Nearly a month later these Scotch loyalists were routed, dispersed, made prisoners, or killed in battle on Moore's Creek. Flora's husband was among the prisoners, and was sent to Halifax jail. He was soon afterward released, when he left North Carolina with his family for Scotland in a British sloop of war. On the way the vessel was attacked by a French vessel of war. The courage of the English sailors appeared to desert them, and capture seemed inevitable, when Flora ascended to the deck, and by words and deeds so stimulated their spirits that they beat off the enemy, and the Macdonalds were landed safely on their native soil of Skye. During the engagement Flora was severely wounded in the hand. She said, sometimes, when speaking of the peculiarity of her situation. "I have hazarded my life both for the house of Stuart and the house of Hanover, and I do not see that I am a great gainer by it."
Flora Macdonald was the mother of five sons and two daughters. She retained much of her beauty and all her dignity and loveliness of character until the last. She was always modest, always kind, always sweet and benevolent in disposition. She died early in March, 1790, and was buried in the cemetery of Kilmuir, in the isle of Skye. Her shroud, as she requested long before her death, was made of the sheets in which Prince Charles Edward reposed on the night he slept at Kingsburg. Her funeral was attended by fully three thousand persons. Two years later the remains of her husband were laid by her side. For eighty years their resting-place was covered only by the greensward. In 1871 a beautiful monument was erected over them.
"When the news of Flora Macdonald's death reached the Barbacue Congregation," said Mrs. McL——, "a solemn funeral service was held in the church there, when Dr. Hall, who died in 1826, in the eighty-second year of his age, preached the sermon. He had been a military leader as well as a preacher of righteousness. My husband was then an elder in the church, and we were both present. Flora Macdonald had no more sincere mourners than were found in the Barbacue Congregation at that time."
[A LITTLE MARAUDER.]
BY MRS. MARGARET SANGSTER.
Oh, Robin, my Robin, so clever and merry,
Pray why do you never peck twice at a cherry?
You fly at the daintiest one you can see,
Eat a morsel yourself, and just spoil it for me.
Oh, Robin, sweet Robin, you dear little warden,
You're welcome to feast on the fruit in my garden:
I know what invaders you're driving away
From flower and tree through the long summer day.
But, Robin, bright Robin, please listen to reason:
You waste lots of cherries, my pet, every season.
I finish my cake to the very last crumb—
Why can not you finish your cherry or plum?