country people. To this he was
exposed, not only from his being intrusted with the odious office of
depriving the people of their arms and national dress, but still more
from his usually carrying about with him a stock of money and
valuables, considerable for the time and period, and enough of itself
to be a temptation to his murder.

On the 28th day of September, the Sergeant set forth, along with a
party, which was to communicate with a separate party of English
soldiers at Glenshee; but when Davis's men came to the place of
rendezvous, their commander was not with them, and the privates could
only say that they had heard the report of his gun after he had parted
from them on his solitary sport. In short, Sergeant Arthur Davis was
seen no more in this life, and his remains were long sought for in
vain. At length a native of the country, named M'Pherson, made it known
to more than one person that the spirit of the unfortunate huntsman had
appeared to him, and told him he had been murdered by two Highlanders,
natives of the country, named Duncan Terig alias Clerk, and Alexander
Bane Macdonald. Proofs accumulated, and a person was even found to bear
witness, that lying in concealment upon the hill of Christie, the spot
where poor Davis was killed, he and another man, now dead, saw the
crime committed with their own eyes. A girl whom Clerk afterwards
married, was, nearly at the same time, seen in possession of two
valuable rings which the Sergeant used to have about his person.
Lastly, the counsel and agent of the prisoners were convinced of their
guilt. Yet, notwithstanding all these suspicious circumstances, the
panels were ultimately acquitted by the jury.

This was chiefly owing to the ridicule thrown upon the story by the
incident of the ghost, which was enhanced seemingly, if not in reality,
by the ghost-seer stating the spirit to have spoken as good Gaelic as
he had ever heard in Lochaber.--"Pretty well," answered Mr M'Intosh,
"for the ghost of an English sergeant!" This was indeed no sound jest,
for there was nothing more ridiculous, in a ghost speaking a language
which he did not understand when in the body, than there was in his
appearing at all. But still the counsel had a right to seize upon
whatever could benefit his clients, and there is no doubt that this
observation rendered the evidence of the spectre yet more ridiculous.
In short, it is probable that the ghost of Sergeant Davis, had he
actually been to