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MEMOIR 
 
 COLONEL JOHN CAMERON; 
 
 FASSIEFERN, K.T.S., 
 
 f WKttnant-C^fllffiwI of i\t §axM |ig|Iantos, ax 92li ^t^mmi bf |ffot. 
 
 REV. ARCHIBALD CLERK, 
 
 MINISTEU OF KII.MAI.I.ir. 
 
 " . . proud Ben-Nevis hears with awe, 
 How, at the bloody Quatre Br^s, 
 Brave Cameron heard the wild hurrah 
 ; Of covqaelt., as he fdlI."r;-ScOTT. 
 
 THIED EDITION. 
 
 GLASGOW: 
 THOMAS MURRAY & SON, BUCHANAN STREET. 
 
 MDCCCLIX. 
 
HENRY MORSE STEPHENB 
 
 
(for private CIBCULATION.) 
 
 The demand fur the "Memoir of Colonel Cameron" having been such as speedily to 
 exhaust the First Edition, Sir Duncan Camerot^, in order to gratify the wishes of the 
 many interested in the subject, has issued this Second Edition. A few verbal inaccuracies, 
 which had escaped notice in the first issue, are here corrected ; and slight additions have 
 been made to some of the Notes, but no material alteration has been made either in the 
 Text or the Notes. 
 
 A. CLERK. 
 KiLMALLiE Manse, August, 1858. 
 
 |l0i£ ia tlje Jfirst |pulrlis§'«tr ^irlllon. 
 
 BEING THE THIBD ISSUE. 
 
 Two Editions of this Memoir, as the preceding Note shows, have been printed by Sir Duncan 
 Cameron for private circulation. The Second has been exhausted as rapidly as was the 
 First ; and very many applications for copies contuiuing to be made to him, he has thought 
 proper to publish this Third Edition, in order more fully to satisfy the interest manifested in 
 the Life of Colonel Cameron — an interest which he is gratified to find so much more 
 extensive than he. had anticipated. 
 
 This brief Sketch, having been drawn up for private distribution, without any view 
 of its being given to the public, contams references to purely local matters, which, to the 
 general reader, may appear unduly minute; but it has not been thought proper to alter 
 what is already in the hands of several hundreds. The writer's chief regret is on account of 
 his inability to give a fuller and clearer portraiture of a truly brave and able man, who, 
 if known thoroughly, would be acknowledged by all to deserve public and permanent 
 commemoration. 
 
 * A. CLERK. 
 
 KiLMALLiE Manse, April, 1859. 
 
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Jfrom t^e Mcllington gespattbes. 
 
 "Obville, Junk 25, 1815. 
 " YouK Lordships will see, in the enclosed Lists, the Names of some 
 
 MOST valuable OFflCggS LOST TO HiS MaJESTY'S SERVICE. AMONG THEM I 
 CANNOT AVOID TO MENTION COLONEL CAMERON OP THE 92D ReGIMENT, AND 
 
 Colonel Sib H. Ellis of the 23d Eegiment, to whose conduct I have 
 
 FREQUENTLY CALLED YOUR LORDSHIPS' ATTENTION, AND WHO AT LAST FELL, 
 distinguishing themselves at THE HEAD OP THE BRAVE TROOPS WHICH THEY 
 COMMANDED. NOTWITHSTANDING THE GLORY OF THE OCCASIOH, IT IS IMPOSSIBLE 
 NOT TO LAMENT SUCH MEN, BOTH ON ACCOUNT OF THE PUBLIC, AND AS FRIENDS. 
 
 " WELLINGTON." 
 
MEMOIR 
 
 COLONEL JOHN CAMERON. 
 
^JtT * 
 
 Si 
 
 ti 
 
MEMOIR 
 
 OF 
 
 COLONEL JOHN CAMERON, 
 
 OF FASSIEFERN, K.T.S., 
 &c., &c. 
 
 CHAPTEE I. 
 
 MONUMENT AT KILMALLIE — BEIEF REMARKS ON THE CLAN SYSTEM, AND ON THE 
 CHARACTER OF THE HIGHLANDERS. 
 
 The stranger visiting Lochaber, on approaching the "Great Glen" from 
 the south, will have his attention attracted by a lofty obelisk at a short 
 distance from the opening of the Caledonian Canal. The situation is 
 admirably chosen for a monument, commanding a scene, such as, amid 
 the many, remarkable alike for beauty and sublimity presented by 
 the Highlands, is rarely to be met with. On one side, Bennevis — " the 
 monarch of (British) mountains" — rears aloft its massive and snow-clad 
 summit. Immediately to the south, Lochiel, branching off at a right angle 
 from the Linnhe-Loch, studded with green islets, and bordered by the 
 wooded shores of Ardgour, winds its inland way for many miles. On the 
 west again, and quite close to the monument, is the old churchyard of 
 Kilmallie,'"' surrounded by truly magnificent beech trees, that have shed 
 
 * Churchyard of Kilmallic. ViJ. Appendix, Note A. 
 
Mi 
 
 2* MEMOIR. 
 
 their leaves over the remains of many generations which rest beneath their 
 wide-spreading shade. Far in the west the Arasaig hills rear their 
 wavy outlines; and on whatever side the beholder turns his eye, he will 
 see, rising from a foreground varied by plain, and wood, and water, 
 mountain tops of towering height, and of diversified forms and hues. 
 The "Great Glen of Scotland," lying nearly north and south, is here 
 intersected by what anywhere else might well be called a "great glen"— 
 the valley of Lochiel extending far to the west, and, on the other hand, 
 Glennevis, which, from its prodigious depth and vast extent, is truly 
 sublime, extending to the north-east. Strath-Lochy, on which the be- 
 holder is supposed to stand, is one of those " meeting-places of the glens" 
 deeply interesting alike to the geologist, who thinks of the " earthquake 
 shatterings" by which these mighty masses have been riven asunder, or to 
 the lover of natural scenery, who is content to admire the varied forms of 
 grandeur and of beauty, so frequently to be met with amid our Highland 
 glens, and mountains, and sea-lochs, without inquiring into the causes 
 that have made them what they are. 
 
 The inscription on the obelisk alluded to tells us that it is raised in 
 memory of " Col. John Cameron, eldest son of Sir Eweu Cameron of 
 Fassiefern, who, during twenty years of active military service — with a 
 spirit that knew no fear and shunned no danger — accompanied, or led in 
 battles, sieges, and marches, the 9 2d Regiment of Scottish Highlanders, 
 
 always to honour — almost always to victory; and who, 
 
 honoured and lamented, closed a life of fame with a death of glory." 
 
 This inscription is from the pen of Sir Walter Scott, who again and 
 again, in poetry and prose, expressed his admiration of " brave Cameron," 
 " the gallant Fassiefern." His fall was lamented by his great commander, 
 Wellington, on public grounds as well as on those of private friendship. 
 The country conferred permanent honour on his family, in testimony of his 
 achievements ; and his name has taken a stronger hold on the Highland 
 mind than that of almost any other of the many distinguished Highland 
 
MEMOIR. 3 
 
 warriors who fought and fell throughout the great European struggle 
 against the encroachments of France. 
 
 As an officer, combining in no common degree the most heroic bravery 
 with great mental resources, who, in the words of no mean judge, rarely 
 lavish of praise. Sir William Napier, " conducted himself gloriously," and 
 was " by nature a soldier," Colonel Cameron well deserves to be held in 
 remembrance. But more than this, as born and nurtured amid the influ- 
 ences of a system now past, and never to return — the Clan or patriarchal 
 system — he combined many of the habits of that interesting olden time 
 with those of modern days, much of the character of the Highland Chief 
 with that of the British officer ; and thus, could his life be fully portrayed, 
 it would present many features of interest and of instruction. 
 
 Our materials for personal anecdote, and that minute delineation so 
 desirable in a Memoir, are far scantier than we would wish. There are 
 few of his companious-in-arms now living; and his letters to his friends 
 have not been carefully kept. But such of his papers as are preserved 
 have been placed at our disposal by his only surviving brother. Sir Duncan 
 Cameron, Bart, of Fassiefern, to whom every statement of fact in tke fol- 
 lowing pages has been submitted ; and this will afford a sufficient guarantee 
 for accuracy. 
 
 AVe cannot help remarking, on a perusal of these papers — which are of 
 the most miscellaneous character, and extend, with many occasional blanks, 
 over a period of nearly twenty years — through what a variety of strange 
 being an officer in the armies of such an extended empire as that of Britain 
 has frequently to pass; and what a remarkable assemblage of widely dif- 
 ferent scenes, and circumstances, and feelings, the records of such a life 
 present to the reader after the actor in them all has long passed away. 
 These papers before us contain, for example, receipts for various articles 
 purchased in Egypt, and in Holland, for jewellery in Paris, and for horse 
 provender in Drogheda. They speak of money expended in theatres in 
 Spain, and of money given to poor soldiers, or to their widows and orphans 
 
4 MEMOIR. 
 
 in the Highlands. They contain love-letters and war-letters, letters full 
 of tender affection to friends, and of cold, stern formality to persons in 
 office; or full of rejoicing at the success of companions who lived and 
 prospered, and of grief for the many who had fallen during those years 
 of constant and of bloody strife. There is, however, in them all, a remark- 
 able strength, and freshness of home-feeling, for one who was engaged so 
 long in such important events in far distant quarters of the world 
 — an unfailing interest in all that pertained to family, kindred and 
 country. 
 
 We shall endeavour, from the materials at our command, to give a 
 faithful representation of the man, and of his actions; and though our 
 Sketch must necessarily be a very imperfect one, we would fain hope that 
 it may perchance prove the means of inducing others better qualified to 
 give to the public, memorials of some of the many brave Highland gentle- 
 men who, from the raising of the Highland regiments to the close of the 
 Napoleon wars, fought and fell in the service of their country; for thus 
 only do we expect that any amount of true light can ever be thrown on the 
 past life of the Highlands. It is superfluous to remark that the few scanty 
 records of that life, which were written while it was in actual being, are 
 not portraits, but the grossest caricatures. Drawn up, either by English- 
 men utterly ignorant of the language, and the institutions of the moun- 
 tains, or by Scotchmen who, to the disqualification of ignorance, superadded 
 that of bitter hatred generated by the constant warfare which raged on 
 the border-land between south and north, these records misrepresent 
 and mislead.'"' Such memoirs as we have alluded to, with an attentive 
 study of the songs yet preserved, and of the traditions still floating in the 
 glens and islands, might give a faithful, though now necessarily a faint 
 conception of what the Highlands really were in the days of the Clans. 
 
 AVe do not propose to enter formally upon the task; but as the subject 
 of our Memoir was— in the words of one who knew him well — the author of 
 
 * Appendix, Note B. 
 
MEMOIR. 5 
 
 the "Romance of War" — "a true Highland gentleman," very much formed 
 and fashioned by the system of things which made the Highlands what 
 they were, we must, in order to make his character more intelligible, offer 
 a few brief remarks on that system ; and we trust we may be pardoned for 
 some observations on the character of the people, at a time when the misre- 
 presentations above alluded to are stamped by the authority of the most 
 eloquent historian of the age.""' 
 
 The essential feature of the Clan System, and that which distinguished 
 it in its very nature from the Feudal, was, that it rested not solely, nor 
 primarily on the basis of mutual interests and services, but on the deeper 
 and more sacred one of natural affection, of the relation between father and 
 son. The Chief, ceann cinne, or head of the kin, regarded the tribe as his 
 children — the true meaning of clan — whose welfare was his chief care and 
 object; and they again looked upon him as their father, whom they were 
 naturally bound to honour and to uphold. We are well aware that the 
 mutual recognition of this sacred relation permitted many deeds of cruelty 
 and ferocity ; but these deeds were common to every form of government 
 then in existence — pervaded society at large. At the same time, we main- 
 tain that it did produce many scenes of tender devotedness and noble 
 self-sacrifice, which were peculiar to the Clan or patriarchal system, and 
 consequently, that it helped to give, in many respects, an elevation to tlie 
 character of the people, rarely, if at all, to be met with elsewhere. 
 
 The instances of clansmen conquering the motives that are generally 
 thought the most powerful in determining the actions of men — even the 
 love of life and the dread of death — in order to save the Chief, are too 
 numerous and well known to require specific mention ; but it is not even 
 imagined, by those ignorant of the Highlands, that this devotedness was 
 acknowledged as imposing a reciprocal obligation on the Chief. Such, 
 however, was the case ; and Stewart surrendering himself to his powerful 
 enemy, Argyle; the Mackintosh putting his life in the hands of the 
 
 * Appendix, Note C. 
 
6 MEMOIR. 
 
 Gordon, to rescue their respective Clans from ruin wLicli could not other- 
 wise be averted, are historical facts proving that it was so. 
 
 In further confirmation of this view, we refer to the songs of the High- 
 land bards, of which, fortunately, many are preserved, thoiigh very many 
 are irretrievably lost. Mary Macleod, who lived in the sixteenth century, 
 ]\Iaclean, the Duart Seanachie, and Allan Macdonald of Uist, who both lived 
 in the seventeenth century, as well as many others, have left us minute 
 delineations of what a Chief was, or ought to be. In their writings we 
 find, as might naturally be expected, prominence given to warlike quali- 
 ties, to power or strength in every form— to mastery over the foe in the 
 fiercest fight- — -mastery of the hirlinn in the stormiest sea — of the horse in 
 his wildest career. But we, at the same time, find many qualities extolled 
 which are at utter variance with the popular notion of a Highland Chief, 
 who is regarded as the embodiment of barbaric pride, and selfishness, and 
 savage cruelty. We find hospitality to the stranger, compassion to the 
 friendless, kindness towards all, and more especially "kindness to the 
 tenantry," frequently commended. Then liberality to the "sons of song," 
 accomplishment in music and in oratory, "a tongue to persuade the men," 
 and a "mastery of knowledge," are mentioned in terms of the highest praise ; 
 while, in the elegy of Sir Hector Maclean of Duart, some stanzas of which 
 are paraphrased by Scott in "Roderick vie Alpin duibh," the Chief is 
 praised as one who "feared and loved the Son of God," and at whose table 
 "God's book was read." 
 
 We know how utterly improbable all this may appear to many ; but to 
 the influence of lona, which diSiised "the benefits of knowledge, and the 
 blessings of religion" so very extensively, might be allowed some humanis- 
 ing efi'ects in its own immediate neighbourhood. Such qualities as the 
 above are frequently attributed to the head of the Clan ; that, however, which 
 we uniformly find placed in the foreground of the picture, that which forms 
 the fundamental idea of the character, is attachment to, and care for the 
 people ; and endless similitudes are used to illustrate this idea. He is the 
 
MEMOIR. 
 
 "head," the "shield," the "fortress," the "stay," the "sheltering tree," and 
 the "haven of safety," and over and over he is styled the "shepherd," the 
 "defender of the flock." 
 
 Let us make full allowance for poetic imagination, and for bardic 
 adulation ; let it be granted that the above characters are far more ideal 
 than real, it will still be seen that such ideal was within the range of the 
 Celtic mind, that such qualities were those appreciated and admired in a 
 Highland Chief. 
 
 Notwithstanding all this, the notion that Highlanders, Chief and Clan, 
 were notoriously savage, ferocious, and blood-thirsty, beyond any other 
 race in Britain, has taken such a hold of the public mind, that it is almost 
 a hopeless task to attempt its removal; and there are deeds of cruelty 
 again and again quoted in proof that the case was so. We do not for a 
 moment deny or palliate such deeds. They were ferocious and cruel, but 
 unfortunately they can easily be paralleled by referring to the annals of 
 the "bloody feuds" in the south of Scotland, to those of England in 
 the days of the barons, to those of France while its nobles were in 
 a great measure independent of the Crown, or to those of any other 
 country where the defence of life and property is maintained by the 
 individual, instead of being confided to the laws and the guardianship of 
 the State. 
 
 And further, even in modern times, deeds may be proved against Scotch- 
 men and Englishmen, which cast into the shade the fiercest and darkest in- 
 stances of Celtic Clan vengeance ever recorded. The "Massacre of Glencoe" 
 was devised, and delineated in its minutest particulars, by the "accomplished 
 Dalrymple," and was sanctioned by William HI., who, according to Sir 
 WiUiam Napier,"'' "is the only General on record to whom attaches the 
 detestable distinction of sporting with men's lives by wholesale, ... and 
 who fought at St Denis with the Peace of Nimeguen in his pocket, because 
 he would not deny himself a safe lesson in his trade." That massacre un- 
 
 • Penins. War. Vol. VI., p. 177. 
 
8 MEMOIR. 
 
 questionably surpasses in cold-blooded atrocity, in all that is at once cruel 
 and base, anything that darkens the annals of the Highlands. 
 
 Again, the conduct of English and Hanoverian soldiers and officers, 
 after the battle of CuUoden, is likewise unmatched in Clan history. The 
 burning of the wounded soldiers in the houses to which they had crawled 
 for shelter, surpasses both the smothering of the Macdonalds in the cele- 
 brated cave of Eigg, or the oft-mentioned burning of the Mackenzies at 
 Kilchrist ; while the doings of English officers and soldiers, some weeks 
 later at Fort- Augustus, where they held "races of naked women on 
 horseback for the amusement of the camp,""' is of a thoroughly brutal 
 character, such as was never laid to the charge of Highlanders. 
 
 The opposite picture presented by Maclain of Glencoe, in 1 745, guard- 
 ing the house of the murderer of his ancestor from all injury on the part 
 of the Highland host;t or that in 1746, by the seven "outlaws," as they 
 are called, of Glenmorriston, driven to the mountain and the cave by the 
 burning of their homes and the plundering of their property, yet sheltering 
 Prince Charles, with the full knowledge that his surrender would procure 
 them untold wealth (£30,000) — these pictures, contrasted with the above, 
 are not unfavourable to the Celtic character, as compared mth the Saxon. 
 
 It is idle, however, to quote instances on either side. The truth is too 
 obvious that deeds of cruelty are justly chargeable against all tribes and 
 all races, until they are brought under the influence of the public law of 
 the State. Nay, more, deeds of cruelty are chargeable against even all 
 nations when engaged in warfare; and this is one point in which much 
 injustice is shown by those who pronounce upon the character of the 
 Highlanders. They forget that they were almost constantly engaged in 
 warfare; and, moreover, they censure acts done by them, which meet with 
 no reproach when done by others — when done on a large scale by nations. 
 They who shot from the rifle-pits before Sebastopol were just as assassin- 
 
 * "The Forty-Five," by Lord Mahon, p. 125; or chap. xxix. of his History of England. 
 
 t Ap[icndix, Note D. 
 
MEMOIR. 
 
 like as was the Celt who shot his foe from behind rock or tree. They who 
 plundered, and burned the Eussian granaries along the shores of Azoff, 
 were as thorough "robbers and reivers" as was ever Highland cateran when 
 spoiling the fields or the folds of his foe, and destroying what was "too 
 hot or heavy to lift;" yet " as one murder makes a villain, while a million 
 makes a hero," we see the same deed reprobated, or applauded, as done by 
 a small tribe, or by a great nation — ^the moral character of actions deter- 
 mined entirely by an arithmetical computation. 
 
 The Highlanders, rightly or wrongly, regarded their Saxon neighbours 
 as invaders of their land, and with them they waged undisguised warfare 
 — war to the knife, from sire to son. Then often, very often, the Clans 
 warred with each other, and warred fiercely and sternly. But at the same 
 time, the lives and property of friendly Clans, of all who were at peace with 
 them, were regarded with as much sacredness as in any portion of the 
 kingdom. Here, also, the songs of the people, of which, fortunately, many 
 are in print, show us what the popular mind felt on these subjects. They 
 often breathe a spirit of the most bitter vindictiveness against an enemy, 
 and show exultation in the destruction of everything belonging to him ; 
 but robbery, as such, and more especially theft, are uniformly denounced as 
 base and vUe; and the last known instance of assassination from private 
 vengeance — that of Colin Campbell of Glenure, by a Stuart, shortly after 
 the '45 — is, in the well-known elegy of Duncan B4n, execrated in the very 
 strongest terms which the bard could command. 
 
 In determining what the character of the Highlanders was of old, 
 
 considerable weight ought to be allowed to that which they manifest 
 
 at the present day ; for while they have changed, they have changed less 
 
 than the inhabitants of any other portion of the kingdom ; and that because 
 
 infinitely less has been done for them by means of education, religion, 
 
 literature, or commerce. Their country, with its pathless forests, and 
 
 deep ravines, and inaccessible corries, afibrds facilities for the commission of 
 
 outrage, and for concealment after its commission, such as are not presented 
 
 c 
 
10 MEMOIR. 
 
 by any other part of Britain. Yet with all this, in the total absence of 
 soldiers, and with a constabulary force, (if it deserve such a name,) intro- 
 duced only a few years ago, crimes which are of every-day occurrence in 
 the South, such as highway robbery and garroting, housebreaking, mur- 
 dering, by poison or otherwise, are in the Highlands almost unknown. 
 
 This is not a matter resting on the authority of song or story, but clearly 
 proved by the records of our criminal courts; and on their unquestionable 
 testimony we venture openly to affirm, that there is not another country in 
 Europe, where property, and more especially life, are held so sacred ; clearly 
 showing that the violence charged against the people of old, though not 
 peculiar to them, was the result of the circumstances in which they were 
 placed, and of the state of society in which they lived, but not of any 
 inherent ferocity of disposition; showing, further, that the system under 
 which they lived contained in it elements fitted to soften and elevate the 
 character. These elements, when freed from counteracting and disturbing 
 causes, have mainly contributed to produce the very remarkable order 
 and peacefulness which, for a series of years back, have prevailed among 
 the mountains. ^ 
 
 The bitterest enemy of the Highlanders will give them credit for personal 
 bravery ; and while their Chiefs are frequently ridiculed for overbearing 
 pride, we know not that the most vain-glorious among them ever claimed 
 or received homage more servile or abject than is at this day, throughout 
 the kingdom, offered to wealth alone. Then there was among them much 
 •of the mcorriipta fides, held in such honour of old; and nowhere was the 
 sacredness of a promise more religiously regarded, as is evinced by the Chief, 
 of Lament protecting the slayer of his only son, because he had plighted 
 his word to him, and by many similar instances. Beyond all question, 
 the praise which they have obtained for their hospitality was well merited; 
 its rights were fully acknowledged, and rendered with a gracefulness which 
 doubled the value of the favour. Even to this day, some of the remnant of 
 the olden time, to be found in secluded spots, consider the entertaining of 
 
MEMOIR. ' 11 
 
 strangers not a duty only, but a high privilege, and manifest a politeness 
 of bearing, a true courteousness of manner rarely to be found among any 
 other people. It may be strange that in the words of Shakespeare — 
 
 "An invisible instinct should so frame them 
 To loyalty unlearned, honour untaught, 
 Civility not seen from others, valour 
 That wildly grows in them, but yields a crop 
 As if it had been sowed." 
 
 Yet it is true that "loyalty, honour, civility, and valour," did so meet in 
 them as to form a character at once interesting, attractive, and excellent 
 in no common degree. 
 
 Lengthened as our remarks on this subject are, we cannot pass from it 
 without quoting some of the words of the late Professor Wilson, regarding 
 the past and the present character of the Highlanders; and he, above 
 almost all other men, had opportunities of judging, having for many years 
 mingled so freely with them, having scaled every mountain, and explored 
 every forest, and traversed every glen, and studied every lake throughout 
 the whole country, while at the same time he had a heart that could fully 
 sympathise with the feelings of the people : — 
 
 " Time and tide 
 Have washed away, like weeds upon the sands, 
 Crowds of the olden life's memorials; 
 And, mid the mountains, you as well might seek 
 For the lone site of fancy's filmy dream. 
 
 The simple system of primeval life — 
 Simple but stately — hath been broken down ; 
 The Clans are scattered, and the Chieftain's power 
 Is dead. 
 
 Yet to far battle-plains still Morvem sends 
 Her heroes, and still glittering in the sun. 
 Or blood-dimmed, her dread line of bayonets 
 Marches with loud shouts straight to victory. 
 
12 MEMOIR. 
 
 The huts 
 Abodes are still of high-soul'd Poverty, 
 And underneath their lintels Beauty stoops 
 Her silken-snoodcd head." 
 
 Again, writing in sober prose, he says — "We love the people too well 
 to praise them ; we have had too heartfelt experience of their virtues. In 
 castle, hall, house, manse, hut, hovel, shieling — on mountain and moor, we 
 
 have known without having to study their character They are now, 
 
 as they ever were, affectionate, faithful, and fearless." And he thus con- 
 cludes his eloquent estimate: — "The time will come when we shall be able 
 to contemplate without any pain the condition of a race who, to use the 
 noble language of one often scornful, and sarcastic overmuch, yet at heart 
 their friend, 'almost in an hour subsided into peace and virtue, retaining 
 their places, their possessions, their Chiefs, their songs, their traditions, their 
 su.perstitions, and peculiar usages, even that language and those recollec- 
 tions which still separate them from the rest of the nation. They retained 
 even their pride, and they retained their contempt of those who imposed 
 that order on them ; and still they settled into a state of obedience to that 
 Government of which the world produces no other instance! It is a splen- 
 did moral phenomenon, and reflects a lustre on the Highland character, 
 whether of the Chiefs or the people, which extinguished all past faults, and 
 which atones for what little remains to be amended. A peculiar political 
 situation was the cause of their faults, and that which swept away the 
 cause has rendered the efiects a tale of other times.'"'"' 
 
 * Swau's " Lakes of Scotland," Vol. I., pp. 51, 52. 
 
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CHAPTEE 11. 
 
 FURTHER ILLUSTRATION OF CLAN FEELING — ANCESTRY OF JOHN CAMERON — HIS BIRTH 
 AND YOUTH — APPRENTICED TO A LAWYER — ENTERS THE ARMY — RAISING OF THE 
 GORDON HIGHLANDERS — MUTINY OF THE LOCHABER MEN AT ABERDEEN. 
 
 To draw nearer, however, to our more immediate subject, we will poiat 
 to a scene of the '45, which helps at once to illustrate the Clan-life of 
 the Highlands, and the influences which surrounded Colonel Cameron in his 
 younger days. If the traveller, after examining the monument we have 
 referred to, directs his steps westward towards Glenfinnan — in itself perhaps 
 the most picturesque of spots, and so intimately blended with the memory 
 of the last struggle of the Stuarts — he will, after a few miles' walk by the 
 shores of Lochiel, and over spots celebrated in local tradition by many 
 tales of strife, and wild legends, reach a green and wooded point stretching 
 out into the lake — Fassiefern, or "the Point of Alders." Here, embosomed 
 amid lofty trees, and, tiU lately, surrounded by a hedge of holly, which 
 might vie with Evelyn's "glorious holly hedge" on the banks of the 
 Thames, he will see a house evidently belonging to a past age. In this 
 house dwelt the Tanister of Lochiel, or the next heir to the Chief. At the 
 time we refer to, John of Fassiefern, brother to the "gentle Lochiel" of the 
 '45 — so justly praised by friend and foe — occupied the dwelling. 
 
 In July, 1 745, when, after many exciting and contradictory rumours 
 among the friends of the Stuart cause, it was ascertained that Prince 
 Charles had actually landed in Moidart, Lochiel visited his brother at 
 Fassiefern on his way to the Prince, determined to dissuade him from so 
 hopeless an enterprise as that on which he had entered. John of Fassie- 
 fern, who knew both the fascinating power of the Prince's conversation, 
 
14 MEMOIR. 
 
 aud the chivalrous character of his brother, strongly urged him to return 
 home to Achnacarry, foretelling what the result of a personal interview 
 would be. The Chief, however, felt himself bound in honour to proceed, 
 and Fassiefern, clearly foreseeing the disastrous end of the rising, which 
 most of the Highland gentlemen considered hopeless from the first, offered 
 himself to visit the Prince, to raise the Camerons, and to expose himself 
 to the consequences ; but entreated his brother to remain at home, so that 
 the remnant of the Clan might be preserved, its head being safe. Lochiel, 
 however, went forward, and, in the words of Sir Walter Scott, "his 
 sagacity was overpowered by his sense of what he esteemed honour and 
 loyalty, which induced him to front the prospect of ruin, with a disin- 
 terested devotion, not unworthy the best days of chivalry." He adds, "His 
 decision was the signal for the commencement of the rebellion ; for it was 
 generally understood that there was not a Chief in the Highlands who - 
 would have risen had Lochiel maintained his pacific purpose." 
 
 It is well known that Lochiel did not maintain his "pacific purpose:" 
 that he became the very head and hand of that singular enterprise, the his- 
 tory of which now reads like a romance of far distant days, an enterprise 
 which, according to all calculation, was unfitted to make the slightest im- 
 pression on the power of the British Government, which yet scattered 
 regular troops like verf- chaff, and marched onwards triumphantly so far as 
 to fill with terror even the dwellers in the securest recesses of London — 
 terror, the effects of which, are visited by some upon the Highlanders to 
 this day. But, gallant as were the achievements of that small and devoted 
 band, both in Scotland and England, the dark day of Culloden witnessed 
 the complete overthrow of the last hope of the Stuarts, and the complete 
 "scattering of the Clans." The ultinaiite effects, it is very needless to say, 
 were most beneficial to every portion of the kingdom ; but the conduct of 
 the conquerors, for a considerable time after the battle, was such as 
 neither friend nor foe would now wish to dwell upon ; certainly it was as 
 savage as any ever charged against the Clans. 
 
MEMOIR. 15 
 
 We refer to these things, however, only to point out the influences which 
 surrounded the object of our Memoir in the days of his youth, and neces- 
 sarily moulded and fashioned his character. He was the grandson of this 
 "John of Fassiefern," whose devotedness to Chief and Clan we have men- 
 tioned, who lived till his grandson was fourteen years of age, and this must 
 naturally have impressed upon him the views and feelings of the olden time. 
 
 "The gentle Lochiel" lived and died an exile in France. Another 
 brother, Dr Archibald Cameron, was, for some unexplained cause, seized by 
 the Government as late as 1 752, and executed in London ;""' John of Fassie- 
 fern was imprisoned for a period of seven years, exiled for another term ; 
 but more fortunate than his brothers, was allowed to return to his native 
 land, and to end his days in peace at Fassiefern. 
 
 His eldest son, Ewen, afterwards Sir Ewen, occupied the family property 
 of Inverscadale (now belonging to MacLean of Ardgour), situated on the 
 western shores of the Linnhe-Loch, and in the opening of one of the many 
 great glens which give such an aspect of ever-varying grandeur to this 
 whole district of country. Glenscadale is one of the widest of these open- 
 ings, and displays many of the attributes of a Highland glen in their most 
 striking features. A river, now forming deep and eddying pools, now 
 rushing impetuously over faUs and rapids, bold and rugged rocks, riven 
 into many seams and fissures, brown shoulders of*hills, skirted with the 
 waving birch (which next to the mountain pine is the tree most charac- 
 teristic of the Highlands), and covered with heather to the very summit — 
 these hills again divided by deep ravines and chasms, the edges of which 
 are invariably fringed by the birch, mingled with the pale hazel, and strong- 
 branched mountain ash ; while, in singular contrast to all around, a massive 
 hill, clothed with green to the very spmmit, and forming quite a table-land, 
 rises up in the centre of the valley, dividing it into two distinct glens, which 
 stretch far away, amid the mass of mountains that make up the wild back- 
 ground to the scene. 
 
 * Appendix, Note E. • 
 
16 MEMOIE. 
 
 At Inverscadale, Ewen of Fassiefern lived, and there, on the 16th 
 August, 1771, was born the subject of our notice. His mother was Lucy 
 Campbell, daughter of Campbell of Barcaldine, The family consisted of 
 Mary, afterwards married to M'Donald, or Maclain, of Glencoe; Jean, 
 married to M'Neill of Barra, the Chief of that Clan; John, the subject of 
 our Memoir ; Catherine, married ■ to M'Pherson of Cluny M'Pherson, like- 
 wise Chief of his Clan; Duncan, now Baronet of Fassiefern; and Peter, 
 subsequently commander of the "Balcarras," East Indiaman. Sir Duncan 
 alone survives. 
 
 John was nursed by Mrs M'Millan, the wife of one of his father's 
 tenants, whose' son, Ewen M'Millan, the foster-brother, attended him in 
 youth, followed him faithfully through the wars, and was beside him when, 
 
 "At bloody Quatre Bras, 
 BraTe Cameron heard the wild hurrah 
 Of conquest, as he fell." 
 
 The family removed from Inverscadale to Fassiefern, on the shores of 
 Lochiel, which we have already noticed as their ancient dwelling-place, 
 care being taken to provide a residence for old M'Millan in Glendessarie, 
 at, the head of Loch Arkaig, a place still unknown to tourists, but in many 
 respects equalling, if noli surpassing, the most attractive seen es^ frequented 
 by them. 
 
 John Cameron grew up here amid external scenery well fitted to make 
 a deep and lasting impression on his mind; but it is to the moral influ- 
 ences which surrounded him that we particularly direct attention. His 
 grandfather, who bore such an important part in all that concerned the 
 '45, naturally took the deepest interest in him who was the heir of his 
 house and of his name. Then, very many others belonging to the olden 
 time were around him, for he was born within twenty-six years of the '45 ; 
 and though the Clan System had been proscribed by law before his birth, 
 the "heritable jurisdictions" abolished, the Clans disarmed, and every 
 attempt made to assimilate Highland habits to those of the Lowlands, it 
 
MEMOIR. 17 
 
 need scarcely be said that legislative enactments are unable to change, of a 
 sudden, long-established customs, far less to eradicate deeply-cherished feel- 
 ings, and deeply-seated principles. In illustration of this, we mention 
 one instance of remarkable fidelity and devotedness on the part of the 
 "Cameron men," to which he was witness, and in which all his friends 
 were concerned. Their country was ravaged by Cumberland's soldiers, 
 as all the neighbouring districts were; houses were burned, and even trees 
 were wantonly set on fire, or split asunder with gunpowder — some scarred 
 and scathed trunks at Achnacarry still manifest the traces; but the 
 attention of the soldiery was chiefly directed to plunder, and they swept 
 the district of everything they could convert into money, 'cattle, horses, 
 sheep, and goats. The people saved a remnant by driving them to the 
 most inaccessible fastnesses, among the remotest mountains; and there 
 are old men still living who point out those deep crater, or cauldron- 
 shaped carries, in which the cattle were hidden, and the caves where 
 women and children sought shelter and concealment, while the plundering 
 and slaying lasted. 
 
 After the establishment of civil rule, the people were allowed to return 
 to their former places of abode, to rebuild their ruined huts, and to replant 
 their desolated patches of crop-land. The Government received them as 
 their own tenants, exacting rent from them — in justice let it be said, a 
 moderate and reasonable rent. They cheerfully paid it; but impoverished 
 as they were by the spoliation of the soldiery, they remitted a second rent 
 regularly and faithfully to Lochiel in France,"'^ The one rent they paid in 
 deference to law, the other in deference to feelings and principles having a 
 deeper seat, and a more indestructible character than any human law could 
 bestow — principles which had grown with their growth, and strengthened 
 with their strength, which no human authority could enhance, and which 
 no adverse circumstances could overthrow. 
 
 John Cameron witnessed all these things in his younger days. Further, 
 
 * Appendix, Note F. , 
 
 D 
 
18 MEMOIR. 
 
 he saw these faithful and generous clansmen coming, in every difficulty 
 and emergency, to seek counsel and aid from his own father. Sir Ewen, 
 who, in the absence of their Chief, became his representative; and we 
 believe that, for sound judgment, unshaken firmness, and unspotted 
 integrity of character, coupled with rare courtesy and gracefulness of 
 manner, very few could be found so well fitted for a situation at once so 
 dehcate and so honourable. 
 
 We dwell on these things with the view of directing attention to what 
 was peculiar in Colonel Cameron's character among officers, rather than to 
 his bravery and devotion to his service, which many of them shared with 
 him. He was as brave and devoted as any man could be; but, further, 
 he regarded himself as in a special manner the head and protector of the 
 men who followed him to the camp ; then, as his command extended, he re- 
 ceived the increasing numbers constituting that command, as it were, into 
 his Clan, and no Chief ever showed deeper anxiety for the prosperity of his 
 Clan than he showed for the welfare of all that gathered under his banner. 
 
 There is nothing remarkable remembered of his youth. He was 
 educated for a time in the Grammar School of Fort-William — then, as 
 ever since, celebrated as an excellent seminary; but his education Avas 
 chiefly conducted by a private tutor, and he completed his course of 
 instruction at the University of King's College, Aberdeen. During the 
 whole of this period he was attentive to his studies, and made respectable 
 progress in every branch to which his mind was directed, having the spirit 
 i^? to do well whatever he undertook ; but he was by no means distinguished 
 
 for scholarship, nor did his youth affbrd any prognostication of future 
 eminence. He spent his vacations in those sports and exercises which 
 then formed, as they still do, much of the pastime of every Highland 
 gentleman, fishing, shooting, and especially stalking the deer. In those 
 days, however, this last pursuit was a very different thing from what 
 it is now; for then there were no wire fences to confine the range of 
 the lords of the forest, nor were they tamed by turnip and hay feed- 
 
MEMOIR. 19 
 
 ing, but roamed, in unrestrained freedom, from mountain to mountain, 
 and the mountain alone was their abode. Then there were no shooting 
 lodges, providing shelter, comfort, and even luxuries as now for the sports- 
 man, at convenient distances. He was obliged to follow his game over 
 mountain and moor, and to trust for food and shelter to the chance 
 shieling, or to the cave of the rock. Following the deer was then a 
 work of toil, requiring alike \agour of will and of muscle, resolution and 
 activity. Its excitement possessed remarkable attractions for the High- 
 landers generally, and some of the most spirit-stirring of their songs 
 celebrate the achievements of the chase. 
 
 Beyond question these exercises — hunting the deer, fishing the salmon, 
 and steering the skiff across the squally lake — tend not merely to promote 
 strength and hardihood, but also to ensure the quickness of eye, and ready 
 decision of purpose, which are of such importance to the soldier, and wholly 
 indispensable to the commander. 
 
 John Cameron was much devoted to such pursuits, and by the training 
 he thus gave himself amid the mountains in his youth, a constitution, 
 originally strong, became so hardened that no amount of toil in the field, 
 no change of climate, from the sands of Egypt to the fens of Holland, or to 
 the lofty Sierras of Spain, could exhaust or undermine it ; and very re- 
 markable it is, that long and arduous as were his services, he scarcely ever 
 suflered from sickness, or privation, or weariness — he was scarcely a day 
 off duty except from wounds received in combat. 
 
 One thing more we must remark regarding the habits and tastes of his 
 youth. He not only spoke the language of his native hills, but he was 
 fond of it, and loved to converse in it. He stored his mind with its tales 
 and its songs, and often when far away he gave vent to his feebngs, whether 
 of joy or of sorrow, in the utterances of the Gaelic muse. Even in the 
 last solemn moment of departing life, it was in this language that he 
 expressed his hopes and aspirations. He showed the same predilection for 
 Highland music. He was passionately fond of the mountain pipe, which, 
 
20 MEMOIR. 
 
 however unintelligible to the ears of a stranger, speaks to the heart of a 
 Highlander as nothing else can. It was his delight, after he had got the 
 command of a regiment, to march at its head, surrounded by the entire 
 band of pipers, and to some of these he showed the greatest regard. 
 
 These tastes and acquirements, as may easily be understood, gave him 
 a power over Highland soldiers such as no officer, however brave or 
 deserving, could wield, if a stranger to their language and their most 
 cherished associations. 
 
 When the time arrived for his fixing on a profession, the law was chosen 
 for him; and he was duly apprenticed to a Writer to the Signet in 
 Edinburgh, James Fraser, Esq. of Gorthleck. While he dutifully entered 
 upon the work that devolved on him in this situation, he very soon found 
 it utterly uncongenial to his taste. He expressed a strong desire to enter 
 the army, and his father, instead of opposing his choice, purchased a 
 commission for him in the 26th, or Cameronian Eegiment. This was in 
 the year 1793, so that, at twenty-two years of age, he entered on the 
 profession which evidently was that intended for him by nature. But 
 instead of joining the 26th, he entered as Lieutenant in an independent 
 Highland company, which had been raised by Campbell of Ardcliattan in 
 Argyle'shire — a company which was afterwards incorporated with the 93d 
 Regiment. 
 
 In 1794, however, the Marquis of Huntly resolved to raise a regiment 
 on his father's extensive lands, and there being a considerable portion of 
 these in Lochaber, he addressed himself to the gentlemen there. He called 
 on Fassiefern, and offered to his son John a Captain's commission in the 
 regiment thus to be raised — first numbered as the 100th of the line — 
 afterwards so well known as the Gordon Highlanders, or 92d Eegiment. 
 Fassiefern declined the gratifying honour, on the ground of his inability 
 to raise the number of men requisite to entitle his son to such a rank ; 
 whereupon the Marquis, with great kindness, offered the rank without 
 any stipulation or condition, saying he would be glad to have John 
 
MEMOIR. 21 
 
 Cameron a Captain in his regiment although he brought not a single 
 recruit. 
 
 Fassiefern resolved to exert himself to requite such generosity. He 
 applied to his Chief, Lochiel, now happily restored to the estates forfeited 
 by his ancestor, who at once sanctioned the undertaking. M'NeUl of 
 Barra, whom we have already mentioned as brother-in-law to John 
 Cameron, sent twelve very active, soldierly men from his insular property. 
 With such aid the full complement was speedily gathered, and Cameron 
 joined the regiment with a hundred men as brave and true as any who 
 ever fought under the British banner. 
 
 It was at Aberdeen that they mustered; and here the Lochaber 
 men showed at once the influence of that Clan feeling under which they 
 had consented to go to war. When it was proposed to draft them into 
 the separate divisions of grenadiers and light troops, they at once declared 
 that they would neither be separated from each other, nor serve under 
 any Captain except Cameron, that they had followed him as their leader, 
 and him only they would serve. It required all his persuasion to induce 
 them to submit to the rules of the service; but, assisted by his relative, 
 Major Campbell of Auch — a man of weight and experience — and promis- 
 ing that he himself would always watch over their interests in whatever 
 division they were ranked, he prevailed on them to submit ; and, as we 
 shall subsequently see, none of them ever had cause to reproach him with 
 forgetting his pledge. 
 
 It is evident that these men joined the army solely from attachment 
 to, and confidence in their leader ; and so it was throughout the Highlands 
 when that thinly-inhabited country furnished, in the course of less than 
 fifty years, more than 70,000 soldiers.'"" During that time the pre- 
 judice against enlisting, which still prevails so strongly throughout the 
 kingdom, was stronger in the Highlands than anywhere else, much 
 stronger than it is to-day ; for, added to this, there was then a deep dislike 
 
 * Appendix^ Note G. 
 
22 MEMOIR. 
 
 or, more properly speaking, a bitter hatred of the " red army," of the 
 King's troops, as associated with all the sad and savage scenes that 
 followed CuUoden; yet the Highlands in those days poured forth warriors 
 in au abundant, never-failing stream. In the present day, again, whole 
 districts may be traversed without calling one soldier from the hill- 
 side; and during the Crimean war, the Highlanders, as is well known, 
 did not furnish probably a tithe of their just proportion of the defenders 
 of the empire. 
 
 The cause of this marked change is very obvious, though not always - 
 noticed. Through change of time and circumstances, the old relation of 
 Chief, and Clansman, has been merged in the modern commercial one of 
 land-owner, and rent-payer, which does not imply any obligation on the 
 latter to "host, or hunt, or watch, or ward." Then the commercial induce- 
 ment — the pay of the soldier — is not such as to induce a man, who can 
 support himself with any degree of comfort at home, to abandon home and 
 kindred for military service; and until matters are greatly improved in 
 this respect, until the character and position of the soldier are considerably 
 raised, the Highlands will yield few recruits. 
 
 We are convinced that, in the period we refer to, 1794, a mere "recruit- 
 ing sergeant" would meet with, if possible, less success than he finds in 
 1857: that he would not, by his "beat of drum," raise half a regiment 
 between Inverness and Kintyre, or between Arran and St Kilda ; but at 
 that time men of character and influence, like the subject of our Memoir 
 — still more, heads of Clans, like Lochiel and others, personally addressing 
 men who personally knew them, and respected and trusted them, looking 
 to them as their natural guardians and friends — readily got men to follow 
 them whithersoever they chose to lead; and if influence did not always 
 produce its desired efifect, the pressure of authority was sometimes brought 
 to supplement it. 
 
 The raising of the Gordon Highlanders themselves, illustrates strikingly 
 the difi"erence between the past and the present mode of recruiting. Every 
 
MEMOIR. 23 
 
 gentleman connected with that powerful family exerted himself to draw- 
 out all the "fencible men" in his neighbourhood; and it is said that the 
 celebrated Duchess herself was more active and far more successful than 
 any of her vassals or friends; that, equipped in semi-military costume, she 
 rode from farm to farm, from hamlet to hamlet of her extensive estates, by 
 an eloquent tongue rousing the martial ardour of her tenantry, and in rare 
 cases, where this failed, offering the bribe of a hiss from her own lips. 
 Such a bribe always proved irresistible; but the measure, though sanc- 
 tioned by another very high example — that of "the beautiful Duchess of 
 Devonshire," who is said, in those stirring times, to have purchased the 
 political vote of a London butcher by giving him a kiss — is not likely to 
 be generally followed in the present age. 
 
 Beyond all question, it was personal and family influence, exerted by 
 means of personal solicitation among the people, which then filled the ranks 
 of the Highland regiments ; and that this was so, is shown by the manner 
 in M'hich still surviving veterans describe the service in which they have 
 been engaged. An old Highland soldier does not speak of his having 
 been in the "red army," or even in the King's army, still less does he 
 speak of the number by which his corps is known at the Horse Guards ; 
 but he speaks of his having been in the "Gordon," or the "Sutherland," or 
 the "Lochnell," or the "Fraser" Regiment; these names having been alike 
 his banner and his shield. 
 
CHAPTEE III, 
 
 EEGIMENT GOES TO HOLLAND — TO THE MEDITERRANEAN — TO EGYPT — BATTLES OF 
 SANDHILLS AND ALEXANDRIA — RETURNS TO BRITAIN — GOES TO IRELAND — TO 
 WALCHEREN — RETURNS TO BRITAIN. 
 
 We do not intend to record all the movements of the 92d (or 100th as it 
 was still numbered) from station to station, but we observe, that, about 
 the end of the year 1794, they were ordered to Gibraltar. While stationed 
 here, some dispute, the nature of which we know not, arose between 
 Cameron, and then Lieutenant, afterwards Sir John Maclean, likewise of 
 the 9 2d, which, according to the barbarous fashion of the times — now 
 happily acknowledged to be barbarous — led to a duel. Fortunately, the 
 combatants parted without serious injury, and this was the only instance 
 in which Cameron had a hostile encounter with a brother ofl&cer. 
 
 In July of the following year the regiment was sent to Corsica to 
 assist the well-known Paoli; and with the bravery which ever afterwards 
 characterised all their actions, they completely carried out the object 
 entrusted to them. The island — of which Gibbon, writing in 1783, says, 
 "It is easier to deplore its fate than to describe its actual condition," and 
 now of such world-wide fame as the birth-place of Napoleon — was taken 
 possession of by British arms, and for a time annexed to the British 
 dominions. 
 
 The regiment returned to Gibraltar, was brought to England, and in 
 the autumn of 1798, was sent to Ireland, to guard against a French 
 invasion, and to quell the Irish, who entirely sympathised with the French 
 Kevolutionists. 
 
MEMOIR. 25 
 
 Cameron's letters to his father, at the outset of his career, have been 
 unfortunately lost, but several belonging to this period are preserved, and 
 from them we will give extracts which exhibit his true character far 
 better than any description from another pen can do. 
 
 The first we meet with is dated Camp, Glen of Imale, 28th August, 
 1798. — After speaking of the report that the French had actually landed 
 in Sligo Bay, and that the regiment had been ordered thither with alt 
 speed, he says, "I am terribly alarmed that they will be destroyed before 
 we get up to them. Would to Heaven that it might be our chance to 
 come to action with them!" and he adds, "I will venture to say this much, 
 that if I can in any way judge of myself, whatever may happen in this 
 expedition, you will hear that your son has acted in a manner not to 
 disgrace you, nor the blood from which he has sprung." The whole of his 
 subsequent career fully shows that he was at all times animated by the 
 resolution here so characteristically expressed. 
 
 His wish to come to action with the French was not for the present 
 gratified. The regiment, countermanded in the march to Sligo Bay, was, 
 for a time, quartered in the neighbourhood of Kilkenny, and while there 
 he formed a very deep attachment to a young lady — a Miss H. of that 
 town, who fully returned his affection. Being now senior Captain, he 
 thought himself entitled to marry, but on consulting his father, was 
 absolutely forbidden, on pain of his sternest displeasure, to marry Miss H. 
 With a deference to parental authority which could scarcely be expected, 
 in such circumstances, from a man w^ho generally showed an unyielding 
 will, he consented to abandon a prospect from which he had hoped fo'r the 
 highest happiness; at the same time telling his father that the sacrifice 
 which he made was at the expense of his future peace. He wrote a letter 
 to the lady's father, frankly stating the barrier that had been opposed to 
 his wishes, releasing her from her promise to him, but at the same time 
 declaring that he would, while living, consider himself bound to her, and 
 feelingly deploring the loss to W'hich he was doomed. 
 
26 • MEMOIR. 
 
 She was in course of time married to another, and, it is said, very 
 happily. He remained single through life, and the disappointment he met 
 with seems to have permanently saddened his character. For many years 
 afterwards he occasionally reverts to the subject, and always with undimi- 
 nished regret — at the time he applied for active service, writing to his 
 father that he was "utterly indifferent whether it should be in Otaheite, 
 or Botany Bay." 
 
 Fortunately for him, the regiment was immediately engaged in ser- 
 vice, which, though unpleasant, required constant activity and exertion- — 
 repressing the popular disturbances that occurred throughout the greater 
 part of Ireland at this period. It was work, however, in which no laurels 
 were to be won, and uncongenial to the taste of every officer and man 
 in the regiment. It was with unfeigned pleasure he learned in the 
 following year, 1799, that they were ordered to Holland, to form part of 
 the expedition under Sir Ralph Abercromby; for there they would 
 encounter the soldiers of the French Republic, already filling all Europe 
 with their fame — a service far better suited to them than chasing disorderly 
 bands of the Irish peasantry, who, except at Vinegar Hill, never stood the 
 charge of regular troops. 
 
 The 92d formed part of the brigade commanded by the gallant and 
 gentle Sir John Moore, whose rare combination of excellences, it is super- 
 fluous to add, commanded alike the respect and affection of all who served 
 under him. 
 
 We think it needless to detail the various actions fought in this 
 expedition, which completely failed in effecting its object, and for which, 
 considering that it was composed of 18,000 British, and 17,000 Russian 
 troops, it might be thought well fitted. Whether the generalship of 
 the Duke of York, who took the supreme command in the early part of 
 the autumn, or the unhealthiness of the climate, was chiefly to blame, we 
 know not; but Holland was abandoned to the French at the beginning 
 of winter. The conduct of the British troops, however, was not to blame. 
 
MEMOIR. 19 27 
 
 They landed at the Helder in the face of the Batavians — they repelled an 
 attack made by the brave Vandamme with forces far outnumbering theirs. 
 At Alkmaar they gained a decided victory over the left and centre of the 
 French, although the Russians were utterly routed on the right ; and, a 
 few days afterwards (October 2), the French, under Brune, were driven 
 back with great loss. 
 
 In every action the 92d had their full share of work, and showed 
 uniform determination. In the battle of Egmont-op-Zee they lost, between 
 killed and wounded, more than 250 men, and led the charge, which 
 rescued from the hands of the enemy twenty pieces of ajftillery that had 
 been captured in the earlier part of the day. Here Cameron, leading his 
 men, received a severe wound in the knee, from the eflFects of which he 
 suffered for a long time. The Marquis of Huntly was also wounded, and 
 Sir John Moore most severely. It was Cameron who sent men to carry 
 the latter off the field, and an extract of a letter of his on this subject, 
 written in 1804, to Lieut.-Colonel Napier, commanding the regiment, is 
 worth referring to, as showing his lasting sense of gratitude for the favour 
 conferred on him : — 
 
 Richmond, 17th November, 1804. 
 
 My Deae Napiee, — I have been for some days on leave in London, and 
 received your letters there. I am here vt'ith my mother for a day, and return this 
 night to Sandgate. My reason for troubling you for a drawing is, that, as a knight, I 
 am entitled to supporters. I have chosen a light infantry soldier for one, being 
 Colonel of a light infantry regiment, and a Highland soldier for the other, in gratitude 
 to, and commemoration of, two soldiers of the 92d, who, in action of the 2d October, 
 raised me from the groimd when I was lying on my face wounded and stunned (they 
 must have thought me dead), and helped me out of the field. As my senses were • 
 returning, I heard one of them say, "Here is the General, let us take huu away," upon 
 which they stooped and raised me by the arm. I never could discover who they were, 
 and therefore concluded they must have been killed. I hope the 9 2d will not have 
 any objection — as I commanded them, and as they rendered me such a service — to my 
 taking one of the corps as a supporter. I do not care for the drawing being elegant : 
 all I want is the uniform and appointments. Any person who can draw a figure 
 tolerably, but will dress him correctly with arms, accoutrements, and in parade order, 
 
28 MEMOIR. 
 
 will answer every purpose, as I want it for a model only from which a painter may 
 draw another. If you are at a loss to do this, I dare say Lieut. -Col. Birch would do it, 
 or get one of the officers of the department to do so, if you sent a man ju'operly dressed 
 to Colchester; but I think your own quarters will produce some one sufficiently expert. 
 I received your letter by Captain Grant before I left Sandgate. He seems a very 
 gentlemanly young man. I do not think I can recommend a proper Adjutant to you 
 at present. Remember me kindly to my friends of the 9 2d, and believe me. 
 
 My Dear Napiee, 
 
 Sincerely, etc., 
 (Signed) JOHN MOORE. 
 
 Lieut.-Ool. Napiee of Blackstone. 
 
 It ought to be added that Moore offered a reward of £20 to the soldiers 
 who had borne him off the field ; but while this offer was publicly made 
 known, none ever came forward to claim the reward. It may be that 
 those entitled to it had subsequently fallen on the field, or had been cut off 
 by the pestilential vapours of the Holland fens, so much more fatal than 
 the arms of the enemy. If so, it says much for the truthfulness and honour 
 of the survivors, that, where deception was so easy, no one attempted to 
 practise it. We consider it probable, however, that their silence was owing 
 to the utter dread the Highlanders generally entertain of participating in 
 any manner, directly or indirectly, in what they call "blood-money;" that 
 is, money received either for preserving the life of a friend, or destroying 
 the life of an enemy. It is a popular belief that money obtained as the 
 price of an enemy's blood will infallibly entail on the receiver a curse and 
 woe, both here and hereafter; also, that money accepted as a compensation 
 for saving the life of a friend, will, instead of benefiting the receiver, 
 speedily bring danger to himself, or to his family ; and we have no doubt 
 that these beliefs influenced the Highlanders as much amid the plains of 
 Holland as among their own mountain wilds, which alone are thought the 
 fit and natural abodes of superstition. 
 
 We may here mention that in these days Ewen ]\Iacmillan, Cameron's 
 foster-brother and constant attendant, received a wound. Being at an 
 out-post, he noticed a Frenchman at a considerable distance, whom he 
 
 4k. 
 
MEMOin. 29 
 
 thought he could stalk, as he was in the habit of doing to the deer in the 
 forests of Loch-Arkaig. He crawled forward very cautiously, but just as 
 he thought himself secure of his game, and was taking very deliberate aim 
 over a low dyke, the Frenchman, quicker than he, fired, and carried off his 
 ear. ' Macmillan, however, was revenged. He fired in return, brought his 
 adversary to the ground, and, not content with this, rushed forward and 
 transfixed him with his bayonet. He speedily returned to his own 
 friends, and sought his master, to whom, in his native tongue, he com- 
 plained of what the Frenchman had done to him. "The devil's son, do 
 you see what he did to me!" "You well deserved it, Ewen, in going be- 
 yond your post," was Fassiefern's remark. "He'll not do it again, faith!" 
 was the contented reply. 
 
 The 9 2d, with the other regiments engaged in this mismanaged cam- 
 paign, returned to Britain after the convention of Alkmaar, and Cameron, 
 obtaining leave of absence, visited his native glens, accompanied by his 
 steady follower, Macmillan. He soon, however, returned to his regiment, 
 which was engaged in various operations in the Mediterranean, under 
 General Maitland, and afterwards under Lord Dalhousie; but these services 
 seem to have been extremely distasteful, as they did not bring the army 
 to any important engagement with the enemy. 
 
 There is a letter of Cameron's to his father, dated "H.M.S. Inconstant, 
 frigate, at Sea, 22d June, 1800," which strikingly shows the care taken by 
 those in command to conceal their intended movements from the enemy. 
 It is in the following words: "All well, but where we are, or what we are 
 about, I dare not mention." 
 
 There is another, dated "Inconstant, ofi' Malaga, 6th July, 1800," where 
 some account is given of their previous proceedings: "On the 5th June 
 we landed on the island of Houat, in Quiberon Bay, opposite the country 
 of the Chouans, where we landed General Georges, a Chouan chief, who 
 was sent by our Government with a large sum of money to try his fortune 
 in raising his countrymen in force, and who has had the high honour and 
 
1*- 
 
 30 MEMOIR. 
 
 probity to return the money, on finding he could not succeed. On Houat 
 our small army was formed into divisions, and the order of battle given, 
 but on the 1 5th June we all embarked again. Embarking and disembark- 
 ing, vessels running foul of each other — such is what we are engaged in." 
 
 On the 4th August, he writes from the Inconstant frigate, Port-Mahon : 
 •'The regiment in general is exceedingly healthy, and all the lads from the 
 country are in excellent health and spirits." These "lads from the coun- 
 try," we shall find, formed his especial care. 
 
 Again, on the 22d August, he writes from George's Town, Minorca, 
 saying: "We landed a fortnight ago for the benefit of our health. At sea 
 we had no one dangerously ill. Here two have died, and ninety-two are 
 in hospital. What would I not give for a letter from home! but here 
 there is no chance of receiving one." 
 
 On the 7th October, he writes "Off Cadiz," complaining both of the 
 inaction of the army, and of his not hearing from home, saying, "We are 
 all in shocking spirits at having been so completely humbugged during the 
 whole of this season." 
 
 On the 29th October, "H.M.S. Stately, off Tetuan Bay," he gives 
 strong expression to these feelings: "We left our station, off Cadiz, the 
 day after I wrote you, and have ever since been 'parading in a pretty 
 severe gale of wind backwards and forwards between Gibraltar, Tetuan 
 Bay, and Cape Spartell. I shall ever regret, and feel perfectly ashamed, 
 that I belonged to this army. It is now a few days more than five months 
 since I left England, and not a syllable have I heard from, or of, my 
 friends, which is the most trying thing in the world. It would greatly 
 lessen the regret that I feel at a long separation from them, were I to hear 
 frequently from them, All the lads from the country are well, except 
 Neil M'Donald, who, poor fellow, was left very ill at Minorca." 
 
 These regrets and repinings were, however, speedily dissipated, by 
 the army being called to Egypt under the command of the distinguished 
 Abercromby, 
 
MEMOIE. 31 
 
 Egypt, for centuries shorn of its ancient glorj, enduring the foretold 
 degradation of being a servant of servants, had been, as is known, seized 
 by the French in 1798; and though the repulse at Acre had dissipated 
 Napoleon's gorgeous visions of oriental conquest, being, as he himself 
 frequently said, "The event which made him miss his destiny" — though 
 he had thrown himself once more into the midst of the European struggle, 
 he had left a strong and well-organised army in Egypt, which it was 
 necessary for the interests of Britain to expel or to subdue. Arrangements 
 were made to bring 8,000 troops from India, under Sir David Baird, in 
 order to join those under Abercromby in the Levant, and to co-operate 
 with a Turkish army which was to descend from Syria. Sir Ralph 
 Abercromby, however, finding the re-organisation of the Turkish force 
 proceeding very slowly, and knowing that the arrival of Sir David must 
 be necessarily uncertain, adopted the bold resolution of at once attacking 
 the French with the comparatively small force under his immediate com- 
 mand. Accordingly, he sailed for Marmorice,'"' in the Levant, with 17,500 
 troops, and reached the Bay of Aboukir on the 1st March, 1801. The 
 battle of the Sandhills is well known. The British effected a landing in 
 the face of the French troops and artillery, and the Highland Regiments 
 bore their full share of the struggle, and of the loss of that engagement. 
 Egypt, indeed, is with many veterans whom we have met with, a more 
 favourite reminiscence than even the Peninsula. 
 
 In the battle of Mandora, fought shortly afterwards, Cameron's Com-, 
 pany occupied an advanced position, and suffered severely, but conducted 
 themselves so gallantly as to call forth special commendation from the 
 Commander-in-Chief, who, on this as on other occasions, gave public testi- 
 mony to the gallant bearing of the 92d, from whose men he selected his 
 body-guard. Cameron was at this time promoted to a Majority, and bore 
 a conspicuous part in the bloody and important battle of Alexandria, 
 where he was Avounded, and where not merely the army, but the whole 
 
 * Appendix, Note H. 
 
32 MEMOIR. 
 
 nation, had cause to lament the fall of the brave Abercromby. The 
 victory of Alexandria, as is known, was the first important and decisive 
 one obtained by British over French troops, from the commencement of 
 the war. Here the latter were superior in cavalry and in artillery; yet 
 the British, though deprived of their gallant leader, beyond all question, 
 gained the honours of the day. The French were compelled to retreat, 
 and, before -the end of August, the whole army, amounting to 24,000 
 veterans, capitulated to the British. 
 
 The French invasion wrought considerable changes on the condition of 
 Egypt — virtually annihilating the Mamelukes, who had so long exercised 
 despotic sway over that once great, but long-degraded country. It utterl}' 
 failed, however, in the objects contemplated by its ambitious originator ; 
 and its failure helped materially to arouse and strengthen that confidence 
 in the power of Britain, by land as well as by sea, which was the main 
 cause of the final overthrow of the gigantic fabric which his marvellous 
 talents had reared. 
 
 All the regiments engaged in that arduous service conducted them- 
 selves with uniform and signal bravery. None, however, was more con- 
 spicuous than the 92d, who carry on their banners one Egyptian inscrip- 
 tion more than do even the 42d, whose fame in Egypt is universally known. 
 Cameron, besides his promotion in the regiment, obtained a gold medal 
 from the Sultan, and became known as one of the most efficient and trust- 
 worthy officers in the service. 
 
 Unfortunately, the letters which he must have written from Egypt 
 are lost, except one, from which we quote, as showing the care he took 
 of everything belonging to the "lads from the country," or "our ow^n 
 lads,""" as he at other times calls them. He dates Camp before Alex- 
 andria, 29th August, 1801, and says: — "I wrote you before leaving 
 Newport, enclosing a bill on Charles Erskine for money belonging to 
 Ewen dubh Tdillear;^ and from Marmorice Bay, a letter with money for 
 
 * Appendix, Note I. t Viz., "Black Hugh, the Tailor." 
 
MEMOIR. 33 
 
 Ewen dubh Coul"' (tlie names by which these two Ewens Cameron were 
 known at home) — also, money for the two MacPhies; but you do not 
 mention whether you received these." 
 
 We know not the answer to this letter; but we were much struck by 
 finding, among Sir Ewen Fassiefern's papers, receipts from the relatives of 
 all these soldiers, carefully docqueted and filed, showing that father and 
 son alike interested themselves in the welfare of those who naturally 
 looked to them as their protectors. 
 
 The 92d, after returning from Egypt, were ordered to Scotland, and 
 were for some time quartered in Glasgow. In 1805, we find them in Eng- 
 land, and a letter dated "Ospringe Barracks, Feversham, Kent, 6tli 
 November, 1805," says: — "We are waiting here till the transports are 
 ready for us. . . . For we are to embark the moment they can be 
 got ready. We are all of us this morning in the most extraordinary 
 mixture of joy and sorrow, for the loss, in the midst of such glorious 
 achievements, of that greatest of great men — Nelson." 
 
 Again, writing from Canterbury, he says : — 
 
 "25th December, 1805. 
 
 "Ten thousand men have embarked from this immediate neighbour- 
 hood, and to the astonishment of every person here, we are still without a 
 word of moving ; the Second Battalion of the 79th and we form the brigade 
 of the Honoiirable M. General John Hope, commanded ad interim by his 
 brother Charles. I wish you would write Ardgourt to thank him for the 
 attention the General has viniformly paid me, of which I can never be too 
 sensible, nor my friends too thankful. God bless and protect you and my 
 
 mother. 
 
 "Yours very affectionately, 
 
 "JOHN CAMERON." 
 He had much cause of gratitude to M. General Hope, who, from their 
 first acquaintance, not merely appreciated his good qualities as an officer, 
 
 * Black Hugh of Cul. 
 t Ardgour was married to Lady Margaret Hope, daughter to Lord Hopetoun, and sister to 
 General Hope. 
 
34 MEMOIR. 
 
 but showed the warmest friendship towards him. Before this time, 24th 
 June, 1805, he had written to the Duke of York, "strongly recommending 
 Major Cameron as highly deserving of His Royal Highness's favourable 
 notice." Throughout the whole of his future career, General Hope mani- 
 fested the same warm interest in him, and after his fall, no one lamented 
 him more sincerely. 
 
 We have given the conclusion of the last letter, because we have 
 noticed, that, from this time forward, he rarely closes a letter without some 
 reference to God's providence, and an earnest wish for God's blessing on 
 his father and mother, in their declining years. At the same time, he 
 refers more frequently and tenderly to his various friends, and connexions 
 at home, the thought of which seems ever present to him. 
 
 About this time he says: — "I am just going to dine, in company with 
 the Marquis of Douglas — the most extraordinary man in the world — at 
 a Colonel Webb's, who is said to live as well as any man in England. I 
 have frequently dined there, and once at a family party, as he called it, 
 "where, indeed, there were only three strangers besides myself We sat 
 down to as superb a dinner as I ever saw, with quantities of Champagne, 
 Burgundy, Hock, Claret, Madeira, etc., etc., so that I fancy I shall dine 
 better than even at Fassiefern, though I care little how I dine if I were 
 only with my friends." 
 
 The next is from "London, 11th January, 1806:" — "Instead of being 
 sent to the Continent, we have been ordered here to attend Lord Nelson's 
 funeral. I had the honour to lead the procession with a small detachment 
 of cavalry, and four light companies of the line. When we aA-ived at St 
 Paul's, I formed my party within the railing. The rest of the troops, with 
 the exception of the Grenadiers, passed on to Moorfields. Though the 
 honour was great, the trouble was by no means slight, as we were under 
 arms from six in the morning, till past seven at night, during most of 
 which time I was on horseback." 
 
 The public honours thus rendered to the memory of Nelson, who is on 
 
MEMOIR. 35 
 
 all hands allowed to have been the greatest naval commander of this, or of 
 any other age, were undoubtedly well merited, and were very imposing. 
 We need scarcely refer to what will now naturally suggest itself to every 
 reader in connection with this subject — -the greater honours recently 
 rendered in the same St Paul's to one who, great on land as the other was 
 on sea, did as much to break the military power of France, as Nelson did 
 to break her naval power. When will Britain produce another Nelson, or 
 another Wellington 1 
 
 Major Cameron wrote several letters about this time, inquiring 
 minutely about all his friends, interesting himself much in promoting 
 the success of his younger brother Peter, who had gone on board one of 
 the East Indiamen, as they were then called, and who, like many others, 
 had to struggle for years before he could achieve independence. There are 
 also letters about obtaining a commission in the 92d to "Ewen Corries" 
 (Ewen Campbell) — likewise a near relative, whose appointment was, after 
 great trouble, at length secured. 
 
 Writing from "Colchester, 16th March, 1806," he says:— "The Colonel 
 of the East Middlesex Militia has been so well pleased with Donald 
 Ardtoe's son, that he has applied to me to recommend some such young 
 men for commissions, saying, that if they conduct themselves well for a 
 twelvemonth, he will endeavour to procure them commissions in the line. 
 If you think of any in your neighbourhood whom this would answer, I 
 will expect to hear from you immediately. May God bless and preserve 
 you and my mother." 
 
 The regiment was at this time ordered to Ireland. Cameron became 
 Senior Major, and for a time held the command of the Second Battalion. 
 He expresses gratitude and pride, which are natural on obtaining such 
 advancement; but he tnore than once writes to his father that, notwith- 
 standing the annual allowance derived from home, his pay was insuffi- 
 cient to maintain him, that the prize money of Egypt alone enabled 
 him to maintain his position in England, and that the journey to Ireland 
 
36 MEMOIR. 
 
 would subject him to debt, of which he always seems to have had a whole- 
 some horror. His father, besides allowing him £100 a year reg'ularly, 
 authorised him to draw further in any special exigency ; but often has it 
 occurred to us in reading these letters, that if he who had such extra 
 aid to support him, and who, from the minute accounts he kept, appears 
 to have been an economist, was so straitened and pinched for pecuniary 
 means, hard, indeed, must be the condition of many brave men who have 
 no extraneous source of supply — who have nothing but their bare pay to 
 rely on. 
 
 The prospect of revisiting Ireland, and especially of approaching the 
 neighbourhood of Kilkenny, was, from the still fresh memory of his early 
 love, most painful to him. He writes to his father in a state of "utter 
 misery," and entreats him, "for mercy's sake, to tell him what he is to do." 
 We know not the answer; but he was saved from the pain of a meeting 
 with her who had taken such a hold on his affections, by her marrying 
 another about this time, as we formerly mentioned. No allusion to her 
 name after this period ever occurs in any of his letters. 
 
 He writes from Birr, King's County, Ireland, on the 10th April, 1806, 
 saying that he had been there only a few days, when the regiment was 
 ordered to Dublin. The Duke of Bedford, who was married to a daughter 
 of the Duke of Gordon, was Lord-Lieutenant of Ireland at the period. 
 Speaking of being ordered to Dublin, Cameron says, "It is reported that 
 to the Duchess of Bedford we owe this honour; and if it be so, we could 
 easily have forgiven her ; for of all the misfortunes that could happen to 
 the Battalion, I look on being quartered in Dublin as one of the greatest. 
 The duty is so severe that the Battalion will go to pieces, and the expenses 
 so excessive as to be quite ruinous to the officers ; but it is useless to 
 repine." 
 
 There are various letters from Dublin about this period, all speaking 
 with gratitude of the great attention which the Duchess paid to him, and 
 to the other officers of the Gordon Highlanders; complaining at the same 
 
MEMOIR. 
 
 3? 
 
 time of the expense entailed by the necessity of attending the Vice-regal 
 Court, Balls, etc. ; and all charged with kindest messages to friends and 
 relatives at home. 
 
 On the 14th Jan., 1807, he expresses great joy at the Battalion having 
 received the route for Scotland; but it was scarcely received when 
 countermanded, and they remained in Dublin. He says, " I had lately 
 as friendly a letter as it was possible to pen, from the Marquis of Huntly, 
 mentioning how highly flattered he was by his sister's, the Duchess of 
 Bedford's, account of us, and requesting a favour of me for an officer, a 
 friend of his." 
 
 In the same letter he asks his father to give friendly advice to the 
 father of a young officer in the regiment, who was beginning to show 
 symptoms of folly and extravagance, trusting that he might thus be pre- 
 served from embarrassment, and eventual disgrace, 
 
 On the 23d March, 1807, he speaks of a sudden change of Ministry, 
 which, of course, produced a great change in the state of matters in 
 Dublin. "I dined with their Graces on Friday the 20th, when they 
 were in very high spirits. I went next night with Lord Harrington's 
 family to the play, and several of the Vice-regal Suite were in the box. 
 The second act was scarce over when a messenger arrived with the 
 intelligence that the Ministry had resigned. Such faces, good gracious! 
 such faces as some of the dependent crew exhibited !— Their Graces are 
 determined to leave this place at all events, on the score of the Catholic 
 (pestion, and few have greater reason to regret that determination than I 
 have, for their attention to me has been truly far more than I either 
 expected or wished." 
 
 On 13th May, 1807, he says: — "The Duke of York promises me 
 faithfully in respect to Ewen Corries' commission; but he has done so 
 for these three years past. I have therefore written General Hope on the 
 subject, and think I shall succeed." In the same letter he mentions rather 
 an uncommon preventive of rheumatism, saying, in expressing sympathy 
 
38 MEMOIR. 
 
 with his father, who was suffering from it, "I always find that if I am long 
 of getting wet, quite wet through, I am liable to it." He concludes his 
 letter by inquiring minutely about "the poor old miller at Fassiefern," and 
 a request to be told how "all the old people were." 
 
 On 19th June he writes: — "I have been in the midst of great annoy- 
 ance and trouble, by our First Battalion applying for, and getting one 
 hundred of our picked men, so that we are left a skeleton ; they are ordered 
 for immediate service, and my character as an officer, as well as my own 
 feelings demanding it, I have applied for permission to join them." There 
 • is further mention of Ewen Carries' business, and kind inquiries about 
 both Barra and Glencoe, his brothers-in-law. 
 
 On the 28th June he writes from Dublin: — "We are on the move; six 
 companies have already marched : Drogheda is our head-quarters, but we 
 are to be stationed in seventeen different quarters. Weak as we are, this 
 distribution is dismal." "I have just received the Duke of York's positive 
 refusal to my joining the First Battalion." 
 
 The next is dated from Drogheda, 1st August. It appears that his 
 father had requested him to purchase a good Irish horse, to be sent to 
 Fassiefern. In various former letters he complains of the Irish dealers 
 as more deceptive than even the Yorkshire Jockeys. At length, however, 
 he says he has got a great catch of a horse of the first blood in Ireland. 
 He paid £40 Irish, or £36 Sterling, for it, and says, after putting it in 
 better condition, he would forward it to Scotland. It appeared shortly 
 afterwards that it was not without cause he distrusted the Irish Jockeys. 
 The horse, showy as it was, proved to be diseased and worthless. On 
 this being discovered, he begs his father's acceptance of a mare belonging 
 to himself, concerning which he writes so minutely as to appear strange 
 to any person except one who, like himself, had a strong regard for horses ; 
 and he frequently writes in terms even of affection about both horses and 
 dogs. This mare is said to be "a perfect picture," "a great pet," "the 
 gentlest and best creature in the world," his "greatest favourite of the 
 
MEMOIR. 39 
 
 four-footed creation." He says, "It will be doing me a favour that you 
 take her, and let her end her days in peace at Fassiefern. I have two 
 favours to ask of you for her : first, that she be kept solely for your own 
 riding, or my mother's, if my mother does ever ride now ; and, second, that 
 she is, on no account whatever, to be sent to the woods. Nay, T am sure, 
 from her being such a favourite of mine, my mother will not allow her to 
 be ill-used." At length she was sent off in charge of a soldier of the regi- 
 ment, with route — embracing eighteen stations, or journeys — as carefully 
 and minutely marked as it could have been for the Battalion. She reached 
 Fassiefern in safety, and was allowed, according to the kind wish of her 
 owner, to end her days there in peace, in company, we may add, though 
 it is anticipating, with an uncommonly fine mule that he sent from Spain, 
 and one of the chargers that he had at Quatre Bras. 
 
 In November of this year the division was ordered to Ballyshannon, 
 where they seem to have remained for a considerable time. On the 23d 
 December he writes from Ballyshannon that the Duke and Duchess of 
 Eichmond, having come on a visit to Slane Castle, the residence of the 
 Earl of Conyngham, had reviewed the regiment while at Drogheda, and 
 that the Duchess made a great work about them. She applied to Major 
 Cameron for a Highland bonnet, and, though with considerable difficulty, 
 he succeeded in procuring her two. She also was a daughter of the Duke 
 of Gordon; and we mention these things, though apparently trivial, to 
 show the deep and unceasing interest that the Gordon family took in their 
 family regiment. 
 
 This season was one of great distress in the Highlands, owing to the 
 failure of the crops. It appears that Fassiefern wrote to his son to 
 purchase as much oatmeal as he could secure in Ireland. Various letters 
 from him are occupied with this business, expressing the deepest com- 
 miseration for his countrymen, stating that the scarcity was equally great 
 in Ireland, but at the same time making every exertion to dispatch a cargo 
 to Lochaber. 
 
40 MEMOIR. 
 
 It is worthy of observation, as at least curious, that the years marked 
 by seven have so frequently proved years of scarcity and suffering in the 
 Highlands. We here see that 1807 was so. Again, 1817 was most 
 disastrous to farmers in various ways. The winter and spring of 1827 
 witnessed considerable scarcity. 1837 was one of actual starvation to 
 the poorer Highlanders; and the wailing cry which in 1847 arose both 
 from the Highlands and Ireland actually reached the uttermost parts 
 of the earth, and, as is known, was answered from East, West, North, 
 and South, by charity, the liberality of which was a marvel to every 
 one, and truly honourable to humanity. It is to be hoped that 
 the present year (1857) will help to separate all evil augiiry from the 
 number. 
 
 On the 3d May, 1808, he writes, complaining of being so harassed by 
 business letters that he has little time to write to his friends, saying that 
 his postage account for the year amounted nearly to £50. (Assuredly the 
 country owes much to Eowland Hill, and the penny postage.) He 
 mentions that "Ewen Corries," so repeatedly referred to, had at length 
 joined the regiment; while he expresses great delight that his nephew, 
 young Barra, had been put into the hands of General Moore. Regarding 
 another nephew he writes, "I am grieved to hear of John Glencoe's illness, 
 more especially when his regiment is going on service. For God's sake 
 let him not remain behind, if it be possible for him to join." 
 
 He writes in warm terms of the hospitable kindness of Allan 
 Lundavra, a Lochaber gentleman who held an important civil office in 
 Drogheda; and with his uniformly warm home feeling he says, "It is now 
 near six years since I have had the happiness of seeing my mother or you, 
 and I am so situated that I know not when I may get leave, but you may 
 well believe what happiness it would afford me. Eemember me most 
 affectionately to my mother." 
 
 On the 23d May he writes that he had got a Brevet Lieutenant- 
 Colonelcy, but adds rather grumblingly, "The only good it has done me 
 
MEMOIR. 41 
 
 yet is to have cost me £20 in commission fees, then the usual entertain- 
 ments, etc., etc. May God bless and protect my mother and you. Yours 
 most affectionately." 
 
 In June he was appointed to a full Lieutenant-Colonelcy. 
 
 He writes from Tuam on the 24th November; and after many kind 
 remembrances to relatives and friends, mentions that he had got Ewen 
 Corries appointed Adjutant. He then speaks with the deepest interest of 
 the doings of Sir John Moore in Spain, with whom the First Battalion of 
 the 9 2d was serving, saying, "I would rather than a thousand pounds I 
 was with our regiment in Spain." 
 
 In January, 1809, he mentions that they are ordered to their 
 "detestable old quarters" in Athlone, and thanks his father very warmly 
 for befriending "poor Sandy Cleghorn," the old gardener at Fassiefern, 
 who had incurred his master's displeasure, but for whom Cameron had 
 pleaded warmly and repeatedly. 
 
 On the 28 th January, the first news of the sad, though glorious battle 
 of Corunna reached him, and he writes in deep sorrow about the loss of 
 " the immortal Moore, one of the very best Generals in the service," as 
 he terms him ; also about the death of Lieutenant-Colonel Napier of his 
 own regiment, and in anxiety regarding "young Eory," Barra's son, 
 whose fate he did not then know, who, however, not only survived 
 Corunna, but is still living as Major-General MacNeill. Cameron, imme- 
 diately after this, left Ireland to take charge of the First Battalion as 
 Senior Lieutenant-Colonel, the second having been given to Lieutenant- 
 Colonel Lamond of Lamond; and thus, at the age of thirty -seven, he 
 obtained the command of one of the best regiments in the army, which, 
 from his age, his character, and his minute knowledge of the men, he was 
 certainly well fitted to lead. 
 
 They remained for some months in England, and in July of this 
 year, when the unfortunate Walcheren expedition, commanded by Lord 
 Chatham, was undertaken, Cameron joined it with a thousand men. The 
 
' » 
 
 42 MEMOIR. 
 
 fever of the Walcheren fens, infinitely more fatal to the British troops 
 than the fiercest foe that ever met them in the field, while it prostrated 
 the army generally, reduced the effective men of the 9 2d to less than three 
 hundred. 
 
 Among the first who died was one of Cameron's own followers from 
 Lochaber; and here he manifested that intimate knowledge of, and 
 sympathy with, the feelings of his countrymen, which formed one great 
 cause of his entire mastery over them — which gave him power over 
 their hearts. Standing at the head of the open grave, he mentioned the 
 name, and the birth-place of the departed soldier, pronounced a high 
 eulogium on his character and conduct; and then ordered his com- 
 panions to "give him the smoothest bed, and to cover him with the 
 greenest sod." 
 
 All this may possibly appear to many as very undignified, and very 
 unimportant; but they who know the habits and feelings of Highlanders 
 will readily appreciate the action. Standing in the place of Chief to these 
 men, more especially in a strange and foreign land, he discharged a duty 
 which they regarded as solemnly obligatory on him. As their country- 
 man, he was paying a proper and a graceful tribute to customs and 
 sentiments long cherished by them, and sacred in their estimation; 
 while as a commander he was unquestionably acting wisely in deep- 
 ening and strengthening his hold over them, an effect which such 
 conduct as the above was better fitted to produce than the giving them 
 the richest rewards. 
 
 Even to this day. every Highlander to whom any remnant of the olden 
 time feeling clings, is most ambitious of being favourably mentioned by 
 his siiperior, and more especially of being remembered with honour after 
 death. In the ordinary ways of life, they have, in many respects, 
 conformed to the habits of their neighbours, but we still see them, in the 
 rites rendered to the dead, cleave to the customs of their fathers. 
 The journeys, which even the very poor will travel to mingle the dust 
 
MEMOIR. 43 
 
 of their friends mth the kindred dust of their fathers, are often incredibly 
 long and toilsome, and when the grave is dug, the persevering pains taken 
 to render it perfectly level, to free the last resting-place from the slightest 
 inequality, is, to q, stranger, very surprising. Then, the anxious care taken 
 to procure a fitting sod, to spread it smoothly and evenly, so that it 
 shall not extend even by an inch to one side more than another — that it 
 shall cover every particle of earth which has been brought up by the spade 
 — that it shall present a faultlessly uniform appearance in all its parts, 
 even to the most critical eye, — all this is still to be witnessed by the 
 grave of the humblest, in the remotest and most secluded glen, where 
 often the green mounds marking the graves of the departed, or the 
 dark nettle waving over the hearth and home on which centered their 
 hearts while living, form the only memorials of man having ever dwelt 
 there. 
 
 Such anxious care, reminding us of a mother's tender anxiety to 
 smooth the bed of her ailing child, is, as we have said, still manifested 
 regarding the resting-place of the departed, is felt to be a sacred tribute 
 due to them ; and the neglect of any of these particiilars would be regarded 
 as a deep and disparaging affront to their memory. 
 
 The remnant of the fine army, unfortunately sent to such pestilential 
 ground as Walcheren, and in no respect well managed by the commander, 
 was speedily withdrawn, and Cameron's brigade was for a considerable 
 time stationed at Woodbridge in England. We have not found any letters 
 written from Holland, but several written from Woodbridge are preserved, 
 and from these we shall give a few extracts. 
 
 On 14th December, 1809, he writes to his father as usual: "The 
 poor little Bo-man's (cattle-herd's) son is alive, and doing well. He is our 
 Quarter-Master Sergeant, and Kennedy's son from Moy, Peter More's 
 friend, is our Sergeant-Major. I do all I can, of course, to keep our own 
 
 people uppermost, if they at all deserve it The Bo-man's son 
 
 has begged of me to forward you (enclosed) one-half of a ten pound note 
 
44 MEMOIR. 
 
 to assist his father's family. The other half he will forward to his brother 
 by next post. He is a very siccer lad. [ 
 
 "Not one of the poor fellows who came with me has ever behaved ill 
 — none of them is even a questionable character. Poor Mackenzie from 
 Balachulish, or rather from Ounich, was taken prisoner on the retreat 
 through Spain, and has not since been heard of." 
 
 This letter we consider particularly valuable, as showing, in so very 
 marked a manner', the warm and minute interest he took in all the men 
 that followed him to the war. He had intimate personal knowledge of 
 them. He watched anxiously over their interests, and never lost an 
 opportunity "of keeping uppermost" those whom he designates "our 
 own people." Four of them were, after this period — when their soldierly 
 qualities became better known, and his influence had increased — ^promoted 
 to commissions — Kennedy, two Camerons, and Ferguson; and several of 
 them, as is apparent from the letter before us, were raised to the rank of 
 non-commissioned ofiicers. He most amply redeemed the promise which, 
 many years previously, he had given them at Aberdeen, of being their 
 guardian and friend wherever they were.'"' 
 
 On 31st January, 1810, he writes another very characteristic letter, 
 showing, as usual, great anxiety to promote the interests of several of his 
 young relatives, containing kind messages to the Rev. Dr Eoss, Minister of 
 Killmonivaig — who was married to his aunt — and of whom he makes 
 frequent mention in his home letters; and proposing various plans for 
 benefiting the "poor old Miller's son," who seems to have been obliged to 
 leave the regiment on account of bad health. 
 ^ On the 22d February he writes a letter of great importance, as 
 
 determining his own future career, and also interesting as exhibiting his 
 character in a very remarkable light. It appears that his father at this 
 time urged him to retire on half-pay, and ofi'ered to make ample pecuniary 
 provision for his future comfort. 
 
 * Appendix, Note I. 
 
MEMOIR. 45 
 
 After thanking his father very warmly for this proposal, he sets forth 
 strongly the many reasons he had for declining it; his unfitness for any 
 other line of life than the military ; his " being in the very situation to 
 which for sixteen years he had been aspiring;" and adds, "It is pro- 
 bable, in the present aspect of affairs, that every- man who wishes well to 
 his country will soon have to fight her battles on her own soil ; and what 
 situation more becoming, or of greater trust or honour, could I occiipy 
 than that which I hold 1 In short, it would disappoint me beyond measure 
 were I obliged to quit my present post in the present times. But I have 
 laid it down as a rule through life, to sacrifice my dearest feelings to the 
 pleasing of the best of fathers. Therefore, if you absolutely insist on it, I 
 will endeavour to quit on half-pay," 
 
 Fortunately, the father did not "absolutely insist" on carrying his 
 wishes into efiect, consequently the son remained where nature intended 
 him, and where his country needed him. But we cannot help calling 
 attention to what appears so opposite to his general character of strong, 
 resolute will, and unshaken determination, as the yielding so completely 
 to his father's wishes in two such very important matters as his intended 
 marriage with the object of his early choice, and his now forsaking the 
 army. The father, we know, possessed a very remarkable amount of 
 authority over all his children; but apart from his personal power of 
 commanding respect and inspiring affection, it is to be noticed that in the 
 Highlands of old, reverence to parents, implying implicit obedience, was 
 inculcated with a degree of care, and enforced by a solemnity of sanction 
 which may appear very antiquated and irrational in the present day, 
 when personal gratification, regardless of all obligation to others — whether 
 parents or brethren — seems to be the principle in highest favour and 
 fashion. The family relation, as we formerly observed, was the foundation 
 and the corner-stone of social life in the Highlands ; and Cameron, reared 
 in the midst of this influence when at its strength, as well as feeling its 
 dictates seconded by deep personal affection towards him whom he styles 
 
46 MEMOIR. 
 
 the "best of fathers," found his mind governed by it to an extent 
 difficult for us now to realise. This, however, must be remembered to 
 understand his character aright. 
 
 It is worthy of remark, that, even to this day, Highlanders are more 
 characterised by filial piety than probably any other race in the kingdom. 
 The conduct of "the poor Bo-man's son," noticed above, in sending a sum 
 of money "to help his father," is still happily imitated by Highlanders, 
 even in the farthest distant lands ; and every packet from Australia to 
 Britain bears evidence in the many bank remittances to "help fathers" 
 and mothers, that the feeling is not yet dead. 
 
 Colonel Cameron remained with his regiment, and in truth they 
 needed his services, and those of all who could serve them. The de- 
 structive Walcheren fever, which had in Holland reduced a noble army of 
 40,000 to 27,000, still pursued the remnant with its pestilential breath, 
 and prostrated them by hundreds. Its effects were felt in Spain as late as 
 1812; but at this time, on 15th May, 1810, 522 men of the 92d were in 
 hospital, and several were dying. Before this he had applied for the 
 leave of absence after which his heart had been yearning for so long a 
 time ; but he writes, after a distressing account of the state of sickness 
 around him, "I am so wedded to these poor fellows that I cannot leave 
 them in their present state." The regiment was removed to Canterbury 
 — carried by sea on account of their weak state — and the change of situa- 
 tion speedily restored them to convalescence. 
 
 On the 7th June he writes, saying that he had got a commission in 
 the Middlesex Militia for a son of Ewen More Cameron, recommended by 
 Mr Ord, his old tutor, and now teacher of the Fort- William Grammar 
 School, and that he had promoted in his own regiment the brother of his 
 sister's nurse. 
 
 On the 22d July he writes from Canterbury that he had at length got 
 three months' leave of absence, dating from the end of the month ; and in 
 the anticipation of high enjoyment from once more meeting with the 
 
MEMOIR. 47 
 
 friends that were so dear to him, he announces his intention of being with 
 them early in August. He gave minute directions about his gun, dogs, 
 etc., which he ordered to be forwarded to Cluny Castle, the residence of his 
 brother-in-law, where he expected to be on "the 12th," a day fraught 
 with so many stirring associations to every sportsman. 
 
CHAPTER IV, 
 
 SERVICE IN THE PENINSULA FEOM 1810 TO THE CLOSE OF THE WAR. 
 
 Colonel Cameron was speedily called away from the enjoyment of home 
 and friends to services more arduous and important than he had yet been 
 engaged in. It was now indeed that his military career, properly so called, 
 actually began, — a career in which he earned a name for gallantry and 
 conduct that wiU live, not only in the memory of Highlanders, but will 
 occupy a perpetual place in the history of the kingdom. 
 
 The Government, after several ineffectual attempts in Holland, Italy, 
 and various other quarters, to stem Napoleon's apparently resistless course 
 towards universal dominion, had at length selected the Peninsula for a 
 battle-field, and the final result showed how wisely the selection had been 
 made. In 1808, Wellington — then Sir Arthur Wellesley — had been sent 
 to Portugal, Sir John Moore, and Sir David Baird to Spain. The fate of 
 Moore's expedition was disastrous, and the immediate effect most dis- 
 couraging to the nation. Yet, according to Sir William Napier, it was the 
 fact of Moore's drawing the French troops after him to Corunna (1809) 
 that enabled Wellington to organise a strong base of operation in Portugal. 
 That base, on which such a wonderful superstructure, alike of political 
 results and military glory, was eventually raised, had now (1810) been 
 completed, and towards the close of the year, Cameron reached the far- 
 famed lines of Torres Vedras. Here, at the head of the 92d, he joined 
 that army of which its " iron leader" afterwards said " he could go any- 
 where he liked, and do anything he liked with them ; " with which he raised 
 
MEMOIR. » 49 
 
 the fame of British valour higher than it had ever been raised, again and 
 again broke to pieces those famed French legions, which until now had 
 broken to pieces all other opposing armies, and with which he contributed 
 so much to the final overthrow of the gigantic fabric reared by the 
 transcendent genius of Napoleon, but which Napoleon's own arm alone 
 sustained. 
 
 Very few of Cameron's letters from the Peninsula are to be found, and 
 the knowledge of this has led us to quote more largely from those written 
 at an earlier period; they, we think, will bring his private character before 
 the reader, and his military character henceforth is written in the history 
 of his country. 
 
 The 9 2d, commanded by Cameron, the 71st, likewise a Highland 
 regiment, commanded by Cadogan, and the 50th, by Stewart, formed 
 the first, or General Howard's Brigade in the second, or Lord Hill's well- 
 known division of Infantry. 
 
 We will not, of course, enter into the history of this distinguished 
 division, nor even of the brigade, as efficient in men and leaders as 
 any in the army, but confine ourselves to the more important events in 
 which the subject of our Memoir bore a distinguished part. 
 
 It is worth mentioning, that, at the very outset, he gave proof of his 
 resolution to have his regiment as efiective as possible, by turning the 
 regimental band into the ranks. The full complement of pipers, however, 
 he retained to the last. He also considerably reduced the number of horses 
 that were ordinarily attached to the regiment. 
 
 The 92d took a prominent part in the battle of Fuentes d'Onore (4th 
 May, 1811), where, according to Alison, "The British were more nearly 
 defeated than in any other action in Spain;" where, however, their great 
 steadiness not merely prevented a defeat, but secured most important 
 results — the relief of Almeida, the retreat of Massena, and the complete 
 expulsion of the French from Portugal. The position of the 9 2d in this 
 severe conflict was a perilous one, being for a length of time exposed to a 
 
50 .. MEMOIR. 
 
 heavy cannonade ; and their loss, both in officers and men, was very con- 
 siderable. 
 
 In the following year, they took part in the capture of Badajoz, 
 where the carnage was dreadful — very far surpassing either of the unfor- 
 tunate assaults on the Redan, or even the taking of the MalakhofF, before 
 Sebastopol. 
 
 In October of this year, Lord Hill — we call him so for convenience's 
 sake, though it was in consequence of his distinguished conduct in the 
 [j^eninsula that he was afterwards raised to the Peerage — obtained a very 
 brilliant victory over the able French commander. General Gerard, at the 
 village of Aroyo des Molinos, and in it the 9 2d bore so conspicuous a part, 
 that we must enter into a detail of the action. Gerard, commanding three 
 thousand men— said to be the finest troops then in Spain — was retreating 
 before Hill towards Merida, where the French were in force. He halted at 
 the above village, thinking himself sufficiently distant from the British to 
 be perfectly safe. Hill, however, during weather so stormy as would 
 prevent most troops from moving — through defiles so narrow and rugged 
 as to be judged by others impracticable — rapidly pushed forward, and on 
 the morning of the 28th October, when, in the language of Sir William 
 Napier, "during the raging of a tempest, a thick mist rolled down the craggy 
 mountain, a terrific shout was heard amid the clatter of the elements, and 
 with the driving storm came the 7lst and 92d regiments charging down 
 the street." The French fought bravely and well, but such was the 
 slaughter made among them by the two Highland regiments, more - 
 particularly by the 92d, which latterly took the lead, that only 600 of 
 them escaped, and these saved themselves by throwing away their arms 
 and packs, and scrambling up the face of a very steep hill. From 1200 to 
 1300 prisoners, including General Bron, and the Prince of Aremberg; all 
 the French artillery, baggage, and commissariat, together with a contri- 
 bution just raised, fell into the hands of Hill. Lieutenant-Colonel Stewart 
 of the 50th, for the time commanding the brigade, in making his report of 
 
MEMOIR. 51 
 
 the action to Lieutenant-Colonel Rooke, says, " I distinctly saw the real 
 o-allantry, and the good military conduct of the Lieutenant-Colonels, the 
 Hon. H. Cadogaa, and J. Cameron, at the head of their respective corps. 
 The latter officer was wounded early, but did not for a moment quit the 
 command of his regiment until the affair was entirely concluded." 
 
 This wound, though not actually severe, had well nigh proved fatal. 
 While holding his sword, a musket-ball struck him in the middle-finger of 
 the right hand, passed through the hilt of the sword, and hit him on the 
 breast. The resistance offered by the hilt, however, was so great as to 
 deprive the ball of its force, so that he suffered no injury except the loss of 
 his finoer, and a contusion on the breast. 
 
 The sword which had so fortunately proved a shield to him on this 
 occasion, he forwarded to his father, mentioning, at the same time, that it 
 had been a gift from his much-respected friend Mr Gordon, Paymaster 
 to the regiment. In the letter in which he states this, he says to his 
 father : " None of the country lads was either killed or wounded. Captains 
 D. M'Donald, J. M'Pherson, and Dunbar, wounded; Captain M'Donald, 
 Dalchosney, very severely. The 71st and 92d led in the storming of the 
 village, and it is said, though I do not vouch for it, that the first intelli- 
 gence the French commander had of our being near him, was hearing 
 our pipers playing, ' Hey, Johnnie Cope, are you waukin' yet?'" 
 
 This story, true or false, seems to have taken a strong hold of the minds 
 of the soldiers of the 92d, and set the poets among them to work in tortur- 
 ing the name of Gerard, so as to fit into the lines composed to old " Johnnie 
 Cope," of sleepy memory. Others, again, manufactured words to the same 
 air, but claiming some measure of originality in the arrangement. There 
 are three versions before us, sent by Colonel Cameron to amuse his friends. 
 There are variations and interlineations quite in the style of laboured and 
 oft-corrected composition ; but we must say of the best of them, that they 
 are more creditable to the patriotism and pluck, than to the poetic powers 
 of the 92d. We venture to give one stanza, and one only, as a specimen: — 
 
52 MEMOIR. 
 
 " Go and tell Napoleon, go, 
 "While Freedom's laws he tramples low. 
 That Highland boys will be his foe, 
 
 And meet them all in the morning. 
 
 " Hey, Monsieur Gerard, are ye waukin' yet?" etc. 
 
 After this action, so creditable to the generalship of Lord Hill, and to 
 the bravery of his men, he returned to his old quarters, but not to rest 
 there. To protect the resources of Estremadura against the French com- 
 mander Drouet, his division was kept in constant motion for a considerable 
 time, in the midst of severe winter weather, and amid great hardships. He 
 gained an important advantage over the enemy at Nava de Membrillos ; 
 but what is chiefly remarkable is, that amid constant marching and 
 counter-marching during a most inclement season, bivouacking on the 
 hill-side, without tent or shelter, ill fed and ill paid, very few men of the 
 division perished. It is said that the 92d lost only two men, who died 
 from exhaustion, and these two were commissioned oflBcers. 
 
 On the 18th May, 1812, Hill achieved another victory, and one of 
 greater importance than the surprise of Gerard. It being of great con- 
 sequence, in order to break the communication between Soult and 
 Marmont, to seize three forts on the Tagus, named Mirabete, Eagusa, 
 and Fort Napoleon, he undertook the enterj)rise with 6000 men. So 
 difiicult was the road to be traversed, that the scaling-ladders were cut 
 into two, in order to be carried through the narrow and quick-turning 
 gorges of the mountains. It was intended to take the French by surprise. 
 They were found, however, fully prepared, and the attack on Mirabete 
 was countermanded. That on Fort Napoleon was undertaken, and 
 successfully carried out, in spite of the great natural strength of the 
 place, turned to the best advantage by engineering skill, defended by 
 heavy artillery, and by more than 1000 proved men. The scaling-ladders 
 were found far too short, but there being a berm left about the middle of 
 the scarp, which aflbrded a footing, these dauntless men, after ascending 
 
MEMOIK. 53 
 
 to this ledge, drew the ladders after them, planted them anew on the 
 berm, and poured over the parapet with force which could not be 
 resisted. The French were driven back. Some were pushed into the 
 river, others sought safety in a strong stone-work which guarded the 
 head of the- bridge; but hither the 9 2d, with Cameron at their head, 
 rushed in along with them, defying every opposition, with clubbed 
 muskets, swords, and even sledge-hammers, smiting and slaying on every 
 side. The carnage was dreadful. Not only was Fort Napoleon speedily 
 taken, but the panic created by the fierce daring of the Highlanders extended 
 itself to the troops in Eagusa, on the other side of the river; and they, 
 after breaking down the bridge, which might have enabled their comrades 
 to escape, abandoned the fort. Several grenadiers of the 92d sprang into 
 the river, swam across, and seizing some boats on the Eagusa side, brought 
 them over, and thus enabled their companions to cross, so that both forts 
 were captured. 
 
 After this most gallant exploit. Hill retired to Merida, and with a force 
 of 23,000 men confronted Drouet for a considerable time. No battle was 
 fought, but there was great hardship endured, and toil undergone — severely 
 trying aUke to the constitutions and the discipline of the men. 
 
 The next employment of the division was to cover the rear of the main 
 army when Wellington advanced towards Salamanca. Here, after some 
 days of counter-maoeuvring, each of which turned out in favour of the 
 French, placing the British in a worse situation than the preceding, 
 one unguarded movement made by Marmont, caught the eagle eye of 
 Wellington, and called forth the celebrated exclamation, " At last I have 
 them!" followed by the instantaneous charge which completely routed 
 the French, and deprived them of 14,000 men. This great victory was 
 gained on the 22d July, 1812. Immediately afterwards, Wellington 
 advanced towards Madrid, and in September formed the siege of Burgos. 
 Hill's division occupied Madrid, and guarded the besieging army to the 
 South. 
 
54 MEMOIR. 
 
 The manner in which the siege of Burgos was conducted, and more 
 especially the retreat, after it was raised, have, as is universally known, 
 drawn more censure on Wellington than probably any other portion of his 
 military career. After persevering for thirty days, and making repeated 
 ineffectual attempts to carry the place by storm, the siege was raised, and 
 that retreat commenced where the army hurried onwards during most 
 inclement weather, without regular food or proper clothing, and pressed on 
 by 60,000 French in every way well equipped, endured misery at the 
 remembrance of which some of the survivors shudder to the present day. 
 Disorder and disorganisation prevailed to a most alarming extent, and this 
 drew forth the celebrated censure from Lord Wellington, which excited 
 deep dissatisfaction, and even bitter indignation, more especially on account 
 of the universality of its terms — confounding the deserving with the un- 
 deserving. A parallel has been frequently drawn between the retreat of 
 Burgos, and that of Corunna; and the latter, amid far greater difficulties, 
 is, by many military critics, allowed to have been conducted with more 
 skill, and certainly with a manifestation of a kindlier and more sympathis- 
 ing spirit on the part of its leader. Hill's division was involved in all the 
 hardships of this disastrous movement, and fortunately there is a letter 
 by Colonel Cameron, written on the 12th December following to his friend 
 General Hope, where there is a minute account given of what they did and 
 suffered. We omit the professional account given of the various move- 
 ments, and. the minute enumeration of the various stations occupied ; but 
 the following statements from one so hardy and resolute, show that the 
 suffering must have been extreme: "From the 27th October to the 20th 
 November, we were exposed to greater hardships than I thought the 
 human frame could bear. Mine, I know, was very near yielding to it. 
 In most inclement weather, with the canopy of heaven for our covering, 
 wet, cold, and hungry, we were generally marching day and night, espe- 
 cially during the 16th, 17th, and 18th. Fifteen poor fellows of the 92<J 
 fell down, and were lost. My heart bled for them. . . ... But I am 
 
MEMOIR. 55 
 
 sick of it. Should I write from June to January, I can give no adequate 
 idea of the horrible scene." 
 
 In a very brief letter of the same period to his brother, now Sir 
 Duncan, he says: "I have just passed through the most wretched and 
 distressing occurrences of my military life, which, perhaps, I may detail 
 by next post." 
 
 The brigade to which he belonged — Howard's — was entrusted with a 
 most perilous duty during this retreat, but one which was essential for the 
 safety of the army, and which was discharged with intrepid, enduring for- 
 titude, that would, by itself alone, suffice to stamp them as among the best 
 soldiers of that distinguished army. Soult was pressing on so closely that 
 it became absolutely necessary to check his progress for a time. The town 
 of Alba, once a Roman town, situated on the river Tormes, and thus called 
 Alba de Tormes, was selected as the best place for making a stand ; and 
 here the 92d, 50th, and 71st, were ordered to hold out to the last. The 
 town was in ruins, the old wall full of gaps ; the place was completely 
 commanded by the surrounding heights, and 10,000 French, with a heavy 
 park of artillery, commenced the assault on the morning of .9th Novem- 
 ber. Cameron, in the above letter, says: "We did what we could to 
 improve our situation during the short time left us. I threw an old door 
 across the place where the gate once had been, and barricaded it with 
 sticks and stones. . . . We had not a single piece of ordnance. Just 
 as the clock of Alba struck two, the French columns moved to the 
 attack, and, from that time until night, we sustained a hurricane of shot 
 and shell from twenty pieces of cannon! Their riflemen threw themselves 
 into ditches and ravines round the walls, but their masses never forsook 
 the protection of their artillery, which was most dastardly for Soult, with 
 ten thousand men!" 
 
 From the 9th to the 1 4th this most unequal struggle continued, but 
 with far greater loss to the French than to the small British band, who, 
 carefully tended by their leader, held their own with singularly little loss. 
 
56 MEMOIE. 
 
 At the end of five clays, the main army having gained sufficient distance, 
 and the French having crossed the river some leagues higher up, the 
 gallant brigade was ordered to withdraw. This they did in the most 
 perfect order, blowing up the bridge over the Alba, and, as Cameron says, 
 "the last sentinel of the 9 2d knocked the Frenchman opposite to him 
 heels over head." 
 
 It is said, that on the 8th, the day before the attack was commenced, 
 a French officer, of high rank, approached so close to the position of the 
 92d that several muskets were levelled at him, when Cameron, disdaining 
 to take such an advantage, promptly forbade the firing of a shot. It was 
 Soult who was thus saved; and strange, indeed, are the "chances of war" 
 as they appear to us, though all regulated by a higher Power. The 
 dreadful carnage of the 92d at Maya, the loss of thousands of brave men 
 through the blood-stained passes of the Pyrenees, might have been saved, 
 had not Cameron, at this moment, stayed the deadly Aveapons of his soldiers. 
 
 The whole of the British army at length got into winter quarters 
 throughout Leon, their wants being abundantly supplied from Ciudad Eod- 
 rigo. Seven thousand are said to have been lost during the retreat, and 
 many perished throughout the winter, in consequence of the hardships they 
 had endured. Among these was Colonel Stewart of the 50th, a brave and 
 kind-hearted man, very deeply regretted by the whole brigade. Cameron's 
 health and strength continued unimpaired throughout the whole struggle. 
 
 During the winter months Wellington succeeded in completely restor- 
 ing the discipline and high tone of his army, which had been for a season 
 so relaxed. He received supplies of clothing, as well as of money and 
 large reinforcements of troops, from Britain. He got the command of 
 the Spanish armies into his own hands. Thus he was, by the beginning 
 of summer, 1813, in circumstances incomparably more favourable than he 
 had hitherto been in. Besides, Soult having been called away to Germany 
 to prop the tottering fabric of the Emperor's greatness, and the afi"airs of 
 Spain being committed to the vacillating Joseph, it was easier for the 
 
MEMOIR. 57 
 
 British commander to carry out his plans on a comprehensive scale than 
 it would have been in the face of such an able opponent. 
 
 These plans are said by competent judges to have manifested mar- 
 vellous powers of far-seeing calculation ; and the execution was as vigorous 
 as the conception was able. 
 
 By a series of movements during May and the early part of June, all pre- 
 arranged and mutually connected, he compelled the French armies, under 
 Joseph and Jourdan, to gather together in the basin of Vitoria — ill adapted 
 in every respect for their purpose, but admirably for his ; and there, on the 
 20th' June, he brought his whole force of 78,000 men to bear upon them. 
 
 The utter defeat of the French armies, shattering their power in Spain, 
 and delivering untold spoils into the hands of the British, are universally 
 known as the results of the battle of Vitoria. AYe must speak, however, 
 of the 9 2d and their leader. He had, some time before this, got the 
 command of the First Brigade of Hill's Division, and had successfully sus- 
 tained various attacks by the French General Foy to dislodge them from 
 Bejar. On the day of Vitoria he had a task of no ordinary difficulty 
 entrusted to him. The village and hill, or rather mountain of Puebla, 
 formed a very important part of the French position, and were guarded with 
 corresponding care, being occupied in great force by Maransin. The village 
 was seized early in the day; then the mountain — so steep, that to ascend it 
 was rather climbing than walking — was attacked. Cameron was ordered to 
 " seize the heights, and to hold them while he had a man left." Such 
 orders were welcome to him ; and to the war-notes of the " Cameron's 
 gathering," he and his brave followers ascended the mountain side. The 
 resistance was comparatively feeble until they neared the summit, but 
 then a fierce and deadly struggle commenced. The French fought 
 resolutely — when their ranks were thinned they received reinforcements — 
 and long continued the fight with unyielding determination. Colonel 
 Cadogan of the 71st — a truly admirable officer, beloved by his soldiers and 
 by his fellow-officers, by none more than Cameron — was slain ; hundreds of 
 
» 
 
 58 MEMOIR. • 
 
 the brigade fell ; but the survivors, headed by Cameron, redoubled their 
 daring, crowned the heights, and retained them, though exposed for a 
 length of time to a most destructive fire. Hill passed the defile of Puebla, 
 carried, after another obstinate conflict, the village of Subijana de Alava, 
 and thus contributed greatly to the thorough victory of the day. 
 
 The battle of Vitoria, as we have said, broke the French power in 
 Spain. The scattered remnants of their army were rapidly driven through 
 the rugged passes of the Pyrenees; and this, after the great disaster of 
 Moscow, with the combination of the allied powers, marshalling such pro- 
 digious forces in Germany, led many to expect that France would imme- 
 diately yield, and that the British might cross her frontiers without 
 opposition. These formed, however, an utterly erroneous estimate of the 
 marvellous powers of him who still ruled over France. The battles of 
 Lutzen and Bautzen — displaying the genius of his earlier days, and for a 
 time paralysing his opponents, mighty as they were — did much to restore 
 the great influence of his magic name. On learning the news of Vitoria, 
 he at once despatched Soult to Spain as Imperial Lieutenant, with the 
 amplest authority; and that most able commander so restored the army 
 which had been shattered under King Joseph and Jourdan, and so used it 
 as to promise not only to guard the French frontier, but to wrest from the 
 British the whole fruits of the great victory of the 20th June. 
 
 We enter not into the masterly combinations which he formed, and 
 which, where under his own eye, were skilfully, and for a time, most suc- 
 cessfully carried out, but direct our attention to the scene in the Pass 
 of Maya, still mournfully, but proudly, remembered by many Highlanders. 
 The guarding of this pass, a valley deep and rugged, devolved on Cameron, 
 in the absence of his superior in command, Stewart, who is much blamed 
 by Napier for not having perceived the enemy's design, and having pre- 
 pared accordingly. 
 
 On the 25th July, 15,000 French troops, in the highest order, attacked 
 the British, not amounting to a fifth of that number, and considerably 
 
MEMOIR. 69 
 
 scattered. For a time the enemy advanced rapidly, driving the outposts 
 and skirmishers easily before them, but Cameron, making the most skilful 
 dispositions which his small force allowed of, speedily checked their course. 
 "That fierce and formidable old regiment," the 50th, not merely checked 
 the French column, but drove it back a considerable distance. The 9 2d he 
 divided into two wings, which did all that men could do. The overpower- 
 ing numbers of the French, however, proved irresistible, and the British 
 were obliged to draw back, until they reached the rock of Maya, where the 
 valley contracted, and where, consequently, a stand was more easily made. 
 Here the scene was appalling, and such as must sadden any one to relate 
 or to contemplate. For ten hours that brave band maintained the conflict 
 against five times their number. "That officer (Cameron) still holding 
 the pass with the left wings of the 71st and 92d, then brought their right 
 wings and the Portuguese guns into action, and thus maintained the fight ; 
 but so dreadful was the slaughter, especially of the 92d, that it is said the 
 advancing enemy was actually stopped by the heaped mass of dead and 
 dying ; and then the left wing of that noble regiment coming down from 
 the higher ground, smote wounded friends and exulting foes alike, as 
 mingled together they stood or crawled before its wasting fire. Never did 
 soldiers fight better — seldom so well. The stern valour of the 92d Avould 
 have graced Thermopylae.""'' 
 
 At length, just as the ammunition was about being expended, and as 
 some of the soldiers had recourse to stones, which they 'hurled at the 
 enemy, they received succour from General Barnes, who advanced with 
 a considerable body of men. The shattered remnant of the 92d was 
 forbidden to charge ; but, whether from the determination to avenge their 
 slaughtered comrades, or from being suddenly seized by that battle 
 delirium frequently spoken of in their native tongue as "mire catha," 
 causing, as is thought, insane joy, even exultation, in the fiercest fight, and 
 resistlessly urging on to the deadliest danger, these warriors dashed for- 
 
 * Napier, Vol. V., pp. 219 and 221. 
 
60 MEMOIE. 
 
 ward at the very head of the charge, and hurled their enemies back over 
 the ground that had been lost. This charge was led by Captain Seton, 
 and animated by the war tune of the "Haughs of Cromdale," one of 
 Cameron's favourite pipe tunes. It was indeed "stern valour," but the 
 loss to the regiment was frightful; 324 privates, out of about' 750, fell 
 there; 19 officers were killed or wounded. Colonel Cameron received 
 three wounds. His horse was killed, and his cloak, strapped on the front 
 of his saddle, was pierced in several places. His faithful follower, Ewen 
 Macmillan, who fortunately escaped unhurt, led him forth from the battle, 
 and guided him to some shelter, where his wounds were dressed. Major 
 Mitchell, who succeeded to his command, was likewise struck down. Ewen 
 Kennedy, who had left Lochaber as a private, but had, through Cameron's 
 influence, been promoted to a commission, was killed, as were many other 
 officers of the highest character and promise. Captain Seton, who showed 
 such headlong daring, was spared to lead the remains of the regiment out 
 of the field. For his distinguished conduct on this day. Colonel Cameron 
 was permitted by the King to bear the name Maya upon his shield. 
 
 We must pass rapidly over the many exciting events of the Pyrenees, 
 forming the most spirit-stirring portion of the whole Peninsular war, and 
 where the natives of the mountains had many advantages over their fellow- 
 soldiers from the plains and the cities. After many fierce encounters 
 between the contending armies, after many extraordinary adventures from 
 regiments now bewildered in mists that darkened the hiU-tops, and again 
 gaining most unlooked-for advantages from being thus shrouded from the 
 gaze of the enemy, the two battles of Sauroren, where Wellington com- 
 manded in person, along with gallant strokes by Picton, and Cole, and 
 HiU, completely turned back the tide of success that had hitherto favoured 
 Soult, and compelled him to retreat without succouring the garrisons of 
 Sebastian, or Pampeluna, far less driving the British across the Ebro, as he 
 had anticipated. Instead of this, he was in the most imminent danger of 
 being completely surrounded by the skilful arrangements of his opponents 
 
MEMOIR. 61 
 
 about St Estevan. "A few hours gained," says Napier,'"' " aud Soult must 
 surrender or disperse;" but " three marauding English soldiers," crossing 
 the ridge which had hitherto effectually concealed the British, gave warning 
 of danger. In half-an-hour the French drums beat to arms, and their 
 columns moved on to Sumbella. " Thus the disobedience of three plunder- 
 ing knaves, unworthy of the name of soldiers, deprived one consummate 
 commander of the most splendid success, and saved another from the most 
 terrible disaster." Soult's retreat was, however, disastrous, and by the 1st 
 August, he was obliged to abandon the Spanish territory with a loss 
 of 15,000 of his best troops, but inflicting a loss of full 7000 on the 
 allies. 
 
 "Wellington followed him, and on the 7th September, having crossed 
 the Bidasoa, planted the victorious standard of Britain on the soU of 
 France, for so many years deemed not merely inaccessible to foes, but pro- 
 ducing heroes whom no foe could withstand. 
 
 Before this time Colonel Cameron recovered from his wounds, had 
 rejoined his regiment, and, at the head of that splendid body, was the first 
 to cross the river Nivelle, when the important and long-contested battle 
 of that name was fought. He also greatly distinguished himself in fording 
 the Nive at Cambo. Here he, and Gordon of the 50th — afterwards 
 General Gordon of Lochdhu, who lived to the great age of eighty-eight — 
 advanced side by side ; and on the authority of the latter, we mention the 
 following characteristic incident : — ♦ 
 
 When in the ford of the Nive, Colonel Cameron's favourite piper was 
 hit by a ball from the enemy, and fell down by his side. He at once 
 stopped to render assistance, and, on finding that his assistance was of 
 no avail, he exclaimed, in the saddest tone, that the loss of twenty of the 
 regiment would not be so severely felt by him as that of this one man! 
 There was little time for lamentation, however. Heavy columns of the 
 enemy were guarding the bank, but neither the river nor the enemy could 
 
 ♦Vol. v., p.' 243. 
 
62 MEMOIR. 
 
 stay the advance of these heroic men. They advanced steadily and rapidly, 
 and the French yielded before them. 
 
 From the period of crossing the Bidasoa to the battle of Toulouse, it 
 might be said that there was constant fighting between the two armies, 
 and many instances of profound calculation were displayed by the two 
 great commanders, many instances of noble valour by their troops. But 
 from the passage of the Nive, on the 9th December, to the battle of St 
 Pierre, on the 13th, for five consecutive days the combat was fierce and 
 unintermitting. " It is agreed by French and English that the battle of 
 St Pierre was one of the most desperate of the whole war. Wellington 
 said he had never seen a field so thickly strewn with dead : nor can the 
 vigour of the combatants be well denied where five thousand men were 
 killed or wounded in three hours, upon a space of one mile square." ''^ 
 
 The gaining of the decisive victory was, according to the same authority, 
 very much due to Hill, who acted in " a manner that in less eventful times 
 would have rendered him the hero of a nation." The 9 2d charged early in 
 the day against two regiments of French, who gave way completely before 
 the onset ; but Soult brought such a storm of artillery to bear on them, 
 that they, in their turn, were obliged to retreat. Their old comrades, the 
 71st, gave way also; but the " fierce and formidable" 50th, and the Portu- 
 guese, " fought desperately," to give time to the 92d to rally and re-form. 
 " Then its gallant Colonel — Cameron — once more led it down the road, 
 with colours flying and music playing, resolved to give the shock to what- 
 ever stood in the way. At this sight the British skirmishers on the flanks, 
 suddenly changing from retreat to attack, rushed forward, and drove those 
 of the enemy back on each side. A small force was the 92d compared 
 with the heavy mass in its front, . . . but that mass faced about and 
 retired across the valley." ..." How gloriously did that regiment 
 come forth again to charge, with their colours flying and their national 
 music playing as if going to a review! This was to understand war. The 
 
 * Napier, Vol. V., p. 415. 
 
MEMOIR. ^ 69 
 
 man who in that moment, and immediately after a repulse, thought of 
 such military pomp, was by nature a soldier." '''' 
 
 For his service on this day Cameron received an honorary badge 
 marked with the word Nive. 
 
 At St Pierre the faithful Macmillan signalised not only his devotion to 
 his master's person, but his care for his master's property, in a manner 
 worthy of being commemorated, and with a contempt of danger deserving 
 of all honour. Colonel Cameron, during the first advance, had his horse 
 killed under him, and the sudden fall entangled him so as completely to 
 disable him for a moment. A Frenchman rvLshed on him, and was on the 
 very point of transfixing him with his bayonet, when the ever-present 
 Macmillan transfixed the Frenchman. He instantly liberated his master, 
 led him forward till he reached his own men, then suddenly turning 
 round, he made his way back to the dead horse, cut the girths, and raising 
 the saddle on his shoulders, rejoined the 92d, displaying his trophy, and 
 exclaiming, " We must leave them the carcase, but they shan't get the 
 saddle where Fassiefern sat!" All this was done in the midst of hot and 
 heavy firing, during the progress of one of the fiercest and deadliest 
 fights that occurred during the whole war. The anecdote, however, is 
 abundantly vouched. "Kindred to twenty (degrees), fosterage to a 
 hundred ; " " Woe to the father of the foster-son who is unfaithful to his 
 trust;" are old Gaelic sayings ; and their spirit has often been exemplified 
 by devotedness as pure and exalted as that of Pythias to Damon, or any 
 other recorded, whether in ancient or modern story. 
 
 The storminess of the weather suspended operations for a short time, 
 but frost having set in, Wellington moved his forces on the 1 4th February, 
 1814, and in the following sixteen days accomplished what probably he 
 only, with the nobly-disciplined army under his command, could have 
 accomplished in the time or in the circumstances. He constructed a 
 bridge across the Adour — a " stupendous undertaking, which must always 
 
 * Napier, Vol. V., pp. 408 and 416. 
 
64 MEMOIR. 
 
 rank with the prodigies of war." " He traversed with his right wing eighty 
 miles; passed five large and several small rivers; forced the enemy to 
 abandon two fortified bridge-heads, and many minor works; gained one 
 great battle and two combats; captured six guns, and a thousand 
 prisoners; seized the magazines at Dax, Mont Morsan, and Aire; forced 
 Soult to abandon Bayonne, and also cut him ofi" from Bordeaux." ''^ 
 
 In all these operations Hill's Division bore a conspicuous part, and no 
 regiment was more constantly engaged than the 9 2d. They fought with 
 their usual resolution at Hellete, and on the summit of Garris, where 
 Seton, who had led them out from the bloody Maya Pass, at length fell ; 
 but at Arriverette, on the banks of the Gauve de Moleon, they especially 
 distinguished themselves. Their Colonel was ordered to make a demonstra- 
 tion at some distance up the river, with the view of inducing the enemy to 
 withdraw part of their number from the bridge, which they held in great 
 force. He asked permission to turn the feint into a real attack if 
 he should see cause. Discretionary power was given him. Discovering 
 a fordable place, he plunged into the stream, led his undaunted followers 
 across, under a storm of shot from the French artillery, rushed upon the 
 enemy in the village, which they strongly held, and rapidly routed them ; 
 more than this, continuing the impetuous charge, he drove them from the 
 bridge-head, and thus enabled the whole division to cross. For this splendid 
 achievement he received from His Majesty an additional ornamentation to 
 his crest, which we shall mention below. 
 
 The battle of Orthes, fought on the 27th February, 1814, seemed for a 
 time to declare all in favour of Soult, who, in a moment of exultation, 
 which must have been indeed gladdening, is said to have slapped his thigh 
 and to have exclaimed, looking at his dread antagonist, as he thought, in 
 inextricable difficulties, "At last, I have him!" Biit that antagonist never 
 showed his characteristic qualities of imperturbable calmness in danger, 
 and daring promptness in action, more conspicuously than on that occasion. 
 
 * Napier, Vol. VI., p. 112. 
 
MEMOIR. 65 
 
 By splendid generalship, worthily seconded by his splendid troops, he speedily 
 changed the whole aspect of affairs, and gained a complete victory, which, 
 however, he did not follow up as he might, being pained and retarded, it 
 is said, by a wonud which he had received in the early part of the day. 
 
 Here, as usual, Cameron and the Gordon Highlanders were foremost in 
 the fray, and here he was rewarded by an additional honorary badge for 
 his conduct in the battle. 
 
 On the 2d of March, the French occupied a steep ridge in front of the 
 town of Aire— high and wooded on the right, where it overlooked the 
 river — a truly strong position, which, however, Hill attacked without 
 hesitation. The Portuguese, not showing the valour which, after their 
 training by British officers, they had often displayed, gave way, and the 
 battle w^as on the point of being lost, when the 9 2d, and the 50th, came 
 to the rescue. Their charge was so vehement, as at once to turn the 
 stream of the fight, and Byng's brigade coming up, completed the rout of 
 the French, after which Cameron took possession of the town. 
 
 For his conduct on this occasion, he received a reward which we 
 shall describe in the words of the Royal Patent .conferring the distinction. 
 He was authorised to bear, "above the cognisance of Lochiel, a representa- 
 tion of the town of Aire, in allusion to his glorious services on the 2d 
 March last, when, after an arduous and sanguinary conflict, he succeeded 
 in forcing a superior body of the enemy to abandon the said town-; and 
 subsequently he had the honour to receive an address from the inhabitants, 
 expressive of their gratitude for the maintenance of discipline, by which he 
 had saved them from plunder and destruction." 
 
 Amid the distinctions which were at this time so numerously bestowed 
 on him, none places his character in a higher- or more honourable light than 
 this of Aire. It shows that he was not merely a successful soldier, but 
 more than this, that he regarded as sacred the rights of the citizens ; and it 
 proves the extraordinary power he had over his men, when he could 
 preserve from "pillage and destruction" a town entered under such cir- 
 
66 MEMOIR. 
 
 cumstances "after an arduous and sanguinary conflict." The laurels 
 earned in the Peninsula were too often tarnished by the "pillage and 
 destruction" of towns and villages. The saving them from such dire 
 infliction reflects the highest honour on the commander. 
 
 The bloody and needless battle of Toulouse followed on the 10th 
 April. We do not enter on the question, so often discussed, as to who 
 was answerable for the slaughter of the 8,000 men that fell in this de- 
 structive conflict, nor yet on the apparently absurd assertion that Soult 
 gained a victory. He was compelled to abandon Toulouse and all his lines 
 of defence, and Wellington, beyond question, attained the objects which he 
 sought. The 92d were not in the immediate vicinity of Toulouse, but 
 they were hotly engaged at a little distance above the town, where, it is 
 sufiicient to say, they displayed their usual valour. 
 
CHAPTEE Y. 
 
 PEACE OF PARIS — RETURN HOME— THE BELGIAN CAMPAIGN — FALL AT QUATRE BRAS — 
 
 TRIBUTES TO HIS MEMORY. 
 
 Immediately after the battle of Toulouse, full confirmation was brought 
 of news which some time previously would have been utterly incredible, 
 for often had the hearts of the bravest well nigh failed in contemplation of 
 what seemed the destiny of Napoleon. Even Pitt himself had once flung 
 aside the map of Europe, saying, "It might be closed for half a century." 
 It was at length confirmed that he " who had made the earth to tremble, 
 that did shake kingdoms," had been stripped of the many crowns which he 
 had grasped, deprived of the many kingdoms which he had conquered, 
 and was henceforth to be a prisoner in the power, a pensioner on the 
 bounty of his enemies — that peace was at length restored to Europe. 
 
 We doubt not that many of "the chief ones of the earth, of the kings 
 of the nations," who had so often trembled at the dread name of 
 Buonaparte, must have exclaimed in wonder: "Art thou also become 
 weak as we'( Art thou become like one of usl How art thou fallen, 
 son of the morning!" 
 
 That Peninsular army, trained by their great leader to deeds which 
 truly equal "Greek or Roman fame," probably the most efficient and 
 resistless army ever seen, if we except Cromwell's "redoubtable Ironsides," 
 must have felt no slight degree of exultation on reviewing the part which 
 they had acted in bringing the great drama to such a close. Sure we are, 
 however, at the same time, that "the soft peace-march, home, brothers, 
 home" — must have sounded sweetly in their ears after so many years of 
 
68 MEMOIR. 
 
 absence, of conflict, and of danger. Joyous, indeed, was the welcome 
 awaiting them at that home, and great was the happiness of many a father 
 and many a mother as they again embraced brave sons for whose fate they 
 had so often trembled, though in many, very many instances that happi- 
 ness was checkered by the memory of brave sons whose memory alone 
 survived. 
 
 The country generally was filled with enthusiasm which it is now 
 difficult to realise. Britain had come forth from the long-protracted and 
 oft doubtful struggle, "the most triumphant nation in the world," and her 
 gratitude to those who had achieved her triumph was expressed in over- 
 flowing liberality. Peerages and pensions — well-won unquestionably — 
 were showered on the heroes of the Peninsula ; but, as always happens in 
 the distribution of such honours, some were neglected who were considered 
 by themselves, and by many others, entitled to distinction. Among these 
 was Colonel Cameron. He had obtained a Brevet-Colonelcy on 4th June, 
 and a full Colonelcy afterwards ; but he thought that he was entitled to 
 the rank of Knighthood, which had been conferred on some whose services 
 did not equal his. 
 
 He applied to the Horse Guards, and was answered by the Duke of 
 York, that, "according to the fixed principle laid down and approved of 
 by the Prince Eegent, no officer of the army holding the rank of Colonel 
 or Lieutenant-Colonel, has been, created a Commander of the most 
 Honovirable Military Order of the Bath, who had not been previously 
 recommended for Five Badges of distinction, in commemoration of im- 
 portant victories obtained by His Majesty's arms in the field." 
 
 Not satisfied with this answer. Colonel Cameron laid his case before the 
 Duke of Wellington, then in Vienna. In a letter, dated 17th January, 
 1815, after recounting the various services performed by the 92d, he says: 
 "As far as I am personally concerned, I assure you, my Lord Duke, 
 most solemnly, that I would not put pen to paper on the subject. But 
 when I reflect that there are few in the army who do not know what my 
 
MEMOIR. 69 
 
 claims are in comparison with some whose services have been rewarded by 
 five or six medals, and the honour of K.C.B. — especially when I consider 
 that the 92d feel, as a reproach to themselves, the contempt and neglect 
 shown to their Commander, in comparison with some whom they well 
 remember acting as subalterns and captains under him, when he was in 
 command of battalions, or even of brigades — I cannot resist the temptation 
 of earnestly soliciting your Grace's consideration of the case in their 
 favour." 
 
 The Duke wrote a long autograph letter from Vienna, February 5th, 
 1815, in which, after minutely explaining the rules, to which he was bound 
 to conform in recommending officers for medals, or other distinction, he 
 says : " I have had nothing to do with the selection of the officers recently 
 appointed Knights Commanders of the Bath. I did not know their names 
 until I saw them in the Gazette. 
 
 " If you had known these facts, I hope the same spirit of justice by 
 which I have always been animated, would have induced you to spare me 
 the pain of receiving the reproaches and charges of injustice contained in 
 your letter, and that you would have defended me with the 9 2d, and that 
 you would have shown them that the regulations, and not I, deprived you 
 of those marks of honour which they wished to see you obtain. As these 
 facts are in the knowledge of everybody, it is scarcely possible to believe 
 that you was not aware of them ; and I attribute the harshness of your 
 letter solely to the irritation which you naturally feel in considering your 
 own case. 
 
 " However, the expression of this irritation, however unjust towards 
 me, and unpleasant to my feelings, has not made me forget the ser- 
 vices which you and your brave corps rendered upon every occasion on 
 which you was called upon; and although I am afraid it is too late, 
 I have recommended you in the strongest terms to the Secretary of 
 State." 
 
 We see not, in Colonel Cameron's letter, which we have given above, 
 
70 MEMOIR. 
 
 any expressions containing a charge of injustice against the Duke ; but, 
 consideriiig that he viewed, it so, the frank and generous conchision of his 
 letter is assuredly most creditable to his good feeling, and to the military 
 character of his correspondent. 
 
 We have most abundant proof that it was no vanity on the part of 
 Colonel Cameron, nor any partiality entertained by his regiment towards 
 their favourite leader, which led-to the opinion of his being unjustly over- 
 looked on this occasion. 
 
 Lieutenant-General Sir William Stewart — whom Napier characterises 
 as a ." brave, energetic, zealous, indefatigable man, and of a magnanimous 
 spirit "^ — -writing from London on the 23d January, 1815, says: " Before I 
 received your letter, my dear Colonel, I had not only anticipated what 
 your feelings would be on perusing the list of K.C.B.s, but I had myself 
 felt every degree of regret, and, I will add, of indignation, at seeing your 
 name omitted in that list. I may say truly that it was the first name I 
 looked for there.- 
 
 "I have been waiting this afternoon for some hours in General 
 Torrens'^"' outer-room, to speak to him about the injustice of your case, 
 and the singularity of omitting likewise my friend Abercrombie; and after 
 having had some conversation with him on the subject, I came away 
 as little aware as before of the real principle which has been gone upon 
 in making the curious selection of K.C.B.S. I was warm with him, and 
 expressed my feelings freely, but could get no more than that the selec- 
 tion was made without favour or affection, but simply as individuals 
 happened to have more or fewer medals, or to have had their names 
 appear in a public despatch. My remark was, ' Of course it is avowed, 
 then, to be no order of merit.' I did not like to say too much in- 
 vidiously of some who had been under my command, but I assured him 
 that I could not with patience see your name omitted — you, whose ser- 
 vices, zeal, and steady adherence to duty, at the head of one of the finest 
 
 * Secretary to the Duke of York, Commander-in-Chief. 
 
MEMOIR. 71 
 
 regiments in H.M.'s service, had invariably acquired the admiration of our 
 Peninsular and allied armies." 
 
 It was Sir William Stewart who had ordered Cameron, at Vitoria, to 
 seize the heights of Puebla, " and to hold them while he had a man left," 
 so that he well knew what he had done, and could do; but there is still 
 higher testimony borne to him on this occasion. Lord Hill, writing from 
 Hawkstone, near Shrewsbury, January 31, -181 5, says: 
 
 "I beg to inform you that I had not the least idea that the new order 
 was to take place until I opened the Gazette, and saw the whole arrange- 
 ment in it. With respect to yourself, I can only say that it would have 
 given me great pleasure and satisfaction to have seen your name in the list, 
 for I assure you I never can forget the eminent services rendered to me, 
 by yourself and your excellent regiment, during our late campaigns. . . . 
 "I remain, 
 
 "My Dear Colonel, 
 
 "Yours very faithfully, 
 
 "HILL." 
 
 Further, his ever -faithful friend, General Hope — by this time Lord 
 Niddry — writes him on the 21st January from Hawley, near Bagshot, 
 saying,— 
 
 "My Dear Colonel, — I have received yours of the 13th, and can 
 assure you that I felt almost as much concern as you will yourself on 
 seeing that you were not included in the late arrangements for extending 
 the Honour of the Bath, and I have written to the Commander-in-Chief's 
 Secretary as strongly as it is in my power to do, in support of your claim. 
 On what principle the arrangement has been made, or what is the rule 
 followed, I know not ; but it appears to have given more general dissatis- 
 faction than anything within my remembrance. I have requested General 
 Torrens, that if any opening yet remains, or if any chance is to be expected, 
 he will bring your case before the Commander-in-Chief; but I think you 
 should transmit to them a more detailed statement of your services than it 
 has been in my power to do. 
 
72 MEMOIR. 
 
 "I am writing in a very uneasy and constrained position — my wound* 
 continuing to incommode me much, and being much more troublesome 
 than when I saw you in Kent; and therefore I can only add my very best 
 compliments, and Lady Niddry's, to your father and all the family, — and 
 I always am, 
 
 "My Dear Colonel, 
 
 "Yours faithfully, 
 
 "NIDDRY." 
 
 On the 5th February his Lordship sends the following extract from 
 General Torrens' reply to his application: — "Sufl&ce it to say that Colonel 
 Cameron has been excluded, not from want of a thorough conviction of his 
 peculiar merits and distinguished gallantry, but because he did not come 
 within the line — namely, that he had not been recommended for Five 
 Medals." 
 
 We have above given Sir William Stewart's letter to Colonel Cameron, 
 but he did not confine the expression of his favourable opinion to mere 
 private correspondence. On the thanks of Parliament being given to that 
 gallant officer (24th June, 1814) for his conduct at the battle of Vitoria, 
 after paying, in his reply, an eloquent and well-merited compliment to 
 Colonel Cadogan, who there closed his brave career, he adds: "I should be 
 ungrateful for the services rendered me by Colonel Cameron and by General 
 Byng on that, as on all occasions, if I were not to advert to them in my 
 present place ; for to their exertions and support am I indebted for the 
 success of those measures of which I am reaping the rich reward from my 
 country at your too generous hands this day." And again, on being thanked 
 for his conduct in the Pyrenees, he says: — "Supported as I was by my 
 gallant friend on my right (Major-Gen eral Pringle), by such corps as the 
 92d Highlanders and the 50th British Lifantry, I shoidd have been without 
 
 * This distinguished commander was severely wounded and taken prisoner during a sally made 
 at night by the French garrison of Bayonne, on the 14th April, 1814, three days after the battle of 
 Toulouse. Captain Hemes, and Mr Moore— a nephew of Sir John Moore — who had endeavoured 
 to release him when lying under his horse, were also struck down, and made prisoners along with 
 Mm. 
 
MEMOIR. 73 
 
 excuse if a less firm stand had been made on the positions of the Pyrenees 
 than was made." 
 
 The following communication, made by the Highland Society of Scot- 
 land to Colonel Cameron, is also \^^orthy of insertion, as showing the 
 estimation in which he was held by that most influential body of noblemen 
 and gentlemen, and also the opinion entertained of him by Lord Hill : — 
 
 "Edinburgh, 2ith Feb., 1814. 
 
 " Sir, — I have it in charge from the Highland Society of Scotland, in 
 behalf of the Society, to address you in consequence of the letter from 
 Lieutenant-General Sir Rowland Hill (of which a copy is annexed) having 
 been communicated to the Society. While the testimony of so distin- 
 guished an officer as Sir Rowland Hill to the gallantry and good conduct 
 of the Highland Regijnents is highly gratifying to the Society, the Directors 
 have, at the same time, desired me to assure you of the peculiar pleasure 
 they have felt that you, a member of the Society, descended of an ancient 
 Highland family of the first respectability, should have so signalised your- 
 self in the immediate command of a brigade of these regiments, as to merit 
 the handsome encomiums bestowed upon you by the Lieutenant-General ; 
 and the Directors have high satisfaction in adding their suff'rage, in the 
 name of the Society, to the highly honourable testimony of Sir Rowland 
 Hill. The regiments referred to have always been distinguished, but on 
 this occasion the Directors cannot refrain from expressing their admiration 
 of the conduct of the 92d, when, on the 13th December last, led by you, 
 they defeated, by successful charges, such very superior numbers of the 
 enemy, as to call for the particular notice of General Hill. The Directors 
 have no doubt that, by perseverance in the zealous discharge of the duties 
 of the profession in which you have so long and so honourably served, you 
 will soon be promoted to a rank which will enable you still farther to dis- 
 tinguish yourself, for the credit of the Highlands and advantage of the 
 country. 
 
 " I have the honour to be, 
 
 (Signed) " R. M'DONALD, Secy. 
 
 "To Lieutenant-Colonel Camekon, 92(1 Regiment, etc. etc." 
 
 L 
 
74 MEMOIR. 
 
 From Sir Eowlaud Hill, K.B., to the Right Hon. Sir John Sinclair, 
 Bart.: — 
 
 " ViEUX MoEGERTE, Jan. 8, 1814. 
 
 "Sir, — I have the honour to acknowledge the receipt of your obliging 
 note, transmitting to me the report of the competition of Highland pipers 
 in Edinburgh in July last, and which I had great pleasure in communicat- 
 ing to the 71st and 92d Highland regiments under my command. In 
 justice to these distinguished corps, it affords me the highest satisfaction to 
 state that they have, on all occasions, imitated the example of their war- 
 like ancestors. The conduct of the officers and men throughout tliese cam- 
 paigns has been so uniformly good, as to make it almost unnecessary for 
 me to select particular individuals for praise. Lieutenant-Colonel Cameron 
 of the 92d does, however, demand that distinction; during the greater 
 part of the battle of Vitoria, he commanded my first brigade, 50th, 71st, 
 and 9 2d regiments, and also at Maya, and other severe operations in the 
 Pj^renees. I am also much indebted to him for leading the gallant 9 2d in 
 several successful charges against very superior numbers of the enemy's 
 troops in the battle of the 13th of last month, near Bayoune. With the 
 highest respect for the patriotic Highland Society, of which you are so dis- 
 tinguished a member, 
 
 " I have the honour to be, etc., etc., 
 
 " R. HH^L, Li EUTEN ant-General." 
 
 We have already referred to some of the honorary badges conferred on 
 him from time to time by his Sovereign, but we think it proper to give, in 
 full, the terms in which one of these grants of armorial ensigns was made, 
 as containing an authoritative record of his services. We omit only the 
 formal preamble, and the lengthy designations and signature of Norroy, 
 Clarencieux, etc., etc., King-at-arms : — 
 
 "Whereas, taking into our royal consideration the able and highly- 
 distinguished services of our trusty and well-beloved John Cameron, Esq., 
 Colonel in our army, and Lieutenant-Colonel of our 92d Highland Regi- 
 ment of Foot, upon various occasions: in Holland in the year 1799, in 
 
MEMOIR. 75 
 
 Egypt in the year 1801, and the recent glorious and ever-memorable cam- 
 paigns in Portugal, Spain, and France, under our Field-Marshal Arthur 
 Duke of Wellington ; and more especially the signal intrepidity and heroic 
 bravery displayed by him in the action of Aroyo Moulino on the 28th 
 October, 1811, in defence of the Pass of Maya on the 25th July, 1813, 
 and more particularly in the brilliant action of the 13th December, 1813, 
 near Bayonne, in crossing the Gava de Moulino at Arriverete on the 1 7th 
 day of February, 1814, and compelling a very superior force of the enemy 
 to abandon the town of Aire on the 2d March, 1814; and being 
 desirous of conferring upon the said Colonel John Cameron such a mark of 
 our royal favour as may, in an especial manner, evince the sense we enter- 
 tain of his distinguished merits, we have thought fit to grant unto him our 
 royal license and permission for his w^earing certain honourable armorial 
 distinctions allusive thereto, whereby hLs faithful and zealous exertions in 
 our service may be transmitted to posterity: know ye, that we, of our 
 princely grace and special favour, having given and granted, and by these 
 presents do give and grant, unto the said Colonel John Cameron, our royal 
 license and authority that he, and his descendants, may, as a lasting 
 memorial of our royal approbation of his highly distinguished services, 
 bear the crest of honourable augmentation following ; that is to say, on a 
 wreath, a demi-Highlander of the 92d Eegiment armed and accoutred, and 
 up to the middle in water, grasping in his dexter-hand a broad sword, and 
 in his sinister a banner inscribed 92d, within a wreath of laurel, and in an 
 escrol above, ' Arriverete,' in allusion to the signal intrepidity displayed 
 by him at the passage of the river Gava de Moulino, on the aforesaid 1 7th 
 day of February, 1814, etc., etc. 
 " 20th May, 1815." 
 
 In the same month he received a royal license to accept and wear the 
 insignia of a Knight of the Eoyal Portuguese Military Order of the Tower 
 and Sword, with which, in the terms of the license, " Our good brother 
 
 %> 
 
76 MEMOIR. 
 
 and cousin, His Royal Highness John Prince of Brazil, Prince Regent of 
 Portugal, has been pleased to honour him, in testimony of the high sense 
 which that Prince entertains of the great courage and intrepidity displayed 
 by that officer in several actions with the enemy in the Peninsula." 
 
 Such expressions of esteem and regard from the distinguished Com- 
 manders under whom he had immediately served, and such public recogni- 
 tion of his merits by his own country, as well as by Portugal, must have 
 been highly gratifying to Colonel Cameron, and all the more so on account 
 of the full acknowledgment that technical and incidental forms alone ex- 
 cluded him from a mark of honour to which his distinguished merits gave 
 him an ample title. 
 
 His regiment, on their return from the Peninsula, was stationed at 
 Cork. He passed the end of 1814 and the beginning of 1815 among his 
 friends in the Highlands, and, looking forward to pass his closing days in 
 the home of his youth, to which his heart always clung, he obtained a 
 lease of the lands of Fassiefern, his father having gone to reside at 
 Arthurstone, a property in Perthshire which he had recently purchased. 
 
 All such visions of home and repose were, however, speedily dissipated 
 by a fresh call to arms, — a call to arms so loud, so urgent, so universal, as 
 has been rarely heard in the world, and such as we trust may be heard 
 no more. 
 
 The great Congress at Vienna were leisurely, though not with 
 unanimity or cordiality, reconstructing the map of the world, when, on 
 7th March, 1815, they were startled, "as if a thunderbolt had fallen 
 in the midst of the assembly," by the news that Napoleon had broken 
 forth from his prison-house. Then they learned, day by day, of his 
 triumphal progress to Paris, which he himself afterwards said was the 
 happiest period of his life. The veterans, who had so often followed his 
 eagles to victory, though they had sworn allegiance to the Bourbons, yet 
 soon 
 
 " Swarmed round the old familiar well-loved banners." 
 
MEMOIR. 77 
 
 To use his own. expression, he was, in a few days, raised on their bucklers 
 once more to the throne of France, and was soon prepared to defend that 
 throne with 200,000 soldiers of the empire — a truly mighty host under 
 such a mighty leader, 
 
 "The great powers" made preparations sufficient to withstand even this 
 might. They bound themselves to bring 650,000 armed men to oppose 
 this disturber of the world ; and again the trumpet sounded from east to 
 west, from north to south. However obvious and oft-repeated the remark, 
 it is, and ever will continue to be, most marvellous, that one mortal man 
 should exercise such a tremendous and such a baneful influence as this over 
 his fellows; should banish peace from so many lands, and bring desolation" 
 on so many families; should, in a moment, overthrow so many of the 
 existing relations of society; should, by one movement of his, compel the 
 dwellers in the most distant regions — the Cossack from the steppes of the 
 far east, and the Highlander from the mountains and islands of the far 
 west — to gather together to the field of slaughter; should convulse all 
 Europe, and sacrifice hundreds of thousands to the demands of his 
 individual will. Millions had already perished to gratify the giant ambi- 
 tion of NapoleoM ; but many thousands more were yet doomed to complete 
 the ofiering. 
 
 Britain knew full well that the torrent would first dash against her, and 
 she promptly did all that skill and energy, backed by her inexhaustible 
 wealth, could do, to stem its course. Messengers spurred "in hot haste" 
 through all her borders, summoning all her warriors to the muster-place in 
 Belgium, which had been chosen as the fittest for meeting the dread power 
 wielded anew by Napoleon. Inexpressibly sad, as we have heard the tales 
 often told, were the sudden partings which now once more severed families 
 that had begun to taste the blessings of reunion and repose; and very 
 remarkable were the adventures of many officers, who, living in remote 
 places, were late of receiving the summons, and consequently had to make 
 extraordinary effi^rts to reach the gathering-place in time. 
 
78 MEMOIR. 
 
 Colonel Cameron left his aged father at Arthurstone, joined his regiment 
 at Cork, and in the beginning of June reached Brussels, where eight bat- 
 talions were placed under his command. These he brought to present 
 such an effective appearance as to call forth unqualified admiration at the 
 reviews which there took place. 
 
 On the 13th he dined with the Duke of Wellington; and on the 15th 
 he attended the celebrated ball given by the Duchess of Richmond, where 
 "Belgium's capital had gathered her beauty, and her chivalry." Late in 
 the evening he was requested by the Duke to march with all speed on 
 Quatre Bras, and was, with characteristic caution, directed, as other officers 
 were, to withdraw privately from the ball-room. He communicated with 
 Mr Gordon, paymaster of the regiment, who had been, as formerly men- 
 tioned, for years on terms of the most cordial friendship with him, and on 
 whose authority we state these minute details. They occupied the same 
 billet. They walked together to it, and, familiar with danger, parted in 
 the early morning without any anticipation of their being "parted to meet 
 no more." 
 
 Colonel Cameron marched forwards to Quatre Bras, animated and ani- 
 mating his men by the martial strains he loved so well. 
 
 "Then wild and high the Cameron's gathering rose 
 
 The war-note of Lcchiel, which Albyn's hills have heard, 
 And heard too have her Saxon foes, 
 
 How in the noon of night that pibroch thrills, 
 
 Savage and shrill ! but with the breath which fills 
 Their mountain pipe, so fill the mountaineers 
 
 AVith the fierce native daring which instils 
 The stirring memory of a thousand years, 
 And Evan's, Donald's fame, rings in each Clansman's ears." 
 
 By 2 P.M. he was in front of the enemy. The doings of that day are 
 well known; but while the glory of Waterloo — "the first and last of 
 fields, king-making victory" — casts into the shade every other event of 
 the "hundred days," we doubt whether any day, until that of Inker- 
 
MEMOIR. 79 
 
 mann, reflects brighter lustre oa the stern Roaian fortitude of the 
 British, than does that of Quatre Br4s. With fearful odds against 
 them, deserted by the Belgian horse, labouring under many sore and 
 heavy disadvantages, they and the brave black Brunswickers, again and 
 again repelled the French, led on by the fiery Ney— " the bravest of 
 the brave" — now more brave and fiery than ever, in order to cover with 
 success the great treason of which he had been guilty. It was, how- 
 ever, at a terrible sacrifice that the British repulsed the French on that 
 day. The noble 92d was dreadfully thinned ; many gallant officers, and 
 about 300 privates, were struck down. But the loss which the survivors, 
 which the army generally, as well as the great captain himself, regretted 
 most deeply, was that of their Colonel, who here " closed his life of fame 
 by a death of glory." 
 
 We give the account of his fall as related to us by an eye-witness still 
 livino; to confirm the narrative. The regiment lined a ditch in front of 
 the Namur road. The Duke of Wellington happened to be stationed 
 among them. Colonel Cameron seeing the French advance, asked permis- 
 sion to charge them. The Duke replied, " Have patience, and you will 
 have plenty of work by and by." As they took possession of the farm- 
 house, Cameron again asked leave to charge, which was again refused. At 
 length, as they began to push on to the Charleroi road, the Duke exclaimed, 
 " Now, Cameron, is your time — take care of that road." He instantly gave 
 the spur to his horse; the regiment cleared the ditch at a bound, charged, 
 and rapidly drove back the French ; but while doing so, their leader was 
 mortally wounded. A shot fired from the upper storey of the farm-house 
 passed through his body, and his horse, pierced b}^ several bullets, fell 
 dead under him. His men raised a wild shout, rushed madly on the fated 
 house, and, according to all accounts, inflicted dread vengeance on its 
 doomed occupants. 
 
 Ewen Macmillan, who was ever near his master and his friend, speedily 
 gave such aid as he could. Carrying him, with the aid of another private, 
 
80 MEMOIR. 
 
 beyond reach of the firing, he procured "a cart, whereon he laid him, care- 
 fully and tenderly propping his head on a breast than which none was 
 more faithful. The life-blood, however, was ebbing fast, and on reaching 
 the village of Waterloo, where so many other brave hearts were soon after 
 to bleed, Macmillan carried Fassiefern into a deserted house by the road 
 side, and stretched him on the floor. He anxiously inquired how the 
 day had gone, and how his beloved Highlanders had acquitted themselves. 
 Hearing that, as usual, they had been victorious, he said, " I die happy, 
 and I trust my dear country will believe that I have served her faithfully." 
 His dying hour was soothed by that music whicK he always loved, and 
 which, while harsh and unmeaning to a stranger, is so intimately blended 
 with a Highlander's deepest feelings, and most sacred memories, as to 
 awaken his whole heart, to rouse up his whole being, and thus is highly 
 esteemed in the hour of sorrow or of danger, in every great crisis of life. 
 Better still, his dying hour was soothed, and we trust blessed, by earnest 
 prayer. And worthy of remark it is that these dying supplications were 
 uttered in that mountain tongue, the first which he had heard in youth, 
 and now, as we have known in kindred instances, at the close of life, 
 naturally ofi'ering itself as the vehicle of the deepest aspirations of the 
 soul in the most solemn of all situations. 
 
 Thus he met with a warrior's death, and more, with a Highland war- 
 rior's death. His remains Avere hastily interred in a green alley — Allee 
 verte- — on the Ghent road, under the terrific storm of the 1 7th, which, as 
 has often been remarked, seemed to presage the " dread confusion, noise, 
 and garments rolled in blood," that render the 18th a day ever memorable 
 in the annals of mankind. The funeral was attended, we need scarcely 
 say, by the attached Macmillan, by Mr Gordon, already mentioned, and by 
 a few soldiers, disabled by the wounds of Quatre Bras from standing aside 
 their comrades in the fight, but still able and most willing to pay this last 
 tribute of respect and aff'ection to their lamented leader. 
 
 His father and friends resolved that his remains should not be left in a 
 
MEMOIR. 81 
 
 land of strangers, but should repose with those of his ancestors. Accord- 
 ingly, in April of the following year, his youngest brother, accompanied 
 by Macmillan — to identify the spot — opened the hastily-made grave of the 
 AUee verte, and having secured the remains in a leaden coffin, brought 
 them to Leith. His other brother. Sir Duncan, then in Edinburgh, applied 
 for a King's ship to convey them to Lochaber. The request was readily 
 granted; and after being kept for some days at Fassiefern, they were at 
 length committed to their final resting-place in the churchyard of Kil- 
 mallie, within a ruinous aisle of the old church, where lies Sir Ewen 
 Cameron of Lochiel, "the Ulysses of the Highlands," as well as many 
 other Chiefs of the Clan. John of Fassiefern is also buried there, and 
 there, subsequently. Sir Ewen of Fassiefern and Lady Cameron were laid. 
 Sir Ewen at this time resided at Arthurstone, and from age and infirmity 
 was unable to travel to Lochaber. The duty of chief mourner thus fell to 
 Sir Duncan, who led a funeral procession such as Lochaber shall witness 
 no more. He was accompanied by Lochiel, by M'Neil of Barra, M'Donald 
 of Glencoe, Campbell of Barcaldine, and very many other gentlemen 
 of the district, besides the relatives of the family; but still more, he 
 was followed by three thousand Highlanders, who, with feelings respon- 
 sive to the wailing notes of the lament poured forth from many bag- 
 pipes, sincerely mourned for the early death of one whose brave deeds 
 were worthy of his high ancestry, and shed additional lustre on their 
 country. 
 
 We have said that such a scene shall be witnessed in Lochaber no more; 
 for, supposing another Colonel Cameron to arise — and we rejoice to say 
 that there are at the present time more than one Colonel Cameron from 
 Lochaber ranking high in the military profession — yet neither the Chiefs, 
 nor the men to grace any funeral thus, are now to be found in Lochaber. 
 The men have passed away to other countries and climes, and the wild 
 wail of the Highland Lament is more frequently to be heard amid the 
 woods of Canada, and over the plains of Australia, than amid the glens and 
 
 M 
 
82 MEMOIR. 
 
 mountains which of old so oft re-echoed its thrilling notes, and which 
 undoubtedly formed the fitting abode of the pibroch.''' 
 
 Colonel Cameron was forty-four years of age when cut off. In person 
 he was considerably above the middle height, and, as must be apparent 
 from the toil and hardships through which he went, was remarkably active 
 and athletic. Fortunately, his features have been preserved in a portrait 
 taken of him during his last visit to his country, an engraving of which 
 was published in 1815, by C. Turner, London, and a lithograph of which 
 is prefixed to this Memoir. It is needless to say that these features are 
 strikingly handsome, or that the countenance would at once lead us to 
 expect a very superior mind. It indicates very clearly that quickness of 
 glance, and that firmness of purpose which so eminently marked his whole 
 character. An intuitive quickness of perception, with prompt decision, 
 and unyielding resolution, joined to a heart full of the warmest feeling, 
 and dwelling in a frame of rare symmetry and strength, made him what 
 he was — a truly able leader of men. 
 
 Had he survived the glorious campaign of Waterloo, the dignity which 
 he had claimed in the preceding year would, beyond question, have been 
 freely accorded to him. In acknowdedgment of his distinguished merits, a 
 still higher one was conferred on his father, who was created Baronet of 
 Fassiefern in the following year. He lived till 1828, when, full of years 
 and of honours, he bequeathed the title and his estates to his second son, 
 Sir Duncan, who, as we have already mentioned, still enjoys both. His 
 remains were interred beside those of his son, in the ruinous aisle which 
 we have formerly spoken of. 
 
 Of Ewen Macmillan, "so faithful and true," it is due to mention that, 
 after the fall of his leader and foster-brother, no longer finding any attrac- 
 tion in the camp, he returned to his native land, having easily procured a 
 discharge from the service, and for many years he occupied the farm of 
 Ckrnas, on Sir Ewen's property. We regret to say that, by degrees, he 
 
 * Appendix, Note K. 
 
MEMOIR. 83 
 
 became addicted to a "veteran's failing;" and that, showing an ever- 
 growing love for " fighting his battles o'er again," even to the " thrice rout- 
 ing of all his foes, and the thrice slaying of the slain," to the unfailing 
 admiration of his boon companions, but to the neglect of his flocks and 
 herds, he became gradually reduced in circumstances. He was not, how- 
 ever, neglected by the family to which he had shown such devotedness ; a 
 comfortable home was provided for him by Sir Duncan, near his own house 
 of Callard; but M'Millan did not live long to enjoy the provision thus made 
 for his old days. He died in 1840, and was buried in Kilmallie, Sir Duncan, 
 now his Chief, as a matter of course heading the funeral procession. 
 
 The best summary which we have seen of Colonel Cameron's character, 
 is given by the author of the " Eomance of War," who had full opportunity 
 of knowing him, and who says, " John Cameron was a true Highland 
 gentleman, and in heart a hero." * 
 
 The Highland element pervaded his whole being, showing itself in his 
 attachment to the language, the poetry, and the music of the mountains. 
 Then the position of his family, and the atmosphere which surrounded him 
 in his youth, evidently modified his whole conduct and bearing to his 
 regiment, and to those around him. He felt himself born to command, 
 and always exacted the most prompt and absolute obedience to his orders. 
 He was, in truth, very strict, perhaps rigorous, in enforcing discipline. On 
 the other hand, he undoubtedly took a deeper interest in, occupied a more 
 intimate relation towards his men, and manifested a more earnest desire 
 for their welfare, a quicker jealousy for their honour, than perhaps have 
 been shown by any oflicer since his day. 
 
 His constant and fatherly care of "the lads from the country" — his 
 interest in the health, the pecuniary afiairs, and especially the good con- 
 duct of " our own people," the number of them promoted by him, and 
 especially his home feelings manifested at the open grave in Holland, were 
 all Highland, and gave him a power over his Highlanders such as no 
 
 * Vol. IV., p. 176. 
 
84 MEMOIR. 
 
 stranger could ever possibly wield. But he did not confine his regards to 
 the men from Lochaber ; his affection for the regiment at large is strikingly- 
 manifested in his letter from AVoodbridge, where he says that he cannot 
 leave them in their sickness and suffering ; and in his account of the retreat 
 of Burgos, where he says that his heart bleeds for those who fell down and 
 perished. His very watchful care over them is evidenced by the remark- 
 able fact, formerly noticed, that during the severe hardships endured in 
 Estremadura (1811), not one man of the 92d was lost; and his few sur- 
 viving companions well know, that on every occasion the full rights and 
 privileges of the 9 2d were vindicated, whoever might oppose or suffer. It 
 is told that on one occasion General Howard kept them for some time need- 
 lessly awaiting his inspection, when Colonel Cameron boldly sent to his tent 
 to inform him that they had been for such a time ready. On all occasions 
 he showed the same resolution to promote their comfort and their honour, 
 and his uniform character gives full weight to the declaration contained in 
 his letter to the Duke of Wellington, that the slight shown to the 92d waa 
 what prompted him to demand the badge of honour conferred on the com- 
 manders of several other regiments which had done less than the 92d had 
 done. On this subject we quote from a letter sent to us by Mr Gordon, 
 so often referred to, confirmed by a similar one from Captaiu Fyfe, likewise 
 of the 92d: — "Colonel Cameron never allowed the rights or comforts of 
 his men to be disregarded or lost sight of by any one; they considered 
 him their best and never-failing friend, and reposed the most implicit 
 and unbounded confidence in him as their commander." The best proof, 
 however, of his being a true Chief over his men, of their devotedness to 
 him, and entire confidence in him, is to be found in the deeds which they 
 performed under his leadership. They rushed on the most formidable 
 obstacles, as at Aroyo des Molinos, Arriverete, and other places signalised 
 by their daring and resistless valour. They rallied their shattered ranks, 
 and with undiminished confidence closed again in the strife, as at St Pierre. 
 With calmness and " stern valour, which would have graced Thermopylae," 
 
MEMOIR. 85 
 
 they stood beside him at Maya, "from morn to noon, from noon to dewy 
 eve," while the bodies of their comrades were being piled around them, 
 literally "like ocean weeds heaped on the surf-beaten shore." And their 
 conduct, after entering the town of Aire, says more for them and for him 
 than even the most brilliant of these achievements. How often, on entering 
 a city, after being heated by the conflict, did even British soldiers forget 
 the restraints alike of divine and human obligations, give loose to the 
 wildest passions, and perpetrate deeds which it is not good to name! Here, 
 however, the soldiers under Colonel Cameron, after a severe fight with an 
 enemy far superior in numbers, took possession of the town, restrained 
 every evil desire, and called forth alike the wonder and the gratitude of 
 the inhabitants, by showing a sacred regard to the rights of property and 
 of persons. This unquestionably proves that he had a very uncommon 
 mastery over his men. 
 
 That "he was in heart" and in deed "a hero," is amply proved by his 
 whole career. Mere personal courage would be confidently expected of 
 him by every one who knew the blood that flowed in his veins, for faint- 
 heartedness was never a failing of the race of Lochiel. It is no poetical 
 exaggeration of Campbell's, in his well-known lines to Lochiel, to attribute 
 to that Chief the determination that he would 
 
 " As victor exult, or in death be laid low, 
 With his back to the field, and his feet to the foe." 
 
 For such was the resolution that from sire to son the race did act up to ; 
 and oft did the "Cameron men," in the words of the song, prove, by 
 deeds which to others would appear impossible, "that whatever men dare 
 they can do." But Colonel Cameron, beyond having "a spirit that knew 
 no fear and shunned no danger," resolved, at the outset of his career, as 
 we have seen from his own letter, that his conduct should not be unworthy 
 of his father, or of the race from which he sprung ; and with ardour which 
 never cooled, with determination which never yielded, he laboured to 
 raise his regiment to the highest pitch of disciplined valour — to make them 
 
86 MEMOIR. 
 
 pre-eminent among their fellows — and to achieve glory for them and for 
 his country. Nor was he unsuccessful ; for, proud as Britain justly is of 
 the many brave regiments which have extended, and still maintain her 
 power and fame in the east and in the west, iu the north and in the south 
 — which make her name a tower of strength to the oppressed, and a terror 
 to the oppressor throughout the world, there is no corps of her noble 
 armies to which the Gordon Highlanders will yield in true valour. And 
 ably as that distinguished regiment has always been led, it never earned 
 more fame than when led by Colonel Cameron, with whom their proudest 
 recollections wiU ever be associated. 
 
 There were most ample testimonies borne to this able man after his 
 death, which abundantly prove that his character has not been over- 
 estimated, but under-estimated in any expressions used by us ; that his 
 loss was felt as a loss to the nation ; and that those most nearly connected 
 with him in his military career regarded him alike with sincere affection, 
 and admiring esteem. 
 
 First among these tributes to his memory we refer to the Duke of 
 Wellington's despatch, written after the great struggle had been brought 
 to a close, and when he could calmly survey the cost at which victory had 
 been purchased. Addressing the Lords of the Treasury, from Orville, 
 June 25, 1815, he says — "Your. Lordships will see, in the enclosed lists, 
 the names of some most valuable officers lost to His Majesty's service. 
 Among them I cannot avoid to mention Colonel Cameron of the 92d 
 Regiment, and Colonel Sir H. Ellis of the 23d Eegiment, to whose conduct 
 I have frequently called your Lordships' attention, and who at last fell, 
 distinguishing themselves at the head of the brave troops which they 
 commanded. Notwithstanding the glory of the occasion, it is impossible 
 not to lament such men, hath on account of the public, and as friends." 
 
 To be thus specially mentioned and lamented by Wellington, amid the 
 many brave and great men who fell at Waterloo, is in itself a monument 
 of which the bravest might justly be proiid. 
 
MEMOIR. 87 
 
 The surviving officers of the 9 2d, while they and the regiment exe- 
 cuted fearful vengeance on those who slew him, at the same time resolved 
 to embody their affection and regard for their leader iij an enduring form, 
 and subscribed a liberal sum for the erection of a monument to his 
 memory, leaving the site to be determined by his father. The correspon- 
 dence, which is before us, was carried on by Lieutenant-Colonel Mitchell 
 for the regiment ; by Mr Campbell, army agent, (afterwards of Lochnell,) 
 for Sir Ewen. It is creditable alike to the good feeling of all parties 
 concerned. We content ourselves, however, with quoting one letter 
 from Colonel Mitchell to Sir Ewen, dated Hull, 12th May, 181G, in 
 which he says, — . 
 
 " The officers of the 92d, and I myself, feel much gratification at the 
 situation you have fixed upon for the monument, as it is a public place, 
 which will give people of all descriptions passing in that direction an 
 opportunity of viewing the last melancholy tribute of regard that could be 
 paid by his brother officers to a brave and gallant commander, as well as 
 to a most sincere and lamented friend. For my own part, I beg to dis- 
 claim any merit in the case, for I was only giving my humble assistance 
 to perpetuate the memory of one of the siucerest friends I ever had. I 
 am proud to say that, during an acquaintance of twenty-two years — 
 passed chiefly in severe and trying service — our mutual friendship sub- 
 sisted, without intermission, to the last period of his valuable life ; and it 
 will be pleasant for you to know that, in paying this last tribute to his 
 memorj'-, there was not a dissenting voice in the regiment. 
 
 " Most faithfully and sincerely yours, 
 
 "JAMES MITCHELL." 
 
 The obelisk which we have referred to at the commencement of our 
 task, was soon after raised. The expense, which, we believe, amounted to 
 £1400, was borne by Sir Ewen. How this was arranged we know not; 
 
88 MEMOIR. 
 
 but we know that it was with a perfectly good iinderstancling between 
 him and the officers of the 9 2d. 
 
 Colonel Cameron's name is commemorated by another monument, also 
 well worthy of mention. His early commander, the Marquis of Huntly 
 — by this time Duke of Gordon — who, with every member of the family, 
 had uniformly shown the deepest interest in him and in the regiment, 
 raised, at the ducal residence of Kinrara, a column in honour of his brave 
 companions who had fallen in the service of their country. Two names 
 are selected from among these worthies — Colonel Cameron's, and Sir J. 
 Macara's, who fell at "Waterloo, of whom it is enough to say that he was 
 well worthy of the companionship in which he is placed. 
 
 There were many besides, who, if they did not thus literally add a stone 
 to Cameron's cairn, yet expressed their sincere regret for his loss in terms 
 deserving of mention. Amid all the letters submitted to our inspection 
 for the drawing up of this Sketch, the most affecting by far is a parcel 
 carefully set apart, and bearing the following docquet in Sir Ewen's 
 hand, tremulous from age, and, we doubt not, from deep emotion: — 
 " Letters of condolence on the death of my ever-to-be-lamented son. Colonel 
 John Cameron, 92d Eegiment, from Friends. — E. C." Among these there 
 are several from his Chief, Lochiel, written in frank, sincere affection, 
 and containing offers of going to Belgium to bring his friend's remains 
 to his native land. There is one from the Duke of Buccleuch, as President 
 of the Highland Society of Scotland, enclosing extract of a resolution 
 adopted at a general meeting of the Society, wherein they express the high 
 sense they entertained of Colonel Cameron's distinguished merits, and offer 
 their sympathy to his father. There are some from Clanranald, Charles 
 Grant, M.P., and many other Highland gentlemen, ^11 expressive of the 
 pride felt in the heroic career, and sorrow at the early death of their 
 countryman ; and there is one from Lord Niddry (Lord Hopetoun), which 
 is well deserving of being transcribed. It is as follows : — 
 
MEMOIR. 89 
 
 " Rankeilloub, by Auchteemuchty, 
 6th July, 1815. 
 
 "My Dear Sir, — Ever since the melancholy occurrence which de- 
 prived the 92d Regiment of its gallant commander, I have felt a strong 
 inclination to address a few lines to you. I have, however, hitherto been 
 withheld from so doing by an apprehension that I might thereby prema- 
 turely intrude upon the grief which you, and his family, must feel on the 
 occasion. I trust, however, that I may now, without impropriety, assure 
 you that no one can more sincerely participate in these feelings than I do. 
 
 " It can be no consolation, I am aware, to a father, to set before him 
 the glorious circumstances in which his son has fallen, or to paint the 
 feelings of mingled admiration and regret experienced by his fellow-soldiers 
 at his loss. But if any such reflections can alleviate the grief of relatives, 
 Colonel Cameron's family have an abundant store; for no man ever fell 
 under circumstances more glorious, or more memorable ; nor is it possible 
 that any man can be more lamented than he is, not only by the gallant 
 corps which he so often led to victory and honour, but by the whole army 
 and the country at large. 
 
 "I will not dwell longer upon so painful a subject; but, with sincere 
 good wishes for you and Mrs Cameron, beg to subscribe myself 
 
 " Your faithful, humble Servant, 
 
 "NIDDRY." 
 
 The historians of the period, crowded as that period was with great 
 events and with great men, make frequent mention of Colonel Cameron's 
 distinguished abilities and bravery. We have made so many quotations 
 from Sir William Napier that his opinion is sufficiently apparent; Sir 
 Archibald Alison, in his History of Europe, again and again speaks of 
 the gallantry of his noble regiment. We content ourselves, however, 
 with one quotation from another work written immediately after the 
 close of the great struggle, when its every event was fresh and vivid in 
 the public mind — " The History of the Wars" — a quotation which, while 
 slightly differing in words, agrees in substance with the account we have 
 
90 MEMOIR. 
 
 given above of Cameron's fall. The author, page 1396, after speaking 
 of the position of the 9 2d at Quatre Bras, " in the centre of which band 
 of heroes the Commander-in-Chief was stationed," and of the repulse of 
 the French Cuirassiers, says: "This heroic regiment, led on by Colonel 
 Cameron, performed prodigies of valour. It repeatedly repulsed the 
 enemy's columns in their most furious attacks, and with great slaughter. 
 In this manner the combat continued for many hours without a prospect 
 of its termination. Through the columns of smoke the enemy was soon 
 seen advancing with all his forces for another struggle. As they came 
 near, the fire of the artillery slackened, and the bloody struggle began. 
 The moment was pressing. The Duke, who stood with the 92d, turned to 
 them and said : ' 9 2d, you must charge these fellows.' The order was 
 cheerfully obeyed. They rushed against the French battalions with an 
 ardour which nothing could resist. At this moment Colonel Cameron, 
 and three other officers of rank, fell mortally wounded. In the former 
 his country sustained a severe loss. He was indeed a brave man. His 
 death roused the spirit of the Highlanders to fury. They pressed the 
 enemy with such infuriated rage that their last columns fled before this 
 daring band, leaving the field covered with dead, dying, and wounded." 
 
 We must refer to a tribute from another and very different source, but 
 interesting from the nature of that source. This was the very last of the 
 Highland Family Bards, Ailean Dall, or "Blind Allan," who was retained 
 by the Chief of Glengarry — the Glengarry — as he will always be termed. 
 He was assuredly far, very far from being "equalled in renown" with — 
 
 " Those other two equall'd with him in fate — 
 
 Blind Thamyris, and blind Maeonides ; " 
 
 but he did "equal" them in devotedness to the Muse, and may not inaptly 
 be compared to — 
 
 "The wakeful bird 
 That sings darkling, and in the shadiest covert lii<l, 
 Tunes her nocturnal note." 
 
MEMOIR. 91 
 
 He was truly a " son of song," and, as might be expected, he tuned his 
 harp to the praise of one who, white so generally lamented, was above all 
 lamented in Lochaber. He composed an elegy in which there is much 
 true feeling displayed. With pride, which in him was natural, he celebrates 
 the distinguished ancestry and the gallant deeds of his hero; but he 
 particularly dwells on what was so strikingly characteristic of Colonel 
 Cameron, his watchful guardianship, his constant care of his men. As the 
 "shepherd of the flock" he is specially praised and lamented; an image 
 which, as before remarked, was a favourite one of the older bards in 
 depicting a Chief'"' 
 
 It was appropriate that the death of one who may not unjustly be 
 called the last of the Highland military Chiefs, who certainly closes an era 
 — the transition period from the ancient to the modern — in the history of 
 the Highlands, should be sung by the last of the Highland Family Bards; 
 but a Muse of far higher flight than Blind Allan's has celebrated the 
 praises of Colonel Cameron. Sir Walter Scott, whose mind sympathised so 
 thoroughly with all that was chivalrous or lofty, was deeply impressed 
 with his character. He made repeated mention of him in his writings. 
 He composed his epitaph,t and further wrote the following highly charac- 
 teristic verses on his fall. 
 
 With these we close the record of a man, who, however imperfectly 
 portrayed by us, will be admitted by all who take knowledge of his deeds 
 to be deserving of remembrance. He will be remembered in the military 
 annals of his country as long as "the spirit that knows no fear, and shuns 
 no danger," is held in honour. He wiU be, more especially, remembered 
 and honoured in the Highlands as long as the Highlands continue to be, as 
 they have been, "the land of mountains, of glens, and of heroes." 
 
 " And Cameron in the shock of steel, 
 Died like the offspring of Lochiel." — Scott's Field of Waterloo. 
 
 * Appendix, Note L. t Appendix, Note M. 
 
92 MEMOIR. 
 
 " Apart from Albya's war array, 
 'Twas there grey Allan sleepless lay — 
 Grey Allan, who for many a day 
 
 Had followed stout and stern, 
 Where through battle, rout, and reel. 
 Through storm of shot, and hedge of steel. 
 Led the grandson of Lochiel, 
 
 The valiant Fassiefern. 
 Through steel and shot he leads no more. 
 Low -laid 'mid friends' and foemen's gore ; 
 But long his native lake's wild shore, 
 And Sunard rough and wild Ardgour, 
 
 And Morven long shall tell ; 
 And proud Ben-Nevis hear with awe. 
 How, at the bloody Quatre Bras, 
 Brave Cameron heard the wild hurrah 
 
 Of conquest, as he fell." — Scott's '■'■Dance of Death.' 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
# 
 
APPENDIX. 
 
 Note A. — Page 1. 
 
 CHITECHYARD OF KILMALLIE. 
 
 SiK Walter Scott, in his notes to Canto III. of the " Lady of the Lake," gives, from 
 the Laird of MacFarlane's MS. a very curious account of the builder of the first church 
 at Kilmallie; " Oille diihh Mac'Ille Chndmhlaich," or "the Black Child, Son of the 
 Bones;" for such, unpronounceable as it appears, is the true designation; and though 
 the story may be familiar to many, we give the substance of it here as connected Avith 
 the locality. 
 
 Sir Walter says that the account given in the MS. of this man with the ominous 
 name, suggested to him the idea of Brian, " that monk of savage form and face," who 
 plays such an important part in unveiling the future destiny of the Clan Alpine. The 
 {)oet, however, is much more indebted to his imagination than to the MS. for the filling 
 up of the sketch ; and it is worth mentioning, that the tradition still preserved in the 
 country agi'ees exactly with the account given by the old Laird, representing the " Gille 
 dubh" as an able and devout man, totally different from the savage seer depicted in 
 the poem. 
 
 The reason of his obtaining such an uncommon surname was as follows : It chanced 
 on a night long ago, that the young people of Corpach, and of Annat — two neighbouring 
 farms — were, as customary, watching the cattle in the fold. The place was a small hill 
 a little to the west of the present church, close to the public road, and conspicuous from 
 a clump of Scotch fir covering its summit. It shows some faint traces of having been 
 fortified as a stronghold, and its name, Cnoc-nam-faobh, or "the Hill of Spoils," tells of 
 its having been the scene of strife and of bloodshed. At the period in question it was 
 strewn with the bones of the slain, left there to bleach under summer's sim and winter's 
 snow, which proves that the conflict was between parties animated by the deadliest hate 
 towards each other; for rarely, indeed, was such dishonour shown to the dead in the 
 Highlands. 
 
 The young watchers of the fold, finding the night cold, kindled a fire, which, in the 
 absence of other fuel, they nourished with the bones strewn around. They retm-ned to 
 their homes toward morning without the conduct of any of the party exciting remark ; 
 but a girl, who had remained by the fire a little after the departure of her companions, 
 was m due time obliged to lay aside her "maiden snood," without assuming the 
 matronly veil or coif 
 
 " She said no shepherd sought her side, 
 No hunter's hand her snood untied." 
 
96 APPENDIX. 
 
 Tlie only cause she assigned for her being in such a condition was, that when sitting 
 alone by the fire, and taking up her clothes to benefit by the wamith, a sudden gust of 
 wind blew the ashes of the dead men's bones about her. 
 
 " She lock'd her secret in her breast, 
 And died in travail unconfess'd." 
 
 Her son survived, and from the above probable story of his paternity given by his 
 mother, was known as " the Son of the Bones." According to the MS. he proved " a 
 good schoUar, and godlie. He did builde this church which doeth nowe stand in 
 Lochyeld, called Kilmalee;" and, as we have said above, this account of hun is still 
 preserved in the traditions of the place. 
 
 The traditionary account of the origin of the second church built at Kilmallie is 
 also worthy of notice, and, as far as we know, has never been committed to writing. 
 "Ailean nan Creach," or Allan of the Forays, one of the Lochiels belonging to the 
 fifteenth century, did much to extend the boimds of the family estates, and of the 
 Cameron influence — often, like a much greater man, giving only the choice "of the 
 sword or the tribute" to several of his weaker neighbours. As he advanced in years, 
 however, the memory of many of these deeds of his younger days pressed heavily upon 
 him. He tried to compensate for the evil done by the set-ofi" of many acts of charity 
 on the one hand, and self-infliction on the other. Still his "conscience made a coward 
 of him." Eemorse for the past, and dread of the future, rendered him miserable — 
 until at length, with fearlessness characteristic of his younger days, he resolved to 
 unveil the futm-e by extorting answers from the spirits of evil ; and he had recourse to 
 the oracle of the "Tigh gai7-vi," or "House of Invocation." 
 
 The mode of procedure in this intercourse with the world of spirits was as follows : 
 The questioner, with his own hands, built a house or hut in some solitary place ; and the 
 spot chosen by "Ailean nan Ci'each," must, at the period in question, have been suffi- 
 ciently solitary and savage — the centre of the Corpach Moss. That moss is still drear 
 and cheerless, though it is now skirted on one side by the Caledonian Canal, intersected 
 in another direction by a highway, along which carriages of all kinds, including even 
 omnibuses, ply almost daily throughout the sunmier season, and its borders fringed 
 aU round by habitations of men, and by signs of cultivation. Then, neither canal, 
 nor road, nor house, nor green field, was to be seen — all was bleak, and desolate, 
 and gloomy. Here, however, the Chief of Lochiel reared the fabric in which he was to 
 meet the spirits of the deep. He, in due fomi, kindled a blazing fire, in the middle of 
 which was fixed a sharp iron spit, or spike. On this spit he impaled a living cat, and 
 turned it round and round over the flames. Its cries of distress speedily brought 
 many others of its kindred to the rescue. The rafters of the house soon became 
 covered with cats of every hue and size, all gifted with the power of speech, and aU 
 using that power in denouncing every possible vengeance here and hereafter on the 
 tormentor of their companion. If he had nerve enough, despite of all this, to continue 
 at his task, to turn the spit still, "the King of the Oats" came to the combat, dis- 
 tinguished from his subjects by siu'passing size, and more especially by ears of 
 portentous magnitude, giving him the name of Cluasa-leabhra. Dire as the threats 
 had been previous to his arrival, they were insignificant compared with what he uttered, 
 which in horror surpassed " all that fables yet have feigned or fears conceived." And 
 now came " the tug of war"— this v/as the crisis, the moment of fate. If the questioner 
 quailed in the least degree — if his heart misgave, or his nerve quivered — his doom was 
 
APPENDIX. Q^ 
 
 sealed. His body was instantly torn to a thousand shreds by the demons enraged at 
 the presumption of a mortal thus daring their power, and his spirit was carried off as 
 their prey. The command, however, was — 
 
 "Hear you tUs, or see you that, 
 Round the spit and turn the cat." 
 
 "Ciod air bith a chi, no 'chual thu cuir mu 'n cuairt an cat," (a phrase stUl in 
 common proverbial use by those who have forgotten all about its origin,) and he 
 who was able to do so — to give utter defiance to the spirits of darkness — obtained 
 the mastery over them, so that they became his suppliants for the release of 
 their companion, and offered to answer any question which their opponent would 
 propose. 
 
 Lochiel did master them, and the question he is said to have asked, was the great 
 and all-solemn one so often prompted by an accusing conscience, though unfortunately 
 so rarely allowed a fair hearing, "What must I do to be saved?" How was he to 
 obtain forgiveness for his many deeds of rapine and bloodshed, and reach to peace 
 and to hope? The answer given, though not an enlightened one according to the light 
 of the Gospel, was more likely to proceed from spirits of light than of darkness. He 
 was commanded to buUd seven churches throughout the country, a church for each of 
 his great forays, and thus to expiate his sins. One of these was built at Kilmallie, the 
 ruins of which are still to be seen. It replaced that built by the "Son of the Bones." 
 Another was at Kilcoireal (St Cyril's), and a third at Kildonan, both in the neighbouring 
 parish of KUlmonivaig. A fourth was at Kilchoan in Knoydart, a fifth in Arasaig, a 
 sixth in Morven, and the seventh at the end of Loch Laggan in Badenoch. 
 
 Allan returned home from the dread encounter with a high consciousness of power, 
 and more still, with a definite and a good object before him. It is said that he became 
 not a "sadder," but a "happier and a wiser man" — that he found church building a far 
 better occupation than plundering and slaughtering his neighbours, and ended his days 
 in i^eace and hope. 
 
 We have given this wild tradition as repeated to us by old men still living in the 
 parish. We have been unable to obtain any fuller account of the frightful ordeal of 
 the Tigh gairm; but what we have said wUl remind the reader of the superstitions of 
 other nations, among whom, as among the Celts, the prince of the demons is spoken of 
 as "King of the Cats;" more especially will it remind him of the Eastern scene so 
 strikingly delineated by Byron in the powerfully-written drama of Manfred. Manfred, 
 addressing Ahriman, the prince of darkness and of evil — according to the Persian belief 
 — daring him and his whole crew in these words, "I do defy, deny, spurn back, and 
 scorn ye," — this, and the Highland Chief giving utter defiance to the king of demons 
 under another form, present to us one and the same idea, though under widely different 
 as^jects. We doubt not that that idea, however overlaid and disfigured in process of 
 time by ignorance and superstition, was originally the great and the true one — that an 
 energetic, unyielding human will can triumph over evil in every shape and form— nay, 
 can make it even subservient to its own purposes. 
 
 We think the following account of a very remarkable ash-tree which at one time 
 grew in the Churchyard of Kilmallie, will be fomid interesting. We quote from the 
 very learned and well-known work of Loudon, "The Arboretum and Fniticetum," 
 page 1226: — "An ash-tree in the Churchyard of Kilmallie, in Lochaber, the Parish 
 Church of the Lochiel family, burnt down during the troubles in 1746, was long con- 
 
 o 
 
98 APPENDIX. 
 
 sidered as the largest and most remarkable tree in Scotland. Its remains were 
 measured in October, 1764, and at the ground the circumference was no less than 
 fifty-eight feet, (Walker's Essays, p. 17.) This tree stood on a deep rich soil, only 
 about thirty feet above the level of the sea, in Lochiel, with a small rivulet running 
 within a few paces of it. — (Sang.)" 
 
 Notes B and C. — Pages 4, 5. 
 
 macaulay's estimate of the highlands — buet's letters. 
 
 The opinion entertained of the Highlanders by the English about a century and a half 
 ago, is given by Baron Macaulay in the third volume of his most eloquent history, page 
 244: "When the English thought of him (the Highlander) at all — and it was seldom 
 that they did so — -they considered him as a filthy, abject savage, a slave, a papist, a 
 cut-throat, and a thief" We need not refer to other caricatures. 
 
 The great historian's own estimate of the race from which he is not remotely sprimg, 
 is too well known to need quotation here. It is very fortimate, however, that he tells 
 us so plainly the source whence he derived the statements on which that estimate is 
 based; for even as water cannot rise higher than its source, however decorated the 
 aqueducts may be, so the value of these statements must remain at their original level, 
 — they must be judged as they are found in- the flat, prosaic sentences of Lieutenant 
 Bm't, not as they appear in the glowing periods of Macaulay's fascinating style. 
 
 After completing the picture of horrors to be encomitered in visiting the Highlands, 
 the historian says in a foot-note. Vol. III., page 242, "Almost aU these circumstances 
 are taken from Burt's Letters. For the Tar I am indebted to Cleland's poetiy." It 
 is with Bui-t, then, that we have principally to deal, and we must say a few words 
 regarding his reliableness as a witness. Lord Macaulay says that "he was evidently 
 a man of a quick, an observant, and a cultivated mind." We beg to subjoin a few 
 (juotations from his own writings, which aflbrd good ground for dissenting from this 
 favourable opinion of him. 
 
 In Letter XV. (Vol. II., page 6, 10th edition, 1815), speaking of the Highland 
 mountains, he says: "The summits of the highest are mostly destitute of earth, and the 
 huge naked rocks being just above the heath, produce the disagreeable appearance of a 
 scabbed head, especially when they appear to view in a conical figure. . . . Their 
 ridges that appear next to the ether, by their rugged, irregular lines, the heath, and the 
 black rocks, are rendered extremely harsh to the eye by appearing close to that 
 diaphanous body without any medium to soften the opposition, and the clearer the day 
 the more rude and offensive they are to the sight. . . . But of aU the views I 
 think the most horrid is to look at hiUs from east to west, or vice versa'; for then 
 the eye penetrates far among them, and sees more particularly the stupendous bulk, 
 frightful irregularity, and horrid gloom, made yet more sombrous by the shades and 
 faint reflections they communicate one to another." 
 
 Macaulay, hi excuse of this veiy remarkable taste regarding scenery which com- 
 mands the admiration of ninety-nine out of a hundred as unrivalled in its combination 
 of the majestic and the beautiful, says, that "a traveller must be freed from all appre- 
 hension of being murdered or starved before he can be charmed by the bold outlines and 
 
APPENDIX. 99 
 
 rich tints of the hills." Without quoting an authority equal even to Macaulay's, as 
 to the philosophy expressed in this opinion — "Burke on the Sublime and Beautiful" 
 — we would observe that the remark is in no sense applicable to Burt's circumstances. 
 He had his soldiers to back him — he had the stores of a well-supplied commissariat to 
 draw from whenever he chose — nor do we remember that he complains of any attempt 
 being ever made to murder him. A traveller, visiting the Highlands in friendship, was 
 at that day, even as at the present day, far safer from any attack on life or property 
 than he was on Hounslow Heath, or Finchley Common — nay, than he was in many of 
 the streets of London. But apart from all special, or modifying circimistances, we 
 must maintain that the mind to which the towering peaks and ever-varying outlines 
 of the Highland mountains suggested the loathsome idea of a scabbed head, was 
 perverse and distempered. We doubt not that that mind viewed society tlirough a 
 medium as distorting as that in which it viewed external scenery. 
 
 We might bring forward many quotations evincing ignorance and credulity as to 
 natural phenomena which appear simple and obvious enough to any ordinarily "cultivated 
 mind." We content ourselves, however, with the two following: In Letter XVII., page 
 69, he says, "The immediate source of the rivers and lakes in the moimtains is 
 the clouds, and not as our rivers, which have their original from subterraneous 
 aqueducts that rise in springs below." Again, page 72, speaking of the manner in 
 which trout got into some of the mountain lakes, he says quite gravely, " Some will 
 have them to have sprang from the fry carried from other waters, and dropt in these 
 small lakes by tvaterfoivl." These statements require no comment. 
 
 His account of the retinue of a Highland Chief, among whom was one "who carries 
 him when on foot over the fords," (page 143,) is simply absurd, showing utter ignorance 
 of the state of society which he professes to depict. Wlien pei'sonal valour and 
 hardihood were the first requisites in a Chief, such a "carpet knight" as would be afraid 
 to wet his foot in a ford, would very speedily be obliged to content himself with the 
 distaif. All this is in singular contrast to the story — undoubtedly true in .spirit — 
 which represents old Sir Ewen of Lochiel as indignantly rebuking the eflFeminacy of 
 his grandson for resting his head on a pillow — even of snow. 
 
 We do not care to charge Mr Biu-t with any conscious falsehood in the statements 
 he makes, but the following paragraph leads us to see one main cause alike of his 
 ignorance and of his prejudice. 
 
 In Letter XXII., page 185, after saying that the gasconade of the Highlanders about 
 hospitality was most extraordinary, he goes on: "One particular instance was most 
 inhospitable. Being benighted soon after it was dark, I made up to the house of one 
 to whom I was well known, and though I had five or six miles to travel over a 
 dangerous rugged way, wherein there was no other shelter to be expected, yet, upon 
 the trampling of my horses before the house, the lights went out in the twinkling of an 
 eye, and deafness at once seized the whole family." 
 
 We believe, if there be any quality for which friend and foe alike generally 
 praised the ancient Highlanders, it was their hospitality. They fuUy felt and acknow- 
 ledged that — 
 
 " Stranger is a holy name, 
 Guidance, and rest, and food, and fire, 
 In vain he never must require." 
 
 Why was Mr Burt, then, treated so very inhospitably? The cause is most obvious. 
 
100 APPENDIX. 
 
 He was engaged in a work avowedly hostile, and thereby most hateful to the High- 
 landers. He was one of the officers employed under (Jeneral Wade in construct- 
 ing the military roads which were expressly intended to open up to English troops 
 those mountain fastnesses that had been previously inaccessible to the stranger. 
 He was employed in this work from 1726 — shortly after the unsuccessful rise 
 of the '15, which left so many rankling memories behind it — to 1737 — a few 
 years before the rising of the '45, which, as it approached, stirred up to the very 
 depths the feelings of every adherent of the Stuart cause. A "Hanoverian officer" 
 engaged in such a work, and at such a period, was necessarily detested by the 
 gi'eat majority of the people among whom he sojourned, and he naturally and 
 necessarily detested them, knowing them to be the enemies of the Government 
 which he served. Tims he viewed every object through a deeply-coloured medium; 
 and if we add to this the natural prejudices of an Englishman, a mind narrow, 
 pedantic, and credulous, with utter ignorance of the language or history of the 
 mountain tribes, we shall provide all the essential elements for misunderstanding and 
 misrepresenting the Highland character. In short, it is difficult to imagine a person 
 placed in circumstances which more completely excluded the possibility of a fair or 
 impartial account, than those in which Mr Burt was placed. 
 
 If this were remembered, his delineations would not be regarded as very authentic ; 
 and when we consider how, down to the present day, various foreign writers, even 
 French and American, influenced by national prejudice, misrepresent and caricature 
 Britain, yet are universally laughed at by Britons as caricaturists, we will see it to be 
 reasonable that a Highlander should regard Burt's caricatures as deserving of ridicule, 
 and ridicule only. 
 
 One other very obvious remark we must make on his statements as grouped 
 together and embellished by Macaulay. Granting that some instances might be found 
 in the Highlands to verify the darkest and strongest of them, as to the poverty, filth, 
 thievishness, or ferocity of the inhabitants, surely it is not fair or reasonable to hold 
 up these as correct representations of the deeds or character of the people at large. At 
 this very day there is to be found in Gla,sgow or in Edinburgh, in Liverpool or in 
 London, a greater amount of poverty and filth, of ignorance and disease, more 
 especially of crime — crime utterly revolting in nature — than could be found in the 
 Highlands in the days of Burt. Yet he would require a "forehead of brass" who 
 would declare the vile dens of infamy, where all these exist, to be fair specimens of the 
 homes of England — who would say that a stranger was to form his judgment of the 
 great British community of the nineteenth century from such instances as these. But 
 this is what, most unreasonably and unjustly, is done in estimating the Highlands. 
 
 Undoubtedly there were men in the Highlands, thievish, and fierce, and bad in 
 every way, deserving the worst that Macaulay or Burt says of them. These, however, 
 were not the commiuiity, were not the people. They were pariahs, "broken men," who 
 had lost caste in their own clan, and were not received into another. The true staple 
 and strength of the people are entirely overlooked by both the above writers. These 
 were the Tacksmen and the Tenantry. The former were gentlemen in the best sense of 
 the term, men of education and of spirit, influenced by as high a sense of honour as 
 animated any men. The remnant of them furnished hundreds of brave and 
 accomi:)lished officers to our armies during the American and Continental wars. A 
 few of their descendants are still to be met with in the Highlands; and we venture to 
 say, that men of higher or better character are not to be met with in Britain. 
 
APPENDIX. 101 
 
 The Tenantry, again, held smaller farms from these, or directly from the Chief, and 
 formed a class corresponding in many respects to the ancient "Yeomanry" of England. 
 They were generally known as the Ceathairne, the strength, the militia, properly so 
 called, of the clan. They were far removed from the poverty so frequently a.scribed to 
 them, and having a name and position to maintain, were as careful to avoid any deed 
 of infamy as were any of their superiors. 
 
 Instead, however, of endeavouring to combat Lieutenant Burt's misrepresentations 
 by any statements of our own, we refer them to a standard which even the greatest 
 enemy of the Highlands will admit to be fair and unexceptionable, that is Dr Samuel 
 Johnson's opinion, expressed in his "Tour to the Hebrides." The great English 
 scholar visited the comitry in 1773. Burt's Letters were completed in 1737. Thirty- 
 six years only elapsed between the drawing up of the two accounts. During this period 
 great changes had been made in the laws which affected the Highlands ; but society, 
 habits, and manners, continued very much what they had been. Dr Johnson conversed 
 with men who had taken a part in the rebellion of '•15, the very men with whom Burt 
 had conversed. We need not remark on the Doctor's prejudices against Scotland 
 generally, which were especially concentrated on the land of Ossian. These are abun- 
 dantly evident. But let us compare the general view which he gives of society in the 
 Highlands with that given by Burt, and we must in all candour admit that the two 
 are not only dissimilar, but diametrically opposed. One or other of them exaggerates 
 widely, misrepresents thoroughly. The two cannot for a moment be said to be correct. 
 And we believe that few persons will hesitate to give the preference to the great 
 moralist's, even despite Macaulay's endorsation of Burt's. We wish no better answer 
 to these oft-quoted Letters than Johnson's well-known and most unjustly abused 
 "Tour." 
 
 We will not trouble the reader with lengthened quotation from a book which is so 
 universally known throughout Scotland ; nor will we refer to Dr Johnson's accounts 
 of his reception at Armidale, Raasay, Dunvegan, Inch-Kenneth, or Inveraray Castle; 
 for these were the abodes of Chiefs where, according even to Macaulay, some signs of 
 civilisation were visible, but we refer briefly to the letter which the Doctor wi-ote 
 to MacLeod fi-om Ostig, after he had traversed all Skye, and passed nights at 
 Ulinish, Tallisker, Corichatacbain, and Ostaig — all abodes of Tacksmen, or gentle- 
 men farmers, all places where, according to Macaulay, squalid poverty, filth, and 
 vermin were to be encoimtered — where the inhabitants ought to have been covered 
 with itch, and smeared with tar. 
 
 " Ostig, imh Sept., 1773. 
 "Deak Sie, 
 
 "We are now on the margin of the sea, waiting for a boat and a wind. 
 Boswell grows impatient, but the kind treatment which I find everywhere I go, 
 makes me leave with some heaviness of heart an island which I am not very likely 
 
 to see again We passed two days at Tallisker very happily, both 
 
 by the pleasantness of the place, and the elegance of our reception. 
 
 " SAM. JOHNSON."* 
 
 We have now done with Lieutenant Burt; we must, however, say one word as to 
 Cleland and the Tar. Every one, in the least degree acquainted with the Highland.?, 
 
 * "Boswell's Life of Johnson." Edit. 1835, p. 298. 
 
102 APPENDIX. 
 
 knows full well that for nearly a hundred years after the death of Cleland, which took 
 place in 1689, there were no flocks of sheep kept in the Highlands. Their introduc- 
 tion is quite a recent event. There were a few sheep of the smaU Hebridean bi'eed 
 kept by every family ; but these never ranged the mountains, were always housed at 
 night, and certainly were never smeared with tar. We wiU, however, give authority 
 on this subject. Dr Walker, Professor of Natural History in the University of Edin- 
 burgh, was appointed by Government to survey the Highlands and Islands, and to report 
 on their agricultural capabilities in 1760. He completed his task in 1786, and sub- 
 sequently pviblished his "Economical History," etc., in two volumes. In Vol. II., page 
 92, under the article "Smearing," he says, "This practice . . . was never laiown 
 in the Highlands till of late years, that is, since the introduction of the south country 
 sheep;" and at page 67 he mentions that it was about the year 1762 that some sheep 
 farmers in Annandale, and other places in the South, took leases of fanns in the High- 
 land parts of Dumbartonshire and Perthshire, bordering on the low country, and 
 stocked them with sheep. Until that period, smearing was altogether unknown in the 
 Highlands, and forty years later it was by no means common. 
 
 We have been thus minute about an apparently trifling matter, because we consider 
 it of consequence to establish clearly that, at least in one particular. Lord Macaulay 
 has taken his statement entirely on credit, without inquiring into its probability or 
 improbability. His assertion about "the smearing with tar," Vol. Ill, page 242, and 
 his singidar mistake regarding the patronymic of the Argyle family, are not creditable 
 to his accuracy in Highland matters. In styling Argyle Macallum, he has not only 
 deprived him of his own name, but has given him one of the most obscure and least 
 honoured names in the whole country, of which he was the head. Mac Cailein, "the 
 Son of Colin," as even the most ignorant Highlander can tell, has been for many 
 generations the Celtic designation of Argyle. 
 
 Note D. — Page 8. 
 
 MACIAIN PKOTECTING THE HOUSE OF LOED STAIE IN 1745. 
 
 We give the following quotation from Scott's "Tales of a Grandfather," who, after 
 describing the massacre of Glencoe, and saying that the King, availing himself of the 
 option left him by the Scottish Parliament, did not order home for trial any of the 
 actors in that detestable butchery; and that none of them was punished for the crime 
 "otherwise than by the general hatred of the age, and the universal execration of pos- 
 terity," thus goes on, (Vol. II., p. 140, edition 1850,) "Although it is here a little 
 misplaced, I cannot refrain from telling you an anecdote comiected with the preceding 
 events, which befel so late as the year 1 745-6, during the romantic attempt of Charles 
 Edward, grandson of James II., to regain the throne of his fathers. He marched through 
 the Lowlands, at the head of an army composed of the Highland Clans, and obtained, 
 for a time, considerable advantages. Amongst other Highlanders, the descendant of 
 the murdered Maclain of Glencoe joined his standard with a hundred and fifty men. 
 The route of the Highland anny brought them near to a beautiful seat built by the 
 Earl of Stair, so often mentioned in the preceding narrative, and the principal mansion 
 
APPENDIX. 103 
 
 of his family. An alarm arose in the councils of Prince Charles lest the MacDonalds 
 of Glencoe should seize thif? opportunity of marking their recollection of the injustice 
 done to their ancestors, by burning or plundering the house of the descendant of their 
 persecutor; and as such an act of violence might have done the prince great prejudice 
 in the eyes of the people of the Lowlands, it was agreed that a guard should be posted 
 to protect the house of Lord Stair. 
 
 "MacDonald of Glencoe heard of the resolution, and deemed his honour and that of 
 the clan concerned. He demanded an audience of Charles Edward, and admitting the 
 propriety of placing a guard on a house so obnoxious to the feelings of the Highland 
 army, and to those of his own Clan in particidar, he demanded, as a matter of right 
 rather than favoxir, that the protecting guard should be supplied by the MacDonalds of 
 Glencoe. If this request were not granted, he announced his purpose to return home 
 with his people, and prosecute the enterprise no further. 'The MacDonalds of 
 Glencoe,' he said, 'would be dishonoured by remaining in a service where others than 
 their own men were employed to restrain them, under whatsoever circumstances of 
 provocation, within the line of their militaiy duty.' The Eoyal Adventurer granted the 
 request of the high-.spirited Chieftain, and the MacDonalds of Glencoe guarded from 
 the slightest injury the house of the cruel and crafty statesman who had devised and 
 directed the massacre of their ancestors. Considering how natural the thirst of 
 vengeance becomes to men in a primitive state of society, and how closely it was 
 interwoven with the character of the Scottish Highlander, Glencoe's conduct on this 
 occasion is a noble instance of a high and heroic preference of duty to the gratification 
 of revenge." 
 
 We are here naturally reminded of the picture given by Sir Walter, in the "Lady 
 of the Lake," of another Highland Chief — 
 
 "This murderous Chief, this ruthless man, 
 This head of a rebellious Clan, 
 Hath led thee safe through watch and ward 
 Far past Clan Alpine's outmost guard." «. 
 
 And often, indeed, in the history of the Highlands, 
 
 "Shine martial Faith, and Courtesy's bright star, 
 Through all the wreckful storms that cloud the brow of War." 
 
 Many are the instances of a high chivalric sense of honour and generosity to be met 
 with in the days of the Clans. 
 
 Note E. — Page 15. 
 
 DR ARCHIBALD CAMERON. 
 
 Among the Eassiefern papers is one bearing the following title: "Copy of what Dr 
 Archibald Cameron intended to have delivered to the Sheriff of Middlesex at the place 
 of execution, but which he left in the hands of his wife for that end ; with a letter 
 from Dr Cameron, when under sentence of death, to his son in France — to which is 
 added an authentick account of his behaviour at the place of execution. London: 
 printed in the year 1753." 
 
 In this paper, which is very brief, Dr Cameron complains of being condemned on 
 
104 APPENDIX. 
 
 the okl attainder passed against him in IV-IS. He does not, however, make any offer 
 of allegiance to the reigning monarch, but glories in his devotedness to the House of 
 Stuart. The pleas which he brings foi-ward for his life being spared, are principally 
 his having often spared the lives and property of his enemies when in his power. He 
 specially mentions that he and his brother, Lochiel, were the means of preventino- the 
 Prince's army, at their first gathering, from ravaging the lands of the Earl of 
 Breadalbane, a name obnoxious to many of the Clans on account of its connection with 
 the massacre of Glencoe. He says that with great difficulty he prevented his brother's 
 men from sacking the town of Kirkintilloch — the people of that town "havino- two 
 months before murdered two of Lady Lochiel's servants ;" and he especially mentions 
 that he and Lochiel were the means of saving Glasgow from general plunder, as Mr 
 Campbell of Shawfield, and the principal gentry in the neighbourhood, could testify. 
 This last fact we have frequently seen mentioned elsewhere ; and not only is it quite in 
 accordance with the enlightened and humane character of "the gentle Lochiel," but the 
 family seems to have been connected with, and interested in Glasgow particularly. In 
 the beginning of the sixteenth century, one of them, John Cameron, was Bishop of 
 Glasgow, a man whom Buchanan, in his History of Scotland, denounces as tyrannical 
 and utterly unprincipled, but who is represented by the author of Sir Ewen Cameron's 
 Life as singularly able and excellent. Again, John Cameron of Fassiefem, of whom we 
 liave so frequently spoken in the text, was a citizen of Glasgow. His Burgess Ticket, 
 dated July, 1735, is before us, and differs less than might be expected from those granted 
 in the present day. It appears that Sir Ewen of Lochiel obtained, or purchased, property 
 in the West Indies. How it was managed by him, or by his son, we know not, but we 
 see from other documents, that, in singular contrast to the contempt for commerce 
 attributed to the Highland gentry of the day, two of his grandsons, Evan and 
 Alexander, went to the West Indies to manage this property. Evan took with him, in 
 1734, a cargo of people from Maryburgli, as Fort-WiUiam was then called, to carry to 
 the West Indies, "and it was believed in tiie country that he had made rich in Jamaica." 
 It must have been in connection with these — his two brothers — that John of Fassiefern 
 sought and obtained the privileges of citizenship in Glasgow, a place which was and is 
 deeply interested in the West India trade. 
 
 We subjoin the following brief quotations from the paper before us, as referring to 
 points which will always continue interesting: "I cannot pass by in silence that most unjust 
 and hoi-rid calumny — of giving no quarter to our enemy— raised by the rebels under the 
 inhuman son of the Elector of Hanover, which served as an excuse for the unparalleled 
 butchery committed by his orders in cold blood after the unhappy affair of Culloden, 
 which, if true, must have come to my knowledge, who had the honour to serve my dear 
 master in the quality of one of his aides-de-camp. And I hereby declare I never heard 
 such order. The above is truth. Aechd. Cameeon. 
 
 "I likewise declare, on the word of a dying man, that the last time I had the 
 honour to see his Eoyal Highness, Charles Prince of Wales, he told me from his own 
 mouth, and bade me assure his friends from him, that he was a member of the Church 
 of England." 
 
 With what amoiint of sincerity the Prince made the above declaration we know not ; 
 but we give one quotation more, as illustrating the remarkable power of winning 
 affection and regard which it is well known he possessed in so eminent a degree: "As 
 soon as the royall youth had set up the King, his ffather's standard, I immerliately, as 
 in duty bound, repaired to it, and as I had the honour from that time to be almost 
 
APPENDIX. 105 
 
 constantly about his person till November, 17-i8, (excepting the short time after the 
 affair of Culloden, that his Eoyal Highness was in the Western Isles,) I became more 
 and more captivated with his amiable and princely virtues, which are indeed in every 
 instance so eminently great as I want words to describe. I can farther affinn (and my 
 present situation, and that of my dear Prince, too, can leave no room for flattery) that 
 as I have been his companion in the lowest degree of adversity that ever prince was 
 reduced to, so I have beheld him, too, as it were, on the highest pinnacle of glory, 
 amidst the continual applauses, and I had almost said the adorations, of the most 
 brilliant Court in Europe ; yet he was always the same, ever affable and courteous, 
 giving constant proofs of his great humanity and love for his friends and his country. 
 What great good to these nations might not be expected from such a prince were he hi 
 possession of the throne of his ancestors ! . . . I the more cheerfully resign my 
 life, as it is taken away for dohig my duty to my God, my King, and my country ; nor 
 is there anything in this woild I could so much wish to have it prolonged for as to 
 have another opportunity of employing the remainder of it in the same glorious cause." 
 
 It is deserving of mention, that on the inside of the envelope covering these papere 
 is a slight pencil sketch of a youthful figiire in the dress of the period of Charles II., 
 probably an outline, traced by the father, of the features of the son to whom he was 
 ])enning his dying counsel, and transmitting his dying blessing. The letter to the son 
 is only a fragment. Its composition appears to have been cut short by the arrival of 
 the executioner. 
 
 We have much pleasure in adding the following strong testimony to Dr Cameron's 
 character and attainments, from the high authority of Lord Camjjbell, given in a foot 
 note, p. 247, Vol. VI. of "The Lives of the Lord Chancellors," etc., mentioning that 
 in the extract he is erroneously named Alexander, instead of Archibald. 
 
 " The subsequent execution of Dr Archd. Cameron, in 1753, I regard as a wanton 
 atrocity. He was a man of literature and science, who, having studied surgery, had 
 accompanied his brother, the famous Lochiel, into the field in 1745, that he might 
 take care of him when wounded ; and had escaped with Prince Charles, after the 
 battle of Culloden. His name was included in the act of attainder, and he was 
 appointed surgeon to a regiment in the Prench service. Some years after, in a time 
 of profound tranquillity, when all real danger of Jacobitism had passed away, he 
 visited his native country to arrange his private affairs, and, being betrayed, was 
 sent to London, arraigned on the act of attainder, and without trial, executed as a 
 traitor at Tyburn; displaying the brightest qualities of a philosopher and a Christian." 
 
 Note P. — Page 17. 
 
 lochiel's tenantry. 
 Since going to press, we have met with the record of a law-plea regarding a portion of 
 his estate, in which Lochiel was engaged in 1792. Amid evidence on various other 
 points, it is deponed that, on his being restored to his lands in 1 784, aU his tenantry 
 except two — MacLachlan, Coruanain, and Cameron, Erracht — voluntarily gave him an 
 increase of rent; and this they did while they held leases of these lands from the 
 " Commissioners on Forfeited Estates." Such considerate generosity could hardly have 
 been expected from "savages, slaves, and cut-throats!" It may be added, that the reason 
 of Coruanain's not following the general example was his being a minor, and under 
 trustees at the time. 
 
 r 
 
106 appendix. 
 
 Note G. — Page 21. 
 number of soldielis furnished by the highlands. 
 
 For confirmation of the apparently startling statement in* the text, we refer to the 
 "Sketches of the Character of the Highlands," etc., etc., by the late General David 
 Stewart of Garth, Vol. II., page 439 : " We thus find that . . . the whole corps 
 embodied in the Highlands amounted to twenty-six bJCttalions of fencible infantry, 
 which, in addition to the fifti/ battalions of .the line, three of reserve, and seven of 
 militia, formed altogether a force of eighty-six Highland Regiments embodied in the 
 course of the four wars in which Britain had been engaged since the Black Watch 
 was regimented in 1740. From a first glance, the allowing of 1000 men to each of 
 the eighty-six regiments would appear to come near the truth, but on a closer view it 
 will be found to be far short of the actual number. . . . Several of the regiments 
 had in the course of their service treble or quadruple their original number in their 
 ranks. Thus, the 71st, the 72d, and the 73d, during the thirty-one years they were 
 Highland — that is, from their formation in 1778 to 1809 — had at the least 3000 High- 
 landers each; and other regiments had numbers in proportioji to the length and 
 nature of their service, both in tropical and temperate climates." 
 
 We may remark that the immense majority of all these men was raised within forty 
 years, from 1777 to 1813; and especially would we observe that General Stewart's 
 statements are not made at random, that they are to be relied on as perfectly accurate. 
 He gives the place and date of the raising of eveiy regiment, the number of men 
 embodied, and frequently a full list of all the officers. 
 
 We know no man who, in a literary point of view, has deserved so well of the 
 Highlands as General Stewart, in publishing the work from which we have quoted. 
 Unfortunately, he has very few competitors; but judging of his work relatively or 
 absolutely, it deserves the highest praise for elaborate research, and above all, for clear, 
 definite, incontrovertible statement, given with true military frankness. We refer not 
 so much to the commencement of the work, which treats of the character, manners, etc., 
 of the Highlanders; but his "Military Annals" are beyond all praise. 
 
 The detailed account given of the original formation of the "Black Watch," their 
 embodiment as the 42d Royal Highland Regiment, and the many deeds of dauntless 
 heroism performed by them from Fontenoy to Waterloo, is itself deeply interesting and 
 valuable. Besides, as we have noticed above, he records the raising of every other 
 Highland regiment, and follows out the history of some of them with elaborate 
 minuteness. He also gives, from pubhc authentic sources, such incontrovertible proofs 
 of the superior character of these regiments, showing how very rarely desertion or 
 punishment found place among them^how often acts of rare fidelity and honour were 
 performed by soldiers in the ranks — as to prove that these men deserved as much praise 
 for high moral principle as for intrepidity in the field. . 
 
 Most appropriately does he quote the words of the great Pitt, on the subject of 
 the Highland regiments: "I sought for merit wherever it was to be found; it is my 
 boast that I was the first minister who looked for it and found it in the mountains of 
 the North. I called it forth, and drew into your service a hardy and intrepid race of 
 men, who, when left by your jealousy, became a prey to the artifice of your enemies, 
 and had gone nigh to have overturned the state in the war before the last. These men 
 in the last war were brought to combat on your side ; they served with fidelity, as they 
 fought with valour, and conquered for you in every part of the world." 
 
APPENDIX. 107 
 
 Many of General Stewart's anecdotes are exceedingly interesting, ' and highly 
 illustrative of the olden time, and his book, taking it all in all, gives a fuller and 
 fairer view of the real character of the Highlanders than any book we have ever met 
 with. Tlie circumstances in which he was placed enabled him to do justice to his 
 subject. Of an ancient family, a landed proprietor, thoroughly acquainted with the 
 language and the habits of his people, and at the same time a soldier who commanded 
 Highlanders, in the most distant quarters of the world, from North -America to the 
 East Indies — he had the amplest opportunities of knowing them in every relation. 
 Yet, strange to say, neither Baron Macaulay nor any other southern writer on the 
 Highlands, that we know of, ever refers to "General Stewart's Sketches," while Burt's 
 Letters are regarded as infallible oracles. The one was as favourably as the other was 
 unfavourably situated for forming a correct judgment of the subject; but fiction is more 
 exciting than facts, and exaggeration more telling than a simple natural delineation. 
 
 Before concluding our reference to General Stewart's book, we must remark that it 
 fonns an admirable foundation for a more extended work, for a true representation of 
 Highland life and manners. In some respects it is necessarily a skeleton, presenting 
 merely the name, rank, place, and period of death of the officers who led the first 
 Highland regiments; but were this skeleton clothed in flesh and blood — were the 
 surviving friends of many of these gallant men to give personal and home details of 
 their lives, much might yet be done towards presenting a faithful picture — drawing up 
 a true account of the Highlands from 1740 downwards. 
 
 From the appendix to this very interesting work we give the following list of the 
 officers who belonged to the 92d, or Gordon Highlanders, at the original formation of 
 the coqjs in 1794: — 
 
 Lieutenant-Colonel Commandant, Maequis of Huntly. 
 
 Majoes. 
 Charles Erskine of Cardross, killed in Egypt in 1801. 
 Donald MacDonald of Boisdale, died in 1795. 
 
 Captains. 
 Alexander Napier of Blackstoue, killed at Corunna in 1809. 
 John Cameron of Fassiefeni, killed at Quatre Bras in 1815. 
 Hon. Jolih Eamsay, son of Lord Dalhousie, Colonel on half-pay. 
 Andrew Baton, retired. 
 
 William Mackintosh of Aberarder, killed in Holland in ] 799. 
 
 Alexander Gordon, son of Lord Eockville, killed at Talavera in- 1808, Lieutenant- 
 Colonel of 83d regiment. 
 Simon MacDonald of Morer, retired, dead. 
 
 . Captain-Lieutenant. 
 
 John Gordon, retired as Major. ^ 
 
 Lieutenants. W 
 
 Peter Grant, died in 1817, Major on half-pay. 
 
 Archibald MacDonell, died in 1813, Lieutenant-Colonel of Veterans. 
 
 Alexander Stewart, Colonel on half-pay. 
 
 Sir John MacLean, Colonel, K.C.B., on half-pay. 
 
108 APPENDIX. 
 
 Peter Gordon, died 1806. 
 
 Thomas Forbes, killed at Toulouse, 1814>, Lieutenant-Colonel of tlie 4.5tU regiment. 
 
 Eweu MacPherson, Lieutenant-Colonel Veterans. 
 
 George H. Gordon. ^ 
 
 Ensigns. 
 
 Charles Dowle, died of wounds in Egypt, 1801. 
 
 George Davidson, killed at Quatre Bras, ISlo, Captain in the Hi regiment 
 
 Archibald MacDonald, retired. 
 
 Alexander Fraser, killed 2d October, 1799. 
 
 William Tod, retired. 
 
 James Mitchell, Lieutenant-Colonel in 1815, retired in 1819. 
 
 Chaplain, William Gordon. * ^ 
 
 Quarter-Master, Peter Wilkie, died in 1806. 
 
 Surgeon, William Findlay, died in Egypt, 1801. 
 
 This list was drawn up by General Stewart in 1822. Few of those who founded 
 and trained, that brave regiment were alive even at that period, and we believe the 
 thirty-seven years which have since passed have swept them all away. Veiy few even of 
 those who fought at Quatre Bras and Waterloo survive to the present day. 
 
 We add one more statement as to the number of men contributed to the public 
 service by the Highlands, which was published eight years ago, by the Eev. Alexander 
 MacGregor, now one of the ministers of Inverness, formerly minister of Kilmuir in 
 Skye — a gentleman whose extensive and accurate knowledge of Highland statistics is 
 well known — 
 
 " From the commencement of the late wars the island of Skye alone had furnished 
 no fewer than 21 Lieutenant-Generals and Major-Generals, 48 Lieutenant-Colonels, 
 600 commissioned officers of inferior rank, and 10,000 foot-soldiers, 4 Governors of 
 British Colonies, one Governor-General, one Adjutant-General, one Chief Baron of 
 England, and one Judge of the Supreme Court of Scotland." 
 
 Note H.— Page 31. 
 
 When in Marmorice Bay a meeting took place between Cameron and a Turkish officer, 
 so singular, alike in its opening and its close, that we consider it worth relating. We 
 have to add, that though the relation seems to partake of the marvellous, it is strictly 
 and literally true : — * 
 
 As Cameron and another Highland officer were one day walking hi the country at 
 a few miles' distance from the Bay, they met a Turkish dignitary, evidently of high 
 rank, attended by a numerous retinue, among whom was a train-bearer, carrying the 
 sku'ts of his long-flowing white robe. The thorough contrast of such a dress to the 
 scant philaheg, and the appearance of luxurious effeminacy which the whole scene 
 presented, roused alike the contempt and ire of the Highlanders, one of whom said to 
 the other, in their native tongue, which they of course believed to be unknown m 
 Turkey: "Do you see the fellow with the tail? it is easy telling who his mother was, 
 the lazy dog!" Greatly to their astonishment and confusion, the Turk promptly 
 replied in Gaelic as geimine as their own: "Ay, my man, and what sort of mother 
 may own you for her cub?" This was not a hopeful opening of a conferenca The 
 
APPEKDIX. 109 
 
 sound of the Celtic tongue in Turkey, however, operated as a charm. Apologies were 
 freely offered on one side, and frankly accepted on the other. The Turkish officer 
 dined with the 9 2d on board ship next day, and requited their hospitality V^y sending 
 them very handsome presents, among which were boat-loads of fi'uit, which, owing to 
 the health of the troops at the time, proved particulai-ly valuable. He told them that 
 his name was Campbell — that he was a native of Lochaber, having been born in 
 Fort-William — that he had left the place in early youth, and after a variety of 
 adventures in different countries and climes, had entered the Turkish anny, where lie 
 now held a high post in the artillery department. 
 
 This strange meeting with his countrymen awakened in him the long slumbering 
 memories of home and kindred. He wrote to Fassiefern to make inquiry about any 
 surviving relatives. None of them were found in that neighbourhood; but some, and 
 in a most respectable position, were found in the neighbourhood of Campbelton, 
 Argyleshire. They entered into correspondence witli him ; luit we have not learned 
 what the close of his care(!r was, whether he re-visited his native land, or died in his 
 adopted country. 
 
 An old Lochaber man, of whom we made inquiry on the subject, tells us that 
 Campbell, when a boy in Fort- William, had quarrelled with one of his school-fellows, 
 that they retired to some distance from the village to settle the dispute, and fought so 
 fiercely that the other boy died soon after in consequence of the injuries received in the 
 combat. Campbell immediately left the countiy, nor was he again heard of until the 
 accidental rencontre with his countrymen in Marmorice Bay restored his connection 
 with the scenes of his youth. 
 
 Note I. — Pages 32, 44. 
 
 We found the following list in the pocket-book carried by Colond Cameron at Quatre 
 Bras. It is dated at Alexandria, 24th September, 1801, and was evidently the first 
 part of a complete roll of all the men that he had brought to the regiment when he 
 first joined it. We have been unable to trace the remainder of it ; but imperfect as it is, 
 we insert it, both as fidly proving what we have said about the minute interest he took 
 in his men, and also as likely to prove interesting to the surviving relatives of these 
 brave soldiers — 
 
 Name. Where from. 1 Name. Where from. 
 
 Ewen Kennedy, Moy. [ Ewen Kennedy, Fassiefern. 
 
 Sergeant P. Ferguson, Kinlocharkaig. ] Angus Henderson, Annat. 
 
 Sergeant A. Cameron, Achnacany. j Duncan MacKenzie, Balachulish. 
 
 Corporal A. Cameron, Clunes. | AJjex. Cameron, Moy» . 
 
 John Cameron, Murshirlach j Sergeant D. Camfii-on, Barr. 
 
 Ewen MacMillan, Glendessarie. ! Corporal N. Cameron, Invermaillie. 
 
 Corporal A. Cameron, Glendessarie. i Alex. Kennedy, Clunes. 
 
 Donald Eankin, Fort-William. ! Allan MacMaster, Glenmaillie. 
 
 Corporal D. MacEacheni, . . . Fort-WiUiam. ! John MacPhie, Glendessarie. 
 
 Sergeant E. Cameron, Achnasaul. | 
 
 N.B. — Ewen MacMillan, Kinlocharkaig, died at Manuorice; Charles and John 
 Cameron, Counich; Ewen Cameron, Glen.sulaig; and Donald Campbell, Barra, died at 
 Aboukir. 
 
110 APPENDIX. 
 
 It will at once strike any one perusing the alx)ve list as remarkable, that of the 
 nineteen here mentioned, no fewer than eiglit were, within five years of the raising of 
 the regiment, made Sergeants, or Corporals. More than this, as alluded to in the text, 
 four of these were afterwards raised to the rank of commissioned officers — Ewen 
 Keimedy, Moy, killed at Maya; Sergeant D. Cameron, Barr, who died in his native 
 land only a few years ago, and left a most comfortable provision for his family ; Alex. 
 Cameron, Moy, who likewise died in his native land; and "Sergeant P. Ferguson, 
 Kinlocharkaig," who recently died in the south. 
 
 We may further mention that "Sergeant A. Cameron, Achnacarry," was offered a 
 commission, which, partly from diffidence, and partly from bad health, he declined. 
 He is still living at Bunree, in his native parish, feeble and bed-ridden, but an 
 uncommonly intelligent and respectable man. 
 
 "Angus Henderson, Annat," is the only other one we know of among the whole of 
 the original Lochaber 92d men who still survives. He attained the rank of Sergeant, 
 and earned several medals and decorations. From 179-i to 1815 he was present in no 
 fewer than forty-four actions ; but is hale and hearty, not yet to be despised in an 
 action. He lives in Fort-WilKam, where he is much respected by all who know him, 
 and is in appearance, as well as from his uniformly decided conduct, an excellent 
 specimen of " the stem valoiir of the 9 2d." 
 
 The following account of the conduct of the 92d at Waterloo, though, strictly 
 speaking, not belonging to oiir subject, will be found interesting. 
 
 General Stewart (Vol. II. p. 278,) after describing their gallantry at Quatre Brks, 
 and the " loss of their brave commander," says, " At Waterloo, as at Quatre Bras, the 
 Gordon Highlanders were in the Ninth Brigade with the Royal Scots, the Royal 
 Highlanders, and the -iith Regiment. After mentioning the defeat of the Belgians, 
 which "left a large space open for the enemy," he says, "To occupy this space, . . . 
 the third battalioTi of the Royal Scots, and second . battalion of the 44th were ordered 
 up. A sharp conflict of some duration ensued. The enemy's columns continuing to 
 press forward, these two regiments lost many men, and expended their ammunition. 
 General Pack, observing this, ordered up the Highlanders, calluig out, 'Ninety-second, 
 now is your time — charge!' The order was answered by a shout. The regiment 
 instantly formed, and rashed to the front, against a column equal in length to their line, 
 which was only two men in depth, while the column was ten or twelve. The enemy 
 stood as if in suspense, till the Highlanders apjjroached, when, seemingly panic-struck, 
 they wheeled to the rear, and fled in the utmost confusion." 
 
 We give another extract from the "Battle of Waterloo," etc., by George 
 Jones, Esq., R.A., p. 23 of the 11th edition: — "Towards the afternoon, when the 92d 
 were reduced to scarce 200 men, a column of 2,000 of the enemy bore down upon 
 them, when this chosen band charged this overwhelming force with their bayonets, 
 penetrating into the centre of them ; the Scots Greys, cheering the brave Highlanders, 
 rushed forward to support them, driving the enemy back with great loss." 
 
 At page 58 of the same work, we find the following quotation from Viscount 
 Vanderfosse, giving a very high character of the Highland regiments generally — a 
 character to which, as is well known, not merely Belgian, but even French authorities 
 assent: — "On the 16th and 18th of June, 1815, their valour was displayed in a 
 manner the most heroic. Multiplied, constant, and almost unheard-of proofs were 
 given, I do not merely say of courage, but of devotion to their country, quite 
 extraordinary and sublime; nor must we forget that these men, so terrible in the 
 
APPENDIX. , 111 
 
 s 
 
 field of battle, were mild and tranquil out of it." He previously says, " This 
 honoui'able mention is due to their discipline, their mildness, their patience, their 
 humanity, and their bravery without example." 
 
 Note K. — Page 82. 
 
 We give the following eloquent and appropriate remarks on the effects which the 
 bag-pipe produces on the feelings of the Highlanders, from the preface to MacDonald's 
 "Ancient Martial Music of Scotland:" — 
 
 " In halls of joy, and in scenes of mourning it has prevailed ; it has animated her 
 (Scotland's) warriors in battle, and welcomed them back after their toils, to the homes 
 of their love and the hills of their nativity. Its strains were the first sounded on the 
 ears of infancy, and they are the last to be forgotten in the wanderings of age. Even 
 Highlanders will allow that it is not the gentlest of instruments ; but when far from 
 their mountain homes, what sounds, however melodious, could thrill round their heart 
 like one burst of their own wild native pipe? The feelings which other instruments 
 awaken are general and undefined, because they talk alike to Frenchmen, Spaniards, 
 Germans, and Highlanders, for they are common to all; but the bag-pipe is sacred to 
 Scotland, and speaks a language which Scotsmen only feel. It talks to them of home 
 and all the past, and brings before them, on the burning shores of India, the wild hills 
 and oft-frequented streams of Caledonia, the friends that are thinking of them, and the 
 sweethearts and wives that are weeping for them there ! and need it be told here, to 
 how many fields of danger and victory its proud strains have led! There is not a 
 battle that is honourable to Britain in which its war-blast has not sounded. When 
 every other instrument has been hushed by the confusion and carnage of the scene, it 
 has been borne into the thick of battle, and, far in the advance, its bleeding but 
 devoted bearer, sinking on the earth, has sounded at once encouragement to his 
 countrymen and his own coronach." 
 
 Note L. — Page 91. 
 
 BLIND ALLAN. 
 
 We wish that we could accord to all the compositions of this Bard the praise which we 
 have bestowed on his Elegy to Colonel Cameron. Regard to the interests of moraUty 
 compels lis, however, to say that several of his lays, liowever harmonious in language, 
 are, like too many of the compositions of far greater poets, disfigured by licentiousness 
 of sentiment, and thus deserving of all reprobation. 
 
 Note M. — Page 91 
 
 " Sacred to the memory of Colonel Jo^N Cameron, eldest son of Sir Ewen Cameron 
 of Fassiefern, Bart., whose mortal remains, transported from the field of glory where lie 
 died, rest here with those of his forefathers. During twenty years of active military 
 service, with a spirit which knew no fear and shunned no danger, he accompanied, or 
 
112 APPENDIX. 
 
 led. in iiiiuclies, sieg-e.s, and battles, the 92d Regiment of Scottish Highlanders, always . 
 to honour, and almost always to victory; and at length, in the forty-second* year of his 
 age,'upon the memorable 16th of Jime, 1815, was slain in command of that corps, 
 wliile actively contributing to achieve the decisive victory of Waterloo, which gave 
 ])eace to Europe. Thus closing his militaiy career with the long and eventful struggle, 
 in which his services had Ijeen so often distinguished, he died, lamented by that 
 unrivalled General, to whose long train of success he had so often contributed ; by his 
 country, from which he had repeatedly received marks of the highest consideration ; 
 and by his Soveieign, who gTaced his surviving family with those marks of honoui' 
 which could not follow, to this place, him whom they were designed to commemorate. 
 Reader, call not his fate tmtimely, who, thus honoured and lamented, closed a life of 
 fame hy a death of glory !" 
 
 * An error — he was in the forty-fourth year of his age. 
 
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