Page:The Works of the Rev. Jonathan Swift, Volume 10.djvu/389

Rh his honesty; because my lord Dundee had assured him, that the lieutenant general had given him his faith and honour, to be with him in five days, if he marched to the hills to declare for king James. Whereupon I submitted my scruples to my colonel's judgment; and accordingly we all met together at the tavern.

Dinner was no sooner done, than we heard the news that king James was landed in Ireland: then Douglas taking a beer glass, and looking round him, said, gentlemen, we have all eat of his bread, and here is his health; which he drank off, on his knees; and all the company did the same: then filling another bumper, he drank damnation to all who would ever draw a sword against him.

I then returned to Stirling, and soon after the states of Scotland met. To this convention my lord Dundee went incognito; lest the rabble, who had threatened his person, should assault him in the streets. He made a speech to the house, to the following purpose: "That he came thither as a peer of the realm to serve his majesty; and that if the king had no service for him, he hoped that honourable assembly would protect him as a peaceable subject from the rage of his enemies."

Upon receiving an answer from the states, that they could not possibly do it, he slipped out of the house, and privately withdrew from the town; followed by the twenty-four troopers, who had attended him thither: and, as he rode by the castle, seeing the duke of Gordon, who commanded it, walking on the walls, he charged his grace, to keep the place for king James, till he should hear farther from him; who was