some
low-born dependant, instead of his heir. Still, those who were
well-wishers to the Lovat family, built their hopes upon the virtues of
the young Master of Lovat, and they were not deceived. Although forced
by his father to quit the University of St. Andrews, where he was
studying in 1745, and to enter into the Rebellion, he retrieved that
early act by a subsequent respectability of life, and by long and
faithful services.

But there was another victim still more to be pitied, and over whose
destiny the vices of Lord Lovat exercised a still more fatal sway than
on those of his son. The story of Primrose Campbell is, perhaps, the
saddest among this catalogue of crimes and calamities.

She was the daughter of John Campbell, of Mamore, and the sister of John
Duke of Argyle, the friend and patron of Duncan Forbes; and she had
been, by Lovat's introduction, for some time a companion of his first
wife.[215] Lord Lovat, about the year 1732, became a widower. He then
cast his eyes upon the ill-fated Miss Campbell, and sought her in
marriage. The match was of great importance to him, on account of the
family connection; and Lord Lovat had reason to believe, that whatever
the young lady might think of it, her friends were not opposed to the
union. She was staying with her sister, Lady Roseberry, when Lovat
proffered his odious addresses. She to whom they were addressed, knew
him well: for she entertained the utmost abhorrence of her suitor, and
repeatedly rejected his proposals. At last, he gained her consent to the
union which he sought, by the following stratagem. Miss Campbell, while
residing still with her sister in the country, received a letter,
written apparently by her mother, and, beseeching her immediate
attendance at a particular house in Edinburgh, in which she lay at the
point of death. The young lady instantly set out, and reached the
appointed place: here, instead of beholding her mother, she was received
by the hated and dreaded Lovat.[216] She was constrained to listen to
his proffers of marriage; but she still firmly refused her assent. Upon
this, Lord Lovat told the unhappy creature that the house to which she
had been brought was one in which no respectable woman ought ever to
enter;--and he threatened to blast her character upon her continued
refusal to become his wife. Distracted, intimidated by a confinement of
several days, the young lady finally consented. She was married to the
tyrant, who conveye