Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 3.djvu/99

Rh pei haps four churches, in which he was to preach alternately, with the stipend of one parish only; by which means he pocketed two-thirds, with the exception of the trifle given to three illiterate persons who read prayers in the absence of the minister. The allowance to superintendents was stopped at the same time; and when application was made at court, they were told the office was no longer necessary, bishops being placed in the diocese, to whom of right the ecclesiastical jurisdiction belonged. The ministers complained, and desired to be put on their former footing, but they were told that the thirds belonged to the king, and the management of them behoved of course to belong to the regent and council, and not to the church. The assembly of 1574, in order to counteract the effects of their own simplicity, decreed that though a minister should be appointed to more churches than one, he should take the charge of that alone where he resided, and bestow upon the others only what he could spare without interfering with the duty he owed to his particular charge.

In the summer of 1575, an affray on the borders had well nigh involved Morton in a contest with Elizabeth. Sir John Carmichael, one of the Scottish wardens, had delivered up some outlaws to Sir John Forrester the English warden, and now made application to that officer to have a notorious thief delivered up to him; Forrester showed a disposition to evade the demand, and some of the Scottish attendants uttered their dislike in terms ruder than suited the polite ears of Englishmen. Sir John Forrester then said, that Sir John Carmichael was not an equal to him; and his followers, without ceremony, let fly a shower of arrows, that killed one Scotsman dead, and wounded many others. Inferior in numbers, the Scots were fain to flee for their lives, but meeting some of their countrymen from Jedbtirgh, they turned back, and dispersing the Englishmen, chased them within their own borders, and slew by the way George Heron, keeper of Tine- dale and Beddisdale, with twenty-four common men. Forrester himself they took prisoner, along with Francis Russell, son to the earl of Bedford, Cudbert Collingwood, and several others, whom they sent to the regent at Dalkeith; who, heartily sorry for the affray, received them with kindness, entertained them hospitably for a few days, and dismissed them courteously. Elizabeth, informed of the circumstance, demanded by her ambassador, Killigrew, immediate satisfaction. Morton had no alternative but to repair to the border, near Berwick, where he was met by the earl of Huntington, and after a conference of some days, it was agreed that Sir John Carmichael should be sent prisoner into England. Elizabeth finding on inquiry that her own warden had been the offender, and pleased with the submissive conduct of Morton, ordered Carmichael in a few weeks to be honourably dismissed, and gratified him with a handsome present

Morton, having a greedy eye to the temporalities cff the church, had from the beginning been unfriendly to her liberties, and by his encroachments had awakened a spirit of opposition that gathered strength every year till the whole fabric of episcopacy was overturned. This embroiled him with the general assembly every year, and had no small effect in hastening his downfall; but in the bounds we have prescribed to our narrative, we cannot introduce the subject in such a way as to be intelligible, and must therefore pass it over.

In the end of 1575, the regent coined a new piece of gold of the weight of one ounce, and ordained it to pass current for twenty pounds. In the following year, a feud fell out betwixt Athole and Argyle, which the regent hoped to have turned to his own account by imposing a fine upon each of them; but they being aware of his plan, composed their own differences, and kept out of his clutches. An attempt which Morton had before this made upon Semple of Beltrees and Adam Whitford of Milntown, had given all men an evil opinion of