Meanwhile the marquis had been suffering a long imprisonment for his lapse with Montrose, and his estate was embarrassed with a fine of 50,000 merks. It had become indispensable for the good of his family, that he should be somehow reconciled to the stern powers then ruling. At the beginning of 1647, the descendant of those mail-clad Douglases who in the fifteenth century shook the Scottish throne, was found literally on his knees before the Lanark presbytery, expressing his penitence for breach of covenant, and giving assurance of faithfulness in time to come. The Estates consequently contented themselves with one half of his fine, and an offer of the use of his lands for the quartering of troops, and he was then liberated. Soon after, he agreed to consign his children to be boarded with the minister of the parish of Douglas, while a young man should attend to act as their preceptor; but the satisfaction produced by this concession was quickly dashed, when the presbytery learned that his lordship was secretly arranging to send his youngest son to be bred in France. It was really a curious game between their honest unsparing zeal on the one hand, and his lordship’s craft and territorial consequence on the other. Every now and then we have a peep of the demure lady, not less resolute in adhering to her faith than they were pertinacious in seeking to bring her to the superior light. How the recusant pair must have in secret chafed under the mute acquiescence which they were forced to give, in a rule outraging every sense of natural right, and every feeling of self-respect! With what smothered rage would they view those presbyterial deputations on their approach to Douglas Castle--more formidable than a thousand of the troops of Long-shanked Edward had ever been to the good Sir James! During the predominance of the Hamilton Engagement, there was a slight intermission: in those partially clouded days of the church, the presbytery was obliged to speak a little less resolutely. In October 1648, the cloud had passed away: Cromwell was now in the Canongate, conferring with Argyle, Loudon, and Dickson. We accordingly find the Lanark inquisition laconically ordering that, failing immediate satisfaction, his lordship be summoned and the lady ‘excommunicat.’ The noble marquis appeared in this month before them, to answer sundry challenges--‘for not keeping his son at the school with a sufficient pedagogue approven by the presbytery; for not delivering his daughter to some Protestant friend by sight [that is, under the approbation] of the presbytery; for not having a sufficient chaplain approven as said is, for family exercise in his house; for not calling home his son, who is in France;’ and, finally, for his grievous oppression of his tenants. On all of these points, he was forced to make certain professed concessions. And we soon after find this proud grandee pleading to have his son brought