Though he cam to the gallows first he was on hung, All quick bebeaded that him thought long; The beved to London-bridge was send To shende. So ever more mote I the, Some while weened be Hle rideth through the city, as I tell may, To London-bridge he took the way, Mony was the wives child that thereon lacketh-a-day, That he was y-born So fair man he was." 'Periwinckle. 1 He was condemned to be drawn. 2 Head. 4 Burned. Meaning at one time he little thought to stand thus. Saith lack-a-day. Now standeth the heved above the tu-brigge Better him were in Scotland, With his axe in his hand, To play on the green, etc. The preceding stanzas contain probably as minute an account as can be found of the trial and execution of state criminals of the period. Superstition mingled its horrors with those of a ferocious state policy, as appears from the following singular narrative. «The Friday next, before the assumption of Our Lady, King Edward met Robert the Bruce at Saint Johnstoune, in Scotland, and with his company, of which company King Edward quelde seven thousand. When Robert the Bruce saw this mischief, and gan to flee, and hov'd him that men might not him find; but S. Simond Frisell pursued was so sore, so that he turned again and abode bataille, for he was a worthy knight and a bolde of bodye, and the Englishmen pursuede him sore on every side and quelde the steed that Sir Simond Frisell rode upon, and then toke him and led him to the host. And S. Symond began for to flatter and speke fair, and saide, Lordys, I shall give you four thousand markes of silver, and myne horse and harness, and all my armoure and income. Tho' answered Thobaude of Pevenes, that was the kinges archer, Now, God me so helpe, it is for nought that thou speakest, for all the gold of England I would not let thee withgo out commandment of King Edward. And tho' he was led to the king, and the king would not see him, but commanded to lead him away to his doom in London, on Our Lady's even nativity. And he was hung and drawn, and his head smitten off, and hanged again with chains of iron upon the gallows, and his head was set at London-bridge upon a spear, and against Christmas the body was burnt, for encheson (reason) that the men that keeped the body saw many devils ramping with iron crooks, running upon the gallows, and horribly tormenting the body. And many that them saw, anon thereafter died for dread, or waxen mad, or sore sickness they had.»-MS. Chronicle in the British Museum, quoted by Ritson. Note 14. Stanza xxvi. Was not the life of Athole shed, To soothe the tyrant's sicken'd bed? John de Strathbogie, Earl of Athole, had attempted to escape out of the kingdom, but a storm cast him upon the coast, when he was taken, sent to London, and executed, with circumstances of great barbarity, being first half strangled, then let down from the gallows while yet alive, barbarously dismembered, and his body burnt. It may surprise the reader to learn, that this was a mitigated punishment: for, in respect that his mother was a grand-daughter of King John, by his natural son Richard, he was not drawn on a sledge to execution, << that point was forgiven,» and he made the passage on horseback. Matthew of Westminster tells us that King Edward, then extremely ill, received great ease from the news that his relative was apprehended. " Quo audito, Rex Angliæ, etsi gravissimo The gallant knight, like others in the same situation, was pitied morbo tunc languerit, levius tamen tulit dolorem.»> by the female spectators as a proper young man.. To this singular expression the text alludes. Note 15. Stanza xxvi, And must his word, at dying day, Be nought but quarter, hang, and slay! This alludes to a passage in Barbour, singularly expressive of the vindictive spirit of Edward I. The prisoners taken at the castle of Kildrummie had surrendered upon condition that they should be at King Edward's disposal. «But his will,» says Barbour, «<was always evil towards Scottishmen.» The news of the surrender of Kildrummie arrived when he was in his mortal sickness at Burgh-upon-Sands. And when he to the death was near, Off him that through his felony, So soon as the notice of Comyn's slaughter reached Rome, Bruce and his adherents were excommunicated. It was published first by the Archbishop of York, and renewed at different times, particularly by Lambyrton, Bishop of St Andrews, in 1308; but it does not appear to have answered the purpose which the English monarch expected. Indeed, for reasons which it may be difficult to trace, the thunders of Rome descended upon the Scottish mountains with less effect than in more fertile countries. Probably the comparative poverty of the benefices occasioned that fewer foreign clergy settled in Scotland; and the interest of the native churchmen was linked with that of their country. Many of the Scottish prelates, Lambyrton the primate particularly, declared for Bruce, while he was yet under the ban of the church, although he afterwards again changed sides. Note 19. Stanza xxxi. I feel within mine aged breast A power that will not be repress'd. Bruce, like other heroes, observed omens, and one is recorded by tradition. After he had retreated to one of the miserable places of shelter, in which be could venture to take some repose after his disasters, he lay stretched upon a handful of straw, and abandoned himself to his melancholy meditations. He had now been defeated four times, and was upon the point of resolving to abandon all hopes of further opposition to his fate, and to go to the Holy Land. It chanced his eye, while he was thus pondering, was attracted by the exertions of a spider, who, in order to fix his web, en deavoured to swing himself from one beam to another above his head. Involuntarily he became interested in the pertinacity with which the insect renewed his exer |tions, after failing six times; and it occurred to hum that he would decide his own course according to the success or failure of the spider. At the seventh effort the insect gained his object; and Bruce, in like mauner. persevered and carried his own. Hence it has been held unlucky or ungrateful, or both, in one of the name of Bruce to kill a spider. The archdeacon of Aberdeen, instead of the abbot of this tale, introduces an Irish Pythoness, who not on predicted his good fortube as he left the island o Rachrin, but sent her two sons along with him, to in sure her own family a share in it. ، Need. Then in short time men might them seo A wittering here I shall you ma, Send to take part of your labour; << It likes you to say so,» answered his follower; « but you yourself slew four of the five.» «True,» said the king, « but only because I had better opportunity than Bannon's Bruce, Book IV. p. 120, edited by you. They were not apprehensive of me when they saw J. Pinkerton, London, 1790. Note 20. Stanza xxxii. A hunted wanderer on the wild. me encounter three, so I had a moment's time to spring to thy aid, and to return equally unexpectedly upon my own opponents.» In the mean while Lorn's party approached rapidly, This is not metaphorical. The echoes of Scotland and the king and his foster-brother betook themselves did actually ring to a neighbouring wood. Here they sat down, for Bruce was exhausted by fatigue, until the cry of the sloughhound came so near, that his foster-brother entreated Bruce to provide for his safety by retreating farther. « I have heard,» answered the king, << that whosoever will wade a bow-shot length down a running stream, shall make the slough-hound lose scent.-Let us try the experiment; for were yon devilish hound silenced, With the blood-hounds that bayed for her fugitive king. A very curious and romantic tale is told by Barbour upon this subject, which may be abridged as follows:When Bruce had again got footing in Scotland in the | spring of 1306, he continued to be in a very weak and precarious condition, gaining, indeed, occasional ad-I should care little for the rest. >> vantages, but obliged to fly before his enemies whenever they assembled in force. Upon one occasion, while he was lying with a small party in the wilds of Cumnork, in Ayrshire, Aymer de Valence, Earl of Pembroke, with his inveterate foe John of Lorn, came against him suddenly with eight hundred Highlanders, besides a large body of men-at-arms. They brought with them a slough-dog, or blood-hound, which, some say, had been once a favourite with the Bruce himself, and therefore was least likely to lose the trace. Lorn in the mean while advanced, and found the bo Bruce, whose force was under four hundred men, continued to make head against the cavalry, till the men of Lorn had nearly cut off his retreat. Perceiving the danger of his situation, he acted as the celebrated and ill-requited Mina is said to have done in similar circumstances. He divided his force into three parts, appointed a place of rendezvous, and commanded them to retreat by different routes. But when John of Lorn arrived at the spot where they divided, he caused the bound to be put upon the trace, which immediately directed him to the pursuit of that party which Bruce headed. This, therefore, Lorn pursued with his whole force, paying no attention to the others. The king again subdivided his small body in three parts, and with the same result, for the pursuers attached themselves | exclusively to that which he led in person. He then caused his followers to disperse, and retained only his foster-brother in his company. The slough-dog followed the trace, and, neglecting the others, attached himself and his attendants to pursuit of the king, Lorn became convinced that his enemy was nearly in his power, and detached five of his most active attendants to follow him, and interrupt his flight. They did so with all the agility of mountaineers. << What aid wilt thou make?» said Bruce to his single attendant, when he saw the five men gain ground on him. « The best I can, replied his foster-brother. «Then,» said Bruce, here I make my stand.» The five pursuers came up fast. The king took three to himself, leaving the other two to his foster-brother. He slew the first who encountered him; but observing his foster-brother hardpressed, he sprung to his assistance and dispatched one of his assailants. Leaving him to deal with the survivor, he returned upon the other two, both of whom he slew before his foster-brother had dispatched his single antagonist. When this hard encounter was over, with a courtesy, which in the whole work marks Bruce's character, he thanked his foster-brother for his aid. dies of his slain vassals, over whom he made his moan, and threatened the most deadly vengeance. Then he followed the hound to the side of the brook, down which the king had waded a great way. Here the hound was at fault, and John of Lorn, after long attempting in vain to recover Bruce's trace, relinquished the pursuit, Others,» says Barbour, « affirm, that upon this occasion the king's life was saved by an excellent archer who accompanied him, and who, perceiving they would be finally taken by means of the blood-hound, hid himself in a thicket, and shot him with an arrow. In which way,» adds the metrical biographer, « this escape happened I am uncertain, but at that brook the king escaped from his pursuers.» When the chasers rallied were, And John of Lorn had met them there, And said, He is greatly to prise, BARBOUR's Bruce, p. 188. The English historians agree with Barbour as to the mode in which the English pursued Bruce and his followers, and the dexterity with which he evaded them, The following is the testimony of Hardyng, a great enemy to the Scottish nation: The King Edward with host him sought full sore, In the mountaynes and cragges he s ew ay where, Matched. Peter Langtoft has also a passage concerning the extremities to which King Robert was reduced, which he entitles De Roberto Brus et fuga circum circa fit. Has dranken of that blood the drink of Dan Waryn. With he made a res, and misberying of scheld. God give the King Robyn, that all his kind so speed. That they made him restus, bath in moor and wood-side, CANTO III. Note 1. Stanza iv. For, glad of each pretext for spoil, A sort of persons common in the isles, as may be easily believed, until the introduction of civil polity. Witness the Dean of the Isles' account of Ronay. «At the north end of Raarsay, be half myle of sea frae it, Jayes ane ile callit Ronay, mair then a myle in lengthe, full of wood and heddir, with ane havin for Heilaud galleys in the middis of it, and the same havein is guid for fostering of thieves, rugguairs, and revairs, till a nail, upon the peilling and spulzeing of poor pepill. This isle perteins to M'Gillychallan of Raarsay by force, and to the bishope of the iles be heretage.»-SIR DoNALD MONRO'S Description of the Western Islands of Scotland, Edinburgh, 1805, p. 22. opposition to the English. He was the grandson of the competitor, with whom he has been sometimes con founded. Lord Hailes has well described, and in | degree apologized for, the earlier part of his life. His grandfather, the competitor, had patiently aequiesced in the award of Edward. His father, yieldin; to the times, had served under the English banners, But young Bruce had more ambition and a more restless spirit. In his earlier years he acted upon no regule plan. By turns the partisan of Edward, and the vics gerent of Baliol, he seems to have forgotten or stile his pretensions to the crown. But his character developed itself by degrees, and in maturer age became firm and consistent.»-Annals of Scotland, p. 290, quarto, Lon don, 1776. Note 3. Stanza xii. These are the savage wilds that lie The extraordinary piece of scenery which I have here attempted to describe is, I think, unparalleled ia sav part of Scotland, at least in any which I have happeser to visit. It lies just upon the frontier of the Land of Mac-Leod's country, which is thereabouts divided from the estate of Mr Mac-Allister of Strathaird, called Strag nardill by the Dean of the Isles. The following account of it is extracted from a journal kept during a tour through the Scottish islands: the «The western coast of Skye is highly romantic, and a the same time displays a richness of vegetation in the lower grounds to which we have hitherto been strangers We passed three salt-water lochs, or deep embayments, called Loch Bracadale, Loch Einort, and Loch -and about 11 o'clock opened Loch Slavig. We were now under the western termination of the high ridg of mountains called Cuillen, or Quillin, or Coolin, whose weather-beaten and serrated peaks we had admired at a проп distance from Dunvegan. They sunk here sea, but with the same bold and peremptory sped which their distant appearance indicated. They p peared to consist of precipitous sheets of naked rock, down which the torrents were leaping in a hund lines of foam. The tops of the ridge, apparently accessible to human foot, were rent and split into the most tremendous pinnacles. Towards the base of these bare and precipitous crags, the ground, enriched by the soil washed down from them, is comparatively verczak and productive. Where we passed within the smal isle of Soa, we entered Loch Slavig, under the shou of one of these grisly mountains, and observed that t opposite side of the loch was of a milder character, the mountains being softened down into steep green dechvities. From the bottom of the bay advanced a headland of high rocks, which divided its depth into two re cesses, from each of which a brook issued. Here it had been intimated to us we would find some roma scenery; but we were uncertain up which inlet ** should proceed in search of it. We chose, against eur better judgment, the southerly dip of the bay, where we saw a house which might afford us information. We found, upon inquiry, that there is a lake adjoimug The account given by most of our historians, of the conversation between Bruce and Wallace over the Car-to each branch of the bay; and walked a couple of ron river, is equally apocryphal. There is full evidence that Bruce was not at that time on the English side, nor present at the battle of Falkirk; nay, that he acted as a guardian of Scotland, along with John Comyn, in the name of Baliol, and in miles to see that near the farm-house, merely because the honest Highlander seemned jealous of the hoa ur of his own loch, though we were speedily convinced it ** not that which we were recommended to examine had no particular merit excepting from its neighbou bod to a very high cliff, or precipitous mountain, sinks in a profound and perpendicular precipice down otherwise the sheet of water had nothing differing from to the water. On the left-hand side, which we traany ordinary low-country lake. We returned and re- versed, rose a higher and equally inaccessible mountain, imbarked in our boat, for our guide shook his head at the top of which strongly resembled the shivered crater sar proposal to climb over the peninsula, or rocky of an exhausted volcano. I never saw a spot in which head-land which divided the two lakes. In rowing round there was less appearance of vegetation of any kind. the head-land we were surprised at the infinite number The eye rested on nothing but barren and naked of sea-fowl, then busy apparently with a shoal of fish, crags, and the rocks, on which we walked by the side «Arrived at the depth of the bay, we found that the of the loch, were as bare as the pavements of Cheaphscharge from this second lake forms a sort of water- side. There are one or two small islets in the loch, fall, or rather a rapid stream, which rushes down to the which seem to bear juniper or some such low bushy wa with great fury and precipitation. Round this place shrub. Upon the whole, though I have seen many were assembled hundreds of trouts and salmon, strug-scenes of more extensive desolation, I never witnessed ging to get up into the fresh water; with a net we any in which it pressed more deeply upon the eye and might have had twenty salmon at a haul; and a sailor, the heart than at Loch Corriskin, at the same time with no better hook than a crooked pin, caught a dish that its grandeur elevated and redeemed it from the of trouts during our absence. Advancing up this hud-wild and dreary character of utter barrenness,» Lang and riotous brook, we found ourselves in a most extraordinary scene; we lost sight of the sea almost immediately after we had climbed over a low ridge of стад alaif and were surrounded by mountains of naked rock, of the boldest and most precipitous character. Tae ground on which we walked was the margin of a Jake, which seems to have sustained the constant ravage of torrents from these rude neighbours. The shores consisted of huge strata of naked granite, here and there intermixed with bogs, and heaps of gravel and sand piled in the empty water-courses. Vegetation there was little or none; and the mountains rose so perpendicularly from the water edge, that Borrodale, or even Glencoe, is a jest to them. We proceeded a mile and up this deep, dark, and solitary lake, which was about two miles long, half a mile broad, and is, as we arned, of extreme depth. The murky vapours which enveloped the mountain ridges obliged us by assuming 1 thousand varied shapes, changing their drapery into all sort of forms, and sometimes clearing off altoether. It is true, the mist made us pay the penalty by seme heavy and downright showers, from the frequency of which, a Highland boy, whom we brought from the farm, told us the lake was popularly called the WaterKettle. The proper name is Loch Corriskin, from the dp corrie, or hollow, in the mountains of Cuillen, which affords the basin for this wonderful sheet of water. It is as exquisite a savage scene as Loch Katrine is a scene of romantic beauty. After having penetrated star as distinctly to observe the termination of the ake, under an immense precipice, which rises abruptly from the water, we returned, and often stopped to adSire the ravages which storms must have made in these recesses, where all human witnesses were driven to paces of more shelter and security. Stones, or rather large masses and fragments of rocks, of a composite Kind, perfectly different from the strata of the lake, were scattered upon the bare rocky beach, in the strangest and most precarious situations, as if abandoned by the torrents which had borne them down from above. Some lay loose and tottering upon the ledges of the natural rock, with so little security, that the ightest push moved them, though their weight might many tons. These detached rocks, or stones, were chiefly what is called plum-padding stones. bare rocks, which formed the shore of the lakes, were a species of granite. The opposite side of the lake seemed quite pathless and inaccessible, as a huge mounAin, one of the detached ridges of the Cuillen Hills, red The Note 4. Stanza xix. with such alterations as the fictitious narrative rendered foster-brother. Neck. And the good king held forth his way, 4 Make. |