They are these: The perfidy of King Edward, who,
deemed a prince of high honor, had been chosen umpire in the cause of
Bruce and Baliol. He accepted the task, in the character of a friend
to Scotland; but no sooner was he advanced into the heart of our
kingdom, and at the head of the large army he had treacherously
introduced as a mere appendage of state, than he declared the act of
judgement was his right as liege lord of the realm! This falsehood,
which our records disproved at the outset, was not his only baseness;
he bought the conscience of Baliol, and adjudged to him the throne.
The recreant prince acknowledged him his master; and in that degrading
ceremony of homage, he was followed by almost all the lowland Scottish
lords. But this vile yielding did not purchase them peace: Edward
demanded oppressive services from the king, and the castles of the
nobility to be resigned to English governors. These requisitions being
remonstrated against by a few of our boldest chiefs (amongst whom, your
illustrious father, gentle lady, stood the most conspicuous), the
tyrant repeated them with additional demands, and prepared to resent
the appeal on the whole nation.
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