James had determined to recall the exiled Catholic earls, undeterred by
the eloquence of "the last of all our sincere Assemblies," held with deep
emotion in March 1596. The earls came home; in September at Falkland
Palace Andrew Melville seized James by the sleeve, called him "God's
silly vassal," and warned him that Christ and his Kirk were the king's
overlords. Soon afterwards Mr David Black of St Andrews spoke against
Elizabeth in a sermon which caused diplomatic remonstrances. Black would
be tried, in the first instance, only by a Spiritual Court of his
brethren. There was a long struggle, the ministers appointed a kind of
standing Committee of Safety; James issued a proclamation dissolving it,
and, on December 17, inflammatory sermons led a deputation to try to
visit James, who was with the Lords of Session in the Tolbooth. Whether
under an alarm of a Popish plot or not, the crowd became so fierce and
menacing that the great Lachlan Maclean of Duart rode to Stirling to
bring up Argyll in the king's defence with such forces as he could
muster. The king retired to Linlithgow; the Rev. Mr Bruce, a famous
preacher credited with powers of prophecy, in vain appealed to the Duke
of Hamilton to lead the godly. By threatening to withdraw the Court and
Courts of Justice from Edinburgh James brought the citizens to their
knees, and was able to take order with the preachers.




CHAPTER XXIII. THE GOWRIE CONSPIRACY.


James, in reducing the Kirk, relied as much on his cunning and
"kingcraft" as on his prerogative. He summoned a Convention of preachers