counterfeited, in order to prevent the high breathings behind the
wainscot from being heard.

It may be easily conceived what agony she would suffer, lest, by
overdoing her part, she should increase suspicion, and in fact lead to a
discovery. The ruse was fortunately successful. On the search through
the house being given over, Lord Pitsligo was hastily taken from his
confined situation, and again replaced in bed; and, as soon as he was
able to speak, his accustomed kindness of heart made him say to his
servant--'James, go and see that these poor fellows get some breakfast
and a drink of warm ale, for this is a cold morning; they are only doing
their duty, and cannot bear me any ill-will.' When the family were
felicitating each other on his escape, he pleasantly observed--'A poor
prize, had they obtained it--an old dying man!'"

This was the last attempt made on the part of government to seize on the
persons of any of the surviving insurgents. Three years before, Dr.
Archibald Cameron, a brother of Locheill, having clandestinely revisited
Scotland, was arrested, tried, and executed for high treason at Tyburn.
The government was generally blamed for this act of severity, which was
considered rather to have been dictated by revenge than required for the
public safety. It is, however, probable that they might have had secret
information of certain negotiations which were still conducted in the
Highlands by the agents of the Stuart family, and that they considered
it necessary, by one terrible example, to overawe the insurrectionary
spirit. This I believe to have been the real motive of an execution
which otherwise could not have been palliated: and, in the case of Lord
Pitsligo, it is quite possible that the zeal of a partisan may have led
him to take a step which would not have been approved of by the
ministry. After the lapse of so many years, and after so many scenes of
judicial bloodshed, the nation would have turned in disgust from the
spectacle of an old man, whose private life was not only blameless, but
exemplary, dragged to the scaffold, and forced to lay down his head in
expiation of a doubtful crime: and this view derives corroboration from
the fact that, shortly afterwards, Lord Pitsligo was tacitly permitted
to return to the society of his friends, without further notice or
persecution.

Dr. King, the Principal of St. Mary's Hall, Oxford, has borne the
following testimony to the character of Lord Pitsligo.