In the field the Covenanters seemed powerless to make head against Montrose, but they could strike a blow at him nearer home. The aged Napier, now past his seventieth year--"old and not fit for fighting," as he pathetically pleaded to the Committee--was heavily fined and flung into prison. His son, the young Master, had made his escape in time, and had fought gallantly by his uncle's side at Auldearn; but his two daughters, Lilias and Margaret, Lady Stirling of Keir, shared their father's fate. Among their fellow-captives, but not companions for no intercourse was permitted them, were Keir himself and young Lord Graham with his tutor. Their imprisonment was close, but their condition was easy compared with that of Crawford, Ogilvy, and the other Royalists, who suffered the treatment of the lowest criminals in the Tolbooth. To this time, too, belongs the only trace of Montrose's wife that history vouchsafes between the records of her marriage and her death, in a warrant of the Committee of Estates entrusting her with the care of her third son Robert. From this it would appear that she had either contrived to make her peace with her husband's enemies, or that her sympathies were known to be with her own family. Southesk and his son Carnegie had always been staunch, though passive, adherents to the Covenant. But it was no time to brood on private wrongs, or to redress them. Hurry with the fragments of his scattered army had rejoined Baillie, and a fresh force under Lindsay was advancing from the Lowlands. Montrose had been obliged to pay the usual price of his victories, and had again retreated to the hills till the gaps in his ranks could be refilled. But in one respect he was stronger than he had yet been since he first raised the King's banner in Scotland. A warm friendship had sprung up between him and the heir of the Gordons, which, on the younger man's part, showed itself in a chivalrous and unquestioning devotion. Nothing could now separate him from his general's side; his father's commands were disregarded; fresh levies were raised, and the waverers recalled to their duty. Still, without the Highlanders, and with only half the Irishmen, Montrose could not have shown fight had not the Covenanters been divided against themselves. Baillie was not his own master. His movements were not only dictated from Edinburgh, but were still further hampered by a committee appointed to assist him in the field. This committee included such experienced commanders as Argyll, Balfour of Burleigh, and Elcho, and was unlikely therefore to inspire much confidence in any man who had heard of Inverlochy, Aberdeen, and Tippermuir. "Armies," it has been pertinently observed by the historian who has told how another and a worthier Argyll met his fate, "armies have triumphed under leaders who professed no very eminent qualifications. But what army commanded by a debating club ever escaped discomfiture and disgrace?" Moreover Lindsay professed