"Rise, Lord de Valence; it
is my honor, not my will, that grants your life. You threw away your
arms! I cannot strike even a murderer who bares his breast. I give
you that mercy you denied to nineteen unoffending, defenseless old men,
whose hoary heads your ruthless ax brought with blood to the ground.
Let memory be the sword I have withheld!"
While he spoke, De Valence had risen, and stood, conscience-stricken,
before the majestic mien of Wallace. There was something in this
denunciation that sounded like the irreversible decree of a divinity;
and the condemned wretch quaked beneath the threat, while he panted for
revenge.
The whole of the survivors in De Valence's train having surrendered
themselves when their leader fell, in a few minutes Wallace was
surrounded by his chieftains, bringing in the colors, and the swords of
their prisoners.
"Sir Alexander Ramsay," said he, to a brave and courteous knight, who
with his kinsman, William Blair, had joined him in the Lothians; "I
confide Earl de Valence, to your care. See that he is strongly
guarded; and has every respect according to the honor of him to whom I
commit this charge.
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