Donald of the Isles never forgave Mackenzie for thus refusing to assist him in obtaining the Earldom of Ross, and he determined to ruin him if he could. On this subject the Earl of Cromartie says that at the battle of Harlaw Donald was assisted by almost "all the northern people, Mackenzie excepted, who because of the many injuries received by his predecessors from the Earls of Ross, and chiefly by the instigation and concurrence of Donald's predecessors, he withdrew and refused concurrence. Donald resolved to ruin him, but deferred it till his return, which falling out more unfortunately than he expected, did not allow him power nor opportunity to use the vengeance he intended, for on his return to Ross he sent Mackenzie a friend with fair speeches desiring his friendship, thinking no enemy despicable as he then stood." Murdoch, at Donald's request, proceeded to Dingwall, where the Island Lord urged him to join and promise him to support his interest. This Mackenzie firmly refused, "partly out of hatred to his family for old feuds, partly dissuaded by Donald's declining fortunes" at that particular period; whereupon the Lord of the Isles made Murdoch prisoner in an underground chamber in the Castle of Dingwall. He was not long here, however, when he found an opportunity of making his plight known to some of his friends, and he was soon after released in exchange for some of Donald's immediate relatives who had been purposely captured by Mackenzie's devoted vassals. Here it may be appropriate to give the traditionary account of the origin of the Macraes and how they first found their way to Kintail and other places in the West; for their relationship with the Mackenzies has from the earliest times been of the closest and most loyal character. Indeed, from the aid they invariably afforded them they have been aptly described as "Mackenzie's shirt of mail." According to the Rev. John Macrae, minister of Dingwall, who died in 1704, and wrote the only existing trustworthy history and genealogy of his own clan, the Macraes came originally from Clunes, in the Aird of Lovat, recently acquired from patriotic family reasons by Horatio Macrae, W.S., Edinburgh, the representative in this country of the Macraes of Inverinate, who were admittedly the chiefs of that brave and warlike race. The Rev. John Macrae, who was himself a member of the Inverinate family, says that the Macraes left the Aird under the following circumstances: A dispute had arisen in the hunting field between Macrae of Clunes and a bastard son of Lovat, when a son of Macrae intervened to protect his father, and killed Fraser's son in the scuffle. The victor "immediately ran oft; and calling himself John Carrach, that he might be less known, settled on the West Coast, and of him are descended the branch of the Macraes called Clann Ian Charraich. It was some time after this that his brethren and other relatives began seriously to consider that Lovat's own kindred and friends