Hunted and Harried

“And pray, who are you, that ye seem so anxious to catch the rebels?”

“Wha am I?” repeated Quentin with glaring eyes, and a sort of grasping of his strong fingers that suggested the idea of tearing some one to pieces. “Div ’ee no see that I’m a shepherd? The sufferin’s than I hae gaen through an’ endured on accoont o’ thae rebels is past— But c’way, sirs, they’ll escape us if we stand haverin’ here.”

So saying the bold man dashed down the stair and into the next house, followed by the town-guards, who did not know him. The prisoners’ guards were fortunately searching in another direction. A strict search was made in the next house, at which Quentin assisted. When they were yet in the thick of it he went quietly down-stairs and walked away from the scene, as he expressed it, “hotchin’”—by which he meant chuckling.

But poor Andrew Black and Will Wallace were not so fortunate. A search which was made in the outer churchyard resulted in their being discovered among the tombs, and they were forthwith conducted to the Tolbooth prison.

When Ramblin’ Peter, after many narrow escapes, reached the farm in Dumfries in a half-famished state, he sat down among the desolate ruins and howled with grief. Having thus relieved his feelings, he dried his eyes and proceeded in his usual sedate manner to examine things in detail. He soon found that his master had been wrong in supposing that the hidy-hole had been discovered or destroyed. As he approached the outer end of the tunnel a head suddenly appeared above ground, and as suddenly vanished.

“Hallo!” exclaimed Peter in surprise.

“Hallo!” echoed the head, and reappeared blazing with astonishment. “Is that you, Peter?”

“Ay, McCubine, that’s me. I thought ye was a’ deid. Hae ye ony parritch i’ the hole? I’m awfu’ hungry.”

“C’way in, lad: we’ve plenty to eat here, an guid company as weel—the Lord be thankit.”

The man led the way—familiar enough to Peter; and in the hidy-hole he found several persons, some of whom, from their costume, were evidently ministers. They paid little attention to the boy at first, being engaged in earnest conversation.

“No, no, Mr Cargill,” said one. “I cannot agree with you in the stern line of demarcation which you would draw between us. We are all the servants of the most high God, fighting for, suffering for, the truth as it is in Jesus. It is true that rather than bow to usurped power I chose to cast in my lot with the ejected; but having done that, and suffered the loss of all things temporal, I do not feel called on to pronounce such absolute condemnation on my brethren who have accepted the Indulgence. I know that many of them are as earnest followers of Christ as ourselves—it may be more so—but they think it right to bow before the storm rather than risk civil war; to accept what of toleration they can get, while they hope and pray for more.”

“In that case, Mr Welsh,” replied Cargill, “what comes of their testimony for the truth? Is not Christ King in his own household? Charles is king in the civil State. The oath which he requires of every minister who accepts the Indulgence distinctly recognises him—the king—as lord of the conscience, ruler of the spiritual kingdom of this land. To take such an oath is equivalent to acknowledging the justice of his pretensions.”

“They do not see it in that light,” returned Mr Welsh. “I agree with your views, and think our Indulged brethren in the wrong; but I counsel forbearance, and cannot agree with the idea that it is our duty to refuse all connection with them, and treat them as if they belonged to the ranks of the malignants. See what such opinions have cost us already in the overwhelming disaster at Bothwell Brig.”

“Overwhelming disaster counts for nothing in such a cause as this,” rejoined Cargill gravely. “The truth has been committed to us, and we are bound to be valiant for the truth—even to death. Is it not so, Mr Cameron?”

The young man to whom the old Covenanter turned was one of the most noted among the men who fought and died for the Covenant. An earnest godly young minister, he had just returned from Holland with the intention of taking up the standard which had been almost dropped in consequence of the hotter persecutions which immediately followed the battle of Bothwell Bridge.

“Of course you know that I agree with you, Mr Cargill. When you licensed me to preach the blessed Gospel, Mr Welsh, you encouraged me to independent thought. Under the guidance, I believe, of the Holy Spirit, I have been led to see the sinfulness of the Indulgence, and I am constrained to preach against it. Truly my chief concern is for the salvation of souls—the bringing of men and women and children to the Saviour; but after that, or rather along with that, to my mind, comes the condemnation of sin, whether public or private. Consider what the Indulgence and persecution together have done now. Have they not well-nigh stopped the field-preaching altogether, so that, with the exception of yourselves and Mr Thomas Douglas and a few others, there is no one left to testify? Part of my mission has been to go round among the ministers on this very point, but my efforts have been in vain as far as I have yet gone. It has been prophesied,” continued Cameron with a sad smile, “that I shall yet lose my head in this cause. That may well be, for there is that in my soul which will not let me stand still while my Master is dishonoured and sin is triumphant. As to the King, he may, so far as I know, be truly descended from the race of our kings, but he has so grievously departed from his duty to the people—by whose authority alone magistrates exist—and has so perjured himself, usurped authority in Church matters, and tyrannised in matters civil, that the people of Scotland do no longer owe him allegiance; and although I stand up for governments and governors, such as God’s Word and our covenants allow, I will surely—with all who choose to join me—disown Charles Stuart as a tyrant and a usurper.”

The discussion had continued so long that the ministers, as if by mutual consent, dropped it after this point, and turned to Ramblin’ Peter, who was appeasing his hunger with a huge “luggie o’ parritch.” But the poor boy had no heart to finish his meal on learning that Marion Clark and Isabel Scott—of whom he was very fond—had been captured by the soldiers and sent to Edinburgh. Indeed nothing would satisfy him but that he should return to the metropolis without delay and carry the bad news to his master.

That same night, when darkness rendered it safe, Cargill, Cameron, Welsh, and Douglas, with some of their followers, left Black’s place of concealment, and went off in different directions to risk, for a brief space, the shelter of a friendly cottage, where the neighbours would assemble to hear the outlawed ministers while one of them kept watch, or to fulfil their several engagements for the holding of conventicles among the secret places of the hills.

Chapter Ten.

Fiercer and Fiercer

After his escape, Quentin Dick, hearing of the recapture of his comrades, and knowing that he could not in any way help them, resolved to go back to Dumfries to make inquiries about the servant lassies Marion and Isabel, being ignorant of the fact that Ramblin’ Peter had been sent on the same errand before him.

Now, although the one was travelling to, and the other from, Edinburgh, they might easily have missed each other, as they travelled chiefly at night in order to escape observation. But, hearing on the way that the much-loved minister, Mr Welsh, was to preach in a certain locality, they both turned aside to hear him, and thus came together.

A price of 500 pounds sterling had been set on the head of Mr Welsh, and for twenty years he had been pursued by his foes, yet for that long period he succeeded in eluding his pursuers—even though the resolute and vindictive Claverhouse was among them,—and in continuing his work of preaching to the people. Though a meek and humble man, Welsh was cool, courageous, and self-possessed, with, apparently, a dash of humour in him—as was evidenced by his preaching on one occasion in the middle of the frozen Tweed, so that either he “might shun giving offence to both nations, or that two kingdoms might dispute his crime!”

The evening before the meeting at which Quentin and Peter unwittingly approached each other, Mr Welsh found himself at a loss where to spend the night, for the bloodhounds were already on his track. He boldly called at the house of a gentleman who was personally unknown to him, but who was known to be hostile to field-preachers in general, and to himself in particular. As a stranger Mr Welsh was kindly received. Probably in such dangerous times it was considered impolite to make inquiry as to names. At all events the record says that he remained unknown. In course of conversation his host referred to Welsh and the difficulty of getting hold of him.

“I am sent,” said Welsh, “to apprehend rebels. I know where Mr Welsh is to preach to-morrow, and will give you the rebel by the hand.”

Overjoyed at this news the gentleman agreed to accompany him to the meeting on the morrow. Arriving next day at the rendezvous, the congregation made way for the minister and his host. The latter was then invited to take a seat, and, to his great amazement, his guest of the previous night stood up and preached. At the close of the sermon Mr Welsh held out his hand to his host.

“I promised,” he said, “to give you Mr Welsh by the hand.”

“Yes,” returned the gentleman, who was much affected, as he grasped the hand, “and you said that you were sent to apprehend rebels. Let me assure you that I, a rebellious sinner, have been apprehended this day.”

It was at this interesting moment that Quentin and Peter recognised each other, and, forgetting all other points of interest, turned aside to discuss their own affairs.

“Then there’s nae use o’ my gaun ony farer,” said the shepherd thoughtfully.

“Nane whatever,” said Peter; “ye’d best c’way back t’ toon wi’ me. Ye’ll be safer there nor here, an’ may chance to be o’ service to the lassies.”

Alas for the poor lassies! They were in the fangs of the wolves at that very time. In that council-room where, for years, the farce of “trial” and the tragedy of cruel injustice had been carried on, Marion Clark and Isabel Scott were standing before their civil and clerical inquisitors. The trial was nearly over. Proceeding upon their mean principle of extracting confession by the method of entrapping questions, and thus obtaining from their unsuspecting victims sufficient evidence—as they said—to warrant condemnation, they had got the poor serving-maids to admit that they had attended field-preachings; had conversed with some whom the Government denounced as rebels; and other matters which sufficed to enable them to draw up a libel. Those two innocent girls were then handed over to the Justiciary Court, before which they were charged with the crime of receiving and corresponding with Mr Donald Cargill, Mr Thomas Douglas, Mr John Welsh, and Mr Richard Cameron; with the murderers of Archbishop Sharp; and with having heard the said ministers preach up treason and rebellion!

When the indictment was read to them the poor things meekly admitted that it was correct, except in so far as it called the ministers rebels and asserted that they preached up treason. The jury were exceedingly unwilling to serve on the trial, but were compelled to do so under threat of fine. After deliberating on the evidence they found the girls both guilty, by their own confession, of holding the opinions charged against them, but that as actors, or receivers of rebels, the charge was not proven.

Upon this they were condemned to die, but before leaving the court Isabel Scott said impressively: “I take all witness against another at you to your appearance before God, that your proceeding against us this day is only for owning Christ, His Gospel, and His members.” (See A Cloud of Witnesses, page 122 (edition 1871.)) They were then led back to prison.

When Quentin and Peter arrived in Edinburgh, two days later, they passed under the West Port, which was decorated with the shrivelled heads and hands of several martyrs, and made their way to the Grassmarket, which they had to traverse in going towards Candlemaker Row. Here they found a large crowd surrounding the gallows-tree which did such frequent service there. Two female figures were swinging from the beam.

“The auld story,” said the shepherd in a low sad voice. “What was their crime?” he inquired of a bystander.

“They tried to serve the Lord, that was a’,” replied the man bitterly. “But they ended their coorse bravely. Ane sang the 84th Psalm and the ither spake of God’s great love an’ free grace to her and to sinfu’ man.”

“Puir things!” exclaimed Quentin with tremulous voice. “It’s ower noo. They’re fairly inside o’ the celestial gates.”

The sight was all too common in those dark days to induce delay, but the two friends had to pass near the gallows, and naturally looked up in passing.

“Quentin!” gasped Peter, stretching out both hands towards the martyrs, whose now soulless frames were hanging there, “it’s—it’s Marion an’—”

A low wail followed, as the poor boy fell over in a swoon.

The shepherd’s heart almost stood still, and his great chest quivered for a moment as he gazed, but he was a man of strong will and iron mould. Stooping, he picked up his little friend and carried him silently away.

Their grief was, however, diverted to other channels on reaching the abode of Mrs Black, for there they found her and Mrs Wallace and Jean in deepest sorrow over the terrible news just brought to them by Jock Bruce.

Andrew Black, he told them, had been sent a prisoner to the Bass Rock, and Will Wallace, with two hundred others, had been banished to the plantations in Barbadoes, where they were to be sold as slaves.

Quentin sat down, covered his face with both hands, and groaned aloud on hearing this. Peter, who had recovered by that time, looked about him with the expressionless face of one whose reason has been unseated. Observing that Jean was sitting apart, sobbing as if her heart would break, he went quietly to her, and, taking one of her hands, began to stroke it gently. “Dinna greet, Jean,” he said; “the Lord will deliver them. Marion aye telt me that, an’ I believe she was richt.”

Truly these unfortunate people needed all the consolation that the Word could give them, for banishment to the plantations usually meant banishment for life, and as to the hundreds who found a prison on the bleak and rugged Bass Rock at the mouth of the Forth, many of these also found a grave.

After the battle of Bothwell Bridge the persecutions which had been so severe for so many years were continued with intensified bitterness. Not only were all the old tyrannical laws carried into force with increased severity, but new and harsher laws were enacted. Among other things the common soldiers were given the right to carry these laws into effect—in other words, to murder and plunder according to their own will and pleasure. And now, in 1680, began what has been termed the killing-time; in which Graham of Claverhouse (afterwards Viscount Dundee), Grierson of Lagg, Dalziel, and others, became pre-eminently notorious for their wanton cruelty in slaughtering men, women, and even children.

On 22nd June 1680 twenty armed horsemen rode up the main street of the burgh of Sanquhar. The troop was headed by Richard Cameron and his brother Michael, who, dismounting, nailed to the cross a paper which the latter read aloud. It was the famous “Declaration of Sanquhar,” in which Charles Stuart was publicly disowned.

While the fields of Scotland were being traversed and devastated by a lawless banditti, authorised by a lawless and covenant-breaking king and Government, those indomitable men who held with Cameron and Cargill united themselves more closely together, and thus entered into a new bond pledging themselves to be faithful to God and to each other in asserting their civil and religious rights, which they believed could only be secured by driving from the throne that “perfidious covenant-breaking race, untrue both to the most high God and to the people over whom for their sins they were set.”

If the Cameronians were wrong in this opinion then must the whole nation have been wrong, when, a few years later, it came to hold the same opinion, and acted in accordance therewith! As well might we find fault with Bruce and Wallace as with our covenanting patriots.

Be this as it may, Richard Cameron with his followers asserted the principle which afterwards became law—namely, that the House of Stuart should no longer desecrate the throne. He did not, however, live to see his desire accomplished.

At Airsmoss—in the district of Kyle—with a band of his followers, numbering twenty-six horse and forty foot, he was surprised by a party of upwards of one hundred and twenty dragoons under command of Bruce of Earlshall. The Cameronians were headed by Hackston of Rathillet, who had been present at the murder of Sharp, though not an active participator. Knowing that no mercy was to be expected they resolved to fight. Before the battle Cameron, engaging in a brief prayer, used the remarkable words: “Lord, take the ripe, but spare the green.” The issue against such odds was what might have been expected. Nearly all the Covenanters were slain. Richard Cameron fell, fighting back to back with his brother. Some of the foot-men escaped into the moss. Hackston was severely wounded and taken prisoner. Cameron’s head and hands were cut off and taken to Edinburgh, where they were cruelly exhibited to his father—a prisoner at the time. “Do ye know them?” asked the wretch who brought them. The old man, kissing them, replied, “Ay, I know them! They are my son’s—my own dear son’s! It is the Lord; good is the will of the Lord, who cannot wrong me nor mine, but has made goodness and mercy to follow us all our days.” A wonderful speech this from one suffering under, perhaps, the severest trial to which poor human nature can be subjected. Well might be applied to him the words—slightly paraphrased—“O man, great was thy faith!”

Hackston was taken to Edinburgh, which he entered on a horse with his head bare and his face to the tail, the hangman carrying Cameron’s head on a halter before him. The indignities and cruelties which were perpetrated on this man had been minutely pre-arranged by the Privy Council. We mention a few in order that the reader may the better understand the inconceivable brutality of the Government against which the Scottish Covenanters had to contend. Besides the barbarities connected with poor Cameron’s head and hands, it was arranged that Hackston’s body was to be drawn backward on a hurdle to the cross of Edinburgh, where, in the first place, his right hand was to be struck off, and after some time his left hand. Thereafter he was to be hanged up and cut down alive; his bowels to be taken out and his heart shown to the people by the hangman, and then to be burnt in a fire on the scaffold. Afterwards his head was to be cut off, and his body, divided into four quarters, to be sent respectively to Saint Andrews, Glasgow, Leith, and Burntisland.

In carrying out his fiendish instructions the bungling executioner was a long time mangling the wrist of Hackston’s right arm before he succeeded in separating the hand. Hackston quietly advised him to be more careful to strike in the joint of the left. Having been drawn up and let fall with a jerk, three times, life was not extinct, for it is said that when the heart was torn out it moved after falling on the scaffold.

Several others who had been with Cameron were betrayed at this time, by apostate comrades, tried under torture, and executed; and the persecution became so hot that field-preaching was almost extinguished. The veteran Donald Cargill, however still maintained his ground.

This able, uncompromising, yet affectionate and charitable man had prepared a famous document called the “Queensferry Paper,” of which it has been said that it contains “the very pith of sound constitutional doctrine regarding both civil and ecclesiastical rights.” Once, however, he mistook his mission. In the presence of a large congregation at Torwood he went so far as to excommunicate Charles the Second; the Dukes of York, Lauderdale, and Rothes; Sir C. McKenzie and Dalziel of Binns. That these despots richly deserved whatever excommunication might imply can hardly be denied, but it is equally certain that prolonged and severe persecution had stirred up poor Cargill upon this occasion to overstep his duty as a teacher of love to God and man.

Heavily did Cargill pay for his errors—as well as for his long and conscientious adherence to duty. Five thousand merks were offered for him, dead or alive. Being captured, he was taken to Edinburgh on the 15th of July, and examined by the Council. On the 26th he was tried and condemned, and on the 27th he was hanged, after having witnessed a good confession, which he wound up with the words: “I forgive all men the wrongs they have done against me. I pray that the sufferers may be kept from sin and helped to know their duty.”

About this time a test oath was ordered to be administered to all men in position or authority. The gist of it was that King Charles the Second was the only supreme governor in the realm over all causes, as well ecclesiastical as civil, and that it was unlawful for any subject upon pretence of reformation, or any pretence whatever, to enter into covenants or leagues, or to assemble in any councils, conventicles, assemblies, etcetera, ecclesiastical or civil, without his special permission.

Pretty well this for a king who had himself signed the covenant—without which signing the Scottish nation would never have consented to assist in putting him on the throne! The greater number of the men in office in Scotland took the oath, though there were several exceptions—the Duke of Argyll, the Duke of Hamilton, John Hope of Hopetoun, the Duchess of Rothes, and others—among whom were eighty of the conforming clergy whose loyalty could not carry them so far, and who surrendered their livings rather than their consciences.

It would require a volume to record even a bare outline of the deeds of darkness that were perpetrated at this time. We must dismiss it all and return to the actors in our tale.

Will Wallace, after being recaptured, as already stated, was sent off to the plantations in a vessel with about two hundred and fifty other unfortunates, many of whom were seriously ill, if not dying, in consequence of their long exposure in the Greyfriars’ Churchyard. Packed in the hold of the ship so closely that they had not room to lie down, and almost suffocated with foul air and stench, the sufferings which they endured were far more terrible than those they experienced when lying among the tombs; but God sent most of them speedy deliverance. They were wrecked on the coast of Orkney. At night they were dashed on the rocks. The prisoners entreated to be let out of their prison, but the brutal captain ordered the hatches to be chained down. A tremendous wave cleft the deck, and a few of the more energetic managed to escape and reach the shore. The remainder—at least two hundred—were drowned in the hold. Will Wallace was among the saved, but was taken to Leith and transferred to another vessel. After several months of tossings on the deep he reached his destination and was sold into slavery.

Many months—even years—passed away, but no news reached Candlemaker Row regarding the fate of the banished people. As to Andrew Black, the only change that took place in his condition during his long captivity was his transference—unknown to his kindred—from the gloomy prison of the Bass Rock to the still gloomier cells of Dunnottar Castle.

During all this time, and for some years after, the persecutions were continued with ever-increasing severity: it seemed as if nothing short of the extirpation of the Covenanters altogether was contemplated. In short, the two parties presented at this period an aspect of human affairs which may well be styled monstrous. On the one hand a people suffering and fighting to the death to uphold law, and on the other a tyrant king and arrogant ecclesiastics and nobles, with their paid slaves and sycophants, deliberately violating the same!

Quentin Dick and Ramblin’ Peter had been drawn closer together by powerful sympathy after the imprisonment of Black and the banishment of Will Wallace. They were like-minded in their aspirations, though very dissimilar in physical and mental endowment. Feeling that Edinburgh was not a safe place in which to hide after his recent escape, Quentin resolved to return to Dumfries to inquire after, and if possible to aid, his friends there.