Berwick, for English reading, and forwarded by Carey to Cecil. The
narrative is manifestly false, on the points which we have noted. It is
ingeniously asserted by the vindicator that _a servant of James_ brought
the report that he had ridden away. It is not added that the false
report was really brought by Cranstoun, and twice confirmed by Gowrie,
once after he had gone to make inquiry upstairs. Again, the apologist
never even hints at the locked door of the gallery chamber, whereat Mar,
Lennox, and the rest so long and so vainly battered. Who locked that
door, and why? The subject is entirely omitted by the apologist. On the
other hand, the apologist never alludes to the Murrays, who were in the
town. Other writers soon after the events, and in our own day, allege
that James had arranged his plot so as to coincide with the presence of
the Murrays in Perth. What they did to serve him we have heard. John
Murray was wounded by a Ruthven partisan after the Earl and Master were
dead. Some Murrays jostled Gowrie, before he rushed to his death. Young
Tullibardine helped to pacify the populace. That is all. Nothing more
is attributed to the Murrays, and the contemporary apologist did not try
to make capital out of them.
Though the narrative of the contemporary apologist for the Ruthvens
appears absolutely to lack evidence for its assertions, it reveals, on
analysis, a consistent theory of the King's plot. It may not be
verifiable; in fact it cannot be true, but there is a theory, a system,
which we do not find in most contemporary, or in more recent arguments.
James, by the theory, is intent on the destruction of the Ruthvens. His
plan was to bring the Master to Falkland, and induce the world to believe
that it was the Master who brought _him_ to Perth. The Master refuses
several invitations; at last, on his way to Dirleton, he goes to
Falkland, taking with him Andrew Ruthven and Andrew Henderson. The old
apologist asserts, what modern vindicators deny, that Henderson was at
Falkland.
Then the Master sends Henderson first, Andrew Ruthven later, to warn
Gowrie that, for some unknown reason, the King is coming. To conceal his
bloody project (though the apologist does not mention the circumstance),
James next passes four hours in hunting. _To omit this certain fact is
necessary for the apologist's purpose_. The King sends thirty horsemen
in front of him, and follows with thirty more. After dinner he leaves
the hall with the Master, but sends him back for Erskine, Wilson, and
Ramsay. James having secured their help, and next lured the Master into
a turret, the minions kill Ruthven and throw his body downstairs; one of
them, simultaneously, is in the street. James has previously arranged
that one of his servants shall give out that the King has ridden away.
This he does announce at the nick of time (though Gowrie's servant did
it), so that Gowrie shall go towards the stables (where he expects to
find his horse, though he knows it is at Scone), thus coming within
earshot of the turret window. Thence James shouts to Gowrie that
traitors are murdering him, and have murdered the Master. Now this news
would bring, not only Gowrie, but all the Royal retinue, to his Majesty's
assistance. But, as not knowing the topography of the house, the
retinue, James must have calculated, will run up the main stairs, to
rescue the King. Their arrival would be inconvenient to the King (as the
nobles would find that James has only friends with him, not traitors), so
the King has had the door locked (we guess, though we are not told this
by the apologist) to keep out Lennox, Mar, and the rest. Gowrie,
however, has to be admitted, and killed, and Gowrie, knowing the house,
will come, the King calculates, by the dark stair, and the unlocked door.
Therefore James's friends, in the street, will let him and Cranstoun
enter the house; these two alone, and no others with them. They, knowing
the narrow staircase, go up that way, naturally. As naturally, Gowrie
lets Cranstoun face the danger of four hostile swords, alone. Waiting
till Cranstoun is disabled, Gowrie then confronts, alone, the same
murderous blades, is disarmed by a _ruse_, and is murdered.
This explanation has a method, a system. Unfortunately it is
contradicted by all the evidence now to be obtained, from whatever source
it comes, retainers of Gowrie, companions of James, or burgesses of
Perth. We must suppose that Gowrie, with his small force of himself and
Cranstoun, both fencers from the foreign schools, would allow that force
to be cut off in detail, one by one. We must suppose that Erskine was
where he certainly was not, in two places at once, and that Ramsay and
Herries and he, unseen, left the hall and joined the King, on a message
brought by the Master, unmarked by any witness. We must suppose that the
King's witnesses, who professed ignorance on essential points, perjured
themselves on others, in batches. But, if we grant that Mar, Lennox, and
the rest--gentlemen, servants, retainers and menials of the Ruthvens, and
citizens of Perth--were abandoned perjurers on some points, while
scrupulously honourable on others equally essential, the narrative of the
Ruthven apologist has a method, a consistency, which we do not find in
modern systems unfavourable to the King.
For example, the modern theories easily show how James trapped the
Master. He had only to lure him into a room, and cry 'Treason.' Then,
even if untutored in his part, some hot-headed young man like Ramsay
would stab Ruthven. But to deal with Gowrie was a more difficult task.
He would be out in the open, surrounded by men like Lennox and Mar, great
nobles, and his near kinsmen. They would attest the innocence of the
Earl. They must therefore be separated from him, lured away to attack
the locked door, while Gowrie would stand in the street asking 'What is
the matter?' though James had told him, and detained by the Murrays till
they saw fit to let him and Cranstoun go within the gate, alone. Then,
knowing the topography, Gowrie and Cranstoun would necessarily make for
the murder-chamber, by the dark stair, and perish. The Royal wit never
conceived a subtler plot, it is much cleverer than that invented by Mr.
G. P. R. James, in his novel, 'Gowrie.' Nothing is wrong with the system
of the apologist, except that the facts are false, and the idea a trifle
too subtle, while, instead of boldly saying that the King had the gallery
chamber locked against his friends, the apologist never hints at that
circumstance.
We have to help the contemporary vindicator out, by adding the detail of
the locked door (which he did not see how to account for and therefore
omitted), and by explaining that the King had it locked himself, that
Lennox, Mar, and the rest might not know the real state of the case, and
that Gowrie might be trapped through taking the other way, by the narrow
staircase.
An author so conspicuously mendacious as he who wrote the Apology for
English consumption is unworthy of belief on any point. It does not
follow that Henderson was really at Falkland because the apologist says
that he was. But it would appear that this vindicator could not well
deny the circumstance, and that, to work it conveniently into his fable,
he had to omit the King's hunting, and to contradict the Hays and
Moncrieff by making Henderson arrive at Perth after twelve instead of
about ten o'clock.
The value of the Apology, so long overlooked, is to show how very poor a
case was the best that the vindicator of the Ruthvens was able to
produce. But no doubt it was good enough for people who wished to
believe. {93}
VIII. THE THEORY OF AN ACCIDENTAL BRAWL
So far, the King's narrative is least out of keeping with probability.
But had James been insulted, menaced, and driven to a personal struggle,
as he declared? Is the fact not that, finding himself alone with
Ruthven, and an armed man (or no armed man, if you believe that none was
there), James lost his nerve, and cried 'Treason!' in mere panic? The
rest followed from the hot blood of the three courtiers, and the story of
James was invented, after the deaths of the Gowries, to conceal the
truth, and to rob by forfeiture the family of Ruthven. But James had
certainly told Lennox the story of Ruthven and the pot of gold, before
they reached Perth. If he came with innocent intent, he had not
concocted that story as an excuse for coming.
We really must be consistent. Mr. Barbe, a recent Ruthven apologist,
says that the theory of an accidental origin of 'the struggle between
James and Ruthven may possibly contain a fairly accurate conjecture.'
{94} But Mr. Barbe also argues that James had invented the pot of gold
story before he left Falkland; that, if James was guilty, 'the pretext
had been framed'--the myth of the treasure had been concocted--'long
before their meeting in Falkland, and was held in readiness to use
whenever circumstances required.' If so, then there is no room at all
for the opinion that the uproar in the turret was accidental, but Mr.
Barbe's meaning is that James thus forced a quarrel on Ruthven. For
there was no captive with a pot of gold, nor can accident have caused the
tragedy, if Ruthven lured James to Falkland with the false tale of the
golden hoard. That tale, confided by James to Lennox on the ride to
Perth, was either an invention of the King's--in which case James is the
crafty conspirator whom Mr. Bruce, in 1602, did not believe him to be (as
shall be shown);--or it is true that Ruthven brought James to Perth by
the feigned story--in which case Ruthven is a conspirator. I reject, for
reasons already given, the suggestion that Lennox perjured himself, when
he swore that James told him about Ruthven's narrative as to the captive
and his hoard. For these reasons alone, there is no room for the
hypothesis of accident: either James or Ruthven was a deliberate traitor.
If James invented the pot of gold, he is the plotter: if Ruthven did,
Ruthven is guilty. There is no _via media_, no room for the theory of
accident.
The _via media_, the hypothesis of accident, was suggested by Sir William
Bowes, who wrote out his theory, in a letter to Sir John Stanhope, from
Bradley, on September 2, 1600. Bowes had been English ambassador in
Scotland, probably with the usual commission to side with the King's
enemies, and especially (much as Elizabeth loathed her own Puritans) with
the party of the Kirk. His coach had been used for the kidnapping of an
English gentleman then with James, while the Governor of Berwick supplied
a yacht, in case it seemed better to carry off the victim by sea (1599).
Consequently Bowes was unpopular, and needed, and got, a guard of forty
horsemen for his protection. He was no friend, as may be imagined, of
the King.
Bowes had met Preston, whom James sent to Elizabeth with his version of
the Gowrie affair. Bowes's theory of it all was this: James, the Master,
'and one other attending' (the man of the turret) were alone in a chamber
of Gowrie House. Speech arose about the late Earl of Gowrie, Ruthven's
father, whether by occasion of his portrait on the wall, or otherwise.
'The King angrily said he was a traitor, whereat the youth showing a
grieved and expostulatory countenance, and haplie Scotlike words, the
King, seeing himself alone and without weapon, cried Treason!' The
Master placed his hand on James's mouth, and knelt to deprecate his
anger, but Ramsay stabbed him as he knelt, and Gowrie was slain, Preston
said, after Ramsay had made him drop his guard by crying that the King
was murdered. The tale of the conspiracy was invented by James to cover
the true state of the case. {96}
This Bowes only puts forth as a working hypothesis. It breaks down on
the King's narrative to Lennox about Ruthven's captive and hoard. It
breaks down on 'one other attending'--the man in the turret--whatever
else he may have been, he was no harmless attendant. It breaks down on
the locked door between the King, and Lennox and Mar, which Bowes omits.
It is ruined by Gowrie's repeated false assurances that the King had
ridden away, which Bowes ignores.
The third hypothesis, the _via media_, is impossible. There was a
deliberate plot on one side or the other. To make the theory of Bowes
quite clear, his letter is appended to this section. {97}
IX. CONTEMPORARY CLERICAL CRITICISM
The most resolute sceptics as to the guilt of the Ruthvens were the
Edinburgh preachers. They were in constant opposition to the King, and
the young Gowrie was their favourite nobleman. As to what occurred when
the news of the tragedy reached Edinburgh, early on July 6, we have the
narrative of Mr. Robert Bruce, then the leader of the Presbyterians. His
own version is printed in the first volume of the Bannatyne Club
Miscellany, and is embodied, with modifications, and without
acknowledgment (as references to such sources were usually omitted at
that period), in Calderwood's History.
It is thus better to follow Mr. Bruce's own account, as far as it goes.
The preachers heard the 'bruit,' or rumour of the tragedy, by nine
o'clock on the morning of August 6. By ten o'clock arrived a letter from
James to the Privy Council: the preachers were called first 'before the
Council of the town,' and the King's epistle was read to them. '_It bore
that his Majesty was delivered out of a peril_, and therefore that we
should be commanded to go to our Kirks, convene our people, ring bells,
and give God praises.' While the preachers were answering, the _Privy_
Council sent for the Provost and some of the _Town_ Council.
The preachers then went to deliberate in the East Kirk, and decided 'that
we could not enter into the particular defence of' (the existence of?)
'the treason, seeing that the King was silent of the treason in his own
letter, and the reports of courtiers varied among themselves.'
This is not easily intelligible. The letter from Falkland of which
Nicholson gives an account on August 6, was exceedingly 'particular as to
the treason.' It is my impression, based mainly on the Burgh Records
quoted by Pitcairn, that the letter with full particulars cited by
Nicholson, was written, more or less officially, by the notary, David
Moysie, who was at Falkland, and that the King's letter was brief, only
requiring thanksgiving to be offered. Yet Nicholson says that the letter
with details (written by the King he seems to think), was meant for the
preachers as well as for the Privy Council (cf. p. 38, note).
The preachers, in any case, were now brought before the Privy Council and
desired, by Montrose, the Chancellor, to go to church, and thank God for
the King's 'miraculous delivery from that vile treason.' They replied
that 'they could not be certain of the treason,' but would speak of
delivery 'from a great danger.' Or they would wait, and, when quite sure
of the treason, would blaze it abroad.
'They' (the Council) 'said it should be sufficient to read his Majesty's
letter.'
This appears to mean that the preachers would content the Lords by merely
reading James's letter aloud to the public.
'We answered that we could not read his letter' (aloud to the people?)
'and doubt of the truth of it. It would be better to say generally, "if
the _report_ be true."'
The preachers would have contented the Lords by merely reading James's
letter aloud to their congregations. But this they declined to do; they
wished, in the pulpit, to evade the Royal _letter_, and merely to talk,
conditionally, of the possible truth of the _report_, or 'bruit.' This
appears to have been a _verbal_ narrative brought by Graham of Balgonie,
which seemed to vary from the long letter probably penned by Moysie. At
this moment the Rev. David Lindsay, who had been at Falkland, and had
heard James's story from his own mouth, arrived. He, therefore, was sent
to tell the tale publicly, at the Cross. The Council reported to James
that the six Edinburgh preachers 'would in no ways praise God for his
delivery.' In fact, they would only do so in general terms.
On August 12, James took the preachers to task. Bruce explained that
they could thank, and on Sunday had thanked God for the King's delivery,
but could go no further into detail, 'in respect we had no certainty.'
'Had you not my letter?' asked the King. Bruce replied that the letter
spoke only 'of a danger in general.' Yet the letter reported by
Nicholson was 'full and particular,' but that letter the preachers seem
to have regarded as unofficial. 'Could not my Council inform you of the
particulars?' asked the King. The President (Fyvie, later Chancellor
Dunfermline) said that they had assured the preachers of the certainty of
the treason. On this Bruce replied that they had only a report, brought
orally by Balgonie, and a letter by Moysie, an Edinburgh notary then at
Falkland, and that these testimonies 'fought so together that no man
could have any certainty.' The Secretary (Elphinstone, later Lord
Balmerino) denied the discrepancies.
James now asked what was the preachers' present opinion? They had heard
the King himself, the Council, and Mar. Bruce replied that, as a
minister, he was not fully persuaded. Four of the preachers adhered to
their scepticism. Two, Hewat and Robertson, now professed conviction.
The other four were forbidden to preach, under pain of death, and
forbidden to come within ten miles of Edinburgh. They offered terms, but
these were refused. The reason of James's ferocity was that the devout
regarded the preachers as the mouthpieces of God, and so, if _they_
doubted his word, the King's character would, to the godly, seem no
better than that of a mendacious murderer.
From a modern point of view, the ministers, if doubtful, had a perfect
right to be silent, and one of them, Hall, justly objected that he ought
to wait for the verdict in the civil trial of the dead Ruthvens. We
shall meet this Hall, and Hewatt (one of the two ministers who professed
belief), in very strange circumstances later (p. 217). Here it is enough
to have explained the King's motives for severity.
In September the recalcitrants came before the King at Stirling. All
professed to be convinced (one, after inquiries in Fife), except Bruce.
We learn what happened next from a letter of his to his wife. He had
heard from one who had been at Craigengelt's execution (August 23), that
Craigengelt had then confessed that Henderson had told him how he was
placed by Gowrie in the turret. {103} Bruce had sent to verify this.
Moreover he would believe, if Henderson were hanged, and adhered to his
deposition to the last: a pretty experiment! The Comptroller asked,
'Will you believe a condemned man better than the King and Council?' Mr.
Bruce admitted that such was his theory of the Grammar of Assent. 'If
Henderson die penitently I will trust him.' Later, as we shall see, this
pleasing experiment was tried in another case, but, though the witness
died penitently, and clinging to his final deposition, not one of the
godly sceptics was convinced.
'But Henderson saved the King's life,' replied the Comptroller to Mr.
Bruce.
'As to that I cannot tell,' said Mr. Bruce, and added that, if Henderson
took the dagger from Ruthven, he deserved to die for not sheathing it in
Ruthven's breast.
Henderson later, we know, withdrew his talk of his seizure of the dagger,
which James had never admitted. James now said that he knew not what
became of the dagger.
'Suppose,' said the Comptroller, 'Henderson goes back from that
deposition?'
'Then his testimony is the worse,' said Mr. Bruce.
'Then it were better to keep him alive,' said the Comptroller; but Mr.
Bruce insisted that Henderson would serve James best by dying penitently.
James said that Bruce made him out a murderer. 'If I would have taken
their lives, I had causes enough' (his meaning is unknown), 'I need not
have hazarded myself so.' By the 'causes,' can James have meant Gowrie's
attempts to entangle him in negotiations with the Pope? {104} These were
alleged by Mr. Galloway, in a sermon preached on August 11, in the open
air, before the King and the populace of Edinburgh (see _infra_, p. 128).
Mar wondered that Bruce would not trust men who (like himself) heard the
King cry, and saw the hand at his throat. Mr. Bruce said that Mar might
believe, 'as he were there to hear and see.'
He was left to inform himself, but Calderwood says, that the story about
Craigengelt's dying confession was untrue. Bruce had frankly given the
lie to the King and Mar, though he remarked that he had never heard Mar
and Lennox tell the tale 'out of their own mouths.' Mar later (September
24) most solemnly assured Mr. Bruce by letter, that the treason, 'in
respect of that I saw,' was a certain fact. This he professed 'before
God in heaven.' Meanwhile Mr. Hall was restored to his Edinburgh pulpit,
and Mr. Bruce, after a visit to _Restalrig_, a place close to Edinburgh
and Leith, went into banishment. {105a} If he stayed with the Laird of
Restalrig, he had, as will presently appear, a strange choice in friends
(pp. 148-167).
A later letter of Bruce's now takes up the tale. In 1601, Bruce was in
London, when Mar was there as James's envoy. They met, and Bruce said he
was content to abide by the verdict in the Gowrie trial of November 1600.
What he boggled at, henceforward, was a public apology for his disbelief,
an acceptance, from the pulpit, of the King's veracity, as to the events.
In London, Bruce had found that the Puritans, as to the guilt of Essex
(which was flagrant), were in the same position as himself, regarding the
guilt of Gowrie. {105b} But they bowed to the law, and so would he--'for
the present.'
The Puritans in England would not _preach_ that they were persuaded of
the guilt of Essex, nor would Bruce preach his persuasion of the guilt of
Gowrie, 'from my knowledge and from my persuasion.' He assured Mar 'that
it was not possible for any man to be fully persuaded, or to take on
their conscience, but so many as saw and heard.' However Bruce is
self-contradictory. He _would_ be persuaded, if Henderson swung for it,
adhering to his statement. Such were Mr. Brace's theories of evidence.
He added that he was not fully persuaded that there was any hell to go
to, yet probably he scrupled not to preach 'tidings of damnation.' He
wanted to be more certain of Gowrie's guilt, than he was that there is
hell-fire. 'Spiteful taunts' followed, Mar's repartee to the argument
about hell being obvious. Bruce must have asserted the existence of
hell, from the pulpit: though not 'fully persuaded' of hell. So why not
assert the King's innocence?
Bruce returned later to Scotland, and met the King in April 1602. Now,
he said, according to Calderwood, that he was 'resolved,' that is,
convinced. What convinced him? Mar's oath. 'How could _he_ swear?'
asked James; 'he neither saw nor heard'--that is, what passed between
James, the man in the turret, and the Master. 'I cannot tell you how he
could swear, but indeed he swore very deeply,' said Bruce, and reported
the oath, which must have been a fine example. James took Bruce's
preference of Mar's oath to his own word very calmly. Bruce was troubled
about the exact state of affairs between James and the Master. 'Doubt ye
of that?' said the King, 'then ye could not but count me a murderer.'
'It followeth not, if it please you, Sir,' said Mr. Robert, '_for ye
might have had some secret cause_.' {107a}
Strange ethics! A man may slay another, without incurring the guilt of
murder, if he has 'a secret cause.' Bruce probably referred to the
tattle about a love intrigue between Gowrie, or Ruthven, and the King's
wife. Even now, James kept his temper. He offered his whole story to
Bruce for cross-examination. 'Mr. Robert uttered his doubt where he
found occasion. The King heard him gently, and with a constant
countenance, which Mr. Robert admired.' But Mr. Robert would not
_preach_ his belief: would not apologise from the pulpit. 'I give it but
a doubtsome trust,' he said.
Again, on June 24, 1602, James invited cross-examination. Bruce asked
how he could possibly know the direction of his Majesty's intention when
he ordered Ramsay to strike the Master. 'I will give you leave to pose
me' (interrogate me), said James. {107b}
'Had you a purpose to slay my Lord?'--that is, Gowrie.
'As I shall answer to God, I knew not that my Lord was slain, till I saw
him in his last agony, and was very sorry, yea, prayed in my heart for
the same.'
'What say ye then concerning Mr. Alexander?'
'I grant I was art and part in Mr. Alexander's slaughter, for it was in
my own defence.'