"
"Bravo, my Lord Andrew!" cried Kirkpatrick, in an affected whisper, "I
am not always to be bird alone, under the whip of our regent; you have
had a few stripes, and now look a little of my feather!"
"Like as a swan to a vulture, good Roger," answered Murray.
Wallace attended not to this tilting of humor between the chieftains,
but engaged himself in close discourse with the elder nobles at the
higher end of the hall. In half an hour Scrymgeour returned, and with
him Baron Hilton. He brought an apology from De Warenne, for the
behavior of his embassador; and added his persuasions to the demands of
England, that the regent would surrender Berwick, not only as a pledge
for the Scots keeping the truce on the borders, but as a proof of his
confidence in Prince Edward.
Wallace answered, that he had no reason to show extraordinary
confidence in one who manifested, by such a requisition, that he had no
faith in Scotland; and therefore, neither as a proof of confidence, nor
as a gauge of her word, should Scotland, a victorious power, surrender
the eastern door of her kingdom in the vanquished. Wallace declared
himself ready to dismiss the English prisoners to the frontiers, and to
maintain the armistice till they had reached the south side of the
Cheviots.
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