Legend of the Celtic Stone

by Michael Phillips

  It was a monstrous raid. In the Highlands, livestock represented wealth and social standing as well as means to feed one’s people. The Campbells claimed losses in excess of £7500, a huge sum. Many in Glen Lyon vowed to get even.

  Campbell and MacDonald—they were the mightiest of Caledonia’s ancient names, with much shared blood between them. But they remained rivals and enemies, and only one would lead Gaeldom into the future.

  Eleven

  By the autumn of 1691, Brochan and Ginevra had treasured many happy times together on the moors and mountains and each in the village of the other, where despite the rivalries between their chiefs both were well known and loved. They had also spoken—Brochan with words, Ginevra with eyes and her heart—of their future together.

  But the season when Brochan stalked rabbits with bow and arrow was past. A sword and dirk now hung to the side of his plaid, for he had grown to be a man of twenty-one. The years when adulthood’s mantle must rest upon his shoulders had come. He was one who must know his worth, his mettle. Could Highlander and Gael expect less from himself?

  Not Brochan Cawdor. If he would be worthy of her, he must first prove worthy to himself.

  Therefore, a-soldiering he must go. It was the way of his clan . . . the way of his nation.

  He came to the glen one day knowing it would be his last visit for some time.

  Ginevra had become a quiet maiden, beautiful now even in the eyes of her own villagers, tall, graceful, well-proportioned, and modest. She rarely danced about now with hands waving, but could be seen walking beside loch or stream, in village or on distant hillside, with serenity of carriage and grace of expression. Still the faraway look distanced her demeanor and countenance from all others. Different she would always be. But hers was now the faraway expression of an angel, not of a half-wit.

  Even those who in younger days had plagued her now stood not a little in awe. Some were afraid of her. Others greeted and spoke to her. A few, it is true, avoided her when they saw her approaching, in time to cross the road or change their course, for the looks she occasionally cast could still be disconcerting and unnerving. Not everyone knew how to return them. But these were not many. Most, indeed, held her in a similar sort of veneration as they did bard Ranald of the Shield.

  Ginevra could not, of course, be more silent than she had always been. Yet somehow her silence seemed to have deepened. Whenever she and Brochan were together in the sight of those in the glen, she was shy about his affections. Often a pink blush might be seen about neck and cheeks. Alone, however, she could be as animated as ever. Brochan knew every look and expression and movement and glance and twitch of lips, and knew what each signified. Sometimes he felt richer for Ginevra’s silences, for they made him know her better. In one other thing she had changed: she had learned not merely to giggle, but to laugh—a rich, alto, robust laugh of joy.

  On this occasion of Brochan’s visit, however, there was no laughter between them. He had just told her that he was going away.

  They walked hand in hand along the banks of the Coe, then higher into the glen. The waters beside them were gentle and quiet, gathering strength for their winter rushes and tumbles.

  For a long time Brochan was as silent as Ginevra. These tidings could not but bring her sadness. Yet they were at peace. Both had learned that in silence did the best within them meet in the profoundest way. They did not fear silence, but sought it—she because she could not help it, he because he loved her and would know this deepest part of her nature and what it had to teach him.

  When at last he broke the spell of the stillness, it was that together they might remember their times. For in this coming season of their separation, they would have only happy memories to sustain them.

  “The day when I first saw ye,” Brochan was saying, “I was so angry that ye made me miss my rabbit, but afraid too for what I might hae dune . . . an’ spellbound by yer antics all at once. I was sich a loon, I didna ken what t’ say. . . .

  “An’ du ye remember,” he went on, speaking in a peaceful voice, “win we were oot up on Stob Dubh—during the storm, the unco rout o’ thunder an’ watching the water tumblin’ doon all aroun’ us, an’ racin’ doon t’ the glen tryin’ t’ git t’ yer cottage afore the rain . . .”

  As he spoke, Ginevra nodded and smiled with pleasure.

  “ . . . but then the clouds aye let loose . . . an’ there we came rinnin’ into yer puir mither’s hame wet an’ lauchin’ like twa bairns. . . .”

  How could he ask if she remembered? She would never forget a single happy minute they had spent together these four years!

  “Jist last week,” he was saying, “I saw a stag, an’ it put me in the mind o’ when we tracked the one t’ the old crag on Bhuiridh last year. I think ’tis the same one. Ach, but I haup one day t’ lay eyes on the white stag again. Remember hoo we came upon it—”

  Suddenly, in the midst of his speech, Ginevra darted away. A moment later she returned with a tiny violet. She held it toward Brochan with the searching, inquiring eyes he had learned to read.

  “Ay, I remember,” said Brochan, “when we found that bed o’ wee floers by the burn. An’ ye made me bend doon an’ look, ’cause I had eyes only for the fish I was tryin’ t’ git. An’ ye made me smell them. Ay, I mind the day.”

  He paused, then began digging into the leather sporran that hung in front of his kilt.

  “Look,” he said, “I still hae the ones ye pressed for me, atween this scrap o’ paper.”

  Ginevra smiled to think that the great, strong man who was about to become a soldier would keep her few dried flowers.

  Again they resumed their stroll. Brochan continued peacefully to reminisce. He knew he had to speak for both of them, framing their memories into words that they might enjoy them together.

  “An’ the night we crossed the loch in yer father’s boat in moonlight t’ the north shore atween the twa lochs,” he went on. “Yer eyes were so full o’ the moon that night, I thought gien e’er yer tongue wad loose and ye’d speak, it wad hae been that night.”

  There were not many occasions when Ginevra longed for the power of speech. But when Brochan spoke like this, she could not help wishing she could say something, if only to make him happy.

  “All I want, sometime in my life, lassie MacDonald,” he continued, “is t’ hear my ain name on yer bonnie lips. Jist the ane word Brochan, an’ I’ll dee a happy man. Canna ye say it, Ginevra? Canna ye say it, jist fer me?”

  But only the familiar, treasured smile met his question.

  He turned toward her, then leaned down and kissed the silent, expressive lips. As he drew back, Ginevra’s eyes were full of tears.

  If only she could speak, what torrents would her heart pour forth! But only with her eyes could she open her woman’s heart to the world. Now they flooded with the liquid of love.

  They walked some distance in silence, then turned and began the return to Carnoch.

  “Those were aye times when we both were free,” Brochan said at length. “Time doesna move on for you, but it moves for me. I maun gae next week, Ginevra. I’m at last to be in my uncle’s regiment.”

  Now at last did the chill seize Ginevra’s heart. He saw it on her face.

  “Dinna fear fer me, dear lassie MacDonald,” he said. “’Tis what I’ve always wanted t’ du. I’ll be a soldier at last. An’ I’ll come for ye ane day, an’ we’ll marry an’ build a wee cottage up the slopes o’ Aonach Mor where first we saw ane anither. An’ we’ll hae bairnies an’ grow old in oor cottage together, wi’ heather all around an’ the blue o’ the Highland sky abune us. An’ our bairns’ll—they’ll be half Campbell, half MacDonald. We’ll teach all oor people that the clans maun be one, jist as we are one. But I’ve got t’ be a soldier first, Ginevra, my ain lassie MacDonald. ’Tis my dream.”

  Ginevra nodded. She understood. Brochan had helped her understand many things.

  But her bones remained cold. And she could not help being afraid. She would n
ot lay eyes on him again until that snowy evening when she saw him arrive once more in the glen of her home with the other soldiers of his clan.

  Twelve

  After the ruthless slaughter of his army by the Highlanders at Killiecrankie, the English king determined to crush the rebellious spirit of the clan chiefs who remained obdurate in their support for James VII.

  The Highlanders, in William’s eyes, were the most present and visible obstacle to a complete political union between England and Scotland. Their outdated tribal society, backward customs, ridiculous kilts, and uncivilized language . . . they had to be rooted out, destroyed, their independent spirit broken, their defiance humbled. Clans like the MacDonalds were thieving, savage marauders. If they would not submit, they deserved but one fate.

  The word that began to be discussed behind the closed doors of London between the king and his closest advisor, Sir John Dalrymple, himself a Scot and a member of the king’s Privy Council, was extirpation.4 At length King William, advised by Dalrymple, decided upon an ultimatum from which there would be no retreat nor compromise.

  He issued a proclamation ordering all Highland clan chiefs to sign an oath of allegiance to the English crown. If they complied by the last day of December 1691, there would be no further consequences. Upon those who did not sign, the punishment would be carried out by fire and sword.

  Word of the ultimatum came to the deposed king James VII, exiled in France. He knew his son-in-law was a dangerous man and that this was no bluff. He sent word back to Scotland releasing the chiefs from their remaining loyalty toward him. They must, he said, swear allegiance to King William. The Jacobite cause was over.

  Most of the chiefs complied. They were weary of the fight. It was clear they could not hope to win.

  By year’s end, only a handful had not yet signed the oath. Mostly the holdouts were of the MacDonald clan in the northern and western Highlands. The chiefs of Glengarry, Sleat, Glencoe, and Clanranald of Moidart had proved most obstinate. One of these infuriated Dalrymple by his obstinacy more than all the rest—the elderly chief of the smallest branch of MacDonalds, Alasdair the Red of Glencoe. He seemed to represent everything about the Highlands that Dalrymple hated, and thus came to embody the focus of his venom.

  Whatever happened, Dalrymple was not about to let this particular chief go unpunished. In his own mind he had already begun to plot how to destroy him, even if the man did sign.

  But secretly Dalrymple hoped he would not.

  Thirteen

  That Alasdair MacIain of Glencoe was a thief who had spilled the blood of his enemies, there was little doubt. But in the Highlands there existed codes of loyalty to justify such things.

  A century before, for their help in combating disorder in Scotland, the Campbells of Argyll had been granted huge tracts of land by the Crown—land seized from the MacDonalds. Ever since had the two clans remained the bitterest of enemies—with thieving, looting, burning, massacring going both ways between them.

  As the seventeenth century drew to a close, it was still the Campbells who held the Crown’s favor. At their stronghold of Inveraray sat the court and jail from which the king of England meted out justice in the north, presided over by Archibald Campbell, tenth earl of Argyll. No greater satisfaction could exist for any man at Inveraray than once and for all to put an end to the raids by Glencoe’s men. It was the dream of many a Campbell to see Alasdair MacIain one day swinging on the end of a rope.

  It would have taken a high-built gallows. Even in his old age, Alasdair presented an imposing figure, at six foot seven, with long, wild hair and a flowing mustache. In his youth, the hair had been red, and he had displayed a temperament to match. It was scarce wonder he was one of the most well-known—both loved and hated—rascals in the Highlands.

  Argyll had had his chance in 1674, when MacIain had been imprisoned in the Inveraray Tollbooth. But though he was already in his sixties at the time, the huge man had managed to slip from behind Campbell bars and make good his escape back to Glencoe.

  And now, seventeen years later, his red crop and mustache grown white, old Alasdair remained the same rogue he had always been. The years, however, if they had not made him repentant, had at least added a dose of realism to his hatred of the Campbells. By the end of 1691, he had finally accepted the inevitability of compliance.

  After Christmas, therefore, Alasdair MacIain reluctantly set out for Fort William in Inverlochy. His head was now topped with the color of snow on the mountains, not the red of a peat fire. But he still presented a fearsome image, for a glow of the fire of resistance could yet be detected in his eyes.

  Alasdair arrived at Inverlochy on December 31, the very last day before the ultimatum expired, presenting himself to the commander in charge and governor of Fort William, Colonel John Hill.

  He was ready, he said, to take the required oath and swear allegiance to the king.

  Fourteen

  This was not the first time John Hill had seen service in Scotland.

  He had been here at the beginning of his military career, briefly occupying the same post he held now—first as deputy, then as governor of this northern outpost under the shadow of Ben Nevis, the highest peak in all Britain. The Highlanders knew the outpost as Gearasdan dubh nan Inbhir-Lochaidh, the Black Garrison of Inverlochy. He had made many friends among the Highlanders at that time and had governed well.

  For the next thirty years, Hill had moved through the empire as he climbed the military ladder to the position of colonel. Now in his late sixties, he was back in what was now called Fort William, renewing acquaintances among the Highland chiefs with whom he had managed to make peace more successfully than most of his peers.

  Hill was an honest and relatively simple man, not a particular favorite among those who had now come to power in London, especially John Dalrymple. He was perhaps too principled. A good soldier, willing to gain native loyalty by friendship rather than threats, Hill was also set apart by his literary acumen and knowledge of the Scriptures, both of which bolstered a strong Protestant faith. His health was gradually failing, and the loneliness of age was setting in, which both his books and Bible helped alleviate. Events were soon to overtake him, however, for which he would find no comfort in either.

  Hill was a sad figure, not because he had no scruples but because he was one of the few among the figures involved who did. Yet he was powerless to employ them to alter what more and more appeared the inevitability of disaster.

  On this particular December day, a sense of impending doom fell upon him as heavily as the wet, clumping snow outside his office. For a moment he sat stunned as MacIain’s words echoed in his ear.

  “Why do you come to me?” he asked.

  “I have come to swear the oath,” repeated Alasdair in thick, Gaelic-encrusted English.

  “But the proclamation is unambiguous,” insisted Hill. “The oath must be taken in the presence of the sheriffs, or their deputies, of the respective shires where any of the said persons shall live. Those are the orders you all received. You know as well as I do that I am no sheriff.”

  Alasdair stood stoic and silent.

  Colonel Hill looked over the stern, wild figure towering above him, the green-and-red kilt of his tartan dirty from travel, the dirk at his waist, the snow still unmelted on his shoulders, lips unmoving beneath the thick white mustache.

  “I have no power to administer the oath,” Hill added, exasperated. He had done everything in his power to forestall a disaster. Now this old fool had come to the wrong place!

  “I am a military officer, not a magistrate,” he persisted. “You must go to Ardkinglas at Inveraray. He’s the sheriff in this area.”

  “Inverary’s a Campbell toon,” returned MacIain stiffly. “I hae not been there sin’ the day I escaped frae its jail. I’ll nae willingly set foot in sich a place.”

  Hill now realized why the old chief had come to Fort William rather than Inveraray. How could the proud MacDonald chief take such an oath of submi
ssion before a Campbell?

  “I realize it may seem unthinkable, MacIain—” nodded Hill.

  “MacDonalds have swung on Campbell ropes at Inveraray,” interrupted the chief to bolster his point. “I dinna fancy being the next.”

  “I know all about your feuds,” continued Hill. “But believe me, if you take the oath before Ardkinglas, no one will put a rope around your neck. Ardkinglas is a reasonable man.”

  “He’s a Campbell.”

  “Dalrymple’s threats are not to be toyed with, I tell you, MacIain. This is serious business.”

  It was more grave than Hill dared reveal, but he could not tell all he knew. The proclamation of last August had stated the risk clearly: “Such as shall continue obstinate and incorrigible after this gracious offer of mercy shall be punished as traitors and rebels to the utmost extremity of the Law.”

  Hill, after all, was a colonel in the king’s army. He could not tell that troops were already amassing in preparation to march on the strongholds of the septs who refused the oath, that some of the regiments were on their way here even as they spoke.

  “For once in your life, MacIain,” Hill went on, more gently now, “you must listen to reason. The lives of your people depend on it. This is no time to be stubborn. I tell you, the danger is real and imminent.” The softness of his voice made it all the more urgent.

  He paused briefly. His eyes bored solemnly into the Highlander’s. Then he added, “Don’t you understand the danger?”

  As he stood listening, at last the proud, stoic, stubborn, thieving chief began to apprehend the true state of peril in which he stood. He knew Hill to be an honest man. The man’s tone was worrisome.