"Will ye bear this?" cried Badenoch, stamping with his foot, and plucking forth his sword; "is the man to exist who thus braves the assembled lords of Scotland?" While speaking, he made a desperate lunge at the regent's breast; Wallace caught the blade in his hand, and wrenching it from his intemperate adversary, broke it into shivers, and cast the pieces at his feet; then, turning resolutely toward the chiefs, who stood appalled, and looking on each other, he said, "I, your duly elected regent, left you only a few days ago, to repel the enemy whom the treason of Lord March would have introduced into these very walls. Many brave chiefs followed me to that field! and more, whom I see now, loaded me as I passed with benedictions. Portentous was the day of Falkirk to Scotland. Then did the mighty fall, and the heads of counsel perish. But treason was the parricide! The late Lord Badenoch stood his ground like a true Scot; but Athol and Buchan deserted to Edward." While speaking, he turned toward the furious son of Badenoch, who, gnashing his teeth in impotent rage, stood listening to the inflaming whispers of Macdougal of Lorn. "Young chief," cried he, "from their treachery date the fate of your brave father, and the whole of our grievous loss of that day; but the wide destruction has been avenged! more than chief for chief have perished in the Southron ranks, and thousands of the lowlier sort now swell the banks of Carron. Edward himself fell, wounded by my arm, and was born by his flying squadrons over the wastes of Northumberland. Thus have I returned to you with my duties achieved in a manner worthy of your regent! What, then, means the arrest of my embassador? what this silence when the representative of your power is insulted to your face?
"They mean," cried Badenoch, "that my words are the utterance of their sentiments." "They mean," cried Lorn, "that the prowess of the haughty boaster, whom their intoxicated gratitude raised from the dust, shall not avail him against the indignation of a nation over which he dares to arrogate a right."
"Mean they what they will," returned Wallace, "they cannot dispossess me of the rights with which assembled Scotland invested me on the plains of Stirling. And again I demand, by what authority do you and they presume to imprison my officer, and withhold from me the papers sent by the King of France to the Regent of Scotland?"
"By the authority that we will maintain," replied Badenoch; "by the right of my royal blood, and by the sword of every brave Scot, who spurns at the name of Wallace!"
"And as a proof that we speak not more than we act," cried Lorn, making assign to the chiefs, "you are our prisoner!"
Many weapons were instantly unsheathed; and their bearers, hurrying to the side of Badenoch and Lorn, attempted to lay hands on Wallace; but he, drawing the sword of Edward, with a sweep of his valiant arm that made the glittering blade seem a brand of fire, set his back against the wall, and exclaimed:
"He that first makes a stroke at me shall find his death on this Southron steel! This sword I made the puissant arm of the usurper yield to me; and this sword shall defend the Regent of Scotland against his ungrateful countrymen!"
The chieftains who pressed on him recoiled at these words, but their leaders, Badenoch and Lorn, waved them forward, with vehement exhortations.
"Desist, young men!" continued he, "provoke me not beyond my bearing. With a single blast of my bugle I could surround this building with a band of warriors, who at sight of their chief being thus assaulted, would lay this tumult in blood. Let me pass, or abide the consequence!"
"Through my breast, then," exclaimed Badenoch; "for, with my consent, you pass not here but on your bier. What is in the arm of a single man," cried he to the lords, "that ye cannot fall on him at once, and cut him down?"