Leith.] WITCHCRAFT IN LEITH; I81
-
dated 15th March, 1603, among many enumerations,
all in favour of Edinburgh, power is again
given the magistrates to enlarge and extend the
port towards the sea, with bulwarks on both sides
of theaiver; and to build, strengthen, and fortify the
Andrew Sadler, through the agency, in the former
case, of a little bag of black plaiding, wherein she
put some grains of wheat, worsted threads of divers
colours, hair, and nails of ? mennis fingeris ;? and
I in the latter case by a shirt dipped in a certain
GRANT?S SQUARE, 1851.~ (A&r a Dmwiw by W. Chanring.)
same in a substantial and durable manner for the
safety of shipping.
As the sixteenth century was drawing to its close,
the criminal records give many instances of the
dark and gross superstition that had spread over
the land even after the days of Knox. Thus, in
1597, Janet Stewart, in the Canongate, and Christian
Livingstone, in Leith, were accused of witchcraft
and casting spells upon Thomas Guthry and
well ; for which alleged crimes they were sentenced
to die on the Castle Hill, ? thair bodies to be
Grant?s Square has entirely disappeared. ?It was,? writes Dr.
Robtrt Paterson, ?the square in which existed the old Parliament
Houu, once occupied in Mary?s time. The m m in which the Par-
L i e n t met must have been a spacious one, as when I remember it it
was divided into numerous smaller rooms for poor tenants, but yet tkc
carved oak panelling and the richly-decorated mof told of former
magnificence. All has, however, now been cleared away, and replaced
by a granary.?
IS2 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. [Leith
brunt in assis, and all thair moveable guidis to be
escheat.?
On the 6th of August, 1600, as Birrel tells us in
his Diary, there came to Edinburgh tidings of the
King?s escape from the Gowrie Conspiracy, upon
which the castle guns boomed from battery and
tower j the bells clashed, trumpets were sounded
and drums beaten; the whole town rose in arms,
?with schutting of muskettis, casting of fyre
workes and boynfyirs set furth,? with dancing and
such merriness all night, as had never before been
seen in Scotland.. The Earl of Montrose, Lord
Chancellor, the Master of Elphinstone, Lord Treasurer,
with other nobles, gathered the people around
the market cross upon their knees, to give thanks
to God for the deliverance of the King, who crossed
the Firth on the 11th of the month, and was received
upon the sands of Leith by the entire male
population of the city and suburbs, all in their
armour, ?with grate joy, schutting of muskettis,
and shaking of pikes.?
After hearing Mr. David Lindsay?s ? orisone,?
in St. Mary?s Church, he proceeded to the cross
of Edinburgh, which was hung with tapestry, and
where Mr. Patrick Galloway preached on the 124th
Psalm.
In 1601 a man was tried at Leith for stealing
grain by means of false keys, for which he was sentenced
to have his hands tied behind his back and
be taken out to the Roads and there drowned.
Birrel records that on the 12th July, 1605, the
King of France?s Guard mustered in all their bravery
on the Links of Leith, where they were sworn in
and received their pay ; but this must have referred
to some body of recruits for the Ecossuise du Roi,
of which ?? Henri Prince d?Ecosse ? was nominally
appointed colonel in 1601, and which carried on
its standards the motto, In omni modo JdeZis.
Exactly twenty years later another muster in the
same place was held of the Scots Guards for the
King of France, under Lord Gordon (son of the
Marquis of Huntly), whose younger brother, Lord
Melgum, was his lieutenant, the first gentleman of
the company being Sir William Gordon of Pitlurg,
son of Gordon of Kindroch. (? Gen. Hist. of the
Earls of Sutherland.?)
In the April of the year 1606 the Union Jack
first made its appearance in the Port of Leith. It
would seem that when the King of Scotland added
England and Ireland to his dominions, his native
subjects-very unlike their descendants-manifested,
says Chambers, the utmost jealousy regarding
their heraldic ensigns, and some contentions in
consequence arose between them and their English
neighbours, particularly at sea. Thus, on the 12th
April, 1606, ? for composing of some differences
between his subjects of North and South Britain
travelling by seas, anent the bearing of their flags,?
the King issued a proclamation ordaining the ships
of both nations to carry on their maintops the flags
of St. Andrew and St. George interlaced ; those of
North Britain in their stern that of St. Andrew, and
those of South Britain that of St. George.
In those days, whatever flag was borne, piracy
was a thriving trade in Scottish and English waters,
where vessels of various countries were often captured
by daring marauders, their crews tortured,
slaughtered, or thrown ashore upon lonely and
desolate isles. Long Island, on the Irish coast,
was a regular station for English pirate ships, and
from thence in 1609 a robber crew, headed by two
captains named Perkins and William Randall,
master of a ship called the Gryjhound, sailed for
Scottish waters in a great Dutch vessel called the
Iron Prize, accompanied by a swift pinnace, and
for months they roamed about the Northern seas,
doing an incredible deal of mischief, and they
even had the hardihood to appear off the Firth of
Forth.
The Privy Council upon this armed and fitted
out three vessels at Leith, from whence they sailed
in quest of the pirates, who had gone to Orkney to
refit. There the latter had landed near the castle
of Kirkwall, in which town they behaved barbarously,
were always intoxicated, and indulged
?in all manner of vice and villainy.? Three of
them, who had attacked a small vessel lying in
shore, belonging to Patrick Earl of Orkney, were
captured by his brother, Sir James Stewart (gentle
man of the bed-chamber to James VI.), and soon
after the three ships from Leith made their appearance,
on which many of the pirates fled in the
pinnace. A pursuit proving futile, the ships cap
tured the Iron Prize, but not without a desperate
conflict, in which several were killed and wounded.
lhirty English prisoners were taken and brought to
Leith, where-after a brief trial on the 26th of July
-twenty-seven of them, including the two captains,
were hanged at once upon a gibbet at the pier,
three of them being reserved in the hope of their
giving useful information. The Lord Chancellor,
in a letter to James VI., written on the day of the
execution, says that these pirates, oddly enough,
had a parson ?? for saying of prayers to them twice
a day,? who deserted from them in Orkney, but
was apprehended in Dundee, where he gave evidence
against the rest, and would be reserved for
the King?s pleasure.
The next excitement in Leith was caused by the
explosion of one of the King?s large English ships
