the back of Milns Square, over against the Tron Kirk, with some little household plenishing therein;1 and the Company's share of the cargo of the Speedwell, shipwrecked in the East Indies, effeiring to the Stock of six hundred pounds Sterling, with the burden of Cellar rent of the stores of the Caledonia, and the expenses of keeping the said ship after the first of May; and of the freight, seamen, and factor's wages of the said cargo of the Speedwell, and other supervenient charges upon the said ship and cargo." The committee recommended that the above "dead stock" money should be retained by the Company for the purpose of defraying the costs attending the liquidation such as Directors' fees, staff salaries, and legal expenses; and also for awards to be granted to gentlemenofficers and others who went to Darien, for their faithful services. The 25th of March 1707, the day on which the Scottish Parliament sat for the last time, was a red-letter day in the life of Paterson, for on it he beheld the royal sceptre extended to touch the Act concerning the Payment of the Sums out of the Equivalent to the African 1 We have been unable to trace that the Darien Company ever had any connection with the old building called "The Darien House" in Bristo Port, Edinburgh, which was taken down in 1871. As stated above, the Company's office and warehouses were situated in Miln Square, opposite the Tron Church. It would be interesting to know why the building got the name of "Darien House." Company. By this Act an amount "not exceeding the sum of £232,884, 5s. 03d. sterling," was directed to be paid to the Darien subscribers in restitution of all their losses-a great boon to the Scotland of that period; and this consummation was largely achieved through the unremitting pleadings of Paterson during the preceding six years. On the same memorable day, a signal mark of honour was given to him in connection with the part he took in bringing about the Union. The Minutes of Parliament record that "It being moved to recommend Mr William Paterson to her Majesty for his good service, after some reasoning thereon, it was put to the vote, Recommend him to her Majesty or Not? and it was carried Recommend." Mr Hill Burton ('Darien Papers') states that it was only in a comparatively small number of cases that the subscriber who signed the subscription book in 1696 signed the receipt for the Equivalent certificate in 1707. In many cases the certificates were taken by assignees, in others by successors, and in not a few by arresting creditors. De Foe partly explains this by stating that the miscarriage of the Darien Company's designs had been so effectual that not only was their paid-up capital all expended, but they were much in debt besides. This made the subscribers so apprehensive of further calls that many of them eagerly sold out their stock, several offering to dispose of their whole interest for 10 per cent on the original holding. And although repayment of the capital stock to the subscribers was provided for in the Treaty of Union, yet the fury of the opposition to the Union so pronounced, both inside and outside of Parliament, that holders of Darien stock had little dependence on the Treaty being carried out. Reimbursement to the Darien subscribers was to be made in cash. The queen appointed twenty-five Commissioners to administer the funds, and the Equivalent money lay in the Bank of England. De Foe, who was in Scotland at the time, gives an account in his 'History of the Union' of the manner in which the Equivalent money was paid in Edinburgh. In terms of the Articles of Union, the money should have been paid on 1st May 1707; but July arrived, and there was no advice of its having left London. Scandalous reflections began to spread abroad to the effect that the English, having secured the Union, would pay only when they pleased, and perhaps never. Others gave forth the idea that, the money not being paid on 1st May, the Union was dissolved; "and there |