1667. no informations against him could work upon Shel don. Upon Burnet's carrying things so high, Sharp was better used, and was brought again to the council board, where he began to talk of moderation: and in the debate concerning the disbanding the army, he said, it was better to expose the bishops to whatsoever might happen, than to have the kingdom governed, for their sakes, by a military power. Yet in private he studied to possess all people with prejudices against the persons then employed, as the enemies of the church. At that time lord Lauderdale got the king to write to the privy council, letting them know that he had been informed, traitors had been pleaded for at that board. This was levelled at Burnet. The council, in their answer, as they denied the imputation, so they desired to know who it was that had so aspersed them. Burnet, when the letter was offered to him to be signed by him, said, he could not say traitors had never been pleaded for at that board, since he himself had once pleaded for one, and put them in mind of the particular case. After this, he saw how much he had exposed himself, and grew tamer. The army was disbanded: so lord Rothes's authority as general, as well as his commission, was now at an end, after it had lasted three years. The pretence of his commission was the preparing matters for a national sy244 nod: yet in all that time there was not one step made towards one: for the bishops seemed concerned only for their authority and their revenues, and took no care of regulating either the worship or the discipline. The earls of Rothes and Tweedale went to court. The former tried what he could do by the duke of Monmouth's means, who had married his niece: but he was then young, and was engaged 1667. in a mad ramble after pleasure, and minded no business. So lord Rothes saw the necessity of applying himself to lord Lauderdale: and he did dissemble his discontent so dexterously, that he seemed well pleased to be freed from the load of business that lay so heavy upon him. He moved to have his accounts of the treasury passed, to which great exceptions might have been made; and to have an approbation passed under the great seal of all he had done while he was the king's commissioner. Lord Tweedale was against both; and moved that he should be for some time kept under the lash: he knew, that, how humble soever he was at that time, he would be no sooner secured from being called to an account for what was passed, than he would set up a cabal in opposition to every thing; whereas they were sure of his good behaviour, as long as he continued to be so obnoxious. The king loved lord Rothes so the earl of Lauderdale consented to all he asked. But they quickly saw good cause to repent of their forwardness. dale's At this time a great change happened in the A great change in course of the earl of Lauderdale's life, which made Lauderthe latter part of it very different from what the for-temper. mer had been. Mr. Murray of the bedchamber had been page and whipping boy to king Charles I.; and had great credit with him, not only in procuring private favours, but in all his counsels. He was well turned for a court, very insinuating, but very false; and of so revengeful a temper, that rather than any of the counsels given by his enemies should succeed, he would have revealed them, and betrayed both the king and them. It was generally believed, 1667. that he had discovered the most important of all his secrets to his enemies. He had one particular quality, that when he was drunk, which was very often, he was upon a most exact reserve, though he was pretty open at all other times. He got a warrant to be an earl, which was signed at Newcastle. Yet he got the king to antedate it, as if it had been signed at Oxford, to get the precedence of some whom he hated: but he did not pass it under the great seal during the king's life; but did it after his death, though his warrant, not being passed, died with the king. His eldest daughter, to whom his honour, such as it was, descended, married sir Lionel Tall245 mash of Suffolk, a man of a noble family. After her father's death, she took the title of countess of Dysert. She was a woman of great beauty, but of far greater parts. She had a wonderful quickness of apprehension, and an amazing vivacity in conversation. She had studied not only divinity and history, but mathematics and philosophy. She was violent in every thing she set about, a violent friend, but a much more violent enemy. She had a restless ambition, lived at a vast expense, and was ravenously covetous; and would have stuck at nothing by which she might compass her ends. [She had blemishes of another kind, which she seemed to despise, and to take little care of the decencies of her sex.] She had been early in a correspondence with lord Lauderdale, that had given occasion to censure. When he was prisoner after Worcester fight, she made him believe he was in great danger of his life, and that she saved it by her intrigues with Cromwell: which was not a little taken notice of. Cromwell was certainly fond of her, and she took care to entertain him in it; till he, finding what was said 1667. upon it, broke it offs. Upon the king's restoration, she thought that lord Lauderdale made not those returns that she expected. They lived for some years at a distance. But upon her husband's death she made up all quarrels: so that lord Lauderdale and she lived so much together, that his lady was offended at it, and went to Paris, where she died about three years after. The lady Dysert came to have so much power over the lord Lauderdale, that it lessened him much in esteem of all the world; for he delivered himself up to all her humours and passions. All applications were made to her: she took upon her to determine every thing: she sold all places, and was wanting in no methods that could bring her money, which she lavished out in a most profuse vanity. As the conceit took her, she made him fall out with all his friends, one after another: with the earls of Argile, Tweedale, and Kincardin, with duke Hamilton, the marquis of Athol, and sir Robert Murray, who all had their turns in her displeasure, which very quickly drew lord Lauderdale's after it. If after such names it is not a presumption to name my self, I had my share likewise. From that time to the end of his days he became quite another sort of man than he had been in all the former parts of his life. Sir Robert Murray had been designed by her father to be her husband, and was long her true friend. She knew his integrity was proof against all attempts. He had been hitherto the lord Lauderdale's chief friend, and main support. He had great esteem paid him, both by the king and by the whole court: and he employed Cromwell had gallantries with her. S. 1667. it all for the earl of Lauderdale's service. He used great freedom with him at proper times; and was a faithful adviser, and reprover as much as the other 246 could bear it. Lady Dysert laid hold on his absence in Scotland to make a breach between them. She made lord Lauderdale believe, that Murray assumed to himself the praise of all that was done, and was not ill pleased to pass as his governor. Lord Lauderdale's pride was soon fired with those ill impressions. Scotland was very well governed. The government of Scotland had now another face. All payments were regularly made: there was an overplus of 10,000l. of the revenue saved every year: a magazine of arms was bought with it and there were several projects set on foot for the encouragement of trade and manufactures. Lord Tweedale and sir Robert Murray were so entirely united, that, as they never disagreed, so all plied before them. Lord Tweedale was made a privy counsellor in England: and, his son having married the earl of Lauderdale's only child, they seemed to be inseparably united. When he came down from London, he brought a letter from the king to the council, recommending the concerns of the church to their care in particular, he charged them to suppress conventicles, which began to spread generally through the western counties: for upon the disbanding the army, the country, being delivered from that terror, did now forsake their churches, and got their old ministers to come among them; and they were not wanting in holding conventicles from place to place. The king wrote also by him a letter to Sharp with his own pen, in which he assured him of his zeal for the church, and of his favour to himself. Lord Tweedale hoped this would have gained him |