to allow the king to send ambassadors to justify his conduct, Feb. 12t.

The king also replíes in a similar strain, May 15.

The king again invades Scotland, in July; he meets little opposition, and passes the winter there.

A.D. 1302. A truce concluded with the Scots, Jan. 26, until St. Andrew's day, (Nov. 30.)

The Flemings defeat the French at Cambray, July 11. Proposals are made for peace with France, but they refuse to treat unless the Scots are included, and also require the king to pass over in person to negotiate.

The parliament refuses to allow the king to go to France, treating the demand as an insult.

A.D. 1303. Stirling castle is taken by the Scots, Feb. 18. The English defeated at Roslin by Comyn, the regent, Feb. 24.

Peace is made with France, Gascony being restored, and the Scots abandoned to the vengeance of Edward, May 20.

The king again invades Scotland, in June, and advances as far as the Murray Frith; he captures Brechin, Aug. 9; burns Dunfermline, and passes the winter in that country.

William de Geynesburg, bishop of Worcester, is fined 1,000 marks for an alleged contempt of the king's authority".

Two copies of this remarkable document still exist among the public records.

u

The pope (Boniface VIII.) had promoted him to the see on the refusal of the archbishop of Canterbury (Robert Winchelsey) to cousecrate the king's nominee, and in his bull professed to grant him the temporalities as well as the spiritualities. The bishop was

Robert Bruce and many other nobles submit.

A.D. 1304. Comyn, the guardian, concludes a treaty with the king, Feb. 4.

A parliament held at St. Andrew's, by which the garrison of Stirling castle are declared outlaws.

Stirling is besieged by the king, in April; it surrenders, July 20.

The king returns to England, leaving John de Segrave as governor of Scotland*.

This

A.D. 1305. The writ of Trailbâton issued. writ sets forth that murderers, incendiaries, thieves, and other violators of the king's peace abound, and directs the sheriffs of each county to call to their aid good and legal men to make inquiry as to all such offenders and their abettors. The parties discovered were tried before a kind of special commissioners who visited each district, and promptly and rigorously punished.

Wallace is captured near Glasgow, in August, brought to London, and executed as a traitor, Aug. 24.

A council held at London, in September, when reguobliged to renounce the so-called grant, and paid the above heavy fine for "his transgression in admitting that the pope had power to dispose of the said temporalities." Patent Roll, 31 Edw. I., m. 39. John de Segrave was one of the king's most experienced commanders, and was constable of his army in the expedition to Scotland in 1296. He was also governor of Berwick; and under Edward II. he was made keeper of the forests north of Trent, which included the custody of the castles of Nottingham and Derby. He was taken prisoner at Bannockburn, but soon exchanged, and received a large grant as compensation for his services. In 1323, being suspected of having favoured the escape of Roger Mortimer from the Tower, he was sent in disgrace to Gascony, where he shortly after died, in the 70th year of his age.

Arms of Lord Segrave.

lations for the government of Scotland, now considered as conquered, are drawn up.

Robert Bruce leaves the English court, and repairs to Scotland.

A.D. 1306. Bruce, failing to induce Comyn to join him in throwing off the English yoke, kills him in the Minorite convent at Dumfries, Jan. 29, or Feb. 10.

He is joined by numbers, drives out the English justiciaries, and garrisons, who flee to Berwick, and ravages the lands of the adherents of the king.

Bruce is crowned king (Robert I.) at Scone, March 25, in presence of the bishops of St. Andrew's and Glasgow, five earls, and many knights; the ceremony is repeated on Palm Sunday, March 27.

A large army sent against the Scots, in May, under Aymer de Valence, who defeats Bruce, July 22, and obliges him to flee to Cantyre, and thence to the Isles.

The king marches into Scotland, in July; little opposition is made to him, but he captures and executes many of Bruce's adherents, and commits those who surrender to close custody.

Bruce suddenly issues from his retreat, at the end of September; he besieges Henry de Percy in Turnbury castle (near Girvan, in Ayrshire), but a large English force puts him again to flight.

The son of the competitor for the crown, who died in April, 1304.

a

z Son of William de Valence, half-brother of Henry III. Among them were Nigel Bruce, his brother, Seton, his brotherin-law, the earl of Athol, and Simon Fraser. His wife, his daughter, his two sisters, and the countess of Buchan, were captured, and imprisoned until after the battle of Bannockburn.

A.D. 1307. A parliament meets at Carlisle in January. Peter of Spain, the papal legate, excommunicates Bruce, Feb. 22°.

Piers Gaveston, a favourite of the king's son Edward, is banished from England.

A party of Scots, headed by Alexander and Thomas Bruce, land in Galloway, Feb. 10; they are captured by Duncan Macdonald, a partisan of the English, and sent to the king, who has them all executed, Feb. 17.

Bruce again appears, (about the end of March,) defeats Aymer de Valence, and besieges the earl of Gloucester in Ayr.

The king raises the siege, and Bruce retires.

The king summons his army to assemble at Carlisle at the beginning of July.

He commences his last march against Scotland, leaving Carlisle July 3; reaches Burgh on the Sands (five miles distant), July 5; dies there, July 7; his body is brought to Westminster, and buried, Oct. 27o.

The papal bull authorizing this is dated May 18, 1306; it is grounded on the murder of Comyn in a church.

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His dying injunction was thus disregarded, as he had desired that his remains should be carried about with the army, and not deposited in the grave until the entire conquest of Scotland had been achieved.

EDWARD, the fourth son of Edward I. and Eleanor of Castile, was born at Carnarvon, April 25, 1284. By the death of his brother Alphonso in the August following he became heir to the throne, and he soon after received the title of Prince of Wales.

Piers Gaveston, the son of a Gascon gentleman of merit, was chosen as the companion of the young prince, and this circumstance exercised a most unhappy influence on the destiny of both. Edward was frequently embroiled with his father in consequence of his own misconduct as well as that of his favourite, and one of the last acts of the dying king was an endeavour to perpetuate the banishment of the latter.

Edward became king July 8, 1307, being then on the border of Scotland, but he at once abandoned the contest, recalled his favourite, and imprisoned or banished