Then we fought with our swords: now dread Esa frowns defiance; At We fought with our swords :-O, no more the war-horse boundeth, No more the stirring flute, the loud-clanging trumpet soundeth; Nor was Regner Lodbrog the only Saxon of rank who possessed "the vision and the faculty divine" of poetry. Kings and nobles and mighty chieftains vied with each other in an art which raised them to eminence among the people, and elevated them in the estimation of the fair. The illustrious Alfred, the regenerator of English liberty, whose glory was no less brilliant as a scholar than as a warrior, found leisure, amidst the din of battle and the clash of conflicting factions, to cultivate the Muse, and transmitted some noble remnants of his genius and taste to posterity.' King Canute, who died in 1036, was a generous patron of bards and minstrels. Some of his verses written on a visit to Ely were long popular among the English peasantry, and have been preserved to this day. We quote here the original, to shew how nearly the two languages approximate, after a lapse of 843 years: semi-pious expedition, which was attended with direful devastation in Northumbria (to which it was solely directed), the daughters of Regner wove their brothers an enchanted standard of the Raven, the national banner alike of the Norwegians, Danes, Saxons, and other Teutonic nations worshippers of Odin. 'Alfred's biographer assures us that he was the best Saxon poet of his time; also an excellent grammarian, orator, philosopher, architect, geometrician, and historian. He composed several works, that were in great esteem. Among others, he translated into Saxon Gregory's Pastoral, Boethius De Consolatione (which Dr. Plot says was translated by Alfred at Woodstock, and was so great a favourite with him that he constantly carried it about in his bosom), and Bede's Ecclesiastical History. He is also said to have translated the Old and New Testament, and at the time of his death was engaged with a version of the Psalms. See Spelman's Life of Alfred, book iii. c. 100. For an account of the rest of his voluminous works, see the same author, pp. 210-211. So ignorant were the rest of the nation in his time, that he complained bitterly that from the Humber to the Thames there was not a priest that understood the Liturgy in his mother-tongue, and from the Thames to the sea, none who could translate the smallest piece of Latin. See Alfred's Preface to Gregory's Pastoral. The ancient chronicles constantly represent the kings of Denmark, Norway, and Sweden, as attended by one or more scalds or bards, who were the more honoured and caressed by those princes who distinguished themselves for their great actions and passion for glory. The brave and courteous Harold Harfagre placed them at his banquets above all officers of the army or the court. Hacon, earl of Norway, had five celebrated poets along with him, when the warriors of Jornsberg were defeated; and history states that they each sung an ode to animate the warriors when engaged in battle.2 Nor are such instances of mind-worship to be wondered at. These scalds recorded in immortal verse the daring deeds of heroes; the songs were resumed to the dulcet measures of flutes and harps at the banquets of nobles and kings; the echo, caught up by an enthusiastic and imaginative people, through recitation of intermediate agents, extended throughout the length and breadth of the land, to cottage and hall, among lonely shepherds on the hills, and on the battlefield to rude warriors as they sat by their watch-fires on the wintry nights; and, at length, as the wild harmonies were treasured up and moulded into form and shape, arose the history, not only of Saxons, Normans, and Danes, but of the universal world. Nor need we wonder at the manly vigour and rude magnificence of those early poems. Honoured, venerated, beloved, the ancient bards spoke full out from the energy and exuberance of natural passion; bred amid the clang of arms and the strife of powerful spirits, they inherited something of the terrible enthusiasm of the heroes whom they sang; and, dwelling beneath the shadows of huge mountains, wandering over vast wildernesses3 never trod before, in search of conquest or of habitations; dwelling in open plains without a covering, save heaven's canopy with its midnight moon and stars; no marvel the imaginative faculty thus became free, vigorous, and enlarged; they thought, they acted, they spoke, like men, and with the freedom of men; and living as they did in the very heart of liberty, all their inspirations, all their utterances, all their noblest imaginings, were coloured, and elevated, and glorified by liberty. * Alexander the Great was accustomed to sleep with a copy of Homer's Iliad under his pillow. All have heard of his passionate wish "that he had a Homer to record his conquests." Augustus Cæsar was more fortunate in possessing a Horace; and William of Normandy had a Tailléfer. And scalds arose and hence the scalds' strong verse Amid such scenes as these the poet's soul Might best attain full growth: pine-covered rocks, And glens and vales, on whose green quietness The lingering eye reposes, and fair lakes That image the light foliage of the beech, Or the grey glitter of the aspen leaves, SOUTHEY. We have preferred entering into this disquisition on the manners, habits, religion, &c. of our Saxon forefathers, rather than fatigue the reader's attention with the more formal and less interesting historical details of the intervening period of the Saxons, from the time of Hengist and Horsa to the final subversion of the heptarchy. The names of the Northumbrian kings, their bloody contests for power, their assassinations and dethronements, the numerous wars in which they were engaged, the sacrifice of the people to the monarch's ambition, the rude barbarism both of kings and of people, with all the obstinate, daring, and determined efforts, especially of the Northumbrian Saxons, to maintain their freedom, will be found in the page of British history, and would be an idle and unprofitable repetition here. An easy task, indeed, would it have been to traverse the beaten track; but the plan we have adopted, although infinitely more laborious, will, we feel assured, "have its own exceeding great reward" in the approbation of the critic, the scholar, and the public at large. In the reign of ANDRED, king of Northumbria, A.D. 810, two hundred and sixtythree years after the commencement of the reign of the first monarch IDA, Northumbria' submitted to the dominion of Egbert, king of Wessex, who put an end to the heptarchy, 1 The history of the Northumbrian kings will also be found in detail in Charlton's and Young's History of Whitby, two excellent local works (especially the latter), which ought to be in every library, on the same shelf with the History of Cleveland. Elfleda, daughter of Oswy king of Northumberland, who died A.D. 670, founded Streoneshalh, or Whitby Abbey, of which venerable pile the illustrious Lady Hilda was the first abbess. It was destroyed by the Danes; but was re-founded and largely endowed by William de Percy shortly after the Conquest. 2 The kingdom of Northumbria was situated on the north of the Humber, as its name imports. It was bounded on the south, and partly from Mercia, by that river, on the west by the Irish sea, on the north by the country of the Picts and Scots, and on the east by the German Ocean. It contained the present counties of Lancashire, Cumberland, Northumberland, Durham, and Yorkshire. The principal cities were York (Eburacum), Dunelm (Durham), Carlisle (Cacr-leon, British-Luguballia, Roman), Hexham (or Hagulstadt), Lancaster, and some others of less note. This country was divided into two parts-Deïra and Bernicia, each for some time a distinct kingdom of itself. Bernicia was partly situated on the north of Severus' wall (supposed about eighty miles long, and extending from the Solway to the Tyne), and ended in a point at the mouth of the Tweed. Deïra contained the southern part of Northumbria, as far as the Humber. The greatest length of the kingdom, including both parts, was 160 miles, and its greatest breadth 100. or seven kingdoms, of the Saxons, and subdued them to his vassalage.' About the same time Egbert published an edict, wherein it was ordered that the whole heptarchy should be called Engle-lond, or the land of the Angles; who were most numerous and valiant of the three tribes of invaders. They originally came over from a province of Denmark, called Angel, and by Lindebergius, Little Britain. From hence arose the names, Englatheod, Anglycynne, Englcynne, Engliscmon, or Englishmen. When it was first called England, it had attained the highest summit of glory; but afterwards the Danes, who had frequently before committed serious ravages along the coasts, especially in Northumbria, began at length to make miserable havoc of the nation itself. Finally, from the Saxons this country derived its present form of government, its wittena-gemot, or house of commons, its trial by jury, its division into shires, hundreds, and tithings, its shipping, the foundation of England's glory and prosperity, its regal government, and the superstructure of its glorious constitution. This constitution was essentially popular; for although in inferior matters the chiefs decided, yet in all affairs of importance the whole community were summoned to give judgment. Montesquieu states distinctly that in "the treatise on the Manners of the Germans" (Tacitus) “an attentive reader may trace the origin of the British constitution;" and Blackstone is of the same opinion. On the subject of the durability and antiquity of the Saxon influence, we find in Mallet, that "the Normans, two centuries after they had conquered England, in vain endeavoured to make the Norman-French the national language, and to establish the Norman laws. In the course of one or two reigns, the laws, manners, and speech of the English had gradually recovered the superiority, and were adopted by the conquerors themselves and their descendants." And with a still more remarkable passage in Fortescue3 we shall close this ' Dr. Lingard contends there is not sufficient authority for supposing that Egbert gave himself the title of first king of England. If the learned doctor means by "sufficient authority," a sufficient quantity of authority, he will, we are sure, find nineteen out of every twenty of the English historians fully agreed on that point: nor were we aware of any dispute or doubt on the subject till we perused the doctor's volumes. The whole amount of the matter is thus:-"Egbert having subdued the six Saxon kingdoms"-(the seventh kingdom originally possessed by this king comprised Essex, Sussex, Wessex, and Kent, over which he began his reign A.D. 800, and finally completed his conquests over the other kingdoms A.D. 827-828, from which date his title of King of England is to be derived)--" and forced them to submit to his dominion, called a great council at Winchester, whereunto were summoned all the great men of the whole kingdom; and there, by the general consent of the clergy and laity, Egbert was crowned king of Great Britain; and at the same time he enacted, that it should be for ever after called England, and that those who were before called Jutes or Saxons be now styled Englishmen." Annals of the Cathedral Church of Winchester,-in Monast. Anglican. vol. i. p. 32. R. de Diceto, p. 449. Chronol. St. Austin. Monast. Cant. in X. Script. p. 2238; and after them nearly all the modern British chroniclers; whilst others assert that Egbert only confirmed, or revived, the names "England" and "Englishmen." We are content to leave the subject with the authorities already quoted. 2 Vol. i. p. 221. F 3 Cap. xvii. 66 portion of the inquiry :- Regnum Angliæ primo per Britones inhabitatum est, deinde per Romanos regulatum, iterumque per Britones, ac deinde per Saxones possessum, qui nomen ejus ex Britannia in Angliam mutaverunt; extunc per Danos idem regnum parumper dominatum est, et iterum per Saxones, sed finaliter per Normannos, quorum propago regnum illud obtinet in præsenti; et in omnibus nationum harum et regum earum temporibus regnum illud iisdem quibus jam regitur consuetudinibus continue regulatum est." That is: "The kingdom of England was first inhabited by the Britons, afterwards it was governed by the Romans, and again by the Britons, and after that by the Saxons, who changed its name from Britain to England. In process of time the Danes ruled here, and again the Saxons, and last of all the Normans, whose posterity governeth the kingdom at this day; and in all the times of these several nations and of their kings, this realm was still ruled by the same customs that it is now governed withal."1 |