It may be, he can promise for our officers that they will touch me with no infamous punishment; and if they offer me confinement in the dungeon, or death by the musket, to that I may not object." "Alas, and wilt thou trust to their word, my foolish child?
Remember the race of Dermid were ever fair and false; and no sooner shall they have gyves on thy hands, than they will strip thy shoulders for the scourge." "Save your advice, mother," said Hamish, sternly; "for me, my mind is made up." But though he spoke thus, to escape the almost persecuting urgency of his mother, Hamish would have found it, at that moment, impossible to say upon what course of conduct he had thus fixed.

On one point alone he was determined--namely, to abide his destiny, be what it might, and not to add to the breach of his word, of which he had been involuntarily rendered guilty, by attempting to escape from punishment.

This act of self-devotion he conceived to be due to his own honour and that of his countrymen.

Which of his comrades would in future be trusted, if he should be considered as having broken his word, and betrayed the confidence of his officers?
and whom but Hamish Bean MacTavish would the Gael accuse for having verified and confirmed the suspicions which the Saxon General was well known to entertain against the good faith of the Highlanders?
He was, therefore, bent firmly to abide his fate.

But whether his intention was to yield himself peaceably into the bands of the party who should come to apprehend him, or whether he purposed, by a show of resistance, to provoke them to kill him on the spot, was a question which he could not himself have answered.