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THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE 
 
 THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 
 
EDINBURGH : PEINTEL. BY THOMAS CONSTABLE 
 
 FOR 
 
 EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS. 
 
 LONDON . . . HAMILTON, ADAMS. & CO. 
 
 CAMBRIDGE . MACMILLAN & CO. 
 
 DUBLIN . . . W. ROBERTSON. 
 
 GLASGO"W . . JAMES MACLEHOSE. 
 
T' 
 
 THE 
 
 FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE 
 
 THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS, 
 
 1638-88. 
 
 BY JAMES DODDS. 
 
 SECOND EDITION. 
 
 EDINBURGH: 
 EDMONSTON AND DOUGLAS. 
 
 18G0. 
 
PREFACE. 
 
 The following Work was origiually prepared as a 
 Course of Lectures, which I have delivered, at intervals 
 of leisure, in Edinburgh, Glasgow, Liverpool, and several 
 other of our large towTis. This will account for the 
 direct style of address which frequently occurs through- 
 out the volume. 
 
 It will be seen that this little work does not pretend 
 to be an exhaustive history of the period selected, or 
 properly a history at all. It is only a series of de- 
 scriptive sht^tches, meant to represent in outline the 
 successive phases of the Covenanting Struggle. Tlie 
 subject is a noble one for a history, having an epic 
 completeness — a beginning, middle, and end — with its 
 clearly-defined half century ; and I hope that some one 
 having more ability, and more time than I luue for 
 literary' labour, will yet undertake the task. 
 
 The main body of the narrative has been based on 
 a careful collation of the best authorities — those con- 
 temporary or nearly contemporary with the (ivents. 
 
VI PEEFACE. 
 
 Amongst the host consulted and analysed, I may name 
 the following : — Clarendon, Burnet, Kirkton, Wodrow, 
 and Neal ; Principal Baillie's Letters, Sir James Bal- 
 four's Historical Works, Bishop Guthrie's Memoirs, and 
 Scot of Scotstarvet's Scottish Statesmen ; Scottish Sta- 
 tutes edited by Thomson, and Records of the Kirk edited 
 by Peterkin ; Strafford Papers, Miscellanea Scotica, 
 Memoirs of Yeitch and others edited by M'Crie, Dal- 
 rymple's Memoirs, and sundry old Memoirs of received 
 authenticity ; contemporary Journals, Tracts, Poems, and 
 Songs, edited by worthy, faithful, modest David Laing, 
 and other devoted antiquarians ; the various Club and 
 Society publications, Bannatyne, Maitland, Spalding, 
 Wodrow, &c. &c. 
 
 Among the writings, more specially Covenantinff, were 
 the following : — Naphtali, Patrick Walker's Lives of 
 Cargill and others, Shields' Life of Renwick, Faithful 
 ( .^ontendings, containing the Minutes and Letters of the 
 United Societies, Informatory Vindication of the Societies, 
 Collection of Sermons by Cameron and others, Renwick' s 
 Letters, and Howie's various compilations, of considerable 
 authority as to personal incidents and anecdotes, 
 ' I have anxiously compared the conclusions at which 
 I have arrived in regard to facts, with the conclusions 
 of our modern historians — Fox, M'Crie, Hallam, Guizot, 
 iiid Macaulay. As to the/acAs, I think there is now 
 
PREFACE. Vll 
 
 little difterence. The difierence will in general onlj^ be 
 speculative, in the differing views and estimates of men 
 and events which different persons will always form, 
 very much according to the leanings and predispositions 
 of their own minds. 
 
 I have also had the privilege — so invaluable to the 
 modern historical inquirer — of examining the documents 
 of the period in the State Paper Office. I regret that 
 I could only do this imperfectly, owing to the pressure 
 of business, but I received great light and assistance 
 from the examination so far as it proceeded. 
 
 In common, I believe, with all who have pursued 
 their researches in that Office, I cannot too warmly ex- 
 press my sense of the liberality and kindness which I 
 there experienced. It seems a model of a Public De- 
 partment, not only from the richness of its stores, and 
 the simplicity and method of its arrangements, but from 
 the courtesy, intelligence, zeal, and skilled proficiency of 
 the gentlemen who have the charge of it. 
 
 This Work having been prepared at first as a course 
 of popular lectures, and not with a view to publication, 
 my collection and analysis of authorities were jotted 
 do-\\Ti on detached scraps of paper, and I cannot now, 
 without much difficulty, retrace and recover them. I 
 have not therefore attempted to load the page with 
 an array of references, but I have already specified the 
 
Vlll PEEFACE. 
 
 principal sources from which I have drawn my narra- 
 tion of facts. "Where, however, I have quoted, or have 
 derived information from Manuscripts, or from the State 
 Paper Documents, I have noted the circumstance in 
 foot-notes. 
 
 Although averse from the obtrusion of personal feel- 
 ings, yet I cannot part with these Lectures, even in a 
 form in which I hope they may be more usefid, without 
 some half-regrets. The delivery of them during the 
 past four years, as a relief from sterner work, has been 
 a remarkable era in a humble life. They have brought 
 to me from large numbers of my countrymen tokens of 
 attention and regard, which have excited my surprise 
 no less than gratitude, and have established many friend- 
 ships which I trust will sweeten the rest of existence. 
 
 J. D. 
 
 Westminster, June 1860. 
 
CONTENTS. 
 I, 
 
 PA<iK 
 
 Brit«iin"8 Destiny — Obstacles in way of its Fulfilment — 
 House of Stuart one of tlie chief obstacles — Their Downfall 
 at the Revolution of 1G68 — Subject particularly defined — 
 The CovEXAKTixG Struggle — Ecclesiastical aspect of the 
 Struggle — Fundamental ideas underlying it — Its com- 
 mencement with the reign of Charles I., 1625 — Attempt- 
 ed introduction of Liturgy and Ceremonials — National 
 Covenant, 1638 — Military preparations in Support of the 
 Covenant — Campaigns against King, 1639 and 1640, 1 
 
 n. 
 
 King engaged in similar contest with English people — 
 Covenanters support the English Parliament — Solemn 
 League and Covenant, 1643 — Principles embodied in 
 the Covenants — Battle of Marston Moor, 1644 — Decline 
 of Covenanting Influence — Engagement for the King in 
 1648 — Its failure — Eetum of Covenanters to Power — 
 King's execution, 1649, and irreconcilable enmity hence- 
 forth between Royahsts and Presbyterians — Covenanters 
 invite Prince Charles into Scotland, and Crown him King, 
 1651 — Their defeat at the Battle of Dunbar by Cromwell, 
 lose their prestige, ftital consequences — Their principal 
 Leaders hitherto— Akgyle, 87 
 
 III. 
 
 Commonwealth supreme in the three nations — Cromwell's 
 Death, 1658 — Royalists and Presbyterians coalesce — 
 
CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGB 
 
 Hence Kestoration in 1660 — Pic-establisliment of Epis- 
 copacy — Middleton and Sharp the instruments for accom- 
 plishing this in Scothmd — Preparatory Measures against 
 Liberties of country, 1661— Trial and execution of Argyle, 84 
 
 IV. 
 
 Establishment of Episcopacy in Scotland — Parliament of 
 1662 — Secession of the Four Hundked Mixisters— Fall 
 of Middleton — No further Parliaments for six years, 1663 
 — Inquisition in Scotland — The country under Military 
 occupation — Apprehensions by Government of an Insur- 
 I'ection — Standing xVrmy under Dalziel, . . .112 
 
 V. 
 
 Rattle of the Pentlands, 28th November 1666— Hugh 
 M'Kail, — Increased Severities following upon the Pent- 
 land Rising, . . . . . . . .144: 
 
 VI. 
 
 Fall of Clarendon— The " Cabal"— Court break with Angli- 
 cans, and seek support from Nonconformists — Lauderdale 
 — More moderate policy — Ixdulgexce, 1669 — Parliament 
 — Intrigues which ultimately put an end to moderate coun- 
 sels — Countess of Dysart — Severity against Conventicles — 
 Eenewed Persecutions — Universal Prostration in 1676, but 
 speedy revival of the National Spirit — Highland Host, . 180 
 
 VII. 
 
 Assessment for large standing army, 1678 — Sharp's sanguin- 
 ary measure for suppression of Conventicles — His assassina- 
 
CONTENTS. XI 
 
 PAGB 
 
 tion on Magus ^Ioor, 3cI May 1679 — Aggregate meetings 
 amongst the Covenanters — Sir EoLert Hamilton — Claver- 
 house — Battm: ok Drumclog, 1st June 1679 — Battle of 
 BoTHWELL Bbidge, 22d June 1679, . . . .215 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Strict Covenanters separate from other Presbyterians and dis- 
 own House of Stuart — Queensferry Paper, 1680 — Richard 
 Cameron — Sanquhar Declaration, 22d June 1680 — Fight 
 at Ayrsmoss, and Death of Cameron, 23d July 1680— For- 
 mation of United Societies, 1681 — Their Position as to 
 (iovemment and other Presbyterians, .... 257 
 
 IX. 
 
 James Rexwick — The Organizer of the United Societies — 
 Sent to Holland to study for the ministry, 1682 — Returns 
 to Scotland in 1683 — His beneficial influence upon the So- 
 cieties — The Whig movement — Robert Bailue of Jervis- 
 woode — "Killing Times," 1684-85 — Death of Charles and 
 Succession of James, ... .... 294 
 
 X. 
 Pede.v the Pkopuet, 328 
 
 XT. 
 
 Jaraes ii. now absolute ; but ruined by his attempt to intro- 
 duce Despotism and Popery into the Country — His Jesuit 
 advisers — Their first measure was a pretended Toleration 
 to all sects — " Beginning of the End" — Cameronians 
 
XU CONTENTS. 
 
 PAGE 
 
 excluded from the Toleration — "WTiole burden of Struggle 
 now fell upon Eenwick — Capture, Trial, and Death of 
 Eenwick, 1688 — Arrival of William of Orange in Novem- 
 ber 1688, 349 
 
 XII. 
 
 Universal Combination against James — Eevolution of 1688 
 — The Cameronians and the Eevolution — the Eevolution 
 Settlement consummates the Covenanting Struggle — Con- 
 clusion, 370 
 
 \ 
 
THE NATIONAL COVENANT-COMMENCEMENT OF 
 THE STRUGGLE. 
 
 In entering upon the examination of any particular 
 period of British history', we liave now the advantage of 
 being able to take a comprehensive survey of the scope 
 and tendency of that history as a whole. Britain may 
 not yet have fulfilled her destiny. I do not think she 
 has. There may not yet be disclosed to us, in the mirror 
 of her past and present, even the outline of all that she 
 is fated to achieve. Still, the scroll has been so far un- 
 roUed that we may, with some degree of certainty, dis- 
 cern the providential purpose which she is meant to sub- 
 serve ; and in the light of that providential purpose we 
 shall the better understand the bearing and position of 
 any particular period on which our attention may be 
 fixed. 
 
 The destiny of Britain, then (shortly expressed, and 
 coming at once to its essence), seems to be — Gradually 
 to bring the governing powers into accordance with the 
 national will, and to reduce all the varied conflicting 
 classes of the community under obedience to law, by 
 which the national will declares itself The theory which 
 
 A 
 
2 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 through mauy succeeding generations our nation has been 
 aiming to perfect, after which it continues to aspire so 
 far as not completed (and verily it is very far from being- 
 completed), is this : Government, purely the expression 
 of the wishes and interests of the people ; and Law, and 
 Law alone, supreme over all classes and individuals in 
 the community. The design of Providence, in founding 
 and carrying to such a height this mighty empire, has 
 been to evolve, for the benefit and instruction of man- 
 kind, a model of the best system of government which 
 seems practicable in the present stage of human deve- 
 lopment ; a government, that is to say, by representative 
 institutions and equal laws; in short, what is de- 
 noted by the trite and well-known phrase, Constitutional 
 Government. 
 
 I do not mean that the nation has been always striving 
 after this object with a definite conception and intention, 
 as a mathematician labours at his theorem, or an archi- 
 tect designs a cathedral or a palace. It is not thus 
 generally that governments are made. The process is 
 ruder and more round-about ; but, perhaps, the surer 
 and stronger in the end. The nation, it is true, has 
 sometimes wrought with steady view and decided pur- 
 pose at its destined work, but oftener it has wrought 
 nnconsciousl}/. The corn grows whilst the husbandman 
 sleeps, or looks vacantly on, witliout marking or helping 
 the gi'owth. All that I mciui, when speaking of Britain 
 fulfilling her destiny, is, sometimes consciously, oftener 
 unconsciously, from age to age has she been advancing 
 towards the manifestation of a model of regulated liberty. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. ,) 
 
 from which after times and other races shall derive a les- ' 
 son, and shall learn — alike the rulers and the ruled — to 
 satisfy themselves with that sober prosperity, freedom, 
 and happiness, which is the utmost measure that man 
 has to expect within the present conditions of his de- ^ 
 velopment. 
 
 In gi'adually realizing this theory of Constitutionalism, 
 the spirit of the nation has had to encounter many diffi- 
 culties and obstacles. Some of these have arisen from 
 the errors and follies, tlie delusions and imperfect notions 
 of the people themselves ; some, from that inherent dis- 
 position in all governing powers to separate their autho- 
 rity from tlie people, and to arrogate a certain mystical 
 authority to rule and command human beings at will ; 
 some from the usurpation, cruelty, and wickedness of par- 
 ticular kings or of particular dynasties. Frequently all 
 these causes have been combined and been in operation 
 at one and the same time ; popular ignorance and ser- 
 Aility, despotism and ambition in the governing powers ; 
 and these, exhibiting themselves with extraordinary viru- 
 lence in the case of some particular king or of some par- 
 ticular dynasty. 
 
 One of Britain's chief obstacles was the House of 
 Stuart, from the date of their accession to the English 
 throne, that is, from the time of James i. dowTiwards. 
 Under their ref/ime most of the before-mentioned causes 
 of difficulty were in active operation, thwarting and 
 keeping back the progress of Constitutional government. 
 Tlie bulk of peoj)le of all classes in England were suidc 
 in a supine, ridiculous lip-loyalty — lip-loyalty only, for 
 
4 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 SO it was, and so it proved to be when destruction came 
 as an armed man. There was an exception to this de- 
 based, dormant state of the mass. This was in a minority, 
 comparatively small, yet bold, free, and ever swelling in 
 numbers and in weight, who had long been stigmatized 
 under the nickname of Puritans. In Scotland also, 
 though there was a lingering, half-despairing attachment 
 to the race of their ancient kings, still, from the epoch of 
 the Eeformation, there had ever been a real antagonism^ 
 on the part of the people generally against the Stuarts. 
 There was a determination that man's life, acts, and 
 estate should be placed under the subordination of law, 
 and not be subject to the caprices of a court. But the 
 governing powers both in England and Scotland — the 
 minions of the Court — impelled by their own giddy and 
 violent tempers, and inoculated with the di'egs of feudal 
 and monarchical domination, claimed to ride rough-shod 
 over the subject people. The Stuarts themselves were 
 steeped to the lips in those arrogant pretensions ; and 
 their own natural propensity to exercise a small miser- 
 able despotism was stimulated and set on edge by the 
 sight before and around them, — of adoring ecclesiastics, 
 of corrupt and unscrupulous ministers, of a bawling, 
 ignorant, besotted multitude of all ranks, whose only 
 notions of government and religion were the cuckoo cry 
 of " Church and King!" Perhaps, also, they felt chal- 
 lenged to rush forward in their course of despotism and 
 fatuity combined, by another and a different sight — that 
 of the Puritan phalanx now gathering in England, and 
 the serried mass of Presbyterians in Scotland, who had 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 5 
 
 loug braved their wTatli, and were ever engaged in coun- f 
 terworking and baffling their machinations. Being in ': 
 reality weak as well as rash men, and more the gilded 
 playthings of others than true masters of their own 
 counsel, the Stuarts had neither sense to moderate their 
 pretensions according to the times and seasons, nor cau- j 
 tion to refrain from provoking a fatal collision, nor tlie \ 
 ability and desperate valour to crush a people whom they 
 foolishly irritated and aroused. 
 
 After a long course of oppression, imprudence, and 
 iniquity, and having succeeded almost to a miracle in 
 banding against them the whole leading parties and in- 
 terests of the State, even those who had all along been 
 their mainstay and support, the doomed House of Stuart 
 were swept away, as with an overflowing flood, in th(; 
 Revolution of 1<j88, 
 
 The obstacle which they had so long interposed being 
 thus forcibly removed, Britain entered anew upon her 
 predestined path of Constitutionalism. 
 
 By an explicit and solemn compact between the people 
 and the newly-appointed sovereign, the rights of the 
 nation were secured ; and since the Revolution Settle- 
 ment, amid many drawbacks and seasons of retro- 
 gression, and notwithstanding many deficiencies still 
 remaining, the nation has continued firm to the Con- 
 stitutional theory, and has made sensible progress in its 
 realization. 
 
 Tlie suT)ject wliich is more immediately to occupy our 
 attention (and whose position in the map of history we 
 
6 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 shall the better luiderstand from these preliminary re- 
 marks), is one branch of that war for right and justice 
 which the British people waged with tlie House of 
 Stuart. It is what we term, "The Fifty Years' 
 Struggle of the Scottish Covenanters." 
 
 This struggle may be said to have continued, with 
 more or less intensity, and more or less of vicissitude, 
 from the Swearing of the National Covenant in 1638, 
 to the deliverance accomplished in the Revolution of 
 1688 : that is to say, for fifty years. 
 
 I do not propose a minute, continuous histoiy ; that 
 were for the studies of the closet, not the more discur- 
 sive exercises of the lecture-room. Xeither shall I weary 
 you with long, vague dissertations. I\Iy simple wish is, 
 by a series of descriptive sketches, to help you to see, as 
 it were, what was the character of the struggle. The 
 reflections and lessons to be deduced are too obvious 
 to require much formal explication. According to the 
 modern view of history, eveiy people, every party, are 
 entitled to a fair exposition, to be fairly disj^layed in the 
 light of their own times and their own ideas, and are 
 not to be judged off-hand by abstract rules, or by the 
 standard of modern notions. This is how I mean to 
 deal with the Covenanters. I am no apologist of theirs, 
 no indorser of their opinions and acts, no pre-determined 
 censor of their opponents, the Cavaliers. I desire to 
 follow implicitly wherever the current of historic justice 
 leads. My only test in judging of parties, whether past 
 or existing, is this, — Who have done, or are doing most, 
 so far as the ideas and circumstances of their age will 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 7 
 
 permit, for the greatest possible happiness and the great- 
 est possible development of mankind ] 
 
 I must confess, by reason of this very test, tliat my 
 sympathies are on the side of the Covenanters. I look 
 upon them as the party in their own time, who, so far 
 as the ideas and circumstances of tliat time would per- 
 mit, did battle for the cause of human liberty. Their 
 errors, follies, crimes even, were such as tarnish all men 
 and parties ; such as adhere to poor humanity even in 
 its best efforts, — especially in an age, such as theirs was, 
 of ceaseless revolutions. On the other hand, their merits 
 were all their own. In the constant and unwearied 
 struggle, which at last brought about the constitutional 
 settlement of 1688, they stood alone. Many at dif- 
 ferent times joined them, but always fell off from the 
 ranks. They alone stood firm and persevering at their 
 post for the whole term of the fifty years. And that 
 which is most wanted at present, I take it, is not long 
 and learned discourses on the principles of the Cove- 
 nanters, which were never better understood than now ; 
 or the attempts of a novice at historical generalizations, 
 where a Hallam and a Guizot have already spoken ; but 
 the want is, to lift up the veil under which the men 
 themselves are hidden, — to wipe the dust from tlieir 
 l)rows, and show them with their faces to the sun, — 
 tliat you may see they are not men to be forgotten and 
 despised as poor silly fanatics ; but men of every species 
 of talent, of every variety of character, — faithful wit- 
 nesses for principles yet sacred to yourselves, — heroes 
 whom, if you cannot always agi'ce with, you cannot fail 
 
5 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 to admire, — patriots, who in life and in deatli were 
 animated with the noblest zeal to make Britain a free, 
 a pure, a brave, a religious nation, and always the first 
 Protestant power in Europe. 
 
 I have to premise, that much of this struggle will 
 seem to turn upon ecclesiastical questions ; and often- 
 times, in consequence, philosophers and men of literature 
 have been repelled from the study of this particular 
 period of Scottish history, or have only treated it as a 
 foil to set off their own brilliant wit, and refined con- 
 tempt for priestcraft and fanaticism. They imagine that 
 it can involve nothing of universal human interest ; that 
 it was but another amongst the numberless squabbles of 
 rival priesthoods ; that it was a mere running fire of 
 Presbyterio-Prelatic controversies, in which the fate or 
 welfare of the nation had no manner of concern. 
 
 But this is an entire mistake. It often happens, as 
 every one knows who is versant with the minuter details 
 of history, that in revolutions of vast magnitude and far- 
 reaching consequence, the questions, the discussions, the 
 public documents of the period, shall seem to have very 
 little significance indeed ; they are dry bones in which 
 no life appears. But when vivified by reflection, by 
 patient thought, and by an imagination and sympathy 
 which can translate the dead-looking forms of the past 
 into the strong, warm feelings of the present, one gra- 
 dually awakens to the universality, and grandeur, and 
 everlasting human interest of the principles which those 
 old b} gone formulae half-conceal from observation. Many 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 9 
 
 a superficial reader, if not warned beforehand, would 
 glance over the clauses of Magna Cliarta, or the ninety- 
 five Theses posted by Luther on the gates of the Castle- 
 Churcli of Wittenberg, and never perceive, that in the 
 former lay imbedded the seeds of constitutional govern- 
 ment ; that in the latter was the fountain from which 
 tlie Protestant Reformation issued forth. So in the 
 struggle of the Scottish Covenanters. Underneath much 
 that is strange in their dialect, local in their views, pole- 
 mical in their dogmas, we shall trace, if we search aright, 
 a_substratum of principles, in which all men and all 
 generations are vitally interested. 
 
 The ecclesiastical tone of the questions raised during 
 the Covenanting struggle arose from this circumstance : 
 — In England (I am referring to the tiuies subsequent 
 to the Reformation), the Parliament was always the 
 people's organ in their pursuit of Constitutional govern- 
 ment. The Church, from its birth a creature of the 
 Court, was either kept under close tutelage by its august 
 parent, or if ever chafed to show a little anger, could 
 only off'er a feeble and second-rate opposition. Hence 
 the ideas and language of the English Constitutionalists 
 were in the main political ; and it was only by accident 
 if religious influences or ecclesiastical dogmas mingled in 
 the current. In Scotland, the reveise was the case. The 
 Parliament, from radical defects in its structure, was 
 either the mere echo of the Court, or the instrument of 
 .some dominant faction of barons. But from the days of 
 the Reformation, tlie Kirk — the world-renowned Kirk 
 — was the true organ of the Scottish people. It com- 
 
10 THE FIFTY YEAKS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 billed within itself all the functions, all the energies — and 
 (;an it be wondered at, if sometimes also it fell into the 
 excesses — of those three great modern organs of popular 
 opinion : Parliament, the Press, and Public Meetings. 
 Through the Kirk it was that the Scottish masses uttered 
 all their complaints, demands, threats, resolves. By the 
 Kirk they were guided and inspired in all their public 
 movements. It was their rendezvous in the time of 
 alarm and commotion ; their asylum in the hour of 
 danger ; the fortress from which they defied the fiery 
 darts of the oppressor. It was more. It ^vfas more 
 than any Parliament, or any mere earthly association 
 can be to the heart and soid of man — of man, a spiritual 
 being, and acted upon the most powerfidly by spiritual 
 faiths, spiritual impidses, and spiritual institutions. The 
 Kirk, in the eyes of the Scottish Covenanter, was the 
 Mount Zion of the land ; " beautiful for situation, the 
 joy of the whole earth ;" '• the city of the Great King." 
 There Jesus Christ executed his office as a king ; guar- 
 anteed its purity and final triumphs ; and woe unto him 
 who should lay upon it unhallowed hands, — who should 
 seek to wear its crown, or presume to dictate its laws 
 and ordinances ! It was sacred, imperishable, invincible, 
 and laughed to scorn alike the rage of tyrants, the plots 
 <3f hierarchies, and the gates of hell itself. 
 
 Hence the Kirk of Scotland was always but the people 
 of Scotland, in a difterent embodied form ; and although, 
 in consequence of this peculiarity, which distinguishes 
 the history of Scotland more than that of any country I 
 know of, the lano-uasre and the dos:mas of tlie Covenant- 
 
THE SCOTTISH (•0VP:NANTEKS. 1 1 
 
 iiig period may be strongly ecclesiastical, and tinged 
 with some theocratic pretensions, foreign and offensive to 
 modern conceptions ; yet the principles at stake, and the 
 objects which were in reality struggled for, were the' 
 same as, in all ages, nations, and circumstances, have' 
 animated the true and the free in struggling against \ 
 their oppressors : that is to say, freedom of thought, 
 freedom of worship, freedom of social and religious 
 assemblies, "Juctgment by law, and law the expression of 
 f he nation al will. ~~ ^"^ 
 
 AVe cannot realize to ourselves the full force and sig- 
 nificance of thp Covenanting Struggle, unless we take 
 into view the peculiar and distinguishing dogmas of the 
 Kirk, on tlie ground of which, more especially, the 
 struggle took place. 
 
 An Act was passed in 15 GO, in the reign of Queen 
 Mary, abolishing Popery ; but the Queen declined to 
 add her consent to it. In 15G7 (the first Parliament 
 of James vi.), this Act of 1560 was ratified, and another 
 Statute was passed, confirming and adopting the " Con- 
 fession of Faith and Doctrine believed and professed by 
 the Protestants of Scotland." One of the articles in 
 this Confession is, — " We most constantly believe, that t 
 from the beginning there has been, and now is, and to I 
 the end of the world shall be, a Kirk ; that is to say, a ! 
 company and multitude of men, chosen of God, who \ 
 rightly worship and embrace Him, by true faith in / 
 Christ Jesus^ who is the only head of the same Kirk." j 
 The "Second Book of Discipline" was framed in 1578 
 
12 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 (Andrew Melville taking a leading part in the prepara- 
 tion of it) : and in the same year it received the sanction 
 of the General Assembly. It lays down, that " The 
 Kirk . . . has a certain power granted by God, accord- 
 ing to which it uses a proper jurisdiction and govern- 
 ment. . . . This power ecclesiastical is ... to be put 
 in execution by them unto whom the spiritual govern- 
 ment of the Kirk by lawful calling is committed." 
 " This power and policy ecclesiastical is different and 
 distinct in its nature from that power and policy which 
 is called the civil power." '^ This power and policy of 
 the Kirk should lean upon the Word immediately as the 
 only ground thereof, and should be taken from the pure 
 fountains of the Scriptures, — the Kirk hearing the voice 
 of Christ, the only spiritual King, and being ruled by 
 His laws." But it is ordained, on the other hand, that 
 " diligence should be taken . . , that only ecclesiastical 
 things be handled in the Assemblies ; and that there be 
 no meddling with anything pertaining to the civil juris- 
 diction." Concerning the office-bearers of the Church, 
 the " Book of Discipline " teaches (to quote from the 
 abstract by Dr. M'Crie), that " the name bishop is of 
 the same import as that of pastor or minister ; it is not 
 expressive of superiority or lordship ; and the Scriptures 
 do not allow of a pastor of pastors, or a pastor of many 
 flocks." For some years attempts had been making by 
 James and his courtiers to undermine the Presbyterian 
 order of the Kirk, to introduce Episcopacy, and to assert 
 tiie royal supremacy in matters ecclesiastical. But by 
 the united and strenuous efforts of the more influential 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVEXANTERS, 13 
 
 of the ministers and theologians, led by ]\Ielville, and 
 supported by the body of the people, those attempts, 
 sometimes insidious, sometimes violent, were utterly de- 
 feated ; and, in 1592, the Parliament passed an Act, 
 intituled, "• Ratification of the Liberties of the True 
 Kirk,"' which has ever since been distinguished as the 
 charter of Presbyterianism, so far as Presbyterianism 
 rested upon the Statute-Book. This Act " ratifies 
 and approves the General Assemblies, . . . the Syno- 
 dical and Provincial Assemblies, . . . the Presbyteries 
 and particular Sessions appointed by the said Kirk, 
 with the whole jurisdiction and discipline of the same 
 Kirk." 
 
 Such was the constitution of the Scottish Kirk. Such 
 also were the ecclesiastical dogmas which underlay the 
 whole Covenanting struggle. The Kirk maintained, as 
 articles on which her members were bound to make a 
 stand, to resist, to sufi'er, if need were, to die : that the 
 Church has a sphere and jurisdiction distinct from and 
 independent of the State ; that Jesus Christ is the sole 
 King and Head of the Church, and any extraneous 
 authority is usurpation and rebellion against his Divine 
 Majesty ; that under Him all ministers or pastors are 
 equal in rank and power, and all dominion. Popish or 
 Prelatic, or of whatsoever kind, is unscriptural and 
 anti-Christian ; that symbolical rites and modes of wor- 
 ship, substituting something as an object of religious 
 reverence other than the only living and true God, — 
 and where man pretends to be something more than the 
 simple preacher, to be in some occult way the medium 
 
14- THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 and active dispenser of Divine grace, — are of the very 
 
 nature of idolatry. 
 
 j In addition to these dogmas, which are more strictly 
 
 ecclesiastical, it must ever be remembered that all the 
 
 master spirits of the Church — Knox, Melville, Hender- 
 
 i son, Rutherford, and indeed the body of Presbyterians 
 
 ^ in idl times — have been marked for their adherence to 
 
 ' the })rinciples of Constitutional government. 
 
 During all the great electric storms which raged 
 through the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, reli- 
 gious ideas were uppermost, and affected the fate of 
 empires in a way they have never done since. This was 
 not peculiar to Scotland; it was the case all over 
 Europe. But then it must be kept in view, that the 
 various religious sects did not merely represent certain 
 theological opinions : they also represented the various 
 and conflicting political parties and interests of those 
 revolutionary epochs, when all Europe was in agony, 
 convulsively throwing off the Ohl, convulsively taking 
 on the New. Each sect was struggling, not only 
 for its own creed, but for some particular form of 
 secular goverimient, to which it bore some particular 
 affinity. Hence, in those days, the prominency of 
 sectarian controversies. Hence the quivering anxiety 
 with which princes and politicians hung upon the 
 issue of the battles of the Churches. And hence 
 also the animosity and intolerance which prevailed, 
 were not altogether owing to theological rancour, as 
 \ is too hastily assumed and asserted ; (but much more 
 1 to the political passions engendered in the fury of that 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 1 . ) 
 
 internecine ^va^, wliich had then broken out between 
 Kings and Peoplesy 
 
 The Presbyterians in Scothmd (supported in the long- 
 run by the Puritans in England) were striving against 
 Absolutism, and for limited monarchy and government | 
 by popular representation. The antagonists against 
 whom they were pitched in deadly combat, not only 
 theologically, but politically, were, — the Komanists, the 
 Episcopalians of the Church of England (or Anglicans as 
 they are called for shortness), and the Non-religionists, 
 chiefly of the feshionable school of Hobbes, the Hobbists. 
 
 The political aims of the Eomanists are thus described 
 by Riinke, whose correctness and impartiality are un- 
 doubted. Speaking of Romanism, as it exhilnted itself 
 in those centuries, he says, — " It now stood forth in the 
 utmost plenitude of its activity, and the movements in 
 which it took part represent the most influential political 
 occurrences of the day. If the Popes had succeeded at 
 this juncture, they would have secured a perpetual pre- 
 dominance over the State. They advanced claims, and 
 their adherents propounded opinions and principles, by 
 which kingdoms and states were threatened at once 
 with internal convulsions, and with the loss of their inde- 
 pendence. . . . They first laid claim to an unlimitetl 
 supremacy for the Church over the State. . . . Bellar- 
 mine does not go so far as to attribute a secidar power 
 to the Pope as of Divine right ; . . . but so much the 
 more unhesitatingly does the cardinal invest him in- 
 directly with this power. He compares the secular 
 power to the body, and the spiritual to the soul of man ; 
 
1 b THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 attributing to the Clmrcli a dominion over the State 
 similar to that which the soul exercises over the body." 
 "We assert," thus wrote Bellarmine, "that the Pope as 
 pope, though possessing no mere temporal authority, 
 yet, for tlie purposes of spiritual good, has supreme 
 power to dispose of the temporal matters of all Chris- 
 tians. ... As supreme spii'itual prince he can change 
 kingdoms, taking them from one ruler to bestow them 
 on another." 
 
 The Church of England (or Anglican Church) was 
 called into existence by the sovereigns of England, as a 
 counterpoise to turn the scale against the Church of 
 Rome, with its king-deposing tenets. Hence the Angli- 
 can Church distinguished itself from the first by preach- 
 ing up the Divine right of kings, and the duty on all 
 orders of men to yield to them entire passive obedience. 
 The king was head both of Church and State. This was 
 milk and honey to King James, so long nauseated with 
 the black bread of the Scottish Kirk. In his Basilicon 
 Doron^ he thus revels in the Anglican extravagance of 
 the king's absolute dominion over the people : — " Even 
 when a king, as described by Samuel, takes their sons 
 for his horsemen, and some to run before his chariot, to 
 ear his gi'ound, and to reap his harvest, and to make 
 instruments of war ; and their daughters to make them 
 apothecaries, and cooks, and bakers: nor, though he 
 should take their fields and their vineyards, and their 
 best olive trees, and give them to his servants, and take 
 the tenth of their seed, and of their vineyards, and of 
 their flocks, and give it to his servants, — had they a 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 17 
 
 right to niuniiui'. The king was ouly uccuimttible to 
 God; and the chiefs of the people had the example of 
 Elias pointed out for their imitation, who, under the 
 industrious persecution and tyranny of Ahab, raised no 
 rebellion, but did only fly to the wilderness." Mean 
 and sordid as this king-worship sounds to our ears, it 
 was the orthodox politics of the Chiu'ch of England in 
 those centuries. South, in one of his sermons, boasts of 
 this as a proud distinction, that the English " is the 
 only Church in Christendom whose avowed principles and 
 practice disown all resistance to the civil power." End- 
 less quotations to the same effect might be made from the 
 contemporary Anglican doctors. Phillimore, in his History 
 of the Law of Evidence, thus sums up the result : — 
 " The doctrine of passive obedience, in its most slavish 
 and repulsive form, had been, from the time of Eliza- 
 beth, the distinguishing and dishonourable tenet of the 
 English Church. It had been laid down without any 
 sort of reserve or qualification ; cases the most extrava- 
 gant had been studiously selected ; instances of oppres- 
 sion the most grinding, and of cruelty the most frantic, 
 liad been ostentatiously put forward ; and its i)reiates 
 had answered, that as St. Paul had submitted to Nero, 
 no provocation (;ould justify the resistance of a Christian 
 man. In return for these doctrines, the Crown had 
 supported the Church on aU occasions; and tliat sui)i)ort 
 was at one time essential to its existence." 
 
 The Hobbism on which the swarm of Cavalier liber- 
 tines fed and festered, is thus painted by one of our 
 great masters f)n ethical philosophy — Sir James Mac- 
 
 B 
 
18 THE FIFTY YEARS' STPdlGGLE OF 
 
 kiiitosh — whose large calm intellect disposed him rather 
 to the use of mild colouring ; and the principles must 
 have been vile indeed which could kindle his tranquil 
 .spirit into the language almost of execration. He 
 thus sketches the political theories of Hobbes : — " The 
 supreme authority cannot be sufficient for its purpose, 
 unless it be wielded by a single hand ; nor even then, 
 unless his absolute power extends over religion, wdiich 
 may prompt men to discord by the fear of an evil greater 
 than death. The perfect state of a community, accord- 
 ing to him, is where law prescribes the religion and 
 morality of the people, and where the will of an absolute 
 sovereign is the sole fountain of law. . . . Having thus 
 rendered religion the slave of every human tyrant, it 
 was an unavoidable consequence that he should be dis- 
 posed to lower her character, and lessen her power over 
 men ; that he should regard atheism as the most effectual 
 instrument of preventing rebellion, at least that species 
 of rebellion which prevailed in his time, and had excited 
 his alarms. The formidable alliance of religion with 
 liberty haunted his mind, and urged him to the bold 
 attempt of rooting out both these mighty principles." 
 " The Court of Charles ii.," adds Mackintosh, " were 
 equally pleased with Hobbes' poignant brevity and his 
 low estimate of human motives. His ethical epigrams 
 became the current coin of profligate wits." 
 
 It was against these numerous, and seemingly irre- 
 sistible antagonists, that the Scottish Presbyterians (a 
 small, obscure, isolated handful of people) originated, 
 and had often almost alone to maintain, the political 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 19 
 
 struggle. It was against Komish supremacy over all 
 government and all human thought and belief, Anglican 
 sycophancy to the absolute power of kings both in Church 
 and State, and the Hobbist's dead prostration in body 
 and mind under the one huge, all-crushing leviathan. 
 Turn away from all the sickening trash which we have 
 been quoting, and hearken to the loud, strong voice of 
 the North — to the words of practical sense and truth 
 and manhood, to which all that is noble within us at 
 once cordially responds. It is like emerging from a 
 charnel-house into the natural light and healthful breeze 
 of heaven. It is like turning from the nocturnal screech- 
 ing of owls, to the mid-day song of the birds, in fresh 
 green forests, or in the open blue sky. 
 
 Take as a specimen the following propositions from 
 the Lex Bex of Samuel Rutherford, the political text- 
 book of the Covenanters, and fitted even yet to be the 
 text-book of the most advanced lovers of freedom — a 
 work disfigured by some of the pedantry and bad taste 
 of its time, yet marvellous for learning, for free bold 
 thought, for fine rapid argument, and for a wit and 
 fancy that never flag or grow dim : — 
 
 " The power of creating a man a king is from the 
 people. 
 
 " A community transplanted to India, or any place of 
 the world not before inhabited, have a perfect liberty to 
 choose either a monarchy, or a democracy, or an aris- 
 tocracy. 
 
 " If the king have not the consent of the people he 
 is an usurper, for we know no external lawful calling 
 
20 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 that kings liave now, or their family, to the crowu, but 
 only the call of the people. 
 
 " The law is not the king's own, but given to him 
 in trust. 
 
 •' It is true the king is the head of the kingdom ; but 
 the states of the kingdom are as the temples of the 
 head, and so as essentially parts of tlie head as the king 
 is the crown of the head. 
 
 " Power is not an immediate inlieritance from heaven, 
 but a birthright of the people borrowed from them. They 
 may let it out for their good, and resume it when a man 
 is drimk with it. 
 
 " If it be natural to one man to defend himself 
 against the personal invasion of a prince, then it is na- 
 tural and warrantable to ten thousand, and to a whole 
 kingdom ; and what reason to defraud a kingdom of the 
 benefit of self-defence more than one man 1 
 
 " To denude the people of armour because they may 
 abuse the prince, is to expose them to violence and 
 oppression unjustly, for one king may more easily abuse 
 armour than all the people. 
 
 " A limited and mixed monarchy, such as is in Scot- 
 land and England, seems to me the best government, 
 when parliaments, with the king, have the good of all 
 the three. This government hath glory, order, unity, 
 from a monarch ; from the government of the most and 
 wisest it liath safety of counsel, stability, strength ; from 
 tlie influence of the commons it hath liberty, privileges, 
 promptitude of obedience." 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENAXTHRS. 21 
 
 Let me here anticipate what I shall have fre(|ueiit 
 t)Ccasioii hereafter to remark, and what will forcibly 
 impress you as we proceed. The Covenanters, taken as 
 a body, and making the allowances for time and circum- 
 stances which impartiality accords to all historical parties, 
 were the pioneers, and led the van in the battle which/ 
 was won at the Revolution of 1688. Their principles, 
 in the main, just constituted the Revolution Settle- 
 ment, — are just the principles of the existing British 
 Government. With those who are so antiquated and 
 uuteachable as even yet not to accept the principles of 
 tlie Revolution, but who retrograde in their sympathie^; 
 to the regime of the Stuarts — with them we do not argue. 
 To them these Lectures are not addressed. Where there 
 is absolutely no community of sentiment, vain is all dis- 
 cussion. In speaking or writing we must start some- 
 wliere, we must assume some fixed point, and there is 
 no use waiting for those whose fixed point is a thousand 
 miles off. The life of IMethusaleh would not suffice to 
 drag along interminable, everlasting controversies of this 
 kind. Such persons as we have been supposing are born 
 far too late in the centuries. They ought to have been 
 amongst the huntsmen of Nimrod, or to have oaten grass 
 like oxen along with Nebuchadnezzar. 
 
 The symptoms of tlie Covenanting struggle may be 
 traced far back, but the real crisis commenced with the 
 reign of Charles i., who succeeded his father in 162o. 
 
 He was of purer and more respectable character in 
 his private and domestic relations ; more dignified and 
 
22 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Stately in deportment ; if with less of the pedagogue's 
 erudition, with more of the scholar's correctness and ele • 
 gauce ; better fitted for active pursuits, for business, for 
 the administration of affairs ; personally as brave and 
 self-possessed as his fiither had been cowardly and easily 
 thrown into panics ; with a pietistic vein about him, 
 rather evaporating, however, in airy devotions and frothy 
 ceremonials, than having any root of morality and real 
 consistent religion. But Charles was imbued with all 
 his father's crazes about kingcraft and kingly preroga- 
 tive. In his estimation the king was the centre of go- 
 verning power, answerable for his conduct to God alone 
 — entitled on all occasions to the implicit and unresisting- 
 obedience of his subjects ; and as Charles had a courage, 
 a wilfidness of disposition, and a tenacity in clinging — 
 or, if baffled, of returning again and again to his main 
 purposes, in which his father was ridiculously deficient — 
 he was the more dangerous and the more determined in 
 anytliing he might undertake. His fiital vice was utter 
 falsity of nature, so that no one could be sure of his 
 real intentions, or rely upon his promises. He had so 
 many webs all spinning at the same time, so many plots 
 crossing plots, that his friends were more bewildered 
 than his enemies. His friends were nonplussed and 
 could not help him. His enemies always judged the 
 worst, and at last destroyed him. This falsity of nature 
 was aggravated by his insane notions of kingship ; that 
 kings ruled by Divine right, were not amenable to their 
 subjects, and, if forced by necessity to yield in anything, 
 were not, and could not be, bound by sucli concessions 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 23 
 
 or engagements, but when the pressure was got rid of, 
 WTre entitled to cast all promises aside as if they had 
 never been made. The people in all the three kingdoms 
 very speedily saw through the hollowness and duplicity 
 of his character, and trusted him neither in word, oath, 
 nor treaty, but knew in all his windings and doublings 
 he had but one object — to make himself supreme over a 
 powerless nation. 
 
 1*116 national crisis soon arrived in Scotland. 
 
 The Keformation there, as regarded doctrine and dis- 
 cipline, had been put into shape by the agency of men 
 in the rank of presbyters, that is, ordinary ministers, and 
 presbyters drawn by opinion, sympathy, and even long 
 residence, to the model of Geneva. Therefore, by a 
 regular and normal development, the Kirk grew up into 
 Calvinistic Presbyterianism. 
 
 But this type of national religion was abominati(jn to 
 King James, partly for its Calvinism, which he learned 
 in England to detest, but chieliy on account of its ex- 
 ternal political aspect. Scottish Presbyterianism asserted 
 the principle of the Church's independence as a religious 
 society ; and if not directly, yet by sure consequence, it 
 awakened and animated the people to a notion_a^d^love 
 of responsible, representative government in matters civil. 
 During his whole reign, therefore, he laboured to su])- 
 plant this Presbyterian system, and to rear in its stead 
 the irregular and abnormal growtli of Prelacy, on his 
 own favourite maxim, " No bishop, no king." He suc- 
 ceeded in forcing upon the Kirk this alien and hateful 
 establishment. P>ut, like rocks and trunks of trees 
 
24 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 tumbled into the bed of a moiintaiu stream, the only 
 effect was to dam up and increase the volume of the 
 water, and add to the force and fury of the torrent, by 
 which everything was at length swejjt away. 
 
 Charles, on his accession, entered upon this inherit 
 ance of Scottish difficulties. On the side of the Pre- 
 latists were the employees of the Crown, many of the 
 University people, and tliose of the upper classes who 
 were in any way attached to the Court. On the side 
 of the Presbyterians were the mass of burghers and 
 common people, the more popular and active of the 
 working clergy, most of the country gentlemen, and 
 some of the nobles who were descended of old Eeforma- 
 tion families— the representatives of the old " Lords of 
 the Congregation." But the nobility, as a class, had 
 been exposed to the weakening and debauching influence 
 of James's kingcraft ; they had waxed rather indifferent 
 to the " good old cause ;" and, with careful manage- 
 ment, many, if not most of them, would have followed 
 Charles blindly in the routine of mechanical loyalty, reck- 
 ing nought whether he declared for Presbyterianism or 
 Prelacy in Scotland. 
 
 But with that dementedness which precedes destruc- 
 tion, Charles commenced his rule in Scotland by rousing 
 against him both the Nobles and the Presbyterians at 
 once, and driving them, not otherwise necessarily con- 
 nected, into a common confederacy, which was sure to 
 prove his ruin. 
 
 In those ancient times, when rent-rolls did not mount 
 to tlie figure they now do, the nobles mo.de their fortunes 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 25 
 
 cliiefly from holding the gTeat offices of state. On the 
 other hand, their most valuable possessions were the 
 t'hiirch lands and teinds, which, though nominally an- 
 nexed to the Cro\\Ti, their ancestors had (?ontrived to 
 get into their clutches on the downfal of the Popish 
 hierarchy. But Charles filled the offices of state with 
 his creatures, the bishops ; whilst, to provide at once a 
 fund for the prelatic clergy, and a reversion for himself 
 — now reduced to every shift for money, so as to escape 
 from his unruly Parliaments — he passed certain measures 
 (too minute and intricate to be here explained) for the 
 resumption of the church-lands and teinds, or for their 
 compulsory sale at a low price. In both these ways, by 
 withholding from them the offices of state, and by seeking 
 to strip them of so much of their lands and revenues, he 
 impoverished, insulted, and irritated his nobility ; also, 
 by obtaining the superiorities of all those lands, he would 
 augouent the military power of the Crown, and lessen 
 that of the nobility, who would thus be deprived of so 
 many of their vassals. A contemporary letter (of 1st 
 April 1638), amongst the Conway Papers, describes this 
 as part of the design. After speaking of certain pro- 
 clamations which had been delivered to Traquair, the 
 king's commissioner to Scotland, to be published there or 
 not, according to circumstances, the wTiter continues, — 
 " The other proclamation to be published was, to free 
 all those men in Scotland that hold their lands of their 
 lords, and that they should hold those lands of the king 
 upon much easier conditions than they hold of their 
 lords. ... It is possible the commonalty would fall 
 
26 THE FIFTY YEAKS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 off from the lords, for the strength of the Scotch nobility 
 is mostly in these tenures. The Earl of Argjde, by 
 virtue of these tenures, having a huge command of men, 
 above 20,000 as is supposed." ^ 
 
 It so happened, that the commeucemeut of the new 
 reign had been marked by the appearance of a new and 
 fresh generation of noblemen, and of men whose natural 
 sphere was in the administration of public affairs. The 
 old generation seemed to have died out with King James. 
 The great families, patrimonial and political, were now 
 mostly represented by men in the prime of life, ranging 
 from about twenty to forty years of age ; many of them 
 able, subtle, and ambitious, eager for distinction, eager 
 for illustrious position ; some of them generous and 
 patriotic, well fitted at once to adorn and benefit the 
 State, and all impatient of exclusion from places of trust 
 and dignity, and of promotion of the favourites and 
 lackeys of the Court. There were such names as Rothes, 
 Balmerino, Loudon, JMontrose, Melville, Lindsay, Lothian, 
 — almost all the nobles, except the Hamiltons and Gor- 
 dons, who pretended to be fast friends of the king. 
 Amongst the leaders of the nobility at the beginning, 
 there w^as the impulsive, gay, and facile Kothes, " of u 
 pleasant and jovial humour," says Clarendon, but en- 
 trapped in a few years by the bait of a lordship of the 
 bed-chamber, and a promised marriage with the rich 
 Countess of Devonshire. There was the pi'ouiily-aspu'ing 
 Montrose, who made a dash into the first swellings of 
 the tide, hoping to find power, where bold hearts so 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. '2 i 
 
 often find it, in the niidst of national confusion ; but lie 
 was too lofty to play any second part, and speedily 
 revolted fi"om a cause where Leslie held the baton, and 
 Argyle directed the mace. And there was Loudon, a 
 born orator and manager of men, with the long sagacious 
 face, and lambent-speaking eye, who trode the wild 
 paths of revolution agile and clean as the himter of the 
 Alps, — in force of mind, in varied practical talent, in 
 knowledge of his country's constitution, in far-seeing 
 wisdom, in prudence, in nervous eloquence, the Pym of 
 Scotland, and superior to his English compeer in the 
 arts and graces which captivate men and win them over 
 to one's wUl ; but whose voice, generally smooth and 
 l)ersuasive, could rise when the tempest rose, as when 
 he thus sounded the blast of a nation's defiance against 
 the threats of royalty : " We know no other bond 
 betwixt a king and his subjects but religion and law ; 
 if these be broken, men's lives are not dear to them : 
 such fears are passed with us for ever !" When any 
 crisis therefore should arise (and was not the atmosphere 
 laden with presages of a coming tempest ?), be sure the 
 Scottish nobles, with their high blood and youthful 
 impetuosity, would be found amongst the most implac- 
 able foes of the king. His contumelious and impolitic 
 treatment of the aristocracy — that shrewd contemporary 
 observer. Sir James Balfour, declares — " was the ground - 
 stone of all the mischief that followed after, ])oth to the 
 king's government and family." 
 
 After many premonitory acts, which excited general 
 
28 THE FIFTY YEATJS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 distrust and alarm, the king introduced into Scotland, by 
 his own sole prerogative, without any other sanction, a 
 Book of Canons for the regulation of the Church, by 
 which the Presbyterian polity was completely subverted, 
 as well as the civil rights and privileges of the people 
 invaded ; and he followed up this by a Liturgy, framed 
 under the auspices of Laud, largely impregnated with 
 Romish conceits, wdiich contradicted and shocked all 
 Scottish ideas and habits in the matter of religious wor- 
 ship, and many of their most solemn religious convictions. 
 This was in 1637. The national mind was outraged. 
 There was an immediate rush to Edinburgh of supplicants 
 against those innovations, from all parts of the country. 
 Bishop Guthrie acknowledges, — " Besides the increase of 
 noblemen who had not been formerly there, there were 
 few or no shires on the south side of the Grampian hills 
 from which came not gentlemen, burghers, ministers, 
 and commons." To guide, control, and give combined 
 effect to this movement, the people formed under a 
 central body, composed of all the opposition nobles, of 
 two gentlemen for every county, one minister from every 
 Presbytery, and one or two commissioners from every 
 burgh. Each class, nobles, gentry, ministers, and bur- 
 gesses, sat and consulted separately, meeting from time 
 to time for joint conference. Hence this body w^as called 
 " The Tables," the real interim government of Scotland. 
 To confront and avenge the insolence of tyranny which had 
 been displayed, the people, under the guidance of " The 
 Tables," rose in a mass, joined heart and hand, and, as one 
 man, swore and subscribed the National Covenant. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 20 
 
 By this memorable document, first publicly read and 
 subscribed in the Greyfriars' Church of Edinburgh, ori 
 the hist day of Feliruary 1038, the noblemen, barous, 
 gentlemen, burgesses, ministers, and commons, under 
 subscribing, express their resolution — " All the days of 
 our life constantly to adhere unto and to defend the true 
 religion," and " to labour, by all means lawful, to re- 
 cover the purity and liberty of the gospel, as it was 
 established and professed" before the introduction of the 
 late innovations ; " and that we shall defend the same, 
 and resist all these contrary errors and corruptions, ac- 
 (^ording to our vocation, and to the utnujst of that power 
 tliat God hath put into our hands, all the days of our 
 life." They pledge themselves, " that we shall, to the 
 utmost of our power, witli our means and lives, stand t( » 
 the defence of our dread sovereign tlie king's majesty, 
 his person and authority, in tlie defence and preservation 
 of the foresaid true religion, liberties, and laws of the 
 kingdom ; as als(j to the nuitual defence and assistance 
 every one of us of another, so that whatsoever shall be 
 done to the least of us for that cause shall be taken as 
 done to us all in general, and to every one of us in 
 l>articular ; and that we shall, neither directly nor indi- 
 rectly suffer ourselves to be divided or witlidrawu, l^y 
 whatsoever suggestion, combination, allurement, or terror, 
 from our blessed and loyal conjunction." They engage, 
 " for ourselves, our followers, and all other under us, 
 i)oth in public, in (jur particular families and i)ersonal 
 carriage, to endeavour to keep ourselves within the bounds 
 of Christian liberty, and to be good examples to others 
 
30 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 of all godliness, soberness, and righteousness, and of eveiy 
 duty we owe to God and man." 
 
 I need scarcely describe the scene of the first sign- 
 ing of the National Covenant. It is imprinted on the 
 memory of every reader of history. It seems to have 
 stamped itself, as if with a photographic stroke, on the 
 minds of all who were contemporary with the event. 
 All were awed, startled, subdued, as if they had been the 
 witnesses of the rushing mighty wind, and the cloven 
 tongues as of fire, of a new Pentecost. How the dullest 
 old chronicler kindles into a reverential glow, as he 
 relates how the commissioners, who had charge of the 
 momentous task, assembled on the early dawn of that 
 February morning. How the myriads, from Tweed to 
 Tay, from I\Ierse to Galloway, flocked to the Greyfriars, 
 filling church and churchyard. How one great historic 
 face after another appeared on the scene. With what 
 heavenly ardour Henderson prayed to the High and 
 and Lofty One, with Whom a whole nation essayed to 
 enter into covenant, — the vessels of clay with the al- 
 mighty Potter, With what sweetness, force, and per- 
 suasion Loudon spoke to the vast assemblage — he who 
 was famed as the most eloquent man of his time, — 
 enforcing upon them, " that they should carefully keep 
 themselves together in a cause that was common, and in 
 which all and every one was so deeply interested." How 
 earnestly and devoutly the people listened, as Warriston 
 read the Covenant, which owed to his experienced pen 
 much of its comprehensiveness, boldness, and precision. 
 How, after the reading of the document, there was a 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVEXANTERS. 31 
 
 solemn pause, as if men were bowed down by a feeling 
 of the immediate presence of Divinity. How this dread 
 expressive stillness was broken, when the Earl of Suther- 
 land advancing, deeply affected, affixed the first signature 
 to the National Covenant. Then, how a tempest of long 
 pent-up enthusiasm ran through the assembled multi- 
 tudes. Name followed name, as with electric speed, — 
 eye gleamed to eye, hand grasped hand. The fulness of 
 the heart, long with difficulty repressed, now burst free 
 from all restraint. Some wept aloud ; some raised a 
 shout of exultation, as from the field of battle and vic- 
 tory ; some, after their signatures, added the words, " till 
 death ;" some opened their veins, and subscribed their 
 names with their own blood ! 
 
 It was one of those moments of rapt and transcend- 
 ental emotion, which will sometimes seize nations as well 
 as individuals : when there is flashed into them intui- \ 
 tions and resolutions which many rolling generations 
 might ftul to teach ; when they are marvellously embold- 
 ened to do, at a heat, the work of long centuries ; and | 
 seem bonie aloft, as by an irresistible impidse, on the ( 
 strength and swiftness of invisible wings. 
 
 A General Assembly — the first free Assembly for forty 
 years — was held at Glasgow in the winter of the same 
 year (1G38) in which Prelacy was abolished, and Pres- 
 byterianism restored in pristine and perfect integrity. 
 This, in the fond language of the Presbyterian annalists, 
 is commemorated as the " Second Reformation." At 
 this Assembly, the Earl (afterwards Marquis) of Argyle 
 declared his adhesion to the cause of the Covenant. " No 
 
32 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 one thing," writes Baillie, " did C(nifirm us so much as 
 Argyle's presence. . . . The man was the far most power- 
 ful subject in our kingdom." Like most men of extreme 
 caution, when Argyle resolved, he was most resolute. 
 " It was not," he protested to the Assembly, " it was 
 not want of affection to the good of religion and my own 
 country which detained me ; but a desire and hope that, 
 by stajdng with the Court, I might have been able to 
 bring about a redress of grievances. And when I saw 
 that I could not stay longer, without proving unfaithful 
 to God and my country, I felt that it behoved me to 
 join myself openly to your society." 
 
 The Covenanters were now in fact the Nation. Within 
 two months, the whole population, it may be stated 
 roundly, had taken and signed the Covenant ; and 
 30,000 armed men were soon marshalled in array, to 
 support, defend, and execute the mandates of the Cove- 
 nanting leaders. This army of volunteers was placed 
 under the command of Alexander Leslie (afterwards Earl 
 of Leven), who, from an obscure Scottish adventurer, 
 had risen, by skill, gallantry, and success in arms, to the 
 foremost rank in the service of Holland and of Sweden, 
 and became the favourite field-marshal of Gustavus Adol- 
 })hus. The " old, little, crooked soldier" of Baillie — 
 with firm massive face, towering peaked head, short 
 crisp hair, and lancing grey eye, — he was all vigour, 
 decision, wisdom, suavity, simple dignity. He drew 
 around him, like a magnet, all his veteran officers ; col- 
 lected abundance of vrarlike stores from all parts of the 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 33 
 
 Continent ; chilled into excellent soldiers the yeomanry 
 and ploughmen through all the Lowland counties ; and 
 by his tact, and tine perception of character, his affability, 
 his homely comrade-like style of living, and his peerless 
 ability, commanded the reverence and obedience alike of 
 nobles and peasants (to use Baillie's graphic phrase) " as 
 if he had been Great Solyman." At the same time, there 
 was, if not an open and formal, yet a perfect understood 
 accord between the Covenanters of Scotland and the 
 Puritans in England, the latter of whom were now 
 beginning to bear sway in the English Parliament, and 
 were in like manner bestirring themselves to throw oft' 
 much the same load of oppression as that which partly 
 ground down, partly threatened, the people of Scotland. 
 Although the public documents which were emitted 
 by the king launched forth the most imperious edicts 
 and threats against the so-called rebels, the Private Cor- 
 respondence of the time discloses that all this was utter 
 sham. There is nothing but dejection, nothing but 
 croakings of expected defeat, on the part of the English 
 politicians ; — the most boundless confidence and alacrity 
 on the part of Covenanted Scotland. In the Strafford 
 correspondence, Sir Edward Stanhope writes thus plainly, 
 to the overweening and reckless Lord-Deputy of Ireland, 
 a letter which, in a few pithy sentences, lays open to us 
 the very core of history : — " You do not think the lion 
 (meaning Scotland) is so terrible as he is painted. Point 
 blank against this I am not, and yet think he is terrible 
 enough to fear us. . . . Out of doubt they (the Scots) 
 may draw out above three-score thousand strong, able, 
 c 
 
34 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 well-armed men, such as hardly will be terrified with 
 any danger, and such as are inured to all the ills that 
 war commonly puts soldiers to. Though in the first we 
 may equal them, as long as health and strength lasts, 
 yet doubtless in the other we fall far short. It is most 
 certain, of such men excellently well armed, they have 
 in one shire thirty thousand. AVe are questionless far 
 inferior to them in number of great and expert com- 
 manders within this kingdom. And I fear, if it should 
 come to that (which God avert), they would be too far 
 within our bowels to be easily cast out again by those 
 sent for from foreign parts. . . . Who can tell how 
 many hearts they have (God pardon and turn the hearts 
 of such) in this kingdom ? who, though they may be 
 drawn to the field, may fight so faintly as they had 
 better run away ; nay perhaps, if ever fortune smUe 
 on them in any one conflict, false cowards may prove 
 fatal and bloody butchers to their own side. . . . And 
 truly (which God forbid !) if a time of such calamity 
 should come upon us, it would, like a thief in the night, 
 take us unprovided and dismayed — like a sudden plague, 
 or deluge, which would infect and overflow much ground 
 before it could be stayed, and the waters turn home into 
 their own natural channels." 
 
 What a contrast to this letter is the boldness and 
 decision manifested in Scotland ! Thus in a letter from 
 Edinburgh, by Borthwick, an agent much employed by 
 the Covenanters to carry intelligence to and from Eng- 
 land : " All degrees go on without any fainting, and not 
 a man is known to fall from their number, but daily 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS, 35 
 
 coming in. There was never at any time such plenty 
 of preaching and prayer as now in Edinburgh. All the 
 most able ministers are set a-work, preaching every day 
 in many places, and on the Lord's day three sermons in 
 each chiu'ch ordinarily, and so in all the halls and great 
 houses. God is not wanting with his blessing, for the 
 obstinate are powerfully brought in by the ministers of 
 the Word, . . . We hear much of English armies and 
 ships to come, but we neither see nor fear anything that 
 way."^ Thus also in a letter from Alexander Erskine 
 (I suppose of the Mar family) to his brother : "I hope 
 that the same God that strengthened the arm of the 
 land of Sweden against Germany, will strengthen us 
 against England ; at least that part of it that will con- 
 test, without offence given them, for a number of scurvy 
 priests. They may consider that war may well begin 
 here, but, like a pestilence, it will spread over all this 
 isle. . . . Both the king and England are rending that 
 they will never knit again,"^ 
 
 Stung into resistance by national wrongs and insults, 
 and the dark shadows of farther tyranny to come ; united 
 into one brotherhood ; having command of the whole 
 resources of the country, money, men, and arms ; in 
 spired by their rallying cry, " Christ's Crown and Cove- 
 nant ;" and now able to count upon the popular party 
 in England, — the Covenanters, when hostilities opened, 
 achieved an easy victory over Charles, haughty and 
 bigoted, but rash, blind, and unfortunate. " The Cove- 
 nanters," writes the Earl Marshal, from York, to Secre- 
 
 1 State Paper Office. - Thid. 
 
36 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 tary Windebank, just before the meeting of the two 
 armies, " The Covenanters sweep all before them in 
 Scotland with a most high strain of disobedience. . . . 
 We are here (in private be it spoken) without Sir William 
 Uvdale, or so much as one penny of money till he come. 
 How much when, God knows. "^ In both the two cam- 
 paigns of 1639 and 1640, the Covenanters vanquished 
 the king almost without striking a blow, for his power 
 was but a phantom the moment it was approached. 
 They wrung from him, however unwilling, the concession 
 of all their demands, which may be compressed into this 
 one short phrase — Free Parliaments and Free As- 
 semblies. 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 37 
 
 11. 
 
 SOLEMN LEAGUE AND COVENANT WITH ENGLAND. 
 
 The Covenauters had now, in effect, gained the objects 
 for which they took up arms, and had the government 
 of Scotland entirely in their own hands. But the king 
 was engaged in the self-same contest with the English 
 people. 
 
 So long, therefore, as the English contest continued 
 unsettled and doubtful, the Covenanters had no security 
 for the maintenance of their rights. They knew the 
 habitual, the fatal dissimulation of the king ; and that 
 if he could divide and conquer, if he could despatch the 
 liberties of England by its being left alone and unassisted 
 in the contest, he would soon make short work of the 
 extorted concessions in favour of Scotland. 
 
 I cannot pursue the involvements of the English Civil 
 War. It is a history by itself. Suffice it to say, that in 
 1642 both the king and the Parliamentarians were avow- 
 edly mustering for mortal combat, and both were equally 
 anxious about the part which the Scottish Covenanters 
 should take. If they took part at all, the side which 
 they espoused was almost cyrtaiu of a sweeping victory. 
 
38 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 If they even abstained, this sort of negative influence 
 
 would be most portentous ; for, divided as England was, 
 
 and dubiously balanced as were the parties there, no one 
 
 could foretell to which side the fortune of war would 
 
 favourably incline. In all aspects of the matter, the 
 
 responsibility resting upon the Covenanters was tremen- 
 
 ' dous. Owing to a sing-ular combination of events, they 
 
 ; held in their hands the destinies of Britain and the cause 
 
 ' of liberty for an indefinite future. The world was in one 
 
 ' of its biggest throes. On the cast of the die depended 
 
 whether Absolutism or Constitutionalism should rule these 
 
 Islands ; whether there should be any counterpoise to 
 
 the prevailing despotisms of Europe ; or whether it was 
 
 to be consigned to the unrelieved darkness of universal 
 
 repression and bondage. Such was the issue. How did 
 
 the sons of the Covenant reply 1 
 
 Take their reply in the trumpet-tones of the Kirk, 
 which, in those days at least, never uttered an uncertain 
 sound, which never flinched from peril, whose spirit always 
 rose as the waters swelled, and which, with all its peculiar 
 tenets, and all its peculiar phraseology, was ever on the 
 vanguard in the battle for Britain's liberty. Listen to 
 the strong doughty words of the General Assembly : — 
 " The controversies now in England being betwixt the 
 Lord Jesus and Antichrist with his followers, if we 
 would not come under the curse of Meroz, we should 
 come out upon so clear a call from the representative 
 body of England to the representative body of Scotland, 
 and help the Lord against the mighty, being assured 
 that the help we give to His Kirk, in such an exigent. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 39 
 
 is given to Himself, and shall not want a blessed reward." 
 " If we forsake England, we forsake our dearest friends, 
 who can best help us in case we be reduced to the like 
 straits hereafter by the common adversary ; for the dis- 
 tance and distressed estates of other Protestant Kirks 
 make them unable to help us in this kind ; and if we 
 denude ourselv^es of the support of England, by suffering 
 them to sink, we do not only betray their safety, but our 
 own." 
 
 These sentiments, the key-note of a whole people's ,' 
 response, naturally prepared the way for that great public ; 
 act, which truly decided the fate of the Civil War, saved 
 the liberties of Britain at the time, has in a thousand 
 ways influenced her destiny ever since, and first drew 
 England and Scotland into the sympathy of common \ 
 principles and of common interests — I mean " The I 
 Solemn League and Covenant.'^ This bond of alliance 
 between the constituent popular bodies of England 
 and Scotland was entered into in 1643, and was 
 mutually subscribed by the Covenanting and Parlia- 
 mentary leaders, and also extensively by the people of 
 both countries. 
 
 The following is Hallam's analysis, perhaps the neat- 
 est and most concise that can be given, of this sacred 
 treaty between the two nations : — " The Covenant con- 
 sisted in an oath, to be subscribed by all persons in both 
 kingdoms, whereby they bound themselves to preserve 
 the Reformed religion in the Church of Scotland, in 
 doctrine, worship, discipline, and government, according 
 to the Word of God and practice of the best reformed 
 
40 THE FIFTY YEAES STRUGGLE OF 
 
 churclies ; and to endeavour to bring the Cliurches of 
 God, in the three kingdoms, to the nearest conjunction 
 and uniformity in religion, confession of faith, form of 
 church government, directory for worship and catechising ; 
 to endeavour, without respect of persons, the extirpation 
 of Popery, Prelacy, and whatsoever should be found con- 
 trary to sound doctrine and the power of godliness ; to 
 preserve the rights and privileges of the Parliaments, 
 and the liberties of the kingdoms, and the king's person 
 and authority in the preservation and defence of the true 
 religion and liberties of the kingdoms ; to endeavour the 
 discovery of incendiaries and malignants, who hinder the 
 reformation of religion, and divide the king from his 
 people, that they may be brought to punishment ; finally, 
 to assist and defend all such as should enter into this 
 covenant, and not suffer themselves to be withdrawn 
 from it, whether to revolt to the opposite party, or to 
 give in to a detestable indifference and neutrality." 
 
 Let us pause for a moment, and reflect upon the pur- 
 port of this Solemn League, which, together with the 
 National Covenant, was the deliberate and final expres- 
 sion of the opinions of the Scottish people, and to a 
 large extent of the English people, on the civil and reli- 
 gious problems of the da}^ 
 
 There is a vague notion that those Covenants w^ere 
 altogether the work of the austere Scottish Presbyters. 
 But this is not the case. The Covenants, as much as 
 anything could l3e, were the work of the whole nation — 
 the voice of the whole people. The National Covenant 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 41 
 
 was brought forward by tlie famous Tables, as they were 
 called — the four great standing committees organized in 
 1637, and formed so as to represent the nobles, the 
 gentry, the clergy, and the burghers ; and it was ratified \ 
 and made law by the king himself, when he presided in 
 person over the Scottish Parliament of 1641. The 
 Solemn League and Covenant, again, was framed with 
 much care, and formally arranged between the Scottish 
 Parliament and the English Commissioners ; and it was 
 received and adopted by the English Parliament on the! 
 21st September 1643. In short, the Covenants were 
 public legislative acts, expressing what in those days 
 were the fixed ideas and resolutions of the people as to 
 government, as to liberty, as to religion. They were 
 the terms more especially on which Scotland off'ered 
 allegiance to her sovereign. They were the constitution 
 by which the monarch must be bound in rule, no less 
 than the people in loyalty and obedience. 
 
 Wliat, then, were these princiijles ] Looking at both 
 Covenants, and treating them as one document, the prin- 
 ciples therein embodied were the following : — 
 
 1. Defence of the Reformed Presbyterian religion in 
 Scotland. 
 
 2. Promotion of uniformity amongst the churches in 
 the three kingdoms. 
 
 3. Extirpation of Popery, Prelacy, and all unsound 
 forms of religion. 
 
 4. Preservation of the Parliaments, and of the liberties 
 of the people. 
 
 5. Defence of the sovereign in his maintaining the 
 
42 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Reformed religion, the Parliaments, and the liberties of 
 the people. 
 
 6. Discovery and punishment of malignants, and dis- 
 turbers of the peace and welfare of the nations. 
 
 7. Mutual defence and protection of each individually, 
 and of all jointly, who were within the bonds of the 
 Covenant. 
 
 8. Sincere and earnest endeavour to set an example 
 before the world of public, personal, and domestic vu'tue 
 and godliness. 
 
 You will observe, that the principles in these Cove- 
 nants are partly civil or political, partly religious, and 
 partly mixed, or composed of both elements. You will 
 also remember that the Covenants had a twofold deriva- 
 tion : first, they were truly the impulse of the nation, 
 voluntary popular compacts; but, secondly, they were 
 afterwards sanctioned and authorized by the parliaments 
 of both kingdoms. In other words, they were in their 
 origin voluntary bonds of engagement, but were after- 
 wards clothed with authority as legislative acts. 
 
 As voluntary engagements amongst the people them- 
 selves, I can see no objection to them. I think they 
 are worthy of the highest praise and admiration — with 
 one exception, on which I shall have presently to com- 
 ment. The people of Scotland and England, environed 
 with perils as they were at the time, had an undoubted 
 right, as free men and Christian men, to associate volun- 
 tarily for establishing and securing their national privi- 
 leges and institutions as described in the Covenants. 
 
 It is but a truism now-a-days to declare that these 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 43 
 
 were perfectly legitimate objects of voluntary popular 
 association, and are so still ; nay, and I predict, if 
 similar times should recur — if similar perils should again 
 threaten these lands — there are hundreds of thousands, 
 both in England and Scotland, who would also again 
 voluntarily associate, not under the same, but under 
 another Solemn League and Covenant, suited to the 
 ideas, and dangers, and duties of the day. 
 
 Further, it will scarcely now be disputed, that the 
 civil authorities who then actually governed the two 
 nations had a right to intervene with their sanction in 
 the civil objects of the Covenants, such as the preserva- 
 tion of the Parliaments, and of law and liberty, and the 
 requirement that the sovereign should rule in strict ob- 
 servance of these limitations. But was it within their 
 province to interfere with and to add the civil sanction 
 to certain religious principles, such as the defence of 
 Presb}i;crianism in Scotland, the promotion of religious 
 uniformity in the three kingdoms, and the extirpation 
 (in whatever sense that may be taken) of Popery, Pre- 
 lacy, and other unsound forms of religion ? 
 
 There are a number of modern jurists and theologians 
 who contend that the state can only take cognisance of 
 civil affairs ; and that even in these its sphere is a 
 narrow one ; it must let men alone in most of their 
 civil relations and pursuits ; but, above ail, it can take 
 no cognisance of religion ; that is forbidden ground, 
 where it must on no account enter. Men as to their 
 religion must be equally protected, but none favoured 
 and none hindered. For my own hundjlc part, in the 
 
44 THE FIFTY YEAKS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 abstract, I coincide in this view. I cannot interrupt 
 the present discourse witJi a set dissertation upon this 
 questio vexata, daily becoming more urgent for a sohition, 
 and on the true sokitiou of which may soon come to 
 depend, amongst other contingencies, whether free reli- 
 gious societies can really be carried out, — whether large 
 bodies of Christians can realize what they believe to be 
 their Master's model of the Church, His kingdom not 
 of this world, — whether it will be possible to render 
 unto God the things that are God's, without being con- 
 fronted and brought to a stand-still by an arrestment 
 from the hands of Csesar. Opinion is as yet unformed 
 and groping about ; and there is fluctuation and differ- 
 ence amongst the best and wisest. All that I ask is 
 what every one is entitled to, — without argument at 
 present, and without modifying explanations, and in all 
 modesty and candour, I hope, to enunciate what is the 
 broad impression in my own mind. The State, then, in 
 my view, is not a great blind force lying outside of man, 
 like the succession of day and night, or the revolution 
 of summer and winter, which he cannot in any way 
 aflfect or control, but to which he must submit, — to 
 which he must quietly accommodate himself, and do the 
 best he can under the inevitable necessity. The State 
 is his own creature, his own production, over which he 
 has as much control as he has what kind of corn or 
 plants he shall grow upon his lands. The people may 
 assert with truth, what Louis of France did with so 
 much arrogance — "■ The State is ourselves." The State 
 is made for man, not man for the State. It provides 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 45 
 
 for many of liis wants and purposes ; but, it. is not so 
 wide and high as himself; it is not co-extensive with 
 the total of humanity. The people do not place them- 
 selves, soul and body, under its harness, to be turned 
 and driven like dumb cattle. It is only, as it were, a 
 committee appointed by themselves, to conduct certain of 
 their aflFairs, to regulate certain of their actions ; but 
 there is a wide sphere reserved — if not by any express 
 statute, yet by the very essence and dignity of human 
 nature — from the operation of State authority. With- 
 out venturing to define all that is comprised within this 
 reserved sphere, I have no hesitation in affirming, that 
 religious faith, and worship, and discipline are sacredly 
 reserved. In all that appertains to his religion, man 
 stands out free and unshackled, under the blue dome of 
 heaven, alone with his God. The civil magistrate, if he 
 interfere within that region, steps beyond the boundary 
 of his committee powers, and by the free soul of mankind 
 ought to be commanded back into the sole province 
 where he can act or forbid, reward or punish. Hence 
 I cannot even delegate to him any jurisdiction circa 
 sacra. Admit him ci?xa sacra, he will soon force him- 
 self in sacris. AU power, when once admitted, tends to 
 usurp, to absorb, to dominate. Once let the raging 
 flood round about your walls, it will soon sap the foimda- 
 tions, and pour destruction into your innermost chambers. 
 Check it at a distance ; dam it as far away as possible 
 even from your outer walls. 
 
 But then it must be borne in mind, that confused and 
 entangled times will often arise, when that which is 
 
46 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 civil and that wliicli is religious are so mixed, that no 
 human ingenuity, nothing short of omniscience, can 
 analyse and unravel them ; and the State, unless it is 
 ignominiously to forego its whole function of governing, 
 will be necessitated to act, to prescribe, to regulate ; to 
 repress here, to foster and encourage there — even to 
 exercise force, though some may thereby complain that 
 their religion has been interfered with. Such is the 
 seething and boiling in Italy at present, where the so- 
 called spiritual prerogatives of the Pope are mixed up 
 with his claims of temporal sovereignty. Such the in- 
 tense and deep-seated ferment in Hungary (now beginning 
 so closely to resemble the first motions of the Covenant- 
 ing struggle), where the maintenance of ecclesiastical 
 rights is but the symbol of a great national life, which 
 is concentrating until it feel strong enough to shatter 
 that iceberg, within which it would long ago have been 
 frozen to death, but for the immortal fire that animates i 
 the hearts of the people. Such also, to revert to our 
 o\vn subject, w^as the confusion and distraction in this 
 Britain of ours at the time of the Covenanters. Prelacy 
 in eflfect w^as tantamount to royal absolutism, Presby- 
 terianism to constitutional government ; and, conse- 
 quently, the defence of Presbyterianism in Scotland, and 
 its extension, if possible, to the two other kingdoms, 
 were measures all but indispensable, seeing how religious 
 sects were then marshalled, in order to the secure esta- 
 blishment of a constitutional system of government 
 throughout the whole of Britain. The opinion which 
 confines the operations of the State within such narrow 
 
THE SCOTTTSH COVENANTERS. 47 
 
 limits as have been adverted to, is comparatively modern 
 — at least as an active popular opinion. It had never 
 previously been doubted, that the civil magistrate had 
 a charge in regard to the religion of the people (cjrca 
 sacra), quite as much as in regard to their civil relations ; 
 a charge, for instance, not to minister or dispense the 
 sacraments, but a charge to establish the Church within 
 liis dominions ; to protect it, and to guard it from the 
 assaults of error and dissension. Hence it was that all 
 the states throughout Europe were ranged into classes, 
 — Protestant or Popish, Calvinistic or Lutheran, Pres- 
 byterian or Episcopalian ; and had each their national 
 Church civilly endowed and guaranteed, being part and 
 parcel of the State, and had each a certain received civil 
 policy corresponding with these religious distinctions, — 
 a policy which guided them in all their most critical 
 affairs, in war and peace, in their alliances and hostilities, 
 and in the internal government of their several peoples. 
 Such was the understanding of all Europe. It was 
 accepted as an axiom in the government of nations, 
 self-evident, and beyond all dispute. And it is still an 
 axiom in Europe, almost everywhere except in our own 
 country ; and even in our own country it is still held 
 sacred, I apprehend, by a large numerical majority. 
 Surely, then, the Covenanters must have the benefit of 
 this the universal idea of their own times, — the still 
 cherished idea of (as I believe) the majority in the 
 present times. Viewed in the light of this idea, there 
 was nothing wrong or incongruous, there was every- 
 thing just and excellent, in the State lending its sane- 
 
48 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 tion and authority to the religious principles of the 
 Covenants. 
 
 There is one principle, however, which must be ex- 
 cei)ted from the general tribute of praise which we have 
 awarded to the Covenants, — one principle which no 
 allowance for times and circumstances should induce us 
 to slur over and palliate. That is where the Solemn 
 League and Covenant binds the takers of it, — " That we 
 shall, . . . without respect to persons, endeavour the 
 extirpation of Popery, Prelacy, . . . superstition, heresy, 
 schism, profaneness, and whatsoever shall be found to be 
 contrary to sound doctrine and the power of godliness." 
 
 If by " extirpation" it could be supposed that nothing 
 more was intended than that figurative extirpation which 
 may be produced by argument and moral influence (and 
 that gloss has been sometimes attemj^ted upon the pas- 
 sage), there could be no objection, except that a harsh 
 and revolting word had been used. But the context of 
 the Covenants, the measures that were occasionally sanc- 
 tioned by the leaders, as well as the universal intolerance 
 of the period, will not permit this mild construction. It 
 cannot be doubted that the extirpation might be by civil 
 pains, and penalties, and coercions. Si)eaking in the 
 nineteenth century, and in Britain, I need not formally 
 disclaim any approval of such a sentiment. I know of 
 no other weapons a Christian can wield, in combating 
 what he believes to be even deadly error, but persuasion 
 and prayer ; provided always (but this proviso must be 
 well marked) that the error be simply religious, and have 
 no civil characteristics, by which the propagators of it 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 49 
 
 bring lliemselves, by their own default, within the juris- 
 diction of the magistrate. 
 
 Intolerance was the universal vice of the age, and was 
 inevitable in the transition through which mankind were 
 then passing. It was but half a century from the awful 
 struggles of the Reformation ; and there had been war — 
 war — war and bloodshed ever since — through the whole 
 length and breadth of Europe. Romanists and Protes- 
 tants stood on the opposite banks of a small stream, ready 
 to rush across ; and Romanism had latterly been closing 
 in, and gaining the advantage on all sides. Protestant- 
 ism was fresh and young and confident, little used to 
 those doubts, those different \iews of things, with which 
 the modem mind is familiar, and which have taught us 
 at last, it is to be hoped, some lessons of mutual forbear- 
 ance and charity. Young Protestantism, therefore, at 
 first partook largely of the intolerance of old Roman- 
 ism ; although, as can easily be proved from the writings 
 of those very Covenanters, there were visions of loftier 
 things beginning to dawn and glimmer on the inner | 
 sense of Protestant Christians. The Westminster Con- 
 fession, compiled when the Covenanters were at the 
 height of their influence, both in England and Scotland, 
 contains this golden proposition : " God alone is Lord of 
 the conscience, and hath left it free from the doctrines 
 and commandments of men. . . . And the requiring of 
 an implicit faith, and an absolute and blind obedience, 
 is to destroy liberty of conscience, and reason also." 
 Henderson, in a Sermon preached before the House of 
 Lords hi Westminster Abbey, in 1 045, enforces with his 
 
 D 
 
50 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 usual judgment, clearness, and gravity, the entire sjjiri- 
 tuality of Chi:ist's kingdom. Christ " came from heaven 
 for things Divine, to work upon the consciences of men, 
 and was appointed to be Judge of quick and dead ; but 
 never meddled with the office of a temporal king." " The 
 kingdoms of the world have carnal weapons and strength 
 of arms to pursue their ends ; but the weapons of the 
 kingdom of Christ are spiritual, to procure spiritual 
 obedience unto him." " Domination is forbidden church- 
 men ; ministration is commanded." \ If the Covenanters 
 are to be blamed for intolerance — remember — their fault 
 was the blindness of their times, in which their oppon- 
 ents, and other sects and parties, were as much, if not 
 • more involved than themselves.) And Presbyterianism 
 was at least self-curing ; it carried in its bosom the anti- 
 dote as well as the bane. Unlike the dark, close, un- 
 ventilated Hierarchies, Presbyterianism, by its institutions 
 / and opinions, threw itself open to lay influences, to the 
 i voice of the eldership, to the election of the people, to 
 ; the full breeze of public opinion ; and public opinion, as 
 it became more enlightened, was sure, in the end, to blow 
 away and dissipate the fumes of intolerance. 
 
 And at this very juncture, when the Covenanters arose, 
 there were the most ominous, the most gloomy foresha- 
 dowings of danger to Protestantism, and to human liberty, 
 over Europe generally, but particularly in Britain. I 
 shall quote from two Avriters, whose genius, whose calm- 
 ness, whose large comprehension, whose research in ori- 
 ginal documents, invest their statements with the high- 
 est authoritv. I refer to Ranke and Guizot. As regards 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVKNANTERS. ol 
 
 the general daii<rer tu Eurojic, Raiike, in treating of the 
 first half of the seventeenth eentury, thus speaks : " The 
 Catholic world of tliis period was of one mind and faith, 
 elassical and monarchical. The Protestant was divided, 
 romantic and republican. . . . In the year 1 617, every- 
 thing already betokened the approach of a decisive con- 
 flict between them. The Catholic party appears to 
 have felt itself the superior ; it is, at all events, not to 
 be denied that it was the first to take arms." Urban 
 VIII. "• was determined to rest satisfied with nothing 
 less than a complete restitution of all Church property, 
 and the return of all Protestants to Catholicism." Next, 
 as regards the particular danger to Britain, Ranke con- 
 tinues : " But in that moment of prosperity, the pontiff 
 liad raised his thoughts to a design still more vast and 
 daring, if possible, than that just described. This was 
 no other than an attack on England ; an idea that had 
 re-api)eared from time to time, as if by a sort of neces- 
 sity, among the grand combinations of Catholicism. 
 Urban viii. now hoped to make the good understanding 
 re-established between the two crowns (France and Spain), 
 subservient to the promotion of this favomite design." 
 Besides these threats of a foreign Romanist invasion, 
 tliere was internal danger arising from the English Pre- 
 lacy, which, under Laud, .seemed hastening down into 
 the vortex of Rome. Of this latter danger, Guizot gives 
 a ver}' animated and striking description : " Laud was 
 continually innovating without consulting anybody, sup- 
 I)orted only by the king's sanction, and sometimes even 
 acting upon hi.s own sole authority. . . . The object, or 
 
52 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 at least the result of all these alterations, was to render 
 the Church of England more like the Church of Rome. 
 The liberty which the Papists enjoyed, and the hopes 
 which, either from imprudence or policy, they openly 
 manifested, confirmed the people in their most sinister 
 apprehensions. Books were published to prove that the 
 doctrine of the English bishops might very easily be 
 reconciled to that of the Church of Rome ; and these 
 books, although not authorized, were dedicated either 
 to the king or to Laud, and publicly tolerated. . . . 
 Accordingly, the belief in the approaching triumph of 
 Popery daily gained credit, and the courtiers, who had 
 the best opportunities of judging, shared this belief with 
 the general mass of the nation. The daughter of the 
 Duke of Devonshire became a Catholic. Laud inquired 
 what reasons had induced her to take this step. ' I am 
 not fond of being in a crowd,' she replied ; ' I see that 
 your grace and many others are on the way to Rome, so 
 I wish to go there alone, and before you.' " 
 
 It was in the presence of all these threatened dangers 
 that the Covenants were framed and sworn. It was not 
 in halcyon days, such as we have long enjoyed, under 
 the vine and under the fig-tree, sitting in undisturbed 
 repose. It was when all was agitation and conflict 
 and dismay. It was when the laws were openly set at 
 nought by the Crown, which ought to be the centre of 
 all law, or insidiously undermined through the corrup- 
 tion of the judges. It was when the power of the State 
 was being more and more taken out of the hands of its 
 natural custodiers, the great territorial nobles, the great 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEIIS. o3 
 
 intluential commoners, and placed under the grasp of 
 morose and unfeeling priests, and of hirelings bought by 
 cash or coronets, to do the dirty work of the Court. It 
 was when there was a deliberate, methodical scheme — 
 tlie well-known " Thorough" of Strafford and Laud, laid 
 in concert with the king — to destroy everything like a 
 constitution in England, Scotland, and Ireland, and to 
 rule as from Olympus, unchallenged by mortals, fulmi- 
 nating decrees, and edicts, and levies for taxation. It 
 was when the whole three kingdoms were to be ridden 
 down as a conquest. It was when those troublesome 
 Parliaments were to be extinguished altogether, or only 
 convened to register the mandates of the Crown and fis 
 a decent form for draining money out of the pockets of 
 tlie people. But there were to be no stupid debates, no 
 liateful lists of grievances, above all, nothing so dangerous 
 as Parliamentary legislation for the relief of oppressed 
 subjects. It was when all the usual means by which a 
 [)PO})le utter their voice were silenced ; public meetings, 
 books, even the gathering together of two or three 
 to converse ; only one voice was allowed to be heard : 
 " Obey, obey, passively obey ; like a nation of asses, 
 bend to the burden !" And any rash man, trying a 
 little free speech, might be thankful if he oidy had his 
 ears cut off, and his nose slit, and his cheeks branded 
 with the felons' mark, and a ruinous fine imposed, and 
 the bars of a prison to im})n'ss a little wholesome re- 
 straint upon his over-aspiring mind. It was when the 
 Pteformation and all its fruits were like to perish under 
 a mildew, eating away all saj) and .substance : instead of 
 
54 THE FIFTY YEARs' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 God's own Word, some snivelling chant ; instead of a 
 calm and reasonable devotion, a tedious round of mys- 
 tical forms and bowings and tricks of the theatre ; 
 instead of salvation l)y the individual man simply com- 
 ing to the Saviour iov himself, a juggle of priestly im- 
 pertinences and ceremonies and absolutions. A man 
 could not reach heaven for the quantity of lumber that 
 was thrown in his way. And there was behind the 
 shadow of worse to come. Rome treading fast on the 
 heels of Laud and his mongrel priests, wdth her hand 
 ready to screw down the coffin on all intellectual and 
 true spu-itual life — Mother Church, which, like Father 
 Saturn, devours all her children. It was when there 
 was an enormous combination of foreign powers forming 
 to bury Protestant Britain for ever in the ruins of all 
 its peculiar institutions and liberties : Urban of Rome, 
 Richelieu of France, Olivarez of Spain ; all of them 
 names like thunderbolts, embodying the whole strength 
 and terror of Europe, portending instant death to whom- 
 soever they should strike. Then it was, amid dangers 
 and horrors which would have appalled a weak nation, 
 but w^hich always rouse a strong one to some great 
 movement that alters the face of the world, — then it 
 was that first Scotland alone m the National Covenant, 
 next Scotland joined with England in the Solemn League 
 (according to their own glorious devout words), " With 
 our hands lifted up to the Most High," swore to defend 
 the Reformed religion ; to extirpate the errors, not more 
 opposed to the Reformation than destructive of their 
 rivil existence and riglits ; to preserve, alike from foreign 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 55 
 
 foe aud intestine plot, their Parliaments and the lil)eities 
 of the people ; to require from the sovereign, in return 
 for their allegiance, the foithful observance of all consti- 
 tutional guarantees ; and to throw the broad shield of 
 their protection over all who should flock to their banner, 
 whether the blow were aimed at the wliole body, or at 
 the humblest individual of their number. 
 
 In the Inirricane which lately swept around our coast, 
 such as a generation has not seen ; when earth, sea, and 
 sky seemed to commingle in a second chaos, and our 
 waters were strewn with wrecks, and our shores covered 
 with dead bodies, and the cry of bereaved families rose 
 to heaven in anguish, never, never to be forgotten ; 
 amid disaster and grief, there wa« one thing that relieved 
 the dismalness of the scene, that made us smile with 
 triumph in our very tears, and exidt amid our miseries. 
 That was when the tidings came, how, on tthat terrihc 
 day and night, the British Fleet stood out into the mid- 
 Channel, and rode in order of battle into the darkest re- 
 cesses of the tempest, and said to danger, " Where art 
 thou 1" and to destruction, "I can meet thee calmly 
 when duty calls." Oh, what a thrill of patriotic ardour 
 shot through the souls of our people, as they next day 
 read, and read, and never tired reading the noble inci- 
 dents ; and felt what a land they live in, and what men 
 are bom there, who do their duty and serve their coun- 
 try with calm and unflinching steadfastness, leaving all 
 outward events to the God of the brave and the true. 
 " Our fleet rode the Cliannel that night ! " will be the 
 father's .story to his children : and we accf7)t it as nn 
 
56 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 earnest of victory if ever mad ambition and the hellish 
 passions of war attempt to force a passage to our shores. 
 But was it not the same spirit which animated the Bri- 
 tain of the seventeenth century, when she recoiled not 
 from the danger which threatened her utter destruction, 
 but advanced to that danger, and braved it, and rode in 
 order of battle into the very hurricane of its fury 1 It 
 is the spirit to do or die, to forestal rather than give the 
 start to danger, when the liberties of our countiy are at 
 stake. This spirit is our palladium, the secret of our 
 existence and power. Faithfully preserved, we are safe. 
 Lost, our empire and influence are gone. 
 
 The Solemn League and Covenant, between the Cove- 
 nanters of Scotland and the Parliamentarians in England, 
 was sealed and cemented in the common victory which 
 they won alj Marston Moor in 1644, when the king's 
 hopes on the battle-field were extinguished for ever. The 
 melancholy drama, so far as he was concerned, was soon 
 to terminate on the scaffold at Whitehall. 
 
 But the Covenanters had now touched the zenith of 
 their influence. For a time they had been the arbiters 
 of fate between the king and the English people. But 
 as botanists relate, that the full blossom of the flower is 
 just the first stage of decay ; so at the fullest and com- 
 pletest point of their influence, the Covenanting party 
 began to fade and decline. They ceased to play the 
 leading part, which was speedily, and perhaps somewhat 
 roughly, taken out of their hands by tlieir English allies. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. i) I 
 
 To them the Covenanters had acted as a covering army, 
 screening their operations, and enabling them to gather 
 and mar.shal their forces. This done, the function of 
 tlie Covenanters in English affairs came to an end, at 
 least for the present. Their old friends, the original 
 Puritans — in other words, the English Presbyterians — 
 -were sinking equally with themselves before the rise of 
 another, a new and terrible power, — the Independents 
 i/nder Cromiuell. The Covenanters had to fall back 
 within the lines of their own country ; and even there, 
 the fatality of decline, once begun, seemed to track their 
 footsteps. First one entanglement, and then another ; 
 first one dissension, and then another, so embarrassed 
 and weakened and rent them to pieces, that the " blessed 
 and loyal conjunction" of 1G38 became little better 
 than a rope of sand ; and, ere long, the Presbyterian 
 nationality of Scotland, baptized at the Greyfriars in the 
 tears and blood of a people united as one man in the 
 lionds of their sacred Covenant, had to bend, first under 
 the yoke, but the mild and splendid yoke of Cromwell, 
 and finally beneath the degrading chains imposed upon 
 them at the Restoration. 
 
 When the king had been reduced to a state of cap- 
 tivity by the English Parliament, and even his person 
 was no longer secure, the tide of feeling in both coun- 
 tries turned very much in his favour. The people sel- 
 dom deliberate, or reason, or coldly calculate the expe- 
 dl'Micy of things. Tluy feel, they sympathize, they an; 
 agitated bv the varying current of events. If tlicv are 
 
.58 THE FIFTY YEAKs' STEU(iGLE OF 
 
 easily incensed, and even roused to revolt by the oppres- 
 sions of the great, they are the first to melt at the spec- 
 tacle of their misfortunes, though in some respects well 
 deserved, and brought on by their own follies and crimes. 
 Of the turn of popular feeling in favour of Charles, the 
 Royalists prepared to make political capital. The sym- 
 pathy was perhaps more strongly marked in Scotland 
 than in England ; for even the most sincere and sturdy 
 Covenanter, although wroth with the kings "malig- 
 nancy," had still a warm comer in his heart for the royal 
 person and for kingly government. 
 
 Operating upon this state of the national mind, a 
 movement was set a-going in Scotland by a party who 
 ostensibly belonged to the Covenanters, with the \iew 
 of drawing in the Scottish people to join with the Royal- 
 ists in both countries against the prevailing faction in 
 England, and to deliver the king from the unworthy 
 bondage in which he was held ; so that all differences 
 might be settled by parliamentary and peaceable means. 
 Such were the pretexts and the style employed ; the 
 gilding of the Covenant spread over an intrigue of Royal- 
 ism. This party was led by the Marquis of Hamilton, 
 then professing to be a Covenanter ; and was soon 
 strengthened, not only by the fusion of the Royalists, 
 but by large and eminent accessions from the Covenant- 
 ing body. Loudon, the orator of the National Covenant, 
 came ; and Lauderdale, the bearer to the English Par- 
 liament of the Solemn League and Covenant ; and Mid- 
 dleton, whom the Covenanters had formerly pitted (and 
 he was no unequal matcli) against the dazzling chivalry 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVKNANTKKS. 59 
 
 of Montrose. The nobles very generally came. Almost 
 the only great baron who stood aloof, nay, and opposed 
 the measure, was the Marqnis of Argyle ; and the ever- 
 watchful Kirk foresaw the danger, and laid bare the 
 ileceitfuluess and hoUowness of the movement. But the 
 Hamiltouian party persevered. In 1648, the famous 
 P^NGAGEMEXT (as it was stylcd) was entered into between 
 them and the king. Soon afterwards, in pursuance of 
 this engagement, they invaded England ; but at the 
 liattle of Preston, where they were totally routed by 
 Cromwell, they expiated the rashness, absurdity, and 
 treachery of their proceedings. 
 
 The immediate consequence in Scotland was the sud- 
 den and sweeping return of the Strict Covenanters to 
 tlie head of affairs, under the leadership of Argyle, — 
 TJie Whigaraore Raid, as it was called by the humorists 
 <»f those days, — the first time, so far as I recollect, that 
 the title of " Whig" entered into our party nomen- 
 clature. But the ultimate effects were disastrous in the 
 extreme. The once united body of the Covenanters was 
 si)lit into Strict Covenanters and Engagers. The latter 
 may be said — in one sense to have seceded, in another, 
 to have been ejected, from the main body ; and, ere 
 long, virtually abandoned the Covenant altogether. By 
 degrees, they amalgamated more or less perfectly with 
 the Royalists ; and, as is the wont of old friends when 
 they quarrel, they and the Covenanters became irrecon- 
 cilable foes. 
 
 The Covenanters, to fortify their position, pas.sed the 
 celebrated "Act of Classes," in the Parliament of 1049. 
 
60 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 This measure was heralded by a long and severe speecli 
 from Argyle, which is thus curiously reported by Sir 
 James Balfour : — " This day (5th January 1649), the 
 Marquis of Argjde had a very long speech, consisting of 
 five heads, which he called the breaking of the Malig- 
 nants' teeth ; and that he who was to speak after him 
 (Warriston) would break their jaws." By the " Act of 
 Classes," ail general officers, chief movers, and officials, 
 who had made themselves active in the Engagement, 
 were declared to form the first class of Malignants, and 
 to be for ever incapable of public trust or employment. 
 All committee men, volunteers, and other favourers of 
 the Engagement, not in this first class, were incapaci- 
 tated for ten years ; and could only be restored, on their 
 giving proofs the most galling and humiliating, of re- 
 pentance for their past sins, and of a return to the 
 principles of the Covenant. All not within the first and 
 second classes, members or clerks of Parliament, mem- 
 bers of Town-Coimcils, and all other persons, in whatever 
 place or station, who had served in the Engagement, or 
 seduced others to join, or who had not protested against 
 it, or had obstructed those who were protesting or oppos- 
 ing, — were declared incapable of public employment for 
 five years, and could only be restored on the conditions 
 already mentioned. All members of judicatories, and 
 other public officers, who were openly profane and scan- 
 dalous, and neglecters of the worship of Cod in their 
 families, were disqualified for one year, and were only 
 to be restored on similar proofs being given of repent- 
 ance and amendment of life. This wholesale proscription. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 61 
 
 which might to some extent be justified under the neces- 
 sities and convulsions of the period, and which, in the 
 meantime, secured to the Covenanters a monopoly of the 
 Government, led in the event to two results, — each of 
 them almost equally calamitous to the Covenanters them- 
 selves, and for many long, wearisome, wretched years, 
 destructive of all possibility of Constitutional govern- 
 ment in Scotland. The one was, that this proscription 
 of all but the Strict Covenanters from employment in 
 the public seiTice, kindled a new controversy amongst 
 the remaining Covenanters themselves, and dissevered 
 them, thoroughly enfeebled already, into two factions — 
 the Resolutioners, w^ho were favourable to a large admis- 
 sion " of all fencible persons in the land ;" and the Pro- 
 testers. who insisted upon the Act of Classes in all its 
 stringency. The other result was, that the views and 
 objects of the Covenanters (which, amid many defects, 
 were the very germ from which has sprung our British 
 Constitution) were henceforth attacked, and their utter 
 extermination sought after, by a confederation of their 
 old enemies, the Koyalists, and their new enemies, the 
 Engagers or Resolutioners, — a confederation that was 
 soon to be in a situation to carry out its deadly purpose. 
 
 I pass over the execution of Charles i. on the 30th 
 J.muary 1G49, but with this remark : His tragical death 
 caused a gulf of blood to yawn for evermore between the 
 Royalists and tlie Covenanters. On the latter — as the 
 originators of the war — as the first to give the signal of 
 resistance to absolutism — as the allies of the Eno-lish 
 
62 THE FIFTV VEAKs' STRUGGLE OK 
 
 Parliament — as opponents of the Engagement, which, 
 even at the eleventh hour, might have rescued the king, 
 if the Strict Covenanters had joined — and now as the 
 authors of an act by which the whole royal party were 
 proscribed as Malignants, — on their heads, we say, was 
 accumulated the chief odium and guilt of his death. The 
 Royalists ever afterwards looked upon the Presbyterians 
 with more horror and detestation than they did even 
 upon the Independents and Cromwellians. 
 
 Such a thrill of indignation was felt through all Scot- 
 land, amongst all classes and parties, at what was con- 
 sidered the murder of the king ; and so stanch were the 
 people to the monarchical idea, and to the line of the 
 Stuarts, that the Covenanting Government, whether it 
 was agreeable to their own views or not (which is doubt- 
 ful), if they were to keep their own footing, found it 
 necessary to open communications with the Prince, after- 
 wards Charles ii. But knowing his character, even then 
 mature in \dcc, in falsehood, and treachery, thougli he 
 was only twenty years of age, and liad passed under the 
 sometimes salutary rod of adversity, — they did all they 
 could to save the countrj-- from its own extravagance, 
 and to maintain the standard of constitutional liberty. 
 For this purpose they passed an Act, ordering that, 
 before being admitted to the throne of Scotland, lie 
 .should disband his evil counsellors, the Mahgnants ; and 
 furthermore (in the words of the Act itself), " should 
 consent and agree, that all civil matters should be de- 
 termined by the Parliament of the kingdom, and all 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 6^5 
 
 oeelesiastical matters by the General AssembI}- of tlie 
 Kirk." This was just, in other words, that he was to 
 rule as a constitutional kiug, with responsible and po- 
 pular advisers. 
 
 Charles, when everj- other shift failed him, — when ho 
 found that the Enghsh cavaliers were utterly prostrate, 
 tliat the Irish rapparces were not ready at the moment 
 to cut throats, and that Montrose, who had his warrant 
 to try a rebellion in the Highlands, had been brought 
 to the ground, like a shot vulture, — when there was no 
 other door of hope, he flung himself headlong into the 
 arms of the Covenanters, swallowing all their terms, and 
 subscribing the Covenant, and all the paper promises 
 they liked to lay before him. When Patrick Gillespie 
 besought him not to subscribe a certain declaration, 
 " No, not for the three kingdoms, if he were not satisfied 
 in his soul and conscience, beyond all hesitation, of its 
 righteousness," — " Mr. Gillespie, Mr. Gillespie," he 
 answered, haWng, it seems, the royal trick of repeating 
 his words, " I am satisfied, I am satisfied, and, there- 
 fore, will subscribe." 
 
 On the 1st of January 1G51, Charles was crowned, 
 where the ancient kings of Scotland used to be, at Scone, 
 near Perth. " This day," exclaims Baillie, in a rapture 
 of loyalty, writing from Perth, " we have crowned our 
 noble king with all the solemnities, ... So peaceably 
 ;ind magnificently, as if no enemy liad been among us. 
 This is of God ; for it was Cromwell's piu^Dose, which I 
 tliought easily lie miglit have performed, to have marred 
 l)y arms that action, at least the solemnity of it." 
 
64 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 In the morning, the nobles and estates of Parliament 
 attended him at a formal audience, in the presence- 
 chamber of the palace ; and afterwards accompanied 
 liim to the venerable abbey-church (as we learn from the 
 contemporary account), " in order and rank according 
 to their quality, two and two." The crown was carried 
 before him by the Marquis of Argyle. " Then came the 
 king, with the Great Constable on his right hand, and 
 the Great Llarshal on his left hand," his train borne by 
 four earls' eldest sons, and under a canopy of crimson 
 velvet, supported by six earls' eldest sons, and attended 
 by a cluster more of the yoimg nobility. " Thus," says 
 the old journalist, " the king's majesty entered the kirk." 
 The church was suitably prepared ; and in the midst, 
 there was a raised platform, twenty-four feet square, on 
 an elevated portion of which the throne was placed. 
 " All being quietly composed unto an attention," the 
 king sitting in a chair of state opposite the pulpit, 
 Robert Douglas preached the Coronation Sermon. Since 
 the death of Henderson, this was the Kirk's most 
 eminent minister ; wanting the originality, the bold con- 
 ception, the silent stern command of his predecessor, 
 but resembling him in prudence and moderation, and 
 equalling him in integrity of disposition and singleness 
 of heart. The sermon was appropriate and judicious, 
 plain-spoken, without dogmatism or violence, and such 
 as became the Christian patriot. In a few sentences he 
 exhausted the whole philosophy of constitutional govern- 
 ment. "It is good for our king to learn to be wise in 
 time, and know that he receiveth this day a power to 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. C)5 
 
 govern, but a power limited by contract ; and these 
 conditions he is bound by oath to stand to. Kings are 
 deceived, who think that the people are ordained for the 
 king, and not the king for the people. . . . There must 
 be no tyranny upon the throne. ... As the king is 
 solemnly sworn to maintain the right of the subjects 
 against enemies, and is bound to hazard his life and all 
 that he hath for their defence, so the people are also 
 bound to maintain his person and authority, and so 
 hazard life and all that they have in defending him." 
 After sermon, Douglas read the Covenants slowly and 
 distinctly, the Commissioners from the General Assembly 
 standing in front of the pulpit ; and the King kneeling, 
 and lifting up his right hand, sware, — " I, Charles, \^^ 
 King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, do assure"' 
 and declare, by my solemn oath, in the presence of 
 Almighty God, the searcher of hearts, my allowance and 
 approbation of the National Covenant, and of the Solemn 
 League and Covenant, . . . and faithfully oblige myself 
 to prosecute the ends thereof in my station and calling." 
 And he subscribed the Covenants, and the words of the 
 oath, " being drawn up in a fair parchment," as part of 
 the charter by which he was to hold his rights as king. 
 He then ascended the platform, and sat down upon the 
 throne. The lords who were officiating repaired to the 
 four corners of the platform, and the Lord Lyon ad- 
 dressed the assembled multitude, " Sirs, I present unto 
 you the king. . . . Are you willing to have him for 
 your king, and become subject to his commandment ? " 
 And the king rose and showed himself to the people, 
 
66 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 and they answered with cheerful acclamations, " God 
 save the king !" Descending, and resuming his former 
 seat, after certain questions had been proposed to him, 
 Charles took the Coronation Oath, by which he bound 
 himself to " maintain the true religion of Christ Jesus ;" 
 and to " rule the people committed to his charge accord- 
 ing to the will and command of God, and according to 
 the loveable laws and constitutions received in the 
 realm ;" and that "in all judgments he shall command 
 and procure that justice and equity be kept to all crea- 
 tures without exception, as the Lord and Father of 
 mercies shall be merciful to him." " This done," con- 
 tinues our journalist, " the king's majesty sitteth down 
 in his chair, and reposeth himself a little." After an 
 interval of repose, he rises from the chair, and the robes 
 of a prince are taken off him, which up to this time he 
 had worn, and he " is invested by the chamberlain in his 
 royal robes." The sword being girt by his side, and the 
 spurs put on, the Marquis of Argyle places the crown 
 upon his head ; and on the herald's proclamation, the 
 noblemen come forward and kneel, and with their hands 
 touch the crown on the king's head, and each swears, 
 " By the Eternal and Almighty God, who liveth and 
 reigneth for ever, I shall support thee to the uttermost." 
 And the people hold up their hands, whilst the Lord 
 Lyon reads the words of the people's oath, " We become 
 your liege men, and truth and faith shall bear unto you, 
 and live and die with you, against all manner of folks 
 whatsoever, in your semce, according to the National 
 Covenant and Solemn League and Covenant." The king 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 67 
 
 now again ascended the i)latforni, with the crown on his 
 head, and was installed in the throne as the true and 
 lawful sovereign of the Scottish nation. "Sire!" said 
 
 . Robert Douglas, in conclusion, with noble and pathetic 
 eiirnestuess — with a voice of prophecy which was ful- 
 filled within forty years, — " Sire ! destroi/ers are pre- 
 pared for the injustice of the throne. I entreat you, 
 execute righteous judgment. If you do it not, your 
 house will be a desolation." With these awful words 
 of warning still ringing in his ears, the new-made king 
 descended from the throne ; the glittering pageant again 
 formed ; and the chivalry and citizenship of Scotland 
 marched back to the palace in the same (^rder as they 
 had issued forth in the morning. 
 
 A gallant, imposing, almost sublime spectacle, if it had 
 been real. Never perhaps had that contract between 
 king and people, which has been supposed to exist only 
 in the brains of philosophers, been displayed so openly 
 and tangibly in the broad daylight — in the ceremonials 
 of an actual coronation. But, alas ! it was a hollow 
 pomp, a blasphemous farce ; and, to their e(pial shame, 
 Itoth parties were conscious that they had been acting a 
 falsehood before the eyes of a staring and credulous 
 l>e(jple. It is plain that neither of them was deceived 
 in the other. Charles felt that under the name of king 
 he was but a prisoner, and was used as the tool of the 
 
 • dominant party, who gave no credit to his professions. 
 The Covenanters saw that his nature was base and faith - 
 le.ss ; that no tie could bind him ; that declarations and 
 oaths were to him but as empty air. Tliey took their 
 
68 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 measures accordingly. They banished his Malignant 
 associates, reduced him to a nonentity, ruled everything 
 without him, and, what to him was the most intolerable 
 of all, subjected him to a discipline of endless fasts, and 
 prayers, and sermons. Argyle, the real sovereign of the 
 country, whoever might be nominal king, seems to have 
 tended and kept about him with a kind of ostentatious 
 service, half-prying and half-patronizing, which struck 
 the bitterest enmity into the young king's heart. Ever 
 careful in those times of change and jeopardy to fence 
 himself round with ratifications, and indemnities, and 
 secret pactions, Argyle, in whose hands Charles was only 
 a puppet, drew from huu a letter, wi'itten by himself, 
 and signed with his seal-manual, expressive of his favour 
 towards Argyle, and trust and confidence in him ; and, 
 particularly, promising to make him a duke^ a knight of 
 the garter, and lord of the bed-chamber, whenever he 
 should think lit to call for performance of the promise ; 
 to be guided by his counsels ; and, when restored to his 
 just rights in England, to see him paid the sum of 
 <£40,000 sterling (an enormous amount in those days, 
 probably equal to £150,000 now), which was estimated 
 '. as the debt due to Argyle for his public disbursements 
 and expenses. Rising in ambition, and yielding to the 
 weird-like vision that the race of Maccallum-More might 
 yet mount the throne, he proposed that Charles should 
 marry his daughter, to which the needy and reckless 
 youth consented, probably, however, only to amuse him, 
 and attach him by the bands of golden hope to the 
 Royalist cause. This singular piece of secret history is 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 69 
 
 most circumstantially related by old Kirkton, a contem- 
 porary, having the best means of information, honest 
 and unsophisticated, himself a Covenanter, and candid 
 and respectful to the memory of the great Marquis. 
 " The Marquis of Argyle, being all that time almost dic- 
 tator of Scotland, to make all sure for himself, being in 
 great danger from the en\7- of his enemies, thought good 
 to strike up a match betwixt the king and his daughter, 
 Lady Anne, to which the king consented with «,ll asstir- 
 ance ; though all that poor family had by the bargain 
 was a disappointment, so grievous to the poor young 
 lady, that, of a gallant young gentlewoman, she lost her 
 spirit and turned absolutely distracted. So unfortunately 
 do the back wheels of private designs work in the puppet 
 plays of the public revolutions in the world." This real 
 dictation, exercised under the guise of loyal counsel, 
 varied by some sharp reproofs for the vices in which 
 Charles indulged, and aggravated by what would appear 
 the traitorous presumption of taking advantage of the 
 king's necessities to urge the marriage with his daughter ; 
 all these, and many other circumstances, excited in the 
 king feelings of personal revulsion and abhorrence, which 
 in course of time hurried Argyle to his doom. Charles, 
 who was all his life very easy as to public indignities 
 done to the nation, was never known to forgive any man 
 who had insulted or personally offended himself ; only 
 he waited on quietly till the time for revenge came 
 round. He winked like an owl, but at last seized on 
 his prey like a raven. 
 
 This unreal and unnatural state of things, the bow 
 
70 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 being too far bent, snapt and gave way after Cromwell's 
 defeat of the Covenanting army at the battle of Dunbar. 
 This battle was to the Covenanters something like the 
 battle of Preston to the Engagers. It shattered their 
 forces, crippled their intiuence, and dimmed the prestige 
 which liad hitherto surrounded them. On their wreck, 
 military and political, a kind of King's Guard was 
 formed, composed of Royalists and Engagers, who now 
 broke through all the meshes of restraint, soon com- 
 manded a majority in the Committee of Estates, and at 
 one blow demolished that Act of Classes, out of which 
 their own proscription as a party, and the exclusive do- 
 minion of the Covenanters, had equally arisen. They 
 proceeded to levy a new army, commanded, officered, and 
 very much filled by Malignants (or anti-Covenanters), 
 who would fight no longer for the liberties of the people, 
 but only for the restoration of the king to sovereign and 
 absolute power. 
 
 Last fatal sign, that the ancient spirit and the free- 
 dom of Scotland were about to disappear under a total 
 eclipse ! the Kirk, the hitherto impregnable, imyielding 
 Kirk, stooped down from her old height, and emitted 
 resolutions in favour of those proceedings of the Eoyalists. 
 Against these Resolutions, a large, bold, fierce mino- 
 rity, headed by James Guthrie of Stirling, Protested ; 
 l)rotested that the principles of the Covenant should be 
 maintained ; protested that Malignants should not be 
 admitted to places of trust and authority, so as to enable 
 them to sap and betray the liberties of the country ; 
 protested that the king should only be received, and 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 71 
 
 allegiance only accorded to him, on the old constitutional 
 terms of free Parliaments and free Assemblies. Such 
 was the rise of the Eesoluiionei^s and the Protesters, one 
 of the most bitter and implacable feuds that ever raged 
 in any country ; and by which the Church of Scotland, 
 once so united and powerful, and indeed the whole 
 people, were hopelessly divided ; and were so unnerved, 
 shaken to pieces, and deprived of all strength, as to be- 
 come an easy prey to the mighty at the time of the 
 Restoration. 
 
 If the Protesters had not the satisftiction to carry out 
 their own views, they had at least the consolation of 
 paralysing the military movements of the Royalist-Reso- 
 lutioner party. Of the nobles, indeed, Argyle alone 
 sided with the Protesters, at least kept aloof from the 
 Resolutioners ; but the absence of Argyle, lord of such 
 a vast principality, so long the real governor of Scotland, 
 created an ominous blank in the Royalist host. What 
 the Protesters wanted in nobles, they made up in the 
 general support of the smaller gentry, of the citizens, 
 and the common people. This arrested the recruiting 
 for the Royal army, which, besides, was not very bril- 
 liantly ofl&cered, and had the poorest of commanders-in- 
 chief in the person of the king himself Wliat was an 
 army, so mustered and so commanded, but stubble before 
 the sword of Cromwell 1 And such it proved, at the 
 battle of Worcester, in IGol, where, for the time being, 
 the final extingidsher was put upon Royalism in Britain. 
 The protesting Covenanters had thus the merit, as they 
 might themselves deem it — the misfortune, as it turned 
 
72 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 out to their sad experience in the after days of reaction — 
 to aid greatly in exchiding Charles from the throne, and 
 the Royalists from power, wealth, and office, for the full 
 space of ten years longer. 
 
 These ten years — these dismal ten years — imparted 
 edge and keenness to the persecutions that followed the 
 Restoration of 1661 ! 
 
 Their principal leaders hitherto had been the old Earl 
 of Leven, Alexander Henderson, and the Marquis of 
 Argyle. Leven restricted himself very much to his 
 duties as a military commander. Henderson had by 
 this time passed away from the scene, as on the wings 
 of that whirlwind which he had done so much to raise 
 and to moderate, to sustain and direct. Argjde re- 
 mained, the very personification of this period of struggle 
 anterior to the Restoration ; and we shall in due time 
 meet him paying the penalty which all reformers must 
 pay, whenever the floodgates of reaction break loose. 
 
 Archibald, Marquis of Argyle, was the representative 
 of one of the oldest and greatest families in Scotland. 
 It seems to have been a family that generally sided with 
 new aspiring parties, with new imminent revolutions, 
 and rose upon every change. It took part with Bruce, 
 and shared in his prosperous fortunes. It cast in its lot 
 with the Reformation ; and when that cause became all- 
 triumphant, the family of Argyle made a further stride 
 in eminence and power. And now when the great 
 struggle for constitutional liberty broke out, again there 
 was an Argyle — true to the instincts of the family — 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 73 
 
 thoughtfully and cautiously embarking upon the revo- 
 lutionary or popular side ; and at every swell of the 
 wave mounting higher and higher in rank, in posses- 
 sions, in distinction, in personal and political importance. 
 He was born in 1598. He was educated with care, and 
 to a degree beyond what the rough barons of those times 
 generally aspired after. Besides the usual routine of the 
 classics, the native bent of his mind led him to the pro- 
 found and methodical study of theology and jurisprudence. 
 His training thus prepared him to be the foremost states- 
 man in an age of politico-religious revolution ; and the 
 short pithy maxims of the scholastic theologians and 
 jurists are thickly inlaid in all his speeches and writings. 
 On returning from his travels, he repaired to the Court 
 of Charles i., where he was held in gi-eat favour and 
 consideration by the King. In 1626, he was made a 
 privy-councillor, and was much employed in the King's 
 service. His father, also Archibald by name, seems to 
 have been a man of wayward, perverse, and unhappy 
 disposition. He had been a favourite with James ; but 
 being immersed in debt, had to quit the country in 
 1616, and, as Scotstarvet informs us, "went over to 
 West Flanders to serve the King of Spain, and became 
 Papist." The education of the son seems to have been 
 conducted under the eye of the Earl of Morton, whose 
 daughter he afterwards married. The father returning 
 to London after the accession of Charles, was well re- 
 ceived at Court ; for Charles was always kind to old 
 courtier friends, and his conversion to Popery would 
 ingratiate liim with tlie Queen, and her little mischief- 
 
74 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 making caiiiarilla. He had conceived a morbid hatred 
 against his oldest son, then Lord Lorn, and vowed to 
 disinherit him altogether. He furthermore endeavoured 
 to ruin him in the esteem and confidence of the King. 
 But the King disregarded all this as the frenzy of 
 blinded passion ; and having the power of forfeiture 
 against the old Earl by means of the penal laws against 
 Popery, under which he had fallen, Charles very gener- 
 ously protected Lorn from the vindictive fury of his 
 fether, and compelled the latter to assign over to his son 
 all the estates and honours of Argyle, reserving to him- 
 self only a liferent maintenance suitable to his rank. At 
 their last meeting in the royal presence, the old Earl 
 declared, " I submit to the king's pleasure, though I 
 believe I am hardly dealt with ; " then turning to his 
 son, " I have to call to your remembrance how undutiful 
 your carriage has been towards me ; but bear ever in 
 mind how bountiful the king has been to you, which yet 
 I am sure you will forget." Summoning up the whole 
 bitterness of a father when maddened with hatred against 
 his own oftspring, he thus finally addressed the king : 
 " Sire, I know this young man better than you can do. 
 You have brought me low, that you may raise him. I 
 doubt you will live to repent. He is a man of craft, 
 subtlety, and falsehood, and can love no man ; and if 
 ever he finds it in his power to do you mischief, he will 
 be sure to do it." It was amid this hissing fire of curses 
 that Argyle entered into his inheritance ; and certainly, 
 however ominous the entrance, a magnificent inheritance 
 it was, or eventually became under his nursing manage- 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 75 
 
 raent ' Since tlie Dukes of Guise in France, or the 
 Princes of Orange in Holland, or the Black Douglases 
 of Scotland, scarcely had any sovereign or people beheld 
 such a prince- vassal towering up in their midst. From 
 Glenmore in the far north, where in our more peaceful 
 times the Caledonian Canal flows in beneficent current, 
 to the Mull of Kintyre and tlie estuaiy of Clyde in the 
 south, through the mountains of L<3cliaber and the forests 
 of Badenoch, amid a country which nature had made all 
 liut impregnable, and over tens of thousands of hardy 
 and devoted clansmen, who knew the Maccallum-More, 
 but not Charles Stuart — he reigned the undisputed chief. 
 His family had been the High Justiciars of all Scotland, 
 executing the regal authority both in civil and criminal 
 causes ; but since the institution of the Court of Session, 
 this, once the most exalted ofiice under the crown, had 
 been reduced to almost nominal dignity. Argyle ex- 
 changed the now empty bauble for real Justiciary juris- 
 diction, that is for real sovereignty over the Western 
 Highlands, and over the Western Isles from the Hebrides 
 to Arran, having in his hands the liberties, the proper- 
 ties, the lives of the whole population. A dominion so 
 gigantic was felt in the remotest Highland glen, even 
 though not directly under his sway ; and virtually he 
 was King of the North of Scotland, especially when the 
 central government was daily becoming weaker, until it 
 ceased at last to have any influence or control. Nor 
 was his dominion confined to the Highlands. He had pos- 
 sessions in the counties of Renfrew and Ayr and along by 
 the Ochils, where Castle Campbell, from its eyrie of rocks, 
 
70 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 still looks with a falcon's eye over the vale of the Devon 
 and the plains of the Forth. Besides the castles and 
 towers that studded his extensive domains, he had in 
 Edinburgh, in Glasgow, in Stirling, and other chief cities, 
 large and stately mansions, filled with his retainers, 
 where all important personages, whether countrymen or 
 foreigners, congregated around the great man, and which 
 marked his pre-eminence, and impressed the people with 
 feelings of awe and submission. " Questionless," says 
 Baillie, " the greatest subject the King had ! " This 
 unique social position was sure to make him the prime 
 leader of whatever party he might embrace. But, inde- 
 pendently of position, he was endued ^^dth qualities fitted 
 to raise him to the highest pinnacle of the state, espe- 
 cially in confused, crooked, and intricate times. Very 
 unlike a lord and chieftain of the Gael indeed, he was 
 timorous to a degree often verging upon cowardice ; and 
 though, as the head of a warlike clan, and of thousands 
 of tributary vassals, he was frequently under the neces- 
 sity of taking the field and conducting military expedi- 
 tions, his name is not coupled with a single feat of 
 prowess, or one brilliant exploit of arms. Debarred by 
 physical temperament from gaining renown on the field 
 of battle — his legitimate sphere as a Highland prince — 
 he all the more sedulously cultivated the arts of political 
 leadership and diplomacy. His governing characteristic 
 was wisdom, in its highest sense ; that true regulator of 
 the whole intellectual and activ^e powers, as nuich the 
 free gift of nature as genius is, and perhaps even more 
 rare. It is an attribute quite distinct from knowledge, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 7 i 
 
 learning, talent, skill ; or rather, it is the harmonious 
 composition and union of them all, used in their due 
 order, and directed so as most effectually to conduce to 
 the desired result. Separately or unduly exerted, these 
 special faculties are apt to fail of the mark : it is only 
 by their nice adjustment that they are made to work 
 etficiently ; and this nice adjustment constitutes wisdom; 
 — as it is not strength alone that makes the expert 
 \\Testler, nor agility alone, nor tlie knowledge of trips 
 and throws alone, but the combination of them all, and 
 their right use at the right moment. All the contem- 
 poraries of Arg}'le, whether hostile or friendly, whether 
 his own countrjmien or the English politicians, were, I 
 had almost said, overawed by his extraordinary wisdom. 
 His friends had a mysterious faith in it, his enemies a 
 mysterious fear of it. In depicting the perils and per- 
 plexities in 1646, when negotiations were going on be- 
 tween the Scottish and English Parliaments as to terms 
 of accommodation with the King, Baillie thus writes : 
 "Argyle's authority and wise carriage here has much 
 stopped the mouth of our enemies." He elsewhere affirms 
 of him, that in all exigencies he " did give most and best 
 advice in every purpose which came by hand." And 
 writing at the time of his execution, although he had been 
 estranged from him by party controversies for more than 
 ten years, Baillie exclaims with an aflfecting and subdued 
 pathos, " Tlie man was very wise ! " Wisdom always 
 presented itself as the marked and dominating fea- 
 ture of his character. His constant rule in government 
 — the word constantly on his lips — was " moderation :" 
 
78 THE FIFTY YEAKs' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 not the moderatiou of feebleness, but of a considerate and 
 compreliensive mind. The whole policy of Scotland, both 
 in Cliurch and State, from 1638 to 1650 — daring yet 
 cautious, revolutionary in plan, yet moderate and orderly 
 in execution — is the biography of Argyle. Like all the 
 liigher class of statesmen who have ruled pre-eminent at 
 critical eras — such as our own Burleigh, and Regent 
 MuiTay, and Somers, and Pitt, and Peel — he has but 
 little personal history ; his name represents the policy of 
 his country. This large endowment of wisdom for which 
 he was so remarkable, was fitly mated with an industry 
 constant and untiring. Nothing was too hard or heavy 
 for his powers of labour : nothing so minute or nicely 
 disguised as to escape his ever-watchful eye. His own 
 policy was locked up in a breast that revealed nothing ; 
 time alone was his slow interpreter ; but the designs of 
 his adversaries he knew by intuition, or tracked by his 
 extensive means of secret information, and he was always 
 prepared to ward off a blow, long before the arm was 
 raised that was to strike it. He was master of others, 
 because he had first learned to be master of himself : 
 his wisdom and industry were seconded by his unruffled 
 self-possession and coolness. Burnet, who was his con- 
 temporary, and moved in the same circles, descril)es hun 
 as being " of an invincible calmness of temper." There 
 are traces, however, that his temper was naturally some- 
 wliat harsh and austere. Baillie sometimes records his 
 " flytings" in Parliament ; and Sir James Balfour gives 
 specimens of his invective as idiomatic and unceremoni- 
 ous, as if they had proceeded from a Swift or a Cobbett. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. / \) 
 
 The " invincible calmness," therefore, which he gener- 
 ally displayed, and which was his character with the 
 pnblic, must have been a victory of strict self-control and 
 self-discipline. His morals were correct and pure ; his 
 deportment grave and solemn ; and entirely absorbed in 
 the public service, he was sober, reserved, and frugal in 
 his habits of lining. He was an able and accomplished 
 speaker. Baillie calls him " an excellent spokesman ;" 
 Kirkton, " a judicious la^\^er and an eloquent orator." 
 Judging from the remains of his writings and speeches, 
 he was very methodical and comprehensive in treating 
 his subject ; resolved every question into its first prin- 
 ciples, or the plainest grounds of expediency ; was con- 
 cise and sententious, often gravely ironical, and was fond 
 of strong homely metaphors and illustrations. He was 
 a man of decided religion, of fervent and exalted piety. 
 From his first appearance in history down to the close 
 of his career, he was consistent in his profession and con- 
 duct. It is easy and it is usual for cynical men of the 
 world to sneer at such high religious professions as 
 hypocrisy ; but the religion which, as in the case of 
 Argyle, has accompanied a man through a long life, 
 amid every change and temptation, has largely stamped 
 his actions, and set up an altar in his family, has con- i 
 S(jled him in prison, supported him to the scatibld, and j 
 inspired his last breath, will be accepted by every gene- 1 
 rous mind as true, and practical, and sincere. He evi- 
 dently preferred the Presbyterian model ; but he nowhei-e 
 appears as a mere Presbyterian zeahjt, and showed an 
 extreme aversion to clerical secularity. His cliief anxiety 
 
80 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 was for the preservation of the Reformed religion, pure 
 and simple, and the overthrow of all hierarchies. He 
 believed that hierarchies, if ever they get full scope, are 
 incompatible with constitutional monarchy, or constitu- 
 tional government of any kind. In particular, he be- 
 lieved that Papal Rome can only subsist, like cancer, by 
 eating into the living flesh of free men, and corrupting 
 all its sound elements into a foul and diseased mass. 
 Thus, in answer to a taunting letter from the Earl of 
 Strafford, in 1638, he expresses himself in language 
 which is verified every day, even in our own times and 
 country : " This people (the Scots) can hardly be brought 
 back one step to Rome, wliich on so good grounds 
 they have cast off, and settled by their laws. And they 
 keep still this maxim, — that whosoever love or favour 
 Popery more than the Reformed religion, if they durst 
 avouch it, love the Pope too, or any of his sect better 
 than the sovereign of the country." That he had many 
 faults, is at once admitted. This is the common admis- 
 sion to be made concerning all men, even the best and 
 greatest, more particularly in situations of extreme diffi- 
 culty, and in seasons of revolutionary fury. Doubtless 
 he had a selfishness of his own, as we all have. It is 
 probably true, what Burnet alleges, that " he was much 
 set on raising his own family to be a sort of king in 
 the Highlands." He may have been cold, hard, unami- 
 able ; he was by temperament hesitating, suspicious, un- 
 confiding ; and seems to have been only frank and 
 gracious upon policy, when he was gaining people over 
 to his own ways. Then he could trim his sails to catch 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 81 
 
 the breeze, and be courtly, bland, and insinuating, and 
 (as Baillie naively phrases it) " he drew all men after 
 him," It is no presumption in favour of any kindliness 
 in his nature, that he was under the malison of his father ; 
 that he was at mortal enmity with his father-in-law the 
 Earl of Morton ; that, like his own father over again, he 
 took, or pretended to take an inveterate dislike to his 
 eldest son Lord Lorn, and threatened to disinherit 
 him. Even on the good easy maxim in such cases, 
 that there are faults on both sides, a large share of the 
 faults must have been Argyle's. Craft was another vice 
 always charged upon him. We have seen how his en- 
 raged father denounced him as " a man of craft, subtlety, 
 and falsehood," and who could " love no man." His 
 enemies have perpetuated this cry ; and even friendly 
 chroniclers will sometimes drop a hint of his " cun- 
 ning ways." This is the fault into which political wis- 
 dom is the most apt to degenerate. In his very outer 
 man, as transmitted to us in portraits and traditions, 
 there is the adumbration of two natures : the one 
 crafty and politic ; the other wise and clear. The 
 spare wiry figure, the long face, the compressed yet 
 unctuous mouth, the squint eyes — sharp but unreadable, 
 whence he is known as the " giied Marquis " until this 
 day — these we may suppose to indicate a man dexterous, 
 shifty, versatile, capable of the most secret designs, the 
 most imexpected movements, a man deep and impene- 
 trable : yet again, looking at the gi-eat upper head, the 
 finely- knit capacious brow, and the calm fixed energy of 
 expression, you feel in the presence of one who had a 
 
 F 
 
82 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 large grasping intellect, a concentrated subtle force of 
 will, a capacity for gi'eat tlioiiglits and plans, a long- 
 enduring persistence of purpose, fitting him to rule as 
 the first statesman in an age of political and theological 
 revolution. " He kept his authority," observes Kirkton, 
 " after the fall of almost all his competitors, which occa- 
 sioned him, as is usual, a great deal of envy ; and being 
 very wise and politic, he was by many reckoned either 
 subtile or false." Yet with all his faults, I have tried 
 every theory upon his character, and nothing will explain 
 him, in life and in death, except the theory that he was 
 a TRUE PATRIOT. Nothing will explain him, if we do 
 not believe his own solemn words, uttered at his trial, 
 when he knew that he was within a few weeks of death. 
 " In all the transactions of affairs in which I ever had 
 any hand, I was never led by any private design of ad- 
 vantage to myself, either of honour or benefit, which are 
 the main things that sway the most part of men's actions. 
 ... If I had aimed at honours, I wanted not opportu- 
 nities, if I durst have forsaken other things in which I 
 was engaged by strict obligations more binding upon me 
 than personal ends." For more than twenty years, his 
 whole princely power, the whole energies of his mind, 
 his whole working life, were dedicated to the realization 
 of two ideas, — first, the establishment of constitutional 
 monarchy, but he would rather have the throne vacant 
 than occupied by a despot ; second, the abolition of 
 hierarchies, so that the nation might enjoy its religion 
 in assurance and freedom, in peace and security. And 
 when at any time these ideas could not be fully realized, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 83 
 
 his next nile Wiis, never to despair of his country, never 
 to turn away on the other side even if she had fallen 
 amongst thieves, never to neglect the opportunities that 
 remained, but to make the best use of every crisis, and 
 to save the people as much as possible from injury and 
 violence. Of all the peers of Scotland who had first led 
 the battle, all had gone ; — some no doubt by death, but 
 many from timidity, or weariness at the long-protracted 
 struggle ; many of them from wounded pride and rivalry ; 
 most from apostasy, each looking for his gain from his 
 quarter : aU had gone save Argyle. As he had entered 
 the revolution with long forethought and caution, so he 
 kept his post with resolution and unfaltering faith. His- 
 tory ought to be tender with the memory of such men. 
 His frailties were human ; but his great example and 
 his great death are amongst the things divine, which 
 glorify the page of histoiy ; which rouse the pulse of 
 man, when it becomes languid amid the corruptions and 
 tyrannies of the earth, to beat again with hope and re- 
 newed courage, and confidence in the ultimate triumph 
 of every just cause. 
 
84 THE FIFTY YEARS' STP.UGGLE OF 
 
 III 
 
 THE COMMONWEALTH— THE RESTORATION. 
 
 The Commonwealth became supreme in England, 
 Scotland, and Ireland. Charles, a poor contemptible 
 fugitive, hanging on the skirts of this foreign court 
 and that foreign court, pocketing their stingy alms, yet 
 avoided and despised by them, — selfish, mean, spiritless, 
 and licentious, a trifler as to everything manly and serious, 
 and only industrious in vice and debauchery, — Charles 
 was very speedily forgotten by the generality of people, 
 or the reports which they heard concerning him tended 
 only to sink him lower in their estimation. A new 
 generation was growing up, who had listened with won- 
 der to the history of Cromwell, his first appearance, his 
 rise, his activity, his greatness of mind, the deeds of his 
 " Ironsides," his many " crowning mercies," his elevation 
 to sovereign command, his admirable fitness for it ; and 
 how, by the terror he inspired, the name of a Briton 
 was now as much feared throughout the world as was 
 ever that of a Boman. The nations were becoming 
 accustomed to his sway, rigid and arbitrary no doubt in 
 some respects, but upon the whole wise, equitable, and 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. So 
 
 enlightened, eminently favourable to commerce, and 
 gentle and tender on the score of religion. The house 
 of Stuart seemed waning away from the memory of 
 Britain, as that of Bourbon now seems to be from the 
 memory of France. Cromwell — if the Richard had 
 been half equal to the Oliver ! — might have founded a 
 dynasty on the ruins of the Stuarts, under which we 
 might at this day have been living. 
 
 In Scotland, the controversy between the Kesolutioners 
 and Protesters continued with unabated animosity ; and 
 personal rivalries, injuries, and offences mingled Avith 
 and embittered the dispute. Indeed, there was virtually 
 a schism in the Church between the two factions' — vir- 
 tually two Churches. The sort of practical shape which 
 the controversy now took was this : — The Kesolutioners 
 still confided, or affected to confide in Charles, and de- 
 sired and would have aided to bring about his restora- 
 tion, on the best guarantee that could be got from him, 
 or even without any express guarantee. The Protesters, 
 though neither hostile to monarchy, nor to the family of 
 the Stuarts, had no confidence in Charles, and believed 
 that there was neither faith nor truth in him ; that it 
 was not expedient at present to move in his restoration, 
 but so far to acquiesce in, and take the benefit of the 
 present strong, settled, and not unkindly government. 
 In short, the Kesolutioners were ardently attached to 
 royalty and to the Stuarts, and were really enemies to 
 the English Commonwealth. The Protesters were no 
 enemies to royalty in the abstract, but were inclined to 
 trust more to the existing Commonwealth than to any 
 
86 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 kind of royalty likely to be established by Charles or 
 his counsellors. This latter party (the Protesters) were 
 now chiefly represented by Ai'g}de, Warriston, and James 
 Guthrie, who thus, indirectly at least, supported and 
 strengthened the government of Cromwell. Hence, at 
 the Restoration, the whole fury of the Court and Royal- 
 ist party descended upon the Protesters, and especially 
 upon the heads of these three as the leading men. 
 
 But although, during the time of the Commonwealth, 
 this controversy was raging and storming in various 
 ways ; yet Cromwell having, for the sake of public 
 peace and quietness, closed the doors of the General 
 Assembly, which used to be the great scene of the com- 
 bat, many ministers ceased from this work of strife and 
 contention, and devoted themselves more assiduously 
 than they had been doing before to their strictly pasto- 
 ral duties ; to the instruction of their flocks in the 
 essentials of the gospel, to the care of the young, to 
 more stated visiting and catechizing, to those labours of 
 love which best become a Clu'istian ministry, and which 
 are the human means for rearing up the people "in 
 knowledge, righteousness, and true holiness." And the 
 fruits of this awakened, earnest zeal on the part of the 
 ministers soon began to appear in a visible and astonish- 
 ing improvement amongst the people. Blessed prepa- 
 ration for the fiery trials in which they were so soon, 
 ministers and people, to be involved ! 
 
 On the death of Cromwell, on the 3d September 
 1658, the crown of Britain (for so it was, though the 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 87 
 
 title of the -vvearer was Lord Protector instead of his 
 ^Majesty the King) passed as easily from Oliver to 
 Richard, as ever it had done from Tudor to Tudor, from 
 Stuart to Stuart, or does now from Guelph to Guelph. 
 The exiled family liad little hold upon England ; and 
 in Scotland, if there was a national prejudice in their 
 favour, it had been much cooled by the scandal of 
 Charles's behaviour when in Scotland, by the opposition 
 of the Protesters, and also by the prosperity and tran- 
 quillity which had been enjoyed under the rule of Crom- 
 well, Ireland, in its own kind of wild, confused way, 
 threatened to be "up" for the king ; but owing to num- 
 berless circumstances, Ireland could take no initiative in 
 the events that were passing ; and could only, at the 
 utmost, have achieved a riot or a massacre. The Stuarts 
 had been long out of the country, and were now repre- 
 sented only by a young libertine, incapable of any ex- 
 traordinaiy etibrt or daring enterprise. The Cromwells 
 were in possession ; and so they might have continued, 
 had Richard possessed the nerve of Louis Napoleon, or 
 been as lucky in his confederates. 
 
 The nations were calm, still, and moderate, as Richard 
 ascended the steps of the throne. But the moment it 
 was perceived that he stood with tottering feet, and 
 wavering and uncertain purpose, all was tumult and dis- 
 order. Old parties reared their heads ; and new parties, 
 who had been engendered in the confusions of the late 
 years ; and still newer parties, vomited out in the 
 troubles of the moment, plotting and speculating on the 
 chances of the murky future. 
 
88 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 In England, there were of old parties, the Royalists, 
 adherents of the Stuart dynasty, and zealots for the 
 Church of England as part and parcel of their politics ; 
 and Puritans (English Presbyterians), haters of Episco- 
 pacy, asserters of the principles of the Solemn League 
 and Covenant, and of Parliamentary or constitutional 
 government. Of parties new, or even momentarily- 
 formed, were the Protectorists, those attached by inter- 
 est, or preference of any kind, to the Cromwell family ; 
 the Republicans, as also the Independents, the whole 
 brood of sectaries, and the body of common soldiers, who 
 were mostly Republicans of the deepest dye ; and a 
 motley group of adventurers ; single individuals, or 
 little conspiring knots, who had no opinions, no seri- 
 ous objects, no covenant, no sacred banner, but were 
 actuated only by the hungry, wolf-like savageness, the 
 disease of revolutionary times, which stimulates to the 
 work of ravage and gorging, and plunder and destruc- 
 tion. 
 
 In Scotland, several of those types were wanting. 
 There were no Protectorists, Republicans, or sectaries. 
 But there were the old parties — the Royalists and the 
 Presbyterians ; and there were abundance of adventurers, 
 the spawn of the moment. There were also types which 
 were wanting in England, at least in the exact kind. 
 The Resolutioners, who were bound to the Covenants, 
 but who would receive back the Stuarts on any, or no 
 terms, rather than the old monarchy should perish ; and 
 the Protesters, also bound to the Covenants, also inclined 
 to monarchy, and to the Stuarts in the abstract, but who 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 89 
 
 would not receive them back, or assist in any such step, 
 except upon the conditions of the Covenants, that is, 
 upon the terms of limited monarchy. 
 
 The parties in Ireland, for the reason above mentioned, 
 I need not describe. No leading influence could emanate 
 from thence ; but, generally, the parties there woidd go 
 into the scale of Royalism. 
 
 The Republicans of all the various different shades in 
 England, and the Protesters in Scotland, were the only 
 parties in the three kingdoms fixed in their opposition 
 to the return of the Stuarts. But the Republicans and 
 Protesters had no real affinity, and could never co- 
 operate ; for the former were enemies to monarchy 
 altogether ; whereas the latter were only opposed to 
 absolute monarchy, and to the king's supremacy over 
 the Church, but would readily unite to receive him on 
 sufficient and trustworthy guarantees being given. 
 
 Of all the parties now thrown into a state of ferment, 
 there were two which undeniably were the strongest in 
 point of numbers, of wealth, of rank and influence in 
 society, and in the possession of all the old traditions, 
 and old memories, and old sympathies of the country. 
 These were, the Royalists and Presbyterians, both in 
 England and in Scotland. Even singly and alone, 
 each was formidable. If they should form a junction, 
 what should resist their joint determinations ? But 
 were not their antiijathies too keen, and had not 
 these antipathies been too recently inflamed, the one 
 against the other, ever to allow of their entering into 
 combined action for any object whatever ? And, more- 
 
90 • THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 over, was tliere not a lion in their path, which might 
 well appal the stoutest heart 1 those iron legions, 
 namely, scattered through the country, 50,000 strong, 
 whom Cromwell had drilled and prayed into inspiration ; 
 who, under his command, had trodden upon the high 
 places of the earth ; who, on the fields of England, in 
 the mountain-passes of Scotland, before the strengths of 
 Ireland, had shared with him in those " crowning mer- 
 cies" which Heaven distilled upon his head like the 
 drops of the morning ; who abhorred the House of 
 Stuart, as if the curse of Saul were upon it ; who ab- 
 horred the Church of England, as the eldest daughter of 
 Babylon ; and who, since the death of their chief, had 
 held together, and still felt impelled to follow his mighty 
 shade, as it seemed to beckon them on to the Beign of 
 Saints ! 
 
 In spite of all these difficulties, apparently insur- 
 mountable, a coalition was at leng-th formed between the 
 Royalists and Presbyterians ; but not the Presbyterian 
 Protesters, who to the last opposed the return of Charles, 
 except under suitable terms and conditions. In the 
 flush and intoxication of the moment, the Royalists, with 
 the English Presbyterians and the Scottish Resolutioners, 
 prevailed ; and a sufficient armed force was brought to- 
 gether for their protection and support. Common inte- 
 rests and common party ends neutralized their mutual 
 repulsion. George Monk was the secret, wily, wrinkled 
 old alchemist, who extracted this coalition from so 
 many discordant materials. This being accomplished, 
 the result could not be doubtful. Charles ii. was re- 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 91 
 
 stored to liis dominious, and arrived in Loudon on the 
 29th of May IGGO. 
 
 He was now in the prime of life, a'oout thirty years 
 of age ; healthy and vigorous in body ; and if, from 
 circumstances, not very carefully educated or accom- 
 plished, this defect was almost compensated by his natu- 
 ral cleverness and ready understanding. He had been 
 long tried in the furnace of adversity ; he had been re- 
 stored as by a miracle, which might well impress even 
 the most frivolous mind ; and he was hailed by a people 
 who welcomed in him a deliverer from the horrors of 
 anarchy — a prince of the old line, who was to bring 
 hope, relief, and peace, and cheerier, happier times. 
 Such, no doubt, was the day-dream of the populace, 
 always caught by the spangles outside ; never initiated 
 in the farces or tragedies it may be, that are preparing 
 behind the scenes. And so they kindled bonfires, and 
 drank themselves blind, at every market-cross in the 
 country. 
 
 But, alas ! Charles, if so far, since we last met him 
 in Scotland about ten years ago, he had been growing in 
 experience of men and of the world, had equally been 
 growing in all the vices we then obser^^ed, — in falsity, 
 hollowness, idleness, profligacy, and in the voluptuary's 
 rather than tlie tyrant's determination to be king with- 
 out interference or control. " I have no desire," he once 
 said to Lord Essex, " to sit like a Turk, and order men 
 to be bowstringed ; but then, I will not suffer a set of 
 fellows to be prying hito my private atlairs." Almost 
 
92 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 immediately upon his return, he abandoned himself en- 
 tirely to pleasure, the only jewel in his estimation that 
 made a crown worth having ; and although, in his off- 
 hand, good-humoured, no-meaning way, he spoke pleasant 
 things to everybody who approached him, he scarcely 
 bestowed one moment's serious thought upon public 
 business, or any affair of state, except where his own 
 authority or his o^^^l personal feelings or habits were 
 likely to be touched. He left everything to his vizier, 
 Clarendon, and to hundreds of greedy, cruel, insatiable 
 pashas, who immediately fastened open-mouthed upon 
 the country. His truly wicked example, when it came 
 to be seen and known of all men (for, as he was without 
 virtue, so he was without shame), like the upas tree, 
 dropped blasting and death upon his Court, upon the 
 aristocracy, and less or more indeed upon all classes of 
 the community. All historians bear confirming testi- 
 mony to Roger Coke's assertion, that " King Charles 
 left the nation more vitiated and debauched than ever 
 it was by any other king." 
 
 When monarchy was restored in 1660, Clarendon and 
 the Anglican (or Church of England) Royalist party were 
 masters of the situation. Their leading ideas were, to 
 govern under the forms of legality ; but, above all, to 
 revive Episcopacy, which had been abolished in England ; 
 to impose it upon Scotland ; and to compel ecclesiastical 
 uniformity and passive obedience in both kingdoms. 
 
 This Anglican Ministry continued in power from 1660 
 to 1667 ; and so long the Court and the Anglicans 
 worked in harmony. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 93 
 
 The return of Charles, with Clarendon as chief mini- 
 ster, was a sufficient indication that there was a fore- 
 gone design, in due time and season, to re-establish 
 Episcopacy. 
 
 But there was great difficulty in the way. The Pres- 
 byterians in England and Scotland were too numerous 
 and influential, and had too largely contributed to the 
 Restoration, to be ofifended and set aside all at once ; 
 and Charles, the reverse of his father, would have laughed 
 at the idea of dying a martyr, or losing his throne, or 
 even a good night's revelry, for any or all the sects in 
 Christendom — perhaps for Christianity itself. He had 
 a plain matter-of-fact shrewdness, possessed by none of 
 his fiimily before him on the English throne, nor by the 
 only one of his race that came after him. He could see 
 what was practicable in the world. He could see the 
 prose of things, and was not to be carried away by the 
 fumes of zeal or fancy ; and beyond the practicable and 
 workable, he would not commit himself. It is true, he 
 ha<i an extreme dislike and contempt for Presbyterian- 
 ism, and used to declare, " It was not a religion for a 
 gentleman." He would be glad to see it abolished, and 
 Episcopacy (which was more favourable to absolutism) 
 substituted, not only in England, but in Scotland. How- 
 ever, this could not be done without feeling the way ; 
 \vithout preparation ; without clearing and securing the 
 ground ; so that, in making the attempt, no hidden 
 mine of opposition should spring, and throw the country 
 into a state of confusion, — to end, no one could tell how. 
 The times were still ticklish and unsettled. It was the 
 
94 THE FIFTY YEARs' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 part of Clarendon, therefore, and his coadjutors in the 
 intended Anglicanizing process, to lay the train, both in 
 England and Scotland, for their future operations. It 
 was thus that the Royalists and Presbyterians, whose 
 forced coalition had brought about the restoration of the 
 King, ultimately returned to their old state of anta- 
 gonism. 
 
 It is to the course of events in Scotland that we con- 
 fine our attention. 
 
 The first step in the preparatory work was to set up a 
 government in Scotland 'of the right stamp, — a govern- 
 ment that should tame that turbulent, unruly country ; 
 shape and model it into subservience to the Court de- 
 signs ; and, above all, as it was sure to be intractable at 
 first, like a bullock unaccustomed to the yoke, a govern- 
 ment that should strike terror — striJce teiiw ! 
 
 Clarendon had found his tools. Two men, the anti- 
 podes of each other, yet, just because of this diversity 
 between them, and their strongly marked character, the 
 very instruments to be set on and wrought together, 
 like two hounds, in the hunt of death that was about to 
 commence against the civil and religious liberties of the 
 country. These men were Middleton and Sharp. 
 
 Of Middleton's parentage, little seems -tClBe known. 
 He was from the north country, and his father was of a 
 very humble class of the gentry, if so much. His own 
 history was — the common one in those days — of the 
 poor young Scottish adventurer, inclined to the profes- 
 sion of arms, finding no scope for his ambition at home, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 95 
 
 and pushing out into the world, seeking subsistence and 
 distinction in foreign service. He is described by Kirk- 
 ton as having been at first only " a pickman in Colonel 
 Hepburn's regiment in France." Bred up in the civil 
 wars of France, he returned, the soldier of fortune, to 
 sell his sword in the civil wars which had now broken 
 out in his own country. The Covenant, it seems, ofi'ered J 
 him the best prospect ; so he took it, as he would have 
 put a cockade on his hat, merely as the badge of the 
 side on which he fought. He served under the " blue 
 banner" against Charles i., in the English campaign of 
 1G4:4 and 1645. He seems to have risen high under 
 David Leslie, and was always the officer employed by | 
 the Covenanting government to check the ravages of ' 
 Montrose in his various Highland risings. In all their 
 rencontres, he showed himself the match of Montrose in 
 bravery and gallantry ; his superior in tactics and mili- 
 tary art ; and only pelded the palm to him in freaks of 
 childish vanity, and a madman's rashness. On the En- 
 gagement of 1648, he joined the party of the Engagers ; 
 and as David Leslie refused to join, he took his place as 
 general of the horse. After the defeat at Preston, he 
 fell under the proscription of the Covenanters, in com- 
 mon with the other leading Engagers ; and henceforth 
 passed over to the Royalists. When Charles ii. repaired 
 to Scotland in 1650, and was crowned king, Middleton 
 was his military favourite ; but, owing to his " malig- 
 nancy," he was excommunicated by the Church, — the 
 sentence being pronounced, notwithstanding every effort 
 to deter him, by James Guthrie, in the pulpit of Stirling. 
 
96 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Excommimication in those days was accompanied by 
 severe secular penalties and disqualifications. Hence its 
 terror even to hardiest soldiers and most callous poli- 
 ticians ; not as a Churcli censure, for that they might 
 have disregarded, but as a civil ban and condemnation, 
 which pressed them down at every future step. He was 
 one of the King's generals at Worcester, and afterwards 
 followed the royal fortunes in exile ; and became, now 
 that Montrose was dead, the great hero and paladin of 
 the Eoyalist cause. That he possessed some of the 
 highest qualities of the soldier and general, cannot be 
 disputed. This is ob\dous from his military career, 
 always and steadily upward, from his achievements, and 
 from universal contemporary opinion. But those very 
 qualities, of primest value on the field of battle, or in a 
 campaign, are not equally suitable when applied to the 
 management of civil affairs. Middleton, as might be 
 expected, was a man for prompt, quick measures, for 
 making everything bend to the purpose in view, and for 
 instant force and violence when orders were not at once 
 obeyed. He was fierce and arbitrary in disposition — fit 
 nursling of camps. Trained in civil wars, and amid the 
 exterminating feuds of sects and creeds, — himself having 
 been ranged on every side, — he had learned to despise 
 principles, to have no faith in the most sacred pretences, 
 perhaps none in religion ; to slight oaths and covenants 
 as merely the colours of a regiment ; to shudder at no 
 cruelty or oppression ; to be accustomed to the foulest 
 scenes of rage and retaliation ; and to consider that the 
 people were a kind of dangerous animals, to be governed, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 07 
 
 not by reason or participation in rights, but by repres- 
 sion, fear, punisliment, and the mandates of sovereign 
 power. Added to this, whatever he may have been 
 originally, he had now sunk into habits which were the 
 fashion of the day — habits of excess, drunkenness, and 
 all vices of the same sort, which coiTode whatever is 
 good within a man, foment whatever is bad, warp the 
 understanding, inflame the passions, harden the heart 
 against the dictates of humanity, and urge him onwards 
 to eveiything unjust and tyrannical. 
 
 James Sharp was a native of Banffshire, of humble 
 parentage, born in 1G18. He was educated at Aber- 
 deen. But about the time the National Covenant was 
 pressed, having objections to it, he left the country. 
 Whither he went is not said. I surmise it may have 
 been to London ; because it is always stated that he 
 had been long there, even before Cromwell's time, and 
 had made an extensive acquaintance with all sorts of 
 I)eople, especially amongst the Puritan (Anglo-Presby- 
 terian) clergy of the city. This was the circumstance 
 which led afterwards to his being so frequently em- 
 ployed as agent or delegate in London on matters of 
 Church business. On the breaking out of the civil war, 
 about 1644, when the Covenanters were supreme, he 
 returned to Scotland ; and must have been able to gidp 
 down his scruples against the Covenant, for he was ap- 
 pointed tu a Paofessorship at St. Andrews. He was also 
 presented to the neigh Ijouring church of C'rail. In the 
 controversy between the Resolutioners and Protesters, he 
 took the side of the former ; and soon raised himself to 
 
98 THR FIFTY YEAIls' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 consequeuce amongst them by his apparent warmth of 
 zeal, activity of conduct, and incessant unwearied appli- 
 cation. Under the Protectorate, the Protesters for a 
 while seemed to be most in favour. The Resolutioners 
 sent Sharp to London to counteract the Protesters, whose 
 delegates were Warriston and James Gutlirie, counte- 
 nanced by Ai'gyle. Sharp turned to account his ac- 
 quaintance with the English Presbyterians, whom Crom- 
 well was courting very much at the time, as a protection 
 against the Anarchists. By their aid thrown into the 
 scale, he checked the Protesters in the designs at which 
 they were supposed to be aiming. " The great instru- 
 ment of God, to cross their evil designs," wrote Principal 
 Baillie, a keen Resolutioner, " has been that very worthy, 
 pious, wise, and diligent young man, Mr. James Sharp." 
 As the probability of the Restoration dawned upon the 
 country, the Resolutioners, who were the majority of the 
 Church, employed this same " very worthy, pious, wise, 
 and diligent " individual, to watch, guard, and protect 
 the interests of the Presbyterian establishment of Scot- 
 land ; and how ardently he professed to do this, and 
 how basely he betrayed his constituents for the primate's 
 mitre, is matter of trite history, on which we need not 
 enlarge. Even after he had concerted with Clarendon 
 at Breda, previous to the king's return, the outline, at 
 least, of the plan by which Presbyterianism was to be 
 subverted, and Episcopacy established in Scotland, he 
 continued to deceive and mislead the heads of the Pres- 
 byterian Church, who were resting upon his honour and 
 Hdelity all their dearest and most hallowed hopes. They 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 99 
 
 expected that he would fight true ; aud that if he found 
 his o^^^l sword failing him, he woidd at least sound an 
 alarm, to warn them of danger, and give them time to 
 look to their defence. But they discovered, when too 
 late, that he had wilfully drawn them into an ambuscade, 
 from which there was no escape, and where they must 
 lay down their arms, or be cut to pieces. Those who 
 have studied his correspondence, and the minute details 
 of the whole transaction, will admit, that for well-con- 
 cocted, cold-blooded, systematic dissimulation, he stands 
 almost without a match in history. Whether his life 
 liad been stained with those horrid personal crimes which 
 are laid to his charge by some of the old chroniclers, I 
 know not. I liave seen no evidence that warrants the 
 retailing of them. But he had no virtues, beyond the 
 external decorum and gravity necessary for his position. 
 And those acquainted with him atfirni, that they never 
 •liscerned in him any sense of religion, or even heard an 
 (jrdinar}' religious expression drop from his lips. He 
 had ven,- little learning, or general knowledge of any 
 kind. In all his correspondence and writings which I 
 have seen, there is not the smallest trace of anything 
 deserving the name of thought, no original or sagacious 
 remark, no sparkle of tnie intellect, no radiation of feel- 
 ing, no taste, no happy phrase even ; all is in the lowest 
 style of hack dijjlomacy — hard, literal, inanimate, coni- 
 rmmplace. He was a poor preacher ; a cold, formal 
 speaker ; and nothing kindled him into a good Imman 
 heat but the expression of rancour against a rival, or 
 against the former as.sociatos whom he had l)etrayed. 
 
100 
 
 Then for a moment his icy eye would flash like the 
 basilisk. But for the dirty work of the plotting, whis- 
 pering, cajoling agent, he was completely qualified — em- 
 phatic in back stairs, unctuous in lobbies, but discreet 
 and close when the public eye and ear were upon him. 
 Wliatever he undertook he thoroughly " got up." He 
 worked hard for his object ; had address, cunning, and 
 secrecy ; felt no scruple about venting any number of 
 convenient falsehoods ; and was eager and resolute to 
 accomplish his purpose. He adapted himself to men 
 and circumstances. He had the art of winding round 
 acquaintances, and parties, and great men, and could 
 always make a good use of them. Cromwell, in his 
 shrewd, blunt way, dubbed him, Sharp of that ilk. He 
 was a master in that school of business which studies 
 only how to win the game, and winks at the loaded dice ; 
 to whom good and evil are antiquated prejudices, and 
 the success of the hour the only true philosophy. Man- 
 kind, however, choose to judge of things differently. 
 Sharp won the pompous title of Archbishop of St. An- 
 drews ; but posterity know him as the Judas of Scot- 
 land ! 
 
 Middleton was appointed King's Commissioner, and 
 was to open the Scottish Parliament in the beginning of 
 1G61. This nomination foreboded that Scotland was 
 virtually to be placed under martial laiv. 
 
 Although, for reasons of policy, it was not intended to 
 set up Episcopacy in the Parliament of 16G1, yet it was 
 intended to pave the way for this, and, above all, to 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVEXANTEES. 101 
 
 begin at once to sap and remove the foundations of con- 
 stitutional liberty in Scotland. But this could not Vh'. 
 done, if the Parliament were to be fairly and freely 
 chosen. For the body of electors throughout the country 
 were sound ; and if the nobles and official classes — some 
 from a servile and corrupt spirit, some to shelter them- 
 selves from the consequences that might now visit past 
 transactions — had given in their adhesion to the Court 
 designs, there were still a goodly multitude of country 
 gentlemen and of citizens who were tme to constitutional 
 principles. The common people were imbued with the 
 same sentiments ; and at all junctures had been ready 
 to act upon and defend them. And the Kirk, though 
 for many years she had been miserably rent asunder, and 
 now felt within her vitals the secret stab of the traitor, 
 was showing some signs and heavings of her old strength, 
 which in other years had swept away hierarchies, and 
 stopped tyrants in their mad career. The courtiers 
 therefore saw that if they were to enslave the country 
 they must shackle the elections ; and in order to this, 
 they mixst first, by certain signal examples, strike terror. 
 There were many measures for this end taken by the 
 Committee of E.states, which sat down at Edinburgh on 
 the 23d August 1660, expressly to mould and manage 
 everything for packing the Parliament — such as procla- 
 mations against so-called unlawful meetings and sedi- 
 tious papers ; against Rutherford's Leo: Rex, and similar 
 books ; against anything spoken or written to the i)re- 
 judice of the King or his government ; and there were 
 citations and imjirisonmcnts of gontlcmen likely to influ- 
 
102 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 enee the elections in a way favourable to constitutional 
 rights, interference with attempted meetings of Synods, 
 and the banishment of popular ministers, such as M^Ward 
 of Glasgow, Brown of AVamphray, and Li\dngstone of 
 Ancrum, who, with maiiy others, sought an asylum in 
 Holland. 
 
 Moreover, whilst Charles, in his Breda Declaration of 
 April 1660, gave a full and entire indemnity to the 
 English people for all that was past, no such indemnity 
 had been granted to the Scottish people ; so that every 
 man in Scotland had his wdiole words, actions, and con- 
 nexions, during the late confused and troubled years, 
 hanging over his head, ready to be made use of at any 
 moment to his ruin. And the Royalists, sadly disap- 
 pointed of their prey in England — poor and avaricious- — 
 consoled themselves in the anticipation of a harvest of 
 forfeitures and fines in Scotland. 
 
 On the Restoration, the Marquis of Argyle retired to 
 the Highlands, to consult with his friends what he had 
 best do. The generality of them advised him to keep 
 in retirement in the meantime. His son. Lord Lorn, 
 who had been a keen Royalist, and engaged in all the 
 risings during Cromwell's time, was now at Court, at- 
 tending upon the King, and in very good favour. Argyle 
 wrote to the King through his son, soliciting leave to 
 come to London, and wait upon him. The King returned 
 an answer that sounded encouraging, yet bound him to 
 nothing, and was equivocating. Lorn forwarded to his 
 father the very words of the King's answer ; and upon 
 this, Argyle ventured to come up to Coiut. He repaired 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 103 
 
 thither so secretly, that none of his enemies knew till 
 lie was there. He entered Whitehall with confidence to 
 salute his Majesty, and sent his son to beg admittance 
 to the royal presence ; but Charles — ever deceitful, ever 
 cruel, ever vengefid where he had been personally crossed 
 — when he heard of his approach, " with an angry stamp 
 of the foot, commanded Sir William Fleming to execute 
 his orders, who thereupon conveyed the Marquis straight 
 to the Tower." From the Presence-chamber to the 
 Tower I such are the sudden turns in a time of reaction. 
 
 By these and similar nefarious proceedings, such alarm 
 and perplexity were created throughout the country, that 
 generally such members only were elected for the Parlia- 
 ment as were ready to go any lengths with the Court. 
 Few of the old patriotic nobles were now alive. Their 
 chief, Argyle, was a prisoner, and evidently a doomed 
 man. The rest of them w^ere bowed down by the im- 
 petuosity of the blast which had set in, and were passed 
 by and disregarded by the courtiers, now in the full 
 gale of triumph. The young nobles w^re a degenerate 
 seed : most of them poor, and gaping for the cmmbs 
 that might fall from the King's table. The late cala- 
 mities of the countr}', and dissensions in Church and 
 State, had tended to eradicate from their minds all 
 notion of principle, and all sense and care for constitu- 
 tional lilierty. The irreligion and profligacy that rushed 
 in at the Restoration had also come in aid to pollute and 
 utterly debase them ; and slaves themselves, in respect 
 to everything that truly constitutes a free man, they were 
 
104 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 ready instruments to make slaves of their fellow-countiy- 
 men. Of all the vices now prevalent, the most common, 
 gross, and abominable, was that of drunkenness — brutal 
 drunkenness. In speaking of the Parliament which sat 
 down in January 1661, Burnet, who was in Scotland at 
 the time, and had fuU cognizance of the circumstances, 
 declares, " It was a mad, roaring time, full of extrava- 
 gance ; and no wonder it was so, when the men of 
 affairs were almost perpetually drunk." It was called, 
 " The Drunken Parliament." 
 
 They imposed an oath of allegiance, acknowledging 
 the sovereign to be supreme " over all persons and in all 
 causes," the real aim of which was to violate the domain 
 of conscience, and the spiritual arrangements within the 
 Church. They enacted, That it was the King's sole 
 divine prerogative to appoint all officers of state and 
 high officials, and that he was amenable to no Parlia- 
 ment or other mode of popular control : That it was 
 high treason in the people, " upon whatsoever ground," 
 to rise in arms, or enter into leagues, even amongst them- 
 selves, without royal leave and authority : That it was 
 unlawful for them to hold any assemblies without the 
 royal consent on any matter, civil or ecclesiastical : That 
 the Solemn League and Covenant was not obligatory, 
 and was not to be again sworn and renewed : And that 
 all ministers presented to churches should take and sub- 
 scribe the above oath of allegiance. As Presbyterianism 
 was not yet to be directly assailed, they went as near to 
 an attack upon it as possible, in a mean, false, and dis- 
 honest Act concerning religion and church government, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 105 
 
 whicli, like the Delphic oracles, might be interpreted 
 either to mean, the maintenance of the Presbyterian 
 system, or its subversion, and the establishment of Epis- 
 copacy. And worthily to consummate their work, they 
 actually had the unparalleled madness, by one stroke of 
 the pen, in the notorious " Act Rescissory," to repeal 
 and abolish the whole statutes, the whole legislation of 
 Scotland for the past twenty years. This was done 
 after a night of hard drinking. 
 
 Turn we, however, to another scene that was enacting 
 at the same time in this " Drunken Parliament." 
 
 On the 1 6th April 1661, the Marquis of Argyle, who 
 had been conveyed from the Tower, and lain prisoner in 
 the Castle of Edinburgh since December, was brought to 
 the bar of the Scottish Parliament, to answer an indict- 
 ment for high treason. It had become the fashion of 
 late, in those reactionary times, when the Royalists were 
 demanding victims, and the time-servers were looking 
 about for some scape-goat on whose head the whole 
 weight of retribution might fall, to blacken the character 
 of Argyle with every kind of infamy, public and personal. 
 He appeared at the bar of Parliament under every dis- 
 advantage. In looking around, how few the number of 
 his friends ! How many bitter and deadly enemies did 
 he see ! scarce able to suppress their exultation, that 
 now they had the old Covenanting dictator at their 
 mercy, or rather exposed to the full sweep of their ven- 
 geance. Sir John Fletcher, the Lord Advocate, whom 
 Burnet describes as " a bold and fierce man, who hated 
 
106 THE FIFTY YEAKs' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 all mild proceedings, aud could scarce speak with de- 
 cency or patience to those of the other side," degraded 
 his oflBce by the most scurrilous attacks upon the noble 
 but helpless prisoner. " Ai-chibald," said Fletcher at 
 the trial, with brutal familiarity, "it is not with you 
 now as when you set up the iiesh-stocks (meaning the 
 gallows) betwixt the Cross and the Tron." The name 
 Fletcher was then pronounced Flesker^ which is the old 
 Scottish term for the trade of butcher ; Argyle turning 
 round, with quiet contempt retorted, " A Flesher Dog 
 bites sore /"^ Deficient as he had often appeared to be 
 in mere natural courage, his enemies probably expected 
 to have the additional gratification of seeing him come 
 to their bar trembling and dejected. In this they were 
 happily disappointed. Under all the cloud of prejudice 
 against him, under the feelmg that he was a doomed 
 man, his whole demeanour (as if Heaven had suddenly 
 inspired him, in the last extremity, to do honour to the 
 cause of his country's freedom aud religion !) was self- 
 possessed, serene, moderate, and elevated. 
 
 He was tried for nothing peculiar to himself as an 
 individual, but merely as the great representative of 
 Scottish affairs during the past twenty years. Tt was 
 Covenanting Scotland that was upon trial, not the Mar- 
 quis of Argyle. And what rendered the whole exhibi- 
 tion so iniquitous was, that a large number of his judges 
 and prosecutors (Sir John Fletcher himself, for example), 
 were even more implicated than he was in the alleged 
 delinquencies of the past times. Only, they had not 
 
 1 MS. quoted in Napier's Memoirs of Dundee. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 1(»7 
 
 been so consistent, or acted such a conspicuous part, 
 and they were now busy making their peace with Royal- 
 ism — a peace which was to be bought in gi-eat measure 
 at the price of his blood. Middleton, in repeated and 
 virulent harangues, pressed against him the charge of 
 having been accessory to the death of Charles i. ; so as 
 to ruin his character and posterity for ever ; in order 
 that he might the more certainly gain possession of the 
 Argyle estates. But the proof utterly failed ; and Par- 
 liament, even this Parliament of his enemies, acquitted 
 him of the charge. The only remaining article of in- 
 dictment was, compliance with Cromwell. He acknow- 
 ledged that he submitted to Cromwell when submission 
 v\as inevitable and compulsory, and was yielded by the 
 whole nation ; but not till then. "It is evident," he 
 argued, " how clearly and freely I may say, that I do 
 not deserve to be the single sufferer in all his ]\Iajesty's 
 dominions for my carriage during the late troubles, his 
 Majesty having pardoned all but some of the murderers 
 of his late royal father." Illustrating how universal the 
 submission had been, he happened to give as an instance, 
 "What could I think of that matter, after a man so 
 eminent in the law as his Majesty's Advocate" (the same 
 Sir John Fletcher) " took the engagement to Cromwell V 
 This was true, but so irresistible and scathing, that Flet- 
 cher interrupted him in a rage, exclaiming, " You are an 
 impudent villain !" Arg}de, whose equanimity was not 
 to be disturbed, proceeded with the utmost composure, 
 — " I have learned in mine affliction to bear reproaches ; 
 but if the Parliament see no cause to condemn me, I am 
 
108 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 the less concerned at the railing of the King's Advo- 
 cate." 
 
 So doubtful was the issue of the trial, that Chancellor 
 Glencairn, Rothes, and Sharp posted to Court, where 
 Lord Lorn seemed to be prevailing on behalf of his 
 father. Finding there was a lack of evidence to con- 
 demn him, old Monk, with a baseness and inhumanity 
 for which language affords no epithet, gave up certain 
 private letters addressed to him by Argyle when he 
 (Monk) was Governor of Scotland. What were the con- 
 tents of these letters can never be known ; for, along 
 mth all the other warrants of Argyle's trial, they have 
 long since disappeared. But the Parliament affected to 
 be satisfied with this evidence of his compliance with 
 Cromwell ; and on Saturday, May 25th, he was found 
 guilty of high treason, and sentenced to be beheaded on 
 the Monday following, — two days' interval only being 
 allowed, so as to prevent any appeal by him to the King. 
 After sentence, he was about to speak, when the trum- 
 pets sounded the knell of doom. He paused until this 
 ceremony was finished, and then said : " You have the 
 indemnity of an earthly king among your hands, and 
 have denied me a share in that ; but you cannot hinder 
 me from the indemnity of the King of kings. Shortly 
 you must be before His tribunal ; and I pray He may 
 not mete out such measure to you as you have done to 
 me, when you are called to account for all your actings, 
 and this among the rest. I had the honour to set the 
 crown upon the king's head, and now he hastens me to 
 a better crowTi than his own." 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 109 
 
 When lie again entered the prison, his lady was wait- 
 ing for hini. Falling in his arms, she wept bitterly, 
 crj'ing, " The Lord will reqidre it ! the Lord will require 
 it I " He gently chid her. " Forbear, forbear ; truly 
 I pity them, they know not what they do. They may 
 shut me in where they please, but they cannot shut out 
 God from me." In',the course of conversation, he uttered 
 those memorable words which were so lamentably veri- 
 fied for thirty years to come : " Shortly you will envy 
 me who am got before you. Mind that I tell it you ; 
 my skill fails, if you will not either sufier much or sin 
 much." His lady, by his desii'e, left him on Sabbath 
 evening. He slept all night most sweetly, and awoke 
 on the morning of his execution refreshed and vigorous. 
 " He was most composed and |'most cheerful," says 
 Kirkton, "and so he spent his time in a dying Chris- 
 tian's exercise till tlie Monday came." After transaeting 
 all his worldly business that remained, he was accosted 
 by George Hutcheson, an old venerable minister of Edin- 
 burgh, who afiectionately inquired, " What cheer, my 
 Lord?" "Good cheer, sir," he answered : "the Lord 
 hath said to me from heaven. Son ! be of good cheer, 
 thy sins are forgiven thee." A sudden thrilling emotion 
 overcame him ; his eyes filled with tears of joy and 
 rapture ; he stepped aside to the window to compose 
 himself. Then takhig Hutcheson by the hand, he said, 
 " God is good to me, that He lets not out too much of 
 His communications here, for He knows I could not 
 bear it." " Before he went to death," Kirkton informs 
 us, " he dined with his friends cheerfully, and after 
 
110 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 (liuner went to secret prayer." Wlien the prucessiou of 
 death was formed, surrounded by a faithful moui'ning 
 band of noblemen and others who accompanied him, he 
 thus addressed them : "I could die like a Roman, but 
 choose rather to die as a Christian. Come away, gen- 
 tlemen ; he that goes first, goes cleanest," In descending 
 the stairs of the prison, he called for James Guthrie, also 
 a prisoner, awaiting the same sentence of death. They 
 embraced each other tenderly, bidding a mutual short 
 farewell, expecting within a few short days to meet in 
 the blessed realm, where there is no sorrow or suffering, 
 fraud or injustice, " My Lord," exclaimed Guthrie, 
 with a last grasp of the hand, his eye suffused with a 
 tear which his own doom could not extort : " God hath 
 been with you. He is with you, He will be with you ; 
 and such is my respect for your Lordship, that if I were 
 not under the sentence of death myself, I could cheerfully 
 die for you," Burnet, who I believe was present on the 
 occasion, records that " he came to the scaffold in a very 
 solemn but undaunted manner." He spoke briefly to 
 the people, rather uttering the religious thoughts which 
 then occupied his mind, than indulging in any reflections 
 on the political events in which he had borne so distin- 
 guished a part. He thus concluded : "I desire not that 
 the Lord should judge any man, nor do I judge any but 
 myself. I wish that, as the Lord hath pardoned me, so 
 may He pardon them for this and other things, and that 
 what they have done to me may never meet them in 
 their accounts." The moment before he laid down his 
 head on the block, his physician, Cunningham, touched 
 
THE SCOTTISH LOVE^ANTERS. Ill 
 
 his pulse : it wiis beating at the usual i-ate — calm, regu- 
 lar, aud strong. After taking leave of his friends " in 
 a very gentle manner," says Kirkton, " distributing his 
 tokens," and then engaging for some time in secret 
 prayer, he gave the signal to the executioner. The axe 
 fell. And on the boards of the scaffold rolled the head 
 of the once mighty Argyle — mightiest in his death — tlie 
 PROTo-MARTYR of his couutry's religion and liberty ! 
 
112 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 IV. 
 
 EPISCOPACY— DESPOTISM— MILITARY GOVERNMENT. 
 
 Everything bad been so adroitly mauaged, tbat tbere 
 was now little difficulty in tbe way of introducing Epis- 
 copacy. Tbe Anglicans, in delaying tbis cbange, were 
 not so mucb afraid of Scotland, wbicb bad become nearly 
 helpless, as of England, wbere tbe Puritans were strong, 
 and wbere tbey bad tbe majority in tbe Parliament 
 of 1660, wbicb recalled diaries. But tbat ParHament 
 being dissolved, a new one was elected in 1661, wbicb 
 was filled with Ultra-Royalists, in notbing more eager 
 tban in tbe desire to persecute tbe Puritan party. Tbe 
 wbole soul of tbe Cburcb of England, as represented 
 in tbis Anglican Parliament, was concentrated — not on 
 preacbing " on eartb peace, good-will towards men" — 
 but on crushing tbe Puritans. "Whilst tbis enabled 
 Episcopacy to be restored in England, it removed tbe 
 only real difficulty tbat had lain in the way of tbe abo- 
 lition of Presbyterianism, and tbe substitution of Epis- 
 copacy in Scotland. 
 
 There being no further need for disguise, in Septem- 
 ber 1661 the King addressed a letter to the Privy-Coun- 
 cil in Scotland, ordaining that Episcopacy should be 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 1 1 3 
 
 established in that kingdom. Sharp threw aside the 
 transparent mask which he had hitherto worn, and 
 avowed that he was to be Archbishop of St. Andrews. 
 He gained the coveted prize tlirongh Clarendon and the 
 Anglicans ; and it was by their continued support that 
 he was so long able to protect himself against the dislike 
 of many of the Scottish statesmen, and the displeasure 
 and contempt of the King. He had so frequently pro- 
 tested his zeal for Presbyterianisra, and his determination 
 never to join in any attempt for its overthrow, to such 
 multitudes of people, both in word and writing, and with 
 such oaths and imprecations upon himself if he should 
 act othen\'ise, that his conduct excited universal horror 
 — not so much at the mere change he made, and his 
 becoming Archbishop, as at his inexpressible falsehood 
 and treachery. A dissembler to the last, he pretended 
 that, when he saw the King was bent upon Episcopacy, 
 he consented to become primate for the good of his coun- 
 try ; and so as to prevent others stepping in, who would 
 have pursued violent and oppressive courses. What his 
 courses were, we shall have abundant occasion to see. 
 The contemporary ballad of " Noah's Ark " shows with 
 what sort of music the popular voice saluted his promo- 
 tion — 
 
 "The Raven black was first sent out 
 By Noah from the Ark, 
 To luring good tidings back again, 
 
 Wlio thereof found no mark. 
 The second time tliis bird must go, 
 There couW none serve tlie tuni ; 
 But he being Sharp for want of food 
 Did not again return. 
 H 
 
114 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 " Come, help my pen to add a shape 
 
 Unto this monstrons brood, 
 Who was intrusted for to bring 
 
 Tidings to prove good. 
 He was intrusted and betrayed 
 
 His brethren him behind ; 
 ' Hail, master ! ' he, and kissed them — 
 
 Let Judas' end him find ! " ' 
 
 Whatever his motives were, whether it was beeaiise 
 he had no better materials, or because he was afraid of 
 any one eclipsing himself, he enlisted, by all accounts, a 
 most ragged regiment of associates : — Fairfoul for Glas- 
 gow, a clever amusing wag, of life not A-ery exemplary ; 
 Wishart for Edinburgh, a Royalist chaplain, of no mark 
 {iii a theologian, guilty of swearing and drunkenness, but 
 with some generosity of disposition ; Sydserfe, the only 
 one of the old Spottiswoode Bishops surviving, now in 
 his dotage, appointed to Orkney ; Hamilton, brother to 
 Lord Belhaven, for Galloway, good-natured, but weak, 
 and as determined to be always on the winning side as 
 the Vicar of Bray ; and others, all much of the same 
 stamp — ^mediocre, worldly, unpopular men. The only ex- 
 > ception was Robert Leighton of Dunblane, who was very 
 distasteful to Sharp, but was appointed in consequence 
 of some fancy the King had for him ; whose works re- 
 main a memorial of his fine reflective turn of mind, and 
 exalted religious feeling. But in coming as a bishop to 
 convert and soften Scotland into Episcopacy, he had un- 
 dertaken a hopeless task, like attempting to melt the 
 Grampians by a few drops of dew. He was mucli to be 
 condemned for mixing himself up in any way witli a set 
 
 1 Wodrow MSS— Advocates" Libra r v. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVKNANTERS. 115 
 
 whom he really shuimed and despised. And if he was 
 apt to censure the Covenanters as bigots, because they 
 would not away with the externals and ceremonials of 
 Episcopacy, which he himself deemed of no consequence, 
 and inditferent, only decent and becoming ; he forgot 
 the worse bigotry, and the black oppression there was, in 
 attempting to force such trifling, indifferent, ceremonial 
 things upon a nation who refused and abhorred them, 
 on the ground of conscience. " Judge this rather," said 
 Paul, the large-hearted apostle of the Gentiles, so often 
 named, so little studied and appreciated in the greatness, 
 breadth, and richness of his ideas : "Judge this rather, 
 that no man put a stuml^ling-block or an occasion to fall 
 in his brother's way. I know, and am persuaded by the 
 Lord Jesus, that there is nothing unclean of itself ; but 
 to him that esteemeth anything to be unclean, to him it 
 is unclean. But if thy brother be grieved with thy meat, 
 now walkest thou not charitably : Destroy not him with 
 tluj meat^ for whom (Jhrist died.'" 
 
 The Bishops were admitted with much outward pomp 
 and show into tlie Parliament, which commenced its sit- 
 tings on the 8th May 1G62. 
 
 The King's letter ordaining Episcoi)acy was carried 
 into effect by the first Act of Parliament, in which it 
 was laid down, " that the ordering and disposal of the 
 external government and policy of the Church doth pro- 
 perly belong unto his Maje.sty, as an inherent right of 
 tlie Crown, by virtue of his royal i)rerogative and supre- 
 nuicy in causes ecclesiastical." It then restores Episco- 
 
116 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 pacy ill all branches and articles, declaring, " that what- 
 ever shall be determined by his Majesty, with advice of 
 the Bishops and Archbishops, and such of the clergy as 
 shall be nominated by his Majesty, in the external govern- 
 ment and policy of the Church, shall be valid and effec- 
 tual." So that the absolute pleasure of the King was to 
 be the regulating power in the Church. I need not add, 
 that Presbyterianism was expressly abolished. An Act 
 was passed against all resistance" to the King's govern- 
 ment, against the Covenants, and against endeavours 
 for any alteration in Church or State. Also an Act to 
 restore the right of patronage, which had been abolished 
 by the Parliament of 1649, when the strict Covenanters 
 held the reins of government ; and calling upon all 
 ministers ordained in or since that year, to come in be- 
 fore the 20th of September, and take presentation from 
 the patrons, and receive collation from the Bishop of the 
 diocese ; with various other Acts, all meant to exclude 
 the Presb}i;erian or national party from having any 
 share in Government power, official position, or political 
 rights. 
 
 In those two years, from IGGO to 1662, what an 
 immense stride has been made in the downward path of 
 despotism ! Little more remains for after years, but to 
 carry out and aggravate the system W'hich has thus been 
 organized. 
 
 Middleton had hitherto carried everything before him 
 l)y his martial law. He had come to persuade himself 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 117 
 
 that his ferocious, or (as he and his adulators would 
 style it) his energetic administration of Scotland, had 
 tamed and prostrated that once troublesome country. A 
 word from his drunken lips seemed to overawe a people 
 whom nothing could daunt before. But he was soon to 
 receive a check — a clieck which, in its consequences, 
 lielped to throw him down from his seat of power and 
 pride. Tlie first sign was about to be given, that the 
 people, although weakened for the moment, taken off 
 their guard, and bound in fetters when they had no pre- 
 sent means of defence, were silently recovering strength, 
 and watching their opportunity. A great event now 
 took place ; one of the most heroic acts in our annals, 
 where so much of heroism is recorded. It taught Mid- 
 dleton, imbruted and unprincipled as he was, that he 
 had still to deal with the men, and the descendants 
 of the men, who swore the Covenant of 1638. It 
 startled him in the midst of his revels and oppressions 
 — like the " Mene, Mene, Tekel, Upharsin" on the 
 wall of Belshazzar's palace — ominous of judgment and 
 wrath. 
 
 When the Parliament rose, the Privy Council resumed 
 its functions ; and its main business at present was to 
 carry into full effect the establishment of Episcopacy, 
 and to endeavour to bring about, or enforce compliance, 
 on the part of the ministers of the Church of Scotland. 
 One means for this purpose was to command the attend- 
 ance of all ministers at the diocesan meetings to be held 
 by the bi.-^hops, they who sliould not duly attend to ])e 
 ]>imished " as contemners of his Majesty's authority." 
 
1 18 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Throughout the Lowlands of Scotland, the majority of 
 the ministers did not obey this command. It was not 
 at all obeyed anywhere by Avhat we should now term 
 the popular evangelical clerg5^ 
 
 But mere side-winds did not suit the temper of Mid- 
 dleton. He was fierce and imperious by nature, and by 
 his habits as a soldier. He was daily inflamed by the 
 fumes of drunkenness, and by the passions of the junto 
 who surroimded him. He was at this time the more 
 irritable, and more easily hurried into excesses, that he 
 was losing ground with the King ; and he was anxious, 
 by reducing Scotland under complete and immediate 
 subjection to Episcopacy, to raise himself in the eyes of 
 the Anglicans, who were his friends, who had great poli- 
 tical influence, and who could support him against his 
 rivals. He determined, therefore, on a master-stroke of 
 policy. As the west and south-west of Scotland were the 
 most contumacious, he repaired thither with a quonmi 
 of Council to enforce submission to the Act of Parliament, 
 which required all the ministers ordained in and since 
 1649 to come in to the patrons and bishops. Receiving 
 collation from the bishops, was really and truly to re- 
 nounce Presbyterianism, and to adopt Episcopacy. I 
 need not say — from the veiy strong notions which then 
 prevailed on the subject of Church government, and on 
 the binding obligation of the Covenants — that this was 
 deemed, alike by ministers and people, tantamount to 
 perjury, to the sin of Simon Magus, almost to a denial 
 of religion and of God altogether. The act struck more 
 particularly at tlie younger ministers — those ordained 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 119 
 
 within the last thirteen years — who were mostly of the 
 Protesting party, strict Covenanters, eminently evange- 
 lical, the popular men of the clay, rigorous and resolute, 
 and who still fanned and kept alive within the country 
 the old flame of tlie Covenant. Meetings had been held 
 by them. Communications passed, like wild-fire, to the 
 remotest corners of the land. They had formed into a 
 close and perfect union. And they came to this reso- 
 lution, that they would not obey the Act ; that they 
 would nut touch the unclean thing ; that they would 
 quit at once, and in a body, the Church within which 
 they could no longer remain with a safe conscience ; 
 that they would stand in their lot ; and look up to 
 Heaven for grace and strength to bear whatever conse- 
 (piences should follow. 
 
 On the 1st of October 1G62, there was a sitting of 
 the Privy Council in the College-Hall of Glasgow, with 
 Middleton at their head, — if a sitting it could be called, 
 where the members w^ere in such a state of drunkenness, 
 that that posture must have been difficult for them to 
 maintain. They were foaming witli rage against the 
 recusant ministers ; and an edict or proclamation was 
 pa.ssed amongst them, that all the ministers who had not 
 come in to the patrons and bishops, as required, should 
 be immediately ejected. They were commanded " to 
 remove themselves and their families out of their parishes 
 betwixt and the first day of November next to come, 
 and not to reside within the bounds of their respective 
 j)resbyteries ;" and they were to lose, not future stipend 
 (jnly, but also that of the past year. The Parliament 
 
120 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 used to be called the " Drunken Parliament ;" this ])ro- 
 clamation was called the '' Drunken Act of Glasgow." 
 
 Thus was the gauntlet flung down by this mad intoxi- 
 cated tyrant. It was taken up — soberly and calmly 
 /^taken up — by Four Hundred good men and true of the 
 / Church of Scotland, upwards of one-third of the whole 
 ^ number of her clergy. Rather than obey a mandate 
 which outraged the dictates of their conscience — in the 
 depth of winter, most of them with families or dependent 
 relatives, at the utmost inconvenience, with the loss of 
 their earthly all, and worse trials in prospect — the Four 
 Hundred left their churches, manses, and possessions, 
 everjlhing that was dear, valuable, and interesting to 
 them ; and entered upon a dark, untrodden road, which 
 must ever be shaded with uncertainty and perplexity, 
 and which might conduct — which in the event did con- 
 duct — many of them into new and deeper suffering and 
 ; persecution, and even to the martyr's doom. By the 
 1st of November 1662, in the five western counties, 
 through Mid-Lothian and Fife, in the dales of the Mth 
 and Annan and Esk, in the uplands of the Tweed and 
 the Teviot, in short, through all the Lowlands, where- 
 ever there was national life, wherever there was religious 
 feeling, the darkness of night, and the silence of death 
 fell upon the churches. " Then," to quote the words of 
 lamentation from the well-known Napthali^ " Then 
 might we have seen the shepherds smitten, and their 
 flocks scattered, our teachers removed into corners, and 
 the Lord's vineyard and sanctuary laid most desolate ; 
 so that in some whole counties and provinces no preacli- 
 
• THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 121 
 
 iug was to be heard, nor could the Lord's day be other- 
 wise known than by the sorrowful remembrance of those 
 blessed enjoyments whereof now we are deprived." 
 
 Middleton, profligate as he was, and almost dead to 
 ever}i;hing good and generous, was thunderstruck at the 
 decision, magnanimity, and courage which the ministers 
 had displayed. In his usual profone way, cursing and 
 swearing, half pitying and half abusing them, he would 
 often exclaim — " What ivill these mad fellows do ?" 
 
 The secession of the four hundred was the moral 
 Thermopylae in the histoiy of the Persecution. It was 
 one of those defeats, in appearance, which are worth a 
 thousand victories. At the period when it happened, it 
 was the first shock to rouse the Scottish people from the 
 stupor and dejection into which they seemed, and no 
 wonder, to be sinking. From the moment of that act 
 of self-devotion and self-sacrifice, the struggle for liberty, 
 though long, chequered, and severe, was never hopeless, 
 never doubtful. The ultimate issue was secure. And in 
 all times of public difficulty and danger, it has been 
 remembered, and ev^er will be remembered by our people, 
 that in the winter of 1G62, four hundred of Scotland's 
 hero-pastors gave up their all in this world at the behest 
 of conscience, and in their country's cause. 
 
 There had always been a bitter personal animosity 
 between JMiddleton and Lauderdale. Middleton was 
 strenuously supported by the Anglicans of England, and 
 the Prelatists in Scotland, to whom, on the contrary, 
 Lauderdale, from his covenanting antecedents, was an 
 
122 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 object of suspicion and dislike. Up to the time at which 
 we have arrived, Middleton had stood his ground ; but 
 the ruin wliich could not be accomplished by the arts of 
 his rival, was effected by his own misconduct, joined to 
 the fickleness and facility of the King. By his reckless 
 dissipation, as well as by some insubordinate acts, he lost 
 the favour of his royal master. By the rashness and 
 folly with which he had just precipitated matters in 
 Scotland, and in a drunken fit spoiled all chance of a 
 qidet, stealthy introduction of Episcopacy, he had proved 
 himself incapable of being as an administrator in any 
 government, even the most arbitrary and violent. He 
 might do very well where it was merely required to 
 compel or to kill men ; but govern them, it was plain 
 he could not. He was, therefore, recalled from his post 
 as King's Commissioner in Scotland. 
 
 The Earl of Rothes (son of the early leader of the 
 Covenanters) succeeded as commissioner. He was a man 
 not without some coarse, plain sense, but of neglected 
 education, and habits quite as dissipated and more licen- 
 tious than Middleton's. He had some pleasantry and 
 kindliness in his composition ; but being bound to the 
 chariot-wheels of the Prelatic party, and being greedy of 
 place, pelf, and the pomp of State, he was compelled, 
 against some touches of better feeling, to continue the 
 system of violence and oppression which had been intro- 
 duced under Middleton, and which, indeed, must be kept 
 up steadily, if Scotland was to be brought under Episco- 
 pacy and Absolutism. 
 
THP: SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 123 
 
 After a Parliament in 1G63 under Rothes, tliere was 
 not another in Scotland for six years. The government 
 was managed entirely by royal proclamations, acts of the 
 Privy Council, and other arbitrary methods. 
 
 The Council was the chief executive power in the 
 country. The archbishops were members, and very com- 
 monly Sharp was preses. It may be assumed, therefore, 
 tliere was no lack of zeal for the Episcopal Establishment, 
 mid against the poor Covenanters. The measures of the 
 Council for years to come display the most singular, inge- 
 nious, and unfeeling devices, all framed for ore object 
 — the extirpation of a nation's creed, the utter prostra- 
 tion of a people's conscience. Cleverness and malice 
 could scarce go farther. With what success in tlie end 
 — let the whole subsequent history and condition of that 
 nation and that people demonstrate. 
 
 The strength of Sharp lay, not in Scotland, but in 
 England. The body of the people loathed him, as if 
 Judas had reappeared upon earth. The whole Presby- 
 terian ministers — his old Resolutioner friends as well as 
 his Protesting adversaries — believed that the curse of 
 God was upon him, seeing how he had sold their beloved 
 Church for " the wages of unrighteousness." The nobles 
 and gentry, who paid him outward honour only as mat- 
 ter of political courtesy, half feared, half despised him. 
 The other bishops, so far as they had sense or spirit, 
 often kicked against his vanity, selfishness, and arro- 
 gance. Tlie only good, able, and famous man amongst 
 them, Leighton of Dunblane, abominated his ways quite 
 
124 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 as much as did the Presbyterian ministers. He had no 
 admu'ers save, perhaps, his immediate underlings, and 
 those rascally spies and tipstaffs, the country curates. 
 These latter — the worthless successors of the glorious 
 Four Hundred — were hastily collected, chiefly from the 
 dark corners of the Highlands, and thrust into the vacant 
 livings ; so that a north-country laird complained there 
 was no getting herd-boys since the bishops had carried 
 them all away and made them curates. The following 
 was the character drawn of them by Sir Robert Murray, 
 when in the government of Scotland a little after the 
 present date. Having made a journey through the west, 
 he declared on his return, that " the clergy were such a 
 set of men, so ignorant and so scandalous, that it was 
 not possible to support them, unless the greatest part of 
 them could be turned out, and better men found to be 
 put in their i)laces, but it was not esi&y to know how 
 this could be done." With the exception of such low 
 and despicable hirelings. Sharp was very generally 
 avoided and detested by his own countrymen. But in 
 England, he had all along been stoutly supported by 
 Clarendon, who, though liberal in some things, was a 
 blindly bigoted Anglican, and by Sheldon, Archbishop 
 of Canterbury, a mere politician, who esteemed religion 
 only as an engine of State. That is to say, he was sup- 
 ported by the Anglican party. They were ready to back 
 him in everything, and aid him in all his plans and 
 intrigues ; as they knew him to be the best instrument 
 they could employ in their attempted work of Anglican- 
 izing Scotland. Hence it was that he kept his footing 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 125 
 
 SO well against all enemies, and amid ail obloquy. Ac- 
 cordingly, about the beginning of 1664, he posted up to 
 London, complaining bitterly of the Chancellor, Glen- 
 cairn, and of the remissness of the Privy Council, in not 
 pushing forward the new Episcopal Establishment ; and 
 he proposed that there should be a High -Commission 
 Court instituted in Scotland, in fact, an Inquisition. 
 
 He brought down with him the King's warrant, ap- 
 pointing a commission for summarily executing all laws, 
 acts, and orders in favour of Episcopacy, and against 
 recusants, clergy or laity. He was himself appointed to 
 the first and chief place, with certain noblemen, bishops, 
 and others, five to be a cjuorum, an archbishop or bishop 
 being one of the number, sine quo non. They were t0{ 
 have power to summon before them all charged with 
 nonconformity ; all keepers of conventicles and religious 
 meetings ; " all who speak, preach, write, or print " to 
 the reproach or detriment of Church or State, as now ' 
 established. The troops, and all officers of law, were 
 commanded to apprehend and bring in alleged delin- 
 quents ; keepers of castles and prisons to receive them 
 into custody ; and the various officials to grant at once 
 all " diligence " or other necessaiy writs against them, 
 for fine, imprisonment, or other punishment. 
 
 Armed with this warrant of persecution — so much 
 keener and more convincing than the " Go ye into all 
 the vjorld, and preach the gospel to every creature,''' of 
 his professed Master — Sharp commenced the work, which 
 has been so often and often tried, of attempting to lash 
 and drive men into some particular church system, and 
 
12G THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 tried almost always with the same result, the violence 
 recoiling upon the author, and only confirming and 
 strengthening his victims, and securing for them the 
 sympathies of the world. This Court was just the old 
 Star-Chamber of England, with all its most vicious 
 peculiarities. Sharp was constant president, ever stir- 
 ring the flame ; the demon of the scene. The nobles 
 and laymen generally were soon disgusted, and left the 
 Court to himself, and a few of the more violent bishops. 
 They called before them any persons they chose ; served 
 them with no summons, went into no examination of 
 witnesses, allowed no argument, kept no record, put a 
 few taunting questions, twisted the answers, or construed 
 the silence into guilt ; and always condemned. No one 
 was known to escape their fangs. They punished severely 
 and arbitrarily, doubling fines imposed by law, and add- 
 ing punishments without any authority — such as close 
 and long imprisonment, confinement to some distant and 
 remote part of the couutr}% banishment to the planta- 
 tions ; and many were shipped off" and sold as slaves. 
 An old annalist compares this Court to the lion's cave 
 in the fable : there were abundance of footsteps, and 
 tracks of beasts' feet going to tlie cave, but none re- 
 turning ! 
 
 Alexander Smith, who had been minister of Colvend, 
 on the Sol way, a most worthy man, was amongst those 
 ejected by the Act of Glasgow. Since remoWng from 
 his parish, he had been residing at Leith. Having been 
 in the practice of meeting with a few friends for social 
 worshijj, he was cited before the Inquisition, on the 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 127 
 
 charge of keeping conventicles. In answering some in- 
 terrogatories put to him by Sharp, he did not give him 
 his episcopal title, but called him only Sir. Rothes in- 
 terrupted him, " Do you know to whom you are speak- 
 ing ?" " Yes, my lord," replied the intrepid minister ; 
 '' I speak to James Sharp, once a fellow-minister with 
 myself." This was a high crime ; and without any 
 further inquiry as to conventicles, he was ordered to be 
 laid in irons, and cast into the " Thieves' Hole," a filthy 
 dungeon in the Tolbooth, where he had a poor lunatic 
 for his companion. On learning that, through an aper- 
 ture connected with the street, he was often relieved and 
 comforted by the charity of the good people of Edin- 
 burgh, his persecutors removed him to a different part 
 of the prison. Though seized with an alarming sick- 
 ness, brought on by the cold and unwholesomeness of 
 his prison, which threatened to prove mortal, they re- 
 fused to liberate him even for a few days. Shortly after- 
 wards, they banished him to the Shetland Islands. 
 " For four years," says Wodrow, " he lived alone in a 
 wild desolate island, in a veiy miserable plight. He 
 had nothing but barley for his bread, and his fuel to 
 ready it with was sea-tangle and wreck ; and had no 
 more to preserve his miserable life.'" 
 
 ( )n the removal of the well-known John Livingstone 
 from Ancnun, a curate of the name of Scott was thrust 
 into his plac*-. Upon the day of his settlement, a num- 
 ber of people convened, and gave him no pleasant wel- 
 come, but without otlering personal violence. A country- 
 woman desirt'd earnestly to syjeak to liim, to remonstrate 
 
128 THE FIFTY YEARs' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 against his intrusion ; but lie would not stay to listen 
 to lier. She, with a little forwardness, pulled at his 
 cloak, when he turned round and beat her with his staff. 
 Two of her brothers stepped forward to protect her ; and 
 two or three boys began to throw stones, which, however, 
 did not touch the curate or those in company with him. 
 For this offence, such as it was, the Sheriff fined and 
 imprisoned some of the parties said to have been impli- 
 cated. But the Inquisition, hearing of this incident, 
 magnified it into a treasonable tumult. They summoned 
 before them the woman, her two brothers, and four boys. 
 The boys confessed that, upon Scott beating the woman, 
 they had thrown each a stone. Sharp exclaimed, that 
 " hanging was too good for them." They were sentenced 
 to be scourged through the city of Edinburgh, burnt in 
 the face with a hot iron, and sold as slaves to Barbadoes. 
 The poor things endured the punishment with a compo- 
 sure and fortitude worthy of mature men. The two 
 brothers, though having small helpless families dependent 
 upon them, were banished to Virginia. The woman, by 
 a miracle of mercy in those days, was only scourged 
 through the town of Jedburgli. 
 
 Vile, gloomy, and desperate as the times were, this 
 fearful Inquisition, within the space of two years, sanlc 
 and disappeared under the weight of odium which accu- 
 mulated over it. 
 
 All this while Scotland presented the aspect of a coun- 
 try under military occupation. The forces were now 
 constantly traversing the whole country, (;r sitting down 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 129 
 
 in particular places and districts, especially in the west 
 and soutli. Tlie chief officer in command was Sir James 
 Turner, a miniature edition of Middleton : like him, a 
 soldier of fortune, who once had fought for the Covenant, 
 as now he led troops against it ; ready to draw his sword 
 under any flag, his only merit being fidelity to the flag 
 to which for the time he was attached. Like all sucli 
 adventurers — from their youth accustomed to vicissitude 
 and bloodshed, whose home is the camp, whose school 
 has been in the cruelties and agonies of battle — he was 
 fierce, abrupt, imperious ; and, when drunk, which was 
 a common thing, his fury amounted to madness. He 
 admitted, that in military employment, he recognised no 
 law and no consideration but the orders under which he 
 acted. The troops were recruited from the dregs of the 
 populace ; ignorant, ruffianly, brutal in their propensities, 
 devoid of humanity, and capable of any atrocities. Such 
 were the forces now let loose upon the people, and more 
 particularly directed against those classes who were suf- 
 fering on grounds of conscience, that is, against pious 
 Presbyterians, 
 
 The oppressions of every kind, perpetrated by the sol- 
 diery, were grievous beyond expression. They were sent 
 ri)und to overawe tlie people. But anotlier ol)ject was, 
 to levy and collect the fines for nonconformity imposed 
 by various Acts of Parliament. These were principally 
 the fines for absence from the parish cliurch, and the 
 enormous fines which were imposed in Middleton's Par- 
 liament of 1GG2, at the passing of a so-called indemnity. 
 The payment of the latter fines had been from time to 
 I 
 
130 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 time postponed ; but it was now fixed by a proclamation 
 of Council, that the first moiety should be paid in De- 
 cember 1665 ; and as regarded the second, that the same 
 should be remitted to all persons who should come in 
 and take the oath of supremacy, and the declaration 
 against the Covenants, otherwise, both moieties to be 
 instantly enforced. The eff'ect was, that Presbyterians 
 were excluded from the benefit of this remission, as they 
 could neither conscientiously take the oath nor the de- 
 claration, unless they were to throw aside all principle, 
 and violate their consciences to escape such ruinous fines. 
 How execrable the policy which drove the poor people 
 into this dreadful and heart-wringing alternative ! con- 
 science pleading on the one hand, the terror of the fines 
 shaking and urging them on the other. 
 
 It would fill a volume to relate all the iniquity, bar- 
 barity, and insolence of a soldiery who were of them- 
 selves sufficiently inclined to these courses, but who, in 
 addition, found themselves praised and rewarded in pro- 
 portion to the oppressions which they committed. It 
 was not only the exaction of the fines, and fines far be- 
 yond anything authorized, the soldiers, in fact, demand- 
 ing whatever they chose ; but when the fines were not 
 paid, a number of them would quarter upon the person 
 so failing, and his loss was thus tenfold aggravated. 
 Where they came to quarter, they were not satisfied with 
 recei^ang sufficient provision for themselves and their 
 animals ; they wasted and spoiled eveiything ; carried oft" 
 hay, scattered corn, brought sheep from the hills, and 
 besides what tliey themselves devoured, cast the slaugh- 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 131 
 
 tered carcases in the most "svantoii manner to their 
 hounds. " We came to destroy," they would say, with 
 oaths and jeers, "and we shall destroy !" When they 
 had eaten up the landlord, they settled, like a swarm of 
 locusts, upon the tenants ; and having the country at 
 their mercy, little distinction was made between con- 
 formists and nonconformists. Indeed, most of them 
 being in the lowest depths of ignorance and degradation, 
 knew nothing about the nature of those questions. They 
 took a fiendish pleasure in interrupting family worship, 
 and all other religious exercises : and in mocking at 
 everything good and holy. Many of the curates in the 
 various parishes were their informers and directors, 
 stimulated them to more and more excess, and associated 
 and vied with them in drunkenness, and in all manner 
 of profligacy. 
 
 The Scots had always been, and still were, a warlike 
 people ; the generality of them in possession of arms, 
 and bred to the use of them, and to something of mili- 
 taiy discipline. The feudal relation of the vassals and 
 peasantry to their lords led to this ; as well as the civil 
 wars in which they had been so recently engaged. Such 
 a population, when oppressed and irritated, were dan- 
 gerous. They had lost, indeed, their former position, 
 when they were headed by the nobles, and commanded 
 by the ablest generals of the day ; when in every parish, 
 the minister blessed their swords devoted to the Cove- 
 nant ; when they were united as one man ; and when 
 they were in solemn alliance with their brethren, the 
 
132 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 people of England. That was all over. Still a vast 
 portion of the people were faithful as ever to the cause. 
 They had no general to look to, but they had amongst 
 them a number of respectable officers and hardy veterans, 
 who had served under Gustavus Adolphus and Leslie. 
 Their ministers, if expelled from the parishes, were con- 
 tinually moving about amongst them ; and by their late 
 example of firmness and sacrifice, wielded more influence 
 over their minds than ever ; and would not be slack, if 
 anything like an opportunity should off'er, to exhort them 
 once again to unroll the banner of the Covenant. If 
 the English Pimtans, in the lapse of twenty years, had 
 become far divided from them, and had little or no 
 means to "fraternize;" still a covenanting revolt in 
 Scotland might excite a Puritan revolt in England ; and 
 another Solemn League might be the consequence. 
 
 A spectre of this kind had haunted the rulers both 
 in England and Scotland ever since the Restoration. 
 WTiatever the mob of the uninitiated might do — who in 
 all ages dance to any one who pipes, and always believe 
 in the eternity of present success — the more experienced 
 ministers of Charles never trusted the frantic rejoicings 
 with which he was welcomed on his return, or the de- 
 ceitful calm which for some time succeeded. This they 
 knew was superficial and temporary. Externally they 
 afi"ected the greatest confidence in the loyalty of the 
 nation, and the most arrogant contempt for the enemies 
 of the Government ; but their Secret Papers disclose 
 how unsettled they felt the situation to be, and in what 
 constant apprehensions they were from conspiracies and 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 133 
 
 popular movements. Within a year of the Restoration, 
 Pepys, a shrewd observer in his own way, declared : 
 " In short, I see no content or satisfaction anywhere 
 in any sort of people." When the war w^as entered into 
 against the Dutch Republic (which at the time hap- 
 pened to be in fast conjunction with France), this spectre 
 of impending revolution swelled and dilated into the 
 most frightful dimensions. At this time Sir Thomas 
 Gower, member for Yorkshire, was a busy man for the 
 Grovernment, and in almost daily communication with 
 Lord Arlington, Secretary of State. One of his corre- 
 spondents, writing to him on 30th June 1663, says, 
 " Since the fight at sea " (that is, between the English 
 and Dutch ships), " the party are strangely encouraged 
 by letters from Holland. Dixon" (who is frequently 
 mentioned at this time, though the name is probably an 
 assumed one, as an agent between the refugees in Hol- 
 land and the malcontents in Scotland and England) — 
 " Dixon brought them the letters, and is gone into Scot- 
 land, so as all here are possessed the Dutch had an 
 absolute victory, and that they are masters of the sea, 
 and block up the Thames. They are made believe that 
 there shall be thousands of men landed in Scotland 
 within a month. One advice is 6000, another 4000 ; 
 and Dixon is employed to the Remonstrators there" 
 (that is the Presbyterian Nonconformists) " to prepare 
 them. . . . They say the like of Ireland ; and I find 
 the two enemies " (that is Holland and France) " leave 
 nothing unattempted among these people."^ In a Diary 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
134 THE FIFTY YKAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 compiled by Sir Thomas Gower for the use of the 
 Government, we find, under date September 26th, 1 663, 
 the following account of what he had learned as the 
 scheme of a general rising throughout England and 
 Scotland : " Intelligence given from these several per- 
 sons " (his various informants) " that the plot was 
 formed, the rising to be the 1 2th of October. That it 
 was to be in every county at the same time. A party 
 to fall upon Whitehall, commanded by Lieutenant- 
 Colonel Pearson. . . . That i^[ottiugham and Gloucester 
 were to be taken for passes over Trent and Severn. 
 Boston to be fortified, to receive ammunition and sup- 
 plies from Holland. Newcastle and Tynemouth, if pos- 
 sible, surprised for the same purpose, and to have 
 communication with Scotland. That Ludlow was to 
 command in the West, when they assured themselves of 
 8000 men in Wiltshire, Dorset, Somerset. That in 
 Berkshire, Sussex, Surrey, Essex, Sufi'olk, there are great 
 numbers. That in London they were awed by the 
 King's guards and auxiliaries ; but if, upon the insur- 
 rection in the country, they drew out, those hi London 
 would rise ; otherwise they would go out to the rebels 
 abroad. But they had agents in France, Holland, Scot- 
 land — many persons of great account, and members of 
 Parliament, engaged in the conspiracy."^ No wonder, 
 with such frightful rumours prevailing, that poor be- 
 wildered Mrs. Clapham, of Ufiington, near Stamford, 
 writes to her sister, Mrs. Phillips, of Chancery Lane, 
 London, on 12th October 1663, "We are all in a sad 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 135 
 
 condition here, expecting every night for to have our 
 throats cut by the Presbyterians. "^ The Earl of Peter- 
 borough, writing to a member of the Government, com- 
 plains bitterly, "I do not think there was ever a nation 
 more corrupted. ... In fine, they want but an occa- 
 sion to rebel." No reliance, in his opinion, could be 
 placed upon the militia : " The country militias are cer- 
 tainly a useless and a dangerous constitution. It does 
 teach the use of arms unto more enemies than friends." 
 Constitutional government, he thinks, has become un- 
 workable ; the only alternative is, Despotism or Kepub- 
 licanism. " Those old notions of mixed governments, 
 privileges, and conditions, have, by several accidents of 
 State, been put out of the essence of things, and the 
 consequence of all undertakings can no more be but — 
 Monarchy or a Commonwealth." ^ One of the cleverest 
 of Sir Thomas Gower's informers — a knave who pro- 
 fessed the most ultra-Puritanism, so as to worm out the 
 secrets of the party — thus writes to him in February 
 1665 : "A letter came from Holland last week" (that 
 is, to the English malcontents). ..." Ludlow is in 
 Holland, much made of, and hath been twice with 
 De Witt. They have gi'eat assurances of strong assist- 
 ance, as well ammunition as men, if they make a head 
 in any part or place near the sea. . . . The fugitives 
 and Dutch . . . give great hopes on both sides, each 
 hoping for advantage by the other ; and hence all of that 
 party are high and confident. The letters give them 
 a.ssurance that something will be attempted in the west 
 
 1 State Paper Office. = Ibid. 
 
136 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 of England ; and that a rising there will be backed from 
 France, though not by public authority, yet so as shall 
 be etfective. ... I understand that there is one Colonel 
 Gibby Kerr in Holland, who manages the affairs of the 
 Scotch Remonstrators." And in March he writes : — 
 " They have great hoj^es of what will be done in the west 
 of Scotland, for Colonel Kerr promiseth much to the 
 States."^ Sir Philip Musgrave, member for Westmore- 
 land, and Governor of Carlisle Castle, writing to Lord 
 Arlington in January 1666, reports as to the malcon- 
 tents in that part of England : " They discourse among 
 their confidants, that they hope the next summer will 
 produce alterations to their advantage, and have good 
 wishes for his Majesty's enemies abroad. The Noncon- 
 formists hold their meetings still in spite of authority, 
 and are generally better horsed than others of their qua- 
 lity."- In notes taken by Sir Joseph Williamson, then 
 secretary to Lord Arlington, from the information of a 
 person sent over from Ireland by Lord Orrery, we find 
 this statement : " His friend told him that their" (the 
 malcontents') " design is, to march in small numbers to 
 Scotland, there to meet Ludlow and Desborough. Saith, 
 they had listed 10,000 horse."^ From Scotland itself, 
 Burnet, the Archbishop of Glasgow, nearly crazy with 
 excitement, thus warns the Government in February 
 1666 : " Our ejected ministers convocate many hundreds, 
 and sometimes thousands of his Majesty's lieges, who, for 
 the most, are armed with swords and pistols. What 
 these unhappy people may attempt (if a fair opportunity be 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 2 jftjd. 3 jf,id. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 137 
 
 ofiered) is imcertain. We have too just reason to complain 
 that no eflfectual course is yet taken to prevent or repress 
 such tumultuous and disorderly meetings. ... So long 
 as his Majesty's affairs go well in England and Ireland, 
 it is possible we may hope quiet ; but I am confident 
 if we see his Majesty at any disadvantage, our disaffec- 
 tion will quickly appear."^ In a note by Dr. Matthew 
 M'Kail (who will be hereafter mentioned), a man of good 
 position and means of knowledge, it is related, that 
 " there was indeed a plot to have surrendered ^the castles 
 of Edinburgh, Stirling, and Dumbarton, in July that year 
 (1666), and the chief contrivers failing, nothing was 
 done."^ That the Dutch Government Avas in real official 
 eommunication with the malcontents in Britain, is now 
 also most distinctly ascertained. " This appears," says Dr. 
 M'Crie in his miscellaneous volume containing ' Memoirs' 
 of Veitch and others, " from the following extract from 
 the Register of the Secret Resolutions of the States- 
 General, dated July 15, 1666 : — 'It was notified in the 
 Assembly that overtures had been made by certain friends 
 of religion in the dominions of the King of Great Britain, 
 who had resolved without delay, to seize upon the first 
 good opportunity for vindicating from constraint and 
 oppression the Reformed worship of God, to take arms, 
 and do their utmost to get possession of some one or more 
 towns or fortresses lying in the foresaid King of Great 
 Britain's dominions. Their High Mightmesses, therefore, 
 feel themselves here called upon to give assurance, that 
 how soon soever they shall be masters of one or more 
 
 ' State Paper Office. 2 ms. Advocates' Library. 
 
138 THE FIFTY YEARS' STPcUGGLE OF 
 
 such towns or forts, assistance shall be promptly sent to 
 them, and arms and munition of war expedited to such 
 town.' " And then follow details of large supplies of 
 arms, and a very considerable subsidy, which the Dutch 
 Government engaged to transmit to the insurgents in 
 Britain. It seems manifest, from the Government cor- 
 respondence and other documents above shortly quoted, 
 that there was a real wide-spread disaffection throughout 
 England, Scotland, and Ireland, with a general disposi- 
 tion to break into open hostilities against the Govern- 
 ment ; that there was some amount of concert and privity 
 amongst the malcontents in the three kingdoms, especially 
 between Scotland and England ; that again, there was a 
 deliberate and express understanding with the refugees 
 in Holland, and also with the heads of the Dutch Re- 
 public ; and there was an expectation that the first blow 
 would be struck in Scotland ; that there the train would 
 fu'st explode. 
 
 It was under circumstances so full of alarm and terror 
 that an Insurrection did actually break out in Scotland. 
 It does not appear, however, that this resulted from any 
 prior or formal arrangement, or that there was any per- 
 ceptible foreign influence at work causing it ; although 
 it may have been hurried on under the impetus of the 
 general discontent, and in the hope that, make but a 
 beginning, the nation would speedily take up the contest. 
 So far as we can now judge, it was in itself an insurrec- 
 tion accidental and unpremeditated, — like the sudden 
 solitary flash of lightning, wliich bespeaks a generally 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 139 
 
 disordered state of tlie atmosphere, not that dense, sur- 
 charged concentration of elements which produces the 
 long continued and deadly thunder-storm. 
 
 In the apprehension that something dreadful and de- 
 structive was approaching, the panic of the Scottish 
 Ooimcil was extreme. The Archbishop of Glasgow was 
 hastily despatched to Court to urge the imminent dan- 
 ger, and to solicit a wan-ant, which was obtained and 
 put in execution, for the immediate imprisonment of 
 Hl»out twenty gentlemen, chiefly leading Presbyterians 
 in the West, without which it was impossible to answer 
 fur the peace and safety of the country. Amongst the 
 number so imprisoned were Major-General Montgomery, 
 brother of the Earl of Eglinton, Sir Hugh Campbell of 
 Cessnock, Sir William Cunningham of Cunninghamhead, 
 Sir George Maxwell of Polloc, Sir William Muir of 
 Rowallan, Sir James Stewart of Coltness, Major-General 
 Holbom of Menstrie, Colonel Robert Halket, brother of 
 Halket of Pitfirrane, and Sir George Munro. Their im- 
 l)risonment was the highest compliment that could be 
 paid to them. It imported that they were men of 
 acknowledged influence over their countrymen, that 
 their principles were odious to tyrants, and, if proper 
 occasion arose, that they might be expected to conse- 
 crate their abilities, hearts, and swords to the redemption 
 of their country from the bondage under which it was 
 now groaning. 
 
 But the main reliance of the despotic government was 
 in a standing army, which was augmented at this time 
 
140 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 to 3000 foot and eight troops of horse. It was to sup- 
 port itself off the fines levied on the country people ; 
 and was placed under the command of Thomas Dalziel 
 of Biuns as general. 
 
 Dalziel was of the family of the Earls of Carnwath, 
 and born in 1599. Most readers of old gossip are 
 familiar with the description of him in the memoirs of 
 Captain Crichton, one of his ruffian officers. " He was 
 bred up very hardy from his youth both in diet and 
 clothing. He never wore boots, nor above one coat, 
 which was close to his body, with close sleeves, like 
 those we call jockey-coats." In fact, he was bred an 
 Indian savage, not a cultured and gallant gentleman. 
 Such breeiling (not uncommon with certain coarse- 
 minded parents) mistakes hardness for hardiness, and 
 callous insensibility for manliness and courage. Youths 
 so bred generally grow up to be boorish, cruel, truculent 
 men, utterly regardless of the pains and sufferings of 
 their fellow-creatures. Such was the growth of Dalziel. 
 He adopted the military profession ; and his family 
 being eminent loyalists, he adhered faithfully to the 
 cause of Charles i. With him the memory of the be- 
 headed monarch became a fanaticism ; his execution a 
 sacrilege only to be expiated in the blood of the party 
 by whom he had been brought to the block. From that 
 day forth he never shaved his beard, but devoted himself 
 to seek every opportunity to avenge the bloody treason. 
 He served the son with as much zeal as he had shown 
 for the father. He was in the royal army of 1651, was 
 taken prisoner at Worcester, and carried to the Tower, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 141 
 
 but made his escape. During the interval till the Re- 
 storation, he served abroad in Poland and Russia ; and 
 in the barbarous combats with Turks and Tartars, learned 
 the arts of atrocious cruelty which he was so soon to 
 practise upon his own countrymen. Shortly after the 
 Restoration he returned home, and was a good deal 
 petted by the King and courtiers, for his ultra-royalty, 
 his Tartar-fighting reputation, and his dry humour and 
 many laughable eccentricities. " His unusual dress and 
 figure," Crichton relates, " when he was in London, 
 never failed to draw after him a great crowd of boys 
 and other young people, who constantly attended at his 
 lodgings, and followed him with huzzas as he went to 
 Court, or returned from it. As he was a man of humour, 
 he woidd always thank them for their civilities when he 
 left them at the door to go in to the King, and would 
 let them know exactly at what hour he intended to 
 come out again, and return to his lodgings. When the 
 King walked in the park, attended by some of his cour- 
 tiers, and Dalziel in his company, the same crowds would 
 always be after him, showing their admiration of his 
 beard and dress, so that the King could hardly pass on 
 for the crowd ; upon which his Majesty bade the devil 
 take Dalziel for bringing such a rabble of boys together 
 to have their guts squeezed out while they gaped at his 
 long beard and antic habit. ... In compliance to his 
 Majesty he went once to Court in the very height of the 
 fashion ; but as soon as the King and those about him 
 had laughed sufficiently at the strange figure he made, he 
 re-assumed his usual habit, to the great joy of the boys, 
 
142 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 who had not discovered him iu his fashionable dress." 
 But like the generahty of very eccentric men, he was 
 weak, conceited, wilful, and obstinate ; and however he 
 might play the buffoon amongst his Royalist companions, 
 to the people he was a most vindictive, sanguinary 
 and unnatural oppressor, the Haynau of the Scottish 
 l^ersecution. He had not tlie brand of mercenary or 
 apostate upon his forehead, like Middleton and Turner, 
 and the other soldiers of fortune, whose swords were 
 marketable commodities, who cringed to the royalty 
 which they had once helped to ruin, and spoiled and 
 slaughtered the Covenanters in whose service they had 
 risen to their captainships and generalships. Dalziel 
 had the merit of steadfastness and consistency, and if he 
 drew his sword for the Crown now in its hour of exalta- 
 tion, had no less done so in its hour of lowest depression. 
 Although he seems to have been vicious, gross, and de- 
 based in personal character, he was not without some of 
 the redeeming virtues of the " old soldier ;" was touchy 
 in honour, true to parole, and execrated the treachery by 
 which the priests more than once overruled the promises 
 which he had made on the field of battle. For such a 
 man some almost amiable instances are recorded of the 
 old-soldier feeling of brotherhood for former comrades who 
 came to be ranged against him in insurrection, and whom 
 the fortune of war afterwards placed in his power. Yet 
 after giving him credit for some relie\ing points, he still 
 remains emphatically the man of blood. In that sharp- 
 cut flinty fiice, that surly protruding mouth, those gaunt 
 and rigid cheeks, those fiercely gleaming eyes, tliat hoary 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 143 
 
 streaming hair, — one may read the imperious and inifcel- 
 iiig temper, tlie violeuce of disposition which disdains 
 all curb or restraint, the half-crazed savageness which no 
 l)ity can melt, no miser\^ assuage. It was his religion 
 — probably all the religion he had — to destroy the Cove- 
 nanters. They were a canaille good for nothing but to 
 flesh the swords of the cavaliers. They had been the 
 murderers of the Royal Martyr. There was no indignity, 
 no cmelty, which he would not readily inflict upon them. 
 He would put old women and children to torture ; he 
 would kill off poor men by inches in loathsome and 
 stifling dungeons ; he would strike a prisoner at the bar 
 on the mouth with the pommel of his sword till the blood 
 .sprang ; he would shoot men on the spot because they 
 woidd not inform against friends and relatives. He was 
 the worst of all military commanders, the par-tisan 
 r/eneral, who added to the natural violence of his temper, 
 and the common license of the commander in times of 
 ci\il war, all the virulence of political hostility and 
 hatred. 
 
14:4 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 THE PENTLAND RISING. 
 
 About the beginning of November 1666 four of the 
 Wanderers (as those of the Nonconformists \yere then 
 called who were obliged to seek refuge from persecution 
 by betaking themselves to a vagrant life) were under 
 hiding together in the hilly region of Glenkens. One of 
 them was M^Lellan of Barscobe, in the immediate neigh- 
 bourhood. After great hardship in that cold inclement 
 season, and long fasting in their wanderings, on the 
 morning of Tuesday, November 13th, they ventured to 
 quit their fastness in the hills, and come down for food 
 and temporary shelter to the little village or clachan of 
 Dairy on the banks of the Ken, about twenty miles 
 north-west from Dumfries. Some soldiers of Sir James 
 Turner's troop were there quartered. On their way to 
 the village, our Wanderers met the soldiers driving a 
 number of people before them to thresh out the corn of 
 an old man, whose property they were seizing to satisfy 
 certain church-fines for which he was liable. Though 
 indignant at ^\dtnessing this violence, Barscobe and his 
 companions, loath to involve themselves in so serious a 
 quarrel with the soldiers, passed on, and they went into 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 145 
 
 an alehouse liai-d hj for the refreshment which they so 
 much required. Whilst sitting at breakfast, a cry rose 
 tliat the soldiers had laiil violent hands on the old man, 
 bound him in his own house, and were threatening to 
 strip him naked, " and set him on a hot gridiron," 
 l^ecause of his refusal to pay the tines, and were other- 
 wise treating him with revolting barbarity. On this 
 intelligence they hurried to the old man's house, and 
 finding him lying bound upon the floor, they called to 
 the soldiers, " Why do you bind the old man 1 " They 
 answered, " How dare you challenge 1 " Some of the 
 people coming forward to loose him, the soldiers drew on 
 them ^vith their swords, and almost killed two of them. 
 One of Barscobe's companions discharged a pistol^ whicli 
 wounded one of the soldiers, and made him fall. The 
 rest were overpowered by the country people, disarmed, 
 and made prisoners ; and the old man was happil}' deli- 
 vered. At Balmaclellan, a little M'ay off, there were 
 about a dozen soldiers engaged in the same work of 
 exacting fines. To prevent reprisals, Barscobe's com- 
 pany, now augmented by accessions from the country 
 people, set off early next morning for Balmaclellan, and 
 surprised the soldiers, and took them prisoners. They 
 all quietly surrendered their arms except one, who mak- 
 ing some resistance was killed. 
 
 The people now felt that they had gone too far tt> 
 recede : that if they stopped short and dispersed, the 
 effect would only be to throw away all defence, and at 
 the .same time bring down upon themselves and the inha- 
 bitants of tlif district more severe and vengeful retalia- 
 
 K 
 
146 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 tions from Sir James Turner. Considerable nimibers 
 had already flocked to their ranks. Amongst the rest 
 Neilson of Corsack, Alexander Robertson, a minister's 
 son, and one Andrew Gray, merchant in Edinburgh, 
 " accidentally in the country at this time about his busi- 
 ness." They circulated jorivate advertisements through 
 the country summoning all who were ready, and appoint- 
 ing them to come in companies to Irongray Kirk, about 
 six miles from Dumfries, on Wednesday night, that they 
 might enter that town by day-break. Ere they could 
 muster, the sun was up on Thursday morning. Sudden 
 and impromptu as was the movement, and unprepared 
 and staggered as people were when they heard of it, still 
 the gathering insurgent host could count that morning 
 their 50 horse, "provided with cloaks girded over their 
 shoulder for fighting," and about 200 foot. They chose 
 Andrew Gray to be their leader, apparently without 
 knowing much about him, although he produced some 
 kind of warrant to take the command of them, whether 
 it was genuine or [surreptitious. It was ten o'clock 
 before they reached Dumfries. They approached from 
 the Galloway side without giving the least alarm. Tur- 
 ner was so secure in his head-quarters that he had not 
 even a watch set at the ancient famous bridge — one of 
 the many good works of Devorgilla, mother of John 
 Baliol — which connects Nithsdale with Galloway. ]\Iar- 
 shalled in order, the insurgents came to the Bridge- end 
 of Dumfries, their commander riding in advance. The 
 horse marched into the town, the foot stayed without. 
 Corsack and Robertson, with other two, rode up quickly 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. l47 
 
 to Turner's quarters ; the rest following at a little dis- 
 tance. WTieu the four carae to the house, Turner was 
 in bed ; but hearing a noise of horse, he started up in 
 alarm, and came running to the window. Seeing Cor- 
 sack with others, he cries, " Quarters, gentlemen, quar- 
 ters ! there shall be no resistance." Corsack, " a meek 
 and generous gentleman," replied, " If you come down 
 and make no resistance, on the word of a gentleman you 
 shall have quarters." Whilst they were speaking, Gray 
 came up, and seizing Turner, presented a carabine to 
 shoot him. " You shall as soon kill me," exclaimed 
 Corsack, coming between them, "for I have given him 
 «iuarters." Gray, it seems, got disgusted when he found 
 that he was in a company of gentlemen and not of cut- 
 tliroats ; for he soon afterwards went off " in a pet." 
 All the soldiers were disarmed, without injury being done 
 except to one, who, upon his violent resistance, was 
 wounded, and died of his wounds. The insui'gents " took 
 Sir James Turner prisoner, and set him on a low beast, 
 without his best raiment, and carried him through the 
 town in a despicable manner. . . . There he had been 
 reigTiing like a king, and lifted up in pride, with inso- 
 lence and cruelty over the poor people."^ After thus 
 disarming and securing the prisoners, tlie insurgent host 
 assembled at the Cross ; and, somewhat inconsistently it 
 may seem, manifested their loyalty by drinking the King's 
 health, and prosperity to his government. But, be it 
 rememl)ered, the CVjvenanters were always monarchical, 
 and, until a much later stage in the persecution, were 
 
 ' MS. Life of Gubritl Stmplc, by hinafelf. 
 
148 THE FIFTY YEAKS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 attached to the House of Stuart ; and this present move- 
 ment amongst them was fortuitous, unpremeditated, ori- 
 ginating in an accidental scuffle with the soldiers, and 
 was simply drifting on without any decided plan or 
 purpose. " They offered violence to none," writes Kobert 
 Mein, postmaster of Edinburgh, who makes his daily 
 report to the Government in London, " but declared 
 that they were only to be revenged upon the person of 
 that tyrant (Sir James Turner) who had laid their fami- 
 lies waste." ^ 
 
 Being now 300 strong, in the afternoon they marched 
 to the Kirk of Glencairn, some fifteen miles from Dum- 
 fries, on the west side of the Nith ; and next day they 
 passed over into the Glenkens to Dairy, on their way to 
 Ayrshire. They carried along with them Sir James 
 Turner, and the rest of their prisoners. Turner in liis 
 Memoirs relates, that here their commander Gray clan- 
 destinely left them ; "for the day before he had sent 
 away the money and other baggage which he had got 
 from me, and, thinking he had sped well enough, resolved 
 to retire himself before the fire grew hotter. " But his 
 connexion with the insurgents was so accidental and 
 slight, that they were not in the least degree affected by 
 his desertion. Most of them remained together in a 
 body, and kept guard, receiving occasional small addi- 
 ti(jns to tlieir numbers. Some were despatched into 
 ditl'erent parts of the west country, to advertise the 
 people to be in readiness to join at the coming up of the 
 main body. Alexander Robertson was delegated to 
 
 • State Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 149 
 
 Etiiuburgh, to see wliat assistance was to be expected 
 from friends there. 
 
 Altliougli the rising, after it became known, was 
 generally deemed, even by the most zealous of the Pres- 
 byterian sufterers, to be premature, rash, and hopeless ; 
 yet many of the ablest and most influential then residing 
 in Edinburgh felt there would be a want of duty and 
 brotherhood in not casting in their lot with their op- 
 jjressed fellow-subjects, now in arms to proclaim their 
 grievances, and obtain some redress. And amongst many 
 other notable men, Lieutenant-Colonel Wallace, Maxwell 
 of Monreith, John Welsh, William Veitch, and young 
 Hugh M'Kail set out towards the west countiy, to take 
 part with their insurgent brethren. We may note in 
 l»assing, that Wallace, when on his way to Ayr, stumbled 
 suddenly, at " Robert Lockhart's house," somewhere in 
 the Lanark district, upon the deserter Andrew Gray, " in 
 so uncouth a posture, with such a beggar-like habit, and 
 looking with such an abashed countenance, I was asto- 
 nished, and could not speak for a long time." But 
 Wallace soon perceived "that Andrew had taken the 
 j»et" — and the money and baggage too, if Sir James 
 Turner speaks the truth. " Upon this, a grieved and 
 discontented man, I parted with Andrew Gray, fearing 
 what ill he might and would do." 
 
 Immediately after the seizure of Sir James Turner, 
 and the disarming and suppression of his whole troop, 
 Stephen Irvine, one of the magistrates of Dumfries, posts 
 ott" for Edinburgh, fast jus the means of conveyance at 
 that time enable liim ; and late on tlie night of Friday 
 
150 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 the 1 6tli, gives information to the Privy-Council of " an 
 insurrection by a considerable number of armed men." 
 All was consternation at this astounding intelligence ; for 
 the oppressors had long hugged themselves in the belief, 
 that the Covenanting fire in the west was thoroughly 
 stamped out. So recently as the 11th of August, Mein 
 informed the Secretary of State, "All this kingdom is in 
 very gi^eat quietness."^ Lord-Commissioner Rothes had 
 just gone to London to enjoy himself after the fashion of 
 the gay and dissolute court. In his absence, Sharp was 
 president of the Council, and director of all affairs. 
 After he had recovered from the first stun of the intel- 
 ligence, he poured forth- a fiery discharge of military 
 edicts, with all the fury of a bafiled oppressor, and all 
 the excitement and cruelty which mark the coward. 
 L^'nder his orders Dalziel was to march to Glasgow, 
 " with (as our constant correspondent Mein informs us) 
 2000 foot and 500 well appointed horse as any in the 
 kingdom, and four pieces of cannon ;" ^ and from Glas- 
 gow he was to make to any point where he should hear 
 the insurrection had come to a head. 
 
 Meanwhile the insurgent body had been moving in a 
 very devious and uncertain manner through the upper 
 part of Galloway, and by Dalmellington into Ayrshire, 
 exposed to " the great rains and coldness of the weather," 
 and everywhere disappointed in the number of the re- 
 inforcements that joined them. " They have few or no 
 anns," writes Mein, " only scythes made straight and 
 put upon long staves. This ^'s most of their arms."-^ 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 2 mj, s jij^. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 151 
 
 About the 20tli, Wallace met them rendezvousing at the 
 Bridge of Doou. He was accompanied by some experi- 
 enced soldiers quite capable of acting as efficient officers. 
 Amongst others, were Major Learmont, whom Veitch 
 describes as " a man skilful, resolute, and courageous 
 enough, but of no great projection ;" Captain Amot, who 
 had held considerable commands in the late civil wars ; 
 and sturdy John Paton of Meadowhead, who had learned 
 the trade of war under Gustavus Adolphus, and served 
 with credit through the civil wars of his own country. 
 Wallace was at once appointed to take the command. 
 We have a moment's look of him as he was seen on the 
 banks of the Doon, amid the tempestuous blasts of 
 that November, and the no less tempestuous multitudes 
 rollmg and tossing around him, " in a long cloak," says 
 Sir James Turner, " his montero drawn over his face, 
 and his beard very rough" — a wild, rugged figure such 
 iis Salvator Rosa would have chosen for the model of a 
 guerilla chief. 
 
 James Wallace was of the good old Ayrshire family of 
 the Wallaces of Dundonald and Auchans, and sprung of 
 the stock of the great hero of Scotland. He had early 
 distinguished himself in the civil wars on the Covenant- 
 ing side, and was lieutenant-colonel under the Marquis 
 of Argyle. When, in 1650, the Scottish Parliament 
 ordered two regiments of life-guards to be embodied, one 
 of horse and the other of foot, to be composed of " the 
 choicest of the army and fittest for that tmst," Wallace 
 was appointed lieutenant-colonel of the foot regiment. 
 In all the gi'cat battles of the period he bore a conspicu- 
 
152 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 ous part. After the Restoration he had retired into 
 privacy, and lived in the strictest seclusion ; but he was 
 now impelled, by hatred of the dominant oppression, and 
 a sense of duty to his fellow-countrjTnen, to come for- 
 ward and share the fortunes of the insurgent host. 
 Wallace was a thoroughly trained soldier, a gallant and 
 distinguished officer, a noble and disinterested man, a 
 devout and consistent Christian. Even hostile chroni- 
 clers speak of him no otherwise than as an amiable and 
 brave enthusiast. His companions in tribulation can 
 find no terms warm or strong enough to extol his piety, 
 generosity, and zeal in all good works. In that age of 
 license and rapine, when the soldier too generally was a 
 (•ross between the fortune-hunter and the brigand, Wal- 
 lace was remarkable for purity, honour, and constant 
 unwavering devotion to the one cause in which he be- 
 lieved. He was of that type of soldier which has been 
 more recently exhibited in our Gardiners and Havelocks, 
 the world's greatest men of whom it knows little or no- 
 thing, or only comes to know by some extraordinary 
 heave of events, in which their innate greatness shines 
 forth resplendent. The States- General of Holland, where 
 he became an exile up to the date of his death in 1678, 
 gave him this public testimonial : "He has been for 
 many years an inhabitant of this state, and has lived 
 among us highly esteemed for his probity, submission to 
 the laws, and integrity of manners." M'Ward commu- 
 nicated the intelligence of his death to the brethren 
 at home, in a letter of exquisite beauty and pathos : — 
 "I doubt not but you have heard of the removal of 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 153 
 
 worthy and great Wallace. ... He died in great seren- 
 ity of soul. ... He was the most faithful, energetic, 
 compassionate, diligent, and indefatigable elder in the 
 work of the Lord that ever I knew at home or abroad. 
 . . . When the cause for which he had suffered was 
 mentioned, when it w^as scarce believed he understood or 
 could speak, there was a sunshine of serene joy looked 
 out of his countenance, and a lifting up of hands on high 
 as to receive the confessor's crown, together with a lift- 
 ing up of the voice as to sing the conqueror's song of 
 victory." How sublime this deathbed scene of the true 
 Cliristian warrior ! 
 
 When Wallace assumed command of the insurgents, 
 he seems to have had no hope of a successful issue to the 
 movement, but he felt bound to be with his brethren ; 
 and in the event his military skill was of incalculable 
 service to them, enabling them to make the best use of 
 circumstances, to fight well and worthily when they had 
 to fight, and lessening the fellness of the disaster when 
 they were overcome. 
 
 After they were modelled into an army, they held a 
 council of war to deliberate upon a question which was 
 now being much agitated, — Whetlier it was better 
 for them to continue in arms, and hazard the conse- 
 quences ; or presently to disband, and not venture n 
 collision with the Government forces, when there was so 
 little prospect of success ? The whole circumstances in 
 which they were placed were reviewed with a judgment, 
 candour, and calmness truly admirable. But adverse 
 and discouraging as these circumstances were, they camo 
 
154 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 all but unanimously to this resolution, worthy of their 
 fathers in the best days of the Covenant : " That they 
 were in the way of their duty ; and if their design failed, 
 they could say, it was in their heart to build a house to 
 the Lord, and to act for the glory of God, and the cause 
 of religion and liberty, for which they were willing to 
 die as sacrifices ; and they reckoned a testimony for the 
 Lord and their country was a sufficient reward for laboui", 
 loss, and death." 
 
 They continued their march, now in gloomy and stormy 
 weather, by Cumnock, Muirkirk, Douglas, Lesmahagow. 
 Sir James Turner, though a military pedant, and anxious 
 to depreciate them, confesses, " I never saw lustier fel- 
 lows than these foot were, or better marchers, for though 
 I was appointed to stay in the rear, and notwithstanding 
 these inconveniences (of darkness and tempest), yet I saw 
 few or none of them straggle." "Wlien near Lesmaha- 
 gow, Sir James saw them marshalled in order, and put 
 through their militaiy exercises, and he was astonished 
 at their proficiency. " I found their horse did consist of 
 four hundred and forty, and the foot of five hundred and 
 upwards," besides certain small foraging parties whom 
 he specifies. " The horsemen were armed for most part 
 with sword and pistol, some only with swords ; the foot 
 with musket, pike, scythe, fork, and sword, and some 
 with staves great and long. There I saw two of their 
 troops skirmish against other two, which. I confess, they 
 did handsomely, to my great admiration. I wondered at 
 the agility of both horse and rider, and to see them keep 
 troop so well, and how they had come to that perfection 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 155 
 
 in so short a time." Late on the evening of Sunday the 
 25th, they arrived at Lanark. There the tide rose to its 
 height, for they were about 1500 in number, and all 
 lively and courageous. On the morrow they renewed the 
 Covenants in a manner the most solemn ; and emitted a 
 Public Declaration, in which, for the first time, they 
 specifically defined their views and intentions. In this 
 Manifesto they complain, that it had been ordered by 
 the Government " that the Covenant be burnt ; the tie 
 of it is declared void and null, and men forced to sub- 
 scribe a declaration contrary to it ; episcopal government, 
 in its height of tyranny, is established, and men obliged 
 by law not to plead, witness, or petition against those 
 things ; grievous fines, sudden imprisonments, vast quar- 
 terings of soldiers, and a cruel inquisition by the High 
 Commission Court, were the reward of all who could 
 not comply with the Government by lordly hierarchy, 
 and abjure their Covenant. . . . The just sense whereof 
 made us choose rather to betake ourselves to the fields for 
 self-defence, than stay at home, burdened daily with the 
 calamities of others, and tortured with the fears of our 
 own approaching misery." The Covenanting movement 
 was not in its present phasis revolutionary for the over- 
 throw of the Stuarts, but was an armed self-defensive 
 demonstration for the redress of grievances, especially on 
 the score of religion. 
 
 Dalziel, with a force of some 3000 " well-appointed 
 horse and foot," as IMein describes them, was hanging on 
 their skirts. As directed by the Government, he was 
 making for the point where they seemed to have come 
 
156 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 to a head. And unluckily also, when there was so much 
 need of caution and harmony, a difference of opinion 
 sprang up amongst them, which soon widened into a 
 split, some insisting to give battle at Lanark, as the 
 best position either for fighting or retreating, others 
 urging the expediency of avoiding an engagement at 
 present, and continuing the march eastwards, in the 
 certain expectation of recei^dng further reinforcements 
 in the Lothians, an expectation fomented, injudiciously 
 and cruelly as turned out, by communications from well- 
 wishers in Edinburgh, principally from James Stewart, 
 after the Revolution, Lord Advocate of Scotland. The 
 latter party, those who pressed the continuation of the 
 march eastwards, prevailed ; but, in consequence, large 
 numbers broke off, and from this date the insurgent host 
 dwindled until it became a comparative handful. 
 
 The country far and wide, even into the heart of 
 England, was startled and shaken by the news of this 
 gathering insurrection. Many were agitated with fear 
 of new changes and convulsions. Many in England, as 
 well as in Scotland, were animated with the hope that 
 the end of the wedge was now to be inserted which 
 might eventually split in pieces the fabric of corruption 
 and iniquity. The " Pentland Rising" was no insig- 
 nificant thing in its own time, but whilst it lasted, was 
 a portentous meteor on which all eyes were fixed. The 
 Earl of Annandale, writing from Drumlanrig to one of 
 the Musgraves of Carlisle Castle, on the 25th November, 
 says : " The rebels in Scotland are reeling to and fro. 
 . . . They do increase, but not with any accession of 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 157 
 
 persons of quality or interest, though I fear, if the rebels 
 be able to stand out any time, they may declare for them. 
 . . , They are very resolute, and speak of great expec- 
 tations, though I hope ere long they will meet with 
 interruption. In the meantime it is fit all loyal persons 
 put and keep themselves in a posture to assist his 
 Majesty's right. ... In my judgment it is no less 
 necessary for you to do it than ourselves. I shall desire 
 and do intend to keep a constant correspondence with 
 you, that we may be useful to one another." ^ Daniel 
 Fleming, an official in Westmoreland, writing to Sir 
 Joseph Williamson on the 26th, thus expresses the 
 grounds of his alarm : " We hear they (the insurgents) 
 declare for liberty of conscience and freedom from taxes, 
 which fair pretences I wish may work no ill effects in 
 England, and then Scotland cannot in probability much 
 harm us."^ In a letter from York, addressed to Wil- 
 liamson, complaint is made, that " this insurrection in 
 Scotland hath given such an alarm here, that my Lord 
 Mayor hath ordered all the citizens that they do not stir 
 forth of their doors after ten o'clock at night." " 
 
 The march eastwards began towards Bathgate late on 
 M<jnday the 20 th, Dalziel lieing at Stonebyres, only a 
 little on the other side of the Clyde. The weather was 
 extremely cold and boisterous ; there were alternately 
 torrents of rain and blinding drifts of snow ; the roads, 
 had at the best in those days, were but a continued 
 swamp of half-liquid mud ; the streams and rivers were 
 in roaring flood ; night soon added the horrors of dark- 
 
 1 State Par;-r OfRce - ll>i<1. ■' fhid. 
 
158 THE FIFTY YEARS' ^STRUGGLE OF 
 
 ness to the other difl&culties of the journey ; and the men 
 were suffering nameless hardships from cold, fatigue, 
 pain, sickness, and exhaustion. But Turner admits, in 
 a kind of rapture of admiration, which the tried and 
 hardy veteran could not but feel even for enemies, 
 " Again I must say, that I have seldom or never seen 
 lustier foot than those they had. They kept rank and 
 file on that miserable way and weather even to admira- 
 tion, and yet outmarched their horse and got to the van 
 of them." 
 
 In this wretched plight they dragged on from Bath- 
 gate to New Bridge, five or six miles to the west of 
 Edinburgh. They still flattered themselves with hopes 
 of succour in Mid-Lothian ; five hundred men more, with 
 fresh stores of arms and ammunition, would have sufficed 
 to turn the scale against the Royal forces. In the ex]Dec- 
 tation of receiving decisive assistance, and with a fair 
 prospect of victory before them, one of their ministers 
 addressed them at New Bridge, and, whilst encouraging 
 them with the hopes of reinforcements, sought also to 
 moderate their passions and guard them against excess 
 should the victory be theirs. " Remember that Cove- 
 nant and oath of God which you sware yesterday, and 
 that you are pledged in the sight of Heaven to demean 
 yourselves, not only piously to God, but civilly and dis- 
 creetly to man. Your friends are ready to receive and 
 embrace you with open arms, and furnish you with all 
 necessaries of food and raiment, as also with all things 
 necessary to enable you to encoimter the enemy. But 
 you must not stop there. To be civil to those who are 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. lo9 
 
 good to you deserves neither thanks nor reward. I 
 entreat you to use all imaginable discretion to those who 
 are not of your persuasiuu. Gain them with love, and 
 by your good carriage stop the mouths of your adver- 
 saries." With these words of encouragement and caution 
 they again marched from New Bridge to Colinton, at 
 which they arrived late on the 27 th. They were now 
 within three miles of Edinburgh ; but, alas ! they had 
 met with no assistance, no reinforcements, no sympathy 
 in the Lothians ; Edinburgh and Leith, instead of show- 
 ing any friendly disposition, were all in arms against 
 them ; and Dalziel was following them up sharply across 
 the country, being at Calder, no great distance off. Col- 
 inton lying at the north-eastern end of the Pentland 
 range, which is the barrier between the metropolis and 
 the plain of the Forth on the one side, and the roads 
 into the west country on the other, it was evident that 
 Wallace now meditated the opening up of a compara- 
 tively safe and easy means of escape for the insurgents, 
 keeping them in the meantime within reach of the 
 natural defences of those bold and finely diversified 
 hills. 
 
 Tlie night of the 27th had been " a sore night of 
 frost and snow," but the 28th rose " a fair frosty day." 
 Early in the morning Wallace marched the insurgents 
 out of Colinton, led them round the eastern end of the 
 Pentlands, and then turned away on the road running 
 along the .southern base of the hills towards the west 
 country. Tlicy were now reduced in numbers to 900 ill- 
 equipped and worn-out men. " As I wot," writes Mein 
 
160 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 on the 27tli, " pitifully bad appointed, neither saddle or 
 bridle, pistol or sword, amongst the ten men of them ; 
 baggage horses, some whereof not worth forty shillmgs. 
 . . . They are mighty weary with marching. . . . One 
 day may do much."i After a short march, and having 
 passed the southern entrance into a deep defile which 
 intersects the hills nearly north and south, from the 
 direction of Currie to Glencorse, he called a halt, to 
 collect stragglers, and rest his men, and arrange them 
 properly for an orderly and expeditious retreat. 
 
 This defile, which is the only pass through the hills 
 at all practicable, winds for almost its whole length of 
 five or six miles by the bottom of Camethy, the highest 
 and most picturesque summit of that range of hills. 
 Steep and all but inaccessible on its north side, on the 
 south Carnethy sinks down towards the valley of the 
 Esk by successive and gradual slopes, which become, 
 near Glencorse, where this same west country highway 
 runs, a kind of swelling, undulating plain. This undu- 
 lating plain is RuUion Green. At the upper corner of 
 this more level groimd are a series of natural terraces or 
 spurs, sharply marked and somewhat abrupt, narrow, 
 precipitous ridges, springing one above another until 
 they mount and at last enter into the peaked summit of 
 Carnethy itself. 
 
 To guard against any sudden attack, and at the worst 
 to secure an easy escape over the hills, Wallace drew up 
 his men on this series of ridges. He divided them into 
 three companies. On the lower or more southerly ridge 
 
 1 state Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTErvS. 1 G 1 
 
 he placed a small body of horse under Barscobe and the 
 Galloway gentlemen. In the centre were the poorly 
 armed foot under his own command. On the higher or 
 more northerly ridge stood the greatest part of his horse, 
 under the command of ]\Iajor Learmont. 
 
 Whikt resting themselves as they best could on the 
 snow-covered heights, suddenly, about eleven o'clock, 
 they perceived a party of life-guards emerging from the 
 mouth of the defile, and taking their station nearly 
 opposite to them, to the east, on a slight rising ground. 
 Tliis was the van of Dalziel's army, under Lieutenant- 
 Geueral Drummond. Having heard that the insurgents 
 were retreating by the south side of the Pentlands, they 
 had hastened through the defile from Currie, in advance 
 of their main body, to endeavour if possible to cut off 
 the retreat. This could not now be effected, as Wallace 
 of course was too sagacious to draw up his men to the 
 east of the defile, but had posted them on the west, 
 whence the country lay open for them to retreat without 
 danger of being intercepted. After viewing each other 
 for " about half an hour," Dakiel sent out this advanced 
 party, under Drummond, to skirt along the upper slopes 
 and turn the left wing of the insurgents, assuring his 
 attendants that that party would do the business, and 
 that the rest needed only to stand and see fair play. 
 To meet them, Wallace ordered out Captain Arnot, with 
 an equal number of horse. They encountered upon a 
 piece of level groimd, in fact upon part of tins Rulliou 
 Green. After both had spent their fire, they closed at 
 the sword's point, and a hot and lengthened combat 
 
 L 
 
162 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 ensued. The life-guards were rejDulsed with loss ; and 
 but for the difficulty of the ground in pursuit the loss 
 would have been considerable. Wallace here led out a 
 party of foot to second the horse, and forced the life- 
 guards completely off the field. The vanguard were thus 
 very much staggered and humiliated, and many threw 
 down theu' arms in anger and disgust ; and Drummond 
 afterwards confessed, that if the insurgents had been 
 able to follow up their advantage, the whole army might 
 have been thrown into irretrievable confusion. 
 
 It being thus discovered that this little host, though 
 destitute of all the munitions of war, were not the mere 
 silly countrymen or paltry fanatics that Royalist jDride 
 and ignorance chose to fancy, the battle was suspended 
 for three hours, and was not resumed imtil the whole 
 main body of the army had come up, — 3000, fully 
 accoutred, against 900, ill-armed, ill -horsed, ill-provided 
 every way, and but slightly disciplined. Wallace, more- 
 over, was manifestly anxious to protract the fighting 
 until the shades of night should close in, and cover the 
 retreat which, where there was such disparity of num- 
 bers, he saw was inevitable. 
 
 The whole army had now arrived, and Dalziel moved 
 them in mass up to tlie plateau of Rullion Green ; the 
 insurgents, as we have said, holdhig tlie more elevated 
 ridges. His purpose was to dislodge and overpower 
 them, and cany the heights by sheer weight of numbers 
 in which he was so vastly superior. First he sends out 
 a great body of horse, attended with some foot, to attack 
 the left wing on the higher ridge, commanded by Major 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 103 
 
 Learmont. Learmont meets them with a party of horse, 
 tianked with foot. After firing on both sides, they close. 
 Learmont's foot force Diilziel's to give way, on which the 
 horse run also. A second party of horse again advance 
 against the left wing ; and a second party under Lear- 
 mont meet them, and with the same success, chasing 
 them beyond the front of their army. But a fresh body 
 of horse coming up, Learmont's troop retire to their 
 station up the hill. " Learmont's horse was shot under 
 lum and he fell ; but, stepping back a little to a fold- 
 dyke, he killed one of the four horsemen who pursued 
 him, mounted his horse, and came safe off from the other 
 three." The last encounter is after sunset, the dim lurid 
 shadows descending over their heads, as if an emblem of 
 the sinking liberties of Scotland. Dalziel now awakes 
 from his stupid cavalier conceit, to a sense that he has 
 tough antagonists to deal with. Finding the left wing 
 nil the higher ridge nearly impregnable, both from the 
 strength of their position and the signal skill and courage 
 alike of the officers and men, he advances his whole left 
 wing of horse upon the right of the insurgents, placed 
 on the lower ridge of the slope, under the command of 
 Barscobe. Of these there are only thirty weak horse, 
 totally unable to sustain such a charge, and they are 
 therefore soon borne down. Dalziel now tlirows nume- 
 rous masses of foot, aided wherever possiljle by horse, 
 against all the positions occupied by the insurgents. 
 The various companies contend gallantly against this 
 accumulated, overpowering charge. Learinonts left par- 
 ticularly do wonders, and, rushing down upon the foe. 
 
164 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 are nearly drawn away from the line of their position. 
 But what human exertion or bravery can withstand such 
 a weight of numbers ? The horses of the insurgents, 
 too, not trained for war, wild and plunging, create the 
 utmost disorder. As an organized host, they are now 
 cleft in pieces and broken up. Little detached groups, 
 even single individuals, are divided fram the body, 
 hemmed in and surrounded by considerable parties of 
 the Royalists. United resistance is no longer possible. 
 The battle as a regular engagement is at an end. The 
 great bulk of the insurgents happily are escaping over 
 the hills, according to the wise and humane precaution of 
 their excellent commander. Any remaining contest is 
 but a death-struggle of individuals, or of small bands to 
 burst through the meshes which they feel gathering 
 around them. By the dusky wintry twilight we can yet 
 see, battling fiercely upon the field, our sturdy, great- 
 shouldered, lion-hearted yeoman, John Paton of Mea- 
 dowhead. The favourite hero of the chroniclers of the 
 Covenant, the most wonderful stories are related of his 
 hardihood and prowess, and his Bible and his sword with 
 its thirty nicks are still presei'ved at Lochgoin. There 
 he is, with two other horsemen from his native Fenwick, 
 surrounded by a multitude of troopers, five deep, buzzing 
 and stinging like infuriated bees ; but his strong arm 
 makes a way, and he dashes with his companions through 
 the phalanx which had closed round them. Dalziel, ob- 
 serving his escape, lets slip three of his bloodhounds to 
 make sure of him, dead or alive, giving them an exact 
 description of him, for well he knew him, — " of a middle 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 165 
 
 stature, strong and robust, and somewhat fair in com- 
 plexion, with large eyebrows," — altogether a dangerous 
 man to come across when the lion heart of him was 
 beating with the fierce throbs of battle. His pursuers 
 are fast upon his track. He is but a few paces in ad- 
 vance. They spur their steeds, and feel as if they could 
 grasp his cloak. But now a deep black slough lies before 
 them. Paton, used to hasty flights and l)lack pools 
 about his native Fenwiek, leaps over at a bound. He 
 then halts, and steadily watches his pursuers. The first 
 of them tries the leap. With his trusty old sword 
 Paton cleaves the trooper s head, and down into the gulf 
 below roll both the horse and the now nerveless rider. 
 The two othei-s, also attempting the passage, fall short in 
 their leaps, and sink hopelessly bogged into the mire. 
 " Take my compliments to your master," cries Paton, 
 with the grim irony of the battle-field, "and tell him I 
 cannot come to sup with him to-night." 
 
 The battle of the Pentlands was nobly fought by the 
 insurgents. This is fidly acknowledged by Mein in his 
 contemporary reports to the Government. The Royalist 
 officers, many of whom felt for the wrongs and provoca- 
 tions of theu" poor Westland countrymen, expressed the 
 highest admiration of their endurance, bravery, and hard 
 fighting. " All the army," says Mein, writing on the 
 30th November, " affirm they never saw men fight more 
 •gallantly and abide better than they did, tlie General 
 being forced to use stratagems to break tliem." ^ And 
 again, writing un the 1th DccemlxT, " 1 liave s))oke to 
 
 ' Siut'j r.-ipcr Oaicf. 
 
\(]C) THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 most of the officers in the army, and all of them agree 
 that they never saw men fight more courageously than 
 they did for three several charges." ^ But under the 
 inequality of numbers, and so many disadvantages every 
 way, the result could not be doubtful. The loss of the 
 Royal army was never given, but was known to be con- 
 siderable. The insurgents had about fifty killed, and at 
 least one hundred made prisoners. The killed were 
 l)uried in trenches on Rullion Green. An old monument 
 still marks the spot where they were laid ; and an in- 
 scription, in fervent but uncouth rhymes, records — 
 
 " A Cloud of Witnesses lie here, 
 Who for Christ's interest did appear. 
 For to restore true Liberty, 
 O'erturned then by tyranny : 
 These Heroes fought with great reno^m ; 
 By falling got the Martyr's crown !" 
 
 T have been thus minute in recounting the particulars 
 of this engagement, not because there is much conse- 
 (iuence in the details of an old rough battle, but because 
 many of the incidents are curious and striking, and re- 
 flect the stormy aspect of the times ; and also because it 
 is one of the tricks of the calumniators of those perse- 
 cuted people to slur and huddle over their various mili- 
 tary encounters, as if they had been a set of babbling, 
 useless, feeble fanatics, and not, as they really were, a 
 hold and martial race, most of them yet sweating from 
 the civil wars, and only wanting a great commander, 
 even at this early crisis, to have shaken to atoms the 
 throne of oppression. 
 
 '• Stale Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. \ ('>7 
 
 The prisoners liad siirreudered on a promise of quarter. 
 But Sliarp, who presided at the council, and was now as 
 nuicli inflamed with rage as he had fonnerly been damped 
 with fear, resolved to gratify his revenge against the 
 l*resbji;erians, and overruled all remonstrance or oppo- 
 sition on the part of tlie officers of the Crown. Tlie 
 King's Advocate was accordingly ordered to proceed 
 against eleven of the prisoners, who were selected as the 
 first batch of victims. Very quick despatch was made. 
 They were found guilty, and ordered to be hanged at tlie 
 Cross, their heads and riglit arms to be cut off, the latter, 
 because they had been raised up in renewing the Cove- 
 nant at Lanark. They all suffered with unshaken firm- 
 ness ; and their dying declaration, in which they protested 
 against the tyranny exercised upon their country, made 
 a profound impression. "All of them," according to 
 Mein's information, "died, adhering to the Covenant, 
 declaring they never intended in the least any rebellion, 
 and all of them prayed most fervently for His Majesty's 
 interest, and against his enemies." ^ For we have ex- 
 ]ilaiued that at this time, and for many years afterwards, 
 they acknowledged the king as civil ruler, and their acts 
 of resistance were meant only as armed demonstrations 
 for reilress of grievances, a proceeding not unusual in 
 Scottisli history. The Government reporter continues : 
 ''Tliey prayed to forgive their judges and tlio noblemen, 
 and declared their blood lay only at the prelates' door — 
 would not be hindered to exi)i-ess themselves in such a 
 manner — which exi»ressions had too great di])])ing in tlie 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
168 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 hearts of the commonalty. ... If any more die, tliey 
 are to be carried out of the town to the Boroiighmuir, a 
 place where a hundred of them may all hang together."^ 
 A paper dated 7 th December, addressed to Williamson, 
 after narrating those executions, adds with savage glee, 
 — " On Tuesday next there is as many of the same kind 
 of lay elders to fill the stage, and so along, till the rem- 
 nant of the damned old cause be ferreted out of their 
 conventicles of retreat. In order to this, the Lord Com- 
 missioner, with the army, is gone to traverse aU those 
 parts where the frenzy first took its rise." ^ 
 
 No information could be obtained which showed the 
 rebellion to be other than a sudden rising, unconcerted 
 and unprepared. But the prelates, who wished to bring 
 the whole Presbyterian party into bad odour, by black- 
 ening this as only part of a dangerous and extensive 
 conspiracy, determined to force some of the prisoners to 
 a confession to suit their purpose. With this view, two 
 of a fresh batch of prisoners now brought to trial, were 
 selected for the horrible torture of the '• Boots." Those 
 were Neilson of Corsack, and Hugh M'Kail. 
 
 Hugh IM'Kail was a young man about twenty-six, son 
 of Mattliew I\I'Kail, the outed minister of Bothwell. 
 He was educated at the University of Edinburgh, under 
 the eye of an uncle, whose name he bore, one of the 
 ministers of Edinburgh. He was a youth remarkable 
 for delicate beauty of person, and no less for learning, 
 fine intellectual promise, impressive eloquence, and fer- 
 
 1 State Paper Office. - Hid. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 1<)!) 
 
 Tent piety. A contemporary elegist in no unwortliy 
 strains describes him : 
 
 "His early <lawnings sparkled siicb a liglit, 
 As promised a noon that should be bright ; 
 His greener blossoms gave such ample hope, 
 That none did qiiestion the succeeding crop. 
 The Graces their own birth would have him styled, 
 The Muses have adopted him their child ; 
 Amongst her babes, him Eloquence have placed. 
 And as her suckling, Pallas him embraced. 
 
 For he had beauty which might well endear, 
 No blemish in his body did appear ; 
 Some great thing sparkled in that blushing face, 
 Integrity that lovely brow did grace. 
 
 But whate'er were the beauties of his face, 
 A fairer mind dwelt in that lovely case ; 
 A sprightly mind, and unacquaint with guile, 
 Which with no baseness did itself defile ; 
 A divine soul, not made to vice a drudge, 
 A palace where the graces chose to lodge. " 
 
 He was licensed by the Presbytery of Edinburgh in 
 IGGl, when in his twentieth year ; and as he had been 
 tutor, so he continued chaplain in the family of Sir 
 James Stewart of Coltness, a well-known Presbyterian 
 leader, and father of a son of the same name still more 
 distinguished, after the Revolution, Lord Advocate of 
 Scotland. He preached his last sermon in the High 
 Church of Edinljurgh, upon the Sabbath immediately 
 preceding tlie Sth of September 1GG2, the day fixed 
 by the then Parliament for tlie removal of the non-con- 
 forming ministers of that city. In his sermon, taking 
 occasion to dwell upon the persecutions of the Cliurch, 
 
170 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 he used expressions which were never forgotten either 
 by his friends or his enemies, and never forgiven by 
 the latter. 
 
 "Sometimes the fountain whence affliction flows is 
 great power, which the Church of God either cannot or 
 may not reach. ' I returned, and considered all the 
 oppressions that are done under the sun : and behold 
 the tears of such as were oppressed, and they had no 
 comforter ; and on the side of their oppressors there was 
 power ; but they had no comforter.' And the Scripture 
 doth abundantly evidence, that the people of God have 
 been persecuted, sometimes by Pharaoh upon the throne, 
 sometimes by a Haman in the State, sometimes by a 
 Judas in the Church. . . . The tribulations of the chil- 
 dren of God will certainly come to a period, and the 
 more violent they be they are nearer to an end." 
 
 The people were not slow in appropriating these names 
 to the personages whom the caps respectively fitted ; and 
 the memorable name oi Judas was at once and for ever 
 attached to James Sharp. 
 
 In consequence of this supposed attack upon tlie new 
 order of things, a party of horsemen were sent to Good- 
 trees, a seat of Sir James Stewart, in the neighbourhood 
 of Edinburgh, to apprehend ]\I'Kail ; but he made his 
 escape, and after remaining for a while in concealment 
 with his father at Bothwell, he repaired to the Continent, 
 where he spent three years. " During all this space," 
 according to the old Memoir of him, " he was most 
 seriously exercised in the study of piety and true know- 
 ledge, wherein, as he greatly advanced above all his 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVEN.ANTEKS. 171 
 
 ('(iuals, so at length he became most eminent and 
 exemplary." 
 
 He joined the insurgents in ^le West country ; but 
 was in a state of great weakness and prostration. AVhen 
 at Ayr, Yeitch mentions in his Memoirs, " Several that 
 were not used to such hardships were like to turn vale- 
 tudinary ; and the worthy Hugh M'Kail would have 
 fallen ofi' his horse if one had not laid hold of him and 
 kept him up ; and they carrying him into a house in 
 that fainting fit, laying him in a bed, and giving him 
 something for a cordial by which his spirits returned, 
 he recovered." He was obliged to leave them when at 
 ( 'olinton before the battle ; and was taken prisoner when 
 on his way across the country to his father s residence at 
 Liberton, a few miles from Edinburgh. He was brought 
 before the Privy-Council for examination. Rothes, who 
 liad now returned from Court, was filled with rage, as 
 he imagined that the insurrection was no casual thing, 
 but was a deep-laid secret conspiracy, although it had 
 failed of present effect. Determined to be at the bottom 
 of tliis conspiracy, he caused M'Kail to be examined 
 under the torture of the Boot ; and enraged at not being 
 able to extort the sort of confession he wanted, always 
 called out to the executioner for " one toucli more," and 
 ordered his leg to be shattered with eleven strokes of 
 the mallet. " I protest solemnly in the sight of God," 
 cried the poor sufferer, " I can say no more, though aril 
 the joints in my l)0(ly were in as great torture as that 
 poor leg." 
 
 Strong intercessions were made on his behalf liy the 
 
172 THK FIFTY YEAES" STllUGGLE OF 
 
 Ducliess of Hamilton to Rothes, and hy the Marchioness 
 of Douglas to Sharp, but in vain. Dr. Matthew M'Kail, 
 his cousin, a very eminent physician, who has already 
 been alluded to, made personal apiDlication to Sharp in 
 Edinburgh, when Sharp " desired him to assure Mr. Hugh 
 that he would befriend him if he would reveal the mys- 
 tery of the plot, which he not being able to do, occa- 
 sioned his torture. ^ Sharp left Edinburgh and went to 
 St. Andrews, " for that," says Row in his Life of Robert 
 Blair, '' was his ordinary deceitful policy and trick, after 
 he had plotted and contrived greatest wickedness and 
 severities against the honest people, and had engaged the 
 Council to act what he had contrived, and set them on, 
 then to withckaw and come to St. Andrews, and, after 
 the mischief was acted, to say that he was free of it, he 
 was not there," &c. Dr. M'Kail followed him to St. 
 Andrews with fresh recommendations. An account of 
 the visit, as well as of some other incidents, has been 
 preserved in a manuscript (from which quotations have 
 already been made), apparently drawn up by Dr. M'Kail 
 at the time. "After dinner he arrived at the Arch- 
 bishop's house on Saturday, and the servant told that 
 the l)arber was trimming him, and when he had done 
 Mr. Matthew woidd get access. In the meantime, whilst 
 he was walking in the outer room, the Archbishop's 
 son, about twelve years old, came and inquired of Mr. 
 jMatthew if he came from Edinburgh, to which it was 
 answered yes. Then he inquired for the news there, 
 and Mr. Matthew answered there were none, but that 
 
 1 MS. in Advocates' Library. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 173 
 
 other four of the west-coimtiy men were hanged j'cster- 
 day. The youth said, ' No more ! it will be long before 
 they hang them all !' And thus was verified the old 
 proverb, As the old cock crows the young cock learns."^ 
 On his obtaining an interview, and delivering the letters, 
 Sharp, after having perused them, answered drily, " The 
 business is now in the Justiciaries' hands, and I can do 
 nothing." He went through the form, however, of 
 writing a letter for Dr. M'Kail to carry to the Arch- 
 bishop of Glasgow, then in Edinburgh, in the very midst 
 of all the torturings and hangings, for he always took 
 the full responsibility of the i)relatic persecutions, and 
 had none of the sneaking duplicity of Sharp. But that 
 excited zealot had long been demanding from the Go- 
 vernment, as we have seen in his own correspondence, 
 the most extreme and exemplary vengeance against the 
 disaffected Presbyterians, and now when the opportunity 
 of bloodshed had come round, he was not the man to 
 stop the effusion. He turned away from all appeals 
 for mercy, and only gave the same cold stereotype 
 answer, " That the business was now in tlie Justiciaries' 
 hands."- 
 
 An indictment was served upon Hugh M'Kail to ap- 
 pear before the Court of Justiciary ; but the effects of 
 his torture incapacitated him from attending on the 
 day named. In the words of his petition for delay, 
 " I am and have been ever since my torture in a great 
 distemper and fever, besides the great pain and utter 
 inability of my leg, which hatli constantly kept me 
 
 ' MS. in Advocates' Lihrarv 2 ij,j(i_ 
 
174 THE FIFTY YEARB' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 bedfast, and doth render me incapable not only of mind- 
 ing my own defence, but wholly unable to walk or stand." 
 On being somewhat recovered, he was tried, found 
 guilty of treason, and sentenced to be executed at 
 the market-cross of Edinburgh, on Saturday the 2 2d 
 of December. 
 
 After some of the prisoners were condemned, and a few 
 executed, it is stated by most respectable contemporary 
 authorities (in the manuscript of Dr. Matthew M'Kail 
 amongst other places), that a letter came from the King 
 discharging the taking of any more lives. It came into 
 Sharp's hands as President, and ought at once to have 
 been communicated to the Council. But he kept it up 
 until several more of the prisoners were despatched, par- 
 ticularly Hugh M'Kail, against whom he had a bitter 
 grudge ; for were not the birds of the air carrying about 
 the nickname of Judas I 
 
 His father was dotingly fond of him, and Hugh re- 
 turned this affection mth equal ardour. Their interview 
 after the sentence was most affecting. " Hugo," said 
 the old man with a flood of tears, " I called thee a good 
 olive-tree of fair fruits, and now a storm hath destroyed 
 the tree, and his fruits and branches. ... I have 
 sinned : thou, poor sheep I what hast tliou done ? " 
 With many groans Hugh answered : " Through coming 
 short of the fifth commandment I have come short of the 
 promise, that my days should be prolonged in the land 
 of the living. God's controversy with thee," addressing 
 his father, *' is for over- valuing thy children, especially 
 myself" 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 175 
 
 But his sufferings and sorrows, and the awful death 
 awaiting him, did not extinguish the youthful hilarity 
 and light humour which seem to have been natural to 
 him. Like More and Raleigh and James Guthrie, and 
 many other brave good men on the eve of a violent 
 death, he had his quaint and innocent jests. On return- 
 ing to prison after his sentence, some one inquired how 
 his leg was that had been tortured : " Oh," he replied, 
 "the fear of my neck makes me forget my leg." On 
 the Thursday before his execution, sitting at supper with 
 his fellow-prisoners, he called to them, " Come, eat to the 
 full, and cherish your bodies, that we may be a fat 
 Christmas pie to the prelates." The execution would be 
 within three days of Christmas, which was now observed 
 as a High Church festival by the new prelatic establish- 
 ment. On the Friday night, the night immediately pre- 
 ceding his execution, he went to bed a little after eleven, 
 and his cousin Dr. Matthew IM'Kail lay with him, and 
 relates how soundly he slept, " which the said Mr. Mat- 
 thew knew, having slept very little that night because 
 of a pain in his head, wherewith he was frequently trou- 
 bled." About five in the morning he rose, and awoke 
 his comrade John Wodrow, saying pleasantly, " Up, 
 John I you are too long in bed ; you and I look not like 
 men going this day to be hanged, seeing we lie a-bed so 
 long." But soon passing to the serious thoughts sug- 
 gested by their situation, " Now, Lord," he prayed, "we 
 come to Thy tlirone, a place we have not been acquainted 
 with. Earthly kings' thrones have advocates against 
 poor men ; but Thy throne hath Jesus an Advocate for 
 
170 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 US. Our supplication this day is not to be free of death, 
 nor of pain in death, but that we may witness before 
 many witnesses a good confession." 
 
 When he came to the place of execution, " he ap- 
 peared," says the old Memoir, " to the conviction of all 
 that formerly knew him, with a fairer, better, and more 
 staid countenance than ever they had before observed. 
 . . . When Hugh M'Kail suffered, there was scarce 
 ever seen so much sorrow in onlookers. Scarce was 
 there a dry cheek in the whole street or windows at the 
 cross of Edinburgh." When upon the scaffold he said, 
 "Although I be judged and condemned as a rebel 
 amongst men, yet I hope, even in order to this action, 
 to be accepted as loyal before God. Nay, there can be 
 no greater act of loyalty to the King, as the times now 
 go, than for every man to do his utmost for the extirpa- 
 tion of that abominable plant of Prelacy, which is the 
 bane of the throne and of the country. ... I heartily 
 submit myself to death, as that which God hath ap- 
 pointed to all men because of sin. ... I praise God 
 for this fatherly chastisement, whereby He hath made 
 me in part, and will make me perfectly, partaker of His 
 holiness." Standing on the ladder, with the fatal nap- 
 kin over his face, he lifted it for a moment, and in the 
 highest ecstasies of assurance and devotion exclaimed, — 
 " As there is a great solemnity here, of a confluence of 
 people, a scaffold, a gallows, and people looking out at 
 windows ; so is there a greater and more solemn pre- 
 paration in heaven, of angels to carry my soul to Christ's 
 bosom." His closing words were tlie famous anthem of 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 177 
 
 triumph — the " Farewell and Welcome " — whicli tlie 
 after-martyrs so commonly repeated : — 
 
 " Now I leave off to speak any more to creatm'es, and 
 turn my speech to Thee, Lord ! Now I begin my in- 
 tercourse with God, which shall never be broken otf. — 
 Farewell father and mother, friends and relations ! 
 Farewell the world and all delights ! Farewell meat 
 and di'ink ! Farewell sun, moon, and stars I — Welcome 
 God and Father ! Welcome sweet Lord Jesus, the 
 Mediator of the New Covenant ! Welcome blessed 
 Spirit of grace, God of all consolation ! Welcome glory 1 
 Welcome eternal life ! Welcome Death 1" 
 
 Rothes now made a progress through the West, and 
 many persons were executed ; but the sufferings inflicted 
 by these courts were nothing compared to those caused 
 by the military executions which followed the suppres- 
 sion of the rising, and which extended more or less 
 through the following year. " Most of the prisons," 
 writes Mein, on the 13th December; "most of the 
 prisons in the whole country are full of them. Barbadoes 
 will be fidl plenished this next year. Most of them will 
 be picked up.'' ^ 
 
 The prelatic party exulted in what they considered 
 the success of their endeavours, and instead of sliowing 
 any di.sposition to relent, aimed at the utter destruction 
 of their opponents. " If we make a riglit use of our 
 victory and improve it," is tlie language of the Arch- 
 bishop of Glasgow in writing to Williamson, "it will 
 
 1 Siate Paper OflBce. 
 M 
 
178 THE FIFTY YEAKS* STRUGGLE OF 
 
 conduce much to the King and kingdom's advantage, and 
 help to settle this unquiet and tottering kingdom. If 
 not, our remissness in pursuing this will lay the founda- 
 tion for a new and worse rebellion." ^ Official men in 
 their private commimications to the Government evinced 
 that they had no confidence in the forced submission of 
 the people. Although the Pentland Rising, as often 
 happens with sudden popular insurrections, had been 
 dissipated to a marvel, yet they express their conviction 
 that there was a general diffused sympathy with the in- 
 surrection and its objects ; that it had been widely rami- 
 fied, though it broke from want of sufficient pre-arrange- 
 ment ; and that there were still tlie bodings of a future 
 tempest. Thus, Sir Philip Musgrave, writing to Wil- 
 liamson on the 10th December : " I hear the common 
 people in the West of Scotland have kindness enough for 
 those that have been in rebellion, and will uot be veiy 
 ready to discover such as skulk at their own homes. I 
 am about setting a course of intelligence in those parts, 
 for it is whispered everywhere that this late design was 
 more formidably laid than some would seem to believe 
 it, but disappointed by precipitation, and therefore by 
 new encouragement may fall to work again.'" ^ Many 
 of the richer of the Presbyterians had fled the country in 
 order to escape the storm ; and by the law of Scotland a 
 man could not be tried in his absence, and therefore his 
 estates could not be confiscated. But the judges, being 
 previfnisly tampered with, delivered an opinion in answer 
 to a query by tlie King's Advocate, " that a trial miglit 
 
 1 St;ile Paper Office. - lliil. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 179 
 
 proceed, ami forfeiture might be decreed against persons 
 adjudged guilty of high treason, though absent." 
 
 Having obtained this decision, the Council prepared 
 for new trials, and more extensive confiscations tlian 
 
180 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 VI. 
 
 LAUDERDALE IN THE ASCENDANT. 
 
 During the seven years from 1660 to 1667, as 
 might be expected, a junto of persons had been gather- 
 ing about Charles, who made it their study to humour 
 him to the utmost in all his fancies and vices. Every- 
 thing good and serious was turned into jest ; and he 
 was the foremost amongst them who could outdo the 
 rest in monstrous wickedness and shocking profanity. 
 As regarded manners, morals, and religion, the palace 
 was in a swarm with the most depraved libertines. The 
 sober and stately Clarendon was the favourite butt of 
 their lampoons and mimicry. Charles, who could be 
 deaf to a thousand good arguments, could not resist a 
 few bad jokes. Besides, the excesses of the Court, and 
 some public disasters, had excited universal discontent ; 
 and Clarendon, the most faithful of his father's adherents, 
 the most watchful guardian of his own fallen fortunes, 
 was victimized by Charles without remorse, to glut the 
 spite of a crew of the vilest men and women that ever 
 I)reyed upon a country, and to appease the rage of the 
 people at misfortunes which were chargeable, not so 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEKS. LSI 
 
 mucli on Clarendon, as on Cliarles himself and his pro- 
 fligate accomplices. 
 
 The reins of government soon passed into the hands 
 of the notorious Cabal. This ministry was so denomi- 
 nated from the initial letters of the names of its mem- 
 liers — Cliftbrd, Arlington, Buckingham, Ashley Cooper, 
 and Lauderdale. It would be in vain to describe their 
 policy. They had none, except that of doing from hour 
 t<^ hour whatever best suited their own interests and 
 passions, and those of the King. To feed Charles with 
 enormous sums of money to be wasted on the most dis- 
 solute wretches, to seize all the plunder they could make 
 for themselves, to patch up secret and treasonable agree- 
 ments with Louis of France, to mask their villanies 
 under an outward show of opposing France and protect- 
 ing Holland, — such, with almost every other private and 
 public iniquity, was their notion of conducting a govern- 
 ment. It was at this time that Charles became more 
 directly the pensioner of Louis, receiving from him what 
 would now be equal to half a million, to aid him in his 
 continental designs, besides a promise of troops if the 
 ](('(>ple of England should rebel in consequence of the 
 intended e.stal)lLshment of Romanism. It was known to 
 a few of the Caljallers, amongst the rest to Lauderdale, 
 tliat the Duke of York, his brother's superior at least in 
 •letermination and activity, wa.s, althougli a secret, yet a 
 thorougli and l>igot<j(l adlicrent of the Church of Rome ; 
 and it was certain, wlien he could throw oft' disguise, he 
 would enter into tlic most energetic courses for establish- 
 ing the Romish Church on the disorders, confusions, and 
 
IS'2 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 enmities which were now weakening anrl tearing asunder 
 tlie various Protestant sects in Britain. 
 
 The Court having thus broken with the Anglican or 
 Church of England party, sought a counterpoise by- 
 conciliating the Nonconformists, both in England and 
 Scotland, who, it must be owned, under this ministry, 
 experienced considerable relief. 
 
 This change of counsels soon manifested itself in a 
 radical change of the Scottish ministry. From the 
 Restoration, Lauderdale had been secretary for Scotland, 
 and had continued all along to keep in favour with the 
 King, and consequently had always been able to exercise 
 a large amount of control over Scottish affairs. Yet he 
 had been much thwarted, first by IMiddleton, his rival 
 and enemy, and also continually by the ascendency of 
 Sharp and the Prelatists, supported as they had been 
 liy the dominant Anglican party of England, to whom 
 Lauderdale was obnoxious as an old Covenanter. He 
 was now freed from restraint ; and having no rival near 
 the throne, might govern Scotland very much according 
 to his own real opinion and disposition. 
 
 We meet with Lauderdale, some thirty years before 
 this time, when he was Lord Maitland, and a young 
 man. He was then a zealous advocate of the Covenant. 
 At the commencement of the civil war, he figured as 
 commissioner on the part of tlie Covenanters to the 
 English Parliament and the Westminster Assembly of 
 Divines. As there is reason to suspect, however, that 
 from the first the desire of personal notoriety and party 
 
THK SCOTTISH COVENANTEKS. l8o 
 
 leadership was the mainspring of all his actions, he 
 <lropped off in course of time, from the strict Cove- 
 nanters, who were under the patrician sway of Argyle, 
 and were managed in all their transactions by the skill, 
 fervour, and sleepless activity of Warriston. He next 
 tried his luck amongst the Koyalist Engagers, and became 
 their busy diplomatist. For this defection he fell under 
 the ban of the strict Covenanters ; and, like so many 
 others, was compelled, after the defeat of the Engagers 
 in 1648, to do public penance in the church at Largs. 
 .This atfront rankled in his mind ever afterwards. He 
 left Scotland, and repaired to the Hague, where the 
 prince, afterwards Charles ii., was keeping his little 
 poverty-stricken court ; and seeing at once to the bottom 
 of his indolent, easy, worthless character, he got hold 
 of his confidence — a confidence which, strange to say, 
 when so many better men were sacrificed, was never 
 shaken, either by lapse of time, or by the incessant 
 attacks of rivals and adversaries. He was the Prince's 
 main adviser as to coming to Scotland in 1G50, when 
 h»' was crowned King ; he shared in the defeat at Wor- 
 cester, where he was taken prisoner ; and he continued 
 under confinement, principally in the Tower, until the 
 very dawn of the Restoration. The progress of his for- 
 tunes since that time, we have had occasion to mark. 
 He was now at the mature age of fifty -four, when a 
 man's character, if he has one, becomes wound up, fixedly 
 good or fixedly evil. 
 
 He was the most uncouth sort of personage that ever 
 appeared at a court, or in any decent society. Here is 
 
184 THE FIFTY YEAES' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 the account of him by the clever, tattling Burnet. " I 
 knew him very particularly. He made a very ill appear- 
 ance ; he was very big ; his hair red, hanging oddly 
 about him ; his tongue was too big for his mouth, which 
 made him bedew all that he talked to ; and his whole 
 manner was rough and boisterous, and very unfit for 
 a court." In the amusing contemporarj'' " Dialogue 
 betwixt Hamilton and Lauderdale," his coarse and dis- 
 gusting manners are very forcibly sketched when Hamil- 
 ton is made thus to accost him : — 
 
 " Your blustering cannot do us wrong, 
 Should you wear out your buffling tongue, 
 
 So pray proceed no further ; 
 But let's express 
 Tlie practices 
 
 By which we cheat each other." 
 
 His portrait, though touched up by the refining fingers 
 of Sir Peter Lely, attests till this day the accuracy as 
 well as pungency of these descriptions. The low brazen 
 forehead, the loose baggy cheeks, the thick insatiable 
 lips, the satyr's eye, the huge brutish person, bring 
 before us in their combination as gruesome a carle as 
 can well be fancied. 
 
 He was a man of immense erudition, but not a man 
 of thought, or of any fine natural ability. He was a 
 prodigy of learning, according to the cumbrous fashion 
 of the times — great in the classics, and even in Hebrew. 
 He was an adept in theology, and versed in all history, 
 ancient and modern. His ten years' prison (under Crom- 
 well) had no doubt been a good college. His memory 
 equalled his reading ; and his information was thus not 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 185 
 
 only vast, but always at his command. He could ex- 
 press himself with the utmost fluency, and with endless 
 amplitude, but without taste or discrimination. He was 
 ready with topics, plans, expedients ; but he had little 
 prudence, and nothing of the sagacity and life-long 
 patience of a true statesman, Buckingham, who was a 
 wit, and had the wit's felicity in hitting off" a character, 
 called him a man " of a blundering understanding." He 
 was always setting out with a wrong idea, or getting 
 upon a wrong track, or doing even right things in the 
 wrong way. And it was in vain to correct him : this 
 only drove him into further freaks of folly. 
 
 But it was not his intellectual, it was his moral, or 
 rather his immoral qualities, which gave him his high 
 place in the confidence of the King, and consequently in 
 the councils of the nation. As to the utter rottenness 
 of his character, there is not one dissentient voice. Not 
 one " honest chronicler" has a good word to say con- 
 cerning Lauderdale. Amidst the accumulation of vices 
 charged upon his memory, we can trace the one simple 
 type to which all of them may be reduced, unredeemed 
 selfishness, total want of principle, corruption insatiable 
 as " the horse leech with her two daughters," crying 
 eternally, " Give, give !" Even in that age of bold 
 bad men, he was pre-eminently vile. He was swelled 
 out with ambition, not from the grand impulse of a noble 
 mind, not to realize some lofty conception of govern- 
 ment, but for the low paltry gratification of being what 
 is styled the great man of the country. He sought to 
 conceal his treachery and cunning under a roaring noisy 
 
186 THE FIFTY YEARs' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 bluntness. To liis inferiors, and even his peers, he was 
 haughty beyond expression ; to those above him, or 
 who could serve him, an abject loathsome flatterer. His 
 friendships were squared to his interest, even dependent 
 upon the caprice of the ficklest temper in the kingdom. 
 His enmities were deep, burning, and unappeasable. 
 His paroxysms of rage were terrific, Satanic — the mad- 
 ness of a foul distempered soul. At first he affected a 
 kind of austerity of manners, and pretended to despise 
 all worldly grandeur ; but he plunged headlong into 
 the flood of iniquity which set in with tlie Restoration. 
 His sensuality was that of the sow wallowing in the 
 mire, unaccompanied by any of that refinement which 
 half veils its grossness. He rushed into a course of the 
 wildest extravagance, and woidd be guilty of any base- 
 ness or oppression to vrring out money for the support 
 of his magnificence. Enriched by the bribes of Louis, a 
 panderer to the lowest vices of Charles, grovelling at the 
 feet of his mistresses, and blubbering for their favour ; 
 drawing his strength from every species of wickedness, 
 he tm-ned round and defied all the assaults of those who 
 sought to overthrow him, whether from envy or from 
 patriotism. In the earlier part of his life, and when in 
 prison, he seemed under religious convictions, and courted 
 the friendship of such men as good Richard Baxter ; but 
 afterwards, these impressions wore off" as if they had never 
 been ; he was capable of the most awful fiUsehoods, and 
 blasphemous appeals to God ; and the favourite exercise 
 of his coarse hiunour was to pun upon texts of Scripture, 
 and mimic his old doings amongst the Covenanters. For 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVKNANTEKS. 187 
 
 his mess of pottage, lie sold himself, soul and body, to 
 all the monstrous projects of the Court. 
 
 Lauderdale was now sole and uncontrolled master of 
 Scotland ; and it happened to be the trick of the time 
 to follow more moderate courses. Rothes was stripped 
 of all his offices, except that of Chancellor, which he 
 was still allowed to retain, owing to his being a personal 
 favourite of the king. Sharp, by royal mandate, was 
 dismissed from all management of affairs, and confined 
 to his diocese. A poltroon at heart, he was as crest- 
 fallen at this little touch of reverse, as ever he had been 
 insolent in his own Court of Inquisition, and pitiless to 
 the persecuted members of that Church of which he had 
 once been minister and delegate. No respect or sym- 
 pathy followed him into his retirement. The ballad- 
 makers, who seem to have had a Punch-like pleasure in 
 tormenting him, made merry witli his disgrace, and gave 
 tongue to the detestation in which he was held by his 
 contemporaries, even by many on his own side. 
 
 " Most viper-like, I in the kirk 
 
 My mother's bowels rent ; 
 And did cast ont those zealous men 
 
 Whose money I had spent. 
 What nobleman and ruler can 
 
 Say, I have not him wronged, 
 By lying and base calumnies, 
 
 Where no just cause I found. 
 
 All men me hate, none truly love, 
 
 I can no man beguile. 
 My treachery and perjury 
 
 So notour is and vile. 
 
188 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 The wild heads of the time do dream, 
 
 There's a world in the moon ; 
 to deceive, if I were there ! 
 
 For here will trust me — ^none I" i 
 
 The Prelatists, so long accustomed to have theu' heel 
 on the neck of their enemies, were secretly writhing with 
 a chagrin and disappointment which they durst not verj^ 
 well express. " I am resolved," thus groans the Arch- 
 bishop of Glasgow into the ear of Sir Joseph William- 
 son, " I am resolved not to complain any more, lest I 
 seem to reflect on those that are not to be touched. But 
 I am sure we (that is, the Prelatists) are not on the 
 gaining but losing hand. . . . The country complains 
 very much of the soldiers, and I fear the soldiers have 
 as much reason to complain as any. Many, especially 
 of the royal party, are strongly alarmed with the new 
 change of our offices and officers of State, and think a 
 foimdation is laid for ushering in another interest. But 
 I hope their fears and jealousies are groundless. What- 
 ever necessity his Majesty saw for this change, I could 
 wish they had chosen a more seasonable time for it. . . . 
 My fears are indeed very great, and it is my misfortune 
 that I must bury them in my own breast." However, 
 amid all his secret griefs, the Archbishop takes care to 
 fortify himself against the changes of State, by having 
 a friend at Court. He has his own commentary on the 
 text : " Make to yourselves friends of the Mammon 
 of unrighteousness ;" for he informs Under-Secretary 
 Williamson, " I ordered a small present to be tendered 
 
 1 Wodrow MSS. — Advocates' Library. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENAXTERS. . 189 
 
 to you, which I hope you will be pleased to accept, as 
 an acknowledgment of my obligations, and a pledge of 
 that respect which is due to you from me." ^ 
 
 The first step taken by Lauderdale was promising. 
 He placed the management of affairs in the hands of 
 Lords Tweeddale and Kincardine and Sir Kobert Murray. 
 Now that the old race of Scottish patriots had disappeared 
 from the scene, these three were the ablest, worthiest, 
 and most public-spirited statesmen left in Scotland. 
 They agreed in certain characteristics, which fitted them 
 to heal the wounds and gain the respect of the country. 
 They were all three men of general knowledge and 
 scientific attainment, of solid ability, of mild and bene- 
 volent temper, of moderate conciliatory views, and of 
 sound moral and religious principles ; were no zealots 
 for Episcopacy, and were opposed to violence and per- 
 secution in matters of conscience. Sir Robert Murray 
 was the most distiugtiished of them, indeed one of the 
 first men of his time. He had been bred in the service 
 of France, and was a great and trusted favourite of Car- 
 dinal Pvichelieu. During the civil wars, he stood high 
 in the confidence of Charles i. But he is best known to 
 posterity as the founder of the Royal Society. Wodrow, 
 who seldom praises any of the ruling men of that period, 
 warmly panegyrizes him. " He was a very learned and 
 ingenious gentleman, a great ornament of his country, a 
 a diligent promoter of every branch of useful knowledge, 
 and moderate in his temper." Even Sharp, pretending 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
190 THE FIFTY years' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 to learn charity when under dis^^Tace, and as if elevated 
 by breathing the new atmosphere thus introduced, pro- 
 fessed, in assumed meekness and humility, "It was a 
 great happiness to deal with sober and serious men, for 
 Lord Rothes and his crew were perpetually drunk." 
 
 It was impossible but tliat, under such men, the pub- 
 lic admhiistration should improve : and the improvement 
 would have been carried still further, and the wishes and 
 rights of the people been more thoroughly attended to, 
 but for the fatal Frelatic infuence, liaving its roots in 
 England, which tainted the whole government of Scot- 
 land, and paralysed everj- effort to adapt it to the feel- 
 ings of the nation. The Government, instead of being 
 mainly concerned in the civil business of the country, 
 was little more than an engine of the prelates ; and was 
 almost wholly absorbed in the miserable questions that 
 were at issue between them and the people. Prelacy it- 
 self was the monster grievance of the nation. It contra- 
 dicted the national opinion. It was a rock of offence to 
 the national conscience. It could never be modified or 
 shaped so as to harmonize with the principles and liberties 
 of the nation. There was between them a barrier that 
 could never be smoothed down ; a distance as wide asun- 
 der as the poles. So long as that coinpulsory establish- 
 ment lasted, with all its appendages of oaths, declarations, 
 and other fetters upon the conscience, so long real, free, 
 just, and enlightened government was impossible. There 
 could only be, by the best and most lionest of men, a fair 
 ai)proximation. 
 
 Such an apja-oxiiiiation was actually made by the men 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 191 
 
 now in power. They worked in entire and cordial union, 
 and with the greatest application, zeal, and love for the 
 public ser\ice. The finances were reduced to order and 
 regularity. The pubUc money was held sacred as a trust- 
 fund. The public creditor was paid. Economy w^as en- 
 forced. And there was yearly a surplus revenue ; instead 
 of the former state of things, when the motto seemed to 
 l)e — " Waste and Want." A magazine of arms was laid 
 in. Increased manufactures w^ere encouraged ; trade 
 facilitated and protected. Justice was w^ell administered. 
 Vice was discountenanced, both by the example of the 
 leading men themselves, and by the whole spirit and ten- 
 dency of their administration. 
 
 Peace having been conchuled with Holland in Jidy 
 1G67, the army w^as disbanded, saving only a small re- 
 serve force, such as had always existed since the Restora- 
 tion. The poor Archbishop of Glasgow, thus left at sea 
 in a leaky boat, without rudder or sail, exclaimed in an 
 agony of despair, " Now that the army is disbanded, the 
 gospel will go out of my diocese." An indemnity was 
 also passed to all who had been engaged in or accessory 
 to the late insurrection. But, like most indemnities of 
 tlie period, it was burdened with limitations and bonds, 
 which prevented f\dl advantage being taken of it by the 
 Covenanters. Hence, as was observed at the time, " in 
 the beginnmg it pardoned all, in the middle very few, 
 and in the close none at all." 
 
 A searching investigation was made into past militaiy 
 excesses. Dalzicl, the hoary old ruffian, was screened, 
 simply because, if he was the worst offender, he was 
 
192 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 also the highest in station, and had what we should novv- 
 a-days call " good interest at the Horse-Guards." The 
 storm descended upon subordinates, Sir James Turner 
 and Sir William Bannatyne. Turner admitted the charge 
 made against him ; but pleaded the authority of letters 
 from Rothes and Sharp for all that he had done ; and 
 affirmed that he had even fallen short of their instructions. 
 The Archbishop of Glasgow, who had at least the merit 
 of sticking fast to his partisans though in disgrace, made 
 strong interest for him at Court. " I know," he WTites 
 to Williamson, " you are no stranger to my own and 
 other men's conditions here who have been employed in 
 his Majesty's service. For myself, I am not much con- 
 cerned, the conscience of my own innocence and integrity 
 supports me ; and if ever my own life or interest hath 
 been so dear to me as liis sacred Majesty's honour and 
 safety, let me never be happy here nor hereafter. But 
 the disappointments and discouragements others (more 
 deserving persons) meet with, wound me deeper than I 
 can well express, and what this may produce God only 
 knoweth. There is a very honest gentleman, a particu- 
 lar friend of mine, one Sir James Turner, who is much 
 blamed for his severity to the disaffected rebels who rose 
 in arms last year ; and there are some who impute that 
 rebellion to him as occasioned by his rigour. ... I hope 
 without offence I may say, I have heard him recom- 
 mended for the very same acts for which he is now so 
 much condemned ; and soldiers think they do not offend 
 when they obey their superior officers' orders."^ But in 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 193 
 
 the present cashiering of subordinate wrong-doers, the 
 Archbishop's voice was not attended to, and Turner was 
 sentenced to be deprived of all his posts. Sir James was 
 a soldier, though an unmerciful one. Bannatyne was 
 tlie horrible hardened viUain of confused and cruel times. 
 Not satisfied with the ordinary routine of jjillage and 
 spoliation, he and his robber band inspired more fear by 
 their foul licentious practices than even by the havoc 
 which they committed upon the property and means of 
 the country people. He was imprisoned and fined, and 
 afterwards banished. He hung about London for some 
 time to get a remission from Lauderdale, which the latter 
 refused ; and it is said that Bannatyne, in revenge, formed 
 some plot against his life, which however did not succeed. 
 His occupation being gone at home, he went over to the 
 wars in Holland. He was at the siege of Grave in the 
 Netherlands ; and one day as he was walking very negli- 
 gently within reach of the guns, some one called out and 
 warned him of his danger. '' Cannon-balls kill none but fey 
 folk," was his contemptuous answer. Scarce had the words 
 passed his lips, when a ball shot him through the heart — 
 a fate which, according to the report of the times, was in 
 awful coincidence with one of his usual imprecations. 
 
 It was at this particular juncture, when, for various 
 reasons, plans of moderation were in fashion, both in 
 England and Scotland, that a measure was first broached, 
 which came with a very fair appearance, but which in 
 the event had the same lamentable effect in dividing 
 and splitting up the Covenanters of the present, as the 
 
 N 
 
19-i TKE FIFTY YEAES' STKUGGLE OF 
 
 Engagement and Public Resolutions had in dividing the 
 Covenanters of the former generation. This was the 
 measure commonly termed the Indulgence. 
 
 It was evident, from the almost universal desertion of 
 the parish churches, and from the faithful attachment of 
 the people to their former ministers, so far as they had 
 opportunities of evincing it, either, that the public ordi- 
 nances of religion would become all but extinct, and the 
 nation relapse into heathenism.; or that a course of 
 persecution must be entered upon, more complete, more 
 systematic, more virulent and crushing than ever ; or 
 that some liberty must be accorded to the Presbyterian 
 ministers to exercise their functions amongst the people. 
 ITie latter was the alternative which the present rulers 
 adopted ; and hence the Indulgence. 
 
 This scheme took j5nal shape in a letter from the 
 King in June 1669, by which power was granted to 
 the Council, at their discretion, to appoint the outed 
 ministers to vacant parishes ; those who would not re- 
 ceive collation from the bishops, not to have the stipends, 
 but only the manse and glebe, and to be allowed an 
 annuity ; and those, further, who did not attend the 
 diocesan synods of the bishops, to be confined in their 
 ministry within the parishes to which they were ap- 
 pointed ; and none of them were to admit to ordinances 
 persons coming from neighbouring or other parishes. 
 This Indulgence, then, was a royal permission to exer- 
 cise the functions of the ministr}^, under certain limita- 
 tions upon that exercise, and reser\ing to the Government 
 a general authoritative right to watch, superintend, and 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 19o 
 
 control the ecclesiastical actings of tlie ministers. From 
 the account before given of the peculiar dogmas of the 
 Church of Scotland on this subject, it will be apparent 
 that this Indulgence, although as a measure of worldly 
 expediency neither impolitic nor ungTacious, was in its 
 nature and conditions subversive of the true foundation 
 of that Church, which was spiritual independence, under 
 the sole headship of Christ, as manifested in the direc- 
 tory of His Divine Word. If this Indulgence should be 
 accepted to any degree by the Presbyterian clergy, three 
 things were sure to ensue, most injurious to the strength 
 and unity of that Church, and calculated to deepen the 
 evils of the persecution. 1 st, There would be constant arbi- 
 trary interferences, on the part of the Covernment, with 
 those of the ministers who were indulged. 2d, There 
 would break out a rupture between the indulged and 
 non-indulged ; and the people, from their known tena- 
 city to principle, would repudiate the former and cling 
 to the latter (the non-indulged ministers). 3d, Those 
 unauthorized religious meetings, whether in fields or 
 otherwise, now termed Conventicles, to which the bolder 
 ministers had hitherto resorted with the approbation 
 and support of the people, would be more stringently 
 prosecuted than ever by the Government, which would 
 consider it had given eveiy proper facility by the Indul- 
 gence, and was therefore bound to suppress every other 
 mode of ministerial action. 
 
 Many of the clerg^y acceded to the Indulgence, and 
 the above were the results which actually followed. The 
 subsequent years of the Covenanting struggle are marked 
 
196 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 — by incessant attacks upon the indulged, until the In 
 dulgence became a dead letter ; a new schism in the 
 Church, if possible more complete, inveterate, and per- 
 nicious than the old one between the Resolutioners and 
 Protesters ; and a persecution of Conventicles, which 
 never ceased, never flagged, but, on the contrary, ac- 
 quired fresh vigour at every new step of its progress. 
 
 Lauderdale came down as Commissioner to the Scot- 
 tish Parliament of 16G9, a Parliament as venal, corrupt, 
 and subservient as any of its predecessors. 
 
 In his coarse, yet very cunning way, he had done 
 something, by means of the Indulgence, to humbug the 
 Presbyterian people of Scotland. His next object was, 
 by his measures in Parliament, to humbug the King 
 and the Court party in England ; to create in them the 
 impression that he had all Scotland at his nod, and was 
 so dtrectmg things there that, in case of exigency, he 
 could bring in decisive military aid, should England be 
 driven into revolt by the various machinations which 
 were then brewing in the caldron of that infamous Court. 
 Thus, Mein boasts in a letter to Williamson, that there 
 were in Scotland "20,000 militia to rendezvous any- 
 where in the kingdom without one groat to the King."^ 
 
 The key, therefore, to his proceedings in the present 
 Parliament was this : that he endeavoured to exalt him- 
 self with the Court party, by showing what resources he 
 could command in Scotland to aid them in their designs 
 against the liberties of England ; but further, to exalt 
 
 J State Paper OfiBce. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 197 
 
 himself with the Duke of York, and the more daring 
 l>and of conspirators against the Constitution, who were 
 beginning to gather around York as their head, by show- 
 ing how completely the ecclesiastical system of Scotland 
 was bound and laid captive at the foot of the throne, 
 so that, one edict made, one word spoken, and on the 
 instant Romanism would become the established religion 
 of Scotland. 
 
 The wonderful interregnum of moderation which we 
 have previously described, con-esponded in point of date 
 with the saturnalia of the Cabal, when license to Non- 
 conformists was the order of the day in England. It was 
 thought proper to keep up the same appearance for a 
 while in Scotland. But this did not last long. The 
 trusty counsellors who had wrought such an improve- 
 ment in the condition of the country, fell before the ani- 
 mosity of the Prelatic party, aided by the personal spites 
 of one of the most remarkable women of that time ; a 
 time when women had an influence in public afi'airs 
 which, in our altered state of manners, it is difficidt for 
 us to conceive. 
 
 This was the Countess of Dysart. Her father, Wil- 
 liam Murray, was son of the minister of Dysart in Fife. 
 He had an uncle tutor to the prince, afterwards Charles 
 I. ; and by this uncle he got the appointment of page to 
 the prince, as well as whipping-boy, who had the honour 
 to bear all the whacks which ought by right to have 
 descended on tlie slioulders of sacred royalty. Charles 
 was kind to humble dependants ; and, unfortunately for 
 
198 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 himself, whilst he was ungracious and repulsive to honest 
 and independent men who approached him, he had a fatal 
 proclivity towards rash advisers and worthless parasites. 
 When he became king he advanced this " Will Murray" 
 (as the lucky adventurer was called) to be groom of the 
 bed-chamber, and participant in his most secret thoughts 
 and designs. Will evinced his gratitude by the syste- 
 matic betrayal of the King's secrets to his enemies. But 
 he cloaked his knavery from the king, one of whose last 
 acts at Newcastle was to sign the patent by which the 
 former whipping-boy was raised to be Earl of Dysart. 
 His eldest daughter Elizabeth had married one Sir Lionel 
 Tollemache, but on the death of her father, she assumed 
 the title of Countess of Dysart. Quick in brain and 
 loose in virtue, she had been the most notorious of in- 
 triguers, both personally and politically, all through 
 Cromwell's time, and down to the present reigii. But 
 there was a method in her amours ; she was soft but 
 not weak, and lavished her favours on none but high 
 politicians. With the coolness and calculation of a 
 gamester, she made affairs of the heart subservient to 
 affairs of State. Sir John Reresby, who knew her just 
 about the time at which we have now arrived, assures 
 us, " She had been a beautiful woman, the supposed 
 mistress of Oliver Cromwell, and at that time a lady of 
 great parts." And the old song, whether correct in all 
 its scandal or not, echoes the opinion of her contempo- 
 raries as to the variety and distinction of her gallants : 
 
 " Now justice iirovokes me in ihyme to express 
 The truth which I know of my bonnie old Bess : 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 199 
 
 She is Bess of my heart, she was Bess of old Noll, 
 She was once Fleetwood's Bess, and is now of Athole." 
 
 She still had the remains of her former kind of 
 beautj, — showy, meretricious, Duessa-like ; was dashing, 
 clever, learned, stored with accomplishments, and full of 
 amazing \ivacity of conversation. She lived at bound- 
 less expense, and required some how or other to raise a 
 boundless revenue ; and she stuck at nothing to com- 
 pass this end. From the time of Lauderdale's imprison- 
 ment, after the Battle of Worcester, she had acquired a 
 complete ascendency over him — the old story of Beauty 
 and the Beast ! After his release their intimacy was 
 continued, and was so conducted that his Countess sepa- 
 rated from him. Now that he v»^as in the plenitude of 
 official power she managed him as she pleased, made a 
 traffic of his immense patronage, and could at pleasm-e 
 kindle his hostility against old friends, or assuage his 
 resentment against his worst enemies. Tweeddale and 
 Sir Robert Murray were too incorruptible to feed her 
 avarice or wink at her extortions. The consecj[uence was, 
 that she speedily sowed the seeds of dissension between 
 them and Lauderdale ; and these honest and useful 
 statesmen retbed from office, and with them departed 
 all real and disinterested patriotism from the government 
 of Scotland. What remained was sham, and even the 
 sham was not long kept up. Lauderdale, at the insti- 
 gation of Lady Dysart, advanced to the management of 
 afiairs his brother Lord Halton, whom he had ever 
 treated with deserved contempt ; a low creature, weak 
 and rapacious, corrupt and insolent, to the last degree. 
 
200 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Rothes, a half flame of hers, crei^t back into favour. 
 Sharp now offered homage to the culminating star of 
 Lauderdale. These three, Rothes, Sharp, and Halton, 
 came to have the government very much in their own 
 hands. Need it be said how rapidly any good that had 
 been effected now disappeared ! how surely all former 
 evils returned, and returned with redoubled virulence 
 and intensity ! 
 
 Hence the severity against Conventicles in the Par- 
 liament now held by Lauderdale. The outed ministers 
 were prohibited from preaching or praying except in 
 their own houses and to those of their own family, and 
 none but members of the family were to be present at 
 any such meetmg. All who acted to the contrary were 
 to be held guilty of keeping conventicles. The person 
 conducting such services in any house not his own was 
 to be seized, and imprisoned till he found security, under 
 pain of three hundred pounds, not to do so again, or else 
 engaged to remove from the country. Persons present 
 at the service were to be fined according to their rank ; 
 proprietors in a fourth part of their yearly rent, and so 
 on as to the rest. The master or mistress of the house 
 where a conventicle had been held was to be fined double. 
 Magistrates of burghs, in case of any house conventicle 
 being held therein, were liable to an arbitrary fine by the 
 Council. But it was the field conventicles (those " ren- 
 dezvouses of rebellion," as the Acts of the period always 
 style them) that suffered the full weight of the rage of 
 the persecutors. The preacher in the fields, or even in 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 201 
 
 a house which was so full that some were out of doors, 
 was to be puuished with death and contiscation of goods. 
 Any one arresting and securing him was to receive a 
 reward of thirty pounds, and to be indemnified in case 
 he killed the preacher or any others in the seizure. Per- 
 sons present at field, were to be fined double the amount 
 of what was imposed on those present at house conven- 
 ticles. Sheriff's and magistrates were empowered to call 
 before them all who had attended conventicles, and for 
 their encouragement were to receive for themselves the 
 fines of all under the rank of proprietors. And the 
 people were required, under the terror of heavy fines, to 
 attend the curates in their various parish churches. In 
 one county alone, that of Renfrew, the fines imposed 
 upon proprietors at this period amounted to little short 
 of j£9 0,000 (according to the present value of money) ; 
 and the Marquis of Athole, a creature of Lauderdale's, 
 who had a gift of certain fines, made by them in one 
 week upwards of £ ^j . 
 
 Lauderdale had now climbed to the highest summit of 
 glory of which his sordid nature was capable. He had 
 entered the Engli.sh Cabinet(of which he had not hitherto 
 been a member), was one of the Cabal, had been created 
 a Duke, and liad married that magnificent shrew the 
 Cfjuntcss of Dysart, his first wife having lately died at 
 Paris forsaken and neglected. He brought his Duchess 
 down to Scotland in the summer of 1G72, with a pomp 
 and ostentation never before witnessed in that kingdom. 
 They travelled about the country in royal state, and 
 
202 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 were everywhere received with royal honours, with that 
 oriental worship which from age to age is offered up 
 by low, greedy sycophants to the most successful villain 
 of the hour. Amongst the summer swarm that were 
 dancing attendance upon them, was to be seen conspicu- 
 ous the smooth dimpling face and glazed learing eye of 
 James Sharp, Primate of Scotland. Such a godly man 
 was much required to act as a monitor in the midst of so 
 much pride, vanity, and excess. The Duchess under her 
 robes of silk, did a large trade as a common huckster. 
 She was in the general line. Not a place, post, or office 
 in the State, not a sly favour or a dirty job, but was sold 
 over the counter to the highest bidder. Lauderdale she 
 led according to her fancies and humours. Incapable of 
 attachment or respect, she treated him as a convenience 
 simply, and valued him for what slie could make by him. 
 He was a huge uncouth elephant, but the brute had an 
 ivory tusk. She extorted incredible sums of money by 
 all kinds of peculation and corruption ; but it must be 
 confessed that she returned back to the country an almost 
 incredible amount in her daily and hourly extravagancies. 
 It is true, the Cabal went to pieces in 1673, like a 
 rotten rag, and the Court in its perplexity had again re- 
 course to the Anglicans. Lauderdale, tumbling at first 
 in the wreck, was threatened with impeachment in Eng- 
 land, and a truly formidable coalition against him, under 
 the Duke of Hamilton in Scotland. It is needless to 
 enter into detail ; for by that species of good fortune which 
 is known as the " devil's luck," he weathered all these 
 rising storms, and became firmer with Charles, and more 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 203 
 
 tlioroiiglily master of Scotland than ever. " This man," 
 says an able contemporary document,—" This man, under 
 the pretext of being his Majesty's sole Secretary, and 
 haviiig the advantage of residing at Court, is and hath 
 been these years bygone, not so much his minister as our 
 master ; for he, being the King's informer in our matters, 
 excluding all others vvith a severe jealousy, and having 
 the absolute disposal of all places, gifts, and other things 
 that concern us, it is evident that not only persons, but 
 our Courts also, must depend entirely on his pleasure. 
 ... He being for most part absent, as well as the King, 
 doth exercise the power of his own creatures ; so that 
 they, moving him according as they are pleased to sug- 
 gest, all men are so exposed to their clandestine and 
 partial informations, that it is very certain that the mean- 
 est of his favourites are courted by the greatest of our 
 nobles ; and, if I may say it with reverence, the kindness 
 of his valet- de-chambre is more sought after than his 
 Majesty's grace and favour." In the " Dialogue," from 
 which we have already quoted, Hamilton is made finally 
 to apostrophize him : — 
 
 " Well, faith ! I'm almost out of hope. 
 You have so oft deserved a rope, 
 
 A.nd yet escajjed \vitho\it it : 
 But your arrears 
 Of sixty years 
 You'll pay, you need not doubt it." 
 
 The head of the new Anglican ministry in England was 
 Lord Danby. Although unscrupulous en(jugh in his own 
 way, he was respectable when compared with his prede- 
 cessors. He so fiir truly reflected British instinct in that 
 
204 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 he was hostile to France ; but he had not the hardihood, 
 perhaps not the power, to put a stop to Charles's base 
 dependence upon Louis. In all other respects he was an 
 enemy to the liberties of the country, and was a much 
 more fiery zealot for Anglicanism than ever the moderate 
 Clarendon had been. He also strained eveiy nerve to 
 raise a powerful standing army, not for any legitimate 
 purpose of defence, but to overawe the country, and in 
 due season to clinch the fetters of despotism. Under his 
 administration, the Prelatists in Scotland had fidl scope 
 to renew their persecutions. Lauderdale, determined on 
 retaining power at any price, made up his terms with 
 Danby and the Scottish Prelatists. And henceforth, 
 although swaggering before the world as the all-power- 
 ful governor of Scotland, he was in reality the bond- 
 slave of James Sharp ; and was allowed to rule solely 
 on condition that he should join the Prelatic party in 
 their most violent schemes of persecution. 
 
 The country very soon began to assume the same ap- 
 pearance which preceded the insurrection of Pentland- 
 
 The Armed Conventicle being now the most threat- 
 ening form which the Covenanting struggle took, the 
 sword of persecution was turned with keenest edge against 
 the holding of these assemblages. As the Privy Council 
 was too large and unwieldy for the quick work required, 
 and was not always without voices that uttered the 
 language of complaint and remonstrance, the persecution 
 was transferred to a few steady, unshrinking hands, 
 under the title of the " Committee for Public Aflfairs." 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 205 
 
 This Committee, styled the " Secret Committee," had 
 ever afterwards the principal management of the perse- 
 cution. At this, its first constitution, it was composed 
 of some of the most pliant of Lauderdale's party, headed 
 by Ai'chbishop Sharp, who was ever to be seen perched 
 upon his eyrie, when there was a . prospect of carnage, 
 spoil, and destruction. This was just the revival of 
 liis inquisition, with more defined objects, and this time 
 with more ready and facile instruments. The soldiers 
 were again let loose upon the people, in roving bands, 
 and in garrison parties, and of course repeated their 
 endless sickening round of annoyances and cruelties. 
 And aU the while a hail-storm of proclamations was 
 poured down on the devoted heads of the Conventiclers. 
 Masters were enjoined to see that none of their servants 
 or dependants attended conventicles, otherwise they were 
 instantly to dismiss them. Landlords were to enforce 
 upon their tenants subscription to a bond, obliging them- 
 selves not to attend conventicles ; and on the latter 
 failing so to subscribe, their property and possessions 
 were to be forfeited, and the forfeiture to fall to the 
 landlord, as his bribe for enforcing the bond. Magis- 
 trates of burghs w^ere to be liable for the burgesses and 
 inhabitants, in case of conventicles being held within 
 burgh. Masters, landlords, and magistrates, if they 
 failed to put the act into rigorous execution, were to 
 incur all the penalties of contraveners. Whosoever 
 should seize persons attending, or repairing to conven- 
 ticles, were to have their fines ; and in case of forfeiture, 
 to obtain the gift of the property forfeited. The Council 
 
206 THE FIFTY YEAES' STEUGOLE OF 
 
 were to cite before them any one suspected of having 
 been present at a conventicle. If he appeared and 
 confessed, he was to be subjected to an arbitrary punish- 
 ment, that is, any punishment which the Council thought 
 proper to inflict. If he did not appear, they were to 
 hold him as confessed, and pronounce sentence upon him 
 for the full penalty or punishment incurred under their 
 multifarious and horrible statutes. To strengthen the 
 hands of the Council, and to facilitate the execution of 
 their mandates, additional forces were to be raised ; a 
 thousand foot and three troops of horse. Garrisons were 
 stationed in the more disaffected districts ; and were 
 intentionally and maliciously placed in the mansion- 
 houses of eminent Presbyterian gentlemen, or those who 
 were opponents of Lauderdale, their houses being thus 
 utterly dilapidated and ruined. Letters of intercom- 
 muning were launched against himdreds of persons — 
 gentlemen, and even ladies, of old family and good estate, 
 and against the more active ministers — forbidding any of 
 the lieges, under the direst threatenings and pains, " to 
 reset, supply, or intercommune" with any of the persons 
 denounced as rebels, "or to furnish them with meat, 
 drink, house, harbour, victual, nor no other thing useful 
 or comfortable to them ; nor have intelligence with 
 them, by word, writ, or message, or any other manner 
 of way." 
 
 Is it to be wondered at that the Covenanters stag- 
 gered for an instant under these merciless blows ? Only 
 figure to yourselves the situation of an individual who 
 still adhered to the old national creed and worsliip. For 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 207 
 
 eveiy Sabbath he was absent from the homily of the 
 ignorant, dissipated curate of his parish, there was a 
 heavy fine. If he attended in a house, or in the open 
 air, to hear the gospel according to the way of his fore- 
 fathers, that was a conventicle, and he was liable to be 
 fined, imprisoned, transported, sold as a slave in Barba- 
 does or Virginia. If he was the most faithful of servants, 
 no master durst engage or keep him. If he was the 
 most industrious of tenants, his landlord was bound to 
 turn him out of his possession, and rob him of all the 
 fruits of his industry. If he was himself an outed 
 minister, he was virtually deposed from the ministry 
 which, according to his belief, he had received from the 
 sole King and Head of the Church. Deprived of every 
 other means of exercising his ministry and of edifying 
 the people, who clung to him with imabated, with 
 augmented affection, — if he preached to them in the 
 fields, his sentence was death. Preacher or hearer, his 
 eveiy step was dogged by spies, many of them his 
 former companions : and he was pricked into the list 
 of defaulters kept by the curate of his parish, who, if 
 he coidd not convert, was always glad to ruin his 
 parishioners. He might at any time be dragged before 
 the Secret Committee, who owned no law, were amen- 
 able to no appeal, and seized, not to try, but to destroy. 
 Soldiers were everywhere present, to insult, to abuse, to 
 pillage, to waste ; and there was no security for his 
 person or property, no redress for injustice and oppres- 
 sion. He was shut out, by the dreadful ban of inter- 
 communing, from the common hospitalities and cour- 
 
208 THE FIFTY YEAES' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 tesies of life. Neighbour, friend, relative — all must 
 shun him, all must close tlie door upon him. He was 
 civilly, socially dead. Trying, awful situation for an 
 individual I — for a nation ! For a moment there was a 
 horrid pause of suspense. The Armed Conventicle melted 
 away as thin mist from the hills. The oracle ceased. 
 The nation sank dumb. 
 
 The year 1676 witnessed an almost universal pros- 
 tration. 
 
 So it was for a few months. But again, as ever it 
 had been, the great heart of the nation rallied ; and its 
 pulsations recommenced in all their former vigour and 
 activity. 
 
 After seventeen years of every species of persecution, 
 what advance had been made in the establishment of 
 Episcopacy 1 The Episcopal churches were attended 
 by officials, by many of the upper classes as the Court 
 fashion, and by all those lax and indifferent persons who 
 will only follow the easy and comfortable in religion as 
 in everything else. But the body of the Presbyterians, 
 that is, the body of the nation, had not been seduced 
 from their old mode of worship. The more moderate of 
 them sought after the indulged ministers. As for the 
 more zealous and uncompromising, the conventicle in 
 the open fields, which had ceased for a while, was 
 renewed. The Armed Conventicle was to be again seen, 
 standing to the defence of religious rights. A report to 
 the Government, containing " an account of the present 
 
TKE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 209 
 
 posture of affairs in tlie shires of Ayr and Kenfrew, Nov. 
 5, 1G77/' mentions, tliat at their meetings it was deter- 
 mined, " That the people should not rise in arms till 
 they should be someway oppressed and provoked, and 
 that then the signs should be given them to make ready, 
 that all the world might see they would not invade the 
 worst pretenders without just cause. . . . This corner 
 is in a perfect distraction, and still worse and worse. 
 . . . Last week there was a fair at Maybole, where a 
 great many swords were sold."^ In fact, unless the State 
 Church was to be allowed to drop from sheer inanition, 
 some more eflScacious remedy must be devised than had 
 hitherto been applied. 
 
 The oft-repeated nostrums were tried to an extent 
 never previously used — fines, imprisonments, intercom- 
 munings. In the year 1677, not fewer than 17,000 
 persons were harassed in this way for the crime of 
 frequenting conventicles. 
 
 Next a bond was attempted to be imposed on all 
 heritors or proprietors, by which they were to undertake 
 obligations, not only for themselves, but for their wives, 
 childi'cn, cottars, and servants, that none of them should 
 withdraw from their parish churches ; that they should 
 not be married, or have their children baptized, except 
 by the then parish ministers ; and should not be present 
 at conventicles. The proposal was monstrous. The 
 west-country gentlemen, against whtjm principally the 
 bond was levelled, came to Edinburgli to remonstrate 
 with Lauderdale, who was there as King's Commissioner. 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 O 
 
210 THE FIFTY YEAES' STUUGGLE OF 
 
 In a frenzy of rage, lie raade bare his arms to the elbow, 
 struck the Council table with fury, and swore " by 
 Jehovah !" he would compel them to enter into the 
 bond. But even with a blaspheming madman like this 
 as ruler, some things wiU be found impracticable ; and 
 so it was with this bond. It could not be carried into 
 effect. 
 
 One device remained, and one which at the time was 
 the very thing the Court wanted. It was at this junc- 
 ture that a strenuous attempt was made, on one pretext 
 or another, to raise a powerful standing army. The 
 army was in reality meant to be used against the liberties 
 of the country. The English people and Parliament — 
 always, since Cromwell's time, jealous of a standing 
 army — were more jealous than ever, now tliat they had 
 gained a thorough insight into the designs of the Court ; 
 and they set themselves in firm opposition to this scheme. 
 When any piece of despotism coidd not be carried tlirough 
 in England, it was customary to get it passed in Scotland, 
 where the Parliament was mere servant of all work 
 to the Court, and where the people were disfranchised, 
 and had not the slightest direct control. It was there- 
 fore determined to get up a cry which would afford some 
 colourable pretext for raising a standing army in Scot- 
 land. This framework of an army might be enlarged from 
 time to time, and turned to account against the EngKsh 
 people, if their discontents should ever swell into any- 
 thing like rebellion. The cry in Scotland was that very 
 convenient one which we have so often heard in our own 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVEXANTEES, 211 
 
 times, " That the Church was in danger ! " that an 
 insurrection was breeding. The ground for this clamour 
 was the increase of Armed Conventicles, and one or two 
 paltry scuffles between small parties of country people 
 and the lawless myrmidons of power, who were always 
 roving about with arms in their hands, and committing 
 acts of violence. These circumstances were magnified 
 into the beginnings of a rebellion ; and as it was difficult 
 to raise a force in the ordinary way of enlistment, a plan 
 Y»^as formed, the most barbarous and unnatural that could 
 be conceived, that was, to bring down hoards of High- 
 landers upon the Lowland population, especially upon the 
 west country. 
 
 The Highlanders of those days were in a state of 
 rudeness bordering upon utter barbarism. Being en- 
 gaged in constant feuds against one another, clan against 
 clan, and almost man against man, they were ferocious, 
 cruel, and predatory in their habits. But their broils 
 with one another were nothing compared with the intense 
 antipathy and scorn with which, from time immemorial, 
 they looked down upon the Lowland " Sassenachs." To 
 this old inveterate grudge had long been added difference 
 in religion, if religion in any sense could be predicated 
 of such uncouth barbarians. Whilst the Lowlanders 
 were Presbyterians of the deepest dye, the Highlanders 
 swore by the creed of their chief, which was either 
 Episcopal, or in many cases Romish. Although fond of 
 war, thehrs was a wild and tumultuous warfare, without 
 discipline, or any military restraint. 
 
212 TEE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 At the bidding of the Government they came down 
 from their hills, about 10,000 in number, and were 
 joined near Stirling by the few regular forces then exist- 
 ing. This Highland Host, as it was styled, marched 
 upon the west country, not only with the ordinary arms, 
 but with field-pieces, spades, and mattocks, as if to lay 
 siege to some great fortifications. They were also 
 provided with a large assortment of shackles to bind 
 prisoners, and of thumbkins to work persuasion in the 
 minds of reluctant witnesses. But what w^as the sur- 
 prise even of those savage hordes when they looked 
 about them, and could see no enemy ? The ploughmen 
 were busy in the fields, the shepherds were tending 
 their flocks on the hills, the hum of the shuttle was 
 heard in every town and village through which they 
 passed. Enemy there was none. However bloody and 
 ruthless they might be, they were not quite so callous 
 to the common instincts even of the rudest natures, as to 
 rush sword in hand and massacre a peaceful and unof- 
 fending people. Since there was no scope for fighting, 
 it struck their rough lieads that there was an excellent 
 opportunity for stealing. They spread all over the shires 
 of Lanark and Ayr, plundering and ravaging without 
 mercy. " The Highlanders," writes Quintin Dick of 
 Dalmellington, a sufi'erer of the period, in a little diary 
 left behind him : " The Highlanders were sent in swarms 
 through the coimtry, there to lie and to plunder, pillage, 
 and await orders for more havoc, against all wdio should 
 seem to scruple whatever should be enjoined them. In 
 such a shock, when all refuge failed me, I thought it 
 
THS SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. ^13 
 
 high time to make haste to the Eock of Ages." It is 
 needless to detail the outrages Avhich they perpetrated. 
 These may easily he imagined. It was a downright levy 
 of blackmail all over the west. It was an incursion of 
 10,000 " Ticket-of-Leave men," with license from the 
 Government to exercise their vocation to the uttermost. 
 They lived at free charters ; and, not content with the 
 best ordinary fare, they forced the poor people to keep 
 them in a full stock of brandy and tobacco. They at- 
 tacked and robbed any one they met, and broke open 
 houses, and carried off whatever they chose. If there 
 was refusal, or remonstrance, or anything done to dis- 
 please them, they drew their dirks, and inflicted the 
 most severe wounds and ghastly mutilations. If they 
 suspected any of having money or valuables concealed, 
 they would roast them before the fire to extort a dis- 
 covery of the place of concealment. Their gross and 
 licentious conduct cannot be depicted. Over these enor- 
 mities a veil must be drawn. Wodrow's description of 
 the spoliation committed by them is more forcible and 
 striking than is usual with his narratives. " When the 
 Highlanders went back, one would have thought they 
 had been at the sacking of some besieged town, by their 
 baggage and luggage. They were loaded with spoil. 
 They carried away a great many horses, and no small 
 quantity of goods out of merchants' shops, v/hole webs 
 of linen and woollen cloth, some silver-plate bearing the 
 names and arms of gentlemen. You would have seen 
 them with loads of bed-clothes, carpets, men and women's 
 
214 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 clothes, pots, pans, gridirons, shoes, and other furniture, 
 whereof they had pillaged the country." 
 
 During the two months the invasion lasted, the 
 damage in the county of Ayr alone was moderately esti- 
 mated at £30,000. 
 
 But the Highland Host did not produce the effect 
 which Lauderdale and his confederates desired. Their 
 calculation was that the oppressed people of the west 
 would be provoked beyond endurance, and be hurried 
 into a rebellion. Then there would be a gorging over 
 their forfeited estates. Already, in exidting glee, had 
 they parcelled out amongst themselves the several do- 
 mains ; and on St. Valentine's eve, instead of sweethearts, 
 they drew the estates of the unfortunate gentlemen 
 of the west country. But they were foiled in their 
 expectations. The gentlemen and country people took 
 patiently the spoiling of their goods ; and the horror 
 excited by those proceedings became so universal and 
 overjiowering; that the Government were fain to with- 
 draw the Highland Host as hastily as they had brought 
 it down. In two months the wild caterans disappeared 
 from the west, like one of their own mountain-torrents, 
 which exhausts itself in its very violence, but leaves be- 
 hind it marks of devastation that are remembered for 
 many a long day. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 215 
 
 VII. 
 
 DRUMCLOG— BOTHWELL BRIDGE. 
 
 Haying no longer the Highlanders to depend upon 
 as the champions of their faith, the Prelatic party, to 
 whom Lauderdale now pandered in everything, insisted 
 on having a large standing army. Accordingly, a Con- 
 vention of Estates was called in 1678, where an Act 
 was passed to embody sufficient forces for the suppres- 
 sion of conventicles, and a national assessment, generally 
 denominated the cess, was imposed for the suj^port of 
 the troops. 
 
 In the Private Correspondence of the time, we find 
 the most forcible delineations of the growing evils and 
 WTetchedness of the country, of the factions and rivalries 
 of the great men, and of the people's steadfast adherence 
 to their creed in spite of all severities and oppressions. 
 A letter of Gth August 1678, addressed to someone 
 in Carlisle, says, " We have now every other day fre- 
 quent conventicles, but on Sunday last there was a con- 
 venticle in the west country in Carrick that the like 
 hath not been seen in Scotland ; for there were, as is 
 said, above 600 well-appointed men in arms, and above 
 
21 G TRK FIFTY YEARS STUUGCLE OF 
 
 7000 common peoj>le, so that inallpr<»bability they will 
 rise ill rebelli(»ii. For I am inlbrmeil that there is many 
 a man in Galloway, if he liath but two cows, he will sell 
 one cow for a pair of pistok"^ Another letter- writer, 
 of 23d AnL,aist, says, " There was never so much insol- 
 ence committed jis is now by those jxx>ple ; 14,000 were 
 at a m('etiii<,' in Galloway, an«l were three days rendez- 
 vousini; there."- There is in the State PajKr Ottice a 
 verj' instructive series of letters fmm ]>r. Matthew 
 M'Kail, wliom we formerly mentioned, to John Adams, 
 merciiant in Lis])<>n. No doubt the letters had been 
 seized by the Government, and heUv-e they ;ire now found 
 in the State Pai)er rej)08itories. In one of them, dated 
 22d Oftolx^r 1078, Dr. M'Kail gives the following .speci- 
 men of the ugly feuils and contentions that were now 
 dividing the chief nu-n : " I cannot give you a better char- 
 acter of the present state of this kingdom than what 
 passed publicly here at the solemnizing of a marriag*' lie- 
 twixt the L«jrd Xewbyth's eldest son and the late Lord 
 President of Session's eldest daughter, where Ix? sure was 
 no small assembly of lawycre, and amongst the rest Sir 
 George Lockhart, brother to the late Lord Ambassador 
 Lockhart, and the ablest lawyer in this kingdom, who as 
 it seems, I assure you f\ir from his custom, has l)een 
 tempted to take a cup to the advantage ; and being at 
 the principal table with the present Lord Chancellor 
 (Rothes), a health was begim by the Chancellor to Sir 
 Greorge Lockhart's mistress, his lady being lately dead 
 To which Sir George presently replied, ' My Lord, you 
 
 1 Sute pjpcr Office. - Ibid. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENA^TEHS. 217 
 
 have a daughter ; give me her in niarriago, and Til put 
 her in the best eondition of any Lady in this kingdom.' 
 To whicli the Chancellor replied, he behoved first to un- 
 derstand what fiualifications he had besides that he was 
 a lawyer ; to which he answered again, that it was not 
 possible to convince him even of these abilities, for he 
 had lately in a case of the Chancellor's own cousin, the 
 Lord i\Iclville, disputed five hours, and he believed he 
 understood not one word of the purpose. At which the 
 Chancellor huffing, Sir George takes him up, and says, 
 ' My Lord, you are the most unworthy man within the 
 kingdom, for after you had engngcd a noble person, Duke 
 Hamilton, who had laid himself out for the liberty of the 
 kingdom, you have most basely and treacherously for- 
 saken him ;' and, say.s he, ' Sir George Mackenzie did 
 many times in the beginning of that business call you a 
 hocus, and that most rightly, but then I did not believe 
 it.' Then the Lonl Newbyth, who was master of the 
 feast, was called to make a diversion, and begins to drink 
 to Sir George. But ho wiis easily rencountered : ' 
 Newbyth, are you come to hinder me to speak truth ? 
 thou art one of the most unjust fellows upon all that 
 bench. Such a crew of Judges as ye are all did never 
 the sun shine upon. Good Lord 1' says he, ' what shall 
 come of tliis poor kingdom ? ' Sir George being a person 
 of so great authority and parts, nothing will follovr upon 
 it ; but when they parted he said, ' Now, gentlemen, I 
 desire to be accused upon this to-morrow, for I am ready 
 to make it all out.' " Dr. M^Kad adds, " The truth is, 
 the constitution of all the judicatories in this kingdom 
 
218 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 is absolutely at Duke Lauderdale's beck, that in judg- 
 ment a dog cannot move his tongue against him, and he 
 is able to effectuate anything that he pleases to wish, 
 and every day his hands wax more and more strong. . . 
 The policy that he follows is the point of absolute 
 supremacy in his Majesty's person, and he values the 
 Episcopal clergy as little as the Presbyterians when it 
 comes in competition with that point."^ 
 
 Sharp, from his old experience, understood the ideas 
 of the Covenanters better than any of his fellow-persecu- 
 tors. He could discern where the real danger lay in 
 tlieir operations. He had from the first apjoreciated the 
 significance of the Armed Conventicle. The whole active 
 spirit of the Covenant was there. It was a running pro- 
 test against everything done by the Government. It was 
 a renewal of the famous distinction — that the king 
 pei'sonal may be resisted when he is impelled by evil 
 counsellors to act contrary to his obligations as king con- 
 stitutioncd. It was a declaration that the present state 
 of things was a state of war, and that all which was 
 wanting for actual hostilities was opportunity. It was 
 offering a nucleus around which the scattered forces of 
 the Covenant might gather in arms. The Covenant was 
 a bond of the firmest union, a source of the highest in- 
 spiration, a transaction which had the seal and authority 
 of Heaven ; and who could foretell the surprising results 
 which might spring from the continued action of the 
 Covenanting Armed Conventicle upon the popidar mind 1 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COYEXANTEES. 219 
 
 It might grow so formidable that either the Government 
 AYoulcl be fain to yield (of which they had shown symp- 
 toms in the various Indulgences), and entirely or virtu- 
 ally annul the Episcopal establishment in favour of 
 Presbyterianism, or, linking itself to the discontent which 
 was at work in England, a new combination might be 
 formed on the model of the Solemn League and Covenant, 
 which might overturn Episcopal supremacy in both king- 
 doms, and the throne of the Stuarts on which that su- 
 premacy depended. A man like Rothes, a gay, dashing, 
 reckless sensualist, saw in an Armed Conventicle only a 
 disorderly meeting which ought to be dispersed. Sharp, 
 cautious, astute, and knowing what lay beneath the sur- 
 face, saw even in the humblest Armed Conventicle the 
 germ of a revolution which must be crushed in the first 
 seed if it was to be crushed at all. Hence his continual 
 edicts against conventicles, Rothes, writing to the Duke 
 of Queensberry in the end of 1678, says — " I have been 
 frequently at our meetings in my Lord St. Andrew's 
 lodgings, where we are busied taking care how to dispose 
 of the forces through the country for suppressing field 
 conventicles and others, for securing of the peace in this 
 conjuncture." Hence also on the 1st of May 1679, 
 Sharp brought before the Council the draft of a new 
 edict, exceeding all that had yet been thought of, the 
 effect of which, if properly executed, would be to give 
 power to hill every man going armed to or from a con- 
 venticle. The warrant was not only to judges, but to all 
 ofiicers of the forces, and no form of trial was prescribed, 
 so that the meanest serjeant might shoot a man dead 
 
220 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 upon tlie spot who was carrying arms, if he chose to 
 believe that the mau was repairing to or returning 
 from a conventicle. This was the gospel according to 
 James Sharp. He thought there was no security for 
 Episcopacy in Scotland, perhaps for the government of 
 the Stuarts, unless every Armed Conventicler was killed. 
 It is not to be wondered at that such an extreme 
 measure met with much opposition in Council, and was 
 carried only with difficulty. It was to be sent in draft 
 to London for the consideration of the King. It was to 
 be forwarded on the 6 th of May, and on the same day 
 Sharp was to set off for London, to expedite the passing 
 of this measure, and to concert other effectual means for 
 the final suppression — were it even to be in torrents of 
 blood — of this everlasting Covenanting struggle. 
 
 Before his departure to London, he started on the 2d 
 of May for St. Andrews. He rode in his carriage of 
 state, drawn by six horses, and was accompanied by his 
 eldest daughter, and escorted by four servants. He 
 crossed the Forth, and came to Captain Seton's house in 
 Kennoway, some twenty miles from St. Andrews, where 
 he remained all night. On the 3d, about nine in the 
 morning, he left Kennoway for St. Andrews, taking 
 Ceres in the way, which was some twelve miles farther 
 on, where he " smoked a pipe with tlie Episcopal incum- 
 bent there." He had despatched one of his four servants 
 vrith his salutations to the Earl of Crawford, whose an- 
 cient family seat of Struthers lay close to Ceres. 
 
 That same morning very early a party of nine, amongst 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 221 
 
 Y\-hom were David Hackston of Ratliillet, John Balfour 
 of Kinloch, better known by his by-name of Burley, and 
 James Russell in Kettle, met in arms near Cupar, to 
 proceed in search of one William Carmichael, a drunken 
 bankrupt magistrate of Edinburgh, v/ho had been ap- 
 pointed by Sharp sheriff- depute in Fife, for putting in 
 force the laAvs against nonconformity and conventicles. 
 Like most of the low broken creatures who obtained 
 this kind of appointment, he executed his cruel office in 
 the most cruel and wanton manner. He would beat and 
 wound women and children, and torment defenceless 
 servant girls, fixing burning matches between their fin- 
 gers to force them to discover where their masters lay 
 concealed, with all other atrocities which such a mis- 
 creant is sure to commit when armed with full power, 
 backed by Government, and having nobody and nothing 
 to restrain him. The intention of the party who were 
 in search of him was probably to chastise him severely, 
 and frighten him out of the district ; in short, to make 
 his vile office dangerous to the holder. They had learned 
 that he was to be out that day hunting on the Scotstarvet 
 hUls above Cupar, and, in fact, so he v^as, but a shep- 
 herd informing him that a number of strangers had been 
 inquiring after him, he made home with the utmost 
 speed, suspecting that their errand would be anything 
 but agi'eeable. They searched hills, fields, and woods in 
 vain, and about the middle of the day had arrived about 
 a mile to the eastward of Ceres. There, wearied and 
 disappointed, they drew their horses' bridles, and stood 
 together for a few moments before parting. Just at this 
 
222 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 instant a farmer's boy of the ueigliboiirhood came run- 
 ning to tliem in great haste, and told them that the 
 Ai'chbishop's carriage was in Ceres, and was in a little 
 to come up by Blel^o, which was not far distant from 
 the spot where they were standing. This intelligence, 
 as an old account bears, put them " in a pose." They 
 were overcome with surprise and a thousand agitating 
 reflections. They had come out in search of a paltry, 
 miserable agent ; here was the chief author of Scotland's 
 twenty years of suffering brought straight into their very 
 grasp. A few moments longer they would have parted 
 for the day ; this intelligence had come across their path 
 and arrested them like a decree of fate. Burley first 
 broke the silence, — " It seems God has delivered him 
 into our hands." Russell sternly replied, " I think we 
 have a clear call from God to go forth and pursue him." 
 After some further consideration they rode forward in 
 the direction the carriage must take, but one of them 
 called a halt, and suggested that a commander should be 
 appointed whose word the rest should obey. Hackston 
 was chosen leader, a truly brave man and a gentleman, 
 though imbued with the fiercest tenets which those fierce 
 and violent times had engendered. He answered, " God 
 is my witness that T resolve to own the cause of Christ 
 with my life and fortune, the Lord strengthening me 
 so to do, but to be commander I will by no means con- 
 sent. This is a matter of blood, of the last consequence 
 to this nation and church, and requires more deliberation 
 by fiir. Besides, there is a known private difference 
 between James Sharp and me, so that what I should do 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 223 
 
 as commauder in tins business would seem to be from 
 personal revenge, and would thus mar any public testi- 
 mony tliat there may be in such an act. But as you are 
 determined to go forward, I shall not part from your 
 company." When Hackston refused to take the com- 
 mand, Burley cried with a loud voice, as he spuiTed his 
 steed, " Gentlemen, follow me ! " They all obeyed, and 
 again set off in hot pursuit. 
 
 The Archbishop's carriage had now passed Blebo, and 
 gained the high ground of Magus Moor. His daughter 
 related afterwards, that " coming near to a farmer's 
 house, called Magus, he says, ' There lives an ill-natured 
 man : God preserve us, my child.' " Since an assault 
 made upon him by one James Mitchell, in 1668, with 
 intent to take his life, Sharp seems to have lived under 
 a dread of assassination. But what ground of appre- 
 hension could there be where he now was '? It was 
 noontide in May ; and there rolled before him the broad 
 bright expanse of St Andrews Bay ; and the spires of 
 tlie ancient city rose pointed and close at hand, as if one 
 could touch them. He was on the highway to tlie cele- 
 brated university and cathedral town, more important 
 and more frequented than ever, because it was the resi- 
 dence of James Sharp, Primate of all Scotland. He was 
 travelling in no narrow defile, no remote and lonely glen, 
 no dark and tangled forest, fit spots for ambuscade or 
 murder, — but on a high exposed summit, visible for 
 many miles around, and the whole district dotted with 
 hamlets and little towns. The husbandmen were in their 
 fields ; the shepherds on their hill sides ; and for perfect 
 
224 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 security, were not garrisons stationed at Cupar, Largo, 
 and other places at no great distance 1 and were not 
 patrols of soldiers constantly ranging through Fife, to 
 watch and seize the outlawed Covenanters 1 But what- 
 ever his train of thoughts might be at the moment, his 
 attention was suddenly roused by a hurried exclamation 
 of his coachman. The latter, near the village of Magus, 
 perceiving some horsemen making towards them, cried 
 to the postilion to drive fast. Sharp, looking out at 
 the window, saw a man riding forward at a furious rate 
 on a fleet horse, and others at full gallop a little behind. 
 He repeated the cry, " Drive, drive ! " The carriage 
 bounded along with frightful rapidity. The foremost 
 rider, who was James Russell, casting oti the cloak 
 which encumbered him, urged his horse to greater speed, 
 and came close upon the carriage. Some of his comrades 
 had overtaken him. One Wallace, a servant of the Arch- 
 bishop's, vvdieeled round upon them, and presented his 
 carabine. They wounded him on the head, and dis- 
 mounted him. This momentary diversion had allowed 
 the carriage to gain a little ground ; they discharged 
 their muskets at it, but without any effect ; and it was 
 dashing away from them, fast as nimble horses, lashed 
 and sjourred to very madness, could fly. Russell, like 
 the panther of the wilderness, again darted after his 
 prey. Again he came up to the side of the carriage, and, 
 firing in at the window, exclaimed, " Judas, be taken !" 
 The rest of his companions (except Hackston, who rode 
 a considerable way off), casting off their cloaks as he had 
 done, at length came up, and commenced a running fire, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVE^^ANTEES. 225 
 
 all with no effect. The coachman endeavoured to keep 
 them back, by lashing with his long whip at the pur- 
 suing horses ; and the choked, hoarse voice of the Arch- 
 bishop from within was heard ever crying, " Drive ! 
 drive ! drive !" One of them rushed forward to the 
 postilion, commanding him to halt ; and on his refusal, 
 smote him on the face with his sword, and dismounted 
 him j then cut the traces, and the carriage was stoj^ped. 
 Russell, advancing to the door, addressed the Archbishop, 
 " Come out, cruel and bloody traitor ! " for they were 
 unwilling his daughter shoidd sustain any harm. Sharp 
 refused to come out, although the demand was frequently 
 repeated. Burley and Russell, the rest being engaged 
 in securing the servants, shot at him in the carriage ; 
 and one of them thrust at him with a sword. Strangely 
 enough, he was not wounded. The party, however, be- 
 lieving him to be killed, were mounting their horses to 
 go off. As they were doing so, one of them overheard 
 his daughter sobbing in a low tone of voice, " Oh, there's 
 life yet !" He gave information ; and on returning, 
 they found the Archbishop had not been touched. He 
 was again commanded to come out, but he lingered, and 
 implored mercy. " I take God to witness," said Bmiey, 
 " whose cause I desire to own in adhering to this perse- 
 cuted gospel, that it is not out of hatred to thy person, 
 nor for any prejudice thou hast done or could do to me, 
 that I intend to take thy life from thee this day ; but it 
 is because thou hast been, and still continuest to be, an 
 avowed ojDposer of the flourishing of Christ's kingdom, 
 and murderer of his saints, whose blood thou hast shed 
 p 
 
226 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 like water on the ground." Russell, who was standing 
 on foot at the carriage door, said to him, " Repent, 
 Judas ! and come forth." The only answer the prelate 
 continued to make was, " Gentlemen, gentlemen, save 
 my life, and I wiU save all yours." " I know," retorted 
 the fierce and inexorable John Balfour, " I know it is 
 not in thy power either to save or kill us ; and I declare 
 here before the Lord, that it is no particular quarrel of 
 mine that moves me to this ; but because thou hast 
 been, and still continuest, a traitor to Jesus Christ, and 
 his interest and cause ; and hast wrung thy hands in the 
 blood of the saints, not only at Pentland, but several 
 times since ; and hast perfidiously betrayed the Church 
 of Scotland. These crimes and that blood cry with a 
 loud voice to Heaven for vengeance, and we are this day 
 sent by God to execute the same." He again ordered 
 him to come out and prepare for death, judgment, and 
 eternity. Sharp still refused, evidently hoping, by means 
 of this procrastination, that they might be diverted from 
 their fell purpose, or that they might be interrupted by 
 some accident or some cause of alarm. Again and again 
 he besought mercy, and offered them money to spare his 
 life. Burley interrupted him with a scowl of wrath and 
 impatience : " Thy money perish with thee !" One of 
 the company at some distance then called out, " Seeing 
 there have been so many lives unjustly taken by him, for 
 which there is no sign of repentance, if any more be 
 taken, we shall not ourselves be guiltless of the blood of 
 them who are so slaughtered." As he still remained 
 within the carriage, Biurley fired a pistol at him ; Russell, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 227 
 
 who was standing at the door, stabbed him with a sword. 
 Whereupon he fell back, crying, " Alas ! I am gone." 
 But the wound was not mortal. A number of them 
 stepped forward to drag him out. " I am gone already, 
 what needs more ?" he murmured faintly ; •' but I will 
 come out, as I know you will save my life." Pale and 
 staggering, he came out of the carriage. He was urged 
 to betake himself to prayer. Falling on his knees, he 
 entreated them to spare his life, and promised to lay 
 down the mitre of St. Andrews. The answer was, that 
 he had been without mercy, and would receive none ; 
 that they would not spare his life ; and that he must 
 prepare instantly for death. He could not be prevailed 
 upon to pray ; and seemed under some delusive impres- 
 sion that the design was only to intimidate him, and 
 that his death w^as not really intended. What perhaps 
 confirmed him in this belief was seeing Hackston, " who 
 was standing at a distance with his cloak about his 
 mouth, all the time on horseback," not participating in 
 the acts of the rest. A ray of hope dawned upon the 
 wretched old man. He crept on his knees towards 
 Hackston, and thus appealed to him : " Sir, I know you 
 are a gentleman ; you will protect me." Though disap- 
 proving, as we have seen, of the act,- and only present 
 because he would not desert his companions, Hackston 
 felt that he could not interfere. " Sir, I shall never lay 
 a hand upon you," was his rei»ly, and he turned aside 
 from the shocking scene. The Archl^isliop, left alone 
 with the more determined of the band, renewed his 
 entreaties, protestations, and blandishments; for, how- 
 
228 THE FIFTY YEAES' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 ever singular, it is apparent that he was incredulous to the 
 last as to their intending to take away his life. Seeing 
 that nothing would induce him to believe that they were 
 in earnest, or prevail upon him to go to prayer, they all 
 fired upon him as he lay on his knees on the ground, 
 and he fell back as dead. But somehow, whether from 
 confusion or from some other cause, the shots did not 
 take deadly efi'ect, and he was found to be still alive. 
 Wild thoughts of diablerie now mingled with their other 
 passions. They believed, a common notion even amongst 
 intelHgent men in those days, that by the arts of sorcery 
 he had rendered his body proof against shot, and that 
 nothing 'but cold steel could kill him. What a scene 
 did the bare, desolate moor of Magus present that day ! 
 The whole party drew their swords at once, and held 
 them up flashing in the meridian sun. Sharp, roused 
 by the lurid gleam from that stupor which had hitherto 
 bound him, on seeing their swords, uttered the most 
 piercing and hideous cries of terror. His daughter, burst- 
 ing like a lioness from the hands that held her back, 
 rushed with shrieks and dishevelled hair between her 
 father and the bloody avengers of blood. Hackston, a 
 man of chivalrous nature, meant for a noble soldier, if the 
 times had been just, not for a desperado, again drawn to 
 the spot as by some fearful spell, when the tragedy deep- 
 ened into the last agonies of death, exclaimed in accents 
 of horror, "Spare, spare, these grey hairs !" In vain, 
 in vain ; it was too late ! Whilst the words were still 
 upon his lips, their united swords were plunged into the 
 body of the once terrible James Sharp. " He's dead 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 229 
 
 uow !" growled tlie savage Russell, as lie ruthlessly sur- 
 veyed the body. Then turning to the distracted daughter 
 and affrighted servants, " Go," said he, with a grim 
 ferocious smile, " take up your priest .-'" 
 
 In estimating this act of the seventeenth century, we 
 must bear in mind, that it was solely and entirely the 
 act of the perpetrators, no other persons were cognisant 
 of it, or participated in it ; that it was an unpreme- 
 ditated act, to which the perpetrators were impelled by 
 a sudden, singular, and, as they mis-read it, providential 
 accident ; that so far as intention stamps the character 
 of crime, they did not believe they were cojamitting 
 murder, but believed that they were inflicting just pun- 
 ishment upon a wretch worthy to die, who could not be 
 reached by any ordinaiy course of justice ; that the act 
 was neither instigated, nor ever approved of by the Pres- 
 byterian body — most of them censured and condemned 
 it ; even the wildest would in general only go the length 
 of refusing to pronounce an opinion upon it, regarding it 
 with awe as a Divine judgment. Moreover, in those 
 times, and long before and after, assassination was not 
 the object of horror it now is in our own improved times, 
 and in our own privileged country, but was recognised 
 by even the wisest and ablest men — strange though it 
 sound to our ears ! — as a legitimate weapon of party 
 warfare in cases of extremity, and where no other could 
 reach the foe. Be it remarked, the Covenanters, in their 
 associated capacity, even when driven to extremes, what- 
 ever rash individuals might think or do, always dis- 
 
230 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 daimed, and expressed their abhorrence of assassination, 
 and contended for nothing beyond the right of armed 
 self-defence. 
 
 Sharj), although dead, yet spake. The proclamation, 
 which had been carried by him in Council, against much 
 opposition, only a few days before his tragical end, was 
 returned approved of by 'the King, and was published 
 on the 13th of May 1679. As already stated, it was a 
 warrant, not only to judges, but to the officers of all the 
 forces, even to the meanest serjeant, " to proceed against 
 all such who go with any arms to those field meetings, 
 as traitors," — that is to say, to put them to death. 
 
 As regarded a great portion of the people, this was 
 the same as to declare the preaching and hearing of the 
 gospel to be treasonable, and punishable by death. The 
 people, except in some cases upon downright compulsion, 
 would not attend the preaching of the curates. They 
 would as soon have knelt before the Mass, or before an 
 idol of wood or stone. Nor could they conscientiously 
 acknowledge the indulged ministers, who, according to 
 their \iew, held their commission, not from the sole Head 
 of the Church, but from the King's usurped supremacy. 
 They had no outlet therefore to hear the Gospel at all, 
 or have the sacraments administered amongst them, 
 according to their conscientious belief, except at the field 
 meetings, where some few ministers still preached, who 
 had not defiled their hands by touching the unclean 
 thing. But in attending field meetings, they were ex- 
 posed to tlie attacks of the soldiery ; and hence it had 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 231 
 
 become necessary, and had for many years been their 
 practice, to carry arms to those meetings, but only for 
 self-defence. The proclamation declaring this treason- 
 able, was thus tantamount to denouncing death upon 
 the hearing of the Gospel. 
 
 This new capital offence, coupled with all the past 
 wrongs and severities, especially of the ten last years, 
 gave rise to a new movement on the part of the strict 
 Covenanters. Up to this time, their conventicles had 
 been held in a detached manner, in different localities 
 throughout the country. But since these meetings had 
 been proclaimed to be treasonable, and the military were 
 directed to put the proclamation everywhere in force, 
 they felt tliat they must resort to more effective plans of 
 defence. Instead of detached meetings, they resolved 
 only to hold great aggregate meetings, in central situa- 
 tions, to which the people might repair from aU the 
 surrounding districts. Having adopted this plan, there 
 was always at their command a large body of popular 
 forces to resist any force that might attack them when 
 engaged in the worship of God, according to the dictates 
 of their conscience. A conventicle now became an en- 
 campment. AVliere the people worshipped, there they 
 were prepared to fight and die in case of interference 
 with their worship. 
 
 This no doubt was the commencement of war. And 
 as there was no proper standing army in those days, and 
 the forces then embodied were comparatively small, the 
 Covenanters, by a series of military demonstrations, 
 
232 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 miglit have overmatched, or thoroughly shaken the 
 Government, but for two circumstances. The first was, 
 that so many controversies and divisions had crept in 
 amongst the body. When the time for decisive action 
 arrived, they were never at a loss for numbers or for 
 enthusiasm ; but one difficulty always rose up before 
 them like a wall of brass — the difficulty of " stating the 
 quarrel " (as they termed it), so as to comprehend and 
 satisfy all. The nicety of their logic blunted the edge 
 of their swords. This evil, weakening and tantalizing 
 as it was, could have been counteracted, if happily there 
 had arisen amongst them a gi'eat commander, fit for the 
 occasion. Less than Cromwell would have sufficed : 
 such a man as their forefathers had in either of the 
 Leslies ; as that very generation had seen at Peutland 
 in Colonel James Wallace. This also was denied them. 
 They had many brave men to fight at their side ; many 
 excellent officers to march at their head ; but never a 
 great commander to master and wield them to purpose. 
 This was their second defect. But an all-wise Provi- 
 dence meant them only to be the jealous temporary 
 guardians of the liberties of Scotland, placed in jeopardy 
 of being lost ; not to be the dictators of the final settle- 
 ment, when the British Constitution came to be founded, 
 not for the special benefit of the Covenanters alone, but 
 on principles tending to the equal development and uni- 
 versal welfare of both kingdoms — we may now say of 
 the three kingdoms — nay, of a boundless empire beyond. 
 
 They were about this time joined by a young gentle- 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 233 
 
 man, Robert Hamilton, the younger son of Sir Thomas 
 Hamilton of Preston. He had been educated under 
 Bumet, the historian, when professor of Divinity at 
 Glasgow. Burnet was nearly related to him, and praises 
 him as having been " a lively hopeful young man." That 
 he had many excellent qualities, was demonstrated by 
 his leaving a station where he had before him wealth 
 and worldly distinction, and espousing the cause of a 
 despised and persecuted people. A life of consistency 
 and self-denial must be accepted as a proof that he was, 
 in his own way, a pious and patriotic man. They who 
 knew him most intimately, loved and respected him 
 most, which is always a favourable sign of any man. 
 A contemporary poet, in mourning his death, describes 
 him in these noble lines, — 
 
 ''Mirror of patience, resolute and brave ; 
 For all the shocks united dangers gave. 
 Moved not his soul, which still serene appeared ; 
 He hated no man, and he no man feared." 
 
 But there is no doubt that his mind had a twist ; and 
 like all persons of the incurable crotchety description, 
 he was self-sufficient, narrow-minded, obstinate, and 
 supercilious. "Wlien once entangled in the web of diffi- 
 culties which his own conceit and rashness did so much 
 to weave, he seemed to be fascinated, and could neither 
 move nor make a sign. Many a precious life came to 
 be lost from his panic-stricken helplessness in positions 
 which he ought to have had the good sense and the 
 modesty never to occupy. Blown up by a vain ambition, 
 he entered as a matter of com'se on the post of Com- 
 
234 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 mander-in-cliief of the Armed Conventicle. For this 
 post he had not one qualification ; it seems doubtful 
 whether he had even the elementary one of personal 
 courage, at least in the field of battle. Although good 
 and kind enough in the very small circle within which his 
 views and sympathies were confined, his was the worst 
 type of fanaticism, which gloats in the extermination of 
 those who are presumptuously deemed the enemies of the 
 Lord. " To spare none of Babel's brats," was his code 
 of warfare. On the austere stock of the Covenanters, he 
 sought to ingraft the monstrosities of the Dominicans. 
 
 If the poor Covenanting remnant had thus made a 
 very doubtful acquisition in such a commander as Sir 
 Robert Hamilton, the Government were fortunate in 
 their new rising Lucifer, John Graham of Claverhouse. 
 He was the eldest son of Sir William Graham of Claver- 
 house, a place lying a few miles to the north of Dundee, 
 and was born in 1643. He was a remote kinsman of 
 Montrose. When about twenty-two years of age, he 
 entered the University of St. Andrews, where, according 
 to an old account, — " He was admired for his parts and 
 respects to churchmen, which made him dear to the arch- 
 bishop of that see (Sharp), who ever after honoured and 
 loved him." At the university he is said to have parti- 
 cularly excelled in mathematics. Such being the bent of 
 his mind, and with so many hereditary associations, it is 
 not to be wondered at that his ambition urged him into a 
 military career. He served both in the armies of France 
 and Holland, and in the latter is related to have earned very 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 235 
 
 high distinction. He returned to his own country about 
 1678, when he was 35 years of age. He seems to have 
 been marked out at once by the Duke of York for favour ; 
 and about the end of that same year was appointed cap- 
 tain of one of three troops of horse which the Government 
 were then raising. This was a crisis when the country, 
 ever irritated by constant and unmitigated suffering, 
 broke out into one of its fits of insurrection. From this 
 period down to the Revohition, CLiverhouse continued to 
 be chief military commissioner in the west coimtry, to 
 keep in check, and idtimately the object was to exter- 
 minate, the so-called " Fanatics." It was an ignoble 
 employment, even in the mere military point of view — 
 this riding down and slaughtering of the peasantry, 
 because they would not conform to the Prelatic establish- 
 ment, and because they could not and would not acknow- 
 ledge the supremacy of the King in the matter of their 
 religion. In such a low, degrading, and unnatural service, 
 no man can acquire — no man deserves — the character of 
 a great and illustrious soldier : he may be a first-rate 
 mounted policeman, — he can never be more. That 
 Claverhouse was able for better work — simply regard- 
 ing him as a military man — few will doul)t ; but it is 
 equally indultitable that he showed himself but too well 
 qualified also for this — to be chief of a dragonade. Great 
 injustice has been done both to him and to Montrose, by 
 comparing them together. Except in some coincidences 
 of sentiment and of fate, they bore little resemblance to 
 each other. Montrose was a man of genius, with its 
 defects as well as its brilliancies ; of literary and poetic 
 
536 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 impulses, not of metliodic study ; of a heroic and ima- 
 ginative temperament -, not a professional soldier, but a 
 soldier because lie lived in a military age, when every 
 nobleman must head his vassals in arms. Swift, sharp, 
 and sudden, he did everything by rapid surprises, which 
 took away the breath of his own party as juuch as of his ' 
 opponents ; and though he could win any number of 
 battles, was not the man ever to secure a stable and 
 fi.nal victory. Claverhouse, in his early years, addicted 
 himself, not to the elegant studies of the poet, but to the 
 severer sciences, which prepare the exact, technical sol- 
 dier and strategist. He was a man of his o^\ti profes- 
 sion merely ; for though some of his panegyrists would 
 exalt him as a great politician and diplomatist, there is 
 really nothing to support this character, — it is a mere 
 illusion — a whim of their own small idolatry. That he 
 had talent to form military combinations — to see how 
 physical force could best be brought to bear upon any 
 object — may be true ; but this is the characteristic only 
 of the able soldier, not by itself of the able statesman. 
 Burnet commends him as a man " of some very valuable 
 virtues." AMiat these were he does not particularize ; 
 but, aided by glimpses we have from other quarters into 
 the habits of his life, we imagine that these were the 
 virtues by which he v/as favourably distinguished when 
 contrasted with most of the public men of the day, that 
 he was more sober and decorous, more diligent and in- 
 dustrious in the execution of his trusts, and in age of 
 venality and sordidness, felt some little spark of chivalry 
 for the service of his masters at least, however much he 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 237 
 
 might ignore every other consideration. " He was proud 
 and ambitious," adds Burnet ; and no one can look at 
 his portrait — the disdainful gleaming eye, the haughty 
 lip, the almost effeminate delicacy of feature, the queru- 
 lous and dissatisfied expression of countenance — without 
 feeling that such the man was ; proud, and isolated from 
 all sympathy with the mass ; ambitious, and ever fretting 
 himself away for a wider sphere and a higher position. 
 As might be expected from his family connexions, and his 
 own antecedents, the same author testifies that " he had 
 taken up a most violent hatred of the whole Presbyter- 
 ian party." In this he was truly a zealot ; he was in- 
 flamed with the passions of a Grand Inquisitor. In his 
 one bosom seemed to be hoarded the whole accumulated 
 rage of his party against the Presbyterians. " Fellows," 
 "rogues," "villains," and " sufi"ering sinners," are, 
 throughout his correspondence, the contemptuous names 
 by which alone he wiU deign to refer to them. The 
 Scottish Episcopalians saw in him the champion who was 
 to fix their ascendency beyond all reach of attack ; and 
 year after year he marched and toiled, planned laborious 
 campaigTis, and perpetrated hideous butcheries, to exe- 
 cute this fen purpose. From the rank of a true and 
 legitimate ofl&cer, he dropped down and down to be the 
 lowest thing that a man wearing a sword can be — (the 
 nickname that Gustavus Adolphus gave to Tilly) — 
 " Tlte Parsons' Drudge !'"' But he was not without re- 
 wards more substantial and tangible than the sublime 
 gratification of Episcopal zeal. This ideal knight of the 
 Jacobites understood well the realism of lands and estates 
 
238 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 — of pounds, sliillings, and pence. To him, as to Pistol, 
 " the world was an oyster, which with his sword he 
 opened." By some strange* accident, the more the west- 
 country lairds were harried, the more was he enriched 
 with fresh estates ; the more blood of the fanatics there 
 was shed, the more gifts of money flowed from the Trea- 
 sury into his pocket.^ This great hero did not trouble 
 himself to inquire or to speculate what was the cause 
 and meaning of the disorders of the country. The right 
 or the wrong, the just or the unjust, was to him a thirig 
 indifferent. Enough that there were disturbances, and 
 tliat he was ordered to quell them ; enough that the 
 people were disaffected, and that he was ordered to strike 
 an exterminating blow. His only care was how to ren- 
 der that blow most effectual and destructive. He dis- 
 claimed reflection, he disclaimed morality, and only pro- 
 fessed to awe the people into subjection by a series of 
 terrible examples. In a letter to the Commander-in-chief, 
 in 1679, he frankly declares — " In any service I have 
 been in, I never inquired further in the laws than the 
 orders of my superior officers." And again, in a letter 
 to the Chancellor in 1683, " I am as sorry to see a man 
 die, even a Whig, as any of themselves. But when one 
 dies justly for his own faults, and may save a hundred 
 to fall in the like, I have no scruple." Just the inhu- 
 man, immoral, atheistic code of all the military execu- 
 tioners, who have mowed down the people that tyrants 
 may walk smoothly over them. " Three days of blood- 
 shed," grinned old Kadetsky of Austria, — " Three days 
 
 1 Entries in Warrant-Book of ScoUand — State Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 239 
 
 of bloodshed yield thirty years of peace." Yes, ye en- 
 sanguined ruffians ! and an immortality of curses on the 
 memory of those who are guilty of such crimes against 
 the human race. 
 
 On Sabbath morning, the 1st of June 1G79, an aggre- 
 gate conventicle was held in Avondale, one of those long- 
 drawn valleys, so many of which strike off from the great 
 strath of the Clyde. The place of meeting was on the 
 Harlaw, a slight knoll in that wide heath-clad expanse 
 which is overlooked by the dark frowning peaks of Lou- 
 don Hill. Thither the multitudes flocked from all parts 
 of the West. Hamilton was present with a consider- 
 able band of armed men. Claverhouse was in command 
 of the garrison stationed at Glasgow ; and had been 
 apprised of the intended meeting. Thirsting for the 
 blood of those dangerous fanatics, he hastened towards 
 the spot at the head of his own troop of horse, assisted 
 by two companies of dragoons. Worship had begun. 
 Thomas Douglas was in the commencement of his ser- 
 mon, when suddenly one of the watchmen stationed on a 
 neighbouring height, fired the signal gim, and retreated 
 at full speed towards the assembled congregation. Cla- 
 verhouse was seen advancing from the east. Interrupted 
 in the midst of his discourse, it is recorded that the 
 preacher thus addressed his hearers : " You have got 
 the theory ; now for the practice ! " But they required 
 no address to animate them. Their hearts swelled with 
 ardour to meet Claverhouse in something like equal 
 combat. The Armed Men drew out, firmly and orderly. 
 
240 THE FIFTY YEAES' STKTJGGLE OF 
 
 from the rest of the meeting. Their aged parents, their 
 wives, children, and kindred, and those of them who had 
 no weapons, were left behind, and directed to retire 
 slowly towards some security, in case their defenders 
 should be overpowered. There they mustered on that 
 hill-side, transformed at once from a peaceful assemblage 
 of Christian worshippers into a body of stem and fear- 
 less warriors, ready to the last drop of their blood to 
 protect their homes, and the moorland temple of their 
 God. They formed into a compact mass of fifty horse, 
 fifty footmen with guns, and one hundred and fifty on 
 foot, who were only equipped with halberts, forks, and 
 other rude and inefficient weapons. Hamilton took the 
 command, and was supported by brave men and skilful 
 soldiers, who acted as his officers, — the veteran Henry 
 Hall of Haughhead, in Teviotdale, Hackston, and Burley, 
 and the gallant young soldier-poet, the Korner of the 
 Covenanting army, William Cleland of Douglas, now 
 only in his eighteenth year. Being formed in battle 
 array, a grand old tradition survives, which tells how 
 this little host marched in solemn majesty down the 
 brow of the hill, singing together, to the half plaintive, 
 half triumphant " Martyrs," that sublime Psalm : — 
 
 " In Judah's land God is well kno-\vn. 
 His name 's in Isr'el great : 
 In Salem is his tabernacle. 
 In Sion is his seat. 
 
 " There arrows of the bow he brake. 
 The shield, the sword, the war. 
 More glorious thou than hills of prey, 
 More excellent art far. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 241 
 
 •• Those that were stout of heart are spoil'd, 
 They slept their sleep outright ; 
 And none of those their hands did find, 
 That were the men of might. 
 
 " When thj' rebuke, Jacob's God ! 
 Had forth against them past, 
 Tlieir horses and their chariots both 
 Were in a dead sleep cast." 
 
 At the swamps of Drumclog they met face to face 
 with Claverhouse and his dragoons, ranged on the oppo- 
 site slope. The troops fired first. By an instruction 
 from young Cleland, at the burst of the guns the Cove- 
 nanters dropped flat upon the ground, and not a shot 
 took efi'ect. Instantly they darted to their feet, and 
 discharged volley after volley against the enemy with 
 well-directed aim. As the clouds of smoke rolled ofi", 
 many a saddle was seen to be empty, and the troops 
 were thrown into confusion. Claverhouse now urged his 
 dragoons to cross the morass. The Covenanters, fight- 
 ing for all that the soul of man holds dear, and roused 
 by the battle's heat, accepted the challenge. Burley at 
 the head of the horse, Cleland at the head of the foot, 
 splashed across the dividing swamp, and grappled with 
 the enemy hand to hand and foot to foot ; whilst the 
 women were at their side (" for the women," says Rus- 
 sell in his account, " ran as fast as the men"), carrying 
 off some that were wounded to the rear, and doing all 
 they could for their relief. This close and desperate 
 (jnset disordered the troops, who began to reel about 
 like di'unken men. " They received our fire," says 
 Claverhouse in his own report, " and advanced to the 
 Q 
 
242 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 shock. The first they gave us brought down the cornet 
 Crawford and Captain Blyth." His own horse was 
 disembowelled by a pitchfork, " yet," adds Claverhouse, 
 " he carried me off a mile." This impetuous assault 
 could no longer be borne. The dragoons wavered and 
 broke, and Claverhouse fled with the shattered remains 
 of the troopers. " Their horse took the occasion of 
 this," he proceeds in the report already quoted, " and 
 pursued us so hotly that we got no time to rally. I 
 saved the standards, but lost on the place about eight 
 or ten men, besides wounded, but the dragoons lost 
 many more." There were about forty in all Idlled, and 
 a considerable number wounded and taken prisoners. 
 On the side of the Covenanters there was only one killed 
 on the field, but five were mortally wounded and died 
 soon afterwards. One of these, William Daniel, who 
 had borne his part in the tragedy of Magus Moor, lying 
 in his death-wounds, " spake to the astonishment of all 
 beholders," his associate Russell informs us, " so that 
 those that never saw William Daniel before wept so 
 much, that at his grave in Strathaven kirkyard they sat 
 down and wept before all the people." 
 
 This was an example of what a few hundreds could 
 achieve when their hearts were in unison. We shall 
 presently see how several thousands were most iuglo- 
 riously vanquished when rent asunder by those divisions, 
 for which, alas ! they were as much distinguished, as for 
 their wrongs and sufi'erings. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 243 
 
 After the victory of Dnmiclog they held a consulta- 
 tion, and resolved to keep together in arms, and await 
 the further direction of Providence, But when they had 
 come to this propitious turn in their affairs, they felt 
 more than ever the want of a master-spirit to preside 
 over them. Although they had gained a momentary 
 success, they had no sure or definite aim. Multitudes 
 from all quarters were flocking to their standard, many 
 of them gentlemen of good rank and estate ; and their 
 recruits were tolerably supplied with arms and other 
 munitions of war. The peoj^le were galled by long op- 
 pression, and animated ])y the most fiery enthusiasm. 
 As we have had occasion to notice, the standing forces 
 (jf the Government were few, and the insurgents, to all 
 appearance, had little to do but to march fijrward and 
 take investiture of the country. But what would be the 
 issue even of continued successes ? Additional forces 
 would be drawn from England and Ireland, breathing na- 
 tional hatred against the Scottish rebels ; and the Goveni- 
 ment would be exasperated to the utmost height of fury. 
 Ultimately the insurrection must be crushed under an 
 accumulation of numbers ; and the last oppressions of 
 the country would be worse than the first. There was 
 only one door of hope ; that would have been to renew 
 the Covenanting policy of 1643, and form a close al- 
 liance, ottensive and defensive, with the Puritans of 
 England. But thirty-six years of storm and vicissitude 
 liad passed since the signing of the Solemn League and 
 Covenant. The Puritans were no longer the fresh and 
 vigorous party they had been in those days, but were 
 
244 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 nearly as mucli broken and decimated as the Covenanters 
 themselves. Besides, a whole generation had intervened ; 
 a cliasm ya\vned between them ; they no longer under- 
 stood each other, no longer sympathized with each other. 
 Many years were yet to elapse before the whole parties 
 in Britain, religious and political, could be so fused 
 together, and melted into such a community of ideas, as 
 to form into a great union for the redemption of their 
 common country. Isolated for the present from any 
 great central movement, the Covenanting Struggle could 
 not swell up to the might of a Ee volution. It could 
 only at most foam and break into continued Insurrec- 
 tions. But had the Covenanters been a united body, 
 these insurrections might at least have been a series of 
 little brilliant triumphs, like Drum clog. Torn as they 
 were by intestine feuds, the struggle seemed to termi- 
 nate for ever in the miserable catastrophe of Bothwell 
 Bridge. 
 
 After much aimless marching and counter-marching 
 for some weeks after Drum clog, they gradually centred 
 in a permanent camp on the Moor of Hamilton, in the 
 close vicinity of old Bothwell Bridge. As no regular 
 discipline was maintained, large eddying masses of people 
 came and went at pleasure. Sometimes the number 
 might reach eight or ten, but they gradually settled at 
 an average of between four and five thousand. Robert 
 Hamilton, more by his own presumption than by any 
 kind of appointment, was still commander. We have 
 seen how unfit for the task ! He had the assistance of 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 245 
 
 the four able officers who gained the victory at Drum- 
 clog, — Hall, Hackston, Burley, and Cleland ; and there 
 was TurnbuU of Beauley, from Teviotside ; and valuable 
 accessions were daily arriving in a number of steady old 
 soldiers whose names are familiar to those acquainted 
 with the insurrectionary movements in Scotland at this 
 period. The two best known were veterans who had 
 led the Westland men at Pentland, ]\Iajor Learmont, and 
 famous Captain John Paton of Meadowhead. This mul- 
 titude of people, welded into an army simply by fellow- 
 ship of suffering and of faith, although irregular and 
 undisciplined, were of one mind and of one spirit, and 
 fit for the most daring enterprises. But soon an unfor- 
 tunate accident broke their harmony, and clogged all 
 their after movements. This was the coming amongst 
 them of John Welsh, and a considerable number of what 
 were then termed Moderate Presbyterians, who shrank 
 from the old policy of the Covenant, without having 
 any new or detenninate policy of their own to substitute. 
 F'rom the time of the arrival of this party, the camp 
 became a debating club ; and instead of preparations for 
 war, time was wasted, and passions were infuriated in 
 hopeless attempts nicely to state the grounds of quarrel 
 on which the persecuted people had taken up arms. 
 Officer differed with officer ; minister preached against 
 minister ; leader might be seen nishing upon leader 
 with dra\vn sword. Tlieir councils of war broke up in 
 tumults, — so many of the officers following Hamilton, so 
 many adhering to "Welsh. The madness of divi.sion in- 
 flamed tlie people, who sputtered and disjjuted wlien 
 
246 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 they ought to have been attending to their drill. Mul- 
 titudes were every day leaving ; some from party rage, 
 but many in grief and despondency, because they foresaw 
 the end of such divisions must be utter ruin. This motley 
 army was not so much as apportioned into regiments ; 
 no officers were appointed ; no stores of ammunition or 
 other supplies provided ; no plan of battle concerted ; 
 and Hamilton was only commander by a kind of grum- 
 bling sufferance. 
 
 The popular party were now in power in England. 
 It was the time of the short-lived Essex (or Whig) ad- 
 ministration, the party which had ousted and succeeded 
 that of Lord Danby. Milder measures were being every- 
 where adopted ; and to suppress this rebellion with as 
 little violence as was consistent with the peace and safety 
 of the country, the English Government deputed Mon- 
 mouth, the favoui'ite of the popular party, to take com- 
 mand of the forces in Scotland. His instructions were 
 not unfavourable to the Scottish sufferers ; and Ms own 
 disposition, mild and kindly, and his love of popular ap- 
 plause (for, by winning all hearts, might he not, in course 
 of time, win a crown for his brow 1) — these were a gua- 
 rantee that at least none of the barbarities would be 
 pei'petrated which would have been too likely had the 
 command been with old Tom Dalziel or with Claver- 
 house. Indeed, there was an underhand correspondence 
 going on between him and the Moderates under Welsh, 
 which, however, led to no good, and did much harm by 
 throwing the insurgents off their guard. 
 
 The Government army consisted of a small standing 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 247 
 
 force of about five thousand, with a Highland militia, 
 and some English troops, amounting in all to 15,000 
 men, well equipped and well provided. They reached 
 Bothwell without interruption ; 15,000 against 5000 ! 
 But they Avere ill-assorted materials ; and, numerous as 
 they were, would have been no match, under better cir- 
 cumstances, for the Covenanters. Had the latter only 
 been as united as their brethren at Drumclog, when they 
 descended the hill singing with one voice and one soul 
 the 76th Psalm, they might have swept the 15,000 
 before them as chaff is driven before the wind. Union 
 and enthusiasm have sometimes done greater things than 
 that. But even when the Royal army had come close 
 upon them, their camp was as agitated as ever with dis- 
 putes and contentions, and no preparations were made 
 for receiving the foe. Ure of Shargarton in his narra- 
 tive observes : — " We were not concerned with an enemy, 
 as if there had not been one within a thousand miles of 
 us. There were none went through the army, to see if 
 we wanted powder or ball. I do really think there were 
 few or none that had both powder and ball, in all the 
 army, to shoot twice." Amidst this confusion and fatuity, 
 there were three true and vigilant officers. All the day 
 and all the night previous to the engagement, that old 
 bridge of BothweD, which was the key of defence, was 
 watched by Hackston, Hall, and Turnbull. There they 
 stood, firm and steadfast, being afterwards joined by Ure 
 of Shargarton and John Fowler, " whom Robert Hamil- 
 ton made a captain who was once his man." They had 
 under their command some 300 good men, but had only 
 
248 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 one solitary cannon, and that very defective, against the 
 large army that was advancing to the attack. About 
 three o'clock in the morning of Sabbath the 2 2d June, 
 the advanced guard of the Royal forces might be seen 
 creeping up with their cannon to the opposite side of 
 the bridge. The attack was begun, but vigorously re- 
 sisted by the gallant three hundred, who stood their 
 ground, returned fire for fire, and, preserving themselves 
 under the shelter of some slight fortifications which they 
 had run up, dealt deadly execution against the exposed 
 front of the enemy. The bugle now soimded a parley. 
 " The enemy/' to follow lire's narrative, " came hard to 
 the bridge end, and spoke to us, and we to them. They 
 desired us to come over, and they would not harm us, 
 and called for Mr. Hamilton to speak with him ; so IVIr. 
 David Hume (who had been minister of Coldingham, 
 Welsh's right-hand man) went over, and another gentle- 
 man with him, and spoke with the Duke, and desired 
 his Grace, if he would prevent the efiusion of blood. 
 He told them their petition should have been more 
 humbly worded ; and said, lay down our arms and come 
 in his mercy, and we should be favourably dealt with. 
 So he returned and told us. When Robert Hamilton 
 heard it, he laughed at it, and said, "And hang next !" 
 This parley of the Moderates ended in smoke, gave time 
 for the whole of the Royal forces to be moved up, and 
 added fresh fuel to the internal contentions which, more 
 than the enemy, were subduing the insurgent host. The 
 *' Forlorn Hope" at the bridge resumed their struggle. 
 They vigorously re-opened the attack, and repulsed their 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 249 
 
 assailants from the guns ; but were not supported by re- 
 serves from behind, who ought to have crossed the bridge 
 and pursued the flying troops. There being no pursuit, 
 fresh regiments came up and renewed the attempt to 
 force the bridge, but still without eftect. The gallant 
 three hundred stood their ground. They felt that the 
 bridge was the battle. For three hours they bore the 
 brunt of attack, — those 300 wearied and overtasked 
 men. Well do they deserve the tribute of admiration 
 and praise ; for theirs is the one bright act to irradiate 
 the memory of this disastrous day. Overpowered by 
 numbers, they sent for reinforcements ; but none came. 
 Exhausted by long watching, fatigue, and the toils of 
 the incessant contest, they begged to be relieved by some 
 of the many troops that were standing idly on the moor ; 
 but there was no commander, there was no order, every 
 man was in hot dispute with his neighbour. If they 
 were to stand alone and unsupported in the breach, 300 
 against the iron weight of 15,000, at least they required 
 more ammunition, for their store was failing them. The 
 answer returned was that the ammunition was exhausted. 
 Who can imagine the despair of that gallant 300, and 
 their three brave ofiicers, who had watched that bridge 
 night and day, and maintained their post against all odds 
 and against all comers ? But madness ruled the hour. 
 They were ordered to retire from the bridge, and fall 
 back to the main body on the moor. They retired with 
 " sore hearts," as Hackston relates, for they knew that 
 the fate of the battle was sealed. Monmouth's army 
 slowly and steadily passed the bridge, and formed at 
 
250 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 leisure on the same moor where the Covenanters were 
 drawn up. When Hackston returned with desponding 
 heart from the bridge, he was so far consoled to find that 
 the troops on the moor were in good spirits, and were 
 preparing (as they assured him) to fight the enemy 
 " with hand strokes." All of a sudden, however, the 
 panic-cry ran through their ranks, that their leaders had 
 fled ; and true it was that the maniacs who had betrayed 
 them as effectually as if they had sold them for so much 
 hard cash, rode off at fidl speed from the scene of misery 
 of which they were the authors. Now all was utter 
 confusion. The horse, in making their escape, dashed 
 through the foot, and threw them into disorder. The 
 foot fled in all directions, recklessly and at random. To 
 their honour be it recorded, amid the universal panic, 
 Hackston and his troop of horse, as they had been the 
 most resolute in the hour of battle, were the most faith- ^ 
 ful in the hour of defeat. They lingered long after the 
 rest of the horse had fled, to see if they coidd render any 
 assistance ; and when they saw all was hopeless, they 
 -withdrew in gloomy and heart-broken silence. 
 
 The Royal army, which evinced very little spirit so 
 long' as there was any chance of resistance, now broke 
 from the leash like mastiffs, and sprung upon the dis- 
 ordered and helpless multitude. The foot, who tried to 
 escape, were pursued along the banks of the Clyde, and 
 through the woods of Hamilton, and cut to pieces by 
 the barbarous soldiery. No prisoners were brought 
 back, all were slain where they were found. In this 
 death-chase, no fewer than 400 perished. An old 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. '2-) I 
 
 ballad, with simple pathos, recounts the disasters of 
 that day — 
 
 " When the enemy had won the Bridge, 
 The Westland men did flee ; 
 The Englishmen and Clavers both 
 Did kill them grievously. 
 
 " And all along through Hamilton town, 
 They did both kill and wound. 
 Until the streets with bodies dead 
 Was covered in the to^\^l. 
 
 " Some were dead, and some were sick, 
 And some were sorely wounded : 
 They drove them east like unto sheep 
 Before the dogs were hounded. 
 
 " Then some were dead, and some were sick, 
 And some for quarters cried, 
 And many a brave gallant's blood 
 Upon the ground there lied." 
 
 On the moor, twelve hundred, having no means of 
 escape, and incapable of further defence, flimg down 
 their arms, and yielded themselves prisoners at discre- 
 tion. The brutal soldiers, led on by officers as brutal as 
 themselves, would have massacred every man of them 
 where they stood ; but Monmouth issued the command 
 to spare the people. After Monmouth left the field, 
 however, the soldiers had free scope to exercise their 
 Ijarbarities. The prisoners on the moor were stripped 
 almost naked, and ordered to lie flat on the ground. If 
 any happened to raise their heads, in changing from 
 one posture to another, they were instantly shot like 
 vermin. Thirst is well known to be the most excruciat- 
 ing cause of suffering to men in such a situation : and 
 
252 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 when some country women, moved by an instinct of 
 compassion, came with water to relieve their neces- 
 sities, the soldiers broke the pitchers, and subjected the 
 women to every species of insult and ill treatment. The 
 monsters roamed through all the neighbourhood like a 
 pack of wolves, and slaughtered in cold blood almost 
 every person they met. 
 
 When Monmouth returned to London, the Duke of 
 York, his imbittered rival, as hard-hearted as the other 
 was merciful, reprobated his clemency to the rebels ; and 
 Charles, gay and debonair amongst his licentious com- 
 panions, but perhaps more heartless than even York 
 himself, taunted Monmouth by the innuendo, "If I had 
 been present, there should have been no trouble about 
 prisoners," meaning that he would have put every man 
 of them to the sword. Monmouth's reply was as digni- 
 fied as it was humane, "If that was your wish, you 
 should not have sent me, but a hiitclierr 
 
 Strange to say, only two persons were executed for 
 Bothwell, two clergymen of the names of Kid and 
 King. This enforced idleness of the scaffold was no 
 doubt owing to the merciful disposition and moderate 
 c()unsels of Monmouth, who prevailed upon the King to 
 pass an indemnity, and a relaxation in favour of House 
 Conventicles. In after years, however, this reluctant 
 leniency was amply balanced : for the indemnity was so 
 clogged as to give little relief, and the indulgence was 
 soon abolished ; and for the nine years down to the 
 Revolution itself, Bothwell was the stereotype excuse for 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 253 
 
 continual fines and imprisonments, proscriptions and for- 
 feitures. 
 
 The prisoners, tied two and two, were dragged in dis- 
 gusting triumph into Edinburgh. On the road, their 
 necessities were not in the least attended to, or rather 
 were purposely and wantonly neglected. Men durst not 
 come to offer them any relief ; for that act of charity 
 alone, they woidd be instantly seized and added to the 
 train of prisoners. Women only could venture to 
 minister to theu* wants ; but generally, when they did 
 so, they were ill used by the guard, the food which they 
 brought was thrown away, and the vessels containing it 
 broken to pieces. The Edinburgh mob met the poor 
 prisoners at Corstorphine, exulting over them with 
 mockery and laughter, and shouting to them in language 
 worthy of pagan savages, " Wliere's your God ? where's 
 your God V As the prisons coidd not hold them, the 
 Greyfriars churchyard, where forty years before the 
 National Covenant had been signed with such universal 
 devotion, was converted into a place of confinement. 
 Sentinels were stationed over them day and night. No 
 shelter or covering was allowed them ; but they were 
 exposed to sun and shower, wind and weather. During 
 the day, some 1500 active, stalwart men had to find 
 exercise within that narrow space as they best could. 
 All night they had to lie on the bare, hard ground, 
 without any accommodation, and their clothing very 
 scanty. They were insufficiently fed by the authorities ; 
 and when charitable persons came to supply them with 
 food, or any little comfort, either access was denied, or 
 
254 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 they had to bribe the sentries, and generally whatever 
 was brought was in some way plundered in passing. The 
 soldiers on guard beat and maltreated the prisoners at their 
 pleasure ; and made a constant practice of robbing them 
 during night of any little money they might happen to 
 possess, or of some of their few articles of clothing. For 
 five montlLs, until November, they continued in this sad 
 state. Considerable numbers, however, were liberated 
 on taking a bond of non-resistance ; some received 
 favour, and some escaped, at the risk of their lives, over 
 the wall of the churchyard. Being now reduced in 
 number to about 250, who had failed to escape, who 
 had no friends at head-quarters, and who stoutly refused 
 to take the bond, without any previous intimation to 
 themselves or their friends, early in a cold, raw morning 
 of November, they were conveyed by a party of soldiers 
 from Greyfriars to a vessel lying in Leith Roads, for the 
 purpose, as it was given out, of being transported to the 
 American plantations, and sold as slaves. About thirty, 
 languishing under flux, and other distempers contracted 
 by their cruel usage, were kidnapped along with the 
 rest. On board the ship their treatment was, if possible, 
 worse than that which they had hitherto experienced ; 
 for, by permission of Him who hardened Pharaoh's 
 heart, this was a time when the rulers seemed to be 
 dead to the commonest sensations of kmdness or pity, 
 and equalled by their inhumanities all that we can ima- 
 gine of the malignity of demons. These 250 were 
 stowed under deck into a hole not sufticient to hold 1 00 
 persons. Those who had some measure ^of health and 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 255 
 
 strength had to continue standing, so as to allow the 
 sickly and dying to lie down on the boards. The place 
 was so confined that many of them fainted away for 
 want of air. Their meat was stinted ; even water was 
 served out to them with the most niggardly hand ; and 
 in the maddening extremity of thirst, men were reduced 
 to modes of relief which nature sickens to think of. 
 " All the troubles we met with since Bothwell," com- 
 plains one of them, James Corson, in a letter to his wife 
 and friends, " were not to be compared to one day in 
 our present circumstances. Our uneasiness is beyond 
 words. Yet the consolations of God overbalance all ; 
 and I hope we are near our port, and heaven is open for 
 us." After setting sail, the vessel encountered great 
 tempests in the North Seas. Off" the coast of Orkney, 
 the danger was so imminent that the captain ran the 
 ship close in shore, and cast anchor. The prisoners, in 
 apprehension of what might happen, begged to be landed, 
 and lodged in any prison, there to await the further 
 orders of the Government. The captain's answer was, 
 to lock and chain down the hatches upon them. About 
 ten at night, a fearful swell broke over the vessel, and 
 dashed her against the rocks. She was cleft right down 
 the middle. The sailors, lowering the mast, laid it 
 between the sinking vessel and the rock on whicli she 
 liad split, thus making a way for their own escape. But 
 tliey refused to open the hatches, notwithstanding the 
 agonizing cries and entreaties of the prisoners. A few 
 of the latter, when the vessel vrent asunder, got out and 
 
256 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 reached the shore on pieces of the wreck ; but at least 
 two hundred were swallowed up in the raging deep, 
 most merciless in appearance, yet to them a welcome 
 refuge from the persecutions, far more merciless, to 
 which they had been exposed in their native country ! 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 257 
 
 VIII. 
 
 THE HOUSE OF STUART DISOWNED. 
 
 We have had occasion to notice that, for some years 
 past, a process of separation had been going on amongst 
 the Presbyterians, both ministers and people. It was 
 one of those separations which always occur amidst the 
 ferment of a Revolutionary struggle. In such times, 
 the moderate and the extreme sections of the struggling 
 party, sooner or later, are sure to divide, and then to 
 direct against each other those energies of opposition, 
 which ought to have been husbanded and employed only 
 against the common enemy. 
 
 The proximate causes which led to separation in the 
 present case were various, but the principal were — the 
 Indulgence, or State terms, on which the Presbyterian 
 ministers were permitted to exercise their functions, — 
 the taxes, particularly the cess, levied by the Govern- 
 ment expressly to maintain the persecuting troops, — 
 and the keeping of Armed Conventicles. The quieter 
 and tamer of the ministers had accepted the Indulgence, 
 or countenanced and approved of those of their brethren 
 who had done so. A large number, perhaps numerically 
 the greater part of the Presbyterians, especially those 
 who had estates to lose, wealth that could be plundered, 
 
 R 
 
258 THE FIFTY YEAES' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 or positions from which they could not easily retire, 
 dropt into a kind of obscure and passive compliance, and 
 paid the taxes which otherwise would have been wrung 
 from them by a visitation of the dragoons, although they 
 were painfully aware that these taxes were to be applied 
 to the extermination of their creed, and of their co-reli- 
 gionists. Almost the whole of the ministers, even those 
 who had not bowed to accept the Indulgence, now ceased 
 to hold conventicles of any kind, but, above all. Armed 
 Conventicles, which it had become the fashion of the 
 moderate Presbyterians to decry as the main cause of 
 the continued and aggravated persecutions. 
 
 Judging by the average measure of men and things, 
 who can condemn them ? Who amongst ourselves would 
 have been sufficient for the trials and terrors of that 
 period 1 Who amongst ourselves would not have equally 
 succumbed ? Yet these compliances, however human 
 and excusable, were defections from the principles of the 
 Covenant. Those principles involved the spiritual inde- 
 pendence of the Church ; the right of the people, through 
 free Parliaments, to raise and regulate the taxation of 
 the country ; and the right and duty of armed resistance 
 against tyrannical, anti-national governments. The com- 
 mon compliances of the Presbyterians, then, were so far 
 a giving up of the Covenanting struggle. These evi- 
 dently were not the men to deliver Zion. One thing 
 after another was surrendered or softened down, until 
 soon not a vestige of constitutionalism would remain. 
 The free breath of liberty was dying away into stagna- 
 tion ; the fetters of despotism, civil and religious, were 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 259 
 
 closing around tlie people without a word of remon- 
 strance being uttered, or a hand raised, if not in resist- 
 ance, at least in protest. 
 
 All seemed to be fast settling down, on the one side 
 into rampant oppression, on the other into quiescent 
 apathy. K this state of things had continued, then, 
 humanly speaking, Scotland would have sunk under 
 absolutism, and the Revolution of 1688 would either 
 not have taken place, or not have been so decisive, com- 
 plete, and successful, as happily it turned out to be. 
 
 The common people, always, since the Reformation, so 
 well-educated and trained to the knowledge and defence 
 of their principles, always the true custodiers of national 
 traditions and sentiments, — the common people breathed 
 inward defiance against the aggressors, burned with in- 
 dignation against their unfaithful watchmen, and were 
 anxious again to uprear and to rally around the fallen 
 standard of Scotland. 
 
 Since Bothwell, a ferment had evidently been going 
 on in the minds of the strict Covenanters. No longer 
 standing merely at a testimony against the Indulgence, 
 at refusing to pay cess, and at carrying on the Armed 
 Conventicles, they were fast drifting towards a new, 
 towards a final development of the Covenanting struggle ; 
 that was, to throw off all allegiance to the House of Stuart, 
 and constitute themselves a people apart within the king- 
 dom until deliverance should arise. 
 
 The first rustling of the leaves was heard in a docu- 
 ment very famous in its day, called the " Queensferry 
 
260 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Paper." Some time in June 1G80, it was prepared in 
 draft, merely for future consultation, by old Donald 
 Cargill, the worn-out faithful watchman in his lonely 
 tower, moody and self-mortified, who thought " it was 
 well won that was won off the flesh," and with whom 
 " preaching and praying went best," when he came to 
 the conventicles with his head bandaged up from wounds 
 received in his innumerable narrow escapes ; but amid 
 all his moodiness and sorrowfulness, a man most affec- 
 tionate, mild, and charitable, and who, within the 
 boundary-line of certain fixed ideas, could vigorously 
 think out his subject, and express his thoughts with 
 great nerve and precision. Notwithstanding some vaga- 
 ries, taking their complexion from the wild unsettled 
 times, this Paper will be found to contain the very pith 
 of sound constitutional doctrine regarding both civil and 
 ecclesiastical rights. It is framed in the manner of a 
 Bond or Covenant, and declares for all that shall enter 
 into it, " We do reject the King, and those associate 
 with him in the Government . , . from being our 
 king and rulers, . . . being no more bound to them, 
 they having altered and destroyed the Lord's established 
 religion, overturned the fundamental and established 
 laws of the kingdom, taken away altogether Christ's 
 Church government, and changed the civil government 
 of this laud, which was by a king and free parliament, 
 into tyranny." The conclusion is in the highest strain 
 of patriotism, and may well be the watchword of all 
 struggling freemen : — " We bind and oblige ourselves 
 to defend ourselves, and one another, in our worship- 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 261 
 
 ping of God, and in our natural, civil, and divine rights 
 and liberties, till we shall overcome, or send them down 
 under debate to posterity, that they may begin where 
 we end." " That they may begin where we end !" 
 How there breathes in these few heroic words the very- 
 soul of liberty — unwearied, invincible, immortal I In 
 all ages the same ; a legacy from each free generation to 
 its free posterity. Little thought Byron, poet of the 
 liberties of Greece, that the archetype of his own splendid 
 lines was in an old mouldering paper of Donald Cargill, 
 priest of the liberties of Scotland, — 
 
 " Freedom's battle once begun, 
 Beriueathed by bleeding sire to son, 
 Though baffled oft, is ever won." 
 
 As often happens, though Cargill was the first to 
 speak the word, yet, bending as he was under the load 
 of seventy years of age, and twenty of ceaseless perse- 
 cution, he was not destined to be the man to convert 
 the word into a living reality — into a sacred popular 
 act. That was reserved for his son in the faith, Kichard 
 Cameron, the one son left that would jeopard his life in 
 the high places of the field, now in the very noon of his 
 days, and possessed of that spell of magic eloquence 
 which, in seasons of difficulty and danger, binds the 
 masses together, and inspires them with preternatural 
 strength for grand united movem-ents. 
 
 Richard Cameron was born at Falkland, the fine old 
 palace-town of Fife, under the shadow of the Lomonds, 
 In what year is not recorded, but he was a young man 
 
262 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 at the time of his death, in 1680. His father was a 
 merchant in Falkland. He seems to have received an 
 academic education, jDrobably in the neighbouring Uni- 
 versity of St. Andrews, and was brought up in the 
 dominant Episcopal persuasion. He was for some time 
 schoolmaster in Falkland, under the curate there ; but 
 somehow he fell into the habit of attending the indulged 
 Presbyterian ministers, and from that into attending 
 the- field conventicles. His opinions underwent an entire 
 change. He not only adopted the doctrinal and ecclesias- 
 tical views of the Presbyterians, but being of a peculiarly 
 honest, sincere, and decided turn of mind, he seems to 
 have been shocked from the first at the inconsistencies 
 into which those of their clergy had run who had accepted 
 of the Indulgence, at the scandal which their compli- 
 ances had raised, and the weakness and aU but ruin which 
 they had brought upon the old Covenanted Church. ' His 
 conversion to Presbyterianism exposing him to a great 
 deal of annoyance in his native place, he removed to 
 be tutor in the family of Sir William Scott of Harden, 
 in the county of Koxburgh, — a gentleman who suffered 
 both imprisonment and a fine of £4000 on account of 
 nonconformity. That family, however, attended an in- 
 dulged minister ; and Cameron, finding that his not 
 accompanying them, and his strong aversion to the 
 Indulgence, gave offence, resigned his situation, and 
 joined in company with John "Welsh, who happened to 
 be residing and holding conventicles in Teviotdale. As 
 there was a lack of young preachers, Welsh, who was 
 much satisfied with him, pressed him to accept license 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 2G3 
 
 to preach. For some time he refused, alleging as one 
 reason that he had such clear convictions of the error 
 and sinfulness of the Indulgence, that he should consider 
 himself bound, on the first opportunity, to bear public 
 witness against it, and to counsel separation from the 
 indulged. His scniples being overruled, however, he 
 received license, and was set apart to the ministry in the 
 house of the redoubted Henry Hall of Haughhead. 
 After the service he still continued to repeat, with fore- 
 boding earnestness, that he should be a bone of conten- 
 tion amongst the Presbyterians. During 1677 and 
 1678, he preached with the outed ministers, such as 
 Welsh, Semple, and others, on the Borders, and in 
 Nithsdale and Galloway ; but, as he announced when 
 licensed, he distinguished himself by taking every occa- 
 sion to protest against the Indulgence. This was very 
 ilispleasing to the generality of ministers, even the non- 
 indulged ; and a cry was raised against him of schism. 
 By constant harassing interferences, he was at length 
 prevailed upon, for the sake of momentary peace, to 
 promise to the body of ministers that he would abstain 
 for a time from urging his objections to the Indulgence, 
 and his arguments tending to separation. This was 
 about the end of 1678. To a mind so single and up- 
 right as his, this engagement to silence was, on further 
 reflection, a source of profound distress. Had he not 
 hereby done violence to his own conscience ? Had he 
 not agreed to withhold part of the counsel of God 1 Had 
 he not become tlie dumlj dog, the false amljassador, the 
 very characters for which he had censured others 1 Had 
 
264 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 he not made himself partaker of other men's sins, — 
 doubly heinous in his case, as he sinned against light 
 and knov/ledge 1 In an agony of self-reproach, he 
 rushed from the scene of what he considered his apostasy, 
 and went over to Holland, to unbosom his griefs, and 
 doubts, and anxieties to the venerable fathers of the 
 Church, who had been so many years in exile there — 
 Brown and M'Ward, — the most learned, eloquent, and 
 eminent of the Scottish ministers of the day, and whose 
 letters and writings were received almost as oracles by 
 the Presbyterians at home. The impression which 
 Cameron made when there has been vividly described 
 by M'Ward : " As to our brethren at home, I am not 
 so great a stranger to what they preach, and to what 
 others preach too. But I have confidence to say, on 
 their behalf, they are much abused in the matter ; and, 
 which may be a cooling and calming instance, I crave 
 leave to tell you, that the common report of poor Mr. 
 Cameron (from which I may take my measure as to the 
 truth and falsehood of what is said, and that with no 
 less confidence of others) was, that not only he did 
 preach nothing but babble against the Indulgence, but 
 that he could do no other thing. And this was so con- 
 fidently and commonly talked, that I was not in case to 
 contradict it upon knowledge. But by his coming 
 hither, the reporters have lost their credit of being so 
 easily believed for the future ; and many who heard 
 him were convinced, that prejudice heightened to malice 
 had given men liberty to talk so. For here he was 
 found a man of a savoury gospel spirit ; the bias of his 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 265 
 
 lieart lying to\yarcls the proposing of Christ, and per- 
 suading to a closing with Him. And, besides, I can tell 
 you what a person said to myself, whom you esteem 
 gracious and judicious, and have reason to esteem him 
 such, having heard him preach after his ordination, — 
 ' That he had not heard such gospel preaching since Mr. 
 Brown's banishment.'" (Some two years before this 
 time, Brown had been banished from Holland, most 
 reluctantly on the part of the States-General, at the 
 pressing importunity of the English Ambassador, who 
 was instigated to this course by Archbishop Sharp.) 
 Those who are acquainted with the talents of John 
 Brown of Wamphray, and the character and style, and 
 rich vein of piety in his writings, will understand this 
 high estimate of Pdchard Cameron. 
 
 After many earnest consultations, his mind was some- 
 what set at rest, and his resolutions confirmed ; and, 
 accordingly, he received ordination in the Scottish Church 
 at Rotterdam, at the hands of M'Ward and Brown, 
 assisted by Kooleman, an eminent Dutch divine. When 
 the two latter lifted up their hands from his head, 
 M'Ward still continued his, and cried out, " Behold, all 
 ye spectators ! here is the head of a faithful minister 
 and servant of Jesus Christ, who shall lose the same for 
 his Master's interest, and it shall be set up before sun 
 and moon, in the view of the world." 
 
 With this prophetic commission, Richard Cameron re- 
 turned in 1G80 to Scotland, to duty, and to martyrdom ! 
 
 Cameron, we may here remark, gave his name to tlie 
 
266 THE FIFTY YEAES' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 Strict Covenanters. It was the name they bore down 
 to the Kevolution, and after it ; and it is even per- 
 petuated until this day. The party themselves, indeed, 
 did not assume the name ; and with all their reverence 
 for Cameron, repudiated such an application of it. But 
 the world takes its own way in these things. They 
 were known as Cameeonians so long as Covenanters 
 existed, and those who claim to be their nearest modem 
 representatives are still known by the self-same title. 
 
 Whenever a man gives his name to a sect, or to any 
 considerable and enduring party, we may be sure there 
 has been something singular about him, — something 
 deserving tlie study of all who are interested in the 
 aspects of human character. Whether they be men of 
 rare intellect, as John Calvin, or men of a more common 
 and measurable kind, as John Wesley, the founders of 
 sects and parties have all some distinguishing faculty, 
 some peculiar charm which draws around them the 
 popular opinions and sympathies, and which assimilates 
 into life and unity what would otherwise be a loose 
 chaotic mass. Their times may be rude or enlightened ; 
 their sphere may be narrow, or wide as the globe itself ; 
 their influence may be beneficial or pernicious, or mixed 
 in its effects. But allowing for the conditions under 
 which they operate, they will always be found to have, 
 on the one hand, marked individuality ; on the other, 
 large geniality of character. In short, they have some- 
 thing very special to themselves, combined with much 
 that is common to all. That which is common, kindles 
 sympathy ; that which is special, establishes leadership. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 267 
 
 Althongli Cameron w-as a remarkable and " represen- 
 tative man," I do not claim for him any of the higher 
 attributes of intellect. I do not mean that he was an 
 original or profound thinker, a skilful director of affairs, 
 or a man of literary attainment. On the contrary, his 
 scholarshijD, considering his opportunities, must have 
 been of as himible an order as a public teacher could 
 well have. His management, in the eyes of this world, 
 was utter foolishness — the blind frenzy of fanaticism. 
 And his whole modes of thought were drawn from two 
 very old sources — the Bible, and the standards of the 
 Scottish Kirk. But he had an honest mind tlint insisted 
 on carr}'ing out its convictions to their full legitimate 
 consequences. He could not halt between two opinions. 
 "SVhat to his mind was falsehood, was a thing to be cast 
 out, though it were a right eye. What to his mind was 
 truth, was a thing to be owned, proclaimed, and acted 
 upon, whatever the hazard, and though all men should 
 be offended in him. To this zeal and directness of pur- 
 pose he added an amazing courage, physical, mental, and 
 moral. He had the finn front of the confessor, the 
 strong nerve of the soldier, the unflinching spirit of the 
 polemic, and — rarest, grandest, most heavenly gift ! — 
 he had the calm willingness to die for the cause which 
 his conscience taught him to be of God. The people 
 always love and follow the man who goes straight like 
 an aiTow to his mark, and is not eaten up of doubts and 
 difficulties. Such a leader the Strict Covenanters ob- 
 tained in Richard Cameron. In common with all men 
 who bear sway over their fellows, the cause v.'hich he 
 
268 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 undertook was not a mere piece of business to be taken 
 up and laid aside according to occasion. It was liis life^ 
 that which alone bound him to the earth, and gave his 
 existence its meaning and interest. Hence the intense 
 and life-like power of that eloquence (rustic and primi- 
 tive, no doubt, so far as regards artistic form) which he 
 thundered forth in the moors and mountain-recesses of 
 Scotland. It was not talk : it was not the perfume of 
 the breath, the honey of the lip. In the few poor me- 
 morials we have of his discoiu"ses, snatched from oblivion 
 by some fond disciples in the imperfect short-hand of the 
 period, and under all disadvantages of outv/ard circum- 
 stances, we see a brave, truthful, elevated soid, living and 
 communicating kindi'ed life to others. The function of 
 the preacher is not to dig dovrn in search of obscure and 
 hidden dogmas ; not to weave fine and intricate webs of 
 -irgument ; not to play ofi" the legerdemain of style and 
 ■mmeaning rhetoric ; but seizing the great and necessary 
 truths where all spiritual and eternal reality lies, so to 
 flash them upon the hearts and consciences of men, that 
 they shaU be forced to exclaim, like the multitudes on 
 the day of Pentecost, " What shall we do ? what shall 
 we do .?" In this sense Richard Cameron was a mighty 
 
 PREACHER. 
 
 Picture to yourselves this noble and majestic youth, 
 with blooming countenance and eagle eye, standing on 
 some huge rock uplifted in the wilderness. Ten thousand 
 people are grouped around him : the aged, with the 
 women and childi'en, seated near this pulpit of nature's 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 269 
 
 handiwork ; the men of middle age and the stalwart 
 youths of the surrounding hamlets composing the outer 
 circle, many of them with their hands on their swords, 
 or theii' trusty guns slung by their side ; and on each 
 neighbouring height may be seen the solitary figure of 
 the watchman, intently gazing in all directions for the 
 approach of the troopers, who are now kept garrisoned 
 in every district, and who night and day are on the 
 prowl to catch some poor outlawed Covenanter, or sur- 
 prise some conventicle in the depths of the hills. It is a 
 Sabbath in May. The great wild moor stretches out to 
 a kind of infinity, blending at last with the serene blue 
 sky. How sublime and peaceful the moment ! even in 
 this age of violence and oppression, — of the dimgeon, 
 the rack, the scaff'old, and murder in cold blood in the 
 fields. Heaven smiles on the " Eemnant." All is hushed 
 and reverent attention. The w^ord is precious. There 
 are but three men now in Scotland who will venture 
 their all to preach to the people, free from the chains of 
 despotism, and asserting the independence of man's spirit 
 and man's creed from all State control. These are, 
 faithful old Cargill, weary-footed, prophetic old Peden, 
 and the youthful Cameron, who now stands before us. 
 The psalm has been sung, and the echoes of the myriad 
 voices have died on the moorland breeze. The prayer 
 has been offered, the earnest wrestlings with Heaven of 
 men who before sunset may themselves be an offering for 
 their religion. The preacher rises. He eyes for a mo- 
 ment in silence that vast multitude, gatliered from all 
 parts of the West. Always serious, always inspired with 
 
270 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 elevated feeling, tliere is in his manner more than the 
 usual solemnity. There is a mysterious look, full of 
 mingled emotion, of tenderness, sorrow, weariness, long- 
 ing for rest, and the presentiment of Paul, " I am now 
 ready to be offered, and the time of my departure is at 
 hand." Yes ! he knows that his days are numbered ; 
 and but a few more suns, the heather-sod shall be his 
 bed of death. A strange, almost unearthly sympathy is 
 visible, stirring those assembled thousands to the very 
 depths of their being. Rousing himself from the reverie 
 which had passed over him, the preacher announces his 
 text, " Ye will not come to me that ye might have life.'" 
 He commences by expounding the words : he enters 
 into a plain and forcible illustration of the various doc- 
 trines which lie embedded in the text. Yet there is 
 manifestly something weighing upon his mind, a vehe- 
 ment desire to throw aside mere general discourse, and 
 to come into close interior contact — soul to soul — with 
 the consciences and affections of the people. He may 
 never see them more ; never again address them on the 
 concerns of their eternal wellbeing. He bursts away from 
 the trammels of common didactic speech. Hearken ! as 
 that mighty thrilling voice startles the solitudes around — 
 
 " Are there any of you here saying. This doctrine is 
 true that you are telling us ; you have told me the 
 thoughts of my heart, for there is a great unwillingness 
 in me to come to Christ 1 
 
 " Alas ! ye came too easily by your religion in the 
 West of Scotland, and so betides. You have taken it 
 up at your feet. You have been born with it. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. ' 271 
 
 " Oh, sad to tliiuk upon the West of Scotland ! The 
 wild Highlands have not neglected so many caUs as thou 
 hast done. ye in the West ! ye all have religion ! 
 Truly, ye are like the Church of Laodicea, that lacked 
 nothing, but knew not that she was lukewarm, poor, 
 wretched, blind, and naked. 
 
 " It may be ye think ye have enough, and stand in no 
 need of persecuted gospel ordinances. Yet ye are the 
 people in all Scotland that are in the worst condition. 
 My Master hath been crying unto you in the parishes of 
 Muirkirk, and Crawfordjohn, and Douglas, ' Ye will not 
 come unto me that ye might have life.' What say ye ? 
 Shall I go away and tell my Master that ye will not 
 come unto Him ? 
 
 " Ye that have been plagued with deadness, hardness 
 of heart, and unbelief. He now requires you to give in 
 your answer, — Yes, or no. 
 
 " I take instruments before these hills and mountains 
 around us, that I have offered Him unto you this day. 
 Angels are wondering at the offer. They stand behold- 
 ing with admiration, that our Lord is giving you such 
 an offer this day. 
 
 " What shall I say to Him that sent me ] Shall I 
 say, ' L(ird, there are some yonder saying, I am content 
 to give Christ my heart and hand, house, land, and all I 
 have for His cause.' 
 
 " Look over to the Shaw-head, and all those hills, — 
 look at them 1 They are all witnesses now, and when 
 you are dying, they shall come before your face." 
 
 The preacher trembles as he speaks ; and the thou- 
 
272 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 sands aroimd liim, from the aged patriarcli to the tender 
 stripling, are touched with indescribable emotion. Lan- 
 guage fails to paint the scene. Fancy cannot realize it. 
 The old chronicler, with Hebraic beauty and simplicity, 
 records : " Here both minister and people fell into a 
 state of calm weeping." Calm loeeping I What a depth 
 of meaning in that one phrase ! The Shaw-head seemed 
 to look down into their very souls. " All those hills" 
 became animated into living creatures with eyes of flame. 
 Surrounding Xatiu'e was bound over to appear as a wit- 
 ness against them at the day of dread decision ; and 
 already they felt themselves amid all the fears and an- 
 xieties, the shadows and gleams of hope that wait upon 
 a dying bed. " The Shaw-head and all those hills ! . . . 
 When you are dying, they shall come before your face !" 
 After a long and affecting pause — after an interval 
 where so many thousands were subdued into "calm 
 weeping" — Cameron, before again proceeding, offered up 
 a prayer for the composing and tranquillizing influences 
 of the Holy Spirit. 
 
 If you comprehend, even in the faintest measure, the 
 scene which I have endeavoiu-ed to depict, you have the 
 key which at once explains the whole problem — How it 
 was that Scotland could bear up for so many years, and 
 gi*ow in strength and fortitude, and ultimately triumph 
 over the fiercest and most desolating persecution which, 
 perhaps, ever descended upon any age or nation. The 
 Mother of sons like Richard Cameron could not be 
 crushed. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 273 
 
 But Cameron was not merely the preacher of the per- 
 secuted remnant. He was the champion that was first 
 to proclaim, that the House of Stuart had forfeited the 
 British throne. It was now necessary, in the evolution 
 of circumstances, that the tie which had so long attached 
 the Scottish people to their native dynasty, should l»e 
 gradually loosening ; and Cameron commenced this dis - 
 solving process amongst the strict Covenanters. 
 
 In one of his earliest sermons, after his return from 
 Holland, he thus expounds his views : — 
 
 " The most part of the land cry out. We Vv'ill have no 
 other king but Ca?sar, no other king but King Charles. 
 We must cry, We will have no other king but Christ. 
 What, say ye, are ye against monarchical government i 
 We are not much tahcn iip with that, if God let pure 
 government he estahlished, that is most for the advantage 
 of civil and ecclesiastical society. ... If ye would have 
 God be for you, you must cut off this king, and these 
 magistrates, and make able men be rulers ; men endued 
 with suitable qualifications, both of body and mind. . . . 
 If ever ye see good days in Scotland vvithout disowning 
 the present king, then believe me no more. Indeed, that 
 is not much ; but l(Dok to the Word of God. If ye would 
 raise up ten thousand, yea a hundred thousand men, ye 
 would not prosper, even though they were well trained 
 and equipped, if they owned the present king and magis- 
 trates. ... I know not if this generation will be hon- 
 oured to cast off these nilers ; but those that the Lord 
 makes instmments to bring back Christ, and to recover 
 our liberties, civil and ecclesiastical, shall be such as 
 s 
 
274 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 shall disown this king and the magistrates under him, 
 . . . Let them take heed unto themselves ; for though 
 they should take us to scaffolds, or kill us in the fields, 
 the Lord will yet raise up a party who will be avenged 
 upon them. . . . We had rather die than live in the 
 same country with them, and outlive the glory of God 
 departing altogether from these lands." 
 
 In 1680, this was Treason : in 1688, it became the 
 Iievolution Settlement. 
 
 On the 2 2d of June (the anniversary of Bothwell), the 
 ancient burgh of Sanquhar was startled, in the midst of 
 its black and desolate hills, by the appearance of twenty 
 armed men on horseback, wdio rode slowly up the main 
 street. On arriving at the market-place, two dismounted 
 and went to the cross, whilst the rest formed a circle 
 around them at a little distance, and the inhabitants 
 flocked to the spot. The two who dismounted were 
 Richard Cameron and his brother IMichael. A psalm 
 was sung ; a prayer offered ; after wdiich Michael read 
 a paper, amid the strange and breathless silence of the 
 gathered multitude. It was the Sanquhar Declaration : 
 — " We do by these presents disown Charles Stuart, that 
 has been reigning, or rather tyrannizing on the throne 
 of Britain these years bygone, as having any right, title 
 to, or interest in the crown of Scotland, for government, 
 — as forfeited several years since, by his perjury and 
 breach of covenant both to God and His Kirk, and by 
 his tyranny, and breach of the very leges regnandi (the 
 very essential conditions of government), in matters civil. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 275 
 
 . . . We do declare a war with such a tyrant and 
 usurper, and all the men of his practices. . . . And we 
 hope after this, none will blame us for, or offend at our 
 rewarding those that are against us as they have done 
 to us, as the Lord gives opportunity." After a conclud- 
 ing prayer, those twenty armed horsemen formed again 
 in rank, and sternly cind silently rode away into the 
 pathless deserts from which they had come. 
 
 There were now in Scotland two kingdoms, the Stuart 
 monarchy and the Cameronian theocracy. The latter 
 was but a cloud the size of a man's hand, yet in eight 
 years it overspread the whole sky, and descended in a 
 hurricane of ruin on the " Bloody House," Amidst 
 much that is sectarian in their phraseology, the real 
 matter of fact for which they were contending was jiist 
 the old claim of the Covenanters — a Free Parliament 
 and a free Assembly. And these were the essential 
 principles which triumphed at the Revolution. It is 
 the glory of the Cameronians, in which no other party 
 shares, that when most peojDle lay prostrate, and many 
 of the bravest stood aloof, they were the first to hoist 
 the flag disowning the government of the Stuarts, with- 
 out whose expulsion liberty was impossible. 
 
 Cameron felt that his work was done. He used to 
 say that " the Sanquhar Declaration would ere long 
 shake the throne of Britain." And so it did in this 
 sense. It v/as the first public testimony against the 
 race of Stuart, it was the first token that the Scottish 
 
276 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 people were beginning to be alienated from tliem, and it 
 worked away amongst them like leaven, until tliey were 
 fitted to unite with the English people in the great 
 common movement of the Revolution. With this public 
 act, the launching of the Sanquhar Declaration, Came- 
 ron believed that his career was to terminate. By his 
 decision, veracity, and eloquence, he had given a new 
 current to the minds of his countrymen ; the rest must 
 be left to the Joshuas whom it might be the will of 
 Providence to raise up after him. lu hourly expectation 
 of a violent death, his mind was interpenetrated with 
 two absorbing sentiments. The one was a fixed assur- 
 ance that the time of Scotland's deliverance, both as 
 to her religious principles and civil rights, was rapidly 
 approaching ; the other was a sentiment as regarded 
 himself of the most entire resignation to the disposing 
 hand of God, and tranquil repose under the shadow of 
 the Almighty wings. In all his remaining acts and 
 words, these two sentiments come out steadily, clearly, 
 impressively. 
 
 His last sermon was preached in Avondale, not far 
 from the field of Drumclog. This was only three days 
 before his death. His text was from the Psalms : — 
 " Be still and l-now that I am God ; I will he exalted 
 among the heathen; I will he exalted in the earth.'" Some 
 notes of this sermon have been preserved. Meagre as 
 they are, they present to our minds a very distinct and 
 noble image of Cameron, when standing at the entrance 
 of the valley of the shadow of death. 
 
 Speaking with certain assurance of the restoration 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. Zi t 
 
 which was about to visit the now persecuted cliurch, he 
 breaks out into this bold apostroishe — " ' I will be 
 exalted among the heathen.' What need you trouble 
 yourselves, ye that are the people of God ! Hearken to 
 what He says ; ye that are in hazard for the truth, be 
 not troubled. Our. Lord shall be exalted among the 
 heathen. Many will say, we know He will be exalted 
 at the last and great day. Yes, but He says, I will be 
 exalted in the earth. . . . The people of God have been 
 exalted already. Oh, the Church of the Jews was some- 
 times very high, and sometimes the Christian Church ! 
 In the time of Constantine she was high, yea, and the 
 Church of Scotland has been high in her time, fair 
 as the moon, clear as the sun, and terrible as an army 
 ^vith banners. The day has been when Zion was stately 
 in Scotland. The terror of the Church of Scotland once 
 took hold of all the kings and great men that passed by. 
 . . . But all this exalting that we have yet seen is 
 nothing to what is to come. . . . Let us not be judged 
 to be of the opinion of some men in England, called the 
 Fifth-Monarchy men, who say that before the great day 
 Christ shall come in person from heaven, with all the 
 saints and martyrs, and reign a thousand years on earth. 
 But we are of opinion that the Church shall yet be more 
 high and glorious, and have more power than ever she 
 had before. Therefore we declare avowedly in oppo- 
 sition to all tyrannical magistrates, magistrates that are 
 open enemies to God. We declare that we will have 
 none such acknowledged as lawful magistrates over us. 
 We wiU have none but such as are for the advancement 
 
278 THE FIFTY YEAES STr.UGGLE OF 
 
 of piety and the suppression of impiety and wickedness. 
 The work begun shall be carried on in spite of all 
 opposition. Our Lord shall be exalted in the earth, 
 and we do not question but He shall be exalted in 
 Scotland. ... If ye be not delivered and made a free 
 and purified people, ye sliall no more be a nation or 
 embodied people than the Jews are at this day. I say 
 not this to disquiet you, but to stir you up to take hold 
 of Christ, and to range yourselves under his standard, 
 on which shall be written — Let Chpjst eeign ! . . . 
 It is hard to tell where it shall be first erected, but our 
 Lord is to set up a standard, and oh that it may be 
 carried to Scotland ! When it is set up it shall be 
 carried through the nations, and it shall go to Rome, 
 and the gates of Rome shall be burned with fire. It is 
 a standard that shall overthrow the throne of Britain, 
 and all the thrones in Europe that will not kiss the Son 
 lest He be angry, and in His anger they perish from the 
 way. Be still and know that I am God ; I ^Yi\l be 
 exalted among the heathen ; I will be exalted in the 
 earth." 
 
 Imperfectly reported as they are, do not these words 
 run like a ball of fire, burning along the paper on 
 which they are printed '? Said I not well that Richard 
 Cameron was a mighty preacher ? A man of his times, 
 as we all are, circumscribed by the ideas and phrases of 
 his age — ideas, some of them extinct now — phrases, 
 many of which have now ceased to operate like a sj^ell, 
 as they did in those days on the moorlands and moun- 
 tains of Scotland. But in his own age he was a great 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 279 
 
 living spirit. And apart altogether from what is pecu- 
 liar to his times, do we not hear in the surging and 
 swelling of those old rough sentences, the eternal voic/e 
 of Humanity, ever struggling against tyranny which is 
 of the Devil, ever struggling for liberty which is of 
 God? 
 
 But the most affecting passages are those where, with 
 hymn-like sweetness and beauty, he descants on the 
 great theme embodied in the text, that in a believing 
 stillness and peacefulness we ought ever to feel, that we 
 are not withered leaves blown about by the breath of 
 chance, but are immortal spirits under the guidance of 
 a Being all-wise and all-gracious. Not that the sermon 
 contains any statement of personal circumstances or 
 feelings. In references to himself Cameron seldom in- 
 dulges. The man was too great and expansive for that, 
 and when he happens to make any such allusions, he 
 does so always with humility and manliness. But 
 although he does not make his statements in the form 
 of personal experiences, you see at once that he has 
 himself wrought in the mine whose rich ores he so well 
 describes; that he has himself been a tiller in the gar- 
 den whose medicinal plants and refreshing fruits he so 
 ardently recommends to others. Never was there a 
 more touching utterance of a soul fully and entirely sur- 
 rendered into the keeping of God. "Abba, Father!" 
 breathes in every word. As the trusty swimmer to 
 whom ocean is not a terror but a delight, buffets not 
 against the waves in fear or unskilfulness, but lays him- 
 self down upon them lovingly and is borne along in 
 
280 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 safety and joy ; so does Richard Cameron lay himself 
 down on the swellings of the Jordan of death, in the full 
 assurance of faith, that they will only waft him over to 
 that celestial city where there remaineth a rest for the 
 people of God. 
 
 I only cull one or two scattered sentences. 
 
 *' Inquietude of mind is inwardly experienced, not 
 only in the beginning of outward trouble, but even when 
 God is about to put an end to it. Some men's minds 
 will be in a strange hurry. The reason is, their inordi- 
 nate and excessive desire of the speedy accomplishment 
 of what they are in the hope and expectation of from 
 the Word of God. . . . Whensoever the Lord is to 
 make an end of troubles, let us study to be still and 
 know that he is God." 
 
 " There are very few, and those very well circum- 
 stanced, that find themselves in no hazard of quarrelling 
 with God. I think almost if angels were on earth they 
 would be in hazard of it. There are none that have 
 corruption but they have need to be afraid of this. But 
 many give way to this quarrelling, and consider not the 
 hazard thereof. Beware of it, for it is a dreadful thing 
 to quarrel with God. Who may say unto him, What 
 doest thou ? It is a good account of Aaron, that when 
 God made fire to destroy his sons he held his peace. 
 Let us then, while we bear the yoke, sit alone and keep 
 silence, and put our mouths in the dust, if so be there 
 may be hope." 
 
 " Are ye not in love with this — Be still ! Be still ! 
 Woidd ye not be content to be at this with it? . . . 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 281 
 
 Labour to have much of the awe, fear, aud dread of God 
 upon your spirits. If we looked to the greatness, 
 sovereignty, and power of God, and could say, The Lord 
 of hosts is with us, the God of Jacob is our refuge, we 
 should have composure of spirit." 
 
 " Ye should be brought to calmness and submission. 
 . . . The man that has a good conscience has a good 
 bed to sleep on, were it in a moss, moor, or mountain ; 
 in the open field exposed to wind and weather. But 
 for a guilty conscience, there is no getting free from it. 
 A man that has a good conscience, before he sees the 
 enemy may be afraid ; but when they come his fear 
 evanishes. But an evil conscience is never without 
 fears : and, man ! if thy heart condemn thee, God 
 can lay much more to thy charge." 
 
 "If we had this fixedness, we would be fit to go 
 about duties. . . . AVithout being still, there is no right 
 going about duty. AVithout it, we cannot wrestle, pray, 
 or praise. How can ministers preach, or people hear 1 
 How can there be reading or praying aright, without 
 being still 1 The man that is disquieted and fearful is 
 unfit for any duty. He is a prey to every temptation. 
 There is a proverb, ' It is good fishing in troubled 
 waters.' The devil labours to confuse men, and then he 
 easily catches them. He busks his hook, and takes by 
 one temptation or another. So that the thing to be 
 understood is — to be patiently waiting on God, and to 
 beware of murmuring, despondency, fearfulness, and dis- 
 quiet of mind." 
 
282 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 He spent the last niglit of his life in the house of 
 William I\Iitchell of Meadowhead, on the Water of Ayr. 
 On the morning of the 2 2d July, the woman of the 
 house gave him Twater to wash himself. Having finished, 
 he looked at his hands, and laid them on his face, say- 
 ing, " This is their last washing. I have need to make 
 them clean, for there are many to see them." At this 
 the woman's mother wept. "Weep not for me," he 
 said, " but for yourself and yours ; for melancholy, sor- 
 rowful, and weary days are before you." 
 
 For a week past, he had been escorted by what may 
 be called a body-guard of upwards of sixty persons — 
 twenty-three of them horsemen, and forty on foot — very 
 indifferently armed. But they were sufficient for any 
 ordinary attack. The principal persons amongst them, 
 besides Cameron himself, were his brother Michael, 
 Hackston of Rathillet, who had been military director 
 since Bothwell, and a youth, James Gray of Chryston, 
 as remarkable for zeal and piety, as for great bodily 
 activity and strength. They had heard that a party of 
 soldiers were in search of them ; and they lay all night 
 in Ayrsmoss, a large dismal morass, stretching for miles 
 between Cumnock and Muirkirk. In the afternoon, 
 they were reposing themselves on a grassy plot, a soli- 
 tary green spot in this waste and gloomy desert. Sud- 
 denly and unexpectedly a troop of dragoons came into 
 view, and were seen riding furiously towards them. It 
 was Bruce of Earlshall's regiment — some one hundred 
 and twenty men, of coiu'se well equipped, and in good 
 
THE SCOTTISH CO VEX AX TEES, 283 
 
 condition every way. As there were no means of escape, 
 the small body of Covenanters resolved to fight it out. 
 There were only a few minutes to offer up their sup- 
 plications to Heaven. They gathered devoutly round 
 Cameron, who uttered a short prayer. Even in that 
 anxious moment, one memorable and sublime expression 
 thrilled through every soul, and by faithful chroniclers 
 has been floated down to our own time. Thrice, with 
 all the intensity of a dying man, he prayed — " Loixl, 
 sjxrre the green, and take the ripe /" On concluding, he 
 turned hastily to his brother Michael, who was at his 
 side, and with a last fraternal pressure of the hand, in- 
 trepidly whispered, " Now let us fight it out to the last ; 
 for this is the day that I have longed for, and the day 
 that I have prayed for, to die fighting against our Lord's 
 avowed enemies. This is the day for the crowTi." He 
 then addressed the rest of the little devoted band — " Be 
 encouraged, all of you, to fight it out valiantly : for all 
 of you that fall this day, I see heaven's gates open to 
 receive you." They put themselves into the best pos- 
 ture they could ; and formed on a small rising knoll, 
 surrounded in almost all directions by bogs and stand- 
 ing pools of water. On the right were drawn up eight 
 horse, commanded by Cameron ; on the left were the 
 remainder of the horse, commanded by Hackston ; the 
 forty footmen were in the centre. Scarcely had they 
 time to form, when about twenty dragoons on foot made 
 a movement to outflank them ; but an equal number of 
 footmen were sent out to repulse this movement. At 
 the same instant, the rest of the dragoons rode forward 
 
284 THE FIFTY YEAES' STFtUGGLE OF 
 
 in a body ; and the horsemen of the Covenanters ad- 
 vanced to their very faces, fired first, and killed and 
 wounded several. They broke the first line of the 
 forces ; but unfortunately their foot — unaccustomed to 
 military manoeuvres — did not come forward and support 
 them, but only fired from a -distance. The numbers 
 being so unequal, the horse of the Covenanters were soon 
 separated, and each of them was separately surrounded 
 by several of the dragoons. They fought desperately, 
 neither giving nor taking quarter ; and in the thick of 
 the combat Cameron fi'll dead to the ground. Young 
 Gray of Chrystou performed prodigies of valour ; and 
 the troopers afterwards admitted, in their own words, 
 that " he was the one that mauled them most." Hack- 
 ston, with his great strength and impetuous courage, had 
 ridden right through the whole body of dragoons, out 
 at the other side, dealing wounds and death around him, 
 for he was an admirable swordsman. He was assailed 
 on all hands, and long maintained a running fight in 
 the morass, sometimes pursuing, and sometimes pursued, 
 At length his horse bogged, and so did that of the 
 foremost of the dragoons, David Ramsay — " one of my 
 acquaintance," writes Hackston quite coolly, in his nar- 
 rative of the rencontre. Such are the strange meetings 
 of acquaintances in times of civil commotion ! The two 
 fought for awhile on foot, both very equally matched ; 
 but as they closed, three di'agoons from behind most 
 basely struck Hackston on the head, and wounded him 
 severely. He fell to the ground, and surrendered pri- 
 soner to Ramsay. The few horse of the Covenanters 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 285 
 
 were killed or scattered ; but most of the foot, -when 
 they saw the day against them, saved themselves by 
 retreating into the moss, where the dragoons could not 
 follow them. " They gave us all testimony," says 
 Hacksion, his military spirit proud of the acknowledg- 
 ment, even amid his painful wounds, and with the 
 prospect before him of the most racking tortures, and 
 the traitor's barbarous death — " They gave us all testi- 
 mony of being brave, resolute men." The prisoners, 
 amongst whom was Hackston, were carried into Edin- 
 burgh amidst every vulgar indignity. Cameron's head 
 and hands were cut off by Robert Murray, and also 
 taken to Edinburgh. " There," cried Murray, as he 
 delivered them up to the officials of the Council, — 
 " There are the head and hands of a man who hved 
 praying and preaching, and died praying and fighting." 
 
 After the death of Cameron, followed as it soon was 
 by the execution of old Donald Cargill, the Strict Cove- 
 nanters formed tliemselves into what were termed 
 Societies. The first meeting was held in December 
 1681. In the individual societies, the members engaged 
 in the fellowship of mutual prayer and conference ; and 
 then, for maintaining a common union and discipline, 
 there were general or aggregate meetings, held quarterly, 
 in some secluded but central locality, which were com- 
 posed of commissioners delegated from the several sepa- 
 rate societies. Gordon of Earlstoun, when examined 
 before the Privy Council in September 1G83, with the 
 instruments of torture standing by, and when he was 
 
286 THE FIFTY YEAES' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 under the temptation rather to diminish the importance 
 of the Societies, and allay the fears of the Council, than 
 make any exaggerated statements, declares, that the 
 members were divided into " districts in the several 
 shires of the kingdom ; that there were 80 such dis- 
 tricts, and about 7000 associated members."^ He is 
 speaking of what they were near the commencement of 
 their association ; but from various facts it is manifest 
 that they increased in numbers and resolution as the 
 perils increased around them, and from their vast assem- 
 blages at the time of the Revolution, they had e\ddently 
 become a great and imposing force, — all armed, and 
 secretly trained in military exercises. Something like a 
 systematic correspondence was set on foot by the Socie- 
 ties with foreign Protestant churches and divines, who 
 showed sympathy for their cause and peculiar opinions. 
 This connexion was principally with the churches in 
 Holland, and was conducted mainly through Sir Robert 
 Hamilton, who was now resident there. One can also 
 trace that, on special occasions, they were in the habit 
 of sending abroad as their representatives some of the 
 more influential of their number ; such as Alexander 
 Gordon, of Earlston, who was Hamilton's brother-in-law. 
 This machinery, of affiliated societies at home, and of 
 correspondence with foreign churches, was very admir- 
 ably ^vTOught, amid so many hazards and obstacles down 
 to the Revolution. 
 
 The United Societies, or, as they were popularly styled, 
 
 1 State Paier Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 287 
 
 the Cameronians, thus took up a new position, both in 
 relation to the Stuart despotism, aud in rehition to the 
 Moderate Presbyterians. 
 
 Hitherto the Presbyterian party had acknowledged 
 the rule of the Stuarts as a civil government ; but they 
 refused, on grounds of conscience, to yield submission tt) 
 their interference in religious matters ; and so far, but 
 so far onlj^, they had always passively, and sometimes 
 actively resisted the encroachments of the Government ; 
 and they also protested generally against the whole sys- 
 tem by which the ancient political constitution of tlie 
 country had been violated. Still they were professed 
 subjects of the King, but subjects suffering from oppres- 
 sion — oppression in matters of faith and worship. To 
 this species of oppression the name of persecution is 
 more particularly applied ; and in cases of persecution, 
 it is the governments that are almost invariably in the 
 wrong, — wanting in tenderness and conciliation towards 
 the subject, and trenching upon a domain which belongs 
 peculiarly to the individual's own conscience. 
 
 But this persecution had now continued for more than 
 twenty years ; and instead of there being any prospect 
 of abatement, it was only acquiring more strength and 
 more violence. Once somewhat intermittent, it was now 
 becoming a constant and fixed disease of the body politic. 
 There was evidently to be no release, so long as a Pres- 
 byterian or Constitutionalist (and these were convertible 
 titles) was left in the country. This party were treated 
 by the Government no longer as subjects. They were 
 stripped of all civil rights, disqualified for all oflfices, 
 
288 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 denied the privilege of petition or remonstrance, and 
 liable to the most arbitrary j^nnishments, if they at- 
 tempted to follow theu' own mode of worship, — to fines, 
 and imprisonment, and banishment, and summary death 
 without trial before any regular tribunal. Be jure, in 
 their treatment by the so-called laws, they were no 
 longer subjects. And, forsooth ! whilst they were thus 
 deprived of all protection and rights, — whilst thus ex- 
 posed to every injustice and cruelty, without the means 
 of redress, — like the task-masters of Egypt, who de- 
 manded bricks whilst they refused straw, the despotic 
 rulers expected the most ready and implicit submission, 
 and were amazed and enraged when they found that op- 
 pression produced discontent, not cheerfid and grateful 
 obedience ! The Moderate Presbyterians, — as is always 
 the case with moderate sections, who are only fitted for 
 the questions and expediencies of ordinary times, but 
 fail when they have to cope with monster evils and ini- 
 quities, — I say, the Moderate Presbyterians temporized 
 with this system of oppression ; and, without altogether 
 yielding to it, would not commit themselves to an open 
 rupture, where there was so little chance of success, and 
 where there was so much power and rigour in the oppo- 
 site scale. The Cameronians represented those bolder, 
 firmer, and more fervid minds, who preserve nations from 
 slavery, and the world from stagnation. They were of 
 those who will not be governed like the horse or the mule, 
 but must be governed by reason, through their own free 
 will, and for the general good. As the oppressions had 
 continued unabated, had been more and more aggravated 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 289 
 
 for so many long years, tlie question at length arose, Ought 
 there not to be an end put to this state of things by the 
 people themselves ? The Cameronians held that all true 
 government was dissolved ; that the tie between king 
 and people was hopelessly rent asunder. Their rulers 
 had treated them as no longer subjects de jure. The 
 Cameronians replied : " We accept the situation : we de- 
 clare that henceforth we are no longer subjects de factor 
 This simplified the position. The Cameronians separated 
 themselves from the Moderate Presbyterians ; they dis- 
 owned the Government altogether ; and, so far as they 
 were concerned, the remaining stages of the struggle were 
 not properly the persecution of subjects, but the incipient 
 conflicts of a civil war. They counted not their num- 
 bers ; they measured not their weakness ; they quailed 
 not before the power of the oppressors ; they refused 
 nothing to their coimtry — not only words, and arguments, 
 and testimonies, but body, and blood, and life it.: elf ; 
 and with a great faith and a great heart, they proclaimed, 
 " This tyranny can no longer be endured : we disown it, 
 we declare war against it. We wait the movements of 
 Providence; and God defend the right !" 
 
 There is no need, in this country, and in this age, to 
 insist upon the proposition, that the duties of ruler and 
 people are correlative, and that a point may arrive where 
 such is the tyranny, and wickedness, and illegal conduct 
 of the mler, that the people are absolved from their duty 
 of allegiance, and are entitled to resist and overthrow 
 the ruler, and substitute another and a better govern- 
 ment. This has long been, not a thesis, but a trite 
 
 T 
 
290 TPIE FIFTY years' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 established postulate in all our own political discussions. 
 It needs as much as ever to be thundered in the ears 
 of the potentates and congresses on the Continent of 
 Europe ; but ^Yith us, it is about as inconsequential to 
 labour this proposition, as to set about formally proving, 
 that the man who has been long troubled with a smoky 
 cliimney is entitled to get the mason to repair it. Our 
 ancestors — with whom this proposition was no easy pos- 
 tulate, but a novel and difficult problem, on which hung 
 the issues of life and death — deei)ly and maturely weighed 
 the subject, and only came to the resolution after the 
 most patient and anxious thought. What gross injus- 
 tice has been done to them by the Romancers who make 
 mirth out of their sufferings, and madness out. of their 
 grave, heroic wisdom ! We are to believe them to have 
 been a mere howling jumble of Macbrau's, and Kettle- 
 drummles, and Mause Headiiggs, only saved from utter 
 contempt by a certain kind of earnest, enraptured non- 
 sense. Never was there a more baseless libel. Read, 
 but read with proper understanding and information be- 
 forehand, — read the treatises of the men who really led 
 them, — read, above all, the Minutes of their Society 
 meetings from 1G81 to 1691, and you will be struck 
 with the prudence, sobriety, and calnmess with which 
 they transacted all their business, and encountered all 
 emergencies, and considered all the difficult and trying 
 questions that came before them. This very question 
 of resistance to the ruling power, which, as we have 
 said, was then a novel and perplexing question, they 
 discuss with a depth, precision, and comjjleteness which 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS, 291 
 
 has not been exceeded by any of the jurists or statists 
 who have since reasoned on the subject. There is not a 
 finer or more comprehensive statement of the proposition 
 than that which is contained in the Society's letter to 
 Friends in Ireland, dated 2d March 1687 : — " In things 
 civil, though we do not say that every tyrannical act 
 makes a tyrant, yet we hold that habitual, obstinate, 
 and declared opposition to, and overturning of religion, 
 laws, and liberties, and making void all contracts with 
 the subjects, intercepting and interdicting all redress by 
 supplications or otherwise, doth sufficiently invalidate 
 his right and relation of magistracy, and warrant sub- 
 jects ... to revolt from under, and disown allegiance 
 to such a power. Yet they may not lawfully arrogate 
 to themselves that authority which the tyrant hath for- 
 feited, or act judicially either in civil or criminal courts. 
 Only, they may do that which is necessary for securing 
 themselves, liberty, and religion." See with what fear- 
 less breadth they enunciate the main principle, that 
 systematic and incurable tyranny invalidates the title of 
 the ruler, and warrants the people to revolt and to over- 
 throw his lawless authority ; yet with what caution they 
 guard against this princii)le being abused by sudden, 
 insufficient, and rash rebellions for only occasional freaks 
 of tyranny. And again, with what sagacity, and self- 
 control, and true Conservatism, they check any ebullition 
 of democratic folly, any hasty running-up of lath-and- 
 plaster governments before the national will has been fully 
 matured and exprc5.sed ; at the same that they advise 
 the most careful provisional arrangements to maintain 
 
292 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 order, and to secure the safety and liberties of tlie people 
 until a solid constitutional government has been formed. 
 A whole volume could not more clearly define, or more 
 completely exhaust the subject. These are the maxims, 
 at once wise and bold, on which the British Revolution 
 was soon afterwards effected. They are the maxims 
 which are at present being exemplified before our eyes 
 by the Italian people, and which have gained for them 
 the respect and confidence and sympathy of every 
 thoughtful friend of liberty throughout the world. 
 
 Such, then, was the principle upon which the Came- 
 ronians took up their position at the period of which 
 we are now speaking. The House uf Stuart, by their 
 inveterate character of selfishness and violence, and by 
 their course of systematic and incurable tyranny, had, 
 upon this principle, forfeited the throne of Britain. The 
 Cameronians felt and believed this ; they would be held 
 back by no timid counsels or whisperings of expediencj^, 
 but disowned the authority of their rulers, and threw ofi" 
 their yoke. They formed into a separate community — 
 armed, drilled, organized — and eight years before any 
 other party, when the rest of the nation were supine or 
 overawed, when other people, "as in the days that were 
 before the flood, were eating and drinking, mariying and 
 giving in marriage," they foresaw that a great convulsion 
 must take place, and they prepared steadily and methodi- 
 cally for it ; would be drawn aside into no rash or 
 sectional movement (such as that of Monmouth and 
 Argyle), but waited on and suffered patiently until the 
 decisive hour came ; and when the hour came they knew 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 293 
 
 it, and rose in their thousands of armed and disciplined 
 men — the sole Volunteers for their country — and bore a 
 glorious part in accomplishing the Revolution of 1688. 
 
 That Revolution justified their whole resistance. The 
 government of the Stuarts was not a whit worse or more 
 tyrannical in 1688 than it was in 1680. If it was just 
 and right to declare they had forfeited the throne in 
 1688, it was just and right, and far more noble and 
 far-sighted to have done so in 1680. And those who 
 have studied the protests and papers of the Cameronians 
 will bear witness, that these documents set forth the 
 same grievances, and require substantially the same 
 alterations of government, as were embodied in the 
 "Claim of Right" of 1689, on which William of 
 Orange was crowned King of Scotland ; and on the 
 tenure of which, in effect, our Kings and Queens have 
 held the crown of Britain ever since. 
 
 So thoroughly are our Cameronian ancestors identified 
 with the constitutional status which all of us now pos- 
 sess, and of which we ought never to forget how largely 
 they were the founders. 
 
294 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 IX. 
 
 CAMEROXIAN AND WHIG MOVEMENTS. 
 
 At tlie origin of the United Societies, no doubt some 
 difficulty was felt by the members from the want of 
 some i^erson of superior education accustomed to the use 
 of the pen, and with a capacity for the transaction of 
 lousiness. That want was immediately supplied. In 
 Richard Cameron they had the mighty Agitator ; in 
 James Renwick they were to receive the masterly 
 Organizer. 
 
 Amongst the great mixed crowd assembled in the 
 Grassmarket of Edinburgh, on the 27th of July 1681, 
 to witness the execution of the far-famed Donald Car- 
 gill, might be seen, close to the scaffold, a mere youth, 
 evidently under twenty, of small stature and slight 
 appearance, but of a fair, ruddy countenance, and sweet 
 engaging look. Unconscious of all else, his whole soul 
 seemed entranced as he gazed intently on the aged and 
 venerable martyr, and drank in every syllable which 
 flowed from his lips. With what a throb of emotion 
 he heard his concludino' words, — " Now I am near the 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 29 O 
 
 getting of the crown, for which I bless the Lord, and 
 desire all of you to bless Him that He hath brought me 
 here, and made me triumph over devils, men, and sin. 
 They shall wound me no more. I forgive all men the 
 wrongs they have done me, and I pray the sufferers may 
 be kept from sin, and helped to know their duty." 
 When the death-struggle came, the youth closed his eyes 
 in anguish and horror, and hurried away to some place 
 of solitude where he could vent his grief and mourn over 
 the iniquities and miseries of the time. This youth was 
 James Renwick. His course was of the shortest, for he 
 died at twenty-six, but bright, fresh, and cheering, as 
 the sun in a clear, cloudless, early spring day. 
 
 He was born in 1GG2, at the pleasant village of 
 Minniehive in Nithsdale. His father was a weaver, an 
 excellent, exemplary man ; and his mother is recorded 
 to have been a woman of superior intelligence, pensive 
 and thoughtful, and exquisitely tender in her maternal 
 feelings. After many deaths in the family, he was her 
 last born, and he was her only son ; and with the pecu- 
 liar sentiment of the ago, she treasured him as a gift 
 from the Lord. He displayed amazing precocity of 
 intellect, something almost incredible, if it were not well 
 attested. At two, he was obsei-ved to aim at prayer. 
 When a mere child, he mastered the first elements of 
 learning, and read with avidity every book he could lay 
 his hands upon. In the cottage of Minniehive the chief 
 book was the Biljle ; but there were various other works. 
 As early as his sixth year, he read, and brooded, and 
 
296 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 pondered, until a strange whirl of tlionglit perplexed the 
 little opening mind. " Where are the invisible worlds 1 
 and how could they be reached ? How was it that all 
 things had been created ? Where did God dwell ? and 
 how could we know of His existence "?" For two years 
 shadows of this kind, singular at such an age, haunted 
 and frightened him ; but they dispersed as they came, 
 it was impossible to tell how. As he waxed older, it 
 was necessary for him to take to some vocation ; and 
 so obedient was he to his parents, that if they had 
 desired him, he woidd have gone to any trade they 
 chose. But his whole love was in books, and in the 
 attainment of learning. Some persons having the means, 
 impressed by the rare promise of such a boyhood, enabled 
 him to prosecute his studies. Afterwards, obtaining some 
 very good engagements as tutor to the sons of gentlemen, 
 he entered upon the curriculum of Edinburgh University. 
 He seems at this time — in the bloom of youth, clever, 
 brilliant, and agreeable — to have been as much the com- 
 panion as the tutor of his pupils, and indulged in gaieties 
 and diversions of which he afterwards bitterly repented, 
 and which, most maliciously and unjustly, were often 
 made matter of subsequent reproach against him by his 
 enemies. It was probably at this time that those 
 shadows of mental doubt, which haunted him even in 
 childhood, again settled down upon him, denser and 
 heavier in proportion to the more advanced state of his 
 mind, like a darkness Avhich might be felt. He was for a 
 moment enveloped in the tremendous gloom of Atheism. 
 •' Oh !" he groaned to a trusted friend, with whom he 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 297 
 
 was walking in the fields, looking with haggard and 
 disconsolate eye to the mountains near them, " If these 
 were all devouring furnaces of burning brimstone, I 
 should be content to go through them all if so be I 
 could be assured there was a God !" But like all true 
 and deeply reflective spirits, he groped his way out of 
 this labyrinth, and reached a firmness of belief, a perfect 
 balance and serenity of mind, and a realizing sense of 
 divine things, such as have seldom been attained on 
 earth. Having finished his studies at Edinburgh with 
 honour, he ought to have received his University degrees ; 
 but in order to this, he must by law take the oath of 
 supremacy. He refused, and would rather give up his 
 laurels. A complete transformation had taken place 
 in a mind which could once be gay, thoughtless, and 
 volatile. Circumstances had thrown him amongst the 
 Society people ; he had been a spectator, as we have 
 seen, of the martyrdom of Cargill ; and though only in 
 his nineteenth year, Youth and he parted company for 
 ever ; he passed at once into a grave and mature man- 
 hood, and determined to cast in his lot amongst the per- 
 secuted remnant. 
 
 He saw that if religion and liberty were to be pre- 
 served in Scotland against the threatened inundation of 
 despotism and Popery, there must be no compromise, no 
 half measures, no patching up of incongruous materials. 
 The old principles of the Covenant must be maintained 
 in unalloyed, unmixed purity, involving the perfect spi- 
 ritual independence of the Church, and the government 
 
298 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 of the country by free Parliaments and just settled laws. 
 Hence, tliere must be a separation from all trimmers, 
 even tliougii walking under the colours of Presbyterian- 
 ism ; but above all, there must be a disowning of the 
 perjured and tyrannical House of Stuart. Better ten 
 men pulling all one way, than a hundred straining and 
 tugging in as many different directions. The strength 
 of a party lies more in oneness than in great loose mul- 
 titudes. Such were Renwick's notions of policy. And 
 it will again l^e observed, what is characteristic less or 
 more of all the successive and vaijiug phases of the 
 Covenanting struggle, that, although there was much 
 that was ecclesiastical in his views, in his language, and 
 in his modes of operation, yet the result upon the country 
 was political ; for, with all its exclusivism in some re- 
 spects, the Covenant necessitated and di'ew along with 
 it the^setting up of Constitutional government. The 
 Free Assembly could only work vrhen in harness with 
 the Free Farliament. 
 
 Of the almost extreme breadth of Renwick's political 
 doctrines there can be no doubt. What, indeed, could 
 be broader than disowning and declaring war against the 
 reigning sovereign, on the gi'ound of his being the sub- 
 verter of the religion and liberty of the nation ? At his 
 veiy first joining the Societies, he thus discusses the 
 rights of the people in a letter addressed to Sir Robert 
 Hamilton : — " Magistrates have no power but ivhat is 
 derived from the j^eople ; and magistrates have nothing 
 actually, but what the people have virtually ; yea, and 
 more than virtually, for they may actually confer it upon 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 299 
 
 whom they think most fit. For the power of govern- 
 ment is natural and radical to them, being unitedly in 
 the whole, and singularly in every one. So ivhatever 
 magistrates may do, the people may do the same, either 
 wanting magistrates, or the magistrates failing or re- 
 fusing to do their duty.'"' That is as ultra as anything 
 in Samuel Rutherford's " Les Rex," from which we 
 formerly quoted, and which was published near the com- 
 mencement, as this letter was written near the close, of 
 the Covenanting struggle. So that all through the epochs 
 of the Covenant, this most liberal and comprehensive 
 idea of civil government was held aloft, — That all true 
 government is but the original scattered power of the 
 people concentrated into a head, and brought into an 
 orderly and workable shape. 
 
 Soon after Renwick's accession to the Societies, they 
 resolved — being altogether without a ministry — to send 
 him over to Holland to the University of Groningen, 
 that he might there pursue the study of theology, and 
 become qualified to be their minister. He went over 
 about the end of 1 G82 ; and as their case was urgent 
 they could only allow him half a year. During the 
 whole course of his theological studies, he was kept in 
 continual solicitude and affliction by the intelligence of 
 the increasing persecutions in Scotland, especially of the 
 people by whom he had been sent, and amongst whom 
 he was to labour. Every day he was travailing with 
 them in pain ; and his studies were almost interrupted 
 and broken by distress at the news he was constantly 
 
300 
 
 hearing, and a home-sickness to be amongst his people, 
 to live or to die with them. 
 
 What was said of Luther, that in his monk's cell he 
 went through, within his own soul, the whole struggles 
 of the Keformation, may be adapted to Renwick. In 
 his student's chamber at Groningen, he went through, 
 within his own soul, the struggles of the Covenanting 
 cause in Scotland. In one of his letters when in Hol- 
 land he says, " My longings and earnest desires to be in 
 that land, and with that pleasant remnant, are very 
 great. I cannot tell what may be in it, but I hope the 
 Lord hath either some work to work, or else is minded 
 presently to call for a testimony at my hand ; and if He 
 give me frame and furniture, I desire to welcome either 
 of them. Oh, dear Sir, mind me, become of me what 
 will ! " Then, in one of those matchless sentences, ring- 
 ing like the clang of a trumpet, which are uttered only 
 by the great heroic spirits of this earth, " Courage yet ! 
 for all that is come and gone. The loss of men is not 
 the loss of the cause. Wiat is the matter though ive all 
 fafl .? the cause shall not fall.'''' 
 
 In the end of 1683, James Renwick returned to 
 Scotland ; and his presence was soon felt, both amongst 
 the people and by the Government. The gentle — fear- 
 less one ! his motto, again using his own inimitable 
 words, was this, " Let us be lions in God's cause, and 
 lambs in our own !" 
 
 From his powerful and cultivated mind, his rare 
 practical abilities, his tact and skill in managing men, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEKS. 301 
 
 his prudence and meekness working in combination with 
 zeal and courage, his acuteness as a thinker, his fertility 
 and force as a writer — in a word, from his inherent 
 governing genius — the " poor wasted Remnant" derived 
 inestimable benefit. This youth of twenty — the " boy 
 Renwick," as people called him — was truly their necessary 
 man. He gave coherence and smoothness to their orga- 
 nized Societies : he gave new life and ardour to their 
 operations, so that, like subterranean fire, they burst 
 from the earth at all points, to the confusion of their 
 enemies, and to the surprise and encouragement of those 
 who were still lingering on in hope of their country's 
 revival. He enunciated their principles, and expounded 
 their plans of action, in a series of logical and masterly 
 papers ; and no longer left them to be misrepresented 
 by opponents, to be falsely accused by the Government, 
 to be mistaken even by good and candid men who had 
 hitherto had no authentic means of information. Amid 
 provocations which would have wellnigh justified every 
 excess ; amid oppressions which might have driven the 
 wisest of men mad, he trained them to a moderation, 
 caution, and habitual forbearance, unprecedented in his- 
 tory. " Iron sharpeneth iron ; so a man sharpeneth 
 the countenance of his friend." Himself of a large, 
 warm. Christian spirit, and brought up and fostered 
 amongst foreign Christians, differing widely in many 
 things from the Church of Scotland, he infused into the 
 persecuted people amongst whom he laboured the most 
 elevated feeling of the communion of saints. On the 
 distorted pages of our novelists and historians — most of 
 
302 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 them, whatever their merits otherwise, but the spawn of 
 the old Jacobite faction — the Cameronian stands the 
 type of an ignorant, fixed, repulsive, self-righteous bigot. 
 Yet show me the sect or party in their own time, show 
 me even the individual writer, except such prodigies as 
 Milton and Locke, who equalled them in comprehensive 
 Christian charity. 
 
 In the "Informatory Aandication" — the great standard 
 which defines their position — which, though drafted by 
 Renwick, was long and maturely considered by the 
 Societies, both in their sections and at their aggTCgate 
 meetings — in tlie " Informatory Vindication," they laid 
 down a platform of Christian fellowship such as no 
 other sect or denomination in their own time could have 
 conceived, far less propounded. As in their politics 
 they anticipated the Revolution, so iu their ideas of 
 religious union they anticipated, nay, they even sur- 
 passed in breadth and catholicity, our modern Missionary 
 Societies and Evangelical Alliances. They were before 
 their time every way, and hence they suffered the fate 
 of all premature Reformers — they were vilified, and 
 hated, and persecuted, and their very extermination was 
 the whole Scottish policy of the Stuarts during the 
 remaining five years of their misgovernmeut. On the 
 question of communion they distinguished between their 
 own special condition in Scotland, where strict terms of 
 fellowship were necessar}'-, and the general relation of 
 Christians to one another, which ought to be free, and 
 open, and trustful. They said in efi'ect, — " We are not 
 a Church at present, and cannot act as an embodied 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 303 
 
 Church. We are a broken remnant, scattered and 
 hunted through the country, every one of us under 
 the doom of death. Our societies are not a Church, 
 but only the temporary means by which alone we can 
 enjoy religious instruction and ordinances. Besides, 
 they are also associations for self-defence, for watching 
 and taking advantage of any national movement through 
 which we may aid in overturning the present despotism, 
 and regaining our liberties civil and religious. To guard 
 their efficiency and safety, therefore, we must be strin- 
 gent in the terms on which we admit members into our 
 societies, else we should soon be overrun with spies who 
 would betray us into the hands of the enemy, or with 
 loose and contentious men who would breed quarrels, 
 di\ide our associations, and reduce us to our former 
 helpless imbecility. But turning away from this our 
 special, our broken and melancholy condition, are there 
 not close and hallowed relations between all who are 
 truly disciples of the same Lord ? On this catholic 
 communion let us impose no narrow restrictions. Al- 
 though they differ from us in the word of their speciiil 
 testimony, if they agree in the essentials, let us embrace 
 them, and love them, and acknowledge fellowship with 
 them as Christian brethren." Impelled by the grandeur 
 of this conception, they — they, the proscribed, the per- 
 secuted to death — from their glens and mountain sides 
 in Scotland, sent forth their commissioners with messages 
 of affection to the churches of Holland and Switzerland, 
 and yearned for brotherly communication with the Wal- 
 denses of the Alps and the Protestants of Hungary ! 
 
304 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 j^ay, with a depth of penetration and an ardour of love, 
 not only transcending their own times but ours, they 
 divined the idea, That Christianity ivas (jrander than 
 Protestantism ; that there might be souls who had not 
 found their way out of ancient corrupt systems, yet who 
 lived by faith on the Son of God, who were one with 
 themselves in the Head, and whom if they met they 
 could not start back from as from the pestilence, but 
 must join and clasp as living members of the same body. 
 Renwick in one of his letters, lamenting ovei* the divi- 
 sions among Christians, and longing for communion and 
 brotherhood with all truly good men, exclaims like a 
 second Paul, " Oh, when shall those be agreed on earth 
 that shall be agreed in heaven ! Methinks if my blood 
 were a means to procure that end, I could willingly 
 offer it." 
 
 Besides the movement in the Cameronian Societies, 
 there was also a movement about this time amongst a 
 large body of independent country gentlemen of Scotland. 
 These were much the same class, many of them were 
 the same persons, who, it may be remembered, were 
 arbitrarily imprisoned in 166G, on the eve of the Pent- 
 land insurrection. Being men of worldly experience, 
 and having properties and other important interests open 
 to easy attack, the generality of them had acted with 
 care and caution during the hazardous times since the 
 Restoration. Few of them had been implicated in 
 Pentland or Bothwell, and although mostly Presby- 
 terians, they had not committed themselves too far in 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 305 
 
 the acts of resistance -which had been oJBferecI to the 
 establishment of the Episcopacy. The most that the 
 rulers, gaping for their estates, had ever been able to 
 make out of them, were swingeing fines for absence from 
 the parish church, or for their ladies attending conven- 
 ticles, or for their harbouring intercommuned persons. 
 But then their very prudence, and careful, moderate 
 conduct, only rendered them the more a source of alarm 
 to the Government. Were they not biding their time 1 
 were they not in a state of preparation to move when- 
 ever a clear prospect of success opened before them ? 
 
 This independent country party in Scotland were not 
 directly identified with the Covenanters, least of all 
 with the Cameronians. Their opinions and designs 
 were more akin to those of their own class in England, 
 who in general composed the popular party there. As 
 the name of Whi(/ was now commonly given to this 
 party {Tory being the counterpart for the adherents of 
 the Court), we shall, for the sake of brevity and distinct- 
 ness, style them either the English or the Scottish 
 Whigs. Their main principles were : in domestic con- 
 cerns, parliamentary government ; in ecclesiastical mat- 
 ters, toleration amongst Protestant sects, and a political 
 barrier against Popery ; in foreign relations, a hostile 
 attitude to the ambition of France, and a good und{T- 
 standing with Holland. Their antipathy against the 
 Church of Ptome was founded, not alone in an abhor- 
 rence of her creed, which no doubt most of them enter- 
 tained, but in a deep sense that that Church was the 
 ' main prop of despotism all over the world. 
 u 
 
306 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Into the movement wliicli tliey now set on foot, and 
 which heaved above the smface in the year 1683, and 
 afterwards in the invasions of Argyle and Monmouth, it 
 is not my jDiirpose to enter. Tliis would be foreign to 
 .my subject, which is confined to the special case of the 
 Covenanting branch of the movement. But in treating of 
 this portion of Scottish history, I should feel there was 
 indeed a woful blank in my humble delineations, if I 
 paid no passing tribute to the august memory of Robert 
 Baillie of Jerviswoode, who belonged rather to the body 
 of Scottish Whigs than to that of the Covenanters. 
 
 When the Duke of York rose into the ascendant in 
 1680, the Whigs in both kingdoms were impressed with 
 the conviction that decisive steps must be taken for the 
 preservation of the country's liberties, otherwise despotism 
 and Popery would ere long fling their baleful shadows 
 over the whole length and breadth of the land. 
 
 In Scotland, the Earl of Argyle had been sentenced 
 to death as a traitor (though he made his escape at this 
 time), because in taking the test, he added a reservation 
 by explaining that he was not thereby to be precluded 
 from seeking such alterations in Church and State as he 
 might deem for the public good. Again, Laurie of 
 Blackwood had received sentence of death (though he 
 was respited), on the new capital charge of Intercom- 
 muning; because he had had business dealings in open 
 market with a country drover, who, on the authority of 
 some private list, was alleged to have been at Bothwell 
 four years previously, but who had never been charged, 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 307 
 
 or tried, or proclaimed rebel, and who all these four 
 years had been living unmolested, and dealing openly 
 with all the world at fair and market. A proclamation 
 was also issued that all such converse and dealing was 
 treason. There were at least 20,000 persons in the 
 country who in one way or other might be implicated 
 in the charge of rebellion, any intercourse with whom 
 would be a capital crime. What hand could be touched, 
 which might not thus communicate the contagion of 
 death ] 
 
 Scotland becoming really uninhabitable for free men, 
 the Whig country gentlemen engaged in a scheme of 
 emigrating and forming a new settlement in Carolina. 
 In 1682, about thirty-six leading noblemen and gentle- 
 men, among whom were the Earls of Callendar and 
 Haddington, Lords Cardross and Yester, and the two 
 distinguished advocates, Lockhart and Gilmour, had 
 entered into negotiations with the patentees of the 
 colony for the purchase of a large tract of country, in 
 which they might settle, and enjoy their religion and 
 liberty imdisturbed. It was at this time that the ex- 
 tensive project was fermenting in England amongst the 
 popular party, which was disconcerted by the discovery 
 of the minor affair, concocted by a different and lower 
 set of conspirators, known as the "Rye-House Plot." 
 The Scottish malcontents, in their journeys to London 
 to negotiate their purchase in America, came into com- 
 munication with the leaders of the English Whigs, and 
 entered warmly into their plans. The chief of the 
 
308 THE FIFTY YEARS' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 Scottish Whigs in this matter were, — Lord Melville, 
 Sir John Cochrane of Ochiltree and his son, the two 
 Campbells of Cessnock, Crawford of Crawfordland, 
 Stewart of Coltness, and Kobert Baillie of Jerviswoode. 
 It is now universally admitted that the Whig chiefs 
 knew nothing of what was properly the " Eye-House 
 Plot," that is, of any plot to murder the King or the 
 Duke of York. It is probable they had no very defined 
 scheme ; but the outline was, to move again, more 
 strenuously than ever, in the agitation for the exclu- 
 sion of the Duke of York from the throne, and to com- 
 pel the King to summon Parliament and govern in a 
 constitutional manner. Probably this compulsion was 
 meant to be accomplished by certain military demonstra- 
 tions, in which the Earl of Argyle, now under sentence 
 of death, having fled to Holland, and the other refugees, 
 were to take part. No details were fixed. However, 
 mainly by the artful management of York, the Whig 
 leaders were at once involved in all the infamies of the 
 Rye-House Plot ; and by this cunning but nefarious 
 method of confounding the project for reform with the 
 alleged plot for the murder of the Royal family, Russell 
 and Sidney were brought to the block in England, and 
 Baillie of Jerviswoode was executed in Scotland. 
 
 Robert Baillie was descended of a good old family in 
 Lanarkshire. His grandfiither was a younger son of 
 the house of St. John's Kirk in upper Clydesdale. 
 Younger sons in those days generally either betook 
 themselves to foreign military service, or embarked in 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 309 
 
 commercial pursuits. The grandfather became a mer- 
 chaut-burgess of Edinburgh, and amassed a large fortune. 
 He acquired the estate of Jerviswoode, near Lanark ; 
 and either he or the family afterwards acquired the 
 estate of Mellerstain in the rich and fertile plains of the 
 Merse. Robert was an elder son, and had the rare for- 
 tune to be connected by affinity with some of Scotland's 
 greatest men. He w^is a great-grandson of John Knox, 
 through the marriage of an ancestor with one of the 
 Reformer's daughters. His own mother was a sister of 
 Lord Warriston ; and he married his cousin, a daughter 
 of that celebrated man. Through this connexion with 
 the Warristons, he was cousin-german to Burnet, the 
 historian, who regarded him with the warmest esteem 
 and friendship. 
 
 I scarcely know an instance where, in the case of a 
 man so extraordinary as Baillie of Jerviswoode, distin- 
 guished no less by his character than by his fate, the 
 materials for biography are so few and disappointing. 
 One reason undoubtedly is, that he was cast in an evil 
 time, when wise men kept in seclusion, and good men 
 were thrust out of view, and men remarkable for wisdom 
 and goodness combined, a.s he was, were marked men, 
 and required to be doubly guarded with their tongue 
 and pen and in their every action. We have light 
 enough, and more than enough, to comprehend all the 
 infamouB crew who then engrossed the stage, — Charles 
 and James, Buckingham and Lauderdale, Sharp and 
 Claverhouse. But when we strain our eyes to catch 
 something of tlie lineaments of Robert Baillie, he seema 
 
310 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 to recede from our view into a dim religious shade. 
 Still, we have some memorials that bring us very close 
 to him ; and his is one of those strongly defined charac- 
 ters about which there can be no mistake. 
 
 We have an authentic record of his momentous public 
 acts, and the concurrent testimony of some of his ablest 
 and most discerning contemporaries. We have, what I 
 always feel to be less or more an index to the man, a 
 good portrait of him, of which, however, I have only 
 seen an engraving ; and we have an elaborate character, 
 by Dr. Cheyne, of his only son George, who rose to 
 eminence at the Eevolution, and who, from the trying 
 circumstances of his youth, ever retained a most lively 
 and tender feeling in regard to his father's memory, and, 
 besides hereditary disposition, no doubt formed himself 
 gi'eatly on his father's example. It so happens also, 
 that all these divers rays of light fall into one focus, 
 and bring out one harmonious impression. The fanciful 
 analogist tracing the qualities of the father in the son, 
 the physiognomist reading the portrait as a map of the 
 living soul, the biographer weaving together the various 
 accounts and hints of him, the historian diving through 
 acts into motives and sentiments, — would all meet on 
 one and the same landing-place, and agree in one com- 
 mon character. It is as simple as it is exalted. It looks 
 all one way, and has no hidden corners or double aspects. 
 
 In my vision of Baillie, derived from various sources, 
 I see before me a handsome and stately figure, compact 
 •and athletic ; the contour of the face at once elegant 
 and manly ; the head a vast dome, elevated almost to 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 311 
 
 disproportion in that region where the phrenologists 
 liave ip\a,ced Jiiinness, whilst the hair falls in great thick 
 masses over the shoulders ; the lips closely compressed, 
 yet soft and rounded ; the eyes large, luminous, and 
 penetrating, but shaded by a contemplative depth of 
 meaning ; the forehead broad and projecting, with an 
 appearance as if hea\7' -laden ; the countenance betoken- 
 ing dignity, nobility, that might easily pass into scornful- 
 ness and pride, yet suffused also with an expression of 
 calm and thoughtful benignity. The inward man was 
 more than worthy of this majestic exterior. His charac- 
 ter, as we have said, was simple, and of a perfect one- 
 ness. It is always difficult to dispose of such a multiform 
 and mixed thing as human character by one word, yet 
 Baillie's might very nearly be concentrated into that one 
 word, magnanimity. His mind was truly great. In 
 that age of meanness, frivolity, and vice, his genius 
 natiu-ally allied itself to great thoughts, gi'eat studies, 
 great objects. His intellect was solid, vigorous, and 
 comprehensive, taking in the whole range of knowledge, 
 but particularly devoted to those branches which require 
 industry, sustained attention, and the power of abstract 
 thought. He was learned in the languages, thoroughly 
 versed in law, and an adept in mathematics, and in the 
 natural sciences as then known. " You liavc truly men 
 of great spirits in Scotland," observed Dr. John Owen 
 in conversing with a Scottish friend ; " there is for a 
 gentleman Mr. Baillie of Jcrv'iswoode, a person of the 
 greatest abilities I ever almost met with." 
 
 But if his great and varied abilities elicited so much 
 
312 THE FIFTY YEAHS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 admiration, what shall be said of his virtues and piety 'I 
 Burnet describes him in one happy stroke — " A gentle- 
 man of great parts, but of much greater virtue." 
 Magnanimous in everything. Truth and Honour were the 
 two poles within which his whole actions revolved. By 
 natural temperament, by the innate quality of his mind, 
 no less than by education and self-discipline, he was 
 capable only of the loftiest conceptions, of the noblest 
 sentiments. Everything little, false, and corrupt, he 
 spurned as the dust beneath his feet. In a crooked 
 path he could not walk ; in a foul atmosphere he could 
 not breathe. Like the pine of his native forests, he 
 loved the hiU top, in the upper region, high and pure, 
 where the gales of heaven might breathe upon his 
 branches. His resolutions and convictions were rooted 
 too deep to be torn up by any blast that could blow ; 
 and his was that rarest and most heroic form of courage, 
 which is superior to events, which looks above the vain 
 fleeting show of things, and stands immovable on the 
 eternal laws of righteousness. His piety, like every- 
 thing about him, was genuine, efficacious, and practical ; 
 and more concerned with the main thing — a humble and 
 holy deportment in the sight of God — than with ques- 
 tions of doubtful disputation. 
 
 Though debarred, as a Presbyterian, from public life, 
 and keeping himself generally very retired owing to the 
 utter hopelessness of the times, yet he had reflected 
 deeply upon Civil Government ; and his political views 
 were mature, rational, and enlightened.. " As for my 
 principles with relation to Government," he writes, in 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 313 
 
 one of the few papers which have survived him, " they 
 are such as I ought not to be ashamed of, being con- 
 sonant to the Word of God, the Confessions of Faith of 
 the Reformed Churches, the rules of policy, reason, and 
 humanity." Wodrow, who lived very near his times, 
 and amongst many who had been his contemporaries, 
 records : "He was a gentleman who had the testimony 
 of some of the greatest men of this age whom I could 
 name, for one of the best of men and greatest of states- 
 men ; and so was a very proper object of the fury of 
 this period." Into the political arena he brought all 
 his high intellectual qualities, and all the grandeur and 
 heroism of his character. During the great concerted 
 Whig movement in 1682 and 1683, he was the object 
 of every one's confidence, of every one's veneration. He 
 carried about him that priceless talisman, the magic of 
 exalted moral character. He was boundlessly trusted 
 by the Country party of Scotland, the Melvilles and 
 Campbells ; by the Patriots of England, the Russells 
 and Sidneys ; by the Refugees in Holland, the Argyles 
 and Polwarths ; and he is believed to have been more 
 completely the depositary of the whole political secrets 
 connected with the movements of that time than any 
 other man. All worthy was he of the trust thus re- 
 posed in him ! His breast was the temple of honour, 
 which nothing selfish or unjust could approach. All 
 these secrets, so far as not otherwise discovered, perished 
 with himself on the scaftbld ; though in return for them 
 he would have received life, and estate, and every worldly 
 advantage. 
 
314 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 If his magnanimity of character commanded the re- 
 gard and veneration of the good, it was fuel to the 
 wrath, it was gall and wormwood to the temper of the 
 persecutors. As lightning seeks to discharge itself on 
 the tallest oak, or the highest spire, so he seems to have 
 been the person in all Scotland most feared and hated 
 by the rulers. This instinctive, envenomed hostility can 
 only be explained upon the ground of the antagonism 
 between their utter baseness and his exalted virtues. 
 It was like Satan scowling at the Sun, — " How I hate 
 thy beams ! " Sharp, some eight years before this time, 
 seized upon an infamous pretext, and by all that malig- 
 nity, cunning, and falsehood could do, endeavoured to 
 effect his ruin. And now the " Rye-House Plot" affords 
 another opportunity to the ruling powers to exhibit 
 against him the peculiar fierceness and intensity of their 
 malice. The writer of a letter to Secretary Jenkins 
 says : " This Baillie is certainly a dangerous man, what- 
 ever the others are." ^ That is, the other delegates 
 from Scotland who had come to confer with the English 
 patriots. 
 
 Having been apprehended in London in the summer 
 of 1683, he was speedily brought before the Privy 
 Council. The King and the Duke of York were both 
 present. The Duke was in high feather, revelling in 
 the misfortunes of the party that had so long struggled 
 to exclude him from the throne. The King had now 
 lost his former boasted gaiety, and was openly showing 
 the malice and blood-thirstiness which had always been 
 
 1 State Paper Office. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 315 
 
 latent under his careless, smirking exterior, at least when 
 he was in any way personally touched. They were both 
 aware that Baillie held the whole secrets within his 
 breast. So eager and anxious was the King, that he 
 conducted the examination himself. At first he attempted 
 to extract information by a show of courtesy and indul- 
 gence. When he found this ineffectual, both he and 
 York became more vehement ; and at length their pas- 
 sions broke loose, and they threatened Baillie with every 
 extreme and torturing punishment. Their low and sensual 
 natures could not measure the man that was before them. 
 This was none of their small courtiers ; none of their 
 trimmers and apostates, whom they could always allure 
 or affright. He had passed through a different training, 
 and been formed in a school of which they knew nothing. 
 Cold and indifferent to their courtesy, his magnanimous 
 spirit rose in disdain at their threats. Just as Aristides, 
 firm as Cato, devout as Polycarp, he bade defiance to 
 their dungeons, their fetters, and their racks. 
 
 Foiled in their attempts either upon his integrity, or 
 upon nature's horror of pain, they ordered him back to 
 prison, and commanded that he should be heavily loaded 
 with irons. This was done to such an extent that his 
 constitution, already undermined, was now completely 
 prostrated, and his life rendered a burden and a n^sery. 
 Another chance was given to him to redeem his life, not 
 for his own sake, but to enable the Government the 
 better to prosecute their vengeance against others. For 
 this purpose he was taken to Newgate on the morning 
 of the trial of Lord William Russell, and by every con- 
 
316 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 sideration urged to be a witness against liim. For still 
 the worldlings will hug themselves with the conceit that 
 virtue is all a sham, and honour but another mode of 
 raising a man's price, and that he will no longer hold 
 out when he finds that he must either sell his conscience, 
 or miss the market of life altogether. If they had minds 
 that could be convinced (but they have not, for the god 
 of this world blinds their eyes with incurable darkness), 
 a man like Robert Baillie would teach them, that life is 
 indeed sweet, but an approving conscience sweeter ; that 
 wealth, and ease, and the delights of hearth and hall, 
 are a strong temptation, but evanish at the touch of 
 honour ; that Death is awful, but the voice of Duty 
 inspires a still deeper awe. 
 
 It need not be said with what inexpressible loathing 
 and abhorrence this heroic man turned away from all 
 these enticements of the tempter. He was sent down 
 to Scotland, where the law of treason was so wide and 
 loose that even the most trifling expressions of dissent 
 from the measures of Government might be brought in 
 as treasonable ; and where, besides, the laws could be 
 more readily strained than they yet could in England, 
 and judges and juries were but the beagles of the King's 
 Advocate. On his arrival, he was shut up in Edinburgh 
 close prisoner. He was in the lowest state of weakness. 
 His wife, the sore-tried daughter of Lord Warriston, 
 supplicated admission to him, and offered to be laid in 
 irons at his side, so as to remove any fear of escape ; her 
 supplications were rejected. His little daughter, twelve 
 years of age, who sought to comfort him in his sickness. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 317 
 
 was also refused admittance. At length when his trouble 
 appeared to be mortal, his wife and his sister-in-law, 
 Lady Graden, were allowed to come and attend him in 
 prison. A few weeks longer, perhaps a few days, his 
 enemies would get rid of him by natural death, which 
 was evidently near at hand ; but this would not feed 
 their revenge. It woidd also disappoint their avarice, 
 for, if he died a natural death, then his estates could not 
 legally be forfeited ; and if the Duke of York wanted his 
 head, the Government robbers wanted his estates ; and for 
 fear that death might perchance carry off their prey, they 
 imposed a fine upon him (independently of the treason 
 charge) for harbouring and converse with outlawed Pres- 
 byterians. The fine was equal to £1 8,000 or £20,000. 
 All the while he was fast siuking. " Yet," says Burnet, 
 ""he was so composed, and even so cheerful, that his be- 
 haviour looked like the reviving of the spirit of the noblest 
 of the old Greeks or Komans, or rather of the primitive 
 Christians, and first martyrs, in those best days of the 
 Church." 
 
 His trial in all the steps of it, into which I shall not 
 enter, was worthy of the Court of the Inquisition. It 
 was for a conspiracy against the life of the King and the 
 Duke of York, and for the subversion of the King's 
 Government. The witnesses were two of his own con- 
 fidential friends, who by threats and every foul means 
 had been coerced into giving evidence against him ; in 
 fact, to purchase their own lives and freedom at the 
 price of his destruction. And there were also used 
 against him certain written declarations of persons im- 
 
318 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 plicated, some extracted under torture, some ou the 
 assurance that they were not to be used in any prosecu- 
 tion, and all of them inadmissible according to the just 
 rules of evidence. 
 
 He was so weak that he was brought to the bar wrapt 
 in his night-gown. Lady Graden sat at his side, and 
 sujDported him, and had often to administer cordials to 
 keep him from fainting away. That " tmkling cymbal" 
 of tyranny, Sir George Mackenzie, though he had ad- 
 mitted to him, in a private interview, that he believed 
 him innocent, now declaimed, with professional eloquence 
 and acrimony, on the hideous crime of which he had 
 been guilty, and on the condign punishment which was 
 his due. Baillie, as was his wont, listened unmoved and 
 serene. At the conchision of the advocate's harangue, he 
 rose with difhculty, amid the breathless silence and earnest 
 sympathetic looks of the audience, and, resting for support 
 on the bar, thus addressed the President of the Court : — 
 
 " My Lord, I desire liberty to speak a few words, not 
 being able to say much, because of my great weakness. 
 
 " My Lord, the sickness now upon me, in all human 
 appearance, will soon prove mortal, and I cannot live 
 many days. I find I am intended for a public sacrifice 
 in my life and estate ; and my doom being predetermined, 
 I am only sorry, under such circumstances, that my trial 
 has given the Court so much and so long trouble by 
 staying here till past midnight." 
 
 Then turning to the Jury : — 
 
 " Gentlemen, I doubt not but you will act as men of 
 honoiu" on the evidence which vou have heard. The 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 319 
 
 depositions of the witnesses, I admit, contain some hard 
 things against me ; and these must be your rule in 
 coming to a verdict, and nothing that I can say may be 
 entitled to any legal efl'ect. Yet, for the exoneration of 
 my own conscience, and that my poor memory and 
 ruined family may not suffer additional injustice from 
 the breath of calumny, I am bound to direct your atten- 
 tion to this, that the most material witnesses were for- 
 mer associates and correspondents of my own, connected 
 in what I was connected, embarked in the same princi- 
 ples and cause. Life may be precious to them, and the 
 saving of it may colour or even add something to their 
 evidence. One of them certainly is blessed with a very 
 ready memory, w^hich is never at a loss ; yet I am sure 
 there were some things said to have been spoken at 
 a meeting at which I attended, which I am positive 
 were not, at least not when I was present. I say this 
 merely in self-defence, and from my own consciousness 
 of innocence. A.s to the witnesses who have appeared 
 against me, I do most heartily forgive them. But," he 
 continued, with a fire and energy which came from his 
 noble spirit, not from his frail shattered body, " there is 
 one thing whi(di distresses me extremely, and where I am 
 injured to the last degree, — that is, to be charged with a 
 plot to cut off the King and the Duke of York ; and that 
 I was engaged in this with such an ardent zeal and fury, 
 that I sat up whole nights to form a declaration to pal- 
 liate or justify such villany. I am in all probability to 
 appear in a few hours before the tribunal of the Great 
 Judge. In His omniscient presence, and before your 
 
320 THE FIFTY YEAES' STEUGGLE OF 
 
 Lordships and all present, I solemnly declare that never 
 was I prompted or privy to any such thing, and that I 
 abhor and detest all thoughts or principles that would 
 lead to touching the life and blood of his Majesty, or his 
 royal brother, or of any person whatever. I was ever 
 for monarchical government, and I designed nothing in 
 all my public appearances, which have been few, but the 
 preservation of the Protestant religion, the safety of his 
 Majesty's person, the continuation of our ancient govern- 
 ment upon the foundations of justice and righteousness, 
 the redressing of cur grievances by King and Parliament, 
 the relieving of the oppressed, and putting a stop to the 
 shedding of blood." 
 
 With a grandeur of manner truly electrifying, he 
 turned suddenly from the Court and the Jury, and fixed 
 his still penetrating glance on the Lord Advocate. For 
 a moment he paused, half collecting the strength which 
 was ebbing away, half swelling with indignant scorn. 
 Looking full in the face of his adversary, who cowered 
 beneath his eye, he thus appealed to him : — 
 
 " My Lord Advocate, I think it strange beyond ex- 
 pression that you charge me with such abominable things. 
 Do you remember when you came to me in prison, you 
 told me such things were laid to my charge, but you did 
 not believe them ? How, then, my Lord, dare you throw 
 such a stain upon my character, and with so much vio- 
 lence of accusation ? Are you now convinced in your 
 conscience that I am more guilty than I was at the in- 
 terview, where you freely acquitted me of guilt ? Do 
 you remember what passed betwixt us in prison 1 " 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 321 
 
 Every eye in the assembly was riveted on Mackenzie. 
 He rose agitated and embarrassed, and said in tremulous 
 and hurried tone, " Jerviswoode ! I own what you say ; 
 my thoughts there were as a private man. ^\Tiat I 
 say here, is by special direction of the Privy Council." 
 Pointing to Sir William Paterson, the Clerk — " He 
 knows my orders." 
 
 "Well, my Lord," was Jerviswoode's stern-ringing 
 reply, " if you keep one conscience for yourself, and an- 
 other for the Council, T pray God to forgive you — I do ! " 
 
 Overpowered at last, not from any failure in his ever 
 magnanimous spirit, but from sheer exhaustion of the 
 enfeebled body, looking up to the President, he said, " I 
 trouble your Lordships no further," — and sank back in 
 his seat. 
 
 I need not say, that by the verdict he was found 
 guilty ; and sentence was pronounced that he was to be 
 executed on that very same day, within a few hours of 
 the sentence ; his body was to be quartered, and the 
 mutilated remains exposed in the chief towns of the 
 kingdom ; his estates confiscated ; his name, fame, 
 memory, and honours to be extinct ; and his blood 
 tainted for ever. 
 
 Greater and stronger the nearer he approached the 
 goal, he rose with dignity, drew around him his sick 
 robes, and in slow and solemn accents uttered his memor- 
 able Farewell : — 
 
 " My Lords, the time is short, the sentence is sharp ; 
 but I thank my God, who hath made me as fit to die 
 as you are to live I " 
 
 X 
 
322 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 The sentence was executed in all its revolting barbarity. 
 His estates were confiscated, and made over to tlie Duke 
 of Gordon, a Popish minion of York ; his honours were 
 extinguished ; his despoiled and bereaved family com- 
 pelled even for life's sake to flee to Holland, then the 
 refuge of oppressed Liberals, as happily our own shores 
 are now ; and the name, fame, and memory of Jervis- 
 woode disappeared for a time from the face of Scotland. 
 
 In his Dying Testimony, he says with touching and 
 noble pathos, — " I leave my wife and children upon the 
 compassionate and merciful heart of my God, having 
 many reiterated assurances that God will be my God, 
 and the portion of mine." 
 
 In his last hours, he expressed to his beloved son 
 George, then only nineteen years of age, the full assurance 
 he felt, that the testimony of the Psalmist would be 
 verified in the case of his ftimily, — " I have been young, 
 and now am old, yet have I not seen the righteous for- 
 saken, nor his seed begging bread," 
 
 When the signs of an approaching revolution became 
 palpable, and James in afiright sought to appease the 
 Liberals whom he had so long persecuted, his first ex- 
 pedient was to redress the grievous wTongs which had 
 been suffered by the family of their chief. Against the 
 strenuous opposition of the Duke of Gordon, he ordered 
 all moveables to be refunded to his widowed lady ; and 
 her full jointure to be paid out of the estates.^ A pen- 
 sion was granted to Lady Graden, who so devotedly 
 attended him at his trial and execution.^ Two months 
 
 1 Warrant Book of Scotland, State Paper OtEce. - Ibid. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 323 
 
 only before William of Orauge landed, one of the last 
 orders in the Warrant Book of Scotland directs, that the 
 liead of the patriot, and liis dismembered body should be 
 taken down from the places where tliey were exposed, 
 ;nid be delivered to his family for interment.^ After th(^ 
 Revolution, his son George, the inheritor of much of his 
 talent and all his virtues, had the estates restored to him, 
 rose high in the confidence of King William, was ap- 
 pointed Secretary of State for Scotland, and managed the 
 whole politics of the country, lived respected, and died 
 in honour and peace, lea\dng a name not unworthy of 
 tlie martyred sire from whom he had sprung. His 
 descendants, the Baillies of Jerviswoode, have ever been 
 amongst the most esteemed and beloved of our country 
 gentlemen. It is a pleasing reflection, one which "jus- 
 tifies the ways of God to man," — that but a short time 
 ago one of his descendants held the very office of Lord 
 
 ) Advocnte which was prostituted for liis ilestruction, and 
 
 ' now sits a member of that Bench by whom his doom was 
 pronounced, and sits there under the same venerated 
 title — JervmiKxule, — one of tlie l)rightest jewels in the 
 historic crown of Scotland. And the Ijlood of the mar- 
 tyred Robert Baillie — tliat Ijlood that was to be "tainted 
 for ever " — now, by iidieritance and marriage, flows in 
 
 \ the veins of some of the greatest and noblest families 
 
 i both in Scotland and England. 
 
 I say not, that God orders the affairs of men and of 
 families so as always to square with our moral instinct 
 of justice ; but when He is pleased to do so, as He has 
 
 ' Warriiit Bcok of Scotland. State Paper rtffice. 
 
324 THE FIFTY YEARS* STRUGGLE OF 
 
 done in this case most signally, then let all honest and 
 patriotic men take courage. The sentence of tyranny is 
 reversed, when carried hy appeal to the bar of Heaven ! 
 
 Although the Popular party was quashed in the mean- 
 time, yet the Government were still irritated against 
 them, and still afraid of them. It became evident also, 
 that, although frustrated for the present, a hostile inva- 
 sion was meditating amongst the refugees in Holland 
 and other foreign countries. In Scotland, the Came- 
 ronian Societies were believed to be in concert with the 
 refugees ; and to be a domestic army gradually forming 
 and preparing for the season of active hostilities. The 
 Armed Conventicle, which had dwindled out of sight 
 after the death of Cameron, was again displaying its 
 hated banner. James Renwick, to adopt the striking 
 imagery of the Covenanters, " had lifted it up, where 
 Richard Cameron laid it down." The United Societies 
 driven into a corner, — subjected to every oppression and 
 barbarity that can be named, — ensnared on all sides by 
 spies and informers, — and daily and hourly hunted down 
 by military murderers, — ^had emitted a Declaration, 
 drawn up, as all their papers now were, by Renwick, in 
 which they proclaim their firm resolve to defend them- 
 selves to the uttermost, and being in a state of war, to 
 retaliate on tlieir implacable foes. " Let not any think 
 that (our God assisting us) we will be so slack-handed in 
 time coming to put matters in execution, as heretofore 
 we have been ; seeing we are bound faithfully and 
 valiantly to maintain our Covenants and the cause of 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 325 
 
 Christ. Therefore, let all persons be admonished of 
 their hazard j and particularly, all ye spies ! who by 
 your voluntary informations endeavour to render us up 
 into the enemy's hands, that our blood may be shed. 
 By such courses, ye both endanger your immortal souls, 
 if repentance prevent not, seeing God will make inqui- 
 sition for shedding the precious blood of his saints, 
 whatever be the thoughts of men ; and, also your bodies, 
 seeing you render yourselves actually and maliciously 
 guilty of our blood, whose innocence the Lord know- 
 eth. , . . AYe desire you to take warning of the hazard 
 that ye incur by following such courses. Sinless neces- 
 sity for self-preservation, accompanied with holy zeal for 
 Christ's reigning in our land, and suppressing of pro- 
 fanity, will move us not to let you pass unpimished. 
 Call to your remembrance, all that is in peril is not lost, 
 and all that is delayed is not forgiven." 
 
 These various concomitant grounds of alarm, followed 
 up in the course of time by the actual, though ill-planned 
 and ill-fated invasions of Argyle and Monmouth, ciuick- 
 ened the vigilance, and whetted the vengeance of the 
 Government. In the years 1684 and 1685, the fur- 
 nace of persecution was indeed heated sevenfold ; and 
 nothing less was intended than to consume and destroy 
 every individual member of the detested sect. To all 
 the usual appliances — fines, imprisonments, forfeitures, 
 spoiling of goods, banishment, tortures, executions on the 
 scaffold, military cjuarterings, and ravages, — there were 
 now added other and more deadly means to insure the 
 extirpati(jn of the Cameronians. Extirpation ! — that 
 
326 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 was now tlie word of the powers of darkness w^ho ruled 
 the country. The execution of the laws was committed 
 wholly and absolutely to the soldiers. They had no 
 limited instructions ; they had powers and express orders 
 to go through the whole country and kill ; kill in the 
 house, kill in the field, kill one or many, as they should 
 meet them ; kill with full indemnity against conse- 
 (luences, kill at their own discretion, and kill instantly 
 and upon the spot. These times are still named with a 
 slnidder, " The Killing Times of Scotland.'''' 
 
 What need to repeat those martyrdoms, so many of 
 which are now sacred in the world's memory — like the 
 history of Joseph, or the three Hebrew youths in the 
 fiery furnace, or Daniel in the lions' den ? — such as the 
 martyrdom of Margaret M'Lauchlan the devout widow, 
 and Margaret Wilson the heaven-consecrated maiden, 
 drowned together in the waters of the Blednoch : and 
 of John Brown of Priesthill, the " Christian Carrier," 
 shot in front of his own habitation, before the eyes of 
 his wife and children ! All know, all have wept over 
 those scenes of unparalleled tragedy. At this time 
 murder stalked red-shod in every valley, and by every 
 homestead of the Y\'est and south of Scotland. 
 
 In the midst of this hideous mass of horrors, in the 
 beginning of 1685, Charles, who had hitherto been 
 healthy and strong, and was only fifty-four years of age, 
 died a sudden and fearful death, not without suspicion 
 of his having been poisoned. This suspicion fell strong 
 upon that cockatrice-nest of Reactionists who had long 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 327 
 
 beeu forming round the Duke of York, the next heir to 
 tlie throne. Charles Avas understood latterly to be tired 
 of playing the tyi'aut, for which certainly he had no 
 qualification except low and bestial selfishness, and no 
 taste, if only he could get money quietly from the people 
 to fill the quagmire of his vices. His death seemed 
 very convenient at the time to the Eeactionary party. 
 If it was natural, it was a fortunate accident to them. 
 If it was by foul means, it was a crime which they 
 would have no difficulty in committing. But however 
 this might be, the Duke of York stepped on the throne 
 over an utterly prostrated people, amid acclamations and 
 festive rejoicings not inferior to those which had wel- 
 comed the Restoration. 
 
328 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 X. 
 
 PEDEN THE PROPHET. 
 
 Before we become entangled in the narrative — short 
 and rapid it must be — of the conchiding struggles of 
 the Covenanters, let us turn aside for a moment in 
 reverential grief, and close the wearied eyes of one who 
 has a niche all his own in this history — Alexander Peden, 
 the Prophet of the Covenant. At the end of this same 
 year, 1685, from his sufferings, and wanderings, and 
 toils, and l)urdens in the valley of vision, prematurely 
 old and worn out long before his natural term had run, 
 he came to die in his native i)lace, in his old home of 
 Auchincloich, near the murmurings of the Water of Ayr. 
 
 Peden — in an age fertile in singular men, and when 
 tlie circumstances of the times brought out their qualities 
 in the strongest relief — surpassed all in what may be 
 termed the romance of character. His memory has 
 been overlaid by the very doatingness of martyrology, 
 by the very rankness and luxuriant foliage of tradition. 
 Wonder-Tales creep and cluster and tvrine all around 
 him, as the \xy does around some majestic old tower. 
 Love and awe and primitive simplicity — working on an 
 extraordinary subject — have well-nigh changed into a 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. o29 
 
 wizard this brave, wise, kindly old spirit, whose mar- 
 vellous insight, and great intensity of feeling and ex- 
 pression, were all his sorcery. 
 
 Yet in the main, the accounts concerning him are 
 authentic ; and it is generally easy to see the exact line, 
 where the real loegins to pass into the haze of the 
 imaginative or superstitious. Lord Grange, a lawyer, a 
 judge, and an acute man of the world, contemporary 
 with Peden, and intimate with many of his friends, 
 gives his testimony on this point, when writing in re- 
 ference to some of the crude biographies which had been 
 published soon after his death : — " I have talked about 
 it with some who were personally acquainted with Mr. 
 Peden, and were often in his company, and from whom 
 I have heard several uncommon things about him. They 
 say, the author is mistaken as to several circumstances ; 
 but as to the main, in all the passages, or most of them 
 whereof they had particular knowledge (and were eye 
 and ear witnesses of divers), they say he tells the truth ; 
 but missing of circumstances, and a wrong way and 
 manner of narrating, in matters so delicate, gives them 
 a very different form and appearance." 
 
 Of all the men of this strange and troubled time, 
 Peden displays most of that temperament, and of those 
 subtle traits, to which we give the scarcely definable 
 name of f/enius. Not of tlic high creative order ; nor 
 has it stamped any great result upon the world ; yet 
 the essence was there ; and the little wild-flowers are to 
 be discerned by tiiose lowlv and loving eves that follow 
 
330 THE FIFTY YEARs' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 nature into her out-of-the-way nooks and corners. His 
 character is a mosaic, chequered and irregular in com- 
 position, but the materials good, the colours striking, 
 and the whole effect full of a nameless interest and 
 charm. He was the sage, the humorist, the rhapsodist, 
 the devout believer, the mystic. These were the primal 
 elements of his character. And as the storm of perse- 
 cution deepened around him ; as he was driven more 
 and more into the wilderness for his home ; as his own 
 sufferings increased, and the blood of his brethren began 
 to flow in larger torrents ; as civil and religious slavery 
 more and more firmly enchained the land ; as the dis- 
 pensations of Heaven became more and more frowning 
 and mysterious, and his own impulsive soul turned in 
 upon itself, and terribly heaved in conflict and anguish, 
 — everything external commingled itself with his own 
 spirit ; and his own sj^irit retreated more and more into 
 silent, awful contemplation, and wrestling communion 
 with God — with God, to whom was the last appeal of 
 His creatures oppressed and miserable, who alone could 
 shield His people, and purify His sanctuary. There 
 thus formed around him a kind of imiversal living reality, 
 where not the Present only, but where the Future lived 
 before his mind, in the visions of Divine faith. '' God 
 is in the Future," he felt to himself, " and I see it — I 
 see it ! I see the tracings of His righteous and Almighty 
 Hand ! " And he spake to the peojDle the visions of his 
 faith ; and they received them, wondering and trembling, 
 and he was their Prophet. 
 
 It is in no fantastic or preternatural sense I say it, — • 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 331 
 
 it is in the ordinary course of Divine illumination, that 
 a man so peculiarly constituted and attempered, with 
 keen human insights, quick darting thoughts, powerful 
 imagination, and transcendent faith in the unity and 
 certainty of the Divine purpose, has flashes and appre- 
 hensions of things, analogous to the prophetic gift ; and 
 sees more vividly and palpably than other men, what 
 must needs be the future fact — the fate to which this or 
 that man is driving ; the result in which this or that 
 course of actions must terminate. This spiritual pre- 
 conception Alexander Peden undoubtedly possessed in 
 one of its highest degrees. 
 
 He w-as born at Auchincloich in Sorn, about the year 
 1626. His father was a small proprietor ; and he seems 
 to have been the eldest son ; at least he is spoken of as 
 having had the heritage. Whether it was from early con- 
 nexion, or from subsequent acquaintance, he was honoured 
 by the friendship of the Boswells of Auchinleck, in his 
 immediate neighbourhood, an old respected family from 
 whom descended the biographer of Samuel Johnson. In- 
 deed it is manifest from many incidents, that Peden was 
 on terms of endearing friendship with many of the best 
 old families of the West. I mention this in passing, not 
 because in itself it made him anything better ; but to 
 remove an impression which has been propagated, that 
 he was some obscure, ranting vagrant, half-crazed non- 
 descript. In the best sense of the word, Alexander 
 Peden was a gentleman, and through life the companion 
 of gentlemen, — of the Boswells, and Campbells, and 
 
332 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Fergusons, aud FuUertons, families vrho still form the 
 flower and blossom of the west country. It is not 
 without some interest also to mark, that when the 
 iniquitous fine of £18,000 was inflicted on Baillie of 
 Jerviswoode for reset and converse, Alexander Pedeu 
 has the distinction to stand on the roll of his guests. 
 
 No exact description has been preserved of his personal 
 appearance ; but there can be no doubt that he was a 
 man of a massive frame, and a noble and impressive 
 countenance. All the old accounts — some of them by 
 persons who had seen and heard him — speak of the 
 majesty of his appearance. One old journalist, relating 
 some of his conversations, begins with this expression, — 
 " And he laid his heavy hand upon my shoulder," im- 
 plying weight and massiveness. His wanderings, and 
 escapes, and long days' flights before the pursuing dra- 
 goons, bespeak great physical strength. 
 
 Omitting intermediate circumstances of his life — many 
 of which, however, tended to confirm that taint of me- 
 lancholy which was implanted in his natm'e, — we find 
 that he was ordained, a litile before the Restoration, as 
 minister of New Luce in Galloway. This place lies at 
 the head of a long narrow glen, girdled in by dusky 
 hills ; and there tlie waters of the Luce, with many a 
 whirl by bank and scaur, seek for passage into the ^vdde 
 expanding and glistening Bay. It is a lonely, pastoral, 
 out-of-the-w^orld spot. 
 
 After some three years' sojourn there, he was ejected 
 in 1GG3, by the operation of the " Drunken Act of Glas- 
 gow." His farewell services were so eagerly listened to 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 333 
 
 — SO loath were people and pastor to part — that on his 
 last Sabbath, until the shades of night descended, he 
 continued amongst them in the church. Frequently did 
 they interrupt his discourses by bursts of wailing ; and 
 though himself deeply moved, he besought them to com- 
 pose themselves. As he left the pulpit, he closed tlie 
 door fast behind him ; and knocking on it very hard 
 with his Bible three times, he thrice repeated, — " In my 
 Master's name I arrest thee ! that none ever enter thee 
 but such as enter as I have done — by the door." The 
 hoary-headed peasants of Glenluce, who were witnesses 
 to this solemn act of " arrest," used, after the Revolu- 
 tion, to relate with a glow of pride to the new genera- 
 tion, that no curate or indulged minister ever entered 
 that pulpit ; and that the door was never opened again, 
 nor Peden's arrest taken off, until the Church of Scot- 
 land was restored to her rights ; and then a pastor 
 entered lawfully and Christianly, as their old Prophet 
 had done before. 
 
 After his ejectment, he was amongst the first of the 
 ministers whom we find preaching at conventicles. On 
 the Pentland insurrection, he joined the party at Lanark; 
 but soon left them, from an apprehension that they were 
 not in a condition to offer any successful resistance. As 
 he had been present, however, he was included in an 
 indictment directed against all the leading insurgents ; 
 and not appearing, was denounced an outlaw, and his 
 X)roperty forfeited. 
 
 Being now an outlaw, he was forced to that trying, 
 wandering mode of life in which the remainder of his 
 
334 THE FIFTY YEA.RS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 days was spent, — sometimes in the north of Ireland, 
 sometimes in Scotland. In 1673, when staying in the 
 house of Ferguson of Knockdow in Carrick, he was 
 apprehended ; and being brought before the Council in 
 Edinburgh, was sentenced to imprisonment in the Bass. 
 Whilst there, a contribution was sent from some Chris- 
 tian friends, through the hands of Patrick Simpson, the 
 indulged minister at Kilmalcolm in Renfrewshire, for his 
 relief, so far as he might recj[uire it, and that of his 
 fellow-prisoners. His answer, written, as he himself 
 says, " in great haste and no less confusion," and which, 
 it seems, had to be conveyed away secretly from the 
 Bass, has been preserved. It was difficult to decipher ; 
 and therefore some obscurities in the sense are probably 
 owing to errors in the copy. It is an admirable speci- 
 men of mingled dignity, delicacy, and meek submission 
 to a most painful lot. It is just the letter that brother 
 would WTite to brother ; and, short though it be, is 
 distinguished by those compact, pithy sayings — those 
 touches of nature that make the whole world kin, those 
 pictures in a stroke, and that terse abrupt diction, which 
 seem to have been spontaneous to him, even when " in 
 great haste, and no less confusion." 
 
 " Love," he -^Tites, " yea conscience to duty, makes 
 me run the hazard thus to bless you, with the brethren 
 there, for your sympathy and continued earnest care, 
 especially towards me, unworthy of bonds, and most 
 unworthy to be remembered in bonds. My trial enjoins 
 deep silence abroad ; but loud pitiful language upwards. 
 But it were not a cross, if not crossing ; nor a prison, if 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 335 
 
 not straitening." In how few pathetic words does he 
 embody the whole vast sorrow of the prisoner's soiil ! — 
 " We are close shut up in our chambers ; not permitted 
 to converse, diet, worship together ; but conducted out 
 l>y two at once in the day, to breathe in the open air, — 
 envying {ivith reverence) the birds their freedom ; lyrovok- 
 ing and calling on us to bless Him for the most common 
 mercies. Again we are close shut up day and night, to 
 hear only the sighs and groans of our fellow-prisoners." 
 For five years had Peden now been close prisoner in the 
 dungeons of that desolate sea-girt Rock. " He only 
 knows wherefore we are reserved, and what is appointed 
 for us, who out of the eater brings forth meat. Our 
 long fast will resolve in sad earnest ; and when darkest, 
 it will be light ; and most care, least care. for grace 
 to credit Him (hitherto never cumbersome) and His cross, 
 in whatever piece of service, in bonds or freedom. He 
 cuts out I" Then reverting to the liberality of which 
 he and his fellow-prisoners had been the recipients, he 
 gently reminds his coiTespondent, " ingenuously, without 
 breach of charity, there were at freedom more in neces- 
 sity than some in bonds ; and to suspend towards me, 
 who design no great things for myself (His cross and 
 l)onds excepted), for food and raiment, promising to 
 burden you with the first." His closing benediction 
 lias the graciousness and simplicity of the early Chris- 
 tian times : " Now peace be to the brethren, and love, 
 with faith, from God the Father ; and grace be to all 
 them that love our Lord Jesus Clirist in sincerity ! So 
 prayeth your unworthy and affectionate well-wisher in 
 bond-^, — Alexandeu Peden." 
 
336 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 In December 1678, he was brought out of the Bass, 
 but only to be sentenced, with sixty other prisoners, to 
 perpetual banishment. They were put on board a ship 
 at Leith to be carried to London, and thence to be con- 
 veyed to America. He encouraged his companions, as- 
 suring them that " the ship was not built that would 
 bear them over the sea to any of the plantations." When 
 they reached London they were all liberated ; from what 
 cause is not explained. It was reported to have been 
 through the influence of Lord Shaftesbury, whose party 
 was then in power, and who was courting the friendship 
 and support of the Presbyterians. Peden remained for 
 a while in London, and then travelled through various 
 parts of England. He returned to Scotland in 1679, 
 and for the five years down to his death he divided his 
 time very much between Ireland and Scotland ; or, as 
 he described it in his graphic manner, " in going from 
 the one bloody land to the other bloody land." 
 
 In 1682, we find him amongst his people at Glen- 
 luce ; and two sermons Avhich he preached there are the 
 only lengthened specimens of his preaching which we 
 possess. Their undressed homeliness and roughness 
 make us feel as if we were hearing them actually deli- 
 vered ; and no doubt they were preserved, like so many 
 others of the period, by the shorthand of some attached 
 disciple. 
 
 With Peden, a sermon or discourse was no formal 
 harangue, but an utterance of the oracle within ; a reflex 
 of the ebbings and flowings of his own soul. It was 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 337 
 
 triilj^ the man thinking and feeling aloud. In the lan- 
 guage of musicians, it was a fantasia starting from a 
 certain theme, running away on the imj)ulses of the mo- 
 ment, but returning ever back and back upon the theme 
 with which it commenced. He does not reason, dis- 
 cuss, or propound. What he sees b}^ the inward ej^e, 
 that he declares, and describes in all its living linea- 
 ments as it stands before him. The universe is not to 
 him a bundle of doctrines and notions and platitudes ; 
 but all is present to him as a living and working reality. 
 The condition of man, the sovereignty of God, the hearts 
 of his hearers, the events of the times, the scenes and 
 appearances of nature, even the embiyo forms of futu- 
 rity, — all press close upon him, and lie as with a real 
 heavy weight upon his soul. Hence everything is spoken 
 of as SEEN. His descriptions assume the prophetic mould ; 
 his images are vital, and his words beat like pulses. By 
 constant meditation upon God ; by a constant realizing 
 sense of His presence, he looks up to Him as the ever- 
 watchful, ever-pitying Father, who tries His children only 
 to strengthen them, and allows their punishment only for 
 their improvement, and will assuredly break the arm of 
 their oppressors. This begets a filial confidence, a home- 
 bred familiarity, especially when expressed in his own 
 simple Hebraic form of speech, which can be only de- 
 lightful to those who appreciate the moral and personal 
 in the Divine attributes, and to whom the name of God 
 is something more than an abstract term in metaphysics. 
 Whilst there is one region of his being which touches 
 upon the cloud-land of mysticism, there is another whicli 
 
 Y 
 
338 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRITGGLE OF 
 
 is most thoroughly mundane, — most genially human. On 
 his heart he bears every interest of man, — all the cares 
 and sorrows and joys of his brethren. His sympathies 
 are tender as those of woman, — artless and outspoken 
 us a child's. Then, like April weather, sunshine and 
 shower, where the spirit of pathos is, there the spirit 
 of humour will generally be found ; and nothing can 
 be more rich, grotesque, and honest- hearted than the 
 humours of Alexander Peden. Even his nicknames — 
 glancing and sharp as a sketch by Cruickshank or Leech 
 — used to transfix a man as upon the point of a lance ; 
 and many of them stuck to families even after the Kevo- 
 lution. " There comes the Devil's rattle-bag I " he cried 
 out one day as he was preaching, when he observed 
 David Manson, a noisy religious pretender, pushing for- 
 ward and trampling over the people to get near to him, 
 — " There comes the Devil's rattle-bag ! we don't want 
 liini liere." David in due time became a spy, and 
 through all the country round was known as " the 
 Devil's rattle-bag." After the Revolution the nickname 
 stuck like a bur to himself and his family ; and when 
 he complained to his minister of the grievance, all the 
 consolation he could get was, " You well deserve it. 
 He was an honest man that gave it to you ; you and 
 yours must enjoy the title of ' the Devil's rattle-bag ; ' 
 there's no help for it." 
 
 No wonder that sucli a true, leal, large-minded man 
 w;ts the oliject of so mucli love in his own time ; and 
 that his memory is cherished with reverence, at least by 
 the peasantiy of Scotland, even till this day. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 339 
 
 \Vo have the rare good fortime to possess a speaking 
 portrait of Pedeu's peculiar manner and style of preach- 
 ing, in the foUo-ft-ing description from the diary of his 
 contemporary and frequent attendant, Serjeant Nisbet : — 
 " Although every act of worship that Peden was en- 
 gaged in was full of diWne flights and useful digressions, 
 yet he carried alongst with them a divine stamp ; and 
 such was the weighty and con\incing majesty that ac- 
 companied what he spoke, that it obliged the hearers 
 both to love and fear him. I observed, that every time 
 he spoke, whether conversing, reading, praying, or preach- 
 ing, between every sentence he paused a little, as if he 
 had been hearkening what the Lord would say unto 
 him ; or listening to some secret whisper. And some- 
 times he would start, as if he had seen some surprising 
 sight." How real and perfect I — the mingled love and 
 fear of the hearers, the flights, the digi'essions, yet the 
 unfailing majesty of the preacher, — his pauses, his listen- 
 ing attitudes, his sudden starts, his impulsive exclama- 
 tions ! 
 
 Imperfectly reported as his " Sermons in the Wil- 
 derness" must be, there is a uniqueness about them, a 
 strangeness, a humorousness, and at times a wild, bare, 
 mgged, moorland-looking su])limity which cannot be 
 mistaken, which mark all tliat tradition or written 
 registers have transmitted to us of his peculiar utter- 
 ances. A Pedeniinn may be known amid any quantity 
 of dull mbbisli. 
 
 To his old flock at Glenluce he preached in 1682, 
 
340 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 s<jme three years before his death. One sermon was 
 on the Parable of the lord of the vineyard, and the hus- 
 bandmen who killed his eldest son : — 
 
 " Now there is fruit called for from these husband- 
 men. What fruit is this ? ye will say. This fruit, sirs, 
 is not such fruit as y§ pay your rents with, as corn, hay, 
 or the like, that your hearts love well. Then what fruit 
 is this that is called for *? "Why, it is faith and repent- 
 ance, love to God, and obedience to his revealed will, 
 which many of you, yea the most part of you, are as 
 great strangers to as if ye had never heard the ever- 
 lasting gospel preached. Now, people of God ! what 
 are you doing when such dreadfid wrath is at hand in 
 Scotland this day ? He is not worth his room in Scot- 
 land that prays not half his time, to see if he can prevent 
 the dreadful wrath that is at the door, coming on our 
 poor mother-land. O sirs ! ye must pray ploughing, 
 harrowing, reaping, and at all your other labours — when 
 ye are eating and drinking, going out and coming in, and 
 at all your other employments. that noble life we 
 must have of communion with God ! It is He that 
 makes heaven pleasant ; it is communion with God 
 that makes heaven. Do ye long to be there, people 
 of God?" 
 
 In describing what, in his usual figurative style, he 
 calls " dead folk," he says : — 
 
 " A third sort of dead folk are you who are plunging 
 in the world — who have no God but the world : that 
 bears most sway in your hearts. We must lay you by, 
 for your worldly-mindedness and excessive covetousness. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 341 
 
 ' Oh,' say ye, ' we must labour for our living. Would 
 you have us let oiu: handy labour alone ]' But, 
 worldly miser and fool that thou art ! hath not Christ 
 said, ' Seek first the kingdom of heaven, and the right- 
 eousness thereof, and all other things shall be added 
 imto you.' Oh, sirs ! will ye tru^t God, and give him 
 credit ? If so, He wiU help you at all your work. 
 Friends I if ye will make Him your own, I will tell 
 you what He would do for you. He would plough your 
 land, sow your corn, shear your corn, sell your corn, 
 and bring home your money. He will even, as it were, 
 rock the cradle, if it were necessary for you. He will 
 condescend as low as ye desire Him — only once close 
 with Him, and that upon His own terms, and make a 
 surrender of your hearts unto Him." 
 
 And how he scatters about his sayings and stories, so 
 brief, pithy, and keen ! 
 
 " For you, the poor broken-hearted followers of Christ, 
 to whom He hath given grace to follow Him in the 
 storm, I tell you, Grace is young Glory ! At your first 
 conversion oiu' Lord gives you the one end of the line, 
 but He keeps the other end in gloiy with Himself. But, 
 sirs, He will have you all there at length !" 
 
 '• Where is the Church of God in Scotland, sirs, at 
 this day '? It is not amongst the great clergy. I will 
 tell you where the Church is : It is wherever a praying 
 young man or young woman is at a dyke-side in iScof- 
 land ; that's wliere the Church is. ... A praying 
 party shall go through the storm. But many of you in 
 this country-side know not these things. The weight of 
 
342 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 the broken Chiircli of Scotland never troubles you. The 
 loss of a cow, or an ill market day, goes nearer your 
 hearts than all the troubles of the Church of God. . . . 
 Poor creature that resolvest to follow Him, pray fast ! 
 If there he one of you. He zvill be the second ; if there 
 be tvjo, He will be the third. Ye shall never want 
 company r 
 
 " There was a poor widow in Clydesdale as I came 
 through, that was worth many of you put together. 
 She was asked how she did in this evil time % ' I do 
 very well,' says she, ' I get more good of one verse of 
 the Bible now than I did of it all lang sjme. He hath 
 cast me the keys of the pantiy-door, and bidden me take 
 my fill.' Was not that a Christian indeed ! Oh, sirs, 
 take heed what ye are doing, when the blood of the 
 saints is running so plentifidly." 
 
 " I trow there are many of you in this age that are 
 like young wanton folk that run fast together and marry, 
 but never take any account how they will keep house, 
 but presently go to poverty and beggary. It falls out 
 so with many of you that are professors in this genera- 
 tion. Ye take up your religion and wot not how, and 
 cannot give an account how ye came by it. I tell you, 
 sirs, ye will abide no longer by Christ than till a storm 
 blow. Then ye will quit Him and deny His cause." 
 
 In some of his images and expressions what a scorch- 
 ing intensity, what an almost Dantesque sternness and 
 terribleness ! 
 
 " A sixth sort of dead folk are you that want heart- 
 holiness. Although ye have a profession, ye are but 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 343 
 
 light wanton professors. I fear the devil is invested in 
 many of you, boiling in your hearts' lusts and idols. 
 Well, sirs, all the ministers in the world cannot help 
 you in this case. It must be Christ himself that must 
 do it, as He did to Mary Magdalene. For the devil is 
 as much in many of you as he was in her. And I fear 
 Christ hath quitted many of you, and given you the far e- 
 well clap upon the heart, and He will reprove you no 
 more until He make his fury to rest upon you."' 
 
 " people of God, ' enter into your chambers I ' For 
 I fear there shall be no shelter ere it be long. Yea, 
 I fear ere the storm be over, the day is coming on these 
 lands that a hloochj scaffold shall he thought a good 
 shelter y 
 
 '' When God comes to call the roll of Scotland, He 
 shall find many blanks, dead ministers, dead professors, 
 dead men and looimn though going upon their feet.'" 
 
 Of a different style — of his humour, rich and broad 
 as that of the Ayrshire bard, born in the same valley, 
 who followed him at the interval of a century — it would 
 be easy to select specimens, but space forbids ; and at 
 any rate this current of humour will be seen trickling 
 and glancing even through many of the quotations 
 already given. 
 
 Of his rude moorland sublime we cannot refrain from 
 giving one specimen, not as the finest, but tlie easiest of 
 extract. 
 
 " Now, sirs, what is it that has carried through the 
 sufferers for Christ these twenty years in Scotland \ It 
 is the fellowship of His sufferings. It is the filling up 
 
344 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 of His sufferings according to the ancient decree of 
 Heaven. For my jDart, I seek no more if He bids me 
 go ! He "bade many, from 1660 to the year of Pent- 
 land, go forth to scaffolds and gibbets for Him ; and 
 they sought no more but His commission — -they went 
 and He carried them well through. Then in 1666, at 
 Pentland, He bade so many go to the fields and die for 
 Him, and so many to scafi'olds and lay down their lives 
 for Him ; they sought no more but His commission — 
 they went and He carried them Avell through. Again, 
 in 1679, at Bothwell, He bade so many go to the fields 
 and scaffolds and die for Him ; they sought no more 
 but His commission, and went. He bade so many go 
 to the seas and be meat for the fishes for Him ; they 
 sought no more but His commission, and went. And 
 afterwards in the year 1680, at Ayrsmoss, He bade so 
 many go to the fields and scaftolds for Him ; they 
 sought no more but His commission, and went. This 
 cup of suffering hath come all the way down from 
 Abel to this year 1682 in Scotland. Our Lord hath 
 held this cup to all the martyrs heads wherever He 
 had a Church in the world, and it will go to all the lips 
 of all the martyrs that are to suffer for Christ, even to 
 the sounding of the last trumpet. But yet, people of 
 God, it is only the brim that the saints taste of Be ye 
 patient in believing ; God shall yet make His enemies 
 wring out the bitter dregs of the cup, and fall and rise no 
 more. Believe it, our Master will set up this cup, and 
 close it, and swallow up time in eternity, and blow that 
 great trumpet, and heaven and earth shall go at once 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 345 
 
 into a red flame. believers, long for that noble day ! 
 it will put an end to all your sad and suffering days ! 
 . . . Our noble Captain of salvation hath vanquished 
 these bloody persecutors in Scotland these twenty-two 
 years, more by the patient suflerings of the saints than 
 if He had threshed all down in a moment. The patient 
 suffering of the saints, with their blood running, declares 
 His glory much abroad in the world, and especially in 
 these lands. As I came through the country, there was 
 a poor widow whose husband fell at Bothwell ; the 
 bloody soldiers came to plunder her house, telling her 
 ' they would take all she had ; we will leave thee no- 
 thing either to put in thee or on thee.' ' I care not,' 
 said she ; 'I shall not want so long as God is in the 
 heavens.' That was a believer indeed I" 
 
 His remaining years were the " Killing Times'' of 
 Scotland, and he lived entirely a wanderer in the wilder- 
 ness. Toil, grief, and mental depression, bowed down 
 the massive frame ; and although only sixty, he was 
 always spoken of, and alw^ays spoke of himself as a very 
 aged man. " Cast the lap of Thy cloak," as he once 
 prayed, in his strange familiar way, with its touch of 
 rude sublimity — " Cast the lap of Thy cloak. Lord ! over 
 2)uir auld Sandy. ^' All day long he led a life of sore 
 travel and danger ; at night he betook himself to some 
 cave of the rock ; but slept none, groaning over the 
 miseries of the land. It was now remarked that he 
 could not be prevailed upon to preach, always answer- 
 ing, " It was praying folk alone that would get through 
 
346 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 the storm." " John ! " he said, as he laid his heavy- 
 hand ou John Clerk of Muirbrook in Carrick, — " there 
 shall be dark days, such as the poor Church of Scotland 
 never saw the like, nor ever shall see, if once they were 
 over. If a poor thing should go from the east sea-bank 
 to the west sea-bank, seeking one to whom they might 
 communicate their case, or that would tell them the 
 mind of the Lord, he shall not find one. Many a con- 
 venticle has God had in thee, Scotland ! but ere long, 
 God will hold a conventicle that will make Scotland 
 tremble. He sent forth faithful messengers to preach to 
 thee ; but ere long, He shall preach to thee by fire and 
 sword. Yet, John ! the Church shall arise from her 
 gi-ave ; and at the crack of her winding-sheet, as many 
 as had a hand in her burial shall be distracted with fear. 
 Then shall there be brave days for the Church ; and she 
 shall come forth ivith a honny bairn-time at her hack. 
 O John ! I shall not see these days, but you may." 
 
 Early one morning, after he had slept for the night, 
 in company with some others, in a sheep-cot far up in 
 the moorlands, he took a walk along the margin of a 
 solitary stream, where he stayed for some time. When 
 he returned, he saluted his little company with that 
 verse of the 3 2d Psalm : — 
 
 " Thou art my hiding-place, Thou shall 
 From trouble keep me free ; 
 Thou with songs of deliverance 
 About shalt compass me," — 
 
 adding, in his strange, deep, picturesque way, " These 
 and the following 'are sweet lines. / got them at the 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 347 
 
 huniside this morning ; I will get more to-morrow ; 
 and so we shall have daily provision, and go on in His 
 streng-th." Brave, God-trusting old man ! 
 
 When he felt his end drawing nigh, he crept back to 
 the old home of Auchincloich ; but even there he was 
 not allowed to rest ; for a constant search was kept up 
 for him by the wretched emissaries of the Government ; 
 and he was fain to hide in a cave in the neighbourhood. 
 Often he would say with a sigh, " Carry me to Ayrs- 
 moss, and bury me beside Richie, that I may have rest 
 in my gTave, for I have had little in my life." But he 
 added, " Bury me where you will, my body will be lifted 
 again." When he died, the Boswells of Auchinleck, to 
 protect his bones from insult, gave the most touching 
 proof of friendship by causing the body to be interred 
 secretly in their family vault, under the shadow of the 
 far-stretching plane-trees. But the soldiers in the gar- 
 rison of Sorn heard of the circumstance ; and though it 
 was forty days from the time of the interment, most 
 daringly invaded the territories of death, and rifled the 
 tomb of its lawful prey. The peasant of Auchinleck will 
 yet tell with horror-stricken look, — how the miscreants 
 burst open the coffin, and tore off the shroud ; and 
 though the day had previously been without a breath of 
 air stirring, there came a sudden blast like a whirlwind, 
 which caught up the shroud, and twisted it round the 
 large projecting branch of one of these plane-trees ; and 
 from that day, he will add, as he points to it, that 
 branch withered away, but has remained there ever since. 
 
348 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 like a black shrivelled arm uplifted to lieaveu, — Nature's 
 protest against the sacrilegious crime ! ^ This is one of 
 the countless Wonder-Tales that have gathered around 
 the memory of Peden. The body was carried to the hill 
 above Cumnock where the common gallows stood ; and 
 there, in spite of the remonstrances both of the Boswells 
 and the Countess of Dumfries, was suspended on the 
 gibbet. When taken down, it was reinterred in con- 
 tempt, like the body of a felon, at the foot of the gal- 
 lows-tree. At that time the churchyard of Cumnock 
 was in the town below ', but generation after generation 
 came and laid their dust on the Gallows-Hill beside 
 Peden. It thus became the churchyard of the place ; 
 and there lies the Prophet in the midst of his own dear 
 people of the West, with two old thorn-bushes — the one 
 at the head, the other at the foot of his grave — planted 
 there by some kindly, reverential hand. It is a place 
 worth visiting ; a sweet spot, a sweet sight, — soothing, 
 tranquillizing, ennobling ! 
 
 1 Local Tradition. 
 
THK SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 349 
 
 XL 
 
 THE BEGINNING OF THE END. 
 
 James — partly by a coucurrence of favourable cir- 
 cumstances, partly by the effect of his temper, as dogged 
 and imperious as that of his brother had been light, 
 careless, and incapable of long or severe tension — ap- 
 peared now to have reached that Elysium of absolute 
 peaceful sovereignty, which Charles during his whole 
 reign had desired with as much ardour as he could pos- 
 sibly feel about anything. The explosions consequent 
 upon the Rye-House Plot seemed to have blown to atoms 
 the country party both in England and Scotland. The 
 ruin of Argyle and Monmouth had put a stop for ever 
 to the conspiracies of the exiles, and of the malcontents 
 at home. The Terrorism of so many long dismal yeai's 
 had awed into submission the Nonconformists of both 
 countries, or stript them of all means of becoming dan- 
 gerous. The Anglicans still surrounded the Throne with 
 the most profuse declarations of loyalty. Parliaments, 
 called and dismissed at the will of their royal master, 
 crouched before him like beaten spaniels. The courts of 
 law (so called) were filled with lay figures which the 
 King could mould into any shape he chose. The towns 
 
350 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 and coiporations, robbed of their ancient charters and 
 rights, had sunk into insignificance, or only echoed the 
 phrases of the palace. There was not a breath to ruffle 
 this calm, except some coarse harsh sounds issuing from 
 remote corners of Scotland, from the Cameronian out- 
 laws, wandering in deserts, or hidden in dens and caves 
 of the earth. 
 
 Had James been content with this position of things, 
 it is difficult to see how any change could have been 
 brought about, or how Britain could have been saved, if 
 not from perpetual, at least from long-continued, dull, 
 and abject servitude. Happily for the cause of British 
 freedom, James had a nature that could not be quiet, 
 but, like a rook on its tree, must be eternally fluttering 
 and screeching. He was cursed with that vain, med- 
 dling restlessness, which will always be found to dis- 
 tingmsh men of narrow intellect, false ambition, and 
 morose and unfeeling temper, when under the dominion 
 of some superior wicked influence, goading them on to 
 their ruin, James had long dreamed of the glory to 
 which he was destined to rise by founding a " grand 
 monarchy," that is a complete absolute government, 
 like that of France ; but above all, by gathering back 
 the erring sheep of England and Scotland into the fold 
 of the Catholic Church. Hence he set himself with all 
 his might to establish those two things in Britain — 
 Despotism and Popeiy. He ceased to be his own mas- 
 ter and became a puppet in the hands of Father Petre, 
 a bold daring ecclesiastic, and his Jesuitical confederates. 
 " It is wonderful," writes one of the fraternity, — " it is 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 351 
 
 wonderful to see King James's great affection to our 
 
 Society Upon Father John Keene's return into 
 
 England, he gave him a most gracious reception, while 
 earls and dukes were commanded for some hours to wait 
 
 for admittance Father Clare being arrived at 
 
 London, got an easy access to the King, and as easily 
 gained his point. The King himself forbid him to kneel 
 and kiss his hand according to custom, saying, ' Reverend 
 Father, you have indeed once kissed my hand, but if I 
 had known then, as I do now, that you were a Priest, I 
 would rather myself, Father, have kneeled down and 
 kissed your hand !' After he had finished his business, 
 in a familiar conversation liis Majesty told this father, 
 that he would either convert Eugland, or die a martyr ; 
 and he had rather die the next day, and convert it, than 
 reign twenty years piously and happily, and not effect it. 
 
 .... The Catholic interest grows very strong 
 
 There is to be great preparation of war at London ; and 
 a lieet of above an hundred men-of-war is to be fitted 
 out against tlie Spring." 
 
 The Jesuit Cabinet, as might be expected, were very 
 knowing in their schemes. As they were necessarily 
 breaking with the Anglicans, they must strengthen them- 
 selves by getting up an alliance with the Nonconformists 
 of England and Scotland, who had suffered nearly a 
 generation of persecution at the hands of this same 
 Anglican Church. A deep and dreadful provocation, it 
 must be confessed ! The Jesuit Cabinet, therefore, in 
 the most magniloquent terms, descanted upon the 
 
352 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 beauties of universal toleration, as the bait to catch the 
 Nonconformists ; and also upon the justice of abolishing 
 all penal laws and disqualifications, as the postern-gate 
 by which Romish intrigue could be smuggled into the 
 citadel of the Constitution. At the same time, the most 
 strenuous efforts were making to raise a large standing 
 army, to be commanded by officers, and as far as possible 
 composed of soldiers, of the Romish communion. The 
 Toleration, it Avas reckoned, would alienate the Noncon- 
 formists from the Anglicans. The Church of England 
 party, by for the most formidable opponents to the Court, 
 would in this way be isolated from all the other Pro- 
 testant denominations, and be rendered helpless. The 
 whole Protestant and national parties being thus be- 
 fooled, bewildered, and divided, the Romanized army, at 
 a signal from the Jesuit Cabinet, would trample down 
 every vestige of Constitutional Government, and erect in 
 its stead the Tyrant's Throne and the Priest's Inquisition. 
 A notable clever scheme ! yet, somehow, like the 
 counsel of Ahithophel, every part of it was turned into 
 foolishness. A toleration w^as granted both to England 
 and Scotland, and this was done by the King's own 
 Proclamation, as the Parliament declined to pass it. So 
 far well in one respect, as the long fire of persecution, 
 kept up, it must be owned to her shame, by the Church 
 (if England, was slackened. But the Nonconformists 
 were not in conseipience won over to the Jesuits. On 
 the contrarj% thoroughly understanding the double game 
 that was being played, and that the Toleration was only 
 pushed forward to smooth the "way for Romish ascend- 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVEXANTEKS. 353 
 
 ency, they came to a distinct and cordial agreement with 
 the Anglican party, for the defence of the liberties and 
 Protestant institutions of the colmtr}^ The Parliament, 
 however servile and spiritless, could never be got to fur- 
 nish funds for maintaining a large standing army. Both 
 the soldiers and sailors, as if seized with some epidemic 
 fervour of Protestant zeal, refused to serve under Romish 
 officers, or to receive into their number Romish recruits. 
 The army and navy had a mind to be Protestant ! 
 Thus, after all their plotting and projecting, James and 
 his Jesuit Cabinet found themselves standing alone in 
 the midst of a whole nation, — with the great Anglican 
 party against them ; with the dense and solid body of 
 Nonconformists against them ; the soldiers and sailors 
 almost in mutiny — the aristocracy and leading men dis- 
 gusted, and already looking out for another sovereign. 
 They found themselves deserted even by the moderate 
 men of their own creed, and only cheered on in their cru- 
 sade by the frantic shouts of a few bigots and desperadoes. 
 
 After our lengthened survey of a scene of oppression 
 without parallel in the history of the world, it is a relief 
 that we have at length arrived at " the beginning of 
 the end !" 
 
 I have mentioned, that a universal toleration, or 
 liberty of W(^i-ship, was granted to all sects in England 
 and Scotland. Although the real object was perfectly 
 seen through — to introduce Romish ascendency and ab- 
 solute government — yet the Nonconformists in both 
 countries readily embraced the breathing-time thus 
 z 
 
354 THE FIFTY YEARS STRUGGLE OF 
 
 allowed. When I say there was Toleration conceded to 
 all^ I ought to add there was one exception — one re- 
 markable prophetic exception. That was, The Armed 
 Conventicle of Scotland ! The Conventicle was excepted 
 from the millennial age of the Jesuits. It was proscribed 
 as heretofore. It was denounced as treasonable. Death 
 continued to be the doom of him who preached, and of 
 them who heard. And if no quarter was given, no 
 quarter was asked or expected. The Cameronians had 
 been born out of due time. They had anticipated by 
 eight good years the verdict which was at last pro- 
 nounced by all Britain, united to a man. They had 
 disowned the Stuarts ; liad proclaimed that by their 
 oppressions and cruelties that family had forfeited the 
 British throne ; and had stated themselves in readiness, 
 according to their means and power, to make war against 
 the Bloody House. When all other sects smiled and 
 received favour from their hands — when the body of the 
 Presbyterian Clergy of Scotland, cowed and silenced for 
 so many years, rose again into vitality and eloquence at 
 the touch of the Jesuits' wand — there was this one j5rm, 
 dauntless, solitary band, who spurned the treacherous; 
 gift ; who defied the tyrannical giver : who would hold 
 nothing from a government under forfeiture for its crimes 
 against the nation ; who stood upon man's natural rights, 
 and the ancient treaties and covenants of the land ; who 
 would rather suffer on, and wait in the patient belief that 
 tlie day was drawing nigh when Zion should be redeemed 
 by a mighty hand, and when freedom could be enjoyed 
 truly free, without base compromise or sinful (compliance. 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 3 5;") 
 
 The whole burden of the Covenanting struggle now 
 fell upon the shoulders of James Renwick, alone and 
 unassisted : a young man only twenty -live years of age, 
 always slight and weak in body, but now worn out with 
 toil, and fevered with constant thought and endless an- 
 xieties. His former associates, Shields and Houston, had 
 both left the country, and there was thus devolved upon 
 him the whole care and management of the Tinted Socie- 
 ties. In those days, so different from the present, when 
 places were so inaccessible, and travelling so slow and 
 diflScult, he had to be in constant movement through all 
 the Lowland districts, at least through Galloway and the 
 South Borders, Fife and the West of Scotland. He had 
 to be daily and almost hourly lecturing and preaching, 
 visiting households, examining, conversing with the 
 people individually, and in groups, and advising in all 
 matters both public and private. He had to attend at 
 the stated meetings of the Societies, take the heaviest 
 part in their discussions, guide their deliberations, write 
 their papers and manifestoes, and conduct their public 
 debates against opposing parties. He was tlieir foreign 
 Secretary, maintaining an extensive and regular corre- 
 spondence with friends abroad, and with the foreign 
 churches and theologians. Besides, he had a large pri- 
 vate correspondence, and was necessitated from his posi- 
 tion, and impelled by his own warm Christian sympathies, 
 to address letters of advice, condolence, and encourage- 
 ment to all sufferers — to all in bonds, to all under 
 banishment, to all appointed to die for adherence to their 
 faith. And all this was done with a method and do- 
 
3.56 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 spatch, an industry and aptitude, a talent and over-mas- 
 tering influence upon the minds of others, worthy of a 
 first-rate administrator. Not whilst he was in the pos- 
 session of every focility, but, on the contrary, in the 
 midst of impediments, alarms and distresses, rendering 
 anything like serious and continuous work all but im- 
 possible. Naturally of a weak constitution, he was now 
 very often so borne down with sickness and total pros- 
 tration, that he had to be carried from place to jjlace on 
 the shoulders of his affectionate followers, or supported 
 when on horseback. Soldiers and spies were ever on his 
 track. The greater part of ordinary loose-living people 
 hated him for his religious strictness, and were every- 
 where ready to inform against or seize him. To their 
 disgrace be it spoken, many of the moderate Presbyter- 
 ians were so incensed against him, that they would have 
 betrayed him without scruple, especially at the present 
 time, when his Testimonies and his Armed Conventicles 
 were endangering the newly-acquired liberty granted, for 
 ends of their own, by James and his Jesuit cabinet. A 
 price was fixed upon his head of several hundred pounds, 
 to inflame the cupidity of every base wretch in the 
 kingdom. Letters of intercommuning hung over his 
 every movement, forbidding any one, on pain of death, to 
 yield him shelter or resting-place, a mouthful of food, or 
 a cup of cold water ; to salute him, converse with him, 
 interchange writing with him, or offer to him the smallest 
 services of common humanity. Thirteen times during 
 the one year, 1687, had the troops made the strictest 
 search for him throughout the whole country, prying 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. ' 357 
 
 into every cellar, and tearing off the thatch, and pulling 
 down the ceilings of the houses. He had to travel in 
 disguise by the most unfrequented paths, chased like a 
 partridge on the mountains; and to him the mist was a 
 protecting garment, and the dead hour of midnight the 
 guardian of his footsteps. He lived in rude and rennjte 
 cottages, in shepherds' huts on the tops of the hills, in 
 bosky forests, in caves and in rocks. Wherever he was, 
 he had watches stationed all round to give the alarm. 
 He preached with a fleet horse standing beside him, 
 saddled and bridled, on which he could mount in a 
 moment and leave far behind him all the troopers in 
 Scotland. Amid all his labours, toils, and jeopardies, he's 
 had no word of encouragement from the Presbyterian', 
 clerg)'- of the day, no hand of friendship stretched out to ! 
 him by any party of politicians. Instead of this, many i 
 of them branded him with names the most odious, and 
 raised against him calumnies the most groundless and 
 detestable. He was, on their respectable lips, the 
 " enemy of the brethren," the "intruder," the " Jesuit,"' 
 the •' white devil going through the land cariying the 
 devil's flag ;" with many other as unsavoury and frantic 
 expressions of their malice. They endeavoured to destroy 
 his character both at home, and amongst his religious 
 patrons and friends in Holland. And why? The little 
 fragments that remain of his sermons prove that he 
 preached only " Jesus Christ and Him crucified," and 
 that with a fulness, earnestness, and success, that might 
 have put to shame his accusers. His life was blameless, 
 his rules of conduct scrupulous ; and there is no such 
 
;)08 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 thiug ais piety in the world, if his piety was not genuine 
 and ardent. He fed his flock with no mere wind of 
 doctrine, but enforced purity and holiness of life, and 
 maintained the most correct and careful discipline amongst 
 the United Societies. What, then, was his fault, in the 
 eyes of the Presbyterian clergy and political moderates 
 of that day 1 It was this : — That he strictly adhered to 
 the principles of the Covenant, when they themselves 
 were sliding away from them ; that he refused indul- 
 gences and tolerations which came from polluted hands, 
 and which were meant to amuse and lull the nation 
 asleep, in order to the introduction of despotism and 
 Popery ; that, in one word, he had anticipated the future 
 verdict of all Britain, had disowned the sway of tlie 
 Stuarts, would have none of their gifts, would render 
 them no allegiance, and chose rather for a season to live 
 in a state of nature — an outlaw, but a free man I — until 
 God should dash to pieces the throne of iniquity, and in 
 His own good time establish a new throne in righteous- 
 ness. 
 
 " Let me be mistaken as men please," he says in one 
 of his letters, well knowing the charges made against 
 him of stiffness, and of running into extremes. " Let 
 me be mistaken as men please. This is my study, not 
 to partake in other men's sins, neither to cover them ; 
 but, considering the confusions of this time, and the 
 weakness of poor people, I hold it my duty to be a 
 help and a prop as I can to those that are staggering, 
 and to carrv so toward such as will go off, as their 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 359 
 
 stumbling, neither in law nor in my own conscience, may 
 be charged upon me. This is like unto my Master, who 
 hath promised to save them that halt, and gather them 
 that are driven out." 
 
 In his correspondence there are many striking accounts 
 of his labours and sutferings. Perhaps the most pathetic 
 is the following : — 
 
 " My business was never so weighty, so multiplied, 
 and so ill to be guided, to my apprehension, ;is it hath 
 been this year ; and my body was never so frail. Ex- 
 cessive travel, night wanderings, unseasonable sleep and 
 diet, and frec[uent preaching in all seasons of weather, 
 especially in the night, have so debilitated me, that I 
 am often incapable for any work. I find myself greatly 
 weakened inwardly, so that I sometimes fall into fits 
 of swooning and fainting. When I use means for my 
 recoverj^, I find it someways eff*ectual ; but my desire to 
 the work, and the necessity and importunity of people, 
 prompt me to do more than my natural strength will 
 well allow, and to undertake such toilsome business as 
 casts my body presently dovm. again. I mention not 
 this through any anxiety, (quarrelling, or discontent, but 
 to show you my condition in this respect. I may say 
 that, under all my frailties and distempers, I find great 
 peace and sweetness in reflecting upon the occasion 
 thereof It is a part of my glory and joy to bear such 
 infirmities, contracted through my poor and small labour 
 in my Master's vineyard." 
 
 As he approaches the goal of his brief eventful career, 
 his letters deepen into solemn pathos, into the sublime 
 
360 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 devotion of one who feels himself ready to be offered. 
 " Those whose souls are vexed with the now abounding 
 abominations," he says in writing to Sir Robert Hamil- 
 ton, " shall have a Zoar to fly into, when the fire of 
 God shall fall down upon our Sodom. I am certain the 
 Lord will have a sanctuary for his people. We must be 
 brought to that extremity wherein there can be no longer 
 subsistence without present help, but God will not leave 
 his people there. . . . There is now strange thirsting 
 after my blood, but that moves me not ; though they had 
 it, they would not be satisfied." 
 
 One beautiful passage more. It occurs in a letter to 
 two sister ladies in Holland, to whom he offers thanks 
 in his correspondence for their bountiful remembrance of 
 the afflicted people of Scotland. " Count the cost of 
 religion. God is a liberal dealer ; deal not niggardly 
 with Him. . . . Lay down to Him your names, your 
 enjoyments, your lives, your all at His feet, for He only 
 is worthy to have the disposal of them, and the suffer- 
 ings of this present time are not worthy to be compared 
 with the glory that shall be revealed. Think not much 
 to quit the vain and carnal delights of the world ; they 
 cannot satisfy your senses, much less your souls. The 
 earth is round., the heart of man is three-cornered, thefre- 
 fore this cannot be filled by that. And though ye could 
 find content in them, yet how vain were it because 
 inconstant, and how unsolid because uncertain !" 
 
 In the month of January 1688, Ren wick came to 
 Edinburgh, and as the Presbyterian clergy had now 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 361 
 
 formed something like Assemblies, he lodged in the 
 hands of the Moderator a protest against the Toleration to 
 be laid before their ensuing Assembly. He then passed 
 over into Fife, where he lield numerous conventicles. 
 On the last day of January he returned to Edinburgh, 
 and with two friends repaired to his usual place of con- 
 cealment there, in the house of one John Lookup, in the 
 Castle Hill. John was a Cameronian. Moreover he was 
 a merchant dealing in English goods, and as the two 
 kingdoms were then separate, and under different fiscal 
 arrangements, John, rightly or wrongly, was suspected 
 of doing something in the contraband line, and his pre- 
 mises were rather exposed to sudden visitations from the 
 Custom-house. Thomas Justice, an officer, being upon 
 the search in Lookup's house, happened to overhear 
 family worship, and noticed that some one conducted it 
 who was above the ordinary stamp. He knew that the 
 landlord was a follower of Renwlck, and thereupon he 
 made his own conjecture who the guest was. In the 
 course of the night, when he was drinking with his boon 
 companions, the conversation turned upon a report that 
 Houston, Renwick's associate, had been apprehended in 
 Ireland. Justice remarked with a knowing look, he 
 should have another of them ere long, and lifting up a 
 glass of wine, drank Renwick's health, saying he should 
 have him prisoner by seven next morning. By that 
 hour accordingly, he and a posse of tide-waiters entered 
 the house on pretence of searching for contraband goods. 
 Renwick hearing a noise, came to the door of his cham- 
 ber, when Justice challenged him, exclaiming, " My life 
 
362 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 for it, this is James Renwick ! All within this house 
 must go to the guard that they may show what trade 
 they are of." Renwick in a determined manner replied, 
 " I shall soon show you what is my trade." Justice, 
 seemingly afraid to grapple with him, rushed to the 
 street, crying for help to carry " that dog Renwick" to 
 the guard. Renwick, now armed, in company with his 
 two friends, attempted to escape by another door, but 
 on opening it found that a considerable crowd was 
 standing there also to stop all egress. He thereupon 
 fired a pistol so as not to hurt any one, when the crowd 
 gave way on each side in fright, and left an open pas- 
 sage, by which means he and his friends escaped from 
 the house. But in passing, some one in the crowd, with 
 a long staff, struck Renwick on the breast, which pained 
 and weakened him much in running and caused him 
 several times to fall. Justice and his comrades had 
 raised the hue and cry, and set off in pursuit. Not- 
 withstanding the pain and ftills, Renwick had cleared 
 the old Castle Wynd, made across the Grassmarket, and 
 was at the head of the Cowgate. But his streng-th was 
 failing him, and a mob of people gathering, and not 
 knowing what the matter was, one of them seized him, 
 but his two companions escaped free. Thus simply at 
 last was he apprehended, who for five years seemed to 
 bear a " charmed life," and whilst ever active, ever at 
 his work, continued to elude the whole swarm of Govern- 
 ment spies, of malicious enemies, and of the troops con- 
 stantly scouring the country in pursiut of him ! 
 
 He was conveyed to the guard-house, and was for 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 363 
 
 some time exposed to the insults of a low and ignorant 
 rabble who came to see the famous " Cameronian outlaw." 
 Graham, the captain of the guard, stared with astonish- 
 ment at liim, so small in stature, so very youthful 
 in appearance, so sweet and comely of countenance. 
 "What!" he cried, "is this hoy the James Renwick 
 that the whole nation has been so much troubled with ? " 
 Renwick answered him only with a gentle smile. By 
 order of the Council, he was committed to prison and 
 laid in irons. As soon as he was left alone he betook 
 himself by prayer to God. " He made an offer of his 
 life freely to Him, and supplicated through-bearing 
 grace. But he prayed earnestly that the cruelties of the 
 enemy might be so far restrained as to do nothing 
 farther against his body than take his life." Like most 
 men of finely organized and sensitive nature, physical 
 and mental, he had always felt a great fear of torture. 
 Living in constant hazard of being taken, subjected to 
 torture, and executed, he would sometimes look to his 
 hands, and say with a shudder, " How shall I endure to 
 have these struck off, and my legs tortured in the boots, 
 and my head taken from the body '?" All the braver ! 
 that he stood firm to his cause notwithstanding these 
 natural shrinkings and horrors. True bravery lies not 
 in dead insensibility, but in a perfect knowledge and 
 lively sense of the threatened danger, yet hardening 
 one's-self against the very first instincts of nature, in 
 the prosecution and defence of that which is believed to 
 be the cause of truth. 
 
 Prior to receiving his indictment, he was brought 
 
364 THE FIFTY YEARs' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 before the Chancellor Perth, Viscount Tarbet, and other 
 Members of the Council. It is plain they were very 
 much struck with him ; instead of a wild, shallow 
 fanatic, or an empty agitator, as probably they expected, 
 finding him a youth of excellent parts and thorough 
 education, of a candid and judicious frame of mind, of 
 modest carriage, combined with the most extraordinary 
 heroism, of mild engaging temper, and of great dialectic 
 power. Tarbet especially, a man of superior intellect, 
 but lax and easy in his opinions — a favourite under 
 Charles, under James, at the Revolution, and down to 
 the reign of Queen Anne — seemed to take pleasure in 
 raising discussions with him. In after times he would 
 often recur to this noble-minded youth, and would say — 
 " He was the stiffest maintainer of his principles that 
 ever came before us. Others we used always to cause 
 one time or other to waver ; but him we could never 
 move. Where we left him, there we found him. We 
 could never make him yield, or vary in the least. He 
 was of old Knox's principles." 
 
 He had hitherto been kept a close prisoner ; but a 
 little before his trial his mother was admitted to see 
 him. Being a most affectionate and tender-hearted 
 woman, she said to him one day in an agony of grief, 
 " How shall I look upon that head and those hands set 
 up among the rest on tlie port of the city !" He smiled, 
 assuring her she should never see that : "I have offered 
 my life unto the Lord, and have sought that He may 
 bind them up ; and I am persuaded that they shall not 
 be permitted to torture my body, nor touch one hair (jf 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 365 
 
 my head farther." He afterwards siirmoimted even the 
 fear of torture, which had always during his whole 
 public career, and after his apprehension, lain heavy 
 upon his mind. " The terror of it is so removed," he 
 said, "that I would rather be cast into a caldron of 
 boiling oil, than do anything to wrong truth." To some 
 friends who were bemoaning his loss, he addressed these 
 deeply touching w^ords : — " You have more need to 
 thank the Lord, that I shall now be taken away from 
 the reproaches which have broken my heart, and which 
 (jannot be otherwise wiped off." Poor young sufferer ! 
 and so the evil days and the evil tongues had struck 
 him more keenly than appeared to the outward eye, — 
 looking only at the composed and beautiful countenance, 
 and the mildness and serenity of his demeanom*. 
 
 The heads of his indictment were — his denymg the 
 King's authority, his preaching the unlawfulness of pay- 
 ing Cess (the war-tax), and his counselling his followers 
 to come with arms to the field meetings. He in fact 
 admitted the indictment. 
 
 " I own all authority," he said, " which has its pre- 
 scriptions and limitations from the Word of God ; but 
 cannot own this usurper as lawful king, seeing both by 
 the Word of God such a one is incapable to bear rule, 
 and also by the ancient laws of the kingdom, wliich 
 admit none to the Crown of Scotland until he swear to 
 defend the Protestant religion, which a man of his pro- 
 fession cannot do. ... As to the cess exacted to the 
 present usurper, I hold it unlawful to pay it, both in 
 regard it is oppressive to the subjects for the mainten- 
 
366 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 aiice of tyranny, and because it is imposed for the sup- 
 pression of the gospel. Would it have been thought 
 la^yful/' he exclaimed, Avarming Avith his theme as he 
 proceeded — " Would it have been thought lawful for 
 the Jews, in the days of Nebuchadnezzar, each to bring 
 a coal to augment the flame of the furnace, to devour 
 the three children, if they had been so required by the 
 tyrant ? And how can it be lawful, either to oppress 
 people for not bowing to the idols which the King sets 
 up, or for their brethren to contribute what may help 
 forward their oppression ] . . . That I have taught my 
 hearers to come armed to their meetings, and, in case of 
 hostile opposition, to resist — I admit. It were incon- 
 sistent with reason and religion to teach otherwise. 
 You, yourselves, in the like circumstances, would do the 
 same. I own I taught them to carry arms to defend 
 themselves, and to resist the acts of violence perpetrated 
 by your command, or under your authority." 
 
 As a matter of course he was brought in " guilty ;" 
 and was sentenced to be executed within three days. 
 The Justice-General asked, if he desired longer time. 
 With the tranquil magnanimity which always charac- 
 terized him, he answered, " It is all one to me. If pro- 
 tracted, it is welcome : if shortened, it is welcome. My 
 Master's time is the best." 
 
 After sentence, the greatest efforts were made by 
 official men and parties in connexion with the Govern- 
 ment, in order to have his life saved. What the motive 
 was, it is difficult at this distance of time to ascertain. 
 It might in part be owing to the interest which his 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 367 
 
 talents, integrity, and mild demeanour, even his youth 
 and beauty, had undoubtedly excited in some of the 
 leading men of the State. In this case — the first and 
 only time these thirty barbarous years — something like 
 heart was displayed by the nilers. This anxiety to pre- 
 vent any fresh execution might also be attributable to 
 the fine doctrines of universal toleration now in vogue 
 amongst the governing party. In Scotland, as in Eng- 
 land, though not in the same marked degree, the 
 Anglicans and the Romanists were both bidding against 
 each other for the favour of the people, especially of the 
 Nonconformists ; and they might both dread the effect 
 of Renwick's execution on popular opinion, the odium of 
 which might be thrown on either of them, or on both, 
 and kindle new and increased hostility against them. 
 The Bishop of Edinburgh, and several of his curates, 
 the King's Advocate (Sir John Dalrymple), and even a 
 number of Romish priests, thronged his prison — all in 
 one way or other importuning him to apply for pardon ; 
 or to signify in the most modified terms that he acknow- 
 ledged the authority of the King, and his pardon would 
 immediately be granted. If he would sign his name, or 
 even let fall a drop of ink on a blank sheet of paper, he 
 was assured of pardon. But he resisted all these temp- 
 tations with a firmness which commanded respect, and 
 with a meekness, and a sense of the courtesy shown to 
 him, which seem to have inspired personal esteem and 
 regard. The Bishop commended him highly as a young 
 man of ability — often saying, " It was a pity he had 
 been of such principles, for he was a pretty lad !" The 
 
3 68 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 Jesuits, who troubled him very much, seem to have 
 fared the worst at his hands ; for it was a proverb in 
 Edinburgh Tolbooth for many years afterwards — 
 " Begone ! as Renwick said to the Priests." 
 
 On the morning of his execution, he writes in the 
 following terms to Sir Robert Hamilton : — " This being 
 my last day upon earth, I thought it my duty to send 
 you this my last salutation. The Lord hath been won- 
 derfully gracious to me since I came to prison. He 
 hath assured me of His salvation, helped me to give a 
 testimony for Him, and own before His enemies all that 
 I have taught ; and strengthened me to resist and repel 
 many temptations and assaults." After giving the most 
 cool, business-like directions as to some papers of his, 
 which WTre in Hamilton's hands, he thus concludes : 
 " Remember me to all that are friends to you, particu- 
 larly to the ladies at Lewarden (in Holland), to whom I 
 would have written if I had not been kept close in 
 prison, and pen, ink, and paper kept from me. But I 
 must break off. I go to your God and my God. Death 
 to me is as a bed to* the weary." " Death to me is as 
 a bed to tJie weary f' These were the last words, 
 within a few moments of his execution, traced by the 
 hand of James Renwick — still, for years, in the morn- 
 ing of life — ere his sun had reached its noon. Oh, 
 what a weight of labour, what a web of care, what an 
 age of sad experience, w^hat a crushing of the young 
 earthly feelings, are in these few dirge-like words, 
 " Death to me is as a bed to the weary V 
 
 When he came to the place of execution, on the 1 7th 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 369 
 
 February 1G88, he manifested his habitual composure, 
 fortitude, and spiritual elevation of mind. Never had 
 been seen such a multitude as was there gathered, of 
 earnest and sorrowing spectators. The furnace of mar- 
 tyrdom was refining him, and making him precious in 
 all eyes, even in those which had hitherto despised or 
 looked upon him with jealousy. Little of what he said 
 was heard, for the drums beat all the time he spoke ; 
 and he was frequently interrupted by the officials who 
 were upon the scaffold, probably when he uttered ex- 
 pressions which they construed into a reflection upon 
 the Government. Once only, when there happened to 
 be a momentary pause, his clear, sweet, ethereal voice, 
 was heard by the assembled thousands, like one great 
 sudden gush of the lark's melody as it is mounting 
 heavenwards : "I shall soon be above these clouds — I 
 shall soon be above these clouds ; then shall I enjoy 
 Thee and glorify Thee, my Father ! without interrup- 
 tion, and without intermission, for ever !" 
 
 In a few moments he submitted to the executioner, 
 and the yearnings of his soul were realized. 
 
 Renwick was, in one sense, the last martyr of the 
 Covenanting struggle ; in another, he was the Pre- 
 martyr of the Revolution. Like the shepherd over- 
 whelmed in the snow-storm, he perished within sight of 
 the door. The door of deliverance was speedily opened 
 on the arrival of William in November 1688. 
 
370 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 XIL 
 
 THE REVOLUTION OF 1688. 
 
 After James's accessiou in 1G88, iit least after he 
 had got rid of all his foes by the discomfiture of Argyle 
 and Monmouth, his policy, as we have already noticed, 
 underwent a sudden and total change. Ha^dng, as 
 he fancied, reached the summit of absolute power, he 
 recurred to his long-cherished project of establishing 
 Eomanism in Britain. He commenced his operations 
 by affecting to extend toleration to all classes of Non- 
 conformists, and by repealing the tests and penal laws 
 on which the Church of England had reared her supre- 
 macy. This looked all very well on the outside ; but 
 the nation were aware that these pseudo-liberal measures 
 were only meant to usher in the old Popish domination. 
 Here once more came up the point, and the only point, 
 where all the religious sects and all the political parties 
 of the country could unite. Whatever their differences 
 otherwise, the attempt to introduce Popery was sure to 
 bind them fast together. The alarm once given, they 
 ■\\'ere all up in arms against the Coiu-t. The Anglicans 
 contributed their corporate influence, their weight of 
 numbers, the learning and eloquence of their highly- 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTKKS. 371 
 
 trained dignitaries ; the Nonconformists tlieir active and 
 fer\dd zeal ; the Royalists their old English prejudices, 
 and their old English swords, if needed ; the Popular 
 party their aristocratic chiefs, their traditions and watch- 
 words, and the memory of their recently martyred Bus- 
 sells, and Sidneys, and.Baillies. It was the movement 
 of a nation. It was decisive and resistless. 
 
 Besides, the complication of European politics at the 
 mom.ent rendered it necessary to wrest the empire of 
 Britain from the coiTupt, cruel, detested hands of the 
 Stuarts, who, from tlie strong, racy, original stem, had, 
 in the two last of the race, degenerated into rotten 
 stumps. Both Charles and James were sold to France 
 for so many million francs ; and James, in mind and 
 spirit, was the most miserable, drivelling slave that ever 
 kissed a Pope's toe ; and he never would have rested 
 until, had it been possible, he had dragooned every stift'- 
 necked Briton in his dominions to perform the same de- 
 grading operation. William of Orange, in whom both 
 European necessities and British predilections centred, 
 came over with 14,000 Dutch bayonets, and cut the 
 matter short. On his approach, the race of the Stuarts 
 melted away from the throne of Britain, like a guilty 
 spectre at the first dawning of morn. 
 
 The part taken at this turning-point of Britain's 
 history by the strict Covenanters or Cameronians was 
 decided and eventful. Amongst the parties of the day 
 they stood alone for energy, disinterestedness, courage, 
 and unalloyed public zeal. 
 
372 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 In about six months from the martyrdom of James 
 Renwick, the alarm rang through the country, that Wil- 
 liam of Orange was on his way to the British shores. 
 
 Confining our view more particularly to Scotland, all 
 was there consternation, confusion, helpless paralysis. 
 The Scottish ]Ministry, lately irresistible in their ter- 
 rorism, with their ijrisons, racks, and scaffolds, were 
 blasted as in a night, and fell into universal contempt. 
 Tliey kindled beacons on the hill-tops to rouse the people 
 against the threatened invasion. The people, on the con- 
 trary, rejoiced in these blazing lights as the first morning 
 beams of their own deliverance. The butchering troopers 
 being called up to England by the King, the Ministry 
 issued proclamation on the back of proclamation, sum- 
 moning the militia. "They called spirits from the 
 vasty deep, but would they come ?" The only response 
 was mockery and laughter. The head-torturers, Perth 
 and all his sanguinary brood, fled headlong from the 
 seat of power, and left Scotland without a government. 
 The Cavalier or Royalist party were like men suddenly 
 awakened in the midst of a shipwreck. A few retii'ed 
 sullenly to the poop, determined to go dovrn with the 
 vessel ; but most of them were clutching at spars and 
 splinters to carry them, if possible, to some place of 
 safety. The Moderate Presbyterians, those who for the 
 last thirty years had been edging as far as they could out 
 of the sweep of persecution, and had been thankfully 
 accepting indulgences and tolerations, and been denounc- 
 ing their stricter co-religionists, vilifying Cargill and 
 Cameron and Renwick, mingling in the hue and cry 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTEES. 373 
 
 against the United Societies, and branding the Armed 
 Conventicles in terms the most opprobrious ; the Mode- 
 rates, who, amid the upheaving shocks of Revolution, 
 always affect a monopoly of wisdom, and are always to 
 do such great things when the proper time comes, which 
 proper time will be somewhere about the Greek kalends, 
 — these Moderate Presbyterians were as prostrated and 
 helpless as the RoyaUsts. They had condemned and dis- 
 couraged the use of arms, and had joined, open-mouthed, 
 against the armed Cameronians as rebels and assassins ; 
 and now, without arms, without discipline, without con- 
 cert, and enfeebled by their own timid habits, and their 
 system of compliances contrary to their fundamental 
 principles, they stood trembling and terrified like a flock 
 of sheep, gazing wistfully at what might happen, but 
 having no definite policy, and unable to originate any 
 direct or active movement. In the meantime, William 
 of Orange, though accompanied in his march with end- 
 less good wishes and complimentary addresses, had little 
 real force to depend upon but his own fourteen thousand 
 heavy and stubborn Dutchmen. And as regarded Scot- 
 land and Ireland, the Royalists were beginning to recover 
 from their first fright, and to assume a very menacing 
 attitude. Claverhouse was posting to Scotland to take 
 command of his dragoons — commander and troops tho- 
 roughly matched — burning with wrath to crimson their 
 swords once more in the blood of Scotland's peasantry. 
 
 Was the country then to be plunged back, before it 
 had well breathed, into the horrors from which there 
 had seemed a prospect of escape ^ Was there to be no 
 
37-4 THE FIFTY YEARS' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 voice raised ? no defence offered ? Were no volunteers 
 to start up for mother-land, and the national faith ? 
 Yes ! the silence was suddenly broken ; the nation was 
 instantaneously revived, and made to feel that she still 
 liad undegenerate sons. Clear and loud as the clarion's 
 sound — distinct, hold, and unwavering, from the wild 
 mountain solitudes of Wanlockhead, long the haunt and 
 refuge of the persecuted, — there issued a voice, when all 
 others were mute. It was the voice of the Gameronian 
 Hod ! And thus it spake : — " Duty and safety require 
 that we should rise in a posture of defence, when all 
 will be compelled to take a side and declare whom they 
 are for. It will be a reproach, when the quarrel is for 
 religion and liberty, if they who have borne arms 
 hitherto for the defence thereof, shall now lay them 
 by as indifferent." 
 
 Listen to the well-known accents I The same voice 
 in 1688 that was heard in 1638 ; the lapse of fifty 
 years has neither cracked nor weakened its freedom- 
 loving, tyranny-defying tones. 
 
 The armed Gameronian s modelled themselves into a 
 military force. They were the first Volunteers in Britain 
 who appeared for the Revolution of 1688. They — the 
 persecuted, despised, maligned Cameronians — were called 
 to Edinburgh to protect the Scottish Parliament, whilst 
 deliberating on the transfer of the crowTi to William, 
 against the perils which environed them from the plots 
 of the Jacobites, who were mustering together imder 
 Claverhouse. For this inestimable service, they accepted 
 the thanks of tlie Parhament, but refused any pay ; they 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 375 
 
 were serving, not as mercenaries, but as men devoted by 
 Covenant to the salvation of their country. And now 
 that they had arms in their hands — in short, were the 
 only army in Scotland, and had full scope to wreak re- 
 tribution on their persecutors, to have at least one bloody 
 week of vengeance for thirty years of nameless wrongs 
 and horrors — did they break loose into Sicilian Vespers, 
 or a repetition of St. Bartholomew's Day ? No ! but the 
 United Societies, their authoritative body — as opposed 
 to anarchy as to despotism — learning that here and there 
 a disposition was manifested to " rabble the curates,"' 
 published a Manifesto, which almost entirely put a sto}) 
 to these comparatively trifling disturbances. " Per- 
 ceiving that some are too bent to take redress of wrongs 
 rashly at their own hand, in doing whereof disorders 
 may be committed whereby the cause, their brethren, 
 and themselves will sufl'er reproach, we judge it expe- 
 dient that parties aggrieved should not at their own hand 
 take redress, seeing titer e are now some hopes of getting 
 wrongs redressed in a legal and orderly manner.'''' 
 
 And, finally, when the Revolution Government, though 
 nationally recognised and sanctioned, was still infirm and 
 precarious, and in urgent want of increased military force, 
 especially in Scotland, — in the spring of 1689, without 
 bounty, without beat of drum, starting to their feet in a 
 moment at the cry of their distressed mother-land, the 
 Cameronians assembled, nine thousand strong, on Douglas 
 Moor, the very gate into their western hills, those glorious 
 ramparts of British freedom ; and at once, without the 
 least difficulty, and without any stimulus except a belief 
 
376 THE FIFTY YEAES' STRUGGLE OF 
 
 that the Revolution was in danger, and a determination 
 to defend and establish it, they turned out a regiment of 
 eight hundred brethren, ready armed, fit for the field, 
 under the command of Lord Angus, and William Cleland, 
 the young hero of DiTimclog. This was the origin of the 
 celebrated Cameronian re^/hient. They fiu-ther oflered 
 to the Government to raise and equip other regiments, if 
 required — and ultimately they consecrated 1200 brethren 
 in all — to aid in securing, and placing beyond all danger 
 of attack, the newly-planted liberties of the country, civil 
 and religious. 
 
 Such was the part which the Cameronians performed 
 in achieving the Revolution of 1688. These armed, and 
 trained, and desert-bred, and God-covenanted legions 
 were the legacy which Cameron and Renwick bequeathed 
 to their country, when the hour struck for Britain's re- 
 demption, or her tenfold slavery for generations and 
 generations to come. 
 
 f And so far, the Revolution Settlement — in the 
 / main adopting what was universal, and rejecting what 
 I was exclusive or over-grasping in their views — was the 
 consummation and triumph, civilly, and politically, and 
 \ to a large extent ecclesiastically, of " The Fifty Years' 
 i Struggle of the Scottish Covenanters." 
 
 We have thus surveyed the whole fifty years of the 
 Covenanting struggle, from the first swearing of the 
 Covenant in 1638 to the settlement at the Revolution 
 of 1688, when its objects were substantially accom- 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVEXAXTERS. 377 
 
 plished, and when it ceased, therefore, as a paper docu- 
 ment, to have any further active operation. 
 
 Under the Stuart reaction, seeking absolute sove- 
 reignty, and, as one step to that end, a king-ruled 
 Church, there was aimed a deadly blow at legitimate 
 aristocratic power, at public opinion, and at the con- 
 science and independence of man as a religious being. 
 To countermine this universal attack, the Parliament 
 and the Kirk of Scotland united as one ; and, seeing 
 that no national movement can be brought into cohe- 
 rence, or rendered permanent, without some imific sym- 
 bol, the leaders both of Kirjk and Parliament caught up 
 the whole voices of the people, and compressed into the 
 Covenants all that they were vaguely and inarticulately 
 longing to express. 
 
 The Covenants, viewed not simply in themselves, but 
 under the side-lights thrown upon them by their received 
 interpreters, like all popular standards, had something 
 that was local and special, and breathed the imperfec- 
 tions of the particular age ; and something universal, 
 and perpetual, and interesting to all mankind, so long 
 as there shall be such things as the true love of liberty, 
 and the free, pure exercise of religious belief and worship. 
 There was Universality, and there was Exclvsivism. 
 That which was exclusive, was the avowed intention to 
 extirpate (putting the most charitable construction upon 
 the modes of extirpation which were meant) — to extir- 
 pate certain other churches and creeds, and the desire 
 and tendency to impose upon the three kingdoms, if 
 possible upon the world, a Presbyterian uniformity. 
 
.'i78 THE FIFTY YEARs' STKUCJiJLE OF 
 
 Tliat which was univerml was tlie principle, that the 
 I>eople should be governed by fixed laws jtassed in assem- 
 blies representing the national will ; and that religious 
 belief, and the Church as the embodied organ of the 
 individual beliefs, should be secured in perfect spiritual 
 independence. 
 
 It may be true that many of the (Jovenanters attached 
 equal value to the Exclusivism as to the Universality. 
 It may lie true that they would not have struggled so 
 long and strciniously, witli the ardour of devotees, with 
 the braveiy of soldiers, with the constancy of martyrs, 
 for that whicli was universal, if they had not been in- 
 cited by the expectation of thereljy gaining, for the 
 aggrandizement of tlieir own sect, that which was exclu- 
 sive. All this may be partially tnie, and it is true only 
 })artially. But if we had time to illustrate, this is a tale 
 which may be told of all even the most patriotic parties, 
 of all even the most important and beneficial movements. 
 Tlie motive power may be a temporaiy and imperfect 
 thing, yet the principles which are involved, and the 
 results which are wrought out, may l)e of essential and 
 lasting benefit to the world. The si)ur which rouses 
 into mettle the swift steed, is a piece of didl, cold steel ; 
 the occasion is nothing ; it is the fine muscle and noble 
 blood of the animal that truly cany him forward in 
 the race. Is it not from a worthless-looking nut that 
 nature rears her oaks ? Is it not within a rough, mean 
 coating that she forms her precious pearls ] So is it 
 with great human struggles and great human reforma- 
 tions. The immediate impulse may be common, insig- 
 
TKE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 379 
 
 iiificant, imperfect, yet we must do justice to the great 
 principles which have been stirred up and driven forward 
 in the movement, and to the golden prize, richer than 
 perhaps he dreamed of or anticipated, which ultimately 
 crowns the brow of the charioteer. 
 
 But whatever impetus the Covenanters might derive 
 from the not unnatural desire to see their own creed and 
 sect all triumphant, on the other hand, that they were 
 perfectly cognizant of — that consciously and purposely, 
 as part of their struggle, they laboured after — that which 
 was universal in civil and religious liberty, has been 
 previously demonstrated beyond the possibility of con- 
 tradiction. 
 
 It is this which connects tliem with ourselves. I have 
 not been rehearsing an old-world tragedy, " a tale of 
 Troy divine," which may tickle the ear or excite the 
 feelings, but which does not touch our (jwn blood, or 
 come home to our own business and bosoms. In the 
 grand leading outline, their principles are ours. Their 
 mode of national action is the same which we now adopt 
 for achieving any great and difficult public object — that 
 is, by aggregate association, and by binding oiu-selves to 
 some standard document expressive of our general prin- 
 ciples. They grappled, on its first appearance, with the 
 monster form of Absolutism, under which, but for their 
 determined and long-continued resistance, we might have 
 been trampled down even till this day. Their Fifty 
 Years' Struggle has insured us our many long years of 
 peace and freedom. If we sit at our firesides in security ; 
 if we travel and traffic without restraint ; if we own no 
 
380 THE FIFTY years' strug(;le of 
 
 subjection luit to fixed law ; if \ve know little or no- 
 thing of the influence of the Crown beyond the good 
 example and beneficent actions of the possessor of it ; if 
 we have rii^lits and franchises, and are proud of our 
 burgh charters, and are convened together to elect our 
 legislators ; if we hold ])n]ilic meetings, and every man 
 may sjjcak out his mind according to his measure of un- 
 derstanding and courage, there being none to make him 
 afraid ; if we can read and hear and discourse at plea- 
 sure, always witliin the fair l>ounds of truth and justice 
 to our ncigldxmrs : if we can sing the evening psalm in 
 tlie bosom of our families with none to mock or molest ; 
 if the Sab]>ath bell, in silvery sweetness, calls us to otier 
 the sacrifice of free worsiiij) to (»ur God — almost every- 
 thing we do, or enjoy, or exj)ect, connects us in the Umds 
 of a sacred union, which distance of time does not im- 
 pair but only the more hallows, with the spirits of our 
 ( 'ovenanting forefathers. 
 
 We shall b(\st repay their care, and best i)ruve that 
 we are their true posterity, if we preserve witli jealous 
 fidelity the rights which they have transmitted to us, at 
 the cost of how much sutivring, how much blood ; and 
 if we gradually carry out those rights fiirther and farther, 
 l)eyond what was given to them to accomjdish, to foresee, 
 even to conceive. Like them, let us not be solely ab- 
 sorbed in material interests, but act up to the full free- 
 dom and dignity of man. It is well that we shoidd 
 have our physical comforts, our sanitarj' improvements, 
 our new commercial openings, our high-art decorations : 
 
THE SCOTTISH COVENANTERS. 381 
 
 but it is also well, it is better, that we should possess 
 and carefully guard our rights as intellectual, moral, 
 active, and religious beings. Had it been the will of 
 our Creator, that our mere outer-world interests should 
 be the be-all and end- all of our existence — that we 
 should only be clean-littered like the bullock, well fed 
 like the dog, regularly trained and breathed like the 
 horse, and ridden with bit and s})ur to kec]) us from 
 stumbling, and to get us properly along in our journey 
 of life, — if, in short. Materialistic Government had been 
 all that God intended us for, I venture to surmise that 
 He would have constituted our natures somewhat differ- 
 ently than He has done, and in their formation would 
 have kept out one thing which happens to be there — one 
 thing which happens to be the greatest there — one thing 
 which happens to be the essential glory of man, shared 
 by no other creature on earth — that is, the inquiring, 
 aspiring, ever-working Soul ! 
 
 Despise then the designing cant about Paternal 
 Government^ which of late has been creeping too much 
 even into this free, bold country of ours. Scorn the 
 shallow modern foppery which lisps as if the world were 
 made for Caesar ; as if we should simply eat and drink, 
 and die to-morrow ; as if there were not a principle 
 worth the trouble of moving one's tongue ; as if there 
 were not a human right worth a moment's struggle, far 
 less a struggle of Fifty Years. I adjure you — especially 
 ye brave, uncorrupted youth who may be hearing me — 
 to keep yourselves unspotted from this jargon of slavery, 
 from these dregs of a used-up civilisation, running down 
 
.H^l' THK FIFTY YF:aR> STRrOHLK OF 
 
 into inert' athfisni, and the Lost c«»rnii»tion of moriliund 
 states. Tlie good old maidy custom in Britain — may 
 it 1k' i>eri»etual ! — lias ]>een, to contend earnestly for all 
 Imnian rii^hts. Never let ns sell our hirthright : never 
 let us pawn our crown. Least of all note, when we are 
 tliC elder lintJiren (d' great empires of free men, alrea<ly 
 Iteginnini; to cover the wide ]>rairies of Canada, and the 
 lioumlless tracts of tlic Australian continent. 
 
 Mut altove all. let us study that our lives Ik- more 
 noble all"! ('liri>tian. Such lives will Ik- the best anti- 
 dote against the evils which now threaten EurojM', and 
 are even crusting a shade over the horizon of our own 
 country. What avails our l>oast, " The Bible, the Bible 
 is the religion of Protestants," if, whilst our creed is 
 l>il»lical, our lives and aetions are unl>ibli<al ? I am not 
 afraid of foreign despotisms or invasions. Britain has 
 resources and energ}' enough to meet an«l foil all men* 
 external and jthysical ii-xsaults. \Vliat I most dread, as 
 portemling evil and ruin, is the pride, and avarice, and 
 cornij)tion, and fraud, and tawdiy idiotic vanity which 
 ])revail so much amongst us, and which, I think, are 
 upon the increase amongst the young. A thousand bar- 
 barous legions rushing agjiinst the boss of our shield, 
 Would l>e sna])t like so many bulrushes. But our own 
 vices and follies may unfit us for l>eing any longer CJod's 
 instruments, as in many important respects we have 
 hitherto been, in " teaching the nations how to live," 
 and the Governments how to rule with freedom and 
 order combined. 
 
Till-: SCOTTISH COVK.VANTKRS. 3S;i 
 
 And let others trust for renovation and iniprovenicnt 
 to mere human agency : I cannot. P^ven philosopliy 
 and tlie facts of tlie age pronounce any sueh expeetation 
 to b(! liopeless. A higher Powrr must intervene. A 
 new and cele^tial influence, fresli from tlie chamlters of 
 tiie sky, must breatiie upon society, an<l (piicken, cleanse, 
 and sweeten it. As God alone could create, as CJod 
 alone ui>holds, so (lod alone can regenerate and renew 
 the world, wlien it has sunk into one of its periods of 
 moral decadence and di.ssolution. 
 
 That He may sjieedily do so, ami esj)ecially that He 
 may winnow and purify Britain, and render her more 
 tlian ever the missionary of civili.sation, freedom, and 
 religion to the ends of the earth, — let this W our earnest 
 l)rayer, let this be our huml)le endeavour, as fellow- 
 workers along with His almighty goodness. T believe 
 in the future of my country. Our em])ire has not hiUf 
 accomplished her mission. Heaven's liglit pr>ints the 
 way, and a Voice from the cloud j.roclaim.s, " Britain 1 
 continue to be tlie nurse of Freedom ! thk mighty 
 
 MOTHKR OF FUKK COLONIES, AND OF TMK FITURE FRFA'. 
 KMP1KE.S OF THE WORLD 1" 
 
i .X I) i: \. 
 
 Acf8 of the Dniukcn Parliament, lOi, 
 105. 120,332. 
 
 Adams, John, a merchant in LiOion, 
 216. 
 
 Anpu.'', Lord, c'immand.s the Camerooian 
 Uei,'iracnt, 31<>. 
 
 Annnndale's Letter quoted, 151. 
 
 Arpvle, Archibald, 7th Earl, character 
 of, 73, 74. 
 
 Anrjie, Archiliald, Sth Earl, and Mar- 
 quis of, 26, 27 ; declares hi'^ adhe.<l<in 
 to the Covenant, 31 ; ojiposes the En- 
 gagement, 59 ; speech on the '• Act 
 of Classes," 00 : at the Coronation of 
 Charles ii., 63. i'>6 . bis irreat power, 
 68 ; proposes that Charles should 
 marry his dau^rhter, C>9 ; sides with 
 Cromwell. 7l . his political character, 
 72-83 ; represent the Protesters. 86, 
 98 : sent to the Tower, 103, 104 : re- 
 moved to Edinburgh. lOr); iriiil. 106- 
 108: deportiiient after inal, 101); 
 executii>n, 1 11. 
 
 Argyle, .tVrchibald. 9th Earl of. as Lord 
 Lorn, a ke»ii Royali«t. 102 ; inter- 
 cedes for his father, loS; Fcntonced 
 to death, escapes, 306 ; inrasion of, 
 306. 324 
 
 Arlinirton. Lord, 136, 181 : see Cabal. 
 
 Armed Conventicles. 204-208. 
 
 Amot. Captain, joins the insurccnts, 
 151 : at the battle of Pentland, 161. 
 
 Athole. Marquis of, 201. 
 
 Ayrsmoss. fight at. 263. 
 
 Baillie, George, 310, 322, 323. 
 
 Baillie, Principal, letters quoted, 32. 33. 
 63. 76. 81, 98. 
 
 Baillie, Robert, of Jerviswoode : his po- 
 litical character, 306 ; family. 30S : 
 portrait, 310-312 ; apprehended in 
 o 
 
 London, 31 4 ; sent to Edinbureh, 3K. ; 
 heavily tined, 317, 332 ; his trial, 317- 
 :r22; execution. .".•J2. 
 Balfour, John, of Burley, assists at 
 I Sharp's a-s.HJi.'vsination, 221-230 ; at 
 I Kruinclo;:. 240. 241. 
 Bjilfour. J<ir Jauu-i. Works quoted, 27. 
 60. 78. 
 I Balmerino. 26. 
 Bannatyne. Sir W.. cashiered, 192. ]'J3 
 li<uHifim iMnron of James, 16. 
 Ba.«s Kock. 334-33»;. 
 niyth. Captain. 242. 
 Book of Common Prayer framed by 
 
 liaud, 28. 
 Book of Discipline, the Second, 11. 
 Borthwick. an agent of the Covenanters. 
 
 quoted. 34. 
 Boswells of Auchinleck, 347. 
 Botbwell Brid-c, Battle of. 244-252. 
 Breda Declaration, 102. 
 Brown, John, of Pric^thill, 326. 
 , Brown, John, of Wamphray. 102: ba- 
 nished, finds .in asylum in Holland. 
 2'34-26fi. 
 Bruce of Earlshall's Reriment, 282. 
 \ Buckimzham, a member of the Cabal. 
 I 181. 
 
 , Burnet. Archbishop, of Gla«gow, warn? 
 I the Government, iJrC ; his letter t<> 
 ; Secretary Williamson, 177, lSS-191: 
 
 despair. 191. 
 , Burnet. Gilbert, on Ar^le. 78; on the 
 1 Drunken Parliament. 104 : on Robert 
 j Hamilton, 23'^ : on Claverhouse. 230 : 
 ! on Baillie of Jerviswoode, 312,317. 
 
 Cabal Mini.=:try, ISl ; falls to pieces, 202. 
 Callendar, Lord. 307. 
 Cameronians, 2S7 : form United Socie- 
 ties, 294 ; excluded from the tolera- 
 
386 
 
 INDEX. 
 
 tion, 354 ; first volunteers for the Re- 
 volution of 1688, 374. 
 
 Cameron, Richard, 261 ; birth and pa- 
 rentage, 262 ; his character, 263, 267 ; 
 visits Holland, 264, 265 ; ordained at 
 Rotterdam, 265 ; leader of the Co- 
 venanters, 267; extracts from his 
 sermons, 270-274, 2'r6-281 ; Sanquhar 
 Declaration, 274 ; his last sermon, 277 ; 
 his death at Ayrsmoss, 284. 
 
 Cameron, Michael, 274, 282, 283. 
 
 Campbell, Sir Hugh, of Cessnock, im- 
 prisoned, 139. 
 
 Campbells of Cessnock, 308. 
 
 Cardross, Lord, 307. 
 
 Cargill, Donald, 260 ; prepares the 
 Queensferry paper, 261 ; one of the 
 three preachers to the Remnant, 269 ; 
 execution, 285, 294. 
 
 Carraichael, W., 221. 
 
 Charles i., his political character, 21; 
 diflaculties with the Scottish nobility, 
 24, 25 ; execution, 61. 
 
 Charles ii. invited home by the Co- 
 venanters, 62 ; crowned, 63 ; Resto- 
 ration, 91 : character and opinions, 
 91-94 ; Court and Government, 180, 
 181 ; death, 326. 
 
 Chevne's character of George Baillie, 310. 
 
 Church of England, 16. 
 
 Church ; see Kirk, 9. 
 
 Clare, Father, 351. 
 
 Clapham, Mrs., letter quoted, 134. 
 
 Clarendon, 92-95, 180 : supports Sharp, 
 124 ; his character of Rothes, 26. 
 
 Claverhouse ; see Graham. 
 
 Cleland, William, at Drumclog, 240, 
 241; at Bothwell Bridge, 245; ap- 
 pointed Colonel of the Cameronian 
 Regiment, 376. 
 
 Clerk, John, of Muirbrook, 346. 
 
 Clifford, a member of the Cabal, 181. 
 
 Cochrane, Sir John, of Ochiltree, 308. 
 
 Coke, Roger, quoted, 92. 
 
 Committee for Public Affairs, 204. 
 
 Confession of Faith (original in Knox's 
 time) confirmed, 11. 
 
 Conventicle, Armed, 204-208. 
 
 Conway papers, quoted, 25. 
 
 Cooper, Anthony Ashley; see Shaftes- 
 bury. 
 
 Corson, James, narrative of the sufifer- 
 ings of prisoners at Bothwell, 255. 
 
 Cra\vford, Cornet, 242. 
 
 Crawford of Crawfordland, 308. 
 
 Crawford, Earl of, 220. 
 
 Cromwell, 57, 84; victory at Dunbar, 
 70 ; death, 86. 
 
 Cromwell, Richard, 85-87. 
 Cuningham, Argyle's physician, 110. 
 Cunningham, Sir William. 139. 
 
 Dalrymple, Sir John, 367. 
 
 Dalziel, Thomas, of Binns : his charac- 
 ter, 139-143 ; ordered to march to 
 Glasgow, 150, 155, 157, 158 ; at Rul- 
 lion Green, 160-166: his conduct not 
 inquired into, 191. 
 
 Danby's Administration, 203, 246. 
 
 Daniel, WiUiam, 242. 
 
 Desborough, 136. 
 
 Devonshire, Countess of, 26. 
 
 Devonshire, Duke of ; his daughter turns 
 Romanist, 52. 
 
 Dixon, an agent of the Malcontents, 
 133. 
 
 Douglas, Marchioness of, 172. 
 
 Douglas, Robert, 64, 67. 
 
 Douglas, Thomas ; sermon at Drumclog, 
 239. 
 
 Drumclog, 239-242. 
 
 Drummond, Lieutenant - General, at 
 Pentland, 161, 162. 
 
 " Drunken Act ;" see Acts. 
 
 Drunken Parliament ; see Acts. 
 
 Dumfries, Countess of, 348. 
 
 Dysart, Countess of ; her birth, parent- 
 age, and character, 197-200 ; becomes 
 Duchess of Lauderdale, 202. 
 
 Dysart, Earl of; see Murray. 
 
 Edinburgh, Bishop of, 367 : see Wishart. 
 " Engagement," The, 59. 
 Erskine, Alexander ; letter quoted, 35. 
 Es-ex, Lord, 91 ; his administration, 246. 
 
 Fairfoul, Bishop of Glasgow, 114. 
 Ferguson of Knockdow, 334. 
 Fleming, Daniel, 157. 
 Fleming, Sir William, 103. 
 Fletcher, Sir John, 105. 
 Fowler, Captain John, 247. 
 
 General Assembly of 1638, 31. 
 
 Gillespie, Patrick, 63. 
 
 Glencairn, Chancellor, 108, 125. 
 
 Gordon, Alexander, of Earlstoun, 285. 
 
 Gower, Sir Thomas, 133 ; diary, 134, 135. 
 
 Graden, Lady, 317. 318, 322. 
 
 Graham, John, of Claverhouse ; his pa- 
 rentage, character, and political opin- 
 ions, 234-237 ; at Drumclog, 239-242 ; 
 his efforts to aid James in 1688, 337-5. 
 
INDEX. 
 
 387 
 
 Grange, Lord, on the character of Peden, 
 329. 
 
 Gray, Andrew, 146-149. 
 
 Gray, James, of Chryston, 282, 2S4. 
 
 Guizot quoted, 51. 
 
 Guthrie, Bishop, quoted, 28. 
 
 Guthrie, James, of Stirling, heads pro- 
 testers, 70, 86 ; excommunicates Mid- 
 dletou, 95 ; despatched to London, 
 98 ; last interview with Argyle, 110. 
 
 Ffackston, David, of Rathillet; present 
 at Sharp's death, 221-229; at Drum - 
 clog, 240; at Bothwell Bridge, 245- 
 250 ; taken prisoner at Ayrsmoss, 282- 
 284. 
 
 Haddington, Lord, .307. 
 
 Halket. Colonel Robert, 139. 
 
 Hall, Henrv, of Ilauiihhead, at Drum- 
 clog, 240 ; at BothweU, 245-247, 263. 
 
 Hallam quoted. :B9. 
 
 Halton, Lord, 199, 200. 
 
 Hamilton, Bishop, of Galloway, 114. 
 
 Hamilton, Marquis of, 58. 
 
 Hamilton, Duke of, heads a coalition, 
 202. 
 
 Hamilton, Duchess of, intercedes for 
 M'Kail, 172. 
 
 Hamilton, Sir Robert, of Preston ; pa- 
 rentage, character, 233. 234 ; political 
 opinions, 234 ; at Drumclog, 239, 240 ; 
 at Bothwell, 244 ; his incapacity, 244, 
 246, 248; assists in the formation of 
 United Societies, 28G ; correspondence 
 with Renwick, .360, 368. 
 
 Henderson, Alexander, 30, 49, 64, 72. 
 
 High Commission Court, 125. 
 
 Highland Host, 211-214. 
 
 Hobbes, 18. 
 
 Holbom of Menstrie, Major-General, 
 139. 
 
 Houston, an associate of Renwick, 355, 
 361. 
 
 Hume, David, minister of Coldingham, 
 248. 
 
 Hutcheson, George, 109. 
 
 Independents, .57. 
 Indulgence, 194. 
 
 Irvine, Stephen, a Dumfries magistrate, 
 149. 
 
 James i., 3, 16, 23, 26. 
 James ii.. 181, 191, 306, 308, 349. 
 Jenkins, Secretary, correspondence, 314. 
 Justice, Thomas, 361. 
 
 Keene, Father, .351. 
 
 Ken-. Colonel, 136. 
 
 Kid executed, 252. 
 
 " KilUng Times of Scotland," 326. 
 
 Kincardine, Lord, 189. 
 
 King executed, 252. 
 
 Kirk of Scotland, 9-15. 
 
 Kirkton quoted, 69, 82, 95, 109. 111. 
 
 Kooleman, a Dutch minister, 265. 
 
 Laud, Archbishop ; his Prayer-Book for 
 Scotland, 28 ; his policy, 52, 53. 
 
 Lauderdale, John, Duke of. Commis- 
 sioner from the Church to the West- 
 minster Assembly, 5S ; hates Middle- 
 ton, 121 ; a member of the Cabal, 181 ; 
 Secretary for Scotland. 182; his por- 
 trait, character, and poHtical opinions, 
 182-187 ; Royal Commissioner to Scot- 
 tish Parliament, 1!»C; marries the 
 Countess of Dysart, 197, 198 : threat- 
 ened with impeachment, 202 ; his 
 continued power, 203 ; makes terms 
 with Danby, and becomes slave to 
 Sharp, 204 ; his violence as Commis- 
 sioner, 209 ; disappointed at the failure 
 of the Highland Host, 214. 
 
 Laurie of Blackwood, 306. 
 
 Learmont, I^Iajor, 151 ; at Pentland, 
 151, 161, 163; at Bothwell, 245. 
 
 Leighton, Bishop of Dunblane, 114, 115. 
 
 Leslie, Alexander, Earl of Leven, 27 ; 
 his character, 32 ; a leader of the Co- 
 venant, 72. 
 
 Leslie, David, 95. 
 
 Leven, Earl of ; see Leslie. 
 
 Lindsay, 26. 
 
 Livingstone, John, minister of Ancrum, 
 102, 127. 
 
 Lockhart, Robert, 149. 
 
 Lockhart, Sir George, 216. 
 
 Lookup, John, 361. 
 
 Lords of the Congregation, 24. 
 
 Lorn, Lord ; sic Argyle. 
 
 Lothian, 26. 
 
 Loudon, 26 ; hischaracter, 27: eloquence, 
 30. 
 
 Ludlow, 134, 135. 
 
 Maitland; xce Lauderdale. 
 
 Manson, David, 338. 
 
 Marshal, Earl, letter, 36. 
 
 Marston Moor, 56. 
 
 Maxwell of Monreith, 149. 
 
 Maxwell, Sir George, of Polloc, 139. 
 
 Mein, Robert, correspondence with Go- 
 vernment, 148, 150, 155, 165, 167, 168, 
 177. 196. 
 
388 
 
 IXDEX. 
 
 Melville, Lord, 26, 217, 308. 
 
 Middleton, 58 ; Lis character, 94 ; ap- 
 pointed Roj'al Commissioner, 100 ; at 
 Argj'le's trial, 107 ; his policy, 116 ; its 
 result, 118 ; his Parliament, 119, 120 ; 
 fall, 122. 
 
 MitcbeU, James, 22.3. 
 
 Monk, George, 90, 108. 
 
 Monmouth takes the command in Scot- 
 land, 246; his humauity, 251, 252; 
 invasion, 325. 
 
 Montgomery, Major-General, 139. 
 
 Montrose, JIarquis of, 26, 59, 63, 95. 
 
 Morton, Earl of, 73, 81. 
 
 Munro. Sir George, l;-s9. 
 
 Muir, Sir William, of Rowallan, 139. 
 
 Murray, Robert, 2S5. 
 
 Murray, Sir Robert, on the curates, 124 ; 
 characterized, 189, 199. 
 
 Murray, William, son of the minister of 
 Dysart, is made Earl of Dysart, 198. 
 
 Musgrave, Sir Philip, correspondence, 
 
 136, 178. 
 M'Crie, quoted, 1S7. 
 
 M'Kail, l)r. Matthew, diary and letters, 
 
 137, 172, 174, 175, 216. 
 
 M'Kail, Hugh, at Pentland, 149 ; sketch 
 
 of his career, 16S-177. 
 Mackenzie, Sir George, 217, 318, 321. 
 Mackintosh, Sir James, on Hobbism, 18. 
 M'Lauchlan, Margaret, 326. 
 M'Lellan of Barscobe, 144 ; at Pentland, 
 
 161, 163. 
 M'Ward of Glasgow, Scottish minister, 
 
 in Holland, 102 ; letter on Wallace, 
 
 152 ; letter on Cameron, 264, 265. 
 
 National Covenant, 6 ; subscribed, 28. 
 IS'eilson of Corsack, 146, 168. 
 Newbyth, Lord, 217. 
 Nisbet, Sergeant, on Peden, 339. 
 
 OUvarez, 54. 
 
 Orrery, Lord, 136. 
 
 Owen, Dr. John, quoted, 311. 
 
 Paterson, Sir William, clerk to Privy 
 Council, 321. 
 
 Paton. Captain John, of Meadowhead, 
 151 ; at Pentland, 164, 165 ; at Both- 
 weU, 245. 
 
 Peden, Alexander, 269 ; opinions respect- 
 ing, 328-331 ; birth and parentage, 
 331 : settlement at New Luce, 332 ; 
 ejected, 332 ; at Pentland, 333 ; a pri- 
 soner in the Bass, 334, 335 ; carried to 
 London, 336 ; his sermons, 336-345 ; 
 Death, 347. 
 
 Pentland, Battle of, 161. 
 
 Pentland Rising, 144. 
 
 Pepys, quoted, 133. 
 
 Perth, Lord, 364. 
 
 Peterboroush, Lord, quoted, 135. 
 
 Petre, Father, 350. 
 
 PhilUmore's Law of Evidence, 17. 
 
 Polwarth, 313. 
 
 Preston, Battle of, 69. 
 
 Protesters, 70. 
 
 Queensferry Papers, 259-261. 
 
 Ramsay, David, 284. 
 
 Ranke, quoted, 51. 
 
 Renwick, James, 294; character, 295; 
 policy, 298, 299 ; his labours, 324, 355- 
 360 ; capture, trial, and execution, 
 360-69. 
 
 Reresby, Sir John, 198. 
 
 Resolutioners, 70. ' 
 
 Revolution Settlement, 376. 
 
 Richelieu, 54. 
 
 Robertson, Alexander, 146, 148. 
 
 Rothes, Duke of, 108, 123 ; a member 
 of the High Commission Court, 127; 
 Lord Commissioner, 150 ; inhuman 
 conduct at the trial of Hugh M'Kail, 
 171 ; progress through the West, 177 ; 
 a favouriite of Lady Dysart, 200; and 
 Sir G. Lockhart, 216, 217; letter to 
 the Duke of Queensberry, 219. 
 
 Rothes, Earl of. 26. 
 
 Row's Life of Blair, quoted, 172. 
 
 Russell, James, in Kettle, 221, 222, 224, 
 241. 
 
 Rullion Green, 161. 
 
 Rutherford, Samuel, Lex Rex, 19, 101, 
 299. 
 
 Sanquhar Declaration, 274, 275. 
 
 Scott, curate of Ancrum, 127. 
 
 Seniple, 263. 
 
 Shaftesbury, Earl of, Anthony Ashley 
 Cooper, a member of the Cabal, 181; 
 supposed to have obtained the libera- 
 tion of Peden, 336. 
 
 Sharp, James, his birth and early life, 
 97 ; "a Professor" at St. Andrews, 
 and parish minister of Crail, 97 ; em- 
 ployed by the Presbyterians to watch 
 their interests, 98 ; character, 99; goes 
 to London, 108 ; throws off the mask, 
 113 ; Preses of the Council, 123 ; Pre- 
 sident of the High Commission Court, 
 125-128; presides at Council, 150; 
 
INDEX. 
 
 389 
 
 after Pentland, 1(J7 ; deceitful policy, 
 J 72; dismissal, 187; pays court to 
 Lady Dysart, '2(j0, 20'2 ; obtains power 
 under Danby's Administration, 2o4 ; 
 at the head of the Secret Committee, 
 •205 ; measure for suppressing Conven- 
 ticles, 218 ; assassination, 220-229. 
 
 Sheldon, Archbishop of Canterbury, 124. 
 
 Shields, 355. 
 
 Simpson, Patrick, minister of Kilmal- 
 colm, 334. 
 
 Smith, Alexander, minister of Colvend, 
 126 ; his trial, 127. 
 
 Solemn League and Covenant, 39. 
 
 South, quoted, 17. 
 
 Stanhope, Sir Edward, letter to Straf- 
 ford, 36. 
 
 State Papers, quoted, 25, 35, 36, 133, 
 lU, 135, 136, 137, 148, 150, 157, 160, 
 16.5, 167, 168, 177, 178, 188, 192, 196, 
 209, 216, 314, 322, 323. 
 
 Stewart, Sir James, of Coltness, 139, 156, 
 169, 170, 308. 
 
 Strafford Correspondence, quoted, 33. 
 
 Strafford, 53, 80. 
 
 Sutherland, Earl of, signs the National 
 Covenant, 31. 
 
 Sydserfe, Bishop of Orkney, 114. 
 
 " Tables," The, 28 ; their construction, 
 
 41. 
 Tarbet, Viscount, 364. 
 ToUemache, Sir Lionel, 198. 
 Traquair. 25. 
 Tumbull of Beauley, 245, 247. 
 
 Turner, Sir James; bis character, 129; 
 
 at Dairy, 144 ; taken prisoner, 1*7 ; 
 
 .sketches of the Insurgents, 148, 154, 
 
 158 ; cashiered, 193. 
 Tweeddale, Lord, 189, 199. 
 
 United Societies, 324. 
 
 Urban viii. 51, 54. 
 
 Ure of Shargarton's account of Both well 
 
 Bridge, 247. 
 Uvdale, Sir WiUiam, 36. 
 
 Veitch, William, 149, 151, 171. 
 
 Wallace, Lieutenant-Colonel, 149; coin 
 mands the Insurgents, 151-153; at 
 Pentland, 160, 232. 
 
 Warriston, 30, 60. S6, 98, 183. 
 
 Welsh, John, 149, 245, 262. 
 
 Westminster Confession, 49. 
 
 Whigamore Raid, 59. 
 
 Williamson, Sir Joseph, 136; corresj'on 
 dence, 157, 168, 177. 191. 
 
 William of Orange, 369, 371, 372. 
 
 WiLson, Aiargaret, 326. 
 
 Windebank, letter to, 36. 
 
 Wishart, Bishop of Edinburgh, 114. 
 
 Wodrow, quoted, 127, 176, 189, 213, 31-3 
 
 Worcester, battle of, 71. 
 
 Tester, Lord, 307. 
 
 York, Duke of; see James 
 
CRITICAL NOTICES. 
 
 There is every prospect that the history of the Kirk will be 
 studied '^^^th greater freedom and impartiality. . . . Here are two 
 works (Principal Lee's Lectures on the History of the Church of 
 Scotland, and Dodds' Scottish Covenanters) to which we especially 
 invite attention as likely to promote a similar feeling, and to make 
 the history of the Kirk, what it has never yet been, a useful and 
 agreeable study. . . . The volume before us is by a Mr. Dodds, 
 with whose name we were not previously acquainted. His Lec- 
 tures on the Covenanters were addressed to popular audiences, 
 and they are calculated to be exceedingly popular. . . . They 
 have merits of their own ; they are in some passages very eloquent ; 
 they are full of graphic touches ; they appeal Avith no small suc- 
 cess to our sympathies ; and, though we cannot endorse the lead- 
 ing idea of the book, we must do it all honour as an advance upon 
 previous ideas on the same subject. — Times. 
 
 This is an excellent little book, written in a large-hearted, 
 earnest, pious, and thoroughly manly spirit. . . . The style is 
 forcible, graphic, and robust ; now and then perhaps a little stiff, 
 sometimes pseudo-rhetorical, but, in general, well suited to the 
 subject. . . . These men, whatever be the reader's prepossessions, 
 are really worth reading about. There was manhood in them !~ 
 Spectator. 
 
 Without being a severe judge of Covenanting excesses, he is a 
 temperate apologist, and one who at least defers to the laws of 
 morality, instead of attempting, in tlie Carlyle and Fronde fashion, 
 to trample them under foot when they have tlie impertinence to 
 come into collision with the conduct of id(jlized ruflians. . . . We 
 would willingly (piote one or two of Mr. Dodds' characters of the 
 leading Covenanters, did not their length preclude it. They do 
 not show a master's hand, and they are rather too favourable, but 
 
II CRITICAL NOTICES. 
 
 they are real attempts to set out the ditfereut parts of a complex 
 moral whole, and tfot slapdash strokes of rhetoric. . . . We can 
 understand that the Lectures may have given great pleasure to 
 their hearers ; and as a Look they are likely to be popidar with 
 readers to whom the memory of the Cpveuanters is dear. — Satur- 
 day Review. 
 
 Mr. Dodds can waite vigoroiisly when he likes, and his narrative 
 is told throughout with clearness and spirit. Although avowedly 
 sympathizing with the Covenanters, he sincerely aims to he im- 
 partial, and his judgments, both of men and of the time, are sen- 
 sible and liberal. — Economist. 
 
 Mr. Dodds desires to represent the characters of the heroes of 
 this struggle prominently in the struggle itself, and these he draws 
 with a fervent admiration that commands our sympathy. The 
 energy and earnestness of the writer have the contagious effect 
 always wrought by sincerity of purpose, — Globe. 
 
 The volume before us is not unworthy the noble theme. It is 
 written in a good and glowing style ; it is careful as to facts, and 
 generous in the construction of them ; even the enemies of the 
 Covenanters, to whom it is now the fashion to deny every element 
 of honesty, are treated in a spirit of fairness. . . . The volume is 
 the more valuable, inasmuch as the author has had access to ori- 
 ginal documents, which he has used Avith great discrimination, and 
 which have enabled him to give to his story considerable origin- 
 ality. —i^rge?«<Mi. 
 
 The materials have been collected from every available authority, 
 and are both abundant and well arranged. . . . The work is one 
 that has been long wanted, and every student of the historj' of the 
 seventeenth century will on perusal perceive the value of it.— 
 < 'ourt Journal. 
 
 The subject is somewhat old, yet it comes to us just now rather 
 appropriately, and is here presented in an attractive form. . , . 
 He aims at nothing more than a series of descriptive sketches, and 
 these are well done, the style being warmly coloured and pictur- 
 esfpie. ... It is a sad tale, worth the telling, and well told. — 
 Atloj^. 
 
 Mr. Dodds lias treated with vigour, .skill, and industiy, one of 
 the most important episodes in the history of liis Scottish father- 
 land. . . . There is ample evidence here of original research in 
 
CRITICAL NOTICES. Ill 
 
 the State P;il)er OtYice and elsewla-ie, and of a long cuurse of iu- 
 dustrious study of i)iiiited authorities —the more unexpected and 
 the more laudable that Mr. Dodds is no litterateur or lecturer by 
 habit or profession, and that the time for the composition of the 
 work has been snatched from the laborious practice of the law. 
 . . . We hope to meet Mr. Dodds again in the field of Scottish 
 histor\'. — Critic. 
 
 Under the plastic pen of Mr. Dodds, the story assumes all the 
 unity and grandeur of an epic. . . . Our author is e((ually happy, 
 whether in tracing the issues of important principles, in painting 
 great national scenes, or in delineating historic characters. His 
 l»ortraits are life-like and masterly. He dashes them off with a 
 freedom and boldness of stroke, and an ease of touch, which is re- 
 markably eftective, and which rarely fails to hit its mark. His 
 colouring is wann, partaking of the enthusiasm of his own mind, 
 and breathing a genial and generous sympathy with all that is 
 noble in human character. — Witness. 
 
 His style is of a most interesting character, assisted rather than 
 otherwise by the fact that his sketches were originally written for 
 the lecture-room. . . . The volume will be read with much interest, 
 and Mr. Dodds deserves the credit of having given to a subject which 
 has been hitherto isolated to a considerable extent from the politics 
 of the times, its trtie position in the history of Great Britain.— 
 f'lasf/cnv Daily Herald. 
 
 In the course of last winter the Literary Institute announced 
 that'. Mr. Dodds of London had been requested and had consented 
 to deliver a series of four Lectures on the Scottish Covenanters. 
 Tlie fame of the lecturer preceded him, and on each succeeding 
 night the Queen's Rooms were filled with the elite of the West End^ 
 dra\\ni together by his enchanting eloquence. Hoary-headed doc- 
 tors of divinity, thoughtful-visaged young clergymen, civic digni- 
 taries and princely merchant.s, prim-looking matrons and bloonnng 
 maidens, were all fully represented in the nightly assemblages, 
 and all combined in praising the lecturer. . . . Every one who 
 has had the jdeasure of hearing these discourses must hail their 
 issue with much pleasure and satisfaction. — Gla.<nj<nr (jmirier. 
 
 The story of miiigle<l suffering, heroism, and blood, is told with 
 fidelity and force ; and tho.'^e who take up the work will find it ti» 
 be most reliable and satisfactory,-- (T/r<,9^rt?r Citizen. 
 
IV CRITICAL NOTICES. 
 
 Mr. James Dockls, wlujse brilliant lectures in the City Hall are 
 still within the memory of those who were fortunate enough to 
 hear them, has pursued the historical labours in which he was 
 then engaged, and elaborated a history of the Scottish Covenanters. 
 . . . We heartily commend it to the attention of all who desire to 
 become acquainted with that much talked of but little known 
 period of Scottish history. — Commonwealth (Glasgow). 
 
 His sketches, whether of character or incident, are drawn with 
 a pen so graphic as to impress the reader with an unmistakable 
 conviction of their truth. . . . From tbese extracts we shall be 
 enabled to judge of the character of a volume, which not only 
 shows careful research from acknowledged authorities, as well as 
 from private and hitherto unrecognised sources, but a style of 
 writing that increases our interest in the records of a period so 
 crowded with excitement. — Manchester Examiner. 
 
 We are grateful to Mr. Dodds for the life-like portraits of the 
 leading Covenanters, and the grapliic sketches of the leading 
 events in Covenanting history which he has drawn in the pages 
 before us. As the production of one immersed in professional 
 avocations, this volume does great credit to his pen. . . . There is 
 a catholicity of spirit, a comprehensiveness of view, and a grace- 
 fulness of style in the work, which will secure for it the favourable 
 regard of the majority of readers, not only in Scotland, but where- 
 ever the principles of the Reformation, as recognised in the estab- 
 lishment of the present dynasty, are prized.— 2>w>ic?ee, Perth, and 
 Cupar Advertiser. 
 
 The historical sketches he has here submitted to the public were 
 originally prepared in the form of Lectures, in Avhich shape they 
 were read to large and admiring audiences, ... To this circum- 
 stance doubtless the style owes much of its rapid generalization, 
 its condensed vigour, and incisive plainness of speech. But it is 
 also marked by a broad grasp and honest energy of thought that 
 strikes at the root of the matter, and brushes aside the sophistries 
 that would obscure the truth, while the narrative is a smooth and 
 flowing one, and proceeds on a solid basis of carefully Aveighed 
 facts and authorities. It often rises into elocjuence, informed 
 with a glowing and passionate sympathy for those who suffered so 
 cruelly for conscience' sake. — Dumfries Courier. 
 
 First in Wigtownshire a few years ago, and afterwards in Edin- 
 burgh, Glasgow, and Liverpool, Mr. James Dodds, the vrell-known 
 
I'RITICAL NOTICES. V 
 
 Parliamentary Solicitor, gave a series of Lectures on tlie Cove- 
 nanters, which were distinguislied by great breadth of view, in- 
 dustrious historical research, and glowing eloquence of composition 
 and delivery. . . . The work in its present form is, we have no 
 
 hesitation in saying, the best that exists upon the subject 
 
 The style is animated throughout, and what m\ist it have been 
 when the Lectures were delivered viva voce ? Mr. Dodds, we need 
 scarcely say, is a powerful orator. . . . We hope it will speedily 
 become a household book in Scotland. — Dumfries and Galloway 
 StondanJ. 
 
 Thoi;gh Mr. Dodds" work was originally prepared as a course of 
 lectures, it is remarkably free of the vices of style incident to 
 books wnitten with that purpose. He has bestowed honest and 
 independent laboxir on his subject, and the result is a tastefully- 
 composed work — a book that deserves to be read, and that will 
 repay perusal, ... He speaks Avith discrimination and judgment 
 of the various details that come under review. His estimate of 
 individuals— the result of a careful collation of all accessible points 
 of information — is eminently just and candid. —J 6erc?eew Free 
 Pvp^s. 
 
 The book contains some stirring incidents sketched in a new and 
 grai)hic manner ; and from the author's researches in the State 
 Paper Office, and his extensive knowledge of the literature and 
 manners of the period, his descriptions are often of the highest 
 order, and enable the reader to realize the scenes poiirtrayed, to 
 see the actors, and to note their ^\)%^q\\.— Greenock Herald. 
 
 He modestly disclaims pretension to its being an exhaustive 
 history of the period selected ; but we rather suspect the reader 
 has this benefit in the author's preparation, intended for oral 
 delivery, that there is more power in these separate sketches, more 
 spirited and life-like delineations of character and event, than a 
 condensed work with a higher claim to unity could display. We 
 have seldom read a more delightful volume. The author is no 
 ascetic, but an impartial and discriminating cni\c.~ Ayr Advertiser. 
 
 We strongly recommend Mr. Dodds' work. ... If the book 
 does not become pojiular, the fault will be with the pu])lic, for 
 the subject has been well chosen, and the author has done it 
 justice. — Montrose Standard. 
 
VI CRITICAL NOTICES. 
 
 The more important incidents during the Fifty Years' Struggle 
 are minutely and graphically described, and there is a boldness of 
 tone in dealing with details, which makes these Lectures tell with 
 great power. . . . There has not issiied from the press a volume 
 distinguished for richer fancy and finer literary taste.— Berivick 
 Journal. 
 
 The writer, though his feelings by no means run in a cold 
 chaimel, looks with a calm and dispassionate eye on passing 
 scenes and character. He gives his opinions freely, built as they 
 are upon reflection, extensive data, as well as sound and dis- 
 criminating judgment. . . . The volume is very handsomely got 
 np, is of excellent paper and tyjie, and everj-^ way creditable to 
 both author and publishers. — Kilmarnock Post. 
 
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