The letter is addressed "to the Honourable and Right Reverend," and begins as follows:--"Wee have lately received yours of the first of Merch, 1649, for the which and your wisdomes Christian care of ws, and your fatherly admonition to ws, we humbly and heartily rander yow all possible thanks." This lamb-like tone is maintained with admirable gravity all through the epistle, and is combined with a canting phraseology which was meant to be impressive, but which must have entertained any members of the Commission of the General Assembly who originally possessed and still retained a sense of humour. "And quheras [whereas]," so it goes on, "your wisdomes taks it a matter of no lesse wonder then [than] greife that we, being vnder the oath of God and tye of our Nationall Covenant, would make insurrection and take armes against the Lords people, certainly, if it were so, we acknowledge your wisdomes had reason to wonder and to be grieved. And it is no lesse winder and griefe to ws, being wnder the said oath and tye of Covenant, furthering the same with all our power and meanes, and at all occasions desireing nothing els then [than] the enjoying of the liberty of the subject, and proprietie of our goods, intended and promised in and by our Covenant." No one who has read any of Sir Thomas Urquhart's original works can doubt that the next sentence was either composed or revised by him. The two phrases which we have taken the liberty of putting into italics could scarcely have occurred to any other member of the Committee of War. "Yet we find, that evill willers and envyous vnderminers, _in a singular and prœtextuous way_ aiming at our ruine, doe spend _the quintessence of their witts_ to find out means whereby, under specious pretences of the publick [good?] to extermine ws with povertie, and by inventing fresh occasions to make ws odious, and bring ws vpon fresh stages [_sic_] vnder the base name of Malignancy." It is unnecessary to quote the whole of the letter, but a couple of sentences, which describe what the insurgents had done at Inverness, deserve notice. "But the whole countrey of all degrees, being sensible of the oppression and insolency of the vnnecessary and vnprofitable garison of Innernes to Church or State, did heartily and vnanimously contribute to the demolishing thereof, which being done, all disbanded peaceablie, and the people retired peaceablie to their owne homes, without offence to any nighbour of any degree or condition.... And now, when the said garison is dismantled, we shall be found not only disposed to live peaceablie, bot also ready to obey all publick ordours for the good of the Kingdome." The writers ask that "the taxes and impositions," which pressed with special severity on the class to which they belonged, should be remitted, and liberty given them to lead that religious, peaceful life, to which both by nature and by deliberate choice, they seem to say, they were strongly inclined. The sting of the letter is in its closing words. If these "evill willers" succeed in persuading the Commissioners of Assembly to go on with the sentence of excommunication, as fully deserved, they (the writers) formally appeal against such a decision from the Commission to the next General Assembly.[102]