cation.
The circumstances attending the slaughter of the Schaws argue a fierce
and vindictive temper, and the frame of mind which Sinclair displays as
an author exhibits the same character. They are, however, very curious,
and it is to be hoped will one day be made public, as a valuable
addition to the catalogue of royal and noble authors. It is singular
that the author seems to have written himself into a tolerably good
style, for the language of the Memoirs, which at first is scarcely
grammatical, becomes as he advances disengaged, correct, and
spirited."[245]

On the whole, it must be acknowledged that qualities more repulsive and
a career more culpable, have darkened no narrative connected with the
Jacobites so unpleasantly as the biography of the Master of Sinclair. A
disgrace to every party, he appears to have joined the adherents of the
Stuarts, only in order to disturb their councils, and to vilify their
memory with personal invective. He has extorted no compassion for the
errors and crimes of his earlier years by the courage and magnanimity of
a later period: his character stands forth, unredeemed by a single trait
of heroism, in all the darkness of violence and revenge.

The Barony of Sinclair, lost to the family in consequence of the
attainder of the Master of Sinclair, was not assumed either by him,
after his pardon in 1726, nor by his brother General James Sinclair. At
the death of General Sinclair in 1762, the title reverted to Charles
Sinclair, Esq., of Herdmanstown, a cousin, and after him to his son
Andrew, who also allowed his claim to the Barony to lie dormant. It was,
however, revived at his death in 1776, by his only son Charles, who is
the present Lord Sinclair.[246]

FOOTNOTES:

[226] See Proceedings of the Court Martial held upon John, Master of
Sinclair, with Correspondence, p. 27. 1828. Printed by Ballantyne and
Company. Presented to the Roxburgh Club by Sir Walter Scott.

[227] It is printed in the interesting little collection before referred
to, p. 35.

[228] Life of the Master of Sinclair, p. ix.

[229] His name is not among those who were assembled on the
hunting-field of Braemar.

[230] Reay, p. 234.

[231] See Lord Mar's Life and Letters.

[232] Life of the Master of Sinclair, page v.

[233] See Lord Mar's Life, from the Mar Papers.

[234] Mar Papers.

[235] Reay's History of the Rebellion, p. 218.

[236] Reay, p. 387.

[237] See the certificate of the Justices of Fo