e
of elaborate rage and insult was put in practice by order of the
parliament. At the gate of the city he was met by the magistrates, and
put into a new cart, purposely made with a high chair or bench, where he
wus placed, that the people might have a full view of him. He was bound
with a cord, drawn over his breast and shoulders, and fastened through
holes made in the cart. The hangman then took off the hat of the noble
prisoner, and rode himself before the cart in his livery, and with
his bonnet on; the other officers, who were taken prisoners with the
marquis, walking two and two before them.

The populace, more generous and humane, when they saw so mighty a change
of fortune in this great man, so lately their dread and terror, into
whose hands the magistrates, a few years before, had delivered on their
knees the keys of the city, were struck with compassion, and viewed him
with silent tears and admiration. The preachers next Sunday exclaimed
against this movement of rebel nature, as they termed it; and reproached
the people with their profane tenderness towards the capital enemy of
piety and religion.

When he was carried before the parliament, which was then sitting,
Loudon, the chancellor, in a violent declamation, reproached him with
the breach of the national covenant, which he had subscribed; his
rebellion against God, the king, and the kingdom; and the many horrible
murders, treasons, and impieties for which he was now to be brought
to condign punishment. Montrose, in his answer, maintained the same
superiority above his enemies, to which, by his fame and great actions,
as well as by the consciousness of a good cause, he was justly entitled.
He told the parliament, that since the king, as he was informed, had so
far avowed their authority as to enter into a treaty with them, he now
appeared uncovered before their tribunal: a respect which, while they
stood in open defiance to their sovereign, they would in vain have
required of him: that he acknowledged, with infinite shame and remorse,
the errors of his early conduct, when their plausible pretences had
seduced him to tread with them the paths of rebellion, and bear arms
against his prince and country: that his following services, he hoped,
had sufficiently testified his repentance; and his death would now
atone for that guilt, the only one with which he could justly reproach
himself. That in all his warlike enterprises he was warranted by that
commission wh