THE POPULAR EDUCATOR. 



ready to settle the quarrel by the arbitrament of the sword. To 

 the King of Scotland and England they confessed a certain sort 

 of allegiance, which they were quite ready to renounce whenever 

 the king's pleasure ran counter to their own ; but when they 

 once threw in their lot with him they stuck as close as burrs ; and 

 no one could have more utterly devoted adherents. Trained 

 from childhood to regard implicit obedience to their own chief 

 as the highest virtue, their services were of immense import- 

 ance to him with whom, for the time being, their chief was on 

 terms of friendship ; and so thorough was their blind attach- 

 ment, that while they would go through fire and water for such 

 a one so long as the friendship lasted, they would not scruple 

 to murder him the very moment that the chief's sentiments 

 altered. They were rough men, lived rough lives, and held it 

 more honourable to live by plunder than by toil ; and they pos- 

 sessed those vices, as well as those virtues, which are incidental 

 to savages who dwell in the face of nature, and are but slightly 

 influenced by the voice of civilisation. Much sentimental matter 

 has often been written about the Highlanders, chiefly by those 

 who never knew what their chief characteristics were ; and in 

 popular novels their virtues have been extolled, while their 

 numerous vices have been hidden or varnished over, and their 

 manners and customs have been presented with that enchant- 

 ment which distance lends to the view. While there was much 

 that was admirable in the Highlanders much to excite the most 

 exalted respect for their courage, their endurance, their devotion, 

 their hospitality there was much also to condemn in their 

 revengefulness. their thievishness, their brutality. Few of them 

 were given to honest labour for procuring themselves a liveli- 

 hood, and many of them were, not to put too fine a point on it, 

 no better than King William's letter described them, " a set of 

 thieves." They lived in the mountains, as their name implied ; 

 and protected by their hills, which they knew how to defend by 

 their indomitable bravery protected also by their poverty, they 

 were long able to defy the authorities in the Lowlands. They 

 preserved with religious care their allegiance to the Stuart 

 princes, who found among them, on the two great risings against 

 the house of Hanover in 1715 and 1745, their most hardy and 

 most faithful adherents. Some of the heads of clans were 

 members of the Scotch nobility, and these swayed the political 

 influence of their followers according to their own interests at 

 court ; so that it often happened that as interests conflicted, 

 clans were opposed to one another, and when they were so, it 

 was an opposition to the death, for enmity was cherished among 

 them to the entire exclusion of forgiveness. 



Some of the more powerful clans had given in their allegiance 

 to King William and Queen Mary ; but these clans were for the 

 most part amenable to military coercion by the Government, 

 while the rest were influenced by bribes, either of money or 

 favour, and were ready at any moment to turn against the hand 

 that patted them. But by far the greater number of the clans 

 remained in a state of chronic disaffection, would not own 

 sovereign allegiance to any one, and remained independent of 

 any king save their own chiefs. The trouble they gave was 

 enormous ; the necessity of keeping up a strong force to check 

 them, most annoying and costly ; and the nucleus they furnished 

 for the gathering of a hostile army in the heart of Scotland, most 

 dangerous to the peace of the kingdom. 



Statesmen in London were more concerned for the pacification 

 of the Scotch Highlands than for any other matter of domestic 

 policy. They tried all sorts of ways to effect the object ; they 

 played off one chieftain against another, sowed the seeds of 

 dissension between them, bribed, flattered, threatened, and, 

 whenever they had the chance, used force ; but all means failed, 

 and the Highlands remained a bugbear and a thorn in the side 

 of the rulers, until, many years later, Mr. Pitt conceived the idea 

 of utilising the courage and the hardihood of the men by em- 

 ploying them as soldiers in the service of the state. Not until 

 the Highland regiments were raised were the Highlands pacified, 

 and certainly in 1691, the time treated of in this sketch, they 

 were the homes of men who were ready for any desperate enter- 

 prise against the Government. 



Sir John Dalrymple, Master of Stair, was William's Prime 

 Minister for Scotland. He was a man who hated the marauding 

 mountaineers with an implacable hatred, and would gladly have 

 given his voice in favour of any project for crushing out their 

 spirit by harsh means. He disbelieved in anything short of extir- 

 pation, and did his best to dissuade the Government from a policy 



of lenity, which they were willing to adopt. Contrary to his wish, 

 it was determined to try the effect of a conciliatory present of 

 .15,000, which was to be divided among the several chiefs, and 

 John Campbell, Earl of Breadalbane, was chosen to be the agent 

 for distributing it. He was to treat with the chiefs, and buy 

 their friendship for so much ; and he was to hint that, if this 

 plan did not succeed, or if the chiefs should afterwards go from 

 their bargain, there would be no more gentle treatment, but an 

 overwhelming force to overawe them. The earl was not very 

 successful in his negotiations. The chiefs came to his house at 

 Glenorchy, but they could not agree about the price, and one of 

 them, Macdonald of Glencoe, came to an open quarrel with the 

 king's representative. Lochiel, head of the Camerons, joined 

 with Macdonald, and there were local claims, not thought of by 

 the Government, and which Breadalbane had not power to settle, 

 that prevented an apportionment of the money. Negotiation 

 was protracted, the Master of Stair was losing his patience, and, 

 before the Earl of Breadalbane could give an account of his 

 proceedings, had taken steps more in accordance with his own 

 view of things. 



Proclamation was made at Edinburgh, calling upon the High- 

 land chiefs to submit themselves to King William and Queen 

 Mary before the 31st of December, 1691, and threatening that 

 those who did not take the oaths of allegiance by that date 

 should be treated as traitors and public enemies. Several 

 months were allowed for the rebel chiefs to come in ; the Earl 

 of Breadalbane's negotiations went slowly forward ; and the 

 Government, on the other hand, were earnest in their prepara- 

 tions to act up'to the spirit of the proclamation that had been 

 issued. 



Naturally enough, the chiefs were unwilling to make submis- 

 sion. They hesitated, they blustered, they would die rather 

 than submit. Some of them actually made preparations to 

 resist the royal troops, and collected stores of provisions and 

 warlike material. But as the time drew near, and the atti- 

 tude of the Government remained firm and threatening, doubts 

 entered the minds of some whether it would not, after all, bo 

 over-hazardous to continue obstinate. A comparison of their 

 resources with those of the Government showed at a glance 

 how hopeless it was for them to persevere ; and gradually they 

 gave way, pocketed their pride, and, presenting themselves before 

 the sheriffs, took the oaths. By the 31st of December all had 

 submitted, except Macdonald of Glencoe. 



Macdonald had delayed, partly out of unwillingness to go, 

 partly out of bravado. He was ambitious of the honour of 

 remaining out after powerful rivals had submitted, and he 

 waited, perhaps in the hope that other chiefs would be laggards 

 besides himself, and that, united, they would be able to offer 

 such a stout resistance to the Government as would compel better 

 terms than an unconditional surrender. But when he found 

 that all the rest had given in their adhesion, and that if he per- 

 sisted in obstinacy, he would have to face the wrath and to cope 

 with the strength of the king, he resolved to take the oaths. 



Not until the 31st of December, the very last moment, did 

 Mac Ian (Macdonald of Glencoe was so called in the Highlands) 

 set out with his principal men, to take the oaths at Fort William. 

 Arrrived at the fort, he found that Colonel Hill, the governor, 

 had not any power to administer the oaths, and that he must go 

 to Inverary, the residence of the nearest competent magistrate. 

 Colonel Hill gave him a letter of recommendation to the sheriff 

 of Argyleshire, Sir Colin Campbell of Ardkinglass, and Mac Ian 

 went on his way ; but " the way was long, the wind was cold," 

 the pitiless storms of a winter in the Highlands impeded the old 

 man in his journey, and it was not till the sixth day after the 

 expiration of the term fixed by the amnesty proclamation that 

 Mac Ian appeared before the sheriff at Inverary. 



Overcome by the entreaties of Mac Ian, and by the letter of 

 Colonel Hill, certifying that the rebel chief had offered himself 

 at Fort William on the 31st of December to be sworn, Sir Colin 

 Campbell administered the oath, and sent an explanatory cer- 

 tificate to Edinburgh, showing why he had departed from the 

 strict words of the proclamation. 



Mac Ian went back to his home in the pass of Glencoe, glad 

 at having made his peace, his mind having no misgivings about 

 the ratification of his accepted allegiance. The news went up 

 to London that Mac Ian of Glencoe had not submitted, and by 

 the time the further news of his submission arrived, steps had 

 been taken to punish him. The Master of Stair was greatly 



