Note 796 — Chapter XXVIII
Reading edition
About this time, if we may believe the accounts of the Stuart party, the spirit of Jacobitism was widely diffused in Scotland. “The violentest Whigs,” says Mr. John Stuart in a letter to Secretary Edgar from Boulogne, in February, 1744, “are become the most zealous Jacobites. My friend says that the last night of the year with us (that is to say, the prince’s birth-night,) was celebrated there (in Scotland) as publicly as we could do it here,—that he was himself in a numerous company of people of fashion, amongst whom were several officers of the army,—that the health of the day, the merry meeting, and a whole train of such, were drunk publicly,—that about the third hour, when the third bottle had banished all reserve, servants were turned out and the doors lockt, one of the company made a speech, and filled a bumper to the restoration, and damnation to every one that would not help; the whole stood to their feet, drunk the (some words are here torn away in the original,) and their hands to their swords: the officers pulled the cockades out of their hats, trampled them under feet, and then tossed them into the fire; then called for music, and serenaded the ladies with loyal tunes, songs,” &c.—Stuart Papers.