to go to the country for the Good Friday and Easter holidays, to remain for religious services in the old kirk (ib. p. 457). In August of this year the articles of Perth were confirmed by parliament. The opposition to the episcopal forms gradually, however, increased, especially in Edinburgh, and on 16 April 1623 Melrose, in giving an account to the king of the order observed at Easter, reported that the number of communicants was small, and ventured to suggest that 'time and convenience shall prevail more to reduce them to conformity than sudden or vehement instance' (Melrose Papers, ii. 632). On account of the remissness of the authorities of Edinburgh in repelling the attack on a Dunkirk ship, and their plain speaking to Melrose, who endeavoured to concuss them to interference (Calderwood, vii. 573-4), he advised the king that he might raise money enough to keep a standing force and be independent of the people (Melrose Papers, ii. 572). Melrose was one of the Scottish nobility who attended the funeral of King James to Westminster, 20 May 1625. It having been intimated after the accession of Charles I that no nobleman or officer of state should in future have a seat on the bench of the court of session, Melrose on 15 Feb. 1626 resigned the office of lord president. Soon afterwards he also resigned that of secretary of state and was appointed lord privy seal. After the death of Sir John Ramsay, viscount Haddington, Melrose, deeming it a greater honour to take his style from a county than from an abbey, received on 27 Aug. 1626 a patent changing his title to Earl of Haddington. He died 29 May 1637.
The Earl of Haddington was thrice married. By his first wife, Margaret, daughter of James Borthwick of Newbyres, he had two daughters: Christian, married first to Robert, tenth lord Lindsay of Byres, and secondly to Robert, sixth lord Boyd; and Isabel, married to James, first earl of Airlie. By his second wife, Margaret, daughter of James Foulis of Colinton, he had three sons: Thomas, second earl [q. v.], Sir James Hamilton of Priestfield, and Sir John Hamilton of Trabroun; and four daughters: Margaret, married first to David, lord Carnegie, and secondly to James, first earl of Hartfell; Helen, died young; Jean, married to John, sixth earl of Cassilis; and Anne, died unmarried. By his third wife, widow of Sir Patrick Hume of Polwarth, he had a son, the Hon. Robert Hamilton of Wester Binning, killed at the blowing up of Dunglass Castle in 1640 [see under Hamilton, Thomas, second Earl of Haddington]. Three portraits of the first earl are at Tynninghame.
The first two lines of a curious epitaph on Haddington among Sir James Balfour's MSS. in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh, give with sufficient conciseness, but with exactness and justice, a summary of his character and career:
Heir layes a lord quho quhill he stood
Had matchless beene had he beene ——
He was undoubtedly the most successful Scotchman of his time, and more remarkable for versatility than particular ability. He was believed to be in possession of the philosopher's stone, but he modestly, if not quite ingenuously, explained his success by attributing it to the fact that he never put off till to-morrow what could be done to-day, and never trusted another to do what he could do himself. As a lawyer he was famed both as advocate and judge for his remarkable shrewdness, for his almost instinctive perception of fraud, and for his skill in dragging the truth from a recalcitrant or hostile witness. He was at the same time a skilful administrator, though often lending his abilities to a questionable policy. He probably carried out the disastrous ecclesiastical policy of James unwillingly. Haddington was a student and a man of varied culture. Men of letters were numbered among his friends, and, as is evident from the notes and observations he left behind him, and the marginal references on his books, he was widely read not only in civil law but in history, especially the history of his country. His extensive collection of papers, including a variety of Scottish historical records, is preserved in the Advocates' Library, Edinburgh. His 'Decisions' are well known, and are contained in three manuscript volumes reporting upwards of three thousand cases decided between 1592 and 1624. A selection of his state papers, including his correspondence with King James, was published under the title 'State Papers of Thomas, Earl of Melrose,' by the Abbotsford Club, 1837. His transcripts of the Exchequer Rolls include the earliest known of these documents. Two manuscript volumes once belonging to him, containing excerpts made under his direction from the register of the privy council, include a portion of the register now missing, and to help to supply the hiatus these excerpts have been incorporated in vol. v. of the published register, 1599-1604. 'Notes of the Charters, &c., by the Right Honourable the Earl of Melrose/ also appeared at Edinburgh in 1830.
