Part 3

Dundee consented to overlook this wild episode, on account of the supplies it brought him; but there was another person grievously offended. The Macdonald who lived among the Grants was one of those who fell in the late skirmish. By all the customs of Highland feeling, this was an event for the notice of his chief Glengarry, who was one of the magnates in Dundee’s army. Glengarry appeared to resent the man’s death highly, and soon presented himself before the general, with a demand for satisfaction on Locheil and the Camerons. ‘Surprised at the oddness of the thing, his lordship asked what manner of satisfaction he wanted; “for,” said he, “I believe it would puzzle the ablest judges to fix upon it, even upon the supposition that they were in the wrong;” and added, that “if there was any injury done, it was to him, as general of the king’s troops, in so far as they had acted without commission.” Glengarry answered that they had equally injured and affronted both, and that therefore they ought to be punished, in order to deter others from following their example.’ To this Dundee replied with further excuses, still expressing his inability to see what offence had been done to Glengarry, and remarking, that ‘if such an accident is a just ground for raising a disturbance in our small army, we shall not dare to engage the king’s enemies, lest there may chance to be some of your name and following among them who may happen to be killed.’ Glengarry continued to bluster, threatening to take vengeance with his own hand; but in reality he was too much a man of the general world to be himself under the influence of these Highland feelings—he only wished to appear before his people as eager to avenge [Sidenote: 1689.] what they felt to be a just offence. The affair, therefore, fell asleep.[17]

[Sidenote: JULY 4.]

The Earl of Balcarres, having failed to satisfy the government about his peaceable intentions, was put under restraint in Edinburgh Castle, which was now in the hands of the government. There, he must have waited with great anxiety for news of his friend Lord Dundee.

‘After the battle of Killiecrankie, where fell the last hope of James in the Viscount of Dundee, the ghost of that hero is said to have appeared about daybreak to his confidential friend, Lord Balcarres, then confined to Edinburgh Castle. The spectre, drawing aside the curtain of the bed, looked very steadfastly upon the earl, after which it moved towards the mantel-piece, remained there for some time in a leaning posture, and then walked out of the chamber without uttering one word. Lord Balcarres, in great surprise, though not suspecting that which he saw to be an apparition, called out repeatedly to his friend to stop, but received no answer, and subsequently learned that at the very moment this shadow stood before him, Dundee had breathed his last near the field of Killiecrankie.’[18]

On the news of the defeat of the government troops, his lordship had some visits from beings more substantial, but perhaps equally pale of countenance. In his Memoirs, he tells us of the consternation of the new councillors. ‘Some were for retiring to England, others to the western shires of Scotland ... they considered whether to set at liberty all the prisoners, or make them more close; the last was resolved, and we were all locked up and debarred from seeing our friends, but _never had so many visits from our enemies_, all making apologies for what was past, protesting they always wished us well, as we should see whenever they had an opportunity.’

Lord Balcarres was liberated on the 4th of March 1690, on giving caution for peaceable behaviour, the danger of Jacobite reaction being by that time abated.

[Sidenote: JULY 10.]

A poor young woman belonging to a northern county, wandering southwards in search of a truant lover, like a heroine of one of the old ballads, found herself reduced to the last extremity of distress [Sidenote: 1689.] when a few miles south of Peebles. Bewildered and desperate, she threw her babe into the Haystown Burn, and began to wander back towards her own country. A couple of the inhabitants of Peebles, fishing in the burn, soon found the body of the infant, and, a search being made, the wretched mother was discovered at a place called Jedderfield, brought into town, and put in confinement, as a suspected murderess. The magistrates of the burgh applied to the sheriff, John Balfour of Kailzie, to have the supposed culprit taken off their hands, and tried; but he refused to interfere, owing to ‘the present surcease of justice’ in the country. Consequently, the magistrates were ‘necessitate to cause persons constantly guard the murderer, the prison not being strong enough to secure her.’ On their petition, the Privy Council allowed the Peebles authorities to send Margaret Craig, with a guard, to Edinburgh, and ordained her to be received into the Tolbooth of Leith, till she be processed for the murder.[19]

This miserable young woman must have lain in prison three years, for she was tried by the Court of Justiciary in June 1692, and condemned to be hanged.[20]

[Sidenote: JULY 26.]

There is something interesting in the early difficulties of so valuable an institution as the Post-office. John Graham had been appointed postmaster-general for Scotland in 1674, with a salary of a thousand pounds Scots (£83, 6_s._ 8_d._ sterling), and had set about his duty with great spirit. He had travelled to many towns for the purpose of establishing local offices, thus incurring expenses far beyond what his salary could repay. He had been obliged on this account to encroach on money belonging to his wife; also to incur some considerable debts; nor had he ever been able to obtain any relief, or even the full payment of his salary from the late state-officers. He was now dead, and his widow came before the Privy Council with a petition setting forth how she had been left penniless by her husband through his liberality towards a public object. It was ordained that Mrs Graham should get payment of all debts due by provincial offices to her husband, and have the income of the general office till Martinmas next.

It is to be feared that Mrs Graham did not profit much by this order, as on the subsequent 19th of October we find her complaining that William Mean of the Edinburgh letter-office, and others, [Sidenote: 1689.] had refused to pay her the arrears declared to be due to her; wherefore the order was renewed.

The general post-mastership was at this time put upon a different footing, being sold by roup, July 24, 1689, to John Blair, apothecary in Edinburgh, he undertaking to carry on the entire business on various rates of charge for letters, and to pay the government five thousand one hundred merks (about £255 sterling) yearly, for seven years. The rates were, for single letters to Dumfries, Glasgow, and Ayr, Dundee, Perth, Kelso, and Jedburgh, two shillings; to Carlisle, Portpatrick, Aberdeen, and Dunkeld, three shillings; to Kirkcudbright and Inverness, four shillings, all Scots money.

[Sidenote: OCT. 8.]

In October of this year, the above-mentioned William Mean was sent with a macer to the Tolbooth for keeping up letters sent from Ireland ‘untill payment of the letters were paid to him, albeit the postage were satisfied in England, and that he had sent back packets to London which were directed for Ireland.’ Also, ‘notwithstanding the former order of Council appointing him to deliver in to them any letters directed for James Graham, vintner, he had kept up the same these eight or ten days, and had never acquainted any member of Council therewith.’ He was liberated two days after, on caution for reappearance under 500 merks. It may be surmised that William Mean was disposed to take advantage of some regulations of his office in order to give trouble to the existing government.

In the course of 1690, besides a deliberate robbery of the post-boy on the road between Cockburnspath and Haddington (see under August 16th of that year), the fact of the bag frequently coming with the seals broken, is adverted to in angry terms by the Privy Council. An edict for the use of official seals and the careful preservation of these was passed; nevertheless, we soon after hear of the bag or box coming once more into Edinburgh with the seals broken, Mrs Gibb, the post-mistress at the Canongate post,[21] sent for, Mrs Mean of the letter-office also called up, and much turmoil and fume for a while, but no sort of decisive step taken in consequence. It is to be observed that the post from the English to the Scottish capital was at this time carried on horseback with a fair degree of speed. English parliamentary proceedings of Saturday are noted to be in the hands of the Edinburgh public on the ensuing Thursday.[22]

[Sidenote: 1689. SEP.]

Alexander Irvine of Drum, the representative of a distinguished historical family in Aberdeenshire, was unfortunately weak both in mind and body, although it is related that he could play well on the viol, and had picked up the then popular political tune of _Lullibullero_ in the course of a few days. Under sanction of the Privy Council, Dr David Mitchell of Edinburgh undertook to keep him in his house in a style befitting his quality, and with the care required by his weakly condition, and for this purpose hired some additional rooms, and made other necessary furnishings and preparations. The laird came to him at the close of July, but before the end of August, Marjory Forbes had induced the laird to own her as his wife, and it became necessary that Drum should leave his medical protector. A petition being presented by Dr Mitchell for payment of board and recompense for charges thus needlessly incurred, he was allowed by the Lords £500 Scots, or £41, 13_s._ 4_d._ sterling, over and above twenty pieces he had received for a professional visit paid to the laird’s Aberdeenshire castle, to arrange for his migration to Edinburgh.[23]

James Broich, skipper of Dundee, was proceeding in his scout to Norway with a small parcel of goods, and a thousand pounds Scots wherewith to buy a larger vessel. In mid-sea he fell in with a French privateer, who, after seizing cargo and money, having no spare hands to leave on board, proceeded to cut holes in the vessel, in order to sink her, proposing to put the unfortunate crew to their boat, in which case they must have perished, ‘there being then a great stress.’ By the prayers and tears of the skipper and his people, the privateer was at length induced to let them go in their vessel, but not without first obtaining a bond from Broich, undertaking to remit six hundred guelders to Dunkirk by a particular day. As a guarantee for this payment, the rover detained and carried off the skipper’s son, telling him he would hear no good of him if the money should fail to be forthcoming.

Poor Broich got safe home, where his case excited much commiseration, more particularly as he had suffered from shipwreck and capture four times before in the course of his professional life. He was penniless, and unable to support his family; his son, also—‘the stay and staff of his old age’—had a wife and small children of his own left desolate. Here was a little [Sidenote: 1689.] domestic tragedy very naturally arising out of the wars of the _Grand Monarque_! Beginning in the council-room of Versailles, such was the way they told upon humble industrial life in the port of Dundee in Scotland. It was considered, too, that the son was in ‘as bad circumstances, in being a prisoner to the French king, as if he were a slave to the Turks.’

[Sidenote: SEP. 2.]

On the petition of Broich, the Privy Council ordained a voluntary contribution to be made for his relief in Edinburgh, Leith, Borrowstounness, and Queensferry, and in the counties of Fife and Forfar.

In a contemporary case, that of a crew of Grangepans, carried by a privateer to Dunkirk, and confined in Rochefort, it is stated that they were each allowed half a sous _per diem_ for subsistence, and were daily expecting to be sent to the galleys.[24]

[Sidenote: OCT. 10.]

It was now acknowledged of the glass-work at Leith, that it was carried on successfully in making green bottles and ‘chemistry and apothecary glasses.’ It produced its wares ‘in greater quantity in four months than was ever vended in the kingdom in a year, and at as low rates as any corresponding articles from London or Newcastle.’ The Privy Council therefore gave it the privileges of a manufactory, and forbade introduction of foreign bottles, only providing that the Leith work should not charge more than half-a-crown a dozen.

[Sidenote: DEC. 2.]

The magistrates of Edinburgh were ordered to put William Mitchell upon the Tron, ‘and cause the hangman nail his lug [ear] thereto,’ on Wednesday the 4th instant, between eleven and twelve in the forenoon, with a paper on his breast, bearing ‘that he stands there for the insolencies committed by him on the Guards, and for words of reflection uttered by him against the present government.’[25]

[Sidenote: 1690. FEB. 2.]

A large flock of _mere-swine_ (porpoises?) having entered the Firth of Forth, as often happens, and a considerable number having come ashore, as seldom happens, at Cramond, the tenants of Sir John Inglis, proprietor of the lands there, fell upon them with all possible activity, and slew twenty-three, constituting a prize of no inconsiderable value. After fastening the animals with ropes, so as to prevent their being carried out to sea—for the [Sidenote: 1690.] scene of slaughter was half a mile in upon a flat sandy beach—the captors sold them for their own behoof to Robert Douglas, soapboiler in Leith, fully concluding that they had a perfect right to do so, seeing that mere-swine are not royal fish, and neither had they been cast in dead, in which case, as wrack, I presume, they would have belonged to the landlord.

The greater part of the spoil had been barrelled and transported to Leith—part of the price paid, too, to the captors—when John Wilkie, surveyor there, applied to the Privy Council for a warrant to take the mere-swine into his possession and dispose of them for the benefit of such persons as they should be found to belong to. He accordingly seized upon the barrels, and disposed of several of them at eleven pounds four shillings per barrel, Douglas protesting loudly against his procedure. On a petition, representing how the animals had been killed and secured, Wilkie was ordained to pay over the money to Douglas, deducting only his reasonable charges.

[Sidenote: FEB. 28.]

A few hot-headed Perthshire Jacobites, including [George] Graham of Inchbrakie, David Oliphant of Culteuchar, and George Graham of Pitcairns, with two others designed as ensigns, met to-day at the village of Dunning, with some other officers of the government troops, and, getting drink, began to utter various insolencies. They drank the health of King James, ‘without calling him the late king,’ and further proceeded to press the same toast upon the government officers. One of these, Ludovick Grant, quarter-master of Lord Rollo’s troop, was prudentially retiring from this dangerous society, when Ensign Mowat cocked a pistol at him, saying: ‘Do you not see that some of us are King William’s officers as well as you, and why will ye not drink the health as well as we?’ Grant having asked him what he meant by that, Inchbrakie took the pistol, and fired it up the chimney—which seems to have been the only prudential proceeding of the day. The party continued drinking and brawling at the place, till James Hamilton, cornet of Rollo’s troop, came with a party to seize them, when, drawing their swords, they beat back the king’s officer, and were not without great difficulty taken into custody. Even now, so far from being repentant, Inchbrakie ‘called for a dishful of aqua vitæ or brandy, and drank King James’s health,’ saying ‘they were all knaves and rascals that would refuse it.’ He said ‘he hoped the guise would turn,’ when Lord Rollo would not be able to keep Scotland, and he would get [Sidenote: 1690.] Duncrub [Lord Rollo’s house and estate] to himself. His fury against the soldiers extended so far, that he called for powder and ball to shoot the sentinels placed over him, and ‘broke Alexander Ross’s face with ane pint-stoup.’ Even when borne along as prisoners to Perth, and imprisoned there, these furious gentlemen continued railing at Lord Rollo and his troop, avowing and justifying all they had done at Dunning.

The offenders, being brought before the Privy Council, gave in defences, which their counsel, Sir David Thores, advocated with such rash insolency that he was sent away to prison. The culprits were punished by fines and imprisonment. We find them with great difficulty clearing themselves out of jail six months after.[26]

In religious contentions, there is a cowardice in the strongest ascendency parties which makes them restlessly cruel towards insignificant minorities. The Roman Catholics in Scotland had never since the Reformation been more than a handful of people; but they had constantly been treated with all the jealous severity due to a great and threatening sect. Even now, when they were cast lower than at any former time, through the dismal failure of King James to raise them, there was no abatement of their troubles.

It was at this time a great inconveniency to any one to be a Catholic. As a specimen—Alexander Fraser of Kinnaries, on the outbreak of the Revolution, to obviate any suspicion that might arise about his affection to the new government, came to Inverness, and put himself under the view of the garrison there. Fears being nevertheless entertained regarding him, he was sent to prison. Liberated by General Mackay upon bail, he remained peaceably in Inverness till December last, when he was sent to Edinburgh, and there placed under restraint, not to move above a mile from town. [Sidenote: MAR. 2.] He now represented the hardship he thus suffered, ‘his fortune being very small, and the most of his living being only by his own labouring and industry.’ ‘His staying here,’ he added, ‘any space longer must of necessity tend to his own and his family’s utter ruin.’ With difficulty, the Lords were induced to liberate him under caution.

Mr David Fairfoul, a priest confined in prison at Inverness, only regained his liberty by an extraordinary accident. James Sinclair of Freswick, a Caithness gentleman, had chanced a [Sidenote: 1690.] twelvemonth before to be taken prisoner by a French privateer, as he was voyaging from his northern home to Edinburgh. Having made his case known to the Scottish Privy Council, he was relieved in exchange for Mr Fairfoul (June 5, 1690).

About the end of the year, we find a considerable number of Catholics under government handling. Steven Maxwell, who had been one of the two masters in the Catholic college at Holyroodhouse, lay in durance at Blackness. John Abercrombie, ‘a trafficker,’ and a number of other priests recently collected out of the Highlands, were immured in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh. Another, named Mr Robert Davidson, of whom it was admitted that ‘his opinion and deportment always inclined to sobriety and moderation, shewing kindness and charity to all in distress, even of different persuasions, and that he made it no part of his business to meddle in any affairs, but to live peaceably in his native country for his health’s sake,’ had been put into Leith jail, with permission to go forth for two hours a day, under caution to the amount of fifty pounds, lest his health should suffer.

At this very time, a fast was under order of the General Assembly, with sanction of the government, with a reference to the consequences of the late oppressive government, citing, among other things, ‘the sad persecutions of many for their conscience towards God.’[27]

[Sidenote: APR. 25.]

It was declared in the legislature that there were ‘frequent murders of innocent infants, whose mothers do conceal their pregnancy, and do not call for necessary assistance in the birth.’ It was therefore statute, that women acting in this secretive manner, and whose babes were dead or missing, should be held as guilty of murder, and punished accordingly.[28] That is to say, society, by treating indiscretions with a puritanic severity, tempted women into concealments of a dangerous kind, and then punished the crimes which itself had produced, and this upon merely negative evidence.

Terrible as this act was, it did not wholly avail to make women brave the severity of that social punishment which stood on the other side. It is understood to have had many victims. In January 1705, no fewer than four young women were in the Tolbooth of Aberdeen at once for concealing pregnancy and [Sidenote: 1690.] parturition, and all in a state of such poverty that the authorities had to maintain them. On the 23d July 1706, the Privy Council dealt with a petition from Bessie Muckieson, who had been two years ‘incarcerat’ in the Edinburgh Tolbooth on account of the death of a child born by her, of which Robert Bogie in Kennieston, in Fife, was the father. She had not concealed her pregnancy, but the infant being born in secret, and found dead, she was tried under the act.

At her trial she had made ingenuous confession of her offence, while affirming that the child had not been ‘wronged,’ and she protested that even the concealment of the birth was ‘through the treacherous dealing and abominable counsel of the said Robert Bogie.’ ‘Seeing she was a poor miserable object, and ane ignorant wretch destitute of friends, throwing herself at their Lordships’ footstool for pity and accustomed clemency’—petitioning that her just sentence might be changed into banishment, ‘that she might be a living monument of a true penitent for her abominable guilt’—the Lords looked relentingly on the case, and adjudged Bessie to pass forth of the kingdom for the remainder of her life.[29]

It was seldom that such leniency was shewn. In March 1709, a woman named Christian Adam was executed at Edinburgh for the imputed crime of child-murder, and on the ensuing 6th of April, two others suffered at the same place on the same account. In all these three cases, occurring within four weeks of each other, the women had allowed their pregnancy and labour to pass without letting their condition be known, or calling for the needful assistance, Adam acting thus at the entreaty of her lover, ‘a gentleman,’ who said it would ruin him if she should declare her state. Another, named Bessie Turnbull, had been entirely successful in concealing all that happened; but the consciousness of having killed her infant haunted her, till she came voluntarily forward, and gave herself up. At the scaffold, Adam ‘gave the ministers much satisfaction;’ Margaret Inglis ‘did not give full satisfaction to the ministers;’ Turnbull ‘seemed more affected than her comrade, but not so much as could be wished.’[30]

[Sidenote: JULY 5.]