llant adventurer, for whom so much blood was shed, supported
his spirits in a wonderful manner, and acted, with a heavy heart, the
part of the gay and prosperous. He gave balls at Inverness, and even
danced himself, which he had declined doing when in the midst of his
prosperity at Edinburgh. Those who looked only on the surface of affairs
were deceived by his appearance of happiness; but the well informed knew
too well that the crisis which was to end the struggle was rapidly
approaching. To complete the sad summary of disappointments and
misfortunes, it was now ascertained that the expedition from Boulogne,
and that from Dunkirk, with which the false-hearted French had so long
amused the unfortunate Jacobites, were entirely and perfidiously
relinquished.

Lord George Murray, meantime, was ordered to march to Inverness. He was
now worn with fatigues, and by the protracted anxieties of his
situation. Foreseeing, as he must have done, many of the dangers and
difficulties of the contest; observing, on the one hand, his eldest
brother, the Marquis of Tullibardine, the adherent of the Stuarts,
proscribed, impoverished, a nominal proprietor of his patrimonial
estates; on the other, beholding his second brother, the actual Duke of
Atholl, cherished by Government, prosperous, honours showered down upon
him; what impulses less strong than that of a generous, and fixed
principle of fidelity could have maintained his exertions in a service
so desperate as that in which he had engaged?

The great deficiency in Lord George Murray's character was the absence
of hope; but, independent of that vital defect, his attributes as a
soldier and a general cannot fail to excite admiration. His exertions
were unparalleled; besides the marching and fatigue that others had to
undergo, he had the vast responsibility of command. "Though others were
relieved and took their turns," he remarks, "I had none to relieve." On
first assuming the command, he received and despatched every express
himself; and saw the guards and sentinels settled. In gaining
intelligence he was indefatigable; and his discipline was such that the
country suffered but little from the visitations of his well-governed
forces. But the time was fast approaching when his great abilities,
which never ceased to be acknowledged by the whole army, his fortitude,
and personal valour were to be put to the severest test.

On the third of April, Lord George Murray joined Charles Edward a