The Prince galloped up to the company of MacDonalds, who had stood sullenly aloof because, at the beginning of the fight, they had not been given the first post of danger.
“MacDonalds!” he said. “Who comes with me to the bridge?”
They forgot their sulkiness, forgot allegiance to their chieftain. There was the Stuart here, his face crimsoned by a glancing musket-shot, his voice alive and dominant. From frank disaster, from toothache and the miry roads, from this day’s battle, which had found him skilled in fight, he had learned his kingship.
The MacDonald turned sharply round, putting himself between his clansmen and the Prince. “We stay,” he said, with peremptory and harsh command. “They would not give us the right wing of the battle—we’ll take no other.”
The Prince saw them halt in the midst of their eager rush to serve him—saw them look at each other, waver, and stand still. A call stronger than his own had come to them—the call that is in each man’s blood, blowing willy-nilly like the wind and bidding him obey the teaching of dead forefathers. Their hearts were toward the Prince—they hungered for this onset at the bridge—but they held back, just as at Derby, because old allegiance was demanded by their chieftain.
“MacDonalds!” cried the Prince again, with desperate eagerness. “Who’s for the bridge?”
And then, before he guessed their purpose, some of his gentlemen rode close about him, clutched his reins, compelled him to desert the field.
“All’s lost, your Highness—except your safety,” said one.
He struggled to get free of them. “My pleasure,” he said hotly, “is to die as poorer friends are doing.”
They would not listen. Their love of him—whether it took a misguided form or no—compelled them to use force, to disregard commands, entreaties. His vision, maybe, was clearer than their own. They were concerned with his immediate welfare, could not look into the years ahead that were to be a lingering, heart-broken death, instead of the pleasant end he craved.