still exhibited signs of life amid the changed forms of worship
and belief. This was strikingly manifested in connection with the
venerated wells of the early saints. The General Assembly, in 1573,
determined that the discipline of the Church should be used against
all who went on pilgrimage to wells; and it was deemed an offence
that the magistrates ought to punish. In 1580, the Church requested
the government to make a special punishment for all those who went
on pilgrimages to wells and churches, as a number of persons had
lately passed on pilgrimages to the Holy Rood of Peebles, and to other
places. The following year, the General Assembly craved that an act of
parliament should be passed against persons who go on pilgrimages, and
perform superstitious practices at wells, crosses, images, and altars,
or observe feasts on days dedicated to saints. Accordingly parliament
passed an act in 1581 forbidding pilgrimages to wells, chapels, and
crosses, the observance of any festival days, “and such other monuments
of idolatry――as making bonfires, singing of carols in and about the
churches at certain seasons of the year, and the observance of other
superstitious rites to the dishonour of God and the contempt of true
religion.” A severe fine was to be imposed upon all who broke the law
for the first time, and for the second offence the penalty of death
was to be inflicted.¹ But only two years later, a question came before
the Assembly as to how the ministers who permitted people to repair on
pilgrimages to wells close beside their own manses, without reproving,
but rather encouraging them by entertaining them with meat and drink,
should be punished? The Assembly concluded that a minister guilty
of such neglect of his obvious duty, deserved to be deprived of
his office.² In spite, however, of the acts of parliament and the
discipline of the Church, numbers of the people still continued to
visit the wells, to go on pilgrimages to certain churches, to make
bonfires, and to keep holydays.³ In fact, many of the wells were
resorted to down to the present century, and within my own recollection
there were wells supposed to possess special virtues, which were
frequently resorted to by the people.
¹ _Book of the Universal Kirk_, pages 280, 462, 535‒536; _Acts
of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., page 212.
² _Book of the Universal Kirk_, page 638.
³ _Ibid._, pages 720‒721, 874, 1055, 1120.
The relation of the sexes at the time of the Reformation was in an
extremely unsatisfactory state. In the preceding volume of this work,
it was shown that the institution of marriage had passed through
various modifications, and that though the Roman Catholic Church had
often attempted to make it a public and solemn act, she had only partly
succeeded in overcoming the loose habits of the people.¹ In this volume
it has already been indicated that the principle of celibacy imposed
upon the Roman priesthood and the religious orders had the effect of
lowering, instead of elevating, the feelings and sentiments naturally
associated with the institution of marriage. The obvious fact could
hardly fail to strike the mind that, if marriage is a good and lawful
connection instituted for the continuance and comfort of the race, the
consequent inconsistency of prohibiting any class or profession from
entering into it becomes palpable; for what is absolutely necessary
to the continuance of the race, and calculated to increase the sum
of human happiness, cannot be denied to any class of men without
introducing a most invidious, immoral, and warping distinction. The
principle of moral consistency is utterly shocked by the rules of a
celibate priesthood, as if this pretension of unhuman purity exalted
them above their fellow-men, and prepared and enabled them to become
qualified instructors of mankind; as if the natural sentiments which
cluster round the domestic hearth must be eradicated from their breasts;
and that when thus shorn and dwarfed, they are better able to feel
and understand what is needful for the well-being of humanity. First
extinguish the strongest and most essential sentiments of the human
heart, and then you have a priesthood admirably fitted to maintain
their position as the enemies of all progress, of all liberty, of all
freedom of thought; a priesthood that for ever struggles to uphold a
belief in traditions and legends, in signs and wonders, and enfolds
their adherents in a mesh of puerilities and absurdities well suited
to the spirit of the Dark Ages.
¹ Mackintosh’s _History of Civilisation in Scotland_, Volume
I., pages 153‒156, 244, 428.
The first General Assembly of the Reformed Church agreed to adopt the
law of Moses, touching the degrees of blood relations in marriage. By
it first cousins were allowed to marry with each other, and all remoter
degrees, but in the direct line of descent marriage is forbidden
throughout; this became law by act of parliament in 1567. It was
found, however, to be difficult to bring the people under restraint
in the relation of the different sexes; as men and women had a custom
of cohabiting after promising to marry, without publicly solemnising
their marriage. The Church was forced to take severe measures against
defaulters of this character, and the reformed discipline was sternly
applied. It was enacted by the General Assembly that those who wished
to be married must give in banns to their parish minister and be
proclaimed on three successive Sundays. In 1579 it was stated in the
General Assembly that some of the ministers would solemnise marriage
only on Sunday, while others married people upon week-days, which
had raised much slander; and the Assembly was called upon to give a
decisive answer on the point. The answer of the Assembly was, that
when parties had been thrice proclaimed they might be married on any
day of the week if a sufficient number of witnesses were present.¹ But
some persons were still married without proclamation of banns, and the
General Assembly of 1597 resolved that none should be joined together
in marriage, unless thrice proclaimed in their own parish church,
according to the custom observed in Scotland; and that any minister who
contravened this rule should be deprived of his office, and the other
parties ordained to satisfy the Church by public repentance.²
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., page 26;
_Book of the Universal Kirk_, pages 5, 30, 32, 66, 72, 73,
114, 440‒441.
² _Book of the Universal Kirk_, page 939.
It was not necessary that marriage should be celebrated by a clergyman,
and though it was the law of the Church that banns should be proclaimed,
the consent of the parties might be declared simply before witnesses.
Even when no formal consent appeared, marriage was presumed from
cohabitation, if the parties were reputed to be husband and wife.
Before the civil courts of Scotland evidence of this description was
often held to prove marriage.¹ When marriage was solemnised according
to the order of the Church, it was called regular, when otherwise,
clandestine, which, however, was held to be valid, though penalties
were sometimes annexed to it.
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume II.; Erskine’s
_Principles of the Law of Scotland_, page 66; 1802. The
complete system of registration, established about forty
years ago, will ultimately supersede the necessity of having
recourse to such evidence touching marriages.
In connection with marriage some curious points were occasionally
brought before the General Assembly. In 1575 this question was asked:
“Whether the contract of marriage which used to be made before the
proclamation of banns between the man and the woman should be made by
words of the present time. The man saying to the woman, I take thee
to be my wife, and the woman saying to the man, I take thee to be my
husband; or should there be no promise made till the very time of the
solemnisation of the marriage. Answer――Parties to be married should
come before the session and give in their names, that their banns
may be proclaimed, and no further ceremony used.” Again, it was asked
what should be done in the following case: “A man and a woman in the
presence of some of the parishioners were married in the parish church,
or hand-fast by the reader, and thereafter mutually cohabited together
at bed and board as married people, and were so reputed and holden. The
minister of the same church, at the woman’s desire, a good space after,
leads a form of divorce between them in this manner: he calls the woman
before him, and caused her to swear that her husband never had any
sexual intercourse with her, and thereupon, without further questions
at the man, decerns them separated and divorced from each other, the
man always dissenting and still claiming her as his wife. Whether is
this form of divorce allowable in a Reformed Church that has received
the Gospel, and if it be not, what correction does the minister deserve
who usurped and used this manner of process and judgment?” The Assembly
answered: “That this divorce was not lawful, and that the minister
should be suspended and make public repentance.” Once more: “A certain
man with his accomplices ravished and took away a woman, and thereafter
married her without proclamation of banns, but did not solemnise the
marriage in the face of the Church, but in a private house. Whether
is this marriage lawful, or are children begotten therein legitimate
or not? and what punishment should the minister receive who so abused
marriage?” The Assembly answered that the minister should be deposed.¹
In 1579 it was asked in the General Assembly: “What order should be
taken with the persons who went to a popish priest to be married, and
their banns not being proclaimed, should they be esteemed as married
persons, and if not, what discipline should be used against them?” It
was answered: “This connection is no marriage, and therefore ordains
the persons to be called before the particular assemblies, and to make
satisfaction as fornicators; and upon a new proclamation to be married
according to the order of the Reformed Church, and the papist priest to
be punished.”²
¹ _Book of the Universal Kirk_, pages 143, 144, 345.
² _Ibid._, page 441. In the Register of the Kirk Session of
St. Andrews, which covers the period from 1559 to 1600,
there is great collection of interesting information on the
social state of the people; the Register was issued by the
Scottish History Society in 1889‒90.
The question, at what age the young should be allowed to marry, came
before the General Assembly in 1600. It was then stated that great
inconveniences had arisen from the untimeous marriages of young persons
before they were of age meet for entering into this union. As yet there
was no statute of the Church defining the age at which persons might
marry; but it was then enacted that henceforth no minister should join
in matrimony any persons, except the male be fourteen years of age,
and the female at the least twelve years: the Assembly directed their
commissioners to request parliament to ratify this act.¹ When the
Church was making an act on this important social point, she might have
shown a little more wisdom, and not given her sanction to the marriage
of persons at this early age. In justice to the Church, however,
it must be mentioned that there was still an heirship of feudalism
involved in the marriage of a certain class of individuals. This was
a pecuniary casualty due to the superior from the heir of his former
vassal, after the age of fourteen if a male, and if a female twelve;
and thus there was an engrossing interest attached to the marriage of
a portion of the landed class while they were minors, and under the
control of their superiors. This marriage casualty arose from the right
which the superior had over the person, as well as over the estates of
the minor heir; and it was chiefly restricted to ward holdings, except
where a special clause in the charter imported it. It was the privilege
of the superior to dispose of the heir in marriage, and to take the
marriage portion to himself; but if the minor heir refused the offered
match, and named another, then he was not entitled to the possession of
his lands after the ward terminated, till the superior was refunded the
double of the value of the portion which would have accrued to him from
the offered marriage. Seeing, however, that no man nor woman could be
forced to marry, it was the interest of the superior to have the power
of arranging this important affair, while the heir or heiress was very
young; and so an extremely complicated mode of attaining this end was
gradually introduced into the law of the kingdom.² Cases arising out of
these peculiar rights of the superior, in connection with the marriage
of his vassals, frequently came before the courts;³ and under various
modifications these invidious privileges continued till 1748, when they
were finally abolished.
¹ _Book of the Universal Kirk_, page 953. Erskine says, “But
by our law, children may enter into marriage without the
knowledge, and even against the remonstrances, of a father.”
――_Principles of the Law of Scotland_, page 66.
² _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume II.; Volume III.
³ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 311, 324,
326; Volume II., pages 470‒472, 447, 693; Volume III., pages
250, 312, 318, 547, 667, 687; Volume IV., pages 222, 418,
422, 712; also Volumes V. and VI.
Regarding divorce, the doctrine of the Reformed Church was clear and
emphatic. She insisted that marriage could only be dissolved either on
the ground of adultery, or wilful desertion; and for obvious reasons
she endeavoured to make divorce difficult. The Church firmly maintained
that divorced persons should not be permitted to marry their paramours;
and at her request, Parliament passed an Act in 1600 prohibiting such
unions.¹ There are two sides to this social question, and at that time
there was ample justification for the Act.
¹ _Book of the Universal Kirk_, pages 19, 31, 146, 148,
197, 262, 269, 306, 333, 377, 524, 539, 953; _Acts of the
Parliaments of Scotland_, Volumes III., IV.; _Register of
the Privy Council_, Volume II., page 7.
Some account has already been given of the measures taken for the
relief of the poor in the period preceding the Reformation. From the
first, the Reformed Church endeavoured to make provision for the really
indigent poor, and also to relieve the labourers of the ground and
the oppressed tenants, from some of their burdens. The first General
Assembly resolved to petition the government to make better laws for
the protection of pupils and orphans. In 1565, the Assembly took into
consideration what should be done to those who oppressed children,
and it was resolved in 1568, that oppressors of children, should
be admonished by the Church to make public repentance in sackcloth,
bareheaded and barefooted, as often as the particular congregation
shall appoint.¹ The following year, the General Assembly petitioned the
government to make provision for the poor, suggesting that a portion of
the tithes should be applied to that purpose, and requesting that the
poor labourers of the ground should have intromission to take their own
tithes upon a reasonable composition. It is quite evident that after
the nobles obtained possession of the Church lands, they then oppressed
the tenants by exacting tithes, rents, and other dues, so that for a
considerable time the occupiers of these lands were much harder pressed
than before the Reformation. The reformed clergy in many ways exerted
themselves to improve the material well-being of the people, as well
as their moral and social state: and there is ample evidence of this
throughout the records of the period.²
¹ _Book of the Universal Kirk_, pages 6, 75, 125.
² _Ibid._, pages 146, 306, 353, 339, 417, 425, 603. In 1587,
the General Assembly petitioned the King: “That order should
be taken with the poor, who in such multitudes wandered up
and down the country without law or religion.” _Ibid._, page
715. The next year, the Assembly made a proposal that every
minister should endeavour to deal with this moving mass of
poor within his own parish. _Ibid._, page 731. Concerning
the tenants and labourers of the ground, the Assemblies
made repeated appeals to the Government to take measures to
relieve them, pages 22, 40, 49, 60, 108, 507, 511.
Collections were made in the churches every Sunday for the poor; other
sources of revenue that should have fallen to them, had been diverted
by the Revolution into other channels. The government in 1574 ordered
the provost and magistrates of Aberdeen to remove the organs out of
their churches, and dispose of them, and to give the proceeds to the
poor. They were ordered to sell the Gray Friars’ church and grounds
to the highest bidder, except what was required for lodging the poor,
and all the proceeds of the sale to be applied to sustain the poor. At
the same time the Town Council of Aberdeen came under an obligation to
build an hospital for the poor and impotent, and to put the croft and
the mire and the house belonging to the leper folk, which lies between
Old and New Aberdeen, into proper repair, for the support of the leper
men and women, as was originally intended. The community of the city
the same year resolved that alms should be collected weekly by one of
the elders of the Church, and delivered to the keeping of the minister,
to be distributed among the poor every month, according to the
discretion of the session. Beggars not born in the town were ordered
to be removed, and the poor citizens were directed to wear the town’s
token on their outer garments that they might be known.¹ The Lords
of Council passed an act in 1575 for the punishment of sturdy and
idle beggars, and for providing support for the poor and helpless. In
1578 there was a great dearth in Scotland, and the Lords of Council
discharged the customs on victuals imported, in order to mitigate the
suffering of the poor.²
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume II., pages 391‒393,
402; _Burgh Records of Aberdeen_, Volume II., pages 20, 21.
² _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume II., pages 435, 680.
One difficulty of dealing with the poor arose from the defective police
organisation. There was no adequate means for handling the multitude of
strong beggars, “such as make themselves fools and bards,” gipsies, and
a host of other vagabonds, who moved about and continually multiplied.
It was difficult to separate these from the really deserving poor, and
this long hampered the laws relating to the latter class. The city of
Aberdeen had an official whose duty it was to keep the town free from
extraneous beggars “not born and bred within the burgh.” In 1577 the
council agreed to give him forty shillings to buy a garment to himself,
on which the town’s arms was to be put, and then remitted “him to the
session, to be helped and aided by them also, as his office concerns
for the most part the ecclesiastical jurisdiction.”¹ When mixed notions
of this kind prevailed regarding the jurisdiction of the civil and
ecclesiastical spheres of action, we can easily see how the beggars
would succeed. In 1574 Parliament passed an Act re-enacting the former
Acts against beggars and all idle persons between the age of fourteen
and seventy, and proposed to inflict severe penalties upon them.
This Act also provided for the support of the poor, the aged, and the
helpless, and it may be considered the first Poor-law Act of Scotland.
It was repeated in 1579, and again, with some additions, in 1592, and
once more in 1597. But the beggars and vagabonds still increased.²
The centuries of feudal anarchy had entailed a legacy of vagrancy
which the Government and the Church endeavoured to suppress. Years
and generations passed, yet all the influences of religion and the
restraints of the law appeared equally powerless to remove the idle
and the ruffian population who preyed upon the industrious inhabitants
of the kingdom. A long train of circumstances had concurred to feed
the natural inclination to idleness and wandering among the people.
A large portion of mankind have always manifested a similar tendency.
But notwithstanding all the anarchy and the wretchedness of the nation,
there was a core of vigour and health; and the moral discipline which
the Church was so earnestly inculcating soon began to take root in the
heart of the people.
¹ _Burgh Records of Aberdeen_, Volume II., page 29.
² _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., pages
86‒89, 139, 579; Volume IV.
The subject now to be noticed is one of melancholy interest, for the
sad aberration of the faculties of the human mind which it manifested.
A belief in magic, sorcery, witchcraft, and necromancy is a phenomenon
which has afflicted mankind from the earliest ages onward to the
present day. The forms they assumed are innumerable and endless;
but whether it originated from ignorance, and has been sustained and
continued by this; or whether something akin to it must naturally arise
from the constitution of man, and the circumstances in which he was
placed in the universe, as some eminent philosophers seem to hold; or
whether it springs up gradually from a confused consciousness, at first
tinged with an inclination, and afterwards with a deliberate intention
to impose upon and deceive the people for interested ends, is a problem
that cannot be decidedly answered.¹ The manifestation of the mind
and feeling of the human race has been so diversified and unequally
developed, that what is superstition and necromancy to one nation,
may appear to another to be the only true form of religion; while
that which another community believes and professes to be true and
holy, a different people may believe to be the very work of the enemy
himself. The beliefs of mankind, so far as they are known, have always
contained opposing and directly exclusive elements of this character,
which is mainly a result of the varied degrees of civilisation
that have prevailed throughout the world. Even the same nation, at
different periods of her life and development, may entertain the most
opposite beliefs, as we find in the history of our own country. The
difference between a believer in witchcraft and a believer in modern
spiritualism is only one of degree and development; and if witchcraft
and spiritualism are both founded upon the same class of notions, it
is the higher development of morality and intelligence which renders
the latter more harmless in the nineteenth century than the former was
in the sixteenth. Among all the forms of belief in evil spirits, that
which assumes the reality of a union between the evil spirit and a
human being for the purpose of doing injury to other people is the most
mischievous in its action on society. When men believed that the devil
was an enormously powerful being, and that he could give an almost
unlimited portion of this power to his confederates――the witches, for
working all manner of evil――we need not be surprised that the King and
the clergy were very anxious to purge the land of witches.
¹ On the rise and development of the notions of ghosts,
spirits, demons, divination, exorcism, and sorcery, there
is much valuable information in Tylor’s _Primitive Culture_,
and in the First Volume of Herbert Spencer’s _Principles of
Sociology_.
It seems to be pretty well ascertained that the belief in ghosts,
spirits, and demons, has descended from the early cult of the
prehistoric ages. One cause of the continuance of the belief in such
imaginary beings into comparatively advanced stages of civilisation,
appears to be the extreme credulity of uncultured and uncritical man,
and another is the craving for the marvellous――a notable trait even in
recent times. In the early stages of culture there seems to have been
scarcely any distinction between the facts of inspiration and the facts
of divination. The diviner employed his power for practical ends. The
medicine-man of the savage stage operated in a somewhat similar way as
an exorcist does; he invoked the aid of supernatural agents, and then
endeavoured to make the body of the patient so disagreeable that the
demon became glad to depart. In the more developed forms of exorcism,
one demon was employed to expel another, or the officiating priest
might summon a friendly spirit to his assistance. This power of the
exorcist over evil spirits, when further developed, was used for many
other purposes, and assumed the forms of sorcery and magic. The belief
in the agency of evil spirits which the human race has manifested
is a perplexing problem in the history of religion. In the earlier
forms of religion the evil spirit or god was most feared, and hence
a kind of devil worship seems to have prevailed. In the neo-platonic
philosophy――that curious mixture of subjective thought, ecstasy, and
theosophy, which flourished from the beginning of the third century to
the sixth――there was a large element of theurgy and magic, and some of
the most eminent of these philosophers were addicted to sorcery, and
professed to have received divine communications to foresee ♦the future,
and to perform miracles. The trials and executions for witchcraft in
the sixteenth century present painful evidence of the continuance of
the belief of demoniac agency. The belief in the power of the devil
as something which manifested itself in the life of men and women
was universal; the Reformation failed to shake it. The seventy-third
canon of the Church of England, enacted in 1603, prohibited the clergy
from casting out devils; in the present century the belief in demoniac
possession of the body, which continued among the lower classes of the
people in Germany in spite of the progress of civilisation, was revived
among educated Protestants; and even yet it is not quite extinct in any
nation in Europe.
♦ duplicate word “the” removed
In 1563, witchcraft was declared by Act of Parliament to be punishable
by death. Probably the sudden shaking and the suppression of the
traditions and notions of the people at the Reformation, had tended
to arouse and revive other ideas of the demoniac order. However,
witches soon became numerous after the revolution. The clergy and
the kirk-sessions were very active in searching for witches. When
these poor creatures were apprehended, they were placed in solitary
confinement, and often fearfully tortured, to extort a confession of
their guilt. They were systematically deprived of their natural rest;
they had to endure cold, hunger, and thirst; and then the branks were
applied to the unhappy victims, who were soon reduced to a fit state
for confessing what was required. Their trial followed on the emission
of one or more of the confessions thus obtained, which usually formed
the groundwork of the public accusation and prosecution for this
imaginary crime.¹
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume II.; Pitcairn’s
_Criminal Trials_, Volume I., pages 38, 49‒58.
It was stated in the General Assembly of 1563, that four witches had
been delated for witchcraft by the superintendent of Fife and Galloway.
The Assembly requested the Lords of Council to take order with them,
and the complainers were commanded to give in their information. The
General Assembly, in 1573, passed an act touching those who consult
with witches, and ordered that persons suspected of conferring with
them should be called before the superintendents; and, if they were
found to have consulted witches, then they had to undergo public
repentance in sackcloth, on Sunday in the church, under the penalty
of excommunication. “If they be disobedient, to proceed after due
admonition, and excommunicate them.” The popular party in the Church
accused Bishop Adamson of consulting witches. Under the year 1583,
James Melville records that Adamson was lying sick in his castle,
“and oftentimes under the care of a woman suspected of witchcraft....
This woman being examined by the presbytery, and found to be a witch,
in their judgment, was given to the bishop to be kept in his castle
for execution, but he suffered her to slip away; but within three or
four years thereafter, she was taken, and executed in Edinburgh for a
witch.”¹
¹ _Book of the Universal Kirk_, pages 44, 283; Melville’s
_Diary_, page 137.
It is well known that James VI. was a firm believer in witchcraft, and
he greatly encouraged the prosecution of the wretched creatures accused
of this crime. During the last twenty years of the sixteenth century, a
considerable number of witches were tried and executed in every quarter
of the kingdom. They were accused, tried, burnt, and drowned, for doing
and attempting to do, many curious and wonderful things; but most of
the points in the accusations appear to us very ridiculous and absurd.
Making a clay picture of the individual whom the witch intended to
injure or to kill, was a very common point of the indictment. One
count of the indictment against Bessy Rory, who was tried in 1590 for
witchcraft, but acquitted, was this: “Thou art indicted for a common
awaytaker of women’s milk in the whole country, and detaining the
same at thy pleasure, as the whole country will testify.” Much of the
records of the trials for witchcraft are quite unfit for publication.
One of the most extraordinary stories in these indictments is the
account of the meeting of the witches with the devil in the church
of Berwick. The company who met his satanic majesty on this occasion
consisted of a hundred persons, of whom six were men, and the rest
women. The old enemy boldly ascended the pulpit, and delivered an
address to his servants. He inquired what they had done since their
last meeting; then, after giving them some more instructions, he
concluded by commanding them to do all the evil that they could. Before
the company separated, the witches showed their respect for their
master in an unmistakable and exceedingly becoming fashion. On this
night, the devil was respectably dressed――he wore a fine black gown
and a hat.¹
¹ Pitcairn’s _Criminal Trials_, Volume I., pages 76, 101,
161‒165, 186, 201‒204, 207‒213, 230‒241.
Many of the witches were accused of conspiring and attempting by their
devilry to destroy the King; and this aroused the weak-minded monarch
to greater efforts against them.
Francis Stewart, Earl Bothwell and High Admiral of Scotland, was a
son of John Stewart, prior of Coldingham, a natural son of James V.;
thus the Earl was a nephew of Queen Mary and the Regent Moray, and a
cousin of James VI. He became a powerful personage, and by his daring
exploits often threw the King into a state of extreme alarm and terror.
Politically he was wayward and reckless, and acquired a reputation for
dissipation. For a considerable time many of his offences were condoned;
but at last he was accused of trafficking with witches in a treasonable
manner, and for treasonable purposes, and on these charges he was
brought before the King and Council on the 15th of April, 1591, and
committed to prison in Edinburgh Castle to await his trial; while two
of his servants were summoned on similar charges to appear before the
King and Council on the 6th of May. Bothwell escaped from the Castle of
Edinburgh on the morning of the 21st of June; and on the 25th a royal
proclamation was issued denouncing him as a wicked traitor who had
entered into a conspiracy “against his Majesty’s own person, consulted
with necromancers and witches, both in and without this country, for
the purpose of taking his Highness’s life, which was confessed by some
of the same class already executed, and by some others yet alive, ready
to be executed for the same crime.... For which cause, and the former
treasonable offence whereof he was convicted, his Majesty now at last
has caused the doom of forfeiture to be pronounced against him, so that
he is now a declared rebel, a traitor, an enemy to God, his Majesty,
and this his native country.” Yet Bothwell was not extinguished, for,
on the night of the 27th of December, he suddenly entered Holyrood
Palace and battered at the doors of the King’s chamber, the Queen’s
chamber, and the apartments of Maitland, the Chancellor. It seems that
he intended to seize the King, to murder the Chancellor if necessary,
and thus effect such a revolution in the Government as he desired in
his own interest; but his attempt failed, though it appeared that he
was abetted by several persons in the King’s court. The hue and cry
against the bold rebel and consulter of witches was redoubled, and
proclamations against his accomplices were issued, still the daring
Bothwell, with his witchery, almost drove the King, the Chancellor,
and the Council, into utter distraction. Meantime the prosecution and
execution of the witches and the sorcerers had been proceeding. Euphame
MacCalyean, the wife of a notable Edinburgh advocate, was accused on
various charges of witchcraft. Her trial lasted from the 9th to the
13th of June, and one of the chief counts in her indictment was that
she had kept intercourse with the witches who had formed a conspiracy
for the destruction of the King. She was convicted and sentenced to
death, and the poor woman, “on her conscience, protested that she was
innocent of the crimes laid to her charge.” On the 25th of June, 1591,
the very day on which Bothwell was proclaimed a rebel, Euphame was
executed on the castle hill of Edinburgh. Barbara Napier of Edinburgh
was another reputed witch, and was also accused of treasonable
witchcraft against the King’s own person. On the 11th of May, 1591,
she was convicted, and sentenced to be strangled and burned; but, after
the stake was set in the Castlehill, and everything prepared for her
execution, some of her friends alleged that she was pregnant, whereupon
the execution was delayed. As it was considered hard to execute her
after this, her life was spared, whereat the King was much displeased.
James was enraged at the jury for acquitting her of the charge of
treasonable witchcraft against his own person, and he purposely went
to the Tolbooth of Edinburgh and delivered an oration on the subject
to enlighten the minds of jurymen and the people touching “The use of
witchcraft, and the enormity of the crime; its punishment according to
Scripture, the ignorance of thinking such matters were fantasies, the
cause of his own interference, the ignorance of the jury in the late
trial, the cause of their finding, and his own opinion of what witches
really are.” His Majesty explicated the above points at great length;
and it appears that his oratory had been effective, for on the 26th of
October the Privy Council appointed a Special Commission, consisting
of six members, viz., Cockburne, the Justice-Clerk; MacGill, the King’s
advocate; two burgesses of Edinburgh, and two Presbyterian ministers.
This Commission was empowered to deal with all persons suspected,
delated, or accused of witchcraft, sorcery, and all such devilish
devices, and to examine, imprison, and torture them, and then report
in writing the depositions to the King and his Council in order
that the witches and sorcerers might be tried by a jury and justice
executed upon them. Moreover, the King granted, and also sold, many
commissions to earls, barons, sheriffs, stewards, and to the local
authorities of burghs and towns, which empowered them to search for all
persons suspected of witchcraft within the districts included in the
commissions, to examine and torture them, put them to trial and execute
them. For many years this cruel mania against witches raged throughout
the kingdom, and was mainly instigated by the conceit and timidity of
the King.
Richard Graham, the great sorcerer of the time, who had been connected
with the alleged evil practices of Euphame MacCalyean, Barbara Napier,
Earl Bothwell, and others, was himself at last brought to trial and
condemned. He appears to have been a thorough rascal; but he adhered to
the declarations which he had emitted, that Bothwell had held magical
consultations touching the King’s death, and he also asserted that
Ex-Chancellor Arran had dealt in witchcraft. He confessed to several
raisings of the devil, especially once in the house of John Boswell
of Auchinleck, “and once in the yard of the house in the Canongate
belonging to Sir Lewis Ballenden, the late Justice-Clerk.” On the 29th
of February, 1592, Graham was strangled and burned at the Cross of
Edinburgh.
Bothwell still continued his exploits. On the night of the 28th of
June, 1592, he re-appeared with an armed company of his followers and
besieged the King and Queen in Falkland Castle, intending to carry
them off, and putting them in terror of their lives; but the people
of Fifeshire mustered and went to the rescue of the King, and on their
approach Bothwell retired, having been frustrated in his main object.
Great efforts were made to drive him out of the kingdom, yet, though
repeatedly chased, condemned and forfeited, and proclaimed a traitor
and an outlaw, under every possible form, still he was at liberty, and
supported by an unknown number of followers; and thus he was a cause of
constant anxiety to the Government and of terror to the King. Early on
the morning of the 24th of July, 1593, Bothwell was again in the Palace
of Holyrood by the connivance of the Duke of Lennox, Lord Ochiltree,
and other courtiers. The King was then forced to capitulate to his
detested archenemy; in fact, Bothwell for five or six weeks was master
of the political situation; so on the 26th of July the King granted an
act of remission and condonation of all the crimes of Bothwell and his
accomplices. This was obtained, however, under menacing circumstances,
when Bothwell and a band of his armed followers stood around the King,
who was in terror of his life. Bothwell then had such a number of
associates in Edinburgh that he offered to stand his trial to clear
himself of the charges of witchcraft against the King’s life, which
had been the chief cause of all the trouble with him. Accordingly a
jury was summoned, and on the 10th of August he was tried before it,
and unanimously acquitted of all the charges of witchcraft against the
King’s person. For a time Bothwell and his party had the King in their
hands, and his Majesty was sorely vexed at the restraint of his liberty,
and extremely perplexed as to how he could extricate himself from his
embarrassed position. On the 7th of September, a Convention of Estates
was assembled at Stirling, in which Bothwell’s party seems to have sunk
into a feeble minority. On the initiative of the King, the Convention
intimated to him that he was not in any way bound by the conditions
extorted from him at Holyrood Palace, and an Act was immediately
passed declaring “that his Majesty, with the advice of the Estates, had
recalled the grant made to Bothwell in August last.” This was intimated
to Bothwell, and shortly after he assumed a threatening attitude. On
the 11th of October he was summoned, along with two of his adherents,
to appear before the King and the Council on the 25th, under the
penalty of rebellion, and having failed to appear he was denounced;
still, he was not extinguished. On the 3rd of April, 1594, he appeared
at Leith with a body of armed followers, attacked the royal army under
the King’s own command, and forced them to retire, and nearly obtained
possession of the capital. The following year, early in April, however,
he was obliged to leave Scotland. It was reported that he had gone to
France, thence into Spain, and finally to Naples, where he died in poor
circumstances, about the year 1606.
It appears that no other man of public mark had been so much connected
with the alleged practices of witchcraft as Bothwell, or so incessant
in consultations with the noted witches and warlocks of the period, and
especially with the arch warlock Richard Graham. In the charge of high
treason on which he was arrested and imprisoned in April 1591, which
had driven him into his subsequent career of rebellion, the main count
had been that he conspired with such infernal agencies for the death of
the King, and thus to attain his own ambitious aims in the State. This
was the view that the King entertained of Bothwell’s proceedings and
exploits.
It is quite evident that the belief in witchcraft was entertained by
all classes, the parliament, the Lords of Council, and the Judges of
the Court of Session; none of them indicated any doubt of the reality
of infernal agency, nor any inkling of the absurdity of the devil
appearing in a human form, and assisting persons to accomplish all
manner of mischief.¹
¹ Pitcairn’s _Criminal Trials_, Volume I., pages 242‒257,
Volume II., pages 361, 397‒400. Witchcraft was a crime for
which no remission or respite was given. _Register of the
Privy Council_, Volume II., pages 198, 318; Volume IV.,
pages 392, 609, 624, 643, 666, 680, 705; _et seq._, Volume
V., pages 4‒5, 14, 72, 91‒98, 100, 137‒139, _et seq._
The Church also continued to search and hunt for witches. The General
Assembly, in 1587, had before them the case of a witch who was lying
in prison at St. Andrews; but it seems the evidence in her case was
insufficient, and James-Melville was ordered by the Assembly to travel
on the coast side and collect matter for an indictment against her.
In 1597, it was reported to the Assembly that several persons had
been convicted of witchcraft, yet the magistrates not only refused
to punish them according to the law of the country, but in contempt
set them at liberty. The Assembly then ordered that the presbyteries
should proceed in all severity with the censures of the Church against
such magistrates as liberated convicted witches. About the end of the
century a great number of witches were burnt in Aberdeen; yet it seems
the city was not free of them, as in the beginning of the year 1600
the council resolved――“That the commission purchased to the provost of
the burgh and the sheriff of the county, for holding of justice courts
on witches and sorcerers, should be prosecuted upon all persons in
this burgh and the freedom thereof, who were delated for this crime,
so that the city should be purged of such contagious enemies of the
commonweal.”¹ Indeed the local authorities and the clergy were intently
bent on reforming the nation, and with the Catholics, the Jesuits, the
troops of beggars, the poor, and the mass of crime and vice, it must
be admitted that their hands were full enough. They never wavered,
however, but steadfastly fought against everything which they deemed
an evil; and, although we must candidly confess that their ideas of
what constituted an evil or a crime were often confused and mistaken,
and that their judgments were frequently wanting in discrimination,
nevertheless, the evidence proves that they struggled manfully to
improve the social state of the people.
¹ _Book of the Universal Kirk_, pages 725, 938‒939; _Burgh
Records of Aberdeen_, Volume II., pages 144, 155‒6, 204‒5.
There are many books on witchcraft; but those who wish to
make a study of Scottish witchcraft will find a mass of
original information on the subject in Pitcairn’s _Criminal
Trials_, 3 volumes, in the _Old Spalding Club Miscellany_,
and in the _Records of the Proceedings of the Church Courts_;
and also in the volumes of the _Register of the Privy
Council_.
The number of trials and executions for witchcraft in Scotland was
not comparatively greater than in other European countries. Barrington
estimated that in England, during a period of two centuries, 30,000
witches were executed. Matthew Hopkins, the witch finder, by his
allegations caused the execution of one hundred persons in 1645‒47,
in the counties of Essex, Norfolk, and Suffolk. In 1515, five hundred
witches were burned at Geneva in the space of three months. In 1520,
a great number were burned in France, and one sorcerer confessed to
having twelve associates; while in Lorraine, between the years 1580 and
1595, nine hundred witches and warlocks were burned; and in Bretagne
twenty poor women were executed as witches in 1654. In Germany upwards
of 100,000 were executed for witchcraft; while in Wurtemburg alone,
between the years 1627 and 1629, one hundred and fifty-seven persons
were burned.
The discipline of the Reformed Church not only aimed at the suppression
of crime and vice, but also, according to its light, endeavoured to
strike at the roots of evil. The General Assembly in 1563 passed an act
prohibiting the publication of any book either printed or written, if
it touched upon religion, till it was presented to the superintendent
of the district and approved by him and the most learned of his
brethren within his bounds; but if they could not agree on the points
raised in the book, then it should be placed before the General
Assembly for a final decision on its merits and orthodoxy. In 1568 the
Assembly found that Thomas Bassandyne had printed a book in Edinburgh,
entitled _The Fall of the Roman Church_, “naming our King supreme head
of the primitive Church,” and that he had printed a psalm book at the
end of which was a profane song called “Welcome Fortune”; and that
these books had been issued without the license of the magistrates or
the Church. The Assembly unanimously agreed to order the printer to
call in all the copies of the book which had been sold, to alter the
title and expunge the profane song, and in the future to refrain from
printing anything without the license of the supreme magistrate, and
the revision of such matters as related to religion by the committee
appointed for that purpose.¹ Though the Church was thus careful
in guarding against the spread of immoral writings, and what she
held to be erroneous doctrine, she was not an enemy to the press.
Robert Lekpreuik, the Edinburgh printer, had fallen into straitened
circumstances; and in 1569 the General Assembly, after considering his
position, and the money which he had expended on his establishment,
resolved to give him fifty pounds yearly out of the funds of the
Church. The Assembly in several other instances encouraged printers,
and petitioned the government to treat them liberally.²
¹ _Book of the Universal Kirk_, pages 35, 125‒126.
² _Ibid._, pages 164, 306, 462.
The Privy Council in 1574 passed an act prohibiting the printing of any
book without a license from the government. The act directed that the
authorities throughout the kingdom should proclaim to the people, that
none of them may presume to print or sell any books, ballads, rhymes or
tragedies, either in Latin or English until they were seen and examined,
and allowed by the Chancellor and other persons appointed by the King,
and at the least three of these must concur before the King’s license
could be granted for the publication. The penalty attached to the
contravention of this act was death and confiscation of goods.¹
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume II., page 387;
Volume III., pages 587, 549, 583; Volume IV., page 459;
Volume V., page 313; Volume VI., pages 18, 185; _Acts of
the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume IV., page 187.
In the secular affairs of life, the citizens still exhibited the same
restriction and monopoly, which was described in the tenth chapter of
the first volume. This greatly hampered the internal industry and the
trade of the country. While the wars with England and the disturbed
state of the nation before the Reformation, and the troubles which
ensued after it, were all inimical to trade and commerce. Owing to
these circumstances, industry and trade made comparatively little
progress in the sixteenth century; this period was more remarkable
for moral and religious change and transformation than for material
prosperity.
During the reigns of James V. and Queen Mary, many acts of parliament
were passed relating to the coinage of the kingdom. A great variety
of gold, silver, and copper coins were struck. In 1525 it was ordered
that a gold coin should be struck, called a crown, of the fineness of
twenty-one carats and a-half and two grains; nine of these were to be
coined out of the ounce of gold, and each to pass current for twenty
shillings. For every ounce of gold brought to the mint, the seller was
to get seven pounds, and out of every ounce of coined gold the King was
to get twenty-five shillings. In 1527 the Crown entered into a contract
with two men for coining of silver money. According to this agreement,
one hundred and seventy-six coins were to be made out of the pound of
silver, and each was to be of the value of eighteen pence Scots. The
coins of Queen Mary are numerous and present a variety of types. In
1547 the Regent and Lords of Council passed an act stating that the
pennies and half-pennies were mostly all gone out of the country; and
thus the people, but especially the poor, suffered for want of them.
The Council ordered twelve stones of silver to be coined into pennies
and half-pennies, of the fineness and weight of the old pennies;
and commanded that they should have currency throughout the kingdom.
In 1554 the Bishop of Ross was going to France in the character of
ambassador, and the Regent and Council ordered James Atcheson, the
master coiner, to receive a silver vessel and coin it into babies
to defray the ambassador’s expenses. In the end of the year 1565
directions were issued for coining the silver piece called the Mary
Rall; it was to pass for thirty shillings, and the two-thirds and
the one-third of the same to pass for twenty, and ten shillings
respectively. During the reign of Queen Mary, the intrinsic value of
the currency underwent several remarkable changes. As in 1544 the value
of a pound of silver was £9 10 shillings, in 1556, £13, and in 1565
it was raised to £18. At this time, in England the pound of silver was
worth from £2 8 shillings to £3, which pretty plainly shows that money
was scarce in Scotland.¹
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume II.; _Register
of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 71, 151‒152, 154,
413; Lindsay’s _View of the Coinage of Scotland_, pages
39‒52, 141‒145; 1865.
In 1565, the Lords of Council ordered the false coins called hardheads,
brought from Flanders, to be melted, and to have no currency in the
kingdom. The same year an act was passed against the importation of
false coin; and in 1566, several persons were convicted in Aberdeen
for this offence. The following year, in May, a proclamation was issued
against importing false coins――hardheads, placks, babies, or any other
light money; and in 1568, Forbes of Monymusk and Forbes of Pitsligo,
two brothers, were cited for coining false babies.¹
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 325, 335,
468, 510, 642‒643. “Owing to the constant exporting of good
coin and the importing of bad, the circulating medium of the
country was in a wretched state. There seems to have been a
regular system of coining base placks and lions (otherwise
called hardheads) in the Low Countries, to be introduced by
merchants into Scotland.”――Chambers’s _Domestic Annals_,
Volume I., page 102.
Many acts touching the coinage were passed in the reign of James VI.
In 1567, the regent and council passed an act ordering the coinage
of a silver piece, to be called the James Rall, of the weight of an
ounce troy, and to pass for thirty shillings in Scotland, two-parts of
the same for twenty shillings, and the third-part for ten shillings.
This year, in December, the parliament passed an act dealing with
the coinage, and with false and clipped coins. It was stated that the
King with the consent of the Regent, may coin gold and silver pieces
of the same fineness as that of other countries, and that no gold or
silver coin should be melted. The Lords of Council, in 1572, stated
that parliament had authorised a new silver coin to be sent out, “for
payment and support of the charges of this present civil and intestine
war, raised against his highness’ authority by certain declared
traitors, rebels, and conspirators, who, after the murder of the King’s
dearest father, and of his uncle the Regent of this realm, have never
ceased to resist his highness’ authority and to seek his own life, and,
as far as in them lies, to pull his royal crown off his head.” This
money was coined in whole and in half-pieces――the first to be called
the half mark, and to pass for six shillings and eightpence; the second
to be called the forty-penny piece, and to pass for three shillings
and fourpence. The council ordered that the new coinage should be made
known to the people by proclamation: “And to command and charge them
to receive the said money in thankful and ready payment, and no one
may presume to refuse the same upon any pretence whatever, under the
penalty of treason; certifying to those that fail, that they shall be
condemned to death with all rigour as an example to others.”¹ This act
gives some indication of the difficulties connected with the currency,
which mainly arose from the scarcity of specie, and the confused ideas
of what constituted wealth; as yet there was no paper currency to
make up the deficiency. Only three months after the issue of these two
pieces of money, the Council had to proclaim that it was counterfeited
by some persons to the great injury of the people.² It may be inferred
that the motive for counterfeiting these coins so quickly arose from
their being further debased than the money before in circulation. In
the copper coinage, as well as in the gold and silver, there seems to
have been much counterfeiting practised.³ During the later half of the
century numerous acts were passed prohibiting the exportation of gold
and silver; and injunctions were issued for bringing all the gold and
silver to the master coiner, who was to pay the ordinary price for it.⁴
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., page 556; Volume
II., pages 135‒136.
² _Ibid._, Volume II., page 160.
³ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III.
⁴ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 212‒213,
330; Volume II., pages 410, 554, 615‒616; _Acts of the
Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., page 216.
In 1579 parliament enacted that there should be a piece of gold coined
of twenty-one carats, containing ten in the ounce, to be called the
Scottish crown, and to pass for forty shillings. At the same time it
was proclaimed that the ounce of the finest gold was to be bought for
twenty-one pounds of the money of the realm, and the price of all other
gold to be according to its fineness. A silver piece was to be coined
of the fineness of eleven deniers, in whole and in half pieces――the
first to pass for twenty-six shillings and eightpence, and to be called
the two-mark coin; and the half piece to pass for thirteen shillings
and fourpence, and to be called the half-mark. The price to be given
for the finest silver was thirty-six shillings the ounce, and for
other silver in proportion to its quality. But in 1580, parliament
ordered that all the money in the kingdom, except the stamped placks
and pennies, should be reformed and reduced to the fineness of eleven
deniers, and a new gold coin was also ordered to be struck. The next
year, the King and parliament thought that the last silver coinage had
been fixed at too high a value, and this had caused great injury to
the people, and had also been the occasion of a dearth and many other
inconveniences. The new act, therefore, directed that the last coinage,
which extended to two hundred and eleven stones and ten pounds of
silver, should be brought in again to be recoined into ten shilling
pieces, containing four in the ounce. In 1584, parliament passed
another act, reciting that the gold of the kingdom had been continually
exported, and that of other countries introduced to the loss and injury
of the people; and it was then ordered that two pieces of gold, of
the fineness of twenty-one carats and a-half, should be coined――the
one of six coins to the ounce, each to pass for three pounds fifteen
shillings; and the other nine to the ounce, and to pass for fifty
shillings. In 1597, it was stated in an act of parliament that the
current money of the kingdom was scarce, and that gold and silver
had risen to exorbitant prices owing to the liberty which all persons
took of raising the price of money at their pleasure, far above the
value prescribed by the laws and acts of parliament. Through this,
and constant exporting of the money, great confusion had been caused;
and it was then enacted that parties transgressing the laws would be
severely punished. The scarcity of money is very apparent from the
high value which the laws set upon it. The ounce of foreign gold of
twenty-two carats was twenty-eight pounds sixteen shillings, Scots
money, in 1598; and in 1601, the price given at the mint for gold was
thirty-three pounds the ounce; at the same time the ounce of silver
was about forty-eight shillings, Scotch money.¹ In 1587, parliament
passed an act limiting the rate of interest on money and on grain to
ten per cent.
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., pages
150, 191, 310, 311; Volume IV., 134‒135. Lindsay’s _View of
the Coinage of Scotland_, pages 53‒59, 145‒151.
At the time of the union of the crowns the relative value of English
and Scotch money was as twelve to one; the gold pieces which passed in
England for twenty-one shillings each, in Scotland passed for twelve
pounds.
Some early attempts at mining were noticed in the preceding volume. In
the reign of James IV., the gold mines of Crawfurd Moor were discovered;
and in the years 1511, 1512, and 1513, many payments were made by the
crown to Sir James Pettigrew for working these gold mines. Payments
were also made to Sebald Northberge, the master finer, Andrew Ireland,
finer, and Gerard Essemer, the melter; and in 1513 the Abbot of
Tungland received payment from the King to visit the mines of Crawfurd
Moor. These mines engaged the attention of the government in 1515. In
1524 a court was ordered to be held at Edinburgh to deal with those who
had broken the order of the mine, and conveyed gold out of the kingdom;
and the gold of the mine was then ordered to be coined in the coining
house. The Albany medal of 1524 was made from gold found in Crawfurd
Moor; and it seems that some of the gold coinage of James V. was minted
of native metal. In 1526 a lease was granted to a party of Germans
and Dutchmen of all the mines of gold, silver, and other metals for
a term of forty-three years; and in the following year a contract was
made with them to coin certain gold and silver money for ten years,
but it appears that the enterprise was not successful as the foreigners
departed homeward in 1531. In 1535 a Commission was appointed to
inquire into the working of the mines, and in 1539 miners from Lorraine
were brought to Scotland to work the mines. They were placed under the
management of John Mossman, a goldsmith, and a considerable quantity
of gold seems to have been found by them; and shortly after forty-one
ounces of native gold were used in making a crown for James V., and
thirty-five ounces for a crown to his Queen, while seventeen ounces
were added to the King’s great chain, and nineteen and a half ounces
for making a belt to the Queen; a quantity was also used for the
coinage of gold bonnet pieces and other purposes. During the minority
of Queen Mary little was done in gold mining. In 1565 the Privy Council
granted a licence to John Stewart of Tarlair, and his son William, to
search for all kinds of minerals, and to work the mines of gold and
silver and other metal between the Tay and Orkney, on the condition
that they should pay to the government one stone of metal out of every
ten which they found. They were also authorised to work all the gold
and silver mines throughout the country, on the condition that they
brought all the gold and silver to the coining-house; for every ounce
of gold they were to receive ten pounds, and for each ounce of silver
twenty-four shillings. If in the course of their explorations they
discovered coal haughs, not within ten miles of any royal residence,
then they should be free to work them, and only pay the tenth penny of
the proceeds to the Crown. Their licence was to endure for nine years.
In March, 1568, the Regent Moray granted a licence to Cornelius Vois, a
Dutchman, to work the gold and silver mines for nineteen years in every
quarter of the kingdom, and he undertook to pay to the Crown for every
hundred ounces of gold and silver which was found, purified by washing,
eight ounces, and if purified by fire, four ounces; while there were
other alternative arrangements. Cornelius was allowed to employ as many
of the Scots as he pleased, but not more than twenty foreigners. He
had, as one of his partners, Nicolas Hilliard, the noted medallist, and
also the Earl of Morton, who had ten shares, and some of the Scottish
merchants.
In 1576 Abraham Paterson and his partners obtained a licence to work
all the gold, silver, lead, and copper mines in Scotland, excepting
the lead mines of Glengonar and Orkney, which were then worked by
George Douglas of Parkhead, and Adam Fullerton, a burgess of Edinburgh.
Lengthy and very minute stipulations occur in this licence; he was to
pay six ounces out of every hundred of gold or silver to the Crown,
and the licence was to continue for twelve years. In 1583 a general
grant of all the mines and minerals in the country for twenty-one
years was given to Eustachius Roche, mediciner. He was authorised to
search anywhere for minerals, and to use timber, coals, and peats from
the royal territories on the condition of paying seven ounces out of
every hundred of gold found, and of all the other metals ten ounces
out of every hundred, and all the rest of the gold and silver was
to be brought to the coining-house at the price of twenty-two pounds
Scots per ounce of fine gold, and forty shillings per ounce for fine
silver. All other persons were prohibited from working minerals unless
authorised by Roche. Further privileges were granted to him by contract,
which was ratified by Parliament in August, 1584; but certain mines
which belonged to the Earl of Arran were exempted from the scope of
Roche’s lease; afterwards Roche obtained a separate lease of Arran’s
mines, but when Roche attempted to transport the lead, in 1585,
which had been got in the mines of Glengonar and Wanlock (on Arran’s
territory) it was arrested in Leith by the Treasurer, although, on
appeal to the Privy Council, the claim was abandoned and the lead
permitted to be transported on payment of the royal duty according to
the contract.
George Douglas of Parkhead, mentioned above, had obtained a grant of
the mines in the Leadhills district in 1576, but he was forfeited in
1581, and fled to England. On the turn of the political wheel, however,
he was restored in 1585, and in 1592 he was permitted to work the mines
of Waterhead, “otherwise called Over-Glengonar,” on the condition of
paying fifty ounces of fine silver out of every thousand stone of lead
ore. He was allowed to sell one thousand stone weight of the ore for
the advancement of the work. The following year the master of the
metals complained to the Privy Council that Douglas had worked much
more ore than his licence permitted, and so he was summoned to pay the
whole duty due from the commencement of his lease. This resulted in an
agreement between Douglas and Thomas Foullis, a goldsmith and burgess
of Edinburgh, by which all the rights of Douglas in connection with the
mines were transferred to Foullis for an annual rent of five hundred
merks. Foullis then obtained an Act of the Privy Council, confirmed by
Parliament, granting to him all the minerals and metals in the lands
of the Friar’s Moor, in the sheriffdom of Lanark, for twenty-one years,
at a yearly rent of one thousand merks; but he ceased to search for the
precious metals on any extensive scale, and directed his attention to
develop the lead mines.¹
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 232, 330,
612‒614; Volume II., pages 506‒514; also Volumes III. and
IV.; _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume II.;
_Early Records Relating to Mining in Scotland_, by R. W.
Cochran-Patrick, 1878.
A long Act of Parliament touching the mines was passed in 1592. This
Act explicitly stated that all mines belonged to the Crown, and that in
the past these mines had not been made so profitable as they might have
been, owing mainly to there not having been a specially qualified man
appointed to look after the whole work connected with them. Therefore,
it was enacted that henceforth there should be an officer appointed by
the Government to oversee the whole matter of the metals and minerals,
who should be called the Master of the Metals, with full powers
touching the management and working of the mines. The Act appointed
Mr. John Lindsay, a brother of Sir David Lindsay of Edzell, Master of
the Metals for life. One clause of the Act stated that the King, if
he thought fit, with the advice of the Treasurer and the Master of the
Metals, for a reasonable composition, might let in feu to every earl,
baron, or other freeholder in the kingdom, all mines of gold, silver,
copper, lead, or other metals and minerals “which is or may be found
in their own lands, giving to them power to seek and to work such
mines on the condition of paying the Crown one-tenth part of the whole
metals found.” It appears that Roche had not been very successful in
his mining operations, and it was resolved to reduce his contract.
Accordingly he was charged with having neither worked the mines in
operation before the date of his contract, nor those which he had
discovered himself, that he had also neglected to pay the duty owing
to the Crown, and he was ordered to appear before the Privy Council to
answer these charges, and at the same time to produce all his papers
and titles. Roche appeared and answered the charges against him, but
the contract with him was reduced, and his connection with the mines
then ceased.¹
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., page 556;
Balcarres’ _Papers_; _Lives of the Lindsays_, Volume II.
There is little mention of iron mining till a comparatively late period,
but coal was a common article of commerce in ♦1425. In 1542 the annual
value of the coal haughs of Wallyfurd and Preston, which belonged to
the Crown, was 1100 merks. Coal was worked at Culross in 1572, and in
1584, Lord Sinclair had a coal pit at Dysart. In 1592 Parliament passed
an Act relating to the working of coal, which enacted that any person
who wilfully set fire to coal haughs, from motives of revenge and spite,
should incur the penalty of treason, if found guilty of this crime.
In 1600 it was enacted, that as the King’s coal haughs could not be
worked within the bounds of his annexed territories unless at great
expense; in consequence of this his Majesty neither received coal for
the royalty, nor any profit, it was therefore resolved to separate them
from the Crown lands and let them in feu.¹
♦ date uncertain; probably “1525”
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume II., pages 10,
424; Volume IV., page 229.
In the sixteenth century there was not much commerce between England
and Scotland. The Low Countries, France, and the Baltic kingdoms, were
the places where the Scots mostly traded. During the war between the
two countries in the reign of Henry VIII., within a very short time,
the English took twenty-eight trading ships from the Scots. In 1545
the treaty between the Emperor and Scotland touching the commerce of
the Scots with Flanders was renewed; thus the Flemings were exempted
from attacks of the Scottish ships commissioned for warfare. But
difficulties arose between this country and Flanders, and several
Scottish ships were detained there. It was stated in 1550 that “when
our ships came to Flanders as to our friends for traffic of merchandise,
after they had been well received, and were ready to depart, the whole
fleet of fourteen ships, richly laden with Flemish wares, were taken,
held, and disposed of, and the merchants imprisoned by the Emperor’s
subjects.” The same year the Lords of Council had to interfere to
protect the Scots from the ships of Holland and the Lowlands of
Flanders, the subjects of the Emperor; they were daily committing
enormities upon the Scots within the Firths and other places. As many
of the Scottish war ships as could be put into a seaworthy state,
were commissioned and instructed to proceed against them; they were
commanded to take, and chase these pirates off the coasts and out
of the waters of Scotland. But they were specially restricted from
interfering with the ships of England, France, Denmark, Sweden, and
Hamburg. It seems however that trade was not long interrupted between
Scotland and Flanders. In 1552 the Lords of Council passed an act
complaining that the flesh of the country was barrelled, packed, sold,
and sent out of the kingdom to other countries, and especially to
Flanders, which had caused a great dearth of meat at home whereby the
people had been much hurt; and its exportation was therefore prohibited
under the penalty of confiscation and death.¹ New regulations
were passed by the Council in 1565 for the guidance of the Scotch
Conservator in Flanders; these were very minute and bear upon the
merchants as well as the Conservator, touching the hours of business
and such matters as the following: “That no merchant when he has bought
his goods should bring them home himself, but should employ others to
carry his gear to his lodgings or his cellar like a merchant, under
a fine of five shillings. That no merchant who buys his meat in the
market should truss it home upon his sleeve or on the point of his
knife, under the same fine. That no one should deal in merchandise
unless he be honestly able like a merchant; and if he be not well
dressed the Conservator should warn him to clothe himself better, and
if he fail to do that, then the Conservator should take as much of his
goods as will clothe him properly withal.”²
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 18, 40, 41,
92, 104, 127; Macpherson’s _Annals of Commerce_, Volume II.,
page 93.
² _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 332‒334.
Even in the latter part of the sixteenth century the foreign trade of
Scotland was comparatively small. The exports were comprised within
very narrow limits, but the imports were more varied. There were some
very curious regulations imposed in connection with the exports, which
strikingly brings before us the state of society and the character
of the times. It was noticed that there were acts prohibiting the
exportation of gold and silver; and there were other things which
were allowed to be exported under limitations one year, while the
next they were absolutely prohibited. A considerable quantity of salt
was produced at the various salt works throughout the country, but
the export of salt was only permitted under certain contingencies. The
Council in 1573 passed an act stating that it was unlawful to export
any salt until the whole people and the carriers to all the markets in
the kingdom were supplied with a sufficient quantity of it, which had
to be sold at the salt-pans for eight shillings the boll. Then whatever
quantity of it remained after satisfying the people, was allowed to
be exported to other countries. But the owners and carriers of it were
obliged to buy six ounces of silver for every chalder of salt exported,
and this silver had to be delivered to the master coiner within eight
days after their return to Scotland, and for every ounce of which
the owner of the salt was to receive from the master coiner thirty
shillings. It was further provided, that in the event of the exporters
of salt buying up the stipulated proportion of silver, and not buying
it from abroad, the silver so bought should be forfeited to the crown,
and the exporters of the salt condemned to pay a sum equivalent to
the silver they should have brought from foreign parts. To ensure
the fulfilment of this condition the custom officers were ordered
not to give the exporters of salt a cocket, till they came to the
coining-house and gave security to bring home the required quantity
of silver.¹
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume II., pages 264‒265,
290, 293; _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volumes II.,
III.
This rather peculiar arrangement, which was contrary to acts of
parliament, did not prove to be satisfactory. In 1574, the Lords of
Council discharged the granting of licenses to export salt, on account
of the exorbitant dearth of small salt at home. “As experience now
teaches,” they said, “the granting of such licenses has been very
prejudicial to the commonweal of the nation, as the conditions for
furnishing and serving the people at the prices mentioned in the
Acts of Parliament has in nowise been observed; but our sovereign
lord’s subjects have been constrained to buy salt at exorbitant and
unreasonable prices, and likely from day to day to rise to greater
extortion, if timely remedy be not provided. Therefore all the licenses
for exporting salt out of the kingdom were henceforward discharged.”¹
Three weeks after their lordships had passed this act, however, they
granted a license to Robert Paterson, the master of the ship called
“The Grace of God,” to export to Norway six chalders of salt for curing
fish; and another to William Ker, the master of the “Swallow,” to
export four chalders; and two burgesses of Edinburgh became sureties
that the salt should not be converted to any other use. At this time
the authorised price of salt was eight shillings per boll, but there
were many complaints of parties selling it at a higher rate.² Only
white salt was allowed to be exported in 1584; and the export of salt
was prohibited in 1587; there was a duty on salt exported.
¹ _Ibid._, Volume II., pages 406‒407.
² _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume II., page 285;
Volumes III., IV. On the 30th of August, 1573, the owners
of thirty-eight salt-pans, of Preston and Musselburgh, gave
security to supply Scotsmen with salt at eight shillings the
boll.――_Ibid._, page 296.
Several other articles were dealt with in the same way. Licenses were
now and again granted by the Lords of Council for exporting things
which were prohibited by parliament. The exportation of coal was
prohibited by Act of Parliament; but the Council, in 1573, resolved
to grant licenses for exporting smithy-coal. In the same year, on the
other hand, Walter Scott, in Dysart, became bound that the coals loaded
in a ship of that port should not be exported;¹ the export of coal was
forbidden in 1586, and in 1597. The trade of the country was carried
on under the same changing and disturbing influences as its politics;
and, so few of the resources of the country were as yet developed, and
such restrictive and conflicting agencies were in operation that the
merchants were greatly hampered. The regulations touching the export
of lead were of the same varying character. Lead might be exported,
but there was a royalty placed upon it; the exporter had to pay fifteen
ounces of silver for every thousand stones of lead shipped.²
¹ _Ibid._, Volume I., page 340; Volume II., page 290, Volumes
IV. V.; _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume II.,
page 543.
² _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume II., pages 102, 507,
626.
Licenses were sometimes granted for exporting grain, but owing to bad
harvests, and the frequent neglect of agriculture from war, it was
often deemed necessary to prohibit the export of corn and wheat. There
were frequently seasons of dearth, and many attempts to fix the price
of grain were made. In September, 1567, the Regent and Council stated
that the merchants and others had exported great quantities of grain,
under the pretence of licenses granted “by the Queen’s grace, our
Sovereign Lord’s dearest mother, to the great increase and dearth
of the same; the corn of this year’s crop being at God’s pleasure
plagued and spoiled with rain, and so in all appearance scarce enough
to sustain the inhabitants of this country.” Therefore the Council
resolved to revoke all such licenses, and ordered that no grain
should be exported hereafter, under the penalty of the confiscation
of the ship and her cargo. In 1574, the Regent and Council ordered the
comptroller to ascertain the quantity of grain exported that year, by
whom, and at what ports, and other points concerning it. The Council,
in the winter of 1577, agreed to allow the free export of grain for the
following reason: “In times of dearth this country has received large
help and support of victuals out of France, Flanders, and England,
whereby the people have been greatly relieved; and the like favour and
good neighbourhood, charity, and amity ought to be extended towards the
people of these countries in this present year, when it has pleased God
to visit them with the like dearth and scarcity, and this realm with
such increase and plenty of grain, as some part thereof may, without
prejudice of the State, be spared to the relief of our neighbours’
necessities.”¹
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 402, 571,
572; Volume II., pages 252, 589.
Horses and cattle were occasionally exported, but Acts of Parliament
and Council frequently prohibited this; and on the whole the regular
export trade of Scotland was as yet very small. It consisted mostly of
raw materials, such as hides, wool, and the like; but the imports were
more varied, and comprised a variety of articles, and especially large
quantities of wines. There were Acts of Parliament and Council which
prohibited the importers of wines from selling any to the people till
the king, bishops, earls, lords, and barons, were first well stocked.¹
¹ _Ibid._, Volume I., pages 282, 298, 191, 285, 402, 571‒572;
Volume II., pages 128‒129, 505, 515, 662, 675, 693; _Acts of
the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III.
The trade between the Highlands and Lowlands chiefly consisted of
cattle and wood. The Highlanders had long been accustomed to bring
their cattle to the Lowland markets; but sometimes parties in the
Lowlands seized their flocks under the pretence that they were
authorised by the Government, which was not the case. They brought
the timber down the rivers in floats to the towns and sold it to the
citizens.¹
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 401,
470‒471; Volume II., pages 500‒501; _Burgh Records of
Aberdeen_, Volume II., page 33.
The internal trade of the country was still carried on, under the
strict principle of monopoly. The price of manufactured articles
and goods, as well as of food and provisions, was fixed by law and
regulated by the local authorities. The guild or merchants openly
insisted on their exclusive right of commerce, not only in foreign
trade, but also within the burgh, and often over the county in which
it was situated.¹
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volumes II., III.,
IV.; _Burgh Records of Edinburgh_, Volumes I., II., III.
Among the many regulations fixing the supply and the price of
provisions, perhaps those relating to the sale of ale and spirits
are the most instructive. Ale had long been a beverage in common and
daily use, and large quantities of it were consumed by all classes
of the people. The Acts of Parliament and Council fixing the price of
malt and ale were numerous; and the statutes and regulations of the
burghs touching the supply and the price of these two necessaries were
endless. In 1535 Parliament passed an Act stating that the inhabitants
of Edinburgh and the people who frequented it were greatly oppressed
by the maltmakers of Leith, and others in that neighbourhood, exacting
four, five, and even six shillings more for the malt than they paid for
the barley. It was therefore enacted that maltmakers should produce and
sell their malt at a competent profit, and charge only two shillings
more for the boll of malt than the current price of the boll of barley.
“Those who disobey these acts, it was ordained, shall be called and
punished as oppressors of the King’s subjects, and particular courts
shall be set for them, and the King shall give commission to such as he
pleases to call the offending maltmakers before them in the Tolbooth of
Edinburgh, to execute justice upon them as they may think fit, and to
cause this statute to be observed in all points.”¹ In 1551 the Regent
and the Lords of Council, taking into consideration the high prices of
all kinds of victuals “whereby the poor were at the point of perishing,”
issued a commission under the great seal to the provost of Edinburgh,
authorising him to deal with all the maltmakers, maltsellers, bakers,
and regraters, within a circle of four miles of Edinburgh; and to
bring them to punishment according to the Acts of Parliament and the
laws of the kingdom. When Queen Mary visited Jedburgh in October,
1566, it seems that the good citizens of that town raised the price
of provisions. Whereupon her majesty called together her council and
the authorities of the burgh, who passed an act fixing the price of
everything during the stay of the court in that quarter. The pint
of good ale was to be fourpence, and sixteen ounces of fine bread
fourpence. The price of a man’s dinner, “being served with beef, mutton,
and roast at the least, was sixteenpence. For the use of a furnished
bed the charge was to be twelvepence each night; and for stabling to
a horse for the space of twenty-four hours, twopence.”² In 1573 the
price of ale was four shillings the gallon; in 1589 the pint of ale was
eightpence; and from this time to the end of the century it ran from
one shilling to one and fourpence the pint.³ In 1571 the magistrates
of Edinburgh enacted that Dutch drinking beer should not be sold higher
than sixpence the pint.
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume II., page 351;
_Burgh Records of Edinburgh_, Volume II., pages 265‒266.
² _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., pages 115,
488‒489.
³ _Ibid._, Volume II., page 269; _Burgh Records of Glasgow_,
pages 25, 137, 162, 172, 198, 214; _Burgh Records of
Edinburgh_, Volume III., page 284.
The price of wine varied during the first half of the sixteenth century,
from sixpence the pint to one shilling and fourpence; but towards the
end of the century, the price of it had nearly tripled. There is much
evidence that large quantities of wine were consumed in Scotland. The
members of the guild claimed the exclusive right to sell wine in all
the burghs of the kingdom.¹
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volumes II., pages
373, 376, 483; Volumes III., IV.; _Register of the Privy
Council_, Volume I., pages 128‒129, 212‒213, 425‒428, 451;
Volume II., pages 505, 662, 693; Volumes III., IV., V., VI.;
_Burgh Records of Edinburgh_, Volume II., pages 114, 115,
120, 123, 125, 127, 132, 134, 144, _et seq._; Volume III.,
pages 29, 84, 132, 156, 191, 198, 224; _Burgh Records of
Glasgow_, pages 66, 82, 107, 184, 201; _Burgh Records of
Aberdeen_, Volume II., page 149.
Whisky was known, but as yet it was not much used among the people.
In 1557, as noticed in a preceding page, Bessy Campbell was brought
before the magistrates of Edinburgh, and ordered to cease from making
whisky in the burgh, and from selling it, except on the market-day,
according to the privilege granted to the barbers, under their seal of
cause, unless she was permitted by them. The use of whisky, however,
was gradually becoming more common. In 1579, Parliament passed an
act restricting the making and selling of it. This Act opened with
a statement that grain would be scarce that year, and yet great
quantities of malt was consumed in the making of aquavitæ, which was
the cause of the dearth of the malt. It was enacted therefore that
no person, either in town or country, should brew or sell any whisky,
from the 1st of December, 1579, to the 1st of October, 1580, under the
penalty of the breaking of their brewing utensils, and the confiscation
of their stock of spirits. But the nobles and men of rank were
permitted to brew and distil whisky from their own malt, on their
own premises, for the use of their own house, families, and friends.¹
This act is very characteristic of much of the subsequent legislation
relating to the sale of whisky and spirits; but it is clear that whisky
had not then the hold on the people which it afterwards obtained.
¹ _Burgh Records of Edinburgh_, Volume II., page 262; _Acts
of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., page 174;
_Register of the Privy Council_, Volume II., page 269.
There were many complaints that leather and shoes were so dear that the
people were unable to buy them. In 1541, a number of the shoemakers of
Aberdeen were convicted by a jury for making insufficient shoes, and
for selling them above the legal price. The magistrates of Edinburgh,
in 1563, fixed the price of boots and shoes as follows: “The pair of
double-soled shoes of the largest size, well made and of good material,
three shillings and eightpence; a pair of single-soled shoes of similar
size, two shillings and eightpence; a pair of the finest double-soled
boots, twenty-four shillings; a pair of single-soled boots, twenty
shillings;” and so on in proportion for smaller sizes. The authorities
of Aberdeen, in 1580, ordained that the price for shoeing the largest
horses should be six shillings and eightpence, and the charge for the
smaller horses and nags, four shillings.¹
¹ _Burgh Records of Aberdeen_, Volume I., pages 453‒454;
Volume II., pages 38‒39; _Burgh Records of Edinburgh_,
Volume III., page 155; _Register of the Privy Council_,
Volume I.
Complaints were often made against the craftsmen that their workmanship
was insufficient, and their charges too high. Complaints of this
description frequently came before Parliament and the Privy Council,
and acts were from time to time passed fixing the price of manufactured
goods and articles. But the craftsmen struggled hard, and by their
organisations they became a considerable power in the burghs. Sometimes
they were rather troublesome to the guilds. Amongst the craftsmen the
spirit of monopoly was excessive. The trade disputes between Edinburgh
and Leith, and between the Canongate and Edinburgh, were numerous
and bitter. The different bodies of craftsmen sometimes manifested
an extreme jealousy of each other, and of their exclusive privileges,
which was unfavourable to the development of trade and to the
acquisition of skill.¹
¹ _Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., page 142; Volume,
II., pages 33‒34, 220‒221, 260, 577‒579; _Burgh Records of
Edinburgh_; _Burgh Records of Glasgow_, pages 165‒166.
In 1562, the bonnetmakers of Edinburgh complained that various
craftsmen, fleshers, wrights, shoemakers, and others, in the burgh, had
enticed away their apprentices and servants, who were unfree persons,
and had caused them to labour at kinds of work which belonged to their
craft. The provost and council agreed that the bonnetmakers should be
protected in their privileges and liberties; but they added, “That in
case it pleased the goodness of God to give the gift to strangers and
others resorting to this town to labour, and invent upon points a more
perfect and finer fashion of hose, sleeves, gloves, and such like,
than they themselves, their servants, or apprentices, could do, or
has done, at any time before this, and that in such cases the said
persons should not be stopped, nor the gifts of God smothered, provided
always that nowhere they nor any others should be served by servants
and apprentices who have had their beginning under the deacon and
masters.”¹ This opinion of the Town Council was on the line which leads
to improvement. In 1587, Parliament passed an act in favour of Flemish
craftsmen――makers of serges, bedcovers, and other woollen fabrics
belonging to their craft. They were to teach the Scots to make this
class of goods, and the conditions of the bargain extended to twelve
heads.²
¹ _Burgh Records of Edinburgh_, Volume III., page 148.
² _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., pages
607‒609.
It was already observed that the reformed clergy had exerted themselves
to extinguish some of the amusements of the people; and Parliament
followed in the same track, and passed sumptuary enactments. In 1567,
the Estates of the realm enacted that no women should adorn themselves
with dress above what was appropriate to their rank, unless they were
prostitutes. And Parliament, in 1581, passed an act touching dress,
and another against superfluous banqueting, and the inordinate use of
confectionery and drugs. The act on dress opened with a statement that
there was great abuse among the common people, even of the meanest rank,
inasmuch as they presumed to counterfeit the king and his nobility by
their habit of wearing costly clothing of silk, and of all varieties:
“Laine, cameraige, fringes, pasments of gold, of silver, of silk,
and woollen cloth, brought from other countries; thus the price of
these goods had been raised to such a dearth that this state of matters
cannot be longer endured without great scath to the nation. Though
God has granted to the kingdom sufficient commodities for clothing
the people thereof within itself, if they were properly employed
manufacturing them at home; and whereby great numbers of the people now
wandering in beggary might be relieved, and the honesty and the wealth
of the country greatly increased.” The Act prohibited all persons
below the ranks of duke, earl, lord of parliament, knight, and landed
gentlemen, and their wives and families, from wearing costly dresses.
Minute provisions were made for carrying out the Act, and penalties
were to be inflicted for its infringement. This Act also contained
a clause prohibiting the exportation of wool, under the penalty of
confiscation, the object of which was to give more employment to the
people at home, and to confer a benefit on the nation. The act against
the wearing of costly clothing was ratified in 1584, and ordered to be
carried out with all rigour.¹
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., pages 40,
220‒221, 354.
Parliament was equally anxious to put the people right in the matter
of eating and drinking at marriages and baptisms. It was enacted that
only bishops, earls, barons, and gentlemen who have two thousand marks
of free yearly rent, or fifty chalders of grain after deducting all
charges, should presume to have at their marriages and banquets, or
on their tables for their daily fare, any drugs or confectionaries,
brought from foreign countries. After the Reformation Acts of
Parliament and Council were often passed forbidding the eating of flesh
during Lent. On the 12th of February, 1562, the Lords of Council passed
an Act prohibiting the eating of flesh from that date to the 29th of
March, under the penalty of ten pounds for the first offence, twenty
pounds for the second, and confiscation of all movable goods for the
third. The Act proceeded on the ground that:――“In the spring of the
year, called Lenten, all kinds of flesh decays and grows out of season,
that it is not meet for eating; and also that by the tempestuous storms
of the last and preceding winters, the whole stocks of cattle were so
plagued, smothered and dead, that the price of flesh had risen to such
extreme dearth that the like had not been within this realm; and if
such dearth continued it will be to the great hurt of the commonweal.”¹
In 1567, Parliament, to save the nation from the harm entailed by the
daily eating of flesh, enacted that the people should eat flesh only
on four days of the week, under a penalty: and in 1568 the Lords of
Council passed an act forbidding all classes to eat any flesh during
Lent. It was ordered also that no fleshers, cooks, hostlers, nor tavern
keepers, should slay or prepare any kind of flesh for sale during
that time, under the penalty of the confiscation of their goods and
the imprisonment of their persons, unless they had obtained a written
license from the King upon reasonable consideration. During the time
of the civil war, after the flight of Mary, the Lords of Council
issued proclamations against the eating of flesh in Lent, but they were
little heeded.² In 1584 it was again enacted, “because of the disorder
amongst all ranks of the people by the licentious eating of flesh
every day of the week, which besides producing other evils, was also
the cause of the dearth of all meat.” It was then commanded that no
one should presume hereafter to eat any kind of flesh on Wednesday,
Friday, or Saturday, nor in the time of Lent, under the penalty of
the confiscation of all their goods to the Crown. This act was again
repeated in 1587 with some additions.³
¹ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, page 221; _Register
of the Privy Council_, Volume I., page 200. The same year it
was stated: “Forasmuch as the tempest and storms of weather
fallen this last winter, the most part of the sheep of
Scotland are perished and dead, which causes the dearth
thereof so to increase that the poor cannot well abide the
same; and if the lambs be likewise wasted and consumed,
the dearth shall not only increase, but also the sheep of
the country shall so decay that few or none shall be left
therein, for the sustaining of the people of this kingdom.
For remedy thereof, it is statuted by the Queen’s Majesty,
with the advice of the Lords of Council, that no manner of
lambs be slain or eaten by any of the people of this realm
for the space of three years to come, under the penalty of
the confiscation of all the movable goods of the persons who
contravene this statute.”――_Register of the Privy Council_,
Volume I., pages 200‒201.
² _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., pages 40;
_Register of the Privy Council_, Volume I., page 611; Volume
II., pages 337, 431, 500, 593.
³ _Acts of the Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume III., pages
353, 453.
After the Reformation several of the old amusements of the people were
proscribed. This however need occasion no great regret, for with the
spread of refinement and the progress of civilisation they would have
died out of themselves. The citizens of Edinburgh had a pastime called
“bickering,” and this word itself partly explains the character of the
amusement. The bickering seems to have consisted of a company of people,
mostly the young, who made a mock attack upon certain places, which
however often ended in serious mischief. On the 11th of April, 1567,
the Town Council of Edinburgh:――“ordered the bellman to pass through
the town and discharge the bickerers, under the penalty of hanging
those come to age, and the scourging of such as are not of age.”¹ The
people were still in the habit of amusing themselves pretty freely.
There were rude stage plays; the field games of golf, of football,
and many others, which the humblest of the people enjoyed. Towards the
end of the century parliament passed an act that enjoined Monday to be
observed as a holiday for pastime and amusement, that every one in the
nation might have one day in the week for their own enjoyment. The King
himself had a fancy for rope-dancers, in the year 1600 James Melville
records in his diary “that in Falkland, I saw a Frenchman play strange
and incredible pranks upon stretched ropetakle in the Palace close,
before the King, the Queen, and the whole Court.” In the accounts of
the Lord High Treasurer, in August, 1600, the sum of £333 7 shillings 8
pence is entered as the payment of this rope-dancer, so it seems he was
handsomely rewarded for his performance. In 1598 an English juggler,
“played such supple tricks upon a rope, which was fastened between the
top of St. Giles’s Kirk steeple and a stair beneath the cross, the like
was never seen in this country, as he rode down the rope and played so
many pavies on it.” For the performance of this trick the King ordered
him to get twenty pounds.²
¹ _Burgh Records of Edinburgh_, Volume III., pages 229‒230.
² _Burgh Records of Glasgow_, page 193; _Burgh Records
of Aberdeen_, Volume II., pages 179, 180; _Acts of the
Parliaments of Scotland_, Volume IV.; Melville’s _Diary_,
pages 17, 29, 30, 487.
The general influence of the Reformation on the social state of the
people was in the main salutary and beneficial. It is true that some
of the commons and tenants were in better circumstances under the
Roman Catholic churchman than after the Reformation, and the fact is
undeniable that many of the tenants of land were excessively oppressed
by the nobles after that event.¹ The evidence adduced in this volume
is sufficient to prove that the exertions of the reformed clergy to
lighten the burdens of the people were not in vain; while the benefits
of the revolution were far reaching and immense.
¹ Pinkerton’s _Ancient Scottish Poems_, Volume II., page 321;
1786.
CHAPTER XX.
_The Literature of the Nation in the
First Half of the Sixteenth Century._
IN the eleventh chapter of the first volume an account of the national
literature to the end of the fifteenth century was presented; and in
this chapter it is intended to present a continuation, till the current
of thought and feeling became affected by the revolutionary movement;
and then in the succeeding chapter to treat of the literature of the
Reformation, and the latter part of the century; and thus exhibit
a connected narrative of its development. Education, culture, and
literature, in one point of view are mutually related words, and in
many ways reciprocal in their effects; although they are far from being
co-extensive in meaning. Education of some kind precedes literature and
culture; but at a comparatively early stage of civilisation, literature
assumes a more general, if a less definite influence than education.
In nations with pretty well developed civilisations, the customary
education and the national literature sometimes run on opposite lines.
This is especially observable in revolutionary periods, when the
established education and the national literature may each be seen
pursuing diverse ends. At such times, the existing school ♦education
is often more than ever conservative and opposed to any change.
Illustrations of this will occur to every one; and yet all the elements
and influences of a nation are closely related, and act and re-act
upon each other in manifold ways; still, in historic exposition it is
necessary to signalise the opposites, in what appears to be the most
nearly allied and interdependent agencies in the organisation of a
nation.
♦ “eduction” replaced with “education”
In the first section of this volume, reference to the invention and the
introduction of printing was made; but it is a singular fact that until
near the end of the last century, it was unknown when the typographic
art was first introduced into Scotland. Mr. George Chalmers, the author
of _Caledonia_, first announced the real date of its introduction. He
said that “it was the intelligent and industrious William Robertson,
of the General Register House, who, to gratify my desire, discovered
a patent by James IV., which plainly demonstrates that a printing
press was established at Edinburgh during the year 1507.” Prior to this
there was no printing press in Scotland. Since Chalmers’ time, the late
Dr. David Laing and others, and the efforts of printing clubs, have
rendered the earlier productions of the Scottish press familiar.
The history of the matter may be briefly told. In 1507, James IV.
granted a patent to Walter Chepman, a burgess of Edinburgh, and Andrew
Myllar, to erect a printing press, for printing within the kingdom
the Books of Law, Acts of Parliament, Chronicles, Mass Books, Legends
of Scottish Saints then collected, and all other books, that should
be necessary, and to sell them for competent prices, “by our advice
and discretion their labour and expense being considered.... It is
also devised and thought expedient by us and our council, that in time
coming, Mass Books, after our own Scottish use, and with Legends of
Scottish Saints, as now collected by a Reverend Father in God, and our
trusty counsellor, William, Bishop of Aberdeen, and others, should be
used generally within the realm as soon as the same may be printed and
provided, and that no manner of such books of Salisbury use be brought
to be sold within our realm in time coming; and if any one does in the
contrary, that they shall lose the same. Wherefore we charge strictly
and command you all, our officers and subjects, that none of you take
upon hand to do anything contrary to this our ordinance, under the
penalty of escheating the books and punishment of their persons.” As
Bishop Elphinstone’s _Breviary_ was to be printed as soon as possible,
while other service books were to be excluded, it may be inferred that
he had used his influence with the King in the granting of the patent
to Chepman and Myllar for erecting a printing press.
Both Chepman and Myllar were burgesses of Edinburgh. Chepman was
a merchant, and traded in wood, wool, cloths, and other articles
of merchandise, a man of some capital and property, and appears to
have had a connection with the King’s household; while Myllar was
a bookseller in the city, and had supplied books to the King for
some time, importing them from England and the Continent; and he also
appeared as a publisher in 1505 and 1506, and as a practical printer
in 1508. Chepman possessed several houses in Edinburgh, in one of
which, at the foot of the Blackfriars Wynd, in the Cowgate, he and
Myllar erected their printing press. After obtaining the patent, they
immediately proceeded to work; and in April, 1508, they issued a number
of short pieces. These consisted of: 1. “The Porteous of Noblenes,” in
commendation of the twelve virtues “in ane nobil man;” 2. “The Knightly
Tale of Golagros and Gawane,” a somewhat singular romance, which
has been assigned to the fourteenth century; 3. “Syr Eglamoure of
Artoys,” a short romance; 4. “Book of Good Council to the King,” a
piece which also forms the last chapter of the eleventh book of the
“Liber Pluscardensis;” 5. “The Maying of Chaucer,” found in all the
collections of his works; 6. “The Tale of Orpheus and Eurydice,” one of
Robert Henryson’s poems; 7. “The Gest of Robyn Hode,” and the following
four pieces of Dunbar’s: “The Golden Targe,” “The Flyting between
Dunbar and Kennedy,” “A Ballad of Lord Barnard Stewart,” and the “Two
Married Women and the Widow.” Only one imperfect copy of the volume
containing the above pieces is known to be extant. As in it have been
preserved the very earliest specimens of the first Scottish press, it
was deemed of inestimable value. Early in the present century the late
Dr. Laing undertook the reproduction of this volume in facsimile, and
also to supply the deficiencies of the original. After the volume had
been completed, excepting the preliminary notices, a disastrous fire
happened, which consumed the premises of Abram Thomson, bookbinder
in Edinburgh, where the sheets were lying, and the greater part of
the volume was destroyed or rendered useless. At last the volume was
published in 1827, seventy-two copies on paper, and four on vellum
were issued. One of the vellum copies was sold at Dr. Laing’s sale in
December 1879, and was purchased by Mr. Quaritch for £71. Dr. Laing
in his valuable introduction to the volume, presented a body of
interesting information touching the earliest Scottish printers, to
which subsequent inquirers have been much indebted.¹
¹ _Annals of Scottish Printing_, from 1507 to 1599, by A.
Dickson and J. P. Edmond, Chapters I. to IX.
As the _Aberdeen Breviary_ was intended to supersede the _Sarum
Breviary_, and to become the chief church service book for the
priesthood of Scotland, it might be presumed that its publication
had excited some interest. It was the most important work issued from
the primitive Scottish press, and consisted of two volumes――the first
was completed on the 13th of February 1510, and the second on the
4th of June the same year. The text was printed in double columns of
thirty-seven lines each, and done in black and red ink; and the whole
work extended to 1527 pages of comparatively small type. The printing
is unequally executed, some pages being very clear and distinct, while
others are blurred. Four copies of the original edition are known to be
extant, all of which are incomplete. One in the University of Edinburgh,
which has the title to the first volume but not to the second; one in
the Advocates’ Library which wants twenty-seven leaves of the first
volume and fourteen of the second; an imperfect copy of the first
volume in the University Library of Aberdeen; and one belonging to the
Earl of Strathmore in the Library at Glamis Castle, which wants only
a few leaves. Under the editorship of the Rev. James Blew, a reprint
of this _Breviary_ was published in 1854 by James Toovey, London, in
two volumes. A number of special copies were executed for the members
of the Bannatyne Club, to which Dr. Laing contributed an excellent
preface.¹
¹ _Annals of Scottish Printing._
Myllar’s name does not appear in the pages of the _Breviary_, and it
has been supposed that he had retired from the partnership or died.
It seems probable that with the completion of the _Breviary_ Chepman’s
connection with printing ceased; and the printing materials were
perhaps sold, or laid aside. Chepman died in the winter of 1529; and
during the last fifteen years of his life, all the works of learned
Scotsmen were printed on the Continent. But it cannot be supposed that
the pieces and fragments which have been preserved, represent all the
works printed by Chepman and Myllar. It appears that they printed some
small school books; and probably an edition of blind Henry’s _Wallace_.
Excepting a fragment of eight leaves, containing “the Office of our
Lady of Pity,” and the legend of the relics of St. Andrew, which was
printed at Edinburgh in 1520, by John Story, the printing art seems to
have ceased in Scotland for nearly twenty years. Although during this
interval there is evidence that books were imported into Scotland from
England and the Continent.
Thomas Davidson, said to have been a north countryman, born on the
banks of the river Dee, was a practical printer. The exact date when
he began to print in Edinburgh has not been ascertained; some writers
have supposed that he commenced about 1530, but only one of his works
is dated 1542. In December, 1541, he was commissioned by the Lord Clerk
Register to print the Acts of three Parliaments of James V., which he
executed in the following February. This placed him in the position of
King’s printer, and he assumed that title in his works. As only three
complete specimens of his works have been preserved, the number of
different books which he printed cannot be ascertained; but the finest
specimen of his press is Bellenden’s translation of Boece’s _History of
Scotland_.
John Scot was a contemporary of Davidson. It appears that Scot printed
books both in Edinburgh and St. Andrews, and possibly also in Dundee,
where it seems he was living in 1547. In 1552 he printed Archbishop
Hamilton’s Catechism at St. Andrews. After the Reformation he printed
the new Confession of Faith. In August, 1562, he was engaged in
printing “The Last Blast of the Trumpet,” by Ninian Winzet, when the
magistrates of Edinburgh and their officers entered the printing office,
seized the copies of the work, and imprisoned the printer. Scot again
appeared in 1568, when he printed an edition of Sir David Lindsay’s
works; and in 1571 he printed the same work, but after this his name
disappeared. From this time to the end of the century, the chief
printers in Scotland were――Robert Lekpreuik, Thomas Bassandyne, John
Ross, Henry Charteris, Vantrollier, Robert Waldegrave, and Robert Smyth.
The most eminent Scottish writer of this period was William Dunbar,
the court poet of James IV. He was born in East Lothian about the year
1460, and on rather slender ground it has been conjectured that he was
descended from the fourth son of the tenth Earl of Dunbar. It seems
probable that Dunbar received his early education at the well-known
school of Haddington; and he entered the University of St. Andrews in
1474, attained the degree of Bachelor of Arts in 1477, and graduated as
Master of Arts in 1479. He became a novice in the order of Franciscans;
and in the character of a friar, he for some time travelled and
preached in France and England, as well as in Scotland. At a later
stage of his life, it seems he visited France in 1491, in connection
with an embassy from Scotland to negotiate a marriage for James IV.;
yet little is clearly known touching the life and wanderings of Dunbar
from 1479 to the end of the century. But in one of his poems he claims
to have served the King, not only in France, England, Ireland, and
Germany, but also in Italy and Spain. His name first occurs in the
public records in 1500, when he obtained from the King an annual
pension of ten pounds, which should “be paid to him of our Sovereign
Lord’s coffers, by the Treasurer, for all the days of his life, or
until he be promoted by the King to a benefice of the value of forty
pounds or more yearly.” In 1507, the King increased Dunbar’s pension to
twenty pounds, and again in 1510 it was increased to eighty pounds――“to
be paid to him half-yearly by the Treasurer, until he be promoted to
a benefice of one hundred pounds or above.” Dunbar also occasionally
received presents from his royal master, and, while James IV. lived,
at least, the poet was pretty liberally rewarded; although he never
obtained the great object of his ambition――to wit, a benefice. From the
end of the fifteenth century to the death of James IV., Dunbar attended
the Scottish court regularly; and he addressed many of his short poems
to the King, and also to the Queen, while the burden of most of these
effusions was that the poet wanted to be presented to a benefice.
Though Dunbar had abandoned the order of St. Francis, still he had
become a priest; and on the 17th of March, 1504, he performed his first
mass in presence of the King, who gave an offering of four pounds and
eighteen shillings in honour of the occasion. Yet he was only one of
the many servants who catered to the royal pleasure and the court.¹
Most of Dunbar’s writings, between 1500 and 1513, were poems composed
to amuse the court, or to suit his own humour, by satirising its
policies and vices; and they show the favour in which he was held,
especially by the Queen, and his constant petitions for salary and for
a benefice. The picture which they presented of the Scottish court was
a real, but not a flattering or a pleasing one――to modern taste and
sentiment. The poet’s benefactor fell on the fatal field of Flodden,
and whether he continued to receive his pension subsequent to that
event, has not been ascertained, as the Treasurer’s accounts from
August, 1513, to June, 1515, have not been preserved, and in those of
a subsequent date Dunbar’s name does not occur. Most of his religious
poems or hymns were supposed to have been written between the date of
Flodden and the time of his death. The exact date of Dunbar’s death has
not been discovered; but it has been supposed that he died about the
year 1520, when he had reached sixty years of age.²
¹ See Volume I., pages 417, 459, 468.
² Dunbar’s Poems, _Memoir_, pages 7‒17; Volume I., pages 28,
149; Volume II., pages 231‒234, Laing’s Edition; _Scottish
Text Society, Edinburgh_, Part III., Introduction.
Although during Dunbar’s lifetime, and for a few years after his death,
his writings received attention and were admired, and a few of his
poems were printed as mentioned in a preceding paragraph, yet from
about the year 1530 to 1724 his name was rarely mentioned in Scottish
literature; and therefore the historian cannot assume that Dunbar’s
writings have had much influence upon the nation, seeing that for
two hundred years few, if any of them, were read by the people. The
chief historic value of his poems consists in the many pictures of
the Scottish court and its coarse manners and speech, which they so
vividly portray; and the illustrations of the habits and manners of
other classes of society in his time, which they presented. If we look
for great conceptions, any inspiring ideals, or striking thought and
ennobling passion or sentiment calculated to stimulate and improve the
civilisation of the people, in Dunbar’s writings, we will be somewhat
disappointed.
Since 1724, when Allan Ramsay called attention to the long forgotten
poems of Dunbar, and published sixteen of them in his _Evergreen_,
there have been several notable efforts made to restore the lost fame
of this poet. In 1770 Lord Hailes, in his “Ancient Poems from the
Bannatyne Manuscript,” published thirty-one of Dunbar’s poems; in
1786, Pinkerton, in his “Ancient Scottish Poems from the Maitland
Manuscript,” published twenty-one of Dunbar’s; and in 1802, Sibbald’s
“Chronicle of Scottish Poetry from the Thirteenth Century,” was
published, which included thirty-two poems by Dunbar. About the
beginning of this century George Chalmers, the well-known author
of “Caledonia,” made collections for a complete edition of Dunbar’s
poems; but he died before accomplishing the work. Chalmers’ intention
was carried into effect by the late Dr. Laing, who had acquired his
transcripts for the purpose. Dr. Laing’s edition appeared in 1834,
in two volumes, to which he issued a supplement in 1865: this edition
has been long much esteemed, as it is enriched with various readings,
interesting and valuable notes, and a concise but excellent glossary.
The works of Dunbar, including his life, by James Paterson, author
of “The History of Ayrshire and Ayrshire Families,” was published
at Edinburgh in 1863. The very valuable researches of Dr. Laing, and
the excellent work of Professor Schipper of Vienna, which appeared in
1884, and made Dunbar known on the Continent, seems to have given a
remarkable stimulus to the study of this ancient Scottish poet. It has
been reported that Schipper’s is the best work which has been written
on Dunbar, and that his German translations of the Scotch poet are
executed with surprising skill and fidelity, and astonishing lucidity.
Kaufmann has also written a Dissertation on Dunbar, which was published
in 1873. But apparently the most elaborate edition of Dunbar’s poems
will be the one undertaken by the Scottish Text Society, which when
completed will consist of five parts. Part I. was published in 1884,
and Part II. in 1885; these contain the text of the poems, which was
ably and carefully edited by Mr. John Small, M.A., F.S.A., Scotland;
Part III. appeared in 1887, consisting of an exceedingly elaborate
Introduction by Sheriff Mackay, and extending to 283 pages. It
presents――1, an interesting and comprehensive biography of Dunbar,
judiciously introducing such portions of the contemporary history of
Scotland as seemed necessary to estimate the character and genius of
his author; 2, a classification of Dunbar’s poems――dividing them into
ten classes, and commenting on each class in detail; 3, a valuable
Appendix to the Introduction, which gives――_a_, Table of Dunbar’s
poems according to the probable order of their dates; _b_, Notes
on the versification and metres of Dunbar; _c_, Bibliography of
Dunbar――including both manuscripts and printed editions of his
writings; _d_, Historical notice of persons alluded to in Dunbar’s
poems, in which many interesting particulars are given. Part IV. was
published in 1890, and consists of Notes to the Poems by Walter Gregor,
LL.D., and covers the poems from number one to thirty-eight. Dr. Gregor
is an enthusiastic admirer of Dunbar as a poet, and he is himself a
thorough master of the Scottish language. He is also fully conversant
with the literature of the subject. Thus his notes on each of the
poems of Dunbar are numerous, varied, accurate, and instructive,
showing wide and intelligent research throughout, and consequently
they are exceedingly valuable. Part V. will contain the remainder of
Dr. Gregor’s Notes, and a Glossary by him; and also an Appendix on
the “Intercourse between Scotland and Denmark,” by Sheriff Mackay.
When this edition is completed, it will be a veritable offering to
the genius of Dunbar, and a striking monument of the special historic
research and enthusiasm of its editors.
There were various causes which accounted for Dunbar and his writings
being neglected and almost forgotten for about two centuries. The chief
cause was the approach of the Reformation, and the new turn which it
gave to the sentiments and opinions of the people. When Dunbar had
attempted to be a friar,――he ultimately became a priest,――and during
the time that he was Court poet, he was ever clamouring for a benefice.
In spite of his ironical treatment of the lives of the friars, he
showed not the slightest trace of accepting any of the doctrines of
the Reformation; and as he advanced in years he became a more pious
observer of Roman Catholic usage; while his last poems were of the
nature of religious hymns in strict conformity with Romanism. Thus
Dunbar was in no sense a precursor of the Reformation.
The range of Dunbar’s subjects was pretty wide. In the new edition
mentioned above, there are one hundred and one poems, of which
eighty-nine have been considered as undoubtedly Dunbar’s, and the other
twelve have, on various grounds, with more or less probability, been
attributed to him. Most of his poems are comparatively short, the
longest one is “The Two Married Women and the Widow,” extending to 530
lines. His poems may be described as consisting of allegorical poems,
comic and humourous, satirical, moral, religious and amatory. The best
marked specimens of his allegorical poems, are “The Goldyn Targe,”
“The Thistle and Rose,” and “Beauty and the Prisoner.” “The Goldyn
Targe” extends to 275 lines, and its aim was to show that love, unless
restrained by reason, always blinds and leads astray. The language
and versification of the poem is flowing and easy, and some fine
descriptive touches occur in it, such as this:――
“For mirth of May, with skippis and with hoppis,
The birdis sang upon the tender croppis,
With curiouse note, as Venus chapell clerkis:
The rosis yong, new spreding of their knoppis,
War powderit brycht with hevinly beriall droppis,
Throu bernes rede, birnyng as ruby sperkis;
The skyes rang schouting of the larkis,
The purpur hevyn our scailit in silvir sloppis
Ourgilt the treis, branchis, lefis, and barkis.”¹
He introduces Homer and a number of classic gods in this poem, and the
student will find it amply illustrated in Dr. Gregor’s notes.
¹ _Scottish Text Society_, Part I., page 2.
The short ballad sung at the marriage of James IV., was composed by
Dunbar to welcome the Princess Margaret, and began thus:――
“Now fayre, fayrest off every fayre,
Princes most pleasant and preclare,
The lustyest one alyve that byne,
Welcum of Scotland to be Quene!
* * * * *
Sweet lusty lusum lady clere,
Most myghty Kinges dochter dere,
Borne of a princes most serene,
Welcum to Scotland to be Quene!”¹
¹ _Scottish Text Society_, page 279.
He also produced “The Thistle and the Rose” to celebrate this
interesting event. This poem extends to 185 lines, and it assumed the
characteristics of allegory and the mingling of classic names with the
objects of nature. The rhyme is flowing, and it presents many pleasing
descriptive touches; but it lacks strength and the characteristic glow
of real poetry. The following stanzas occur near the end of the poem:――
“Thane all the birdis sang with voce on hicht,
Quhois mirthfull soun wes mervelus to heir;
The mavyss song, ‘Haill, Roiss most riche and richt,
That dois up flureiss under Phebus speir;
Haill, plant of youth, haill, princes dochtir deir,
Haill, blosome breking out of the blud royall,
Quhois pretius vertew is imperiall.’
“The merle scho sang, ‘Haill, Roiss of most delyt,
Haill, of all flowris quene and souerane;’
The lark scho sang, ‘Haill, Roiss, both reid and quhyt,
Most plesand flour, of michty cullouris twane;’
The nichtingaill sang, ‘Haill, naturis suffragene,
In bewty, nurtour and every nobilness,
In rich array, renown and gentilness.’”¹
¹ _Ibid._, page 188.
Many of Dunbar’s short pieces have much merit, “The Dance of the Seven
Deadly Sins” is animated and full of biting satire. Take the stanzas on
“Gluttony”:――
“Then the foull monster Gluttony,
Off wame insatiable and gredy,
To dance he did him dress:
Him followed mony foull drunkerd,
With can and collep, cup and quart,
In surffet and excess;
Full mony a waistless wallydrag,
With wames unweildable, did furth wag,
In creische¹ that did incress;
Drink! ay they cryed, with mony a gaip,
The fiends gave them hot leid to laip,
Thair lovery was na less.”²
This piece exhibits a strong satirical vein, while the whole picture is
boldly drawn and full of energy.
¹ Grease, fat.
² Volume I., pages 52‒53, Laing.
The curious satirical poem, entitled “The Joust between the Tailor
and the Shoemaker,” is brimful of comic humour, but the phraseology is
extremely coarse and vulgar. His “Devil’s Inquest” is also strong in
satire and humour. The poem addressed to the “Merchants of Edinburgh”
afforded Dunbar an opportunity of giving a vivid and characteristic
description of the capital, which in his day presented to the beholder
anything rather than the picture of a fair city. Much of the manners of
the court and also of the habits of the people, are reproduced in the
writings of Dunbar: and it is this chiefly that renders them valuable
to us: the mere literary and poetical value of his works have sometimes
been over-estimated by modern authorities.
The long and curious production, entitled “The Flyting of Dunbar and
Kennedy,” which extends to 552 lines, was written, as the title implies,
partly by both. Kennedy was a contemporary poet, and the two by turns
abuse each other in no stinted terms: the “Flyting,” was exceedingly
rich in words and phrases of biting scorn and vehement vituperation. It
has been supposed that the two poets had no personal animosity towards
each other, which may or may not have been the case. Dunbar began the
flyting, and Kennedy had the last words, thus: “Out! out! I schout,
upon that snout that snevels, tale teller, rebel, indweller with the
devil, spink, sink with stink ad Tertara Termagorum.”¹ Walter Kennedy
was the third son of Gilbert, first Lord Kennedy, and was educated at
the College of Glasgow. Besides his part of the “Flyting,” a few of his
poems have been preserved.
¹ _Poems_, Volume II., page 68. “This jolly, quick-witted friar
and courtier is sometimes called the Scottish Chaucer. The
two have, indeed, a good many points of resemblance. Both
were men of the world and favourites at court; companionable
men, witty and good humoured, both showed sufficient address
and business dexterity to be employed on embassies of state.
But if we wish to give the title of ‘Scottish Chaucer’ its
full significance, we must place considerable emphasis on
the adjective. Dunbar and Chaucer belonged to the same class
of easy self-contained men, whose balance is seldom deranged
by restless straining and soaring; but within that happy
pleasure-loving circle, they occupied distinct habitations;
and one way of bringing out their difference of spirit is
to lay stress upon their nationality. Dunbar is unmistakably
Scotch. He is altogether stronger and harder――perhaps of
harsher――nerve than Chaucer; more forcible and less diffuse
of speech; his laugh is rougher, he is boldly sarcastic
and derisive of persons; his ludicrous conceptions rise to
more daring heights of extravagance; and, finally, he has a
more decided turn for preaching――for offering good advice.”
――Minto’s _Characteristics of English Poets_, page 130.
A number of Dunbar’s poems have been supposed to be lost, and, as
mentioned in a preceding page, other poems and pieces of verses have
sometimes been attributed to him, most of which were printed in Dr.
Laing’s edition of the poet. Of this class is “The Friars of Berwick,”
a rhymed tale extending to 592 lines. It is a satire on the life of
the religious orders, and it is worked out with considerable skill and
effect.¹
¹ Dunbar’s _Poems_, Volume II., pages 3‒23. Professor Veitch
says, “‘The Friars of Berwick’ is a tale very much in the
manner of Chaucer, and it is not unworthy of his style. It
satirises the vices of the regular clergy in a way that must
have come home to the sense of domestic purity of the people.
It is evidently a production of the pre-reformation period,
and, like the writings of Sir David Lyndsay, must have
contributed in some measure to the ecclesiastical revolution
of 1560.”――_The History and Poetry of the Scottish Borders_,
page 326. 1878.
“The Three Tales of the Three Priests of Peebles” is another
rhymed production of this period, the authorship of which
has not been definitely ascertained. See _The Complaynt of
Scotland_, page 143. Murray’s edition, 1872. These tales
were first printed in 1603, and reprinted by Pinkerton in
1792, and by Dr. Laing in his _Early Metrical Tales_, 1826.
The groundwork of the story is simple and natural. The three
priests met together on the 1st of February――St. Bride’s
Day――in Peebles, and each in turn tells a story. The first
tale proceeds on the supposition that the King proposes to
each of the three estates in parliament certain questions.
The second tale refers to the thoughtlessness of the King
in so often changing his servants. The third one is more
allegorical, and refers to Death as the messenger of
God. The tales are moral and didactic in tone and highly
patriotic.――Veitch, _Ibid._, pages 319‒326. In regard to
Dunbar’s contemporaries in Scotland, there is little now
remaining of their writings. See Dr. Laing’s edition of
Dunbar, Volume II., pages 352‒362, and the Supplement, which
contains much additional information.
Gavin Douglas, the bishop of Dunkeld, was the third son of Archibald,
the fifth Earl of Angus, “Bell the Cat,” and was born about the year
1474. He completed his education at the University of St. Andrews, and
graduated Master of Arts in 1494. Shortly after this he entered into
priest’s orders and in the year 1496 he received a grant of the tithes
of Monymusk, in Aberdeenshire. Chiefly owing to his family connections,
other preferments soon came to him, and about the year 1501 he was
appointed provost of the collegiate church of St. Giles, at Edinburgh.
It was while he held this office that most of his works were composed.
His poem, “The Palace of Honour,” was finished in 1501; and in 1512 he
began the translation of Virgil, and completed it in July, 1513.¹ After
the battle of Flodden he became deeply involved in the knotty politics
of the times; and made a bold but unsuccessful effort to attain to the
primacy of the Scottish Church. In 1515 he was nominated to the see of
Dunkeld, and after much opposition and delay obtained possession of the
bishop’s palace. He again became entangled in the political troubles
of the day, and, having passed to England, died near London in the year
1522.²
¹ The Works of Gavin Douglas, edited by John Small, M.A.,
F.S.A. Scotland, 4 volumes, 1874. Volume I., pages 2‒9,
Introduction.
² The Works of Gavin Douglas, Volume I., page 11, _et seq._ The
Biographical Introduction to Mr. Small’s complete edition of
Douglas’s Works is very full and exhaustive.
The “Palace of Honour,” his longest poem, is an allegorical production
of remarkable power. Douglas had one requisite of the poet in a
high degree, a command of copious, varied, and striking imagery. His
poetry has a glow about it which will be sought in vain in Dunbar.
His language is difficult to understand, as he used many words and
phrases derived from the Latin and the French, which often render his
expression obscure and his lines rather stilted. But his diction is
entirely free from the coarse and vulgar phrases which disfigure the
writings of Dunbar. As a poem, the “Palace of Honour” is loose and
rambling; though it gives ample evidence of the classical reading of
the author. He introduces various moral reflections throughout the
production, and concludes it with a ballad on virtue. The last stanza
is rhetorical and ornate:――
“Haill rose most choce till clois thy fois great micht,
Haill stone which shone upon the throne of licht,
Virtue, whose trew sweit dew overthrow al vice,
Was ay ilk day gar say the way of licht;
Amend, offend, and send our end ay richt.
Thow stant, ordant as sanct, of grant most wise,
Till be supply, and the high gre of price,
Delite the tite me quite of site to dicht,
For I apply schortlie to thy devise.”¹
¹ _Ibid._, Volume I., page 80.
His poem of “King Hart” is an allegory of the progress of human life.
The heart of man is represented in it as a mystical king in the full
bloom of youth, surrounded by attendants who personify the propensities
of early manhood. Though the King is a feudal monarch, he is far from
enjoying freedom; for those around him hold him in leading-strings
without much hope of his being able to shake them off. After a few more
details about the King, the palace of Dame Pleasance is described. This
lady with a legion of attendants passes by the Castle of King Hart;
and two of his attendants go to ascertain who the party are. They are
surprised and easily made prisoners. The King then sends out other
messengers, who are also captured; at last, becoming enraged, he arrays
his host for battle with Dame Pleasance and her army. But the King’s
party are defeated, many of his subjects are taken prisoners and
confined in dungeons; and King Hart is imprisoned in a grated chamber,
where he listened to the mirth proceeding from the halls of the Queen.
Through the help of Dame Pity, who at this juncture deserts Dame
Pleasance, King Hart and his adherents are set free; and then, taking
possession of the palace, they capture the Queen herself. After an
interview with King Hart, she finds that he is deeply affected by her
charms, and the first canto ends with their espousals and the marriage
feast.¹
¹ _Works_, Volume I., Introduction, pages 139‒141.
The second canto begins with a description of age in this form:――
“At morning tide, when at the sone so schene
Out rushed had his beamis frome the sky
Ane auld gude man befoir the gate was sene,
Apone ane steed that raid full easalie.
He rappit at the gate, but courtaslie,
Yet at the straik the grit dungeon can din;
Syne at the last he schouted fellonlie;
And bad them rys, and said he would cum in.
Sone Wantonness came to the wall abone,
And cryit out, what folk ar ye thair out?
My name is Age, said he again full sone;
May thou nocht heir? Langar how I culd schout?
What war your Will? I will cum in without dout.
Now God forbid! In faith ye cum nocht heir,
Rin on thy way, or thou sall beir ane route:
And say, the portar he is wonder sweir.”¹
¹ _Ibid._, page 101.
The sentiment is very natural, few people wish for old age to overtake
them. The King is grieved that fresh delight has deserted him, sadness
intrudes and whispers something into his ear. The Queen now loses
patience, and when the King is asleep, she leaves him; wisdom and
reason then counsel him to return to his own castle. There, however,
he finds little comfort; enjoyment and strength both creep away, and
decrepitude with his host takes the castle and mortally wounds the King,
who prepares for death, and makes his last testament, the details of
which conclude the poem.¹
¹ _Works_, pages 141‒142; Introduction, Volume I., pages
102‒120, 145‒146.
The most notable of Douglas’s works is his translation of the Æneid
of Virgil. He has the honour of being the author of the first metrical
translation of a Latin classic in Britain, although soon followed
by others. Virgil was the most popular of the classical writers, and
before the end of the fifteenth century his works had passed through
ninety editions. In the days of Douglas they were read by young
and old. Taking everything into account, competent authorities have
affirmed that Douglas has discharged the duty of a translator tolerably
well, “he was a master of the Latin tongue,” and his translation of
the greatest Roman poet is a work of which his countrymen may justly be
proud.¹ To each of the thirteen books of his translation of the Æneid,
Douglas wrote a prologue. Some of these prologues are of considerable
length, and three at least out of the thirteen contain passages of
remarkable descriptive power. As a whole, they display considerable
knowledge of human nature, and contain many pointed observations on the
manners of mankind. The following passage is from the seventh of the
series, and is a part of his much admired description of winter, from
a modernised version.
¹ _Ibid._, Volume I., pages 144‒147. Introduction.
“Now reign’d the power of keen congealing frost,
When all the beauty of the year is lost;
The brumal season, bitter, cold, and pale,
When short dull days and sounding storms prevail,
The wild north winds tremendous from afar,
O’erwhelm’d imperial Neptune in his car,
Their scatter’d honours from the forests tore,
And dash’d the mad waves headlong on the shore.
Fierce, foaming rivers, swell’d with torrents brown,
Hurl’d all their banks precipitately down;
Loud roar’d the thunder of the raging floods,
Loud as gaunt lions bellowing shake the woods.
Th’ unwieldy monsters which the deeps contain,
Sought safety at the bottom of the main.
* * * * *