Transcribed from the 1897 Longmans, Green, and Co. edition by David
Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org
[Picture: Pickle the Spy]
PICKLE THE SPY
or
The Incognito of Prince Charles
* * * * *
BY
ANDREW LANG
* * * * *
‘I knew the Master: on many secret steps of his career
I have an authentic memoir in my hand.’
THE MASTER OF BALLANTRAE
* * * * *
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO.
LONDON, NEW YORK, AND BOMBAY
1897
All rights reserved
PREFACE
THIS woful History began in my study of the Pelham Papers in the
Additional Manuscripts of the British Museum. These include the letters
of Pickle the Spy and of JAMES MOHR MACGREGOR. Transcripts of them were
sent by me to Mr. ROBERT LOUIS STEVENSON, for use in a novel, which he
did not live to finish. The character of Pickle, indeed, like that of
the Master of Ballantrae, is alluring to writers of historical romance.
Resisting the temptation to use Pickle as the villain of fiction, I have
tried to tell his story with fidelity. The secret, so long kept, of
Prince Charles’s incognito, is divulged no less by his own correspondence
in the Stuart MSS. than by the letters of Pickle.
For Her Majesty’s gracious permission to read the Stuart Papers in the
library of Windsor Castle, and to engrave a miniature of Prince Charles
in the Royal collection, I have respectfully to express my sincerest
gratitude.
To Mr. HOLMES, Her Majesty’s librarian, I owe much kind and valuable aid.
The Pickle Papers, and many despatches in the State Papers, were examined
and copied for me by Miss E. A. IBBS.
In studying the Stuart Papers, I owe much to the aid of Miss VIOLET
SIMPSON, who has also assisted me by verifying references from many
sources.
It would not be easy to mention the numerous correspondents who have
helped me, but it were ungrateful to omit acknowledgment of the kindness
of Mr. HORATIO F. BROWN and of Mr. GEORGE T. OMOND.
I have to thank Mr. ALEXANDER PELHAM TROTTER for permission to cite the
MS. Letter Book of the exiled Chevalier’s secretary, ANDREW LUMISDEN, in
Mr. TROTTER’S possession.
Miss MACPHERSON of Cluny kindly gave me a copy of a privately printed
Memorial of her celebrated ancestor, and, by CLUNY’S kind permission, I
have been allowed to see some letters from his charter chest.
Apparently, the more important secret papers have perished in the years
of turmoil and exile.
This opportunity may be taken for disclaiming any belief in the
imputations against CLUNY conjecturally hazarded by ‘NEWTON,’ or KENNEDY,
in the following pages. The Chief’s destitution in France, after a long
period of suffering in Scotland, refutes these suspicions, bred in an
atmosphere of jealousy and distrust. Among the relics of the family are
none of the objects which CHARLES, in 1766–1767, found it difficult to
obtain from CLUNY’S representatives for lack of a proper messenger.
To Sir ARTHUR HALKETT, Bart., of Pitfirrane, I am obliged for a view of
BALHALDIE’S correspondence with his agent in Scotland.
The Directors of the French Foreign Office Archives courteously permitted
Monsieur LÉON PAJOT to examine, and copy for me, some of the documents in
their charge. These, it will be seen, add but little to our information
during the years 1749–1766.
I have remarked, in the proper place, that Mr. MURRAY ROSE has already
printed some of Pickle’s letters in a newspaper. As Mr. MURRAY ROSE
assigned them to JAMES MOHR MACGREGOR, I await with interest his
arguments in favour of this opinion in his promised volume of Essays.
The ornament on the cover of this work is a copy of that with which the
volumes of Prince CHARLES’S own library were impressed. I owe the stamp
to the kindness of Miss WARRENDER of Bruntsfield.
Among printed books, the most serviceable have been Mr. EWALD’S work on
Prince Charles, Lord STANHOPE’S History, and Dr. BROWNE’S ‘History of the
Highlands and Clans.’ Had Mr. EWALD explored the Stuart Papers and the
Memoirs of d’Argenson, Grimm, de Luynes, Barbier, and the Letters of
Madame du Deffand (edited by M. DE LESCURE), with the ‘Political
Correspondence of Frederick the Great,’ little would have been left for
gleaners in his track.
I must not forget to thank Mr. and Mrs. BARTELS for researches in old
magazines and journals. Mr. BARTELS also examined for me the printed
correspondence of Frederick the Great. To the kindness of J. A. ERSKINE
CUNNINGHAM, Esq., of Balgownie I owe permission to photograph the
portrait of Young Glengarry in his possession.
If I might make a suggestion to historical students of leisure, it is
this. The Life of the Old Chevalier (James III.) has never been written,
and is well worth writing. My own studies, alas! prove that Prince
Charles’s character was incapable of enduring misfortune. His father,
less brilliant and less popular, was a very different man, and, I think,
has everything to gain from an unprejudiced examination of his career.
He has certainly nothing to lose.
Since this work was in type the whole of Bishop Forbes’s MS., _The Lyon
in Mourning_, has been printed for an Historical Society in Scotland. I
was unable to consult the MS. for this book, but it contains, I now find,
no addition to the facts here set forth.
_November_ 5, 1896.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY TO PICKLE
PAGE
Subject of this book—The last rally of Jacobitism hitherto 1
obscure—Nature of the new materials—Information from spies,
unpublished Stuart Papers, &c.—The chief spy—Probably known
to Sir Walter Scott—‘Redgauntlet’ cited—‘Pickle the
Spy’—His position and services—The hidden gold of Loch
Arkaig—Consequent treacheries—Character of Pickle—Pickle’s
nephew—Pickle’s portrait—Pickle detected and denounced—To
no purpose—Historical summary—Incognito of Prince
Charles—Plan of this work
CHAPTER II
CHARLES EDWARD STUART
Prince Charles—Contradictions in his character—Extremes of 11
bad and good—Evolution of character—The Prince’s personal
advantages—Common mistake as to the colour of his eyes—His
portraits from youth to age—Descriptions of Charles by the
Duc de Liria; the President de Brosses; Gray; Charles’s
courage—The siege of Gaeta—Story of Lord Elcho—The real
facts—The Prince’s horse shot at Culloden—Foolish fables of
David Hume confuted—Charles’s literary tastes—His
clemency—His honourable conduct—Contrast with
Cumberland—His graciousness—His faults—Charge of
avarice—Love of wine—Religious levity—James on Charles’s
faults—An unpleasant discovery—Influence of Murray of
Broughton—Rapid decline of character after 1746—Temper,
wine, and women—Deep distrust of James’s Court—Rupture with
James—Divisions among Jacobites—King’s men and Prince’s
men—Marischal, Kelly, Lismore, Clancarty—Anecdote of
Clancarty and Braddock—Clancarty and
d’Argenson—Balhaldie—Lally Tollendal—The Duke of York—His
secret flight from Paris—‘Insigne Fourberie’—Anxiety of
Charles—The fatal cardinal’s hat—Madame de
Pompadour—Charles rejects her advances—His love
affairs—Madame de Talmond—Voltaire’s verses on her—Her
scepticism in Religion—Her husband—Correspondence with
Montesquieu—The Duchesse d’Aiguillon—Peace of
Aix-la-Chapelle—Charles refuses to retire to Fribourg—The
gold plate—Scenes with Madame de Talmond—Bulkeley’s
interference—Arrest of Charles—The compasses—Charles goes
to Avignon—His desperate condition—His policy—Based on a
scheme of D’Argenson—He leaves Avignon—He is lost to sight
and hearing
CHAPTER III
THE PRINCE IN FAIRYLAND
FEBRUARY 1749—SEPTEMBER 1750. I.—WHAT THE WORLD SAID
Europe after Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle—A vast gambling 44
establishment—Charles excluded—Possible chance in
Poland—Supposed to have gone thither—‘Henry Goring’s
Letter’—Romantic adventures attributed to Charles—Obvious
blunders—Talk of a marriage—Count Brühl’s opinion—Proposal
to kidnap Charles—To rob a priest—The King of Poland’s
ideas—Lord Hyndford on Frederick the Great—Lord Hyndford’s
mare’s nest—Charles at Berlin—‘Send him to Siberia’—The
theory contradicted—Mischievous glee of Frederick—Charles
discountenances plots to kill Cumberland—Father Myles
Macdonnell to James—London conspiracy—Reported from
Rome—The Bloody Butcher Club—Guesses of Sir Horace
Mann—Charles and a strike—Charles reported to be very
ill—Really on the point of visiting England—September 1750
CHAPTER IV
THE PRINCE IN FAIRYLAND. II.—WHAT ACTUALLY OCCURRED
Charles mystifies Europe—Montesquieu knows his 67
secret—Sources of information—The Stuart
manuscripts—Charles’s letters from Avignon—A proposal of
marriage—Kennedy and the hidden treasure—Where to look for
Charles—_Cherchez la femme_!—Hidden in Lorraine—Plans for
entering Paris—Letter to Mrs. Drummond—To the Earl
Marischal—Starts for Venice—At Strasbourg—Unhappy
Harrington—Letter to James—Leaves Venice—‘A bird without a
nest’—Goes to Paris—The Prince’s secret revealed—The
convent of St. Joseph—Curious letter as Cartouche—Madame de
Routh—Cartouche again—Goring sent to England—A
cypher—Portrait of Madame de Talmond—Portrait of Madame
d’Aiguillon—Intellectual society—Mademoiselle Luci—‘Dener
Bash’—The secret hoard—Results of Goring’s English
mission—Timidity of English Jacobites—Supply of
money—Charles a _bibliophile_—‘My big muff’—A patron of
art—Quarrels with Madame de Talmond—Arms for a
rising—Newton on Cluny—Kindness to Monsieur Le Coq—Madame
de Talmond weary of Charles—Letters to her—Charles reads
Fielding’s novels—Determines to go to England—Large order
of arms—Reproached by James—Intagli of James—_En route_ for
London—September 1750
CHAPTER V
THE PRINCE IN LONDON; AND AFTER.—MADEMOISELLE LUCI (SEPTEMBER
1750–JULY 1751)
The Prince goes to London—Futility of this tour—English 102
Jacobites described by Æneas Macdonald—No chance but in
Tearlach—Credentials to Madame de Talmond—Notes of visit to
London—Doings in London—Gratifying conversion—Gems and
medals—Report by Hanbury Williams—Hume’s legend—Report by a
spy—_Billets_ to Madame de
Talmond—Quarrel—Disappearance—‘The old aunt’—Letters to
Mademoiselle Luci—Charles in Germany—Happy thought of
Hanbury Williams—Marshal Keith’s mistress—Failure of this
plan—The English ‘have a clue’—Books for the
Prince—Mademoiselle Luci as a critic—Jealousy of Madame de
Talmond—Her letter to Mademoiselle Luci—The young lady
replies—Her bad health—Charles’s reflections—Frederick ‘a
clever man’—A new adventure
CHAPTER VI
INTRIGUES, POLITICAL AND AMATORY.—DEATH OF MADEMOISELLE LUCI, 1752
Hopes from Prussia—The Murrays of Elibank—Imprisonment of 124
Alexander Murray—Recommended to Charles—The Elibank
plot—Prussia and the Earl Marischal—His early
history—Ambassador of Frederick at Versailles—His odd
household—Voltaire—The Duke of Newcastle’s
resentment—Charles’s view of Frederick’s policy—His alleged
avarice—Lady Montagu—His money-box—Goring and the Earl
Marischal—Secret meetings—The lace shop—Albemarle’s
information—Charles at Ghent—Hanbury Williams’s mares’
nests—Charles and ‘La Grandemain’—She and Goring refuse to
take his orders—Appearance of Miss Walkinshaw—Her
history—Remonstrances of Goring—‘Commissions for the worst
of men’—‘The little man’—Lady Primrose—Death of
Mademoiselle Luci—November 10, date of postponed Elibank
plot—Danger of dismissing an agent
CHAPTER VII
YOUNG GLENGARRY
Pickle the spy—_Not_ James Mohr Macgregor or 145
Drummond—Pickle was the young chief of Glengarry—Proofs of
this—His family history—His part in the
Forty-five—Misfortunes of his family—In the Tower of
London—Letters to James III.—No cheque!—Barren honours—In
London in 1749—His poverty—Mrs. Murray of Broughton’s
watch—Steals from the Loch Arkaig hoard—Charges by him
against Archy Cameron—Is accused of forgery—Cameron of
Torcastle—Glengarry sees James III. in Rome—Was he sold to
Cumberland?—Anonymous charges against Glengarry—A friend of
Murray of Broughton—His spelling in evidence against
him—Mrs. Cameron’s accusation against Young Glengarry—Henry
Pelham and Campbell of Lochnell—Pickle gives his real name
and address—Note on Glengarry family—Highlanders among the
Turks
CHAPTER VIII
PICKLE AND THE ELIBANK PLOT
The Elibank plot—George II. to be kidnapped—Murray and 169
Young Glengarry—As Pickle, Glengarry betrays the plot—His
revelations—Pickle and Lord Elibank—Pickle meets
Charles—Charles has been in Berlin—Glengarry writes to
James’s secretary—Regrets failure of plot—Speaks of his
illness—Laments for Archy Cameron—Hanbury Williams seeks
Charles in Silesia—Pickle’s ‘fit of sickness’—His dealings
with the Earl Marischal—Meets the Prince at the masked
ball—‘A little piqued’—Marischal criticises the plot to
kidnap George II.—‘A night attack’—Other schemes—Charles’s
poverty—‘The prophet’s clothes’—Mr. Carlyle on Frederick
the Great—Alleges his innocence of Jacobite
intrigues—Contradicts statesmen—Mr. Carlyle in
error—Correspondence of Frederick with Earl Marischal—The
Earl’s account of English plotters—Frederick’s
advice—Encouragement underhand—Arrest of Archy Cameron—His
early history—Plea for clemency—Cameron is hanged—His
testimony to Charles’s virtues—His forgiveness of his
enemies—Samuel Cameron the spy—His fate—Young Edgar on the
hidden treasure—The last of the treasure—A _salmo ferox_
CHAPTER IX
DE PROFUNDIS
Charles fears for his own safety—Earl Marischal’s 207
advice—Letter from Goring—Charles’s danger—Charles at
Coblentz—His changes of abode—Information from
Pickle—Charles as a friar—Pickle sends to England
Lochgarry’s memorial—Scottish advice to Charles—List of
loyal clans—Pickle on Frederick—On English adherents—‘They
drink very hard’—Pickle declines to admit arms—Frederick
receives Jemmy Dawkins—His threats against
England—Albemarle on Dawkins—Dawkins an
archæologist—Explores Palmyra—Charles at feud with Miss
Walkinshaw—Goring’s illness—A mark to be put on Charles’s
daughter—Charles’s _objets d’art_—Sells his pistols
CHAPTER X
JAMES MOHR MACGREGOR
Another spy—Rob Roy’s son, James Mohr Macgregor—A spy in 230
1745—At Prestonpans and Culloden—Escape from Edinburgh
Castle—Billy Marshall—Visit to Ireland—Balhaldie reports
James’s discovery of Irish Macgregors—Their loyalty—James
Mohr and Lord Albemarle—James Mohr offers to sell
himself—And to betray Alan Breck—His sense of honour—His
long-winded report on Irish conspiracy—Balhaldie—Mrs.
Macfarlane who shot the Captain—Her romance—Pitfirrane
Papers—Balhaldie’s snuff-boxes—James Mohr’s
confessions—Balhaldie and Charles—Irish invasion—Arms in
Moidart—Arms at the house of Tough—Pickle to play the spy
in Ireland—Accompanied by a ‘Court Trusty’—Letter from
Pickle—Alan Breck spoils James Mohr—Takes his
snuff-boxes—Death of James Mohr—Yet another spy—His wild
information—Confirmation of Charles’s visit to Ireland
CHAPTER XI
‘A MAN UNDONE.’—1754
Jacobite hopes—Blighted by the conduct of Charles—His 252
seclusion—His health is affected—His fierce impatience—Miss
Walkinshaw—Letter from young Edgar—The Prince easily
tracked—Fears of his English correspondents—Remonstrances
of Goring—The English demand Miss Walkinshaw’s
dismissal—Danger of discarding Dumont—Goring fears the
Bastille—Cruelty of dismissing Catholic servants—Charles’s
lack of generosity—Has relieved no poor adherents—Will
offend both Protestants and Catholics—Opinion of a
Protestant—Toleration desired—Goring asks leave to
resign—Charles’s answer—Goring’s advice—Charles’s
reply—Needs money—Proceedings of Pickle—In London—Called to
France—To see the Earl Marischal—Charles detected at
Liège—Verbally dismisses Goring—Pickle’s letter to
England—‘Best metal buttons’—Goring to the Prince—The
Prince’s reply—Last letter from Goring—His
ill-treatment—His danger in Paris—His death in Prussia—The
Earl Marischal abandons the Prince—His distress—‘The
poison’
CHAPTER XII
PICKLE AS A HIGHLAND CHIEF.—1754–1757
Progress of Pickle—Charles’s last resource—Cluny called to 276
Paris—The Loch Arkaig hoard—History of Cluny—Breaks his
oath to King George—Jacobite theory of such oaths—Anecdote
of Cluny in hiding—Charles gives Pickle a gold snuff-box—‘A
northern —’—Asks for a pension—Death of Old
Glengarry—Pickle becomes chief—The curse of
Lochgarry—Pickle writes from Edinburgh—His report—Wants
money—Letter from a ‘Court Trusty’—Pickle’s pride—Refused a
fowling-piece—English account of Pickle—His arrogance and
extortion—Charles’s hopes from France—Macallester the
spy—The Prince’s false nose—Pickle still unpaid—His
candour—Charles and the Duc de Richelieu—A Scottish
deputation—James Dawkins publicly abandons the
Prince—Dawkins’s character—The Earl Marischal denounces
Charles—He will not listen to Cluny—Dismisses his
servants—Sir Horace Mann’s account of them—‘The boy that is
lost’—English rumours—Charles declines to lead attack on
Minorca—Information from Macallester—Lord Clancarty’s
attacks on the Prince—On Lochgarry—Macallester acts as a
prison spy—Jesuit conspiracy against Charles
CHAPTER XIII
THE LAST HOPE—1759
Charles asks Louis for money—Idea of employing him in 300
1757—Letter from Frederick—Chances in 1759—French
friends—Murray and ‘the Pills’—Charles at Bouillon—Madame
de Pompadour—Charles on Lord George Murray—The night march
to Nairn—Manifestoes—Charles will only land in
England—Murray wishes to repudiate the National
Debt—Choiseul’s promises—Andrew Lumisden—The Marshal’s old
boots—Clancarty—Internal feuds of Jacobites—Scotch and
Irish quarrels—The five of diamonds—Lord Elibank’s
views—The expedition starting—Routed in Quiberon Bay—New
hopes—Charles will not land in Scotland or Ireland—‘False
subjects’—Pickle waits on events—His last letter—His ardent
Patriotism—Still in touch with the Prince—Offers to sell a
regiment of Macdonalds—Spy or colonel?—Signs his real
name—‘Alexander Macdonnell of Glengarry’—Death of
Pickle—His services recognised
CHAPTER XIV
CONCLUSION
Conclusion—Charles in 1762—Flight of Miss 316
Walkinshaw—Charles quarrels with France—Remonstrance from
Murray—Death of King James—Charles returns to Rome—His
charm—His disappointments—Lochgarry enters the Portuguese
service—Charles declines to recognise Miss
Walkinshaw—Report of his secret marriage to Miss
Walkinshaw—Denied by the lady—Charles breaks with
Lumisden—Bishop Forbes—Charles’s marriage—The Duchess of
Albany—‘All ends in song’—The Princesse de Talmond—The end
_Erratum_
Page 3, line 2, _for_ George III. _read_ George II.
LIST OF PLATES
PICKLE THE SPY _Frontispiece_
THE PRINCE OF WALES, 1735 To _face p._ 18
PRINCE CHARLES ABOUT 1734 38
_From a miniature at Strathtyrum_. (_By
permission of Messrs. Charles Scribners’ Sons_.)
PRINCE CHARLES IN 1750 98
_From a miniature in Her Majesty’s Collection at
Windsor Castle_.
MISS WALKINSHAW 140
_From a miniature in the possession of Mrs.
Wedderburn Ogilvie_, _of Rannagulzion_. (_By
permission of Messrs. Charles Scribners’ Sons_.)
THE KING, 1780 (?) 320
CHAPTER I
INTRODUCTORY TO PICKLE
Subject of this book—The last rally of Jacobitism hitherto obscure—Nature
of the new materials—Information from spies, unpublished Stuart Papers,
&c.—The chief spy—Probably known to Sir Walter Scott—‘Redgauntlet’
cited—‘Pickle the Spy’—His position and services—The hidden gold of Loch
Arkaig—Consequent treacheries—Character of Pickle—Pickle’s
nephew—Pickle’s portrait—Pickle detected and denounced—To no
purpose—Historical summary—Incognito of Prince Charles—Plan of this work.
THE latest rally of Jacobitism, with its last romance, so faded and so
tarnished, has hitherto remained obscure. The facts on which ‘Waverley’
is based are familiar to all the world: those on which ‘Redgauntlet’
rests were but imperfectly known even to Sir Walter Scott. The story of
the Forty-five is the tale of Highland loyalty: the story of 1750–1763 is
the record of Highland treachery, or rather of the treachery of some
Highlanders. That story, now for the first time to be told, is founded
on documents never hither to published, or never previously pieced
together. The Additional Manuscripts of the British Museum, with relics
of the government of Henry Pelham and his brother, the Duke of Newcastle,
have yielded their secrets, and given the information of the spies. The
Stuart Papers at Windsor (partly published in Browne’s ‘History of the
Highland Clans’ and by Lord Stanhope, but mainly virginal of type) fill
up the interstices in the Pelham Papers like pieces in a mosaic, and
reveal the general design. The letters of British ambassadors at Paris,
Dresden, Berlin, Hanover, Leipzig, Florence, St. Petersburg, lend colour
and coherence. The political correspondence of Frederick the Great
contributes to the effect. A trifle of information comes from the French
Foreign Office Archives; French printed ‘Mémoires’ and letters, neglected
by previous English writers on the subject, offer some valuable, indeed
essential, hints, and illustrate Charles’s relations with the wits and
beauties of the reign of Louis XV. By combining information from these
and other sources in print, manuscript, and tradition, we reach various
results. We can now follow and understand the changes in the singular
and wretched development of the character of Prince Charles Edward
Stuart. We get a curious view of the manners, and a lurid light on the
diplomacy of the middle of the eighteenth century. We go behind the
scenes of many conspiracies. Above all, we encounter an extraordinary
personage, the great, highborn Highland chief who sold himself as a spy
to the English Government.
His existence was suspected by Scott, if not clearly known and
understood.
In his introduction to ‘Redgauntlet,’ {3} Sir Walter Scott says that the
ministers of George III. ‘thought it proper to leave Dr. Cameron’s new
schemes in concealment (1753), lest by divulging them they had indicated
the channel of communication which, it is now well known, they possessed
to all the plots of Charles Edward.’ To ‘indicate’ that secret ‘channel
of communication’ between the Government of the Pelhams and the Jacobite
conspirators of 1749–1760 is one purpose of this book. Tradition has
vaguely bequeathed to us the name of ‘Pickle the Spy,’ the foremost of
many traitors. Who Pickle was, and what he did, a whole romance of
prosperous treachery, is now to be revealed and illustrated from various
sources. Pickle was not only able to keep the Duke of Newcastle and
George II. well informed as to the inmost plots, if not the most hidden
movements of Prince Charles, but he could either paralyse a serious, or
promote a premature, rising in the Highlands, as seemed best to his
English employers. We shall find Pickle, in company with that devoted
Jacobite, Lochgarry, travelling through the Highlands, exciting hopes,
consulting the chiefs, unburying a hidden treasure, and encouraging the
clans to rush once more on English bayonets.
Romance, in a way, is stereotyped, and it is characteristic that the last
romance of the Stuarts should be interwoven with a secret treasure. This
mass of French gold, buried after Culloden at Loch Arkaig, in one of the
most remote recesses of the Highlands, was, to the Jacobites, what the
dwarf Andvari’s hoard was to the Niflungs, a curse and a cause of
discord. We shall see that rivalry for its possession produced
contending charges of disloyalty, forgery, and theft among certain of the
Highland chiefs, and these may have helped to promote the spirit of
treachery in Pickle the Spy. It is probable, though not certain, that he
had acted as the agent of Cumberland before he was sold to Henry Pelham,
and he was certainly communicating the results of his inquiries in one
sense to George II., and, in another sense, to the exiled James III. in
Rome. He was betraying his own cousins, and traducing his friends.
Pickle is plainly no common spy or ‘paltry vidette,’ as he words it.
Possibly Sir Walter Scott knew who Pickle was: in him Scott, if he had
chosen, would have found a character very like Barry Lyndon (but worse),
very unlike any personage in the Waverley Novels, and somewhat akin to
the Master of Ballantrae. The cool, good-humoured, smiling, unscrupulous
villain of high rank and noble lineage; the scoundrel happily unconscious
of his own unspeakable infamy, proud and sensitive upon the point of
honour; the picturesque hypocrite in religion, is a being whom we do not
meet in Sir Walter’s romances. In Pickle he had such a character ready
made to his hand, but, in the time of Scott, it would have been
dangerous, as it is still disagreeable, to unveil this old mystery of
iniquity. A friend of Sir Walter’s, a man very ready with the pistol,
the last, as was commonly said, of the Highland chiefs, was of the name
and blood of Pickle, and would have taken up Pickle’s feud. Sir Walter
was not to be moved by pistols, but not even for the sake of a good story
would he hurt the sensibilities of a friend, or tarnish the justly
celebrated loyalty of the Highlands.
Now the friend of Scott, the representative of Pickle in Scott’s
generation, was a Highlander, and Pickle was not only a traitor, a
profligate, an oppressor of his tenantry, and a liar, but (according to
Jacobite gossip which reached ‘King James’) a forger of the King’s name!
Moreover he was, in all probability, one fountain of that reproach, true
or false, which still clings to the name of the brave and gentle
Archibald Cameron, the brother of Lochiel, whom Pickle brought to the
gallows. If we add that, when last we hear of Pickle, he is probably
engaged in a double treason, and certainly meditates selling a regiment
of his clan, like Hessians, to the Hanoverian Government, it will be
plain that his was no story for Scott to tell.
Pickle had, at least, the attraction of being eminently handsome. No
statelier gentleman than Pickle, as his faded portrait shows him in full
Highland costume, ever trod a measure at Holyrood. Tall, athletic, with
a frank and pleasing face, Pickle could never be taken for a traitor and
a spy. He seemed the fitting lord of that castellated palace of his
race, which, beautiful and majestic in decay, mirrors itself in Loch
Oich. Again, the man was brave; for he moved freely in France, England,
and Scotland, well knowing that the _skian_ was sharpened for his throat
if he were detected. And the most extraordinary fact in an extraordinary
story is that Pickle _was_ detected, and denounced to the King over the
water by Mrs. Archibald Cameron, the widow of his victim. Yet the breach
between James and his little Court, on one side, and Prince Charles on
the other, was then so absolute that the Prince was dining with the spy,
chatting with him at the opera-ball, and presenting him with a gold
snuff-box, at about the very time when Pickle’s treachery was known in
Rome. Afterwards, the knowledge of his infamy came too late, if it came
at all. The great scheme had failed; Cameron had fallen, and Frederick
of Prussia, ceasing to encourage Jacobitism, had become the ally of
England.
These things sound like the inventions of the romancer, but they rest on
unimpeachable evidence, printed and manuscript, and chiefly on Pickle’s
own letters to his King, to his Prince, and to his English employers—we
cannot say ‘pay-masters,’ for _Pickle was never paid_! He obtained,
indeed, singular advantages, but he seldom or never could wring ready
money from the Duke of Newcastle.
To understand Pickle’s career, the reluctant reader must endure a certain
amount of actual history in minute details of date and place. Every one
is acquainted with the brilliant hour of Prince Charles: his landing in
Moidart accompanied by only seven men, his march on Edinburgh, his
success at Prestonpans, the race to Derby, the retreat to Scotland, the
gleam of victory at Falkirk, the ruin of Culloden, the long months of
wanderings and distress, the return to France in 1746. Then came two
years of baffled intrigues; next, the Treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle insisted
on the Prince’s expulsion from France; last, he declined to withdraw. On
December 10, 1748, he was arrested at the opera, was lodged in the prison
of Vincennes, was released, and made his way to the Pope’s city of
Avignon, arriving there in the last days of December 1748. On February
28, 1749, he rode out of Avignon, and disappeared for many months from
the ken of history. For nearly eighteen years he preserved his
incognito, vaguely heard of here and there in England, France, Germany,
Flanders, but always involved in mystery. On that mystery, impenetrable
to his father, Pickle threw light enough for the purposes of the English
Government, but not during the darkest hours of Charles’s incognito.
‘Le Prince Edouard,’ says Barbier in his journal for February 1750, ‘fait
l’admiration et la curiosité de l’Europe.’ This work, alas! is not
likely to add to the admiration entertained for the unfortunate
adventurer, but any surviving curiosity as to the Prince’s secret may be
assuaged. In the days of 1749–1750, before Pickle’s revelations begin,
the drafts of the Prince’s memoranda, notes, and angry love-letters,
preserved in Her Majesty’s Library, enable us to follow his movements.
On much that is obscurely indicated in scarcely decipherable scrawls,
light is thrown by the French memoirs of that age. The names of Madame
de Talmond, Madame d’Aiguillon, and the celebrated Montesquieu, are
beacons in the general twilight. The memoirs also explain, what was
previously inexplicable, the motives of Charles in choosing a life ‘in a
hole of a rock,’ as he said after the Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle (1748).
It is necessary, however, to study the internal feuds of the Jacobites at
this period, and these are illuminated by the Stuart Papers, the letters
of James and his ministers.
The plan of our narrative, therefore, will be arranged in the following
manner. First, we sketch the character of Prince Charles in boyhood,
during his Scottish expedition, and as it developed in cruelly thwarting
circumstances between 1746 and 1749. In illustrating his character the
hostile parties within the Jacobite camp must be described and defined.
From February 1749 to September 1750 (when he visited London), we must
try to pierce the darkness that has been more than Egyptian. We can, at
least, display the total ignorance of Courts and diplomatists as to
Charles’s movements before Pickle came to their assistance, and we
discover a secret which they ought to have known.
After the date 1752 we give, as far as possible, the personal history of
Pickle before he sold himself, and we unveil his motives for his villany.
Then we display Pickle in action, we select from his letters, we show him
deep in the Scottish, English, and continental intrigues. He spoils the
Elibank Plot, he reveals the hostile policy of Frederick the Great, he
leads on to the arrest of Archibald Cameron, he sows disunion, he
traduces and betrays. He finally recovers his lands, robs his tenants,
dabbles (probably) in the French scheme of invasion (1759), offers
further information, tries to sell a regiment of his clan, and dies
unexposed in 1761.
Minor spies are tracked here and there, as Rob Roy’s son, James Mohr
Macgregor, Samuel Cameron, and Oliver Macallester. English machinations
against the Prince’s life and liberty are unveiled. His utter decadence
is illustrated, and we leave him weary, dishonoured, and abandoned.
‘A sair, sair altered man
_Prince Charlie_ cam’ hame’
to Rome; and the refusal there of even a titular kingship.
The whole book aims chiefly at satisfying the passion of curiosity.
However unimportant a secret may be, it is pleasant to know what all
Europe was once vainly anxious to discover. In the revelation of
manners, too, and in tracing the relations of famous wits and beauties
with a person then so celebrated as Prince Charles, there is a certain
amount of entertainment which may excuse some labour of research. Our
history is of next to no political value, but it revives as in a magic
mirror somewhat dim, certain scenes of actual human life. Now and again
the mist breaks, and real passionate faces, gestures of living men and
women, are beheld in the clear-obscure. We see Lochgarry throw his dirk
after his son, and pronounce his curse. We mark Pickle furtively
scribbling after midnight in French inns. We note Charles hiding in the
alcove of a lady’s chamber in a convent. We admire the ‘rich anger’ of
his Polish mistress, and the sullen rage of Lord Hyndford, baffled by
‘the perfidious Court’ of Frederick the Great. The old histories emerge
into light, like the writing in sympathetic ink on the secret despatches
of King James.