But although appalled and checked
for a brief space by the suddenness of the assault, and the
masses of rock which the enemy rolled down from the precipices,
Bruce, at the head of his division, pressed up the side of the
mountain. Whilst this party assaulted the men of Lorn with the
utmost fury, Sir James Douglas and his party shouted suddenly
upon the heights in their front, showering down their arrows upon
them; and, when these missiles were exhausted, attacking them
with their swords and battle-axes. The consequence of such an
attack, both in front and rear, was the total discomfiture of the
army of Lorn; and the circumstances to which this chief had so
confidently looked forward, as rendering the destruction of Bruce
almost inevitable, were now turned with fatal effect against
himself. His great superiority of numbers cumbered and impeded
his movements. Thrust by the double assault, and by the peculiar
nature of the ground, into such narrow room as the pass afforded,
and driven to fury by finding themselves cut to pieces in detail,
without power of resistance, the men of Lorn fled towards Loch
Eitive, where a bridge thrown over the Awe, and supported upon
two immense rocks, known by the name of the Rocks of Brandir,
formed the solitary communication between the side of the river
where the battle took place and the country of Lorn.
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