Page:A biographical dictionary of eminent Scotsmen, vol 2.djvu/66

 were so valiantly met and opposed by the king 1, that the post was still maintained, when the loud shout of Robert's followers advancing to his rescue, warned the Gallovidians to retire, after sustaining in this unexampled combat the loss of fourteen of their men. The danger to which the king had been exposed on this occasion, and the great daring and bravery which he had manifested, sensibly roused the spirits of his party, who now began, with increasing confidence and numbers, to flock to his standard. Douglas, who had been successfully employed against the English in his own district of Douglas-dale, also about this time, joined the king with what followers he had been able to muster among the vassals of his family.

Pembroke, the guardian, at the head of a considerable body of men, now took the field against Robert; and was joined by John of Lorn, with a body of eight hundred Highlanders, men well calculated for that irregular species of warfare to which Bruce was necessitated to have recourse. Lorn is said to have had along with him a blood-hound which had once belonged to the king, and which was so strongly attached to its old master, and familiar with his scent, that if once it got upon his track it would never part from it for any other. These two armies advanced separately, Pembroke carefully keeping to the low and open country, where his cavalry could act with effect; while Lorn, by a circuitous rout, endeavoured to gain the rear of the king's party. The Highland chieftain so well succeeded in this manoeuvre, that before Robert, whose attention had been wholly occupied by the forces under Pembroke, was aware of his danger, he found himself environed by two hostile bodies of troops, either of which was greatly superior to his own. In this emergency, the king, having appointed a place of rendezvous, divided his men into three companies, and ordered them to retreat as they best might, by different routes, that thus, by distracting the attention of the enemy, they might have the better chance of escape.

Lorn arriving at the place where the Scottish army had separated, set loose the blood-hound, which, falling upon the king's scent, led the pursuers immediately on the track which he had taken. The king finding himself pursued, again subdivided his remaining party into three, but without effect, for the hound still kept true to the track of its former master. The case now appearing desperate, Robert ordered the remainder of his followers to disperse themselves; and, accompanied by only one person, said to have been his foster-brother, endeavoured by this last means to frustrate the pursuit of the enemy. In this he was of course unsuccessful; and Lorn, who now saw the hound choose that direction which only two men had taken, knew r certainly that one of these must be the king; and despatched five of his swiftest men after them with orders either to slay them, or delay their flight till others of the party came to their assistance. Robert, finding these men gaining hotly upon him, faced about, and, with the aid of his companion, slew them all Lorn's men were now so close upon him that the king could perceive they were led on by means of a blood-hound. Fortunately, he and his companion had reached the near covert of a wood, situated in a valley through which ran a brook or rivulet. Taking advantage of this circumstance, by which they well knew the artifice of their pursuers would be defeated, Bruce and his foster-brother, before turning into any of the surrounding thickets for shelter, travelled in the water of the stream so far as they judged necessary to dissipate and destroy the strong scent upon which the hound had proceeded. The highland chieftain, who was straightway directed to the rivulet, along which the fugitives had diverged, here found that the hound had lost its scent; and aware of the difficulty and fruitlessness of a further search, was reluctantly compelled to quit the chase and retire. By another account, the escape of Bruce from the blood-hound is told thus: An archer