The Patriot (34 page)
The Test Act was, of course, universally unpopular, save to ardent Episcopalians. So this motion appealed to most men there, and it was carried by a majority of over one hundred.
Amidst cheers, Montgomery rose to propose the abolition of standing armies, these to be replaced by local militia companies, Belhaven seconding.
This was a different kettle-of-fish, and Hamilton and his friends would have none of it. They perceived, also, what Montgomery was at, seeking to get the items on his list passed one by one. This, as well as being obnoxious, would be a lengthy procedure. The Duke, therefore, banged on his table, declared the motion invalid, as an attack on the
crown's
prerogative, the armed forces being raised in the King's name and therefore not to be abolished without the King's authority. He then rose, without further warning, announcing that the Convention stood adjourned for three days, and left the hall.
Scotland's Parliament Hall thereafter bore some resemblance to a bear-pit.
* *
Hamilton's three-days interval proved to be an eventful one for Edinburgh, all on account of a ship putting into Leith haven two days later, one amongst many, for this was the port of Edinburgh. But this ship bore Hugh Mackay of Scourie, William's general, and some of his staff. Frustrated by the necessarily slow progress of marching infantry and ox-drawn cannon, when he had reached Tees he had requisitioned all the shipping available in that estuary, embarked almost all his cavalry, fifteen troops of horse, selected the fastest craft for himself and set sail, leaving his foot to trudge northwards as best they might. So now he was at Leith, less than two miles from the capital, awaiting his cavalry - which inevitably had to use larger, slower ships - but which was expected to arrive in a couple of days. The cavalry totalled, it was reported, some eleven hundred men.
The news of this reached Edinburgh as fast as a man could ride - and of course, set off as swift reaction, cheering amongst William's supporters, consternation amongst the Jacobites, and doubts and fears amongst the ordinary citizens, who advisedly were suspicious of all solidery.
Dundee reacted fast. His own army had continued to melt away, unpaid and demoralised, and such as remained in the park of Holyroodhouse were in no state to fight a battle against fresh cavalry. Able to trust only two or three troops of his dragoons, he sought to cut his way up to the castle with them, to join forces with the Duke of Gordon and his garrison. But the narrow and difficult approach to the fortress, climbing up from the Lawnmarket, had been barricaded off, with timbers, broken masonry and miscellaneous rubble, trenches even dug amongst the cobblestones, to assist in keeping the garrison more or less penned in, besieged. For his dragoons to clear a way through would have taken hours and moreover made the dismounted cavalry extremely vulnerable. So instead, Graham led his squadron outside the city-walls northwards, to the Nor' Loch which lay at the foot of the castle-rock, and riding round the rim of this reached a section of the thrusting cliff which it was just possible for an agile man with a head for heights to climb up. And there his dragoons and such of the townsfolk as were in the vicinity, saw the King of Scots' handsome general, Bloody Clavers as he was known to the crowd, or Bonnie Dundee as the Jacobites preferred to call him, thigh-boots, scarlet-and-gold coat, feathered bonnet and all, go clambering up, hands and knees, scaling the huge perpendicular rock like a monkey, zigzagging, hoisting, traversing, up and up until he reached a ledge immediately below the castle-walling itself, up which no man could climb. But there, above him, heads looked down from an open window, watching astonished. And those below could hear Dundee calling for the Duke of Gordon. Presumably the Cock o' the North was there waiting, or nearby, for a shouted conversation took place, not all of which could be heard from the lochside but in which, fairly clearly, Dundee called upon the Duke to fire some shots from his cannon, one or two into the city itself, as intimation of the King's continuing authority, and two or three in the general direction of Leith, as warning to Mackay. Evidently Gordon expressed reluctance to do this, for Graham urged it again, the louder, and added that the castle must hold out for King James at all costs. He himself was for Stirling, where he was calling a new Convention and Parliament in the royal name, for 18th April; and thereafter he would raise the Highland clans, whose chiefs, thank God, were Jacobites to a man and Catholic, to bring down to teach Edinburgh a lesson and drive the William-ites into the sea. Moreover, James himself would be landing a large Irish-French army
on the west coast any day. So
cannon-fire and no surrender. The Duke's replies were inaudible. Dundee clambered down again, to the huzzahs of the dragoons, and rode back into the city.
Graphic accounts of this feat swept the town like a forest-fire, Andrew obtaining various versions of it at a meeting of the dissident Williamites in Penston's tavern that evening. So far there was no cannon-fire however.
Next midday the Convention reassembled in a great hum of excitement, although with a smaller attendance than heretofore owing to fears that the castle guns might well open fire on Parliament Hall as their principal target. Andrew saw that there were three new spectators sitting near himself, all wearing military red coats, and was informed that these were General Mackay, Sir Thomas Livingstone his cavalry commander and an English aide called Major Bunting. There was no sign of Dundee when Hamilton opened the proceedings, which some took as ominous.
However they had barely started when Graham made an entry and, in dramatic fashion, flinging wide the doors and stamping in, booted and spurred, with actually a dragoon trumpeter to blow a flourish and so gain approximate quiet and adequate attention, drowning out the outraged Hamilton's voice.
"I come to this unlawful gathering for one purpose and one only - to warn you all!" he announced, into a quivering hush.
"To warn you of wrath to come, in King James's royal name. I am leaving this city forthwith - but the Duke of Gordon is not! His ca
nnon are trained on this hall. I
do not stay another day, thanks to one honest man, one John Binnie, a master-dyer, who overheard a dastardly plot being hatched to murder myself, the Earl of Balcarres and Sir George Mackenzie, the Lord Advocate, this very night. I remove myself from this company of assassins and traitors! I ride to Stirling where I call a true Convention and Parliament, in King James's name, to meet on 18th April - by which time I hope the King may be there to preside in person - and with a large French-Irish army to add to the Highland host I shall muster forthwith. Then we shall march on this wicked city and it will be the day of reckoning indeed! By then every traitor and rebel will be well advised to have left Scotland. That is all that I have to say to you — save to command all loyal subjects of the King of Scots to leave this hall behind me!"
Signing to the trumpeter to sound again, John Graham marched out.
In the pandemonium which succeeded, every Jacobite in the Convention rose to follow his lead, this time the Marquis of Atholl going also - and some who were not avowed Jacobites but merely men of discretion.
After a while, and some consultation with Dalrymple, Tweeddale and Lothian, the Duke of Hamilton hammered loud and long on his table, to restore order and his authority. He declared stiffly, that this Convention of the Estates of Scotland was still in session, that they were well quit of all Popish and contumacious supporters of the tyrant James Stewart, and that their business must go on. He ordered the officers to lock the doors of the hall and to lay the keys on his table, so that none unauthorised might enter - and clearly, no more were to leave. And he called upon Sir James Dalrymple to speak on a new clause which could be incorporated in the proposed Claim of Right, urging King William to support a federal union of the two kingdoms, which would undoubtedly greatly redound to Scotland's benefit.
The Lord President thereafter did his able best on this theme, emphasising the advantages of increased and mutual commerce with England, equal trading rights in the overseas colonies, the use of English ports, the removal of the risks of war, and much else. Andrew was not convinced - but then he had rather pronounced views on independence, in nations as in men. Dalrymple may have been more successful with others, but he was up against difficult conditions for convincing oratory, the fact being that the commissioners were really in no state to heed and consider theory and long-range policy just then. Their thoughts tended to be elsewhere, notably on the Duke of Gordon's cannon, trained on this building; and what that devil Dundee might be up to now. Indeed, before very long it was Tweeddale himself who interrupted the Lord President, calling on Hamilton to adjourn the session and lead an authoritative party up through the barricades to as near the castle entrance as they could get, there to demand the surrender of his fellow-duke forthwith, with his garrison, under pain of eventual execution, to end this intolerable threat to honest men. The cheers and stamping which greeted this proposal left even Hamilton in no doubt as to the feelings of the assembly; and although he declared that
he
certainly was not going to go shouting surrender-terms to that fat and deplorable Gordon, he conceded that it might be as well to warn him that General Mackay's forces, when they arrived in full, would be well equipped with cannon with which to batter the castle into submission, and the consequences for himself and his people when that happened. A deputation from this Convention could accordingly proceed, to that end. Since the Lord Tweed-dale seemed so concerned, he could lead it, with say the Earl of Lothian, the Lord Lyon King of Arms and a trumpeter.
To relieved cheers he added that the session would reconvene three days hence, by which time the situation in the city should be more clear and Mackay's cavalry, it was to be hoped, patrolling the streets. Meeting adjourned.
Thereafter the would-be legislators certainly found the streets thronged with excited crowds - but this held its own reassurance, for if Dundee's dragoons had been on the rampage the populace would not be so much in evidence. Swiftly the news spread. Bloody Clavers was gone, quite gone, pray God for good! He and his troopers had ridden out of the city, shouting that he was going to follow the spirit and example of his great kinsman, Montrose, by the West Port, on their way to Stirling, admittedly promising to return one day in vengeful might. But meantime the town was free of them, at least, and all the prominent Jacobites were scuttling off too. And no cannon had been fired from the castle. It seemed that the Gordon was not of the same stuff as the Graham.
Edinburgh, despite chill April showers, blossomed into holiday mood.
Next day Mackay's cavalry began disembarking at Leith, and Major Bunting was sent, with some three hundred horse, in a sort of token pursuit of Dundee, to try to keep him moving and if possible prevent any sort of muster or assembly at Stirling.
Andrew Fletcher was glad to get out of that volatile and noisy town and to ride eastwards, with Johnnie Belhaven, for Beil, until the Convention reassembled. Although he scarcely admitted it to himself, he was rather inclined to avoid Saltoun these days, Henry's bliss with Margaret being difficult for him to swallow, however much he berated himself.
It was a shrunken Convention which resumed after the interval, all the Jacobite lords and commissioners absent and quite a few of the less politically-conscious non-Jacobites also left the city, having had enough of affairs of state, domestic affairs drawing them home. Indeed the session, although productive of results, was something in the nature of an anticlimax and lacking in drama. When the adjusted Claim of Right was put to the vote there were only five against it and its explicit offer of the crown to William and Mary. If Andrew was perturbed by that new clause incorporated, referring to a federal union of the two kingdoms, he was at least consoled by the decision to include Sir James Montgomery as one of the three representatives to go to London with the Claim. He was to represent the commissioners of the shires, Argyll the lords and Sir John Dalrymple, the younger, for the burghs - for, although a west-country laird's son, oddly enough he sat for the royal burgh of North Berwick in Haddingtonshire.
Apart from this all-important matter, and a hasty decision to go ahead with the raising of militia companies, calling upon all
Protestant males between the ages of sixteen and sixty to be ready for mobilisation, little other business was done. They heard from Tweeddale that the delegation summoning the Duke of Gordon to surrender the castle had been entirely fruitless, but at least had provoked no artillery fire in response. Once Mackay's cannon came up, things would be different. Meanwhile, unfortunately, the news from Ireland was not good, with all the Catholic South and West declaring for James and only the largely Protestant Ulster counties opposing. The dangers for Scotland did not have to be stressed.
Hamilton adjourned the series of sessions until 21st May, by which time they should have William's answer. Assuming acceptance, the King would be asked by the three representatives to name the resumed Convention a full Parliament, so that all necessary steps could be enacted. Meantime let them pray Almighty God that Dundee in Scotland, and James Stewart in Ireland, both came to grief.
So that chapter, at least, was closed.
Andrew Fletcher was too proud to plead, thereafter, with Montgomery, that he should urge William to revoke the forfeiture on himself and Saltoun estate; but he did point out the importance of emphasising that other unredeemed forfeitures by James's regime were not only contrary to justice but seriously hampering William's own cause by souring relations and preventing proper representation in the Estates of Parliament. It was to be hoped that Montgomery would take the hint.
