Nay, Doctor, it was not for the prompting of the swords or for the jostling of the bayonets that I took it to mind to do it; nor for the men, whether auld or bare bairns, who lay cooling their veins on the heather. Neither was there in me or mine hope of petticoats or favours when we took the young man through.
You have paid me many compliments, Doctor, as to call me a woman of soft features, of gentle manners, of, God save you, an elegant presence; but such as these must wither be they not housed in a kind soul.
I was no heedless overblown girl-child when I met Prince Charles; I was a grown woman a cast above twenty and some among my kin had said that I would cost them no dower but was likely to spare them no feeding in my age. It was a strange e’en then, when they came chieftain, prince, and all from Dunvegan a-pleading to my skirts.
I looked over the young gentleman and I thought what some had said of him; that he was Italian and no blood of ours by birth, of the Romish persuasion, that he had left our friends and our cousins to suffer in a cold pass. I heard alike the beseeching of Kingsburgh, that the slight laddie was all we had of hope.
I thought of the gold promised on warrants, and the chill eyes of the country ministers, and as I held out my hand to Charlie’s kiss I thought then, yon boy will look more handsome in ain of my auld frocks than upon the gibbets of Butcher Cumberland.
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