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Before Castle Toward was built, on the southern end of the East Cowal penninsula, the home of the chief of the Lamonts was
at Inveryne. Inveryne is near the present day Kilfinan, on the eastern shore of Loch Fyne, looking across to Knapdale.
During one of the many Highland conflicts, the Lamonts managed to take prisoner15 Campbells, and had them held at Inveryne,
in a high tower room reached only by a narrow stair on which a guard had been placed.
After several days of captivity, the Campbells made an escape plan. That evening, they began to sing, and they continued
to sing until it was far into the night. But their singing was simply subterfuge: while they sang they took their blankets,
ripped them up and tied them together to make a rope. The guards on watch gathered at the bottom of the stair to listen to
the songs, and were not able to see what the prisoners were doing.
The prisoners secured one end of the rope and threw out the other end out the single window. One by one, they lowered
themselves to the ground and melted into the evening. The guards on watch noticed that fewer and fewer voices were joined
in song, but must have believed that the prisoners were going to bed. Finally, they heard but one very sweet voice, so beautiful
that they listened raptly to his song. When he had sung his song to the end he said in a loud voice, "since you have
all gone to bed, I shall go to bed also," and off he went out the window, down the rope and followed the rest into the
mist.
The next day, when the Lamonts went to see their prisoners, there was not one of them left to be found."
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