2«* S. IX. Jan. 14. '60.] 



NOTES AND QUERIES. 



19 



LONDON, SATURDAY, JANUARY 14, 18C0. 



N°. 211.— CONTENTS. 



NOTES: — The Gowry Conspiracy, 19 — The Crossing 

 Sweeper, 20 — The Graffiti of Pompeii, 21 — A Difficult 

 Problem solved during Sleep, 22. 



Minor Notes : —Notes on Regiments — The Stuart Papers 

 — Writers who have been bribed to Silence — Child saved 

 by a Dog — Use of the Word " Sack," 23. 



QUERIES: — MS. Poems by Burns, 24 — Bazels of Baize, 

 25 — A Question iu Logic — Quotation Wanted — Electric 

 Telegraph half a Century ago— Landslips at Folkstone — 

 Books of an Antipapal Tendency written before the Refor- 

 mation — Metrical Version of the Psalms in Welsh — Lord 

 Tracton — Orlers's Account of Ley den— Fafelty Clough — 

 Stakes fastened together with Lead as a Defence — Ex- 

 traordinary Custom at a Wedding — Sepulchral Slabs and 

 Crosses — Sir Mark Kennaway, 27. 



Queries with: Answers: — Eikon Basilica: Picture of 

 Charles I. — Taylor the Platonist — To fly in the Air — 

 Boiled — Anglo-Saxon Literature — The Coan — "Parlia- 

 mentary Portraits," 27. 



REPLIES:— Anne Pole, 29 — Sea-breaches, 30 — The "Te 

 Deum " interpolated ? 31 — The Suffragan Bishop of Ips- 

 wich, 32 — Translations mentioned by Moore — Claudius 

 Gilbert — John Gilpin — Note about the Records, temp. 

 Edward III. — The Prussian Iron Medal — Lodovico 

 Sforza — Misprint in Seventh Commandment — MS. News 

 Letters — Derivation of Hawker — Sending Jack after 

 Tes, &c, 33. 



Monthly Feuilleton on French Books, &c. 



latest. 

 THE GOWRY CONSPIRACY. 



We have in the State Paper Office some con- 

 temporary letters, apparently partly official and 

 partly private, which contain a good deal of in- 

 formation about the curious and inexplicable con- 

 spiracy of the Earl of Gowry. 



Foremost amongst the writers is Mr. George 

 Nicholson, who was in Edinburgh when the plot 

 was discovered, and who writes from that city on 

 the 6th of August, 1600, to Sir Robert Cecil, 

 Secretary of State. He gives us a long account 

 of the different circumstances attending the exe- 

 cution of the plot, both before the King arrived at 

 Gowry's House, and after, when the Master made 

 his attack upon him ; his information being evi- 

 dently taken from the report first current in 

 Edinburgh, and which was doubtless circulated 

 by the Council. His letter is interesting and mi- 

 nute. I give it nearly verbatim as far as relates 

 to Gowry, omitting here and there a few words : — 



" It may please your Honour, 

 " This day morning, at 9 hours, the King wrote to the 

 Chancellor's Secretary and to others, and to one of the 



Kirk and the King's Secretary told me, That 



yesterday the Earl of Gowry sent the Master his Brother, 

 Mr. Alexander Kuthven, to the King, hunting in Falk- 

 land Park [and told him], that his Brother the Earl had 

 found in an old Tower in his house at St. Johnston's a 

 great Treasure, to help the King's service with, which he 

 said his Brother would fain have the KiDg go to see 



quickly that day: Whereon, after the King had hunted 

 a while, and taken a drink, he took fresh horse, and dis- 

 charged his Company, with the Duke (of Lennox) and 

 the Eurl of Mar, then in company with him, and taking 

 only a servant with him, rode with the Master. The 

 Duke (of Lennox) and the Earl of Mar though yet fol- 

 lowed, and the King met by the way the Lord of Inchaf- 

 fray, who also rode with him to St. Johnston's, where 

 the King coming, the Earl meeting him carried him into 

 his house, and gave him a good dinner, and afterwards 

 went to dinner with the rest of the Company. The 

 Master, in the mean time of their dinner, persuaded the 

 King to go with him quietlj- to see it (the Treasure), and 

 the King discharging his Company from following, went 

 with the Master from staith to staith, and chamber to 

 chamber, looking for it, the lords behind him, until he 

 came to a chamber where a man was, whom the King 

 thought was the man that kept the Treasure. 



" Then the Master caught hold on the King, and drew 

 his dagger, saying he (the King) had killed his Father 

 and he would kill him. The King with good words and 

 measures, struggled to dissuade him, saying he was 

 young when his father, and divers other honest men, 

 were executed ; that he was innocent thereof; that he 

 had restored his Brother, and made him greater than he 

 (ever) was; that if he killed him (the King), he would 

 not escape nor be his heir. That he presumed Master 

 Alexander had learned more divinity than to kill his 

 prince, assuring him and faithfully promising him that if 

 he would leave off his enterprize he would forgive him 

 and keep it secret, as a matter attempted upon heat and 

 rashness onely. To this the Master replied: 'What he 

 was preaching that should not help him. He should 

 dye.' And that therewith he struck at the King, and 

 the King and he both fell to the ground. The Master 

 then called to the man there present to kill the King : 

 the man answered he had neither heart or hand. And 

 yet he is a very courageous man. The King having no 

 dagger, but in his hunting clothes with his horn, yet de- 

 fended himself from the Master; and, in struggling, got 

 to the window, where he cried ' Treason,' which Sir Tho. 

 Erskine, John Ramsey, and Doctor Harris hearing, ran 

 up after the King, but found the door shut as they could 

 not pass. Sir John Ramsey knowing another way, got 

 up, and in to the King, who cryed to John he was slain : 

 whereon John out with his rapier, and killed the Master, 

 In the mean time the Earl of Gowry told the Duke and 

 the rest that the King was gone away out at a back 

 gate, and they ran out, and Gowry with them ; but miss- 

 ing him, the Earl said he wold go back and see where 

 the King was. The Earl took with him a steel Bonnet 

 and two Rapiers, and ran up the stairs. Sir John Ram- 

 sey meeting him with drawn swords, Sir Thomas Erskin 

 and Docter Harris being then come to join, after sundry 

 strokes in and killed the Earl ; Sir Thomas being hurt, 

 and Docter Harris mutilated and wanting two fingers. 

 [During] this stir The Townsmen, and Gowry's friends 

 in evil, appearing, said the) - would have account where 

 the Earl was .... and to pacify them the Duke and 

 Earl of Mar were sent to the Magistrates, and so quieted, 

 [and] the King and his Company got away. The King 

 thanking God for his deliverance. Yesternight he 

 knighted, as I hear, John Ramsey and Docter Harris, 

 but the Secretary told it not me. 



" Upon this, letters came from the Courts, the whole 

 Counsell here (at Edinburgh) convened, and in, and at 

 one of the clock rose and came all to the Market Cross, ; 

 and there, by sound of trumpets, intimated, but in 

 brief, the happy Escape of the King; and then in, and 

 . . . . made (orVler) in Council for the people to thank 

 God for it, and iu joy thereof to ring bells and build 

 bonfires. Mr. David Lindsaye,' standing at the Cross, 



