WILLIAM AND MANY.

273

Before the Estates proceeded, to deliberate on the business ciiap.for which they had met, they thought it necessary to provide •for their own security. They could not be perfectly at ease E<iin-> while the roof under which they sate was commanded by the c“sue

batteries of the Castle. A deputation was therefore sent to *™ mon 'inform Gordon that the Convention required him to evacuatethe fortress within twenty four hours, and that, if he complied,his past conduct should not be remembered against him. Heasked a night for consideration. During that night his waveringmind was confirmed by the exhortations of Dundee and Balcar-ras. On the morrow he sent an answer drawn in respectful butevasive terms. He was very far, he declared, from meditatingharm to the City of Edinburgh. Least of all could he harbourany thought of molesting an august assembly which he regardedwith profound reverence. He would willingly give bond for hisgood behaviour to the amount of twenty thousand poundssterling. But he was in communication with the governmentnow established in England. He. urns in hourly expectation of: important despatches from that government; and, till they

arrived, he should not feel himself justified in resigning hiscommand. These excuses were not admitted. Heralds andtrumpeters were sent to summon the Castle in form, and todenounce the penalties of high treason against those who should; continue to occupy that fortress in defiance of the authority of

the Estates. Guards w r ere at the same time posted to interceptall communication between the garrison and the city.*

Two days had been spent in these preludes; and it w r as ex- Dundeepected that on the third morning the great contest would begin, ed Ly theMeanwhile the population of Edinburgh was in an excited state. „anters.It hadbeen discovered thatDundee had paid visits to the Castle;

* Act. Pari. Scot., March 14. and 15. 1689; Balcarras’s Memoirs; Lon-' don Gazette, March 25; History of tlio late Revolution in Scotland, 1690;

Account of the Proceedings of the Estates of Scotland, 16S9.

Macaulay, History. IV. 18

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