in the bud, as we used to say, he might endanger the King's interests and affairs in Scotland. The Earl being brought unto the King, with great demonstration of affection on the Marquis's part, the King, without taking any great notice of him, gave him his hand to kiss, and so turned aside; which so confirmed the truth of that false report which Hamilton had delivered to him, that in great displeasure and disdain he makes for Scotland, where he found who knew how to work on such humours as he brought along with him, till, by seconding the information which he had from Hamilton, they had fashioned him wholly to their will.”*

The disgust which Charles had conceived at the Rothes party in Scotland, and the circumstances which occasioned that disgust, have been noticed in our introductory chapter. Most probably Hamilton had taken advantage, of the King's disposition to evince upon every opportunity a marked discountenance of all who adhered to that faction, to persuade Charles that Montrose was to be a leader among those turbulent nobles. Be this as it may, such a reception of a young nobleman, as yet only distinguished for every personal attraction, must have been as remarkable, as it was mortifying to its object. Sir Philip Warwick tells us, that Charles "with any artist or good mechanic, traveller, or scholar would discourse freely;" and he also records this trait of the King's affectionate character, that" whenever any young nobleman, or gentleman of quality, who was going to travel, came to kiss his hand, he cheerfully would give

* This is from Heylyn's Remarks upon L'Estrange, p. 205. In his Life of Laud he tells the same story, but omits the surmise of Montrose's commanding the Guard of France. It will be observed, as noticed in our introductory chapter, that Heylyn obtained some materials for his Life of Laud from Lord Napier. Sanderson and Whitelock both allude to the circumstance narrated by Heylyn.

them some good counsel leading to moral virtue, especially to good conversation, telling them that if he heard they kept good company abroad, he should reasonably expect they would return qualified to serve him and their country well at home." Were it not for the explanation given by Heylyn, we might almost suppose, that Charles had now determined to select his favourites by a rule contrary to that which had elevated Villiers. The hard visage, little black callot-cap, and puritanically cropt hair of the young Marquis of Hamilton, had found favour in the sight of the King whose own "love-lock" became the theme of puritanical scurrility. And there was another young nobleman, generally described as of mean stature, with red hair and squinting eyes, whom the King had already regarded most graciously, admitted to his councils, and loaded with favours. This was Archibald Lord Lorn, afterwards Earl, and Marquis of Argyle, the coward, par excellence, of his times,-one who through life, but ever at a distance, watched and followed Montrose with sinister and deadly aspect. Argyle was the snake in the grass to his sovereign, as Hamilton was " the serpent in the bosom." Montrose, says Clarendon, " had always a great emulation, or rather a great contempt of the Marquis of Argyle, (as he was too apt to contemn those he did not love,) who wanted nothing but honesty and courage to be a very extraordinary man, having all other good talents in a very great degree." The same noble author also remarks of these rivals, that " the people looked upon them both as young men of unlimited ambition, and used to say, that they were like Cæsar and Pompey, the one would endure no superior, and the other would have no equal." De Retz confirms the comparison as regards Montrose, the parallel be

twixt Pompey and Argyle would be more difficult to illustrate. The old Earl of Argyle had embraced the Roman Catholic faith, and the King, never papistically inclined, commanded him to divest himself of his vast territorial rights, in favour of his son, reserving only a competency for his own life. Lorn, Clarendon tells us, had provoked his father by "disobedience and insolence;" and the old Earl meditated such a disposal of the property as threatened his representative with impoverished titles. Charles, to save the family, made that arrangement which banished the father, and extorted from him those memorable and prophetic sentences,"he would submit to the King's pleasure, though he believed he was hardly dealt with ;' and then, with some bitterness, put his son in mind of his undutiful carriage towards him, and charged him to carry in his mind how bountiful the King had been to him, which yet he told him he was sure he would forget, and thereupon said to his Majesty, Sir, I must know this young man better than you can do; you may raise him, which I doubt you will live to repent, for he is a man of craft, subtilty, and falsehood, and can love no man, and if ever he finds it in his power to do you mischief, he will be sure to do it,'"-a prophecy fulfilled to the very letter.

But it was fated that Charles should trust Hamilton and neglect Huntly, elevate Argyle, and discountenance Montrose,-and that one and all of them should perish on the scaffold.

CHAPTER II.

WHEN AND WHY MONTROSE JOINED THE COVENANTERS.

HOWEVER probable it may be that Montrose would not have been so far misled as he was by the democratical party in Scotland, had the King attached him to his person, instead of repulsing him from court, it is a mistaken idea, though generally assumed for a fact, that in the fever of his disappointment, and without any better impulse, he had on the instant become bitterly opposed to the measures of the King.* Let us glance at the history of the sudden combustion in Scotland, which brought on the great Rebellion, and mark, as precisely as we can, the time and the occasion when Montrose joined the ranks of the insurgents.

Guided by the policy of Laud, Charles at length determined to effect the long-meditated scheme of ecclesiastical uniformity throughout his dominions. The book of Canons was circulated by authority in Scotland in the year 1636. The interval betwixt the promulgation of the Canons, and the appointment of the liturgy in the month of July 1637 was employed, by the fomenters of discontent in Scotland, as a period of secret agitation, during which they laboriously infused into the minds of the people ideas that the laws

* Even D'Israeli, doing injustice to his own brilliant and critical Life of Charles, no less than to the character of Montrose, by so loose an assertion, thus gives it: "The slighted and romantic hero, indignant at the coldness of that royalty which best suited his spirit, hastened to Scotland, and, threw himself, in anger and despair, into the hands of the Covenanters."-Comment. Vol. p. iv. 15.

of the country were about to be infringed, and the Protestant religion on the eve of being forcibly supplanted by Popery, the same false view of the King's intentions, that, for a like factious purpose, had been propagated against the tithe policy. The scheme of uniformity in the Protestant worship of the kingdom was, in itself, rational and praiseworthy, not originating with, but inherited by, Charles. The attempt, however, was ill timed, and worse conducted, and resistance to it in Scotland might have claimed some admiration, as well as sympathy, had that resistance been the natural and unanimous expression of a rational feeling, or had it possessed one feature which deserves to be regarded with other sentiments than disgust. The people of Scotland, though, as Malcolm Laing well observes," seldom distinguished for loyalty," were not, generally speaking, anti-monarchical, nor were they disposed, says Clarendon, to enter into " a bare-faced rebellion against their King, whose person they loved, and reverenced his government;" nor, he adds, "would they have been wrought upon towards the lessening the one or the other, by any other suggestions or infusions, than such as should make them jealous, or apprehensive of a design to introduce Popery, their whole religion consisting in an entire detestation of Popery, in believing the Pope to be antichrist, and hating perfectly the persons of all Papists." A false alarm of Popery was, indeed, the great lever of insurgency in Scotland, and the better suited for the purposes of those who used it, that the enlightened monarch was capable of regarding it, at the time, as nothing else than what the Church of Scotland herself now admits it to have been,* namely, a

* See "Popular Reflections on the progress of the Principles of Toleration, and the reasonableness of the Catholic claims, by a Protestant,"