THE ENGLISH FISHING SETTLEMENTS. 317 



shown at every step. He invoked the Bishop of the Isles 

 to co-operate in furthering the interests of the adven- 

 turers ; and directed the Privy Council of Scotland to 

 inquire into the charges levied by the heritors of the Isles, 

 and to ascertain whether or not foreigners were being 

 brought to the islands by the proprietors. The Privy 

 Council appointed Lord Lome and the Bishop of the Isles 

 to institute the necessary inquiries, and late in 1634, 

 submitted their report, containing the details of the dues 

 as noticed above. Seaforth, who had good reasons for 

 maintaining cordial relations with the King, informed the 

 Commissioners that he imposed no charges at all on the 

 Englishmen in Lewis, and that no foreigners were allowed 

 within his bounds. 



We shall now see how it fared with the English settlers 

 in Lewis. In order, doubtless, to impress the natives with 

 the fact that the King of Great Britain, France, and 

 Ireland was the patron-in-chief of the Fishing Corporation 

 and its off-shoots, the Resident Agent at Stornoway caused 

 the Royal standard to be unfurled on the walls of Storno- 

 way Castle. The intrusion of the Englishmen was a 

 bitter pill to the Lowland fishermen, who had hitherto 

 monopolised the best fishings of the island. One of the 

 Lowlanders, a fisherman named Thomas Lindsey from 

 Crail, Fifeshire, became the ringleader of an organised 

 opposition to the new-fangled Society and its representa- 

 tives. When he saw the Royal colours flying at Stornoway 

 Castle, he ran up the flag of the Duke of Lennox beside 

 them, and went about Stornoway telling the people that 

 the Duke had more lands in England, Scotland, and 

 France, than he who called himself King of France. 

 " Charles I. has nothing to do with Lewis," he declared. 

 He was never proclaimed in the island, and had therefore 

 no authority over it. In January, 1635, Lindsey had a 

 serious quarrel, over a question of wreckage, with the 

 Association of the Earl of Arundel and Surrey, Earl 

 Marshal of England, who, on the death of Lord Portland, 

 had assumed the direction of the affairs of the Company, 



