Ancient Scottish ballads, recovered from tradition, and never before ...

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1561, the mob were so enraged in being dis-
appointed in making a Robin Hood, that they
rose in mutiny, seized on the city gates, com-
mitted robberies upon strangers; and one of the
ring- leaders, being condemned by the magis-
trates to be hanged, the mob forced open the
jail, set at liberty the criminal and all the
prisoners, and broke in pieces the gibbet erec-
ted at the cross for executing the malefactor.
They next assaulted the Magistrates, who were
sitting in the council-chamber, and who fled to
the tolbooth for shelter, where the mob attack-
ed them, battering the doors, and pouring stones
through the windows. Application was made to
the deacons of the corporations to appease the
tumult. Remaining, however, unconcerned
spectators, they made this answer. " They
will be magistrates alone; let them rule the multi-
tude alone." The Magistrates were kept in con-
finement till they made proclamation be pub-
lished, offering indemnity to the rioters upon
laying down their arms. Still, however, so late
as the year 1592, we find the General Assem-
bly complaining of the profanation of the Sab-