DIGITISED MANUSCRIPTS

amounted to about five and a half millions: in Scot- land to little more than one million. Knowledge and education were confined within a narrow range ; steam and electricity were still undreamed of ; the newspaper press was in its infancy; and communi- cations were as defective as information was scarce. In England the old chivalrous feeling of blind and unconditional homage to the legitimate king had not been extinguished by the newly-born forces of politi- cal thought and democratic power. In Scotland the feudal system of clanship still acted as a strong stimulant to loyalty. The wild and romantic character of the Highlands inspired the bard in his praise of the legitimate sovereign beyond the sea, whom distance and misfortune transfigured and en- nobled. No wonder, therefore, that on the one hand the sentiments of dreamy idealists found a wide theme of romance in the sufferings of the exiled Prince, and that on the other, the Stuarts were liable to mistake the exaggerated promises and impassioned accents of a few enthusiasts for the unanimous voice of the nation. . Indolent, irresolute, licentious, and bigoted ; tall, meagre, and melancholy in aspect, the Old Pre- tender was said to be ‘ without any of the particular features of the Stuarts, yet to have had the strong lines and fatality of air peculiar to them all.’ He was married to a Polish princess, who bore him two