• LORD , LOVAT.* "Iv may be a matter of
opinion," says Mr. Mackenzie in his introduction, "whether after all Simon Fraser is worthy of a biography "; but be is evidently in no doubt on the point himself, and he brings sympathy, insight, and the enthusiasm of a fellow-countryman to bear upon his subject, which, coupled with a refreshing directness and simplicity of style, result in a very entertaining volume. Lovat's former biographer, Dr. Hill Burton, was at no pains to whitewash his character ; indeed, he dealt with him in a way which renders any further indictment superfluous ; and Mr. Mackenzie makes a conscientious endeavour to be impartial, while utilising a considerable body of information unknown to, or disregarded by, Dr. Burton. Lovat's own Memoirs he finds, after verifica- tion by contemporary documents, to be in the main correct as to essentials ; Major Fraser's Manuserz'pe, which was Published too late to be of service to the former biographer, he utilises with discrimination, and to good purpose; and the "Additional Manuscripts" at the British Museum have proved a'valuable Bonnie of fresh facts. The result is a fuller, more intimate, and more intelligible, if not more likeable, picture of Simon. Prager than we have yet had, and one in 'which
• Simon Fraser, Lord Lovat Iris Life and. Times. By W. C. Mackenzie, (Boot.) London: Choptnan and Hall. [10a. Od. not. J
ample justice is done to the whole-hearted, deliberate, and amazingly successful political duplicity which he practised in an age when the atmosphere was surcharged with suspicion, and when mere cognisance of schemes such as he carried through in triumph resulted in the public ruin, and sometimes the death, of men of less strategic ability.
Dispossessed when a boy of the heritage he had every reason to expect, he contrived by one means or another to realise his chief ambition, and win against extraordinary odds the power to play the part of feudal lord to the Lovat clan. For nearly half-a-century be kept the balance of his allegiance nicely adjusted between the Courts of St. James and St. Germain; and not till the Rebellion of '45 found him with a crippled constitution and a failing capacity for the masterly intrigue of his former years were the sorely tried victors of Culloden able to lay him by the heels and bale him to the block on a verdict that was virtually predetermined. He flattered his accusers and his Judges so long as he thought flattery would serve any purpose, but he came out in his true colours at the end, and died an avowed Jacobite and Roman Catholic, with a tag of Horace about patriotism on his lips. From the days of Lovat's early manhood, when be sought by means of a forced marriage (to which, thinks Mr. Mackenzie, the lady may not have been an unwilling victim) to regain the estates he had been despoiled of, contrary to all clan custom, in favour of a girl, down to the days when, awaiting for the death-sentence to be carried out, be yet retained enough of his old spirit to remark to the Major of the Tower : "I am preparing myself, Sir, for a place where hardly any majors and very few lieutenant-generals go," Mr. Mackenzie has told briskly and with discrimination the facts of a life of remarkable vicissitude, and in doing so has included much that is new and of interest. A detailed description of the hitherto mysterious transactions on which Lovat was engaged at the beginning of the eighteenth century, and the discovery of the letters of a certain "Limy Jones," whom, it would appear, be was anxious to marry, and may indeed have married, are among the most interesting features of a comprehensive and entertaining volume.
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