at it to you in the same frank
words--I do not want your testimony."

"I desire not to be thought to make a repartee, when I express only the
plain sense of our position," said I. "But if your lordship has no need
of my testimony, I believe the other side would be extremely blythe to
get it."

Prestongrange arose and began to pace to and fro in the room. "You are
not so young," he said, "but what you must remember very clearly the
year '45 and the shock that went about the country. I read in Pilrig's
letter that you are sound in Kirk and State. Who saved them in that
fatal year? I do not refer to his Royal Highness and his ramrods, which
were extremely useful in their day; but the country had been saved and
the field won before ever Cumberland came upon Drummossie. Who saved it?
I repeat; who saved the Protestant religion and the whole frame of our
civil institutions? The late Lord President Culloden, for one; he played
a man's part, and small thanks he got for it--even as I, whom you see
before you, straining every nerve in the same service, look for no
reward beyond the conscience of my duties done. After the President, who
else? You know the answer as well as I do; 'tis partly a scandal, and
you glanced at it yourself, and I reproved you for it, when you first
came in. It was the Duke and the great clan of Campbell. Now here is a
Campbell foully murdered, and that in the King's service. The Duke and I
are Highlanders. But we are Highlanders civilised, and it is not so with
the great mass of our clans and families. They have still savage virtues
and defects. They are still barbarians, like these Stewarts; only the
Campbells were barbarians on the right side, and the Stewarts were
barbarians on the wrong. Now be you the judge. The Campbells expect
vengeance. If they do not get it--if this man James escape--there will
be trouble with the Campbells. That means disturbance in the Highlands,
which are uneasy and very far from being disarmed: the disarming is a
farce...."

"I can bear you out in that," said I.

"Disturbance in the Highlands makes the hour of our old watchful enemy,"
pursued his lordship, holding out a finger as he paced; "and I give you
my word we may have a '45 again with the Campbells on the other side. To
protect the life of this man Stewart--which is forfeit already on
half-a-dozen different counts if not on this--do you propose to plunge
your country in war, to jeopardise the faith of your fathers,