By the officers and soldiers at Culloden, Lord George was received with joy. They regretted his absence, and were pleased to say that had he been with them they should have "given a good account of Lord Loudon and his troops, whom they had been prevented from pursuing at Inverness." Lord George soon found that these professions were sincere. The Prince was induced to send him to Dingwall, that he might assist the Earl of Cromartie in pursuing Lord Loudon, who had passed up to Tain. This scheme having proved impracticable, he returned to Inverness. Meantime the county of Atholl suffered under the unparalleled cruelties of the English soldiery. The Duke of Cumberland had visited that interesting district; and it requires little more to be said, to comprehend that beauty was turned to desolation; that crimes hitherto unheard of among a British army reflected dishonour on the conquerors, and brought misery to the conquered. On the sixth of February, 1746, the Duke had arrived at Perth. His first orders were to seize the Duchess of Perth, the mother of the Duke, and the Viscountess Strathallan, and to carry them to a small, wretched prison in Edinburgh, where they remained nearly a year. The Duke of Cumberland was succeeded at Edinburgh by his brother-in-law, the Prince of Hesse, who had landed at Leith with five thousand infantry and five hundred huzzars in the pay of England. These were stationed in the capital, ready to swarm into the country to subdue its brave inhabitants. Whilst Lord George Murray was still at Inverness, he heard that his cherished home, the territory of his proud forefathers, the scenes of his youth, were ravaged by a detachment of Cumberland's army. The houses of such gentlemen as had assisted Prince Charles were burned; and their families, after receiving every species of indignity that could palliate the guilt of a future revenge, and that could break honest hearts, were turned out to perish on the hills with cold and hunger. The very nature of Englishmen appears to have been changed during this most mournful, most disgraceful warfare; and never did the British army sink so low in morals, in humanity, as during the German yoke of a Prince whom one rejects as a countryman.[173] Lord George was instantly ordered to go to Atholl. Little could he suspect the construction afterwards placed on his conduct, and the snare which was laid for him by his enemies, in the events of the next few weeks.