part which the Earl of Bothwell and Lord John had in this matter was probably taken out of spite to the Earl of Arran, between whom and Bothwell there was at this time a violent feud. On the other hand, it may, without any great breach of charity, be supposed, that this disturbance was noticed by the Assembly, not so much from its enormity, as from the opportunity thus afforded to the Reformers of pronouncing a public censure upon the dissolute manners of the court. Tea. Tea, dulcis conjux, tea solo in littore secum, Tea veniente die, tea decedente canebat. My muse, if in my greatest need Hail, noble plant! the very name Let other bards, wi' rhyming clink, Wi' double glare, 'Tis thine a peaceful mirth to gi'e, My skull when twinging headaches tear, Virg. G. 4, 465. racters, and canvass their merits and faults; it becomes, in some measure, the duty of every man, who values the privileges which they purchased with their blood,-by stating those facts, and publishing those parts of their history which he may have collected, or with which he may be acquainted, to enable at least the unprejudiced to form a fair, candid, and unbiassed judgment. To redeem their names from undeserved reproach, and to propagate whatever is meritorious and worthy of imitation in their character and conduct, are almost the only tribute we can pay to their memories; and though few may have talents to defend them with the same ability with which they have been ridiculed, yet truth, as it is exhibited in the simple and candid statement of facts, must eventually prevail over misrepresentation, clothed though it may be in all the fascinating beauties of elegant composition, and accompanied by masterly delineation of character, poetical description, and romantic adventure. Such views produced the interesting works of "Ringan Gilhaize" and "Memoirs of Mr Blackadder," and similar motives have induced the compiler of the following narrative to lay it before the public, through the medium of this journal. The facts are given with little variation or embellishment, as they have often been related to him by a kinsman, now on the verge of the grave,-and contain an account of a man, who, in more quiet times, would have lived in peace and died in obscurity, but who, in the circumstances in which he was placed, did no discredit to the cause in which he was embarked, either by his life or his death. His resistance and sufferings are still cherished in grateful remembrance by the inhabitants of the district to which he belonged, and his grave is pointed out as the bed of a hero, whose memory ought to live in the hearts of every succeeding generation. About the beginning of autumn, in the year after the memorable de feat at Pentland, as Nathan Cowan, the ferryman at Cunningholm, sat at the door of his hut repairing a net, he was thrown into a state of considerable alarm by the appearance of a regiment of dragoons. One of them, at the command of his officer, left the ranks, and inquired the way and the distance to Lag Tower. "It's about three miles," answered Nathan," and the road gangs straight by the neuk o' that hill." At a time when the whole island was under martial law, and troops of military were scouring the country in all directions, this might have created little surprise, even to the inhabitant of a remote and lonely cabin; but Nathan had never before seen so many horsemen together, and from past experience, he conjectured that it boded no cessation of suffering to his persecuted countrymen. A quarter of an hour's ride brought the dragoons to the summit of the rising ground which bounds the vale of Nith, and they began to descend one of the declivities which forms the narrow valley called the "Glen of the Lag." "A barren country," said Colonel Strachan, the commanding-officer, casting his eyes on each side of the bleak hills, tenanted only by a few sheep, to Lieutenant Livingston, as they traced the narrow windings of the glen. "A wild country," replied Livingston, "and but thinly peopled, I should suppose. Sir Robert is likely to give us little to do in the neighbourhood of his own house at least.' "A man of Sir Robert Grierson's activity and zeal," said Colonel Strachan," will neither remain long idle himself, nor suffer those under his directions to go without employment." As they approached the house, or, as it was more commonly called, the Tower, the valley widened, and the land had a more cultivated aspect; while several waving fields of corn proved, that, amid all the troubles and confusion of the times, husbandry had not been entirely neglected. The Tower itself was a square building of great strength, but without architectural beauty, situated on a small mount near the middle of the glen. It had been surrounded by a moat; but, as it was now dry, there was access to it on all sides. The principal entrance, however, was by a bridge, which had once been defended by two small towers. Sir Robert Grierson of Lag had descried the soldiers as they came up the glen, and, on their nearer approach, recognised their leader: he therefore came out to meet them, just as the foremost had reached the bridge, and the officers had given orders to halt. He was a stout man, somewhat above the middle size, and about sixty years of age. His countenance was rather handsome than otherwise, but had that particular expression, which, though not absolutely forbidding, would have prevented you from chusing its possessor either as a companion or a friend. It was not devoid of meaning: his brows always knit, and his lips compressed, bespoke a mind firm to execute whatever purpose it undertook; but they also shewed that he was a stranger to all the tender sensibilities of human nature, His eye never gleamed with the workings of anger, or the fulness of joy. If he never stormed or raged with wrathful fury, his features as seldom relaxed into a smile, or beamed with delight. In the bloody work of persecution, in which he was so actively and extensively engaged, his countenance never exhibited a mind melted to pity at the agonies of suffering, or visited by fear in situations of danger. Reproaches he commonly answered by a hollow, diabolical laugh, and curses he heard with the most supreme indifference. In chusing his part in the tragical drama, he had been instigated, partly by a bigotted attachment to prelatic faith, partly by inordinate cupidity. The party which he favoured were in power, and were exerting themselves to establish the religion which he professed; and when he found that, by seconding their exertions, he could serve the interests of both, and best preserve his wealth and property from exaction and dilapidation, he embraced the cause with a willingness, and supported it with a constancy that nothing could shake. It has also been alleged, that his zeal was from time to time kept alive by valuable presents, and by being allowed to appropriate pretty large sums from those fines which were exacted from the non-conformists. The eagerness with which he pursued sensual gratification, in private life, proves that his mind was the seat of other passions equally fierce with those arising from bigotry and avarice. "You are welcome to Lag Tower," said he, as he shook Colonel Strachan by the hand. The colonel thanked him with the frankness of a soldier, and instantly explained the cause of his present intrusion with so numerous a retinue. "Our worthy Councillors and Commissioners," said he, “instigated by that most reverend and tender-hearted father in God, the Archbishop, are incensed that these obstinate wretches should reject the lenity of the Act of Indulgence, and have dispatched me with these fellows to assist you, and all the friends of the good cause, to teach them obedience, by a little wholesome coercion, or convey them to Edinburgh, to be placed before their Lordships' most impartial tribunal. But," continued he, delivering a small packet to Sir Robert, 66 on all these matters you will, I presume, find ample instructions in these papers. In the meantime, you can probably direct these men to good quarters." All the accommodation to be spared in the Tower had already been occupied by a party of Dundee's troopers, and, at any rate, would have been quite inadequate; but Sir Robert ordered his own servants, and those of the troopers who knew the country, to conduct the men to such places as he knew could accommodate them. He then led the way to Colonel Strachan and the other superior officers into his own house, and having ordered them to be served with refreshments, begged leave to be permitted to retire, in order to peruse his despatches. Among these was a letter from no less a personage than the Primate himself, which that hypocritical apostate had written with all the fervency and zeal of a man who knew that his all depended on upholding the system of proceedings which he had been so instrumental in bringing about and fomenting. He began by lamenting, that, notwithstanding all the measures, both lenient and coercive, which had hitherto been employed, Episcopacy, the only true religion, might be considered as being still far from established; that the people displayed an obstinacy in resisting the truth, which nothing but the most violent remedies could cure; and these were rendered tenfold more necessary, on account of the resistance which had lately been made to the civil and military power. "The southern and western shires,' he said, "had, by their whole, and especially by their late conduct, shewn themselves to be particularly contumacious; it was therefore necessary to proceed against them with the utmost rigour. No partialities or motives of private interest ought to divert the friends of prelacy and loyalty from the speedy suppression of obdurate resistance and rebellion. The Presbyterians, by their rejection of the Indulgence, had plainly proved that they were alike incapable of appreciating the clemency of their rulers, or of consulting their own spiritual and temporal interests; their convictions must therefore be awakened, and their contumacy subdued, by increasing severity. Sir Robert Grierson," he continued, "had hitherto exerted himself with the most commendable zeal, and would doubtless continue to do so with unswerving constancy. His Majesty's Council for Scotland," added he in conclusion, “entertain a grateful sense of your exertions and assiduity, and, most assuredly, will not suffer them to go unrewarded." From the tenor of this epistle, Sir Robert saw that the conduct expected of him was to proceed with re doubled vigour in the path which he had already chosen. This squared so exactly with his own views and inclinations, that his resolutions were instantly formed; he therefore returned to his guests, to do them the honours of his house. Next morning the troops were dispersed throughout the country, whereever it was thought they could be most effective. A considerable number of them, with their colonel, remained in Nithsdale, to assist Sir Robert in subordinating the inhabitants of that district. With a party of these, he proceeded first to the house of Daniel M'Millan, one of the most respectable of his own tenants. This man, though he had been engaged in none of the late tumultuary proceedings, was nevertheless exceedingly obnoxious to the Prelatists, on account of his firm at tachment to the religion of his fathers. He had been severely fined, but that had only served to confirm him the more in his Presbyterian principles. During the early part of his life, he had been for many years a servant at the Tower, under Sir Robert's father, and, in some measure, a companion of the boyhood, and an attendant on the juvenile sports of Sir Robert himself. He therefore often used a freedom of speech toward his landlord which none of his other tenants or dependants dared to venture. He had never presumed to reproach him with his conduct toward his innocent countrymen, but when, about the time that the fine was exacted, Sir Robert had warned him of the consequences, perhaps fatal, which, what he called, his obstinacy might draw on his head, Daniel boldly replied, that he would never subscribe to a system of religious faith which needed the cruel arguments of arbitrary power and penal laws to enforce its observance. He might, he said, like many others, be hunted like a partridge on the mountains, and be compelled to hide his body in the dens and caverns of the earth; but his conscience was the peculiar property of his Heavenly Master, and could not be subjected to the dictates of human authority. Little as Sir Robert was accustomed to listen to the dictates of affection, or to be overawed by firmness, he found himself incapable of proceeding at once to extremities against a man whom he had always regarded with feelings of more than ordinary respect. These liberties were therefore, at that time, passed over unnoticed and unresented; but now, when superior authority seemed to encourage his cruelties, they returned to his recollection with a bitterness which determined him to proceed to the full extent of his commission. The regard which he was, as it were, compelled to entertain towards M'Millan, he had also considered as a weakness, which he was anxious to overcome; it was therefore with something like emotions of joy that, having disengaged himself from its thraldom, he entered the cottage, whose inmates had been thrown into a state of no small consternation, on beholding the approach of so many armed men. Only three of the family were present-M'Mil lan and his wife, who were standing in expectation of the entrance of the visitors, and James, their eldest son, an invalid, who lay stretched on a settle beside the fire. "Good morning, Daniel," said Sir Robert, speaking hastily, and without any other preface introducing the object of his visit. "Do you still continue obsti nate in refusing to acknowledge the King's supremacy, and to renounce the Covenant? Do you approve of the Act of Indulgence?" Daniel waited for a few moments, in an attitude of attention, as if expecting to hear something more; but at last inquired what were to be the consequences, and whither he was to go, in case he continued firm in his profession? "To prison," said Sir Robert. "Then, soldiers, do your duty," cried M'Millan, giving the orders for his own arrest. At the mention of the word prison, the anguish endured by M'Millan's wife deprived her even of the power of shedding tears. She had surveyed the whole scene with the painful interest of one who waits to hear something more awful than she dares almost to believe possible. At the approach of the soldiers to seize her husband, she fell on her knees to Sir Robert; but all power of entreaty was denied her, and with an agony, which arrested the attention and softened the hearts of the brutal soldiers themselves, she could only exclaim, "Oh, Sir !" and sunk senseless on the floor. The arrest of his father, and the distress of his mother, brought a hectic glow over the pallid countenance of James M'Millan, and exerting an energy, of which disease had deprived him for many a day, he raised her from the ground, and placed her on the settle. "Behold some of the consequences of your stubbornness," said Sir Robert to M'Millan, pointing to his almost lifeless wife and emaciated son. "I was prepared for the worst," replied he, with a voice in which sorrow and anger seemed to strive for the mastery. In a moment, however, he regained his firmness, and, as soon as his wife began to recover, signified that he was ready to accompany them. "But where is William?" inquired Sir Robert, after they were mounted; "my orders are, to spare neither old nor young; and although I will take upon me to suffer James to remain unmolested for the present, yet William must share the fate of his father, if he inherits any of his obstinacy." "Wherever he is," replied M'Millan, "I hope he will be enabled to keep out of the reach of the enemy, or, if he too does become a prey, that he will receive grace to endure tribulation like a Christian.” When they arrived at the Tower, M'Millan was conducted to a small dark apartment, which was to serve as a temporary place of confinement till he could be conveyed to Edinburgh. When left alone, the first act which he performed was to throw himself on his knees, and commend himself to his Heavenly Father. It was with something like a look of triumph that he surveyed the grated windows and uncomfortable appearance of his new abode, after he arose from these pious exercises. He felt that he had now to act another and a different part from that which he had hitherto performed, and that all his fortitude would be necessary, to enable him to conduct himself with becoming constancy. From the beginning, he had been no unconcerned spectator of the sufferings of his countrymen; and although, through the forbearance of his master, he had been less hardly dealt with than many others, yet he knew too well the character of that master, and the disposition of the Government, not to foresee that he might one day be called upon to suffer in the cause of truth. He had therefore all along considered proceedings like the present as extremely likely to take place; and, on this account, he displayed more firmness than in other circumstances he might have been able to command. What might now be his fate he was unable to conjecture; but the experience of others taught him to forebode the worst. Imaginary and real suffering, he began to feel, were totally different: still the goodness of the cause, a strong sense of duty, and perhaps other motives more nearly allied to human frailty, gilded his present woes and his future prospects with the vivid colouring of enthusiasm. In the train of reflections which fol |