This is the date of the patent of Charles I., conferring on Sir Robert
Gordon of Gordonstown the dignity of a baronet of Nova Scotia, being
the first patent of the kind granted. Gordon of Cluny and Gordon of
Lesmoir also got similar patents during the same year, and Lesmoir’s
eldest son, being of full age, was at the same time made a knight; such
being the original design regarding this honour. The order of baronets
of Nova Scotia, which still holds an honourable place in Scottish
society, was projected by King James, as an encouragement to gentlemen
of property in his native kingdom to enter into the scheme of Sir
William Alexander (subsequently Earl of Stirling) to plant Nova Scotia.
In the patent of each, a certain portion of land in that country is
assigned along with the honour, the infeoffment being executed on the
Castle Hill of Edinburgh; but this, as is well known, has never been
otherwise than an ideal advantage. ‘His majesty, the more to encourage
the baronets in that heroic enterprise [of planting Nova Scotia],
besides other privileges, did augment every one of their coats of arms
by joining thereto a saltire azure, or a blue St Andrew’s cross, set
in a white field, with another scutcheon in the middle of the blue
cross, comprehending a red rampant lion in a yellow field, with a red
tressure of fleur-de-luces about the lion, with an imperial crown above
the scutcheon, being the arms of New Scotland. The crest of the arms
of New Scotland is two hands joined together, the one armed, the other
unarmed, holding a laurel and a thistle twisted, issuing out of them,
with this motto, “_Munit hæc, et altera vincit_.” The supporters are a
unicorn upon the right side, and a savage man upon the left.’--_G. H.
S._
* * * * *
The town-council of Aberdeen at this time anticipated the wisdom and
good manners of a later age, by ordaining that ‘no person should, at
any public or private meeting, presume to compel his neighbour, at
table with him, to drink more wine or beer than what he pleased, under
the penalty of forty pounds.’[1]
* * * * *
[Sidenote: JUNE 12.]
Thomas Crombie, burgess of Perth, was ‘summoned to underlie the law,
for the alleged slaughter of ane William Blair, a westland gentleman,
wha notwithstanding had done the same negligently to himself. Being
of intention to have struck the said Thomas with ane whinger, he hurt
himself in the arm, whereof he died twenty days after. The said Thomas
compeared with eighty burgesses of Perth, besides five earls, six
lords, and twenty-six barons, upon the burgh of Perth’s desire to back
him, [and] was clengit and freed therefrae.’--_Chron. Perth._
* * * * *
[Sidenote: JULY 20.]
By the royal command, a fast was held throughout Scotland, in
consequence of the heavy rains which had prevailed since the middle
of May, threatening the destruction of the fruits of the earth. It
was a time of calamity. The marriage of the king to the Princess
Henrietta Maria of France (June 16th), had of course brought the mass
into London, and ‘no sooner was the queen’s mass, the plague of the
soul, received, than a raging pestilence broke out in the city of
London and parts adjoining, which in a short time cut off above 40,000
persons.’--_Stevenson’s Hist. C. Scot._
* * * * *
[Sidenote: JULY 26.]
[Sidenote: 1625.]
The government was incensed by _bruits_ set in circulation by a
set of ‘restless and unquiet spirits,’ to the effect that the king
designed some change in the kirk and its canons. The king issued a
proclamation denouncing these injurious rumours as troublesome to the
commonwealth, and protesting that so well was he pleased with the
existing arrangements, that, if he had not found them established by
his late dear father, he would himself have never rested till they were
perfected as they now stood. It may be suspected that this proclamation
did not put an end to the _bruits_, for in October the king discovered
that a number of Catholic noblemen and gentlemen were bringing up their
children in popish seminaries abroad, and at the same time entertaining
popish priests at home; wherefore it had become necessary that some
suitable anti-papist edicts should be published. The parents of
children educated abroad were ordered to have them brought home before
a certain day, under severe penalties. Great pains were threatened
against those who should give entertainment or shelter to popish
priests after a certain day. Finally, the proclamation charged ‘all
our subjects, of whatsoever rank or degree, to conform themselves to
the publict profession of the true religion, prohibiting the exercise
of ony contrary profession, under the pains conteinit in the laws made
thereanent.’--_P. C. R._
* * * * *
[Sidenote: AUG. 30.]
A proclamation was resolved on for a strict execution of the laws
against the selling of tallow out of the country. Contrary to the views
of modern mercantile men, there was a general fear and dislike in those
days regarding export trade. It was always thought to have a bad effect
in making things scarce and dear at home. No one seems ever to have
dreamed of the profitable _quid pro quo_ without which the trade could
not have been carried on. We require to have a full conception of this
universal delusion, before we can understand the frame of mind under
which the Privy Council of the day could speak of the transport of
tallow as ‘a crime most pernicious and wicked,’ perpetrated by a set of
‘godless and avaritious persons,’ acting ‘without regard of honesty or
of those common duties of civil conversation whilk in a good conscience
they ought to carry in the estate.’
It was, to all appearance, under a sincere horror for ‘this mischeant
and wicked trade,’ which threatened to leave not enough of tallow to
supply the needs of the population, that the lords announced their
resolution to punish it with confiscation of all the remaining movable
goods of the guilty parties.--_P. C. R._
* * * * *
John Gordon of Enbo, having suffered some injury at the hands of
Sutherland of Duffus, longed for revenge, but for some time in vain.
At length, riding with a single friend between Sideray and Skibo,
he encountered Duffus’s brother, the Laird of Clyne, also attended
by a single friend on horseback. Gordon, with a cudgel in his hand,
assaulted Clyne, and gave him many blows. ‘Then they drew their swords,
and, with their seconds, fell to it eagerly.’
[Sidenote: 1625.]
Clyne, after being sorely wounded in the head and hand, was suffered by
Eubo to escape with his life.
The curious part of the affair is to come. Enbo was prosecuted by
Duffus before the Privy Council, and committed to the Castle of
Edinburgh. The Duffus party were full of triumph, making sure of ample
retribution. At that crisis arrives the sage and courteous Sir Robert
Gordon of Gordonstown, who had heretofore made so many rough matters
smooth in the north. He first dealt with Duffus, to induce him to
withdraw the prosecution, which he apparently looked on in no other
light than as a species of unrighteous revenge. Duffus proved obdurate,
‘thinking to get great sums of money decerned to him by the lords from
John Gordon, for satisfaction of the wrong done to his brother, whereby
he might undo John Gordon’s estate.’ Feeling now relieved from all ties
towards Duffus, Sir Robert ‘dealt by all means for John Gordon’s relief
and mitigation of his fine.’ Very much by the interest of the Lord
Gordon, then in Edinburgh with the French commissioners, he succeeded
in inducing the Privy Council to let John Gordon off with a fine of
a hundred pounds Scots, equal to £8, 6s. 8d. sterling!--‘and nothing
to the party.’ Duffus left Edinburgh in sad discomfiture, to meet the
blame of his friends for not having accepted the better conditions
offered at first by Sir Robert Gordon. The proto-baronet at the same
time returned to the north, bringing John Gordon of Enbo along with
him, ‘beyond the expectation of all his friends and foes in those
parts, who thought that he should not have been released so soon, nor
fined at so small a rate, _wherein Sir Robert purchased himself great
credit and commendation_.’ So Sir Robert calmly assures us in his own
narrative of the transaction.--_G. H. S._
* * * * *
[Sidenote: OCT. 27.]
[Sidenote: 1625.]
A convention of Estates was held, under the Earl of Nithsdale as
commissioner, to treat regarding the revocation of the church-lands.
Those whose fortunes were thus threatened were greatly alarmed and
incensed by the urgency of the king. The suspicion of the Earl of
Nithsdale being a papist must have added to the unpopularity of the
affair. If we are to believe a story which Burnet reports from Sir
Archibald Primrose, they held a private meeting to consult how they
might best protect their own interests, and it was agreed by them that,
when assembled, ‘if no other argument did prevail to make the Earl of
Nithsdale desist, they would fall upon him and all his party in the
old Scots manner, and knock them on the head.... One of these lords,
Belhaven, of the name of Douglas, who was blind, bid them set him by
one of the party, and he would make sure of _one_. So he was set next
the Earl of Dumfries. He was all the while holding him fast. And when
the other asked him what he meant by that, he said, ever since the
blindness was come on him, he was in such fear of falling, that he
could not help the holding fast to those who were next to him. He had
all the while a poniard in his other hand, with which he had certainly
stabbed Dumfries, if any disorder had happened. The appearance at that
time was so great, and so much heat was raised upon it, that the Earl
of Nithsdale would not open all his instructions, but came back to
court, looking on the service as desperate.’
It is much to be desired for this anecdote that it had some support in
other authority. The Lord Belhaven pointed to was then a man little
over fifty, and his epitaph in Holyrood Abbey describes him as kind
to his relations, charitable to the poor, moderate in prosperity, and
constant under adversity--though, to be sure, posthumous certificates
of that kind do not generally rank as evidence of the first class.[2]
* * * * *
[Sidenote: OCT.]
A taxation was granted to the king by the Scottish parliament,
amounting to £40,000 Scots. Some of the burghs came to an agreement
with the lords of the Privy Council for certain proportions of this
taxation, to be paid annually while it continued; and we are thus
supplied with a means of estimating the comparative importance and
wealth of some of the principal towns in the kingdom. We find the
following towns set down, with the annexed sums at their names:
Glasgow, £815, 12s. 6d.; Linlithgow, £163, 2s. 6d.; Stirling, £422,
17s. 9d.; St Andrews, £490; Dunbar, £90, 15s.; Culross, £84, 10s.;
Canongate, £100; Hamilton, 100 merks.
* * * * *
[Sidenote: 1626.