WALLACE;

OR, THE LIFE AND ACTS OF SIR WILLIAM WALLACE, OF ELLERSLIE.

BY HENRY THE MINSTREL.

PUBLISHED FROM A MANUSCRIPT DATED M.CCCC.LXXXVIII. WITH NOTES, AND PRELIMINARY REMARKS.

By JOHN JAMIESON, D.D., FELLOW OF THE ROYAL SOCIETY OF EDINBURGH, OF THE SOCIETY OF THE ANTIQUARIES OF SCOTLAND, AND THE AMERICAN ANTIQUARIAN SOCIETY.

A NEW EDITION.

GLASGOW: MAURICE OGLE & CO. 1869.

[Pg i]

PRELIMINARY REMARKS, CHIEFLY REGARDING THE LIFE OF THE AUTHOR, AND CHARACTER OF THE WORK.

So little is known, with respect to Henry the Minstrel, that I can scarcely pretend to add any thing to the meagre account which has been given of him by former writers. As we cannot certainly fix the time, we can form no conjecture even as to the place, of his birth. Almost all that can be viewed as an historical record concerning him, is that with which we are supplied by Major. Integrum librum, he says, Guillelmi Vallacei Henricus, a natiuitate luminibus captus, meae infantiae tempore cudit; et quæ vulgo dicebantur, carmine vulgari, in quo peritus erat, conscripsit; (ego autem talibus scriptis solum in parte fidem impertior); qui historiarum recitatione coram principibus victum et vestitum quo dignus erat nactus est. Hist. Lib. IV. c. 15. “Henry, who was blind from his birth, in the time of my infancy composed the whole Book of William Wallace; and committed to writing in vulgar poetry, in which he was well skilled, the things that were commonly related of him. For my own part, I give only partial credit to writings of this

description. By the recitation of these, however, in the presence[Pg ii] of men of the highest rank, he procured, as he indeed deserved, food and raiment.”

This account, as it merely respects the recitation of his poem, is not inconsistent with what Henry himself says, when he asserts his independence in the composition of it, and declares that the motive by which he was chiefly actuated, was a patriotic desire to preserve the memory of the illustrious deeds of Wallace from oblivion.

Mr. Pinkerton has given 1470 as the date when it may be supposed that Henry appeared in the character of an author. It is generally admitted, indeed, that Major was born in the year 1469. Henry, by reason of his blindness, could not himself have written his poetical effusions; and it may reasonably be supposed, from his dependent and ambulatory mode of life, that he could not employ an amanuensis properly qualified for the task. Hence may we account for the obscurity, and even for the apparent absurdity, of some passages in his work. Bating these imperfections, his descriptions are often so vivid, and his images so just, that he undoubtedly ranks higher, as a poetical writer, than either Barbour or Wyntown, who had all the advantages of a liberal education, such, at least, as the times could afford.

Mr. Pinkerton has thus expressed his sentiments concerning[Pg iii] this work: “It has great merit for the age, and is eminently curious. The language in a few places is not sense. When, by altering a word or two, the sense may be restored, attention to this will not only be allowable, but laudable in any proper editor; especially when we consider the singularity of the case, and that the poem is very good sense everywhere, save in perhaps a dozen lines at most.” List of Scotish Poets, xc.

The late elegant author of Specimens of Early English Poets has remarked; “That a man born blind should excel in any science is extraordinary, though by no means without example; but that he should become an excellent poet, is almost miraculous; because the soul of poetry is description. Perhaps, therefore, it may be easily assumed, that Henry was not inferior in point of genius either to Barbour or Chaucer, nor indeed to any poet of any age or country.” Ellis’s Spec. Vol. I. p. 354.

As the venerable Minstrel could not himself have written his poem, succeeding ages have never had it in their power to view him in his proper character. It is unquestionable, however, that he has not, in any edition hitherto published, appeared to such advantage as he might have done. Almost every editor, from the time of Andro Hart downward, used the same unpardonable liberty with his work as with that of Barbour, in attempting to render it more intelligible, by substituting for terms, which had become obsolete, or were going into desuetude, others more generally known. Thus, from gross misapprehension, the very sense of the poet was often lost. Even the edition of Perth, A. 1790, which professes to be an exact transcript from the MS., is still more inaccurate than that of the year 1714.

Although, from his disastrous circumstances, the principal fountain of knowledge was shut up to poor Henry, it is evident that he had made trial of every other within his reach. Knowing the facts of his blindness, itinerary life, and oral publication[Pg iv] of his poetry, the generality of readers, it may be presumed, have previously formed a contemptuous idea of the author, as if he had been a common ballad-singer, and have either read his book under the influence of this prepossession, or thrown it aside as unworthy of their attention. But it should be recollected, that the rank of a bard or minstrel was once very high among our forefathers; and that, although it had considerably fallen in repute by the time that Henry flourished, he did nothing that was deemed unworthy of the character when at its highest elevation. The language of Major has, it would appear, been understood according to the prejudices of our own time, not according to the sense which it must still have borne even in that age in which Henry lived, notwithstanding

the Act of James II. A. 1449, against “bardis, or vthirs siclyke rinnaris about.” Acts, Parl. X. c. 21. “He procured food and raiment by the recitation of his compositions.” Is this any thing different from what was invariably accounted the privilege of minstrels? Did Henry recite his poetry to the vulgar; did he stroll through cities, towns, or villages with this view? Not a hint of this kind is given; the very reverse is implied in the specification made by the historian. He recited his compositions “in vulgar poetry” indeed, but it was coram principibus, “in the presence of princes,” or “men of the highest rank.” Major uses the most honourable term that he could select, to show that even the most exalted in the kingdom did not deem themselves degraded by admitting the Minstrel into their presence, or by listening to his poetical narrative. He indeed says; Quæ vulgo dicebantur, carmine vulgari, in quo peritus est, conscripsit; but he does not mean by this to affix a stigma on Henry’s style of writing. The use

of the term vulgari, if not merely a paronomasia on the preceding one vulgo, can signify nothing more than that Henry did not write, as he himself did, in the language of the learned, which would have been lost even on men of the highest rank[Pg v] in that age. He does not mean to say that the diction of the Minstrel was low, and thus adapted merely to the vulgar; for then men of all ranks spoke in the same manner: but that his work, as being a collection of what was commonly related in Scotland concerning Wallace, was composed in the vernacular tongue. When he uses the phrase, in quo peritus est, he is not to be understood as uttering so gross a solecism, as to say that Henry was well skilled in the language of the lower classes, but that he was an adept in Scottish poetry; for it is evident that in quo more immediately refers to carmine. He designs to throw as little discredit on him by the phrase, victum et vestitum nactus est. For all that he could mean to assert by it is, that as the tables of the great were open to him, where, in former

times at least, a minstrel had the prerogative of an honourable seat, he had also, by established custom from time immemorial, as good a right to claim the raiment allotted to his vocation as the baron had to exact military service from his vassals. Hence, when speaking of this procurement, he qualifies his language by the following insertion,—quo dignus erat; applicable not merely to the hereditary claim of minstrels, but to the peculiar merit of Henry as sustaining this character.

I will not pretend to exculpate Henry from the charge of credulity. Far more, however, has been said as to his ignorance than can be well supported. We have no other standard of the measure of his knowledge than his own work; and this, there is every reason to think, much disfigured by unavoidable corruptions. But even judging from this, we have sufficient evidence that, from his early years, he must diligently have used all the means of information which were properly within his reach. He seems to have been pretty well acquainted with that kind of history which was commonly read in that period. He alludes to the history of Hector, of Alexander the Great, of Julius Cæsar, Book VIII. 845, 886, 961, &c., and to that of Charlemagne, whose army, at Ronceval in Navarre, being[Pg vi] betrayed by Ganelon, was defeated by the Saracens, Book VIII. 1256. XI. 837. V. Dict. de Trevoux, vo. Rouncevaux. With the romances that were most popular in that age he was perhaps as well acquainted as Barbour. He seems to have been familiar with that of Alexander; as, like the latter, he refers to

Gaudifer, Book X. 342. V. Note on The Bruce, B. II. 468.

His acquaintance with the popular romances is perhaps still more apparent from his style of writing. As it abounds, much more than that of Barbour, with poetical allusions to the face of nature, which the poor Minstrel had never beheld, to the change of the seasons, to the supposed influence of the planets or of the constellations; it is more richly strewed with the more peculiar phraseology of the writers of romance; whence a stranger to our chronology might be induced to view the Life of Wallace as of an older date than The Bruce, although nearly a century later. We meet with a variety of terms or phrases in Wallace, which, from the difference of his habits, do not seem to have been familiar with the good Archdeacon of Aberdeen, as frekis, frekis on fold; bane and lyre; brycht, and frely of fassoun, for a fair maid, &c. &c.

It is necessary to observe, that the Minstrel’s mode of expression is often very elliptical. In order to understand his meaning, the reader must therefore recollect, that he very commonly omits the pronouns, whether personal or relative. This, to those who are not familiar with the ancient style, has given him an air of absurdity, and has induced the idea of his being far more illiterate than we can reasonably suppose him to have been. Let us take an example or two among many.

The principal assertion is not, that the defenders were powerful in defence; but that they, being so powerful in[Pg vii] defence, guarded their town well. The reader must supply quha, or who, after defendouris.

“Wallace was well acquainted with the mayor, who kept the port of that village.”

The only means that occurred to me for rendering the sense of such elliptical passages more obvious, was to throw in a comma; as, after The mar, in the passage quoted.

It cannot be denied that the feelings of the reader are often harrowed up by the coarse description which the Minstrel gives of the warlike deeds of his hero, and by the delight which he seems to take in those merciless scenes in which the English were the immediate sufferers. But great allowance must be made for him, not merely from the barbarism of the time in which he wrote, and from his want of such opportunities of refinement as even Barbour enjoyed, but from the soreness which every thorough Scotchman still felt, in consequence of the unpardonable treachery, violence, and ferocity of Edward the First, and of those employed under him, and the disgraceful stigma they had endeavoured to fix on a nation that had been always independent and always extremely jealous of its liberty. If the manners of the age do not form a sufficient apology for the cruelty ascribed to Wallace himself; it should be recollected that Scotland had no other chance of liberation from the usurpation of Edward than by the diminution of the number of the

invaders, and that it was impossible for a few partisans to retain prisoners. Old Wyntown honestly defends Wallace on the grounds of the provocation given to him, and of his owing the English nothing.

There is a prayer at the beginning of the poem, which had been prefixed by the transcriber. It is thus given in Perth edition, Notes, p. 1.

The first line has been injured in the binding of the MS.; but it would seem that it should rather be read thus:

In all the editions of this work which I have seen, it is divided into twelve books; which are subdivided into chapters or sections, with rubrics prefixed, pointing out the principal matter of each division. I have observed the plan of the MS., which confines the work to eleven books, without any rubrics. Some, indeed, are marked on the margent; but evidently in a different hand-writing, by some early proprietor of the MS.

Mr Pinkerton has said; “The first and best edition I have yet seen is, imprentit at Edinburgh, be Robert Lekprevik, at the expensis of Henrie Charteris; and ar to be sauld in his buith, on the north syde of the gait abone the throne [trone?] Anno Do. MD. LXX. 4to. black letter. A fine copy of this edition is in the British Museum among Queen Elizabeth’s books: this has no title-page; but the second title is, The Actis and Deidis of the illuster and vailyeand Campioun Schir William Wallace, Knicht of Ellerslie.” List of Scotish Poets, XC, XCI.

This edition I have never had an opportunity of inspecting.[Pg ix] The oldest that I have seen, after every possible inquiry, is an imperfect one in quarto, formerly the property of Mr George Paton, of the Customs here, now in my possession. It wants the title-page, part of the first leaf, and the last sheet, which must have contained about fifteen pages, besides being imperfect in one or two other places. The title, printed on page first, seems to have been the same with the second title of Edit. 1570, with this difference, that in mine Wallace is denominated “the maist illuster,” &c. Besides that of 1570, Mr Pinkerton mentions only another edition in 4to, Edin. 1594. I have therefore ventured to quote this as the edition of that year.

Dr Mackenzie seems either to have been unacquainted with any prior edition, or to have preferred this to that of 1570; although, from his known character as a writer, it is most probable that he had never compared the editions to which he refers. “This book,” he says, “being highly esteem’d amongst the vulgar, has had many impressions; but the best are these, viz. that printed in the year 1594, and Andrew Hart’s, in the year 1620, both printed at Edinburgh, and that at Glasgow in the year, 1699.” &c.

Besides the edition of 1594, I have compared the MS. with Hart’s, 1620; and with one printed by Gedeon Lithgow, Edinburgh, 1648, which I have not seen mentioned by any writer. It is a neat edition, in small 8vo, black letter, pp. 343, in the square form of our more early publications. It has an introduction, entitled The Printer to the Reader, considerably larger than that prefixed to Hart’s, as it extends to nineteen pages. This contains an abridgment of the History of Scotland from the portentous death of Alexander III. A. 1285, to the year 1318. I have also consulted the Edinburgh edition of 1673, printed by Andrew Anderson, in twelves, pp. 252. This is considerably inferior in execution to the one last mentioned, although it seems to have been taken from it, with some slight changes of the orthography. The introduction to the former is[Pg x] reprinted verbatim; but there is added, after the Table of Contents, a poetical address of “Scrimger to Wallace, by reason of the false Menteith captive at London,” and the reply of

“Wallace to Scrimger, his Baner-man.” The following page contains a curious wood-cut of Wallace in armour, with his bow and quiver.

Mr Pinkerton mentions also editions at Edinburgh 1601, Aberdeen 1630, and Glasgow 1665, in 8vo. He adds; “There are many editions of the present [eighteenth] century, but bad. The very worst is that of Edinburgh, 1758, 4to., which the printer very expertly reduced to modern spelling, and printed in black letter, and in quarto; being exactly, in every point, the very plan which he ought not to have followed. The same sagacious personage gave Barbour’s Poem in the same way; and neither selling, (how could they?) the booksellers sometimes tear out the title, and palm them upon the ignorant as old impressions.” List of Scot. Poets, ut sup.

This is the edition which is here quoted in the Notes as that of 1714. For I have been assured, on good authority, that this edition, as well as that of The Bruce, was printed by Robert Freebairn, printer to his Majesty, in the year 1714 or 1715; but that, as he engaged in the rebellion in the year last mentioned, before the work was ready for publication, they were suffered to lie in a bookseller’s ware-house till A. 1758, when they were published, either without titles, or with titles bearing the false date of this year. As to the merit of these editions, I am under the necessity of differing from Mr Pinkerton. To me, the editions printed by Freebairn appear more correct than any of the preceding ones, and his Wallace even preferable to the Perth edition, A. 1790; as, bating the liberty used with regard to the orthography, they, in a great variety of instances, give the sense of the original writers more accurately, having evidently been collated with the MSS. of The Bruce and Wallace in the Advocates’ Library.

[Pg xi]

I flattered myself, that I might have had it in my power to have enriched this work by some valuable communications from the British Museum. Although, through the good offices of the Earl of Aberdeen, one of the trustees of this national repository, search has been made, nothing of importance has been discovered in regard to this period of our history. Henry Ellis, Esq. of the Museum, who, in the most obliging manner, offered every assistance in his power, has in a letter addressed to his Lordship, furnished two extracts from MSS., which have a claim to attention, at least as matters of curiosity. I shall take the liberty of communicating them in his own language:—

“I find nothing in the King’s, the Cottonian, or the Harleian Collections; but among the Donation Manuscripts, No. 4934, (in the first volume of Francis Peck’s Collections for a Supplement to Dugdale’s Monasticon), is a transcript of ‘Prioris Alnwicensis de Bello Scotico apud Dumbarr, tempore Regis Edwardi I. Dictamen, sive Rithmus Latinus quo de Willielmo Wallace, Scotico illo Robin Whood, plura, sed invidiose, canit.’ It is somewhat in the manner of Walter de Mapes, as your Lordship will perceive by the following specimens; and consists of sixty stanzas.

1.

46.

47.

[Pg xii]

48.

49.

“The above are the chief allusions in the poem to historical facts.

“There is another manuscript in the same collection, No. 1226, without a title-page, but apparently a composition of the time of King Charles the First, principally relating to the period of Scottish history in question. The work is divided into two books, and as it is possible that Dr Jamieson may know what it is from its contents, I will trouble your Lordship with the heads of the different chapters, the numbers of which are irregular.

‘Of the strif and debate that chanced betweine Robert de Bruce and John Ballioll, and how Edward Longshanks inwadit Scotland.’ Chap. 1.

‘Of the walliant deadis of Williame Wallace, in the defence of his Contrie.’ Chap. 2.

‘How Williame Wallace past to St Johnstone, and of the strange Combattis he had withe Englismen in that Jornay.’ Chap. 3.