Part 46

William Stewart escaped, and we hear no more of him. The Privy Council, horror-struck at the outrage, had two meetings on the same day to consider what should be done. At the first, before noon, they ordered that the Earl of Morton, James commendator of Melrose, Sir George and Sir Archibald Douglas, his uncles, ---- Douglas now of Torthorald, William Douglas, apparent of Drumlanrig, Archibald Douglas of Tofts, and Sir James Dundas of Arniston--all friends of the deceased, and presumably eager to revenge his slaughter--should be confined to their lodgings. Lord Ochiltree, on whom the Douglases might be apt to vent their fury, was likewise commanded to keep within doors. At the second meeting, after noon, they gave an order for the apprehension of the culprit.

There is a remarkable connection of murders recalled by this shocking transaction. Not only do we ascend to Torthorald’s slaughter of Stewart in 1596, and Stewart’s deadly prosecution of Morton to the scaffold in 1581; but William Stewart was the son of the Sir William Stewart who was slain by the Earl of Bothwell in Blackfriars’ Wynd in 1588. This, however, is the last open murder of one gentleman by another which we have to record as taking place on a street in Edinburgh.

Lord Torthorald lies buried under a carved slab in Holyrood Chapel, where the guide reads his name daily to hundreds of visitors, few of whom know what a series of tragic circumstances in old Scottish history lies concentered in the body of him who sleeps below.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: 1608.]

[Sidenote: JULY.]

The progress of persecution against the Catholics may be traced all through this period by the equal progress of the king’s measures for introducing the episcopal system into the church. A General Assembly, which met at Linlithgow in December 1606, was brought by court influence to give a consent to the principle of permanent moderators for presbyteries--a necessary step to the assumption of entire power over dioceses by the bishops. They sent the act to court, with a petition for fresh securities against the Catholic nobles of the north, and their ladies. James affected to listen to their desires, and promised well, but does not seem to have taken any decisive steps till he found that the act for constant moderators, as interpreted by him, met considerable resistance. He then called another General Assembly, mainly for the purpose of taking ‘strait order’ with the adherents of the proscribed faith.

This reverend body professed to consider the country as in unexampled danger from popery. It is found complaining that Jesuit and seminary priests were allowed to traffic within the land, that papistical books were brought from abroad, and that persons in authority often shewed favour to traffickers and excommunicated papists, ‘such as the abbot of New Abbey and other mass priests, demitted, as is thought, out of ward, not without reward [bribery], and without all warrant of his majesty, and presently tolerated in this country without pursuit.’ Amongst some objects petitioned for from the king, were--that papists of rank be imprisoned, and only Protestants have access to them; that orders be given for down-casting of the Laird of Gight’s chapel, and the house of John Cheyne in Kissilmonth, who receipted all Jesuits and seminary priests; and that order be taken with the pilgrimages--namely, to the Chapel called Ordiquhill, and the Chapel of Grace, and to a well in the bounds of Enzie upon the south side of Spey.

[Sidenote: 1608.]

The most important of their actual measures bore reference to the Marquis of Huntly, and the Earls of Angus and Errol, who were considered as the prime supports of popery in the northern section of the kingdom. Huntly we have seen (June 1597) received formally and publicly into the Presbyterian Church, with all appearances of sincerity on his part, while the truth was that he only gave a lip-obedience in order to save his estates and place in the country, of which otherwise he would have been deprived. The hollowness of his professions was soon after sufficiently apparent, for he built a popish chapel in his house, and he continued, as before, to ‘reset’ priests. The Presbyterian tutors imposed on his family may be presumed to have made little progress in their work, as his children all grew up Catholics. Processes had been raised against him in the church-courts for ‘relapse in popery;’ and though the king had tried to screen him from the vengeance he had incurred, it was ineffectual. It was now necessary for James, if he would make way with his episcopal innovations, that he should give proof of sincerity in Protestantism, by leaving his old friend and councillor to the mercy of the General Assembly.

Accordingly, the business being ripe for instantly proceeding, the moderator--being the same Bishop Law who had promised such a sore ‘handling’ of the Catholics to James Melville and his friends in London (see under November 7, 1606)--pronounced the sentence of excommunication ‘after a very solemn manner;’ while the Earl of Dunbar, the king’s commissioner, promised that, ‘forty days being expired from the pronouncing of the sentence, the civil sword should strike without mercy or favour to him or his; and although some of his friends should come and buy his escheat, it should be refused.’--_Cal._ Arrangements were made for taking the same measures with Errol and Angus, Dunbar promising the like severity with them.

While the Assembly continued sitting, a gentleman came on behalf of the Marquis of Huntly, pleading for a little extension of time ‘till he had perfyter resolution,’ shewing that he was not _opiniâtre_, as had appeared from his ‘yielding to have conference,’ and from his ‘going to the kirk;’ he entreated to be heard for himself before final condemnation. But the petition was set aside as frivolous, and because he had failed to fulfil his promise given by solemn bond a month ago to communicate before a certain day.--_Cal._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: AUG. 29.]

The plague broke out in Perth, and continued till the ensuing May, ‘wherein deit young and auld five hundred persons.’--_Chron. Perth._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: SEP. 1.]

[Sidenote: 1608.]

It was reported to the Privy Council that a quarrel had arisen between John Napier of Merchiston, and the sons and daughters of the late Sir Archibald Napier of Edinbellie, regarding the right to the teind sheaves of the lands of Merchiston for the crop of the present year. ‘Baith the said parties,’ says the record, ‘_intends to convocate their kin, and sic as will do for them in arms_, for leading [home-bringing], and withstanding of leading, of the said teinds; whereupon further inconvenients are like to fall out.’ To prevent breach of the peace, William Napier of Wrightshouses, a neutral person, was ordered to collect the teind sheaves of Merchiston, and account to the Council.--_P. C. R._ ‘Whilk order,’ says John Napier, ‘is guid eneuch for me, and little to their contentment;’ that is, to the contentment of his Edinbellie relatives.[330]

This, it must be owned, is a new light in which to view the inventor of the logarithms. It is, however, worthy of observation, that a dispute between other parties on the same grounds is described in precisely similar terms, and the same arrangement made to preserve the peace.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: SEP.]

‘In the beginning of September, the Duke of Wirtemberg, a prince in Germany, a young man of comely behaviour, accompanied with twenty-four in train, came to see the country. He was convoyed from place to place by noblemen, by the king’s direction, and weel enterteened. His train were all clothed in black.’--_Cal._

The duke was a great friend and ally of the king, who, soon after his accession, sent Lord Spencer with a splendid ambassage to Stuttgart, to invest his serene highness with the Order of the Garter.

* * * * *

The records of Privy Council are still full of instances of assaults made by men of rank and others with deadly weapons upon persons against whom they bore hatred. It would be wearisome to enumerate even those which occur throughout a single year. It is to be remembered there were famous acts of parliament against going armed defensively or offensively; yet in every case we find the guilty parties set about their vengeful proceedings in steel bonnets, gauntlets, and plait-sleeves, and with swords and pistolets.

[Sidenote: 1608.]

As an example--one Gavin Thomson, burgess of Peebles, was held at hatred by Charles Pringle, another burgess; we do not learn for what cause. One day in September 1608, as Gavin was walking in sober and quiet manner along the High Street of the burgh, Charles Pringle, accompanied by nine or ten persons, all armed with lances and whingers, set upon and ‘cruelly hurt and wounded the said Gavin upon the left hand, drave him perforce back, and housit him within the dwelling-place and lock-fast yetts of Isobel Anderson; and were it not by the providence of God, that the Person and Minister of Peebles, accompanied with some others weel-affected persons to the peace of the said town, and knawing the said Gavin his innocency, come forth to the redding,[331] they had not failit, as they had begun, with great jeists, trees, and fore-hammers, to have surprised and strucken up the yetts and doors of the said dwelling-house, and within the same to have unmercifully slain and murdered the said Gavin.’

For several subsequent months, Pringle and his associates had lain in wait at divers times to kill Gavin, so that he had been prevented from attending kirk or market, or going about the business of his farm. At length, on the 2d of December, as he was walking peaceably on the street, they attacked him again, armed as before. ‘Being informit that he had come furth of his house, they first bostit and menaced him aff the hie street, and he retiring himself hame again in quietness, they all followit and pursewit him with drawn swords,’ when one of the party, Alexander Dalmahoy, ‘by his sword, with ane great stane of aucht pund wecht in his hand, hurt the said Gavin his thie-bone.’ The assailants ‘hurt and woundit William Murray of Romanno and divers other gentlemen redders, and in end fiercely pursewit Gavin and housit him within the dwelling-house of the close yetts of William Elliot, and cryit for jeists and fore-hammers, and had not failit to have strucken up the doors and yetts thereof, and to have slain the said Gavin within the same, were not timous relief come at hand.’ The active parties in this wickedness were denounced rebels by the Council.--_P. C. R._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: OCT.]

William Turnbull of Airdrie lived in Edinburgh, having in his family a daughter, Elizabeth, eleven years of age. He admitted to his house, and often civilly entertained Robert Napier son of William of Wrightshouses--a gentleman who has just been under our notice. On the 4th of October, Turnbull complained to the Privy Council that, on the 29th of September, Robert Napier had by craft and violence taken away his daughter, under cloud of night, and now keeps her in some obscure place, refusing to render and deliver her up to her father. The Council caused Robert Napier to be denounced as a rebel for this fact.

[Sidenote: 1608.]

The abduction of women, of which some examples were formerly given, was still an offence of frequent occurrence. On the subsequent 8th of December, there is a complaint before the Council from Margaret Stewart, widow, that as she was walking home from her booth to her dwelling-house in Edinburgh, between seven and eight o’clock in the evening of the 5th of the same month, accompanied by her orphan grandchild, Katherine Weir, fourteen years of age, a young citizen, named William Geddes, had beset her with six men armed like himself with swords, gauntlets, steel bonnets, and plait-sleeves, and violently took the child from her, ‘without pity of her manifold exclamations and crying.’ Geddes was likewise denounced rebel.

* * * * *

[Sidenote: NOV. 8.]

‘There was an earthquake at nine hours at night, sensible enough at St Andrews, Cupar, Edinburgh, Glasgow, Dundee, but more sensible at Dumbarton; for there the people were so affrayed, that they ran to the kirk, together with their minister, to cry to God, for they looked presently for destruction. It was thought the extraordinar drouth in the summer and winter before was the cause of it.’--_Cal._

At Perth, this earthquake shook the east end of the Tolbooth, insomuch that ‘many stones fell aff it.’--_Chron. Perth._

At Aberdeen, where the shock excited great alarm, the kirk-session met, and accepting the earthquake as ‘a document that God is angry against the land, and against this city in particular, for the manifold sins of the people,’ appointed a solemn fast to be held on the ensuing day, and ‘the covenant to be renewed by the haill people with God, by halding up of their hands publicly before God in his sanctuary, and promising by his grace to forbear in time coming from their sins.’ There was one particular sin which was thought to have had a great concern in bringing about the earthquake--namely, the salmon-fishing practised on the Dee on Sunday. Accordingly, the proprietors of the salmon-fishings were called before the session, and rebuked. ‘Some,’ says the session record, ‘promist absolutely to forbear, both by himselfs and their servands in time coming; other promised to forbear, upon the condition subscryvant; and some plainly refusit anyway to forbear.’[332]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: DEC. 1.]

[Sidenote: 1608.]

‘The Earl of Mar declared to the [Privy] Council that some women were ta’en in Broughton, as witches, and being put to ane assize, and convict, albeit they persevered constant in their denial to the end, yet they were burnt quick [alive], after sic ane cruel manner, that some of them deit in despair, renuncand and blasphemand, and others, half burnt, brak out of the fire, and was cast in quick in it again, while [till] they were burnt to the deid.’[333]

* * * * *

[Sidenote: 1609.

JAN. 5.]

‘... the wind did blow so boisterously, that the like was not heard in the memory of man. Houses in burgh and land were thrown down with the violence of it; trees rooted up, corn-stacks and hay-stacks blown away. Some men passing over bridges were driven over violently and killed. The wind continued vehement many days and weeks, even till mid-March, howbeit not in the same measure that it blowed this day.’--_Cal._

* * * * *

The book entitled _Regiam Majestatem_, containing the ancient laws of Scotland, seems to have been printed by a contribution from the burghs. In April this year, we find the magistrates of Glasgow charged to make payment of £100 on this account. In September, the learned author, Sir John Skene, had some difficulty with his printer, Thomas Finlayson, of importance enough to come under the attention of the Privy Council. It was alleged that Thomas, after _perfyting_ the Scottish volume, ‘upon some frivole consait and apprehension of his own, without ony warrant of law or pretence of reason,’ maliciously refused to deliver the volume to Sir John, ‘but shifts and delays him fra time to time with foolish and impertinent excuses, to Sir John’s heavy hurt and prejudice.’ The Lords of Council ordered Thomas to deliver the book to its author within eight days, on pain of being denounced rebel; and ‘whereas there is some little difference and question betwixt the said parties _anent their comptis_,’ a committee was appointed ‘to sort the same, and put them to ane rest.’--_P. C. R._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: MAY.]

[Sidenote: 1609.]

The severities called for by the General Assembly against the papist nobles and others, had been, to appearance, backed up by the royal power. The Marquis of Huntly was actually in prison at Stirling as an excommunicated rebel. The king probably felt this a high price for the soothing of Presbyterian scruples regarding episcopacy; but it had so far been paid. He contemplated having the observance of Christmas brought in at the end of the year; and it was therefore advisable to shew a little further earnestness in the right direction.

By the activity of Spottiswoode, archbishop of Glasgow, John Hamilton, a zealous trafficking priest, was apprehended--an act the more important that this culprit was uncle to the king’s advocate. Another priest, named Paterson, was taken with all his vestments, while celebrating mass in a house in the Canongate in Edinburgh before an audience of thirty persons. These must, of course, have been gratifying proofs of the royal zeal, albeit Calderwood cannot repress a bitter remark as to the ‘tolerable entertainment’ allowed to the prisoners (the allowance made in another case for an incarcerated priest, and probably in these also, was a merk--1s. 1-1/3d. sterling--_per diem_), while ministers incarcerated for opposition to the king’s episcopal innovations ‘were left to their shifts.’

About the same time, the archbishop went with a party to the town of New Abbey, in the stewartry of Kirkcudbright, and there broke into the house of Mr Gilbert Brown, former abbot of New Abbey, ‘and having found a great number of popish books, copes, chalices, pictures, images, and such other popish trash, he most worthily and dutifully as became both a prelate and a councillor, on a mercat-day, at a great confluence of people in the hie street of the burgh of Dumfries, did burn all those copes, vestments, and chalices,’ delivering up the books to Maxwell of Kirkconnel, to be afterwards dealt with. The Privy Council (June 13, 1609) allowed this to be good service on the part of the archbishop, and granted him a gift of the books left unburnt.--_P. C. R._

In the parliament held a few days after the last date, several acts were passed against popery--one ordaining that pedagogues sent abroad with the sons of noblemen and others, should be duly licensed by a bishop; another that the young persons so sent abroad should remain at places where ‘the religion’ is professed, and ‘where there is no cruel inquisition;’ a third for confiscating the property of papists to the king’s use; a fourth was meant to deprive Catholics of all benefit from the legal system of the country. The more severe class of Presbyterians looked on, with no inclination to object to these measures, but only with a disbelief in the sincerity of the government which had brought them forward. They had begun to see that it was ‘to grace the bishops, and procure them greater credit and authority in the country,’ that popery was thus dealt with.--_Cal._

* * * * *

[Sidenote: JULY.]

[Sidenote: 1609.]

We have seen that, so lately as September 1606, the Borders were reduced to obedience by a moral medicine of considerable sharpness, administered by the Earl of Dunbar; that is to say, one hundred and forty thieves had been hanged. We now find that the effect was only temporary, for it had become necessary for the earl to go once more to Dumfries to hold a justice-court. On this occasion, he was equally severe with such offenders as were in custody, causing many to be hanged.--_Cal._ The Chancellor Dunfermline wrote to the king that Lord Dunbar ‘has had special care to repress, baith in the in-country and on the Borders, the insolence of all the proud bangsters, oppressors, and nembroths [Nimrods], but [without] regard or respect to ony of them; has purgit the Borders of all the chiefest malefactors, robbers, and brigands as were wont to reign and triumph there, as clean, and by as great wisdom and policy, as Hercules sometime is written to have purged Augeas, the king of Elide, his escuries; and by the cutting aff ... the Laird of Tynwald, Maxwell, sundry Douglases, Johnstons, Jardines, Armstrangs, Beatisons, and sic others, _magni nominis luces_, in that broken parts, has rendered all those ways and passages betwixt your majesty’s kingdoms of Scotland and England, as free and peaceable, as Phœbus in auld times made free and open the ways to his awn oracle in Delphos, and to his Pythic plays and ceremonies, by the destruction of Phorbas and his Phlegians, all thieves, voleurs, bandsters, and throat-cutters. These parts are now, I can assure your majesty, as lawful, as peaceable, and as quiet, as any part in any civil kingdom of Christianity.’[334]

[Sidenote: 1609.]

This was too happy a consummation to be quite realised. We find, not long after, a representation going up to the king from the well-disposed people of the Borders, shewing that matters were become as bad as ever. It is a curious document, full of Latin quotations. The thieves, it says, are like the beasts of the field, according to the words of Cicero in his oration for Cluentius; _quæ, fame dominante, ad eum locum ubi aliquando pastæ sunt, revertuntur_. Lord Dunbar being now gone with his justice-courts, they are returned to their old evil courses, and there is nothing which they will not attempt. ‘Wild incests, adulteries, convocations of lieges, shooting and wearing of hagbuts, pistolets, and lances, daily bloodsheds, oppression, and disobedience in civil matters, neither are nor has been punished ... there is no more account made of going to the horn, than to the ale-house.’ Lord Scone and his guard are of no use, for they favour their friends. ‘If diligent search were made ... there would be found ane grit number of idle people, without any calling, industry, or lawful means to live by, except it be upon the blood of the poorest and most obedient sort.’

* * * * *

The final attempt to plant the Lewis took place this year, under the care of only two adventurers, Sir George Hay (subsequently chancellor of Scotland) and Sir James Spens of Wormiston. The Lord of Kintail had in the interval made an unsuccessful attempt to obtain a grant of the island.

The two undertakers went to the island with a force which they considered sufficient to meet the opposition of the pertinacious Niel Macleod. ‘The Lord of Kintail did privately and underhand assist Niel Macleod, and sent his brother, Rorie Mackenzie, openly with some men to aid the undertakers by virtue of the king’s commission. He promised great friendship to the adventurers, and sent unto them a supply of victuals in a ship from Ross. In the meantime he sendeth quietly to Niel Macleod, desiring him to take the ship by the way, that the adventurers, trusting to these victuals, and being disappointed, might thereby be constrained to abandon the island, which fell out accordingly; for Sir George Hay and Sir James Spens failing to apprehend Niel, and lacking victuals for their army, they wearied of the bargain, and dismissed all the neighbouring forces. Sir George Hay and Wormiston retired into Fife, leaving some of their men in the island to keep the fort, until they should send unto them supply of men and victuals. Whereupon Niel Macleod, assisted by his nephew ... and some other of the Lewis men, invaded the undertakers’ camp, burnt the fort, apprehended the men which were left behind them in the island, and sent them home safely into Fife, since which time they never returned again into the island.’--_G. H. S._

[Sidenote: 1609.]