Fletcher of Saltoun, presented a scheme of limitations that savoured strongly of republican principles.

He afterwards enlarged upon every article, endeavouring to prove that they were absolutely necessary to prevent the consequences of English influence; to enable the nation to defend its rights and liberties; to deter ministers of state from giving bad advice to their sovereign; to preserve the courts of judicature from corruption, and screen the people from tyranny and oppression.

The earl of Stair having argued against these limitations, Fletcher replied, "It is no wonder he opposed the scheme; for, had such an act subsisted, his lordship would have been hanged for the bad counsel he had given to king James; for the concern he had in the massacre of Glencoe; and for his conduct since the revolution." The next subject on which the parliament deliberated was the conspiracy.

A motion being made that the house might know what answer the queen had returned to their address in the last session, the chancellor delivered to the clerk register the papers relating to the plot, that they might be perused by the members: but these being copies, and the evidences remaining at London, no further progress was made in the affair.

Yet the duke of Athol, in a distinct narrative of the pretended conspiracy, boldly accused the duke of Queensberry of having endeavoured to mislead the queen by false accusations against her good subjects.