William Augustus, Duke of Cumberland at this time, was only in his twenty-fifth year, having been born on April 15th, 1721, and was just four months younger than Prince Charlie. He possessed, however, none of the graces of person of his Stuart cousin. Though not yet twenty-five, he was exceedingly corpulent and unwieldy, and had a rough uncouth manner and a savage temper; in fact he looked exactly what he was afterwards called, “The Butcher.” It was into such a man as this, that the handsome idolized son of Caroline had grown. There could not possibly have been a greater contrast between any two persons than between these two young men who were destined to fight to a finish this contest for the throne of England. Despite the fact that Cumberland had lost the battle of Fontenoy, the military authorities seemed to feel sufficient confidence in him to send him to Scotland to take the supreme command at such a critical period. Certainly his father believed in his military talents such as they were. He received his appointment very soon after the arrival in London of the news of the defeat of Falkirk, and left, as he was requested to do, without delay, and travelled night and day, arriving unexpectedly at Holyrood on the 31st of January; here he chose the very bed in which Prince Charlie had slept. In Edinburgh he found his favourite, General Hawley, busily engaged in hanging his own men, right and left, for having run away from the Highlanders at Falkirk. He had prepared the gallows for the Prince’s followers, and was using it for his own. These executions Cumberland at once stopped. An incident, which occurred in Flanders, will give an idea of the nature of this brute Hawley, a very fit second-in-command, for such a man as Cumberland afterwards proved himself to be. During the campaign in the Low Countries when Hawley commanded a regiment, one of his own men, a deserter, had been hanged before his windows. So pleasant a sight did he find it, that when the surgeons came to beg the body for dissection he was very loth to part with it. “At least,” he said at last, “you shall give me the skeleton to hang up in the guard-room!” Fancy a spruce Colonel of a line-battalion of our own day ordering a guard-room to be decorated in this fashion! Cumberland remained little more than twenty-four hours in Edinburgh, then moved out to find the Prince’s army, which he understood lay at Falkirk; his men appeared to have advanced with every confidence in him. Charles had, however, much against his will, commenced a retreat towards the Highlands, where his generals had persuaded him with much difficulty to pass the remainder of the winter. This retreat appears to have been conducted with carelessness and disorder, and much baggage was lost to the pursuing English troops. However, Crieff was reached, and here the two divisions marched by different roads towards Inverness.