Part 59

This and some other instances of lenity towards Romish clergymen were ill looked on by the zealous Presbyterians, and there arose a _fama_ to the king’s prejudice. On the 30th of October, he wrote from Hitchinbrooke to his Scottish councillors, in great indignation at a report which had gone abroad, in consequence of some late circumstances, to the effect that he intended to ‘_tolerate or grant liberty of conscience_!’ ‘The foolish apprehension thereof’ had ‘given occasion both to papist and puritan to tak heart and grow insolent, the one vainly boasting of the said pretendit liberty, and the other with a seeming fear thereof.’ ‘God knows,’ says the king solemnly, ‘that what proceedit in that course concerning the papists here was without ony such intention.’ It was ‘groundit upon good reasons of state, in the deep and mystery whereof every man is not to dive nor wyde.’ His conscience and his works alike bore witness of his constancy in the right course. So he ‘could not but marvel how ony of our subjects can be possest with _so unjust ane opinion of us_.’ The Council was enjoined immediately to consult with the Archbishop of St Andrews as to the best measures for the ‘curbing of insolent papists and disconform preachers.’ In case any of the former had shewn themselves in consequence of the pretended liberty, they were to be severely punished, as an example and terror to others. The Council, acknowledging his majesty’s ‘most religious and upright disposition towards the suppression of popery,’ communicated accordingly with the archbishop, requesting him to have a care to give his majesty satisfaction.--_P. C. R._

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[Sidenote: OCT.]

George Earl Marischal, a noble of great wealth and influence, who has already been under our notice,[409] was now approaching the end of his earthly pilgrimage. After his death, his countess, who had hastily re-married, was accused of having been concerned, along with the gentleman whom she took for her second husband--Sir Alexander Strachan of Thornton, knight--in stealing forth of his lordship’s house of Benholm a green coffer belonging to him, containing money and other valuables, besides the furniture of the house, and a bag containing evidents of property. James Keith of Benholm was accused of having a share in the same crime.

[Sidenote: 1622.]

The case is worthy of notice, chiefly on account of the list of articles contained in the coffer--evidencing as they do a degree of wealth which few will be prepared to find belonging to a Scottish nobleman of that age. There were--‘of Portugal ducats and other species of foreign gold to the avail of twenty thousand pounds or thereby; thretty-sax dozen of gold buttons; ane rich jewel all set with diamonts, whilk the earl resavit as ane gift given to him the time he was ambassador in Denmark, worth sax thousand merks; the Queen of Denmark’s picture in gold, set about with rich diamonts, estimat to five thousand merks; ane jasp stane for steming of bluid,[410] estimat to five hundred French crowns; ane chenyie of equal pearl, wherein was four hundred pearls great and small; twa chenyies of gold, of twenty-four unce wecht; ane other jewel of diamonts set in gold worth three thousand merks; ane great pair of bracelets, all set with diamonts, price thereof five hundred crowns; the other pair of gold bracelets, at sax hundred pounds the pair; ane turcas ring worth ten French crowns; ane diamont set in ane ring, price twenty-eight French crowns; with ane number of other small rings set with diamonts and other rich stanes in gold, worth three hundred French crowns; mair sixteen thousand merks of silver and gold ready-cunyit, whilk was within the said green coffer; together with the haill tapestry, silver-work, bedding, and other guids, geir, and plenishing, being within the said place.’--_Pit._

The king, in a letter to the Chancellor Hay, dated 22d August 1624, alludes to a recommendation he had formerly sent, that this injury to his esteemed councillor the Earl Marischal should be inquired into, and adds: ‘Whereas we are informed that, in a later letter under our hand, we have shewn to you that it was not our pleasure nor meaning in ony former letters to hurt the said Lady Marischal or ony other person, these are now expressly to mak it known to you, that we nather gave direction to insert any sic clause in our letters, nather, at the putting of our hand to the samen, did tak heed thereto, nor never meant ony sic favour to her who hath so ill deserved of one for whose sake we were only to respect her.’ And then he added a command to proceed with the case against the peccant lady.--_An. Scot._

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[Sidenote: 1623.

JAN.]

‘Lord Colville took journey to France, to crave the re-establishment of the Scots Guard and Company of Scottish Men at Arms, according to their first institution and the French king’s promise often made to that effect.’--_Bal._

[Sidenote: 1623.]

The Scots Guard of the French king was an old institution, and for a long time past the command had passed from generation to generation of the Sieurs D’Aubigné (Earls and Dukes of Lennox). Louis XIII. readily agreed to the proposed revival of the corps, and designed to confer the command on Ludovick, Duke of Richmond and Lennox, the favourite councillor of King James. It chanced, however, that the duke was suddenly cut off by apoplexy (February 1624), ‘beloved and lamented’ beyond all remembered example, ‘because he was naturally inclined to do good without distinction of persons.’--_G. H. S._ The honour was therefore transferred to his nephew, Lord Gordon, son of the Marquis of Huntly.

In July 1625, Lord Gordon made his first muster of the corps on the Links of Leith, in presence of several officers deputed by the French king for that purpose. These gentlemen had been conducted to Edinburgh by Sir Robert Gordon, Tutor of Sutherland; they were there entertained in the handsomest manner by the Lord Gordon and other nobles, ‘and sent home again to their master, the French king, in great satisfaction and content.’ Lord Gordon’s younger brother, Lord Melgum, was his lieutenant, and the first gentleman of the company was Sir William Gordon, son of George Gordon of Kindroch, a branch of the family of Pitlurg.--_G. H. S._

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[Sidenote: JUNE 20.]

‘... the king’s picture in the hall of the palace of Linlithgow fell ... and brake in pieces. The like befell the king of France’s picture, in that same place, six weeks before his death.’--_Cal._

Such incidents were then invariably noted with superstitious awe. Aubrey tells us that on the first day of the sitting of the Long Parliament, the picture of Archbishop Laud fell in his closet, by the breaking of the string.[411]

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[Sidenote: 1623.]

George, Earl of Caithness, was one of the most unruly spirits of his age. The almost uncontrolled power which he possessed in his own remote country, was generally employed by him in advancing base and selfish purposes, and half his life was passed in a state of outlawry. Sometimes he is found at war with the Sutherland family, sometimes with his neighbours the Mackays of Strathnaver. One year, he is proclaimed a rebel; the next, he is found honoured with a royal commission against some other rebel. (See the account of the case of the Earl of Orkney in 1615.) He was overwhelmed with debt, yet did not regard it much. His son, Lord Berriedale, having become responsible for him, lay five years in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, as a prisoner to the earl’s creditors, while Caithness himself passed a pleasant life in his sea-cliff fortalices of Girnigo and Aikergill, in the far north. There must have been something plausible about this singular noble. Notwithstanding all the injuries he had inflicted on the Sutherland family, and the badness of his general character, he contrived, in 1619, to patch up a reconciliation with Sir Robert Gordon, a most respectable man, a friend and servant of the king, and who represented the interests of that great family. He had on that occasion visited Sir Robert in Sutherland, and Sir Robert in his turn spent several days with the earl at Girnigo. The truce, however, was not of long continuance, for the Earl of Caithness’s outrages were incessant. It was felt by the Privy Council as a scandal to the country, that such a hardy rebel against the ordinary authorities of the land should exist, and they looked about for the means of putting him down. The usual expedient of the age was resorted to--namely, to employ some other great man against him--thus accomplishing by a kind of private war what ought to have been the business of a force of their own. Sir Robert was the man they pitched upon.

Behold, then, this courtier of St James’s and Newmarket, leaving those scenes in the south where he was accustomed to meet Bacon and (not many years ago) Shakspeare, and coming down to the land of Mackays, Guns, and Sinclairs, in order to conduct an army against one of those rude grandees who could even trouble a king. He had a strange associate in the enterprise; Lord Berriedale had been liberated from prison, on a paction with the creditors, that he might do what he could to bring his heartless father within the grasp of the law.

[Sidenote: SEP. 3.]

Sir Robert’s forces were the Clan Sutherland and their friends, a selection of the most active and hardy, and all well armed. Assembling in Strathullie, and having been properly arranged and officered, they lost no time in setting forth to cross the Ord. A company of the Clan Gun went before to clear the ground and prevent surprise. Before they had advanced far into Caithness, they learned that the earl, unable to withstand so great a force, had deserted the country, and taken refuge in Orkney, intending to go thence to Norway. At Latheron, James Sinclair of Murkle, Sir William Sinclair of Mey, the Laird of Forss, and some other Caithness magnates, came to yield their obedience and offer their assistance. Sir Robert received them with great civility, but ‘gave small trust to some of them; neither suffered he any of the inhabitants to come in or go out of the army after the setting of the sun until sunrising.’

[Sidenote: 1623.]

Passing Wick, he conducted his troops to Girnigo, a castle so strongly placed on the verge of a lofty cliff overhanging the sea, that there might have been some difficulty in taking it. The keys, however, were at once rendered up, and so the army took quiet possession of the fortress. They went forward, and, in like manner took Aikergill and Keiss, two forts which the earl had abandoned in succession. Meanwhile, Sir Robert had spies throughout all Caithness to report to him about the dispositions of the people. They were said to be quiet, but angry that any of the House of Sutherland should be charged with such a commission against their lord.

Learning that Lady Caithness, who was his cousin-german, had removed to a house a few miles distant, Gordon went to pay his respects to her. She pleaded for her husband, on the ground that he was not attempting any resistance; but Sir Robert left her no hopes of his being speedily pardoned. He proceeded with deliberation to settle Lord Berriedale in possession of the country and its fortresses, and made various other arrangements for its benefit; after which he returned in triumph to Dunrobin, and dismissed his men. ‘Thus you see how the Earl of Caithness, having attained to the top of fortune’s wheel, and to the height of his desires, by his service in Orkney, did by his own misdemeanours, and wicked actions, fall into this extremity, which a man of his life and conversation could not escape. Neither could the Earl of Orkney’s example, which was recent before his eyes, divert him from the course which brought him to this misery. A notable example to posterity.’--_G. H. S._

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[Sidenote: JUNE 14.]

[Sidenote: 1623.]

During the earlier half of this year, Scotland suffered under a famine of extreme severity. There was a vast increase to the usually inordinate number of beggars, in consequence of many of the poorer class of tenants throwing their farms in the hands of their landlords, and wandering forth in search of food. And it is remarked that the condition of these new mendicants was the most miserable of all, ‘because they, being for the most part ashamed to beg, underlies all the extremities wherethrough the pinching of their bellies may affect them; whereas, by the contrair, strong and sturdy beggars, by their importunity and crying, and sometimes by extorting of almous, are in some measure relieved.’ The administrators of the state are found in alarm that, unless something be done to enable the poor to tide over till the new harvest should be realised in September, ‘numbers of them will betake themselves to live by stowth or [ere] they will starve through hunger, whilk will not only produce a foul imputation agains the whole land, but the wrath and anger of God will be wakened.’ At the date noted, therefore, the Privy Council took measures for bringing the principal men together in their respective county towns to arrange for a taxation according to means and substance, in order to procure victual for the poor. A hundred merks for every thousand pounds of substance was the rate recommended.

In July, the famine ‘increased daily, till at last many, both in burgh and land, died of hunger. Many poor came to Edinburgh for succour, of which number some died in the streets.’ A fast was held on account of the calamity; ‘the sermons began every day in the week at seven hours, and ended at nine. Immediately after the fast was ended, that same night, 7th of July, there was such a fire in the heaven, with thunder and fire-flaught, that the hearers and beholders thought verily that the day of judgment was come.’--_Cal._

‘There was this harvest-time ane great mortality ... ten or twelve died ordinarily every day [in Perth] from midsummer to Michaelmas’ [September 29].--_Chron. Perth._

It was probably to this famine that a story told by Wodrow refers. While the poor people were dying in great numbers in the fields, ‘some people passing by saw a young child about seven years old, lying and dying by a dike-side--which could not but move their pity, though they could give it no relief. They observed the child to get up to its feet, and looking up cheerfully towards heaven, clapping its hands, making a tripping and dancing motion with its feet, they heard it cry: “O! Lamb’s days for evermore! O! Lamb’s days for evermore! I see heaven! Lamb’s days for evermore!” And with that it presently fell down and died. I had this from my mother, who had it from her mother, and that it was told as a certain truth.’--_W. A._

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[Sidenote: JULY 10.]

Bessie Smith, of Lesmahago, appeared before the presbytery of Lanark, and confessed sundry dealings with unlawful arts. She had ‘charmed the heart-fevers.’ The patients, kneeling under her direction, asked their health ‘for God’s sake, for Sanct Spirit, for Sanct Aikit, for the nine maidens that died in the boortree in the Ladywell Bank--This charm to be buik and beil to me, God grant that sae be.’ She also ‘appointed them the wayburn leaf, to be eaten nine mornings.’--_R. P. L._

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[Sidenote: JULY 15.]

[Sidenote: 1623.]

While the Egyptians were everywhere a proscribed race, and often the victims of an indiscriminate severity, there was one spot where mercy and even kindness seems to have been extended to them. This was Roslin. Sir William Sinclair of Roslin, Lord Justice-general under Queen Mary, riding home one day from Edinburgh, found a poor Egyptian about to be hanged on the gibbet at the Burgh-moor, and brought him off unharmed. In remembrance of this kindness, ‘the whole body of gipsies were accustomed to gather in the stanks [marshes] of Roslin every year, where they acted several plays during the months of May and June.’ So tells us the quaint Father Hay, a connection of the Roslin family; and he adds: ‘There are two towers which were allowed them for their residence, the one called Robin Hood, the other Little John.’

At the time noted, the Privy Council had their attention called to this Patmos of the outlawed race. They remark that,‘while the laws enjoined all persons in authority to execute to the deid the counterfeit thieves and limmers, the Egyptians,’ it was nevertheless reported that a number of them were now within the bounds of Roslin, ‘where they have a peaceable receipt and abode as if they were lawful subjects, committing stowths and reifs in all parts where they may find the occasion.’ The Council, therefore, issued an order to the sheriff of the district, who happened to be Sinclair younger of Roslin himself, commanding him ‘to pass, search, seek, hunt, follow, and pursue the said vagabond thieves and limmers,’ and bring them to the Tolbooth of Edinburgh for due punishment.--_P. C. R._

An order for the execution of a number of Egyptians was actually issued on the ensuing 27th of January.

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[Sidenote: AUG. 1.]

[Sidenote: 1623.]

One Thomas Grieve was tried in Edinburgh for carrying on a species of medical practice by witchcraft. He was accused of having cured many people of heavy sickness and grievous diseases, by various magical arts; as, for instance, the making of signs and crosses upon them, the washing of their shirts in south-running streams, and the uttering of unknown words. He took sickness off a woman near Leslie, in Fife, and put it upon a cow, ‘whilk thereafter ran wood [mad] and died.’ He cured William Kirk’s bairn in Tullibole, of the _morbus caducus_, ‘by straiking back the hair of his head,’ and wrapping the child in an anointed cloth, by that means putting him asleep. To cure diseased cattle, he sprinkled a byre with enchanted water. He passed various patients through a hasp of yarn three several times, and then threw the hasp into a fire, where it burned _blue_; thus the people were cured. He was alleged to have cured William Cousin’s wife by manifest sorcery, ‘causing her husband heat the coulter of his plough, and cool the same in water brought from Holywell of Hillside, thereafter making certain conjurations, crosses, and signs upon the water,’ which he caused the patient to drink. One of the items in the dittay was, ‘curing James Mudie, his wife and children, of the fever; in curing his wife, by causing ane great fire to be put on, and ane hole to be made in the north side of the house, and ane quick hen to be put furth thereat, at three several times, and ta’en in at the house-door witherships [contrary to the course of the sun]; thereafter taking the hen, and putting it under the sick woman’s oxter or arm, and therefra carrying it to the fire, where it was halden doun and burnt quick therein.’

The assize, having read the depositions of sundry parish ministers, and being ‘ripely advised,’ sentenced Thomas to be strangled at a stake and burnt.--_Pit._

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[Sidenote: NOV. 30.]

‘... about nine hours at night, there appeared like a rainbow in the west, the moon shining clearly in the east, with some rain in the meantime, whereat many wondered.’--_Cal._

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[Sidenote: 1624.

JAN.]

From Martinmas of the preceding year to the end of January in the present, there was a hard continuous frost, which, after a slight thaw, was resumed, and lasted till the 23d of February. During this time, ‘eleven carts, with twenty-one puncheons of wine, came over upon the ice from Dundee here.’--_Chron. Perth._

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‘About the midst of Januar, four gentlemen of good credit, having gone out of Stirling some two miles or thereby, to pass their time, heard sensibly like the shots of many muskets, and after that, taking better heed, like the beating upon drums, and playing upon piffers and the sound of trumpets; and last of all, the shot of great cannons; so that for fear they went back again to the town, and reported what they had heard.’--_Cal._

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[Sidenote: FEB. 18.]

[Sidenote: 1624.]

The Town Council of Aberdeen had occasion to consider an abuse which had lately crept into their burgh, in the form of ‘costly banqueting at the baptising of bairns,’ and the ‘convocating of great numbers of people thereto.’ It is mentioned that, on these occasions, there were ‘all sorts of succours [sugars], confections, spiceries, and dessert, brought from foreign parts, beside great superfluity of venison, and wild meat of all sorts ... and withal, extraordinary drinking and scolling [health-drinking] ... to the slander of the town, in sic a calamitous time, when God is visiting the whole land with dearth and famine, and mony poor anes [are] dying and starving at dykes and under stairs for cauld and hunger.’

The Council ordained that hereafter no person of whatever degree should have ‘mae than four gossips and four cummers at the maist’ at their baptisms, that not more than six women be invited ‘to convoy the bairn to and frae the kirk,’ and that twelve should be the utmost amount of company present ‘at the dinner, supper, or afternoon’s drink.’ All extravagances at table were at the same time strictly forbidden.

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[Sidenote: MAY 25.]

The wappinshaw was a periodical muster of the irregular armed force of the country; it got its name from the more immediate purpose of the assembly--namely, an exhibition of weapons. At Dunfermline, on this day, while a wappinshaw was going on, ‘William Anderson, son till John Anderson, bailiff of the said town, and Charles Richeson, his servant, being shooting a shot with some of their friends in a certain place of the town, [a little piece of the lunt flieth upon a thack-house, which easily kindled. The fire increased with the violency of the wind[412]], and did flie from house to house, and sometimes wald flie over ane house without doing it any harm, but wald burn the next house, till the great admiration of all men; so that this fire burnt so meikle of the town, that, excepted the abbey and the kirk thereof, the tenth part were not free of it. This, by the judgment of all the beholders, was thought till have been some divinity, or some witchcraft, rather nor this foresaid accidental fire.’--_Jo. H._

‘The fire began at twelve hours, and burnt the whole town, some few sclate houses excepted, before four afternoon; goods and geir within houses, malt and victual in kilns and barns, were consumed.’--_Cal._

The town of Dunfermline consisted at this time of 120 houses, containing 287 families.--_Bal._

There was a collection in the parish churches for ‘the support of the town of Dunfermline, burnt with fire’ (_R. P. L._); and, in June 1625, King Charles I. ordered £500 sterling to be added to the fund for the relief of the poorer class of sufferers.--_P. C. R._

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[Sidenote: MAY.]

[Sidenote: 1624.]