The countess had
written a letter to her cousin, Lord Buchan, who being a sworn friend
of England, she intimated with Lord de Valence at Dumbarton. In this
epistle she intimated her wish that Lord Buchan would devise a plan to
surprise Bothwell Castle the ensuing day, to prevent the departure of
its armed vassals, then preparing to march to the support of the outlaw
Sir William Wallace, who, with his band of robbers, was lurking about
the caverns of the Cartlane Craigs.
When this letter arrived, Lord Soulis was at dinner with the other
lords; and Buchan, laying it before De Valence, they all consulted what
was best to be done. Lady Mar begged her cousin not to appear in the
affair himself, that she might escape the suspicions of her lord; who,
she strongly declared, was not arming his vassals from any disloyal
disposition toward the king of England, but solely at the instigations
of Wallace, to whom he romantically considered himself bound by the
ties of gratitude. As she gave this information, she hoped that no
attainder would fall upon her husband. And to keep the transaction as
close as possible, she proposed that the Lord Soulis, who she
understood was then at Dumbarton, should take the command of two or
three thousand troops, and marching to Bothwell next morning, seize the
few hundred armed Scots who were there ready to proceed to the
mountains.
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