ent paper to enter minutely into the
details of his service during the stormy period when Scotland was
certainly misgoverned, and when there was little unity, but much
disorder in the land. In whatever point of view we regard the history of
those times, the aspect is a mournful one indeed. Church and State never
was a popular cry in Scotland, and the peculiar religious tendencies
which had been exhibited by a large portion of the nation, at the time
of the Reformation, rendered the return of tranquillity hopeless until
the hierarchy was displaced, and a humbler form of church government,
more suited to the feelings of the people, substituted in its stead.

Three years after the accession of James VII. Claverhouse was raised to
the peerage, by the title of Lord Viscount Dundee. He was major-general,
and second in command of the royal forces, when the Prince of Orange
landed, and earnestly entreated King James to be allowed to march
against him, offering to stake his head on the successful result of the
enterprize. There is little doubt, from the great popularity of Lord
Dundee with the army, that, had such consent been given, William would
have found more than a match in his old officer; but the King seemed
absolutely infatuated, and refused to allow a drop of blood to be shed
in his quarrel, though the great bulk of the population of England were
clearly and enthusiastically in his favour. One of the most gifted of
our modern poets, the Honourable George Sydney Smythe, has beautifully
illustrated this event.

"Then out spake gallant Claverhouse, and his soul thrilled wild and high,
And he showed the King his subjects, and he prayed him not to fly.
O never yet was captain so dauntless as Dundee!
He has sworn to chase the Hollander back to his Zuyder-Zee."

But though James quitted his kingdom, the stern loyalty of Dundee was
nothing moved. Alone, and without escort, he traversed England, and
presented himself at the Convention of Estates, then assembled at
Edinburgh for the purpose of receiving the message from the Prince of
Orange. The meeting was a very strange one. Many of the nobility and
former members of the Scottish Parliament absolutely declined attending
it, some on the ground that it was not a legal assembly, having been
summoned by the Prince of Orange, and others because, in such a total
disruption of order, they judged it safest to abstain from taking any
prominent part. This gave an immense ascend