"My heart is empty now," thought he; "and the sooner it is cold the better." He had no desire to live, and, after seeking and slaying Gordon, had resolved to perish on the battle-field. The centre and vanguard was composed of 4000 Campbells, under Argyle's kinsman, the Laird of Auchinbreck. They carried the earl's banner, and his badges as Great Master of the Household and High Justiciar of the kingdom. Half of these Campbells carried arquebusses; the remainder carried bows, targets, and two-handed claymores.
Argyle in person led the reserve, which consisted of 5000 warriors of the Ebudæ and western tribes of Lorn, all clad in their native tartans, with targets of burnished brass, battle-axes of steel, and short Highland bows. More than a hundred war-pipes were pouring the wild piobrachds of the various clans from flank to flank, as Huntly's little band approached them.
His vanguard consisted of 300 gentlemen on horseback, clad in bright armour, led by the Earl of Errol, Sir Patrick Gordon of Auchindoune, the Lairds of Gicht and Bonnitoun, Sir Thomas Kerr, and Halbert Gordon of the Moated Tower. In front of this small column were three fieldpieces under Sir Andrew Gray, afterwards colonel of the Scottish troops in Bohemia.
Gordon of Cluny led the right wing, Gordon of Abergeldie the left, and Huntly the main body. He had no reserve. In full armour, with a scarf of the Gordon tartan over his cuirass, with his visor up and his sword brandished, he rode along the line.
"My brave clansmen," he exclaimed, "and you, my comrades and most illustrious allies of the house of Errol, remember that this day no alternative is left us but victory or death—glory or extermination! We are not here to fight for our lives only, but for the existence of our families, our estates, our honour, and what is dearer than all beside, the church of our forefathers, and, with that church, the souls of our children, and the souls of all their posterity. In the name of God and the blessed Virgin, charge! a Gordon! a Gordon!"
Led on by the Lord High Constable (though galled by an ill-directed fire from the arquebussiers of Argyle), Huntly's vanguard of knights rushed with uplifted swords upon the first column of the Calvinists, who received them on their targets, and a furious combat took place. These gentlemen were in full armour, while the poor clansmen were only in their homespun tartan, and thus fought at great disadvantage; but their tremendous claymores cut through many a head and helmet, while every thrust pierced a coat-of-mail, or sliced away a yard of good horseflesh; thus many a steed recoiled frantically on the main body, bleeding and riderless.
Over the heads of these combatants, the cannoniers of Sir Andrew Gray fired briskly on the yellow standard, according to a treacherous arrangement made secretly between Huntly and Campbell of Lochnell, who bore a mortal enmity to Argyle, for having slain his brother Campbell of Calder in 1592; and, being next heir to the earldom, he saw with ambitious hope and joy the ordnance fire on that peculiar banner which marked the post of his chief; but, lo! a misdirected shot raked the ranks of Lochnell himself, and that deep-witted duinewassal was the first whom it cut in two. The next ball killed M'Neil of Barra, and the third wounded John Grant of Corriemonie.
From the brow of a steep eminence, the M'Leans poured volley after volley with their arquebusses on Huntly's desperate troop, until Sir Patrick Gordon of Auchindoune dashed up, and fell amongst them with a few horsemen; but then the M'Leans slung their fire-arms behind them, and repelled the troopers by the claymore, embowelling the horses by dirk and skene-dhu, and slaying the riders as they were tumbled prone to the earth; and there died the brave Auchindoune, pierced by fifty wounds. His knights fought blindly in a dark cloud; for the smoke of the cannon and arquebusses filled the whole glen, while their reports rang among the mountain peaks with a thousand echoes.
In dark sreen tartans, bare-legged and bare-armed, with their targets slung behind them, and their claymores swayed by both hands, the Campbells poured down in thousands like a torrent upon the devoted band of Huntly, whose daring horsemen broke into two bodies, one led by himself, the other by the high constable, who was severely wounded, and desperately they fought, with all the fury that Highland valour, feudal hatred, and religious rancour could inspire; and thus for two hours the battle raged in that narrow glen, till Argyle, observing that his main body wavered, ordered John Grant of Gartenbeg, with his column, consisting of a thousand men of his own name, to "advance and sweep the Catholics from the field."
Clad in scarlet tartan, with helmets and cuirasses of steel, and targets of burnished brass, this body, which had not been engaged otherwise than suffering from the cannonade, was advancing to end the contest, when their leader, who in secret was an ally of Huntly, and a well-wisher to the Catholic cause, threw his target over his shoulder, sheathed his claymore, and cried—