and courage were gone.

Bruce had given up all as lost. He was about to run away from Scotland,
and to leave the country in the hands of his enemies.

Full of sorrow, he lay stretched on a pile of straw in the poor
woodchopper's hut. While he lay thinking, he noticed a spider spinning
her web.

The spider was trying to spin a thread from one beam of the cottage to
another. It was a long way between the beams, and Bruce saw how hard a
thing it was for her to do.

"She can never do it," thought the king.

The little spider tried it once and failed She tried it twice and
failed. The king counted each time. At length she had tried it six times
and had failed each time.

"She is like me," thought the king. "I have tried six battles and
failed. She has tried six times to reach the beam and failed."

Then starting up from the straw, he cried, "I will hang my fate upon
that little spider.

If she swings the seventh time and fails, then I will give up all for
lost. If she swings the seventh time and wins, I will call my men
together once more for a battle with the enemy."

The spider tried the seventh time, letting herself down upon her slender