Stirling.
The happy effects of these rapid conquests were soon apparent. The fall of Berwick excited such a confidence in the minds of the neighboring chieftains, that every hour brought fresh recruits to Wallace. Every mouth was full of the praises of the young conqueror; every eye was eager to catch a glimpse of his person; and while the men were emulous to share his glory, the women in their secret bowers put up prayers for the preservation of one so handsome and so brave.
Amongst the many of every rank and age who hastened to pay their respects to the deliverer of Berwick, was Sir Richard Maitland, of Thirlestane, the Stawlart Knight of Lauderdale.**
**Sir Richard Maitland, of the castle of Thirlestane on the Leeder, is noted in Scottish tradition for his bravery. His valiant defense of his castle against the English in his extreme old age, is still the subject of enthusiasm amongst the people of Lauderdale.
Wallace was no sooner told of the approach of the venerable chief, than he set forth to bid him welcome. At sight of the champion of Scotland, Sir Richard threw himself off his horse with a military grace that might have become even youthful years; and hastening toward Wallace, clasped him in his arms.
"Let me look on thee!" cried the old knight; "let me feast my eyes on the true Scot, who again raises this hoary head, so long bent in shame for its dishonored country!" While he spoke, he viewed Wallace from head to foot. "I knew Sir Ronald Crawford, and thy valiant father," continued he, "O! had they lived to see this day! But the base murder of the one thou hast nobly avenged, and the honorable grave of the other, on Loudon Hill,** thou wilt cover with a monument of thine own glories. Low are laid my own children, in this land of strife, but in thee I see a son of Scotland that is to dry all our tears."
**Sir Malcolm Wallace, the father of Sir William Wallace, was killed in the year 1295, on Loudon Hill, in a battle with the English.
He embraced Wallace again and again; and, as the veteran's overflowing heart rendered him garrulous, he expatiated on the energy with which the young victor had pursued his conquests, and paralleled them with the brilliant actions he had seen in his youth. While he thus discoursed, Wallace drew him toward the castle, and there presented to him the two nephews of the Earl of May.
He paid some warm compliments to Edwin on his early success in the career of glory; and then turning to Murray: "Ay!" said he, "it is joy to me to see the valiant house of Bothwell in the third generation. Thy grandfather and myself were boys together at the coronation of Alexander the Second; and that is eighty years ago. Since then, what have I not seen! the death of two noble Scottish kings! our blooming princes ravished from us by untimely fates! the throne sold to a coward, and at last seized by a foreign power! Then, in my own person, I have been the father of as brave and beauteous a family as ever blessed a parent's eye; but they are all torn from me. Two of my sons sleep on the plains of Dunbar; my third, my dauntless William, since that fatal day, has been kept a prisoner in England. And my daughters, the tender blossoms of my aged years—they grew around me, the fairest lilies of the land: but they, too, are passed away. The one, scorning the mere charms of youth, and preferring a union with a soul that had long conversed with superior regions, loved the sage of Ercildown. But my friend lost this rose of his bosom, and I the child of my heart, ere she had been a year his wife. Then was my last and only daughter married to the Lord Mar; and in giving birth to my dear Isabella she, too, died. Ah, my good young knight, were it not for that sweet child, the living image of her mother, who in the very spring of youth was cropped and fell, I should be alone: my hoary head would descend to the grave, unwept, unregretted!"
The joy of the old man having recalled such melancholy remembrances, he wept upon the shoulder of Edwin, who had drawn so near, that the story, was begun to Murray, was ended to him. To give the mourning father time to recover himself, Wallace was moving away, when he was met by Ker, bringing information that a youth had just arrived in breathless haste from Stirling, with a sealed packet, which he would not deliver into any hands but those of Sir William Wallace. Wallace requested his friends to show every attention to the Lord of Thirlestane, and then withdrew to meet the messenger.
On his entering the ante-room, the youth sprung forward, but suddenly checking himself, he stood as if irresolute whom to address.
"This is Sir William Wallace, young man," said Ker; "deliver your embassy."
At these words the youth pulled a packet from his bosom, and putting it into the chief's hand, retired in confusion. Wallace gave orders to Ker to take care of him, and then turned to inspect its contents. He wondered from whom it would come, aware of no Scot in Stirling who would dare to write to him while that town was possessed by the enemy. But not losing a moment in conjecture, he broke the seal.
How was he startled at the first words! and how was every energy of his heart roused to redoubled action when he turned to the signature! The first words in the letter were these:
"A daughter, trembling for the life of her father, presumes to address Sir William Wallace." The signature was "Helen Mar." He began the letter again:
"A daughter, trembling for the life of her father, presumes to address Sir William Wallace. Alas! it will be a long letter! for it is to tell of our countless distresses. You have been his deliverer from the sword, from chains, and from the waves. Refuse not to save him again to whom you have so often given life, and hasten, brave Wallace, to preserve the Earl of Mar from the scaffold.
"A cruel deception brought him from the Isle of Bute, where you imagined you had left him in security. Lord Aymer de Valence, escaping a second time from your sword, fled under rapacious robber of all our castles, found in him an apt coadjutor. They concerted how to avenge your late successes; and Cressingham, eager to enrich himself, while he flattered the resentments of his commander, suggested that you, Sir William Wallace, our deliverer, and our enemy's scourge, would most easily be made to feel through the bosoms of your friends. These cruel men have therefore determined, by a mock trial, to condemn my father to death, and thus, while they distress you, put themselves in possession of his lands, with the semblance of justice.
"The substance of this most unrighteous debate was communicated to me by De Valence himself; thinking to excuse his part in the affair by proving to me how insensible he is to the principles which move alike a patriot and a man of honor.
"Having learned from some too well-informed spy that Lord Mar had retired in peaceful obscurity to Bute, these arch-enemies to our country sent a body of men disguised as Scots to Gourock. There they dispatched a messenger into the island to inform Lord Mar that Sir William Wallace was on the banks of the Frith waiting to converse with him. My noble father, unsuspicious of treachery, hurried to the summons. Lady Mar accompanied him, and so both fell into the snare.
"They were brought prisoners to Stirling, where another affliction awaited him;-he was to see his daughter and his sister in captivity.
"After I had been betrayed from St. Fillian's monastery by the falsehoods of one Scottish knight, and were rescued from his power by the gallantry of another, I sought the protection of my aunt, Lady Ruthven, who then dwelt at Alloa, on the banks of the Forth. Her husband had been invited to Ayr by some treacherous requisition of the governor, Arnuf; and with many other lords was thrown into prison. Report says, bravest of men, that you have given freedom to my betrayed uncle.
"The moment Lord Ruthven's person was secured, his estates were seized, and my aunt and myself being found at Alloa, we were carried prisoners to this city. Alas! we had then no valiant arm to preserve us from our enemies! Lady Ruthven's first born son was slain in the fatal day of Dunbar, and in terror of the like fate, she placed her eldest surviving boy in a convent.
"Some days after our arrival, my dear father was brought to Stirling. Though a captive in the town, I was not then confined to any closer durance than the walls. While he was yet passing through the streets, rumor told my aunt that the Scottish lord then leading to prison was her beloved brother. She flew to me in agony to tell me the dreadful tidings. I heard no more, saw no more, till, having rushed into the streets, and bursting through every obstacle of crowd and soldiers, I found myself clasped in my father's arms—in his shackled arms! What a moment was that! Where was Sir William Wallace in that hour? Where the brave unknown knight, who had sworn to me to seek my father, and defend him with his life? Both were absent, and he was in chains.
"My grief and distraction baffled the attempts of the guards to part us, and what became of me I know not until I found myself lying on a couch, attended by many women, and supported by my aunt. When I had recovered to lamentation and to tears, my aunt told me I was in the apartments of the deputy warden. He, with Cressingham, having gone out to meet the man they had so basely drawn into their toils, De Valence himself saw the struggles of paternal affection contending against the men who would have torn a senseless daughter from his arms, and yet, merciless man! he separated us, and sent me, with my aunt, a prisoner to his house.
"The next day a packet was put into my aunt's hands, containing a few precious lines from my father to me, also a letter from the countess to Lady Ruthven, full of your goodness to her and to my father, and narrating the cruel manner in which they had been ravished from the asylum in which you had placed them. She then said that could she find means of apprising you of the danger to which she and her husband are now involved, she would be sure of a second rescue. Whether she has blessedly found these means I know not, for all communication between us, since the delivery of that letter, has been rendered impracticable. The messenger that brought the packet was a good Southron, who had been won by Lady Mar's entreaties. But on his quitting our apartments, he was seized by a servant of De Valence, and on the same day put publicly to death, to intimidate all others from the like compassion to the sufferings of unhappy Scotland. Oh! Sir William Wallace, will not your sword reach these men of blood?
"Earl de Valence compelled my aunt to yield the packet to him. We had already read it, therefore did not regret it on that head, but feared the information it might give relative to you. In consequence of this circumstance, I was made a closer prisoner. But captivity could have no terrors for me, did it not divide me from my father. And, grief on grief! what words have I to write it? they have CONDEMNED HIM TO DIE! That fatal letter of my step-mother's was brought out against him, and as your adherent, Sir William Wallace, they have sentenced him to lose his head!
"I have knelt to Earl de Valence; I have implored my father's life at his hands, but to no purpose. He tells me that Cressingham, at his side, and Ormsby, by letters from Scone, declare it necessary that an execution of consequence should be made to appall the discontented Scots; and that as no lord is more esteemed in Scotland than the Earl of Mar, he must be the sacrifice.
"Hasten, then, my father's preserver and friend! hasten to save him! Oh, fly, for the sake of the country he loves; for the sake of the hapless beings dependent on his protection! I shall be on my knees till I hear your trumpet before the walls; for in you and Heaven now rest all the hopes of Helen Mar."
A cold dew stood on the limbs of Wallace as he closed the letter. It might be too late! The sentence was passed on the earl, and his executioners were prompt as cruel: the ax might already have fallen.
He called to Ker, for the messenger to be brought in. He entered. Wallace inquired how long he had been from Stirling. "Only thirty-four hours," replied the youth, adding that he had traveled night and day for fear the news of the risings in Annandale, and the taking of Berwick, should precipitate the earl's death.
"I accompany you this instant," cried Wallace! "Ker, see that the troops get under arms." As he spoke he turned into the room where he had left the Knight of Thirlestane.
"Sir Richard Maitland," said he, willing to avoid exciting his alarm, "there is more work for us at Stirling. Lord Aymer de Valence has again escaped the death we thought had overtaken him, and is now in that citadel. I have just received a summons thither, which I must obey." At these words, Sir Roger Kirkpatrick gave a shout and rushed from the apartment. Wallace looked after him for a moment, and then continued: "Follow us with your prayers, Sir Richard; and I shall not despair of sending blessed tidings to the banks of the Lauder."
"What has happened?" inquired Murray, who saw that something more than the escape of De Valence had been imparted to his general.
"We must spare this good old man," returned he, "and have him conducted to his home before I declare it publicly; but the Earl of Mar is again a prisoner, and in Stirling."
Murray, who instantly comprehended his uncle's danger speeded the departure of Sir Richard; and as Wallace held his stirrup, the chief laid his hand on his head, and blessed him. "The seer of Ercildown is too ill to bring his benediction himself, but I breathe it over this heroic brow!" Wallace bowed his head in silence; and the bridle being in the hand of Lord Andrew, he led the horse out of the eastern gate of the town, where, taking leave of the veteran knight, he soon rejoined his commander, whom he found in the midst of his chieftains.
He had informed them of the Earl of Mar's danger, and the policy as well as justice of rescuing so powerful and patriotic a nobleman from the threatened execution. Lord Ruthven needed no arguments to precipitate him to the assistance of his brother and his wife; and the anxieties of the affectionate Edwin were all awake when he knew that his mother was a prisoner. Lord Andrew smiled proudly when he returned his cousin's letter to Wallace. "We shall have the rogue on the nail yet," cried he; "my uncle's brave head is not ordained to fall by the stroke of such a coward!"
"So I believe," replied Wallace; and then turning to Lord Dundaff-"My lord," said he, "I leave you governor of Berwick."
The veteran warrior grasped Wallace's hand. "To be your representative in this fortress, is the proudest station this warworn frame hath ever filled. My son must be my representative with you in the field." He waved Sir John Graham toward him; the young knight advanced, and Lord Dundaff, placing his son's hands upon his target, continued, "Swear, that as this defends the body, you will ever strive to cover Scotland from her enemies; and that from this hour you will be the faithful friend and follower of Sir William Wallace."
"I swear," returned Graham, kissing the shield. Wallace pressed his hand. "I have brothers around me, rather than what the world calls friends! And with such valor, such fidelity to aid me, can I be otherwise than a victor? Heaven's anointed sword is with such fellowship!"
Edwin, who stood near this rite of generous enthusiasm, softly whispered to Wallace, as he turned toward his troops, "But amongst all these brothers, cease not to remember Edwin—the youngest and the least. Ah, my beloved general, what Jonathan was to David, I would be to thee!"
Wallace looked on him with penetrating tenderness; his heart was suddenly wrung by a recollection, which the words of Edwin had recalled. "But thy love, Edwin, passes not the love of woman!" "But it equals it," replied he; "what has been done for thee I would do; only love me as David did Jonathan, and I shall be the happiest of the happy." "Be happy then, dear boy!" answered Wallace; "for all that ever beat in human breast, for friend or brother, lives in my heart for thee."
At that moment Sir John Graham rejoined them; and some other captains coming up. Wallace made the proper military dispositions, and every man took his station at the head of his division.
Until the men had marched far beyond the chance of rumors reaching Thirlestane, they were not informed of the Earl of Mar's danger. They conceived their present errand was the recapture of De Valence. "But at a proper moment," said Wallace, "they shall know the whole truth; for," added he, "as it is a law of equity, that what concerns all, should be approved by all, and that common dangers should be repelled by united efforts, the people who follow our standards, not as hirelings, but with willing spirits, ought to know our reasons for requiring their services."
"They who follow you," said Graham, "have too much confidence in their leader, to require any reasons for his movements."
"It is to place that confidence on a sure foundation, my brave friends," returned Wallace, "that I explain what there is no just reason to conceal. Should policy ever compel me to strike a blow without previously telling my agents wherefore, I should then draw upon their faith, and expect that confidence in my honor and arms which I now place on their discretion and fidelity."
Exordiums were not requisite to nerve every limb, and to strengthen every heart in the toilsome journey. Mountains were climbed, vast plains traversed, rivers forded, and precipices crossed, without one man in the ranks lingering on its steps, or dropping his head upon his pike, to catch a moment's slumber. Those who had fought with Wallace, longed to redouble their fame under his command; and they who had recently embraced his standard, panted with a virtuous ambition to rival those first-born in arms.
Sir Roger Kirkpatrick had been the first to fly to arms, on the march to Stirling being mentioned; and when Wallace stood forward to declare that rest should be dispensed with till Stirling fell, full of a fierce joy, the ardent knight darted over every obstacle to reach his aim. He flew to the van of his troops, and hailing them forward: "Come on!" cried he, "and in the blood of Cressingham let us forever sink King Edward's Scottish crown."
The shouts of the men, who seemed to drink in the spirit that blazed from Kirkpatrick's eyes, made the echoes of Lammermuir ring with a long-estranged noise. It was the voice of liberty. Leaping every bound, the eager van led the way; and, with prodigious perseverance, dragging their war-machines in the rear, the rest pressed on, till they reached the Carron side. At the moment the foaming steed of Wallace, smoking with the labors of a long and rapid march, was plunging into the stream to take the form, Ker snatched the bridle of the horse: "My lord," cried he, "a man on full speed from Douglas Castle has brought this packet."
In his march to Ayr, Wallace had left Sir Eustace Maxwell governor of that castle, and Monteith as his lieutenant.
Wallace opened the packet and read as follows:
"The patriots in Annandale have been beaten by Lord de Warenne. Sir John Monteith (who volunteered to head them) is taken prisoner, with twelve hundred men.
"Earl de Warenne comes to resume his arrogant title of Lord Warden of Scotland, and thereby to relieve his deputy, Aymer de Valence, who is recalled to take possession of the lordship of Pembroke. In pursuance of his usurping commission, the earl is now marching rapidly toward the Lothians, in the hope of intercepting you in your progress.
"Thanks to the constant information you send us of your movements, for being able to surprise you of this danger! I should have attempted to have checked the Southron, by annoying his flanks, had not his numbers rendered such an enterprise on my part hopeless. But his aim being to come up with you, if you meet him in the van, we shall have him in the rear; and, so surrounded, he must be cut to pieces. Surely the tree you planted in Dumbarton, is not now to be blasted!
"Ever your general's and Scotland's true servant,
"Eustace Maxwell."
"What answer?" inquired Ker.
Wallace hastily engraved with his dagger's point upon his gauntlet, "Reviresco!** Our sun is above!" and desiring it to be given to the messenger to carry to Sir Eustace Maxwell, he refixed himself in his saddle, and spurred over the Carron.
**Reviresco! means "I bud again!" This encouraging word is now the reuto of the Maxwell arms.
The moon was near her meridian as the wearied troops halted on the deep shadows of the Carse of Stirling. All around them was desolation; the sword and the fire had been there, not in open declared warfare, but under the darkness of midnight, and impelled by rapacity and wantonness; hence from the base of the rock, even to the foot of the Clackmannan Hills, all lay a smoking wilderness.
An hour's rest was sufficient to restore every exhausted power to the limbs of the determined followers of Wallace; and, as the morning dawned, the sentinels on the ramparts of the town were not only surprised to see a host below, but that (by the most indefatigable labor, and a silence like death) had not merely passed the ditch, but having gained the counterscarp, had fixed their movable towers, and were at that instant overlooking the highest bastions. The mangonels and petraries, and other implements for battering walls, and the ballista, with every efficient means of throwing missive weapons, were ready to discharge their artillery upon the heads of the beseiged.
At a sight so unexpected, which seemed to have arisen out of the earth like an exhalation (with such muteness and expedition had the Scottish operations been carried on), the Southrons, struck with dread, fled a moment from the walls; but immediately recovering their presence of mind, they returned, and discharged a cloud of arrows upon their assailants. A messenger, meanwhile, was sent into the citadel to apprise De Valence and the Governor Cressingham of the assault. The interior gates now sent forth thousands to the walls; but in proportion to the numbers which approached, the greater was the harvest of death prepared for the terrible arm of Wallace, whose tremendous war wolves throwing prodigious stones, and lighter springalls, casting forth brazen darts, swept away file after file of the reinforcements. It grieved the noble heart of the Scottish commander to see so many valiant men urged to inevitable destruction; but still they advanced, and that his own might be preserved they must fall. To shorten the bloody contest, his direful weapons were worked with redoubled energy; and so mortal a shower fell that the heavens seemed to rain iron. The crushed and stricken enemy, shrinking under the mighty tempest, forsook their ground.
The ramparts deserted, Wallace sprung from his tower upon the walls. At that moment De Valence opened one of the gates; and, at the head of a formidable body, charged the nearest Scots. A good soldier is never taken unawares, and Murray and Graham were prepared to receive him. Furiously driving him to a retrograde motion, they forced him back into the town. But there all was confusion. Wallace, with his resolute followers, had already put Cressingham and his legions to flight; and, closely pursued by Kirkpatrick, they threw themselves into the castle. Meanwhile, the victorious Wallace surrounded the amazed De Valence, who, caught in double toils, called to his men to fight for their king, and neither give nor take quarter.
The brave fellows too strictly obeyed; and while they fell on all sides, he supported them with a courage which horror of Wallace's vengeance for his grandfather's death, and the attempt on his own life in the hall at Dumbarton, rendered desperate. At last he encountered the conquering chief, arm to arm. Great was the dismay of De Valence at this meeting; but as death was now all he saw before him, he resolved, if he must die, that the soul of his enemy should attend him to the other world.
He fought, not with the steady valor of a warrior determined to vanquish or die; but with the fury of despair, with the violence of a hyena, thirsting for the blood of his opponent. Drunk with rage, he made a desperate plunge at the heart of Wallace—a plunge, armed with execrations, and all his strength; but his sword missed its aim, and entered the side of a youth, who at that moment had thrown himself before his general. Wallace saw where the deadly blow fell; and instantly closing on the earl—with a vengeance in his eyes, which reminded his now determined victim of the horrid vision he had seen in the burning Barns of Ayr—with one grasp of his arm, the incensed chief hurled him to the ground; and setting his foot upon his breast, would have buried his dagger there, had not De Valence dropped his uplifted sword, and with horror in every feature, raised his clasped hands in speechless supplication.
Wallace suspended the blow; and De Valence exclaimed: "My life! this once again, gallant Wallace! by your hopes of heaven, grant me mercy!"
Wallace looked on the trembling recreant with a glare, which, had he possessed the soul of a man, would have made him grasp at death, rather than deserve a second. "And hast thou escaped me again?" cried Wallace. Then turning his indignant eyes from the abject earl to his bleeding friend-"I yield him his life, Edwin, and you, perhaps, are slain?"
"Forget not our own bright principle to avenge me," said Edwin, as brightly smiling; "he has only wounded me. But you are safe, and I hardly feel a smart."
Wallace replaced his dagger in his girdle. "Rise, Lord de Valence; it is my honor, not my will, that grants your life. You threw away your arms! I cannot strike even a murderer who bares his breast. I give you that mercy you denied to nineteen unoffending, defenseless old men, whose hoary heads your ruthless ax brought with blood to the ground. Let memory be the sword I have withheld!"
While he spoke, De Valence had risen, and stood, conscience-stricken, before the majestic mien of Wallace. There was something in this denunciation that sounded like the irreversible decree of a divinity; and the condemned wretch quaked beneath the threat, while he panted for revenge.
The whole of the survivors in De Valence's train having surrendered themselves when their leader fell, in a few minutes Wallace was surrounded by his chieftains, bringing in the colors, and the swords of their prisoners.
"Sir Alexander Ramsay," said he, to a brave and courteous knight, who with his kinsman, William Blair, had joined him in the Lothians; "I confide Earl de Valence, to your care. See that he is strongly guarded; and has every respect according to the honor of him to whom I commit this charge."
The town was now in possession of the Scots; and Wallace, having sent off the rest of his prisoners to safe quarters, reiterated his persuasions to Edwin, to have the ground, and submit his wounds to the surgeon. "No, no," replied he; "the same hand that gave me this, inflicted a worse on my general at Dumbarton: he kept the field then; and shall I retire now, and disgrace my example? No, my brother; you would not have me so disprove my kindred!"
"Do as you will," answered Wallace, with a grateful smile; "so that you preserve a life that must never again be risked to save mine. While it is necessary for me to live, my Almighty Captain will shield me; but when his word goes forth, that I shall be recalled, it will not be in the power of friendship, nor of hosts, to turn the steel from my breast. Therefore, dearest Edwin, thrown not yourself away, in defending what is in the hands of Heaven—to be lent, or to be withdrawn at will."
Edwin bowed his modest head; and having suffered a balsam to be poured into his wound, braced his brigandine over his breast; and was again at the side of his friend, just as he had joined Kirkpatrick before the citadel. The gates were firmly closed, and the dismayed Cressingham was panting behind its walls, as Wallace commanded the parley to be sounded. Afraid of trusting himself within arrow-shot of an enemy who he believed conquered by witchcraft, the terrified governor sent his lieutenant up on the walls to answer the summons.
The herald of the Scots demanded the immediate surrender of the place. Cressingham was at that instant informed by a messenger, who had arrived too late the preceding night to be allowed to disturb his slumbers, that De Warenne was approaching with an immense army. Inflated with new confidence, he mounted the wall himself, and in haughty language, returned for answer, "That he would fall under the towers of the citadel before he would surrender to a Scottish rebel. And as an example of the fate which such a delinquent merits," continued he, "I will change the milder sentence passed on Lord Mar, and immediately hang him, and all his family, on these ramparts, in sight of your insurgent army."
"Then," cried the herald, "thus says Sir William Wallace—if even one hair on the heads of the Earl of Mar and his family falls with violence to the ground, every Southron soul who has this day surrendered to the Scottish arms shall lose his head by the ax."
"We are used to the blood of traitors," cried Cressingham, "and mind not its scent. But the army of Earl de Warenne is at hand; and it is at the peril of all your necks, for the rebel, your master, to put his threat in execution. Withdraw, or you shall see the dead bodies of Donald Mar and his family fringing these battlements; for no terms do we keep with man, woman, or child, who is linked with treason!"
At these words, an arrow, winged from a hand behind Cressingham, flew directly to the unvisored face of Wallace, but it struck too high, and ringing against his helmet fell to the ground.
"Treachery!" resounded from every Scottish lip; while indignant at so villainous a rupture of the parley, every bow was drawn to the head; and a flight of arrows, armed with retribution, flew toward the battlements. All hands were now at work, to bring the towers to the wall; and mounting on them, while the archers by their rapid showers drove the men from the ramparts, soldiers below, with pickaxes, dug into the wall to make a breach.
Cressingham began to fear that his boasted auxiliaries might arrive too late; but, determining to gain time at least, he shot flights of darts, and large stones, from a thousand engines; also discharged burning combustibles over the ramparts, in hopes of setting fire to the enemy's attacking machines.
But all his promptitude proved of no effect. The walls were giving way in parts, and Wallace was mounting by scaling-ladders, and clasping the parapets with bridges from his towers. Driven to extremity, Cressingham resolved to try the attachment of the Scots for Lord Mar; and even at the moment when their chief had seized the barbican and outer ballium, this sanguinary politician ordered the imprisoned earl to be brought out upon the wall of the inner ballia. A rope was round his neck, which was instantly run through a groove, that projected from the nearest tower.
At this sight, horror froze the ardent blood of Wallace. But the intrepid earl, descrying his friend on the ladder which might soon carry him to the summit of the battlement, exclaimed, "Forward! Let not my span of life stand between my country and this glorious day for Scotland's freedom!"
"Execute the sentence!" cried the infuriate Cressingham.
At these words, Murray and Edwin precipitated themselves upon the ramparts, and mowed down all before them, in a direction toward their uncle. The lieutenant who held the cord, aware of the impolicy of the cruel mandate, hesitated to fulfill it; and now, fearing a rescue from the impetuous Scots, hurried his victim off the works, back to his prison. Meanwhile, Cressingham perceiving that all would be lost should he suffer the enemy to gain this wall also, sent such numbers upon the brave Scots who had followed the cousins, that, overcoming some, and repelling others, they threw Murray, with a sudden shock, over the ramparts. Edwin was surrounded; and his successful adversaries were bearing him off, struggling and bleeding, when Wallace, springing like a lioness on hunters carrying away her young, rushed in singly amongst them. He seized Edwin; and while his falchion flashed terrible threatenings in their eyes, with a backward step he fought his passage to one of the wooden towers he had fastened to the wall.
Cressingham, being wounded in the head, commanded a parley to be sounded.
"We have already taken Lord de Valence and his host prisoners," returned Wallace; "and we grant you no cessation of hostilities till you deliver up the Earl of Mar and his family, and surrender the castle into our hands."
"Think not, proud boaster!" cried the herald of Cressingham, "that we ask a parley to conciliate. It was to tell you that if you do not draw off directly, not only the Earl of Mar and his family, but every Scottish prisoner within these walls, shall perish in your sight."
While he yet spoke, the Southrons uttered a great shout, and the Scots looking up, beheld several high poles erected on the roof of the keep, and the Earl of Mar, as before, was led forward. But he seemed no longer the bold and tranquil patriot. He was surrounded by shrieking female forms, clinging to his knees; and his trembling hands were lifted to heaven, as if imploring its pity.
"Stop!" cried Wallace, in a voice whose thundering mandate rung from tower to tower. "The instant he dies, Lord Aymer de Valence shall perish!"
He had only to make the sign, and in a few minutes that nobleman appeared between Ramsay and Kirkpatrick. "Earl," exclaimed Wallace, "though I granted your life in the field with reluctance, yet here I am ashamed to put it in danger. But your own people compel me. Look at that spectacle. A venerable father, in the midst of his family; he and they doomed to an ignominious and instant death, unless I betray my country and abandon these walls. Were I weak enough to purchase their lives at such an expense, they could not survive that disgrace. But that they shall not die, while I have the power to preserve them, is my resolve and my duty! Life, then, for life; yours for this family!"
Wallace, directing his voice toward the keep:
"The moment," cried he, "in which that vile cord presses too closely on the neck of the Earl of Mar, or any of his blood, the ax shall sever the head of Lord de Valence from his body!"
De Valence was now seen on the top of one of the besieging towers. He was pale as death. He trembled, but not with dismay only; ten thousand varying emotions tore his breast. To be thus set up as a monument of his own defeat, to be threatened with execution by an enemy he had contemned, to be exposed to such indignities by the unthinking ferocity of his colleague, filled him with such contending passions of revenge against friends and foes, that he forgot the present fear of death in turbulent wishes to deprive of life all by whom he suffered.
Cressingham became alarmed on seeing the retaliating menace of Wallace brought so directly before his view; and, dreading the vengeance of De Valence's powerful family, he ordered a herald to say that if Wallace would draw off his troops to the outer ballium, and the English chief along with them, the Lord Mar and his family should be taken from their perilous situation, and he would consider on terms of surrender.
Aware that Cressingham only wanted to gain time until De Warenne should arrive, Wallace determined to foil him with his own weapons, and make the gaining of the castle the consequence of vanquishing the earl. He told the now perplexed governor that he should consider Lord de Valence as the hostage of safety for Lord Mar and his family, and therefore he consented to withdraw his men from the inner ballium till the setting of the sun, at which hour he should expect a herald with the surrender of the fortress.
Thinking that he had caught the Scottish chief in a snare, and that the lord warden's army would be upon him long before the expiration of the armistice, Cressingham congratulated himself upon this maneuver; and resolving that the moment Earl de Warenne should appear, Lord Mar should be secretly destroyed in the dungeons, he ordered them to their security again.
Wallace fully comprehended what were his enemy's views, and what ought to be his own measures, as soon as he saw the unhappy group disappear from the battlements of the keep. He then recalled his men from the inner ballium wall, and stationing several detachments along the ramparts, and in the towers of the outer wall, committed De Valence to the stronghold of the barbican, under the especial charge of Lord Ruthven, who was, indeed, eager to hold the means in his own hand that were to check the threatened danger of relatives so dear to him as were the prisoners in the castle.
Cambus-Kenneth.
Having secured the advantages he had gained in the town and on the works of the castle, by manning all the strong places, Wallace set forward with his chosen troops to intercept De Warenne.
He took his position on a commanding ground about half a mile from Stirling, near to the Abbey of Cambus-Kenneth. The Forth lay before him, crossed by a wooden bridge, over which the enemy must pass to reach him, the river not being fordable in that part.
He ordered the timbers which supported the bridge to be sawed at the bottom, but not displaced in the least, that they might stand perfectly firm for as long as he should deem it necessary. To these timbers were fastened strong cords, all of which he intrusted to the sturdiest of his Lanark men, who were to lie concealed amongst the flags. These preparations being made, he drew up his troops in order of battle. Kirkpatrick and Murray commanded the flanks. In the center stood Wallace himself, with Ramsay on one side of him, and Edwin, with Scrymgeour on the other, awaiting with steady expectation the approach of the enemy, who, by this time, could not be far distant.
Cressingham was not less well-informed of the advance of De Warenne; and burning with revenge against Wallace, and earnest to redeem the favor of De Valence by some act in his behalf, he first gave secret orders to his lieutenant, then set forth alone to seek an avenue of escape, never divulged to any but to the commanders of the fortress. He soon discovered it; and by the light of a torch, making his way through a passage bored in the rock, emerged at its western base, screened from sight by the surrounding bushes. He had disguised himself in a shepherd's bonnet and plaid, in case of being observed by the enemy; but fortune, favored him, and unseen he crept along through the thickets, till he descried the advance of De Warenne's army on the skirts of Tor Wood.
Having missed Wallace in West Lothian, De Warenne divided his army into three divisions, to enter Stirlingshire by different routes; and so he hoped, certainly, to intercept him in one of them. The Earl of Montgomery led the first, of twenty thousand men; the Barons Hilton and Blenkinsopp, the second, of ten thousand; and De Warenne himself the third, of thirty thousand.
It was the first of these divisions that Cressingham encountered in Tor Wood; and revealing himself to Montgomery, he recounted how rapidly Wallace had gained the town, and in what jeopardy the citadel would be, if he were not instantly attacked. The earl advised waiting for a junction with Hilton or the lord warden, "which," said he, "must happen in the course of a few hours."
"In the course of a few hours," returned Cressingham, "you will have no Stirling Castle to defend. The enemy will seize it at sunset, in pursuance of the very agreement by which I warded him off, to give us time to annihilate him before that hour. Therefore no hesitation, if we would not see him lock the gates of the north of Scotland upon us, even when we have the power to hurl him to perdition."
By arguments such as these the young earl was induced to give up his judgment; and, accompanied by Cressingham, whose courage revived amid such a host, he proceeded to the southern bank of the Forth.
The bands of Wallace were drawn up on the opposite shore, hardly five thousand strong, but so disposed the enemy could not calculate their numbers, though the narrowness of their front suggested to Cressingham that they could not be numerous; and he recollected that many must have been left to occupy the outworks of the town and the citadel. "It will be easy to surround the rebel," cried he; "and that we may effect our enterprise before the arrival of the warden robs us of the honor, let us about it directly, and cross the bridge."
Montgomery proposed a herald being sent to inform Wallace that, besides the long line of troops he saw, De Warenne was advancing with double hosts, and if he would now surrender, a pardon should be granted to him and his, in the king's name, for all their late rebellions. Cressingham was vehement against this measure, but Montgomery being resolute, the messenger was dispatched.
In a few minutes he returned, and repeated to the Southron commanders the words of Wallace: "Go," said he, "tell your masters we came not here to treat for a pardon of what we shall never allow to be an offense; we came to assert our rights—to set Scotland free. Till that is effected, all negotiation is vain. Let them advance; they will find us prepared."
"Then onward!" cried Montgomery; and, spurring his steed, he led the way to the bridge; his eager soldiers followed, and the whole of his center ranks passed over. The flanks advanced, and the bridge, from end to end, was filled with archers, cavalry, men-at-arms, and war-carriages. Cressingham, in the midst, was hallooing in proud triumph to those who occupied the rear of the straining beams, when the blast of a trumpet sounded from the till now silent and immovable Scottish phalanx. It was re-echoed by shouts from behind the passing enemy, and in that moment the supporting piers of the bridge** were pulled away, and the whole of its mailed throng was precipitated into the stream.
**This historical fact relating to the bridge is yet exultantly repeated on the spot, and the number of the Southrons who fell beneath the arms of so small a band of Scots, is not less the theme of triumph.-(1809.)
The cries of the maimed and the drowning were joined by the terrific slogan of two bands of Scots. The one with Wallace toward the head of the river, while the other, under the command of Sir John Graham, rushed from its ambuscade on the opposite bank upon the rear of the dismayed troops; and both divisions sweeping all before them, drove those who fought on land into the river, and those who had just escaped the flood, to meet its waves again, a bleeding host.
In the midst of this conflict, which rather seemed a carnage than a battle, Kirkpatrick, having heard the proud shouts of Cressingham on the bridge, now sought him amidst its shattered timbers. With the ferocity of a tiger hunting its prey, he ran from man to man, and as the struggling wretches emerged from the water, he plucked them from the surge; but even while his glaring eye-balls and uplifted ax threatened destruction, he only looked on them; and with imprecations of disapointment, rushed forward on his chase. Almost in despair that the waves had cheated his revenge, he was hurrying on in another direction, when he perceived a body moving through a hollow on his right. He turned, and saw the object of his search crawling amongst the mud and sedges.
"Ha!" cried Kirkpatrick, with a triumphant yell, "art thou yet mine? Damned, damned villain!" cried he, springing upon his breast: "Behold the man you dishonored!-behold the hot cheek your dastard hand defiled! Thy blood shall obliterate the stain; and then Kirkpatrick may again front the proudest in Scotland!"
"For mercy!" cried the horror-struck Cressingham, struggling with preternatural strength to extricate himself.
"Hell would be my portion did I grant any to thee," cried Kirkpatrick; and with one stroke of the ax he severed the head from its body. "I am a man again!" shouted he, as he held its bleeding veins in his hand, and placed it on the point of his sword. "Thou ruthless priest of Moloch and of Mammon, thou shalt have thine own blood to drink, while I show my general how proudly I am avenged!" As he spoke, he dashed amongst the victorious ranks, and reached Wallace at the very moment he was freeing himself from his fallen horse, which a random arrow had shot under him. Murray, at the same instant, was bringing up the wounded Montgomery, who came to surrender his sword, and to beg quarter for his men. The earl turned deadly pale; for the first object that struck his sight was the fierce knight of Torthorald, walking under the stream of blood which continued to flow from the ghastly head of Cressingham, as he held it exultingly in the air.
"If that be your chief," cried Montgomery, "I have mistaken him much—I cannot yield my sword to him."
Murray understood him: "If cruelty be an evil spirit," returned he, "it has fled every breast in this army to shelter with Sir Roger Kirkpatrick; and its name is Legion! That is my chief!" added he, pointing to Wallace, with an evident consciousness of deriving honor from his command. The chief rose from the ground dyed in the same ensanguined hue which had excited the abhorrence of Montgomery, though it had been drawn from his own veins, and those of his horse. All, indeed, of blood about him seemed to be on his garment; none was in his eyes, none in his heart but what warmed it to mercy and to benevolence for all mankind. His eyes momentarily fell on the approaching figure of Kirkpatrick, who, waving the head in the air, blew from his bugle the triumphal notes of the Pryse, and then cried to his chief: "I have slain the wolf of Scotland! My brave clansmen are now casing my target with his skin,** which, when I strike its bossy sides, will cry aloud. So, perishes thy dishonor! So perish all the enemies of Scotland!"
**It is recorded that the memory of Cressingham was so odious to the Scots, they did indeed flay his dead body, and made saddles and girths and other things of his skin.-(1809.)
"And with the extinction of that breath, Kirkpatrick," cried Wallace, looking serenely from the head to him, "let your fell revenge perish also. For your own honor commit no indignities on the body you have slain."
"'Tis for you to conquer like a god!" cried Kirkpatrick; "I have felt as a man, and like a man I revenge. This head shall destroy in death; it shall vanquish its friends for me; for I will wear it like a Gorgon on my sword, to turn to stone every Southron who looks on it." While speaking, he disappeared amongst the thickening ranks; and as the victorious Scots hailed him in passing, Montgomery, thinking of his perishing men, suffered Murray to lead him to the scene of his humility.
The ever-comprehensive eye of Wallace perceived him as he advanced; and guessing by his armor and dignified demeanor who he was, with a noble grace he raised his helmed bonnet from his head when the earl approached him. Montgomery looked on him; he felt his soul, even more than his arms, subdued; but still there was something about a soldier's heart that shrunk from yielding his power of resistance. The blood mounted into his before pale cheeks; he held out his sword in silence to the victor; for he could not bring his tongue to pronounce the word "surrender."
Wallace understood the sign, and holding up his hand to a herald, the trumpet of peace was raised. It sounded—and where, the moment before, were the horrid clashing of arms, the yell of savage conquest, and direful cries for mercy, all was hushed as death. Not that death which had passed, but that which is approaching.—None spoke, not a sound was heard, but the low groans of the dying, who lay, overwhelmed and perishing, beneath the bodies of the slain, and the feet of the living.
The voice of Wallace rose from this awful pause. Its sound was ever the harbinger of glory, or of "good will to men." "Soldiers!" cried he, "God has given victory—let us show our gratitude by moderation and mercy. Gather the wounded into quarters and bury the dead."
Wallace then turned to the extended sword of the earl; he put it gently back with his hand: "Ever wear what you honor," said he; "but, gallant Montgomery, when you draw it next, let it be in a better cause. Learn, brave earl, to discriminate between a warrior's glory and his shame; between the defender of his country, and the unprovoked ravager of other lands."
Montgomery blushed scarlet at these words; but it was not with resentment. He looked down for a moment: "Ah!" thought he, "perhaps I ought never to have drawn it here!" Then raising his eyes to Wallace, he said: "Were you not the enemy of my king, who, though a conqueror, sanctions none of the cruelties that have been committed in his name, I would give you my hand, before the remnant of his brave troops, whose lives you grant. But you have my heart: a heart that knows no difference between friend or foe, when the bonds of virtue would unite what only civil dissensions hold separate."
"Had your king possessed the virtues you believe he does," replied Wallace, "my sword might have now been a pruning-hook. But that is past! We are in arms for injuries received, and to drive out a tyrant. For believe me, noble Montgomery, that monarch has little pretensions to virtue, who suffers the oppressors of his people, or of his conquests, to go unpunished. To connive at cruelty, is to practice it. And has Edward ever frowned on one of those despots, who, in his name, have for these two years past laid Scotland in blood and ashes?"
The appeal was too strong for Montgomery to answer; he felt its truth, and bowed, with an expression in his face that told more than, as a subject of England, he dared declare.
The late respectful silence was turned into the clamorous activity of eager obedience. The prisoners were conducted to the rear of Stirling; while the major part of the Scots (leaving a detachment to unburden the earth of its bleeding load), returned in front to the gates, just as De Warenne's division appeared on the horizon, like a moving cloud gilded by the now setting sun. At this sight Wallace sent Edwin into the town with Lord Montgomery, and marshaling his line, prepared to bear down upon the approaching earl.
But the lord warden had received information which fought better for the Scots than a host of swords. When advanced a very little onward on the Carse of Stirling, one of his scouts brought intelligence that having approached the south side of the Forth, he had seen that river floating with dead bodies; and soon after met Southron horns blowing the notes of victory. From what he learned from the fugitives, he also informed his lord, "that not only the town and citadel of Stirling were in the possession of Sir William Wallace, but the two detachments under Montgomery and Hilton had both been discomfited, and their leaders slain or taken."
At this intelligence, Earl de Warenne stood aghast; and while he was still doubting that such disgrace to King Edward's arms could be possible, two or three fugitives came up, and witnessed to its truth. One had seen Kirkpatrick, with the bloody head of the Governor of Stirling on his sword. Another had been near Cressingham in the wood, when he told Montgomery of the capture of De Valence; and concluding that he meant the leader of the third division, he corroborated the scout's information of the two defeats, adding (for terror magnified the objects of fear), that the Scots army was incalculable; but was so disposed by Sir William Wallace, as to appear inconsiderable, that he might ensnare his enemies, by filling them with hopes of an easy conquest.
These accounts persuaded De Warenne to make a retreat; and intimidated by the exaggerated representations of those who had fled, his men, with no little precipitation, turned to obey.
Wallace perceived the retrograde motion of his enemy's lines; and while a stream of arrows from his archers poured upon them like hail, he bore down upon the rear-guard with his cavalry and men-at-arms, and sent Graham round by the wood, to surprise the flanks.
All was executed with promptitude; and the tremendous slogan sounding from side to side, the terrified Southrons, before in confusion, now threw away their arms, to lighten themselves for escape. Sensible that it was not the number of the dead, but the terror of the living, which gives the finishing stroke to conquest, De Warenne saw the effects of this panic, in the total disregard of his orders; and dreadful would have been the carnage of his troops had he not sounded a parley.
The bugle of Wallace instantly answered it. De Warenne sent forward his herald. He offered to lay down his arms, provided he might be exempted from relinquishing the royal standard, and that he and his men might be permitted to return without delay to England.
Wallace accepted the first article; granted the second; but with regard to the third, it must be on condition that he, the Lord de Warenne, and the officers taken in his army, or in other engagements lately fought in Scotland, should be immediately exchanged for the like number of noble Scots Wallace should name, who were prisoners in England; and that the common men of the army, now about to surrender their arms, should take an oath never to serve again against Scotland.
These preliminaries being agreed to (their very boldness arguing the conscious advantage which seemed to compel the assent), the lord warden advanced at the head of his thirty thousand troops; and first laying down his sword, which Wallace immediately returned to him, the officers and soldiers marched by with their heads uncovered, throwing down their weapons as they approached their conqueror. Wallace extended his line while the procession moved, for he had too much policy to show his enemies that thirty thousand men had yielded, almost without a blow, to scarce five thousand. The oath was afterward administered to each regiment by heralds, sent for that purpose into the strath of Monteith, whither Wallace had directed the captured legions to assemble and refresh themselves, previous to their departure next morning for England. The privates thus disposed of, to release himself from the commanders also, Wallace told De Warenne that duty called him away, but every respect would be paid to them by the Scottish officers.
He then gave directions to Sir Alexander Ramsay to escort De Warenne and the rest of the noble prisoners to Stirling. Wallace himself turned with his veteran band to give a conqueror's greeting to the Baron of Hilton, and so ended the famous battles of Cambus-Kenneth and the Carse of Stirling.
Stirling Castle.
The prisoners who had been taken with Montgomery were lodged behind the town, and the wounded carried into the Abbey of Cambus-Kenneth; but when Edwin came to move that earl himself, he found him too faint with loss of blood to sit a horse to Snawdoun. He therefore ordered a litter; and so conveyed his brave prisoner to that palace of the kings of Scotland in Stirling.
The priests in Wallace's army not only exercised the Levitical but the good Samaritan's functions, and they soon obeyed the young knight's summons to dress the wounds of Montgomery.
Messengers, meanwhile, arrived from Wallace, acquainting his chieftains in Stirling with the surrender of De Warenne's army. Hence no surprise was created in the breast of the wounded earl when he saw his commander enter the palace as the prisoner of the illustrious Scot.
Montgomery held out his hand to the lord warden in silence, and with a flushed cheek.
"Blush not, my noble friend!" cried De Warenne; "these wounds speak more eloquently than a thousand tongues, the gallantry with which you maintained the sword that fate compelled you to surrender. But I, without a scratch, how can I meet the unconquered Edward? And yet it was not for myself I feared: my brave and confiding soldiers were in all my thoughts; for I saw it was not to meet an army I led them, but against a whirlwind, a storm of war, with which no strength that I commanded could contend."
While the English generals thus conversed, Edwin's impatient heart yearned to be again at the side of Wallace; and gladly resigning the charge of his noble prisoner to Sir Alexander Ramsay, as soon as he observed a cessation in the conversation of the two earls, he drew near Montgomery to take his leave.
"Farewell, till we meet again!" said the young earl, pressing his hand; "you have been a young brother rather than an enemy, to me."
"Because," returned Edwin, "I follow the example of my general, who would willingly be the friend of all mankind."
Warenne looked at him with surprise: "And who are you, who, in that stripling form, utters gallant sentiments which might grace the maturest years?"
With a sweet dignity, Edwin replied, "I am Edwin Ruthven, the adopted brother of Sir William Wallace."
"And the son of him," asked De Warenne, "who, with Sir William Wallace, was the first to mount Dumbarton walls?"
At these words the cheeks of Edwin were suffused with a more animated bloom. At the moment when his courage was distinguished on the heights of Dumbarton, by the vowed friendship of Wallace, he had found himself beloved by the bravest and most amiable of beings; and in his light he felt both warmth and brightness; but this question of De Warenne, conveyed to him that he had found fame himself; that he was there publicly acknowledged to be an object not unworthy of being called the brother of Sir William Wallace!-and, casting down his eyes, beaming with exultation, from the fixed gaze of De Warenne, he answered, "I am that happy Ruthven, who had the honor to mount Dumbarton Rock by the side of my general; and from his hand there received the stroke of knighthood."
De Warenne rose, much agitated: "If such be the boys of Scotland need we wonder, when the spirit of resistance is roused in the nation, that our strength should wither before its men?"
"At least," said Montgomery, whose admiration of what passed seemed to reanimate his languid faculties, "it deprives defeat of its sting, when we are conscious we yielded to power that was irresistible. But, my lord," added he, "if the courage of this youth amazes you, what will you say ought to be the fate of this country? what to be the crown of Sir William Wallace's career, when you know the chain of brave hearts by which he is surrounded? Even tender woman loses the weakness of her sex when she belongs to him." Earl de Warenne, surprised at the energy with which he spoke, looked at him with an expression that told him so. "Yes," continued he, "I witnessed the heroism of Lady Wallace, when she defended the character of her husband in the midst of an armed host, and preserved the secret of his retreat inviolate. I saw that loveliest of women, whom the dastard Heselrigge slew."
"Disgrace to knighthood!" cried Edwin, with indignant vehemence; "if you were a spectator of that bloody deed, retire from this house; go to Cambus-Kenneth—anywhere; but leave this city before the injured Wallace arrives; blast not his eyes with a second sight of one who could have beheld his wife murdered."
Every eye was now fixed on the commanding figure of the young Edwin, who stood with the determination of being obeyed breathing in every look. De Warenne then at once saw the possibility of so gentle a creature being transformed into the soul of enterprise, into the fearless and effective soldier.
Lord Montgomery held out his hand to Edwin. "By this right arm, I swear, noble youth, that had I been on the spot when Heselrigge, lifted his sword against the breast of Lady Wallace, I would have sheathed my sword in his. It was before then that I saw that matchless woman; and offended with my want of severity in the scrutiny I had made at Ellerslie for its chief. Heselrigge sent me back to Ayr. Arnuf quarreled with me there, on the same subject; and I immediately retired in disgust to England."
"Then how? you ought to be Sir Gilbert Hambledon?" replied Edwin; "but whoever you are, as you were kind to the Lady Marion, I cannot but regret my late hasty charge; and for which I beseech your pardon."
Montgomery took his hand, and pressed it. "Generous Ruthven, your warmth is too honorable to need forgiveness. I am that Sir Gilbert Hambledon; and had I remained so, I should not now be in Scotland. But in my first interview with the Prince of Wales, after my accession to the Earldom of Montgomery, his highness told me, it had been rumored from Scotland that I was disloyal in my heart to my king. 'And to prove the falsehood of such calumniators,' continued the prince, 'I appoint you second in command there to the Earl de Warenne.' To have refused to fight against Sir William Wallace, would have been to have accused myself of treason. And while I respected the husband of the murdered Lady Marion, I yet condemned him as an insurgent; and with the same spirit you follow him in the field, I obeyed the commands of my sovereign."
"Lord Montgomery," returned Edwin, "I am rejoiced to see one who proves to me what my general, wronged as he has been, yet always inculcates—that all the Southrons are not base and cruel! When he knows who is indeed his prisoner, what recollections will it awaken! But till you and he again meet, I shall not intimate to him the melancholy satisfaction he is to enjoy, for, with the remembrances it will arouse, your presence must bring the antidote."
The brave youth then telling Ramsay in what parts of the palace the rest of the lords were to be lodged, with recovered composure descended to the courtyard, to take horse for Tor Wood. He was galloping along, under the bright light of the moon, when he heard a squadron on full speed approaching, and presently Murray appeared at its head. "Hurrah, Edwin!" cried he; "well met! We are come to demand the instant surrender of the citadel. Hilton's division has surrendered!"
The two barons had indeed come up about half an hour after Earl de Warenne's division was discomfited. Sir William Wallace had sent forward to the advancing enemy two heralds, bearing the colors De Valence and Montgomery, with the captive banner of De Warenne, and requiring the present division to lay down its army also. The sight of these standards was sufficient to assure Hilton there was no deceit in the embassy. The nature of his position precluded retreat; and not seeing any reason for ten thousand men disputing the day with a power to whom fifty thousand had just surrendered, he and his compeer, with the reluctance of veterans, embraced the terms of surrender.
The instant Hilton put his argent banner** into the victor's hand, Wallace knew that the castle must now be his; he had discomfited all who could have maintained it against him. Impatient to apprise Lord Mar and his family of their safety, he dispatched Murray with a considerable escort to demand its surrender.
**The arms of Hilton are, argent, two bars azure. The charge on those of Blenkinsopp are three wheat-sheaves; crest, a lion rampant, grasping a rose. The ruins of the patrimonial castles of these two ancient barons are still to be seen in the north of England. The author's revered mother was a descendant from the latter venerable name, united with that of the brave and erudite race of Adamson, of further north.
Murray gladly obeyed, and now, accompanied by Edwin, with the standards of Cressingham and De Warenne trailing in the dust, he arrived before the castle, and summoned the lieutenant to the walls. But that officer, well aware of what was going to happen, feared to appear. From the battlements of the keep he had seen the dreadful conflict on the banks of the Forth—he had seen the thousands of De Warenne pass before the conqueror. To punish his treachery, in not only having suffered Cressingham to steal out under the armistice, but upholding also the breaking of his word to surrender at sunset, the terrified officer believed that Wallace was now come to put the whole garrison to the sword.
At the first sight of Murray's approaching squadron, the lieutenant hurried to Lord Mar, to offer him immediate liberty if he would go forth to Wallace and treat with him to spare the lives of the garrison. Closed up in a solitary dungeon, the earl knew naught of what was occurring without; and when the Southron entered, he expected it was to lead him again to the death which had been twice averted. But the pale and trembling lieutenant had no sooner spoken the first word than Mar discerned it was a suppliant, not an executioner, he saw before him, and he was even promising that clemency from Wallace, which he knew dwelt in his heart, when Murray's trumpet sounded.
The lieutenant started, horror-struck. "It is now too late! We have not made the first overture, and there sounds the death-bell of this garrison! I saved your life, earl!" cried he, imploringly, to Lord Mar; "when the enraged Cressingham commanded me to pull the cord which would have launched you into eternity. I disobeyed him! For my sake, then, preserve this garrison, and accompany me to the ramparts."
The chains were immediately knocked off the limbs of Lord Mar, and the lieutenant presenting him with a sword, they appeared together on the battlements. As the declining moon shone on their backs, Murray did not discern that it was his uncle who mounted the walls; but calling to him in a voice which declared there was no appeal, pointed to the humbled colors of Edward, and demanded the instant surrender of the citadel.
"Let it be, then with the pledge of Sir William Wallace's mercy?" cried the venerable earl.
"With every pledge, Lord Mar," returned Murray, now joyfully recognizing his uncle, "which you think safe to give."
"Then the keys of the citadel are yours," cried the lieutenant; "I only ask the lives of my garrison."
This was granted, and immediately preparations were made for the admission of the Scots. As the enraptured Edwin heard the heavy chains of the portcullis drawn up, and the massy bolts of the huge doors grating in their guards, he thought of his mother's liberty, of his father's joy, in pressing her again in his arms; and hastening to the tower where Lord Ruthven held watch over the now sleeping De Valance, he told him all that had happened. "Go, my father," added he; "enter with Murray, and be the first to open the prison doors of my mother."
Lord Ruthven embraced his son. "My dear Edwin! this sacrifice to my feelings is worthy of you. But I have a duty to perform, superior even to the tenderest private ones. I am planted hereby my commander; and shall I quit my station, for any gratification, till he gives me leave? No, my son! Be you my representative to your mother; and while my example teaches you, above all earthly considerations, to obey your honor, those tender embraces will show her what I sacrifice to duty."
Edwin no longer urged his father, and leaving his apartment, flew to the gate of the inner ballium. It was open; and Murray already stood on the platform before the keep, receiving the keys to the garrison.
"Blessed sight!" cried the earl, to his nephew. "When I put the banner of Mar into your unpracticed hand, little could I expect that, in the course of four months, I should see my brave Andrew receive the keys of proud Stirling from its commander!"
Murray smiled, while his plumed head bowed gratefully to his uncle, and turning to the lieutenant, "Now," said he, "lead me to the Ladies Mar and Ruthven that I may assure them they are free."
The gates of the keep were now unclosed, and the lieutenant conducted his victors along a gloomy passage, to a low door, studded with knobs of iron. As he drew the bolt, he whispered to Lord Mar, "These severities are the hard policy of Governor Cressingham."
He pushed the door slowly open, and discovered a small, miserable cell—its walls, of rugged stone, having no other covering than the incrustations which time, and many a dripping winter, had strewn over their vaulted service. On the ground, on a pallet of straw, lay a female figure in a profound sleep. But the light which the lieutenant held, streaming full upon the uncurtained slumberer, she started, and, with a shriek of terror at the sight of so many armed men, discovered the pallid features of the Countess of Mar. With an anguish which hardly the freedom he was going to bestow could ameliorate, the earl rushed forward, and, throwing himself beside her, caught her in his arms.
"Are we, then, to die?" cried she, in a voice of horror. "Has Wallace abandoned us? Are we to perish? Heartless-heartless man!"
Overcome by his emotions, the earl could only strain her to his breast in speechless agitation. Edwin saw a picture of his mother's sufferings, in the present distraction of the countess; and he felt his powers of utterance locked up; but Lord Andrew, whose ever-light heart was gay the moment he was no longer unhappy, jocosely answered, "My fair aunt, there are many hearts to die by your eyes before that day! and, meanwhile, I come from Sir William Wallace—to set you free!"
The name of Wallace, and the intimation that he had sent to set her free, drove every former thought of death and misery from her mind; again the ambrosial gales of love seemed to breathe around her—she saw not her prison walls; she felt herself again in his presence; and in a blissful trance, rather endured than participated in the warm congratulations of her husband on their mutual safety.
Edwin and Murray turned to follow the lieutenant, who, preceding them, stopped at the end of the gallery. "Here," said he, "is Lady Ruthven's habitation; and—alas! not better than the countess'." While he spoke, he threw open the door, and discovered its sad inmate also asleep. But when the glad voice of her son pierced her ear—when his fond embraces clung to her bosom, her surprise and emotions were almost insupportable. Hardly crediting her senses, that he whom she had believed was safe in the cloisters of St. Colomba, could be within the dangerous walls of Stirling; that it was his mailed breast that pressed against her bosom; that it was his voice she heard exclaiming, "Mother, we come to give you freedom!" all appeared to her like a dream of madness.