Blair Collection > Celtic magazine > Volume 2

THE CELTIC T^IAGAZINE. 3i3i
turned from Holland, having the charge of a Captain. This gentleman
came one afternoon abroad to his pasture in the fields, and tliis John
Macdonald meets him, and seetli his cloaths shining like the skins of
fishes, and his periwig all wet, though indeed the day was fine and very
iixir ; whereupon he told privately, even then, to one of Coil's gentlemen,
that he feared he should be drowned. Tliis gentleman was Charles Mac-
lean, who gave me account of it. The event followed about a year
thereafter ; for the Laird of Coll was drowned in the water of Lochy, in
Lochaber. I examined both Charles Maclean and John Macdonald, and
found that the prediction was as he told me ; and the said John ]\[ac-
donald could produce no other warrant, than that he found such signs
frequently before to forego tlie like events. This man, indeed, was
known to have many visions of this kind, but lie was none of the
strictest life.
" The fifth instance is strange, and yet of certain truth, and known to
the whole inhabitants of the Island of Eigg : — There ^\as a tenant in this
Island, that Avas a native, a follower of the Captain of Clanranald, that
lived in a town called Killdonan, in the year 1685, who told publickly to
the whole inhabitants upon the Lord's Day after divine service, by Father
O'Rain, then priest of that place. That they should all flit out of that
Isle, and plant themselvea somewhere else, because that people of strange
and different habits and arms were to come to the Isle, and to use all acts
of hostility, as killing, burning, tirling, and deforcing of women, finally
to discharge all that the hands -of an enemy could do, but what they
were, or whence they came, he could not tell. At the first there was no
regard had to his words, but frequently thereafter he begged of them to
notice Avhat he said, otherwise they should repent it when they could not
help it, which took such an impression upon some of his near acquaint-
ance, as that severals, even then, some to the Isle of Cannay, some to the
Isle of Rum, fourteen days before the enemy came thither, under the
command of one Major Ferguson, and Captain Pottinger, whilst there
was no word of their coming, or any fear of them conceived. In the
month of June, 1G89, this man fell sick, and Father O'Rain came to see
him, in order to give him the benefit of absolution and extreme unction,
attended with several of the inhabitants of the Isle, Avho, in the first
place, narrowly questioned him l)efore his friends, and begged of him to
recant his former folly, and his vain prediction, to whom he answered,
That they should find very shortly the truth of what he had spoken, and
so he died : and within fourteen or fifteen days thereafter, I was eye-
witness (being then a prisoner with Captain Pottinger) to the truth of
what he did foretell, and being before-hand well instructed of all he said,
I did admire to see it particularly verified, especially that of the different
habits and arms, some being clad with red coats, some Avith white coats
and grenadier caps, some armed Avith sAVord and pike, and some Avith
SAVord and musket."
General SteAvart of Garth, in his " Sketches of the Highlanders,"
relates a very remarkable instance of second sight, Avhich happened in his
OAvn family. His Avords are these : — " Late on an autumnal evening in
the year 1773, the son of a neighbouring gentleman came to my father's
house. He and my mother Avere from home, but several friends Avere in