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Fire and sword and torture, the destruction of tilled lands, and even of the shell-fish on the shore, did not break the spirit of the Highlanders. Many bands held out in arms, and Lochgarry was only prevented by the Prince's command from laying an ambush for Cumberland.
Mac-Donnell of Lochgarry, a man of unquestioned honour, lodged an information against James Drummond before the High Bailie of Dunkirk, accusing him of being a spy, so that he found himself obliged to leave that town and come to Paris, with only the sum of thirteen livres for his immediate subsistence, and with absolute beggary staring him in the face.
Lord George, Lovat, Lochgarry, Keppoch, Ardshiel, and Cluny did persist; the fatal die was cast; and the men who well fed and confident might have routed Cumberland, fled in confusion rather than retreated, to be ruined later, when, starving, out-wearied, and with many of their best forces absent, they staggered his army at Culloden.
The state of the country was ticklish; Prince Charles expected to invade with Swedish forces, under the famous Marshal Keith, by the connivance of Frederick the Great, and he had sent Lochgarry, with Dr. Archibald Cameron and others, to feel the pulse of the western clans.
We shall find Pickle, in company with that devoted Jacobite, Lochgarry, travelling through the Highlands, exciting hopes, consulting the chiefs, unburying a hidden treasure, and encouraging the clans to rush once more on English bayonets. Romance, in a way, is stereotyped, and it is characteristic that the last romance of the Stuarts should be interwoven with a secret treasure.
A considerable number of Jacobite gentlemen who had lain for months in hiding had been drawn to Lochnanuagh by the report of the landing of the French ships; amongst these were young Clanranald, Glenaladale, and Macdonald of Daleby. On the Prince's ship there sailed with him Lochgarry, John Roy Stuart, Dr. Cameron, and Lochiel.
Pickle now writes again from Edinburgh, on October 10, 1754. He wants money, and, as becomes a Highland chief, takes a high tone. He has been in service as a spy for four years that is, since autumn 1750. This, of course, Pickle could not do, as he had, in his capacity of spy, to keep on terms with Prince Charles. Did Young Lochgarry know Pickle to be a traitor?
'The Prince, swearing, said he would not put away a cat to please such fellows; but, as Lord Clancarty never opened his mouth without a curse, his evidence is not valuable. On March 8, hearing that Lochgarry was in the neighbourhood, Clancarty called him a 'thief and a cow-stealer, and bade the footman lock up the plate!
The brave Lochgarry, however, came to dinner, as being unaware of his Lordship's sentiments. Enough of the elegant conversation of this one-eyed, slovenly Irish nobleman, whom we later find passing his Christmas with Prince Charles. Mr. Macallester now made two new friends, the adventurous Dumont and a Mr. Lewis.
Frederick's letters have brought us to May 1753, when Archy Cameron, in the Tower of London, lay expecting his doom. While kings, princes, ambassadors, statesmen, and highland chiefs were shuffling, conspiring, peeping, lying and spying, the sole burden of danger fell on Archibald Cameron, Lochgarry, and Cluny. They were in the Elector's domains; their heads were in the lion's mouth.
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