ng whether they ought not to cut down their king's prisoner
rather than let him be rescued; and meanwhile the cry, 'Save King James!'
broke out on all sides, knights leapt down to tender their homage, and
among the foremost Malcolm knew Sir Patrick Drummond, crying aloud, 'My
lord, my lord, we have waited long for you. Be a free king in free
Scotland! Trust us, my liege.'

'Trust you, my friends!' said James, deeply touched; 'I trust you with
all my heart; but how could you trust me if I began with a breach of
faith to the King of England?'

Ralf Percy held up his finger and nodded his head to the Yorkshire
squires, who stood open-mouthed, still believing that a Scot must be
false. There was an angry murmur among the Scots, but James gazed at
them undauntedly, as though to look it down.

'Yes, to King Harry!' he said, in his trumpet voice. 'I belong to him,
and he has trusted me as never prisoner was trusted before, nor will I
betray that trust.'

'The foul fiend take such niceties,' muttered old Douglas; but, checking
himself, he said, 'Then, Sir, give me your sword, and we'll have you home
as my prisoner, to save this your honour!'

'Yea,' said James, 'that is mine own, though my body be yours, and till
England put me to ransom you would have but a useless captive.'

'Sir,' said Sir John Swinton, pressing forward, 'if my Lord of Douglas be
plain-spoken, bethink you that it is no cause for casting aside this one
hope of freedom that we have sought so long. If you have the heart to
strike for Scotland, this is the time.'

'It is not the time,' said James, 'nor will I do Scotland the wrong of
striking for her with a dishonoured hand.'

'That will we see when we have him at Hermitage Castle,' quoth Douglas to
his followers. 'Now, Sir King, best give your sword without more
grimace. Living or dead you are ours.'

'I yield not,' said James. 'Dead you may take me--alive, never.' Then
turning his eyes to the faces that gazed on him so earnestly in
disappointment, in affection, or in scorn, he spoke: 'Brave friends, who
may perchance love me the better that I have been a captive half my life
and all my reign, you can believe how sair my heart burns for my bonnie
land's sake, and how little I'd reck of my life for her weal. But broken
oaths are ill beginnings. For me, so notably trusted by King Henry, to
break my bonds, would shame both Scots and kings; and it were yet more
paltry to feign to yield to my Lo