It were vain to look for good generalship in a time so remote as that of the reign of Alexander III. Wallace and Bruce had not yet appeared to teach the Scots the advantage of united action, and the methods of warfare were still of an unmilitary kind. Battles were little better than mere free fights, without order, without controlling discipline, without preconcerted plan. It may be that Kenric of Bute might, with a little more forethought in the disposal of his forces, have saved his castle from the hands of his enemies. But a lad of seventeen, with no better counsellors than a few peaceful men such as Sir Oscar Redmain and the Abbot Thurstan -- men inexperienced in the arts of war, and ill qualified to repel an invader or hold a castle against a siege -- what could he do? Sir Oscar Redmain was killed in the first engagement. The abbot was sufficiently occupied with the protection of his church lands, and the one skilful soldier who could have organized the defences -- Sir Piers de Currie -- was even now defending his own castle of Ranza against the forces of Margad. Nevertheless, the manner in which Kenric defended the sacred buildings of St. Blane's redeemed the mistakes he had committed in a too great division of his forces at Rothesay. He protected the abbey lands from a possible approach of the enemy from the sea by stationing six of his ships, fully manned, at regular intervals along the south coast of the island from Glencallum Bay to the bay of Dunagoil. Thus disposed, the vessels formed a half-circle round the abbey and its demesnes. At Dunagoil he stationed a guard of five hundred men under Allan Redmain, with a like number in Glencallum, under Duncan Graham, ready at a moment's warning to form a connection across the neck of land. Within the walled inclosure known as the Circle of Penance, standing midway between these two stations, were two hundred other men under Kenric himself. Thus the abbey and its grange with some forty cottages were entirely surrounded. The abbey with its chapel was a small building in the Norman style, inclosed by a high wall, and standing in a grove of birch and ash trees. In the crypt of the chapel and within the cottages the women of Bute, some hundreds in number, had made their retreat, and the Lady Adela of Rothesay had a most anxious four days attending to her numerous charges. Food there was in plenty, of a simple sort, and the wells within the abbey buildings provided abundance of pure water. In the underground passage connecting the crypt with the walled inclosure of the Circle of Penance the children had been collected. Ailsa Redmain was with them, attending to their many wants, helped by some of the women.