Introduction
In 1688, King James II (who was also James VII of Scotland) unwillingly abdicated in favour of his daughter Mary and her Dutch husband William, Prince of Orange. Many who had sworn loyalty to James felt obliged to support the Jacobite Rebellions of 1715 and 1745, and at the age of sixty-seven Alexander, 4th Lord Forbes, of Pitsligo in Aberdeenshire, found himself a fugitive from justice.
WHEN Charles Stuart came to Scotland in 1745,* hoping to reclaim the crown lost by his grandfather James II almost sixty years earlier, Alexander, 4th Lord Forbes of Pitsligo, joined the campaign out of loyalty rather than enthusiasm. In any case, he was by now sixty-seven, and struggling to mount his own horse. “My little fellow,” he said to a boy who brought him a stool, “this is the severest reproof I have yet met with, for presuming to go on such an expedition.”
After the final defeat at Culloden on April 16th, 1746, Forbes refused to leave Scotland, but there was a bounty of thirty thousand pounds on his head. He became a fugitive, wandering over the moors and sheltering in hedges or under bridges. It was a hard life for a man of his years, and he developed a hacking cough. At last, one of King George II’s dragoons did bump into him, but took him for a beggar. He gave him a few pennies, expressed sympathy for his cough, and rode on.
Charles’s grandfather, King James VII of Scotland and II of England, was ousted at the instigation of Parliament in 1688, and his crown was accepted by his daughter Mary II and her husband William II and III. See Home Page. Under William, the Act of Settlement in 1701 barred Roman Catholics (and thus James’s descendants) from inheriting the crown, and under Mary’s sister Anne the Act of Union in 1707 merged the Scottish Parliament and Crown into the English to form Great Britain. All this prompted a series of armed protests by James’s supporters in The Jacobite Rebellions.
Word Games
Sevens Based on this passage
Suggest answers to this question. See if you can limit one answer to exactly seven words.
Variations: 1.expand your answer to exactly fourteen words. 2.expand your answer further, to exactly twenty-one words. 3.include one of the following words in your answer: if, but, despite, because, (al)though, unless.
Jigsaws Based on this passage
Express the ideas below in a single sentence, using different words as much as possible. Do not be satisfied with the first answer you think of; think of several, and choose the best.
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