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ROYAL HERALDRY. 350
entirely new system of government for Scotland, by which, while the name
of authority was given to the Scottish Commissioners who were to sit in
parliament, the real power belonged solely to King Edward. The conquest
and settlement of Scotland seemed complete.
But the flames soon burst out again. Robert Bruce, who had hitherto
been on the English side, fancying that his claims had gained new force
by the withdrawal of Baliol, commenced an intrigue with Lamberton,
Bishop of St. Andrews, and finding that it was discovered, fled for his
life to his castle at Lochmaben. In the Church of the Grey Friars, at
Dumfries, he met John (called Red) Comyn, lord of Badnoch, and charging
him with treachery in this matter, slew him on the spot, and assumed
the Crown six weeks after, in the abbey of Scone (March 27th, 1306).
Edward, exasperated on hearing this, determined on another expedition
convened a great gathering at Westminster on the Feast of Pentecost,
where he knighted the Prince of Wales and 300 young esquires ; and at
the banquet which followed, vowed by the swan on the table before him,
the emblem of constancy and truth, to inflict vengeance on the murderer
himself, and marched towards the north. Aymer de Valence, however,
speedily routed the disorderly forces of the new monarch. Bruce was
compelled to flee, and noble after noble who had supported him were
hurried to the block. Edward, having advanced as far as Lanercost,
ordered the Countess of Buchan, who had set the crown on the head of
Bruce, to be exposed in an iron cage on one of the towers of Berwick ;
but he never arrived to complete the conquest, and expired at Burgh -
on-the-Sands, July yth, 1307.
The cause of Bruce gained ground under his vacillating successor,
Edward II., whose measures seem to have mostly evaporated in orders
and preparations countermanded or disobeyed, while he himself was
immersed in the pleasures of his Court, and engrossed by his infatuated
fondness for his favourite Gaveston.
Douglas rallied to the call of Bruce, and many
of the Lowland
nobles followed his example. Edward, in 1309, summoned his parliament
to meet him at York, to hold conference and treaty (colloquium et tractatum},
and from thence made a feeble effort to repel the advances of the Scotch
their herds
into England but ; they evaded his army, and driving away
and flocks, compelled him to return to Berwick for fear of starvation to
his forces. Edinburgh, Roxburgh, Perth, and many
other fortresses fell
into the hands of the Scotch. The clergy met in council, at Dundee,
February, 1310, and owned Bruce as their lord, who at length invested
Stirling, now the last fortress which held out for Edward. On this the
King, having reinforced his army, advanced to its relief, only to be utterly
routed at Bannockburn on June 2oth, and fly for safety to York. Here