In Freedoms Cause | Page 3

his mother he had heard of his brave father's deeds in
arms; and although, from the way in which she repressed any such
utterances, he said but little to his mother, he was resolved as much as
she could wish him to be, that he would some day win back his
patrimony, and avenge his father upon his slayers.
Consequently, upon every opportunity when Sandy Grahame could
spare time from his multifarious work, Archie practised with him, with
sword and pike. At first he had but a wooden sword. Then, as his limbs
grew stronger, he practised with a blunted sword; and now at the age of
fifteen Sandy Grahame had as much as he could do to hold his own
with his pupil.
At the time the story opens, in the springtime of the year 1293, he was
playing at ball with some of the village lads on the green, when a party
of horsemen was seen approaching.
At their head rode two men perhaps forty years old, while a lad of some
eighteen years of age rode beside them. In one of the elder men Archie
recognized Sir John Kerr. The lad beside him was his son Allan. The
other leader was Sir John Hazelrig, governor of Lanark; behind them
rode a troop of armed men, twenty in number. Some of the lads would
have ceased from their play; but Archie exclaimed:
"Heed them not; make as if you did not notice them. You need not be in
such a hurry to vail your bonnets to the Kerr."
"Look at the young dogs," Sir John Kerr said to his companion. "They
know that their chief is passing, and yet they pretend that they see us
not."
"It would do them good," his son exclaimed, "did you give your
troopers orders to tie them all up and give them a taste of their stirrup
leathers."
"It would not be worth while, Allan," his father said. "They will all
make stout men-at-arms some day, and will have to fight under my
banner. I care as little as any man what my vassals think of me, seeing

that whatsoever they think they have to do mine orders. But it needs not
to set them against one needlessly; so let the varlets go on with their
play undisturbed."
That evening Archie said to his mother, "How is it, mother, that the
English knight whom I today saw ride past with the Kerr is governor of
our Scottish town of Lanark?"
"You may well wonder, Archie, for there are many in Scotland of older
years than you who marvel that Scotsmen, who have always been free,
should tolerate so strange a thing. It is a long story, and a tangled one;
but tomorrow morning I will draw out for you a genealogy of the
various claimants to the Scottish throne, and you will see how the thing
has come about, and under what pretence Edward of England has
planted his garrisons in this free Scotland of ours."
The next morning Archie did not forget to remind his mother of her
promise.
"You must know," she began, "that our good King Alexander had three
children -- David, who died when a boy; Alexander, who married a
daughter of the Count of Flanders, and died childless; and a daughter,
Margaret, who married Eric, the young King of Norway. Three years
ago the Queen of Norway died, leaving an only daughter, also named
Margaret, who was called among us the `Maid of Norway,' and who, at
her mother's death, became heir presumptive to the throne, and as such
was recognized by an assembly of the estates at Scone. But we all
hoped that the king would have male heirs, for early last year, while
still in the prime of life, he married Joleta, daughter of the Count of
Drew. Unhappily, on the 19th of March, he attended a council in the
castle of Edinburgh, and on his way back to his wife at Kinghorn, on a
stormy night, he fell over a precipice and was killed.
"The hopes of the country now rested on the `Maid of Norway,' who
alone stood between the throne and a number of claimants, most of
whom would be prepared to support their claims by arms, and thus
bring unnumbered woes upon Scotland. Most unhappily for the country,
the maid died on her voyage to Scotland, and the succession therefore

became open.
"You will see on this chart, which I have drawn out, the lines by which
the principal competitors -- for there were nigh upon a score of them --
claimed the throne.
"Before the death of the maid, King Edward had proposed a marriage
between her and his young son, and his ambassadors met the Scottish
commissioners at Brigham, near Kelso,