intriguing nobles, trailing their great inheritance in the mire, we
exclaim: Was it for this that there was such magnificent heroism? Was
it worth seven {271} years of such struggle to emancipate the land from
a foreign tyranny, only to have it fall into a degrading domestic one?
But the reassuring fact is, that the governing power of a nation is
only an incident, more or less imperfect. The life is in the people.
There was not a cottage nor a cabin in all of Scotland that was not
ennobled by the consciousness of what had been done. Men's hearts were
glad with a wholesome gladness; and every child in the land was lisping
the names of Wallace and of Bruce and learning the story of their
deeds. But for all that, the period following the death of the great
King and Captain is a disappointing one, and we are not tempted to
linger while the incapable David II. wears his father's crown, and
while the son of Baliol, instigated by England, is troubling the
kingdom, and even having himself crowned at Scone; and while Edward
III., until attracted by more tempting fields in France, is invading
the land and recapturing its strongholds. The limit of humiliation
seems to be reached when David II., in the absence of an heir, proposes
to leave his throne to Lionel, son of Edward III.!
When Robert Bruce bestowed his {272} daughter, Marjory, upon the High
Steward of Scotland, he determined the course of history in two
countries; in England even more than in Scotland. The office of
Steward was the highest in the realm. Since the time of David I. it
had been hereditary in one family, and according to a prevailing
custom, to which many names now bear testimony, the official
designation had become the family name. The marriage of Robert Stewart
(seventh High Steward of his house) to Marjory Bruce was destined to
bear consequences involving not alone the fate of Scotland, but leading
to a transforming revolution and the greatest crisis in the life of
England. As the Weird Sisters promised to Banquo, this Stewart was "to
be the fader of mony Kingis," for Marjory was the ancestress of
fourteen sovereigns, eight of whom were to sit upon the throne of
Scotland, and six upon those of both England and Scotland (1371 to
1714, three hundred and forty-three years).
Marjory's son, Robert II., the first of the Stuart kings, was crowned
at Scone in 1371. His natural weakness of character made him the mere
creature of his determined and {273} ambitious brother, the Duke of
Albany, who, in fact, held the state in his hand until far into the
succeeding reign of Robert III., which commenced in 1390. The nobles
had now established a ruinous ascendancy in the state, and so abject
had the King become, that Robert III. was paying annual grants to the
Duke of Albany and others for his safety and that of his heir. In
spite of this, his eldest son, Rothesay, was abducted by Albany and the
Earl of Douglas, and mysteriously died, it is said of starvation. The
unhappy King then sent Prince James, his second son, to France for
safety; but he was captured by an English ship by the way, and lodged
in the Tower of London by Henry IV. When Robert III. died immediately
after of a broken heart, the captive Prince was proclaimed king (1406),
and his uncle, the Duke of Albany, the next in royal succession, ruled
the kingdom in name, as he had for many years in fact.
There existed between France and Scotland that sure bond of friendship
between nations--a common hatred. This had given birth to a political
alliance which was to be a thorn in the side of England for many {274}
years. French soldiers and French gold strengthened Scotland in her
chronic war with England, and in return the Scots sent their soldiers
to the aid of the Dauphin of France. It was this which gave such value
to the royal prisoner. He could be used by Henry IV. to restrain the
French alliance, and also to keep in check the ambitious Duke of
Albany, by the fact that he could in an hour reduce him to
insignificance by restoring James to his throne.
Such were some of the influences at work during the eighteen years
while the Scottish Prince with keen intelligence was drinking in the
best culture of his age, and at the same time studying the superior
civilization and government of the land of his captivity. He seems to
have studied also to some effect the affairs of his own kingdom. He
was released in 1424, crowned at Scone, and a new epoch commenced. He
had resolved to break the power of the nobles, and with extraordinary
energy he set about his task! There was a long and unsettled account
with his own relatives. He knew well who had humiliated and broken his
father's heart, and starved to death his brother Rothesay, {275} and,
as he believed, had also conspired with Henry IV. for his own capture
and eighteen years' captivity. The old conspirator who had been the
chief author of these things had recently died, but his son wore his
title. So the Duke of Albany (the King's cousin) and a few of the most
conspicuous of the conspirators were seized, tried, and one after
another five of the King's kindred died by the axe, in front of
Stirling Castle. It was one of those outbursts of wrath after a long
period of wrongdoing, terrible but wholesome. An unscrupulous nobility
had wrenched the power from the Crown, and it must be restored, or the
kingdom would perish. This disease, common to European monarchies,
could only be cured by just such a drastic remedy; successfully tried
later in France, by Louis XI. (fifteenth century), by Ivan the Terrible
in Russia (sixteenth century), and by slower methods accomplished in
England, commencing with William the Conqueror, and completed when
great nobles were cringing at the feet of Henry VIII. There are times
when a tyrant is a benefactor. And when a centralized, or even a
despotic, monarchy {276} supplants an oligarchy, it is a long step in
progress.
This ablest of the Stuart kings was assassinated in 1437 by the enemies
he had shorn of power, his own kindred removing the bolts to admit his
murderers. He was the only sovereign of the Stuart line who inherited
the heroic qualities of his great ancestor Robert Bruce, a line which
almost fatally entangled England, and sprinkled the pages of history
with tragedies, four out of the fourteen dying violent deaths, two of
broken hearts, while two others were beheaded.
It is a temptation to linger for a moment over the personal traits of
James I. We shall not find again among Scottish kings one who is
possessed of "every manly accomplishment," one who plays upon the
organ, the flute, the psaltery, and upon the harp "like another
Orpheus," who draws and paints, is a poet, and what all the world
loves--a lover. It was his pure, tender, romantic passion for Lady
Jane Beaufort, whom he married, just before his return to his kingdom,
which inspired his poem, "The Kingis Qahaiir" (the King's book), a work
{277} never approached by any other poet-king, and which marked a new
epoch in the history of Scottish poetry. It is the story of his life
and his love--a fantastic mingling of fact and allegory after the
fashion of Chaucer and other mediaeval writers. It is pleasant to
fancy that a sympathetic friendship may have existed between the
unfortunate youth and the warm-hearted, impulsive Prince Hal, who,
immediately upon his accession as Henry V., had James transferred from
the Tower to Windsor. There it was he spent the last ten years of his
captivity, there he met Lady Jane Beaufort, and wrote a great part of
his poem.
The turbulence which had been checked by the splendid energy of James
I., revived with increased fury after his death. The fifty years in
which James II. and James III. reigned, but did not govern, is a
meaningless period, over which it would be folly to linger. If it had
any purpose it was to show how utterly base an unpatriotic feudalism
could become--Douglases, Crawfords, Livingstons, Crichtons, Boyds, like
ravening beasts of prey tearing each other to pieces, and trying to
outwit by perfidy when {278} force failed; Livingstons holding the
infant King, James II., a prisoner in Stirling Castle, of which they
were hereditary governors, and together with the Crichtons entrapping
the young Earl of Douglas and his brother by an invitation to dine, and
then beheading them both--so that it is with satisfaction we learn of
the King's reaching his majority and beheading a half-score of
Livingstons at Edinburgh Castle! Then to the Douglases is traced every
disorder in the realm, and with relief we hear of their disgrace and
banishment, only to have the Boyds come upon the scene with a villanous
conspiracy to seize the young King, James III., they, after rising to
power, swiftly and tragically to fall again. History could not afford
a more shameful and senseless display of depravity than in these human
vultures. A Scottish writer says: "There was nothing but slaughter in
this realm, every party lying in wait for another, as they had been
setting tinchills (snares) for wild beasts."
In viewing this raging storm of anarchy one wonders what had become of
the people. We hear nothing of them. They had no political influence,
and if they had {279} representatives in Parliament, they were dumb,
for the voice of the Commons was never heard. But there is reason to
believe that, in spite of the ferocious feudal and social anarchy, the
urban population and the peasantry were groping their way into a higher
civilization. That better ways of living prevailed we may infer from
sumptuary laws enacted by James III., and in the founding of three
universities (St. Andrew's, 1411, Glasgow, 1450, and Aberdeen, 1494)
there is sure indication that beneath the turbid political surface
there flowed a stream of intellectual life. From these literary
centres "learned Scotsmen" began to swarm over the land, and a solid
scholarship was the aim of ambitious youths, who found in that the road
to posts of distinction once won only by arms. There was a small body
of national literature. Barbour's poem, "The Brus," led the way in the
fourteenth century, then King James's poem in the fifteenth, then
Henryson and Boece, and the procession of splendid names had commenced
which was to be joined in later ages by Burns, Scott, and Carlyle.
England had now become the refuge for {280} disgraced and intriguing
nobles. The Duke of Albany, the Earl of Douglas, and others entered
into negotiations with the English King, offering to acknowledge his
feudal superiority, he in return promising to give the crown of
Scotland to Albany. A battle between the English and Scottish forces
took place in the vicinity of Stirling. During the engagement King
James was thrown from his horse and then slain by his miscreant nobles
(1488). The scheme was a failure, and the son of the murdered King was
at once crowned James IV. Henry VII., now King of England, conceived a
plan of cementing friendly relations between the two kingdoms by the
marriage of his daughter, Princess Margaret, with the young King. This
union, so fruitful in consequences, took place at Holyrood in 1502,
amid great rejoicings.
During the two preceding reigns the relations of Scotland with her
great neighbor were comparatively peaceful. But in 1509 Queen
Margaret's brother, Henry VIII., was crowned King of England. Family
ties sat very lightly upon this monarch, and his hostile purposes soon
became apparent, and {281} the friendly relations were broken. A war
between France and England was the signal for a renewal of the old
alliance between the French and the Scots. James himself led an army
against that of his brother-in-law across the Tweed, and at Flodden met
an overwhelming defeat and his own death (1513).
Europe was now unconsciously on the brink of a moral and spiritual
revolution, a revolution which was going to affect no country more
profoundly than Scotland. The Church of Rome, deeply embedded and
wrought into the very structure of every European nation, seemed like a
part of nature. As soon would men have expected to see the foundations
of the continent removed, and yet there was a little rivulet of thought
coursing through the brain of an obscure monk in Germany which was
going to undermine and overthrow it, and cause a new Christendom to
arise upon its ruins. And strangely, too, as if by pre-arrangement,
that wonderful new device--the printing press--stood ready, waiting to
disseminate the propaganda of a Reformed Church!
But kings and nobles went on as before {282} with their absorbing game.
The infant James V. was proclaimed king. The conditions which had
disgraced the minority of his predecessors were repeated, and until he
was eighteen he was virtually a prisoner; then with relentless severity
he turned upon the traitors. The Reformation which was assuming great
proportions was beginning to creep into Scotland. The Catholic King,
with a double intent, placed Primates of the Church in all the great
offices, and the excluded nobles began to lean toward the new faith.
Luther's works were prohibited and stringent measures adopted to drive
heretical literature out of the land. When, for reasons we all know,
Henry VIII. became an illustrious convert to Protestantism, he tried to
bring about a marriage between his nephew, James, and his young
daughter, Princess Mary; at the same time urging his nephew to join him
in throwing off the authority of the Pope. But James made a choice
pregnant with consequences for England. He married, in 1538, Mary,
daughter of the great Duke of Guise in France; thus rejecting the
peaceful overtures of his uncle, Henry VIII., and confirming the French
alliance and {283} the anti-Protestant policy of his kingdom. Henry
was displeased, and commenced an exasperating course toward Scotland.
There was a small engagement with the English at Solway Moss, which
ended in a panic and defeat of the Scots. This so preyed upon the mind
of the King that his spirit seemed broken. The news of the birth of a
daughter--Mary Stuart--came to him simultaneously with that of the
defeat. He was full of vague, tragic forebodings, sank into a
melancholy, and expired a week later (1542). The little Queen Mary at
once became the centre of state intrigues. Henry VIII. secured the
co-operation of disaffected Scotch nobles in a plan to place her in his
hands as the betrothed of his son, Prince Edward. A treaty of alliance
was drawn and signed, agreeing to the marriage, with the usual
condition of the feudal lordship of the English King over Scotland.
The Scottish Parliament, through the efforts of Cardinal Beaton,
rejected the proposal, and the furious Henry declared war, with
instructions to sack, burn, and put to death without mercy, Cardinal
Beaton's destruction being especially enjoined. The Cardinal, in the
{284} meantime, was trying to stamp out the Reform-fires which were
spreading with extraordinary swiftness. There were executions and
banishments. Wishart, the Reformer and friend of John Knox, was burned
at the stake. Following this there was a conspiracy for the death of
the Cardinal, who was assassinated, and his Castle of St. Andrew became
the stronghold of the conspirators. John Knox, for his own safety,
took refuge with them, and upon the surrender of the castle to a French
force, Knox was sent a prisoner to the French galleys.
The infant Queen, now six years old, was betrothed to the grandson of
Francis I. and conveyed by Lord Livingston to France for safe-keeping
until her marriage. Her mother, Mary of Guise, was Regent of Scotland,
and doing her best to stem the tide of Protestantism. The spread of
the Reformed faith was amazing. It took on at first a form more
ethical than doctrinal. It was against the immoralities of the clergy
that a sternly moral people rose in its wrath, and, on the other hand,
it was the reading of the Scriptures, and interpreting them without
authority, for which men were condemned to the {285} stake, their
accusers saying, "What shall we leave to the bishops to do, when every
man shall be a babbler about the Bible?" Carlyle says the Reformation
gave to Scotland a soul. But it might have fared differently had not a
co-operating destiny at the same time given Scotland a John Knox! Knox
was to the Reformed Church in Scotland what the body of the tree is to
its branches. He not only poured his own uncompromising life into the
branches, but then determined the direction in which they should
inflexibly grow. Knox had been the friend and disciple of Calvin in
Geneva. The newly awakened soul in Scotland fed upon the theology of
that great logician as the bread of heaven, and Calvinism was forever
rooted in the hearts and minds of the people.
The marriage of Queen Mary with the Dauphin had been quickly followed
by the death of Henry II., and her young consort was King of France.
Queen Elizabeth, in response to an appeal from the Reformed Church,
sent a fleet and soldiers to meet the powerful French force which would
now surely come. But the reign of Francis {286} II. was brief. In
1560 tidings came that he was dead. Mary now resolved to return to her
own kingdom. Elizabeth tried to intercept her by the way, but she
arrived safely and was warmly welcomed. She was nineteen, beautiful,
gifted, rarely accomplished, had been trained in the most brilliant and
gayest capital in Europe, and was a fervent Catholic. She came back to
a land which had by Act of Parliament prohibited the Mass and adopted a
religious faith she considered heretical, and a land where
Protestantism in its austerest form had become rooted, and where John
Knox, its sternest exponent, held the conscience of the people in his
keeping. What to her were only simple pleasures, were to them deadly
sins. When the Mass was celebrated after her return, so intense was
the excitement, the chapel-door had to be guarded, and Knox proclaimed
from the pulpit, that "an army of 10,000 enemies would have been less
fearful to him" than this act of the Queen.
During the winter in Edinburgh the gayeties gave fresh offence. Knox
declared that "the Queen had danced excessively till after midnight."
And then he preached a sermon {287} on the "Vices of Princes," which
was an open attack upon her uncles, the Guises in France. Mary sent
for the preacher, and reproved him for disrespect in trying to make her
an object of contempt and hatred to her people, adding, "I know that my
uncles and ye are not of one religion, and therefore I do not blame
you, albeit you have no good opinion of them." The General Assembly
passed resolutions recommending that it be enacted by Parliament that
"all papistical idolatry should be suppressed in the realm, not alone
among the subjects, but in the Queen's own person." Mary, with her
accustomed tact, replied, that she "was not yet persuaded in the
Protestant religion, nor of the impiety in the Mass. But although she
would not leave the religion wherein she had been nourished and brought
up, neither would she press the conscience of any, and, on their part,
they should not press her conscience."
We cannot wonder that Mary was revolted by the harshness of John Knox;
nor can we wonder that he was alarmed. A fascinating queen, with a
rare talent for diplomacy, and in personal touch with all the Catholic
centres in Europe, was a {288} formidable menace to the Reformed Church
in Scotland, and would in all probability have temporarily overthrown
it, had not the course of events been unexpectedly arrested. Every
Court in Europe was scheming for Mary's marriage. Proposals from
Spain, France, Austria, Sweden, Denmark, and the Earl of Leicester in
England were all considered. Mary's preference was for Don Carlos of
Spain; but when this proved impossible, she made, suddenly, an
unfortunate choice. Henry Stewart, who was Lord Darnley, the son of
the Earl of Lennox, was, like herself, the great grandchild of Henry
VII. That was a great point in eligibility, but the only one. He was
a Catholic, three years younger than herself, good-looking, weak and
vicious. The marriage was celebrated at Holyrood in 1565, and Mary
bestowed upon her consort the title of king. This did not satisfy him.
He demanded that the crown should be secured to him for life; and that
if Mary died childless, his heirs should succeed. With such violence
and insolence did Darnley press these demands, and so open were his
debaucheries, that Mary was revolted and disgusted. Her chief {289}
minister was an Italian named Rizzio, a man of insignificant, mean
exterior, but astute and accomplished. There seems no reason to
believe that Darnley was ever jealous of the Italian, but he believed
that he was an obstacle to his ambitious designs and was using his
influence with Mary to defeat them. He determined to remove him.
While Rizzio and the Queen were in conversation in her cabinet, Darnley
entered, seized and held Mary in his grasp, while his assassins dragged
Rizzio into an adjoining room and stabbed him to death. Who can wonder
that she left him, saying, "I shall be your wife no longer!" But after
the birth of her infant, three months later, her feelings seem to have
softened, and it looked like heroic devotion when she went to his
bedside while he was recovering from small-pox, and had him tenderly
removed to a house near Edinburgh, where she could visit him daily.
It will never be known whether Mary was cognizant of or, even worse,
accessory to Darnley's murder, which occurred at midnight a few hours
after she had left him, February 9, 1567.
{290}
Suspicion pointed at once to the Earl of Bothwell. The Court acquitted
him, but public opinion did not. And it was Mary's marriage with this
man which was her undoing. Innocent or guilty, the world will never
forgive her for having married, three months after her husband's death,
the man believed to be his murderer! Even her friends deserted her. A
prisoner at Lochleven Castle, she was compelled to sign an act of
abdication in favor of her son. A few of the Queen's adherents, the
Hamiltons, Argyles, Setons, Livingstons, Flemings, and others gathered
a small army in her support and aided her escape, which was quickly
followed by a defeat in an engagement near Glasgow. Mary then resolved
upon the step which led her by a long, dark, and dreary pathway to the
scaffold. She crossed into England and threw herself upon the mercy of
her cousin, Elizabeth.
Immediately upon the Queen's abdication her son, thirteen months old,
was crowned James VI. of Scotland. There was a powerful minority which
disapproved of all these proceedings; so now there was a Queen's party,
a King's party, the latter, under the {291} regency of Moray, having
the support of the Reformed clergy. These conditions promised a bitter
and prolonged contest, which promise was fully realized; and not until
1573 was the party of the Queen subdued. During the minority of the
King a new element had entered into the conflict. The Reformation in
Scotland had, as we have seen, under the vigorous leadership of John
Knox, assumed the Calvinistic type. In England, during the reign of
Elizabeth, a more modified form had been adopted--an episcopacy, with a
house of bishops, a liturgy, and a ritual. To the Scotch Reformers
this was a compromise with the Church of Rome, no less abhorrent to
them than papacy. The struggle resolved itself into one between the
advocates of these rival forms of Protestantism, each striving to
obtain ascendancy in the kingdom, and control of the King. Some of the
most moderate of the Protestants approved of restoring the
ecclesiastical estate which had disappeared from Parliament with the
Reformation, and having a body of Protestant clergy to sit with the
Lords and Commons. These questions, of such vital moment to the
consciences of many, were to others merely a cloak for {292} personal
ambitions and political intrigues. When James was seventeen years old,
the method already so familiar in Scotland, was resorted to. In order
to separate him from one set of villanous plotters, he was entrapped by
another by an invitation to visit Ruthven Castle, where he found
himself a prisoner, and when the plot failed, the Reformed clergy did
its best to shield the perpetrators, who had acted with their knowledge
and consent.
But James had already made his choice between the two forms of
Protestantism, and the basis of his choice was the sacredness of the
royal prerogative. A theology which conflicted with that, was not the
one for his kingdom. He would have no religion in which presbyters and
synods and laymen were asserting authority. The King, God's anointed,
was the natural head of the Church, and should determine its policy.
Such was the theory which even at this early time had become firmly
lodged in the acute and narrow mind of the precocious youth, and which
throughout his entire reign was the inspiration of his policy. In the
proceedings following the "Ruthven Raid," as it is {293} called, he
openly manifested his determination to introduce episcopacy into his
kingdom.
So the conflict was now between the clergy and the Crown. The latter
gained the first victory. Parliament, in 1584, affirmed the supreme
authority of the King in all matters civil and religious. The act
placed unprecedented powers in his hands, saying, "These powers by the
gift of Heaven belong to his Majesty and to his successors." And so it
was that in 1584 the current started which, after running its ruinous
course, was to terminate in 1649 in the tragedy at Whitehall. There
was a reaction from the first triumph of divine right, and in 1592 the
Act of Royal Supremacy was repealed, and the General Assembly succeeded
in obtaining parliamentary sanction for the authority of the presbytery.
The Roman Catholic Church, although no longer conspicuous in the arena
of politics, was by no means extinguished in Scotland. Its stronghold
was in the North, among the Highlands, where it is estimated that out
of the 14,000 Catholics in the kingdom, 12,000 were still clinging with
unabated ardor to the {294} old religion. It was this minority, with
many powerful chiefs for its leaders, which looked to Mary as the
possible restorer of the faith; and this was the nursery and the
hatching-ground for all the plots with France or Spain which for twenty
years were leading Mary step by step toward Fotheringay. Whether the
copies of the compromising letters which convicted her of complicity in
these plots would have stood the test of an impartial investigation
to-day we cannot say; but we know that Mary's tarnished name was
restored almost to lustre by the fortitude and dignity with which she
bore her long captivity, and met the moment of her tragic release
(1587). There is something in this story which has touched the
universal heart, and the world still weeps over it. But we do not hear
that it ever cost her son one pang. James was twenty years old when
Elizabeth signed the fatal paper, and if he ever made an effort to save
his mother or shed a single tear over her fate, history does not
mention it. Perhaps it was in recognition of this, or it may have been
in reward for his championship of episcopacy, that Elizabeth made James
her heir and successor. Whatever {295} was the impelling motive, the
protracted struggle between the two nations came to a strange ending;
not the supremacy of an English king in Scotland, as had been so often
attempted, but the reign of a Scottish king in England. Elizabeth died
in 1603, leaving to the son of Mary her crown, and a few days later
James arrived in London, was greeted by the shouts of his English
subjects, and crowned James I., King of England, upon the Stone of
Destiny.
The limits of this sketch do not permit more than the briefest mention
of the period between the union of the crowns, and the legislative
union, a century later, when the two kingdoms became actually one. Its
chief features were the resistance to encroachments upon the polity and
organization of the Presbyterian Church in Scotland, the cruelty and
oppressions used by Charles I. to enforce the use of the liturgy of the
Church of England, the formation of the "National Covenant," a sacred
bond by which the Covenanters solemnly pledged an eternal fidelity to
their Church, the alliance between the Scotch Covenanters and English
Puritans, and the consequences to Scotland {296} of the overthrow of
the monarchy by Cromwell. Still later (1689) came the rising of the
Highland chiefs and clans, the Jacobites, as the adherents of the
Stuarts are called, an attempt by the Catholics in the North to bring
about the restoration of the exiled King or his son, the Pretender.
Statesmen in England, and some in Scotland, believed there would be no
peace until the two countries were organically joined. In the face of
great opposition a treaty of union was ratified by the Scottish
Parliament in 1707. The country was given a representation of
forty-five members in the English House of Commons, and sixteen peers
in the House of Lords, and it was provided that the Presbyterian Church
should remain unchanged in worship, doctrine, and government "to the
people of the land in all succeeding generations." With this final Act
the Scottish Parliament passed out of existence.
The wisdom of this measure has been abundantly justified by the
results--a growth in all that makes for material prosperity, a richer
intellectual life, and peace. After centuries of anarchy and misrule
and {297} aimless upheavals, Scotland had reached a haven. Her triumph
has been a moral and an intellectual triumph, not political. In
intellectual splendor her people may challenge the world, and in moral
elevation and in righteousness they will find few peers. But candor
compels the admission that Scotland has no more than Ireland proved
herself capable of maintaining a separate nationality. Without the
excuse of her sister island, never the victim of a foreign conquest,
left to herself, with her own kings and government for nearly a
thousand years, what do we see? A brave, spirited, warlike race with a
passion for liberty dominated and actually effaced by vicious kings,
intriguing regents, and a corrupt nobility; only once, under Wallace
and Bruce, rising to heroic proportions, and then to throw off a
foreign yoke and under leaders who were both of Norman extraction.
Never once were her native oppressors checked or awed; never once did
an outraged people unite under a great political leader; and only one
sovereign after Bruce (James I.) can be said to have had great kingly
qualities. What are we to conclude? {298} Are we not compelled to
believe that Scotland reached her highest destiny when she was joined
to England, and when she bestowed her leaven of righteousness and her
moral strength and the genius of her sons, and received in exchange the
political protection of her great neighbor?
{299}
SOVEREIGNS AND RULERS OF ENGLAND.
ANGLO-SAXON LINE Reign began
A.D.
Egbert ........................................... 800
Ethelwulf ........................................ 836
Ethelbald ........................................ 857
Ethelbert ........................................ 860
Ethelred ......................................... 866
Alfred ........................................... 871
Edward the Elder ................................. 901
Athelstan ........................................ 925
Edmund ........................................... 940
Edred ............................................ 946
Edwy ............................................. 955
Edgar ............................................ 957
Edward the Martyr ................................ 975
Ethelred the Unready ............................. 978
Edmund Ironside .................................. 1016
DANISH LINE
Canute ........................................... 1017
Harold I ......................................... 1030
Hardi Canute ..................................... 1039
SAXON LINE
Edward the Confessor ............................. 1041
Harold II ........................................ 1066
{300}
NORMAN LINE
William I ........................................ 1066
William II ....................................... 1087
Henry I .......................................... 1100
Stephen .......................................... 1135
PLANTAGENET LINE
Henry II ......................................... 1154
Richard I ........................................ 1189
John ............................................. 1199
Henry III ........................................ 1216
Edward I ......................................... 1272
Edward II ........................................ 1307
Edward III ....................................... 1327
Richard II ....................................... 1377
HOUSE OF LANCASTER
Henry IV ......................................... 1399
Henry V .......................................... 1413
Henry VI ......................................... 1422
HOUSE OF YORK
Edward IV ........................................ 1461
Edward V ......................................... 1483
Richard III ...................................... 1483
HOUSE OF TUDOR
Henry VII ........................................ 1485
Henry VIII ....................................... 1509
Edward VI ........................................ 1547
Mary ............................................. 1553
Elizabeth ........................................ 1558
STUART LINE
James I .......................................... 1603
Charles I ........................................ 1625
THE COMMONWEALTH
1649-1660
{301}
STUART LINE
Charles II ....................................... 1660
James II ......................................... 1685
HOUSE OF ORANGE
William and Mary ................................. 1688
STUART LINE
Anne ............................................. 1702
BRUNSWICK LINE
George I ......................................... 1714
George II ........................................ 1727
George III ....................................... 1760
George IV ........................................ 1820
William IV ....................................... 1830
Victoria ......................................... 1837
Edward VII ....................................... 1901
BEGINNING OF SCOTTISH KINGDOM UNDER KENNETH MACALPINE,
AFTER UNION OF PICTS AND SCOTS
Began to Reign
A.D.
Kenneth II ....................................... 836
Union with the Picts ............................. 843
Donald V ......................................... 854
Constantine II ................................... 858
Ethus ............................................ 874
Gregory .......................................... 875
Donald VI ........................................ 892
Constantine III .................................. 903
Malcolm I ........................................ 943
Indulfus ......................................... 952
Duff ............................................. 961
{302}
Culenus .......................................... 966
Kenneth III ...................................... 970
Constantine IV ................................... 994
Grimus ........................................... 996
Malcolm II ....................................... 1004
Duncan I ......................................... 1034
Macbeth .......................................... 1040
Malcolm III ...................................... 1057
Donald VII ....................................... 1093
Duncan II ........................................ 1094
Edgar ............................................ 1098
Alexander I ...................................... 1107
David I .......................................... 1124
Malcolm IV ....................................... 1153
William .......................................... 1165
Alexander II ..................................... 1214
Alexander III .................................... 1249
INTERREGNUM
John Baliol ...................................... 1293
Robert I (Bruce) ................................. 1306
David II ......................................... 1330
Edward Baliol .................................... 1332
Robert II ........................................ 1370
Robert III ....................................... 1390
INTERREGNUM
HOUSE OF STUART
James I .......................................... 1424
James II ......................................... 1437
James III ........................................ 1460
James IV ......................................... 1489
James V .......................................... 1514
Mary Stuart ...................................... 1544
Mary and }
Henry Stuart } jointly .......................... 1565
James VI ......................................... 1567
{303}
INDEX.
ENGLAND
Abelard, 53
Act of Supremacy, 84
Addison, 135
Agincourt, 65
Agricola, 13
Albert, Prince of Saxe-Coburg, 159, 171
Alfred, King, 27, 40
Anglo-Saxons, 15-20, 22, 39
Anne Boleyn, 75, 77
Anne, of Cleves, 78
Anne, Queen of England, 131, 135
Anselm, 38
Antoninus, 14
Aquitaine, 65
Army Plot, 116
Arthur, King, 16
Arthur, Prince 48
Atlantic Cable, 169
Bacon, Francis, 95, 100
Bacon, Roger, 53
Baeda, 27
Balaklava, Battle of, 163
Bank of England, 130
Bannockburn, Battle of, 56
Basques, 10
Bayeux Tapestry, 33
Bedford, Duke of, 65
Bible, 101
Bill of Rights, 127
Black Death, 58
Black Prince, 58
Blenheim, Battle of, 133
Boadicea, 11
Bosworth, Battle of, 71
Bothwell, 93
Boyne, Battle of, 127
Bright, John, 160, 171
British Association, 27
Britons, 10, 14, 20
Bruce, Robert, 56
Bruno, 86
Buddha, 193
Buller, General, 185
Bunker Hill, 148
Bunyan, 124
Burke, 145, 149
Burney, Frances, 153
Burns, 153
Byron, 154
Cade, Jack, 66
Caedmon, 26
Caesar, 11
Calais, 81
Calcutta, Black Hole of, 140
Calvin, 84
Canada, 140, 143
Canning, 149
Canterbury, 25, 45
Canterbury, Archbishop of, 44
Canute, 31
Cape of Good Hope, 172
Caroline, of Brunswick, 156
Caroline, Queen, 138
Catharine de Medici, 91
Catholicism, Roman Church, 25, 63, 74-79, 83, 99, 123
Cavaliers, 123, 137
Cawnpore, Massacre at, 166
Caxton, 71
Cerdic, 19-22
Charles I, 102, 118
Charles II, 121, 123
Charles V, 74
Charles VII, 65
Charlotte, Princess, 156
Chaucer, 60
Christianity, 18, 23, 26
Chronicle, 149
Church of England, 76, 83
Churchill, John, 132
Circuits, 45
Clarence, Duke, 62
Claudius, 11
Clive, 140
Cobden, Richard, 160
Coleridge, 149, 153
Colonies, The Thirteen, 145
Commonwealth, 119
Conservatives, 137, 157
Constance, of Brittany, 48
Cook, Captain, 143
Cornwallis, Lord, 148
Court of Appeals, 45
Cowper, 153
Crecy, Battle of, 57
Crimean War, 162
Cromlechs, 9
Cromwell, Oliver, 117, 119
Cromwell, Thomas, 77
Cronje, General, 185-191
Crusades, 42, 47
Culloden Moor, 139
Daguerre, 169
Danes, 30
Darnley, Lord, 93
Defoe, 135
De Wet, 189
Dickens, 170
Disraeli (Lord Beaconsfield), 160, 171
Domesday Book, 36
Drake, Sir Francis, 94
Dufferin, 187
Duncan, 31
Dutch East India Co., 172
East India Co., 89, 140, 149, 173
Edict of Nantes, 173
Education Bill, 195
Edward "the Confessor," 32
Edward I, 54
Edward II, 56
Edward III, 56, 62, 66
Edward IV, 68
Edward V, 70
Edward VI, 78, 79
Edward VII, 191
Edward, of York, 67
Edward, Prince of Wales, 68
Edwin, 26
Egbert, 23
Elizabeth, 80, 82
Erasmus, 71
Escurial, 86
Exeter, Duke of, 69
Exposition, 169
Fawkes, Guy, 99
Feudalism, 34, 66, 69
Fielding, 135
Flodden Field, 91
Florida, Cession of, 141
Fox, 145, 148, 149
Franchise, 184
Francis I, 74
Frith-Gilds, 40
Fulton, 154
Gage, General, 147
Geoffrey, Count of Anjou, 43
Geoffrey, Prince, 48
George I, Elector of Hanover, 135, 138
George II, 138
George III, 143, 146, 151
George IV, 155
George, Prince of Denmark, 134
Gilds, 40
Gladstone, 171
Godwin, 32
Goldsmith, 153
Grand Alliance, 131, 132
Grand Lama, 193
Great Britain, 101
Great Trek, 175
Gregory, Pope, 24
Grey, Lady Jane, 79
Guise, House of, 92, 102, 123
Guise, Mary, 91
Gunpowder Plot, 99
Habeas Corpus, 123, 124
Hadrian, 14
Hampden, John, 106, 112, 116
Hanover, House of, 135
Harold, 32, 33, 38
Hastings (Senlac), Battle of, 33
Hastings, Warren, 149
Havelock, General, 167
Hengest, 22
Henrietta, of France, 103
Henry I, 42
Henry II, 44
Henry III, 51
Henry IV, 63
Henry V, 64
Henry VI, 68
Henry VII, 71
Henry VIII, 73-79
Henry Tudor, 71
High Commission Court, 115
Hinterland, 176
Horsa, 22
House of Commons, 54, 63, 87, 119, 156
Howard, John, 153
Howard, Katharine, 78
Huguenots, 89, 173, 186
Hundred Years' War, 65
Iberians, 10
India, 140, 143, 164, 168
India, Viceroy of, 192-193
Ireland, 154, 159, 194
Jackson, General Andrew, 151
James I, of England, 96, 99, 102
James II, 123, 125
James IV, of Scotland, 90
James V, of Scotland, 91
James VI, of Scotland, 94
Jameson Raid, 182, 183
Jamestown, Virginia, 99
Jeffries, Chief Justice, 124
Jew, 36, 51, 53, 55
Joan of Arc, 65
John, Prince, 46
John of Gaunt, 62
Johnson, 153
Joubert, General, 185
Jutes, 22
Kaffir, 188
Katharine, Princess of Aragon, 73
Katharine, Princess, 65
Kelt, 20
Keltic-Aryans, 9
Keltic-Britons, 13, 55
Keltic-Gauls, 13
King's Court, 42, 45
Knox, John, 94
Kruger, Paul Stephanus, 177
Lancaster, Duke of, 62
Lancaster, House of, 62, 67, 71
Laud, Archbishop, 103, 111, 115
Leicester, Earl of, 95
Lexington, Battle of, 148
Lhassa, 193
Liberals, 137, 157
Lionel of York, 67
Lollards, 64
London, 11, 12, 35
Long Parliament, 114-120
Louis XIV, 126
Loyalists, 114
Luther, 74
Magna Charta, 49
Margaret, Princess, 90
Marlborough, Lord, 132
Mary Stuart, 81, 89, 96
Mary Tudor, 80
Massachusetts Charter, 107, 147
Massacre of St. Bartholomew's, 89
Matilda, 43
Mayflower, 98
Merchant Co., 89, 140
Metabeli, 178
Methodism, 141
Milner, Sir Alfred, 184
Milton, 124
Monopolies, 112
Montcalm, 140
More, Sir Thomas, 73, 95
Mortimer, 56
Motley, John, 186
Napoleon Bonaparte, 150
Naseby, Battle of, 117
Natal, 178
Netherlands, 186
New England, 98
Newton, 124
Nightingale, Florence, 164
Nonconformists, 195
Normandy, 42
North, Lord, 148
Northmen, 30
O'Connell, Daniel, 155
Opus Maius, 53
Orange Free State, 175, 179
Orleans, Battle of, 65
Ouck, Kingdom of, 165
Oxford, 52, 54, 59, 71
Parliament, 54, 62, 69, 88, 105
Parr, Katharine, 78
Peel, Sir Robert, 155
Petition of Right, 106, 127
Philip II, of Spain, 80, 85
Picts, 13, 14, 23
Pitt, William, 142, 145
Plantagenet, 44, 58
Plymouth, 99
Popular Sovereignty, 196
Presbyterianism, 114
Pretender, 131, 137
Pretender, the Young, 139
Protectorate, 119
Protestantism, 76, 83, 103, 121
Puritans, 84, 98, 104, 124
Pym, 104, 114, 116
Quebec, Battle of, 144
Railway, 154
Raleigh, Sir Walter, 89, 101
Reform Act, 156
Reformation, 75, 83
Rhodes, Cecil, 183
Richard I, "Coeur de Lion," 47
Richard II, 58
Richard, Duke of York, 62, 67, 70
Richard, Duke of Gloucester, 70
Robert, Prince, 42
Roberts, General, 185
Robsart, Amy, 95
Romans, 11-16
Roundheads, 123, 137
Royalists, 113
Royal Society, 27
Russia, 160
Salisbury Plain, 10, 37
Scotland, 55, 90, 114
Scots, 13, 14
Scott, 153
Sepoy Rebellion, 165
Seven Years' War, 139
Severus, 14
Seymour, Jane, 78
Shelley, 154
Sheridan, 149, 153
Ship Money, 112, 146
Sidney, Sir Philip, 86
Simon de Montfort, 54
Solway Moss, 91
South Sea Bubble, 138
Southey, 153
Spanish Armada, 94
Spectator, 135
Spenser, 86
Stamp Act, 145
Star Chamber, 110, 115, 120
Statute of Heresy, 63
St. Bartholomew's Eve, 89
Steane, 135
Steele, 135
Stephen, King, 43
Stephenson, George, 154
Stonehenge, 10, 35
Strafford, Earl, 110, 114
Stuart, Charles Edward, 139
Stuart, House of, 91, 97, 123, 125, 139
Suez Canal, 171
Supremacy, Oath of, 155
Suzerainty, 180, 184
Sweyn, 31
Swift, 135
Sydenham Palace, 169
Tax on Tea, 146
Tennyson, 169
Thackeray, 169
Thomas a Becket, 44
Three Years' War, 189
Tibet, 192
Times, 149
Tory, 125, 132, 136, 146
Transvaal Republic, 178, 179, 180, 182
Tudor, House of, 71
Tyler, Wat, 58
Uitlanders, 182
United States, 149, 150
Victor, Prince, 187
Victoria, Accession of, 159
Virginia, Colonization of, 89
Wales, 55
Wales, Prince of, 55
Walpole, Horace, 153
Walpole, Robert, 136, 138
War of 1812 with United States, 150
Wars of the Roses, 62, 67
Warwick, Earl of, 66, 67
Washington, George, 148
Waterloo, 150
Watt, James, 150
Wellington, Duke of, 150, 154
Wentworth, Sir Thomas, 110
Wesley, John, 141
Westminster Abbey, 55
Whig, 125, 132, 136
White Ship, 43
Wickliffe, 59, 64
Wilberforce, 158
William the Conqueror, 32
William, Prince of Orange, 125, 128, 130, 137
William Rufus, 41
William IV, 156, 159
Witenagemot, 29
Wolfe, 140
Wolsey, Chancellor, 74
Yangtse Valley, 194
York, House of, 68
York, Princess Elizabeth of, 71
SCOTLAND
Aberdeen, University of, 297
Act of Royal Supremacy, 293
Agricola, 249
Albany, Duke of, 273, 274, 280
Alexander III, 258
Angles, 251
Annandale, Earl of, 264
Argyle, 251
Assembly, General, The, 287
Ayr, 268
Baliol, 258, 259, 262
Bannockburn, 268
Beaton, Cardinal, 283
Beaufort, Lady Jane, 276
Berwick, 268, 269
Birnam, 254
Boece, 252, 279
Bothwell, Earl of, 290
Boyds, 278
Bruce, 258, 262-271, 276, 296
Bruce, Marjory, 272
Bruis, Robert de, 261
Canmore, 254
Catholic Church, 267, 287, 293, 296
Comyn, 266
Covenanters, 295
Crichtons, 277, 278
Cromwell, 296
Danes, 251
Darnley, 288
David I, King, 258, 264
David II, 271
Donegal, 250
Douglas, Earl of, 273, 278, 280
Duncan, 251, 254
Dundee, 262
Dunsinnane, 254
Edgar the Atheling, 255
Edward I of England, 258, 261
Edward III of England, 271
Elizabeth, Queen, 285, 290, 295
Falkirk, 262
Fergus, 250, 252
Flodden, 287
Glasgow, 262, 279, 290
Grampians, 260
Guise, Mary of, 282, 284
Henry II of England, 257
Henry IV, 273, 274
Henry V, 277
Henry VII, 280
Henry VIII, 280, 282
Henryson, 279
Holyrood, 280, 288
Iona, Monastery at, 250
Jacobites, 297
James, Prince, 273, 274
James I, 276, 277
James II, 278
James III, 278, 280
James IV, 280
James V, 282
James VI, 290
James I of England, 295
John I, 259-261
Knox, John, 284, 286
Lamberton, Bishop of, 266
Lennox, Earl of, 288
Lionel, Prince, 272
Livingston, 278, 284
Lochleven Castle, 290
Lothian, 251
Luther, 282
Macbeth, 252, 254
Maid of Norway, 258
Malcolm II, 251
Malcolm III, 254, 256
M'Alpin, Kenneth, 251
Margaret, 255
Margaret, Princess, 280
Mary, Princess, 282
Moray, 291
National Covenanters, 295
Normans, 256, 296
Parliament, Scottish, 260, 269, 279, 283, 291, 296
Pembroke, Earl of, 268
Picts, 249, 251
Presbyterian Church, 293, 296
Pretender, The, 296
Protestantism, 286
Puritans, 295
Reformation, 282, 291
Reformed Church, 281, 285, 288, 291
Richard I, 257
Rizzio, 289
Robert II, 272
Robert III, 273
Rothesay, 273, 274
Ruthven Raid, 292
Scone, 251, 254, 259, 274
Scots, 249
Solway Moss, 283
St. Andrew's University, 279
St. Columba, 250
St. Nimian, 250
Steward, High, of Scotland, 272
Stewart, Robert, 272
Stirling, 262, 268, 275
Stone of Destiny, 250, 261, 295
Stuart, Mary, 283, 286, 288, 295
Stuarts, 272, 276, 296
Tay, River, 251
Tweed, 251, 281
William the Lion, 257
William Wallace, 261, 265, 296
Wishart, 284
IRELAND
Act of Settlement, 221
Act of Uniformity, 210
Act of Union, 238, 241
Ard Reagh, 201
Armagh, 214
Bard, 202
Bowes, Lord Chancellor, 226
Boyne, Battle of, 223
Brefny, Lord of, 204
Brehon Law, 202, 205
Brehons, 202
Brian Boru, 204
Caesair, Lady, 199
Catholic Church, 210, 221-227, 233, 239-241, 244
Cavendish, Lord Frederick, 245
Celts, 201
Charles I, 213, 215
Charles II, 216, 218-221, 228
Christianity, 202-203
Church of England, 213
Clan, 201
Connaught, 201, 212, 216
Crecy, 208
Cromlechs, 201
Cromwell, 216
Crosby, Sir Francis, 212
Curran, Sarah, 239
Danes, 204, 205
Declaration of Rights, 234
Dermot, 204
Desmond, House of, 207, 211, 212
Desmond Rebellion, 211
Dillon, 242
Dublin, 205, 209
Edward III, 208
Elizabeth, Queen, 210
Emmet, Robert, 239
Enniskillen, 222
Eric, 202
Erin, 200
Famine in Ireland, 241
Fenians, 244
Fenius, 200
Fitzgerald, 237
Flood, Henry, 232, 237
Gael, 199
Gaelic, 200
Geraldines, 207, 209, 237
Geraldine League, 211
Ginkel, 223
Gladstone, 244, 245
Godfrey, Sir Edward Bery, 219
Grattan, Henry, 232, 237
Great Rebellion, The, of 1690, 224
Heber, 199, 200
Henry II, 204-206
Henry VII, 209
Henry VIII, 209
Heremon, 200
Hibernia, 200
Home Rule, 244
Home Rule Act, 245
Irish Parliament, 209, 213, 221, 234, 235, 238
James II, 221-222
Kildare, Earl of, 210
Kildare, House of, 207, 212
Kilkenny, Statutes of, 208, 210, 232
Laud, Archbishop, 213, 215
Leinster, 201, 204
Liberals, 244
Limerick, 223
Limerick, Articles of, 223
Locke, 230
London, 210
Londonderry, 222
Long Parliament, 214
Louis XIV, 222
Meagher, 242, 247
Meath, 201, 227
Milesius, 199
Mitchell, 242
Molyneux, William, 230, 234
Mountjoy, 213
Mullaghmast, 212
Munster, 201, 212
National Land League, 244
Nemehd, 199
New Land Act, 246
Normans, 206, 209
Oates, Titus, 219
O'Brien, 204, 206
O'Brien, Smith, 242
O'Connell, Daniel, 240
O'Connells, 206
O'Moore, Clan of, 212
O'Neill, Shane the Proud, 211
O'Neills, 206, 209, 210
Ormond, House of, 207, 219, 221
Palatines, 206
Pale, Lords of the, 207, 209, 214
Parnell, Charles, 244
Penal Code, 225
Picts, 200
Pitt, 237
Plunkett, Dr., 220
Popish Plot, 221
Poyning, Sir Edward, 209
Poynings Act, 209, 210, 221, 224, 235
Presbyterians, 214
Protestantism, 210, 214, 215, 219-227, 232
Reformation, 210
Rinucini, 216
Robinson, Chief-Justice, 226
Roman Christianity, 203
Rome, 202
Rory O'Moore, 212
Saarsfield, 223
Scota, 199
Scots, 200
Sept, 201
Shinar, 199
Society of United Irishmen, 236
St. Patrick, 202, 203
Strafford, 213, 215
Strongbow, Earl of Pembroke, 204
Swift, Dean, 231
Tanistry, Law of, 202, 211
Tara in Meath, 201, 204
Thomond, 226
Tone, Wolfe, 236
Tyrone, Earl of, 210, 213, 214
Ulster, 201, 210, 212, 213
Viking, 204
White Boys, 236
William of Orange, 222-225
Wolsey, 209
Young Ireland, 241