"
When the door closed, and Wallace was left alone, he stood for awhile
in the midst of the tent, listening to the departing steps of his
friends. When the last sound died on his ear, "I shall hear them no
more!" cried he; and throwing himself into a seat, he remained for an
hour in a trance of grievous thoughts. Melancholy remembrances and
prospects dire for Scotland pressed upon his surcharged heart. "It is
to God alone I must confide my country!" cried he; "His mercy will pity
its madness, and forgive its deep transgressions. My duty is to remove
the object of ruin far from the power of any longer exciting jealousy
or awakening zeal." With these words, he took a pen in his hand to
write to Bruce.
He briefly narrated the events which compelled him, if he would avoid
the grief of having occasioned a civil war, to quit his country
forever. The general hostility of the nobles, the unresisting
acquiescence of the people in measures which menaced his life and
sacrificed the freedom for which he had so long fought, convinced him,
he said, that his warlike commission was now closed. He was summoned
by Heaven to exchange the field for the cloister; and to the monastery
at Chartres he was now hastening, to dedicate the remainder of his days
to the peace of a future world.
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