Randolph caught at the proposal, desperate as it was, and, selecting thirty men, chose an excessively dark night for the adventure. Frank went the first, climbing up the face of the precipice with hands and feet; then followed Sir Andrew Grey; thirdly, Randolph himself; and then the rest of the party. The ascent was exceedingly difficult and dangerous, especially in utter darkness and to men in full armor, fearing to make the slightest noise. Coming to a projecting crag, close under the wall, they rested to collect their breath, and listen. It was the moment when the guards were going their rounds, and, to their horror, they heard a soldier exclaim, as he threw a pebble down on them, “Away! I see you well!” A few more stones, and every man of them might have been hurled from the cliff by the soldiers merely rolling down stones on them. They dared not more, and a few moments’ silence proved that the alarm had been merely a trick to startle the garrison—a jest soon to turn to earnest.
When the guard had passed on, the brave Scots crept to the foot of the wall, where it was only twelve feet high, and fixed the iron hook of their rope-ladder to the top of it. Ere all had mounted, the clank of their weapons had been heard, shouts of “Treason!” arose, and the sentinels made a brave resistance; but it was too late, and, after some hard fighting, the survivors of the garrison were forced to surrender. Sir Piers Luband, on being released from his dungeon, offered his services to King Robert, whereupon the English laid all the blame of the loss of the castle upon him, declaring that he had betrayed them. Randolph’s seizure of Edinburgh was considered as the most daring of all the many gallant exploits of the Scots.
Bruce forayed Cumberland, and threatened Berwick, so that the poor Countess of Buchan was removed from thence to a more secure place of captivity. He also pursued his enemies, the Macdougals of Lorn, up the passes of Cruachan Ben, and even hunted them into the Isle of Man, where he took Rushyn Castle, and conquered the whole island. In his absence, Edward Bruce took Dundee, and besieged Stirling, until the governor, Philip Mowbray, was reduced to such straits by famine, that he begged for a truce, in which to go and inform the King of England of the state of affairs, promising to surrender on the Midsummer Day of the following year, if he were not relieved before that time. Edward Bruce granted these terms, and allowed Mowbray to depart. Robert was displeased at such a treaty, giving a full year to the enemy to collect their forces: but his brother boldly answered, “Let Edward bring every man he has; we will fight them—ay, and more too!” King Robert saw more danger than did the reckless prince, but he resolved to abide by his brother’s word, though so lightly given. It was, in fact, a challenge to the decisive battle, which was to determine whether Bruce or Plantagenet should reign in Scotland.
Mowbray’s appeal met with attention at court. Edward II. had newly recovered from the loss of Gaveston, and hoped by some signal success to redeem his credit with his subjects. He sent his cousin, the Earl of Pembroke, who was well experienced in Scottish wars, to the North; despatched writs to ninety-three Barons to meet him with their retainers at Newcastle, three weeks after Easter, 1313; summoned all the Irish chiefs under his obedience to come with Richard de Burgh, Earl of Ulster; called in Gascon troops, placed a fleet under the charge of John of Argyle, and took every measure for the supply of his army with provisions, tents, and every other necessary. For once the activity and spirit of his father seemed to have descended upon him, and, as the summer of 1313 drew on, he set out with Queen Isabel, and their infant son the Prince of Wales, to St. Alban’s Abbey, where, amid prayers and offerings for the success of his enterprise, he bade her farewell.
At Berwick he met his host, and, to his disappointment, found that four of the disaffected earls, Lancaster, Warwick, Arundel, and Warrenne, had absented themselves; but they had sent their vassals in full force. Edward’s troops, at the lowest computation, could not have been less than 100,000, of whom 40,000 were mounted, and 3,000 of these were knights and squires, both men and horses sheathed in plate-armor.
To meet this force, Bruce could only muster 40,000 men, poorly armed, and few of them mounted, and those on small, rough mountain steeds, utterly incapable of withstanding the shock of the huge Flemish chargers ridden by the English knights. The fatal power of the English long-bow was like wise well known to the Scots; but Bruce himself was a tried captain, and the greater part of his followers had been long trained by succession of fierce conflicts. They had many a wrong to revenge, and they fought for home and hearth; stern, severe, savage, and resolute, they were men to whom defeat would have brought far worse than death—unlike the gay chivalry who had ridden from England as to a summer excursion.
The army met in the Torwood, near Stirling, and were reviewed with cheerfulness by King Robert. He resolved to compensate for the inferiority of his cavalry by fighting on foot, and by abiding the attack in a field called the New Park, which was so covered with trees and brushwood, and broken by swamps, that the enemy’s horse would lose their advantage; and on the left, in the only open and level ground near, he dug pits and trenches, and filled them with pointed stakes and iron weapons called calthorps, so as to impede the possible charge of the knights.
The little burn, or brook, of Bannock, running through rugged ground covered with wood, protected his right, and the village of St. Ninian was in front. He divided his little army into four parts: the first under his brother Edward; the second under Douglas and young Walter, High Steward of Scotland; the third under Randolph; and the fourth body, the reserve, under his own command. The servants and baggage were placed on an eminence in the rear, still called Gillies Hill.
By this time it was the 23d of June, and early on Sunday morning the soldiers heard mass and confessed as dying men, then kept the vigil of St. John by fasting on bread and water. Douglas and Sir Robert Keith rode out to reconnoitre, and came back, reporting to the King that the enemy were advancing in full force, with banners displayed and in excellent array; but warily spreading a rumor among the Scots that they were confused and disorderly.
In effect, Edward II. had hurried on so hastily and inconsiderately, that his men and horses were spent and ill-fed when he arrived in the neighborhood of Stirling. Two miles from thence, he sent 800 horsemen with Sir Robert Clifford, with orders to outflank the Scottish army, and throw themselves into the town. Concealed by the village of St. Ninian, this body had nearly effected their object, when they were observed by the keen eye of Bruce, who had directed his nephew to be on the watch against this very manoeuvre. Riding up on his little pony to Randolph, he upbraided him, saying, “Thoughtless man, you have lightly kept your trust! A rose has fallen from your chaplet!”