The Scottish Cavalier: An Historical Romance, Volume 2 (of 3)Grant, James
History
The Scottish Cavalier: An Historical Romance, Volume 2 (of 3)
Grant, James
Scotland -- History -- 1649-1660 -- Fiction
On the first day of October the Scottish army crossed the Tweed, and
drew up on English ground, when General Douglas (to quote Captain
Crichton, the cavalier-trooper who served in the Grey Dragoons) "gave
a strict charge to the officers that they should keep their men from
offering the least injury on their march; adding, that if he heard
any of the English complain, the officers should answer for the
faults of their men."
That night the Scottish drums were ringing in the streets of "merry
Carlisle." There Douglas halted for the night, and Dunbarton's
regiment bivouacked in a field on the banks of the Eden. Provisions
were brought from the city in abundance, fires were lighted, and the
cooking proceeded with the utmost dispatch.
English troops kept guard at the gates of the city, which was
inclosed by a strong wall, and Saint George's red cross waved on the
castle of William Rufus--the same grim fortress where, a hundred and
twenty-one years before, Mary of Scotland experienced the first
traits of Elizabeth's inhospitality.
General Douglas, who commanded the Scottish troops, was a traitor at
heart, and deeply in the interest of William. On the morning after
the halt at Carlisle, he ordered the Viscount Dundee, with his
division of cavalry, to march for London by the way of York; while he
in person led the infantry and artillery by the road to Chester.
Anxious that William should land before the army of James could be
strong enough to oppose him, Douglas, by a hundred frivolous
pretences, and by every scheme he could devise, delayed the march of
his infantry, which did not form a junction with the English under
the Earl of Faversham at London until the 25th of October.
James VII. had now under his command a well disciplined and well
appointed army, led by officers of distinguished birth and courage,
and he awaited with confidence the landing of his usurping
son-in-law. The whole of his troops were quartered in the vicinity
of London.
For many reasons, the people of England, like those of Scotland, were
prepossessed against all the measures of King James, and to his brave
army alone did this unhappy monarch look for support in the coming
struggle; but notwithstanding that for years he had been a father
rather than a captain to his soldiers, and had watched over their
interests with the most kingly and paternal solicitude, quarrels and
disgusts broke out between them, and he was yet to find that he leant
on a broken reed. The strict amity subsisting between him and Louis
of France, excited the jealousy of the nation, who dreaded an
invasion of French and Irish catholics, to enforce the entire
submission of the protestants.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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