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chosen on 8 Dec. 1598 to sit in the palace of Holyrood on Tuesdays and Thursdays to assist the king in the discharge of business (, v. 727). On 10 July 1600 he was appointed one of a commission to consider means for the more effectual concurrence of the lieges with the sheriffs and magistrates in the execution of their offices (Reg. P. C. Scotl. vi. 68), and, on 1 April of the same year, one of a commission for reporting on remedies for abuses in cloth-making (ib. p. 98). In order more effectually to carry out the act of 1567 for the pursuit of thieves he was, on 28 July 1600, ordered to repair to and reside within his castle of Neidpath (ib. p. 138). On 19 Sept. 1604 he was nominated to act as interim chancellor during the absence of the Earl of Montrose in England as a commissioner for the union (ib. vii. 15). He was one of the assessors chosen at Linlithgow in January 1605-6 for the trial of the ministers imprisoned in Blackness (, vi. 375). On 10 Feb. of the same year he was created Earl of Lothian by patent to him and heirs male of his body. On 11 July he resigned the office of master of requests in favour of his eldest son, Robert (Reg. P. C. Scotl. vii. 226). In 1608 Lothian acted as assessor to the Earl of Dunbar, the king's commissioner to the assembly of the kirk (, vi. 752). On 6 Feb. 1608-1609 he was appointed one of a commission to advise the king as to the best means of assuring the peace of the Isles and planting 'religion and civilitie therein' (Reg. P. C. Scotl. viii. 742).

He died on 8 April 1609. By his wife, Margaret Maxwell, daughter of John, lord Herries, he had four sons: Robert, second earl of Lothian, Sir William Ker of Blackhope, Sir Mark Ker, and Hon. Henry Ker, and seven daughters: Janet, married, first to Robert, master of Boyd, and secondly to David, tenth earl of Crawford; Janet, married to William, eighth earl of Glencairn; Margaret (founder of Lady Yester's Church, Edinburgh), married, first to James, seventh lord Yester, and secondly to Andrew, master of Jedburgh; Isabell, married to William, first earl of Queensberry; Lilias, married to John, lord Borthwick; Mary, married to Sir James Richardson of Smeaton; and Elizabeth, married to Sir Alexander Hamilton of Innerwick. Scot of Scotstarvet affirms that in all the Earl of Lothian had by his wife thirty-one children. The statement is probably, however, as baseless as is Scot's story that the countess was addicted to the black art, and that,' being vexed with a cancer in her breast,' she was healed by 'a notable warlock,' on condition 'that the sore should fall on them she loved best:' her husband died of a boil in his throat.

[Acta Parl. Scot. vols. iii. and iv.; Reg. P. C. Scotl. vols.iv-viii.; Calderwood's Hist.of Church of Scotland; Moysie's Memoirs (Bannatyne Club); Scot's Staggering State of Scottish Statesmen; Douglas's Scottish Peerage (Wood), ii. 130-1.]  KERR, ROBERT, fourth and first  (1636–1703), born in 1636, was the eldest son of William, third earl [q. v.], by his wife Anne, countess of Lothian in her own right. In 1673 he served as a volunteer in the Dutch war. He succeeded his father in 1675, and on 23 Oct. 1678 a patent of the earldom of Lothian was granted to him and heirs male of his body, with the original precedency. On 4 Jan. 1686 he was sworn a privy councillor ( of Fountainhall, Hist. Notices, p. 686), but on 14 Sept. a letter was read in the council from James II removing him and four other privy councillors (ib. p. 750). He was a supporter of the revolution, and on 25 June wrote to the Earl Melville suggesting 'some return suitable to the capacity I think I can best serve his majesty in '(Leven and Melville Papers, Bannatyne Club,p. 79). He was appointed a privy councillor to King William, and in August was also constituted justice-general. On the death of his brother Charles, second earl of Ancrum, in 1690, he united that earldom to his other titles.

In 1692 Lothian was appointed commissioner of the king to the general assembly of the kirk of Scotland. The occasion was notable, on account of the recommendation of the king that episcopal ministers who were prepared to accept the confession of faith and submit to the authority of the ecclesiastical courts should be received into the kirk. The royal recommendation was enforced by Lothian in a speech the liberality and kindliness of which tended rather to awaken than allay presbyterian prejudice. After a month spent in routine business the assembly still refrained from taking into consideration the subject pressed upon their attention, and it was dissolved by Lothian, who declined to fix any date for the next assembly. Thereupon the moderator, notwithstanding the protest of Lothian, appointed the third Wednesday of August 1693. No assembly was, however, held on that date (see narrative in Hist. of Scotl. vii. 450-3, founded on the Register of the Actings and Proceedings of the Assembly, printed for private circulation).

Lothian was created marquis by patent on 23 June 1701. He died on 15 Feb. 1703. A portrait of him, attributed to Scougal, dated