little excitement, only a momentary rush and gazing of the crowd as the group with its little band of attendants and defenders passed upward along the High Street, the herald's tabard alone betraying its character. Sir James Hamilton, however, was very well known and little loved, and small would be the sympathy in the looks of the citizens, and many the stern nods and whispers of satisfaction that vengeance had seized him at length. The King, like his representatives, was astonished by the accusation, but when he heard of the terrible "dittay" which had been brought against Hamilton "he came suddenly out of Falkland, where His Grace was for the time, and brought the said Sir James out of the castle to the Tolbooth, and gave him fair assize of the lords and barons, who convicted him of sundry points of treason; and thereafter he was headed and quartered, and his lands annexed to the Crown." It is a curious question, which however none of the historians think of asking, whether there could be any connection between the scheme, if any, for which the Lady Glamis suffered, and this wholly unexpected outbreak of murderous intention on the part of Hamilton. The Hamiltons and Douglases were sworn enemies, yet greater wonders have been seen than the union of two feudal foes to compass the destruction of the enemy of both. Angus and his brothers banished, but little forgetful of all that had happened, and trusting in the favour of King Henry, were soon to show themselves at the head of expeditions hostile to Scotland across the Border. Were these two sudden disclosures of unexpected treachery the manifestations of a deep-laid plot which might have further developments--if with the bastard of Arran also perhaps in still more unlikely quarters? It is but a conjecture, yet it is one that might seem justified by two isolated events so extraordinary, and by the state of discouragement and misery into which James seems soon to have fallen. Pitscottie relates that the King "took ane great suspition of his nobles, thinking that either one or other of them would deceive him;" and then there began to appear to him "visions in his bed." He thought he saw Sir James Hamilton, fierce and vengeful, appearing to him in the darkness with a drawn sword, with which he cut off the King's right arm. Next time the cruel spectre appeared it upbraided him with an unjust sentence and struck off the other arm: "Now therefore thou sall want both thy armes, and sall remain in sorrow ane while, and then I will come and stryk thy head from thee," said the angry ghost. Whatever may be the reader's opinion about the reality of these visions, there can be little doubt that they show deep depression in the mind of James to whom they came. He woke out of his sleep in great excitement and terror, and told his attendants what he had dreamed, who were very "discontent of his visioun, thinking that they would hear hastily tidings of the same."