On the appointed day the Assembly met, a day not less momentous in the history of Scotland than that on which two years later the Long Parliament met in the old chapel of St. Stephen was destined to prove in the history of England. The place appointed was the venerable cathedral, one of the few triumphs of Gothic art which had been preserved by the affectionate pride of the citizens from the furious zeal of Knox's Vandals. On a high chair of state sat Hamilton in all the pomp, the barren pomp as he was now conscious, of the representative of the Crown. The Privy Council were ranged below him. Directly opposite were placed seats for the Moderator and his clerk. At a long table in the body of the church sat the Lords of the Covenant, while the representatives of the Presbyteries had to be content with humbler places on either side behind them. Beyond these again was a stage for the accommodation of the sons of the Covenanting nobility and other distinguished spectators, while every unoccupied part of the building was thronged with a vast and miscellaneous crowd, including many gentlewomen. Not a single bishop was present. Only two indeed, the Bishops of Ross and Argyll, had ventured to enter the city; they had come under the protection of Hamilton and his friends, and were now lodged safely in the castle. Swords and daggers were to be seen on all sides. The regularly elected members numbered two hundred and forty in all, of whom one hundred were laymen. But besides these there were almost as many again who had no vote nor lawful place in the Assembly and professed to be there only in the capacity of friends, _amici curiæ_ as it were, to impart confidence by their presence, and perhaps aid by their counsels. Many of them could neither read nor write, but they were strong in numbers and loud of voice. Great care had been taken to exclude all who had not subscribed the Covenant. The provost had issued a number of leaden tickets stamped with his arms, without which no spectator was admitted into the building, and the distribution of these was solely in the hands of the Covenanters. To add to Hamilton's discomfiture, he was aware that he could no longer trust even the members of his own council so far as any vote on Episcopacy was concerned. "What then," he wrote to the King on the day after this Assembly had met, "what then can be expected but a total disobedience to authority, if not a present rebellion?"