, First Lord of Buccleuch, and on
the first Earl of Roxburghe.
Francis Stewart, son of the forfeited Earl, obtained from the favour of Charles
I. a decreet-arbitral, appointing the two noblemen, grantees of his father's
estate, to restore the same, or make some compensation for retaining it. The
barony of Crichton, with its beautiful castle, was surrendered by the curators
of Francis, Earl of Buccleuch, but he retained the far more extensive property
in Liddesdale. James Stewart also, as appears from writings in the author's
possession, made an advantageous composition with the Earl of Roxburghe. »But,«
says the satirical Scotstarvet, »male parta pejus dilabuntur; for he never
brooked them (enjoyed them) nor was anything the richer, since they accrued to
his creditors, and are now in the possession of Dr. Seaton. His eldest son
Francis became a trooper in the late war; as for the other brother, John, who
was Abbot of Coldingham, he also disponed all that estate, and now has nothing,
but lives on the charity of his friends.« (The Staggering State of the Scots
Statesmen for one hundred years, by Sir John Scot of Scotstarvet. Edinburgh,
1754. P 154.)
Francis Stewart, who had been a trooper during the great Civil War seems to have
received no preferment, after the Restoration, suited to his high birth, though,
in fact, third cousin to Charles II. Captain Crichton, the friend of Dean Swift,
who published his Memoirs, found him a private gentleman in the King's
Life-Guards. At the same time this was no degrading condition; for Fountainhall
records a duel fought between a Life-Guardsman and an officer in the militia,
because the latter had taken upon him to assume superior rank as an officer, to
a gentleman private in the Life-Guards. The Life-Guardsman was killed in the
rencontre, and his antagonist was executed for murder.
The character of Bothwell, except in relation to the name, is entirely ideal.
 
9 The general account of this act of assassination is to be found in all
histories of the period. A more particular narrative may be found in the works
of one of the actors, James Russel, in the Appendix to Kirkton's History of the
Church of Scotland, published by Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, Esquire. 4to,
Edinburgh, 1817.
 
10 One Carmichael, sheriff-depute in Fife, who had been active in enforcing the
penal measures against nonconformists. He was on the moors hunting, but
receiving accidental information