e Earl of Sutherland's followers, than resisted
when they apprehended him.[378]

Amiable in private life, affable in manner, and exempt from the pride of
a Highland chieftain, this nobleman had been beloved by his neighbours
of inferior rank; to the poor he had been a kind benefactor. The
domestic relations of life he had fulfilled irreproachably. Every heart
bled for him; and the case of his son, Lord Macleod, who had espoused
the same cause, excited universal commiseration.

On the Sunday following the trial, Lady Cromartie presented her petition
to the King: he gave her no hopes; and the unhappy woman fainted when he
left her.

It is pleasing to rest upon one action of clemency, before returning to
the horrors of capital punishment. To the intercession of Frederick
Prince of Wales, Lord Cromartie eventually owed his life; that
intercession is believed to have been procured by the merits and the
attractions of Lady Cromartie, who was indefatigable in her exertions.

This Lady, the daughter of Sir William Gordon of Dalfolly, is said to
have possessed every quality that could render a husband happy.
Beautiful and intellectual, she manifested a degree of spirit and
perseverance when called upon to act in behalf of her husband and
children, that raised her character to that of a heroine. She was then
the mother of nine children, and about to give birth to a tenth. During
the period of suspense, her conduct presented that just medium between
stoicism and excess of feeling, which so few persons in grief can
command.[379]

At last, a reprieve for Lord Cromartie arrived on the eleventh of
August; it was not, however, followed by a release, nor even by a free
pardon. During two years, Lord Cromartie was detained a prisoner in the
Tower, there, being condemned to witness the departure of his generous
friends, Kilmarnock and Balmerino, to the scaffold. On February the
eighteenth, 1748, he was permitted to leave his prison, and to lodge in
the house of a messenger. In the following August he went into
Devonshire, where he was desired to remain. A pardon passed the Great
Seal for his Lordship on the twentieth of October, 1749, with a
condition that he should remain in any place directed by the King. He
died in Poland-street in London, on the twenty-eighth of September,
1766.[380]

On Thursday, the seventh of August, the Reverend James Foster, a
Presbyterian minister, was allowed access to Lord Kilmarnock, to prepare
him fo