Conscience of the King

by Alfred Duggan

  That first year we lived well, for the crops had been sown before our invasion began, and we had nothing to do but harvest them as they ripened. But the future was doubtful. We were right in the middle of Britain, and there were organized Roman states on our western border; any day they might send a confederate army to drive us out. That meant that it was unsafe to scatter to different ploughlands. Once again the dream of every barbarian invasion had failed to materialize; it would have been very nice to have ruled as a warrior aristocracy over a population of hard-working peasants, like the Goths in the south, but my men were too savage to refrain from killing the goose that might have laid golden eggs. Luckily we had captured more sheep and cattle than we could eat at once, so we had a little stock of breeding animals to begin the next year. But it was not the kind of life that satisfied my instinct for civilization; nomad shepherds can keep a sort of culture, particularly in military affairs, but isolation in family groups leads to the decay of traditional learning.

  I talked over the problem with Cynric. We decided that at all costs we must keep in touch with the coast, and encourage a stream of lower-class immigrants from Germany. We still had the one ship, and sent it on several voyages that summer to bring back working settlers; these began to clear the valleys by the Sea of Vectis.

  But the life that I planned was not what the warriors wanted. The whole Empire was a prize for adventurous swords, and in other places more valuable plunder was to be gained than mutton and woollen cloaks. Many nobles left me in the autumn of 497, when they found that I intended to remain in the empty land that I had conquered. I was able to fill their places with other recruits, to whom good food was a greater booty than gold; but these were not so well born or so well armed, or above all so capable of absorbing civilization. I was worried about what would happen if we were attacked by a really good Roman comitatus.

  The only thing to do was to keep very quiet where I was, and trust that the increase in the numbers of my following would outweigh the decline in its quality. A professional Saxon raider was a match for three Romans; even peasant spearmen ought to be able to hold their own against equal numbers. These people brought their women with them, for they needed labour on the land; that was a stabilizing influence, since the women made them wash occasionally, and eat meals at stated times, and sleep under a roof. Men alone are always trying to prove how tough they are, and how like brute beasts they can live; without women they would soon run naked and forget how to speak.

  I did not marry again. I had brought bad luck to both Gertrude and Frideswitha, and it seemed I did not possess the art of ruling women. I was now forty-six years of age, and quite content to sleep alone most nights. It is unusual for a chieftain to be unmarried, and most of them want as many descendants as possible, but I had put all my eggs into one basket. I thought only of Cynric, who should have an undisputed succession, without kinsmen to intrigue against him. He was still attached to the memory of his unfortunate mother, and that was another reason for my celibacy; a stepmother often clouds the relationship between father and son.

  So I settled down as the ruler of a peasant folk; it was a small and backward country, and I did not make myself a laughing-stock by taking the title of King. But every year more settlers came, brought in my own ship and owing obedience to me, and more woods by the Sea of Vectis were cleared for the plough. I myself, with my dear son, lived in the open country to the north, and we herded our sheep from one hill-fort to another; the peasants of the coastland kept us supplied with bread and beer. We fought many little skirmishes with the miserable Celtic squatters, but we had no set battles with rival armies, and we ate abundantly, even in the spring. It was not the sort of life I had planned when I left Germany; then I had dreamed of ruling a subject population of civilized men, the ambition of every German raider; now I was nothing more than the war chief of a very barbarous band of nomads. But at least I had won the complete independence that had been my object since I was a child; the orders I could give my men were circumscribed by a thousand customary rights and obligations, but nobody could give me any orders at all.

  Every spring I led out small parties of scouts; we were careful not to attack any place that was guarded by well-armed men, but of course we destroyed any village that could not defend itself. In this way we won definite borders for our infant state, and our neighbours grew accustomed to having us there. To the south our country stretched to the sea, to the west there were the Roman states that were best left alone, and to the east, after many miles of empty forest and ruined farms, one would come to the outposts of the men of Kent. On the north we had no defined border; Londinium was now a deserted ruin, and there were no Roman cities south of the Thames, though warlike bands of Romans dwelt on the high hills north of it. In the valley itself the sons of the Saxon mercenaries I had led under Count Ambrosius still lived in peace in their riverside clearings. They now paid tribute to no ruler, and had settled down to a very savage and poverty-stricken life of fishing and hunting; when their weapons broke they had no metal to make new ones, and they had interbred with the lowest class of coloni, so that they had degenerated from even the low level of culture that they had managed to retain when I first knew them. They were a useful object-lesson of what happens to men who try to live an independent life without women of their own kind, or a competent ruler. But it fascinated me to think that they had come to their present home by the rivers that flow out on the east coast, and that we had met them coming from the south. The German invasions, after fifty years of steady infiltration, had mastered all the southeast of Britain, and there was not a walled city or a properly-run villa anywhere east of the territory of Corinium.

  I was not afraid of the Romans of the west; they had got used by degrees to owning only half of the island, and they were too busy murdering one another for the thrones of the remaining cities to undertake a war of conquest.

  For three years we lived in peace, the quietest period of my middle life. The land I ruled fell into two definite portions; in the north was the open chalk, a broken country of steep slopes and sudden valleys, where armies could move freely in any direction; in the south were the rivers, running through thick forest to the sheltered sea; they were swampy and liable to sudden flood, but small boats could bring new settlers with good German spears. In the north my little war-band of very inferior comrades moved peacefully from one hill-fort to the next, as our sheep ate the grazing; and in the valleys of the south the corn-lands increased year by year where new farmers cleared the woods.

  The year 500 passed in that peaceful manner. To me it was a landmark, as such a nice round number, but no Saxons counted the years, and I believe the Romans, hopelessly out of touch with the civilized world, now dated by the regnal years of their ephemeral Kings. I was in my fiftieth year, and Cynric was past his twenty-second birthday; though he was quite content with his position as my heir, and waited patiently for me to die a natural death. I might have ended my days as a petty war chief of the open chalk; but various dangers came upon me one after the other, and the action I was forced to take raised me to my present exalted position.

  My first trouble came not from the Romans, but from the side of Germany, and it was one I had long foreseen. In the full summer of the year 501 I was sitting quietly in a little hut of turf in the hill-fort where my band was halted. There was a light drizzle, and I was eating my supper under shelter, for I had already begun to suffer from the rheumatic pains that are the natural penalty of campaigning in the climate of Britain. My men were making the usual disgusting mess of their supper in the rain outside, and I was glad of the excuse to eat neatly and silently, with no companion except my son. German table-manners have always been the greatest trial I have had to endure while living among these barbarians, and they still offend me after fifty years. But I could not often indulge in the luxury of private meals; the Saxons know in their hearts that they are rather disgusting people, and they are always on the look-out for fancied insults. My rheumatism had gi
ven me the chance of a little treat, and I was enjoying myself talking sense to Cynric instead of bellowing war-songs with my dear comrades-in-arms.

  Then a messenger pushed his way, crouching, through the low door of the hut, and sat down beside me. Of course, there was no room to stand up, but a civilized man would at least have asked for permission before plumping himself down. He was only a farmer from the south coast, of the lowest class of Saxon who was counted as really free, but I had to shake him by the hand, and offer him food from my bowl, before I could ask him why he had left his squalid clearing to interrupt my rest. I have always managed to be a good comrade to the shaggiest barbarian, but even after all these years it is a strain, especially with very smelly peasants at meal-times.

  As a matter of fact he had important news, and he had done right to come and tell me. Two strange warships had come to land at Cerdics-ora by the Sea of Vectis, and the crews were helping themselves to the produce of the farms near the coast without paying for what they took; so far they had not killed anyone.

  My dear Cynric was for blowing the war-horn at once, and summoning the whole countryside to drive them to their ships; since they had come in only two we must outnumber them, and we ought to be able to make their stay uncomfortable, though pirates fight much better than farmers. But I persuaded him to sit quiet and talk it over, for that evening at least; I never start a war until I am pushed into it, and those two ships might be the forerunners of a fleet. My heart sank as I thought that from now on we would face that perpetual watch against seaborne raiders that had been the most unpleasant feature of my youth in Anderida; I suppose that men who settle down to grow corn in any part of the world are at once the target of every ruffian who would rather fight than dig, but it was a wearisome prospect. I held a council, to see if we could deal with the matter without fighting.

  My war-band at this time consisted of no more than fifty warriors who had never stiffened their muscles by doing useful work of any kind, though of course I could raise a large army of clumsy peasants; most of the ambitious and blood-thirsty men who had come with me from Germany had moved on in search of better plunder. Those who remained were happy to be at peace for as long as possible, and nobody enjoys waging war on pirates, who fight very fiercely and possess no riches, otherwise they would not have gone to sea. The chief thing in our favour was that we were hardly worth plundering either; the raiders could not have intended to come ashore in a German land, where all the craftsmen had long ago been killed, and the scanty gold and silver traded for weapons and ploughs. They would either sail farther west, or if they were seeking new corn-lands they could take axes and go into the forest, where there was room for all.

  So my captains decided, and from their point of view they were sensible; but it might make my position very shaky if an independent leader shared my territory. We arranged that I should try to get into peaceful discussion with the new arrivals; I sat up late with Cynric, planning how I could keep the leadership of my own men, and if possible become the war chief of the pirates also. It depended on the personality of their present leader. He might be a man who kept his oath, and in that case I could make him my subordinate and ally, as though he was a barbarian chief seeking employment from a Roman ruler; but that was how all the trouble had started between Vortigern and Hengist, long ago, and I knew that sworn promises seldom checked a leader of pirates if he saw a chance of bettering his position. I could not make any firm plans until I had met him and sized him up.

  In the morning the whole war-band started south; I went ahead with the ten best-dressed men as an escort, and we marched openly along the track, without attempting to scout for an ambush. But half a mile behind came the rest of the warriors, with a crowd of armed peasants; they marched with their swords loose in the scabbard, ready to come to our rescue as soon as they heard the alarm. Cynric led them, and I knew he would do his best to save us if we were received with treachery. Most rulers would never have dared to put their safety into the hands of the heir to all that they possessed; but Cynric was the prop of my old age.

  We spent a night in camp on the road, for the journey was longer than a comfortable day’s march, and I had decided against riding the wretched little ponies that we sometimes used. We would look more impressive if we walked steadily in close order than if we straggled along the trail on those cow-hocked, razor-backed nags, that always stopped to nibble the grass of the wayside when you wanted them to keep together. Even the kindliest critic could not say that Saxons are good horsemen, and a dozen of them riding together are a horrid sight.

  On the second day we marched along the track, singing to keep our paces in unison, with a green and leafy branch borne in front of the little procession. So many wars have started by accident; because two bodies of armed men had to approach closely to discuss terms, and some nervous ass drew his sword, out of sheer fright. On the other hand, it would be putting an appalling strain on the honour of a pirate commander if I walked up to his camp by myself, without escort. His sentries would see the army marching half a mile behind; but they would only conclude that they had to deal with a sensible and experienced war-band, that wanted peace but could defend itself at a pinch. For the same reason we pretended not to notice the fresh footprints of their scouts when we passed them on the track, and kept our eyes turned away from the bushes; I gave strict orders that no one was to see a stranger until we had reached the main camp, and begun to parley.

  Our peasants, who had fled from the pirates, were also hiding in the woods. They did not show themselves to my small escort, but came out of their refuge to join the supporting force, and Cynric had the sense to send forward a messenger with their news. It appeared that the pirates were not seeking war; they had given everyone time to run away before they pillaged a farm, they had not killed the sick who had to be left behind, and after helping themselves to what they wanted they had left the huts unburned. This information cheered me up; the newcomers would not be so careful to avoid starting a blood-feud unless they intended to have peaceful dealings with us in future.

  It was quite late in the afternoon that at last we arrived at the pirates’camp. The track led to a little creek where the woods had been cleared. Just outside we found a small body of pirates; they had evidently been told by their scouts how many men I had with me, for their guard was of exactly the same strength, and their leader stood in front, waving a green branch. I gave a sigh of relief; we had managed to get into touch without fighting; now surely my Roman education would give me the advantage, when it came to negotiating with an ignorant barbarian.

  Our respective escorts remained about fifty yards apart, and I met their leader alone. We began, of course, by giving our names, and the names of our ancestors right back to Woden. He was called Port, and he had with him his two sons, Baeda and Maegla, and two shiploads of lesser warriors, all Saxons. Germans never lie about their descent, and I accepted this quite easily, but the reason he gave for coming to my small and ravaged land was really very extraordinary. He said that he had had the misfortune to kill a peculiarly sacred bear, and that the witch who was the servant and guardian of the animal had told him that to avert the unpleasant consequence of his sacrilege he must sail to a land already called by his own name, where the local priest would have power to cleanse him of his guilt. He had inquired diligently from travellers in his part of Germany, and at last had heard there was an old Roman city on the shore of the Sea of Vectis called Portus. Then he gathered a war-band, including both his sons, and here he was.

  I say that this story struck me as extraordinary, although it is a fair example of barbarian witchcraft. That is because he was the first German I had met who put himself to inconvenience for religious motives; the Germans have a great quantity of religious beliefs, and a whole crowd of competing gods and goddesses; but no great poet has ever brought order into their Pantheon, as Homer did for civilized men, and they worship whichever Divine Power they find most handy. The normal German thing to do, if you have the m
isfortune to kill the sacred bear of Freya, is to switch over at once and worship Thor instead. Germans have an enviable capacity for proving to themselves that whatever they did was really right, or at least that it was the fault of someone else; Port was the first who had ever to my knowledge suffered from remorse.

  Of course, I pretended to credit everything that he said; if I had not, the fighting would have begun at once. I pointed out politely that I had a prior claim to anything of value that might remain in the deserted city of Portus; but the whole land was underpopulated, and he was welcome to dwell there, if he would come to my war-band and be my faithful companion. I ought soon to be able to learn whether he was really a priest-ridden ass, or whether some deep scheme lay at the back of this astonishing tale.

  He was delighted to be given his spiritual home without having to fight for it, and we embraced before the two escorts. Then we all went into his camp, and feasted on cattle stolen from my farms; but in future we arranged that he should pay, or at least owe, for the food his men needed until they had harvested their first crop. After supper, Port spoke again of the need to get himself cleansed from the blood-guilt of the sacred bear. His earnest request for the services of the local priest put me in a difficult position. For the last six years I and all my followers had got on very well without any holy men at all; now here was my new ally inquiring earnestly for a priest, who would have to perform a fairly complicated ritual.

  I filled the gap myself. I did not want to detail a comrade to act as a temporary priest, for it might have put ideas into his head; a ruler must always beware of those who pretend to know the will of the gods, and take it upon themselves to proclaim what the laity should do. We have no bears in the south of Britain, otherwise the obvious thing would have been to order Port to sacrifice pretty heavily to the first bear he met; but I made up a most colourful and impressive ritual. I made him fast for a whole day, and sacrifice his jewelled sword-belt by hanging it in a tree where I could retrieve it later; he also provided a Roman, though they were scarce in the neighbourhood, who was burnt in a large fire at midnight; I then recited as much as I could remember of the Penitential Psalms; as a climax to the whole proceeding I baptized him. The joke is that the baptism was probably valid, for I am a baptized Christian myself; if there is any truth in what I was taught as a child, Port must have been very surprised when he died shortly afterwards.