[133] I shall leave it to the Reader to determine how far this answer of Mr. Amelot agrees with what Mr. D[rummond] advances in his Letter and if it be at all reasonable to imagine that the Cardinal had resolved upon an Invasion when the person he had employed in this affair had never read the Memorial given in concerning it nor even understood the manner in which it was concerted and carried on in Scotland and again whether or not Lord Semple had succeeded as he braged in preventing much delay by perswading the Cardinal to make Mr. Amelot privy to the whole affair.
[134] I mentioned before that the King had ordered a Sum not exceeding £900 Ster yearly to be payed to Sir J[ames] C[ampbell] provided money could be raised he had hitherto gott no more than £200 Lord T[ra]q[uai]r had payed him so I was instructed to know why it was not answered as promised, which I accordingly did, when Mr. Drummond said he thought it very odd that the people in Scotland could not give him that small pension when Lord T[ra]q[uai]r had offered Lord Semple credit for £1,000 the year before when in London. I told him people had little money to spare and that since the Gentlemen was in a manner starving I would write to the King about it as directed, upon which he said in a passion I had better not do it for it would hurt them in the King’s Eyes as it must look bad that people who profered doing so much could not advance such a trifle, and I remember he said the King would not fail to look upon them as tamperers which I never did mention to them looking upon it as the heat of passion. He then said as he had all along made it his Business to advance their Interest and Honour, he would fall upon a method of raising a sum of money to the Value of 5 or 6,000£ upon a bond payable at the Restoration with six per cent. of Interest and that D[uke of] P[erth] L[ord] T[ra]q[uai]r L[ochie]l and I should bind for it and that he would even endeavour to gett an equall sum for D[uke of] P[erth] on L[ord] T[ra]q[uai]r’s particular Use upon the same Conditions. As I then did not know my man I went on to what he proposed and did not write to the King about it, neither did I till after I found out the double fetch he had in it, he at this time was applying to have a Pension settled upon himself which my writing in behalf of Sir J[ames] C[ampbell] would certainly have prevented as the King had ordered him to stay at home in the view of receiving the forementioned Sum, then his proposing to raise this sum for the D[uke] of P[erth]’s use was a means to encourage him to advance him £100, which he desired I would tell his Grace he would draw upon him at my leaving London, which he accordingly gott.
[135] During all the time I was at London after my return from Paris I keept it secret from Coll. Cicel and Mr. Smith that I had ever been there, and gave it out that I had been in Kent making a visit to one Doctor Rutton, an old fellow student at Leyden, so upon the footing of my not knowing anything that was passing I told Coll. Cicel in Conversation upon my return to Scotland the King’s friends would inquire of me if I had not been to waite of him and what news I had gott so begg to know what I should say, he told me he at that time could say nothing positively but if the French did not do something soon the affairs of England in particular and Europe in general stood in such a way that in three moneth time he would order affairs so as to call the King over with his own attendance only this Vaunt was so rediculous that I had great difficulty to keep my Countinance and gave me a very low Opinion of every other thing he said.
[136] One evening after I had waited an hour in L[ord] T[ra]q[uai]r’s lodgings at Edinburgh till such time as he should come in to talk with me about his journey to London he told me he understood that I was no friend to Bishop Keith, and upon asking what ground he had to think so, he told me that one Mr. Gordon, a Roman Catholick Bishop, had informed him of it, it seems Bishop Keith was of his acquaintance had been complaining to him that I had not represented him in a favourable Light. By which I conjectured that Keith had been applying that way to be named Bishop of Edinburgh for how should L[ord] J[ohn] Drummond have acquainted Lady Clanronald of Mr. Rattrae’s being named, which was a thing entirely foreign to both him and her if Keith had not been endeavouring to procure that preferment through the interest of the Roman Catholicks,[649] and Lord Drummond did write to Lady Clanronald that I had procured an order for Bishop Rattrae’s Election is certain, for it was by her means quite well known in Edinburgh before I came back from London and Lord T[ra]q[uai]r assured me from Bishop Gordon that L[ord] J[ohn] had wrote it to Lady Clanranald.
[137] My Lord T[ra]q[uai]r made all the dispatch possible to settle his affairs at home, being sensible how necessary it was for him to be att London and sett out from his own house on the sixth of Aprile.
[138] For this ecclesiastical episode in Murray’s career, see Appendix.
[139] Thomas Rattray, D.D., laird of Craighall-Rattray, Perthshire. Born 1684; consecrated bishop at large, 1727; afterwards Bishop of Brechin, and subsequently of Dunkeld; Primus, 1739; died 1743.
[140] See Introduction, p. xxiii.
[141] Thomas Cochrane; 6th earl; died 1737.
[142] Robert Freebairn, consecrated bishop at large, 1722; Primus, 1731; Bishop of Edinburgh, 1733; died 1739.