ABSTRACT
The word of Bruce was as irreversible as his spirit was determined. No temptation of indulgence could seduce him from the one; no mischance of adversity, could subdue the other. The standard of liberty had been raised by him amidst his faithful chieftains on the carse of Gowrie, and carried by his victorious arm from east to west; from the most northern point of Sutherland to the walls of Stirling: but there, the garrison which the treason of the late Regent had admitted into the citadel, gave a momentary check to his career. The English governor refused to surrender on the terms proposed; and while his first flag of truce was yet in the tent of the Scottish monarch, a second arrived to break off the negociation.a King Edward at the head of a hundred thousand men, having forced a rapid passage through the Southern lowlands, was within a few hours march of Stirling; not only to relieve that place, but with a determination to bury Scotland in her own slain, or to restore it at once to his sole empire.
