of guild, his shop was entered by thieves, his apprentice murdered, and his cash-box stolen (Private Letters chiefly to Robert Wodrow, 1694–1732, pp. 64–5, 1829). During the Porteous riots in 1736 he succeeded in reaching the quarters of the Welsh fusiliers with a verbal message from the authorities asking their assistance against the mob, but the officer, on the ground that Lindsay manifested evident signs of conviviality, declined to act on it. On a bill being introduced into parliament to disfranchise Edinburgh on account of the riot, Lindsay delivered a convincing speech against the proposal. After retiring from the representation of the city he was appointed by the Duke of Atholl governor of the Isle of Man, but on account of indisposition resigned that office some time before his death, which took place at the Canongate, Edinburgh, 20 Feb. 1753.
Lindsay was the author of ‘The Interest of Scotland, considered with reference to its Police, Agriculture, Trade, Manufacture and Fishery,’ Edinburgh, 1733; 2nd edit. London, 1736.
By his first wife, Margaret, daughter of David Montier, merchant in Edinburgh, he had three sons—Patrick, appointed deputy-secretary at war in 1741; John, a lieutenant-colonel in the army; and James, captain of a ship at war belonging to the East India company—and two daughters: Mary unmarried, and Janet, married to James Anderson of Monthrieve, Fifeshire. He married as his second wife Janet, daughter of James Murray of Polton, and as his third wife Lady Catherine Lindsay, daughter of William, fifteenth earl of Crawford, but had no issue by his second or third marriage.
[Douglas's Baronage of Scotland; Gent. Mag. 1753, p. 148; Scots Mag. xv. 101; Forster's Members of the Scottish Parliament, p. 215; Lord Lindsay's Lives of the Lindsays; Lindsay Pedigree, by W. A. Lindsay, in the College of Arms.]
LINDSAY, ROBERT (1500?–1565?), of Pitscottie, Scottish historian, was born at Pitscottie, in the parish of Ceres, Fifeshire. He was a cadet of the principal family of Lindsays Earls of Crawford, and probably a descendant of Patrick, fourth lord Lindsay of the Byres (d. 1526), whose third son was William Lindsay of Piotstown, a place in the neighbourhood of Pitscottie, about the origin of whose name Lindsay tells a curious story (History, Freebairn's ed., p. 99). According to the ‘Privy Seal Register,’ Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie in 1552 received a grant of escheat, and a service in the Douglas charter-chest proves that he was alive in 1562. If the Robert Lindsay of Pitscottie whose son Christopher was served as his heir in 1592 be the historian, and not the historian's son, he lived till about 1592. But he is not responsible for any part of his ‘History’ after 1565, and that fact makes it more likely that he died about 1565. The dedicatory verses to Robert Stuart, bishop of Caithness and commendator of St. Andrews, who died in 1586, prefixed to the ‘History,’ supply a narrative of its contents, which ends with the Reformation. The ‘History’ discloses in its author a man of much humour and decided character. The preface states his intention of continuing what ‘had been left unwritten by the last translators, Hector Boece [q. v.] and John Bellenden [q. v.], from the succession of James II unto this day and date hereafter following, and specially the Manner of the Reformation of Religion and what was done therein since the fifty and eighth year until the three score and fifteen.’ The last date seems to be an error for threescore and five, as there are no entries relative to the Reformation after 1568, when the addition by another hand certainly begins, and takes the record as far as 1604. Lindsay expresses in his preface his obligations to the following persons, by whom he says he was ‘lately inspired:’ Patrick, sixth lord Lindsay of the Byres [q. v.]; Sir William Scot of Balwearie; Sir Andrew Wood of Largo; John Major [q. v.], doctor of theology, whose ‘History,’ reaching to the death of James III, was published in 1518; Sir David Lindsay [q. v.] of the Mount, Lyon king of arms; Andrew Fermie of that ilk; and Sir William Bruce of Earlshall, ‘who has written very justly all the deeds since Floudoun Field,’ a work unfortunately lost.
Pitscottie's ‘History’ was first published by Robert Freebairn the printer in 1728, folio, again in 1749 and 1778 in 12mo, and in 1814 in 2 vols. 8vo. by Graham Dalyell. Lord Crawford, in his ‘Lives of the Lindsays,’ states that none of these editions give the text of the best manuscript, which, he says, belongs to Captain Wemyss of Wemyss Castle. Lord Crawford proposed to print this manuscript as a new edition for the Bannatyne Club, but his intention was not carried out; and a comparison made by the present writer of the Wemyss MS. with the text of Freebairn's edition satisfied him that there was no material variation such as would make it worth while to publish that manuscript. The ‘History’ itself is a very singular and tantalising work. It covers a period of Scottish history, about the earlier part of which, from the death of James I to that of James III, very little is known. The quaint language and vivid narrative of certain passages led to its being largely
