by G. A. Henty
Chapter XXVI
Edinburgh
So vigilant was the watch in the castle of Dunottar that the instantthe cry of alarm rose almost simultaneously from the warder aboveand the soldiers at the gate, the portcullis came thundering down.It was caught, however, by the two upright blocks of wood, andremained suspended three feet above the sill. The armed guardsat the gate instantly fell upon Archie and his companions, whileothers endeavoured in vain to close the gates. Scarcely had theswords clashed when the man who had chained down the drawbridgejoined Archie, and the five with their heavy broadswords kept atbay the soldiers who pressed upon them; but for only a minute ortwo did they have to bear the brunt of the attack unsupported, forWilliam Orr and the five men who had been loitering near the moatdashed across the bridge, and passing under the portcullis joinedthe little band.
The alarm had now spread through the castle, and the governorhimself, followed by many of his men, came rushing down to thespot, shouting furious orders to the warder to raise the drawbridge,being in ignorance that it was firmly fixed at the outer end.
Archie and his followers were now hotly pressed, but soon a thunderof steps was heard on the drawbridge, and the whole of the band,together with some twenty or thirty of the fishermen, passed underthe portcullis and joined them. Archie now took the offensive, andbearing down all opposition burst with his men into the courtyard.
The combat was desperate but short. The governor with some of hissoldiers fought stoutly, but the suddenness of the surprise andthe fury and vigour with which they were attacked shook the courageof many of the soldiers. Some, instead of joining in the fray, atonce threw away their arms and tried to conceal themselves, othersfought feebly and half heartedly, and the cries of "A Forbes! AForbes! Scotland! Scotland!" rose louder and louder as theassailants gradually beat down all resistance. In ten minutes fromthe falling of the portcullis all resistance was virtually over.The governor himself fell by the hand of Archie Forbes, and athis death those who had hitherto resisted threw down their armsand called for quarter. This was given, and the following day theprisoners were marched under a strong guard down to Montrose, thereto be confined until orders for their disposal were received fromthe king. For the next fortnight Archie and his retainers, aided bythe whole of the villagers, laboured to dismantle the castle. Thebattlements were thrown down into the moat, several wide breacheswere made in the walls, and large quantities of straw and wood piledup in the keep and turrets. These were then fired, and the Castleof Dunottar was soon reduced to an empty and gaping shell. ThenArchie marched south, and remained quietly at home until the termof rest granted him by the king had expired.
Two girls and a son had by this time been born to him, and themonths passed quietly and happily away until Bruce summoned him tojoin, with his retainers, the force with which Randolph had sat downbefore Edinburgh Castle. Randolph was delighted at this accessionof strength. Between him and Douglas a generous rivalry in gallantactions continually went on, and Douglas had scored the lasttriumph. The castle of Roxburgh had long been a source of troubleto the Scots. Standing on a rocky eminence on the margin of theTeviot, just at its junction with the Tweed and within eight milesof the Border, it had constituted an open door into Scotland, andeither through it or through Berwick the tides of invasion had everflowed. The castle was very strongly fortified, so much so thatthe garrison, deeming themselves perfectly safe from assault, hadgrown careless. The commandant was a Burgundian knight, Gilleminde Fienne. Douglas chose Shrove Tuesday for his attack. Being afeast day of the church before the long lenten fast the garrisonwould be sure to indulge in conviviality and the watch would beless strict than usual. Douglas and his followers, supplied withscaling ladders, crept on all fours towards the walls. The nightwas still and they could hear the sentries' conversation. They hadnoticed the objects advancing, but in the darkness mistook them forthe cattle of a neighbouring farmer. Silently the ladders werefixed and mounted, and with the dreaded war cry, "A Douglas! ADouglas!" the assailants burst into the castle, slaying the sentriesand pouring down upon the startled revellers. Fienne and his menfought gallantly for a time, but at length all surrendered, withthe exception of the governor himself and a few of his immediatefollowers, who retired into a tower, where they defended themselvesuntil the following day; then Fienne being seriously wounded, thelittle party also surrendered. As Douglas had no personal quarrelwith the garrison of Roxburgh such as he bore with those who occupiedhis ancestral castle, he abstained from any unnecessary cruelties,and allowed the garrison to withdraw to England, where Fienne soonafterwards died of his wounds.
The castle was as usual levelled to the ground, and as the strongholdof Carlaverock soon afterwards surrendered, the districts of Tweeddaleand Galloway were now completely cleared of the English, with theexception of the Castle of Jedburgh, which they still held.
Randolph had been created Earl of Moray, and after establishinghimself in his new earldom he had returned with his feudal followersand laid siege to Edinburgh, whose castle was considered all butimpregnable. It had been in the possession of the English ever sinceit was captured by Edward I in 1296, and was strongly garrisonedand well provisioned.
Even when joined by Archie Forbes and his retainers Randolph feltthat the castle could not be captured by force. The various attemptswhich he made were signally foiled, and it was by stratagem onlythat he could hope to carry it. The news of the capture of Roxburghby Douglas increased his anxiety to succeed. Accompanied by Archiehe rode round the foot of the steep rock on which the castle stands,eagerly scanning its irregularities to see if by any possibilityit could be scaled.
"I would give a brave reward," he said to Archie, "to any who couldshow us a way of climbing those rocks, which, methinks, even a goatcould scarcely manage to ascend."
"I can tell you of a way," a Scotch soldier who was standing a fewpaces off when he made the remark, said, saluting the earl. "Itneeds a sure foot and a stout heart, but I can lead a score ofmen with such qualifications to the foot of yonder walls;" and hepointed to the castle rising abruptly from the edge of the rocks.
"If you can make good your word, my brave fellow," Randolph said,"you may ask your own reward, and I pledge you my word, that if itbe aught in reason it shall be granted. But who are you, and howdid it come that you know of a way where none is supposed to exist?"
"My name is William Francus," the soldier said. "I was at one time,before the king took up arms, a soldier in the castle there. I hada sweetheart in the town, and as my turn to go out from the castlecame but slowly I used at night to steal away to visit her. I foundafter a great search that on the face of yonder wall where it looksthe steepest, and where in consequence but slight watch is kept,a man with steady foot and head could make shift to climb up anddown, and thus, if you please, will I guide a party to the top ofthe rock."
"It looks impossible," Randolph said, gazing at the precipice;"but as you tell me that you have done it others can do the same.I will myself follow your guidance."
"And I," Archie said.
"What, Sir Archie, think you is the smallest number of men withwhom, having once gained footing on the wall, we may fight our wayto the gates and let in our friends."
"I should think," Archie replied, "that with thirty men we mightmanage to do so. The confusion in the garrison will be extremeat so unexpected a surprise, and if we divide in two parties andpress forward by different ways they will think rather of holdingtogether and defending themselves than of checking our course, andone or other of the parties should surely be able to make its wayto the gates."
"Thirty let it be then," Randolph said. "Do you choose fifteenactive and vigilant men from among your retainers; I will pick asmany from mine, and as there is no use in delaying let us carryout the enterprise this very night; of course the rest of our menmust gather near the gates in readiness to rush in when we throwthem open."
As soon as it was dark the little party of adventurers set outon their way. Francus acted as guide, and u
nder his leading theyclimbed with vast difficulty and no little danger up the face ofthe precipice until they reached a comparatively easy spot, wherethey sat down to recover their breath before they prepared for thefinal effort.
They could hear the sentries above speaking to each other, andthey held their breath when one of them, exclaiming suddenly, "Ican see you!" threw down a stone from the battlement, which leapt,crashing down the face of the rock close beside them. Great wastheir relief when a loud laugh from above told them that the sentryhad been in jest, and had but tried to startle his comrade; thenthe two sentries, conversing as they went, moved away to anotherpart of the walls.
The ascent was now continued, and proved even more difficult thanthat which they had passed. They were forced continually to halt,while those in front helped those following them, or were themselveshoisted up by the men behind. At last, panting and breathless, theystood on the summit of the rock, on a narrow ledge, with the castlewall rising in front of them. They had, with enormous difficulty,brought up a light ladder with them. This was placed against thewall. Francus was the first to mount, and was followed by Sir AndrewGrey, whom Randolph had invited to be of the party, by Archie Forbes,and by the earl. Just as the latter stepped on to the battlementsthe sentries caught sight of them and shouted:
"Treason! treason! to arms!" An instant stir was heard in thecastle. Rapidly the thirty men followed each other up the ladder,and so soon as the last had gained the battlements they divided inthree bodies, each headed by one of the leaders. One party descendedstraight into the castle and there attacked the soldiers who werehurrying to arms, while the others ran along the wall in oppositedirections, cutting down the sentries and brushing aside allopposition until together they met at the gate. This was thrownopen, and the Scots outside running up at the top of their speedpoured into the castle. At first Randolph's party, which haddescended into the courtyard, had been hotly pressed, and had withdifficulty defended themselves; but the attention of the startledgarrison was distracted by the shouts upon the walls, which toldthat other parties of their assailants had gained footing there.All sorts of contradictory orders were issued. One commanded themto cut down the little party opposed to them, another ordered themto hurry to the walls, a third to seize the gate and see that itwas not opened. The confusion reached its height as the Scots pouredin through the open gate. The garrison, surprised and confoundedas they were at this, to them, almost magical seizure of the castleby their foes, fought bravely until the governor and many of theofficers were killed. Some of the men threw down their arms, andothers, taking advantage of their knowledge of the castle, madetheir way to the gate and escaped into the open country.
The news of the capture was immediately sent to the king, by whoseorders the castle and walls were razed to the ground, and thusanother of the strongholds, by whose possession the English wereenabled to domineer over the whole of the surrounding country, wasdestroyed.
While Douglas and Randolph were thus distinguishing themselvesEdward Bruce captured the castle of Rutherglen, and afterwards thetown of Dundee; and now, save Stirling Castle, scarcely a hold inall Scotland remained in English hands. Thus was Scotland almostcleared of the invader, not by the efforts of the people at large,but by a series of the most daring and hazardous adventures by theking himself and three or four of his knights, aided only by theirpersonal retainers. For nine years they had continued their careerunchecked, capturing castle by castle and town by town, defeatingsuch small bodies of troops as took the field against them, England,under a supine and inactive king, giving itself up to privatebroils and quarrels, while Scotland was being torn piecemeal fromher grasp.
After Edward Bruce had captured Dundee he laid siege to Stirling.As this castle had for many months resisted Edward I backed by thewhole power of England, Bruce could make little impression uponit with the limited appliances at his disposal. From February tillthe 24th of June the investment continued, when the governor, SirPhilip Mowbray, becoming apprehensive that his provisions wouldnot much longer hold out, induced Edward Bruce to agree to raisethe siege on condition that if by the 24th of June next, 1314, thecastle was not effectually relieved by an English force, it shouldthen be surrendered.
No satisfactory explanation has ever been given of the reasons whichinduced Edward Bruce to agree to so one sided a bargain. He hadalready invested the place for four months, there was no possibility ofan army being collected in England for its relief for many monthsto come, and long ere this could arrive the garrison would havebeen starved into surrender. By giving England a year to relievethe place he virtually challenged that country to put forth allits strength and held out an inducement to it to make that effort,which internal dissension had hitherto prevented. The only feasibleexplanation is that Edward Bruce was weary of being kept inactiveso long a time before the walls of the fortress which he was unableto capture, and that he made the arrangement from sheer impatienceand thoughtlessness and without consideration of the storm which hewas bringing upon Scotland. Had it been otherwise he would surelyhave consulted the king before entering upon an agreement of suchextreme importance.
Bruce, when he heard of this rash treaty, was highly displeased,but he nevertheless accepted the terms, and both parties began atonce their preparations for the crowning struggle of the war. TheEnglish saw that now or never must they crush out the movementwhich, step by step, had wrested from them all the conquests whichhad been won with such vast effort under Edward I; while Bruce sawthat a defeat would entail the loss of all that he had struggledfor and won during so many years.
King Edward issued summonses to the whole of the barons of Englandand Wales to meet him at Berwick by the 11th of June with all theirfeudal following, while the sheriffs of the various counties andtowns were called upon to supply 27,000 foot soldiers. The Englishof the settlements in Ireland were also summoned, besides O'Connor,Prince of Connaught, and twenty-five other native Irish chiefs,with their following, all of whom were to be under the command ofRichard de Burgh, Earl of Ulster.
The Prince Bishop of Constance was requested to furnish a bodyof mounted crossbowmen. A royal fleet of twenty-three vessels wasappointed to assemble for the purpose of operating on the eastcoast, while the seaports were commanded to fit out another fleetof thirty vessels. A third fleet was ordered to assemble in thewest, which John of Lorne was appointed to command under the titleof High Admiral of the Western Fleet of England. From Aquitaineand the French possessions the vassals were called upon to attendwith their men-at-arms, and many knights from France, Gascony, andGermany took part in the enterprise.
Thus, at the appointed time over 100,000 men assembled at Berwick,of whom 40,000 were men-at-arms, and the rest archers and pikemen.For the great armament the most ample arrangements were made in theway of warlike stores, provisions, tents, and means of transport,together with the necessary workmen, artificers, and attendants.
This army surpassed both in numbers and equipments any that EdwardI had ever led into Scotland, and is considered to have been the mostnumerous and best equipped that ever before or since has gatheredon English ground. Of the whole of the great nobles of England onlyfour were absent--the Earls of Warrenne, Lancaster, Arundel, andWarwick--who, however, sent their feudal arrays under the chargeof relations.
Among the leaders of this great army were the Earls of Gloucester,Pembroke, Hereford, and Angus, Lord Clifford, Sir John Comyn, SirHenry Beaumont, Sir John Seagrave, Sir Edmund Morley, Sir Ingramde Umfraville, Sir Marmaduke de Twenge, and Sir Giles de Argentine,one of the most famous of the Continental knights.
While this vast army had been preparing, Bruce had made everyeffort to meet the storm, and all who were loyal and who were ableto carry weapons were summoned to meet at Torwood, near Stirling,previous to the 24th of June. Here Edward Bruce, Sir James Douglas,Randolph, Earl of Moray, Walter the Steward, Angus of Isla, SirArchibald Forbes, and a few other knights and barons assembled with30,000 fighting men, besides camp followers and servants. It wasa small force inde
ed to meet the great army which was advancingagainst it, and in cavalry in particular it was extremely weak.The English army crossed the Border, and marched by Linlithgow andFalkirk toward the Torwood.
Each army had stirring memories to inspire it, for the English intheir march crossed over the field of Falkirk, where sixteen yearsbefore they had crushed the stubborn squares of Wallace; while fromthe spot which Bruce selected as his battleground could be seenthe Abbey Craig, overlooking the scene of the Scottish victory ofStirling Bridge. On the approach of the English the Scotch fellback from the Torwood to some high ground near Stirling now calledthe New Park. The lower ground, now rich agricultural land calledthe Carse, was then wholly swamp. Had it not been so, the positionnow taken up by Bruce would have laid the road to Stirling open tothe English.
The Scotch army was divided into four divisions. The centre wascommanded by Randolph. Edward Bruce commanded the second, whichformed the right wing. Walter the Steward commanded the left wing,under the guidance of Douglas, while the king himself took commandof the fourth division, which formed the reserve, and was stationedin rear of the centre in readiness to move to the assistance ofeither of the other divisions which might be hard pressed. The campfollowers, with the baggage and provisions, were stationed behindthe Gillies Hill.
The road by which the English would advance was the old Romancauseway running nearly north and south. The Bannock Burn was fordablefrom a spot near the Park Mill down to the village of Bannockburn.Above, the banks were too high and steep to be passed; while below,where ran the Bannock through the carse, the swamps preventedpassage. The army was therefore drawn up, with its left restingon the sharp angle of the burn above the Park Mill, and extendedwhere the villages of Easterton, Borestine, and Braehead now standto the spot where the road crosses the river at the village ofBannockburn. In its front, between it and the river, were two bogs,known as Halberts Bog and Milton Bog, while, where unprotected bythese bogs, the whole ground was studded with deep pits; in thesestakes were inserted, and they were then covered with branches andgrass. Randolph's centre was at Borestine, Bruce's reserve a littlebehind, and the rock in which his flagstaff was placed during thebattle is still to be seen. To Randolph, in addition to his commandof the centre division, was committed the trust of preventing anybody of English from passing along at the edge of the carse, andso making round to the relief of Stirling.
On the morning of Sunday, the 23d of June, immediately aftersunrise, the Scotch attended mass, and confessed as men who haddevoted themselves to death. The king, having surveyed the field,caused a proclamation to be made that whosoever felt himself unequalto take part in the battle was at liberty to withdraw. Then, knowingfrom his scouts that the enemy had passed the night at Falkirk, sixor seven miles off, he sent out Sir James Douglas and Sir RobertKeith with a party of horsemen to reconnoitre the advance.
The knights had not gone far when they saw the great army advancing,with the sun shining bright on innumerable standards and pennons,and glistening from lance head, spear, and armour. So grand andterrible was the appearance of the army that upon receiving thereport of Douglas and Keith the king thought it prudent to concealits full extent, and caused it to be bruited abroad that the enemy,although numerous, was approaching in a disorderly manner.
The experienced generals of King Edward now determined upon makingan attempt to relieve Stirling Castle without fighting a pitchedbattle upon ground chosen by the enemy. Had this attempt beensuccessful, the great army, instead of being obliged to crossa rapid stream and attack an enemy posted behind morasses, wouldhave been free to operate as it chose, to have advanced againstthe strongholds which had been captured by the Scots, and to forceBruce to give battle upon ground of their choosing. Lord Cliffordwas therefore despatched with 800 picked men-at-arms to cross theBannock beyond the left wing of the Scottish army, to make theirway across the carse, and so to reach Stirling. The ground was,indeed, impassable for a large army; but the troops took withthem faggots and beams, by which they could make a passage acrossthe deeper parts of the swamp and bridge the little streams whichmeandered through it.
As there was no prospect of an immediate engagement, Randolph,Douglas, and the king had left their respective divisions, and hadtaken up their positions at the village of St. Ninians, on highground behind the army, whence they could have a clear view of theapproaching English army. Archie Forbes had accompanied Randolph,to whose division he, with his retainers, was attached. Randolphhad with him 500 pikemen, whom he had withdrawn from his divisionin order to carry out his appointed task of seeing that the Englishdid not pass along the low ground at the edge of the carse behindSt. Ninians to the relief of Stirling; but so absorbed were knightsand men-at-arms in watching the magnificent array advancing againstthe Scottish position that they forgot to keep a watch over thelow ground. Suddenly one of the men, who had straggled away intothe village, ran up with the startling news that a large party ofEnglish horse had crossed the corner of the carse, and had alreadyreached the low ground beyond the church.
"A rose has fallen from your chaplet, Randolph," the king saidangrily.
Without a moment's loss of time Randolph and Archie Forbes set offwith the spearmen at a run, and succeeded in heading the horsemenat the hamlet of Newhouse. The mail clad horsemen, confident intheir numbers, their armour, and horses, laid their lances in rest,struck spurs into their steeds, and, led by Sir William Daynecourt,charged down upon the Scotch spearmen. Two hundred of these consistedof Archie Forbes' retainers, all veterans in war, and who had morethan once, shoulder to shoulder, repelled the onslaught of themailed chivalry of England. Animated by the voices of their lordand Randolph, these, with Moray's own pikemen, threw themselvesinto a solid square, and, surrounded by a hedge of spears, steadilyreceived the furious onslaught of the cavalry. Daynecourt and manyof his men were at the first onslaught unhorsed and slain, and thosewho followed were repulsed. Again and again they charged down uponthe pikemen, but the dense array of spears was more than a matchfor the lances of the cavalry, and as the horses were wounded andfell, or their riders were unhorsed, men rushed out from the square,and with axe and dagger completed the work. Still the Englishpressed them hard, and Douglas, from the distance, seeing how hotlythe pikemen were pressed by the cavalry, begged the king to allowhim to go to Randolph's assistance. Bruce, however, would suffer nochange in his position, and said that Randolph must stand or fallby himself. Douglas, however, urged that he should be allowed togo forward with the small body of retainers which he had with him.The king consented, and Douglas set off with his men.
When the English saw him approach they recoiled somewhat from thesquare, and Douglas, being now better able to see what was goingon, commanded his followers to halt, saying that Randolph wouldspeedily prove victorious without their help, and were they nowto take part in the struggle they would only lessen the credit ofthose who had already all but won the victory. Seeing the enemy insome confusion from the appearance of the reinforcement, Randolphand Archie now gave the word for their men to charge, and these,rushing on with spear and axe, completed the discomfiture of theenemy, killed many, and forced the rest to take flight. Numbers,however, were taken. Randolph is said to have had but two men killedin the struggle.