us Jacobites whom it had been my luck hitherto to
meet with. Old ladies of family over their hyson, and grey-haired lairds
over their punch, I had often heard utter a little harmless treason;
while the former remembered having led down a dance with the Chevalier,
and the latter recounted the feats they had performed at Preston,
Clifton, and Falkirk.

The disaffection of such persons was too unimportant to excite the
attention of government. I had heard, however, that there still
existed partisans of the Stuart family of a more daring and dangerous
description; men who, furnished with gold from Rome, moved, secretly and
in disguise, through the various classes of society, and endeavoured to
keep alive the expiring zeal of their party.

I had no difficulty in assigning an important post among this class of
persons, whose agency and exertion are only doubted by those who look
on the surface of things, to this Mr. Herries, whose mental energies, as
well as his personal strength and activity, seemed to qualify him
well to act so dangerous a part; and I knew that all along the Western
Border, both in England and Scotland, there are so many nonjurors, that
such a person may reside there with absolute safety, unless it becomes,
in a very especial degree, the object of the government to secure his
person; and which purpose, even then, might be disappointed by early
intelligence, or, as in the case of Mr. Foxley, by the unwillingness
of provincial magistrates to interfere in what is now considered an
invidious pursuit of the unfortunate.

There have, however, been rumours lately, as if the present state of the
nation or at least of some discontented provinces, agitated by a
variety of causes but particularly by the unpopularity of the present
administration, may seem to this species of agitators a favourable
period for recommencing their intrigues; while, on the other hand,
government may not, at such a crisis, be inclined to look upon them
with the contempt which a few years ago would have been their most
appropriate punishment.

That men should be found rash enough to throw away their services and
lives in a desperate cause, is nothing new in history, which abounds
with instances of similar devotion--that Mr. Herries is such an
enthusiast is no less evident; but all this explains not his conduct
towards me. Had he sought to make me a proselyte to his ruined cause,
violence and compulsion were arguments very unlikely to prev