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days of yore did Scottish bards,

Our heroes’ acts proclaim,

And ’mong the chief was Robert Bruce,

A king of noble fame.

After the death of Wallace wight,

(Butcher'd at London town,)

The English overpower'd the land,

And claim'd the Scottish crown.

Most of the forts were in their hands,

Stirling, Bothwell, Dunbar,

And nothing could redeem the land

But hot and bloody war.

Our noble King, for want of men,

Was forc'd in woods to lie,

Till fortune's wheel turn’d up her spoke,

And rais’d his courage high.

The gallant chieftains of the land

Unto their King have flown,

And vow’d to die thro' sweet revenge,

Than bear the English frown.

The forts and castles they retook,

And made the English flee;

Rutherglen's stout Peel they next reduc'd,

And then they took Dundee.

Bold Moubray Stirling Castle kept,

(A place of noted fame,)

And when the Scots laid siege thereto,

He would not yield the same.

At last a treaty he did make,

For twelve months and a day,

If Edward did not him relieve,

He then should march away.