“There shall be no delay on my part-that I promise your majesty,” said Lord Derwentwater.
“And none on yours, I trust, fair lady?”
“None,” she replied, but in accents so low that they were scarce heard above the sound of the waves as they flowed within a few yards of them.
“All then will go well,” said the prince. “May our next merry meeting be at Dilston! where the lovely bride, as well as her noble consort, will, I am certain, give me a hearty welcome.”
“That I will, my gracious liege, most assuredly, if I am there,” she rejoined.
“If you are not there, I won’t enter the castle,” said the prince. “But find you I shall-or there is no truth in man or woman.”
“Nay, my liege, I only meant that you may perchance return before the marriage has been solemnised.”
“Have I not said that it must not be delayed?” rejoined the prince. “I now lay my commands upon you both to that effect, and I trust I shall not be disobeyed.”
“I will take care that your majesty’s injunctions are fulfilled,” said Lady Webb.
“With that assurance I shall depart in better humour with myself than I should have done otherwise,” said the prince. “My voyage has not been altogether fruitless. If I have not succeeded in my own design I have helped a dear friend to a charming wife-and that is something.”
Just then, a flash of light was seen in the Fairway, and next moment the sound of a gun was heard; the loud report being echoed by the rocks behind the party.
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BOOK THE THIRD
THE INSURRECTION IN SCOTLAND
I
The Hunting in Braemar
NOT till the accession of George the First did the general insurrection take place, for which the partisans of the Pretender had been preparing so long.
During the latter years of Anne, who was so much and so deservedly beloved by the people, the Jacobites had remained quiescent, believing that in the political crisis certain to arise on the queen’s death, the Chevalier de Saint George would be called to the throne.
Disappointed in this expectation, they determined not to tolerate a rule adverse to the religion of the majority, and hateful to all.
In the year 1715, at which date we shall resume our story, a formidable plot spread throughout England and Scotland, causing the greatest alarm to the Government by the avowed intention of the conspirators to depose the reigning monarch, whom they described as a tyrannous usurper, and restore the ancient sovereignty.
Aware of the designs of his enemies, King George made an appeal to the Nation, in which he said, that after his solemn assurances, and the opportunities he had taken to do everything that might tend to benefit the Church of England, it was unjust and ungrateful to doubt him, and he refused to believe that the people could be so far misled by false representations as to desire to place a Popish Pretender on the throne.
In an address to his majesty by the Lord Mayor, James the Third was denounced as an impostor, who proposed to govern the kingdom by Popish maxims, while the High Church Tories, who were regarded as the Pretender’s main supporters in England, and more dangerous than the Roman Catholics themselves, were stigmatised as “Non-resisting rebels, passive-obedience rioters, abjuring Jacobites, and Frenchified Englishmen; monsters, whom no age or country ever produced till now.”
The first movements of the Jacobites were checked by the death of Louis the Fourteenth, and the appointment of the Duke of Orleans as Regent; thus precluding any hope of immediate assistance from France, as had been previously calculated upon, since the Regent, on assuming the government, had at once entered into friendly relations with George the First.
Notwithstanding this unpropitious circumstance, the Chevalier de Saint George, who felt that his position had become critical, sent orders to the Earl of Mar and some others of his adherents that a general rising should take place without delay.
The prince’s command was promptly obeyed by the Earl of Mar, who embarked in disguise in a coal-sloop at Gravesend, accompanied by Major General Hamilton and Colonel John Hay, brother of the Earl of Kinnoul. Eventually the earl and his companions reached Braemar Castle in Aberdeenshire in safety.
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