Collected works > Edinburgh edition, 1894-98 - Works of Robert Louis Stevenson > Volume 21, 1896 - Miscellanies, Volume IV

THE PENTLAND RISING
a reproach ; and many of them were openly vicious.
They . . . were indeed the dreg and refuse of the
northern parts. Those of them who arose above
contempt or scandal were men of such violent
tempers that they were as much hated as the others
were despised.' 1 It was little to be wondered at,
from this account, that the country-folk refused to
go to the parish church, and chose rather to listen
to outed ministers in the fields. But this was not
to be allowed, and their persecutors at last fell on
the method of calling a roll of the parishioners'
names every Sabbath, and marking a fine of twenty
shillings Scots to the name of each absenter. In
this way very large debts were incurred by persons
altogether unable to pay. Besides this, landlords
were fined for their tenants' absences, tenants for
their landlords', masters for their servants', servants
for their masters', even though they themselves were
perfectly regular in their attendance. And as the
curates were allowed to fine with the sanction of
any common soldier, it may be imagined that often
the pretexts were neither very sufficient nor well
proven.
When the fines could not be paid at once, Bibles,
clothes, and household utensils were seized upon, or
a number of soldiers, proportionate to his wealth,
were quartered on the offender. The coarse and
drunken privates filled the houses with woe ; snatched
the bread from the children to feed their dogs ;
1 History of My Own Times, beginning 1660, by Bishop Gilbert Burnet,
p. 158.