On the 22d of July, an Act was passed for the abolition of Prelacy, which was followed by an Act of Parliament, which met at Edinburgh in April 1690, rescinding the king's supremacy over the Church; and, by two other Acts of the same Parliament, restoring to their Churches such Presbyterian Ministers, then alive, as had been ejected from their charges since the 1st of May 1661; ratifying the Confession of Faith; settling the Presbyterian form of government in the Church; and appointing the first meeting of the General Assembly to be held at Edinburgh, upon the third Tuesday of October ensuing. Although these matters were highly gratifying to the people in general, an action of unexampled barbarity disgraced the government of William in Scotland. In August 1692, in consequence of a pacification with the Highlanders, a proclamation of indemnity had been issued to such insurgents as would take the oaths to the King and Queen, on or before the last day of December. The Chiefs of the few tribes who had been in arms for James, complied soon after with the proclamation; but M'Donald, of Glencoe, failed in submitting in the limited time, more, however, from accident than design. In the end of December, he came to Colonel Hill, who commanded the garrison in Fort William, to take the oaths of allegiance to the Government. Hill having furnished M'Donald with a letter to Sir Colin Campbell, Sheriff of the County of Argyle, directed him immediately to repair to Inverary, to make his submission in a legal manner before the Magistrate. The way to Inverary lay through a mountainous country, almost impassable, the season was extremely rigorous, and the whole country covered with deep snow. So eager, however, was M'Donald to take the oaths, before the limited time should expire, that, though the road lay within half a mile of his own house, he would not stop to visit his family. After various obstructions, he arrived at Inverary. The time was elapsed, and the Sheriff hesitated to receive his submission, but M'Donald prevailed on him by his

importunities, and even tears. Sir John Dalrymple, afterwards Earl of Stair, attended King William as Secretary of State for Scotland. Dalrymple took advantage of M'Donald's neglecting to take the oaths within the time prescribed, and procured from the King a warrant of military execution against him and his whole tribe. As a mark of his own eagerness, or to save Dalrymple from popular fury, William signed the warrant, both above and below, with his own hand. The Secretary, in letters expressive of a brutal ferocity of mind, urged the officers who commanded in the Highlands, to execute their orders with the utmost rigour. Campbell of Glenlyon, a Captain in Argyle's regiment, and two subalterns, were ordered, with 120 men, to repair to Glencoe, on the 1st of February. Campbell being uncle to young M'Donald's wife, was received by the father with all manner of friendship and hospitality; the men were treated in the houses of his tenants with free quarters and kind entertainment. Till the 13th of the month, the troops lived in good humour and familiarity with the people; the officers, on the very night of the massacre, passed the evening and played at cards in M'Donald's house. In the night, Lieutenant Lindsay, with a party of soldiers, called in a friendly manner at his door, he was instantly admitted; M'Donald, as he was rising to receive his guest, was shot dead, behind his back, with two bullets; his wife had already put on her clothes, but she was stripped naked by the soldiers, who tore the rings off her fingers with their teeth. The slaughter was become general: to prevent the pity of the soldiers to their hosts, their quarters had been changed the night before; neither age nor infirmity was spared; some women, in defending their children, were killed; boys, imploring mercy, were shot by officers, on whose knees they hung; in one place, nine persons, as they sat enjoying themselves at table, were shot dead by the soldiers. At Inveriggen, in Campbell's own quarters, nine men were first bound by the soldiers, and then shot at intervals, one by one; near

forty persons were massacred by the troops; several, who fled to the mountains, perished by famine and the inclemency of the season. Those who escaped, owed their lives to à tempestuous night. Lieutenant-Colonel Hamilton, who had the charge of the execution from Dalrymple, was on his march with 400 men, to guard all the passes from the valley of Glenco; but was obliged to stop by the severity of the weather, which proved the safety of the unfortunate tribe. He entered the valley the next day, laid all the houses in ashes, and carried away all the cattle and spoil, which were divided among the officers and soldiers.

After this disgraceful outrage, which terminated a series of sufferings and persecutions of thirty-one years continuance, the Church of Scotland was restored to that form of government for which her sons had so firmly and nobly contended; and those who were devoted as victims to her cause, have been distinguished by the honourable title of martyrs in defence of truth and liberty; and thus the happy revolution was brought about, under which, according to Hume, "we have ever since enjoyed, if not the best system of government, at least the most entire system of liberty that was ever known among mankind."

From the period at which James VI. ascended the English throne, in 1603, down to the Revolution in 1688, the records of our country present a melancholy picture of human nature; Judges and Jurors severally obedient to the will of arbitrary Governors; abundantly forward to prostitute their powers at the nod of their superiors, to almost every measure, however cruel or sanguinary, capricious or unwarrantable. When we view such subversions of justice, and such undue exertions of power, and the legal murders with which our criminal records abound, we are naturally led to contrast these oppressions with the blessings we enjoy, under a free government, and in a more enlightened age; while we draw from this constrast ample grounds of consolation, may we learn and cherish

just detestation for the uncharitable spirit of persecution which is so disconsonant with the principles of forbearance and brotherly love inculcated in the doctrines, and exemplified in the life and character of the great Founder of Christianity, and may we feel and preserve a due abhorrence of all attacks and encroachments upon our inestimable civil and religious liberties.

The Queen, in the latter end of 1694, was seized with the small pox, and died on the 28th of December.

William having also sickened, paid the debt of nature on the 8th of March 1702. He was succeeded by the Princess Anne, who had married George, Prince of Denmark; she ascended the throne in the thirty-eighth year of her age, to the satisfaction of all parties. During her reign, the Duke of Marlborough obtained many brilliant successes on the Continent. Although the Kingdoms of England and Scotland had been governed by one Sovereign since the time of James I. of England, yet each nation continued to be ruled by its respective Parliament, and often professed to pursue opposite interests to that of its neighbour. A union between the Kingdoms, which had often been attempted, and as often failed, was concluded and ratified by the Scotch Parliament, on the 25th of March 1707; the articles of this agreement are herein afterwards narrated. The terms of the Union were particularly obnoxious to the Scotch, for although they had deputed twenty Commissioners to meet twenty-three belonging to England, the body of the people insisted that the terms had been carefully concealed, and that they were not known till the whole was at once laid before Parliament; the ferment was so general, that all ranks of people, however divided in other matters, joined issue against this detested treaty; the nobility and gentry were exasperated at the annihilation of Parliament, and their consequent loss of influence and credit; the body of the people conceived that they saw the independence of the nation sacrificed to treaties and corruptions; they insisted,

that, by the Scotch members living in London, the money would be drained from the country: nor were the commercial part of the people better satisfied; the restrictions of the India Company, the taxes laid on the necessaries of life, the vast number of duties, customs, and restrictions, laid upon trade, were all of them matters of complaint. Before this time, the trade of Scotland had been open to the Levant, the Baltic, France, Spain, Portugal, Holland, and the Dutch Plantations; and it seemed difficult to conceive how the commerce of the country could be advanced by laying restrictions on it to all those places, especially as the compensation allowed, namely, the privilege of trading to the English Settlements and the Plantations in America, must have been very trifling, as the amount of the exports to these places did not nearly equal the expense of defending them. The most violent disputes took place in Parliament. Lord Belhaven, in deploring the situation in which the Union would bring the Scotch nation, drew tears from the eyes of the audience; almost every article of the treaty was subject to a protest; addresses against it was presented to Parliament by the convention of Royal Burghs, the Commissioners of the General Assembly, the Company trading to Africa and the Indies, as well as from Shires, Burghs, Towns, and Parishes, without distinction of Whigs, Tories, Presbyterians, or Episcopalians.

In Glasgow, the disturbances were carried to a great height, and addresses against the Union were presented by almost every description of persons. Messrs. John Bowman, Dean of Guild, Robert Scott, Deacon of the Tailors, and John Stevenson, Deacon of the Cordiners, went to Parliament with the remonstrances of their fellow-citizens.

The Commission of the General Assembly appointed a fast, to be kept on Thursday the 7th of November, to implore Divine assistance from the impending calamity; on which occasion, Mr. James Clark, the Minister of the Tron Church, Glasgow, preached from these words, in Ezra viii. 21. "Then I pro