The sum was ample; but the King was not fortunate in the choice of an agent.

[206] John Earl of Breadalbane, the head of a younger branch of the great House of Campbell, ranked high among the petty princes of the mountains.
He could bring seventeen hundred claymores into the field; and, ten years before the Revolution, he had actually marched into the Lowlands with this great force for the purpose of supporting the prelatical tyranny.

[207] In those days he had affected zeal for monarchy and 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.