Chapter XI: Accession of the Stewarts, 1329-1370
This fiery document apparently had a wholesome effect upon the contumacious bishop. He appears to have come in hot haste from his diocese to Glasgow five days before the court to which he had been cited was to meet. [23] Probably fearing to appear before the irate canons in judgment, he compromised the matters in dispute with the Abbot and his Convent. An agreement between them was drawn out, in which the Abbot seems to have got the better in the dispute, and the Bishop promised to have the agreement proclaimed and explained, in their mother tongue [24] to the people belonging to the churches in question, who were to be specially convened for this purpose.
This compromise was made in 1361, in which year an Abbot John is mentioned as presiding over the Convent. [25] He was present at the Parliament held at Perth three years [26] afterwards to make arrangements for payment of the ransom of King David, and the establishing of a firm peace between England and Scotland. The Stewart was there also with his eldest son, John, Lord of Kyle, endeavouring to combat, with the ability of a great statesman, the fickleness and treachery of the King. King David seems to have hated him with a cordial hatred, and one time he and his sons were imprisoned by his orders, [27] and remained in confinement for more than a year. The Stewart had led a chequered life from his very boyhood, and had suffered much in the cause of his country. His trials were now seemingly at an end. The King died on the 22nd February, 1370, and Robert the Stewart ascended the throne by the title of Robert II. The Abbey was now under royal patronage, and Walter the son of Alan, its founder—the Shropshire colonist—the progenitor of a race of kings.
[23] Ibid, p. 145.
[24] In materna lingua.
[25] See Lennox Charters ; also, Eglinton Charters, Vol. II., 2.
[26] 13th June, 1364. See Tytler, Appendix HH.
[27] Fordun by Goodall, Vol. II., p. 380.