hospital. The pope, as informed by the king's letter, says the whole of Scotland was ringing with the scandal of it. The position of the "minister" of Faile as provincial of all the Red friars in Scotland, with a seat in Parliament, must have aggravated the scandal. The rental of Faile is stated at seventy pounds sterling. The pope appointed the bishop and archdeacon of Glasgow and the bishop of Galloway (always called Candida Casa in papal letters) a commission of inquiry.1 This petition was the last ecclesiastical act of the king. For more than a hundred years, ever since the battle of Neville's Cross, the frontier fortress of Roxburgh had been in the hands of the English. In the midst of a truce between the two countries James laid siege to it, and was killed by the bursting of a cannon, one of the rude pieces of ordnance then coming into use, in the month of August 1460. The king had not completed his thirtieth year when he met his untimely death. He left three sons -James, his successor, Alexander, duke of Albany, and John, earl of Mar-and two daughters. The widowed queen hastened with her infant son James to Roxburgh and urged the Scottish army to continue the siege, which resulted in the immediate capture of the castle. The prince was then hurriedly conducted to Kelso Abbey and crowned in his eighth year -James III. After which the court removed to Edinburgh for the burial of the late king in Holyrood, where he had been crowned twenty-three years before. 1 Theiner, p. 421. CHAPTER XXVII JAMES III., 1460-1488 Death of bishop Kennedy-Englishmen precluded from Scottish benefices Tulloch, bishop of Orkney-King's marriage-Papal letters and privileges-Scottish clerics begging benefices at Rome-King's usurpation and abuse of patronage-Deterioration of the Church-St. Giles', Edinburgh, made collegiatePrimacy of St. Andrews and archbishop Graham—Accusations against Graham-His trial and condemnation—Archbishop Scheves-Papal exemptions-Papal jubilee-Pilgrims' privileges at Rome, at Glasgow Cathedral, and at St. Mary's, Lasswade-Bishop Blackader of Glasgow-Rivalry between Glasgow and St. Andrews-Founding of Aberdour "Hospital" for education of girls. THE young king was early deprived of his two best advisers the queen-mother, who died suddenly in 1463, and good bishop Kennedy, whose death in May 1466 was regarded as a national calamity. George Buchanan, in no way partial to bishops, says of him that "his death was so deeply deplored by all good men, that the country seemed to weep for him as for a public parent."1 His successor in the see of St. Andrews was his uterine brother, Patrick Graham, grandson of Robert III.2 Bishop Patrick was translated from Brechin to St. Andrews in 1466 and became the first archbishop in 1472. In the year 1466 the 1 Hist. Scot., xii. 23. 2 Mary, the daughter of Robert III., was three times married. Scottish Parliament, losing Bishop Kennedy was a son of the second marriage, and Graham of the third. bishop Kennedy's guidance, revived the act of king Robert Bruce forbidding Englishmen to hold benefices in Scotland. In the same year the application of Christian, king of Denmark and Norway, for the protection of the king of Scots on behalf of Tulloch, bishop of Orkney, led to an important political change in these isles. The bishop, who is described as "a Scotsman, and a prelate of high accomplishments and great suavity of manners," had been imprisoned by a son of the earl of Orkney. The steps taken to release the bishop were followed by proposals for a marriage between king James and Margaret the daughter of king Christian. Margaret became queen of Scotland, and the Orkney and Shetland Islands, pledged for her dowry which was never paid, became part of the kingdom of Scotland. The queen is said to have been endowed with a rare union of wisdom and sweetness. The application made to the pope by king James for her canonisation after her death1 would imply that she was a woman of exceptional piety. Nothing came of the application in the midst of the troubles of the king's latter years; but it is not generally known how near Scotland. was to having two Saint Margarets in her roll of queens. King James is credited with artistic tastes and some literary culture, but they were a poor substitute for the political capacity and firmness so much needed in a Scottish king of that age, and which he so singularly lacked. His education fell into bad hands after the death of bishop Kennedy, and he was tossed, as his father had been in his minority, from one unprincipled faction to another. Of church incidents in the reign of James III., from 1460 to 1472, when St. Andrews was made the metropolitan see, we have the following additional information from 1 Theiner, p. 499. XXVII VARIOUS PAPAL FAVOURS 471 Theiner. Hugh of Dunglass, a member of the Home family, receives the living of Kirkinner, rich in that day with forty pounds sterling. The parish church of Dunoon, £12, is made" mensal" to the see of Argyll, worth only £140, upon which income George Lauder its bishop complained that he could not decently live. The friar bishops of Argyll made no such complaint. The king out of pity made the gift to Argyll at the expense of Dunoon.2 Το the abbot of Arbroath is granted that the vicars of the parish churches annexed to the abbey shall not be subjected officially, financially, or otherwise, to the bishops in whose dioceses they are, but only to the diocesan bishop of the monastery, namely St. Andrews.3 Thomas Spence, bishop of Aberdeen, receives power to nominate to all benefices falling vacant in his diocese, secular or regular, for six alternate months in the year during his episcopate.1 To Mary of Gueldres, the queen-mother, is granted confirmation of the union of the hospital which she had erected for poor men at Soultra, near Edinburgh, with the collegiate church founded and endowed by her in memory of her husband." In the next year, 1463, the last of her life, Mary receives indulgence to have a portable altar (altare portabile) on which a priest might celebrate every Lord's Day, wherever she should be. Gilbert Forester, archdeacon of Brechin, after being excommunicated for some offence, publicly flogged George Shores 1 Theiner, p. 429. If Hugh took possession he held it for a short time, as it was offered three years afterwards, in 1463, to Thomas Livingston, "bishop of Dunkeld in the universal church," as a consolation for the king's opposing his election to that see. Livingston had to vacate Kirkinner when made abbot of 2 Ibid., p. 432. 3 Ibid., p. 435. 4 Ibid., p. 437. 5 Ibid., pp. 439, 442. Trinity Collegiate Church, endowed with 100 marks a year to support a provost and twelve presbyters and clerics, stood in the valley, a few yards to the east of the present Waverley Station. It was still standing in 1848, with the stones numbered for rebuilding on another site. 6 Ibid., p. 451. wood, the bishop of Brechin, and some time chancellor of Scotland, in his own cathedral. For this grave assault he was subjected to a court of inquiry held under papal commission.1 There are about twenty recommendations made within a few years by pope Pius II. on behalf of hungry applicants for Scottish canonries and other benefices. The papal court was crowded by these hangers - on, begging and bribing the officials for livings which they had evidently no hope of procuring by meritorious service at home. James I. had passed an act of Parliament against barratry, or simony, prohibiting ecclesiastics to leave the kingdom except by permission of the crown, and forbidding them at the same time to carry money with them out of the country. In two of these cases, dated 1460, William Elphinstone, the future bishop of Aberdeen, is applied to by the papal court, and is designated canon and Official of Glasgow.2 King James III. is also largely responsible for the abuse of ecclesiastical patronage by invading the rights of cathedral and monastic chapters and appointing his own unworthy nominees. He requested pope Paul II., in 1471, to confirm the abbots he had nominated to Arbroath and Melrose. The pope characterised the application as wanting in respect to the apostolic see, professed to ignore the king's nominations, and at the same time appointed his nominees.3 The king was guilty of the same tyrannical intrusion into Paisley and Dunfermline Abbeys-in the latter case annulling the election made by the chapter, and appointing his own favourite, Crichton, as their abbot.* 1 Theiner, p. 444. 2 Ibid., pp. 429, 454. 3 Ibid., p. 464. 4 Bellesheim, Hist., ii. 96, laments the growing evil of appointing utterly incompetent persons to the most important offices, and attributes it to the influence of the nobles, but is silent as to the larger share of blame which attached to the Roman see |