Yet the Highlanders, though few in numbers, still looked forward with the utmost spirit, and something approaching to delight, to the desperate conflict which they conceived to be just approaching; and when, on the 28th January, they learned that Argyle was actually on his march towards Perth, it seemed rather to announce a jubilee than a battle with fearful odds. The chiefs embraced, drank to each other, and to the good day which was drawing near; the pipes played, and the men prepared for action with that air of alacrity which a warlike people express at the approach of battle.

When, however, a rumour, first slowly whispered, then rapidly spreading among the clans, informed them, that notwithstanding all the preparations in which they had been engaged, it was the general's purpose to retire before the enemy without fighting, the grief and indignation of these men, taught to think so highly of their ancestors' prowess, and feeling no inferiority in themselves, rose to a formidable pitch of fury, and they assailed their principal officers in the streets with every species of reproach. "What can we do?" was the helpless answer of one of these gentlemen, a confident of Mar. "Do?" answered an indignant Highlander; "Let us do that which we were called to arms for, which certainly was not to run away.

sioned the putting off that ceremony: And as his avowed bigotry to Popery occasioned great divisions among his new counsellors, so it cooled the affections of his female friends, the Episcopal ladies, who, entertaining the notion of his being a Protestant, had excited their husbands to take arms for him."-RAE, p. 360.]

Why did the King come hither?-was it to see his subjects butchered like dogs, without striking a blow for their lives and honour ?" When the safety of the King's person was urged as a reason for retreat, they answered- "Trust his safety to us; and if he is willing to die like a prince, he shall see there are ten thousand men in Scotland willing to die with him."

Such were the general exclamations without doors, and those in the councils of the Chevalier were equally violent. Many military men of skill gave it as their opinion, that though Perth was an open town, yet it was so far a safe post, that an army could not, by a coup-de-main, take it out of the hands of a garrison determined on its defence. The severity of the snow-storm and of the frost, precluded the opening of breaches; the country around Perth was laid desolate; the Duke of Argyle's army consisted in a great measure of Englishmen and foreigners, unaccustomed to the severe climate of Scotland; and vague hopes were expressed, that, if the general of Government should press an attack upon the town, he might receive such a check as would restore the balance between the parties. To this it was replied, that not only the superiority of numbers, and the advantage of discipline, were on the side of the royal army, but that the garrison at Perth was destitute of the necessary provisions and ammunition; and that the Duke of Argyle had men enough at once to form the blockade of that town, and take possession of Dundee, Aberdeen, and all the counties to the

northward of the Tay, which they lately occupied ; while the Chevalier, cooped up in Perth, might be permitted for some time to see all the surrounding country in his enemy's possession, until it would finally become impossible for him to escape. In the end it was resolved in the councils of the Chevalier de St George, that to attempt the defence of Perth would be an act of desperate chivalry. To reconcile the body of the army to the retreat, reports were spread that they were to make a halt at Aberdeen, there to be joined by a considerable body of troops which were expected to arrive from abroad, and advance again southwards under better auspices. But it was secretly understood that the purpose was to desert the enterprise, to which the contrivers might apply the lines of the poet

"In an ill hour did we these arms commence,
Fondly brought here, and foolishly sent hence."

CHAPTER LXXIII.

Retreat of the Jacobite Army from Perth-Escape of the Chevalier and the Earl of Mar-Dispersion of the Ja cobite Army-Incapacity of Mar as a General-Argyle's Arrival in London, and Reception at Court-he is deprived of all his Employments-Causes of this Act of Ingratitude on the part of the English GovernmentTrial of the Jacobite Prisoners, at Carlisle-Disarming of the Highlanders-Sale of Forfeited Estates-Plan of Charles XII. of Sweden for Restoring the StewartsExpedition fitted out by Cardinal Alberoni for the same purpose Battle of Glenshiel-the Enterprise Abandoned.

[1716-1719.]

WHATEVER reports were spread among the soldiers, the principal leaders had determined to commence a retreat, at the head of a discontented army, degraded in their own opinion, distrustful of their officers, and capable, should these suspicions ripen into a fit of fury, of carrying off both king and general into the Highlands, and there waging an irregular war after their own manner.

On the 28th of January, an alarm was given in Perth of the Duke of Argyle's approach; and it is remarkable, that, although in the confusion, the general officers had issued no orders what measures

were to be taken in case of this probable event, yet the clans themselves, with intuitive sagacity, took the strongest posts for checking any attack; and, notwithstanding a momentary disorder, were heard to cheer each other with the expression, "they should do well enough." The unhappy Prince himself was far from displaying the spirit of his partisans. He was observed to look dejected, and to shed tears, and heard to say, that instead of bringing him to a crown, they had led him to his grave. "Weeping," said Prince Eugene, when he heard this incident, "is not the way to conquer kingdoms."

The retreat commenced under all these various feelings. On the 30th of January, the anniver sary of Charles the First's decapitation, and ominous therefore to his grandson, the Highland army filed off upon the ice which then covered the Tay, though a rapid and deep stream. The town was shortly afterwards taken possession of by a body of the Duke of Argyle's dragoons; but the weather was so severe, and the march of the rebels so regular, that it was impossible to push forward any vanguard of strength sufficient to annoy their re

treat.

On the arrival of the rebels at the seaport of Montrose, a rumour arose among the Highlanders, that the King, as he was termed, the Earl of Mar, and some of their other principal leaders, were about to abandon them, and take their flight by sea. To pacify the troops, orders were given to continue the route towards Aberdeen; the equi