The Chevalier's Return to France. 43 a hopeless enterprise, were his worst friends, that gallant army marching after him to Dundee might yet have saved his cause. Like all weak characters, he threw all the blame of failure on others. He is even said to have shed tears, while reproaching Lord Mar and his friends for 'bringing him to a grave instead of a crown ;' and in an evil hour he took a fatal resolution (if he still hoped to win a throne)—he determined on going back to France. O gallant Highlanders! you deserved a braver prince! Deeply did his unfortunate followers murmur when they heard his resolution of abandoning them. James disregarded any advice, except that of a few false friends, and soon afterwards embarked on board a French ship, that carried him safely over to Flanders. As he was by no means hard-hearted, and only a weak, irresolute prince, he must have felt great remorse, as his eyes rested on the shores of a land vanishing from his gaze, and that he was never to see again, at the thoughts of all he left behind him. Out of the little devoted army who had fought for the Pretender, there were very few whose fate was not cruel in the last extreme. Those who escaped pursuit had to hide for days, weeks, and months in caves and holes, while watching for an opportunity of flying the country. Lord Mar accompanied James to France, where the latter lived for some time in seclusion at Avignon. He married, in 1719, the Princess Clementina Maria, daughter of the heroic Sobieski, and passed the remainder of his unhappy and disappointed life chiefly in Rome. He had two sons by Clementina; but it was a very unhappy marriage. It is far pleasanter to turn from the story of a prince whose character displayed all the failings and but few of the better qualities of the House of Stuart, to the more interesting tale of Prince Charles Edward's attempts to regain the lost inheritance of his ancestors. He was styled the 'Younger Pretender' to distinguish him from his father. His adventures were romantic in the extreme, and are the prominent feature of the days of 1745, when Highlanders once more donned the white cockade 'to fight for their king.' CHAPTER II. PRINCE CHARLES EDWARD. 'Welcome, Charlie, o'er the main, JACOBITE SONG. HE misery and misfortunes entailed by the insurrection in 1715 on the Highlands of Scotland, as well as on the Jacobite party in England, did not end with James Edward's retirement to France in 1716. The Cavaliers were forced to save themselves, in the best way they could, from the consequences of their devotion to his cause. The English general, Argyle, was humane, and, it is said, connived at the flight of the army he pursued. Many a Scottish chieftain and noble was thankful to purchase life by escaping under feigned names to France, and even to America, where they settled down under the ban of attainder and exile, rather than own King George for their rightful monarch. One would have believed that such heavy troubles must have crushed the Jacobite party; but it still wore the white rose for its emblem, and still plotted on. In 1719 another unsuccessful attempt was made. Before Louis XIV. died in 1715, he had written to his grandson, the King of Spain, enjoining him to befriend the young Pretender, whose cousin he was by marriage. After James's return to France, in 1716, he was forbidden to remain in the French dominions, and compelled to find a home in Italy, first of all at Urbino, and later at Rome. The English Government wreaked its vengeance on him by the most unworthy measures; for instance, by persuading the Austrian Government to imprison his betrothed bride, the Princess Clementina, daughter of Sobieski, King of Poland, while on her road to join him at Innspruck, in the Tyrol. When James therefore received an invitation to Madrid, he thought it more prudent to pretend to be setting out in another direction; and he thus managed to land safely in Spain, in March 1719. The Spanish court was completely governed at that time by Cardinal Alberoni, a powerful minister, who had risen to that high position solely by his own. talents. He had originally been a village curate of low extraction. For some time Alberoni had persuaded King Philip to withhold any decided support Another Invasion attempted. 47 from James Edward; but in 1719 he determined to befriend him openly, being influenced in doing so, not so much by sympathy with the hapless House of Stuart, as by enmity to other powers then in league with England. Alberoni fitted out a fleet of ten ships of the line, and as many frigates; and the expedition, having a Jacobite general, the Duke of Ormond, at its head, with 6000 men at his disposal, actually sailed from Cadiz to England. Their misfortunes in 1715 did not deter many Scotchmen who had risen in that year from joining Ormond, while the English Government, in alarm, offered £10,000 for his capture, should he land on the coast of England or Scotland. The elements seem to have been always on King George's side. Ormond's fleet had scarcely left the Spanish coast before it was dispersed by a violent hurricane, and compelled to return disabled to Spain. Two frigates, separated from the fleet, managed to reach Scotland, under Earl Marischal's command. The adventurers-for such they were, to dream of invading England with only 300 soldiers -effected a landing in Scotland on the island of Lewis. Very few Highlanders joined them, when, on landing, they declared for James; and they were finally dispersed at Glenshiel, in Ross-shire. Most of the Highland gentlemen and their leaders managed |