Isles*, by turns, exercised such despotism and inhumanity, as no monarch in the fifteenth century would have dared to practice.

probably from ancient rivalry; and it was still more unfortunate that their talents were not united with corresponding virtues; for they both appear to have been alike ambi. tious, cruel, and unscrupulous politicians. It is said by the Scots' Chronicles that, after the murder of the king, the parliament assigned to Crichton the chancellor, the administration of the kingdom, and to Livingston the care of the person of the young king.

* The Lords of the Isles, during the utter confusion which extended through Scotland during the regency, had found it easy to reassume the independence of which they had been deprived during the vigorous reign of Robert Bruce. They possessed a fleet with which they harrassed the main land at pleasure; and Donald who now held that insular lordship, ranked himself among the allies of England, and made peace and war as an independent sovereign. The Regent had taken no steps to reduce that kinglet to obedience, and would probably have avoided embarking in so arduous a task, had not Donald insisted upon pretentions to the Earldom of Ross, occupying a great extent in the north-west of Scotland, including the large isle of Sky, and laying adjacent to, and connected with his own insular domains. The regent Albany, however, after the battle of Marlow, compelled him to submit himself to the allegiance of Scotland, and to give hostages for his future obedience. "Donald," says Lindsay, gathered a company of mischievous cursed limmers, and invaded the king in every airth, whenever he came, with great cruelty; neither sparing old nor young; without regard to wives, or feeble or decrepit women; or young infants in the cradle, which would have moved a heart of stone to commiseration; and burned villages, towns, and corn!

The endeavours of the First and Second James were turned towards improving the jurisprudence of the country, by engrafting on it the best parts of the English system; but the suddenness of their deaths and the weak reign of their successor James III, prevented these people from receiving much benefit from such laudable designs.

The parliament of Scotland at this period, had nearly monopolized all judicial anthority. Three committees were formed from the house (for there was only one) soon after the members met. The first like the Friers' in England, examined, approved, or disapproved of petitions to the senate; the second constituted the highest court in all criminal prosecutions, as did the third in civil ones. And as every lord of parliament, who chose it, might claim his place in each of these committees, almost the whole administration of law, civil as well as military, resided in the breast of the Scottish nobility. There was another court, that of session, of which the members and the duration were appointed by parliament.

The justiciary (an office discontinued in England as too potent) was still nominally at the head of the Scottish law, and held courts which were styled 'justiciares,' as did the chamberlain, chamberlainaires :' from the courts there was allowed an appeal to a jurisdiction of great antiquity, styled, the four Bour

6

roughs' Court. This was formed of burgesses from Edinburgh, and three other towns, who met at Haddington, to judge on such appeals.*

There was one abuse, however, which rendered every court of justice nugatory! It had become a custom for the Scottish monarchs to bestow on their favourites not only estates, but powers and privileges equal to their own. These were styled "Lords of Regalities:" they formed courts around them, had numerous officers of state, and tried, executed, or pardoned the greatest criminals. The good sense of James II prompted him to propose a remedy for this inordinate evil; but two admirable laws which he brought forward (the one against granting 'regalities,' without consent of parliament; the other to prohibit the bestowing of hereditary dignities) were after his decease neglected; and Scotland continued two centuries longer a prey to the jarring interests of turbulent, traitorous noblemen,

Although every obstruction had occurred which ruinous foreign wars, and still more detestable civil contentions, could cause, some advantage in the interim had been gained to the cause of general security. About the middle of the 16th century, the parliament appointed justices and sheriffs, in Ross, Caithness, the Orkneys, and the Western Isles, where none had been before, and appointed courts to be holden from time to time, in very remote districts. There was need of this attention if the preamble to the acts is to be credited," Through lack of justiciaries, jus

*Public Acts,

tices, and sheriffs, by which the people are become wild."-Public acts, James VI.

James V, who could sometimes exert a just and people spirit, sailed in 1535 from Leith, and examined in person how far those wholesome regulations had been put in practice. He seized and brought away some of the most turbulent chieftains, and inspired the most ungovernable of his subjects with a decent respect for the laws.*

The parliaments were frequently and regularly called, particularly by James IV and V. Every thing which the nation could afford was granted by the house (for it was but single, the scheme which James I had planned, of forming two chambers, having unhappily miscarried) and all possible care was there taken, that the king should not alienate the demesnes of the crown. In some instances this branch of the legislative appears to have trenched upon the royal prerogative,† and even to have assumed the executive power,

* "Justice," says Pennant, "was administered with great expedition, and too often with vindictive severity. Originally the time of trial and execution was to be within three suns.' About the latter end of the seventeenth century, the period was extended to nine days after the sentence; but since a rapid and unjust execution in a petty Scottish town in 1720, the execution has been ordered to be deferred for forty days on the south, and sixty on the north side of the Tay, that time may be allowed for an application for mercy.'

"

As in 1503, when an act was passed for prohibiting the king from pardoning those convicted of wilful and premeditated murder; but this appears to have been done at the monarch's own request, and was liable to be rescinded at his pleasure. James IV, Act. 97.

It is certain (as has been remarked by a well informed historian) that this mixture of liberality and of caution in the Scottish representatives, at the same time that it maintained their kings in decent magnificence by the revenues of the crown lands,

prevented the subjects from being harrassed by loans, benevolences, and other oppressive acts, which were so often employed by the powers of Europe, their contemporaries." Yet as the government had very seldom sufficient strength to guard the unarmed members of society from assassination and pillage, arrayed under the banners of a factious nobleman, it may be doubted, whether the extortion and despotism of a Seventh or Eighth Henry, might not be more tolerable than the domestic tyranny* and murderous ravages committed by the satellites of a Douglas, a Home,† a Sinclair, or of a Hamilton.

It appears that each great man had his courts, held by power delegated from the crown, with a soc sac, (a pit for drowning some offenders, particularly women) pit, and gallows, toill and paine, in-fang thief; he had power to hold courts for slaughter and doe upon ane man that is seized therewith in hand havand, or in back bearand.'

+ The Homes were intrepid border chiefs; and their af frays were often taunted with that prevalent species of ferocity which characterised the times. Anthony d'Arcy, Seigneur de la Bastie a French knight of great courage and fame, had been left by the regent (Albany) in the important situation of warden of the eastern marshes, and had taken up the duties of the office with a strict hand. But Home of Wedderburn, a powerful chief of the name, could not brook that an office usually held by the head of his house, should be lodged in the hands of a foreigner dependent on the regent, by whom Lord Home had been put to death. Eager for revenge, the border chieftain way-laid the new warden with an ambuscade of armed men. Seing himself beset, the un