Breadalbane

“ Of the home life in Scotland, Mr. Innes gives us some very attractive notices, passing in review no less than four collections of family documents—the Morton, the Breadalbane, the Cawdor, and the Kilravock papers. Abounding, as these papers do, in social illustrations, and sketching, as they do, the character and spirit of the age, the condition and customs of the people, they cannot fail to instruct and entertain. ”

“ A huge grey polecat, about three feet long, gazed at us from a fragment of rock without moving, and with an expression of wonder in its savage eyes; for by the result of the game-restrictions and other Draconian laws of our Highland feudatories, God's image was becoming somewhat as scarce in these districts as in Breadalbane, Sutherland, or on the Braes of Lochaber.
As the sunset lingered on our magnificent native mountains, Callum and I gazed about in silence. Every spot had its old and quaint—its terrible or beautiful—associations and traditions. ”

“ They drove in silence; idly Lady Stair pulled at her fan and stared out of the window; moodily he traced patterns on the coach floor with his scabbard point, his face turned from her. So they galloped through Edinburgh and thundered into the courtyard of Lord Breadalbane’s house.
CHAPTER II
FOREBODINGS The musicians were playing the delicate melody of a pavan in Lady Breadalbane’s ball-room, the air was heavy with the scent of the white and pink roses that decorated the walls and the rhythmical movements of the dancers were reflected in smooth pale floors. ”

“ In the wilds of Glendochart Rob began to frame daring political schemes, which the protection afforded to him by his kinsman, Sir John Campbell, of Glenorchy, now Earl of Breadalbane, enabled him to mature, and arms were collected and hidden in secret places, and men were prepared for the coming strife. ”

“ There is not a man in the house; even the Boots is a girl, so that 22, Breadalbane Terrace is as truly a castra puellarum as was ever the Castle of Edinburgh with its maiden princesses in the olden time.
We talked with Miss Diggity-Dalgety on the evening of our first day at Mrs. M'Collop's, when she came up to know our commands. As Francesca and Salemina were both in the room, I determined to be as Scotch as possible, for it is Salemina's proud boast that she is taken for a native of every country she visits. ”

“ Upon the sequestered spot, which is so beautifully situated between lake, mountain, and river, arose afterwards the feudal castle of the Ballough [Balloch is Gaelic for the discharge of a lake into a river] , which in our time has been succeeded by the splendid palace of the Earls of Breadalbane. ”

“ On this much-disputed ground, the sons of Alpin were in touch with many neighbours, more or less hostile, their relations with whom are darkly commemorated in such traditional tales of bloodshed, ravage, and treachery as too much stain the rags of Highland history. Some of these tales we have already come upon in passing through Breadalbane. For a time, the Macgregors seem to have shared Balquhidder with other clans, notably the Maclarens, an older stock of occupants, who claimed the right of being first to enter the parish church. ”

“ Naturally such a personage did not thrive in his quarrel with the age; and when he died in 1816, what was left of the Macnab property passed into the hands of his kinsman and creditor, Lord Breadalbane, to whom the laird had stooped his pride to become a sort of humoured hanger-on. His nephew, heir to a load of debt, was fain to emigrate to Canada with a following of the broken clan. ”

“ By her will she left large sums to the Society for Promoting Christian Knowledge, chiefly for the maintenance of schools. Lady Glenorchy was so absorbed with the spiritual bearings of life that its more human aspects were somewhat overlooked. Her intense sincerity and consistency won the admiration, though hardly the sympathy, both of her husband, Lord Glenorchy, and her father-in-law, Lord Breadalbane. ”

“ In the year 1795 a serious disturbance broke out in Glasgow among the Breadalbane Fencibles. Several men having been confined and threatened with corporal punishment, considerable discontent and irritation were excited among their comrades, which increased to such violence, that, when some men were confined in the guard-house, a great proportion of the regiment rushed out and forcibly released the prisoners. ”

“ In 1843 he was chosen lord rector of the university of Glasgow. During the controversy between the church of Scotland and the civil courts Breadalbane was conspicuous for his earnest advocacy of the 'non-intrusion' cause. In that connection he was by far the most outstanding man among the laity. Though not a great speaker he advocated the cause in the House of Lords, as well as in public meetings, and when the Free church was set up he cordially adhered to it, and was one of its most munificent supporters. ”

“ Breadalbane was quite willing to give the best advice he could, provided he did not compromise himself, and at any rate had no objection to reap what pecuniary advantage might be offered him by the court of St. Germains. ‘His business,’ as the Master of Sinclair expressed it, ‘was to trick others, not to be trickt.’ He had engaged to raise twelve hundred men to join the clans, but although his memory was refreshed by sending him money to raise them, he only sent three hundred. ”

“ The direct line of Breadalbane died out in George III.’s reign with the third earl, whose son, Lord Glenorchy, had predeceased him, leaving a widow, known, like the Countess of Huntingdon, as a patroness of evangelical preachers, who came to end her life at Matlock. For an heir, the family had to cast back more than a century to one of the collateral branches. Campbell of Carwhin, who succeeded to the earldom in 1782, at the age of twenty, had a long and prosperous tenure, swelling the family wealth by his marriage with a great Scottish heiress. ”

“ On the wide uplands hangs nature’s own tapestry of bell-heather and broom, the purple of the one and the glowing gold of the other mixed in harmonious splendour; and here and there a little tarn—the largest, Loch Derculich, a lonely heron-haunted loch, held close to the heart of the moorland—lifts its blue eye to catch the smile of heaven.
If we are to visit every part of Perthshire, we must tear ourselves away from this characteristic antechamber{51} of Highland scenery, to the sides of which open Atholl and Breadalbane. ”

“ Which occurrence in lower degree would enforce many to retire; but in state of that he shewed such splendid courage that he swimed over that of the river near Killin’s Inn, in that posture, to his habitate, to have himself extricated of the arrows. The day after that fatal day, a valiant number of Breadalbane people, or tenants, went after the ravishers, and took the prey back, after killing the ravishers utterly, except about two escaped. ”

“ 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 ”

“ Bramapootra R., the offspring of Brahma Brazil, named from the colour of its dye-woods, braza, Port. a live coal Breadalbane, 29 Brecknock, the hill of Brecon or Brychan, a Welsh prince Breda, 29 Breslaw, named after King Vratis-law Breton, Cape, discovered by mariners from Brittany Bridgenorth, 31 Bridgewater, 31 Brieg, 29 Brighton, corrupt. from Brighthelmston, from a personal name Bristol, 183 Britain: the Cym.-Cel. root brith, to paint, is supposed by some to be the root of the word ”

“ Roderigh Vich Alpine dhu. The words vich and dhu are Gaelic, the first meaning "descendant of," the second "black or swarthy." King Alpine was the half-mythical ancestor from whom the clan of Alpine sprung. The line means, therefore, "Black Roderick, descendant of Alpine." Compare II, xii, 220, where Allan-bane calls the chieftain "Black Sir Roderick."
410. Blooming at Beltane. See note to II, 319.
416. Breadalbane. A large district in the western part of the county of Perth.
419–426. Glen Fruin, Bannochar, Glenn Luss, Ross-dhu, Leven-glen. ”

“ Any one who knows the countryside I am writing of, or takes a glance at my relative Neill Bane’s diagram or map of the same, will see that we were now in the very heart of a territory hotching (as the rough phrase goes) with clans inimical to the house of Argile. Between us and the comparative safety of Bredalbane lay Stewarts, MacDonalds, Macgregors, and other families less known in history, who hated the name of MacCailein more than they feared the wrath of God. The sight of our tartan in any one of their glens would rouse hell in every heart about us. ”

“ Breaden was born and bred in the bush, and had lived his life away up in Central Australia hundreds of miles from a civilised town. And yet a finer gentleman, in the true sense of the word, I have never met with. Such men as he make the backbone of the country, and of them Australia may well be proud. Breaden had with him his black-boy "Warri," an aboriginal from the McDonnell Ranges of Central Australia, a fine, smart-looking lad of about sixteen years, whom Breaden had trained, from the age of six, to ride and track and do the usual odd jobs required of black-boys on cattle stations. ”

“ The Brezonek, the Brythonic tongue of Brittany, is undoubtedly the language of those Celtic immigrants who fled from Britain the Greater to Britain the Less to escape the rule of the Saxon invaders, and who gave the name of the country which they had left to that Armorica in which they settled. In the earliest stages of development it is difficult to distinguish Breton from Welsh. From the ninth to the eleventh centuries the Breton language is described as ‘Old Breton.’ ‘Middle Breton’ flourished from the eleventh to the seventeenth centuries, since when ‘Modern Breton’ has been in use. ”

“ You've robbed Merle!"
Old Broadbrim did not reply to this assertion, but continued to look into the eyes before him.
"How's the pit?" he suddenly queried.
There was a start on the old man's part, and he would have leaped from the chair, if Old Broadbrim had not held him down.
"I knew it. You're the man!" he cried.
"There was no tenth step, Danny."
"You found that out, did you?"
"There are loose stones in the wall of the round dungeon." ”

“ You will probably find me in the fight when it comes off; but I can't take service under Captain Merle."
"Why can't you?"
"I—don't—like—the man."
"Very well. We will hold the ranch to the last," said Old Broadbrim. "If Blacklocks knew this perhaps he would postpone his swoop."
"Not he! You don't know him," cried Black George. "He has sworn a great oath that by to-morrow not one of you shall be alive, and that the gold in the treasure house shall be in the pockets of his bandits."
The native cast a hasty glance over the landscape behind him and drew back. ”

“ Old Broadbrim knew what the visit meant.
Merle was looking for the detective; he was investigating in person to see if the hunter who had escaped the pit in Melbourne had yet found his way to Round Robin Ranch.
Over each sleeper the man bent and threw the light of the little bull's-eye upon him. ”

“ The Château de Mereac stood on the outskirts of the forest of Arteze, not many leagues distant from the little Breton town of Martigue. The country on this side of Rennes had from time immemorial been the debatable land between Brittany and her overweening sister France; countless feuds raged constantly between the peoples, such as were fought in the Middle Ages, and even later, along our own Scottish border, and every Breton eyed his French neighbour as a natural and implacable enemy. ”

“ Whom do you serve in this part of the island?"
"I serve myself!" cried Danny, his little eyes blazing like stars. "I'm an old man who does no wrong, but I come from Melbourne, now and then, on business."
"The business of a spy!"
The next minute Old Danny sprang up with the agility of a cat and his face seemed transformed.
In one of his bony hands he gripped a dagger, which he threw above his head with all the fiendishness of a thug, and in another instant he made at Old Broadbrim like a panther.
But the detective threw up one hand and caught the descending arm in a grip of steel. ”

“ Old Broadbrim dropped his voice to a solemn whisper.
"Look here, Danny," he said, "the man is dead."
"What, the person who incurred Belle's vengeance at Monaco?"
"Yes."
"Does she know it?" cried the old man. "Did you tell her?"
"She knows it. Not only this, but Merle went to America months ago charged with a commission from her."
"To kill him?" exclaimed Danny of Melbourne, his face losing every particle of color and his eyes seeming to leap from his head.
"Do you think Merle would cross the sea to serve Belle Demona?" quietly asked the detective. ”

“ Merle was looking Old Broadbrim squarely in the eye and his gaze seemed to transfix him like a lance.
"It's a bargain, eh?" he cried.
"I'll try," said Old Broadbrim.
"That's all I ask. I know if you 'try' we'll get rid of this pest in skirts. Don't mince matters, Riggs. Let her have the full benefit of your grip and that will be sufficient."
Old Broadbrim cast his eyes down the ravine and seemed to measure the distance to the bottom mentally.
"Stareyes is cunning and cool. I have stood before her and seen her orbs flash like twin stars. ”

“ Were they trying to assure themselves that he was a fit man to be in the employ of old Breede? He could imagine it of them; as soon as they thought about voting they began to interfere in a man's business. Yet this suspicion slept when he was with the flapper alone. Sometimes he was conscious of liking very much to be with her. He decided that this was because she didn't talk.
The evening of his last day came. Breede, in a burst of garrulity, had said: "Had enough this; go town to-morrow!" The flapper, and even the Demon, had seemed to be stirred by the announcement. ”