74 TJie Shetland* in the 



so devisit against many of them that they were 

 compellit by imprisonment and small rewaird to 

 resign their heritable titles to him .... gif not life 

 and all besides." 



It is not difficult to understand why, after most 

 entries of the kind, we read, " Wanting probation 

 the earl is assoilized," as at least ten times in a 

 single volume of the Register appear such entries as 

 the following : 



" Sederunt, Cancellarius, Orknay Thesaurius, col- 

 lector, &c." 



" Sederunt, presente Rege, Lennox, cancellarius, 

 Angus, Orkney, Mar, &c." 



But Lord Orkney trod once too often on the toes 

 of his Royal cousin, and in 1613 Lord Carew,* writing 

 to give his dear friend, Sir Thomas Roe, ambassador 

 to the Great Mogul, the last gossip of the London 

 season that Sir Moyle Finch is dead, leaving the 

 richest widow in England ; that Lord Berkeley and 

 Lord Fitzwalter have married the two pretty 

 daughters of Sir M. Stanhope ; that a ship fitted 

 with provisions for nine months (the forerunner by 

 200 years of Sir John Franklyn's ill-fated expedition) 

 is just starting to find a North- West Passage ; and 

 that there is much talk at Court of the u rising 

 fortune at Court of a young gentleman 'of good 

 parts '" ; a Mr. Villiers, &c., is able to fill a corner in 

 his letter with the news that " the Erie of Orkeney in 

 Scotland is beheaded and his lands and honnour 

 escheated to the Kinge." 



As we left behind us the beautiful scene of so 

 many iniquities, a Raven, big and hoarse enough 

 to have been a survivor from Patrick's day, when 



* " Letters of Lord Carew." Published by the Camden 

 Society. 



