PRINCE CHARLES AND THE LONG ISLAND. 469 



board, and O'Neil hastened to Rossinish on the bare chance 

 of Charles not having left. When he returned from his 

 fruitless errand, he found that the French ship had sailed 

 three hours before his arrival. Three boats, each with 

 thirty armed men, had been sent after the Frenchman, and 

 the captain having a fair wind, and deeming it imprudent 

 to wait longer, had left the Prince and O'Neil to their fate. 

 O'Neil then tried to induce the Prince's boatmen who 

 had meanwhile returned from Skye to go back with him, 

 but they declined to accept the risk. They, themselves, 

 were soon afterwards seized, and threatened with torture 

 or death if they refused to disclose all they knew. Captain 

 Ferguson, having obtained a description of the dress worn 

 by Charles, followed him to Skye in hot pursuit* O'Neil, 

 finding it impossible to get away from South Uist, went 

 to Rossinish, where he took refuge in a sheiling, waiting 

 for an opportunity to cross to Skye. He was discovered 

 by Captain Macneill of the Argyllshire militia, and was sent 

 as a prisoner to Lord Albemarle, who was then at Fort 

 | Augustus. He states in his Journal that he was brought 

 ; before Ferguson, and on refusing to give any information 

 i about the Prince, Ferguson had him stripped, and ordered 

 him to be put into a rack and whipped by his hangman ; 

 but he was saved from this ignominy by the intervention 

 of a lieutenant of the Scotch Fusiliers. He was less reticent 

 when brought before Lord Albemarle, for his declaration on 

 oatht gives a full account of the Prince's proceedings up to 

 | the period that he parted from him. O'Neil, being a foreign 

 i officer, was treated as a prisoner of war. He was taken to 

 Berwick- on-Tweed, and after some time, set at liberty. J 



*The reputation of Ferguson is vividly illustrated by a remark of Mrs. 

 Macdonald of Kingsburgh. " If Ferguson," she exclaimed, "is to be my 

 judge, then God have mercy on my soul." 

 t See Appendix H. 



+ In Chambers's History of the Rebellion, it is stated that OWeH's/wro** 

 news a somewhat confused intellect, but he certainly possessed "a generous 

 ! heart." Adverting to O'Neil's possession of 500 (or 450) guineas at the time he 

 | was captured, Murray of Broughton caustically remarks : " How that gen- 

 j tleman (O'Neil) will answer for reserving so large a proportion of his master's 

 purse for his own use, is more than I shall pretend to divine/' The Govern- 

 ment appropriated the money. 



