‘... being the Sabbath-day, Robert Auchmuty, barber, slew James Wauchope at the combat in St Leonard’s Hill, and upon the 23d, the said Robert [was] put in ward in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh. In the meantime of his being in ward, he hang ane cloak without the window of the iron house, and another within the window there, and, saying that he was sick, and might not see the light, he had aquafortis continually seething at the iron window, while [till] at the last the iron window was eaten through. Sae, upon a morning, he causit his prentice-boy attend when the town-guard should have dissolvit, at whilk time the boy waited on, and gave his master ane token that the said guard were gone, by the show or wave of his handcurch. The said Robert hung out ane tow whereon he thought to have come down. The said guard spied the wave of the handcurch, and sae the said Robert was disappointit of his intention and device; and sae, on the 10 day, he was beheadit at the Cross, upon ane scaffold.’--_Bir._ * * * * * [Sidenote: MAY.] We possess the rental-sheet of the Marquis of Huntly for this date, and obtain from it a striking idea of the worldly means resting with that noble and potent lord. In the first place, the document extends over fifty-nine pages of print in small quarto, detailing the particulars of money and produce due from each farm on his lordship’s various estates--in the lordship of Huntly, the lordship of the Enzie, the lordship of Badenoch, the barony of Fochabers, the lands of Marr, the Cabrach, and Lochaber. The sum of ‘silver mail’ or money-rent is £3819, besides £636 of teind silver. The ‘ferm victual’ payable to his lordship was 3816 bolls, besides which there were 55 bolls of custom meal, 436 of multure beir, 108 of custom oats, 83 of custom victual, 167 marts (cattle for slaughter), 483 sheep, 316 lambs, 167 grice (young pigs), 14 swine, 1389 capons, 272 geese, 3231 poultry, 700 chickens, 5284 eggs, 4 stones of candle, 46 stones of brew tallow, 34 leats of peats, 990 ells of custom linen, 94 stones of custom butter, 40 barrels of salmon, 8 bolls of teind victual, 2 stones of cheese, and 30 kids. The large proportion of payment in kind speaks of a country in which there was little industry or commerce beyond what was connected with husbandry and store-farming; but it is easy to see what an amount of power the noble marquis would derive from possessing the means of feeding so many retainers. [Sidenote: 1600.]