Page:Life and surprising adventures of Sir William Wallace.pdf/4

4 opposed his flight, and being still pursued very keenly, he went into an inn, exhausted with his exertions. Wallace was instantly dressed in the attire of a female, and was busily employed twirling his distaff and humming his song, when the pursuers searched the house, which they had seen him enter. They were so completely outwitted by his device that they did not discover him; and upon retiring from the immediate pursuit, he found himself at leisure to concert and adopt measures for the more effectually securing his retreat. Having left the roof of his kind hostess, he bent his steps towards the residence of a paternal uncle at Dunipace.

Wallace, after a short stay with his mother at Dunipace, proceeded to Ellerslie, On their arrival, they learned from Sir Ronald Crawford, the lady's husband and elder son had been cruelly murdered at Lochmaben, by the English, who infested and tyrannized over the whole country without controul. The old lady got a promise of protection from Percy, Edward's Lord Lieutenant: but Wallace scorned to accept of protection from the hands of those men who had become the tools of that tyrant's oppressions. In this situation of his affairs, he went to live in secrecy at the house of his paternal uncle