CHAPTER I IT is a thing past all contesting, that, in the Reformation, there was a spirit of far greater carnality among the champions of the cause, than among those who in later times so courageously, under the Lord, upheld the unspotted banners of the Covenant. This I speak of from the remembrance of many aged persons, who either themselves bore a part in that war with the worshippers of the Beast and his Image, or who had heard their fathers tell of the heart and mind wherewith it was carried on, and could thence, with the helps of their own knowledge, discern the spiritual and hallowed difference. But, as I intend mainly to bear witness to those passages of the late bloody persecution in which I was myself both a soldier and a sufferer, it will not become me to brag of our motives and intents, as higher and holier than those of the great elder Worthies of %"the Congregation.%' At the same time it is needful that I should rehearse as much of what happened in the troubles of the Reformation, as, in its effects and influences, worked upon the issues of my own life. For my father's father was out in the raids of that tempestuous season, and it was by him, and from the stories he was wont to tell of what the government did, when drunken with the sorceries of the gorgeous Roman harlot, and rampaging with the wrath of Moloch and of Belial, it trampled on the hearts and thought to devour the souls of the subjects, that I first was taught to feel, know, and understand, the divine right of resistance. He was come of a stock of bein burghers in Lithgow; but his father having a profitable traffic in saddle-irons and bridle-rings among the gallants of the court, and being moreover a man who took little heed of the truths of religion, he continued with his wife in the delusions of the papistical idolatry till the last, by which my grandfather's young soul was put in great jeopardy. For the monks of that time were eager to get into their clutches such men-children as appeared to be gifted with any peculiar gift, in order to rear them for stoops and posts to sustain their Babylon, in the tower and structure whereof many rents and cracks were daily kithing. The Dominican friars, who had a rich howf in the town, seeing that my grandfather was a shrewd and sharp child, of a comely complexion, and possessing a studious observance, were fain to wile him into their power; but he was happily preserved from all their snares and devices, in a manner that shows how wonderfully the Lord worketh out the purposes of His will, by ways and means of which no man can fathom the depth of the mysteries. Besides his traffic in the polished garniture of horse-gear, my grandfather's father was also a ferrier, and enjoyed a far-spread repute for his skill in the maladies of horses; by which, and as he dwelt near the palace-yett, on the south side of the street, fornent the grand fountain-well, his smiddy was the common haunt of the serving-men belonging to the nobles frequenting the court, and as often as any new comers to the palace were observed in the town, some of the monks and friars belonging to the different convents were sure to come to the smiddy to converse with their grooms and to hear the news, which were all of the controversies raging between the priesthood and the people. My grandfather was then a little boy, but he thirsted to hear their conversations; and many a time, as he was wont to tell, has his very heart been raspet to the quick by the cruel comments in which those cormorants of idolatry indulged themselves, with respect to the brave spirit of the reformers; and he rejoiced when any retainers of the protestant lords quarrelled with them, and dealt back to them as hard names as the odious epithets with which the hot-fed friars reviled the pious challengers of the papal iniquities. Thus it was, in the green years of his childhood, that the same sanctified spirit was poured out upon him, which roused so many of the true and faithful to resist and repel the attempt to quench the re-lighted lamps of the gospel, preparing his young courage to engage in those great first trials and strong tasks of the Lord. The tidings and the bickerings to which he was a hearkener in the smiddy, he was in the practice of relating to his companions, by which it came to pass that, it might in a manner be said, all the boys in the town were leagued in spirit with the reformers, and the consequences were not long of ripening. In those days there was a popish saint, one St Michael, that was held in wonderful love and adoration by all the ranks and hierarchies of the ecclesiastical locust then in Lithgow; indeed, for that matter, they ascribed to him power and dominion over the whole town, lauding and worshipping him as their special god and protector. And upon a certain day of the year they were wont to make a great pageant and revel in honour of this supposed saint, and to come forth from their cloisters with banners, and with censers burning incense, shouting and singing paternosters in praise of this their Dagon, walking in procession from kirk to kirk, as if they were celebrating the triumph of some mighty conqueror. This annual abomination happening to take place shortly after the martyrdom of that true saint and gospel preacher Mr George Wishart, and while kirk and quire were resounding, to the great indignation of all Christians, with lamentations for the well-earned death of the cruel Cardinal Beaton, his ravenous persecutor, the monks and friars received but little homage as they passed along triumphing, though the streets were, as usual, filled with the multitude to see their fine show. They suffered, however, no molestation nor contempt, till they were passing the Earl of Angus' house, on the outside stair of which my grandfather, with some two or three score of other innocent children, was standing; and even there they might, perhaps, have been suffered to go by scaithless, but for an accident that befell the bearer of a banner, on which was depicted a blasphemous type of the Holy Ghost in the shape and lineaments of a cushy-doo. It chanced that the bearer of this blazon of iniquity was a particular fat monk, of an arrogant nature, with the crimson complexion of surfeit and constipation, who, for many causes and reasons, was held in greater aversion than all the rest, especially by the boys, that never lost an opportunity of making him a scoff and a scorn; and it so fell out, as he was coming proudly along, turning his Babylonish banner to pleasure the women at the windows, to whom he kept nodding and winking as he passed, that his foot slipped, and down he fell as it were with a gludder, at which all the thoughtless innocents on the Earl of Angus' stair set up a loud shout of triumphant laughter, and from less to more began to hoot and yell at the whole pageant, and to pelt some of the performers with unsavoury missiles. This, by those inordinate ministers of oppression, was deemed a horrible sacrilege, and the parents of all the poor children were obligated to give them up to punishment, of which none suffered more than did my grandfather; who was not only persecuted with stripes till his loins were black and blue, but cast into a dungeon in the Blackfriars' den, where for three days and three nights he was allowed no sustenance but gnawed crusts and foul water. The stripes and terrors of the oppressor are, however, the seeds which Providence sows in its mercy, to grow into the means that shall work his own overthrow. The persecutions which from that day the monks waged, in their conclaves of sloth and sosherie, against the children of the town, denouncing them to their parents as worms of the great serpent and heirs of perdition, only served to make their young spirits burn fiercer. As their joints hardened and their sinews were knit, their hearts grew manful, and yearned, as my grandfather said, with the zealous longings of a righteous revenge, to sweep them away from the land as with a whirlwind. After enduring for several years great affliction in his father's house, from his mother, a termagant woman, who was entirely under the dominion of her confessor, my grandfather entered into a paction with two other young lads to quit their homes for ever, and to enter the service of some of those pious noblemen who were then active in procuring adherents to the protestant cause, as set forth in the first covenant. Accordingly, one morning in the spring of 1558, they bade adieu to their fathers' doors, and set forward on foot towards Edinburgh. %"We had light hearts,%' said my grandfather, %"for our trust was in Heaven; we had girded ourselves for a holy enterprise, and the confidence of our souls broke forth into songs of battle, the melodious breathings of that unison of spirit which is alone known to the soldiers of the great Captain of Salvation.%' About noon they arrived at the Cross of Edinburgh, where they found a crowd assembled round the Luckenbooths, waiting for the breaking up of the States, which were then deliberating anent the proposal from the French king, that the Prince Dolphin, his son, should marry our young queen, the fair and faulty Mary, whose doleful captivity and woful end scarcely expiated the sins and sorrows that she caused to her ill-used and poor misgoverned native realm of Scotland. While they were standing in this crowd, my grandfather happened to see one Icener Cunningham, a servant in the household of the Earl of Glencairn, and having some acquaintance of the man before at Lithgow, he went towards him, and after some common talk, told on what errand he and his two companions had come to Edinburgh. It was in consequence agreed between them, that this Icener should speak to his master concerning them; the which he did as soon as my Lord came out from the Parliament; and the Earl was so well pleased with the looks of the three young men, that he retained them for his service on the spot, and they were conducted by Icener Cunningham home to his Lordship's lodgings in St Mary's Wynd. Thus was my grandfather inlisted into the cause of the Lords of the Congregation; and in the service of that great champion of the Reformation, the renowned, valiant, and pious Earl of Glencairn, he saw many of those things, the recital of which kindled my young mind to flame up with no less ardour than his, against the cruel attempt that was made, in our own day and generation, to load the neck of Scotland with the grievous chains of prelatic tyranny. CHAPTER II THE Earl of Glencairn, having much to do with the other Lords of the Congregation, did not come to his lodging till late in the afternoon; when, as soon as he had passed into his privy chamber, he sent for his three new men, and entered into some conversation with them concerning what the people at Lithgow said and thought of the Queen-dowager's government, and the proceedings at that time afoot on behalf of the reformed religion. But my grandfather jealoused that in this he was less swayed by the expectation of gathering knowledge from them, than by a wish to inspect their discretion and capacities; for, after conversing with them for the space of half an hour, or thereby, he dismissed them courteously from his presence, without intimating that he had any special service for them to perform. One evening as the Earl sat alone at supper, he ordered my grandfather to be brought again before him, and desired him to be cup-bearer for that night. In this situation, as my grandfather stood holding the chalice and flagon at his left elbow, the Earl, as was his wonted custom with such of the household as he, from time to time, so honoured, entered into familiar conversation with him; and when the servitude and homages of the supper were over, and the servants were removing the plate and trenchers, he signified, by a look and a whisper, that he wished him to linger in the room till after they were gone. %"Gilhaize,%' said he, when the serving men had retired, and they were by themselves, %"I am well content with your prudence, and therefore, before you are known to belong to my train, I would send you on a confidential errand, for which you must be ready to set forth this very night.%' My grandfather made no reply in words to this mark of trust, but bowed his head, in token of his obedience to the commands of the Earl. %"I need not tell you,%' resumed his master, %"that, among the friends of the reformed cause, there are some for policy, and many for gain; and that our adversaries, knowing this, leave no device or stratagem untried to sow sedition among the Lords and Leaders of the Congregation. This very day the Earl of Argyle has received a mealy-mouthed letter from that dissolute papist, the Archbishop of St Andrews, entreating him, with many sweet words, concerning the ancient friendship subsisting between their families, to banish from his protection that good and pious proselyte, Douglas, his chaplain; evidently presuming, from the easy temper of the aged Earl, that he may be wrought into compliance. But Argyle is an honest man, and is this night to return, by the Archbishop's messenger and kinsman, Sir David Hamilton, a fitting and proper reply. It is not however to be thought, that this attempt to tamper with Argyle is the sole trial which the treacherous priest is at this time making to breed distrust and dissension among us, though as yet we have heard of none other. Now, Gilhaize, what I wish you to do, and I think you can do it well, is to throw yourself in Sir David's way, and, by hook or crook, get with him to St Andrews, and there try by all expedient means to gain a knowledge of what the Archbishop is at this time plotting_for plotting we are assured from this symptom he is_and it is needful to the cause of Christ that his wiles should be circumvented.%' In saying these words the Earl rose, and, taking a key from his belt, opened a coffer that stood in the corner of the room, and took out two pieces of gold, which he delivered to my grandfather, to bear the expenses of his journey. %"I give you, Gilhaize,%' said he, %"no farther instructions; for, unless I am mistaken in my man, you lack no better guide than your own discernment. So God be with you, and His blessing prosper the undertaking.%' My grandfather was much moved at being so trusted, and doubted in his own breast if he was qualified for the duty which his master had thus put upon him. Nevertheless he took heart from the Earl's confidence, and, without saying any thing either to his two companions or to Icener Cunningham, he immediately, on parting from his master, left the house, leaving his absence to be accounted for to the servants according to his lord's pleasure. Having been several times on errands of his father in Edinburgh before, he was not ill-acquainted with the town, and the moon being up, he had no difficulty in finding his way to Habby Bridle's, a noted stabler's at the foot of Leith Wynd, nigh the mouth of the North Loch, where gallants and other travellers of gentle condition commonly put up their horses. There he thought it was likely Sir David Hamilton had stabled his steed, and he divined that, by going thither, he would learn whether that knight had set forward to Fyfe, or when he was expected so to do; the which movement, he always said, was nothing short of an instinct from Heaven; for just on entering the stabler's yard, a groom came shouting to the hostler to get Sir David Hamilton's horses saddled outright, as his master was coming. Thus, without the exposure of any inquiry, he gained the tidings that he wanted, and with what speed he could put into his heels, he went forward to the pier of Leith, where he found a bark, with many passengers on board, ready to set sail for Kirkcaldy, waiting only for the arrival of Sir David, to whom, as the Archbishop's kinsman, the boatmen were fain to pretend a great outward respect; but many a bitter ban, my grandfather said, they gave him for taigling them so long, while wind and tide both served,_all which was proof and evidence how much the hearts of the common people were then alienated from the papistical churchmen. Sir David having arrived, and his horses being taken aboard, the bark set sail, and about day-break next morning she came to anchor at Kirkcaldy. During the voyage, my grandfather, who was of a mild and comely aspect, observed that the knight was more affable towards him than to the lave of the passengers, the most part of whom were coopers going to Dundee to prepare for the summer fishing. Among them was one Patrick Girdwood, the deacon of the craft, a most comical character, so vogie of his honours and dignities in the town-council, that he could not get the knight told often enough what a load aboon the burden he had in keeping a' things douce and in right regulation amang the bailies. But Sir David, fashed at his clatter, and to be quit of him, came across the vessel, and began to talk to my grandfather, although, by his apparel, he was no meet companion for one of a knight's degree. It happened that Sir David was pleased with his conversation, which was not to be wondered at; for in his old age, when I knew him, he was a man of a most enticing mildness of manner, and withal so discreet in his sentences, that he could not be heard without begetting respect for his observance and judgment. So out of the vanity of that vogie tod of the town-council, was a mean thus made by Providence to further the ends and objects of the Reformation, in so far as my grandfather was concerned; for the knight took a liking to him, and being told, as it was expedient to give a reason for his journey to St Andrews, that he was going thither to work as a ferrier, Sir David promised him not only his own countenance, but to commend him to the Archbishop. There was at that time in Kirkcaldy one Tobit Balmuto, a horse-setter, of whom my grandfather had some knowledge by report. This Tobit being much resorted to by the courtiers going to and coming from Falkland, and well known to their serving-men, who were wont to speak of him in the smiddy at Lithgow as a zealous reformer,_chiefly, as the prodigals among them used to jeer and say, because the priests and friars, in their journeyings atween St Andrews and Edinburgh, took the use of his beasts without paying for them, giving him only their feckless benisons instead of white money. To this man my grandfather resolved to apply for a horse, and such a one, if possible, as would be able to carry him as fast as Sir David Hamilton's. Accordingly, on getting to the land, he inquired for Tobit Balmuto, and several of his striplings and hostlers being on the shore, having, on seeing the bark arrive, come down to look out for travellers that might want horses, he was conducted by one of them to their employer, whom he found an elderly man, of the corpulent order, sitting in an elbow-chair by the fireside, toasting an oaten bannock on a pair of tormentors, with a blue puddock-stool bonnet on his head, and his grey hose undrawn up, whereby his hairy legs were bare, showing a power and girth such as my grandfather had seen few like before, testifying to what had been the deadly strength of their possessor in his younger years. He was thought to have been an off-gett of the Boswells of Balmuto. When he had made known his want to Tobit, and that he was in a manner obligated to be at St Andrews as soon as Sir David Hamilton, the horse-setter withdrew the bannock from before the ribs, and seeing it somewhat scowthert and blackent on the one cheek, he took it off the tormentors, and scraped it with them, and blew away the brown burning, before he made any response; then he turned round to my grandfather, and looking at him with the tail of his eye, from aneath his broad bonnet, said,_ %"Then ye're no in the service of his Grace, my Lord the Archbishop? and yet, frien', I think na ye're just a peer to Sir Davie, that ye need to ettle at coping with his braw mare, Skelp-the-dub, whilk I selt to him mysel; but the de'il a bawbee hae I yet han'let o' the price; howsever that's neither here nor there, a day of reckoning will come at last.%' My grandfather assured Tobit Balmuto, it was indeed very true he was not in the service of the Archbishop, and that he would not have been so instant about getting to St Andrews with the knight, had he not a dread and fear that Sir David was the bearer of something that might be sore news to the flock o' Christ, and he was fain to be there as soon as him, to speak in time of what he jealoused, that any of those in the town, who stood within the reverence of the Archbishop's aversion, on account of their religion, might get an inkling, and provide for themselves. %"If that's your errand,%' said the horse-setter, %"ye s'all hae the swiftest foot in my aught to help you on, and I redde you no to spare the spur, for I'm troubled to think ye may be owre late_Satan, or they lie upon him, has been heating his cauldrons yonder for a brewing, and the Archbishop's thrang providing the malt. Nae farther gane than yesterday, auld worthy Mr Mill of Lunan, being discovered hidden in a kiln at Dysart, was ta'en, they say, in a cart, like a malefactor, by twa uncircumcised loons, servitors to his Grace, and it's thought it will go hard wi' him, on account of his great godliness; so mak what haste ye dow, and the Lord put mettle in the beast that bears you.%' With that Tobit Balmuto ordered the lad who brought my grandfather to the house, to saddle a horse that he called Spunkie; and in a trice he was mounted and on the road after Sir David, whom he overtook, notwithstanding the spirit of his mare, Skelp-the-dub, before he had cleared the town of Pathhead, and they travelled onward at a brisK trot together, the Knight waxing more and more pleased with his companion, in so much, that by the time they had reached Cupar, where they stopped to corn, he lamented that a young man of his parts should think of following the slavery of a ferrier's life, when he might rise to trusts and fortune in the house of some of the great men of the time, kindly offering to procure for him, on their arrival at St Andrews, the favour and patronage of his kinsman, the Archbishop. CHAPTER III IT was the afternoon when my grandfather and Sir David Hamilton came in sight of St Andrews, and the day being loun and bright, the sky clear, and the sea calm, he told me, that, when he saw the many lofty spires and towers and glittering pinnacles of the town rising before him, he verily thought he was approaching the city of Jerusalem, so grand and glorious was the apparition which they made in the sunshine, and he approached the barricadoed gate with a strange movement of awe and wonder rushing through the depths of his spirit. They, however, entered not into the city at that time, but, passing along the wall leftward, came to a road which led to the gate of the castle where the Archbishop then dwelt; and as they were approaching towards it, Sir David pointed out the window where Cardinal Beaton sat in the pomp of his scarlet and fine linen to witness the heretic Wishart, as the knight called that holy man, burnt for his sins and abominations. My grandfather, on hearing this, drew his bridle in, and falling behind Sir David, raised his cap in reverence and in sorrow at the thought of passing over the ground that had been so hallowed by martyrdom. But he said nothing, for he knew that his thoughts were full of offence to those who were wrapt in the errors and delusions of popery like Sir David Hamilton; and, moreover, he had thanked the Lord thrice in the course of their journey for the favour which it had pleased Him he should find in the sight of the kinsman of so great an adversary to the truth as was the Archbishop of St Andrews, whose treasons and treacheries against the church of Christ he was then travelling to discover and waylay. On reaching the castle-yett they alighted: my grandfather springing lightly from the saddle, took hold of Sir David's mare by the bridle-rings, while the knight went forward, and whispered something concerning his Grace to a stalwart hard-favoured grey-haired man-at-arms, that stood warder of the port leaning on his sword, the blade of whilk could not be shorter than an ell. What answer he got was brief, the ancient warrior pointing at the same time with his right hand towards a certain part of the city, and giving a Belial smile of significance; whereupon Sir David turned round without going into the court of the castle, and bidding my grandfather give the man the beasts and follow, which he did, they walked together under the town wall towards the east, till they came to a narrow sallyport in the rampart, wherewith the priory and cathedral had of old been fenced about with turrets and bastions of great strength against the lawless kerns of the Highlands, and especially the ships of the English, who have in all ages been of a nature gleg and glad to mulct and molest the sea-harbour towns of Scotland. On coming to the sallyport, Sir David chapped with his whip twice, and from within a wicket was opened in the doors, ribbed with iron stainchers on the outside, and a man with the sound of corpulency in his voice, looked through and inquired what they wanted. Seeing, however, who it was that had knocked, he forthwith drew the bar and allowed them to enter, which was into a pleasant policy adorned with jonquils and jelly-flowers, and all manner of blooming and odoriferous plants, most voluptuous to the smell and ravishing to behold, the scents and fragrancies whereof smote my grandfather for a time, as he said, with the very anguish of delight. But, on looking behind to see who had given them admittance, he was astounded when, instead of an armed and mailed soldier, as he had thought the drumly-voiced sentinel there placed was, he saw a large elderly monk, sitting on a bench with a broken pasty smoking on a platter beside him, and a Rotterdam greybeard jug standing by, no doubt plenished with cordial drink. Sir David held no parlance with the feeding friar, but going straight up the walk to the door of a lodging, to the which this was the parterre and garden, he laid his hand on the sneck, and opening it, bade my grandfather come in. They then went along the trance towards an open room, and on entering it they met a fair damsel in the garb of a handmaid, to whom the knight spoke in familiarity, and kittling her under the chin, made her giggle in a wanton manner. By her he was informed that the Archbishop was in the inner chamber at dinner with her mistress, upon which he desired my grandfather to sit down, while he went ben to his Grace. The room where my grandfather took his seat was parted from the inner chamber, in which the Archbishop and his lemane were at their festivities, by an arras partition, so that he could hear all that passed within, and the first words his Grace said on his kinsman going ben were_ %"Aweel, Davie, and what says that auld doddard Argyle, will he send me the apostate to mak a bonfire?%' %"He has sent your Grace a letter,%' replied Sir David, %"wherein he told me he had expounded the reasons and causes of his protecting Douglas, hoping your Grace will approve the same.%' %"Approve heresy and reprobacy!%' exclaimed the Archbishop; %"but gi'e me the letter, and sit ye down, Davie._Mistress Kilspinnie, my dauty, fill him a cup of wine, the malvesie, to put smeddum in his marrow: he'll no be the waur o't, after his gallanting at Enbro._Stay! what's this? the auld man's been at school since him and me hae swappit paper. My word, Argyle, thou's got a tongue in thy pen neb! but this was ne'er indited by him; the cloven foot of the heretical Carmelite is manifest in every line. Honour and conscience truly!_braw words for a hieland schore, that bigs his bield wi' other folks gear!%' %"Be composed, your sweet Grace, and dinna be so fashed,%' cried a silver-tongued madam, the which my grandfather afterwards found, as I shall have to rehearse, was his concubine, the Mrs Kilspinnie_%"what does he say?%' %"Say! why that Douglas preaches against idolatry, and he remits to my conscience forsooth, gif that be heresy_and he preaches against adulteries and fornications too_was ever sic varlet terms written in ony nobleman's letter afore this apostate's time_and he refers that to my conscience likewise!%' %"A faggot to his tail would be owre gude for him,%' cried Mrs Kilspinnie. %"He preaches against hypocrisy,%' said his Grace, %"the which he also refers to my conscience_conscience again! Hae, Davie, tak thir clishmaclavers to Andrew Oliphant. It'll be spunk to his zeal. We maun strike our adversaries wi' terror, and if we canna wile them back to the fold, we'll e'en set the dogs on them_Kind Mistress Kilspinnie, help me frae the stoup o' sherries, for I canna but say that this scalded heart I hae gotten frae that auld shavling-gabbit hielander has raised my corruption, and I stand in need, my lambie, o' a' your winsome comforting.%' At which words Sir David came forth the chamber with the letter in his hand; but seeing my grandfather, whom it would seem he had forgotten, he went suddenly back and said to his Grace_ %"Please you, my Lord, I hae brought with me a young man of a good capacity and a ripe understanding, that I would commend to your Grace's service. He is here in the outer room waiting your Grace's pleasure.%' %"Davie Hamilton,%' replied the Archbishop, %"ye sometimes lack discretion_what for did ye bring a stranger into this house_knowing as ye ought to do, that I ne'er come hither but when I'm o' a sickly frame, in need o' solace and repose? Howsever, since the lad's there, bid him come ben.%' Upon this, Sir David came out and beckoned my grandfather to go in; and when he went forward, he saw none in that inner chamber but his Grace and the Mrs Kilspinnie, with whom he was sitting on a bedside, before a well-garnished table, whereon was divers silver flagons, canisters of comfits, and goblets of the crystal of Venetia. He looked sharp at my grandfather, perusing him from head to foot, who put on for the occasion a face of modesty and reverence, but he was none daunted for all his eyes were awake, and he took such a cognition of his Grace as he never afterwards forgot. Indeed, I have often heard him say, that he saw more of the man in the brief space of that interview, than of others in many intromissions, and he used to depict him to me as a hale black-avised carl, of an o'ersea look, with a long dark beard inclining to grey; his abundant hair, flowing down from his cowl, was also clouded and streaked with the kithings of the cranreuch of age_there was, however, a youthy and luscious twinkling in his eyes, that showed how little the passage of three and fifty winters had cooled the rampant sensuality of his nature. His right leg, which was naked, though on the foot was a slipper of Spanish leather, he laid o'er Mistress Kilspinnie's knees, as he threw himself back against the pillar of the bed, the better to observe and converse with my grandfather; and she, like another Delilah, began to pattle it with her fingers, casting at the same time glances, unseen by her papistical paramour, towards my grandfather, who, as I have said, was a comely and well-favoured young man. After some few questions as to his name and parentage, the prelate said he would give him his livery, being then anxious, on account of the signs of the times, to fortify his household with stout and valiant youngsters; and bidding him draw near and to kneel down, he laid his hand on his head, and mumbled a benedicite; the which my grandfather said, was as the smell of rottenness to his spirit, the lascivious hirkos, then wantoning so openly with his adulterous concubine, for no better was Mistress Kilspinnie, her husband, a creditable man, being then living, and one of the bailies of Crail. Nor is it to be debated, that the scene was such as ought not to have been seen in a Christian land; but in those days the blasphemous progeny of the Roman harlot were bold with the audacious sinfulness of their parent, and set little store by the fear of God, or the contempt of man. It was a sore trial and a struggle in the bosom of my grandfather that day, to think of making a show of homage and service towards the mitred Belial and high priest of the abominations wherewith the realm was polluted, and when he rose from under his paw, he shuddered, and felt as if he had received the foul erls of perdition from the Evil One. Many a bitter tear he long after shed in secret for the hypocrisy of that hour, the guilt of which was never sweetened to his conscience, even by the thought that he may be thereby helped to further the great redemption of his native land, in the blessed cleansing of the Reformation. CHAPTER IV SIR David Hamilton conducted my grandfather back through the garden and the sallyport to the castle, where he made him acquainted with his Grace's seneschal, by whom he was hospitably entertained when the knight had left them together, receiving from him a cup of hippocras, and a plentiful repast, the like of which, for the savouriness of the viands, was seldom seen out of the howfs of the monks. The seneschal was called by name Leonard Meldrum, and was a most douce and composed character, well stricken in years, and though engrained with the errors of papistry, as was natural for one bred and cherished in the house of the speaking horn of the Beast, for such the high priest of St Andrews was well likened to, he was nevertheless a man of a humane heart and great tenderness of conscience. The while my grandfather was sitting with him at the board, he lamented that the Church, so he denominated the papal abomination, was so far gone with the spirit of punishment and of cruelty, as rather to shock men's minds into schism and rebellion, than to allure them back into worship and reverence, and to a repentance of their heresies. A strain of discourse which my grandfather so little expected to hear within the gates and precincts of the guilty castle of St Andrews, that it made him for a time distrust the sincerity of the old man, and he was very guarded in what he himself answered thereto. Leonard Meldrum was, however, honest in his way, and rehearsed many things which had been done within his own knowledge against the reformers, that, as he said, human nature could not abide, nor the just and merciful Heavens well pardon. Thus, from less to more, my grandfather and he fell into frank communion, and he gave him such an account of the bloody Cardinal Beaton, as was most awful to hear, saying, that his then present master, with all his faults and prodigalities, was a saint of purity compared to that rampagious cardinal, the which to hear, my grandfather thinking of what he had seen in the lodging of Madam Kilspinnie, was seized with such a horror thereat, that he could partake no more of the repast before him; and he was likewise moved into a great awe and wonder of spirit, that the Lord should thus, in the very chief sanctuary of papistry in all Scotland, be alienating the affections of the servants from their master, preparing the way, as it were, for an utter desertion and desolation to ensue. They afterwards talked of the latter end of that great martyr, Mr George Wishart, and the seneschal informed him of several things concerning the same, that were most edifying, though sorrowful to hear. %"He was,%' said he, %"placed under my care, and methinks I shall ever see him before me, so meek, so holy, and so goodly was his aspect. He was of tall stature, black hair'd, long bearded, of a graceful carriage, elegant, courteous, and ready to teach. In his apparel he was most comely, and in his diet of an abstemious temperance. On the morning of his execution, when I gave him notice that he was not to be allowed to have the sacrament, he smiled with a holiness of resignation that almost melted me to weep. I then invited him to partake of my breakfast, which he accepted with cheerfulness, saying_ %""I will do it very willingly, and so much the rather, because I perceive you to be a good Christian, and a man fearing God.' %"I then ordered in the breakfast, and he said_ %""I beseech you, for the love you bear to our Saviour, to be silent a little while, till I have made a short exhortation, and blessed this bread we are to eat.' %"He then spoke about the space of half an hour of our Saviour's death and passion, exhorting me, and those who were present with me, to mutual love and holiness of life; and giving thanks, brake the bread, distributing a part to those about him; then taking a cup, he bade us remember that Christ's blood was shed to wash away our sins, and, tasting it himself, he handed it to me, and I likewise partook of it: then he concluded with another prayer, at the end of which he said, "I will neither drink nor eat any more in this world,' and he forthwith entered into an inner chamber where his bed was, leaving us filled with admiration and sorrow, and our eyes flowing with tears.%' To this the seneschal added, %"I fear, I fear, we are soon to have another scene of the same sort, for to-morrow the Bishops of Murray, and Brechin, and Caithness, with other dignitaries, are summoned to the cathedral, to sit in judgment on the aged priest of Lunan, that was brought hither from Dysart yestreen, and from the head the newfangled heresies are making, there's little doubt that the poor auld man will be made an example. Woes me! far better would it be an they would make an example of the like of the Earls of Argyle and Glencairn, by whom the reprobates are so encouraged.%' %"And is this Mill,%' inquired my grandfather with diffidence, for his heart was so stung with what he heard, that he could scarcely feign the necessary hypocrisy which the peril he stood in required_%"Is this Mill in the castle?%' %"Sorry am I to say it,%' replied the seneschal, %"and under my keeping; but I darena show him the pity that I would fain do to his grey hairs and aged limbs. Some of the monks of the priory are with him just now, trying to get him to recant his errors, with the promise of a bein provision for the remainder of his days in the abbey of Dunfermline, the whilk I hope our blessed Lady will put it into his heart to accept.%' %"I trust%' said my grandfather in the core of his bosom, %"that the Lord will fortify him to resist the temptation.%' This, however, the seneschal heard not, for it was ejaculated inwardly, and he subjoined_ %"When the monks go away, I will take you in to see him, for truly he is a sight far more moving to compassion than displeasure, whatsoever his sins and heresies may be.%' In this manner, for the space of more than an hour, did my grandfather hold converse and communion with Leonard Meldrum, in whom he was often heard to say, there was more of the leaven of a sanctified nature, than in the disposition of many zealous and professing Christians. When the two shavlings that had been afflicting Master Mill with the offer of the wages of Satan were departed from the castle, the seneschal rose, and bidding my grandfather to come after him, they went out of the room, and traversing a narrow dark passage with many windings, came to the foot of a turnpike stair which led up into the sea-tower, so called because it stood farthermost of all the castle in the sea, and in the chamber thereof they found Master Mill alone, sitting at the window, with his ancient and shrivelled lean hand resting on the sole and supporting his chin, as he looked through the iron stainchers abroad on the ocean that was sleeping in a blessed tranquillity around, all glowing and golden with the schimmer of the setting sun. %"How fares it with you?%' said the seneschal with a kindly accent; whereupon the old man, who had not heard them enter, being tranced in his own holy meditations, turned round, and my grandfather said he felt himself, when he beheld his countenance, so smitten with awe and admiration, that he could not for some time advance a step. %"Come in, Master Meldrum, and sit ye down by me!%' said the godly man. %"Draw near unto me, for I am a thought hard of hearing. The Lord has of late, by steeking the doors and windows of my earthly tabernacle, been admonishing me that the gloaming is come, and the hour of rest cannot be far off.%' His voice, said my grandfather, was as the sound of a mournful melody, but his countenance was brightened with a solemn joyfulness. He was of a pale and spiritual complexion; his eyes beamed as it were with a living light, and often glanced thoughts of heavenly imaginings, even as he sat in silence. He was then fourscore and two years old; but his appearance was more aged, for his life had been full of suffering and poverty; and his venerable hands and skinny arms were heart-melting evidences of his ineffectual power to struggle much longer in the warfare of this world. In sooth, he was a chosen wheat-ear, ripened and ready for the garnels of salvation. %"I have brought, Master Mill,%' said the seneschal, %"a discreet youth to see you, not out of a vain curiosity, for he sorrows with an exceeding grief that such an aged person should be brought into a state of so great jeopardy; but I hope, Master Mill, it will go well with you yet, and that ye'll repent and accept the boon that I hae heard was to be proffered.%' To these words the aged saint made no reply for the space of about a minute; at the end of which he raised his hands, and casting his eyes heavenward, exclaimed_ %"I thank thee, O Lord, for the days of sore trial, and want, and hunger, and thirst, and destitution, which thou hast been pleased to bestow upon me, for by them have I, even now as I stand on the threshold of life, been enabled, through thy merciful heartenings, to set at nought the temptations wherewith I have been tempted.%' And, turning to the seneschal, he added mildly, %"But I am bound to you, Master Meldrum, in great obligations, for I know that, in the hope you have now expressed, there is the spirit of much charitableness, albeit you discern not the deadly malady that the sin of compliance would bring to my poor soul. No, sir, it would na be worth my while now, for world's gain, to read a recantation. And blessed be God, it's no in my power to yield, so deeply are the truths of his laws engraven upon the tablet of my heart.%' They then fell into more general discourse, and while they were speaking, a halberdier came into the room with a paper, whereby the prisoner was summoned to appear in the cathedral next day by ten o'clock, to answer divers matters of heresy and schism laid to his charge; and the man having delivered the summons, said to the seneschal, that he was ordered by Sir Andrew Oliphant, to bid him refrain from visiting the prisoner, and to retire to his own lodging. The seneschal to this command said nothing, but rose, and my grandfather likewise rose. Fain would he have knelt down to beg the blessing of the martyr, but the worthy Master Meldrum signified to him with a look to come at once away; and when they were returned back into his chamber where the repast had been served, he told him, that there was a danger of falling under the evil thoughts of Oliphant, were he to be seen evidencing any thing like respect towards prisoners accused of the sin of heresy. 17:34:16 6 … VME 2900 OPERATING SYSTEM JOB: YK02SGALT2 USER: XLASER 1984/03/19__17:34:16 … RUN UNDER PROFILE DAY FROM OP0A … 17:34:48 4 OUCS JOB TIMER: limit 60 seconds 17:34:50 1 0001 WHENEVER RESULT NE 0 THEN SRSMSG(RESULT, "GOTO QUIT") FI 17:34:50 1 0002 SETOPTIONS(NOLREADS) 17:34:50 1 0003 CRF(,OUTF) 17:34:51 1 0004 LASERCHECK(PROJNAME=YK02S,INPUT=REMOTEJOBDESC,OUTPUT=GALT2, 17:34:53 1 0005 SAVELIST=*OUTF,LANGTYPE=LAT1) 17:34:53 4 * LASERCHECK version 16. March 1984 * input from :XLASER.REMOTEJOBDESC(1,*,1) 17:34:57 57 RI_TRANSLATE_BE_FILENAME,PROCESSING *OUTF ,RECEIVED 0 FROM THN AND GENERATED 43751. 17:34:57 57 CREATE_FILE,PROCESSING *OUTF ,RECEIVED 43751 FROM RI_TRANSLATE_BE_FILENAME AND GENERATED 43751. listing to :XLASER/ICL8403191734510507.ICL8403191734510625(1,*,1) 17:34:58 57 CREATE_FILE,PROCESSING *OUCSCRAFCURRJSV.YK02SGALT2(+1) ,RECEIVED 43754 FROM RI_TRANSLATE_BE_FILENAME AND GENERATED 43754. 17:34:58 4 OXTIME: limit 54 seconds 17:35:33 75 FORTRAN STOP OK 17:35:34 4 output to :LASER.LASEROUTLAT1(3,*,1).YK02SGALT2(1) 17:35:34 4 Used 13.012 seconds 17:35:35 1 0487 QUIT: WHENEVER RESULT NE 0 THEN SRSMSG(RESULT) FI 17:35:35 1 0488 OXTJNF(YK,*OUTF,"second.out","lxxlx","geoiu",*STDFORT) 17:35:41 4 Cost_so_far 17:35:41 4 DAY 17:35:41 4 Elapsed (mins) 1 17:35:41 4 Filestore (xfers) 403 17:35:41 4 OCP (seconds) 15 17:35:41 4 Charge (credits) 0 17:35:41 4 Listing of LASERCHECK input 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. 6. 7. CHAPTER V 8. 9. 10. THE next day was like a cried fair in St Andrews. 11. All the country from ayont Cupar, and many 12. reformed and godly persons, even from Dundee 13. and Perth, were gathered into the city to hear 14. the trial of Master Walter Mill. The streets 15. were filled with horses and men with whips in 16. their hands and spurs at their heels, and there 17. was a great going to and fro among the 18. multitude; but, saving in its numbers, the 19. congregation of the people was in no other 20. complexion either like a fair or a tryst. Every 21. visage was darkened with doure thoughts; none 22. spoke cheerfully aloud; but there was whispering 23. and muttering, and ever and anon the auld 24. men were seen wagging their heads in sorrow, 25. while the young cried often %"Shame! shame!%' 26. and with vehement gestures clave the air with 27. their right hands, grasping their whips and 28. staffs with the vigour of indignation. 29. At last the big bell of the cathedral began to 30. jow, at the doleful sound of which there was, for 31. the space of two or three minutes, a silence and 32. pause in the multitude, as if they had been 33. struck with panic and consternation; for till 34. then there was a hope among them that the 35. persecutors would relent; but the din of the bell 36. was as the signal of death and despair, and the 37. people were soon awakened from their astonishment 38. by the cry that %"the bishops are coming;%' 39. whereat there was a great rush towards the gates 40. of the church, which was presently filled, leaving 41. only a passage up the middle aisle. 42. In the quire a table was spread with a purple 43. velvet cloth, and at the upper end, before the 44. high place of the mass, was a stool of state for 45. the Archbishop; on each side stood chairs for 46. the Bishops of Murray, Brechin, and Caithness 47. and his other suffragans, summoned to sit in 48. judgment with him. 49. My grandfather, armed and wearing the 50. Archbishop's livery, was with those that guarded 51. the way for the cruel prelates, and by the 52. pressure of the throng in convoying them into 53. their place, he was driven within the skreen 54. of the quire, and saw and heard all that 55. passed. 56. When they had taken their seats, Master Mill 57. was brought before them from the prior's 58. chamber, whither he had been secretly conducted 59. early in the morning, to the end that his great 60. age might not be seen of the people to work 61. on their compassion. But, notwithstanding the 62. forethought of this device, when he came in, his 63. white hair, and his saintly look, and his feeble 64. tottering steps, softened every heart; even the 65. very legate of antichrist, the Archbishop himself, 66. my grandfather said, was evidently moved, and 67. for a season looked at the poor infirm old man 68. as he would have spared him, and a murmur of 69. universal commiseration ran through the church. 70. On being taken to the bottom of the table, 71. and placed fornent the Archbishop, Master Mill 72. knelt down and prayed for support, in a voice 73. so firm, and clear, and eloquent, that all present 74. were surprised; for it rung to the farthest corner 75. of that great edifice, and smote the hearts of 76. his oppressors as with the dread of a menacing 77. oracle. 78. Sir Andrew Oliphant, who acted as clerk and 79. chancellor on the occasion, began to fret as he 80. heard him thus strengthened of the Lord, and 81. cried, peevishly_ 82. %"Sir Walter Mill, get up and answer, for you 83. keep my lords here too long.%' 84. He, however, heeded not this command, but 85. continued undisturbed till he had finished his 86. devotion, when he rose and said_ 87. %"I am bound to obey God more than man, 88. and I serve a mightier Lord than yours. You 89. call me Sir Walter, but I am only Walter. Too 90. long was I one of the Pope's knights: but now 91. say what you have to say.%' 92. Oliphant was somewhat cowed by this bold 93. reply, and he bowed down, and turning over his 94. papers, read a portion of one of them to himself, 95. and then raising his head, said_ 96. %"What thinkest thou of priests' marriage?%' 97. The old man looked bravely towards the 98. bishops, and answered with an intrepid voice_ 99. %"I esteem marriage a blessed bond, ordained 100. by God, approved by Christ, and made free to 101. all sorts of men; but you abhor it, and in the 102. meantime take other men's wives and daughters; 103. you vow chastity, and keep it not.%' 104. My grandfather at these words looked unawares 105. towards the Archbishop, thinking of what he had 106. seen in the lodging of Mistress Kilspinnie; and 107. their eyes chancing to meet, his Grace turned his 108. head suddenly away as if he had been rebuked. 109. Divers other questions were then put by 110. Oliphant, touching the sacraments, the idolatry 111. of the mass, and transubstantiation, with other 112. points concerning bishops, and pilgrimages, and 113. the worshipping of God in unconsecrated places; 114. to all which Master Mill answered in so brave a 115. manner, contrary to the papists, that even 116. Oliphant himself often looked reproved and 117. confounded. At last the choler of that sharp 118. weapon of persecution began to rise, and he said 119. to him sternly_ 120. %"If you will not recant, I will pronounce 121. sentence against you.%' 122. %"I know,%' replied Master Mill, with an 123. apostolic constancy and fortitude, %"I know that 124. I must die once; and therefore, as Christ said 125. to Judas, What thou doest do quickly. You 126. shall know that I will not recant the truth; for 127. I am corn and not chaff. I will neither be 128. blown away by the wind, nor burst with the 129. flail, but will abide both.%' 130. At these brave words a sough of admiration 131. sounded through the church, but, instead of 132. deterring the prelates from proceeding with 133. their wicked purpose, it only served to harden 134. their hearts and to rouse their anger; for when 135. they had conferred a few minutes apart, Oliphant 136. was ordered to condemn him to the fire, and to 137. deliver him over to the temporal magistrates to 138. see execution done. 139. No sooner was the sentence known, than a cry 140. like a howl of wrath rose from all the people, 141. and the provost of the town, who was present 142. with the bailies, hastily quitted the church and 143. fled, abhorring the task, and fearful it would be 144. put upon him to see it done, he being also bailie 145. of the archbishop's regalities. 146. When the sentence was pronounced, the session 147. of the court was adjourned, and the bishops, as 148. they were guarded back to the castle, heard 149. many a malison from the multitude, who were 150. ravenous against them. 151. The aged martyr being led back to the prior's 152. chamber, was, under cloud of night, taken to 153. the castle; but my grandfather saw no more of 154. him, nor of Master Meldrum the seneschal; for 155. there was a great fear among the bishop's men 156. that the multitude would rise and attempt a 157. rescue; and my grandfather, not being inclined 158. to go so far with his disguise as to fight against 159. that cause, took occasion, in the dusk of the 160. evening, to slip out of the castle, and to hide 161. himself in the town, being resolved, after what 162. he had witnessed, no longer to abide, even as 163. a spy, in a service which his soul loathed. 164. All the night long there was a great commotion 165. in the streets, and lights in many houses, and a 166. sound of lamentation mingled with rage. The 167. noise was as if some dreadful work was going 168. on. There was no shouting, nor any sound of 169. men united together, but a deep and hoarse 170. murmur rose at times from the people, like the 171. sound of the bandless waves of the sea when 172. they are driven by the strong impulses of the 173. tempest. The spirit of the times was indeed 174. upon them, and it was manifest to my grandfather, 175. that there wanted that night but the voice of a 176. captain to bid them hurl their wrath and 177. vengeance against the towers and strongholds 178. of the oppressors. 179. At the dawn of day the garrison of the castle 180. came forth, and on the spot where the martyrdom 181. of Mr George Wishart had been accomplished, 182. a stake was driven into the ground, and faggots 183. and barrels of tar were placed around it, piled 184. up almost as high as a man; in the middle, next 185. to the stake, a place was left for the sufferer. 186. But when all things were prepared, no rope 187. could be had_no one in all the town would 188. give or sell a cord to help that sacrifice of 189. iniquity, nor would any of the magistrates come 190. forth to see the execution done, so it was thought 191. for a time that the hungry cruelty of the 192. persecutors would be disappointed of its banquet. 193. One Somerville, however, who was officer of the 194. Archbishop's guard, bethought himself, in this 195. extremity, of the ropes wherewith his master's 196. pavilion was fastened, and he went and took 197. the same; and then his men brought forth the 198. aged martyr, at the sight of whom the multitude 199. set up a dreadful imprecation, the roar and 200. growling groan of which was as if a thousand 201. furious tigresses had been robbed of their young. 202. Many of Somerville's halberdiers looked cowed, 203. and their faces were aghast with terror; and 204. some cried, compassionately, as they saw the 205. blessed old man brought, with his hands tied 206. behind him, to the stake, %"Recant, recant!%' 207. The monks and friars of the different monasteries, 208. who were all there assembled around, 209. took up the word, and bitterly taunting him, 210. cried likewise, %"Recant, recant and save thyself!%' 211. He, however, replied to them with an awful 212. austerity_ 213. %"I marvel at your rage, ye hypocrites, who 214. do so cruelly pursue the servants of God. As 215. for me, I am now fourscore and two years old, 216. and by course of nature cannot live long; but 217. hundreds shall rise out of my ashes who shall 218. scatter you, ye persecutors of God's people.%' 219. Sir Andrew Oliphant, who was that day the 220. busiest high priest of the horrible sacrifice, at 221. these words pushed him forward into the midst 222. of the faggots and fuel around the stake. But, 223. nothing moved by this remorseless indignity, 224. the martyr looked for a moment at the pile 225. with a countenance full of cheerful resignation, 226. and then requested permission to say a few 227. words to the people. 228. %"You have spoken too much,%' cried Oliphant, 229. %"and the bishops are exceedingly displeased 230. with what you have said.%' 231. But the multitude exclaimed, %"Let him be 232. heard! let him speak what he pleases!_speak, 233. and heed not Oliphant.%' At which he looked 234. towards them and said_ 235. %"Dear friends, the cause why I suffer this day 236. is not for any crime laid to my charge, though 237. I acknowledge myself a miserable sinner, but 238. only for the defence of the truths of Jesus Christ, 239. as set forth in the Old and New Testaments.%' 240. He then began to pray, and while his eyes 241. were shut, two of Somerville's men threw a cord 242. with a running-loop round his body, and bound 243. him to the stake. The fire was then kindled, 244. and at the sight of the smoke the multitude 245. uttered a shriek of anguish, and many ran 246. away, unable to bear any longer the sight of 247. that woful tragedy. Among others, my grandfather 248. also ran, nor halted till he was come to 249. a place under the rocks on the south side of the 250. town, where he could see nothing before him but 251. the lonely desert of the calm and soundless ocean. 252. 253. 254. CHAPTER VI 255. 256. MANY a time did my grandfather, in his old age, 257. when all things he spoke were but remembrances, 258. try to tell what passed in his bosom while he 259. was sitting alone, under those cliffy rocks, gazing 260. on the silent and innocent sea, thinking of that 261. dreadful work, more hideous than the horrors 262. of winds and waves, with which blinded men, in 263. the lusts of their idolatry, were then blackening 264. the ethereal face of heaven; but he was ever 265. unable to proceed for the struggles of his spirit 266. and the gushing of his tears. Verily it was 267. an awful thing to see that patriarchal man 268. overcome by the recollections of his youth; and 269. the manner in which he spoke of the papistical 270. cruelties was as the pouring of the energy of a 271. new life into the very soul, instigating thoughts 272. and resolutions of an implacable enmity against 273. those ruthless adversaries to the hopes and 274. redemption of the world, insomuch that, while 275. yet a child, I was often worked upon by what 276. he said, and felt my young heart so kindled with 277. the live coals of his godly enthusiasm, that he 278. himself has stopped in the eloquence of his 279. discourse, wondering at my fervour. Then he 280. would lay his hand upon my head, and say, 281. the Lord had not gifted me with such zeal 282. without having a task in store for my riper years. 283. His words of prophecy, as shall hereafter appear, 284. have greatly and wonderfully come to pass. 285. But it is meet that for a season I should rehearse 286. what ensued to him, for his story is full of 287. solemnities and strange accidents. 288. Having rested some time on the sea-shore, he 289. rose and walked along the toilsome shingle, 290. scarcely noting which way he went,_his 291. thoughts being busy with the martyrdom he 292. had witnessed, flushing one moment with a 293. glorious indignation, and fainting the next 294. with despondent reflections on his own friendless 295. state. For he looked upon himself as 296. adrift on the tides of the world, believing that 297. his patron, the Earl of Glencairn, would to a 298. surety condemn his lack of fortitude in not 299. enduring the servitude of the Archbishop, after 300. having been in so miraculous a manner accepted 301. into it, even as if Providence had made him a 302. special instrument to achieve the discoveries 303. which the Lords of the Congregation had then 304. so much at heart. And while he was walking 305. along in this fluctuating mood, he came suddenly 306. upon a man who was sitting, as he had so shortly 307. before been himself, sad and solitary, gazing on 308. the sea. The stranger, on hearing him approach, 309. rose hastily, and was moving quickly away; but 310. my grandfather called to him to stop and not to 311. be afraid, for he would harm no one. 312. %"I thought,%' said the melancholy man, %"that 313. all his Grace's retainers were at the execution of 314. the heretic.%' 315. There was something in the way in which he 316. uttered the latter clause of the sentence, that 317. seemed to my grandfather as if he would have 318. made use of better and fitter words, and therefore, 319. to encourage him into confidence, he 320. replied_ 321. %"I belong not to his Grace.%' 322. %"How is it then that you wear his livery, and 323. that I saw you, with Sir David Hamilton, enter 324. the garden of that misguided woman?%' 325. He could proceed no farther, for his heart 326. swelled, and his utterance was for a while 327. stifled, he being no other than the misfortunate 328. Bailie of Crail, whose light wife had sunk into 329. the depravity of the Archbishop's lemane. She 330. had been beguiled away from him and her five 331. babies, their children, by the temptations of a 332. Dominican, who, by habit and repute, was 333. pandarus to his Grace, and the poor man had 334. come to try if it was possible to wile her back. 335. My grandfather was melted with sorrow to see 336. his great affection for the unworthy concubine, 337. calling to mind the scene of her harlotry and 338. wanton glances_and he reasoned with him on 339. the great folly of vexing his spirit for a woman 340. so far lost to all shame and given over to iniquity. 341. But still the good man of Crail would not be 342. persuaded, but used many earnest entreaties 343. that my grandfather would assist him to see 344. his wife, in order that he might remonstrate 345. with her on the eternal perils in which she 346. had placed her precious soul. 347. My grandfather, though much moved by the 348. importunity of that weak honest man, nevertheless 349. withstood his entreaties, telling him 350. that he was minded to depart forthwith from 351. St Andrews and make the best of his way 352. back to Edinburgh, and so could embark in 353. no undertaking whatever. 354. Discoursing on that subject in this manner, 355. they strayed into the fields, and being wrapt 356. up in their conversation, they heeded not which 357. way they went, till turning suddenly round the 358. corner of an orchard, they saw the castle full 359. before them, about half a mile off, and a dim 360. white vapour mounting at times from the spot, 361. still surrounded by many spectators, where the 362. fires of martyrdom had burnt so fiercely. 363. Shuddering and filled with dread, my grandfather 364. turned away, and seeing several countrymen 365. passing, he inquired if all was over. 366. %"Yes,%' said they, %"and the soldiers are 367. slockening the ashes; but a' the waters of the 368. ocean-sea will never quench in Scotland the 369. flame that was kindled yonder this day.%' 370. The which words they said with a proud look, 371. thinking my grandfather, by his arms and gabardine, 372. belonged to the Archbishop's household,_but 373. the words were as manna to his religious 374. soul, and he gave inward praise and thanks that 375. the self-same tragical mean which had been 376. devised to terrify the Reformers, was thus, 377. through the mysterious wisdom of Providence, 378. made more emboldening than courageous wine 379. to fortify their hearts for the great work that 380. was before them. 381. Nothing, however, farther passed; but, changing 382. the course of their walk, my grandfather and 383. the sorrowful Master Kilspinnie, for so the poor 384. man of Crail was called, went back, and entering 385. the bow at the Shoegate, passed on towards a 386. vintner's that dwelt opposite to the convent of 387. the Blackfriars; for the day was by this time 388. far advanced, and they both felt themselves in 389. need of some refreshment. 390. While they were sitting together in the 391. vintner's apartment, a stripling came several 392. times into the room, and looked hard at my 393. grandfather, and then went away without 394. speaking. This was divers times repeated, and 395. at last it was so remarkable that even Master 396. Kilspinnie took notice of him, observing, that 397. he seemed as if he had something very particular 398. to communicate if an opportunity served, offering 399. at the same time to withdraw, to leave the room 400. clear for the youth to tell his errand. 401. My grandfather's curiosity was, by this strange 402. and new adventure to him, so awakened, that 403. he thought what his companion proposed a 404. discreet thing; so the honest bailie of Crail 405. withdrew himself, and going into the street, 406. left my grandfather alone. 407. No sooner was he gone out of the house than 408. the stripling, who had been sorning about the 409. door, again came in, and coming close up to 410. my grandfather's ear, said with a significance 411. not to be misconstrued, that if he would follow 412. him he would take him to free quarters, where 413. he would be more kindly entertained. 414. My grandfather, though naturally of a quiet 415. temperament, was nevertheless a bold and brave 416. youth, and there was something in the mystery 417. of this message, for such he rightly deemed it, 418. that made him fain to see the end thereof. So 419. he called in the vintner's wife and paid her the 420. lawin', telling her to say to the friend who had 421. been with him, when he came back, that he 422. would soon return. 423. The vintner's wife was a buxom and jolly 424. dame, and before taking up the money, she 425. gave a pawkie look at the stripling, and as my 426. grandfather and he were going out at the door, 427. she hit the gilly a bilf on the back, saying it 428. was a ne'er-do-weel trade he had ta'en up, and 429. that he was na blate to wile awa' her 430. customers,_crying after him, %"I redde ye warn your madam, 431. that gin she sends you here again, I'll may be 432. let his Grace ken that her cauldron needs 433. clouting.%' However, the graceless gilly but 434. laughed at the vintner's wife, winking as he 435. patted the side of his nose with his 436. fore-finger, which testified that he held her vows of 437. vengeance in very little reverence; and then 438. he went on, my grandfather following. 439. They walked up the street till they came to 440. the priory yett, when, turning down a wynd to 441. the left, he led my grandfather along between 442. two dykes, till they were come to a house that 443. stood by itself within a fair garden. But instead 444. of going to the door in an honest manner, he 445. bade him stop, and going forward he whistled 446. shrilly, and then flung three stones against a 447. butt, that was standing at the corner of the 448. house on a gauntrees to kep rain water from 449. the spouting image of a stone puddock that 450. vomited what was gathered from the roof in 451. the rones,_and soon after an upper casement 452. was opened, and a damsel looked forth; she 453. however said nothing to the stripling, but she 454. made certain signs which he understood, and 455. then she drew in her head, shutting the casement 456. softly, and he came back to my grandfather, 457. to whom he said it was not commodious at 458. that time for him to be received into the house, 459. but if he would come back in the dark, at eight 460. o'clock, all things would be ready for his 461. reception. 462. To this suggestion my grandfather made no 463. scruple to assent, but promised to be there; and 464. he bargained with the lad to come for him, 465. giving him at the same time three placks for a 466. largess. He then returned to the vintner's, 467. where he found the Crail man sitting waiting 468. for him;_and the vintner's wife, when she saw 469. him so soon back, jeered him, and would fain 470. have been jocose, which he often after thought 471. a woful immorality, considering the dreadful 472. martyrdom of a godly man that had been done 473. that day in the town; but at the time he was 474. not so over strait-laced as to take offence at 475. what she said; indeed, as he used to say, sins 476. were not so heinous in those papistical days as 477. they afterwards became, when men lost faith 478. in penance, and found out the perils of purchased 479. pardons. The following founts were called by this job 0050 Bembo Roman No errors. xlaser/project=yk02s/name=galt3/remote="lxxlx,geoiu,third.out" CHAPTER VII MY grandfather having, as I have told, a compassion for the silly affection wherewith the honest man of Crail still regarded his wanton wife, told him the circumstantials of his adventure with the stripling; without, however, letting wot he had discovered that the invitation was from her; the which was the case, for the damsel who looked out at the window was no other than the giglet he had seen in her lodging when he went thither with Sir David Hamilton,_and he proposed to the disconsolate husband that he should be his friend in the adventure; meaning thereby to convince the unhappy man, by the evidence of his own eyes and ears, that her concubinage with the Antichrist was a blessed riddance to him and his family. At first Master Kilspinnie had no zest for any such frolic, for so it seemed to him, and he began to think my grandfather's horror at the martyrdom of the aged saint but a long-fac't hypocrisy; nevertheless he was wrought upon to consent; and they sat plotting and contriving in what manner they should act their several parts, my grandfather pretending great fear and apprehension at the thoughts of himself, a stranger, going alone into the traps of a house where there were sic forerunners of shame and signs of danger. At last he proposed that they should go together and spy about the precincts of the place, and try to discover if there was no other entrance or outgate to the house than the way by which the stripling conducted him, though well he remembered the sallyport, where the fat friar kept watch, eating the pasty. Accordingly they went forth from the vintner's, and my grandfather, as if he knew not the way, led his companion round between the priory and the sea, till they came near the aforesaid sallyport, when, mounting upon a stone, he affected to discover that the house of the madam stood in the garden within, and that the sallyport could be no less than a back yett thereto. While they were speaking concerning the same, my grandfather observed the wicket open in the gate, and guessing therefrom that it was one spying to forewarn somebody within who wanted to come out unremarked, he made a sign to his companion, and they both threw themselves flat on the ground, and hirsled down the rocks to conceal themselves. Presently the gate was opened, and then out came the fat friar, and looked east and west, holding the door in his hand; and anon out came his Grace the Antichrist, hirpling with a staff in his hand, for he was lame with that monkish malady called the gout. The friar then drew the yett to, and walked on towards the castle, with his Grace leaning on his arm. In the meantime the poor man of Crail was grinding the teeth of his rage at the sight of the cause of his sorrow, and my grandfather had a sore struggle to keep him down, and prevent him from running wud and furious at the two sacerdotal reprobates, for no lightlier could they be called. Thus, without any disclosure on my grandfather's part, did Master Kilspinnie come to jealouse that the lemane who had trysted him was no other than his own faithless wife, and he smote his forehead and wept bitterly, to think how she was become so dreadless in sin. But he vowed to put her to shame; so it was covenanted between them, that in the dusk of the evening the afflicted husband should post himself near to where they then stood, and that when my grandfather was admitted by the other entrance to the house, he should devise some reason for walking forth into the garden, and while there admit Master Kilspinnie. Accordingly, betimes my grandfather was ready, and the stripling, as had been bargained, came for him to the vintner's, and conducted him to the house, where, after giving the signals before enumerated, the damsel came to the door and gave him admittance, leading him straight to the inner chamber before described, where her mistress was sitting in a languishing posture, with the table spread for a banquet. She embraced my grandfather with many fond protestations, and filled him a cup of hot malvesie, while her handmaid brought in divers savoury dishes; but he, though a valiant young man, was not at his ease, and he thought of the poor husband and the five babies that the adultress had left for the foul love of the papist high-priest, and it was a chaste spell and a restraining grace. Still he partook a little of the rich repast which had been prepared, and feigned so long a false pleasance, that he almost became pleased in reality. The dame, however, was herself at times fearful, and seemed to listen if there was any knocking at the door, telling my grandfather that his Grace was to be back after he had supped at the castle. %"I thought,%' said she, %"to have had you here when he was at the burning of the heretic, but my gilly could not find you among the troopers till it was owre late; for when he brought you my Lord had come to solace himself after the execution. But I was so nettled to be so balked, that I acted myself into an anger till I got him away, not, however, without a threat of being troubled with him again at night.%' Scarcely had Madam said this, when my grandfather started up and feigned to be in great terror, begging her to let him hide himself in the garden till his Grace was come and gone. To this, with all her blandishments, the guilty woman made many obstacles; but he was fortified of the Lord with the thoughts of her injured children, and would not be entreated, but insisted on scogging himself in the garden till the Archbishop was sent away, the hour of his coming being then near at hand. Seeing him thus peremptory, Madam Kilspinnie was obligated to conform; so he was permitted to go into the garden, and no sooner was he there than he went to the sallyport and admitted her husband;_and well it was that he had been so steadfast in his purpose; for scarcely were they moved from the yett into a honeysuckle bower hard by, when they heard it again open, and in came his Grace with his corpulent pandarus, who took his seat on the bench before spoken of, to watch, while his master went into the house. The good Bailie of Crail breathed thickly, and he took my grandfather by the hand, his whole frame trembling with a passion of grief and rage. In the lapse of some four or five minutes, the giglet damsel came out of the house, and by the glimpse of a light from a window as she passed, they saw she had a tankard of smoking drink in her hand, with which she went to the friar; and my grandfather and his companion taking advantage of this, slipped out of their hiding-place and stole softly into the house, and reached the outer chamber, that was parted from Madam's banquet bower by the arras partition. There they stopped to listen, and heard her complaining in a most dolorous manner of great heart-sickness, ever and anon begging the deluded prelate Hamilton to taste the feast she had prepared for him, in the hope of being able to share it with him and the caresses of his sweet love. To which his Grace as often replied, with great condolence and sympathy, how very grieved he was to find her in that sad and sore estate, with many other fond cajoleries, most odious to my grandfather to hear from a man so far advanced in years, and who, by reason of the reverence of his office, ought to have had his tongue schooled to terms of piety and temperance. The poor husband meanwhile said nothing, but my grandfather heard his heart panting audibly, and three or four times he was obligated to brush away his hand, for, having no arms himself, the bailie clutched at the hilt of his sword, and would have drawn it from the scabbard. The Antichrist seeing his lemane in such great malady as she so well feigned, he at last, to her very earnest supplications, consented to leave her that night, and kissed her as he came away; but her husband broke in upon them with the rage of a hungry lion, and seizing his Grace by the cuff of the neck, swung him away from her with such vehemence, that he fell into the corner of the room like a sack of duds. As for Madam, she uttered a wild cry, and threw herself back on the couch where she was sitting, and seemed as if she had swooned, having no other device so ready to avoid the upbraidings and just reproaches of her spouse. But she was soon roused from that fraudulent dwam by my grandfather, who, seizing a flagon of wine, dashed it upon her face. CHAPTER VIII MRS KILSPINNIE uttered a frightful screech, and, starting up, attempted to run out of the room, but her husband caught her by the arm, and my grandfather was empowered, by a signal grant of great presence of mind, to think that the noise might cause alarm, whereupon he sprung instanter to the door that led into the garden, just as the damsel was coming up, and the fat friar hobbling as fast as he could behind her,_and he had but time to say to her, as it was with an inspiration, to keep all quiet in the garden, and he would make his escape by the other door. She, on hearing this, ran back to stop the pandarus, and my grandfather closed and bolted fast that back-door, going forthwith to the one by which he had been himself admitted, and which, having opened wide to the wall, he returned to the scene of commotion. In the meantime, the prelatic dragon, that was so ravished from the woman, had hastily risen upon his legs, and, red with a dreadful wrath, raged as if he would have devoured her husband. In sooth, to do his Grace justice, he lacked not the spirit of a courageous gentleman, and he could not, my grandfather often said, have borne himself more proudly and valiantly had he been a belted knight, bred in camps and fields of war, so that a discreet retreat and evasion of the house was the best course they could take. But Master Kilspinnie fain would have continued his biting taunts to the mistress, who was enacting a most tragical extravagance of affliction and terror; my grandfather, however, suddenly cut him short, crying, %"Come, come, no more of this; an alarm is given, and we must save ourselves.%' With that he seized him firmly by the arm, and in a manner harled him out of the house, and into the lane between the dykes, along which they ran with nimble heels. On reaching the Shoegate they slackened their speed, still, however, walking as fast as they could till they came near the port, when they again drew in the bridle of their haste, going through among the guards that were loitering around the door of the wardroom, and passed out into the fields as if they had been indifferent persons. On escaping the gate, they fell in with divers persons going along the road, who, by their discourse, were returning home to Cupar, and they walked leisurely with them till they came to a cross-road, where my grandfather, giving Master Kilspinnie a nodge, turned down the one that went to the left, followed by him, and it happened to be the road to Dysart and Crail. %"This will ne'er do,%' said Master Kilspinnie, %"they will pursue us this gait.%' Upon hearing this reasonable apprehension, my grandfather stopped and conferred with himself, and received on that spot a blessed experience and foretaste of the protection wherewith, to a great age, he was all his days protected. For it was in a manner revealed to him, that he should throw away the garbardine and sword which he had received in the castle, and thereby appear in his simple craftsman's garb, and that they should turn back and cross the Cupar road, and go along the other, which led to the Dundee water-side ferry. This he told to his fearful companion, and likewise, that as often as they fell in with or heard any body coming up, the bailie should hasten on before, or den himself among the brechans by the road-side, to the end that it might appear they were not two persons in company together. But they had not long crossed the Cupar road, and travelled the one leading to the ferry, when they heard the whirlwind sound of horsemen coming after them, at which the honest man of Crail darted aside, and lay flat on his grouff ayont a bramble bush, while my grandfather began to lilt as blithely as he could, %"The Bonny Lass of Livingston,%' and the spring was ever after to him as a hymn of thanksgiving; but the words he then sang was an auld ranting godless and graceless ditty of the grooms and serving-men that sorned about his father's smiddy,_and the closer that the horsemen came he was strengthened to sing the louder and the clearer. %"Saw ye twa fellows ganging this gait?%' cried the foremost of the pursuers, pulling up. %"What like were they?%' said my grandfather in a simple manner. %"Ane of them was o' his Grace's guard,%' replied the man, %"but the other, curse tak me gin I ken what he was like, but he's the bailie or provost of a burrough's town, and should by rights hae a big belly.%' To this my grandfather answered briskly, %"Nae sic twa hae past me; but as I was coming along whistling, thinking o' naething, twa sturdy loons, ane o' them no unlike the hempies of the castle, ran skirring along, and I hae a thought that they took the road to Crail or Dysart.%' %"That was my thought too,%' cried the horseman, as he turned his beast, and the rest that were with him doing the same, bidding my grandfather good-night, away they scampered back; by which a blessed deliverance was there wrought to him and his companion, on that spot, in that night. As soon as the horsemen had gone by, Bailie Kilspinnie came from his hiding-place, and both he and my grandfather proved that no bird-lime was on their feet till they got to the ferry-house at the water-side, where they found two boats taking passengers on board, one for Dundee and the other for Perth. Here my grandfather's great gift of foreknowledge was again proven, for he proposed that they should bargain with the skipper of the Dundee boat to take them to that town, and pay him like the other passengers at once, in an open manner; but that, as the night was cloudy and dark, they should go cannily aboard the boat for Perth, as it were in mistake, and feign not to discover their error till they were far up the river, when they should proceed to the town, letting wot, that by the return of the tide they would go in the morning by the Perth boat to Dundee, with which Master Kilspinnie was well acquainted, he having had many times, in the way of his traffic as a plaiding merchant, cause to use the same, and thereby knew it went twice a-week, and that the morrow was one of the days:_all this they were enabled to do with such fortitude and decorum, that no one aboard the Perth boat could have divined that they were not honest men, in great trouble of mind at discovering they had come into the wrong boat. But nothing showed more that Providence had a hand in all this than what ensued, for all the passengers in the boat had been at St Andrews to hear the trial and see the martyrdom, and they were sharp and vehement not only in their condemnation of the mitred Antichrist, but grieved with a sincere sorrow, that none of the nobles of Scotland would stand forth in their ancient bravery, to resist and overthrow a race of oppressors more grievous than the Southrons that trode on the neck of their fathers in the hero-stirring times of the Wallace wight and King Robert the Bruce._Truly there was a spirit of unison and indignation in the company on board that boat, every one thirsting with a holy ardour to avenge the cruelties of which the papistical priesthood were daily growing more and more crouse in the perpetration;_and they made the shores ring with the olden song of %"O for my ain king, quo' gude Wallace, The rightfu' king of fair Scotlan';_ Between me and my sovereign dear I think I see some ill seed sawn.%' It was the grey of the morning before they reached Perth; and as soon as they were put on the land, the bailie took my grandfather with him to the house of one Sawners Ruthven, a blanket-weaver, with whom he had dealings, a staid and discreet man, who, when he had supplied them with breakfast, exhorted them not to tarry in the town, then a place that had fallen under the suspicion of the clergy, the lordly monks of Scoone taking great power and authority, in despite of the magistrates, against all that fell under their evil thoughts anent heresy. And he counselled them not to proceed, as my grandfather had proposed, straight on to Edinburgh by the Queensferry, but to hasten up the country to Crieff, and thence take the road to Stirling. In this there was much prudence; but Bailie Kilspinnie was in sore tribulation on account of his children, whom he had left at his home in Crail, fearing that the talons of Antichrist would lay hold of them, and keep them as hostages till he was given up to suffer for what he had done, none doubting that Baal, for so he nicknamed the prelatic Hamilton, would impute to him the unpardonable sin of heresy and schism, and leave no stone unturned to bring him to the stake. But Sawners Ruthven comforted him with the assurance that his Grace would not venture to act in that manner, for it was known how Mistress Kilspinnie then lived at St Andrews as his concubine. Nevertheless, the poor man was in sore affliction; and, as he and my grandfather travelled towards Crieff, many a bitter prayer did his vexed spirit pour forth in its grief, that the right arm of the Lord might soon be manifested against the Roman locust, that consumed the land, and made its corruption naught in the nostrils of Heaven. Thus was it manifest, that there was much of the ire of a selfish revenge mixt up with the rage which was at that time kindled in so unquenchable a manner against the Beast and its worshippers; for in the history of the honest man of Crail there was a great similitude to other foul and worse things which the Roman idolaters seemed to regard among their pestiferous immunities, and counted themselves free to do without dread of any earthly retribution. xlaser/project=yk02s/name=galt4/remote="lxxlx,geoiu,fourth.out" CHAPTER IX MY grandfather and his companion hastened on in their journey; but instead of going to Stirling they crossed the river at Alloa, and so passed by the water-side way to Edinburgh, where, on entering the West-port, they separated. The bailie, who was a fearful man, and in constant dread and terror of being burned as a heretic for having broke in upon the dalliance of his incontinent wife and the carnal-minded primate of St Andrews, went to a cousin of his own, a dealer in serge and temming in the Lawn-market, with whom he concealed himself for some weeks; but my grandfather proceeded straight towards the lodging of the Earl of Glencairn, to recount to his lordship the whole passages of what he had been concerned in, from the night that he departed from his presence. It was by this time the mirkest of the gloaming, for they had purposely tarried on their journey that they might enter Edinburgh at dusk. The shops of the traders were shut, for in those days there was such a resort of sorners and lawless men among the trains of the nobles and gentry, that it was not safe for honest merchants to keep their shops open after nightfall. Nevertheless the streets were not darkened, for there were then many begging-boxes, with images of the saints, and cruisies burning afore them, in divers parts of the High-street and corners of the wynds, insomuch that it was easy, as I have heard my grandfather tell, to see and know any one passing in the light thereof. And indeed what befell himself was proof of it; for as he was coming through St Giles' kirk-yard, which is now the Parliament-close, and through which at that time there was a style and path for passengers, a young man, whom he had observed following him, came close up just as he reached a begging image of the Virgin Mary with its lamp, that stood on a pillar at the south-east corner of the cathedral, and touching him on the left shoulder at that spot, made him look round in such a manner that the light of the Virgin's lamp fell full on his face. %"Dinna be frighted,%' said the stranger, %"I ken you, and I'm in Lord Glencairn's service; but follow me and say nothing.%' My grandfather was not a little startled by this salutation; he however made no observe, but replied, %"Go on then.%' So the stranger went forward, and after various turnings and windings, led him down into the Cowgate, and up a close on the south side thereof, and then to a dark timber stair, that was so frail and creaking, and narrow, that his guide bade him haul himself up with the help of a rope that hung down dangling for that purpose. When they had raised themselves to the stair-head, the stranger opened a door, and they went together into a small and lonesome chamber, in the chimla-nook of which an old iron cruisie was burning with a winking and wizard light. %"I hae brought you here,%' said his conductor, %"for secrecy; for my Lord disna want that ye should be seen about his lodging. I'm ane of three that hae been lang seeking you; and, as a token that ye're no deceived, I was bade to tell you, that before parting from my Lord he gi'ed you two pieces of gold out of his coffer in the chamber where he supped.%' My grandfather thought this very like a proof that he had been so informed by the Earl himself; but, happening to remark that he sat with his back to the light, and kept his face hidden in the shadow of the darkness, Providence put it into his head to jealouse that he might nevertheless be a spy, one perhaps that had been trusted in like manner as he had himself been trusted, and who had afterwards sold himself to the perdition of the adversaries' cause; he was accordingly on his guard; but replied with seeming frankness, that it was very true he had received two pieces of gold from the Earl at his departure. %"Then,%' said the young man, %"by that token ye may know that I am in the private service of the Earl, who, for reasons best known to himsel', hath willed that you should tell me, that I may report the same secretly to him, what espionage you have made.%'. My grandfather was perplexed by this speech, but distrust having crept into his thoughts, instead of replying with a full recital of all his adventures, he briefly said, that he had indeed effected nothing, for his soul was sickened by the woeful martyrdom of the godly Master Mill to so great a disease that he could not endure to abide in St Andrews, and therefore he had come back. %"But you have been long on the way_how is that?_it is now many days since the burning,%' replied the stranger. %"You say truly,%' was my grandfather's answer, %"for I came round by Perth; but I tarried at no place longer than was needful to repair and refresh nature.%' %"Perth was a wide bout-gait to take frae St Andrews to come to Edinburgh; I marvel how ye went so far astray,%' said the young man curiously. %"In sooth it was; but being sorely demented with the tragical end of the godly old man,%' replied my grandfather, %"and seeing that I could do the Earl no manner of service, I wist not well what course to take; so, after meickle tribulation of thought, and great uncertainty of purpose, I e'en resolved to come hither.%' Little more passed: the young man rose and said to my grandfather, he feared the Earl would be so little content with him, that he had better not go near him, but seek some other master. And when they had descended the stair, and were come into the street, he advised him to go to the house of a certain Widow Rippet, that let dry lodgings in the Grass-market, and roost there for that night. The which my grandfather in a manner signified he would do, and so they parted. The stranger at first walked soberly away; but he had not gone many paces when he suddenly turned into a closs leading up to the High-street, and my grandfather heard the pattering of his feet running as swiftly as possible, which confirmed to him what he suspected; and so, instead of going towards the Widow Rippet's house, he turned back and went straight on to St Mary's Wynd, where the Earl's lodging was, and knocking at the yett, was speedily admitted, and conducted instanter to my Lord's presence, whom he found alone, reading many papers which lay on a table before him. %"Gilhaize,%' said the Earl, %"how is this? why have you come back? and wherefore is it that I have heard no tidings from you?%' Whereupon my grandfather recounted to him all the circumstantials which I have rehearsed, from the hour of his departure from Edinburgh up till the very time when he then stood in his master's presence. The Earl made no inroad on his narrative while he was telling it, but his countenance often changed, and he was much moved at different passages_sometimes with sorrow and sometimes with anger; and he laughed vehemently at the mishap which had befallen the grand adversary of the Congregation and his concubine. The adventure, however, with the unknown varlet in the street appeared to make his Lordship very thoughtful, and no less than thrice did he question my grandfather, if he had indeed given but those barren answers which I have already recited; to all which he received the most solemn asseverations, that no more was said. His Lordship then sat some time cogitating, with his hands resting on his thighs, his brows bent, and his lips pursed as with sharp thought. At last he said_ %"Gilhaize, you have done better in this than I ought to have expected of one so young and unpractised. The favour you won with Sir David Hamilton was no more than I thought your looks and manners would beget. But you are not only well-favoured but well-fortuned; and had you not found yourself worthily bound to your duty, I doubt not you might have prospered in the Archbishop's household. The affair with Madam Kilspinnie was a thing I reckoned not of; yet therein you have proved yourself not only a very Joseph, but so ripe in wit beyond your years, that your merits deserve more commendation than I can afford to give, for I have not sufficient to bestow on the singular prudence and discernment wherewith you have parried the treacherous thrusts of that Judas Iscariot, Winterton, for so I doubt not is the traitor who waylaid you. He was once in my service, and is now in the Queen Regent's. In sending off my men on errands similar to yours, I was wont to give them two pieces of gold, and this the false loon has gathered to be a custom, from others as well as by his own knowledge, and he has made it the key to open the breasts of my servants. To know this, however, is a great discovery. But, Gilhaize, not to waste words, you have your master's confidence. Go therefore, I pray you, with all speed to the Widow Rippet's, and do as Winterton bade you, and as chance may require. In the morning come again hither; for I have this night many weighty affairs, and you have shown yourself possessed of a discerning spirit, that may, in these times of peril and perjury, help the great cause of all good Scotchmen.%' In saying these most acceptable words, he clapped my grandfather on the shoulder, and encouraged him to be as true-hearted as he was sharp-witted, and he could not fail to earn both treasure and trusts. So my grandfather left him, and went to the Widow Rippet's in the Grass-market; and around her kitchen fire he found some four or five discarded knaves that were bargaining with her for beds, or for leave to sleep by the hearth. And he had not been long seated among them when his heart was grieved with pain to see Winterton come in, and behind him the two simple lads of Lithgow that had left their homes with him, whom, it appeared, the varlet had seduced from the Earl of Glencairn's service, and inveigled into the Earl of Seaton's, a rampant papist, by the same wiles wherewith he thought he had likewise made a conquest of my grandfather, whom they had all come together to see; for the two Lithgow lads, like reynard the fox when he had lost his tail, were eager that he too should make himself like them. He feigned, however, great weariness, and indeed his heart was heavy to see such skill of wickedness in so young a man as he saw in Winterton. So, after partaking with them of some spiced ale, which Winterton brought from the Salutation tavern opposite the gallows-stone, he declared himself overcome with sleep, and per force thereof obligated to go to bed. But when they were gone, and he had retired to his sorry couch, no sleep came to his eyelids, but only hot and salt tears; for he thought that he had been in a measure concerned in bringing away the two thoughtless lads from their homes, and he saw that they were not tempered to resist the temptations of the world, but would soon fall away from their religious integrity, and become lewd and godless roisters, like the wuddy worthies that paid half price for leave to sleep on the widow's hearth. CHAPTER X AT the first blink of the grey eye of the morning my grandfather rose, and, quitting the house of the Widow Rippet, went straight to the Earl's lodgings and was admitted. The porter at the door told him, that their master having been up all night had but just retired to bed; but, while they were speaking, the Earl's page, who slept in the antechamber, called from the stair-head to inquire who it was that had come so early; and being informed thereof, he went into his master, and afterwards came again and desired my grandfather to walk up, and conducted him to his Lordship, whom he found on his couch, but not undressed, and who said to him, on his entering, when the page had retired_ %"I am glad, Gilhaize, that you have come thus early, for I want a trusty man to go forthwith into the west country. What I wish you to do cannot be written, but you will take this ring;%' and he took one from the little finger of his right hand, on the gem of which his cipher was graven, and gave it to my grandfather. %"On showing it to Lord Boyd, whom you will find at the Dean Castle, near Kilmarnock, he will thereby know that you are specially trusted of me. The message whereof you are the bearer is to this effect,_That the Lords of the Congregation have, by their friends in many places, received strong exhortations to step forward and oppose the headlong fury of the churchmen; and that they have in consequence deemed it necessary to lose no time in ascertaining what the strength of the Reformed may be, and to procure declarations for mutual defence from all who are joined in professing the true religion of Christ. Should he see meet to employ you in this matter, you will obey his orders and instructions whatsoever they may be.%' The Earl then put his hand aneath his pillow, and drew out a small leathern purse, which he gave to my grandfather, who, in the doing of this, observed that he had several other similar purses ready under his head. In taking it my grandfather was proceeding to tell him what he had observed at the Widow Rippet's, but his Lordship interrupted him, saying_ %"Such things are of no issue now, and your present duty is in a higher road; therefore make haste, and God be with you.%' With these words his Lordship turned himself on his couch, and composed himself to sleep; which my grandfather, after looking on for about a minute or so, observing, came away; and having borrowed a frock and a trot-cozey for the journey from one of the grooms of the hall, he went straight to Kenneth Shelty's, a noted horse-setter in those days, who lived at the West-port, and bargained with him for the hire of a beast to Glasgow, though Glasgow was not then the nearest road to Kilmarnock; but he thought it prudent to go that way, in case any of the papistical emissaries should track his course. There was, however, a little oversight in this, which did not come to mind till he was some miles on the road, and that was, the obligation it put him under of passing through Lithgow, where he was so well known, and where all his kith and kin lived; there being then no immediate route from Edinburgh to Glasgow but by Lithgow. And he debated with himself for a space of time, whether he ought to proceed, or turn back and go the other way, and his mind was sorely troubled with doubts and difficulties. At last he considered, that it was never deemed wise or fortunate to turn back in any undertaking, and besides, having for the service of the Saviour left his father's house and renounced his parents, like a bird that taketh wing and knoweth the nest where it was bred no more_he knit up his ravelled thoughts into resolution, and, clapping spurs to his horse, rode bravely on. But when he beheld the towers of the palace, and the steeples of his native town, rising before him, many remembrances came rushing to his heart, and all the vexations he had suffered there were lost in the sunny recollections of the morning of life, when every one was kind, and the eyes of his parents looked on him with the brightness of delight, in so much, that his soul yearned within him, and his cheeks were wetted with fast-flowing tears. Nevertheless, he overcame this thaw of his fortitude, and went forward in the strength of the Lord, determined to swerve not in his duty to the Earl of Glencairn, nor in his holier fealty to a far greater master. But the softness that he felt in his nature, made him gird himself with a firm purpose to ride through the town without stopping. Scarcely, however, had he entered the port, when his horse stumbled and lost a shoe, by which he was not only constrained to stop, but to take him to his father's smiddy, which was in sight when the mischance happened. On going to the door, he found, as was commonly the case, a number of grooms and flunkies of the courtiers, with certain friars, holding vehement discourse concerning the tidings of the time, the burden of which was, the burning of the aged Master Mill, a thing that even the monks durst not, for humanity, venture very strenuously to defend. His father was not then within; but one of the prentice lads, seeing who it was that had come with a horse to be shod, ran to tell him; and at the sight of my grandfather, the friars suspended their controversies with the serving-men, and gathered round him with many questions. He replied, however, to them all with few words, bidding the foreman to make haste and shoe his horse, hoping that he might thereby be off and away before his father came. But, while the man was throng with the horse's foot, both father and mother came rushing in, and his mother was weeping bitterly, and wringing her hands, chiding him, as if he had sold himself to the Evil One, and beseeching him to stop and repent. His father, however, said little, but inquired how he had been, what he was doing, and where he was going; and sent the prentice lad to bring a stoup of spiced ale from a public hard by, in which he pledged him, kindly hoping he would do well for himself and he would do well for his parents. The which fatherliness touched my grandfather more to the quick than all the loud lament and reproaches of his mother; and he replied, that he had entered into the service of a nobleman, and was then riding on his master's business to Glasgow; but he mentioned no name, nor did his father inquire. His mother, however, burst out into clamorous revilings, declaring her dread, that it was some of the apostate heretics; and, giving vent to her passion, was as one in a frenzy, or possessed of a devil. The very friars were confounded at her distraction, and tried to sooth her and remove her forth the smiddy, which only made her more wild, so that all present compassionated my grandfather, who sat silent and made no answer, wearying till his horse was ready. But greatly afflicted as he was by this trial, it was nothing to what ensued, when, after having mounted and shaken his father by the hand, he galloped away to the West-port. There, on the outside, he was met by two women and an old man, parents of the lads whom he had taken with him to Edinburgh. Having heard he was at his father's smiddy, instead of going thither, they had come to that place, in order that they might speak with him more apart, and free from molestation, concerning their sons. One of the women was a poor widow, and she had no other child, nor the hope of any other bread-winner for her old age. She, however, said nothing, but stood with the corner of her apron at her eyes, sobbing very afflictedly, while her friends, on seeing my grandfather coming out of the port, stepped forward, and the old man claught the horse by the bridle, and said gravely_ %"Ye maun stop and satisfy three sorrowful parents! What hae ye done with your twa thoughtless companions?%' My grandfather's heart was as if it would have perished in his bosom; for the company he had seen the lads with, and the talk they had held, and above all their recklessness of principle, came upon him like a withering flash of fire. He, however, replied soberly, that he had seen them both the night before, and that they were well in health, and jocund in spirit. The mother that was standing near her husband was blithe to hear this, and reminded her gudeman, how she had often said, that when they did hear tidings of their son her words would be found true, for he had ever been all his days a brisk and a valiant bairn. But the helpless widow was not content, and she came forward, drying her tears, saying, %"And what is my poor fatherless do-na-gude about? I'm fearfu, fearfu, to be particular; for, though he was aye kind-hearted to me, he was easily wised, and I doubt, I doubt, he'll prove a blasting or a blessing, according to the hands he fa's among.%' %"I hope and pray,%' said my grandfather, %"that he'll be protected from scaith, and live to be a comfort to all his friends.%' And, so saying, he disengaged his bridle with a gentle violence from the old man's hold, telling them, he could not afford to stop, being timed to reach Glasgow that night. So he pricked the horse with his rowals, and shot away; but his heart, all the remainder of his day's journey, was as if it had been pierced with many barbed arrows, and the sad voice of the poor anxious widow rung in his ears like the sound of some doleful knell. Saving this affair at Lithgow, nothing befell him till he came to the gates of Glasgow; by which time it was dark, and the ward and watch set, and they questioned him very sharply before giving him admission. For the Queen Regent was then sojourning in the castle, and her fears and cares were greatly quickened at that time, by rumours from all parts of the kingdom, concerning the murder, as it was called, of Master Mill. On this account the French guards, which she had with her, were instructed to be jealous of all untimeous travellers, and they being joined with a ward of burgers, but using only their own tongue, caused no small molestation to every Scotsman that sought admission after the sun was set; for the burgers not being well versed in military practices, were of themselves very propugnacious in their authority, making more ado than even the Frenchmen. It happened, however, that there was among those valiant traders and craftsmen of Glasgow one Thomas Sword, the deacon of the hammermen, and he having the command of those stationed at the gate, overheard what was passing with my grandfather, and coming out of the wardroom, inquired his name, which when he heard, and that he was son to Michael Gilhaize, the Lithgow ferrier, he advised to let him in, saying, he knew his father well, and that they had worked together, when young men, in the King's armory at Stirling; and he told him where he lived, and invited him, when his horse was stabled, to come to supper, for he was glad to see him for his father's sake. CHAPTER XI AT this time an ancient controversy between the Archbishops of St Andrews and of Glasgow, touching their respective jurisdictions, had been resuscitated with great acrimony, and in the debates concerning the same the Glasgow people took a deep interest; for they are stout-hearted and of an adventurous spirit, and cannot abide to think that they or their town should, in any thing of public honour, be deemed either slack or second to the foremost in the realm; and none of all the worthy burgesses thereof thought more proudly of the superiority and renown of their city than did Deacon Sword. So it came to pass, as he was sitting at supper with my grandfather, that he enlarged and expatiated on the inordinate pretensions of the Archbishop of St Andrews, and took occasion to diverge from the prelate's political ambition to speak of the enormities of his ecclesiastical government, and particularly of that heinous and never-to-be-forgotten act, the burning of an aged man of fourscore and two years, whose very heresies, as the deacon mercifully said, ought rather to have been imputed to dotage than charged as offences. My grandfather was well pleased to observe such vigour of principle and bravery of character, in one having such sway and weight in so great a community as to be the chief captain of the crafts who were banded with the hammermen, namely, the cartwrights, the saddlers, the masons, the coopers, the mariners, and all whose work required the use of edge-tools, the hardiest and buirdliest of the trades_and he allowed himself to run in with the deacon's humour, but without letting wot either in whose service he was, or on what exploit he was bound; sowing, however, from time to time, hints as to the need that seemed to be growing of putting a curb on the bold front wherewith the Archbishop of St Andrews, under the pretext of suppressing heresies, butted with the horns of oppression against all who stood within the reverence of his displeasure. Deacon Sword had himself a leaning to the reformed doctrines, which, with his public enmity to the challenger of his own Archbishop, made him take to those hints with so great an affinity, that he vowed to God, shaking my grandfather by the hand over the table, that if some steps were not soon taken to stop such inordinate misrule, there were not wanting five hundred men in Glasgow, who would start forward with weapons in their grip, at the first tout of a trump, to vindicate the liberties of the subject, and the wholesome administration, by the temporal judges of the law against all offenders as of old. And giving scope to his ardour, he said there was then such a spirit awakened in Glasgow, that men, women, and children, thirsted to see justice executed on the churchmen, who were daily waxing more and more wroth and insatiable against every one who called their doctrines or polity in question. Thus out of the very devices, which had been devised by those about the Queen Regent to intercept the free communion of the people with one another, was the means brought about whereby a chosen emissary of the Congregation came to get at the emboldening knowledge of the sense of the citizens of Glasgow, with regard to the great cause which at that period troubled the minds and fears of all men. My grandfather was joyfully heartened by what he heard; and before coming away from the deacon, who, with the hospitality common to his townsmen, would fain have had him to prolong their sederunt over the gardevine, he said, that if Glasgow were as true and valiant as it was thought, there could be no doubt that her declaration for the Lords of the Congregation would work out a great redress of public wrongs. For, from all he could learn and understand, those high and pious noblemen had nothing more at heart than to procure for the people the free exercise of their right to worship God according to their conscience, and the doctrines of the Old and New Testaments. But though, over the liquor-cup, the deacon had spoken so dreadless, and like a manly citizen, my grandfather resolved with himself to depart betimes for Kilmarnock, in case of any change in his temper. Accordingly, he requested the hostler of the hostel where he had taken his bed, to which his day's hard journey early inclined him, to have his horse in readiness before break of day. But this hostel, which was called the Cross of Rhodes, happened to be situated at the Waterport, and besides being a tavern and inn, was likewise the great ferryhouse of the Clyde when the tide was up, or the ford rendered unsafe by the torrents of speats and inland rains_the which caused it to be much frequented by the skippers and mariners of the barks that traded to France and Genoa with the Renfrew salmon, and by all sorts of travellers, at all times, even to the small hours of the morning. In short it was a boisterous house, the company resorting thereto of a sort little in unison with the religious frame of my grandfather. As soon, therefore, as he came from the deacon's, he went to bed without taking off his clothes, in order that he might be fit for the road as he intended; and his bed being in the public room, with sliding-doors, he drew them upon him, hoping to shut out some of the din, and to win a little repose. But scarcely had he laid his head on the pillow, when he heard the voice of one entering the room, and listening eagerly, he discovered that it was no other than the traitor Winterton's, the which so amazed him with apprehension, that he shook as he lay, like the aspen leaf on the tree. Winterton called like a braggart for supper and hot wine, boasting he had ridden that day from Edinburgh, and that he must be up and across his horse by daylight in the morning, as he had need to be in Kilmarnock by noon. In this, which vanity made him tell in bravado, my grandfather could not but discern a kind Providence admonishing himself, for he had no doubt that Winterton was in pursuit of him; and thankful he was that he had given no inkling to any one in the house as to whence he had come, and where he was going. But had this thought not at once entered his head, he would soon have had cause to think it; for while Winterton was eating his supper he began to converse with their host, and to inquire what travellers had crossed the river. Twice or thrice, in as it were an off-hand manner, he spoke of one whom he called a cousin; but, in describing his garb, he left no doubt in my grandfather's bosom that it was regarding him he seemed at once both so negligent and so anxious. Most providential therefore it was, that my grandfather had altered his dress before leaving Edinburgh, for the marks which Winterton gave of him were chiefly drawn from his ordinary garb, and by them, their host in consequence said he had seen no such person. When Winterton had finished his repast, and was getting his second stoup of wine heated, he asked where he was to sleep. To the which question the host replied, that he feared he would, like others, be obligated to make a bench by the fireside his couch, all the beds in the house being already bespoke or occupied. %"Every one of them is double,%' said the man, %"save only one, the which is paid for by a young man that goes off at break of day, and who is already asleep.%' At this Winterton swore a dreadful oath, that he would not sleep by the fire after riding fifty miles, while there was half a bed in the house, and commanded the host to go and tell the young man that he must half blankets with him. My grandfather knew that this could only refer to him; so, when their host came and opened the sliding doors of the bed, he feigned himself to be very fast asleep at the back of the bed, and only groaned in drowsiness when he was touched. %"O, let him alane,%' cried Winterton, %"I ken what it is to be tired; so, as there's room enough at the stock, when I have drank my posset I'll e'en creep in beside him.%' My grandfather, weary as he was, lay panting with apprehension, not doubting that he should be speedily discovered; but when Winterton had finished his drink, and came swaggering and jocose to be his bedfellow, he kept himself with his face to the wall, and snored like one who was in haste to sleep more than enough, insomuch that Winterton, when he lay down, gave him a deg with his elbow, and swore at him to be quiet. His own fatigue, however, soon mastered the disturbance which my grandfather made, and he began himself to echo the noise in defenceless sincerity. On hearing him thus fettered by sleep, my grandfather began to consider with himself what he ought to do, being both afraid and perplexed he knew not wherefore; and he was prompted by a Power that he durst not and could not reason with, to rise and escape from the jeopardy wherein he then was. But how could this be done? for the house was still open, and travellers and customers were continually going and coming. Truly his situation was one of great tribulation, and escape therefrom a thing seemingly past hope and the unaided wisdom of man. CHAPTER XII AFTER lying about the period of an hour in great perturbation, he began to grow more collected, and the din and resort of strangers in the house also subsided, by which he was enabled, with help from on High, to gather his scattered thoughts, and to bind them up into the sheaves of purpose and resolution. Accordingly, when all was still, and several young men, that were sitting by the fire on account of every bed being occupied, gave note, by their deep breathing, that sleep had descended upon them, and darkened their senses with her gracious and downy wings, he rose softly from the side of Winterton, and stepping over him, slipped to the door, which he unbarred, and the moon shining bright he went to the stable to take out his horse. It was not his intent to have done this, but to have gone up into the streets of the city, and walked the walls thereof till he thought his adversary was gone; but seeing the moon so fair and clear, he determined to take his horse and forthwith proceed on his journey; for the river was low and fordable, and trintled its waters with a silvery sheen in the stillness of the beautiful light. Scarcely, however, had he pulled the latch of the stable door,_even as he was just entering in, when he heard Winterton coming from the house rousing the hostler, whom he profanely rated for allowing him to over-sleep himself. For, wakening just as his bedfellow rose, he thought the morning was come, and that his orders had been neglected. In this extremity my grandfather saw no chance of evasion. If he went out into the moonshine he would to a surety be discovered, and in the stable he would to a certainty be caught. But what could he do, and the danger so pressing? He had hardly a choice; however, he went into the stable, shut the door, and running up to the horses that were farthest ben, mounted into the hack, and hid himself among the hay. In that concealment he was scarcely well down, when Winterton, with an hostler that was half asleep, came with a lantern to the door, banning the poor knave as if he had been cursing him with bell, book, and candle; the other rubbing his eyes and declaring it was still far from morning, and saying he was sure the other traveller was not gone. To the which there was speedy evidence; for on going towards Winterton's horse the hostler saw my grandfather's in its stall, and told him so. At that moment a glimpse of the lantern fell on the horse's legs, and its feet being white,_%"Oho!%' cried Winterton, %"let us look here._Kenneth Shelty's Lightfoot;_the very beast;_and hae I been in the same hole wi' the tod and no kent it. The de'il's black collie worry my soul, but this is a soople trick. I did nae think the sleekit sinner had art enough to play't;_nae doubt, he's gane to hide himsel in the town till I'm awa, for he has heard what I said yestreen. But I'll be up sides wi' him. The de'il a foot will I gang this morning till he comes back for his horse.%' And with these words he turned out of the stable with the hostler, and went back to the house. No sooner were they well gone than my grandfather came from his hiding-place, and twisting a wisp of straw round his horse's feet, that they might not dirl or make a din on the stones, he led it cannily out, and down to the river's brink, and there mounting took the ford, and was soon free on the Gorbals side. Riding up the gait at a brisk trot, he passed on for a short time along the road that he had been told led to Kilmarnock; but fearing he would be followed, he turned off at the first wynd he came to on the left; and a blessed thing it was that he did so, for it led to the Reformation-leavened town of Paisley, where he arrived an hour before daylight. Winterton, little jealousing what had happened, went again to bed, as my grandfather afterwards learnt, and had fallen asleep. In the morning when he awoke, and was told that both man and horse were flown, he flayed the hostler's back and legs in more than a score of places, believing he had connived at my grandfather's secret flight. My grandfather had never before been in the town of Paisley, but he had often heard from Abercorn's serving-men that were wont to sorn about his father's smiddy, of a house of jovial entertainment by the water-side, about a stone-cast from the abbey-yett, the hostess whereof was a certain canty dame called Maggy Napier, then in great repute with the shavelings of the abbey. Thither he directed his course, the abbey towers serving him for her sign, and the moonlight and running river were guides to her door, at the which he was not blate in chapping. She was, however, long of giving entrance; for it happened that some nights before, the magistrates of the town had been at a carousal with the abbot and chapter, the papistical denomination for the seven heads and ten horns of a monastery, and when they had come away and were going home, one of them, Bailie Pollock, a gaucy widower, was instigated by the devil and the wine he had drank, to stravaig towards Maggy Napier's,_a most unseemly thing for a bailie to do, especially a bailie of Paisley, but it was then the days of popish sinfulness. And when Bailie Pollock went thither, the house was full of riotous swankies, who being the waur of drink themselves, had but little reverence for a magistrate in the same state; so they handled him to such a degree that he was obliged to keep his bed and put collops to his eyes for three days. The consequence of which was, that the house fell under the displeasure of the town-council, and Maggy was admonished to keep it more orderly and doucely,_though the fault came neither from her nor her customers, as she told my grandfather, for detaining him so long, it being requisite that she should see he was in a condition of sobriety before letting him in. But, when admitted, he was in no spirit to enjoy her jocosity concerning Bailie Pollock's spree, so he told her that he had come far, and had far to go, and that having heard sore tidings of a friend, he was fain to go to bed and try if he could compose himself with an hour or two of sleep. Maggy accordingly refrained from her jocularity, and began to sooth and comfort him, for she was naturally of a winsome way, and prepared a bed for him with her best sheets, the which, she said, were gi'en her in gratus gift frae the Lord Abbot, so that he undressed himself, and enjoyed a pleasant interregnum of anxiety for more than five hours; and when he awoke and was up, he found a breakfast worthy of the abbot himself ready, and his hostess was most courtly and kind, praising the dainties, and pressing him to eat. Nor, when he proposed to reckon with her for the lawin, would she touch the money, but made him promise, when he came back, he would bide another night with her, hoping he would then be in better spirits,_for she was wae to see so braw a gallant sae casten down, doless, and dowie. When they had settled their contest, and my grandfather had come out to mount his beast, which a stripling was holding ready for him at a louping-on-stane near the abbey-yett, as he was going thither, a young friar, who was taking a morning stroll along the pleasant banks of the Cart, approached towards him, and after looking hard at him for some time, called him by name, and took him by both the hands, which he pressed with a brotherly affection. This friar was of Lithgow parentage, and called Dominick Callender, and when he and my grandfather were playing-bairns, they had spent many a merry day of their suspicionless young years together. As he grew up, being a lad of shrewd parts, and of a very staid and orderly deportment, the monks set their snares for him, and before he could well think for himself he was wiled into their traps, and becoming a novice, in due season professed himself a monk. But it was some time before my grandfather knew him again, for the ruddy of youth had fled his cheek, and he was pale and of a studious countenance; and when the first sparklings of his pleasure at the sight of his old play-marrow had gone off, his eyes saddened into thoughtfulness, and he appeared like one weighed down with care and heavy inward dule. xlaser/project=yk02s/name=galt5/remote="lxxlx,geoiu,fifth.out" CHAPTER XIII AFTER Dominick Callender and my grandfather had conversed some time, with many interchanges of the kindly remembrances of past pleasures, the gentle friar began to bewail his sad estate in being a professed monk, and so mournfully to deplore the rashness with which inexperienced youth often takes upon itself a yoke it can never lay down, that the compassion of his friend was sorrowfully awakened, for he saw he was living a life of bitterness and grief. He heard him, however, without making any reply, or saying any thing concerning his own lot of hazard and adventure; for, considering Dominick to be leagued with the papistical orders, he did not think him safe to be trusted, notwithstanding the unchanged freshness of the loving-kindness which he still seemed to bear in his heart; nor even, had he not felt this jealousy, would he have thought himself free to speak of his errand, far less to have given to any stranger aught that might have been an inkling of his noble master's zealous, but secret stirrings, for the weal of Scotland, and the enfranchisement of the worshippers of the true God. When my grandfather had arrived at his horse, and prepared to mount, Dominick Callender said to him, if he would ride slowly for a little way he would walk by his side, adding, %"for maybe I'll ne'er see you again_I'm a-weary of this way of life, and the signs of the times bode no good to the church. I hae a thought to go into some foreign land, where I may taste the air of a freeman, and I feel myself comforted before I quit our auld hard-favoured, but warm-hearted Scotland, in meeting wi' ane that reminds me how I had once sunny mornings and summer days.%' This was said so much in the sincerity of a confiding spirit, that my grandfather could not refrain from observing, in answer, that he feared his friar's cloak did not sit easy upon him; which led him on to acknowledge that it was so. %"I am speaking to you, Gilhaize,%' said he, %"with the frank heart of auld langsyne, and I dinna scruple to confess to one that I hae often thought of, and weary't to see again, and wondered what had become of, that my conscience has revolted against the errors of the papacy, and that I am now upon the eve of fleeing my native land, and joining the Reformed at Geneva. And maybe I'm no ordain't to spend a' my life in exile; for no man can deny that the people of Scotland are not inwardly the warm adversaries of the church. That last and cruellest deed, the sacrifice of the feckless old man of fourscore and upward, has proven that the humanity of the world will no longer endure the laws and pretensions of the church; and there are few in Paisley whom the burning of auld Mill has not kindled with the spirit of resistance.%' The latter portion of these words was as joyous tidings to my grandfather, and he tightened his reins and entered into a more particular and inquisitive discourse with his companion, by which he gathered that the martyrdom of Master Mill had indeed caused great astonishment and wrath among the pious in and about Paisley, and not only among them, but had estranged the affections even of the more worldly from the priesthood, of whom it was openly said, that the sense of pity towards the commonalty of mankind was extinguished within them, and that they were all in all for themselves. But as they were proceeding through the town and along the road, conversing in a familiar but earnest manner on these great concerns, Dominick Callender began to inveigh against the morals of his brethren, and to lament again, in a very piteous manner, that he was decreed, by his monastic profession, from the enjoyment of the dearest and tenderest pleasures of man. And before they separated, it came out that he had been for some time touched with the soft enchantments of love for a young maiden, the daughter of a gentleman of good account in Paisley, and that her chaste piety was as the precious gum wherewith the Egyptians of old preserved their dead in everlasting beauty, keeping from her presence all taint of impurity, and of thoughts sullying to innocence, insomuch, that, even were he inclined, as he said many of his brethren would have been, to have acted the part of a secret canker to that fair blossom, the gracious and holy embalmment of her virtues would have proved an incorruptible protection. %"But,%' he exclaimed with a sorrowful voice, %"that which is her glory, and my admiration and praise, is converted, by the bondage of my unnatural vows, into a curse to us both. The felicity that we might have enjoyed together in wedded life is forbidden to us as a great crime. But the laws of God are above the canons of the church, the voice of Nature is louder than the fulminations of the Vatican, and I have resolved to obey the one, and give ear to the other, despite the horrors that await on apostacy. Can you, Gilhaize, in aught assist my resolution?%' There was so much vehemence and the passion of grief in these ejaculations, that my grandfather wist not well what to say. He told him, however, not to be rash in what he did, nor to disclose his intents, save only to those in whom he could confide; for the times were perilous to every one that slackened in reverence to the papacy, particularly to such as had pastured within the chosen folds of the church. %"Bide,%' said he, %"till you see what issue is ordained to come from this dreadful deed which so shaketh all the land, making the abbey towers topple and tremble to their oldest and deepest foundations. Truth is awakened, and gone forth conquering and to conquer. It cannot be that ancient iniquities will be much longer endured; the arm of Wrath is raised against them; the sword of Revenge is drawn forth from its scabbard by Justice; and Nature has burst asunder the cords of the Roman harlot, and stands in her freedom, like Samson, when the spirit of the Lord was mightily poured upon him, as he awoke from the lap of Delilah.%' The gentle friar, as my grandfather often told, stood for some time astounded at this speech, and then he said_ %"I dream't not, Gilhaize, that beneath a countenance so calm and comely, the zealous fires of a warrior's bravery could have been kindled to so vehement a heat. But I will vex you with no questions. Heaven is on your side, and may its redeeming promptings never allow its ministers to rest, till the fetters are broken and the slaves are set free.%' With these words he stepped forward to shake my grandfather by the hand, and to bid him farewell; but just as he came to the stirrup he halted and said_ %"It is not for nothing that the remembrance of you has been preserved so much brighter and dearer to me than that of all my kin. There was aye something about you, in our heedless days, that often made me wonder, I could not tell wherefore; and now, when I behold you in the prime of manhood, it fills me with admiration and awe, and makes me do homage to you as a master.%' Much more he added to the same effect, which the modesty of my grandfather would not allow him to repeat; but when they had parted, and my grandfather had ridden forward some two or three miles, he recalled to mind what had passed between them, and he used to say that this discourse with his early friend first opened to him a view of the grievous captivity which nature suffered in the monasteries and convents, notwithstanding the loose lives imputed to their inmates; and he saw that the Reformation would be hailed by many that languished in the bondage of their vows, as a great and glorious deliverance. But still he was wont to say, even with such as these, it was overly mingled with temporal concernments, and that they longed for it less on account of its immortal issues, than for its sensual emancipations. And as he was proceeding on his way in this frame of mind, and thinking on all that he had seen and learnt from the day in which he bade adieu to his father's house, he came to a place where the road forked off in two different airts, and not knowing which to take, he stopped his horse and waited till a man drew nigh, whom he observed coming towards him. By this man he was told, that the road leading leftward led to Kilmarnock and Ayr, and the other on the right to Kilwinning; so, without saying any thing, he turned his horse's head into the latter; the which he was moved to do by sundry causes and reasons. First, he had remarked that the chances in his journey had, in a very singular manner, led him to gain much of that sort of knowledge which the Lords of the Congregation thirsted for; and, second, he had no doubt that Winterton was in pursuit of him to Kilmarnock, for some purpose of frustration or circumvention, the which, though he was not able to divine, he could not but consider important, if it was, as he thought, the prime motive of that varlet's journey. But he was chiefly disposed to prefer the Kilwinning road, though it was several miles more of bout-gait, on account of the rich abbacy in that town; hoping he might glean and gather some account how the clergy there stood affected, the meeting with Dominick Callender having afforded him a vista of friends and auxiliaries in the enemy's camp little thought of. Besides all this, he reflected, that as it was of consequence he should reach the Lord Boyd in secrecy, he would be more likely to do so by stopping at Kilwinning, and feeing some one there to guide him to the Dean Castle by moonlight. I have heard him say, however, the speakable motives of his deviation from the straight road were at the time far less effectual in moving him thereto, than a something which he could not tell, that with an invisible hand took his horse as it were by the bridle-rings, and constrained him to go into the Kilwinning track. In the whole of this journey there was indeed a very extraordinary manifestation of a special providence, not only in the protection vouchsafed towards himself, but in the remarkable accidents and occurrences, by which he was enabled to enrich himself with the knowledge so precious at that time to those who were chosen to work the great work of the Gospel in Scotland. CHAPTER XIV AS my grandfather came in sight of Kilwinning, and beheld the abbey with its lofty horned towers and spiky pinnacles, and the sands of Cunningham between it and the sea, it seemed to him as if a huge leviathan had come up from the depths of the ocean and was devouring the green inland, having already consumed all the herbage of the wide waste that lay so bare and yellow for many a mile, desert and lonely in the silent sunshine, and he ejaculated to himself, that the frugal soil of poor Scotland could ne'er have been designed to pasture such enormities. As he rode on, his path descended from the heights into pleasant tracks, along banks feathered with the fragrant plumage of the birch and hazel, and he forgot, in hearkening to the cheerful prattle of the Garnock waters, as they swirled among the pebbles by the road side, the pageantries of that mere bodily worship which had worked on the ignorance of the world to raise such costly monuments of the long-suffering patience of Heaven, while they showed how much the divine nature of the infinite God, and the humility of His eternal Son, had been forgotten in this land among professing Christians. When he came nigh the town, he inquired for an hostel, and a stripling, the miller's son, who was throwing stones at a flock of geese belonging to the abbey, then taking their pleasures uninvited in his father's mill-dam, guided him to the house of Theophilus Lugton, the chief vintner, horse-setter, and stabler, in the town; where, on alighting, he was very kindly received; for the gudewife was of a stirring, household nature, and Theophilus himself, albeit douce and temperate for a publican, was a man obliging and hospitable, not only as became him in his trade, but from a disinterested good-will. He was indeed, as my grandfather came afterwards to know, really a person holden in great respect and repute by the visitors and pilgrims who resorted to the abbey, and by none more than by the worthy wives of Irvine, the most regular of his customers. For they being then in the darkness of papistry, were as much given to the idolatry of holidays and masses, as, thanks be and praise! they are now to the hunting out of sound gospel preachers and sacramental occasions. Many a stoup of burnt wine and spiced ale they were wont, at Pace and Yule, and other papistical high times, to partake of together in the house of Theophilus Lugton, happy and well content when their possets were flavoured with the ghostly conversation of some gawsie monk, well versed in the mysteries of requiems and purgatory. Having parted with his horse to be taken to the stable by Theophilus himself, my grandfather walked into the house, and Dame Lugton set for him an elbow-chair by the chimla lug, and while she was preparing something for a repast, they fell into conversation, in the course of which she informed him that a messenger had come to the abbey that forenoon from Edinburgh, and a rumour had been bruited about soon after his arrival, that there was great cause to dread a rising among the heretics; for, being ingrained with papistry, she so spoke of the Reformers. This news troubled my grandfather not a little, and the more he inquired concerning the tidings, the more reason he got to be alarmed, and to suspect that the bearer was Winterton, who being still in the town, and then at the abbey_his horse was in Theophilus Lugton's stable_he could not but think, that, in coming to Kilwinning instead of going right on to Kilmarnock, he had run into the lion's mouth. But, seeing it was so, and could not be helped, he put his trust in the Lord, and resolved to swerve in no point from the straight line which he had laid down for himself. While he was eating of Dame Lugton's fare, with the relishing sauce of a keen appetite, in a manner that no one who saw him could have supposed he was almost sick with a surfeit of anxieties, one James Coom, a smith, came in for a mutchkin-cap of ale, and he, seeing a traveller, said, %"Thir's sair news! The drouth of cauld iron will be slockened in men's blood ere we hear the end o't.%' %"'Deed,%' replied my grandfather, %"it's very alarming; Lucky, here, has just been telling me that there's like to be a straemash amang the Reformers. Surely they'll ne'er daur to rebel.%' %"If a' tales be true, that's no to do,%' said the smith, blowing the froth from the cap in which Dame Lugton handed him the ale, and taking a right good-willy waught. %"But what's said?%' inquired my grandfather, when the smith had fetched his breath. %"Naebody can weel tell,%' was his response; %"a' that's come this length is but the sough afore the storm. Within twa hours there has been a great riding hither and yon, and a lad straight frae Embro' has come to bid my Lord Abbot repair to the court; and three chiels hae been at me frae Eglinton Castle, to get their beasts shod for a journey. My Lord there is hyte and fykie; there's a gale in his tail, said they, light where it may. Now, atween oursels, my Lord has na the heart of a true bairn to that aged and worthy grannie of the papistry, our leddy the Virgin Mary_here's her health, poor auld deaf and dumb creature_she has na, I doubt, the pith to warsle wi' the blast she ance in a day had.%' %"Haud that heretical tongue o' thine, Jamie Coom,%' exclaimed Dame Lugton. %"It's enough to gar a body's hair stand on end to hear o' your familiarities wi' the Holy Virgin. I won'er my Lord Abbot has na langsyne tethert thy tongue to the kirk door wi' a red-het nail, for sic blasphemy. But fools are privileged, and so's seen o' thee.%' %"And wha made me familiar wi' her, Dame Lugton_tell me that?%' replied James; %"was na it my Lord himsel, at last Marymas, when he sent for me to make a hoop to mend her leg that sklintered aff as they were dressing her for the show. Eh! little did I think that I was ever to hae the honour and glory of ca'ing a nail intil the timber hip o' the Virgin Mary! Ah, lucky, ye would na hae tholed the dirl o' the dints o' my hammer as she did. But she's a saint, and ye'll ne'er deny that ye're a sinner.%' To this Dame Lugton was unable to reply, and the smith, cunningly winking, dippet his head up to the lugs in the ale-cap. %"But,%' said my grandfather, %"no to speak wi' disrespeck of things considered wi' reverence, it does na seem to me that there is ony cause to think the Reformers hae yet rebelled.%' %"I'm sure,%' replied the smith, %"if they hae na, they ought, or the de'il a spunk's amang them. Isna a' the monks, frae John o' Groat's to the Border, getting ready their spits and rackses, fryingpans and branders, to cook them like capons and doos for Horney's supper? I never hear my ain bellows snoring at a gaud o' iron in the fire, but I think o' fat Father Lickladle, the abbey's head kitchener, roasting me o'er the low like a laverock in his collop-tangs; for, as Dame Lugton there weel kens, I'm ane o' the Reformed. Heh! but it's a braw thing this Reformation. It used to cost me as muckle siller for the sin o' getting fu', no aboon three or four times in the year, as would hae kept ony honest man blithe and ree frae New'ersday to Hogman%a; but our worthy hostess has found to her profit, that I'm now ane of her best customers. What say ye, Lucky?%' %"Truly,%' said Dame Lugton, laughing, %"thou's no an ill swatch o' the Reformers; and naebody need be surprised at the growth o' heresy wha thinks o' the dreadfu' cost the professors o't used to be at for pardons. But maybe they'll soon find that the de'il's as hard a taxer as e'er the kirk was; for ever since thou has refraint frae paying penance, thy weekly calks ahint the door hae been on the increase, Jamie, and no ae plack has thou mair to spare. So muckle gude thy reforming has done thee.%' %"Bide awee, lucky,%' cried the smith, setting down the ale-cap, which he had just emptied, %"bide awee, and ye'll see a change. Surely it was to be expecket, considering the spark in my hass, that the first use I would mak o' the freedom o' the Reformation would be to quench it, which I never was allowed to do afore; and whenever that's done, ye'll see me a geizen't keg o' sobriety,_tak the word o' a drowthy smith for't.%' At this jink o' their controversy, who should come into the house, ringing ben to the hearth-stane with his iron heels and the rattling rowels o' his spurs, but Winterton, without observing my grandfather, who was then sitting with his back to the window-light, in the arm-chair at the chimla lug; and when he had ordered Dame Lugton to spice him a drink of her best brewing, he began to joke and jibe with the blacksmith; the which allowing my grandfather time to compose his wits, which were in a degree startled; he saw that he could not but be discovered, so he thought it was best to bring himself out. Accordingly, in as quiet a manner as he was able to put on, he said to Winterton_ %"I hae a notion that we twa hae forgathered no lang sincesyne.%' At the sound of these words Winterton gave a loup, as if he had tramped on something no canny, syne a whirring sort of triumphant whistle, and then a shout, crying, %"Ha, ha! tod lowrie! hae I yirded you at last?%' But instanter he recollected himsel', and giving my grandfather a significant look, as if he wished him no to be particular, he said, %"I heard o' you, Gilhaize, on the road, and I was fain to hae come up wi' you, that we might hae travelled thegither. Howsever, I lost scent at Glasgow.%' And then he continued to haver with him, in his loose and profligate manner, anent the Glasgow damsels, till the ale was ready, when he pressed my grandfather to taste, never letting wot how they had slept together in the same bed; and my grandfather, on his part, was no less circumspect, for he discerned that Winterton intended to come over him, and he was resolved to be on his guard. CHAPTER XV WHEN Winterton had finished his drink, which he did hastily, he proposed to my grandfather that they should take a stroll through the town; and my grandfather being eager to throw stour in his eyes, was readily consenting thereto. %"Weel,%' said the knave, when he had warily led him into the abbey kirk-yard, %"I did na think ye would hae gane back to my Lord; but it's a' very weel, since he has looked o'er what's past, and gi'en you a new dark.%' %"He's very indulgent,%' replied my grandfather, %"and I would be loath to wrang so kind a master;%' and he looked at Winterton; the varlet, however, never winced, but rejoined lightly,_ %"But I wish ye had come back to Widow Rippet's, for ye would hae spar't me a hard ride. Scarcely had ye ta'en the road when my Lord mindit that he had neglekit to gie you the sign, by the which ye were to make yoursel and message kent to his friends, and I was sent after to tell you.%' %"I'm glad o' that,%' replied my grandfather, %"what is't?%' Winterton was a thought molested by this thrust of a question, and for the space of about a minute said nothing, till he had considered with himself, when he rejoined_ %"Three lads were sent off about the same time wi' you, and the Earl was nae quite sure, he said, whilk of you a' he had forgotten to gie the token whereby ye would be known as his men. But the sign for the Earl of Eglinton, to whom I guess ye hae been sent, by coming to Kilwinning, is no the same as for the Lord Boyd, to whom I thought ye had been missioned; for I hae been at the Dean Castle, and finding you not there, followed you hither.%' %"I'll be plain wi' you,%" said my grandfather to this draughty speech, %"I'm bound to the Lord Boyd; but coming through Paisley, when I reached the place where the twa roads branched, I took the ane that brought me here instead of the gate to Kilmarnock; so, as soon as my beast has eaten his corn, I mean to double back to the Dean Castle.%' %"How, in the name of the saints and souls! did ye think, in going frae Glasgow to Kilmarnock, o' taking the road to Paisley?%' %"'Deed, an' ye were acquaint,%' said my grandfather, %"wi' how little I knew o' the country, ye would nae speir that question; but since we hae fallen in thegither, and are baith, ye ken, in my Lord Glencairn's service, I hope ye'll no objek to ride back wi' me to the Lord Boyd's.%' %"Then it's no you that was sent to the Earl of Eglinton?%' exclaimed Winterton, pretending more surprise than he felt; %"and all my journey has been for naething. Howsoever, I'll go back wi' you to Kilmarnock, and the sooner we gang the better.%' Little farther discourse then passed, for they returned to the hostel, and ordering out their horses, were soon on the road; and as they trotted along, Winterton was overly outspoken against the papisticals, calling them all kinds of ill names, and no sparing the Queen Regent. But my grandfather kept a calm tongue, and made no reflections. %"Howsever,%' said Winterton, pulling up his bridle, and walking his horse, as they were skirting the moor of Irvine, leaving the town about a mile off on the right, %"you and me, Gilhaize, that are but servants, need nae fash our heads wi' sic things, the wyte o' wars lies at the doors of kings, and the soldiers are free o' the sin o' them. But how will ye get into the presence and confidence of the Lord Boyd?%' %"I thought,%' replied my grandfather pawkily, %"that ye had gotten our master's token; and I maun trust to you.%' %"O,%' cried Winterton, %"I got but the ane for the lad sent to Eglinton Castle.%' %"And hae ye been there?%' said my grandfather. Winterton didna let wot that he heard this, but stooping over on the off-side of his horse, pretended he was righting something about his stirrup-leather. My grandfather was, however, resolved to probe him to the quick; so, when he was again sitting upright, he repeated the question, if he had been to Eglinton Castle. %"O, ay,%' cried the false loon; %"I was there, but the bird was flown.%' %"And how got he the ear of the Earl,%' said my grandfather, %"not having the sign?%' In for a penny in for a pound, was Winterton's motto, and ae lie with him was father to a race. %"Luckily for him,%' replied he, %"some of the serving-men kent him as being in Glencairn's service, so they took him to their master.%' My grandfather had no doubt that there was some truth in this, though he was sure Winterton knew little about it; for it agreed with what James Coom, the smith, had said about the lads from Eglinton that had been at his smiddy to get the horses shod, and remembering the leathern purses under the Earl his master's pillow, he was persuaded that there had been a messenger sent to the head of the Montgomeries, and likewise to other lords, friends of the Congregation; but he saw that Winterton went by guess, and lied at random. Still, though not affecting to notice it, nor expressing any distrust, he could not help saying to him, that he had come a long way, and after all it looked like a gowk's errand. The remark, however, only served to give Winterton inward satisfaction, and he replied with a laugh, that it made little odds to him where he was sent, and that he'd as lief ride in Ayrshire as sorn about the causey of Enbrough. In this sort of talk and conference they rode on together, the o'ercome every now and then of Winterton's discourse being concerning the proof my grandfather carried with him, whereby the Lord Boyd would know he was one of Glencairn's men. But, notwithstanding all his wiles and devices to howk the secret out of him, his drift being so clearly discerned, my grandfather was enabled to play with him till they were arrived at Kilmarnock, where Winterton proposed to stop till he had delivered his message to the Lord Boyd, at the Dean Castle. %"That surely cannot be,%' replied my grandfather; %"for ye ken, as there has been some mistak about the sign whereby I am to make myself known, ye'll hae to come wi' me to expound, in case of need. In trooth, now that we hae forgatherit, and as I hae but this ae message to a' the shire of Ayr, I would fain hae your company till I see the upshot.%' Winterton could not very easily make a refusal to this, but he hesitated and swithered, till my grandfather urged him again;_when seeing no help for it, and his companion, as he thought, entertaining no suspicion of him, he put on a bold face and went forward. When they had come to the Dean Castle, which stands in a pleasant green park about a mile aboon the town-head of Kilmarnock, on entering the gate, my grandfather hastily alighted, and giving his horse a sharp prick of his spur as he lap off, the beast ran capering out of his hand, round the court of the castle. With the well-feigned voice of great anxiety, my grandfather cried to the servants to shut the gate and keep it in; and Winterton alighting, ran to catch it, giving his own horse to a stripling to hold. At the same moment, however, my grandfather sprung upon him, and seizing him by the throat, cried out for help to master a spy. Winterton was so confounded that he gasped, and looked round like a man demented; and my grandfather ordered him to be taken by the serving-men to their master, before whom, when they were all come, he recounted the story of his adventures with the prisoner, telling his Lordship what his master, the Earl of Glencairn, suspected of him. To which, when Winterton was asked what he had to say, he replied bravely, that it was all true, and he was none ashamed to be so catched, when it was done by so clever a fellow. He was then ordered by the Lord Boyd to be immured in the dungeon-room, the which may be seen to this day; and though his captivity was afterwards somewhat relaxed, he was kept a prisoner in the castle till after the death of the Queen Dowager, and the breaking up of her two-faced councils. This exploit won my grandfather great favour, and he scarcely needed to show the signet-ring when he told his message from the Lords of the Congregation. CHAPTER XVI BY such devices and missions, as my grandfather was engaged in for the Earl Glencairn with the Lord Boyd, a thorough understanding was concerted among the Reformed throughout the kingdom; and, encouraged by their great strength and numbers, which far exceeded what was expected, the Lords of the Congregation set themselves roundly to work, and the protestant preachers openly published their doctrines. Soon after my grandfather had returned from the shire of Ayr, there was a weighty consultation held at the Earl his patron's lodging in Edinburgh, whereat, among others present, was that pious youth, afterwards the good Regent Murray. He was by office and appointment then the head and lord of the priory of St Andrews; but his soul cleaving to the Reformation and the Gospel, he laid down the use of that title, and about this time began to be called the Lord James Stuart. The Lords of the Congregation, feeling themselves strong in the goodness of their cause and the number of their adherents, resolved at this council, that they should proceed firmly but considerately to work, and seek redress as became true lieges, by representation and supplication. Accordingly a paper was drawn up, wherein they set forth how, for conscience sake, the Reformed had been long afflicted with banishment, confiscation of goods, and death in its cruellest forms. That continual fears darkened their lives, till, being no longer able to endure such calamities, they were compelled to beg a remedy against the oppressions and tyranny of the Estate Ecclesiastical, which had usurped an unlimited domination over the minds of men,_the faggot and the sword being the weapons which the prelates employed to enforce their mandates,_plain truths that were thus openly stated in order to show that the suppliants were sincere; and they concluded with a demand, that the original purity of the Christian religion should be restored, and the government so improved as to afford them security in their persons, opinions, and property. Sir James Calder of Sandilands was the person chosen to present this memorial to the Queen Regent; and never, said my grandfather, was an agent more fitly chosen to uphold the dignity of his trust, or to preserve the respect which, as good subjects, the Reformed desired to maintain and manifest towards the authority regal. He was a man far advanced in life; but there was none of the infirmities of age under the venerable exterior with which time had clothed his appearance. Of great honour and a pure life, he was reverenced by all parties, and had acquired both renown and affection, through his services to the realm and his manifold virtues. On a day appointed by the Queen Regent, the Lords and leaders of the Congregation attended Sandilands, each with a stately retinue, to Holyrood-house; my grandfather having leave from the Earl, his master, to wait on his person on that occasion. It was a solemn day to the worshippers of the true God, who came in great multitudes to the town, many from distant parts, to be present, and to hear the issue of a conference that was to give liberty to the consciences of all devout Scotchmen. From the house in the Lawn-market, where the Lords assembled, down to the very yetts of the palace, the sight was as if the street had been paved with faces, and windows over windows, roofs and lum-heads, were clustered with women and children. All temporal cares and businesses were that day suspended: in the accents and voices of men there was an awful sobriety, few speaking, and what was said, sounded as if every one was affected with the sense of some high and everlasting interest at stake. When the Lords went down into the street, there was, for a brief interval, a stir and a murmur in the multitude, which opened to the right and left as when the waves of the Red Sea were opened, and through the midst thereof prepared a miraculous road for the children of Israel. A deep silence succeeded, and Sandilands, with his hoary head uncovered, bearing in his hand the supplication and remonstrance, walked forward, and the Lords went after also all bare-headed, and every one with them followed in like manner, as reverentially as their masters. The people, as they passed along, slowly and devoutly, took off their caps and bonnets, and bowed their heads as when the ark of the covenant of the Lord was of old brought back from the Philistines; and many wept, and others prayed aloud, and there was wonder, and awe, and dread, mingled with thoughts of unspeakable confidence and glory. When Sandilands and those with him were conducted into the presence of the Queen-dowager, she was standing under a canopy of state, surrounded by many of the nobles and prelates, and by her maidens of honour. My grandfather had not seen her before, and having often heard her suspected of double-dealing, and of a superstitious zeal and affection for the papal abominations and cruelties, he had pictured to himself a lean and haggard woman, with a pale and fierce countenance, and was therefore greatly amazed when he beheld a lady of a most sweet and gracious aspect, with mild dark eyes beaming with a chaste dignity, and a high and fair forehead, bright and unwrinkled with any care, and lips formed to speak soft and gentle sentences. In her apparel she was less gay than her ladies, but nevertheless she was more queenly. Her dress and mantle were of the richest purple Genoese unadorned with embroidery, and round her neck she wore a ruff of fine ermine and a string of princely pearls: a small golden cross of curious graven gold dangled to her waist from a loup in the vale of her bosom. Sandilands advanced several paces before the Lords by whom he was attended, and falling on his knees, read with a loud and firm voice the memorial of the Reformed; and when he had done so and was risen, the Queen received a paper that was given to her by her secretary, who stood behind her right shoulder, and also read an answer which had been prepared, and in which she was made to deliver many comfortable assurances, that at the time were received as a great boon with much thankfulness by all the Reformed, who had too soon reason to prove the insincerity of those courtly flatteries. For no steps were afterwards taken to give those indulgences by law that were promised; but the papists stirring themselves with great activity, and foreign matters and concerns coming in aid of their stratagems, long before a year passed the mind of the Queen and government was fomented into hostility against the protestants. She called into her favour and councils the Archbishop of St Andrews, with whom she had been at variance; and the devout said, when they heard thereof, that when our Saviour was condemned, on the same day Herod and Pilate were made friends, applying the text to this reconciliation; and boding therefrom woe to the true church. Moved by the hatred which his Grace bore to the Reformers, the Queen cited the protestant preachers to appear at Stirling to answer to the charges which might there be preferred against them. My grandfather, when this perfidy came to a head, was at Finlayston-house, in the shire of Renfrew, with the Earl, his master, who, when he heard of such a breach of faith, smote the table, as he was then sitting at dinner, with his right hand, and said, %"Since the false woman has done this, there is nothing for us but the banner and the blade;%' and starting from his seat he forthwith ordered horses, and, attended by my grandfather and ten armed servants, rode to Glasgow, where Sir Hugh Campbell of Loudon, then sheriff of Ayr, and other worthies of the time, were assembled on business before the Lords of Justiciary; and it was instanter agreed, that they should forthwith proceed to Stirling where the court was, and remonstrate with the Queen. So, leaving all temporal concerns, Sir Hugh took horse, and they arrived at Stirling about the time her Highness supped, and going straight to the castle, they stood in the ante-chamber, to speak if possible with her as she passed. On entering the room to pass to her table she saw them, and looked somewhat surprised and displeased; but without saying any thing particular she desired the Earl to follow her, and Sir Hugh, unbidden, went also into the banquet-room. It was seldom that she used state in her household, and on this occasion, it being a popish fast, her table was frugally spread, and only herself sat at the board. %"Well, Glencairn,%' said she, %"what has brought you hither from the west at this time? Is the realm to be for ever tossed like the sea by this tempest of heresies? The royal authority is not always to be insulted with impunity, and in spite of all their friends the protestant preachers shall be banished from Scotland, aye, though their doctrines were as sound as St Paul's.%' The Earl, as my grandfather heard him afterwards relate, replied, %"Your Majesty gave your royal promise that the Reformed should be protected, and they have done nothing since to cause the forfeiture of so gracious a boon: I implore your Majesty to call that sacred pledge to mind.%' %"You lack reason, my Lord,%' she cried, sharply; %"it becomes not subjects to burden their princes with promises which it may be inconvenient to keep.%' %"If these, madam, are your sentiments,%' replied the Earl, proudly, %"the Congregation can no longer acknowledge your authority, and must renounce their allegiance to your government.%' She had, at the moment, lifted the salt-celler to sprinkle her salad,_but she was so astonished at the boldness of this speech, that she dropt it from her hand, and the salt was spilt on the floor_an evil omen, which all present noted. %"My Lord Glencairn,%' said she, thoughtfully, %"I would execute my great duties honestly, but your preachers trouble the waters, and I know not where the ford lies that I may safest ride. Go ye away and try to keep your friends quiet, and I will consider calmly what is best to be done for the weal of all.%' At these words the Earl and Sir Hugh Campbell bowed, and, retiring, went to the lodging of the Earl of Monteith, where they were mindet to pass the night; but, when they had consulted with that nobleman, my grandfather was ordered to provide himself with a fresh horse from Monteith's stable, and to set out for Edinburgh with letters for the Lord James Stuart. %"Gilhaize,%' said his master, as he delivered them, %"I foresee we must buckle on our armour; but the cause of the Truth does not require that the first blow should come from our side. By this time John Knox, who has been long expected, may be hourly looked for; and as no man stands higher in the aversion of the papists than that brave honest man, we shall know, by the reception he meets with, what we ought to do.%' So my grandfather, putting the letters in his bosom, retired from the presence of the Earl, and by break of day reached the West-port, and went straight on to the Lord James Stuart's lodging in the Canongate. But, though the household were astir, it was some time before he got admittance; for their master was a young man of great method in all things, and his chaplain was at the time reading the first prayers of the morning, during which the doors were shut, and no one, however urgent his business, could gain admission into that house while the inmates were doing their homage to the King of kings. xlaser/project=yk02s/name=galt6/remote="lxxlx,geoiu,sixth.out" CHAPTER XVII AS my grandfather, in the grey of the morning, was waiting in the Canongate till the worship was over in the house of the Lord James Stuart, he frequently rode up and down the street as far as the Luckenbooths and the Abbey's sanctuary siver, and his mind was at times smitten with the remorse of pity, when he saw, as the dawn advanced, the numbers of poor labouring men that came up out of the closes and gathered round the trone, abiding there to see who would come to hire them for the day. But his compassion was soon changed into a frame of thankfulness, at the boundless variety of mercies which are dealt out to the children of Adam, for he remarked, that, for the most part, these poor men, whose sustenance was as precarious as that of the wild birds of the air, were cheerful and jocund, many of them singing and whistling as blithely as the lark, that carries the sweet incense of her melodious songs in the censer of a sinless breast to the golden gates of the morning. Hitherto he had never noted, or much considered, the complicated cares and trials wherewith the lot of man in every station is chequered and environed; and when he heard those bondmen of hard labour, jocund after sound slumbers and light suppers, laughing contemptuously as they beheld the humiliating sight, which divers gallants and youngsters, courtiers of the court, degraded with debauch, made of themselves as they stumbled homeward, he thought there was surely more bliss in the cup that was earned by the constancy of health and a willing mind, than in all the possets and malvesia that the hoards of ages could procure. So he composed his spirit, and inwardly made a vow to the Lord, that, as soon as the mighty work of the redemption of the Gospel from the perdition of papistry was accomplished, he would retire into the lea of some pleasant green holm, and take, for the purpose of his life, the attainment of that happy simplicity which seeks but the supply of the few wants with which man comes so rich from the hands of his Maker, that all changes in his natural condition of tilling the ground and herding the flocks only serve to make him poorer by increasing. While he was thus ruminating in the street, he observed two strangers coming up the Canongate. One of them had the appearance of a servant, but he was of a staider and more thoughtful aspect than belongs to men of that degree, only he bore on his shoulder a willease, and had in his hand a small package wrapt in a woollen cover and buckled with a leathern strap. The other was the master; and my grandfather halted his horse to look at him as he passed, for he was evidently no common man nor mean personage, though in stature he was jimp the ordinary size. He was bent more with infirmities than the load of his years. His hair and long flowing beard were very grey and venerable, like those of the ancient patriarchs who enjoyed immediate communion with God. But though his appearance was thus aged, and though his complexion and countenance betokened a frail tenement, yet the brightness of youth shone in his eyes, and they were lighted up by a spirit over which time had no power. In his steps and gait he was a little hasty and unsteady, and twice or thrice he was obliged to pause in the steep of the street to draw his breath; but even in this there was an affecting and great earnestness, a working of a living soul within, as if it panted to enter on the performance of some great and solemn hest. He seemed to be eager and zealous, like the apostle Peter, in his temper, and as dauntless as the mighty and courageous Paul. Many in the street stopped, and looked after him with reverence and marvelling, as he proceeded with quick and desultory steps, followed by his sedate attendant. Nor was it surprising, for he was, indeed, one of those who, in their lives, are vast and wonderful,_special creations that are sent down from heaven, with authority attested by the glowing impress of the signet of God on their hearts, to avenge the wrongs done to His truths and laws in the blasphemies of the earth._It was John Knox! When he had passed, my grandfather rode back to the yett of the Lord James Stuart's lodgings, which by this time was opened, and instanter, on mentioning to the porter from whom he had come, was admitted to his master. That great worthy was at the time sitting alone in a back chamber, which looked towards Salisbury Crags, and before him, but on the opposite side of the table, among divers letters and papers of business, lay a large Bible, with brass clasps thereon, in which, it would seem, some one had been expounding to him a portion of the Scriptures. When my grandfather presented to him the letter from the Earl of Glencairn, he took it from him without much regarding him, and broke open the seal, and began to peruse it to himself in that calm and methodical manner for which he was so famed and remarkable. Before, however, he had read above the half thereof, he gave as it were a sudden hitch, and turning round, looked my grandfather sharply in the face, and said,_ %"Are you Gilhaize?%' But before any answer could be made, he waved his hand graciously, pointing to a chair, and desired him to sit down, resuming at the same time the perusal of the letter; and when he had finished it, he folded it up for a moment; but, as if recollecting himself, he soon runkled it up in his hand and put it into the fire. %"Your Lord informs me,%' said he, %"that he has all confidence, not only in your honesty, Gilhaize, but in your discernment; and says, that in respect to the high question anent Christ's cause, you may be trusted to the uttermost. Truly, for so young a man, this is an exceeding renown. His letter has told me what passed last night with the Queen's Highness. I am grieved to hear it. She means well; but her feminine fears make her hearken to counsels that may cause the very evils whereof she is so afraid. But the sincerity of her favour to the Reformed will soon be tried, for last night John Knox arrived, and I was with him; and, strong in the assurances of his faith, he intends to lead on to the battle. This morning he was minded to depart for Fife._"Our Captain, Christ Jesus,' said he, "and Satan, His adversary, are now at open defiance; their banners are displayed, and the trumpet is blown on both sides for assembling their armies.' As soon as it is known that he is within the kingdom, we shall learn what we may expect, and that presently too; for this very day the clergy meet in the monastery of the Greyfriars, and doubtless they will be advertised of his coming. You had as well try if you can gain admittance among the other auditors, to hear their deliberations; afterwards come again to me, and report what takes place; by that time I shall be advised whether to send you back to Glencairn or elsewhere.%' My grandfather, after this and some farther discourse, retired to the hall, and took breakfast with the household, where he was much edified with the douce deportment of all present, so unlike that of the lewd and graceless varlets who rioted in the houses of the other nobles. Verily, he used to say, the evidences of a reforming spirit were brightly seen there; and, to rule every one into a chaste sobriety of conversation, a pious clerk sate at the head of the board, and said grace before and after the meal, making it manifest how much all things about the Lord James Stuart were done in order. Having taken breakfast, and reposed himself some time, for his long ride had made him very weary, he rose, and, changing his apparel, went to the Greyfriars church, where the clergy were assembling, and elbowing himself gently into the heart of the people waiting around for admission, he got in with the crowd when the doors were opened. The matter that morning to be considered concerned the means to be taken, within the local jurisdictions of those there met, to enforce the process of the summons which had been issued against the reformed preachers to appear at Stirling. But while they were busily conversing and contriving how best to aid and further that iniquitous aggression of perfidious tyranny, there came in one of the brethren of the monastery, with a frightened look, and cried aloud, that John Knox was come, and had been all night in the town. At the news the spectators, as if moved by one spirit, gave a triumphant shout,_the clergy were thunderstruck,_some started from their seats, unconscious of what they did,_others threw themselves back where they sat,_and all appeared as if a judgment had been pronounced upon them. In the same moment the church began to skail,_the session was adjourned,_and the people ran in all directions. The cry rose every where, %"John Knox is come!%' All the town came rushing into the streets,_the old and the young, the lordly and the lowly, were seen mingling and marvelling together,_all tasks of duty, and servitude, and pleasure, were forsaken,_the sick-beds of the dying were deserted,_the priests abandoned their altars and masses, and stood pale and trembling at the doors of their churches,_mothers set down their infants on the floors, and ran to inquire what had come to pass,_funerals were suspended, and the impious and the guilty stood aghast, as if some dreadful apocalypse had been made;_travellers, with the bridles in their hands, lingering in profane discourse with their hosts, suddenly mounted, and speeded into the country with the tidings. At every cottage door and wayside bield, the inmates stood in clusters, silent and wondering, as horseman came following horseman, crying, %"John Knox is come!%' Barks that had departed, when they heard the news, bore up to tell others that they saw afar at sea. The shepherds were called in from the hills;_the warders on the castle, when, at the sound of many quickened feet approaching, they challenged the comers, were answered, %"John Knox is come!%' Studious men were roused from the spells of their books;_nuns, at their windows, looked out fearful and inquiring,_and priests and friars were seen standing by themselves, shunned like lepers. The whole land was stirred as with the inspiration of some new element, and the hearts of the persecutors were withered. %"No tongue,%' often said my grandfather, %"could tell the sense of that great event through all the bounds of Scotland, and the papistical dominators shrunk as if they had suffered, in their powers and principalities, an awful and irremediable overthrow.%' CHAPTER XVIII WHEN my grandfather left the Greyfriars, he went to the lodging of the Lord James Stuart, whom he found well instructed of all that had taken place, which he much marvelled at, having scarcely tarried by the way in going thither. %"Now, Gilhaize,%' said my Lord, %"the tidings fly like wild-fire, and the Queen Regent, by the spirit that has descended into the hearts of the people, will be constrained to act one way or another. John Knox, as you perhaps know, stands under the ban of outlawry for conscience sake. In a little while we shall see whether he is still to be persecuted. If left free, the braird of the Lord, that begins to rise so green over all the land, will grow in peace to a plentiful harvest. But if he is to be hunted down, there will come such a cloud and storm as never raged before in Scotland. I speak to you thus freely, that you may report my frank sentiments to thir noble friends and trusty gentlemen, and say to them, that I am girded for the field, if need be.%' He then put a list of several well-known friends of the Reformation ayont the frith into my grandfather's hands, adding, %"I need not say that it is not fitting now to trust to paper, and therefore much will depend on yourself. The confidence that my friend the Earl, your master, has in you, makes me deal thus openly with you; and I may add, that if there is deceit in you, Gilhaize, I will never again believe the physiognomy of man_so go your ways; see all these, wheresoever they may be,_and take this purse for your charges.%' My grandfather accepted the paper and the purse; and reading over the paper, imprinted the names in it on his memory, and then said_ %"My Lord, I need not risk the possession of this paper; but it may be necessary to give me some token by which the lords and lairds therein mentioned may have assurance that I come from you.%' For some time the Lord James made no reply, but stood ruminating, with the forefinger of his left hand pressing his nether lip: then he observed_ %"Your request is very needful;%' and taking the paper, he mentioned divers things of each of the persons named in it, which he told my grandfather had passed between him and them severally when none other was present. %"By remembering them of these things,%' said he, %"they will know that you are in verity sent from me.%' Being thus instructed, my grandfather left the Lord James, and proceeding forthwith to the pier of Leith, embarked in the Burntisland ferry-boat_and considering with himself, that the farthest away of those whom he was missioned to see ought to be the first informed, as the nearer had other ways and means of communion, he resolved to go forward to such of them as dwelt in Angus and Merns; by which resolution he reached Dundee shortly after the arrival there of the champion of the Reformation, John Knox. This resolution proved most wise and fortunate; for, on landing in that town, he found a great concourse of the Reformed from the two shires assembled there, and among them many of those to whom he was specially sent. They had come to go with their ministers before the Queen Regent's counsel at Stirling, determined to avow their adherence to the doctrines of which those pious men were accused. And it being foreseen, that as they went forward others would join, my grandfather thought he could do no better in his mission than mingle with them, the more especially as John Knox was also to be of that great company. On the day following, they accordingly all set forward towards Perth,_and they were a glorious army, mighty with the strength of their great ally the Lord of the hosts of heaven. No trumpet sounded in their march, nor was the courageous drum heard among them,_nor the shouts of earthly soldiery,_nor the neigh of the war-horse,_nor the voice of any captain. But they sang hymns of triumph, and psalms of the great things that Jehovah had of old done for his people; and though no banner was seen there, nor sword on the thighs of men of might, nor spears in the grasp of warriors, nor crested helmet, nor aught of the panoply of battle, yet the eye of faith beheld more than all these, for the hills and heights of Scotland were to its dazzled vision covered that day with the mustered armies of the dreadful God:_the angels of his wrath in their burning chariots; the archangels of his omnipotence, calm in their armour of storms and flaming fires, and the Rider on the white horse, were all there. As the people with their ministers advanced, their course was like a river, which continually groweth in strength and spreadeth its waters as it rolls onward to the sea. On all sides came streams of new adherents to their holy cause, in so much that when they arrived at Perth it was thought best to halt there, lest the approach of so great a multitude, though without weapons, should alarm the Queen Regent's government. Accordingly they made a pause, and Erskine of Dun, one of the Lord James Stuart's friends, taking my grandfather with him, and only two other servants, rode forward to Stirling, to represent to her Highness the faith and the firmness of the people. When they arrived, they found the town in consternation. Busy were the bailies, marshalling such of the burgesses as could be persuaded to take up arms; but all who joined them were feckless aged men, dealers and traffickers in commodities for the courtiers. Proud was the provost that day, and a type of the cause for which he was gathering his papistical remnants. At the sight of Dun and his three followers riding up the street to the castle, he was fain to draw out his sword and make a salutation; but it stuck sae dourly in, that he was obligated to gar ane of the town-officers hold the scabbard, while he pulled with such might and main at the hilt, that the blade suddenly broke off, and back he stumbled, and up flew his heels, so that even my grandfather was constrained, notwithstanding the solemnity of the occasion, to join in the shout of laughter that rose thereat from all present. But provosts and bailies, not being men of war, should not expose themselves to such adversities. Nor was the fyke of impotent preparation within the walls of the castle better. The Queen had been in a manner lanerly with her ladies when the sough of the coming multitude reached her. The French guards had not come from Glasgow, and there was none of the warlike nobles of the papistical sect at that time at Stirling. She had therefore reason both for dread and panic, when the news arrived that all Angus and Merns had rebelled, for so it was at first reported. On the arrival of Dun, he was on the instant admitted to her presence; for she was at the time in the tapestried chamber, surrounded by her priests and ladies, and many officers, all consulting her according to their fears. The sight, said my grandfather, for he also went into the presence, was a proof to him that the cause of the papacy was in the dead-thraws, the judgments of all present being so evidently in a state of discomfiture and desertion. Dun going forward with the wonted reverences, the Queen said to him abruptly_ %"Well, Erskine, what is this?%' Whereupon he represented to her, in a sedate manner, that the reformed ministers were not treated as they had been encouraged to hope; nevertheless, to show their submission to those in temporal authority over them, they were coming, in obedience to the citation, to stand trial. %"But their retinue_when have delinquents come to trial so attended?%' she exclaimed eagerly. %"The people, please your Highness,%' said Dun, with a steadfastness of manner that struck every one with respect for him,_%"the people hold the same opinions and believe the same doctrines as their preachers, and they feel that the offence, if it be offence, of which the ministers are accused, lies equally against them, and therefore they have resolved to make their case a common cause.%' %"And do they mean to daunt us from doing justice against seditious schismatics?%' cried her Highness somewhat in anger. %"They mean,%' replied Dun, %"to let your Highness see whether it be possible to bring so many to judgment. Their sentiment, with one voice, is, Cursed be they that seek the effusion of blood, or war, or dissension. Let us possess the evangile, and none within Scotland shall be more obedient subjects. In sooth, madam, they hold themselves as guilty of the crime charged as their ministers are, and they will suffer with them.%' %"Suffer! call you rebellion suffering?%' exclaimed the Queen. %"They have not yet rebelled,%' said Dun, calmly; %"they come to remonstrate with your Highness first; for, as Christians, they are loth to draw the sword. They have no arms with them, to the end that no one may dare to accuse them of any treason.%' %"It is a perilous thing when subjects,%' said the Queen, much troubled, %"declare themselves so openly against the authority of their rulers.%' %"It is a bold thing for rulers,%' replied Dun, %"to meddle with the consciences of their subjects.%' %"How!%' exclaimed the Queen, startled and indignant. %"I will deal yet more plainly with your Highness,%' said he firmly. %"This pretended offence, of which the Reformed are accused, is not against the royal authority. They are good and true subjects, and, by their walk and conversation, bear testimony to the excellence and purity of those doctrines for which they are resolved to sacrifice their lives rather than submit to any earthly dictation. Their controversies pertain to things of Christ's kingdom,_it is a spiritual warfare. But the papists, conscious of their weakness in the argument, would fain see your Highness abandon that impartial justice which you were called of Heaven to administer in your great office, and to act factiously on their side, as if the cause of the Gospel could be determined by the arm of flesh.%' %"What has brought you here?%' exclaimed the Queen, bursting into tears. %"To claim the fulfilment of your royal promises,%' said Dun, making a lowly reverence, that by its humility took away all arrogance from the boldness of the demand. %"I will,%' said she: %"I am ever willing to be just, but this rising has shaken me with apprehensions; therefore, I pray you, Erskine, write to your brethren; bid them disperse; and tell them from me, that their ministers shall neither be tried nor molested.%' At these words, she took the arm of one of her ladies and hastily retired. Dun also withdrew, and the same hour sent my grandfather back to Perth with letters to the Congregation, to the effect of her request and assurance. That same evening the multitude broke up and returned to their respective homes, rejoicing with an exceeding great joy at so blessed a termination of their weaponless Christian war. Dun, however, distrusting the influence of some of those who were of the Queen's council, and who had arrived at the castle soon after my grandfather's departure, did not return, as he had intended, next morning to Perth, but resolved to wait over the day of trial; or, at least, until the ministers were absolved from attendance on the summons, either by proclamation or other forms of law. xlaser/project=yk02s/name=galt7/remote="lxxlx,geoiu,seventh.out"/time=2min CHAPTER XIX JOHN KNOX, among all the ministers who remained at Perth after the Congregation of the Reformed had dispersed, was the only one, my grandfather has been heard to say, that expressed no joy nor exultation at the assurances of the Queen Regent. %"We shall see, we shall see,%' was all he said to those among them who gloried in the victory; adding, %"But if there is truth in the Word of God, it is not in the nature of the Beast to do otherwise than evil;%' and his words of discernment and of wisdom were soon verified. Erskine of Dun, while he remained at Stirling, had his eyes and ears open; and in their porches he placed, for sentinels, Distrust and Suspicion. He knew the fluctuating nature of woman; how every succeeding wave of feeling washes away the deepest traces that are traced on the quicksands of her unstable humours; and the danger having passed, he jealoused that the Queen Regent would forget her terrors, and give herself up to the headlong councils of the adversaries, whom, from her known adherence to the Romanish ritual, he justly feared she was inclined to favour. Nor was he left long in doubt. On the evening before the day which had been appointed for the trial, no proclamation or other token was promulged to appease the anxieties of the cited preachers. He, therefore, thought it needful to be prepared for the worst; so, accordingly, he ordered his two serving-men to have his horses in readiness forth the town in the morning, and there to abide his orders. Without giving any other about him the slightest inkling of what he had conceited, he went up betimes to the castle, having learnt that the Queen Regent was that day to hold a council. And being a man held in great veneration by all parties, and well known to the household of the court, he obtained access to the ante-chamber after the council was met; and standing there, he was soon surprised by her Highness coming out, leaning on the arm of the Lord Wintoun, and seemingly much disturbed. On seeing him she was startled, and paused for a moment; but soon collecting all her pride, she dropped the Lord Wintoun's arm, and walked straight through the apartment without noticing any one, and holding herself aloft with an air of resolute dignity.. Dun augured no good from this; but following till the Lord Wintoun had attended her to the end of the long painted gallery, where she stopped at the door that opened to her private apartments, he there awaited that nobleman's return, and inquired of him if the process against the protestant ministers had been rescinded. %"No,%' said Wintoun, peevishly; %"the summons have been called over, and they have not appeared, either in person or by agents.%' %"Say you so, my Lord!%' cried Dun; %"and what is the result?%' %"Outlawry, for non-appearance, is pronounced against them,%' replied Wintoun, haughtily, and went straight back into the council-chamber. Dun thought it unnecessary to inquire farther; so, without making more ado, he instanter left the castle, and, going down the town, went to the spot where his horses stood ready, and, mounting, rode off with the tidings to Perth, grieving sorely at the gross perfidy and sad deceit which the Queen Regent had been so practised on, by the heads of the papist faction, to commit. It happened on the same day, that John Knox, who remained at Perth, a wakeful warder on a post of peril, was moved by the spirit of God to preach a sermon, in which he exposed the idolatry of the mass and the depravity of image-worship. My grandfather was present, and he often said that preaching was an era and epoch worthy to be held in everlasting remembrance. It took place in the Greyfriars' church. There was an understanding among the people that it was to be there; but many fearing the monks might attempt to prevent it, a vast concourse, chiefly men, assembled at the ordinary mass hour, and remained in the church till the Reformer came, so that, had the friars tried to keep him out, they could not have shut the doors. A lane was made through the midst of the crowd to admit the preacher to the pulpit; and when he was seen advancing, aged and feeble, and leaning on his staff, many were moved with compassion, and doubted if it could be the wonderful man of whom every tongue spoke. But when he had ascended and began, he seemed to undergo a great transfiguration. His abject mien and his sickly visage became majestic and glorious. His eyes lightened; his countenance shone as with the radiance of a spirit that blazed within; and his voice dirled to the heart like vehement thunder. Sometimes he spoke to the understandings of those who heard him, of that insane doctrine which represented the mission of the Redeemer to consist of believing, in despite of sight, and smell, and touch, and taste, that wafers and wine were actually the flesh and blood of a man that was crucified, with nails driven through his feet and hands, many hundred years ago. Then, rising into the contemplation of the divinity of the Saviour, he trampled under the feet of his eloquence a belief so contrary to the instincts and senses with which Infinite Wisdom has gifted his creatures; and bursting into ecstasy at the thought of this idolatrous invention, he called on the people to look at the images and the effigies in the building around them, and believe, if they could, that such things, the handy works of carpenters and masons, were endowed with miraculous energies far above the faculties of man. Kindling into a still higher mood, he preached to those very images, and demanded of them, and those they represented, to show any proof that they were entitled to reverence. %"God forgive my idolatry,%' he exclaimed, %"I forget myself_these things are but stocks and stones.%' Not one of all who heard him that day ever gave ear again to papistry. When he had made an end, and had retired from the church, many still lingered, discoursing of his marvellous lecture, and, among others, my grandfather. An imprudent priest belonging to the convent, little aware of the great conversion which had been wrought, began to prepare for the celebration of the mass, and a callan who was standing near, encouraged by the contempt which some of those around expressed at this folly, jibed the priest, and he drove him away. The boy, however, returned, and levelling a stone at a crucifix on the altar, shattered it to pieces. In an instant, as if caught by a whirlwind, the whole papistical trumpery was torn down, and dashed into fragments. The cry of %"Down with the idols!%' became universal: hundreds on hundreds came rushing to the spot. The magistrates and the ministers came flying to beseech order and to sooth the multitude; but a Divine ire was upon the people, who heard no voice but only the cry of %"Down with the idols!%' and their answer was, %"Burn, burn, and destroy!%' The monasteries of the Black and the Grey Friars were sacked and rendered desolate, and the gorgeous edifice of the Carthusian monks levelled to the ground.. So dreadful a tumult had never before been heard of within the realm. Many of the best of the Reformed deplored the handle it would give to the blasphemies of their foes. Even my grandfather was smitten with consternation and grief; for he could not but think that such a terrible temporal outrage would be followed by a temporal revenge as ruthless and complete. Sober minds shuddered at the sudden and sacrilegious overthrow of such venerable structures; and many that stood on the threshold of the house of papistical bondage, and were on the point of leaving it, retired in again, and barred the doors against the light, and hugged their errors as blameless compared with such enormities. To no one did the event give pleasure but to John Knox. %"The work,%' said he, %"has been done, it is true, by the rascal multitude; but when the nests are destroyed the rooks will fly away.%' The thing, however, most considered at that time, was the panic which this intemperance would cause to the Queen Regent; and my grandfather, seeing it had changed the complexion of his mission, resolved to return the same evening by the Queensferry to the Lord James Stuart at Edinburgh. For the people no sooner cooled, and came to a sense of reflection, than they discerned that they had committed a heinous offence against the laws, and, apprehending punishment, prepared to defend themselves. Thus, by the irresolute and promise-breaking policy of the Queen, was the people maddened into grievous excesses, and many of those who submitted quietly in the faith of her assurances, and had returned to their respective homes, considered the trumpet as sounded, and began to gird themselves for battle. CHAPTER XX IT'S far from my hand and intent, to write a history of the tribulations which ensued from the day of the uproar and first outbreaking of the wrath of the people against the images of the Romish idolatry; and therefore I shall proceed, with all expedient brevity, to relate what farther, in those sore times, fell under the eye of my grandfather, who, when he returned to Edinburgh, found the Lord James Stuart on the point of proceeding to the Queen Regent at Stirling, and he went with him thither. On arriving at the castle, they found the French soldiery all collected in the town, and her Highness, like another fiery Bellona, vowing to avenge the calamities that had befallen the idols and images of Perth; and summoning and invoking the nobility, and every man of substance she could think of, to come with their vassals, that she might be enabled to chastise such sacrilegious rebellion. The Lord James Stuart seeing her so bent on extremities, and knowing, by his secret intelligences, that strong powers were ready to start forward at a moment's warning, both in the West, and in Fife, Angus, and Merns, entreated her to listen to more moderate councils than those of revenge and resentment, and rather to think of pacification than of punishment. But she was fiery with passion, and a blinded instrument in the hands of Providence to work out the deliverance of the land, even by the crooked policy that her papistical counsellors hurried her into. So that the Lord James, seeing she was transported beyond reason, sent my grandfather and other secret emissaries to warn the Lords and leaders of the Congregation, and to tell them, that her Highness was minded to surprise Perth as soon as she had gathered a sufficient array. The conduct of that great worthy was in this full of wisdom, and foresight, and policy. By staying with the Queen he incurred the suspicion of the Reformed, to whom he was a devoted friend; but he gained a knowledge of the intents of their enemies, by which he was enabled to turn aside the edge of vengeance when it was meant to be most deadly. Accordingly, reckless of the opinions of men, he went forward with the Queen's army towards Perth; but before they had crossed the Water of Earn, word was brought to her Highness, that the Earl of Glencairn, at the head of two thousand five hundred of the Reformed, was advancing from the shire of Ayr. Such were were the fruits of my grandfather's mission to the Lord Boyd, and he heard likewise that the bold and free lairds of Angus and Merns, with all their followers, had formed themselves in battle-array to defend the town. Still, however, her Highness was resolute to go on; for she was instigated by her feminine anger, even as much as by the wicked councils of the papist lords by whom she was surrounded. But when she reached the heights that overlooked the sweet valley of the Tay, whose green and gentle bosom was then sparkling with the glances of warlike steel, her heart was softened, and she called to her the Lord James Stuart and the young Earl of Argyle,_the old Lord, his father, had died some time prior,_and sent them to the army of the Congregation, that peace might still be preserved. They accordingly went into the town, and sending notice to the leaders of the Reformed to appoint two of their party to confer with them, John Knox and the Master Willocks were nominated. My grandfather, who attended the Lord James on this occasion, was directed by him to receive the two deputies at the door and to conduct them in; and when they came he was much troubled to observe the state of their minds; for Master Willocks was austere in his looks as if resolved on quarrel, and the Reformer was agitated and angry, muttering to himself as he ascended the stairs, making his staff often dirl on the steps. No sooner were they shown into the presence of the two lords, even before the door was shut, than John Knox began to upbraid the Lord James for having broken the covenant and forsaken the Congregation. Much to that effect, my grandfather afterwards learnt, passed; but the Lord James pacified him with the assurance that his heart and spirit were still true to the cause, and that he had come with Argyle to prevent, if possible, the shedding of blood; he likewise declared both for himself and the Earl, who had hitherto always abided by the Queen, that if she refused to listen to reasonable terms, or should break any treaty entered into, they would openly take part against her. Upon these assurances a treaty was concluded, by which it was agreed, that both armies should retire peaceably to their respective habitations; that the town should be made accessible to the Queen Regent; that no molestation should be given to those who were then in arms for the Congregation, and no persecutions undertaken against the Reformed,_with other covenants calculated to sooth the Congregation and allay men's fears. But no sooner was this treaty ratified, the army of the Congregation dispersed, and her Highness in possession of the town, than it was manifest no vows nor obligations were binding towards the heretics, as the Reformed were called. The Queen's French guards, even when attending her into the town, fired into the house of a known zealous protestant and killed his son; the inhabitants were plundered and insulted with impunity, and the magistrates were dismissed to make way for men devoted to papistry. The Earl of Argyle and the Lord James Stuart, filled with wrath and indignation at such open perfidy, went straight into her Highness' presence without asking audience, and reproached her with deceit and craftiness; and having so vented their minds, instanter quitted the court and the town, and, attended by my grandfather and a few other servants, departed for Fife, to which John Knox had also retired after the dispersion of the Congregation at Perth. The Lord James, in virtue of being Prior of St Andrews, went thither attended by the Earl, and sent my grandfather to Crail, where the Reformer was then preaching, to invite him to meet them and others of the Congregation with all convenient expedition. My grandfather never having been before in Crail, and not knowing how the people there might stand affected, instead of inquiring for John Knox, bethought himself of his acquaintance with Bailie Kilspinnie, and so speired his way to his dwelling, little hoping, from the fearful nature of that honest man, he would find him within. But, contrary to his expectation, he was not only there, but he welcomed my grandfather as an old and very cordial friend, leading him into his house and making much of him, telling him, with a voice of cheerfulness, that the day of reckoning had at last overtaken the lascivious idolaters. Then he caused to be brought in before my grandfather the five pretty babies that his wife had abandoned for her papistical paramour, the eldest of whom was but turned of nine years. The thoughts of their mother's shame overcame their father at that moment, and the tears coming into his eyes he sobbed aloud as he looked at them, and wept bitterly, while they flocked around, and wreathed him, as it were, with their caresses and innocent blandishments. So tender a scene melted my grandfather's spirit into sadness; and he could not remain master of himself, when the eldest, a mild and meek little maiden, said to him, as if to excuse her father's sorrow, %"A foul friar made my mother an ill-doer, and took her away ae night when she was just done wi' harkening our prayers.%' At this juncture, a blooming and modest-eyed damsel came into the room; but, seeing a stranger, she drew back and was going away, when the bailie, drying his eyes, said_ %"Come ben, Elspa; this is the young man that ye hae heard me sae commend for his kind friendship to me, in that dotage-dauner that I made in my distraction to St Andrews. This,%' he added, turning to my grandfather, %"is Elspa Ruet, the sister of that misfortunate woman;_to my helpless bairns she does their mother's duty.%' Elspa made a gentle beck as her brother-in-law was speaking, and turning round, dropt a tear on the neck of the youngest baby, as she leant down to take it up for a screen to hide her blushing face, that reddent with the thought at seeing one who had so witnessed her sister's shame. From that hour her image had a dear place in my grandfather's bosom, and after the settlement of the Reformation throughout the realm, he courted her, and she became his wife, and in process of time my grandmother. But of her manifold excellencies I shall have occasion to speak more at large hereafter, for she was no ordinary woman, but a saint throughout life, returning in a good old age to her Maker, almost as blameless as she came from His pure hands; and nothing became her more in all her piety, than the part she acted towards her guilty sister. Having taken away the children, she then brought in divers refreshments, and a flagon of posset; but she remained not with the bailie and my grandfather while they partook thereof; so that they were left free to converse as they listed, and my grandfather was glad to find, as I have already said, that the poor man had triumphed over his fond grief, and was reconciled to his misfortunes as well as any father could well be, with so many deserted babies, and three of them daughters. He likewise learnt, with no less solace and satisfaction, that the Reformed were strong in Crail, and that the magistrates and beinest burgesses had been present on the day before at the preaching of John Knox, and had afterwards suffered the people to demolish the images and all the monuments of papistry, without molestation or hinderance; so that the town was cleansed of the pollution of idolatry, and the worship of humble and contrite hearts established there, instead of the pagan pageantry of masses and altars. After the repast was finished, the bailie conducted my grandfather to the house where John Knox then lodged, to whom he communicated his message from the Lord James Stuart. %"Tell your master,%' was the reply of the Reformer, %"that I will be with him, God willing; and God is willing, for this invitation, and the state of men's minds, maketh His will manifest. Yea, I was minded myself to go thither; for that same city of St Andrews is the Zion of Scotland. Of old, the glad tidings of salvation were first heard there,_there, amidst the damps and the darkness of ages, the ancient Culdees, men whose memory is still fragrant for piety and purity of faith and life, supplied the oil of the lamp of the living God for a period of four hundred years, independent of pope, prelate, or any human supremacy. There it was that a spark of their blessed embers was, in our own day, first blown into a flame,_and there, please God, where I, His unworthy instrument, was condemned as a criminal for His truth's sake, shall I, in His strength, be the herald of His triumph and great victory.%' CHAPTER XXI WHEN my grandfather had returned to the bailie's house after delivering his message to the Reformer, he spent an evening of douce but pleasant pastime with him and the modest Elspa Ruet, whose conversation was far above her degree, and seasoned with the sweet savour of holiness. But ever and anon, though all parties strove to eschew the subject, they began to speak of her erring sister, the bailie compassionating her continuance in sin as a man and a Christian should, but showing no wish nor will to mind her any more as kith or kin to him or his; a temper that my grandfather was well content to observe he had attained. Not so was that of Elspa; but her words were few and well-chosen, and they made a deep impression on my grandfather; for she seemed fain to hide what was passing in her heart. Twice or thrice she spoke of the ties of nature, intimating that they were as a bond and obligation laid on by THE MAKER, whereby kindred were bound to stand by one another in weal or in wo, lest those who sinned should be utterly abandoned by all the world. The which tender and Christian sentiment, though it was melodious to my grandfather's spirit, pierced it with a keen pain; for he thought of the manner in which he had left his own parents, even though it was for the blessed sake of religion, and his bosom was at the moment filled with sorrow. But, when he said how much he regretted and was yet unrepentant of that step, Elspa cheered him with a consolation past utterance, by reminding him, that he had neither left them to want nor to sin; that, by quitting the shelter of their wing, he had but obeyed the promptings of nature, and that if, at any time hereafter, father or mother stood in need of his aid or exhortation, he could still do his duty. Without well considering what he said, the bailie observed on this, that he was surprised to hear her say so, and yet allow her sister to remain so long unreproved in her offences. Elspa Ruet to this made no immediate reply,_she was indeed unable;_and my grandfather sympathized with her, for the sting had plainly penetrated to the very marrow of her soul. At last, however, she said,_ %"Your reproach is just, I hae been to blame baith to Heaven and man_but the thing has na been unthought, only I kent na how to gang about the task; and yet what gars me say sae but a woman's weakness, for the road's no sae lang to St Andrews, and surely iniquity does not there so abound, that no ane would help me to the donsie woman's bower.%' My grandfather, on hearing this, answered, that if she was indeed minded to try to rescue her sister, he was ready and willing to do all with her and for her that she could desire; but, bearing in mind the light woman's open shame, he added, %"I'm fearful it's yet owre soon to hope for her amendment: she'll hae to fin the evil upshot of her ungodly courses, I doubt, before she'll be wrought into a frame of sincere penitence.%' %"Nevertheless,%' replied Elspa Ruet, %"I will try; it's my duty, and my sisterly love bids me no to be slothful in the task.%' At which words she burst into sore and sorrowful weeping, saying, %"Alas, alas! that she should have so fallen!_I loved her_oh! naebody can tell how dearly_even as I loved myself. When I first saw my ain face in a looking-glass I thought it was her, and kissed it for the likeness, in pity that it didna look sae fair as it was wont to be. But it's the Lord's pleasure, and in permitting her to sink so low HE has no doubt some great lesson to teach.%' Thus, from less to more, as they continued conversing, it was agreed that Elspa Ruet should ride on a pad ahint my grandfather next morning to St Andrews, in order to try if the thing could be to move her sister to the humiliation of contrition for her loose life. And some small preparations being needful, Elspa departed and left the bailie and my grandfather together. %"But,%' said my grandfather to him, after she had been some time away, %"is't your design to take the unfortunate woman back amang your innocent lassie bairns?%' %"No,%' replied the bailie; %"that's no a thing to be now thought of; please Providence, she'll ne'er again darken my door; I'll no, however, allow her to want. Her mother, poor auld afflicted woman, that has ne'er refrain't from greeting since her flight, she'll tak her in; but atween her and me there's a divorce for ever.%' By daylight my grandfather had his horse at the door; and Elspa having borrowed the provost's lady's pad over night, it was buckled on, and they were soon after on the road. It was a sunny morning in June, and all things were bright, and blithe, and blooming. The spirits of youth, joy, and enjoyment, were spread abroad on the earth. The butterflies, like floating lilies, sailed from blossom to blossom, and the gowans, the bright and beautiful eyes of the summer, shone with gladness, as Nature walked on bank and brae, in maiden pride, spreading and showing her new flowery mantle to the sun. The very airs that stirred the glittering trees were soft and genial as the breath of life; and the leaves of the aspine seemed to lap the sunshine like the tongues of young and happy creatures that delight in their food. As my grandfather and Elspa Ruet rode along together, they partook of the universal benignity with which all things seemed that morning so graciously adorned, and their hearts were filled with the hope that their united endeavours to save her fallen sister would be blessed with success. But when they came in sight of the papal towers and gorgeous edifices of St Andrews, which then raised their proud heads, like Babel, so audaciously to the heavens, they both became silent. My grandfather's thoughts ran on what might ensue if the Archbishop were to subject him to his dominion, and he resolved, as early as possible, to make known his arrival to the Lord James Stuart, who, in virtue of being head of the priory, was then resident there, and to claim his protection. Accordingly he determined to ride with Elspa Ruet to the house of the vintner in the Shoegate, of which I have already spoken, and to leave her under the care of Lucky Kilfauns, as the hostess was called, until he had done so. But fears and sorrows were busy with the fancy of his fair companion; and it was to her a bitter thing, as she afterwards told him, to think that the purpose of her errand was to entreat a beloved sister to leave a life of shame and sin, and sadly doubting if she would succeed. Being thus occupied with their respective cogitations, they entered the city in silence, and reached the vintner's door without having exchanged a word for several miles. There Elspa alighted, and being commended to the care of Lucky Kilfauns, who, though of a free outspoken nature, was a most creditable matron, my grandfather left her, and rode up the gait to the priory yett, where, on his arrival, he made himself known to the porter, and was admitted to the Lord Prior, as the Lord James was there papistically called. Having told his Lordship that he had delivered his message to John Knox, and that the Reformer would not fail to attend the call, he then related partly what had happened to himself in his former sojourn at St Andrews, and how and for what end he had brought Elspa Ruet there that day with him, entreating the Lord James to give him his livery and protection, for fear of the Archbishop; which, with many pleasing comments on his devout and prudent demeanour, that noble worthy most readily vouchsafed, and my grandfather returned to the vintner's. CHAPTER XXII WHEN my grandfather had returned to the vintner's, he found that Elspa had conferred with Lucky Kilfauns concerning the afflicting end and intent of her journey to St Andrews; and that decent woman, sympathizing with her sorrow, telling her of many woful things of the same sort she had herself known, and how a cousin of her mother's, by the father's side, had been wiled away from her home by the abbot of Melrose, and never heard tell of for many a day, till she was discovered, in the condition of a disconsolate nun, in a convent, far away in Nithsdale. But the great difficulty was to get access to Marion Ruet's bower, for so, from that day, was Mrs Kilspinnie called again by her sister; and, after no little communing, it was proposed by Lucky Kilfauns, that Elspa should go with her to the house of a certain widow, Dingwall, and there for a time take up her abode, and that my grandfather, after putting on the Prior's livery, should look about him for the gilly, his former guide, and, through him, make a tryst to meet the dissolute madam at the widow's house. Accordingly the matter was so settled, and while Lucky Kilfauns, in a most motherly and pitiful manner, carried Elspa Ruet to the house of the Widow Dingwall, my grandfather went back to the priory to get the cloak and arms of the Lord James' livery. When he was equipped, he then went fearless all about the town, and met with no molestation; only he saw at times divers of the Archbishop's men, who recollected him, and who, as he passed, stopped and looked after him, and whispered to one another and muttered fierce words. Much he desired to fall in with that humane Samaritan, Leonard Meldrum, the seneschal of the castle, and fain would he have gone thither to inquire for him; but, until he had served the turn of the mournful Elspa Ruet, he would not allow any wish of his own to lead him to aught wherein there was the hazard of any trouble that might balk her pious purpose. After daunering from place to place, and seeing nothing of the stripling, he was obligated to give twalpennies to a stabler's lad to search for him, who soon brought him to the vintner's, where my grandfather, putting on the look of a losel and roister, gave him a groat, and bade him go to the madam's dwelling, and tell her that he would be, from the gloaming, all the night at the Widow Dingwall's, where he would rejoice exceedingly if she could come and spend an hour or two. The stripling, so fee'd, was right glad, and made himself so familiar towards my grandfather, that Lucky Kilfauns observing it, the better to conceal their plot, feigned to be most obstreperous, flyting at him with all her pith and bir, and chiding my grandfather, as being as scant o' grace as a gaberlunzie, or a novice of the Dominicans. However, they worked so well together, that the gilly never misdoubted either her or my grandfather, and took the errand to his mistress, from whom he soon came with a light foot and a glaikit eye, saying she would na fail to keep the tryst. That this new proof of the progress she was making in guilt and sin might be the more tenderly broken to her chaste and gentle sister, Lucky Kilfauns herself undertook to tell Elspa what had been covenanted to prepare her for the meeting. My grandfather would fain have had a milder mediatrix, for the vintner's worthy wife was wroth against the concubine, calling her offence redder than the crimson of schism, and blacker than the broth of the burning brimstone of heresy, with many other vehement terms of indignation, none worse than the wicked woman deserved, though harsh to be heard by a sister, that grieved for her unregenerate condition far more than if she had come from Crail to St Andrews only to lay her head in the coffin. The paction between all parties being thus covenanted, and Lucky Kilfauns gone to prepare the fortitude of Elspa Ruet for the trial it was to undergo, my grandfather walked out alone to pass the time till the trysted hour. It was then late in the afternoon, and as he sauntered along he could not but observe that something was busy with the minds and imaginations of the people. Knots of the douce and elderly shopkeepers were seen standing in the street, with their heads laid together; and as he walked towards the priory he met the provost between two of the bailies, with the dean of guild, coming sedately, and with very great solemnity in their countenances, down the crown of the causey, heavily laden with magisterial fears. He stopped to look at them, and he remarked that they said little to one another, but what they did say seemed to be words of weight; and when any of their friends and acquaintances happened to pass, they gave them a nod that betokened much sadness of heart. The cause of all this anxiety was not, in its effects and influence, meted only to the men and magistrates: the women partook of them even to a greater degree. They were seen passing from house to house, out at one door and into the next, and their faces were full of strange matters. One in particular, whom my grandfather noticed coming along, was often addressed with brief questions, and her responses were seemingly as awful as an oracle's. She was an aged carlin, who, in her day, had been a midwife, but having in course of time waxed old, and being then somewhat slackened in the joints of the right side by a paralytic, she eked out the weakly remainder of her thread of life in visitations among the families that, in her abler years, she had assisted to increase and multiply. She was then returning home after spending the day, as my grandfather afterwards heard from the Widow Dingwall, with the provost's daughter, at whose birth she had been the howdy, and who, being married some months, had sent to consult her anent a might-be occasion. As she came toddling along, with pitty-patty steps, in a rose satin mantle that she got as a blithemeat gift when she helped the young master of Elcho into the world, drawn close over her head, and leaning on a staff with her right hand, while in her left she carried a Flanders pig of strong ale, with a clout o'er the mouth to keep it from jawping, scarcely a door or entry mouth was she allowed to pass, but she was obligated to stop and speak, and what she said appeared to be tidings of no comfort. All these things bred wonder and curiosity in the breast of my grandfather, who, not being acquaint with any body that he saw, did not like for some time to inquire; but at last his diffidence and modesty were overcome, by the appearance of a strong party of the Archbishop's armed retainers, followed by a mob of bairns and striplings, yelling, and scoffing at them with bitter taunts and many titles of derision; and on inquiring at a laddie, what had caused the consternation in the town, and the passage of so many soldiers from the castle, he was told that they expected John Knox the day following, and that he was mindet to preach, but the Archbishop has resolved no to let him. It was even so; for the Lord James Stuart, who possessed a deep and forecasting spirit, had, soon after my grandfather's arrival with the Reformer's answer, made the news known to try the temper of the inhabitants and burghers. But, saving this marvelling and preparation, nothing farther of a public nature took place that night; so that, a short time before the hour appointed, my grandfather went to the house of Widow Dingwall, where he found Elspa Ruet sitting very disconsolate in a chamber by herself, weeping bitterly at the woful account which Lucky Kilfauns had brought of her sister's loose life, and fearing greatly that all her kind endeavours and humble prayers would be but as water spilt on the ground. CHAPTER XXIII AS the time of appointment drew near, Elspa Ruet was enabled to call in her wandering and anxious thoughts, and, strengthened by her duty, the blessing of the tranquil mind was shed upon her. Her tears were dried up, and her countenance shone with a serene benignity. When she was an aged withered woman, my grandfather has been heard to say, that he never remembered her appearance without marvelling at the special effusion of holiness and beauty which beamed and brightened upon her in that trying hour, nor without thinking that he still beheld the glory of its twilight glowing through the dark and faded clouds of her old age. They had not sat long when a tapping was heard at the widow's door, and my grandfather, starting up, retired into a distant corner of the room, behind a big napery-press, and sat down in the obscurity of its shadow. Elspa remained in her seat beside the table, on which a candle was burning, and, as it stood behind the door, she could not be seen by any coming in, till they had passed into the middle of the floor. In little more than the course of a minute, the voice of her sister was heard, and light footsteps on the timber stair. The door was then opened, and Marion swirled in with an uncomely bravery. Elspa started from her seat. The guilty and convicted creature uttered a shriek; but in the same moment her pious sister clasped her with loving-kindness in her arms, and bursting into tears, wept bitterly, with sore sobs, for some time on her bosom, which was wantonly unkerchiefed. After a short space of time, with confusion of face, and frowns of mortification, and glances of rage, the abandoned Marion disengaged herself from her sister's fond and sorrowful embraces, and, retreating to a chair, sat down, and seemed to muster all the evil passions of the guilty breast,_fierce anger, sharp hatred, and gnawing contempt; and a bad boldness of look that betokened a worse spirit than them all. %"It was na to see the like of you I cam' here,%' said she, with a scornful toss of her head. %"I ken that, Marion,%' replied Elspa, mournfully. %"And what business then hae ye to come to snool me?%' Elspa for a little while made no answer to this, but, drying her eyes, she went to her seat composedly, and then said,_ %"'Cause ye're my sister, and brought shame and disgrace on a' your family._O Marion, I'm wae to say this!_but ye're owre brave in your sin.%' %"Do ye think I'll e'er gae back to that havering, daunering cuif o' a creature, the Crail bailie?%' %"He's a man o' mair worth and conduct, Marion,%' replied her sister, firmly, %"than to put that in your power_even, woman, if ye were penitent, and besought him for charity.%' %"Weel, weel, no to clishmaclaver about him, how's a' wi' the bairns?%' %"Are ye no frighted, Marion, to speer sic a question, when ye think how ye left them, and what for ye did sae?%' %"Am na I their mither, have na I a right to speer?%' %"No,%' said Elspa; %"when ye forgot that ye were their father's wife, they lost their mother.%' %"Ye need na be sae snell wi' your taunts,%' exclaimed Marion, evidently endeavouring to preserve the arrogance she had assumed; %"ye need na be sae snell; I'm far better off, and happier than e'er I was in James Kilspinnie's aught.%' %"That's no possible,%' said her sister. %"It would be an unco thing of Heaven to let wickedness be happier than honesty. But, Marion, dinna deceive yoursel', ye hae nae sure footing on the steading where ye stan'. The Bishop will nae mair, than your gudeman, thole your loose life to him. If he kent ye were here, I doubt he would let you bide, and what would become of you then?%' %"He's no sic a fool as to be angry that I am wi' my sister.%' %"That may be,%' replied Elspa: %"I'm thinking, however, if in my place here he saw but that young man,%' and she pointed to my grandfather, whom her sister had not till then observed, %"he would have some cause to consider.%' Marion attempted to laugh scornfully, but her heart gurged within her, and instead of laughter, her voice broke out into wild and horrid yells, and falling back in her chair, she grew stiff and ghastly to behold, in so much, that both Elspa and my grandfather were terrified, and had to work with her for some time before they were able to recover her; nor indeed did she come rightly to herself till she got relief by tears; but they were tears of rage, and not shed for any remorse on account of her foul fault. Indeed, no sooner was she come to herself, than she began to rail at her sister and my grandfather, calling them by all the terms of scorn that her tongue could vent. At last she said_ %"But nae doubt ye're twa Reformers.%' %"Ay,%' replied Elspa, %"in a sense we are sae, for we would fain help to reform you.%' But after a long, faithful, and undaunted endeavour on the part of Elspa, in this manner, to reach the sore of her sinful conscience, she saw that all her ettling was of no avail, and her heart sank, and she began to weep, saying,_%"O Marion, Marion, ye were my dear sister ance, but frae this night, if ye leave me to gang again to your sins, I hope the Lord will erase the love I bear you utterly out of my heart, and leave me but the remembrance of what ye were when we were twa wee playing lassies, clapping our young hands, and singing for joy in the bonny spring mornings that will never, never come again.%' The guilty Marion was touched with her sorrow, and for a moment seemed to relent and melt, replying in a softened accent_ %"But tell me, Eppie, for ye hae na telt me yet, how did ye leave my weans?%' %"Would you like to see them?%' said Elspa, eagerly. %"I would na like to gang to Crail,%' replied her sister, thoughtfully; %"but if%'_, and she hesitated. %"Surely, Marion,%' exclaimed Elspa, with indignation, %"ye're no sae lost to all shame as to wish your innocent dochters to see you in the midst of your iniquities?%' Marion reddened, and sat abashed and rebuked for a short time in silence, and then reverting to her children, she said, somewhat humbly_ %"But tell me how they are_poor things!%' %"They are as weel as can be hoped for,%' replied Elspa, moved by her altered manner; %"but they'll lang miss the loss of their mother's care. O, Marion, how could ye quit them! The beasts that perish are kinder to their young, for they nourish and protect them till they can do for themselves; but your wee May can neither yet gang nor speak._She's your very picture, Marion,_as like you as_God forbid that she ever be like you!%' The wretched mother was unable to resist the energy of her sister's appeal, and, bursting into tears, wept bitterly for some time. Elspa, compassionating her contrition, rose, and, taking her kindly by the hand, said,_%"Come, Marion, we'll gang hame_let us leave this guilty city_let us tarry no longer within its walls_the curse of Heaven is darkening over it, and the storm of the hatred of its corruption is beginning to lighten:_let us flee from the wrath that is to come.%' %"I'll no gang back to Crail_I dare na gang there_every one would haud out their fingers at me_I canna gang to Crail_Eppie, dinna bid me_I'll mak away wi' mysel' before I'll gang to Crail.%' %"Dinna say that,%' replied her sister: %"O, Marion, if ye felt within the humiliation of a true penitent, ye would na speak that way, but would come and hide your face in your poor mother's bosom; often, often, Marion, did she warn you no to be ta'en up wi' the pride and bravery of a fine outside.%' %"Ye may gang hame yoursel',%' exclaimed the impenitent woman, starting from her seat; %"I'll no gang wi' you to be looket down on by every one. If I should hae had a misfortune, nane's the sufferer but mysel'; and what would I hae to live on wi' my mother? She's pinched enough for her ain support. No; since I hae't in my power, I'll tak my pleasure o't. Ony body can repent when they like, and it's no convenient yet for me. Since I hae slippit the tether, I may as well tak a canter o'er the knowes. I won'er how I could be sae silly as to sit sae lang willy-waing wi' you about that blethering bodie, James Kilspinnie. He could talk o' naething but the town-council, the cost o' plaiding, and the price o' woo'. No, Eppie, I'll no gang wi' you, but I'll be glad if ye'll gang o'er the gait and tak your bed wi' me. I hae a braw bower_and, let me tell you, this is no a house of the best repute.%" %"Is your's ony better,%' replied Elspa, fervently. %"No, Marion; sooner would I enter the gates of death, than darken your guilty door. Shame upon you, shame!_But the sweet Heavens, in their gracious hour of mercy, will remember the hope that led me here, and some day work out a blessed change. The prayers of an afflicted parent, and the cries of your desolate babies, will assuredly bring down upon you the purifying fires of self-condemnation. Though a wicked pride at this time withholds you from submitting to the humiliation which is the just penalty of your offences, still the day is not far off, when you will come begging for a morsel of bread to those that weep for your fall, and implore you to eschew the evil of your way.%' To these words, which were spoken as with the vehemence of prophecy, the miserable woman made no answer, but plucked her hand sharply from her sister's earnest pressure, and quitted the room with a flash of anger. My grandfather then conveyed the mournful Elspa back to the house of Lucky Kilfauns, and returned to the priory. CHAPTER XXIV THE next day, Elspa Ruet, under the escorting of my grandfather, was minded to have gone home to Crail, but the news that John Knox was to preach on the morrow at St Andrews had spread far and wide; no man could tell by what wonderful reverberation the tidings had awakened the whole land. From all quarters droves of the Reformed and the Pious came pressing to the gates of the city, like sheep to the fold and doves to the windows. The Archbishop and the priests and friars were smitten with dread and consternation; the doom of their fortunes was evident in the distraction of their minds: but the Earl of Argyle and the Lord James Stuart, at the priory, remained calm and collected. Foreseeing that the step they had taken would soon be visited by the wrath of the Queen Regent, they resolved to prepare for the worst, and my grandfather was ordered to hold himself in readiness for a journey. Thus was he prevented from going to Crail with Elspa Ruet, who, with a heavy heart, went back in the evening with the man and horses that brought the Reformer to the town. For John Knox, though under the ban of outlawry, was so encouraged with inward assurances from on High, that he came openly to the gate, and passed up the crown o' the causey on to the priory, in the presence of the Archbishop's guards, of all the people, and of the astonished and dismayed priesthood. As soon as the Antichrist heard of his arrival, he gave orders for all his armed retainers, to the number of more than a hundred men at arms, to assemble in the cloisters of the monastery of the Blackfriars; for he was a man of a soldierly spirit, and though a loose and immoral churchman, would have made a valiant warrior; and going thither himself, he thence sent word to the Lord James Stuart at the priory, that if John Knox dared to preach in the cathedral, as was threatened, he would order his guard to fire on him in the pulpit. My grandfather, with others of the retinue of the two noblemen, had accompanied the Archbishop's messenger into the Prior's chamber, where they were sitting with John Knox when this bold challenge to the champion of Christ's cause was delivered; and it was plain that both Argyle and the Lord James were daunted by it, for they well knew the fearlessness and the fierceness of their consecrated adversary. After the messenger had retired, and the Lord James, in a particular manner, had tacitly signified to my grandfather to remain in the room, and had taken a slip of paper, he began to write thereon, while Argyle said to the Reformer,_ %"Master Knox, this is what we could na' but expect; and though it may seem like a misdooting of our cause now to desist, I'm in a swither if ye should mak the attempt to preach.%' The Reformer made no answer; and the Lord James, laying down his pen, also said, %"My thoughts run wi' Argyle's,_considering the weakness of our train, and the Archbishop's preparations, with his own regardless character,_I do think we should for a while rest in our intent. The Queen Regent has come to Falkland wi' her French force, and we are in no condition to oppose their entrance into the town; besides, your appearance in the pulpit may lead to the sacrifice of your own most precious life, and the lives of many others who will no doubt stand forth in your defence. Whether, therefore, you ought, in such a predicament, to think of preaching, is a thing to be well considered.%' %"In the strength of the Lord,%' exclaimed John Knox, with the voice of an apostle, %"I will preach. God is my witness that I never preached in contempt of any man, nor would I willingly injure any creature; but I cannot delay my call to-morrow if I am not hindered by violence. As for the fear of danger that may come to me, let no man be solicitous; for my life is in the custody of HIM whose glory I seek, and threats will not deter me from my duty when Heaven so offereth the occasion. I desire neither the hand nor the weapon of man to defend me; I only crave audience, which, if it be denied to me here at this time, I must seek where I may have it.%' The manner and confidence with which this was spoken silenced and rebuked the two temporal noblemen, and they offered no more remonstrance, but submitted as servants, to pave the way for this intent of his courageous piety. Accordingly, after remaining a short time, as if in expectation to hear what the Earl of Argyle might further have to say, the Lord James Stuart took up his pen again, and when he had completed his writing, he gave the paper to my grandfather,_(it was a list of some ten or twelve names,)_saying, %"Make haste, Gilhaize, and let these, our friends in Angus, know the state of peril in which we stand. Tell them what has chanced; how the gauntlet is thrown; and that our champion has taken it up, and is prepared for the onset.%' My grandfather forthwith departed on his errand, and spared not the spur till he had delivered his message to every one whose names were written in the paper; and their souls were kindled, and the spirit of the Lord quickened in their hearts. The roads sparkled with the feet of summoning horsemen, and the towns rung with the sound of warlike preparations. On the third day, towards the afternoon, my grandfather embarked at Dundee on his return, and was landed at the Fife water-side. There were many in the boat with him; and it was remarked by some among them, that, for several days, no one had been observed to smile, and that all men seemed in the expectation of some great event. The weather being loun and very sultry, he travelled slowly with those who were bound for St Andrews, conversing with them on the troubles of the time, and the clouds that were gathering and darkening over poor Scotland; but every one spoke from the faith of his own bosom, that the terrors of the storm would not be of long duration,_so confident were those unlettered men of the goodness of Christ's cause in that epoch of tribulation. While they were thus communing together, they came in sight of the city, with its coronal of golden spires, and Babylonian pride of idolatrous towers, and they halted for a moment to contemplate the gorgeous insolence with which Antichrist had there built up and invested the blood-stained throne of his blasphemous usurpation. %"The walls of Jericho,%' said one of the travellers, %"fell at the sound but of rams' horns, and shall yon Babel withstand the preaching of John Knox?%' Scarcely had he said the words, when the glory of its magnificence was wrapt with a shroud of dust; a dreadful peal of thunder came rolling soon after, though not a spark of vapour was seen in all the ether of the blue sky; and the rumble of a dreadful destruction was then heard. My grandfather clapped spurs to his horse, and galloped on towards the town. The clouds rose thicker, and filled the whole air. Shouts and cries, as he drew near, were mingled with the crash of falling edifices. The earth trembled, and his horse stood still, regardless of the rowels, as if it had seen the angel of the Lord standing in his way. On all sides monks and nuns came flying from the town, wringing their hands as if the horrors of the last judgment had surprised them in their sins. The guards of the Archbishop were scattered among them like chaff in the swirl of the wind; then his Grace came himself on Sir David Hamilton's fleet mare, with Sir David and divers of his household fast following. The wrath of Heaven was behind them, and they rattled past my grandfather like the distempered phantoms that hurry through the dreams of dying men. My grandfather's horse at last obeyed the spur, and he rode on and into the city, the gates of which were deserted. There he beheld on all sides, that the Lord had indeed put the besom of destruction into the hands of the Reformers; and that not one of all the buildings which had been polluted by the papistry,_no, not one had escaped the erasing fierceness of its ruinous sweep. The presence of the magistrates lent the grace of authority to the zeal of the people, and all things were done in order. The idols were torn down from the altars, and deliberately broken by the children with hammers into pieces. There was no speaking,_all was done in silence; the noise of the falling churches, the rending of the shrines, and the breaking of the images, were the only sounds heard. But for all that, the zeal of not a few was, even in the midst of their dread solemnity, alloyed with covetousness. My grandfather himself saw one of the town-council slip the bald head, in silver, of one of the twelve apostles into his pouch. xlaser/project=yk02s/name=galt8/remote="lxxlx,geoiu,eighth.out"/time=90sec CHAPTER XXV THE triumph of the truth at St Andrews was followed by the victorious establishment, from that day thenceforward, of the Reformation in Scotland. The precautions taken by the deep forecasting mind of the Lord James Stuart, through the instrumentality of my grandfather and others, were of inexpressible benefit to the righteous cause. It was foreseen that the Queen Regent, who had come to Falkland, would be prompt to avenge the discomfiture of her sect, the papists; but the zealous friends of the Gospel, seconding the resolution of the Lords of the Congregation, enabled them to set all her power at defiance. With an attendance of few more than a hundred horse, and about as many foot, the Earl of Argyle and the Lord James set out from St Andrews, to frustrate, as far as the means they had concerted might, the wrathful measures which they well knew her Highness would take. But this small force was by the next morning increased to full three thousand fighting men; and so ardently did the spirit of enmity and resistance against the papacy spread, that the Queen Regent, when she came with her French troops and her Scottish levies, under the command of the Duke of Chatelherault, to Cupar, found that she durst not encounter in battle the growing strength of the Congregation, so she consented to a truce, and, as usual in her dissimulating policy, promised many things which she never intended to perform. But the protestants, by this time knowing that the papists never meant to keep their pactions with them, discovering the policy of her Highness, silently moved onward. They proceeded to Perth, and having expelled the garrison, took the town, and fired the Abbey of Scone. But as my grandfather was not with them in those raids, being sent on the night of the great demolition at St Andrews to apprise the Earl of Glencairn, his patron, of the extremities to which matters had come there, it belongs not to the scope of my story to tell what ensued, farther than that from Perth the Congregation proceeded to Stirling, where they demolished the monasteries;_then they went to Lithgow, and herret the nests of the locust there; and proceeding bravely on, purging the realm as they went forward, they arrived at Edinburgh, and constrained the Queen Regent, who was before them with her forces there, to pack up her ends and her awls, and make what speed she could with them to Dunbar. But foul as the capital then was, and covered with the leprosy of idolatry, they were not long in possession till they so medicated her with the searching medicaments of the Reformation, that she was soon scrapit of all the scurf and kell of her abominations. There was not an idol or an image within her bounds that, in less than three days, was not beheaded like a traitor and trundled to the dogs, even with vehemence, as a thing that could be sensible of contempt. But as all these things are set forth at large in the chronicles of the kingdom, let suffice it to say, that my grandfather continued for nearly two years after this time a trusted emissary among the Lords of the Congregation, in their many arduous labours and perilous correspondences, till the Earl of Glencairn was appointed to see idolatry banished and extirpated from the West Country,_in which expedition, his Lordship, being minded to reward my grandfather's services in the cause of the Reformation, invited him to be of his force; to which my grandfather, not jealousing the secularities of his patron's intents, joyfully agreed, hoping to see the corner-stone placed on the great edifice of the Reformation, which all good and pious men began then to think near completion. Having joined the Earl's force at Glasgow, my grandfather went forward with it to Paisley. Before reaching that town, however, they were met by a numerous multitude of the people, half way between it and the castle of Cruikstone, and at their head my grandfather was blithened to see his old friend, the gentle monk Dominick Callender, in a soldier's garb, and with a ruddy and emboldened countenance, and by his side, with a sword manfully girded on his thigh, the worthy Bailie Pollock, whose nocturnal revels at the abbey had brought such dule to the winsome Maggy Napier. For some reason, which my grandfather never well understood, there was more lenity shown to the abbey here than usual; but the monks were rooted out_the images given over to destruction_and the old bones and miraculous crucifixes were either burnt or interred. Less damage, however, was done to the buildings than many expected, partly through the exhortation of the magistrates, who were desirous to preserve so noble a building for a protestant church, but chiefly out of some paction or covenant secretly entered into anent the distribution of the domains and property, wherein the house of Hamilton was concerned, the Duke of Chatelherault, the head thereof, notwithstanding the papistical nature of his blood and kin, having some time before gone over to the cause of the Congregation. The work of the Reformation being thus abridged at Paisley, the Earl of Glencairn went forward to Kilwinnning, where he was less scrupulous; for having himself obtained a grant of the lands of the abbacy, he was fain to make a clean hand o't, though at the time my grandfather knew not of this. As soon as the army reached the town, the soldiers went straight on to the abbey, and entering the great church, even while the monks were chanting their paternosters, they began to show the errand they had come on. Dreadful was the yell that ensued, when my grandfather, going up to the priest at the high altar, and pulling him by the scarlet and fine linen of his pageantry, bade him decamp, and flung the toys and trumpery of the mass after him as he fled away in fear. This resolute act was the signal for the general demolition, and it began on all sides; my grandfather giving a leap, caught hold of a fine effigy of the Virgin Mary by the leg to pull it down; but it proved to be the one which James Coom the smith had mended, for the leg came off, and my grandfather fell backward, and was for a moment stunned by his fall. A band of the monks, who were standing trembling spectators, made an attempt, at seeing this, to raise a shout of a miracle; but my grandfather, in the same moment recovering himself, seized the Virgin's timber leg, and flung it with violence at them, and it happened to strike one of the fattest of the flock with such a bir that it was said the life was driven out of him. This, however, was not the case; for, although the monk was sorely hurt, he lived many a day after, and was obligated, in his auld years, when he was feckless, to be carried from door to door on a hand-barrow, begging his bread. The wives, I have heard tell, were kindly to him, for he was a jocose carl; but the weans little respected his grey hairs, and used to jeer him as auld Father Paternoster, for even to the last he adhered to his beads. It was thought, however, by a certain pious protestant gentlewoman of Irvine, that before his death he got a cast of grace; for one day, when he had been carried over to beg in that town, she gave him a luggie of kail owre het, which he stirred with the end of the ebony crucifix at his girdle, thereby showing, as she said, a symptom that it held a lower place in his spiritual affections than if he had been as sincere in his errors as he let wot. CHAPTER XXVI ALTHOUGH my grandfather had sustained a severe bruise by his fall, he was still enabled, after he got on his legs, to superintend the demolishment of the abbey till it was complete. But in the evening, when he took up his quarters in the house of Theophilus Lugton with Dominick Callender, who had brought on a party of the Paisley reformers, he was so stiff and sore, that he thought he would be incompetent to go over next day with the force that the Earl missioned to herry the Carmelyte convent at Irvine. Dominick Callender, had, however, among other things, learnt, in the abbey of Paisley, the salutary virtues of many herbs, and how to decoct from them their healing juices; and he instructed Dame Lugton to prepare an efficacious medicament, that not only mitigated the anguish of the pain, but so suppled the stiffness, that my grandfather was up by break of day, and ready for the march, a renewed man. In speaking of this, he has been heard to say, it was a thing much to be lamented, that when the regular abolition of the monasteries was decreed, no care was taken to collect the curious knowledges and ancient traditionary skill preserved therein, especially in what pertained to the cure of maladies; for it was his opinion, and many were of the same mind, that among the friars were numbers of potent physicians, and an art in the preparation of salves and sirups, that has not been surpassed by the learning of the colleges. But it is not meet that I should detain the courteous reader with such irrelevancies; the change, however, which has taken place in the realm, in all things pertaining to life, laws, manners, and conduct, since the extirpation of the Roman idolatry, is, from the perfectest report, so wonderful, that the inhabitants can scarcely be said to be the same race of people; and, therefore, I have thought, that such occasional ancestral intimations might, though they proved neither edifying nor instructive, be yet deemed worthy of notation in the brief spaces which they happen herein to occupy. But now, returning from this digression, I will take up again the thread and clue of my story. The Earl of Glencairn, after the abbey of Kilwinning was sacked, went and slept at Eglinton Castle, then a stalwart square tower, environed with a wall and moat, of a rude and unknown antiquity, standing on a gentle rising ground in the midst of a bleak and moorland domain. And his Lordship having ordered my grandfather to come to him betimes in the morning with twenty chosen men, the discreetest of the force, for a special service in which he meant to employ him, he went thither accordingly, taking with him Dominick Callender, and twelve godly lads from Paisley, with seven others, whom he had remarked in the march from Glasgow, as under the manifest guidance of a sedate and pious temper. When my grandfather with his company arrived at the castle yett, and he was admitted to the Earl his patron, his Lordship said to him, more as a friend than a master,_ %"I am in the hope, Gilhaize, that after this day, the toilsome and perilous errands on which, to the weal of Scotland and the true church, you have been so meritoriously missioned ever since you were retained in my service, will soon be brought to an end, and that you will enjoy in peace the reward you have earned so well, that I am better pleased in bestowing it than you can be in the receiving. But there is yet one task which I must put upon you. Hard by to this castle, less than a mile eastward, stands a small convent of nuns, who have been for time out of mind under the protection of the Lord Eglinton's family, and he, having got a grant of the lands belonging to their house, is desirous that they should be flitted in an amiable manner to a certain street in Irvine, called the Kirkgate, where a lodging is provided for them. To do this kindly I have bethought myself of you, for I know not in all my force any one so well qualified. Have you provided yourself with the twenty douce men that I ordered you to bring hither?%' My grandfather told his Lordship that he had done as he was ordered. %"Then,%' resumed the Earl, %"take them with you, and this mandate to the superior, and one of Eglinton's men to show you the way; and when you have conveyed them to their lodging, come again to me.%' So my grandfather did as he was directed by the Earl, and marched eastward with his men till he came to the convent, which was a humble and orderly house, with a small chapel, and a tower, that in after times, when all the other buildings were erased, was called the Stane Castle, and is known by that name even unto this day. It stood within a high wall, and a little gate, with a stone cross over the same, led to the porch. Compassionating the simple and silly sisterhood within, who, by their sequestration from the world, were become as innocent as birds in a cage, my grandfather halted his men at some distance from the yett, and going forward, rung the bell; to the sound of which an aged woman answered, who, on being told he had brought a letter to the superior, gave him admittance, and conducted him to a little chamber, on the one side of which was a grating, where the superior, a short corpulent matron, that seemed to bowl rather than to walk as she moved along, soon made her appearance within. He told her in a meek manner, and with some gentle prefacing, the purpose of his visit, and showed her the Earl's mandate; to all which, for some time, she made no reply, but she was evidently much moved; at last she gave a wild skreigh, which brought the rest of the nuns, to the number of thirteen, all rushing into the room. Then ensued a dreadful tempest of all feminine passions and griefs, intermingled with supplications to many a saint; but the powers and prerogatives of their saints were abolished in Scotland, and they received no aid. Though their lamentation, as my grandfather used to say, could not be recited without moving to mirth, it was yet so full of maidenly fears and simplicity at the time to him, that it seemed most tender, and he was disturbed at the thought of driving such fair and helpless creatures into the bad world; but it was his duty;_so, after soothing them as well as he could, and representing how unavailing their refusal to go would be, the superior composed her grief, and exhorting the nuns to be resigned to their cruel fate, which, she said, was not so grievous as that which many of the saints had in their day suffered, they all became calm and prepared for the removal. My grandfather told them to take with them whatsoever they best liked in the house; and it was a moving sight to see their simplicity therein. One was content with a flower-pot; another took a cage in which she had a lintie; some of them half-finished patterns of embroidery. One aged sister, of a tall and spare form, brought away a flask of eye-water which she had herself distilled; but, saving the superior, none of them thought of any of the valuables of the chapel, till my grandfather reminded them, that they might find the value of silver and gold hereafter, even in the spiritual-minded town of Irvine. There was one young and graceful maiden among them who seemed but little moved by the event; and my grandfather was melted to sympathy and sorrow by the solemn serenity of her deportment, and the little heed she took of any thing. Of all the nuns she was the only one who appeared to have nothing to care for; and when they were ready, and came forth to the gate, instead of joining in their piteous wailings as they bade their peaceful home a long and last farewell, she walked forward alone. No sooner, however, had she passed the yett, than, on seeing the armed company without, she stood still like a statue, and, uttering a shrill cry, fainted away, and fell to the ground. Every one ran to her assistance; but when her face was unveiled to give her air, Dominick Callender, who was standing by, caught her in his arms, and was enchanted by a fond and strange enthusiasm. She was indeed no other than the young maiden of Paisley, for whom he had found his monastic vows the heavy fetters of a bondage that made life scarcely worth possessing; and when she was recovered, an interchange of great tenderness took place between them, at which the superior of the convent waxed very wroth, and the other nuns were exceedingly scandalized. But Magdalene Sauchie, for so she was called, heeded them not; for, on learning that popery was put down in the land by law, she openly declared, that she renounced her vows; and during the walk to Irvine, which was jimp a mile, she leant upon the arm of her lover: and they were soon after married, Dominick settling in that town as a doctor of physic, whereby he afterwards earned both gold and reputation. But to conclude the history of the convent, which my grandfather had in this gentle manner herret, the nuns, on reaching the foot of the Kirkgate, where the Countess of Eglinton had provided a house for them, began to weep anew with great vehemence, fearing that their holy life was at an end, and that they would be tempted of men to enter into the temporalities of the married state; but the superior, on hearing this mournful apprehension, mounted upon the steps of the tolbooth stair, and, in the midst of a great concourse of people, she lifted her hands on high, and exclaimed, as with the voice of a prophetess, %"Fear not, my chaste and pious dochters; for your sake, and for my sake, I have an assurance at this moment from the Virgin Mary herself, that the calamity of the marriage-yoke will never be known in the Kirkgate of Irvine, but that all maidens who hereafter may enter, or be born to dwell therein, shall live a life of single-blessedness_unasked and untempted of men.%' Which delightful prediction the nuns were so happy to hear, that they dried their tears, and chanted their Ave Maria, joyfully proceeding towards their appointed habitation. It stood, as I have been told, on the same spot where King James the Sixth's school was afterwards erected, and endowed out of the spoils of the Carmelytes' monastery, which, on the same day, was, by another division of the Earl of Glencairn's power, sacked and burnt to the ground. CHAPTER XXVII WHEN my grandfather had, in the manner rehearsed, disposed of those sisters of simplicity in the Kirkgate of Irvine, he returned back in the afternoon to the Earl of Glencairn at Eglinton Castle to report what he had done; and his Lordship again, in a most laudatory manner, commended his prudence and singular mildness of nature, mentioning to the Earl and Countess of Eglinton, then present with him, divers of the missions wherein he had been employed, extolling his zeal, and above all his piety. And the Lady Eglinton, who was a household character, striving, with great frugality, to augment the substance of her Lord, by keeping her maidens from morning to night eydent at work, some at their broidering drums, and some at their distaffs, managing all within the castle that pertained to her feminine part in a way most exemplary to the ladies of her time and degree, indeed to ladies of all times and degrees, promised my grandfather that when he was married, she would give his wife something to help the plenishing of their house, for the meek manner in which he had comported himself toward her friend, the superior of the nuns. Then the Earl of Glencairn said,_ %"Gilhaize, madam, is now his own master, and may choose a bride when it pleases himself; for I have covenanted with my friend, your Lord, to let him have the mailing of Quharist, in excambio for certain of the lands of late pertaining to the abbacy of Kilwinning, the which lie more within the vicinage of this castle; and, Gilhaize, here is my warrant to take possession.%' With which words the Earl rose and presented him with a charter for the lands, signed by Eglinton and himself, and he shook him heartily by the hand, saying, that few in all the kingdom had better earned the guerdon of their service than he had done. Thus it was that our family came to be settled in the shire of Ayr; for after my grandfather had taken possession of his fee, and mindful of the vow he had made in the street of Edinburgh on that blessed morning when John Knox, the champion of the true church, arrived from Geneva, he went into the east country to espouse Elspa Ruet, if he found her thereunto inclined, which happily he soon did. For their spirits were in unison; and from the time they first met, they had felt toward one another as if they had been acquaint in loving-kindness before, which made him sometimes say, that it was to him a proof and testimony that the souls of mankind have, perhaps, a living knowledge of each other before they are born into this world. At their marriage, it was agreed that they should take with them into the west Agnes Kilspinnie, one of the misfortunate bailie's daughters. As for her mother, from the day of the overthrow and destruction of the papistry at St Andrews, she had never been heard of; all the tidings her sister could gather concerning her were, that the same night she had been conveyed away by some of the Archbishop's servants, but whither no one could tell. So they came with Agnes Kilspinnie to Edinburgh; and, for a ploy to their sober wedding, they resolved to abide there till the coming of Queen Mary from France, that they might partake of the shows and pastimes then preparing for her reception. They, however, during the season of their sojourn, feasted far better than on royal fare, in the gospel banquet of John Knox's sermons, of which they enjoyed the inexpressible beatitude three several Sabbath-days before the Queen arrived. Of the joyous preparations to greet Queen Mary withal, neither my grandfather nor grandmother were ever wont to discourse much at large, for they were holy-minded persons, little esteeming the pageantries of this world. But my aunt, for Agnes Kilspinnie being in progress of time married to my father's fourth brother, became sib to me in that degree, was wont to descant and enlarge on the theme with much wonderment and loquacity, describing the marvellous fabrics that were to have been hung with tapestry to hold the ladies, and the fountains that were to have spouted wine, which nobody was to be allowed to taste, the same being only for an ostentation, in order that the fact thereof might be recorded in the chronicles for after-times. And great things have I likewise heard her tell of the paraphernalia which the magistrates and town-council were getting ready. No sleep, in a sense, she used to say, did Maccalzean of Cliftonhall, who was then provost, get for more than a fortnight. From night to morning the sagacious bailies sat in council, exercising their sagacity to contrive devices to pleasure the Queen, and to help the custom of their own and their neighbours' shops. Busy and proud men they were, and no smaller were the worshipful deacons of the crafts. It was just a surprise and consternation to every body, to think how their weak backs could bear such a burden of cares. No time had they for their wonted jocosity. To those who would fain have speered the news, they shook their heads in a Solomon-like manner, and hastened by. And such a battle and tribulation as they had with their vassals, the magistrates of Leith! who, in the most contumacious manner, insisted that their chief bailie should be the first to welcome the Sovereign on the shore. This pretence was thought little short of rebellion; and the provost and the bailies, and all the wise men that sat in council with them, together with the help of their learned assessors, continued deliberating anent the same for hours together. It was a dreadful business that for the town of Edinburgh. And the opinions of the judges of the land, and the lords of the council, were taken, and many a device tried to overcome the upsetting, as it was called, of the Leith magistrates; but all was of no avail. And it was thought there would have been a fight between the bailies of Leith and the bailies of Edinburgh, and that blood would have been shed before this weighty question, so important to the dearest interests of the commonweal of Scotland, could be determined. But, in the midst of their contention, and before their preparations were half finished, the Queen arrived in Leith Roads; and the news came upon them like the cry to the foolish virgins of the bridegroom in the street. Then they were seen flying to their respective places of abode, to dress themselves in their coats of black velvet, their doublets of crimson satin, and their hoes of the same colour, which they had prepared for the occasion. Anon they met in the council-chamber_what confusion reigned there! Then how they flew down the street! Provost Maccalzean, with the silver keys in his hand, and the eldest bailie with the crimson-velvet cod, whereon they were to be delivered to her Majesty, following as fast as any member of a city corporation could be reasonably expected to do. But how the provost fell, and how the bailies and town-council tumbled over him, and how the crowd shouted at the sight, are things whereof to understand the greatness it is needful that the courteous reader should have heard my aunty Agnes herself rehearse the extraordinary particularities. Meanwhile the Queen left her galley in a small boat, and the bailies of Leith had scarcely time to reach the pier before she was on shore. Alas! it was an ill-omened landing. Few were spectators, and none cheered the solitary lady, who, as she looked around and heard no loyal greeting, nor beheld any show of hospitable welcome, seemed to feel as if the spirit of the land was sullen at her approach, and grudged at her return to the dark abodes of her fierce ancestors. In all the way from Leith to Holyrood she never spoke, but the tear was in her eye and the sigh in her bosom; and though her people gathered, when it was known she had landed, and began at last to shout, it was owre late to prevent the mournful forebodings, which taught her to expect but disappointments and sorrows from subjects so torn with their own factions, as to lack even the courtesies due to their sovereign, a stranger, and the fairest lady of all her time. CHAPTER XXVIII SOON after Queen Mary's return from France, my grandfather, with his wife and Agnes Kilspinnie, came from Edinburgh and took up their residence on his own free mailing of Quharist, where the Lady Eglinton was as good as her word in presenting to them divers articles of fine napery, and sundry things of plenishing both for ornament and use; and there he would have spent his days in blameless tranquillity, serving the Lord, but for the new storm that began to gather over the church, whereof it is needful that I should now proceed to tell some of the circumstantials. No sooner had that thoughtless Princess, if indeed one could be so called, who, though reckless of all consequences, was yet double beyond the imagination of man; no sooner, I say, had she found herself at home, than, with all the craft and blandishments of her winning airs and peerless beauty, she did set herself to seduce the Lords of the Congregation from the sternness wherewith they had thrown down, and were determined to resist the restoration of the Roman idolatry; and with some of them she succeeded so far, that the popish priests were heartened, and, knowing her avowed partiality for their sect, the Beast began to shoot out its horns again, and they dared to perform the abomination of the mass in different quarters of the kingdom. It is no doubt true, that the Queen's council, by proclamation, feigned to discountenance that resuscitation of idolatry; but the words of their edict being backed by no demonstration of resolution, save in the case of a few worthy gentlemen in the shire of Ayr and in Galloway, who took up some of the offenders in their district and jurisdiction, the evil continued to strike its roots, and to bud and flourish in its pestiferous branches. When my grandfather heard of these things, his spirit was exceedingly moved, and he got no rest in the night, with the warsling of troubled thoughts and pious fears. Some new call, he foresaw, would soon be made on the protestants, to stand forth again in the gap that the Queen's arts had sapped in the bulwarks of their religious liberty, and he resolved to be ready against the hour of danger. So, taking his wife and Agnes Kilspinnie with him, he went in the spring to Edinburgh, and hired a lodging for them; and on the same night he presented himself at the lodging of the Lord James Stuart, who had some time before been created Earl of Murray; but the Earl was gone with the Queen to Lochleven. Sir Alexander Douglas, however, the master of his Lordship's horse, was then on the eve of following him with John Knox, to whom the Queen had sent a peremptory message, requiring his attendance; and Sir Alexander invited my grandfather to come with them; the which invitation he very joyfully accepted, on account of the happy occasion of travelling in the sanctified company of that brave worthy. In the journey, however, save in the boat when they crossed the ferry, he showed but little of his precious conversation; for the knight and the Reformer rode on together some short distance before their train, earnestly discoursing, and seemingly they wished not to be overheard. But when they were all seated in the ferry-boat, the ardour of the preacher, which on no occasion would be reined in, led him to continue speaking, by which it would seem, that they had been conversing anent the Queen's prejudices in matters of religion and the royal authority. %"When I last spoke with her Highness,%' said John Knox, %"she laid sore to my charge, that I had brought the people to receive a religion different from what their princes allowed, asking sharply, if this was not contrary to the Divine command, which enjoins that subjects should obey their rulers; so that I was obliged to contend plainly, that true religion derived its origin and authority, not from princes, but from God; that princes were often most ignorant respecting it, and that subjects never could be bound to frame their religious sentiments according to the pleasure of their rulers, else the Hebrews ought to have conformed to the idolatry of Pharaoh, and Daniel and his associates to that of Nebuchadnezzar, and the primitive Christians to that of the Roman emperors.%' %"And what could her Highness answer to this?%' said Sir Alexander. %"She lacketh not the gift of a shrewd and ready wit,%' replied Master Knox; for she nimbly remarked, %"That though it was as I had said, yet none of those men raised the sword against their princes;%'_which enforced me to be more subtle than I was minded to have been, and to say, %"that nevertheless, they did resist, for those who obey not the commandments given them, do in verity resist.%'_%"Ay,%' cried her Highness, %"but not with the sword,%' which was a thrust not easy to be turned aside, so that I was constrained to speak out, saying, %"God, madam, had not given them the means and the power.%' Then said she, still more eagerly, %"Think you that subjects, having the power, may resist their princes?%'_And she looked with a triumphant smile, as if she had caught me in a trap; but I replied, %"If princes exceed their bounds, no doubt they may be resisted, even by power. For no greater honour or greater obedience is to be given to kings and princes than God has commanded to be given to father and mother. But the father may be struck with a phrenzy, in which he would slay his children; in such a case, if the children arise, join together, apprehend the father, take the sword from him, bind his hands and keep him in prison till the phrenzy be over, think you, madam,%' quo' I, %"that the children do any wrong? Even so is it with princes that would slay the children of God that are subject to them. Their blind zeal is nothing but phrenzy, and therefore to take the power from them till they be brought to a more sober mind, is no disobedience to princes, but a just accordance to the will of God._So I doubt not,%' continued the Reformer, %"I shall again have to sustain the keen encounter of her Highness' wit in some new controversy.%' This was the chief substance of what my grandfather heard pass in the boat; and when they were again mounted, the knight and preacher set forward as before, some twenty paces or so in advance of the retinue. On reaching Kinross, Master Knox rode straight to the shore, and went off in the Queen's barge to the castle, that he might present himself to her Highness before supper, for by this time the sun was far down. In the meantime, my grandfather went to the house in Kinross where the Earl of Murray resided, and his Lordship, though albeit a grave and reserved man, received him with the familiar kindness of an old friend, and he was with him when the Reformer came back from the Queen, who had dealt very earnestly with him to persuade the gentlemen of the west country to desist from their interruption of the popish worship. %"But to this,%' said the Reformer to the Earl, %"I was obligated, by conscience and the fear of God, to say, that if her Majesty would exert her authority in executing the laws of the land, I would undertake for the peaceable behaviour of the protestants; but if she thought to evade them, there were some who would not let the papists offend with impunity.%' %"Will you allow,%' exclaimed her Highness, %"that they shall take my sword in their hands?%' %"The sword of justice is God's,%' I replied, %"and is given to princes and rulers for an end, which if they transgress, sparing the wicked and oppressing the innocent, they who in the fear of God execute judgment where God has commanded, offend not God, although kings do it not. The gentlemen of the west, madam, are acting strictly according to law; for the act of parliament gave power to all judges within their jurisdiction to search for and punish those who transgress its enactments;%' and I added, %"it shall be profitable to your Majesty to consider what is the thing your Grace's subjects look to receive of your Majesty, and what it is that ye ought to do unto them by mutual contract. They are bound to obey you, and that ye ought to do unto them by mutual that not but in God; ye are bound to keep laws to them_ye crave of them service, they crave of you protection and defence. Now, madam, if you shall deny your duty unto them (which especially craves that ye punish malefactors), can ye expect to receive full obedience of them? I fear, madam, ye shall not.%' %"You have indeed been plain with her Highness,%' said the Earl thoughtfully; %"and what reply made she?%' %"None,%' said the Reformer; %"her countenance changed; she turned her head abruptly from me, and, without the courtesy of a good night, signified with an angry waving of her hand, that she desired to be rid of my presence; whereupon I immediately retired, and, please God, I shall, betimes in the morning, return to my duties at Edinburgh. It is with a sad heart, my Lord, that I am compelled to think, and to say to you, who stand so near to her in kin and affection, that I doubt she is not only proud but crafty; not only wedded to the popish faith, but averse to instruction. She neither is nor will be of our opinion; and it is plain that the lessons of her uncle, the Cardinal, are so deeply printed in her heart, that the substance and quality will perish together. I would be glad to be deceived in this, but I fear I shall not; never have I espied such art in one so young; and it will need all the eyes of the Reformed to watch and ward that she circumvent not the strong hold in Christ, that has been but so lately restored and fortified in this misfortunate kingdom.%' Nothing farther passed that night; but the servants being called in, and the preacher having exhorted them in their duties, and prayed with even more than his wonted earnestness, each one retired to his chamber, and the Earl gave orders for horses to be ready early in the morning, to convey Master Knox back to Edinburgh. This, however, was not permitted; for by break of day a messenger came from the castle, desiring him not to depart until he had again spoken with her Majesty; adding, that as she meant to land by sunrise with her falconer, she would meet him on the fields where she intended to take her pastime_and talk with him there.