but to
all intents and purposes of combination and mutual attachment, they
remained the clan Gregor, united together for right or wrong, and
menacing with the general vengeance of their race, all who committed
aggressions against any individual of their number.

They continued to take and give offence with as little hesitation as
before the legislative dispersion which had been attempted, as appears
from the preamble to statute 1633, chapter 30, setting forth, that the
clan Gregor, which had been suppressed and reduced to quietness by the
great care of the late King James of eternal memory, had nevertheless
broken out again, in the counties of Perth, Stirling, Clackmannan,
Monteith, Lennox, Angus, and Mearns; for which reason the statute
re-establishes the disabilities attached to the clan, and, grants a new
commission for enforcing the laws against that wicked and rebellious
race.

Notwithstanding the extreme severities of King James I. and Charles I.
against this unfortunate people, who were rendered furious by
proscription, and then punished for yielding to the passions which had
been wilfully irritated, the MacGregors to a man attached themselves
during the civil war to the cause of the latter monarch. Their bards have
ascribed this to the native respect of the MacGregors for the crown of
Scotland, which their ancestors once wore, and have appealed to their
armorial bearings, which display a pine-tree crossed saltire wise with a
naked sword, the point of which supports a royal crown. But, without
denying that such motives may have had their weight, we are disposed to
think, that a war which opened the low country to the raids of the clan
Gregor would have more charms for them than any inducement to espouse the
cause of the Covenanters, which would have brought them into contact with
Highlanders as fierce as themselves, and having as little to lose.
Patrick MacGregor, their leader, was the son of a distinguished chief,
named Duncan Abbarach, to whom Montrose wrote letters as to his trusty
and special friend, expressing his reliance on his devoted loyalty, with
an assurance, that when once his Majesty's affairs were placed upon a
permanent footing, the grievances of the clan MacGregor should be
redressed.

At a subsequent period of these melancholy times, we find the clan Gregor
claiming the immunities of other tribes, when summoned by the Scottish
Parliament to resist the invasion of the Commonwealth's army, in 1