The Rev. John Livingstone says: ‘I was present at Lanark, and at several other parishes, when, on a Sabbath, after the forenoon sermon, the Covenant was read and sworn, and may truly say that in all my lifetime, except one day at the Kirk of Shotts, I never saw such motions from the Spirit of God; all the people generally and most willingly concurring; where I have seen more than a thousand persons all at once lifting up their hands, and the tears falling down from their eyes.’ Maitland, describing the Edinburgh copy of the Covenant, says: ‘It is written on a parchment of the length of four feet, and the depth of three feet eight inches, and is so crowded with names on both sides, that there is not the smallest space left for more. It appears that, when there was little room left to sign on, the subscriptions were shortened by only inserting the initials of the Covenanters’ names; which the margin and other parts are so full of, and the subscriptions so close, that it were a difficult task to number them. However, by a cursory view, I take them to be about five thousand in number.--_Hist. Ed._ [Sidenote: APR.] The household book of the Dowager-countess of Mar[80] commencing at this time, and running on for several years, affords a few rays of scattered light regarding the domestic life of the aristocracy of the period.[81] They are not susceptible of being worked up to any general effect, and the reader must therefore take them as they occur. [Sidenote: 1638.] ‘April 21, to ane little boy for two buiks of the Covenant, 12_s._[82] May 4, for pressing ane red scarlet riding-coat for John the Bairn [a grandson of the countess], 12_s._ May 16, to ane blind singer who sang the time of dinner, 12_s._ May 17, ane quire paper, 5_s._ May 18, to ane of the nourices who dwells at the Muir, who came to thig [beg], 29_s._ May 25, for ane belt to Lord James [an elder grandson of the countess], 18_s._; for ane powder-horn to him, 4_s._ 6_d._; for raisins to Lord James and Charles, 10_s._ June, to William Shearer his wife for ane pair hose to Lord James, £3. Paid for contribution to the Confederat Lords, £4. To ane old blind man as my lady came from prayers, 4_s._ Edinburgh, July 18, for a periwig to Lord James, £8, 2_s._ July 19, ane pound and ane half pound of candles, 6_s._ July 21, ane pound raisins to keep the fasting Sunday, 6_s._ 8_d._ July 27, given to the kirk brodd [board], as my lady went to sermon in the High Kirk, 6_s._ Stirling, August 17, to my lady to give to the French lacquey that served my Lord Erskine when he went back to France, 4_s._ August 25, sent to my lady, to play with the Lady Glenurchy after supper, 4_s._ September 1, for making a chest [coffin] to Katherine Ramsay, who deceased the night before, 20_s._; for two half pounds tobacco ane eighteen pipes to spend at her lykewake, 21_s._; to the bellman that went through the town to warn to her burial, 12_s._; to the makers of the graff, 12_s._ 4_d._ September 8, to twa Highland