which oppressed them, and carrying their resistance beyond the bounds of mere self-defence. There were instances, though less numerous than might have been expected, of their attacking the houses of the curates, or of others by whose information they had been accused of nonconformity; and several deaths ensued in those enterprises, as well as in skirmishes with the military. Superstitious notions also, the natural consequences of an uncertain, melancholy, and solitary life among the desolate glens and mountains, mingled with the intense enthusiasm of this persesecuted sect. Their occasional successes over their oppressors, and their frequent escapes from the pursuit of the soldiery, when the marksmen missed their aim, or when a sudden mist concealed the fugitives, were imputed, not to the operation of those natural causes by means of which the Deity is pleased to govern the world, and which are the engines of his power, but to the direct interposition of a miraculous agency, over-ruling and suspending the laws of nature, as in the period of Scripture history. Many of the preachers, led away by the strength of their devotional enthusiasm, conceived themselves to be the vehicles of prophecy, and poured out tremendous denunciations of future wars, and miseries more dreadful than those which they themselves sustained; and, as they imagined themselves to be occasionally under the miraculous protection of the heavenly powers, so they often thought themselves in a peculiar manner exposed to the envy and persecution of the spirits of darkness, who lamed their horses when they were pursued, betrayed their footsteps to the enemy, or terrified them by ghastly apparitions in the dreary caverns and recesses where they were compelled to hide themselves. But especially the scattered Covenanters believed firmly, that their chief persecutors received from the Evil Spirit a proof against leaden bullets-a charm, that is, to prevent their being pierced or wounded by them. There were many supposed to be gifted with this necromantic privilege. In the battle of Rullion Green, on the Pentland Hills, many of the Presbyterians were willing to believe that the balls were seen hopping like hailstones from Tom Dalziel's buff coat and boots. Silver bullets were not supposed to be neutralised by the same spell; but that metal being scarce among the persecuted Covenanters, it did not afford them much relief. I have heard of an English officer, however, who fell by baser metal. He was attacking a small house in Ayrshire, which was defended by some of the Wanderers. They were firing on both sides, when one of the defenders, in scarcity of ammunition, loaded his piece with the iron ball which formed the top of the fire-tongs, and taking aim at the officer with that charge, mortally wounded him whom lead had been unable to in jure. It is also said, that the dying man asked to know the name of the place where he fell; and being told it was Caldens, or Caldons, he exclaimed against the Evil Spirit, who, he said, had told him he was to be slain among the Chaldeans, but who, as it now appeared, had deceived him, by cutting him off when his death was totally unexpected. To John Graham, of Claverhouse, a Scottish officer of high rank, who began to distinguish himself as a severe executer of the orders of the Privy Council against Nonconformists, the Evil Spirit | was supposed to have been still more liberal than to Dalziel, or to the Englishman who died at Caldons. He not only obtained proof against lead, but the devil is said to have presented him with a black horse, which had not a single white hair upon its body. This horse, it was said, had been cut out of the belly of its dam, instead of being born in the usual manner. On this animal Claverhouse was supposed to perform the most unwonted feats of agility, flying almost like a bird along the sides of precipitous hills, and through pathless morasses, where an ordinary horse must have been smothered or dashed to pieces. It is even yet believed, that, mounted on this steed, Claverhouse (or Clavers, as he is popularly called) once turned a hare on the mountain named the Brandlaw, at the head of Moffatdale, where no other horse could have kept its feet. But these exertions were usually made whilst he was in pursuit of the Wanderers, which was considered as Satan's own peculiar pleasing work. THE MURDER OF THE DE WITTS. (Davies' History of Holland.) A.D. 1672. THE internal condition of the United Provinces was at this time such as to incite the combined monarchs, no less than their own successes, to treat them with insolence and oppression. They beheld the inhabitants, instead of uniting with one generous sentiment of patriotism in a firm and strenuous defence of their fatherland, torn by dissensions and turning against each other the rage which should have been directed against their enemies. The divisions in every province and town were daily becoming wider and more embittered. Though both parties had merited an equal share of blame for the present miscarriages, the people imputed them exclusively to the government of De Witt and his adherents; who, they said, had betrayed and sold the country to France; and this accusation, to which their late pusillanimous counsels gave but too strong a colour of plausibility, the heads of the Orange party, though well aware of its untruth, diligently The sustained and propagated. ministers of the Church, always influential, and always on the alert, made the pulpits resound with declamations against the treachery and incapacity of the present Government, as the cause of all the evils under which they groaned; and emphatically pointed to the elevation of the Prince of Orange to the dignities of his ancestors, as the sole remedy now left them. To this measure De Witt and his brother were now regarded as the only obstacles; and, so perverted had the state of public feeling become, that the most atrocious crimes began to be looked on as meritorious actions, provided only they tended to the desired object of removing these obnoxious ministers. On one occasion, the pensionary having been employed at the chamber of the States to a late hour of the night, was returning home, attended by a single servant, according to his custom, when he was attacked by four assassins. He defended himself for a considerable time, till, having received some severe wounds, he | of impaired health, been greeted with the spectacle of his picture, which had given such umbrage to the King of England, cut into strips and stuck about the town with the head hanging on the gallows. fell, and his assailants decamped, leaving him for dead. One only, James van der Graaf, was arrested; the other three took refuge in the camp, where, though the States of Holland earnestly enjoined the Prince of Orange and the other generals to use diligent means for their discovery, they remained unmolested till the danger was past. Van der Graaf was tried and condemned to death. The pensionary was strongly solicited by his friends to gratify the people by interceding for the pardon of the criminals; but he resolutely refused to adopt any such mode of gaining popular- | ity. Impunity, he said, would but increase the number and boldness of such miscreants; nor would he attempt to appease the causeless anger of the people against him, by an act which he considered would tend to endanger the life of every member of the government. The determination, however just, was imprudent. The criminal, an account of whose last moments was published by the minister who attended him, was regarded by the populace as a victim to the vengeance of De Witt, and a martyr to the good of his country. On the same day a similar attempt was made on the life of his brother, Cornelius de Witt, at Dordrecht, by a like number of assassins, who endeavoured to force their way into his house, but were prevented by the interference of a detachment of the burgher guard. Cornelius had already, on his return from the fleet, in consequence These symptoms of tumult rapidly increased in violence. A mob assembling, with loud cries of "Orange boven! De Witten onder! (Long live the Prince of Orange! Down with the De Witts !) surrounded the houses of the members of the council, whom they forced to send for the prince, and to pass an Act, repealing the "Perpetual Edict," declaring him stadtholder, and releasing him from the oath he had taken not to accept that office while he was captain - general. Having been signed by all the other members of the council, this act was carried to the house of Cornelius de Witt, who was confined to his bed by sickness; the populace at the same time surrounding the house, and threatening him with death in case of refusal. He long resisted, observing that he had had too many balls falling around him lately to fear death, which he would rather suffer than sign that paper; but the prayers and tears of his wife, and her threats that if he delayed compliance, she would throw herself and her children amongst the infuriated populace, in the end overcame his resolution. He added to his signature the let. ters V. C. (vi coactus), but the people, informed by a minister of their purport, obliged him to erase them. Similar commotions broke | iterated assertions that they had betrayed and sold their country to France, John de Witt was said to have embezzled a portion of the public funds set apart for maintaining foreign correspondence, although the mediocrity of his circumstances and the frugality of his habits were matters of public notoriety; and he proved, by the declarations of all the members of the council of state, that not the smallest sum had even so much as passed through his hands. It was affirmed of Cornelius de Witt that he had been obliged to quit the fleet, not on account of sickness, as was reported, but in consequence of a wound he had received in a quarrel with De Ruyter; that he had refused to fight the French fleet, and had prevented the renewal of the engagement on the morning after the battle of Solebay. It was in vain that De Ruyter himself bore the most ample testimony to the cordial and uninterrupted friendship between them, and to the gallant behaviour of the deputy in that, as well as every other action in which he had borne a part; the populace refused to believe any evidence in his favour. Such was the state of fury to which they were excited, that at Amsterdam the house even of De Ruyter, who might justly be considered as the saviour of his country, and against whom his bitterest enemy could bring no other accusation than that of his attachment to the De Witts, was surrounded by a mob, and only rescued from pillage by the firm out at Rotterdam, Haarlem, Leyden, Amsterdam, and in other towns, both of Holland and Zealand, where the populace constrained the magistrates by menace and violence to the repeal of the edict. Reluctant to have such a measure forced on them by tumult and sedition, the States of Holland and Zealand now unanimously passed an Act revoking the Perpetual Edict, and conferring on the Prince of Orange the dignity of stadtholder, captain, and admiralgeneral of these provinces. Friesland and Groningen had already a stadtholder in the person of William of Nassau, and the three remaining provinces had now no states, as being subject to the enemy. But this measure contributed little to appease the general disorders. The prince, indeed, issued a manifesto exculpating the municipal governments from the charge of treachery, but so ambiguously worded that it failed of producing any beneficial effect. He refused to promulgate an edict condemning the seditions in the towns, because, as he alleged, they were excited by the more considerable burghers, who were not to be coerced by decrees. The hatred of the people against the De Witts, far from being appeased by the overthrow of that party and the elevation of their idol, appeared hourly to increase in virulence. Accusations, the most absurd and improbable, were industriously spread and received greedily. Besides the re |