the Prince with earth, and killed a man who held
a led horse near him. Presently the Prince
mounted and rode along the lines of the Camerons
and Frasers, urging men, who did not understand
a word he said, to fight bravely against
the Germans and the Whigs.

They answered him with shrieks of devotion
and blessings in guttural and sonorous
Gaelic.

The duke, too, did his part in his own
domineering way—calling on Tom of Stepney,
Dick of Highgate, and Joe of Whitechapel, to
stand firm, to let the Highland savages feel the
bayonet, and know what sort of men they had
to deal with. He then ordered Wolfe's regiment
to form en potence (gibbet F-shape) at
the left wing, so as to lap round the clansmen
when they attacked the left division. He also
ordered up two more regiments from the reserve
to strengthen the second line, for there were
terrible reports of those broadsword men—how
they lopped off arms as if they were only carrots,
and could cut a dragoon clean through to the
waist at a single blow.

The duke was unwilling to attack the Prince
while he had his turf walls to guard him, and
the Prince was unwilling to surrender his
valuable shelter. But if the duke had no
heart, the Prince had no brains, for he allowed
his Highlanders to be cowed by half an hour's
cannonade; although ever since the victory at
Preston they had treated English artillery as
mere popguns, always certain to be taken by a
determined rush. In everything he showed
incompetency to govern other men or to govern
himself. At last he sent the order to charge,
but young Maclachlan, his aide-de-camp, was
killed by a cannon-ball before he reached the
front to convey it. Lord George Murray, in the
mean time, had ordered the attack without waiting
for the tardy Prince; but, even before he
could pass the order round, the Macintoshes, a
brave clan never before in action, galled by the
fire, their hot Celtic blood unable to tamely
endure the slaughter of their friends, all in a glow
with rage, had tightened their belts (scrugged),
pulled down their bonnets over their brows,
flashed out their claymores, and shouting the
war-cry of the clan, rushed from the centre
down upon Barrel's and Munro's men. A
Lowland gentleman who saw that wild charge, and
looked along the Highland lines, described
the almost supernatural passion which lit every
face and burned in every eye. After them,
swift as deer through the steel and smoke, then
rushed the Athole-men, the Camerons, Stuarts,
Frasers, and Macleans, with Lord George Murray
chivalrously waving his sword at their head.
In two minutes a torrent of steel bore down all
along the line on those firm masses that had
marched from Finchley.

The storm had broken at last. The duke's
cannon on the wings mowed them with
"cartouche" (grape?) shot. The front rank of
Cumberland's army kept their firelocks steady
at them, and swept and lashed them with fire,
while Wolfe's regiment tormented them on the
flank. It was musket against sword. The
Highlanders first fired their pistols, then flung
themselves like wild cats among the bayonets,
slashing and stabbing like madmen. The duke
must have looked anxiously through the hot
smoke; but when it drifted off, the long lines
of white gaiters were still firm in the rear,
though the front had partly gone down, the
few Highlanders left giving way before the
shattering fire. Only three of the Macintosh
officers escaped; a few still hewed at the bayonets,
and died at the very feet of the Sassenach
soldiers. One sinewy fellow, Major John
Mor Macgilvra, was seen a gun-shot past the
enemy's cannon surrounded by grenadiers, of
whom he struck down twelve before the
halberds went home to his heart. The bodies of
these fierce fighters were afterwards found in
swathes, three and four deep.

But the charge was, unfortunately, not
simultaneous. The pride of the Macdonalds was hurt
by their being removed to the left wing. They
had fought on the right of the Scottish army
ever since Bannockburn, and they thought the
change an insult and an ill omen. The true
Highlander is hot as a Welshman, and proud
as a North American Indian. He would
rather have the battle lost than acknowledge
himself unworthy of the post of honour. In
vain the Young Pretender promised to take
the name of Macdonald, and ever hereafter, if
they fought well, to place them in the van.
No. They sullenly discharged their muskets and
slowly advanced, but they would not charge.
They endured the English fire with soured and
sullen faces, only hewing at the heath with their
broadswords. When the other clans gave way,
the Macdonalds turned, too, and fled.
Heartbroken at this, their colonel, the Chieftain of
Keppoch, an excellent and chivalrous man,
exclaimed: "My God, have the children of my
tribe forsaken me?" and advanced upon the
English alone, his sword in one hand, his pistol
in the other. A devoted clansman following him
with tears and prayers, reached him just as he
was struck down by a bullet. Keppoch
replied only, "Take care of yourself," then
staggered forward till another bullet struck
him dead.

The Young Chevalier's front line was now
repulsed, but there was still a hope of the Lowland
regiments; yet there was no time to head them,
for Lord Ancrum's and Cobham's Dragoons
were now pouring in on the flanks, through the
inclosures that had been broken down by the
Argyle Highlanders. Some Irish pickets kept
up a spirited fire and checked the dragoons,
who were sabring the unhappy Macdonalds,
and one of Lord Lewis Gordon's regiments
stopped another squadron to the right; but
when the English infantry moved forward to
charge, the Highlanders fled in spite of all the
entreaties of Charles, Lord George, Lochiel,
Sheridan, Ogilvie, and Glenbucket. It was a
rout, and the sabres were after the brave men,
hot, fast, and wrathful. Yet the English
dragoons had been terribly handled. The Clan