“The public were ravenous with curiosity about the great Leviathan that had been at last so effectually hooked, and it was necessary to fill the ear of London with details of his previous history, as well as anecdotes of his conduct since his capture. Many of them are fabulous, and many not worth preserving, but a few are too characteristic to be passed over. They may be announced by an incident not mentioned in the contemporary accounts, but preserved by tradition. On his return from the House of Lords to the Tower, an old woman not very well favoured, had pressed through the crowd and screamed in at the window of the coach, ‘You’ll get that nasty head of yours chopped off, you ugly old Scotch dog,’ to which he answered, ‘I believe I shall, you ugly old English b——,’ paying her back with the feminine of the masculine epithet she had applied to him. The major of the Tower coming to visit him and ask how he did, he answered, ‘Why, I am about doing pretty well, for I am preparing myself, sir, for a place where hardly any majors, and very few lieutenant-generals go;’ this was a more distinct hint than that given to the House of Lords.”[1297]
On the 2d of April the sheriffs of London and Middlesex received a warrant for his execution, which was appointed to take place on the 9th. His lordship, it is said, petitioned the king that he might be despatched by the maiden, the Scottish instrument of decapitation; but his application was not attended to. His approaching fate did not in the least discompose him, and though in the eightieth year of his age, his spirits never flagged, nor was his natural vivacity in any degree diminished. He said, the day before his execution, that he was never at any time in better spirits; and he told Dr. Clark, his physician, that the Tower was a better recipe for upholding them than the emetics he used to give him.[1298] Though regardless of death, and even occasionally facetious on the circumstances of his coming exit, he was not indifferent to the consolations of religion, and cheerfully availed himself of the spiritual assistance of a Catholic priest. Early on the morning of the execution, 1,200 troops drew up on Tower-hill, and all the preparations were gone through as in the former instances. About an hour before the execution, a serious accident occurred, in consequence of the fall of a large scaffolding with 400 persons, by which eighteen were killed on the spot, and many bruised and crippled. When Lovat heard of it his cool remark was,[1299] “The more mischief the better sport.” When he arrived at the scaffold, Lovat was obliged, from infirmity, to obtain the assistance of two persons in mounting. He displayed, to the very last, his characteristic fortitude, or rather bravado, and, with great coolness, felt the edge of the axe, with the sharpness of which he declared himself satisfied. On looking round and observing the great crowd, he said, “God save us,—why should there be such a bustle about taking off an old gray head that cannot get up three steps without two men to support it.”[1300] He gave the executioner ten guineas, advised him to perform his duty firmly, and take a good aim, and told him that if he mangled his shoulders, he would be displeased with him. In conversation he used frequently to cite passages from the classics; and, on the present occasion, he repeated the celebrated saying of Horace,—“Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori,” as peculiarly applicable to the cause for which he was about to suffer. After spending some time in devotion, this remarkable man laid his head down upon the block with the utmost composure, and the executioner struck it off at a single blow. His lordship had given directions that his body should be carried to Scotland, and his friends had removed it to an undertaker’s in the Strand preparatory to its being sent down; but, by order of government, it was interred at St. Peter’s in the Tower, in the same grave with Lords Kilmarnock and Balmerino.
A Representation of the Execution of Lord Lovat.
A The Scaffold.
B Lord Lovat’s Head on ye Block.
C. Cloth to receive the Head.
D. The Executioner with ye Axe.
E. The Coffin.
F. The House from which he came on the Scaffold.
Whilst these executions could not fail to impress the disaffected with a strong idea of the power and inclination of government to uphold and maintain the authority of the law, they were calculated by their number and severity rather to excite a thirst for vengeance, than to inspire that salutary fear which it is the object of punishment to promote. During these executions, a scheme was concocted to arrest the arm of the law by seizing and carrying off the person of the Duke of Cumberland, and retaining him as a hostage for the lives of the prisoners. The originators of this bold design went from London to Paris, and laid their plan before Charles shortly after his arrival from Scotland, and offered to make the attempt; but Charles refused to sanction it, and the scheme was dropped.[1301]
By way of conciliating the offended feelings of the nation, the government got an act of indemnity passed in June, 1747, granting a pardon, with certain exceptions, to all persons who had been engaged in the rebellion; but these exceptions were so numerous as to divest the act of all pretensions to the character of grace or favour. Besides all persons attainted of high treason by act of parliament or judgment, or conviction of high treason by verdict, confession, or otherwise, upwards of eighty persons were specially excepted by name.[1302]
FOOTNOTES:
[1283] Shenstone has commemorated this melancholy event in his plaintive ballad of ‘Jemmy Dawson.’