episcopacy; but in truth he cared for no government and no religion.  He seems to have united two different sets of vices, the growth of two different regions, and of two different stages in the progress of society.  In his castle among the hills he had learned the barbarian pride and ferocity of a Highland chief.  In the Council Chamber at Edinburgh he had contracted the deep taint of treachery and corruption.  After the Revolution he had, like too many of his fellow nobles, joined and betrayed every party in turn, had sworn fealty to William and Mary, and had plotted against them.  To trace all the turns and doublings of his course, during the year 1689 and the earlier part of 1690, would be wearisome.208 That course became somewhat less tortuous when the battle of the Boyne had cowed the spirit of the Jacobites.  It now seemed probable that the Earl would be a loyal subject of their Majesties, till some great disaster should befall them.  Nobody who knew him could trust him; but few Scottish statesmen could then be trusted; and yet Scottish statesmen must be employed.  His position and connections marked him out as a man who might, if he would, do much towards the work of quieting the Highlands; and his interest seemed to be a guarantee for his zeal.  He had, as he declared with every appearance of truth, strong personal reasons for wishing to see tranquillity restored.  His domains were so situated that, while the civil war lasted, his vassals could not tend their herds or sow their oats in peace.  His lands were daily ravaged; his cattle were daily driven away; one of his houses had been burned down.  It was probable, therefore, that he would do his best to put an end to hostilities.209

He was accordingly commissioned to treat with the Jacobite chiefs, and was entrusted with the money which was to be distributed among them.  He invited them to a conference at his residence in Glenorchy.  They came; but the treaty went on very slowly.  Every head of a tribe asked for a larger share of the English gold than was to be obtained.  Breadalbane was suspected of intending to cheat both the clans and the King.  The dispute between the rebels and the government was complicated with another dispute still more embarrassing.  The Camerons and Macdonalds were really at war, not with William, but with Mac Callum More; and no arrangement to which Mac Callum More was not a party could really produce tranquillity.  A grave question therefore arose, whether the money entrusted to Breadalbane should be paid directly to the discontented chiefs, or should be employed to satisfy the claims which Argyle had upon them.  The shrewdness of Lochiel and the arrogant pretensions of Glengarry contributed to protract the discussions.  But no Celtic potentate was so impracticable as Macdonald of Glencoe, known among the mountains by the hereditary appellation of Mac Ian.210