PRECAUTIONS TAKEN IN ENGLAND.

While the young pretender endeavoured to improve the advantages he had gamed, the ministry of Great Britain took every possible measure to retard his progress. Several powerful chiefs in the highlands were attached to the government, and exerted themselves in its defence. The duke of Argyle began to arm his vassals; but not before he had obtained the sanction of the legislature. Twelve hundred men were raised by the earl of Sutherland; the lord Rae brought a considerable number to the field; the Grants and Monroes appeared under their respective leaders for the service of his majesty; sir Alexander Macdonald declared for king George, and the laird of Macleod sent two thousand hardy islanders from Skye to strengthen the same interest. These gentlemen, though supposed to be otherwise affected, were governed and directed by the advice of Duncan Forbes, president of the college of justice at Edinburgh, a man of extensive knowledge, agreeable manners, and unblemished integrity. He procured commissions for raising twenty independent companies, and some of these he bestowed upon individuals who were either attached by principle, or engaged by promise, to the pretender. He acted with indefatigable zeal for the interest of the reigning family; and he greatly injured an opulent fortune in their service. He confirmed several chiefs who began to waiver in their principles; some he actually converted by the energy of his arguments, and brought over to the assistance of the government, which they had determined to oppose; others he persuaded to remain quiet, without taking any share in the present troubles. Certain it is, this gentleman, by his industry and address, prevented the insurrection of ten thousand highlanders, who would otherwise have joined the pretender; and, therefore, he may be said to have been one great cause of that adventurer’s miscarriage. The earl of Loudon repaired to Inverness, where he completed his regiment of highlanders; directed the conduct of the clans who had taken arms in behalf of his majesty; and, by his vigilance, overawed the disaffected chieftains of that country, who had not yet openly engaged in the rebellion. Immediately after the defeat of Cope, six thousand Dutch troops* arrived in England, and three battalions of guards, with seven regiments of infantry, were recalled from Flanders, for the defence of the kingdom.

* They were composed of the forces who had been in garrison
at Tournay and Dendermonde when those places were taken, and
engaged by capitulation, that they should not perform any
military function before the first day of January, in the
year 1747; so they could not have acted in England without
the infringement of a solemn treaty.

They forthwith began their march to the north, under the command of general Wade, who received orders to assemble an army, which proceeded to Newcastle. The parliament meeting on the sixteenth day of October, his majesty gave them to understand, that an unnatural rebellion had broke out in Scotland, towards the suppression of which he craved their advice and assistance. He found both houses cordial in their addresses, and zealous in their attachment to his person and government. The commons forthwith suspended the habeas-corpus act; and several persons were apprehended on suspicion of treasonable practices. Immediately after the session was opened, the duke of Cumberland arrived from the Netherlands, and was followed by another detachment of dragoons and infantry. The train-bands of London were reviewed by his majesty; the county regiments were completed; the volunteers, in different parts of the kingdom, employed themselves industriously in the exercise of arms; and the whole English nation seemed to rise up as one man against this formidable invader. The government being apprehensive of a descent from France, appointed admiral Vernon to command a squadron in the Downs, to observe the motions of the enemy by sea, especially in the harbours of Dunkirk and Boulogne; and his cruisers took several ships laden with soldiers, officers, and ammunition, destined for the service of the pretender in Scotland.

This enterprising youth, having collected about five thousand men, resolved to make an irruption into England, which he accordingly entered by the west border on the sixth day of November. Carlisle was invested, and in less than three days surrendered; the keys were delivered to him at Brampton, by the mayor and aldermen on their knees. Here he found a considerable quantity of arms; his father was proclaimed king of Great Britain, and himself regent, by the magistrates in their formalities. General Wade being apprized of his progress, decamped from Newcastle, and advanced across the country as far as Hexham, though the fields were covered with snow, and the roads almost impassable. There he received intelligence that Carlisle was reduced, and forthwith returned to his former station, In the meantime, orders were issued for assembling another army in Staffordshire, under the command of sir John Ligonier. Prince Charles, notwithstanding this formidable opposition, determined to proceed. He had received assurances from France, that a considerable body of troops would be landed on the southern coast of Britain, to make a diversion in his favour; and he never doubted but that he should be joined by all the English malcontents, as soon as he could penetrate into the heart of the kingdom. Leaving a small garrison in the castle of Carlisle, he advanced to Penrith, marching on foot in the highland garb, at the head of his forces; and continued his route through Lancaster and Preston to Manchester, where on the twenty-ninth day of the month, he established his head quarters. There he was joined by about two hundred Englishmen, who were formed into a regiment under the command of colonel Townley. The inhabitants seemed to receive him with marks of affection; and his arrival was celebrated by illuminations and other public rejoicings. His supposed intention was to prosecute his march by the way of Chester into Wales, where he hoped to find a great number of adherents; but all the bridges over the river Mersey being broken down, he chose the route to Stockport, and forded the river at the head of his division, though the water rose to his middle. He passed through Macclesfield and Congleton; and on the fourth day of December entered the town of Derby, in which his army was quartered and his father proclaimed with great formality. He had now advanced within one hundred miles of the capital, which was filled with terror and confusion. Wade lingered in Yorkshire; the duke of Cumberland had assumed the command of the other army assembled in the neighbourhood of Lichfield. He had marched from Stafford to Stone; so that the rebels, in turning off from Ashbourne to Derby, had gained a march between him and London. Had Charles proceeded in his career with that expedition which he had hitherto used, he might have made himself master of the metropolis, where he would have been certainly joined by a considerable number of his well wishers, who waited impatiently for his approach; yet this exploit could not have been achieved without hazarding an engagement, and running the risk of being enclosed within three armies, each greatly superior to his own in number and artillery. Orders were given for forming a camp on Finchley-common, where the king resolved to take the field in person, accompanied by the earl of Stair, field-marshal and commander-in-chief of the forces in South-Britain. Some Romish priests were apprehended; the militia of London and Middlesex were kept in readiness to march; double watches were posted at the city-gates, and signals of alarm appointed. The volunteers of the city were incorporated into a regiment; the practitioners of the law, headed by the judges, weavers of Spitalfields, and other communities, engaged in associations; and even the managers of the theatres offered to raise a body of their dependents for the service of the government. Notwithstanding these precautions and appearances of unanimity, the trading part of the city, and those concerned in the money corporations, were overwhelmed with fear and dejection. They reposed very little confidence in the courage or discipline of their militia and volunteers; they had received intelligence that the French were employed in making preparations at Dunkirk and Calais for a descent upon England; they dreaded an insurrection of the Roman-catholics, and other friends of the house of Stuart; and they reflected that the highlanders, of whom by this time they had conceived a most terrible idea, were within four days’ march of the capital. Alarmed by these considerations, they prognosticated their own ruin in the approaching revolution; and their countenances exhibited the plainest marks of horror and despair. On the other hand, the Jacobites were elevated to an insolence of hope, which they were at no pains to conceal; while many people, who had no private property to lose, and thought no change would be for the worse, waited the issue of this crisis with the most calm indifference.