Duncan Robertson, a younger son of the deceased Laird of Struan, had fallen out of all good terms with his mother, apparently in consequence of some disputes about their respective rights. Gathering an armed band of idle ruffians, he went with them to his mother’s jointure-lands, and laid them waste; he went to a ‘room’ or piece of land occupied by his sister Margaret, and carried off all that was upon it; he also ‘laid waste any possession his other sister Mrs Janet had.’ When a military party, posted at Carie, came to protect the ladies, he fired on it, and afterwards plainly avowed to the commander that his object was to dispossess his mother and her tenants. By this cruel act, Lady Struan and her other children had been ‘reduced to these straits and difficulties, that they had not whereupon to live.’
Aug. 2.
The Privy Council gave orders for the capture of Duncan Robertson, and his being put in the Tolbooth of Edinburgh, and kept there till further orders.[[280]]
Nov. 16.
A band of persons, usually called Egyptians or gipsies, used to go about the province of Moray in armed fashion, helping themselves freely to the property of the settled population, and ordinarily sleeping in kilns near the farmhouses. There seems to have been thirty of them in all, men and women; but it was |1700.| seldom that more than eight or ten made their appearance in any one place. It was quite a familiar sight, at a fair or market in Banff, Elgin, Forres, or any other town of the district, to see nearly a dozen sturdy Egyptians march in with a piper playing at their head, their matchlocks slung behind them, and their broadswords or dirks by their sides, to mingle in the crowd, inspect the cattle shewn for sale, and watch for bargains passing among individuals, in order to learn who was in the way of receiving money. They would be viewed with no small suspicion and dislike by the assembled rustics and farmers; but the law was unable to put them entirely down.
Macpherson’s Sword.
James Macpherson, who was understood to be the natural son of a gentleman of the district by a gipsy mother, was a conspicuous or leading man in the band; he was a person of goodly figure and great strength and daring, always carrying about with him—how acquired we cannot tell—an example of the two-handed swords of a former age, besides other weapons. He had a talent for music, and was a good player on the violin. It has been stated that some traits of a generous nature occasionally shone out in him; but, on the whole, he was merely a Highland cateran, breaking houses and henroosts, stealing horses and cattle, and living recklessly on the proceeds, like the tribe with which he associated.
Duff, Laird of Braco, founder of the honours and wealth of the Earls of Fife, took a lead at this time in the public affairs of his district. He formed the resolution of trying to give a check to the lawless proceedings of the Egyptians, by bringing their leaders to justice. It required some courage to face such determined ruffians with arms in |1700.| their hands, and he had a further difficulty in the territorial prejudices of the Laird of Grant, who regarded some of the robbers as his tenants, and felt bound, accordingly, to protect them from any jurisdiction besides his own.[[281]] This remark bears particularly upon two named Peter and Donald Brown, who had lived for half a year at a place closely adjacent to Castle-Grant, and the former of whom was regarded as captain of the band.
Finding Macpherson, the Browns, and others at the ‘Summer’s Eve Fair in Keith, the stout-hearted Braco made up his mind to attack them. To pursue a narrative which appears to be authentic: ‘As soon as he observed them in the fair, he desired his brother-in-law, Lesmurdie, to bring him a dozen stout men, which he did. They attacked the villains, who, as they had several of their accomplices with them, made a desperate resistance. One of them made a pass at Braco with his hanger, intending to run him through the heart; but it slanted along the outside of the ribs, and one of his men immediately stabbed the fellow dead. They then carried Macpherson and [Peter] Brown to a house in Keith, and set three or four stout men to guard them, not expecting any more opposition, as all the rest of the gang were fled. Braco and Lesmurdie were sitting in an upper room, concerting the commitment of their prisoners, when the Laird of Grant and thirty men came calling for them, swearing no Duff in Scotland should keep them from him. Braco, hearing the noise of the Grants, came down stairs, and said, with seeming unconcern and humour: “That he designed to have sent them to prison; but he saw they were too strong a party for him to contend with, and so he must leave them;” but, without losing a moment, he took a turn through the market, found other two justices of peace, kept a court, and assembled sixty stout fellows, with whom he retook the two criminals, and sent them to prison.’[[282]]