Languages & literature > Key to the drama

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contempt it deferved : Maclean ordered
him to quit his houfe in an inftant, or
fwore he would immediately fend his head
as a prefent to his King, with a label inti¬
mating the daring affront he had offered to
his family. The monfter thought it belt to
obey, and thanklefsly left his entertainers,
with a heart as full of refentmentas of luft:
From the caille he went immediately in
quell of fome of his profligate brethren,
and having found out four or five as big
ruffians as himfelf, he with them, returns
to the caftle in the dead of night; and
after fetting fire to one part of it, they en¬
tered fwordin hand into another: Maclean
did not dream of his ungrateful guefl, but
fufpedting them to be a party authorifed by
the King to apprehend and carry him off
a prifoner, on account of a backwardnefs
he had ffiewn to deliver up fome rights of
vaffalage, then in his poffeffion; he en¬
deavoured to conceal himfelf: and the un¬
happy wife imagining ffie rifked nothing,
affifled in leting him down from a back
window from which he might make his ef-
cape. She had juft returned, and was
making towards her own chamber, when
the villain who had infulted her at mid-day,
caught her rudely in his arms; and fup-
pofing that Maclean was ftill in his cham¬
ber, he locked the door, and fet fire to it!
he