WARREN, EARL OF SURREY, GOVERNOR OF SCOTLAND UNDER EDWARD I.
Scotland was now treated as a conquered country; and Warrene, earl of Surrey, was appointed governor, Hugh de Cressingham, treasurer, and William Ormesby, chief justicier.
Robert Bruce the grandfather, and also Robert Bruce the father of our hero, considered it the better part of discretion to resign all pretensions to the throne of Scotland. They therefore swore fealty to King Edward.
Robert de Bruce, the sixth lord of Annandale, had accompanied Edward, when prince of England, and Louis I. of France, to the Holy Land, where he acquired great renown. A romantic story is told of his courtship and marriage.
One day this knight of the crusades was riding through the domains of Turnberry. As he was proceeding leisurely along through the majestic forests, charmed with the beauty of the sylvan scenery, watching the glinting sunbeams dance athwart the leaves, and play hide-and-seek with the shadows, in the cosey nooks where moss-banks nestled, he was startled by the sound of a hunting-horn; and shortly a gay cavalcade of lords and ladies dashed through the forest on their way to the castle near by. One of the ladies, Margaret, countess of Garrick, the owner of this castle, and hostess of this splendid retinue, being captivated by the lordly bearing of the handsome, unknown knight, with the freedom and natural courtesy of one who felt her independence upon her own domain, reined in her high-bred steed, whose wild spirits were curbed by slightest touch of her fair fingers, and, bowing to the knight with queenly dignity, she invited him to join her visitors, and share her hospitality. Robert de Bruce, knowing the high position of this gracious lady, and fearing to accept too eagerly such an unexpected honor, courteously declined the kind invitation, which he supposed had been offered only out of a courtly hospitality, as he had been found a stranger within her own domains. But the beautiful countess, moved by some strange attraction, which she did not stop to analyze, gaily laid hold of the reins of his steed, and laughingly replied:—
“Ah, noble knight! no trespasser on my grounds ever escapes imprisonment in my castle;” and thereupon she led him away, like a captive knight, to her castle of Turnberry.
For fifteen days he was the honored guest amidst all the festivities at the castle, and the first in the chase, by the side of the bewitching countess; and, having obtained her heart, as well as her hand, they were married, without the consent of the king, whose ward she was, or the knowledge of her relatives; in consequence of which the estates and castle of the young countess were seized by the sovereign, and were only saved to her by the payment of a large fine to the crown.
The eldest son of this brave knight and beautiful countess, who had risked so much for love, and whose marriage was as romantic as any described in Scottish tales of fiction, was Robert the Bruce, our hero, who was afterwards King Robert I. of Scotland. He was born on the 21st of March, 1274. He spent his early youth at Carrick, where he was distinguished for his brave spirit and persevering energy.
The grandfather of Robert the Bruce, Robert, lord of Annandale, refusing to take the oath of homage to his rival, John Baliol, when King Edward of England decided in his favor, gave up his Scottish domains in Annandale to his son, the earl of Carrick, lest he should hold them as Edward’s minion. This proceeding was also followed by the earl in 1293, in behalf of his son, Robert the Bruce, who was then serving the king of England. Notwithstanding the sympathy of young Bruce with the cause of Scotland, and his resolve to assert his claims to the Scottish crown, he had, during the greater part of the reign of his weak rival, adhered to the fortunes of Edward, deeming it better policy to yield himself to the uncontrollable necessity of circumstances, rather than risk his cause by undue haste. Sometimes he appeared to assert his own pretensions to the crown, and the independence of his country; and then, again, he yielded submission to the superior power of the English king, whose good-will he wished to keep until a favorable opportunity should offer itself of openly asserting his rights. Robert might have obtained the crown if he would have acknowledged the superior power of England, and submitted himself as a vassal to the English king, as Baliol had done. But he would not receive it on any other terms than as a free crown, which had been worn by his ancestors, and of right belonged to him.