Part 7

The second marquis, who, while Lord Ormelie, had sat in the Reformed Parliament as a Whig, lived in esteem and prosperity till 1862, but would perhaps have given up half his possessions for a son. At his death, the new marquisate became extinct; and once more the clan had to look back some generations for an heir to the estate and the earldom, this time with appeal to law in a trial not yet forgotten. There were popularly said to be some fourscore competitors for the prize. One of them was a schoolfellow of mine, who invited me to Taymouth, when he should come into his kingdom, but that hospitality fell through. The real contest lay between Campbell of Glenfalloch and Campbell of Boreland, both descended from the nearest collateral, a Glenfalloch who died 1791. The question arose in the liberal view of Scots law as to proof of marriage. The elder son, while a subaltern in an English regiment, had eloped with the wife of one Christopher Ludlow, grocer and apothecary at Chipping Sodbury. This husband died three years later, both before and after which date the lady had marched with Campbell’s regiment as his wife. Her son, through whom the claim descended, was born after she became legally free to marry again; and the dispute mainly turned upon this delicate point: whether a union begun in adultery could be confirmed by the usual evidence of habit and repute marriage. It was shown that the lady had been received at Glenfalloch as the heir’s wife, that she had drawn a pension as his widow when he died Quartermaster of the Breadalbane Fencibles, and, what seemed much to the purpose, that the younger branch had not contested her son’s legitimacy as heir of Glenfalloch, nor till the tempting prize of the Breadalbane succession came in view. On these grounds, the Courts presumed that eloping couple to have taken themselves as husband and wife, so taken by the world in their lifetime: then their descendant must be recognised head of the family.

The successful claimant gained the old earldom, the marquisate becoming extinct, but it was revived in the person of his son, who married a daughter of the house of Montrose, hereditary enemy of his race. He now has reigned for a generation at Taymouth Castle, one of the noblest Scottish seats, among finely planted grounds and gardens, where, but for the mountain background, one would hardly believe oneself in the Highlands. The neat model village of Kenmore also suggests anything but a Highland clachan. Some critics, indeed, have found fault with the glories of Taymouth as out of keeping--“an artificial and drilled scene that seems to have been modelled in a toyshop and transplanted hither by a chain and a theodolite”; and the celebration of them in Burns’s verse shows his Muse for the nonce in her Sunday clothes, cut after the prevalent fashion. At least, most of the “Temples” and such-like have disappeared, with which this oasis of grandeur was once adorned, after a model shown in Kew Gardens and elsewhere by the “Capability” Browns, Chamberses, Reptons, and other “improvers” of nature in the Georgian period. More at home seem the ruins of a Priory hidden among old sycamore trees, on a small island in the lake, where the Campbells had a castle of refuge, bombarded from the shore by Montrose as he swept through the Highlands. General Monk’s soldiery were quartered on this island, and have the traditional credit of teaching the natives to smoke tobacco; but snuffing, at least, was older in the Highlands.

It is whispered that the lord of this lake does not trust himself on the water that, according to old prophecy, is to be fatal to a Breadalbane. But for undoomed strangers a tourist steamer plies on Loch Tay, “an immense plate of polished silver, its dark heathy mountains and thickets of oak serving as arabesque frame to a magnificent mirror.” Like the other Perthshire lakes, this is a deep trough set in slopes furrowed by affluents of what appears a broad river fifteen miles long. Loch Tay’s banks are well wooded and cultivated on the south side, while the north shows more truly Highland features, “a clan of Titans,” as Scott calls them, commanded by “the frowning mountains of Ben Lawers, and the still more lofty eminence of Ben Mhor, arising high above the rest, whose peaks retain a dazzling helmet of snow far into the summer season, and sometimes during the whole year.” Ben Lawers is now recognised as the chieftain of Perthshire summits, only a few hundred feet short of Ben Nevis. From the lake this is easily ascended for what Macculloch extols as the most varied and far-reaching Highland prospect.

To the south, we look down on the lake, with all its miniature ornament of woods and fields, terminating westward in the rich vale of Killin, and uniting eastward with the splendour of Strath Tay, stretching away till its ornaments almost vanish among the hills and in the fading tints of the atmosphere. Beyond the lake the successive ridges of hills lead the eye over Strathearn, which is, however, invisible, to the Ochills and the Campsie, and hence, even to Edinburgh; the details of this quarter, from Perth, being unexpectedly perfect and minute, and at the same time well indicated by the marked characters of the Lowmont hills. The place of Dunkeld and the peculiar style of its scenery are also distinctly visible; and it is equally easy to make out the bright estuary of the Tay, the long ridge of the Sidlaw, and the plain of Strathmore. Westward, we trace, without difficulty, the hills of Loch Lomond and Loch Cateran; and, in the same manner, every marked mountain, even to Oban, Cruachan and Buachaille Etive being particularly conspicuous. To the north, Glen Lyon is entirely excluded; the first objects, in this direction, being Schihallien and its accompanying mountains, leading us to the vale of the Tumel and Loch Rannoch, and even to Loch Laggan, seen as a bright narrow line: and thus, on one hand, to Glenco and Ben Nevis, and, on the other, to Ben-y-Gloe, lifting its complicated summit above the head of Ferrogon; beyond which the mountains at the head of Dee, of Marr and Cairngorm, marked with perpetual snow, were the last objects which I could satisfactorily determine. So great a range of view, with so many and such marked objects, is unexampled in any other spot in Scotland.

At the head of the lake, between the streams of the Dochart and the Lochay that unite to fill it, stands the pretty village of Killin, whose sojourners soon come upon names and relics of other clans overlaid by the intruding Campbells. Near the pier are the ruins of Finlarig Castle, for a time their chief seat, built by Black Duncan on the site of a ruder stronghold he had acquired from the Drummonds, whose name is preserved by Drummond Hill at the other end. When the Breadalbanes had moved on to Taymouth, Finlarig became their last home, in the modern mausoleum that has not yet gathered such gloomy note as the old Doom-tree on which hung many a plaided offender, while a heading-stone was provided for the shedding of gentle blood.

Black Duncan and his line did much stern work as “justiciars,” especially on their neighbours, the Macgregors, then under James VI. going down in a changed world, as the Campbells came up. Fetters and shackles made an important part of the furniture at Finlarig, which has comic as well as grim traditions of its rough-and-ready executions, like that of the reluctant Highlander urged by his wife to more alacrity in stepping up to be hanged “to pleasure the laird.” The axe is still shown at Taymouth with which a Macgregor chief was executed; more than one, indeed, coming to such an end, if all tales be true.

In one case the legend is that a Macgregor, invited to a friendly conference, was ambushed by armed men, who dragged him to the block at Kenmore, having killed his aged father on the way. But the stories make some confusion of father and son; and it seems doubtful whether this were the same victim as the “Red Macgregor” beheaded before the eyes of his wife, herself a Campbell by birth, who cursed her kindred in a celebrated Gaelic lament, with its burden of--

Ochain, ochain--sad my heart, my child! Ochain, ochain--thy father hears not our moan!

On Lammas morn I rejoiced with my love; ere noon my heart was pressed with sorrow.

Under ban be the nobles and friends who pained me so: who unawares came on my love, and overmastered him by guile.

Had there been twelve of his race and my Gregor at their head, my eyes would not be dim with tears, nor my child without its father.

They laid his head upon an oaken block: they poured his blood on the ground: oh had I there a cup I would drink of it my fill!

Oh that my father had been sick, and Colin in the plague, and all the Campbells in Balloch wearing manacles!

I would have put Gray Colin under lock and Black Duncan in a dungeon, though Ruthven’s daughter would be wringing her hands.

I went to the plains of Balloch, but rest found not there: I tore the hair from my head, the skin from my hands.

Had I the wings of the lark, the strength of Gregor in my arms, the highest stone in the castle would have been the one next the ground.

Oh that Finlarig were wrapped in flames, proud Taymouth lying in ashes, and fair-haired Gregor of the white hands in my embrace!

All others have apples: I have none, my sweet, lovely apple has the back of his head to the ground.

Other men’s wives sleep soft in their homes: I stand by the bedside wringing my hands.

Another tale of Loch Tay is told almost identically of more than one pair of hostile Highland families, but here with a picturesque opening and a rather lame conclusion. A Macgregor had been at feud with the head of the Breadalbane Campbells, who held out a deceitful olive branch by proposing a treaty of peace in his new-built castle at Taymouth. Macgregor trustfully kept the rendezvous with an appointed number of friends. On the hill above Balloch they found an old man kneeling before a large grey stone, uttering prayers for the dead, in which he mixed this sentence, “To thee, grey stone, I tell it; but when the black bull’s head appears, Macgregor’s sword can hardly save the wearer’s fated head. Deep the dungeon--sharp the axe--and short the shrift!” Macgregor recognised this as a warning from one who had perhaps been bound to secrecy and thus salved his conscience; but he was not the man to turn back. The lord of the castle received him and his men with feigned kindness, and they sat down to meat, each Campbell having a Macgregor on his right hand. When a black bull’s head was borne in, a clatter of arms being heard outside, the guest took the initiative by holding his dagger to Campbell’s breast and clutching him by the throat. The other Macgregors were quick to follow this example so effectively that their false host allowed himself to be dragged out of his castle, across the loch, and to the top of Drummond Hill, where he was fain to subscribe an amnesty and promise of future friendship, that did not long hold good. One would like to compare the Campbell version of such legends.

A story of the next century may have suggested to Scott the Strathyre wedding interrupted by a messenger of the Fiery Cross, though in this case the incidents seem less romantic. To a party gathered at Finlarig for the marriage of the chief’s daughter to a Menzies laird, came news of the approach of Macdonald raiders driving home their booty. Even at such a time Campbells were not to be kept from the throats of Macdonalds, whose offence, according to one account, was refusing to pay toll for passage through Breadalbane, such as explorers of our age have found exacted by African chiefs across whose territory lay their way. The wedding guests seized their arms, and sallied forth, bridegroom and all, to attack the Macdonalds, who were defeated in a hot encounter, with heavy loss on both sides, including the Macdonald chief and MacIan of Glencoe, while nearly a score of the wedding party had to be carried home with the coronach. Such were the scenes amid which the Breadalbane lairds sowed the seeds of more peaceful manners.

On a wooded islet of the Dochart are the tombs of the Macnabs, older lairds of this district. They appear to have been a branch of the Macgregors, their name being taken to mean “Sons of the Abbot,” who in more orthodox climes might have rather been styled “nephews.” They showed themselves right Celts, shutting their eyes to the signs of change, trusting to claymores rather than to charters, and apt to turn out on the losing side, so that they went under the waves of time on the top of which the Campbells rode triumphantly.

The last laird of Macnab figured as a well-known “character” in Scott’s day, his outer man still familiar in Raeburn’s portrait of him. He was huge of stature, imperious in manner, irascible, proud and impracticable to an ultra-Highland degree. To him is attributed that vaunt of the Macnabs having a boat of their own at the Flood, also the declaration that there were many _Mr._ Macnabs but only one Macnab, naturally the crown and chieftain of the human race. When an arrogant scholar boasted in the same spirit that England had only one Master of Trinity, a stuttering don broke the awed silence with too audible comment, “Thank God for that!” With not less irreverence a bold pretender is said to have answered the chieftain’s pride by signing himself _The other Macnab_. Ill would it have fared with the Sassenach body who should thus have bearded the Macnab to his face. In Mr. P. R. Drummond’s _Perthshire_, there is reported this instance of his wrath being provoked by an audacious stranger:--

It occurred after dinner, the laird being a little mellow, for as to being drunk, oceans of liquor would have failed to produce that effect, at least to the length of prostration. The unhappy querist began: “Macnab, are you acquainted with Macloran of Dronascandlich, who has lately purchased so many thousand acres in Inverness-shire?” This was more than enough to set the laird off in a furious tilt on his genealogical steed. “Ken wha? the paddock-stool o’ a cratur they ca’ Dronascandlich, wha no far bygane dawred (curse him) to offer siller, sir, for an auld ancient estate, sir. An estate as auld as the flude, sir; an infernal deal aulder, sir. Siller, sir, scrappit thegither by the meeserable deevil in India, sir, not in an officer or gentlemanlike way, sir; but (Satan burst him) makin’ cart wheels and trams, sir, and harrows, and the like o’ that wretched handiwork. Ken him, sir? I ken the cratur weel, and whae he comes frae, sir; and so I ken that dumb tyke, sir, a better brute by half than a score o’ him!” The querist interjected, “Mercy on us, Macnab, you surprise me. I thought from the sublime sound of his name and title, he had been, like yourself, a chief of fifteen centuries’ standing at least.” The instant this comparison was drawn, the laird’s visage grew ghastly with rage. His eyes caught fire and he snorted like a mountain whirlwind.

But for the climax of this storm, worthy of Meg Dods or of Meg Merrilies, the reader may be referred to my authority, with the hint that it will be wasted on who cannot interpret the vernacular eloquence then familiar at lordly dinner-tables as in kailyard “cracks.”

Many are the stories told, in print or tradition, of the Macnab’s sayings and doings. Mr. Drummond states that the library at Taymouth Castle contained two scrapbooks filled with them, cut out of publications like the _Gentleman’s Magazine_ and the _Literary Gazette_. The most often told of these stories relates to a time when the spendthrift laird was at last falling into the toils of law, whose minions he looked on as very sons of the devil. The Perth men of business, it is said, showed indulgence to his shortcomings; but a bill of his having come into the hands of some less considerate creditor at Stirling, a clerk, accompanied by two messengers-at-arms, ventured to his house in Breadalbane on the perilous errand of taking the Macnab into custody. Getting wind of their design, he kept out of the way, and left his housekeeper schooled to play a cunning part. She welcomed the visitors, let them understand that the laird was expected home next morning, and after hospitable entertainment, sent them to bed, the clerk at one end of the house and the legal myrmidons at the other. When they awoke next morning, they were horrified to see dangling from a tree outside what seemed the body of their companion. They quickly took to flight on hearing from the housekeeper, as matter of course, that “a bit clerk body had been hanged, who came here to deave the laird for siller.” The clerk, whose greatcoat and boots had been borrowed to rig out a stuffed figure, was not less terrified by the explanation of their absence: “The laird’s gillies have taken them awa’ to be drooned in the pool of Crianlarich, and they’ll be back for _you_ the noo.” That set the clerk to flight in turn; and never again, goes the story, would anyone venture to serve a legal process on the Macnab in his own country.

Naturally such a personage did not thrive in his quarrel with the age; and when he died in 1816, what was left of the Macnab property passed into the hands of his kinsman and creditor, Lord Breadalbane, to whom the laird had stooped his pride to become a sort of humoured hanger-on. His nephew, heir to a load of debt, was fain to emigrate to Canada with a following of the broken clan. But all over Britain a sprinkling of Macnabs are found more or less flourishing, who have formed an association, two or three hundred strong, that takes on itself the pious duty of tending those ancestral graves at Killin, the chieftains buried in a central square, their humbler clansmen and connections lying round about them under the shade of funereal pine-trees. Killin has also to show a lonely stone, taken to mark the tomb of Fingal, which is said to have given the original name, _Kilfin_.

Kinnell House, the Macnabs’ chief seat, is now a favourite residence of Lord Breadalbane, in which are preserved some odd relics of that last laird, his frying-pan, his kail-pot, and so on. But the glory of the place--Auchmore, as it is also called--is its famous vine that, to the reproach of your Dr. Johnsons, can boast itself the largest in Britain, and still goes on growing exuberantly, though it has been decided that no more glass room can be provided for it.

Killin well deserves its renown in the tourist world, presenting a lovely mixture of Highland and Lowland aspects. Its two rivers make the same contrast, the leafy pools of the Lochay to be compared to the tranquillising influences that have prevailed in Loch Tay, while the untamed rapids of the Dochart suggest the wild mountain spirit dashed to foam against rocks of hard fact. But the Lochay, too, up its beautiful glen, has cascades and other features of romance such as we look for a little farther back in Lowland life; and if the people forget their Gaelic and their legends, Nature still wears her garb of bracken and heather.

A plain sign of new times is the branch railway, link in a tourist round that a few miles from Killin falls in with the line from Callander to Oban. Here, turning back Lowlandwards, the rocky wilds of Glen Ogle lead us towards the softer beauties of Loch Earn, which we shall approach from the other end. Up Glen Dochart the railway runs into the higher yet opener reach of Strath Fillan; and here for a little it has the close companionship of its rival, the West Highland line, struggling on to Ben Nevis over lofty wastes of heather. At Crianlarich the two lines cross, then they draw apart at Tyndrum, under the ridge of Ben Lui, that cradles the infant Tay, as yet unchristened, unless by its nursery name of Fillan Water, where it gambols down to swell Loch Dochart, at the foot of Ben More. By its course, along the line of the Oban railway, the Campbells must have flowed into Breadalbane from their spring at Kilchurn Castle on Loch Awe. But beyond the head of Strath Fillan the streams flow to the Atlantic; and here we turn back from the Argyllshire gates of the Western Highlands.

Strath Fillan gets its name from the Irish missionary, Fillan, who became the patron saint of central Scotland, his memory preserved by a monastery that had much reverence in Breadalbane. He is, indeed, such a shadowy personage that there are said to have been two saints of the name, the other belonging to Loch Earn. St. Fillan’s pool, near Crianlarich, was a famous Highland rendezvous, used occasionally, as we have seen, for ducking objectionable persons; but its chief repute was in the cure of lunacy. The unhappy sufferer, brought here by his friends, was three times marched round a cairn from east to west--a rite of unconscious paganism--then after being immersed in the pool, he was tied up for the night in an adjacent chapel. If he managed to break loose that was a hopeful sign of his wits; but the result of this rough treatment must often have been an effectual cure for all the ills flesh is heir to. The reputation of St. Fillan’s well held out till quite recently; even now, perhaps, offerings may be secretly cast into it, or hung upon the bushes around, as pins or crossed rushes are found in the sacred wells of Cornwall. The superstition is, of course, world-wide; and deeper in the Highlands are wells still sought for pious hydropathy. To St. Fillan’s bell were also attributed supernatural properties: this and his crosier, long preserved in a family of hereditary custodians named Dewar, after wanderings as far as Canada, have come to be treasured at the Antiquarian Museum of Edinburgh.

In history, also, this fair strath has a name. Dalry, near Tyndrum, was the scene of one of Robert Bruce’s traditional exploits. Defeated at Methven, after his coronation at Scone, he had to take to the Highlands,

roving in perils and hardships like those of his unhappy descendant, Prince Charlie. At Dalry he had gathered force enough to make a stand against Macdougal, Lord of Lorn, eager to avenge on him the kindred blood of the Red Comyn. Overborne by numbers, the king retreated through a narrow pass, the mouth of which he held in person till all his men should be out of danger. Three doughty Macdougal champions, a father and two sons, having vowed to slay or take him alive, fell upon Bruce at once. The sons he cut down as they tried to drag him from his horse, then the father grasping him by the cloak so close that he could not use his sword, Bruce dashed out this man’s brains with the hilt, or with a hammer hanging at his saddle-bow. But the dying Macdougal kept such a grasp on the cloak that, to make good his escape, the king had to let it go, undoing the brooch which fastened it. Thus is said to have come into the hands of the Macdougals that Brooch of Lorn, treasured by the family to our time--an idle trophy, indeed, that was to cost them dear. In Bruce’s day of triumph he did not forget those bitter foes; then on their fall rose the Argyllshire Campbells, who have so long been Lords of Lorne.