er the death of the others. A month
before Sir John Schaw had joined the Duke, Lady Schaw, the daughter of
Sir Hugh Dalrymple, and a woman of singular energy and spirit, assembled
the Greenock companies in arms, and telling them that the Protestant
religion, with their laws, liberties, and lives, and all that was dear
to them as men and Christians, were in hazard by that unnatural
rebellion, exhorted them to conduct themselves suitably to the occasion.

The conduct of Sinclair at the battle of Sherriff Muir was not
inconsistent with his former life. He remained, in that engagement,
stationary, with the Marquis of Huntley, at the head of the cavalry of
Fife and Aberdeen; hence the lines in the old song on Sherriff Muir.

"Huntly and Sinclair
They baith play'd the Tinkler,
With consciences black as a craw, man."

Upon the return of the Jacobite army to Perth, where they waited, as
Scott remarks in a tone of mournful reprobation of Mar, "until their own
forces should disperse, those of their enemy advance, and the wintry
storm so far subside as to permit the Duke of Argyle to advance against
them," Sinclair was the chief promoter of a scheme formed by the
Grumblers for a timely submission to Government. Instigated by their
wishes, an attempt was made by Lord Mar to procure, through the Duke of
Argyle's mediation, some terms with Government; but it failed, and those
who had embarked in the cause were obliged to provide, as they best
might, individually for their safety. The whole tenour of Sinclair's
conduct was such as to draw down upon him the severest invectives of his
party. In one of the poems of the day he is thus described:

"The master with the bully's face,
And with the coward heart,
Who never fail'd, to his disgrace,
To act a coward's part,
Did join Dunbogue, the greatest rogue,
In all the shire of Fife,
Who was the first the cause to leave,
By counsel from his wife."

The Master quitted the insurgent party at Perth, and joined the Marquis
of Huntley at Strathbogie; thence he proceeded as a fugitive through
Caithness and Orkney, with a few friends, who, like himself, were
hopeless of pardon. After wandering in these remote districts for some
time, the Master and his friends seized upon a small vessel and fled to
the Continent. The Marquis of Huntley, more fortunate than his
political ally, obtained his full pardon in consideration of his hav