[1] Hemingburgh also gives February 10; Rishanger, Walsingham, and others give January 29. It is the difference between iv. _Id._ Feb. and iv. _Kal._ Feb. Probably both dates are wrong. The true date, it is suggested, is January 27--'Thursday next before Carne-prevyum' (_Cal._ ii., p. 486, under August 4, 1306). [2] So say the modern authorities. The chroniclers call him Bruce's 'nephew,' and Bruce himself calls him 'nepos'; and Boece calls him David's 'cousin.' But is not 'nephew' used here, not in the present strict sense, but in the wider sense of young relative? Bruce's father and mother were married not before 1270 at earliest. Isabel was married to the King of Norway on November 15, 1293; and probably the marriage was in contemplation when her father and she went to Norway in autumn, 1292. Was she a widow, then, at 21? Randolph was present with his father at proceedings in the Succession case at Berwick in August 1292. If, then, he was the son of Isabel, he must have been a mere child--five or six at most. If there was another sister Isabel (Bain), the age difficulty remains. Was Isabel--if Isabel _was_ Randolph's mother's name--not the sister, but the aunt, of Bruce? And was Randolph really Bruce's _cousin_? [3] Visage. [4] Somewhat gray (swarthy). [5] Hair. [6] Limbs. [7] Bones. [8] Shoulders broad. [9] Lean. [10] Lisped. [11] Became. Transcriber's Notes: Punctuation and spelling were made consistent when a predominant preference was found in this book; otherwise they were not changed. Simple typographical errors were corrected; occasional unbalanced quotation marks retained. Ambiguous hyphens at the ends of lines were retained. Page 35: Unmatched closing single quotation mark after "is a traitor'". Page 43: "David ap Griffith" means "son of" (Welch origin). End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of King Robert the Bruce, by A. F. Murison