Bruce a name unknown, unheard, unloved, that thou, too, breathest it
not?"

"My brother, my brave, my noble brother!--I saw it, I knew it! Thou wert
no changeling, no slavish neutral; but even as I felt, thou art, thou
wilt be! My brother, my brother, I may live and die for thee!" and the
young enthusiast raised his clasped hands above his head, as in
speechless thanksgiving for these strange, exciting news; his flushed
cheek, his quivering lip, his moistened eye betraying an emotion which
seemed for the space of a moment to sink on the hearts of all who
witnessed it, and hush each feeling into silence. A shout from the court
below broke that momentary pause.

"God save King Robert! then, say I," vociferated Alan, eagerly grasping
the knight's hand. "Sit, sit, Sir Knight; and for the love of heaven,
speak more of this most wondrous tale. Erewhile, we hear of this goodly
Earl of Carrick at Edward's court, doing him homage, serving him as his
own English knight, and now in Scotland--aye, and Scotland's king. How
may we reconcile these contradictions?"

"Rather how did he vanish from the tyrant's hundred eyes, and leave the
court of England?" inquired Nigel, at the same instant as the Countess
of Buchan demanded, somewhat anxiously--

"And Sir John Comyn, recognizes he our sovereign's claim? Is he amongst
the Bruce's slender train?"

A dark cloud gathered on the noble brow of the knight, replacing the
chivalric courtesy with which he had hitherto responded to his
interrogators. He paused ere he answered, in a stern, deep voice--