by the good offices of the Earl of Enzie, and put, for behoof of himself, and his own and his father’s creditors, in possession of the family estates from which his father was driven by Sir Robert Gordon acting under a royal warrant, a just punishment for the many enormities of a long and misspent life.[208] Desperate as the fortunes of the Earl of Caithness were even previous to the disposal of his estates, he most unexpectedly found an ally in Sir Donald Mackay, who had taken offence at Sir Robert Gordon, and who, being a man of quick resolution and of an inconstant disposition, determined to forsake the house of Sutherland, and to ingratiate himself with the Earl of Caithness. He alleged various causes of discontent as a reason for his conduct, one of the chief being connected with pecuniary considerations; for having, as he alleged, burdened his estates with debts incurred for some years past in following the house of Sutherland, he thought that, in time coming, he might, by procuring the favour of the Earl of Caithness, turn the same to his own advantage and that of his countrymen. Moreover, as he had been induced to his own prejudice to grant certain life-rent tacks of the lands of Strathie and Dilred to John and Alexander Gun, and others of the clan Gun for revealing the affair of Sanset, he thought that by joining the Earl of Caithness, these might be destroyed, by which means he would get back his lands which he meant to convey to his brother, John Mackay, as a portion; and he, moreover, expected that the earl would give him and his countrymen some possessions in Caithness. But the chief ground of discontent on the part of Sir Donald Mackay was an action brought against him and Lord Forbes before the court of session, to recover a contract entered into between the last Earl of Sutherland and Mackay, in the year 1613, relative to their marches and other matters of controversy, which being considered by Mackay as prejudicial to him, he had endeavoured to get destroyed through the agency of some persons about Lord Forbes, into whose keeping the deed had been intrusted.