After staying in that Country till the beginning of Aprile, without receiving any Accounts from abroad and giving up all hopes of a Landing, I left my Lord T[ra]q[uai]r there and came to Stirlingshire where I stayed about three weeks and so came to Edinburgh, and from that went to the Country the 11th of May. In the beginning of June, when Lord T[ra]q[uai]r returned, I went to wait of him, and being very uneasy to think we had received no accounts from Abroad, I said if I could afford the expence I would go over on pretence of seeing the Army in flanders and so see the Prince myself and learn distinctly what situation things were in. This his Lordship was well pleased with but I did not say anything positively, but upon Reflexion by the Road, I thought it was hard that people who had been for so long concerned in the Kings affairs and putt to so great Charge about it with the hazard of their Lives and fortunes should now be left in the dark as to every thing. Wherefore I resolved to do it, and next day wrote a Letter to my Lord telling him that if the Duke of P[erth] would give me a 100£ I would be att the rest of the expence myself and go over and in case his Lordship approved of it, he would be so good as meet me at Peebles on Saturday, which he did, and after talking with him I came home and sett out the same night about     O Clock and gott to Drummond [Castle] next afternoon. The Duke immediately agreed to the thing and gave me an order for the money. About this time came a letter from Lord Semple to Lord T[ra]q[uai]r by way of an account of their precedure in the Spring, which I went to T[ra]q[uai]r and assisted his Lordship to decypher, but was so little to our satisfaction that my Lord still thought my going over more necessary than before. About this time I received a letter from St[uar]t of Ard[shie]ll,[197] telling me that he would have come to the Country to wait of me but his dress made him remarkable, being in Highland Cloaths, but as he had comed to Town purposely to meet with me, he hoped I would give him a meeting, and yt he had seen L[ochie]l lately. I went to town in a day or two after and dined with him. His Errand was to know of me if I had gott any Accounts lately, and what hopes I had. I did not think it att all proper to let him know any thing of my having seen such a letter as Lord Semple had wrote, nor indeed that any Accounts had come; for in that case he would have expected something positive. But I put him off by telling him I imagined the french were resolved to renew the Expedition soon and so friends did not care to write least any discovery should ensue, but could easily see that the Answer was not att all satisfactory. I returned that same night to the Country, and during a few days that I stayed, prepared for my journey. N.B.--_This is a fragment of a letter written by Mr. Murray to the Pretender soon after the miscarriage of the French Expedition._ [Sidenote: Murray to the Chevalier]