On Scotch Gentility-Nonsense — Charlie O’er the Waterism

Of the literature just alluded to Scott was the inventor. It is founded on the fortunes and misfortunes of the Stuart family, of which Scott was the zealous defender and apologist, doing all that in his power lay to represent the members of it as noble, chivalrous, high-minded, unfortunate princes; though, perhaps, of all the royal families that ever existed upon earth, this family was the worst. It was unfortunate enough, it is true; but it owed its misfortunes entirely to its crimes, viciousness, bad faith, and cowardice. Nothing will be said of it here until it made its appearance in England to occupy the English throne.

The first of the family which we have to do with, James, was a dirty, cowardly miscreant, of whom the less said the better. His son, Charles I., was a tyrant, exceedingly cruel and revengeful, but weak and dastardly; he caused a poor fellow to be hanged in London, who was not his subject, because he had heard that the unfortunate creature had once bit his own glove at Cadiz, in Spain, at the mention of his name; and he permitted his own bull-dog, Strafford, to be executed by his own enemies, though the only crime of Strafford was that he had barked furiously at those enemies, and had worried two or three of them when Charles shouted, ‘Fetch ’em!’ He was a bitter, but yet a despicable, enemy, and the coldest and most worthless of friends; for though he always hoped to be able some time or other to hang his enemies, he was always ready to curry favour with them, more especially if he could do so at the expense of his friends. He was the haughtiest yet meanest of mankind. He once caned a young nobleman for appearing before him in the drawing-room not dressed exactly according to the court etiquette; yet he condescended to flatter and compliment him who, from principle, was his bitterest enemy — namely, Harrison, when the Republican colonel was conducting him as a prisoner to London. His bad faith was notorious; it was from abhorrence of the first public instance which he gave of his bad faith — his breaking his word to the Infanta of Spain, that the poor Hiberno–Spainard bit his glove at Cadiz; and it was his notorious bad faith which eventually cost him his head; for the Republicans would gladly have spared him, provided they could have put the slightest confidence in any promise, however solemn, which he might have made to them. Of them it would be difficult to say whether they most hated or despised him. Religion he had none. One day he favoured Popery; the next, on hearing certain clamours of the people, he sent his wife’s domestics back packing to France, because they were Papists. Papists, however, should make him a saint, for he was certainly the cause of the taking of Rochelle.

His son, Charles the Second, though he passed his youth in the school of adversity, learned no other lesson from it than the following one — take care of yourself, and never do an action, either good or bad, which is likely to bring you into any great difficulty; and this maxim he acted up to as soon as he came to the throne. He was a Papist, but took especial care not to acknowledge his religion, at which he frequently scoffed, till just before his last gasp, when he knew that he could lose nothing, and hoped to gain everything by it. He was always in want of money, but took care not to tax the country beyond all endurable bounds, preferring, to such a bold and dangerous course, to become the secret pensioner of Louis, to whom, in return for his gold, he sacrificed the honour and interests of Britain. He was too lazy and sensual to delight in playing the part of a tyrant himself; but he never checked tyranny in others, save in one instance. He permitted beastly butchers to commit unmentionable horrors on the feeble, unarmed, and disunited Covenanters of Scotland, but checked them when they would fain have endeavoured to play the same game on the numerous, united, dogged, and warlike Independents of England. To show his filial piety, he bade the hangman dishonour the corpses of some of his father’s judges, before whom, when alive, he ran like a screaming hare; but permitted those who had lost their all in supporting his father’s cause, to pine in misery and want. He would give to a painted harlot a thousand pounds for a loathsome embrace, and to a player or buffoon a hundred for a trumpery pun, but would refuse a penny to the widow or orphan of an old Royalist soldier. He was the personification of selfishness; and as he loved and cared for no one, so did no one love or care for him. So little had he gained the respect or affection of those who surrounded him, that after his body had undergone an after-death examination, parts of it were thrown down the sinks of the palace, to become eventually the prey of the swine and ducks of Westminster.

His brother, who succeeded him, James the Second, was a Papist, but sufficiently honest to acknowledge his Popery, but, upon the whole, he was a poor creature; though a tyrant, he was cowardly; had he not been a coward he would never have lost his throne. There were plenty of lovers of tyranny in England who would have stood by him, provided he would have stood by them, and would, though not Papists, have encouraged him in his attempt to bring back England beneath the sway of Rome, and perhaps would eventually have become Papists themselves; but the nation raising a cry against him, and his son-inlaw, the Prince of Orange, invading the country, he forsook his friends — of whom he had a host, but for whom he cared little — left his throne, for which he cared a great deal, and Popery in England, for which he cared yet more, to their fate, and escaped to France, from whence, after taking a little heart, he repaired to Ireland, where he was speedily joined by a gallant army of Papists whom he basely abandoned at the Boyne, running away in a most lamentable condition at the time when, by showing a little courage, he might have enabled them to conquer. This worthy, in his last will, bequeathed his heart to England, his right arm to Scotland, and his bowels to Ireland. What the English and Scotch said to their respective bequests is not known, but it is certain that an old Irish priest, supposed to have been a great-grand-uncle of the present Reverend Father Murtagh, on hearing of the bequest to Ireland, fell into a great passion, and, having been brought up at ‘Paris and Salamanca,’ expressed his indignation in the following strain: ‘Malditas sean tus tripas! teniamos bastante del olor de tus tripas al tiempo de tu nuida dela batalla del Boyne!’

His son, generally called the Old Pretender, though born in England, was carried in his infancy to France, where he was brought up in the strictest principles of Popery, which principles, however, did not prevent him becoming (when did they ever prevent anyone?) a worthless and profligate scoundrel. There are some doubts as to the reality of his being a son of James, which doubts are probably unfounded, the grand proof of his legitimacy being the thorough baseness of his character. It was said of his father that he could speak well, and it may be said of him that he could write well — the only thing he could do which was worth doing, always supposing that there is any merit in being able to write. He was of a mean appearance, and, like his father, pusillanimous to a degree. The meanness of his appearance disgusted, and his pusillanimity discouraged the Scotch when he made his appearance amongst them in the year 1715, some time after the standard of rebellion had been hoisted by Mar. He only stayed a short time in Scotland, and then, seized with panic, retreated to France, leaving his friends to shift for themselves as they best could. He died a pensioner of the Pope.

The son of this man, Charles Edward, of whom so much in latter years has been said and written, was a worthless, ignorant youth, and a profligate and illiterate old man. When young, the best that can be said of him is that he had occasionally springs of courage, invariably at the wrong time and place, which merely served to lead his friends into inextricable difficulties. When old, he was loathsome and contemptible to both friend and foe. His wife loathed him, and for the most terrible of reasons; she did not pollute his couch, for to do that was impossible — he had made it so vile; but she betrayed it, inviting to it not only Alfieri the Filthy, but the coarsest grooms. Doctor King, the warmest and almost last adherent of his family, said that there was not a vice or crime of which............