[1559 A.D.]

prior of St. Andrews. Argyll, Glencairn, and others, the associates of this distinguished person, were, like himself, men of courage and sagacity and full of that species of enthusiasm which is inspired by an enlarged sphere of thought and action, and by the sense of having thrown off the fetters of ecclesiastical bondage.

The lords of the Congregation were not long in discovering, that in the task of besieging a fortified town like Leith, defended by veteran and disciplined troops, they had greatly over-rated their own strength. A still greater difficulty arose from the want of money to pay and maintain an army in the field. The lords of the Congregation resolved upon invoking the assistance of England, the only neighbour of power and wealth whose alliance or countenance could counterpoise that of France.

The cause of the Reformation had been espoused and defended by Queen Elizabeth, whose right to the crown and whose title to legitimacy depended upon her father Henry's having disowned the authority of the church of Rome. Indeed, if she herself had not seen her danger from the queen of Scots' title being set up in preference to her own, the princes of Lorraine had, with arrogance peculiar to their house, called her attention to the subject by making open pretence to the throne of England in behalf of their niece Mary of Scotland.

Money had been struck in France bearing the arms of England; proclamations had been made in the names of Francis and Mary as king and queen of that country, as well as of France and Scotland; and an open and avowed claim to the crown of England was brought forward in Queen Mary's behalf by every mode short of a direct challenge of Elizabeth's title. The English Catholics were known to be favourable to these views. It was natural, therefore, that Elizabeth, whose birth and title of succession were thus openly impugned by the princes of Lorraine, should foster and encourage those Scottish insurgents who were in arms to dispossess their sister the queen-regent of the government of Scotland. Accordingly, though accustomed to act with great economy, she was readily induced to advance considerable sums to the lords of the Congregation, by which assistance they were enabled to form the siege of Leith.

Their undertaking was at first very unfortunate. A large sum of the subsidy [£1,000] furnished by Queen Elizabeth fell into the hands of the earl of Bothwell, whose ill-omened name now first appears in history, and who had adopted the faction of the queen-mother. Two skirmishes, in which the Protestants were defeated, filled the besiegers with consternation: they renounced their enterprise precipitately and retreated from Edinburgh, November 25th, to Stirling with fallen hopes and an army diminished by desertion. But Knox encouraged them by his fulminations from the pulpit: he sternly upbraided the hearers with their confidence in the arm of flesh, and promised them victory as soon as they should humble themselves to acknowledge the power of the Divine Disposer of events. The eloquence of this extraordinary and undaunted preacher was calculated to work on the stubborn and rough men to whom it was addressed.

The lords of the Congregation resumed their purpose of resistance to the last, and resolved to despatch William Maitland of Lethington, one of the most distinguished statesmen of his time, to show the queen of England the pressure of the circumstances under which they laboured. The great reputation which Lethington enjoyed as a statesman did not exceed his real abilities; and his judicious remonstrances easily persuaded the sagacious Elizabeth to grant the succours required by his constituents.

[1559-1560 A.D.]

ENGLISH AND SCOTCH TROOPS FIGHT SIDE BY SIDE

In the mean time the queen-regent of Scotland, who had received some additional assistance from France and was in expectation of a much larger force, resolved to press the moment of advantage before the power of England could be put in motion. A body of French infantry and a considerable party of horse, amounting altogether to about four thousand men, were sent into Fife, the most civilised part of Scotland, and where the inhabitants were most devoted to the Protestant faith, to punish the rebellious and to destroy the power of the barons of that district. The invaders passed by the bridge of Stirling, and then marched eastward along the firth of Forth, burning and wasting the villages and gentlemen's houses with which the shores are thickly studded. This was not done without much resistance and retaliation.'

The two armies continued for several days to move along the coast; the flames of towns and villages marking the progress of the French, and the sudden and vigorous charges of the Protestants interrupting from time to time the work of devastation, when the sight of a gallant navy of ships of war sailing up the firth of Forth attracted the attention of both parties, January 23rd, 1560. D'Oysel, the French general, concluded that they were the fleet expected from France, and in that belief made his soldiers fire a general salute. But he was soon painfully undeceived by the capture of two of his own transports which sailed along the shore to supply his men with provisions, and presently after this act of decisive violence the fleet showed English colours.

D'Oysel attempted a retreat to Stirling by a dangerous march in the opposite direction. The Scots had broken down a bridge over the Devon hoping to intercept the enemy's return; but the French, well acquainted with the duties of the engineer, threw over a temporary bridge composed of the roof or timbers of a church, which afforded them the means of passage. They effected with difficulty their retreat to Stirling and from thence to Lothian. The critical arrival of the English fleet being considered as an especial interference of Providence in the Protestant cause, gave new courage to the lords of the Congregation, who assembled forces on every side.

The English land army, amounting to six thousand men under Lord Grey de Wilton, now entered Scotland agreeably to the engagement of Elizabeth, and united their forces with those of the Protestants. The French troops retired into Leith, March the 29th, and prepared to make good their defence in hopes of receiving succour from France. The town was instantly blockaded by the English fleet on the side of the sea, and beleaguered on the landward side by the united armies of Scotland and England.

The eyes of all Britain were bent on this siege of Leith which the English and Scottish, now for the first time united in a common cause, carried on with the utmost perseverance, whilst the French defended themselves with such skill and determination as was worthy the character they bore of being the best troops in Europe. They were, indeed, defeated at the Hawkhill, near Loch End, where the Scottish cavalry charged them with great fury and gained considerable advantage; but the garrison of Leith shortly after avenged themselves by a successful sally, April 14th, in which they killed double the number they had lost at the Hawkhill. On this occasion it became evident that the English, who had not lately been engaged in any great national war, had in some degree lost the habit of discipline. The attack on the be

[In the words of Knox, the earl of Argyll and Lord James "for twenty and one days they lay in their clothes; their boots never came off; they had skirmishing almost every day; yea, some days from morn to even."]

[1560 A.D.]

siegers found their lines carelessly watched; and the ground where they opened their trenches being unfit for the purpose, argued inexperience on the part of the engineers.

The loss which they had sustained taught the English greater vigilance and caution; but so intimately were the French acquainted with defensive war that the siege advanced very slowly. At length a breach was effected, and an assault both terrible and persevering was made on the town May 7th. The ladders, however, which were prepared for the occasion proved too short for the purpose, and the besiegers were finally repulsed with great loss [eight hundred dead and wounded]. The English were at first depressed by this repulse; but they were encouraged to continue the siege by the duke of Norfolk, commanding in the northern counties of England with the title of lieutenant. He sent a reinforcement of two thousand men, with an assurance that the besiegers should not lack men so long as there were any remaining between Tweed and Trent. The siege was renewed more closely than ever, with reliance rather on famine than force for reducing the place. But the garrison endured without murmur the extremity of privation to which they were reduced, and continued to maintain the defence of Leith with the most undaunted firmness.'

DEATH OF MARY OF LORRAINE; PEACE DECLARED (1560 A.D.)

Whilst the affairs of Scotland were in this unpropitious condition Mary of Lorraine, whose misrule had been the cause of these civil hostilities, died in the castle of Edinburgh, June 10th, 1560. It was justly said that her talents and virtues were her own; her errors and faults the effect of her deference to the advice of others, and especially of her aspiring brothers.

Her death was speedily followed by proposals of peace from France. In managing a difficult negotiation, the princess of Lorraine employed Monlue bishop of Valence and the Sieur de Randan, men of consummate talent. The removal of the foreign troops was agreed on July 6th; for the French government now desired their presence at home as much as the Scots wished their absence. The fortified places of Leith, Dunbar, and Inchkeith were to be surrendered, and the fortifications destroyed. It was made a condition that no foreign forces should be introduced into Scotland without consent of parliament. The administration of government was vested in a council of twelve persons, of whom seven were to be named by the king and queen and the other five by parliament. An indemnity was stipulated for whatever violences had been committed by either party during the civil war. On the matter of religion it was declared that the estates should report to the king and queen their opinion on that matter; and it was agreed that the parliament should be convoked without further summons.

A treaty was at the same time made between France and England, by which Francis and Mary recognised in the fullest manner the claim of Elizabeth to the English crown, and agreed that Mary, in time to come, should neither assume the title nor bear the arms of England. By this pacification, which was called the Treaty of Edinburgh, the civil wars of Scotland were conducted to a termination highly favourable to the cause of the Protestant religion, and very different from what seemed at first probable.

['Brantôme says that a seal was put on the reputation of a soldier who could say that he had taken part in this gallant defence of Leith.]

[1560 A.D.]

THE PARLIAMENT OF 1560

The Scottish parliament never assembled in such numbers or had affairs of such weight before them, August 3rd, 1560; but the most pressing and important business was a petition from the principal Protestants, comprehending the chief lords of the Congregation, desiring and urging the parliament to adopt a formal manifesto against the errors and corruption of the church of Rome, the exorbitance of its power and wealth and its oppressive restrictions on the liberty of conscience. The parliament with little hesitation adopted the declaration, that the domination of the church of Rome was an usurpation over the liberties and consciences of Christian men; and, to make their grounds of dissent from its doctrines still more evident, they promulgated a confession of faith in which they renounced, in the most express terms, all the tenets by which the church of Rome is distinguished from other Christian churches, and disowned the whole authority of the Roman pontiffs, and the hierarchy of their church.

The entire system of ecclesiastical government, both in doctrine and practice, which had existed for so many centuries and been held inviolably sacred, was by these enactments utterly overthrown and one altogether new adopted in its stead. The worship of Rome so long that of the kingdom and of all Europe was at once denounced as idolatrous; and following one of Rome's worst tenets, secular punishments were menaced against those who continued to worship according to the manner of their fathers. The celebration of mass was punished in the first instance by banishment, in the second by a forfeiture of goods and corporal punishment, in the third by death itself. It is remarkable that the acts of parliament authorising these great and radical changes in the religion and church government of the country passed without the slightest opposition on the part of the Roman Catholic churchmen, bishops, and mitred abbots, who had still retained seats in the Scottish parliament. They were confounded and overawed by the unanimity with which the nobility, gentry, and burgesses united in these innovations, and all might hope that the propositions approved in parliament had every chance of falling to the ground by the king and queen refusing their consent.

Neither did they in that respect calculate falsely. Sir James Sandilands, lord St. John, being sent to announce the proceedings of this reforming parliament to Francis and Mary, was very coldly received at the court of France, and the ratification of its statutes which he sought to obtain was positively refused. The princes of Lorraine on the other hand, by their insolent carriage towards the envoy, by their general expressions of resentment, by the levy of troops, and their employing Lord Seton and other active agents in Scotland to draw together those who still favoured the Catholic cause, intimated their purpose that the war should be rekindled in Scotland in the next spring by the invasion of a French fleet and army.

But these intentions were cut short by the sudden death of Francis II, who had acted as much under the influence of his beautiful wife as she herself, their niece, had under that of the princes of Lorraine. Charles IX, the brother and successor of Francis, was entirely governed by the counsels of his mother, who, jealous of the ascendency which Mary had acquired over her deceased husband, avenged herself now that she had the power in her hands by so many marks of slight and contempt that the younger queendowager, overwhelmed with the reverse of fortune, retired entirely from the court and took up her residence in solitude at Rheims.

H. W.-VOL. XXI. S

[1560-1561 A.D.]

PRESBYTERIANISM ESTABLISHED

The Scottish Protestants were rejoiced at the timely change which destroyed all possibility of their plans of reformation being disturbed by the power of France, and proceeded with full assurance of success to complete the model of their church government. The tenets of the celebrated Calvin respecting ecclesiastical rule were selected, probably because they were considered most diametrically opposite to those of Rome. This form of church government had been established in the city of Geneva where John Knox and other reformed teachers pursued their theological studies, and it was earnestly recommended by them to the imitation of their countrymen. This modification of the reformed religion differed in its religious tenets but little from that of the Lutherans, and still less from that which was finally adopted in England.

But the Presbyterian system was, in its church government, widely distinguished from that of all countries which, renouncing the religious doctrines of the Roman clergy, had retained their hierarchy, whether in whole or in part. Invented in a republican country the Presbyterian government was entirely unconnected with and independent of the civil government of the state, and owned no earthly head. The church was governed in the extreme resort by the general assembly of the church, being a convocation of the clergy by representation, together with a certain number of the laity, admitted to sit and vote with them as representing the Christian community under the name of lay elders.

In the original sketch of the Scottish church discipline provision was made for certain persons named superintendents who were intrusted, as their name implies, with the spiritual power of bishops. A digest of the forms of the church called the Book of Discipline' was willingly received and subscribed to by the readers of the Congregation January 15th, 1561, the lay reformers offering no objection to anything which the preachers proposed, whether respecting the doctrines of the church or the forms by which it was to be governed.c

Through its different courts every doubtful case was so thoroughly sifted that a satisfactory result was generally obtained, and an error in doctrine, however subtle, could scarcely escape undetected and unannounced. This fact was distinctly stated by King James himself to an English ecclesiastic who was expressing his wonder that so seldom heresy had troubled the good people of Scotland. "I'll tell you how, man," replied this royal solver of difficulties, with more than his wonted wisdom: "if it spring up in a parish, there is an eldership to take notice of it; if it be too strong for them, the presbytery is ready to crush it; if the heretic prove too obstinate for them, he shall find more witty heads in the synod; and if he cannot be convinced there, the general assembly, I'll warrant you, will not spare him."

As the Scottish reformers were aware that the general neglect of ecclesiastical discipline in the Romish church had been a fruitful source of its crimes and the principal cause of its downfall, their chief care was to restore the apostolic rule to its primitive importance. "As no commonwealth," they said in their preamble, "can flourish or long endure without good laws and sharp execution of the same, so neither can the kirk of God be brought to

['Hume Browns calls this "the most interesting and in many respects the most important of public documents in the history of Scotland."]