The scheme of this unnatural rebellion being persevered in with great determination and asperity, a court was held next day in the Castle of Stirling, where all the ceremonies of a royal levee were gone through with studied state and affected etiquette. The Earl of Argyle was reinstated in the office of chancellor, which had been conferred by his father on Elphinston, Bishop of Aberdeen. A negotiation was opened with the English king, Henry VII., who, having had a dispute with the old king as to the restoration of Berwick, very readily entered into the views of the son, and agreed to grant passports to his ambassadors, the Bishops of Glasgow and Dunkeld, the Earl of Argyle, Lords Lyle and Hailes, with the Master of Hume, who were, in fact, the heads of the rebellious party. The boldness of these proceedings, quadrating with the weakness of the king's actions, spread disaffection among the people of Scotland far and wide; and it was soon rumoured that the monarch, afraid of the disposition of his subjects towards the south, had proceeded to Aberdeen, and issued orders for the array of Strathearn and Angus, and all his friends in the north who still retained their allegiance. If the son soon found himself at the head of a large force in the south, the father was as successful in the north. Athole, Huntly, Crawford, and Lindsay of Byres, joined his standard; and to these were soon added Buchan, Errol, Glammis, Forbes, and Kilmaurs--so that the two ends of the kingdom were completely arrayed against each other, and the antagonist forces were headed by a father and a son. The monarch having thus vacated the capital, and betaken himself to the north, an opportunity was held out to the son to lay siege to the Castle of Edinburgh; and orders were given to the troops to proceed in that direction. During all this time the mind of the prince had been kept up by the insidious counsels of the rebel lords, who represented the unfilial work in which he was engaged as conducive to the benefit of the kingdom, which would receive the blessings of his wise legislation. The youth was flattered by these statements; and the details of an army, by occupying his thoughts, banished from his recollection the night scene of the Castle of Stirling, which, as time aided the efforts of his sceptical wishes, gradually appeared to assume more and more the character of a false and delusive dream. Meanwhile, Hume and Hailes, and others who had been sent as ambassadors to England, returned with intelligence that Henry was favourable to their cause--a circumstance which still farther flattered the vanity of the youth, and prevented him from giving way to the feelings of instinctive duty and affection towards his father. Proceeding gradually forward, the rebel army came to Blackness, near Linlithgow, where they encamped.