50 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Edinburgh Castlc.
brother Sir James, with two burgesses of the City,
were drawn backwards in carts to the market
cross, where they were hanged, and their heads
were placed upon the ruined castle walls. Within
the latter were found twenty-two close carts for
ammunition, and 2,400 cannon balls.
The whole gamson were thrust into the dungeons
of adjacent castles in the county; and four soldiers-
Glasford, Stewart, Moffat, and Millar-?declared
traitors ? for having assisted Kirkaldy ? in
the demolishing and casting down of the bigginis,
showting great and small peissis, without fear of
God or remorse of conscience,? had to do public
penance at one of the doors of St. Giles?s for
three days ?? cleid in sack cleith.? *
The Regent made his brother, George Douglas
of Parkhead (one of the assassins of Rizzio),
governor, and he it was who built the present half- . moon battery, and effected other repairs, so that
a plan still preserved shows that by 1575 the fortress
had in addition thereto eight distinct towep,
facing the town and south-west, armed by forty
pieces of cannon. exclusive of Mons Meg, arquebusses,
and cut-throats. Over the new gate Morton
placed, above the royal arms, those of his own
family, a fact which was not forgotten when he lost
his head some years after.
In 1576, Alexander Innes of that ilk being
summoned to Edinburgh concerning a lawsuit with
a clansman, Innes of Pethknock, met the latter
by chance near the market cross-then the chief
promenade-and amid high words struck him dead
with his dagger, and continued to lounge quietly
near the body. He was made prisoner in the
Castle, and condemned to?lose his head; but procured
a remission from the corrupt Regent by
relinquishing one of his baronies, and gave an
entertainment to all his friends. ?If I had my
foot once loose,? said he, vauntingly, ??I would
fain see if this Earl of Morton dare take possession
of my land!? This, though a jest, was repeated
to Morton, who retained the bond for the barony,
but, according to the history of the Innes family,
had the head of Innes instantly struck off within
the fortress.
So odious became the administration of Morton
that, in 1578, James VI., though only twelve years
of age, was prevailed upon by Argyle and Athole
to summon the peers, assume the government, and
dismiss Morton, an announcement made by heralds
at the cross on the 12th of March, under three
salutes from the new half-moon ; but it was not
until many scuffles with the people, culminating in
Keith?s ?Register?; ?Maitknd Club nIiiellury.?
a deadly brawl which roused the whole city in arms
and brought the craftsmen forth with morions,
plate sleeves, and steel jacks, and when the entire
High Street bristled with pikes and Jedwood axes,
that Parkhead, when summoned, gave up the fortress
to the Earl of Mar, to whom the Ezrl of Morton
delivered the regalia and crown jewels, conformably
to an ancient inventory, receiving in return a
pardon for all his misdemeanours-a document
that failed to save him, when, in 1580, he was condemned
and found guilty of that crime for which
he had put so many others to death-the murder
of Darnley-and had his head struck off by the
?Maiden,? an instrument said to be of his own adop
tion, dying unpitied amid the execratidns of assembled
thousands. Calderwood relates that as he
was being conducted captive to the Castle, a woman,
whose husband he had put to death, cursed him
loudly on her bare knees at the Butter Tron. His
head was placed on a port of the city.
From this period till the time of Charles I. little
concerning the Castle occurs in the Scottish annals,
save the almost daily committal of State prisoners
to its dungeons, some of which are appalling
places, hewn out of the living rock, and were then
destitute nearly of all light. From one of these,
Mowbray of Barnbougle, incarcerated in 1602 for
slaying a servant of James VI. in the palace of
Dunfermline, in attempting to escape, fell headlong
through the air, and was dashed on the stony
pathway that led to the Royal Mews 300 feet
below. His body was quartered, and placed on the
Cross, Rether Bow, Potter Row, and West Ports.
In May, 1633, Charles I. visited the capital of?
his native country, entering it on the 16th by the
West Port, amid a splendour of many kinds ; and
on the 17th, under a salute of fifty-two guns, he
proceeded to the Castle attended by sixteen.
coaches and the Horse Guards. He remained in
the royal lodgings one night, and then returned
to Holyrood. On the 17th of June he was again
in the Castle, when the venerable Earl of Mar gave
a magnificent banquet in the great hall, where
many of the first nobles in Scotland and England
were, as Spalding states, seated on each side
of Charles. To that hall he was conducted next
morning, and placed on a throne under avelvet
canopy, by the Duke of Lennox, Lord High
Chamberlain of Scotland. The peers of the realm
then entered in procession wearing their crimson
velvet robes, each belted with his sword, and with
his coronet borne before him. The Chancellor,
Viscount Dupplin, addressed him in the name of the
Parliament. Charles was then conducted to the gate,
from whence began a procession to Holyrood
