334 OLD AND NEW EDINBURGH. 11746.
b
ONE of the most important events in the annals
of Edinburgh was the erection of the North
Bridge, by means of which, in spite of years of
opposition, the long-suggested plan for having a
his just and honourable cause.?? His wife pleaded
for his pardon at the feet of George 11. in vain,
and, like the others, ?he died with his last breath
imploring a blessing on Prince Charles.?
Lord Arundel of Wardour relates the following
anecdote :-? Many years after the Stuart rising,
the Duke of Cumberland being present at a ball
at Bath, indicated as a person with whom he
would like to dance, a beautiful girl, the daughter
of Major Macdonald who was executed at Carlisle,
and the circumstances of whose last moments
supplied Sir Walter Scott with the incidents of
M?Ivor?s execution in ? Waverley.? The lady rose
in deference to the prince, but replied in a tone
which utterly discomfited his Royal Highness,
? NO, sir, I will never dance with the murderer yf
my father/ ? ?
The Duke, with an army overwhelming in numbers,
as contrasted with that of Charles, passed
through Edinburgh on the ~ 1 s t of February, 1746,
not marching at the head of his troops, like the
latter, but travelling in a coach-and-six presented
to him by the Earl of Hopetoun; and on being
joined by 6,000 Hessians, who landed under the
Landgrave at Leith, he proceeded to obliterate
? all memory of the last disagreeable affair ? as the
rout at Falkirk was named. As he passed up
the Canongate and High Street he is said to have
expressed great surprise at the .number of broken
windows he saw ; but when informed that this was
the result of a recent illumination in his honour,
and that a shattered casement indicated the residence
of a Jacobite, he laughed heartily, remarking,
?that he was better content with this explanation,
ill as it omened to himself and his family, than
he could have been with his first impression,
which ascribed the circumstance to poverty or
negligence.?
A vast mob followed his coach, which passed
through the Grassmarket, and quitted the city by
new and enlarged city, beyond the walls an&
barriers of the old one, was eventually and successfully
developed to an extent far beyond what
its enthusiastic and patriotic projectors caul$.
the West Port, en route to Culloden, and ?at midnight
on Saturday the 19th of April Viscount
Bury, colonel of the 20th Regiment, aide-de-camp.
to the Duke of Cumberland, reined up his jaded
horse at the Castle gate, bearer of a despatch t e
the Lieutenant-General, announcing the victory ;.
and at two o?clock on the morning of Sunday a.
salute from the batteries informed the startled and
anxious citizens that, quenched in blood on the.
Muir of Drummossie, the star of the Stuarts had
sunk for ever.?
The standard of Charles, which Tullybardine.
unfurled in Glenfinnan, and thirteen others belonging
to chiefs, with several pieces of artillery and a
quantity of arms, were brought to the Castle and
lodged in the arsenal, where some of the latter
still remain; and one field-piece, which was placed
on abattery to the westward, was long an object
of interest to the people. With a spite that seems.
childish now, by order of Cumberland those
standards, whose insignia were all significant ot
high descent and old achievement, were camed ia
procession to the Cross. The common hangmall.
bore that of Charles, thirteen Tronmen, or sweeps,.
bore the rest, and all were flung into a fire,
guarded by the 44th Regiment, while the heralds
proclaimed the name of each chief to whom they
belonged-hchiel, Clanranald, Keppoch, Glengarry,
and so forth ; while the crowd looked on in
silence. By this proceeding, so petty in its character,
Cumberland failed alike to inflict an injuryon
the character of the chiefs or their faithful
followers, among whom, at that dire time, the
bayonet, the gibbet, the torch, and the axe, were
everywhere at work; and, when we consider his.
blighted life and reputation in the long years that
followed, it seems that it would have been well had
the Young Chevalier, the ?bonnie Prince Charlie ?
of so much idolatry, found his grave on the Moor
of Culloden.
. .