Various
Blackwood's Edinburgh Magazine, Volume 62, Number 385. November, 1847.
MAGUS MUIR
The subject of the following ballad is the atrocious and dastardly assassination of James Sharp, Archbishop of St Andrews and Primate of Scotland.
More than one attempt was made upon the life of that eminent prelate. On the 11th of July, 1668, a shot was fired into his carriage in the High Street of Edinburgh, by one James Mitchell, a fanatical field preacher, and an associate of the infamous Major Weir. The primate escaped unharmed, but his colleague Honyman, Bishop of Orkney, received a severe wound, from the effects of which he died in the following year. The assassin Mitchell fled to Holland, but subsequently returned, and was arrested in the midst of his preparations for another diabolical attempt. This man, who afterwards suffered for his crimes, and who in consequence has obtained a place in the book of "Covenanting Martyrology," described his motive "as an impulse of the Holy Spirit, and justified it from Phinehas killing Cosbi and Zimri, and from that law in Deuteronomy commanding to kill false prophets!" This is no matter of surprise, when it is recollected that the "principles of assassination," as Mr C. K. Sharp observes, "were strongly recommended in Naphthali, Jus Populi Vindicatum, and afterwards in The Hind let Loose, which books were in almost as much esteem with the Presbyterians as their Bibles." Sir George Mackenzie states, "These irreligious and heterodox books, called Naphthali and Jus Populi, had made the killing of all dissenters from Presbytery seem not only lawful, but a duty among many of that profession: and in a postscript to Jus Populi, it was told that the sending of the Archbishop of St Andrews' head to the king would be the best present that could be made to Jesus Christ."16
These principles, at first received with doubt, were afterwards carried out to the utmost extent by the more violent of the insurgent party. Murder and assault, frequently perpetrated upon unoffending and defenceless persons, became so common, that the ordinary course of the law was suspended, and its execution devolved upon the military. Scotland was indeed in a complete state of terrorism. Gangs of armed fanatics, who had openly renounced their allegiance, perambulated the country, committing every sort of atrocity, and directing their attacks promiscuously against the clerical incumbents and the civil magistracy.
But the crowning act of guilt was the murder of the unfortunate Archbishop. On the 3d of May 1679, a party of the Fife non-conformists were prowling near the village of Ceres, on the outlook, it is said, for Carmichael the Sheriff-substitute of the county, against whom they had sworn vengeance if he should ever fall into their hands. This party consisted of twelve persons, at the head of whom were John Balfour of Kinloch, better known by his soubriquet of Burley, and his brother-in-law, David Hackstoun of Rathillet. Balfour, whose moral character had never stood high, though his religious fanaticism was undoubted, had been at one time chamberlain to the Archbishop, and had failed to account for a considerable portion of the rents, which it was his official duty to levy. Hackstoun, whose earlier life had been in little accordance with the ostensible tenets of his party, was also in debt to the Archbishop, and had been arrested by the new chamberlain. "These two persons," says Mr Lawson, "had most substantial reasons for their rancour and hatred towards the Archbishop, apart from their religious animosities."
It does not seem to be clearly ascertained, whether Carmichael was the real object of their search, or whether their design from the first had been directed against the person of the Primate. It would appear, however, from the depositions taken shortly after the murder, that the deed had been long premeditated, and that three days previously some of the assassins had met at a house in Ceres and concerted their plans. The incumbent of Ceres, the Rev. Alexander Leslie, was also to have been made a victim if found in company with the Prelate.
Fortunately for himself, Carmichael eluded their search, but towards evening the carriage of the Archbishop was seen approaching the waste ground near St Andrews, which is still known by the name of Magus Muir. A hurried council was then held. Hackstoun, probably from some remnant of compunction, declined to take the lead; but Balfour, whose bloodthirsty disposition was noted even in those unhappy times, assumed the command, and called upon the others to follow him. The consummation of the tragedy can best be told in the words of the historian already quoted.
"When the Primate's servants saw their master followed by a band of men on horseback, they drove rapidly, but they were overtaken on the muir about three miles west of St Andrews; the murderers having previously satisfied themselves, by asking a female domestic of the neighbouring farmer, who refused to inform them himself, that it was really the Archbishop's coach.
"Russell first came up, and recognised the Primate sitting with his daughter. The Archbishop looked out of the coach, and Russell cast his cloak from him, exclaiming, – 'Judas, be taken!' The Primate ordered the postilion to drive, at which Russell fired at the man, and called to his associates to join him. With the exception of Hackstoun, they threw off their cloaks, and continued firing at the coach for nearly half a mile. A domestic of the Archbishop presented a carbine, but was seized by the neck, and it was pulled out of his hands. One of the assassins outrun the coach, and struck one of the horses on the head with a sword. The postilion was ordered to stop, and for refusing he was cut on the face and ankle. They soon rendered it impossible to proceed further with the coach. Disregarding the screams, entreaties, and tears of his daughter, a pistol was discharged at the Primate beneath his left arm, and the young lady was seen removing the smoking combustibles from her father's black gown. Another shot was fired, and James Russell seized a sword from one of his associates, dismounted, and at the coach-door called to the Archbishop, whom he designated Judas, to come forth." Sir William Sharp's account of what now occurred, which would be doubtless related to him by his sister, is as follows: – "They fired several shots at the coach, and commanded my dearest father to come out, which he said he would. – When he had come out, not being yet wounded, he said, – 'Gentlemen, I beg my life!' 'No – bloody villain, betrayer of the cause of Christ – no mercy!' Then said he, – 'I ask none for myself, but have mercy on my poor child!' and, holding up his hand to one of them to get his, that he would spare his child, he cut him on the wrist. Then falling down upon his knees, and holding up his hands, he prayed that God would forgive them; and begging mercy for his sins from his Saviour, they murdered him by sixteen great wounds in his back, head, and one above his left eye, three in his left hand when he was holding it up, with a shot above his left breast, which was found to be powder. After this damnable deed they took the papers out of his pocket, robbed my sister and their servants of all their papers, gold, and money, and one of these hellish rascals cut my sister on the thumb, when she had him by the bridle begging her father's life."
So died with the calmness and intrepidity of a martyr this reverend and learned prelate, maligned indeed by the fanatics of his own and succeeding ages, but reverenced and beloved by those who best knew his innate worth, unostentatious charity, and pure piety of soul. In the words of a worthy Presbyterian divine of last century, – "His inveterate enemies are agreed in ascribing to him the high praise of a beneficent and humane disposition. He bestowed a considerable part of his income in ministering to pressing indigence, and relieving the wants of private distress. In the exercise of his charity, he had no contracted views. The widows and orphans of the Presbyterian brethren richly shared his bounty without knowing whence it came. He died with the intrepidity of a hero, and the piety of a Christian, praying for the assassins with his latest breath."
Gently ye fall, ye summer showers,
On blade, and leaf, and tree;
Ye bring a blessing to the earth,
But nane – O nane, to me!
Ye cannot wash this red right hand
Free from its deadly stain,
Ye cannot cool the burning ban
That lies within my brain.
O be ye still, ye blithesome birds,
Within the woodland spray,
And keep your songs within your hearts
Until another day:
And cease to fill the blooming brae
With warblings light and clear,
For there's a sweeter song than yours
That I maun never hear.
It was upon the Magus Muir
Within the lanesome glen,
That in the gloaming hour I met
Wi' Burley and his men.
Our hearts were hard as was the steel
We bore within the hand;
But harder was the heart of him
That led that bluidy band.
Dark lay the clouds upon the west
Like mountains huge and still:
And fast the summer lightning leaped
Behind the distant hill.
It shone on grim Rathillet's brow
With pale and ghastly glare:
I caught the glimpse of his cold gray eye —
There was MURDER glittering there!
* * * * *
Away, away! o'er bent and hill,
Through moss and muir we sped:
Around us roared the midnight storm,
Behind us lay the dead.
We spoke no word, we made no sign
But blindly rade we on,
For an angry voice was in our ears
That bade us to begone,
We were brothers all baptised in blood,
Yet sought to be alone!
Away, away! with headlong speed
We rade through wind and rain,
And never more upon the earth
Did we all meet again.
There's some have died upon the field,
And some upon the tree,
And some are bent and broken men
Within a far countrie,
But the heaviest curse hath lighted down
On him that tempted me!
O hame, hame, hame! – that holy place —
There is nae hame for me!
There's not a child that sees my face
But runs to its mither's knee.
There's not a man of woman born
That dares to call me kin —
O grave! wert thou but deep enough
To hide me and my sin!
I wander east, I wander west,
I neither can stop nor stay,
But I dread the night when all men rest
Far more than the glint of day.
O weary night, wi' all its stars
Sae clear, and pure, and hie!
Like the eyes of angels up in heaven
That will not weep for me!
O weary night, when the silence lies
Around me, broad and deep,
And dreams of earth, and dreams of heaven,
That vex me in my sleep.
For aye I see the murdered man,
As on the muir he lay,
With his pale white face, and reverend head,
And his locks sae thin and gray;
And my hand grows red with the holy blude
I shed that bitter day!
O were I but a water drop
To melt into the sea —
But never water yet came down
Could wash that blude from me!
And O! to dream of that dear heaven
That I had hoped to win —
And the heavy gates o' the burning gowd
That will not let me in!
I hear the psalm that's sung in heaven,
When the morning breaks sae fair,
And my soul is sick wi' the melodie
Of the angels quiring there.
I feel the breath of God's ain flowers
From out that happy land,
But the fairest flower o' Paradise
Would wither in my hand.
And aye before me gapes a pit
Far deeper than the sea,
And waefn' sounds rise up below,
And deid men call on me.
O that I never had been born,
And ne'er the light had seen!
Dear God – to look on yonder gates
And this dark gulf between!
O that a wee wee bird wad come
Though 'twere but ance a-year!
And bring but sae much mool and earth
As its sma' feet could bear,
And drap it in the ugsome hole
That lies 'twixt heaven and me,
I yet might hope, ere the warld were dune,
My soul might saved be!
W. E. A.
A NOVEMBER MORNING'S REVERIE
BY DELTA
Hast thou a chamber in the utter West,
A cave of shelter from the glare of day,
Oh radiant Star of Morning! whose pure eye,
Like an archangel's, over the dim Earth,
With such ineffable effulgence shines?
Emblem of Sanctity and Peace art thou!
Thou leavest man, what time to daily toil
His steps are bent – what time the bustling world
Usurps his thought; and, through the sunny hours,
Unseen, forgot, art like the things that were;
But Twilight weeps for joy at thy return,
With brighter blaze the faggots on the hearth
Sparkle, and home records its happiest hour!
Hark! 'tis the Robin's shrill yet mellow pipe,
That in the voiceless calm of the young morn,
Commingles with my dreams: – lo! as I draw
Aside the curtains of my couch, he sits,
Deep over-bower'd by broad geranium leaves,
(Leaves trembling 'neath the touch of sere decay,)
Upon the dewy window-sill, and perks
His restless black eye here and there, in search
Of crumbs, or shelter from the icy breath!
Of wild winds rushing from the Polar sea:
For now November, with a brumal robe,
Mantles the moist and desolated earth;
Dim sullen clouds hang o'er the cheerless sky,
And yellow leaves bestrew the undergrove.
'Tis earliest sunrise. Through the hazy mass
Of vapours moving on like shadowy isles,
Athwart the pale, gray, spectral cope of heaven,
With what a feeble, inefficient glow
Looks out the Day; all things are still and calm,
Half wreathed in azure mist the skeleton woods,
And as a picture silent. Little bird!
Why with unnatural tameness comest thou thus,
Offering in fealty thy sweet simple songs
To the abode of man? Hath the rude wind
Chilled thy sweet woodland home, now quite despoiled
Of all its summer greenery, and swept
The bright, close, sheltering bowers, where merrily
Rang out thy notes – as of a haunting sprite,
There domiciled – the long blue summer through?
Moulders untenanted thy trim-built nest,
And do the unpropitious fates deny
Food for thy little wants, and Penury,
With tiny grip, drive thee to dubious walls, —
Though terrors flutter at thy panting heart, —
To stay the pangs which must be satisfied?
Alas! the dire sway of Necessity
Oft makes the darkest, most repugnant things
Familiar to us; links us to the feet
Of all we feared, or hated, or despised;
And, mingling poison with our daily food,
Yet asks the willing heart and smiling cheek:
Yea! to our subtlest and most tyrannous foes,
May we be driven for shelter, and in such
May our sole refuge lie, when all the joys,
That, iris-like, wantoned around our paths
Of prosperous fortune, one by one have died;
When day shuts in upon our hopes, and night
Ushers blank darkness only. Therefore we
Should pity thee, and have compassion on
Thy helpless state, poor bird, whose loveliness
Is yet unscathed, and whose melodious notes,
(Sweeter by melancholy rendered,) steal
With a deep supplication to the heart,
Telling that thou wert happy once – that now
Thou art most destitute; and yet, and yet —
Only were thy small pinching wants supplied
By Charity – couldst be most happy still! —
Is it not so?
Out on unfeeling man!
Will he who drives the beggar from his gates,
And to the moan of fellow-man shuts up
Each avenue of feeling – will he deign
To think that such as Thou deserve his aid?
No! when the gust raves, and the floods descend,
Or the frost pinches, Thou may'st, at dim eve,
With forced and fearful love approach his home,
What time, 'mid western mists, the broad, red sun,
Sinking, calls out from heaven the earliest star;
And the crisp blazing of the dry Yule-log
Flickers upon the pictured walls, and lights
By fits the unshutter'd lattice; but, in vain,
Thy chirp repeated earnestly; the flap,
Against the obdurate pane, of thy small wing; —
He hears thee not – he heeds not – but, at morn,
The ice-enamoured schoolboy, early afoot,
Finds thy small bulk beneath the alder stump,
Thy bright eyes closed, and tiny talons clench'd,
Stiff in the gripe of death.
The floating plume
Tells how the wind blows, with a certainty
As great as doth the vessel's full-swoln sheets;
So doth the winged seed; 'tis not alone
In mighty things that we may truliest read
The heart, but in its temper and its tone: —
Thus true Benevolence we ever find
Forgiving, gentle, tremblingly alive
To pity, and unweariedly intent
On all the little, thousand charities,
Which day by day calls forth. Oh! as we hope
Forgiveness of our earthly trespasses, —
Of all our erring deeds and wayward thoughts, —
When Time's dread reckoning comes, – oh! as we hope
Mercy, who need it much, let us, away
From kindness never turning, mould our hearts
To sympathy, and from all withering blight
Preserve them, and all deadening influences: —
So 'twill be best for us. The All-seeing Eye,
Which numbers each particular hair, and notes
From heaven the sparrow's fall, shall pass not o'er
Without approval deeds unmarked by man —
Deeds, which the right hand from the left conceals —
Nor overlook the well-timed clemency,
That soothed and stilled the murmurs of distress.
Enamour'd of all mysteries, in love
With doubt itself, and fond to disbelieve,
We ask not, "if realities be real?"
With Plato, or with Berkeley; but we know
Life comes not of itself, and what hath life, —
However insignificant it seem
To us, whose noblest standard is ourselves, —
Hath been by the Almighty's finger touch'd,
Or ne'er had been at all – it must be so.
Therefore 'tis by comparison alone
That things seem great or small; and noblest they
Whose sympathies, with a capacious range,
Would own no limit to their fond embrace.
Yea, there, as in all else, doth Duty dwell
With happiness: for far the happiest he,
Who through the roughnesses of life preserves
His boyish feelings, and who sees the world,
Not as it is in cold reality,
A motley scene of struggle and of strife,
But tinted with the glow of bright romance:
For him the morning has its star; the sun,
Rising or setting, fires for him the clouds
With glory; flowers for him have tales,
Like those which, for a thousand nights and one,
Enchained the East; each season as it rolls
Strikes in his bosom its peculiar chord,
Yet each alike harmonious, to a heart
That vibrates ever in sweet unison:
Each scene hath its own influence, nor less
The frost that mimics each on pool or pane:
Delight flows in alike from calm or storm:
Delight flows in to him from nature's shows
Of hill and dale, swift river, or still lake:
To him the very winds are musical —
Have harmony Æolian, wild and sweet;
The stream sings to its banks, and the wild birds
To Echo – viewless tell-tale of the rocks —
Who in the wantonness of love responds.
Gifts, in the eye of Heaven, not always bear
The marketable value stamped by man
Upon them, – else the poor were truly poor,
The willing spirit destitute indeed.
In other balance are our actions weighed
By Him who sees the heart in all its thoughts;
Both what it wills and cannot, what it tries
And doth, – and with what motive, for what end.
Clouds clothe them like realities, and shine
Even so to human eyes; yet, not the less
Are only mockeries of the things they seem,
And melt as we survey them. Let us not
The shadow for the substance take, the Jay
For the true Bird of Paradise. A crust
Dealt, by the poor man, from his daily loaf,
To the wayfarer, poorer than himself —
A cup of water, in the Saviour's name
Proffered, with ready hand, to thirsting lips, —
Seem trifles in themselves, yet weigh for wine,
And gems, and gold, and frankincense. The mite, —
The widow's offering, and her all, put in
With grief, because she had no more to give,
Yet given although her all, – was in the sight
Of Heaven a sumless treasury bestowed,
And reckoned such in her account above: —
When Nineveh, through all her myriad streets,
Lay blackened with idolatry and crime,
God had preserved her – would have saved her whole —
Had but the Prophet, as a leaven, found
His righteous ten!
Therefore, Oh never deem
Thoughts, deeds, or feelings valueless, that bear
The balance of the heart to Virtue's side!
The coral worm seems nought, but coral worms
Combined heave up a reef, where mightiest keels
Are stranded, and the powers of man put down.
The water-drop wears out the stone; and cares
Trifling, if ceaseless, form an aggregate,
Whose burden weighs the buoyant heart to earth.
Think not the right path may be safely left,
Though 'twere but for one moment, and one step;
That one departure, slight howe'er it be,
From Innocence is nought. The young peach-bloom,
Rudely brushed off, can be restored no more,
By all the cunning of the painter's art;
Nor to the sered heart comes, in after life
Again, – however longed for, or bewailed, —
Youth's early dews, the pure and delicate!