[974] Culloden Papers, pp. 231–254.
[975] Kirkconnel MS.
[976] Maxwell of Kirkconnel had a very sorry opinion of the capabilities of most of the members of the council. After stating, that by degrees all the colonels of the army were admitted into it, he thus proceeds:—“I must acknowledge that very few of the members of this assembly were either able statesmen or experienced officers; but as those who knew least were generally led by the opinions of those they thought wiser than themselves, and they in their turn had private conferences with the ablest of the prince’s secret friends in Edinburgh, things might have been well enough conducted had there been as much harmony and union as the importance of the affair required; but an ill-timed emulation soon crept in, and bred great dissensions and animosities. The council was insensibly divided into factions, and came to be of little use when measures were approved of or condemned, not for themselves, but for the sake of their author. These dissensions, begun at Edinburgh, continued ever after, and their fatal influence was not always confined to the council: by degrees it reached the army; and though the prince’s orders were ever respected and punctually obeyed by the army, there were, nevertheless, a certain discontent and diffidence which appeared on sundry occasions, especially towards the end, and was very detrimental to his affairs.”—Kirkconnel MS.
[977] Idem.
[978] Vide the report in the Stuart Papers, and a letter of 26th November, 1745, from Gordon to the Chevalier de St. George, inclosing a copy of his report.
[979] Marchant, p. 130.
[980] Boyse, p. 95.
[981] Home, p. 139.
[982] Kirkconnel MS.
[983] Maxwell of Kirkconnel.