After the defeat of MacFadyan, Wallace is represented as holding a council or meeting with the chieftains of the West Highlands, in the Priory of Ardchattan. The ruins of the Priory are still to be found on the banks of Loch Etive, a few miles from the scene of strife; and among the rubbish, as well as in the neighbouring grounds, coins of Edward I. have at different times been dug up, in considerable quantities. So late as March 1829, the following paragraph appeared in the Glasgow Herald:—“In digging a grave, a few days ago at Balvodan (or St Modan’s), a burial-place in the neighbourhood of the Priory of Ardchattan, Argyllshire, a number of ancient silver coins were found, in a remarkably fine state of preservation. The place where they had been deposited was about four feet below the surface; and they seem to have been contained in an earthen vessel, which mouldered into dust, on exposure to the atmosphere; they were turned up by the shovel, as those who were attending the interment were surrounding the grave, and each of the party present having picked up a few, the rest were, by the Highlanders, returned with the earth to the grave. The coins were struck in the reign of the First Edward, whose name can be distinctly traced on them; and they were probably placed there at the time, when that monarch had succeeded in getting temporary possession of the greater part of Scotland. In that case they must have lain where they were found for upwards of five hundred years.” The writer had an opportunity of examining a number of these coins on the spot; he found a great many of them to be struck in Dublin, and they seemed below the regular standard. Though numerous discoveries have been made of the coins of this ambitious monarch in other parts of Scotland, yet in the West Highlands they are extremely rare. Neither Edward, nor any of his English generals, ever penetrated so far in that direction. It is, therefore, highly probable, that the above money may have formed part of the contents of the military chest of MacFadyan, which, in that superstitious age, had found its way into the hands of the priesthood.
Although Henry cannot be collated with his original, the truth or falsehood of his narrative may, in part, be ascertained by comparing him with those who preceded him on the same subject. The most reputable of these writers, and those whose characters for veracity stand highest in the estimation of the learned, are John de Fordun, and Andro de Wyntown, both original historians; for, though Wyntown outlived Fordun, he had not an opportunity of seeing his history. With respect to Fordun’s agreement with the Minstrel, the reader has the evidence of Nicholson, Archdeacon of Carlisle, who says, that “Hart’s edition of Wallace contains a preface which confirms the whole of it out of the Scoti-Chronicon.”[5] Wyntown, who finished his history in 1424, being about 46 years before Henry, in alluding to those deeds of Wallace which he had left unrecorded, says,
“Of his gud Dedis and Manhad
Gret Gestis; I hard say, ar made;
Bot sá mony, I trow noucht,
As he in-till hys dayis wroucht.
Quha all hys Dedis of prys wald dyte,
Hym worthyd a gret Buk to wryte;
And all thái to wryte in here
I want báthe Wyt and gud Laysere.”
B. viii. c. xv. v. 79–86.
The first couplet may allude to Blair’s Diary, or perhaps to Fordun’s History, which he had no doubt heard of; and, in the succeeding lines, he doubts that, however much may have been recorded, it must still fall very short of what was actually performed. This is so far satisfactory, from one who lived almost within a century of the time, and who no doubt often conversed with those whose fathers had fought under the banners of Wallace; it is a pity that his modesty, and his want of “gud laysere,” prevented him from devoting more of his time to so meritorious a subject. The first transaction which he has narrated, is the affair at Lanark; but it is evident from what he says, that Wallace must have often before mingled in deadly feud with the English soldiers, and done them serious injury; otherwise, it would be difficult to account for their entertaining towards him the degree of animosity expressed in the following lines:
“Gret Dyspyte thir Inglis men
Had at this Willame Walays then.
Swá thai made thame on á day
Hym for to set in hard assay:”
B. viii. c. xiii. v. 19–22.
Every particular that Wyntown gives of the conflict which ensues, in consequence of this preconcerted quarrel on the part of the English, is detailed in the account of the Minstrel with a degree of correctness, leaving no room to doubt that either the two authors must have drawn their materials from the same source, or that Henry, having heard Wyntown’s version of the story, considered it so near the original as to leave little to be corrected. The language, as will be seen from the following examples, is nearly the same: