eir escape to Skye, Lewis, and other of the
north-western islands, till ships came to their relief and carried them
abroad.[239] What was the fate of the Earl of Southesk afterwards is not
known: neither what became of his descendant.[240] He had married the
Lady Margaret Stewart, daughter of the Earl of Galloway, and by her,
according to some accounts, he had two sons; according to a contemporary
Scottish peerage, he had one child only. His widow also went on the
Continent, and the mention of her name by her brother, the Earl of
Galloway, in a letter written at Clery in France,[241] without that of
her husband, in May 1730, appears to indicate that she was then a widow,
and not married again.[242]

How long Lady Southesk lived, the wife of the Master of Sinclair, is
dubious. He survived her, and married afterwards, Emilia the daughter of
Lord George Murray, brother of the Duke of Atholl. This intimate
connection with one of the principal leaders of the Rebellion of 1745,
did not, however, induce the Master to enter a second time into a course
towards which he had, perhaps in truth, no sincere good will.

Upon his flight to the Continent, the Master of Sinclair was outlawed,
and attainted in blood for his share in the Insurrection of 1715. His
father being still alive, and not having taken an active part, his
estates escaped forfeiture, and Lord Sinclair endeavoured so to dispose
of them as to prevent their becoming the property of the Crown. It was
necessary, on this account, that Lord Sinclair should disinherit his
eldest son; and "as it would," says Sir Walter Scott, "have been highly
impolitic to have alleged his forfeiture for treason as a cause of the
deed, the slaughter of the Schaws was given as a reason for his
exheredation." The following is a clause of the deed by which the end
was to be accomplished:

"This new diposition of the family estate is explained and qualified by
the second deed, being a back bond running in the names of the said
James and William Sinclairs, which set forth that their father had been
induced to grant a disposition of his estate in their favour, and to
pass over their elder brother, to prevent all inconvenience and hazard
whatsoever which the rents of the said Lord Sinclair, his heritable
estate, or his moveables, might be liable to, if they were settled in
the said Master's person, '_on accompt of the said Master of Sinclair
his present circumstances, by means of an unfortunate qu