Part 21

"For which causes, and in respect of Her Majesty's most gentle clemency and liberal support, the said Duke, and all the nobility, as well such as be now joined, as such as shall hereafter join with him for defence of the liberty of that realm, shall, to the uttermost of their power, aid and support Her Majesty's arm against the French, and their partakers,[162] with horsemen and footmen, and with victuals, by land and by sea, and with all manner of other aid to the best of their power, and so shall continue during the time that Her Majesty's army shall remain in Scotland. They shall be enemy to all such Scotsmen and French as shall in anywise show themselves enemies to the realm of England in respect of the aiding and supporting of the said Duke and nobility in the delivery of the realm of Scotland from conquest. They shall never assent nor permit that the realm of Scotland shall be conquered, or otherwise knit to the Crown of France than it is at this present time only by the marriage of the Queen their Sovereign to the French King, and by the laws and liberties of the realm, as it ought to be....

[162] Allies.

"And, finally, the said Duke and the nobility joined with him certainly perceiving that the Queen's Majesty of England is thereunto moved only upon respect of princely honour and neighbourhood for the defence of the freedom of Scotland from conquest, and not of any other sinister intent, do by these presents testify and declare that neither they nor any of them mean by this count to withdraw any due obedience to their Sovereign Lady the Queen, or to withstand the French King, her husband and head, in any lawful thing that, during the marriage, shall not tend to the subversion and oppression of the just and ancient liberties of the said kingdom of Scotland; for preservation whereof, both for their Sovereign's honour, and for the continuance of the kingdom in ancient estate, they acknowledge themselves bound to spend their goods, lands, and lives...."

[Sidenote: The Regent lays waste the Country.]

Shortly after this contract was completed, our pledges were delivered to Master Winter, Admiral of the navy[163] that came to Scotland, a man of great honesty, so far as ever we could espy of him, and these were safely convoyed to Newcastle. Then the English began to assemble near the Border; and the French and Queen Regent, informed of this, began to destroy what they could in the towns and country about. The whole victuals they carried to Leith; the mills they broke; the sheep, oxen, and kine, yea, the horses of poor labourers, they made all to serve their tyranny. In the end, they left nothing undone which very enemies could have devised, except that they demolished not gentlemen's houses, and burnt not the town of Edinburgh: in this particular, God bridled their fury, to let His afflicted understand that He took care of them.

[163] Fleet.

Before the coming of the land army, the French passed to Glasgow, and destroyed the country thereabout. The tyranny used by the Marquis upon a poor Scottish soldier is fearful to hear, and yet his act may not be omitted. They would give no silver to the poor men, and so they were slow to depart from the town; and, albeit the drum was beaten, the ensign could not be got. A poor craftsman, who had bought for his victuals a grey loaf and was eating a morsel of it, was putting the rest of it in his bosom. The tyrant came to him, and with the poor caitiff's own whinger first struck him in the breast, and afterwards cast it at him. The poor man staggering and falling, the merciless tyrant ran him through with his rapier, and thereafter commanded him to be hung over the stair. Lord, Thou wilt yet look, and recompense such tyranny; however contemptible the person was!

On the second of April, in the year of God 1560, the army by land entered Scotland. Its conduct was committed to the Lord Grey, who had in his company the Lord Scrope, Sir James Crofts, Sir Harry Percy, and Sir Francis Lake; many other captains and gentlemen having charge, some of footmen, some of horsemen. The army by land was estimated at ten thousand men. The Queen Regent and some others of her faction had passed to the Castle of Edinburgh. At Preston the English were met by the Duke's Grace, the Earl of Argyll (Huntly came not until the siege was confirmed), Lord James, the Earls of Glencairn and Monteith, Lords Ruthven, Boyd, and Ochiltree, and all the Protestant gentlemen of West Fife, Angus, and Mearns. For a few days the army was great.

[Sidenote: The Siege of Leith: April 1560.]

After two days' deliberation at Inveresk, the whole camp marched forward with ordnance and all preparation necessary for the siege, and came to Restalrig upon Palm Sunday evening. The French had put themselves in battle array upon the Links without Leith, and had sent forth their skirmishers. These, beginning before ten o'clock, continued skirmishing until after four o'clock in the afternoon, when some horsemen of Scotland and some of England charged upon them. But, because the principal captain of the horsemen of England was not present, the whole troop durst not charge, and so the overthrow and slaughter of the French was not so great as at one time it appeared to be. The great battle was once at the trot; but when the French perceived that the great force of the horsemen stood still, and charged not, they returned and gave some resource to their fellows that fled. Thus there fell in that defeat only about three hundred Frenchmen. God would not give the victory so suddenly, lest man should glory in his own strength. This small victory put both the English and Scots in too great security, as the issue declared.

The French enclosed within the town, the English army began to plant their pavilions betwixt Leith and Restalrig. The ordnance of the town, and especially that which lay upon St. Anthony's steeple, caused them great annoyance; and eight cannon were bent against this place. These shot so continually, and so accurately, that, within few days, that steeple was condemned, and all the ordnance on it was dismounted. This made the Englishmen somewhat more negligent than it became good men of war to have been; for, perceiving that the French made no pursuit outside their walls, they got the idea that they would never ish more. Some of the captains for pastime, went to the town:[164] the soldiers, for their ease, laid their armour aside, and, as men beyond danger, fell to the dice and cards. So, upon Easter Monday, at the very hour of noon, when the French ished, both on horse and foot, and entered into the English trenches with great violence, they slew or put to flight all that were found there.

[164] That is, to Edinburgh.

The watch was negligently kept, and succour was slow, and long in coming; the French, before any resistance was made, approached almost to the great ordnance. But then the horsemen trooped together, and the footmen got themselves in array, and so repulsed the French back again to the town. But the slaughter was great: some say it exceeded double of that which the French received the first day. And this was the fruit of their security and ours.

Matters were afterwards remedied; for the Englishmen, most wisely considering themselves not able to besiege the town at all points, made mounds at divers quarters of it. In these, they and their ordnance lay in as good strength as did the enemy within the town. The common soldiers kept the trenches, and had the said mounds for their safeguard and refuge, in case of any greater pursuit than they were able to sustain. The patience and stout courage of the Englishmen, but principally of the horsemen, is worthy of all praise: for where was it ever heard that eight thousand (they that lay in camp never exceeded that number) should besiege four thousand of the most desperate cut-throats that were to be found in Europe, and lie so near to them in daily skirmishing, for the space of three months and more. The horsemen kept watch night and day, and did so valiantly behave themselves that the French got no advantage from that day until the day of the assault.

In the meantime, another bond to defend the liberty of the Evangel of Christ was made by all the nobility, barons, and gentlemen, professing Christ Jesus in Scotland, and by divers others that joined with us in expelling the French army.... This contract and bond came not only to the ears but to the sight of the Queen Dowager. Thereat she stormed not a little, and said, "The malediction of God I give unto them that counselled me to persecute the preachers, and to refuse the petitions of the best part of the true subjects of this realm. It was said to me that the English army could not lie in Scotland ten days; but they have lain nearly a month now, and are more likely to remain than the first day they came."

They that gave such information to the Queen, spoke as worldly wise men, and as things appeared to have been. For, the country being almost in all parts wasted, the victuals within reach of Leith either brought in to their stores or else destroyed, and the mills and other places cast down, it appeared that the camp could not have been furnished, unless it had been by their own ships. That could not have been for any long continuance of time, and so would have been of little comfort. But God confounded all worldly wisdom, and made His own benediction as evidently to appear as if, in a manner, He had fed the army from above. In the camp all the time that it lay, after eight days had passed, all kinds of victuals were more abundant, and of more easy prices, than they had been in Edinburgh at any time in the two previous years, or yet have been in that town to this day. The people of Scotland so much abhorred the tyranny of the French that they would have given their substance to have been rid of that chargeable burden which our sins had provoked God to lay upon us--in giving us into the hands of a woman, whom our nobility, in their foolishness, sold unto strangers, and with her the liberty of the realm....

[Sidenote: The Assault upon Leith is unsuccessful.]

The camp abounding in all necessary provision, arrangements were made for the confirmation of the siege; and the trenches were drawn as near to the town as they well might be. The great camp removed from Restalrig to the west side of the Water of Leith; and the cannons were planted for the bombardment, and shot at the south-west wall. But all was earth, and the breach was not made so great during the day but that it was sufficiently repaired at night. The English, beginning to weary, determined to give the brush and assault. This they did, upon the seventh day of May, beginning before daylight, and continuing until it was near seven o'clock. Albeit the English and Scottish, with great slaughter of the soldiers of both, were repulsed, there was never a sharper assault given at the hands of so few. The men that assaulted the whole two quarters of the town exceeded not a thousand, and yet they silenced the whole block-houses; yea, they once put the French clean off their walls, and were upon both the east and west block-houses. But they had not sufficient backing. Their ladders wanted six quarters of the proper height; and so, while the foremost were compelled to fight upon the top of the wall, their fellows could not get up to support them. Thus they were dung back again, by overwhelming numbers, when it was thought that the town was won.

[Sidenote: Sir James Crofts is blamed.]

Sir James Crofts was blamed by many for not doing his duty that day. He, with a sufficient number of most able men, had been instructed to assault the north-west quarter upon the sea-side, where, at low-water, as at the time of the assault, the passage was easy: but neither he nor his approached the quarter appointed. At their first coming in, he had spoken with the Queen Regent at the front block-house of the Castle of Edinburgh. Whether she had enchanted him we knew not, but we suspected so that day. He certainly deceived the expectation of many, and, so far as man could judge, was the cause of that great repulse.... All the time of the assault, which was both terrible and long, the Queen Regent sat upon the fore-wall of the Castle of Edinburgh; and when she perceived our overthrow, and that the ensigns of the French were again displayed upon the walls, she gave a guffaw of laughter, and said, "Now will I go to the Mass, and praise God for that which my eyes have seen!"

The French, proud of the victory, stripped naked all the slain, and laid their dead carcases in the hot sun along their wall, where they suffered them to lie more days than one. When the Queen Regent looked towards this, she hopped for mirth and said, "Yonder are the fairest tapestries that ever I saw: I would that the whole fields that are betwixt this place and yon were strewn with the same stuff." This act was seen by all, and her words were heard by some, and misliked by many. Against this, John Knox spake openly in pulpit, and boldly affirmed, that God would revenge that contumely done to His image, not only on the furious and godless soldiers, but even on such as rejoiced thereat. And that which actually happened did declare that he was not deceived, for within a few days thereafter the Queen Regent was smitten with disease.

[Sidenote: The Siege is continued. Illness of the Queen Regent.]

The Duke of Norfolk, who then lay at Berwick, commanded the Lord Grey to continue the siege, and promised that he should not lack men, so long as any were to be had betwixt Trent and Tweed; so far was he lieutenant.... While the siege thus continued, a sudden fire chanced in Leith, and this devoured many houses and much victual. Thus did God begin to fight for us, as the Lord Erskine in plain words said to the Queen Regent. "Madam," quoth he, "I can say no more; but seeing that men may not expel unjust possessors from this land, God Himself will do it; for yon fire is not kindled by man." These words offended the Queen Regent not a little. Her sickness daily increasing, she used great craft that Monsieur D'Oysel might be permitted to speak with her. Belike she wished to bid him farewell, for of old their familiarity had been great; but that was denied. Then she wrote as if to her chirurgeon and apothecary, explaining her sickness and requiring drugs. The letter being presented to the Lord Grey, he espied craft. Few lines being written above and much white paper left, he said, "Drugs are abundant and fresher in Edinburgh than they can be in Leith: there lurks here some other mystery." By holding the paper to the fire, he perceived some writing appear, and this he read. But what it was, no other man can tell; for he burnt the bill immediately, and said to the messenger, "Albeit I have been her secretary, yet tell her I shall keep her counsel. But say to her, such wares will not sell in a new market."

[Sidenote: The Regent expresses Repentance, and receives godly Instruction.]

When the Queen received this answer, she was not content; and travailed earnestly that she might speak with the Earls of Argyll, Glencairn, and Marischall, and with the Lord James. After deliberation, it was thought expedient that they should speak with her, but not altogether, lest some part of the Guisian practice had lurked under the colour of such friendship. She expressed to them all regret that she had behaved herself so foolishly, and had compelled them to seek the support of others rather than of their own sovereign; and she said that she sore repented that ever it came to that extremity. But hers was not the wyte.[165] Her action had been dictated by the wicked counsel of her friends on the one part, and the Earl of Huntly upon the other; if he had not been there, she would have fully agreed with them at their communing at Preston. They gave her what counsel and comfort they could in that extremity, and willed her to send for some godly learned man, of whom she might receive instruction; for these ignorant Papists that were about her, understood nothing of the mystery of our Redemption. Upon their motive, John Willock was sent for. With him she talked a reasonable space, and he did plainly show to her the virtue and strength of the death of Jesus Christ, as well as the vanity and abomination of the Mass. She did openly confess that there was no salvation but in and by the death of Jesus Christ. We heard not her confession concerning the Mass.

[165] Blame.

[Sidenote: Death of the Queen Regent.]

Some said the Queen was anointed in the papistical manner, a sign of small knowledge of the truth, and of less repentance of her former superstition. Yet, howsoever it was, Christ Jesus got no small victory over such an enemy. For, albeit she had formerly avowed that, in despite of all Scotland, the preachers of Jesus Christ should either die or be banished the realm, she was compelled not only to hear that Christ Jesus was preached, and all idolatry openly rebuked, and in many places suppressed, but also she was constrained to hear one of the principal ministers within the realm, and to approve the chief head of our religion, wherein we dissent from all Papists and papistry. Shortly thereafter she finished her unhappy life; unhappy, we say, for Scotland, from the first day she entered into it, to the day she departed this life, which was the ninth of June, the year of God 1560....

[Sidenote: Peace with France is concluded.]

Upon the sixteenth day of June, after the death of the Queen Regent, there came to Scotland Monsieur Randan, and with him the Bishop of Valance, in commission from France, to entreat of peace. Their negotiation was longsome; for both England and we, fearing deceit, sought by all means that the contract should be sure. They, upon the other part, intending to gratify those who had sent them and meant nothing but mere falseness, protracted time to the uttermost, even while those in Leith were very scarce of victuals, and those on Inchkeith would have perished, had not they by policy got a ship with victuals, and some munition. Yet in the end peace was concluded....

[Sidenote: The English Army is withdrawn, with Honours.]

Peace proclaimed, immediate provision was made for transporting the French to France. The most part were put into the English ships, and these also carried with them the whole spoil of Leith. That was the second benefit which Leith received from their late promised liberty; the end is not yet come. The English army by land departed on the sixteenth day of July, in the year of God 1560. The most part of our Protestant nobility, honorably convoyed them, and in very deed they had well deserved this honour. The Lord James would not leave the Lord Grey and the other noblemen of England, until they had entered Berwick. After that, the Council began to look upon the affairs of the commonwealth, as well as upon the matters that might concern the stability of religion....

[Sidenote: Public Thanksgiving in St. Giles's Kirk.]

A day was appointed, when the whole nobility and the greatest part of the Congregation assembled in St. Giles's Kirk in Edinburgh, and there, after the sermon made for that purpose, public thanks was given unto God for His merciful deliverance, in form as follows:--

"O Eternal and Everlasting God, Father of our Lord Jesus Christ, who hast not only commanded us to pray, and promised to hear us, but also dost will us to magnify Thy mercies, and to glorify Thy name when Thou showest Thyself pitiful and favourable unto us, especially when Thou deliverest us from desperate dangers, ... we ought not to forget, nor can we, in what miserable estate stood this poor country, and we the just inhabitants thereof, not many days past.... Out of these miseries, O Lord, neither our wit, policy, nor strength could deliver us; yea, they did show unto us how vain is the help of man, where Thy blessing gives not victory. In these our anguishes, O Lord, we made suit unto Thee, we cried for Thy help, and we proclaimed Thy name, as Thy troubled flock persecuted for Thy truth's sake. Mercifully hast Thou heard us.... And Thou hast looked upon us as pitifully as if we had given unto Thee most perfect obedience, for Thou hast disappointed the counsels of the crafty, Thou hast bridled the rage of the cruel, and Thou hast of Thy mercy set this our perishing realm at reasonable liberty. Oh, give us hearts--Thou Lord, that only givest all good gifts--with reverence and fear, to meditate upon Thy wondrous works lately wrought before our eyes....

"We beseech Thee, therefore, O Father of mercies, that, as of Thy undeserved grace Thou hast partly removed our darkness, suppressed idolatry, and taken from above our heads the devouring sword of merciless strangers, it would so please Thee to proceed with us in this Thy grace begun. Albeit that in us there is nothing that may move Thy Majesty to show us Thy favour, O yet for the sake of Christ Jesus, Thy only well-beloved Son, whose name we bear, and whose doctrine we profess, we beseech Thee never to suffer us to forsake or deny this Thy truth which now we profess.... And seeing that nothing is more odious in Thy presence, O Lord, than is ingratitude and violation of an oath and covenant made in Thy name; and seeing that Thou hast made our confederates of England the instruments by whom we are now set at liberty, and that to them we, in Thy name, have promised mutual faith again, let us never fall to that unkindness, O Lord, that either we shall declare ourselves unthankful unto them, or profaners of Thy holy name. Confound the counsels of them that go about to break that most godly league contracted in Thy name, and retain Thou us so firmly together by the power of Thy Holy Spirit, that Satan shall never have power to set us again at variance or discord. Give us Thy grace to live in that Christian charity which Thy Son, our Lord Jesus, has so earnestly commanded to all members of His body; that other nations, provoked by our example, may set aside all ungodly war, contention, and strife, and study to live in tranquillity and peace, as it becomes the sheep of Thy pasture, and the people that daily look for final deliverance by the coming again of our Lord Jesus; to whom with Thee, and the Holy Spirit, be all honour, glory, and praise, now and ever. Amen."

[Sidenote: Preachers and Superintendents are appointed.]

After this, the Commissioners of Burghs, with some of the nobility and barons, were appointed to see to the equal distribution of ministers, and to change and transpose as the majority should think expedient. Thus John Knox was appointed to Edinburgh; Christopher Goodman, who during the most part of the troubles had remained in Ayr, was appointed to St. Andrews; Adam Heriot to Aberdeen; Master John Row to Perth; Paul Methven, of whom no infamy was then known, to Jedburgh; William Christison to Dundee; David Ferguson to Dunfermline; and Master David Lindsay to Leith. There were nominated as superintendents Master John Spottiswood for Lothian; Master John Winram for Fife; Master John Willock for Glasgow; the Laird of Dun for Angus and Mearns; and Master John Carswell for Argyll and the Isles. It was agreed that these should be elected upon certain days fixed, unless the districts to which they were to be appointed could in the meantime find out men more able and sufficient, or else show such causes as might inable[166] them for that dignity.

[166] Disqualify.

[Sidenote: The first Protestant Parliament.]