| Some time, in the obscure ages, Macneil of
Barra married the Lady Maclean, who had the Isle of Col for her
jointure. Whether Macneil detained Col, when the widow was dead, or
whether she lived so long as to make her heirs impatient, is perhaps not
now known. The younger son, called John Gerves, or John the Giant, a man
of great strength who was then in Ireland, either for safety, or for
education, dreamed of recovering his inheritance; and getting some
adventurers together, which, in those unsettled times, was not hard to
do, invaded Col. He was driven away, but was not discouraged, and
collecting new followers, in three years came again with fifty men. In
his way he stopped at Artorinish in Morvern, where his uncle was
prisoner to Macleod, and was then with his enemies in a tent. Maclean
took with him only one servant, whom he ordered to stay at the outside;
and where he should see the tent pressed outwards, to strike with his
dirk, it being the intention of Maclean, as any man provoked him, to lay
hands upon him, and push him back. He entered the tent alone, with his
Lochabar-axe in his hand, and struck such terror into the whole
assembly, that they dismissed his uncle.
When he landed at Col, he saw the
sentinel, who kept watch towards the sea, running off to Grissipol, to
give Macneil, who was there with a hundred and twenty men, an account of
the invasion. He told Macgill, one of his followers, that if he
intercepted that dangerous intelligence, by catching the courier, he
would give him certain lands in Mull. Upon this promise, Macgill pursued
the messenger, and either killed, or stopped him; and his posterity,
till very lately, held the lands in Mull.
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