ut she never went
to Newcastle. Three months later, being still in London, she was sent
for to a house in the Strand, where she met Anne Oglethorpe. Anne gave
her a letter from her mother, which had been kept back because Anne
had expected to come up sooner to town, otherwise she would have sent
it. Anne had a cold and a swelled face. She and Eleanor were going to
France, and she persuaded Fanny to go with them. To make a long tale
short, they shut her up in a convent lest she should blab the great
secret, 'James Stuart is really James Oglethorpe!'

In September 1701 James II. died, and Lady Oglethorpe carried to the
Princess Anne the affecting letter of farewell he wrote to her,
commending his family to her care. Anne and Eleanor went to England in
November 1702, and from that date until Easter 1706 Fanny Shaftoe says
she heard no more about them. In April 1702 Sir Theophilus died, and
was buried in St. James's, Piccadilly, where the memorial erected by
his widow may be seen.

Theophilus, the heir, probably remained a while in the far East with
Pitt; but there were Oglethorpes nearer home to dabble in the Scots
plot of that year (1704). In June several Scottish officers--Sir
George Maxwell, Captain Livingstone, and others, amounting to fifteen
or sixteen, with three ladies, one of whom was Anne Oglethorpe,
embarked at the Hague for Scotland. Sir George had tried in vain to
procure a passport from Queen Anne's envoy, so, though it was in
war-time, they sailed without one. Harley informed by Captain Lacan,
late of Galway's Foot in Piedmont, told Lord Treasurer Godolphin, who
had the party arrested on landing. The Queen, who plotted as much as
anybody on behalf of her brother, was indulgent to fellow-conspirators,
and, though it was proved their purpose had been 'to raise commotions
in Scotland,' they were soon set at liberty, and the informer sent
back to Holland with empty pockets.[33]

[Footnote 33: Boyer, _Reign of Queen Anne_.]

Anne Oglethorpe, nevertheless, having crossed without a pass, lay at
the mercy of the Government, but, as with Joseph in Egypt, her
misfortune turned into her great opportunity. The late Mr. H. Manners,
in an article in the _Dictionary of National Biography_,[34] supposes
she had been King James's mistress before she left St. Germains. Now,
see how Thackeray has misled historians! _He_ makes _Fanny_
Oglethorpe, James's mistress, 'Queen Oglethorpe,' at Bar-le-Duc in
1714. And, resting on