“Ay! just what I took you for; a parcel of highway robbers and scoundrels. Come, my good fellows” (addressing the soldiers in charge of the baggage, and extending his voice with the lungs of a Stentor) “prime! load!”
The excisemen did not wait the completion of the order, but fled at full speed.
“Now, my lads,” said the Laird, “proceed—the whisky’s safe.”
Another anecdote illustrates how equal he was to a delicate occasion. The Laird was a regular attender at Leith races. He rode a most wretched-looking steed, which gave occasion for many jibes at his expense, and one year, while rushing in to see the result of a heat, his horse fell and was seriously injured. The year following, a puppy, who thought he might raise a laugh at Macnab’s expense, looked up to him as he passed by, and enquired—
“Is that the same horse ye had here last year, Laird?”
“No,” retorted Macnab, bringing his whip-shaft down on his interrogator’s head with a force that made him bite the dust, “but it’s the same whup!”
But the Laird’s grand escapade—his coup d’état—remains yet to be related. It happened to be the last in his life, and it forms a fitting climacteric to a truly wonderful career. It is narrated at great length in a MS. scrap book of his adventures still preserved at Breadalbane Castle, and is briefly as follows:—
The pressure of a declining revenue began to tell heavily on the Laird, and he had occasionally to grant bills for his purchases. For many years these bills were regularly discounted at the Perth Bank, the Directors of which, knowing their money to be sure, though perhaps not soon, humoured his idiosyncracies, and took his acceptances although signed “The Macnab.” Unluckily for the Laird, one of these “cursed bits o’ paper,” as he termed them, found its way to the Stirling Bank, an establishment with which he had no direct connection, and, having no personal friend to protect his credit at Stirling, it was duly noted and protested, and notice was sent to him. These formalities the Laird treated, of course, with the most lofty indifference. He was effectually roused, however, when the alarming information reached his ear that a “caption and horning” had been issued against him, and that a clerk, accompanied by two messengers, would proceed to Auchlyne House on the following Friday for the purpose of taking him into custody. The Laird called a council of war. Janet, his faithful old housekeeper, and other two trusty retainers, were made familiar with the disgrace that was threatening to fall on the Chief of all the Macnabs. Janet was a diplomatist of the true Caleb Balderstone type, and the Laird trusted chiefly to her wit and ingenuity in the emergency. “To clap me within four bare stane wa’s,” said he, addressing his female major-general, “and for what, think ye? A peetifu’ scart o’ a goose’s feather—deil cripple their souple shanks. It would ill become me to hae ony hobble-show wi’ siccan vermin, so I’ll awa’ doun to my Lord’s at Taymouth, and leave you, Janet, my bonnie woman, to gie them their kail through the reek.” And off he went, leaving Janet to master the situation as best she could. This was on Friday morning. In the course of the day the officers made their appearance at Auchlyne House.
“O, sirs,” quoth Janet, receiving them blandly, “ye maun be sair forfouchten wi’ your langsome travel. Sit down, and get some meat. The Laird’s awa’ to see a friend, and will be back momently. What gars ye gloom that gate? There’s a’ ye want, and muckle mair, locked up in that kist there, in bonnie yellow gowd, fairly counted by his honour this very mornin’,” and, so saying, she spread before the wayworn travellers a plentiful store of Highland cheer—including kippered salmon and braxtie ham, and a “good willie-waucht” of the “rale peat reek.” The gloaming came, but brought no signs of the Laird’s returning. “Nae doot,” said Janet, “his honour will be down at the Earl’s, so ye’ll just e’en mak’ yer beds here for the nicht, and the first thing ye’ll get for your handsel in the mornin’ will be a sonsie breakfast and weel-counted siller.”