His companions, after a courteous good-night, broke up and went off in different directions, some keeping them company for about a mile, until they dropped off one by one, and the travellers were left alone.
The company had not long left the Howff, as Blane's public-house was called, when the trumpets and kettle-drums sounded.

The troopers got under arms in the market-place at this unexpected summons, while, with faces of anxiety and earnestness, Cornet Grahame, a kinsman of Claverhouse, and the Provost of the borough, followed by half-a-dozen soldiers, and town-officers with halberts, entered the apartment of Niel Blane.
"Guard the doors!" were the first words which the Cornet spoke; "let no man leave the house .-- So, Bothwell, how comes this?
Did you not hear them sound boot and saddle ?" "He was just going to quarters, sir," said his comrade; "he has had a bad fall." "In a fray, I suppose ?" said Grahame.

"If you neglect duty in this way, your royal blood will hardly protect you." "How have I neglected duty ?" said Bothwell, sulkily.
"You should have been at quarters, Sergeant Bothwell," replied the officer; "you have lost a golden opportunity.

Here are news come that the Archbishop of St Andrews has been strangely and foully assassinated by a body of the rebel whigs, who pursued and stopped his carriage on Magus-Muir, near the town of St Andrews, dragged him out, and dispatched him with their swords and daggers." [Note: The general account of this act of assassination is to be found in all histories of the period.

A more particular narrative may be found in the words of one of the actors, James Russell, in the Appendix to Kirkton's History of the Church of Scotland, published by Charles Kirkpatrick Sharpe, Esquire.