The suspicions which Montrose had managed to allay for a time in the field, now broke out against him with renewed force when arms once more gave place to diplomacy. While the Scots lay in garrison at Newcastle, letters passed freely between them and the English camp. Before crossing the Tweed a general order had been issued by Leslie that no communication should be held with the enemy except under his warrant. Anything in the nature of a secret correspondence was declared treasonable, and he who held it liable to the punishment of a traitor. With this offence Montrose was now charged. While the negotiations for the Treaty of Ripon were proceeding, word was brought to Leslie that a letter had gone from Montrose to the King which had never passed under the eyes of the Committee. How the secret was discovered is not clear. It may have been, as Wishart and other contemporaries have maintained, through the treachery of some member of the King's own household. It may have been through sheer accident, according to Burnet's story. The manner of the discovery is unimportant; the fact of the letter is certain. When taxed with it before the Committee, Montrose made no attempt at denial or excuse. At once and boldly avowing what he had done, he challenged any man present to say that he had done wrong. He had written to the King, professing his obedience and loyalty. What then? Had they not all, but the other day, signed a humble petition to his majesty in the character of his most loyal and obedient subjects? Their articles of war forbade all secret correspondence with the enemy. What man among them would venture to call his sovereign an enemy? Did not the same articles declare that, "If any man shall open his mouth against the King's majesty's person or authority, or shall presume to touch his sacred person, he shall be punished as a traitor"? The Committee was in a strait. They knew that Montrose was fooling them, but they could not gainsay him. Leslie indeed, more apt at war than council and impatient of such nice distinctions, muttered that he had known princes lose their heads for less faults. But his colleagues dared not accept the alternative Montrose offered them. They could not deny the letter of their own law, and they did not feel strong enough to refuse his wide interpretation of its spirit. They were in truth in the uncomfortable position of being caught in their own snare.

But though victory was for the time with Montrose, it was but a momentary gleam. His enemies were ever on the watch to catch him tripping, and they soon found graver matter against him. In the following November the young Lord Boyd, Montrose's relation and one of the signatories of the Cumbernauld Bond, lay dying of a malignant fever. In his delirium he uttered some rambling words about a secret which, reported to Argyll, were enough to put those quick wits on the track. Almond was then at his house at Callendar on leave from Newcastle, and from him Argyll soon contrived to learn all about the Bond and who had signed it. Montrose was at once summoned to Edinburgh to answer this new accusation of treason. He took the same course before the Estates that he had taken before the Committee at Newcastle. He avowed what he had done, and justified it by the dangers then threatening Scotland and the Covenant. There was hot debate, and some, especially among the clergymen, would have made it a capital offence. But Argyll knew that his party was not yet strong enough to carry matters with so high a hand. Montrose did not stand alone. Some good Covenanters had shared in his treason, Almond and Mar and Marischal. And there were others whom half Leslie's army would have marched on the capital to save or revenge. Montrose himself was quite as much feared as he was hated by his accusers. They knew he had many friends among the Covenanters, and suspected he might have more than they knew. He must be separated from them before it would be safe to proceed to extremities against him. Moreover there were some who still thought it might not be too late to win this high spirit and ready genius to their side. He was ambitious, and events might so shape their course that the Covenant would be able to feed his ambition more liberally than the King. So this offence too was passed over. The Bond was surrendered and burned: the subscribers signed a declaration that they had meant nothing by it against the common weal; and once again the Covenant was outwardly at peace with itself.

But even after these two warnings Montrose could not keep quiet. The very opposite to Argyll on every side of his character, while the latter bided the time that he foresaw must come with eyes and ears ever open and tongue ever still, Montrose roamed restlessly about the country between the army at Newcastle and his own home, talking wildly to whomsoever would listen. The purpose of the burned Bond, Argyll's dictatorship, his meditated attack on the royal authority,—he poured all these dangerous secrets out to his comrade of the hour, careless who he might be. Once he talked in this strain in the presence of no less a person than old Leslie himself, as they were riding from Chester to Newcastle with a Colonel Cochrane. The prudent Colonel did not care for such talk in such company, and begged his rash lordship to change the subject. There might have been more dangerous listeners than Leslie, who was an honest man not given to making mischief, and, so long as his pay was safe and he did his duty by his soldiers, caring as little for one faction as the other. But it had been all one with Montrose who was by to hear him. Everything was going wrong. He could no longer trust the Covenant; he could not yet trust the King. His associates in the Bond, with one or two exceptions, had made their peace with the enemy. The Bond itself had been promptly burned, and the wildest stories circulated of its language and purpose.[9] Even among the more moderate Covenanters there were many who believed these stories, and looked askance at Montrose as an ambitious, unscrupulous, designing man, careless of his country and intent only on his own ends. Conscious of the popular suspicions, chafing against a false position from which he saw no present means of escape, uneasy, discontented, doubtful where to turn and whom to trust—there could be but one issue to the struggle between such a man in such a mood and Argyll. Nor could the issue be far distant. Argyll had but to sit still and wait. He could not play his game better than his rival was playing it for him.

In the spring of 1641, while the Scottish army still lay at Newcastle and their commissioners still wrangled in London over the price of their return, a family party of four used to meet almost daily in Edinburgh at Montrose's lodgings in the Canongate, or at Napier's old house of Merchiston on the Borough Moor. Besides the two brothers-in-law there were their nephew Sir George Stirling of Keir, and Sir Archibald Stewart of Blackhall who had married Keir's sister. Of course the talk ran on the old lines. How was this unhappy country to be saved, and who could save it? It was agreed that the only possible saviour was the King. He must come to Edinburgh when the Parliament met in the summer, and satisfy his Scottish subjects that he meant fairly by them, as these four had satisfied themselves he could and would. To establish their religion and liberties would be to establish his own authority; the people would rally to the Throne when they recognised that only under the shadow of the Throne could they hope to enjoy the blessings of a settled government, just laws, and a free religion. "For they assured themselves" (so runs Montrose's vindication) "that the King giving God His due, and the people theirs, they would give CÆsar that which was his." It was necessary to communicate with Charles, and most necessary to find a trusty messenger. They fixed upon a certain Walter Stewart of Traquair, who was on the eve of journeying to London on his own business, and whom, from his name, they conceived likely to get easy access to the Court. It was decided to approach the King through his cousin the Duke of Lennox, who was in high favour with his majesty, and had been employed in a similar capacity by the supplicants of 1637 to plead their grievances against Laud's prayer-book. There exists a paper in Napier's handwriting,—but evidently, from its similarity to the discourse on sovereign power mentioned in the last chapter, in great part, if not wholly, Montrose's composition,—which is believed to be the substance of the letter sent to Charles, and the tenor of his answer to Montrose strengthens the belief. All things, the King is told, depend on his personal presence in Scotland, the success of his affairs, the security of his authority, the peace and happiness of his subjects. It is useless to send a commissioner, no matter whom; he must come in person. The people bear him no ill-will, nor the Throne, nor will they suffer any attack to be made on it; their religion, as chosen by themselves, and their liberties as settled by the law of the land, are all they want. Let what they ask, if it be for their good, be granted, for that which tends to their good will assuredly include his own. But though the people should be justly treated and reasonably indulged, they should not be suffered to dispute his power. The sovereign power, he is warned, in words almost identical with those addressed to Montrose's Noble Sir, "is an instrument never subject yet handled well." A king's authority should be maintained to the height allowed by the law of God and Nature, and the fundamental laws of the country. If not it sinks into contempt; and "weak and miserable is that people whose prince hath not power sufficient to punish oppression, and to maintain peace and justice." On the other hand, he is warned not to aim at absoluteness, which of all people the Scots will least endure. "Practice, sir, the temperate government. It fitteth the humour and disposition of the nation best. It is most strong, most powerful, and most durable of any. It gladdeth the hearts of your subjects, and then they erect a throne for you to reign." He is bid to beware of Rehoboam's counsellors: "they are flatterers, and therefore cannot be friends; they follow your fortune and love not your person." Finally, he is urged to settle the high offices of State upon men chosen by himself according to his own knowledge of their ability and honesty. Men who owe their preferment to the recommendation of others will not serve him well if it must be to the prejudice of their patrons. Whether this wise and liberal letter was the only letter entrusted to Stewart by the Plotters, as they soon came to be called, is not clearly known, but of that hereafter. For the present, having seen his messenger safely off on his journey south, Montrose himself left Edinburgh on a visit to Lord Stormont at Scone Abbey.

It was an unfortunate visit. The company gathered to welcome Montrose was the worst he could have met in his present temper. Stormont had himself been a subscriber to the Bond, and was one of the few who had not made his peace with the enemy. There too was Athole, still smarting under the indignities suffered at Argyll's hands, and with Athole was his faithful henchman, John Stewart of Ladywell, Commissary of Dunkeld. It is easy to guess what were the subjects of conversation among such spirits. Unfortunately Montrose was not content with unburdening his sore mind to his friends. Some Covenanting ministers in the neighbourhood came ostensibly to pay their respects to him, and doubtless also to learn what such an ominous conjunction of malcontents might mean, and Montrose must needs also talk to them. He knew them all personally. They were John Graham of Auchterarder hard by his own castle of Kincardine, John Robertson of Perth, and Robert Murray of Methven. To the latter he was particularly anxious to explain himself, as one of the chief instruments of his subscription to the Covenant whose interests he was now accused of having sold. All the secret history of the Bond was accordingly poured into Murray's curious ears, of the treason it was designed to thwart, of the Dictatorship and the Triumvirate, of his intention to clear himself by challenging Argyll to his face before Parliament. It was known that Murray had been talking to Montrose, and his colleagues were not long in extracting from him all he had to tell. This was reported, doubtless with some embellishments, at the next meeting of the Presbytery at Auchterarder, and of course at once carried down to Argyll. Graham, when summoned to answer for his words, quoted Murray: Murray quoted Montrose; and so at last the long-gathering storm burst.

Never in any crisis of his life was Montrose slow to accept the consequences of his own acts. He frankly owned that Argyll, whom Murray had not dared to name before the Committee, was the man he aimed at; that he had done so partly on his own knowledge, partly on the authority of others who would bear him out; and he concluded by a direct appeal to Argyll to say what he knew of the business. Argyll swore that he had never heard of it before, and that the man who said he had ever uttered treason against the King was a base liar. Montrose then named his witnesses. Lord Lindsay of the Byres, he said, had spoken to him of the Dictatorship. The man who had reported the talk against the King was John Stewart of Ladywell. For the Triumvirate, he referred the Committee to Argyll's proposed colleagues, Cassillis and Mar, and to others, also named, who were present when the plan was framed.

Ladywell was instantly summoned, and corroborated all that his word had been pledged for. Argyll broke into a storm of passionate denial, but the witness stood firm. "My lord," he said, "I heard you speak these words in Athole in presence of a great many people, whereof you are in good memory." Lindsay was next examined. He admitted the conversation, but persisted that he had not named Argyll. Montrose could say no more than that if his memory had played him false on this point, at least the tenor of Lindsay's words had left him in no doubt at whom they were aimed. This relieved the Committee from an embarrassing position. Lindsay's admissions, coming on the back of Ladywell's sworn evidence, had grievously disturbed them. If Montrose was right, two of their stoutest champions had been dabbling in what their own articles condemned as treason. But as Montrose had admitted the possibility of being mistaken in one instance it was open to assume that he had been mistaken in all. They accordingly reported to that effect. Lindsay's words, they found, did not bear Montrose's interpretation.

There still remained Ladywell to deal with. A man cursed with such an inconvenient memory could not safely be suffered to go at large, and the unfortunate creature had already been for days under close ward in the Castle. All good Covenanters were now rejoiced, and probably not much surprised, to hear that he had confessed to have done Argyll wrong. The treasonable speeches made in Athole were, he now said, his own fabrication, and further that he had been persuaded to send copies of them to the King by Montrose's messenger, Walter Stewart. A watch was accordingly set for Stewart; he was arrested on his way home at Cockburnspath, between Berwick and Dunbar, and sent to keep his namesake company in the Castle.

A man who denies his oath under pressure of fear is not easily believed, except by those who expect to profit by his denial. But it is probable that Ladywell's second story was the true one. For, after all, his confession amounted to no more than this, that Argyll's conversation had been rather historical than personal; he had spoken generally of the relation of subjects to their kings, not directly of Charles and Scotland. This is certainly more consistent with Argyll's character, who was not wont to let his tongue go too freely in any company, and would hardly have selected an audience of loyal Ogilvies and Atholemen for such confidences. Argyll indeed still swore that he had not broached the subject at all, and brought a crowd of Campbells to bear him out. But Ladywell's amended version was corroborated by the only one of his witnesses who was summoned. It seems on the whole impossible to doubt that Argyll had been making some experiments on the national temper in the direction of what even his own party was as yet obliged to call treason. These things were in the air. Clarendon's report of his conversation with Henry Martin at Westminster shows what was in many minds at this time, and Argyll's own speeches in Parliament during the previous year had gone some little way on the same road. Ladywell's partial recantation did not save him. Perhaps it was too partial; perhaps his exoneration of Montrose from any share in his deception disappointed his judges; perhaps they resolved not to run the risk of a third version. At all events, when he had signed his confession, he was sent back to prison, tried under that old statute of leasing-making which had raised such an outcry when revised four years ago by Charles against Balmerino, found guilty, and executed. To Guthrie, who attended him on the scaffold, the poor creature asserted at the last that he had been induced to bear false witness against himself by promises of pardon and reward. But when a man once begins to go back on his own words, even his most probable version must be received cautiously.

The other prisoner, Walter Stewart, proved a more valuable prize. To clear Argyll was after all no great matter, for Argyll was strong enough to clear himself. The important point was to convict Montrose. A letter to him from the King was discovered in the lining of Stewart's saddle. There was nothing in its language capable of being turned to his discredit, but it could be construed as an answer to some previous communication, and it certainly established the fact of a secret correspondence between the two which was contrary to the articles of the Covenant. And this was not all. Papers of a more suspicious nature were discovered—papers in Stewart's own hand, written in a strange jargon, where letters, phrases, and sometimes the names of animals were substituted for the names of persons. Stewart explained these as the heads of certain instructions entrusted to him by the Plotters to be delivered to the King through the hands of Lennox and Traquair. The Elephant or Serpent stood for Hamilton, the Dromedary for Argyll, Montrose himself was the Genero, the letters A B C signified the four conspirators—and so forth. The papers also contained some suggestions as to the preferment of Montrose and himself, and a warning that if they were neglected it would go ill with the King.

Stewart, like his namesake, did not keep to one story. He altered much, added something, contradicted himself many times. Traquair, who was then in London, flatly denied all knowledge of the papers, nor would he believe that Montrose or any man of sense, if minded to play such a dangerous game, would have taken into his confidence a timorous half-witted fool like Stewart. The King wrote in his own hand to Argyll one of his ambiguous letters, committing himself to nothing beyond a declaration that his journey to Scotland had not been prompted by Montrose or Traquair to their own ends, but was intended solely to settle all disputes on the terms of the new treaty, and that he had given no promises of office to any man. He avowed his letter to Montrose as one fit to be written by a king to a good subject. Finally, he requested Argyll to do him right in this matter, and not permit him to be unjustly suspected. The day before this letter reached Edinburgh the four Plotters were arrested and sent as prisoners to the Castle.

Stewart's story, or stories, unquestionably rested on some foundation of truth, but on how much no man can tell. The accused, with the exception of Montrose, confessed to have talked with Stewart, but denied all knowledge of his hieroglyphics. Keir, indeed, owned to have been shown a paper by him containing some general propositions on public affairs which he understood to have been submitted to Charles by Lennox, and the King's answers. He gave a copy of it to Napier, but nothing seems to have been said either then or afterwards as to the author. Beyond this we cannot go. From this point of view Argyll and his faction were of course justified in regarding Montrose and his friends as conspirators. They were conspiring against Argyll, whom they believed to be the worst enemy of their country no less than of the King. Under his rule the Covenant had sunk to a mere faction, in which no honest patriot could any longer bear part or lot. They had persuaded themselves that salvation could come only by the King. He had promised all that a reasonable people could expect from him, and if he would hesitate no more nor go back again upon his word all would be well. While Argyll was carrying all before him, they could only work for their country's good in secret. So far they were undoubtedly conspirators. Napier would have been soon set free at an early stage of the proceedings. He was an old man, much respected and liked by all parties. But he would not accept a favour which would imply, he said, a tacit confession of his guilt. Whatever their crime might be, they all shared it equally. Montrose refused, always courteously but persistently refused, to answer any questions before the Committee. If he was guilty, he said, let him be brought to a public trial. He was declared contumacious, and an order issued to make search for further evidence of treason against him. His servants were examined, his houses ransacked, his cabinets broken open, and his private papers read; but only one document was found that could by any ingenuity be turned against him. This was a defence of the Cumbernauld Bond, written, he assured the Committee, for his own private satisfaction only, now that the Bond had been burned and the whole affair, as he had supposed, laid for ever to rest. The Covenanting historians have described it as an "infamous and scurvey libel, full of vain humanities, magnifying to the skies his own courses, and debasing to hell his opposites." But as they have omitted to allow posterity the means of determining the justice of their description, and as Montrose's public writings and speeches certainly do not justify it, we may conclude that party feeling had something to do with these tremendous epithets. The Covenanters had in truth a profound belief in the wisdom of the advice embodied at a later day in the well-known formula, Give your judgment, but never give your reasons. They burned the Bond, they burned its justification, and then they thundered against both in safety. And they took the same prudent course in another matter. In one of Montrose's cabinets were found some letters written in earlier and happier years by ladies with whom the young gallant had danced and exchanged compliments in the flowery fashion of the time. Their contents were never made public, but evil things were freely circulated of them to the edification of the sterner sort of Puritans; though others held that Lord Sinclair, who had been entrusted with the search, had played no honourable part in chattering of such private matters.

Such was the position of affairs when the King arrived in Edinburgh on the evening of August 14th, 1641. As usual he was received with every semblance of respect. The nobles thronged to Holyrood to kiss his hand; Argyll made flattering speeches to him in Parliament; he was entertained at a splendid banquet, where his health was drunk in right loyal fashion. He attended the Presbyterian service zealously, and talked much with Henderson. He drove with Leslie, who had now brought his army back from England, through the city amid the cheers of a delighted crowd. But this halcyon weather could not last long. The time came to fill those vacant offices of State which Montrose was accused of claiming for himself and his friends; then Argyll put forth his hand, and the mortified King soon found that it was the hand which now practically wielded the sceptre of Scotland. An Act was passed, making the King's choice of his ministers dependent on the will of Parliament. It was next moved that Parliament should have the right of submitting their own nominees to the King, and that no one who had sided with him during the late troubles should be eligible. These arbitrary measures provoked indeed much discontent among the nobles, who had not stood up against the King to crouch under Argyll. "If this be what you call liberty," cried Perth, "God give me the old slavery again." But under their new Lords of the Articles the nobles, even if united, could no longer command a majority in Parliament; each Estate now chose its own lords, and out of the three two almost to a man followed Argyll. Outside the House, however, they had still to be reckoned with, and there the clamour against the popular leader was rising high. For the moment it was aimed even more against Hamilton, who, with his brother Lanark, was now openly courting Argyll, as against a renegade who had deserted both his faith and his friend. Ker, Lord Roxburgh's son, a headstrong young man who had once quarrelled and fought under the flag of the Covenant, publicly challenged Hamilton as a traitor. He was forced to apologise before the House, but he came up the High Street to make his submission escorted by six hundred armed retainers, and there were many who took a less tumultuous way of showing their sympathy with his action. Even Charles now found it a hard matter to keep his belief in the favourite unshaken.

At this juncture the King received a letter on which, after much reflection, he determined to take counsel. Twice already had Montrose written from his prison praying for an interview on matters of the deepest moment. The King would not see him nor answer his letters; a man in Montrose's position, he said, would promise much to secure an audience. Montrose now wrote a third time, no longer vaguely hinting of danger, but directly offering to prove some one, whom he did not name, but who was clearly Hamilton, a traitor. It was impossible to disregard warnings that now began to match so well with his own suspicions. Charles determined to lay the letter before the Chancellor, Loudon, and others, including Argyll himself, and to ask their advice.

Suddenly all Edinburgh broke into uproar. The news spread like wildfire that a plot had been discovered to murder Argyll, Hamilton, and Lanark, and that they had fled the city in fear of their lives. It was true that they had gone. Late on the evening of October 11th, the evening of the day on which the King had received Montrose's last letter, the three men had been warned of their danger by Leslie, and on the next day they left the city. But what was the danger, and from what quarter did it come? Leslie, when questioned, answered carelessly that the whole affair was a foolish business not worth talking of. On the afternoon of the 12th the King went down to Parliament to declare all he knew of the mystery. All he knew, if he told them all, was little enough. It really amounted to no more than that Hamilton had talked strangely to him of plots and calumnies, that he was very fond of Hamilton, and that it hurt him grievously to find himself distrusted by his friend. Finally he urged that his own credit, no less than Hamilton's, demanded an instant and public inquiry before the whole House. But Parliament insisted on the examination being conducted by a select committee; and after an unseemly wrangle lasting over several days, the King had to give way. The truth is that the Parliament had already begun to make inquiries, and what they had learned suggested the possibility of some awkward disclosures. The Earl of Crawford, a fiery old Papist who had learned fighting in the German wars and had carried Ker's challenge to Hamilton, had already been arrested, with some lesser men. It was known that Montrose had been in communication with the King, and they not unreasonably suspected both of being at least privy to the plot, if not of favouring it. It is impossible even to guess how much the King knew, but there can be little doubt that Montrose was in the secret. The story, first circulated by Clarendon, that he had offered at a private interview with the King to kill both Hamilton and Argyll, as the surest and speediest means of bringing a couple of traitors to their deserts, is now generally and justly discredited. But Clarendon, it should be remembered, gave two versions of this perplexing affair. The King, he writes, was warned by certain persons in the confidence of Montrose that Argyll and Hamilton were playing him false, and his leave was asked to bring them to justice. The majority of the nobles, he was told, were on his side, and ready, if he consented, to take the two traitors out of the reach of their retainers and lodge them securely in prison to await fair trial. While the King, doubtful of the chance of bringing their guilt home to such high offenders, was pondering these things, the two men (Lanark's name is not mentioned in Clarendon's story) suddenly and secretly left the capital on the plea that their enemies were plotting to murder them. Then followed a confused period of debates in Parliament, appointment of committees, examination of witnesses, charges and counter-charges, after which the fugitives returned to Edinburgh, acknowledging to the King that the danger, though assuredly no mere fancy, was perhaps less pressing than they had been led to believe; and so the trouble passed gradually away. Such in substance is Clarendon's original version of what is known in Scottish history as the Incident, and two centuries of research have enabled us to add little to it. But such is not the version that first appeared in Clarendon's pages. Twenty years after he had finished the greater part of the History of the Rebellion, he began, in banishment at Montpellier, to write the history of his own life. Many passages were subsequently transferred from the more private narrative to the pages of the History, and among them one in which Montrose's share in the Incident takes a new and startling complexion. He is now directly charged with offering to play the assassin. No authority is vouchsafed for the new story. For the old one Charles, and indirectly Montrose himself, stand sponsors. Clarendon did not live to finally revise the transcript of his History, and we can only therefore conjecture his reasons for changing an intelligible, if meagre, narrative of events, matching well with all that has been subsequently learned concerning them, for a grave personal charge which there is no tittle of evidence to prove. Such as it was, however, the History was published with all its imperfections on its head, nor did the world learn till more than a century later that there was another version of this strange story, clearing the memory of a brave and honourable man from an odious imputation.[10]

In this earlier version we probably have the true story of the Incident in outline. But all attempts to fill the outline in lead only to confusion. It is certain that there was a strong party among the nobles violently incensed against Hamilton and Argyll. Some, like Montrose, were no doubt convinced that these two men were playing both their king and country false; others were merely jealous of an influence won and exercised at their expense. The former were bent only on a fair trial; but to talk of a fair trial was idle while the culprits went at large with five thousand armed men at their back; the sole chance of proving their guilt was to render them incapable of resistance during its proof. Such was probably the original plan of the Incident, and if not devised by Montrose would assuredly have found no opposition from him; and such, it is not unreasonable to suppose, would have been his proposal to the King had his petition for a private interview been granted. Strange diseases, to borrow Argyll's own words, need strange remedies; and to enforce justice by violence, if it could be secured in no other way, would have shocked few Scotsmen of that day. Such at least, if the witnesses spoke truth, was the plan as it had shaped itself in Almond's mind, who intended and would tolerate no more than was needed to ensure the straight course of the law. But the secret was shared by more unscrupulous spirits than Montrose or Almond. Carnwath had been heard to say with many curses that there were now three kings in Scotland, and that two of them must lose their heads. Crawford, who was to have been entrusted with the seizure, was reported to have declared that the best way to bring traitors to justice was to cut their throats. It was probably through such wild speeches that the plot miscarried. Many a man, and Montrose among them, had doubtless been well pleased to see Argyll or Hamilton at his sword's point on a fair field, who would lend no countenance to stabber's work. But it is not safe to put much reliance on the evidence of the witnesses. All of them contradicted each other, and many contradicted themselves. Conspicuous among them was William Murray, a member of the royal household and high in his master's confidence, who, unless foully wronged by history, was the most unconscionable rogue of all that treacherous time. He seems indeed to have been no better than a spy in the pay both of the Scottish Covenant and the English Parliament, and he was certainly intriguing at the same time with both Hamilton and Montrose. But in truth a suspicion of insincerity hangs over the whole inquiry. The Parliament were manifestly unwilling to press matters too closely. They would have been well pleased to prove the plot, could they have selected the plotters, and they did not want to hear too much about its intended victims.

On one point, however, they were firm. They determined to know the truth of the correspondence between Montrose and the King. Charles showed them the last letter, the letter on which he had decided to ask their advice before the storm of the Incident burst. Nothing was to be learned from it. It was couched in general terms, promising, if admitted to an interview, "to acquaint his Majesty with a business which not only did concern his honour in a high degree, but the standing and falling of his crown likewise." Montrose was twice examined on the meaning of these ambiguous words, once in the presence of the King at Holyrood by a special committee, and again before the general committee of inquiry. Both examinations were fruitless. Of the first there is no record; but from the meagre report preserved of the second Montrose seems to have adhered at both to the literal text of his letter, and to have declined to commit himself to any more definite statement. He did not intend, he is reported to have said, "neither could he, nor would he, wrong any particular person whatsoever." This answer, it is naÏvely added, did not give the House satisfaction.

It was all the satisfaction they were to get. Wearied with an examination that would plainly not discover what they wished to find, and might discover what they wished to conceal, with fresh and more serious matters for thought in the startling news of the Irish rising, Parliament suffered the Incident to die a natural death. The fugitives were welcomed back to the capital with the assurance that they were honest men, loyal subjects, and good patriots. Argyll on his return carried all before him. The offices of State were filled with his nominees. The Privy Council was carefully weeded to make room for his friends. The unfortunate King, to fill the cup of his humiliation full, scattered titles with a lavish hand. Argyll was raised to a marquisate; Almond was created Earl of Callendar; bluff old Leslie took his seat among the peers of Scotland as Earl of Leven. To complete the burlesque, Crawford was released from custody without more ado, at the particular request of the magnanimous heroes whose throats he was to have cut. Even Montrose and his friends were suffered to share in the general amnesty, though after a colder fashion. On November 16th, after an imprisonment of five months without a trial, and without any specific allegation of offence, they were discharged with a caution "to carry themselves soberly and discreetly" for the future, and to appear for trial when required. Charles bound himself never to employ their services again without the consent of Parliament, or suffer them to approach his presence; and on the 18th of November he left Scotland for the last time, a contented prince, as he professed to believe, taking leave of a contented people.

It was not till the following March that the case against the Plotters was finally closed. The mockery of their trial was continued at intervals throughout the winter, but no fresh evidence was found against them, no report of their examination was ever published, nor indeed was any formal judgment ever delivered. It had been decided that sentence should be left to the King. The committee, in short, was playing the same game that had already proved so successful in the affairs of the Bond and the Incident. By keeping the inquiry secret the real weakness of their case was concealed, and by refraining from a punishment that they could not inflict they acquired an easy reputation for mercy, while leaving the accused open to every charge that the imagination of fear or faction could devise. It was even intimated that the prisoners owed their escape to Argyll's clemency. Argyll's clemency consisted in refusing to press matters to an extremity which he foresaw might prove more inconvenient to his friends than to his enemies. But in truth he could have afforded to be merciful. For the second time Montrose had challenged him on his own ground, and for the second time victory, even more signally than before, had declared for him.