26

HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

CHAP.

XVIII.

1692 .

Eighty years later that sad dirge was still repeated by the- population of the valley. *

The survivors might well apprehend that they had escapedthe shot and the sword only to perish by famine. The wholedomain was a waste. Houses, barns, furniture, implementsof husbandry, herds, flocks, horses, were gone. Many monthsmust elapse before ’the clan would be able to raise on its ownground the means of supporting even the most miserableexistence.**

It may be thought strange that these events should not havebeen instantly followed by a burst of execration from every partof the civilised world. The fact, however, is that years elapsedbefore the public indignation was thoroughly awakened, andthat months elapsed before the blackest part of the story foundcredit even among the enemies of the government. That themassacre should not have been mentioned in the LondonGazettes, in the Monthly Mercuries which were scarcely lesscourtly than the Gazettes, or in pamphlets licensed by officialcensors, is perfectly intelligible. But that no allusion to itshould be found in private journals and letters, written by per-

* Deposition of Ronald Macdonald in the Report of 1695; Letters fromthe Mountains, May 17. 1773. I quote Mrs. Grant’s authority only forwhat she herself heard and saw. Her account of the massacre was writtenapparently without the assistance of books, and is grossly incorrect. Indeedshe makes a mistake of two years as to the date.

** I have taken the account of the Massacre of Glencoe chiefly from theReport of 1695, and from the Gallienus Redivivus. An unlearned, and in-deed a learned, reader may be at a loss to guess why the Jacobites shouldhave selected so strange a title for a pamphlet on the massacre of Glencoe.The explanation will be found in a letter of the Emperor Gallienus, pre-served by Trebellius Pollio in the Life of Ingenuus. Ingenuus had raiseda rebellion in Moesia. He was defeated and killed. Gallienus ordered thewhole province to be laid waste, and wrote to one of his lieutenants inlanguage to which that of the Master of Stair bore but too much re-semblance. “Non mihi satisfacies si tantum armatos occideris, quos etfors belli interimere potuisset. Periraendus est omnis sexus virilis. Oc-cidendus est quicunque maledixit. Occidendus est quicunque male voluit.Lacera. Occide. Concide.’ 1