prosper rebels, and that nothing should induce him to give over the cause. He avowed that whoever staid by him must do it at the cost of his life, or of being made as miserable as the violence of insulting rebels could make him. But by the grace of God he would not alter, and bade him not on any consideration "to hearken after treaties." That he would take no less than he bad asked for at Uxbridge.
Charles, blind to the last, was still hoping for assistance from Ireland, and was elated by the news of successes from Montrose.
It will be recollected that the earls of Antrim and Montrose had been engaged by Charles to exert themselves in Ireland and Scotland on his behalf. Their first attempt was to take vengeance on the covenanting earl of Argyll, who had so much contributed to defeat the king's attempts on the Scottish church and government. Montrose, therefore, unfurled the royal standard as the king's lieutenant-general at Dumfries; but, having before been a strong covenanter, he did not all at once win the confidence of the royalists. His success was so poor that he returned to England. At Carlisle he was more effective in serving the king, and was made a marquis in consequence. After the battle of Marston Moor he again returned into the Highlands, and there learned the success of Antrim's labours in Ireland. He had sent over a body of fifteen hundred men under the command of his kinsman Alaster Macdonald, surnamed MacColl Keitache, or Colkitto. They landed at Knoydart, but a fleet of the duke of Argyll's burnt their ships, and hung in their roar waiting a fitting chance to destroy them. To their surprise they received no welcome from the Scotch royalists, but they continued their march to Badenoch, ravaging the houses and farms of the covenanters, but every day menaced by the gathering hosts of their foes, and learning nothing of their ally, Montrose. At length Montrose obtained tidings of them: they met at Blair Athol, in the commencement of August, 1644. Montrose assumed the command, and published the royal commission. At the sight of a native chief the Highlanders flocked to his standard, and the covenanters saw to their astonishment an army of between three and four thousand men spring at once, as it were, out of the ground. Montrose Tote to Charles that if he could receive five hundred horse on his way, he would soon be in England with twenty thousand men.
The movements and exploits of Montrose now became rather a story of romance than of sober modern warfare. Argyll and lord Elcho dogged his steps, but he advanced or disappeared with his half-clad Irish and valid mountaineers, amongst the hills in a manner that defied arrest. At Tippermuir, in Perthshire, he defeated Elcho, took his guns and ammunition, and surprised and plundered the town of Perth. As was constantly the case, the Highlanders, once loaded with booty, slipped off to their homes; and, left alone with his Irish band, who were faithful because their way home was cut off, he retreated northward, in hope of joining the clan Gordon. He found himself stopped at the bridge of Dee by two thousand seven hundred covenanters under lord Burley, but he managed to cross at a ford higher up, and, falling on the rear of the covenanters, threw them into a panic flight. They fled to Aberdeen, pursued by the wild Irish and Highlanders, and the whole mass of pursuers and pursued rushed wildly into the city together. The place was given up to plunder, and for three days Aberdeen became a scene of horror and revolting licence, as it had been from an attack of Montrose four years before, when fighting on the other side. The approach of Argyll compelled the pillagers to fly into Banffshire, and, following the banks of the Spey, he crossed the mountain of Badenoch, and, after a series of wild adventures in Athol, Angus, and Forfar, he was met by the covenanters at Fyvie Castle, and compelled to retreat into the hills. His followers then took their leave of him, worn out with their mountain flights and skirmishes, and he announced his intention of retiring for the winter into the mountains of Badenoch.
The earl of Argyll, on his part, retired to Inverary, and sent his followers home. He felt secure in the mighty barrier of mountains around, which in summer offered a terrible route to an army, but now blockaded with snow, he deemed utterly impregnable. But he was deceived; the retirement of Montrose was a feint. He was busily employed in rousing the northern clans to a sweeping vengeance on Argyll, and the prospect of a rich booty. In the middle of December he burst through all obstacles, threaded the snow-laden defiles of the mountains, and descended with fire and sword into the plains of Argyll. The earl was suddenly roused by the people from the hills, whose dwellings were in flames behind them, and their cattle in the hands of the army of Montrose, and only effected his escape by pushing across Loch Tyne in an open boat. Montrose divided his host into three columns, which spread themselves over the whole of Argyll, burning and laying all waste. Argyll had set a price upon Montrose's head; and Montrose now reduced his splendid heritage to a black and frightful desert. The villages and cottages were burnt down, the cattle destroyed or driven off, and the people slain wherever found with arms in their hands. This lasted from the 13th of December to the end of January.
Argyll by that time had mustered the clan Campbell, and lord Seaforth the mountaineers of Moray, Ross, Sutherland, and Caithness, to bear down on the invaders. Montrose, therefore, led forth his Highlanders and Irish to encounter them, and came first on Argyll and his army at Inverlochy Castle, in Lochaber. There he totally defeated Argyll, and slew nearly fifteen hundred of his people. This success brought to his standard the whole clan Gordon and others. The whole north was in their power, and they marched from Inverlochy to Elgin and Aberdeen. At Brechin they were met by Baillie with a strong force, which protected Perth; but Montrose marched to Dunkeld, and thence to Dundee, which he entered, and began plundering, when Baillie arrived with his covenanters, and caused him to retire. Once more he escaped to the mountains, but this time not without severe losses, for his indignant foes pursued him for threescore miles, cutting off many of his soldiers, besides what had perished in the storming of Dundee. When he appeared again it was at Auldearn, a village near Nairn, where, on the 4th of May, a bloody battle was fought betwixt him and the covenanters, under the victorious Hurry, two thousand men being said to be left upon the field.
