"
At this generous declaration the proud despair of De Monthermer gave
way to nobler feelings; and while a big tear stood in each eye, he
turned to Wallace, and stretching out his hand to him. "Noble Scot,"
said he, "your unexampled generosity, and the invincible fidelity of
these heroic men, have compelled me to accept the life I had resolved
to lose under these walls, rather than resign them. But virtue is
resistless, and to it do I surrender that pride of soul which made
existence insufferable under the consciousness of having erred. When I
became the husband of King Edward's daughter, I believed myself pledged
to victories or to death. But there is a conquest, and I feel it,
greater than over hosts in the field; and here taught to make it, the
husband of the princess of England, the proud Earl of Gloucester,
consents to live to be a monument of Scottish nobleness, and of the
inflexible fidelity of English soldiers."
"You live, illustrious and virtuous Englishmen," returned Wallace, "to
redeem that honor of which too many rapacious sons of England have
robbed their country. Go forth, therefore, as my conqueror, for you
have on this spot extinguished that burning antipathy with which the
outraged heart of William Wallace had vowed to extirpate every Southron
from off this ravaged land.
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