"The contents of his sideboard were as oddly assorted as those of his table, and served the same purpose. He began,—'My lord, here is excellent venison, here turbot, &c.: call for any wine you please; there is excellent claret and champagne on the sideboard. Pray, now, Dunballock or Killbockie, help yourselves to what is before you; there are port and lisbon, strong ale and porter, excellent in their kind;' then calling to the other end of the table,—'Pray, dear cousin, help yourself and my other cousins to that fine beef and cabbage; there is whiskey-punch and excellent table-beer.' His conversation, like his table, was varied to suit the character of every guest. The retainers soon retired, and Lovat (on whom drink made no impression) found means to unlock every other mind, and keep his own designs impenetrably secret; while the ludicrous and careless air of his discourse helped to put people off their guard; and searchless cunning and boundless ambition were hid under the mask of careless hilarity."
But darker deeds even than these diversified the pursuits of a man who had quitted the prisons of Angoulême and of Saumur only to wreak, upon his own faithful and trusting clansmen, or his neighbours, as well as his foes, the vindictive cruelty of a nature utterly depraved, not softened even by kindness, still less chastened by a long series of misfortunes.
Lovat's re-establishment at the head of his clan seems to have intoxicated him, and the display of his power to have risen into a ruling passion. Above all, he boasted of it to Duncan Forbes, whose endurance of this wretched ally's correspondence lasted until the pretended friendship was succeeded by avowed treachery to the Government to which he had professed such gratitude, and to the King and Prince whom he was wont to call "the bravest fellows in the world."[214]
In accordance with this spirit of self-glorification was Lovat's erection of two monuments,—filial piety dictating the inscription on one of them, that dedicated to his father, and his own audacious vanity assisting in the composition of the tribute to his own virtues.
It was his Lordship's favourite boast that at his birth a number of swords which hung up in the hall of his paternal home leaped themselves out of their scabbards, denoting that he was to be a mighty man of arms. The presage was not fulfilled, but Lord Lovat's ingenuity suggested the following means of imposing upon the credulity of his simple clansmen, by the composition of an epitaph which he erected in the old church of Kirkhill, a few miles from Castle Downie.
TO THE MEMORY OF
THOMAS LORD FRASER, OF LOVAT,
Who chose rather to undergo the greatest hardships of fortune than to part with the ancient honours of his house, and bore these hardships with undaunted fortitude of mind.
This monument was erected by
SIMON LORD FRASER OF LOVAT, HIS SON.