Series 1 > Loyall dissuasive

INTRODU CTION
Ixiii
was through all his subsequent troubles. Their history would
lead us too far afield. It is well to pause here, when, after
failure, the Loyall Dissuasive secures a permanent triumph.
The Band of 1744 abides in force, and though, alas ! many of
the old houses know Macpherson no more, yet Clan Vurich
and its tribes all over the world give to Cluny as Chief of old
Clan Chattan loving loyalty, founded on community of blood.
We must now glance at the work of Sir JEneas in its bear¬
ing upon the origin and history of Clan Chattan and its great
and abiding controversy between the partisans of Mackintosh
and of Macpherson.
Though an expert lawyer, and well read for his time, it must
be conceded that he is no sure guide in the mist enshrouding
his subject. Nor is this to be wondered at. His authority in
the history of the Scottish tribes was Hector Boece, as pre¬
sented by Buchanan. Thomas Innes was bom near Aboyne,
in 1662, while JSneas, trusting to the first principal of King’s
College, Aberdeen, as given to him in the pages of Buchanan,
was already fathering Clan Chattan on the Chatti of Germany
and on Catalonia in Spain. The Critical Essay and The
Civil and Ecclesiastical History of Scotland by Innes began the
elucidation of Scottish History, and how brilliantly, and at the
same time how substantially, its work has been followed up
by the scholars of Aberdeen (whence the former fiction arose)
is known to all. George Chalmers, Joseph Robertson, John
Stuart, Cosmo Innes, George Grub, William Skene are names
that come into our thought without thinking, and they have
been accompanied and followed by eminent students whose
researches have brought many children of the mist into the
sunlight. Had iEneas followed, instead of preceding them,
we should have had an account of Clan Chattan at once
brilliant and trustworthy. As it stands it is neither. But he
is not to be blamed. It was as good as, and sometimes better
than, the tales of his contemporaries.