_IN COLOURS_ GOWRIE’S COAT OF ARMS _Frontispiece_ _PHOTOGRAVURES_ JAMES VI. _to face p._ 4 _From the picture painted by Paul Van Somer_ (1621) _now in the National Portrait Gallery_ QUEEN ANNE 138 _From a painting by Paul Van Somer in Queen Anne’s Room_, _St. James’s Palace_ _OTHER ILLUSTRATIONS_ FALKLAND PALACE 33 _From a Photograph by J. Valentine & Sons_, _Dundee_ DIRLETON CASTLE 82 _From a Photograph by J. Valentine & Sons_, _Dundee_ FALKLAND PALACE: THE COURTYARD 116 _From a Photograph by J. Valentine & Sons_, _Dundee_ RESTALRIG HOUSE 150 _From a Photograph by W. J. Hay_, _Edinburgh_ RESTALRIG VILLAGE 150 _From a Photograph by W. J. Hay_, _Edinburgh_ FASTCASTLE (_circ._ 1820) 154 _From a picture by the Rev. Mr. Thomson_, _of Duddingston_, _in the possession of Mrs. Blackwood-Porter_ FASTCASTLE _to face p._ 176 _From a Photograph by J. Valentine & Sons_, _Dundee_ FASTCASTLE _From a Photograph by J. Valentine & Sons_, _Dundee_ HANDWRITING OF LOGAN (_January_ 1585–6) 196 HAND OF LOGAN AS FORGED BY SPROT (second page of 202 Letter IV) HANDWRITING OF SPROT (_July_ 5, 1608) 210 _PLANS_ SITUATION AND TOPOGRAPHY OF GOWRIE HOUSE 15 INTERIOR OF GOWRIE HOUSE 16 THE GALLERY CHAMBER AND THE TURRET, GOWRIE HOUSE 59 I. THE MYSTERY AND THE EVIDENCE There are enigmas in the annals of most peoples; riddles put by the Sphinx of the Past to the curious of the new generations. These questions do not greatly concern the scientific historian, who is busy with constitution-making, statistics, progress, degeneration, in short with human evolution. These high matters, these streams of tendency, form the staple of history, but the problems of personal character and action still interest some inquiring minds. Among these enigmas nearly the most obscure, ‘The Gowrie Conspiracy,’ is our topic.