often travel with coach and six, but with so much
caution, that, besides their other attendance, they have a lusty running
footman on each side of the coach, to manage and keep it up in rough
places.’ It is added: ‘This carriage of persons from place to place might
be better spared, were there opportunities and means for the speedier
conveyance of business by letters. They have no horse-posts besides those
which ply betwixt Berwick and Edinburgh, and from thence to Port-Patrick
for the sake of the Irish packets. From Edinburgh to Perth, and so to
other places, they use foot-posts and carriers, which, though a slow way
of communicating our concerns to one another, yet is such as they
acquiesce in till they have a better.’
What makes it the more improbable
that William Hume’s enterprise was successful, notwithstanding the
well-meant patronage of the Glasgow magistrates, is that, in October 1743,
the Town Council of the western city was found considering a similar
project of one John Walker, merchant in Edinburgh, who proposed to ‘erect’
a stage-coach betwixt the two cities, with six horses, and holding six
passengers, to go twice a week from the one to the other in summer, and
once in winter. The corporation was called upon to guarantee that as many
as two hundred tickets should be sold each year. The proposal does
not appear to have been entertained.
In 1749, a caravan—a kind of covered
spring-cart---passed twice a week from the one city to the other, taking a
day and a half to the journey!—Strang.
May 2
Two old women, belonging to the village of Prestonpans, were tried for
witchcraft by a commission, and, ‘on their confession, no ways
extorted, were burnt.’ Before their death, they gave information
regarding some other persons who, they said, were also witches; and, one
telling on another, there were in September as many as eight or ten
collected from the parishes of Ormiston, Pencaitland, and Crichton,
besides seven who belonged to Loanhead of Lasswade. The justices shewed a
disinclination to treat all these poor creatures as witches; and Sir John
Clerk of Pennicuik—first baronet of a family which has produced many
scholars, judges, antiquaries, and men of general talent—declined to be
upon the commission appointed for the seven of Loanhead, ‘alleging drily
that he did not feel himself warlock (that is, conjuror) enough to be
judge upon such an inquisition.' The leniency of the justices was cried
out upon by some, as interfering with the discovery of these enemies of
mankind. As usually happened, the accused made confession of guilt,
telling much the same story of intercourse with the devil, renouncing
their baptism, and going about in the form of ravens, &c., as was set
forth by the witches of Auldearn in 1661—a traditionary set of
hallucinations, they may be called, the uniformity of which ought in
itself to have put judges sooner on their guard against a misjudgment of
these unfortunate beings. Fountainhall, who conversed with a few of the
present group, speaks somewhat rationally about them, and it is evident he
was inclined to regard their adventures with the devil as mere dreams.
‘Only,’ he says, ‘in these diabolic transports their sleep is so deep,
that no pinching will awake them scarce ‘—an intimation, some will think,
of the sleep being mesmeric. Sad to say, however, nine of the East Lothian
women were condemned on their confession, although seeming rational and
penitent; and were burnt, five between Edinburgh and Leith, and four at
Painston, while the seven of Loanhead were reserved for future procedure.
The statement of this case has
induced Fountainhall to mention one or two others by way of digression. In
the time of James VI., a Scottish gentleman, being troubled with a
disease, sought relief from a magician in Italy, but was told he need not
have come so far from home, as there was a person in Scotland who could
cure him, and this person he particularly described, so that the gentleman
might know him. Some years after, being returned, the patient met, on the
Bridge of Earn, one to whom the description in every particular applied;
and, having accosted him, and asked for his aid, he was cured by this
stranger with a few simple herbs. The story being told, the curer of the
disease was prosecuted as a necromancer, in compact with the devil, and
found guilty, notwithstanding his protestation that the cure was natural,
and the devil’s having named or described him was no fault of his. In this
narration, the reader will recognise a story which has been told with many
variations, as to person, place, and circumstances, but always with the
assumption of what would now in certain circles be described as an
exercise of the power of clairvoyance regarding a person unknown
and living at a great distance.
The other story is even more curious
in its details. Fountainhail says: ‘As for the rencontre between Mr
Williamson, schoolmaster at Cupar (he has writ a grammar), and the
Rosicrucians, I never trusted it till I heard it from his own son, who is
present minister of Kirkcaldy.’ A stranger coming to Cupar called for Mr
Williamson, and they went to drink together at a tavern. When the
reckoning came to be paid, the stranger whistled for spirits, and one in
the shape of a boy came and gave him some gold. It is to be remarked that
no servant had been seen attending the stranger while riding into the
town, or at his inn. ‘He caused his spirits next day bring him noble Greek
wines from the pope’s cellar, and tell the freshest news then was at
Rome.’ Some time after, Mr Williamson, being in London, and passing along
London Bridge, heard himself called by name, and turning about, discovered
it was his Rosicrucian. At the request of the stranger, he met him at
dinner in a house to which he was directed, and there found a
magnificently spread table, with a company of good fashion, all being
served by spirits. The conversation turned on the advantage of being
served by spirits, and Mr Williamson was asked to join their happy
society; but he started back with dismay, when it was mentioned as a
necessary preliminary, that he should abstract his spirit from all
materiality, and renounce his baptism. In his alarm, he fell a
praying, whereupon they all disappeared. He was then in a new alarm,
dreading to have to pay a huge reckoning; but the boy who answered his
summous, told him that ‘there was nothing to pay, for they had done it,
and were gone about their affairs in the city.’ It is barely necessary to
remark to those who have seen and believed in the wonders of what is
called electrobiology; there is nothing in Mr Williamson’s case which
might not be explained on that principle—namely, a condition of brain
artificially produced, in which the suggestion of objects and events is
enough to make the patient believe them real.
After this date, witch-cases before
the high court are rare, and there had evidently set in a disrelish for
such prosecutions. The fact may reasonably be attributed in some degree to
the publication, in 1677, of Webster’s rational treatise,
The Displaying of Supposed Witchcraft.
July 19
James Gray, a ‘litster,’ that is, dyer, in Dalkeith, went to Glasgow in
March this year as a lieutenant in the Midlothian Militia. He there met,
over a bottle, a young man, named Archibald Murray, son of the Laird of
Newton, and who was a trooper in the king’s Life Guard. When heated with
liquor, Gray began to boast that to be a lieutenant under the Duke of
Lauderdale was as good as to ride in the king’s Life Guard—rather a
petulant speech from a Dalkeith craftsman to the son of a laird in its
neighbourhood. Murray stormed and called him a base fellow, to compare
himself with gentlemen! They went out and fought, and Gray soon returned,
saying: ‘I trow I have pricked him,’ never imagining that he had taken the
young man’s life. Such, however, proved to be the case. Gray, who was a
handsome, vigorous man, of about fifty, was tried for the act, and much
interest was felt in his behalf, as it was believed that he had meant
nothing like murder. Five thousand merks were offered to the friends of
the deceased, by way of assythment. But all was in vain. On the day noted
in the margin, ‘he was beheaded, dying with courage, and declaring that
ambition, leading to discontents and quarrels, joined to marrying an
old woman, had ruined him.’—Foun.
Aug 15
Scotland now had a visitor of an extraordinary kind. In a petition
presented to the Privy Council, he described himself as Mercurius Lascary,
a Grecian priest, a native of the island of Samos. He stated that himself,
his brother Demetrius, who was also a priest, and two sons, had been
seized by night by Algerine pirates; and his brother had now been detained
for three years in a most miserable condition in Barbary. Testimonials
from the patriarch of Constantinople and various Greek bishops confirmed
this sad tale; and on his petition, a general charitable contribution was
ordered to be raised in his behalf.—P. C. R.
En the history of the introduction
of the more refined arts into Scotland, there is no reason why one so
ingenious as cabinetmaking should not be included. We now first
hear of it on the occasion of a petition from one James Turner, styling
himself ‘cabinet-maker and mirror-glass maker.’ He having, as he says,
‘with much labour, pains, and expenses, attained to the art of making
cabinet; mirror-glasses, dressing-boxes, chests of drawers, comb-boxes,
and the like curious work, of the finest olive and princes’ wood, not
formerly practised by any native of this country,’ had been peaceably
exercising his craft, when he was assailed by the deacon of the
corporation of wrights as an unfreeman. He had first been forbidden to
work, and then they took away his tools and materials. On his petition,
however, he received the protection of the Council.—P.
C. R.
Not long after (February 1682), we
hear of a kindred trade as being practised in Edinburgh. Hugh M’Gie,
mirror-maker in the Canongate, gave in a bill to the Privy Council,
representing that, by the practice of other nation; any tradesman having
seven sons together, without the intervention of a daughter, is declared
free of all public burdens and taxes, and has other encouragements
bestowed on him, to enable him to bring up the said children for the use
and benefit of the commonwealth; and claiming a similar privilege on the
strength of his having that qualification. The Council recommended the
magistrates to take Hugh’s seven sons into consideration when they laid
their ‘stents’ upon him.—Foun.
Some years later (January 1685),
Turner being again troubled by the wrights’ corporation, the Privy
Council, on his producing an essay piece of ‘an indented cabinet and
standishes,’ gave him a licence to set up as a freeman.—Foun.
Dec.
Sep 13
At Prestonpans dwelt a respectable old widow named Katharine Liddell, or
Keddie. During the late panic in East Lothian regarding witches, she had
been seized by John Rutherford, bailie of Prestonpans, as one liable to
suspicion of that crime. With the assistance of a drummer, two
salt-makers, and other persons, he barbarously tormented her in prison in
order to extort a confession, ‘by pricking of pins in several parts of her
body, to the great effusion of her blood, and whereby her skin is raised
and her body highly swelled, and she is in danger of her life.’ She had
also been kept from sleep for several nights and days. It was not till she
had undergone this treatment for six weeks that on her petition an order
was obtained from the Privy Council for her liberation.
There must have been some unusual
force of character about Katharine Liddell, for not only had she stood her
tortures without confessing falsehood, as most of her sister unfortunates
did, but she turned upon her tormentors by presenting a petition to the
Council, in which she charged them with defamation, false imprisonment,
and open and manifest oppression, and demanded that they should be
exemplarily punished in their persons and goods. After hearing the accused
in answer, the Council declared Liddell entirely innocent and free, and
condemned Rutherford and his associates for their unwarrantable
proceedings. In respect, however, of ‘the common error and vulgar practice
of others in the like station and capacity,’ they let him off without any
punishment. ‘David Cowan, pricker,’ the most active of the tormentors,
they sentenced to be confined during pleasure in the Tolbooth.—P.
C. R.
Oct
At this time, eighty persons were detained in prison in Edinburgh, on
account of matters of religion, waiting till they should be transported as
slaves to Barbadoes.’—Foun. Dec.
In connection with this distressing
fact may be placed one of a different complexion, which Fountainhall
states elsewhere. The magistrates, he tells us, were sensible of the
inadequacy of their Old Tolbooth for the purposes of justice in these days
of pious zeal. Consequently, one Thomas Moodie leaving them twenty
thousand merks to build a church, they—declaring ‘they have no use for a
church ‘—offered to build with the money a new Tolbooth, above the West
Port, ‘and to put Thomas Moodie’s name and arms thereon! ‘—Foun.
In the entire history of the
municipality of Edinburgh, this is not the worst of its attempts at
the perversion of funds intended for the building of a church. And it
really appears that our ancestors looked upon the building of a jail as a
public act of some dignity and importance. PATRIAE ET POSTERIS [for our
country and posterity] is the self-complacent inscription on the front of
the Canongate Tolbooth.
Nov 13
A civil process of this date between Sir R. Hepburn of Keith and David
Borthwick his tenant, reveals the fact that lime was ‘the usual way of
improving and gooding land in East Lothian, at least in that corner of
it.’—Foun. Dec.
1679
So early as 1590 a foreigner came to Scotland, and
applied for some encouragement to his design of erecting a paper-work
within the kingdom. There is reason to believe that this design proved
abortive, and that there was no further attempt at a native manufacture of
paper till 1675, when a work was established at Dairy Mills, a place on
the Water of Leith, in the immediate vicinity of Edinburgh. This work
obtained the benefit of an act passed in 1662, offering privileges to
those who should erect such manufactories within the kingdom, and French
workmen were introduced as necessary for the instruction of the natives.
After suffering a temporary stoppage in consequence of the burning of the
buildings, the work was again in such a condition in 1679, that it was
able, according to the statement of its owners, to produce ‘gray and blue
paper much finer than ever this country formerly offered to the Council.’
Mar 7
At this date, Alexander Daes, merchant, one of the proprietors, presented
a petition setting forth how this work not only supplied good paper, but
promised another general usefulness in the ‘improvement of rags, which
formerly were put to no good use,’ and in the gathering of which many poor
and infirm people could make their bread: in the work itself, moreover,
‘many Scotsmen and boys are already, and many more may be, instructed in
the art of making paper.’ There was but one thing wanting for the due
encouragement of the work, and that was the suppression of ‘a faulty
custom, not practised anywhere else,’ of employing fine rags in the making
of wicks for candles. This custom, it was alleged, involved a cheat to the
liege; in as far as these rags, not exceeding eight or ten shillings (8d.
or 10d. sterling) per stone in value, formed part of the weight of the
candles, of which the price was three pounds ten shillings (5s.10d.
sterling). It was represented that cotton-wicks should be employed, which,
if dearer, were also better, as they gave more light. Thus it was that, in
those day; hardened as every one was in the spirit of monopoly, one trade
made no scruple in interfering with another, if its own selfish ends could
thereby be advanced.
The Council did actually ‘discharge
the candlemakers to make use of clouts and rags for the wicks of candles.’
A subordinate branch of the petition
for an extension of the time during which the privileges granted by
statute were to last, was silently overlooked.—P.
C. R.
There is reason to conclude that
this paper-mill was not continued, and that paper-making was not
successfully introduced into Scotland till the middle of the succeeding
century.
July 11
Robert Mean, keeper of the letter-office in Edinburgh, was brought before
the Privy Council, accused of ‘sending up a bye-letter with the
flying packet upon the twenty-two day of June last, giving ane account to
the postmaster of England of the defeat of the rebels in the west, which
was by the said postmaster communicated to the king before it could have
been done by his majesty’s secretary for Scotland, and which letter
contains several untruths in matter of fact.’ Notwithstanding an abject
apology, Mean was sent to the Tolbooth, there to remain during the
Council’s pleasure.—P. C. B.
Mr Mean’s office was at this time a
somewhat critical one. On the 19th of August 1680, he was imprisoned by a
committee of the Privy Council ‘for publishing the news-letter before it
was revised by a councillor or their clerk; though he affirmed he had
shewn it to the Earl of Linlithgow before he divulged it.’ What offended
them was a false piece of intelligence contained in it, to the
disparagement of the Duke of Lauderdale. Robert was liberated in a day or
two with a rebuke.
The bringing of the news of the
defeat of the rebels at Bothwell Bridge seems to have been looked upon as
a matter of a high degree of consequence. The instrument was one James Ker,
a barber in the Canongate, who acted as a messenger between the royal army
and the capital, under favour of the Chancellor Duke of Rothes, whom he
had perhaps attended professionally in Holyroodhouse. The lords of the
Privy Council were so over-joyed at the intelligence, that they promised
James some signal mark of their gratitude; and he soon after asked them,
by way of discharging the obligation, to get him entered as a freeman in
the city corporation of chirurgeons. They used influence with the deacon
of this important body to get Ker’s wish gratified; but it could not be
done—he had not served the proper apprenticeship. He went to London, and
petitioned the king on the subject, ‘who, finding that the corporation
stuck upon their privilege, was graciously pleased to refer [him] back to
the Council, to be rewarded as the Council should judge fit.’ Upwards of
three years after (December 14, 1682), he is found petitioning the Council
for this suitable reward, representing that by the expense of his journey
to London and the loss of his employment, he and his wife and numerous
family had been reduced to ‘great straits and necessity.’ They could only
refer him to the Bishop of Edinburgh, that be might deal with the
magistrates, to see their first recommendation made effectual.—P.
C. R.
In 1673, two brothers, probably of
English birth, Edward Fountain of Lochhill and Captain James Fountain, had
their patent formally proclaimed throughout Scotland, as
Masters of the Revels within the kingdom.
They thus possessed a privilege of licensing and
authorising balls, masks, plays, and such-like entertainments; nor was
this quite such an empty or useless privilege as our traditionary notions
of the religious objections formerly cherished against public amusements
might have led us to suppose.
July 24.
At the date noted, the two Fountains petitioned the Privy Council against
sundry dancing-masters who took upon them to make ‘public balls, dances,
masks, and other entertainments in their schools, upon mercenary designs,
without any licence or authority from the petitioners.’ It was set forth
that this practice not only invaded their privileges, but tended to ‘the
eminent discouragement of the playhouse,’ which ‘the petitioners
had been at great charge in erecting.’ Agreeing with the views of the
petitioners, the Council ordered all dancing-masters to desist from the
above-described practice, and in particular prohibited ‘Andrew Devoe to
keep any ball to-morrow, or at any other time,’ without proper licence.—P.
C. B.
This, as far as I am aware, is the
only notice we possess of a theatre in Edinburgh about 1679. It sounds
strange to hear of a dancing-master’s ball in our city little more than a
month after the battle of Bothwell Bridge, and while a thousand poor men
were lodging on the cold ground in the Greyfriars’ Church-yard.
We find in September 1680 the two
Fountains adverting to their playhouse as still kept up—’at great
expenses;’ and they then petition for redress against such as ‘keep public
games, plays, and lotteries’ without that licence which they, as
masters of the revels, were alone entitled to grant. The Council on that
occasion directed letters of horning to be issued against the persons
complained of soon after, February 10, 1681, Andrew Devoe, who made his
bread by teaching the children of noblemen and gentlemen to dance,
complained that he was troubled by the two Fountains demanding from him
that he should give caution not to have any more balls in his school. It
was an unheard-of thing in Europe, in Andrew’s opinion, that a school-ball
should be regarded as an infringement of the patent of a master of revels.
The Lords, entering into his views, ordered that any former acts they had
passed in favour of the Messrs Fountain should be held as restricted to
public shows, balls, and lotteries.
The privilege of the Messrs Fountain
must have in time become an insupportable grievance to the lieges, or at
least such of them as were inclined to embroider a little gaiety on the
dull serge of common life. While the parliament sat in August 1681, an act
was projected, though not brought forward, to complain of some oppressive
monopolies, and ‘particularly of Mr Fountain’s gifts as Master of the
Revels, by which he exacts so much off every bowling-green, kyle-alley,
&c., through the kingdom, as falling under his gift of lotteries.' In June
1682, Hugh Wallace appeared before the Privy Council as agent for ‘the
haill royal burghs of the kingdom,’ shewing that individuals were daily
charged by these gentlemen ‘upon pretence of gaming at cards and dice, and
other games, or having such plays at their houses,’ acting thus on their
pretended powers derived from certain general letters of the Council, and
proceeding in due course to hornings and captions where their demands for
money were not complied with. The Council ordained letters to be directed
to the Masters of the Revel; if the petitioner could ‘condescend upon
particular acts of exaction.’
Aug 26
The little village of Corstorphine, three miles from Edinburgh, was
disturbed by a frightful occurrence. The title of Lord Forrester was at
this time borne by a gentleman of mature years, who had acquired it by his
marriage to the heiress, and had subsequently had a family by a second
wife. He lived in the Castle of Corstorphine, the ancient seat of the
family. It appears that he sided with the Presbyterians, and was zealous
enough in their cause to build a meeting-house for their worship. He had
nevertheless formed an improper connection with the wife of one Nimmo, a
merchant in Edinburgh; and, what made this scandal the greater, the
unfortunate woman was niece to his first wife, besides being
grand-daughter of a former Lord Forrester. She was a woman of violent
character, accustomed, it was alleged, to carry a weapon under her
clothes. We are further informed that Mrs Bedford, an adulteress who had
murdered her husband a few years back, was her cousin; and that Lady
Warriston, who suffered for the same offence in 1600, was of the same
family.
It was pretty evident that this was
a woman not to be rashly offended. Lord Forrester had nevertheless spoken
opprobriously of her in his drink, and the fact came to her knowledge. She
proceeded to his house at Corstorphine, and, finding he was at the village
tavern, sent for him. The meeting took place in the garden. After a
violent altercation, the unhappy woman stabbed her paramour with his own
sword. ‘He fell under a tree near the pigeon-house, both of which still
remain, and died immediately. The lady took refuge in the garret of the
castle, but was discovered by one of her slippers, which fell through a
crevice of the floor.' Being seized and brought before the sheriffs of
Edinburgh, she made a confession of her crime, though seeking to extenuate
it, and, two days after, she was tried, and condemned to die. Taking
advantage of a humanity of the law, she contrived by deception to postpone
the execution of the sentence for upwards of two months. And in this
interval, notwithstanding the great care of her enjoined to John Wan, the
keeper of the Tolbooth, she succeeded in making her escape in men’s
apparel, but was found next day at Fala Mill, and brought back to prison.
On the 12th of November, Mrs Nimmo was beheaded at the Cross of Edinburgh,
appearing on the scaffold in mourning, with a large veil, which, before
laying down her head, she put aside, baring her shoulders at the same
time, ‘with seeming courage enough.’
Connected with the murder, a
circumstance characteristic of the age took place. The deceased nobleman,
leaving only heirs of his second marriage, who took the name of Ruthven
from their mother, and who were in possession of his house, the family
honours and estates, which came by his first wife, by whom he had no
surviving progeny, passed, according to a deed of entail, to another
branch of the family. In that day, no offence was more common than that of
violently seizing and interfering with the legal writings connected with
landed properties. Well knowing this, William Baillie of Torwoodhead and
his mother dreaded that the young Ruthvens might play foul with the late
lord’s charter-chest, and so prejudice their succession. They went with
friends to the house, while the murdered nobleman’s body still lay in it,
and intruded in a violent manner, by way of taking possession of their
inheritance. Their chief aim, as they afterwards alleged, was to see that
no documents should be embezzled or made away with. On a complaint from
the Ruthvens, the Lords adjudged Baillie and his mother to lie in prison
during their pleasure, and fined their assistant, a Mr Gourlay, in a
hundred pounds Scots. The court at the same time took measures to secure
the charter-chest.
Oct 26
The Duke of York arrived in Scotland, designing to reside in the c country
till the storm of the Exclusion Bill should blow over. He and his family
experienced a favourable reception in Edinburgh. In July 1681, he was
joined by his daughter, styled the Lady Anne (subsequently Queen Anne).
The royal party occupied the palace of Holyroodhouse, which had recently
received such large additions as to give them handsome accommodation.
According to the report of Mr William Tytler, who had conversed with many
who remembered the duke’s visit, the gaiety and brilliancy of the court of
Holyroodhouse on this occasion was a subject of general satisfaction. ‘The
princesses were easy and affable, and the duke studied to make himself
popular among all ranks of men.’ It was indeed an unpropitious time for
the duke to be in his father’s native kingdom—when a large portion of the
people were at issue with the government about matters of faith, and men
were daily suffering extreme seventies on account of their religious
practice. Nevertheless, he was far from being unpopular. It is clearly
intimated by Fountainhall that his birthday came to be observed with more
cordial demonstrations than the ldng’s. Though the contrary has been
insinuated, there are many instances, credibly reported, of his shewing
humanity towards the unfortunate ‘phanatiques,’ as they were called, who
came under the notice of the local authorities during the period of his
visit.
Mr Tytler reports that the duke and
the princesses gave balls, plays, and masquerades, much to the enjoyment
of the nobility and gentry who attended them, though to the disgust and
horror of the more rigid Presbyterians. It will be found that Nat Lee’s
play of Mithridates, King of Pontus, was acted privately at the
palace (November 15, 1681), with Lady Anne and the maids of honour as the
only performers. It was probably afterwards that a portion of the duke’s
company of players came down to Edinburgh to give regular performances. Mr
Tytler had a dim recollection of seeing one of their playbills,
advertising in capital letters The Indian Emperor, as to be played
by them at the Queen’s Chocolate House, which, he thought, would be
near the palace, though we must regard the High Street as a much more
likely situation. This was Dryden’s play on the sad story of Montezuma.
The great English poet comes into connection in another way with this
histrionic expedition to the north, for, when the remainder of the company
appeared at Oxford, he had to write a prologue apologising for the
weakness of the corps, and did it ludicrously at the expense of Scotland.
‘Our brethren are from Thames to
Tweed departed;
And of our sisters all the kinder-hearted,
To Edinborough gone, or coached or carted.
With bonny Blue-cap there they act
all night,
For Scotch half-crown,
in English threepence hight.
One nympth to whom fat Sir John Falstaff’s lean,
There with her single person fills
the scene.
Another, with long use and
wont decayed,
Dived here old woman, and there rose a maid.
Our trusty doorkeepers of former time,
There strut and swagger in heroic rhyme.
Tack but a copper lace to drugget suit,
And there a hero’s made without dispute,
And that which was a capon’s tail before,
Becomes a plume for Indian emperor.
But all his subjects, to express the care
Of imitation, go like Indian bare:
Laced linen there would be a dangerous
thing,
It might perhaps a new rebellion bring—
The Scot who wore it would be chosen king.’
Mr Tytler also states that ‘tea, for
the first time heard of in Scotland, was given as a treat by the
princesses to the Scottish ladies who visited at the abbey.’ He adds: ‘The
duke was frequently seen in a party at golf on the Links of Leith, with
some of the nobility and gentry. I remember in my youth to have often
conversed with an old man, named Andrew Dickson, a golf-club maker, who
said that, when a boy, he used to carry the duke’s golf-clubs, and to run
before him and announce where the balls fell.’
In July 1681, hearing that the Duke
and Duchess of York were now residing in Scotland, an Irish theatrical
company thought it might be a good speculation to visit Edinburgh, ‘to set
up a playhouse for the diversion and entertainment of such as shall desire
the same.’ They, to the number of thirty persons, landed at Irvine in
Ayrshire, bringing with them ‘clothes necessar for their employment,
mounted with gold and silver lace,’ when a difficulty was encountered,
arising from the late act of parliament regarding laced clothes. The
company was obliged to send a petition to the Privy Council in Edinburgh,
shewing that ‘trumpeters and stage-players’ were exempted from the said
act, and supplicating a pass to be exhibited to the tax-collector at
Irvine. His Royal Highness and the Council at once acceded to the prayer
of this petition.—P. C. R.
The Duke of York left Edinburgh by
sea, on the 6th of March 1682, ‘being desired to see his majesty at
Newmarket. There was great solemnity and attendance at his parture.' He
returned to Scotland, on the 7th of May, also by sea, on which occasion
occurred the disastrous shipwreck of the Gloucester frigate in
which he sailed. His purpose at this time was to bring back his family
from Scotland, and, accordingly, he and the princesses finally departed on
the 15th of the month.
Dec 19
A commission composed of country gentlemen and advocates sat in the
Tolbooth of Borrowstounness to try a number of poor people for the crime
of witchcraft. There was Annaple Thomson, who had had a meeting with the
devil in the time of her widowhood, before she was married to her last
husband, on her coming betwixt Linlithgow and Borrowstounness, when he,
‘in the likeness of ane black man, told you, that you was ane poor puddled
body, and had an evil life, and difficulty to win through the world, and
promised if you would follow him, and go alongst with him, you should
never want, but have ane better life; and about five weeks thereafter the
devil appeared to ye when you was going to the coal-hill about seven
o’clock in the morning. Having renewed his former tentation, you did
condescend thereto, and declared yourself content to follow him and become
his servant.’ There were also women called Margaret Pringle, Margaret
Hamilton (two of the name), and Bessie Vicker, besides a man called
William Craw. ‘Ye and each person of you was at several meetings with the
devil in the links of Borrowstounness, and in the house of you Bessie
Vicker, and ye did eat and drink with the devil, and with one another, and
with witches in her house in the night-time; and the devil and the said
William Craw brought the ale which ye drank, extending to about seven
gallons, from the house of Elizabeth Hamilton, and you, the said Annaple,
had ane other meeting about five weeks ago, when you was going to the
coal-hill of Grange, and he invited you to go along with him and drink
with him in the Grange-pans.’ Two of the other accused women were said to
have in like manner sworn themselves into the devil’s service and become
his paramours, one eight years, the other thirty years ago. It was charged
against Margaret Pringle, that ‘the devil took you by the right hand,
whereby it was for eight years grievously pained, but [he] having touched
it of new again, it immediately became hail;’ against Margaret Hamilton—’
the devil gave you ane five-merk piece of gold, whilk a little after becam
ane sklaitt stane.’ And finally, ‘you and ilk ane of you was at ane
meeting with the devil and other witches at the cross of Muirstane, above
Kinneil, upon the thretteen of October last, where you all danced, and the
devil acted the piper.’
