FAMOUS SCOTS SERIES The following Volumes are now ready :— KING ROBERT THE BRUCE BY A. F. MURISON FAMOUS SCOTS SERIES PUBLISHED BY OLIPHANT ANDERSON & FERRIER · EDINBURGH AND LONDON The designs and ornaments of this volume are by Mr Joseph Brown, and the printing from the press of Messrs Turnbull & Spears, Edinburgh. July 1899. ALMAE MATRI VNIVERSITATI ABERDONENSI ∆. ∆....

The present volume on King Robert the Bruce is the historical complement to the former volume on Sir William Wallace. Together they outline, from the standpoint of the leading spirits, the prolonged and successful struggle of the Scots against the unprovoked aggression of Edward I. and Edward II.—the most memorable episode in the history of Scotland. As in the story of Wallace, so in the story of Bruce, the narrative is based on the primary authorities. Happily State records and official papers

When Sir William Wallace, the sole apparent hope of Scottish independence, died at the foot of the gallows in Smithfield, and was torn limb from limb, it seemed that at last 'the accursed nation' would quietly submit to the English yoke. The spectacle of the bleaching bones of the heroic Patriot would, it was anticipated, overawe such of his countrymen as might yet cherish perverse aspirations after national freedom. It was a delusive anticipation. In fifteen years of arduous diplomacy and warfa

Robert Bruce, the sixth Robert de Brus of Annandale and the seventh de Brus of the Annandale line, was the eldest son of the preceding lord and a grandson of the Competitor. He was born on July 11, 1274. The place of his birth is uncertain—Ayrshire says Turnberry; Dumfriesshire says Lochmaben. Geoffrey le Baker calls him an Englishman ( nacione Anglicus ), and records that he was 'born in Essex,' to which another hand adds, 'at Writtle,' a manor of his father's. Geoffrey, it is true, like severa

Stirling surrendered and Wallace a fugitive, Edward went home and meditated measures for the government of the conquered country. While yielding no point of substance, he recognised the policy of conciliation in form. He took counsel with the Bishop of Glasgow, the Earl of Carrick, and Sir John de Mowbray; and, ostensibly guided by their suggestions, he appointed a meeting of ten Scots and twenty English representatives to be held in London in the middle of July. The meeting was subsequently pos

The new King buckled to his task with fiery energy. 'All the English' had not, though many of them had, 'returned to their own land'; and Bruce instantly issued a proclamation requiring those that remained to follow those that had gone. According to the Meaux chronicler, he proceeded to expel them; but the particular acts are not recorded. At the same time he imperiously insisted on the submission of such Scots as had not yet joined him. He threw the Perth bailies into prison, and required them,

When Sir Nigel Bruce parted for the last time with his brother and passed on his fated way to Kildrummy, the King was left with some two hundred men, all on foot. He kept steadily to the hills, where he suffered severely from hunger, cold, and wet, till at last he resolved to make southward to Cantyre. Despatching Sir Nigel Campbell, whose kinsmen dwelt in these parts, to obtain boats and victuals, and to meet the party 'at the sea'—either on Loch Long or on the Firth of Clyde—Bruce, says Barbou

In the midst of his new success, another severe family blow was impending on Bruce. On February 10, 1306–7—the first anniversary of the Dumfries tragedy—his brothers Thomas and Alexander made a raid on Galloway, with some 300 Scots and 700 Irish auxiliaries, landing at Loch Ryan, in the territory of Sir Dougal MacDowall. In a desperate fight, the force was completely crushed by MacDowall, who captured Thomas and Alexander, and Sir Reginald Crawford, Wallace's uncle, all 'wounded and half-dead.'

While the great Edward was passing south on his last march, Valence was actively engaged in strengthening the English positions in Kyle and Carrick. Percy held Ayr Castle, and John of Argyll guarded Ayr town and neighbourhood with a large force, which was presently joined by half a score of redoubtable Scots knights with their followings. The young King started from Carlisle on July 31, 1307, for Dumfries, where many Scots nobles obeyed his summons to do homage and fealty. Advancing up the valle

Bruce was now in a position to turn his main energies against the strongholds still in English occupation. Towards the end of March 1312 he was preparing to besiege Berwick with an unusually large force. But the operations are not known; and, in any case, they were soon postponed. On April 26, he held a parliament at Ayr, and carefully settled the succession to the throne. The dissensions between Edward and his barons appear to have induced Bruce to carry the war into the enemy's territory. Whil

As far back as December 23, Edward II. had summoned his army to assemble at Berwick on June 10, 1314, for the war against Scotland. In March, he was busily ordering his fleet for service on the east and west coasts, and hastening the muster of the Irish contingent under the Lord of Ulster. On May 27, from New Abbey, he issued an urgent reminder to the sheriffs and barons of the northern and midland counties to have their men at Wark by June 10. He has learnt, he tells them, that the Scots are ma

The battle of Bannockburn might well have been the historical, as well as the dramatic, close of the struggle. But Edward refused to be taught by experience, and the desultory welter of war was miserably prolonged for nearly half a generation to come. The disaster rankled in Edward's mind, ever craving vengeance, impotently. With childish wilfulness, he would not even concede to Bruce the formal title of King of Scots, though the Lanercost chronicler admits that the victory at Bannockburn extort

On January 1, 1316–17, the Pope declared a truce of two years between Edward and Bruce 'acting as King of Scotland' ( gerentem se pro rege Scotiæ ), and denounced excommunication against all breakers thereof. By a Bull dated March 17, he exhorted Edward to peace with Bruce 'now governing the realm of Scotland' ( impraesentiarum regnum Scotiæ gubernantem ), representing not only the waste of good lives and property but also the hindrance to the recovery of the Holy Land, and announcing the despat

The Scots manifesto of April 6, 1320, presented a united and firm front to English pretensions and Papal intrigues. Yet there were traitors in the camp. Little more than four months had elapsed when the Black Parliament, held at Scone on August 20, was investigating a conspiracy to kill King Robert and elevate to the throne Sir William de Soulis. Sir William was a brother of Sir John, and a grandson of Sir Nicholas, one of the Competitors in 1292. Edward's emissaries had been tampering with the

King Robert the Bruce died at Cardross on the Clyde, on June 7, 1329, a little more than a month before the completion of his fifty-fifth year. The cause of his death is said to have been leprosy. Barbour says it was the development of a severe cold, a benumbment contracted in the hardships of his early wanderings. Apart from specific disease, the strain of his laborious reign of nearly a quarter of a century would have shaken the strongest constitution of man. In the last three years he had bee