Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 4.djvu/45

Rh progress through the north, returned to Edinburgh with a hundred gentlemen as honourable as himself, to support his charges, and bear witness to the innocence and integrity of his character; or rather to browbeat the authorities, and extort from fear a decision which he well knew could never be procured from the voice of truth and justice. Finding, however, that he had undertaken what would fail him in the issue, he once more set out for London, the day before the trial should have come on, and was nonsuited in his absence; and thus, by his imprudent temerity, lost the opportunity of being fairly instated in the estate and honours of Lovat, as he would certainly have been, through. the interest of Argyle and his other friends, had he allowed them to do their own work in their own way.

The restoration of king James was now Lovat's sheet anchor; and, lest the Hurrays, whom he suspected of being warmer friends to James than he was himself, should also be before him here, it was necessary for him to be peculiarly forward. Accordingly, on the death of king William in the early part of the year 1702, he procured a commission from several of the principal Scottish Jacobites to the court of St Germains, declaring their being ready to take up arms and hazard their lives and fortunes for the restoration of their lawful prince; as usual, paying all manner of respect to the court of Versailles, and requesting its assistance. With this, he proceeded by the way of England and Holland, and reached the court of St Germains about the beginning of September, 1702; just in time to be particularly useful in inflaming the contentions that distracted the councils of James VIII., for the direction of whose affairs there was a most violent struggle among his few followers. He had for his fellow-traveller his cousin-german, Sir John Maclean, well known in the history of the intrigues of that time, who, leaving him at Paris, was his precursor to the court of St Germains, whence in two days he returned to conduct him into the presence of the duke of Perth, from whom he received private instructions how to conduct himself towards the queen. The principal of these was to request of the queen that she should not make known any part of what he proposed to lord Middleton, who, at the time, was the rival of lord Perth for the supreme direction of their affairs, which might be said to lie chiefly in sending out spies, fabricating reports, and soliciting pensions. Nothing could be more agreeable to Lovat, the very elements of whose being seemed to be mystery, and with whom to intrigue was as natural as to breathe. To work he went, exacted the queen's promise to keep every thing secret from Middleton; and by the aid of the marquis de Torcy, the marquis Callieres, and cardinal Gualterio, the pope's nuncio, fancied himself sole administrator of the affairs of Scotland. The queen herself was so much pleased with the opening scene, that she gladdened the heart of Lovat, by telling him she had sent her jewels to Paris to be sold, in order to raise the twenty thousand crowns he had told her were necessary for bringing forward his Highlanders in a properly effective manner. But she was not long true to her promise of secrecy; and Middleton at once depicted Lovat as "the greatest traitor in the three kingdoms:" nor did he treat his favourite Highlanders with any more respect, representing them as mere banditti, excellent at plundering the Lowlanders, and carrying oft* their cattle, but incapable of being formed into a regular corps that would look a well appointed enemy in the face. From this day forward, Lovat seems to have fallen in the opinion of Mary d'Este, who was a woman of rather superior talents, though he seems to have gone on well with de Torcy, Callieres, and Gualterio, who found in him, as they supposed, a very fit tool for their purpose of raising in Scotland a civil war, without much caring whether it really promoted the interests of James or not. After much intriguing with Perth and