The meeting, with one accord, agreed that the declaration should go forth; and certain of those who were ready writers, being provided with implements, retired apart to make copies, while Mr Renwick, with the remainder, joined together in prayer. By the time he had made an end, the task of the writers was finished, and then lots were cast to see whom the Lord would appoint to affix the declaration on the trones and kirk doors of the towns where the rage of the persecutors burnt the fiercest, and He being pleased to choose me for one to do the duty at Edinburgh, I returned in the gloaming back to the house of Mrs Brownlee, to abide the convenient season which I knew in the fit time would be prepared. Heron Brownlee, who, as I have narrated, brought me to his mother's house, was by trade a tailor, and kept his cloth shop in the Canongate, some six doors lower down than St Mary's Wynd, just after passing the flesher's stocks below the Netherbow; for in those days, when the court was at Holyrood, that part of the town was a place of great resort to the gallants, and all such as affected a courtly carriage. And it happened that, on the morning after the meeting, a proclamation was sent forth, describing the persons and clothing of the prisoners who had escaped from the tolbooth with me, threatening grievous penalties to all who dared to harbour them. This Heron Brownlee seeing affixed on the cheek of the Netherbow, came and told me; whereupon, after conferring with him, it was agreed that he should provide for me a suit of town-like clothes, and at the second-hand, that they might not cause observance by any novelty. This was in another respect needful; for my health being in a frail state, I stood in want of the halesome cordial of fresh air, whereof I could not venture to taste but in the dusk of the evening. He accordingly provided the apparel, and when clothed therewith, I made bold to go out in the broad daylight, and even ventured to mingle with the multitude in the garden of the palace, who went daily there in the afternoon to see the nobles and ladies of the court walking with their pageantries, while the Duke's musicants solaced them with melodious airs and the delights of sonorous harmony. And it happened on the third time I went thither, that a cry rose of the Duke coming from the garden to the palace, and all the onlookers pressed to see him. As he advanced, I saw several persons presenting petitions into his hands, which he gave, without then looking at, to the Lord Perth, whom I knew again by his voice; and I was directed, as by a thought of inspiration, to present, in like manner, a copy of our declaration, which I always carried about with me; so placing myself among a crowd of petitioners, onlookers and servants, that formed an avenue across the road leading from the Canongate to the Abbey kirk-yard, and between the garden yett and the yett that opened into the front court of the palace. As the Duke returned out of the garden, I gave him the paper; But how to effect that was no easy thing; for the multitude around was very great, and but three narrow yetts allowed of egress from the enclosure—one leading into the garden, one to the palace, and the other into the Canongate. I therefore calmly put my trust in Him who alone could save me, and remained, as it were, an indifferent spectator, following the Duke with an anxious eye. Having passed from the garden into the court, the multitude followed him with great eagerness, and I also went in with them, and walked very deliberately across the front of the palace to the south-east corner, where there was a postern door that opened into the road leading to the King's park from the Cowgate-port, along the outside of the town wall. I then mended my pace, but not to any remarkable degree, and so returned to the house of Mrs Brownlee. Scarcely was I well in, when Heron, her son, came flying to her with a report that a man was seized in the palace garden who had threatened the Duke's life, and he was fearful lest it had been me; and I was much grieved by these tidings, in case any honest man should be put to the torture on my account; but the Lord had mercifully ordained it otherwise. In the course of the night Heron Brownlee, after closing his shop, came again and told me that no one had been taken, but that some person in the multitude had given the Duke a dreadful paper, which had caused great consternation and panic; and that a council was sitting at that late hour with the Duke, expresses having arrived with accounts of the same paper having been seen on the doors of many churches, both in Nithsdale and the shire of Ayr. The alarm, indeed, raged to such a degree among all those who knew in their consciences how they merited the doom we had pronounced, that it was said the very looks of many were withered as with a pestilent vapour. Yet, though terrified at the vengeance declared against their guilt, neither the Duke nor the Privy Council were |