rogue, one of whose eyes General Braddock had knocked out with a
bottle in a tavern brawl! Clancarty gave himself forth as a
representative of the English Jacobites, but d'Argenson, in his
'Memoires,' says he could produce no names of men of rank in the
party except his own. D'Argenson was pestered by women, priests, and
ragged Irish adventurers. In September 1745, the Earl Marischal and
Clancarty visited d'Argenson, then foreign minister of Louis XV. in
the King's camp in Flanders. They asked for aid, and the scene, as
described by the spy Macallester, on Clancarty's information, was
curious. D'Argenson taunted the Lord Marischal with not being at
Charles's side in Scotland. To the slovenly Clancarty he said, 'Sir,
your wig is ill-combed. Would you like to see my perruquier? He
manages wigs very well.' Clancarty, who wore 'an ordinary black tie-
wig,' jumped up, saying in English, 'Damn the fellow! He is making
his diversion of us.' {32a} The Lord Marischal was already on bad
personal terms with Charles. Clancarty was a ruffian, d'Argenson was
the adviser who suggested Charles's hidden and fugitive life after
1748. The singular behaviour of the Earl Marischal in 1751-1754 will
afterwards be illustrated by the letters of Pickle, who drew much of
his information from the unsuspicious old ambassador of Frederick the
Great to the Court of Versailles. It is plain that the Duke of
Ormonde was right when he said that 'too many people are meddling in
your Majesty's affairs with the French Court at this juncture'
(November 15, 1745). The Duke of York, Charles's brother, was on the
seaboard of France in autumn 1745. At Arras he met the gallant
Chevalier Wogan, who had rescued his mother from prison at Innspruck.
{32b} Clancarty, Lord Marischal, and Lally Tollendal were pressing
for a French expedition to start in aid of Charles. Sempil,
Balhaldie, Lismore, were intriguing and interfering. Voltaire wrote
a proclamation for Charles to issue. An expedition was arranged,