As they did so Wallace reunited his bands, and pressed hard upon them.

At Linlithgow he fell upon their rear and inflicted heavy loss, and so hotly did he press them that the great army was obliged to retreat rapidly across the Border, and made no halt until it reached the fortress of Carlisle.
That it was compulsion alone which forced Edward to make his speedy retreat we may be sure from the fact that after the victory of Dunbar he was contented with nothing less than a clean sweep of Scotland to its northern coast, and that he repeated the same process when, in the year following the battle of Falkirk, he again returned with a mighty army.

Thus decisive as was the battle of Falkirk it was entirely abortive in results.
When the English had crossed the Border, Wallace assembled the few gentlemen who were still with him, and announced his intention of resigning the guardianship of Scotland, and of leaving the country.
The announcement was received with exclamations of surprise and regret.
"Surely, Sir William," Archie exclaimed, "you cannot mean it.

You are our only leader; in you we have unbounded confidence, and in none else.

Had it not been for the treachery of Comyn the field of Falkirk would have been ours, for had the horse charged when the English were in confusion round our squares they had assuredly been defeated.