Page:History of the life and death, of the great warrior Robert Bruce.pdf/3



Edward the First of England, in the year 1305, had cruelly put to death the Scottish Champion Sir William Wallace, the bold assertor of Scotland's independence, he imagined himself to be now secure in the possession of that kingdom. John Baliol, who latterly had been king, or rather Edward's viceroy, was now dead, and the goverment had been committed into the hands of Baliol's nephew, John Comyn, who was completely devoted to Edward's interests. But the English monarch had still one person to dread,—that was Robert Bruce, the young Earl of Carrick, whose grandfather had been the rival candidate of Baliol for the crown of Scotland, when their pretensions had been unfortunately submitted to the decision of Edward at Norham, in the year 1292. All along it had been the opinion of the majority of the Scots that the claims of Bruce were the best founded, and he himself had never lost sight of his title.

Bruce was one of those individuals admirably fitted, both by qualities of mind and body, for great and dangerous undertakings. His frame was vigorous and robust; he was possessed of the most heroic courage, but, above all, he was endowed with invincible patience and unswerving