Page:Books and men.djvu/204

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BOOKS AND MEN.

tent of his shortcomings in this direction lay in his protesting against the insults offered by a Selkirk preacher to King James through the easy medium of his religion.

Now it is only natural that the Covenanters, who feared and hated Dundee, should have found infinite comfort in believing that he was under the direct protection of Satan. In those days of lively faith, the charge was by no means an uncommon one, and the dark distinction was shared by any number of his compatriots. On the death of Sir Robert Grierson of Lag, the devil, who had waited long for his prey, manifested his sense of satisfaction by providing an elaborate funeral cortége, which came over the sea at midnight, with nodding plumes and sable horses, to carry off in ostentatious splendor the soul of this much-honored guest. Prince Rupert was believed by the Roundheads to owe his immunity from danger to the same diabolic agency which made Claverhouse proof against leaden bullets; and his white dog, Boy, was regarded with as much awe as was Dundee's famous black charger, the gift of the evil one himself. As a fact, Boy was not altogether unworthy of