FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[61]Cf. the present writer's "Mary, Queen of Scots" (Scottish History from Contemporary Writers).[62]The spelling "Stuart", which Queen Mary brought with her from France, now superseded the older "Stewart".[63]Foreign Calendar: Elizabeth, December 31st, 1560.[64]Cabala, Sive Scrinia Sacra, pp. 345-349.[65]Foreign Calendar, May 7th, 1562.[66]Foreign Calendar, June 8th, 1562.[67]Foreign Calendar, March 31st, 1561.[68]Foreign Calendar, 20th August, 1563.[69]Sir James Melville'sMemoirs, pp. 116-130 (Bannatyne Club).[70]Laing'sKnox, vi, p. 541.[71]Laing'sKnox, vol. ii, p. 513. Melville'sMemoirs, p. 134.[72]Foreign Calendar, July-December, 1565.[73]The evidence for the scandal which associated Mary's name with that of Rizzio will be found in Mr. Hay Fleming'sMary, Queen of Scots, pp. 398-401. It is very far indeed from being conclusive.[74]Foreign Calendar, March, 1566.[75]Mary to Elizabeth, July, 1566. Keith's History, ii, p. 442.[76]It is almost certain that Darnley was murdered before the explosion.[77]Mary's defenders point out that her 25th birthday fell in November, 1567, and that it was necessary to prevent her from taking any steps for the restitution of Church land; and they look on the plot as devised by Bothwell and the other nobles, the latter aiming at using Bothwell as a tool to ruin Mary. On the question of the Casket Letters, see Mr. Lang'sMystery of Mary Stuart.[78]Keith's History, ii, pp. 736-739.[79]In forming any moral judgment with regard to Elizabeth's conduct towards Mary, it must be remembered that Mary fled to England trusting to the English Queen's invitation.

[61]Cf. the present writer's "Mary, Queen of Scots" (Scottish History from Contemporary Writers).

[62]The spelling "Stuart", which Queen Mary brought with her from France, now superseded the older "Stewart".

[63]Foreign Calendar: Elizabeth, December 31st, 1560.

[64]Cabala, Sive Scrinia Sacra, pp. 345-349.

[65]Foreign Calendar, May 7th, 1562.

[66]Foreign Calendar, June 8th, 1562.

[67]Foreign Calendar, March 31st, 1561.

[68]Foreign Calendar, 20th August, 1563.

[69]Sir James Melville'sMemoirs, pp. 116-130 (Bannatyne Club).

[70]Laing'sKnox, vi, p. 541.

[71]Laing'sKnox, vol. ii, p. 513. Melville'sMemoirs, p. 134.

[72]Foreign Calendar, July-December, 1565.

[73]The evidence for the scandal which associated Mary's name with that of Rizzio will be found in Mr. Hay Fleming'sMary, Queen of Scots, pp. 398-401. It is very far indeed from being conclusive.

[74]Foreign Calendar, March, 1566.

[75]Mary to Elizabeth, July, 1566. Keith's History, ii, p. 442.

[76]It is almost certain that Darnley was murdered before the explosion.

[77]Mary's defenders point out that her 25th birthday fell in November, 1567, and that it was necessary to prevent her from taking any steps for the restitution of Church land; and they look on the plot as devised by Bothwell and the other nobles, the latter aiming at using Bothwell as a tool to ruin Mary. On the question of the Casket Letters, see Mr. Lang'sMystery of Mary Stuart.

[78]Keith's History, ii, pp. 736-739.

[79]In forming any moral judgment with regard to Elizabeth's conduct towards Mary, it must be remembered that Mary fled to England trusting to the English Queen's invitation.

When Mary fled to England, Elizabeth refused to see her, on the ground that she ought first to clear herself from the suspicion of guilt in connection with the murder of Darnley. In the end, Mary agreed that the case should be submitted to the judgment of a commission appointed by Elizabeth, and she appeared as prosecuting Moray and his friends as rebels and traitors. They defended themselves by bringing accusations against Mary, and produced the Casket Letters and other documents in support of their assertions. Mary asked to be brought face to face with her accusers; Elizabeth thought the claim "very reasonable", and refused it. Mary then asked for copies of the letters produced as evidence against her, and when her request was pressed upon Elizabeth's notice by La Mothe Fénélon, the French ambassador, he was informed that Elizabeth's feelings had been hurt by Mary's accusing her of partiality.[80]Mary's commissioners then withdrew, and Elizabeth closed the case, with the oracular decision that, "nothing has been adduced against the Earl of Moray and his adherents, as yet, that may impair theirhonour or allegiances; and, on the other part, there has been nothing sufficiently produced nor shown by them against the queen, their sovereign, whereby the Queen of England should conceive or take any evil opinion of the queen, her good sister, for anything yet seen". So Elizabeth's "good sister" was subjected to a rigorous imprisonment, and the Earl of Moray returned to Scotland, with an increased allowance of English gold. Henceforth the successive regents of Scotland had to guide their policy in accordance with Elizabeth's wishes. If they rebelled, she could always threaten to release her prisoner, and, once or twice in the course of those long, weary years, Mary, whose nature was buoyant, actually dared to hope that Elizabeth would replace her on her throne. While Mary was plotting, and hope deferred was being succeeded by hope deferred and vain illusion by vain illusion, events moved fast. In November, 1569, the Earls of Northumberland and Westmoreland raised a rebellion in her favour, which was easily suppressed. In January, 1570, Moray was assassinated at Linlithgow, and the Earl of Lennox, the father of Darnley, and the traitor of Mary's minority, succeeded to the regency, while Mary's Scottish supporters, who had continued to fight for her desperate cause, were strengthened by the accession of Maitland of Lethington, who, with Kirkaldy of Grange, also a recruit from the king's party, heldEdinburgh Castle for the queen. Mary's hopes were further raised by the rebellion of the Duke of Norfolk, whose marriage with the Scottish queen had been suggested in 1569. Letters from the papal agent, Rudolfi, were discovered, and, in June, 1572, Norfolk was put to death. Lennox had been killed in September, 1571, and his successor, the Earl of Mar, was approached on the subject of taking Mary's life. Elizabeth was unwilling to accept the responsibility for the deed, and proposed to deliver up Mary to Mar, on the understanding that she should be immediately killed. Mar, who was an honourable man, declined to listen to the proposal. But, after his death, which occurred in October, 1572, the new regent, the Earl of Morton, professed his willingness to undertake the accomplishment of the deed, if Elizabeth would openly acknowledge it. This she refused to do, and the plot failed. It is characteristic that the last Douglas to play an important part in Scottish history should be the leading actor in such a plot as this.

The castle of Edinburgh fell in June, 1573, and with its surrender passed away Mary's last chance in Scotland. Morton held the regency till 1578, when he was forced to resign, and the young king, now twelve years old, became the nominal ruler. In 1581, Morton was condemned to death as "airt and pairt" in Darnley's murder, and Elizabeth failed in her efforts to save him.Mary entered into negotiations with Elizabeth for her release and return to Scotland as joint-sovereign with James VI, and the English queen played with her prisoner, while, all the time, she was discussing projects for her death. The key to the policy of James is his desire to secure the succession to the English crown. To that end he was willing to sacrifice all other considerations; nor had he, on other grounds, any desire to share his throne with his mother. In 1585, he negotiated a league with England, which, however, contained a provision that "the said league be without prejudice in any sort to any former league or alliance betwixt this realm and any other auld friends and confederates thereof, except only in matters of religion, wheranent we do fully consent the league be defensive and offensive". As we are at the era of religious wars, the latter section of the clause goes far to neutralize the former. Scotland was at last at the disposal of the sovereign of England. Even the tragedy of Fotheringay scarcely produced a passing coldness. On the 8th February, 1587, Elizabeth's warrant was carried out, and Mary's head fell on the block. She was accused of plotting for her own escape and against Elizabeth's life. It is probable that she had so plotted, and it would be childish to express surprise or indignation. The English queen, on her part, had injured her kinswoman too deeply to render it possible to be generous now. Maryhad sent her, on her arrival in England, "a diamond jewel, which", as she afterwards reminded her, "I received as a token from you, and with assurance to be succoured against my rebels, and even that, on my retiring towards you, you would come to the very frontiers in order to assist me, which had been confirmed to me by divers messengers".[81]Had the protection thus promised been vouchsafed, it might have spared Elizabeth many years of trouble. But it was now too late, and the relentless logic of events forced her to complete the tale of her treachery and injustice by a deed which she herself could not but regard as a crime. But while this excuse may be made for the deed itself, there can be no apology for the manner of it. The Queen of England stooped to urge her servants to murder her kinswoman; when they refused, she was mean enough to contrive so as to throw the responsibility upon her secretary, Davison. After Mary's death, she wrote to King James and expressed her sincere regret at having cut off the head of his mother by accident. James accepted the apology, and, in the following year, made preparations against the Armada. Had the son of Mary Stuart been otherwise constituted, it would scarcely have been safe for Elizabeth to persevere in the execution of his mother; an alliance between Scotland andSpain might have proved dangerous for England. But Elizabeth knew well the type of man with whom she had to deal, and events proved that she was wise in her generation. And James, on his part, had his reward. Elizabeth died in March, 1603, and her successor was the King of Scots, who entered upon a heritage, which had been bought, in the view of his Catholic subjects, by the blood of his mother, and which was to claim as its next victim his second son. Within eighty-five years of his accession, his House had lost not only their new kingdom, but their ancestral throne as well. In all James's references to the Union, it is clear that he regarded that event from the point of view of the monarch; had it proved of as little value to his subjects as to the Stuart line there would have been small reason for remembering it to-day. The Union of England and Scotland was one of the events most clearly fore-ordained by a benignant fate: but it is difficult to feel much sympathy for the son who would not risk its postponement, when, by the possible sacrifice of his personal ambition, he might have saved the life of his mother.

There are certain aspects of James's life in Scotland that explain his future policy, and they are, therefore, important for our purpose. In the first place, he spent his days in one long struggle with the theocratic Church system which had been brought to Scotland by Knoxand developed by his great successor, Andrew Melville. The Church Courts, local and central, had maintained the old ecclesiastical jurisdiction, and they dealt out justice with impartial hand. In all questions of morality, religion, education, and marriage the Kirk Session or the Presbytery or the General Assembly was all-powerful. The Church was by far the most important factor in the national life. It interfered in numberless ways with legislative and executive functions: on one occasion King James consulted the Presbytery of Edinburgh about the raising of a force to suppress a rebellion,[82]and, as late as 1596, he approached the General Assembly with reference to a tax, and promised that "his chamber doors sould be made patent to the meanest minister in Scotland; there sould not be anie meane gentleman in Scotland more subject to the good order and discipline of the Kirk than he would be".[83]Andrew Melville had told him that "there is twa kings and twa kingdomes in Scotland. Thair is Chryst Jesus the King and his Kingdom the Kirk, whase subject King James the Saxt is: and of whase Kingdom nocht a King, nor a lord, nor a heid, bot a member."[84]James had done his utmost to assert his authority over the Church. He had tried to establish Episcopacy in Scotland to replace the Presbyterian system, and hadsucceeded only to a very limited extent. "Presbytery", he said, "agreeth as well with a king as God with the Devil." So he went to England, not only prepared to welcome the episcopal form of church-government and to graciously receive the episcopal adulation so freely showered upon him, but also determined to suppress, at all hazards, "the proud Puritanes, who, claining to their Paritie, and crying, 'We are all but vile wormes', yet will judge and give Law to their king, but will be judged nor controlled by none".[85]"God's sillie vassal" was Melville's summing-up of the royal character in James's own presence. "God hath given us a Solomon", exulted the Bishop of Winchester, and he recorded the fact in print, that all the world might know. James was wrong in mistaking the English Puritans for the Scottish Presbyterians. Alike in number, in influence, and in aim, his new subjects differed from his old enemies. English Puritanism had already proved unsuited to the genius of the nation, and it had given up all hope of the abolition of Episcopacy. The Millenary Petition asked only some changes in the ritual of the Church and certain moderate reforms. Had James received their requests in a more reasonable spirit, he might have succeeded in reconciling, at all events, the more moderate section of them to the Church, and at the very first it seemed as if he were likelyto win for himself the blessing of the peace-maker, which he was so eager to obtain. But just at this crisis he found the first symptoms of Parliamentary opposition, and here again his training in Scotland interfered. The Church and the Church alone had opposed him in Scotland; he had never discovered that a Parliament could be other than subservient.[86]It was, therefore, natural for him to connect the Parliamentary discontent with Puritan dissatisfaction. Scottish Puritans had employed the General Assembly as their main weapon of offence; their English fellows evidently desired to use the House of Commons as an engine for similar purposes. Therefore said King James, "I shall make them conform themselves, or I will harry them out of the land, or else do worse". So he "did worse", and prepared the way for the Puritan revolution. If the English succession enabled the king to suppress the Scottish Assembly, the Assembly had its revenge, for the fear of it brought a snare, and James may justly be considered one of the founders of English dissent.

A violent hatred of the temporal claims of the Church also affected James's attitude to Roman Catholicism. His Catholic subjects in Scotland had not been in a position to do him any harm, and the son of Mary Stuart could not but havesome sympathy for his mother's fellow-sufferers. Accordingly, we find him telling his first Parliament: "I acknowledge the Roman Church to be our Mother Church, although defiled with some infirmities and corruption". But, after the Gunpowder Plot, and when he was engaged in a controversy with Cardinal Perron about the right of the pope to depose kings, he came to prove that the pope is Antichrist and "our Mother Church" none other than the Scarlet Woman. His Scottish experience revealed clearly enough that the claims of Rome and Geneva were identical in their essence. There is on record an incident that will serve to illustrate his position. In 1615, the Scottish Privy Council reported to him the case of a Jesuit, John Ogilvie. He bade them examine Ogilvie: if he proved to be but a priest who had said mass, he was to go into banishment; but if he was a practiser of sedition, let him die. The unfortunate priest showed in his reply that he held the same view of the royal supremacy as did the Presbyterian clergy. It was enough: they hanged him.

Once more, James's Irish policy seems to have been influenced by his experience of the Scottish Highlands. He had conceived the plan which was afterwards carried out in the Plantation of Ulster—"planting colonies among them of answerable inland subjects, that within short time may reforme and civilize the best-inclined among them; rooting out or transporting the barbarousor stubborne sort, and planting civilitie in their roomes".[87]Although James continued to carry on his efforts in this direction after 1603, yet it may be said that the English succession prevented his giving effect to his scheme, and that it also interfered with his intentions regarding the abolition of hereditary jurisdictions, which remained to "wracke the whole land" till after the Rising of 1745.

On the 5th April, 1603, King James set out from Edinburgh to enter upon the inheritance which had fallen to him "by right divine". His departure made considerable changes in the condition of Scotland. The absence of any fear of an outbreak of hostilities with the "auld enemy" was a great boon to the borders, but there was little love lost between the two countries. The union of the crowns did not, of course, affect the position of Scotland to England in matters of trade, and beyond some thirty years of peace, James's ancient kingdom gained but little. King James, who possessed considerable powers of statesmanship, if not much practical wisdom, devised the impossible project of a union of the kingdoms in 1604. "What God hathe conjoyned", he said, "let no man separate. I am the Husband, and all the whole Isle is my lawful wife.... I hope, therefore, that no man will be so unreasonable as to think that I, that am a Christian King under the Gospel, should be aPolygamist and husband to two wives." He desired to see a complete union—one king, one law, one Church. Scotland would, he trusted, "with time, become but as Cumberland and Northumberland and those other remote and northern shires". Commissioners were appointed, and in 1606 they produced a scheme which involved commercial equality except with regard to cloth and meat, the exception being made by mutual consent. The discussion on the Union question raised the subject of naturalization, and the rights of thepost-nati,i.e.Scots born after James's accession to the throne. The royal prerogative became involved in the discussion and a test case was prepared. Some land in England was bought for the infant grandson of Lord Colvill, or Colvin, of Culross. An action was raised against two defendants who refused him possession of the land, and they defended themselves on the ground that the child, as an alien, could not possess land in England. It was decided that he, as a natural-born subject of the King of Scotland, was also a subject of the King of England. This decision, and the repeal of the laws treating Scotland as a hostile country, proved the only result of the negotiations for union. The English Parliament would not listen to any proposal for commercial equality, and the king had to abandon his cherished project.

James had boasted to his English Parliament that, if they agreed to commercial equality, theScottish estates would, in three days, adopt English law. It is doubtful if the acquiescence even of the Scottish Parliament would have gone so far; but there can be no doubt that the English succession had made James more powerful in Scotland than any of his predecessors had been. "Here I sit", he said, "and governe Scotland with my pen. I write and it is done, and by a clearke of the councell I governe Scotland now, which others could not doe by the sword." The boast was justified by the facts. The king's instructions to his Privy Council, which formed the Scottish executive, are of the most dictatorial description. James gives his orders in the tone of a man who is accustomed to unswerving obedience, and he does not hesitate to reprove his erring ministers in the severest terms of censure. The whole business of Parliament was conducted by the Lords of the Articles, who represented the spiritual and temporal lords, and the Commons. All the bishops were the king's creatures, and by virtue of their position, entirely dependent on him. It was therefore arranged that the prelates should choose representatives of the temporal lords, and they took care to select men who supported the king's policy. The peers were allowed to choose representatives of the bishops, and could not avoid electing the king's friends, while the representatives of the spiritual and temporal lords choose men to appear for the small barons and the burgesses.In this way the efficient power of Parliament was completely monopolized, and none dared to dispute the king's will. Even the Church was reduced to an unwilling submission, which, from its very nature, could only be temporary. He forbade the meeting of a General Assembly; and the convening of an Assembly at Aberdeen, in defiance of his command, in 1605, served to give him an opportunity of imprisoning or banishing the Presbyterian leaders. He had to give up his scheme of abolishing the Presbyterian Church courts, and contented himself with engrafting on to the existing system the institution of Episcopacy, which had practically been in abeyance since 1560, although Scotland was never without its titular prelates. Bishops were appointed in 1606; presbyteries and synods were ordered to elect perpetual moderators, and the scheme was devised so that the moderator of almost every synod should be a bishop. The members of the Linlithgow Convention, which accepted this scheme, were specially summoned by the king, and it was in no sense a free Assembly of the Church. But the royal power was, for the present, irresistible; in 1610 an Assembly which met at Glasgow established Episcopacy, and its action was, in 1612, ratified by the Scots Parliament. Three of the Scottish bishops[88]receivedEnglish orders, to ensure the succession; but, to prevent any claim of superiority, neither English primate took any part in the ceremony. In 1616, the Assembly met at Aberdeen, and the king made five proposals, which are known as the Five Articles of Perth, from their adoption there in 1618. The Five Articles included:—(1) The Eucharist to be received kneeling; (2) the administration of the sacrament of the Lord's Supper to sick persons in private houses; (3) the administration of Baptism in private houses in cases of necessity; (4) the recognition of Christmas, Good Friday, Easter, and Pentecost; and (5) the episcopal benediction. Scottish opposition centred round the first article, which was not welcomed even by the Episcopalian party, and it required the king's personal interference to enforce it in Holyrood Chapel, during his stay in Edinburgh in 1616-17. His proposal to erect in the chapel representations of patriarchs and saints shocked even the bishops, on whose remonstrances he withdrew his orders, incidentally administering a severe rebuke to the recalcitrant prelates, "at whose ignorance he could not but wonder". Not till the following year were the articles accepted at Perth, under fear of the royal displeasure, and considerable difficulty was experienced in enforcing them.

The only other Scottish measures of James's reign that demand mention are his attempts to carry out his policy of plantations in the Highlands. As a whole, the scheme failed, and was productive of considerable misery, but here and there it succeeded, and it tended to increase the power of the government. The end of the reign is also remarkable for attempts at Scottish colonization, resulting in the foundation of Nova Scotia, and in the Plantation of Ulster.

FOOTNOTES:[80]Fénélon, i, 133 and 162.[81]Mary to Elizabeth, 8th Nov., 1582. Strickland'sLetters of Mary Stuart, i, p. 294.[82]Calderwood,History of the Kirk of Scotland, v, 341-42.[83]Ibid, pp. 396-97.[84]James Melville'sAutobiography and Diary, p. 370.[85]Basilikon Doron.[86]Cf. the present writer'sScottish Parliament before the Union of the Crowns.[87]Basilikon Doron.[88]The old controversy about the relation of the Church of Scotland to the sees of York and Canterbury had been finally settled, in 1474, by the erection of St. Andrews into a metropolitan see. Glasgow was made an archbishopric in 1492.

[80]Fénélon, i, 133 and 162.

[81]Mary to Elizabeth, 8th Nov., 1582. Strickland'sLetters of Mary Stuart, i, p. 294.

[82]Calderwood,History of the Kirk of Scotland, v, 341-42.

[83]Ibid, pp. 396-97.

[84]James Melville'sAutobiography and Diary, p. 370.

[85]Basilikon Doron.

[86]Cf. the present writer'sScottish Parliament before the Union of the Crowns.

[87]Basilikon Doron.

[88]The old controversy about the relation of the Church of Scotland to the sees of York and Canterbury had been finally settled, in 1474, by the erection of St. Andrews into a metropolitan see. Glasgow was made an archbishopric in 1492.

The new reign had scarcely begun when trouble arose between King Charles and his Scottish subjects. On the one hand, he alienated the nobles by an attempt, partially successful, to secure for the Church some of its ancient revenues. More serious still was his endeavour to bring the Scottish Church into uniformity with the usage of the Church of England. James had understood that any further attempt to alter the service or constitution of the Church of Scotland would infallibly lead to serious trouble. He had given up an intention of introducing a new prayer-book to supersede the "Book of Common Order", known as "Knox's Liturgy", which was employed in the Church, though not to the exclusion of extemporary prayers. When Charles came to Edinburgh to be crowned, in 1633, he made a further attempt in this direction, and, although he had to postpone the introduction of this particular change, he left a most uneasy feeling, not only among the Presbyterians, but also among the bishops themselves. An altar was erected in Holyrood Chapel, and behind it was a crucifix, before which the clergy made genuflexions. He erected Edinburgh into a bishopric,with the Collegiate Church of St. Giles for a cathedral, and the Bishops of Edinburgh, as they followed in rapid succession, gained the reputation of innovators and supporters of Laud and the English. Even more dangerous in its effect was a general order for the clergy to wear surplices. It was widely disobeyed, but it created very great alarm.

In 1635, canons were issued for the Church of Scotland, which owed their existence to the dangerous meddling of Laud, now Archbishop of Canterbury. James, who loved Episcopacy, had dreaded the influence of Laud in Scotland; his fear was justified, for it was given to Laud to make an Episcopal Church impossible north of the Tweed. Although certain of the Scottish bishops had expressed approval of these canons, they were enjoined in the Church by royal authority, and the Scots, whose theory of the rights of the Church was much more "high" than that of Laud, would, on this account alone, have met them with resistance. But the canons used words and phrases which were intolerable to Scottish ears. They spoke of a "chancel" and they commended auricular confession; they gave the Scottish bishops something like the authority of their English brethren, to the detriment of minister and kirk-session, and they made the use of a new prayer-book compulsory, and forbade any objection to it. Two years elapsed before the book was actuallyintroduced. It was English, and it had been forced upon the Church by the State, and, worse than this, it was associated with the hated name of Laud and with his suspected designs upon the Protestant religion. When it came it was found to follow the English prayer-book almost exactly; but such changes as there were seemed suspicious in the extreme. In the communion service the rubric preceding the prayer of consecration read thus: "During the time of consecration he shall stand at such a part of the holy table where he may with the more ease and decency use both his hands". The reference to both hands was suspected to mean the Elevation of the Host, and this suspicion was confirmed by the omission of the sentences "Take and eat this in remembrance that Christ died for thee, and feed on him in thy heart by faith, with thanksgiving", and "Drink this in remembrance that Christ's blood was shed for thee, and be thankful", from the words of administration. On more general grounds, too, strong objection was taken to the book, and on July 23rd, 1637, there occurred the famous riot in St. Giles's, which has become connected with the name of Jennie Geddes. The objection was not, in any sense, to read prayers in themselves; the Book of Common Order had been read in St. Giles's that very morning. The difficulty lay in the particular book, and it is notable that the cries which have come downto us as prefacing the riot are all indicative of a suspected attempt to reintroduce Roman Catholicism. "The mass is entered upon us." "Baal is in the Church." "Darest thou sing mass in my lug."

The Privy Council was negligent in punishing the rioters, and it soon became evident that they had public opinion behind them. Alexander Henderson, who ministered to a Fifeshire congregation in the old Norman church of Leuchars, and whom the king was to meet in other circumstances, issued a respectful and moderate protest, in which he did not deal with the particular points at issue, but asserted the ecclesiastical independence of Scotland. Riots continued to disturb Edinburgh, and Charles was impotent to suppress them. He refused Henderson's "Supplication"; its supporters drew up a second petition boldly asking that the bishops should be tried as the real authors of the disturbances, and, in November, 1637, they chose a body of commissioners to represent them. These commissioners, and some sub-committees of them, are known in Scottish history as The Tables, the name being applied to several different bodies. Charles replied to the second petition in wrathful terms, and it was decided to revive the National Covenant of 1581, to renounce popery. It had been drawn up under fear of a popish plot, and was itself an expansion of the Covenant of 1557. To it was now added a declaration suited to immediatenecessities. On the 1st and 2nd March, 1638, it was signed by vast multitudes in the churchyard of Greyfriars, in Edinburgh, and it continued to be signed, sometimes under pressure, throughout the land. Hamilton, Charles's agent in Scotland, was quite unable to meet the situation. In the end Charles had to agree to the meeting of a General Assembly in Glasgow, in November, 1638. Hamilton, the High Commissioner, attempted to obtain the ejection of laymen and to create a division among his opponents. When he failed in this, he dissolved the Assembly in the king's name. At the instance of Henderson, supported by Argyll, the Assembly refused to acknowledge itself dissolved, and proceeded to abolish Episcopacy and re-establish the Presbyterian form of Church government.

The king, on his part, began to concert measures with his Privy Council for the subjugation of Scotland. The "Committee on Scotch affairs" of the English Privy Council was obviously unconstitutional, but matters were fast drifting towards civil war, and it was no time to consider constitutional niceties. It is much more important that the committee was divided and useless. Wentworth, writing from Ireland, advised the king to maintain a firm attitude, but not to provoke an outbreak of war at so inconvenient a moment. Charles again attempted a compromise. He offered to withdraw Laud's unlucky service-book, the newcanons, and even the Articles of Perth, and to limit the power of the bishops; and he asked the people to sign the Covenant of 1580-81, on which the new Covenant was based, but which, of course, contained no reference to immediate difficulties. But it was too late; the sentiment of religious independence had become united to the old feeling of national independence, and war was inevitable. The Scots were fortunate in their leaders. In the end of 1638 there returned to Scotland from Germany, Alexander Leslie, the great soldier who had fought for Protestantism under Gustavus Adolphus. In February, 1639, he took command of the army of the Covenant, which had been largely reinforced by veterans from the Thirty Years' War. A more attractive personality than Leslie's was that of the young Earl of Montrose, who had attached himself with enthusiasm to the national cause, and had attempted to convert the people of Aberdeen to covenanting principles. Charles, on his part, asserted that his throne was in danger, and that the Scottish preparations constituted a menace to the kingdom of England, and so attempted to rouse enthusiasm for himself.

While the king was preparing to reinforce the loyalist Marquis of Huntly at Aberdeen, the news came that the garrisons of Edinburgh and Dunbarton had surrendered to the insurgents (March, 1639), who, a few days later, seized the regalia at Dalkeith. On March 30th Aberdeen fell into the hands of Montrose and Leslie, and Huntly was soon practically a prisoner. Charles had by this time reached York, and it was now evident that he had entirely miscalculated the strength of the enemy. He had hoped to subdue Scotland through Hamilton and Huntly; he now saw that, if Scotland was to be conquered at all, it must be through an English army. The first blood in the Civil War was shed near Turriff, in Aberdeenshire (May 14th, 1639), where some of Huntly's supporters gained a slight success, after which the city of Aberdeen fell into their hands for some ten days, when it was reoccupied by the Covenanters. Meanwhile Charles and Leslie had been facing each other near Berwick; the former unwilling to risk his raw levies against Leslie's trained soldiers, while the Covenanters were not desirous of entering into a war in which they might find the whole strength of England ultimately arrayed against them. On the 18th June the two parties entered into the Pacification of Berwick, in accordance with which both armies were to be disbanded, and Charles promised to allow a free General Assembly and a free Parliament to govern Scotland. While the pacification was being signed at Berwick, a battle was in progress at Aberdeen, where, on June 18th-19th, Montrose gained a victory, at the Bridge of Dee, over the Earl of Aboyne, the eldest son of the Marquis of Huntly. For the third time,Montrose spared the city of Aberdeen, and Scotland settled down to a brief period of peace.

It was clear that the pacification was only a truce, for no exact terms had been agreed upon, and both sides thoroughly distrusted each other. Disputes immediately arose about the constitution of Parliament and the Assembly. Charles refused to rescind the acts constituting Episcopacy legal, and it is clear that he never intended to keep his promise to the Scots, who, on their part, were too suspicious of his good faith to carry out their part of the agreement. In the end Assembly and Parliament alike abolished Episcopacy, and Parliament passed several acts to ensure its own supremacy. Charles refused to assent to these Acts, and prorogued Parliament from November, 1639, to June, 1640. The result of the king's evident disinclination to implement the Treaty of Berwick, was an interesting attempt to undo the work of the preceding century by a reversion to the old policy of a French alliance. It was, of course, impossible thus to turn back, and Richelieu met the Scottish offers with a decisive rebuff, while the fact of these treasonable negotiations became known to Charles, and embittered the already bitter controversy. A new attempt at negotiation failed, and in June, 1640, the second Bishops' War began. As usual the north suffered, especially from the fierceness of the Earl of Argyll, who disliked the more moderate policy advocated byMontrose. The king's English difficulties were increasing, and the Scots had now many sympathizers among Englishmen, who looked upon them as fighting for the same cause of Protestantism and constitutional government.

In August the Scots invaded England for the first time since the minority of Mary Stuart, and, on August 28th, they defeated a portion of the king's army at Newburn, a ford near Newcastle. The town was immediately occupied, and from Newcastle the invaders advanced to the Tees and seized Durham. Charles was forced, a second time, to give way. In October he agreed that the Scottish army of occupation should be paid until the English Parliament, which he was about to summon, might make a final arrangement. By Parliament alone could the Scots be paid, and thus, by a strange irony of fate, the occupation of the northern counties by a Scottish army was, for the time, the best guarantee of English liberties. There were, however, points on which the Scottish army and the English Parliament found it difficult to agree, and it was not till August, 1641, that the Scots recrossed the Tweed. Charles, who hoped to enlist the sympathy of the Scots in his struggle with the English Parliament, paid a second visit to Edinburgh, where he gave his assent to the abolition of Episcopacy, and to the repeal of the Acts which had given rise to the dispute. But it became evident that the Parliament, and not the king, was tobear rule in Scotland. The king's stay in Edinburgh was marked by what is known as "The Incident", a mysterious plot to capture Argyll and Hamilton, who was now the ally of Argyll. It was supposed that the king was cognizant of the plan; he had to defend himself from the accusation, and was declared guiltless in the matter. At the time of the Incident, Argyll fled, but soon returned, and Charles had to yield to him in all things. Parliament, under Argyll, appointed all officials. Argyll himself was made a marquis, and Leslie became Earl of Leven. There was a general amnesty, and among those who obtained their liberty was the Earl of Montrose, who had been imprisoned in May for making terms with the king. In November, 1641, Charles left Scotland for London, to face the English Parliament. He can scarcely have hoped for Scottish aid, and when, a few months later, he was on the verge of hostilities and made a request for assistance, it was twice refused.

With the general course of the Great Rebellion we are not here concerned. It is important for our purpose to notice that it affected Scotland in two ways. The course of events converted, on the one hand, the Episcopalian party into a Royalist party, and placed at its head the Covenanter, Montrose. On the other hand, the National Covenant was transformed into the Solemn League and Covenant, which had forits aim the establishment of Presbytery in England as well as in Scotland. This "will o' the wisp" of covenanted uniformity led the Scottish Church into somewhat strange places. As early as January, 1643, Montrose had offered to strike a blow for the king in Scotland, but Charles would not take the responsibility of beginning the strife. In August negotiations began for the extension of the covenant to England. The Solemn League and Covenant, which provided for the abolition of Episcopacy in England, was adopted by the Convention of Estates at Edinburgh on August 17th, and in the following month it passed both Houses of Parliament in England, and was taken both by the House of Commons and by the Assembly of Divines at Westminster. Its only ultimate results were the substitution in Scotland of the Westminster Confession of Faith, Catechisms, and Directory for Public Worship, in place of the older Scottish documents, and the approximation of Scottish Presbytery to English Puritanism, involving a distinct departure from the ideals of the Scottish Reformation, and the introduction into Scotland of a form of Sabbatarianism which has come to be regarded as distinctively Scottish, but which owes its origin, historically, to English Nonconformity.[89]Its immediate effects were the short-lived predominance of Presbytery in England,and the crossing of the Tweed, in January, 1644, by a Scottish army in the pay of the English Parliament. The part taken by the Scottish army in the war was not unimportant. In April they aided Fairfax in the siege of York; in July they took an honourable share in the battle of Marston Moor; they were responsible for the Uxbridge proposals which provided for peace on the basis of a Presbyterian settlement. In June, 1645, they advanced southwards to Mansfield, and, after the surrender of Carlisle, on June 28th, and its occupation by a Scottish garrison, Leven proceeded to Alcester and thereafter laid siege to Hereford, an attempt which events in Scotland forced him to abandon. Finally, in May, 1646, the king surrendered to the Scottish army at Newark, which had been invested by Leven since the preceding November.

While the Scottish army was thus aiding the Parliamentary cause, the Earl of Montrose had created an important diversion on the king's side in Scotland itself. In April, 1644, he occupied Dumfries and made an unsuccessful attempt on the Scottish Lowlands. In May Charles conferred on him a marquisate, and in August he prepared to renew the struggle. To his old foes, the Gordons, he first looked for assistance, but was finally compelled to raise his forces in the Highlands, and to obtain Irish aid. On September 1st he gained his first victory at Tippermuir, near Perth, on which he had marched withhis Highland host. From Perth he marched on Aberdeen, gaining some reinforcements from the northern gentry, and in particular from the Earl of Airlie. Once again Montrose fought a battle which delivered the city of Aberdeen into his power (September 13th), but now he was unwilling or unable to protect the captured town, which was cruelly ravaged. From Aberdeen Montrose proceeded by Rothiemurchus to Blair Athole, but suddenly turned backwards to Aberdeenshire, where he defended Fyvie Castle, slipped past Argyll, and again reached Blair Athole. The enemies of Argyll crowded to his banner, but his army was still small when, in December, 1644, he made his descent upon Argyll, and reached the castle of Inverary. From Inverary he went northwards, ravaging as he went, till he found, at Loch Ness, that there was an army of 5000 men under the Earl of Seaforth prepared to resist his advance, while Argyll was behind him at Inverlochy. Although Argyll's army considerably outnumbered his own, Montrose turned southwards and made a rapid dash at Argyll's forces as they lay at Inverlochy, and won a complete victory, the news of which dispersed Seaforth's men and enabled Montrose to invite Charles to a country which lay at his mercy. At Elgin he was joined by the heir of the Marquis of Huntly, his forces increased, and the excommunication which the Church immediately published against him seemedof but little importance. On April 4th he seized Dundee, and on May 9th won a fresh victory at Auldearn, which was followed, in rapid succession, by a victory at Alford in July, and in August by the "crowning mercy" of Kilsyth, which made him master of the situation, and forced Leven to raise the siege of Hereford. From Kilsyth he marched to Glasgow, where both the Highlanders and the Gordons began to desert him. From England, Leven sent David Leslie to meet Montrose as he marched by the Lothians into the border counties. On September 13th, 1645, just one year after his victory at Aberdeen, Montrose was completely defeated at Philiphaugh. He escaped, but his power was broken, and he was unable henceforth to take any important share in the war.

When Charles surrendered himself to the Scots, in May, 1646, his friends in Scotland were helpless, and he had to meet the Presbyterian leaders without any hope beyond that of being able to take advantage of the differences of opinion between Presbyterians and Independents, which were fast assuming critical importance. The king held at Newcastle a conference with Alexander Henderson, which led to no definite result. In the end the Scots offered to adopt the king's cause if he would accept Presbyterianism. This he declined to do, and his refusal left the Scots no choice except keeping him a prisoner or surrendering him to hisEnglish subjects. They owed him no gratitude, and, while it might be chivalrous, it could scarcely be expedient to retain his person. While he was unwilling to accede to their conditions they were powerless to give him any help. He was therefore handed over to the commissioners of the English Parliament, and the Scots, on the 30th January, 1647, returned home, having been paid, as the price of the king's surrender, the money promised them by the English Parliament when they entered into the struggle in 1644.

In the end of 1647 the Scots again entered into the long series of negotiations with the king. When Charles was a prisoner at Newport, and while he was arranging terms with the English, he entered into a secret agreement with commissioners from Scotland. The "Engagement", as it was called, embodied the conditions which Charles had refused at Newcastle—the recognition of Presbytery in Scotland and its establishment in England for three years, the king being allowed toleration for his own form of worship. The Engagement was by no means unanimously carried in the Scottish Parliament, and its results were disastrous to Charles himself. It caused the English Parliament to pass the vote of No Addresses, and the second civil war, which it helped to provoke, had a share in bringing about his death. The Duke of Hamilton led a small army into England, where in August 17th, 1648, it wastotally defeated by Cromwell at Preston. Meanwhile the Hamilton party had lost power in Scotland, and when Cromwell entered Scotland, Argyll, who had opposed the Engagement, willingly agreed to his conditions, and accepted the aid of three English regiments. In the events of the next six months Scotland had no part nor lot. The responsibility for the king's death rests on the English Government alone.

The news of the execution of the king was at once followed by the fall of Argyll and his party. The Scots had no sympathy with English republicanism, and they were alarmed by the growth of Independency in England. On February 5th Charles II was proclaimed King of Great Britain, France, and Ireland, and the Scots declared themselves ready to defend his cause by blood, if only he would take the Covenant. This the young king refused to do while he had hopes of success in Ireland. Meanwhile three of his most loyal friends perished on the scaffold. The English, who held the Duke of Hamilton as a prisoner, put him to death on March 9th, 1649, and on the 22nd day of the same month the Marquis of Huntly was beheaded at Edinburgh. On April 27th, Montrose, who had collected a small army and taken the field in the northern Highlands, was defeated at Carbisdale and taken prisoner. On the 25th May he was hanged in Edinburgh, and with his death the story is deprived of its hero.

The pressure of misfortune finally drove Charles to accept the Scottish offers. Even while Montrose was fighting his last battle, his young master was negotiating with the Covenanters. Conferences were held at Breda in the spring of 1650, and Charles landed at the mouth of the river Spey on the 3rd July, having taken the Covenant. In the middle of the same month Cromwell crossed the Tweed at the head of an English army. The Scots, under Leven and David Leslie, took up a position near Edinburgh, and, after a month's fruitless skirmishing, Cromwell had to retire to Dunbar, whither Leslie followed him. By a clever manœuvre, Leslie intercepted Cromwell's retreat on Berwick, while he also seized Doon Hill, an eminence commanding Dunbar. The Parliamentary Committee, under whose authority Leslie was acting, forced him to make an attack to prevent Cromwell's force from escaping by sea. The details of the battle have been disputed, and the most convincing account is that given by Mr. Firth in his "Cromwell". When Leslie left the Doon Hill his left became shut in between the hill and "the steep ravine of the Brock burn", while his centre had not sufficient room to move. Cromwell, therefore, after a feint on the left, concentrated his forces against Leslie's right, and shattered it. The rout was complete, and Leslie had to retreat to Stirling, while the Lowlands fell into Cromwell's hands. Cromwellwas conciliatory, and a considerable proportion of Presbyterians took up an attitude hostile to the king's claims. The supporters of Charles were known as Resolutioners, or Engagers, and his opponents as Protesters or Remonstrants. The consequence was that the old Royalists and Episcopalians began to rejoin Charles. Before the battle of Dunbar (September 2nd) Charles had been really a prisoner in the hands of the Covenanters, who had ruled him with a rod of iron. As the stricter Presbyterians withdrew, and their places were filled by the "Malignants" whom they had excluded from the king's service, the personal importance of Charles increased. On January 1st, 1651, he was crowned at Scone, and in the following summer he took up a position near Stirling, with Leslie as commander of his army. Cromwell outmanœuvred Leslie and seized Perth, and the royal forces retaliated by the invasion of England, which ended in the defeat of Worcester on September 3rd, 1651, exactly one year after Dunbar. The king escaped and fled to France.

Scotland was now unable to resist Monk, whom Cromwell had left behind him when he went southwards to defeat Charles at Worcester. On the 14th August he captured Stirling, and on the 28th the Committee of Estates was seized at Alyth and carried off to London. There was no further attempt at opposition, and all Scotland, for the first time since the reign of Edward I, wasin military occupation by English troops. The property of the leading supporters of Charles II was confiscated. In 1653 the General Assembly was reduced to pleading that "we were an ecclesiastical synod, a spiritual court of Jesus Christ, which meddled not with anything civil"; but their unwonted humility was of no avail to save them. An earlier victim than the Assembly was the Scottish Parliament. It was decided in 1652 that Scotland should be incorporated with England, and from February of that year till the Restoration, the kingdom of Scotland ceased to exist. The "Instrument" of Government of 1653 gave Scotland thirty members in the British Parliament. Twenty were allotted to the shires—one to each of the larger shires and one to each of nine groups of less important shires. There were also eight groups of burghs, each group electing one member, and two members were returned by the city of Edinburgh. Between 1653 and 1655 Scotland was governed by parliamentary commissioners, and, from 1655 onwards, by a special council. The Court of Session was abolished, and its place taken by a Commission of Justice.[90]The actual union dates from 1654, when it was ratified by the Supreme Council of the Commonwealth of England, but Scotland was under English rule from the battle of Worcester. The wise policy of allowing freedom oftrade, like the improvement in the administration of justice, failed to reconcile the Scots to the union, and, to the end, it required a military force to maintain the new government.

As Scotland had no share in the execution of Charles I, so it had none in the restoration of his son. The "Committee of Estates", which met after the 29th of May, was not lacking in loyalty. All traces of the union were swept away, and the pressure of the new Navigation Act was severely felt in contrast to the freedom of trade that had been the great boon of the Commonwealth. But worse evils were in store. The "Covenanted monarch" was determined to restore Episcopacy in Scotland, and for this purpose he employed as a tool the notorious James Sharpe, who had been sent up to London to plead the cause of Presbytery with Monk. Sharpe returned to Scotland in the spring of 1661 as Archbishop of St. Andrews. Parliament met by royal authority and passed a General Act Rescissory, which rendered void all acts passed since 1638. The episcopal form of church government was immediately established. The Privy Council received enlarged powers, and was again completely subservient to the king. The execution of Argyll atoned for the death of Montrose, in the eyes of Royalists, and two notable ecclesiastical politicians, Johnston of Warriston and James Guthrie, were also put to death. An Indemnity Act was passed, but many men foundthat the king's pardon had its price. On October 1st, 1662, an act was passed ordering recusant ministers to leave their parishes, and the council improved on the English Five Mile Act, by ordering that no recusant minister should, on pain of treason, reside within twenty miles of his parish, within six miles of Edinburgh or any cathedral town, or within three miles of any royal burgh. A Court of High Commission, which had been established by James VI in 1610, was again entrusted with all religious cases. The effect of these harsh measures was to rouse the insurrections which are the most notable feature of the reign. In 1666 the Covenanters were defeated at the battle of Pentland, or Rullion Green, and those who were suspected of a share in the rising were subjected to examination under torture, which now became one of the normal features of Charles's brutal government. Prisoners were hanged or sent as slaves to the plantations. In 1669, an Indulgence was passed, permitting Presbyterian services under certain conditions, but in 1670, Parliament passed a Conventicle Act, making it a capital crime to "preach, expound scripture, or pray", at any unlicensed meeting. On May 5th, 1679, Sharpe was assassinated near St. Andrews. The murderers escaped, and some of them joined the Covenanters of the west. The Government had determined to put a stop to the meetings of conventicles, and had chosen for this purpose John Graham of Claverhouse. Onthe 11th June, Claverhouse was defeated at Drumclog, but eleven days later he routed the Covenanting army at Bothwell Bridge, and took over a thousand prisoners. Only seven were executed, but the others were imprisoned in Greyfriars' churchyard, and a large number of them were sold as plantation slaves. A small rising at Aird's Moss in Ayrshire, in 1680, was easily suppressed. In 1681 the Scottish Parliament prescribed as a test the disavowal of the National Covenant of 1638 and the Solemn League and Covenant of 1644, and it declared that any attempt to alter the succession involved the subjects "in perjury and rebellion". In connection with the Test Act, an opportunity was found for convicting the Earl of Argyll[91]of treason. His property was confiscated, but he himself was allowed to escape. The last years of the reign, under the administration of the Duke of York, were marked by exceptional cruelty in connection with the religious persecutions. The expeditions of Claverhouse, the case of the Wigtown martyrs, and the horrible cruelties of the torture-room have given to these years the title of "the Killing time".

The Scottish Parliament welcomed King James VII with fulsome adulation. But the new king was scarcely seated on the throne before a rebellion broke out. The Earl of Argyll adoptedthe cause of Monmouth, landed in his own country, and marched into Lanarkshire. His attempt was an entire failure: nobody joined his standard, and he himself, failing to make good his retreat, was captured and executed without a new trial. The Parliament again enforced the Test Act, and renewed the Conventicle Act, making it a capital offence even to be present at a conventicle. The persecutions continued with renewed vigour. James failed in persuading even the obsequious Parliament to give protection to the Roman Catholics. He attempted to obtain the same end by a Declaration of Indulgence, of which the Covenanters might be unable to avail themselves, but in its final form, issued in May, 1688, it included them. The conjunction of popery and absolute prerogative thoroughly alarmed the Scots, and the news of the English Revolution was received with general satisfaction. The effect of the long struggle had been to weaken the country in many ways. Thousands of her bravest sons had died on the scaffold or on the battle-field or in the dungeons of Dunnottar, or had been exiled to the plantations. Trade and commerce had declined. The records of the burghs show us how harbours were empty and houses ruinous, where, a century earlier, there had been a thriving trade. Scotland in 1688 was in every way, unless in moral discipline, poorer than she had been while England was still the "auld enemy".

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