Examination of the claim of John Lindsay Crawfurd

28 EXAMINATION OF THE CLAIM OF
quality, and there he remained until his decease in 1765." Mr Bell
then alludes to the testimonies of Christian Orr and others ; but
they are more fully given in the case next to be noticed, and will
be afterwards quoted. They are not only referred to, but believed
in, by Mr Bell.
case pub- The next printed Case for the claimant, was that published in
182I ,B London in September 1824, after the investigation of Messrs Buck-
ton and Bowie had been completed, and after they had made their
report to the gentlemen who interested themselves in support of
the claimant's cause. This Case displayed great ability ; but talent
was never so ill employed, as will be shown in the sequel. The
writer of this Case, after a general introduction and history of the
Crawfurd family, comes down to the Honourable James Crawfurd,
who was born at Kilbirnie on the 15th March, 1700, and then says,
ibid. P . a " At a very early age we find him entering into active life. Un-
fortunately for him, he was early enabled to gratify passions over
which he seems to have had but little control. It appears that he
became attached during this period to Lady Susan Kennedy, after-
wards Countess of Eglinton. This attachment involved him in a
contest with a young man of high rank, and the result was a duel.
James Crawfurd is stated to have acted precipitately in the duel
and to have killed his antagonist unfairly. Distracted at the com-
mission of this unwarrantable act, which, at the period in question,
was a capital crime, James Crawfurd fled, and secreted himself. A
strict search was made after him, and on one occasion it was nearly
successful. Once, and once only, he ventured to come over to Ugdale,
the then residence of his sister, Lady Margaret M'Neil. The fact
having been by some unknown means disclosed, a party of soldiers
came over to the house, and a most rigorous, though unavailing,
scrutiny of the place was the result. Alarmed at this, and at the
fatal consequences in which a caption would have involved him, he
fled to Dublin, and introduced himself to Colonel Joshua Dawson,
the father of Arthur Dawson, one of the Barons of his Majesty's
Court of Exchequer in Ireland, and with whom the Honourable
James Crawfurd's father and elder brother were intimately ac-
quainted. Apprized of his danger, Colonel Dawson carried his guest