banished for
life. The king was to appoint officers only with the consent of the
barons, without which he was not to go to war nor leave the kingdom.
The ordinances may have been justified in so far as they restrained
the authority of a king so incapable as Edward II. Constitutionally
their acceptance was a retrograde step, as, like the Provisions of
Oxford, they placed power in the hands of the barons, passing over
Parliament as a whole. Edward agreed to the ordinances, but refused to
surrender Gaveston. The barons took arms to enforce their will, and in
=1312=, having captured Gaveston, they beheaded him near Warwick
without the semblance of a trial.

22. =Success of Robert Bruce. 1307--1314.=--Whilst Edward and the
barons were disputing Bruce gained ground rapidly. In =1313= Stirling
was the only fortress of importance in Scotland still garrisoned by
the English, and the English garrison bound itself to surrender on
June 24, =1314=, if it had not been previously relieved. Even Edward
II. was stirred by this doleful news, and in =1314= he put himself at
the head of an army to relieve Stirling. Lancaster, however, and all
whom he could influence refused to follow him, on the ground that the
king had not, in accordance with the ordinances, received permission
from the barons to go to war. On June 24 Edward reached Bannockburn,
within sight of Stirling. Like his father, he brought with him English
archers as well as English horsemen, but he foolishly sent his archers
far in advance of his horsemen, where they would be entirely
unprotected. Bruce, on the other hand, not only had a small body of
horse, which rode down the archers, but he strengthened the defensive
position of his spearmen by digging pits in front of his line and
covering them with turf. Into these pits the foremost horses of the
English cavalry plunged. Edward's whole array was soon one mass of
confusion, and before it could recover itself a body of gillies, or
camp-followers, appearing over a hill was taken for a fresh Scottish
army. The vast English host turned and fled. Stirling at once
surrendered, and all Scotland was lost to Edward. Materially, both
England and Scotland suffered grievously from the result of the battle
of Bannockburn. English invasions of southern Scotland and Scottish
invasions of northern England spread desolation far and wide, stifling
the germs of nascent civilisation. Morally, both nations were in the
end the gainers. The hardi