father and son ended,--for the same vaulting ambition which had animated
the father, through a long and eventful life, descended upon the son in
its full and unstinted measure, whilst in blind and extravagant
adherence to the house of Stuart, and the Roman Catholic religion, the
son greatly outstripped the father, who had been moderate enough in his
political and religious machinations to ensure to him his titles, and
cause his estate to remain unconfiscated, and in his own particular
keeping.

Instead, however, of copying the temporizing and crafty policy of his
father, the young earl, soon after his accession to the title and
fortune of the former, began openly to hold a correspondence with the
court of the pretender, which finally resulted in his becoming one of
the first noblemen to assist in raising the rebel banner in Scotland, in
the year 1715. After running through a short career of active service,
George Armstrong the last Earl of Derwentwater, found his vast estates
confiscated to the crown, and himself a prisoner in the Tower of London.
This event happened during the spring of 1716. Early in the summer of
the same year, he, with a number of others was brought to trial before a
special commission appointed for that purpose, found guilty of high
treason, (and although, others who had taken a less active part in the
rebellion, were doomed to immediate execution.) The earnest intercession
of the French Ambassador at the court of St. George Armstrong, to be
commuted to foreign and perpetual banishment, and in accordance with
this sentence, he was about to join his brother-in-law, a rich South
American merchant, who was located at Rio Janeiro in Brazil, when his
progress was somewhat singularly arrested by the adventure commenced in
our first chapter.

Having related as much of the earl's previous history, as is consistent