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 Quantum Field Theory

Quantum Field Theory (QFT), the language of particle physics, is crucial to a physicist’s
graduate education. Based on lecture notes for courses taught for many years at Radboud
University in the Netherlands, this book presents an alternative approach to teaching QFT
using Feynman diagrams. A diagrammatic approach to understanding QFT exposes young
physicists to an orthogonal introduction to the theory, bringing new ways to understand
challenges in the field. Diagrammatic techniques using Feynman diagrams are used didac-
tically, starting from simple discussions in lower dimensions to more complex topics in
the Standard Model. Worked-out examples and exercises help the reader develop a deep
understanding and intuition that enhance their problem-solving skills and understanding of
QFT. Classroom tested, this accessible textbook is valuable for physics graduates and for
researchers.

Ronald Kleiss has been a CERN staff member and is a full professor at Radboud University
in the Netherlands. Working in particle physics for more than 40 years, he was one of the
first theorists to develop Monte Carlo event generators for high-energy experiments.
Quantum Field Theory
A Diagrammatic Approach

Ronald Kleiss
Radboud University
 University Printing House, Cambridge CB2 8BS, United Kingdom
One Liberty Plaza, 20th Floor, New York, NY 10006, USA
477 Williamstown Road, Port Melbourne, VIC 3207, Australia
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It furthers the University’s mission by disseminating knowledge in the pursuit of
education, learning, and research at the highest international levels of excellence.

www.cambridge.org
Information on this title: www.cambridge.org/9781108486217
DOI: 10.1017/9781108665209
© Cambridge University Press 2021
This publication is in copyright. Subject to statutory exception
and to the provisions of relevant collective licensing agreements,
no reproduction of any part may take place without the written
permission of Cambridge University Press.
First published 2021
Printed in the United Kingdom by TJ Books Limited, Padstow Cornwall
A catalogue record for this publication is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Names: Kleiss, Ronald, author.
Title: Quantum field theory : a diagrammatic approach / Ronald Kleiss.
Description: New York : Cambridge University Press, 2021. | Includes
bibliographical references and index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2020056956 (print) | LCCN 2020056957 (ebook) | ISBN
9781108486217 (hardback) | ISBN 9781108665209 (ebook)
Subjects: LCSH: Quantum field theory.
Classification: LCC QC174.45 .K58 2021 (print) | LCC QC174.45 (ebook) |
DDC 530.14/3–dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020056956
LC ebook record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2020056957
ISBN 978-1-108-48621-7 Hardback
Cambridge University Press has no responsibility for the persistence or accuracy of
URLs for external or third-party internet websites referred to in this publication
and does not guarantee that any content on such websites is, or will remain,
accurate or appropriate.
The Ancients were wont to draw Diagrams & thus divine Predictions for future Happen-
ings, by Arts magickal or conjectural. . . . In like Wise will the Savants of Times Future
learn to employ Diagrams, yet not by Arts magickal, but rather by the Arithmetick & Arts
algebraickal & by Geometrie and the Quadrature will they seek to foretell the Events of
Nature.

Inspired by Šimon Partlic

(Trest, 1590 – Trencin, 1640)
Astronomer and Mathematician
 Contents

Preface page xiii

1 QFT in Zero Dimensions 1

1.1 Introduction 1
1.2 Probabilistic Considerations 1
1.3 Diagrammatics 7
1.4 Synopsis of Feynman Rules 15
1.5 Exercises 15

2 The Loop Expansion and the Effective Action 19

2.1 Planck’s Constant 19
2.2 The Effective Action 23
2.3 The Wetterich Equation 29
2.4 Synopsis of Feynman Rules 30
2.5 Exercises 31

3 On Renormalization 36
3.1 Doing Physics: Mentality Against Reality 36
3.2 A Handle on Loop Divergences 39
3.3 Scale Dependence 42
3.4 The Method of Counterterms 48
3.5 Asymptotics of Renormalization 49
3.6 Exercises 53

4 More Fields in Zero Dimensions 56

4.1 The Action and the Path Integral 56
4.2 Connected Green’s Functions and Field Functions 57
4.3 The Schwinger–Dyson Equations 57
4.4 The Sum Rules Revisited 58
4.5 A Zero-Dimensional Toy for QED 59
4.6 The Wetterich Equation Revisited 62
4.7 Exercises 62

5 QFT in Euclidean Spaces 66

5.1 One-Dimensional Discrete Theory 66
vii
viii Contents

5.2 One-Dimensional Continuum Theory 70

5.3 The Momentum Representation 76
5.4 Doing It in Momentum Space 77
5.5 More-Dimensional Theories 79
5.6 Synopsis of Feynman Rules 82
5.7 Exercises 82

6 QFT in Minkowski Space 85

6.1 Marking Time 85
6.2 Moving in Minkowski Space: Particles 93
6.3 Synopsis of Feynman Rules 102
6.4 Exercises 102

7 Scattering Processes 105

7.1 Introduction 105
7.2 Incursion into the Scattering Process 105
7.3 How to Build Predictions 108
7.4 Unitarity Issues 114
7.5 Some Example Calculations 120
7.6 Calculations at the Threshold 124
7.7 Unitary Amplitudes and Resonances 127
7.8 Synopsis of Feynman Rules 130
7.9 Exercises 131

8 Introduction to Loop Calculations 134

8.1 The One-Loop Cook Book 134
8.2 Dispersion Relations 140
8.3 Exercises 143

9 More on Renormalization 147

9.1 Renormalizability, or Non-, or Super- 147
9.2 One-Loop Renormalization 152
9.3 The Callan–Symanzik Equation 158
9.4 Exercises 159

10 Dirac Particles 162

10.1 Pimp That Propagator 162
10.2 The Dirac Algebra 164
10.3 Dirac Spinors 174
10.4 Dirac Particles 180
10.5 The Fermi Sign for Dirac Particles 188
10.6 The Dirac Equation 191
10.7 Synopsis of Feynman Rules 193
10.8 Exercises 193
ix Contents

11 Helicity Techniques for Dirac Particles 198

11.1 The Standard Form for Spinors 198
11.2 Summary of Tools for Spinor Techniques 203
11.3 Fermionic Decays: The Fermi Model 203
11.4 Charged Pion Decay 209
11.5 Exercises 210

12 Vector Particles 213

12.1 Massive Vector Particles 213
12.2 The Spin-Statistics Theorem 218
12.3 Massless Vector Particles 220
12.4 Synopsis of Feynman Rules 225
12.5 Exercises 225

13 Quantum Electrodynamics 228

13.1 Introduction 228
13.2 Constructing QED 228
13.3 Some QED Processes 238
13.4 Scalar Electrodynamics 253
13.5 The Coulomb Potential 257
13.6 Electrons in External Fields: g = 2 258
13.7 Selected Topics in QED 261
13.8 Synopsis of the Vertices for QED 270
13.9 Exercises 271

14 Higher-Order Effects in QED 279

14.1 The Photon Self-Energy 279
14.2 The Fermion Self-Energy 288
14.3 Soft Bremsstrahlung 293
14.4 The Vertex Correction 304
14.5 The Infrared Sector 307
14.6 The Nonrelativistic Limit: g − 2 Revisited 309
14.7 The Running Coupling for QED 310
14.8 Light-by-Light: Fear, Loathing, and Relief 313
14.9 Exercises 316

15 Quantum Chromodynamics 321

15.1 Introduction: Colored Quarks and Gluons 321
15.2 Quarks and Gluons: First Feynman Rules 322
15.3 The Three-Gluon Interaction 326
15.4 The Four-Gluon Interaction 336
15.5 Current Conservation in QCD 338
15.6 Selected Topics in QCD 340
x Contents

15.7 Synopsis of the Vertices for QCD 344

15.8 Exercises 345

16 Higher-Order Effects in QCD 348

16.1 The Feynman Gauge 348
16.2 Picking Propagators 351
16.3 The Gluonic Self-Energy 353
16.4 The Ward Identity for QCD 356
16.5 The Running QCD Coupling 357
16.6 Exercises 360

17 Electroweak Theory 362

17.1 Muon Decay 362
17.2 The W Particle 364
17.3 The Z Particle 371
17.4 The Higgs Sector 379
17.5 Archeology of the Higgs Sector 391
17.6 Running Masses and the Top 392
17.7 About Anomalies 396
17.8 Remarks on What We Did 397
17.9 Toward a Nonminimal Higgs Sector 398
17.10 Quartic Divergences 401
17.11 Toward the Rξ Gauge 406
17.12 Synopsis of the Electroweak Vertices 413
17.13 Exercises 414

18 More Example Computations 419

18.1 Neutrino Production in e+ e- Scattering 419
18.2 W Pair Production in e+ e- Scattering 422
18.3 Higgs Coupling to Massless Vectors 428
18.4 Neutral Pion Decay 432
18.5 “Naturalness” for the Higgs Propagator 434
18.6 Exercises 437

Appendices 439
A Perturbative (Non)convergence Issues 439
B More on Symmetry Factors 442
C Derivation of the Diagrammatic Sum Rules 445
D Scale Dependence for Theories with More Parameters 447
E An Album of Diagrams 449
F Alternative Solutions to the SDe 455
G Diagram Counting 459
H Concavity of the Effective Action 467
I Functional Derivatives 469
xi Contents

J Cruel and Unusual Actions 470

K Newton’s First Law Revisited 474
L Unitarity Bounds 477
M Ambiguities in Pauli–Villars Regularization 480
N The Fundamental Theorem for Dirac Matrices 483
O A Ward Identity for the Three-Gluon Amplitude 485
P States of Higher Spin 487
Q Multiparticle Phase Space 502
R The CPT Theorem 507
S Factorially Divergent Series and Renormalization 511
T Mathematical Miscellanies 520

Bibliography 536
Index 538
 Preface

Why This Book?

This book grew out of lectures that I have been giving on quantum field theory (QFT)
for elementary-particle physics over the last 30 years or so. An internet search using the
terms “introduction” and “quantum field theory” yields millions of hits: what could I pos-
sibly add? Only this: that I present the subject in the way that, after all those years, and
with hindsight, pleases me most. Thus this text is a very personal one, and in some ways
my treatment may appear more or less orthogonal to more canonical introductions.1 The
moment I learned about Feynman diagrams I was struck by their power and beauty, and
in this book I use them as much as possible; that is well suited to its goal, to be an intro-
duction into a way that theoretical particle phenomenology can be done. In what follows,
whatever is correct I owe to many other people, but that which is wrong I managed on
my own. Physics is, like all serious science must be, a social undertaking; I have greatly
profited from discussions with many friends and colleagues! Thank you, Ernestos Argyres,
Dima Bardin, Wim Beenakker, Frits Berends, Alain Blondel, Oscar Boher Luna, Michael
Borinsky, Helmut Burkhardt, Dirk van Buul, Sascha Caron, Patrick de Causmaecker, Chris
Dams, Piet Hein Daverveldt, Petros Draggiotis, Helmut Eberl, Steve Ellis, John Ellis,
Frank Filthaut, Karel Gaemers, Raymond Gastmans, Edward Gibbon, Walter Giele, Nigel
Glover, Jeroen de Groot, André van Hameren, Lisa Hartgring, Wolfgang Hollik, Gerard
’t Hooft, Staszek Jadach, Frederick James, Tim Janssen, Sijbrand de Jong, Martijn Jon-
gen, Jos de Heren, Marcel van Kessel, Mila Keijer, Jochem Kip, Stefan Krieg, Hans Kühn,
Hans Kuijf, Kolja Kuijpers, Zoltan Kunszt, Achilleas Lazopoulos, Joep Leenaarts, Yan-
nis Malamos, Michelangelo Mangano, John March-Russell, Melvin Meijer, Ilija Milutin,
Mark Netjes, Harald Niederreiter, Gijs van der Oord, Kostas Papadopoulos, Simon Partlic2 ,
Giampiero Passarino, Roberto Pittau, Marcel Raas, Chris Ripken, Tom Rijken, Frank
Saueressig, Frank Schmidt, Bert Schellekens, James Stirling (much missed!), John Swain,
Oleg Teryaev, Theodor Todorov, Tini Veltman, Rob Verheyen, Jos Vermaseren, Bernard de
Wit, Stefan de Wit, Tai Tsun Wu, and Sjoerd Ypma, for allowing me to learn from you,
and together with you. And my gratitude to the people at Cambridge University Press, who
have allowed me to share what I have learned.

1 Indeed, canonical quantization will not appear at all.

2 Inspirator of various quotations.

xiii
xiv Preface

What Is in This Book?

It may be useful to briefly describe the structure of the book. Quantum field theory is not
trivial, not least because, in its fully fledged form, it uses a lot of technical tools.3 A real
understanding of any field can only grow from handling its tools very often,4 but it is advis-
able to start with the simplest tools first and then to let your skills develop gradually. We
therefore start with QFT in its simplest possible setting, a zero-dimensional universe. Here
we already encounter many of the objects of interest, especially the Feynman diagrams and
the Feynman rules, but in a setting that avoids much of the technicalities. Even the sub-
ject of renormalization can be discussed in zero dimensions, as we shall see. After having
become familiar with the fundamentals we can move toward more realism. We can care-
fully extend our universe, moving from zero to one and then to more dimensions,5 and after
that make a switch to Minkowski space by assigning to time its own special rôle; and then
the way is open to discussing particle dynamics, that is, scattering processes. The Feynman
rules will grow in complexity until we can describe processes involving scalar particles. At
that point we can afford to introduce particles with additional (spin) properties: Dirac par-
ticles and vector particles. The door is then open to the real world of particle physics: we
shall describe quantum electrodynamics, quantum chromodynamics, and finally the elec-
troweak theory. Thus we arrive at what we fondly call the (Minimal) Standard Model.
Throughout, we aim simply to find Feynman rules that work, without deep thoughts about
gauge symmetry.6 For instance, we shall from the outset acknowledge the fact that the W
and Z particles have masses and, rather than pining for a Platonic realm where they are
“really” massless, simply construct a viable theory for them, warts and all. The fact that
our theories turn out to be examples of gauge theories, broken or not, is a bonus in the
sense that it makes clear that you may argue that gauge symmetry is not a fundamental
organizing principle but that our world simply can’t help being that way if it is to function
at all.7 As a consequence, you will not find much “model building” here. In our search for
Feynman rules “that work” we will very often use handlebars. These are operations on
Feynman diagrams8 that allow us to study some of their properties. Putting a handlebar on
diagrams is, here, a purely mechanical operation, leading to things like current conserva-
tion and Ward identities. I think it is very useful to see how they come about from diagrams
rather than from symmetry arguments (which is how they are usually presented).
One of the largest portions of this book is the appendices. I have there collected the
material that, when included in the main text, would interfere with the narrative flow. But
that material is not secondary! The appendices (especially the mathematical one) contain
much that I would like to see at many a theorist’s fingertips.

3 For instance, those necessary for Dirac particles, or the calculational machinery of loop integrals.
4 As everyone who has tried cooking, or open-heart surgery, can attest.
5 And come to the surprising realization that the concepts of space and time may not be so fundamental after all.
6 You will find that I go very lightly on group theory – an example of orthogonality.
7 I am comforted in this opinion by [7].
8 In more technical language, computing the divergence of currents.
xv Preface

Simply reading about QFT is no substitute for actually sitting down and doing it yourself.
This book is intended to encourage you to dirty your hands and compute things,9 and
therefore the text is riddled with exercises, some almost trivial, and others far from trivial.
The exercises apposite to a topic are indicated by a box like ℵ in the margin, where “ℵ” is
0 the number of the exercise, situated at the end of the chapter. Doing the exercises is really
the best way to come to understand the marvellous structure that is QFT.10
Looking at the bibliography, you may be surprised to find how short it is. This is delib-
erate. I have included the necessary minimum (the sources that I actually used to write this
book), finding that in these days of Google, Wikipedia, and InSpire11 it is much more use-
ful for you to find your own way than to stare at a several-hundred-item list of publications.
This book is an introduction, not a comprehensive review.
Finally, a caveat: this is a book for physicists, not for mathematicians. We shall worry
about mathematical rigor but not so much as to become paralyzed.12

Basic Tools

Constants and Units

Classical physics essentially uses three basic SI units: the kilogram, the meter, and the sec-
ond. In addition, there exist fundamental constants of nature. The fundamental constants
of relativistic quantum field theory13 are the speed of light in vacuo,14
m
c = 299792458 , (1)
sec
and Planck’s constant,15

h = 6.62607015 × 10−34 kg m2 /sec. (2)

We shall use the reduced Planck constant (also called the Dirac constant):

 = h/(2π) ≈ 1.054571817 × 10−34 kg m2 /sec

= 6.582119569 × 10−25 GeV sec. (3)

Using  and c, we can exchange energies for inverse lengths:

9 Manus mundissimus fabricae inutilis (inspired by S. Partlic).

10 “[They] were constantly trained in both the morning and the evening, nor was age or knowledge allowed to
excuse the veterans from the daily repetition of what they had completely learned” (E. Gibbon, The History
of The Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire (W. Strahan and T. Cadell, in the Strand, 1776)).
11 InSpire uses extremely useful backward referencing: find it at https://inspirehep.net.
12 Rigor mathesis protractus mortis rigorem inducit (inspired by S. Partlic). In fact you might be surprised by
how much of mathematics was developed just to make physics more rigorous.
13 Their values are taken from [1]. Throughout this book I will use this as a source for all other empirical data
that I quote.
14 This is exact since it establishes the definition of the meter as of October 21, 1983.
15 This is exact since it establishes the definition of the kilogram as of May 20, 2019.
Other documents randomly have
different content
towards captive Jacobites, the Earl of Perth, on a showing of the
injury his health was suffering from long imprisonment in Stirling
Castle, was liberated on a caution for five thousand pounds sterling,
being a sum equal to the annual income of the highest nobles of the
land.
William Livingstone, brother to the Viscount Kilsyth, and husband
of Dundee’s widow, had been a prisoner in the Edinburgh Tolbooth
from June 1689 till November 1690—seventeen months—thereafter,
had lived in a chamber in Edinburgh under a sentry for a year—
afterwards was allowed to live in a better lodging, and to go forth for
a walk each day, but still under a guard. In this condition he now
continued. The consequence of his being thus treated, and of his
rents being all the time sequestrated, was a great confusion of his
affairs, threatening the entire ruin of his 1692.
fortune. On his petition, the Council now
allowed him ‘to go abroad under a sentinel each day from morning to
evening furth of the house of Andrew Smith, periwig-maker, at the
head of Niddry’s Wynd, in Edinburgh, to which he is confined,’ he
finding caution under fifteen hundred pounds sterling to continue a
true prisoner as heretofore; at the same time, the sequestration of his
rents was departed from.
On the 19th April, Mr Livingstone was allowed to visit Kilsyth
under a guard of dragoons, in order to arrange some affairs. But this
leniency was of short duration. We soon after find him again in strict
confinement in Edinburgh Castle; nor was it till September 1693,
that, on an earnest petition setting forth his declining health, he was
allowed to be confined to ‘a chamber in the house of Mistress Lyell,
in the Parliament Close,’ he giving large bail for his peaceable
behaviour. This, again, came to a speedy end, for, being soon after
ordered to re-enter his strait confinement in the Castle, he petitioned
to be allowed the Canongate Jail instead, and was permitted, as
something a shade less wretched than the Castle, to become a
prisoner in the Edinburgh Tolbooth. On the 4th of January 1693, he
was again allowed the room in the Parliament Close, but on the 8th
of February this was exchanged for Stirling Castle. In the course of
the first five years of British liberty, Mr Livingstone must have
acquired a tolerably extensive acquaintance with the various forms
and modes of imprisonment, so far as these existed in the northern
section of the island.
Captain John Crighton, once a dragoon in the service of King
James, and whose memoirs were afterwards written from his own
information by Swift, was kept in jail for twenty-one months after
June 1689; then for ten months in a house under a sentinel; since
that time in a house, with permission to get a daily walk; ‘which long
imprisonment and restraint has been very grievous and expensive to
the petitioner (Crighton),’ and ‘has redacted him and his small family
to a great deal of misery and want, being a stranger in this kingdom.’
His restraint was likewise relaxed on his giving caution to the extent
of a hundred pounds to remain a true prisoner.
Soon after arose the alarm of invasion from France, and all the
severities against the suspected Jacobites were renewed. William
Livingstone was, in June, confined once more to his chamber at the
periwig-maker’s, and Captain John Crighton had to return to a
similar restraint. The Earl of Perth, so recently liberated from
Stirling Castle, was again placed there. At 1691.
that time, there were confined in Edinburgh
Castle the Earls of Seaforth and Home, the Lord Bellenden, and
Paterson, Ex-archbishop of Glasgow. In Stirling Castle, besides Lord
Perth, lay his relation, Sir John Drummond of Machany,[83] and the
Viscount Frendraught, the latter having only six hundred merks per
annum (about £34), so that it became of importance that his wife
should be allowed to come in and live with him, instead of requiring
a separate maintenance; to so low a point had civil broils and private
animosities brought this once flourishing family. Neville Payne lay a
wretched prisoner in Edinburgh Castle. Sir Robert Grierson of Lagg
was contracting sore ailments under protracted confinement in the
Canongate Jail. A great number of other men were undergoing their
second, and even their third year of confinement, in mean and filthy
tolbooths, where their health was unavoidably impaired.
On the 2d of June, Crighton gave in a petition reciting that he had
been again put under restraint, and for no just cause, as he had
always since the Revolution been favourable to the new government,
and on the proclamation of the Convention, had deserted his old
service in the Castle, bringing with him thirty-nine soldiers. He was
relieved from close confinement, and ordered to be subjected to trial.
On the 10th of June, he was ordered to be set at liberty, on caution.
Less than two months after, failing to appear on summons, his bond
for £100 was forfeited, and the money, when obtained from his
security, to be given to Adair the geographer.
On the 14th of June 1692, Captain Wallace represented that he had
now been three years a captive, ‘whereby his health is impaired, his
body weakened, and his small fortune entirely ruined.’ ‘Yet hitherto,
there has been no process against him.’ He entreated that he might
be liberated on signing ‘a volunteer banishment,’ and he would
‘never cease to pray that God may bless the nation with ane lasting
peace, of [which] he would never be a disturber.’ An order for a
process against him was issued.
It was difficult, however, even for the Scottish Privy Council to
make a charge of treason against an officer whose only fault was that,
being appointed by a lawful authority to defend a post, he had
performed the duty assigned to him, albeit at the expense of a few
lives to the rabble which he was 1692.
commanded to resist. Still, when the
solicitor-general, Lockhart, told them he could not process Captain
Wallace for treason ‘without a special warrant to that effect,’ they
divided on the subject, and the negative was only carried by a
majority.[84]

Happened an affair of private war and Apr. 25.

violence, supposed to be the last that took
place in the county of Renfrew. John Maxwell of Dargavel had ever
since the Reformation possessed a seat and desk in the kirk of
Erskine, along with a right to bury in the subjacent ground. William
Hamilton of Orbieston, proprietor of the estate of Erskine, disputed
the title of Dargavel to these properties or privileges, and it came to a
high quarrel between the two gentlemen. Finding at length that
Dargavel would not peaceably give up what he and his ancestors had
so long possessed, Orbieston—who, by the way, was a partisan of the
old dynasty, and perhaps generally old-fashioned in his ideas—
resolved to drive his neighbour out of it by force. A complaint,
afterwards drawn up by Dargavel for the Privy Council, states that
William Hamilton of Orbieston, George Maxwell, bailie of Kilpatrick,
Robert Laing, miller in Duntocher, John Shaw of Bargarran, Gavin
Walkingshaw, sometime of that ilk, came, with about a hundred
other persons, ‘all armed with guns, pistols, swords, bayonets, and
other weapons invasive,’ and, having appointed George Maxwell,
‘Orbieston’s own bailie-depute,’ to march at their head, they
advanced in military order, and with drums beating and trumpets
sounding, to the parish kirk of Erskine, where, ‘in a most insolent
and violent manner, they did, at their own hand, and without any
order of law, remove and take away the complainer’s seat and dask,
and sacrilegiously bring away the stones that were lying upon the
graves of the complainer’s predecessors, and beat and strike several
of the complainer’s tenants and others, who came in peaceable
manner to persuade them to desist from such unwarrantable
violence.’
Dargavel instantly proceeded with measures for obtaining redress
from the Privy Council, when his chief, Sir John Maxwell of Pollock,
a member of that all-powerful body, interfered to bring about an
agreement between the disputants. With the consent of the Earl of
Glencairn, principal heritor of the parish, Dargavel ‘yielded for
peace-sake to remove his seat from that 1692.
place of the kirk, where it had stood for
many generations;’ while Orbieston on his part agreed that Dargavel
‘should retain his room of burial-place in the east end of the kirk,
with allowance to rail it in, and strike out a door upon the gable of it,
as he should see convenient.’ This did not, however, end the
controversy.
The first glimpse of further procedure which we obtain is from a
letter of John Shaw of Bargarran, professing to be a friend of both
parties, though he had appeared amongst the armed party led by
Orbieston’s bailie-depute. He writes, 23d August, as follows to
William Cunningham of Craigends, a decided friend of Dargavel: ‘Sir
—The Laird of Orbieston heard when he was last here that Dargavel
was intendit to put through a door to his burial-place, which will be
(as he says) very inconvenient for Orbieston’s laft [gallery]; so he
desired me to acquaint you therewith, that ye wold deall with
Dargavel to forbear; otherways he wold take it very ill, and has given
orders to some people here to stop his design, if he do it not
willingly; wherefor, to prevent further trouble and emulation betwixt
the two gentlemen, ye wold do well to advyse him to the contrair
either by a lyn or advyse, as ye think most proper. I desyre not to be
seen in this, because they are both my friends, and I a weel-wisher to
them both. I thought to have waited on you myself; bot, being
uncertain of your being at home, gives you the trouble of this lyne,
which is all from, sir, your most humble servant, J. Shaw. Ye wold do
this so soon as possible.’
There are letters from Craigends to Dargavel, strongly indicating
the likelihood that violent measures would again be resorted to by
Orbieston, and advising how these might best be met and resisted.
But the remainder of the affair seems to have been peaceable.
Orbieston applied to the Privy Council for an order to stop Dargavel,
apparently proceeding upon the rule long established, but little
obeyed, against burying in churches; and the Council did send an
order, dated the 29th August, ‘requiring you to desist from striking
any door or breaking any part of the church-wall of Erskine, until
your right and Orbieston’s right be discusst by the judges competent
for preventing further abuse.’ Dargavel immediately sent a petition,
shewing how he was only acting upon an agreement with Orbieston,
and hereupon the former order was recalled, and Dargavel permitted
to have the access he required, however incommodious it might be to
Orbieston’s ‘laft.’[85]
The prisoners in the Canongate Tolbooth 1692. May 10.
forced the key from the jailer, and took
possession of their prison, which they held out against the
magistrates for a brief space. A committee of Privy Council was
ordered to go and inquire who had been guilty of this act of rebellion.
[86]
Viewing the manner in which jails were provided, there can be no
doubt that it was a rebellion of the stomach.

Under our present multiplication of May 17.

newspapers, a piece of false intelligence is
so quickly detected, that there is no temptation for the most perverse
politician to put such a thing in circulation. In King William’s days,
when the printed newspaper barely existed, and the few who were
curious about state-affairs had to content themselves with what was
called a news-letter—a written circular emanating from a centre in
London—a falsehood would now and then prove serviceable to a
party, particularly a depressed one.
 We get an idea of a piece of the social economy of the time under
notice, from a small matter which came under the attention of the
Privy Council. William Murray kept a tavern in the Canongate. Each
post brought him a news-letter for the gratification of his customers,
and which doubtless served to maintain their allegiance to his butt of
claret. Just at this time, when there were alarms of an invasion from
France, a lie about preparations on the French shore was worth its
ink. The lord high chancellor now informed the Council that
Murray’s letter was generally full of false news; that he caused
destroy the one brought by last post, merely to keep Murray out of
trouble; and he had kept up the one just come, ‘in respect there is a
paper therein full of cyphers which cannot be read.’ Matters having
now become so serious, he had caused Murray to be brought before
the Council.
Murray declared before a committee ‘he knows not what person
writes the news-letter to him ... he never writes any news from this to
London ... he knows not what the cyphers in the paper sent in his
letter with this post does signify.’ They sent him under care of a
macer to the Tolbooth, to be kept there in close prison, and his
papers at home to be searched for matter against their majesties or
the government.
On the 2d of June, William Murray represented that he had now
been a fortnight in jail, and his poor family 1692.
would be ruined if he did not immediately
regain his liberty. The Council caused him to be examined about the
cypher-letter, and asked who was his correspondent. We do not learn
what satisfaction he gave on these points; but a week later, he was
liberated.
On the 15th November, the Privy Council ordered the magistrates
of Edinburgh to shut up the Exchange Coffee-house, and bring the
keys to them, ‘in respect of the seditious news vented in and
dispersed from the said coffee-house.’ A month after, the owners,
Gilbert Fyfe and James Marjoribanks, merchants, shewed that, some
of their news-letters having once before been kept up from them on
account of the offensive contents, they had changed their
correspondent, in order that the government might have no such
fault to find with them. Moved, however, by malice against them,
their old correspondent had addressed to them a letter sure by its
contents to bring them into trouble with the officers of state, and it
had been the cause of their house being shut up accordingly. Seeing
how innocently on their part this had come about, and how
prejudicial it was to their interest, the men petitioned for re-
possession of their house, which was granted, under caution that
they were to vent no news until it was approved of by their majesties’
solicitor, or whoever the Privy Council might appoint, ‘the reviser
always setting his name thereto, or at least ane other mark, as having
revised the same.’
Not long after, we find the Council in such trouble on account of
false news as to be under the necessity of considering some general
measure on the subject.
In December, one William Davidson, described as a ‘writer,’ was
taken up and put into the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, ‘for writing and
spreading of lies and false news;’ and the Privy Council issued an
order ‘for delivering of the said William to ane of the officers come
from Flanders, to have been carried there as a soldier.’ On its
appearing, however, that William ‘is but a silly cripple boy, having
had his leg and thigh-bones broke,’ they ordered the magistrates of
Edinburgh to banish him from their city, ‘in case they shall find him
guilty of the said crime.’
On the 12th of July 1694, we hear something more of this William
Davidson. For inadvertently adding to a news-letter a postscript
‘bearing some foolish thing offensive to the government, without
affirming whether it was true or false, but only that it was reported,’
he had been condemned to banishment from the city, and also
disinherited by a Whiggish father, now 1692.
deceased. He had since lived upon the
charity of his relations and acquaintances; but these were now weary
of maintaining him, and he was consequently ‘redacted to extream
misery.’ Having broken his thigh-bone six several times, he was
incapable of any employment but that of writing in a chamber, from
which, however, he was debarred by his banishment from
Edinburgh. He therefore craved a relaxation of his sentence, offering
‘to take the oath of allegiance and subscribe the assurance, to
evidence his sincerity towards the government.’ The poor lad’s
petition was complied with.[87]
 Sir James Carmichael of Bonnyton, a July.
minor, was proprietor of the lands of
Thankerton, lying on the north side of the river Clyde, in the upper
ward of Lanarkshire. The Clyde had been the march between his
estate and those of the adjacent proprietors—Chancellor of
Shieldhill, and George Kellie in Quothquan; but ‘rivers are bad
neighbours and unfaithful boundaries, as Lucan says of the Po,’[88]
and there had happened a mutatio alvei about fifty years before, in
consequence of a violent flood, and now a part of Bonnyton lands
was thrown on the opposite side. Under the name of the Park-holm,
it had lain neglected for many years; but at length, in 1688, the
present laird’s father sowed and reaped it; whereupon the opposite
neighbours, considering it as theirs, resolved to assert their right to
it. At the date noted, they came eighty strong, ‘resolved to take
advantage of Sir James his infancy, and by open bangstry and
violence to turn him and his tenants out of his possession.’ Their
arms were ‘pitchforks, great staves, scythes, pistols, swords, and
mastive dogs.’ In a rude and violent manner, they cut down ‘the
whole growth of fourteen bolls sowing of corn or thereby,’ drove it
home to their own houses, and there made use of it in bedding their
cattle, or threw it upon the dunghills. Thus, ‘corns which would have
yielded at least nine hundred bolls oats at eight pounds Scots the
boll, were rendered altogether useless for man or beast.’ During the
progress of this plunder, the tenants were confined to their houses
under a guard. So it was altogether a riot and oppression, inferring
severe punishment, which was accordingly called for by the curators
of the young landlord.
The Council, having heard both parties, found the riot proven, and
ordained Chancellor of Shieldhill to pay three hundred merks to the
pursuer.[89] Afterwards (December 26, 1692.
1695), the Lords of Session confirmed the
claim of Bonnyton to the Park-holm.[90]

In this year died the Viscountess Stair—born Margaret Ross of

Balniel, in Wigtonshire—the wife of the ablest man of his age and
country, and mother of a race which has included an extraordinary
number of men of talent and official distinction. The pair had been
married very nearly fifty years, and they were tenderly attached to
the last. The glories of the family history had not been quite free of
shade; witness the tragical death of the eldest daughter Janet, the
original of Lucy Ashton in The Bride of Lammermoor.[91] Lady Stair
is admitted to have been a woman of a soaring mind, of great
shrewdness and energy of character, and skilled in the ways of the
world; and to these qualities on her part it was perhaps, in part,
owing that her family, on the whole, prospered so remarkably. The
public, however, had such a sense of her singular power over fortune,
as to believe that she possessed necromantic gifts, and trafficked
with the Evil One. An order which she left at her death regarding the
disposal of her body, helped to confirm this popular notion. ‘She
desired that she might not be put under ground, but that her coffin
should stand upright on one end of it, promising that, while she
remained in that situation, the Dalrymples should continue to
flourish. What was the old lady’s motive for the request, or whether
she really made such a promise, I shall not take upon me to
determine; but it’s certain her coffin stands upright in the aile of the
church of Kirkliston, the burial-place of the family.’[92]
A local historian attributes to her ladyship ‘one of the best puns
extant. Graham of Claverhouse (commonly pronounced Clavers) was
appointed sheriff of Wigtonshire in 1682. On one occasion, when this
violent persecutor had been inveighing, in her presence, against our
illustrious reformer, she said: “Why are you so severe on the
character of John Knox? You are both reformers: he gained his point
by clavers [talk]; you attempt to gain yours by knocks.”’[93]

The boy carrying the post-bag on its last Aug. 13.

stage from England was robbed by ‘a person
mounted on horseback with a sword about 1692.
him, and another person on foot with a
pistol in his hand, upon the highway from Haddington to Edinburgh,
near that place thereof called Jock’s Lodge [a mile from town], about
ten hours of the night.’ The robbers took ‘the packet or common mail
with the horse whereon the boy rode.’ The Privy Council issued a
proclamation, offering a reward of a hundred pounds for the
apprehension of the offenders, with a free pardon to any one of them
who should inform upon the rest.
 The troubles arising from corporation Oct. 1.
privileges were in these old times incessant.
Any attempt by an unfreeman to execute work within the charmed
circle was met with the sternest measures of repression and
punishment, often involving great suffering to poor industrious men.
Indeed, there is perhaps no class of facts more calculated than this to
disenchant modern people out of the idea that the days of old were
days of mutual kindliness and brothership.
At the date noted, one William Somerville, a wright-burgess of
Edinburgh, was engaged in some repairs upon the mansion of the
Earl of Roxburgh, in the Canongate, when Thomas Kinloch, deacon
of the wrights of that jurisdiction, came with assistants, and in a
violent manner took away the whole of the tools which the workmen
were using. This was done as a check to Edinburgh wrights coming
and doing work in a district of which they were not free. Somerville,
two days after, made a formal demand for the restoration of his
‘looms;’ but they were positively refused. The Earl of Roxburgh was a
minor; but his curators felt aggrieved by Kinloch’s procedure, and
accordingly concurred with Somerville in charging the Canongate
deacon, before the Privy Council, with the commission of riot and
oppression in the earl’s house. Apparently, if the Roxburgh mansion
had been subject to the jurisdiction of the Canongate, the Council
could not have given any redress; but it so happened, that when the
earl’s ancestor, in 1636, gave up the superiority of the Canongate, he
reserved his house as to be holden of the crown; therefore, the
Canongate corporations had no title to interfere with the good
pleasure of his lordship in the selection of workmen to do work in his
house. The Council remitted this point of law to the Court of Session;
but meanwhile ordered the restoration of Somerville’s tools.[94]
As an example of the troubles connected 1692.
with mercantile privilege, it may be well to
introduce one simple case of the treatment of an interloper by the
Merchant Company of Edinburgh, the members of which were the
sole legalised dealers in cloth of all kinds in the city. In June 1699, it
was reported to the Company that one Mary Flaikfield, who had
formerly been found selling goods ‘off the mercat-day,’ and enacted
herself to desist from the practice, had been found sinning again in
the same manner. She was detected in selling some plaids and eight
pieces of muslin to a stranger, and the goods were seized and
deposited in the Merchants’ Hall.
The poor woman at first alleged that she had only been conversing
with this stranger, while the goods chanced to be lying beside her,
and the Company was wrought upon to give back her goods, all
except two pieces of the muslin, which they said they would detain
till Mary could prove what she alleged.
Presently, however, there was a change in their mood, for John
Corsbie came forward with information that Mary Flaikfield was
really a notable interloper. The very person she was lately detected in
dealing with, she had wiled away from Corsbie’s own shop, where he
was about to buy the same goods. She was accustomed to sell a good
deal to the family of Lord Halcraig. Then she had not appeared to
prove her innocence. ‘The vote was put: “Roup the two pieces of
muslin or not?” and it carried “Roup.” Accordingly, the muslin being
measured, and found to be twenty-two ells, and ane hour-glass being
set up, several persons bid for the same. The greatest offer made was
fourteen shillings per ell, which offer was made by Francis Brodie,
treasurer—the time being run—the said offer was three several times
cried out, and the said two pieces of muslin were declared to belong
to him for £15, 8s. [Scots]; but if she compear and relieve the same
before the next meeting, allows her to have her goods in payment of
the above sum.’
At the meeting of the ensuing week, Mary Flaikfield not having
come forward to redeem her muslin, the treasurer was instructed to
dispose of it as he should think fit, and be comptable to the Company
for £15, 8s. Two days later, however, there was another meeting
solely on account of Mary, when the Master, Bailie Warrender, and
his assistants, felt that Christian charity would not allow them to
proceed further. ‘Considering that Mary Flaikfield is a poor woman,
big with child, and has been detained here about a fortnight, they, in
point of pity and compassion for her, order 1692.
that her two pieces of muslin be given her
back upon payment of fourteen shillings to the officer.’ She was not
dismissed without a caution as to her future behaviour.[95]

Nov.
 The stranding of whales in the Firth of Forth was of such natural
and frequent occurrence in early times, that a tithe of all cast ashore
between Cockburnspath and the mouth of the Avon, was one of the
gifts conferred by the pious David upon the Canons Augustine of
Holyrood. In modern times, it may be considered as an uncommon
event. At this time, however, one had embayed itself in the harbour
of Limekilns, a little port near Queensferry. A litigation took place
regarding the property of it, between the chancellor, the Earl of
Tweeddale, as lord of the regality of Dunfermline, and Mr William
Erskine, depute to the admiral, and the Lords finally adjudged it to
the chancellor, with seven hundred merks as the price at which it had
been sold.[96]

The Earl of Moray, being pursued at law Dec. 1.

for a tradesman’s account, which was
referred to his oath, craved the Court of Session to appoint a
commission to take his oath at Dunnibrissle, on the ground that, if
he were obliged to come to Edinburgh for the purpose, he should
incur as much expense as the whole amount of the alleged debt. As
Dunnibrissle is visible from Edinburgh across the Firth of Forth, this
must be looked upon as an eccentrically economical movement on
his lordship’s part. The court granted the commission, but ordained
his lordship to pay any expense which might be incurred by the
debtor, or his representative, in travelling to Dunnibrissle to be
present at the oath-taking.[97]
The court had occasionally not less whimsical cases before it. In
February 1698, there was one regarding a copper caldron, which had
been poinded, but not first taken to the Cross to be ‘appreciate.’ The
defenders represented that they had done something equivalent in
carrying thither a part of it—the ledges—as a symbol; following here
a rule applicable with heavy movables, as where a salt-pan was
represented by two nails; nay, a symbol not homogeneous, as a wisp
of straw for a flock of sheep, fulfilled the law. The defence was
sustained, and the poinding affirmed.[98]
The Privy Council had under its hands 1692. Dec.
three Protestant clergymen—namely, Mr
John Hay, late minister at Falkland; Mr Alexander Leslie, late
minister at Crail; and Mr Patrick Middleton, late minister at Leslie—
in short, three of the ‘outed’ Episcopal clergy—for not praying for
William and Mary. They acknowledged that they prayed ‘only in
general terms’ for the king and queen, and were therefore discharged
from thereafter exercising any clerical functions, under severe
penalties. Soon after, the Council judged, in the case of Mr Alexander
Lundie, late minister of Cupar, who stated that, ‘having a mixed
auditory, he prayed so as might please both parties.’ This style of
praying, or else the manner of alluding to it, did not please the Privy
Council, and Mr Lundie was ordered ‘to be carried from the bar, by
the macers, to the Tolbooth, there to remain during the Council’s
pleasure.’ Having lain there four days, far from all means of
subsistence, while his wife was ill of a dangerous disease at home,
and his family of small children required his care, Mr Lundie was
fain to beg the Council’s pardon for what he had said, and so
obtained his liberation also, but only with a discharge from all
clerical functions till he should properly qualify himself according to
act of parliament.
On the 22d of May 1693, Mr David Angus, minister of Fortrose,
was before the Council on a charge that, although deprived for not
praying for their majesties in terms of the act of parliament, ‘he has
publicly preached and exercised the ministerial function within his
own house, and parish where the same lies, and elsewhere, without
qualifying himself by signing the oath of allegiance.’ So far from
evidencing the sense he ought to have had of the grievous
circumstances from which the nation had been relieved, by reading
the proclamation of estates, he had neglected it, and prayed for King
James, thus stirring up the disaffected in opposition to their
majesties’ government, and discouraging their loyal subjects. These
were ‘crimes which ought to be severely punished for the terror of
others.’ The Lords, therefore, finding him unable to deny the alleged
facts, and indisposed to engage for a different behaviour in future,
confirmed his deprivation, and discharged him from preaching or
exercising any ministerial function within the kingdom.
As a specimen of the equivocating prayers—Mr Charles Key, one of
the ministers of South Leith, was charged, in September 1694, with
using these expressions, ‘“That God would bless our king and queen,
and William and Mary,” or “our king and 1692.
queen, William and Mary, and the rest of the royal family.”’[99]

A great number of recruits were now Dec. 31.

drawn together to be sent to Flanders, but
the vessels for their transportation were not ready. The Privy Council
therefore ordered their distribution throughout the jails of Lothian
and Fife, sixty, eighty, a hundred, and even more, to each tolbooth,
according to its capacity—for example, two hundred and forty-four to
the jails of Musselburgh, Haddington, and Leith—there to be
furnished with blankets to lie on by the various magistrates. When it
is known that two Jacobite gentlemen had lately petitioned for
liberation from Musselburgh jail, on the ground that it did not
contain a fireroom, and their health was consequently becoming
ruined, it will not seem surprising that a competent troop of horse
and foot had to be ordered ‘to keep guard upon the said recruits, and
take care that none of them escape.’
That a good many, induced either by the hardships of their
situation, or the enticements of disaffected persons, did desert the
service, is certain: a strict proclamation on this subject came out in
April 1694. At the same time, John M‘Lachlan, schoolmaster in
Glasgow, was before the Privy Council on a charge of having induced
a number of soldiers in the regiments lying at that city to desert.
‘Being disaffected,’ it was said, ‘to their majesties’ government, he
has, so far as possible for thir three or four years past, made it his
business to weaken the government, and to instigate and persuade
several soldiers to run away.’ He did ‘forge passes for them.’ In
particular, in January last, he did ‘persuade John Fergusson and
John M‘Leod, soldiers in Captain Anderson’s company in Lord
Strathnaver’s regiment, then lying at Glasgow, to run away and
desert ... telling them that they were but beasts and fools for serving
King William, for that he was sure that the late King James would be
soon here again.... He had given passes to several of the regiment
formerly in garrison at Glasgow, and offered to go with them to a
gentlewoman’s house without the Steeple-green port, who was a
cousin of his, who would secure them and receive their clothes, and
furnish them with others to make their escape; and told them they
were going to Flanders, and would be felled there, and so it was best
for them to desert, and that he would hide their firelocks
underground, and give them other coats 1692.
and money, and a pass to carry them safe
away.’
The Council, having called evidence, and found the charge proven,
sentenced M‘Lachlan to be whipped through the city of Edinburgh,
and banished to the American plantations. They afterwards altered
the sentence, and adjudged the Jacobite schoolmaster, instead of
being whipped, to stand an hour on the pillory at Edinburgh, and an
hour on the pillory at Glasgow, under the care of the hangman, with
a paper on his brow, with these words written or printed thereon
—‘John M‘Lachlan, schoolmaster at Glasgow, appointed to be set on
the pillory at Edinburgh and Glasgow, and sent to the plantations,
for seducing and debauching soldiers to run away from their colours,
and desert their majesties’ service.’
Two days later, the Privy Council recommended their majesties’
advocate to prosecute M‘Lachlan before the committee anent pressed
men, ‘for the disloyal and impertinent speeches uttered by him
yesterday while he stood upon the pillory of Edinburgh.’ What came
of this, we do not learn; but on the 3d of July there is a petition from
M‘Lachlan, setting forth that, after a nineteen weeks’ imprisonment,
he is sinking under sickness and infirmity, while his family are
starving at home, and craving his liberty, on giving assurance that he
shall not offend again against the government. His liberation was
ordered.
James Hamilton, keeper of the Canongate Tolbooth (July 16,
1696), represented to the Privy Council that it had been customary
for him and his predecessors to receive two shillings Scots per night
for each recruit kept in the house, with a penny sterling to the
servants (being 3d. sterling in all), and their lordships, in
consideration of his ‘great trouble in keeping such unruly prisoners
in order’—he ‘being liable to the payment of ten dollars for every man
that shall make his escape’—had authorised him to take
‘obleisements’ from the officers for the payment of these dues, till
lately when the authority was withdrawn. This had led to loss on the
part of the petitioner, who had now spent all his own means, and
further run into debt, so that, ‘through continual hazard of captions,’
he was threatened with becoming a prisoner in his own jail. He
entreated payment of some arrears for General Mackay’s recruits, as
well as these recent arrears, and likewise for the proper allowance for
‘the coiners and clippers,’ latterly an abundant class of prisoners, on
account of the tempting condition of the coin of the realm for
simulation. The Lords recommended 1693.
Hamilton to the treasury for payment of the
monies due to him.[100]

Though Scotland had long enjoyed the Feb. 2.

services of four universities, the teaching of
any of the natural sciences was not merely unknown in the country,
but probably undreamed of, till the reign of Charles II. The first faint
gleam of scientific teaching presents itself about 1676, when, under
the fostering care of Dr (afterwards Sir) Robert Sibbald, a botanic
garden was established near the Trinity College Church, as a means
of helping the medical men of Edinburgh to a better knowledge of
the pharmacopœia. It was put under the care of James Sutherland,
who had been a common gardener, but whose natural talents had
raised him to a fitness for this remarkable position. In his little
garden in the valley on the north side of the city, he taught the
science of herbs to students of medicine for small fees, receiving no
other encouragement besides a salary from the city of twenty
pounds, which did not suffice to pay rent and servants’ wages, not to
speak of the cost of new plants. At the time of the siege of Edinburgh
Castle in the spring of 1689, it had been thought necessary, for
strategic reasons, to drain the North Loch, and, as the water ran
through the Botanic Garden, it came to pass that the place was for
some days under an inundation, and when left dry, proved to be
covered with mud and rubbish, so that the delicate and costly plants
which Sutherland had collected were nearly all destroyed. It had cost
him and his assistants the work of a whole season to get the ground
cleared, and he had incurred large charges in replacing the plants.
At this date, the Privy Council, on Sutherland’s petition, took into
consideration his losses, his inadequate salary, and the good service
he was rendering, ‘whereby not only the young physicians,
apothecaries, and chirurgeons, but also the nobility and gentry, are
taught the knowledge of the herbs, and also a multitude of plants,
shrubs, and trees are cultivated which were never known in this
nation before, and more numerous than in any other garden in
Britain, as weel for the honour of the place as for the advantage of
the people.’ They therefore declared that they will in future allow Mr
Sutherland fifty pounds a year out of fines falling to them, one half
for expenses of the garden, and the other half by way of addition to
his salary.[101]
Mr Stephen Maxwell, ‘alleged to be a 1693. Apr. 13.
Romish priest,’ prisoner in Blackness
Castle, Mr George Gordon, Mr Robert Davidson, and Mr Alexander
Crichton, ‘also alleged to be popish priests,’ and prisoners in the
Edinburgh Tolbooth, were ordered to be set at liberty, provided they
would agree to deport themselves from the kingdom ‘in the fleet now
lying under convoy of the man-of-war lying in the Road of Leith,’ and
give caution to the extent of a hundred pounds that they would never
return. On the 17th, Mr James Hepburn, ‘alleged to be a popish
priest,’ was ordered to be liberated from the Canongate Tolbooth on
the same terms. All of these gentlemen had been for many months
deprived of their liberty.
There still lay in Blackness Castle one John Seaton, who had been
apprehended in December 1688, on suspicion of being a priest, and
confined ever since, being four and a half years. He had been offered
the same grace with the rest; but he was prevented by his personal
condition from accepting it. According to his own account, he was
seventy years of age. He ‘has not only spent any little thing he had,
but his health is likewise entirely ruined, beyond any probability of
recovery.’ He was most willing to have gone abroad, ‘where he might
have expected better usage for ane in his condition than he can
reasonably propose to himself anywhere in this kingdom;’ but ‘when
the rest went away above a month ago, finding his health so totally
broken by sickness, old age, and imprisonment, and his infirmity still
growing worse,’ he was ‘necessitat to continue prisoner, rather than
hazard a long sea-voyage, whereby he could expect no less than an
unavoidable painful death, the petitioner, when formerly in health
and strength at sea, being still in hazard of his life.’ John Seaton
further represented that he had never, during his long
imprisonment, received any support from the government, but been
maintained by the charity of his friends. He now prayed the Council
that they would take pity on him, and ‘not permit him, ane old sickly
dying man, to languish in prison for the few days he can, by the
course of nature and his disease, continue in this life,’ but let him
retire to ‘some friend’s house, where he may have the use of some
help for his distressed condition, and may in some measure mitigate
the affliction he at present lies under by old age, sickness, poverty,
and imprisonment.’
The Council ordered Seaton to be liberated.[102]
For some time past there had been an 1693. Apr.
unusual and alarming number of highway
robberies. One case, of a picturesque character, may be
particularised. William M‘Fadyen, who made a business of droving
cattle out of Galloway and Carrick to sell them in the English
markets, had received a hundred and fifty pounds sterling at
Dumfries, and was on his way home (December 10, 1692), about four
miles from that town, when at sunrise he was joined by two men,
‘one in a gentleman’s habit, mounted on a dark-gray horse, with a
scarlet coat and gold-thread buttons. He was of extraordinary
stature, with his own hair, sad-coloured, ane high Roman nose,
slender-faced, thick-lipped, with a wrat [wart] above one of his eyes
as big as ane nut, and the little-finger of his left hand bowed towards
his loof’—a peculiarity, by the way, which the Duke of Lauderdale
believed to denote a man who would come to some sad and untimely
end. ‘The other appeared to be his servant, and was also mounted
upon ane dark-gray horse, and carried a long gun.’ ‘After they had
travelled about half a mile on the way, the servant said he was going
through the muir, and desired [M‘Fadyen] to go along with him,
which he refused; whereupon he beat [M‘Fadyen] with the but-end of
his gun, and said he would make him go. Immediately thereafter, the
other came up, and presented a pistol to his breast; and so, after he
had made what defence he was able, and had received several
wounds, they carried him about a quarter of a mile off the way, and
cut the cloak-bag from behind his saddle, and carried away his
money.’
Among other steps taken by the Privy Council in consequence of
this daring robbery, was to ‘recommend Sir James Leslie,
commander-in-chief for the time of their majesties’ forces within this
kingdom, to cause make trial if there be any such person, either
officer or soldier, amongst their majesties’ forces, as the persons
described.’ They sent the same recommendation to the Earl of Leven
with regard to ‘the officers which are come over from Flanders to levy
recruits.’
This seems to have put the military authorities upon their mettle,
and they engaged a certain Sergeant Fae, of Sir James Leslie’s
regiment, as a detector of the robbers, ‘upon his own expenses,
except five pounds allowed him by the [Privy Council].’ The sergeant,
an enterprising fellow, with ‘a perfect abhorrence of such villainies,’
went into the duty assigned him with such zeal and courage, that he
soon, at the hazard of his life, made seizure of several robbers, of
whom two were convicted. Three months of 1693. Apr. 5.
this work having, however, exhausted his
means, he was obliged to petition for further encouragement, and the
Privy Council ordered him ten pounds for the past service, and five
pounds for every robber whom he might apprehend, and who should
be convicted in future.[103]

A great number of the smaller lairds of Apr. 11.

Fife were Jacobite; among the rest, David
Boswell of Balmouto. On the other hand, the Earl of Leven, one of
the nobility of the county, stood high in office under the Revolution
government. Besides a general quarrel with the earl on this ground,
Balmouto had probably some private cause of offence to exasperate
him; but on this point we only have conjecture.
At the date noted, there was a horse-race at the county town,
Cupar; and both gentlemen attended. It is alleged that Balmouto first
waited near a house in the town where the earl was, in expectation of
his coming forth, but afterwards went away to the raceground. There,
as the earl was quietly riding about, Balmouto came up to him
behind his back, and struck him twice or thrice over the head and
shoulders with a baton. On his lordship turning to defend himself,
the assailant struck the horse on the face, and caused it to rear
dangerously. Balmouto then fired a pistol at the earl without effect,
and was immediately seized by the bystanders, and prevented from
doing further mischief.
In a debate before the Privy Council on this case, after hearing
representations from both parties, it was held that the earl’s
complaint was proved, while an attempt of Balmouto to make out a
counter-charge of assault against Lord Leven was declared to have
failed. Balmouto was obliged to beg the earl’s pardon on his knees,
and, on pain of imprisonment, give caution for future good-
behaviour.
On the ensuing 13th of March 1694, Balmouto is found
representing to the Council that ‘his misfortune has been so great,
that his friends are unwilling to interest themselves in his liberation,
whereby his family is in hazard to be ruined, and himself to die in
prison;’ and he craved that they would accept his personal obligation,
and allow him his liberty. The Earl of Leven having concurred in
desiring this, the petition was complied with.[104]
A broadside published this month at 1693. JUNE.
Glasgow, under the title of the Scottish
Mercury, ‘by Mr John Stobo, student in astrologophysick,’ being
dated, however, ‘from Kirkintilloch, where I dwell,’ makes us aware
that the almanac-making charlatanry was not unknown in Scotland.
We learn from it that the French nation are near a sad calamity; that
there were fears of conspiracies about Rome and Milan; and
Constantinople not likely to be free from tumultuous uproars of the
soldiery. ‘The conjunction of Venus with Jupiter relates to some
great lady’s marriage.’ The author professes to ground upon natural
causes, but not to conclude positively about anything—‘that belongs
to God’s providence.’ Finally, there is an advertisement informing
the world that John Stobo, as is known in many parts of this
kingdom, cures infallibly all diseases, couches cataracts, amputates,
&c., working for the poor gratis, and imposing upon the rich ‘as little
cost as may be.’

To promote the making of linen in June 14.

Scotland, an act was passed in 1686,
ordaining that ‘no corps of any persons whatsoever be buried in any
shirt, sheet, or anything else, except in plain linen,’ the relatives of
deceased persons being obliged, under heavy penalties, to come to
their parish minister within eight days of the burial, and declare on
oath that the rule had been complied with.[105] Another act was now
passed, ordaining that, for the same end, no lint should be exported
from the kingdom; that lint imported should be duty free; and
making sundry arrangements for a uniformity in the breadth of the