As Wallace ceased, and was retiring from the ground, several old men, and young women with their babes in their arms, rushed from behind the ranks, and throwing themselves at his feet, caught hold of his hands and garments. "We go," said the venerable fathers, "to pray for your welfare; and sure we are, a crown will bless our country's benefactor, here or in heaven!" "In heaven," replied Wallace, shaking the plumes of his bonnet over his eyes, to hide the moisture which suffused them; "I can have no right to any other crown." "Yes," cried a hoary-headed shepherd, "you free your country from tyrants, and the people's hearts will proclaim their deliverer their sovereign!" "May your rightful monarch, worthy patriarch," said Wallace, "whether a Bruce of a Baliol, meet with equal zeal from Scotland at large; and tyranny must then fall before courage and loyalty!" The women wept as they clung to his hand and the daughter of Ireland, holding up her child in her arms, presented it to him. "Look on my son!" cried she, with energy; "the first word he speaks shall be Wallace; the second liberty. And every drop of milk he draws from my bosom, shall be turned into blood to nerve a conquering arm, or to flow for his country!" At this speech all the women held up their children toward him. "Here," cried they, "we devote them to Heaven, and to our country! Adopt them, noble Wallace, to be thy followers in arms, when, perhaps, their fathers are laid low!" Unable to speak, Wallace pressed their little faces separately to his lips, then returning them to their mothers, laid his hand on his heart, and answered in an agitated voice. "They are mine!-my weal shall be theirs--my woe my own." As he spoke he hurried from the weeping group, and emerging amid the cliffs, hid himself from their tears and their blessing. He threw himself on a shelving rock, whose fern-covered bosom projected over the winding waters of Loch Lubnaig, and having stilled his own anguished recollections, he turned his full eyes on the lake beneath; and while he contemplated its serene surface, he sighed, and thought how tranquil was nature, till the rebellious passions of man, wearying of innocent joys, disturbed all by restlessness and invasion on the peace and happiness of others. The mists of evening hung on the gigantic tops of Ben Ledi and Ben Vorlich; then sailing forward, by degrees obscured the whole of the mountains, leaving nothing for the eye to dwell on but the long silent expanse of the waters below.