‘About the end of Januar, the Scotch Secretar, Sir Alexander Hay, came
from court with sundry directions, and among the rest, for the habit
of the senators of the College of Justice [which the Chancellor had
told the king was now, since the departure of the court to England,
‘the _special spunk of light and fondament of your majesty’s estate,
and only ornament of this land_‘],[335] advocates, clerks, and scribes;
which was proclaimed in the beginning of Februar--viz., that the
senators should wear a purple robe or gown in judgment and in the
streets, when they were to meet or were dissolved; that advocates,
clerks, and scribes should wear black gowns in the judgment-hall and in
the streets ... the provost and bailies of burghs and their councillors
should wear black when they sat in council and judgment; that ministers
should wear black clothes, and in the pulpit black gowns; that bishops
and doctors of divinity should wear black cassikins syde to [long
enough to reach] their knee, black gowns above, and a black crape about
their neck.... On the 15th of Februar, the Lords of the Session and
the bishops put on their gowns and came down from the chancellor’s
lodging, with their robes, to the Tolbooth [the court-house--a section
of St Giles’s Church]. All the robes, except the chancellor’s, were of
London cloth, purple coloured, with the fashion of an heckled cloak
from the shoulders to the middle, with a long syde hood on the back,
the gown and hood lined with red sattin. The people flocked together to
behold them. The bishops were ordeened to have their gowns with lumbard
sleeves, according to the form of England, with tippets and crapes
about their craigs [necks]; which was performed.’--_Cal._
On the 20th of June, the lord provost of Edinburgh exhibited in his
council ‘twa gowns, the ane red, the other black claith linit in the
breists with sable furring, sent to his lordship by the king’s majesty
for to be worn by him, and to be patterns of the gowns to be worn
by the provost and bailies, and sic of the council and town as are
appointed thereto by his majesty.’[336]
* * * * *
[Sidenote: FEB. 27.]
[Sidenote: 1610.]
Alexander Kirkpatrick, younger of Closeburn, being in the Tolbooth of
Edinburgh for the slaughter of James Carmichael, son to John Carmichael
of Spothe, the Lady Amisfield, wife of a neighbour, came to the prison,
and entered into conference with the keeper in his private apartments.
At her persuasion, the man allowed ‘Young Closeburn’ to come to speak
with her; and she then executed her design of exchanging clothes with
him, and so allowing him to escape. The lady was warded in the Castle;
but what ultimately became of her does not appear.--_Pit._
* * * * *
[Sidenote: JUNE.]
A General Assembly was held at Glasgow, so constituted and managed by
royal authority that the king at length accomplished one grand portion
of his ecclesiastical scheme for Scotland, in being acknowledged as
the head of the kirk. Three English divines, chaplains to the king, Dr
Christopher Hampton, Dr Phineas Hodson, and Dr George Meriton, were
present to use their influence in reconciling the country to ‘a more
comely and peaceable government in our kirk than was presently.’ But
for the absence of the six banished ministers, and the confinement of
zealous, fiery, fearless Andrew Melville in the Tower, it might not
have been possible to carry this measure. The Presbyterian historians
also insinuate that bribes were used with the members, whence they take
leave to call it _the Golden Assembly_.
‘Immediately after this, the Bishops of Glasgow and Brechin took
journey to court, to report what was done, and got great thanks frae
the king. Galloway followed, who all three abode there till the month
of November, at what time ... by a special commission from the king
to the Bishop of London to that effect, the Archbishop of Glasgow and
the other two were solemnly ordained, inaugurat, and consecrated,
with anointing of oil and other ceremonies, according to the English
fashion.’ [The ceremony, which took place in the chapel at London
House, was celebrated by a banquet, at which ‘gifts were bestowed, and
gloves were distributed, in token of the solemnisation of the marriage
between the bishops and their kirks.’--_Cal._] The three new prelates,
‘thereafter [January 23, 1611] returning to Scotland, did to the
Archbishop of St Andrews, in St Andrews, as they were done withal at
Lambeth, as near as they could possibly imitate; and thereafter the two
archbishops consecrated the rest, and the new entrant bishops as they
were nominat by the king ... first quietly, as being ashamed of the
foolish guises in it, but afterward more and more solemnly, as their
estate grew.’--_Row._ ‘All of them [the whole thirteen] deserted their
flocks, and usurped thereafter jurisdiction over the ministers and
people of their dioceses.’--_Cal._
[Sidenote: 1610.]
At the same time the king established in Scotland a court of High
Commission, by which the new hierarchy acquired great power over the
people.
‘The king was so earnest upon the creating of bishops, that he cared
not what it cost him.... In buying in their benefices out of the
hands of the noblemen that had them, in buying votes at Assemblies,
in defraying of all their other charges, and promoving of all their
adoes and business, as coming to, and going from, and living at court
prelate-like; that is, sumptuously and gorgeously in apparel, house,
diet, attendants, etc., [he] did employ (by the confession of such
as were best acquainted with, and were actors in, these businesses)
above the sum of £300,000 sterling money, one huge thing indeed; but
sin lying heavy on the throne, crying aloud for wrath on him and his
posterity, is infinitely sadder nor £300,000 sterling!‘--_Row._
The Marquis of Huntly, and other papists of rank, had meanwhile been
suffering considerably in order to dispose the Presbyterian opposition
to yield to the king’s wishes. But now there was no longer any
immediate occasion for severity. The marquis, professing to be once
more thoroughly Protestant, was relieved from excommunication, and
allowed to return to his palace in the north. With Errol there was
greater difficulty. The king, through the Earl of Dunbar, had promised
that he should lose his lands. He had, what Huntly happily wanted, a
painfully tender conscience. One day, he was brought to promise that
he would subscribe; but that very night he fell into such a trouble
of mind as to have been on the point of killing himself. ‘Early next
morning, the Archbishop of Glasgow being called, he confessed his
dissimulation with many tears, and, beseeching them that were present
to bear witness of his remorse, was hardly brought to any settling all
that day.’ By some treacherous excuse, lenity was extended to Errol
also. Such was the way in which the king performed his engagements on
this solemn subject. ‘The turn being done,’ says Calderwood, ‘promises
were not keepit.’
* * * * *
[Sidenote: JULY 3.]
An act was passed by the Privy Council in favour of Anthony Aurego,
Anthony Soubouga, and Fabiano Fantone, allowing them to live in the
country, and practise their ‘trade and industry of making hecks and
other machines for taking of rottons and mice.’--_P. C. R._
* * * * *
[Sidenote: JULY 27.]
[Sidenote: 1610.]
Piracy was at this time a flourishing trade, and the Scottish and
Irish seas were a favourite walk of its practitioners. Vessels of
various countries besides Scotland, were pursued by these marauders
and mercilessly plundered, their crews seized, tortured, and sometimes
slaughtered, or else set ashore on desolate coasts, that they might
not be readily able to take measures of redress. The Long Island,
on the west coast of Ireland, appears to have served as a regular
station for pirate ships; they also haunted much the Western Isles
of Scotland. In 1609, a piratical crew, headed by two captains named
Perkins and Randell, started from the Long Island in a vessel of 200
tons, named the _Iron Prize_, attended by a nimble pinnace of about
half that burden; and for some months they roamed about the northern
seas, picking up whatever small-craft came in their way. They even had
the audacity to shew themselves at the mouth of the Firth of Forth.
The attention of the Privy Council being called to their proceedings,
three vessels were fitted out in a warlike manner at Leith, and sent in
quest of the pirates. Perkins and Randell had meanwhile come to Orkney
to refit. They ‘landed at the castle, and came to the town thereof,’
where they ‘behaved themselves maist barbarously, being ever drunk, and
fechting amang themselves, and giving over themselves to all manner
of vice and villany.’ Three of them attacked a small vessel belonging
to the Earl of Orkney, lying on the shore, and were taken prisoners
in the attempt by the earl’s brother, James Stewart. A day or two
after this event, the three government ships made their appearance,
and immediately a great part of the piratical company made off in the
pinnace. A pursuit proving vain, the government ships returned and
attacked the _Iron Prize_; and after a desperate conflict, in which
they had two men killed and sundry wounded, they succeeded in capturing
the whole remaining crew, amounting to nearly thirty men, who, with
those previously taken, were brought to Leith and tried (July 26).
Being found guilty, twenty-seven of these wretched men, including the
two captains, were hung upon a gibbet next day at the pier of Leith.
Three were reserved in the hope of their giving useful information.
[Sidenote: 1610.