Endnotes + 

Abbotsford Manuscripts. ↩ + 

See Scott’s reply, with the anecdote about Mrs. Aphra Behn’s novels. —⁠Lockhart, VI 406 (edition of 1839) ↩ + 

A history of Scott’s Manuscripts, with good facsimiles, will be found in the Catalogue of the Scott Exhibition, Edinburgh, 1872. ↩ + 

While speaking of correction, it may be noted that Scott, in his “Advertisement” prefixed to the issue of 1829, speaks of changes made in that collected edition. In Waverley these emendations are very rare, and are unimportant. A few callidae juncturae are added, a very few lines are deleted. The postscript of the first edition did not contain the anecdote about the hiding-place of the manuscript among the fishing tackle. The first line of Flora Macdonald’s battle-song (chapter XXII) originally ran, “Mist darkens the mountain, night darkens the vale,” in place of “There is mist on the mountain and mist on the vale.” For the rest, as Scott says, “where the tree falls it must lie.” ↩ + 

Abbotsford Manuscripts. Hogg averred that nobody either read or wrote poetry after Sir Walter took to prose. ↩ + 

Scott reviewed Frankenstein in 1818. Mr. Shelley had sent it with a brief note, in which he said that it was the work of a friend, and that he had only seen it through the press. Sir Walter passed the book on to Mr. Morritt, who, in reply, gave Scott a brief and not very accurate history of Shelley. Sir Walter then wrote a most favourable review of Frankenstein in Blackwood’s Magazine, observing that it was attributed to Mr. Percy Bysshe Shelley, a son-in-law of Mr. Godwin. Mrs. Shelley presently wrote thanking him for the review, and assuring him that it was her own work. Scott had apparently taken Shelley’s disclaimer as an innocent evasion; it was an age of literary superscheries. —⁠Abbotsford Manuscripts ↩ + 

Journal, March 14, 1826. ↩ + 

Mr. R. P. Gillies says that in 1811 “Waverley, in three volumes, had been announced by John Ballantyne, and a sheet or two set in types.” —⁠Recollections of Sir Walter Scott, p. 204 ↩ + 

Lockhart, IV, 172. ↩ + 

In a letter to Lady Abercorn, written when he was busy with the Lady of the Lake, Scott complained that he could not draw a lover, in spite of his own experience. ↩ + 

“The ‘Quarterly Review,’ in 1817.” This notice was written by Scott, in conjunction with his friend Mr. Willian Erskine. As his own correspondence and that of Mr. Murray, the publisher, show, Scott offered to criticise his own novels, as a proof that he had not written them. See Introduction to Old Mortality. The review is published in Scott’s Miscellaneous Prose Works. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

A homely metrical narrative of the events of the period, which contains some striking particulars, and is still a great favourite with the lower classes, gives a very correct statement of the behaviour of the mountaineers respecting this same military license; and, as the verses are little known, and contain some good sense, we venture to insert them. ↩ + 

Alas! that attire, respectable and gentlemanlike in 1805, or thereabouts, is now as antiquated as the Author of Waverley has himself become since that period! The reader of fashion will please to fill up the costume with an embroidered waistcoat of purple velvet or silk, and a coat of whatever colour he pleases. ↩ + 

Where the Chevalier St. George, or, as he was termed, the Old Pretender, held his exiled court, as his situation compelled him to shift his place of residence. ↩ + 

Long the oracle of the country gentlemen of the high Tory party. The ancient Newsletter was written in manuscript and copied by clerks, who addressed the copies to the subscribers. The politician by whom they were compiled picked up his intelligence at coffeehouses, and often pleaded for an additional gratuity in consideration of the extra expense attached to frequenting such places of fashionable resort. ↩ + 

“Alma.” The allusion is to Prior’s poem of “Alma: The Vital Principle.” In the first edition Scott says, “Alma, when seated in his arms and legs,” in accordance with Prior’s humorous theory. + 

“To her next stage as Alma flies, + 

And likes, as I have said, the thighs, + 

With sympathetic power she warms + 

Their good allies and friends, the arms.” + 

—⁠Editor + 

↩ + 

There is a family legend to this purpose, belonging to the knightly family of Bradshaigh, the proprietors of Haigh Hall, in Lancashire, where, I have been told, the event is recorded on a painted glass window. The German ballad of the Noble Moringer turns upon a similar topic. But undoubtedly many such incidents may have taken place, where, the distance being great and the intercourse infrequent, false reports concerning the fate of the absent Crusaders must have been commonly circulated, and sometimes perhaps rather hastily credited at home. ↩ + 

See Hoppner’s tale of The Seven Lovers. ↩ + 

These Introductory Chapters have been a good deal censured as tedious and unnecessary. Yet there are circumstances recorded in them which the author has not been able to persuade himself to retrench or cancel. ↩ + 

The attachment to this classic was, it is said, actually displayed in the manner mentioned in the text by an unfortunate Jacobite in that unhappy period. He escaped from the jail in which he was confined for a hasty trial and certain condemnation, and was retaken as he hovered around the place in which he had been imprisoned, for which he could give no better reason than the hope of recovering his favourite Titus Livius. I am sorry to add that the simplicity of such a character was found to form no apology for his guilt as a rebel, and that he was condemned and executed. ↩ + 

“The edition of Sweynheim and Pannartz.” This is “Historiaruam Romanarum decades III, ex recognitione Joan. Andreae, episc. alierensis. Romae: Conradus Sweynheym et Arnoldus Pannartz. Folio.” The date is believed to be 1467. A copy was sold for £472 10s. at the sale of Sir Mark Sykes, whom Scott succeeded as a member of the Roxburghe Club. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

Nicholas Amhurst, a noted political writer, who conducted for many years a paper called the Craftsman, under the assumed name of Caleb D’Anvers. He was devoted to the Tory interest, and seconded with much ability the attacks of Pulteney on Sir Robert Walpole. He died in 1742, neglected by his great patrons and in the most miserable circumstances. + 

“Amhurst survived the downfall of Walpole’s power, and had reason to expect a reward for his labours. If we excuse Bolingbroke, who had only saved the shipwreck of his fortunes, we shall be at a loss to justify Pulteney, who could with ease have given this man a considerable income. The utmost of his generosity to Amhurst that I ever heard of was a hogshead of claret! He died, it is supposed, of a broken heart; and was buried at the charge of his honest printer, Richard Francklin” —⁠Lord Chesterfield’s Characters Reviewed, p. 42 ↩ + 

I have now given in the text the full name of this gallant and excellent man, and proceed to copy the account of his remarkable conversion, as related by Doctor Doddridge. + 

“This memorable event,” says the pious writer, “happened towards the middle of July 1719. The major had spent the evening (and, if I mistake not, it was the Sabbath) in some gay company, and had an unhappy assignation with a married woman, whom he was to attend exactly at twelve. The company broke up about eleven, and, not judging it convenient to anticipate the time appointed, he went into his chamber to kill the tedious hour, perhaps with some amusing book, or some other way. But it very accidentally happened that he took up a religious book, which his good mother or aunt had, without his knowledge, slipped into his portmanteau. It was called, if I remember the title exactly, The Christian Soldier, or Heaven taken by Storm, and it was written by Mr. Thomas Watson. Guessing by the title of it that he would find some phrases of his own profession spiritualised in a manner which he thought might afford him some diversion, he resolved to dip into it, but he took no serious notice of anything it had in it; and yet, while this book was in his hand, an impression was made upon his mind (perhaps God only knows how) which drew after it a train of the most important and happy consequences. He thought he saw an unusual blaze of light fall upon the book which he was reading, which he at first imagined might happen by some accident in the candle, but, lifting up his eyes, he apprehended to his extreme amazement that there was before him, as it were suspended in the air, a visible representation of the Lord Jesus Christ upon the cross, surrounded on all sides with a glory; and was impressed as if a voice, or something equivalent to a voice, had come to him, to this effect (for he was not confident as to the words), ‘Oh, sinner! did I suffer this for thee, and are these thy returns?’ Struck with so amazing a phenomenon as this, there remained hardly any life in him, so that he sunk down in the armchair in which he sat, and continued, he knew not how long, insensible.” + 

“With regard to this vision,” says the ingenious Dr. Hibbert, “the appearance of our Saviour on the cross, and the awful words repeated, can be considered in no other light than as so many recollected images of the mind, which probably had their origin in the language of some urgent appeal to repentance that the colonel might have casually read or heard delivered. From what cause, however, such ideas were rendered as vivid as actual impressions, we have no information to be depended upon. This vision was certainly attended with one of the most important of consequences connected with the Christian dispensation⁠—the conversion of a sinner. And hence no single narrative has, perhaps, done more to confirm the superstitious opinion that apparitions of this awful kind cannot arise without a divine fiat.” Doctor Hibbert adds in a note⁠—“A short time before the vision, Colonel Gardiner had received a severe fall from his horse. Did the brain receive some slight degree of injury from the accident, so as to predispose him to this spiritual illusion?” —⁠Hibbert’s Philosophy of Apparitions, Edinburgh, 1824, p. 190 ↩ + 

The courtesy of an invitation to partake a traveller’s meal, or at least that of being invited to share whatever liquor the guest called for, was expected by certain old landlords in Scotland even in the youth of the author. In requital mine host was always furnished with the news of the country, and was probably a little of a humorist to boot. The devolution of the whole actual business and drudgery of the inn upon the poor gudewife was very common among the Scottish Bonifaces. There was in ancient times, in the city of Edinburgh, a gentleman of good family who condescended, in order to gain a livelihood, to become the nominal keeper of a coffeehouse, one of the first places of the kind which had been opened in the Scottish metropolis. As usual, it was entirely managed by the careful and industrious Mrs. B⁠⸺; while her husband amused himself with field sports, without troubling his head about the matter. Once upon a time, the premises having taken fire, the husband was met walking up the High Street loaded with his guns and fishing-rods, and replied calmly to someone who inquired after his wife, “that the poor woman was trying to save a parcel of crockery and some trumpery books”; the last being those which served her to conduct the business of the house. + 

There were many elderly gentlemen in the author’s younger days who still held it part of the amusement of a journey “to parley with mine host,” who often resembled, in his quaint humour, mine Host of the Garter in the Merry Wives of Windsor; or Blague of the George in the Merry Devil of Edmonton. Sometimes the landlady took her share of entertaining the company. In either case the omitting to pay them due attention gave displeasure, and perhaps brought down a smart jest, as on the following occasion: + 

A jolly dame who, not “Sixty Years Since,” kept the principal caravansary at Greenlaw, in Berwickshire, had the honour to receive under her roof a very worthy clergyman, with three sons of the same profession, each having a cure of souls; be it said in passing, none of the reverend party were reckoned powerful in the pulpit. After dinner was over, the worthy senior, in the pride of his heart, asked Mrs. Buchan whether she ever had had such a party in her house before. “Here sit I,” he said, “a placed minister of the Kirk of Scotland, and here sit my three sons, each a placed minister of the same kirk. Confess, Luckie Buchan, you never had such a party in your house before.” The question was not premised by any invitation to sit down and take a glass of wine or the like, so Mrs. B. answered drily, “Indeed, sir, I cannot just say that ever I had such a party in my house before, except once in the forty-five, when I had a Highland piper here, with his three sons, all Highland pipers; and deil a spring they could play amang them.” ↩ + 

There is no particular mansion described under the name of Tully-Veolan; but the peculiarities of the description occur in various old Scottish seats. The House of Warrender upon Bruntsfield Links and that of Old Ravelston, belonging, the former to Sir George Warrender, the latter to Sir Alexander Keith, have both contributed several hints to the description in the text. The House of Dean, near Edinburgh, has also some points of resemblance with Tully-Veolan. The author has, however, been informed that the House of Grandtully resembles that of the Baron of Bradwardine still more than any of the above. ↩ + 

Probably the old House of Traquair is as like Tully-Veolan as any surviving edifice, bears and all. The avenue of Tully-Veolan resembles that of Kenmure Castle, in Galloway. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

At Ravelston may be seen such a garden, which the taste of the proprietor, the author’s friend and kinsman, Sir Alexander Keith, Knight Mareschal, has judiciously preserved. That, as well as the house is, however, of smaller dimensions than the Baron of Bradwardine’s mansion and garden are presumed to have been. ↩ + 

This is a genuine ancient fragment, with some alteration in the two last lines. ↩ + 

I am ignorant how long the ancient and established custom of keeping fools has been disused in England. Swift writes an epitaph on the Earl of Suffolk’s fool⁠— + 

Whose name was Dickie Pearce + 

In Scotland, the custom subsisted till late in the last century; at Glamis Castle is preserved the dress of one of the jesters, very handsome, and ornamented with many bells. It is not above thirty years since such a character stood by the sideboard of a nobleman of the first rank in Scotland, and occasionally mixed in the conversation, till he carried the joke rather too far, in making proposals to one of the young ladies of the family, and publishing the bans betwixt her and himself in the public church. ↩ + 

“C’est des doux oreilles.” So in the edition of 1829. “C’est des deux oreilles” is the reading in the first edition, while Messrs. Black’s edition of 1890 offers the reading “c’est d’une oreille,” which is correct. Cotgrave’s Dictionary (1611) is quoted for “ ‘à une oreille,’ said of wine that’s excellent good.” Littré, “Vin d’une oreille = le bon vin.” A somewhat mythical explanation of the phrase is given in the Dictionary of the French Academy. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

After the Revolution of 1688, and on some occasions when the spirit of the Presbyterians had been unusually animated against their opponents, the Episcopal clergymen, who were chiefly nonjurors, were exposed to be mobbed, as we should now say, or rabbled, as the phrase then went, to expiate their political heresies. But notwithstanding that the Presbyterians had the persecution in Charles II and his brother’s time to exasperate them, there was little mischief done beyond the kind of petty violence mentioned in the text. ↩ + 

The Baron of Bradwardine. There were doubtless many brave, scholarly old Scottish gentlemen like the Baron, who “had fought the foreign loons in their own countrie.” Mr. Chambers (Illustrations of the Author of “Waverley”) mentions Col. Alexander Robertson, of the Struan family, and John Stewart of Kincardine; but the fourth Lord Forbes of Pitsligo, who was out in the Fifteen and the Forty-five, had two bears as supporters of his shield; so he, perhaps, was as like the Baron as any of his compeers. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

“Ben Jonson’s Tom Otter.” In The Silent Woman, act IV scene II —⁠Editor ↩ + 

Southey’s Madoc. ↩ + 

I may here mention that the fashion of compotation described in the text was still occasionally practised in Scotland in the author’s youth. A company, after having taken leave of their host, often went to finish the evening at the clachan or village, in “womb of tavern.” Their entertainer always accompanied them to take the stirrup-cup, which often occasioned a long and late revel. + 

The Poculum Potatorium of the valiant Baron, his blessed Bear, has a prototype at the fine old Castle of Glamis, so rich in memorials of ancient times; it is a massive beaker of silver, double gilt, moulded into the shape of a lion, and holding about an English pint of wine. The form alludes to the family name of Strathmore, which is Lyon, and, when exhibited, the cup must necessarily be emptied to the Earl’s health. The author ought perhaps to be ashamed of recording that he has had the honour of swallowing the contents of the Lion; and the recollection of the feat served to suggest the story of the Bear of Bradwardine. In the family of Scott of Thirlestane (not Thirlestane in the Forest, but the place of the same name in Roxburghshire) was long preserved a cup of the same kind, in the form of a jackboot. Each guest was obliged to empty this at his departure. If the guest’s name was Scott, the necessity was doubly imperative. + 

When the landlord of an inn presented his guests with deoch an doruis, that is, the drink at the door, or the stirrup-cup, the draught was not charged in the reckoning. On this point a learned bailie of the town of Forfar pronounced a very sound judgment. + 

A., an alewife in Forfar, had brewed her “peck of malt” and set the liquor out of doors to cool; the cow of B., a neighbour of A., chanced to come by, and seeing the good beverage, was allured to taste it, and finally to drink it up. When A. came to take in her liquor, she found her tub empty, and from the cow’s staggering and staring, so as to betray her intemperance, she easily divined the mode in which her “browst” had disappeared. To take vengeance on Crummie’s ribs with a stick was her first effort. The roaring of the cow brought B., her master, who remonstrated with his angry neighbour, and received in reply a demand for the value of the ale which Crummie had drunk up. B. refused payment, and was conveyed before C., the bailie, or sitting magistrate. He heard the case patiently; and then demanded of the plaintiff A. whether the cow had sat down to her potation or taken it standing. The plaintiff answered, she had not seen the deed committed, but she supposed the cow drank the ale while standing on her feet, adding, that had she been near she would have made her use them to some purpose. The bailie, on this admission, solemnly adjudged the cow’s drink to be deoch an doruis, a stirrup-cup, for which no charge could be made without violating the ancient hospitality of Scotland. ↩ + 

This has been censured as an anachronism; and it must be confessed that agriculture of this kind was unknown to the Scotch Sixty Years Since. ↩ + 

Suum cuique. This snatch of a ballad was composed by Andrew Macdonald, the ingenious and unfortunate author of Vimonda. ↩ + 

Suum cuique. The ingenious and unfortunate author of Vimonda was a Scotch Episcopalian clergyman, Andrew Macdonald. Scott’s friend William Erskine (Lord Kinedder) boarded at Mr. Macdonald’s house when a boy. (Lockhart, I 279.) Vimonda, though put on the stage, did not prevent its author from dying in extreme poverty. Scott as a boy had seen Macdonald in Mr. Sibbald’s bookshop, where he also saw Burns, “at a distance.” —⁠Lockhart, I 64. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

Luckie Macleary throws her plaid over the swords. This may have been suggested to Scott by a scene in the “Eyrbyggja Saga,” where a lady named Aud performs a similar feat in a fray. Less fortunate than Luckie Macleary, Aud lost a hand from a sword-stroke. Sir Walter published an account of the “Eyrbygeja Saga” in 1813, when he was engaged on Waverley. As an illustration of Scotch convivial manners and of random sword-blows, we print an account of the death of the Laird of Stewartfield, from a curious manuscript diary in the possession of Mr. Charles Grieve, in Branxholme Park, the work of one of his ancestors. Scott has not exageerated the manners which he describes. + 

“The death of Stewartfield happened at a Head Court at Jedburgh. The gentlemen at the meeting were all drunk, and some quarrel arose between Sir ⸻ of ⸻ and Stewartfield, and the latter was stabbed by a sword under the table. There was a precognition taken, but no light could be thrown on the matter. Sir ⸻’s servant carried his master off as soon as he understood what had happened, and brought him to the churchyard and laid him down upon a tombstone, where he slept for some time, he covering him with a blanket. He conveyed his horses to a distance, and after allowing him some time to sleep off the drink, he waked him and conveyed him up Rule Water, and he lay concealed in Waughope Wood till he made his escape to Holland.” —⁠Editor ↩ + 

Dr. Johnson on Scotch breakfasts: “If an epicure could remove by a wish in quest of sensual gratification, wherever he had supped, he would breakfast in Scotland.” —⁠Johnson’s Works, IX 52 —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The learned in cookery dissent from the Baron of Bradwardine, and hold the roe venison dry and indifferent food, unless when dressed in soup and Scotch collops. ↩ + 

A barefooted Highland lad is called a “gillie-wet-foot.” Gillie, in general, means servant, or attendant. ↩ + 

The Baron ought to have remembered that the joyous Allan literally drew his blood from the house of the noble earl whom he terms⁠— + 

“Dalhousie of an old descent + 

My stoup, my pride, my ornament.” + 

↩ + 

“A rhyme quoted by Edgar in ‘King Lear,’ ” act III scene IV:⁠— + 

“Saint Withold footed thrice the wold; + 

He met the Night-mare and her nine-fold; + 

Bid her alight, + 

And her troth plight, + 

And, aroint thee, witch, aroint thee!” + 

—⁠Editor + 

↩ + 

The story last told was said to have happened in the south of Scotland; but cedant arma togae and let the gown have its dues. It was an old clergyman, who had wisdom and firmness enough to resist the panic which seized his brethren, who was the means of rescuing a poor insane creature from the cruel fate which would otherwise have overtaken her. The accounts of the trials for witchcraft form one of the most deplorable chapters in Scottish story. ↩ + 

Although canting heraldry is generally reprobated, it seems nevertheless to have been adopted in the arms and mottos of many honourable families. Thus the motto of the Vernons, Ver non semper viret, is a perfect pun, and so is that of the Onslows, Festina lente. The Periissem ni per‑iissem of the Anstruthers is liable to a similar objection. One of that ancient race, finding that an antagonist, with whom he had fixed a friendly meeting, was determined to take the opportunity of assassinating him, prevented the hazard by dashing out his brains with a battle-axe. Two sturdy arms, brandishing such a weapon, form the usual crest of the family, with the above motto, Periissem ni per‑iissem⁠—I had died, unless I had gone through with it. ↩ + 

A creagh was an incursion for plunders, termed on the Borders a “Raid.” ↩ + 

“The celebrated Belides.” More frequently called the Danaïds, daughters of Danaus, who was the son of Belus. Their punishment was to carry water in a sieve, and, unlike the lad in the fairy tale, they had not the wit to daub the sieve with clay. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

“Sornars” may be translated sturdy beggars, more especially indicating those unwelcome visitors who exact lodgings and victuals by force, or something approaching to it. ↩ + 

Macdonald of Barrisdale, one of the very last Highland gentlemen who carried on the plundering system to any great extent, was a scholar and a well-bred gentleman. He engraved on his broadswords the well-known lines⁠— + 

Hae tibi erunt artes pacisque imponere morem, + 

Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos. + 

Indeed, the levying of blackmail was, before 1745, practised by several chiefs of very high rank, who, in doing so, contended that they were lending the laws the assistance of their arms and swords, and affording a protection which could not be obtained from the magistracy in the disturbed state of the country. The author has seen a Memoir of MacPherson of Cluny, chief of that ancient clan, from which it appears that he levied protection-money to a very large amount, which was willingly paid even by some of his most powerful neighbours. A gentleman of this clan, hearing a clergyman hold forth to his congregation on the crime of theft, interrupted the preacher to assure him, he might leave the enforcement of such doctrines to Cluny MacPherson, whose broadsword would put a stop to theft sooner than all the sermons of all the ministers of the Synod. ↩ + 

The Town-guard of Edinburgh were, till a late period, armed with this weapon when on their police-duty. There was a hook at the back of the axe, which the ancient Highlanders used to assist them to climb over walls, fixing the hook upon it and raising themselves by the handle. The axe, which was also much used by the natives of Ireland, is supposed to have been introduced into both countries from Scandinavia. ↩ + 

It is not the weeping birch, the most common species in the Highlands, but the woolly-leaved Lowland birch, that is distinguished by this fragrance. ↩ + 

An adventure very similar to what is here stated actually befell the late Mr. Abercromby of Tullibody, grandfather of the present Lord Abercromby, and father of the celebrated Sir Ralph. When this gentleman, who lived to a very advanced period of life, first settled in Stirlingshire, his cattle were repeatedly driven off by the celebrated Rob Roy, or some of his gang; and at length he was obliged, after obtaining a proper safe-conduct, to make the cateran such a visit as that of Waverley to Bean Lean in the text. Rob received him with much courtesy, and made many apologies for the accident, which must have happened, he said, through some mistake. Mr. Abercromby was regaled with collops from two of his own cattle, which were hung up by the heels in the cavern, and was dismissed in perfect safety, after having agreed to pay in future a small sum of blackmail, in consideration of which Rob Roy not only undertook to forbear his herds in future, but to replace any that should be stolen from him by other freebooters. Mr. Abercromby said Rob Roy affected to consider him as a friend to the Jacobite interest and a sincere enemy to the Union. Neither of these circumstances were true; but the laird thought it quite unnecessary to undeceive his Highland host at the risk of bringing on a political dispute in such a situation. This anecdote I received many years since (about 1792) from the mouth of the venerable gentleman who was concerned in it. ↩ + 

This was the regale presented by Rob Roy to the Laird of Tullibody. ↩ + 

This celebrated gibbet was, in the memory of the last generation, still standing at the western end of the town of Crieff, in Perthshire. Why it was called the kind gallows we are unable to inform the reader with certainty; but it is alleged that the Highlanders used to touch their bonnets as they passed a place which had been fatal to many of their countrymen, with the ejaculation “God bless her nain sell, and the Teil tamn you!” It may therefore have been called kind, as being a sort of native or kindred place of doom to those who suffered there, as in fulfilment of a natural destiny. ↩ + 

The story of the bridegroom carried off by caterans on his bridal-day is taken from one which was told to the author by the late Laird of MacNab many years since. To carry off persons from the Lowlands, and to put them to ransom, was a common practice with the wild Highlanders, as it is said to be at the present day with the banditti in the south of Italy. Upon the occasion alluded to, a party of caterans carried off the bridegroom and secreted him in some cave near the mountain of Schiehallion. The young man caught the smallpox before his ransom could be agreed on; and whether it was the fine cool air of the place, or the want of medical attendance, MacNab did not pretend to be positive; but so it was, that the prisoner recovered, his ransom was paid, and he was restored to his friends and bride, but always considered the Highland robbers as having saved his life by their treatment of his malady. ↩ + 

The Scotch are liberal in computing their land and liquor; the Scottish pint corresponds to two English quarts. As for their coin, everyone knows the couplet⁠— + 

How can the rogues pretend to sense? + 

Their pound is only twenty pence. + 

↩ + 

This happened on many occasions. Indeed, it was not till after the total destruction of the clan influence, after 1745, that purchasers could be found who offered a fair price for the estates forfeited in 1715, which were then brought to sale by the creditors of the York Buildings Company, who had purchased the whole, or greater part, from government at a very small price. Even so late as the period first mentioned, the prejudices of the public in favour of the heirs of the forfeited families threw various impediments in the way of intending purchasers of such property. ↩ + 

This sort of political game ascribed to MacIvor was in reality played by several Highland chiefs, the celebrated Lord Lovat in particular, who used that kind of finesse to the uttermost. The Laird of Mac⁠—was also captain of an independent company, but valued the sweets of present pay too well to incur the risk of losing them in the Jacobite cause. His martial consort raised his clan and headed it in 1745. But the chief himself would have nothing to do with king-making, declaring himself for that monarch, and no other, who gave the Laird of Mac⁠—“half-a-guinea the day and half-a-guinea the morn.” ↩ + 

In explanation of the military exercise observed at the Castle of Glennaquoich, the author begs to remark that the Highlanders were not only well practised in the use of the broadsword, firelock, and most of the manly sports and trials of strength common throughout Scotland, but also used a peculiar sort of drill, suited to their own dress and mode of warfare. There were, for instance, different modes of disposing the plaid, one when on a peaceful journey, another when danger was apprehended; one way of enveloping themselves in it when expecting undisturbed repose, and another which enabled them to start up with sword and pistol in hand on the slightest alarm. + 

Previous to 1720 or thereabouts, the belted plaid was universally worn, in which the portion which surrounded the middle of the wearer and that which was flung around his shoulders were all of the same piece of tartan. In a desperate onset all was thrown away, and the clan charged bare beneath the doublet, save for an artificial arrangement of the shirt, which, like that of the Irish, was always ample, and for the sporran-mollach, or goat’s-skin purse. + 

The manner of handling the pistol and dirk was also part of the Highland manual exercise, which the author has seen gone through by men who had learned it in their youth. ↩ + 

Pork or swine’s flesh, in any shape, was, till of late years, much abominated by the Scotch, nor is it yet a favourite food amongst them. King Jamie carried this prejudice to England, and is known to have abhorred pork almost as much as he did tobacco. Ben Jonson has recorded this peculiarity, where the gipsy in a masque, examining the king’s hand, says⁠— + 

You should, by this line, + 

Love a horse and a hound, but no part of a swine. + 

—⁠The Gipsies Metamorphosed. + 

James’s own proposed banquet for the Devil was a loin of pork and a poll of ling, with a pipe of tobacco for digestion. ↩ + 

In the number of persons of all ranks who assembled at the same table, though by no means to discuss the same fare, the Highland chiefs only retained a custom which had been formerly universally observed throughout Scotland. “I myself,” says the traveller, Fynes Morrison, in the end of Queen Elizabeth’s reign, the scene being the Lowlands of Scotland, “was at a knight’s house, who had many servants to attend him, that brought in his meat with their heads covered with blue caps, the table being more than half furnished with great platters of porridge, each having a little piece of sodden meat. And when the table was served, the servants did sit down with us; but the upper mess, instead of porridge, had a pullet, with some prunes in the broth” (“Travels,” p. 155). + 

Till within this last century the farmers, even of a respectable condition, dined with their work-people. The difference betwixt those of high degree was ascertained by the place of the party above or below the salt, or sometimes by a line drawn with chalk on the dining-table. Lord Lovat, who knew well how to feed the vanity and restrain the appetites of his clansmen, allowed each sturdy Fraser who had the slightest pretensions to be a Duinhewassel the full honour of the sitting, but at the same time took care that his young kinsmen did not acquire at his table any taste for outlandish luxuries. His lordship was always ready with some honourable apology why foreign wines and French brandy, delicacies which he conceived might sap the hardy habits of his cousins, should not circulate past an assigned point on the table. ↩ + 

In the Irish ballads relating to Fion (the Fingal of MacPherson) there occurs, as in the primitive poetry of most nations, a cycle of heroes, each of whom has some distinguishing attribute; upon these qualities, and the adventures of those possessing them, many proverbs are formed, which are still current in the Highlands. Among other characters, Conan is distinguished as in some respects a kind of Thersites, but brave and daring even to rashness. He had made a vow that he would never take a blow without returning it; and having, like other heroes of antiquity, descended to the infernal regions, he received a cuff from the Arch-fiend who presided there, which he instantly returned, using the expression in the text. Sometimes the proverb is worded thus⁠—“Claw for claw, and the devil take the shortest nails, as Conan said to the devil.” ↩ + 

The Highland poet almost always was an improvisatore. Captain Burt met one of them at Lovat’s table. ↩ + 

The description of the waterfall mentioned in this chapter is taken from that of Ledeard, at the farm so called, on the northern side of Lochard, and near the head of the lake, four or five miles from Aberfoyle. It is upon a small scale, but otherwise one of the most exquisite cascades it is possible to behold. The appearance of Flora with the harp, as described, has been justly censured as too theatrical and affected for the ladylike simplicity of her character. But something may be allowed to her French education, in which point and striking effect always make a considerable object. ↩ + 

The young and daring adventurer, Charles Edward, landed at Glenaladale, in Moidart, and displayed his standard in the valley of Glenfinnan, mustering around it the Macdonalds, the Camerons, and other less numerous clans, whom he had prevailed on to join him. There is a monument erected on the spot, with a Latin inscription by the late Doctor Gregory. ↩ + 

The Marquis of Tullibardine’s elder brother, who, long exiled, returned to Scotland with Charles Edward in 1745. ↩ + 

Flora Macdonald’s song. + 

“Ye sons of brown Dermid, who slew the wild boar, + 

Resume the pure faith of the great Callum-More.” + 

There was no Callum-More; the name is Mac Cailean Mohr, Dermid should be Diarmaid, in Irish apparently Diarmuid. For the slaughter of the boar by the mythical father of the Campbells, see The Pursuit of Diarmuid and Grainne. Ossianic Society, Dublin, 1857. The modern Irish have anglicized Diarmuid as Jeremiah. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

Good sooth, I reck nought of your Helicon; + 

Drink water whoso will, in faith I will drink none. + 

↩ + 

This ancient Gaelic ditty is still well known, both in the Highlands and in Ireland. It was translated into English, and published, if I mistake not, under the auspices of the facetious Tom D’Urfey, by the title of “Colley, my Cow.” ↩ + 

“The Pope’s legate.” See Mr. Hume Brown’s Early Travellers in Scotland, p. XII The legate visited Scotland in 1543. “His name and identity are still a disputed point, and he is variously known as Peter Francis Contareno, Mark German, and Marcus Grymanus, Patriarch of Aquileia.” —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The thrust from the tynes, or branches, of the stag’s horns was accounted far more dangerous than those of the boar’s tusk:⁠— + 

If thou be hurt with horn of stag, it brings thee to thy bier, + 

But barber’s hand shall boar’s hurt heal, thereof have thou no fear. + 

↩ + 

This garb, which resembled the dress often put on children in Scotland, called a “polonie” (that is, “polonaise”), is a very ancient modification of the Highland garb. It was, in fact, the hauberk or shirt of mail, only composed of cloth instead of rings of armour. ↩ + 

Old Highlanders will still make the “deasil” around those whom they wish well to. To go round a person in the opposite direction, or wither-shins (German wider-shins), is unlucky, and a sort of incantation. ↩ + 

“A charm, which in English ran thus.” The charm, as given by Reginald Scott (1584), is⁠— + 

“Hail be thou, holie hearbe + 

Growing on the ground; + 

All in the mount Calvarie + 

First wert thou found. + 

Thou art good for manie a sore, + 

And healest manie a wound; + 

“In the name of sweete Jesus + 

I take thee from the ground.” + 

—⁠The Discoverie of Witchcraft, book XII ch. XIV (edition of 1886, p. 198) + 

—⁠Editor + 

↩ + 

This metrical spell, or something very like it, is preserved by Reginald Scott in his work on Witchcraft. ↩ + 

On the morrow they made their biers + 

Of birch and hazel grey. + 

—⁠Chevy Chase + 

↩ + 

The author has been sometimes accused of confounding fiction with reality. He therefore thinks it necessary to state that the circumstance of the hunting described in the text as preparatory to the insurrection of 1745 is, so far as he knows, entirely imaginary. But it is well known such a great hunting was held in the Forest of Brae-Mar, under the auspices of the Earl of Mar, as preparatory to the Rebellion of 1715; and most of the Highland chieftains who afterwards engaged in that civil commotion were present on this occasion. ↩ + 

Corresponding to the Lowland saying, “Mony ane speirs the gate they ken fu’ weel.” ↩ + 

These lines form the burden of an old song to which Burns wrote additional verses. ↩ + 

These lines are also ancient, and I believe to the tune of + 

“We’ll never hae peace till Jamie comes hame;” + 

to which Burns likewise wrote some verses. ↩ + 

“Whatever were the original rights of the Stewarts.” Scott has been accused of “blind Jacobitism.” The extent of his blindness may be estimated from Waverley’s reflections in this chapter. Scott was interested as an historian and as the descendant of “Auld Beardie” in the Jacobite cause. He admired⁠—as who does not?⁠—the self-sacrificing loyalty of the Highlanders, never so nobly displayed as after Drumossie. He felt the poetic charm of the unhappy and ungrateful Honse of Stewart. But his writings might be searched in vain for even a sentimental approval of “plunging a kingdom into all the miseries of civil war for the purpose of replacing upon the throne the descendants of a monarch by whom it had been wilfully forfeited.” —⁠Editor ↩ + 

A Highland rhyme on Glencairn’s Expedition, in 1650, has these lines⁠— + 

We’ll bide a while amang ta crows, + 

We’ll wiske ta sword and bend ta bows + 

↩ + 

The Oggam is a species of the old Irish character. The idea of the correspondence betwixt the Celtic and Punic, founded on a scene in Plautus, was not started till General Vallancey set up his theory, long after the date of Fergus MacIvor. ↩ + 

“Oggam,” generally spelled “Ogham,” a system of writing by means of lines incised, at various angles, on the edges of a squared stone. The researches of Professor Rhys do not support the Punic hypothesis of General Vallancey. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The sanguine Jacobites, during the eventful years 1745⁠–⁠46, kept up the spirits of their party by the rumour of descents from France on behalf of the Chevalier St. George. ↩ + 

“The sanguine Jacobites, during the eventful years 1745⁠–⁠46, kept up the spirits of their party by the rumour of descents from France on behalf of the Chevalier St. George.” See Tom Jones, book XI ch. VI Mrs. Fitzpatrick asked Honour “who were come!” “Who?” answered she, “why, the French; several hundred thousands of them are landed, and we shall be all murdered and ravished.”⁠ ⁠… “Ay, ay,” quoth the landlord, smiling, “her ladyship knows better things; she knows the French are our very best friends, and come over hither only for our good, They are the people who are to make old England flourish again.⁠ ⁠… His Honour’s Majesty [Charles Edward], Heaven bless him, hath given the duke the slip, and is marching as fast as he can to London, and ten thousand French are landed to join him on the road.” —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The Highlander, in former times, had always a high idea of his own gentility, and was anxious to impress the same upon those with whom he conversed. His language abounded in the phrases of courtesy and compliment; and the habit of carrying arms, and mixing with those who did so, made it particularly desirable they should use cautious politeness in their intercourse with each other. ↩ + 

The Reverend John Erskine, D. D., an eminent Scottish divine and a most excellent man, headed the Evangelical party in the Church of Scotland at the time when the celebrated Doctor Robertson, the historian, was the leader of the Moderate party. These two distinguished persons were colleagues in the Old Grey Friars’ Church, Edinburgh; and, however much they differed in church politics, preserved the most perfect harmony as private friends and as clergymen serving the same cure. ↩ + 

“The Engagers, and the Protesters, and the Whiggamore’s Raid, and the Excommunication at Torwood.” These are various persons, parties, and incidents in the history of the Covenanters. The “Engagers” entered into the Engagement with Charles I at Newport in the Isle of Wight in 1648. They were reprobated by the severer sect, “the Protesters,” for “intercommuning with prelatical malignants.” The “Whiggamore’s Raid” was a march of Westland Whigs on Edinburgh from Mauchline (1648). See Hill Burton’s History of Scotland, VII 238⁠–⁠243. Near the Torwood oak, in 1680, Cargill excommunicated Charles II —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The clan of MacFarlane, occupying the fastnesses of the western side of Loch Lomond, were great depredators on the Low Country, and as their excursions were made usually by night, the moon was proverbially called their lantern. Their celebrated pibroch of Hoggil nam Bo, which is the name of their gathering tune, intimates similar practices, the sense being:⁠— + 

We are bound to drive the bullocks, + 

All by hollows, hirsts, and hillocks, + 

Through the sleet, and through the rain. + 

When the moon is beaming low + 

On frozen lake and hills of snow, + 

Bold and heartily we go; + 

And all for little gain. + 

↩ + 

This noble ruin is dear to my recollection, from associations which have been long and painfully broken. It holds a commanding station on the banks of the river Teith, and has been one of the largest castles in Scotland. Murdoch, Duke of Albany, the founder of this stately pile, was beheaded on the Castle-hill of Stirling, from which he might see the towers of Doune, the monument of his fallen greatness. + 

In 1745⁠–⁠46, as stated in the text, a garrison on the part of the Chevalier was put into the castle, then less ruinous than at present. It was commanded by Mr. Stewart of Balloch, as governor for Prince Charles; he was a man of property near Callander. This castle became at that time the actual scene of a romantic escape made by John Home, the author of Douglas, and some other prisoners, who, having been taken at the battle of Falkirk, were confined there by the insurgents. The poet, who had in his own mind a large stock of that romantic and enthusiastic spirit of adventure which he has described as animating the youthful hero of his drama, devised and undertook the perilous enterprise of escaping from his prison. He inspired his companions with his sentiments, and when every attempt at open force was deemed hopeless, they resolved to twist their bedclothes into ropes and thus to descend. Four persons, with Home himself, reached the ground in safety. But the rope broke with the fifth, who was a tall, lusty man. The sixth was Thomas Barrow, a brave young Englishman, a particular friend of Home’s. Determined to take the risk, even in such unfavourable circumstances, Barrow committed himself to the broken rope, slid down on it as far as it could assist him, and then let himself drop. His friends beneath succeeded in breaking his fall. Nevertheless, he dislocated his ankle and had several of his ribs broken. His companions, however, were able to bear him off in safety. + 

The Highlanders next morning sought for their prisoners with great activity. An old gentleman told the author he remembered seeing the commandant Stewart + 

Bloody with spurring, fiery red with haste, + 

riding furiously through the country in quest of the fugitives. ↩ + 

“The Castle of Doune.” See Lockhart, I 290. Scott visited the place in his Highland tour in 1793. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The Judges of the Supreme Court of Session in Scotland are proverbially termed among the country people, The Fifteen. ↩ + 

To go out, or to have been out, in Scotland was a conventional phrase similar to that of the Irish respecting a man having been up, both having reference to an individual who had been engaged in insurrection. It was accounted ill-breeding in Scotland about forty years since to use the phrase rebellion or rebel, which might be interpreted by some of the parties present as a personal insult. It was also esteemed more polite, even for stanch Whigs, to denominate Charles Edward the Chevalier than to speak of him as the Pretender; and this kind of accommodating courtesy was usually observed in society where individuals of each party mixed on friendly terms. ↩ + 

“Wude Willie Grime.” Chapbooks and county histories have, hitherto, yielded no information about this a bandit of the Torwood. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

“The patriotic statesman.” This was President Blair of Avonton. See “Provincial Antiquities,” under “Linlithgow,” and Lockhart, III, 316. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The Jacobite sentiments were general among the western counties and in Wales. But although the great families of the Wynnes, the Wyndhams, and others had come under an actual obligation to join Prince Charles if he should land, they had done so under the express stipulation that he should be assisted by an auxiliary army of French, without which they foresaw the enterprise would be desperate. Wishing well to his cause, therefore, and watching an opportunity to join him, they did not, nevertheless, think themselves bound in honour to do so, as he was only supported by a body of wild mountaineers, speaking an uncouth dialect, and wearing a singular dress. The race up to Derby struck them with more dread than admiration. But it is difficult to say what the effect might have been had either the battle of Preston or Falkirk been fought and won during the advance into England. ↩ + 

Divisions early showed themselves in the Chevalier’s little army, not only amongst the independent chieftains, who were far too proud to brook subjection to each other, but betwixt the Scotch and Charles’s governor O’Sullivan, an Irishman by birth, who, with some of his countrymen bred in the Irish Brigade in the service of the King of France, had an influence with the Adventurer much resented by the Highlanders, who were sensible that their own clans made the chief or rather the only strength of his enterprise. There was a feud, also, between Lord George Murray and John Murray of Broughton, the Prince’s secretary, whose disunion greatly embarrassed the affairs of the Adventurer. In general, a thousand different pretensions divided their little army, and finally contributed in no small degree to its overthrow. ↩ + 

The Doutelle was an armed vessel which brought a small supply of money and arms from France for the use of the insurgents. ↩ + 

Old women, on whom devolved the duty of lamenting for the dead, which the Irish call Keening. ↩ + 

These lines, or something like them, occur in an old magazine of the period. ↩ + 

That is, contiguous. ↩ + 

They occur in Miss Seward’s fine verses, beginning⁠— + 

“To thy rocks, stormy Lannow, adieu.” + 

↩ + 

Which is, or was wont to be, the old air of “Good night and joy be wi’ you a’!” ↩ + 

“My friend Bangour.” The Editor is unable to find the quotation in Poems on Several Occasions, by Hamilton of Bangour. (Glasgow, 1748.) —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The main body of the Highland army encamped, or rather bivouacked, in that part of the King’s Park which lies towards the village of Duddingston. ↩ + 

The Helot clans. The Autobiography of Dr. Carlyle (“Jupiter Carlyle”), who saw the field after Preston Pans, contains a singular account of the ill-clad and ill-fed Highlanders who formed the bulk of Charles Edward’s forces. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

This circumstance, which is historical, as well as the description that precedes it, will remind the reader of the war of La Vendée, in which the royalists, consisting chiefly of insurgent peasantry, attached a prodigious and even superstitious interest to the possession of a piece of brass ordnance, which they called Marie Jeanne. + 

The Highlanders of an early period were afraid of cannon, with the noise and effect of which they were totally unacquainted. It was by means of three or four small pieces of artillery that the Earls of Huntly and Errol, in James VI’s time, gained a great victory at Glenlivat, over a numerous Highland army, commanded by the Earl of Argyle. At the battle of the Bridge of Dee, General Middleton obtained by his artillery a similar success, the Highlanders not being able to stand the discharge of Musket’s Mother, which was the name they bestowed on great guns. In an old ballad on the battle of the Bridge of Dee these verses occur:⁠— + 

“The Highlandmen are pretty men + 

For handling sword and shield, + 

But yet they are but simple men + 

To stand a stricken field. + 

“The Highlandmen are pretty men + 

For target and claymore, + 

But yet they are but naked men + 

To face the cannon’s roar. + 

“For the cannons roar on a summer night + 

Like thunder in the air; + 

Was never man in Highland garb + 

Would face the cannon fair.” + 

But the Highlanders of 1745 had got far beyond the simplicity of their forefathers, and showed throughout the whole war how little they dreaded artillery, although the common people still attached some consequence to the possession of the fieldpiece which led to this disquisition. ↩ + 

Bran, the well-known dog of Fingal, is often the theme of Highland proverb as well as song. ↩ + 

Scottice for followers. ↩ + 

The faithful friend who pointed out the pass by which the Highlanders moved from Tranent to Seaton was Robert Anderson, junior, of Whitburgh, a gentleman of property in East Lothian. He had been interrogated by the Lord George Murray concerning the possibility of crossing the uncouth and marshy piece of ground which divided the armies, and which he described as impracticable. When dismissed, he recollected that there was a circuitous path leading eastward through the marsh into the plain, by which the Highlanders might turn the flank of Sir John Cope’s position without being exposed to the enemy’s fire. Having mentioned his opinion to Mr. Hepburn of Keith, who instantly saw its importance, he was encouraged by that gentleman to awake Lord George Murray and communicate the idea to him. Lord George received the information with grateful thanks, and instantly awakened Prince Charles, who was sleeping in the field with a bunch of peas under his head. The Adventurer received with alacrity the news that there was a possibility of bringing an excellently provided army to a decisive battle with his own irregular forces. His joy on the occasion was not very consistent with the charge of cowardice brought against him by Chevalier Johnstone, a discontented follower, whose Memoirs possess at least as much of a romantic as a historical character. Even by the account of the Chevalier himself, the Prince was at the head of the second line of the Highland army during the battle, of which he says, “It was gained with such rapidity that in the second line, where I was still by the side of the Prince, we saw no other enemy than those who were lying on the ground killed and wounded, though we were not more than fifty paces behind our first line, running always as fast as we could to overtake them.” + 

This passage in the Chevalier’s Memoirs places the Prince within fifty paces of the heat of the battle, a position which would never have been the choice of one unwilling to take a share of its dangers. Indeed, unless the chiefs had complied with the young Adventurer’s proposal to lead the van in person, it does not appear that he could have been deeper in the action. ↩ + 

The death of this good Christian and gallant man is thus given by his affectionate biographer, Doctor Doddridge, from the evidence of eyewitnesses:⁠— + 

“He continued all night under arms, wrapped up in his cloak, and generally sheltered under a rick of barley which happened to be in the field. About three in the morning he called his domestic servants to him, of which there were four in waiting. He dismissed three of them with most affectionate Christian advice, and such solemn charges relating to the performance of their duty, and the care of their souls, as seemed plainly to intimate that he apprehended it was at least very probable he was taking his last farewell of them. There is great reason to believe that he spent the little remainder of the time, which could not be much above an hour, in those devout exercises of soul which had been so long habitual to him, and to which so many circumstances did then concur to call him. The army was alarmed by break of day by the noise of the rebels’ approach, and the attack was made before sunrise, yet when it was light enough to discern what passed. As soon as the enemy came within gunshot they made a furious fire; and it is said that the dragoons which constituted the left wing immediately fled. The Colonel at the beginning of the onset, which in the whole lasted but a few minutes, received a wound by a bullet in his left breast, which made him give a sudden spring in his saddle; upon which his servant, who led the horse, would have persuaded him to retreat, but he said it was only a wound in the flesh, and fought on, though he presently after received a shot in his right thigh. In the meantime, it was discerned that some of the enemy fell by him, and particularly one man who had made him a treacherous visit but a few days before, with great professions of zeal for the present establishment. + 

“Events of this kind pass in less time than the description of them can be written, or than it can be read. The Colonel was for a few moments supported by his men, and particularly by that worthy person Lieutenant-Colonel Whitney, who was shot through the arm here, and a few months after fell nobly at the battle of Falkirk, and by Lieutenant West, a man of distinguished bravery, as also by about fifteen dragoons, who stood by him to the last. But after a faint fire, the regiment in general was seized with a panic; and though their Colonel and some other gallant officers did what they could to rally them once or twice, they at last took a precipitate flight. And just in the moment when Colonel Gardiner seemed to be making a pause to deliberate what duty required him to do in such circumstances, an accident happened, which must, I think, in the judgment of every worthy and generous man, be allowed a sufficient apology for exposing his life to so great hazard, when his regiment had left him. He saw a party of the foot, who were then bravely fighting near him, and whom he was ordered to support, had no officer to head them; upon which he said eagerly, in the hearing of the person from whom I had this account, “These brave fellows will be cut to pieces for want of a commander,” or words to that effect; which while he was speaking he rode up to them and cried out, “Fire on, my lads, and fear nothing.” But just as the words were out of his mouth, a Highlander advanced towards him with a scythe fastened to a long pole, with which he gave him so dreadful a wound on his right arm, that his sword dropped out of his hand; and at the same time several others coming about him while he was thus dreadfully entangled with that cruel weapon, he was dragged off from his horse. The moment he fell, another Highlander, who, if the king’s evidence at Carlisle may be credited (as I know not why they should not, though the unhappy creature died denying it), was one MacNaught, who was executed about a year after, gave him a stroke either with a broadsword or a Lochaber-axe (for my informant could not exactly distinguish) on the hinder part of his head, which was the mortal blow. All that his faithful attendant saw farther at this time was that, as his hat was fallen off, he took it in his left hand and waved it as a signal to him to retreat, and added, what were the last words he ever heard him speak, ‘Take care of yourself’; upon which the servant retired” (Some Remarkable Passages in the Life of Colonel James Gardiner, by P. Doddridge, D. D. London, 1747, p. 187). + 

I may remark on this extract, that it confirms the account given in the text of the resistance offered by some of the English infantry. Surprised by a force of a peculiar and unusual description, their opposition could not be long or formidable, especially as they were deserted by the cavalry, and those who undertook to manage the artillery. But, although the affair was soon decided, I have always understood that many of the infantry showed an inclination to do their duty. ↩ + 

It is scarcely necessary to say that the character of this brutal young Laird is entirely imaginary. A gentleman, however, who resembled Balmawhapple in the article of courage only, fell at Preston in the manner described. A Perthshire gentleman of high honour and respectability, one of the handful of cavalry who followed the fortunes of Charles Edward, pursued the fugitive dragoons almost alone till near Saint Clement’s Wells, where the efforts of some of the officers had prevailed on a few of them to make a momentary stand. Perceiving at this moment that they were pursued by only one man and a couple of servants, they turned upon him and cut him down with their swords. I remember when a child, sitting on his grave, where the grass long grew rank and green, distinguishing it from the rest of the field. A female of the family then residing at Saint Clement’s Wells used to tell me the tragedy, of which she had been an eyewitness, and showed me in evidence one of the silver clasps of the unfortunate gentleman’s waistcoat. ↩ + 

The Laird of Balmawhapple. The gentleman who was killed in the manner described was Mr. David Threipland, of the Fingask family, “an elegant person and in delicate health.” A different account of his death is given in a letter by his sister, Miss Christian Threipland, Nov. 20, 1745. “As my eldest brother and twenty more horsemen were planted at a pass to prevent their escape-making, the resolute dragoons wounded three, and killed my brother and another” —⁠The Threiplands of Fingask. By Robert Chambers. Edinburgh, 1882 —⁠Editor ↩ + 

“Letters of slains.” This remark was added by Scott by an afterthought in his manuscript. In Hume’s Commentaries on the Laws of Scotland, respecting crimes (Edinburgh, 1819), vol. I p. 279, we read:⁠— + 

“When it happens that the panel is convicted only of culpable homicide [and in certain other cases], he becomes liable in a sum of money, or assythment, as it is called, to the widow and children or others next of kin to the deceased.⁠ ⁠… It is a point of controversy whether this is to be properly viewed as damages, or (which is the view of Lord Kames) as the remains of an old and barbarous usage, before the full establishment of public justice, when the criminal redeemed his blood and pacified the resentment of the kindred by the payment of ‘stated composition.’ ” + 

This “price” is the Greek ποινή, the utu of the Maoris. If this payment was accepted, the blood-feud ceased. The Baron means that Ballenkeiroch, having accepted the assythment, has no blood-feud with him. “Evidence of this,” as Hume goes on, “was litteroe pacis, or ‘letters of slains.’ These were receipts signed by the four principal branches of the kin of the deceased.” These letters the Baron had “expedited.” —⁠Editor ↩ + 

“Lie Boots.” Various explanations are suggested | of lie, or lie = id est. It isa term that occurs in old Scotch charters. Some think it is lis = lege, the imperative of the French lire (legere). Others suggest a derivation from videlicet. The term recurs in Introduction to Chronicles of the Canongate: “Sub vexillo regio, apud prelium juxta Branxton, lie Flodden field.” —⁠Editor ↩ + 

Charles Edward took up his quarters after the battle at Pinkie House, adjoining to Musselburgh. ↩ + 

The name of Andrea de Ferrara is inscribed on all the Scottish broadswords which are accounted of peculiar excellence. Who this artist was, what were his fortunes, and when he flourished, have hitherto defied the research of antiquaries; only it is in general believed that Andrea de Ferrara was a Spanish or Italian artificer, brought over by James IV or V to instruct the Scots in the manufacture of sword blades. Most barbarous nations excel in the fabrication of arms; and the Scots had attained great proficiency in forging swords so early as the field of Pinkie; at which period the historian Patten describes them as “all notably broad and thin, universally made to slice, and of such exceeding good temper that, as I never saw any so good, so I think it hard to devise better” (Account of Somerset’s Expedition.) + 

It may be observed that the best and most genuine Andrea Ferraras have a crown marked on the blades. ↩ + 

The clergyman’s name was MacVicar. Protected by the cannon of the Castle, he preached every Sunday in the West Kirk while the Highlanders were in possession of Edinburgh, and it was in presence of some of the Jacobites that he prayed for Prince Charles Edward in the terms quoted in the text. ↩ + 

The incident here said to have happened to Flora MacIvor actually befell Miss Nairne, a lady with whom the author had the pleasure of being acquainted. As the Highland army rushed into Edinburgh, Miss Nairne, like other ladies who approved of their cause, stood waving her handkerchief from a balcony, when a ball from a Highlander’s musket, which was discharged by accident, grazed her forehead. “Thank God,” said she, the instant she recovered, “that the accident happened to me, whose principles are known. Had it befallen a Whig, they would have said it was done on purpose.” ↩ + 

The Author of Waverley has been charged with painting the young Adventurer in colours more amiable than his character deserved. But having known many individuals who were near his person, he has been described according to the light in which those eyewitnesses saw his temper and qualifications. Something must be allowed, no doubt, to the natural exaggerations of those who remembered him as the bold and adventurous Prince in whose cause they had braved death and ruin; but is their evidence to give place entirely to that of a single malcontent? + 

I have already noticed the imputations thrown by the Chevalier Johnstone on the Prince’s courage. But some part at least of that gentleman’s tale is purely romantic. It would not, for instance, be supposed that at the time he is favouring us with the highly wrought account of his amour with the adorable Peggie, the Chevalier Johnstone was a married man, whose grandchild is now alive; or that the whole circumstantial story concerning the outrageous vengeance taken by Gordon of Abbachie on a Presbyterian clergyman is entirely apocryphal. At the same time it may be admitted that the Prince, like others of his family, did not esteem the services done him by his adherents so highly as he ought. Educated in high ideas of his hereditary right, he has been supposed to have held every exertion and sacrifice made in his cause as too much the duty of the person making it to merit extravagant gratitude on his part. Dr. King’s evidence (which his leaving the Jacobite interest renders somewhat doubtful) goes to strengthen this opinion. + 

The ingenious editor of Johnstone’s Memoirs has quoted a story said to be told by Helvetius, stating that Prince Charles Edward, far from voluntarily embarking on his daring expedition, was, literally bound hand and foot, and to which he seems disposed to yield credit. Now, it being a fact as well known as any in his history, and, so far as I know, entirely undisputed, that the Prince’s personal entreaties and urgency positively forced Boisdale and Lochiel into insurrection, when they were earnestly desirous that he would put off his attempt until he could obtain a sufficient force from France, it will be very difficult to reconcile his alleged reluctance to undertake the expedition with his desperately insisting upon carrying the rising into effect against the advice and entreaty of his most powerful and most sage partisans. Surely a man who had been carried bound on board the vessel which brought him to so desperate an enterprise would have taken the opportunity afforded by the reluctance of his partisans to return to France in safety. + 

It is averred in Johnstone’s Memoirs that Charles Edward left the field of Culloden without doing the utmost to dispute the victory; and, to give the evidence on both sides, there is in existence the more trustworthy testimony of Lord Elcho, who states that he himself earnestly exhorted the Prince to charge at the head of the left wing, which was entire, and retrieve the day or die with honour. And on his counsel being declined, Lord Elcho took leave of him with a bitter execration, swearing he would never look on his face again, and kept his word. + 

On the other hand, it seems to have been the opinion of almost all the other officers that the day was irretrievably lost, one wing of the Highlanders being entirely routed, the rest of the army outnumbered, outflanked, and in a condition totally hopeless. In this situation of things the Irish officers who surrounded Charles’s person interfered to force him off the field. A cornet who was close to the Prince left a strong attestation that he had seen Sir Thomas Sheridan seize the bridle of his horse and turn him round. There is some discrepancy of evidence; but the opinion of Lord Elcho, a man of fiery temper and desperate at the ruin which he beheld impending, cannot fairly be taken in prejudice of a character for courage which is intimated by the nature of the enterprise itself, by the Prince’s eagerness to fight on all occasions, by his determination to advance from Derby to London, and by the presence of mind which he manifested during the romantic perils of his escape. The author is far from claiming for this unfortunate person the praise due to splendid talents; but he continues to be of opinion that at the period of his enterprise he had a mind capable of facing danger and aspiring to fame. + 

That Charles Edward had the advantages of a graceful presence, courtesy, and an address and manner becoming his station, the author never heard disputed by any who approached his person, nor does he conceive that these qualities are overcharged in the present attempt to sketch his portrait. + 

The following extracts corroborative of the general opinion respecting the Prince’s amiable disposition are taken from a manuscript account of his romantic expedition, by James Maxwell of Kirkconnell, of which I possess a copy, by the friendship of J. Menzies, Esq., of Pitfoddells. The author, though partial to the Prince, whom he faithfully followed, seems to have been a fair and candid man, and well acquainted with the intrigues among the adventurer’s council:⁠— + 

“Everybody was mightily taken with the Prince’s figure and personal behaviour. There was but one voice about them. Those whom interest or prejudice made a runaway to his cause could not help acknowledging that they wished him well in all other respects, and could hardly blame him for his present undertaking. Sundry things had concurred to raise his character to the highest pitch, besides the greatness of the enterprise and the conduct that had hitherto appeared in the execution of it. + 

“There were several instances of good nature and humanity that had made a great impression on people’s minds. I shall confine myself to two or three. + 

“Immediately after the battle, as the Prince was riding along the ground that Cope’s army had occupied a few minutes before, one of the officers came up to congratulate him, and said, pointing to the killed, ‘Sir, there are your enemies at your feet.’ The Prince, far from exulting, expressed a great deal of compassion for his father’s deluded subjects, whom he declared he was heartily sorry to see in that posture. + 

“Next day, while the Prince was at Pinkie House, a citizen of Edinburgh came to make some representation to Secretary Murray about the tents that city was ordered to furnish against a certain day. Murray happened to be out of the way, which the Prince hearing of called to have the gentleman brought to him, saying, he would rather despatch the business, whatever it was, himself than have the gentleman wait, which he did, by granting everything that was asked. So much affability in a young prince flushed with victory drew encomiums even from his enemies. + 

“But what gave the people the highest idea of him was the negative he gave to a thing that very nearly concerned his interest, and upon which the success of his enterprise perhaps depended. It was proposed to send one of the prisoners to London to demand of that court a cartel for the exchange of prisoners taken, and to be taken, during this war, and to intimate that a refusal would be looked upon as a resolution on their part to give no quarter. It was visible a cartel would be of great advantage to the Prince’s affairs; his friends would be more ready to declare for him if they had nothing to fear but the chance of war in the field; and if the court of London refused to settle a cartel, the Prince was authorised to treat his prisoners in the same manner the Elector of Hanover was determined to treat such of the Prince’s friends as might fall into his hands; it was urged that a few examples would compel the court of London to comply. It was to be presumed that the officers of the English army would make a point of it. They had never engaged in the service but upon such terms as are in use among all civilised nations, and it could be no stain upon their honour to lay down their commissions if these terms were not observed, and that owing to the obstinacy of their own Prince. Though this scheme was plausible, and represented as very important, the Prince could never be brought into it, it was below him, he said, to make empty threats, and he would never put such as those into execution; he would never in cold blood take away lives which he had saved in heat of action at the peril of his own. These were not the only proofs of good nature the Prince gave about this time. Every day produced something new of this kind. These things softened the rigour of a military government which was only imputed to the necessity of his affairs, and which he endeavoured to make as gentle and easy as possible.” + 

It has been said that the Prince sometimes exacted more state and ceremonial than seemed to suit his condition; but, on the other hand, some strictness of etiquette was altogether indispensable where he must otherwise have been exposed to general intrusion. He could also endure, with a good grace, the retorts which his affectation of ceremony sometimes exposed him to. It is said, for example, that Grant of Glenmoriston having made a hasty march to join Charles, at the head of his clan, rushed into the Prince’s presence at Holyrood with unceremonious haste, without having attended to the duties of the toilet. The Prince received him kindly, but not without a hint that a previous interview with the barber might not have been wholly unnecessary. “It is not beardless boys,” answered the displeased Chief, “who are to do your Royal Highness’s turn.” The Chevalier took the rebuke in good part. + 

On the whole, if Prince Charles had concluded his life soon after his miraculous escape, his character in history must have stood very high. As it was, his station is amongst those a certain brilliant portion of whose life forms a remarkable contrast to all which precedes and all which follows it. ↩ + 

Charles Edward at Culloden. In his Note Sir Walter Scott gives, as he had given elsewhere (Quarterly Review, No. LXXI, and in the Tales of a Grandfather), the story about Lord Elcho and Charles at Culloden. It is a story which we would gladly think inaccurate; and inaccurate, or rather absolutely erroneous, it seems to be. Scott got it from Sir James Stewart Denham (whose father had been out in the ’45), and recorded it in his Journal for February 10, 1826. Sir James was the nephew of Lord Elcho, who left one copy of his Memoirs with Sir James’s family (says Scott), and one with Lord Wemyss. According to Sir James (for Sir Walter had not read the words in either manuscript), Lord Eleho exclaimed, when Charles did not head a desperate charge, “There you go for a damned cowardly Italian!” Indeed, the manuscript of Sir Walter’s Journal shows that Lord Elcho’s eloquence was even more florid than that which is published. Sir Walter adds that Lord Elcho “never would see Charles again.” Here, then, is the source of the tale; namely, a verbal communication from Sir James Stewart Denham. But Mr. Ewald, author of The Life of Prince Charles Stuart (London, 1875), has read the manuscript memoirs of Lord Elcho, the property of Mrs. Erskine Wemyss, and has not found this anecdote in their pages. In them, Lord Elcho tells a story of a conversation with Charles, held four miles from Culloden, after the battle. Lord Elcho says that Charles told him he would return to France; Elcho vainly asked him to remain, and collect his scattered forces. “Then I left him, fully determined never to have anything more to do with him.” (Op. cit. II 26.) This was written forty years after the event, and certainly is by no means evidence in favour of the anecdote recorded by Scott. Another copy of Lord Elcho’s narrative in manuscript (obviously an abridgment) the present Editor has seen in the hands of Mr. Douglas, publisher of Sir Walter’s Journal. It contains neither version of the story. In the Abbotsford Library, Press B, Shelf 9, is a manuscript copy of Lord Elcho’s Short Account of Affairs in Scotland, 1744, 45, 46, which appears to correspond to that in Mr. Douglas’s possession, as does Lord Wemyss’s copy of the manuscript. + 

Home, the author of Douglas, in his book on the ’45, quotes an unnamed cornet of the Horse Guards who saw Sheridan remonstrate with Charles for remaining on the lost field, and saw Sullivan seize his bridle and force him away. But the most curious evidence which the Editor has met is that of Sir Stewart Threipland of Fingask, copied from his original manuscript by Mr. Robert Chambers, sent by him to Sir Walter, and now in the private library of Abbotsford. The singular thing is that Mr. Chambers does not quote the following text in his own “History of the Rebellion,” nor in his “Threiplands of Fingask.” + 

Perhaps it may be as well to quote the very words of Sir Stewart Threipland: “Just at this time,”⁠—namely, as the ranks were breaking⁠—“the prince called out to stop, and he would alight from his horse and return to the charge at their head. But a number of his officers got about him and assured him that it was improbable[sic] for him to do any good at present, for since the clans had turned their backs, they would not rally.” This report Mr. Chambers sent to Scott in 1829, but Sir Walter does not quote it in his Note to Waverley. As to Lord Elcho’s vow never to see Charles again, Mr. Ewald shows that Lord Elcho accompanied the prince to Versailles on his first official appearance there after his escape to France. The authority for this statement is “the narrative in the Lockhart Papers.” —⁠Prince Charles Stuart, II, 138 + 

On the whole, it seems that Sir James Stewart Denham must have inadvertently given Scott an incorrect version of his anecdote. There is nothing to show that Charles was deficient in martial courage, much to show that before he became a dipsomaniac, and manifestly suffered from lesion of the brain, he was brave among the bravest. + 

In the Quarterly Review, June, 1827, Scott himself defends Charles Edward against the charges of the Chevalier Johnstone, and those which are attributed to Lord Elcho. “The word of two private and disappointed men,” he says, “is not to be taken where it is contradicted by a hundred others, and seems to involve the denial of the whole history from beginning to end.” But he observes, in the same review, that Lord Elcho “left manuscript memoirs” containing the story about the refusal to charge. The story, as we saw, is neither in Mrs. Erskine Wemyss’s copy, nor in that of Lord Wemyss, nor in that of Mr. Douglas. It is directly contradicted by the anecdote in Mrs. Erskine Wemyss’s copy, by Sir Stewart Threipland, and by the evidence of a servant of the prince who saw Lord Elcho in the prince’s company some miles from the field after the battle. This is printed in Bishop Forbes’s “Jacobite Memoirs,” Edinburgh, 1834. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The “Bodach Glas.” This is the earliest of not a few apparitions in the Waverley Novels, and may be made the text of a few remarks on Scott’s attitude towards ghosts and ghost stories. In Lockhart, IX 249, Mr. Adolphus probably states the case correctly. + 

“On the subjects commonly designated as ‘the marvellous,’ his mind was susceptible, and it was delicate. He loved to handle then in his own manner and at his own season; not to be pressed with them, or brought to anything like a test of belief or disbelief respecting them. There is, perhaps, in most minds a point more or less advanced, at which incredulity on these subjects may be found to waver. Sir Walter Scott, as it seemed to me, never cared to ascertain very precisely where this point lay in his own mental constitution.⁠ ⁠…” + 

The night he spent at haunted Glammis in 1793 was, he says, “one of the two periods, distant from each other,” at which he could recollect experiencing “that degree of superstitious awe which his countrymen call eerie.” It may be noted (Lockhart, I 295, 296) that Scott mentions the famed Secret Chamber, but gives no hint of any legend connected with it. Hence we may almost conclude that the modern story of some horror in the chamber is later than the visit paid by Scott. But what was the other time when he felt superstitious awe? Apparently (see Lockhart, IX 140) it was not when he thought he beheld the dead Byron at Abbotsford, though he certainly did not care for trifling on that topic. Mr. Gillies (Recollections of Sir Walter Scott, p. 170) gives a ghost-story of Scott’s which Lockhart does not repeat. Sir Walter said, “Very many persons have either seen a ghost, or something very like one; and I am myself among the number.” He added, “The good stories are sadly devoid of evidence⁠—the stupid ones only are authentic.” The ghost was merely a figure in dark brown with a long staff, which alternately appeared, and, when approached, disappeared, on the green open hillside near Ashiesteil. Scott rode “within a few yards,” it vanished; he returned, saw it again, and again “he vanished instantaneously. I must candidly confess I had now got enough of the phantasmagoria; and whether it were from a love of home, or a participation in my dislike of this very stupid ghost, Finella [his mare] did her best to run away. I will not deny that I felt somewhat uncomfortable.” + 

“The state of the atmosphere and outline of the scenery” supplied no explanation. The nocturnal disturbances at Abbotsford which roused Scott, “as nearly as could be ascertained, at the very hour” when Mr. Bullock, who superintended the farnishing, died in London, produced no “eerie” feeling. But the event “made a much stronger impression on his mind” than he cared to confess in alluding to the matter. (Lockhart, V 309⁠–⁠315.) “I protest to you [Terry] the noise resembled half-a-dozen men hard at work putting up beards and furniture; and nothing can be more certain than that there was nobody on the premises at the time. With a few additional touches, the story would figure in Glanville or Aubrey’s collection.” He connected the affair with a less interesting “coincidence” in the last days of President Blair, “the patriot statesman” of an earlier Note (Lockhart, III 7 318). + 

Scott got as much interest and pleasure out of the “supernatural” as it could safely yield him; but he had a fair dose of scepticism. “Tom Erskine was positively mad. I have heard him tell a cock-and-a-bull story of having seen the ghost of his father’s servant, John Burnet, with as much gravity as if he believed every word he was saying” (Lockhart, IX 318). + 

The “Bodach Glas” himself is supposed by Mr. Robert Chambers to have been suggested by the family spectre of Maclaine of Lochbuy, “Hugh of the Little Head” (Illustrations of the Author of ‘Waverley,’ p. 31, 1825). But Hugh was an equestrian ghost. The “Bodach-an-dun” of Grant of Rothiemurans is more akin to the “Bodach Glas.” See Lady of the Lake, canto III, note 6. + 

For a touching story of Scott’s own appearance to Mr. Skene of Rubislaw in 1864, see the Journal, II 456, note. “One evening his daughter found him [Mr. Skene] with a look of inexpressible delight on his face, when he said to her, ‘I have had such a great pleasure! Scott has been here⁠—he came from a long distance to see me; he bas been sitting with me at the fireside talking over our happy recollections of the past.’ ” Two or three days later, Mr. Skene died, in his ninetieth year. —⁠Editor ↩ + 

The following account of the skirmish at Clifton is extracted from the manuscript Memoirs of Evan MacPherson of Cluny, Chief of the clan MacPherson, who had the merit of supporting the principal brunt of that spirited affair. The Memoirs appear to have been composed about 1755, only ten years after the action had taken place. They were written in France, where that gallant chief resided in exile, which accounts for some Gallicisms which occur in the narrative. + 

“In the Prince’s return from Derby back towards Scotland, my Lord George Murray, Lieutenant-General, cheerfully charg’d himself with the command of the rear, a post which, altho’ honourable, was attended with great danger, many difficulties, and no small fatigue; for the Prince, being apprehensive that his retreat to Scotland might be cut off by Marischall Wade, who lay to the northward of him with an armie much superior to what H.R.H. had, while the Duke of Comberland with his whole cavalrie followed hard in the rear, was obliged to hasten his marches. It was not, therefore, possible for the artilirie to march so fast as the Prince’s army, in the depth of winter, extremely bad weather, and the worst roads in England; so Lord George Murray was obliged often to continue his marches long after it was dark almost every night, while at the same time he had frequent alarms and disturbances from the Duke of Comberland’s advanc’d parties. + 

“Towards the evening of the twentie-eight December 1745 the Prince entered the town of Penrith, in the Province of Comberland. But as Lord George Murray could not bring up the artilirie so fast as he wou’d have wish’d, he was oblig’d to pass the night six miles short of that town, together with the regiment of MacDonel of Glengarrie, which that day happened to have the arrear guard. The Prince, in order to refresh his armie, and to give My Lord George and the artilirie time to come up, resolved to sejour the 29th at Penrith; so ordered his little army to appear in the morning under arms, in order to be reviewed, and to know in what manner the numbers stood from his haveing entered England. It did not at that time amount to 5,000 foot in all, with about 400 cavalrie, compos’d of the noblesse who serv’d as volunteers, part of whom form’d a first troop of guards for the Prince, under the command of My Lord Elchoe, now Comte de Weems, who, being proscribed, is presently in France. Another part formed a second troup of guards under the command of My Lord Balmirino, who was beheaded at the Tower of London. A third part serv’d under My Lord le Comte de Kilmarnock, who was likewise beheaded at the Tower. A fourth part serv’d under My Lord Pitsligow, who is also proscribed; which cavalrie, though very few in numbers, being all noblesse, were very brave, and of infinite advantage to the foot, not only in the day of battle, but in serving as advanced guards on the several marches, and in patroling dureing the night on the different roads which led towards the towns where the army happened to quarter. + 

“While this small army was out in a body on the 20th December, upon a riseing ground to the northward of Penrith, passing review, Mons. de Cluny, with his tribe, was ordered to the Bridge of Clifton, about a mile to southward of Penrith, after having pass’d in review before Mons. Pattullo, who was charged with the inspection of the troops, and was likeways Quartermaster-General of the army, and is now in France. They remained under arms at the bridge, waiting the arrival of My Lord George Murray with the artilirie, whom Mons. de Cluny had orders to cover in passing the bridge. They arrived about sunset closly pursued by the Duke of Comberland with the whole body of his cavalrie, reckoned upwards of 3,000 strong, about a thousand of whom, as near as might be computed, dismounted, in order to cut off the passage of the artilirie towards the bridge, while the Duke and the others remained on horseback in order to attack the rear. + 

“My Lord George Murray advanced, and although he found Mons. de Cluny and his tribe in good spirits under arms, yet the circumstance appear’d extremely delicate. The numbers were vastly unequall, and the attack seem’d very dangerous; so My Lord George declin’d giving orders to such time as he ask’d Mons. de Cluny’s opinion. “I will attack them with all my heart,” says Mons. de Cluny, “if you order me.” “I do order it then,” answered My Lord George, and immediately went on himself along with Mons. de Cluny, and fought sword in hand on foot at the head of the single tribe of MacPhersons. They in a moment made their way through a strong hedge of thorns, under the cover whereof the cavalrie had taken their station, in the struggle of passing which hedge My Lord George Murray, being dressed en montagnard, as all the army were, lost his bonet and wig; so continued to fight bareheaded during the action. They at first made a brisk discharge of their firearms on the enemy, then attacked them with their sabres, and made a great slaughter a considerable time, which obliged Comberland and his cavalrie to fly with precipitation and in great confusion; in so much that, if the Prince had been provided in a sufficient number of cavalrie to have taken advantage of the disorder, it is beyond question that the Duke of Comberland and the bulk of his cavalrie had been taken prisoners. + 

“By this time it was so dark that it was not possible to view or number the slain who filled all the ditches which happened to be on the ground where they stood. But it was computed that, besides those who went off wounded, upwards of a hundred at least were left on the spot, among whom was Colonel Honywood, who commanded the dismounted cavalrie, whose sabre of considerable value Mons. de Cluny brought off and still preserves; and his tribe lykeways brought off many arms;⁠—the Colonel was afterwards taken up, and, his wounds being dress’d, with great difficultie recovered. Mons. de Cluny lost only in the action twelve men, of whom some haveing been only wounded, fell afterwards into the hands of the enemy, and were sent as slaves to America, whence several of them returned, and one of them is now in France, a sergeant in the Regiment of Royal Scots. How soon the accounts of the enemies approach had reached the Prince, H.R.H. had immediately ordered Milord le Comte de Nairne, Brigadier, who, being proscribed, is now in France, with the three batalions of the Duke of Athol, the batalion of the Duke of Perth, and some other troups under his command, in order to support Cluny, and to bring off the artilirie. But the action was entirely over before the Comte de Nairne, with his command, cou’d reach nigh to the place. They therefore return’d all to Penrith, and the artilirie marched up in good order. + 

“Nor did the Duke of Comberland ever afterwards dare to come within a day’s march of the Prince and his army dureing the course of all that retreat, which was conducted with great prudence and safety when in some manner surrounded by enemies.” ↩ + 

As the heathen deities contracted an indelible obligation if they swore by Styx, the Scottish Highlanders had usually some peculiar solemnity attached to an oath which they intended should be binding on them. Very frequently it consisted in laying their hand, as they swore, on their own drawn dirk; which dagger, becoming a party to the transaction, was invoked to punish any breach of faith. But by whatever ritual the oath was sanctioned, the party was extremely desirous to keep secret what the especial oath was which he considered as irrevocable. This was a matter of great convenience, as he felt no scruple in breaking his asseveration when made in any other form than that which he accounted as peculiarly solemn; and therefore readily granted any engagement which bound him no longer than he inclined. Whereas, if the oath which he accounted inviolable was once publicly known, no party with whom he might have occasion to contract would have rested satisfied with any other. + 

Louis XI of France practised the same sophistry, for he also had a peculiar species of oath, the only one which he was ever known to respect, and which, therefore, he was very unwilling to pledge. The only engagement which that wily tyrant accounted binding upon him was an oath by the Holy Cross of Saint Lo d’Angers, which contained a portion of the True Cross. If he prevaricated after taking this oath Louis believed he should die within the year. The Constable Saint Paul, being invited to a personal conference with Louis, refused to meet the king unless he would agree to ensure him safe conduct under sanction of this oath. But, says Comines, the king replied, he would never again pledge that engagement to mortal man, though he was willing to take any other oath which could be devised. The treaty broke oft, therefore, after much chaffering concerning the nature of the vow which Louis was to take. Such is the difference between the dictates of superstition and those of conscience. ↩ + 

A pair of chestnut trees, destroyed, the one entirely and the other in part, by such a mischievous and wanton act of revenge, grew at Invergarry Castle, the fastness of Macdonald of Glengarry. ↩ + 

The first three couplets are from an old ballad, called “The Border Widow’s Lament.” ↩ + 

“The Place of Fergus’s confinement.” “After that we went to the castle, where a new showman went through the old trick of pointing out Fergus MacIvor’s very dungeon. Peveril said, ‘Indeed, are you quite sure, sir?’ and on being told there was no doubt, was troubled with a fit of coughing, which ended in a laugh. The man seemed exceeding indignant; so, when papa moved on, I whispered who it was. I wish you had seen the man’s start.⁠ ⁠…” June 1, 1828, Letter from Miss Scott. —⁠Lockhart, IX 256 —⁠Editor ↩ + 

“It is a catholic security.” See Bell’s Principles of the Law of Scotland (8th edition), sec. 914, sub-sec. 6: “(6) Catholic Securities.⁠—When a real security extends over several estates, on one of which there are other securities, the debt of the catholic security falls to be paid ratably from all.” Erskine’s Institutes of the Law of Scotland (Ivory’s edition), vol. I page 581: “66. It is a rule in all real diligences that where a creditor is preferable to others on several different subjects belonging to his debtor, he cannot use his preference arbitrarily, by favouring one of his co-creditors more than another, where his own interest is not concerned, but must allocate his universal, or catholic, debt proportionally against all the subjects or parties whom it affects.” Bell’s Dictionary and Digest of the Law of Scotland (1838 edition): “Catholic Creditor.⁠—A catholic, or universal, creditor is a creditor whose debt is secured over several subjects or over the whole subject belonging to his debtor; as, for example, one who has heritable securities over two or more estates for the same debt. Such a creditor is bound to claim according to certain equitable rules, and is not entitled to exercise his right so as to injure unnecessarily the claims of secondary creditors.” —⁠Editor ↩ + 