so were the sayings of Peden, Cargill, and others, believed to be finding their realisation in the many actual and supposed calamities that every now and then occurred within the land for which they had suffered so much. An interesting notice of the power of these books is furnished by the Rev. Dr. Alexander Carlyle, minister of Inveresk, in the middle of last century:--‘In the month of March or April this year [1744], having gone down [from Glasgow] with a merchant to visit New Port-Glasgow, as our dinner was preparing at the inn, we were alarmed with the howling and weeping of half-a-dozen of women in the kitchen, which was so loud and lasting that I went to see what was the matter, when, after some time, I learnt from the calmest among them that a pedlar had left a copy of Peden’s _Prophecies_ that morning, which having read part of, they found that he had predicted woes of every kind to the people of Scotland; and in particular that Clyde would run with blood in the year 1744, which now being some months advanced, they believed that their destruction was at hand. I was puzzled how to pacify them, but calling for the book, I found that the passage which had terrified them was contained in the forty-fourth paragraph, without any allusion whatever to the year; and by this means I quieted their lamentations. Had the intended expedition of Mareschal Saxe been carried into execution that year, as was intended, their fears might have been realised.’[38] An instance of the supposed fulfilment of a prophecy of Thomas the Rhymer, about this date, may be cited from Dougal Graham’s _History of the Rebellion_. Referring to Prestonpans, and after describing the battle fought there on the 21st of September, 1745, between the clans under Prince Charlie and the troops under Sir John Cope, he says:-- ‘The place old Rhymer told long before, “That between Seaton and the sea, “A dreadful morning there should be, “Meet in the morning lighted by the moon, “The lion his wound here, heal shall not soon.” In Thomas’ book of this you’ll read, Mention’d by both Merlin and Bead.’