George Smith, of Glenlivet, already quoted, early found his position desperate. He was a legalised distiller, and paid his covenanted duty to Government, and he rightly considered himself entitled, in return for the tribute he rendered, to some measure of protection. He therefore petitioned the Lords of the Treasury to that effect; and my lords duly replied, after the manner of such, that the Government would prosecute any who dared molest him. This, however, was not altogether satisfactory from Smith’s point of view. He desired rather to be protected from molestation than to be left open to attack and the aggressors to be punished. A dead man derives no satisfaction from the execution of his assassin. Moreover, even the prosecution was uncertain. In Smith’s own words, “I cannot say the assurance gave me much ease, for I could see no one in Glenlivet who dared institute such proceedings.” It was necessary for a revenue officer to be almost killed in the execution of his duty before the Government resorted to the force requisite for the support of the civil power. A revenue cutter was stationed in the Moray Firth, with a crew of fifty men, designed to be under the orders of the excise officers in cases of emergency. But the smugglers were not greatly impressed with this display, and when the excisemen, accompanied with perhaps five-and-twenty sailors, made raids up-country, frequently met them in great gangs of perhaps a hundred and fifty, and recaptured any seizures they had made and adopted so threatening an attitude that the sailors were not infrequently compelled to beat a hasty and undignified retreat. One of these expeditions was into Glenlivet itself, where the smugglers were all Roman Catholics. The excisemen, with this in mind, considered that the best time for a raid would be Monday morning, after the debauch of the Sunday afternoon and night in which the Roman Catholics were wont to indulge; and accordingly, marching out of Elgin town on the Sunday, arrived at Glenlivet at daybreak. At the time of their arrival the glen was, to all appearance, deserted, and their coming unnoticed, and the sight of the peat-reek rising in the still air from some forty or fifty “sma’ stills” rejoiced their hearts.