citizens for subsistence.
The partisans of James were headed by the earl of Balcarras, and Graham
viscount Dundee, who employed their endeavours to preserve union among
the individuals of their party; to confirm the duke of Gordon, who
began to waver in his attachment to their sovereign; and to manage their
intrigues in such a manner as to derive some advantage to their cause
from the transactions of the ensuing session. When the lords and commons
assembled at Edinburgh, the bishop of that diocese, who officiated as
chaplain to the convention, prayed for the restoration of king James.
The first dispute turned upon the choice of a president. The friends of
the late king set up the marquis of Athol in opposition to the duke of
Hamilton; but this last was elected by a considerable majority; and
a good number of the other party, finding their cause the weakest,
deserted it from that moment. The earls of Lothian and Tweedale were
sent as deputies, to require the duke of Gordon, in the name of the
estates, to quit the castle in four-and-twenty hours, and leave the
charge of it to the protestant officer next in command. The duke, though
in himself irresolute, was animated by Dundee to demand such conditions
as the convention would not grant. The negociation proving ineffectual,
the states ordered the heralds, in all their formalities, to summon him
to surrender the castle immediately, on pain of incurring the penalties
of high treason; and he refusing to obey their mandate, was proclaimed
a traitor. All persons were forbid, under the same penalties, to aid,
succour, or correspond with him; and the castle was blocked up with the
troops of the city.

LETTERS TO THE CONVENTION FROM KING WILLIAM AND KING JAMES.

Next day an express arrived from London, with a letter from king William
to the estates; and, at the same time, another from James was presented
by one Crane, an English domestic of the abdicated queen. William
observed that he had called a meeting of their estates at the desire of
the nobility and gentry of Scotland assembled at London, who requested
that he would take upon himself the administration of their affairs. He
exhorted them to concert measures for settling the peace of the kingdom
upon a solid foundation; and to lay aside animosities and factions,
which served only to impede that salutary settlement. He professed
himself sensible of the good effects that would arise from an union of
the two kingdoms; and