Charles from France. The latter had just returned from an expedition to South Uist, where he had more than once narrowly escaped being taken by some vigilant English cruiser. It was impossible, he urged, for a ship of any size to escape through such a closely-drawn net; the idea of starting directly for France must be abandoned, but could the Prince escape to the outer islands and there secure a suitable vessel, he might be out upon the wide seas before his departure was discovered. It was therefore decided that the little party should cross the Minch in an open boat and make for the Long Island. For this expedition the very man was forthcoming in the person of the Highland pilot who had accompanied Mr. Macdonald to South Uist. This was old Donald MacLeod of Guatergill, in Skye, a trader of substance and a man of shrewdness and experience. In spite of being a MacLeod he was a staunch Jacobite, and had joined the Prince's army at Inverness. He had a son, a mere lad, at school in that place; this boy, hearing that a battle was likely to take place, flung aside his book, borrowed a dirk and a pistol, and actually fought in the battle of Culloden. More lucky than most, he escaped from the fight, tracked the Prince to Borodale, and arrived in time to take his place as one of the eight rowers whom his father had collected for the expedition. The boat belonged to the missing John Macdonald, for the Borodale family gave life and property equally unhesitatingly in the Prince's service.
On April 26, in the deepening twilight, the party started from Lochnanuagh. Hardly had they set out when they were overtaken by a terrible storm, the worst storm, Donald declared, that he had ever been out in, and he was an experienced sailor. The Prince demanded vehemently that the boat should be run on shore, but Donald, knowing the rock-bound coast, answered that to do so would be to run on certain death. Their one chance was to hold out straight to sea. It was pitch dark, the rain fell in torrents; they had neither lantern, compass, nor pump on board. Charles lay at the bottom of the boat, with his head between Donald's knees. No one spoke a word; every moment they expected to be overwhelmed in the waves or dashed against a rock, and for several hours the vessel rushed on in the darkness. 'But as God would have it,' to use Donald's words, 'by peep of day we discovered ourselves to be on the coast of the Long Isle. We made directly for the nearest land, which was Rossinish in Benbecula.'
Here they found only a deserted hut, low, dark, and destitute of window or chimney; the floor was clay, and when they had lit a fire, the peat smoke was blinding and stifling. Still, they could dry their clothes and sleep, even though it were on a bed no better than a sail spread on the hard ground. Here they rested two days, and then found a more comfortable refuge in the Island of Scalpa, where the tacksman – although a Campbell – was a friend of Donald MacLeod's and received them hospitably.
CHAPTER II
ON THE LONG ISLAND
The object of the expedition was, of course, to find some vessel big enough to carry the Prince and his friends over to France. Such ships were to be had in Stornoway, and Donald MacLeod, being a man well known in these parts, undertook to secure a vessel and pilot, under the pretence of going on a trading expedition to the Orkneys. The Prince and his party were to remain at Scalpa till Donald should send for them. On May 3 came the message that vessel and pilot were in readiness, and that they should come to Stornoway without a moment's delay.
Owing to the wind being ahead it was impossible to go by sea, and the Prince and his two Irish followers were forced to go the thirty miles to Stornoway on foot. No footpath led through the wastes of heavy, boggy moorlands, the rain fell with an even downpour, and the guide stupidly mistook the way and added eight long Highland miles to the distance. They were thoroughly drenched, exhausted, and famished when Donald met them at a place a mile or two out of Stornoway. Having cheered their bodies with bread and cheese and brandy, and their souls with the hopeful prospect of starting the next day for France, he took them to a house in the neighbourhood, Kildun, where the mistress, though a MacLeod, was, like most of her sex, an ardent Jacobite. Leaving the Prince and his friends to the enjoyment of food, dry clothes, a good fire, and the prospect of comfortable beds for tired limbs, Donald went back to Stornoway in hopeful spirits to complete his arrangements for taking the Prince on board. Another twenty-four hours and the ship would have weighed anchor, and the worst difficulties would be left behind. But as soon as he entered Stornoway he saw that something was wrong. Three hundred men of the militia were in arms, and the whole place was in an uproar. The secret had leaked out; one of the boat's crew, getting tipsy, had boasted that the Prince was at hand with five hundred men, ready to take by force what he could not obtain by good-will.
The inhabitants of Stornoway were all Mackenzies, pledged by their chief, Seaforth, to loyal support of the Government. It is eternally to their honour that all that they demanded was that the Prince should instantly remove himself from their neighbourhood. Not one amongst them seems to have suggested that a sum of 30,000l. was to be gained by taking the Prince prisoner. So complete was Donald's confidence in their honesty that he did not hesitate to say to a roomful of armed militiamen, 'He has only two companions with him, and when I am there I make a third, and yet let me tell you, gentlemen, that if Seaforth himself were here he durst not put a hand to the Prince's breast.' Donald doubtless looked pretty formidable as he said these words; at any rate, the 'honest Mackenzies' had no sinister intentions, only they vehemently insisted that the party should depart at once, and, what was worse, absolutely refused to give them a pilot. In vain Donald offered 500l.; fear made them obdurate; and so, depressed and crestfallen, Donald returned to Kildun and urged the Prince to instant flight. But not even the fear of immediate capture could induce the three wearied men to set out again in the wet and darkness to plod over rocks and morasses with no certain goal. So Donald had to control his fears and impatience till next day.
At eight next morning they started in the boat, hospitable Mrs. MacLeod insisting on their taking with them beef, meal, and even the luxuries of brandy, butter, and sugar. The weather being stormy they landed on a little desert island called Eiurn, which the Stornoway fishermen used as a place for drying fish. Between some fish which they found drying on the rocks and Mrs. MacLeod's stores they lived in comparative luxury for the next few days. Ned Burke, the valet, was told off as cook; but he soon found that the Prince was far more skilful in the art of cookery than himself. It was his Royal Highness who suggested the luxury of butter with the fish, and who made a quite original cake by mixing the brains of a cow with some meal, giving orders to 'birsle the bannock weel, or it would not do at all.' Donald used to declare that in all his life 'he never knew anyone better at a shift than the Prince when he happened to be at a pinch.' Like many another unfortunate man, whether prince or peasant, Charles found unfailing comfort in tobacco. He seems to have smoked nothing more splendid than clay pipes, and 'as in his wanderings these behoved to break, he used to take quills, and putting one into the other and all into the end of the "cutty," this served to make it long enough, and the tobacco to smoke cool.'
Donald records another characteristic little trait of the Prince at this time. On quitting the island he insisted on leaving money on the rocks to pay for the fish they had consumed.6
In the meantime the situation was growing more and more dangerous. Rumours had got abroad that the Prince was in the Long Island, and the search was being actively pursued. Two English men-of-war were stationed near the island, and sloops and gunboats ran up every bay and sound, while bodies of militia carried on the search by land. These, from their intimate knowledge of the country, would have been the more formidable enemy of the two if many of their officers had not had a secret sympathy with the Jacobite cause and very lukewarm loyalty to the Government.
For several days the Prince's boat had been so constantly pursued that it was impossible for the crew to land. They ran short of food, and were reduced to eating oatmeal mixed with salt water, a nauseous mixture called in Gaelic, Drammach. At last they ran into a lonely bay in Benbecula, where they were free from pursuit. It is characteristic of the Prince's irrepressible boyishness that he and the boatmen here went lobster-hunting with great enjoyment and success.
Without help at this juncture the little party must either have starved or fallen into the hands of their enemies. Charles therefore
In this he resembled his father, who, on leaving Scotland after the failure of 1715, sent money to Argyll to compensate the country folk whose cottages had been burned in the war; an act without precedent or imitation.
