The presbyterian ministers held a general meeting at Edinburgh in January, 1689, and agreed on a well-considered address to the Prince of Orange. They thanked him for his exertions in behalf of the reformed religion, referred to the innumerable evils and the suffering which the establishment of episcopacy had brought upon them and the nation, and humbly beseeched him to adopt measures to free them from the yoke of prelacy, and to restore the presbyterian polity as the most effectual remedy against slavery and the distractions of the nation.82

Several of the Scotch nobles were in London when the Prince of Orange reached it, and many others hastened there to offer him their service. On the 7th of January, 1689, he requested them to meet him the next day at Whitehall. The meeting was headed by the Duke of Hamilton, and consisted of about thirty lords and eighty gentlemen of note. The Prince desired. them to consult together, and to inform him in what way he could best promote the peace and interest of their country, and then left them to form their own conclusion unrestrained by his presence. They debated three days. Then they agreed to resolutions embodied in an address to the Prince, requesting him to call a convention of the Estates at Edinburgh on the 14th of March, and meantime to take upon himself the administration of the kingdom. To these requests he at once acceded. 83

Directly preparations for the convention were begun, all parties being anxious to return members to decide the future destiny of the nation. The Roman Catholics were excluded from voting in the election of members. King William assumed the power to summon to the convention several of the nobles who had been deprived of their honours by sentences which public feeling condemned as unjust, dispensed with a number of other restrictions, and ordered that the members for the boroughs should be elected by a poll of all the adult inhabi

82 Wodrow's Hist., Vol. IV., pp. 481-482.

83 Sixth Collection of State Papers, 1689; Sir J. Mackintosh's History of the Revolution in England in 1688, pp. 574-576.

tants. The Whigs secured a majority favourable to the Prince of Orange, though all the bishops, and some of the nobles, clung to the cause of the fugitive King: the latter party calculated on the support of the Duke of Gordon, who commanded the Castle of Edinburgh, and on Viscount Dundee, who had led a troop of horse into the capital, and with these they hoped to intimidate or to disperse the convention. The other party mainly relied on the aid of the Cameronians from the west, if the necessity for real action should arise. 84

The convention met at the appointed time. Nine of the bishops appeared as the representatives of the spiritual estate, forty-two peers, forty-nine members for the counties, and fifty for the boroughs. The Bishop of Edinburgh opened the proceedings, and prayed that God would assist them and restore King James. The election of a president was next essayed. The supporters of James proposed the Marquis of Athol; the Whigs put forward the Duke of Hamilton, and he was chosen by a majority of forty. This indicated the drift of the convention, and about twenty of the minority then deserted the cause of James, and joined the majority. On the 16th, a letter from the Prince of Orange was read, in which he expressed his desire that they would settle the religion and liberties of the nation upon just grounds, in harmony with the inclination of the people and of the public good. The Estates returned a thankful reply. The same day, after some debate, a letter from King James was read; but there was nothing in it to raise the hope of his adherents. He offered a pardon to those who returned to their allegiance before the end of the month; to others no mercy could be shown. His friends in the convention were mortified, while his enemies were vehement, and the sitting closed in great excitement. 85

The citizens of Edinburgh were greatly agitated as well as the members of the convention. The Whigs had summoned

84 Balcarras' Memoirs.

85 Acts Parl. Scot, Vol. IX., pp. 3-5, 6; Balcarras' Memoirs.

the Duke of Gordon to surrender the Castle, but he refused. So he might at any moment open fire on the Parliament House or on the citizens, while it was almost certain that the Jacobites would attempt some desperate move, as it could not be supposed that they would yield without a struggle. Viscount Dundee and Sir George Mackenzie complained that they were in danger of their life, as the Cameronians had resolved to slay them, and applied to Hamilton for protection. The convention met on the 18th, and had just begun business, when intelligence was brought into the house that Dundee, at the head of fifty dragoons, was on the Stirling road, and that in passing the Castle he had conferred with the Duke of Gordon. This move threw the members into intense alarm, and Hamilton, the president, started to his feet and cried: "It is high time that we should look to ourselves. The enemies of our religion, and of our civil freedom, are mustering all around us; and we may well suspect that they have accomplices even here. Lock the doors. Lay the keys on the table. Let nobody go out but those lords and gentlemen whom we shall appoint to call the citizens to arms. There are some good men from the west in Edinburgh, men for whom I can answer." The convention shouted assent, and what he proposed was immediately done. Leven went out and ordered the drums to be beat, and the Covenanters promptly answered to the call, and mustered in such numbers as overawed all the Jacobites in Edinburgh. In this way they were able, under the Earl of Leven, to protect the convention till the arrival of the Scotch regiments under the command of General Mackay.86

The members of the convention now prepared to settle the chief matter before them. As usual, a committee was appointed to form the acts; and the special task of framing a plan for settling the government was entrusted to eight peers, eight representatives of counties, and eight representatives of the boroughs, the majority being Whigs. These proceeded to draw up and

86 Balcarras' Memoirs; History of the late Revolution in Scotland, 1690.

to discuss the decisive resolution, a task which required some time before it was finally discharged. The resolution of the committee affirmed "that James the Seventh was a professed papist, that he had assumed the royal power and acted as king without ever taking the oath required by law; and by the advice of evil and wicked councillors he had invaded the fundamental constitution of the kingdom, and altered it from a limited monarchy to an arbitrary and despotic power, and did exercise the same to the subversion of the Protestant religion and the violation of the laws and the liberties of the kingdom; whereby he forfeited his right to the crown, and his throne has become vacant". Immediately following this was another resolution which tendered the crown of Scotland to William and Mary. When the two resolutions were put to the vote, nine voted against them, namely, seven bishops and other two members. Immediately after the vote of the convention, the new sovereigns were proclaimed at the Cross of Edinburgh.87

It

The Scotch convention, like the English parliament, embodied a claim of right, to be presented along with the resolutions tendering the crown to the new sovereigns. was deemed requisite to state clearly what institutions and liberties the late kings had infringed, and this statement was meant to be declaratory of the law as it then stood. The following are the chief points of this important document:"That according to the laws of the kingdom, no papist could ascend the throne. That all proclamations assuming an absolute power to suspend, or dispense with, the laws were illegal. That the measures employed to establish popery, the imposing of bonds and oaths, and the exacting of money without the authority of parliament, were contrary to law. That it was illegal to invest the officers of the army with judicial powers, to inflict death without trial, jury, or record; to exact exorbi87 Acts Parl. Scot., Vol. IX., pp. 33, 38-39. At the same time the Estates issued an order to the parish ministers to intimate from their pulpits the contents of the proclamation, and to pray for King William and Queen Mary, under the penalty of deprivation.

tant fines or bail; to imprison without expressing the reason, or to delay the trial; to prosecute and procure the forfeiture of persons by the straining of old and obsolete statutes; to nominate the magistrates and the common council of the boroughs; to dictate the proceedings of courts of justice; to employ torture without evidence or in ordinary crimes; to garrison private houses, or to introduce an hostile army into the country to live at free quarters in a time of peace. That it was illegal to treat persons as guilty of treason for refusing to state their private sentiments touching the treasonable doctrines or actions of others. That prelacy and the superiority of any office in the Church above presbyters is, and has been, a great and insufferable grievance and trouble to this nation, and contrary to the inclination of the majority of the people, ever since the Reformation, when they were reformed from popery to presbytery; and therefore prelacy ought to be abolished. The rights of appeal to parliament, and of petition to the throne, were asserted; frequent meetings of parliament were demanded; and all the preceding points were declared to be undoubted rights against which no declaration or precedent ought to operate to the injury of the people." 88

The convention empowered Hamilton to take any steps that might be necessary for preserving the public peace till the end of the interregnum; and the Estates then adjourned for five weeks. Thus was the Revolution formally recognised in Scotland.

88 Acts Parl. Scot., Vol. IX., pp. 39-40.