' It is
supposed that David II.--who died in 1370--had urged Barbour to engage
in the work, which was not, however, completed till the fifth year of
his successor, Robert II., who gave our poet a pension on account of it.
This consisted of a sum of ten pounds Scots from the revenues of the
city of Aberdeen, and twenty shillings from the burgh mails. Mr James
Bruce, to whose interesting Life of Barbour, in his 'Eminent Men of
Aberdeen,' we are indebted for many of the facts in this narrative,
says, 'The latter of these sums was granted to him, not merely during
his own life, but to his assignees; and the Archdeacon bequeathed it to
the dean, canons, the chapter, and other ministers of the Cathedral of
Aberdeen, on condition that they should for ever celebrate a yearly mass
for his soul. At the Reformation, when it came to be discovered that
masses did no good to souls in the other world, it is probable that this
endowment reverted to the Crown.'
Barbour also wrote a poem under what seems now the strange title, 'The
Brute.' This was in reality a metrical history of Scotland, commencing
with the fables concerning Brutus, or 'Brute,' who, according to ancient
legends, was the great-grandson of Aeneas--came over from Italy, the
land of his birth--landed at Totness, in Devonshire--destroyed the
giants who then inhabited Albion--called the island 'Britain' from his
own name, and became its first monarch.
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