And he that all our comfort was,
Our wit and all our governing,
Is brought, alas, here to ending;
. . . . .
Alas! what shall we do or say?
For in life while he lasted, aye
By all our foes dred were we,
And in many a far country
Of our worship ran the renown,
And that was all for his person.'"

Barbour ends his book by telling of how the Douglas set out to
carry the heart of the Bruce to Palestine, and of how he fell
fighting in Spain, and of how his dead body and the King's heart
were brought back to Scotland.

Barbour was born about six years after the battle of Bannockburn.
As a boy he must have heard many stories of these stirring times
from those who had taken part in them. He must have known many a
woman who had lost husband or father in the great struggle. He
may even have met King Robert himself. And as a boy he must have
shared in the sorrow that fell upon the land when its hero died.
He must have remembered, when he grew up, how the people mourned
when the dead body of the Douglas and the heart of the gallant
Bruce were brought home from Spain. But in spite of Barbour's
prayer to be kept from saying "ought but soothfast thing," we
must not take The Bruce too seriously. If King Robert was a true
King he was also a true hero of romance. We must not take all
The Bruce as serious history, but while allowing for the truth of
much, we must also allow something for the poet's worship of his