A PERFECT DESCRIPTION OF THE PEOPLE AND country OF Scotland.  
LONDON.  
Printed for Rich. Lownds.  
1659.   

A Perfect Description of SCOTLAND.  
FIrst for the Country, I must confess it is good for those that possess it, and too bad for others, to be at the charge to conquer it. The air might be wholesome, but for the stinking People that inhabit it. The ground might be fruitful, had they wit to manure it.  
Their Beasts be generally small, Women only excepted, of which sort there are none greater in the whole world. There is great store of Fowl too, as foul-houses, foul-sheets, foul-linen, foul-dishes and pots, foul-trenchers, and napkins; with which sort, we have been forcaed to say, as the children did with their fowl in the wilderness. They have good store of fish too, and good for those that can eat it raw; but if it come once into their hands, it is worse than if it were three days old: For their Butter and Cheese, I will not meddle withal at this time, nor no man else at any time that loves his life.  
They have great store of Deer, but they are so far from the place where I have been, that I had rather believe, than go to disprove it: I confess, all the Deer I met withal, was dear Lodgings, dear Horse-meat, and dear Tobaco, and English Beer.  
As for Fruit, for their Grandsire Adam's sake, they never planted any; and for other Trees, had Christ been betrayed in this Country, (as doubtless he should, had he come as a stranger) Judas had sooner found the Grace of Repentance, than a Tree to hang himself on.  
They have many Hills, wherein they say is much treasure, but they show none of it; Nature hath only discovered to them some Mines of Coal, to show to what end he created them.  
I saw little Grass, but in their Pottage: The Thistle is not given them of nought, for it is the fairest flower in their Garden. The word Hay is Heathen-Greek unto them; neither man nor beast knows what it means.  
Corn is reasonable plenty at this time, for since they heard of the Kings coming, it hath been as unlawful for the common people to eat Wheat, as it was in the old time for any, but the Priests, to eat show bread. They prayed much for his coming, and long fasted for his welfare; but in the more plain sense, that he might fare the better: all his followers were welcome, but his guard; for those they say, are like Paraoh's leane-kines, and threaten dearth wheresoever they come: They could persuade the Footmen, that oaten-cakes would make them long-winded; & the children of the chapel they have brought to eat of them, for the maintenance of their voices.  
They say our Cooks are too saucy, and for Grooms & Coachmen, they wish them to give to their Horses, no worse than they eat themselves; they commend the brave minds of the pensioners, and the Gentlemen of the bedchambers, which choose rather to go to Taverns, than to be always eating of the King's Provision; they likewise do commend the Yeomen of the Buttery and Cellar, for their readiness, and silence, in that they will hear 20 knocks, before they will answer one. They persuade the trumpeters, that fasting is good for men of that quality; for emptiness, they say, causes wind, and wind causes a Trumpet to sound well.  
The bringing of heralds, they say, was a needless charge, they all know their pedigrees well enough, and the harbingers might have been spared, sit●ence they brought so many Beds with them; & of two evils, since the least should be chosen, They wish the Beds might remain with them, and poor harbingers keep their places, and do their office, as they return: His Hangings they desire might likewise be left as relics, to put them in mind of His Majesty; and they promise to dispense with the Wooden Images, but for those Graven Images in his new beautified chapel, they threaten to pull down soon after his departure, and to make of them a burnt-offering, to appease the indignation they imagined conceived against them in the breast of the Almighty, for suffering such Idolatry to enter into their Kingdom; The Organ, I think will find mercy, because (as they say) there is some affinity between them and the bagpipes.  
The Shipper that brought the singing men, with their Papistical Vestments, complains that he hath been much troubled with a strange singing in his head, ever since they came aboard his Ship. For remedy whereof the Parson of the Parish hath persuaded him to sell that profane Vessel, and to distribute the money among the faithful Brethren.  
For his majesty's entertainment, I must needs ingeniously confess, he was received into the Parish of Edenburg (for a City I cannot call it) with great shouts of joy, but no shows of charge for Pageants; they hold them idolatrous things, and not fit to be used in so reformed a place; from the Castle they gave him some pieces of Ordinance, which surely he gave them, since he was King of Engl. and at the entrance of the Town, they presented him with a Golden basin, which was carried before him on men's shoulders to his Palace, I think, from whence it came. His Majesty was conveyed by the Younkers of the Town, which were about 100 Halberds, (dearly shall they rue it, in regard of the charge) to the Cross, and so to the high Church, where the only Bell they had, stood on tiptoe to behold his sweet face; where I must entreat you to spare him, for an hour I lost him.  
In the mean time to report the Speeches of the people, concerning his never exampled entertainment, were to make his discourse too tedious unto you, as the Sermon was to those that were constrained to endure it. After the Preachment, he was conducted by the same Halberds, unto His Palace, of which I forbear to speak, because it was a place sanctified by His divine Majesty, only I wish it had been better Walled, for my friend's sake that waited on him.  
Now I will begin briefly to speak of the people, according to their degrees and qualities; for the Lords Spiritual, they may well be termed so indeed; for they are neither Fish nor Flesh, but what it shall please their earthly God, the King, to make them. Obedience is better than Sacrifice, and therefore they make a mock at Martyrdom, saying, That Christ was to die for them, and not they for him. They will rather subscribe, than surrender, and rather dispense with small things, than trouble themselves with great disputation; they will rather acknowledge the King to be their head, then want wherewith to pamper their bodies.  
They have taken great pains and trouble to compass their bishoprics, and they will not leave them for a trifle; for the Deacons, whose defects will not lift them up to dignities, all their study is to disgrace them that have gotten the least degree above them; and because they cannot Bishop, they proclaim they never heard of any. The Scriptures, say they, speak of Deacons and Elders, but not a word of Bishops. Their Discourses are full of detraction; their Sermons nothing but railing; and their conclusions nothing but Heresies and Treasons. For their Religion they have, I confess they have it above reach, and God willing I will never reach for it.  
They christian without the Cross, Marry without the Ring, receive the Sacrament without reverence, die without repentance, and bury without Divine Service; they keep no holidays, nor acknowledge any Saint but S. Andrew, who they said, got that honour by presenting Christ with an Oaten Cake, after his forty days fast. They say likewise, that he that translated the Bible, was the son of a Maulster, because it speaks of a miracle done by Barley Loves, whereas they swear they were Oaten-Cakes, and that no other bread of that quantity could have sufficed so nany thousands.  
They use no prayer at all, for they say it is needless, God knows their minds without prattling; and what he doth, he loves to do it freely. Their Sabbaths exercise, is a preaching in the Forenoon, and a persecuting in the Afternoon; they go to Church in the Forenoon to hear the Law, and to the Crags and Mountains in the Afternoon to louze themselves.  
They hold their Noses if you talk of Bear-baiting, and stop their Ears, if you speak of a Play: Fornication they hold but a pastime, wherein man's ability is approved, & a woman's fertility discovered; At Adultery they shake their heads; Theft they rail at; murder they wink at; & Blasphemy they laugh at; they think it impossible to lose the way to Heaven if they can but leave Rome behind them.  
To be opposite to the Pope, is to be presently with God; to conclude, I am persuaded, That if God and his Angels, at the last day, should come down in their whitest Garments, they would run away, and cry, The Children of the chapel are come again to torment us, let us fly from the abomination of these boys, and hide ourselves in the Mountains.  
For the Lords Temporal and Spiritual, temporizing Gentlemen, If I were apt to speak of any, I could not speak much of them; only I must let you know, they are not Scottishmen, for as soon as they fall from the breast of the beast their mother, their careful sire posts them away for France, which as they pass, the Sea sucks from them that which they have sucked from their rude dams; there they gather new flesh new blood, new manners, and there they learn to put on their clothes, and then return into their Countries, to wear them out; there they learn to stand, to speak, and to discourse, and congee, to court women, and to compliment with men.  
They spared for no cost to honour the King, nor for no complemental courtesy to welcome their countrymen; their followers are their fellows, their wives their slaves, their horses their masters, & their swords their Judges; by reason whereof, they have but few labourers, and those not very rich: their Parliaments hold but three days, their Statutes three lines, and their Suits are determined in a manner in three words, or very few more, &c.  
The wonders of their Kingdom are these; the Lord Chancellor, he is believed; the Master of the Rolls, well spoken of; and the whole council, who are the Judges for all Causes, are free from suspicion of corruption. The Country, although it be mountainous, affords no Monsters, but Women, of which, the greatest sort, (as Countesses, and Ladies) are kept like Lions in Iron grates; the merchant's wives are also prisoners, but not in so strong a hold; they have Wooden Cages, like our Boar Franks, through which, sometimes peeping to catch the Air, we are almost choked with the sight of them; the greatest madness amongst the men, is jealousy; in that they fear what no man that hath but two of his senses will take from them.  
The Ladies are of opinion, that Susanna could not be chaste, because she bathed so often. Pride is a thing bred in their bones, and their flesh naturally abhors cleanliness; their breath commonly stinks of Pottage, their linen of Piss, their hands of Pigs turds, their body of sweat, and their splay-feet never offend in Socks. To be chained in marriage with one of them, were to be tied to a dead carcase, and cast into a stinking ditch; Formosity and a dainty face, are things they dream not of.  
The ointments they most frequently use amongst them, are Brimstone and Butter for the Scab, and oil of Bays, and Stave-sacre. I protest, I had rather be the meanest servant of the two of my Pupils chambermaid, than to be the Master Minion to the fairest Countess I have yet discovered. The sin of curiosity of ointments, is but newly crept into the Kingdom, and I do not think will long continue.  
To draw you down by degrees from the Citizens Wives, to the Country Gentlewomen, and convey you to common Dames in Sea-coal Lane, that converse with Rags▪ and marrowbones, are things of Mineral race; every whore in Hounds-ditch is an Helena; and the greasy bawds in turnbull-street, are Greekish Dames, in comparison of these. And therefore to conclude, The men of old did no more wonder, that the great Messiah should be born in so poor a Town as Bethlem in Judea, than I do wonder, that so brave a Prince as King James, should be born in so stinking a Town as Edenburg, in lousy Scotland.  
FINIS.