Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 56, Number 347, September, 1844. Various

once the Scottish Kings were throned

      Amidst their nobles all.

      But there was dust of vulgar feet

      On that polluted floor,

      And perjured traitors fill’d the place

      Where good men sate before.

      With savage glee came Warristoun14

      To read the murderous doom,

      And then uprose the great Montrose

      In the middle of the room.

XI

      “Now by my faith as belted knight,

      And by the name I bear,

      And by the red Saint Andrew’s cross

      That waves above us there—

      Ay, by a greater, mightier oath—

      And oh, that such should be!—

      By that dark stream of royal blood

      That lies ’twixt you and me—

      I have not sought in battle field

      A wreath of such renown,

      Nor dared I hope, on my dying day,

      To win the martyr’s crown!

XII

      “There is a chamber far away

      Where sleep the good and brave,

      But a better place ye have named for me

      Than by my father’s grave.

      For truth and right, ’gainst treason’s might,

      This hand has always striven,

      And ye raise it up for a witness still

      In the eye of earth and heaven.

      Then nail my head on yonder tower—

      Give every town a limb—

      And God who made shall gather them.—

      I go from you to Him!”15

XIII

      The morning dawn’d full darkly,

      The rain came flashing down,

      And the jagged streak of the levin-bolt

      Lit up the gloomy town:

      The heavens were speaking out their wrath,

      The fatal hour was come,

      Yet ever sounded sullenly

      The trumpet and the drum.

      There was madness on the earth below,

      And anger in the sky,

      And young and old, and rich and poor,

      Came forth to see him die.

XIV

      Ah, God! That ghastly gibbet!

      How dismal ’tis to see

      The great tall spectral skeleton,

      The ladder, and the tree!

      Hark! hark! It is the clash of arms—

      The bells begin to toll—

      He is coming! he is coming!

      God’s mercy on his soul!

      One last long peal of thunder—

      The clouds are clear’d away,

      And the glorious sun once more looks down

      Amidst the dazzling day.

XV

      He is coming! he is coming!

      Like a bridegroom from his room,16

      Came the hero from his prison

      To the scaffold and the doom.

      There was glory on his forehead,

      There was lustre in his eye,

      And he never walk’d to battle

      More proudly than to die:

      There was colour in his visage,

      Though the cheeks of all were wan,

      And they marvell’d as they saw him pass,

      That great and goodly man!

XVI

      He mounted up the scaffold,

      And he turn’d him to the crowd;

      But they dared not trust the people,

      So he might not speak aloud.

      But he look’d upon the heavens,

      And they were clear and blue,

      And in the liquid ether

      The eye of God shone through:

      Yet a black and murky battlement

      Lay resting on the hill,

      As though the thunder slept within—

      All else was calm and still.

XVII

      The grim Geneva ministers

      With anxious scowl drew near,17

      As you have seen the ravens flock

      Around the dying deer.

      He would not deign them word nor sign,

      But alone he bent the knee;

      And veil’d his face for Christ’s dear grace

      Beneath the gallows-tree.

      Then radiant and serene he rose,

      And cast his cloak away:

      For he had ta’en his latest look

      Of earth, and sun, and day.

XVIII

      A beam of light fell o’er him,

      Like a glory round the shriven,

      And he climb’d the lofty ladder

      As it were the path to heaven.18

      Then came a flash from out the cloud,

      And a stunning thunder roll,

      And no man dared to look aloft,

      For fear was on every soul.

      There was another heavy sound,

      A hush and then a groan;

      And darkness swept across the sky—

      The work of death was done!

W. E. A.

      THE WITCHFINDER

      Part I

      It was towards the close of an autumnal evening, in the commencement of the sixteenth century, that a crowd of human beings was dispersing from the old market-place of Hammelburg, an ancient and, at that time, considerable town of Franconia, after witnessing the performance of a hideous and living tragedy. The Ober-Amtmann, or governor of the town, who had presided over the awful occasion, had left, attended by his schreibers, or secretaries, the small balustraded terrace which advanced out before the elevated entrance of the old Gothic town-hall. The town-guard were receding in various directions, warning the crowd to seek their homes, and sometimes aiding with a gentle admonition of their pike-heads those who lingered, as, slowly retreating, they moved down the different narrow streets that led from the central market-place, like streams flowing off in different channels after an inundation. Window after window was closing in the quaintly-carved and strangely-decorated gables of the houses; and many a small casement had been pulled to, over sundry withered old faces, that, peering from the

14

Archibald Johnston of Warristoun. This man, who was the inveterate enemy of Montrose, and who carried the most selfish spirit into every intrigue of his party, received the punishment of his treasons about eleven years afterwards. It may be instructive to learn how he met his doom. The following extract is from the MSS. of Sir George Mackenzie:—“The Chancellor and others waited to examine him; he fell upon his face, roaring, and with tears entreated they would pity a poor creature who had forgot all that was in the Bible. This moved all the spectators with a deep melancholy; and the Chancellor, reflecting upon the man’s great parts, former esteem, and the great share he had in all the late revolutions, could not deny some tears to the frailty of silly mankind. At his examination, he pretended he had lost so much blood by the unskilfulness of his chirurgeons, that he lost his memory with his blood; and I really believe that his courage had been drawn out with it. Within a few days he was brought before the parliament, where he discovered nothing but much weakness, running up and down upon his knees, begging mercy; but the parliament ordained his former sentence to be put to execution, and accordingly he was executed at the cross of Edinburgh.”

15

“He said he was much beholden to the parliament for the honour they put on him; ‘for,’ says he, ‘I think it a greater honour to have my head standing on the port of this town, for this quarrel, than to have my picture in the king’s bedchamber. I am beholden to you, that, lest my loyalty should be forgotten, ye have appointed five of your most eminent towns to bear witness of it to posterity.’”—Wigton Papers.

16

“In his downgoing from the Tolbooth to the place of execution, he was very richly clad in fine scarlet, laid over with rich silver lace, his hat in his hand, his bands and cuffs exceeding rich, his delicate white gloves on his hands, his stockings of incarnate silk, and his shoes with their ribands on his feet; and sarks provided for him with pearling about, above ten pund the elne. All these were provided for him by his friends, and a pretty cassock put on upon him, upon the scaffold, wherein he was hanged. To be short, nothing was here deficient to honour his poor carcase, more beseeming a bridegroom than a criminal going to the gallows.”—Nicholl’s Diary.

17

The Presbyterian ministers beset Montrose both in prison and on the scaffold. The following extracts are from the diary of the Rev. Robert Traill, one of the persons who were appointed by the commission of the kirk “to deal with him:”—“By a warrant from the kirk, we staid a while with him about his soul’s condition. But we found him continuing in his old pride, and taking very ill what was spoken to him, saying, ‘I pray you, gentlemen, let me die in peace.’ It was answered, that he might die in true peace, being reconciled to the Lord and to his kirk.”—“We returned to the commission, and did show unto them what had passed amongst us. They, seeing that for the present he was not desiring relaxation from his censure of excommunication, did appoint Mr Mungo Law and me to attend on the morrow on the scaffold, at the time of his execution, that, in case he should desire to be relaxed from his excommunication, we should be allowed to give it unto him in the name of the kirk, and to pray with him, and for him, that what is loosed in earth might be loosed in heaven.” But this pious intention, which may appear somewhat strange to the modern Calvinist, when the prevailing theories of the kirk regarding the efficacy of absolution are considered, was not destined to be fulfilled. Mr Traill goes on to say, “But he did not at all desire to be relaxed from his excommunication in the name of the kirk, yea, did not look towards that place on the scaffold where we stood; only he drew apart some of the magistrates, and spake a while with them, and then went up the ladder, in his red scarlet cassock, in a very stately manner.”

18

“He was very earnest that he might have the liberty to keep on his hat; it was denied: he requested he might have the privilege to keep his cloak about him—neither could that be granted. Then, with a most undaunted courage, he went up to the top of that prodigious gibbet.”—“The whole people gave a general groan; and it was very observable, that even those who at his first appearance had bitterly inveighed against him, could not now abstain from tears.”—Montrose Redivivus.