than Merchiston. And finally, that, "the sade Erle and Mathew his sone sall, for the favouris schawin in this concorde, help, supple, menteyn, and defende the sade Elesabeth, and Archbalde hir sone, and thar ayres, in all thar causis leyfull and honest, and in speciale in the pessabill brukyng and possedyng of hir quarter of the Levenax and landis before expremyt in all things, but (i. e. without) fraude or gyll."*

The necessary steps to perfect this arrangement by division and appropriation according to the forms of law, were immediately adopted by Elizabeth Menteith, who at the same time took care that John Haldane and his son should be present and exhibit a formal consent to the process of division. But there can be little doubt that the contract of excambion of her birth-right was a

*The fac-similes of the signatures of these two first Earls of Lennox of the Dernely race, appended to this deed, will interest the reader. Mathew was he who commanded one of the divisions of the Scotch army at Flodden.

Thoy Reward

There are also appended their seals; bearing first and fourth three fleurs de lis; second and third, a fesse chequé, surrounded of a border charged with buckles; on an escutcheon, the plain saltier and roses; on the seal of Mathew a label of three points.

+ All the original documents connected with this process of division are among the Merchiston papers. The retour of division to the lands lying in Dunbartonshire is dated 21st May 1490, and to the lands in Stirlingshire, 24th May thereafter. She is styled in these deeds" Elizabeth Menteith Lady of Rusky, ane of the portionaris of the erldome of the Levenax." She is put into possession of the lands, nominatim allotted to her, by the sheriff, who, in token and name of possession, delivers a wand to her in open court.

measure to which this lady and her son were constrained by the determined and lawless grasp which Dernely and his son had fastened on the earldom.

A charter of excambion was then granted to her of the lands which were the price of the rights and privileges she had yielded. This runs in the name of Mathew "Comes de Lenax," and is ratified by his father, also styling himself Earl of Lennox,—a fact which may be thus accounted for: The charter of excambion is dated 17th September 1490.* The contract, in which Mathew is not styled Earl, is in May previous. Now on the intervening 1st of June 1490, Dernely having resigned the Earldom of Lennox, Lordship of Dernely, &c. into the hands of James IV., in favour of his son and heir Mathew, in fee, and of himself and spouse, Margaret Montgomery, in liferent, obtained a new charter to that effect. Hence, in accordance with the territorial principle, both father and son being infeft in the comitatus, took the title of Comes.

This charter of excambion grants to Elizabeth Menteith and her heirs, the two towns of Blarnavadis, with the pertinents, lying in the earldom of Lennox and county of Stirling, and the fishing with one boat, and nets in proportion, over the whole of the still water of the lake of Lochlomond, (lacu de Lochlomond,) excepting the fishing in the water of Leven, and the firth of Lochlomond, which are reserved to the granter and his succesThe grant is in perpetuity to a noble lady and our cousin, Elizabeth, Menteith of Rusky, for excambion made to us by her; and the rights yielded are stated to be the fourth part of the tenantry of the whole earldom of Lennox belonging to her, with the pertinents, and with the advowsons and right of patronage + Andrew Stewart's History.

sors.

* Merchiston Papers.

of the whole churches of the earldom of Lennox, with the fishing of the water of Leven and the entry to the still waters of Lochlomond, and half the island of Inchtavannach and Castle-gyle, with all the pertinents belonging to the said Elizabeth by right of heritage in the Lennox. Upon this charter she obtained infeftment on the 22d September 1490.

Having thus arranged matters with Elizabeth Menteith, Dernely's next object was to quiet the claims of Haldane of Gleneagles. Agnes Menteith was by this time dead, and never having made up her titles to the Lennox, James Haldane her eldest son, proceeded to do so in his own person in the beginning of the year 1490. His retours are precisely in the same general terms as Elizabeth Menteith's, nor do they indicate the slightest superiority of claim upon his part. The term of non-entry of the lands since the demise of his great-great-grandfather Earl Duncan, to whom he serves, is stated at sixtysix years, corresponding to the interval between the date of the retour and the Earl's death. In the beginning of the year 1492, James Haldane took out brieves for a division of the whole earldom, as between him and Dernely. Upon the 14th June of that same year, Elizabeth Menteith, to check this assumption, obtained letters under the privy-seal, to be afterwards noticed, for the protection of her own interests in the matter. Upon the 19th of the same month, John Haldane appears as procurator for his son James in the Sheriff-court of Dunbartonshire, and produces brieves of division of the remaining three quarters of the Comitatus, between James Haldane and Dernely, which accordingly takes place, with the express reservation and protection of the other quarter already allotted to Elizabeth Menteith.

This has been supposed finally to have settled the partition of the Lennox among the heirs-general of Earl Duncan. But there is a process, the date of which, as shall be afterwards shown, has hitherto been mistaken, which certainly occurred subsequently to the process of division above-mentioned. It is a new summons of reduction, (dated 2d February 1492, that is, subsequent to June 1492, as the year then commenced on the 25th March,) of Dernely's service, already reduced, but upon which he had again resumed the honours. This is called in court on the 15th of June thereafter, that is, in 1493. It is there delayed of consent of parties until October following. But in the interval " there is a commission dated 8th July 1493 by John Lord Dernely, therein designed Earl of Lennox, to Mathew Stewart, his well beloved son and apparent heir, and to John Stewart of Henrieston, also his son, to go to the kirk of Drymen on the 9th of July then instant, and to commune and agree with John Haldane of Gleneagles, anent the avail of the Earldom of Lennox."* Accordingly, on the 11th July 1493, an indenture is concluded at Drymen betwixt "ane nobile and myty Lord Johnne Erle of Levenax, Lord Dernle, and Mathew his son, apperand ayer and fear of the said Erldom on the ta part, and John Haldane of Glenegass, and James his son, apperand ayer and ane of the parsonars fears of the said Erldom, &c. on the tother part," &c. This contract is precisely of the nature of that concluded with Elizabeth Menteith and her son in 1490. It names, however, the lands which are to compose Haldane's quarter of the fief; and adds certain other lands by way of excambion " for the hale and full contentatioun of all

* Andrew Stewart's History, p. 186.

the rycht clame and interest of the said James, his ayers or assignees, or that may be had in or to the properte or the superiorite of the said erldom, or profyt of the samyn," &c.*

This completes the long delayed partition of the Lennox among the coheirs of Earl Duncan, leaving the youngest, but most powerful branch, in the undisputed possession of the honours.

Elizabeth Menteith, being advanced in years, resigned in 1507 her great possessions in favour of her son Archibald Napier, who subsequently, upon his own resignation, obtained a charter under the Great Seal, dated 21st May 1509, incorporating these estates in the Lennox and Menteith to be held in free barony, called the barony of" Edinballinaper."

About the same period the barony of Haldane, composed in like manner of the lands that had come to that family by Agnes Menteith, was erected in favour of Sir John Haldane (the grandson of Dernely's opponent) who by this time had succeeded his father James.

The Dernely branch of the earldom also obtained new charters of their possessions. "It appears (says Andrew Stewart) that Mathew Earl of Lennox, sensible of the distinction between the destination of the lordship of Dernely, received by grant from the Steward of Scotland, in the year 1361, and the destination of the lands composing the earldom of Lennox, and the title or peerage of Earl connected with those lands, obtained, on the 25th January in the same year, 1511-12, a separate charter from James IV. of the earldom of Levenax, lordship and lands thereof, and the office of

* Gleneagles Papers.