The Scottish Chiefs by Jane Porter (novels to read for beginners txt) 📖

his tent, she started up as he seemed to pause, and with assumed mildness, again addressing the regent, said—that before this apparently ingenuous defense could mislead impartial minds, she thought it just to inform the council of the infatuated attachment of Edwin Ruthven to the accused; for she had ample cause to assert that the boy was so bewitched by his commander—who had flattered his youthful vanity by loading him with distinctions only due to approved valor in manhood—that he was ready at any time to sacrifice every consideration of truth, reason, and duty, to please Sir William Wallace.

"Such may be in a boy," observed Lord Loch-awe, interrupting her "but as I know no occasion in which it is possible for Sir William Wallace to falsify the truth, I call upon him, in justice to himself and to his country, to reply to three questions!" Wallace bowed to the venerable earl, and he proceeded: "Sir William Wallace, are you guilty of the charge brought against you, of a design to mount the throne of Scotland by means of the King of France?"

Wallace replied, "I never designed to mount the throne of Scotland, either by my own means or by any other man's."

Loch-awe proceeded: "Was this scroll, containing the names of certain Scottish chiefs noted down for assassination, written by you, or under your connivance?"

"I never saw the scroll, nor heard of the scroll, until this hour. And harder than death is the pang at my heart when a Scottish chief finds it necessary to ask me such a question regarding a people, to save even the least of whom he has often seen me risk my life!"

"Another question," replied Loch-awe, "and then, bravest of men, if your country acquits you not in thought and deed, Campbell of Loch-awe sits no more amongst its judges! What is your knowledge of the Knight of the Green Plume, that, in preference to any Scottish friend, you should intrust him with your wishes respecting the Countess of Strathearn?"

Wallace's answer was brief: "I never had any wishes respecting the wife or the widow of my friend the Earl of Mar that I did not impart to every chief in the camp, and those wishes went no further than for her safety. As to love, that is a passion I shall know no more; and Lady Strathearn alone can say what is the end she aims at, by attributing feelings to me with regard to her which I never conceived, and words which I never uttered. Like this passion, with which she says she inspired me," added he, turning his eyes steadfastly on her face, "was the Knight of the Green Plume! You are all acquainted with the manner of his introduction to me at Linlithgow. By the account that he then gave of himself, you all know as much of him as I did, till on the night that he left me at Berwick and then I found him, like this story of Lady Strathearn, all a fable."

"What is his proper title? Name him, on your knighthood!" exclaimed Buchan; "for he shall yet be dragged forth to support the veracity of my illustrious kinswoman, and to fully unmask his insidious accomplice!"

"Your kinswoman, Earl Buchan," replied Wallace, "can best answer your question."

Lord Athol approached the regent, and whispered something in his ear. This unworthy representative of the generous Bruce, immediate rose from his seat. "Sir William Wallace," said he, "you have replied to the questions of Lord Loch-awe, but where are your witnesses to prove that what you have spoken is the truth?"

Wallace was struck with surprise at this address from a man who, whatever might be demanded of him in the fulfillment of his office, he believed could not be otherwise than his friend because, from the confidence reposed in him both by Bruce and himself, he must be fully aware of the impossibility of these allegations being true. But Wallace's astonishment was only for a moment; he now saw with an eye that pierced through the souls of the whole assembly, and, with collected firmness, he replied; "My witnesses are in the bosom of every Scotsman."

"I cannot find them in mine," interrupted Athol.

"Nor in mine!" was echoed from various parts of the hall.

"Invalidate the facts brought against you by legal evidence, not a mere rhetorical appeal, Sir William Wallace," added the regent, "else the sentence of the law must be passed on so tacit an acknowledgment of guilt."

"Acknowledgment of guilt!" cried Wallace, with a flush of god-like indignation suffusing his noble brow. "If any one of the chiefs who have just spoken knew the beat of an honest heart, they would not have declared that they heard no voice proclaim the integrity of William Wallace. Let them look out on yon carse, where they saw me refuse that crown, offered by themselves, which my accuser alleges I would yet obtain by their blood. Let them remember the banks of the Clyde, where I rejected the Scottish throne offered me by Edward! Let these facts bear witness for me; and, if they be insufficient, look on Scotland, now, for the third time, rescued by my arm from the grasp of a usurper!—That scroll locks the door of the kingdom upon her enemies." As he spoke he threw the capitulation of Berwick on the table. It struck a pause into the minds of the lords; they gazed with pallid countenances, and without a word, on the parchment where it lay, while he proceeded: "If my actions that you see, do not convince you of my integrity, then believe the unsupported evidence of words, the tale of a woman, whose mystery, were it not for the memory of the honorable man whose name she once bore, I would publicly unravel—believe her! and leave Wallace naught of his country to remember, but that he has served it, and that it is unjust!"

"Noblest of Scots!" cried Loch-awe, coming toward him, "did your accuser come in the shape of an angel of light, still we believe your life in preference to her testimony, for God himself speaks on your side. 'My servants,' he declares, 'shall be known by their fruits!' And have not yours been peace to Scotland and good-will to men?"

"They are the serpent-folds of his hypocrisy!" cried Athol, alarmed at the awe-struck looks of the assembly.

"They are the baits by which he cheats fools!" re-echoed Soulis.

"They are snares, which shall catch us no more!" was now the general acclamation; and in proportion to the transitory respect which had made them bow, but for a moment, to virtue, they now vociferated their center both of Wallace and this his last achievement. Inflamed with rage at the manifest determination to misjudge his commander, and maddened at the contumely with which their envy affected to treat him, Kirkpatrick threw off all restraint, and with the bitterness of his reproaches still more incensed the jealousy of the nobles and augmented the tumult. Lennox, vainly attempting to make himself heard, drew toward Wallace, hoping, by that movement to at least show on whose side he thought justice lay. At this moment, while the uproar raged with redoubled clamor—the one party denouncing the Cummins as the source of this conspiracy against the life of Wallace; the other demanding that sentence should instantly be passed upon him as a traitor—the door burst open and Bothwell, covered with dust, and followed by a throng of armed knights, rushed into the center of the hall.

"Who is it ye arraign?" cried the young chief, looking indignantly around him. "Is it not your deliverer you would destroy? The Romans could not accuse the guilty Manlius in sight of the capitol he had preserved, but you, worse than heathens, bring your benefactor to the scene of his victories, and there condemn him for serving you too well! Has he not plucked you this third time out of the furnace that would have consumed you? And yet in this hour, you would sacrifice him to the disappointed passions of a woman! Falsest of thy sex!" cried he, turning to the countess, who shrunk before the penetrating eyes of Andrew Murray; "do I not know thee? Have I not read thine unfeminine, thy vindictive heart? You would destroy the man you could not seduce! Wallace!" cried he, "speak. Would not this woman have persuaded you to disgrace the name of Mar? When my uncle died, did she not urge you to intrigue for that crown which she knew you had so loyally declined?"

"My errand here," answered Wallace, "is to defend myself, not to accuse others. I have shown that I am innocent, and my judges will not look on the proofs. They obey not the laws in their judgment, and whatever may be the decree, I shall not acknowledge its authority."

As he spoke he turned away, and walked with a firm step out of the hall.

His disappearance gave the signal for a tumult more threatening to the welfare of the state, than if the armies of Edward had been in the midst of them. It was brother against brother, friend against friend. The Lords Lennox, Bothwell, and Loch-awe, were vehement against the unfairness with which Sir William Wallace bad been treated; Kirkpatrick declared that no arguments could be used with men so devoid of reason, and words of reproach and reviling passing on all sides, swords were fiercely drawn. The Countess of Strathearn seeing herself neglected by even her friends in the strife, and fearful that the party of Wallace might at last gain the ascendancy, and that herself, then without her traitor corslet on her breast, might meet their hasty vengeance, rose abruptly, and giving her hand to a herald, hurried out of the assembly.

Chapter LXXIII.

Ballochgeich.

The marshals with difficulty interrupted the mortal attack which the enemies and friends of Wallace made on each other; several of the Cummins were maimed, Lord Athol himself was severely wounded by Kirkpatrick, but the teacherous regent gladly saw that none on his side were hurt unto death. With horrid menaces the two parties separated, the one to the regent's apartments, the other to the camp of Wallace.

Lord Bothwell found him encircled by his veterans, in whose breasts he was trying to allay the storm raging there against the injustice of the regent and the ingratitude of the Scottish lords. At sight of the young and ardent Bothwell, their clamor to be led instantly to revenge the indignity offered to their general redoubled, and Murray, not less incensed, turning to them exclaimed:

"Yes, my friends, keep quiet for a few hours, and then, what honor commands we will do!" At this assurance they retired to their quarters, and Bothwell turned with Wallace into his tent.

"Before you utter a word concerning the present scenes," cried Wallace, "tell me how is the hope of Scotland? the only earthly stiller of these horrid tumults!"

"Alas!" replied Bothwell. "After regaining, by a valor worthy of his destiny, every fortress north of the Forth, his last and greatest achievement was making himself master of Scone; but in storming its walls a fragment of stone falling heavily, terribly rent the muscles of his breast, and now—woe to Scotland!—he lies at Huntingtower reduced to infant weakness. All this you would have known had you received his letters; but villainy must have been widely at work, for none of yours have reached his hands."

This intelligence respecting Bruce was a more mortal blow to Wallace than all he had just sustained in his own person. He remained silent, but his mind was thronged with thoughts. Was Scotland to be indeed lost? Was all that he had suffered and achieved to have been done in vain? and should he be fated to behold her again made a sacrifice to the jealous rivalry of her selfish and contending nobles?

Bothwell continued to speak of the prince, and added, that it was with reluctance he had left him, even to share the anticipated success at Berwick. But Bruce, impatient to learn the issue of the siege (as still no letters arrived from that quarter), had dispatched him back to the borders. At Dunfermline he was stricken with horror by the information that treason had been alleged against Wallace, and turning his steps westward, he flew to give that support to his friend's innocence which the malignity of his enemies might render needful.

"The moment I heard how you were beset," continued Bothwell, "I dispatched a messenger to Lord Ruthven, warning him not to alarm