THE UISTS AND BARRA. 285 



Queen, of whom he stood in wholesome awe, James cast 

 about him for the most likely instrument of capturing the 

 old rover. The reputation of Roderick Mackenzie, after- 

 wards the Tutor of Kintail, as a bold and resolute man, was 

 known to the King, and to him he gave the task of seizing 

 Macneill, a task not devoid either of difficulty or danger. 

 Mackenzie readily undertook the commission, and con- 

 ceived a plan for getting the lord of Barra into his posses- 

 sion by strategy. Disguising himself as a peaceful skipper, 

 he arrived before Macneill's Castle of Kisimul with the 

 greater number of his men under hatches, the remainder 

 posing as the crew of the merchantman. He had a 

 plausible story to tell Macneill. He was a trader bound 

 from Norway to Ireland. On his way to Barra, he had met 

 a French ship, and had bought from her a quantity of first- 

 rate brandy and wines. Would the Chief of the Macneills 

 deign to accept his hospitality on board of his ship, and 

 sample his liquor ? The Chief of the Macneills was 

 not proof against the temptation, for he liked a cup of 

 good wine as well as anyone in the Hebrides. Attended 

 only by his ordinary body-guard, he accompanied the 

 pseudo-trader on board, and the flowing bowl was soon 

 in evidence. On a given signal, the men under hatches 

 rushed out and made the whole party prisoners ; the anchor 

 was weighed, and soon the outlines of Barra faded in the 

 distance. Here we have one more example of the part 

 which wine and treachery played in the Hebrides, in 

 effecting the capture of desperate men. 



In due course, Ruari Mackenzie brought his captive to 

 Holyrood before the King and his Court. Great was the 

 surprise of James to find in his presence, not the rough, 

 evil-looking desperado whom he had expected to see, but a 

 tall, good-looking, elderly gentleman, with a benign counte- 

 nance and a long grey beard, who looked more like a 

 reverend Father of the Kirk than a pirate whose robberies 

 had formed the subject of diplomatic correspondence. And 

 the chief of Barra was a humorist to boot. When asked 

 by the King his reason for harassing the subjects of the 



