THE END OF SAXON ENGLAND.
We have two pictures to draw, preliminary scenes to the fatal battle of Hastings Hill. The first belongs to the morning of September 25, 1066. At Stamford Bridge, on the Derwent River, lay encamped a stalwart host, that of Harold Hardrada, king of Norway. With him was Tostig, rebel brother of King Harold of England, who had brought this army of strangers into the land. On the river near by lay their ships.
Here Harold found them, a formidable force, drawn up in a circle, the line marked out by shining spears. The English king had marched hither in all haste from the coast, where he had been awaiting the coming of William of Normandy. Tostig, the rebel son of Godwin, had brought ruin upon the land.
Before the battle commenced, twenty horsemen rode out from Harold's vanguard and moved towards the foe. Harold, the king, rode at their head. As they drew near they saw a leader of the opposing host, clad in a blue mantle and wearing a shining helmet, fall to the earth through the stumbling of his horse.
"Who is the man that fell?" asked Harold.
"The king of Norway," answered one of his companions.
"He is a tall and stately warrior," answered Harold, "but his end is near."
Then, under command of the king, one of his noble followers rode up to the opposing line and called out,—
"Is Tostig, the son of Godwin, here?"
"It would be wrong to say he is not," answered the rebel Englishman, stepping into view.
The herald then begged him to make peace with his brother, saying that it was dreadful that two men, sons of the same mother, should be in arms against each other.
"What will Harold give me if I make peace with him?" asked Tostig.
"He will give you a brother's love and make you earl of Northumberland."
"And what will he give to my friend, the king of Norway?"
"Seven feet of earth for a grave," was the grim answer of the envoy; "or, as he seems a very tall man, perhaps a foot or two more."
"Ride back, then," said Tostig, "and bid Harold make ready for battle. Whatever happens, it shall never be said of Tostig that he basely gave up the friend who had helped him in time of need."
The fight began,—and quickly ended. Hardrada fought like a giant, but an arrow in his throat brought him dead to the ground. Tostig fell also, and many other chiefs. The Northmen, disheartened, yielded. Harold gave them easy terms, bidding them take their ships and sail again to the land whence they had come.
This warlike picture on the land may be matched by one upon the sea. Over the waves of the English Channel moved a single ship, such a one as had rarely been seen upon those waters. Its sails were of different bright colors; the vanes at the mast-heads were gilded; the three lions of Normandy were painted here and there; the figure-head was a child with a bent bow, its arrow pointed towards the land of England. At the mainmast-head floated a consecrated banner, which had been sent from Rome.
It was the ship of William of Normandy, alone upon the waves. Three thousand vessels in all had left with it the shores of France, six or seven hundred of them large in size. Now, day was breaking, and the king's ship was alone. The others had vanished in the night.
William ordered a sailor to the mast-head to report on what he could see.
"I see nothing but the water and the sky," came the lookout's cry from above.
"We have outsailed them; we must lay to," said the duke.
Breakfast was served, with warm spiced wine, to keep the crew in good heart. After it was over the sailor was again sent aloft.
"I can see four ships, low down in the offing," he proclaimed.
A third time he was sent to the mast-head. His voice now came to those on deck filled with merry cheer.
"Now I see a forest of masts and sails," he cried.
Within a few hours afterwards the Normans were landing in Pevensey Bay, on the Sussex coast. Harold had been drawn off by the invasion in the north, and the new invaders were free to land. Duke William was among the first. As he set foot on shore he stumbled and fell. The hearts of his knights fell with him, for they deemed this an unlucky sign. But William had that ready wit which turns ill into good fortune. Grasping two handfuls of the soil, he hastily rose, saying, cheerily, "Thus do I seize upon the land of England."
Meanwhile, Harold was feasting, after his victory, at York. As he sat there with his captains, a stir was heard at the doors, and in rushed a messenger, booted and spurred, and covered with dust from riding fast and far.
"The Normans have come!" was his cry. "They have landed at Pevensey Bay. They are out already, harrying the land. Smoke and fire are the beacons of their march."
That feast came to a sudden end. Soon Harold and his men were in full march for London. Here recruits were gathered in all haste. Within a week the English king was marching towards where the Normans lay encamped. He was counselled to remain and gather more men, leaving some one else to lead his army.
"Not so," he replied; "an English king must never turn his back to the enemy."
We have now a third picture to draw, and a great one,—that of the mighty and momentous conflict which ended in the death of the last of the Saxon kings, and the Norman conquest of England.
The force of William greatly outnumbered that of Harold. It comprised about sixty thousand men, while Harold had but twenty or thirty thousand. And the Normans were more powerfully armed, the English having few archers, while many of them were hasty recruits who bore only pitchforks and other tools of their daily toil. The English king, therefore, did not dare to meet the heavily-armed and mail-clad Normans in the open field. Wisely he led his men to the hill of Senlac, near Hastings, a spot now occupied by the small town of Battle, so named in memory of the great fight. Here he built intrenchments of earth, stones, and tree-trunks, behind which he waited the Norman assault. Marshy ground covered the English right. In front, at the most exposed position, stood the "huscarls," or body-guard, of Harold, men clad in mail and armed with great battle-axes, their habit being to interlock their shields like a wall. In their midst stood the standard of Harold,—with the figure of a warrior worked in gold and gems,—and beside it the Golden Dragon of Wessex, a banner of ancient fame. Back of them were crowded the half-armed rustics who made up the remainder of the army.
Duke William had sought, by ravaging the land, to bring Harold to an engagement. He had until now subsisted by plunder. He was now obliged to concentrate his forces. A concentrated army cannot feed by pillage. There was but one thing for the Norman leader to do. He must attack the foe in his strong position, with victory or ruin as his only alternatives.
The night before the battle was differently passed by the two armies. The Normans spent the hours in prayer and confession to their priests. Bishop Odo celebrated mass on the field as day dawned, his white episcopal vestment covering a coat of mail, while war-horse and battle-axe awaited him when the benediction should be spoken. The English, on their side, sat round their watch-fires, drinking great horns of ale, and singing warlike lays, as their custom for centuries had been.
Day had not dawned on that memorable 14th of October, of the year 1066, when both sides were in arms and busily preparing for battle. William and Harold alike harangued their men and bade them do their utmost for victory. Ruin awaited the one side, slavery the other, if defeat fell upon their banners.
William rode a fine Spanish horse, which a Norman had brought from Galicia, whither he had gone on a pilgrimage to the shrine of St. Iago. The consecrated standard was borne by his side by one Tonstain, "the White," two barons having declined the dangerous honor. Behind him rode the pride of the Norman nobility.
On the hill-side before them stood Harold and his stout body-guard, trenches and earthworks in their front, their shields locked into a wall of iron. In the first line stood the men of Kent, this being their ancient privilege. Behind them were ranged the burgesses of London, the royal standard in their midst. Beside the standard stood Harold himself, his brothers Gurth and Leofwin by his side, and around them a group of England's noblest thanes and warriors.
On came the Norman column. Steadily awaited them the English phalanx. "Dieu aide!" or "God is our help!" shouted the assailing knights. "Christ's rood! the holy rood!" roared back the English warriors. Nearer they came, till they looked in each other's eyes, and the battle was ready to begin.
And now, from the van of the Norman host, rode a man of renown, the minstrel Taillefer. A gigantic man he was, singer, juggler, and champion combined. As he rode fearlessly forward he chanted in a loud voice the ancient "Song of Roland," flinging his sword in the air with one hand as he sang, and catching it as it fell with the other. As he sang, the Normans took up the refrain of his song, or shouted their battle cry of "Dieu aide."
Onward he rode, thrusting his blade through the body of the first Englishman he met. The second he encountered was flung wounded to the ground. With the third the "Song of Roland" ended; the giant minstrel was hurled from his horse pierced with a mortal wound. He had sung his last song. He crossed himself and was at rest.
On came the Normans, the band of knights led by William assailing Harold's centre, the mercenary host of French and Bretons attacking his flanks. The Norman foot led the van, seeking to force a passage across the English stockade. "Out, out!" fiercely shouted the men of Kent, as they plied axe and javelin with busy hands. The footmen were driven back. The Norman horse in turn were repulsed. Again and again the duke rallied and led his knights to the fatal stockade; again and again he and his men were driven back. The blood of the Norseman in his veins burned with all the old Viking battle-thirst. The headlong valor which he had often shown on Norman plains now impelled him relentlessly forward. Yet his coolness and readiness never forsook him. The course of the battle ever lay before his eyes, its reins in his grasp. At one time during the combat the choicest of the Norman cavalry were driven upon a deep trench which the English had dug and artfully concealed. In they went in numbers, men and horses falling and perishing. Disaster threatened Duke William's army. The Bretons, checked by the marshes on the right broke in disorder. Panic threatened to spread through the whole array, and a wild cry arose that the duke was slain. Men in numbers turned their backs upon the foe; a headlong flight was begun.
At this almost fatal moment Duke William's power as a leader revealed itself. His horse had been killed, but no harm had come to him. Springing to the back of a fresh steed, he spurred before the fugitives, and bade them halt, threatened them, struck them with his spear. When the cry was repeated that the duke was dead, he tore off his helmet and showed his face to the flying host. "Here I am!" he cried, in a stentorian voice. "Look at me! I live, and by God's help will conquer yet!"
Their leader's voice gave new courage to the Norman host, the flight ceased; they rallied, and, following the headlong charge of the duke, attacked the English with renewed fierceness and vigor. William fought like an aroused lion. Horse after horse was killed under him, but he still appeared at the head of his men, shouting his terrible war-cry, striking down a foeman with every swing of his mighty iron club.
He broke through the stockade; he spurred furiously on those who guarded the king's standard; down went Gurth, the king's brother, before a blow of that terrible mace; down went Leofwin, a second brother of the king; William's horse fell dead under him, a rider refused to lend him his horse, but a blow from that strong mailed hand emptied the saddle, and William was again horsed and using his mighty weapon with deadly effect.
Yet despite all his efforts the English line of defence remained unbroken. That linked wall of shields stood intact. From behind it the terrible battle-axes of Harold's men swung like flails, making crimson gaps in the crowded ranks before them. Hours had passed in this conflict. It began with day-dawn; the day was waning, yet still the English held their own; the fate of England hung in the scale; it began to look as if Harold would win.
But Duke William was a man of resources. That wall of shields must be rent asunder, or the battle was lost. If it could not be broken by assault, it might by retreat. He bade the men around him to feign a disorderly flight. The trick succeeded; many of the English leaped the stockade and pursued their flying foes. The crafty duke waited until the eager pursuers were scattered confusedly down the hill. Then, heading a body of horse which he had kept in reserve, he rushed upon the disordered mass, cutting them down in multitudes, strewing the hill-side with English slain.
Through the abandoned works the duke led his knights, and gained the central plateau. On the flanks the French and Bretons poured over the stockade and drove back its poorly-armed defenders. It was mid-afternoon, and the field already seemed won. Yet when the sunset hour came on that red October day the battle still raged. Harold had lost his works of defence, yet his huscarls stood stubbornly around him, and with unyielding obstinacy fought for their standard and their king. The spot on which they made their last fight was that marked afterwards by the high altar of Battle Abbey.
The sun was sinking. The battle was not yet decided. For nine hours it had raged. Dead bodies by thousands clogged the field. The living fought from a platform of the dead. At length, as the sun was nearing the horizon, Duke William brought up his archers and bade them pour their arrows upon the dense masses crowded around the standard of the English king. He ordered them to shoot into the air, that the descending shafts might fall upon the faces of the foe.
Victory followed the flight of those plumed shafts. As the sun went down one of them pierced Harold's right eye. When they saw him fall the Normans rushed like a torrent forward, and a desperate conflict ensued over the fallen king. The Saxon standard still waved over the serried English ranks. Robert Fitz Ernest, a Norman knight, fought his way to the staff. His outstretched hand had nearly grasped it when an English battle-axe laid him low. Twenty knights, grouped in mass, followed him through the English phalanx. Down they went till ten of them lay stretched in death. The other ten reached the spot, tore down the English flag, and in a few minutes more the consecrated banner of Normandy was flying in its stead.
The conflict was at an end. As darkness came the surviving English fled into the woods in their rear. The Normans remained masters of the field. Harold, the king, was dead, and all his brothers had fallen; Duke William was England's lord. On the very spot where Harold had fallen the conqueror pitched his tent, and as darkness settled over vanquished England he "sate down to eat and drink among the dead."
No braver fight had ever been made than that which Harold made for England. The loss of the Normans had been enormous. On the day after the battle the survivors of William's army were drawn up in line, and the muster-roll called. To a fourth of the names no answer was returned. Among the dead were many of the noblest lords and bravest knights of Normandy. Yet there were hungry nobles enough left to absorb all the fairest domains of Saxon England, and they crowded eagerly around the duke, pressing on him their claims. A new roll was prepared, containing the names of the noblemen and gentlemen who had survived the bloody fight. This was afterwards deposited in Battle Abbey, which William had built upon the hill where Harold made his gallant stand.
The body of the slain king was not easily to be found. Harold's aged mother, who had lost three brave sons in the battle, offered Duke William its weight in gold for the body of the king. Two monks sought for it, but in vain. The Norman soldiers had despoiled the dead, and the body of a king could not be told among that heap of naked corpses. In the end the monks sent for Editha, a beautiful maiden to whom Harold had been warmly attached, and begged her to search for her slain lover.
Editha, the "swan-necked," as some chroniclers term her, groped, with eyes half-blinded with tears, through that heap of mutilated dead, her soul filled with horror, yet seeking on and on until at length her love-true eyes saw and knew the face of the king. Harold's body was taken to Waltham Abbey, on the river Lea, a place he had loved when alive. Here he was interred, his tomb bearing the simple inscription, placed there by the monks of Waltham, "Here lies the unfortunate Harold!"
HEREWARD THE WAKE.
Through the mist of the far past of English history there looms up before our vision a notable figure, that of Hereward the Wake, the "last of the Saxons," as he has been appropriately called, a hero of romance perhaps more than of history, but in some respects the noblest warrior who fought for Saxon England against the Normans. His story is a fabric in which threads of fact and fancy seem equally interwoven; of much of his life, indeed, we are ignorant, and tradition has surrounded this part of his biography with tales of largely imaginary deeds; but he is a character of history as well as of folk lore, and his true story is full of the richest elements of romance. It is this noteworthy hero of old England with whom we have now to deal.
No one can be sure where Hereward was born, though most probably the county of Lincolnshire may claim the honor. We are told that he was heir to the lordship of Bourne, in that county. Tradition—for we have not yet reached the borders of fact—says that he was a wild and unruly youth, disrespectful to the clergy, disobedient to his parents, and so generally unmanageable that in the end his father banished him from his home.
Little was the truculent lad troubled by this. He had in him the spirit of a wanderer and outlaw, but was one fitted to make his mark wherever his feet should fall. In Scotland, while still a boy, he killed, single-handed, a great bear,—a feat highly considered in those days when all battles with man and beast were hand to hand. Next we hear of him in Cornwall, one of whose race of giants Hereward found reserved for his prowess. This was a fellow of mighty limb and boastful tongue, vast in strength and terrible in war, as his own tale ran. Hereward fought him, and the giant ceased to boast. Cornwall had a giant the less. Next he sought Ireland, and did yeoman service in the wars of that unquiet island. Taking ship thence, he made his way to Flanders, where legend credits him with wonderful deeds. Battle and bread were the nutriment of his existence, the one as necessary to him as the other, and a journey of a few hundreds of miles, with the hope of a hard fight at the end, was to him but a holiday.
Such is the Hereward to whom tradition introduces us, an idol of popular song and story, and doubtless a warrior of unwonted courage and skill, agile and strong, ready for every toil and danger, and so keenly alert and watchful that men called him the Wake. This vigorous and valiant man was born to be the hero and champion of the English, in their final struggle for freedom against their Norman foes.
A new passion entered Hereward's soul in Flanders, that of love. He met and wooed there a fair lady, Torfrida by name, who became his wife. A faithful helpmeet she proved, his good comrade in his wanderings, his wise counseller in warfare, and ever a softening influence in the fierce warrior's life. Hitherto the sword had been his mistress, his temper the turbulent and hasty one of the dweller in camp. Henceforth he owed a divided allegiance to love and the sword, and grew softer in mood, gentler and more merciful in disposition, as life went on.
To this wandering Englishman beyond the seas came tidings of sad disasters in his native land. Harold and his army had been overthrown at Hastings, and Norman William was on the throne; Norman earls had everywhere seized on English manors, Norman churls, ennobled on the field of battle, were robbing and enslaving the old owners of the land. The English had risen in the north, and William had harried whole counties, leaving a desert where he had found a fertile and flourishing land. The sufferings of the English at home touched the heart of this genuine Englishman abroad. Hereward the Wake gathered a band of stout warriors, took ship, and set sail for his native land.
And now, to a large extent, we leave the realm of legend, and enter the domain of fact. Hereward henceforth is a historical character, but a history his with shreds of romance still clinging to its skirts. First of all, story credits him with descending on his ancestral hall of Bourne, then in the possession of Normans, his father driven from his domain, and now in his grave. Hereward dealt with the Normans as Ulysses had done with the suitors, and when the hall was his there were few of them left to tell the tale. Thence, not caring to be cooped up by the enemy within stone walls, he marched merrily away, and sought a safer refuge elsewhere.
This descent upon Bourne we should like to accept as fact. It has in it the elements of righteous retribution. But we must admit that it is one of the shreds of romance of which we have spoken, one of those interesting stories which men believe to be true because they would like them to be true,—possibly with a solid foundation, certainly with much embellishment.
Where we first surely find Hereward is in the heart of the fen country of eastern England. Here, at Ely in Cambridgeshire, a band of Englishmen had formed what they called a "Camp of Refuge," whence they issued at intervals in excursions against the Normans. England had no safer haven of retreat for her patriot sons. Ely was practically an island, being surrounded by watery marshes on all sides. Lurking behind the reeds and rushes of these fens, and hidden by their misty exhalations, that faithful band had long defied its foes.
Hither came Hereward with his warlike followers, and quickly found himself at the head of the band of patriot refugees. History was repeating itself. Centuries before King Alfred had sought just such a shelter against the Danes, and had troubled his enemies as Hereward now began to trouble his.
ELY CATHEDRAL.
The exiles of the Camp of Refuge found new blood in their organization when Hereward became their leader. Their feeble forays were quickly replaced by bold and daring ones. Issuing like hornets from their nests, Hereward and his valiant followers sharply stung the Norman invaders, hesitating not to attack them wherever found, cutting off armed bands, wresting from them the spoils of which they had robbed the Saxons, and flying back to their reedy shelter before their foes could gather in force.
Of the exploits of this band of active warriors but one is told in full, and that one is worth repeating. The Abbey of Peterborough, not far removed from Ely, had submitted to Norman rule and gained a Norman abbot, Turold by name. This angered the English at Ely, and they made a descent upon the settlement. No great harm was intended. Food and some minor spoil would have satisfied the raiders. But the frightened monks, instead of throwing themselves on the clemency of their fellow-countrymen, sent word in haste to Turold. This incensed the raiding band, composed in part of English, in part of Danes who had little regard for church privileges. Provoked to fury, they set fire to the monks' house and the town, and only one house escaped the flames. Then they assailed the monastery, the monks flying for their lives. The whole band of outlaws burst like wolves into the minster, which they rapidly cleared of its treasures. Here some climbed to the great rood, and carried off its golden ornaments. There others made their way to the steeple, where had been hidden the gold and silver pastoral staff. Shrines, roods, books, vestments, money, treasures of all sorts vanished, and when Abbot Turold appeared with a party of armed Normans, he found but the bare walls of the church and the ashes of the town, with only a sick monk to represent the lately prosperous monastery. Whether or not Hereward took part in this affair, history does not say.
King William had hitherto disregarded this patriot refuge, and the bold deeds of the valiant Hereward. All England besides had submitted to his authority, and he was too busy in the work of making a feudal kingdom of free England to trouble himself about one small centre of insurrection. But an event occurred that caused him to look upon Hereward with more hostile eyes.
Among those who had early sworn fealty to him, after the defeat of Harold at Hastings, were Edwin and Morcar, the earls of Mercia and Northumberland. They were confirmed in the possession of their estates and dignities, and remained faithful to William during the general insurrection of northern England. As time went on, however, their position became unbearable. The king failed to give them his confidence, the courtiers envied them their wealth and titles, and maligned them to the king. Their dignity of position was lost at the court; their safety even was endangered; they resolved, when too late, to emulate their braver countryman, and strike a blow for home and liberty. Edwin sought his domain in the north, bent on insurrection. Morcar made his way to the Isle of Ely, where he took service with his followers, and with other noble Englishmen, under the brave Hereward, glad to find one spot on which a man of true English blood could still set foot in freedom.
His adhesion brought ruin instead of strength to Hereward. If William could afford to neglect a band of outlaws in the fens, he could not rest with these two great earls in arms against him. There were forces in the north to attend to Edwin; Morcar and Hereward must be looked after.
Gathering an army, William marched to the fen country and prepared to attack the last of the English in their almost inaccessible Camp of Refuge. He had already built himself a castle at Cambridge, and here he dwelt while directing his attack against the outlaws of the fens.
The task before him was not a light one, in the face of an opponent so skilful and vigilant as Hereward the Wake. The Normans of that region had found him so ubiquitous and so constantly victorious that they ascribed his success to enchantment; and even William, who was not free from the superstitions of his day, seemed to imagine that he had an enchanter for a foe. Enchanter or not, however, he must be dealt with as a soldier, and there was but one way in which he could be reached. The heavily-armed Norman soldiers could not cross the marsh. From one side the Isle of Ely could be approached by vessels, but it was here so strongly defended that the king's ships failed to make progress against Hereward's works. Finding his attack by water a failure, William began the building of a causeway, two miles long, across the morasses from the dry land to the island.
This was no trifling labor. There was a considerable depth of mud and water to fill, and stones and trunks of trees were brought for the purpose from all the surrounding country, the trees being covered with hides as a protection against fire. The work did not proceed in peace. Hereward and his men contested its progress at every point, attacked the workmen with darts and arrows from the light boats in which they navigated the waters of the fens, and, despite the hides, succeeded in setting fire to the woodwork of the causeway. More than once it had to be rebuilt; more than once it broke down under the weight of the Norman knights and men-at-arms, who crowded upon it in their efforts to reach the island, and many of these eager warriors, weighed down by the burden of their armor, met a dismal death in the mud and water of the marshes.
Hereward fought with his accustomed courage, warlike skill, and incessant vigilance, and gave King William no easy task, despite the strength of his army and the abundance of his resources. But such a contest, against so skilled an enemy as William the Conqueror, and with such disparity of numbers, could have but one termination. Hereward struck so valiant a last blow for England that he won the admiration of his great opponent; but William was not the man to rest content with aught short of victory, and every successful act of defence on the part of the English was met by a new movement of assault. Despite all Hereward's efforts, the causeway slowly but surely moved forward across the fens.
But Hereward's chief danger lay behind rather than before; in the island rather than on the mainland. His accessions of nobles and commons had placed a strong body of men under his command, with whom he might have been able to meet William's approaches by ship and causeway, had not treason laid intrenched in the island itself. With war in his front and treachery in his rear the gallant Wake had a double danger to contend with.
This brings us to a picturesque scene, deftly painted by the old chroniclers. Ely had its abbey, a counterpart of that of Peterborough. Thurston, the abbot, was English-born, as were the monks under his pastoral charge; and long the cowled inmates of the abbey and the armed patriots of the Camp of Refuge dwelt in sweet accord. In the refectory of the abbey monks and warriors sat side by side at table, their converse at meals being doubtless divided between affairs spiritual and affairs temporal, while from walls and roof hung the arms of the warriors, harmoniously mingled with the emblems of the church. It was a picture of the marriage of church and state well worthy of reproduction on canvas.
Yet King William knew how to deal with Abbot Thurston. Lands belonging to the monastery lay beyond the fens, and on these the king laid the rough hand of royal right, as an earnest of what would happen when the monastery itself should fall into his hands. A flutter of terror shook the hearts of the abbot and his family of monks. To them it seemed that the skies were about to fall, and that they would be wise to stand from under.
While the monks of Ely were revolving this threat of disaster in their souls, the tide of assault and defence rolled on. William's causeway pushed its slow length forward through the fens. Hereward assailed it with fire and sword, and harried the king's lands outside by sudden raids. It is said that, like King Alfred before him, he more than once visited the camp of the Normans in disguise, and spied out their ways and means of warfare.
There is a story connected with this warlike enterprise so significant of the times that it must be told. Whether or not William believed Hereward to be an enchanter, he took steps to defeat enchantment, if any existed. An old woman, who had the reputation of being a sorceress, was brought to the royal camp, and her services engaged in the king's cause. A wooden tower was built, and pushed along the causeway in front of the troops, the old woman within it actively dispensing her incantations and calling down the powers of witch-craft upon Hereward's head. Unfortunately for her, Hereward tried against her sorcery of the broomstick the enchantment of the brand, setting fire to the tower and burning it and the sorceress within it. We could scarcely go back to a later date than the eleventh century to find such an absurdity as this possible, but in those days of superstition even such a man as William the Conqueror was capable of it.
How the contest would have ended had treason been absent it is not easy to say. As it was, Abbot Thurston and his monks brought the siege to a sudden and disastrous end. They showed the king a secret way of approach to the island, and William's warriors took the camp of Hereward by surprise. What followed scarcely needs the telling. A fierce and sharp struggle, men falling and dying in scores, William's heavy-armed warriors pressing heavily upon the ranks of the more lightly clad Englishmen, and final defeat and surrender, complete the story of the assault upon Ely.
William had won, but Hereward still defied him. Striking his last blow in defence, the gallant leader, with a small band of chosen followers, cut a lane of blood through the Norman ranks and made his way to a small fleet of ships which he had kept armed and guarded for such an emergency. Sail was set, and down the stream they sped to the open sea, still setting at defiance the power of Norman William.
We have two further lines of story to follow, one of history, the other of romance; one that of the reward of the monks for their treachery, the other that of the later story of Hereward the Wake. Abbot Thurston hastened to make his submission to the king. He and the inmates of the monastery sought the court, then at Warwick, and humbly begged the royal favor and protection. The story goes that William repaid their visit by a journey to Ely, where he entered the minster while the monks, all unconscious of the royal visit, were at their meal in the refectory. The king stood humbly at a distance from the shrine, as not worthy to approach it, but sent a mark of gold to be offered as his tribute upon the altar.
Meanwhile, one Gilbert of Clare entered the refectory, and asked the feasting monks whether they could not dine at some other time, and if it were not wise to repress their hunger while King William was in the church. Like a flock of startled pigeons the monks rose, their appetites quite gone, and flocked tumultuously towards the church. They were too late. William was gone. But in his short visit he had left them a most unwelcome legacy by marking out the site of a castle within the precincts of the monastery, and giving orders for its immediate building by forced labor.
Abbot Thurston finally purchased peace from the king at a high rate, paying him three hundred marks of silver for his one mark of gold. Nor was this the end. The silver marks proved to be light in weight. To appease the king's anger at this, another three hundred silver marks were offered, and King William graciously suffered them to say their prayers thenceforward in peace. Their treachery to Hereward had not proved profitable to the traitors.
If now we return to the story of Hereward the Wake, we must once more leave the realm of history for that of legend, for what further is told of him, though doubtless based on fact, is strictly legendary in structure. Landing on the coast of Lincolnshire, the fugitives abandoned their light ships for the widespreading forests of that region, and long lived the life of outlaws in the dense woodland adjoining Hereward's ancestral home of Bourne. Like an earlier Robin Hood, the valiant Wake made the greenwood his home and the Normans his prey, covering nine shires in his bold excursions, which extended as far as the distant town of Warwick. The Abbey of Peterborough, with its Norman abbot, was an object of his special detestation, and more than once Turold and his monks were put to flight, while the abbey yielded up a share of its treasures to the bold assailants.
How long Hereward and his men dwelt in the greenwood we are not able to say. They defied there the utmost efforts of their foes, and King William, whose admiration for his defiant enemy had not decreased, despairing of reducing him by force, made him overtures of peace. Hereward was ready for them. He saw clearly by this time that the Norman yoke was fastened too firmly on England's neck to be thrown off. He had fought as long as fighting was of use. Surrender only remained. A day came at length in which he rode from the forest with forty stout warriors at his back, made his way to the royal seat of Winchester, and knocked at the city gates, bidding the guards to carry the news to the conqueror that Hereward the Wake had come.
William gladly received him. He knew the value of a valiant soul, and was thereafter a warm friend of Hereward, who, on his part, remained as loyal and true to the king as he had been strong and earnest against him. And so years passed on, Hereward in favor at court, and he and Torfrida, his Flemish wife, living happily in the castle which William's bounty had provided them.
There is more than one story of Hereward's final fate. One account says that he ended his days in peace. The other, more in accordance with the spirit of the times and the hatred and jealousy felt by many of the Norman nobles against this English protégé of the king, is so stirring in its details that it serves as a fitting termination to the Hereward romance.
The story goes that he kept close watch and ward in his house against his many enemies. But on one occasion his chaplain, Ethelward, then on lookout duty, fell asleep on his post. A band of Normans was approaching, who broke into the house without warning being given, and attacked Hereward alone in his hall.
He had barely time to throw on his armor when his enemies burst in upon him and assailed him with sword and spear. The fight that ensued was one that would have gladdened the soul of a Viking of old. Hereward laid about him with such savage energy that the floor was soon strewn with the dead bodies of his foes, and crimsoned with their blood. Finally the spear broke in the hero's hand. Next he grasped his sword and did with it mighty deeds of valor. This, too, was broken in the stress of fight. His shield was the only weapon left him, and this he used with such vigor and skill that before he had done fifteen Normans lay dead upon the floor.
Four of his enemies now got behind him and smote him in the back. The great warrior was brought to his knees. A Breton knight, Ralph of Dol, rushed upon him, but found the wounded lion dangerous still. With a last desperate effort Hereward struck him a deadly blow with his buckler, and Breton and Saxon fell dead together to the floor. Another of the assailants, Asselin by name, now cut off the head of this last defender of Saxon England, and holding it in the air, swore by God and his might that he had never before seen a man of such valor and strength, and that if there had been three more like him in the land the French would have been driven out of England, or been slain on its soil.
And so ends the stirring story of Hereward the Wake, that mighty man of old.
THE DEATH OF THE RED KING.
William of Normandy, by the grace of God and his iron mace, had made himself king of England. An iron king he proved, savage, ruthless, the descendant of a few generations of pirate Norsemen, and himself a pirate in blood and temper. England strained uneasily under the harsh rein which he placed upon it, and he harried the country mercilessly, turning a great area of fertile land into a desert. That he might have a hunting-park near the royal palace, he laid waste all the land that lay between Winchester and the sea, planting there, in place of the homes destroyed and families driven out, what became known as the "New Forest." Nothing angered the English more than this ruthless act. A law had been passed that any one caught killing a deer in William's new hunting-grounds should have his eyes put out. Men prayed for retribution. It came. The New Forest proved fatal to the race of the Conqueror. In 1081 his oldest son Richard mortally wounded himself within its precincts. In May of the year 1100 his grandson Richard, son of Duke Robert, was killed there by a stray arrow. And, as if to emphasize more strongly this work of retribution, two months afterwards William Rufus, the Red King, the son of the Conqueror, was slain in the same manner within its leafy shades.
William Rufus—William II. of England—was, like all his Norman ancestors, fond of the chase. When there were no men to be killed, these fierce old dukes and kings solaced themselves with the slaughter of beasts. In early summer of the year 1100 the Red King was at Winchester Castle, on the skirts of the New Forest. Thence he rode to Malwood-Keep, a favorite hunting-lodge in the forest. Boon companions were with him, numbers of them, one of them a French knight named Sir Walter Tyrrell, the king's favorite. Here the days were spent in the delights of the chase, the nights in feasting and carousing, and all went merrily.
Around them spread far and wide the umbrageous lanes and alleys of the New Forest, trees of every variety, oaks in greatest number, crowding the soil. As yet there were no trees of mighty girth. The forest was young. Few of its trees had more than a quarter-century of growth, except where more ancient woodland had been included. The place was solitary, tenanted only by the deer which had replaced man upon its soil, and by smaller creatures of wing and fur. Barely a human foot trod there, save when the king's hunting retinue swept through its verdant aisles and woke its solitary depths with the cheerful notes of the hunting-horn. The savage laws of the Conqueror kept all others but the most daring poachers from its aisles.
Such was the stage set for the tragedy which we have to relate. The story goes that rough jests passed at Malwood-Keep between Tyrrell and the king, ending in anger, as jests are apt to. William boasted that he would carry an army through France to the Alps. Tyrrell, heated with wine, answered that he might find France a net easier to enter than to escape from. The hearers remembered these bitter words afterwards.
On the night before the fatal day it is said that cries of terror came from the king's bed-chamber. The attendants rushed thither, only to find that the monarch had been the victim of nightmare. When morning came he laughed the incident to scorn, saying that dreams were fit to scare only old women and children. His companions were not so easily satisfied. Those were days when all men's souls were open to omens good and bad. They earnestly advised him not to hunt that day. William jested at their fears, vowed that no dream should scare him from the chase, yet, uneasy at heart, perhaps, let the hours pass without calling for his horse. Midday came. Dinner was served. William ate and drank with unusual freedom. Wine warmed his blood and drove off his clinging doubts. He rose from the table and ordered his horse to be brought. The day was young enough still to strike a deer, he said.
The king was in high spirits. He joked freely with his guests as he mounted his horse and prepared for the chase. As he sat in his saddle a woodman presented him six new arrows. He examined them, declared that they were well made and proper shafts, and put four of them in his quiver, handing the other two to Walter Tyrrell.
"These are for you," he said. "Good marksmen should have good arms."
Tyrrell took them, thanked William for the gift, and the hunting-party was about to start, when there appeared a monk who asked to speak with the king.
"I come from the convent of St. Peter, at Gloucester," he said. "The abbot bids me give a message to your majesty."
"Abbot Serlon; a good Norman he," said the king. "What would he say?"
"Your majesty," said the monk, with great humility, "he bids me state that one of his monks has dreamed a dream of evil omen. He deems the king should know it."
"A dream!" declared the king. "Has he sent you hither to carry shadows? Well, tell me your dream. Time presses."
"The dream was this. The monk, in his sleep, saw Jesus Christ sitting on a throne, and at his feet kneeled a woman, who supplicated him in these words: 'Saviour of the human race, look down with pity on thy people groaning under the yoke of William.'"
The king greeted this message with a loud laugh.
"Do they take me for an Englishman, with their dreams?" he asked. "Do they fancy that I am fool enough to give up my plans because a monk dreams or an old woman sneezes? Go, tell your abbot I have heard his story. Come, Walter de Poix, to horse!"
The train swept away, leaving the monkish messenger alone, the king's disdainful laugh still in his ears. With William were his brother Henry, long at odds with him, now reconciled, William de Breteuil, and several other nobles. Quickly they vanished among the thickly clustering trees, and soon broke up into small groups, each of which took its own route through the forest. Walter Tyrrell alone remained with the king, their dogs hunting together.
That was the last that was seen of William, the Red King, alive. When the hunters returned he was not with them. Tyrrell, too, was missing. What had become of them? Search was made, but neither could be found, and doubt and trouble of soul pervaded Malwood-Keep.
The shades of night were fast gathering when a poor charcoal-burner, passing with his cart through the forest, came upon a dead body stretched bleeding upon the grass. An arrow had pierced its breast. Lifting it into his cart, wrapped in old linen, he jogged slowly onward, the blood still dripping and staining the ground as he passed. Not till he reached the hunting-lodge did he discover that it was the corpse of a king he had found in the forest depths. The dead body was that of William II. of England.
Tyrrell had disappeared. In vain they sought him. He was nowhere to be found. Suspicion rested on him. He had murdered the king, men said, and fled the land.
Mystery has ever since shrouded the death of the Red King. Tyrrell lived to tell his tale. It was probably a true one, though many doubted it. The Frenchman had quarrelled with the king, men said, and had murdered him from revenge. Just why he should have murdered so powerful a friend and patron, for a taunt passed in jest, was far from evident.
Tyrrell's story is as follows: He and the king had taken their stations, opposite one another, waiting the work of the woodsmen who were beating up the game. Each had an arrow in his cross-bow, his finger on the trigger, eagerly listening for the distant sounds which would indicate the coming of game. As they stood thus intent, a large stag suddenly broke from the bushes and sprang into the space between them.
William drew, but the bow-string broke in his hand. The stag, startled at the sound, stood confused, looking suspiciously around. The king signed to Tyrrell to shoot, but the latter, for some reason, did not obey. William grew impatient, and called out,—
"Shoot, Walter, shoot, in the devil's name!"
Shoot he did. An instant afterwards the king fell without word or moan. Tyrrell's arrow had struck a tree, and, glancing, pierced the king's breast; or it may be that an arrow from a more distant bow had struck him. When Tyrrell reached his side he was dead.
The French knight knew what would follow if he fell into the hands of the king's companions. He could not hope to make people credit his tale. Mounting his horse, he rode with all speed through the forest, not drawing rein till the coast was reached. He had far outridden the news of the tragedy. Taking ship here, he crossed over in haste to Normandy, and thence made his way to France, not drawing a breath free from care till he felt the soil of his native land beneath his feet. Here he lived to a good age and died in peace, his life diversified by a crusading visit to the Holy Land.
The end of the Red King resembled that of his father. The Conqueror had been deserted before he had fairly ceased breathing, his body left half clad on the bare boards of his chamber, while some of his attendants rifled the palace, others hastened to offer their services to his son. The same scenes followed the Red King's death. His body was left in the charcoal-burner's cart, clotted with blood, to be conveyed to Winchester, while his brother Henry rode post-haste thither to seize the royal treasure, and the train of courtiers rode as rapid a course, to look after their several interests.
Reaching the royal palace, Henry imperiously demanded the keys of the king's treasure-chamber. Before he received them William de Breteuil entered, breathless with haste, and bade the keepers not to deliver them.
"Thou and I," he said to Henry, "ought loyally to keep the faith which we promised to thy brother, Duke Robert; he has received our oath of homage, and, absent or present, he has the right."
But what was faith, what an oath, when a crown was the prize? A quarrel followed; Henry drew his sword; the people around supported him; soon he had the treasure and the royal regalia; Robert might have the right, he had the kingdom.
There is tradition connected with the Red King's death. A stirrup hangs in Lyndhurst Hall, said to be that which he used on that fatal day. The charcoal-burner was named Purkess. There are Purkesses still in the village of Minstead, near where William Rufus died. And the story runs that the earthly possessions of the Purkess family have ever since been a single horse and cart. A stone marks the spot where the king fell, on it is the inscription,—
"Here stood the oak-tree on which the arrow, shot by Walter Tyrrell at a stag, glanced and struck King William II., surnamed Rufus, on the breast; of which stroke he instantly died on the second of August, 1100.
"That the spot where an event so memorable had happened might not hereafter be unknown, this stone was set up by John, Lord Delaware, who had seen the tree growing in this place, anno 1745."
We may end by saying that England was revenged; the retribution for which her children had prayed had overtaken the race of the pirate king. That broad domain of Saxon England, which William the Conqueror had wrested from its owners to make himself a hunting-forest, was reddened with the blood of two of his sons and a grandson. The hand of Heaven had fallen on that cruel race. The New Forest was consecrated in the blood of one of the Norman kings.
HOW THE WHITE SHIP SAILED.
Henry I., king of England, had made peace with France. Then to Normandy went the king with a great retinue, that he might have Prince William, his only and dearly-loved son, acknowledged as his successor by the Norman nobles and married to the daughter of the Count of Anjou. Both these things were done; regal was the display, great the rejoicing, and on the 25th of November, 1120, the king and his followers, with the prince and his fair young bride, prepared to embark at Barfleur on their triumphant journey home.
So far all had gone well. Now disaster lowered. Fate had prepared a tragedy that was to load the king's soul with life-long grief and yield to English history one of its most pathetic tales.
Of the vessels of the fleet, one of the best was a fifty-oared galley called "The White Ship," commanded by a certain Thomas Fitzstephen, whose father had sailed the ship on which William the Conqueror first came to England's shores. This service Fitzstephen represented to the king, and begged that he might be equally honored.
"My liege," he said, "my father steered the ship with the golden boy upon the prow in which your father sailed to conquer England, I beseech you to grant me the same honor, that of carrying you in the White Ship to England."
"I am sorry, friend," said the king, "that my vessel is already chosen, and that I cannot sail with the son of the man who served my father. But the prince and all his company shall go along with you in the White Ship, which you may esteem an honor equal to that of carrying me."
By evening of that day the king with his retinue had set sail, with a fair wind, for England's shores, leaving the prince with his attendants to follow in Fitzstephen's ship. With the prince were his natural brother Richard, his sister the countess of Perch, Richard, earl of Chester, with his wife, the king's niece, together with one hundred and forty of the flower of the young nobility of England and Normandy, accompanying whom were many ladies of high descent. The whole number of persons taking passage on the White Ship, including the crew, were three hundred.
Prince William was but a boy, and one who did little honor to his father's love. He was a dissolute youth of eighteen, who had so little feeling for the English as to have declared that when he came to the throne he would yoke them to the plough like oxen. Destiny had decided that the boastful boy should not have the opportunity to carry out this threat.
"Give three casks of wine, Fitzstephen," he said, "to your crew. My father, the king, has sailed. What time have we to make merry here and still reach England with the rest?"
"If we sail at midnight," answered Fitzstephen, "my fifty rowers and the White Ship shall overtake the swiftest vessel in the king's fleet before daybreak."
"Then let us be merry," said the prince; "the night is fine, the time young, let us enjoy it while we may."
Merry enough they were; the prince and his companions danced in the moonlight on the ship's deck, the sailors emptied their wine-casks, and when at last they left the harbor there was not a sober sailor on board, and the captain himself was the worse for wine.
As the ship swept from the port, the young nobles, heated with wine, hung over the sides and drove away with taunts the priests who had come to give the usual benediction. Wild youths were they,—the most of them,—gay, ardent, in the hey-day of life, caring mainly for pleasure, and with little heed of aught beyond the moment's whim. There seemed naught to give them care, in sooth. The sea lay smooth beneath them, the air was mild, the moon poured its soft lustre upon the deck, and propitious fortune appeared to smile upon the ship as it rushed onward, under the impulse of its long banks of oars, in haste to overtake the distant fleet of the king.
All went merrily. Fitzstephen grasped the helm, his soul proud with the thought that, as his father had borne the Conqueror to England's strand, he was bearing the pride of younger England, the heir to the throne. On the deck before him his passengers were gathered in merry groups, singing, laughing, chatting, the ladies in their rich-lined mantles, the gentlemen in their bravest attire; while to the sound of song and merry talk the well-timed fall of the oars and swash of driven waters made refrain.
They had reached the harbor's mouth. The open ocean lay before them. In a few minutes more they would be sweeping over the Atlantic's broad expanse. Suddenly there came a frightful crash; a shock that threw numbers of the passengers headlong to the deck, and tore the oars from the rowers' hands; a cry of terror that went up from three hundred throats. It is said that some of the people in the far-off ships heard that cry, faint, far, despairing, borne to them over miles of sea, and asked themselves in wonder what it could portend.
It portended too much wine and too little heed. The vessel, carelessly steered, had struck upon a rock, the Catee-raze, at the harbor's mouth, with such, violence that a gaping wound was torn in her prow, and the waters instantly began to rush in.
The White Ship was injured, was filling, would quickly sink. Wild consternation prevailed. There was but one boat, and that small. Fitzstephen, sobered by the concussion, hastily lowered it, crowded into it the prince and a few nobles, and bade them hastily to push off and row to the land.
"It is not far," he said, "and the sea is smooth. The rest of us must die."
They obeyed. The boat was pushed off, the oars dropped into the water, it began to move from the ship. At that moment, amid the cries of horror and despair on the sinking vessel, came one that met the prince's ear in piteous appeal. It was the voice of his sister, Marie, the countess of Perch, crying to him for help.
In that moment of frightful peril Prince William's heart beat true.
"Row back at any risk!" he cried. "My sister must be saved. I cannot bear to leave her."
They rowed back. But the hope that from that panic-stricken multitude one woman could be selected was wild. No sooner had the boat reached the ship's side than dozens madly sprung into it, in such numbers that it was overturned. At almost the same moment the White Ship went down, dragging all within reach into her eddying vortex. Death spread its sombre wings over the spot where, a few brief minutes before, life and joy had ruled.
When the tossing eddies subsided, the pale moonlight looked down on but two souls of all that gay and youthful company. These clung to a spar which had broken loose from the mast and floated on the waves, or to the top of the mast itself, which stood above the surface.
"Only two of us, out of all that gallant company!" said one of these in despairing tones. "Who are you, friend and comrade?"
"I am a nobleman, Godfrey, the son of Gilbert de L'Aigle. And you?" he asked.
"I am Berold, a poor butcher of Rouen," was the answer.
"God be merciful to us both!" they then cried together.
Immediately afterwards they saw a third, who had risen and was swimming towards them. As he drew near he pushed the wet, clinging hair from his face, and they saw the white, agonized countenance of Fitzstephen. He gazed at them with eager eyes; then cast a long, despairing look on the waters around him.
"Where is the prince?" he asked, in tones that seemed to shudder with terror.
"Gone! gone!" they cried. "Not one of all on board, except we three, has risen above the water."
"Woe! woe, to me!" moaned Fitzstephen. He ceased swimming, turned to them a face ghastly with horror, and then sank beneath the waves, to join the goodly company whom his negligence had sent to a watery death. He dared not live to meet the father of his charge.
The two continued to cling to their support. But the water had in it the November chill, the night was long, the tenderly-reared nobleman lacked the endurance of his humbler companion. Before day-dawn he said, in faint accents,—
"I am exhausted and chilled with the cold. I can hold on no longer. Farewell, good friend! God preserve you!"
He loosed his hold and sank. The butcher of Rouen remained alone.
When day came some fisherman saw this clinging form from the shore, rowed out, and brought him in, the sole one living of all that goodly company. A few hours before the pride and hope of Normandy and England had crowded that noble ship. Now only a base-born butcher survived to tell the story of disaster, and the stately White Ship, with her noble freightage, lay buried beneath the waves.
For three days no one dared tell King Henry the dreadful story. Such was his love for his son that they feared his grief might turn to madness, and their lives pay the forfeit of their venture. At length a little lad was sent in to him with the tale. Weeping bitterly, and kneeling at the king's feet, the child told in broken accents the story which had been taught him, how the White Ship had gone to the bottom at the mouth of Barfleur harbor, and all on board been lost save one poor commoner. Prince William, his son, was dead.
The king heard him to the end, with slowly whitening face and horror-stricken eyes. At the conclusion of the child's narrative the monarch fell prostrate to the floor, and lay there long like one stricken with death. The chronicle of this sad tragedy ends in one short phrase, which is weighty with its burden of grief,—From that day on King Henry never smiled again!