[350] The Prince used to insist upon it that the French would still send him succours. This I heard from severals. See ff. 175, 214.—F.
[351] See the preceding note.—Robert Forbes, A.M.
[352] See f. 1665.
[353] See ff. 173-176, 356.
[354] See f. 173.
[355] It is omitted in this Journal that Auchinsaul himself was with the Prince. See f. 173.—Robert Forbes, A.M.
[356] The affair of the Prince's sending expresses to Lochiel, and of Lochiel's sending proper persons to seek out the Prince, and at last of their meeting together as they both intended, appears to me not to be so distinctly and accurately narrated in this Journal as in that of Mr. John Cameron [See ff. 173-179]. As I have made some enquiry into this matter, I shall note down all I have discovered about it as exactly as possible. Dr. Archibald Cameron (Lochiel's brother) and Mr. John Cameron (late Presbyterian chaplain at Fort William) were the persons despatched by Lochiel to use all the endeavours they could to find out the Prince, in which they were happily successful. Lochiel was by this time recovered of his wounds [See f. 1479] as is evident from Dr. Stewart Threpland's leaving him and making his way to Edinburgh in the habit and character of a Presbyterian probationer, in the month of July, long before the Prince and Lochiel could meet. The foresaid Mr. John Cameron was the person dispatched by Lochiel (after meeting with the Prince) to Edinburgh in order to hire a vessel to take him and whom he should bring along with him off the east coast. Mr. Cameron (by the assistance of proper friends) succeeded in this negotiation, as is well known to some. But when he returned to inform the Prince of his success, he, with Lochiel, etc., had set out for the place where the French were landed upon the west coast to take off the Prince, etc. So that Mr. Cameron was left to shift for himself. He made his way back to Edinburgh in disguise, and at last got off under a borrowed name in the same coach with Lady Lochiel and her children for London, the lady passing under the name of Mrs. Campbell, for she could have no pass. They all got safely to France. When I happened to be conversing with John Cameron, uncle of the said Mr. Cameron, in Edinburgh [See f. 558], he told me that he himself attended Lochiel in his skulking. I told him it was surprizing to me how any person could find out the Prince when the ship landed in the west, because he was so far down the country in his way southward, and then asked him if he could inform me what miles the Prince might be from the ships when notice came to him. He said that he himself was then on an errand enquiring about some of the distressed gentlemen, but that he was persuaded the Prince was no less than 60 miles from the ships in a direct line over the tops of hills, etc., as by that time he behoved to be in the confines or in the county of Athol. I said no doubt he meant Highland miles. He said he meant so, for that it would be no less than 70 or 80 ordinary miles; and if one was to travell it by the common roads [See f. 1475], it would make no less than 90 or 100. The indemnity did not make John Cameron (the uncle) safe, because he had carried arms abroad in the first Highland regiment, and when the Prince landed had a pension from Chelsea. He got off to Holland, and from thence to France. He said the Prince, when skulking, used to retire some time morning and evening by himself.—Robert Forbes, A.M.
[357] This certainly is a wrong date, for by the best intelligence that can be had the Prince arrived in France on the 29th or 30th of September, having set sail from Scotland on the 20th of said month. [See ff. 522, 1476.]
Robert Forbes, A.M.
[358] I asked particularly at Captain Alexander MacDonald whether the Prince arrived on the Arisaig or Moidart side, and he assured me he landed on Arisaig. This serves to clear up any doubt in Vol. 2, f. 355, and Vol. 3, f. 573.