Argyleshire

“ At the period to which the beautiful monuments of Argyleshire are referrible that district stood singularly isolated, sharing only very partially even in the influences of Scottish art, and still less in its social progress, while at the same time the peculiar sanctity indissolubly associated with its ancient shrines kept alive the spirit in which these originated. Scarcely any circumstances can be conceived more favourable for the development of a new style of art ”

“ Judging from the intelligence brought by the last person that arrived in his camp, that the Highlanders were coming directly in his front, the duke considered himself free from surprise, as the Argyleshire men lay on the plain to the west of his camp, while a party of dragoons patrolled all night between Nairn and the sea. ”

“ Lord Mar says, "the Duke of Argyle's leaving Stirling, and going with a part of his army to Edinburgh. Now, had the Scots and English horse, who were then in the south of Scotland, come and joined the fifteen hundred foot, (under Brigadier Mackintosh) as was expected; had the Highland clans performed, as they promised, the service they were sent upon in Argyleshire, and marched towards Glasgow, as the Earl of Mar marched towards Sterling, he had then given a good account of the Government's army, the troops from Ireland not having yet joined them, nor could they have joined them afterwards. ”

“ He held more than one council with the principal Chiefs, combating, perhaps, his own secret inclination as well as theirs. He laid before them the extreme difficulty of marching even a Highland army from the eastward into Argyleshire, through passes scarcely practicable for shepherds and deer-stalkers, and over mountains with which even the clans lying nearest to them did not pretend to be thoroughly acquainted. ”

“ Aulay MacAulay, the twelfth and last chief of the MacAulays, having seen the patrimony of his house sold, and his castle roofless, died about 1767. Ardincaple had been purchased by John, fourth Duke of Argyll, and now belongs to the Argyll family.
About the beginning of the 18th century, a number of MacAulays settled in Caithness and Sutherland. Others went into Argyleshire, and some of the MacPheiderans of that county acknowledged their descent from the MacAulays. ”

“ An individual tribe of them retains the same name. They are accounted one of the most ancient clans in the Highlands, and it is certain they were a people of original Celtic descent, and occupied at one period very extensive possessions in Perthshire and Argyleshire, which they imprudently continued to hold by the coir a glaive, that is, the right of the sword. Their neighbours, the Earls of Argyle and Breadalbane, in the meanwhile, managed to leave the lands occupied by the MacGregors engrossed in those charters which they easily obtained from the Crown ”

“ Justice, in some degree, but still more that warm affection for his own kindred and vassals, which seems to have formed a marked feature in this nobleman’s character, then induces him to make an exception in favour of his poor friends in Argyleshire, in treating for whom, though in what particular way does not appear, he was employing, and with some hope of success, the few remaining hours of his life. ”

“ Dion Cassius says the Caledonians never taste fish, although their lakes and rivers furnish an inexhaustible supply. Two ‘holie fishes’ in the seventeenth century occupied a well near the church of Kilmore in Argyleshire. They were black—never changed colour—neither increased in number nor in size in the memory of the most aged. The people believed that no others existed anywhere. ”

“ It seems hardly possible for a lowlander, unless he begins early in life and has abundant practice, to lose all ‘taste of the English’ in his Gaelic talk. Thus a pre-Disruption minister with whom I was well acquainted in Argyleshire, and who was not a native Celt, but had learnt Gaelic in his youth, made mistakes in the language up to the end of his long life. ”

“ Of these primitive pit-dwellings numerous traces are discernible on Leuchar Moss, in the parish of Skene, and in other localities of Aberdeenshire; on the banks of Loch Fine, Argyleshire; in the counties of Inverness and Caithness; and in various other districts of Scotland still uninvaded by the plough. They are almost invariably found in groups, affording evidence of the gregarious and social habits of man in the simplest state of society. The rudest of them consist simply of shallow excavations in the soil, of a circular or oblong form, and rarely exceeding seven or eight feet in diameter. ”

“ And who will give us anything worthy to take the place of the religion of our fathers and mothers? And what teachers have come comparable to Christ, to David, Isaiah, and Paul?"
Jenny only died a year ago. She brought up David's children admirably, and saw, to her great delight, the marriage of Flora and young Captain Callendar. For it had long been her wish to go back to Argyleshire "among her ain folk and die among the mountains," and this marriage satisfied all her longings. ”

“ At their departure, the Bailie thus expressed himself:—"Thae Hielandmen are o' the westland clans, and just as light-handed as their neighbours, an a' tales be true, and yet ye see they hae brought them frae the head o' Argyleshire to make war wi' puir Rob for some auld ill-will that they hae at him and his sirname. ”

“ Their reasons for resisting the orders to embark are thus stated in their defence:—“The prisoners, Archibald Macivor and Charles Williamson, enlisted as soldiers in the 42d, [356] being an old Highland regiment, wearing the Highland dress. Their native language was Gaelic,—the one being a native of the northern parts of Argyleshire, and the other of the western parts of Inverness-shire, where the language of the country is Gaelic only. They have never used any other language, and are so ignorant of the English tongue that they cannot avail themselves of it for any purpose of life. ”

“ But when we pass to a series of dykes traversing a considerable district of country, and find that those which run in one direction are invariably cut by those which run in another, the inference can hardly be resisted that they do not belong to the same period of eruption, but mark successive epochs of volcanic energy. An excellent example of this kind of evidence is furnished by Mr. Clough from Eastern Argyleshire. The east and west dykes in that district are undoubtedly older than those which run in a N.N.W. direction (Fig. 257) . ”

“ Less reverential motives probably led to the preservation of the Clagan, or Little Bell of St. Barry, a favourite old Celtic saint who gives name to the district of Argyleshire where he is said to have ministered. This relic, which remained till the close of last century in the possession of the principal heritor of Kilberry parish, was somewhat larger, and probably of less hoar antiquity, than the primitive ecclesiastical memorials previously described. "The bell of St. ”

“ Something else apart from our three main interests is a phenomenon that looks like what one might call an alternating series of falls of fishes, whatever the significance may be:
Meerut, India, July, 1824 (Living Age, 52-186) ; Fifeshire, Scotland, summer of 1824 (Werneriam Nat. Hist. Soc. Trans., 5-575) ; Moradabad, India, July, 1826 (Living Age, 52-186) ; Ross-shire, Scotland, 1828 (Living Age, 52-186) ; Moradabad, India, July 20, 1829 (Lin. Soc. Trans., 16-764) ; Perthshire, Scotland, (Living Age, 52-186) ; Argyleshire, Scotland, 1830, March 9, 1830 (Recreative Science, 3-339) ”

“ None of the mainland counties of Scotland can boast of such wonderful ramifications of sea and loch as the county of Argyll. The present amiable and cultured head of the Clan Campbell declaimed, with great applause, at a social gathering not long ago, a fine poem, in which the beauties of his ancestral shire were floridly—but not unjustly—elaborated. It would be difficult to over-praise the county of Argyll, with its splendid sea-board, its rugged and impressive peaks, and its unrivalled fiords and lakes. Thanks to its proximity to large centres of population, few counties are so much visited. ”

“ The professions of Argyll, as interpreted by Charles, were to a certain extent carried out in his speech on 25 June in the Painted Chamber before the committee of the lords and commons, in which he deprecated the persecution of ‘peaceable men who cannot through scruple of conscience come up in all things to the common rule,’ but he was careful to add that the personal regard for the king in Scotland ‘hath never made them forget that common rule, “The safety of the people is the supreme law”’ (The Lord Marques of Argyle's Speech, London, printed for Laurence Chapman, 27 June 1646) . ”

“ The rule of George I. in England implied the domination of that great Whig clan, and its chief the Duke of Argyle, over the lands north of Forth and Clyde. For now, as in 1645 and 1685, the chief of the Campbells, the MacCallain Mor, as his clansmen called him, was at the head Pg 487 of the Presbyterian or Whig party in Scotland. The chiefs of the other Highland tribes were as bitterly hostile to the present Duke of Argyle as their ancestors had been to his father and grandfather. ”

“ The banders flocked to the town with so great backing, the Chancellor and Argyle’s company was so small, that there was a great rumour raised of a wicked design against Argyle’s person; but incontinent the gentry and ministry of Fife running over in thousands, and the Lothians with the town of Edinburgh cleaving to Argyle above expectation, the banders courage and companies of foot and horse melted away as snow in a hot sunshine. A paper of Sir Archibald Johnston’s, as a letter to a friend, gave good satisfaction to the minds of men. ”

“ A boat’s crew whom he sent on shore at Orkney being taken prisoners, gave information of his design, and the bishop of that diocese immediately carried the intelligence to Edinburgh. The militia of the kingdom was called out. The gentlemen of Argyle’s clan were seized and brought to the capital. The earl, finding all his prospects blighted, made a hesitating and timid advance towards Glasgow, where he hoped, but vainly, to be joined by the persecuted people of the west. The government forces advancing on every hand to meet him, his troops melted away ”

“ During the rule of Argyle and Leslie in Scotland, a rule which might aptly be denominated a reign of terror, the possessions of the chief in Mull had been ravaged by the parliamentary troops, without any resistance from the harmless inhabitants, who had been instructed by their lord to offer no retaliation that could furnish a plea for future oppression. The castle of Duart had been besieged, and surrendered to Argyle and Leslie, upon condition that the defenceless garrison, and eight Irish gentlemen, inmates of the hospitable Highlander's home, should be spared. ”

“ After this, two days before Argyle was broken and taken, he was near Wigtown in Galloway; a considerable number of men were gathered together in arms, to go for his assistance; they pressed him to preach, but he positively refused, laying, he would souls pray with them where he continued long, and spent some part of that time in praying for Ireland, pleading that the Lord would spare a remnant, and not make a full end in the day of his anger; and would put it in the hearts of his own to flee over to this bloody land, where they would find safety for a time. ”

“ Since the splendour of the House of Argyle had been eclipsed, no Gaelic chief could vie in power with the Marquess of Athol. The district from which he took his title, and of which he might almost be called the sovereign, was in extent larger than an ordinary county, and was more fertile, more diligently cultivated, and more thickly peopled than the greater part of the Highlands. The men who followed his banner were supposed to be not less numerous than all the Macdonalds and Macleans united, and were, in strength and courage, inferior to no tribe in the mountains. ”

“ On his way to join them, Argyll, with a body of highlanders, was surprised by the Earl of Lanark while dining with the Earl of Mar at Stirling, but galloping across Stirling bridge he reached North Queensferry, and crossed the Firth in a small boat to Edinburgh, where the ‘Whigamores,’ as they were afterwards called, had already arrived. The incursion known as the ‘Whigamore Raid’ dealt the final blow to the cause of the king. At Edinburgh a new committee of estates was formed with Argyll at its head. ”

“ In the series of tangled incidents which followed, Argyll lost control of the national policy. He describes himself at this period as “a distracted man ... in a distracted time” whose “remedies ... had the quite contrary operation.” He supported the invitation from the Covenanters to Charles II. to land in Scotland, gazed upon the captured Montrose, bound on a cart on his way to execution at Edinburgh, and subsequently, when Charles II. came to Scotland, having signed the Covenant and repudiated Montrose, Argyll remained at the head of the administration. ”

“ Even so late as Sunday, the twenty-ninth of January, when Argyle's troops left Stirling and advanced to Braco Castle, Lord Mar appears to have been in ignorance of their actual movements. Perhaps, like the busy world of London politicians, he regarded the project of an attempt upon Perth [Pg 177] in such weather as impracticable. Such was the opinion at St. James's. "Argyle's friends here," writes one near the Court, "speak of the march and the attempt at present as madness." And another individual writes, that "one half of their people must die of cold, and the other be knocked o' the head. ”