hey ordered the executioner to
put his leg to the boot, and to proceed to the torture, to the number of
ten or eleven strokes, with considerable intervals; yet all did not move
him to express any impatience or bitterness.

This torture was the cause of his not being indicted with the first ten,
who were arraigned and sentenced on Wednesday Dec. 5. to be hanged on
the Friday following. Many thought, that his small accession to the
rising, and what he had suffered by torture, should have procured him
some favour, but it was otherwise determined; nor was his former sermon
forgot, and the words _Achab on the throne_. On Monday the 10, he and
other seven received their indictment of treason, and were summoned to
appear before the justices on Wednesday Dec. 12; but his torture and
close imprisonment (for so it was ordered) had cast him into a fever,
whereby he was utterly unable to make his appearance; therefore, upon
Tuesday the 11, he gave in to the lords of the council a supplication,
declaring his weak and sickly condition, craving that they may surcease
any legal procedure against him, in such a weak and extreme condition,
and that they would discharge him of the foresaid appearance. Hereupon
the council ordered two physicians and two chirurgeons to visit him, and
to return their attestations, upon soul and conscience, betwixt and
to-morrow at ten o'clock, to the justices.

Upon Dec. 8, his brother went from Edinburgh to Glasgow, with a letter
from the lady-marquis of Douglas, and another from the duchess of
Hamilton to the lord commissioner in his favour, but both proved
ineffectual; his cousin Mr. Matthew M'Kail carried another letter from
the lady-marquis of Douglas, to the arch-bishop of St. Andrews, for the
same purpose, but with no better success.

On Dec. 18, he, being indifferently recovered, was with other three
brought before the justices, where the general indictment was read,
founded both on old and late acts of parliament, made against rising in
arms, entering into leagues and covenants, and renewing the solemn
league and covenant without and against the king's authority, &c. Mr.
Hugh was particularly charged with joining the rebels at Ayr, Ochiltry,
Lanerk and other places, on horseback, &c.; whereupon, being permitted
to answer, he spoke in his own defence, both concerning the charge laid
against him, and likewise of the ties and obligations that were upon
this land to God; commending the institution, di