BEL 



191 



i; i; i. 



up the defence* for him. In 1424 an act had been passed by 

 the Scottish legislature, providing, thai gif there be ony 

 poor creature that fur lark of cunning or dispenses cannot or 

 may not follow bit cam*, the King, for the lore of God, sal 

 ordain the judge to purvey and gel a loil and wise advocate 

 to follow sik poor creature's cause :' but here, the once potent 

 Earl of Angus had for his first plea, that though ' rallil upon 

 cure life, landes, and gudrs, and ar na man of law ourself, 

 we can get na procuratuur nor advocat to speik for us.' All 

 bis pleas and defences were overruled, and be was found 

 guilty by the parliament, and attainted; hut in March 

 1 jl-J-3, the attainder was reversed, Crawfurd says, on the 

 grounds taken in the defences, and Angus restored to his 

 estates and honours. 



Bellenden immediately after had the honour of knight- 

 hood conferred upon him ; and on his father's death, lie. 

 was in June, 1547, appointed to the vacant places of a lord 

 of session, director of the chancery, and justice-clerk. On 

 the breaking out of the Reformation, he was named hy the 

 Queen Regent one of the commissioners between her and 

 the lords of the congregation : but he soon joined the re- 

 formers, and in August, 1560, he and Wisharl of Pittarrow 

 are mentioned in Randolph's despatch to Cecil, as the two 

 whom they had resolved to join in a mission to France 

 (Robertson's Scotland, vol. i. p. 186), and on Mary's arrival 

 in Scotland, he was, 6th September, 1651, appointed one 

 of the privy council. In December following he was one of 

 those named to modify stipends to the reformed clergy 

 the mean allowance for whom roused the indignation of 

 Knox. On the 23rd September, 1563, he and Sir John 

 Maxwell, the warden of the West Marches, met the English 

 commissioners at Dumfries, where they entered into a con- 

 vention for redressing the mutual trespasses on the borders. 

 (Nicolson's Border Laws, p. 84, et seq.) 



Sir John appears to have been thrice married. His first 

 wife was Barbara, daughter of Sir Hii'jh Kennedy of Gir- 

 vanmains, a friend of the Duuulns family: and on the 1st 

 May, 1559, he had a charter to hmiseli'and his said spouse 

 of the lands of Waukmill with the Fullers-mill, and tome 

 other lands in the regality of Broughtun, belonging to tlie 

 abbey of Holyrood near Edinburgh. His younger brother, 

 Patrick, who was made sheriff of Orkney, also married a 

 daughter of the house of Kennedy, and on the l.sih Fe- 

 bruary, 1565, had a charter from Adam, bishop of Orkney, 

 of the lands of Stenhouse in that diocese, to himstiH and 

 Catherine his wife, and their children, whom failing, the 

 said Sir John. On the 31st May, 1565, Sir John got a 

 grant of the office of usher of exchequer an ollice which 

 seems to have remained in his family till 1796, when on 

 the insolvency of the fifth Lord Ballenden it was attached, 

 and sold by the creditors. The same year Sir John bad a 

 grant of the office of justiciar and bailie of the baronies of 

 Canongate and Broughton, and other lands belonging to 

 Holyrood- house; and the next year the commendator made 

 him justiciar and bailie of Calder, belonging to the same. 

 abbey. 



Among the numerous reports to which the murder of 

 Rizzio gave rise, one was, that the Bellendens were impli- 

 cated in the crime ; and in the despatch from Randolph 

 and the Earl of Bedford to the privy council of England, 

 27th March, 1566, it is said 'There were in this couipuiuu 

 two that came in with the king, the one Andrewe Car of 

 Fawdonside, whom the Queen say th would have slrokfii her 

 with a dagger, and one Patrick Bulentyne, brother to the 

 justice-clerk, who also, her grace say th, offered a dag against 

 her belly with the cock down :' but it is added, ' We huvo 

 been earnestly in hand with the Lord Ruthen to know the 

 varitie, and he assureth us to the contrarie.' (Robertson's 

 Scotland, vol. iii. p. 227.) It would seem, however, that Sir 

 John Bellenden lied from Edinburgh, on the 18th March, 

 1568, on the arrival of Mary and Darnley with an army : but 

 be was soon restored to favour. He carried Mary's commands 

 Ir. John Craig, the famous fellow-minister of John 

 Knox, to proclaim the banns between her and Bothwell, 

 and hod long reasoning with the church on the subject. 

 The marriage was solemnized on the 15th May, 1567, by 

 the above-mentioned Adam, bishop of Orkney an act for 

 which he had to ask pardon of the church, before they would 

 allow him to remain in the ministry. The bishop of Ork- 

 ney afterwards joined the association against Mary and 

 Bothwell ; and in July following he anointed and crowned 

 the infant James. Sir John Ballenden joined the associa- 

 tion likewise. He was also one of the Regent's privy 



council. In 1573 he was employed in framing the ptttfj 

 cation of Perth, whereby nil the <|U'-ch Kirk- 



caldy of Grange. I.ethington. ami those with them in Edin- 

 burgh castle, were brought to the king's olicdi.-M.v. The 

 same year he was, it seems, cmp'. .iilli- 



cult affair, namely, to persuade the General A- 

 the behalf of Morton, that the civil magistrate < 

 head of the church as well as of the Mate. The 

 was continued for twelve days, and then adjourned. (Home's 

 Httlory of the Hut o/ Douglat.) 



Sir John died some time before April, 157 7, leaving by his 

 first wife two sons, on the eldest of whom. I-..-.M-. he by Ins 

 latter will, dated in !>,;, laid an injunction to scr 

 gent and the house of Angus, under the king's majesty's obe- 

 dience, 'as I and my forbearis haf done, m \\\ 

 befoir all the warld.' Sir Lewis succeeded his lather ii 

 possessions, and in his place of justice rlerk. Thomas H, 1- 

 Icnden of Ncwtyle got the vacant place of lord of ses- 

 ' quhilk place (says the king's letter) may not now K 

 by our said familiar clerk, vix. Sir Lewis, by reason a 

 less age.' To what terra of life this lost expression u; 

 is somewhat doubtful, chiefly because the opinion ol , 

 Hailes has intervened. His lordship conceives it t 

 twenty-five, though that age does not appear to have been 

 required for the bench till tha act 1593, o. 134. In the 

 king's latter above referred to, the lords of session un- 

 joined to allow Sir Lewis to remain in court during it* deli- 

 berations, 'that he may hear the reasoning of all causes 

 with advysement of the processes and intfrloquitors the' 

 for it must be remembered that at that time the court of 

 session always deliberated in secret. The practice indeed 

 continued till the Revolution, when an act was passed, re- 

 quiring the judges to advise and vote 'with open doors:' 

 and it is not a little singular that, notwithstanding the im- 

 portance of publicity and of the constant presence in court 

 of a body of vigilant and intelligent lawyers to the due ad- 

 ministration of the law, the practitioners before the court of 

 session do generally continue to perambulate the 'Outer 

 House' to this day. 



Sir Lewis's immediate younger brother, Adam, was bred 

 to the church, and became bishop of Aberdeen. He had 

 another brother, Thomas, said to be of a third rnarri.igc, 

 who was for a short time one of the lords feeMioa. Th<> 

 grandson of Sir Lewis was in June, 1661, created Ix>rd Bal- 

 i of Broughton : and on the deathrof the third Duke 

 of Ruxburghe, the latter honour devolved on his kin>man, 

 the seventh Lord Ballenden, on whose death, the follow ing 

 year, the barony of Bellenden expired. 



HKLLBNDEN, WILLIAM, an eminent writer, con 

 cerning whoso birth and education we possess no certain in- 

 formation except that he was of Scotch family, became known 

 as a writer in the commencement of the sixteenth century. 

 It is stated that he filled the ollice of Professor of Humanity 

 in the University of Paris in 1602, and that he was enabled 

 to reside at that university through the favour of .lan.es \ I. 

 (James I. of England). It is certain that he resided a long 

 time in Paris, and that the various writings which 

 transmitted his name down to us were published during his 

 residence there. In 1608 he published Ins ( 'iceroius I'rin- 

 oeps,' &c., ' a singular woik,' says Dr. Bennett, Bishop <,i 

 Cloyne, ' in which ho extracted from Cicero's writing 

 t ached remarks, and compressed them into one regular body. 

 containing the rules of monarchical government, with the 

 line of conduct to be adopted, ami the virtues proper to be 

 encouraged by the prince himself.' This treatise, which is 

 culled ' De Statu Principis,' he dedicated to 1'nnce Henry, 

 the eldest son of his royal patron. In 1612 he published 

 a work of a similar character, which he called ' ( 'K-. -ronis 

 Consul, Senator, Senatusque Romanus,' that is ' De Statu 

 Reipublicao,' in which the nature of the consular office, 

 and the constitution of the Roman senate are perspioir- 

 treated. Finding these works deservedly successful, he 



1. and partly executed, the plan of a third work, ' De 

 Statu prisci Orbis,' which was to contain a history ol'the pro- 

 gress of religion, government, and philosophy, from the times 

 before the Flood, to their various degrees of improvement 

 under the Hebrews, Greeks, and Romans. He had pro- 

 ceeded so far as to print a few copies of this work in 1615, 

 ' when it seems,' says Dr. Bennett, 'to have been siig.- 

 that his three treatises, ' De Stain 1'iinnr . I v v.iu 

 KeipubliriD,' ' De Statu Prisei Orbis,' living on s 

 nearly resembling each other, there might be a propriety in 

 uniting them into ono work, by republislung the two former, 



