1297-1328

Edward I had failed to recognize the difference between the Scottish barons and the Scottish people, to which we have referred in a former chapter. To the Norman baron, who possessed lands in England and Scotland alike, it mattered little that he had now but one liege lord instead of two suzerains. To the people of Scotland, proud and high-spirited, tenacious of their long traditions of independence, resentful of the presence of foreigners, it could not but be hateful to find their country governed by a foreign soldiery. The conduct of Edward's officials, and especially of Cressingham and Ormsby, and the cruelty of the English garrisons, served to strengthen this national feeling, and it only remained for it to find a leader round whom it might rally.[44] A leader arose in the person of Sir William Wallace, a heroic and somewhat mysterious figure, who first attracted notice in the autumn of 1296, and, by the spring of the following year, had gathered round him a band of guerilla warriors, by whose help he was able to make serious attacks upon the English garrisons of Lanark and Scone (May, 1297). These exploits, of little importance in themselves, sufficed to attract the popular feeling towards Wallace. The domestic difficulties of Edward I rendered the time opportune for a rising, and, despite the failure of an ill-conceived and badly-managed attempt on the part of some of the more patriotic barons, which led to the submission of Irvine, in 1297, the little army which Wallace had collected rapidly grew in courage and in numbers, and its leader laid siege to the castle of Dundee. He had now attained a position of such importance that Surrey and Cressingham found it necessary to take strong measures against him, and they a.s.sembled at Stirling, whither Wallace marched to meet them.

The battle of Stirling Bridge (or, more strictly, Cambuskenneth Bridge) was fought on September 11th, 1297. Wallace, with his army of knights and spearmen, took up his position on the Abbey Craig, with the Forth between him and the English. Less than a mile from the Scottish camp was a small bridge over the river, giving access to the Abbey of Cambuskenneth. Surrey rashly attempted to cross this bridge, in the face of the Scots, and Wallace, after a considerable number of the enemy had been allowed to reach the northern bank, ordered an attack. The English failed to keep the bridge, and their force became divided. Surrey was unable to offer any a.s.sistance to his vanguard, and they fell an easy prey to the Scots, while the English general, with the remnants of his army, retreated to Berwick.

Stirling was the great military key of the country, commanding all the pa.s.ses from south to north, and the great defeat which the English had sustained placed the country in the power of Wallace. Along with an Andrew de Moray, of whose ident.i.ty we know nothing, he undertook the government of the country, corresponded in the name of Scotland with Lubeck and Hamburg, and took the offensive against England in an expedition which ravaged as far south as Hexham. To the great monastery of Hexham he granted protection in the name of "the leaders of the army of Scotland",[45] although he was not successful in restraining the ferocity of his followers. The doc.u.ment in question is granted in the name of John, King of Scotland, and in a charter dated March 1298,[46]

Wallace describes himself as Guardian of the Kingdom of Scotland, acting for the exiled Balliol. In the following summer, Edward marched into Scotland, and although his forces were in serious difficulties from want of food, he went forward to meet Wallace, who held a strong position at Falkirk. Wallace prepared to meet Edward by drawing up his spearmen in four great "schiltrons" or divisions, with a reserve of cavalry. His flanks were protected by archers, and he had also placed archers between the divisions of spearmen. On the English side, Edward himself commanded the centre, the Earls of Norfolk and Hereford the right, and the Bishop of Durham the left. The Scottish defeat was the result of a combination of archers and cavalry. The first attack of the English horse was completely repulsed by the spearmen. "The front ranks", says Mr. Oman, "knelt with their spear-b.u.t.ts fixed in the earth; the rear ranks levelled their lances over their comrades' heads; the thick-set grove of twelve-foot spears was far too dense for the cavalry to penetrate." But Edward withdrew the cavalry and ordered the archers to send a shower of arrows on the Scots. Wallace's cavalry made no attempt to interfere with the archers; the Scottish bowmen were too few to retaliate; and, when the English horse next charged, they found many weak points in the schiltrons, and broke up the Scottish host.

As the battle of Stirling had created the power of Wallace, so that of Falkirk completely destroyed it. He almost immediately resigned his office of guardian (mainly, according to tradition, because of the jealousy with which the great barons regarded him), and took refuge in France. Edward was still in the midst of difficulties, both foreign and domestic, and he was unable to reduce the country. The Scots elected new guardians, who regarded themselves as regents, not for Edward but for Balliol. They included John Comyn and Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick, the future king. The guardians were successful in persuading both Philip IV of France and Pope Boniface VIII to intervene in their favour, but Edward disregarded the papal interference, and though he was too busy to complete his conquest, he sent an army into Scotland in each of the years 1300, 1301, and 1302. Military operations were almost entirely confined to ravaging; but, in February 1302-3, Comyn completely defeated at Rosslyn, near Edinburgh, an English army under Sir John Segrave and Ralph de Manton, whom Edward had ordered to make a foray in Scotland about the beginning of Lent. In the summer of 1303, the English king, roused perhaps by this small success, and able to give his undivided attention to Scotland, conducted an invasion on a larger scale. In September, he traversed the country as far north as Elgin, and, remaining in Scotland during the winter of 1303-4, he set to work in the spring to reduce the castle of Stirling, which still held out against him. When the garrison surrendered, in July, 1304, Scotland lay at Edward's feet. Comyn had already submitted to the English king, and Edward's personal vindictiveness was satisfied by the capture of Wallace by Sir John Menteith, a Scotsman who had been acting in the English interest. Wallace was taken to London, subjected to a mock trial, tortured, and put to death with ignominy. On the 23rd August, 1305, his head was placed on London Bridge, and portions of his body were sent to Scotland. His memory served as an inspiration for the cause of freedom, and it is held in just reverence to the present hour. If it is true that he did not scruple to go beyond what we should regard as the limits of honourable warfare, it must be remembered that he was fighting an enemy who had also disregarded these limits, and much may be forgiven to brave men who are resisting a gratuitous war of conquest. When he died, his work seemed to have failed. But he had shown his countrymen how to resist Edward, and he had given sufficient evidence of the strength of national feeling, if only it could find a suitable leader. The English had to learn the lesson which, five centuries later, Napoleon had to learn in Spain, and Scotland cannot forget that Wallace was the first to teach it.

It is not less pathetic to turn to Edward's scheme for the government of Scotland. It bears the impress of a mind which was that of a statesman and a lawyer as well as a soldier. It is impossible to deny a tribute of admiration to its wisdom, or to question the probability of its success in other circ.u.mstances. Had the course of events been more propitious for Edward's great plan, Scotland and England might have been spared much suffering. But Edward failed to realize that the Scots could no longer regard him as the friend and ally to whose son they had willingly agreed to marry their queen. He was now but a military conqueror in temporary possession of their country, an enemy to be resisted by any means. The new const.i.tution was foredoomed to failure. Carrying out his scheme of 1296, Edward created no va.s.sal-king, but placed Scotland under his own nephew, John of Brittany; he interfered as little as might be with the customs and laws of the country; he placed over it eight justiciars with sheriffs under them. In 1305, Edward's Parliament, which met at London, was attended by Scottish representatives. The incorporation of the country with its larger neighbour was complete, but it involved as little change as was possible in the circ.u.mstances.

The Parliament of 1305 was attended by Robert Bruce, Earl of Carrick, who attended not as a representative of Scotland, but as an English lord. Bruce was the grandson of the Robert Bruce of Annandale who had been promised the crown by Alexander II, and who had been one of the claimants of 1290. His grandfather had done homage to Edward, and Bruce himself had been generally on the English side, and had fought against Wallace at Falkirk. When John Balliol had decided to rebel, he had transferred the lands of Annandale from the Bruces to the Comyns, and they had been restored by Edward I after Balliol's submission. From 1299 to 1303, Bruce had been a.s.sociated with Comyn in the guardianship of the kingdom, but, like Comyn, had submitted to Edward. n.o.body in Scotland could now think of a restoration of Balliol, and if there was to be a Scottish king at all, it must obviously be either Comyn or Bruce. The claim of John Comyn the younger was much stronger than that of his father had been. The elder Comyn had claimed on account of his descent from Donald Bane, the brother and successor of Malcolm Canmore; but the younger Comyn had an additional claim in right of his mother, who was a sister of John Balliol. Between Bruce and Comyn there was a long-standing feud. In 1299, at a meeting of the Great Council of Scotland at Peebles, Comyn had attacked Bruce, and they could only be separated by the use of violence. On the 10th February, 1305-6, Bruce and the Comyn met in the church of the convent of the Minorite Friars at Dumfries. Tradition tells that they met to adjust their conflicting claims, with a view to establishing the independence of the country in the person of one or other of the rivals; that a dispute arose in which they came to blows; and that Bruce, after inflicting a severe wound upon his enemy, left the church. "I doubt I have slain the Red Comyn," he said to his followers. "Doubt?" was the reply of Sir Roger Fitzpatrick, "I'll mak siccar." The actual circ.u.mstances of the affair are unknown to us; but Bruce may fairly be relieved of the suspicion of any premeditation, because it is most unlikely that he would have needlessly chosen to offend the Church by committing a murder within sanctuary. The real interest attaching to the circ.u.mstances lies in the tradition that the object of the meeting was to organize a resistance against Edward I.

Whether this was so or not, there can be no doubt that the result of the conference compelled the Bruce to place himself at the head of the national cause. A Norman baron, born in England, he was by no means the natural leader for whose appearance men looked, and there was a grave chance of his failing to arouse the national sentiment. But the murder of one claimant to the Scottish throne at the hands of the only other possible candidate, who thus placed himself in the position of undoubted heir, could scarcely have been forgiven by Edward I, even if the Comyn had not, for the past two years, proved a faithful servant of the English king. There was no alternative, and, on the 27th March, 1306, Robert, Earl of Carrick and Lord of Annandale, was crowned King of the Scots at Scone. The ancient royal crown of the Scottish kings had been removed by Balliol in 1296, and had fallen into the hands of Edward, but the Countess of Buchan placed on the Bruce's head a hastily made coronet of gold.

It was far from an auspicious beginning. It is difficult to give Bruce credit for much patriotic feeling, although, as we have seen, he had been one of the guardians who had maintained a semblance of independence. The death of the Comyn had thrown against him the whole influence of the Church; he was excommunicate, and it was no sin to slay him. The powerful family, whose head had been cut off by his hand, had vowed revenge, and its great influence was on the side of the English.

It is no small tribute to the force of the sentiment of nationality that the Scots rallied round such a leader, and it must be remembered that, from whatever reason the Bruce adopted the national cause, he proved in every respect worthy of a great occasion, and as time pa.s.sed, he came to deserve the place he occupies as the hero of the epic of a nation's freedom.

The first blow in the renewed struggle was struck at Methven, near Perth, where, on the 19th June, 1306, the Earl of Pembroke inflicted a defeat upon King Robert. The Lowlands were now almost entirely lost to him; he sent his wife[47] and child to Kildrummie Castle in Aberdeenshire, whence they fled to the sanctuary of St. Duthac, near Tain. In August, Bruce was defeated at Dalry, by Alexander of Lorn, a relative of the Comyn. In September, Kildrummie Castle fell, and Nigel Bruce, King Robert's brother, fell into the hands of the English and was put to death at Berwick. To complete the tale of catastrophes, the Bruce's wife and daughter, two of his sisters, and other two of his brothers, along with the Countess of Buchan, came into the power of the English king. Edward placed some of the ladies in cages, and put to death Sir Thomas Bruce and Alexander Bruce, Dean of Glasgow (February, 1306-7). Meanwhile, King Robert had found it impossible to maintain himself even in his own lands of Carrick, and he withdrew to the island of Rathlin, where he wintered. Undeterred by this long series of calamities, he took the field in the spring of 1307, and now, for the first time, fortune favoured him. On the 10th May, he defeated the English, under Pembroke, at Loudon Hill, in Ayrshire. He had been joined by his brother Edward and by the Lord James of Douglas (the "Black Douglas"), and the news of his success, slight as it was, helped to increase at once the spirit and the numbers of his followers. His position, however, was one of extreme difficulty; he was still only a king in name, and, in reality, the leader of a guerilla warfare. Edward was marching northwards at the head of a large army, determined to crush his audacious subject. But Fate had decreed that the Hammer of the Scots was never again to set foot in Scotland. At Burgh-on-Sand, near Carlisle, within sight of his unconquered conquest, the great Edward breathed his last. His death was the turning-point in the struggle. The reign of Edward II in England is a most important factor in the explanation of Bruce's success.

With the death of Edward I the whole aspect of the contest changes. The English were no longer conducting a great struggle for a statesmanlike ideal, as they had been under Edward I--however impossible he himself had made its attainment. There is no longer any sign of conscious purpose either in their method or in their aims. The nature of the warfare at once changed; Edward II, despite his father's wish that his bones should be carried at the head of the army till Scotland was subdued, contented himself with a fruitless march into Ayrshire, and then returned to give his father a magnificent burial in Westminster Abbey. King Robert was left to fight his Scottish enemies without their English allies. These Scottish enemies may be divided into two cla.s.ses--the Anglo-Norman n.o.bles who had supported the English cause more or less consistently, and the personal enemies of the Bruce, who increased in numbers after the murder of Comyn. Among the great families thus alienated from the cause of Scotland were the Highlanders of Argyll and the Isles, some of the men of Badenach, and certain Galloway clans.

But that this opposition was personal, and not racial, is shown by the fact that, from the first, some of these Highlanders were loyal to Bruce, _e.g._ Sir Nigel Campbell and Angus Og. We shall see, further, that after the first jealousies caused by Comyn's death and Bruce's success had pa.s.sed away, the men of Argyll and the Isles took a more prominent part on the Scottish side. In December, 1307, Bruce routed John Comyn, the successor of his old rival, at Slains, on the Aberdeenshire coast, and in the following May, when Comyn had obtained some slight English a.s.sistance, he inflicted a final defeat upon him at Inverurie. The power of the Comyns in their hereditary earldom of Buchan had now been suppressed, and King Robert turned his attention to their allies in the south. In the autumn of 1308, he himself defeated Alexander of Lorn and subdued the district of Argyll, his brother Edward reduced Galloway to subjection, and Douglas, along with Randolph, Earl of Moray, was successful in Tweeddale. Thus, within three years from the death of Comyn, Bruce had broken the power of the great families, whose enmity against him had been aroused by that event. One year later the other great misfortune, which had been brought upon him by the same cause, was removed by an act which is important evidence at once of the strength of the anti-English feeling in the country, and of the confidence which Bruce had inspired. On the 24th February, 1309-10, the clergy of Scotland met at Dundee and made a solemn declaration[48] of fealty to King Robert as their lawful king. Scotland was thus united in its struggle for independence under King Robert I.

It now remained to attack the English garrisons who held the castles of Scotland. An invasion conducted by Edward II in 1310 proved fruitless, and the English king returned home to enter on a long quarrel with the Lords Ordainers, and to see his favourite, Gaveston, first exiled and then put to death. While the attention of the rulers of England was thus occupied, Bruce, for the first time since Wallace's inroad of 1297, carried the war into the enemy's country, invading the north of England both in 1311 and in 1312. Meanwhile the strongholds of the country were pa.s.sing out of the English power. Linlithgow was recovered in 1311; Perth in January, 1312-13; and Roxburgh a month later. The romantic capture of the castle of Edinburgh, by Randolph, Earl of Moray, in March, 1313, is one of the cla.s.sical stories of Scottish history, and in the summer of the same year, King Robert restored the Scottish rule in the Isle of Man. In November, 1313, only Stirling Castle remained in English hands, and Edward Bruce rashly agreed to raise the siege on condition that the garrison should surrender if they were not relieved by June 24th, 1314. Edward II determined to make a heroic effort to maintain this last vestige of English conquest, and his attempt to do so has become irrevocably a.s.sociated with the Field of Bannockburn.

In his preparations for the great struggle, which was to determine the fate of Scotland, the Bruce carefully avoided the errors which had led to Wallace's defeat at Falkirk. He selected a position which was covered, on one side by the Bannock Burn and a mora.s.s, and, on the other side, by the New Park or Forest. His front was protected by the stream and by the famous series of "pottes", or holes, covered over so as to deceive the English cavalry. The choice of this narrow position not only prevented the possibility of a flank attack, but also forced the great army of Edward II into a small s.p.a.ce, where its numbers became a positive disadvantage. King Robert arranged his infantry in four divisions; in front were three schiltrons of pikemen, under Randolph, Edward Bruce, and Sir James Douglas, and Bruce himself commanded the reserve, which was composed of Highlanders from Argyll and the Islands and of the men of Carrick.[49] Sir Robert Keith, the Marischal, was in charge of a small body of cavalry, which did good service by driving back, at a critical moment, such archers as made their way through the forest. The English army was in ten divisions, but the limited area in which they had to fight interfered with their arrangement. As at Falkirk, the English cavalry made a gallant but useless charge against the schiltrons, but it was not possible again to save the day by means of archers, for the archers had no room to deploy, and could only make vain efforts to shoot over the heads of the hors.e.m.e.n. Bruce strengthened the Scots with his reserve, and then ensued a general action along the whole line. The van of the English army was now thoroughly demoralized, and their comrades in the rear could not, in these narrow limits, press forward to render any a.s.sistance. King Robert's camp-followers, at this juncture, rushed down a hill behind the Scottish army, and they appeared to the English as a fresh force come to a.s.sist the enemy. The result was the loss of all sense of discipline: King Edward's magnificent host fled in complete rout and with great slaughter, and the cause of Scottish freedom was won.

The victory of Bannockburn did not end the war, for the English refused to acknowledge the hard-won independence of Scotland, and fighting continued till the year 1327. The Scots not only invaded England, but adopted the policy of fighting England in Ireland, and English reprisals in Scotland were uniformly unsuccessful. Bruce invaded England in 1315; in the same year, his brother Edward landed with a Scottish army at Carrickfergus, in the hope of obtaining a throne for himself. He was crowned King of Ireland in May, 1316, and during that and the following year, King Robert was personally in Ireland, giving a.s.sistance to his brother. But, in 1318, Edward Bruce was defeated and slain near Dundalk, and, with his death, this phase of the Bruce's English policy disappears. A few months before the death of Edward Bruce, King Robert had captured the border town of Berwick-on-Tweed, which had been held by the English since 1298. In 1319, Edward II sent an English army to besiege Berwick, and the Scots replied by an invasion of England in the course of which Douglas and Randolph defeated the English at Mitton-on-Swale in Yorkshire. The English were led by the Archbishop of York, and so many clerks were killed that the battle acquired the name of the Chapter of Mitton. The war lingered on for three years more. The year 1322 saw an invasion of England by King Robert and a counter-invasion of Scotland by Edward II, who destroyed the Abbey of Dryburgh on his return march. This expedition was, as usual, fruitless, for the Scots adopted their usual tactics of leaving the country waste and desolate, and the English army could obtain no food. In October of the same year King Robert made a further inroad into Yorkshire, and won a small victory at Biland Abbey. At last, in March, 1323, a truce was made for thirteen years, but as Edward II persisted in declining to acknowledge the independence of Scotland, it was obvious that peace could not be long maintained.

During the fourteen years which followed his victory of Bannockburn, King Robert was consolidating his kingdom. He had obtained recognition even in the Western Highlands and Islands, and the sentiment of the whole nation had gathered around him. The force of this sentiment is apparent in connection with ecclesiastical difficulties. When Pope John XXII attempted to make peace in 1317 and refused to acknowledge the Bruce as king, the papal envoys were driven from the kingdom. For this the country was placed under the papal ban, and when, in 1324, the pope offered both to acknowledge King Robert and to remove the excommunication, on condition that Berwick should be restored to the English, the Scots refused to comply with his condition. A small rebellion in 1320 had been firmly repressed by king and Parliament. The birth of a son to King Robert, on the 5th March, 1323-24, had given security to the dynasty, and, at the great Parliament which met at Cambuskenneth in 1326, at which Scottish burghs were, for the first time, represented, the clergy, the barons, and the people took an oath of allegiance to the little Prince David, and, should his heirs fail, to Robert, the son of Bruce's daughter, Marjorie, and her husband, Robert, the High Steward of Scotland. The same Parliament put the financial position of the monarch on a satisfactory footing by granting him a tenth penny of all rents.

The deposition and murder of Edward II created a situation of which the King of Scots could not fail to take advantage. The truce was broken in the summer of 1327 by an expedition into England, conducted by Douglas and Randolph, and the hardiness of the Scottish soldiery surprised the English and warned them that it was impossible to prolong the contest in the present condition of the two countries. The regents for the young Edward III resolved to come to terms with Bruce. The treaty of Northampton, dated 17th March, 1327-28, is still preserved in Edinburgh.

It acknowledged the complete independence of Scotland and the royal dignity of King Robert. It promised the restoration of all the symbols of Scottish independence which Edward I had removed, and it arranged a marriage between Prince David, the heir to the Scottish throne, and Joanna, the sister of the young king of England. A marriage ceremony between the two children was solemnized in the following May, but the Stone of Fate was never removed from Westminster, owing, it is said, to the opposition of the abbot. The succession of James VI to the throne of England, nearly three centuries later, was accepted as the fulfilment of the prophecy attached to the Coronation Stone, "Lapis ille grandis":

"Ni fallat fatam, Scoti, quocunque locatum, Invenient lapidem, regnare tenentur ibidem".

Thus closed the portion of Scottish history which is known as the War of Independence. The condemnation of the policy of Edward I lies simply in its results. He found the two nations at peace and living together in amity; he left them at war and each inspired with a bitter hatred of the other. A policy which aimed at the unification of the island and at preventing Scotland from proving a source of danger to England, and which resulted in a warfare covering, almost continuously, more than two hundred and fifty years, and which, after the lapse of four centuries, left the policy of Scotland a serious difficulty to English ministers, can scarcely receive credit for practical sagacity, however wise its aim. It created for England a relentless and irritating (if not always a dangerous) enemy, invariably ready to take advantage of English difficulties. England had to fight Scotland in France and in Ireland, and Edward IV and Henry VII found the King of Scots the ally of the House of Lancaster, and the protector of Perkin Warbeck. Only the accident of the Reformation rendered it possible to disengage Scotland from its alliance with France, and to bring about a union with England.

Till the emergence of the religious question the English party in Scotland consisted of traitors and mercenaries, and their efforts to strengthen English influence form the most discreditable pages of Scottish history.

We are not here dealing with the domestic history of Scotland; but it is impossible to avoid a reference to the subject of the influence of the Scottish victory upon the Scots themselves. It has been argued that Bannockburn was, for Scotland, a national misfortune, and that Bruce's defeat would have been for the real welfare of the country. There are, of course, two stand-points from which we may approach the question. The apologist of Bannockburn might lay stress on the different effects of conquest and a hard-won independence upon the national character, and might fairly point to various national characteristics which have been, perhaps, of some value to civilization, and which could hardly have been fostered in a condition of servitude. On the other hand, there arises a question as to material prosperity. It must be remembered that we are not here discussing the effect of a peaceful and amicable union, such as Edward first proposed, but of a successful war of conquest; and in this connection it is only with thankfulness and grat.i.tude to Wallace and to Bruce that the Scotsman can regard the parallel case of Ireland, which, from a century before the time of Edward I, had been annexed by conquest. The story we have just related goes to create a reasonable probability that the fate of Scotland could not have been different; but, further, leaving all such problems of the "might have been", we may submit that the misery of Scotland in the fourteenth, fifteenth, and sixteenth centuries has been much exaggerated. It is true that the borders were in a condition of perpetual feud, and that minorities and intrigues gravely hampered the progress of the country. But, more especially in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries, there are not wanting indications of prosperity. The chapter of Scottish history which tells of the growth of burghs has yet to be written. The construction of magnificent cathedrals and religious houses, and the rise of three universities, must not be left out of account. Gifts to the infant universities, the records of which we possess, prove that for humble folk the tenure of property was comparatively secure, and that there was a large amount of comfort among the people. Under James IV, trade and commerce prospered, and the Scottish navy rivalled that of the Tudors.

The century in which Scottish prosperity received its most severe blows immediately succeeded the Union of the Crowns. If for three hundred years the civilizing influence of England can scarcely be traced in the history of Scottish progress, that of France was predominant, and Scotland cannot entirely regret the fact. Scotland, from the date of Bannockburn to that of Pinkie, will not suffer from a comparison with the England which underwent the strain of the long French wars, the civil broils of Lancaster and York, and the oppression of the Tudors.

Moreover, there is one further consideration which should not be overlooked. The postponement of an English union till the seventeenth century enabled Scotland to work out its own reformation of religion in the way best adapted to the national needs, and it is difficult to estimate, from the material stand-point alone, the importance of this factor in the national progress. The inspiration and the education which the Scottish Church has given to the Scottish people has found one result in the impulse it has afforded to the growth of material prosperity, and it is not easy to regret that Scotland, at the date of the Reformation, was free to work out its own ecclesiastical destiny.

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 44: There is no indication of any racial division in the att.i.tude of the Scots. Some Highlanders, from various personal causes, are found on the English side at the beginning of the War of Independence; but Mr. Lang has shown that of the descendants of Somerled of Argyll, the ancestor of the Lords of the Isles, only one fought against Wallace, while the Celts of Moray and Badenach and the Highland districts of Aberdeenshire, joined his standard. The behaviour of the Highland chiefs is similar to that of the Lowland barons. If there is any racial feeling at all, it is not Celtic _v._ Saxon, but Scandinavian _v._ Scottish, and it is connected with the recent conquest of the Isles. But even of this there is little trace, and the behaviour of the Islesmen is, on the whole, marvellously loyal.]

[Footnote 45: Hemingburgh, ii, 141-147.]

[Footnote 46: _Diplomata Scotiae_, xliii, xliv.]

[Footnote 47: Bruce had married, 1st, Isabella, daughter of the 10th Earl of Mar, by whom he had a daughter, Marjorie, and 2nd, in 1302, Elizabeth de Burgh, daughter of the Earl of Ulster.]

[Footnote 48: Nat. MSS. ii. 12, No. XVII. The original is preserved in the Register House.]

[Footnote 49: Pinkerton suggests that King Robert adopted this arrangement because he was unable to trust the Highlanders, but this is unlikely, as their leader, Angus Og, had been consistently faithful to him throughout.]

CHAPTER V

EDWARD III AND SCOTLAND

1328-1399

Almost immediately after the conclusion of the Treaty of Northampton, the conditions of government in England and Scotland were reversed.

Since the death of Edward I, Scotland, under a strong king, had gained by the weakness of the English sovereign; now England, under the energetic rule of Edward III, was to profit by the death of King Robert and by the succession of a minor. On the 7th June, 1329, King Robert died (probably a leper) at his castle of Cardross, on the Clyde, and left the Scottish throne to his five-year-old son, David II. In October of the following year the young Edward III of England threw off the yoke of the Mortimers and established his personal rule, and came almost immediately into conflict with Scotland. The Scottish regent was Randolph or Ranulph, Earl of Moray, the companion of Bruce and the Black Douglas[50] in the exploits of the great war. Possibly because Edward III had afforded protection to the Pretender, Edward Balliol, the eldest son of John Balliol, and had received him at the English court, Randolph refused to carry out the provisions of the Treaty of Northampton, by which their lands were to be restored to the "Disinherited", _i.e._ to barons whose property in Scotland had been forfeited because they had adopted the English side in the war. A somewhat serious situation was thus created, and Edward, not unnaturally, took advantage of it to disown the Treaty of Northampton, which had been negotiated by the Mortimers during his minority, and which was extremely unpopular in England. He at once recognized Edward Balliol as King of Scotland. The only defence of Randolph's action is the probability that he suspected Edward to be in search of a pretext for refusing to be bound by a treaty made in such circ.u.mstances, and if a struggle were to ensue, it was certainly desirable not to increase the power of the English party. Edward proceeded to a.s.sist Balliol in an expedition to Scotland, which Mr. Lang describes as "practically an Anglo-Norman filibustering expedition, winked at by the home government, the filibusters being neither more nor less Scottish than most of our _n.o.blesse_". But before Balliol reached Scotland, the last of the paladins whose names have been immortalized by the Bruce's wars, had disappeared from the scene. Randolph died at Musselburgh in July, 1332, and Scotland was left leaderless. The new regent, the Earl of Mar, was quite incapable of dealing with the situation. When Balliol landed at Kinghorn in August, he made his way unmolested till he reached the river Earn, on his way to Perth. The regent had taken up a position near Dupplin, and was at the head of a force which considerably outnumbered the English. But the Scots had failed to learn the lesson taught by Edward I at Falkirk and by Bruce at Bannockburn. The English succeeded in crossing the Earn by night, and took up a position opposite the hill on which the Scots were encamped. Their archers were so arranged as practically to surround the Scots, who attacked in three divisions, armed with pikes, making no attempt even to hara.s.s the thin lines of archers who were extended on each side of the English main body. But the unerring aim of the archers could not fail to render the Scottish attack innocuous. The English stood their ground while line after line of the Scots hurled themselves against them, only to be struck down by the gray-goose shafts. At last the attack degenerated into a complete rout, and the English made good their victory by an indiscriminate ma.s.sacre.

The immediate result of the battle of Dupplin Moor was that "Edward I of Scotland" entered upon a reign which lasted almost exactly twelve weeks.

He was crowned at Scone on September 24th, 1332, and unreservedly acknowledged himself the va.s.sal of the King of England. On the 16th December the new king was at Annan, when an unexpected attack was made upon him by a small force, led, very appropriately, by a son of Randolph, Earl of Moray, and by the young brother of the Lord James of Douglas. Balliol fled to Carlisle, "one leg booted and the other naked", and there awaited the help of his liege lord, who prepared to invade Scotland in May. Meanwhile the patriotic party had failed to take advantage of their opportunity. Sir Andrew Moray of Bothwell, the regent chosen to succeed Mar (who had fallen at Dupplin), had been captured in a skirmish near Roxburgh, either in November, 1332, or in April, 1333, and was succeeded in turn by Sir Archibald Douglas, the hero of the Annan episode, but destined to be better known as "Tyneman the Unlucky".

The young king had been sent for safety to France.

In April, Balliol was again in Scotland, and, in May, Edward III began to besiege Berwick, which had been promised him by Balliol. To defend Berwick, the Scots were forced to fight a pitched battle, which proved a repet.i.tion of Dupplin Moor. Berwick had promised to surrender if it were not relieved by a fixed date. When the day arrived, a small body of Scots had succeeded in breaking through the English lines, and Sir Archibald Douglas had led a larger force to ravage Northumberland. On these grounds Berwick held that it had been in fact relieved; but Edward III, who lacked his grandfather's nice appreciation of situations where law and fact are at variance, replied by hanging a hostage. The regent was now forced to risk a battle in the hope of saving Berwick, and he marched southwards, towards Berwick, with a large army. Edward, following the precedent of Dupplin, occupied a favourable position at Halidon Hill, with his front protected by a marsh. He drew up his line in the order that had been so successful at Dupplin, and the same result followed. Each successive body of Scottish pikemen was cut down by a shower of English arrows, before being able even to strike a blow. The regent was slain, and Moray, his companion in arms, fled to France, soon to return to strike another blow for Scotland.

The victory of Halidon added greatly to the popularity of Edward III, for the English looked upon the shame of Bannockburn as avenged, and they sang:

"Scots out of Berwick and out of Aberdeen, At the Burn of Bannock, ye were far too keen, Many guiltless men ye slew, as was clearly seen.

King Edward has avenged it now, and fully too, I ween, He has avenged it well, I ween. Well worth the while!

I bid you all beware of Scots, for they are full of guile.

"'Tis now, thou rough-foot, brogue-shod Scot, that begins thy care, Then boastful barley-bag-man, thy dwelling is all bare.

False wretch and forsworn, whither wilt thou fare?

Hie thee unto Bruges, seek a better biding there!

There, wretch, shalt thou stay and wait a weary while; Thy dwelling in Dundee is lost for ever by thy guile."[51]

In Scotland, the party of independence was, for the time, helpless.

Edward and Balliol divided the country between them. The eight counties of Dumfries, Roxburgh, Berwick, Selkirk, Peebles, Haddington, Edinburgh, and Linlithgow formed the English king's share of the spoil, along with a rea.s.sertion of his supremacy over the rest of Scotland. English officers began to rule between the Tweed and the Forth. But the cause of independence was never really hopeless. Balliol and the English party were soon weakened by internal dissensions, and the leaders on the patriotic side were not slow to take advantage of the opportunities thus given them. It was, indeed, necessary to send King David and his wife to France, and they landed at Boulogne in May, 1334. But from France, in return, came the young Earl of Moray, who, along with Robert the High Steward, son of Marjory Bruce, and next heir to the throne, took up the duties of guardians. The arrival of Moray gave fresh life to the cause, but there is little interest in the records of the struggle. The Scots won two small successes at the Borough-Muir of Edinburgh and at Kilblain. But the victory in the skirmish at the Borough-Muir (August, 1335) was more unfortunate than defeat, for it deprived Scotland for some time of the services of the Earl of Moray. He had captured Guy de Namur and conducted him to the borders, and was himself taken prisoner while on his journey northwards. Sir Andrew Moray of Bothwell, who had been made guardian after the battle of Dupplin, and was captured in April, 1333, had now been ransomed, and he was again recognized as regent for David II. So strong was the Scottish party that Balliol had to flee to England for a.s.sistance, and, in 1336, Edward III again appeared in Scotland. It was not a very heroic effort for the future victor of Crecy; he marched northwards to Elgin, and, on his way home, burned the town of Aberdeen.

As in the first war the turning-point had proved to be the death of Edward I in the summer of 1307, so now, exactly thirty years later, came another decisive event. In the autumn of 1337, Edward III first styled himself King of France, and the diversion of his energies from the Scots to their French allies rendered possible the final overthrow of Balliol and the Scottish traitors. The circ.u.mstances are, however, parallel only to the extent that an intervention of fortune rendered possible the victory of Scottish freedom. In 1337 there was no great leader: the hour had come, but not the man. For the next four years, castle after castle fell into Scottish hands; many of the tales are romantic enough, but they do not lead to a Bannockburn. The only incident of any significance is the defence of the castle of Dunbar. The lord of Dunbar was the Earl of March, whose record throughout the troubles had been far from consistent, but who was now a supporter of King David, largely through the influence of his wife, famous as "Black Agnes", a daughter of the great Randolph, Earl of Moray. From January to June, 1338, Black Agnes held Dunbar against English a.s.saults by sea and land. Many romantic incidents have been related of these long months of siege: the stories of the Countess's use of a dust-cloth to repair the damage done by the English siege-machines to the battlements, and of her prophecy, made when the Earl of Salisbury brought a "sow" or shed fitted to protect soldiers in the manner of the Roman _testudo_,

"Beware, Montagow, For farrow shall thy sow",

and fulfilled by dropping a huge stone on the machine and thus scattering its occupants, "the litter of English pigs"--these, and her "love-shafts", which, as Salisbury said, "pierce to the heart", are among the most wonderful of historical fairy tales. In the end the English had to raise the siege:

"Came I early, came I late, I found Agnes at the gate",