They could far more easily bear the preeminence of a distinguished stranger, yet even to such a stranger they would allow only a very limited and a very precarious authority.

To bring a chief before a court martial, to shoot him, to cashier him, to degrade him, to reprimand him publicly, was impossible.

Macdonald of Keppoch or Maclean of Duart would have struck dead any officer who had demanded his sword, and told him to consider himself as under arrest; and hundreds of claymores would instantly have been drawn to protect the murderer.

All that was left to the commander under whom these potentates condescended to serve was to argue with them, to supplicate them, to flatter them, to bribe them; and it was only during a short time that any human skill could preserve harmony by these means.

For every chief thought himself entitled to peculiar observance; and it was therefore impossible to pay marked court to any one without disobliging the rest.