Stories of the Macgregors’ doings are not wanting hereabouts, one of which looks as if it may have given a hint to Sir Walter. A Macnaughton was on ill terms with a John Macgregor, who had robbed him of his daughter and made not less bold with certain fields of his in Glenlyon, seized by way of dowry. With a band of sixty men he set out to evict the unwelcome son-in-law from land and life. Macgregor raised a similar force, which he ambushed in the glen, himself going forward to meet its invaders. His person being unknown to them, they enlisted him to serve as guide on the errand of which they made no secret. Macnaughton walking on with them in advance, they came to a deep ditch in a swamp over which the guide leaped nimbly, and showed the chief a way round; but when his men came up, their attempts to imitate that mighty leap only landed them up to the armpits in mire. To Macnaughton, for the moment left alone with the stranger, Macgregor revealed himself by taking his hand and telling him, “I am the man you seek.” Then at a signal from this Roderick Dhu of real life, up started his plaided warriors from their ambush. But the end of the encounter was peaceful. Pleased to find Macgregor so fine a fellow, with such a band of henchmen, Macnaughton opened his arms to his son-in-law, and the two parties feasted together in sign of friendly alliance. Critical reporters, by the way, would like to know how the heroes of such adventures got rid of the distinguishing tartans or other badges of clanship, which came to be made so much of in later song and story. To a mere Sassenach like Fitzjames the Macgregor devices may not have been very kenspeckle; but surely a Mohawk’s eye would have been sharper to read the totem of a Huron.
Above Fortingall, the glen contracts to a romantic pass, three miles long, which would be as famous as Killiecrankie had it made such a figure in history. But nearly all Glenlyon deserves better than to be put in guide-book small print as a backwater of travel. For a dozen miles its road runs up to Meggernie Castle, beyond which a stretch of rougher ways, on to Loch Lyon at the foot of Ben Cruachan, leads one into the very heart of the Highlands and the border of Perthshire.