Kitabı oku: «Pickle the Spy; Or, the Incognito of Prince Charles», sayfa 5

The Prince’s distinguished friends unluckily did not succeed in inspiring him with common sense.

On August 16 he defends the conduct of cette home, ou tête de fer (himself), and he writes a few aphorisms, Maximes d’un l’ome sauvage! He aimed at resembling Charles XII., called ‘Dener Bash’ by the Turks, for his obstinacy, a nickname also given by Lord Marischal to the Prince. Like Balen, he was termed ‘The Wild,’ ‘by knights whom kings and courts can tame.’ He writes to the younger Waters,

To Waters, Junior

‘Ye 21st August, 1749.

‘I receive yrs. of ye 8th. Current with yr two as mentioned and I heve send their Answers for Avignon, plese to Enclose in it a Credit for fifteen thousand Livers, to Relive my family there, at the disposal of Stafford and Sheridan. I am sorry to be obliged oftener to draw upon you, than to remit, and cannot help Reflection on this occasion, on the Misery of that poor Popish Town, and all their Inhabitants not being worth four hundred Louidors. Mr. B. [Bulkeley] Mistakes as to my taking amis anything of him, on the contrary I am charmed to heve the opinion of everybody, particularly them Like him, as I am shure say nothing but what they think: but as I am so much imbibed in ye English air, where My only Concerns are, I cannot help sometimes differing with ye inhabitants of forain Climats.

‘I remain all yours.

‘15,000 ff. Credit for Stafford and Sheridan at Avignon.’

‘Newton’ kept writing, meanwhile, that Cluny can do nothing till winter, ‘on account of the sheilings,’ the summer habitations of the pastoral Highlanders. There may have been sheilings near the hiding-places of the Loch Arkaig treasure. On September 30 we find Charles professing his inébranlable amitié for Madame de Talmond. He bids his courier stop at Lunéville, as she may be at the Court of Stanislas there.

The results of Goring’s mission to England may be gleaned from a cypher letter of ‘Malloch’ (Balhaldie) to James. Balhaldie had been in London; he found the party staunch, ‘but frighted out of their wits.’ The usual names of the official Jacobites are given – Barrymore, Sir William Watkyns Wynne, and Beaufort. But they are all alarmed ‘by Lord Traquair’s silly indiscretion in blabbing to Murray of Broughton of their concerns, wherein he could be of no use.’ They had summoned Balhaldie, and complained of the influence of Kelly, an adviser bequeathed to Charles by his old tutor, Sir Thomas Sheridan, now dead. ‘They saw well that the Insurrection Sir James Harrington was negotiating, to be begun at Litchfield Election and Races, in September ’47, was incouraged, and when that failed, the Insurrection attempted by Lally’s influence on one Wilson, a smuggler in Sussex, which could serve no end save the extinction of the unhappy men concerned in them; therefore they had taken pains to prevent any. They lamented the last steps the Prince had taken here as scarcely reparable.’

Goring had now been with them, and they had insisted on the Prince’s procuring a reconciliation with the French Court. ‘Goring’s only business was to say that the Prince had parted with Kelly, Lally, Sir James Graeme, and Oxburgh, and the whole, and to assure friends in England that he would never more see any one of them.’ Charles was, therefore, provided by his English friends with 15,000l., and the King’s timid party of men with much to lose won a temporary triumph. He sent 21,000 livres to his Avignon household, adding, ‘I received yours with a list of my bookes: I find sumne missing of them. Particularly Fra Paulo [Sarpi] and Boccaccio, which are both rare. If you find any let me know it.’

Charles was more of a bibliophile than might be guessed from his orthography.

On November 22, 1749, Charles, from Lunéville, wrote a long letter to a lady, speaking of himself in the third person. All approaches to Avignon are guarded, to prevent his return thither. ‘Despite the Guards, they assure me that he is in France, and not far from the capital. The Lieutenant of Police has been heard to say, by a person who informed me, that he knew for certain the Prince had come in secret to Paris, and had been at the house of Monsieur Lally. The King winks at all this, but it is said that M. de Puysieux and the Mistress (Madame de Pompadour) are as ill disposed as ever. I know from a good source that 15,000l. has been sent to the Prince from England, on condition of his dismissing his household.’ ⁸²

The spelling of this letter is correct, and possibly the Prince did not write it, but copied it out. That Louis XV. winked at his movements is probable enough; secretive as he was, the King may have known what he concealed even from his Minister, de Puysieux.

On December 19, the Prince, who cannot have been far from Paris, sent Goring thither ‘to get my big Muff and portfeul.’ I do not know which lady he addressed, on December 10, as ‘l’Adorable,’ ‘avec toute la tendresse possible.’ On November 28, ‘R. Jackson’ writes from England. He saw Dr. King (of St. Mary Hall, Oxford), who had been at Lichfield races, ‘and had a list of the 275 gentlemen who were there.’ This Mr. Jackson was going to Jamaica, to Henry Dawkins, brother of Jemmy Dawkins, a rich and scholarly planter who played a great part, later, in Jacobite affairs.

In 1750, February found Charles still without a reply to his letter of May 26, in which he made an anonymous appeal for shelter in Imperial territories. Orders to Goring, who had been sent to Lally, bid him ‘take care not to get benighted in the woods and dangerous places.’ A good deal is said about a marble bust of the Prince at which Lemoine is working, the original, probably, of the plaster busts sold in autumn in Red Lion Square. ‘Newton’ (January 28) thinks Cluny wilfully dilatory about sending the Loch Arkaig treasure, and Æneas Macdonald, the banker, one of the Seven Men of Moidart, accuses ‘Newton’ (Kennedy) of losing 8001. of the money at Newmarket races! In fact, Young Glengarry and Archibald Cameron had been helping themselves freely to the treasure at this very time, whence came endless trouble and recriminations, as we shall see. ⁸³

On January 25 the Prince was embroiled with Madame de Talmond. He writes, obviously in answer to remonstrances:

‘Nous nous prometons de suivre en tout les volontés et les arrangemens de notre fidèle amie et alliée, L. P. D. T.; nous retirer aux heures qu’il lui conviendra a la ditte P, soit de jour, soit de nuit, soit de ses états, en foy de quoi nous signons. C.’

He had begun to bore the capricious lady.

Important intrigues were in the air. The Prince resembled ‘paper-sparing Pope’ in his use of scraps of writing material. One piece bears notes both of February and June 1750. On February 16 Charles wrote to Mr. Dormer, an English Jacobite:

‘I order you to go to Anvers, and there to execute my instructions without delay.’

Goring carried the letter. Then comes a despatch of June, which will be given under date.

Concerning the fatal hoard of Loch Arkaig, ‘Newton’ writes thus: —

Tho. Newton to —

‘March 18, 1750.

‘You have on the other side the melancholy confirmation of what I apprehended. Dr. Cameron is no doubt the person here mentioned that carryd away the horses [money], for he is lately gone to Rome, as is also young Glengery, those and several others of them, have been very flush of money, so that it seems they took care of themselves. C. [Cluny] in my opinion is more to be blamed than any of them, for if he had a mind to act the honest part he certainly could have given up the whole long since. They will no doubt represent me not in the most advantageous light at Rome, for attempting to carry out of their country what they had to support them. I hope they will one day or other be obliged to give an acct. of this money, if so, least they shd. attempt to Impose upon you, you’l find my receipts to C. will exactly answer what I had already the honour of giving you an acct. of.’

Again ‘Newton’ writes:

(Tho. Newton—From G. Waters’s Letter.)

‘April 27, 1750.

‘I am honored with yours of the 6th. Inst. and nothing could equal my surprize at the reception of the Letter I sent you. I did not expect C [Cluny] was capable of betraying the confidence you had in him, and he is the more culpable, as I frequently put it in his power to acquit himself of his duty without reproach of any side. Only Cameron is returned from Rome greatly pleased with the reception he met there. I have not seen him, but he has bragged of this to many people here since his return. I never owned to any man alive to have been employed in that affair.’

In spite of Newton, it is not to be credited that Cluny, lurking in many perils on Ben Alder, was unfaithful about the treasure.

Meanwhile, Young Glengarry (whose history we give later), Archibald Cameron (Lochiel’s brother), Sir Hector Maclean, and other Jacobites, were in Rome, probably to explain their conduct about the Loch Arkaig treasure to James. He knew nothing about the matter, and what he said will find its proper place when we come to investigate the history of Young Glengarry. The Prince at this time corresponded a good deal with ‘Mademoiselle Luci,’ that fair philosophical recluse who did little commissions for him in Paris. On April 4 he wants a list of the books he left in Paris, and shows a kind heart.

‘Pray take care of the young surgeon, M. Le Coq, and see that he wants for nothing. As the lad gets no money from his relations, he may be in need.’ Charles, on March 28, writes thus to ‘Madame de Beauregard,’ which appears to be an alias of Madame de Talmond:

The Prince

March 28, 1750.

‘A Md. Bauregor. Je vois avec Chagrin que vous vous tourmentes et mois aussi bien innutillement, et en tout sans [sens]. Ou vous voules me servire, ou vous ne Le voules pas; ou vous voules me protege, ou non; Il n’y a acune autre alternative en raison qui puis etre. Si vous voules me servire il ne faut pas me soutenire toujours que Blan [blanc] est noire, dans Les Chose Les plus palpable: et jamais Avouer que vous aves tort meme quant vous Le santes. Si vous ne voules pas me servire, il est inutile que je vous parle de ce qui me regarde: si vous voules me protege, il ne faut pas me rendre La Vie plus malheureuse qu’il n’est. Si vous voules m’abandoner il faut me Le dire en bon Francois ou Latin. Visus solum’ [sic].

Madame de Talmond sheltered the Prince both in Lorraine and in Paris. They were, unluckily, born to make each other’s lives ‘insupportable.’

Charles wrote this letter, probably to Madame d’Aiguillon, from Paris:

May 12, 1750.

‘La Multitude d’affaire de toute Espèce dont j’ai été plus que surchargé, Madame, depuis plus de quatre Mois, Chose que votre Chancelier a du vous attester, ne m’ avois permis de vous rappeller Le souvenir de vos Bontés pour Moi; qualque Long qu’ait ete Le Silance que j’ai gardé sur Le Desir que j’ai d’en mériter La Continuation j’espère qu’il ne m’en aura rien fait perdre: j’ose meme presumer Encore asses pour me flater qu’une Longue absence que je projette par raison et par une necessite absolue, ne m’efacera pas totalement de votre souvenir; Daigne Le Conserver, Madame a quelquun qui n’en est pas indigne et qui cherchera toujours a Le meriter par son tendre et respectueux attachement – a Paris Le 12 May, 1750.’

A quaint light is thrown on the Prince’s private affairs (May 12) by Waters’s note of his inability to get a packet of Scottish tartan, sent by Archibald Cameron, out of the hands of the Custom House. It was confiscated as ‘of British manufacture.’ Again, on May 18, Charles wrote to Mademoiselle Luci, in Paris. She is requested ‘de faire avoire une ouvrage de Mr. Fildings, (auteur de Tom Jones) qui s’apel Joseph Andrews, dans sa langue naturelle, et la traduction aussi.’ He also wants ‘Tom Jones’ in French, and we may infer that he is teaching to some fair pupil the language of Fielding. He asks, too, for a razor-case with four razors, a shaving mirror, and a strong pocket-book with a lock. His famous ‘chese de post’ (post-chaise) is to be painted and repaired.

Business of a graver kind is in view. ‘Newton’ (April 24) is to get ready to accompany the Prince on a long journey, really to England, it seems. Newton asked for a delay, on account of family affairs. He was only to be known to the bearer as ‘Mr. Newton,’ of course not his real name.

On May 28, Charles makes a mote about a mysterious lady, really Madame de Talmond.

Project

‘If ye lady abandons me at the last moment, to give her the letter here following for ye F. K. [French King], and even ye original, if she thinks it necessary, but with ye greatest secrecy; apearing to them already in our confidence that I will quit the country, if she does not return to me immediately.’

Drafts of letters to the French King, in connection with Madame de Talmond – to be delivered, apparently, if Charles died in England – will be given later. To England he was now bent on making his way. ‘Ye Prince is determined to go over at any rate,’ he wrote on a draft of May 3, 1750. ⁸⁴ ‘The person who makes the proposal of coming over assures that he will expose nobody but himself, supposing the worst.’ Sir Charles Goring is to send a ship for his brother, Henry Goring, to Antwerp, early in August. ‘To visit Mr. P. of D. [unknown].. and to agree where the arms &c. may be most conveniently landed, the grand affair of L. [London?] to be attempted at the same time.’ There are notes on ‘referring the Funds to a free Parliament,’ ‘The Tory landed interest wished to repudiate the National Debt,’ ‘To acquaint particular persons that the K. [King] will R – ’ (resign), which James had no intention of doing.

In preparation for the insurrection Charles, under extreme secrecy, deposited 186,000 livres (‘livers!’) with Waters. He also ordered little silver counters with his effigy, as the English Government came to know, for distribution, and he commanded a miniature of himself, by Le Brun, ‘with all the Orders.’ This miniature may have been a parting gift to Madame de Talmond, or one of the other protecting ladies, ‘adorable’ or quarrelsome. It is constantly spoken of in the correspondence.

The real business in hand is revealed in the following directions for Goring. The Prince certainly makes a large order on Dormer, and it is not probable, though (from the later revelations of James Mohr Macgregor) it is possible, that the weapons demanded were actually procured.

June 8.

Letter and Directions for Goring. – ‘Mr. Dutton will go directly to Anvers and there wait Mr. Barton’s arrival and asoon as you have received his Directions you’l set out to join me, in the mean time you will concert with Dormer the properest means of procuring the things [‘arms,’ erased] I now order him, in the strictest secrecy, likewise how I could be concealed in case I came to him, and the safest way of travelling to that country?’

For Mr. Dormer. Same Date. Anvers

‘As you have already offered me by ye Bearer, Mr. Goring, to furnish me what Arms necessary for my service I hereby desire you to get me with all ye expedition possible Twenty Thousand Guns, Baionets, Ammunition proportioned, with four thousand sords and Pistols for horces [cavalry] in one ship which is to be ye first, and in ye second six thousand Guns without Baionets but sufficient Amunition and Six thouzand Brode sords; as Mr. Goring has my further Directions to you on them Affaires Leaves me nothing farther to add at present.’

On June 11, Charles remonstrated with Madame de Talmond: if she is tired of him, he will go to ‘le Lorain.’ ‘Enfin, si vous voulez ma vie, il faut changer de tout.’ On June 27, Newton repeated his expressions of suspicion about Cluny, and spoke of ‘disputes and broils’ among the Scotch as to the seizure of the Loch Arkaig money.

On July 2, Charles, in cypher, asked James for a renewal of his commission as Regent. Goring, or Newton, was apparently sent at least as far as Avignon with this despatch. He travelled as Monsieur Fritz, a German, with complicated precautions of secrecy. James sent the warrant to be Regent on parchment – it is in the Queen’s Library – but he added that Charles was ‘a continual heartbreak,’ and warned his son not to expect ‘friendship and favours from people, while you do all that is necessary to disgust them.’ He ‘could not in decency’ see Charles’s envoy (August 4). On the following day Edgar wrote in a more friendly style, for this excellent man was of an amazing loyalty.

From James Edgar

‘August 5, 1750: Rome.

‘Your Royal Highness does me the greatest pleasure in mentioning the desire you have to have the King’s head in an intaglio. There is nobody can serve you as well in that respect as I, so I send you by the bearers two, one on a stone like a ruby, but it is a fine Granata, and H.M.’s hair and the first letters of his name are on the inside of it. The other head is on an emerald, a big one, but not of a fine colour; it is only set in lead, so you may either set it in a ring, a seal, or a locket, as you please: they are both cut by Costanzia, and very well done.’

These intagli would be interesting relics for collectors of such flotsam and jetsam of a ruined dynasty. On August 25, Charles answered Edgar. He is ‘sorry that His Majesty is prevented against the most dutiful of sons.’ He sends thanks for the engraved stones and the powers of Regency. This might well have been James’s last news of Charles, for he was on his way to London, a perilous expedition. ⁸⁵

CHAPTER V
THE PRINCE IN LONDON; AND AFTER. – MADEMOISELLE LUCI
(SEPTEMBER 1750–JULY 1751)

The Prince goes to London – Futility of this tour – English Jacobites described by Æneas Macdonald – No chance but in Tearlach – Credentials to Madame de Talmond – Notes of visit to London – Doings in London – Gratifying conversion – Gems and medals – Report by Hanbury Williams – Hume’s legend – Report by a spy —Billets to Madame de Talmond – Quarrel – Disappearance – ‘The old aunt’ – Letters to Mademoiselle Luci – Charles in Germany – Happy thought of Hanbury Williams – Marshal Keith’s mistress – Failure of this plan – The English ‘have a clue’ – Books for the Prince – Mademoiselle Luci as a critic – Jealousy of Madame de Talmond – Her letter to Mademoiselle Luci – The young lady replies – Her bad health – Charles’s reflections – Frederick ‘a clever man’ – A new adventure.

The Prince went to London in the middle of September 1750; and why did he run such a terrible risk? Though he had ordered great quantities of arms in June, no real preparations had been made for a rising. His Highlanders – Glengarry, Lochgarry, Archy Cameron, Clanranald – did not know where he was. Scotland was not warned. As for England, we learn the condition of the Jacobite party there from a letter by Æneas Macdonald, the banker, to Sir Hector Maclean – Sir Hector whom, in his examination, he had spoken of as ‘too fond of the bottle.’ ⁸⁶ Æneas now wrote from Boulogne, in September 1750. He makes it clear that peace, luxury, and constitutionalism had eaten the very heart out of the grandsons of the cavaliers. There was grumbling enough at debt, taxes, a Hanoverian King who at this very hour was in Hanover. Welsh and Cheshire squires and London aldermen drank Jacobite toasts in private. ‘But,’ says Æneas, ‘there are not in England three persons of distinction of the same sentiments as to the method of restoring the Royal family, some being for one way, some for another.’ They have neither heart nor money for an armed assertion of their ideas. In 1745, Sir William Watkins Wynne (who stayed at home in Wales) had not 200l. by him in ready money, and money cannot be raised on lands at such moments. Yet this very man was believed to have spent 120,000l. in contested elections. ‘It is very probable that six times as much money has been thrown away upon these elections’ – he means in the country generally – ‘as would have restored the King.’ Æneas knew another gentleman who had wasted 40,000l. in these constitutional diversions. ‘The present scheme,’ he goes on, ‘is equally weak.’ The English Jacobites were to seem to side with Frederick, the Prince of Wales, in opposition, and force him, when crowned, ‘to call a free Parliament.’ That Parliament would proclaim a glorious Restoration. In fact, the English Jacobites were devoured by luxury, pacific habits, and a desire to save their estates by pursuing ‘constitutional methods.’ These, as we shall see, Charles despised. If a foreign force cannot be landed (if landed it would scarcely be opposed), then ‘there is no method so good as an attempt such as Terloch [Tearlach] made: if there be arms and money: men, I am sure, he will find enough… One thing you may take for granted, that Terloch’s appearance again would be worth 5,000 men, and that without him every attempt will be vain and fruitless.’ Æneas, in his examination, talked to a different tune, as the poor timid banker, distrusted and insulted by ferocious chieftains.

‘Terloch’ was only too eager to ‘show himself again’; money and arms he seems to have procured (d’Argenson says 4,000,000 francs!), but why go over secretly to London, where he had no fighting partisans? There are no traces of a serious organised plan, and the Prince probably crossed the water, partly to see how matters really stood, partly from restlessness and the weariness of a tedious solitude in hiding, broken only by daily quarrels and reconciliations with the Princesse de Talmond and other ladies.

We find a curious draft of his written on the eve of starting.

‘Credentials given ye 1st. Sept, 1750. to ye P. T.’ (Princesse de Talmond).

‘Je me flate que S.M.T.C. [Sa Majesté Très Chrétien] voudra bien avoire tout foi et credi à Madame La P. de T., ma chere Cousine, come si s’etoit mois-meme; particulierement en l’assurant de nouveau come quois j’ai ses veritable interest plus a cour que ses Ministres, etant toujours avec une attachemen veritable et sincere pour sa sacre persone. C. P. R.’ (Charles, Prince Regent).

Again,

A Mr. Le Duc de Richelieu

‘Je comte sur votre Amitié, Monsieur, je vous prie d’être persuade de la mienne et de ma reconnaissance.

‘All these are deponed, not to be given till farther orders.’

What use the Princesse de Talmond was to make of these documents, on what occasion, is not at all obvious. That the Prince actually went to London, we know from a memorandum in his own hand. ‘My full powers and commission of Regency renewed, when I went to England in 1750, and nothing to be said at Rome, for every thing there is known, and my brother, who has got no confidence of my Father, has always acted, as far as his power, against my interest.’ ⁸⁷

Of Charles’s doings in London, no record survives in the Stuart Papers of 1750. We merely find this jotting:

‘Parted ye 2d. Sep. Arrived to A. [Antwerp] ye 6th. Parted from thence ye 12th. Sept. E. [England] ye 14th, and at L. [London] ye 16th. Parted from L. ye 22d. and arrived at P. ye 24th. From P. parted ye 28th. Arrived here ye 30th Sept. If she [Madame de Talmond, probably] does not come, and ye M. [messenger] agreed on to send back for ye Letters and Procuration [to] ye house here of P. C. and her being either a tretor or a hour, to chuse which, [then] not to send to P. even after her coming unless absolute necessity order, requiring it then at her dor.’

On the back of the paper is:

‘The letter to Godie [Gaudie?] retarded a post; ye Lady’s being arrived, or her retard to be little, if she is true stille.’

Then follow some jottings, apparently of the lady’s movements. ‘N.S. [New style] ye 16th. Sept. Either ill counselled or she has made a confidence. M. Lorain’s being here [the Duke of Lorraine, ex-King of Poland, probably, a friend of Madame de Talmond] ye 12th. Sept. To go ye same day with ye King, speaking to W. [Waters?] ye last day, Madame A. here this last six weeks.’

These scrawls appear to indicate some communication between Madame de Talmond, the Duke of Lorraine, and Louis XV. ⁸⁸

In London Charles did little but espouse the Anglican religion. Dr. King, in his ‘Anecdotes,’ tells how the Prince took the refreshment of tea with him, and how his servant detected a resemblance to the busts sold in Red Lion Square. He also appeared at a party at Lady Primrose’s, much to her alarm. ⁸⁹ He prowled about the Tower with Colonel Brett, and thought a gate might be damaged by a petard. His friends, including Beaufort and Westmoreland, held a meeting in Pall Mall, to no purpose. The tour had no results, except in the harmless region of the fine arts. A medal was struck, by Charles’s orders, and we have the following information for collectors of Jacobite trinkets. The English Government, never dreaming that the Prince was in Pall Mall, was well informed about cheap treasonable jewellery.

‘Paris: August 31, 1750.

‘The Artist who makes the seals with the head of the Pretender’s eldest Son, is called le Sieur Malapert, his direction is hereunder, he sells them at 3 Livres apiece, but by the Dozen he takes less.

‘It is one Tate, who got the engraving made on metal, from which the Artist takes the impression on his Composition in imitation of fine Stones of all colours. This Tate was a Jeweller at Edinborough, where he went into the Rebellion and having made his escape, has since settled here, but has left his wife and Family at Edinborough. He is put upon the list of the French King’s Bounty for eight hundred Livres yearly, the same as is allowed to those that had a Captain’s Commission in the Pretender’s Service and are fled hither. It is Sullivan and Ferguson who employ Tate to get the 1,500 Seals done, he being a man that does still Jeweller’s business and follows it. The Artist has actually done four dozen of seals, which are disposed of, having but half a dozen left. He expects daily an order for the said quantity more – As there are no Letters or Inscription about it, the Artist may always pretend that it is only a fancy head, though it is in reality very like the Pretender’s Eldest Son.’ ⁹⁰

Oddly enough, we find Waters sealing, with this very intaglio of the Prince, a letter to Edgar, in 1750. It is a capital likeness.

Wise after the event, Hanbury Williams wrote from Berlin (October 13, 1750) that Charles was in England, ‘in the heart of the kingdom, in the county of Stafford.’ By October 20, Williams knows that the Prince is in Suffolk. All this is probably a mere echo of Charles’s actual visit to London, reverberated from the French Embassy at Berlin, and arriving at Hanbury Williams, he says, through an Irishman, who knew a lacquey of the French Ambassador’s. In English official circles no more than this was known. Troops were concentrated near Stafford after Charles had returned to Lorraine. Hume told Sir John Pringle a story of how Charles was in London in 1753, how George II. told the fact to Lord Holdernesse, and how the King expressed his good-humoured indifference. But Lord Holdernesse contradicted the tale, as we have already observed. If Hume meant 1750 by 1733 he was certainly wrong. George was then in Hanover. In 1753 I have no proof that Charles was in London, though Young Glengarry told James that the Prince was ‘on the coast’ in November 1752. If Charles did come to London in 1753, and if George knew it, the information came through Pickle to Henry Pelham, as will appear later. Hume gave the Earl Marischal as his original authority. The Earl was likely to be better informed about events of 1752–1753 than about those of September 1750.

After Charles’s departure from London, the English Government received information from Paris (October 5, 1750) to the following effect:

‘Paris: October 5, 1750.

‘It is supposed that the Pretender’s Son keeps at Montl’hery, six leagues from Paris, at Mr. Lumisden’s, or at Villeneuve St. Georges, at a small distance from Town, at Lord Nairn’s; Sometimes at Sens, with Col. Steward and Mr. Ferguson; when at Paris, at Madme. la Princesse de Talmont’s, or the Scotch Seminary; nobody travels with him but Mr. Goring, and a Biscayan recommended to him by Marshal Saxe: the young Pretender is disguised in an Abbé’s dress, with a black patch upon his eye, and his eyebrows black’d.

‘An Officer of Ogilvie’s Regimt. in this Service listed lately. An Irish Priest, who belonged to the Parish Church of S. Eustache at Paris, has left his Living, reckoned worth 80l. St. a year, and is very lately gone to London to be Chaplain to the Sardinian Minister: he has carried with him a quantity of coloured Glass Seals with the Pretender’s Son’s Effigy, as also small heads made of silver gilt about this bigness [example] to be set in rings, as also points for watch cases, with the same head, and this motto round “Look, Love, and follow.”’ ⁹¹

On October 30, Walton wrote that James was much troubled by a letter from Charles, doubtless containing the news of his English failure; perhaps notifying his desertion of the Catholic faith. On January 15, 1751, Walton writes that James has confided to the Pope that Charles is at Boulogne-sur-Mer, which he very possibly was. On January 9 and 22, Horace Mann reports, on the information of Cardinal Albani, that James and the Duke of York are ill with grief. ‘Something extraordinary has happened to the Pretender’s eldest son.’ He had turned Protestant, that was all. But Cardinal Albani withdraws his statement, and thinks that nothing unusual has really occurred. In fact, Charles, as we shall see, had absolutely vanished for three months.

Charles returned to France in September 1750, and renewed his amantium irae with Madame de Talmond. Among the Stuart Papers of 1750 are a number of tiny billets, easily concealed, and doubtless passed to the lady furtively. ‘Si vous ne voulez, Reine de Maroc, pas cet faire, quelle plaisir mourir de chagrin et de desespoire!’

‘Aiez de la Bonté et de confience pour celui qui vous aime et vous adore passionément.’

To some English person:

‘Ask the Channoine where you can by hocks [buy hooks!] and lines for fishing, and by a few hocks and foure lines.’ ⁹²

The Princess writes: