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 Campbell the actual decision of the point was taken out of his hands by the king himself, when on 4 Oct. he escaped or was permitted to escape from Perth, and joined the northern loyalists. Although the king returned to Perth on the 6th declaring that he had been treacherously deceived by some that suggested and made him believe that he was to be delivered up to the enemy (, Annals, iv. 118), not only was nothing done to punish those treacherous persons, but on 12 Oct. an act of indemnity was ordered to be passed to those in Atholl who had taken up arms upon his majesty's departure from Perth on 4 Oct. (ib. iv. 122), and shortly afterwards Argyll and others were sent to the western covenanting army ‘to solicit unity for the good of the kingdom’ (ib. iv. 123). In order to give solidity and weight to the combination against Cromwell, preparations were also begun for the coronation of the king, which took place at Scone 1 Jan. 1651, Argyll putting the crown on his head. From this time the supremacy of Argyll in the affairs of Scotland terminated both in name and reality. For some months, though retaining his place at the helm of affairs, he had been helplessly drifting at the mercy of contending factions. As the extreme covenanters now held aloof from the king, Argyll, at the parliament which met at Perth on 13 March, found his counsels completely overruled, and from this time the struggle of Charles II against Cromwell was directed by the Hamilton faction. Argyll strongly opposed the enterprise of leading an army into England, and when it was decided on excused himself from accompanying it on account of the illness of his lady. After the disaster at Worcester on 3 Sept. he defended himself for nearly a year in his castle at Inverary, but in August 1652 was surprised by General Deane, when he gave in his submission, making as usual a very astute bargain. It is generally stated that he absolutely refused to make an unconditional surrender, and only promised to live peaceably under that government, but the exact form of his declaration was as follows: ‘My dewtie to religioun, according to my oath in the covenant, always reserved, I do agrie for the civill pairt that Scotland be maid a Commounwelth with England, that thair be the same governament, without King or Hous of Lordis deryved to the pepill of Scotland, and yit in the meanetyme, quhill this can be practized, I sall leave quyetlie under the Parliament of the Commounwelth of England and thair authoritie’ ( Diary, p. 100). On his making this declaration Deane engaged that he should have his liberty, and his estates, lands, and debts free from sequestration (Cal. State Papers, Dom. 1655–6, p. 111).

The fall of Argyll was complete and final, and he moreover found that with his power his reputation had vanished like a dream. Up to the time when he entered upon the ill-starred enterprise of recalling Charles II, his statesmanship had been masterly and triumphant. The execution of the king had completely upset his calculations, which had all along been founded on a close union between the parliaments of Scotland and of England. This union was by that event abruptly severed, but the responsibility for the disaster rested not with him but with Cromwell. The results of his safe and prudent policy were ruthlessly annihilated by an act which after events proved to have been a mistake, although the powerful personality of Cromwell was able to turn it into immediate good for England. Argyll lost his presence of mind, and therefore his control of events in this stupendous conjuncture, and became as much a puppet in the hands of contending factions as was Charles II. Consequently, when the scheme for recalling Charles II failed, Argyll was execrated by all parties. ‘He was no less drowned in debt,’ says Baillie, ‘than in public hatred almost of all both Scottish and English’ (Letters and Journals, iii. 387). To the reputation for cowardice which he had gained among his enemies from his conduct on the battle-field was now attached a deeper significance. Even the accidental cast in his vision was now interpreted as indicating a similar blemish in his moral eyesight. Among the hostile highland clans he was long known as ‘Gillespie Grumach,’ Gillespie the ill-favoured, and in the lowlands he was referred to disdainfully as the ‘Glaed-eyed Marquis.’ For the contempt of the outside world he did not find unmingled consolation in the bosom of his family. He was at feud with his own son Lord Lorne [see, ninth ], then a hot-headed royalist who, much to Argyll's disrelish, took part in the attempted rising in the highlands in 1653. ‘These differences,’ according to Baillie, were so real as to make ‘both their lives bitter and uncomfortable to them’ (ib. iii. 288), and, indeed, Argyll had actually to ask a garrison to be placed in his house to keep it from his son's violence. His extreme pecuniary difficulties are graphically illustrated in a passage of Nicoll's diary recording Argyll's visit to Dalkeith in November 1654 to complain of his son Lord Lorne to General Monck. ‘At quhich time,’ says Nicoll, ‘he resaved much effrontes and disgraces of his creditors, quha, being frustrat and defraudit