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NOTES TO CANTO FOURTH.

Note I.

Yet to no sense of selfish wrongs,
Bear witness with me, Heaven, belongs

My joy o'er Edward's bier.-P. 135.

THE generosity which does justice to the character of an enemy, often marks Bruce's sentiments, as recorded by the faithful Barbour. He seldom mentions a fallen enemy without praising such good qualities as he might possess. I will only take one instance. Shortly after Bruce landed in Carrick, in 1306, Sir Ingram Bell, the English governor of Ayr, engaged a wealthy yeoman, who had hitherto been a follower of Bruce, to undertake the task of assassinating him. The king learned this treachery, as he is said to have done other secrets of the enemy, by means of a female with whom he had an intrigue. Shortly after he was possessed of this informa

tion, Bruce, resorting to a small thicket at a distance from his men, with only a single page to attend him, met the traitor, accompanied by two of his sons. They approached him with their wonted familiarity, but Bruce, taking his page's bow and arrow, commanded them to keep at a distance. As they still pressed forward with professions of zeal for his person and service, he, after a second warning, shot the father with the arrow; and being assaulted successively by the two sons, dispatched first one, who was armed with an axe, then as the other charged him with a spear, avoided the thrust, struck the head from the spear, and cleft the skull of the assassin with a blow of his two-handed sword.

"He rushed down of blood all red,
And when the king saw they were dead,
All three lying, he wiped his brand.
With that his boy came fast running,
And said, Our lord might lowyt* be,
"That granteth you might and poweste+
To fell the felony and the pride,
Of three in so little tide.'

The king said, So our lord me see,
They had been worthy men all three,
Had they not been full of treason:
'But that made their confusion." "

BARBOUR'S BRUCE, Book V, p. 153.

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Note II.

Such hate was his on Solway's strand,

When vengeance clench'd his palsied hand,

That pointed yet to Scotland's land.-P. 135.

To establish his dominion in Scotland had been a favourite object of Edward's ambition, and nothing could exceed the pertinacity with which he pursued it, unless his inveterate resentment against the insurgents, who so frequently broke the English yoke when he deemed it most firmly rivetted. After the battles of Falkirk and Methven, and the dreadful examples which he had made of Wallace and other champions of national independence, he probably concluded every chance of insurrection was completely annihilated. This was in 1306, when Bruce, as we have seen, was utterly expelled from Scotland: yet, in the conclusion of the same year, Bruce was again in arms and formidable; and in 1307, Edward, though exhausted by a long and wasting malady, put himself at the head of the army destined to destroy him utterly. This was, perhaps, partly in consequence of a vow which he had taken upon him, with all the pomp of chivalry, upon the day in which he dubbed his son a knight, for which see a subsequent note. even his spirit of vengeance was unable to restore his exhausted strength. He reached Burgh-upon-Sands, a petty village of Cumberland, on the shores of the Solway Firth, and there, 6th July, 1307, expired in sight of the detested and devoted country of Scotland. His dying injunctions to his son required him to continue the Scottish war, and never to recall Gaveston. VOL. IX.

M

But

Edward II. disobeyed both charges. Yet more to mark his animosity, the dying monarch ordered his bones to be carried with the invading army. Froissart, who probably had the authority of eye-witnesses, has given us the following account of this remarkable charge :

"In the said forest, the old King Robert of Scotland dyd kepe hymselfe, whan Kyng Edward the Fyrst conquered nygh all Scotland; for he was so often chased, that none durst loge him in castell, nor fortresse, for feare of the sayd kyng.

"And ever whan the king was returned into Ingland, than he would gather together agayn his people, and conquere townes, castells, and fortresses, iuste to Berwick, some by battle, and some by fair speech and love: and when the said King Edward heard thereof, than would he assemble his power, and wyn the realme of Scotland again; thus the chance went between these two forsaid kings. It was shewed me, how that this King Robert wan and lost his realme v. times. So this continued till the said King Edward died at Berwick and when he saw that he should die, he called before him his eldest son, who was king after him, and there, before all the barones, he caused him to swear, that as soon as he were dead, that he should take his body, and boyle it in a cauldron, till the flesh departed clean from the bones, and than to bury the flesh, and keep still the bones; and that as often as the Scotts should rebell against him, he should assemble the people against them, and cary with him the bones of his father; for he believed verily, that if they had his bones with them, that the Scotts should never attain any victory against them. The

which thing was not accomplished, for when the king died his son carried him to London."-BERNERS' FROISSART's Chronicle, London, 1812, pp. 39, 40.

Edward's commands were not obeyed, for he was interred in Westminster-Abbey, with the appropriate inscription :"EDWARDUS PRIMUS, SCOTORUM MALLEUS, HIC EST. PACTUM SERVA." Yet some steps seem to have been taken towards rendering his body capable of occasional transportation, for it was exquisitely embalmed, as was ascertained when his tomb was opened some years ago. Edward II. judged wisely in not carrying the dead body of his father into Scotland, since he would not obey his living counsels.

It ought to be observed, that though the order of the incidents is reversed in the poem, yet, in point of historical accuracy, Bruce had landed in Scotland, and obtained some successes of consequence, before the death of Edward I.

Note III.

Canna's tower, that, steep and grey,

Like falcon-nest o'erhangs the bay.—P. 141.

The little island of Canna, or Cannay, adjoins to those of Rum and Muick, with which it forms one parish. In a pretty bay opening towards the east, there is a lofty and slender rock detached from the shore. Upon the summit are the ruins of a very small tower, scarcely accessible by a steep and precipitous path. Here it is said one of the kings, or Lords of the Isles, confined a beautiful lady, of whom he was jealous. The ruins are of course haunted by her restless spirit, and many romantie

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