Pickle the Spy; Or, the Incognito of Prince Charles

Transcribed from the 1897 Longmans, Green, and Co. edition by David Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org
BY ANDREW LANG
‘I knew the Master: on many secret steps of his career I have an authentic memoir in my hand.’ The Master of Ballantrae
LONGMANS, GREEN, AND CO. LONDON, NEW YORK, AND BOMBAY 1897
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This woful History began in my study of the Pelham Papers in the Additional Manuscripts of the British Museum. These include the letters of Pickle the Spy and of James Mohr Macgregor. Transcripts of them were sent by me to Mr. Robert Louis Stevenson, for use in a novel, which he did not live to finish. The character of Pickle, indeed, like that of the Master of Ballantrae, is alluring to writers of historical romance. Resisting the temptation to use Pickle as the villain of fiction, I have tried to tell his story with fidelity. The secret, so long kept, of Prince Charles’s incognito, is divulged no less by his own correspondence in the Stuart MSS. than by the letters of Pickle.
For Her Majesty’s gracious permission to read the Stuart Papers in the library of Windsor Castle, and to engrave a miniature of Prince Charles in the Royal collection, I have respectfully to express my sincerest gratitude.
To Mr. Holmes, Her Majesty’s librarian, I owe much kind and valuable aid.
The Pickle Papers, and many despatches in the State Papers, were examined and copied for me by Miss E. A. Ibbs.
In studying the Stuart Papers, I owe much to the aid of Miss Violet Simpson, who has also assisted me by verifying references from many sources.
It would not be easy to mention the numerous correspondents who have helped me, but it were ungrateful to omit acknowledgment of the kindness of Mr. Horatio f. Brown and of Mr. George T. Omond.
I have to thank Mr. Alexander Pelham Trotter for permission to cite the MS. Letter Book of the exiled Chevalier’s secretary, Andrew Lumisden, in Mr. Trotter’s possession.