Nor can any men's malice be gratified further by my letters, than to
see my constancy to my wife, the laws, and religion. Bees will gather
honey where spiders suck poison.--_Eikon Basiliké._
"Dearest Wife,
"You will have heard from other hands the ill success of our
expedition. My Winifred, who knows what have been my fears from the
beginning of this undertaking, also knows that my mind has been
prepared for the result, and will therefore be aware that among all
his sorrows her husband has not had to endure those of disappointed
hope. Let her then be assured that his heart, though grieved, is
unsubdued; and that his soul is fully made up to meet with constancy
whatever may occur to himself.
"As my dear wife may well believe, I have suffered much. I have
seen counsels which appeared to me the most imprudent, and which
the event has proved to be such, invariably prevail. I have seen
every opportunity of success neglected. I have seen, without the
power of preventing it, rashness, where prudence should have ruled;
deliberation, where boldness and decision would have been true
discretion.
"But, as my Winifred knows, it was not with the expectation of
ultimate success that I devoted myself to the cause of my king. I
obeyed what I believed to be the call of duty, but I may have been
mistaken. When I have seen the blood of my countrymen stain their
native soil, then indeed I have felt doubts, agonizing doubts, as
to the correctness of my judgment. I have looked on death before; I
have served in Germany; I have been an eye-witness of assassinations
in Italy; I have seen criminals pay the forfeit of their lives; but,
in the solitude of a prison, it is the image of the first victim of
civil strife that haunts my imagination,--that moment, when I saw one
of our own Scots fell with his battle-axe a fellow Scot; when I heard
one foeman utter a threat, the other a cry for mercy, in the selfsame
tongue! I still see the dying glance of that blue-eyed youth, the
life-blood staining his fair crisped curls: in the heat of battle the
impression was momentary; but now, in darkness and in silence, that
image rises up between me and sleep!
"It is only to my beloved wife, who has so long read every feeling
of this wayward heart, that I dare confess such weakness. To my
companions in arms and in misfortune such sentiments would appear the
sickly phantasies of a distempered mind: even to her, I will dwell on
them no longer.
"My Winifred will have learned with pride for the land of her husband,
that the Scots were the last to yield at the fatal affair of Preston:
indeed, all our party fought with unequalled bravery; each several
street was obstinately defended. General Willis's troops set fire to
the houses betwixt themselves and the barricades; but we still fought
all night by the light of the conflagration, and we had the advantage
in every several attack. Yet what could be done by a small body of
men, cut off from all assistance, and cooped up in a burning town!
"The English were for submission, while our brave men were for rushing
on death, or regaining liberty by one desperate sally. The English
accomplished a capitulation; but Forster's life was near becoming the
sacrifice! Many of our Scots still loudly accuse him of treachery;
and Murray levelled a pistol at his head when he heard what was the
mission on which Oxburgh had been sent to the English general. Had
not a friendly hand struck the weapon upwards, Forster must then
have fallen! But I sincerely believe that he has acted with loyalty
and sincerity throughout. When the cause is hopeless, is a commander
justified in wasting the blood of those under his command? Each of
us, individually, may prefer death to submission; but has a general a
right to sport with the lives of others?
"Should my Winifred have an opportunity of seeing our king,--who,
though his coming is now too late, must, I imagine, be by this time
in Scotland,--it would be but justice towards a man, who, though
unfortunate and perhaps ill-judged, is, I believe, a faithful servant
of King James's, to let his majesty know that such is my impression.
"We have not yet been told our ultimate destination; but we conclude
we shall be conveyed to London, there,--let not my dear wife be
startled, for she must be aware it is the inevitable consequence of
defeat--there to take our trial. Let her rather rejoice that it is
in an honourable, though perhaps a mistaken cause, that her husband
will appear before the tribunal of his country; and that among his
fellow-prisoners he may count the noble Earl of Derwentwater, the good
Viscount Kenmure, and many more of unsullied honour.
"When I make use of the word 'prisoners,' let her not picture to
herself handcuffs and irons, a dark and damp dungeon: we are poorly
lodged, it is true, but we are not deprived of necessary comforts. If
I could see my Winifred----! But that is now impossible.
"She may rely upon my summoning her when there is a hope of her being
allowed to cheer me with her presence. I should think myself unworthy
of her true and devoted affection, if I did not place on it the
implicit reliance which it deserves. Adieu, my beloved! I know that,
next to Heaven, I am ever in your thoughts; neither do you need to be
assured that you are loved with equal truth and fervour. Professions
are needless between those whose souls are united as ours have ever
been! And yet there is a satisfaction in tracing with my own hand the
words which I trust will reach my Winifred's eyes,--that whenever,
however, death may meet me, my last prayer shall be for her, my last
thought on her, and that I firmly believe the affection which fills my
soul must survive death itself; that I am, and ever have been, her
true and faithful husband,
"Nithsdale.
"P.S. I hope I have engaged a countryman of these parts to convey this
safely to your hands, under the promise of a handsome reward upon the
safe delivery of the letter."
Full many a time did Lady Nithsdale read over the assurance of that
affection which she never doubted. She laid the precious document next
her heart; and then she summoned once more the English peasant, who she
thought had probably beheld her lord with his own eyes.
He was ushered into her presence; and never did two human beings form,
in their outward appearance, a more striking contrast, than the pale,
slender, high-born countess, whose anxious countenance bore the traces
of deep feeling, whose transparent complexion varied with every word
she uttered, whose shrinking form seemed as if every breath of wind
might blow it away, while the light which shone from her eye spoke a
soul capable of withstanding the storms of adverse fortune; and Dickon,
who with stout and sturdy limbs, and a ruddy countenance, beaming with
health and good cheer, mixed with a sort of rustic, merry cunning,
stood unawed before her.
"You saw my lord your own self, did you not, my good friend?" inquired
Lady Nithsdale, with a degree of timidity and anxiety in her tone.
"An' it please your ladyship," answered Dickon, with a scrape of the
foot and a pull of the hair, "I saw a many of the rebels, great and
small, one day, when they were changing their quarters."
"But it was my lord himself, the Earl of Nithsdale, who entrusted you
with the packet you brought even now?"
"Yes, I take it, it was; for the packet was directed to the Countess
of Nithsdale, and the gentleman told me to take it to his wife, and to
be sure and give it into her own hands, without fail, myself; and he
said, if I did, I should be sure to get a handsome reward; that nothing
would be too good for me, and such like, he said. He was a civil-spoken
gentleman, and very free of his promises."
"You have been rewarded for your pains, I hope. I gave orders to my
waiting-woman to see to your wishes in every respect."
"Oh! she is a smart lass, that, and she behaved very civil to me, and
I'm no ways dissatisfied. Only perhaps a trifle from your ladyship's
own fair hand; she is but a waiting-woman after all," added Dickon, not
forgetting the eleventh commandment, and making another scrape, which
he meant should savour of gallantry.
Lady Nithsdale slipped some additional gold into his hand. "And did my
lord look well?" she inquired.
"Yes, very well, my lady, as far as I know. Just as well as the other
lords he was along with; only a trifle paler. He did not look, my lady,
as if he had visited his own buttery-hatch quite so lately as I have."
"Alas! was he very pale? Tell me, in pity tell me all the truth."
"Nay, madam! don't put yourself in such a fluster. He looked pale, just
like all the rest of them."
Lady Nithsdale turned away for a moment. She could scarcely endure to
commune with one who saw in her noble husband but a man, like other
men: and yet this peasant had seen him, he had heard his voice; from
him alone could she hope to learn any particulars. Dickon, who was not
wanting in natural shrewdness, perceived that his answers did not give
entire satisfaction; and when Lady Nithsdale again turning towards him
inquired whether her lord moved with a firm step, or whether his health
did not appear to have suffered from long confinement, he answered,
"Oh, bless your heart, my lady, he walked as strong, and looked lusty
and hearty; quite different from the other lords! Oh! he's a fine
gentleman sure enough, and looked more like a prince than anything
else."
"He has a noble carriage, in good sooth," rejoined Lady Nithsdale; "and
sorrow has not yet subdued his lofty bearing?"
"Lord save you, my lady! he was quite of a different sort from the rest
of them. They seemed like rabble by the side of him: anybody might have
known him among a thousand!"
"They might, indeed. And when he spoke did his voice sound full and
mellow as ever?"
"Why, he spoke somewhat low, for he did not wish everybody to hear;
but methought it was a marvellous good voice, quite different from the
other rebels."
Lady Nithsdale hung upon his words with delight, and forgot that
at first she had thought him incapable of estimating her lord's
superiority over his fellows.
"And can you tell me how my lord was lodged, and how he is attended?"
"Why, as I have heard say, very well lodged; not so handsomely as he
would be here in such a castle as this, but right well lodged as times
go; and they say that the rebels they live like fighting-cocks, and
there is revelry of all kinds going on among them. But that's among the
young lords," added Dickon, who saw he had not now touched the right
string; "not my Lord Derwentwater and my Lord Nithsdale, they are quite
of another sort; but some of the young gallants, and young Bottair
of Athol--Oh! he's a comely young fellow that!--and they do say that
pretty Kate Musgrave----"
The countess began to think she had conversed long enough with the
trusty messenger, especially after his supper at the buttery-hatch;
and repeating her thanks in the manner most satisfactory to the worthy
Dickon, she dismissed him to seek the repose he must need after his
journey.
The Chevalier's arrival, which Lord Nithsdale in his letter had
considered almost certain, had not yet taken place: and although the
Earl of Mar was resolved, by keeping possession of Perth, to retain at
least one town where his master might be sure of an honourable and safe
reception, the defection of the whole clan of Fraser, the advance of
the Earl of Sutherland, the reinforcements which strengthened the Duke
of Argyle's army from the regular troops, whose presence was no longer
required in England, rendered each day the situation of the Jacobite
general more desperate.
Still, having formally invited the Chevalier to put himself at the head
of the insurrectionary army, Mar felt himself under the necessity of
keeping his remaining troops together, to protect the person of the
prince when he should effect his landing. In this dilemma, he proposed
a military oath in the name of King James the Eighth; but the attempt
to bind together those who were only waiting for an excuse to disperse
proved as unavailing as his previous proposal of an association. All
the principal chiefs and leaders complained that they had been deluded
by promises which had never been fulfilled. They insisted--and there
was much reason in their arguments--that they had no more grounds for
now believing the king was on the point of arriving, than that the long
promised arms, ammunition, and treasure, should be sent from France;
and from this period a party was established in the very army of the
Earl of Mar which declared for opening a negotiation with the Duke of
Argyle.