The Book of English Folk Tales

by Sybil Marshall

  The crowds blocked the way, and in spite of the Roman’s swords and staves, the journey was slow. The little bridge was so crowded that passage across it was impossible. Alban grew impatient at the delay, and said so to his executioner, who was, to say the least of it, surprised. So, while the soldiers attempted to clear the bridge, the soldier and his victim talked; but as fast as one crowd of onlookers was moved on, another took its place, and the delay grew tedious. Then Alban, anxious to be done with the business, announced his intention of crossing the river through the water, so as to come safely and quickly to the other side, and to the place of his execution. The Roman executioner, puzzled but impressed, stayed at his side. Some say they actually walked through the water, but there are those who declare that as soon as the feet of Alban touched it, the water of the Ver drew back on either side like the Red Sea before the feet of the Israelites, and allowed them dry passage. Whichever was the case, the executioner had lost all heart for his task by the time they reached the hilltop, and throwing down his sword, he declared before all the onlookers that he, too, wished to be a follower of Christ, and begged that he should be allowed to die by the side of Alban who had set him such a tremendous example.

  His plea was granted, and Alban and his only convert died together. But the fame of Alban began to spread even as the awed crowd went on their way homewards, and soon there was a whole body of tales about the miraculous things that had accompanied Alban’s martyrdom. Indeed, so holy grew the spot at which he had been done to death, that when Christianity was once more in the ascendant a little church was built over it, until, in the eighth century AD, Offa, King of Mercia, founded an abbey there.

  The fame of St Alban grew no less as the years went by, no doubt because the Christians had no wish to let the honour of their martyr diminish. Indeed, new dimensions were added to the story, little by little.

  Amphibalus, it appeared, had made good his escape, and after much travelling arrived in Wales to seek refuge in the wild valleys among the mountains; but the pursuit was not allowed to falter, and in Wales at last he was apprehended, and brought back to Verulam. In due course, he was led out some four miles from Verulam (to what later became Redbourne Common), and there done to death, and buried. That would have seemed to be the end of the incident, but it was not so.

  Some eight hundred years later, ‘a man of Walden’ was roused from his sleep in the small hours of the morning by the figure of a priest standing by his side. The ghostly visitant declared himself to be none other than Amphibalus, and said he had a mission for the man of Walden, whom he was visiting. It was that he should seek out the Abbot of St Albans, one Warren de Cambridge, and to him deliver a message, to the effect that the spot wherein the bones of Amphibalus lay was a sacred spot, and that action should be taken forthwith to ensure that in future it was venerated as it deserved.

  Abbots never being averse to a bit of saintly publicity, Warren listened, and thereafter set up some inquiries of his own regarding the whereabouts of Amphibalus’s remains. There was little difficulty as it happened. A layman of the abbey came forward, and confessed that he, too, had had a vision, this time from St Alban himself. In this vision, the saint had indicated to him the exact spot where Amphibalus had been buried; but, said the layman, his remains had already been removed to St Albans. And, as the ghostly saint had recounted to him, so the layman repeated to the abbot the wonders and marvels that had accompanied the disinterment and the journey. The shrine of St Alban himself had been carried out to meet the holy relics of his mentor, and to make the four-mile journey easier to accomplish, it had miraculously diminished itself in weight till it was borne along as if it had been as light as the feathers in ‘the costly feather work’ adorning the monks as they processed in ‘their rich garments and golden hoods’. Alas, it was a long, hot and dusty walk for them, because the summer had been one of almost unprecedented drought, and the fields lay burnt and brown on either side of their path, while crops withered and cattle died for want of water. But once the bones of Amphibalus had been unearthed, and the chanting procession started again on its way back to St Albans, from the blue unclouded sky the rain began to fall a most wonderful golden rain that revived all it fell on in an instant and, moreover, without wetting a single feather or gold thread on the finery of the monks, or the shrine of St Alban. So, singing, said the layman, through golden light and a golden shower, they had brought Amphibalus home to their abbey. The place wherein his bones were lying was truly venerated already, and once this story was known, would be even more so.

  To make assurance doubly sure, however, the abbot built upon the first grave of Amphibalus a church dedicated to St Mary de Pré, and a refuge for leprous women close by (as Matthew Paris reports). But church and hospital, like Alban and Amphibalus, have been swept away by time and now lie under the highway that today follows the track of the ancient Watling Street through modern Hertfordshire.

  Edmund the Holy

  Edmund, King of East Anglia, was a Christian confronted with the necessity of preserving his kingdom and his faith from the heathen Danes. This story is the English version of his conflict with Ragnar Lodbrok and Lodbrok’s sons. Ragnar Lodbrok’s Saga tells quite a different tale. (The explanation of why Ragnar was called ‘Lodbrok’ is taken from the saga.)

  The men from the North had their mouths full of proverbs. One of them was that if you save a man from drowning, no good will come of it. If legend is true, this proved to be the case with Edmund, King of East Anglia – though the Danes tell a very different story.

  In Denmark there lived a chieftain called Ragnar. His wife, Thora, was said to surpass all other women in beauty and grace, as the hart surpasses all other animals, besides which she was the most accomplished of all her peers in the matter of handwork. But while she was growing up into this paragon of beauty and virtue, she was guarded night and day by a fearsome snake. Any wooer had to get by the snake before he could come near enough to the maid to pour out his passion to her, and many died in the attempt.

  Ragnar, however, set himself to solve the problem. He had made for himself a pair of breeches and a cloak of animal skin with the hair-side outside. This was then boiled in pitch, and afterwards allowed to harden. Wearing this armour, he attacked the serpent and won the girl for his wife. This earned for him the nickname of Lod-brok, which means ‘Hairy-breeks’, and as Lodbrok he was always afterwards known.

  In the course of time, two sons were born to him, Inguar and Ubba, and he was a happy and contented enough king in his own country. One day he was out hunting – a favourite as well as a necessary sport – hoping to catch some of the waterfowl that were to be found among the islands near the coast of his realm. He loosed his favourite hawk, which pursued and struck its quarry, whereupon both birds plunged into the sea below. Lodbrok immediately launched a small boat to rescue his hawk, but no sooner had he done so than a violent storm arose, and swept the little craft out to sea before any of his men could get to his rescue. For several days Lodbrok was tossed about on the waves, until at last his tiny vessel was driven towards Britain, and he landed, weak and exhausted, at Reedham in Norfolk. (Reedham is now, of course, a fair distance inland; but it is reasonable to suppose that the coastline of East Anglia in the ninth century ad was very different, and Reedham quite accessible by water.)

  There he was found by some peasants, who from his appearance and clothes judged him to be a man of importance, and carried him to King Edmund.

  Edmund, besides being a devout Christian who felt it his duty to succour the needy, was impressed by his uninvited visitor; and in the same way, Lodbrok was impressed by the peaceable, mannerly order of King Edmund’s court. Besides, he wanted to make observations of Edmund’s military methods while he had the chance. So instead of asking to be sent back across the sea, he made it known that he would like to be allowed to remain awhile where he was. Edmund, of course, had no notion that he was entertaining a foreign king, though he recognized some good breeding in his guest.
He agreed that Lodbrok should stay, and soon became very fond of the stranger.

  Lodbrok missed his freedom to some extent, particularly his hunting; and as soon as he could he asked permission to accompany Edmund’s chief huntsman, Bern, on some of his expeditions.

  Of course it was not long before Lodbrok’s great skill as a huntsman became clear to everyone. He outstripped Bern in everything connected with the chase, and won the king’s approval day after day. Bern was humiliated, and more. He harboured the notion that the king was so fond of his new, foreign huntsman that as soon as it was convenient, he would be got rid of so that Lodbrok might take his place. His rancour grew to bitter hatred, and he made up his mind to dispose of his rival at the first opportunity. This came sooner than he had expected, when they were out alone together in the woods. Bern turned upon Lodbrok, who was quite unsuspecting, and killed him with one blow. Then he concealed the body under the bushes in a thicket, called up the dogs, and went home. But as it happened, there was one hound that Lodbrok had taken a great fancy to, and had trained specially, since he had come to Edmund’s court. This dog regarded Lodbrok as its master, and when all the rest followed Bern, it slunk back and set watch over Lodbrok’s body in the thicket.

  That night at supper, Edmund noticed the absence of his guest, and asked where he was. Bern replied that during the day’s chase he had become separated from Lodbrok, so that he had returned alone, and did not know where his companion had got to.

  At that moment, Lodbrok’s dog came padding into the hall.

  ‘Ah! Here is his dog!’ said the king with relief. ‘It is never far from him, so we can rest assured he is not far off now.’

  The dog went up to the king, and begged for food. He fed it, all the time expecting its master to appear; but supper was finished, and his uneasiness grew, because Lodbrok still did not come in. On the contrary, as soon as its hunger was satisfied the dog disappeared again. So it continued for the next few days, until Edmund, thoroughly alarmed by his guest’s prolonged absence, gave orders that the dog should be followed when it left the hall after being fed. This was done, and the hound led Edmund’s men straight to Lodbrok’s corpse.

  Edmund by this time had grown exceedingly fond of Lodbrok, but in any case it was his duty as law-giver that he should find out how the stranger had met his death. Suspicion fell upon Bern, who was soon charged and convicted of the murder. Then Edmund took counsel with his ‘captains and wise men of the court’ as to what punishment could be meet for such a crime. Their verdict was that Bern should be ‘put into the same boat in which Lodbrok had come to England and exposed on the sea without sail or oar, that it might be proved whether God would deliver him’.

  This was, accordingly, carried out. God did deliver him, and the boat drifted straight back to Denmark, to the very shores from which it had been driven in the first instance.

  As soon as it was beached, the Danes who rushed down to haul it in recognized it, and began to question the voyager eagerly, if menacingly, as to the fate of their king.

  Bern, treacherous murderer already, was now resolved on getting his own back on his former master. He had his tale ready, and described how Lodbrok had been cast ashore in East Anglia and taken to King Edmund, who had given orders immediately for Lodbrok to be killed. Then Bern had slipped away in Lodbrok’s boat to take the news home to his people.

  The anger of Lodbrok’s people knew no bounds at hearing this false tale, and they swore to be revenged. Led by Lodbrok’s two sons, Inguar and Ubba, they were soon an army of 20,000 men, and with Bern as guide they sailed for English shores. Now the wind was against them, and drove them northward, so that they landed at Berwick-on-Tweed, where their rage and ferocity was such that they slaughtered everyone they came upon, regardless of age, sex or anything else; and after a whole summer thus terrorizing the North, they went home again to Denmark for the winter.

  In the spring, however, they set out again, and this time landed their boats on the East Anglian coast. They ravaged the coast, burning villages and monasteries, and trying wherever and whenever possible to catch Edmund, defeat him and take their revenge for Lodbrok’s death.

  On one occasion they besieged him in one of his castle strongholds, and kept up the siege so long that all those inside the castle were in grave danger of starvation. Edmund realized that in their weakened condition they would be no match at all for the fierce Danes, and that the only salvation of the English lay in trickery. They had now left within the castle walls one bull, and a few bushels of wheat. When that was gone, there would be no alternative to surrender. Edmund ordered that the grain should be fed without stint to the bull. The bull grew fat and sleek within a few days on this good diet, and when it was in prime condition the king gave commands that it should be let out secretly, as if it had escaped by mischance, among the Danes.

  When sunrise showed the Danes what a prize had fallen to them, they laughed uproariously, gave chase to the bull and soon brought it down. Delighted at the prospect of such a splendid meal at the expense of their besieged enemies, they began to carve up the carcase, remarking at the same time what a fine beast it was, fattened up for the king’s table, no doubt. But when they opened up his stomach, they found it to be full of still undigested grain – and were amazed. As they saw it, they were wasting time absolutely in trying to starve out a garrison that had provisions enough to feed grain to their animals! So they raised the siege, and once again went home to Denmark.

  Again and again, however, they returned, and every time the English people suffered more than the time before, till there was hardly a homestead in East Anglia that had not been raided, or a town that had not been burned. The monks of Ely, Peterborough, Thorney and Crowland had been driven from their abbeys. While Ubba stayed on at Ely to guard the spoils. Inguar took an army and set out for Thetford, where Edmund had his court; but the king was a few miles away with his army, at a village called Hoxne. Before he could return, Thetford had been pillaged and plundered, and put to the torch. Then Inguar sent envoys to Edmund, with an offer that if the English king would surrender and become a Danish vassal, he should share what spoils there were. Edmund disdained to reply, and led his men into battle, meeting the invaders at Snarehill, just outside Thetford. The battle lasted from dawn to dusk, with great slaughter on both sides (indeed, it is said that the mounds still visible on the heathlands thereabouts cover the bones of those slain during that terrible day). Next morning, the invaders were in retreat; but Ubba had made a march from Ely with ten thousand men to reinforce his brother, and Edmund could do no more. His exhausted troops were defeated, and Edmund ‘yielded his own person to the torment, to save more Christian blood’.

  Torment indeed was what the heathen Danes meted out to the unlucky king. Report has it that they beat him with bats, and scourged him with whips, but his still continuing to call on the name of Jesus drove them well nigh to fury. They bound him to a tree and made sport of sending their arrows through him till, mercifully, he died. Then contemptuously they hacked his head from his body, and kicked it into a nearby bush. So ended the battle of Hoxne, where a stone was afterwards set up to mark the spot at which Edmund had been bound to the tree to die. (He was avenged, at last, by the men of Devon, who defeated the brothers Inguar and Ubba seven years later near Bideford, and killed both – according to a story from Devon.)

  When the last of the victorious Danes had departed, a few of Edmund’s faithful followers who had survived the battle crept out to recover the body of their dead king. They found it, headless, sagging in the bonds that bound it, and pinned by many an arrow to the tree. They took it down, and reverently buried it in a nearby chapel. Then they set about the task of burying their dead comrades, searching all the time for the head of their revered and saintly king as they did so. After forty days of looking, they were ready to admit defeat and give up, when one day they were startled by a voice, sounding exactly like that of their lost leader, shouting, ‘Here! Here! Here!’ Running towards the sou
nd, they parted the bushes – and there lay the severed head, absolutely uncorrupted, between the paws of a great shaggy wolf, whose attitude was shown at once to be only that of protection. Indeed, when they went to remove the head from its custody, it made no effort to prevent them, but after watching them bear it reverently away, the ‘unkouthe thing, so strange ageyn nature’, simply turned and trotted peacefully away among the trees.

  So the head was carried to the chapel, to be interred with the body – when another miracle took place. No sooner had the head been placed with the corpse than it miraculously joined itself on again, leaving no more than a faint red mark to show that it had ever been separated.

  From that time on, the tomb of Edmund became a place of pilgrimage, so many were the miracles the dead king performed. At last, in 903, the temptation to appropriate such a splendid relic overcame the Abbot of Beodricsworth. He prepared a wooden shrine for it, and his monks translated it. Thereafter, what had been Beodricsworth became known as St Edmundsbury (or, as we should now say, Bury St Edmunds).

  Still the story was not finished. When the Danes raided yet again, the body was taken to London for safety. Brought back again, it was honoured by a stone church to replace the wooden one, and at a still later date Baldwin, the first Norman abbot, built the beautiful one which fell into ruins only at the Dissolution.

  In the meantime, however, the saint continued to perform his wonderful deeds, as, for instance, when King Sweyn had sworn to destroy St Edmundsbury and put to death every man, woman and child within the town. With this evil intention he set out from Gainsborough; but on the way, he was suddenly confronted by the ghost of St Edmund, seated on a horse, ‘clothed in full harness, and with a sword in his hands’.

  Terror flooded through the Danish king, and he cried aloud for help, but the ghostly martyr-king rode straight at him, bore him down, and thrust the sword right through him. Then the phantom dissolved into thin air, while the flesh and blood king writhed in agony for a few lingering hours, and then died.