THE LIBRARY 
 
 OF 
 
 THE UNIVERSITY 
 
 OF CALIFORNIA 
 
 RIVERSIDE
 
 LAYS 
 OF THE 
 SCOTTISH 
 CAVALIERS 
 
 AND 
 
 OTHER POEMS
 
 This Volume is a verbatim reprint of the first edition (184.9).
 
 ^ BUSS SANDS 6 c C? 
 
 LONDON? IMDCCCXCVI

 
 TO 
 
 THE RIGHT HONOURABLE 
 
 ARCHIBAID WILLIAM HAMILTON-MONTGOMERIE, 
 JEarl of lEGlinton an& Minton, 
 
 THE PATRIOTIC AND NOBLE REPRESENTATIVE OP 
 
 AN ANCIENT SCOTTISH RACE, 
 
 THIS VOLUME IS RESPECTFULLY INSCRIBED 
 
 BY 
 
 THE AUTHOR.
 
 CONTENTS 
 
 LAYS OF THE SCOTTISH CAVALIERS 
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 THE WIDOW OP GLENCOE 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 PAGE 
 
 9 
 
 31 
 
 52 
 
 67 
 
 91 
 
 109 
 
 131 
 
 177 
 
 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS 
 
 BLIND OLD MILTON . . . . 
 
 197 
 
 HERMOTIMUS ..... 
 
 204 
 
 (ENONE ..... 
 
 216 
 
 THE BURIED FLOWER . . . . 
 
 220 
 
 THE OLD CAMP . . ... 
 
 231 
 
 DANUBE AND THE EUXINE 
 
 235 
 
 THE SCHEIK OF SINAI . ... 
 
 238 
 
 EPITAPH OP CONSTANTINE KANARIS 
 
 243 
 
 THE REFUSAL OF CHARON 
 
 244
 
 LAYS 
 
 OF 
 
 THE SCOTTISH CAVALIERS 
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 The great battle of Flodden was fought upon the 
 9th of September, 1513, The defeat of the Scottish 
 army, mainly owing to the fantastic ideas of chivalry 
 entertained by James IV., and his refusal to avail 
 himself of the natural advantages of his position, 
 was by far the most disastrous of any recounted in 
 the history of the northern wars. The whole 
 strength of the kingdom, both Lowland and Highland, 
 was assembled, and the contest was one of the 
 sternest and most desperate upon record. 
 
 For several hours the issue seemed doubtful. On 
 the left the Scots obtained a decided advantage 
 on the right wing they were broken and overthrown; 
 and at last the whole weight of the liattle was 
 brought into the centre, where King James and the 
 Earl of Surrey commanded in person. The deter- 
 mined valour of James, imprudent as it was, had 
 the effect of rousing to a pitch of desperation the
 
 10 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 courage of the meanest soldiers ; and the ground 
 becoming soft and slippery from blood, they pulled 
 off their boots and shoes, and secured a firmer 
 footing by fighting in their hose. 
 
 " It is owned," says Abercromby, " that both 
 parties did wonders, but none on either side performed 
 more than the King himself. He was again told 
 that by coming to handy blows he could do no 
 more than another man, whereas, by keeping the 
 post due to Ms station, he might be worth many 
 thousands. Yet he would not only fight in person, 
 but also on foot; for he no sooner saw that body 
 of the English give way which was defeated by the 
 Earl of Huntley, but he alighted from his horse, 
 and commanded his guard of noblemen and gentlemen 
 to do the like and follow him. He had at first 
 abundance of success; but at length the Lord 
 Thomas Howard and Sir Edward Stanley, who had 
 defeated their opposites, coming in with the Lord 
 Dacre's horse, and surrounding the King's battalion 
 on all sides, the Scots were so distressed that, for 
 their last defence, they cast themselves into a ring; 
 and being resolved to die nobly with their sovereign, 
 who scorned to ask quarter, were altogether cut off. 
 So say the English writers, and I am apt to believe 
 that they are in the right." 
 
 The battle was maintained with desperate fury 
 until nightfall. At the close, according to Mr. 
 Tytler, " Surrey was uncertain of the result of the 
 battle : the remains of the enemy's centre still held
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN ii 
 
 the field ; Home, with his Borderers, still hovered on 
 the left; and the commander wisely allowed neither 
 pursuit nor plunder, but drew off his men, and kept 
 a strict watch during the night. When the morning 
 broke, the Scottish artillery were seen standing de- 
 serted on the side of the hill ; their defenders had 
 disappeared ; and the Earl ordered thanks to be given 
 for a victory which was no longer doubtful. Yet, even 
 after all this, a body of the Scots appeared unbroken 
 upon a hill, and were about to charge the Lord- 
 Admiral, when they were compelled to leave their 
 position by a discharge of the English ordnance. 
 
 " The loss of the Scots in this fatal battle amounted 
 to about ten thousand men. Of these, a great propor- 
 tion were of high rank ; the remainder being composed 
 of the gentry, the farmers, and landed yeomanry, who 
 disdained to fly when their sovereign and his nobles 
 lay stretched in heaps around them." Besides King 
 James, there fell at Flodden the Archbishop of St. 
 Andrew's, thirteen earls, two bishops, two abbots, 
 fifteen lords and chiefs of clans, and five peers' eldest 
 sons, besides La Motte the French ambassador, and 
 the secretary of the King. The same historian adds 
 — " The names of the gentry who fell are too numerous 
 for recapitulation, since there were few families of note 
 in Scotland which did not lose one relative or another, 
 whilst some houses had to weep the death of all. 
 It is from this cause that the sensations of sorrow 
 and national lamentation occasioned by the defeat 
 were peculiarly poignant and lasting — so that to
 
 12 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 this day few Scotsmen can hear the name of Flodden 
 without a shudder of gloomy regret." 
 
 The loss to Edinburgh on this occasion was pe- 
 culiarly great. All the magistrates and able-bodied 
 citizens had followed their King to Flodden, whence 
 very few of them returned. The office of Provost 
 or chief magistrate of the capital was at that time 
 an object of amliition, and was conferred only upon 
 persons of higli rank and station. There seems 
 to be some uncertainty whether the holder of this 
 dignity at the time of the battle of Flodden was Sir 
 Alexander Lauder, ancestor of the Fountainhall family, 
 who was elected in 1511, or that great historical 
 personage, Archibald Earl of Angus, better known as 
 Archibald Bell-the-Cat, who was chosen in 1513, the 
 year of the battle. Both of them were at Flodden. 
 The name of Sir Alexander Lauder appears upon 
 the list of the slain ; Angus was one of the survivors, 
 but his son, George, Master of Angus, fell fighting 
 gallantly by the side of King James. The city records 
 of Edinburgh, which commence about this period, are 
 not clear upon the point, and I am rather inclined 
 to think that the Earl of Angus was elected to supply 
 the place of Lauder. But although the actual 
 magistrates were absent, they had formally nominated 
 deputies in their stead. I find, on referring to the 
 city records, that "George of Tours" had been ap- 
 pointed to officiate in the absence of the Provost, 
 and that four other persons were selected to discharge 
 the office of bailies until the magistrates should return.
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 13 
 
 It is impossible to describe the consternation which 
 pervaded the whole of Scotland when the intelligence 
 of the defeat became known. In Edinburgh it was ex- 
 cessive. Mr. Arnot, in the history of that city, says, — 
 
 "The news of their overthrow in the field of 
 Flodden reached Edinburgh on the day after the 
 battle, and overwhelmed the inhabitants with grief 
 and confusion. The streets were crowded with women 
 seeking intelligence about their friends, clamouring 
 and weeping. I'hose who officiated in absence of the 
 magistrates proved themselves worthy of the trust. 
 They issued a proclamation, ordering all the inhabit- 
 ants to assemble in military array for defence of the 
 city, on the tolling of the bell ; and conmianding, ' that 
 all women, and especially strangers, do repair to their 
 work, and not be seen upon the street darnorand and 
 crycmd ; and that women of the better sort do repair 
 to the church and offer up prayers, at the stated hours, 
 for our Sovereign Lord and his army, and the towns- 
 men who are with the army.' " 
 
 Indeed the council records bear ample evidence 
 of the emergency of that occasion. Tliroughout the 
 earlier pages, the word " Flow^doun " frequently occurs 
 on the margin, in reference to various hurried orders 
 for arming and defence ; and there can be no doubt 
 that, had the English forces attempted to follow up 
 their victory, and attack the Scottish capital, the 
 citizens would have resisted to the last. But it soon 
 became apparent that the loss sustained by the English 
 was so severe, that Surrey was in no condition to avail
 
 14 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 himself of the opportunity ; and in fact, shortly after- 
 wards, he was compelled to disband his army. 
 
 The references to the city banner, contained in the 
 following poem, may require a word of explanation. 
 It is a standard still held in great honour and reverence 
 by the burghers of Edinburgh, having been presented 
 to them by James the Third, in return for their loyal 
 service in 1482. This banner, along with that of the 
 Earl Marischal, still conspicuous in the Library of the 
 Faculty of Advocates, was honourably brought back 
 from riodden, and certainly never could have been dis- 
 played in a more memorable field. Maitland says, with 
 reference to this very interesting relic of antiquity, — 
 
 "As a perpetual remembrance of the loyalty and 
 bravery of the Edinburghers on the aforesaid occasion, 
 the King granted them a banner or standard, with a 
 power to display the same in defence of their king, 
 country, and their own rights. This flag is kept by 
 the Convener of the Trades; at whose appearance 
 therewith, it is said that not only the artificers of 
 Edinburgh are obliged to repair to it, but all the 
 artisans or craftsmen within Scotland are bound to 
 follow it, and fight under the Convener of Edinburgh 
 as aforesaid." 
 
 No event in Scottish history ever took a more last- 
 ing hold of the public mind than the " woeful fight " 
 of riodden; and, even now, the songs and traditions 
 which are current on the Border recall the memory of 
 a contest unsullied by disgrace, though terminating in 
 disaster and defeat.
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 I. 
 
 News of battle ! — news of battle ! 
 
 Hark ! 't is ringing down the street : 
 And the archways and the pavement 
 
 Bear the clang of hurrying feet. 
 News of battle ? Who hath brought it ? 
 
 News of triumph ? Who should bring 
 Tidings from our noble army, 
 
 Greetings from our gallant King ? 
 All last night we watched the beacons 
 
 Blazing on the hills afar, 
 Each one bearing, as it kindled, 
 
 Message of the opened war. 
 All night long the northern streamers 
 
 Shot across the trembling sky : 
 Fearful lights, that never beckon 
 
 Save when kings or heroes die. 
 
 II. 
 News of battle ! Who hath brought it ? 
 
 All are thronging to the gate ; 
 " Warder — warder ! open quickly ! 
 
 Man — is this a time to wait ? "
 
 i6 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 And the heavy gates are opened : 
 
 Then a murmur long and loud, 
 And a cry of fear and wonder 
 
 Bursts from out the bending crowd. 
 For they see in battered harness 
 
 Only one hard-stricken man, 
 And his weary steed is wounded, 
 
 And his cheek is pale and wan. 
 Spearless hangs a bloody banner 
 
 In his weak and drooping hand — 
 God ! can that be Randolph IMurray, 
 
 Captain of the city band ? 
 
 III. 
 
 Eound him crush the people, crying, 
 
 " Tell us all— oh, tell us true ! 
 Where are they who went to battle, 
 
 Randolph Murray, sworn to you ? 
 Where are they, our brothers — children ? 
 
 Have they met the English foe ? 
 Why art thou alone, unfollowed ? 
 
 Is it weal, or is it woe ? " 
 Like a corpse the grisly warrior 
 
 Looks from out his helm of steel ; 
 But no word he speaks in answer, 
 
 Only with his armed heel 
 Chides his weary steed, and onward 
 
 Up the city streets they ride ;
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 17 
 
 Fathers, sisters, mothers, children, 
 
 Shriekiug, praying by his side. 
 " By the God that made thee, Eandolph ! 
 
 Tell us what mischance hath come ! " 
 Then he lifts his riven banner, 
 
 And the asker's voice is dumb. 
 
 IV. 
 
 The elders of the city 
 
 Have met within their hall — 
 The men whom good King James had charged 
 
 To watch the tower and wall. 
 " Your hands are weak with age," he said, 
 
 " Your hearts are stout and true ; 
 So bide ye in the Maiden Town, 
 
 While others fight for you. 
 My trumpet from the Border-side 
 
 Shall send a blast so clear. 
 That all who wait within the gate 
 
 That stirring sound may hear. 
 Or, if it be the will of heaven 
 
 That back I never come. 
 And if, instead of Scottish shouts. 
 
 Ye hear the English drum, — 
 Then let the warning bells ring out, 
 
 Then gird you to the fray. 
 Then man the walls like burghers stout, 
 
 And fight while light you may. 
 
 B
 
 i8 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 'T were better that in fiery flame 
 The roofs should thunder down, 
 
 Than that the foot of foreign foe 
 Should trample in the town ! " 
 
 Then in came Randolph Murray, — 
 
 His step was slow and weak. 
 And, as he doffed his dinted helm, 
 
 The tears ran down his cheek : 
 They fell upon his corslet, 
 
 And on his mailed hand, 
 As he gazed around him wistfully, 
 
 Leaning sorely on his brand. 
 And none who then beheld him 
 
 But straight were smote with fear, 
 For a bolder and a sterner man 
 
 Had never couched a spear. 
 They knew so sad a messenger 
 
 Some ghastly news must bring : 
 And all of them were fathers, 
 
 And their sons were with the King. 
 
 VI. 
 
 And up then rose the Provost — 
 
 A brave old man was he, 
 Of ancient name and knightly fame. 
 
 And chivalrous degree. 
 He ruled our city like a Lord
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 19 
 
 Who brooked no equal here, 
 And ever for the townsmen's rights 
 
 Stood up 'gainst prince and peer. 
 And he had seen the Scottish host 
 
 March from the Borough-muir, 
 With music-storm and clamorous shout 
 And all the din that thunders out, 
 
 When youth 's of victory sure. 
 But yet a dearer thought had he, 
 
 For, with a father's pride, 
 He saw his last remaining son 
 
 Go forth by Kandolph's side, 
 With casque on head and spur on heel. 
 
 All keen to do and dare ; 
 And proudly did that gallant boy 
 
 Dunedin's banner bear. 
 Oh, woeful now was the old man's look. 
 
 And he spake right heavily — 
 " Now, Randolph, tell thy tidings. 
 
 However sharp they be ! 
 Woe is written on thy visage, 
 
 Death is looking from thy face : 
 Speak, though it be of overthrow — 
 
 It cannot be disgrace ! " 
 
 VII. 
 
 Right bitter was the agony 
 
 That wrung the soldier proud : 
 Thrice did he strive to answer, 
 
 And thrice he groaned aloud.
 
 20 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 Then he gave the riven banner 
 
 To the old man's shaking hand, 
 Saying — " That is all I bring ye 
 From the bravest of the land ! 
 Ay ! ye may look upon it — 
 
 It was guarded well and long, 
 By your brothers and your children, 
 
 By the valiant and the strong. 
 One by one they fell around it, 
 As the archers laid them low, 
 Grimly dying, still uuconquered, 
 
 With their faces to the foe. 
 Ay ! ye well may look upon it — 
 
 There is more than honour there, 
 Else, be sure, I had not brought it 
 From the field of dark despair. 
 Never yet was royal banner 
 
 Steeped in such a costly dye ; 
 It hath lain upon a bosom 
 
 Where no other shroud shall lie. 
 Sirs ! I charge you keep it holy, 
 
 Keep it as a sacred thing, 
 For the stain you see upon it 
 
 Was the life-blood of your King ! " 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Woe, woe, and lamentation ! 
 
 What a piteous cry was there ! 
 Widows, maidens, mothers, children, 
 
 Shrieking, sobbing in despair !
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 21 
 
 Through the streets the death- word rushes, 
 
 Spreading terror, sweeping on — 
 " Jesu Christ ! our King has fallen — 
 
 great God, King James is gone ! 
 Holy Mother Mary, shield us, 
 
 Thou who erst did lose thy Son ! 
 O the blackest day for Scotland 
 
 That slie ever knew before ! 
 O our King — the good, the noble. 
 
 Shall we see him never more ? 
 Woe to us and woe to Scotland, 
 
 our sons, our sons and men ! 
 Surely some liave 'scaped the Southron, 
 
 Surely some will come again ! " 
 Till the oak that fell last winter 
 
 Shall uprear its shattered stem — 
 Wives and mothers of Dunedin — 
 
 Ye may look in vain for them ! 
 
 IX. 
 
 But within the Council Chamber 
 
 All was silent as the grave. 
 Whilst the tempest of their sorrow 
 
 Shook the bosoms of the brave. 
 Well indeed might they be shaken 
 
 With the weight of such a blow : 
 He was gone — their prince, their idol, 
 
 Whom they loved and worshipped so ! 
 Like a knell of death and judgment 
 
 Rung from heaven by angel hand.
 
 22 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 Fell the words of desolation 
 
 On the elders of the land. 
 Hoary heads were bowed and trembling, 
 
 Withered hands were clasped and wrung 
 God had left the old and feeble, 
 
 He had ta'en away the young. 
 
 Then the Provost he uprose, 
 
 And his lip was ashen white, 
 But a flush was on his brow. 
 And his eye was full of light. 
 " Thou hast spoken, Eandolph Murray, 
 Like a soldier stout and true ; 
 Thou hast done a deed of daring 
 Had been perilled but by few. 
 For thou hast not shamed to face us, 
 
 Nor to speak thy ghastly tale, 
 Standing — thou, a knight and captain- 
 Here, alive within thy mail ! 
 Now, as my God shall judge me, 
 
 I hold it braver done, 
 Than hadst thou tarried in thy place. 
 
 And died above my son ! 
 Thou needst not tell it : he is dead. 
 
 God help us all this day ! 
 But speak — how fought the citizens 
 Within the furious fray ?
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 23 
 
 For, by the might of Mary, 
 
 'T were something still to tell 
 That no Scottish foot went backward 
 
 When the Koyal Lion fell ! " 
 
 XI. 
 
 " No one failed him ! He is keeping 
 
 Eoyal state and semblance still ; 
 Knight and noble lie around him, 
 
 Cold on Flodden's fatal hill. 
 Of the brave and gallant-hearted, 
 
 Whom ye sent with prayers away, 
 Not a single man departed 
 
 From his monarch yesterday. 
 Had you seen them, my masters ! 
 
 When the night began to fall, 
 And the English spearmen gathered 
 
 Eound a grim and ghastly wall ! 
 As the wolves in winter circle 
 
 Eound the leaguer on the heath, 
 So the greedy foe glared upward, 
 
 Panting still for blood and death. 
 But a rampart rose before them, 
 
 Which the boldest dared not scale 
 Every stone a Scottish body, 
 
 Every step a corpse in mail ! 
 And behind it lay our monarch 
 
 Clenching still his shivered sword :
 
 24 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 By his side Montrose and Athole, 
 
 At his feet a southern lord. 
 All so tliick they lay together, 
 
 When the stars lit up the sky, 
 That I knew not who were stricken, 
 
 Or who yet remained to die, 
 Few there were when Surrey halted, 
 
 And his wearied host withdrew ; 
 None but dying men around me, 
 
 When the English trumpet blew. 
 Then I stooped, and took the banner. 
 
 As ye see it, from his breast. 
 And I closed our hero's eyelids. 
 
 And I left liim to his rest. 
 In the mountains growled the thunder. 
 
 As I leaped the woeful wall, 
 And the heavy clouds were settling 
 
 Over Flodden, like a pall." 
 
 XII. 
 
 So he ended. And the others 
 
 Cared not any answer then ; 
 Sitting silent, dumb with sorrow. 
 
 Sitting anguish-struck, like men 
 Who have seen the roaring torrent 
 
 Sweep their happy homes away, 
 And yet linger by the margin, 
 
 Staring idly on the spray.
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 25 
 
 But, without, the maddenino; tumult 
 
 Waxes ever more and more. 
 And the crowd of wailing women 
 
 Gather round the Council door. 
 Every dusky spire is ringing 
 
 With a dull and hollow knell. 
 And the Miserere 's singing 
 
 To the tolling of the bell. 
 Through the streets the burghers hurry. 
 
 Spreading terror as they go ; 
 And the rampart 's thronged with watchers 
 
 For the coming of the foe. 
 From each mountain-top a pillar 
 
 Streams into the torpid air, 
 Bearing token from the Border 
 
 That the English host is there. 
 All without is flight and terror, 
 
 All within is woe and fear — 
 God protect thee, Maiden City, 
 
 For thy latest hour is near ! 
 
 XIII. 
 
 No ! not yet, thou high Dunedin ! 
 
 Shalt thou totter to thy fall ; 
 Though thy bravest and thy strongest 
 
 Are not there to man the wall. 
 No, not yet ! the ancient spirit 
 
 Of our fathers hath not gone ;
 
 26 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 Take it to thee as a buckler 
 
 Better far than steel or stone. 
 Oh, remember those who perished 
 
 For thy birthright at the time 
 When to be a Scot was treason, 
 
 And to side with Wallace, crime ! 
 Have they not a voice among us, 
 
 Whilst their hallowed dust is here ? 
 Hear ye not a summons sounding 
 
 From each buried warrior's bier ? 
 " Up ! " — they say — " and keep the freedom 
 
 Which we won you long ago : 
 Up ! and keep our graves unsullied 
 
 From the insults of the foe ! 
 Up ! and if ye cannot save them, 
 
 Come to us in blood and fire : 
 Midst the crash of falling turrets. 
 
 Let the last of Scots expire ! " 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Still the bells are tolling fiercely, 
 
 And the cry comes louder in ; 
 Mothers wailing for their children, 
 
 Sisters for their slaughtered kin. 
 All is terror and disorder. 
 
 Till the Provost rises up, 
 Calm, as though he had not tasted 
 
 Of the fell and bitter cup. 
 All so stately from his sorrow, 
 
 Kose the old undaunted Chief,
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 27 
 
 That you had not deemed, to see hun, 
 
 His was more than common grief. 
 " Rouse ye, Sirs ! " he said ; " we may not 
 
 Longer mourn for what is done : 
 If our King be taken from us, 
 
 We are left to guard his son. 
 We have sworn to keep the city 
 
 From the foe, whate'er they be, 
 And the oath that we have taken 
 
 Never shall be broke by me. 
 Death is nearer to us, brethren. 
 
 Than it seemed to those who died, 
 Fighting yesterday at Flodden, 
 
 By their lord and master's side. 
 Let us meet it then in patience, 
 
 Not in terror or in fear ; 
 Though our hearts are bleeding yonder. 
 
 Let our souls be steadfast here. 
 Up, and rouse ye ! Time is fleeting. 
 
 And we yet have much to do ; 
 Up ! and haste ye through the city. 
 
 Stir the burghers stout and true ! 
 Gather all our scattered people. 
 
 Fling the banner out once more, — 
 Eandolph Murray ! do thou bear it. 
 
 As it erst was borne before : 
 Never Scottish heart will leave it, 
 
 When they see their monarch's gore !
 
 28 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 XV. 
 
 " Let them cease that dismal knellin2 ! 
 
 It is time enough to ring, 
 When the fortress-strength of Scotland 
 
 Stoops to ruin like its King. 
 Let the bells be kept for warning, 
 
 Not for terror or alarm ; 
 When they next are heard to thunder, 
 
 Let each man and stripling arm. 
 Bid the women leave their wailincr, — 
 
 Do they think that woeful strain, 
 From the bloody heaps of Flodden 
 
 Can redeem their dearest slain ? 
 Bid them cease, — or rather hasten 
 
 To the churches, every one ; 
 There to pray to Mary Mother, 
 
 And to her anointed Son, 
 That the thunderbolt above us 
 
 May not fall in ruin yet ; 
 That in fire, and blood, and rapine, 
 
 Scotland's glory may not set. 
 Let them pray, — for never women 
 
 Stood in need of such a prayer ! 
 England's yeomen shall not find them 
 
 Clinging to the altars there. 
 
 No ! if we are doomed to perish, 
 
 Man and maiden, let us fall ;
 
 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 29 
 
 And a common gulf of ruin 
 
 Open wide to whelm us all ! 
 Never shall the ruthless spoiler 
 
 Lay his hot insulting hand 
 On the sisters of our heroes, 
 
 Whilst we bear a torch or brand ! 
 Up ! and rouse ye, then, my brothers, 
 
 But when next ye hear the bell 
 Sounding forth the sullen summons 
 
 That may be our funeral knell, 
 Once more let us meet together, 
 
 Once more see each other's face ; 
 Then, like men that need not tremble, 
 
 Go to our appointed place. 
 God, our Father, will not fail us 
 
 In that last tremendous hour, — 
 If all other bulwarks crumble. 
 
 He will be our strength and tower : 
 Though the ramparts rock beneath us. 
 
 And the walls go crashing down, 
 Though the roar of conflagration 
 
 Bellow o'er the sinking town ; 
 There is yet one place of shelter. 
 
 Where the foeman cannot come, 
 Where the summons never sounded 
 
 Of the trumpet or the drum. 
 There again we 11 meet our children. 
 
 Who, on Flodden's trampled sod, 
 For their king and for their country 
 
 Rendered up their souls to God.
 
 30 EDINBURGH AFTER FLODDEN 
 
 There shall we find rest and refuge, 
 With our dear departed brave ; 
 
 And the ashes of the city 
 Be our universal grave ! "
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 The most poetical chronicler would find it impossible 
 to render the incidents of Montrose's brilliant career 
 more picturesque than the reality. Among the devoted 
 champions who, during the wildest and most stormy 
 period of our history, maintained the cause of Church 
 and King, " the Great Marquis " undoubtedly is en- 
 titled to the foremost place. Even party malevolence, 
 by no means extinct at the present day, has been 
 unable to detract from the eulogy pronounced upon 
 him by the famous Cardinal de Eetz, the friend of 
 Conde and Turenne, when he thus sunnued up his 
 character : — " Montrose, a Scottish nobleman, head of 
 the house of Grahame — the only man in the world 
 that has ever realised to me the ideas of certain heroes, 
 whom we now discover nowhere but in the Lives of 
 Plutarch — has sustained in his own country the cause 
 of the King his master, with a greatness of soul that 
 has not found its equal in our age." 
 
 But the success of the victorious leader and patriot 
 is almost thrown into the shade by the noble mag- 
 nanimity and Christian heroism of the man in the 
 hour of defeat and death. Without wishing, in any
 
 32 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 degree, to revive a controversy long maintained by 
 writers of opposite political and polemical opinions, 
 it may fairly be stated that Scottish history does 
 not present us with a tragedy of parallel interest. 
 That the execution of Montrose was the natural, 
 nay, the inevitable, consequence of his capture, may 
 be freely admitted even by the fiercest partisan of 
 the cause for which he staked his life. In those 
 times, neither party was disposed to lenity ; and 
 Montrose was far too conspicuous a character, and 
 too dangerous a man, to be forgiven. But the igno- 
 minious and savage treatment which he received at 
 the hands of those whose station and descent should 
 at least have taught them to respect misfortune, has 
 left an indelible stain upon the memory of the 
 Covenanting chiefs, and more especially upon that 
 of Argyle, 
 
 The perfect serenity of the man in the hour of 
 trial and death, the courage and magnanimity which 
 he displayed to the last, have been dwelt upon with 
 admiration by writers of every class. He heard his 
 sentence delivered without any apparent emotion, 
 and afterwards told the magistrates who waited upon 
 him in prison, "that he was much indebted to the 
 Parliament for the great honour they had decreed 
 him " ; adding, " that he was prouder to have his 
 head placed upon the top of the prison, than if they 
 had decreed a golden statue to be erected to him 
 in the market-place, or that his picture should be 
 hung in the King's bedchamber." He said, "he
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 33 
 
 thanked them for their care to preserve the remem- 
 brance of his loyalty, by transmitting such monuments 
 to the different parts of the kingdom ; and only 
 wished that he had flesh enough to have sent a 
 piece to every city in Christendom, as a token of his 
 unshaken love and fidelity to his king and country." 
 On the night before his execution, he inscribed the 
 following lines with a diamond on the window of 
 his jail: — 
 
 " Let them bestow on every airtli a limb, 
 Then open all my veins, that I may swim 
 To thee, my Maker ! in that crimson lake ; 
 Then place my parboiled head upon a stake — 
 Scatter my ashes — strew them in the air : 
 Lord ! since thou know'st where all these atoms are, 
 I 'ni hopeful thou 'It recover once my dust, 
 And contident thou 'It raise me with the just." 
 
 After the Eestoration, the dust was recovered, the 
 scattered remnants collected, and the bones of the 
 hero conveyed to their final resting-place by a 
 numerous assemblage of gentlemen of his family and 
 name. 
 
 There is no ingredient of fiction in the historical 
 incidents recorded in the following ballad. The 
 indignities that were heaped upon Montrose during 
 his procession through Edinburgh, his appearance 
 before the Estates, and his last passage to the scaffold, 
 as well as his undaunted bearing, have all been spoken 
 to by eyewitnesses of the scene. A graphic and vivid 
 sketch of the whole will be found in Mr. Mark 
 
 c
 
 34 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 Napier's volume, The Life aiid Times of Montrose — 
 a work as chivalrous in its toue as the Chronicles 
 of Froissart, and abounding in original and most in- 
 teresting materials ; but, in order to satisfy all scruple, 
 the authorities for each fact are given in the shape of 
 notes. The Imllad may be considered as a narrative 
 of the transactions, related by an aged Highlander, 
 who had followed Montrose throughout his campaigns, 
 to his grandson, shortly before the battle of Killie- 
 crankie.
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 Come hither, Evan Cameron ! 
 
 Come, stand beside my knee — 
 I hear the river roaring down 
 
 Towards the wintry sea. 
 There 's shouting on the mountain side, 
 
 There 's war within the blast — 
 Old faces look upon me, 
 
 Old forms go trooping past. 
 I hear the pibroch wailing 
 
 Amidst the din of fight, 
 And my dim spirit wakes again 
 
 Upon the verge of night ! 
 
 II. 
 
 'T was I that led the Highland host 
 Through wild Lochaber's snows, 
 
 What time the plaided clans came down 
 To battle wifeh Montrose. 
 
 I 've told thee how the Southrons fell 
 Beneath the broad claymore,
 
 36 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 And how we smote the Campbell clan 
 
 By Inverlochy's shore. 
 I've told thee how we swept Dundee, 
 
 And tamed the Lmdsay's pride ; 
 But never have I told thee yet 
 
 How the Great Marquis died ! 
 
 III. 
 
 A traitor sold him to his foes ; 
 
 deed of deathless shame ! 
 I charge thee, boy, if e'er thou meet 
 
 With one of Assynt's name — 
 Be it upon the mountain's side, 
 
 Or yet within the glen, 
 Stand he in martial gear alone, 
 
 Or backed bv armed men — 
 Face him, as thou wouldst face the man 
 
 Who wronged thy sire's renown ; 
 Remember of what blood thou art, 
 
 And strike the caitiff down ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 They brought him to the Watergate, 
 
 Hard bound with hempen span. 
 As though they held a lion there, 
 
 And not a 'fenceless man. 
 They set him high upon a cart — 
 
 The hangman rode below — 
 They drew his hands behind his back, 
 
 And bared his noble brow.
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 37 
 
 Then, as a hound is slipped from leash, 
 
 They cheered the common throng, 
 And blew the note with yell and shout, 
 
 And bade him pass along. 
 
 V. 
 
 It would have made a brave man's heart 
 
 Grow sad and sick that day, 
 To watch the keen malignant eyes 
 
 Bent down on that array. 
 There stood the Whig west-country lords 
 
 In balcony and bow, 
 There sat their gaunt and withered dames. 
 
 And their daughters all a-row ; 
 And every open window 
 
 Was full as full might be, 
 With black-robed Covenanting carles, 
 
 That goodly sport to see ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 But when he came, though pale and wan. 
 
 He looked so great and high. 
 So noble was his manly front, 
 
 So calm his steadfast eye ; — 
 The rabble rout forebore to shout. 
 
 And each man held his breath, 
 For well they knew the hero's soul 
 
 Was face to face with death.
 
 38 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 And then a mournful shudder 
 Through all the people crept, 
 
 And some that came to scoff at him, 
 Now turn'd aside and wept. 
 
 VII. 
 
 But onwards — always onwards, 
 
 In silence and in gloom, 
 The dreary pageant laboured, 
 
 Till it reach'd the house of doom : 
 Then first a woman's voice was heard 
 
 In jeer and laughter loud, 
 And an angry cry and a hiss arose 
 
 From the heart of the tossing crowd : 
 Then, as the Grseme looked upwards, 
 
 He met the ugly smile 
 Of him who sold his King for gold — 
 
 The master-fiend Argyle ! 
 
 VIII. 
 
 The Marquis gazed a moment, 
 
 And nothing did he say. 
 But the cheek of Argyle grew ghastly pale, 
 
 And he turned his eyes away. 
 The painted harlot by his side. 
 
 She shook through every limb, 
 For a roar like thunder swept the street. 
 
 And hands were clenched at bun,
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 39 
 
 And a Saxon soldier cried aloud, 
 
 " Back, coward, from thy place ! 
 For seven long years thou hast not dared 
 
 To look him in the face." 
 
 IX. 
 
 Had I been there with sword in hand, 
 
 And fifty Camerons by, 
 That day througli high Dunedin's streets. 
 
 Had pealed the slogan cry. 
 Not all their troops of trampling horse, 
 
 Nor might of mailed men — 
 Not all the rebels of the south 
 
 Had borne us backwards then ! 
 Once more his foot on Highland heath 
 
 Had trod as free as air, 
 Or I, and all who bore my name, 
 
 Been laid around him there ! 
 
 X. 
 
 It might not be. They placed him next 
 
 Within the solemn hall, 
 Where once the Scottish Kings were throned 
 
 Amidst their nobles all. 
 But there was dust of vulgar feet 
 
 On that polluted floor, 
 And perjured traitors filled the place 
 
 Where good men sate before.
 
 40 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 With savage glee came Warristoun 
 To read the murderous doom. 
 
 And then uprose the great Montrose 
 In the middle of the room. 
 
 XI. 
 
 " Now by my faith as belted knight, 
 
 And by the name I bear. 
 And by the bright Saint Andrew's cross 
 
 That waves above us there — 
 Yea, by a greater, mightier oath — 
 
 And oh, that such should be ! — 
 By that dark stream of royal blood 
 
 That lies 'twixt you and me — 
 I have not sought in battle-field 
 
 A wreath of such renown, 
 Nor dared I hope, on my dying day, 
 
 To win the martyr's crown ! 
 
 XII. 
 
 "There is a chamber far away 
 
 Where sleep the good and brave. 
 But a better place ye have named for me 
 
 Than by my father's grave. 
 For truth and right, 'gainst treason's might, 
 
 This hand hath always striven, 
 And ye raise it up for a witness still 
 
 In the eye of earth and heaven.
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 41 
 
 Then nail my head on yonder tower — 
 
 Give every town a linih — 
 And God who made shall gather them : 
 
 I go from you to Him ! " 
 
 XIII. 
 
 The morning dawned full darkly, 
 
 The rain came flashing down, 
 And the jagged streak of the levin-holt 
 
 Lit up the gloomy town : 
 The heavens were thundering out their wrath, 
 
 The fatal hour was come ; 
 Yet ever sounded sullenly 
 
 The trumpet and the drum. 
 There was madness on the earth below, 
 
 And anger in the sky. 
 And young and old, and rich and poor. 
 
 Came forth to see him die. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Ah, God ! that ghastly gibbet ! 
 
 How dismal 't is to see 
 The great tall spectral skeleton, 
 
 The ladder, and the tree ! 
 Hark ! hark ! it is the clash of arms- 
 
 The bells begin to toll — 
 He is coming ! he is coming ! 
 
 God's mercy on his soul !
 
 42 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 One last long peal of thunder — 
 
 The clouds are cleared away, 
 And the glorious sun once more looks down 
 
 Amidst the dazzling day. 
 
 XV. 
 
 He is coming ! he is coming ! 
 
 Like a bridegroom from his room, 
 Came the hero from his prison 
 
 To the scaffold and the doom. 
 There was glory on his forehead, 
 
 There was lustre in his eye, 
 And he never walked to battle 
 
 More proudly than to die : 
 There was colour in his visage. 
 
 Though the cheeks of all were wan. 
 And they marvelled as they saw him pass, 
 
 That great and goodly man ! 
 
 XVI. 
 
 He mounted up the scaffold. 
 
 And he turned him to the crowd ; 
 
 But they dared not trust the people, 
 So he might not speak aloud. 
 
 But he looked upon the heavens, 
 And they were clear and blue,
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 45 
 
 And in the liquid ether 
 
 The eye of God shone through : 
 Yet a black and murky battlement 
 
 Lay resting on the hill, 
 As though the thunder slept within — 
 
 All else was calm and still. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 The grim Geneva ministers 
 
 With anxious scowl drew near, 
 As you have seen the ravens flock 
 
 Around the dying deer. 
 He would not deign them word nor sign, 
 
 But alone he bent the knee ; 
 And veiled his face for Christ's dear grace 
 
 Beneath the gallows-tree. 
 Then radiant and serene he rose, 
 
 And cast his cloak away : 
 For he had ta'en his latest look 
 
 Of earth, and sun, and day. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 A beam of light fell o'er him, 
 Like a glory round the shriven, 
 
 And he climbed the lofty ladder 
 As it were tlie path to heaven.
 
 44 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 Then came a Hasli from out the cloud, 
 
 And a stunning thunder roll, 
 And no man dared to look aloft, 
 
 For fear was on every soul. 
 There was another heavy sound, 
 
 A hush and then a groan ; 
 And darkness swept across the sky — 
 
 The work of death was done !
 
 NOTES TO 
 "THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE" 
 
 "A traitor sold Mm to his foes," — p. 36. 
 
 "Thk contemporary historian of the Earls of Sutherland 
 records, that (after the defeat of Invercarron) Montrose and 
 Kinnoul ' wandered up the river Kyle the whole ensuing 
 night, and the next day, and the third day also, without 
 any food or sustenance, and at last came within the country 
 of Assynt. The Earl of Kinnoul, being faint for lack of 
 meat, and not able to travel any further, was left there 
 among the mountains, where it was supposed he perished. 
 Montrose had almost famished, but that he fortuned in 
 his misery to light upon a small cottage in that wilderness, 
 where he was supplied -with some milk and bread.' Not 
 even the iron frame of Montrose could endure a prolonged 
 existence under such circumstances. He gave himself up 
 to Macleod of Assynt, a former adherent, from whom he 
 had reason to expect assistance in consideration of that 
 circumstance, and, indeed, from the dictates of honourable 
 feeling and common humanity. As the Argyle faction 
 had sold the King, so this Highlander rendered his own 
 name infamous by selling the hero to the Covenanters, for 
 which 'duty to the public' he was rewarded with four 
 hundred bolls of meal." — Napier's Life of Montros&.
 
 46 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 " Tliey hnmght Mm to the Watergate,'^ — p. 36, 
 
 "Friday, \lth May. — Act ordaining James Grahame to 
 be brought from the Watergate on a cart, bareheaded, the 
 hangman in his livery, covered, riding on the horse that 
 draws the cart^the prisoner to be bound to the cart with 
 a rope — to the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, and from thence 
 to be brought to the Parliament House, and there, in the 
 place of delinquents, on his knees, to receive his sentence — 
 viz., to be hanged on a gibbet at the Cross of Edinburgh, 
 with his book and declaration tied on a rope about his 
 neck, and there to hang for the space of three hours until 
 he be dead ; and thereafter to be cut down by the hangman, 
 his head, hands, and legs to be cut off, and distributed 
 as follows — viz., his head to be affixed on an iron pin, 
 and set on the pinnacle of the west gavel of the new 
 prison of Edinburgh ; one hand to be set on the port of 
 Perth, the other on the j^ort of Stirling ; one leg and foot 
 on the port of Aberdeen, the other on the port of Glasgow. 
 If at his death penitent, and relaxed from excommunication, 
 then the trunk of his body to be interred, by pioneers, in 
 the Greyfriars; otherwise, to be interred in the Boroughmuir, 
 by the hangman's men, under the gallows." — Balfour's 
 Notes of Parliament. 
 
 It is needless to remark that this inhuman sentence was 
 executed to the letter. In order that the exposure might 
 be more complete, the cart was constructed with a high 
 chair in the centre, having holes behind, through which 
 the ropes that fastened him were drawn. The author of 
 the Wigton Papera, recently published by the Maitland 
 Club, says, "The reason of his being tied to the cart was 
 in hope that the people would have stoned him, and that
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 47 
 
 he might not be able by his hands to save his face." His 
 hat was then pulled off by the hangman and the procession 
 commenced. 
 
 " But ichen he came, though pale and ivan, 
 He looked so great and high,'^ — p. 37. 
 
 "In all the way, there appeared in him such majesty, 
 courage, modesty — and even somewhat more than natural — 
 that those common women who had lost their husbands and 
 children in his wars, and who were hired to stone him, 
 were upon the sight of him so astonished and moved, that 
 their intended curses turned into tears and prayers ; so that 
 next day all the ministers preached against them for not 
 stoning and reviling him." — Wigton Papej's. 
 
 " Then first a zvoman^s voice zoas heard 
 In jeer and laughter loud," — p. 38. 
 
 " It is remarkable that, of the many thousand beholders, 
 the Lady Jean Gordon, Countess of Haddington, did 
 (alone) publicly insult and laugh at him ; which being 
 perceived by a gentleman in the street, he cried up to 
 her, that it became her better to sit upon the cart for 
 her adulteries." — Wigton Papers. This infamous woman 
 was the third daughter of Huntly, and the niece of Argyle. 
 It will hardly be credited that she was the sister of that 
 gallant Lord Gordon, who fell fighting by the side of 
 Montrose, only five years before, at the battle of Aldford ! 
 
 ^^ For seven long years thou hast not dared 
 To looh him in the face," — p, 39. 
 
 " The Lord Lorn and his new lady were also sitting on a 
 balcony, joyful spectators ; and the cart being stopped when 
 it came before the lodging where the Chancellor, Argyle,
 
 48 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 and Warristoun sat — that they might have time to insult — 
 he, suspecting the business, turned his face towards them, 
 whereupon they presently crept in at the windows ; which 
 being perceived by an Englishman, he cried up, it was no 
 wonder they started aside at his look, for they durst not 
 look him in the face these seven years bygone." 
 
 — Wigton Papers. 
 
 " With savage glee came Warristoun, 
 To read the murderoics doom," — p. 40. 
 
 Archibald Johnston of Warristoun. This man, who was 
 the inveterate enemy of Montrose, and who carried the 
 most selfish spirit into every intrigue of his party, received 
 the punishment of his treasons about eleven years after- 
 wards. It may be instructive to learn how he met his 
 doom. The following extract is from the MSS. of Sir 
 George Mackenzie : — " The Chancellor and others Avaited to 
 examine him ; he fell upon his face, roaring, and with tears 
 entreated they would pity a poor creature who had forgot 
 all that was in the Bible. This moved all the spectators 
 with a deep melancholy ; and the Chancellor, reflecting 
 upon the man's great parts, former esteem, and the great 
 share he had in all the late revolutions, could not deny 
 some tears to the frailty of silly mankind. At his exami- 
 nation, he pretended he had lost so much blood by the 
 unskilfulness of his chirurgeons, that he lost his memory 
 with his blood ; and I really believe that' his courage 
 had been drawn out with it. Within a few days he 
 was brought before the parliament, where he discovered 
 nothing but much weakness, running up and down upon his 
 knees, begging mercy ; but the parliament ordained his 
 former sentence to be put to execution, and accordingly he 
 was executed at the Cross of Edinburgh."
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 49 
 
 " And God ivho made shall gather them : 
 I go from ^jou to Him!" — p. 41. 
 
 "He said he was much beholden to the parliament for 
 the honour they had put on him ; ' for,' says he, ' I think it 
 ft greater honour to have my head standing on the port of 
 this town, for this quarrel, than to have my picture in the 
 king's bedchamber, I am beholden to you that, lest my 
 loyalty should be forgotten, ye have appointed five of your 
 most eminent towns to bear witness of it to posterity.' " 
 
 — Wigton Papers. 
 
 " He is coming ! lie is coining ! 
 
 Like a bridegroom from Ms room^'' — p. 42. 
 
 "In his downgoing from the Tolbooth to the place of 
 execution, he was very richly clad in fine scarlet, laid over 
 with rich silver lace, his hat in his hand, his bands and 
 cuifs exceeding rich, his delicate white gloves on his hands, 
 his stockings of incarnate silk, and his shoes with their 
 ribbands on his feet; and sarks provided for him with 
 pearling about, above ten pund the elne. All these were 
 provided for him by his friends, and a pretty cassock put on 
 upon him, upon the scaifold, wherein he was hanged. To 
 be short, nothing was here deficient to honour his poor 
 carcase, more beseeming a bridegroom than a criminal going 
 to the gallows." — Nicholl's Diary. 
 
 " The grim Geneva ministers 
 
 With anxious scowl drew near" — p. 43. 
 
 The Presbyterian ministers beset Montrose both in prison 
 and on the scaff"old. The following extracts are from the 
 diary of the Rev. Robert Traill, one of the persons who 
 
 D
 
 50 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 
 
 were appointed by the commission of the kirk "to deal with 
 him : " — " By a warrant from the kirk, we staid a while 
 with him about his soul's condition. But we found him 
 continuing in his old pride, and taking very ill what was 
 spoken to him, saying, ' I pray you, gentlemen, let me die 
 in peace.' It was answered, that he might die in true 
 peace, being reconciled to the Lord and to His kirk." — "We 
 returned to the commission, and did show unto them what 
 had passed amongst us. They, seeing that for the present 
 he was not desiring relaxation from his censure of excom- 
 munication, did appoint Mr. Mungo Law and me to attend 
 on the morrow on the scaffold, at the time of his execution, 
 that, in case he should desire to be relaxed from his 
 excommunication, we should be allowed to give it unto him 
 in the name of the kirk, and to pray with him, and for 
 him, that tvhat is loosed on earth might he loosed in heaven.'^ 
 But this pious intention, which may appear somewhat 
 strange to the modern Calvinist, when the prevailing 
 theories of the kirk regarding the efficacy of absolution 
 are considered, was not destined to be fulfilled. Mr. Traill 
 goes on to say, " But he did not at all desire to be relaxed 
 from his excommunication in the name of the kirk, yea, did 
 not look towards that place on the scaffold where we stood ; 
 only he drew apart some of the magistrates, and spake a 
 while with them, and then went up the ladder, in his red 
 scarlet cassock, in a very stately manner." 
 
 " And he climbed the lofty ladder 
 
 As it were the path to heaven^'' — p. 43. 
 
 " He was very earnest that he might have the liberty to 
 keep on his hat ; it was denied : he requested he might 
 have the privilege to keep his cloak about him — neither
 
 THE EXECUTION OF MONTROSE 51 
 
 could that be granted. Then, with a most undaunted 
 courage, he went up to the top of that prodigious gibbet." 
 — "The whole people gave a general groan ; and it was very- 
 observable, that even those who, at his first appearance, had 
 bitterly inveighed against him, could not now abstain from 
 tears. " — Montrose Redivivus.
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 
 Hector Boece, in his very delightful, though some- 
 what apocryphal Chronicles of Scotland, tells us, that 
 " quhen Schir James Dowglas was cliosin as maist 
 worthy of all Scotland to pass with King Eohertis 
 hart to the Holy Land, he put it in ane cais of gold, 
 with arromitike and precious unyementis ; and tuke 
 with him Schir William Sinclare and Schir Piobert 
 Logan, with mony othir nobilmen, to the haly graif; 
 quhare he buryit the said hart, with maist reverence 
 and solempnitie that could be devisit." 
 
 But no contemporary historian bears out the state- 
 ment of the old canon of Aberdeen. Froissart, Fordun, 
 and Barbour all agree that the devotional pilgrimage 
 of the Good Sir James was not destined to be accom- 
 plished, and that the heart of Scotland's greatest king 
 and hero was brought back to the land of his nativity. 
 Mr. Tytler, in few words, has so graphically recounted 
 the leading events of this expedition, that I do not 
 hesitate to adopt his narrative : — 
 
 "As soon as the season of the year permitted, 
 Douglas, liaving the heart of his beloved master under 
 his charge, set sail from Scotland, accompanied by a
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 53 
 
 splendid retinue, and anchored off Slays in Flanders, 
 at this time the great seaport of the Netherlands. 
 His object was to find out companions with whom he 
 might travel to Jerusalem ; but he declined landing, 
 and for twelve days received all visitors on board his 
 ship with a state almost kingly. 
 
 " At Sluys he heard that Alonzo, the King of Leon 
 and Castile, was carrying on war with Osmyn, the 
 Moorish governor of Grenada. The religious mission 
 which he had embraced, and the vows he had taken 
 before leaving Scotland, induced Douglas to consider 
 Alonzo's cause as a holy warfare ; and, before proceed- 
 ing to Jerusalem, he first determined to visit Spain, 
 and to signalise his prowess against the Saracens. But 
 his first field against the Infidels proved fatal to him 
 who, in the long English war, had seen seventy 
 battles. The circumstances of his death were striking 
 and characteristic. In an action near Theba, on the 
 borders of Andalusia, the Moorish cavalry were de- 
 feated ; and, after their camp had been taken, Douglas, 
 with his companions, engaged too eagerly in the 
 pursuit, and, being separated from the main body of 
 the Spanish army, a strong division of the Moors 
 rallied and surrounded them. The Scottish knight 
 endeavoured to cut his way through the Infidels, and 
 in all probability would have succeeded, had he not 
 again turned to rescue Sir William Saint Clair of 
 Eoslin, whom he saw in jeopardy. In attempting 
 this, he was inextricably involved with the enemy. 
 Taking from his neck the casket which contained the
 
 54 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 
 heart of Bruce, he cast it before him, and exclaimed 
 with a loud voice, ' Now pass onward as thou wert 
 w^ont, and Douglas will follow thee or die!' The 
 action and the sentiment were heroic, and they were 
 the last words and deed of a heroic life, for Douglas 
 fell, overpowered by his enemies; and three of his 
 knights, and many of his companions, were slain along 
 with their master. On the succeeding day, the body 
 and the casket were both found on the field, and by 
 his survl\dng friends conveyed to Scotland. The heart 
 of Bruce was deposited at Melrose, and the body of 
 the 'Good Sir James' — the name by which he is 
 affectionately remembered by his countrymen — was 
 consigned to the cemetery of his fathers in the parish 
 church of Douglas." 
 
 A nobler death on the field of battle is not recorded 
 in the annals of chivalry. In memory of this ex- 
 pedition, the Douglases have ever since carried the 
 armorial bearings of the Bloody Heart surmounted by 
 the Crown; and a similar distinction is borne by 
 another family. Sir Simon of Lee, a distinguished 
 companion of Douglas, was the person on whom, after 
 the fall of his leader, the custody of the heart de- 
 volved. Hence the name of Lockhart, and their effigy, 
 the Heart within a Fetterlock.
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 
 It was upon an April morn, 
 While yet the frost lay hoar, 
 
 We heard Lord James's bugle-horn 
 Sound by the rocky shore. 
 
 Then down we went, a hundred knights, 
 
 All in our dark array. 
 And flung our armour in the ships 
 
 That rode within the bay. 
 
 We spoke not as the shore grew less, 
 
 But gazed in silence back. 
 Where the long billows swept away 
 
 The foam behind our track. 
 
 And aye the purple hues decay'd 
 
 Upon the fading hill, 
 And but one heart in all that ship 
 
 Was tranquil, cold, and still.
 
 56 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 
 The good Lord Douglas walk'd the deck, 
 
 And oh, his brow was wan ! 
 Unlike the flush it used to wear 
 
 When in the battle van. — 
 
 " Come hither, come hither, my trusty knight, 
 Sir Simon of the Lee ; 
 There is a freit lies near my soul 
 I fain would tell to thee. 
 
 " Thou know'st the words King Eobert spoke 
 Upon his dying day, 
 How he bade me take his noble heart 
 And carry it far away ; 
 
 " And lay it in the holy soil 
 
 Where once the Saviour trod, 
 Since he might not bear the blessed Cross, 
 Nor strike one blow for God. 
 
 " Last night as in my bed I lay, 
 I dream'd a dreary dream : — 
 Methought I saw a Pilgrim stand 
 In the moonlight's quivering beam. 
 
 " His robe was of the azure dye, 
 Snow-white his scatter'd hairs. 
 And even such a cross he bore 
 As good Saint Andrew bears.
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 57 
 
 " ' Why go you forth, Lord James/ he said, 
 ' With spear and belted brand ? 
 Why do you take its dearest pledge 
 From this our Scottish land ? 
 
 " ' The sultry breeze of Galilee 
 
 Creeps through its groves of palm, 
 The olives on the Holy Mount 
 Stand glittering in the calm. 
 
 " ' But 't is not there that Scotland's heart 
 Shall rest by God's decree. 
 Till the great angel calls the dead 
 To rise from earth and sea ! 
 
 " ' Lord James of Douglas, mark my rede ! 
 That heart shall pass once more 
 In fiery fight against the foe, 
 As it was vi'ont of yore. 
 
 " ' And it shall pass beneath the Cross, 
 And save King Eobert's vow, 
 But other hands shall bear it back, 
 Not, James of Douglas, thou ! ' 
 
 " Now, by thy knightly faith, I pray. 
 Sir Simon of the Lee — 
 For truer friend had never man 
 Than thou hast been to me —
 
 58 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 
 " If ne'er upon the Holy Land 
 'Tis mine in life to tread, 
 Bear thou to Scotland's kindly earth 
 The relics of her dead." 
 
 The tear was in Sir Simon's eye 
 As he wrung the warrior's hand — 
 
 " Betide me weal, betide me woe, 
 I '11 hold by thy command. 
 
 " But if in battle front. Lord James, 
 'T is ours once more to ride, 
 No force of man, nor craft of fiend, 
 Shall cleave me from thy side ! " 
 
 And aye we sail'd, and aye we sail'd, 
 
 Across the weary sea. 
 Until one morn the coast of Spain 
 
 Eose grimly on our lee. 
 
 And as we rounded to the port. 
 Beneath the watch-tower's wall. 
 
 We heard the clash of the atabals, 
 And the trumpet's wavering call. 
 
 " Why sounds yon Eastern music here 
 So wantonly and long, 
 And whose the crowd of armM men 
 That round yon standard throng ? "
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 59 
 
 " The Moors have come from Africa 
 To spoil and waste and slay, 
 And King Alonzo of Castile 
 Must light with them to-day." 
 
 " Now shame it were," cried good Lord James, 
 " Shall never be said of me, 
 That I and mine have turn'd aside, 
 Trom the Cross in jeopardie ! 
 
 " Have down, have down, my merry men all — 
 Have down unto the plain ; 
 We '11 let the Scottish lion loose 
 Within the fields of Spain ! " 
 
 " Now welcome to me, noble lord. 
 Thou and thy stalwart power ; 
 Dear is the sight of a Christian knight 
 Who comes in such an hour ! 
 
 "Is it for bond or faith ye come, 
 Or yet for golden fee ? 
 Or bring ye France's lilies here. 
 Or the flower of Burgundie ? " 
 
 " God greet thee well, thou valiant King, 
 Thee and thy belted peers — 
 Sir James of Douglas am I called. 
 And these are Scottish spears.
 
 6o THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 
 " We do not fight for bond or plight, 
 Nor yet for golden fee ; 
 But for the sake of our blessed Lord, 
 Who died upon the tree. 
 
 " We bring our great King Eobert's heart 
 Across the weltering wave, 
 To lay it in the holy soil 
 
 Hard by the Saviour's grave. 
 
 " True pilgrims we, by land or sea, 
 Where danger bars the way ; 
 And therefore are we here, Lord King, 
 To ride with thee this day ! " 
 
 The King has bent his stately head, 
 And the tears were in his eyne — 
 
 " God's blessing on thee, noble knight, 
 For tliis brave thought of thine ! 
 
 ^o^ 
 
 " I know thy name full well, Lord James, 
 And honour'd may I be, 
 That those who fought beside the Bruce 
 Should fight this day for me ! 
 
 " Take thou the leading of the van. 
 And charge the Moors amain ; 
 There is not such a lance as thine 
 In all the host of Spain ! "
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 6i 
 
 The Douglas turned towards us then, 
 but his glance was high ! — 
 " There is not one of all my men 
 But is as bold as I. 
 
 " There is not one of all my knights 
 But bears as true a spe»ar — 
 Then onwards ! Scottish gentlemen, 
 And think — King Eobert 's here ! " 
 
 The trumpets blew, the cross-bolts flew, 
 
 The arrows flashed like flame, 
 As spur in side, and spear in rest, 
 
 Against the foe we came. 
 
 And many a bearded Saracen 
 
 Went down, both horse and man ; 
 For through their ranks we rode like corn. 
 
 So furiously we ran ! 
 
 But in behind our path they closed, 
 
 Though fain to let us through, 
 For they were forty thousand men, 
 
 And we were wondrous few. 
 
 We might not see a lance's length. 
 
 So dense was their array. 
 But the long fell sweep of the Scottish blade 
 
 Still held them hard at bay.
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 
 " Make in ! make in ! " Lord Douglas cried, 
 " Make in, my brethren dear ! 
 Sir William of Saint Clair is down ; 
 We may not leave him here ! " 
 
 But thicker, thicker, grew the swarm, 
 
 And sharper shot the rain. 
 And the horses reared amid the press, 
 
 But they would not charge again. 
 
 " Now Jesu help thee," said Lord James, 
 " Thou kind and true St Clair ! 
 An' if I may not bring thee off, 
 I '11 die beside thee there ! " 
 
 Then in his stirrups up he stood, 
 
 So lionlike and bold. 
 And held the precious heart aloft 
 
 All in its case of gold. 
 
 He flung it from him, far ahead, 
 
 And never spake he more, 
 But — " Pass thee first, thou dauntless heart. 
 
 As thou wert wont of yore ! " 
 
 The roar of fight rose fiercer yet, 
 
 And heavier still the stour, 
 Till the spears of Spain came shivering in. 
 
 And swept away the Moor.
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 63 
 
 " Now praised be God, the day is won I 
 They fly o'er flood and fell — 
 Why dost thou draw the rein so hard, 
 Good knight, that fought so well ? " 
 
 " Oh, ride ye on. Lord King ! " he said, 
 " And leave the dead to me. 
 For I must keep the dreariest watch 
 That ever I shall dree ! 
 
 " There lies, beside his master's heart, 
 The Douglas, stark and grim ; 
 And woe is me I should be here, 
 Not side by side with him ! 
 
 " The world grows cold, my arm is old. 
 And thin my lyart hair, 
 And all that I loved best on earth 
 Is stretch'd before me there. 
 
 " Bothwell banks ! that bloom so bright. 
 Beneath the eun of May, 
 The heaviest cloud that ever blew 
 Is bound for you this day. 
 
 " And, Scotland, thou may'st veil thy head 
 In sorrow and in pain ; 
 The sorest stroke upon thy brow 
 Hath fallen this day in Spain !
 
 6+ THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 
 
 " We '11 hear them hack unto our ship, 
 We '11 bear them o'er the sea, 
 And lay them in the hallowed earth, 
 Within our own countrie. 
 
 " And be thou strong of heart, Lord King, 
 For this I tell thee sure, 
 The sod that drank the Douglas' blood 
 Shall never bear the Moor !" 
 
 The King he lighted from his horse, 
 
 He flung his brand away. 
 And took the Douglas by the hand, 
 
 So stately as he lay. 
 
 " God give thee rest, thou valiant soul, 
 That fought so well for Spain ; 
 I 'd rather half my land were gone, 
 So thou wert here again ! " 
 
 We bore the good Lord James away, 
 And the priceless heart he bore. 
 
 And heavily we steer'd our ship 
 Towards the Scottish shore. 
 
 No welcome greeted our return, 
 
 Nor clang of martial tread. 
 But all were dumb and hushed as death 
 
 Before the mighty dead.
 
 THE HEART OF THE BRUCE 65 
 
 We laid our chief in Douglas Kirk, 
 
 The heart in fair Melrose ; 
 And woeful men were we that day — 
 
 God grant their souls repose ! 
 
 E
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 It is very much to be regretted that no competent 
 person has as yet undertaken the task of compiling 
 a full and authentic biography of Lord Viscount 
 Dundee, His memory has consequently been left at 
 the mercy of misrepresentation and malignity ; and 
 the pen of romance has been freely employed to 
 portray, as a bloody assassin, one of the most accom- 
 plished men and gallant soldiers of his age. 
 
 It was the misfortune of Claverhouse to have 
 lived in so troublous an age and country. The 
 religious differences of Scotland were then at their 
 greatest height, and there is hardly any act of 
 atrocity and rebellion which had not been committed 
 by the insurgents. The royal authority was openly 
 and publicly disowned in the western districts: the 
 Archbishop of St. Andrew's, after more than one 
 hairbreadth escape, was waylaid, and barbarously 
 murdered by an armed gang of fanatics on Magus 
 Muir ; and his daughter was wounded and maltreated 
 while interceding for the old man's life. The country 
 was infested by banditti, who took every possible
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 67 
 
 opportunity of shooting down and massacring any 
 of the straggling soldiery : the clergy were attacked 
 and driven from their houses ; so that, throughout 
 a considerable portion of Scotland, there was no 
 security either for property or for life. It is now 
 the fashion to praise and magnify the Covenanters 
 as the most innocent and persecuted of men ; but 
 those who are so ready with their sympathy, rarely 
 take the pains to satisfy themselves, by reference to 
 the annals of the time, of the true character of 
 those men whom they blindly venerate as martyrs. 
 They forget, in their zeal for religious freedom, that 
 even the purest and holiest of causes may be sullied 
 and disgraced by the deeds of its upholders, and that 
 a wild and frantic profession of faith is not always 
 a test of genuine piety. It is not in the slightest 
 degree necessary to discuss whether the royal pre- 
 rogative was at that time arbitrarily used, or whether 
 the religious freedom of the nation was unduly curtailed. 
 Both points may be, and indeed are, admitted, — for 
 it is impossible to vindicate the policy of the 
 measures adopted by the two last monarchs of 
 the house of Stuart ; but neither admission will 
 clear the Covenanters from the stain of deliberate 
 cruelty. 
 
 After the battle of Philiphaugh, the royalist prisoners 
 were butchered in cold blood, under the superintendence 
 of a clerical emissary, who stood by rubbing his hands, 
 and exclaiming — " The wark gangs bonnily on !" Were
 
 68 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 I to transcribe from the pamphlets before me the 
 list of the murders which were perpetrated by 
 the country people on the soldiery, officers, and 
 gentlemen of loyal principles, during the reign of 
 Charles IT., I believe that no candid person would be 
 surprised at the severe retaliation which was made. 
 It must be remembered that the country was then 
 under military law, and that the strongest orders had 
 been issued by the Government to the officers in 
 command of the troops, to use every means in their 
 power for the effectvial repression of the disturbances. 
 The necessity of such orders will become apparent, 
 when we reflect that, besides the open actions at 
 Aird's Moss and Drumclog, the city of Glasgow was 
 attacked, and the royal forces compelled for a time 
 to fall back upon Stirling. 
 
 Under such circumstances it is no wonder if the 
 soldiery were severe in their reprisals. Innocent 
 blood may no doubt have been shed, and in some 
 cases even wantonly ; for when rebellion has grown 
 into civil war, and the ordinary course of the law is 
 put in abeyance, it is always impossible to restrain 
 military license. But it is most unfair to lay the 
 whole odium of such acts upon those who were in 
 command, and to dishonour the fair name of gentle- 
 men, by attributing to them personally the commission 
 of deeds of which they were absolutely ignorant. To 
 this day the peasantry of the western districts of 
 Scotland entertain the idea that Claverhouse was a
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 69 
 
 sort of fiend in human shape, tall, muscular, and 
 hideous in aspect, secured by infernal spells from 
 the chance of perishing by any ordinary weapon, and 
 mounted upon a huge black horse, the especial gift 
 of Beelzebub ! On this charger it is supposed that 
 he could ride up precipices as easily as he could 
 traverse the level ground — that he was constantly 
 accompanied by a body of desperadoes, vulgarly known 
 by such euphonious titles as " Hell's Tam," and " the 
 De'il's Jock," and that his whole time was occupied, 
 day and night, in hunting Covenanters upon the 
 hills ! Almost every rebel who was taken in arms 
 and shot, is supposed to have met his death from 
 the individual pistol of Claverhouse ; and the tales 
 which, from time to time, have been written by 
 such ingenious persons as the late Mr. Gait and 
 the Ettrick Shepherd have quietly been assumed 
 as facts, and added to the store of our traditionary 
 knowledge. It is in vain to hint tliat the chief com- 
 manders of the forces in Scotland could have found 
 little leisure, even had they possessed the taste, for 
 pursuing single insurgents. Such suggestions are an 
 insult to martyrology ; and many a parish of the 
 west would be indignant were it averred that the 
 tenant of its gray stone had suffered by a meaner 
 hand. 
 
 When we look at the portrait of Claverhouse, and 
 survey the calm, melancholy, and beautiful features of 
 the devoted soldier, it appears almost inrredi))le that
 
 70 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 he should ever have suffered under such an overwhelm- 
 ing load of misrepresentation. But when — discarding 
 modern historians, who in too many instances do not 
 seem to entertain the slightest scruple in dealing with 
 the memory of the dead — we turn to the writings of 
 his contemporaries who knew the man, his character 
 appears in a very different light. They describe him 
 as one who was stainless in his honour, pure in his 
 faith, wise in council, resolute in action, and utterly 
 free from that selfishness which disgraced the Scottish 
 statesmen of the time. No one dares question his 
 loyalty, for he sealed that confession with his blood ; 
 and it is universally admitted, that with him fell the 
 last hopes of the reinstatement of the house of 
 Stuart. 
 
 I may perhaps be permitted here, in the absence of 
 a better chronicler, to mention a few particulars of his 
 life, which, I believe, are comparatively unknown. 
 John Graham of Claverhouse was a cadet of the family 
 of Fintrie, connected by intermarriage with the blood- 
 royal of Scotland. After completing his studies at 
 the University of St. Andrew's, he entered, as was 
 the national custom for gentlemen of good birth and 
 limited means, into foreign service, served some time 
 in France as a volunteer, and afterwards went to 
 Holland. He very soon received a commission, as a 
 cornet in a regiment of horse-guards, from the Prince 
 of Orange, nephew of Charles 11. and James VII., 
 and who afterwards married the Princess Mary. His
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 71 
 
 manner at that time is thus described : — " He was then 
 ane esquire, under the title of John Graham of Claver- 
 house ; but the vivacity of his parts, and the delicacy 
 and justice of his understanding and judgment, joyned 
 with a certain vigour of mind and activity of body, 
 distinguished him in such a manner from all others of 
 his rank, that though he lived in a superior character, 
 yet he acquired the love and esteem of all his equals, 
 as well as of those who had the advantage of him in 
 dignity and estate." 
 
 By one of those singular accidents which we occa- 
 sionally meet with in history, Graham, afterwards 
 destined to become his most formidable opponent, 
 saved the life of the Prince of Orange at the battle 
 of St. Neff. The Prince's horse had been killed, and 
 he himself was in the grasp of the enemy, when the 
 young cornet rode to his rescue, freed him from his 
 assailants, and mounted him on his own steed. For 
 this service he received a captain's commission, and 
 the promise of the first regiment that should fall 
 vacant. 
 
 But even in early life William of Orange was not 
 famous for keeping his promises. Some years after- 
 wards, a vacancy in one of the Scottish regiments in 
 the Prince's service occurred, and Claverhouse, relying 
 upon the previous assurance, preferred his claim. It 
 was disregarded, and Mr. Collier, afterwards Earl of 
 Portmore, was appointed over his head. It would 
 seem that Graham had suspected some foul play on
 
 72 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 the part of this gentleman, for, shortly after, they 
 accidentally met and had an angry altercation. This 
 circumstance having come to the ears of the Prince, 
 he sent for Captain Graham, and administered a sharp 
 rebuke. I give the remainder of this incident in the 
 words of the old writer, because it must be considered 
 a very remarkable one, as illustrating the fiery spirit 
 and dauntless independence of Claverhouse. 
 
 "The Captain answered, that he was indeed in the 
 wrong, since it was more his Highness's business to 
 have resented that quarrel than his ; because Mr. 
 Collier had less injured him in disappointing him of the 
 regiment, than he had done his Highness in making 
 him break his word. ' Then,' replied the Prince in an 
 angry tone, ' I make you full reparation, for I bestow 
 on you what is more valuable than a regiment when I 
 give you your right arm ! ' The Captain subjoined, 
 that since his Highness had the goodness to give him 
 his liberty, he resolved to employ himself elsewhere, 
 for he would not longer serve a Prince that had broken 
 his word. 
 
 " The Captain, having thus thrown up his com- 
 mission, was preparing in haste for his voyage, when 
 a messenger arrived from the Prince, with two hundred 
 guineas for the horse on which lie had saved his life. 
 The Captain sent the horse, but ordered the gold to be 
 distributed among the grooms of the Prince's stables. 
 It is said, however, that his Highness had the generosity 
 to write to the King and the Duke, recommending him
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 73 
 
 as a fine gentleman and a brave officer, fit for any 
 office, civil or military." 
 
 On his arrival in Britain he was well received by 
 the court, and immediately appointed to a high military 
 command in Scotland, It would be beyond the scope 
 of the present paper to enter minutely into the details 
 of his service during the stormy period when Scotland 
 was certainly misgoverned, and when there was little 
 unity, but much disorder in the land. In whatever 
 point of view we regard the history of those times, 
 the aspect is a mournful one indeed. Church and 
 State never was a popular cry in Scotland, and the 
 peculiar religious tendencies which had been exhibited 
 by a large portion of the nation, at the time of the 
 Eeformation, rendered the return of tranquillity hope- 
 less until the hierarchy was displaced, and a humbler 
 form of church government, more suited to the feelings 
 of the people, substituted in its stead. 
 
 Three years after the accession of James VII. 
 Claverhouse was raised to the peerage, by the title of 
 Lord Viscount Dundee. He was major-general, and 
 second in command of the royal forces, when the 
 Prince of Orange landed, and earnestly entreated King 
 James to be allowed to march against him, offering to 
 stake his head on the successful result of the enter- 
 prize. There is little doubt, from the great popularity 
 of Lord Dundee with the army, that, had such consent 
 been given, William would have found more than a 
 match in his old officer ; but the King seemed absolutely
 
 74 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 infatuated, and refused to allow a drop of blood to be 
 shed in his quarrel, though the great bulk of the 
 population of England were clearly and enthusiastically 
 in his favour. One of the most gifted of our modem 
 poets, the Honourable George Sydney Smythe, has 
 beautifully illustrated this event. 
 
 " Then out spake gallant Claverliouse, and his soul thrilled wild 
 
 and high, 
 And he showed the King his subjects, and he prayed him not 
 
 to fly. 
 O never yet was captain so dauntless as Dundee ! 
 He has sworn to chase the Hollander back to his Zuyder-Zee." 
 
 But though James quitted his kingdom, the stern 
 loyalty of Dundee was nothing moved. Alone, and 
 without escort, he traversed England, and presented 
 himself at the Convention of Estates, then assembled 
 at Edinburgh for the purpose of receiving the message 
 from the Prince of Orange. The meeting was a very 
 strange one. Many of the nobility and former mem- 
 bers of the Scottish Parliament absolutely declined 
 attending it, some on the ground that it was not a 
 legal assembly, having been summoned by the Prince 
 of Orange, and others because, in such a total dis- 
 ruption of order, they judged it safest to abstain from 
 taking any prominent part. This gave an immense 
 ascendency to the Revolution party, who further pro- 
 ceeded to strengthen their position by inviting to 
 Edinburgh large bodies of the armed population of the 
 west. After defending for several days the cause of
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 75 
 
 his master with as much eloquence as vigour, Dundee, 
 finding that the majority of the Convention were 
 resolved to offer the crown of Scotland to the Prince, 
 and having moreover received sure information that 
 some of the wild fanatic Whigs, with Daniel Ker of 
 Kersland at their head, had formed a plot for his 
 assassination, quitted Edinburgh with about fifty 
 horsemen, and, after a short interview — celebrated by 
 Sir Walter Scott in one of his grandest ballads — with 
 the Duke of Gordon at the Castle Eock, directed his 
 steps towards the north. After a short stay at his 
 house of Duddope, during which he received, by order 
 of the Council, who were thoroughly alarmed at his 
 absence, a summons through a Lyon herald to return 
 to Edinburgh under pain of high treason, he passed 
 into the Gordon country, where he was joined by the 
 Earl of Dunfermline with a small party of about 
 sixty horse. His retreat was timeous, for General 
 Mackay, who commanded for the Prince of Orange, 
 had despatched a strong force, with instructions to 
 make him prisoner. From this time, until the day of 
 his death, he allowed himself no repose. Imitating 
 the example, and inheriting the enthusiasm of his 
 great predecessor Montrose, he invoked the loyalty of 
 the clans to assist him in the struggle for legitimacy 
 — and he did not appeal to them in vain. His 
 name was a spell to rouse the ardent spirits of the 
 mountaineers ; and not the Great Marquis himself, in 
 the height of his renown, was more sincerely welcomed
 
 76 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 and more fondly loved than " Ian dhu nan Cath," 
 — Dark John of the Battles, — the name by which 
 Lord Dundee is still remembered in Highland song. 
 In the mean time the Convention, terrified at their 
 danger, and dreading a Highland inroad, had despatched 
 Mackay, a military officer of great experience, with 
 a considerable body of troops, to quell the threatened 
 insurrection. He was encountered by Dundee, and 
 compelled to evacuate the high country and fall back 
 upon the Lowlands, where he subsequently received 
 reinforcements, and again marched northward. The 
 Highland host was assembled at Blair, though not in 
 great force, when the news of Mackay 's advance 
 arrived ; and a council of the chiefs and officers was 
 summoned, to determine whether it would be most 
 advisable to fall back upon the glens and wild fast- 
 nesses of the Highlands, or to meet the enemy at once, 
 though with a force far inferior to his. 
 
 Most of the old officers, who had been trained in 
 the foreign wars, were of the former opinion — 
 "alleging that it was neither prudent nor cautious 
 to risk an engagement against an army of disciplined 
 men, that exceeded theirs in numbers by more than 
 a half." But both Glengarry and Locheill, to the 
 great satisfaction of the General, maintained the 
 contrary view, and argued tliat neither hunger nor 
 fatigue were so likely to depress the Highlanders, as 
 a retreat when the enemy was in view. The account 
 of the discussion is so interesting, and so characteristic
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 77 
 
 of Dundee, that I shall take leave to quote its 
 termination in the words of Drummond of Balhaldy : 
 
 "An advice so hardy and resolute could not miss 
 to please the generous Dundee. His looks seemed 
 to heighten with an air of delight and satisfaction 
 all the while Locheill was speaking. He told his 
 council that they had heard his sentiments from the 
 mouth of a person who had formed his judgment 
 upon infallible proofs drawn from a long experience, 
 and an intimate acquaintance with tlie persons and 
 subject he spoke of. Not one in the company offering 
 to contradict their general, it was unanimously agreed 
 to fight. 
 
 "When the news of this vigorous resolution spread 
 through the army, nothing was heard but acclama- 
 tions of joy, which exceedingly pleased their gallant 
 general; but before the council broke up, Locheill 
 begged to be heard for a few words. ' My Lord,' said 
 he, ' I have just now declared, in the presence of this 
 honourable company, that I was resolved to give an 
 implicit obedience to all your Lordship's commands ; 
 but I humbly beg leave, in name of these gentlemen, 
 to give the word of command for this one time. It 
 is the voice of your council, and their orders are, 
 that you do not engage personally. Your Lordship's 
 business is to have an eye on all parts, and to issue 
 out your commands as you shall think proper; it is 
 ours to execute them with promptitude and courage. 
 On your Lordship depends the fate, not only of this
 
 78 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 little brave army, but also of our king and country. 
 If your Lordship deny us this reasonable demand, 
 for my own part I declare, that neither I, nor any I 
 am concerned in, shall draw a sword on this important 
 occasion, whatever construction shall be put upon the 
 matter.' 
 
 " Locheill was seconded in this by the whole council ; 
 but Dundee begged leave to be heard in his turn. 
 ' Gentlemen,' said he, ' as I am absolutely convinced, 
 and have had repeated proofs, of your zeal for the 
 king's service, and of your affection to me as his 
 general and your friend, so I am fully sensible that 
 my engaging personally this day may be of some 
 loss if I shall chance to be killed. But I beer leave 
 of you, however, to allow me to give one shear-darg 
 (that is, one harvest-day's work) to the king, my 
 master, that I may have an opportunity of convincing 
 the brave clans, that I can hazard my life in that 
 service as freely as the meanest of them. Ye know 
 their temper, gentlemen ; and if they do not think 
 I have personal courage enough, they will not esteem 
 me hereafter, nor obey my commands with cheer- 
 fulness. Allow me this single favour, and I here 
 promise, upon my honour', never again to risk my 
 person while I have that of commanding you.' 
 
 "The council, finding him inflexible, broke up, and 
 the army marched directly towards the Pass of 
 Killiecrankie." 
 
 Those who have visited that romantic spot need
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 79 
 
 not be reminded of its peculiar features, for these, 
 once seen, must dwell for ever in the memory. The 
 lower part of the Pass is a stupendous mountain- 
 chasm, scooped out by the waters of the Garry, which 
 here descend in a succession of roaring cataracts and 
 pools. The old road, which ran almost parallel to 
 the river and close upon its edge, was extremely 
 narrow, and wound its way beneath a wall of enormous 
 crags, surmounted by a natural forest of birch, oak, 
 and pine. An army cooped up in that gloomy ravine 
 would have as little chance of escape from the onset 
 of an enterprising partisan corps, as had the Bavarian 
 troops when attacked by the Tyrolese in the steep 
 defiles of the Inn. General Mackay, however, had 
 made his arrangements with consummate tact and 
 skill, and had calculated his time so well, that he 
 was enabled to clear the Pass before the Highlanders 
 could reach it from the other side. Advancing up- 
 wards, the passage becomes gradually broader, until, 
 just below the House of Urrard, there is a considerable 
 width of meadow-land. It was here that Mackay 
 took up his position, and arrayed his troops, on 
 observing that the heights above were occupied by 
 the army of Dundee. 
 
 The forces of the latter scarcely amounted to one- 
 third of those of his antagonist, which were drawn 
 up in line without any reserve. He was therefore 
 compelled, in making his dispositions, to leave con- 
 siderable gaps in his own line, which gave Mackay
 
 8o THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 a further advantage. The right of Dundee's army- 
 was formed of the M'Lean, Glengarry, and Clanranald 
 regiments, along with some Irish levies. In the centre 
 was Dundee himself, at the head of a small and ill- 
 equipped body of cavalry, composed of Lowland 
 gentlemen and their followers, and about forty of 
 his old troopers. The Camerons and Skyemen, under 
 the command of Locheill and Sir Donald Macdonald 
 of Sleat, were stationed on the left. During the time 
 occupied by these dispositions, a brisk cannonade was 
 opened by Mackay's artillery, which materially in- 
 creased the impatience of the Highlanders to come 
 to close quarters. At last the word was given to 
 advance, and the whole line rushed forward with the 
 terrific impetuosity peculiar to a charge of the clans. 
 They received the fire of the regular troops without 
 flinching, reserved their own until they were close at 
 hand, poured in a murderous volley, and then, throwing 
 away their firelocks, attacked the enemy with the 
 broadsword. 
 
 The victory was almost instantaneous, but it was 
 bought at a terrible price. Through some mistake or 
 misunderstanding, a portion of the cavalry, instead of 
 following their general, who had charged directly for 
 the guns, executed a manoeuvre which threw them 
 into disorder; and, when last seen in the battle, 
 Dundee, accompanied only l)y the Earl of Dunfermline 
 and about sixteen gentlemen, was entering into the 
 cloud of smoke, standing up in his stirrups, and
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 8i 
 
 waving to the others to come on. It was in this 
 attitude that he appears to have received his death- 
 wound. On returning from the pursuit, the Highlanders 
 found him dying on the field. 
 
 It would be difficult to point out another instance 
 in which the maintenance of a great cause depended 
 solely upon the life of a single man. Whilst Dundee 
 survived, Scotland at least was not lost to the Stuarts, 
 for, sliortly before the battle, he had received assur- 
 ance that the greater part of the organised troops in 
 the north were devoted to his person, and ready to 
 join him ; and the victory of Killiecrankie would have 
 been followed by a general rising of the loyal gentle- 
 men in the Lowlands. But with his fall the enterprise 
 was over. 
 
 I hope I shall not be accused of exaggerating the 
 importance of this battle, which, according to the 
 writer I have already quoted, was best proved by the 
 consternation into which the opposite party w^ere 
 thrown at the first news of Mackay's defeat. "The 
 Duke of Hamilton, commissioner for the parliament 
 which then sat at Edinburgh, and the rest of the 
 ministry, were struck with such a panic, that some 
 of them were for retiring into England, others into 
 the western shires of Scotland, where all the people, 
 almost to a man, befriended them ; nor knew they 
 whether to abandon the government, or to stay a few 
 days until they saw what use my Lord Dundee would 
 make of his victory. They knew the rapidity of his 
 
 F
 
 82 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 motions, and were convinced that he would allow 
 them no time to deliberate. On this account it was 
 debated, whether such of the nobility and gentry as 
 were confined for adhering to their old master, should 
 be immediately set at liberty or more closely shut 
 up; and though the last was determined on, yet the 
 greatest revolutionists among them made private and 
 frequent visits to these prisoners, excusing what was 
 past, from a fatal necessity of the times, which obliged 
 them to give a seeming compliance, but protesting 
 that they always wished well to King James, as they 
 should soon have occasion to show when my Lord 
 Dundee advanced." 
 
 "The next morning after the battle," says Drum- 
 mond, "the Highland army had more the air of the 
 shattered remains of broken troops than of conquerors; 
 for here it was literally true that 
 
 ' The vanquished triumphed, and the victors mourned.' 
 
 The death of their brave general, and the loss of so 
 many of their friends, were inexhaustible fountains of 
 grief and sorrow. They closed the last scene of this 
 mournful tragedy in obsequies of their lamented 
 general, and of the other gentlemen who fell with 
 him, and interred them in the church of Blair of 
 Atholl with a real funeral solemnity, there not being 
 present one single person who did not participate in 
 the general affliction." 
 
 I close this notice of a great soldier and devoted
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 83 
 
 loyalist, by transcribing the beautiful epitaph com- 
 posed by Dr. Pitcairii : — 
 
 " Ultime Scotorum ! potuit, qno sospite solo, 
 
 Libertas patriae salva fiiisse tua3 : 
 Te moriente, novos accepit Scotia cives, 
 
 Accepitque novos, te moriente, deos. 
 Ilia nequit superesse tibi, tu non potes illi, 
 
 Ergo Caledonise nonien inane, vale. 
 Tuque vale, gentis priscse fortissime ductor, 
 
 Ultime Scotorum, ac ultime Grame, vale ! "
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 Sound the fife, and cry the slogan — 
 
 Let the pibroch shake the air 
 With its wild triumphal music, 
 
 Worthy of the freight we bear. 
 Let the ancient hills of Scotland 
 
 Hear once more the battle-song 
 Swell within their glens and valleys 
 
 As the clansmen march along ! 
 Never from the field of combat, 
 
 Never from the deadly fray, 
 Was a nobler trophy carried 
 
 Than we bring with us to-day ; 
 Never, since the valiant Douglas 
 
 On his dauntless bosom bore 
 Good King Eobert's heart — the priceless — 
 
 To our dear Kedeemer's shore ! 
 Lo ! we bring with us the hero — 
 
 Lo ! we bring the conquering Graeme, 
 Crowned as best beseems a victor 
 
 From the altar of his fame ;
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 85 
 
 Fresh and bleeding from the battle 
 
 Whence his spirit took its flight, 
 Midst the crashing charge of squadrons, 
 
 And the thunder of the iight ! 
 Strike, I say, the notes of triumph, 
 
 As we march o'er moor and lea ! 
 Is there any here will venture 
 
 To bewail our dead Dundee ? 
 Let the widows of the traitors 
 
 Weep until their eyes are dim ! 
 Wail ye may full well for Scotland — 
 
 Let none dare to mourn for him ! 
 See ! above his glorious body 
 
 Lies the royal banner's fold — 
 See ! his valiant blood is mingled 
 
 With its crimson and its gold. 
 See ! how calm he looks and stately. 
 
 Like a warrior on his shield, 
 Waiting till the flush of morning 
 
 Breaks along the battle-field ! 
 See — Oh never more, my comrades ! 
 
 Shall we see that falcon eye 
 Eedden with its inward lightning, 
 As the hour of fight drew nigh ; 
 Never shall we hear the voice that. 
 
 Clearer than the trumpet's call, 
 Bade us strike for King and Country, 
 Bade us win the field or fall !
 
 86 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 On the heights of Killiecrankie 
 
 Yester-morn our army lay : 
 Slowly rose the mist in columns 
 
 From the river's broken way ; 
 Hoarsely roared the swollen torrent, 
 
 And the pass was wrapped in gloom, 
 When the clansmen rose together 
 
 From their lair amidst the broom. 
 Then we belted on our tartans, 
 
 And our bonnets down we drew, 
 And we felt our broadswords' edges, 
 
 And we proved them to be true ; 
 And we prayed the prayer of soldiers, 
 
 And we cried the gathering-cry. 
 And we clasped the hands of kinsmen, 
 
 And we swore to do or die ! 
 Then our leader rode before us 
 
 On his war-horse black as night — 
 Well the Cameronian rebels 
 
 Knew that charger in the fight ! — 
 And a cry of exultation 
 
 From the bearded warriors rose ; 
 For we loved the house of Claver'se, 
 
 And we thought of good Montrose. 
 But he raised his hand for silence — 
 
 " Soldiers ! I have sworn a vow : 
 Ere the evening-star shall glisten 
 
 On Schehallion's lofty brow. 
 Either we shall rest in triumph, 
 Or another of the Graemes
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 87 
 
 Shall have died in battle-harness 
 
 For his Country and King James ! 
 Think upon the Royal Martyr — 
 
 Think of what his race endure — 
 Think on him whom butchers murder'd 
 
 On the field of Magus Muir : — 
 By his sacred blood I charge ye, 
 
 By the ruin'd hearth and shrine — 
 By the blighted hopes of Scotland, 
 
 By your injuries and mine — 
 Strike this day as if the anvil 
 
 Lay beneath your blows the while, 
 Be they Covenanting traitors, 
 
 Or the brood of false Argyle ! 
 Strike ! and drive the trembling rebels 
 
 Backwards o'er the stormy Forth ; 
 Let them tell their pale Convention 
 
 How they fared within the North. 
 Let them tell that Highland honour 
 
 Is not to be bought nor sold, 
 That we scorn their Prince's anger, 
 
 As we loathe his foreign gold. 
 Strike ! and when the fight is over, 
 
 If ye look in vain for me, 
 Where the dead are lying thickest. 
 
 Search for him that was Dundee ! " 
 
 Loudly then the hills re-echoed 
 
 With our answer to his call. 
 But a deeper echo sounded 
 
 In the bosoms of us all.
 
 88 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 For the lands of wide Breadalbane, 
 Not a man who heard him speak 
 Would tliat day have left tlie battle. 
 
 Burning eye and flushing cheek 
 Told the clansmen's fierce emotion, 
 
 And they harder drew their breath ; 
 For their souls were strong within them, 
 
 Stronger than the grasp of death. 
 Soon we heard a challenge-trumpet 
 
 Sounding in the pass below, 
 And the distant tramp of horses, 
 
 And the voices of the foe : 
 Down we crouched amid the bracken. 
 
 Till the Lowland ranks drew near. 
 Panting like the hounds in summer, 
 
 When they scent the stately deer. 
 From the dark defile emergincj, 
 
 Next we saw the squadrons come, 
 Leslie's foot and Leven's troopers 
 
 Marching to the tuck of drum ; 
 Through the scattered wood of birches. 
 
 O'er the broken ground and heath. 
 Wound the long battalion slowly, 
 
 Till they gained the field beneath ; 
 Then we bounded from our covert. — 
 
 Judge how looked the Saxons then. 
 When they saw the rugged mountain 
 
 Start to life with armed men ! 
 Like a tempest down the ridges, 
 Swept the hurricane of steel.
 
 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 89 
 
 Rose the slogan of Macdouakl — 
 
 Flashed tlie broadsword of Locheill ! 
 Vainly sped the withering volley 
 
 'Mougst the foremost of our band — 
 On we poured until we met them, 
 
 Foot to foot, and hand to hand. 
 Horse and man went down like drift-wood 
 
 When the floods are black at Yule, 
 And their carcasses are whirling 
 
 In the Garry's deepest pool. 
 Horse and man went down before us — 
 
 Living foe there tarried none 
 On the field of Killiecrankie, 
 
 When that stubborn fight was done ! 
 
 And the evening-star was shining 
 
 On Schehallion's distant head. 
 When we wiped our bloody broadswords. 
 
 And returned to count the dead. 
 There we found him, gashed and gory, 
 
 Stretch'd upon the cumbered plain, 
 As he told us where to seek him, 
 
 In the thickest of the slain. 
 And a smile was on his visage, 
 
 For within his dying ear 
 Pealed the joyful note of triumph. 
 
 And the clansmen's clamorous cheer: 
 So, amidst the battle's thunder, 
 
 Shot, and steel, and scorching flame, 
 In tlie glory of his manhood 
 
 Passed the spirit of the Gramme !
 
 90 THE BURIAL MARCH OF DUNDEE 
 
 Open wide the vaults of Athol, 
 
 Where the bones of heroes rest — 
 Open wide the hallowed portals 
 
 To receive another guest ! 
 Last of Scots, and last of freemen — 
 
 Last of all that dauntless race 
 Who would rather die unsullied 
 
 Than outlive the land's disgrace ! 
 thou lion-hearted warrior ! 
 
 Keck not of the after- time : 
 Honour may be deemed dishonour, 
 
 Loyalty be called a crime. 
 Sleep in peace with kindred ashes 
 
 Of the noble and the true, 
 Hands that never failed their country. 
 
 Hearts that never baseness knew. 
 Sleep !— and till the latest trumpet 
 
 Wakes the dead from earth and sea, 
 Scotland shall not boast a braver 
 
 Chieftain than our own Dundee !
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 The Massacre of Glencoe is an event which neither 
 can nor ought to be forgotten. It was a deed of the 
 worst treason and cruelty — a barbarous infraction of 
 all laws, human and divine ; and it exhibits in their 
 foulest perfidy the true characters of the authors and 
 abettors of the Revolution. 
 
 After the battle of Killiecrankie the cause of the 
 Scottish royalists declined, rather from the want of a 
 competent leader than from any disinclination on the 
 part of a large section of the nobility and gentry to 
 vindicate the right of King James. No person of 
 adequate talents or authority was found to supply the 
 place of the great and gallant Lord Dundee; for 
 General Cannon, who succeeded in command, was not 
 only deficient in military skill, but did not possess the 
 confidence, nor understand the character of the High- 
 land chiefs, who, with their clansmen, constituted by 
 far the most important section of the army. Accord- 
 ingly no enterprise of any importance was attempted ; 
 and the disastrous issue of the battle of the Boyne 
 led to a negotiation which terminated in the entire 
 disbanding of the royal forces. By this treaty, which
 
 92 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 was expressly sanctioned by William of Orange, a full 
 and unreserved indemnity and pardon was granted to 
 all of the Highlanders who had taken arms, with a 
 proviso that they should first subscribe the oath of 
 allegiance to William and Mary, before the 1st of 
 January, 1692, in presence of the Lords of the Scottish 
 Council, " or of the Sheriffs or their deputies of the 
 respective shires wherein they lived." The letter of 
 William addressed to the Privy Council, and ordering 
 proclamation to be made to the above effect, contained 
 also the following significant passage : — " That ye 
 communicate our pleasure to the Governor of Inver- 
 lochy, and other commanders, that they be exact and 
 diligent in their several posts ; but that they show no 
 more zeal against the Highlanders after their sub- 
 mission, than they have ever done formerly when these 
 vjerc in open rehellion." 
 
 This enigmatical sentence, which in reality was 
 intended, as the sequel will show, to be inter]3reted in 
 the most cruel manner, appears to have caused some 
 perplexity in the Council, as that body deemed it 
 necessary to apply for more distinct and specific in- 
 structions, which, however, were not then issued. It 
 had been especially stipulated by the chiefs, as an in- 
 dispensable preliminary to their treaty, that they should 
 have leave to communicate with King James, then 
 residing at St. Germains, for the purpose of obtaining 
 his permission and warrant previous to submitting 
 themselves to the existing government. That article
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 93 
 
 had been sanctioned by William before the proclama- 
 tion was issued, and a special messenger was despatched 
 to France for that purpose. 
 
 In the mean time, troops were gradually and cau- 
 tiously advanced to the confines of the Highlands, and, 
 in some instances, actually quartered on the inhabitants. 
 The condition of the country was perfectly tranquil. 
 No disturbances whatever occurred in the north or 
 west of Scotland; Locheill and the other chiefs were 
 awaiting the communication from St. Germains, and 
 held themselves bound in honour to remain inactive ; 
 whilst the remainder of the royalist forces (for whom 
 separate terms had been made) were left unmolested at 
 Dunkeld. 
 
 But rumours, which are too clearly traceable to the 
 emissaries of the new government, asserting the pre- 
 paration made for an immediate landing of King James 
 at the head of a large body of the French, were in- 
 dustriously circulated, and by many were implicitly 
 believed. The infamous policy which dictated such a 
 course is now apparent. The term of the amnesty or 
 truce granted by the proclamation expired with the 
 year 1691, and all who had not taken the oath of alle- 
 giance before that term, were to be proceeded against 
 with the utmost severity. The proclamation was issued 
 upon the 29th of August: consequently, only four 
 months were allowed for the complete submission of 
 the Highlands. 
 
 Not one of the chiefs subscribed until the mandate
 
 94 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 from King James arrived. That document, which is 
 dated from St. Germaius on the 12th of December 
 1691, reached Dunkeld eleven days afterwards, and, 
 consequently, but a very short tiaie before the indem- 
 nity expired. The bearer, Major Menzies, was so 
 fatigued that he could proceed no farther on his 
 journey, but forwarded the mandate by an express 
 to the commander of the royal forces, who was then at 
 Glengarry. It was therefore impossible that the docu- 
 ment could be circulated through the Highlands within 
 the prescribed period. Locheill, says Drummond of 
 Balhaldy, did not receive his copy till about thirty 
 hours before the tune was out, and appeared before the 
 sheriff at Inverara, where he took the oaths upon the 
 very day on which the indemnity expired. 
 
 That a general massacre throughout the Highlands 
 was contemplated by the Whig government, is a fact 
 established by overwhelming evidence. In the course 
 of the subsequent investigation before the Scots Parlia- 
 ment, letters were produced from Sir John Dalrymple, 
 then Master of Stair, one of the secretaries of state in 
 attendance upon the court, which too clearly indicate 
 the intentions of Wilham. In one of these, dated 1st 
 December 1694, — a month, be it observed, before the 
 amnesty expired — and addressed to Lieutenant-Colonel 
 Hamilton, there are the following words: — "The 
 winter is the only season in which we are sure the 
 Highlanders cannot escape us, nor carry their wives, 
 bairns, and cattle to the mountains." And in another 
 letter, written only two days afterwards, he says, —
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 95 
 
 " It is the only time that they cannot escape you, for 
 human constitution cannot endure to be long out of 
 houses. This is the proper season to maule them, in the 
 cold long nights." And in January thereafter, he in- 
 formed Sir Thomas Livingston that the design was 
 " to destroy entirely the country of Lochaher, Locheill's 
 lands, Keppoch's, Glengarry's, Appin, and Glencoe. 
 I assure you," he continues, "your power shall be full 
 enough, aiid I hope the soldiers ivill not trouble the 
 Government with prisoyiers." 
 
 Locheill was more fortunate than others of his friends 
 and neighbours. According to Drummond, — " Major 
 Menzies, who, upon his arrival, had observed the whole 
 forces of the kingdom ready to invade the Highlands, 
 as he wrote to General Buchan, foreseeing the unhappy 
 consequences, not only begged that general to send 
 expresses to all parts with orders immediately to 
 submit, but also wrote to Sir Thomas Livingston, 
 praying him to supplicate the Council for a prorogation 
 of the time, in regard that he was so excessively 
 fatigued, that he was obliged to stop some days to 
 repose a little ; and that though he should send ex- 
 presses, yet it was impossible they could reach the 
 distant parts in such time as to allow the several 
 persons concerned the benefit of the indemnity within 
 the space limited ; besides, that some persons having 
 put the Highlanders in a bad temper, he was confident 
 to persuade them to submit, if a further time were 
 allowed. Sir Thomas presented this letter to the 
 Council on the 5th of January, 1692, but they refused
 
 96 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 to give any answer, and ordered him to transmit the 
 same to Court." 
 
 The reply of William of Orange was a letter, 
 countersigned by Dalrymple, in which, upon the recital 
 that " several of the chieftains and many of their clans 
 had not taken the benefit of our gracious indemnity," 
 he gave orders for a general massacre. " To that end, 
 we have given Sir Thomas Livingston orders to employ 
 our troops (which we have already conveniently posted) 
 to cut off these obstinate rebels hy all manner of hos- 
 tility ; and we do require you to give him your 
 assistance and concurrence in all other things that may 
 conduce to that service ; and because these rebels, to 
 avoid our forces, may draw themselves, their families, 
 goods, or cattle, to lurk or be concealed among their 
 neighbours : therefore, we require and authorise you 
 to emit a proclamation to be published at the market- 
 crosses of these or the adjacent shires where the rebels 
 reside, discharging upon the highest penalties the law 
 allows, any reset, correspondence, or intercomrauning 
 with these rebels." This monstrous mandate, which 
 was in fact the death-warrant of many thousand in- 
 nocent people, no distinction being made of age or sex, 
 would, in all human probability, have been put into 
 execution, but for the remonstrance of one high-minded 
 nobleman. Lord Carmarthen, afterwards Duke of 
 Leeds, accidentally became aware of the proposed 
 massacre, and personally remonstrated with the mon- 
 arch against a measure which he denounced as at once 
 cruel and impolitic. After much discussion, William,
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 97 
 
 influenced rather by an apprehension that so savage 
 and sweeping an act might prove fatal to his new 
 authority, than by any compunction or impulse of 
 humanity, agreed to recall the general order, and to 
 limit himself, in the first instance, to a single deed of 
 butchery, by way of testing the temper of the nation. 
 Some difficulty seems to have arisen in the selection 
 of the fittest victim. Both Keppoch and Glencoe 
 were named, but the personal rancour of Secretary 
 Dalrymple decided the doom of the latter. The Secre- 
 tary wrote thus : — " Argyle tells me that Glencoe hath 
 not taken the oath, at which I rejoice. It is a great 
 work of charity to be exact in rooting out that 
 damnable set." The final instructions regarding 
 Glencoe, which were issued on 16th January, 1692, 
 are as follows : — 
 
 " William R. — As for M'lan of Glencoe, and that tribe, 
 if they can be well distinguished from the rest of the 
 Highlanders, it will be proper for public justice to extirpate 
 that set of thieves. " W. R." 
 
 This letter is remarkable as being signed and counter- 
 signed by William alone, contrary to the usual practice. 
 The Secretary was no doubt desirous to screen himself 
 from after responsibility, and was further aware that 
 the royal signature would insure a rigorous execution 
 of the sentence. 
 
 Macdonald, or, as he was more commonly designed, 
 M'lan of Glencoe, was the head of a considerable sept 
 or branch of the great Clan-Coila, and was lineally 
 
 G
 
 9? THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 descended from the ancient Lords of the Isles, and 
 from the royal family of Scotland — the common ances- 
 tor of the Macdonalds having espoused a daughter of 
 Eobert II. He was, according to a contemporary tes- 
 timony, " a person of great integrity, honour, good 
 nature, and courage ; and his loyalty to his old master, 
 King James, was such, that he continued in arms from 
 Dundee's first appearing in the Highlands, till the fatal 
 treaty that brought on his ruin." In common with 
 the other chiefs, he had omitted taking the benefit of 
 the indemnity until he received the sanction of King 
 James: but the copy of that document which was 
 forwarded to him, unfortunately arrived too late. The 
 weather was so excessively stormy at the time that 
 there was no possibility of penetrating from Glencoe 
 to Inverara, the place where the sheriff resided, before 
 the expiry of the stated period ; and M'lan accordingly 
 adopted the only practicable mode of signifying his 
 submission, by making his way with great difficulty to 
 Fort- William, then called Inverlochy, and tendering 
 his signature to the military Governor there. That 
 officer was not authorised to receive it, but at the 
 earnest entreaty of the chief, he gave him a certificate 
 of his appearance and tender, and on New-Year's day, 
 1692, M'lan reached Inverara, where he produced that 
 paper as evidence of his intentions, and prevailed upon 
 the sheriff. Sir James Campbell of Ardkinglass, to 
 administer the oaths required. After that ceremony, 
 which was immediately intimated to the Privy Council, 
 had been performed, the unfortunate gentleman returned
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 99 
 
 home, in the full conviction that he had thereby made 
 peace with government for himself and for his clan. 
 But his doom was already sealed. 
 
 A company of the Earl of Argyle's regiment had 
 been previously quartered in Glencoe. These men, 
 though Campbells, and hereditarily obnoxious to the 
 Macdonalds, Camerons, and other of the loyal clans, 
 were yet countrymen, and were kindly and hospitably 
 received. Their captain, Robert Campbell of Glenlyon, 
 was connected with the family of Glencoe through the 
 marriage of a niece, and was resident under the roof 
 of the chief. And yet this was the very troop selected 
 for the horrid service. 
 
 Special instructions were sent to the major of the 
 regiment, one Duncanson, then quartered at Balla- 
 chulish — a morose, brutal, and savage man — who 
 accordingly wrote to Campbell of Glenlyon in the 
 following terms : — 
 
 Ballacholis, 12 February, 1692. 
 
 " Sm, — You are hereby ordered to fall upon the rebels, 
 the M'Donalds of Glencoe, and putt all to the sword under 
 seventy. You are to have special care that the old fox and 
 his sons doe upon no account escape your hands. You are 
 to secure all the avenues, that no man escape. This you 
 are to put in execution att five o'clock in the morning 
 precisely, and by that time, or very shortly after it, I'll 
 strive to be att you with a stronger party. If I doe not 
 come to you at five, you are not to tarry for me, but to fall 
 on. This is by the king's speciall command, for the good 
 and safety of the country, that these miscreants be cutt ofi"
 
 loo THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 root and branch. See that this be putt in execution without 
 feud or favour, else you may expect to be treated aa not 
 true to the king's government, nor a man fitt to carry a 
 commission in the king's service. Expecting you will not 
 faill in the fulfilling hereof as you love yourself, I subscribe 
 these with my hand. .< Robert Duncanson. 
 
 " Fw their Majestys' service. 
 " To Captain Robert Campbell of Gle^ilymi." 
 
 This order was but too literally obeyed. At the 
 appointed hour, when the whole inhabitants of the 
 glen were asleep, the work of murder began. M'lan 
 was one of the first who fell. Drumniond's narrative 
 fills up the remainder of the dreadful story. 
 
 " They then served all within the family in the same 
 manner, without distinction of age or person. In a 
 word — for the horror of that execrable butchery must 
 give pain to the reader — they left none alive but a 
 young child, who, being frightened with the noise of 
 the guns, and the dismal shrieks and cries of its dying 
 parents, whom they were a-murdering, got hold of 
 Captain Campbell's knees, and wrapt itself within his 
 cloak ; by which, chancing to move compassion, the 
 captain inclined to have saved it, but one Drummond, 
 an officer, arriving about the break of day with more 
 troops, commanded it to be shot by a file of mus- 
 queteers. Nothing could be more shocking and horrible 
 than the prospect of these houses bestrewed with 
 mangled bodies of the dead, covered with blood, and 
 resounding with the groans of wretches in the last 
 agonies of life.
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE loi 
 
 " Two sons of Glencoe's were the only persons that 
 escaped in that quarter of the country ; for, growing 
 jealous of some ill designs from the behaviour of the 
 soldiers, they stole from their beds a few minutes 
 before the tragedy began, and, chancing to overhear 
 two of them discoursing plainly of the matter, they 
 endeavoured to have advertised their father, but, 
 finding that impracticable, they ran to the other end of 
 the country and alarmed the inhabitants. There was 
 another accident that contributed much to their safety ; 
 for the night was so excessively stormy and tempes- 
 tuous, that four hundred soldiers, who were appointed 
 to murder these people, were stopped in their march 
 from luverlochy, and could not get up till they had 
 time to save themselves. To cover the deformity of 
 so dreadful a sight, the soldiers burned all the houses 
 to the ground, after having rifled them, carried away 
 nine hundred cows, two hundred horses, numberless 
 herds of sheep and goats, and every thing else that 
 belonged to these miserable people. Lamentable was 
 the case of the women and children that escaped the 
 butchery ; the mountains were covered with a deep 
 snow, the rivers impassable, storm and tempest filled 
 the air and added to the horrors and darkness of the 
 night, and there were no houses to shelter them within 
 many miles."* 
 
 Such was the awful massacre of Glencoe, an event 
 which has left an indelible and execrable stain upon 
 the memory of William of Orange. The records of 
 * Memoirs of Sir Ewen Cameron of LocTieill. 
 
 LIBRARY 
 
 UNlVERSir:' C? CALIFORNIA 
 
 RIVERSIDE
 
 I02 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 Indian warfare can hardly afford a parallel instance 
 of atrocity : and this deed, coupled with his deliberate 
 treachery in the Darien scheme, whereby Scotland 
 was for a time absolutely ruined, is sufficient to 
 account for the little estimation in which the name of 
 the "great Whig deliverer" is still regarded in the 
 valleys of the ISTorth.
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 Do not lift him from the bracken, 
 
 Leave him lying where he fell — 
 Better bier ye cannot fashion : 
 
 None beseems him half so well 
 As the bare and broken heather, 
 
 And the hard and trampled sod, 
 Whence his angry soul ascended 
 
 To the judgment-seat of God ! 
 Winding-sheet we cannot give him — 
 
 Seek no mantle for the dead, 
 Save the cold and spotless covering 
 
 Showered from heaven upon his head. 
 Leave his broadsword, as we found it, 
 
 Bent and broken with the blow. 
 That, before he died, avenged him 
 
 On the foremost of the foe. 
 Leave the blood upon his bosom — 
 
 Wash not off that sacred stain : 
 Let it stiffen on tiie tartan, 
 
 Let his wounds unclosed remain,
 
 I04 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 Till the day when he shall show them 
 At the throue of God on high, 
 
 When the murderer and the murdered 
 Meet before their Judge's eye ! 
 
 Nay — ye should not weep, my cliildreu ! 
 
 Leave it to the faint and weak ; 
 Sobs are but a woman's weapon — ■ 
 
 Tears befit a maiden's cheek. 
 Weep not, children of Macdonald ! 
 
 Weep not thou, his orphan heir — 
 Not in shame, but stainless honour, 
 
 Lies thy slaughtered father there. 
 Weep not — but when years are over. 
 
 And thine arm is strong and sure. 
 And thy foot is swift and steady 
 
 On the mountain and the muir — 
 Let thy heart be hard as iron, 
 
 And thy wrath as fierce as fire, 
 Till the hour when vengeance cometh 
 
 For the race that slew thy sire ; 
 Till in deep and dark Glenlyon 
 
 Kise a louder shriek of woe 
 Than at midnight, from their eyrie, 
 
 Scared the eagles of Glencoe ; 
 Louder than the screams that mingled 
 
 With the liowling of the blast. 
 When the murderer's steel was clashing. 
 
 And the tires were risinfj fast ;
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 105 
 
 When thy noble father bounded 
 
 To the rescue of his men, 
 And the slogan of our kindred 
 
 Pealed throughout the startled glen ; 
 When the herd of frantic women 
 
 Stumbled through the midnight snow, 
 With their fathers' houses blazing, 
 
 And their dearest dead below. 
 Oh, the horror of the tempest, 
 
 As the Hashing drift was blown, 
 Crimsoned with the conilagration, 
 
 And the roofs went thundering down ! 
 Oh, the prayers — the prayers and curses 
 
 That together winged their flight 
 From the maddened hearts of many 
 
 Through that long and woeful night ! 
 Till the fires began to dwindle. 
 
 And tlie sliots grew faint and few. 
 And we heard the foeman's challenge 
 
 Only ill a fur halloo ; 
 Till the silence once more settled 
 
 O'er the gorges of the glen. 
 Broken only by the Cona 
 
 Plunging through its naked den. 
 Slowly from the mountain-summit 
 
 Was the drifting veil withdrawn, 
 And the ghastly valley glimmered 
 
 In the gray December dawn. 
 Better had the morning never 
 
 Dawned upon our dark despair '
 
 io6 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 Black amidst the common whiteness 
 
 Kose the spectral ruins there : 
 But the sight of these was nothing 
 
 More than wrings the wild dove's breast, 
 When she searches for her offspring 
 
 Eound the relics of her nest. 
 For in many a spot the tartan 
 
 Peered above the wintry heap, 
 Marking where a dead Macdonald 
 
 Lay within his frozen sleep. 
 Tremblingly we scooped the covering 
 
 From each kindred victim's head, 
 And the living lips were burning 
 
 On the cold ones of the dead. 
 And I left theui with their dearest — 
 
 Dearest charge had everyone — 
 Left the maiden with her lover, 
 
 Left the mother with her son. 
 I alone of all was mateless — 
 
 Far more wretched I than they, 
 For the snow would not discover 
 
 Where my lord and husband lay. 
 But I wandered up the valley 
 
 Till I found him Ivins low. 
 With the gash upon his bosom, 
 
 And the frown upon his brow — 
 Till I found him lying murdered 
 
 Where he wooed me long ago. 
 Woman's weakness shall not shame me ; 
 Why should I have tears to shed ?
 
 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 107 
 
 Could I rain them down like water, 
 
 my hero, on thy head, 
 Could the cry of lamentation 
 
 Wake thee from thy silent sleep, 
 Could it set thy heart a-throLbing, 
 It were mine to wail and weep. 
 But I will not waste my sorrow, 
 Lest the Campbell women say 
 That the daughters of Clanranald 
 
 Are as weak and frail as they. 
 I had wept thee hadst thou fallen, 
 Like our fathers, on thy shield, 
 When a host of English foemen 
 Camped upon a Scottish field ; 
 I had mourned thee hadst thou perished 
 
 With the foremost of his name, 
 When the valiant and the noble 
 
 Died around the dauntless Gramme. 
 But I will not wrong thee, luisband ! 
 
 With my unavailing cries, 
 Whilst thy cold and mangled body. 
 
 Stricken by the traitor, lies ; 
 Whilst he counts the gold and glory 
 That this hideous night has won. 
 And his heart is big with triumph 
 
 At the murder he has done. 
 Other eyes than mine shall glisten. 
 
 Other hearts be rent in twain. 
 Ere the heathbells on thy hillock 
 Wither in the autumn rain.
 
 io8 THE WIDOW OF GLENCOE 
 
 Then I '11 seek thee where thou sleepest, 
 
 And I '11 veil my weary head, 
 Praying for a place beside thee, 
 
 Dearer than my bridal-bed : 
 And I '11 give thee tears, my husband, 
 
 If the tears remain to me, 
 When the widows of the foemen 
 
 Cry the coronach for thee.
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 In consequence of a capitulation with Government, 
 the regular troops who had served under Lord Dundee 
 were transhipped to France, and, immediately upon 
 their landing, the officers and others had their rank 
 confirmed according to the tenor of the commissions 
 and characters which they bore in Scotland. They 
 were distributed throughout the different garrisons in 
 the north of France, and, though nominally in the 
 service of King James, derived their whole means of 
 subsistence from the bounty of the French monarch. 
 So long as it appeared probable that another descent 
 was meditated, those gentlemen, who were almost 
 without exception men of considerable family, assented 
 to this arrangement, but the destruction of the French 
 fleet under Admiral Tourville, off La Hogue, led to a 
 material change in their views. After that naval 
 engagement it became obvious that the cause of the 
 fugitive King was in the mean time desperate, and the 
 Scottish officers, with no less gallantry than honour, 
 volunteered a sacrifice which, so far as I know, has 
 hardly been equalled.
 
 no THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 The old and interesting pamphlet written by one 
 of the corps,* from which I have extracted most of 
 the following details, but which is seldom perused 
 except by the antiquary, states that, "The Scottish 
 officers, considering that, by the loss of the French 
 Fleet, King James's restoration would be retarded 
 for some time, and that they were burdensome to 
 the King of France, being entertained in garrisons 
 on whole pay, without doing duty, when he had 
 almost all Europe in confederacy against him, there- 
 fore humbly entreated King James to have them 
 reduced into a company of private sentinels, and 
 choose officers amongst themselves to command them, 
 assuring his majesty that they would serve in the 
 meanest circumstances, and undergo the greatest hard- 
 ships and fatigues that reason could imagine, or 
 misfortunes inflict, until it pleased God to restore 
 him. King James commended their generosity and 
 loyalty, but disapproved of what they proposed, and 
 told them it was impossible that gentlemen who had 
 served in so honourable posts as formerly they had 
 enjoyed, and lived in so great plenty and ease, could 
 ever undergo the fatigue and hardships of private 
 sentinels' duty. Again, that his own first command 
 was a company of officers, whereof several died, 
 others, wearied with fatigue, drew their discharges, 
 
 * An account of Dundee^ s Officers after they went to France. By 
 an Officer of the Army. Ijondon, 1714.
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS in 
 
 till at last it dwindled into nothing, and he got no 
 reputation by the command: therefore he desired 
 them to insist no more on that project. The officers 
 (notwithstanding his majesty's desire to the contrary) 
 made several interests at court, and harassed him so 
 much, that at last he condescended," and appointed 
 those who were to command them. 
 
 Shortly afterwards tlie new corps was reviewed for 
 the first and last time by the unfortunate James in 
 the gardens of Saint Germains, and the tears are said 
 to have gushed from his eyes at the sight of so many 
 brave men, reduced, through their disinterested and 
 persevering loyalty, to so very humble a condition. 
 " Gentlemen," said he, " my own misfortunes are not 
 so nigh my heart as yours. It grieves me beyond 
 what I can express to see so many brave and worthy 
 gentlemen, who had once the prospect of being the 
 chief officers in my army, reduced to the stations 
 of private sentinels. Nothing but your loyalty, and 
 that of a few of my subjects in Britain, who are forced 
 from their allegiance by the Prince of Orange, and 
 who, I know, will be ready on all occasions to serve 
 me and my distressed family, could make me willing 
 to live. The sense of what all of you have done 
 and undergone for your loyalty hath made so deep 
 an impression upon my heart, that, if it ever please 
 God to restore me, it is impossible I can be forgetful 
 of your services and sufferings. Neither can there be 
 any posts in the armies of my dominions but what
 
 112 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 you have just preteusions to. As for my son, your 
 Prince, he is of your own blood, a child capable of 
 any impression, and, as his education will be from you, 
 it is not supposable that he can forget your merits. 
 At your own desires you are now going a long march 
 far distant from me. Fear God and love one another. 
 Write your wants particularly to me, and depend upon 
 it always to find me your parent and King." The 
 scene bore a strong resemblance to one which many 
 years afterwards occurred at Fontainebleau. The com- 
 pany listened to his words with deep emotion, gathered 
 round him, as if half repentant of their own desire to 
 go, and so parted, for ever on this earth, the dethroned 
 monarch and his exiled subjects. 
 
 The number of this company of ofticers was about 
 one hundred and twenty : their destination was Per- 
 pignan in Rousillon, close upon the frontier of Spain, 
 where they were to join the army under the command 
 of the Mareschal de JSToailles. Their power of endurance, 
 though often most severely tested in an unwholesome 
 climate, seems to have been no less remarkable than 
 their gallantry, which upon many occasions called forth 
 the warm acknowledgment of the French commanders. 
 " Le gentilhonime^' said one of the generals, in acknow- 
 ledgment of their readiness at a peculiarly critical 
 moment, " est toujoiirs gentilhomme, et se monirc toujours 
 tel dans hcs&in et dans le danger " — a eulogy as applicable 
 to them as it was in later days to La Tour d' Auvergne, 
 styled the first grenadier of France. At Perpignan
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 113 
 
 they were joined by two other Scottish companies, and 
 the three seem to have continued to serve together for 
 several campaigns. 
 
 As a proof of the estimation in which they were 
 hehl, I shall merely extract a short account of the 
 taking of llosas in Catalonia, before referring to the 
 exploit which forms the subject of the following 
 ballad. " On the 27th of May, the company of officers 
 and other Scottish companies, were joined by two 
 companies of Irish, to make up a battalion in order 
 to mount the trenches; and the major part of 
 the officers listed themselves in the company of 
 grenadiers, under the command of the brave Major 
 llutherford, who, on his way to the trenches, in 
 sight of Mareschal de Noailles and his court, marched 
 with his company on the side of the trench, which 
 exposed him to the fire of a bastion, where there 
 were two culverins and several other guns planted ; 
 likewise to the fire of two curtins lined with small 
 shot. Colonel Brown, following with the battalion, 
 was obliged, in honour, to march the same way 
 Major Eutherford had done ; the danger whereof 
 the Mareschal immediately perceiving, ordered one 
 of his aides-de-camp to command Paitherford to 
 march under cover of the trench, which he did ; 
 and if he had but delayed six minutes, the grenadiers 
 and battalion had been cut to pieces. Eutherford, 
 with his grenadiers, marched to a trench near the 
 town, and the battalion to a trench on the rear and 
 
 H
 
 114 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 flank of the grenadiers, who fired so incessantly on 
 the besieged, that they thought (the trench being 
 practicable) they were going to make their attacks, 
 innnediately beat a chamade, and were willing to 
 crive up the town upon reasonable terms : but the 
 Mareschal's demands were so exorbitant, that the 
 Governor could not agree to them. Then tiring 
 began on both sides to be very hot; and they in 
 the town, seeing how the grenadiers lay, killed eight 
 of them. When the Governor surrendered the town, 
 he inquired of the Mareschal what countrymen these 
 crrenadiers were; and assured him it was on their 
 account he delivered up the town, because they fired 
 so hotly, that he beheved they were resolved to 
 attack the breach. He answered, smiling, ' Ges sont 
 mes en/ants— Thej are my children.' Again ; ' they are 
 the King of Great Britain's Scottish officers, who, 
 to show their willingness to share of his miseries, 
 have reduced themselves to the carrying of arms, 
 and chosen to serve under my command.' The next 
 day, when the Mareschal rode along the front of 
 the camp, he halted at the company of the officers' 
 piquet, and they all surrounded him. Then, with 
 his hat in his hand, he thanked them for their good 
 services in the trenches, and freely acknowledged it 
 was their conduct and courage which compelled the 
 Governor to give up the town; and assured them 
 he would acquaint his master with the same, which 
 he did. For when his son arrived with the news
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 115 
 
 at Versailles, the King, having read the letter, imme- 
 diately took coach to St. Germains ; and when he had 
 shown King James the letter, he thanked him for 
 the services his subjects had done in taking Eosas 
 in Catalonia; who, with concern, replied, they were 
 the stock of his British officers, and that he was 
 sorry he could not make better provision for them." 
 
 And a miserable provision it was ! They were 
 gradually compelled to part with every remnant of 
 the property which they had secured from the ruins 
 of their fortunes ; so that when they arrived, after 
 various adventures, at Scelestat, in Alsace, they were 
 literally without the common means of subsistence. 
 Famine and the sword had, by this time, thinned their 
 ranks, but had not diminished their spirit, as the 
 following narrative of their last exploit will show : — 
 
 "In December 1697, General Stirk, who commanded 
 for the Germans, appeared with 1G,000 men on the 
 other side of the Ehine, which obliged tlie Marquis de 
 Sell to draw out all the garrisons in Alsace, who made 
 up about 4000 men ; and he encamped on the other 
 side of the Ehine, over against General Stirk, to 
 prevent his passing the Ehine and carrying a bridge 
 over into an island in the middle of it, which the 
 French foresaw would be of great prejudice to them. 
 For the enemy's guns, placed on that island, would 
 extremely gall their camp, which they could not hinder 
 for the deepness of the water and their wanting of 
 boats — for which the Marquis quickly sent ; but
 
 ii6 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 arriving too late, the Germans had carried a bridge 
 
 over into the island, where they had posted above five 
 
 hundred men, who, by order of their engineers, 
 
 intrenched themselves : which the company of officers 
 
 perceiving, who always grasped after honour, and 
 
 scorned all thoughts of danger, resolved to wade the 
 
 river, and attack the Germans in the island ; and for 
 
 that effect, desired Captain John Foster, who then 
 
 commanded them, to beg of the Marquis that they 
 
 might have liberty to attack the Germans in the 
 
 island ; who told Captain Foster, when the boats came 
 
 up, they should be the first that attacked. Foster 
 
 courteously thanked the Marquis, and told him they 
 
 would wade into the island, who shrunk up his 
 
 shoulders, prayed God to bless them, and desired 
 
 them to do what they pleased." Whereupon the 
 
 officers, with the other two Scottish companies, made 
 
 themselves ready; and having secured their arms 
 
 round their necks, waded into the river hand-in-hand, 
 
 "according to the Highland fashion," with the water 
 
 as high as their breasts ; and having crossed the heavy 
 
 stream, fell upon the Germans in their intrenchment. 
 
 These were presently thrown into confusion, and 
 
 retreated, breaking down their own bridges, whilst 
 
 many of them were drowned. This movement, having 
 
 been made in the dusk of the evening, partook of the 
 
 character of a surprise; but it appears to me a very 
 
 remarkable one, as having l3een effected under such 
 
 circumstances, in the dead of winter, and in the face
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 117 
 
 of an enemy who possessed the advantages both of 
 position and of numerical superiority. The author of 
 the narrative adds : — " When the Marquis de Sell 
 heard the firing, and understood that the Germans 
 were heat out of the island, he made the sign of the 
 cross on his face and breast, and declared publicly, that 
 it was the bravest action that ever he saw, and that his 
 army had no honour by it. As soon as the boats came, 
 the Marquis sent into the island to acquaint the officers 
 that he would send them both troops and provisions, 
 who thanked his Excellency, and desired he should be 
 informed that they wanted no troops, and could not 
 spare time to make use of provisions, and only desired 
 spades, shovels, and pickaxes, wherewith they might 
 intrench themselves — which were immediately sent to 
 them. The next morning, the Marquis came into the 
 island, and kindly embraced every officer, and thanked 
 them for the good service they had done his master, 
 assuring them he would write a true account of their 
 honour and bravery to the Court of France, which, 
 at the reading his letters, immediately went to St. 
 Germains, and thanked King James for the services 
 his subjects had done on the Ehine." 
 
 The company kept possession of the island for nearly 
 six weeks, notwithstanding repeated attempts on the 
 part of the Germans to surprise and dislodge them ; 
 but all these having been defeated by the extreme 
 watchfulness of the Scots, General Stirk at length 
 drew off his army and retreated. " In consequence of
 
 ii8 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 this action," says the chronicler, " that island is called 
 at present Isle d'Ecosse, and will in likelihood bear 
 that name until the general conflagration." 
 
 Two years afterwards, a treaty of peace was con- 
 cluded ; and this gallant company of soldiers, worthy 
 of a better fate, was broken up and dispersed. At the 
 time when the narrative, from which I have quoted so 
 freely, was compiled, not more than sixteen of Dundee's 
 veterans were alive. The author concludes thus, — "And 
 tlius was dissolved one of the best companies that ever 
 marched under command ! Gentlemen, who, in the 
 midst of all their pressures and obscurity, never forgot 
 they were gentlemen; and whom the sweets of a brave, 
 a just, and honourable conscience, rendered perhaps 
 more happy under those sufferings, than the most 
 prosperous and triumphant in iniquity, since our minds 
 stamp our happiness." 
 
 Some years ago, while visiting the ancient Scottish 
 convent at Eatisbon, my attention was drawn to the 
 monumental inscriptions on the walls of the dormitory, 
 many of which bear reference to gentlemen of family 
 and distinction, whose political principles had in- 
 volved them in the troubles of 1688, 1715, and 1745. 
 Whether the cloister which now holds their dust had 
 afforded them a shelter in the later years of their 
 misfortunes, I know not; but for one that is so 
 commemorated, hundreds of the exiles must have 
 passed away in obscurity, buried in the field on 
 which they fell, or carried from the damp vaults of
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 119 
 
 the military hospital to the trench, without any token 
 of reniemhrance, or any other wish beyond that which 
 the minstrels have ascrilDed to one of the greatest of 
 our olden heroes — 
 
 " Oh bury me by the bracken bush, 
 Beneath the blooming brier : 
 Let never living mortal ken 
 That a kindly Scot lies here ! "
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 The Ehine is running deep and red, 
 
 The island lies before — 
 " Now is there one of all the host 
 
 Will dare to venture o'er ? 
 For not alone the river's sweep 
 
 Might make a brave man quail : 
 The foe are on the further side, 
 
 Their shot comes fast as hail. 
 God help us, if the middle isle 
 
 We may not hope to win ! 
 Now, is there any of the host 
 
 Will dare to venture in ? " 
 
 II. 
 
 " The ford is deep, the banks are steep. 
 
 The island-shore lies wide : 
 Nor man nor horse could stem its force, 
 
 Or reach the further side. 
 See there ! amidst the willow boughs 
 
 The serried bayonets gleam ;
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 121 
 
 They've Hung their bridge — they've won the isle ; 
 
 The foe have crossed the stream ! 
 Their volley flashes sharp and strong — 
 
 By all the Saints, I trow, 
 There never yet was soldier born 
 
 Could force that passage now ! " 
 
 III. 
 
 So spoke the bold French Mareschal 
 
 With him who led the van, 
 Wliilst rough and red before their view 
 
 The turbid river ran. 
 'Nov bridge nor boat had they to cross 
 
 The wild and swollen Ehine, 
 And thundering on the other bank 
 
 Far stretched the German line. 
 Hard by there stood a swarthy man 
 
 Was leaning on his sword, 
 And a saddened smile lit up his face 
 
 As he heard the Captain's word. 
 " I 've seen a wilder stream ere now 
 
 Than that which rushes there ; 
 I 've stemmed a heavier torrent yet 
 
 And never thought to dare. 
 If German steel be sharp and keen, 
 
 Is ours not strong and true ? 
 There may be danger in the deed. 
 
 But there is honour too."
 
 122 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 IV. 
 
 The old lord in his saddle turned, 
 
 And hastily he said — 
 " Hath bold Diiguesclin's fiery heart 
 
 Awakened from the dead ? 
 Thou art the leader of the Scots — 
 
 Now well and sure I know, 
 That gentle blood in dangerous hour 
 
 Ne'er yet ran cold nor slow, 
 And I have seen ye in the fight 
 
 Do all that mortal may : 
 If honour is the boon ye seek 
 
 It may be won this day. 
 The prize is in the middle isle, 
 
 There lies the venturous way ; 
 And armies twain are on the plain, 
 
 The daring deed to see — 
 Now ask thy gallant company 
 
 If they will follow thee ! " 
 
 Itight gladsome looked the Captain tlien. 
 
 And nothing did he say, 
 But he turned him to his little band — 
 
 Oh few, I ween, were they ! 
 The relics of the bravest force 
 
 That ever fought in fray.
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 123 
 
 No one of all that company 
 
 But bore a gentle name, 
 Not one whose fathers had not stood 
 
 In Scotland's fields of fame. 
 All they had marched with great Dundee 
 
 To where he fought and fell, 
 And in the deadly battle-strife 
 
 Had venged their leader well ; 
 And they had bent the knee to earth 
 
 When every eye was dim, 
 As o'er their hero's buried corpse 
 
 They sang the funeral hymn ; 
 And they had trod the Pass once more. 
 
 And stooped on either side 
 To pluck the heather from the spot 
 
 Where he had dropped and died ; 
 And they had bound it next their hearts, 
 
 And ta'en a last farewell 
 Of Scottish earth and Scottish sky, 
 
 Where Scotland's glory fell. 
 Then went they forth to foreign lands 
 
 Like bent and broken men, 
 Who leave their dearest hope behind, 
 
 And may not turn again ! 
 
 YI. 
 
 " The stream," he said, " is broad and deep, 
 And stubborn is the foe —
 
 124 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 Yon island-strength is guarded well — 
 
 Say, brothers, will ye go ? 
 From home and kin for many a year 
 
 Our steps have wandered wide, 
 And never may our bones be laid 
 
 Our fathers' graves beside. 
 No sisters have we to lament, 
 
 No wives to wail our fall ; 
 The traitor's and the spoiler's hand 
 
 Have reft our hearths of all. 
 But we have hearts, and we have arms 
 
 As strong to will and dare 
 As when our ancient banners flew 
 
 Within the northern air. 
 Come, brothers ; let me name a spell 
 
 Shall rouse your souls again, 
 And send the old blood bounding free 
 
 Through pulse, and heart, and vein ! 
 Call back the days of bygone years — 
 
 Be young and strong once more ; 
 Think yonder stream, so stark and red. 
 
 Is one we 've crossed before. 
 Else, hill and glen ! rise, crag and wood ! 
 
 Else up on either hand — 
 Again upon the Garry's banks, 
 
 On Scottish soil we stand ! 
 Again I see the tartans wave. 
 
 Again the trumpets ring ; 
 Again I hear our leader's call — 
 
 ' Upon them, for the King ! '
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 125 
 
 Stayed we behind that glorious day 
 
 For roaring flood or linn ? 
 The soul of Graeme is with us still — 
 
 Now, brothers ! will ye in ? " 
 
 VII. 
 
 No stay — no pause. With one accord 
 
 They grasped each others' hand, 
 And plunged into the angry flood, 
 
 That bold and dauntless band. 
 High flew the spray above their heads, 
 
 Yet onward still they bore, 
 Midst cheer, and shout, and answering yell, 
 
 And shot and cannon roar, 
 ' Now by the Holy Cross ! I swear. 
 
 Since earth and sea began 
 Was never such a daring deed 
 
 Essayed by mortal man ! " 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Thick blew the smoke across the stream. 
 
 And faster flashed the flame : 
 The water plashed in hissing jets 
 
 As ball and bullet came. 
 Yet onwards pushed the Cavaliers 
 
 All stern and undismayed. 
 With thousand armed foes before. 
 
 And none behind to aid.
 
 126 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 Once, as they iieared the middle stream, 
 
 So strong the torrent swept, 
 That scarce that long and living wall, 
 
 Their dangerous footing kept. 
 Then rose a warning cry behind, 
 
 A joyous shout before : 
 " The current 's strong — the way is long — 
 
 They '11 never reach the shore ! 
 See, see ! They stagger in the midst, 
 
 They waver in their line ! 
 Fire on the madmen ! break their ranks, 
 
 And whelm them in the Ehine ! " 
 
 IX. 
 
 Have you seen the tall trees swaying 
 
 When the blast is piping shrill. 
 And the whirlwind reels in fury 
 
 Down the gorges of the hill ? 
 How they toss their mighty branches, 
 
 Striving with the tempest's shock ; 
 How they keep their place of vantage, 
 
 Cleaving firmly to the rock ? 
 Even so the Scottish warriors 
 
 Held their own against the river ; 
 Though the water flashed around them. 
 
 Not an eye was seen to quiver ; 
 Though the shot flew sharp and deadly, 
 
 Not a man relaxed his hold :
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 127 
 
 For their hearts were big and thrilling 
 
 With the mighty thoughts of old. 
 One word was spoke among them, 
 
 And through the ranks it spread — 
 " Eemember our dead Claverhouse ! " 
 
 Was all the Captain said. 
 Then, sternly bending forward, 
 
 They struggled on awhile, 
 Until they cleared the heavy stream, 
 
 Then rushed towards the isle. 
 
 The German heart is stout and true, 
 
 The German arm is strong ; 
 The German foot goes seldom back 
 
 Where arm^d foemen throng. 
 But never had they faced in field 
 
 So stern a charge before, 
 And never had they felt the sweep 
 
 Of Scotland's broad claymore. 
 Not fiercer pours the avalanche 
 
 Adown the steep incline, 
 That rises o'er the parent springs 
 
 Of rough and rapid Eliine — 
 Scarce swifter shoots the bolt from heaven 
 
 Than came the Scottish band, 
 Right up against the guanled trench, 
 
 And o'er it, sword in hand.
 
 128 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 In vain their leaders forward press — 
 
 They meet the deadly brand ! 
 lonely island of the Ehine, 
 
 Where seed was never sown, 
 What harvest lay upon thy sands, 
 
 By those strong reapers thrown ? 
 What saw the winter moon that night. 
 
 As, struggling through the rain, 
 She poured a wan and fitful light 
 
 On marsh, and stream, and plain ? 
 A dreary spot with corpses strewn. 
 
 And bayonets glistening round ; 
 A broken bridge, a stranded boat, 
 
 A bare and battered mound ; 
 And one huge watch-fire's kindled pile, 
 
 That sent its quivering glare 
 To tell the leaders of the host 
 
 The conquering Scots were there ! 
 
 XL 
 
 And did they twine the laurel-wreath 
 
 For those who fought so well ? 
 And did they honour those who lived, 
 
 And weep for those who fell ? 
 What meed of thanks was given to them 
 
 Let aged annals tell. 
 Why should they twine the laurel-wreath- 
 
 Why crown the cup with wine ?
 
 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 129 
 
 It was not Frenchman's blood that flowed 
 
 So freely on the Rhine — 
 A strang;er band of befjgared men 
 
 Had done the venturous deed : 
 The glory was to France alone, 
 
 The danger was their meed. 
 And what cared they for idle thanks 
 
 From foreign prince and peer ? 
 What virtue had such honeyed words 
 
 The exiles' hearts to cheer ? 
 What mattered it that men should vaunt, 
 
 And loud and fondly swear, 
 That higher feat of chivalry 
 
 Was never wrouoht elsewhere ? 
 They bore within their breasts the grief 
 
 That fame can never heal — 
 The deep, unutterable woe 
 
 Which none save exiles feel. 
 Their hearts were yearning for the land 
 
 They ne'er might see again — 
 For Scotland's high and heathered hills, 
 
 For mountain, loch, and glen — 
 For those who haply lay at rest 
 
 Beyond the distant sea, 
 Beneath the green and daisied turf 
 
 Where they would gladly be ! 
 
 XII. 
 
 Long years went by. The lonely isle 
 In Hhine's impetuous flood 
 
 I
 
 130 THE ISLAND OF THE SCOTS 
 
 Has ta'en another name from those 
 
 Who boucrht it with their blood : 
 And though the legend does not live, 
 
 For legends lightly die, 
 The peasant, as he sees the stream 
 
 In winter rolling by, 
 And foaming o'er its channel-bed 
 
 Between him and the spot 
 Won by the warriors of the sword, 
 Still calls that deep and dangerous ford 
 
 The Passage of the Scot.
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 Though the sceptre had departed from the House of 
 Stuart, it was reserved for one of its last descendants 
 to prove to the world, by his personal gallantry and 
 noble spirit of enterprise, that he at least had not 
 degenerated from his royal line of ancestors. The 
 daring effort of Charles Edward to recover the crown 
 of these kingdoms for his father, is to us the most 
 remarkable incident of the last century. It was 
 honourable alike to the Prince and to those who 
 espoused his cause; and, even in a political point of 
 view, the outbreak ought not to be deplored, since its 
 failure put an end for ever to the dynastical struggle 
 which, for more than half a century, had agitated the 
 whole of Britain, established the rule of law and of 
 social order throughout the mountainous districts of 
 Scotland, and blended Celt and Saxon into one pros- 
 perous and united people. It was better that the 
 antiquated system of clanship should have expired in 
 a blaze of glory, than gradually dwindled into con- 
 tempt ; better that the patriarchal rule should at once 
 have been extinguished by the dire catastrophe of 
 Culloden, than that it should have lingered on, the
 
 132 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 shadow of an old tradition. There is nothing now to 
 prevent us from dweUing with pride and admiration 
 on the matchless devotion displayed by the High- 
 landers, in 1745, in behalf of the heir of him whom 
 they acknowledged as their lawful king. No feeling 
 can arise to repress the interest and the sympathy 
 which is excited by the perusal of the tale narrating 
 the sufferings of the princely wanderer. That un- 
 bought loyalty and allegiance of the heart, which 
 would not depart from its constancy until the tomb 
 of the Vatican had closed upon tlie last of the Stuart 
 line, has long since been transferred to the consti- 
 tutional sovereign of these realms ; and the en- 
 thusiastic welcome which has so often greeted the 
 return of Queen Victoria to her Highland home, owes 
 its origin to a deeper feeling than that dull respect 
 which modern liberalism asserts to be the only tribute 
 due to the first magistrate of the land. 
 
 The campaign of 1745 yields in romantic interest 
 to none which is written in history. A young and 
 inexperienced prince, whose person was utterly un- 
 known to any of his adherents, landed on the west 
 coast of Scotland, not at the head of a foreign force, 
 not munimented with supplies and arms, but accom- 
 panied by a mere handful of followers, and ignorant 
 of the language of the people amongst whom he was 
 hazarding his person. His presence in Scotland had 
 not been urged by the chiefs of the clans, most of whom 
 were deeply averse to embarking in an enterprise
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 133 
 
 which must involve them in a war with so powerful 
 an antagonist as England, and which, if unsuccessful, 
 could only terminate in the utter ruin of their fortunes. 
 This was not a cause in which the whole of Scotland 
 was concerned. Although it was well known that 
 many leading families in the Lowlands entertained 
 Jacobite opinions, and although a large proportion of 
 the common people had not yet become reconciled to, 
 or satisfied of, the advantages of the Union, by which 
 they considered themselves dishonoured and betrayed, 
 it was hardly to be expected that, without some fair 
 guarantee for success, the bulk of the Scottish nation 
 would actively bestir themselves on the side of the 
 exiled family. Besides this, even amongst the High- 
 landers there was not unanimity of opinion. The 
 three northern clans of Sutherland, Mackay, and 
 Monro, were known to be staunch supporters of the 
 Government. It was doubtful what part might be 
 taken in the struggle by those of Mackenzie and Eoss. 
 The chiefs of Skye, who could have brought a large 
 force of armed men into the field, had declined parti- 
 cipating in the attempt. The assistance of Lord Lovat, 
 upon whom the co-operation of the Erasers might 
 depend, could not be calculated on with certainty ; 
 and nothing but hostility could be expected from the 
 powerful sept of tlie Campbells. Lender such circum- 
 stances, it is little wonder if Cameron of Locheill, 
 the most sagacious of all the chieftains who favoured 
 the Stuart cause, was struck with consternation and
 
 134- CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 alarm at the news of the Prince's landing, or that he 
 attempted to persuade him from undertaking an ad- 
 venture so seemingly hopeless. Mr. Eobert Chambers, 
 in his admirable history of that period, does not in the 
 least exaggerate the imj^ortance of the interview, on 
 the result of which the prosecution of the war depended. 
 " On arriving at Borrodale, Locheill had a private 
 interview with the Prince, in which the probabilities 
 of the enterprise were anxiously debated. Charles 
 used every argument to excite tlie loyalty of Locheill, 
 and the chief exerted all his eloquence to persuade the 
 Prince to withdraw till a better opportunity. Charles 
 represented the present as the best possible opportu- 
 nity, seeing that the French general kept the British 
 army completely engaged abroad, while at home there 
 were no troops but one or two newly-raised regiments. 
 He expressed his confidence that a small body of 
 Highlanders would be sufficient to gain a victory over 
 all the force that could now be brought against him ; 
 and he was equally sure that such an advantage was 
 all that was required to make his friends at home 
 declare in his favour, and cause those abroad to send 
 him assistance. All he wanted was that the High- 
 landers should begin the war. Locheill still resisted, 
 entreating Charles to be more temperate, and consent 
 to remain concealed wliere he was, till his friends should 
 meet together and concert what was best to be done. 
 Charles, whose mind was wound up to the utmost 
 pitch of impatience, j)aid no regard to this proposal,
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 135 
 
 hut answered that he was determined to put all to the 
 hazard. ' In a few days/ said he, ' with the few friends 
 I have, I will raise the royal standard, and proclaim 
 to the people of Britain that Charles Stuart is come 
 over to claim the crown of his ancestors — to win it, or 
 to perish in the attempt ! Locheill — who, my father 
 has often told me, was our firmest friend — may stay at 
 home, and learn from the newspapers the fate of his 
 Prince ! ' * No ! ' said Locheill, stung by so poignant 
 a reproach, and hurried away by the enthusiasm of 
 the moment ; ' I will share the fate of my Prince, and 
 so shall every man over whom nature or fortune has 
 given me any power.' Such was the juncture upon 
 which depended the civil war of 1745; for it is a point 
 agreed, says Mr. Home, who narrates this conversation, 
 that if Locheill had persisted in his refusal to take 
 arms, no other chief would have joined the standard, 
 and the spark of rebellion must have been instantly 
 extinguished." Not more than twelve hundred men 
 were assembled in Glenfinnan on the day when the 
 standard was unfurled by the Marquis of Tullibardine, 
 and, at the head of this mere handful of followers, 
 Charles Edward commenced the stupendous enterprise 
 of reconquering the dominions of his fathers. 
 
 With a force which, at the l)attle of Preston, did 
 not double the above numbers, the Prince descended 
 upon the Lowlands, having battled the attempts of 
 General Cope to intercept his march — occupied the 
 city of Perth and the town of Dundee, and finally,
 
 136 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 after a faint show of resistance on the part of the 
 burghers, took possession of the ancient capital of 
 Scotland, and once more established a court in the 
 halls of Holyrood. His youth, his gallantry, and the 
 grace and beauty of his person, added to a most 
 winning and affable address, acquired for him the 
 sympathy of many who, from political motives, ab- 
 stained from becoming his adherents. Possibly certain 
 feelings of nationality, which no deliberate views of 
 civil or religious policy could altogether extirpate, 
 led such men to regard, with a sensation akin to pride, 
 the spectacle of a prince descended from the long line 
 of Scottish kings, again occupying his ancestral seat, 
 and restoring to their country, which had been utterly 
 neglected by the new dynasty, a portion of its former 
 state. No doubt a sense of pity for the probable fate 
 of one so young and chivalrous was often present 
 to their minds, for they had thorough confidence in 
 the intrepidity of the regular troops, and in the 
 capacity of their commander; and they never for a 
 moment supposed that these could be successfully 
 encountered by a raw levy of undisciplined High- 
 landers, ill-armed and worse equipped, and without 
 the support of any artillery. 
 
 The issue of the battle of Prestonpans struck Edin- 
 V)urgh with amazement. In point of numbers the two 
 armies were nearly equal, but in every thing else, 
 save personal valour, the royal troops had the advan- 
 tage. And yet, in four minutes — for the battle is said
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 137 
 
 not to have lasted longer — the Highlanders having 
 only made one terrific and impetuous charge — the 
 rout of the regulars was general. The infantry was 
 broken and cut to pieces ; the dragoons, who behaved 
 shamefully on the occasion, turned bridle and fled, 
 without having once crossed swords with the enemy. 
 Mr. Chambers thus terminates his account of the 
 action: "The general result of the battle of Preston 
 raay be stated as having been the total overthrow and 
 almost entire destruction of the royal army. Most of 
 the infantry, falling upon the park walls of Preston, 
 were there huddled together, without the power of 
 resistance, into a confused drove, and liad either to 
 surrender or to l^e cut to pieces. Many, in vainly 
 attempting to climb over the walls, fell an easy prey 
 to the ruthless claymore. Nearly 400, it is said, were 
 thus slain, 700 taken, while only about 170 in all 
 succeeded in effecting their escape. 
 
 "The dragoons, with worse conduct, were much 
 more fortunate. In falling back, they had the good 
 luck to find outlets from their respective positions by 
 the roads which ran along the various extremities of 
 the park wall, and they thus got clear through the 
 village with little slaughter ; after which, as the High- 
 landers had no horse to pursue tiiem, they were safe. 
 Several officers, among whom were Fowkes and Lascelles, 
 escaped to Cockenzie and along Seton Sands, in a 
 direction contrary to the general flight. 
 
 "The unfortunate Cope had attempted, at the first;
 
 138 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 break of Gardiner's dragoons, to stop and rally them, 
 but was borne headlong, with the confused bands, 
 through the narrow road to the south of the enclosures, 
 notwithstanding all his efforts to the contrary. On 
 getting beyond the village, where he was joined by 
 the retreating bands of the other regiment, he made 
 one anxious effort, with the Earls of Loudoun and 
 Home, to form and bring them back to charge the 
 enemy, now disordered by the pursuit; but in vain. 
 They fled on, ducking their heads along their horses' 
 necks to escape the bullets which the pursuers occa- 
 sionally sent after them. By using great exertions, 
 and holding pistols to the heads of the troopers, Sir 
 John and a few of his officers induced a small number 
 of them to halt in a field near St. Clement's Wells, 
 about two miles from the battle-ground. But, after 
 a momentary delay, the accidental firing of a pistol 
 renewed the panic, and they rode off once more in 
 great disorder. Sir John Cope, with a portion of 
 them, reached Channelkirk at an early hour in the 
 forenoon, and there halted to breakfast, and to write 
 a brief note to one of the state-officers, relating the 
 fate of the day. He then resumed his flight, and 
 reached Coldstream that night. Next morning he 
 proceeded to Berwick, whose fortifications seemed 
 competent to give the security he required. He every- 
 where brought the first tidings of his own defeat." 
 
 This victory operated very much in favour of Prince 
 Charles. It secured him, for a season, the undisputed
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 139 
 
 possession of Scotland, and enabled numerous adherents 
 from all parts of the country to raise such forces as 
 they could command, and to repair to his banner. 
 His popularity in Edinburgh daily increased, as the 
 qualities of his person and mind became known ; 
 and such testimony as the following, with respect to 
 his estimation by the fair sex, and the devotion they 
 exhibited in his cause, is not overcharsred. " His 
 affability and great personal grace wrought him high 
 favour with the ladies, who, as we learn from the 
 letters of President Forbes, became generally so 
 zealous in his cause, as to have some serious effect in 
 inducing their admirers to declare for the Prince. 
 There was, we know for certain, a Miss Lumsden, 
 who plainly told her lover, a young artist, named 
 Piobert Strange, that he might think no more of her 
 unless he should immediately join Prince Charles, and 
 thus actually prevailed upon him to take up arms. It 
 may be added that he survived the enterprise, escaped 
 with great difficulty, and married the lady. He was 
 afterwards the best line -engraver of his time, and 
 received the honour of knighthood from George III. 
 White ribbons and breastknots became at this time 
 conspicuous articles of female attire in private as- 
 semblies. The ladies also showed considerable zeal 
 in contributing plate and other articles for the use of 
 the Chevalier at the palace, tmd iu raising pecuniary 
 subsidies for him. Many a posset-dish and snufi'-box, 
 many a treasured necklace and repeater, many a jewel
 
 140 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 whicli had adorned its successive generations of family 
 beauties, was at this time sold or laid in pledge, 
 to raise a little money for the service of Prince 
 Charlie." 
 
 As to the motives and intended policy of this 
 remarkable and unfortunate young man, it may be 
 interesting to quote the terms of the proclamation 
 which he issued on the 10th October, 1745, before 
 commencing his march into England. Let his history 
 be impartially read, his character, as spoken to by 
 those who knew him best, fairly noted, and I think 
 there cannot be a doubt tliat, had he succeeded in his 
 daring attempt, he would have been true to the letter 
 of his word, and fulfilled a pledge which Britain never 
 more required than at the period when that document 
 was penned : — 
 
 "Do not the pulpits and congregations of the 
 clergy, as well as your weekly papers, ring with the 
 dreadful threats of popery, slavery, tyranny, and 
 arbitrary power, which are now ready to be imposed 
 upon you by the formidable powers of France and 
 Spain ? Is not my royal father represented as a 
 bloodthirsty tyrant, breatliing out nothing but de- 
 struction to all who will not immediately embrace 
 an odious religion ? Or have I myself been better 
 used ? ?>ut listen only to the naked truth. 
 
 " I, with my own money, hired a small vessel. Ill- 
 supplied with money, arms, or friends, I arrived in 
 Scotland, attended by seven persons. I publish the
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 141 
 
 King my father's declaration, and proclaim his title, 
 with pardon in one hand, and in the other liberty of 
 conscience, and the most solemn promises to grant 
 whatever a free Parliament shall propose for the hap- 
 piness of a people. I have, I confess, the greatest 
 reason to adore the goodness of Almighty God, who 
 has in so remarkable a manner protected me and my 
 small army through the many dangers to which we 
 were at first exposed, and who has led me in the way 
 to victory, and to the capital of this ancient kingdom, 
 amidst the acclamations of the King my father's 
 subjects. Why, then, is so much pains taken to spirit 
 up the minds of the people against this my under- 
 taking ? 
 
 " The reason is obvious ; it is, lest the real sense of 
 the nation's present sufferings should blot out the 
 remembrance of past misfortunes, and of the outcries 
 formerly raised against the royal family. Whatever 
 miscarriages might have given occasion to them, they 
 have been more than atoned for since ; and the nation 
 has now an opportunity of being secured against the 
 like in future. 
 
 "That our family has suffered exile during these 
 fifty-seven years everybody knows. Has the nation, 
 during that period of time, been the more happy and 
 flourishing for it ? Have you found reason to love 
 and cherish your governors as the fathers of the 
 people of Great Britain and Ireland? Has a family, 
 upon whom a faction unlawfully bestowed the diadem
 
 142 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 of a rightful prince, retained a due sense of so great a 
 trust and favour ? Have you found more humanity 
 and condescension in those who were not born to a 
 crown, than in my royal forefathers ? Have their 
 ears been open to the cries of the people ? Have 
 they, or do they consider only the interests of these 
 nations ? Have you reaped any other benefit from 
 them than an immense load of debt ? If I am 
 answered in the affirmative, why has their govern- 
 ment been so often railed at in all your public assem- 
 blies ? Why has the nation been so long crying out 
 in vain for redress against the abuse of Parliaments, 
 upon account of their long duration, the multitude of 
 placemen, which occasions their venality, the introduc- 
 tion 01 penal laws, and, in general, against the 
 miserable situation of the kingdom at home and 
 abroad ? All these, and many more inconveniences, 
 must now be removed, unless the people of Great 
 Britain be already so far corrupted that they will not 
 accept of freedom when offered to them, seeing the 
 King, on his restoration, will refuse nothing that a free 
 Parliament can ask for the security of the religion, 
 laws, and liberty of his people. 
 
 " It is now time to conclude ; and I shall do it with 
 this reflection. Civil wars are ever attended with 
 rancour and ill-will, which party rage never fails to 
 produce in the minds of those whom different interests, 
 principles or views, set in opposition to one another. 
 I, therefore, earnestly require it of my friends to give
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 143 
 
 as little loose as possible to such passions : this will 
 prove the most effectual means to prevent the same 
 in the enemies of my royal cause. And this my 
 declaration will vindicate to all posterity the noble- 
 ness of my undertaking, and the generosity of my 
 intentions." 
 
 There was much truth in the open charges preferred 
 in this declaration against the existing government. 
 The sovereigns of the house of Hanover had always 
 shown a marked predilection for their Continental 
 possessions, and had proportionally neglected the 
 affairs of Britain. Under Walpole's administration 
 the imperial Parliament had degenerated from an 
 independent assembly to a junta of placemen, and the 
 most flagitious system of bribery was openly practised 
 and avowed. It was not without reason that Charles 
 contrasted the state of the nation then, with its 
 position when under the rule of the legitimate family ; 
 and had there not been a strong, though, I think, 
 unreasonable suspicion in the minds of many, that his 
 success would be the prelude to a vigorous attack 
 upon the established religions of the country, and that 
 he would be inclined to follow out in this respect the 
 fatal policy of his grandfather, Charles would in all 
 probability have received a more active and general 
 support than was accorded to him. The zeal with 
 which the Episcopalian party in Scotland espoused 
 his cause, naturally gave rise to the idea that the 
 attempt of the Prince was of evil omen to Presbytery ;
 
 144 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 and the settlement of the Church upon its present 
 footing was yet so recent, that the sores of the old 
 feud were still festering and green. The established 
 clergy, therefore, were, nearly to a man, opposed to his 
 pretensions ; and one minister of Edinburgh, at the 
 time when the Highland host was in possession of the 
 city, had the courage to conclude his prayer nearly in 
 the following terms — " Bless the king ; Thou knows 
 what king I mean — may his crown long sit easy on 
 his head. And as to this young man who has come 
 among us to seek an earthly crown, we beseech Thee 
 in mercy to take him to Tliyself, and give him a crown 
 of glory ! " At the same time, it is very curious to 
 observe, that the most violent sect of Presbyterians, 
 who might be considered as the representatives of the 
 extreme Cameronian principle, and who had early 
 seceded from the Church, and bitterly opposed the 
 union of the kingdoms, were not indisposed, on certain 
 terms, to coalesce with the Jacobites. It is hardly 
 possible to understand the motives which actuated 
 these men, who appear to have regarded each 
 successive government as equally obnoxious. Some 
 writers go the length of averring that, in 1688, a 
 negociation was opened by one section of the 
 Covenanters with Lord Dundee, with the object of 
 resistance to the usurpation of William of Orange, 
 and that the project was frustrated only by the death 
 of that heroic nobleman. Sir Walter Scott — a great 
 authority — seems to have been convinced that sucli
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 145 
 
 was the case; but, in the absence of direct proof, I 
 can hardly credit it. It is perfectly well known that 
 a conspiracy was formed by a certain section of the 
 Cameronian party to assassinate Lords Dundee and 
 Dunfermline whilst in attendance at the meeting of 
 Estates; and, although the recognition of William as 
 king might not have been palatable to others who 
 held the same opinions, it would be a strange thing 
 if they had so suddenly resolved to assist Dundee 
 in his efforts for the exiled family. But the political 
 changes in Scotland, more especially the union, seem 
 to have inspired some of these men with a spirit of 
 disaffection to the government; for, according to 
 Mr. Chambers, the most rigid sect of Presbyterians 
 had, since the revolution, expressed a strong desire 
 to coalesce with the Jacobites, with the hope, in case 
 the house of Stuart were restored, to obtain what 
 they called a covenanted king. Of this sect one 
 thousand had assembled in Dumfriesshire at the first 
 intelligence of the insurrection, bearing arms and 
 colours, and supposed to contemplate a junction with 
 the Chevalier. But these religionists were now almost 
 as violently distinct from the Established Church 
 of Scotland as ever they had been from those of 
 England and Eome, and had long ceased to play a 
 prominent part in the national disputes. The Established 
 clergy, and the greater part of their congregations, 
 were averse to Charles upon considerations perfectly 
 moderate, at the same time not easy to be shaken. 
 
 K
 
 146 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 On commencing his march into England, Charles 
 fonnd himself at the head of an army of between five 
 thousand and six thousand men, which force was 
 considered strong enough, with the augmentations it 
 might receive on the way, to effect tlie occupation 
 of London. Had the English Jacobites performed 
 their part with the same zeal as the Scots, it is 
 more than probable that the attempt would have been 
 crowned with success. As it was, the Prince succeeded 
 in reducing the strong fortified town of Carlisle, and 
 in marching, without opposition, through tlie heart 
 of England, as far as Derby, within one hundred 
 miles of the metropolis. But here his better genius 
 deserted him. Discord had crept into his councils ; 
 for some of the chiefs became seriously alarmed at 
 finding that the gentry of England were not prepared 
 to join the expedition, but preferred remaining at 
 home inactive spectatoi's of the contest. Except at 
 Manchester, they had received few or no recruits. 
 No tidings had reached them from Wales, a country 
 supposed to be devoted to the cause of King James, 
 whilst it was well known that a large force was 
 already in arms to oppose the clans. Mr. Chambers 
 gives us the following details. "At a council of war 
 held on the morning of the 5th December, Lord 
 George Murray and the other members gave it as 
 their unanimous opinion that the army ought to 
 return to Scotland. Lord George pointed out that 
 they were about to be environed by three armies,
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 147 
 
 amounting collectively to about thirty thousand men, 
 while their own forces were not above five thousand, 
 if so many. Supposing an unsuccessful engagement 
 with any of these armies, it could not be expected 
 that one man would escape, for the militia would 
 beset every road. The Prince, if not slain in the battle, 
 must fall into the enemy's hands: the whole world 
 would blame them as fools for running into such a 
 risk. Ciiarles answered, that he regarded not his 
 own danger. He pressed, with all the force of argu- 
 ment, to go forward. He did not doubt, he said, 
 that the justice of his cause would prevail. He 
 was hopeful that there might be a defection in the 
 enemy's army, and that many would declare for 
 him. He was so very bent on putting all to the 
 risk, that the Duke of Perth was for it, since his 
 lioyal Highness was. At last he proposed going 
 to Wales instead of returning to Carlisle ; but every 
 other officer declared his opinion for a retreat. These 
 are nearly the words of Lord George Murray. We 
 are elsewhere told that the Prince condescended to 
 use entreaties to induce his adherents to alter their 
 resolution. ' Eather than go back,' he said, ' I would 
 wish to be twenty feet under ground ! ' His chagrin, 
 when he found his councillors obdurate, was beyond 
 all bounds. The council broke up, on the under- 
 standing that the retreat was to commence next 
 morning. Lord George volunteering to take the place 
 of honour in the rear, provided only that he should 
 not be troubled with the baggage."
 
 148 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 This resolution was received by the army with 
 marks of unequivocal vexation. Eetreat, in their 
 estimation, was little less than overthrow ; and it 
 was most galling to find that, after all their labours, 
 hazards, and toils, they were doomed to disappointment 
 at the very moment when the prize seemed ready for 
 their grasp. That the movement was an injudicious 
 one is, I think, obvious. We are told, upon good 
 authority, " that the very boldness of the Prince's 
 onward movement, especially taken into connexion 
 with the expected descent from France, had at 
 length disposed the English Jacobites to come out ; 
 and many were just on the point of declaring 
 themselves, and marching to join his army, when 
 the retreat from Derby was determined on. A Mr. 
 Barry arrived in Derby two days after the Prince 
 left it, with a message from Sir Watkin William 
 Wynne and Lord Barrymore, to assure him, in the 
 names of many friends of the cause, that they were 
 ready to join him in what manner he pleased, either 
 in the capital, or every one to rise in his own county, 
 I have likewise been assured that many of the Welsh 
 gentry had actually left their homes, and were on 
 the way to join Charles, when intelligence of his 
 retreat at once sent them all back peaceably, convinced 
 that it was now too late to contribute their assistance. 
 These men, from the power they had over their tenantry, 
 could have added materially to his military force. In 
 fact, from all that appears, we must conclude that
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 149 
 
 the insurgents had a very considerable chance of 
 success from an onward movement — also, no doubt, 
 a chance of destruction, and yet not worse than what 
 ultimately befell many of them — while a retreat broke 
 in a moment the spell which their gallantry had 
 conjured up, and gave the enemy a great advantage 
 over them." 
 
 One victory more was accorded to Prince Charles, 
 before his final overthrow. After successfully con- 
 ducting his retreat to Scotland, occupying Glasgow, 
 and strengthening his army by the accession of new 
 recruits, he gave battle to the royal forces under 
 General Hawley at Falkirk, and, as at Preston, 
 drove them from the field. The parties were on 
 this occasion fairly matched, there being about eight 
 thousand men engaged on either side. The action 
 was short ; and, though not so decisive as the former 
 one, gave great confidence to the insurgents. It has 
 been thus picturesquely portrayed by the historian 
 of the enterprise : " Some individuals, who beheld 
 the battle from the steeple of Falkirk, used to 
 describe these, its main events, as occupying a 
 surprisingly brief space of time. They first saw 
 the English army enter the misty and storm-covered 
 muir at the top of the hill ; then saw the dull 
 atmosphere thickened by a fast-rolling smoke, and 
 heard the pealing sounds of the discharge; immediately 
 after, they beheld the discomfited troops burst wildly 
 from the cloud in which they had been involved, and
 
 I50 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 rush, in far-spread disorder, over the face of the hill. 
 From the commencement of what they styled ' the 
 hreak of the battle,' there did not intervene more 
 than ten minutes — so soon may an efficient body 
 of men become, by one transient emotion of cowardice, 
 a feeble and contemptible rabble. 
 
 " The rout would have been total, but for the three 
 out-flanking regiments. These not having been opposed 
 by any of the clans, having a ravine in front, and 
 deriving some support from a small body of dragoons, 
 stood their ground under the command of General 
 Huske and Brigadier Cholmondley. When the High- 
 landers went past in pursuit, they received a volley 
 from this part of the English army, which brought 
 them to a pause, and caused them to draw back to 
 their former ground, their impression being that some 
 ambuscade was intended. This saved the English 
 army from destruction. A pause took place, during 
 which the bulk of the English infantry got back 
 to Ealkirk. It was not until Lord George Murray 
 brought up the second line of his wing and the 
 pickets, with some others on the other wing, that 
 General Huske drew off his party, which he did in 
 good order." 
 
 The seat of war was now removed to the North. 
 The month of April, 174G, found Prince Charles in 
 possession of Inverness, with an army sorely dwindled 
 in numbers, and in great want of necessaries and 
 provisions. Many of the Highlanders had retired for
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 151 
 
 the winter to their native glens, and had not yet 
 rejoined the standard. The Duke of Cumberland, 
 who now commanded the English army, with a 
 reputation not diminished by the unfortunate issue 
 of Fontenoy, was at the head of a large body of 
 tried and disciplined troops, in the best condition, and 
 supported by the powerful arm of artillery. He 
 effected the passage of the Spey, a large and rapid 
 river which intersects the Highlands, without en- 
 countering any opposition, and on the loth of the 
 month had arrived at Nairn, about nine miles distant 
 from the position occupied by his kinsman and 
 opponent. His superiority in point of strength was 
 so great that the boldest of the insurgent chiefs 
 hesitated as to the policy of giving immediate battle, 
 and nothing but the desire of covering Inverness 
 prevented the council from recommencing a further 
 retreat into the mountains, where they could not 
 have been easily followed, and where they were certain 
 to have met with reinforcements. As to the Prince, 
 his confidence in the prowess of the Highlanders was 
 so unbounded, that, even with such odds against him, 
 he would not listen to a proposal for delay. 
 
 There yet remained, says Mr. Chambers, before 
 playing the great stake of a pitched battle, one 
 chance of success by the irregular mode of warfare 
 to which the army was accustomed, and Charles 
 resolved to put it to trial. This was a night-attack 
 upon the camp of the Duke of Cumberland. He
 
 152 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 rightly argued that if his men could approach without 
 being discovered, and make a simultaneous attack in 
 more than one place, the royal forces, then probably 
 either engaged in drinking their commander's health 
 (the 15th happened to be the anniversary of the 
 Duke's birthday, and was celebrated as such by his 
 army), or sleeping off the effects of the debauch, must 
 be completely surprised and cut to pieces, or at least 
 effectually routed. The time appointed for setting out 
 upon the march was eight in the evening, when day- 
 light should have completely disappeared, and, in the 
 mean time, great pains were taken to conceal the 
 secret from the army. 
 
 This resolution was entered into at three in the 
 afternoon, and orders were given to collect the men 
 who had gone off in search of provisions. The officers 
 dispersed themselves to Inverness and other places, 
 and besought the stragglers to repair to the muir. 
 But, under the influence of hunger, they told their 
 commanders to shoot them, if they pleased, rather 
 than compel them to starve any longer. Charles had 
 previously declared, with his characteristic fervour, 
 that though only a thousand of his men should 
 accompany him, he would lead them on to the attack, 
 and he was not now intimidated when he saw twice 
 that number ready to assist in the enterprise, though 
 some of his officers . would willingly have made this 
 deficiency of troops an excuse for abandoning what 
 they esteemed at best a hazardous expedition. Having
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 153 
 
 given out for watchword the name of his father, he 
 embraced Lord George Murray, who was to command 
 the foremost cohimu, and, putting himself at the head 
 of that which followed, gave the order to march. 
 
 The attempt proved peculiarly unfortunate, and, 
 from the fatigue which it occasioned to the Highlanders, 
 contributed in a great degree towards the disaster of 
 the following day. The night chanced to be uncom- 
 monly dark, and as it was well known that Cumberland 
 had stationed spies on the principal roads, it became 
 necessary to select a devious route, in order to effect 
 a surprise. The columns, proceeding over broken 
 and irregular ground, soon became scattered and 
 dislocated : no exertions of the officers could keep the 
 men together, so that Lord George Murray at two 
 o'clock found that he was still distant three miles from 
 the hostile camp, and that there were no hopes of com- 
 mencing the attack before the break of day, when 
 they would be open to the observation of the enemy. 
 Under these circumstances a retreat was commenced ; 
 and the scheme, which at one time seemed to hold out 
 every probability of success, was abandoned. 
 
 " The Highlanders returned, fatigued and discon- 
 solate, to their former position, about seven in the 
 morning, when they immediately addressed themselves 
 to sleep, or went away in search of provisions. So 
 scarce was food at this critical juncture, that the Prince 
 himself, on retiring to Culloden House, could obtain 
 no better refreshment than a little bread and whisky.
 
 154 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 He felt the utmost anxiety regarding his men, among 
 whom the pangs of hunger, upon bodies exhausted by 
 fatigue, must have been working effects most unpro- 
 mising to his success ; and he gave orders, before 
 seeking any repose, that the whole country should now 
 be mercilessly ransacked for the means of refreshment. 
 His orders were not without effect. Considerable 
 supplies were procured, and subjected to the cook's art 
 at Inverness ; but the poor famished clansmen were 
 destined never to taste these provisions, the hour of 
 battle arriving before they were prepared." 
 
 About eleven in the forenoon, the troops of Cumber- 
 land were observed upon the eastern extremity of the 
 wide muir of Culloden, and preparations were instantly 
 made for the coming battle. The array had been 
 strengthened that morning by the arrival of the 
 Keppoch Macdonalds and a party of the Erasers ; but 
 even with these reinforcements the whole available 
 force which the Prince could muster was about five 
 thousand men, to oppose at fearful odds an enemy 
 twice as numerous, and heavily supported by artillery. 
 Fortune on this day seemed to have deserted the 
 Prince altogether. In drawing out the line of battle, 
 a most unlucky arrangement was made by 0' Sullivan, 
 who acted as adjutant, whereby the Macdonald regi- 
 ments were removed from the right wing — the place 
 which the great clan Colla has been privileged to 
 hold in Scottish array ever since the auspicious battle 
 of Bannockburn. To those who are not acquainted
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 155 
 
 with the peculiar temper and spirit of the Highlanders, 
 and their punctilio upon points of honour and pre- 
 cedence, the question of arrangement will naturally 
 appear a matter of little importance. But it was not 
 so felt by the Macdonalds, who considered their change 
 of position as a positive degradation, and who further 
 looked upo]i it as an evil omen to the success of the 
 battle. The results of this mistake will be explained 
 immediately. 
 
 Just before the commencement of the action, the 
 weather, which had hitherto been fair and sunny, 
 became overcast, and a heavy blast of rain and sleet 
 beat directly in the faces of the Highlanders. The 
 English artillery then began to play upon them, and, 
 being admirably served, every discharge told with 
 fearful effect upon the ranks. The chief object of 
 either party at the battle of Culloden seems to have 
 been to force its opponent to leave his position, and to 
 commence the attack. Cumberland, finding tliat his 
 artillery was doing such execution, had no occasion to 
 move ; and Charles appears to have committed a great 
 error in abandoning a mode of warfare which was 
 peculiarly suited for his troops, and which, on two 
 previous occasions, had proved eminently successful. 
 Had he at once ordered a general charge, and attempted 
 to silence the guns, the issue of the day might have 
 been otherwise : but his unfortunate star prevailed. 
 
 " It was not," says Mr. Chambers, " till the can- 
 nonade had continued nearly half an hour, and the
 
 156 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 Highlanders had seen many of their kindred stretched 
 upon the heath, that Charles at last gave way to the 
 necessity of ordering a charge. The aide-de-camp 
 intrusted to carry his message to the Lieutenant- 
 general — a youth of the name of Maclachlan — was 
 killed by a cannon-hall before he reached the first 
 line, but the general sentiment of the army, as re- 
 ported to Lord George Murray, supplied the want, and 
 that general took it upon him to order an attack with- 
 out Charles's permission having been communicated. 
 
 "Lord George had scarcely determined upon order- 
 ing a general movement, when the IMacintoshes, a 
 brave and devoted clan, though not before engaged 
 in action, unable any longer to brook the unavenged 
 slaughter made by the cannon, broke from the centre 
 of the line, and rushed forward through smoke and 
 snow to mingle with the enemy. The Athole men, 
 Camerons, Stuarts, Erasers, and Macleans also went on, 
 Lord George Murray heading them with that rash 
 bravery befitting the commander of such forces. Thus, 
 in the course of one or two minutes, the charge was 
 general along the whole line, except at the left ex- 
 tremity, where the Macdonalds, dissatisfied with their 
 position, hesitated to engage. 
 
 " The action and event of the onset were, through- 
 out, quite as dreadful as the mental emotion which 
 urged it. Notwithstanding; that the three files of the 
 front line of English poured forth their incessant fire 
 of musketry — notwithstanding that the cannon, now
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 157 
 
 loaded with grapeshot, swept the field as with a hail- 
 storm — notwithstanding the flank fire of Wolfe's 
 regiment — onward, onward went the headlong High- 
 landers, flinging themselves into, rather than rushing 
 upon, the lines of the enemy, which, indeed, they did 
 not see for smoke, till involved among the weapons. 
 All that courage, all that despair could do, was done. 
 It was a moment of dreadful and agonising suspense, 
 but only a moment — for the whirlwind does not reap 
 the forest with greater rapidity than the Highlanders 
 cleared the line. Nevertheless, almost every man in 
 their front rank, chief and gentleman, fell before the 
 deadly weapons which they had braved ; and, although 
 the enemy gave way, it was not till every bayonet was 
 bent and bloody with the strife. 
 
 " When the first line had thus been swept aside, the 
 assailants continued their impetuous advance till they 
 came near the second, when, being almost annihilated 
 by a profuse and well-directed fire, the shattered 
 remains of what had been before a numerous and con- 
 fident force began to give way. Still a few rushed on, 
 resolved rather to die than forfeit their well-acquired 
 and dearly-estimated honour. They rushed on; but 
 not a man ever came in contact with the enemy. The 
 last survivor perished as he reached the points of the 
 bayonets." 
 
 Some idea of the determination displayed by the 
 Highlanders in this terrific charge may be gathered 
 from the fact that, in one part of the field, their bodies
 
 158 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 were afterwards found in layers of three and four 
 deep. The slaughter was fearful, for, out of the five 
 regiments which charged the English, almost all the 
 leaders and men in the front rank were killed. So 
 shaken was the English line, that, had the Macdonald 
 regiments, well-known to yield in valour to none of 
 the clans, come up, the fortune of the day might 
 have been altered. But they never made an onset. 
 Smarting and sullen at the affront which they con- 
 ceived to have been put upon their name, they bore 
 the fire of the English regiments without flinching, 
 and gave way to their rage by hewing at the heather 
 with their swords. In vain their chiefs exhorted them 
 to go forward : even at that terrible moment the pride 
 of clanship prevailed. " My God ! " cried Macdonald 
 of Keppoch, " has it come to this, that the children of 
 my tribe have forsaken me ! " and he rushed forward 
 alone, sword in hand, with the devotion of an ancient 
 hero, and fell pierced with bullets. 
 
 The Lowland and foreign troops which formed the 
 second line were powerless to retrieve the disaster. 
 All was over. The rout became general, and the 
 Prince was forced from the field, which he would not 
 quit, until dragged from it by his immediate body- 
 guard. 
 
 Such was the last battle, the residt of civil war, 
 which has been fought on British soil. Those who 
 were defeated have acquired as mtich glory from it 
 as the conquerors — and even more, for never was a
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 159 
 
 conquest sullied by such deeds of deliberate cruelty as 
 were perpetrated upon the survivors of the battle of 
 Culloden. It is not, however, the object of the present 
 paper to recount these, or even the romantic history 
 or hairbreadth escapes of the Prince, whilst wandering 
 on the mainland and through the Hebrides. Although 
 a reward of thirty thousand pounds — an immense sum 
 for the period — was set upon his head — although his 
 secret was known to hundreds of persons in every walk 
 of life, and even to the beggar and the outlaw — not one 
 attempted to betray him. Not one of all his followers, 
 in the midst of the misery which overtook them, 
 regretted having drawn the sword in his cause, or 
 would not again have gladly imperilled their lives for 
 the sake of their beloved Chevalier. "He went," 
 says Lord Mahon, "but not with him departed his 
 remembrance from the Highlanders. For years and 
 years did his name continue enshrined in their hearts 
 and familiar to their tongues, their plaintive ditties 
 resounding with his exploits and inviting his return. 
 Again, in these strains, do they declare themselves 
 ready to risk life and fortune for his cause ; and even 
 maternal fondness — the strongest, perhaps, of all 
 human feelings — yields to the passionate devotion to 
 Prince Charlie." 
 
 The subsequent life of the Prince is a story of 
 melancholy interest. We find him at first received in 
 France with all the honours duo to one who, though 
 unfortunate, had exhibited a heroism rarely equalled
 
 i6o CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 and never surpassed: gradually he was neglected and 
 slighted, as one of a doomed and unhappy race, whom 
 no human exertion could avail to elevate to their 
 former seat of power; and finally, when his presence 
 in France became an obstacle to the conclusion of 
 peace, he was violently arrested and conveyed out of 
 the kingdom. There can be little doubt that con- 
 tinued misfortune and disappointment had begun very 
 early to mipair his noble mind. For long periods he 
 was a wanderer, lost sight of by his friends and even 
 by his father and brother. There are fragments of 
 his writing extant which show how poignantly he felt 
 the cruelty of his fortune. " De vivre et pas vivre est 
 beaucoup plus que de mourir!" And again, writing 
 to his father's secretary, eight years after Culloden, he 
 says — "I am grieved that our master should think 
 that my silence was either neglect or want of duty; 
 but, in reality, my situation is such that I have nothing 
 to say but imprecations against the fatality of being 
 born in such a detestable age." An unhappy and 
 uncongenial marriage tended still more to embitter his 
 existence ; and if at last he yielded to frailties, which 
 inevitably insure degradation, it must be remembered 
 that his lot had been one to which few men have ever 
 been exposed, and the magnitude of his sufferings 
 may faii'ly be admitted as some palliation for his 
 weakness. 
 
 To the last, his heart was with Scotland. The fol- 
 lowing anecdote was related by his brother, Cardinal
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES i6i 
 
 York, to Bishop Walker, the late Primus of the 
 Episcopal Church of Scotland : — " Mr. Greathead, a 
 personal friend of Mr. Fox, succeeded, when at Home 
 in 1782 or 1783, in obtaining an interview with 
 Charles Edward; and, being alone with him for some 
 time, studiously led the conversation to his enterprise 
 in Scotland, and to the occurrences which succeeded 
 the failure of that attempt. The Prince manifested 
 some reluctance to enter upon these topics, appearing 
 at the same time to undergo so much mental suffering, 
 that his guest regretted the freedom he had used in 
 calling up the remembrance of his misfortunes. At 
 length, however, the Prince seemed to shake off the 
 load which oppressed him ; his eye brightened, his face 
 assumed unwonted animation, and he entered upon 
 the narrative of his Scottish campaigns with a distinct 
 but somewhat vehement energy of manner — recounted 
 his marches, his battles, his victories, his retreats, and 
 his defeats — detailed his hairbreadth escapes in the 
 Western Isles, the inviolable and devoted attachment 
 of his Highland friends, and at length proceeded to 
 allude to the terrible penalties with which the chiefs 
 among them had been visited. But here the tide of 
 emotion rose too high to allow him to go on — his voice 
 faltered, his eyes became fixed, and he fell convulsed 
 on the floor. The noise brought into his room his 
 daughter, the Duchess of Albany, who happened to be 
 in an adjoining apartment. ' Sir,' she exclaimed, 'what 
 is this ? You have been speaking to my father about 
 
 L
 
 i62 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 Scotland aud the Highlanders ! No one dares to 
 mention those subjects in his presence.'" 
 
 He died on the 30th of January, 1788, in the arms 
 of the Master of Nairn, The monument erected to 
 him, his father, and brother, in St. Peter's, by desire 
 of George IV., was perhaps the most graceful tribute 
 ever paid by royalty to misfortune — KhGio cineri 
 PiETAS Eegia.
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 ON THE ANNIVERSARY OF CULLODEN 
 
 Take away that star and garter — 
 
 Hide them from my aching sight : 
 Neither king nor prince shall tempt me 
 
 From my lonely room this night ; 
 Fitting for the throneless exile 
 
 Is the atmosphere of pall, 
 And the gusty winds that shiver 
 
 'Neath the tapestry on the wall. 
 When the taper faintly dwindles 
 
 Like the pulse within the vein, 
 That to gay and merry measure 
 
 Ne'er may hope to bound again. 
 Let the shadows gather round me 
 
 While I sit in silence here, 
 Broken-hearted, as an orphan 
 
 Watching by his father's bier. 
 Let me hold my still communion 
 
 Far from every earthly sound — 
 Day of penance — day of passion — 
 
 Ever, as the year comes round : 
 Fatal day, whereon the latest 
 
 Die was cast for me and mine —
 
 164 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 Cruel day, that quelled the fortunes 
 
 Of the hapless Stuart line ! 
 Phantom-like, as in a mirror, 
 
 Pdse the griesly scenes of death — 
 There before me, in its wildness, 
 
 Stretches bare Culloden's heath : 
 There the broken clans are scattered, 
 
 Gaunt as wolves, and famine-eyed, 
 Hunger gnawing at their vitals, 
 
 Hope abandoned, all but pride — 
 Pride, and that supreme devotion 
 
 Which the Southron never knew. 
 And the hatred, deeply rankling, 
 
 'Gainst the Hanoverian crew. 
 Oh, my God ! are these the remnants. 
 
 These the wrecks of the array 
 That around the royal standard 
 
 Gathered on the glorious day, 
 When, in deep Glenfinnan's valley, 
 
 Thousands, on their bended knees, 
 Saw once more that stately ensign 
 
 Waving in the northern breeze, 
 When the noble Tullibardine 
 
 Stood beneath its weltering fold. 
 With the Euddy Lion ramping 
 
 In the field of tressured gold. 
 When the miglity heart of Scotland, 
 
 All too big to slumber more, 
 Burst in wratli and exultation. 
 
 Like a huge volcano's roar ?
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 165 
 
 There they stand, 11 le hattered cohimns, 
 
 Underneath tlie murky sky, 
 In the hush of desperation, 
 
 Not to conquer, Ijut to die. 
 Hark ! the l)agpipe's fitful wailing : 
 
 Not the pibroch loud and shrill, 
 That, with hope of bloody banquet, 
 
 Lured the ravens from the hill, 
 But a dirge both low and solemn. 
 
 Fit for ears of dying men, 
 Marshalled for their latest battle, 
 
 Never more to fight again. 
 Madness — madness ! Why this shrinking ? 
 
 Were we less inured to war 
 When our reapers swept the harvest 
 
 From the field of red Dunbar ? 
 Bring my horse, and blow the trumpet ! 
 
 Call the riders of Fitz-James : 
 Let Lord Lewis head the column ! 
 
 Valiant chiefs of mighty names — 
 Trusty Keppoch, stout Glengarry, 
 
 Gallant Gordon, wise Locheill — 
 Bid the clansmen hold together, 
 
 Fast, and fell, and firm as steel. 
 Elcho, never look so gloomy — 
 
 What avails a saddened brow ? 
 Heart, man, heart ! we need it sorely, 
 
 Never half so much as now. 
 Had we but a thousand troopers. 
 
 Had we but a thousand more !
 
 1 66 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 Noble Perth, I hear them coming !— 
 Hark ! the English cannons' roar. 
 God ! how awful sounds that volley, 
 
 Bellowing through the mist and rain ! 
 Was not that the Highland slogan ? 
 
 Let me hear that shout again ! 
 Oh, for prophet eyes to witness 
 
 How the desperate battle goes ! 
 Cumberland ! I would not fear thee. 
 Could my Camerons see their foes. 
 Sound, I say, the charge at venture— 
 
 'T is not naked steel we fear ; 
 Better perish in the mel^e 
 
 Than be shot like driven deer ; 
 Hold ! the mist begins to scatter ! 
 
 There in front 't is rent asunder, 
 And the cloudy bastion crumbles 
 
 Underneath the deafening thunder ; 
 There I see the scarlet gleaming ! 
 
 Now, Macdonald— now or never!— 
 Woe is me, the clans are broken ! 
 Father, thou art lost for ever ! 
 Chief and vassal, lord and yeoman, 
 There they lie in heaps together, 
 Smitten by the deadly volley. 
 
 Rolled in blood upon the heather ; 
 And the Hanoverian horsemen. 
 
 Fiercely riding to and fro. 
 Deal their murderous strokes at random. — 
 Ah, my God ! where am I now ?
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 167 
 
 Will that baleful vision never 
 
 Vanish from my aching sight ? 
 Must those scenes and sounds of terror 
 
 Haunt me still by day and night ? 
 Yea, the earth hath no oblivion 
 
 For the noblest chance it gave, 
 None, save in its latest refuge — 
 
 Seek it only in the grave ! 
 Love may die, and hatred slumber, 
 
 And their memory will decay, 
 As the watered garden recks not 
 
 Of the drought of yesterday ; 
 But the dream of power once broken, 
 
 What shall give repose again ? 
 What shall charm the serpent- furies 
 
 Coiled around the maddening brain ? 
 What kind draught can nature offer 
 
 Strong enough to lull their sting ? 
 Better to be born a peasant 
 
 Than to live an exiled king ! 
 Oh, these years of bitter anguish ! — 
 
 What is life to such as me, 
 With my very heart as palsied 
 
 As a wasted cripple's knee ! 
 Suppliant-like for alms depending 
 
 On a false and foreign court. 
 Jostled by the flouting nobles, 
 
 Half' their pity, half their sport. 
 Forced to hold a place in pageant, 
 
 Like a royal prize of war,
 
 i68 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 Walking with dejected features 
 
 Close behind his victor's car, 
 Styled an equal — deemed a servant — 
 
 Fed with hopes of future gain — 
 Worse by far is fancied freedom 
 
 Than the captive's clanking chain ! 
 Could I change this gilded bondage 
 
 Even for the dusky tower, 
 Whence King James beheld his lady 
 
 Sitting in the castle bower ; 
 Birds around her sweetly singing, 
 
 Fluttering on the kindling spray, 
 And the comely garden glowing 
 
 In the light of rosy May. 
 Love descended to the window — 
 
 Love removed the bolt and bar — 
 Love was warder to the lovers 
 
 From the dawn to even-star. 
 Wherefore, Love, didst thou betray me ? 
 
 Where is now the tender glance ? 
 Where the meaning looks once la\dshed 
 
 By the dark-eyed Maid of France ? 
 Where the words of hope she whispered. 
 
 When around my neck she threw 
 That same scarf of broidered tissue, 
 
 Bade me wear it and be true — 
 Bade me send it as a token 
 
 When my banner waved once more 
 On the castled Keep of London, 
 Where my fathers' waved before ?
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 169 
 
 And I went and did not conquer — 
 
 But I brought it back again — 
 Brought it back from storm and battle — 
 
 Brought it back without a stain ; 
 And once more I knelt before her, 
 
 And I laid it at her feet, 
 Saying, " Wilt thou own it, Princess ? 
 
 There at least is no defeat ! " 
 Scornfully she looked upon me 
 
 With a measured eye and cold — 
 Scornfully she viewed the token, 
 
 Though her fingers wrought the gold ; 
 And she answered, faintly flushing, 
 
 " Hast thou kept it, then, so long ? 
 Worthy matter for a minstrel 
 
 To be told in knightly song ! 
 Worthy of a bold Provencal, 
 
 Pacing through the peaceful plain. 
 Singing of his lady's favour. 
 
 Boasting of her silken chain. 
 Yet scarce worthy of a warrior 
 
 Sent to wrestle for a crown. 
 Is this all that thou hast brought me 
 
 From thy fields of high renown ? 
 Is this all the trophy carried 
 
 From the lands where thou hast been ? 
 It was broidered by a Princess, 
 
 Canst thou give it to a Queen ? " 
 Woman's love is writ in water ! 
 
 Woman's faith is traced in sand !
 
 lyo CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 Backwards — backwards let me wander 
 
 To the noble northern land : 
 Let me feel the breezes blowing 
 
 Fresh along the mountain-side ; 
 Let me see the purple heather, 
 
 Let me hear the thundering tide, 
 Be it hoarse as Corrievreckan 
 
 Spouting when the storm is high — 
 Give me but one hour of Scotland — 
 
 Let me see it ere I die ! 
 Oh, my heart is sick and heavy — 
 
 Southern gales are not for me ; 
 Though the glens are white with winter, 
 
 Place me there, and set me free ; 
 Give me back my trusty comrades — 
 
 Give me back my Highland maid — 
 Nowhere beats the heart so kindly 
 
 As beneath the tartan plaid ! 
 Flora ! when thou wert beside me. 
 
 In the wilds of far Kintail — 
 When the cavern gave us shelter 
 
 From the blinding sleet and hail — 
 When we lurked within the thicket, 
 
 And, beneath the waning moon. 
 Saw the sentry's bayonet glimmer, 
 
 Heard him chant his listless tune — 
 When the howling storm o'ertook us, 
 
 Drifting down the island's lee, 
 And our crazy bark was whirling 
 Like a nutshell on the sea —
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 171 
 
 When the nights were dark and dreary, 
 
 And amidst the fern we lay, 
 Faint and foodless, sore with travel, 
 
 Waiting for the streaks of day ; 
 When thou wert an angel to me, 
 
 Watching my exhausted sleep — 
 Never didst thou hear me murmur — 
 
 Couldst thou see how now I weep ! 
 Bitter tears and sobs of anguish, 
 
 Unavailing though they be : 
 Oh, the brave — the brave and noble — 
 
 That have died in vain for me !
 
 NOTES TO 
 "CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES" 
 
 Could I change this gilded bondage 
 
 Even for the dushy totver 
 Whence King James helield his lady 
 
 Sitting in the castle horcer. — p. 1G8. 
 
 James I. of Scotland, one of the most accomplished kings 
 that ever sate upon a throne, is the person here indicated. 
 His history is a very strange and romantic one. He was 
 son of Kohert III., and immediate younger brother of that 
 unhappy Duke of Eothesay who was murdered at Falkland. 
 His father, apprehensive of the designs and treachery of 
 Albany, had determined to remove him, when a mere boy, 
 for a season from Scotland ; and as France was then con- 
 sidered the best school for the education of one so 
 important from his high position, it was resolved to send 
 him thither, under the care of the Earl of Orkney, and 
 Fleming of Cumbernauld. He accordingly embarked at 
 North Berwiclc, with little escort — as there was a truce for 
 the time between England and Scotland ; and they were 
 under no apprehension of meeting with any vessels, save 
 those of the former nation. Notwithstanding this, the 
 ship which carried the Prince was captured by an armed 
 merchantman, and carried to London, wherf Henry IV.,
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 173 
 
 the usurping Bolingbroke, utterly regardless of treaties, 
 committed him and his attendants to the Tower. 
 
 "In vain," says Mr. Tytler, "did the guardians of the 
 young Prince remonstrate against this cruelty, or present to 
 Henry a letter from the King his father, which, with much 
 simplicity, recommended him to the kindness of the 
 English monarch, should he find it necessary to land in his 
 dominions. In vain did they represent that the mission to 
 France was perfectly pacific, and its only object the 
 education of the prince at the French court. Henry 
 merely answered by a poor witticism, declaring that he 
 himself knew the French language indilferently well, and 
 that his father could not have sent him to a better master. 
 So flagrant a breach of the law of nations, as the seizure 
 and imprisonment of the heir-apparent, during the time of 
 truce, would have called for the most violent remonstrances 
 from any government, except that of Albany. But to this 
 usurper of the supreme power, the capture of the Prince 
 was the most grateful event which coidd have happened ; 
 and to detain him in captivity became, from this moment, 
 one of the principal objects of his future life ; we are not 
 to wonder, then, tliat the conduct of Henry not only drew 
 forth no indignation from the governor, but was not even 
 followed by any request that the prince should be set at 
 liberty. 
 
 " The aged King, already worn out by infirmity, and now 
 broken by disappointment and sorrow, did not long survive 
 the captivity of his son. It is said the melancholy news 
 were brought him as he was sitting down to supper in his 
 palace of Rothesay in Bute, and that the eftect was such 
 upon his aff'ectionate but feeble spirit, that he drooped from 
 that day forward, refused all sustenance, and died soon 
 after of a broken heart."
 
 174 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 James was finally incarcerated in Windsor Castle, where 
 he endured an imprisonment of nineteen years. Henry, 
 though he had not hesitated to commit a heinous breach of 
 faith, was not so cruel as to neglect the education of his 
 captive. The young King was supplied with the best 
 masters ; and gradually became an adept in all the ac- 
 complishments of the age. He is a singular exception 
 from the rule which maintains that monarchs are indifferent 
 authors. As a poet, he is entitled to a very high rank 
 indeed, being, I think, in point of sweetness and melody of 
 verse, not much inferior to Chaucer. From the window of 
 his chamber in the Tower, he had often seen a young lady, 
 of great beauty and grace, walking in the garden ; and the 
 admiration which at once possessed him soon ripened into 
 love. This was Lady Jane Beaufort, daughter of the Earl 
 of Somerset and niece of Henry IV., and who afterwards 
 became his queen. How he loved and how he wooed her is 
 told in his own beautiful poem of " The King's Quhair," of 
 which the following are a few stanzas : — 
 
 " Now there was made, fast by the towris wall, 
 A garden fair ; and in the corners set 
 An arbour green, with wandis long and small 
 Railed about, and so with trees set 
 Was all the place, and hawthorn hedges knet, 
 That lyf was none walking there forbye, 
 That might within scarce any wight espy. 
 
 " So thick the boughis and the leavis greene 
 Beshaded all the alleys that there were. 
 And mids of every arbour might be seen 
 The sharpe, greene, sweete juniper, 
 Growing so fair, with branches here and there, 
 That, as it seemed to a lyf without. 
 The boughis spread the arbour all about.
 
 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 175 
 
 " And on the smalle greene Iwistis sat 
 The little sweet nightingale, and sung 
 So loud and clear the hymnis consecrat 
 Of lovis use, now soft, now loud among, 
 That all the gardens and the wallis rung 
 Right of their song 
 
 IgllU KJL LllLll OUllg. 
 
 "And therewith cast I down mine eyes again, 
 Where as I saw, walking under the tower, 
 Full secretly, now comen here to plain, 
 The fairest or the freshest younge flower 
 That e'er I saw, methought, before that hour : 
 For which sudden abate, anon astart 
 The blood of all my body to my heart. 
 
 " And though I stood abasit for a lite, 
 No wonder was ; for why ? my wittis all 
 Were so o'ercome with pleasance and delight — 
 Only through letting of my eyen fall — 
 That suddenly my heart became her thrall 
 For ever of free will, for of menace 
 There was no token in her sweete face." 
 
 Wherefore, Love, didst thou betray me ? 
 
 Where is noio the tender glance ? 
 Where the vieaning looks once lavished 
 
 By the dark-eyed Maid of France? — p. 168. 
 
 There appears to be no doubt that Prince Charles was 
 deeply attached to one of the princesses of the royal family 
 of France. In the interesting collection called "Jacobite 
 Memoirs," compiled by Mr. Chambers from the voluminous 
 MSS. of Bishop Forbes, we find the following passage from 
 the narrative of Donald Macleod, who acted as a guide to 
 the wanderer whilst traversing the Hebrides: — "When 
 Donald was asked, if ever the Prince used to give any
 
 176 CHARLES EDWARD AT VERSAILLES 
 
 particular toast, when tliey "were taking a cup of cold 
 water, or the like ; he said that the Prince very often 
 drank to the Black Eye — -by which, said Donald, he meant 
 the second daughter of France, and I never heard him 
 name any particular health but that alone. When he 
 spoke of that lady — which he did frequently — he appeared 
 to be more than ordinarily well pleased."
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 The "gentle Locheill" may be considered as the 
 pattern of a Highland Chief. Others who headed the 
 insurrection may have been actuated by motives of 
 personal ambition, and by a desire for aggrandisement ; 
 but no such charge can be made against the generous 
 and devoted Cameron. He was, as we have already 
 seen, the first who attempted to dissuade the Prince 
 from embarking in an enterprise which he conscien- 
 tiously beUeved to be desperate ; but, having failed in 
 doing so, he nobly stood firm to the cause which his 
 conscience vindicated as just, and cheerfully imperilled 
 his life, and sacrificed liis fortune, at the bidding of his 
 master. There was no one, even among those who 
 espoused the other side, in Scotland, who did not 
 commiserate the misfortunes of this truly excellent 
 man, whose humanity was not less conspicuous than 
 his valour throughout the civil war, and who died in 
 exile of a broken heart. 
 
 Perhaps the best type of the Lowland Cavalier of 
 that period, may be found in the person of Alexander 
 Forbes, Lord Pitsligo, a nobleman whose conscientious
 
 178 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 views impelled him to take a different side from 
 that adopted by the greater part of his house and 
 name. Lord Forbes, the head of this very ancient 
 and honourable family, was one of the first Scottish 
 noblemen who declared for King William. Lord 
 Pitsligo, on the contrary, having been educated abroad, 
 and early introduced to the circle at Saint Germains, 
 conceived a deep personal attachment to the members 
 of the exiled line. He was anything but an enthusiast, 
 as his philosophical and religious writings, well worthy 
 of a perusal, will show. He was the intimate friend 
 of Fenelon, and throughout his whole life was remark- 
 able rather for his piety and virtue, than for keenness 
 in political dispute. 
 
 After his return from France, Lord Pitsligo took his 
 seat in the Scottish Parliament, and his parliamentary 
 career has thus been characterised by a former writer.* 
 " Here it is no discredit either to his head or heart to 
 say, that, obliged to become a member of one of the 
 contending factions of the time, he adopted that which 
 had for its object the independence of Scotland, and 
 restoration of the ancient race of monarchs. The 
 advantages which w^ere in future to arise from the 
 great measure of a national union were so hidden by 
 the mist of prejudice, that it cannot be wondered at if 
 Lord Pitsligo, like many a high-spirited man, saw 
 
 * Seo Blackwood's Magazine for May 1829. — Article " Lord 
 Pitsligo."
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 179 
 
 nothing but disgrace in a measure forced on by such 
 corrupt means, and calling in its commencement for 
 such mortifying national sacrifices. The English 
 nation, indeed, with a narrow, yet not unnatural, 
 view of their own interest, took such pains to 
 encumber and restrict the Scottish commercial privileges 
 that it was not till the best part of a century after the 
 event that the inestimable fruits of the treaty began 
 to be felt and known. This distant period Lord 
 Pitsligo could not foresee. He beheld his countrymen, 
 like the Israelites of yore, led into the desert ; but his 
 merely human eye could not foresee that, after the 
 extinction of a whole race — after a longer pilgrimage 
 than that of the followers of Moses — the Scottish 
 people should at length arrive at that promised land, 
 of which the favourers of the Union held forth so gay 
 a prospect. 
 
 "Looking upon the Act of Settlement of the 
 Crown, and the Act of Abjuration, as unlawful, 
 Lord Pitsligo retired to his house in the country, 
 and threw up attendance on Parliament. Upon the 
 death of Queen Anne he joined himself in arms 
 with a general insurrection of the Highlanders and 
 Jacobites, headed by his friend and relative the Earl 
 of Mar. 
 
 "Mar, a versatile statesman and an able intriguer, 
 had consulted his ambition rather than his talents 
 when he assumed the command of such an enterprise. 
 He sunk beneath the far superior genius of the Duke
 
 i8o THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 of Argyle ; and after the undecisive battle of Sheriff- 
 muir, the confederacy which he had formed, but was 
 unable to direct, dissolved like a snow-ball, and the 
 nobles concerned in it were fain to fly abroad. This 
 exile was Lord Pitsligo's fate for five or six years. 
 Part of the time he spent at the Court, if it can be 
 called so, of the old Chevalier de Saint George, where 
 existed all the petty feuds, chicanery, and crooked 
 intrigues which subsist in a real scene of the same 
 character, although the objects of the ambition which 
 prompts such arts had no existence. Men seemed to 
 play at being courtiers in that illusory court, as 
 children play at being soldiers." 
 
 It would appear that Lord Pitsligo was not attainted 
 for his share in Mar's rebellion. He returned to Scotland 
 in 1720, and resided at his castle in Aberdeenshire, 
 not mingling in public affairs, but gaining, through 
 his charity, kindness, and benevolence, the respect and 
 affection of all around him. He was sixty-seven years 
 of age when Charles Edward landed in Scotland. The 
 district in which the estates of Lord Pitsligo lay 
 was essentially Jacobite, and the young cavaliers only 
 waited for a fitting leader to take up arms in the 
 cause. According to Mr. Home, his example was 
 decisive of the movement of his neighbours : " So 
 when he who was so wise and prudent declared his 
 purpose of joining Charles, most of the gentlemen in 
 that part of the country who favoured the Pretender's 
 cause, put themselves under his command, thinking
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER i8i 
 
 they could not follow a better or safer guide than 
 Lord ritsligo." His Lordship's own account of the 
 motives which urged him on is peculiar : — " I was 
 grown a little old, and the fear of ridicule stuck 
 to me pretty much. I have mentioned the weightier 
 considerations of a family, which would make the 
 censure still the greater, and set the more tongues 
 agoing. But we are pushed on, I know not how, — 
 I thought — I weighed — and I weighed again. If 
 there was any enthusiasm in it, it was of the coldest 
 kind ; and there was as little remorse when the 
 affair miscarried, as there was eagerness at the 
 beginning." 
 
 The writer whom I have already quoted goes on 
 to say — " To those friends who recalled his misfortunes 
 of 1715, he replied gaily, 'Did you ever know me 
 absent at the second day of a wedding?' meaning, 
 I suppose, that having once contracted an engagement, 
 he did not feel entitled to quit it while the contest 
 subsisted. Being invited by the gentlemen of the 
 district to put himself at their head, and having 
 surmounted his own desires, he had made a farewell 
 visit at a neighbour's house, where a little boy, a 
 child of the family, brought out a stool to assist 
 the old nobleman in remounting his horse. 'My 
 little fellow,' said Lord Pitsligo, ' this is the severest 
 rebuke I have yet received, for presuming to go on 
 such an expedition.' 
 
 "The die was however cast, and Lord Pitsligo
 
 i82 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 went to meet his friends at the rendezvous they 
 had appointed in Aberdeen. They formed a body 
 of well-armed cavalry, gentlemen and their servants, 
 to the number of a hundred men. When they 
 were drawn up in readiness to commence the expe- 
 dition, the venerable nobleman, their leader, moved 
 to their front, lifted his hat, and, looking up to 
 heaven, pronounced, with a solemn voice, the awful 
 appeal, — ' Lord, thou knowest that our cause is 
 just ! ' then added the signal for departure — ' March, 
 gentlemen ! ' 
 
 "Lord Pitsligo, with his followers, found Charles 
 at Edinburgh, on Stli October 1745, a few days after 
 the Highlanders' victory at Preston. Their arrival 
 was hailed with enthusiasm, not only on account of 
 the timely reinforcement, but more especially from 
 the high character of their leader. Hamilton of 
 Bangour, in an animated and eloquent eulogium upon 
 Pitsligo, states that nothing could have fallen out 
 more fortunately for the Prince than his joining 
 them did — for it seemed as if religion, virtue, 
 and justice were entering his camp, under the 
 appearance of this venerable old man ; and what 
 would have given sanction to a cause of the most 
 dubious right, could not fail to render sacred the 
 very best." 
 
 Although so far advanced in years, he remained 
 in arms during the whole campaign, and was treated 
 with almost filial tenderness by the Prince. After
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 183 
 
 Cullodeii, he became, like many more, a fugitive and an 
 outlaw, but succeeded, like the Baron of Bradwardine, 
 in finding a shelter upon the skirts of his own 
 estate. Disguised as a mendicant, his secret was 
 faithfully kept by the tenantry ; and although it 
 was more than surmised by the soldiers that he was 
 lurking somewhere in the neighbourhood, they never 
 were able to detect him. On one occasion he actually 
 guided a party to a cave on the sea-shore, amidst 
 the rough rocks of Buchau, where it was rumoured 
 that he was lying in concealment ; and on another, 
 when overtaken by his asthma, and utterly unable 
 to escape from an approaching patrol of soldiers, 
 he sat down by the wayside, and acted his assumed 
 character so w^ell, that a good-natured fellow not 
 only gave him alms, but condoled with him on the 
 violence of his complaint. 
 
 For ten years he remained concealed, but in the 
 mean time both title and estate were forfeited by 
 attainder. His last escape was so very remarkable, 
 that I may be pardoned for giving it in the language 
 of the author of his memoirs. 
 
 " In ]\Iarch 1756, and of course long after all 
 apprehension of a search had ceased, information 
 having been given to the commanding ofhcer at 
 Fraserburgh, that Lord Pitsligo was at that moment 
 at the house of Auchiries, it was acted upon with 
 so much promptness and secrecy that the search 
 must have proved successful but for a very singular
 
 1 84 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 occurrence. Mrs. Sophia Donaldson, a lady who lived 
 much with the family, repeatedly dreamt, on that par- 
 ticular night, that the house was surrounded by soldiers. 
 Her mind became so haunted with the idea, that she 
 got out of bed, and was walking through the room, in 
 hopes of giving a different current to her thoughts 
 before she lay down again ; when, day beginning to 
 dawn, she accidentally looked out at the window as 
 she passed it in traversing the room, and was astonished 
 at actually observing the figures of soldiers among 
 some trees near the house. So completely had all 
 idea of a search been by that time laid asleep, that 
 she supposed they had come to steal poultry — Jaco- 
 bite poultry-yards affording a safe object of pillage 
 for the English soldiers in those days. Mrs. Sophia 
 was proceeding to rouse the servants, when her sister, 
 having awaked, and inquiring what was the matter, 
 and being told of soldiers near the house, exclaimed 
 in great alarm, that she feared they wanted sometning 
 more than hens. She begged Mrs. Sophia to look out 
 at a window on the other side of the house, wdien 
 not only were soldiers seen in that direction, but 
 also an officer giving instructions by signal, and 
 frequently putting his fingers to his lips, as if 
 enjoining silence. 
 
 There was now no time to be lost in rousing the 
 family, and all the haste that could be made was 
 scarcely sufficient to hurry the venerable man from 
 his bed into a small recess, behind the wainscot of an
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 185 
 
 adjoining room, which was concealed by a bed, in 
 which a lady, Miss Gordon of Towie, who was there on 
 a visit, lay, before the soldiers obtained admission. A 
 most minute search took place. The room in which 
 Lord Pitsligo was concealed did not escape. Miss 
 Gordon's bed was carefully examined, and she was 
 obliged to suffer the rude scrutiny of one of the party, 
 by feeling her chin, to ascertain that it was not a man 
 in a lady's night-dress. Before the soldiers had 
 finished their examination in this room, the confine- 
 ment and anxiety increased Lord Pitsligo's asthma so 
 much, and his breathing became so loud, that it cost 
 Miss Gordon, lying in bed, much and violent cough- 
 ing, which she counterfeited, in order to prevent the 
 high breathings behind the wainscot from being 
 heard. 
 
 It may be easily conceived what agony she would 
 suffer, lest, by overdoing her part, she should increase 
 suspicion, and in fact lead to a discovery. The ruse 
 was fortunately successful. On the search through 
 the house being given over, Lord Pitsligo was hastily 
 taken from his confined situation, and again replaced 
 in bed; and, as soon as he was able to speak, his 
 accustomed kindness of heart made him say to his 
 servant — 'James, go and see that these poor fellows 
 get some breakfast and a drink of warm ale, for this 
 is a cold morning; they are only doing their duty, 
 and cannot bear me any ill-will.' AVhen the family 
 were felicitating each other on his escape, he pleasantly
 
 1 86 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 observed — ' A poor prize, had they obtained it — an old 
 dying man ! ' " 
 
 This was the last attempt made on the part of 
 government to seize on the persons of any of the sur- 
 viving insurgents. Three years before, Dr. Archibald 
 Cameron, a brother of Locheill, having clandestinely 
 revisited Scotland, was arrested, tried, and executed for 
 high treason at Tyburn. The government was gene- 
 rally blamed for this act of severity, which was con- 
 sidered rather to have been dictated by revenge than 
 required for the public safety. It is, however, pro- 
 bable that they might have had secret information of 
 certain negotiations which were still conducted in the 
 Highlands by the agents of the Stuart family, and that 
 they considered it necessary, by one terrible example, 
 to overawe the insurrectionary spirit. This I believe 
 to have been the real motive of an execution which 
 otherwise could not have been palliated : and, in the 
 case of Lord Pitsligo, it is quite possible that the zeal 
 of a partisan may have led him to take a step which 
 would not have been approved of by the ministry. 
 After the lapse of so many years, and after so many 
 scenes of judicial bloodshed, the nation would have 
 turned in disgust from the spectacle of an old man, 
 whose private life was not only blameless, but exem- 
 plary, dragged to the scaffold, and forced to lay down 
 his head in expiation of a doubtful crime : and this 
 view derives corroboration from the fact that, shortly 
 afterwards, Lord Pitshgo was tacitly permitted to
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 187 
 
 return to the society of his friends, without further 
 notice or persecution. 
 
 Dr. King, tlie Principal of St. Mary's Hall, Oxford, 
 has borne the following testimony to the character of 
 Lord Pitsligo. " Whoever is so happy, either from 
 his natural disposition, or his good judgment, con- 
 stantly to observe St. Paul's precept, * to speak evil of 
 no one ' will certainly acquire the love and esteem of 
 the whole community of which he is a member. But 
 such a man is the rara avis in terris; and, among all 
 my acquaintance, I have known only one person to 
 whom I can with truth assign tliis character. The 
 person I mean is the present Lord Pitsligo of Scot- 
 land. I not only never heard this gentleman speak 
 an ill word of any man living, but I always observed 
 him ready to defend any other person who was ill 
 spoken of in his company. If the person accused 
 were of his acquaintance, my Lord Pitsligo would 
 always find something good to say of him as a coun- 
 terpoise. If he were a stranger, and quite unknown 
 to him, my lord would urge in his defence the general 
 corruption of manners, and the frailties and infirmities 
 of human nature. 
 
 "It is no wonder that such an excellent man, who, 
 besides, is a polite scholar, and has many other great 
 and good qualities, should be universally admired and 
 beloved — insomucli, that I persuade myself he has not 
 one enemy in the world. At least, to this general 
 esteem and affection for his person, his preservation
 
 1 88 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 must be owing ; for since his attainder he has 
 never removed far from his own house, protected 
 by men of different principles, and unsought for and 
 unmolested by government." To which eulogy it 
 might be added, by those who have the good 
 fortune to know his representatives, that the virtues 
 here acknowledged seem hereditary in the family of 
 Pitsligo. 
 
 The venerable old nobleman was permitted to re- 
 main without molestation at the residence of his son, 
 during the latter years of an existence protracted to 
 the extreme verge of human life. And so, says the 
 author of his memoirs, " In this happy frame of 
 mind, — calm and full of hope,— the saintly man con- 
 tinued to the last, with his reason unclouded, able to 
 study his favourite volume, enjoying the comforts of 
 friendship, and delighting in the consolations of 
 religion, till he gently 'fell asleep in Jesus.' He 
 died on the 21st of December, 1762, in the eighty-fifth 
 year of his age ; and to his surviving friends the 
 recollection of the misfortunes which had accompanied 
 him through his long life was painfully awakened 
 even in the closing scene of his mortal career — as 
 his son had the mortification to be indebted to a 
 stranger, now the proprietor of his ancient in- 
 heritance by purchase from the crown, for permission 
 to lay his father's honoured remains in the vault 
 which contained the ashes of his family for many 
 generations."
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 189 
 
 Such a character as this is well worthy of remem- 
 brance; and Lord Pitsligo has just title to be called 
 the last of the old Scottish Cavaliers. I trust that, 
 in adapting the words of the following little ballad to 
 a well-known English air, I have committed no un- 
 pardonable larceny.
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 Come listen to another song, 
 
 Should make your heart beat high, 
 Bring crimson to your forehead, 
 
 And the lustre to your eye ; — 
 It is a song of olden time, 
 
 Of days long since gone by, 
 And of a Baron stout and bold 
 
 As e'er wore sword on thigh ! 
 
 Like a brave old Scottish cavalier. 
 All of the olden time ! 
 
 II. 
 
 He kept his castle in the north, 
 Hard by the thundering Spey ; 
 
 And a thousand vassals dwelt around 
 All of his kindred they. 
 
 And not a man of all that clan 
 Had ever ceased to pray
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 191 
 
 For the Eoyal race they loved so well, 
 Though exiled far away 
 
 From the steadfast Scottish cavaliers, 
 All of the olden time ! 
 
 III. 
 
 His father drew the righteous sword 
 
 For Scotland and her claims. 
 Among the loyal gentlemen 
 
 And chiefs of ancient names 
 Who swore to fight or fall beneath 
 
 The standard of King James, 
 And died at Killiecrankie pass 
 
 With the glory of the Gr?emes ; 
 
 Like a true old Scottish cavalier. 
 All of the olden time ! 
 
 IV. 
 
 He never owned the foreign rule, 
 
 'No master he obeyed, 
 But kept his clan in peace at home. 
 
 From foray and from raid ; 
 And when they asked him for his oath, 
 
 He touched his glittering blade. 
 And pointed to his bonnet blue. 
 
 That bore the white cockade : 
 
 Like a leal old Scottish cavalier, 
 All of the olden time !
 
 192 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 
 
 V. 
 
 At length the news ran through the land — 
 
 The Pkince had come again ! 
 That night the fiery cross was sped 
 
 O'er mountain and through glen ; 
 And our old Baron rose in might, 
 
 Like a lion from his den, 
 And rode away across the hills 
 
 To Charlie and his men. 
 
 With the valiant Scottish cavaliers, 
 All of the olden time ! 
 
 VI. 
 
 He was the first that bent the knee 
 
 When THE Standakd waved abroad, 
 He was the first that charged the foe 
 
 On Preston's bloody sod ; 
 And ever, in the van of fight, 
 
 The foremost still he trod. 
 Until, on bleak CuUoden's heath. 
 
 He gave his soul to God, 
 
 Like a good old Scottish cavalier. 
 All of the olden time ! 
 
 VII. 
 
 Oh ! never shall we know again 
 
 A heart so stout and true — 
 The olden times have passed away. 
 
 And weary are the new :
 
 THE OLD SCOTTISH CAVALIER 193 
 
 Tlie fair "White Rose has faded 
 
 From the garden where it grew, 
 And no fond tears save those of heaven 
 The glorious bed bedew 
 
 Of the last old Scottish cavalier, 
 All of the olden time ! 
 
 N
 
 MISCELLANEOUS POEMS
 
 BLIND OLD MILTON 
 
 Place me once more, my daughter, where the sun 
 
 May sliine upon my old and time-worn head, 
 
 For the last tune, perchance. My race is run ; 
 
 And soon amidst the ever-silent dead 
 
 I must repose, it may be, half forgot. 
 
 Yes ! I have broke the hard and l)itter bread 
 
 For many a year, with those who trembled not 
 
 To buckle on their armour for the fight, 
 
 And set themselves against the tyrant's lot ; 
 
 And I have never bowed me to his might, 
 
 Nor knelt before him — for I bear within 
 
 My heart the sternest consciousness of right, 
 
 And that perpetual hate of gilded sin 
 
 Which made me what I am ; and though the stain 
 
 Of poverty be on me, yet I win 
 
 More honour by it, than the blinded train 
 
 Who hug their willing servitude, and 1)0W 
 
 Unto the weakest and the most profane. 
 
 Therefore, with unencumbered soul I go 
 
 Before the footstool of my Maker, where 
 
 I hope to stand as undebased as now !
 
 198 BLIND OLD MILTON 
 
 Child ! is the sun abroad ? I feel my hair 
 
 Borne up and wafted by the gentle wind, 
 
 I feel the odours that perfume the air, 
 
 And hear the rustling of the leaves behind. 
 
 Within my heart I picture them, and then 
 
 I almost can forget that I am blind, 
 
 And old, and hated by my fellow-men. 
 
 Yet would I fain once more behold the grace 
 
 Of nature ere I die, and gaze again 
 
 Upon her living and rejoicing face — 
 
 Fain would I see thy countenance, my cliild, 
 
 My comforter ! I feel thy dear embrace — 
 
 I hear thy voice, so musical, and mild, 
 
 The patient, sole interpreter, by whom 
 
 So many years of sadness are beguiled ; 
 
 For it hath made my small and scanty room 
 
 Peopled with glowing visions of the past. 
 
 But I will calmly bend me to my doom, 
 
 And wait the hour which is approaching fast. 
 
 When triple light shall stream upon mine eyes, 
 
 And heaven itself be opened up at last 
 
 To him who dared foretell its mysteries. 
 
 I have had visions in this drear eclipse 
 
 Of outward consciousness, and clomb the skies, 
 
 Striving to utter with my earthly lips 
 
 What the divirier soul had half divined, 
 
 Even as the Saint in his Apocalypse 
 
 Who saw the inmost glory, where enshrined 
 
 Sat He who fashioned glory. This hath driven
 
 BLIND OLD MILTON 199 
 
 All outward strife and tumult from my mind, 
 
 And humbled me, until I have forgiven 
 
 My bitter enemies, and only seek 
 
 To find the straight and narrow path to heaven. 
 
 Yet I am weak — oh ! how entirely weak, 
 
 For one who may not love nor suffer more ! 
 
 Sometimes unbidden tears will wet my cheek, 
 
 And my heart bound as keenly as of yore, 
 
 Eesponsive to a voice, now hushed to rest, 
 
 Which made the beautiful Italian shore. 
 
 In all its pomp of summer vineyards drest, 
 
 An Eden and a Paradise to me. 
 
 Do the sweet breezes from the balmy west 
 
 Still murmur through thy groves, Parthenope, 
 
 In search of odours from the orange bowers ? 
 
 Still on thy slopes of verdure does the bee 
 
 Cull her rare honey from the virgin flowers ? 
 
 And Philomel her plaintive chaunt prolong 
 
 'Neath skies more calm and more serene than ours, 
 
 Making the summer one perpetual song ? 
 
 Art thou the same as when in manhood's pride 
 
 I walked in joy thy grassy meads among, 
 
 With that fair youthful vision by my side, 
 
 In whose bright eyes I looked — and not in vain ? 
 
 my adored angel ! my bride ! 
 
 Despite of years, and woe, and want, and pain, 
 
 My soul yearns back towards thee, and I seem 
 
 To wander with thee, hand in hand, again.
 
 200 BLIND OLD MILTON 
 
 By the bright margin of that flowing stream. 
 I hear again thy voice, more silver-sweet 
 Than fancied music floating in a dream, 
 Possess my being ; from afar I greet 
 The waving of thy garments in the glade. 
 And the light rustling of thy fairy feet — 
 What time as one half eager, half afraid. 
 Love's burning secret faltered on my tongue, 
 And tremulous looks and broken words betrayed 
 The secret of the heart from whence they sprung. 
 Ah me ! the earth that rendered thee to heaven 
 Gave up an angel beautiful and young, 
 Spotless and pure as snow when freshly driven : 
 A bright Aurora for the starry sphere 
 Where all is love, and even life forgiven. 
 Bride of immortal beauty — ever dear ! 
 Dost tliou await me in thy blest abode ? 
 While I, Tithonus-like, must linger here, 
 And count each step along the rugged road ; 
 A phantom, tottering to a long-made grave, 
 And eager to lay down my weary load ! 
 
 I, who was fancy's lord, am fancy's slave. 
 
 Like the low murmurs of the Indian shell 
 
 Ta'en from its coral bed beneath the wave, 
 
 Which, unforgetfal of the ocean's swell, 
 
 Pietains within its mystic urn the hum 
 
 Heard in the sea-grots where the Nereids dwell — 
 
 Old thoughts still haunt me — unawares they come
 
 BLIND OLD MILTON 201 
 
 Between me and my rest, nor can I make 
 
 Those aged visitors of sorrow dumb. 
 
 Oh, yet awhile, my feeble soul, awake ! 
 
 Nor wander back with sullen steps again ; 
 
 For neither pleasant pastime canst thou take 
 
 In such a journey, nor endure the pain. 
 
 The phantoms of the past are dead for thee ; 
 
 So let them ever uninvoked remain, 
 
 And be thou calm, till death shall set thee free. 
 
 Thy flowers of hope expanded long ago, 
 
 Long since their blossoms withered on the tree : 
 
 No second spring can come to make them blow. 
 
 But in the silent winter of the grave 
 
 They lie with blighted love and buried woe. 
 
 I did not waste the gifts which nature gave. 
 
 Nor slothful lay in the Circean bower ; 
 
 Nor did I yield myself the willing slave 
 
 Of lust for pride, for riches, or for power. 
 
 No ! in my heart a nobler spirit dwelt ; 
 
 For constant was my faith in manhood's dower ; 
 
 Man— made in God's own image — and I felt 
 
 How of our own accord we courted shame, 
 
 Until to idols like ourselves we knelt. 
 
 And so renounced the great and glorious claim 
 
 Of freedom, our immortal heritage. 
 
 I saw how bigotry, with spiteful aim, 
 
 Smote at the searching eyesight of the sage. 
 
 How error stole behind the steps of truth,
 
 202 BLIND OLD MILTON 
 
 And cast delusion on the sacred page. 
 So, as a champion, even in early youth 
 I waged my battle with a purpose keen ; 
 Nor feared the hand of terror, nor the tooth 
 Of serpent jealousy. And I have been 
 With starry Galileo in his cell, 
 That wise magician with the brow serene, 
 Who fathomed space ; and I have seen him tell 
 The wonders of the planetary sphere, 
 And trace the ramparts of heaven's citadel 
 On the cold flag-stones of his dungeon drear. 
 And I have walked with Hampden and with Vane- 
 Names once so gracious to an English ear — 
 In days that never may return again. 
 My voice, though not the loudest, hath been heard 
 Whenever freedom raised her cry of pain, 
 And the faint effort of the humble bard 
 Hath roused up thousands from their lethargy, 
 To speak in words of thunder. What reward 
 Was mine, or theirs ? It matters not ; for I 
 Am but a leaf cast on the whirling tide, 
 Without a hope or wish, except to die. 
 • But truth, asserted once, must still abide, 
 Unquenchaljle, as are those fiery springs 
 Which day and night gush from the mountain-side, 
 Perpetual meteors girt with lambent wings, 
 Which the wild tempest tosses to and fro. 
 But cannot conquer with the force it brings.
 
 BLIND OLD MILTON 203 
 
 Yet I, who ever felt another's woe 
 
 More keenly than my own untold distress ; 
 
 I, who have battled with the common foe, 
 
 And broke for years the bread of bitterness ; 
 
 Who never yet abandoned or betrayed 
 
 The trust vouchsafed me, nor have ceased to bless, 
 
 Am left alone to wither in the shade, 
 
 A weak old man, deserted by his kind — 
 
 Whom none will comfort in his age, nor aid ! 
 
 Oh ! let me not repine ! A quiet mind, 
 Conscious and upright, needs no other stay ; 
 Nor can I grieve for what I leave behind. 
 In the rich promise of eternal day. 
 Henceforth to me the world is dead and gone. 
 Its thorns unfelt, its roses cast away : 
 And the old pilgrim, weary and alone. 
 Bowed down with travel, at his Master's gate 
 Now sits, his task of life-long labour done. 
 Thankful for rest, although it conies so late, 
 After sore journey through this world of sin, 
 In hope, and prayer, and wistfulness to wait, 
 Until the door shall ope, and let him in.
 
 HERMOTIMUS 
 
 Hermotimus, the hero of this ballad, was a 
 philosopher, or rather a prophet, of Clazomenge, 
 who possessed the faculty, now claimed by the 
 animal-magnetists, of effecting a voluntary separation 
 between his soul and body ; for the former could 
 wander to any part of the universe, and even hold 
 intercourse with supernatural beings, whilst the 
 senseless frame remained at home. Hermotimus, 
 however, was not insensible to the risk attendant 
 upon this disunion ; since, before attempting any of 
 these aerial flights, he took the precaution to warn 
 his wife, lest, ere the return of his soul, the body 
 should be rendered an unfit or useless receptacle. 
 This accident, which he so much dreaded, at length 
 occurred ; for the lady, wearied out by a succession 
 of trances, each of longer duration than the preceding, 
 one day committed his body to tlie flames, and thus 
 effectually put a stop to such unconnubial conduct. 
 He received divine honours at Clazomenae, but must 
 nevertheless remain as a terrible example and warnmg 
 to all husbands who carry their scientific or spiritual 
 pursuits so far as to neglect their duty to their wives.
 
 HERMOTIMUS 205 
 
 It is somewhat curious that Hermotimus is not 
 the ouly person (putting the disciples of Mesnier 
 and Dupotet altogether out of the question) who 
 has possessed this miraculous power. Another and 
 much later instance is recorded by Dr. George Cheyne, 
 in his work entitled, The English Malady, or a Treatise 
 of Nervous Diseases, as having come under his own 
 observation; and, as this case is exactly similar to 
 that of the Prophet, it may amuse the reader to 
 see how far an ancient fable may be illustrated, and 
 in part explained, by the records of modern science. 
 Dr. Cheyne's patient was probably cataleptic; but 
 the worthy physician must be allowed to tell his 
 own story. 
 
 "Colonel Townsheud, a gentleman of honour and 
 integrity, had for many years been afHicted with a 
 nephritic complaint. His illness increasing, and his 
 strength decaying, he came from Bristol to Bath in 
 a litter, in autumn, and lay at the Bell Inn. Dr. 
 Baynard and I were called to him, and attended 
 him twice a-day ; but his vomitings continuing still 
 incessant and obstinate against all remedies, we 
 despaired of his recovery. While he was in this 
 condition, he sent for us one morning; we waited 
 on him with Mr. Skrine, his apothecary. We found 
 his senses clear, and his mind calm : his nurse and 
 several servants were about him. He told us he 
 had sent for us to give him an account of an odd 
 sensation he had for some time observed and felt
 
 2o6 HERMOTIMUS 
 
 in himself; which was, that, by composing himself, 
 he could die or expire when he pleased; and yet by 
 an effort, or somehow, he could come to life again, 
 which he had sometimes tried before he had sent 
 for us. We heard this with surprise ; but, as it was 
 not to be accounted for upon common principles, we 
 could hardly believe the fact as he related it, much 
 less give any account of it ; unless he should please 
 to make the experiment before us, which we were 
 unwilling he should do, lest, in his weak condition, 
 he might cany it too far. He continued to talk 
 very distinctly and sensibly above a quarter of an 
 hour about this surprising sensation, and insisted 
 so much on our seeing the trial made, that we were 
 at last forced to comply. We all three felt his pulse 
 first — it was distinct, though small and thready, and 
 his heart had its usual beating. He composed himself 
 on his back, and lay in a still posture for some time : 
 while I held his right hand, Dr. Baynard laid his hand 
 on his heart, and Mr. Skrine held a clean looking-glass 
 to his mouth. I found his pulse sink gradually, till 
 at last I could not find any by the most exact and 
 nice touch. Dr. Baynard could not feel the least 
 motion in his heart, nor Mr. Skrine the least soil 
 of breath on the bright mirror he held to his mouth; 
 then each of us by turns examined his arm, heart, 
 and breath, but could not, by the nicest scrutiny, 
 discover the least symptom of life in liim. We 
 reasoned a long time about this odd appearance as
 
 HERMOTIMUS 207 
 
 well as we could, and all of us judging it inexplicable 
 and unaccountable ; and, finding he still continued 
 in that condition, we began to conclude that he 
 had indeed carried the experiment too far ; and at 
 last were satisfied he was actually dead, and were 
 just ready to leave him. This continued about half 
 an hour. As we were going away, we observed some 
 motion about the body ; and, upon examination, found 
 his pulse and the motion of his heart gradually 
 returning. He began to breathe gently and speak 
 softly. We were all astonished to the last degree 
 at this unexpected change ; and, after some further 
 conversation with him, and among ourselves, went 
 away fully satisfied as to all the particulars of this 
 fact, but confounded and puzzled, and not able to 
 form any rational scheme that might account for it."
 
 HERMOTIMUS 
 
 I. 
 
 i " Wilt not lay thee down in quiet slumber ? 
 Weary dost thou seem, and ill at rest ; 
 Sleep will luring thee dreams in starry number — 
 Let him come to thee and be thy guest. 
 Midnight now is past — 
 Husband ! come at last — 
 Lay thy throbbing head upon my breast." 
 
 II. 
 
 " Weary am I, but my soul is waking ; 
 Fain I 'd lay me gently by thy side, 
 But my spirit then, its home forsaking, 
 
 Through the realms of space would wander wide- 
 E very thing forgot, 
 What would be thy lot, 
 If I came not back to thee, my bride ? 
 
 III. 
 " Music, like the lute of young Apollo, 
 Vibrates even now within mine ear ; 
 Soft and silver voices bid me follow. 
 Yet my soul is dull and will not hear.
 
 HERMOTIMUS 209 
 
 Waking it will stay : 
 Let me waLeli till day — 
 Fainler will the}' come, and disappear." 
 
 IV. 
 
 " Speak not thus to me, my own — my dearest ! 
 
 These are but the phantoms of thy brain ; 
 Nothing can befall thee which thou fearest, 
 Thou shalt wake to love and life again. 
 Were this sleep thy last, 
 I should hold thee fast, 
 Thou shouldst strive against me but in vain, 
 
 V. 
 
 " Eros will protect us, and will hover. 
 
 Guardian-like, above thee all the night, 
 Jealous of thee, as of some fond lover 
 Chiding back the rosy-fingered light — 
 He will be thine aid : 
 Canst thou feel afraid 
 When his torch above us burnetii liri!iht ? 
 
 VI. 
 
 " Lo I the cressets of the niu;ht are waninu' — 
 
 Old Orion hastens from the sky ; 
 Only thou of all things art remaining 
 Unrefreshed by slumber — thou and I. 
 Sound and sense are still; 
 Even the distant rill 
 Murmurs fainter now, and languidly. 
 
 o
 
 2 10 HERMOTIMUS 
 
 VII. 
 
 " Come and rest thee, husband ! " — And no longer 
 
 Could the young man that fond call resist : 
 Vainly was he warned, for love was stronger — 
 Warmly did he press her to his breast. 
 Warmly met she his ; 
 Kiss succeeded kiss. 
 Till their eyelids closed with sleep oppressed. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Soon Aurora left her early pillow, 
 
 And the heavens grew rosy-rich, and rare ; 
 
 Laughed the dewy plain and glassy billow, 
 
 For the Golden God himself was there ; 
 
 And the vapour-screen 
 
 Rose the hills between, 
 
 Steaming up, like incense, in the air. 
 
 IX. 
 
 O'er her husband sate lone bending — 
 
 Marble-like and marble-hued he lay ; 
 Underneath her raven locks descending, 
 Paler seemed his face, and ashen gray, 
 And so white his brow — 
 White and cold as snow — 
 " Husband ! Gods ! his soul hath passed away ! "
 
 HERMOTIMUS 211 
 
 X. 
 
 Raise ye up the pile with gloomy shadow — 
 
 Heap it with the mournful cypress-bough 1— 
 And they raised the pile upon the meadow, 
 And they heaped the mournful cypress too ; 
 And they laid the dead 
 On his funeral bed, 
 And they kindled up the flames below. 
 
 XI. 
 
 Swiftly rose they, and the corse surrounded. 
 
 Spreading out a pall into the air ; 
 And the sharp and sudden crackling sounded 
 Mournfully to all the watchers there. 
 Soon their force was spent, 
 And the body blent 
 With the embers' slow-expiring glare. 
 
 XII. 
 
 Night again was come ; but oh, how lonely 
 
 To the mourner did that night appear ! 
 Peace nor rest it brought, but sorrow only, 
 Vain repinings and unwonted fear. 
 Dimly burned the lamp — 
 Chill the air and damp — 
 And the winds without were moaning drear.
 
 212 HERMOTIMUS 
 
 XIII. 
 
 Hush ! ;i voice in solemn whispers speaking 
 Breaks within the twilight of the room ; 
 And lone, loud and wildly shrieking, 
 
 Starts and gazes through the ghastly gloom. 
 Nothing sees she there — 
 All is empty air, 
 All is empty as a rilled tomb. 
 
 XIV. 
 
 Once again the voice beside her sounded, 
 
 Low, and faint, and solemn was its tone — 
 " Nor by form nor shade am I surrounded, 
 Fleshly home and dwelling have I none. 
 They are passed away — 
 Woe is me ! to-day 
 Hath robbed me of myself, and made me lone. 
 
 XV. 
 
 " Vainly were the words of parting spoken ; 
 
 Evermore must Charon turn from me. 
 •Still my thread of life remains unbroken, 
 And unbroken ever it must be ; 
 Only they may rest 
 Whom the Fates' behest 
 liom Lheir mortal mansion setLeth free.
 
 HKRMOTIMUS 213 
 
 XVI. 
 
 " I have seen the robes of Hermes glisten — 
 
 Seen him wave afar his serpent-wand ; 
 But to me the Herald would not listen — 
 When the dead swept ]iy at his command, 
 Not with that pale crew 
 Durst I venture too — 
 Ever shut for me the quiet land. 
 
 XVII. 
 
 " Day and night before the dreary portal, 
 
 Phantom-shapes, the guards of Hades, lie ; 
 None of heavenly kind, nor yet of mortal, 
 May unchallenged pass the warders by. 
 None that path may go. 
 If he cannot show 
 His last passport to eternity. 
 
 XVIII. 
 
 " Cruel was the spirit-power thou gavest — 
 
 Fatal, Apollo, was thy love ! 
 Pythian ! Archer 1 brightest God and bravest, 
 Hear, hear me from thy throne above I 
 Let me not, I pray, 
 Thus be cast away : 
 Plead for me — thy slave— plead to Jove !
 
 214 HERMOTIMUS 
 
 XIX. 
 
 " I have heard thee with the Muses singing — 
 
 Heard that full, melodious voice of thine, 
 Silver-clear throughout the ether ringing — 
 Seen thy locks in golden clusters shine ; 
 And thine eye, so bright 
 With its innate light, 
 Hath ere now been bent so low as mine. 
 
 XX. 
 
 " Hast thou lost the wish — the will — to cherish 
 
 Those who trusted in thy godlike power ? 
 Hyacinthus did not wholly perish ; 
 
 Still he lives, the firstling of thy bower ; 
 Still he feels thy rays, 
 Fondly meets thy gaze, 
 Though but now the spirit of a flower. 
 
 XXI. 
 
 " Hear me, Phoebus ! Hear me and deliver ! 
 
 Lo ! the morning breaketh from afar — 
 God ! thou comest bright and great as ever — 
 Night goes back before thy burning car ; 
 All her lamps are gone — 
 Lucifer alone 
 Lingers still for thee — the blessed star !
 
 HERMOTIMUS 215 
 
 XXII. 
 
 " Hear me, Phoebus ! " — And therewith descended 
 
 Through the window-arch a glory-gleam, 
 All effulgent — and with music blended, 
 For such solemn sounds arose as stream 
 From the Memnon-lyre, 
 When the morning fire 
 Gilds the giant's forehead with its beam. 
 
 XXIII. 
 
 " Thou hast heard thy servant's prayer, Apollo ; 
 
 Thou dost call me, mighty God of Day ! 
 Fare-thee-well, lone ! " — And more hollow 
 Came the phantom-voice, then died away. 
 When the slaves arose, 
 Not in calm repose, 
 Not in sleep, but death, their mistress lay.
 
 CENONE 
 
 On the holy mount of Ida, 
 
 Where the pine and cypress grow, 
 Sate a young and lovely woman, 
 
 Weepmg ever, weeping low. 
 Drearily throughout the forest 
 
 Did the winds of autumn blow, 
 And the clouds above were flying, 
 
 And Scamander rolled below. 
 
 " Faithless Paris ! cruel Paris ! " 
 
 Thus the poor deserted spake — 
 " Wherefore thus so strangely leave me ? 
 
 Why thy loving bride forsake ? 
 Why no tender word at parting ? 
 
 Why no kiss, no farewell take ? 
 Would that I could Imt forget thee — 
 
 AVould this throbbins; heart mig;ht l)reak ! 
 
 " Is my face no longer blooming ? 
 
 Are my eyes no longer l3right ? 
 Ah ! my tears have made them dimmer, 
 
 And my cheeks are pale and white.
 
 CENONE 217 
 
 I have wept since early morning, 
 
 I will weep the livelong night ; 
 Now I long for sullen darkness, 
 
 As I once have longed for light. 
 
 " Paris ! canst thou then be cruel ? 
 
 Fair, and young, and brave thou art — 
 Can it be that in thy bosom 
 
 Lies so cold, so hard a heart ? 
 Children were we bred together — 
 
 She who bore me suckled thee ; 
 I have been thine old companion. 
 
 When thou hadst no more but me, 
 
 " I have watched thee in thy slumbers, 
 
 When the shadow of a dream 
 Passed across thy smiling features. 
 
 Like the ripple of a stream ; 
 And so sweetly were the visions 
 
 Pictured there with lively grace, 
 That I half could read their import 
 
 By the changes on thy face. 
 
 " When 1 sang of Ariadne, 
 
 Sang the old and mournful tale, 
 How her faithless lover, Tlieseiis, 
 
 Left her to lament and wail ; 
 Then thine eyes would fill and glisten. 
 
 Her complaint could soften thee : 
 Thou hast wept for Ariadne — 
 
 Theseus' self might weep for me !
 
 2i8 (ENONE 
 
 " Thou may'st lind another maiden 
 
 With a fairer face than mine — 
 With a gayer voice, and sweeter, 
 
 And a spirit liker thine : 
 For if e'er my beauty bound thee. 
 
 Lost and broken is the spell ; 
 But thou canst not find another 
 
 That will love thee half so well. 
 
 " thou hollow ship that bearest 
 
 Paris o'er the faithless deep, 
 Wouldst thou leave him on some island, 
 
 Where alone the waters weep ? 
 Where no human foot is moulded 
 
 In the wet and yellow sand — 
 Leave him there, thou hollow vessel ! 
 
 Leave him on that lonely land ! 
 
 " Then his heart will surely soften, 
 
 When his foolish hopes decay. 
 And his older love rekindle. 
 
 As the new one dies away. 
 Visionary hills will haunt him. 
 
 Rising from the glassy sea, 
 And his thoughts will wander homewards 
 
 Unto Ida and to me. 
 
 " ! that like a little swallow 
 I could reach that lonely spot ! 
 
 All his errors would be pardoned, 
 All the weary past forgot.
 
 CENONE 219 
 
 Never should he wander from me — 
 
 Never should he more depart, 
 For these arms would be his prison, 
 
 And his home would be my heart." 
 
 Thus lamented fair OEuone, 
 
 Weeping ever, weeping low. 
 On the holy mount of Ida, 
 
 Where the pine and cypress grow. 
 In the self-same hour Cassandra 
 
 Shrieked her prophecy of woe, 
 And into the Spartan dwelling 
 
 Did the faithless Paris go.
 
 THE BURIED FLOWER 
 
 In the silence of my chamber, 
 When the night is still and deep, 
 
 And the drowsy heave of ocean 
 Mutters in its charmed sleep, 
 
 Oft I hear the angel-voices 
 
 That have thrilled me long ago, — 
 
 Voices of my lost companions. 
 Lying deep beneath the snow. 
 
 0, the garden I remember, 
 In the gay and sunny spring, 
 
 When our laughter made the thickets 
 And the arching alleys ring ! 
 
 the merry burst of gladness ! 
 
 O the soft and tender tone ! 
 the whisper never uttered 
 
 Save to one fond ear alone !
 
 THE BURIED FLOWER 221 
 
 the light of life that sparkled 
 
 In those bright and bounteous eyes ! 
 
 the blush of happy beauty, 
 Tell-tale of the heart's surprise ! 
 
 the radiant light that girdled 
 Field and forest, land and sea, 
 
 When we all were young together, 
 And the earth was new to me ! 
 
 Where are now the flowers we tended ? 
 Withered, broken, branch and stem ; 
 Where are now the hopes we cherished ? 
 
 Scattered to the winds with them. 
 
 For ye, too, were flowers, ye dear ones ! 
 
 Nursed in hope and reared in love, 
 Looking fondly ever upward 
 
 To the clear blue heaven above : 
 
 SmiUng on the sun that cheered us, 
 Rising liglitly from the rain, 
 
 Never folding up your freshness. 
 Save to give it forth again :
 
 222 THE BURIED FLOWER 
 
 Never shaken, save by accents 
 From a tongue that was not free, 
 
 As the modest blossom trembles 
 At the wooing of the bee. 
 
 ! 't is sad to lie and reckon 
 All the days of faded youth, 
 
 All the vows that we believed in, 
 All the words we spoke in truth. 
 
 Severed — were it severed only 
 By an idle thought of strife, 
 
 Such as time might knit together 
 Not the broken chord of life ! 
 
 my heart ! that once so truly 
 Kept another's time and tune. 
 
 Heart, that kindled in the spring-tide, 
 Look around thee in the noon. 
 
 Where are they who gave the impulse 
 To thy earliest thought and flow ? 
 
 Look around the ruined garden — 
 All are withered, dropped, or low !
 
 THE BURIED FLOWER 22^; 
 
 Seek the birth-place of the lily, 
 
 Dearer to the boyish dream 
 Than the golden cups of Eden, 
 
 Floating on its slumbrous stream ; 
 
 Never more shalt thou behold her- 
 She, the noblest, fairest, best : 
 
 She that rose in fullest beauty. 
 Like a queen, above the rest. 
 
 Only still I keep her image 
 As a thought that cannot die ; 
 
 He who raised the shade of Helen 
 Had no greater power than I. 
 
 ! I fling my spirit backward, 
 And I pass o'er years of pain ; 
 
 All I loved is rising round me, 
 All the lost returns again. 
 
 Blow, for ever blow, ye breezes. 
 Warmly as ye did before ! 
 
 Bloom again, ye happy gardens, 
 With the radiant tints of yore !
 
 224 ^^HE BURIED FLOWER 
 
 Warble out in spray and thicket, 
 All ye choristers unseen ; 
 
 Let the leafy woodland echo 
 With an anthem to its i^ueen ! 
 
 Lo ! she cometh in her beauty, 
 Stately with a Juno grace, 
 
 Kaven locks, Madonna-braided 
 O'er her sweet and blushing face 
 
 Eyes of deepest violet, beaming 
 
 With the love that knows not shame- 
 Lips, that thrill my inmost being 
 With the utterance of a name. 
 
 And I bend the knee before her, 
 As a captive ought to bow, — 
 
 Pray thee, listen to my pleading, 
 Sovereign of my soul art thou ! 
 
 my dear and gentle lady, 
 Let me show thee all my pain, 
 
 Ere the words that late were prisoned 
 Sink into my heart again.
 
 THE BURIED FLOWER 22 
 
 Love, they say, is very fearful 
 
 Ere its curtain be withdrawn, 
 Trembling at the thought of error 
 
 As the shadows scare the fawn. 
 
 Love hath bound me to thee, lady, 
 Since the well-remembered day 
 
 When I first beheld thee coming 
 In the light of lustrous May. 
 
 Not a word I dared to utter — 
 More than he who, long ago. 
 
 Saw the heavenly shapes descending 
 Over Ida's slopes of snow : 
 
 When a low and solemn music 
 
 Floated through the listening grove, 
 
 And the throstle's song was silenced, 
 And the doling of the dove : 
 
 When immortal beauty opened 
 All its grace to mortal sight. 
 
 And the awe of worship blended 
 With the throbbing of delight.
 
 226 THE BURIED FLOWER 
 
 As the sheiDherd stood before them 
 Trembling in the Phrygian dell, 
 
 Even so my soul and being 
 Owned the magic of the spell ; 
 
 And I watched thee ever fondly, 
 Watched thee, dearest ! from afar, 
 
 With the mute and humble homage 
 Of the Indian to a star. 
 
 Thou wert still the Lady Flora 
 In her morning garb of bloom ; 
 
 Where thou wert was light and glory, 
 Where thou wert not, dearth and gloom. 
 
 So for many a day I followed 
 For a long and weary while, 
 
 Ere my heart rose up to bless thee 
 For the yielding of a smile, — 
 
 Ere thy words were few and broken 
 As they answered back to mine. 
 
 Ere my lips had power to thank thee 
 For the gift vouchsafed by thine.
 
 THE BURIED FLOWER 227 
 
 Then a mighty gush of passion 
 
 Through my inmost being ran ; 
 Then my older life was ended, 
 
 And a dearer course began. 
 
 Dearer ! — 0, I cannot tell thee 
 What a load was swept away, 
 
 What a world of doubt and darkness 
 Faded in the dawning day ! 
 
 All my error, all my weakness, 
 All my vain delusions fled : 
 
 Hope again revived, and gladness 
 Waved its wings above my head. 
 
 Like the wanderer of the desert. 
 When, across the dreary sand, 
 
 Breathes the perfume from the thickets 
 Bordering on the promised land ; 
 
 When afar he sees the palm-trees 
 Cresting o'er the lonely well, 
 
 When he hears the pleasant tinkle 
 Of the distant camel's bell :
 
 228 THE BURIED FLOWER 
 
 So a fresh and glad emotion 
 Eose within my swelling breast, 
 
 And I hurried swiftly onwards 
 To the haven of my rest. 
 
 Thou wert there with word and welcome, 
 With thy smile so purely sweet ; 
 
 And I laid my heart before thee, 
 Laid it, darling, at thy feet ! — 
 
 ye words that sound so hollow 
 As I now recall your tone ! 
 
 What are ye but empty echoes 
 Of a passion crushed and gone ? 
 
 Wherefore should I seek to kindle 
 Light, when all around is gloom ? 
 
 Wherefore should I raise a phantom 
 O'er the dark and silent tomb ? 
 
 Early wert thou taken, Mary ! 
 
 In thy fair and glorious prime, 
 Ere the bees had ceased to murmur 
 
 Through the umbrage of the lime.
 
 THE BURIED FLOWER 229 
 
 Buds were blowing, waters flowing, 
 
 Birds were singing on the tree, 
 Every thing was bright and glowing. 
 
 When the angels came for thee. 
 
 Death had laid aside his terror, 
 And he found thee calm and mild, 
 
 Lying in thy robes of whiteness, 
 Like a pure and stainless child. 
 
 Hardly had the mountain violet 
 Spread its blossoms on the sod, 
 
 Ere they laid the turf above thee, 
 And thy spirit rose to God. 
 
 Early wert thou taken, Mary ! 
 
 And I know 't is vain to weep — 
 Tears of mine can never wake thee 
 
 From thy sad and silent sleep. 
 
 away ! my thoughts are earthward ! 
 
 Not asleep, my love, art thou ! 
 Dwelling in the land of glory 
 
 With the saints and angels now.
 
 2 30 THE BURIED FLOWER 
 
 Brighter, fairer far than living, 
 With no trace of woe or pain, 
 
 Robed in everlasting beauty, 
 Shall I see thee once again, 
 
 By the light that never fadeth. 
 Underneath eternal skies, 
 
 When the dawn of resurrection 
 Breaks o'er deathless Paradise.
 
 THE OLD CAMP 
 
 WRITTEN IN A ROMAN FORTIFICATION IN BAVARIA 
 
 I. 
 
 There is a cloud before the sun, 
 
 The wind is hushed and still, 
 And silently the waters run 
 
 Beneath the sombre hill. 
 The sky is dark in every place, 
 
 As is the earth below : 
 Methinks it wore the self-same face 
 
 Two thousand years ago, 
 
 n. 
 
 No light is on the ancient wall, 
 
 No light upon the mound ; 
 The very trees, so thick and tall, 
 
 Cast gloom, not shade, around. 
 So silent is the place and cold, 
 
 So far from human ken, 
 It hath a look that makes me old, 
 
 And spectres time again.
 
 232 THE OLD CAMP 
 
 III. 
 
 I listen, half in thought to hear 
 
 The Eoman trumpet blow — 
 I search for glint of helm and spear 
 
 Amidst the forest bough : 
 And armour rings, and voices swell — 
 
 I hear the legion's tramp, 
 And mark the lonely sentinel 
 
 Who guards the lonely camp. 
 
 IV. 
 
 Methinks I have no other home, 
 
 No other hearth to find ; 
 Por nothing save the thought of Rome 
 
 Is stirring in my mind. 
 And all that I have heard or dreamed, 
 
 And all I had forgot, 
 Are rising up, as though they seemed 
 
 The household of the spot. 
 
 And all the names that Eomans knew 
 Seem just as known to me. 
 
 As if I were a Roman too — 
 A Roman born and free :
 
 THE OLD CAMP ^33 
 
 And I could rise at Coesar's name, 
 
 As though it were a charm 
 To draw sharp lightning from the tame, 
 
 And brace the coward's arm. 
 
 VI. 
 
 And yet, if yonder sky were blue, 
 
 And earth were sunny gay, 
 If nature wore the summer hue 
 
 That decked her yesterday, 
 The mound, the trench, the rampart's space, 
 
 Would move me nothing more 
 Than many a sweet sequestred place 
 
 That I have marked before. 
 
 VII. 
 
 I could not feel the breezes bring 
 
 Rich odours from the trees ; 
 I could not hear the linnets sing, 
 
 And think on themes like these. 
 The painted insects as they pass 
 
 In swift and motley strife, 
 The very lizard in the grass 
 
 Would scare me back to life.
 
 234 THE OLD CAMP 
 
 VIII. 
 
 Then is the past so gloomy now 
 
 That it may never bear 
 The open smile of nature's brow, 
 
 Or meet the sunny air ? 
 I know not that — but joy is power, 
 
 However short it last ; 
 And joy befits the present hour, 
 
 If sadness fits the past.
 
 DANUBE AND THE EUXINE 
 
 " Danube, Danube ! wherefore com'st thou 
 
 Eed and raging to my caves ? 
 Wherefore leap thy swollen waters 
 
 Madly through the broken waves ? 
 Wherefore is thy tide so sullied 
 
 With a hue unknown to me ; 
 Wherefore dost thou bring pollution 
 
 To the old and sacred sea ? " 
 
 " Ha ! rejoice, old Father Euxine ! 
 
 I am brimming full and red ; 
 Noble tidings do I carry 
 
 From my distant channel-bed. 
 I have been a Christian river 
 
 Dull and slow this many a year, 
 Rolling down my torpid waters 
 
 Through a silence morne and drear ; 
 Have not felt the tread of armies 
 
 Trampling on my reedy shore ; 
 Have not heard the trumpet calling, 
 
 Or the cannon's gladsome roar ;
 
 236 DANUBE AND THE EUXINE 
 
 Only listened to the laughter 
 
 From the village and the town, 
 And the church-bells, ever jangling, 
 
 As the weary day went down. 
 So I lay and sorely pondered 
 
 On the days long since gone by, 
 When my old primaeval forests 
 
 Echoed to the war-man's cry ; 
 When the race of Thor and Odin 
 
 Held their battles by my side, 
 And the blood of man was mingling 
 
 Warmly with my chilly tide. 
 Father Euxine ! thou rememb'rest 
 
 How I brought thee tribute then — 
 Swollen corpses, gashed and gory, 
 
 Heads and limbs of slaughter'd men ? 
 Father Euxine ! be thou joyful ! 
 
 I am running red once more — 
 Not with heathen blood, as early. 
 
 But with gallant Christian gore ! 
 For the old times are returning. 
 
 And the Cross is broken down, 
 And I hear the tocsin sounding 
 
 In the village and the town ; 
 And the glare of burning cities 
 
 Soon shall light me on my way — 
 Ha ! my heart is big and jocund 
 
 With the draught I drank to-day. 
 Ha ! I feel my strength awakened, 
 
 And my brethren shout to me ;
 
 DANUBE AND THK EUXINE 237 
 
 Each is leaping red and joyous 
 
 To his own awaiting sea. 
 Ehine and Elbe are plunging downward 
 
 Through their wild anarchic land, 
 Everywhere are Christians falling 
 
 By their brother Christians' hand ! 
 Yea, the old times are returning, 
 
 And the olden gods are here ! 
 Take my tribute, Father Euxine, 
 
 To thy waters dark and drear. 
 Therefore come I with my torrents, 
 
 Shaking castle, crag, and town ; 
 Therefore, with the shout of thunder, 
 
 Sweep I herd and herdsman down ; 
 Therefore leap 1 to thy l>osoni, 
 
 With a loud triumphal roar — 
 Greet me, greet me, Father Euxine, 
 
 I am Christian stream no more ! "
 
 THE SCHEIK OF SINAI IN 1830 
 FROM THE GERMAN OF FREILIGRATH 
 
 " Lift me without the tent, I say, — 
 
 Me and my ottoman, — 
 I '11 see the messenger myself ! 
 It is the caravan 
 
 From Africa, thou sayest. 
 
 And they bring us news of war ? 
 Draw me without the tent, and quick ! 
 
 As at the desert well 
 The freshness of the purling brook 
 Delights the tired gazelle. 
 
 So pant I for the voice of him 
 That cometh from afar ! " 
 
 II. 
 
 The Scheik was lifted from his tent, 
 
 And thus outspake the Moor : — 
 " I saw, old Chief, the Tricolor 
 On Algiers' topmost tower — 
 Upon its battlements the silks 
 Of Lyons flutter free.
 
 THE SCHEIK OF SINAI IN 1830 239 
 
 Each morning, in the market-place, 
 
 The muster-drum is beat, 
 And to the war-hymn of Marseilles 
 The squadrons pace the street. 
 
 The armament from Toulon sailed : 
 The Franks have crossed the sea. 
 
 III. 
 
 " Towards the south, the columns marched 
 
 Beneath a cloudless sky : 
 Their weapons glittered in the blaze 
 Of the sun of Barbary ; 
 And with the dusty desert sand 
 Their horses' manes were white. 
 The wild marauding tribes dispersed 
 
 In terror of tlieir lives ; 
 They fled unto the mountains 
 
 With their children and their wives, 
 And urged the clumsy dromedary 
 Up the Atlas' height. 
 
 IV. 
 
 " The Moors have ta'en their vantage-ground, 
 
 The volleys thunder fast — 
 The dark defile is blazing 
 Like a heated oven-blast ; 
 
 The lion hears the strange turmoil, 
 And leaves his mangled prey —
 
 2+0 THE SCHEIK OF SINAI IN 1830 
 
 No place was that for him to feed ; 
 
 And thick and loud the cries, 
 Yen !— Allah ! Allah !— En avant ! 
 In mingled discord rise ; 
 
 The Franks have reached the summit- 
 They have won the victory ! 
 
 V. 
 
 " With bristling steel, upon the top 
 
 The victors take their stand : 
 Beneath their feet, with all its towns, 
 They see the promised land — 
 From Tunis, even unto Fez, 
 From Atlas to the seas. 
 The cavaliers alight to gaze, 
 
 And gaze full well they may. 
 Where countless minarets stand up 
 So solemnly and gray, 
 
 Amidst the dark-green masses 
 Of the flowering myrtle-trees. 
 
 VI. 
 
 " The almond blossoms in the vale ; 
 
 The aloe from the rock 
 Throws out its long and prickly leaves, 
 Nor dreads the tempest's shock : 
 A blessed land, I ween, is that, 
 Though luckless is its Bey.
 
 THE SCHEIK OF SINAT IN 1830 2+1 
 
 There lies the sea — beyond lies France ! 
 
 Her banners in the air 
 Float proudly and triumphantly — 
 A salvo ! come, prepare ! 
 
 And loud and long the mountains rang 
 With that glad artillery." 
 
 VII. 
 
 " 'T is they ! " exclaimed the aged Scheik. 
 
 " I 've battled by their side — 
 I fought beneath the Pyramids ! 
 That day of deathless pride — 
 
 Red as th}- turban, Moor, that eve, 
 Was every creek in Nile ! 
 But tell me — " and he griped his hand — 
 
 " Their Sultaun. Stranger, say — 
 His form — his face — his posture, man ? 
 Thou saw'st him in the fray ? 
 
 His eye — what wore he?" But the Moor 
 Sought in his vest awhile. 
 
 VIII. 
 
 " Their Sultaun, Scheik, remains at home 
 
 Within his palace walls : 
 He sends a Pasha in his stead 
 To brave the bolts and balls. 
 
 He was not there. An Aga burst 
 For him through Atlas' hold. 
 Q
 
 242 THE SCHEIK OF SINAI IN 1830 
 
 Yet I can show thee somewhat too. 
 
 A Frankish Cavalier 
 Told me his effigy was stamped 
 Upon this medal here — 
 He gave me with others 
 For an Arab steed I sold." 
 
 IX. 
 
 The old man took the golden coin : 
 
 Gazed steadfastly awhile, 
 If that could be the Sultaun 
 Whom from the banks of Nile 
 He guided o'er the desert path — 
 Then sighed and thus spake he — 
 " 'T is not his eye — 't is not his brow — 
 
 Another face is there : 
 I never saw this man before — 
 His head is like a pear ! 
 
 Take back thy medal, Moor — 't is not 
 That which I hoped to see."
 
 EPITAPH OF CONSTANTINE KANARIS 
 
 FROM THE GERMAN OF WILHELM MULLER 
 
 I AM Constantine Kanaiis : 
 
 I, who lie beneath this stone, 
 Twice into the air in thunder 
 
 Have the Turkish galleys blown. 
 
 In my bed I died— a Christian, 
 Hoping straight with Christ to be ; 
 
 Yet one earthly wish is buried 
 Deep within the grave with me — 
 
 That upon the open ocean 
 
 When the third Armada came, 
 They and I had died together, 
 
 Whirled aloft on wings of flame. 
 
 Yet 't is something that they Ve laid me 
 
 In a land without a stain : 
 Keep it thus, my God and Saviour, 
 
 Till I rise from earth again !
 
 THE REFUSAL OF CHARON* 
 FROM THE ROMAIC 
 
 Why look the distant mountains 
 
 So gloomy and so drear ? 
 Are rain-clouds passing o'er them, 
 
 Or is the tempest near ? 
 No shadow of the temptest 
 
 Is there, nor wind nor rain — 
 'T is Charon that is passing by. 
 
 With all his gloomy train. 
 
 The young men march before him, 
 
 In all their strength and pride ; 
 The tender little infants, 
 
 They totter by his side ; 
 The old men walk behind him, 
 
 And earnestly they pray — 
 Both old and young imploring liini 
 
 To grant some brief delay. 
 
 * According to the superstition of the modern Greeks, Charon 
 performs tlic function which their ancestors assigned to Hermes, 
 of conducting the souls of the dead to the other world.
 
 THE REFUSAL OF CHARON 245 
 
 " Charon ! halt, we pray thee, 
 
 Beside some little town, 
 Or near some sparkling fountain, 
 
 Where the waters wimple down ' 
 The old will drink and be refreshed. 
 
 The young the disc will fling, 
 And the tender little children 
 
 Pluck flowers beside the spring." 
 
 " I will not stay my journey, 
 
 Nor halt by any town, 
 Near any sparkling fountain, 
 
 Where the waters wimple down : 
 The mothers coming to the well, 
 
 Would know the babes they bore, 
 The wives would clasp their husbands. 
 
 Nor could I part them more." 
 
 THE END.
 
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 Date Due 
 
 1 
 
 out X ^> ' 
 
 
 
 
 FEB 5J^ 
 
 63 
 
 
 1 
 
 JAfV 1 g 
 
 1983 
 
 
 
 HAR 1 4 19 
 
 BD 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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 I 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
 
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 JNIVER! 
 
 iTY OF CA , R|V6nSJDf |Ll?fl^RY, 
 
 3 1210 01222 0255
 
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 AA 000 613 876 2 
 
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