Lochinvar: A Novel

From beneath arose a response, a faint, wavering cry, without faith or cohesion.

"Ah," cried Lochiell, "have at them now! That is not the cry of men who are going to conquer!"

Dundee raised his hand and the chiefs watched for it to fall. It fell.

"Claymore!" shouted Lochiell, who had been standing like a pillar at the head of his clan.

Keppoch, wild with the joy of battle, instantly fired his gun from where he stood, and throwing his brand into the air, he caught it by the hilt as he too gave the order to charge.

Slowly at first, but quickening their pace as they neared the foe, the clans came down. They held their fire till they were within a hundred yards of the enemy, grimly enduring without reply three separate volleys from the disciplined ranks of the Lowland army. They paused a moment and fired a wild, irregular volley. Then, with the unanimous flash of drawn swords in the air, the whole wild array charged down with a yell upon the triple line of the enemy.

Wat rode by the side of the general; for Dundee charged with the van, exposing himself in the very front of danger. Half way down the slope the old colonel of horse noticed that the Lowland cavalry were not following. He turned in his saddle, lifted his sword, and waved the squadrons on.

"For the king! Charge!" he cried, pointing with the blade to the serried line of Mackay's regiments below.

But at that moment there came another withering volley from the English line, threshing the hill-side like hail. A bullet struck Dundee under the uplifted arm. Instinctively he shifted his bridle hand, and set himself grimly to the charge again; but the quickly growing pallor of his face and the slackness of his grasp told the tale of a terrible wound.

Lochinvar had scarce time to dismount and receive his general in his arms before Dundee fainted and his head fell on Wat's shoulder. His charger galloped on, leading the regiment into action, as though he felt that his master's part had devolved on him.

In an instant the assault swept past them, and Wat and the wounded soldier were left as it had been alone on the field. Here and there a clansman, stricken by a bullet, strove to rise and follow the onset of his clan. He would stumble a few yards, and then throw up his hands and fall headlong. But up from the river edge there came a hell of fiercely mingled sounds. At the first glance at the wound Wat saw there was no hope. Looking over the pale set features of the general, as he lay reclined in his arms, he could see the thin English lines fairly swept away. One or two regiments seemed to have been missed, standing idly at their arms, like forgotten wheat in a corner of an ill-reaped field; but for the rest, clansmen and red soldiers alike had passed out of sight.

Presently the dying commander opened his eyes.

"My lord," said Wat, softly, "how is it with you?"

"Nay, rather, how goes the day?" said Dundee, with an eager look.

"Well for the king," answered Wat.

"Then," replied John Graham, "if it be well with him it is the less the matter for me."

With that he laid his head back on Wat's breast contentedly. He seemed to wander somewhat in his thoughts, speaking fast and disorderly.

"Maybe I was in the wrong – in the wrong. Yet I did it for the king's good. But I was sore vexed for the wife and bairns. And yet the carrier suffered it very unconcernedly, and said he was glad to die – which I can well believe. Maybe he, too, had done well for his king."

His mind dwelt much upon far-off, unhappy things. Anon he seemed to see some terrible tragedy, for he put his hand before his face as if to shut out a painful sight.

"Enough of that, Westerha'," he said, in a grieved tone, "this serves no good end."

Then at the last there came a smile breaking over his face, and he lifted his hand lightly and gently like one who dandles something tender and easily broken.

"'Tis a fine bairn, Jean," he said, pleasantly, "ye may well be proud o' the babe. I wish I could bide wi' you. They might have left me alone this ae nicht. But I must mount and ride. Fare ye weel, Jean, my lass – braw lass and bonny wife ye ever were to me. I must e'en bit and saddle, for I hae a far gate and a gloomy road to travel this night!"

So with no more than this farewell to his wife and young bairn, the hope of the Stuarts, the scourge of the Covenant, the glory of the Grahams, lay dead on the clean-reaped field of victory.

CHAPTER XLVI

THE LEAGUER OF DUNKELD

The leaders of the Highland army knew not for a while whether most to rejoice in the victory which the clans had won for the king, or to grieve for the terrible price which had been paid for it. The army of General Mackay had indeed been swept out of existence. The succors from the distant clans were daily pouring in. Scarlett had arrived with four hundred more of Lochiell's claymores. Ardnamurchan and Morven sent stalwart levies. The way seemed clear to Edinburgh, from whence there came tidings of stricken dismay among the followers of Hamilton, that mighty prince, and where only the Wild Whigs of the West stood firm, patrolling the city and keeping ill-doers in such fear as they had not known since Cromwell encamped betwixt the braes of Canaan and the swamp of Little Egypt.

But Great Dundee was dead, and that balanced all.

For able as were many of the chiefs, and well exercised in their clan warfare, there was not one of them, save it might be Lochiell, who was not jealous of every other.

And Colonel Cannon of the Irish levies, who by virtue of the king's commission held the nominal command, was a man who possessed the confidence of none.

So Wat Gordon, going from clan to clan on the morning after the battle, found nothing but bickering and envies among the victors – how this one had obtained a greater share of the spoil than another, how Glengarry was threatening to cut off Lochiell for the ancient soreness betwixt them, and also because of some supposed favor of position on the day of battle.

"Tut, man," said Lochiell to his vaporing adversary, good-naturedly clapping him on the shoulder, "if you lads of the Garryside are so fighting keen, and as full of hot blood as you say, I doubt not but that a day or two will give you another opportunity of letting out a little of it against the common enemy."

Wat, eager as ever to put the great controversy to the arbitrament of battle, raged impotently, while Major Cannon wheeled and manœuvred the Irishmen through their drills, and carried on his miserable squabblings with the chiefs – whom, in spite of their mutual dislikes and clan jealousies, Dundee had held in leash with such a firm yet delicate hand.

Oftentimes, as day after day was wasted, Lochinvar felt that if only he could throw himself on the enemy, in order, if it might be to cut a way single-handed towards his love – even though he should be slain in the first hundred yards – such an end would be better than this unceasing plundering among allies and bickering between friends.

Nevertheless, the numbers of the Highland army kept up, though the ranks were in a continual state of flux. As for Scarlett, the master-at-arms was driven to distraction by the hopelessness of teaching the clansmen anything.

Things were daily passed over which, had Dundee been above-ground, would in five minutes have brought out a firing party and ended a man's days against a stone dike.

Worst of all, while these precious days, when the whole force ought to have been advancing, were thus idly slipping by, the delay gave the government time to play its strongest card. The fury and enthusiasm of the clans was now for the first time to be brought face to face with an enthusiasm fiercer, because stiller, than their own – with a courage equally great, but graver, sterner, and, best of all, disciplined by years of trial and persecution.

The Cameronians, known throughout Scotland as the "Seven Thousand," had garrisoned Edinburgh during the fierce, troublous months of the Convention. When there was no other force in the country, they had stood between the kingdom and anarchy. And now, when at last the government of William was becoming better established, twelve hundred men of the Blue Banner formed themselves into a regiment – all stern, determined, much-enduring veterans, who had brought from their Westland homes a hatred of the Highlanders sharpened by memories of the Great Raid, when for months the most barbarous and savage clans had been quartered on the West and South, till the poor folk of Galloway and Ayr were fairly eaten up, and most of their hard-won gear vanished clean away into the trackless deserts of the North.

Now, in the anxious days that succeeded Killiekrankie, eight hundred of this Cameronian regiment had been ordered to Dunkeld, which was rightly supposed to be the post of danger. The other four hundred of the regiment had been sent to garrison Badenoch and to keep the West quiet; so that the young Covenanting commander, Cleland – a youth not yet in his twenty-eighth year – had but two-thirds of his regiment with him.

But such men as they were! – none like them had been seen under arms since, the Ironsides of Cromwell went back to their farm-steadings and forges.

It was no desirable stronghold which they were set to keep. Indeed, after a small experience of Dunkeld the other regiments which had been sent under Lord Cardross to assist in driving back the enemy gladly departed for Perth. The town, they said, was completely indefensible. It was commanded on all sides by heights, even as Killiekrankie had been. The streets could readily be forced at a dozen points, and then every man would die miserably, like rats in a hole.

"Even so," said Cleland, calmly, to my Lord Cardross, "but I was bidden to hold this town and no other, and here I and those with me will bide until we die."

And, as is not the case with many a valiant commander's boast, he made his words good.

It was a very considerable army which gathered about the devoted Cameronians – not less than five thousand victorious clansmen – under a leader of experience, if not of well-proven parts.

Wat was still with Lochiell, and Scarlett, in deep disgust at Keppoch's miscellaneous plunderings, drew his sword also with the same chief.

By early morning the town was completely surrounded and the attack began. But the brave band of Wild Whigs of the West stuck dourly to their outposts, and for an hour or more their little handfuls defied behind the walls of town-yards and ruinous petty enclosures, all the assaults of the clansmen. At last these inconsiderable outer defences were driven in, the whole regiment was shut up in the cathedral and in an adjoining house of many unglazed windows, which was standing roofed but unfinished close at hand.

Here the grim men of the South, doggedly saying their prayers behind their clinched teeth, met and turned every assault, taking aim at their assailants with the utmost composure and certainty.

Clan after clan charged down upon those crumbling walls. Rush after rush of plaided men melted before that deadly storm of bullets. Thrice Wat, in the thick of Lochiell's men, dashed at the defences. Thrice was he carried back by the wave of tartan which recoiled from the reeking muskets of the men of the Covenant.

Glengarry fell wounded. The McDonalds broke. Then, in the nick of time, the McLeans dashed into the thick of the fight and had almost won the wall when young Cleland, rushing across the court to meet them in person, was struck by two bullets – one through his head, the other in his side. In spite of his agony, he set his hand to his brow and staggered towards the interior of the church, crying, "Have at them, lads! all is well with me!" This he said in order to conceal his wound from his men. But he fell dead or ever he reached the door.

The lead for the muskets began to give out. But in a moment there were men on the roof of the new building stripping off the metal, while others beneath were melting it and thrusting the bullets, yet warm from the "cams," into their hotter barrels, or cutting the sheets of lead into rough slugs to fire at the enemy.

So, relentlessly, hour by hour the struggle went on. Ever, as the attacks failed, fresh clans tried their fierce courage in emulous assault, firing once, throwing away their guns, and then charging home with the claymore.