Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 4.djvu/246

502 of its members the fate of the two most momentous political measures that ever were debated in it the act of security and the act of union. The events of William's reign had been highly exasperating to the Scottish nation. Not only had commercial enterprise been repressed, but this had been done in the most base and most cruel manner. The same monarch who sanctioned the massacre of Glencoe, first granted a charter to the Darien company, and then exerted his influence with foreign nations in order to withhold from their colony the necessary supplies, and sent instructions to the governor of the English colonies to the same effect. Many perished of famine, "murdered," says Sir Walter Scott, "by king William's government, no less than if they had been shot in the snows of Glencoe." The spirit of an ancient people, never tolerant of contumely, far less of cruelties so atrocious as these, did not burst out into immediate and open defiance of their more powerful neighbour, but reserved itself for a period more favourable for the vindication of its insulted rights. During the rest of his life, William could draw no subsidies from Scotland, nor a single recruit for his continental wars. The instability of a new reign afforded a fitting opportunity for the assertion of independence. An act had been passed in the time of king William, empowering the parliament in being at -his death to continue, and take the steps necessary for securing the protestant succession. In virtue of this act queen Anne thought proper not to call a new parliament: but a party, at the head of whom was the duke of Hamilton, maintained that the purposes contemplated by that provision were sufficiently satisfied by the settlement of her majesty on the throne. Accordingly, before the royal commission was read, the duke took a protest against it, and retiring with twenty-nine who adhered to him, their retreat was greeted with shouts of applause by the people assembled without. This proceeding may be considered the germ of that opposition which ripened in the two following years into the formidable act of security.

The parliament of 1703, instead of proceeding in conformity with the wishes of government, to settle the crown of Scotland on the same person for whom that of England was destined, resolved that this was the time to obtain an equality of commercial privileges, and to rescue the country from the state of a degraded and oppressed province of England. They accordingly passed an act stipulating that the two crowns should not be held by the same monarch, unless the Scottish people were admitted by the English to the full benefit of trade and navigation : to make good the separation of the countries if it should be necessary, every man capable of bearing arms was to be regularly drilled, and all commissions, civil and military, were to lose effect at the moment of the queen's demise, in order that the states of Scotland might then appoint an entirely new set of magistrates and officers, faithful maintainers of the independence of the kingdom. The duke of Hamilton and the marquis of Tweeddale headed the country party, by whom this measure was passed. It was debated with the utmost fierceness by the speakers on both sides, with their hands on their swords. The queen's commissioner refused his assent, and was obliged to dismiss the assembly without obtaining supplies, every demand of that kind being answered with shouts of " Liberty before subsidy!"

At this time the duke was involved in the accusations of Fraser of Lovat, who detailed to the government a plot, in which he alleged that he had engaged several Scottish noblemen for the restoration of the son of James II. The parliament of England took up the matter, and passed a resolution, declaring that a dangerous conspiracy had been formed in Scotland to overthrow the protestant succession. Hamilton, and the others named with him, defended themselves by maintaining that the whole affair was nothing but a malicious attempt of the