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It is clear that the public opinion of Scotland, so far as there was such a thing in existence, had no sympathy whatever with the murderers of James. The instruments of that murder were in the first place Highland caterans, with whom no terms were ever held and against whom every man's hand was armed.
He broke into a more rapid walk, then into a run, with his eyes intent upon the rude dark keep that held the promontory, now the one object in all the landscape that had to his senses some aspect of human fellowship and sympathy. The caterans were assured; Dieu du ciel, how they ran too! Those in advance broke into an appalling halloo, the shout of hunters on the heels of quarry.
The conclusion was, that the life of the Lord of the Isles was spared, but he was committed to safe keeping in the strong Castle of Tantallon, with, however, the unfailing consequence, that his brother took the field with all his caterans in his stead.
And then Queen Anne, that's dead, gae the chiefs bits o' pensions, sae they had wherewith to support their gillies and caterans that work nae wark, as I said afore; and they lay by quiet eneugh, saying some spreagherie on the Lowlands, whilk is their use and wont, and some cutting o' thrapples amang themsells, that nae civilised body kens or cares onything anent.
Upon the occasion alluded to, a party of Caterans carried off the bridegroom, and secreted him in some cave near the mountain of Schehallion.
This step was indeed necessary, Tully-Veolan having become a very unpleasant, and even dangerous, place of residence for an unprotected young lady, on account of its vicinity to the Highlands, and also to one or two large villages which, from aversion as much to the caterans as zeal for presbytery, had declared themselves on the side of government, and formed irregular bodies of partizans, who had frequent skirmishes with the mountaineers, and sometimes attacked the houses of the Jacobite gentry in the braes, or frontier betwixt the mountain and plain.
"I do not think that they are what they seem," Oswald said, as they resumed their journey. "The man's speech was not that of a border raider, and his followers would hardly have sat their horses so silently, and obeyed his orders so promptly, had they been merely thieving caterans; besides, you marked that he said you were not the man they were watching for."
Neither did the front indicate absolute security from danger. There were loop-holes for musketry, and iron stanchions on the lower windows, probably to repel any roving band of gipsies, or resist a predatory visit from the Caterans of the neighbouring Highlands. Stables and other offices occupied another side of the square.
And when I remembered James More, and the red head of Neil the son of Duncan, I thought there was perhaps a fourth in the confederacy, and what remained of Rob Roy's old desperate sept of caterans would be banded against me with the others. One thing was requisite some strong friend or wise adviser.
Upon the occasion alluded to, a party of caterans carried off the bridegroom and secreted him in some cave near the mountain of Schiehallion.
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