cavalry ordered to charge. In vain did Belhaven like a
gallant gentleman gallop to the front. In vain did Mackay place himself
at their head, and, calling on them to follow him, spur into the thick
of the flashing claymores. Before his horse they fell back right and
left in such a way as to justify his boast to Melville that with fifty
stout troopers he could have changed the day even then; but one of his
own servants alone followed him. A few of the dragoons discharged their
carbines at random. Then all turned and spurred off among the crowd of
footmen to the mouth of the pass. Some of the fugitives tried to cross
the Garry, and were either drowned in its swift waters, or cut down as
they scrambled drenched and unarmed through its fords. Down the pass to
Pitlochrie the rout went. The men of Athole, no longer doubtful of the
issue, pounced from their lair upon the easy prey; and even women lent
their hands to the butchery.[104]

Well might Mackay bitterly complain, "There was no regiment or troop
with me but behaved like the vilest cowards in nature except Hastings
and my Lord Leven's."[105] For on the right matters had fared rather
better with the Lowlanders. Many of Leven's Borderers had stood firm and
Hastings' Englishmen; and where the Southrons stood firm the Highlanders
wavered. But they were too few for Mackay to have any hopes of
retrieving the fortune of the day. The Highlanders were now busy with
the baggage, which offered a more tempting and less troublesome prize
than the struggling mass of fugitives. Mackay therefore collected the
few men he could get together, and led them across the Garry by a ford
above the field of battle over the mountains towards Stirling. On his
march he overtook some more of his runaways whom Ramsay was leading in
the same direction. Mackay did all it was possible for a brave man to do
to encourage his men and keep them together. But many were too
frightened to heed his words, or even the pistol with which he
threatened to shoot the first man he saw leaving his ranks. The news of
his defeat had spread with marvellous rapidity: the whole country was
up: every glen and mountain sent out its reapers to the rich harvest.
And where enemies did not exist, the fears of these poor wretches found
them. Every drover with his herd, every shepherd with his flock, was
magnified into a fresh array of the terrible Highlanders. On the evening
of Monday, the 29th, Mackay reached Stirling with barely