Chapter II

CHARLES EDWARD STUART Prince Charles—Contradictions in his character—Extremes of 11 bad and good—Evolution of character—The Prince’s personal advantages—Common mistake as to the colour of his eyes—His portraits from youth to age—Descriptions of Charles by the Duc de Liria; the President de Brosses; Gray; Charles’s courage—The siege of Gaeta—Story of Lord Elcho—The real facts—The Prince’s horse shot at Culloden—Foolish fables of David Hume confuted—Charles’s literary tastes—His clemency—His honourable conduct—Contrast with Cumberland—His graciousness—His faults—Charge of avarice—Love of wine—Religious levity—James on Charles’s faults—An unpleasant discovery—Influence of Murray of Broughton—Rapid decline of character after 1746—Temper, wine, and women—Deep distrust of James’s Court—Rupture with James—Divisions among Jacobites—King’s men and Prince’s men—Marischal, Kelly, Lismore, Clancarty—Anecdote of Clancarty and Braddock—Clancarty and d’Argenson—Balhaldie—Lally Tollendal—The Duke of York—His secret flight from Paris—‘Insigne Fourberie’—Anxiety of Charles—The fatal cardinal’s hat—Madame de Pompadour—Charles rejects her advances—His love affairs—Madame de Talmond—Voltaire’s verses on her—Her scepticism in Religion—Her husband—Correspondence with Montesquieu—The Duchesse d’Aiguillon—Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle—Charles refuses to retire to Fribourg—The gold plate—Scenes with Madame de Talmond—Bulkeley’s interference—Arrest of Charles—The compasses—Charles goes to Avignon—His desperate condition—His policy—Based on a scheme of D’Argenson—He leaves Avignon—He is lost to sight and hearing CHAPTER III

THE PRINCE IN FAIRYLAND

FEBRUARY 1749—SEPTEMBER 1750. I.—WHAT THE WORLD SAID Europe after Peace of Aix-la-Chapelle—A vast gambling 44 establishment—Charles excluded—Possible chance in Poland—Supposed to have gone thither—‘Henry Goring’s Letter’—Romantic adventures attributed to Charles—Obvious blunders—Talk of a marriage—Count Brühl’s opinion—Proposal to kidnap Charles—To rob a priest—The King of Poland’s ideas—Lord Hyndford on Frederick the Great—Lord Hyndford’s mare’s nest—Charles at Berlin—‘Send him to Siberia’—The theory contradicted—Mischievous glee of Frederick—Charles discountenances plots to kill Cumberland—Father Myles Macdonnell to James—London conspiracy—Reported from Rome—The Bloody Butcher Club—Guesses of Sir Horace Mann—Charles and a strike—Charles reported to be very ill—Really on the point of visiting England—September 1750