imminent peril did more for him than medicine or
change of air, and to the joy of his followers he began to recover
his strength. He was then moved down to the river Don. Here Buchan
and his English allies made a sudden attack upon his quarters,
killing some of the outposts. This attack roused the spirit and
energy of the king, and he immediately called for his war horse
and armour and ordered his men to prepare for action. His followers
remonstrated with him, but he declared that this attack by his
enemies had cured him more speedily than medicine could have done,
and heading his troops he issued forth and came upon the enemy
near Old Meldrum, where, after a desperate fight, Buchan and his
confederates were defeated with great slaughter on Christmas day,
1307. Buchan and Mowbray fled into England. Brechin took refuge
in his own castle of Brechin, where he was afterwards besieged and
forced to surrender.

Bruce now marched into the territory of Comyn, where he took a terrible
vengeance for the long adhesion of his hated enemy to England. The
whole country was wasted with fire and sword, the people well nigh
exterminated, and the very forests destroyed. So terrible was the
devastation that for generations afterwards men spoke of the harrying
of Buchan as a terrible and exceptional act of vengeance.

The castle of Aberdeen was next invested. The English made great
efforts for its succour, but the citizens joined Bruce, and a
united attack being made upon the castle it was taken by assault
and razed to the ground. The king and his forces then moved into
Angus. Here the English strongholds were all taken, the castle
of Forfar being assaulted and carried by a leader who was called
Phillip, a forester of Platane. With the exception of Perth, the
most important fortress north of the Forth, and a few minor holds,
the whole of the north of Scotland, was now in the king's hands.
In the meantime Sir James Douglas, in the south, had again taken
his paternal castle and had razed it to the ground. The forests of
Selkirk and Jedburgh, with the numerous fortresses of the district,
were brought under the king's authority, and the English were several
times defeated. In the course of these adventures Sir James came
across Alexander Stewart, Thomas Randolph, the king's nephew,
who, after being taken prisoner at Methven, had joined the English
party, and Adam O'Gordon. They advanced with a much superior force
to capture him, but were