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JAHN, JOHANNES. 



JAMES III. (OP SCOTLAND). 



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the old and new world.'" " The happy contiuuator of the efforts of 

 Vaucanson, who, like him, was engaged at Lyon in the improvement 

 of weaving-machinery, Jacquard has invented a simple and cheap 

 machine, coming within the reach of the humble weaver, the intro- 

 duction of which forms a memorable epoch a new era in the textile 

 art." By its agency the richest and most complex designs are pro- 

 duced with facility at the moat moderate price ; and it has increased 

 the number of workmen in the manufacture in which it is used nearly 

 twenty-fold. 



JAHN, JOHANNES, a distinguished Roman Catholic theologian, 

 was born at Taswitz, in Moravia, in 1750. He devoted himself early 

 to the study of the oriental languages, in which he acquired a great 

 extent of knowledge and a high reputation. He wrote grammars of 

 the Chaldee, Syriac, Arabian, and Hebrew tongues ; an ' Introductio 

 in libros sacros veteris Testament!,' which has gone through several 

 editions; 'Biblische Archiiologie,' Vienna, 1797-1800, which has been 

 translated into English; and a ' Commentarius criticus in libros 

 propheticos veteris Testamenti,' Vienna, 1815. For a considerable 

 time he was professor of theology in the University of Vienna, an 

 office which he resigned in 1807. He was then made a canon, and 

 died in 1815. 



JAMES I., King of Scotland, waa a younger son of King Robert III., 

 who, hearing of the licentious conduct of his other son, David, prince 

 of Scotland, directed Robert duke of Albany, the boy's uncle, to seize 

 him and keep him a prisoner till he promised amendment. This 

 order was readily obeyed by Albany, who wished nothing better than 

 an opportunity to usurp the throne; and in a short time the prince 

 died of dysentery, as it was said, but, as was believed, of hunger in 

 confinement. The king now began to fear Albany, and accordingly 

 had his remaining son James secretly put on board a vessel for France. 

 He did not escape however ; for when but a short way on her voyage 

 the vessel wag taken by an English ship of war, and the prince carried 

 prisoner to London. His weak old father was so affected by the news 

 that in a few hours after receiving the intelligence he died of a broken 

 heart The Duke of Albany was thereupon made regent of the 

 kingdom. 



James, now in the thirteenth year of his age, was on the 14th of 

 April 1405, conducted to the Tower, where he was detained till the 

 10th of June 1407, when he waa removed to the castle of Nottingham. 

 He was carried back to the Tower again on the 1st of March 1414 ; 

 but a few months afterwards he was taken to Windsor, where he 

 remained till the summer of 1417, when King Henry V. took him 

 with him on Ms second expedition to France. The Duke of Albany 

 died in 1419, and from that time measures began seriously to be taken 

 for his release. During all this period James was receiving the best 

 education which could be procured. He became familiar with sights 

 of regal pomp and power, and with the manners and customs of the 

 English court, at a time when there was much to interest and captivate 

 the youthful mind. His habits were active, his conduct prompt and 

 resolute, and at his return to his native kingdom he was in the spring 

 and vigour of his life. He was long afterwards remembered in Italy as 

 the inventor of a plaintive sort of melody, which had been admired 

 and imitated in that country. He was one of the best harpers of his 

 time, and excelled all the Irish and Scotch Highlanders in their use 

 of that instrument ; and in the three pieces of his which have come 

 down to our day 'Christ's Kirk on the Green,' the ' King's Quhair' 

 (or Book), and ' Peebles at the Play ' we have no mean specimens of 

 intellectual power and literary skill. 



At bis accession, in 1424, Scotland was in many respects a perfect 

 contrast to England; it was in fact rather an aggregate of rival powers 

 than a settled and united kingdom. There were still two justiciars 

 of co-ordinate authority, one on the north and the other on the south 

 of the Forth ; and in the former portion of the realm, which alone 

 was properly denominated Scotland, and where the seat of authority 

 itill principally lay, there were numerous and powerful clans. The 

 regencies, in the absence of James, had contributed to the national 

 disorder the two Albanies sacrificing to their own ambitious projects 

 the just authority of government and the supremacy of the law. 



James entered on the administration of bis kingdom with a spirit 

 and energy suitable to the high notions of prerogative which he had 

 imbibed. Immediately on his arrival he proceeded against the family 

 and adherents of the late regents, and eventually had several of there 

 condemned and forfeited. All the customs of the realm, great and 

 small, were annexed to the crown, and every valuable mine of gold 

 or silver. A new coinage was struck, of like weight and fineness with 

 the money of England ; hospitals were to be visited and reformed ; 

 idleness and begging were forbidden ; tLe law records of the kingdom 

 (which seem to have been in a state of neglect) were to be inspected 

 and ascertained ; and the statutes of parliament were ordered, for the 

 first time, to be regularly enrolled. This was not all however ; for in 

 the spirit of King Henry IV.'s time, which had witnessed some detest- 

 able examples of religious persecution, an act was passed 'anent 

 heretics,' tht inquisition bo taken by every bishop in his diocese, and, 

 " gif it misteris," that secular power be called in support and aid of 

 the Church. In his time the chancellor and clergy first got a footing 

 in the administration of the common law. This was in the year 1425, 

 when the chancellor and certain persons of the three estates chosen 

 by the king were empowered, under the name of the Court of Session, 



to hear and finally determine all complaints, cause?, and quarrels 

 competent before the king and his council. 



We have already alluded to the king's conduct towards the family 

 and friends of the regent Duke of Albany immediately on his accession 

 to the throne. At a later period of his reign we have another signal 

 instance of the king's energy and promptitude of purpose in his 

 conduct towards the Lord of the Isles. About the year 1427 the 

 Lord of Isla was slain by a person of the name of Campbell, who had, 

 it seems, a commission from the king to apprehend Isla ; but, it is 

 added, he exceeded his powers in putting that chieftain to death. The 

 circumstance occasioned great disturbance throughout the highlands 

 and isles. Determined to restore order, and to enforce the laws in 

 those wild districts, the king summoned a parliament at Inverness, to 

 which the Lord of the Isles and the other highland chiefs were cited 

 to appear. On their arrival, to the number of about forty, they were 

 seized by a stratagem of the king, and committed to prison in separate 

 apartments. The Lord of the Isles and some others were at length 

 liberated ; but, deeply feeling the indignity he had suffered, the Lord 

 of the Isles, immediately on his return home, gathered together his 

 friends and vassals, and at the head of a vast force wasted all the 

 crown lands near Inverness, aud made an attempt also to destroy the 

 town. Information of this inroad being communicated to the king, 

 orders were instantly given to repair to tho spot ; and leading his 

 troops in person, he succeeded by forced marches in coming up with 

 the rebels in Lochaber, at a time when they least expected such a 

 thing. The consequence was that at length the rebels made an 

 unconditional surrender, and the Lord of the Isles was obliged to 

 make his submission on his bended knees at the court of Holyrood 

 House. 



The king's vigour and determination were not a little obnoxious to 

 the nobles, who saw in it the speedy ruin of their usurped authority. 

 But it is probable that his devotion to the ecclesiastics wounded them 

 more keenly than all the exercise of his royal power. They felt 

 humbled, not so much before the sovereign as before the clergy. A 

 conspiracy was accordingly formed against him, under tho Duke of 

 Athol, the king's uncle, aud on the 21st of February 1437, the king 

 was murdered, in the fourty-fourth year of his age. A year or two 

 afterwards also his adviser Wardlaw, bishop of St. Andrews, died ; 

 and immediately on this event Biahop Cameron, Wardlaw's favourite, 

 was turued out of the chancellorship which he had held from the 

 institution of the Court of the Session, and Sir William Crichton, a 

 layman, and the first who had held the great seal for a long period, 

 was constituted chancellor ; the Court of Session expired, and the 

 course of the old common law was re-established. 



JAMES II., King of Scotland, only son of James I., succeeded to 

 the crown when but about seven years old. The rivalry which existed 

 between the nobles and ecclesiastics at his father's death continued ; 

 and the one party or the other prevailed according as by violence or 

 stratagem they obtained possession of the king's person. Disorder 

 naturally spread throughout the kingdom, and the power of individuals 

 grew most insolent from neglect to enforce the laws. The Earl of 

 Douglas in particular erected a sort of independent principality in the 

 country, and forbidding his vassals and dependents to acknowledge 

 any authority save his own, he created knights, appointed a privy- 

 council, named officers, civil aud military, and appeared in public 

 with a splendour and magnificence more than royal. To add to tho 

 calamities which the nation suffered, the country was visited by a 

 plague, and there was also a great famine. The king was immature in 

 mind as in years, and altogether deficient in the vigour necessary in 

 his circumstances and situation : his partialities were also misplaced. 

 During his whole reign the country was disturbed by intestine broils, 

 and though continual executions and forfeitures took place, yet no 

 regular or effectual measure was adopted to obtain or secure peace. 

 He was also attacked from England, aud at the siege of Roxburgh, 

 which was occupied by tho English, he was killed by the bursting of 

 a cannon. This was in the year 1460, and in the twenty-ninth year 

 of the king's age. 



JAMES III., King of Scotland, was, like his father James II., about 

 seven years old at his accession 'to the throne, 3rd of August 1460. 

 He had scarcely begun his reign when Donald, the Lord of the Isles, 

 seeing the weakness of government and the distracted state of the 

 kingdom, assembled a council of his friends and vassals at his castle 

 of Ardtornish, and in the style of an independent prince granted a 

 commission to ambassadors to confer with deputies from Edward IV., 

 king of England, with a view to the settlement of the realm. The 

 commissioners met at Westminster, and after a negociatiou, concluded 

 a treaty, dated at London, 13th of February 1462, the object of which 

 was no less than the conquest of Scotland by the vassals of the 

 chieftain and the auxiliaries to be furnished by Edward, with such 

 assistance as could be given by the banished Earl of Douglas. While 

 this rebellion was going on in the north, Robert lord Boyd, one of the 

 lords of the regency, and also lord-justiciar south of the Forth, and 

 lord-chamberlain of the kingdom, was grasping in another part of the 

 country at all the chief honours and places of government, and it 

 would seem that the minor offices of magistrates and common- 

 councilmen in the several burghs were also then objects of tumultuous 

 contest : for it was at this time the Act 1469, c. 29, was passed, 

 by which the entire system of burgh election was changed, on the 



