mountaineers
would have been disposed to submit. His inveterate and hereditary
hostility to the Marquis of Argyle insured his engaging in the war with
sufficient energy, while his well-known military talents, and his
tried valour, afforded every hope of his bringing it to a favourable
conclusion.

CHAPTER VIII.

Our plot is a good plot as ever was laid; our friends true and
constant: a good plot, good friends, and full of expectation:
an excellent plot, very good friends.--HENRY IV Part I.

No sooner had the general acclamation of joyful surprise subsided, than
silence was eagerly demanded for reading the royal commission; and the
bonnets, which hitherto each Chief had worn, probably because unwilling
to be the first to uncover, were now at once vailed in honour of
the royal warrant. It was couched in the most full and ample terms,
authorizing the Earl of Montrose to assemble the subjects in arms,
for the putting down the present rebellion, which divers traitors
and seditious persons had levied against the King, to the manifest
forfaulture, as it stated, of their allegiance, and to the breach of
the pacification between the two kingdoms. It enjoined all subordinate
authorities to be obedient and assisting to Montrose in his enterprise;
gave him the power of making ordinances and proclamations, punishing
misdemeanours, pardoning criminals, placing and displacing governors and
commanders. In fine, it was as large and full a commission as any with
which a prince could intrust a subject. As soon as it was finished,
a shout burst from the assembled Chiefs, in testimony of their ready
submission to the will of their sovereign. Not contented with generally
thanking them for a reception so favourable, Montrose hastened to
address himself to individuals, The most important Chiefs had already
been long personally known to him, but even to those of inferior
consequence he now introduced himself and by the acquaintance he
displayed with their peculiar designations, and the circumstances and
history of their clans, he showed how long he must have studied the
character of the mountaineers, and prepared himself for such a situation
as he now held.

While he was engaged in these acts of courtesy, his graceful manner,
expressive features, and dignity of deportment, made a singular contrast
with the coarseness and meanness of his dress. Montrose possessed that
sort of form and face, in which the beholder, at the