During the sitting of the foresaid parliament, another incident occurred, wherein a plot was laid to destroy this nobleman, in the following manner: Some of the nobility, envying the power, preferment and influence that he and the marquis of Hamilton had with the king, laid a close design for their lives. The earl of Crawford, colonel Cochran, and lieut. Alexander Stuart, were to have been the actors (in which it was insinuated, that his majesty, lord Almond, &c. were privy to the design), which was, that Hamilton and Argyle should be called for in the dead of the night to speak with the king; in the way they were to have been arrested as traitors, and delivered to earl Crawford, who was to wait for them with a considerable body of armed men. If any resistance was made, he was to stab them immediately, if not, carry them prisoners to a ship of war in the road of Leith, where they were to be confined until they should be tried for treason.--But this breaking out before it was fully ripe, the two noblemen the night before went off to a place of more strength, twelve miles distant, and so escaped this danger, as a bird out of the hands of the fowler. Yet such was their lenity and clemency, that upon a petition from them, the foresaid persons were set at liberty. After this, the earl (now marquis) of Argyle had a most active hand in carrying on the work of reformation, and uniformity in religion _anno_ 1643. And while he was busied among the covenanters _anno_ 1644, Montrose and some others associated themselves to raise forces for the king, intending to draw the Scots army forth of England.--To effect which, the earl of Antrim undertook to send over ten thousand Irish, under the command of one Alaster M'Donald, a Scotsman, to the north of Scotland. A considerable body was accordingly sent, who committed many outrages in Argyle's country.--To suppress this insurrection, the committee of estates _April_ 10, gave orders to the marquis to raise three regiments; which he accordingly did, and with them marched northward, took several of their principal chieftains, and dispersed the rest for some time. But Montrose being still on the field, wherein he gained several victories during this and the following year, and in the mean time plundered and murdered the greater part of Argyle-shire, and other places belonging to the covenanters, without mercy, and although he was at last defeated and totally routed by general Lesly at Philiphaugh, yet such was the cruelty of those cut-throats, that the foresaid M'Donald and his Irish band returned to Argyle-shire (in the beginning of the year 1646) and burnt and plundered the dwellings of the well-affected, in such a terrible manner, that about twelve hundred men assembled in a body under Acknalase, who brought them down to Monteith, to live upon the disaffected in that country, but the Athol men falling upon them at Calender (and being but poorly armed) several of them were