them, and on the way slept near the mountain of Cairngorm. Fond of the precious stones found here (for one ruby, which cost him only a crown, he had refused fifty guineas), the fugitive, much to the indig nation of his friends, spent some hours with the mountain herdsmen looking for topazes. One topaz which he found on this occasion he afterwards presented to the Cardinal de York, in Paris.

Near Banff, a staunch Calvinist place, precautions were necessary. The che valier changed his Highland dress for that of a stable-man, and in this disguise entered the town and passed through a crowd of some four hundred English soldiers, hardly able to restrain his rage and indignation against them for their cruelties at Culloden. He sought an asylum at the house of Mr. Duff, the provost of Banff, an amiable man with two pretty daughters. The morning after he arrived, as he was putting on his rags, and sitting in an arm-chair with melancholy eyes fixed on the fire, a servant-girl rushed in to say that he was undone, as the court-yard was filled with soldiers come to seize him. Now, as an ex-aide-de-camp of Lord George Murray, general of the rebel army, captain in the Duke of Perth's regiment, and assistant aide-de-camp to Prince Charles himself, his hopes of escaping the scaffold, the axe, and the quartering knife seemed small indeed. Flying to the window, the chevalier therefore took a glimpse at the soldiers, and reseated himself in utter despair, a pistol in either hand ready, to use his own words, "to spring on the soldiers like a lion the moment they should appear." A quarter of an hour of agony, and the door flew open. Johnstone sprang forward to fire; it was only a beautiful girl, the daughter of the host, out of breath, but eager to tell him that the soldiers had merely come in to settle a quarrel by a boxing-match without their officers' knowledge, and that they had now The delighted wanderer may perhaps be forgiven on this occasion for saluting the fair herald, his guardian angel, as he called her, with a thousand tender kisses."

gone.

66

A few minutes after the family had crowded in to congratulate him, the brother-in-law arrived, cold, troubled, and cautious. He protested friendship, seemed on thorns the whole time, and protested against the possibility of procuring a passage, as all vessels at Banff were strictly searched by the government. He strongly advised an immediate return to the High

lands, bowed himself out, and returned no more. Yet this very man had been saved from joining in the unsuccessful rebellion of 1715 by this same fugitive.

Leaving the kind people in tears, Johnstone returned that night to the castle of Gordon of Park. He now decided to leave the Highlands, where he knew nobody, and try, at all risks, to reach Edinburgh. "I resolved," he says, "to consider myself as a lost man, against whom there were a thousand chances to one that he would end his days on the scaffold, but in favour of whom there was still one chance remaining, and I determined, therefore, to abandon myself wholly to Providence, and trust rather to accident than to any certain resource, and to preserve, on all occasions, the coolness and presence of mind which were absolutely necessary to extricate me from the troublesome encounters to which I should be exposed." His friends did all they could to shake his resolution. They told him the counties he had to traverse were full of fanatic Calvinists, who, led by their ministers, sallied out eager to capture unfortunate gentlemen escaping from the Highlands. They also warned him that he had to cross two arms of the sea, and that, without a passport, the English cavalry patrolling the shore would be sure to apprehend him. But the chevalier was resolute, and set out, disguised in rags, to visit, as his first stage, Gordon of Kildrummy, twelve miles distant. Snubbed by the servants, he there lingered in the kitchen till Gordon could see him privately and procure him a guide. In reaching Cortachie, a village of Lord Ogilvie's, Johnstone was in much danger of meeting the minister of Glenila, who had become notorious for his great zeal in arresting stray rebels. "I had been cautioned about this man," says Johnstone, "but I was not afraid of him, for I always had with me my English pistols loaded and trimmed, one in each breeches-pocket. I desired nothing so much as to fall in with him, being confident that I should have given a good account of him in an engagement with pistols." The chevalier, however, did not meet the "suspecting, barbarous, and cruel man," on whom, soon after, Gordon of Abachie took a savage revenge.

At Cortachie, Johnstone heard that two of his comrades were hiding in a ravine in Glen Prossen, and he found them at the house of a peasant named Samuel. They warned him strongly not to venture south, as the patrol was searching all towns and

villages along the Firth of Tay. Several of their friends had recently been made prisoners. For seventeen days the three gentlemen stayed at Samuel's house, living on bread and oatmeal, and frequently alarmed by the appearance of detachments of English cavalry. By day, Samuel's daughter, who lived at the entrance of the glen, informed them of the movements of the troops; at night, when there was danger, the fugitives hid in the mountains, frequently passing hours in the open air, exposed to dreadful tempests of wind and rain. One evening the faithful sentinel informed them that the troops were unusually active. They had taken Sir James Kinloch, at his castle; and Mr. Ker, an aidede-camp of Prince Charles, had just been arrested at Forfar. Another party was searching for Lord Ogilvie, and had heard of the retreat in Glen Prossen. It was time to fly, so after holding a council, the three men agreed to return the next morning to the Highlands. That night a strange dream altered the chevalier's resolution. He dreamed he had escaped every danger, and was in Edinburgh quietly relating his escape from the scaffold to Lady Jane Douglas. He awoke early, tranquillised by this dream, and on hearing that his companions had already set out, at once resolved, to the horror and astonishment of Samuel, to make straight for Edinburgh.

Full of apprehension, but still resolute to push south, the chevalier set out on horseback, with Samuel behind him, for the nearest ferry. On entering Forfar, a peculiarly fanatical town, a panic seized Samuel, who lost his senses for the time at a dog beginning to bark, and tried to throw himself from the horse; but the chevalier held him tight, and, with alternate entreaties and menace, forced him to proceed. Once out of Forfar, Samuel regained his courage, and promised better conduct. They then turned the horse loose in a field, threw the saddle and bridle into a draw-well, and walked on towards the ferry. Presently a friend of Samuel's met him and began to ply him with questions. Samuel told him he was going to fetch a calf, which his man was going home with, while he himself went on to Dundee to buy a cow. At the nearest ale-house the two men stopping to drink some beer, the chevalier had to wait and join in the conversation, with the constant fear of being detected. This man, Samuel afterwards told the chevalier, was one of the greatest knaves and cheats in that part of the country, and would

have sold a dozen fugitives for the price of a watch.

This man

At the castle of Mr. Graham, of Dunstroon, Johnstone obtained food and shelter till a boat could be hired at Broughty. Hidden in an enclosure among some high broom, the chevalier was to be feasted on beef and claret till a certain hour, when a gardener would pass carrying a sack of corn. Johnstone was to follow till he met an old woman, who would guide him to Broughty. The old woman came and led him, in due time, to a hill above Broughty, leaving him while she went to reconnoitre. As the chevalier cowered down in a furrow, eight or ten horsemen passed, who proved to be dragoons sent to search the village below, and warn the boatmen. The old woman returning in an agony of fear, refused, for a long time, to enter the village again. Neither prayers nor money could move the boatmen, but eventually the chevalier tried to coax the two pretty daughters of a Jacobite landlady to row him over. Unable to induce their lovers, the boatmen, to risk their lives, the brave girls at last consented, and at ten o'clock at night the chevalier was landed near St. Andrew's, a place he peculiarly dreaded. Walking all night till his feet were cut to the bone, the miserable man sat down at last by a stream, praying Heaven to take pity on his sufferings, and put an end at once to his wretched existence. He wished he had fallen at Culloden, envied his dead comrades, and already in his fear saw the hangman, knife in hand, waiting for him beside the gibbet. The thought of perishing before a cruel and brutal populace made him, indeed, almost resolve to drown himself in the stream in which he was bathing his feet. Faint and exhausted, he reached St. Andrew's, however, early in the morning, and was stopped in the streets by people who wanted news of the rebels. The chevalier proceeded at once to the house of Mrs. Spence, a cousin of his, who shed a flood of tears at his rashness, for she was a Roman Catholic; her house was peculiarly suspected, and the son of a neighbour had been arrested only the day before. She, however, at once wrote to a tenant of hers, a farmer near the town, to lend the bearer a horse to ride to Wemyss, on business connected with a law-suit, and sent a little girl through byways to guide him out of the town. But the farmer, a staunch Calvinist, refused to profane the Lord's Day by lending the horse, even if Mrs. Spence took the farm away; and new dangers arose round the baffled man.

It was ten miles to Wemyss, and his feet were bleeding and terribly painful. All at once he thought of a gardener named Lillie, who had married a servant of his mother's. She lived at Balfour, half a league from Wemyss. He arrived at the door almost fainting with fatigue, and was warmly welcomed, though Lillie hated what he always called "the accursed race of Stuart." After a sleep of more than twelve hours, Johnstone awoke refreshed, eat heartily, and that night contrived to crawl on to Wemyss, where Lillie introduced him to a fisherman named Salmon, who was to take him over in his boat to Leith.

Salmon, a strong royalist, was at first obdurate. "You deserve, indeed," he cried, "to have your life saved-you who wished to destroy our liberties, abolish our holy religion, and make us all slaves. No; you have come to the wrong man."

In vain the chevalier offered him his last six guineas. Gradually, however, the worthy man softened, and, won by the fugitive's youth, and touched by his misfortunes, consented. Till the boat was ready the chevalier was to hide in a cavern near the sea, celebrated as the scene of one of James the Fourth's adventures with robbers. In the night Johnstone was awoke by horrible and alarming cries, and, imagining that soldiers had surprised him, he leaped up, pistol in hand, resolved to sell his life dearly. The cries, however, only came from the owls and crows the intruder had disturbed. In the morning, making his way to the harbour, the chevalier found that Salmon's wife, having her suspicions roused, had refused to let her husband go to Leith, and, mournful and hopeless, Johnstone returned to his cavern. A Jacobite officer of customs was then induced by Mrs. Lillie to send a sexton named Couselain with the refugee to Dublieside, where he could get a boat. At that place he was sheltered by a Mr. Seton, whose son was also in hiding. Alarmed by the report of a fishwoman that a rebel had been trying to bribe the boatman at Wemyss, Johnstone at last accepted the generous offer of one of the Setons to row him over to Leith. Putting the sexton, who was drunk, at the bottom of the boat, and kicking him when ever he tried to rise, the two young men, in spite of a rough sea, eventually reached Leith in safety.

Fresh dangers, however, still awaited Johnstone. At Leith he sought shelter at the house of his old governess, a Mrs. Blythe,

who late in life had married the master of a smuggling coaster. The good woman received him with caresses and tears of joy, and told him that his mother was ill from anxiety for his safety. Mrs. Blythe then showed him hiding-places for contraband goods, where he could secrete himself. The next day the chevalier's father came to see him, and forgiving him his disobedience in prematurely joining the Pretender, locked him in his arms and wept for joy. The next day some English sergeants calling on Mrs. Blythe for billets, caused Johnstone, who eyed them through a hole in the wainscot, infinite terror, but no discovery took place. Soon after this Lady Jane Douglas came to see the young rebel, and begged him to come to her house at Drumsheugh, about half a league from Leith. Arriving at night, in his beggar's dress, a faithful gardener, who was waiting, brought him to Lady Jane. The room destined for him was one that had been long unoccupied, and above the guest chamber. His rags were taken by the gardener and burnt. The refugee was compelled to remain without shoes till eleven at night, that the servants might not hear his step, and at that hour he went down into the garden to take a walk. He seldom saw any one but the gardener, who brought him his meals, but he had plenty of books, and at times, when no servants were about, he ventured into Lady Jane's apartment. A few days after reaching Drumsheugh, Johnstone read in an Edinburgh paper that the Dublieside people had arrested Couselain for helping a rebel to escape, and had burnt his boat. It was now resolved that the chevalier should hide himself in London, but the false news of the probable arrival of another French squadron delayed his purpose. After two months of this quiet life, a servant-maid one day returning from the Edinburgh market brought word that there was a rumour of the Chevalier Johnstone being hid in the house, and that a search might be expected. Trembling at the thought of endangering Lady Jane, Johnstone at once resolved on a plan of escape. Letting a footman into the secret, he was taken into a small enclosure, where hay was making, and was covered under one of the heaps, only a small aperture being left for breathing. There, with a bottle of water and another of wine, the fugitive remained sweltering for eleven hours. When he emerged he was so faint and weak as to be hardly able to walk. Next day Lady Jane's bailiff purchased him a pony for his ride

through England. If the soldiers arrived before he set out he had resolved to jump from the first floor into the garden, climb the wall, and gain the open fields. But nothing could induce him to try the hay any more, so vivid was his horror of the penance he had undergone. Next day his father came to bid him an eternal adieu, and in vain he begged leave to go and embrace his sick mother. The risk was too great.

About eleven at night Johnstone put on the disguise of a country pedlar. He carried a stock of handkerchiefs, folded up his hair under a long black wig, blackened his eyebrows with burnt cork, and boldly set out. At the first public-house at which he stopped an unpleasant surprise awaited him. At the landlady's wish he joined a gentleman at dinner, and on entering the room was confounded at finding Mr. Scott, a young Edinburgh banker, a violent Hanoverian, and who knew him well by sight. Pretending not to recognise him, Mr. Scott, in a moment of absence, uttered his name. Johnstone, taking no notice of this, tried to deceive Scott as to the road he should take, and told him he should sleep at Jedburgh. Scott seemed anxious to make the fugitive believe he did not know him, and this alarmed him more. Setting off quickly after dinner, Johnstone first took the Jedburgh road, and then struck off to Kelso, where he slept at a private house, plunged into the deepest melancholy at having to abandon his native land and all that was dear to him for ever.

Next day he entered England; nor were his perils yet over. Near Stamford (the fourth day from Edinburgh), he overtook some covered waggons full of wounded English soldiers on their way from Culloden to Chelsea Hospital. There were some rebel deserters among these, and one of them, when he saw Johnstone pass, called

out:

66

See, see, if there is not a man on horseback who resembles our rebel captain, Johnstone, as much as one drop of water resembles another."

The chevalier, who had taken off his large and heavy black wig on account of the heat, and had his hat uncocked, rode on without noticing them to Stamford, and then galloped eight miles further for fear of arrest. On stopping for the night, Johnstone's horse threw itself down, unable to eat or drink; and here an irretrievable misfortune seemed imminent, but in the morning it had quite recovered, and before day

break Johnstone started again to avoid the dangerous waggons. At sunrise a man, who had the appearance of a highwayman, mounted on a beautiful bay courser, came across the fields to him; but daunted by his determined air, he soon rode off. At the inn at Jockey House an exciseman came and dined with him, and saying he was from Scotland, inquired if the rebels were entirely dispersed. Suspecting he was a spy from Stamford, Johnstone represented himself as a pedlar from Annandale, who felt no interest in the rebellion one way or the other. The rough fellow then asked to see his goods; and Johnstone, pretending his heavier linen had gone to London by sea, produced some handkerchiefs, and, not knowing their value, asked a very moderate price. The exciseman praised his honesty at the expense of Scotch pedlars in general, bought the handkerchiefs, and left delighted with his bargain.

On arriving in London (on the seventh day), Johnstone went to an inn in Greekstreet, Soho, where the waiters, as he afterwards heard, were government spies, placed there to watch the Scotch landlord. Taking refuge then, under the name of Leslie, at the house of a friend, Johnstone had still some disagreeable surprises to undergo. One day, hearing a noise in the street, he looked out of window and saw twelve of the Pretender's men on their way to execution at Kennington. Townley, the governor of Carlisle Castle, whose head was placed on Temple Bar, was one of these unfortunate persons. A day or two later, just after he had heard of his mother's death, his landlord, a hairdresser, came to ask him to form a party of pleasure to Tower-hill to see the execution of the Earl of Kilmarnock and Lord Balmerino, but Johnstone excused himself. After a terrible fright from a villanous-looking sweetheart of one of the servants, who kept watching the house, Johnstone received news from Lady Jane Douglas that she was at Harwich, and could secure him a passage for Holland. Though in love at the time, and hardly able to tear himself from London, Johnstone now decided on escape, and set out for Harwich. Passing as a servant, Johnstone had the audacity to accompany the captain of a frigate to Lady Jane's vessel, being on the way nearly recognised by a Scotch midshipman. began," he says, "to reckon the minutes which were to elapse before I should be handcuffed and in irons."

“I

On the way to Helvoetsluys some whimsical scenes occurred. Johnstone shared a small cabin with a servant of Sir - Clifton's, with whom he quarrelled incessantly about the accommodation, till the two supposed footmen nearly came to blows. One day, however, Lady Jane asked the baronet's leave to invite to dinner one of her suite who had been with Prince Charles. This was Johnstone, and the baronet's servant, to his great surprise, proved to be an Irish officer of the same opinions.

Even at the Hague Johnstone was not safe, as a sudden order came to arrest and deliver up all Scotch exiles, and Johnstone only escaped by entering himself as a student at Leyden, where no government arrest could take place, except for the crime of assassination. At the end of the year 1746, Johnstone arrived in Paris, soon after accepted an ensign's commission in the French army, and sailed for Cape Breton. He was near Montcalm when he fell in Quebec. In the latter pages of his memoirs the exile laments his hard fate, and concludes with these ominous words:

"Fortune has not proved more propitious to me since my return to France, having continued to persecute me with an invincible obstinacy. There is now every appearance that she will only cease to persecute me at the termination of my existence, which perhaps will be occasioned by the want of the necessaries of life. At my age our lot is not easily susceptible of amelioration."

We fear the poor chevalier, after so many vicissitudes, ended his life after all in poverty and obscurity. Hogarth, though a sturdy Hanoverian, evidently felt some pity for such unfortunate exiles when he introduced into one corner of his Gate of Calais that recumbent figure of the disconsolate, broken-hearted old Scotch soldier reduced to rags and beggary.

of the manner in which he had been discarded; of the long period during which he had supported himself; and of the manner in which Sir Geoffry received him on his return. Then Mr. Drage, becoming more circumstantial, repeated what Riley had said, and what Mr. Drew's servant had said about the high words passing between father and son, and the manner in which the old soldier's servant had been ordered to turn his young master from the house. Upon this followed an account of the conversation held between Sir Geoffry and the rector, in which the former tried to justify his proceedings, but was, Mr. Drage thought, finally convinced that he had been in the wrong, and not disinclined to make reparation. Then came Captain Cleethorpe's meeting with George in the street, in which the latter had betrayed his anxiety to avoid recognition. And the narrative concluded with a description of the arrest of the young man with his father's body in his arms.

The rector ceased, and Mr. Moss, who had been sitting for the most part with his eyes closed, swaying his body backwards and forwards, and alternately bringing together and separating the tips of his fingers, now and then making a pencil note, now and then elevating his eyebrows, but never in any way showing the slightest sign of interest or surprise, opened his eyes wide, and brought them to bear on his companion. But as he did not speak the rector took the initiative, and asked him what he thought of it.

"Well," said Mr. Moss, contracting his eyelids and speaking very slowly, "it is a strong case of circumstantial evidence. Young man on the spot, blood on his clothes, the body in his arms; bad feeling known to have existed between him and his father; had been down there once before about the same time in the evening, and knew were to find the old general. All these, neatly pieced together, make a very pretty case for Drew's people, or whoever they may choose to employ. What did he do it for? we should say. What did he get by it? Nothing they would reply. Don't propose to show that bad tempered young man; done in a fit of rage and out of revenge. I wish he hadn't been down to this place before; the first business, of his having been discarded when he was a boy, happened so long ago that all the particulars would probably have been forgotten, and the mere fact alone preserved. But now we get voices in altercation and