military strategist, and his plan was continuously kept in view in all future attempts of the Jacobites, and finally acted on in the outbreak of 1745. The advisers of the Pretender seem to have been either slow to trust their coadjutor or to comprehend his project. At last, however, he was despatched (1703) on a secret mission to the Highlands to sound those of the chiefs who were likely to rise, and to ascertain what forces they could bring into the field. He found, however, that there was little disposition to join the rebellion, and he then apparently made up his mind to secure his own safety by revealing all that he knew to the government of Queen Anne. He persuaded the duke of Queensberry that his rival, the duke of Atholl, was in the Jacobite plot, and that if Queensberry supported him he could obtain evidence of this at St Germain. Queensberry foolishly entered into the intrigue with him against Atholl, but when Lovat had gone to France with a pass from Queensberry the affair was betrayed to Atholl by Robert Ferguson, and resulted in Queensberry's discomfiture. The story is obscure, and is complicated by partisanship on either side; but Lovat was certainly playing a double game. His agility, however, was not remunerative. On returning to Paris suspicions got afloat as to Lovat's proceedings, and he was imprisoned in the castle of Angoulême. He remained nearly ten years under supervision, till in November 1714 he made his escape to England. For some twenty-five years after this he was chiefly occupied in lawsuits for the recovery of his estates and the re-establishment of his fortune, in both of which objects he was successful. The intervals of his leisure were filled up by Jacobite and Anti-Jacobite intrigues, in which he seems to have alternately, as suited his interests, acted the traitor to both parties. But he so far obtained the confidence of the government as to secure the appointments of sheriff of Inverness and of colonel of an independent company. His disloyal practices, however, soon led to his being suspected; and he was deprived of both his appointments. When the rebellion of 1745 broke out, Lovat acted with characteristic duplicity. He represented to the Jacobites--what was probably in the main true--that though eager for their success his weak health and advanced years prevented him from joining the standard of the prince in person, while to the Lord President Forbes he professed his cordial attachment to the existing state of things, but lamented that his son, in spite of all his remonstrances, had joined the Pretender, and succeeded in taking with him a strong force from the clan of the Frasers. The truth was that the lad was unwilling to go, but was compelled by his father. Lovat's false professions of fidelity did not long deceive the government, and after the battle of Culloden he was obliged to retreat to the Highlands, after seeing from a distant height his castle of Dounie burnt by the royal army.