r histories. It affords
a basis for judging the character of William and of his government.
They desired that some of the Highlanders should stand out, that an
example might be made; and they hoped that it might be the one
Catholic clan, as they were likely to be the most dangerous
Jacobites. "Who knows," wrote Stair, "but, by God's providence, they
are permitted to fall into this delusion that they may only be
extirpat." Four days later another writes: "The king does not care
that some do it, that he may make examples of them." Accordingly, by
his orders, one branch of the Macdonalds was destroyed by Campbell of
Glenlyon. There is no doubt about the order. But it is not certain
that William knew that the chieftain had taken the oath. The people
concerned were rewarded in due proportion. One became a colonel,
another a knight, a third a peer, and a fourth an earl. It was a way
King William had. When the murder of De Witt made him supreme, he
kept away from The Hague, but then saw that the murderers were
recompensed. Eighty years later a deserter from one of our regiments
was under sentence to be shot. The officer commanding the firing
party, another Captain Campbell of Glenlyon, had received a reprieve,
with secret orders not to produce it until the culprit stood facing
the levelled muskets. At that moment, as he drew the reprieve from
his pocket, his handkerchief, coming with it, fell to the ground. The
soldiers took it for their signal and fired. Glenlyon exclaimed, "It
is the curse of Glencoe!" and at once left the service.

When James escaped to France, he at once went over to Ireland, with a
French army, while a French fleet covered the expedition and swept the
Channel. James had long intended to make Ireland independent of
England, that, under his Protestant successors, it might be an
impregnable refuge for persecuted Catholics. He estimated that it
would take five years of preparation. Tyrconnel also contemplated
separation, and arranged for a French invasion, if James died. When
James came over Tyrconnel thought him hopelessly incompetent, and
offered his country to Lewis XIV. Sarsfield detested his treachery,
and invited Berwick to undertake the government. Of James's French
counsellors, one was Lauzun, who commanded the auxiliary army, and
proposed to burn Dublin to the ground and ravage the open country.
The other was the ambassador D'Avaux, who wished him to make short
work of all the P