Chapter XXII: Inversnaid Garrisoned

After the close of the whole insurrection, when the leaders of it were in their bloody graves or in hopeless exile, seeking in foreign camps and fields their bread at the point of the sword, the old rancorous sentiment against the Clan Alpine was still found to exist; for in the subsequent Act of Indemnity a free pardon was granted to all Jacobites, "_excepting persons of the name of MacGregor_, mentioned in an Act, made in Scotland in the first year of King Charles I., intituled 'Anent the Clan Gregor,' whatever name he or they may have, or do _assume_;" and hence especially among the proscribed appeared the now dreaded name of "Robert Campbell, _alias_ MacGregor, _commonly_ called Robert Roy."

This insulting mode of designating him, as if he had been a common thief in the "Hue and Cry," embittered yet more the soul of MacGregor; though he had been so long outlawed, and subjected to every severity and danger, this new act made little difference circumstantially to Rob, and doubtless he despised it. But the erection of a government fortress and barrack on _his own lands_ of Inversnaid, for the direct purpose of overawing and subjugating his clan, and to lay him and it more completely at the mercy of the Whigs and Montrose, was more than he could suffer with patience.

His house of Auchinchisallan, in which he had resided in Breadalbane, had been wantonly burned, and his wife and children were once more driven to the caves and rocks for shelter; his cattle and crops were seized by a party of troops specially sent for those purposes by General Charles Lord Cadogan, an officer who had served as a brigadier under Marlborough, who had been taken prisoner at the siege of Messina, in 1706, and who was made Master-General of the Ordnance in 1722.

On MacGregor's lands he exercised great severity; and now, separated from his wife and children, the unfortunate Rob Roy, attended by his faithful henchman and foster-brother, Callam MacAleister, lurked in the mountains, and chiefly in the cavern near Loch Lomond, which still bears his name, and from whence he could see the flames of rapine and destruction, as the country was swept by fire and sword; and there he schemed out many a futile plan of vengeance on his oppressors.

Amid all this his heart bled for his children, who were growing up to desperate lives and wayward fortunes, the end of which he could not foresee. One thing, however, his own sense predicted: that the life of war and hazard he now lead could not last for ever, and that the erection of forts in the Highlands, and the entrance of war ships into the great salt lochs by which they were intersected, might ultimately curb the power of the Jacobite clans, especially when the overwhelming strength of the Campbells, the Grants, and other Whig clans, was united to that of the Lowland invader; and ultimately--but not in Rob's time--this prediction of his soul came true.

And yet it was for his children, and the patrimony which had been rent from them, that he maintained a hopeless struggle with their oppressors. It has been well observed by a modern writer, "that the motives to exertion furnished by the possession of children are as powerful as ever moved heart or hand. The secret of many a struggle in life's battle may be found at home. The man who has children dependent upon him will and must struggle manfully against the most adverse circumstances. The thought that the joy of their innocent young lives depends upon his courage, his perseverance, his energy--this thought will enable him to work wonders, and achieve what will appear impossibilities to the man who has only his own selfish needs and his own selfish ambition to urge him on." And so, when poor MacGregor thought of the _future_ of his boys, his otherwise unflinching heart was rent in twain.

Meanwhile, the erection of the government fortress at Inversnaid proceeded rapidly, though he did all in his power to retard it; and he had the mortification to see the stones of his own dwelling-house and of the cottages of his tenantry used in construction of the barrack and bastions.

A builder named Naysmith, from Edinburgh, contracted to build this fort of Inversnaid; but his operations were frequently and roughly interrupted.

It was commenced during the winter season, and he and his workmen lodged in huts near the edifice.

One night, when the snow was falling heavily in great and feathery flakes, they were roused by some travellers noisily demanding shelter. On the door being opened, a number of fierce-looking MacGregors, with their plaids and bonnets coated with snow, rushed in, menaced the poor workmen with drawn swords, and reviled them bitterly.

Being defenceless and unarmed men, they were not slain by Rob Roy's followers, but they were driven half naked through the snow to a distance, when Greumoch and young Coll dismissed them, after exacting from them a solemn oath that they would never again enter the MacGregors' country.

Whether the same masons returned or not we have no means of knowing; but the fort was ultimately finished and garrisoned. "Mr. Naysmith," says Robert Chambers, "being held by Government to a contract which he could not fulfil, was seriously injured in his means by this affair; but its worst consequence was the effect of exposure on that dreadful winter night on his health. He sunk under his complaints, and died about eighteen months after."

When the fort was complete, the works were mounted with cannon, and the barrack within it was occupied by three companies of Lord Tyrawley's regiment, the South British Fusiliers, under Major (formerly Captain) Huske, with express orders to keep the MacGregors in check and to make short work with them on every occasion--orders not to be misconstrued.

During the progress of this--to Rob Roy--most obnoxious erection, he lurked with MacAleister in the cavern near Loch Lomond; the same place which, as we have said, sheltered the gallant King Robert I., after the battle of Dalree, where the famous Brooch of Lorn was torn from his shoulder. It is near Craigrostan and Inversnaid, on the eastern bank of the loch.

The entrance is near the edge of the water, and is partly concealed by great masses of rock, like a fallen Cyclopean wall, which have been shaken by the volcanic throes of nature from the crags above. Amid these masses, the wild foxglove, the purple heather, the green whin, and dense brushwood of every kind flourish, serving to conceal the access, which is every way one of peril and difficulty.

Here he was perfectly secure, though he could hear drums beating in Inversnaid; and sometimes he ventured at night to leave it, and visit his wife and children, who resided under Greumoch's care, in an obscure hut among the mountains of Breadalbane; and on these occasions he twice narrowly escaped being taken when returning to his retreat.

Once, when travelling with three followers, in a solitary and sequestered place near Loch Earn, a beautiful sheet of water, from the shore of which the mountains start in bold and rocky grandeur, he suddenly found himself face to face with seven horsemen, in red uniforms, with conical grenadier caps, on the blue flaps of which the "white horse" of Hanover was embroidered. In fact, they were seven horse grenadiers of Captain MacDougal's troop, which was then attached to the garrison of Inversnaid.

The tattered yet warlike aspect of MacGregor, the well-known red and black checks of his tartan, his powerful figure and ruddy-coloured beard, made them certain that he was Rob Roy, the outlaw, and with shouts of "MacGregor!--MacGregor Campbell!" some drew their swords, while others took pistols from their holsters and prepared for an attack.

Rob turned to seek safety in flight; but the soldiers fired, and his three companions fell mortally wounded. Infuriated by this, he sprang up the steep rocks, where their horses could not find footing, and taking the pistols from his belt, fired repeatedly, with calm and stern determination, sending shot after shot at his baffled pursuers, who remained on the narrow roadway by the loch side, trampling his dying clansmen under their horses' hoofs, and brandishing their swords while they menaced and reviled him.

So good was his aim that he killed three of the soldiers and wounded four of their horses. On this, the remainder galloped off, and left him to pursue, after nightfall, the secret way to his wild abode.

He reached it in safety, but by some means the horse grenadiers, patrols of whom were constantly abroad, succeeded in tracking him to its vicinity; thus, a day or two after the last affair, when he and MacAleister were issuing forth about dawn, in search of such food as the mountains afforded, they suddenly found themselves beset by a party, commanded by Captain MacDougal in person.

With a loud hurrah, the troopers, who were about thirty in number, put spur to their horses, and dashed in single file along the narrow footway on the eastern shore of Loch Lomond; but one, who outrode all the rest, speedily came up with Rob Roy.

"The thousand guineas are mine!" he shouted, and raising himself in his stirrups, he dealt so furious a blow with his long and ponderous cavalry sword at MacGregor, that he beat down his guard, and would inevitably have cleft him to the teeth by the next stroke, but for a circular iron plate which he wore within his bonnet. The blow, however, brought him to the ground, and as he fell he exclaimed--

"To your gun, MacAleister!--to your gun, if there is a shot in it!"

"A witch, and not your grandmother, wrought your nightcap!" cried the astonished trooper, when finding that his sword rung on MacGregor's head; and he had his hilt drawn back to deal the fallen man a deadly forward home thrust, when a ball from the long Spanish musket of the faithful henchman pierced his heart. He fell from his saddle lifeless and bleeding, and was dragged by his terrified horse (for one foot hung in a stirrup) down the steep bank towards the water, where steed and corpse disappeared together.

MacAleister now assisted his foster-brother to rise, and escaping MacDougal and the rest of his troopers, they made a long detour, and reached their gloomy cavern unseen and in safety.