We have reached the approximate date of July 25 (though, of course, after an interval of eight years, Sprot’s memory of dates must be vague). Next day (July 26) Logan, with Bower and others, rode to Nine Wells (where David Hume the philosopher was born), thence, the same night, back to Gunnisgreen, next night, July 27, to Fastcastle, and thence to Edinburgh. This brings us (allowing freely for error of memory) to about July 27, ‘the hinder end of July,’ says Sprot. If we make allowance for a vagueness of four or five days, this does not fit in badly. Logan’s letter to Gowrie (No. IV), which Sprot finally said that he used as a model for his forgeries, is dated ‘Gunnisgreen, July 29.’ ‘At the beginning of August,’ says Sprot (clearly there are four or five days lost in the reckoning), Logan and Bower, with Matthew Logan and Willie Crockett, rode to Edinburgh, ‘_and there stayed three days_, and the Laird, with Matthew Logan, came home, and Bower came to his own house of the Brockholes, where he stayed four days,’ and then was sent for by Logan, ‘and the Laird was very sad and sorry,’ obviously because of the failure of the plot on August 5. How do these dates fit into the narrative? Logan was at Gunnisgreen (his letter (IV) proves it) on July 29. (Later we show another error of Sprot’s on this point.) He writes that he is sending Bower as bearer of his letter to Gowrie. If Bower left Edinburgh on July 30, he could deliver the letter to Gowrie, at Perth, on August 2, and be back in Edinburgh (whither Logan now went) on August 5, and Logan could leave Edinburgh on August 6, after hearing of the deaths of his fellow-conspirators. We must not press Sprot too hard as to dates so remote in time. We may grant that Bower, bearing Logan’s letter of July 29, rode with Logan and the others to Edinburgh; that at Edinburgh Logan awaited his return, with a reply; that he thence learned that August 5 was the day for the enterprise, and that, early on August 6, he heard of its failure, and rode sadly home: all this being granted for the sake of argument. Had the news of August 6 been that the King had mysteriously disappeared, we may conceive that Logan would have hurried to Dirleton, met the Ruthvens there, with their prisoner, and sailed with them to Fastcastle. Or he might have made direct to Fastcastle, and welcomed them there. His reason for being at Restalrig or in the Canongate was to get the earliest news from Perth, brought across Fife, and from Bruntisland to Leith.