This able General now proposed to place guards in such a manner as should prevent the garrison in the castle marching out to surprise him, but his exertions were baffled by the want of judgment and incompetency of those beneath him in command. The guard was placed near the weigh-house at the foot of the Castle-rock, so that the battery of the half-moon, as it was termed, near the Castle-gate, bore upon it, and many of the guard within would have perished upon the first firing. This was not the only mistake. Mr. O'Sullivan, one of Prince Charles's officers, one day placed a small guard near the West Kirk, which was not only exposed to the enemy's fire, but conveniently situated near the sally-port, whence the besieged might issue and take the party there prisoners; for no relief could be sent to them in less than two hours' time, owing to its being necessary to pass round the whole circumference of the castle to arrive at that point. "I never," says Lord George Murray, "knew of that guard's being placed there, until they were taken prisoners." So severe a service was this blockade, that it was found necessary to relieve the guards, which were thus placed, by different corps who could not know the risk which they encountered. Desertions from the Jacobite army were among the most formidable evils with which Lord George had to contend. It was therefore important not to discourage the soldiery. In the midst of difficulty the high-minded Cameron of Lochiel came forward to offer his own person, and to risk his own regiment in this service. He agreed to take all the guards, and to relieve them with the soldiers of his own regiment, who were quartered for that purpose in the outer Parliament House. "I was with him," writes Lord George,[50] "when the guards were relieved, and the men did their duty exceedingly, especially when there was danger; and, when the fire was hottest from the castle, they kept their post with much resolution and bravery. Lochiel and I being much with them, gave them a heartiness that hindered them from complaining of a duty which was so hard, and which the rest of the army had not in their turns. We even placed new guards to keep the castle from sallying, as they seemed disposed; and Keppoch's regiment was brought into town to take some of the guards and support them. I lay in town for some nights, and was constantly visiting the guards and sentinels."
The castle, nevertheless, seated on the precipitous rocks, which, steep as they are, have yet been "scaled by love and ambition,"[51] defied the blockaders. The Highlanders continued to keep guard in the weigh-house, and, stationing themselves in the Grass-market, the Smithfield as well as the Hay-market of Edinburgh, lying on the south side of the Castle-hill, awaited there the proceedings of the enemy.
On the twenty-ninth of September, a letter was sent to the Provost of Edinburgh by General Guest, intimating, that, unless a communication were kept up between the city and the castle, he should be under the necessity of using cannon to dislodge the Highlanders. It was said that Guest had an order from the Government, signed by the Marquis of Tweedale, empowering him to lay the city in ashes if the citizens did not remove the Highlanders from their quarters. A message was dispatched from the Provost to General Guest obtaining a respite for that night; but, meantime, the utmost consternation prevailed in the town. Twelve o'clock at night was the hour fixed upon for the execution of this threat of the enemy; and, although many who reasoned did not believe in the existence of the order, the lower classes were seized with a panic, and the streets were crowded with women and children running towards the gates, and with people removing their property to more secure quarters. When the clocks struck twelve, the hour fixed in General Guest's message, the noise of the cannon was heard firing upon the principal streets; but the Highlanders were all under shelter, and only a few poor inhabitants were injured. Nothing was heard except imprecations on that Government which had issued so cruel an order, since it was quite out of the power of the citizens to dislodge the Highlanders from their quarters. But the firing was soon intermitted; and whether the garrison had private orders only to threaten, or whether they found it impossible to execute so barbarous an order, is unknown. They spared the city generally, and only directed their fire to any place where they fancied that they saw a Highlander.
On the following morning a deputation of citizens waited on the Chevalier, and showed him General Guest's letter. He immediately replied, that he was surprised and concerned at the barbarity of the order, but that if, out of compassion for the city, he were to remove his guards, the castle might with equal reason summon him to quit the town, and abandon all the advantages of which he was possessed. A respite of a day was afterwards obtained; and subsequently for six days, in case the Highlanders would abstain from firing at the castle; and a dispatch to London was sent to obtain a mitigation of the order in council.
Meantime, on the first of October, the Highlanders fired; whether at some people who were carrying provisions to the castle, or at the castle itself, is uncertain. Reprisals were instantly made by a heavy cannonading and small shot. The firing continued for some days, bringing terror to the hearts of those who lived remote from the scene of danger; whilst the aged and infirm were carried out of that noble city, thus threatened with destruction. Sir Walter Scott observes, that the generation of his own time alone can remember Edinburgh in peace, undisturbed by civil commotion. The fathers of that generation remembered the days of 1745—their fathers the disturbances of 1715. The fathers of those who had witnessed the rebellion of 1715 could remember the revolution of 1688.
The merciful temper of the young Chevalier saved the city of Edinburgh. At first he resolved to continue the blockade; and he renewed his former orders, prohibiting any person from going to the castle without a pass from his secretary, and threatening any one who was disobedient to this proclamation with instant death. But, when he beheld the distress to which the firing had already reduced the city,—then, let it be remembered, comprised within boundaries of very moderate extent,—he issued another proclamation, expressing his deep concern for the many murders which were committed upon the innocent inhabitants of the city, so contrary to the laws of war, to the truce granted to the city, and even exceeding the powers given. His humanity had, therefore, yielded to the barbarity of his enemy; the blockade of the castle was taken off, and the threatened punishment suspended.[52]
The army of Charles Edward was now increasing daily; and, in consequence of the reports which were circulated in the metropolis, a panic spread there, of which no estimate can be made without consulting the newspapers of that time. Among other writers who employed their talents in inveighing against the cause of James Stuart, was the celebrated Henry Fielding, whose papers in the True Patriot upon the subject present a curious insight into those transient states of public feeling, which perished almost as soon as expressed. The rapidity of the progress made by the insurgents is declared by his powerful pen to have been unprecedented. "Can History," he writes, "produce an instance parallel to this,—of six or seven men landing in a powerful nation, in opposition to the inclination of the people, in defiance of a vast and mighty army? (For, though the greater part of this army was not then in the kingdom, it was so nearly within call, that every man of them might, within the compass of a few days, or weeks at farthest, have been brought home and landed in any part of it.) If we consider, I say, this handful of men landing in the most desolate corner, among a set of poor, naked, hungry, disarmed slaves, abiding there with impunity till they had, as it were, in the face of a large body of his Majesty's troops collected a kind of army, or rather rabble, together, it will be extremely difficult to assign any adequate cause whatsoever, for this unexampled success, without recurring to one, of whose great efficacy we have frequent instances in sacred history: I mean, the just judgment of God against an offending people." The state of public morals, Fielding considers, to have drawn down upon society this signal visitation of Providence. "Indeed, such monstrous impieties and iniquities have I both seen and heard of, within these last three years, during my sojourning in what is called the world, particularly the last winter, while I tarried in the great city, that, while I verily believe we are the silliest people under Heaven in every other light, we are wiser than Sodom in wickedness."[53] The consternation of the sister kingdom had now, indeed, become general; on the slightest report of foreign ships being seen in the Downs, the dismay of the London citizens was extreme: and such was the liberality, or such were the fears of the inhabitants of the county of York, the capital of which may almost have been deemed, in those days, a northern metropolis, that forty thousand pounds were subscribed for its defence, after a grave and mournful address of the archbishop of that diocese.[54]
When the Prince had determined to take off the blockade, and indeed had actually resolved to evacuate Edinburgh and to march southwards, he sent orders to Lord George Murray to nail the cannon upon the city walls, and to retire to Musselburgh and Dalkeith. But the sagacious Lord George, apprehending no further cannonading from the castle, begged permission not to make a precipitate retreat, and obtained leave to continue three weeks longer in Edinburgh, during which time the town remained in a much quieter state than it had been heretofore.
Whilst Lord George Murray was quartered in Edinburgh, he communicated frequently with his wife, the Lady Emilia, who remained with her children at Tullibardine. That lady seems to have taken a deep interest in the events which so deeply concerned her family. She was the first to communicate to the Marquis of Tullibardine the intelligence of the victory of Preston-Pans. "I pray God," she says in her postscript, "to prosper his Royal Highness's arms, and congratulate your Grace upon his happy success." A gentleman, who had seen her husband after the battle, had brought to the anxious wife the tidings of his success.
Towards the end of October the Prince resolved to march into England, without waiting any longer for the landing of French auxiliaries, or even for the arrival of the friendly Clans of Frasers and Mackintoshes, who were ready to march from the north to join Charles Edward. By some of the Chevalier's advisers he was recommended to go to Berwick; but this was a scheme counteracted by the counsels of Lord George Murray, who, in the presence of the principal officers, represented it as "a thing at least of great difficulty, and of not so great use as to lose time, which is precious." Lord George therefore proposed marching into England by the other road; but, to conceal their design, he advised that the army should be divided into three columns; one to go by Kelso, the second by Moffat, and a third by Galashiels, Selkirk, and Hawick; so that all the columns should join on an appointed day near Carlisle. The plan was approved; and, the secret being very well kept, on the thirty-first of October the army prepared to march.[55] It is remarkable, that, during the whole period of their stay in Edinburgh, no general review of the Jacobite forces had taken place. The consequent uncertainty of what was really the amount of those forces, which existed in England, fostered the general panic. "Abundance of people," writes Mr. Maxwell, "friends as well as enemies, had made it their business to find out the number of the Prince's army, but to no purpose. Great pains had been taken to conceal its weakness."[56]