’The commanding officer of the king’s forces then about Edinburgh, with the other colonels, and several other gentlemen of rank in their respective regiments, favoured him with their company at Bankton, and took dinner with him.  He too well foresaw what might happen amid such a variety of tempers and characters; and fearing lest his conscience might have been ensnared by a sinful silence, or that, on the other hand, he might seem to pass the bounds of decency, and infringe upon the laws of hospitality by animadverting on guests so justly entitled to his regard, he happily determined on the following method of avoiding each of these difficulties.  As soon as they were come together, he addressed them with a great deal of respect, and at the same time with a very frank and determined air, telling them that he had the honour in that district to be a justice of the peace, and consequently that he was sworn to put the law in execution, and, among the rest, those against swearing; that he could not execute them upon others with any confidence, or by any means approve himself a man of impartiality and integrity to his own heart, if he suffered them to be broken in his presence by persons of any rank whatsoever; and that therefore he entreated all the gentlemen who then honoured him with their company that they would please to be upon their guard, and that if any oath or curse should escape them, he hoped they would consider his legal animadversion upon it as a regard to the duties of his office and the dictates of his conscience, and not as owing to any want of deference to them.

The commanding officer immediately supported him in this declaration, as entirely becoming the station in which he was, assuring him that he would be ready to pay the penalty, if he inadvertently transgressed; and when Colonel Gardiner on any occasion stepped out of the room, he himself undertook to be the guardian of the law in his absence; and as one of the inferior officers offended during this time, he informed the colonel, so that the fine was exacted and given to the poor,[*] with the universal approbation of the company.  The story spread in the neighbourhood, and was perhaps applauded highly by many who wanted the courage to “go and do likewise.”  But it may be said, with the utmost propriety, of the worthy person of whom I write, that he feared the face of no man living where the honour of God was concerned.  In all such cases he might be justly said, in Scripture phrase, “to set his face like a flint;” and I assuredly believe, that had he been in the presence of a sovereign prince who had been guilty of this fault, his looks at least would have testified his grief and surprise, if he had apprehended it unfit to have borne his testimony in any other way.

[Note:  It is observable that the money which was forfeited on this account by his own officers, whom he never spared, or by any others of his soldiers who rather chose to pay than submit to corporal punishment, was, by the colonel’s order, laid by in a bank till some of the private men fell sick, and then it was laid out in providing them with proper help and accommodations in their distress.]