Domestic Annals of Scotland from the Reformation to the Revolution, Volume 1 (of 2)Chambers, Robert
History
Domestic Annals of Scotland from the Reformation to the Revolution, Volume 1 (of 2)
Chambers, Robert
Scotland -- History -- 16th century; Scotland -- History -- 17th century
There was a feid of old standing between the Lindsays of Forfarshire
and the Lords Glammis; but for some years the parties were put under
the restraint of _letters of assurance_. On a particular Sunday, during
this month, Sir John Lindsay of Woodhead was passing along the High
Street of Edinburgh, ‘gangand to the kirk,’ when he met Lord Glammis.
The noble and gentle, ‘for the reverence they bure to his majesty and
for observance of the assurance standing betwix them, past by other
without provocation of offence or displeasure in word or countenance
offerit by ony of them.’ As in the case of Montague and Capulet,
however, the servants were not always to be restrained by the same
feelings as the masters. After they were past, Patrick Johnston, a
servant or tenant of Glammis, ‘drew his sword, invadit and pursewit
the complenar [Lindsay] of his life, and strak and cuttit through the
shoulder of his cloak, coat, and doublet, without the allowance of Lord
Glammis, and thereby did what in him lay to have begun ane new feid and
quarrel betwixt them, whilk wald not have faillit to have fallen out
were not Lord Glammis himself and the complenar stayit it.’
[Sidenote: JAN. 13.]
Two days after, Lord Glammis appeared personally before the Privy
Council, and ‘renouncit Patrick to be his man, tenant, or servant, sae
that he sall not be repute, halden, nor esteemit to be his man, tenant,
or servant hereafter;’ further avouching that ‘he sall quarrel nor
beir grudge to nane that sall invade or pursue the said Patrick.’ The
Council at the same time charged Patrick to compeir and answer for ‘his
late violent and unhonest pursuit and invasion of Sir John Lindsay,
_without the consent, knowledge, or allowance of Patrick Lord Glammis_,
in whais company he was for the time, doing thereby what in him lay to
have brocht on and protinued furder trouble and inconvenients betwixt
the said Lord Glammis and the friends of the house of Crawford, to the
break of his majesty’s peace and disquieting of the country.’--_P. C.
R._
An order to denounce Patrick as rebel for not appearing, was given on
the 6th of March.
[Sidenote: 1600.]
We receive in this notice a rich illustration of the relation of
superior and ‘man’ in Scotland at the close of the sixteenth century.
Johnston’s crime of assault is here touched upon lightly; what is
pressed, is his committing this assault without the consent of his
lord, and endangering a further quarrel between that lord and the
assaulted man.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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