Just at the moment when the victory hung trembling in the balance, a strange apparition turned the English pause into a panic. The Scotch wagoners and camp-followers, impatient of inactivity, had hastily armed themselves with such knives, clubs, and rejected weapons as were at hand, improvised banners of tent cloth and plaids, and came marching over the hill, fifteen thousand strong. They made a “splurge” and a racket, in inverse ratio to their real formidableness; but coming directly after the staggering attack of Bruce’s reserves, they had all the appearance to the English of large reinforcements. “When they marked the seeming show Of fresh, and fierce, and marshaled foe, The boldest broke away.” Thus the cooks and hostlers precipitated the English defeat and panic. Edward would have thrown himself away in a personal effort to turn the defeat, but Sir Giles de Argentine seized his horse’s bridle and led him out of the fight. Having despatched him and a few faithful comrades toward the coast, De Argentine said, “As for me, retreating is not part of my business;” and plunging into the fight, hopelessly and uselessly, was slain. The king by hard riding reached Dunbar and escaped by sea to London. The retreat was more disastrous to the English than the battle. The bare-legged, bare-headed, bare-armed Scotch, with their long knives, drove their enemies in large numbers into the river Forth; and Barbour says the Bannock creek was so choked up that one might walk dry-shod from bank to bank on the drowned horses and men. The English loss was ten thousand; among them twenty-seven nobles, two hundred knights and seven hundred esquires, while twenty-two nobles and sixty knights were made prisoners. The pursuit continued for miles, every step marked by blood and booty. Those old knights went soldiering in great style; their military establishments were enormous and rich. The English camp was taken, with great booty in treasure, jewels, rich robes, fine horses, herds of cattle, droves of sheep and hogs (great eaters, those old English!), machines for the siege of towns, wagon loads of grain and portable mills; the train of wagons which carried the treasure into Scotland was sixty miles long. The king’s tent and treasure were captured, including the royal signet-ring. One prisoner was a talented Carmelite friar whom Edward had brought along to celebrate his anticipated victory in verse; but Bruce compelled him to buy his own release by writing a poem glorifying the Scotch victory instead.