e this to heart, you may let it go as you
will.' (June 6, 1752.)
Fassifern, who had no hand in the murder, 'let it go,' and probably
handed the blackmailer's letter over to the Campbells. Later, ----,
---- of ----, the blackest villain in the country, offered to the
Government to accuse Fassifern of the murder. The writer of the
anonymous letter to Fassifern is styled 'Blarmachfildich,' or
'Blarmackfildoch,' in the correspondence. I think he was a Mr. Millar,
employed by Fassifern to agitate against Glenure.
In the beginning of July a man, suspected of being Allan, was arrested
at Annan on the Border, by a sergeant of the Royal Welsh Fusiliers. He
really seems to have changed clothes with Allan; at least he wore gay
French clothes like Allan's, but he was not that hero. Young
Ballachulish, at this time, knew that Allan was already across the
sea. Various guesses occur as to who _the other man_ was; for example,
a son of James of the Glens was suspected, so there _was_ another man.
The 'precognitions,' or private examinations of witnesses before the
trial, extended to more than seven hundred persons. It was matter of
complaint by the Stewart party that 'James Drummond's name appeared in
the list of witnesses;' this is Mr. Stevenson's James More, really
MacGregor, the son of Rob Roy, and father of Catriona, later Mrs.
David Balfour of Shaws, in _Kidnapped_ and _Catriona_. 'James More's
character is reflected upon, and I believe he cannot be called worse
than he deserves,' says one of the Campbells. He alleges, however,
that in April, before the murder, James of the Glens visited James
More, then a prisoner in Edinburgh Castle, 'caressed him,' and had a
private conversation with him. The abject James More averred that, in
this conversation, James of the Glens proposed that James More's
brother, Robin Oig, should kill Glenure for money. James More was not
examined at the trial of James of the Glens, perhaps because he had
already escaped, thanks to Catriona and collusion; but his evidence
appears to have reached the jury, almost all of them Campbells, who
sat at Inveraray, the Duke of Argyll on the bench, and made no
difficulty about finding James of the Glens 'Guilty.' To be sure,
James, if guilty, was guilty as an accessory to Allan, and that Allan
was guilty was not proved; he was not even before the court. It was
not proved that the bullets which slew Glenure fitted the bore of
James's small gun with which Allan w
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