g at Dunblane which had given him fresh
views. During the few hours he had passed there he had talked much with
a Highland gentleman, Alexander Drummond of Bahaldy, son-in-law to Sir
Ewan Cameron of Lochiel, the great chief of the clan Cameron. Drummond
told him that Lochiel had been busy all the winter among his neighbours,
that they were now ripe for war, and were only waiting a leader and some
succours of regular troops and ammunition; that James had been
communicated with, and had approved their plan in a letter written with
his own hand to Lochiel; and that an early day had been appointed for a
rendezvous of the clans in Lochaber, the headquarters of the Camerons.

It is now generally acknowledged that on this occasion, however it may
have been in the next century, the action of the Highland chiefs was not
inspired by devotion to the House of Stuart. Lochiel himself may indeed
have been moved by some personal consideration for the exiled King. He
had fought bravely under Montrose for Charles the First, and under
Middleton for Charles the Second. From the latter King he had received
more than one letter full of those flattering assurances Charles knew so
well how to make. By James he had been graciously welcomed at Whitehall,
and had received the honour of knighthood from the royal hand. He was
brave, wise, generous, and faithful, and, even in a less rude society
than that in which his lot was cast, his manners would have been called
agreeable and his education certainly not contemptible. But even
Lochiel's loyalty was not suffered to run counter to his interests. In
Lochaber the name of James was as nothing compared with the name of Evan
Dhu, and the law of the King of England gave place to the law of the
great Chief of the Camerons. As for the rest, the dispute between Whigs
and Jacobites was no more to them than the dispute between the Guelphs
and Ghibellines had been to their ancestors. They cared not the value of
a single sheep whether James or William sat on the throne of Great
Britain, so long as neither interfered with them. No later than the
previous year the authority of James had been insulted and his soldiers
beaten by one of these independent lordlings--Colin Macdonald of
Keppoch, familiarly known as Coll of the Cows, for his skill in tracking
his neighbour's cattle over the wildest mountains to the most secret
coverts.[78]

But for what loyalty to the House of Stuart was powerless to effect a
motive w