ovenanter's sword seemed to wrap itself about Dalyell's blade
and sent it twirling high in the air. In a little he found himself lying
on the heather at the mercy of the man whom he had attacked. He asked
for his life, and Alexander Gordon granted it to him, making him
promise by his honour as a gentleman that whenever he had the fortune to
approach a conventicle he would retire, if he saw a white flag elevated
in a particular manner upon a flagstaff. This seemed but a little
condition to weigh against a man's life, and Dalyell agreed.

Now the Cavalier was an exceedingly honourable man and valued his spoken
word. So on the occasion of a great conventicle at Mitchelslacks, in the
parish of Closeburn, he permitted a great field meeting to disperse,
drawing off his party in another direction, because the signal streaming
from a staff told him that the man who had spared his life was amongst
the company of worshippers.

After this, the white signal was frequently used in the neighbourhood
over which Dalyell's jurisdiction extended, and to the great credit of
the Cavalier it is recorded that on no single occasion did he violate
his plighted word, though he is said to have remarked bitterly that the
Whig with whom he fought must have been the devil, 'for ever going to
and fro in the earth, and walking up and down in it.'

But Alexander Gordon was too great a man in the affairs of the Praying
Societies to escape altogether. He continually went and came from
Holland, and some of the letters that he wrote from that country are
still in existence. At last, in 1683, having received many letters and
valuable papers for delivery to people in refuge in Holland, he went
secretly to Newcastle, and agreed with the master of a ship for his
voyage to the Low Countries. But just as the vessel was setting out from
the mouth of the Tyne, it was accidentally stopped. Some watchers for
fugitives came on board, and Earlstoun and his companion were
challenged. Earlstoun, fearing the taking of his papers, threw the box
that contained them overboard; but it floated, and was taken along with
himself.

Then began a long series of misfortunes for Alexander Gordon. He was
five times tried, twice threatened with torture--which he escaped, in
the judgment hall itself, by such an exhibition of his great strength as
terrified his judges.[40] He simulated madness, foamed at the mouth, and
finally tore up the benches in order to attack the judges with t