Anne of Argyle; or, Cavalier and Covenant

Chapter I

" Child Rowland to the dark tower came." King Lear. At morning service on the second last Sunday of June, in the year 1650, an unusually large audience had assembled in Glasgow Cathedral. Not that any irregularity was wont at that period to be noticed in the ordinary weekly attendance of douce Glasgow citizens at church. All persons, indeed, not incapacitated by age or infirmity, were under the necessity of appear ing each Sunday without, fail in their respective places there on pain of summons and fine by the kirk-session. But on this particular occasion it had been spread abroad that the discourse was to be preached by Dr. Zachary Boyd, the B reverend and redoubted minister of the uni versity in the town, and as it was known that he had just returned from the Convention of the General Assembly then sitting in Edinburgh, it was expected that he would have a word to say and pregnant news to dispense regarding the movement on foot for bringing the young Prince Charles to the throne of Scotland.

For the ministers of those days, as is well known, were not only the spiritual admonishers and guides of the people, but in convocation assembled, as the most formidable estate of the realm, were the wielders of political power as well, and might therefore be looked upon as the most general, though not perhaps always the most trustworthy, sources of political infor mation. On this Sunday of June, therefore, in the year 1650, the people, attracted more, it is to be feared, by the prospect of hearing news than of profiting by spiritual exhortations, had gathered in from many outlying parishes to hear the discourse of the reverend doctor ; and the incomers, adding their numbers to the assembly of regular attenders at the place, filled the cathedral church to overflowing. Stirring news was expected, and the staunch Presbyterian burgesses were all anxiety to learn the safeguards which, in case of the Prince's coming to the throne, were likely to be taken to secure the permanence and domination of their own particular form of worship.

Among these burgesses, however, were not a few who, while for prudential reasons con forming outwardly with the views and proceed ings of their Presbyterian neighbours, were none the less anxious for tidings which should bring hope of some relaxation in the straitlaced order of things of late so rigidly enforced. By these it was expected that the assumption of power by another King Charles would bring with it some release from the necessity of obey ing the strict rules of conformity laid down by the Assembly of divines ; and their hope was therefore for news of the Prince's arrival. For already that Presbyterian party which had signed the Solemn League and Covenant as a declaration of freedom of conscience and a protest against religious oppression, had proved itself when in possession of power as rigid and intolerant as its prelatic predecessors.

But whatever these dissenters in the cathedral congregation might think and desire, they took good care to make no display of their difference of opinion. In outward appearance they were as dismally garbed and as strictly conforming in every respect as their more sincere if less genial neighbours. The terrible fate of the great Marquis of Montrose and his friends was too recent for the most enthusiastic well-wisher of the Cavaliers to make more than an inward protest against the sombre form of dress and worship to which the lieges were compelled. It was therefore with no small amount of astonish ment that, when the church had all but filled, there was observed to enter and seat himself before one of the great stone pillars, in full view of the congregation and of the pulpit, a young man in the unmistakable dress of the aristocratic party.

The sanctity of the place and the strictness of principle of those assembled did not prevent a whisper going round the congregation upon the appearance of this person ; and while stolid Presbyterian elders were seen to frown heavily, and to cast threatening looks in his direction — being doubtless inclined to regard his presence just then as an omen of the possible advent to power again of the " Malignants," as the Cava liers were called, there were not wanting secret glances of admiration from under the snood of many a burgess's fair daughter. It was not that the colour of the stranger's dress marked him out for observation. This was as dark and as sad-toned as the dress of those about him. It might, indeed, have been taken for the garb of one in mourning for some near relative. Nor did his face, though he could scarcely be more than twenty years of age, wear the bright expression or the glow of health which usually, from their outdoor habits of life, bespoke the youth of the King's party, and which might have been supposed an attraction to maiden eyes.

His features were pale, not to say careworn, and in his look there was to be detected a mournful, weary expression strange in one so young. His dress, however, was of the unmistakable cut of the Cavaliers, and his gloves, and, when he drew these off, the rings which sparkled on his fingers, with, above all, the long chestnut hair flowing down upon his shoulders — vanities, every one, abhorred by the ascetic party in power — bespoke him nothing less than a Royalist and a Malignant of the most aristocratic type. Meanwhile the stranger appeared to be as unconscious of the dark looks with which he was favoured by: the elders of the congregation as he was of the attention bestowed upon him by their less politically-minded wives and daughters. Entirely indifferent, evidently, to the good or ill-will of the individuals with whom he found himself rubbing shoulders, he appeared to scan the congregation far and near as if in search of some one or something, and, apparently not having succeeded in his search, his features resumed their expression of abstracted melancholy.

Presently, however, the speculations of the congregation were recalled to a more legitimate channel by the entrance of the minister. Clad in the full black gown affected by the followers of the doctrines and church discipline of Geneva, and preceded by the bedellus with Bible and Psalter, he ascended the few steps, and took his place in the pulpit. A man, one would have guessed, somewhat past middle age, there was about his eyes and mouth an expression of concentrated purpose well befitting the character of one of those churchmen of the time, whose ambition, like that of Israel's prophets of old, was as much to rule the nation as to teach the faith. Dr. Zachary Boyd was one of those ministers of whom Scotland then bore so plentiful a crop, who hesitated neither to use their pulpits nor ANNE OF ARGYLL. 7 the words of Holy Writ itself for the furtherance of their views of statecraft.

This tendency very shortly became evident when his eyes had detected the representative of too obviously Malignant opinions who had ventured to intrude himself within the church. The garb of the stranger in such a place, and particularly at such a crisis in political affairs, was indeed exactly the thing most likely to call forth the reverend doctor's peculiar powers of hortatory rhetoric. He was like the war-horse that has scented battle, and whatever the original purport of the service may have been, there could be no doubt that it was now inspired by very definite political feelings. The psalms given out to be sung by the congregation assumed a singularly warlike and uncompromising com plexion, being chiefly such as besought the aid of Heaven against the proud and " such as do lying vanities regard ; " while in the prayers a sufficiently definite abhorrence was expressed of alliance with those who openly bow the knee to Baal.

But it was when the discourse itself was reached that the particular turn of the worthy doctor's sentiments became most conspicuous. His text was chosen from that place in Scripture where the Israelites call aloud to Samuel, " Nay, but we will have a king to reign over us." A parallel far too obvious to be missed lay here, of course, between the prophets who had success fully governed the chosen nation before the cry for a king, and the ministers of the Kirk in Scotland whose voice had of late been all powerful in the management of State affairs. Details were not wanting of the success which had attended the warfare of these ministers against the enemies of Israel — that is, against the enemies of the Presbyterian form of Church government ; and for proof of the heaven-sent nature of the clerical authority, had not the Lord but lately delivered into their hands that chief Malignant and troubler of the people, that Philistine of the Philistines, James Graham, called the Marquis of Montrose ?

At this allusion to the capture and execution, scarcely yet a month ago, of the Great Marquis, arch-enemy as he had been to the Presbyterians, a visible stir of awakened excitement passed over the whole congregation. As for the young Cavalier stranger, his originally almost pallid face suddenly flushed crimson, his eyes flashed fiercely upon the speaker, and he half rose from his seat. But, mastering himself, though evi dently with a strong effort, he let himself sink back into his place, and his features became, if anything, paler than before. AVithout appearing to notice this gesture, however, or the involuntary exclamation which accompanied it, the preacher went on. The hearts of the people, he said, hankered after a king. Already they had forgotten how the Lord had led them by His prophets to triumph over their enemies.

Already they had forgotten the tale of bricks, and how they had been led out of the Egypt of a Popish bondage ; how before now they had groaned under the oppres sion of princes of this earth, till the Lord de livered them by the sword of the godly. But their eyes were blinded that they should not see, and their ears were stopped that they should not hear ; and now, when Philistines of the south, the men of Cromwell, pressed sore upon them, they had lifted up their voice again and cried aloud for the anointing of a king. A king, therefore, in their high places they should once more have, to be a scourge of their sins — a king of the royal house. But first that king must throw down the strange altars of his fathers, and become a partaker of the circum cision with the elect ; and woe to him if he returned to the sins of his fathers !

After this fashion the preacher made it known to the worthy burgesses of Glasgow that Charles II. was to be allowed to assume the throne of his ancestors in Scotland, but only under such agreements and limitations as should make him a king in name rather than reality, and should leave the actual power as before in the hands of the Presbyterian leaders. This, in fact, was the policy formulated by the party at whose head was the crafty and diplomatic Marquis of Argyle. By this means they thought to secure the domi nation of the Presbyterian form of Church government, both against the Episcopal leanings of the royal house and the inroads of the English Independents. In this mind, accordingly, they insisted upon the King's putting apart from himself all such as were known or supposed to hold " Malignant " opinions ; and hence the denunciation with which the Reverend Zachary Boyd proceeded to wind up his sermon that June afternoon against Malignants of all types generally, and the Royalist Cavaliers in particular.

Though a king should once more be anointed over the elect, none must be left to bow the knee in the house of Rimmon ; all toleration of Malignancy was but a joining of hands with the Delilah who should betray Israel. Wherefore it behoved the nation to gird up its loins and make diligent search, and in whatsoever high places the Agagites be found, let them be plucked thence, and, if need be, as the prophet of old hewed in pieces the false prophets of Baal, even so let these be hewed in pieces, and their flesh given to the fowls of the air. At this last denunciation, given with all the thunder and fire of one who had the behests of Heaven to enforce, the listeners seemed to per ceive another allusion to the recent fate of Montrose, and a perceptible murmur of ac quiescence overran the congregation.

But the service was over, and after a somewhat long winded benediction the crowd began to stream out through the kirkyard, which then, as now, surrounded the cathedral. With his velvet bonnet pulled low over his face, leaving nothing to give a clue to his thoughts of the moment but the pallor of his lower features and the tight compression of his lips, which his slight moustache was not yet heavy enough to conceal, the youthful stranger pro ceeded rapidly towards the street. He was not, however, permitted to escape thus without attention. The soberer part of the late audience, indeed, despite the inspiring eloquence of the sermon they had just heard, would have let him pass with no further molestation than an audible observation or so upon the sin of vain show, and the wrath awaiting those who turn not their feet from the paths of the ungodly.

But the danger of figurative eloquence in a public place is that it is likely to be understood literally by a certain part of its hearers. In the present instance this is exactly what had happened. So it came about that the young stranger had scarcely passed the gateway of the church when he was accosted by a fellow worshipper. The assailant was one of those rack-brains familiar enough in every community, possessing just sufficient method in their madness to be able to make some sort of living for themselves, while smiled at compassionately by those around them as " half-naturals." The stranger, however, could not be supposed to know all this, and when he suddenly found some one step in his way, and, with solemn remark about " vainglory in the courts of Zion," stretch out a hand as if to snatch the white ostrich feather from his cap, the most natural thing in the world was that he should throw up an arm ■3 to defend himself.

But Willie Shaw, for so the lack-wit was called, had been ill-advised enough to bring his physiognomy closer than necessary to the scene of action, and the wrist of his opponent, in the sudden gesture of protection, unluckily caught him on the edge of his most prominent feature, which promptly spouted forth a shower of blood. There is but a step between the fool and the fanatic. In this case the sight of blood was enough to raise the cry that the Malignant had struck and wounded the " puir nat'ral," and in a moment there was as much hubbub in the cathedral precincts as if some one had been slain. The first man to offer violence to the stranger was a red-haired, yellow-eyed fellow who, rushing forward with clubbed stick, let drive a blow which must inevitably have at least stunned its victim, had the energy with which it was wielded not first taken effect in the small of a worthy burgess's back, who in the sudden rush to the spot had been thrust rather nearer than he wished to the scene of fracas.

With a roar of mingled pain and terror this worthy dropped to the ground, and shouted that he was slain. Others, however, pressed forward, and though the stranger, seeing the bodily clanger he was in, swept out his sword and set his back against the stone pillar of the gateway, things might have gone hardly enough with him. But the commotion on the highway side, and the roar of the good man who had so unexpectedly suffered in the small of the back, with the shouts of " Down with the Malignant ! " which now began to rise, had already attracted the attention of the town-guard, by no means un used to such emergencies. Several of this force accordingly came suddenly upon the scene from the castle-yard at hand, and as the crowd scattered to the right and left before them, and the young Cavalier was the only person discovered in a suspicious attitude, sword in hand, they did what is frequently done in such emergencies — valiantly arrested the unoffending party, and carried him off to the lock-up.

Explanation, in the circumstances, the stranger saw was useless, and perceiving, after a glance at their weapons, that resistance to the armed emissaries of the law could not but be disastrous, he suffered himself to be conducted across the somewhat dilapidated drawbridge of what had once been the palace-castle of the Bishops of Glasgow. Once within the courtyard, however, a sudden recollection seemed to strike the prisoner. He stopped, and seemed disposed to dispute his incarceration. But his escort had no intention of permitting this, and he had only time to cast a hasty glance at the general surroundings of the place, when he was thrust through a low doorway and found himself a prisoner in the basement chamber of Bishop Cameron's Tower. Remonstrances were in vain, and the only information vouchsafed to his inquiries was that the time being sabbath, and the magistrates of the city engaged in the observance of the Lord's day, he must needs wait till the morrow to have his case examined by the worshipful Bailie Lightbody.

Meanwhile, the prisoner was fain to consider it a fortunate thing for himself, as well as for the Royalist prospects altogether just then, that these rough-handed watchmen did not consider it part of their duty to inquire into his personal effects. As it was, the donation of a gold Carolus or two sent the fellows off satisfied that they had acquitted themselves sufficiently in the discharge of their duty, and procured for the prisoner presently, notwithstanding the scruples as to observance of the Lord's day, a flask of fair claret and a plateful of fresh-made girdle-scones.

Chapter II

" I ha'e layen three herring a-saut ; Bonnie lass, gin ye'll tak' me, tell me now ; And I ha'e hrew'n three pickles o' mant, And I canna cnm ilka day to woo." Old Song. One of the most marked characteristics of the strict Presbyterians of the time of which we write was their stern observance of the sabbath. It was not that the people were in any way insincere in what they did ; the fault, if it was one, lay in the logical seriousness with which they carried out a particular form of doctrine. Tinctured with that gloomier Calvinism which insisted on regarding God's fair earth as but " a desert drear," and bent apparently upon earning a future life by making the present one as miserable as possible, they carried out the letter of the Mosaic law to its extremest limit. Not only did they refrain from touching any work whatever, even of the most necessary sort, on Sunday, but they scarcely dared to speak.

When they did open their lips it was to discuss such cheerful subjects as the doctrine of election or of original sin, and if a child, in the innocence of its heart, was heard so much as to laugh it was instantly promised condign punishment on the morrow, and threatened with the terrors of " the bottomless pit." During the hours of kirk service the streets were scoured by a vigilance committee,* and any delinquent found straying from the ordinances was attached for fine and admonition by the session. During the re mainder of the day the heads of families in their dwellings, from which the sunshine was carefully darkened out, employed the time to edification by catechising the members of their households. To venture abroad for a breath of air in the evening was an undreamed-of desecration, and the only sound to be heard then in the streets was the swell and cadence of a psalm tune here and there from some dwelling where the family was engaged at its devotions. * The officers of this committee were called Com purgators, and were appointed by the magistrates.

Their function came to a sudden end about the middle of last century. A gentleman then arrested by one of them on Glasgow Green took the magistrates to law, when it was decided that they had no right to exercise authority in that way. C A most unusual circumstance, therefore, it was when the clatter of a horse's hoofs on this Sunday evening was heard coming up the Bell o' the Brae, as the upper part of High Street was called, and a loud rattle at his door startled the landlord of the Zion Inn. This worthy and his fortunes had shared the vicissitudes of the times. In the years before the troubles of the late King Charles, this inn had borne the name of the Bishop's Arms, and, as the best-appointed house of entertainment in town, had done a roaring business with the free living Cavaliers who frequented the castle, and who passed to and fro on affairs with the Royalist gentlemen of the west.

But with the Civil War and the ascendancy of the ecclesiastical party the fortunes of the house had suffered change. Since the defeat of Montrose at Philip haugh, and the death of the King, all the free handed gentlemen of the royal faction had either fled abroad or lay crippled at home under fines of the Parliament. Custom had dwindled, and mine host beheld the cobwebs grow rather thicker than he had intended on his hogsheads of ripe Burgundy and Canary. It was in vain that he had changed the name of the house. The thin-blooded followers of Argyle, he declared, wanted no mellow vintage to help them in their psalm-singing. And so, grown cadaverous where he used to be plump, and with the ruddy bloom which used to tinge his cheeks transferred to the tip of his nose, poor Spigott had fallen to a somewhat peevish humour, and more frequently than formerly, in absence of other patrons, had taken to consoling himself with the contents of his own cellar, for the departure of the " good old days."

Such, indeed, if the truth must be told, was his occupation now when he was startled by the " birl " of an unceremonious riding-whip on his door. " Wha the deevd — ahem ! I should say," he exclaimed, " What son of the Gentiles can this be ? " Amd setting down the tankard he was in the act of raising to his lips, he proceeded, with steps not altogether of the steadiest, down the low passage which led to the street. " Wha are ye," he added, before undoing the door, " that comes here on the Lord's day disturbing honest folk at their devotions ? " " Open the door to Neil Guthrie ; send a boy round for my horse ; and damn your devotions ! " " Wi' the greatest pleisure i' the world," returned Boniface, with a sudden access of energy ; and undoing the door and issuing out, he added in an accent of surprise, " Neil Guthrie !

Eh, man, little did I think to see you again at the auld Bishop's Airms ! They said ye had been killt i' the wars o' Montrose." " Killed or alive, I'm at your door again, ye see. And if that boy o' yours wad only come to look to my nag, I'd let ye perceive presently that I can strip a mutton -rib and drink a stoup yet, wars or no wars." " I maun e'en be stable-lad mysel'," returned the landlord, a trifle ruefully. " The Bishop's Airms, or I should say the Zion Inn, has fa'en on ill days. But step up to the parlour, an' help thysel' to what's there. His sister's guid son shall ne'er pay lawin' in Sandy Spigott's house. I'll see to yer nag." Ten minutes later the landlord hastened to rejoin his guest. The latter, a sandy-haired, muscular young fellow of twenty-seven or so, had apparently proceeded without delay to make himself at home.

On the table already stood a bountiful providing of cheese and bread, and a large quaich or drinking-cup newly emptied, while from the kitchen at hand could be heard the fizzling of meat being "brandered" over the fire. Whatever his vicissitudes since last visiting his good-uncle's house, it was evident that the new-comer had not forgotten how to forage for himself. ' Weel, lad," cried the old man, wiping the harness oil from his hands with a wisp of hay, " what's come o' ye for the last five years ? What's yer news ? An' what brings ye now to this end o' the country ? I wad ask ye to drink, but I see ye've fended that for yersel'." " For the last five years I've been on the continent o' Holland," replied the young man. " My news is that Prince Charles — that is, King Charles the Second, is landed in Moray ; and my errand in the toun o' Glasgow this clay is — business o' my ain.

As for the empty quaich, if ye are anxious to drink the King's health never let that stand i' the way." " The King's health ! " cried the other, with sudden enthusiasm. " God bless him ! that we will, and i' the best liquor o' the house. The King in Scotland ! That's news to hear ! The King in Scotland ! " And proceeding to a closet at hand he brought forth a flask covered with valuable dust. " His Majesty's health ! God bless him ! " The toast was drunk more than once, with this difference of effect, that whereas the landlord did nothing but drink, and so became by degrees more enthusiastic and less steady of hand and speech, the younger man merely used the liquor to wash down the more substantial parts of his meal, and was no whit affected. In this proceeding Guthrie made his refreshment serve more than one purpose.

Taken with food in its legitimate way the wine could only render his own supper more generous, while the encouragement of drink served admirably to loosen the wits and open the secrets of his companion. " A quiet town ye seem to keep here now of a Sunday night," he exclaimed by the way presently, as he set down his bicker ; " not a wench to touch the cap to from the Drygate port to the door of the Bishop's Arms ! " " Soho ! that's the airt o' the wind, is it ? " said the landlord, leaning back in his chair with a look of tipsy surmise. " They said it was the flichtiness o' a lassie sent ye awa' wi' Montrose when he plundered the Glesca bailies ester Kilsyth.* Like enough it's the thocht o' a lassie that brings ye back to the Tounheid now." * Upon the victory of Montrose over General Baillie at Kilsyth, the magistrates of Glasgow, taking the bull by The sturdy man-at-arms looked up with a defiant laugh, which was no more than half successful.

" I left St. Mungo's five years syne," he said, " to see the world and seek my fortune under a gallant leader when I had the chance. As for the lasses, ye may know that where I ha'e been there were steps as light and faces as sweet as any i' the Townhead o' Glasgow. Besides, Bessie Frew, for it's her, doubtless, ye hint at, was married, I suppose, soon ester I bade her fareweel." " Na, lad, na ; ye're wrang there. The lassie's for the seekin' yet. No' but what there ha'e been stout, callants speirin' at her, but she has said Nay to them a. It's as weel, though, that yer thochts ar'na in her direction, for Andra Frew's keeper o' the toun prison now, and for a follower o' Montrose like yersel' to step through that gate ester Bessie wad be to set his craig i' the hangman's collar." the horns, invited the Marqnis to town.

A plague was then raging in the city, and Montrose remained there only one night. In the morning before leaving he demanded and received from his hosts for the purposes of the King a sum of £50,000. His opponent Lesley, coming afterwards, took from the magistrates £20,000, merely the interest, he said, of the .sum they had given Montrose. " Ye forget, my worthy uncle," said Guthrie, ' that the King's landed i' the north." "The King may be landed," answered Spigott, with a wag of the head, " but he's no' at the lug o' the law yet. It was but this morning that a braw young gentleman — his like hasna darkened this door for months — left his beast here, and, for a' I could say, went in his plumes and ruffles to kirk, and the sermon wasna five meenutes endit when they clapt him under Andra's lock and key."

" A Cavalier gentleman ! " exclaimed Guthrie, with sudden attention. " What might his name be ? " " Names ar'na just the first things mentioned i' these fine hing and quarter days. Every body's no' a hair-brained Neil Guthrie that comes bawlin' his title to be made immortal by the hangman at ilka inn door, and the young gentleman, for a' his beardless face, had seen something o' the warld's ways ere this, I warrant, for there was a sword-cut dimple on his chin when he spoke. That's no' to say, though, but what ye're safe enough in Sandy Spigott's house, so bide where ye are. I'll let ye see anither flask o' the best presently, and ye'U let's hear yer news. When did the King land ? How did ye escape when Lesley's men made flags and popinjays o' their prisoners ester Philiphaugh ? " * "I'll tell ye that when I come back," said Guthrie, rising and brushing the last crumbs of oatcake from his moustache with one hand, whUe with the other he took up from the table the light sword he had laid there on sitting down to eat.