by A. D. Crake
CHAPTER XXVIII. AESCENDUNE ONCE MORE.
"Last scene of all,Which ends this strange eventful history."
Once more we must ask our readers to accompany us to Aescendune--itis for the last time--to witness the final scenes recorded in theseveracious Chronicles.
Thirty-four years have passed since the battle of Hastings; and ourtale has now advanced to the autumn of the last year of theeleventh century.
The face of the country is little altered since we last beheld it,so far as the works of God are concerned: the woods, His firsttemples, and the everlasting hills stand, as when Elfric and hisbrother hunted therein with Prince Edwy, or the sainted Bertricsuffered martyrdom in the recesses of the forest, at the hands ofthe ruthless Danes {xxix}.
But the works of man are more transitory, and in them there is agreat change. The Norman castle rebuilt by Etienne stands whereerst stood the Anglo-Saxon hall; the new Priory of St. Wilfred'sresembles that of St. Denys in architecture, although it bears thename of the old English saint, to whose honour the first sacredpile, erected by Offa of Aescendune was dedicated; the houses whichdot the scene are of a more substantial character; stone issuperseding wood. Whatever were its darker features, the Normanconquest brought with it a more advanced civilisation, especiallyas expressed in architecture {xxx}.
Within her bower, as the retiring apartments of the lady of thecastle were termed, sat Edith of Aescendune, not the first who hadborne that name. She had now passed middle age, and her years wouldsoon number half a century, yet time had dealt very kindly withher, and but few shades of grey appeared amidst her locks. Thetraces of a gentle grief were upon her, but men said she mournedfor the absence of her lord and her eldest son, and her thoughtsseemed far away from the embroidery at which she worked with hermaidens--an altar frontal for the priory church.
She thought of the far East--of the sandy wastes of Syria. Or herfancy painted the holy city, with her dear ones as worshippers inits reconquered shrines.
For she had not found an unkind lord in Etienne. The scenes whichhe had passed through, as related in the earlier pages of thisChronicle, had produced fruit for good, which Lanfranc (under whosespiritual guidance he placed himself) had zealously tended andfostered.
He dared not think of his father, of whose guilt he could not butbe unwillingly convinced; nor was it true in his case:
"He who's convinced against his willIs but an unbeliever still."
But there was one act of mercy of which he had been the object,which above all influenced and changed his heart towards theEnglish. And that was the Christian charity he had received fromthe aged Englishwoman, the nurse of Wilfred, whose son Eadwin hehad so cruelly slain in the Dismal Swamp.
Acting under the advice of Lanfranc, he had sought and obtainedEdith in marriage, and had thereby, like Henry Beauclerc, unitedthe claims of conquerors and conquered in his person. He hadobtained from the king a promise of free pardon to all the refugeesyet in the Dismal Swamp, where it will be remembered the poorEnglish had fled, who were unfit to accompany Wilfred to the Campof Refuge, and had thereupon invited them all to rebuild their oldhomes and dwell in them.
At first they would not trust him, but through the mediation ofFather Kenelm and of poor old Hilda, he succeeded in gaining theirconfidence, and he did not betray their trust.
So Norman and Englishman were happily united at Aescendune, and inspite of some little difficulties, arising from the airs theconquerors could not help giving themselves, became more like onepeople daily; and in a few years, so many followed their lord'sexample, and intermarried with the English, captivated by thebeauty of the Anglo-Saxon maidens, that distinction of race becamespeedily abolished, and hence Aescendune was perhaps the happiestvillage in the distracted island.
The priory was rebuilt, as well as the castle, and occupied byBenedictine monks of both races; but unlike most other monasteries,it had an English prior. Lanfranc had appointed Father Kenelm, atEtienne's earnest request, in gratitude for events in which thatgood father had borne his part in the Dismal Swamp. Thisappointment, more than aught else, reconciled the English to Normanrule.
At first Edith feared her new lord, whom she had been compelled tomarry, remembering the sadness of her mother's married life; buthis persistent kindness won her heart; and after the birth of youngEdward, whom we have introduced to our readers, all restraint wasremoved, and they were as happy a pair as need be.
Their children were taught to converse in both tongues--Old Englishand Norman French--and to treat all alike, the kinsfolk of fatheror of mother.
Putting together the details given by Edward of Aescendune to theKnight of the Holy Sepulchre, and these few outlines of interveningevents, our readers will have little difficulty in understandingthe history of the thirty years.
Within her bower (as we have said) was the lady of Aescendune.Seated in an embrasure of the lofty tower in which her rooms weresituate, her attention became fixed upon a horseman, who was ridingswiftly towards the castle from the direction of Warwick.
"I wonder," thought she, "whether this be a messenger from--" andthen she checked the thought, as though it must end in disappointment.
For months she had not heard from the absent ones. She knewJerusalem was taken; but if any letters had been sent, they hadmiscarried--no unlikely circumstance in those days.
The messenger reached the castle.
Soon steps were heard ascending the stairs with such precipitatehaste, that the lady felt sure that some important tidings hadarrived.
Young Hugh--an active, fresh-coloured boy, with his Father'sfeatures, tempered by the softer expression of his mother,perhaps--bounded into the room.
"Oh, mother! lady mother!--letters from father, about him andEdward. The man below is old Tristam--you remember Tristam who wentto the wars. They have landed, landed, and are upon the road home.Oh! happy day. Tristam was sent forward. Read,--only read."
She was as pale as death, and fainting from the sudden shock.Excess of joy has its dangers.
Her two girls, Margaret and Hilda, had followed their brother, andtheir gentle care soon restored her: but the shock had been great.
"Read, mother,--read," said Hugh.
The accomplishments of reading and writing--for they wereaccomplishments then--were possessed both by husband and wife.
We will give but one paragraph in the letter:
We have landed safely at Southampton, my own Edith. God haspreserved us from many dangers, doubtless owing to thy many prayersat St. Wilfred's altar. Thou hast, I hope, received safely theletters I sent from Joppa last autumn, and knowest whom I ambringing home with me. How wonderful it all is, and with whatstrange feelings the exile must approach the home of his boyhood!But he is very composed and quiet in his manner, and we grow inmutual esteem daily. He declares that he will accept no part of hisancient inheritance, but that he finds his highest joy in thinkingthat, in his sister's children, the descendants of the ancient lineyet possess the land of their forefathers.
"What can he mean? Whom is he bringing with him? Send for Tristam.Ah! I see there is the old prior at the gate--he is talking withhim;" and Hugh hurried down to fetch them up.
They entered the room: our old friend, Father Kenelm, as hale anold man as one could well find at seventy-five years ofage--Wilfred's protector and friend, in the most critical momentsof his life--and Tristam--do our readers remember him?
"God bless you, my children, in joy as in sorrow," was hissalutation.
"How far are they off?"
"When will they be here?" and Tristam, who stood humbly at thedoor, found himself the object of universal attraction, and did notknow which to answer first.
"Welcome, Tristam, welcome," said his lady; "thou art the morningstar, the harbinger of my sun. How far hence are they?"
"They will be here by sunset, my lady."
"I will go and meet them," cried Hugh, and ran down stairs to gethis horse ready.
"But whom is he bringing with him?"
&nb
sp; "My child," said Father Kenelm, "has he not told thee?"
"Nay, he speaks so mysteriously--read."
Father Kenelm read. Then, looking up, he spoke with deep emotion.Tristam had told him all.
"One long since dead to the world, and as many thought buried. Ialone knew of his existence, as a secret which I was absolutelyforbidden to disclose; and as many years had elapsed since I lastheard of him, I thought him dead--he who was once the hope ofAescendune."
"End our suspense!"
"Thou hadst a brother once--a bright, laughing, fair-haired boy,whom thou didst love whilst father and mother lived. I speak ofevents long forgotten, save by me."
"Nay, I have never forgotten him. Hast thou not often commemoratedhim amongst the faithful departed, at my request?"
"Only as one, whom the world might yet contain in the body, orwhose soul heaven might have received--I knew not which. Well, mylady, this thy brother yet lives."
"Wilfred?"
"And is returning home with thy husband."
"Wilfred alive!--nay, thou jestest. He died at Oxenford and wasburied there, nearly thirty years agone."
"Geoffrey, then Bishop of Coutances, deceived the lad's enemies bya fictitious death and burial, but forbade the rescued youth toreturn home, or make his existence known, save to me."
At this moment, the gleams, the parting beams, of the setting sunshone upon pennon and upon lance, issuing from the wood afar off.The multitude, who had assembled below, saw the sight, and rushedtumultuously forward to meet their kinsfolk.
Hugh forgot the story about his uncle, ran down stairs, and joinedthe throng, who pressed over the bridge.
Amidst the pomp of banners, the crash of trumpets, and the loudacclamations and cheers of the crowd, the Crusaders reached home,and entered the castle yard.
Edith fell into the arms of her lord as he dismounted, then soughther son. She knew not to which to turn.
A grave personage, who studied hard to maintain his composure, butwhose eyes were filled with tears, had also dismounted, and wasstanding by.
"Edith," cried Etienne, "behold our brother."
And she fell upon his neck with a torrent of tears, as all the lifeof her childhood rushed upon her--"hours that were to memory dear."
Only a few more lines are needed to dismiss the heroes andpersonages of our tale to rest.
Wilfred spent a few happy days with his brother-in-law cheered bythe society of his sister and her children.
Between him and Etienne all clouds had departed; they had learned,amidst the perils of the return journey, to appreciate each other,and wondered they had ever been such foes.
Once only he visited the Dismal Swamp, the scene of such excitingevents in his earlier life. He found it an utter wilderness, not ahouse had been left standing; Etienne had wished to abolish thevery remembrance of the scenes in which, as his conscience toldhim, he had acted so ill a part, and when he had succeeded inpersuading the English to trust him, and return to Aescendune, hehad fired the little hamlet and reduced it to ashes.
The brook murmured in solitude and silence, the birds sangundisturbed by the strife of men.
The scene of Edwin's death from the arrows of Etienne's followerscould hardly be identified; but under the very tree where Pierrehad fallen in stern retaliation, Wilfred knelt, and besought pardonfor himself and rest for the soul which he had sent so hurriedlybefore the judgment seat.
"Oh how much we had to forgive each other, Etienne and I," he saidhalf aloud.
These words caused him to raise his head, and look instinctivelyover the place where the light wind was bowing down the heads ofthe tall reeds and sedges, which grew where the fire, thatdestroyed Count Hugo and his band, had swept over theirpredecessors.
These remembrances saddened him, he returned to the castle--theprey of conflicting emotions.
But much did Wilfred marvel at the peace and concord that reignedin this happy village, in such contrast to the discord whichelsewhere marked the relations between Englishman and Norman, theconquered and the conquerors; and one day he ventured to remarkupon the happy change to his old rival and brother-in-law.
"Come with me," said Etienne, "and I will explain it all."
He led Wilfred to the Priory Church, and they entered the hallowedpale, with its round Norman arches and lofty roof, where the verytread seemed an intrusion upon the silence, which spake of theeternal repose that shall be, after the storms of this troublesomeworld have their end.
There is something in the Early Norman architecture which appearsto the writer awe-inspiring; the massive round column, the bold andsimple arch, have a more solemn effect upon his senses than theloveliest productions of the more florid and decorated period.
Such a stern and simple structure was this Priory Church of St.Wilfred of Aescendune.
It was the hour of nones, and the strains of the hymn of St.Ambrose, "Rerum Deus tenax vigor," were pealing from theBenedictines in the choir: which has been thus paraphrased:
"O strength and stay, upholding all creation:Who ever dost Thyself unmoved abide,Yet, day by day, the light, in due gradation,From hour to hour, through all its changes guide.
"Grant to life's day a calm unclouded ending,An eve untouched by shadow of decay,The brightness of a holy death bed, blendingWith dawning glories of the eternal day {xxxi}."
His thoughts full of the ideas suggested by the solemn strain,Wilfred followed Etienne into the south transept.
There, upon a plain altar tomb of stone lay the effigy of an agedmatron, her hands clasped in prayer, and beneath were the words:
HILDAIN PACEBEATI PACIFICI {xxxii}.
The "rival heirs" stood by the tomb, their hands clasped, while thetears streamed down their cheeks. It was she indeed, who by hersimple obedience to the Divine law of love, which is the centralidea of the Gospel, had reconciled jarring hearts, and broughtabout, in Aescendune, the reign of peace and love.
"I strove," said Etienne, at last breaking the long silence, "to bea son to her, in place of the ill-fated boy whom I so cruelly slew;nor were my efforts in vain, or my repentance unaccepted. We builther a house, on the site of her ancient cottage, and when strifearose, we often submitted the matter to her judgment, and she, whohad been the foster mother of one lord, and the preserver fromdeath of the other, reconciled the followers of both.
"When at last the hour came for her to commit her sweet soul toGod, I stood by her dying bed.
"'Mother,' said I, 'what can I do when thou art gone to show mylove for thy memory?'
"'Only go on as thou hast begun,' she replied, 'be a father to allthy people, Englishman and Norman alike, and their prayers willsuccour thee at the judgment seat of God--I go into peace.'
"And she left peace behind her--"
Here Etienne could say no more, and the two "rival heirs" stood along time gazing upon the "cold marble and the sculptured stone,"while tears which were no disgrace to their manhood fell likegentle rain from heaven.
Soon after this Wilfred had a long conference with Prior Kenelm.The result was, that he announced his intention of retiring fromthe world and ending his days in the cloister. His years had beenyears of strife and tumult--he would give the residue to God.
So he entered the famous order of St. Benedict, and after the deathof Father Kenelm became the prior of the monastery dedicated to hispatron saint--founded by his own forefathers.
His greatest joy was when surrounded by his nephews andnieces--yea, great-nephews and great-nieces, after the happymarriage of Edward of Aescendune to Lady Agatha of Wilmcote.
Etienne and Edith lived blessed in each other's love to the end.The Norman estates fell to Hugh, the English ones to Edward, whonot unworthily represented both English and Norman lines--"a knightwithout fear and without reproach."
The last years of our hero, Wilfred, were years of tranquilhappiness and serene joy, such as Milton wrote of in later ages, inthose lines of wondrous beauty:
"Let my due feet never failTo walk the cloisters hal
lowed pale,With storied windows richly dight,Casting a dim religions light,And let the pealing organ blowTo the foil-voiced choir below,Bring all heaven before mine eyes,Dissolve me into ecstasies."
In the ruins of the abbey of St. Wilfred the spectator may notice across-legged knight, whose feet rest upon a vanquished lion. Hiswhole attitude is expressive of intense action; the muscles seemstrained in the effort to draw his sword and demolish a Turk, whilethe face expresses all that is noble in manly courage.
Hard by lies a prior in his vestments, his hands meekly clasped.The colour has not yet quite faded, which embellished the statue;but the remarkable thing is the face. Even yet, in spite of thebroken and mouldering stone, there is a calmness of repose aboutthat face which is simply wonderful.
It has been our task to call them both back to life--knight andprior, and to make them live in our pages. Pardon us, gentlereaders, for the imperfect way in which we have fulfilled it.
Thus ends the Third and last Chronicle of Aescendune.
i Ordericus Vitalis, lib. iv. 523.
ii William of Malmesbury.
iii Sassenach equals Saxon.
iv It seems strange how such a misconception could ever havearisen and coloured English literature to so great an extent, forif we turn to the pages of the contemporaneous historians, such asHenry of Huntingdon, William of Malmesbury, Florence of Worcester,Ordericus Vitalis--born within the century of the Conquest--we findthat they all describe the Anglo-Saxons as English, not Saxons.
v See the Second Chronicle, chapter VI.
vi Genealogy of Aescendune.
The reader may be glad to have the genealogy of the family, in whomit has been the author's aim to interest him, placed clearly beforehim. The following table includes the chief names in the threeChronicles; the date of decease is given in each case.
Offa, 940. * Oswald, 937. + Ragnar, 959. * Ella, 959. + Elfric, 960. + Alfred, 998, m. Alftrude. o Elfric, 975. o Elfwyn, 1036, m. Hilda. # Bertric, 1006. # Ethelgiva, 1064, m. Alfgar. @ Edmund, 1066, m. Winifred. - Wilfred, 1122. - Edith, 1124, m. Etienne, 1110. @ Elfleda, 1030. o Cuthbert, 1034 (Prior). o Bertha, 1030, m. Herstan. # Winifred, 1067. + Edgitha, 990.
vii This Herstan figures largely in "Alfgar the Dane." Hemarried Bertha, daughter of Alfred of Aescendune, the hero of the"First Chronicle." See the genealogical table at the end of thebook.
viii"By Thy Cross and Passion;Good Lord, deliver her."
ix Poison amongst the Normans.
It may be thought by many readers that the poisoner's art couldnever have flourished among so chivalrous a people as the Normans;but the contrary was the case; and there are several instances ofsuch foul murders in the pages of the old chroniclers, sufficientto justify the introduction of the scene in our story.
At the plot called the Bridal of Norwich, A.D. 1075, Roger, Earl ofHereford, and Ralph, Earl of Norwich, did not scruple to accuseWilliam himself of the murder of Conan, Duke of Brittany, who,finding that the duke was on the point of withdrawing all histroops for the invasion of England, prepared to take advantage ofit by making a raid upon Normandy. It was said that William couldthink of no other means of meeting the difficulty, than by causingthe gauntlets and helmet of the unfortunate Conan to be poisoned byone of his chamberlains, who held lands in Normandy, and was underWilliam's influence. Conan, however, did not die till the 11th ofDecember, after the battle of Senlac, and the accusation is hard toreconcile with the general character of William. Ordericus relatesthat Walter, Count of Pontoise, and his wife, were murdered atFalaise, when prisoners, by poison "treacherously administered bytheir enemies," A.D. 1064.
x Anglo-Saxon Outlaws.
The true secret of the sympathy of the English people with suchnoted outlaws as Robin Hood and Little John, and their companions,is, that they were made such by Norman tyranny, and maintainedtheir freedom in the greenwoods, when the usurping barons hadreduced the people elsewhere to slavery. Hence their exploits weresung by every minstrel, and received with enthusiasm.
"History," says Thierry, "has not understood these outlaws; it haspassed them over in silence, or else, adopting the legal acts ofthe time, it has branded them with names which deprive them of allinterest--such as 'rebels,' 'robbers,' 'banditti.'
"But let us not," continues the historian, "be misled by theseodious titles; in all countries, subjugated by foreigners, theyhave been given by the victors to the brave men who took refuge inthe mountains and forests, abandoning the towns and cities to suchas were content to live in slavery."
Such were our refugees in the Dismal Swamp.
xi See "Alfgar the Dane."
xii "If thine enemy hunger, feed him; if he thirst, give himdrink: for in so doing thou shalt heap coals of fire on his head."
xiii Martyrdom of St. Edmund, King of East Anglia.
This saintly king fought against the Danes, under Hinguar andHubba, in defence of his country. Being defeated, he was takenprisoner by the enemy, who offered him his life, and restoration tohis kingdom, if he would renounce Christianity, and becometributary. Upon his refusal he was tied naked to a tree, cruellyscourged, and then shot slowly to death with arrows, calling uponthe name of Christ throughout his protracted martyrdom, Whodoubtless did not fail His servant in his hour of extreme need.
The strangest part of the story has yet to be told. An old oak waspointed out as the tree of the martyrdom until very recent years.Sceptics, of course, doubted the fact; but when the tree was blowndown in a violent storm, a Danish arrowhead was found embedded inthe very centre of the trunk, grown over, and concealed for nearlya thousand years--the silent witness to the agonies of a martyr.The martyrdom took place A.D. 870, the year before Alfred ascendedthe throne. In the churches of Norfolk and Suffolk the picture ofSt. Edmund, pierced with arrows, is often seen on old rood screens.
xiv Norman Torture Chamber.
We read in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle of the barons in Stephen'sdays.
"They greatly oppressed the wretched people by making them work attheir castles, and when the castles were finished they filled themwith devils and evil men. Then they took those whom they suspectedto have any goods, by night and by day, seizing both men and women,and they put them in prison for their gold and silver, and torturedthem with pains unspeakable. They hung some up by their feet, andsmoked them with foul smoke; some by their thumbs, or by the head,and they hung burning things on their feet. They put a knottedstring about their heads, and twisted it till it went into theirbrain. They put them into dungeons, wherein were adders and snakesand toads, and thus wore them out. Some they put into a crucethouse--that is, into a chest that was short and narrow, and notdeep, and they put sharp stones in it, and crushed the man thereinso that they broke all his limbs. There were hateful and grimthings called Sachenteges in many of the castles, and which two orthree men had enough to do to carry. The sachentege was made thus:it was fastened to a beam having a sharp iron to go round a man'sthroat and neck, so that he might noways sit, or lie, or sleep, butmust bear all the iron. Many thousands they exhausted with hunger.I cannot and I may not tell of all the wounds and all the torturesthey inflicted upon the wretched men of this land."
This awful description of the cruelty of the Norman barons underthe grandson of the Conqueror may partially apply to the barons ofan earlier period, such as Hugo de Malville.
xv Destruction of Norman Forces by Fire.
We read that at the instigation of Ivo Taille-Bois (see Note),William had the weakness to employ a sorceress to curse the Englishin the Camp of Refuge, and by her spells to defeat those of thesupposed English magicians. She was placed in a wooden turret atthe head of the road, which the Conqueror was labouring to makeacross the fens, to get at the refugees; but Hereward, watching hisopportunity, set fire to the flags and reeds; the wind rapidlyspread the conflagration; and th
e witch, her guards, the turret,and the workmen, all alike perished in the flames, even as in ourstory, Hugo de Malville in the Dismal Swamp.
xvi State of England in 1069.
In order that the reader may the better comprehend the chanceswhich lay before the insurgents of this year, the third afterHastings, we will briefly summarise the state of affairs.
At the close of the preceding year the Midlands, after severalspasmodic struggles, appeared prostrate and helpless at the feet ofthe Conqueror, who had taken advantage of the opportunity to buildstrong castles everywhere, and to garrison them with brave captainsand trusty soldiers. Warwick Castle was given to Henry de Beaumont,whose lady we have seen at Aescendune, at the dedication of thepriory, and the jousts which followed; Nottingham was held byWilliam Peverill; and similar measures were taken at York, Lincoln,Huntingdon, Oxford, Cambridge, and elsewhere.
But ere all this was fully accomplished, the three sons of KingHarold--Godwin, Edmund and Magnus--who had been kindly received byDermot, King of Leinster in Ireland, reappeared in the southwest,and although, after some partial success, they were forced toretreat, yet they aroused anew the spirit of resistance to theNorman yoke, and kindled the expiring embers of patriotism.
In the month of February 1069--at which period the city of York wasthe extreme limit of the Conquest--one Robert de Comyn was sent toreduce Durham and the banks of the Tyne to subjection. As heapproached the city, Egelwin the bishop met him, and begged him notto enter or there would be bloodshed; but he disdained the mildrequest, and, entering, his soldiers behaved with the utmostinsolence, and slew a few inoffensive men "pour encourager lesautres," to intimidate the rest. The soldiers then encamped in thestreets of the town, and the general took up his quarters in thebishop's palace.
When night came on, the gallant countrymen who dwelt on the Tynelit the beacon fires on all the hills; the country arose, and allhastened to Durham. By daybreak they had forced the gates, whichthe Normans defended; the soldiers then took refuge from the peoplethey had so cruelly insulted, in the Episcopal palace; thence theyhad the advantage with their arrows, until the English, unable tostorm the place, set it on fire, and burned the dwelling, withRobert de Comyn, who well deserved his fate, and all his men:twelve hundred horse, and a large number of foot soldiers andmilitary attendants, perished, and only two escaped.
A larger body, sent to avenge them, halted between York and Durham,and, seized with an unwonted terror, refused to proceed; the goodpeople said that Saint Cuthbert had struck them motionless bysupernatural power to protect his shrine in Durham.
This success stirred up the people of Yorkshire, who, later in theyear, besieged William Mallet in York, aided by a Danish forcewhich had landed on the coasts, and took it on the eighth day, whenall the garrison was slain--"three thousand men of France," as theChronicles express it. The Earl Waltheof killed, with his ownbattle-axe, twenty Normans in their flight, and, chasing a hundredmore into the woody marshes, took advantage of the dry season, likeour friends at Aescendune, and burned them all with the wood.
All over England the struggle spread. Hereward took the command atthe Camp of Refuge, in the Isle of Ely, and crippled the Normansaround. Somerset and Dorset rose again; the men of Chester and abody of Welshmen under "Edric the Wild" (sometimes called theForester), besieged Shrewsbury. The men of Cornwall attackedExeter, and a large body of insurgents collected at Stafford.
It was in putting down the northern insurrection that Williamdevastated Yorkshire and Northumberland, with such severity thatthe country did not recover for centuries, while the victims tofamine, fire, and sword equalled a hundred thousand. Thesespasmodic insurrections were only the dying throes of Anglo-Saxonliberty. Everywhere they miscarried, and the Normans prevailed.
xvii The readers of Alfgar the Dane will remember that we gavea brief account of this interesting spot in that chronicle. It wasthe town to which Edmund Ironside and Alfgar first repaired aftertheir escape from the Danes in the Isle of Wight.
xviii On one of these islands now stands the mill, on the otherthe Nag's Head Inn; the site of the old abbey is chiefly occupiedby a brewery!
xix Monastic Offices.
These were seven in number, besides the night hours. Lauds, beforedaybreak; Prime, 7 A.M.; Terce, 9 A.M.; Sext, noon; Nones, 3 P.M.;Vespers, 6 P.M.; and Compline, 9 P.M. These were in addition tomany daily celebrations of Mass.
Our modern prayer-book Matins is an accumulation and abridgment ofMatins, Lauds, and Prime; our Evensong of Vespers and Compline.Terce, Sext, and Nones, which consisted mainly of portions of Psalm119, with varying Versicles and Collects, are unrepresented in ourAnglican office.
If the older reader is curious to learn of what Compline consisted,he may be told that its main features were Psalms 4, 31, 91, and184; the hymn, Te Lucis ante Terminum, "Before the ending of theday."--H. A. & M. 15; and the Collect, "Lighten our Darkness."
xx Roll of the Conquerors.
These names are taken from a charter, long preserved in BattleAbbey, and quoted in the notes to Thierry's Norman Conquest. Itgives a list of the principal warriors who fought at Hastings,whose names are afterwards found, much to their advantage, inDomesday Book. Many names now common, even amongst the poor, maketheir first appearance in England therein, besides the noble onesquoted in our text. We regret that our space does not allow us togive the roll, which is many columns in length.
xxi Ivo Taille-Bois.
This petty tyrant, of infamous memory, was the chief of the Angevinauxiliaries of William, who received as his reward the hand ofLucy, sister of the Earls Edwin and Morcar; and with her alsoreceived all the ancient domains of their family in theneighbourhood of the Camp of Refuge, which proximity did notaugment his prosperity. The ancient chronicler of the Abbey ofCroyland (Ingulf) says:
"All the people of that district honoured Ivo with the greatestattention, and supplicated him on bended knee, bestowed on him allthe honour they could, and the services they were bound to render;still he did not repay their confidence, but tortured and harassed,worried and annoyed, imprisoned and tormented them, every dayloading them with fresh burdens, till he drove them, by hiscruelty, to seek other and milder lords. Against the monastery andthe people of Croyland he raged with the utmost fury; he wouldchase their cattle with dogs, drown them in the lakes, mutilatethem in various ways, or break their backs or legs."
It is pleasing to learn that he met some punishment for his evildeeds. Hereward took him prisoner, very ignominiously, and held hima captive for a long time, to the delight of the poor vassals; hefell under the displeasure of William Rufus, in 1089, as a partisanof Robert and was sent home to Anjou deprived of all his ill-gottenwealth. He was, however, allowed to return under Henry, and died ofparalysis in 1114 at his manor of Spalding, where, the oldchronicler pithily says, "he was buried amidst the loudly expressedexultation of all his neighbours."
xxii The Camp of Refuge.
There still exists, in the southeastern district of Lincolnshireand the northern part of Cambridgeshire, a vast extent of flatland, intersected in every direction by rivers and dykes, known asthe fen country.
Eight centuries ago, before many attempts had been made to confinethe streams within their banks, this country resembled an inlandsea, interspersed with flat islands of firm ground.
One portion of this country was called the "Isle of Ely;" anotherthe "Isle of Thorney;" another, partially drained by the monks, the"Isle of Croyland."
In many parts half bog, it was quite impracticable for heavy-armedsoldiers, and hence it offered a refuge to bands of patriots fromall the neighbouring districts when worsted by the Normans.
Hither came the true Englishman Stigand, sometime Archbishop ofCanterbury, and after the conquest of the north, Egelwin, Bishop ofDurham, who found both substantial entertainment at the board ofAbbot Thurstan, abbot of the great monastery of Ely, and one of thestoutest patriots of the day.
At this time Hereward was living in Flanders; but hearing that hisfather was dead, t
hat a Norman had seized his inheritance, and wasgrievously maltreating his aged mother, he returned home secretly,and, assembling a band of relations and retainers, expelled theintruder from his house after a sharp but brief conflict.
But he could not hope to rest after such an exploit; therefore hewaged open war with the Normans around, and by his extraordinarybravery and good fortune soon attracted such universal attentionthat the patriots in the Camp of Refuge besought him to come and betheir leader.
Here, for nearly three years, he defied all the efforts of William.His uncle Brand, Abbot of Peterborough, conferred on him the orderof knighthood, for which act William designed adequate punishment.The abbot would doubtless have been expelled, but death anticipatedthe Conqueror of England. To punish the monks, the King appointedthe fighting abbot, Turauld, as the successor of Brand, and inorder to conciliate this ruffian-for such he was-the monks ofPeterborough prepared their best cheer. But Hereward and his merrymen anticipated Turauld's arrival by an hour or two, ate up thedinner prepared for the Normans, and spoiled what the did not eat;carried away, for safe keeping at Ely, all the treasures of theabbey, and left an empty house for the intruder.
Shortly afterwards, that worthy, together with Ivo Taille-Bois,concerted a plan for attacking the English. Hereward entrapped themboth, and kept them in captivity, much to the joy of the monks ofPeterborough, and the vassals of Ivo, as we have elsewhere noted.
All the valour and nobility of Old England yet surviving, gatheredaround the great chieftain; thither came Edwin and Morcar, thebrothers-in-law of King Harold; and many an earl and knight,fearless as the warriors of the Round Table, fought beneath thebanner of Hereward, and banqueted while there was aught left toeat, at the board of the large-hearted Abbot Thurstan.
The Danes, who had been summoned to the aid of the Englishpatriots, were bought off soon after their arrival by the gold ofWilliam, but still Hereward fought on.
At length William stationed his fleet in the Wash, with orders toguard every outlet from the fens to the ocean; still he could notreach Hereward, who had retired, with his valiant men, to theirstronghold, situate in an expanse of water, which, in the narrowestpart, was at least two miles in breadth. Then the king undertook atremendous task-that of constructing a solid road through theinundated marshes, throwing bridges over the deeper channels, andbuilding a causeway elsewhere. But in the face of an active enemythis was no easy task; and so frequently were the Normans surprisedby Hereward that they believed he must be aided by sorcery, andemployed the "witch," who perished by fire (as mentioned in anotherNote), to counteract his magic, with the result already described.
But William was determined that the last refuge of English libertyshould fall, and, backed by all the resources of a kingdom, the endcame at last. The monks of Ely, starved out, deposed their abbot,the gallant Thurstan, and betrayed the secret approaches of thecamp to the Normans.
In the gray dawn of an autumnal morning, in the year 1071, theNormans, guided through the labyrinth by the traitors-the guardshaving been decoyed from their posts-entered the camp.
Hereward and his men fought like heroes, with all the courage ofdespair; they did all that men could do; but, assailed from allsides, many of the English lords, dismayed by the hopelesscharacter of the conflict, threw down their swords, and cried forquarter. But their brave chieftain-with a mere handful ofmen-disdaining to save their lives by submission, cut their waythrough the foe, and escaped across the marshes, after most doughtydeeds of valour, for the assault was led by William in person.
For a long time Hereward maintained the hopeless struggle-for itwas now hopeless-till the king sent to offer him his favour, andrestoration to his paternal estates, on condition his acceptingaccomplished facts, and taking the oath of allegiance to theConqueror. Feeling that all hope of shaking off the Norman yoke waslost, Hereward laid down his arms and accepted "the king's peace."
There are two accounts of his death; the one, which we hope istrue, that he ended his days in peace; the other, that his Normanneighbours fell upon him as he was sleeping in the open air; thathe awoke in time to defend himself, and slew fifteen men-at-armsand a Breton knight ere he succumbed to numbers-the chief of thetroop, named Asselin, swearing, as he cut the head from the corpse,that he had never seen so valiant a man. It was long a popularsaying amongst the English, and amongst the Normans that, had therebeen four such as he, the Conquest could not have been accomplished.
The fate of those who submitted, or were taken in the Camp ofRefuge, was pitiable; many had their hands cut off, or their eyesput out, and with cruel mockery were set "free;" the leaders wereimprisoned in all parts of England.
Egelwin, Bishop of Durham, was sent to Abingdon, where within a fewmonths he died of hunger, either voluntary or enforced; whileArchbishop Stigand was condemned to perpetual imprisonment.
xxiii Lanfranc.
This noted ecclesiastic was a native of Pavia; he was bred up tothe law, and, coming to France, established a school at Avranches,which was attended by pupils of the highest rank.
On a journey to Rouen he was robbed and left bound in a wood, wheresome peasants found him, and brought him for shelter to the Abbeyof Bec, recently founded by Herluin. Here he felt himself called tothe monastic life, and became a monk at Bec, which sprang uprapidly under him into a school no less of literature than ofpiety, where William often retired to make spiritual retreats, andwhere an intimacy sprang up between them. He became successivelyPrior of Bec and abbot of William's new foundation of St. Stephen'sat Caen. His influence with the Pope procured the papal sanctionfor the invasion of England; and afterwards, in 1070, theArchbishopric of Canterbury was pressed upon him by William, whichhe held until his death in 1089, in the eighty-fourth year of hisage.
In some respects he dealt harshly with the English clergy, andconnived at their wholesale deprivation. We must own, inextenuation, that their lives and conduct had not been such as todo honour to God, that they were said to be the most ignorantclergy in Europe; and that the sins of the nation under theirguidance were owned, even by the English, to have brought the heavyjudgment of the Conquest upon them. Otherwise, Lanfranc was aprotector of the oppressed, in which character he is introduced inthe tale.
If Englishmen can only forgive him his share in the Conquest, fewArchbishops of Canterbury can be named more worthy of our respect.
xxiv It must be remembered that Lanfranc was a firm believer inthe right of King William, in the supposed testament of Edward theConfessor; and in the right of Rome to dispose of disputed thrones.Good man though he was, he believed in all this rubbish, as trueEnglishmen must ever deem it.
xxv Oxford in the Olden Time.
The earliest authentic record in which Oxford finds a place is ofthe year 912, when we read in the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle that KingEdward took possession of the city, when he took upon himself theresponsibility of defending the valley of the Thames against Danishincursions, upon the death of his sister's husband, Aethelred,Ealdorman of the Mercians, to whom the city had formerly belonged.
Then, probably, was that mound thrown up which still existsopposite the old Norman tower of Robert D'Oyly; and from thatperiod the city gradually grew into importance, until it quitesuperseded the more ancient city, Dorchester. which was situated atthe angle formed by the tributary river Tame, fifteen miles lowerdown the stream, even as Oxford occupied the similar angle formedby the Cherwell.
The charge of Oxford, and the district around, was committed toRobert D'Oyly, afore-mentioned, who built the lofty tower oppositethe mound, deepened the ditches, enlarged the fortifications hefound already there; and, about the date of our tale, founded theChurch of St. George in the Castle.
He had a ruinous city to preside over. Before the Conquest itcontained about three thousand inhabitants; but the number wasgreatly diminished, for out of seven hundred and twenty-one housesformerly inhabited, four hundred and seventy-eight were now lyingwaste.
The University was yet a thing of the future. Mr. James Parker
(inhis pamphlet, on the history of Oxford during the tenth andeleventh centuries, which he kindly presented to the writer.) hasclearly shown that its supposed foundation by Alfred is a myth. Thepassage in Asser, commonly quoted in support of the statement, isan interpolation not older, perhaps, than the days of Edward III.During the twelfth century the town appears, from whatever causes,to have recovered from the effects of the Conquest, and from thatperiod its growth was rapid, until circumstances brought about thegrowth of a University honoured throughout the civilised world.
xxvi An undisciplined mob had preceded them and perished on theroad. We have not space to write their history.
xxvii The Varangians.
Ordericus Vitalis, B. iv., says, "When the English had lost theirfreedom, they turned themselves eagerly to discover the means ofregaining their liberty. Some fled to Sweyn, King of Denmark, toexcite him to fight for the inheritance of his grandfather, Canute.Not a few fled into exile in other lands, either to escape theNorman rule, or in the hope of acquiring the means of renewing thestruggle at home. Some of these, in early manhood, penetrated intoa far distant land, and offered their services to the Emperor ofConstantinople, against whom (the Norman) Robert Guiscard hadarrayed all his forces. The English exiles were favourablyreceived, and opposed in battle to the Normans, who were far toostrong for the Greeks in personal combat.
"The Emperor Alexius began to build a town for the English, alittle above Constantinople; but the troubles from the Normansincreasing, he soon recalled them to the capital, and intrusted thepalace, with all its treasures, to their keeping. This was the wayin which the English found their way to Ionia, where they stillremain, honoured by the Emperor and his people."
xxviii Particularly those portions found in the Gospels for thedifferent Sundays in the Christian year, which even then (and longbefore) existed in nearly the same order as in our presentPrayer-book, and were read in the vernacular each Sunday at Mass.
xxix See First and Second Chronicles.
xxx Anglo-Saxon and Norman Churches.
Originally, the churches of the Anglo-Saxons were built of wood,with perhaps a foundation of stone; but before the Conquest noblerbuildings were introduced. Thus, for instance, the church whichHarold built at Waltham was designed in the new style ofarchitecture, of which the earliest specimen in England wasEdward's Abbey Church at Westminster. Waltham was sumptuouslyadorned: the capitals and bases of the pillars were curiouslycarved; and the ornaments of the altar, vestments, hooks,furniture, most elaborate (see the tract De Inventione SanctaeCrucis, edited by Professor Stubbs). But with the advent of a morehighly civilised people, the churches generally shared in therevival of architecture, as the many massive remains, still extant,of that early period sufficiently testify.
xxxi H. A. & M. 12.
xxxii "Blessed are the peacemakers."--St. Matthew v.
