10. Second Marriage of the Queen.—The most interesting question now for all parties was, whom the Queen would marry. Many foreign princes were talked of, and Elizabeth suggested her own favourite, the Earl of Leicester, but Mary settled the matter herself by falling in love with her own cousin, Henry Stewart, Lord Darnley. He was son of Lennox and Margaret Douglas, and was therefore the grandson of Margaret Tudor, and was received as first prince of the blood at the English court. Mary called a special council and announced to them her intended marriage. She then raised Darnley to the Earldom of Ross, and afterwards created him Duke of Albany. They were married with the rites of the Romish Church, July 29, 1565. Murray had refused his consent to the marriage. He and some others of the lay Lords now took up arms. They got into the town of Edinburgh, but were fired at from the Castle, and, as they were disappointed in their hopes of recruits, they retreated to Dumfries. There they issued a declaration that their religion was in danger, and that the Queen had acted unconstitutionally in proclaiming Darnley King of Scots without the consent of the Estates. The feudal force was summoned, and the King and Queen led it against them. On this the Lords retreated into England and disarmed their followers.
11. Murder of Rizzio.—Mary soon began to tire of her worthless husband. She had all the weakness of her family for making favourites, and no wisdom in the choice of them. At this time she had taken a fancy to an Italian, David Rizzio, who acted as her secretary, and who had great skill in music to recommend him. The nobles grew jealous of this foreigner and determined to get rid of him; but, to save themselves from any ill-consequences of the murder which they had planned, they persuaded Darnley to sign a bond promising to stand by them in anything they might do. At the same time he signed another bond for the recall of Murray and the other banished lords. The Queen summoned a parliament, which she expected would pronounce sentence of forfeiture on those banished lords. In order to secure compliance with her wishes, she interfered with the choosing of the Lords of the Articles, into whose hands all the real business of the parliament was thrown. One evening, as she was sitting at supper in the palace at Holyrood, the conspirators, who had secured the gates, burst into the room, headed by the Lord Ruthven. They seized on Rizzio, who clutched at the Queen for help; they dragged him into the outer room; killed him, and then threw the body downstairs, March 9, 1566. His fate was not made known to the Queen till next day. James Hepburn, Earl of Bothwell, who already stood high in the Queen's favour, and the Earl of Huntly, who had been restored to the titles and estates which his father had forfeited, were in the palace when it was thus taken possession of, but they contrived to escape.
12. Flight to Dunbar.—The Queen showed no signs of anger at first. She pretended to be reconciled to Darnley, and promised pardon to the banished lords. When they appeared before her the next day, she received Murray affectionately. But the confederates soon found that they had been mistaken in their hopes of Darnley, for in the night following he fled with the Queen to Dunbar. Bothwell brought up a force for her protection, and before the end of the month she re-entered Edinburgh. Rizzio's body was taken up and buried among the kings in the palace chapel, and James Douglas, Earl of Morton, Ruthven, and others were cited to answer for the murder of Rizzio, and, as they did not appear, they were outlawed.
13. Murder of Darnley.—A new favourite soon took the place of Rizzio in the Queen's favour. This was Bothwell, who had lately done such good service in coming to her aid at Dunbar. The abbey-lands of Melrose and Haddington were given to him. He was made Lord High Admiral, and Warden of the Borders, and it was noticed that it was he and not Darnley who played the principal part at the baptism of her son, the Prince of Scotland. Darnley was hated by everyone; by his wife, because he had connived at the murder of her favourite, and by his accomplices for his treachery in deserting them. Shortly after this he fell ill of the small-pox, and was taken to Glasgow, to be tended by his father, Lennox. There, when he was getting better, the Queen paid him a visit, and proposed that he should be taken to Craigmillar Castle, in order to hasten his recovery; but this plan was afterwards changed, and he went instead to a house called the Kirk-o'-Field, close to Edinburgh. This house was blown up on the night of February 9, 1567, while the Queen was present at a ball at Holyrood, and the bodies of Darnley and of his page were found in a field hard by, as though they had been killed while trying to make their escape. It was commonly believed that Bothwell was guilty of the murder, and it was suspected that he had done it to please the Queen and with her consent. This suspicion was strengthened by her conduct. She made no effort to find out the murderer and to bring him to punishment, and on the day of the funeral she gave Bothwell the feudal superiority over the town of Leith. Lennox now came forward and demanded that Bothwell and the other persons suspected of the murder should be tried by the Estates. This was granted, and a day was fixed for the trial. But as Lennox was forbidden to bring any but his own household when he appeared as the accuser of the murderer, while Bothwell had a great following, he thought it more prudent not to appear. As no one came forward to bring evidence against Bothwell, he was acquitted, and he offered to give wager of battle to anyone who should still accuse him.
14. Third Marriage of the Queen.—Bothwell was now determined on marrying the Queen, and, after the parliament rose, he got many of the nobles to sign a bond agreeing to help him to do so. As he was already married to Huntly's sister, his wife had to be got rid of first. This was not now such an easy matter as it had been in former times. The canon law had been done away with along with the old Church; the Reformers had set up a court of their own to try such cases, while the Queen had lately restored the old one. To make the matter sure Bothwell's marriage was dissolved in both these courts. As the Queen was coming back from Stirling, where she had been to visit her child, Bothwell met her and carried her off to Dunbar, and on the day the divorce was sent they came back to Edinburgh together. He was created Duke of Orkney and Shetland, and they were married by Adam Bothwell, who had been Bishop of Orkney, but was now one of the ministers of the new Church, May 15, 1567.
15. Surrender at Carberry.—A fortnight later Mary called out the feudal force for an attack on the Borderers, but the barons did not answer to her summons. On this the Queen and Bothwell, alarmed at the increasing signs of discontent, shut themselves up in his strong castle of Borthwick, but they were scarcely there before an army with the Lords Morton and Home at its head appeared at its gates, and they fled to Dunbar. The barons then entered Edinburgh; the governor of the Castle gave it up to them. They had the Prince in their hands, and they took measures for carrying on the government, though they still professed to act in the Queen's name, and to be only striving to free her from Bothwell. He meanwhile had mustered his followers, who, though nearly equal in numbers, were in discipline far inferior to their opponents. The two armies came in sight near Musselburgh, but there was no battle, for the Queen surrendered to William Kirkcaldy of Grange, who had been sent out with a body of horse to cut off her retreat to Dunbar, at Carberry, June 15, 1567, on condition that Bothwell should be allowed to return to Dunbar unhurt. Bothwell escaped first to his own dukedom of Orkney, and afterwards to Denmark, where he died about ten years later.
16. Captivity of the Queen.—Just a month after her third marriage the Queen was brought back to Edinburgh, to be greeted by the railings of the mob, who now openly accused her as a murderess, and paraded before her eyes a banner, showing the dead body of her husband; her infant son on his knees, as though praying for justice against the murderers of his father, and the words, "Judge and avenge my cause, O Lord," embroidered upon it. From Edinburgh she was taken to a lonely castle built on a small island in the centre of Loch Leven. A few days later a casket containing eight letters was produced. These letters, it was said, Bothwell had left behind him in his flight, and they seemed to have been written by Mary to him while Darnley was ill in Glasgow. If she really wrote them, they proved very plainly that she had planned the murder with Bothwell. They are called the "casket letters," from the box or casket in which they were found. The confederate barons acted as if they were really hers. The Lord Lindsay and Robert Melville were sent to her at Loch Leven, and she there signed the demission of the government to her son, and desired that Murray should be the first Regent. From that time Mary ceased to be Queen of Scots. Her beauty, talents, and misfortunes have won her much pity and many champions, but it was her own folly and sin that changed the love of her people into hate, and their rejection of her stands out as one of the facts in their history that does most honour to the nation.
17. James VI., 1567-1625. Regency of Murray.—The infant King who was now to be set up in the room of his mother was crowned and anointed at Stirling. By his sponsor Morton he took an oath to uphold the Reformed, or as its supporters called it, the true Church, and to root out all heretics and enemies of the same. Murray was recalled from France, whither he had gone soon after the murder of the King. He made some objection to accepting the regency, and would not do so till he had had an interview with his sister. At last he agreed to take it, to comply with her wishes, as he said. As the country was crying out for vengeance on the murderers of the King, four of Bothwell's creatures who had aided in his crime were hanged at Edinburgh, but no steps were taken to punish the lords who had joined themselves by a bond with Bothwell.
18. Escape of Mary.—But there was a large party of the nobles, with the Hamiltons at their head, who were opposed to the new government and kept themselves apart at Hamilton. Before a year of her captivity had passed, Mary escaped and joined them there, and again took up the sceptre which she had so lately laid down. Eighteen lords of parliament and many lesser barons signed a bond to uphold their Queen, and she sent a message from her court at Hamilton to Murray, who was at Glasgow almost unguarded, commanding him to resign the regency. Instead of obeying, Murray seized the herald who had come to proclaim the Queen; sent to Stirling for cannon, and called out the feudal force in the name of King James.
19. Battle of Langside.—The Castle of Dunbarton Rock, the strongest fortress in the kingdom, was held for the Queen, and to it she determined to go for greater safety. To get there she had to pass close by Glasgow, where Murray was. At Langside, on the southern shore of the Clyde, her way was barred by the King's army, which, though not so large as her own, had much better leaders. The fight that followed settled the fate of Scotland, May 13, 1568. Few lives were lost, for at the first charge the spears of the front rank got locked in the jacks of their opponents. They could thus neither go backward nor forward, and kept those behind from coming within arm's length of one another. Grange turned the day by charging the Queen's force with his cavalry. They fled in confusion, and Mary rode with all speed to the Border; crossed the Solway, and going straight to Carlisle, threw herself on the protection of Elizabeth. But Elizabeth had not forgotten how Mary had assumed her arms and had given herself out as the real Queen of England; and as she knew that Mary, if left at liberty, would plot with the English Roman Catholics, she put her in ward in Bolton Castle, and refused to see her till she cleared herself of the suspicion under which she lay of having been concerned in her husband's death. But at the same time Elizabeth would not acknowledge the government of Scotland, nor approve the conduct of the lords who had set up King James, for she did not like the doctrine that princes, however badly they had acted, might be judged and punished by their subjects.
20. The Conference.—To give both parties a chance of saying what they could for themselves, it was agreed to hold a conference, to which Murray came in person, and Mary and Elizabeth each sent commissioners. The conference met at York in October. On opening it the Duke of Norfolk required that Murray should do homage in the name of his King to the Queen of England. On this, William Maitland of Lethington, the Scottish Secretary of State, a very subtle man, said that if England liked to give up again the northern counties, once held by Scotland, their King would gladly do homage for them; but as for the kingdom it was as free, or more so, than England itself. This he said to show that they did not ask Elizabeth to judge between them because she had any right to interfere, but only because she was their nearest neighbour. Before the end of the month the conference was removed to Hampton Court, and held before the Queen in Council. The lords brought forward the "casket letters," as a proof against Mary, and she refused to vindicate herself, but ordered her commissioners to withdraw. Thus the conference ended, leaving matters much as they were before, for Elizabeth decided that nothing had been brought forward to the dishonour of Murray, nor anything proved against Mary. At the same time she lent Murray five thousand pounds for the maintenance of peace and order between the two countries, which was an indirect acknowledgment of his government.
21. State of Parties.—The Hamiltons and Huntly were the chief upholders of Mary's interest. The Hamiltons wished to keep Mary on the throne, because they were the next heirs to Mary, and in the event of her son dying before her, Chatelherault could claim the crown. But as they were not the next heirs to James, they were naturally opposed to the revolution which had placed him on the throne, for they feared that if he died when actually reigning, the crown would pass to his heir, Charles Stewart, his father's brother. Huntly held out, from hatred of Murray and love of the old Church, which was still strong in his county. A compromise was at last made between the two parties. Murray promised a pardon for all past offences and a reversal of forfeitures if the other party would promise to obey King James. To make matters more sure, when the Duke of Chatelherault went up to Edinburgh, Murray put him in ward in the Castle. Just at this time there was a great rising of the Roman Catholics in the north of England, Murray marched southward, in order to be ready to put down any disturbance on the Border. There he seized as his prisoner the Earl of Northumberland, the head of the Romanists in England, who had come to seek a refuge on the Scottish side among the Borderers, many of whom still clung to the old Church.
22. Murder of the Regent.—The Hamiltons had determined on Murray's death. Though the Duke was in prison, John, the archbishop, the constant stirrer up of strife, was at liberty, and he was popularly supposed to be the contriver of a plot against the life of the Regent. Murray was murdered by James Hamilton of Bothwellhaugh, who shot at him as he was riding in state through that town on his way from Stirling to Edinburgh, February 23, 1570. This foul murder, the third which had disgraced Scotland within the last quarter of a century, was a great misfortune for the country, for Murray had ruled well and wisely, he had put down the Highlanders and the Borderers, and had enforced justice and order with a strong hand. In his time the land was visited by a famine and a plague, evils for which the people are ever apt to blame their rulers, but, in spite of these calamities, he was popular during his life, and was remembered after his death as the Good Regent.
23. Regency of Lennox.—While the government was thus without a head, and the country was in confusion, two English armies invaded Scotland to punish the Borderers for the shelter which they had given to the leaders of the late rising in England. One of these armies came north as far as the Clyde and wasted the Hamilton country. Hitherto the Queen's party had been chiefly made up of nobles with but a small following, but this attack on the part of the English aroused the old hatred of England and drove a large mass of the people to join them. The choice of Lennox, the King's grandfather, as the new Regent, did still more to divide the nation, for not only was he the subject of Elizabeth and recommended by her, but also, when he came to Scotland, it was as joint leader of one of these invading armies. Now, for the first time, the nation was truly divided against itself. The war which followed was the first real civil war in the annals of Scotland. It was no strife of class against class, or of one chief against another, but a war in which the commons were severed into two parties by the great questions of loyalty, national honour, and religion. Grange, whom Murray had made governor of Edinburgh Castle, declared for the Queen, and Lethington, who was there in ward on a charge of having had some part in the King's murder, followed his example.
24. Taking of Dunbarton.—This castle, the strongest in the kingdom, was the chief strength of the Queen's party, and in it was the moving spirit of the Hamiltons, John, the much hated and feared archbishop. Both fell during this regency. Crawford of Jordanhill, a retainer of Lennox, took the castle by subtlety with but a handful of men. He scaled the steep rock on which the castle is built under cover of the night, and when he had gained the highest point he turned the guns on the garrison below, who had no choice left but to give in, April 2, 1571. Five days later, the archbishop was hanged at Stirling, after the form of a trial had been hurried through, on a charge of having planned the murder of the King and of the Regent.
25. Parliament at Stirling.—The other noteworthy event during the regency of Lennox was the holding of a parliament, for the first time since 1567. It met at Stirling, and the young King, who lived in the castle under the care of the Earl of Mar, was himself present. While the Regent and all the leaders of his party were thus gathered in the town, a body of four hundred men, sent out by the Queen's party in Edinburgh Castle, came down upon them suddenly, swept the streets, and captured Morton and the Regent; and though the latter was afterwards rescued, he had been mortally wounded in the scuffle, and died after lingering a few hours, September 4, 1571. It was then remembered how the little King had spied a hole in the cloth with which the board whereon he sat was covered, and, trying to poke his finger into it, had said, "There is a hole in this parliament." This was looked on as a prophecy of the violent death of the Regent, and laid the foundation of that reputation for wisdom and acuteness which clung to James all his life.
26. Mar's Regency.—John Erskine, Earl of Mar, governor of Stirling, was chosen Regent the very next day. As the Queen's party, who held Edinburgh, had held a rival parliament in her name in the Parliament House, it was clear that all efforts must be made to get the castle out of their hands. Mar therefore began the siege, and open war broke out. The West, the North, and the Border were for the Queen, the eastern Lowlands for the King; the latter looked to England for help, but got none; the former appealed to France with not much better success. After much useless bloodshed, a truce of two months was agreed on, August 1, 1572.
27. Tulchan Bishops.—Under Mar episcopacy was set up again. At least it was settled that the titles and dignities of bishops and archbishops were to stay as they were before the Reformation till the King's majority, but they were shorn of their old authority, and were to be subject to the General Assembly, which now managed all church matters. The people thought so little of them that they called them in mockery "Tulchan" bishops: the word "Tulchan" meaning a sham calf which it was the custom to place before a cow to make her give milk when the real calf had been taken from her. About this time there came the news of the massacre of all the Protestants in Paris, on St. Bartholomew's Day. This roused a general horror of Romanists and created a reaction in favour of Presbytery, for the Scots wished to be more like the French Protestants, who had no bishops. It also made many of the Queen's party go over to the other side.
Mar died after being little more than a year in office, and Morton, who had latterly directed everything, was chosen Regent in his place, November 24, 1572.
28. Death of Knox.—On the same day died John Knox, who for thirteen years had been the leader of religious reform in Scotland. He spent his life and his wonderful talents in striving for what he believed to be truth and sound doctrine. One of the finest traits in his character was his moral courage, which enabled him to speak the truth boldly to those who stood highest in rank or power. To this Morton himself bore witness, saying, as he looked on the dead body of Knox, "There lies he who never feared the face of man." His zeal sometimes led him to turn against the Romanists their own weapons of intolerance and persecution, but he lived in times when men had not yet found out that it was best to let one another alone in the matter of religion. In those days any one who had shown himself tolerant of the errors of others would have been looked on either as a hypocrite or as an unbeliever. But Knox was not so much opposed to bishops and to a set form of prayer as his followers afterwards became. He drew up a prayer-book for daily use called the Book of Common Order, which was pretty nearly a translation of the book of the church at Geneva, and was what he had himself used when ministering to the English Protestants who in the reign of Mary Tudor had taken refuge at Frankfort.
29. Taking of Edinburgh.—With the new year the war began again. Morton was now in possession of the town of Edinburgh, and he held a meeting of the Estates there. But the castle still held out, and it was only by bringing against it an English force of fifteen hundred men that Elizabeth had at last sent, that its defenders were reduced to such straits that they were compelled to surrender. Grange gave himself up to the English general and appealed to the English Queen. But she either could not or would not protect him. His gallant defence of the castle for Mary was looked on as treason against the government of James, which Elizabeth had in a manner acknowledged. He was given up into the hands of Morton, his bitter enemy, and hanged at Edinburgh, August 3, 1573, in spite of all the efforts of his many friends to save him. Brave, gallant, and unselfish, he was distinguished among a greedy generation by his contempt alike of money and of place. In this he was a great contrast to his companion, the clever, unprincipled, selfish Lethington, who died by his own hand.
30. Morton's Regency.—Morton had now got all his old enemies out of the way, but he soon made more; partly by his avarice, partly by the firmness with which he insisted that the crown property should be restored. He offended Argyle by making him give back some crown jewels that had come into his possession by his marriage with Murray's widow; and, by trying to stop a feud between him and Athole, he made enemies of them both. To make his power complete Morton longed to get the King into his own hands, but he was kept apart in Stirling, under the care of Erskine the Governor, and while there Morton had no more power over him than any of the other nobles. He tried to persuade James, who was now twelve years old, that he was old enough to rule alone, but Argyle and Athole, who were both in the castle at the time, found out his plan and outwitted him. A proclamation was suddenly issued by them, setting forth that the king would now take the government into his own hands, and would act by the advice of a council, March 4, 1578. A time of great confusion followed. Morton, who at first had seemed to lay down his power with a good grace, before long was up in arms, got into Stirling Castle, dispersed the new council, and again directed everything just as he pleased.
31. Fall of Morton.—About this time Esmé Stewart, Lord of Aubigny, and nephew of the late Earl of Lennox, came from France and became a great favourite with his cousin the king. Aubigny was stirred up by James Stewart of Ochiltree, another favourite, to do his utmost to turn the king against Morton, whom he already disliked. At length Ochiltree accused Morton before the Council of having been a party in the king's murder, and on this charge he was condemned and beheaded at Edinburgh. After his death the two favourites rose still higher. Aubigny was made Duke of Lennox, and Keeper of Dunbarton Castle; and a royal bodyguard was set up in order to give him the dignity of commander. Stewart, whose mother was a Hamilton, was raised to their Earldom of Arran.
32. Raid of Ruthven.—Certain of the old nobles, who were displeased and alarmed by the power exercised by these upstarts, bound themselves together to displace them both, and to get the King by a bond into their own power. The time they chose for carrying out their plan was when the King went on a hunting party into the Highlands. The Earl of Gowrie, one of the confederates, son of that Ruthven who had played the chief part in the murder of Rizzio, invited him to the castle of Ruthven. James went, and found himself a prisoner in the hands of the barons, August 22, 1581. They then made him declare that he was well pleased with what they had done, and was not under any restraint. Lennox was ordered to leave the kingdom, and after wandering about in poverty and distress till the end of the year, he went back to France, where he died before long. But before the Ruthven Lords had been a year in power, another change came. The king escaped disguised as a groom, rode to St. Andrews, where the nobles who were not in the bond gathered round him in such force that the Confederates were obliged to yield.
33. Fall of Gowrie.—At first James acted moderately and wisely, for he promised to pardon all those who had taken part in the Raid of Ruthven; but when Arran got back his old power over him he turned about and declared them all traitors, who must submit to his grace. Upon this most of them fled to England, but Gowrie submitted to the King and was pardoned. Arran had however determined on his fall, and Gowrie was so much insulted and slighted at Court that he made up his mind to leave the country. Just before he sailed, he heard that his old comrades had contrived another plot, and he delayed his setting out in order to have a share in it. Before anything was done, news of it got abroad, Gowrie was seized and, after a very unjust trial, beheaded at Stirling. The other conspirators made off to England again and were outlawed, and their estates were forfeited.
34. Fall of Arran.—Arran's triumph did not last long. A fray took place on the Border in which an Englishman, Lord Russell, was slain. Arran was accused of having been the chief cause in this affair, and he was ordered to withdraw from Court. Then the banished lords, thinking this a good opportunity for them to return, went northward, joined the Hamiltons and Maxwells on the Border, came to Stirling and made their way into the presence of the king, who was forced to seem pleased to see them, as they had eight thousand men to support them, November 4, 1585. A Parliament was called soon after, in which three important pieces of business were done. Gowrie's children were restored to the honours forfeited by the treason of their father; Arran was stripped of all his dignities, and a new league was made with England.
35. Death of Mary.—The captive Queen, whose influence in the affairs of her own country had ceased with the surrender of Edinburgh, had, during her long imprisonment, been the cause of many plots against the peace of England and the life of Elizabeth. For her share in Babington's Plot, the object of which was the assassination of Elizabeth, she was tried, found guilty, and condemned to death. She was beheaded at Fotheringhay, February 8, 1587. Though James made some show of feelings of grief and anger at the news of his mother's death, no steps were taken to avenge it, and the matter soon seemed to be forgotten.
36. Marriage of the King.—As James was now of age, his counsellors were looking about for a suitable wife for him. Frederick the Second King of Denmark had lately sent offering to pay up the money for which the Orkney and Shetland Isles had been given in pledge, and as Scotland had no wish to give them back, it was thought that the difficulty might be got over by choosing one of his daughters, who would most likely bring the islands as her dowry. This proposal was agreed to by Frederick. His daughter Anne was betrothed to James, and Keith, the Earl Marshal, was sent to Copenhagen to act as proxy for the King in the marriage ceremony and to bring home the bride. On their way home the wedding party were storm-stayed and obliged to put into a Norwegian Port, and the King, to the surprise of every one, suddenly made up his mind to go himself to fetch his bride. He joined her at Upslo, but as nothing could make him brave the long sea voyage again till the winter was over they returned together to Copenhagen, and did not come to Scotland till the next spring, May 1, 1590.
37. Abolition of Episcopacy.—For some time the government and the church had been at variance about the bishops. The General Assembly of 1581 had declared the episcopal order to be contrary to the Word of God, and had adopted the Second Book of Discipline as the rule of the government of the Church. This book was drawn up by Andrew Melville, who had succeeded Knox as the spiritual leader of the reformed Church. He was a zealous presbyterian, and it was mainly owing to him that the Scottish Church adopted that form of church government. The Ruthven lords had been the champions of the presbyterian or no-bishop party, and, while they were in power, the ministers upheld by them had taken more and more authority upon themselves. In theory they placed the church far above the civil power, and they taught that the chief magistrate, the King, ought to be subject to them in all matters of conscience and religion. They also claimed the right of the old Church in interfering with people's private affairs. Each minister looked on himself as bishop over his own flock, and would not submit to having any overseer set over him again. But, as the removal of the bishops as spiritual peers would have been the removal of one of the three Estates—that one too that had always been on the side of the crown—and as their existence served as a pretext to the nobles for drawing their revenues, it was clearly the interest both of the crown and of the nobles to maintain them. In 1588 Philip of Spain fitted out a great fleet for the invasion of England. This caused a great panic throughout Scotland. The people feared that Philip might conquer England and bring it again under the dominion of the Pope, in which case the subjection of Scotland must soon follow. The Covenant for the maintenance of the Protestant religion, which had been signed in 1581, was renewed and signed all over the land. So great was the dread of the bishop of Rome that the people looked on all bishops with suspicion, and in 1592 an act was passed by which the whole order was swept away and the presbyterian polity established. Thenceforth the church was to be governed by a series of courts, the members of which were presbyters. The ministers of several parishes formed a presbytery, these again were grouped together into synods, while supreme over all was the General Assembly, composed of ministers and lay elders from the several presbyteries, which was to meet once a year at Edinburgh, and at which the King or his commissioner was to be present.
38. The Spanish Blanks.—Still a large party adhered to the old Church. The chiefs of this party were Huntly in the north and the Maxwells on the Border. They were always suspected of scheming for its restoration, and, as the King could not or would not proceed against them, he was supposed to favour their plans. In 1592 eight suspicious papers were seized on the person of George Kerr, the Lord Newbottle's brother, who was leaving Scotland by the western coast. These papers, called the Spanish blanks, were signed by Huntly, Errol, and Angus, but had no other writing on them. Kerr, after being put to the torture, declared that these blank papers were to be filled up by two Jesuits who were commissioned to offer the services of the nobles who had signed them to the King of Spain, to aid him in the re-establishment of the old religion. This discovery filled every one with horror. Angus was seized; but as Huntly retreated to his own country in the north, Argyle, his rival in the Highlands, was sent with full power against him. The two armies met at Glenlivat, not far from the scene of the well-remembered fight of Harlaw. Huntly had but two thousand men, raised chiefly in the northern Lowlands, but they defeated Argyle's swarm of Highlanders, October 1594. But the Romish party was too weak to follow up the victory, and in 1597 Huntly and Errol publicly renounced their old faith, and joined the established Church.
39. Religious Tumults.—The King and the Church were not long at peace. He called certain of their ministers to account before the council for what they had said in the pulpit. The ministers looked upon this interference as an attack on their privileges. The people supported them, and the result was a riot, so serious that the Court had to flee to Linlithgow. Upon this the King threatened to take away the courts of justice from Edinburgh. The fear of this damped the spirit of the mob, and after the return of the Court the ministers who had withstood the King fled to England. The Estates soon after passed an act by which the King might confer on any minister the title of bishop or abbot, but only so as to give him a seat in Parliament; the title was not to imply any lordship over his brethren.
40. The Gowrie Plot.—On the morning of the fifth of August, 1600, as James was setting out hunting from Falkland Palace, he was met by Alexander Ruthven, the younger brother of the Earl of Gowrie, who told him with a great air of mystery that he had discovered a man burying a pot of money in a field, and that he thought the affair so suspicious that he had taken him prisoner, and begged the King to come to Gowrie House in Perth to see him. James went, taking with him Mar, Lennox, and about twenty other gentlemen. After dinner Alexander took the King aside, and, when his attendants missed him, they were told that he had gone back to Falkland. They were preparing to follow him there when some of them heard cries from a turret. They recognized the King's voice, and they presently saw his head thrust out of a window calling for help. They had much ado to make their way to him, but they found him at last in a small room struggling with Alexander, while a man dressed in armour was looking on. Alexander Ruthven and Gowrie were both killed in the scuffle which followed. A tumult rose in the town, for the Earl had been Provost and was very popular with the townsfolk, and the King and his followers had to make their escape by the river. The doom of traitors was passed on the dead men, and their name was proscribed, but, as no accomplice could be discovered, it was hard to say what was the extent or object of their plot. The whole affair was very mysterious, the only witnesses being the King himself and Henderson the man in armour. Some of the ministers thought it so suspicious that they refused to return thanks for the King's safety, as they thought the whole affair an invention of his own. Eight years later some letters were discovered in the hands of one Sprot, a notary at Eyemouth, which threw some more light on the mystery. They were written by Logan of Restalrig, and revealed a plan between him and the Ruthvens for bringing some prisoner, who was not named, but might possibly be the King, to Fast Castle, a fortress belonging to Logan, standing on a rock at the entrance to the Forth. Sprot was found guilty of treason, and was put to death for not revealing all he knew about the plot long before.
41. Union of the Crowns.—When Elizabeth died, James was the nearest heir to the throne of England by right of descent from Margaret, elder daughter of Henry the Seventh. But her right had been passed over by Henry the Eighth, who had in the will, which he was empowered by Parliament to make, settled the succession on the heirs of his younger sister, Mary. As it was politically convenient to the English Privy Council that James should succeed Elizabeth on her death, they sent off post haste to summon him to come and take the crown. His questionable right was made good by the voice of the people in his first Parliament. He entered London May 6, 1603. Hitherto he had had less money and less power than almost any other prince in Europe; he now became suddenly one of the richest and most powerful among them. This union of the crowns made the third break in the history of Scotland. The gallant struggle for freedom which had drawn forth all the energies of the nation during the past three centuries was now over. It was now to be united to the powerful neighbour that had so long threatened its independence. The representative of the ancient royal Celtic line, which the national reverence for hereditary royalty had upheld unbroken through the strain of seven long minorities, now became king of the larger and richer kingdom of England, which had been ruled by one foreign dynasty after another ever since the Norman Conquest.
42. State of the Nation.—In Scotland the feudal system was still unshaken. To it the great barons owed their power, and the Reformation, which in England had strengthened the crown, had in Scotland only thrown more wealth and more power into the hands of the nobles. Hitherto the people had been only dependents of the great feudal barons, whose burthens they bore in return for their protection. Still they could not have been very badly off, for in Scotland there were no peasant wars, as in France and England. It was the Reformation which first brought them out as a separate body in the state. Their condition was now much worse than it had formerly been. The crown brought its increased power to bear upon the nobles, who in their turn, slaves and flatterers at the foreign Court and tyrants at home, used their feudal rights for the oppression of the people, who could hope for no redress from their absent King.
43. Summary.—We have, in this chapter, traced the progress of the Reformation, and noted the changes which it made in the state of the nation. Though the Reformation did not begin so soon in Scotland as in Germany and England, it made more striking changes and overthrew the old Church more completely than it did in either of those countries. It first gave to the people an independent national life. Until it roused them to separate action, they had been swayed by no party feelings, but had blindly followed the lead and fought in the feuds of their feudal superiors, without paying any heed to the cause for which they laid down their lives. The Reformation also broke off the alliance with France which had subsisted ever since the War of Independence. All the events of this period are closely connected with the change of religion, and it is marked by more civil war, more bloodshed, more crimes of violence, more party strife, more treachery and wrong and robbery, than any other period in the history of Scotland. It was the bad faith of Mary of Lorraine which first drove the Reformers to take up arms in defence of their opinions. Under their own native queen they hoped to enjoy liberty of conscience, and as they looked to her to redress their grievances they welcomed her return with much loyal feeling. By the craftiness and dissimulation of her policy in public affairs, and by the scandals of her private life, she changed their loyal affection into loathing and contempt, and finally forfeited the crown. During the long minority which followed, the country was desolated by a civil war, and the crown was impoverished by the grasping greediness of the nobles. When the King came of age, he showed himself quite unequal to the task of ruling and uniting the different rival factions in the church and in the state, and allowed himself to be governed by one worthless favourite after another. Nor were the ecclesiastical affairs of this period at all more settled than the secular. The form of church government was changed four times before the presbyterian polity was finally established in 1592. The lands of the old Church had been seized by the most worthless of the nobles instead of being set apart for the support of the new Church, so that the ministers could with difficulty secure a bare subsistence. During such an unhappy state of affairs there could be little social or intellectual development. There were however among the Reformers many men distinguished for their learning and brilliant talents. Of these the most conspicuous were George Buchanan, tutor to the young king, who wrote a fabulous history of Scotland and other books in very elegant Latin, and John Knox, who wrote a History of the Reformation, remarkable for the vigour, clearness, and simplicity of its style. Sir James Melville, who was also an accomplished courtier, and stood high in favour both with Mary and with James, gives an excellent picture of these disturbed times in his very entertaining memoirs. The Prayer Book of the Reformed Church was also translated into Gaelic. It was published in 1567, and was the first Celtic book that had ever yet been printed.
THE UNION OF THE CROWNS.
James VI.; results of the Union (1)—restoration of Episcopacy (2)—planting of the Highlands (3)—Articles of Perth (4)—founding of Nova Scotia (5)—the King's death (6)—Charles I.; resumption of benefices (7)—King's visit and coronation (8)—Book of Canons (9)—Liturgy tumults (10)—the Tables (11)—renewal of the Covenant (12)—Hamilton Commissioner (13)—Glasgow Assembly (14)—war in the north (15)—pacification of Berwick (16)—Assembly and Parliament (17)—invasion of England (18)—Treaty of Ripon (19)—war breaks out (20)—Montrose's campaign (21)—dealings with the king (22)—the Engagement; Whiggamores' raid (23)—Directory; confession of faith (24)—the king's death (25)—Charles II.; fate of Hamilton and Huntly (26)—Montrose's rising (27)—arrival of Charles (28)—Cromwell's conquest (29)—the coronation (30)—battle of Worcester (31)—union with England (32)—Glencairn's expedition (33)—the Restoration (34)—episcopacy re-established (35)—fate of Guthrie and Argyle (36)—the Ejection (37)—western rising (38)—the Persecution (39)—the Indulgence (40)—murder of Sharp (41)—Sanquhar Declaration (42)—Drumclog (43)—Bothwell Bridge (44)—Test Act (45)—Argyle's opposition (46)—James VII.; the Killing Time (47)—Argyle's rising (48)—the Indulgence (49)—deposition of James (50)—William and Mary; the Convention (51)—the Rabbling (52)—Dundee's revolt (53)—battle of Killiecrankie (54)—attack of Dunkeld; Buchan's attempt (55)—dealings with the chiefs (56)—Massacre of Glencoe (57)—Darien Scheme (58)—William's death (59)—Education Act (60)—Anne; Act of Security (61)—trial and death of Captain Green (62)—the Union (63)—literature and art (64)—summary (65).
1. James VI., 1603-1625. Results of the Union. —Immediately after the Union of the Crowns, the Border laws on each side were repealed, and it was settled that subjects of either country born after the Union should no longer be looked on as aliens in the other, but should have the undisputed right of inheriting property in either. A Lord High Commissioner was appointed to represent the King in Scotland, and there was some talk of an union of the parliaments, but it was not carried out.
2. Restoration of Episcopacy.—The great desire of the King was to bring the Church of Scotland into conformity with the Church of England. To bring this about, he summoned some of the ministers to England, in the hope that he should be able to persuade them to agree with him. Melville, their leader, spoke out so plainly against episcopacy before the bishops in the Privy Council that he was sent to the Tower and finally banished. But the King carried his point, and in 1606 the Estates passed an act for the restoration of the bishops. No acts of church government were in future to be lawful without their consent, and though the General Assembly was still to go on, its power was to be very much lessened. As the old line of Scottish bishops had died out, John Spottiswood, Andrew Lamb, and Gavin Hamilton were consecrated by English bishops at London House to the bishoprics of Glasgow, Brechin, and Galloway. To avoid all dispute about the old claim of supremacy, neither of the English archbishops was present. But these bishops had a very hard time of it, for they did not get the lands of their sees restored to them as had been promised, and many of them had hard work to get a living at all. In 1610, two Courts of High Commission were set up. These courts were afterwards united into one, but, as this court was under the control of the Court of Session, it could never be so tyrannical as the Court of High Commission in England.
3. Planting of the Highlands.—In the early part of his reign James had tried to do something to improve the state of the Highlands. To this end three new burghs were founded, and the lands of all chiefs who could not show written titles were declared forfeited. These lands were given to Lowland colonists, who were however soon glad to give up any attempt at settling among their lawless neighbours. The MacGregors, whose district lay close on the Lowland border, had shown themselves the most savage and lawless of all the Highland clans. Argyle was commissioned to hunt them down, but they beat the Lowlanders with great slaughter in a battle at Glen Fruin in 1604. Their chief was afterwards taken and hanged, and the name proscribed, but that was only breaking the power of one clan, whilst the others remained as formidable as ever. To prevent such outbreaks in future, Argyle and Huntly were entrusted with full powers to carry on the planting of the Highlands. Three conditions were required of those chiefs who were suffered to stay in possession of their lands. That they should give sureties for the good order of their clans; promise to let their land for a fixed rent in money instead of all other exactions, and agree to send their children to school in the Lowlands. These changes not only strengthened the Government, but made united action on the part of the clans more difficult.
4. Articles of Perth.—The King only paid one visit to Scotland after his accession to the throne of England. He then gave great offence by introducing ceremonial vestments at the service in his own chapel. These vestments and other ornaments which were customary in England were hateful to the presbyterians. The passing of the "Five Articles" by a General Assembly held at Perth completed their dismay, and plainly showed the King's intention to impose upon them the ceremonies which they so much disliked. By those Articles the private administration of the sacraments was allowed, all persons were enjoined to kneel at the Sacrament of the Lord's Supper, to bring their children to the Bishops for confirmation, and to observe the five great festivals of the Christian Church as holidays.
5. Founding of Nova Scotia.—The poverty of their country and the love of adventure had made the Scots from the earliest times ever ready to seek their fortunes abroad. They had won themselves renown as soldiers or traders in nearly all the countries of the Old world, but they had not as yet any colony of their own in the New one. Hitherto these emigrants, though they were called Scots, had been chiefly Saxons from the Lowlands, but in the beginning of this reign bodies of Celts had gone back to the original Scotia, and in Ulster, their old home, they won back settlements from the kindred Celtic race who now looked on them as intruders. But while some of the wanderers thus went back to the old country, others were founding a New Scotland beyond the sea. This, the third land to which the wandering people gave its name, was called by the Latin form of the name, Nova Scotia. It was granted by a Royal Charter to Sir William Alexander, afterwards Earl of Stirling, the projector of this scheme of emigration in 1621. This new settlement was divided into 1,000 parts, and every adventurer who was willing to brave the hardships of an uncleared country, and resist the encroachments of the neighbouring settlers, was rewarded with the rank and title of baronet. About the same time too the Lowlanders were encouraged to go over to the North of Ireland, and to take up the lands from which the Irish chiefs had been driven. As the soil there was much better than that which they had left, they gladly agreed to the change, and passed over in great numbers, more than ten thousand going in two years.
6. The King's Death.—On the twenty-seventh of March, 1625, the King died. He had governed Scotland during his twenty-two years of absence with a much firmer hand than in the troubled time of his personal rule. He had then been quite at the mercy of his ministers and of the nobles. The wealth and power of his larger kingdom made him now able to deal with the smaller one pretty much as he liked, and the nobles were too eagerly seeking favour and place at the richer court to be willing to risk the loss of them by opposing his will. James was quite unlike all his forefathers. He had good abilities and an unusual amount of learning, besides a good deal of common sense and shrewdness, which he sometimes made use of, but his repulsive appearance and manners, and his want of self-reliance, exposed him to ridicule and contempt. He had none of the courage, high spirit, graceful tastes and ready wit that spread a veil over the faults and vices of his ancestors. Yet he alone escaped the tragic fate that seemed the doom of all the Stewart line, and was singled out from among them for an almost fairy-like change and advance of fortune.
7. Charles I., 1625-1649. Resumption of Benefices.—Charles, who succeeded James as King of the two kingdoms, had even more exalted ideas than his father of the power of the prerogative. It fell to the lot of the Scots to take the lead and set an example to the English in resisting his arbitrary measures. Before he had been a year on the throne, it was clear that he meant to carry out his father's plan of making the Scotch Church as like the English Church as possible. He issued a proclamation recalling all the church lands which were in the hands of laymen, whether they had been granted by the crown or not. The holders protested against this injustice, and at last a compromise was made by which they agreed to give up part of the lands they held on condition of having their claim to the rest made good.
8. King's Visit and Coronation.—In 1633 Charles came to Scotland, and was crowned with great pomp in the Abbey church of Holyrood. The vestments that were worn on this occasion by the clergy gave great offence to the people. Their discontent was increased by an order from the King enjoining their own ministers to wear surplices, and the bishops to wear rochets and sleeves, instead of the Geneva cloak as heretofore. While Charles was in Scotland, a meeting of the Estates was held, in which he met with no opposition, owing to a new arrangement in choosing the Lords of the Articles. Formerly this committee had consisted of eight members from each Estate chosen by their own peers; but now the bishops were first chosen, they again chose the barons, and barons and bishops together chose the commons, so that all those chosen were really the allies of the bishops. A supplication was drawn up to remonstrate with the King about this interference, but, instead of taking it in good part, Charles was very angry, treated their remonstrance as a political offence, and put the lord Balmerinoch, who had revised the supplication which was presented to him, in prison. He was afterwards pardoned, but this did not make the King any more popular, as it was thought that he had only liberated Balmerinoch from fear and not from goodwill. While in Scotland he founded a new bishopric at Edinburgh, which had formerly formed part of the diocese of St. Andrews.
9. Book of Canons.—The discontent and distrust of the people which had been roused by the introduction of vestments, by the increase in the number of the bishops, and by the appointment of the primate as chancellor were now brought to a head by the appearance of a Book of Canons, or rules for the government of the Church. This book they were called on to accept in place of the Book of Discipline, on the authority of the King alone, unconfirmed by the Estates, and not long after the King attempted to change their form of worship as well. Through the influence of Laud, Archbishop of Canterbury, a Liturgy was drawn up on the plan of the first book of Edward the Sixth. From this Liturgy the Scotch clergy were commanded by the King to read prayers in the churches, instead of from the book of Common Order which was still in general use.
10. Liturgy Tumults.—The imposition of this book roused the old national jealousy. The people thought that to have an English service book forced upon them would be a mark of subjection; and on the day named by the King for bringing it into use, July 16, 1637, when the Dean of Edinburgh tried to read the prayers from it in St. Giles' Church, a riot broke out. Stools and books were thrown at the Dean, the Archbishop, and the Bishop of Edinburgh, who had great difficulty in escaping out of the hands of the mob. And this tumult was but a sign of the common feeling throughout the country. The King was highly incensed and ordered the offenders to be brought to punishment, and the use of the liturgy to be enforced. Numberless petitions against it from all ranks of the people poured in on the Privy Council, or were sent up to London to the King, while Edinburgh was thronged with the petitioners from all parts of the country waiting for the answer which they hoped would be favourable. No answer was given to them, but the King issued a proclamation ordering them all to return to their homes, and threatening to remove the courts from Edinburgh to Linlithgow if the disturbance continued, as had been done in the late reign. But this had no effect. The bishops and the other members of the Council were mobbed, and the supplicants joined in a common petition to the King, called the Great Supplication.
11. The Tables.—The Council finding it impossible to treat with a turbulent mob which increased instead of diminishing, persuaded the malcontents to choose representatives to act in their names, four from each class, nobles, lesser barons, clergy, and burgesses. The rest were to return peaceably to their several homes. But this committee, known as The Tables, gave the Council more trouble than the unruly mob had done, for they made their way into the Council chamber, insisted on debating there, and demanded that the bishops should be turned out.
12. Renewal of the Covenant, 1638.—Still the King would not give in, and he met a less submissive protest on the part of his subjects by another threatening proclamation. On this the Tables renewed the Covenant, with a clause added to it aimed at the bishops. At the last renewal of the Covenant, only notable persons had put their names to it, but this time it was signed by every one throughout the land, rich and poor alike. There was the greatest excitement and enthusiasm about it all over the country, and from this time the popular party became known as the Covenanters.
13. Hamilton Commissioner.—A few months later the Marquess of Hamilton came to Scotland as Commissioner with full power, it was said, to settle everything. The demands of the Covenanters were that the Court of High Commission, the Canons and the Liturgy should all be done away, and that a free Assembly and a free Parliament should be summoned. But Hamilton, acting on the orders given him, kept putting them off with promises till the King should be ready to put them down by force, when suddenly the King turned about, promised all they asked, and agreed that the Assembly should be called, and that the bishops should be tried by it.
14. Glasgow Assembly.—The Assembly met in the Cathedral Church at Glasgow, November 21, 1638. Hamilton opened it as the Royal Commissioner. But after a few days, when the attack on the bishops began, he withdrew and ordered the members to disperse. They paid no heed to this order, but went on with the trial of the bishops, who were all deposed, and eight of them excommunicated. The Canons and the Liturgy were then rejected, and all acts of the Assemblies held since 1606 were annulled.
15. War in the North.—In the North, where Huntly was the King's Lieutenant, the Covenant had not been received, and the Tables resolved to enforce it with the sword. Scotland was now full of trained soldiers just come back from Germany, where they had learnt to fight in the Thirty Years war, and as plenty of money had been collected among the Covenanters, an army was easily raised. Their banner bore the motto, For Religion, the Covenant, and the Country, and their leader was James Graham, Earl of Montrose, one of the most zealous among the champions of the cause. Aberdeen, Huntly's capital, dared make no resistance, for the soldiers occupied the town and the ministers the pulpits, and Montrose brought Huntly himself back to Edinburgh in his train. But in the first brush of actual war the King's party, the Cavaliers, or Malignants as their opponents called them, had the advantage, for they surprised and scattered the Covenanters of the North at the little village of Turriff, which they had made their trysting place. In this action, called the Trot of Turriff, the first blood was shed in the great Civil War. The Cavaliers were the first to draw the sword. Though Huntly had been taken out of the way by his removal to Edinburgh, his two sons, the Lord Aboyne and Lewis Gordon, supplied his place and called out the Highlanders. Aberdeen changed hands, and again Montrose was sent to subdue the North before the expected struggle with England should begin. At the Bridge of Dee he defeated the Malignants, and once more entered Aberdeen in triumph. Just after this entry the news was brought that peace had been made between the King and the other army of the Covenant on the Border. June 1639.
16. Pacification of Berwick.—While Montrose had been thus busy for the Covenant in the North, the King had been making ready to put down his rebellious Scottish subjects with the sword. Early in May a fleet entered the Forth under the command of Hamilton. But the Tables took possession of the strongholds, and seized the ammunition which had been laid in for the King. They then raised another army of twenty-two thousand foot and one thousand two hundred horse, and placed at its head Alexander Leslie, a veteran, trained in the German war. Their army they sent southwards to meet the English host which the King was bringing to reduce Scotland. The two armies faced each other on opposite banks of the Tweed. The Scots were skilfully posted on Dunse Law, a hill commanding the Northern road. To pass them without fighting was impossible, and to fight would have been almost certain defeat. The King seeing this agreed to treat. By a treaty called the "Pacification of Berwick," it was settled that the questions at issue between the King and the Covenanters should be put to a free Assembly, that both armies should be disbanded, and that the strongholds should be restored to the King. June 9, 1639.
17. Assembly and Parliament.—The Assembly which met at Edinburgh repeated and approved all that had been done at Glasgow. When the Estates met for the first time in the New Parliament-house, June 2, 1640, they went still further, for they not only confirmed the Acts of the Assemblies, but ordered everyone to sign the Covenant under pain of civil penalties. Now for the first time they acted in open defiance of the King, to whom hitherto they had professed the greatest loyalty and submission. Three times had they been adjourned by the King, who had also refused to see the Commissioners whom they sent up to London. Now they met in spite of him, and, as in former times of troubles and difficulties, they appealed to France for help. When this intrigue with the French was found out, the Lord Loudon, one of their Commissioners, was sent to the Tower, and the English parliament was summoned to vote supplies for putting down the Scots by force of arms. But by this time the English were beginning to see that the cause of the Scots was the cause of freedom. There was much difficulty in raising an army to march against them, and when raised it was discontented and mutinous.
18. Invasion of England.—As for the Scots they mustered stronger than before, and, on August 20, 1640, they crossed the Tweed, and entered England. At Newburn they defeated a body of English, and crossing the Tyne, marched on to Newcastle, which yielded to them without offering resistance. They then took Durham, Tynemouth, and Shields without a struggle. Meanwhile news came from Scotland that the two great strongholds of the East and of the West, Edinburgh and Dunbarton, had again fallen into their hands.
19. Treaty of Ripon.—Once more they sent to the King, who was then at York, a supplication in which they declared that all they wanted was satisfaction to their just demands. The King laid the matter before a great council of peers which he had called at York. By their advice it was decided to treat with the Scots. Eight Commissioners from their army came to Ripon, and the treaty which was begun there was not ended until nearly a year afterwards at London. All that they asked was granted, and they were promised three hundred thousand pounds to defray the expenses of this war, into which they said they had been driven. The armies were then disbanded, and peace seemed to be restored. The King came to Scotland once more, and a meeting of the Estates was held in which he let the members have their own way in everything. He also confirmed the right of the Estates to meet once every three years, and fixed the next meeting for June, 1644.
20. Breaking out of the War.—This seeming peace was but the lull before the storm, and, before one year had passed, the English had followed the example set them by the Scots in resisting the unlawful exactions of the King; the Long Parliament had brought his minister Strafford, the chief agent of his despotism, to the scaffold, and had called on the people to arm in defence of their rights and liberties. When the great Civil War began in earnest, each side was eager to secure the help of the fine army which the Scots had at their command. Religious opinion decided the matter. The Parliament, which was as much opposed to episcopacy as the Scots were, adopted the solemn League and Covenant, and ordered every one to sign it, and by so doing induced the Scots to join them. The army was raised again, and put under the command of the two Leslies, Alexander, now Earl of Leven, and his nephew David, who soon proved the better soldier of the two. A second time they entered England, January 19, 1644, and leaving a part of their force to besiege Newcastle marched on into Yorkshire, and joined the troops of the Parliament in time to share their victory at Marston Moor. Newcastle was taken by storm, October 19.
21. Montrose's Campaign.—Meanwhile Montrose, whose zeal for the Covenant had now changed into zeal for the King, was taking advantage of the absence of the Covenanting force in England to win back the North for Charles with an army of Celts alone. It was the first time that the Highlanders had been turned to account in regular war. Hitherto they had been thought only capable of preying upon one another, but now, under a General who knew how to handle them, they did wonders. The Lowlanders who had hastily mustered to oppose them were beaten at Tippermuir. Montrose then took Perth, marched northward, again defeated the Covenanters, took Aberdeen once more, and held for the King this town which twice before he had held for the Covenant. He then turned to the West, wasted the country of his great enemy Argyle, pounced down upon and scattered the force gathered to oppose his own on the shore of Loch Linnhe; kept his army in the Highlands during the winter, and early in the spring took Dundee. He twice defeated the Covenanters in the country north of the Forth, and once south of it at Kilsyth. Thus in a wonderfully short time he won back nearly the whole country for the King. But the secret of his success had lain in the rapid marches and sudden attacks that kept his men busy. When the fighting was over, the Highlanders, as was their wont, went off in large numbers to take home their spoil. In this way his army was diminished. David Leslie, who had been summoned home to oppose him, brought some cavalry from the southern army against his weakened force, and won a complete victory at Philiphaugh, near Selkirk, September 12th, 1645. Montrose retreated with the small remnant that was left to him, but he found it impossible to reassemble his scattered force. His campaign had lasted little more than a year, and a few months later the King, who had thrown himself on the protection of the Scots army at Newark, ordered him to lay down his arms. Montrose obeyed and left the country.
22. Dealings with the King.—While the Scots army was lying before Newark, Charles, whose cause was now nearly hopeless, secretly left Oxford, where he was besieged by the army of the Parliament, and sought protection in the camp of the Scots. A few days afterwards Newark surrendered, and they returned with the King to Newcastle. He stayed in their hands eight months. During this time, though they behaved towards him with respect and courtesy, he was really their prisoner, and they were busy treating with the Parliament for the terms of his surrender. If he had turned Presbyterian and signed the Covenant, no doubt they would have protected him, but after many arguments with Henderson, a noted divine of their party, he still remained unconvinced. In the end they agreed to leave England on payment of 400,000 pounds arrears of pay that were due to them. When they returned to their own country, they left the King to the mercy of the English Parliament.
23. The Engagement.—A few months later, when Charles was a prisoner at Carisbrooke, he made a secret treaty with the moderate party in Scotland, to the effect that, if they would help him to win back his power, he would confirm the Covenant and would make a trial of the presbyterian Church in England. On this the Committee of Estates, in whose hands the government was, raised an army and sent it into England, with Hamilton, who had been created a Duke, at its head. They were defeated at Preston by Oliver Cromwell, lieutenant-general of the parliamentary army. The Duke marched on to Uttoxeter. There he and his army laid down their arms, and yielded themselves prisoners, August 25, 1648. But the extreme party in Scotland were very wroth against the Engagers, as they called those who had made this "engagement" with the King. They thought that the taking of the Covenant by the King was a mere pretence, and that Hamilton's expedition was a sinful helping of the Malignants. A change in the government was the result. Argyle, the head of the extreme Covenanters, raised his followers, while from the Western Lowlands, which were just waking to zeal for the Covenant, a body of men, with Lord Eglinton at their head, marched on Edinburgh. This was called the Whiggamores' Raid, from Whig, a word used in the Westland for urging on horses. This was the origin of the word Whig, which gradually became the nickname of a political party. Argyle and his party came to terms with Cromwell, and formed a new Committee of Estates. Cromwell then marched to Edinburgh, and made them give him an assurance that none of the Engagers should be allowed to take any part in the government. By the Act of Classes which was then passed, all profane persons and enemies of the Covenant were likewise shut out from holding office.
24. The Directory and Confession of Faith. —The Scots now hoped to see their Church and their Covenant adopted over all three kingdoms. In this hope they were disappointed, for the most of the parliamentary party were Independents, who had no idea of exchanging the tyranny of bishops for that of presbyters. An Assembly of Divines met at Westminster, June 12, 1643, to settle religious matters. They adopted the Covenant, and the Scots in return accepted their directory of public worship, and the Confession of Faith drawn up by them in place of their own Books of Discipline and Common Order. But though the Covenant was thus nominally accepted in England, the different English sects were allowed far more liberty than the strict Covenanters thought right.