BOOK XII

. 210-327

It is the privilege of early historians to equip their leading personages with speeches, and in its pertinent, practical character the speech here provided for King Robert is a good example of such--so good, indeed, as to suggest the probability that Barbour is working up some transmitted material. There is on record another speech attributed to Bruce, which formed part of a Latin poem on Bannockburn by Abbot Bernard of Arbroath, Bruce’s Chancellor, portions of which are quoted in the _Scotichronicon_.[58] This speech consists of twenty-five hexameter lines, and is a rhetorical flourish on Scottish liberty, the miseries inflicted by the English on the country, and the hapless condition of “mother Church,” closing in strains of ecclesiastical exhortation. Moreover, it immediately precedes the opening of the battle, while Barbour’s version is of the evening before. In the latter a special interest attaches to lines 263-268 and 303-317, which may be compared with the following extracts from a speech by Alexander the Great in _The Vowes_, one of the three romances which make up the Scottish _Buik of Alexander_, the translation of which from the French was probably the work of Barbour himself.[59] Alexander says:

“Be thay assailyeit hardely, And encountered egerly, The formest cumis ye sall se, The hindmest sall abased be.

* * * * *

Forthy I pray ilk man that he Nocht covetous na yarnand be, To tak na ryches that thay wald, Bot wyn of deidly fais the fald; Fra thay be winnin all wit ye weill The gudis are ouris ever ilk deill; And I quyteclame yow utrely Baith gold and silver halely, And all the riches that thaires is, The honour will I have I wis.”[60]

[58] Lib. xii., chap. xxi.

[59] See Appendix E.

[60] P. 318.

To the same purport as these latter lines is a portion of a subsequent address;[61] and lines 325, 334 find a similar parallel in:

“Thus armit all the nicht thay lay, Quhile on the morne that it was day.”[62]

Of the cardinal sentiment in the speech, the origin is probably to be found in the familiar story of the Maccabees, referred to more than once in _The Bruce_. Judas Maccabeus was one of the typical heroes of French romance, and had one metrical romance, at least, devoted to his career. And in 1 Maccabees, chap. iv., we have:

“17. (Judas) said to the people, Be not greedy of the spoils, inasmuch as there is a battle before us.

“18. And Gorgias and his host are here by us in the mountain; but stand ye now against our enemies, and overcome them, and after this ye may boldly take the spoils.”[63]

[61] P. 339.

[62] P. 350, lines 12, 13.

[63] _Cf._ also Neilson on _The Real “Scots Wha Hae”_ in _Scottish Antiquary_, vol. xiv., No. 53, July, 1899.

APPENDIX C

THE NUMBERS AT BANNOCKBURN

ENGLISH: _One hundred thousand men and ma._

SCOTS: _Thretty thousand, and sum deill mare._

These figures have given rise to much discussion, without any very certain result. Yet official data are not wanting--sufficient, at least, to check what is only another example of the wild conjectures of mediæval chroniclers when dealing with numbers. Hemingburgh gives Wallace at Falkirk “about three hundred thousand men”[64]--rather more, probably, than the whole male population of Scotland. We need not be surprised, then, at how all such estimates shrink in the cold light of Exchequer figures.

[64] II. p. 180.

Edward II. summoned all owing him military service,[65] which corroborates the statement of the author of the _Vita Edw. Sec._ that “the King exacted from all the service due,”[66] as well as that of Barbour--“of England hale the chivalry.” The Earls of Lancaster, Warenne, Arundel, and Warwick did not attend, for a particular reason, but sent their contingents.[67] Now, by Mr. Round’s calculations, the whole number of knights’ fees in England did not exceed 5,000;[68] Mr. Morris raises the figure to something short of 7,000.[69] The important point is, however, that in practice the assessment was only a nominal or conventional one. Thus Gloucester, with 455 fees, was assessed at ten knights.[70] Including all grades of horsemen, Mr. Morris puts “the maximum of the cavalry arm” at “about 8,000”; but, all things considered, no such number could ever take the field.[71] Edward I. had summoned his full feudal array (_omnes sui fideles_) for the Falkirk campaign, and Hemingburgh says that, when counted, it came to 3,000 men on armoured horses (Barbour’s “helit hors”), and more than 4,000 on unarmoured horses--say, roughly, 7,000 in all.[72] Mr. Morris, however, by a generous calculation from the rolls, arrives at 2,400 as the highest possible figure.[73] Now, it is to be noted that the author of the _Vita Edw. Sec._, while lauding the size and magnificence of the host that went to Bannockburn, gives 2,000 men-at-arms as apparently the total of the cavalry, since he simply adds “a considerable body of footmen.”[74] On the whole, 3,000 to 4,000 English horse is a higher limit for Bannockburn, when we consider all the difficulties of sufficient armour, remounts, and forage. Mr. Morris thinks 10,000 “impossible,” though he is here calculating on yards of frontage on a site where the battle was not fought.[75] About 7,000 is Mr. Round’s free estimate, adopting Hemingburgh’s figure for Falkirk.[76] Bain accepts Barbour’s 3,000 heavy horsemen, and suggests 10,000 light horse, but proceeds on no data.[77] Mr. Oman calculates that “three thousand ‘equites coperti,’ men-at-arms on barded horses,” means, probably, 10,000 for the whole cavalry,[78] but this traverses his Falkirk figures. England never put, nor could maintain, on the field such a mounted force, to say nothing of the difficulty of handling and manœuvring it.

[65] _Fœdera_, iii., p. 464, etc.

[66] P. 201.

[67] _Vita Edw._, p. 201.

[68] _Feudal England_, p. 292.

[69] _The Welsh Wars of Edward I._, p. 41.

[70] _Welsh Wars_, p. 59.

[71] _Ibid._, pp. 81, 82.

[72] II. p. 173.

[73] _Welsh Wars_, p. 292.

[74] _Peditum turba copiosa_, p. 201.

[75] _Engl. Hist. Rev._, vol. xiv., p. 133. _Cf._ Appendix A.

[76] _Bannockburn_ in _The Commune of London_, p. 298.

[77] _Calendar_, iii., p. xxi.

[78] _Art of War_, p. 575 note.

For the foot we have, fortunately, exact figures in the _Fœdera_[79]--21,540 men all told, which would include the archers. Only the northern counties--but not all--and Wales are drawn upon, as those of the south would be for a French campaign.[80] Such had been the practice of Edward I., whose levies from the northern counties and Wales ranged from 29,400 foot in 1297 to 12,000 in 1301.[81] Mr. Morris contends that not till 1322 were infantry drawn from all England for a Scottish campaign (_as cited_), but in this he is wrong. It was done by a special vote of Parliament, and according to a prescribed form, as early as March, 1316, when every township, with some special exceptions, furnished one soldier,[82] and again in 1318.[83] These are clearly new and special arrangements, and there is thus no reason to believe that the list in _Fœdera_, etc., is not complete, as Mr. Oman suggests, adding, accordingly, a southern contingent of about 30,000 men, though he doubts if “the extreme South” sent its full muster.[84] This is quite gratuitous. Lord Hailes, too, contended that the official records are imperfect, and that the numbers given by Barbour “are within the limits of probability.”[85] Bain’s authoritative reply is that, “as a rule, the writs were always enrolled, and the Patent Rolls of the time are not defective.”[86] This, however, is not always true, and Bain, applying this principle absolutely, is once, at least, led to a wrong conclusion.[87]

[79] Vol. iii., p. 482, etc.; also in _Rotuli Scotiæ_, i., p. 127; and _Parliamentary Writs_,