alone in these days. The godly, and zealous, and faithful unto the death, Mr. John Blackadder, was at the Cowhill, in the parish of Livingstone, in the year 1675 in the month of August: He went into the fields in the evening, being a retired place; when he came in he was very melancholy: Some friends enquired, what made him so sad? He said, he was afraid of a very dangerous infectious mist to go through the land that night, that might have sad effects, of many deaths and great dearth to follow; and desired the family to close door and window, and keep them as long close as they might, and take notice where the mist stood thickest and longest, for there they would see the effects saddest; which they did: And it remained longest upon that town called the Craigs, being within their sight, and only a few families; and within a four months thereafter, 30 corpses went out of that place, and bad crops followed for three years, the meal was at half a crown the peck: But, lo, in the year 1678 there was such a crop, that the Lothian barley was sold at four pound the boll, and the pease at forty pence, and for that we got ten thousand Highlanders, five hundred English Dragoons, the whole Militia of the kingdom, and all the standing forces cast in upon the West of Scotland at Bothwell-bridge: And, as they said, they came to destroy, and destroy they would; and yet there was abundance for them all, and the inhabitants also.
After Mr. Cargill left the Under-bank-wood, he preached at Loudon-hill upon a week day, the 5th of May. He designed only to preach once, and baptize some children: His text was, "No man that hath followed me in the regeneration, shall be a loser, but great gainers" In his conference lately with the Gibbites, finding so much of Peter's religion among them, that they had left all and followed him, made him to insist in shewing that it was not every pretended way of following Christ he would either regard or reward; holding forth the great danger and ruin to place so
