https://www.gutenberg.org/files/5998/5998-h/5998-h.htm
"The Baron having also retired to give some necessary directions, Waverley seized the opportunity to ask, whether this Fergus, with the unpronounceable name, was the chief thief-taker of the district?
'Thief-taker!' answered Rose, laughing; 'he is a gentleman of great honour and consequence, the chieftain of an independent branch of a powerful Highland clan, and is much respected, both for his own power and that of his kith, kin, and allies.'
'And what has he to do with the thieves, then? Is he a magistrate, or in the commission of the peace?' asked Waverley.
'The commission of war rather, if there be such a thing,' said Rose; 'for he is a very unquiet neighbour to his unfriends, and keeps a greater following on foot than many that have thrice his estate. As to his connection with the thieves, that I cannot well explain; but the boldest of them will never steal a hoof from any one that pays black-mail to Vich Ian Vohr.'
'And what is black-mail?'
'A sort of protection-money that Low-Country gentlemen and heritors, lying near the Highlands, pay to some Highland chief, that he may neither do them harm himself, nor suffer it to be done to them by others; and then if your cattle are stolen, you have only to send him word, and he will recover them; or it may be, he will drive away cows from some distant place, where he has a quarrel, and give them to you to make up your loss.' [Footnote: See note 13.]
'Thief-taker!' answered Rose, laughing; 'he is a gentleman of great honour and consequence, the chieftain of an independent branch of a powerful Highland clan, and is much respected, both for his own power and that of his kith, kin, and allies.'
'And what has he to do with the thieves, then? Is he a magistrate, or in the commission of the peace?' asked Waverley.
'The commission of war rather, if there be such a thing,' said Rose; 'for he is a very unquiet neighbour to his unfriends, and keeps a greater following on foot than many that have thrice his estate. As to his connection with the thieves, that I cannot well explain; but the boldest of them will never steal a hoof from any one that pays black-mail to Vich Ian Vohr.'
'And what is black-mail?'
'A sort of protection-money that Low-Country gentlemen and heritors, lying near the Highlands, pay to some Highland chief, that he may neither do them harm himself, nor suffer it to be done to them by others; and then if your cattle are stolen, you have only to send him word, and he will recover them; or it may be, he will drive away cows from some distant place, where he has a quarrel, and give them to you to make up your loss.' [Footnote: See note 13.]
Note 13:
Mac-Donald of Barrisdale, one of the very last Highland gentlemen who carried on the plundering system to any great extent, was a scholar and a well-bred gentleman. He engraved on his broadswords the well-known lines—
Indeed, the levying of black-mail was, before 1745, practised by several chiefs of very high rank, who, in doing so, contended that they were lending the laws the assistance of their arms and swords, and affording a protection which could not be obtained from the magistracy in the disturbed state of the country. The author has seen a Memoir of Mac-Pherson of Cluny, chief of that ancient clan, from which it appears that he levied protection-money to a very large amount, which was willingly paid even by some of his most powerful neighbours. A gentleman of this clan, hearing a clergyman hold forth to his congregation on the crime of theft, interrupted the preacher to assure him, he might leave the enforcement of such doctrines to Cluny Mac-Pherson, whose broadsword would put a stop to theft sooner than all the sermons of all the ministers of the synod.
Waverley, Sir Walter Scott, Vol.1, Ch.15, 1814
Mac-Donald of Barrisdale, one of the very last Highland gentlemen who carried on the plundering system to any great extent, was a scholar and a well-bred gentleman. He engraved on his broadswords the well-known lines—
Hae tibi erunt artes; pacisque imponere morem,
Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos.
Waverley, Sir Walter Scott, Vol.1, Ch.15, 1814
Hae tibi erunt artes; pacisque imponere morem,
Parcere subjectis, et debellare superbos.
[Aeneid, 6: 852-853]
["Disposing peace and war by thy own majestic way;
To tame the proud, the fetter'd slave to free:
These are imperial arts, and worthy thee."
Translation, John Dryden]
[These will be ere unto thee skills for you; [Remember] to impose custom on peace,
to spare those having been subjected, and to conquer the proud.
Found on youtube]
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