The means adopted to promote reformed opinions among the people were equally drastic. The most rigid observance of Sunday as a Sabbath was enforced. In 1627 nine millers at Stow, in Midlothian, had to do public penance and pay forty shillings for that "their milnes did gang on the Sabbath;" and in 1644 another miller, in Fifeshire, was sentenced to a fine of thirty shillings, with the same addition, for a similar offence. The uncertainty of the weather was not admitted as any excuse for Sunday harvesting, as is shown by a fine inflicted (together with the usual penance) upon one Alexander Russell and his servant for "leading corn on the Sabbath evening," at Wester Balrymont. There are records of the stool of repentance being called into use for the correction of fishermen who mended their nets, of sundry people who gathered nuts, of a woman who "watered her kaill," and of another who "seethed bark," on a Sunday. The last named had to stand in the jagg for three Sundays as well. Lads who were found playing on Sunday were sometimes whipt, as in a case dealt with by the Kirk Session of St. Andrews in 1649, and others at Dunfermline in 1685. In 1664 it was enacted at Dumfries that "persons walking idly from house to house and gossipping on Sabbath" should be fined thirty shillings for their evil conduct; and in 1652 the Kirk Session of Stow actually compelled one William Howatson to do public penance for having, on a Sunday, "walked a short distance to see his seik mother." But mere abstinence from work and play was not sufficient; attendance at the kirk was compulsory. The amount of the fine exacted in different districts varied, but everywhere even a single absence was noted, and had to be paid for. At Aberdeen, in 1568, the penalty was 6d. for every service missed; at Lasswade, in 1615, it was 6s. 8d. from a gentleman, and 3s. 4d. from a servant; at Dunino, in 1643, sum was 2s. for a first offence, 4s. for the second, and a like proportion for others. Paupers who failed in this duty were to be deprived of all relief, by order of the Kirk Session of St. Andrews in 1570.