RAILLIE. 



379 



Sccttish literary history for a memoir of the church 

 during his own times, which was of great service in 

 manuscript to the historian Wodrow, and was at length 

 published in 1817. One day in June, 1676, as Mr 

 Kirkton was walking along the High Street of Edin- 

 burgh, Carstairs, whose person he did not know, ac- 

 costed him in a very civil manner, and expressed a 

 desire to speak with him in private. Mr Kirkton, 

 suspecting no evil, followed Carstairs to a very mean 

 looking house, near the common prison. Carstairs, 

 who had no warrant to apprehend or detain Mr 

 Kirkton, went out to get one, locking the door upon 

 his victim. The unfortunate clergyman then per- 

 ceived that he was in some danger, and prevailed 

 upon a person in the house to go to seek his brother- 

 in-law, Mr Baillie, and apprise him of his situation. 

 Carstairs, having in vain endeavoured to get the re- 

 quisite number of privy councillors to sign a warrant, 

 uow came back, resolved, it appears, to try at least 

 if he could not force some money from Mr Kirkton 

 for his release. Just as they were about to confer 

 upon this subject, Mr Baillie came to the door, with 

 several other persons, and called to Carstairs to open. 

 Kirkton, hearing the voices of friends, took courage, 

 and desired his captor either to set him free, or to 

 show a warrant for his detention. Carstairs, instead 

 of doing either, drew a pocket pistol, and Kirkton 

 found it necessary, for his own safety, to enter into a 

 personal struggle, and endeavour to secure the wea- 

 pon of his antagonist. The gentlemen without, 

 hearing a struggle, and cries of murder, burst open 

 the door, and found Carstairs sitting upon Mr Kirk- 

 ton, on the floor. Baillie drew his sword, and com- 

 manded the poltroon to come off, asking him at the 

 same time if he had any warrant for apprehending 

 Mr Kirkton. Carstairs said he had a warrant for 

 conducting him to prison, but he utterly refused to 

 show it, though Mr Baillie said that, if he saw any 

 warrant against his friend, he would assist in carrying 

 it into execution. The wretch still persisting in say- 

 ing he had a warrant, but was not bound to show it, 

 Mr Baillie left the place, with Mr Kirkton and other 

 friends, having offered no violence whatever to Car- 

 stairs, but only threatened to sue him for unlawful 

 invasion of his brother-in-law's person. It might 

 have been expectftf from even a government so lost 

 to all honour and justice as that which now prevailed 

 in Scotland, that it would have at least the good 

 sense to overlook this unhappy accident to one of its 

 tools. On the contrary, it was resolved to brave the 

 popular feeling of right, by listening to the com- 

 plaints of Carstairs. Through the influence of arch- 

 bishop Sharpe, who said that, if Carstairs was not 

 countenanced, no one would be procured to appre- 

 hend fanatics afterwards, a majority of the council 

 agreed to prosecute Baillie, Kirkton, and the other 

 persons concerned. For this purpose, an antedated 

 warrant was furnished to Carstairs, signed by nine of 

 the councillors. The marquis of Athol told bishop Bur- 

 net, that he had been one of the nine who lent their 

 names to this infamous document. The whole case 

 was, therefore, made out to be a tumult against the 

 government ; Baillie was fined in 6,000 merks, (318 

 sterling,) and his friends in smaller sums, and to 

 be imprisoned till they should render payment. 

 This award was so opposite, in every particular, to 

 the principles of truth, honour^ and justice, that, even 

 if not directed against individuals connected with the 

 popular cause, it could not have failed to excite 

 general indignation. It appears that a respectable 

 minority of the council itself was strongly opposed to 

 the decision, and took care to let it be known at 

 court. Mr Baillie was therefore released at the 

 end of four months, in consideration of payment of 

 one half of his fine to the creature Carstairs. Lord 



Halton, however, who was at this time a kind of 

 pro-regent under his brother Lauderdale, had interest 

 to obtain the dismissal of his opponents from the 

 council, namely, the duke of Hamilton, the earls of 

 Morton, Dumfries, and Kincardine, and the lords 

 Cochrane and Primrose, whom he branded, for their 

 conduct on this occasion, as enemies to the church, 

 and favourers of conventicles. 



After this period, nothing is known of Mr Baillie 

 till the year 1683, when he is found taking a pro- 

 minent share in a scheme of emigration, agitated by 

 a number of Scottish gentlemen, who saw no refuge 

 but this from the tyranny of the government. These 

 gentlemen entered into a negotiation with the paten- 

 tees of South Carolina, for permission to convey 

 themselves thither, along with their families and de- 

 pendents. While thus engaged, Mr Baillie was in- 

 duced, along with several of his friends, to enter into 

 correspondence and counsel with the heads of the 

 Puritan party in England, who were now forming an 

 extensive plan of insurrection, for the purpose of ob- 

 taining a change of measures in the government, 

 though with no ulterior view. Under the pretext of 

 the American expedition, lord Melville, Sir John 

 Cochrane of Ochiltree, Mr Baillie, and three others, 

 were invited and repaired to London, to consult with 

 the duke of Monmouth, Sydney, Russell, and the 

 rest of that party. This scheme was never properly 

 matured ; indeed, it never was any thing but a mat- 

 ter of talk, and had ceased to be even that, when a 

 minor plot for assassinating the king, to which only 

 a small number of the party were privy, burst pre- 

 maturely, and involved several of the chiefs, who 

 were totally ignorant of it, in destruction. Sydney 

 and Russell suffered for this crime, of which they 

 were innocent ; and Baillie and several other gentle- 

 men were seized and sent down to be tried in Scotland. 



The subsequent judicial proceedings were charac- 

 terized by the usual violence and illegality of the 

 time. He endured a long confinement, during which 

 he was treated very harshly, and not permitted to 

 have the society of his lady, though she offered to go 

 into irons, as an assurance against any attempt at 

 facilitating his escape. An attempt was made to 

 procure sufficient proof of guilt from the confessions 

 wrought out of his nephew-in-law, the earl of Tarras 

 (who had been first married to the elder sister of the 

 duchess of Monmouth) ; but, this being found in- 

 sufficient, his prosecutors were at last obliged to 

 adopt the unlawful expedient, too common in those 

 distracted times, of putting him to a purgative oath. 

 An accusation was sent to him, not in the form of an 

 indictment, nor grounded on any law, but on a letter 

 of the king, in which he was charged with a con- 

 spiracy to raise rebellion, and a concern in the Rye- 

 house Plot. He was told that, if he would not clear 

 himself of these charges by his oath, he should be 

 held as guilty, though not as in a criminal court, but 

 only as oefore the council, who had no power to 

 award a higher sentence than fine and imprisonment. 

 As he utterly refused to yield to such a demand, he 

 was fined by the council in 6,000, being about the 

 value of his whole estates. It was then supposed 

 that the prosecution would cease, and that he would 

 escape with the doom of a captive. For several 

 months he continued shut up in a loathsome prison, 

 which had such an effect upon his health that he 

 was brought almost to the last extremity. Yet "all 

 the while," to use the words of bishop Burnet, " he 

 seemed so composed, and even so cheerful, that his 

 behaviour looked like a reviving of the spirit of the 

 noblest of the old Greeks or Romans, or rather of 

 the primitive Christians, and first martyrs in those 

 last days of the church. At length, on the 23d of 

 December, 1684, he was brought before the court of 



