which the reader will find detailed in Wishart’s Memoirs of Montrose. “The tragedy of Drummondernoch did not end with the effects of the murder on the Lady Ardvoirlich. The clan of the M‘Gregors being convoked in the church of Balquhidder, upon the Sunday after the act, the bloody head was produced on the altar, when each clansman avowed the murder to have been perpetrated by his own consent, and, laying successively his hands on the scalp, swore to defend and protect the authors of the deed,—‘in ethnic and barbarous manner,’ says an order of the Lords of the Privy Council, dated 4th February, 1589, ‘in most proud contempt of our Sovereign Lord and his authority, if this shall remain unpunished.’ Then follows a commission to search for and pursue Alaster M‘Gregor of Glenstrae, and all others of his name, with fire and sword. We have seen a letter upon this subject from Patrick, Lord Drummond, who was naturally most anxious to avenge his kinsman’s death, to the Earl of Montrose, appointing a day in which the one shall be ‘at the bottom of the valley of Balquhidder with his forces, and advance upward, and the other, with his powers, shall occupy the higher outlet, and move downwards, for the express purpose of taking _sweet revenge_ for the death of their cousin.’ Ardvoirlich assisted them with a party, and it is said they killed thirty-seven of the clan of Dougal of the Mist upon the single farm of Inverneuty.”—_Quarterly Review_, vol. xiv., p. 307. THE GREAT MONTROSE. The illustrious personage whose fortunes form the ground-work of this Tale, was the only son of John, fourth Earl of Montrose,[48] by Lady Margaret Ruthven, daughter of William, first Earl of Gowrie.[49] He was born in the year 1612, succeeded his father in 1626, and was married soon after, while yet very young,—a circumstance which is said to have somewhat marred his education. He travelled into foreign parts, where he spent some years in study, and in learning the customary accomplishments of that period, in which he excelled most men; and he returned home in 1634. Meeting with a cold and forbidding reception at Court, his Lordship joined the supplicants in 1637, and became one of the most zealous supporters of the Covenant in 1638. Next year he had the command of the forces sent to the north against the town of Aberdeen, which he obliged to take the Covenant; and the Marquis of Huntly, who, on his approach, disbanded the men he had raised, was sent prisoner to Edinburgh. Lord Aboyne appearing in arms in the north the same year, Montrose was despatched against him, and totally routed his forces at the Bridge of Dee. When the pacification of Berwick was concluded, Montrose was one of the noblemen who paid their respects to Charles I. at that place in July, 1639.