Such was life in the Highlands in the golden days of the Clans, before sheep, Lowlanders, evictions, emigration, and deer forests brought, as we are told, discontent and destitution. The poor lived on mussels and cockles, some tenants eked out a scanty livelihood by stealing their neighbours’ cows, and the genial Barisdale kept all in good order. For Barisdale’s prowess we are not obliged to rely on the ‘Impartial Hand’ and the Gartmore MS. alone. In ‘The Highlands of Scotland: a Letter from a Gentleman at Edinburgh to a Friend in London,’ we meet our Col again. This manuscript[54] is in the King’s Collection, 104, in the British Museum. The author is an _enragé_ Whig and Protestant, but a close observer. From him we learn how cattle-stealing paid; for at first blush it looks like the practice of those fabled islanders ‘who eke out a livelihood by taking in each other’s washing.’ The business was extended over a wide area; the Macdonells did not merely harry the Mackenzies and Rosses. Speaking of Knoydart, our author says: ‘Coll. Macdonell of Barisdale, cousin-german of Glengarry, took up his residence here, as a place of undoubted security from all legal prosecution. He entered into a confederacy with Lochgarry and the Camerons of Loch Arkaig, with some others as great villains in Rannoch. This famous Company had the honour to introduce theft into a regular trade; they kept a number of savages dependent on them for the purpose, whom they out-hounded’ on predatory expeditions. They robbed from Sutherlandshire to Perthshire, Stirlingshire, and Argyle. When the thieves were successful these gentlemen had a dividend of the spoil. When unsuccessful, the thieves lived on the country which they traversed. To denounce them was ill work. A gentleman, known to our author, was nearly ruined by Barisdale & Co. He caught two of the Macdonalds, who were hanged. Fifteen years later his son, going to Fort William, vanished. The tribe, says our author, demanded ‘blood for blood.’