was at last killed while fighting fiercely in defence of his charge. Two hundred of the loyalists were drowned in crossing the river near which the battle took place. Four hundred were taken prisoners, including Sir John Hurry and other thirty officers. Lord Frendraught, who had so generously yielded his horse to Montrose, had two wounds, and was taken. As for the victorious party, only two men were wounded, and one drowned. Strachan himself was hit on the belly by a musket bullet; but it was prevented from hurting him by the double plies of his buff-belt, upon which it alighted. The principal standard of the enemy, together with all Montrose's papers, fell into the hands of the victors, who, before quitting the field of battle, rendered thanks to God for their success. They soon after returned to Tain; but the country people of Ross and Sutherland continued to harass and kill the broken loyalists for several days.15 So many of the Orkney levies were slain, 14 that it was afterwards discovered that there was not a family of gentry in that country which had not lost a son or a brother,16 CHAPTER XI. MONTROSE'S capture and EXECUTION. With scoffs, and scorns, and contumelious taunts, Henry VI. WHEN the unfortunate general retired from the field where he had seen his hopes finally and for ever blasted, he directed his route, either by accident or design, along the wild and uninhabited valley, at the mouth of which he had halted before the battle. At first he pursued his way on horseback, accompanied by the friends who had got away with him; but, the ground becoming speedily unfit for his horse, and it being represented to him that he ran the less risk of capture by travelling without a retinue and in a humbler guise, he abandoned in succession his horse and his friends, threw away his cloak, star, and sword, exchanged clothes with a Highland rustic, and toiled along the valley on foot. The whole of that night, and of the next day, and of the next night again, he pursued his lonely and difficult path, his body exhausted by hunger and fatigue, and his mind in all probability a prey to the most agonizing sensations. When at length almost famished, "he fortuned," says the author of the Sutherland Memoirs," to light in his miserie upon a small cottage in the wilderness, where he was supplied with some bread and milk." It must have been a strange sight to see the man who, two days before, seemed to have three kingdoms at his disposal, now reduced to implore the hospitality of the meanest shed which these three kingdoms contained. He was soon after, as he continued his flight, obliged by the extremity of hunger, to devour his gloves.1 His first wish or intention after the battle, seems to have been to get north to Caithness, where he had still a party, and from whence, if no hope remained of renewing the war, he could easily get over to Orkney, or to the Continent. Unfortunately, his want of acquaintance with the country, and the real difficulties of travelling at all through such a mountainous region, prevented him from attaining his object. He could only wander wildly on, in famine and despair, amongst the immense hills which encumber the west of Sutherland, ignorant of almost every local circumstance, except that he believed himself to be leaving his enemies behind him. Even in this satisfactory notion he was fatally disappointed. His enemies, apprised of the direction he had taken, by finding, in succession, his cloak, his sword, and his horse, and conjecturing that he might get into the country of Assynt, the western extremity of Sutherland, dispatched information to that effect, to Neil Macleod, the proprietor of the district, with a strict injunction that he should apprehend whatever stranger of a sus picious appearance came within his bounds, and promising him a splendid reward in case he should seize "James Graham." The Laird of Assynt, who had formerly served under Montrose, and who is even said to have been on foot with his vassals to join him in his present expedition, made no scruple to turn his attention to the duty enjoined upon him, but dispatched everywhere, in search of that "excommunicated traitor," parties of the very men whom he had just before designed for his service. By one of these parties the unfortunate Montrose was discovered, along with an Orkney officer of the name of Sinclair, and both were immediately brought before the laird. When Montrose met his former friend, he thought there would be little difficulty in prevailing upon him to act as his guide to Orkney; but he soon found what a change his reverse of fortune had produced upon the mind of his captor. Neither pity for his condition, nor "great offers," (probably of preferment,) which Montrose made to him, had the least effect upon this hard-hearted man. When the unhappy captive found him perfectly inexorable, he intreated that, by causing his men to dispatch him where he stood, he would save him from the ignominious death which his enemies were sure to inflict upon him. But this favour was also denied; and Assynt immediately sent off intelligence of his capture to General Leslie, who soon after sent a party under Major-General Holburn to conduct him to head-quarters. "Whatever indignities," to use the words of Laing, "the bitterness of party rage or religious hatred could suggest, were now accumulated upon a fallen illustrious enemy, formerly terrible and still detested." Under the charge of Strachan and Halket, who had acquired the chief renown by the late victory, he was conducted through the north, in the same mean habit in which he had been detected; Leslie and Holburn being left behind to complete the reduction of his followers in Caithness and Orkney, which they very easily accomplished. The Argyle government at Edinburgh, on learning the news of Montrose's defeat, had felt such a transport of joy as to decree Strachan a present of a thousand pounds sterling, together with a gold chain, calculated by its length to reach from his neck " to his boot-head," and at the clasp of which there was a costly diamond.5 But when they received intelligence that the hero's person was in their power, they could only express their satisfaction by ordering a public fast and thanksgiving to be observed over all Scotland. Having issued orders for his immediate removal to Edinburgh, they forthwith bestirred themselves in anticipation of his arrival, to settle among themselves the manner of his punishment. A committee of parliament was appointed, consisting of his known enemies, to advise the Estates upon this subject. They, after deliberating a very short time, gave in their opinion in writing, to the effect that, on his arrival, he should be, without further ceremony, sentenced to the ignominious death which his numerous treasons deserved. Montrose, during his melancholy journey to Edinburgh, did not suffer his mind to be disturbed either by the personal indignities to which he was already subjected, or by the prospect of death and torture which lay in all its horrors before him. Knowing the worst which could befall him, and |