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Prestonpans and Vicinity

Cover Contents 1 2 4 6 8 10 12 14 16 18 20 22 24 26
28 30 32 33 34 36 38 40 42 44 46 48 50 52 54 56 58 60 62 64
66 68 70 72 74 76 78 80 81 82 84 86 88 90 92 94 96 98 100 102
104 106 108 110 112 114 116 118 120 122 124 126 128 130 132 134 136 138 140 142
144 146 148 150 152 154 156 158 160 162 164 166 168 170 172 174 176 177 178 180
182 184 186 188 190 192 194 196 198 200 201 202 204 206 208 209 210 212 214 216
218 220 222 224 226 228 229 230 232 234 236 238 240 242 244 246 248 249 250 252
254 256 257 258 259 260 261                          

THE CREATURE HAD DIED THE NIGHT BEFORE.
One Highlander who had become possessor of a gold watch sold it the following day for a trifling sum, triumphantly remarking, on the close of the bargain, that "the creature had died the night before. " This may be true; if so, it is evident the plunderer had known nothing about a watch. It had run down the preceding night, and stopped for want of winding.
The day after the battle Charles returned to Holyrood House, and his reception by the people of Edinburgh was great. His father was proclaimed at the Cross James VIII. of Scotland and III. of England. But public rejoicings in honour of his victory were forbidden, "on account of the great slaughter of his father's subjects. " He remained in Edinburgh till October, and spent his time there right royally.
On 3131 October 1745 he left Edinburgh with about 6000 men. He crossed the Borders, and on 9th of November he invested Carlisle, which surrendered to his forces after a three days' siege.
Charles proceeded on the 27th to Manchester, thence to Derby. Here he is said to have "awoke from his dream of ambition and paused, " the reception he met with being chilling in the extreme.
Leaving Derby he retreated into Scotland before a harrassing enemy with a celerity and good order almost unparalleled. He defeated General Hawley at Falkirk, and met with several other successes. But his short, if hitherto successful, career was rapidly drawing to a close. His exchequer was almost exhausted and his provisions rim out. His men too were getting mutinous, clamouring for arrears of pay, etc. To crown all, at this turning-point, he was compelled to give battle to a superior army under the Duke of Cumberland, and on the fatal field of Culloden, 16th April 1746, his forces were totally routed.
With a few attendants he escaped on horseback, got to the Highlands, where he continued to wander till, about a year after the Battle of Preston, 20th September 1746, when, after many romantic adventures and hairbreadth escapes, he finally embarked in a privateer, and, accompanied by the brave Lochiel, miraculously eluded the British squadron during a fog. He eventually landed on the coast of Bretagne; and thus ended the Rebellion of 1745.

PETITION.

The following is a copy of a petition presented to the editor of the Scots Magazine by certain enthusiastic towns and villages against the misnomer of Preston Battle. It tells its own story: —
"To THE AUTHOR OF THE 'SCOTS MAGAZINE, '
" The Petition of Prestonpans, Preston, Cockenzie, Seton,
and Tranent, —

"Humbly sheweth, —That, whereas from all antiquity it has been and still is the universal custom to denominate battles from the field on which they were fought, or from some town or village near to such fields, and whereas some dignity is thereby added to such fields, towns, or villages, their names made remarkable in the maps and recorded in history; witness the small village of Dittingen, which was never of such consideration as to find a place in the maps of Germany until it was celebrated by the engagement which happened near a few years ago.
"And whereas, on 21st September last, there was a battle fought on a field which is in a manner surrounded by the petitioning towns and villages, from one or other of which the said battle ought undoubtedly to derive its title.
" Nevertheless, the publishers of a certain newspaper, entitled The Caledonian Mercury, have most unjustly denominated the said battle from a moor on which it was not fought, nor near to it; in which they are followed by several people who, either through malice against your petitioners or through stupidity, have affected to call and still call it 'The Battle of Gladsmuir, ' by which practice your petitioners are, conjunctly and severally, deprived of that honour and fame which of right pertains to them, and which in all histories, future map?, and almanacs, ought to be transmitted as theirs, to latest posterity.
"Your petitioners humbly apprehend that even the conquerors themselves have no right, after a battle is once fought, to determine that it was fought on any other field than where it really was.
"Shall, then, our fruitful fields and meadow ground be called by the name of a barren moor? This, sir, is downright transubstantiation, and can be enforced by nothing less than the late fashionable argument of military execution.
" Your petitioners could have put up with such encroach-

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