Transcribed from the 1902 Longmans, Green, and Co. edition byDavid Price,
JAMES VI
and
THE GOWRIE MYSTERY
by
ANDREW LANG
withgowrie’s coat of arms in colour, 2 photogravure portraits
and other illustrations
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.
39 paternoster row, london
new york and bombay
1902
All rights reserved
to
THE LADY CECILY BAILLIE-HAMILTON
this inquiry
is gratefully dedicated
p. viiINTRODUCTION
An old Scottish lady, four generations ago, used to say,‘It is a great comfort to think that, at the Day ofJudgment, we shall know the whole truth about the GowrieConspiracy at last.’ Since the author, as a child,read ‘The Tales of a Grandfather,’ and shared KingJamie’s disappointment when there was no pot of gold, butan armed man, in the turret, he had supposed that we do know allabout the Gowrie Conspiracy, that it was a plot to capture theKing, carry him to Fastcastle, and ‘see how the countrywould take it,’ as in the case of the Gunpowder Plot. But just as Father Gerard has tried to show that the Gunpowderaffair may have been Cecil’s plot, so modern historiansdoubt whether the Gowrie mystery was not a conspiracy by KingJames himself. Mr. Hume Brown appears rather to lean tothis opinion, in the second volume of his ‘History ofScotland,’ and Dr. Masson, in his valuable edition of the‘Register of the Privy Council,’ is alsodubious. Mr. Louis Barbé, in his ‘Tragedy ofGowrie House,’ holds a brief against the King. Thus Ihave been tempted to study this p.viii‘auld misterie’ afresh, and have convincedmyself that such historians as Sir Walter Scott, Mr. FrazerTytler, and Mr. Hill Burton were not wrong; the plot was not theKing’s conspiracy, but the desperate venture of two veryyoung men. The precise object remains obscure in detail,but the purpose was probably to see how a deeply discontentedKirk and country ‘would take it.’
In working at this fascinatingly mysterious puzzle, I havemade use of manuscript materials hitherto uncited. The mostcurious of these, the examinations and documents of the‘country writer,’ Sprot, had been briefly summarisedin Sir William Fraser’s ‘Memorials of the Earls ofHaddington.’ My attention was drawn to this source bythe Rev. John Anderson, of the General Register House, who aidedSir William Fraser in the compilation of his book. The Earlof Haddington generously permitted me to have copies made of thedocuments, which Lady Cecily Baillie-Hamilton was kind enough tosearch for and rediscover in an enormous mass of documentsbequeathed by the learned first Earl.
On reading the Calendars of the Hatfield MSS. I had observedthat several letters by the possible conspirator, Logan ofRestalrig, were in the possession of the Marquis of Salisbury,who