A history of the Highlands and of the Highland clans : with an ...

TREATY BETWEEN THE EARL OP ROSS AND EDWARD IT 171
to attack the Clandonald. They met on the sanJa ot btrathfleet, and,
after a fierce and bloody struggle, the islanders and their allies were
overthrown with great slaughter. The survivors fled with great preci-
pitation, and were pursued as far as the Bonagh. Many perished in
the course of their flight. This was the last hostile irruption of the
Clandon-ald into Sutherland, as all the disputes between the Lord of tho
Isles and the Sutherland family were afterwards accommodateil by a ma-
trimonial alliance.*
The vigorous administration of James II. which checked and con-
trolled the haughty and turbulent spirit of his nobles, was also felt, as
we have seen, in tho Highlands, where his power, if not always acknowledged,
was nevertheless dreaded; but upon the murder of that
wise prince, and the accession of his infant son to the crown, the
princes of tlic north again abandoned themselves to their lawless courses.
The first who showed the example was Allan of Lorn of the Wood, as
lie was called, a nephew of Donald Balloch by liis sister. Coveting the
estate of his elder brother, Ker of Lorn, Allan imprisoned him in a
dungeon in the island of Kerera, with the view of starving him to
deatli that he might the more easily acquire the unjust possession he de-
sired ; but Ker was liberated, and his property restored to him by the
earl of Argyle to whom he was nearly related, who suddenly attacked
.\llan with a fleet of galleys, defeated him, Ijurnt his fleet, and slew the
greater pai-t of his men. This act, so justifiable in itself, roused the re-
vengeful passions of the island chiefs, who issued from their ocean re-
treats and committed the most dreadful excesses.f
Afl;er the decisive battle of Teuton, Henry VI. and his Queen retired
to Scotland to watch the first favourable opportunity of seizing the
sceptre from the house of York, and fixing it in the race of Lancaster
Edward IV. anticipating the danger that might arise to his crown by an
alliance between his rival, the exiled monarch, and the king of Scotland,
determined to counteract the effects of such a connexion by a stroke of
policy. Aware of the disaffected disposition of some of the Scottish
nobles, and northern and island chiefs, he immediately entered into a ne-
gotiation with Jolm, earl of Ross, anil Donald Balloch, to detach them
from their allegiance. On the nineteenth day of October fourteen hun-
dred and sixty-one, the eai-1 of Ross, Donald Balloch, and his son John
de Isle, held a council of their vassals and dependants at Astornish, at
which it was agreed to send ambassadors to England to treat with Ed-
ward. On the arrival of these ambassadors a negotiation was entered
into between them and the earl of Douglas, and John Douglas of Balvenj-,
his brother, both ofwhom had been obliged to leave Scotland for theirtrea-
sons in the previous reign. These two brothers, who were animated by a
spirit of hatred and revenge against the family of their late sovereign James
It., warmly entered into the views of Edward, whose subjects they had
• .Sir R. Gordon, p. 7!. f AurhinlccJi Chronicle, pp 5H, flg.