Feb.
Keeping in view the article under September 1690, regarding the marriage of Walter Scott of Kelso with Mary Campbell of Silvercraigs, we may read with additional interest a letter by that person, written from Glasgow to his wife in February 1714, |1714.| giving an account of the peculiar arrangements regarding her father’s funeral:
‘Glasgow, Feb. 2, 1714.
‘My Dear—I left Edinr upon fryday the 29th of the last. Dean of [Guild] Allane nor your sister either durst venture to travell to Glasgow with [me], on account of the season, but said that Mr Bell, Lisis younge husband, was there, whom Dean of Guild Allane had trusted with any business that could bee done for him. I called at Lithkow and saw Lissie, who was very kinde, was at Kilsyth all that night, came to Glasgow the next day, beeing Saturday, at twelve of the clock, and at two of the clock that day went down to the chesting of your father. He was buried yesterday att four a clock afternoon, beeing Monday the first instant, very devoutlie and honourablie, for Blythswood had ordered all things proper and suitable to a nicety. All the gentlemen in the place, the magistrates, and the citiezens of best esteem and substance, accompanied the funerall in very good order. I carried his head, Blythswood on my right, and Alex. Bell, Lissies husband, on my left hand; other nerest relations and Sr James Campbell of Auchinbrook carried all the way. After the funerall, there was prepared in the large room of the Coffee-house a very handsome and genteele treat, to wh the Magistrates and Gentlemen and friends were invited. The treat consisted of confections, sweet breads, and bisket of divers sorts, very fine and well done, and wines. There were at it upwards of thirtie. Wee are this day to look to his papers in presence of Bailie Bowman and town-clark, wherof you shall have account of after this. I have sent a letter to Sir Robert Pollock just now, whose answer I will wait. I am like to stay five days after this here, and the time I may stay in Edir depends on my success from Sir Rot Pollock. In the mean time let Robie[[466]] be making himself ready, for his master told Dean of Guild that he thought he would bee readie to saill about the middle of this instant. When I come to Edr I shall know whither it will be needfull to send for him before I come home myselfe or not. I recommend you all to the protection of God, and am,
‘My dear, your
‘W. Scott.
REIGN OF GEORGE I.: 1714–1727.
The Tory ministry of Anne, which had certainly meditated some attempt at the restoration of the Stuart line, were paralysed, as we have seen, by her death, and allowed the accession of George of Hanover to take place without opposition. The new king had no sooner settled himself in London, than he displaced the late queen’s advisers, and surrounded himself with the Whigs, whom he knew to be his only true friends. The sharpness of this proceeding, added to the general discontent, produced an almost immediate insurrection. Two of the ex-ministers—the Duke of Ormond and Lord Bolingbroke—went to France, and attached themselves to the exiled court. The Earl of Mar, after in vain attempting to obtain the favour of King George, repaired to his native country, and, on the 6th of September 1715, set up the standard of rebellion in Aberdeenshire, although he is said to have had no commission to that effect from the rival prince. This nobleman, who had acted as Secretary of State under the late government, was speedily surrounded with hundreds of armed men, chiefly of the Highland clans, who were willing to be led by him to battle.
The government had at this time only a few regiments in Scotland, not exceeding in all fifteen hundred men, and these could not be concentrated in one place, without leaving the rest of the country exposed. They were, however, put under the command of the Duke of Argyle, a young soldier who had served under Marlborough, and at one time commanded the British troops in Spain. The government could not well spare more men for service in Scotland, as England, being threatened with a corresponding invasion from France, required a large number of the disposable troops for its own defence, and also for the purpose of preventing a rising among the native Jacobites. An attempt was made to surprise Edinburgh Castle in behalf of the Chevalier, and it would have in all likelihood succeeded, but for the folly of one or two of the conspirators. By this enterprise, if successful, the Duke of Argyle must have been disabled for keeping together his small army, and the whole of the south of Scotland would at once have fallen into the hands of the insurgent general, if he had been gifted with common energy to take it into his possession.
Mar entered Perth on the 28th of September, having with him about five thousand horse and foot, fully armed. Among his Highland adherents were the chieftains of Clanranald and Glengarry, the Earl of Breadalbane, and the Marquis of Tullibardine (eldest son of the Duke of Athole), all of whom brought their clansmen into the field. Among the Lowland Jacobites who had already joined him were the Earls of Panmure and Strathmore, with many of the younger sons of considerable families. On the 2d of October, a party of his troops performed the dexterous exploit of surprising a government vessel on the Firth of Forth opposite to Burntisland, and taking from it several hundred stand of arms, which it was about to carry to the north, for the purpose of arming the Whig Earl of Sutherland against his Jacobite neighbours. This gave a little éclat to the enterprise.