ever since he returned from Scotland. The major had provided himself with thirty-six ells of black silk ribbon with which to tie the prince, and on hearing him give directions to that effect, Charles offered his parole that he would hurt neither himself nor any other person, and added, that he thought so many persons were quite sufficient to guard one unarmed man without resorting to such a step. The major then went to the Duke de Biron to report, and on returning repeated his orders to bind the prince. Charles was accordingly tied in five different placesHis arms were pinioned close to his body, and his hands tied behind his back. The ribbon was then drawn round his waist, and round his arms and legs, so as to prevent him even from walking. In this situation he was put into a hired coach, attended by the major and two captains of the blue guards, and was driven, under a strong guard, to the castle of Vincennes, into which he was received by M. de Chatelet, the governor. He was then, in terms of orders which the governor had received, thrust into an upper apartment in the Tower, fifty-four steps high, and about seven feet wide and eight feet long. The only person who was allowed to relieve the solitariness of his confinement was Neil Mac Eachan, who had attended him in his perilous journey from Uist to Skye. Charles had borne the indignity offered him with great composure, the disgrace attending which, he told M. de Vaudreuil, could only affect his master; but, after Charles found himself shut up in the dungeon of the castle, his feelings were overcome, and he is said to have clasped his hands together and to have burst into tears. "Ah! my faithful mountaineers," he pathetically exclaimed, "from you I never would have received such treatment. Would to God I were still among you !" Meanwhile the three gentlemen who had attended Charles to the opera were also seized, and five others, who were by chance at his house, and all his servants were sent to the Bastile. His hotel was taken possession of by the lieutenant of police, who remained in it from six o'clock at night till three next morning, during which he put the broad seal on his effects. Next day all the prince's French servants were released.

The arrest of the prince created an extraordinary sensation in Paris, and next morning all the public places of the city were covered with pasquinades, which had been put up during the night, reflecting, in very severe terms, upon the conduct of the king and his ministers, for their treatment of the prince. One of these was in the form of an order from King George, directed to Louis of Bourbon, as his viceroy, commanding and requiring him to seize, and, if necessary, to tie the person of Charles Edward Stuart, and to conduct him out of the kingdom of France; and that, if Louis should continue to please his master as he had hitherto done, he should be continued, by the king of England, in the viceroyalty of his kingdom of France. These placards were exceed

dix.

Genuine Account, p. 63. Anonymous letter to Dr Meighan, in the Appen

ingly annoying to the French court, and were torn down by the police with as great expedition as possible.*

Charles was kept in close confinement till the fourteenth, on which day, in consequence of a correspondence which had passed between him and the king on that and the previous day, he was allowed to walk a few hours in the gardens. Having tendered his parole to leave the French territories without guards, Charles was released at seven o'clock, in the morning of Sunday the fifteenth of December, and departed for Fontainebleau, in a coach, under the charge of a commandant of musketeers; and Messrs Stafford and Sheridan, two gentlemen of his household, who had been set at liberty, followed him in two post-chaises. The remainder of Charles's domestics were released a few days afterwards. On reaching Fontainebleau, Charles despatched a facetious note to a M. de Boile at Paris, requesting him to inform his friends that he carried himself well,—that his head had never been off his shoulders, and that it was still upon them.† From Fontainebleau Charles proceeded, by easy stages, to Avignon, where he arrived on the morning of the twenty-seventh of December, disguised in the uniform of a French officer of musketeers. He had received a letter from his father on the road, and four days after his arrival he despatched an answer acquainting him thereof, and that he was "in perfect good health, notwithstanding the unheard-of barbarous and inhuman treatment" he had met with.‡

The following is a literal copy of the placard alluded to:-"George par la grace de Dieu, Roi de la Grande Bretagne, de France et D'Irlande, mandons et commandons à Louis de Bourbon, nôtre viceroi en notre dit Royaume de France, qu'il ait à faire saisir et lier si besoin est le nommé Charles Edouard Stuart; et le faire conduire hors de confins de nôtre dit Royaume. Par quoi, continuant de nous complaire, comme il nous a complu jusqu'ici, il méritera nôtre bienveillance; et d'être, par nous, maintenu, en la viceroiauté de nôtre dit Royaume.

+ See the letter in the Appendix.

"George Roi."

This letter, which is dated 1st January, 1749, and another of 31st December, 1748, from Mr James Murray, who was created Earl of Dunbar by the Chevalier de St George, will be found in the Appendix, copied from the originals among the Stuart papers.

CHAPTER XV.

Departure of Prince Charles from Avignon incognito-Visits Loudon-Interview with Dr King-Proposed marriage with a Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt-The Chevalier urges Charles to marry-Charles's reported change of religion-Embezzlement of money by Dr Cameron-Execution of the Doctor-Negotiations between Charles and his Jacobite friends in England-Result-Negotiations resumed and finally broken off-Death of the Chevalier de St George-Marriage of Charles-His death-Character-Death of Cardinal York-Enactments against the Scottish Episcopalians— Disarming act-Attempts to evade the laws against the Highland garb-The dress restored-Abolition of the heritable jurisdictions.

THE city of Avignon, in Provence, which Charles selected for his place of abode, did not at this time form a part of the French dominions, but belonged to the pope. On the death of George I. the Chevalier de St George had taken up his residence in this city, that he might the better be enabled to correspond with his friends in England; but he was soon obliged to retire across the Alps, in consequence, it is understood, of an application from the British government to the court of Rome. To expel the Stuarts from the French territories, whilst, by a sort of geographical subtlety, they were allowed to reside almost in the heart of France, was certainly an absurdity, and had Charles remained for any length of time at Avignon, it is probable, that, as in the case of his father, he would have been soon forced to look out for another asylum; but, to the astonishment of all Europe, he left Avignon incognito, after a residence of about two months, and went whither nobody could tell.

Attended only by Colonel Goring, Charles left Avignon in a travelling chaise, followed by his valet and two servants, out of livery, on horseback, and proceeded on the road to Lyons. The prince and Goring passed for French officers, who, on the conclusion of the peace, had obtained leave to visit their friends; and, to guard still farther against being recognised, they ordered the postillion to stop for refreshments only at the most obscure houses. Charles took the name of the Count D'Espoir. What his motives were for taking this step have not been

"Letter from H— G―g, Esquire, one of the gentlemen of the bed chamber tu the young Chevalier, and the only person of his own retinue that attended him from Avignon, in his late journey through Germany and elsewhere, &c., to a particular friend, London, 1750."

ascertained; but it is probable that one of his objects was an inter view with the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt, with whose daughter, the Princess Charlotte Louisa, he contemplated a matrimonial alli

ance.

At a small village about two leagues from Lyons, Charles was recognised by the Marquis de Valere; but having informed him that he was travelling incognito, the marquis addressed him by his assumed name. After passing through Lyons, Charles dismissed his valet and the other servants with the chaise, and hired another in which he and his companion proceeded to Strasbourg. From Strasbourg it is supposed that Charles went to Paris, as it is quite certain that he visited that capital in the month of May, from which he addressed an anonymous letter to some official personage in Germany, who appears to have taken an interest in his adherents, wishing to know if the emperor or the queen of Hungary would afford an exiled prince, who had been unworthily abandoned by his friends, an asylum in their states. The person to whom this letter was sent was directed to address his answer to Mr John Douglas, care of Mr Waters, junior, banker in Paris.† To conceal his movements from his own friends, Charles either omitted in his letters the name of the place where they were written, or dated them from a place where he was not at the time. While at Paris, he wrote a letter to a gentleman of the name of Bulkeley, which he dated from Venice, and eight days thereafter he sent him another letter referring him to the formIn this last letter he stated that a report had been spread that he intended to take up his residence in Bologna; but he says that this 66 was but a blind," and that no part of the pope's dominions should ever see his face.

er.

Of Charles's wanderings, during the several years that he continued to roam on the continent, no satisfactory account has yet appeared; but recent researches have thrown some light on this obscure part of his history. Secretary Edgar, who corresponded frequently with "the dear wild man," as he jocularly styled Charles, considered the prince's incognito as one of the most extraordinary circumstances that had ever occurred, so great was the secrecy with which it was, for several years, preserved.

After his departure from Paris, the first trace that can be discovered of him is in September seventeen hundred and fifty, when he visited

• Charles wrote a letter from Avignon on 24th February, 1749, to the Landgrave, asking his daughter in marriage, and on same day granted a commission to a Mr Dou. glas to proceed to the court of the Landgrave, and enter into a treaty of marriage be tween him and the Princess of Hesse-Darmstadt. Copies of these documents, taken from the original draughts among the Stuart papers, will be found in the Appendix. Had this marriage taken place, it appears to have been Charles's intention to have asked an asylum from the king of Poland, as there is a draught of an intended letter to the king in Charles's hand-writing among the same papers, of which a copy will be also found in the Appendix.

+ See this letter, and a note to Waters inclosing it, in the Appendix.

This singular production will be found in the Appendix.

London. His object in coming over appears to have been to establish a regular correspondence with his friends in England; to ascertain the probability of a rising in his favour; and to fix with them upon a proper place for landing arms, &c. Before his departure he applied to his father for a renewal of his powers as regent, which James reluctantly granted. If he found matters in a favourable train, he intended to have issued a declaration in which he was to offer to refer the funds to a free parliament, and to encourage the army to join him, he was to show the nullity of the oaths they had taken to the “Elector.”‡ Charles arrived in London in the month of September, and went immediately to the house of Lady Primrose. Her ladyship sent a note to Dr King, a zealous jacobite, desiring to see him immediately. On the doctor's entering the house, Lady Primrose led him into her dressing-room, and presented him to the prince. Dr King was surprised at seeing him, and still more astonished when informed of the motives which had induced him to hazard a journey to England at such a juncture. According to Dr King, whose statement is fully supported by documents among the Stuart papers,§ the impatience of the prince's friends who were in exile had formed a scheme which was impracticable; but although it had been as feasible as they had represented it to him, yet no preparation had been made to carry it into execution. Charles was soon convinced that he had been deceived, and, after a stay in London of five days only, returned to the continent.||

As Charles studiously concealed from his father all his designs and movements, the latter was entirely ignorant of his contemplated marriage with the daughter of the Landgrave of Hesse-Darmstadt. The Chevalier had suggested, in seventeen hundred and forty-seven, a marriage with one of the duke of Modena's daughters, from which family his mother had sprung; but Charles appears not to have relished the proposed match.** He now urged upon him the necessity of marrying, so as

Charles alludes to this visit in a note dated 1st July, 1754, in his own hand-writing, among the Stuart Papers, a copy of which will be found in the Appendix.

+ Excerpt of letter from James to Charles, 4th August, 1750, in the Appendix.

↑ See a curious memorandum dated 3d May, 1750, in the Appendix, copied from the original among the Stuart Papers. From this document it is evident that Charles thought that the French ministry were bribed by the British government to withhold assistance from him.

See the following papers in the Appendix, viz. Letter young Glengary to O'Bryen, "Lord Lismore," 20th September, 1749; the same to Secretary Edgar, 16th January, 1750; Extract of a letter from the Chevalier de St George to Lord George Murray, 20th April, 1750; Lord George's answer, 19th May, 1750; and Letters, the Chevalier to the Prince, 5th May and 5th October, 1750.

King's Political and Literary Anecdotes, p. 197:-" He came," says Dr King, "one evening to my lodgings and drank tea with me: my servant, after he was gone, said to me, that he thought my new visitor very like Prince Charles.' Why,' said I, 'have you ever seen Prince Charles?' 'No, sir,' replied the fellow, but this gentleman, whoever he may be, exactly resembles the busts which are sold in Red-lion-street, and are said to be the busts of Prince Charles.' The truth is, these busts were taken in plaster of Paris from his face."

Letter to Charles, 17th April, 1747.