takes away nothing, however, from the just fame of Flora Macdonald, "whose name will he mentioned in history, and, if courage and fidelity he virtues, mentioned with honour." Johnson, after recounting how "the sheets which the Prince used were never put to any meaner offices, but were wrapped up hy the lady of the house, and at last, according to her desire, were laid round her in her grave," ends the passage with much satisfaction, by observing: "These are not Whigs." Upon the table in the room he left a piece of paper "on which he had written with his pencil these words: Quantum cedat virtutibus aurum."[1] He was thinking, no doubt, of the reward of £30,000 set upon Charles Edward's head, and of the fidelity of the poor Highlanders who one and all refused to betray him. To more than fifty people he was forced in his wanderings to trust his life, many of them "in the lowest paths of fortune," and not one of them proved faithless. It was well for him that he had not had to trust to fifty hangers-on of a Court.
The old house in which he had taken shelter for one night, and where Boswell and Johnson were so hospitably received, where they heard from their hostess the strange story of her adventures—this interesting old house no longer exists. Some of the trees which surround the modern residence must he old enough to have seen not only our two travellers, but also the fugitive Prince. As we looked upon it from the opposite shore of the narrow loch it seemed a pleasant spot, nearly facing the west, sheltered from the east by hills, and embosomed in trees, with meadows in front sloping down to the sea. In the rear rose barren dreary hills, but all their lower slopes were green with grass and with the young crops of oats. Far down the loch the green slopes ended in a steep rocky coast. In the distance the mountains of Lewis fringed the northern sky. The steep headland on which we sat was beautiful with grasses and flowers and ferns and heather. Of wild flowers we gathered no less than thirty-six varieties on this one small spot. We found even a lingering primrose, though June was rapidly drawing to its close. How different were our thoughts as we watched this peaceful scene from those which, one hundred and forty-three years earlier, had troubled the watchers as the young Wanderer slept! As the morning wore on, and he did not awake, one of them, in her alarm lest the soldiers should surprise him, roused her father, who was also in hiding, and begged that "they
- ↑ "With virtue weighed what worthless trash is gold."
