But the vengeance of his uncle was of a more refined character. The stone which covered the aperture in the roof was opened, and a quantity of salted beef let down to the prisoner, who devoured it eagerly. When he had glutted himself with this food, and expected to be supplied with liquor, to quench the raging thirst which the diet had excited, a cup was lowered down, which, when he eagerly grasped it, he found to be empty! They then rolled the stone on the opening in the vault, and left the captive to perish by thirst, the most dreadful of all deaths.

Many similar stories could be told you of the wild wars of the islanders; but these may suffice at present to give you some idea of the fierceness of their manners, the low value at which they held human life, and the manner in which wrongs were revenged, and property acquired. They seem to have been accounted by King James a race whom it was impossible to subdue, conciliate, or improve by civilization; and the only remedy which occurred to him, was to settle Lowlanders in the islands, and drive away or extirpate the people by whom they were inhabited.

For this purpose, the king authorized an association of many gentlemen in the county of Fife, then the wealthiest and most civilized part of Scotland, who undertook to make a settlement in the isles of Lewis and Harris. These undertakers, as they were called, levied money, assembled soldiers, and manned a fleet with which they landed on the Lewis, and effected a settlement at Stornoway in that country. At this time the property of the Lewis was disputed between the sons of Rory MacLeod, the last lord, who had two families by separate wives. The undertakers finding the natives thus quarrelling among themselves, had little difficulty in building a small town and fortifying it; and their enterprize in the beginning assumed a promising appearance.

attracted by the name of a place which she had such awful reasons for remembering, and, on looking attentively at the man who spoke, she recognised her preserver. She called him into the house, received him in the most cordial manner, and finding that he was come from the Western Islands on some business of great importance to his family, she interested her husband in his favour, by whose influence it was speedily and successfully settled; and the Hebridean, loaded with kindness and presents, returned to his native island, with reason to congratulate himself on the humanity which he had shown in so singular a manner.

After the surprise of their fort, and the massacre of the defenders, the Fife gentlemen were tired of their undertaking; and the Lord of Kintail had the whole advantage of the dispute, for he contrived to get possession of the Lewis for himself, and transmitted it to his family, with whom it still remains. It appears, however, that King James did not utterly despair of improving the Hebrides, by means of colonization. It was supposed that the powerful Marquis of Huntly might have had strength to acquire the property, and wealth enough to pay the Crown something for the grant. The whole Archipelago was offered to him, with the exception of Skye, and Lewis, at the cheap price of ten thousand pounds Scots, or about 8001. ; but the Marquis would not give more than half the sum demanded, for what he justly considered as a permission to conquer a steril region, inhabited by a warlike race.

Such was the result of the efforts to introduce some civilization into these islands. In the next chapter we shall show that the improvement of the Highlanders on the mainland was not much more satisfactory.

CHAPTER VI.

Contempt of the Highlanders for the Arts of Peace-Story of Donald of the Hammer-Execution of the Laird of MacIntosh by order of the Marchioness of Huntly-Massacre of the Farquharsons-Race of the Trough-Execution of the Earl of Orkney.

THE size and position of the Highlands of Scotland rendered them much less susceptible of improvement than the Border districts, which, far less extensive, and less difficult of access, were now placed between two civilized and peaceful countries, instead of being the frontier of two hostile lands.

The Highlanders, on the contrary, continued the same series of wars among themselves, and incursions upon their Lowland neighbours, which had distinguished them ever since the dawn of their history. Military adventure, in one form or other, was their delight as well as their employment, and all works of industry were considered as unworthy the dignity of a mountaineer. Even the necessary task of raising a scanty crop of barley was assigned to the aged, and to the women and children. The men minded nothing but hunting and war. I will give you an account of a Highland chieftain, in character and practice not very different from that of Allan-a-Sop, the Hebridean.

But the Lord of Kintail, chief of the numerous and powerful clan of MacKenzie, was little disposed to let this fair island fall into the possession of a company of Lowland adventurers. He had himself some views of obtaining it in the name of Torquil Connaldagh MacLeod, one of the claimants who was closely connected with the family of MacKenzie, and disposed to act as his powerful ally desired. Thus privately encouraged, the islanders united themselves against the undertakers; and, after a war of various fortune, attacked their camp of Stornoway, took it by storm, burnt the fort, slew many of them, and made the rest prisoners. They were not expelled, you may be sure, without bloodshed and massacre. Some of the old persons still alive in the Lewis, talk of a very old woman, living in their youth, who used to say, that she had held the light while her countrymen were cutting the throats of the adventurers. A lady, the wife of one of the principal gentlemen in the expedition, fled from the scene of violence into a wild and pathless desert of rock and morass, called the Forest of Fannig. In this wilderness she became the mother of a child. A Hebridean, who chanced to pass on one of the ponies of the country, saw the mother and infant in the act of perishing with cold, and being struck with the misery of their condition, contrived a strange manner of preserving The Stewarts, who inhabited the district of Appin them. He killed his pony, and opening its belly, in the West Highlands, were a numerous and warand removing the entrails, he put the new born in-like clan. Appin is the title of the chief of the clan. fant and the helpless mother into the inside of the The second branch of the family was that of Invercarcass, to have the advantage of the warmth which nahyle. The founder, a second son of the House of this strange and shocking receptacle afforded. In Appin, was called by the uncommon epithet of Saoithis manner, with or without assistance, he contrived leach, or the Peaceful. One of his neighbours was to bear them to some place of security, where the the Lord of Dunstaffnage, called Cailen Unine, or lady remained till she could get back in safety to her Green Colin, from the green colour which predomiown country. She became, after this wonderful nated in his tartans. This Green Colin surprised escape, the wife of a person of consequence and in- the peaceful Laird of Invernahyle, assassinated him, fluence in Edinburgh, a Judge, I believe, of the Court burnt his house, and destroyed his whole family, of Session. excepting an infant at the breast.

One evening, while she looked from the window This infant did not owe its safety to the mercy of of her house in the Cannongate, just as a heavy Green Colin, but to the activity and presence of storm was coming on, she heard a man in the High-mind of his nurse. Finding she could not escape land dress say to another with whom he was walking, "This would be a rough night for the Forest of Fannig." The lady's attention was immediately

the pursuit of that chief's attendants, the faithful nurse determined to provide for the safety of her foster-child, whose life she knew was aimed at, in

CHAP. VI.1

3H SCOTTISH HISTORY.

the only manner which remained. She therefore hid the infant in a small fissure, or cave, of a rock, and as the only means she had of supplying him with subsistence, hung by a string round his neck a large piece of lard. The poor woman had only time to get a little way from the place where she had concealed her charge, when she was made prisoner by the pursuers. As she denied any knowledge where the child was, they dismissed her as a person of no consequence, but not until they had kept her two or three days in close confinement, menacing her with death unless she would discover what she had done with the infant.

When she found herself at liberty and unobserved, she went to the hole in which she had concealed her charge, with little hope save of finding such relics as wolves, wild cats, or birds of prey, might have left after feasting upon its flesh, but still with the pious wish to consign the remains of her dault, or foster-child, to some place of Christian burial. But her joy and surprise were extreme to find the child still alive and well, having lived during her absence by sucking the lard, which it had reduced to a very small morsel, scarce larger than a hazelnut. The delighted nurse made all haste to escape with her charge to the neighbouring district of Moidart, of which she was a native, being the wife of the smith of the clan of MacDonald, to whom that country belonged; the mother of the infant thus miraculously rescued had also been a daughter of this tribe.

At length the powerful Earl of Argyle resented the injuries which were offered to his clansmen and kindred. The Stewarts of Appin refused to support their kinsman against an enemy so formidable, and insisted that he should seek for peace with the Earl. So that Donald, left to himself, and sensible that he was unable to withstand the force which might be brought against him by this mighty chief, endeavoured to propitiate his favour by placing himself in his hands.

To ensure the safety of her foster-child, the nurse persuaded her husband to bring it up as their own son. The smith, you must remark, of a Highland tribe, was a person of considerable consequence. His skill in forging armour and weapons was usually united with dexterity in using them, and with the strength of body which his profession required. If I recollect right, the smith usually ranked as third officer in the chief's household. The young Donald Stewart, as he grew up, was distinguished for great personal strength. He became skilful in his fosterfather's art, and so powerful, that he could, it is said, wield two fore-hammers, one in each hand, for hours together. From this circumstance, he gained the name of Donuil nen Ord, that is, Donald of the Hammer, by which he was all his life distinguished. When he attained the age of twenty-one, Donald's foster-father, the smith, observing that his courage and enterprise equalled his personal strength, thought fit to discover to him the secret of his birth, the injuries which he had received from Green Colin of Dunstaffnage, and the pretensions which he had to the property of Invernahyle, now in the possession of the man who had slain his father, and usurped his inheritance. He concluded his discovery by presenting to his beloved foster-child his own six sons to be his followers and defenders for life and death, and his assistants in the recovery of his patrimony.

Law of every description was unknown in the Highlands. Young Donald proceeded in his enterprise by hostile measures. In addition to his six foster-brethren, he got some assistance from his mother's kindred, and levied among the old adherents of his father, and his kinsmen of the house of Appin, such additional force, that he was able to give battle to Green Colin, whom he defeated and slew, regaining at the same time his father's house and estate of Invernahyle. This success had its dangers; for it placed the young chief in feud with all the families of the powerful clan of Campbell, to which the slain Dunstaffnage belonged by alliance at least, for Green Colin and his ancestors had assumed the name, and placed themselves under the banner, of this formidable clan, although originally they were chieftains of a different and independent race. The feud became more deadly, when, not satisfied with revenging himself on the immediate authors of his early misfortune, Donald made inroads on the Campbells in their own dominions; in evidence of which his historian quotes a verse to this purpose

Donald of the Smithy, the Son of the Hammer,

Fill'd the banks of Lochawe with mourning and clamour.

Son of dark Colin, thou dangerous Earl,

Small is the boon that I crave at thy hand;
Enough if in safety from bondage and peril,

Thou lett'st me return to my kindred and land.
The Earl was too generous to avail himself of
the advantage which Invernahyle's confidence had
afforded him, but he could not abstain from maintain-
ing the conversation thus begun, in a gibing tone.
tom, allied to his mode of education, and the haughti-
Donuil nan Ord was harsh-featured, and had a cus-
ness of his character, of throwing back his head, and
laughing loudly with his mouth wide open. In ridi-
cule of this peculiarity, Argyle, or one of his attendants,
pointed out to his observation, a rock in the neigh-
bourhood, which bore a singular resemblance to a
human face, with a large mouth much thrown back,
and open as if laughing a horse laugh. "Do you see
it is called Gaire Granda, or the Ugly Laugh."
Yonder crag ?" they said to Donald of the Hammer,
Donald felt the intended gibe, and as Argyle's lady was
a plain and haughty woman, he replied, without hesi
Ugly the sneer of yon cliff of the hill,
tation, in a verse like the following

Nature has stamp'd the grim laugh on the place>
Seek for a grimmer and uglier still,

You will find it at home in your countess's face.
Argyle took the raillery of Donald in good part, but
would not make peace with him, until he agreed to
make two creaghs, or inroads, one upon Moidart, and
one upon Athole. It seems probable that the purpose
of Argyle was to engage his troublesome neighbour in
a feud with other clans to whom he bore no good-
will; for whether he of the Hammer fell or was.
successful, the Earl, in either event, would gain a
certain advantage. Donald accepted peace with the
Campbells on these terms.

On his return home, Donald communicated to MacDonald of Moidart the engagement he had come under; and that chieftain, his mother's kinsman and ally, concerted that Invernahyle and his band should plunder certain villages in Moidart, the inhabitants of which had offended him, and on whom he desired chastisement should be inflicted. The incursion of Donald the Hammerer punished them to some purpose, and so far he fulfilled his engagement to Argyle, without making an enemy of his own kinsman. With the Athole men, as more distant and unconnected with him, Donald stood on less ceremony, and made more than one successful creagh upon them. His name was now established as one of the most formidable marauders known in the Highlands, and a very bloody action which he sustained against the family of the Grahams of Monteith, made him more dreaded.

The Earls of Monteith, you must know, had a castle situated upon an island in the lake, or loch, as it is called, of the same name. But though this residence which occupied almost the whole of the islet upon which its ruins still exist, was a strong and safe place times, it had this inconvenience, that the stables, cowof abode, and adapted accordingly to such perilous houses, poultry-yard, and other domestic offices, were necessarily separated from the castle, and situated on

120

the mainland, as it would have been impossible to the spade out of an awkward fellow's hand, and dig be constantly transporting the animals belonging to a little himself, to show him how to use it. This the establishment to and fro from the shore to the last act of degeneracy drove the Hammerer frantic; island. These offices, therefore, were constructed on he seized a currah, or boat covered with hides, which the banks of the lake, and in some sort defenceless. was near, jumped into it, and pushed across the It happened on one occasion that there was to be a stream, with the determination of destroying the son, great entertainment in the castle, and a number of who had, in his opinion, brought such anutterable the Grahams were assembled. The occasion, it is disgrace upon his family. The poor agriculturist, said, was a marriage in the family. To prepare for seeing his father approach in such haste, and having this feast, much provision was got ready, and in par- a shrewd guess of the nature of his paternal intenticular a great deal of poultry had been collected. tions, fled into the house and hid himself. Donald While the feast was preparing, an unhappy chance followed with his drawn weapon; but, deceived by brought Donald of the Hammer to the side of the passion and darkness, he plunged his sword into the lake, returning at the head of a band of hungry body of one whom he saw lying on the bed-clothes. followers, whom he was conducting homewards to Instead of his son, for whom the blow was intended, the West Highlands, after some of his usual excur- it lighted on the old foster-mother, to whom he owed sions into Stirlingshire. Seeing so much good vict- his life in infancy and education in youth, and slew uals ready, and being possessed of an excellent appe- her on the spot. After this misfortune, Donald betite, the western Highlanders neither asked questions, came deeply affected with remorse; and, giving up or waited for an invitation, but devoured all the provi- all his estates to his children, he retired to the Abbey sions that had been prepared or the Grahams, and of Saint Columbus, in Ionia, and passed the remainthen went on their way rejoicing, through the difficult der of his days as a monk. and dangerous path which leads from the banks of the loch of Monteith. through the mountains to the side of Loch Katrine.

The Grahams were filled with the highest indignation. Nothing in those fierce times was so contemptible as an individual who would suffer himself to be plundered without exacting satisfaction and revenge, and the loss of their dinner probably aggravated their sense of the insult. The company who were assembled at the castle of Monteith, headed by the Earl himself, hastily took to their boats, and, disembarking on the northern side of the lake, pursued with all speed the marauders and their leader. They came up with Donald's party in the gorge of a pass, near a rock, called Craig-Vad, or the Wolf's cliff. Here the Grahams called, with loud insults, on the Appin men to stand, and one of them, in allusion to the execution which had been done amongst the >poultry, exclaimed in verse

They're brave gallants, these Appin men
To twist the throat of cock and hen!

Donald instantly replied to the reproach-
And if we be of Appin's line,

We'll twist a goose's neck in thine.

So saying, he shot the unlucky scoffer with an arrow. The battle then began, and was continued with much fury till night came. The Earl of Monteith and many of his noble kinsmen fell, while Donald, favoured by darkness, escaped with a single attendant. The Grahams obtained from the cause of quarrel the nickname of Gramoch and Garrigh, or Grahams of the hens; although they certainly lost no honour in the encounter, having fought like gamecocks.

Donald of the Hammer was twice married. His second marriage was highly displeasing to his eldest son, whom he had by his first wife. This young man, whose name was Duncan, seems to have partaken rather of the disposition of his grandfather, Alister Saoileach, or the Peaceful, than of the turbulent spirit of his father the Hammerer. He quitted the family mansion in displeasure, and passed to a farm called Inverfalla, which his father had bestowed upon his nurse in reward for her eminent services. Duncan lived with this valued connexion of the family, who was now in the extremity of old age, and amused himself with attempting to improve the cultivation of the farm; a task which not only was considered as far below the dignity of a highland gentleman, but even regarded as the last degree of degradation.

The idea of his son's occupying himself with agricultural operations struck so much shame and anger into the heart of Donald the Hammerer, that his resentment against him became ungovernable. At length, as he walked by his own side of the river, and looked towards Inverfalla, he saw, to his extreme displeasure, a number of men employed in digging and levelling the soil for some intended crop. Soon after, he had the additional mortification to see his son come out and mingle with the workmen, as if giving them directions; and, finally, beheld him take

It may easily be believed, that there was little peace and quiet in a country abounding with such men as the Hammerer, who thought the practice of honest industry on the part of a gentleman was an act of degeneracy, for which nothing short of death was an adequate punishment; so that the disorderly state of the Highlands was little short of that of the Isles. Still, however, many of the principal chiefs attended occasionally at the court of Scotland; others were frequently obliged to send their sons to be educated there, who were retained as hostages for the peaceful behaviour of the clan; so that by degrees they came to improve with the increasing civilization of the times.

The authority also of the great nobles, who held estates in or adjacent to the Highlands, was a means, though a rough one, of making the district over which they exercised their power, submit, in a certain degree, to the occasional influence of the laws. It is true, that the great Earls of Huntly, Argyle, Sutherland, and other nobles, did not enforce the Lowland institutions upon their Highland vassals out of mere zeal for their civilization, but rather because, by taking care to secure the power of the sovereign and the laws on their own side, they could make the infraction of them by the smaller independent chiefs the pretext for breaking down entire clans, and binding them to their own authority.

I will give you an example of the manner in which a noble lady chastised a Highland chief in the reign of James the Sixth. The head of the House of Gordon, then Marquis of Huntly, was by far the most powerful lord in the northern counties, and exercised great influence over the Highland clans who inhabited the mountains of Badenoch, which lay behind his extensive domains. One of the most ancient is that of MacIntosh, a word which means Child of the Thane, as they boast their descent from MacDuff, the celebrated Thane of Fife.

This haughty race having fallen at variance with the Gordons, William MacIntosh, their chief, carried his enmity to so great a pitch, as to surprise and burn the Castle of Auchindown, belonging to the Gordon family. The Marquis of Huntly vowed the severest vengeance. He moved against the MacIntoshes with his own chivalry; and he let loose upon the devoted tribe, all such neighbouring clans as would do any thing, as the old phrase was, for his love or for his fear.

MacIntosh, after a short struggle, found himself unequal to sustain the conflict, and saw that he must either behold his clan totally exterminated, or contrive some mode of pacifying Huntly's resentment. Of the last he saw no chance, save by surrendering himself into the power of the Marquis, and thus personally atoning for the offence which he had committed. To perform this act of generous devotion with as much chance of safety as possible, he chose a time when the Marquis himself was absent, and asking for the lady, whom he judged likely to prove less inexorable than her husband, he presented himself as the unhappy Laird of MacIntosh, who came

CHAP. VII.]

to deliver himself up to the Gordon, to answer for his burning of Auchindown, and only desired that Huntly would spare his clan.

The Marchioness, a stern and haughty woman, had shared deeply in her husband's resentment. She regarded MacIntosh with a stern eye, as the hawk or eagle contemplates the prey within its clutch, and having spoken a word aside to her attendants, replied to the suppliant chief in this man"MacIntosh, you have offended the Gordon so deeply, that Huntly has sworn by his father's soul, that he will never pardon you, till he has brought your neck to the block."-"I will stoop even to that humiliation, to secure the safety of my father's house," said MacIntosh. And as this interview passed in the kitchen of the Castle at Bog of Gicht, he undid the collar of his doublet, and kneeling down before the huge block on which, in the rude hospitality of the time, the slain bullocks and sheep were broken up for use, he laid his neck upon it, expecting, doubtless, that the lady would be satisfied with this token of unreserved submission. But the inexorable Marchioness made a sign to the cook, who stepped forward with his hatchet raised, and struck MacIntosh's head from his body.

burdened with all the expense of maintaining them.
"my sword helped to make these poor children or-
phans, and it is not fair that your lordship should be
You have supported them for a year and a day-
Huntly was tired of the joke of the pig-trough, and
allow me now to take them to Castle-Grant, and
keep them for the same time at my cost.'"
willingly consented to have the undisciplined rabble
of children taken off his hands. He troubled himself
no more about them; and the Laird of Grant, carry-
ing them to his castle, had them dis ersed among his
clan, and brought up decently, giving them his own
name of Grant; but it is said their descendants are
still called the Race of the Trough, to distinguish
them from the families of the tribe into which they
were adopted.

These are instances of the severe authority exercised by the great barons over their Highland neighbours and vassals. Still that authority produced regard to the laws, which they would not otherwise have received. These mighty lords, though possessed of great power in their jurisdictions, never affected England, without the consent of the King of Scotentire independence, as had been done by the old Lords of the Isles, who made peace and war with Another story, and I will change the subject. It land; whereas, Argyle, Huntly, and others, always is also of the family of Gordon; not that they were used at least the pretext of the king's name and auby any means more hard-hearted than other Scot- thority, and were, from babit and education, less apt tish barons, who had feuds with the Highlanders, but to practise wild stretches of arbitrary power than the because it is the readiest which occurs to my recol-native chiefs of the Highlands. In proportion, thereIt must not here be forgotten, that the increase of lection. The Farquharsons of Dee side, a bold and fore, as the influence of the nobles increased, the warlike people, inhabiting the dales of Brae-mar, had country approached more nearly to civilization. taken offence at, and slain, a gentleman of consequence, named Gordon of Brackley. The Marquis power acquired by the sovereign, had been felt seof Huntly summoned his forces, to take a bloody verely by one of his great feudal lords, for exercising vengeance for the death of a Gordon; and that none violence and oppression, even in the most distant of the guilty tribe might escape, communicated with extremity of the empire. The Earl of Orkney, dethe Laird of Grant, a very powerful chief, who was scended from a natural son of James V., and of an ally of Huntly, and a relation, I believe, to the course a cousin-german of the reigning monarch, slain Baron of Brackley. They agreed, that, on a had indulged hin self in extravagant excesses of arday appointed, Grant, with his clan in arms, should bitrary authority amongst the wild recesses of the occupy the upper end of the vale of Dee, while the Orkney and Zetland islands. He had also, it was Gordons should ascend the river from beneath, each alleged, shown some token of a wish to assume party killing, burning, and destroying, without mercy, sovereign power, and had caused his natural son to whatever and whomsoever they found before them. defend the Castle of Kirkwall, by force of arms, A terrible massacre was made among the Farquhar- against the King's troops. For these offences the sons, taken at unawares, and placed betwixt two earl was tried and executed at Edinburgh; and his enemies. Almost all the men and women of the punishment struck such terror among the aristorace were slain, and when the day was done, Huntly cracy, as made even those great lords, whose power found himself encumbered with about two hundred lay in the most distant and inaccessible places of orphan children, whose parents had been killed. Scotland, disposed to be amenable to the royal auWhat became of them, you shall presently hear.h thority, About a year after this foray, the Laird of Grant chanced to dine at the Marquis's castle. He was, of course, received with kindness, and entertained with magnificence. After dinner was over, Huntly said to his guest, that he would show him some rare sport. Accordingly, he conducted Grant to a balcony, which, as was frequent in old mansions, overlooked the kitchen, perhaps to permit the lady to give an Injurious Effects to Scotland of the Removal of the Court to occasional eye to the operations there. The numerous servants of the Marquis and his visiters had already dined, and Grant beheld all the remains of the victuals flung at random into a large trough, like that out of which swine feed. While Grant was wondering what this could mean, the master cook gave a signal with his silver whistle; on which a hatch, like that of a dog-kennel, was raised, and there rushed into the kitchen, some shrieking, some shouting, some yelling-not a pack of hounds, which, in number, noise, and tumult, they greatly resembled, but a huge mob of children, half naked, and totally wild in their manners, who threw themselves on the contents of the trough, and fought, struggled, and clamoured, each to get the largest share.

THE Scottish people were soon made sensible, that if their courtiers and great men made fortunes by King James's favour, the nation at large was not enriched by the union of the crowns. Edinburgh was no longer the residence of a Court, whose exwhose sole trade had been war and battle, were dependiture, though very moderate, was diffused among her merchants and citizens, and was so far of importance. The sons of the gentry and better classes, Grant was a man of humanity, and did not see in prived of employment by the general peace with fitted to the genius of the Scots, who have always that degrading scene all the amusement which his England, and the nation was likely to feel all the disnoble host had intended to afford him. "In the tress arising from an excess of population. The name of Heaven," he said, "who are these unfor-wars on the Continent afforded a resource peculiarly tunate creatures that are fed like so many pigs?"They are the children of those Farquharsons whom had a disposition for visiting foreign parts. we s ew last year on Dee side," answered Huntly. "My lord," he said, The Laird felt more shocked than it would have been prudent or polite to express. VOL. VI.-P

The celebrated Thirty Years' War, as it was called, ade of Scots were engaged in the service of Gustavus was now raging in Germany, and a large national brig