Matheson Collection > Macleods of Dunvegan from the time of Leod to the end of the seventeenth century

SOME LATER EVENTS 173
This was paid by MacLeod. There is among the papers
a letter to MacLeod, written in 1763, by the man who
brought Lady Grange from St. Kilda. In this he
threatens that he will publish all he knows unless his
silence is bought by a large sum of money.
These documents show that MacLeod knew what had
been done. It is asserted by some writers that the story
of Lady Grange being a spy is a myth, and that Lord
Grange merely wanted to get rid of his wife, and got his
friends, among whom were Sir Alexander MacDonald
and MacLeod, to co-operate in this scheme in order to
do so. But it is difficult to believe that they would join
in such a nefarious and dangerous proceeding merely to
help a friend and, if they did, it does not raise our opinion
of their characters. As I think, therefore, the story
indicates that both Sir Alexander and MacLeod had been
concerned in some of the Jacobite plots of the period.
But this does not prove that they had invited Prince
Charles to come over, and promised to raise their clans
in his support when he did so, as Murray of Broughton
asserts, and that therefore they were guilty of the
foulest treachery in refusing to join him. If they had
made any promises at all, they were probably condi-
tional on the Prince com.ing with a French army and
with large supplies of arms and money. In which case
they would feel that they were not bound by any pledges
they might have given, when Charles Edward came,
absolutely alone, with very few arms and very little
money.
In any case they had not promised more than such
ardent Jacobites as Clan Ranald and Lochiel had done,
and both these Chiefs took the view that the enterprise
was absolutely insane, refused to join in it, and strongly
advised the Prince to return to France without making
any attempt to win his father's crown, and no one has
ever suggested that they were treacherous villains because