He had heard the destruction of Scotland
declared, and himself sentenced to perish if he did not escape the
general ruin by flying from her side! This terrible decree of fate, so
disastrously corroborated by the extremity of Bruce, and the divisions
in the kingdom, had been sounded in his ear, had been pronounced by one
of those sages of his country, on whom the spirit of prophecy, it was
believed, yet descended, with all the horrors of a woe-denouncing
prophet. Could he then doubt its truth? He did not doubt; he believed
the midnight voice he had heard. But recovering from the first shock
of such a doom, and remembering that it still left the choice to
himself, between dishonored life or glorious death, he resolved to show
his respect to the oracle by manifesting a persevering obedience to the
eternal voice which gave those agents utterance: and while he bowed to
the warning, he vowed to be the last who should fall from the side of
his devoted country. "If devoted," cried he, "then our fates shall be
the same. My fall from thee shall be into my grave. Scotland may have
struck the breast the breast that shielded her, yet, Father of Mercies,
forgive her blindness, and grant me still permission a little longer to
oppose my heart between her and this fearful doom!"
CHAPTER LXXV.
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