These mutual exasperations had reached the highest pitch, when, in February 1638, the Presbyterians assumed a bold and perilous attitude, amounting almost to a practical dereliction of their allegiance to the King, and an assumption of supreme authority. In order to avoid the large and tumultuary assemblages which had taken place during the preceding year, the Council had required that the supplications and communications should be managed by delegates and commissioners from the greater masses; and, accordingly, those persons acting in this capacity, under the sanction of the King’s Council, had, in the preceding November, formed large and influential subdivisions of themselves into distinct bodies called “Tables,” representing the different classes who were combined for the vindication of their religious liberties—one for the nobility, another for the gentry, a third for the clergy, and a fourth for the burghs. Committees of the most influential and zealous of each class, sat at four different tables in the Parliament House, having sub-committees, and a central one of the whole, devising and concocting such measures as they deemed necessary for promoting the common cause; thus centralizing the public feeling of the country, and again giving forth mandates from their united Councils, with all the force and authority of law, to the people, and superseding virtually the functions both of the Executive and Legislature of the country. The most noted act of this anomalous Convention was the formation of a muniment, which was composed by Henderson and Johnston of Warriston, and revised by Balmerino, Rothes, and Loudon, and which was destined to be a powerful instrument in the hands of these national leaders. THE COVENANT was framed and promulgated at the time we refer to, and henceforward became the rallying standard of the nation, or, at least, of a great majority of its inhabitants, during the space of half a century, till a more benignant symbol of freedom was unfurled at the Revolution, under which the people of these realms have hitherto, since that time, enjoyed all the blessings of a limited monarchy, and institutions for the maintenance of the Protestant faith, and perfect freedom of conscience to all classes of the people. The adoption and character of that remarkable League enter so deeply into the subject of the present undertaking, that, in order to render numerous subsequent proceedings intelligible to many persons, it is necessary to devote particular attention to it, and the circumstances under which it was promulgated.