The History Of Scotland - Volume 8: From The Scots Invasion To The Restoration E-Book

Andrew Lang

• Herausgeber: Jazzybee Verlag
• Kategorie: Geisteswissenschaft
• Sprache: Englisch
• Veröffentlichungsjahr: 2012

Seitenzahl: 367

Beschreibung

This is volume 8, covering the time from the Scots invasion to the Restoration. In many volumes of several thousand combined pages the series "The History of Scotland" deals with something less than two millenniums of Scottish history. Every single volume covers a certain period in an attempt to examine the elements and forces which were imperative to the making of the Scottish people, and to record the more important events of that time.

Leseprobe

The History Of Scotland – Volume 8

From The Scots Invasion To The Reformation

Andrew Lang

Contents:

The Scots Invasion Of England

The Year Of Montrose

The Revenge Of The Covenanters

Kirk's Triumph & National Ruin

Cromwell And Scotland (1650-1651)

From Worcester To The Restoration (1651-1660)

THE HISTORY OF SCOTLAND – VOLUME 8, Andrew Lang

Jazzybee Verlag Jürgen Beck

86450 Altenmünster, Loschberg 9

Germany

ISBN: 9783849604684

www.jazzybee-verlag.de

[email protected]

THE SCOTS INVASION OF ENGLAND

THE presence of a Scottish army at Newcastle, confiscating the patrimony of St Cuthbert and the goods of Catholics or of Anglicans at will, would once have united England in arms. The Scots would have been driven from Tees and Tyne to the Naver, calling on their mountains to cover them. An England united and prepared would have done it: in a few years an England prepared, though not united, did it. But England was now neither united nor prepared. Strafford met the retreating levies of the king at Darlington. Terrified as they were, they were scarcely more uneasy than the Scots had been after their victory at the ford of Tyne. Some 4000 of the Scots army are said to have decamped, homesick no doubt, towards Berwick. Though the numbers are probably exaggerated, Leslie reports (September 2) "the evil carriage of our own soldiers," and " the multitude of runaways, who abandon the army." Says Baillie, who was present, "If Newcastle had but closed their ports, we had been in great hazard of present disbanding," but the garrison was at once withdrawn.

Only the gentlemen of England had fought well. Wilmot had cut down one or two opponents in a cavalry charge: Strafford, from Darlington, reported to Charles, at York, that Wilmot had slain Montrose, a rumour contradicted by Vane on September 3. The counties of Durham and York had begun to show some spirit; even now, had Charles concentrated at York and advanced, the heart of England might have been aroused, whether by victory or defeat. It was not to be. England, apart from all other distractions, was in one of her fits of fear about Popery: as absurd as if Spain had been in terror of a Protestant plot. It was commonly said that whoever was not Scotch was Popish. In place of aiding the king, the chief Puritan peers were in London, agitating and petitioning. They and the middle classes stood towards the invading Scots, as Brunston and Ormistoun, Knox and Glencairn, and the Douglases, had stood of old towards the invading English. They called for a Parliament, for the trial of the king's ministers: while the Scots also now insisted on the punishment of "incendiaries," chiefly Traquair and Hamilton, Strafford and Laud. Baillie, by his pamphlets, was a chief agent in hounding Laud to the block; " We pant," says this clergyman, " for the trials of Laud and Strafford."

We need not dwell on the tragedy of Charles, the familiar steps to ruin with dishonour. The petition of the city for a Parliament was added to the petition of the peers. Hamilton was in terror: he wished to fly the country; that being forbidden he helped the Commissioners whom the Scots presently sent to London, with all his might. He "was very active for his own preservation." The Royalist garrisons in the castles of Edinburgh and Dumbarton yielded to scurvy and starvation. The great Council of Peers met, for the first time since Henry VII., at York. They appointed Commissioners to capitulate to the Scots at Ripon (October 2). In the Scottish camp there was trouble. Montrose, " whose pride was long ago intolerable, and meaning very doubtsome, was found to have intercourse of letters with the king, for which he was accused publicly by the General in face of the Committee," says Baillie. Montrose is said to have been betrayed by Hamilton and the gentlemen pickpockets of the king's bedchamber. Burnet says that his letter to the king happened to fall to the ground, and the address was noticed by Sir James Mercer, who picked it up. Wishart, Montrose's chaplain, blames the gentlemen of the king's bedchamber, who acted as spies for the Covenanters. Of these men, Will Murray, of old the king's "whipping-boy," is the most notorious. He is freely accused of being employed, now by Hamilton, now by Argyll; he is mixed up in every intrigue: he was always suspected, never discarded, and could probably have explained many a problem that history cannot unravel. Montrose's letter was a mere protestation of loyalty, such as the Covenanters indulged in publicly. The king was not " the enemy," so Montrose was safe: he had not communicated with " the enemy." Meanwhile, in the meeting of Scots and English at Ripon, the forgery of Savile was detected. He justified himself by patriotic motives; he too was safe; who could denounce him, to whom? The Ripon meeting haggled over the question of how much the Scots would take to remain quietly where they were. In the end they received a considerable sum of money, " brotherly assistance." The inevitable Parliament, the Long Parliament, met on November 3. Baillie, travelling south with the Scottish Commissioners, reports that the inns were " like palaces." The king at this time reprieved a Jesuit, sentenced to death for being one; the anti-Popish agitation went on; the presence of Rossetti, a papal agent, and the queen's futile dealings with him were resented. The utter uprooting of Episcopacy was clamoured for by the preacher Henderson, in a pamphlet which gave great offence to the English: " diverse of our true friends did think us too rash, and, though they loved not the bishops, yet for the honour of their nation, they would keep them up rather than we strangers should pull them down," says Baillie. The Scots cherished the ambition to see all England Presbyterian on their own model, a lovely dream, that came through the Ivory Gate. The Root and Branch party, however, was powerful and very noisy. But Cheshire petitioners on the Episcopal side objected to " the mere arbitrary government of a numerous Presbytery, who, together with their ruling elders, will arise to near forty thousand Church governors." The Cheshire petition was signed by four peers, more than eighty knights and esquires, seventy clergymen, three hundred gentlemen, and over six thousand freeholders and others. The anti-prelatists produced a counter-petition, in which the numbers all round were exactly doubled! The thing was a forgery, or a Presbyterian joke. 

In March 1643 the satisfaction of the Scottish demands for money was postponed to the business of illegally condemning Strafford: " pleasure first, business afterwards." The Scots acquiesced in this arrangement. We do not dwell on a tragedy " too deep for tears," not the death of a brave man already near his end, but the moral overthrow and the worm that never dies in the breast of Charles. He appears to have yielded in fear of mob violence, which threatened the life of the queen. In August the arrangement with the Scots was completed, and, much to the wrath of the English Parliament, the king hurried northwards, to forget, if he could, in changed scenes: to save his servant, the incendiary Traquair, if he could; to procure evidence of English treason in inviting a Scottish invasion; to see whether the name of Stuart might yet have a charm, and make Scotland a rallying -point of resistance against the English; possibly to punish Argyll, who lay, as we shall see, under some suspicion of flat undeniable personal treason. Above all, Charles may have hoped to establish the less enthusiastic Covenanters in the chief offices of State. 

Already, in England, Catholics were dying for their religion. William Ward, a priest, was hanged at Tyburn, just as a friend of his, for no other crime than his creed, had perished thirteen years earlier. Resisting the fury of the House of Commons, and the pressure of the mob, as he should have done when Strafford was condemned, Charles now rode out of Palace Yard with his face to the north. The man should repent it, he said, who touched his horse's reins. If we may believe the Venetian Ambassador, the Scottish Commissioners had made him loyal promises. He was their native king: Scotland had ever been jealous of his prolonged absences. But if he expected to win Scotland, to awaken Scottish national sentiment, the king was notably deceived. He went to abase himself in the dust, to assent to all that his soul loathed. He had apparently bought Rothes, by money and place, but at this moment Rothes died. " From him his Majesty expected much service at the present conjuncture, he having given many assurances thereof." He was to have enjoyed high office, in England, and to have married the rich Countess of Devon. We have, perhaps, no right to say that Rothes, the chief fomenter of the Covenant, was bought. He may have been pricked in heart and conscience by the situation of the king. However, there were promises and hopes held before him: to Montrose no bribes were offered. To regard his change of party as the result of personal jealousy and self-seeking, is the note of a mind incapable of understanding a noble motive.

"Though jealousy of Argyll had, no doubt, its full weight in sending Montrose to the king's side," says Mr. Gardiner, " there can be little doubt that he was swayed in the main by higher considerations." There can be no doubt, except among the unreflecting base. Rats do not desert to a sinking ship, as was the king's in 1639-1640. Had Montrose deserted the Covenant earlier, had he joined Strafford, had he led the king's army from Berwick to meet Leslie at Dunse, English history would have been other than it is. But when the Royal ship had foundered, when Strafford's head had fallen, when every month brought its new attack, it was then that Montrose, in Scotland, began to stir for his king. On one side he saw the representative of centuries of legitimate monarchy, on the other, zealots led by or leading Argyll: and power in the hands of whatever great House best pleased the populace and the preachers.

Returning to Scottish affairs after the capture of Newcastle, we find, in 1640-1641, first the beginning of a split between the less immoderate and the more enthusiastic preachers; next, the affair of Montrose's so-called " plot " against Argyll. Before attending to these we may note a singular example of social manners. Ministers of the Gospel still carried daggers, "whingers," and used them. A preacher of the pleasing name of Lamb had been deposed, in the time of Episcopal darkness, by the Bishop of Galloway, as a quarrelsome person. The ministers of Edinburgh secured for this victim of prelatical prejudice a church in the Presbytery of Peebles. " They say he had stricken a man, whereof he died." His Presbytery suspended him, and he appealed to the General Assembly. They remitted him to his Presbytery, which irritated Lamb. On a Sunday, after hearing two sermons, he acted in an indescribably insulting manner to a young man unknown, and when the youth remonstrated, "with his whinger struck him, whereof presently he died." Mr. Lamb then easily obtained a letter of Slains from the family of the young man, which means that he would pay the eric, or blood-wyte. " But we think the Constable will cause execute him," says Baillie, "murder (1), by a preacher (2), especially on the Sabbath day (3), while the Assembly was sitting (4), being a thing of dangerous example."

The ministers had trouble within their fold. As soon as bishops were turned out, amateur professors of religion came in. A tailor and a surgeon from England, " and from Ireland a fleece of Scots people," dissatisfied with official Presbyterianism, had introduced conventicles of their own. Among them were a gifted ploughman and the laird of Lecky. They "sought edification by private meetings " (than which nothing seems more praiseworthy), and were said to be supported by two notable divines, Mr. Blair of St Andrews, and Mr. Samuel Rutherford, the author of celebrated devotional letters, and of ' Lex Rex,' a political treatise of liberal complexion. Henderson, Guthry, and others opposed the private religious meetings, as savouring of Brownism, or of that New Independent heresy then raising its head in England. A conference was held by both parties, and it was agreed that private devotional meetings had been vastly well in times of corruption, but that now, when the Gospel shone in all its purity, such assemblies might break up congregations, " and by progress of time the whole Kirk," which was very true. But Covenanters forbidding conventicles reminds us of the Gracchi denouncing sedition. The circumstance may be remembered when we find bishops equally intolerant.

The members of the conference signed the document, but those who had been friends of " revival " meetings encouraged them more than ever. " Such as kept those private meetings were, by the rigid sort, esteemed the godly of the land," a thing naturally irritating to the official godly. An Assembly at Aberdeen followed (July 1640), when Dickson, Rutherford, and most of the ministers and elders of the West defended the meetings, and would have carried licence for them, but Guthry produced * the signed paper of the conference, disallowing these conventicles, and an Act of the Assembly against them was passed. This Guthry, later Bishop of Dunkeld, died in 1676. Always a moderate Presbyterian, he inclined to the Royal side. His evidence, in his book, is certainly not always accurate, though of value when he was personally concerned. In 1641 the conventiclers wished the Act of the Aberdeen Assembly to be revoked. Calderwood, the historian, was fiercely opposed to conventicles, however limited in number, being a Presbyterian of the old rock: Blair and Dickson were moderate. An eirenicon was found, but Mr. Calderwood continued to be "very peevish" on points of the constitution of the Assembly. " Likely he shall not in haste be provided " with a living, says Baillie; " the man is sixtysix years, his utterance is unpleasant, his carriage . . . has made him less considerable." Thus our old friend and authority who had bearded King James, became unpopular among the brethren: and indeed a certain peevishness and delight in hair-splitting may be remarked in his historical writings.

We now turn to the affairs of Montrose, whose advice was probably one of the causes that brought the king to Scotland in August 1641. It will be remembered that he had contrived the Cumbernauld anti-Argyll band, with eighteen other nobles, in August 1640, and had been known to write a protestation of loyalty to the king, from Newcastle. That gave no handle against him, for the Covenanters always kept up the farce of pretending loyalty to "his Majesty's sacred person and authority." But in November 1640 young Lord Boyd, on his deathbed, let out the secret of the Cumbernauld band, and Argyll got wind of it, and drew the whole truth from Lord Almond, at Callendar House, where Queen Mary and Darnley had rested on their way to Kirk o' Field. Argyll reported to the Committee of the Estates, who summoned Montrose and the other banders before them. They acknowledged and justified their band, and, says Guthry, " some of the ministers and other fiery spirits pressed that their lives might go for it." But some banders commanded regiments, and were not lightly to be meddled with, and the quarrel was patched up, the Committee burning the band, whereof we have a copy. On May 26, 1641, at a sitting of the Committee new trouble began. Montrose had heard, from Atholl, Stewart of Grandtully, and John Stewart, younger of Ladywell, many things about Argyll's words and ways at the time when he was Christianising Lochaber, Angus, and Atholl with fire and sword, and took these gentlemen prisoners. Montrose sent Ladywell to collect evidence, and appears to have meant to denounce Argyll and Hamilton of treason when the king came (and for that reason Montrose desired him to come) to the Scottish Parliament.

Montrose was working at a paper on Sovereignty, in 1640-1641; it is printed by Mr. Napier, and contains the ideas of the Great Marquis. They are peculiar. He acknowledges, of course, that sovereignty may, and does, exist in Republics, Aristocracies, as at Venice, and in Monarchies. He does not claim any more of sacredness for monarchy than for other polities, but he appears to hold that tampering with any form of sovereignty, once established Republic, Aristocracy, or Kingdom is so dangerous as to be positively wrong. The Scots, if they go too far, will suffer the worst of all tyrannies, that of subjects usurping power (he means Argyll, and other nobles with Argyll), and the end will be despotism: " the Kingdom fall into the hands of One, who of necessity must, and for reasons of State, will tyrannize over you." The One was then walking about England, in clothes ill-made by a country tailor; his sword very close by his side; a speck of blood noticed on his little white band. This One was to arrive, and tyrannize, and his officer was to turn the General Assembly into the streets. To revert to Montrose, the Doge of Venice, he says, " is no sovereign, is nothing but the idol to whom ceremonies and compliments are addressed." To this constitutional position of a Doge, Argyll, with his demand that the Estates should appoint the chief ministers of the Crown, would reduce the Sovereign of Scotland. The Highland chief and his allies, with the populace and popular preachers, would really hold the sovereignty. Charles ought not thus to abdicate power, but ought to hold frequent Parliaments, and never encroach on religion and just liberties, as guaranteed by law.

Montrose desires a reformed Charles, a contented people, safety from the tyranny of preachers, populace, and Argyll.

But the worst of these is Argyll.

Montrose made no secret of his ideas. He wrote them out in a treatise, perhaps addressed to Drummond of Hawthornden. Here he named no names, but in private correspondence he spoke out to Mr. Murray, a minister who, in the beginning of the troubles, had helped Rothes to convert him to the Covenant. Murray told Graham, another preacher. Graham talked, and the affair, as we saw, in May 1641 came before the Committee. What had Montrose said about Argyll's sayings? Montrose had averred that Argyll had said to Atholl, Ladywell, Grandtully, and other prisoners, that he and his party had consulted lawyers and divines about deposing the king, and that they meant to do it. He cited Ladywell as having heard the words, and Lindsay as having mentioned, on another occasion, that Argyll was to be Dictator. Lindsay, summoned, did not remember having named Argyll, and, if he had, it was no great matter. The evidence of Ladywell would be more serious. Montrose sent for him, and he appeared before the Committee in May, and signed a written statement in corroboration of Montrose. It is obvious that Argyll was a very unlikely man to have used, in the hearing of opponents, the language reported by Ladywell. But, in these days, men often did speak, over the bottle, with surprising indiscretion. Argyll is never charged with intemperance, but a glass of wine, and the heat of discussion, may have betrayed him into hasty expressions. This would be a theory less tenable if the measures taken against Ladywell had not evinced a desire to silence for ever, with little or no regard to law and usage, an inconvenient witness.

Having signed his corroboration of Montrose's charges, Ladywell was sent to the castle, and there was so worked on by Balmerino and Dury that he " cleared " Argyll. He also confessed that, impelled by Montrose, Napier, Stirling of Keir, and others, he had sent a report of Argyll's treasonable speeches to the king. The messenger who carried the report, Captain Walter Stewart, was captured for the Committee on his return. In his possession was found a brief note to Montrose from the king, in which he merely promised to behave in Scotland on the lines laid down by Montrose in the treatise on sovereignty. On June 12 Charles wrote to Argyll, denying that he had promised high official places to Montrose and his associates. He avowed his letter to Montrose, taken with Walter Stewart, and maintained that it was such a letter as he ought to write. This was incontestable. But another paper, in cypher, or at least with cant names, " A. B. C." " the Serpent," " the Elephant," " the Dromedary," and so forth, was found in the captured Walter Stewart's possession. This paper was in his pocket, "and, with astonishment, he swore he thought it had not been in the world," writes Hope to Waristoun (June 7). This indicates that the cyphered paper really contained cryptic notes made by Walter Stewart of his own ideas, and that he probably thought that he had destroyed it. But he had casually kept it in his pocket! This was the least likely way of concealing a document which, according to what was finally dragged out of Walter Stewart, really contained, not his own words, but messages from Montrose, Napier, Keir, and Blackball, taken by him to Traquair in London, and by Traquair to Charles, who gave "particular answers" to them. Where were the " particular answers "? They were not found on Walter Stewart, or were not produced, and have never been discovered. And why, in place of the answers, was Walter bringing back the questions? It may be guessed, on the other side, that he was unconsciously carrying back Montrose's messages to Charles, in his pocket, hence his astonishment when they were found there. Traquair denied all connection with the Elephant, Dromedary, Serpent, and the rest, as did the king. Montrose, Napier, and others averred that they had, indeed, sent Walter Stewart to Lennox, his chief, in London, but "only to speed his Majesty's journey to Scotland. . '. ." " There was some other discourses to that purpose in the bye, as, that it was best his Majesty should keep up the offices [of State] vacant, till he had settled the affairs here. . . ."

This is not very satisfactory. Walter Stewart's cypher papers may have been made by him to assist his memory, in London, and may have been his notes of "other discourses in the bye."

Whatever the document really was, it seemed like an attempt by Montrose's friends to secure office at the expense of Argyll, and the matter was carried to the long account of his enemies against Traquair. Lennox was more or less involved in an intrigue which employed so many of his clan. There are notes by Vane of a meeting of the English Privy Council on June 18, in which this business was discussed. Argyll, after the discovery of Walter Stewart's cyphered paper, appears to have informed Charles that he himself has been cleared (of the charge brought by Ladywell), by the Committee in Scotland. " He desires you to hear my Lord Traquair. A foolish business concerning Captain Walter Stewart. Whatsoever plot he was upon, your Majesty is not knowing of it, nor the Duke of Lennox. Great mistake." The notes are so confused that we cannot often tell who is being spoken about.

The result was the separate caging of Montrose, Napier, Stirling of Keir, and Stewart of Blackball in the castle (June 11). Montrose had certainly designed to denounce Argyll of treason in Parliament, on the strength of Ladywell's, and probably of other evidence. Ladywell, we see, recanted he truckled to Argyll, but he was hanged for "leasing making." He was executed on July 28. Baillie writes " it is true that none ever died for no transgressions of that act" (against leasing making). However, "stone dead hath no fellow," and Ladywell (there is little reason to suspect that he had been tortured) was inconvenient to Argyll. It was also convenient to keep Montrose and his friends in prison, to brand them as "plotters," and denounce them with fury.

Montrose declined the judicature of the Committee; if tried he would be tried publicly, by his peers. Napier avoided the appearance of " contumacy," but gave negative answers without discussion. They had all, we saw, repudiated Walter Stewart's cypher, and the meaning which he chose to put upon it. Napier maintained, and his honour is not doubted, that if any were guilty he was, and he could not be induced to accept release from prison as a favour. Napier's conduct was nobly constant; he knew well why Argyll's Committee tried to separate him from Montrose. All the houses of Montrose were ransacked, and nothing worse was discovered than some old letters of euphuistic courtship. A copy of the harmless Cumbernauld band, with some of Montrose's thoughts on the subject, found in a charter chest, was made matter for outcry. On July 27 Montrose was called before Parliament. "My resolution is," he said, " to carry along with me fidelity and honour to the grave." He nobly kept his word. Such was the demeanour of this turn-coat plotter, as Montrose is called by the devotees of the Covenant.

Montrose lay in close confinement during the visit of the king to Scotland. Watched at Edinburgh by Hampden and other Commissioners from the English Parliament, Charles combined strenuous efforts to win popularity with feeble attempts to recover authority. Lennox, after some hesitation, signed the Covenant, as did Hamilton. There were festivals, much lip-loyalty, and the king almost convinced himself that all was going well. He attended the sermons of the preachers, and had to listen to abuse of bishops. Fanaticism had been making great progress. "The Lord's prayer began to grow out of fashion, as being a set form." An Act for abolishing " monuments of idolatry " was passed. Already in the north, screens whose colours and gold had weathered the blasts in the roofless Cathedral of Elgin, were used as firewood. The ancient and beautiful seventh -century Cross of Ruthwell near Dumfries, with its Anglo-Saxon hymn in Runic characters, was broken into three pieces. It had passed unscathed through the Border wars and the Reformation: it had for a thousand years proved that the dark ages knew more of art and poetry than Presbyterianism could provide or endure. In 1802 it found a shelter in the manse garden, and is now re-erected under the roof of the church. What the Vikings had spared in lona, with much work of later times, wild preachers desecrated and destroyed. In Aberdeen, Easter Day was perforce kept as a fast (1642), "no flesh durst be sold in Aberdeen," says Spalding.

While Charles was in Edinburgh, old Lady Huntly was driven into exile to escape excommunication. Catholics were boycotted, and their property was confiscated. Charles accepted an Act by which he must choose his officers of State subject to consent of Parliament. Argyll now denounced one of these officers, Morton, who had brought him up. The barons wished to give their votes on election of officers by ballot, Charles decried this as cowardly. Morton begged leave to refuse office as Chancellor, he did not wish to be a cause of trouble.  It will be remembered that while Roxburgh, "that awful man," had refused the Covenant, his son, Lord Ker, had taken it. But Ker now challenged Hamilton as a traitor to the king, for both Hamilton and his brother Lanark, the secretary, were suspected by all who held the ideas of Napier and Montrose. Ker was constrained to apologise before the House, and the Estates passed an Act acquitting Hamilton. Meanwhile the battle over the appointment of officers of State raged, and even in Balfour's brief jottings of the debates we see that the king's self-control nearly broke down. Would they accept Loudoun as chancellor, yes or no? He pressed for a reply, " else he protested to God he would name none more to them."

Meanwhile, what of "the plotters"? On August 28, Napier, Keir, and Stewart of Blackball were brought to Parliament, where Charles encouraged them by taking off his hat, and nodding in a kindly way; but the hearing of their case was ever postponed. Sir Patrick Wemyss (September 25) wrote to Ormonde saying that the king had " engaged his royal promise to Montrose, not to leave the kingdom till he come to his trial. For if he leave him, all the world will not save his life." Would Charles be more loyal to Montrose than to Strafford? The world knows by what chicanery Strafford was brought to the block; doubtless Argyll would have found out a way for Montrose thither, as in the case of Ladywell. Perhaps Montrose, in criticising Argyll and Hamilton, and in accusing Argyll, had been guilty of " leasing making," and so might be righteously executed. But it was infinitely desirable that he should not speak in his defence, publicly, before his peers. "If this be what you call liberty," said the Earl of Perth, " God send me the old slavery again." If Montrose lost his head for what he had done, then, as Argyll's Celts boasted, Scotland would serve King Campbell, not King Stuart.

While Loudoun had become Chancellor, Charles had nominated Lord Almond as Treasurer. Perhaps because Almond had signed the Cumbernauld band, perhaps because he was not of the Argyll clique, or merely because the king had proposed him, Parliament resisted Almond's appointment. At this juncture, when the most that Charles could hope for was to save the lives and estates of men like Montrose and Napier, when Hamilton had secured himself by an alliance with Argyll, and when men like the Earl of Perth were dreading the new " liberty " more than the old slavery, a dramatic event did not occur. In place of a successful return to the old Scottish methods of kidnapping or assassinating, a feeble effort was made to revive these practices, and the result was THE INCIDENT.

The exact truth about this mismanaged mystery can never, perhaps, be ascertained. In exploring the evidence we meet currents of cross-swearing; where only two witnesses can speak to certain details, they flatly contradict each other. Probably the first symptom of a brewing plot (which seems to have been overlooked by historians) occurs in a speech of the Chancellor Loudoun on October 5. He "remonstrated to the king and Parliament that there was a great confluence of people of late come into the town, upon what ground he did not know." A proclamation was issued against the gathering. Later we shall find that Hamilton and Argyll were said to have 5000 of their "friends" concealed in the city. It was the Scottish custom in any crisis to collect "friends." Ker is said to have been accompanied by 600 men when he apologised to Hamilton, and Hamilton also was accompanied by many gentlemen of his name.

The first overt movement was on October 12, when Charles, with some 500 gentlemen not of the godliest, went down to the House. He told the Estates that he had come to Scotland with intent to "settle their religion and liberties," and that he had done it. "None should ever draw him from that." "Yet, my Lords, I must needs tell you a very strange story. Yesternight " (October 11) " my Lord Hamilton came to me, I being walking in the garden, with a petition of very small moment, and thereafter in a philosophical and parabolical way, such as he sometimes had used, he began a very strange discourse to me," to the effect that enemies had provoked the queen against him by calumnies, and so he requested permission to leave Court that night. Next day (October 12) Hamilton, Lanark, and Argyll retired to Hamilton's house of Kinneil, some twenty .miles away. On the 12th, therefore, the advanced party found itself  deprived of its leader, the extremely cautious Argyll, while he, Hamilton, and Lanark were to be regarded as victims of an intended plot. Their partisans would, of course, suspect the complicity of the king with the conspirators. Now Charles, as reported by Balfour in the passage just cited, knew not a word of a plot against the life or liberty of Hamilton; but merely that he complained of having been traduced to the queen. Charles then produced a letter, full of loyalty, written to him by Hamilton, and received that day. " With tears in his eyes," the king complained of Hamilton's distrust of him: he had taken Hamilton, when accused of treasonable projects, to sleep in his chamber: yet his friend held him in suspicion.

Our next source is in the statements of Hamilton and Lanark, written from their retreat at " Keneel," on October 22. Lanark had found, before October u, that Charles had some suspicions both of himself and his brother; " he was pleased to say that he thought me to be an honest man, and that he had never heard anything to the contrary; but that he thought my brother had been very active in his own preservation," a phrase already cited. Days went on after Charles spoke thus, and Lanark hoped that an accommodation with Parliament was probable, when all was ruined by The Incident of October 11. On that day Leslie had sent for Hamilton and Argyll to come to him privily.

In the circumstances now to be related, Leslie ought at once to have told to the king what he proceeded, on October u, to tell to Hamilton and Argyll. But " he said for excuse that he thought it a foolish business, and therefore omitted it."

Going to Leslie's rooms, on October 11, Argyll and Hamilton had found him with Colonel Hurry, who " told them," says Lanark, " that there was a plot, that same night, to cut the throats both of Argyll, my brother, and myself." This fact Hurry had learned from Captain William Stewart, " who should have been an actor in it." The three nobles were to be inveigled into a room at Holyrood, as if to speak to the king on business. Two lords were to enter by a garden door (as Ruthven entered Mary's cabinet on the night of Riccio's murder); they were to be followed, as in that old crime, by a large company, who would slay Hamilton, Lanark, and Argyll, or convey them on board a ship of the royal navy. As there was but one witness, Hurry, Hamilton had told the king, in the garden, "in general, that he had heard there was some plot intended against his life."

According to Charles, as reported by Balfour, and more fully by Nicholas, Hamilton then spoke only of being calumniated, and of desiring to retire on that score, and, from a letter of Hamilton's presently to be cited, it seems that he said no more than this. But Hamilton's speech, the king said, was "problematical." Later, on October 11, Captain William Stewart confirmed Hurry's tale, and Hamilton and Argyll, sending for Lanark to Lindsay's house, told him all, and the three took measures for their safety. Next day (October 12) they wrote to the king, who, dissatisfied with their letters, went straight to Parliament, as we saw, with his " very strange story." In his escort were men whom Hurry and Captain Stewart had denounced. To avoid tumult, the three menaced noblemen did not go to the House " with our friends at our backs," but retired, as has been seen, to Kinneil. " I am most confident," adds Lanark, " his Majesty knows not of any such base design (if any such there were), yet I may say he injures himself much in striving to protect those that are accused."

Charles, as a matter of fact, was praying Parliament vainly for a public trial of the case. On October 22 Hamilton also wrote, from Kinneil, to the king to whom Lanark wrote we do not know. From Hamilton's letter of October 22, it seems that, in the garden, he only told Charles vaguely " that I knew not when I should be so happy as to attend on your Majesty again." Thus Charles did not know, from Hamilton, in the garden, on October 11, that there was "some plot intended against his life." Nor did Hamilton tell Charles later, on that night, when he had now two witnesses, Hurry and Captain William Stewart, to his story. The king knew nothing: but next day Argyll sent a Mr. Maule with all that they had learned. Hamilton explains that he left the town, on the 12th, to avoid a street fight, and he protested that he was not base enough to suspect the king's knowledge of the conspiracy. No more is known of Mr. Maule, but his message proved to Charles that Hamilton was suspicious of a plot against his life and Argyll's.

We now come to the evidence of Captain William Stewart, interrogated by a Committee of the House, on October 12. He said that at nine o'clock P.M. of the previous day, he and Hurry were summoned to speak to Lieutenant-Colonel Alexander Stewart, who offered them drink. Both declined; Hurry because he was to dine with the Earl of Crawford at eleven, a very early hour. Hurry departed, but Colonel Alexander Stewart took the captain to his rooms, where he revealed the plot, saying that Lord Almond was to take the role of entering from the garden, that he would denounce Hamilton and Argyll, and, with a force of three or four hundred men, convey them to a ship. William Murray, of the king's bedchamber, was to lure the two nobles into a drawing-room proper for the purpose of kidnapping them, and the Earl of Crawford, recently returned from the Imperial Service, was to command the four hundred men. Crawford was for killing the nobles; Almond intended merely to have them legally tried. Captain Stewart (though at feud with Argyll for the death of Ladywell and captivity of Stewart of Blackhall) refused to be concerned, but said that he might appear at Crawford's rooms where Hurry was to dine. On October 21 Captain William Stewart, again examined, gave similar evidence before a secret Committee of the House, for the public trial demanded by Charles was not granted. The captain now said that he had revealed all to Hurry, bidding him tell Leslie, which, as we know, he did, and Leslie then told Argyll and Hamilton. On October 12 Lieutenant-Colonel Robert Home, being examined, implicated Colonel Cochrane, who declared that William Murray had taken him to the king's bedside, for what purpose Cochrane did not say. On October 11, however, Colonel Cochrane had sent for Home to come to Crawford's rooms, where he promised to make Home's fortune; but Home declined to listen to his plan. Hurry, on the 12th and later, corroborated Captain Stewart; he had been approached by Crawford, but declined to deal with him, though by Leslie's permission he dined with the earl. He declared that Crawford asked him to come to him "early next morning" (the 12th) "with three or four good fellows, and it would be a means to make him a fortune." But the plot, if plot there ever had been, was for the night of August 11! Hurry did not go, as he heard a guess that Crawford meant to liberate Montrose from the castle, and attack Argyll on October 12. If so, this was a second plot.

On October 22 Lieutenant -Colonel Alexander Stewart, under examination, gave his account of his interview on October 11 with Captain William Stewart. The captain had spoken ill of Hamilton, and said that he certainly was a traitor. But he despaired of success in petitioning Charles for the release of his own uncle, Stewart of Blackhall, "for the marquis" (Hamilton) "is of such power with the king," adding "all was true that my uncle said" against Hamilton. Captain Stewart then informed the colonel that the town was full of Argyll's and Hamilton's men to the number of 5000. Now five days earlier, Loudoun had told the king and the House that " there was a great confluence of people lately, upon what ground he did not know." The Royalists maintained that Argyll and Hamilton did not wish for a happy accommodation with the king, and that The Incident exactly suited their designs. Hamilton and Argyll may have gathered their men into the town to attain their purpose in another way, by force, or they may have heard of an attempt to be made against themselves. The colonel replied to the captain that if Hamilton and Argyll made any treasonable enterprise, Home, Roxburgh, Almond, and Mar could raise their counties against them, and Crawford would help. They could seize Hamilton in his coach, or in the king's rooms, " if the king were out of the way." They would carry their prisoner to a ship, and kill him, in the German fashion, if a strong rescue were attempted. Though the captain and the colonel thus differed widely in details, yet the idea of the plot clearly remained the same. It might be defensive, against the 5000 of Hamilton and Argyll, or these 5000 may have been summoned in anticipation of a Royalist attack.

When Crawford was examined (October 23), our knowledge of the plot was carried a day farther back, to Sunday, October 10. On that day the earl, and William Murray of the royal bedchamber, met Lords Ogilvy (of the bonnie House of Airlie), Gray, Almond, and Colonel Cochrane, and Murray asked the company if they had heard of a letter from Montrose to the king offering to accuse Hamilton of treason. (No such letter is known to have been written by Montrose.) Almond thought the charge improbable. As to his talk with Hurry on October 11, Crawford said that it merely concerned the colonel's desire to serve abroad; Lieutenant Colonel Stewart had the same purpose. On Monday night (the nth) he and his friends met and drank at Cochrane's rooms. (By this time they must have known, through William Murray, of Hamilton's visit to the king in Holyrood gardens, that Hamilton had suspicions, and that the game was up.) On October 27 Crawford admitted that, from the talk held on Sunday night (October 10), he gathered that there might be an idea of arresting Hamilton. He had no further information. He " did not remember " having talked about cutting the throats of traitors. His request to Hurry to come with three or four others on the morning of the 12th, referred only to the purpose of their taking foreign service, which is natural enough, as the 12th would have been "the day after the fair." The nobles were to have been seized on the night of October 11; on the 12th they decamped.

On October 23 and 27 Cochrane implicated William Murray as having spoken to him about the desirableness of "sequestrating" Hamilton and Argyll, and as having sounded him about his regiment, then quartered at Musselburgh. He had made no attempt to tamper with Lieutenant Colonel Home, and on Monday morning (October 11), near Holyrood, had told Crawford that he would have nothing to do with "cutting of throats." He denied that he had been with Almond, Crawford, Murray, and the others on the Sunday night (October 10), and Crawford had already withdrawn his original statement that Cochrane was there. On October 23-27 William Murray said that, by Cochrane's repeated desire, he had taken him into the king's bedroom, where he had an interview with his Majesty. As to Hamilton and Argyll, he himself, he confessed, had said that if they really were traitors, they should be legally "sequestrated." On Sunday, October 10, his business with Almond was to tell him that the king wished him to resign the treasurership, the royal nomination being opposed by the House. A letter of Montrose to the king was spoken of, Murray saying that his Majesty would be 10th to interrupt peaceful negotiations by noticing it. No names of Hamilton or others were mentioned in Montrose's letter (though historians are apt to say that Hamilton was named). Murray denied all knowledge of the plan that he should lure Hamilton and Argyll into a room where they should be arrested. He could not be expected to confess to that.