what had
disturbed him. "I have been," he said, "in Argyle's prison. I have seen
him within an hour of eternity, sleeping as sweetly as ever man did. But
as for me -------"

And now the Earl had risen from his bed, and had prepared himself for
what was yet to be endured. He was first brought down the High Street
to the Council House, where he was to remain during the short interval
which was still to elapse before the execution. During that interval
he asked for pen and ink, and wrote to his wife: "Dear heart, God is
unchangeable: He hath always been good and gracious to me: and no place
alters it. Forgive me all my faults; and now comfort thyself in Him, in
whom only true comfort is to be found. The Lord be with thee, bless and
comfort thee, my dearest. Adieu."

It was now time to leave the Council House. The divines who attended the
prisoner were not of his own persuasion; but he listened to them with
civility, and exhorted them to caution their flocks against those
doctrines which all Protestant churches unite in condemning. He mounted
the scaffold, where the rude old guillotine of Scotland, called the
Maiden, awaited him, and addressed the people in a speech, tinctured
with the peculiar phraseology of his sect, but breathing the spirit
of serene piety. His enemies, he said, he forgave, as he hoped to be
forgiven. Only a single acrimonious expression escaped him. One of the
episcopal clergymen who attended him went to the edge of the scaffold,
and called out in a loud voice, "My Lord dies a Protestant." "Yes," said
the Earl, stepping forward, "and not only a Protestant, but with a heart
hatred of Popery, of Prelacy, and of all superstition." He then embraced
his friends, put into their hands some tokens of remembrance for his
wife and children, kneeled down, laid his head on the block, prayed
during a few minutes, and gave the signal to the executioner. His head
was fixed on the top of the Tolbooth, where the head of Montrose had
formerly decayed. [350]

The head of the brave and sincere, though not blameless Rumbold, was
already on the West Port of Edinburgh. Surrounded by factious and
cowardly associates, he had, through the whole campaign, behaved himself
like a soldier trained in the school of the great Protector, had in
council strenuously supported the authority of Argyle, and had in the
field been distinguished by tranquil intrepidity. After the dispersion
of the army he was set upon by a party of militia.