WALLACE ON HIS WAY TO WESTMINSTER HALL. (See p. [354.])

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The resolve of Bruce to throw off all disguise and declare himself openly for his country had been accelerated by the treason of Comyn, and six months had scarcely passed over the bloody relics of Wallace when the Scots were up in arms again, round the champion he had himself invoked to assume that post. In June, 1305—two months before the execution of Wallace—it appears that Bruce had made a secret compact with William de Lamberton, the Bishop of St. Andrews, of mutual aid and support. This contract, still preserved in the "Annals" of Lord Hailes, had for its ultimate object the claims of Bruce on the crown. Comyn had come by some means to the knowledge of this league; had pretended to join in it; but had betrayed it to the king. Bruce was marked for due vengeance by Edward, who only waited for an opportunity also to seize his three brothers, resident in Scotland. But through the friendship of the Earl of Gloucester, the son-in-law of the king, Bruce was apprised of his danger, the earl sending him a pair of gilt spurs, and twelve silver pennies, under pretence that he had borrowed them of him. Bruce caught the meaning of the device, and resolved to escape at once. To this purpose, tradition says, he had his horse shod backwards so as to deceive those who might attempt to trace his route, for the ground was then covered with snow. Bruce arrived safely in a few days at his castle of Lochmaben, in Annandale, the chief seat of his family; and here he found, fortunately, a great number of the Scottish nobility assembled, and in the midst of them no other than John Comyn, his professed friend, but treacherous, secret foe. If he had wanted any evidences of the perfidy of this man, he had them now in his pocket; for on the way from town he had met a courier bearing letters from Comyn to King Edward, urging the absolute necessity of Bruce's instant death or imprisonment. This man he slew, on the principle "that dead men tell no tales, and carry no messages"; and the fatal secret now in his possession presents us with a certain clue to the motive of a much more startling act which he perpetrated soon after.

CAPTURE OF BRUCE'S WIFE AND DAUGHTER AT TAIN. (See p. [358.])

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These legends were probably invented to clear the fair fame of Bruce. All that is certainly known is that the two men met at Dumfries, that Bruce demanded a conference, and that he followed Comyn, after the party had gone, into the cloisters of the Minorites, and ran him through the body. Hurrying from the convent, he cried "To horse!" and Sir Roger Kirkpatrick, one of his attendants, seeing him greatly agitated, demanded whether the traitor was slain. "I doubt so," replied Bruce. "You doubt!" exclaimed Kirkpatrick; "I will make sure;" and so saying, he rushed into the monastery, stabbed the Comyn to the heart, and killed also his kinsman, Sir Robert Comyn, who strove to defend him. From this circumstance the Kirkpatrick family adopted the crest of a bloody hand holding a dagger, and the motto, "I mak sicker" ("I make sure").

The die was now cast. There was no retreat, no reconciliation after that terrible deed. Bruce called his staunchest friends hastily around him; they were few, but devoted spirits. The Bishops of St. Andrews and Glasgow, the Abbot of Scone, the four brothers of Bruce, his nephew, Thomas Randolph, his brother-in-law Christopher Seton, and some ten or twelve young men, gathered at the call. Bruce flew in various directions, exciting his countrymen to arms. He attacked and defeated the English, took some of their forts, and drove them from the open country.