The Episcopal clergymen were
rabbled throughout all the western shires. Their houses were sacked, and
themselves and their families insulted and sometimes beaten: the
churches were locked, and the keys carried off in triumph by the pious
zealots. In Glasgow the Cathedral was attacked, and the congregation
pelted through the streets. In Edinburgh Holyrood Palace was carried by
storm: the Catholic chapel, which James had built and adorned with great
splendour, was gutted, and the printing-press, employed to publish
tracts in favour of the Catholic religion, was broken up. Perth fled for
his life, but was overtaken at sea, carried back and lodged in Stirling
Castle, followed by the threats and curses of the mob. Such was the
temper of the Scottish nation when the Convention of Estates, summoned
by William, met at Edinburgh on March 14th, 1689.
The Act depriving the Presbyterians of the franchise had been annulled,
and the elections had gone strongly in favour of the Whigs. Hamilton had
been chosen President by a majority of forty votes over Athole,
whereupon twenty ardent Jacobites went straightway over to the other
side. The next thing to be done was to get rid of Gordon. It was
impossible, they said, for a free Parliament to deliberate under the
shadow of hostile guns. Two of his friends, the Earls of Lothian and
Tweeddale, were accordingly sent to the Duke with a message from the
Convention, offering him favourable terms of surrender.
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