Part 47
The Lord of Kintail afterwards obtained possession of the isle of Lewis, and Niel, thoroughly circumvented by the Clan Kenzie, was driven for refuge with a small company to a fortified rock called Berissay. ‘The Clan Kenzie then gathered together the wives and children of those that were in Berissay, and such as, by way of affinity or consanguinity, within the island, did appertein to Niel and his followers, and placed them all upon a rock within the sea, where they might be heard and seen from Berissay. They vowed and protested that they would suffer the sea to overwhelm them the next flood, if Niel did not presently surrender the fort; which pitiful spectacle did so move Niel Macleod and his company to compassion, that immediately they yielded the rock and left the Lewis; whereupon the women and children were rescued and rendered.’--_G. H. S._
This unfortunate insular chief, falling into the hands of his enemies, was taken to Edinburgh, and there executed in April 1613.
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[Sidenote: AUG.]
There was a Presbyterian prejudice against burying in churches, and the _blame of kirk-burial_ had not only been a subject for the pamphleteer, but the legislature. Nevertheless, John Schaw of Sornbeg in Ayrshire, on the death of his wife, resolved to inhume her corpse in his parish kirk of Galston, in spite of all the minister and session could say or do to the contrary. Accompanied by his brother and his ‘bailie,’ and attended by a numerous party, ‘all bodin in feir of weir,’ he came to the church, broke up the door with fore-hammers, and dug a grave, in which he deposited his spouse. He was afterwards glad to make public repentance for this fact, and pay twenty pounds to the box-master of the kirk, besides which the Privy Council ordained him to appear again as a penitent, and solemnly promise never again to attempt to bury any corpse within the church.’--_P. C. R._
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[Sidenote: AUG. 10.]
Notwithstanding Lord Ochiltree’s protestations of innocence regarding the assassination of Lord Torthorald, the relatives of the latter continued to bear a deadly grudge at him, and seemed likely to wreak it out in some wild manner. This came to the knowledge of the king, who felt himself called upon to interfere. The Privy Council, in obedience to the royal letters, had the parties summoned before them. William Lord Douglas and James Lord Torthorald appeared before them that day, and undertook, before the 20th of September, that ‘they sall owther pursue the said Lord Ochiltree criminally before his majesty’s justice in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, for airt, part, rede, and counsel, of the slaughter of umwhile Lord Torthorald, or then that they sould reconceil themselves with the said Lord Ochiltree, and be agreit with him.’--_P. C. R._
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[Sidenote: 1609.]
[Sidenote: OCT. 26.]
Under favour of the king, a number of strangers had been introduced into the country to practise the making of cloths of various kinds. A colony of them was settled in the Canongate, Edinburgh, headed by one John Sutherland and a Fleming named Joan Van Headen, and ‘are daily exercised in their art of making, dressing, and litting of stuffis, and gives great licht and knowledge of their calling to the country people.’ These industrious and inoffensive men, notwithstanding the letters of the king, investing them with various privileges, were now much molested by the magistrates of the Canongate, with a view to forcing them to become burgesses and freemen there in the regular way. On an appeal to the Privy Council, their exemption was affirmed.
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[Sidenote: NOV. 7.]
From London, where the pest had long been, a ship had lately come to Leith, and was now lying at the west side of the bulwark there, prepared to discharge her cargo. The case looked the more alarming, as several of the mariners had died of plague during the voyage. The Lords of Council immediately issued orders that the vessel should be taken to Inchkeith, where her cargo should be taken out and handled, cleansed, and dressed, the inhabitants affording all facilities for that purpose, ‘with such houses and other necessaries as are in the said inch.’--_P. C. R._
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[Sidenote: NOV. 9.]
The time was approaching when, in accordance with a recent act, the Egyptians were to depart from Scotland, under pain of being liable thereafter to be killed by any one without challenge of law. In anticipation of this dread time, one of the nation, named Moses Faw, appeared before the authorities of the kingdom, and pleaded for permission to remain under protection of the laws, on the ground that he had wholly withdrawn himself and his family from that infamous society, and was willing to give surety for his future good behaviour. The desired permission was extended to him on that condition.--_P. C. R._
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[Sidenote: DEC. 25.]
Having of late shewn some zeal against popery, King James thought he might now effect one little change essential to episcopacy, without more than enough of outcry from the earnest Presbyterians. By his order, sent by Chancellor Seton, it was arranged that Christmas-day should henceforth be solemnly held in Scotland. The Court of Session accordingly rose for that day, and till the 8th of January ensuing. ‘This,’ says Calderwood, ‘was the first Christmass vacance of the session keepit since the Reformation. The ministers threatened that the men who devised that novelty for their own advancement, might receive at God’s hand their reward to their overthrow, for troubling the people of God with beggarly ceremonies long since abolished with popery. Christmass was not so weel keepit by feasting and abstinence from work in Edinburgh these thretty years before, _an evil example to the rest of the country_.’
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[Sidenote: 1610.
JAN.]
‘About the end of Januar, the Scotch Secretar, Sir Alexander Hay, came from court with sundry directions, and among the rest, for the habit of the senators of the College of Justice [which the Chancellor had told the king was now, since the departure of the court to England, ‘the _special spunk of light and fondament of your majesty’s estate, and only ornament of this land_‘],[335] advocates, clerks, and scribes; which was proclaimed in the beginning of Februar--viz., that the senators should wear a purple robe or gown in judgment and in the streets, when they were to meet or were dissolved; that advocates, clerks, and scribes should wear black gowns in the judgment-hall and in the streets ... the provost and bailies of burghs and their councillors should wear black when they sat in council and judgment; that ministers should wear black clothes, and in the pulpit black gowns; that bishops and doctors of divinity should wear black cassikins syde to [long enough to reach] their knee, black gowns above, and a black crape about their neck.... On the 15th of Februar, the Lords of the Session and the bishops put on their gowns and came down from the chancellor’s lodging, with their robes, to the Tolbooth [the court-house--a section of St Giles’s Church]. All the robes, except the chancellor’s, were of London cloth, purple coloured, with the fashion of an heckled cloak from the shoulders to the middle, with a long syde hood on the back, the gown and hood lined with red sattin. The people flocked together to behold them. The bishops were ordeened to have their gowns with lumbard sleeves, according to the form of England, with tippets and crapes about their craigs [necks]; which was performed.’--_Cal._
On the 20th of June, the lord provost of Edinburgh exhibited in his council ‘twa gowns, the ane red, the other black claith linit in the breists with sable furring, sent to his lordship by the king’s majesty for to be worn by him, and to be patterns of the gowns to be worn by the provost and bailies, and sic of the council and town as are appointed thereto by his majesty.’[336]
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[Sidenote: FEB. 27.]
[Sidenote: 1610.]
Alexander Kirkpatrick, younger of Closeburn, being in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh for the slaughter of James Carmichael, son to John Carmichael of Spothe, the Lady Amisfield, wife of a neighbour, came to the prison, and entered into conference with the keeper in his private apartments. At her persuasion, the man allowed ‘Young Closeburn’ to come to speak with her; and she then executed her design of exchanging clothes with him, and so allowing him to escape. The lady was warded in the Castle; but what ultimately became of her does not appear.--_Pit._
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[Sidenote: JUNE.]
A General Assembly was held at Glasgow, so constituted and managed by royal authority that the king at length accomplished one grand portion of his ecclesiastical scheme for Scotland, in being acknowledged as the head of the kirk. Three English divines, chaplains to the king, Dr Christopher Hampton, Dr Phineas Hodson, and Dr George Meriton, were present to use their influence in reconciling the country to ‘a more comely and peaceable government in our kirk than was presently.’ But for the absence of the six banished ministers, and the confinement of zealous, fiery, fearless Andrew Melville in the Tower, it might not have been possible to carry this measure. The Presbyterian historians also insinuate that bribes were used with the members, whence they take leave to call it _the Golden Assembly_.
‘Immediately after this, the Bishops of Glasgow and Brechin took journey to court, to report what was done, and got great thanks frae the king. Galloway followed, who all three abode there till the month of November, at what time ... by a special commission from the king to the Bishop of London to that effect, the Archbishop of Glasgow and the other two were solemnly ordained, inaugurat, and consecrated, with anointing of oil and other ceremonies, according to the English fashion.’ [The ceremony, which took place in the chapel at London House, was celebrated by a banquet, at which ‘gifts were bestowed, and gloves were distributed, in token of the solemnisation of the marriage between the bishops and their kirks.’--_Cal._] The three new prelates, ‘thereafter [January 23, 1611] returning to Scotland, did to the Archbishop of St Andrews, in St Andrews, as they were done withal at Lambeth, as near as they could possibly imitate; and thereafter the two archbishops consecrated the rest, and the new entrant bishops as they were nominat by the king ... first quietly, as being ashamed of the foolish guises in it, but afterward more and more solemnly, as their estate grew.’--_Row._ ‘All of them [the whole thirteen] deserted their flocks, and usurped thereafter jurisdiction over the ministers and people of their dioceses.’--_Cal._
[Sidenote: 1610.]
At the same time the king established in Scotland a court of High Commission, by which the new hierarchy acquired great power over the people.
‘The king was so earnest upon the creating of bishops, that he cared not what it cost him.... In buying in their benefices out of the hands of the noblemen that had them, in buying votes at Assemblies, in defraying of all their other charges, and promoving of all their adoes and business, as coming to, and going from, and living at court prelate-like; that is, sumptuously and gorgeously in apparel, house, diet, attendants, etc., [he] did employ (by the confession of such as were best acquainted with, and were actors in, these businesses) above the sum of £300,000 sterling money, one huge thing indeed; but sin lying heavy on the throne, crying aloud for wrath on him and his posterity, is infinitely sadder nor £300,000 sterling!‘--_Row._
The Marquis of Huntly, and other papists of rank, had meanwhile been suffering considerably in order to dispose the Presbyterian opposition to yield to the king’s wishes. But now there was no longer any immediate occasion for severity. The marquis, professing to be once more thoroughly Protestant, was relieved from excommunication, and allowed to return to his palace in the north. With Errol there was greater difficulty. The king, through the Earl of Dunbar, had promised that he should lose his lands. He had, what Huntly happily wanted, a painfully tender conscience. One day, he was brought to promise that he would subscribe; but that very night he fell into such a trouble of mind as to have been on the point of killing himself. ‘Early next morning, the Archbishop of Glasgow being called, he confessed his dissimulation with many tears, and, beseeching them that were present to bear witness of his remorse, was hardly brought to any settling all that day.’ By some treacherous excuse, lenity was extended to Errol also. Such was the way in which the king performed his engagements on this solemn subject. ‘The turn being done,’ says Calderwood, ‘promises were not keepit.’
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[Sidenote: JULY 3.]
An act was passed by the Privy Council in favour of Anthony Aurego, Anthony Soubouga, and Fabiano Fantone, allowing them to live in the country, and practise their ‘trade and industry of making hecks and other machines for taking of rottons and mice.’--_P. C. R._
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[Sidenote: JULY 27.]
[Sidenote: 1610.]
Piracy was at this time a flourishing trade, and the Scottish and Irish seas were a favourite walk of its practitioners. Vessels of various countries besides Scotland, were pursued by these marauders and mercilessly plundered, their crews seized, tortured, and sometimes slaughtered, or else set ashore on desolate coasts, that they might not be readily able to take measures of redress. The Long Island, on the west coast of Ireland, appears to have served as a regular station for pirate ships; they also haunted much the Western Isles of Scotland. In 1609, a piratical crew, headed by two captains named Perkins and Randell, started from the Long Island in a vessel of 200 tons, named the _Iron Prize_, attended by a nimble pinnace of about half that burden; and for some months they roamed about the northern seas, picking up whatever small-craft came in their way. They even had the audacity to shew themselves at the mouth of the Firth of Forth. The attention of the Privy Council being called to their proceedings, three vessels were fitted out in a warlike manner at Leith, and sent in quest of the pirates. Perkins and Randell had meanwhile come to Orkney to refit. They ‘landed at the castle, and came to the town thereof,’ where they ‘behaved themselves maist barbarously, being ever drunk, and fechting amang themselves, and giving over themselves to all manner of vice and villany.’ Three of them attacked a small vessel belonging to the Earl of Orkney, lying on the shore, and were taken prisoners in the attempt by the earl’s brother, James Stewart. A day or two after this event, the three government ships made their appearance, and immediately a great part of the piratical company made off in the pinnace. A pursuit proving vain, the government ships returned and attacked the _Iron Prize_; and after a desperate conflict, in which they had two men killed and sundry wounded, they succeeded in capturing the whole remaining crew, amounting to nearly thirty men, who, with those previously taken, were brought to Leith and tried (July 26). Being found guilty, twenty-seven of these wretched men, including the two captains, were hung upon a gibbet next day at the pier of Leith. Three were reserved in the hope of their giving useful information.
[Sidenote: 1610.
AUG. 12.]
The Chancellor Dunfermline, who took the lead in this severe administration of the law, tells the king in a letter written on the day of the execution: ‘This company of pirates did enterteen one whom they did call their Person [parson] for saying of prayers to them twice a day, who belike either wearied of his cure, or foreseeing the destruction of his flock, had forsaken them in Orkney, and, privily convoying himself over land, was at length deprehendit in the burgh of Dundee.’ As he confessed and gave evidence against the rest, besides bringing some of them to confession, he was reserved for the king’s pleasure, and probably let off.--_Pit._ _C. K. Sc._
There was at this time ‘a great visitation of the young children [of Aberdeen] with the plague of the pocks.’ There were also ‘continual weets,’ which threatened to destroy the crops and cause a famine. The cause being ‘the sins of the land,’ a public fast and humiliation was ordered in Aberdeen, ‘that God may be met with tears and repentance.’--_A. K. S. R._
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[Sidenote: OCT. 21.]
‘The Archbishop of St Andrews [Gladstanes], reposing in his bed in time of the afternoon sermon, the Sabbath after his diocesan synod in St Andrews, was wakened, and all the kirk and town with him, with a cry of blood and murder. For his sister son [Walter Anderson], master of his household, with a throw of his dagger, killed his cook [Robert Green], while as he was busy in dressing the lord-bishop’s supper. The dagger light[ed] just under the left pap of the cook, who fell down dead immediately.’--_Cal._
The young man was committed to prison; but, ‘the poor man’s friends being satisfied with a piece of money, none being to pursue the murder, he was by moyen [influence] cleansed by a white assize (as they call it) and let go free.’--_Row._ This trial took place before the regality court of St Andrews. On the ensuing 17th January, letters were raised by the king’s advocate against the assize, but with what result does not appear.--_P. C. R._
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[Sidenote: NOV. 1.]
‘... before the going to of the sun, there were seen by twelve or thretteen husbandmen, great companies of men in three battles, joining together and fighting the space of an hour, on certain lands perteening to my Lord Livingston and the Laird of Carse. The honest men were examined in the presence of divers noblemen, barons, and gentlemen, and affirmed constantly that they saw such appearance.’--_Cal._
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[Sidenote: DEC. 23.]
[Sidenote: 1610.
DEC. 24.]
We have now the first hint at public conveyances in Scotland in a letter of the king, encouraging Henry Anderson of Trailsund to bring a number of coaches and wagons with horses into Scotland, and licensing him and his heirs for fifteen years ‘to have and use coaches and wagons, ane or mae, as he shall think expedient, for transporting of his hieness lieges betwixt the burgh of Edinburgh and town of Leith ... providing that he be ready at all times for serving of his majesty’s lieges, and that he tak not aboon the sum of twa shillings Scots money for transporting of every person betwixt the said twa towns at ony time.’
A patent was granted for the establishment of a glass-manufacture in Scotland. The business was commenced at Wemyss, in Fife, and, about ten years after, we find it, to all appearance, going on prosperously. ‘Braid glass’--that is, glass for windows--was made, measuring three quarters of a Scots ell and a nail in length, while the breadth at the head was an ell wanting half a nail, and at the bottom half an ell wanting half a nail. It was declared to be equal in quality to Danskine glass. The glasses for drinking and other uses not being of such excellence, it was arranged that some specimens of English glass should be bought in London and established in Edinburgh Castle, to serve as patterns for the Scotch glass in point of quality. For the encouragement of the native manufacture, and to keep money within the country, the importation of foreign glass was (March 6, 1621) prohibited.--_P. C. R._
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[Sidenote: 1611.
MAR.]
The Veitches and Tweedies of the upper part of Peeblesshire had long been at issue,[337] and peace was only kept between them by means of mutual assurances given to the Privy Council. The king heard of the case, and was the more concerned about it, because he believed he had, by his personal exertions, so entirely suppressed what he called _the auld and detestable monster of deidly feid_ in Scotland, that ‘we do hardly think there be any one feid except this in all that kingdom unreconciled.’ As to these belligerent men of the Tweed, ‘the wrongs and mischiefs done by either of, as we understand, to others’ [each other], is ‘in such a proportion of compensation, as neither party can either boast of advantage, or otherwise think himself too much behind.’ He now ordered his Scottish Council, ‘that you call before you the principals of either surname, and then take such course for removing of the feid, and reconceiling, as you have been accustomed to do in the like cases’--that is, force them into bonds of amity, if they would not go of their own accord.--_P. C. R._
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[Sidenote: MAY 10.]
[Sidenote: 1611.]
It was found necessary to put some restraint upon the number of poor Scotch people who repaired to the English court in hope of bettering their circumstances. The evil is spoken of as a ‘frequent and daily resort of great numbers of idle persons, men and women, of base sort and condition, and without ony certain trade, calling, or dependence, going from hence to court, by sea and land.’ It was said to be ‘very unpleasant and offensive to the king’s majesty, in so far as he is daily importuned with their suits and begging, and his royal court almost filled with them, they being, in the opinion and conceit of all behalders, bot idle rascals and poor miserable bodies;’ the country, moreover, ‘is heavily disgracit, and mony slanderous imputations given out against the same, as gif there were no persons of guid rank, comeliness, nor credit within the same.’ The Council, therefore, deemed it necessary to cause an order to be proclaimed in all the burghs and seaports, forbidding masters of vessels to carry any people to England without first giving up their names, and declaring their errands and business to the Lords, under heavy penalties.--_P. C. R._
A number of the king’s Scottish courtiers had, as is well known, accompanied or followed him into England, and obtained shares of his good-fortune. Sir George Home, now Earl of Dunbar; Sir John Ramsay, created Earl of Haddington; Sir James Hay, ultimately made Earl of Carlisle; and recently, Mr Robert Ker, who became the king’s especial favourite, and was made Earl of Somerset, are notable examples. The English, regarding the Scottish courtiers with natural jealousy, called them ‘beggarly Scots,’ of which they complained to the king, who is said to have jocosely replied: ‘Content yourselves; I will shortly make the English as beggarly as you, and so end that controversy.’ On one occasion, this jealousy broke out with some violence at a race at Croydon, in consequence of a Scotsman named Ramsay striking the Earl of Montgomery with his riding-switch. ‘The English,’ says the scandal-mongering Osborne, ‘did, upon this accident, draw together, to make it a national quarrel; so far as Mr John Pinchbeck, a maimed man, having but the perfect use of two fingers, rode about with his dagger in his hand, crying: “Let us break our fast with them here, and dine with the rest in London!” But Herbert, not offering to strike again, there was nothing lost but the reputation of a gentleman.’[338] A ballad of the day described the metamorphosis which Scotchmen were understood to have undergone after their migration into England:
[Sidenote: 1611.]
‘Bonny Scot, we all witness can, That England hath made thee a gentleman.