s fray, was the heir of Murray of
Tullibardine, and ancestor, in the male line, of the present Duke of
Atholl. He later married a niece of the Earl of Gowrie. His father
being a man of forty in 1600, young Tullibardine must have been very
young indeed. The Murrays were in Perth on the occasion of the marriage
of one of their clan, an innkeeper.

Some of their party were in the street, and seeing an altercation in
which two of the King's gentlemen were prevented from seizing Gowrie,
they made an ineffectual effort to capture the Earl. Gowrie ran from
them along the street, and there 'drew his two swords out of one
scabbard,' says Cranstoun. {28} The Earl had just arrived in Scotland
from Italy, where he had acquired the then fashionable method of fencing
with twin-swords, worn in a single scabbard. Gowrie, then, had retreated
from the Murrays to the house of one Macbreck, as Cranstoun and Macbreck
himself declared. Cranstoun too drew his sword, and let his cloak fall,
asking Gowrie 'what the fray was.' The Earl said that 'he would enter
his own house, or die by the way.' Cranstoun said that he would go
foremost, 'but at whom should he strike, for he knew not who was the
enemy?' He had only seen the Erskines collar Gowrie, then certain
Murrays interfere, and he was entirely puzzled. Gowrie did not reply,
and the pair advanced to the door of the house through a perplexed
throng. A servant of Gowrie's placed a steel cap on his head, and with
some four or five of Gowrie's friends (Hew Moncrieff, Alexander Ruthven,
Harry Ruthven, and Patrick Eviot) the Earl and Cranstoun entered the
front court.

Here Cranstoun saw the body of a man, whether dead or wounded he knew
not, lying at 'the old turnpike door,' the entry to the dark narrow
staircase up which Ramsay had run to the King's rescue. 'Who lies
there?' asked Cranstoun. Gowrie only replied, 'Up the stair!' Cranstoun
led the way, Gowrie came next; the other four must have followed, for
several witnesses presently saw them come down again, wounded and
bleeding. Cranstoun found Erskine, Ramsay, and Herries with drawn swords
in the chamber. The King, then in the turret, he did not see. He
taunted Herries; Ramsay and Gowrie crossed swords; Cranstoun dealt, he
says, with Herries, Erskine, and perhaps Wilson. But, though Cranstoun
'nowise knew who followed him,' the four men already named, two Ruthvens,
a Moncrieff, and Eviot, were in the fray, though there was