I slept in that ruinous room in the Bishop's house till far in the
morning, when, on going to the window with the intent of dropping myself
into the wynd, I saw that it was ordained and required of me to remain
where I then was; for the inmates of the houses forenent were all astir
at their respective vocations; and at the foot of the wynd, looking
straight up, was a change-house, into which there was, even at that
early hour, a great resorting of bein elderly citizens for their dram
and snap. Moreover, at the head of the wynd, an aged carlin, with a
distaff in her arms and a whorl in her hand, sat on a doorstep tending a
stand of apples and comfits; so that, to a surety, had I made any
attempt to escape by the window, I must have been seen by some one, and
laid hold of. I therefore retired back into the obscurity of the
chamber, and sat down again on the old kist-lid, to abide the issues
that were in reservation for me. I had not, however, been long there,
till I heard the voices of persons entering into the next chamber behind
where I was sitting, and I soon discerned by their courtesies of speech,
that they were Lords of the Privy Council, who had come to walk with the
Bishop to the palace, where a council was summoned in sudden haste that
morning. The matter whereof they discoursed was not at first easily made
out, for they were conversing on it when they entered; but I very soon
gathered that it boded no good to the covenanted cause nor to the
liberties of Scotland.
"What you remark, Aberdeen," said one, "is very just; man and wife are
the same person; and although Queensberry has observed, that the revenue
requires the penalties, and that husbands ought to pay for their wives,
I look not on the question in that light; for it is not right, in my
opinion, that the revenues of the crown should be in any degree
dependent on fines and forfeitures. But the presbyterians are a sect
whose main principle is rebellion, and it would be happy for the kingdom
were the whole race rooted out; indeed I am quite of the Duke of York's
opinion, that there will be little peace among us till the Lowlands are
made a hunting-field, and therefore am I as earnest as Queensberry that
the fines should be enforced."
"Certainly, my Lord Perth," replied Aberdeen, "it is not to be denied,
that, what with their Covenants, and Solemn Leagues, and Gospel
pretensions, the presbyterians are dangerous and bad subjects; and
though I shall not go so far as to say, with the Duke, that the Lowlands
should be laid waste, I doubt if there be a loyal subject west the
castle of Edinburgh. Still the office which I have the honour to hold
does not allow me to put any interpretation on the law different from
the terms in which the sense is conceived."
"Then," said Perth, "if there is any doubt about the terms, the law must
be altered; for, unless we can effectually crush the presbyterians, the
Duke will assuredly have a rough accession. And it is better to strangle
the lion in his nonage than to encounter him in his full growth."
"I fear, my Lord," replied the Earl of Aberdeen, "that the presbyterians
are stronger already than we are willing to let ourselves believe. The
attempt to make them accept the episcopalian establishment has now been
made, without intermission, for more than twenty years, and they are
even less submissive than they were at the beginning."
"Yes, I confess," said Lord Perth, "that they are most unreasonably
stubborn. It is truly melancholy to see what fools many sensible men
make of themselves about the forms of worship, especially about those of
a religion so ungentlemanly as the presbyterian, which has no respect
for the degrees of rank, neither out nor in the church."
"I'm afraid, Perth," replied Aberdeen, laughing, "that what you say is
applicable both to the King and his brother; for, between ourselves, I
do not think there are two persons in the realm who attach so much
importance to forms as they do."
"Not the King, my Lord, not the King!" cried Perth; "Charles is too much
a man of the world to trouble himself about any such trifles."
"They are surely not trifles, for they overturned his father's throne,
and are shaking his own," replied Aberdeen, emphatically. "Pray, have
you heard any thing of Argyle lately?"
"O yes," exclaimed Perth, merrily; "a capital story. He has got in with
a rich burgomaster's frow at Amsterdam; and she has guilders anew to
indemnify him for the loss of half the Highlands."
"Aye," replied Aberdeen, "I do not like that; for there has been of late
a flocking of the presbyterian malcontents to Holland, and the Prince of
Orange gives them a better reception than an honest man should do,
standing as he does, both with respect to the crown and the Duke. This,
take my word for it, Perth, is not a thing to be laughed at."
"All that, Aberdeen, only shows the necessity of exterminating these
cursed presbyterians. We shall have no peace in Scotland till they are
swept clean away. It is not to be endured that a King shall not rule his
own kingdom as he pleases. How would Argyle, and there was no man
prouder in his jurisdictions, have liked had his tenants covenanted
against him as the presbyterians have so insultingly done against his
Majesty's government? Let every man bring the question home to his own
business and bosom and the answer will be a short one, _Down with the
presbyterians!_"
While they were thus speaking, and I need not advert to what passed in
my breast as I overheard them, Patterson the Bishop of Edinburgh came
in; and with many interjections, mingled with wishes for a calm
procedure, he told the Lords of our escape. He was indeed, to do him
justice, a man of some repute for plausibility, and take him all in all
for a prelate, he was, in truth, not void of the charities of human
nature, compared with others of his sect.
"Your news," said the Lord Perth to him, "does not surprise me. The
societies, as the Cameronians are called, have inserted their roots and
feelers every where. Rely upon't, Bishop Patterson, that, unless we chop
off the whole connexions of the conspiracy, you can hope neither for
homage nor reverence in your appointments."
"I could wish," replied the Bishop, "that some experiment were made of a
gentler course than has hitherto been tried. It is now a long time since
force was first employed: perhaps, were his Royal Highness to slacken
the severities, conformity would lose some of its terrors in the eyes of
the misguided presbyterians; at all events, a more lenient policy could
do no harm; and if it did no good, it would at least be free from those
imputed cruelties, which are supposed to justify the long-continued
resistance that has brought the royal authority into such difficulties."
At this juncture of their conversation a gentleman announced, that his
master was ready to proceed with them to the palace, and they forthwith
retired. Thus did I obtain a glimpse of the inner mind of the Privy
Council, by which I clearly saw, that what with those members who
satisfied their consciences as to iniquity, because it was made
seemingly lawful by human statutes, and what with those who, like Lord
Perth, considered the kingdom the King's estate, and the people his
tenantry, not the subjects of laws by which he was bound as much as
they; together with those others who, like the Bishop, considered mercy
and justice as expedients of state policy, that there was no hope for
the peace and religious liberties of the presbyterians, merely by
resistance; and I, from that time, began to think it was only through
the instrumentality of the Prince of Orange, then heir-presumptive to
the crown, failing James Stuart, Duke of York, that my vow could be
effectually brought to pass.