authority had practically ceased to exist. There was now a proposal that judges and officers of state should be elected in Parliament; and it did not require much knowledge of Scottish society to be aware that such an arrangement would put the administration of the laws entirely in the hands of those of the great houses which were to be found on the popular side.

Montrose had been recently explaining his political principles in a letter to the King. Sovereign power, he said, must exist in every State. It might be placed, according to the circumstances of each country, in the hands of a democracy, an aristocracy, or a monarchy. In Scotland it must be entrusted to a monarchy. The nobles were incapable of postponing their private interests to the public good. The people were too easily led astray to offer a secure foundation for a stable government. Let the King, therefore, come in person to Scotland to preside over the coming Parliament. Let him freely grant to his subjects the exercise of their religion and their just liberties. Let him be ready to consult parliaments frequently, in order to learn the wants of the people, and win his subjects' hearts by ruling them with wisdom and moderation.1

It was excellent advice, but Charles was not very likely to take it. If he was bent on coming to Edinburgh, it was not because he was burning with impatience to understand the wants of his Scottish subjects, but because he hoped to avail himself of their assistance in his quarrel with his English subjects. Whether the Scots were qualified for self-government or not, they were shrewd enough to resist an attempt to flatter them into becoming a mere instrument of attack upon the English Parliament.

About the middle of May it was known that Montrose had been talking loosely of his knowledge that Argyle had formed a plan for deposing the King. Evidence was taken, and, on the 27th, he was summoned before the Committee of Estates. In the face of Argyle he boldly maintained his ground. He gave the authority on which his statement had been based—that of Lord Lindsay and

May 27. Montrose before the Committee

of Estates.

1 Napier, Memorials of Montrose, ii. 43.

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PARTIES IN SCOTLAND.

397

John Stewart of Ladywell. Lindsay explained that what he had said had no more than a general significance. Stewart maintained the truth of the charge, and was thrown into prison.

Walter

Stewart.

Before further proceedings were taken, a certain Walter Stewart was captured on his way from London to Edinburgh. On him was June 4. found a paper, to be presented to the King by Lennox Capture of and Traquair, in which, under the jargon of feigned names, were concealed warnings to the King against Hamilton's influence. With these were mingled assurances that Charles would be well received in Scotland if he came prepared to grant to the people their religion and just liberties. The paper also purported to contain the King's reply to some further proposal made to him by Montrose, apparently to the effect that Argyle was to be charged with treason.

It may be that, as Montrose averred, this paper was drawn up by Stewart, and not by himself. It may even be true that he had not given Stewart any positive instructions to suggest the accusation of Argyle to the King. But there can be little doubt that the scheme was one which he had entertained, and it is just possible that Stewart's paper may have been the jottings of a messenger anxious to keep in mind all the loose talk which had been spoken in his presence. Montrose's explanation, not very probable in itself, was not likely to be accepted by the Scottish leaders. Together with his brother-in-law, Lord Napier, Stirling of Keir, and Stewart of Blackhall, who were implicated with him as the joint contrivers of the intrigue, he was summoned before the Committee of Estates, and all four were committed to custody in the Castle. The resolution was no doubt prompted by the feeling that to come to a private understanding with the King was to separate from the national cause.1

June 11. Imprison

ment of Montrose.

1 The feeling of moderate men was expressed by Lothian. "I fear the King yet be engaged to further discontent if he come, for he will not find our Parliament so submissive and slavish as the last, nor will a pen to mark men's names hinder free voting and speaking. This work must go through or our rest must go upon it, and the parties inviting him will, in their undertakings, leave him in the mire, as others have done before." Later on the same writer says of Montrose: "In winter indeed, when the Band was

Charles felt the full bearing of these revelations upon himself. In the Privy Council he protested that if he had resolved to go to Scotland, it was 'not to make distractions, but to settle peace.' Traquair distinctly asserted that neither the King nor Lennox knew anything of the scheme for accusing Argyle.1

June 18. Charles attempts to clear him

self.

Charles's object.

It is probable enough that the idea of attacking Argyle was more agreeable to Montrose than to Charles. What Charles wanted was not to establish his authority in Scotland, but so to pacify Scotland as to bring its influence to bear on England, or at least to prevent its influence being used against himself. Already during the first half of June the courtiers were looking eagerly for any sign of disagreement between the two Houses, which might follow on the rejection of the Bishops' Exclusion Bill.2 Already, too, Charles had engaged in a second Army Plot. At the end of May or the beginning of June, Army Plot. Daniel O'Neill, an officer who had taken part in the first plot, had been sent down to sound Conyers and Astley as to the feasibility of bringing up the army to London if the Proposed neutrality of the Scots could be assured. A Captain petition. Legg was entrusted by the King with a petition, to which he was to obtain signatures in the army. At the foot of

The second

burnt, I did what I could to quiet matters, and bring him off, and he thought I did him good offices. But now I took not so much pains, for his often relapses are not to be endured, and his practices will be found much to the prejudice of the public, and very malicious against particular men, who, to my knowledge, deserve it not at his hands."-Lothian to Ancrum, May 23, July 6, Correspondence of the Earls of Ancrum and Lothian, I. 121, 126.

There are rough notes of this scene in Vane's hand which I found amongst the Irish State Papers. They have since been transferred to the Domestic series. The words assigned to the King are: "It is not to make distractions, but to settle peace, which is not to be done by any but myself. The Commissioners in [? of] Scotland have cleared him, and therefore he desires you to hear my Lord Traquair. A foolish business concerning Captain Wal. Stewart." The documents relating to this affair are printed in Napier's Memorials of Montrose.

2 Giustinian to the Doge, June

18 28'

Ven. Transcripts.

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ANOTHER ARMY PLOT.

399

it were written a few words to commend it to Astley's notice, to which the King's initials were appended by himself.1

The petitioners, after thanking the King for his many concessions to his people, complained of the turbulent and mutinous persons who were daily forging new and unreasonable demands; and who, whilst all men of reason, loyalty, and moderation were thinking how they might provide for his Majesty's 'honour and plenty,' were only aiming at the diminution of his 'just regalities.' They then asserted that 'these ill-affected persons were backed in their violence by the multitude, and power of raising tumults; that thousands flock at their call and beset the Parliament and Whitehall;' not only 'to the prejudice of that freedom which is necessary to great councils and judicatories, but possibly to some personal danger of your sacred Majesty and the Peers.' Due punishment ought to be inflicted on the ringleaders of those tumults. "For the suppression of which," such was the final conclusion of the petition, "in all humility we offer ourselves to wait upon you, if you please, hoping we shall appear as considerable in the way of defence to our gracious Sovereign, the Parliament, our religion, and the established laws of the kingdom, as what number soever shall audaciously presume to violate them; so shall we, by the wisdom of your Majesty and the Parliament, not only be vindicated from precedent innovations, but be secured from the future that are threatened, and likely to produce more dangerous effects than the former."2

Charles's view of the situation.

The language of this petition reveals the view which Charles took of the situation. He would abide by the law, but there was no law to compel him to give the royal assent to Bills which he held to be injurious to his own rights and to the good of the nation. Once he had given way against his conscience to the dictation of a London mob. He would do so no more. He was in his right in asking the army to repel force by force and to overpower the violence of a turbulent populace.

1 The whole evidence of this affair is to be found in D'Ewes's Diary, under the date of Nov. 17, Harl. MSS. clxiv. fol. 157 b.

2 Clarendon, iii. 170. As Hallam discovered, this petition is misplaced in date, so as to connect it with the former plot.

Its weak

ness.

If only government were a mere affair of technical legality, it would be difficult to detect a flaw in this reasoning. Unhappily for Charles there are laws inherent in the constitution of human nature which are less easy to be defied than any which are to be found in the books of English lawyers. Puritanism was an existing fact, and Charles made no sign of any disposition to allow it any weight whatGovernment can never be conducted in the mere spirit of negation. Charles could object to the Church reforms proposed by the Commons. He had no solution of his own to offer, no plan for marking the difference between the Episcopacy of the future and the Episcopacy of the past.

éver.

Failure of the plot.

The second Army Plot, like the first, came to nothing. Conyers and Astley would hear nothing of it, and O'Neill, having been summoned before a committee of the Commons to give an account of his connection with the former plot, sought safety in flight. It seemed as if Charles would be willing to acknowledge his obligation to rule in agreement with his Parliament. On the 22nd the King gave his assent to a Tonnage and Poundage Bill, conveying those duties to him for a limited time-a time which was to expire as early as July 15. By this Bill Charles surrendered for ever his claim to levy customs duties of any kind without a Parliamentary grant. He intended, as he said when he passed the Bill, to 'put himself wholly upon the love and affection of his people for his subsistence.' As for the idle rumours which had reached his ears about an extraordinary way, he had 'never understood it otherwise than as having relation to the Scottish army, and preventing insurrection, which vanished as soon as they were born.'1

June 22. The Tonnage and Poundage Bill.

What Charles in this ill-constructed sentence called preventing insurrection, Pym would call overawing Parliament.

June 24.

It is hazardous to suppose that Pym had no information on the second Army Plot because no such information was publicly disclosed till five months later. But, even if this were the case, the news from Scotland was

Pym's proposals.

Rushworth, iv. 297.