BOOK XVI.

A.D. 1681.

Edinburgh College shut—Isobel Alison and Marion Harvey executed—Other executions—Search for covenanters—Thomas Kennoway’s exploits—Mock-courts held by Cornet Graham and Grierson of Lag—Mr Spreul tried—acquitted—sent to the Bass—John Blackadder, Gabriel Semple, and Donald Cargill seized—Walter Smith, William Cuthil, and others apprehended, tried, and executed.

This year was ushered in by the council ordering the College of Edinburgh to be shut up, January 4, and the students, several of whom were sent to prison, dispersed in consequence of the insult they had offered to the religion of his Grace the Duke of York, who had now openly avowed his being a papist. The youths expressed loudly their indignation at such treatment, and had threatened, it was said, to burn the provost’s house about his ears for his servility, when the house by some means or other actually took fire, and was burnt to the ground. How it happened was never discovered, and a report that it was done by some of the Duke of York’s emissaries, gained general credit, although various efforts had been made to affix the blame to the students; but they voluntarily came forward and offered to stand trial that their characters might be vindicated. The offer was refused.

A more grateful tribute, however, was paid to his Royal Highness’ faith, by the immolation of two virgin martyrs in the end of the same month—Isobel Alison, who was apprehended at Perth, where she quietly resided, and Marion Harvey, a maid-servant, a native of Borrowstounness, who was seized upon the road as shewas walking from Edinburgh to hear sermon in the country. Atrocious as these times were, their annals do not afford many instances of more heartless, cold-blooded, entrapping levity, than the examination of these simple girls, both before the privy council and the court of justiciary, do, in the conduct of their examinators, on the one hand, nor more interesting exhibitions than their artless yet pointed replies, on the other.

When Isobel Alison was before the privy council, “they asked me,” says she, in an account of it which she left, “if I could read the Bible? I answered, Yes. They asked me if I knew the duty we owe to the civil magistrate? I answered, when the magistrate carrieth the sword for God, according to what the Scripture calls for, we owe him all due reverence; but when they overturn the work of God, and set themselves in opposition to him, it is the duty of his servants to execute his laws and ordinances on them. They asked, if I ever conversed with rebels? I answered, I never conversed with rebels. They asked if I conversed with David Hackston? I answered, I did converse with him, and I bless the Lord that ever I saw him; for I never saw ought in him but a godly pious youth. They asked, when saw ye John Balfour, that godly pious youth? I answered, I have seen him. They asked, when? I answered, these are frivolous questions; I am not bound to answer them. They said I thought not that a testimony.”

“They asked, what think ye of that in the Confession of Faith, that magistrates should be owned though they were heathens? I answered, it was another matter than when those who seemed to own the truth have now overturned it, and made themselves avowed enemies to it. They asked, who should be judge of these things? I answered, the Scriptures of truth and the Spirit of God, and not men who have overturned the work themselves.” She refused to call Sharpe’s death murder; and being asked if she would own all that she had said, as she would be put to own it in the Grassmarket, they expressed their regret that she should hazard her life in such a quarrel. “I think my life little enough in the quarrel of owning my Lord and Master’s sweet truths;—for he has freed me from everlasting wrath; and as for my body,it is at his disposal. They said I did not follow the Lord’s practice in that anent Pilate. I answered, Christ owned his kingly office when he was questioned on it, and told them he was a king, and for that end he was born; and it is for that we are called in question this day—the owning of his kingly government. The bishop said, we own it. I answered, we have found the sad consequences of the contrary. The bishop said he pitied me for the loss of my life. I told him that he had done me much more hurt than the loss of my life, or all the lives they had taken, for it had much more affected me that many souls were killed by their doctrine. The bishop said, wherein is our doctrine erroneous? I said, that was better debated already than a poor lass could debate it.”

Marion Harvey was not twenty years of age. When brought before the council, there was no criminal act which they could lay against her; nor does it appear that there was any witness they could have brought to substantiate any charge. But she was easily ensnared; she acknowledged having been at field-conventicles, and respecting the king’s authority, she said, “so long as the king held the truths of God which he swore, we are obliged to own him; but when he brake his oath and robbed Christ of his kingly rights, which do not belong to him, we are bound to disown him. They asked, were ye ever mad? She answered, I have all the wit that ever God gave me. Do ye see any mad act about me? When told that she had been guilty of the sin of rebellion, she smiled and said, if she were as free of all sin as of the sin of rebellion, she should be an innocent creature.”

Both were sent to the justiciary and indicted for treason, because it was alleged the one had spoken freely against the severities then practised against the Presbyterians, and the other had attended field-conventicles. Their own declarations were the only evidence adduced against them. When the jury were sworn in, Marion, looking towards them, solemnly said, “Now, beware what ye are doing, for they have nothing against me, but only for owning Jesus Christ and his persecuted truths; for ye will get my blood upon your heads!” One of them who had been seized with a fit of trembling, desired the confessions to be read, whichbeing done, the advocate addressed them, and concluded with “ye know these women are guilty of treason!” One of the jury remarked, “they are not guilty of matters of fact.” “Treason is fact,” replied the accuser, and added, “’tis true it is but treason in their judgment; but go on according to our law, and if you will not do it, I know how to proceed.” He then addressed the prisoners, “’Tis not for religion we are pursuing you, but for treason.” “It is for religion,” replied Harvey; “for I am of the same religion that ye all are sworn to be of! I am a true Presbyterian; and,” turning to the jury, “I charge you before the tribunal of God, as ye shall answer there! ye have nothing to say to me but for my owning the persecuted gospel.” They were both brought in guilty upon their own confession, and condemned to be hanged at the Grassmarket on the 26th. They were executed according to their sentence, and died, not with composure only, but with rapture.

When being brought from the tolbooth to the council-chamber to be carried to the place of execution, the youngest, who had several friends attending her, exclaimed, with an air of unearthly ecstacy, “Behold, I hear my beloved saying unto me, ‘Arise, my dove, my fair one, and come away!’” When in the room waiting the last preparations, Bishop Paterson, with a kind of fiendish exultation, said, “Marion, you said you would never hear a curate pray, now you shall be forced to hear one,” and ordered a suffragan of his who was in attendance to proceed; on which she turned to her companion, and saying, “Come, Isobel, let us sing the 23d Psalm;” they commenced immediately, and drowned the voice of the poor curate, who, with his employers, stood amazed at the clear unbroken tones of the youthful confessors.

On the scaffold, the most of her discourse was of God’s love to her and the commendation of free grace. Ascending the ladder a few steps, she sat down and said, “I am not come here for murder; for they have no matter of fact to charge me with, but only my judgment. I am about twenty years of age. At fourteen or fifteen, I was a hearer of the curates and indulged; and while I was a hearer of these, I was a blasphemer and Sabbath breaker,and a chapter of the Bible was a burden to me; but since I heard this persecuted gospel, I durst not blaspheme nor break the Sabbath, and the Bible became my delight;” on which the town major called to the hangman—“Cast her over,” which he immediately did.

Isobel, looking to the crowd from the scaffold, cried out—“Rejoice in the Lord, ye righteous; and again I say rejoice.” When she went up the ladder, “O! be zealous, sirs; be zealous! Love the Lord all ye his servants; for in his favour there is life. O! ye his enemies, what will ye do—whither will ye fly? for now there is a dreadful day coming on all the enemies of Jesus Christ. Come out from among them all ye that are the Lord’s own people;” then added, “Farewell, all created comforts! farewell, sweet Bible! in which I delighted most, and which has been sweet to me since I came into prison. Now, into thy hands I commit my spirit, Father, Son, and Holy Ghost!” And while these words yet trembled on her lips, she was launched into eternity. In order to imbitter their punishment, they were hanged along with five other women for child murder. The latter were attended by a curate, who gave them every consolation, but upbraided their virtuous companions in suffering in the most opprobrious terms as traitors.

Within a few days, John Murray, in Borrowstounness, Christopher Miller, weaver, Gargunnock, and, on March 8th, William Gowgar, Borrowstounness, with Robert Sangster, a Stirlingshire man, were found guilty by a like speedy process, and hanged together in the Grassmarket on the 11th, except Murray, who was reprieved.[133]Their testimonies embraced the same topics, andwere in every respect similar to those of their worthy predecessors who had vindicated the religious and civil liberties of their afflicted country at the expense of their lives. Gowgar was rather more harshly used than the rest. Some heads of an intended speech, written on a small slip of paper, having fallen out of his Bible in the council chamber, whither he had been taken just before being led to the gallows. After some of the councillors had read it, they ordered the executioner to tie his arms harder than usual, so that he could scarcely climb the ladder; and when he began to speak, the drums were immediately commanded to roll; nor would they even allow him to pray.

133.Murray had presented a petition to the Duke of York disowning king-killing principles, which concluded rather strangely, considering the person to whom it was addressed:—“For I declare I am nopapist, and hate and abhor all these jesuitical, bloody, and murdering principles.” When this was read in council, Murray was asked who drew it, and with much difficulty was induced to name Mr Spreul. Spreul was thereupon immediately called, and being interrogated, asked to see the paper. This reasonable request was not complied with; but York rose and imperiously demanded—“Sir, would you kill the king?” Spreul, turning to the Chancellor, said—“My lord, I bless God I am no papist. I lothe and abhor all these jesuitical, bloody, and murdering principles; neither my parents nor the ministers I heard ever taught me such principles.” York frowned; and Spreul afterwards suffered for his freedom of speech, but Murray appears to have benefited by the business, for he was afterwards pardoned as being “misled rather than malicious.”

Adam Urquhart, laird of Meldrum, having been accused, and offered to be proved guilty of the most exorbitant oppression, the council, to mark their sense of such conduct, renewed his former commission with additional powers, for searching out and apprehending all who had not taken the bond, or who had been at Bothwell or harboured any who had been there. As a specimen of the manner in which such searches were carried on, I give the following:—Thomas Kennoway, one of the king’s guards, came to the parish of Livingstone with a party late on Saturday, 19th March, pretending that he had orders—for he produced none—to apprehend such as had been concerned in the Bothwell rising. Having tampered with the neighbours to procure a list of such as had been engaged, he at last obtained the name of one young man who lived with his father and brother in a small house near a moss, which the party entered; and after smashing and destroying the furniture, under pretence of searching for arms, Kennoway cursed the father for an old devil, and swore “he would hang him at the tae end of a tow an’ his son at the t’ither;” and carried them all off along with him. When they had marched some little way, Kennoway suffered the old man and one of his sons to return, and proceeded with the other to a hamlet at a considerable distance to search another suspected house. When he alighted here, he obliged his prisoner to take off his coat and cover his horse withit, in a cold stormy night, till the poor fellow could scarcely stand with shivering. The person they were in search of escaped out at a window in his shirt, and in this state ran nearly a mile before he obtained shelter. Meanwhile the party took away his father in his stead. They made a third attempt the same night upon a fresh steading, still dragging their captives along with them, but missed their prey.

Having spent the night in rioting, early on the Sabbath morning they came to Swine-abbey, a public-house properly so called, and having procured lights, “Kennoway,” says honest Wodrow, “swore bloodily he feared they had brought the wrong man;” and the prisoner peremptorily denying that he had been at Bothwell, two of the soldiers were despatched to bring “the old dog” and the other son. But by this time the young dog had got out of the way, and the old one, through terror and maltreatment, was so ill that he could neither ride nor walk. The troopers brought some women to bear witness to the fact, and also that the prisoner was not the person mentioned in their list. Chagrined at their disappointment, the valiant Kennoway and his party endeavoured to drown their mortification in “eight pints of wine and brandy, for which he swore the prisoners should pay.” Thus passed the Sabbath. On Monday he held a court, fined the old man in eight dollars, forced an heritor in West Calder to give him a bond for five hundred merks, and committed many other extravagances, of which the sufferers durst not complain, and for which there was no redress. The young man was allowed to depart; but in consequence of his harsh treatment, fevered, and died within a few days.

Such burlesque courts now became common with the military, who carried them to the most extravagant length. Cornet Graham, who appears to have infested several parishes, held one at Dalry in the beginning of the year, to which all men and women above the age of sixteen, were summoned. Those who appeared were ordered to declare upon oath whether they had ever been at any field-meetings or countenanced any who frequented them, and whether they were married or got any infants baptized by field-preachers. The infamous Grierson of Lag was also particularlyactive in holding others in Dumfries and Galloway, where great numbers of the inhabitants were put to much expense, besides loss of time and damage to their various occupations.

Some estimate may be formed of the extent of the wanton extortion experienced by the most industrious part of the community at this period, when it is recollected that not only all whom the curates and clergy chose to denounce as guilty of “horrid contempt of the law,” but all against whom they had the smallest grudge and chose to name as witnesses of the contempt of others, were brought from their homes, week after week, and kept dangling after their court diets. The case of Mr James Aird of Milltoun will furnish an apt illustration. While residing at Kilmarnock upon a very stormy Sabbath, the church being very thin, one Carnegie, the curate, at the close of his afternoon’s sermon caused the kirk doors to be locked, and the names of the heads of families, parishioners, called over, and all the absentees marked on purpose to be fined—an excellent method of procuring attendance on rainy Sundays in country parishes. Mr Aird was not only fined on this occasion, but was brought before the justiciary shortly after, whenfifty-five witnesses were examinedin order to prove his accession to Bothwell, not one of whom could say a word about the matter; and much as they were inclined to strain every point to get him forfeited, all failed, and he was liberated. Yet was he forced to compound with the Laird of Broich, who, on pretext of alleged converse, had got a gift of his moveables, besides paying upwards of three hundred merks in expenses before the justiciary. Nor did this terminate his sufferings; ere three short months elapsed, parties were anew sent in pursuit of him; and he was, after sleeping in the open fields upwards of forty nights forced to abscond for several years, leaving his house and effects to the mercy of the plunderer.

There is something truly diabolical in first torturing a suspected person to force a confession of crime, and then producing this confession in a criminal court, and upon it, without any other evidence, condemning a man to die; yet such a practice was now attempted to be introduced by Sir George Mackenzie, in order to reach the lives of the persecuted. Before Mr Spreul was recoveredfrom the effects of his torture, the Lord Advocate served him with an indictment; and an extrajudicial examination of several witnesses took place before some of the councillors, against which the prisoner protested; yet although both threatened and cajoled, their evidence appeared so defective, that proceedings were delayed, though the Duke of York pressed his immediate trial, “alleging they were at much pains about poor country people, but Mr Spreul was more dangerous than five hundred of them.” At length, June 10, he was brought before the court upon a new indictment, “charged with treason and rebellion, corresponding and being present with the rebels at Bothwell, also keeping company and corresponding with Mr John Welsh and Mr Samuel Arnot, the bloody and sacrilegious murderers of the late Archbishop of St Andrews”—it being now the custom to accumulate in the indictment a number of charges which the public prosecutor himself knew to be false, and did not even intend attempting to prove.

The panel was assisted by some of the first advocates at the bar—Sir George Lockhart, Mr Walter Pringle, Mr James Deas, Mr Alexander Swinton, and Mr David Theirs. It was contended by his counsel, that he could not now be put upon his trial, or, in legal language, “pass to the knowledge of an inquest,” because, being examined before the council for the same crime, and having denied the same, and thereafter being tortured two several times, persisted in his denial, he cannot by the law of this and all other nations be impanelled nor condemned for that crime upon any new probation.

The reply of the Lord Advocate was indeed worthy of himself:—“A denial upon torture cannot infer absolute liberation, since no man’s obstinacy should be of advantage to him—that were to make disingenuity a remission, and tempt criminals to conceal truth; nor does torture, in law, import any more than a presumption of innocence—and, in law, presumptions may be taken off by clear probation. Were torture to preclude future probation, it will follow, that either crimes must be left undiscovered by not putting suspected persons to torture, or criminals be absolved and suffered to go unpunished, by wanting after opportunities of leading just probation against them. The most that can be pleadedin law, is, that no man can be tried upon the principal and chief points for which he was tortured; but the panel was never tortured upon the grounds he is now to be tried upon; besides, he neither cleared himself nor satisfied the judges, but continued in one insuperable obstinacy. Nor was it necessary to examine him respecting his accession to the rebellion since it can be proven that previously to his torture he confessed the crime.”

Sir George Lockhart offered to prove that the panel was tortured twice most violently upon the very crime; that it is the opinion of all lawyers, when once torture is used, it excludes all other probation, even although there should afterwards appear the fullest evidence against the accused; for, were it not so, double punishment would be undergone—and the practice of this nation has been exactly agreeable thereto. In the year 1632-33, John Toshach being pursued as guilty of statutory treason for wilful fire and burning the house of Frendraught, the panel being interrogated, not upon the whole fact, but whether he entered into the vault with a candle that night the house was burnt, and upon this subjected to torture and denied it. The process was prolonged from August to November, and then to February. His majesty’s advocate urging a new probation, and the panel’s lawyers advancing his torture as a defence, the lords of justiciary sustained it.

Sir George Mackenzie then consented that it would be sufficient for the panel to prove that he was tortured upon this very point by command of the council, and produced the commission. Sir George Lockhart said he did not mean to accuse the committee appointed by the council of illegal procedure by acting in opposition to their commission; but it is certain the panel was interrogated upon the crimes libelled, and his answers drawn up as his confession. The lords repelled the defence, founded upon the torture, inasmuch as the commission of council did not warrant the prisoner’s being questioned upon any of the crimes mentioned in the indictment, and adjourned the trial till the 13th.

At this sederunt several witnesses were examined, but none of them brought the facts home to the prisoner, and the Lord Advocate adduced his alleged confession in presence of the council as a corroborative evidence. Sir George Lockhart argued thatthe pretended confession before council could not be received, for it was not acknowledged nor signed by the panel, besides being extrajudicial and not taken before a competent judicature. The king’s advocate offered to prove by witnesses that the confession was read to the panel, and he could not disown it; his contumacy, therefore, ought not to be of any use to him, unless one crime was brought forward to defend another. Yet, following the merciful example of the king, his master! and being unwilling to stretch any debateable point, he only adduced this confession against the panel as an adminicle and a presumption, joined with other pregnant grounds,—and what can be stronger? Writs may be forged, witnesses may be false, but a man will never confess untruly to his own hurt, and therefore a confession, even before an incompetent tribunal, unless the confessor can show what made him err. Then assuming, what does not appear plain upon the record, his presence and converse with rebels, he proceeds—“all that is wanting is, whether it was with a criminal intention, of which his own confession must be owned the most solid evidence.”

Sir George Lockhart insisted that there could not be one instance produced of a confession importing forfeiture of life and estate not signed by the person, or judge, if he cannot write; that in pecuniary matters the bare verbal confession would not be admitted to be proven by deposition of witnesses for one hundred pounds Scots—and would it be admitted in a matter of life and fortune? The lords “refused to sustain the confession to be proven by witnesses as a mean of probation, either plenary or adminiculate.”

The advocate, as a last forlorn hope, moved “that the panel be interrogated if he thinks the being at Bothwell Bridge rebellion?” The panel answered, that he conceives that he is not obliged to answer, because it is not the crime libelled, and he may as well be interrogated upon any other point of treason. The lords having, however, put the question, the panel answered, “that was no part of the libel, and his future life should witness him to be both a good subject and a good Christian.” The prosecutor now declared his proof closed, and protested for an assize of error incase the inquest assoilzie the panel. The jury were then enclosed and ordered to return their verdict next day, which they did in the following terms:—“The assize having considered the depositions of the haill witnesses led against John Spreul,una voce, find nothing proven of the crimes contained in the libel which may make him guilty.”

What follows marks as much almost as any deed of the times the tyranny of the government and the servile prostitution of justice at the fountainhead. When Spreul and his procurators, upon his acquittal, took instruments and craved that he might be liberated, his majesty’s advocate produced an act of council previously prepared:—“Edinburgh, June 14, 1681. The council give order and warrant to the justices, notwithstanding of any verdict or sentence upon the criminal dittay lately pursued against John Spreul, to detain him in prison until he be examined upon several other points they have to lay to his charge.” Mr Spreul was accordingly remanded to jail; and such was the persevering greed of his rapacious persecutors, that, on the 14th of July, he, together with a William Lin, writer in Edinburgh, was brought before the privy council for being at field-conventicles. They were both accused of having at least heard Presbyterian ministers preach when some of the congregation were without doors, and likewise of resett and converse with intercommuned persons; and the truth of the accusation being referred to their oaths, because they would not swear, they were both found guilty, and each of them fined five hundred pounds sterling and sent to the Bass. Mr Spreul lay there six years, whence, “from his long continuance in that place,” Wodrow adds, “he has yet the compellation of Bass John Spreul, whereof he needs not be ashamed.”[134]

134.This unusual severity was said to have been occasioned by Mr Spreul’s rather imprudent answer; but as York repeatedly and voluntarily was present, and appeared much interested in such spectacles, it would appear the natural unfeeling disposition of the tyrant was stimulated by the horrible maxims of his religion.

Mr Blackadder was seized in Edinburgh on Tuesday, April 5, and has left the following account of his apprehension, so characteristic of the manners of these satellites of prelatic domination,that I give it at length:—“The party came to his house before he arose. His daughter and servant were up expecting the Borrowstounness carrier, who had promised to come that day. About five or six o’clock, one knocked softly at the hanging gate. She looked through a hole in the door and spied a man with a grey hat, and thought it had been the carrier, who was there the night before with a grey hat of somebody’s on his head. She opened the door, but it proved to be Johnstoun the town-major, with a party at his back, who came into the hall, and asked, ‘If there were any strangers in the house.’ She said, ‘No.’ Yet he came to the chamber where her father was lying, putting the end of his staff to the side of the curtain, and then went up stairs to the gallery where the minister used to stay, and found only his son lying in the bed, and came down again to his chamber, saying to the minister’s wife, ‘Mistress, desire your husband to rise.’ He looking forth out of the bed, said, ‘How, now, major, is that you? I am not surprised, but where is your order?’ The other said, ‘You are only to rise and come down to a friend in the Canongate.’ ‘Well,’ said the minister, ‘if I were dressed, I am ready.’

“Meanwhile he spoke gently to his men to wait on the prisoner, but he himself went quickly to Dalziel in the Canongate; upon which and other presumptions, the minister conjectured he had no order at the time, except privately from Prelate Paterson, till after he was taken; for he did not take him out of his house till he returned. After he returned, the minister calling for a drink, sought a blessing, and caused give them all a drink, and went forth; his wife being very sickly, yet behaved more quietly than he could have believed. It was observable that such a wicked person as the major was, who used to swear and domineer in all such cases, did at that time carry most calmly, as all the party did, not one menacing word being heard. The major took him down the Cowgate, himself on the one hand, and the minister’s son Thomas on the other, the party following, and brought him to Dalziel’s lodgings, near the foot of the Canongate. The major went first, the minister following. Dalziel himself opening the door, the major told him he had brought the prisoner. Dalziel bade him take him to the guard. The minister stepping up stairs,said—‘May I speak a little?’ at which he rudely raged, ‘You, sir, have spoken too much; I would hang you with my own hands over that outshot.’ He knew not yet who he was, nor what was laid to his charge till afterward, as the minister perceived by a strange alteration in his calmness to him when he came to the court at twelve o’clock, at which time he was called.

“His examinators were, the Duke of Rothes, chancellor; the king’s advocate, Sir George Mackenzie; General Dalziel; and Bishop Paterson of Edinburgh. In answer to questions from the Chancellor, he acknowleged he was a minister at Troqueer, in Galloway, since 1653. ‘Did you excommunicate the king? or was you at Torwood at the time?’ ‘I have not been at Torwood these four years.’ ‘But what do you think of it? do you approve of it?’

“Perceiving that many such extraneous questions concerning his thoughts and judgments of things might be asked, and being resolved to make a stand at first, he shunned declaring his inward sentiments, and answered—‘Though I be as free to answer to that as to all the former, yet I must tell you I came here to give account of my judgment to no man; therefore, seeing this is an interrogating of me about my thoughts, I humbly beg to be excused. Produce a libel, and I’ll endeavour to answer it as I can.’ On this point he was repeatedly interrogated by the Chancellor and the Advocate, but to no purpose.

“‘But do you approve of taking the king’s life?’ ‘No, I do not, and no good man will.’ The Chancellor said, ‘Sir, you have done yourself a favour in saying so. But we hear you keep conventicles since the last indemnity?’ ‘I need not ask what is meant by conventicles, seeing that term has been frequently applied to our preaching who are ministers of the gospel, and under the strictest obligation to exercise our ministry, as we shall be answerable at the great day. My lord, I have the honour to be lawfully and duly called to the sacred function, and am bound to exercise that office, which I ever did and still do account my duty, abstracting from all indemnities whatever.’ ‘But you have preached in the fields, that is, on moors and hill sides? I shall not ask you if you have preached in houses or not, though thereis not liberty even for that.’ ‘I place no case of conscience, nor make any difference betwixt preaching in houses or in the fields, but as may best serve the convenience of the hearers; nor know I of any restriction lying on me from the word of God, where I have my commission, which reaches to houses and fields, within and without doors.’ ‘You know, and no doubt have seen, the laws discharging such preaching?’ ‘My lord, no doubt I have; and I am sorry that there ever should have been laws and acts made against preaching the gospel.’ ‘Not against preaching the gospel, but against sedition and rebellion.’ ‘I preach no sedition or rebellion.’

“Then the Lord Advocate rose out of his place and came to the prisoner, and courteously asked him, why he answered not more clearly to the Chancellor about the excommunication, and alleged he was straitened. To this insidious query, Mr Blackadder replied, ‘I am noways straitened or confused about that; but I do of purpose shun to answer such interrogatories as require me to give account of my thoughts and judgment about persons or practices, not knowing how many such questions may be put, or what use may be made of them; and I am here only to answer for matters of fact that concern myself.’ Then intending to speak somewhat more, he craved liberty to be heard; to which the Chancellor replied, ‘You have leave to speak, if you speak not treason;’ but immediately rose and went out with the other two, it being near one o’clock, their dinner hour.

“Before the next examination, he sent his son to tell Colonel Blackadder, a cousin of his, who went and informed General Dalziel, whose comrade he had been in the wars, of the prisoner’s relation to the house of Tulliallan, with which Dalziel also was connected. The examination consisted only of a few trifling questions, and passed smoothly. At two o’clock on Wednesday, Captain Maitland, who was on the guard, told the prisoner he was to carry him up to the council at three, and desired him to be ready. When the Duke went to the council, he, Mr Blackadder, was ranked among three rank of musketeers in Captain Maitland’s company, who marched him up the rear of the life-guards who attended the Duke up streets. When he came to the ParliamentClose, the captain sent four soldiers to wait on the prisoner in an outer room till he should be called. There he sat from three till five o’clock, when the council rose. He was not called, which he marvelled at; but sent his son Thomas to inquire what word was concerning him, who answered he believed he was sentenced to the Bass. On the morrow he was sent off. When they reached the Fisherrow, they observed a gathering of people upon some occasion or other at the end of the town, upon the green, which, when the captain perceived, he took the alarm, apprehending it might be a design to rescue the prisoner. Upon this he came to the minister, and said, ‘If these people attempt to rescue you, you are a dead man; for upon the first attack, I will shoot you through the head.’ The minister said he knew nothing about it, and did not believe there was any such design. They came to Castleton over against the Bass about three afternoon. The prisoner dined the whole party there! and after dinner two of them went over with him in a boat to the rock; and he was delivered to the governor of the Scottish Bastile about five afternoon, on Thursday, April 7, 1681, after he had laboured in the work from 1662, when he was cast out in many and divers places in the land under continual persecution, manifold hardships and hazards, till he accomplished the service appointed by his master.”

Mr Gabriel Semple, son of Sir Bryce Semple of Cathcart, minister of Kirkpatrick-Durham in Galloway, an able associate of Blackadder and Welsh, particularly obnoxious as being one of the first who took to the fields, was in July this year seized in the house of Sir Patrick Hepburn of Blackcastle, at Oldhamstocks, and liberated upon giving bond to appear when called for, under a penalty of ten thousand merks. When seized, he was labouring under an ague and unable to ride, yet would not the council dispense with his presence; but procuring the accommodation of Lady Stevenstoun’s calash, he was able to perform the journey, accompanied by his nephew. On his arrival, he was lodged in the Canongate jail, where he lay for a short time. When called before a committee of council, his petition was read to him, and he was called to acknowledge it; but the clerk, in reading, had added some strong expressions, disavowing the principles for whichMr Semple was suffering, in hopes that he would disclaim it. This he afterwards found had been done on purpose to extort money from him, (but Lord Maitland, who was one of the number, was very friendly.) When asked if he owned the supplication after it was read, he requested a sight of the paper; and observing that the paper itself had not been altered, he returned it, saying that that paper was the very same he had written and given in; upon which he was dismissed without being required to renew the bond, and shortly after he withdrew to England.

His host, however, did not escape so easily. He was brought before the council and fined in the sum of two hundred pounds sterling, and imprisoned till he found caution to pay it.

Cargill had nobly kept the field, after all his brethren had retired to safer stations, and his ministry had been greatly blessed. In consequence, he had become an object of more eager pursuit; but the Torwood excommunication had raised the malignant passions of the persecutors to a degree of virulent animosity beyond what can be imagined or accounted for by those who consider the transaction an object of contempt; and a reward of five thousand merks was offered for his apprehension. He delivered his last sermon upon Dunsyre Common, from Isaiah xxvi. 20. “Come, my people, enter thou into thy chambers, and shut thy doors about thee: hide thyself as it were for a little moment, until the indignation be overpast.” That night, through the persuasion of Messrs Smith and Boig, he went to Covington-mill, where he was seized, together with his two companions, by James Irvine of Bonshaw, who exclaimed with satanic glee—“O blessed Bonshaw! and blessed day that ever I was born! that has found such a prize this morning.” At Lanark, they procured horses, and placing the prisoners on their bare backs, Bonshaw with his own hands tied Mr Cargill’s feet below the animal’s belly, painfully hard. “Why do you tie me so hard?” said the venerable saint; “your wickedness is great; you will not long escape the just judgment of God.”[135]Fearing a rescue, they pushed on for Glasgow asfast as they could. When near the city, they turned him on his horse, and led him in backward. They halted at the tolbooth till the magistrates came to receive them. Multitudes flocked to gaze; and while many stood weeping to see their late revered minister in such a situation, John Nisbet, a dissolute character, the bishop’s factor, addressed him tauntingly—‘Mr Donald, will you give us one word more?’ alluding to an expression Mr Cargill sometimes used in preaching. The prisoner, looking sorrowfully on him, replied—‘Mock not, lest your bands be made strong; the day is coming, when you shall not have one word to say though you would.’ This natural and serious reproof was received as a prophecy; and Wodrow adds—“This came very shortly to pass. Not many days after, the Lord was pleased to lay his hand on that ill man. At Glasgow, where he lived, he fell suddenly ill, and for three days his tongue swelled; and though he seemed very earnest to speak, yet he could not command one word, and died in great torment and seeming terror. Some yet alive know the truth of this passage.”[136]

135.Crookshanks adds, “‘And if I be not mistaken, it will seize you in this place.’ And this was verified, for soon after he got the price of his blood; he was killed in a duel near Lanark. His last words were—‘God damn my soul eternally, for I am gone.’” Vol. ii. p. 85.

136.Crookshanks says, “Robert Godwin and John Hodge, two Glasgow men who were witnesses to this, went to visit him. Godwin desired him to write what kept him from speaking. He wrote that it was a just judgment from the Lord, and the sayings of the minister verified upon him for his mocking at him; and if he had the whole world, he would give it for the use of his tongue again. But he died in great torment and seeming terror.” Vol. ii. p. 86.

Mr Cargill and his fellow-prisoners were brought to the capital, and on the 15th July examined before the council. Being asked if he owned the king’s authority and the king as his lawful prince, he answered, as the magistrates’ authority is now established by the act of parliament anent supremacy and the explanatory act, he denied the same. When pressed to say explicitly if he owned the king as his lawful prince, yes or no; he refused to give any other answer than he had already given, and declined their interference respecting the excommunication, that being entirely an ecclesiastical matter. He acknowledged having seen Balfour, Henderson, and Russell, within the last two years, but knew nothingof their intentions before the deed—i. e.the archbishop’s death—was done. A copy of the sermon alleged to have been preached by him at the Torwood, was produced—so vigilant were their spies in procuring information—and he was asked if it was a true copy. He desired time to consider before he answered. He owned the lawfulness of defensive arms in case of necessity, and did not consider those who were at Bothwell rebels, but oppressed men; and refused to say whether he was there or at Airs-moss. He did not see the Sanquhar declaration till after it was proclaimed, but refused to say whether he had any hand in advising it or not; and with regard to the principles it contained, would give no opinion rashly. He further declared he could not give his sense respecting the archbishop’s death, but that the Scripture says that the Lord giving a call to a private man to kill, he might do it lawfully, and instanced Jael and Phineas—thinks he is not obliged to obey the king’s government as it is now established by the act of supremacy. He was repeatedly before the council, but varied nothing in his declarations.

Mr Walter Smith, though young in years, was an eminent Christian and an excellent scholar. He had studied abroad under Leusden, who highly esteemed him; and when he heard of his martyrdom, burst into weeping, and said in broken English—“O! Smit, great, brave, Smit; b’yond all as ever I taut.”[137]He declared he did not think it lawful to rise in arms against lawful authority, but could not acknowledge the present authority the king is invested with, as being clothed with a supremacy over the church. The Sanquhar declaration being read, he owned it, with this explication, that he did not look on those who composed it as the regular representatives of the Presbyterian church; he thought what the king had done, justified the people in revolting against him, but as to declaring war, he did not know if they were called or in a capacity to declare war; and thinks that they thereby intended only to justify the killing of any of the king’s forces in their own defence, when assaulted, otherwise it might havebeen esteemed murder. As to these words where the king is called an usurper and a tyrant, he knows certainly the king is an usurper, and wishes he were not a tyrant.

137.He wrote several tracts; one on Fellowship Meetings, and another on the Defections of the Times, which were highly esteemed; neither of which have I seen.

James Boig, also a student of divinity, a young man of talent and piety, was examined upon the same points, and bore testimony to the same truths.

William Thomson, a farm-servant in Fife, apprehended when coming from hearing sermon at Alloa, in a testimony, most admirably written, considering his situation in life, coincided with his minister—“I was before the year 1679,” said he, in that paper, “running away with the rest of this generation to God-provoking courses.” “Now I do with all my heart bless the Lord for his wonderful workings with me, since he began with me. I think when I look on his dealings since that time till now, I must say that I am a brand pluckt out of the fire. O! that my heart and soul could praise him for all that he has done for me; and now I am content to die a debtor to free grace!” He then declared his adherence to the Scriptures, to the Covenants, National and Solemn League, and to the Directory for Worship; and, “in the last place, bore his testimony to the cross of Christ, as the only desirable upmaking and rich lot of the people of God this day in Scotland.” “There is no better way,” he added, “to carry the cross right, than to cast all our care upon Christ, and trust him for all things, and use our single endeavours in this matter; speak what he bids us, and obey his voice in all things.”

William Cuthil—a seaman belonging to Borrowstounness, who suffered at the same time—struck fairly at the root of the mischief—the recalling of the Stuarts, which indeed was the first grand step of backsliding by the honest people in Scotland, and not more inconsistent in a religious than totally unaccountable in a rational or political point of view—“The admitting Charles Stuart to the exercise of kingly power, and crowning him while they knew he carried heart enmity against the work and people of God, and while in the mean time there was so much of his treachery made known to the parliament by his commissionating James Graham, Earl of Montrose, to burn and slay the subjects of this kingdom, that would not side with, or wouldwithstand, him in the prosecution of his wickedness.” Another point in his testimony was equally just; it was “against that unparalleled practice of ministers in quitting their charges; and that which doth more aggravate their guilt, at his command who had no power to act, nor right to be obeyed, either in that or civil things, seeing he hath unkinged himself.”

Had the whole ministers in Scotland and England individually refused to move till the people themselves had desired them, it is more than probable that they never would have been ejected. It was the great anxiety evinced, during their primary negotiations with Charles, by each party and separate section to engross the whole of the royal favour for themselves, that laid the foundation of his tyranny, and cast into his hands a power which enabled him to overthrow the constitution of this country;[138]and their at once yielding to their own illegal ejectment confirmed it. If there be primary principles of government, founded upon the constitution of our nature, and, like the doctrines of revelation, suited to the necessities and the existence of society, no power on earth has a right to uproot or destroy them, more especially if planted with the genera] consent of a nation; and such were the principles acknowledged, avowed, legalized, and acted upon by the estates of Scotland at Glasgow, which were said to be set aside by the act rescissory, but which were afterwards at the Revolution acknowledged as inalienable; for these the humblest of the martyrs shed their blood, and their sufferings have only been decried by those who allege that Christian privileges and civil privileges can be separated, or who suppose that a man can enjoy rational freedom, while he is not allowed to worship God, except in the manner prescribed by the state.

Back to Index Next