The Waverley novels, by Sir Walter Scott, complete in 12 vol., printed from the latest English ed., embracing the author's last corrections, prefaces & notes.

34 WAVERLEY NOVELS.
before the High Court of Justiciary. This point is very learnedly debated
in these pleadings by Mr. Grant, Solicitor for the Crown, and the celebrated
Mr. Lockhart, on the part of the prisoner; but James Mhor did not wait the
event of the Court's decision.
He had been committed to the Castle of Edinburgh on some reports that
an escape would be attempted. Yet he contrived to achieve his liberty even
from that fortress. His daughter had the address to enter the prison, disguised as a cobbler, bringing home work, as she pretended. In this cobbler's
dress her father quickly arrayed himself. The wife and daughter of the
prisoner were heard by the sentinels scolding the supposed cobbler for
having done his work ill, and the man came out with his hat slouched over
his eyes, and grumbling, as if at the manner in which they had treated him.
In this wav the prisoner passed all the guards without suspicion, and made
his escape to France. lie was afterwards outlawed by the Court of Justiciary, which proceeded to the trial of Duncan MacGregor, or Drummond,
his brother, 15th January 1753. The accused had unquestionably been
with the party which carried off Jean Key; but no evidence being brought
which applied to him individually and directly, the jury found him not
guilty, -and nothing more is known of his fate.
That of James MacGregor, who, from talent and activity, if not by
seniority, may be considered as head of the family, has been long misrepresented; as it has been generally averred in Law Reports, as well as elsewhere, that his outlawry was reversed, and that he returned and died in
Scotland. But the curious letters published in Blackwood's Magazine for
December 1817, show this to be an error. The first of these documents is
a petition to Charles Edward. It is dated 20th September 1753, and pleads
his service to the cause of the Stuarts, ascribing his exile to the persecution
of the Itanoverian Government, without any allusion to the affair of Jean
Key, or the Court of Justiciary.- It is stated to be forwarded by MacGregor
Drummond of Bohaldie, whom, as before mentioned, James Mhor acknowledged as his chief.
The effect which this petition produced does not appear. Some temporary
relief was perhaps obtained. But, soon after, this daring adventurer was
engaged in a very dark intrigue against an exile of his own country, and
placed pretty nearly in his own circumstances. A remarkable Highland
story must be here briefly alluded to. Mr. Campbell, of Glenure, who had
been named factor for Government on the forfeited estates of Stewart of
Ardshiel, was shot dead by an assassin as he passed through the wood of
Lettermore, after crossing the ferry of Ballichulish. A gentleman, named
James Stewart, a natural brother of Ardshiel, the forfeited person, was
tried as being accessory to the murder, and condemned and executed upon
very doubtful evidence; the heaviest part of which only amounted to the
accused person having assisted a nephew of his own, called Allen Breck
Stewart, with money to escape after the deed was done. Not satisfied with
this vengeance, which was obtained in a manner little to the honour of the.
dispensation of justice at the time, the friends of the deceased Glenure were
equally desirous to obtain possession of the person of Allan Breck Stewart,
supposed to be the actual homicide. James Mhor Drummond was secretly
applied to to trepan Stewart to the sea-coast, and bring him over to Britain,
to almost certain death. Drummond MacGregor had kindred connexions
with the slain Glenure; and, besides, the MacGregors and Campbells had
been. friends of late, while the former clan and the Stewarts had, as we
have seen, been recently at feud; lastly, Robert Oig was now in custody
at Edinburgh, and James was desirous to do some service by which his
brother might be saved. The joint force of these motives may, in James's
estimation of right and wrong, have been some vindication for engaging in
such an enterprise, although, as must be necessarily supposed, it could
only be executed by treachery of a gross description. MacGregor stipulated