History of the Clan MacLean from its first settlement at Duard Castle, in the Isle of Mull, to the present period

Partisans op the House of Stuart — -1598 to 1746. 193
the actual debt and the great amounts paid on it, through the manipuhitions
of the eightli and ninth Earls of Argyle and Lauderdale, it rapidly reached
the amount of £200,000, exclusive of previous payments.
Daring the time of the negotiations relating to the settlement of this
debt, there were instances of some interest which transpired that should not
fail to be recorded. Archibald Campbell, ninth earl of Argyle, was anxious
that lord MacDonald should not assist the MacLeans in their struggles against
his persecutions. On September 10, 1G75, he addressed MacDonald a flatter-
ing letter, and, among otiicr things, states he had received a commission of
fire, and was " ready to go about the business ;" and farther adds : " I am con-
fident you will not make their word good who say that you will assist the out-
laws of the MacLaincs in opposing his majesty's commission." * But the
MacDonalds did lend assistance. During the same month, the MacLoans, the
MacDonalds of Glcngai-ry, and the Brae of Lochaber and the Camerons, to
the number oF three hundred men, in fourteen boats, 'assaulted one of Argyle's
frigates, sent from Leith and becalmed near an old castle in Ardnamurchan.
After the frigate had received one hundred and four shot in her mainsail, she
succeeded in beating off" her assailants. f
The MacLeans of Lochbuy were not idle spectators of the stirring scenes
around them. On October 18, 1675, Locldjuy, with the brothers of MacLean
of Kingerloch and three score men, in three birlinos, during the night landed
in the isles of Garvelloch, and either destroyed or carried away fifty-two cows ;
twelve stirks ; one hundred and twenty sheep ; several clothes chests ; brass
and iron work to the amount of £436 ; one great cauldron, £40 ; four pans,
£12; iron pots, £40 : ironwork, £12; twelve silver spoons, £80 ; four silver
dishes, £100 ; one six-oared boat, £100 ; tliirty stones of butter; forty balls
of victuals, besides leaving the inhabitants, thirty-two in number, destitute. |
In the same year, MacLean of Lochbuy, Lauchlan MacLean of Brolass, Major
David Ramsay, and others, raided the island of Kerrera, and carried off
" many cattle, stirks, kye," etc., for which they weri* charged to appear in
Edinburgh. 1 1
Campbell of Inverawe, writing to Argyle, states that, on February 24,
1677, a party of Argyle's men, who were garrisoning Duard Castle, seized a
boat with Irish victuals in Lochiel, six miles from Duard, and brought her to
the castle ; but before the boat could be unloaded, the laird of Kingerloch's
brother and Ardgour's brother, with about seventy men, got between the castle
* Appendix to Sixth Report Hist. MS Gimm.is>iiv?i, p. tjl7. f Ibid. J Ibid., p. G28. || Ibid.