CHAPTER XIII.

CONCLUSION.

The wisdom of the ancient Egyptians has been much celebrated, but in no respect does it appear more conspicuous than in the uses to which they applied the historical records of their country. By their laws, the hand which kept a faithful transcript of passing events, and registered with strict impartiality the transactions and characters of their kings, was removed from the knowledge and influence of those whose deeds were thus related. On the accession of every new monarch, it was part of the ceremonial to read in his presence the records of his predecessor’s reign. By this means he was apprised of the faults he ought to avoid, and admonished of the virtues it was incumbent on him to emulate; while the reflection arising from the certainty that after death his name also would be consigned over to posterity--either to receive the meed of grateful remembrance, or the impress of merited reprobation, according to his actions--operated on the royal mind as a useful and salutary restraint.

Other nations aspired to imitate the Egyptians; but national imitation is too often like that among individuals. The faults and blemishes of the original are more readily caught than its beauties and perfections. Thus, while the grossness of Egypt’s mythology was most servilely copied, _one_ practice which gave dignity and utility to her history was entirely overlooked, and the pen of the historian, in place of being wielded by the impartial, fearless, and untrammelled friend of public virtue, was more frequently found in the hand of the needy parasite; employed in the base and degrading occupation of varnishing the enormities of the ermined tyrant, whose ambitious progress to distinction had been marked by the subversion of the rights, and the carnage of his fellow-men. This prostitution of the historic muse is not unknown among modern authors, and may be often attributed to an unworthy desire of administering to the feelings of a favourite party, or a wish to conciliate the national prejudices of their readers. Though compelled, by the general increase of knowledge, to give a more faithful narrative of facts than the writers of antiquity, when it may suit any of the purposes that have been mentioned, the subject of their biography is seldom dismissed without being made to undergo a sort of purgation in the general estimate of his character, and which is often found to be at antipodes to the actions with which it stands connected. Perhaps the annals of England cannot afford a more striking instance of this perversion of all that is valuable in historical literature, than in the portraits which some historians have drawn of Edward I.

Without attempting to delineate the character of this ambitious disturber of the peace of Britain, the writer will merely notice a few of the leading circumstances of his history, and leave the reader to discover by what curious process of literary chemistry those crudities have been made to harmonize, in order to produce so fair a display of political sagacity and kingly greatness.

The littleness which appears to have been inherent in the mind of Edward was laid open to the Londoners in 1263, by his breaking into the treasury of the Knights Templars, and carrying off 1000_l._ deposited there by the citizens. This robbery was looked upon by the people as an act so thoroughly base, that they instantly flew to arms, and assaulted the houses of those among the nobility who were supposed accessary to the theft. Edward was at this time in his 26th year; of course youthful indiscretion cannot be advanced as an excuse for the crime.

His aggression upon Scotland has been indulgently placed to the account of those enlightened and statesman-like views which he entertained of the true interests and general welfare of Britain, and the advantages he discovered would result from the resources of the two countries being consolidated under one head. This “reason of state,” has been held up in extenuation of the nefarious means which he resorted to for the accomplishment of his purpose. But by the extracts which we are about to make from the pages of an author every way inclined to treat the faults of Edward with lenity, the reader will perceive, that though the enlightened views “which he took of the solid interests of his kingdom,” may have found a place in the imagination of the historian, they do not appear to have occurred to the monarch. The extinction of every thing like rational liberty, and the establishment of an extensive and uncontrollable autocracy, seem to have been the undisguised objects of his ambition. In proof of which, we have only to refer to his demeanour towards his barons, and the unwarrantable appropriation of the effects of his subjects, mentioned in the extracts alluded to. His conduct in respect to Scotland being thus stripped of the only palliation that can be offered, it stands forward on the page of history in all its native deformity, unrelieved by one solitary extenuating circumstance, while the following transaction gives it, if possible, a darker and more disgusting complexion.

In 1267, Henry and Prince Edward, being driven to the greatest extremity by the Earl of Gloucester and other Barons, whom their oppressions and unlawful exactions had forced to take up arms, when every hope failed them, and even the Tower of London was besieged by a numerous army of enraged assailants, they were very opportunely relieved from their perilous situation by the assistance of 30,000 Scots, whom Alexander sent to their relief; and with these auxiliaries they were enabled to withstand, and afterwards to subdue, their exasperated and refractory subjects. The debt of gratitude which was thus incurred, Edward had not an opportunity of discharging, till after the death of Alexander, when the Scots, with a generous confidence, which their own conduct naturally inspired, applied to him to act as umpire in settling the succession to the crown. How honourably he acquitted himself in the discharge of the duties of the trust thus reposed in him, and how generous was the return he made for their good offices, the reader requires not to be told. Two nations, who had for nearly a century regarded each other with feelings of mutual good-will, and had lived in a state of friendly intercourse highly beneficial to both, were suddenly transformed into the most inveterate enemies; and an implacable spirit of animosity engendered between them, which it required the slow revolution of ages to soften and obliterate. The guilty ambition of this short-sighted tyrant entailed upon the British states a quarrel the most bloody, the most expensive, and the most insane that perhaps ever existed between two nations. By the ridiculous pretensions of the one, the improvement of both countries was retarded, and their frontier populations demoralized into cut-throats or plunderers, who wandered in search of their prey over a land barren as the desert, which might otherwise have been teeming with the fruits of honest and profitable industry.

Edward’s ideas of honesty we have already seen in the affair of the Templars, and his feelings of gratitude in his conduct towards the Scots. His sense of justice may be gathered from his proceedings against the Jews. The silver pennies of the realm having been clipped, the offence was traced to some of that unfortunate people, and in one day 280 of both sexes were executed in London, besides a great many more in different parts of the kingdom, where it seems simultaneous measures had been taken against them. That this crime was confined entirely to the Jews, is not likely. The implements by which it could be committed were certainly not beyond the reach of English intellect; nor could the latter be supposed, in every instance, superior to the temptation which the gains presented. That the guilt of all who suffered was ascertained, is impossible; and a wholesale butchery of this kind, authorized by law, as it could not answer the ends of justice, can only be considered as gratuitously administering to the worst of human passions.

The estimation in which Edward held those arts which are calculated to instruct, refine, and elevate the human mind, may be learned from his treatment of the Minstrels of Wales. The remorseless and sanguinary policy which suggested that unhallowed act, could only have found place in the breast where every virtuous and honourable feeling had disappeared before the withering influence of a selfish and detestable ambition. In an age when the Minstrel’s profession was a passport to the presence and protection of the great, and the persons of those who exercised the calling were held sacred even among tribes the least removed from barbarism, the mind must have reached a fearful state of depravity, that could break through those barriers with which the gratitude and veneration of mankind had surrounded the children of genius, and thus immolate at the shrine of an heartless despotism, the innocent and meritorious depositories of a nation’s lore.

* * * * *

The reader may form some idea of the treasures squandered by Edward in the Scottish wars, from the Statement of Receipts and Disbursements for the year 1300, inserted in Appendix M, at the end of this volume. The military operations of that year were not on a more expensive scale than those connected with the preceding and subsequent invasions; and by this statement, it will be found, that the disbursements for the campaign of 1300, exceeded, “within one department of the national expenditure,” _one fifth_ of the national income. That the expenses of this campaign pressed equally hard on other departments of the exchequer, is sufficiently obvious from the singular expedients which were resorted to for the purpose of carrying it on. The year 1300 is remarkable for the first attempt to depreciate the currency of the realm, it having been then ordered that 243 pennies should be coined out of the pound of silver, in place of 240 as formerly. In this year, also, as will be seen by the statements already alluded to, the Wardrobe department was in arrears to the amount of 5949_l._ 4s. 3d., which circumstance--taken in connexion with the fact, that Sir Simon Fraser and other knights soon after deserted the English service, because their pay and other allowances were withheld--proves that the treasury of England at this time must have been in a very depressed state. This profitless expenditure was continued with little interruption, from 1296 till 1320, in pursuit of an object, which, happily for the future prosperity of both countries, was unattainable.

We have already alluded to the treacherous designs of Edward, regarding the liberties of his own subjects; and, in illustration of the opinion then expressed, we shall now subjoin the account of his behaviour, after his triumphant return from the north, as it appears in the pages of Dr Lingard, an author who certainly cannot be considered as a friend to Scotland:--we wish we were able to call him a _candid_ adversary.

“Had Edward,” says this learned, though often disingenuous writer, “confined his rapacity to the clergy, he might perhaps have continued to despise their remonstrances; but the aids which he had annually raised on the freeholders, the tallages which he so frequently demanded of the cities and boroughs, and the additional duties which he extorted from the merchants, had excited a general spirit of discontent. Wool and hides were the two great articles of commerce; the exportation of which was allowed only to foreign merchants, and confined, by law, to eleven ports in England, and three in Ireland. In the beginning of his reign, the duty had been raised to half a mark on each sack of wool; but the royal wants perpetually increased; and, during his quarrel with the King of France, he required five marks for every sack of fine, three for every sack of coarse wool, and five for every last of hides. On one occasion, he extorted from the merchants a loan of the value of all the wool which they exported; on two others, he seized and sold both wool and hides for his own profit. He even stretched his rapacious hands to the produce of the soil, and the live-stock of his subjects; and, to provision his army in Guienne, he issued precepts to each sheriff to collect, by assessment on the landholders of his county, a certain number of cattle, and two thousand quarters of wheat. Though this requisition was accompanied with a promise of future payment, the patience of the nation was exhausted: Consultations began to be held: and preparations were made for resistance. Edward had assembled two bodies of troops, with one of which he intended to sail for Flanders, the other he destined to reinforce the army in Guienne, (1297, Feb. 24.) At Salisbury, he gave the command of the latter to Bohun Earl of Hereford, the constable, and to Bigod Earl of Norfolk, the mareschal of England; but both these noblemen refused the appointment, on the alleged ground, that, by their office, they were bound only to attend on the King’s person. Edward, in a paroxysm of rage, addressing himself to the mareschal, exclaimed--‘By the everlasting God, Sir Earl, you shall go or hang.’--‘By the everlasting God, Sir King,’ replied Bigod, ‘I will neither go nor hang.’ Hereford and Norfolk immediately departed: they were followed by thirty bannerets, and fifteen hundred knights; and the royal officers, intimidated by their menaces, ceased to levy the purveyance. Edward saw that it was necessary to dissemble, and summoned some,--requested others, of his military tenants to meet him in arms in London.

“The two Earls, in concert with the Archbishop of Canterbury, had arranged their plan of resistance to the royal exactions. On the appointed day the constable and John de Segrave, as deputy-mareschal, (Bigod himself was detained at home by sickness) attended the King’s court; but when they were required to perform their respective duties (July 8th), they returned a refusal in writing, on the ground that they had not received a legal summons, but only a general invitation. Edward appointed a new constable and mareschal; and, to divide and weaken his opponents, sought to appease the clergy, and to move the commiseration of the people (July 11th). He received the primate with kindness, ordered the restoration of his lands, and named him one of the council to Prince Edward, whom he had appointed regent. On a platform before the entrance of Westminster Hall, accompanied by his son, the Archbishop, and the Earl of Warwick, he harangued the people, (July 14.) He owned that the burdens which he had laid on them were heavy; but protested that it had not been less painful to him to impose, than it had been to them to bear them. Necessity was his only apology. His object had been to preserve himself and his liege men from the cruelty and rapacity of the Welsh, the Scots, and the French, who not only sought _his_ crown, but also thirsted after _their_ blood. In such case, it was better to sacrifice a part than to lose the whole. ‘Behold,’ he concluded, ‘I am going to expose myself to danger for you. If I return, receive me again, and I will make you amends; if I fall, here is my son; place him on the throne, and his gratitude shall reward your fidelity.’ At these words the King burst into tears; the Archbishop was equally affected; the contagion ran through the multitude; and shouts of loyalty and approbation persuaded Edward that he might still depend on the allegiance of his people. This exhibition was followed by writs to the sheriffs, ordering them to protect the clergy from injury, and to maintain them in the possession of their lands.

“He now ventured to proceed as far as Winchelsey on his way to Flanders. But here he was alarmed by reports of the designs of his opponents, and ordered letters to be sent to every county, stating the origin of his quarrel with the two earls, asserting that he had never refused any petition for redress, and promising to confirm the charter of liberties and charter of the forests, in return for the liberal aid of an eighth which had been granted by the council in London. Soon afterwards a paper was put into his hands, purporting to be the remonstrance of the archbishops, bishops, abbots, and priors, the earls, barons, and whole commonalty of England. In it they complained that the last summons had been worded ambiguously; that it called on them to accompany the King to Flanders, a country in which they were not bound to serve by the custom of their tenures; that even if they were, they had been so impoverished by aids, tallages, and unlawful seizures, as to be unable to bear the expense; that the liberties granted to them by the two charters had been repeatedly violated; that the ‘evil toll’ (the duty) annually on wool amounted alone to one-fifth of the whole income of the land; and that, to undertake an expedition to Flanders in the existing circumstances, was imprudent, since it would expose the kingdom without protection to the inroads of the Welsh and Scots. Edward replied, that he could return no answer on matters of such high importance, without the advice of his council, a part of which had already sailed for Flanders; that if the remonstrants would accompany him, he would accept it as a favour; if they refused, he trusted they would raise no disturbance during his absence, (Aug. 19.) Before his departure he appointed commissioners in each county with powers to require security from all persons for the payment of aids due to the crown, and to imprison the publishers of false reports, the disturbers of the peace, and such of the clergy as might presume to pronounce censures against the royal officers for the discharge of their duty.

“At length the King set sail, accompanied by the barons and knights who had espoused his cause; and two days later, Bohun and Bigod, with a numerous retinue, proceeded to the exchequer. The constable, in the presence of the treasurer and judges, complained of the King’s extortions, of his illegal seizures of private property, and of the enormous duty imposed upon wool; and forbade them, in the name of the baronage of England, to levy the last eight which had been granted by the great council, because it had been voted without his knowledge and concurrence, and that of his friends. From the exchequer they rode to the Guildhall, where they called upon the citizens to join in the common cause, and to aid in wresting the confirmation of the national liberties from a reluctant and despotic sovereign. The tears which the Londoners had shed during Edward’s harangue, were now dried up; considerations of interest suppressed the impulse of pity; and they gave assurances of their co-operation to the barons, who immediately retired to their respective counties. Both during their progress to the capital, and their return from it, they had marched in military array. But at the same time they had been careful to preserve the peace; and had threatened, by proclamation, to punish every lawless aggressor with immediate amputation of a hand, or the loss of the head, according to the quality of the offence.

“The King was soon informed of these proceedings, and ordered the barons of the exchequer to disregard the prohibition. But in a few weeks his obstinacy was subdued by a succession of untoward events. The people and clergy universally favoured the cause of the earls; the Scots, after their victory at Stirling, had burst into the northern counties; and Edward himself lay at Ghent in Flanders, unable to return to the protection of the kingdom, and too weak to face the superior force of the French king. In these circumstances, the lords who composed the council of the young Prince, invited the archbishop, six prelates, twenty-three abbots and priors, the constable and mareschal, and eight barons, to treat with them on matters of the greatest moment, and summoned a parliament to meet in London a week later (Sept. 30.), and witness the confirmation of the two charters. In the conferences which preceded, the two parties, though opposed in appearance, had the same interests and the same views; a form of peace (so it was called) was speedily arranged; and, to the ancient enactments of the charters, were appended the following most important additions:--”No tallage or aid shall henceforth be laid or levied by us or our heirs in this our realm, without the goodwill and common assent of the archbishops, bishops, and other prelates, the earls, barons, knights, burgesses, and other free men in our realm. No officer of us or our heirs shall take corn, wool, hides, or other goods, of any person whatsoever, without the good will and assent of the owner of such goods. Nothing shall henceforth be taken on the sack of wool, under the name or pretence of the evil toll. We also will and grant for us and our heirs, that all both clergy and laity of our realm shall have their laws, liberties, and free customs, as freely and wholly as at any time when they had them best; and if any statutes have been made or customs introduced by us or our ancestors contrary to them, or to any article in the present charter, we will and grant that such statutes and customs be null and void for ever. We have, moreover, remitted to the Earl Constable, and Earl Mareschal and all their associates, and to all those who have not accompanied us to Flanders, all rancour and ill will, and all manner of offences which they may have committed against us or ours before the making of this present charter. And for the greater assurance of this thing, we will and grant for us and our heirs, that all archbishops and bishops in England for ever, shall, twice in the year after the reading of this charter in their cathedral churches, excommunicate, and cause, in their parochial churches, to be excommunicated, all those that knowingly shall do or cause to be done, any thing against the tenor, force and effect of any article contained in it.

“When the parliament assembled (Oct. 10.), these additions to the charter were received with enthusiasm; and provided the King would assent to them, the laity voted him an eighth, the clergy of Canterbury a tenth, and the clergy of York a fifth. The prince, by a public instrument, took the Earls and their associates under his protection; and the Lords of the Council bound themselves to indemnify them against the effects of the royal displeasure. A common letter was written to the King, soliciting him to appease all differences by giving his assent, and assuring him that his faithful barons were ready at his command either to join him in Flanders, or to march against his enemies in Scotland; but at the same time requiring, in a tone of defiance, an answer against the sixth day of December. It cost the haughty mind of Edward several struggles, before he could prevail on himself to submit: three days were spent in useless deliberation and complaints; but at last, with a reluctant hand, he signed the confirmation of the two charters with the additional articles, and a separate pardon for the Earls and their followers, (Nov. 5.)

“This was perhaps the most important victory which had hitherto been gained over the Crown. By investing the people with the sole right of raising the supplies, it armed them with the power of checking the extravagance, and controlling the despotism of their monarchs. Whatever jealousy might be entertained of Edward’s intentions, his conduct wore at first the semblance of sincerity. As soon as an armistice had been concluded between him and the King of France, he returned to England, and appointed commissioners to inquire into the illegal seizures which had been made previously to his departure. They were to be divided into two classes. Where the officers acted without warrant, they were, at their own cost, to indemnify the sufferers; where the goods had been taken by the royal orders, their value was to be certified into the exchequer, and prompt payment was to be made. Still it was suspected that he only waited for a favourable moment to cancel the concessions which had been wrung from him by necessity; and it was whispered that among his confidential friends he had laughed at them as being of no force, because they had been made in a foreign country, where he possessed no authority. When he met his parliament at York, the Earls of Hereford and Norfolk required that he should ratify his confirmation of the charters. He objected from the necessity of hastening to oppose the Scots, solemnly promised to comply with their request on his return, and brought forward the Bishop of Durham and three Earls, who swore ‘on his soul,’ that he should fulfil his engagements.” A. D. 1299. March. The victory of Falkirk and a long series of success gave a lustre to his arms; but when the parliament assembled the next year, the King was reminded of his promise. His reluctance employed every artifice to deceive the vigilance, or exhaust the patience, of the two Earls. He retired from the parliament in anger; he returned and proposed modifications; at last he ratified his former concessions, but with the addition of a clause, which, by saving the rights of the Crown, virtually annulled every provision in favour of the subject. Bohun and Bigod instantly departed with their adherents; and the King, to ascertain the sentiments of the people, ordered the sheriffs to assemble the citizens in the cemetery of St Paul’s, and to read to them the new confirmation of the charters. The lecture was repeatedly interrupted by shouts of approbation; but when the illusory clause was recited, the air rung with expressions of discontent, and curses were poured on the head of the prince, who had thus disappointed the expectations of his people. Edward took the alarm; summoned a new parliament to meet him within a fortnight; granted every demand; and appointed a commission of three Bishops, three Earls, and three Barons, to ascertain the real boundaries of the royal forests.”[83]

In the foregoing extract, we find Edward, on the 14th July, holding up the Scots as a bugbear to terrify his subjects into an acquiescence with his oppressive demands; and on the 30th September the English, in turn, are found making the very same use of the Scots, for the purpose of extorting from _their_ reluctant and unprincipled “Justinian,” the confirmation of their national liberties. It did not, however, appear to strike them that the subversion of freedom in Scotland was totally inconsistent with its existence in the southern part of the island.

By the same author we are also told, that after the surrender of Stirling Castle in 1304, Edward sent a secret deputation to the Pope, craving that a dispensation might be granted him from the oaths he had taken. This request appears to have been complied with; but the learned author adds, “Whether the papal rescript did not fully meet the King’s wishes, or that he was intimidated by the rebellion of the Scots, he made no public use of its contents; but suffered the concessions, galling as they were, to remain on the statute-roll at his death, and descend to future sovereigns as the recognised law of the land. Thus, after a long struggle, was won, from an able and powerful monarch, the most valuable of the privileges enjoyed by the commons of England at the present day. If we are indebted to the patriotism of Cardinal Langton, and the Barons at Runnymead, the framers of the great charter, we ought equally to revere the memory of Archbishop Winchelsey and the Earls of Hereford and Norfolk. The former erected barriers against the abuse of the sovereign authority; the latter fixed the liberties of the subject on a sure and permanent foundation.”[84] In his list of meritorious characters, the learned author ought certainly not to have omitted the Knight of Elderslie and his patriotic followers, who, in standing nobly forward for the independence of their own country, were also instrumental in securing such invaluable and lasting privileges for their neighbours.

From the evidence adduced in the quotations made, of the powerful diversion effected in favour of English liberty by the stubborn opposition of the Scots, it appears, that the success of the arms of the latter was the palladium on which the most important of England’s chartered rights depended. When the people of England, therefore, think of erecting monuments to the characters the worthy Doctor has enumerated, it is to be hoped that a tablet to the memory of the Guardian of Scotland will not be forgotten, on which, with propriety, may be inscribed

“LIBERTÉ CHERIE, quand tu meurs _en Ecosse_, Certes, l’Anglais, _chez lui_, peut bien creuser TA fosse.”

APPENDIX.

A.

ORIGINAL LETTER FROM SIR WILLIAM WALLACE AND SIR ANDREW MURRAY.

Page 11.

It affords the writer no little pleasure, to be able to lay before his readers the following authentic document, which establishes beyond a doubt the early and deep interest which Wallace took in the re-establishment of the commercial prosperity of Scotland. As this important writing, however, has not hitherto appeared in the works of either English or Scottish historians, nor even been alluded to in any former account of Wallace, it will be necessary to give some explanation respecting the source from which it has been obtained. In the Foreign Quarterly Review for August 1829, the following notice appeared:--“Our Scottish antiquarian friends will be gratified to hear, that Dr Lappenberg of Hamburg, in his researches among the ancient records of that city, has discovered a letter, of the date 1287, addressed by _Robert Wallace_ and Andrew Murray to Hamburg and Lubec.” An intimation of this kind could not fail to excite a considerable degree of interest in the writer; and the possibility that a mistake might have occurred respecting the date, as well as the name of one of the parties, encouraged the hope, that a letter of William Wallace and Andrew Murray, with which the public were unacquainted, might still be in existence. Under this impression, the writer communicated with an intelligent friend, through whose means application was made to Dr Lappenberg on the subject, who, with that genuine politeness which seldom fails to accompany distinguished merit, promptly communicated a copy of the letter in question, taken from the _original_, which still exists among the archives of the Hanseatic city of Lubec.[85] The letter is to the following effect:--

“Andreas de Morauia et Willelmus Wallensis, duces exercitus regni Scotie et communitas eiusdem Regni, prouidis viris et discretis ac amicis dilectis, maioribus et communibus de Lubek et de Hamburg salutem et sincere dilectionis semper incrementium. Nobis per fide dignos mercatores dicti regni Scotie est intimatum, quod vos vestri gratiâ, in omnibus causis et negociis, nos et ipsos mercatores tangentibus consulentes, auxiliantes et favorabiles estis, licet nostra non precesserent merita, et ideo magis vobis tenemur ad grates cum digna remuneracione, ad que vobis volumus obligari; rogantes vos, quatinus preconizari facere velitis inter mercatores vestros, quod securum accessum ad omnes portus regni Scotie possint habere cum mercandiis suis, quia regnum Scotie, Deo regraciato, ab Anglorum potestate bello est recuperatum. Valete. Datum apud Badsingtonam in Scotia, undecimo die Octobris, Anno gracie, millesimo ducentesimo nonagesimo septimo. Rogamus vos in super vt negocia Johannis Burnet, et Johannis Frere, mercatorum nostrorum promoueri dignemini, prout nos negocia mercatorum vestrorum promovere velitis. Valete dat: ut prius.”

TRANSLATION.

“Andrew Murray and William Wallace, commanders of the army of the kingdom of Scotland, and the community of the same kingdom--To the prudent and discreet men, and well-beloved friends, the Mayors and Commonwealths of Lubeck and of Hamburg, greeting, and perpetual increase of sincere friendship.

“To us it has been intimated, by trust-worthy merchants of the said kingdom of Scotland, that, as a mark of your regard, you have been favourable to, counselling and assisting in, all matters and transactions relating to us and said merchants, though [such good offices] may not have been preceded by our deserts, and on that account we are the more bound to tender you our thanks, and a suitable return. This we have willingly engaged ourselves to [perform towards] you, requesting, that in so far you would cause your merchants to be informed, that they will now have safe access to all the ports of the kingdom of Scotland with their merchandise, as the kingdom of Scotland, thanks to God, has during the war been recovered from the power of the English. Farewell.--Given at Badsington [Haddington?[86]], in Scotland, this eleventh day of October, in the year of grace one thousand twelve hundred and ninety-seven.--We have moreover to request, that you would condescend to forward the interests of our merchants John Burnet and John Frere in their business, in like manner as you may wish us to act towards your merchants in their commercial transactions. Farewell.--Dated as above.”

Dr Lappenberg, in his valuable communication, remarks, that this letter “appears to be the oldest document existing relative to the intercourse of Hamburg and Lubec, or other Hanseatic cities, with Scotland.”[87] As the reader will perceive,--a mistake had occurred in the date, and also in the name of Wallace.

From the above interesting muniment, various important points in our history may be established. In the first place, it seems evident, that Wallace and Murray, _up to the 11th October 1297_, acted only as “duces exercitus regni Scotie,” in behalf of the _community of said kingdom_; and that _the commission from John Baliol_, authorizing them to act under his sanction, must have been received by them _on their march to England_, or _during the time the devastation of that country was going forward_; that is to say, between the 11th _October_ and 7th _November_, on which day the charter was granted to the monks of Hexham,[88] where we find “the name of the illustrious Prince John, by the Grace of God King of Scotland,” is added to the authorities mentioned in the above letter. And again, that between the 7th _November_ 1297, and the 29th _March_ 1298, _another commision_ must have been forwarded from _Baliol_ to _Wallace_ constituting him the _sole Regent of the Kingdom of Scotland_, as we find him on _that day_ at Torphichen granting, in that capacity, a charter to Alexander Scrimgeor, and affixing to it the _seal of Baliol_; which circumstance is mentioned in the charter, while no mention is made of any seal being used in that at Hexham.[89]

From the circumstance of Andrew Murray’s name having precedence in the letter to the Hanse Towns, and in the charter of Hexham, it may with great probability be inferred, that these two documents were either written by Wallace himself, or under his direction. That he was qualified for the task is evident, from the care which had been bestowed on his education; first by his uncle, and afterwards at the seminary of Dundee. If Murray had either written them, or ordered them to be written, it is not likely that he would have placed his own name before one whose merits were so generally acknowledged, as to procure him the appointment of Regent in so short a time afterwards; while Wallace, in placing, or causing the name of Murray to be placed, before his own, appears acting in perfect consistency with those amiable traits in his character which we have already noticed. As these writings are also free from that monkish pedantry, and mystification which pervades in the literature of that age, they may with great probability be considered as the composition of the talented Liberator.[90]

It may be remarked, that the envy which a number of the magnates of Scotland entertained towards the Guardian, seems to have arisen after his appointment to the Regency. How Sir Andrew Murray demeaned himself on the occasion, does not appear; but the conduct and feelings of Cumyn, his near relation,[91] were too unequivocally expressed to be misunderstood.

The above letter, besides affording a good specimen of the diplomatic talents of our hero, is at the same time highly complimentary to the friendly feelings and mercantile integrity of the merchants of the two Hanse cities, and exhibits a singular contrast to the policy of Philip, who, though bound by treaties, allowed his allies to struggle on against their powerful adversary, without affording them the slightest assistance.

B.

MEMOIR OF PATRICK EARL OF DUNBAR.[92]

Page 13.

This powerful and warlike baron was descended from Gospatrick, the Governor of Northumberland, in the time of William the Norman, who deprived him of that office in consequence of his joining the Danes in 1069, on their invasion of England. He afterwards retired to Scotland, and sought the protection of Malcolm III., who conferred on him the Castle of Dunbar and the lands adjoining. In virtue of this grant, his descendants were styled Earls of March, and sometimes of Dunbar; the former title being derived from the lands, the latter from the name of the principal castle belonging to the family. They were also possessed of the castle of Coldbrands-path, a fortress of almost equal importance.

Patrick, or (Corspatrick, as he is sometimes called), the subject of the present notice, was the eighth Earl of Dunbar; he succeeded to his father in 1289, being then about forty-seven years of age. He was one of the nobles who consented to the projected marriage between prince Edward and Margaret the young Queen of Scotland. In 1291, he put in his claim to the crown, among the other competitors, founding his right on being the great-grandson of Ilda or Ada, the daughter of William king of Scots. On the commencement of hostilities between Edward and Baliol, he adhered to the former; but his castle of Dunbar being left in possession of his wife Margery, daughter of Alexander Comyn, Earl of Buchan, she delivered it over to Baliol--conceiving the duties she owed her country paramount to the injunctions of her husband.

Whatever blame may be attached to this Earl, for the active part he took against the interest of Scotland, still the merit of consistency must be awarded to him in the crooked line of policy he adopted; for, having sworn fealty to Edward in 1291, he adhered to the interests of his over-lord with zeal and fidelity. The answer[93] which he returned to Wallace and the Scottish barons assembled at Perth, is quite in accordance with that tone of independence assumed by the family, and which, according to Lord Hailes, was so prejudicial to Scotland.

After being driven from Scotland, as has already been stated, he continued to molest his countrymen as he found occasion. In 1298, he was actively engaged in the Scottish wars, and in November was appointed one of Edward’s Lieutenants in Scotland. In 1300, he and his son,[94] a youth at that time about 15 years of age, were present at the siege of Carlaverock castle, when he must have been at least 58 years old. In 33d Edward I., he was to have attended the parliament as one of the representatives of the Commons of Scotland; but from some reason or other, he did not appear. On the 30th September 1308, he was commanded by Edward II. to assist in suppressing the insurrection of Bruce, but what efforts he made, cannot well be ascertained. In the following year he died, and was succeeded by Patrick, his son by the daughter of the Earl of Buchan.

C.

CHARTER OF PROTECTION GRANTED TO THE PRIOR AND CONVENT OF HEXCELDSHAM.

Page 19.

“Andreas de Moravia et Willelmus Wallensis, _Duces exercitûs Scotiæ, nomine præclari Principis Domini Johannis, Dei gratiâ, Regis Scotiæ illustris, de consensu communitatis regni ejusdem_, omnibus hominibus dicti regni ad quos præsentes literæ pervenerint, salutem. Sciatis, nos, _nomine dicti Regis_, Priorem et Conventum de Hexhildesham in Northumbria, terras suas, homines suos, et universas eorum possessiones, ac omnia bona sua, mobilia et immobilia, sub firma pace et protectione ipsius Domini Regis, et nostra, justè suscepisse. Quare firmiter prohibemus, ne quis eis in personis, terris, seu rebus, malum, molestiam, injuriam, seu gravamen aliquod, inferre præsumat, super plenaria forisfactura ipsius Domini Regis, aut mortem eis, vel alicui eorum, inferat, sub pœna amissionis vitæ et membrorum; præsentibus post annum minimè valeturis. Dat. apud Hexhildesham, vii. die Novembris.”--_W. Hemingford_, t. i. p. 135.[95]

D.

Page 21.

The intentions of Edward to curtail the power of his barons, and render them more subservient to his will, were most unequivocally displayed in his proceedings towards Bigod, Earl of Norfolk, immediately after his return from the conquest of Scotland. The imperious language of the tyrant, and the bold and determined conduct of the vassal, the reader will find narrated in the extracts from Dr Lingard, inserted in the concluding chapter of the narrative. The plans of Edward for the extinction of British freedom, were such as have been generally resorted to by other despots, who have encroached upon the rights of their subjects or neighbours. While the Scots were summoned to fight his battles in France, the Welsh were marched to Scotland to assist in the subjugation of that country; and had the former remained passive under the yoke, there is every reason to believe that they would soon, in their turn, have been employed to enforce the arbitrary measures of the ambitious monarch upon the subjects of his native kingdom. Thus Scotland, England and Wales, would have mutually assisted in rivetting the fetters of each other.

E.

THE SETONS.

Page 26.

With respect to the fate of Christell of Seyton, some little inquiry may be necessary. It is well known, that a person of his name appears to great advantage in the history of the struggles of Bruce, and afterwards became a martyr in his cause; of course, he could not have been the individual mentioned in the text. It appears from various sources, that there were three of the Seyton family, of the name of Christell, grandfather, father, and son. If any of these were killed in the above battle, it must have been the second, for the first, “a man given more to devotion nor worldliness,” died in the reign of Alexander III. As the other two were both engaged in the contest for independence along with Wallace, the following account of them may be interesting to the reader. It is taken from the History of the House of Seyton, by Sir Richard Maitland of Lethington, and lately printed by the Maitland Club, from the MS. in the Advocates’ Library.

“OFF CHRISTELL SEYTOUN,

THE SECUND OF THAT NAME.

“Christell the secund of that name succedit to Christell the first, his father, in the tyme of Allexander the Thryd, and was ane nobill man, and did mony gud actis aganis the Inglismen, quhen the Crowne was desolat and in pley betuix the Bruce and the Balioll. Quhilk Christell, quhen he micht nocht brouk the lawland of Lowthyane, quhair was his duelling place, duelt and remainit wyth his kyn and freyndis in Jedburgh forrest, ay awating his tyme contrare the Inglismen; and deit in the tyme of William Wallace.”

“OFF CHRYSTELL SEYTOUN,

THE THRYD OF THAT NAME.

“Christell the thryd succedit to Christell the secund, his father, in the tyme of Williame Wallace; quhilk Christell was efter maid knycht be King Robert Bruce, and for his monye gude actis done againis the Inglismen, was callit Gud S^r Christell. Quha quhen King Robert Bruce was tane presonare in handis be the Inglismen at ane feild besyde Methven, and thay that tuke him cryit in scorne and derisioun, Quha will help the new maid King? quhilk cry the said S^r Chrystell hard, and come in all haist and straik at erd him that had the king in handis; and thair he and his freindis reskewit the said King Robert, and pat him to libertie. This Chrystell maryit the said King Robert Bruce sister, and thairfor the said King Robert gaif to the said S^r Chrystell the dowbil tresour of flour de lycis, to be worne about his armes and the armes of his posterité, lyk as the King weris thame. Efter mony grit and notabill actis done be the said S^r Chrystell contrair Ingland, he was tane at the last, and had to Londoun, and thair put to deid in maist cruell maner. In this mene tyme, King Robert Bruce hapnit to be in the toun of Dunfreis, and passand furth till ane lytill knoll besyd the said toun to tak the air, quhair the word and tythingis come to him of the crewell slauchter of the said S^r Chrystell, quhilk the king heirand maid grit lamentatioun wyth sum teiris, saying, It is ane pieté that sa nobill ane knycht suld die sa crewell ane deid. And incontinent, in the samin place quhair he wes standand quhen the tythingis come to him, gart found ane chapell in honour of the Virgene Marie; and in remembrance of the said S^r Chrystell foundit ane preist to do devyne service thairin perpetuallie, and pray for the said Schir Chrystell; and gaif to the said preist and his successouris the sowme of fyve pundis Streviling, to be tane of the baronie of Carlauerok, for thair sustentatioun. Quhilk fundatioun I haue had oft in my handis, and red it sindrie tymes. The quhilk chapell was standand haill and vndecayit in the yeir of God J^m v^c lii yeiris, as I saw my self; and as I beleve standis yit in the samin maner, and is callit be all the inhabitaris in that cuntre Christallis chapell.

“ANE EIK OF S^R CHRISTOPHER OF SETOUN,

THE THRID OF THAT NAME.

“It is to wit that efter that I had wryttin the Historie of the Hous of Setoun, I haue fund in the greit Cronicles of Ingland, set furth sen I wret the historie of Setoun, quhilk ar as efter followis:

“Efter this was the castell of Lochdore taiken, and wythin it Christopher Seitoun, that had maried the sister of Robert le Bruce; [and bicause he was no Scot, but an Englishman borne,] the King of Ingland commandit that he suld be led wnto Dunfreis, quhar he had killit on of the Kingis knychtis, and thair to be hangit drawin and quarterit: The wyf of this Christopher Seitoun he apoyntit to be keipit in the monesterie of Thixell in Lyndsay.”--“Morouer, the manor of Seitoun, in Quhytbestroud, he gaue wnto the Lord Edmonde de Mawlay, and those wther landis that belongeth to the said Christopher Seitoun in Northumberland he gaue wnto the Lord Williame Latemer.”

“And howbeit that I wret of before as I was informit for the tyme, That the first tyme that King Robert the Bruce com to Dunfreis efter that S^r Christopher Setoun was crewellie slane in Ingland, that in the sam place quhar the King was quhen the thydingis com till him he garde bige ane chapell, and dottit the samyng perpetuallie to pray for the said S^r Christopher; bot now it apeiris be the Inglis Cronicles, That quhan the said King com to Dunfreis, that quhan it was reportit till him be the inhabeturis of the said toun the crewell marterdome of the said S^r Christopher, that he garde bige the said chapell in the samyng place quhar the said S^r Christopher was pute to deid and executtit. Of the quhilk chapell I haue red the foundatioun and infythment of ane priest onder the saidis kingis greit seill; and hes hard Mes in the samyng chapell, quhilk standis as I beleif to this present day.”--P. 18-21.

F.

MEMOIR OF FITZ-MARMADUKE.

Page 33.

“This stern soldier was the eldest son of Marmaduke Fitz-Geoffrey, Lord of Hordene, in the bishoprick of Durham, who, in the 45th Henry III., 1260-1, obtained the King’s license to embattle his mansion-house there. In August 1282, John Fitz-Marmaduke, with nine other knights, performed services due from the Bishop of Durham, who styled him, on another occasion, “Nostre tres cher bachelier, Mons^r. Jehan le Fitz-Marmaduk;” but from that time nothing is recorded of him, until February 1301, when he was a party to the Letter from the Barons to the Pontiff, in which he is called “Lord of Hordene,” excepting that he was at the siege of Carlaverock in June 1300, where his bravery was particularly conspicuous. He came, we are told, to assail the castle with a great and full troop of good and select bachelors, and stood as firm as a post, and his banner received many a rent difficult to mend.

“It is most extraordinary, that for nearly twenty years, no notice can be found in the records of an individual who, at the end of that period, was a party to an instrument from the Baronage of the realm; and it was from this circumstance, the similarity of their arms, and his surname, that he was confounded with Marmaduke de Thweng in the “Synopsis of the Peerage.”

“In the 31st Edward I., Fitz-Marmaduke was commanded to appear before the King on the first Sunday in Lent, with full powers from the community of the Bishoprick of Durham, to accept his Majesty’s mediation between them and the Bishop; and, in April in the same year, he was appointed a Commissioner of Array. On the 30th September, 1st Edward II. 1307, he was ordered, with others, to proceed to Galloway, to repress the rebellion of Robert de Brus; and, in October following he was commanded to serve with horse and arms against the Scots; after which time his name does not occur among the writs of service. He continued in the wars of Scotland, “comme une estache;” and, on the 21st June 1308, was again enjoined to oppose the attempts of Bruce. On the 16th February, 3d Edward II., 1310, he was authorized, with others, to treat with the Scots for a truce. Fitz-Marmaduke died in 1311, at which time he was governor of St John’s Town of Perth; and a very curious fact is recorded respecting his funeral. He particularly requested to be interred within the precincts of the cathedral of Durham, but, as the state of the country prevented the removal of his corpse in the usual manner, his domestics adopted the expedient of dismembering the body, and then boiling the flesh from the bones; by which means they preserved his reliques, until an opportunity offered of transmitting them with safety across the border. For this outrage against an ecclesiastical canon, which had been promulgated in consequence of the frequency of the practice, Cardinal Berengarius, Bishop of Jerusalem, imposed on the offenders the mild penance of attending their master’s obsequies in the cemetery of the cathedral of Durham, having first used the authority of the church to ensure the quiet transportation of his remains.

“Fitz-Marmaduke was twice married; first, to Isabella, sister, and heiress of Robert Brus of Stanton, by whom he had Richard, his son and heir, and a daughter, Mary, who married ---- Lumley; and, secondly, Ida, who survived him, and was living his widow in 1313. Richard Fitz-Marmaduke was Seneschal of the Bishoprick of Durham, and was slain, in 1318, by his kinsman Robert Neville, on the Old Bridge of Durham, as he was riding to hold the county court, which event is described as “a most strange and detestable action.” Though married to Alianora ----, he died without children, when Mary, his sister, became his heiress. She left issue Robert Lumley of Ravensholm, who married Lucia, the daughter and co-heiress of Marmaduke de Thweng. They had issue a son, Marmaduke Lumley, whose representative is the present Earl of Scarborough.”

_Siege of Carlaverock._

G.

MEMOIR OF BRIAN FITZ-ALAN.

Page 38.

“Brian Fitz-Alan succeeded his father Brian before the 5th Edward I., and on the 6th April, 10th Edward I. 1282, and 14th June 1287, was summoned to serve with horse and arms in Wales. In the 19th Edward I., he obtained permission to make a castle of his house at Kilwardeby in Yorkshire; and in the following year, being one of King Edward’s vicegerents in Scotland, he, with others, received that monarch’s precept to give John de Balliol possession of the kingdom. He was a witness to that personage’s surrender of his crown on the 10th July 1296, about which time he was constituted the King’s Lieutenant in Scotland. Fitz-Alan was present at the siege of Carlaverock in June 1300; and in the ensuing February, was a party to the Letter from the Barons to Pope Boniface, in which he is styled, “Lord of Bedale.” His seal affixed to that document has been the subject of remark, for instead of containing his arms, it presents a whimsical assemblage of animals, apparently consisting of two birds, a rabbit, a stag, and a pig or boar, all of which are looking to the dexter excepting the latter, which is regarding the chief, and is inscribed with this curious legend,

TOT.CAPITA.TOT.SENTENCIE.

“The inference to be drawn from this singular seal tends to establish, that its owner was eccentric or satirical; for it must either have been used from unmeaning caprice, or with the intention of ridiculing the devices in the signets of his contemporaries. The allusion in the poem (The siege of Carleverock) to the arms of Fitz-Alan, is too important to be allowed to pass unnoticed. It not only informs us of an event in his life, by proving that he had been involved in a dispute with Hugh Poyntz, but shows that it was always one of the fundamental laws of arms, that no two persons should bear the same ensigns, and that there was then sufficient pride felt on the point to resent its infringement.

“All that is farther known of Fitz-Alan is, that he was summoned to Parliament from the 23d June 23d Edward I. 1295, to the 22d January, 33d Edward I. 1305, though he died in 1302. The name of his wife is not stated, but it is almost certain that he married late in life; for, according to a note of the inquisition held on his death, Maud his daughter was his heir; though, at the death of his brother Theobald Fitz-Alan, on the 1st Edward II. 1307-8, his heirs are said to have been Maud and Katherine, the daughters of his brother Brian Fitz-Alan, the former of whom was then aged seven years, and the latter five; so that Katherine, who made proof of her age on the 12th Edward II., was probably a posthumous child. A discrepancy, however, exists on the subject; for, agreeable to a note of the inquisition on the death of this baron, his daughter Maud was then eight years old, and Dugdale says that Katherine was at the same time aged six, which, if the other statement be correct, was impossible. Of these daughters, Maud married Sir Gilbert Stapleton, and, according to a pedigree in Dodsworth’s MSS., secondly Thomas Sheffield; and Katherine became the wife of John Lord Grey of Rotherfield. Brian Fitz-Alan was buried in the south aisle of Bedale church in Yorkshire, and a sumptuous monument was there erected to his memory, a beautiful engraving and accurate description of which are given in Blore’s “Monumental Remains.” Sir Brian is said to have possessed a very elegant figure, and manners highly polished for the age.”

_Siege of Carlaverock._

H.

MEMOIR OF AYMER DE VALENCE, EARL OF PEMBROKE.

Page 71.

“AYMER DE VALENCE was the third son of William de Valence, who was created Earl of Pembroke by his uterine brother King Henry the Third. He was born about 1280, and succeeded his father in his honours on the 13th June 1296, both of his elder brothers having previously died without issue. The earliest notice of him which is recorded, is, that on the 26th January, 25th Edward I., 1297, he was summoned to Parliament as a baron, though, according to modern opinions on the subject, he was fully entitled to the earldom of Pembroke, nor was the title ever attributed to him in public records, until the 6th November, 1st Edward II. 1307; and the first writ to Parliament addressed to him as “Earl of Pembroke,” was tested on the 18th of the following January. Upon this remarkable circumstance, some observations have been recently made; but it is wholly impossible to explain the cause of the anomaly in a satisfactory manner. Although never styled “Earl of Pembroke” until the accession of Edward II., it is manifest, that from the death of his father, he ranked above all barons excepting Henry of Lancaster, who being of the blood royal, is uniformly mentioned next to Earls; hence it appears, that notwithstanding his claim was not positively acknowledged, he was considered to be entitled to a higher degree of precedency than belonged to the baronial dignity. In the 25th Edward I., he was in the expedition into Flanders, and, in the same year, was appointed a commissioner to ratify an agreement between the King and Florence, Count of Holland, relative to some auxiliaries from the Count in that war; and was likewise one of the ambassadors sent by Edward to treat for a truce between England and France. In the 26th and 27th Edward I., he was in the Scottish wars, and in June 1300, in the 28th Edward I., was present at the siege of Carlaverock, when he must have been about twenty-one years of age; but the poet pays him no other compliment than what a pun upon his name suggested.

“Le Valence Aymars li Vaillans.”

“In the following year, he was a party to the Barons’ letter to the Pope, in which, though his name occurs immediately after that of the Earl of Arundel, and before Henry de Lancaster’s, he is only styled ‘Lord of Montiniac.’ Shortly afterwards, he was appointed to treat with the ambassadors of the King of France on the subject of peace. In the 31st Edward I., he was again in the wars of Scotland; and, in the same year, received permission to leave the realm upon his own affairs. He obtained a grant, in 1305, of the Castles of Selkirk and Traquair, and of the borough of Peebles in Scotland, to hold by the service of one knight’s fee, together with other possessions in that kingdom; and, in the 34th Edward I., was constituted Guardian of the Marches of Scotland towards Berwick, when he was intrusted with the sole command of the English forces which had been levied against Robert Bruce. In the instrument by which he was appointed to that important duty, as well as in most others, he is styled “Dilectum consanguineum et fidelum nostrum.” The appellation of “Cousin” was not then a mere title of honour, when addressed to a peer, but was used in its most literal sense; and Aymer de Valence’s claim to it is shown by the following slight pedigree.

Hugh le Brun, == Isabel, daughter, and heiress == King John, Count of the | of Aymer, Count of | ob. 1216, Marches of the | Angouleme. | 1st husband. Aquitaine, 2d | | husband. | | | | +--------+ +------------+ | | William de Valence, created == K. Henry III. ob. 1272. == Earl of Pembroke, ob. 1296. | | | | +----------------------+ +---------------+ | | AYMER DE VALENCE, Earl == KING EDWARD I. ob. 1307 == of Pembroke, ob. 1323. | +-----------------+ | KING EDWARD II.

“The successes which attended this nobleman against Robert Bruce, are described by a contemporary chronicler; and it is said that Valence, after a severe contest, pursued Bruce, and presuming that he would take refuge in Kildrummie castle, he gained possession of that place, but finding only Nigel de Bruce, brother of Robert, there, he caused him and all who were with him, to be immediately hung. This action has given rise to some pertinent remarks by the able biographer of the Earl in the beautiful work before noticed,[96] who has satisfactorily shown that Nigel was not put to death by him, but that at least the forms of law were practised on the occasion. On the deathbed of Edward I., Pembroke, with some other personages, received the King’s dying injunctions to afford his son their counsel and support, and not to permit Piers de Gaveston to return into England. His strict adherence to this command, naturally excited the favourite’s displeasure; and he is said, in derision of his tall stature and pallid complexion, to have termed him “Joseph the Jew.” In the first year of the young monarch’s reign, Valence was, as has been before observed, allowed and summoned to Parliament by his proper title of Earl of Pembroke; and at the coronation of that monarch, he carried the King’s left boot, but the spur belonging to it was borne by the Earl of Cornwall. In the same year, after performing homage upon the death of his mother for her lands, he was joined with Otho de Grandison in an embassy to the Pope; and in the 3d Edward II., was found heir to his sister Agnes, or more probably Anne. It has been considered, from the circumstance of the Earl being a witness to the instrument by which the King recalled Gaveston, and bestowed the possessions of the Earl of Cornwall upon him, that he approved of, or at least consented to, those acts; but this idea rests upon far too uncertain evidence to be relied upon; and if he ever changed his opinion it was of short duration, for in the 3d Edward II., he joined the Earl of Lancaster against Gaveston, and when he was banished the realm in 1311, the Earl of Pembroke was one of the persons deputed to petition the King that he should be rendered incapable of ever holding any office.

“In the 6th Edward II., he was again sent on a mission to Rome, and in the same year obtained a grant of lands in London, in which was included the New Temple. In the 7th Edward II. he was appointed Custos and Lieutenant of Scotland, untill the arrival of the King, and was present at the fatal battle of Bannockburn. Two inedited MSS. cited in the “Monumental Remains,” allude to the Earl’s conduct on that occasion, in words fatal either to his loyalty or his courage: the one stating that “Insuper Comes de Pembrok, Henricus de Bellomonte, et multi magnates, _cordetenus Pharisei_, a certamine recesserunt;” and the other, that “in pedibus suis evasit ex acie et cum Valensibus fugientibus se salvavit.” In all probability, however, the language was in both instances that of an enemy, and deserves but little credit; though, even if it were true, “there is no great disgrace,” as the learned biographer, from whose memoir these extracts are taken, has truly remarked, “in seeking safety by flight when defeat was inevitable, and the whole army pursued a similar course.”

“In the 9th Edward II., the Earl was a commissioner for holding a Parliament in the King’s absence, and he took an active part in the proceedings therein. Being sent to Rome on a mission to the Pontiff, a singular misfortune befel him, as he was taken prisoner on his return by a Burgundian called John de Moiller with his accomplices, and sent to the Emperor, who obliged him to pay a ransom of 20,000 pounds of silver, upon the absurd pretence that Moiller had served the King of England without being paid his wages. Edward used every exertion to procure the Earl’s liberty, and wrote to several sovereign princes, soliciting them to interfere on the subject; but he did not immediately succeed. In the 11th Edward II., Pembroke was once more in the Scottish wars, and was appointed governor of Rockingham castle; and upon the King’s purposed voyage in the 13th Edward II., to do homage to the King of France for the Duchy of Acquitaine, he was constituted Guardian of the realm during his absence, being then also Custos of Scotland. In the 15th Edward II., he sat in judgment on the Earl of Lancaster at Pontefract; and for his conduct on the occasion, was rewarded with the grant of several manors.

“In March 1309, the Earl of Pembroke was one of the peers appointed to regulate the royal household; in the 5th Edward II., he was commanded not to approach the place where the Parliament was held with an armed retinue, or in any other manner than was observed in the time of the late King; in the 8th Edward II., he was a commissioner to open and continue a parliament at York; in the 12th Edward II., he was sent to Northampton with others to treat with the Earl of Lancaster, for the better government of the realm, and was one of the peers then appointed to be about the King’s person, at which time he signed the agreement between the King and that Earl; he advised the reversal of the judgment against Hugh le Despencer the younger; by writ tested on the 19th January, 14 Edward II. 1321, he was appointed a commissioner to treat for peace with Robert de Brus; and in the 18th Edward II., the Earl, as Justice in Eyre of the Forest of Essex, claimed the appointment of Marshal thereof.

“The Earl of Pembroke accompanied Isabel, Queen of England to France in 1323; and is said to have lost his life in that year, at a tournament given by him, to celebrate his nuptials with his third wife, Mary, daughter of Guy de Chastillon, Count of St Paul’s; though, from the obscure manner in which his death is mentioned by some chroniclers, and the attempt which they have made to consider it as a mark of the vengeance of Heaven for his conduct relative to the Earl of Lancaster, Dugdale asserts that he was murdered on the 23d June 1324, “by reason he had a hand” in that affair. But the former statement his recent biographer considers to be corroborated by the following lines in a long MS. poem, containing a life of the Earl, in the Cottonian collection, written by Jacobus Nicholaus de Dacia, who calls himself a scholar of Mary de St Paul, Countess of Pembroke; by which he probably meant that he belonged to Pembroke Hall, which she had founded.

_Mors Comitem Comitum necuit, mors ipsa cruenta Ipsa cruore rubrum campum facit et rubicundum._

“From the annexed account of the Earl’s death, however, by another contemporary writer, it would appear that he died of apoplexy:

“Ea vero tempestate primorum consultu direxit ad partes transmarinas Rex Almaricum de Valencia Comitem de Penbrokia, virum siquidem ad queque nepharia peragenda iuxta sue propinquitatis nequiciam continue paratum, regis Francorum presencie nuncium super dictis negocüs assistendum vt eiusdem regis Francorum animum ab inceptis, revocaret, ut ipsius benevolenciam affectum regis Anglorum varijs blandiciis inclinaret. Quo perveniente, ac iuxta proposita suorum verborum responsis acceptis, per Pykardiam rediens, ad quoddam municipium mi. villa, id est, _dimidia villa_, nuncupatum, tribus leucis a Compyne distans, in vigilia Sancti Johannis, declinavit pransurus, ubi Christus voluit virum sanguineum et dolosum non dimidiare dies suos. Sed finita refectionis hora thalamum ingreditur, deambulando statim in atrio corruit, ac sine confessione et viatico salutari infelicem animam subito in solo sufflavit.”[97]

The following account of the Earl of Pembroke is from the pen of Hutchinson. “This Earl” (Adomer de Valence) “seemed to have a divine interdict depending over him, and the immediate vindictive hand of Providence to be upon him and his posterity for his atrocious deeds. He was a tool to his prince, and servilely submitted to the mandate of the crown, contrary to the dictates of humanity, honour, and justice. He sat in judgment on Thomas Earl of Lancaster, and impiously acquiesced in his sentence. He was a chief instrument in apprehending the famous Scottish patriot Wallace in 1305; accomplishing his capture by the treachery of his most intimate associates, and those in whom he placed his utmost confidence, Sir John Menteith and others of infamous memory. _Adomer_, on his bridal day, was slain in a tournament, held in honour of his nuptials; and left a wife at once a _maiden_, _bride_ and _widow_. It is said that, for several generations of this family, _a father was never happy enough to see his son_, the proscribed parent being snatched off by the hand of death before the birth of his issue.” (_Hutchinson’s History of Northumberland._)

It may be also remarked as a singular coincidence, the fatality which attended the Stuarts after they came to the throne, not one of whom, for many generations, died a natural death. John Menteith was the son of Walter Stuart, Earl of Menteith, and of the same family which afterwards swayed the Scottish sceptre.

Aymer, or Adomer de Valence, is likewise charged by the Minstrel, as being the instrument made use of for corrupting the fidelity of Menteith; and he mentions, that the infamous bargain was finally concluded in “_Ruglyne Kirk_,” where the two met by appointment, and that Menteith received from Valence three thousand crowns of gold as the price of his friend. “_Ruglyne_” is situated nearly mid-way between Bothwell and Dumbarton castles; the former being the place where the Earl of Pembroke usually resided when in Scotland, and was quite convenient for his keeping an appointment at “_Ruglyne_” with the governor of Dumbarton Castle. When it is recollected, that John Comyn, who, according to “_Douglas’s peerage_,” married a sister of Valence, was hatching the treason which he afterwards put in practice against Bruce, at the time when his brother-in-law was tampering with the friend of Wallace, it will not be doing him great injustice, if we suppose him _at least_ in the secret of the infamous transaction with Menteith. In fact, both of these deeds of darkness appear to have been part of the same plan for placing Comyn, and consequently the sister of the Earl of Pembroke, on the Scottish throne.

The Earl was thrice married; first, to Beatrix, daughter of Ralph de Noel, Constable of France; secondly, to a daughter of the Earl of Barre; and thirdly, to Mary, daughter of Guy de Chastillon, Count of St Paul; but he had no issue; and the descendants of his sisters, Isabel, the wife of John Baron Hastings, and Joan, who married John Comyn of Badenoch, are consequently his representatives. His eldest sister, Anne, married, first, Maurice Fitz-Gerald; secondly, Hugh de Balliol; and, lastly, John de Avennes; and probably died, S. P. in the 3d Edward II.

Mary, Countess of Pembroke, is chiefly known to the present age by an action, which seldom fails to ensure immortality. She was the foundress of a College for the purposes of learning and religion, which still bears the name of Pembroke Hall; and was likewise a benefactress to several religious houses. She died about 1376; and on the 13th March in that year made her will at Braxted, in Essex, by which she ordered her body to be buried in the church of the sisters of Denny, where she had caused her tomb to be made; and bequeathed to the church of the Abbey of Westminster, where her husband was interred, a cross, with a foot of gold and emeralds, which Sir William de Valence, Knight, brought from the Holy Land.

The body of the Earl of Pembroke was conveyed to England, and buried in Westminster Abbey; but upon the beautiful tomb erected to his memory, it is unnecessary to say a single word, ample justice having been done to it by the artist and the author of a biographical notice, which accompanies a recent engraving of his tomb.

_Siege of Carlaverock._

I.

MEMOIR OF HENRY DE LACY, EARL OF LINCOLN.

Page 86.

“HENRY DE LACY was the eldest son of Edmund de Lacy, Earl of Lincoln, by Alice, the daughter of the Marquess of Saluces in Italy. He succeeded his father in the earldom in 1257, at which time he was probably about nine years of age, his parents having been married in May 1247. The first circumstance relating to the Earl after his birth, of which we have any notice, was his marriage, in 1256, to Margaret, the eldest daughter and co-heiress of William de Longespee, the covenants of which are given by Dugdale. In 1269, the Earl became involved in a dispute about some lands with John Earl Warren, and each party prepared to establish his claim by force of arms; but their intention becoming known to the King, he commanded his Justices to hear and determine the cause, who decided it in favour of the Earl of Lincoln. William de Longespee, his wife’s father, died in the 52d Henry III.; and soon afterwards the Countess and her husband performed homage for, and obtained livery of, all the lands which had in consequence devolved upon her. In her right he is considered to have become Earl of Salisbury, the said William de Longespee having been entitled to that dignity, though he was never allowed it, as son and heir of William de Longespee, the natural son of King Henry II., by the well-known Rosamond Clifford, who obtained the Earldom of Salisbury by his marriage with Elizabeth, the daughter and heiress of William d’Evereux. On the feast of St Edward, 18th March 1272, the Earl of Lincoln received the honour of knighthood, and in the same year was appointed Governor of Knaresborough Castle. In 5th Edward I. he had livery of the fee which his ancestors had usually received ‘_nomine comitatûs Lincoln_’ with all the arrears from the time he was invested by King Henry III. with the sword of that earldom. Upon several occasions, between the 6th and 10th Edward I., he obtained grants of fairs, markets, and free-warrens in different parts of his domains; and in the year last mentioned, he accompanied the expedition then sent into Wales. Leland asserts that the Earl built the town of Denbigh, the land of which had been granted to him “from his having married into the blood of those princes, and that he walled it, and erected a castle, on the front of which was a statue of him in long robes; and that anciently prayers were offered in Saint Hillary’s chapel in that place, for Lacy and Percy.”

“Dugdale considers, that his surrender of the castle and barony of Pontefract to the King, with all the honours thereto belonging, in the 20th Edward I., arose from his “having been long married, and doubting whether he should ever have issue, but upon condition, as it seems,” for the king, by his charter, dated at Newcastle-on-Tyne, 28th December, 21. Edward I., re-granted the same to him and to the heirs of his body, with remainder to Edmund Earl of Lancaster, the King’s brother, and to the heirs of his body, failing which, to the king and his heirs. In almost the next paragraph, however, that eminent writer says, “that in the 22d Edward I., the Earl received a grant of several manors from the King, with remainder to Thomas, the son of Edmund Earl of Lancaster, and Alice his wife, sole daughter of the Earl, and to the heirs of their two bodies lawfully begotten, and failing such issue, to the right heirs of the said Thomas” from which it would appear, that, at the time of the surrender by the Earl of Lincoln to the King, the said Alice was living; and which is further confirmed by his saying, in a subsequent page, that she was 28 years of age at the death of her father in 1312, in which case she must have been above seven at the time in question. In the 20. Edward I., the Earl was sent as ambassador to the King of France, to treat on the subject of the restraint of those pirates who robbed some French merchants; and in the 22d year of that monarch he again attended him into Wales, and was likewise in the expedition sent into Gascony. He accompanied the Earl of Lancaster, in the 24. Edward I., into Brittany, and was present at various successes of the English forces. On the death of that nobleman, he succeeded him in his command, and besieged the town of Aux with great vigour, though without success, and was forced to retreat to Bayonne; from which place he marched, with John de St John, towards Bellegard, which was then besieged by the Count d’Artois. The engagement which took place in the vicinity of that town, does not, from Dugdale’s relation of it, appear to have added to the reputation of the Earl, as he informs us, upon the authority of Walsingham, that “approaching a wood about three miles from Bellegard, he divided his army into two parts, whereof the van was led by John de St John, and the rear by himself; but having past the wood where St John, meeting the enemy, began the fight, discerning their strength, he retreated to Bayonne, leaving the rest to shift for themselves, so that St John and many others were by reason thereof taken prisoners.” Whatever stain this circumstance might have cast upon his military character, seems to have been partially removed towards the end of that year, by his having obliged the enemy to raise the siege which they had laid to St Katherine’s, in Gascony; soon after which he proceeded into Flanders, and thence returned to England. In the ensuing year, 27. Edward I., he was summoned by writ, tested 17th September, 27. Edward I., 1299, to be at York, with horse and arms, on the morrow of the Feast of St Martin, to serve against the Scots; and, in the next year, he is stated to have been sent to the Pope, with Sir Hugh Spencer, to complain of injuries received from the Scots; and about the same time he was appointed Lieutenant of Gascony. In the 29. Edward I., he was made Governor of Corfe Castle, from which year until the 31. Edward I., when he was joined in commission with the Bishop of Winchester to treat of peace between England and France, Dugdale gives no account of him.

“It was, however, on the 24th June, in the 29. Edward I., anno 1300, when the Earl must have been above 50 years of age, that he commanded the first division of the army which besieged Carlaverock Castle. The only characteristic trait recorded of him by the poet, is that of valour, which, we are told, was the principal feeling that animated his heart, and in so rude an age, this attribute was perhaps the highest and most gratifying praise that could be imagined. His name does not afterwards occur in that production, from which we may conclude, that his services at the siege and assault were not very conspicuous. In 1305, the Earl was again employed on a mission to the Pope, being deputed with the Bishops of Lichfield and Worcester to attend the inauguration of the Pontiff at Lyons, and to present him, in the name of the King, with several vessels of pure gold. After having executed this command, it appears that he was once more in the wars in Gascony, and in the ensuing year was similarly employed in Scotland. Upon the death of the King, at Burgh in Cumberland, the Earl was one of the Peers who attended him in his last moments, and received his solemn request to be faithful to his son, and not to allow Piers de Gaveston to return into England. Immediately after Edward’s demise, he joined some Earls and Barons in a solemn engagement to defend the young King, his honour and authority; and at his coronation he is recorded to have carried one of the swords borne at that ceremony; shortly after which he was appointed Governor of Skipton Castle. His conduct seems to have secured the confidence of the new monarch, for, upon his expedition towards Scotland in the 3d and 4th years of his reign, the Earl of Lincoln was constituted Governor of the realm during his absence.

“The preceding account of this personage has been almost entirely taken from Sir William Dugdale’s Baronage. The only facts which have been ascertained relating to him, not stated in that work, are, that he was one of the Mainpernors for the Earl of Gloucester in 1292; that he was a Receiver and Trier of Petitions in 1304; that he was present in the parliament held at Carlisle in February, 35th Edward I., 1307; and that he was one of the Peers appointed to regulate the King’s household in May, 3d Edward II., 1309.

“His works of piety were proportionate to his extensive possessions, and, adopting this criterion of his religious sentiments, we may conclude that he was not behind his contemporaries in superstition or devotion. Amongst his more substantial gifts to the church, was his large contribution to the “new work” at St Paul’s Cathedral in London; and three gilt crosses and a carbuncle, and a cup of silver gilt, which was said to have belonged to the shrine of St Edmund, in the abbey of Salley.

“The Earl of Lincoln closed a long and active career in 1312, at Lincoln’s Inn,[98] in the suburbs of London, being then about sixty-three or sixty-four years of age, and he is reported to have called his son-in-law, the Earl of Lancaster, to him, upon his death-bed, and, after representing how highly “it had pleased God to honor and enrich him above others,” he told him that “he was obliged to love and honor God above all things;” and then added, “See’st thou the Church of England, heretofore honourable and free, enslaved by Romish oppressions, and the King’s wicked exactions? See’st thou the common people, impoverished by tributes and taxes, and, from the condition of freemen, reduced to servitude? See’st thou the nobility, formerly venerable throughout Christendom, vilified by aliens, in their own native country? I therefore charge thee, by the name of Christ to stand up like a man for the honor of God and his church, and the redemption of thy country, associating thyself to that valiant, noble, and prudent person, Guy, Earl of Warwick, when it shall be most proper to discourse of the public affairs of the kingdom, who is so judicious in counsel, and mature in judgment. Fear not thy opposers who shall contest against thee in the truth, and if thou pursuest this my advice, thou shalt gain eternal honour!” This patriotic speech, which is attributed to him by Walsingham, who wrote in the fifteenth century, is worthy of attention, as conveying the view taken of the affairs of the period by a monk about one hundred years afterwards; for it would require extraordinary credulity to consider that it was really uttered by the dying Earl, whose whole life does not appear to present a single action indicative of the sentiments there attributed to him. His body was buried in the eastern part of St Paul’s Cathedral in London, between the chapel of our Lady and that of St Dunstan.

“The Earl of Lincoln was twice married, first to Margaret de Longespee before-mentioned, by whom he had a son, Edmond de Lacy, who was drowned in a well in a high tower, called the Red Tower, in Denbigh Castle, in his father’s lifetime; and a daughter, Alice, the wife of Thomas Earl of Lancaster, who was his sole heiress, and, at the Earl’s death, was twenty-eight years of age. His second wife was Joan, sister and heiress of William Baron Martin, who survived him, and was remarried to Nicholas Baron Audley.

“Alice, Countess of Lancaster, whose romantic life has been made the subject of a popular novel, styled herself, as sole inheritrix of the extensive possessions of her father and mother, Countess of Lincoln and Salisbury. She was thrice married; first to the Earl of Lancaster; secondly, to Eubolo le Strange; and, thirdly, to Hugh le Frenes; but died without issue on the Thursday next after the feast of St Michael, 22d Edward III., _i. e._ 2nd October 1348, when the representation of the powerful house of Lacy became vested in the descendants of Maud, the sister of Henry Earl of Lincoln, who married Richard de Clare, Earl of Gloucester.”

_Siege of Carlaverock._

K.

MEMOIRS OF RICHARD SIWARD, AND WALTER DE HUNTERCOMBE.

Page 97.

We shall here insert some account of Richard Siward and Walter de Huntercombe, two characters who appeared on this occasion. The latter, besides being at the siege of Carlaverock, where he attracted the notice of the poet, who mentions him as the handsome Huntercombe, bearing “ermine with two red gemmells,” was also governor of Edinburgh castle, and engaged in almost every campaign which Edward made in Scotland. The following notice, therefore, abridged from Mr Nicolas, will be useful in supplying that information respecting him which it has been inconvenient to give in the course of the narrative. It is also the more necessary, from the circumstance of the writer being pledged, in the advertisement of the “Life of Wallace,” to furnish “biographical notices of contemporary English and Scottish warriors” who figured in the contest between the two countries.

RICHARD SIWARD.--“Though this individual is frequently spoken of in the records of his day, yet very few particulars are known that can throw much light on his family pedigree. It has been conjectured, that he was descended from Syward, the great Saxon Earl of Northumberland; but of this, however, there is little certainty. His importance appears to have been considerable; for we find that, on 18th November 1292, he was appointed by Edward I. (in his character of Umpire on the question of the Succession) to act as Governor of the Castles of Dumfries, Wigton, and Kirkcudbright. On the 22d April, 1294, he obtained a grant of the marriage of the widow of Simon Fresel, or Frazer; and on the 15th October, in the same year, he was summoned to attend the English monarch, with all his retainers, in the expedition to Wales. Towards the end of 1295, he affected to unite with the Scottish Barons in their attempt to restore their King to the dignity of an independent sovereign, and, in consequence, had the defence of the Castle of Dunbar assigned to him. How he conducted himself on that occasion, has already been noticed. His subsequent confinement in the Tower, has been adduced by some writers as a powerful argument against the charge of treason brought against him by his countrymen. We cannot, however, see it in that light. His treachery was of the most profligate description. By negociating the surrender of a fortress, which, from its strength and importance, was reckoned in those days the key of the kingdom, and also using it, at the same time, as a trap to ensnare the greater part of the nobility, was conduct that required the exercise of some _ruse_ in order to lessen the odium it was calculated to excite even in the estimation of the English nobility, who must otherwise have looked with disgust on a man who could have acted in so base a manner towards his own countrymen. By the following lines of Peter Langtoft, Siward appears to have had for some time a private understanding with the enemy:--

“A knycht was tham among, Sir Richard Seward, Tille our faith was he long, & with kyng Edward. Tille our men he com tite, & said, ‘the Scottis wilde Thre dayes haf respite, & than the castelle zelde. To the Baliol suld thei send, ther castelle to rescue, Bi that bot he vs mend with for zow to remue The castelle ze salle haue, without any delay.’”

Vol. ii. p. 274-5.

“For the performance of this agreement, hostages were given to the English, and a messenger despatched to acquaint Baliol that a truce had been obtained; which he was instructed to say, was effected entirely by the dexterity of Siward, and his personal influence with a number of the English nobles. Baliol was also advised to advance and attack the English army while “at meat,” and that, at the same time, Siward would make a sally to assist him in destroying the enemy--which the messenger spoke of as a matter of certainty, and moreover counselled Baliol to proceed immediately afterwards and plunder Northumberland.

“On the third day, Siward, from the battlements of Dunbar, discovered the Scottish army rapidly approaching towards him; he therefore hastily sought the English head-quarters, and proffered to go personally and retard the advance of the Scots till the expiry of the time stipulated for by the agreement. The English, however, were not inclined to believe that he would carry his treason quite so far, and refused him permission to proceed to the Scottish lines.[99]

“Siward, on being relieved from his confinement in the Tower, rose high in the confidence of Edward. On 26th September 1298, 7th May and 16th June 1299, he was summoned, by the title “Baron,” to serve in Scotland. His name appears on several occasions in the Wardrobe Account of 28th Edward I. In that year he received 41_l._ 5s. for the services of himself and his followers in the garrison of Lochmaben. Also an allowance of 2_l._ 13s. 4d. for the value of a horse killed at Kirkcudbright; eight merks for a winter dress (robe); and the like sum appears to have been paid to him for a summer dress. In the same year he was again summoned for the Scottish war, and also in 1301. He was made sheriff of Dumfries-shire in 1305, and was also aiding in the suppression of Robert Bruce in 1308; in which year he was appointed to the charge of a district in Galloway, under Edward II. In 1309 he was governor or constable of Dumfries, and is supposed to have died in 1310.

By his wife Mary he had two sons, Richard and John. They both attained the age of manhood; and John, in particular, appears to have followed the crooked anti-patriotic policy of his father. He accompanied the Earl of Pembroke in his invasion of Fife, as has been already mentioned, and was rewarded by Edward with an appointment as Governor of Perth. Little appears to have been known of Richard. He was married to Elizabeth ---- in 1296. The arms of Siward, as has been already noticed, were sable, a cross fleury, argent.

“WALTER DE HUNTERCOMBE succeeded his father in his lands in the 55. Henry III., at which time he was of full age; and shortly afterwards married Alice, third daughter and co-heiress of Hugh de Bolebec, and who, in the 2d Edward I., was found to be one of the co-heirs of Richard de Muntfichet, in right of her grandmother Margery, his sister. In the 5th Edward I. he paid 50_l._ for his relief of the barony of Muschamp; and on the 12th December in that year, was summoned to serve with horse and arms against the Welsh: he received similar writs tested 6th April and 24th May, 10th Edward I., and 14th June, 15th Edward I. He was one of the peers who were present in parliament in the 18th Edward I., when a grant was made to the King, for the marriage of his eldest daughter, of the same aid as had been given to Henry III. for the marriage of his daughter the Queen of Scotland; and shortly afterwards the Isle of Man was intrusted to his charge, but which he only held three years, as, in obedience to the King’s commands, he surrendered his trust to John de Baillol in the 21st Edward I. In the 19th Edward I., by writ tested the 16th April at Darlington, he was ordered to be at Norham, equipped for the field by the ensuing Easter; and obtained a charter of free-warren in all his demesne lands in the county of Northumberland before the end of that year. On the 26th June 1294, Huntercombe was ordered to join the expedition then made into Gascony. His military services, during the remainder of the reign of Edward I. were incessant, for he was in the Scottish wars in the 25th, 26th, 28th, 31st, and 34th years of that monarch; was Governor of Edinburgh Castle in the 26th; Lieutenant of Northumberland in the 27th Edward I.; and afterwards Warden of the Marches there. In the 28th Edward I. we find that he was at the siege of Carlaverock; and in the next year he was a party to the letter to Pope Boniface, in which he is called “Walter Lord of Huntercombe.” It appears from the Wardrobe accounts of the 28th Edward I., that he was allowed 10_l._ as a compensation for a black nag which was killed by the Scots at Flete, on the 6th August 1299. But the nature and extent of Huntercombe’s services are best shown by his own statement of them in his petition to the King in the 35th Edward I., praying a remission of his scutage for the expeditions in which he had been engaged, with which prayer the crown complied. He says, that he had been in all the wars of Scotland up to that time; namely, in the first war at Berwick with twenty horse; then at Stirling with thirty-two horse, in the retinue of the Earl of Warren; then at Le Vaire Chapelle with thirty horse in the retinue of the Bishop of Durham; afterwards at Gaway with sixteen horse; and that he sent eighteen horse to the last battle, though he was not present himself, being then Warden of the Marches of Scotland and Northumberland. From that year nothing more is known of this Baron, excepting that he was summoned to parliament from the 23d June, 23d Edward I., 1295, to the 16th June, 14th Edward II., 1311, and died in 1312; but after the 25th Edward I. he was probably prevented by age from taking an active part in public affairs, for even allowing him to have been but twenty-one in the 55th Henry III., he must have been above sixty in 1307; which calculation makes him to have been about fifty when he was at Carlaverock, and sixty-four at his decease. Though he was twice married he died without issue. His first wife was Alice de Bolebec, before mentioned; but we only know that the Christian name of his second was Ellen, and that she survived him. Nicholas Newbaud, his nephew, son of his sister Gunnora, was found to be his heir.

“The arms of Huntercombe were ermine, two bars gemells, gules.”

L.

MEMOIR OF SIR SIMON FRASER.

Page 113.

This warrior appears to have been most actively engaged in the battle of Roslin; and the renown which has in consequence attached itself to his name, will perhaps render the following notice of him acceptable.

* * * * *

_Simon de Fraser_ was the eldest son of Simon de Frazer, the ancestor of the baronial houses of Saltoun and Lovat; and is supposed to have been a near connexion of William Frazer, Bishop of St Andrew’s, whose politics he appears in his early years to have adopted; for, when he was taken prisoner on the surrender of the castle of Dunbar in 1296, he swore fealty to Edward, and remained faithful to the English interest till 1302. He was repeatedly summoned to fight against his countrymen, particularly on 26th September 1298, and 7th May 1299. He also figured at the siege of Carlaverock in 1300 as a Baron;--in the same year, he was appointed Warden of the Forest of Selkirk, and, by that designation, the truce between the two countries was announced to him on the 30th October. In the same year, the sum of 64_l._ 18s. is charged in the Wardrobe Account, as having been paid him as the wages of himself and a retinue of three knights and twelve esquires, from 13th July till 3d September, at which time his horses were valued, and hire for 59 days allowed him. There is also an allowance of 17_l._ 6s. 8d. for the maintenance of his wife Lady Mary, her daughters and family, living in the castle of Jedworth, by the grant of the King, from Christmas till St John Baptist’s day, 26 weeks, at a merk per week, as per agreement with the Steward of Berwick-upon-Tweed.[100] On his withdrawing from Edward, he joined Comyn, and gained the battle of Roslin, as has already been observed. When the English afterwards succeeded in subduing Scotland, a severe penalty was inflicted upon him; he was banished from all the territories belonging to, or under the influence of England, for three years, and his rents for that time forfeited. In 1306 he joined Bruce; but having unfortunately fallen into the hands of the enemy, he was conveyed to London and ordered by Edward for execution;--after being drawn and quartered, his head was fixed upon London Bridge. “But,” says Mr Nicholas, “a much more minute and curious account is given of the tragical termination of Frazer’s life in a fragment of an inedited chronicle in the British Museum of the 15th century,[101] from which Mr Ritson printed the subjoined extract in illustration of a poem which will be more fully noticed.

“The fryday next before assumpcioun of oure lady, King Edeward mette Robert the Brus bisides seynt Johns toune in Scotland and with his companye, of whiche companye King Edewarde quelde sevene thowsand. When Robert the Brus saw this myschif, and gan to flee, and hovd hym that men mygte nougt hym fynde, but S^r Simond Frisell pursuede hym socore, so that he turnede ayen and abode bataille, for he was a worthy knyght and a bolde of body, and the Englisshe men pursuede hym sore yn every syde, and quelde the stede that S^r Symond Frisell rood uppon, and ther toke hym and lad hym to the host. And S^r Symond began for to flater and speke faire, and saide, Lordys, I shall yeve you iiij thousand marke of sylver, and myne hors and harneys, and all my armure and vicome. Tho answerd Theobaude of Pevenes, that was the Kinge’s archer, Now God me so helpe hit is for nougt that thou spexte, for alle the gold of Engelonde I wold the noght lete gone withoute commaundement of King Edeward. And tho was he lad to the King. And the King wolde not see hym, but commaunded to lede hym awey to his dome to London on our Ladyes even nativite, and he was honge and drawe, & his heede smyten of, and honged ayene with chynes of jren oppon the galwes, and his hede was sette oppon London brug on a sper. And ayens Cristesmasse the body was brent, for enchesoun that the men that kepte the body by nyghte sawe menye devellis rampande with jren crokes, rennynge uppon the gallews, and horribliche tormented the body; and meny that ham sawe, anoon after thei deied for dred, or woxen mad, or sore sykenesse thei had.”

In one of the Harleian manuscripts,[102] there is a ballad written on the subject, a few years after the circumstance took place, and which was published by Ritson.[103] The following stanzas are so extremely interesting, from the manner in which Frazer is alluded to, that, notwithstanding the length to which they extend, it is impossible to avoid inserting them. After noticing the capture and the fate of his unfortunate companions, the poet says:

“Thenne saide the iustice that gentil is ant fre, Sire Simond Frysel, the Kynges traytour hast thou be, In water ant in londe that monie myhten se, What sayst thou thareto, how wolt thou quite the?

Do say. Sa foul he him wiste, Nede waron truste Forto segge nay.

Ther he was ydemed, so hit wes londes lawe, For that he wes lordswyk furst he wes to drawe, Upon a retheres hude forth he wes ytuht, Sum while in ys time he wes a modi knycht, In huerte. Wickednesse and sunne Hit is lutel wunne, That maketh the body smerte.

For al is grete poer yet he wes ylaht, Falsnesse and swykedom al hit g’eth to nacht, Tho he wes in Scotlond lutel wes ys thoht, Of the harde iugement that him wes bysocht In stounde. He wes foursithe forswore To the King ther bifore, And that him brohte to grounde.

With feteres and with gyves ichot he wes to drowe, From the tour of Londone, that monie myhte knowe, In a curtel of burel aselkethe wyse, Ant a gerland on ys heued of the newe gwyse, Thurh Cheepe Moni mon of Engelonde, For to se Symond, Thideward con lepe.

Tho he come to galewes furst he wes an honge, Al quick byheueded, thah him thohte longe, Seth the he wes yopened, is boweles ybrend, The heued to Londone brugge wes send, To shonde: So ich ever mote the Sum while wende he Thes lutel to stonde.

He rideth thourh the site as y telle may, With gomen and wyth solas, that wes here play, To Londone brugge hee nome the way, Moni wes the wyves chil that ther on laketh a day, Ant seide alas That he was ibore, And so villiche forlore, So feir mon ase he was.

Now stont the heued above the tubrugge, Faste bi Waleis, soth forte sugge, After socour of Scotlond longe he mowe prye, Ant after help of Fraunce, met halt hit to lye, Ich wene. Betere him were in Scotlond, With is ar in ys hond, To pleyen othe grene.

Ant the body hongeth at the galewes faste With yrnene claspes longe to laste, Forte wyte wel the body, and Scottysh to garste, Foure and twenti the beoth to sothe ate laste, By nychte, Yef eny were so hardi The body to remny, Also to dyhte.”

Fraser left two daughters, his co-heirs, one of whom married Sir Patrick Fleming, ancestor of the Earls of Wigton; and the other named Mary, was the wife of Sir Gilbert Hay, ancestor of the Marquess of Tweedale. From Alexander Fraser his brother the Barons Saltoun and Lovat descended.

The arms of Simon Frazer were, sable, semée of roses argent; but the descendants of his brother bear, azure, three cinque foils argent.

After this notice of so distinguished a leader among the Scots, the reader may reasonably be supposed to feel some curiosity respecting the English general,

SIR JOHN SEGRAVE.

From the researches of Mr Nicolas, it appears that this eminent Baron was the eldest son of Nicholas Baron Segrave; and at his father’s death, in the 23d Edward I., was thirty-nine years of age. In the 54th Henry III., he married Christian, daughter of Hugh de Plessets, knight, and at the same time, his sister Amabil became the wife of his brother-in-law, Sir John de Plessets. Soon after the accession of Edward I., he was engaged in the wars of Scotland, and in the 13th Edward I. he attended the King in his expedition into Wales. In the 19th Edward I. he was with his father in the Scottish wars; and in the 24th Edward I. executed the office of Constable of the English army.

Dugdale asserts, that in the 25th Edward I., John de Segrave was, by indenture, retained to serve Roger le Bigot, Earl of Norfolk, the Earl Marshal, with six knights, including himself, as well in peace as war, for the term of his whole life, in England, Wales, and Scotland, with the following retinue:--In time of peace, with six horses, so long as the Earl should think fit, taking _bouche of court_ for himself and six knights; and for his esquires hay and oats, together with livery for six more horses, and wages for six grooms and their horses. He was also to receive two robes for himself, as for a banneret, yearly, as well in peace as in war, with the same robes for each of his five knights, and two robes annually for his other bachelors. In war, he was bound to bring with him his five knights and twenty horses, in consideration of which, he was to receive for himself and his company, with all the said horses, xl s. per diem; but if he should bring no more than six horses, then xxij s. per diem. It was further agreed, that the horses should be valued, in order that proper allowance might be made, in case any of them should happen to be lost in the service; and, for the performance of this agreement, he had a grant from the Earl of the manor of Lodene in Norfolk.

The preceding document has been cited nearly in Dugdale’s own words, because at the same time that it affords much information with respect to the retinue by which Segrave was attended to the field, it proves that he was intimately connected with the Earl Marshal, which tends to explain his having in the same year, namely, on the 12th August, 25th Edward I. 1297, been appointed by the Earl to appear in his name before the King, in obedience to a precept directed to him and the Constable, commanding them to attend him on the subject of a body of armed men which had assembled in London. The record states, that on the appointed day, the Earl of Hereford as Constable, and “Mons^r John de Segrave, qui excusa le Comte Mareschal par maladie,” came accordingly.[104] In the 25th Edward I., this baron was also summoned to accompany the King beyond the sea, and afterwards at Newcastle-upon-Tyne, with horse and arms; and, in the next year, was present when the English army gained the victory of Falkirk. In the 28th Edward I., he was again summoned to serve in the wars of Scotland, in which year, when he must have been about forty-five years old, he was at the siege of Carlaverock. The account given of him by the poet, that he performed the Earl Marshal’s duties upon that occasion, because that nobleman was prevented from attending, is not only strongly corroborated by the preceding statement of his having acted as deputy of the Earl Marshal in the year 1297, but also by the following extract from Peter de Langtoft’s chronicle (p. 309.), when speaking of the expedition into Scotland in 1300.

“After Midesomers tide thorgh comon ordinance, No lenger suld thei bide, bot forth & stand to chance. Norreis & Surreis, that seruice auht the kyng, With hors & harneis at Carlele mad samnyng. The erle Marschalle Rogere no hele that tyme mot haue, He went with his banere Sir Jon the Segraue, To do alle tho service that longed the office tille, & mayntend alle the prise, ther he sauh lawe & skille.”

After Carlaverock castle surrendered, Segrave’s banner, from his having acted as Marshal during the siege, was displayed on its battlements. In the 30th of Edward I., he was a party to the Letter from the Barons to the Pope, in which he is styled “John Lord of Segrave;” and about that time was appointed Governor of Berwick, and Warden of Scotland. In the same year, whilst riding out of Berwick with a small escort, he was surprised by an ambuscade of the Scots, wounded, and taken prisoner; which event is thus noticed by Langtoft (p. 319.)

“Our men in Scotland with sautes sodeynly, The Segrave myght not stand, Sir Jon tok the gayn stie. His sonne & his brother of bedde als thei woke, & sextene knyghtes other, the Scottis alle them toke.”

His captivity was however, it appears, of short duration; for, on Edward’s return to England, Segrave was left as his Lieutenant of Scotland. At different periods during the reign of Edward I., he obtained grants of free warren and other privileges in several of his manors, and possessed that elevated place in his sovereign’s confidence and esteem, which his long and zealous services so justly merited. Nor was he less distinguished by his successor, for soon after the accession of Edward II., he was constituted Governor of Nottingham castle, which had belonged to Piers de Gaveston, and was likewise appointed to his situation of Justice of the Forests beyond the Trent, and Keeper of all the Rolls thereto belonging; but he resigned these offices in the following year, when they were conferred upon Henry de Percy. In the 2d Edward II., he was again appointed Warden of Scotland; in the 6th Edward II. he was taken prisoner at the battle of Bannockburn, and about twelve months afterwards Thomas de Moram and several other Scots, then prisoners in the Tower of London, were delivered to Stephen de Segrave, son and heir of the Baron, to be exchanged for him. In the 8th Edward II., commissioners were appointed to hear and determine all disputes relative to the taking up of carriages by him or his agent, in consequence of his offices of Keeper of the Forests beyond the Trent, and of the castles of Nottingham and Derby. He was summoned upon several occasions to serve in the Scottish wars during the early part of the reign of Edward II., and to Parliament from the 26th August, 24th Edward I., 1296, to the 6th May, 18th Edward II., 1325. In the 10th Edward II., in recompence of his great services, and of his imprisonment in Scotland, he received a grant of L.1000; but what was then due to the crown for money received by him from the time of his appointment of Warden of the Forests beyond the Trent and Governor of Nottingham Castle, was to be deducted from that sum.

The tide of royal favour at last turned, and he accidentally fell a victim to the displeasure of his sovereign. Having, in 1325, excited Edward’s anger by the escape of Roger Lord Mortimer from the Tower, he sent Segrave and the Earl of Kent into Gascony, under the pretence of defending that province, where he was attacked with a disease then prevalent there, of which he shortly afterwards died, aged about seventy years, leaving John de Segrave, his grandson, son of his eldest son Stephen, who died in his lifetime, his heir.

The preceding unadorned narrative of John de Segrave’s services forms a splendid monument of his fame: for, whilst the impossibility of colouring the biography of his contemporaries with meretricious ornaments of language, is strongly felt when their actions are few or obscure, the absence of such assistance tends to the advantage of those who need no other eulogy than the simple record of the occasions upon which they were present in the field, or were selected to execute high and important duties.

John de Segrave, the next Baron, added to the honours of his ancestors in an unprecedented manner, by marrying Margaret, the daughter and heiress of Thomas de Brotherton, Marshal of England, younger son of King Edward I. Through the marriage of Elizabeth, their daughter and heiress, with John Lord Mowbray, that family attained the Marshalship of England. The present representatives of John Baron Segrave, the subject of this article, are the Lords Stourton and Petre and the Earl of Berkley. The arms of John de Segrave were sable, a lion rampant, argent, crowned or.

M.

EXTRACTS FROM THE WARDROBE ACCOUNTS.

Page 120.

This, of course, is mere conjecture on the part of the author; but that he has, at least, probability on his side, may be inferred from the extraordinary outlay attending the Scottish expeditions, as proved by the following extracts from the Wardrobe Accounts--exhibiting the Revenue and Expenditure of Edward for the year 1300, and including the disbursements occasioned by the invasion of Scotland during that year:--

Total amount of receipts, p. Exchequer, for this present 28. year of Edward I. -- L.49,048 19 10

Fines levied, and proceeds of stores, horses, &c. sold 9,106 16 2½ --------------- Per fo. 15. L.58,155 16 0½ =============== Charges on Scottish War.

For royal garrisons and castles in Scotland,

fo. 154. L.18,638 1 8

... replacing horses killed or destroyed in King’s service, belonging to knights, and officers, and gratification to messengers, servants, &c. fo. 187. 4,386 4 5

... annual fees to knights of King’s household, wages of bannerets and simple knights, &c. fo. 210. 3,077 19 0

... wages of engineers, archers, sergeants-at-arms of King’s household, esquires, &c. fo. ix. Observ. on W. A. 1,038 10 7

... wages of foot-soldiers, crossbow-men, archers, artificers and workmen, fo. 270. 4,446 9 11½

... wages of seamen belonging to the fleet of the Cinque Ports and other towns, employed in the King’s service, fo. 279. 1,233 9 8 ------------- Amount of charges for the year L.32,820 15 3½

* * * * *

Separate Disbursements.

Alms and charitable donations of the King and his family, fo. 47. L.1,166 14 6

Necessaries for the King’s household, travelling expenses, ambassadors, messengers to Court of Rome, wages of King’s servants _not_ on the Marshall’s roll, &c. (Observ. on W. A. fo. viii.) 3,338 19 3

Expenses of messengers and others, despatched on King’s business, fo. 303. 87 11 1

Falconers, huntsmen, &c. fo. 309 77 6 11½

Allowance to bannerets, knights, clerks, and other servants of the King’s household for their winter and summer robes, fo. 331. 714 3 4

Expenses of sundry furnishings for the Royal household, including separate expenses of the Queen and her household, amounting to L.3668, 2s. 9d., and Chancellor’s fee, amounting to L.581, 9s. 9d. fo. 360. 15,575 18 5½

“The account then states the payments contained in this book to amount to L.53,178 15 0

“To which are added the expenses of the household contained in a separate account, amounting to L.10,969 16 0½ --------------- And “the whole of the national expenditure, within this department, during one entire year,” is stated at L.64,105 0 5 ============== It is added, “The account is corrected and approved by the comptroller in every page; but the balance is not struck. If we take, however, the sum told of the money received, which amounted to L.58,155 16 2

And deduct it from the money paid, we shall find a balance due to the accountant, amounting to 5,949 4 3” =============

On data furnished by the ascertained difference in the value of silver in 1300, which is stated to be “_thrice_ as much” as it was in 1700, and the comparative value of certain provisions, estimated, as being in 1300, “_five_ times as cheap” as in 1700. Bishop Fleetwood “makes the difference of the value of a shilling between the two periods to be fifteen;” and it is added, “supposing this calculation to be well-founded, computations might be made, so as to form a judgment of the difference between the latter of those periods and the present time.”--(_Vide_ p. xii. Observations on Wardrobe Account, 1787.)

An estimate of the expense of the Scottish war, according to this mode of computation, would therefore present the following result, for (1700) the period alluded to by Bishop Fleetwood:--

Charges on Scottish war for 1300 L.32,820 15 3½ For difference in the weight of silver 3 -------------- L.98,462 5 10½ For the variation in the value of money 5 -------------- L.492,311 9 4½

being an increase of the sum of 32,820_l._ 15s. 3½d. of the year 1300, to 492,311_l._ 9s. 4½d., or nearly _one-eighth_ of 3,895,205_l._, the revenue of the kingdom in the reign of William III., according to Sir John Sinclair:--while, from a statement by the same respectable authority, the whole revenue of the kingdom under Edward I. is estimated at 150,000_l_; the disbursements for the Scottish war will therefore be found to exceed, within one department of the national expenditure, _one-fifth_ of the national income.

N.

TRIAL OF WALLACE.

Page 158.

“William Wallace, which had oft-times set Scotland in great trouble, was taken and brought to London, with great numbers of men and women wondering upon him. _He was lodged in the house of William Delect, a citizen of London, in Fenchurch Street._ On the morrow, being the eve of St Bartholomew, he was brought on horseback to Westminster-hall; John Segrave and Geoffrey, knights, the mayor, sheriffs, and aldermen of London, _many, both on horseback and on foot_, accompanying him; and in the great hall at Westminster, _he being placed on the south bench_, crowned with laurel, for that he had said in times past that he ought to wear a crown in that hall, as it was commonly reported; and being appeached as a traitor by Sir Peter Malorie, the King’s Justice, he answered _that he was no traitor to the King of England_; but for other things whereof he was accused, he confessed them, and was, after, headed and quartered.”--_Stow. Chron._ p. 209.

O.

ON THE MARTYRDOM OF WALLACE.

Page 159.

The following account is given by Langtoft of the capture, sentence, and execution of Wallace:

“A! Jhesu, when thou wille how rightwis is thi mede? That of the wrong has gilt, the endying may thei drede. William Waleis is nomen, that maister was of theues, Tething to the Kyng is comen, that robberie mischeues. Sir Jon of Menetest sewed William so nehi. He tok him whan he wend lest, on nyght his leman bi. That was thorght treson of Jak Schort his man, He was the encheson, that Sir Jon so him nam, Jak brother had he slayn, the Waleis that is said, The more Jak was fayn, to do William that braid. Selcouthly he endis the man that is fals, If he trest on his frendes, thei begile him als. Begiled is William, taken is & bondon, To Inglond with him thei cam, & led him vnto London, The first dome he fanged, for treson was he drawen. For robbrie was he hanged, & for he had men slawen, & for he had brent abbies, & men of religion, Eft fro the galweis quik thei lete him doun, & boweld him alle hote, & brent tham in the fire. His hede than of smote, suilk was William hire; & for he had mayntend the werre at his myght, On lordschip lended thore he had no right, & stroied those he knewe, in fele stede sers His body thai hewe on foure quarters, To hang in foure tounes, to mene of his maners In stede of Gonfaynounes, & of his baners. At London is his heued, his quarters ere leued, in Scotland spred, To wirschip her iles, & lere of his wiles, how wele that he sped. It is not to drede, traytour salle spede, als he is worthi, His lif salle he tyne, & die thorgh pyne, withouten merci. Thus may men here, a ladde for to lere, to biggen in pays; It fallis in his iye, that hewes ouer hie, with the Walays.”

Vol. ii. p. 329. 330.

“The martyrdom of Wallace,” says the editor of Wyntoun’s Chronicle, “is thus described, in a ballad written about a year after, when the head of Sir Simon Frazer, one of the heroes of Roslin, was set up beside those of Wallace and Lewellyn, the last sovereign of Wales.

“To warny alle the gentilmen, that liueth in Scotlonde.} The Waleis wes to drawe seththe he wes anhonge, } to abyde. Al quic biheueded, ys boweles ybrend, } The heued to Londone brugge wes send

* * * * *

Sire Edward oure Kyng, that ful ys of pietè, } The Waleis quarters sende to is oune contre, } Ant drede.” On four half to honge, huere myrour to be, } Ther-apon to thenche, that manie myhten se, }

_MS. Harl. No. 2253, f. 59, b. Trivet._ p. 340.

“Thus did Edward glut his vengeance on the dead body of this worthy man, whose living soul all his power never could subdue.

“Some of the English historians have stained their pages with low invectives against Wallace. Carte, in particular [Hist. v. ii. p. 290.], labours hard to prove him a traitor to King Edward, whose _mercy_ he praises. That he was a traitor, he proves from his being a native of Galloway, _or_ the Cambrian territories, which, _he says_, the kings of Scotland held in vassalage of the crown of England, and because the subvassals were, in cases of rebellion, subject by the feudal law to the same forfeitures and penalties as the immediate vassal.

“A man must feel himself very much pinched for arguments, when he has recourse to such as are confessedly not founded on reason, and to quibbles and perversion of facts. Clydesdale, the ancient kingdom of Strathcluyd, one of the first independent kingdoms established in Britain by the expulsion of the Romans, which for many centuries withstood the attacks of the Angles, Pichts, Scots, and Norwegians, and had the honour to produce STEWART, DOUGLAS, and WALAYS, was never pretended to be any part of the territories of which the kings of England claimed the superiority. So the pretence that Walays was a traitor, in consequence of the place of his birth, falls to the ground; and the pretence of rebellion is equally unfounded, unless the noble exertions of a free people against the unjustifiable attempts of a neighbouring prince to subject them to his dominion, are to be branded with the name of rebellion. Well may the spirit of the noble Walays forgive those writers for accusing him of inhumanity and rebellion, who have extolled the clemency of Edward I.”--_Notes to Wyntoun’s Chronicle_, vol. ii. p. 503.

The inclination to detract from the merits of Wallace, does not appear to have become entirely extinct among the historians of England. Dr Lingard thus expresses himself respecting our hero: “It may perhaps offend the national partiality of some among my readers, but I greatly suspect that Wallace owes his celebrity as much to his execution as to his exploits. Of all the Scottish chieftains who deserved and experienced the enmity of Edward, he alone perished on the gallows; and on this account his fate called forth and monopolized the sympathy of his countrymen.”--Vol. iii. p. 227.

On this Mr Tytler remarks, “It is not true, that of all the Scottish chieftains who deserved Edward’s enmity, Wallace was the only one who perished on the gallows. Sir Nigel Bruce, Sir Christopher Seton, John Seton, the Earl of Athol, Sir Simon Fraser, Sir Herbert de Morham, Thomas Boys, Sir David Inchmartin, Sir John de Somerville, Sir Thomas and Sir Alexander Bruce, both brothers of the king, and Sir Reginald Crawfurd, were all hanged by Edward’s orders in the course of the year 1306, within a year of the execution of Wallace. So much for the accuracy of the ground on which Lingard has founded his conjecture, that Wallace owes his celebrity ‘to his execution.’”

Respecting the inaccuracies of Dr Lingard on this subject, we shall give another extract from the same authority. “He,” Dr Lingard “observes, that after the surprise of Ormesby the Justiciary, by Wallace and Douglas, other independent chieftains arose in different counties, who massacred the English, and compelled their own countrymen to fight under their standards. These other independent chieftains are brought in ‘for the nonce’ by Dr Lingard. They are utterly unknown to the contemporary historians, English and Scottish. But they do not appear upon the stage without a use. On the contrary, they first multiply like Falstaff’s men in buckram, ‘into numerous parties,’ and then act a principal part in the next sentence; for the historian goes on to observe, ‘that the origin and progress of _these numerous parties_ had been viewed with secret satisfaction by the Steward of Scotland, and Wishart the Bishop of Glasgow, who determined to collect them into one body, and to give their efforts one common direction. Declaring themselves the assertors of Scottish independence, they invited the different leaders to rally around them; and the summons was obeyed by Wallace and Douglas, by Sir Alexander Lindsay, Sir Andrew Moray, and Sir Richard Lundy,’ vol. iii. p. 305. This last sentence is one of pure and gratuitous invention, without a shadow of historical authority to support it. The numerous and independent parties and chieftains who rose in different counties--the silent satisfaction with which they were contemplated by the Bishop of Glasgow and the High Steward--their determination to collect them into one body, and to give them one common direction--their declaring themselves the assertors of Scottish independence--their summons to the different leaders to rally round them, and the prompt obedience of this summons by Wallace, Douglas, and the rest--are facts created by the ingenuity of the historian. They seem to be introduced for the purpose of diminishing the reputation of Wallace; and the impression they leave on the mind of the reader, appears to me to be one totally different from the truth. The Steward and the Bishop of Glasgow are the patriot chiefs under whom Douglas and Wallace, and many other independent chieftains consent to act for the recovery of Scottish freedom; and Wallace sinks down into the humble partisan, whose talents are directed by their superior authority and wisdom. Now, the fact is exactly the reverse of this. The Steward and Wishart, encouraged by the successes of Wallace and Douglas, joined their party, and acted along with them in their attempt to free Scotland; but neither Fordun, nor Wynton, nor Bower gives us the slightest ground to think that they acted a principal part, or any thing like a principal part, in organizing the first rising against Edward. On the contrary, these historians, along with Trivet and Walsingham, Tyrrel and Carte, ascribe the rising to Wallace alone, whose early success first caused him to be joined by Douglas, and afterwards by the Bishop and the Steward, along with Lindsay, Moray, and Lundy. Indeed, instead of playing the part ascribed to him by Lingard, the patriotism of the Steward and the Bishop, was of that lukewarm and short-lived kind which little deserves the name. It did not outlive eight weeks; and they seized the first opportunity to desert Wallace and the cause of freedom. The attack upon Ormesby the Justiciary took place some time in May 1297; and on the 9th of July of the same year, did Bishop Wishart, this patriot assertor of Scottish independence, negociate the treaty of Irvine, by which he and the other Scottish barons, with the single exception of Wallace and Sir Andrew Moray of Bothwell, submitted to Edward. Lingard’s other hero, the High Steward, who is brought in to divide the glory with Wallace, was actually in the English service at the battle of Stirling; and although he secretly favoured the Scottish cause, he did not openly join his countrymen till he saw the entire destruction of Surrey’s army. I may remark, in concluding this note, that the idea of an attack upon Wallace, and an eulogy on the clemency of Edward, has probably not even the merit of originality. It appears to be borrowed from Carte, vol. ii. p. 290; but it is only the idea which is taken. The clumsy and absurd argument of Carte is discarded, and a far more ingenious hypothesis, with a new set of facts, is substituted in its place. On reading over Hemingford again, I find one expression which may perhaps have suggested this theory of Lingard. Hemingford says, speaking of Bruce, p. 120, that he joined the Bishop of Glasgow and the Steward, ‘qui tocius mali fabricatores exstiterant.’ Yet this is inconsistent with his own account in p. 118, and is not corroborated, so far as I know, by any other historian.”

Among other singular passages in the work of the learned Doctor, we cannot omit taking notice of the following: “The only great battles in which Wallace is known to have fought, are those of Stirling and Falkirk. In the first he was victorious; but he must share the glory of the action with Sir Andrew Murray, who was certainly his equal in command, perhaps his superior. In the second he was defeated, and the defeat was the most disastrous that Scotland ever experienced. In the history of the next five years, his name is scarcely ever mentioned.” Scottish historians never pretended that there was any battle of equal importance to those of Stirling and Falkirk, in which Wallace was engaged. But where Dr Lingard could get his information, that Sir Andrew Murray held a superior, or even an _equal command_ with him, it is not easy to conjecture. In Scottish authors, evidences to the contrary are innumerable; and if Dr Lingard had not preferred substituting his own “perhaps,” in place of historical record, he might have proofs in direct opposition to the statement he has made, and that even from English authors, with whom he appears to be familiar.

At the treaty of Irvine, for the submission of the Scottish barons, when all deserted Wallace but Sir Andrew Murray, it is mentioned in the instrument as having been notified to Wallace “Escrit à Sire Willaume,” and the name of Sir Andrew is not even alluded to. This would certainly not have been the case, had he held even an equal command, much less a superior.--_Fœdera, T._ ii. p. 774.

In the Chronicle of Langtoft, page 297, we have an account of the battle of Stirling, which is thus introduced:--

“The rascail of ther route bigan to werre alle newe, Now Edward is oute, the barons be not treue. The suffred, as it sais, the Scottis eft to rise, & William the Walais _ther hed & ther justise_. Thorgh fals concelement William did his wille, Our castels has he brent, our men slayn fulle ille.”

The chronicler, after telling us that Wallace was the _head and justice of the Scots_--expressions which embrace a pretty extensive prerogative--proceeds to narrate the operations of the day, in which he speaks of Wallace as the only commander opposed to Warren: nor does he even hint of any individual who had a right to “divide the glory” of the victory with him: on the contrary he says,

“The Inglis were alle slayn, the Scottis bare them wele, The Waleis had the wayn, als maistere of that eschele.”

Sir Andrew Murray is not even mentioned by Langtoft. That he fought bravely, and died nobly in defence of his country, is what no one will attempt to deny, and the same might be said of many more who were present on that occasion; but being the only man amongst a timid and backsliding aristocracy, who acted with patriotism and spirit in so trying a time, his name has been handed down to the grateful remembrance of posterity.

“In the next five years,” adds Dr Lingard, the “name” of Wallace “is scarcely ever mentioned.” When Scottish affairs are concerned, and more particularly when the character of her deliverer is the subject adverted to, a reference to authorities appears to be extremely irksome, or attended with too much trouble to our learned author. In the present instance, however, we shall not ask him to go farther than the pages of his own work, where he will find matter that might lead him to suspect the truth of the above assertion, as well as the correctness of the view he has taken of the grounds on which our patriot’s popularity is founded. We are informed (vol. iii. p. 227), “The only man whose enmity could give him” (Edward) a “moment’s uneasiness, was Wallace, and in few months he was brought captive to London.” And again, vol. iii. p. 329, “If the fate of Wallace was different from all others, it proves that there was something peculiar in his case which rendered him less deserving of mercy.” If we are to credit our author’s statements, Edward must have been a more nervous character than he has ever been supposed to be, if he could feel “uneasiness” at “the enmity” of a man who had been thus buried in obscurity, and whose “name had scarcely been heard of for five years,”--one who, in the only great battle in which he was successful, held but a subordinate command, and acted during the insurrection in the humble character of a mere partisan, under the direction of others. Surely there was nothing peculiarly aggravating in the case of such a man, to have “rendered him less deserving of mercy” than his more guilty superiors, particularly from _one_ whom our author informs us “was _not_ a blood-thirsty tyrant.” It is strange that it did not appear to Dr Lingard, as a very high degree of praise, that after Wallace had been deprived, by the severe and sanguinary policy of Edward, of all resources save what arose from his own dauntless heart and irresistible arm, that he should still continue to be the only man _whose_ “enmity” could give the oppressor of his country “a moment’s uneasiness.” From this circumstance, and from this alone, arose that “something peculiar” in his case which rendered him obnoxious to the tender mercies of Edward. In conclusion, we cannot help remarking, that the Doctor’s method of substituting, where his prejudices happen to be interested, his own theoretical conjectures, in opposition to the authentic records of the country, is rather an indirect way to the confidence of his reader.

P.

PERSONAL APPEARANCE OF WALLACE.

P. 162.

From the following passage in the Minstrel it would seem, that a portrait of Wallace had been taken during his short stay in France, and forwarded to his friends in Scotland. What afterwards became of this precious relic, cannot now be discovered. Though there are many likenesses of him to be met with in the country, yet the pretensions to originality of all those we have yet seen, are extremely questionable. It would be difficult for a blind man to give his ideas of a picture in more appropriate language than the following.

“The wyt off Frans thocht Wallace to commend; In to Scotland, with this harrold, thai send Part off his deid, and als the discriptioune Off him tane thar, be men off discretioun, Clerkis, knychtis, and harroldis, that him saw; Bot I hereoff can nocht reherss thaim aw.”

The description of Wallace, in the following lines, places the genius of Henry in a very favourable light. It is evidently the effort of a master, and might be studied to advantage by the artist who intended to commit his ideas of the hero of Scotland to canvas:--

“Wallace statur, off gretness, and off hycht, Was jugyt thus, be discretioun off rycht, That saw him bath dissembill and in weid; Nyne quartaris large he was in lenth indeid; Thryd part lenth in schuldrys braid was he, Rycht sembly, strang, and lusty for to se; Hys lymmys gret, with stalwart paiss and sound, Hys browys hard, his armes gret and round; His handis maid rycht lik till a pawmer, Off manlik mak, with naless gret and cler; Proportionyt lang and fayr was his wesage; Rycht sad off spech, and abill in curage; Braid breyst and heych, with sturdy crag and gret, His lyppys round, his noyss was squar and tret; Bowand bron haryt, on browis and breis lycht, Cler aspre eyn, lik dyamondis brycht. Wndir the chyn, on the left syd, was seyn, Be hurt, a wain; his colour was sangweyn. Woundis he had in mony diuerss place, Bot fayr and weill kepyt was his face. Off ryches he kepyt no propyr thing; Gaiff as he wan, lik Alexander the King. In tym off pes, mek as a maid was he; Quhar wer approchyt the rycht Ector was he. To Scottis men a gret credens he gaiff; Bot knawin enemyss thai couth him nocht disayff. Thir properteys was knawin in to Frans, Off him to be in gud remembrans.”