It was the memory of severities such as these, together with their local position, that fostered a spirit of resentment and ferocious resistance to all civil law in the tribe of MacGregor.
"When I asked a very learned minister in the Highlands," says Dr. Johnson, "which he considered the most savage clans, those, said he, which live next the Lowlands."
This was the mere force of circumstances and position; and hence the most warlike and predatory of the Lowland clans were those of the borders adjoining England.
CHAPTER LI.
HE FIGHTS THE LAIRD OF BARRA.
"Rob Roy had two especial qualities," says the "New Picture of Scotland" (published in 1807): "he spent his revenue generously, and was a true friend to the widow and the orphan."
On his return to Portnellan, he now hoped that, by the treasure which he had judiciously distributed among his people, they might, if the persecution of them ceased, stock their little farms and take to cattle-dealing, that they might all live in ease and comfort, and that his sons might learn some of the arts of peace without forgetting those of war.
Soon after his return from Glensheil, Rob heard that Grahame of Killearn, who always treated the tenantry of Montrose with great severity, had sequestrated, or distrained, the cows and furniture of a poor woman who lived near the Highland border.
As she was a widow, and more especially as she was the widow of Eoin Raibach, who had fallen at the storming of Inversnaid, he immediately visited her cottage, and she burst into tears when she beheld him, exclaiming,—
"MacGregor, mo comraich ort!" (my protection is thee.)