The story was told, as a legend old, And by withered dame and sire, When they sat secure from the winter’s cold, All around the evening fire.
His capabilities of enduring cold, hunger, and fatigue prove that his constitution was of a very high order, and not what might have been expected from the descendant of a hundred kings brought up in the enervating atmosphere of courts. The magnanimity was surprising with which he bore up under his adverse lot, and the very trying privations to which he was subjected. The buoyancy of spirit with which he encountered the toils that hemmed him round, seemed to gather fresh energy from each recurring escape while wandering about, a hunted fugitive.
His appearance when concealed in the cave of Achnacarry as described by Dr Cameron, who was for a time a companion of his wanderings, is not suggestive of much comfort, but rather of contentedly making the most of circumstances. “He was then,” says Dr Cameron, “bare footed; he had an old black kilt and coat on, a plaid, philabeg, and waistcoat, a dirty shirt, and a long red beard, a gun in his hand, a pistol and dirk by his side. He was very cheerful and in good health, and, in my opinion, fatter than when he was at Inverness.” His courage and patience during his wandering drew forth even the admiration of his enemies, while his friends regretted that one capable of so much was so wanting in decision of character when it was urgently required by his own affairs, and the fortunes and lives of those who had perilled all for his sake. His friends, rich and poor, “for a’ that had come and gane,” were staunch in his favour to the very death; while his enemies, hounded on by a scared and vindictive Government, and earnestly anxious to enrich themselves by obtaining the reward offered for his capture, left no means untried to secure his person.
Among the many who signalized themselves in these attempts was one Ferguson, who, in command of a small squadron, cruised round the coast in search of the Prince and his fugitive friends, but in reality sparing none on whom it was possible or not dangerous to vent those feelings of oppression and worse, which the cruel Cumberland had made a fashion as regards Highlanders and the Highlands, and a sure recommendation to the notice of Government.
Soon after Culloden, Ferguson appeared off the coast and dropped anchor in Loch-Cunnard. A party landed there and proceeded up the strath as far as the residence of Mackenzie of Langwell, who was married to a near relation of Earl George of Cromartie. Mackenzie got out of the way, but the lady was obliged to attend some of her children who were confined by small-pox. The house was ransacked, a trunk containing valuable papers, and among these a wadset of Langwell and Inchvennie from the Earl of Cromartie, was burnt before her eyes, and about fifty head of black cattle were mangled by their swords and driven away to their ships.
Similar depredations were committed in the neighbourhood, without discrimination of friends or enemies. So familiarized were the west Highlanders and Islanders with Captain Ferguson, his cutter and crew, that they were in the habit of jeering him and them by calling after them—“Tha sinn eolach air a h-uile car a tha na t’eaman”—(We are acquainted with every turn in your tail)—a source of great irritation to the annoyed commander, who knew well the fugitives were hiding on the West Coast of Inverness-shire, and consequently resolved to adopt every species of decoy to entrap the Prince and his companions. To deceive the inhabitants of this wild and extensive coast, Ferguson pretended to give over the search and leave for Ireland. The Highlanders, wondering what would be the next move, were not deceived, nor did they relax their watchful precautions. The dwellers at Samalaman, the most western point of Moidart, had been especially harassed, as it was suspected they were in the confidence of Prince Charles. The suspicion was correct, and therefore, although they went about their usual employments they kept many an anxious look towards the ocean—many a lonely watch and walk was taken for the protection of the hunted wanderers.
To those who are not oppressed by anxiety the look-out from this headland is of surpassing beauty. Few scenes are equal to that presented in a midnight walk by moonlight along the sea beach, the glossy sea sending from its surface a long stream of dancing and dazzling light, no sound to be heard save the small ripple of the idle wavelets or the scream of a sea bird watching the fry that swarms along the shores! In the short nights of summer the melancholy song of the throstle has scarcely ceased on the hillside when the merry carol of the lark commences, and the snipe and the plover sound their shrill pipe. Again, how glorious is the scene which presents itself from the summits of the hills when the great ocean is seen glowing with the last splendour of the setting sun, and the lofty hills of the farther isles rear their giant heads amid the purple blaze on the extreme verge of the horizon.
Nothing of all this, for they were sights and scenes of continual recurrence, did Mary Macleod feel. Mary was a bold, spirited, handsome girl, who, in company with her father and two brothers forming the boat’s crew, knew well all ocean’s moods, and often braved the storms so common on that coast, and so fatal to many toilers of the deep.
On the morning of the fifth day after the departure of Captain Ferguson, Mary arose as usual to prepare the food for the family, and in going outside for a basket of peat fuel was surprised to observe a strange looking little vessel at anchor in a dark creek in the opposite island of Shona which partly occupies the mouth of Loch-Moidart. Time was when a circumstance, so apparently trivial, would have created no wonder nor left in the mind any cause for suspicion; but now Mary carefully scanned the low long dark hull of the craft, and her tanned and patched sails, which ill agreed with the trimness about her, and which at once spoke against her being a fishing craft or smuggler. “Cuilean an t-seann mhadaidh” (cub of the old fox) sighed the girl as she returned to the house to communicate the circumstance to the rest of the family, each of whom on reconnoitring the vessel confirmed her opinion. “Well then,” said Mary, “let us advise the neighbours to betake themselves to their daily employment without seeming to suspect the new comer, and above all let us warn the deer of the mountain that the bloodhounds have appeared.”
As the Moidart men were about to go to sea they were visited by a couple of miserable looking men from the suspected craft. One of them who spoke in Irish made them understand that they had lately left the coast of France laden with tobacco and spirits, some of which they would gladly exchange for dried fish and other provisions of which they were much in want, having been pursued for the last three days by an armed cutter, from which they had escaped with difficulty, and from which they intended to conceal themselves for some days longer in their present secluded anchorage. The fishermen, pretending to commiserate their condition, replied that they had no provisions to spare, and left only more convinced that Mary’s suspicions were well founded. Matters remained in this state for a few days, the craft lying quietly at anchor, and her six hands, being, it was said, the full complement of her crew, sneaking about in all directions, in pairs, on pretence of searching for provisions. At last, after an unusually fine day the sun sank suddenly behind a mountain mass of clouds which for some time before had been collecting into dense columns, whose tall and fantastic shapes threw an obscurity far over the western horizon.