Page:Dictionary of National Biography volume 07.djvu/133

 well wood and domain lands as other lands, and both within and without burgh, supplies one reason for their presence. The clergy probably made a grant in a separate assembly of their own. Although the peace between England and Scotland was ratified by Edward III on 8 March 1327, both sides made preparations for the renewal of the war, so that it is difficult to support the accusations of breach of faith against either. On 18 May Edward contracted with John of Hainault for a large force of mercenary cavalry, a sign that he was unable to rely on his own feudal levy.

On 15 June Randolph and Douglas crossed the border with 20,000 men, and Edward with more than double that number advanced to Durham. The Hainault mercenaries could not be relied on to co-operate with the English troops, and their dissensions, of which Froissart has left a livelv picture, had probably much to do with the English discomfiture. A series of manoeuvres and counter-manoeuvres on the Tyne and Wear showed that neither side was willing to try the issue of a battle. Randolph declined a challenge to leave a favourable position on the north of the Wear and fight on the open ground at Stanhope Park. Douglas with a small band made a daring nigut attack on Edward's camp on 4 Aug., when his chaplain was slain and the young king with difficulty escaped. The Scotch under cover of night abandoned their camp and retreated homewards, and on 15 Aug. Edward disbanded his army at York, dismissing the Hainaultcrs, who had been found too costly or too dangerous allies.

Bruce himself now assumed the command, but his sudden attack on the eastern marches fidled. Alnwick repulsed an assault of Douglas, and Kandolph and Bruce were not more successful in the siege of Norham. While still engaged in it he was approached by English commissioners with overtures of peace. The preliminaries were debated at Newcastle, and at a parliament in York on 8 Feb. 1328 the most essential article was accepted. It was agreed that Scotland, 'according to its ancient bounds in the days of Alexander III, should remain to Robert king of Scots and his heirs and successors free and divided from the kingdom of England, without any subjection, right of service, claim, or demand, and that all writs executed at any time to the contrary should be held void.

The parliament of Northampton in April 1328 concluded the final treaty by which (1) peace was made between the two kingdoms; (3) the coronation-stone of Scone was to be restored; (3) the English king promised to ask the pope to recall all spiritual processes against the Scots; (4) the Scots agreed to pay thirty thousand marks; (5, 6, and 7) ecclesiastical property which had changed hands in the course of the war was to be restored, but not lay fiefs, with an exception in favour of three barons. Lord Wake, the Earl of Buchan, and Henry de Percy; (8) Johanna, Edward's sister, was to be given in marriage to David, the son and heir of Bruce, and to receive a jointure of 2,000l. a year; (9) the party failing to observe the articles of the treaty was to pay 2,000l. of silver to the papal treasury.

On 12 July 1328 the marriage of the infant prince and bride was celebrated at Berwick. The English and Edward, when he attained his independence from the guardianship of the queen mother and Mortimer, denounced this treaty as shameful, and ascribed it to the departure of the Hainaulters, the treachery of Mortimer, and the bribery used by the Scots. But it was the necessary result of the situation at the commencement of his reign, and the bloody war of two centuries failed to reverse its main provisions. Scotland remained an independent monarchy. The chief author of its independence barely survived the accomplishment of his work. On 7 June 1329 Bruce died at Cardross of leprosy, a disease contracted during the hard life of his earlier struggles. There are frequent, and towards the close increasing, references to his physical sufferings, which made his moral courage more conspicuous. He was buried by his wife, who had died in 1327, at Dunfermline, but his heart was, by a dying wish, entrusted to Douglas, to fulfil the vow he had been unable to execute in person of visiting the holy sepulchre. His great adversary Edward I had made a similar request, not so faithfully executed, and his grandson granted a passport, to Douglas on 1 Sept. to proceed to the Holy Land, to aid the christians against the Saracens, with the heart of Lord Robert, king of Scotland. The death of Douglas fighting against the Moors in Spain, and the recovery of the heart of Bruce by Sir William Keith, who brought it to Scotland and buried it along with the bones of Douglas in Melrose Abbey, may be accepted as authentic; but the words with which Douglas is said to have parted with it, Now passe thou forth before As thou was wont in field to bee, And I shall follow or else die,

are an addition to the original verses of Barbour. When the remains of Bruce were disinterred at Dunfermline in 1819, the breast-