A strong gate, loopholed for musketry, and surmounted by a coat of arms with the motto, Victoriam coronat Christus, was closed and secured as the MacGregors approached, and all was still within, save the lowing and bellowing of the cattle, so closely penned within the barbican.
Rob Roy thundered with his sword-hilt on the outer gate, in which an eyelet-hole was opened, and thereat the porter's face appeared, with an expression of anxiety and alarm, which was no way lessened when he found himself front to front with the keen eyes, the ruddy beard, and sunburned visage of the Red MacGregor, whom he knew instinctively.
"Is the laird at home?" asked the resolute visitor.
"Yes," stammered the gate-ward.
"Why does he not come in person when he knows who are here?" was the haughty query.
"He is at dinner."
"What! Is this Highland manners, to close your gates at meal-time, when other men open theirs wide, that all men may enter? Is this the way your master rewards those who protect him from thieving MacNabs and broken men of the Lennox?"
"Sir James Livingstone, Sir Humphrey of Luss, and several gentlemen are at dinner with him, and I dare not disturb them," urged the porter, whose orders were to keep out Rob at all hazards.
"Gentlemen!" repeated Rob. "Whigs, probably, plotting treason against King James. Tell your master that the Red MacGregor of Inversnaid is here, without, where it is not his wont to be kept, awaiting his arrears of black-mail, and that he shall see him, even if the King of Scotland and the Hanoverian Elector, too, were at table with him!"
After a time, the gate-ward returned, trembling, to say that "his master knew no such persons as either the King, the Elector, or the Laird of Inversnaid."