King's great strength can only lie; and let us not, from a design to preserve either party, lose effectually both; for the one is safe, upon taking of right measures, and the other will be at best uncertain and not to be relied on in a day of trouble."

(Leven Papers, p. 359.)

"31 Dec. 1689.

"I am much concerned at the continuing opposition to the Presbyterian interest, and strong endeavours for restoring the other, and deeply weighted at the storm arisen against your lordship. If you quit your post, I desire a liberty likewise from the King to retire; for the same motives which render you uneasy will lay me aside; and I incline to have no share in the civil government, though I should be put to beg my livelihood, where I cannot serve the interests of Christ, his Church and people, to any advantage, and without resiling in some measure from my principle, the adhering to which has given me peace, yea comfort, in my greatest straits. I hope, in all the capacities I shall ever be trysted with, to serve his Majesty faithfully and affectionately, not only out of duty to him as my King, but from a peculiar respect and love to his person; yet, if he judges it his concern that Presbytery be not established in this nation, I expect that favour of him, that he conclude not my retiring a wearying of his service. . . I am still of the same opinion as I was at first, anent your lordship's management, that it is your truest policy to act for Presbytery with all the zeal that is consistent with knowledge; for, though your lordship should be remiss, you will never be agreeable to the opposite party, and your appearing for God frankly will bring his blessing on your person and family, and a yielding to or complying in part with adversaries may provoke Him to pour out his wrath. It was Elijah's great commendation, that he had been very jealous for the Lord God of hosts,-O that this may be the motto of my family, though our condition should be among the meanest in the nation; and that we may be helped to follow God fully, avowedly, and without all reserve!—for I am convinced none will be losers at his hand at long run, and those who venture for Him seldom want (go without) their reward here."

(Leven Papers, p. 376.)

"I shall once more repeat, what I have oft said on this subject, that no Episcopal man, since the late happy revolution, whether laic or of the clergy, hath suffered by the Council upon the account of his opinion in Church matters, but allenarly (solely) for their disowning the civil authority, and setting up for a cross interest. If I make not this good, I shall willingly forfeit my credit with his Majesty and all good men."

No. XL.-PAGE 252.

The "Country" of the Lindsays of the Byres.

(From A Letter from Fife,' by Mr. Ebenezer Anderson, Edinburgh Magazine,' 1823.)

"A few mornings ago, when the frost was keen and the air elastic, and the snow scarcely admitted of an impression from the foot, I sallied out to visit Struthers, the old family residence of the House of Lindsay and Crawford, a name which, next perhaps to that of Stuart, has left the most indelible remembrance of former sway and magnificence within the bosom of this kingdom.' As I stood upon the eminence which looks down upon the Urbs Tricollis,' (Cupar-Fife,) from the South, and cast my eye abroad over the Strath of Eden, the estuary of the Tay, the Braes of Angus, and the still more remote range of Grampian magnificence by which the horizon towards the North is bounded, I felt a corresponding expansion and amplification within me; I breathed freer and more assured, assimilating as it were to the character of that immensity which it was my delight to contemplate.

"In narrowing and circumscribing the field of my vision, my eye came at last to rest upon 'The Mount,' immediately before me, and lying at about a mile's distance towards the North-West from Cupar. This could not fail to suggest to my mind the image and the character of the father of Scottish song and the champion of Scottish independence, that famous and worthy knight, Sir David Lindsay, Lord Lyon King at Arms, cujus,' according to the expressive motto to his works, 'vivit etiam post funera virtus.'

Into that park I saw appear

An aged man, that drew me near,
Whase beard was near three quarter lang;
His hair down o'er his shoulders hang,
The whilk as ony snaw was white,-
Whom to behold I thought delight.'

-And truly it was indeed delightful to image out this venerable aged man' in those very habiliments in which the genius of the author had so imperishably invested him! And as I pursued in my musings the purposings which have so long been carried into effect, I could not forbear from repeating those lines which seem now to partake of the nature of prophecy,—

Howbeit that divers cunning clerks

In Latin tongue have written sundry books,
The unlearnit knows little of their warks
Mair than they do the croaking of the rooks;
Wherefore to calliates, carriers, and to cooks-
To Jock and Tam my rhyme shall be directit !'

And hence, in consequence of this popular and accommodating resolution, every old woman in Scotland, who never heard in all likelihood of Bede or Duns Scotus, is yet quite familiar with Davie Lindsay.'

"In the middle of the valley, immediately beneath me, and embosomed in an extensive and suitable plantation of pines, the magnificent modern mansion

of the present representative of the family of Lindsay and Crawford" (the late Lady Mary Lindsay Crawford) "arises. . .

"Towards the East, and in the centre of a table-land, or elevated plain, about half a mile distant from the village of Ceres, the mansion-house, now altogether obliterated, of the famous Lindsay of Pitscottie was formerly situated. It was here that this historian of his native land lived, whilst he was employed in composing that work which is well calculated to transmit his name to the latest ages.-And last of all, in this enumeration of 'Lindsay worthies,' turn we, as originally proposed, towards the South, and there we shall perceive, betwixt us and the declining sun, the ragged and irregular outline of the ruins of Struthers. Here, however, there is nothing either of decayed grandeur or scarcely obliterated magnificence to reward our investigation. Upon approaching this venerable ruin from the North, I found the vestiges of a very princely avenue, and had the gratification, whilst scrambling over dilapidated walls and under damp and low arches, to see a hen-wife feeding poultry, and an unseemly goat munching at kail-blades where the most noble of all the land' had been accustomed to call forth their merry men for the chase, or to caparison and marshal out their retainers for defence or attack."

Mr. Anderson proceeds to describe the family burial-place at Ceres, and to sketch the history of John, the Gallant Earl of Crawford,-but I prefer giving the following extracts from an interesting paper entitled, A Day in the West of Fife,' in Chambers' Edinburgh Journal :

6

"A few miles brought us to the rural village of Ceres, a pleasantly situated place, with a neatly-kept rivulet-bordered green, such as every village ought to have, though in our northern land this is the good fortune of very few. I had often heard of the burial-vault of the noble family of Crawford Lindsay, as being a sight worth seeing at this village, and to this object we lost no time in directing our steps. Close beside a large modern church of homely appearance, situated on the top of a high bank, is a small tile-covered building, which the grave-digger tells you is the tomb of the Lindsays! It was once a wing of the church, with a gallery for the use of the living family above, but is now disjoined; and it is accordingly to something like a potatohouse that the pilgrim is directed as the last home of a family which has filled Scottish history with its greatness and its deeds, from the time when the 'Lindsays light and gay' fought at Otterbourne, and two centuries before that time to boot, down to Dettingen and Fontenoy. We entered this poor earth-floored shed-for it was nothing better-and there found a few objects which I shall describe in order. Beside the wall, on the left, lay a full-sized stone figure of a gentleman in armour, being a distinguished member of the family who lived in the fourteenth century. Excepting in being broken through at the waist, it was in good condition, and a faithful memorial, no doubt, of the accoutrements of a warrior of that period. It formerly lay in the church, from which it was removed hither nearly forty years ago. The only other objects of a conspicuous nature were two frames or cases raised above the ground on skids, and which contained the remains of John Earl of

Crawford, a famous general of George II., and his wife. The lid of the larger case being raised, disclosed the top of a coffin covered with crimson velvet, and presenting a brass plate with the following inscription:- John Earl of Crawford, born 4th October, 1702; died 25th December, 1749, in the 48th year of his age.' The lid of the coffin itself being raised, showed a close coffin of lead, in which it is believed the embalmed body remains entire. It was with feelings which I should vainly attempt to describe that I felt myself in the bodily presence of the gallant and accomplished soldier, who, in the service of Russia, astonished even the Cossacks by his horsemanship—who, commanding the life-guards at Dettingen, cried out, My dear lads, trust to your swords, and never mind your pistols,' and charged to the tune of Britons strike home-who kept the passes into the Lowlands while poor Charles was staking all his hopes at Culloden; and on many other occasions acted a conspicuous part in an age of which hardly any living specimen can now exist. And his countess, the elegant Lady Jean Murray, who left him after only six months of wedded happiness, and before she had completed her twentieth year, and whom his affection caused to be embalmed, and sent from Aix-laChapelle, where she died, to this place what of her? A dusky, battered, metal cover, bearing the letters L. J. M., with a coronet, being lifted up from the case beside his lordship's coffin, we beheld beneath a quantity of mere rubbish, a mixture of decayed wood and bones, constituting all that now remains of 'what once had beauty, honours, wealth, and fame,' and was, besides, an object of the fondest solicitude to the best and bravest of men.

How loved, how honour'd once, avails thee not,

To whom related, or by whom begot;

A heap of dust alone remains of thee,

'Tis all thou art, and all the proud shall be.'

"Of all the other members of this ancient family buried here, no memorial remains, excepting three slab tombstones placed at the end of the vault on the outside, and which we found deeply covered with rubbish. Having got them cleared, I easily read upon one, 'HIC JACET Joannes Lindsay DOMINUS DE BYRES,' with the date of his death, 1562. The person referred to was John, fifth Lord Lindsay of the Byres, who commanded the Scottish army at the battle of Ancrum Moor, and was the father of that fierce reforming lord whom Scott describes in such lively terms in 'The Abbot,' as forcing Queen Mary at Loch Leven to resign her kingdom by sternly griping her arm. On the only other stone containing anything intelligible, I read the words EUPHAM DUGLIS. It was the monument of the wife of that savage lord, a daughter of the knight of Loch Leven, Queen Mary's jailor, and sister of the Regent Moray. Probably the other stone, as they were all of a size and similar in style, was the monument of Lord Patrick himself. These monumental slabs had once formed part of the floor of the church, but had been removed when that edifice was renewed in 1806; to such contingencies are the memorials of greatness exposed when a few ages have passed away. The line of these Lords Lindsay terminated in the great general above mentioned, who was fourth Earl of Lindsay, and twentieth Earl of Crawford. Now that great family has no acknowledged male representatives, their lands are in the

possession of others, and of their house of the Struthers, near Ceres, where they once lived in splendour, only a gable wall or two remains; the site of the garden being occupied by a modern farm-house."*

No. XLI.-PAGE 252.

Epitome of the Crawford Peerage Case with the Opinion of Counsel thereon, &c.—their Report (that is to say) on abandoning the Claim of John (Lindsay) Crawfurd and his Family to the Earldoms of Crawford and Lindsay in 1839. Reprinted.

In the year 1810 Mr. John Lindsay Crawfurd preferred a claim to the titles and estates of Crawfurd and Lindsay, as the nearest heir to the deceased George Earl of Crawfurd, and lineal descendant of James third son of John first Viscount Garnock. He produced much feasible parole proof in support of his allegations, but, unfortunately for his expectations, two schoolmasters he had employed to collect evidence anticipated the object of their commission, by supplying proofs from the resources of their own invention, and vitiating and otherwise altering genuine documents to suit their own theories. They then made an exorbitant demand upon the claimant for the services they had rendered him, which he refused to sustain; whereupon they made overtures to the responding party, into whose hands they transferred their papers. A trial on a charge of forgery was commenced, which ended in the conviction and transportation of the claimant in 1812, along with one of the forgers, the other having been admitted an approver.

It was all but universally believed at the time that the claimant had fallen a victim to an overwhelming influence, abetted by the purchased services of these unprincipled persons, who had violated truth and conscience to promote a nefarious object. The public sympathy was roused in his favour, and many statements sent abroad bearing the names of magistrates-of clergymen—of professional and other equally respectable individuals, tending strongly to strengthen the popular impression that he was not only an innocent and muchinjured man, but that he had been disposed of by a side wind," although the rightful heir to the titles and estates he claimed.

66

In 1820 the claimant returned from New South Wales, and immediately renewed proceedings to have himself served heir. Many noblemen and eminent professional men encouraged and patronized him, and many thousand pounds were expended in collecting evidence, and otherwise preparing his Case for the Lords' Committee of Privileges, where it had been referred by

"Struthers is described by Sibbald as a large old house, with gardens, great orchards, and vast enclosures and plantations.' Little of the house, with its towers and battlements, now remains, the greater portion of the buildings having been taken down, nor has the wood been spared." Swan's Hist. of Fife, tom. ii. p. 251.

That this was on the instigation of John Crawfurd himself appears from his letters to the confederates, printed in Mr. Dobie's Examination' of his claim, pp. 94 sqq.-L.