The Frasers of Oliver Castle have given me two hundred men; and the brave Sir Alexander Scrymgeour, whom I met in West Lothian, has not only brought fifty stout Scots to my command, but, as hereditary standard-bearer of the kingdom, has come himself to carry the royal banner of Scotland to glory or oblivion." "To glory!" cried Murray, waving his sword; "O! not while a Scot survives, shall that blood-red lion** again lick the dust!" **A lion gules, in a field or, is the arms of Scotland.-( 1809.) "No," cried Kirkpatrick, his eyes flashing fire; "rather may every Scot and every Southron fall in the struggle, and fill one grave! Let me," cried he, sternly grasping the hilt of his sword, and looking upward, "let me, oh, Saviour of mankind, live but to see the Forth and the Clyde, so often reddened with our blood, dye the eastern and the western oceans with the vital flood of these our foes; and when none is spared, then let me die in peace." The eyes of Wallace glanced on the young Edwin, who stood gazing on Kirkpatrick, and turning on the knight with a powerful look of apprehension-"Check that prayer," cried he; "remember my brave companion, what the Saviour of mankind was; and then think, whether he, who offered life to all the world, will listen to so damning an invocation.

If we would be blessed in the contest, we must be merciful." "To whom ?" exclaimed Kirkpatrick; "to the robbers who tear from us our lands; to the ruffians who wrest from us our honors?
But you are patient; you never received a blow!" "Yes," cried Wallace, turning paler; "a heavy one--on my heart." "True," returned Kirkpatrick, "your wife fell dead under the steel of a Southron governor; and you slew him for it! You were revenged; your feelings were appeased." "Not the death of fifty thousand governors," replied Wallace, "could appease my feelings.

Revenge were insufficient to satisfy the yearnings of my soul." For a moment he covered his agitated features with his hand, and then proceeded: "I slew Heselrigge because he was a monster, under whom the earth groaned.

My sorrow, deep as it was--was but one of many, which his rapacity, and his nephew's licentiousness, the whole nation without reserve! When the sword of war is drawn, all who resist must conquer or fall; but there are some noble English who abhor the tyranny they are obliged to exercise over us, and when they declare such remorse, shall they not find mercy at our hands?
Surely, if not for humanity's, for policy's sake we ought to give quarter; for the exterminating sword, if not always victorious, incurs the ruin it threatens, even hope, that by or righteous cause and our clemency, we shall not only gather our own people to our legions but turn the hearts of the poor Welsh and the misled Irish, whom the usurper has forced into his armies, and so confront him with troops of his own levying.
Many of the English were too just to share in the subjugation of the country they had sworn to befriend.

And their less honorable countrymen, when they see Scotsmen no longer consenting to their own degradation, may take shame to themselves for assisting to betray a confiding people." "That may be," returned Kirkpatrick; "but surely you would not rank Aymer de Valence, who lords it over Dumbarton, and Cressingham, who acts the tyrant in Stirling--you would not rank them amongst these conscientious English ?" "No," replied Wallace; "the haughty oppression of the one and the wanton cruelty of the other, have given Scotland too many wounds for me to hold a shield before them; meet them, and I leave them to your sword." "And by heavens!" cried Kirkpatrick, gnashing his teeth with the fury of a tiger, "they shall know its point!" Wallace then informed his friends he purposed marching next morning by daybreak toward Dumbarton Castle.