Historical memoirs of Rob Roy and the Clan Macgregor

28 INTRODUCTORY SKETCH.
resisted, so that, within the last century, it was
not unusual for a proprietor to carry with him
an armed force to compel his tenantry to pay.
This, in particular, was the case with the island
of Islay and the extensive districts of Ardna-
murchan and Sunart in Argyllshire. The for-
mer was sold, not sixty years ago, for a sum
which is now* its yearly rental, viz., ,£12,000;
and the latter, about the same period, was given
in lease for 999 years for a rent of .£300, which
lands now pay about £7000 a year. Both these
valuable estates were thus disposed of because
the proprietors could get no rent from the occu-
piers, and one of these gentlemen was shot in
going to uplift his rent.t
The doctrines of the Reformation were not
considered of such importance by the High-
landers as for some time to change their creed.
They had never owned the supremacy of mon-
archical power until a late period, and they re-
garded not the degrees enacted by the lords of
the congregation. But from events which fol-
lowed, and which agitated and distracted other
parts of the kingdom, they were not free. They
experienced sundry deeds of atrocity equally
obnoxious to justice as they were to humanity ;.
* In 1819. +See Note, page 193.