The doctors said that it would kill him;
and he was obliged to remain. The worst of it was, that two of five
Scotch deputies who had been hidden at Montrouge near Paris, had been
sent into Scotland a fortnight before, to announce the immediate arrival
of the King with arms and troops. The movement which it was felt this
announcement would create, increased the impatience for departure. At
last, on Saturday, the 19th of March, the King of England, half cured and
very weak, determined to embark in spite of his physicians, and did so.
The enemy's vessels hats retired; so, at six o'clock in the morning, our
ships set sail with a good breeze, and in the midst of a mist, which hid
them from view in about an hour.

Forty-eight hours after the departure of our squadron, twenty-seven
English ships of war appeared before Dunkerque. But our fleet was away.
The very first night it experienced a furious tempest. The ship in which
was the King of England took shelter afterwards behind the works of
Ostend. During the storm, another ship was separated from the squadron,
and was obliged to take refuge on the coast of Picardy. This vessel, a
frigate, was commanded by Rambure, a lieutenant. As, soon as he was able
he sailed after the squadron that he believed already in Scotland. He
directed his course towards Edinburgh, and found no vessel during all the
voyage. As he approached the mouth of the river, he saw around him a
number of barques and small vessels that he could not avoid, and that he
determined in consequence to approach with as good a grace as possible.
The masters of these ships' told him that the King was expected with
impatience, but that they had no news of him, that they had come out to
meet him, and that they would send pilots to Rambure, to conduct him up
the river to Edinburgh, where all was hope and joy. Rambure, equally
surprised that the squadron which bore the King of England had not
appeared, and by the publicity of his forthcoming arrival, went up
towards Edinburgh more and more surrounded by barques, which addressed to
him the same language. A gentleman of the country passed from one of
these barques upon the frigate. He told Rambure that the principal
noblemen of Scotland had resolved to act together, that these noblemen
could count upon more than twenty thousand men ready to take up arms, and
that all the towns awaited only the arrival of the King to proclaim him.

More and more troubled that th