SOURCE: "Of the Bruce," in The "Wallace" and the "Bruce" Restudied, P. Hanstein's Verlag, 1900, pp. 85-155.

In the following excerpt, Brown argues that The Bruce has been extensively altered by a later editor.

Gi; … John Ramsay's Hand in the Bruce. =~ S… John Ramsay's Hand in the Bruce.

Do the Cambridge and Edinburgh manuscripts of The Bruce preserve the work of John Barbour in its original form, due allowance being made for fifteenth century orthography of the scribe: or do they exhibit the fourteenth century poem in a form more or less recast, amplified and embellished by an editor in the succeeding century? That question without doubt is of far more importance than anything concerning Barbour's authorship of The Stewartis Orygynalle, the Troy Book, Legends of the Saints or The Brut.

Some years ago, after repeated perusal of The Bruce, I began to suspect that another and later hand...