European Genealogy and
History
ALFRED THE GREAT
Entered,
according to Act of Congress, in the year one thousand
eight hundred and forty-nine, by
Harper & Brothers,
In the Clerk's Office of the District Court of
the Southern District
of New York.
PREFACE.
It
is the object of this series of histories to present a clear, distinct, and
connected narrative of the lives of those great personages who have in various
ages of the world made themselves celebrated as leaders among mankind, and, by
the part they have taken in the public affairs of great nations, have exerted
the widest influence on the history of the human race. The end which the author
has had in view is twofold: first, to communicate such information in respect
to the subjects of his narratives as is important for the general reader to
possess; and, secondly, to draw such moral lessons from the events described
and the characters delineated as they may legitimately teach to the people of
the present age. Though written in a direct and simple style, they are intended
for, and addressed to, minds possessed of some considerable degree of maturity,
for such minds only can fully appreciate the character and action which
exhibits itself, as nearly all that is described in these volumes does, in
close combination with the conduct and policy of governments, and the great
events of international history.
Contents
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XI. |
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XII. |
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XIII. |
Illustrations
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Chapter I.
The
Britons.
Alfred
the Great figures in history as the founder, in some sense, of the British
monarchy. Of that long succession of sovereigns who have held the scepter of
that monarchy, and whose government has exerted so vast an influence on the
condition and welfare of mankind, he was not, indeed, actually the first. There
were several lines of insignificant princes before him, who governed such
portions of the kingdom as they individually possessed, more like semi-savage
chieftains than English kings. Alfred followed these by the principle of
hereditary right, and spent his life in laying broad
and deep the foundations on which the enormous superstructure of the
Although
the period of King Alfred's reign seems a very remote one as we look back
toward it from the present day, it was still eight hundred years after the
Christian era that he ascended his throne. Tolerable authentic history of the
British realm mounts up through these eight hundred years to the time of Julius
Cæsar. Beyond this the ground is covered by a series
of romantic and fabulous tales, pretending to be history, which extend back
eight hundred years further to the days of Solomon; so that a much longer
portion of the story of that extraordinary island comes before than since the
days of Alfred. In respect, however to all that pertains to the interest and
importance of the narrative, the exploits and the arrangements of Alfred are
the beginning.
The
histories, in fact, of all nations, ancient and modern, run back always into
misty regions of romance and fable. Before arts and letters arrived at such a
state of progress as that public events could be
recorded in writing, tradition was the only means of handing down the memory of
events from generation to generation; and tradition, among semi-savages,
changes every thing it touches into romantic and marvelous fiction.
The
stories connected with the earliest discovery and settlement
of
At
the close of the Trojan war,1 Æneas retired with a company of Trojans, who escaped from
the city with him, and, after a great variety of adventures, which Virgil has
related, he landed and settled in
One
day, while Brutus was hunting in the forests, he accidentally killed his father
with [page 16] an arrow. His father
was at that time King of Alba—a region of Italy near the spot on which Rome was
subsequently built—and the accident brought Brutus under such suspicions, and
exposed him to such dangers, that he fled from the country. After various
wanderings he at last reached
Pandrasus was to give Brutus his daughter Imogena for a wife, and a fleet of ships as her dowry.
Brutus, on the other hand, was to take his wife and all his followers on board
of his fleet, and sail away and seek a home in some other quarter of the globe.
This plan of a monarch's purchasing his own ransom and peace for his realm from
a band of roaming robbers, by offering the leader of them his daughter for a
wife, however strange to our ideas, was very characteristic of the times. Imogena must [page 17] have found it a hard alternative to choose between such a
husband and such a father.
Brutus,
with his fleet and his bride, betook themselves to sea, and within a short time
landed on a deserted island, where they found the ruins of a city. Here there
was an ancient
"Goddess
of shades and huntress, who at will
Walk'st on the rolling sphere, and through the deep,
On thy third reign, the earth, look now and tell
What land, what seat of rest thou bidd'st me
seek?"
To
which the oracle returned the following answer:
"Far
to the west, in the ocean wide,
Beyond the realm of
Sea-girt it lies—where giants dwelt of old.
Now void, it fits thy people; thither bend
Thy course; there shalt thou find a lasting
home."
It
is scarcely necessary to say that this meant
At
length, after enduring great privations and suffering, and encountering the
extreme dangers to which their frail barks were necessarily exposed from the
surges which roll in perpetually from the broad Atlantic Ocean upon the coast
of
The
island of Great Britain is in the latitude of Labrador, which on our side of
the continent is the synonym for almost perpetual ice and snow; still these
wandering Trojans found it a region of inexhaustible verdure, fruitfulness, and
beauty; and as to its extent, though often, in modern times, called a little
island, they found its green fields and luxuriant forests extending very far
and wide over the sea. A length of nearly six hundred miles would seem almost
to merit the name of continent, and the dimensions of this detached outpost of the
habitable surface of the earth would never have been deemed inconsiderable, had
it not been that the people, by the greatness of their exploits, of which the
whole world has been the theater, have made the physical dimensions of their
territory appear so small and insignificant in comparison. To Brutus and his
companions the land appeared a world. It was nearly four hundred miles in
breadth at the place where [page 20] they landed, and,
wandering northward, they found it extending, in almost undiminished beauty and
fruitfulness, further than they had the disposition to explore it. They might
have gone northward until the twilight scarcely disappeared in the summer
nights, and have found the same verdure and beauty continuing to the end. There
were broad and undulating plains in the southern regions of the island, and in
the northern, green mountains and romantic glens; but all, plains, valleys, and
mountains, were fertile and beautiful, and teeming with abundant sustenance for
flocks, for herds, and for man.
Brutus
accordingly established himself upon the island with all his followers, and
founded a kingdom there, over which he reigned as the founder of a dynasty.
Endless tales are told of the lives, and exploits, and quarrels of his
successors down to the time of Cæsar. Conflicting
claimants arose continually to dispute with each other for the possession of
power; wars were made by one tribe upon another; cities, as they were
called—though probably, in fact, they were only rude collections of hovels—were
built, fortresses were founded, and rivers were named from princes or
princesses drowned in them, in accidental journeys, or by the violence [page 21] of rival claimants to
their thrones. The pretended records contain a vast number of legends, of very
little interest or value, as the reader will readily admit when we tell him
that the famous story of King Lear is the most entertaining one in the whole
collection. It is this:
There
was a king in the line named Lear. He founded the city now called
Cordiella, all this time, stood meekly and
silently by, and when her father asked her how it was with her, she replied,
"Father, my love toward you is as my duty bids. What can a father ask, or a daughter promise more? They who pretend beyond this only
flatter."
The
king, who was old and childish, was much pleased with the manifestation of love
offered by Gonilla and Regana,
and thought that the honest Cordiella was heartless
and cold. He treated her with greater and greater neglect and finally decided
to leave her without any portion whatever, while he divided his kingdom between
the other two, having previously married them to princes of high rank. Cordiella was, however, at last made choice of for a wife
by a French prince, who, it seems, knew better than the old king how much more
to be relied upon was unpretending and honest truth than empty and extravagant
profession. He married the portionless Cordiella, and took her with him to the Continent.
The
old king now having given up his kingdom to his eldest daughters, they managed,
by artifice and maneuvering, to get every thing else away from him, so that he
became wholly dependent upon them, and had to live with them by turns. This was
not all; for, at the instigation of their husbands, they put so many
indignities and affronts upon him, that his life at length became an
intolerable burden, and finally he was compelled to leave the realm altogether,
and in his destitution and distress he [page 23] went for refuge and protection to his rejected daughter Cordiella. She received her father with the greatest
alacrity and affection. She raised an army to restore him to his rights, and
went in person with him to
Centuries
passed away, and at length the great Julius Cæsar,
who was extending the Roman power in every direction, made his way across the
Channel, and landed in
They
did not, however, hold it in peace all this time. They became continually
involved in difficulties and contests with the native Britons, who could ill
brook the oppressions of such merciless masters as Roman generals always proved
in the provinces which they pretended to govern. One of the most formidable
rebellions [page 24] that the Romans had to
encounter during their disturbed and troubled sway in
By
struggles such as these the contest between the Romans and the Britons was
carried on for many generations; the Romans conquering at every trial, until,
at length, the Britons learned to submit without further resistance to their
sway. In fact, there gradually came upon [page 26] the stage, during the progress of these centuries, a new
power, acting as an enemy to both the Picts and
Scots; hordes of lawless barbarians, who inhabited the mountains and morasses
of Scotland and Ireland. These terrible savages made continual irruptions into
the southern country for plunder, burning and destroying, as they retired,
whatever they could not carry away. They lived in impregnable and almost
inaccessible fastnesses, among dark glens and precipitous mountains, and upon
gloomy islands surrounded by iron-bound coasts and stormy seas. The Roman
legions made repeated attempts to hunt them out of these retreats, but with
very little success. At length a line of fortified posts was established across
the island, near where the boundary line now lies between England and Scotland;
and by guarding this line, the Roman generals who had charge of Britain
attempted to protect the inhabitants of the southern country, who had learned
at length to submit peaceably to their sway.
One
of the most memorable events which occurred during the time that the Romans
held possession of the
At
the time when Severus undertook this expedition, he was advanced in age and
very infirm. He suffered much from the gout, so that he was unable to travel by
any ordinary conveyance, and was borne, accordingly, almost all the way upon a
litter. He crossed the Channel with his army, and, leaving one of his sons in
command in the south part of the island, he advanced with the other, at the
head of an enormous force, determined to push boldly forward into the heart of
He
met, however, with very partial success. His soldiers became entangled in bogs
and morasses; [page 28] they fell into
ambuscades; they suffered every degree of privation and hardship for want of
water and of food, and were continually entrapped by their enemies in
situations where they had to fight in small numbers and at a great
disadvantage. Then, too, the aged and feeble general was kept in a continual
fever of anxiety and trouble by Bassianus, the son
whom he had brought with him to the north. The dissoluteness and violence of
his character were not changed by the change of scene. He formed plots and
conspiracies against his father's authority; he raised mutinies in the army; he
headed riots; and he was finally detected in a plan for actually assassinating
his father. Severus, when he discovered this last enormity of wickedness, sent
for his son to come to his imperial tent. He laid a naked sword before him, and
then, after bitterly reproaching him with his undutiful and ungrateful conduct,
he said, "If you wish to kill me, do it now. Here I stand, old, infirm,
and helpless. You are young and strong, and can do it easily. I am ready.
Strike the blow."
Of
course Bassianus shrunk from his father's reproaches,
and went away without committing the crime to which he was thus reproachfully [page 29] invited; but his
character remained unchanged; and this constant trouble, added to all the other
difficulties which Severus encountered, prevented his accomplishing his object
of thoroughly conquering his northern foes. He made a sort of peace with them,
and retiring south to the line of fortified posts which had been previously
established, he determined to make it a fixed and certain boundary by building
upon it a permanent wall. He put the whole force of his army upon the work, and
in one or two years, as is said, he completed the structure. It is known in
history as the Wall of Severus; and so solid, substantial, and permanent was
the work, that the traces of it have not entirely disappeared to the present
day.
The
wall extended across the island, from the mouth of the Tyne, on the
Wall of Severus
The
wall was a good defense as long as Roman soldiers remained to guard it. But in
process of time—about two centuries after Severus's day—the
The
Anglo-Saxons.
Any
one who will look around upon the families of his acquaintance will observe
that family characteristics and resemblances prevail not only in respect to
stature, form, expression of countenance, and other outward and bodily tokens,
but also in regard to the constitutional temperaments and capacities of the
soul. Sometimes we find a group in which high
intellectual powers and great energy of action prevail for many successive
generations, and in all the branches into which the original stock divides; in
other cases, the hereditary tendency is to gentleness and harmlessness of
character, with a full development of all the feelings and sensibilities of the
soul. Others, again, exhibit congenital tendencies to great
physical strength and hardihood, and to powers of muscular exertion and
endurance. These differences, notwithstanding all the exceptions and
irregularities connected with them, are obviously, where they exist, deeply
seated and [page 35] permanent. They depend
very slightly upon any mere external causes. They have, on the contrary, their
foundation in some hidden principles connected with the origin of life, and
with the mode of its transmission from parent to offspring, which the
researches of philosophers have never yet been able to explore.
These
same constitutional and congenital peculiarities which we see developing
themselves all around us in families, mark, on a greater scale, the
characteristics of the different nations of the earth, and in a degree much
higher still, the several great and distinct races into which the whole human
family seems to be divided. Physiologists consider that there are five of these
great races, whose characteristics, mental as well as bodily, are distinctly,
strongly, and permanently marked. These characteristics descend by hereditary
succession from father to son, and though education and outward influences may
modify them, they can not essentially change them. Compare, for example, the
Indian and the African races, each of which has occupied for a thousand years a
continent of its own, where they have been exposed to the same variety of
climates, and as far as possible to the same general outward influences. How [page 36] entirely diverse from
each other they are, not only in form, color, and other physical marks, but in
all the tendencies and characteristics of the soul! One can no more be changed
into the other, than a wolf, by being tamed and domesticated, can be made a
dog, or a dog, by being driven into the forests, be transformed into a tiger.
The difference is still greater between either of these races and the Caucasian
race. This race might probably be called the European race, were it not that
some Asiatic and some African nations have sprung from it, as the Persians, the
Phœnicians, the Egyptians, the Carthaginians, and, in
modern times, the Turks. All the nations of this race, whether European or
African, have been distinguished by the same physical marks in the conformation
of the head and the color of the skin, and still more by those traits of
character—the intellect, the energy, the spirit of determination and
pride—which, far from owing their existence to outward circumstances, have
always, in all ages, made all outward circumstances bend to them. That there
have been some great and noble specimens of humanity among the African race,
for example, no one can deny; but that there is a marked, and fixed, and
permanent constitutional [page 37] difference between them
and the Caucasian race seems evident from this fact, that for two thousand
years each has held its own continent, undisturbed, in a great degree, by the
rest of mankind; and while, during all this time, no nation of the one race has
risen, so far as is known, above the very lowest stage of civilization, there
have been more than fifty entirely distinct and independent civilizations
originated and fully developed in the other. For three thousand years the
Caucasian race have continued, under all
circumstances, and in every variety of situation, to exhibit the same traits
and the same indomitable prowess. No calamities, however great—no desolating
wars, no destructive pestilence, no wasting famine, no night of darkness,
however universal and gloomy—has ever been able to keep them long in
degradation or barbarism. There is not now a barbarous people
to be found in the whole race, and there has not been one for a thousand years.
Nearly
all the great exploits, and achievements too, which have signalized the history
of the world, have been performed by this branch of the human family. They have
given celebrity to every age in which they have lived, and to every country
that they have ever possessed, [page 38] by some great deed, or discovery, or achievement, which
their intellectual energies have accomplished. As Egyptians, they built the
Pyramids, and reared enormous monoliths, which remain as perfect now as they
were when first completed, thirty centuries ago. As Phœnicians,
they constructed ships, perfected navigation, and explored, without compass or
chart, every known sea. As Greeks, they modeled architectural embellishments,
and cut sculptures in marble, and wrote poems and history, which have been ever
since the admiration of the world. As Romans, they carried a complete and
perfect military organization over fifty nations and a hundred millions of
people, with one supreme mistress over all, the ruins of whose splendid palaces
and monuments have not yet passed away. Thus has this race gone on, always
distinguishing itself, by energy, activity, and intellectual power, wherever it
has dwelt, whatever language it has spoken, and in whatever period of the world
it has lived. It has invented printing, and filled every country that it
occupies with permanent records of the past, accessible to all. It has explored
the heavens, and reduced to precise and exact calculations all the complicated
motions there. It [page 39] has ransacked the
earth, systematized, arranged, and classified the vast melange
of plants, and animals, and mineral products to be found upon its surface. It
makes steam and falling water do more than half the work necessary for feeding
and clothing the human race; and the howling winds of the ocean, the very
emblems of resistless destruction and terror, it steadily employs in
interchanging the products of the world, and bearing the means of comfort and
plenty to every clime.
The
Caucasian race has thus, in all ages, and in all the varieties of condition in
which the different branches of it have been placed, evinced the same great
characteristics, marking the existence of some innate and constant
constitutional superiority; and yet, in the different branches, subordinate
differences appear, which are to be accounted for, perhaps, partly by
difference of circumstances, and partly, perhaps, by similar constitutional
diversities—diversities by which one branch is distinguished from other
branches, as the whole race is from the other races with which we have compared
them. Among these branches, we, Anglo-Saxons ourselves, claim for the
Anglo-Saxons the superiority over all the others.
The
Anglo-Saxons commenced their career as pirates and robbers, and as pirates and
robbers of the most desperate and dangerous description. In fact, the character
which the Anglo-Saxons have obtained in modern times for energy and enterprise,
and for desperate daring in their conflicts with foes, is no recent fame. The
progenitors of the present race were celebrated every where, and every where
feared and dreaded, not only in the days of Alfred, but several centuries
before. All the historians of those days that speak of them at all, describe them as universally distinguished above their
neighbors for their energy and vehemence of character, their mental and
physical superiority, and for the wild and daring expeditions to which their
spirit of enterprise and activity were continually impelling them. They built
vessels, in which they boldly put forth on the waters of the
Saxon Military Chief
They
would build small vessels, or rather boats, of osiers, covering them with
skins, and in fleets of these frail floats they would sally forth among the
howling winds and foaming surges of the
It
was the landing of a few boat-loads of these determined and ferocious
barbarians on a small island near the mouth of the Thames, which constitutes
the great event of the arrival of the Anglo-Saxons in
And
yet the event, though so wide-reaching and grand in its bearings and relations,
and in the vast consequences which have flowed and which still continue to flow
from it, was apparently a minute and unimportant circumstance at the time when
it occurred. There were only three vessels at the first arrival. Of their size
and character the accounts vary. Some of these accounts say they contained
three hundred men; others seem to state that the number which arrived at the
first landing was three thousand. This, however, would seem impossible, as no
three vessels built in those days could convey so large a number. We must
suppose, therefore, that that number is meant to include those who came at
several of the earlier expeditions, and which were grouped by the historian
together, or else that several other vessels or transports accompanied the
three, [page 47] which history has
specially commemorated as the first arriving.
In
fact, very little can now be known in respect to the form and capacity of the
vessels in which these half-barbarous navigators roamed, in those days, over
the British seas. Their name, indeed, has come down to us, and that is nearly
all. They were called cyules; though the name
is sometimes spelled, in the ancient chronicles, ceols,
and in other ways. They were obviously vessels of considerable capacity and
were of such construction and such strength as to stand the roughest marine
exposures. They were accustomed to brave fearlessly every commotion and to
encounter every danger raised either by winter tempests or summer gales in the
restless waters of the
The
names of the commanders who headed the expedition which first landed have been
preserved, and they have acquired, as might have been expected, a very wide
celebrity. They were Hengist and Horsa.
Hengist and Horsa were
brothers.
The
place where they landed was the
In
the time of Hengist and Horsa
the creek was so considerable that its mouth furnished a sufficient harbor for
their vessels. They landed at a town called Ebbs-fleet, which is now, however,
at some distance inland.
There
is some uncertainty in respect to the motive which led Hengist
and Horsa to make [page 49] their first descent upon the English coast. Whether they came on one of their customary piratical expeditions,
or were driven on the coast accidentally by stress of weather, or were invited
to come by the British king, can not now be accurately ascertained. Such
parties of Anglo-Saxons had undoubtedly often landed before under somewhat
similar circumstances, and then, after brief incursions into the interior, had
re-embarked on board their ships and sailed away. In this case, however, there
was a certain peculiar and extraordinary state of things in the political
condition of the country in which they had landed, which resulted in first protracting
their stay, and finally in establishing them so fixedly and permanently in the
land, that they and their followers and descendants soon became the entire
masters of it, and have remained in possession to the present day. These
circumstances were as follows:
The
name of the king of
Hengist and Horsa
acceded to this proposal. They marched their followers into battle, and
defeated Vortigern's enemies. They sent across the
sea to their native land, and invited new adventurers to join them. Vortigern was greatly pleased with the success of his
expedient. The Picts and Scots were driven back to
their fastnesses in the remote mountains of the north, and the Britons once
more possessed their land in peace, by means of the protection and the aid
which their new confederates afforded them.
In
the mean time the Anglo-Saxons were establishing and strengthening themselves
very rapidly in the part of the island which Vortigern
had assigned them—which was, as the reader will understand from what has
already been said in respect to the place of their landing, the southeastern
part—a region which now constitutes the county of Kent. In addition, too, to
the natural increase of their power from the increase of their numbers and
their military force, Hengist contrived, if the story
is true, to swell his own personal influence by means of a matrimonial alliance
which he had the adroitness to effect. He had a daughter named Rowena. She was
very beautiful and accomplished. Hengist sent for her
to come to
At
all events, the power of Hengist and Horsa gradually increased, as years passed on, until the
Britons began to be alarmed at their growing strength and multiplying numbers,
and to fear lest these new friends should prove, in the end, more formidable than
the terrible enemies whom they had come to expel. Contentions and then open
quarrels began to occur, and at length both parties prepared for war. The
contest which soon ensued was a terrible struggle, or rather series of
struggles, which continued for two centuries, during which the Anglo-Saxons
were continually gaining ground and the Britons losing; the mental and physical
superiority of the Anglo-Saxon race giving them with very few exceptions, every
where and always the victory.
There
were, occasionally, intervals of peace, and partial
and temporary friendliness. They accuse Hengist of
great treachery on one of [page 53] these occasions. He
invited his son-in-law, King Vortigern, to a feast,
with three hundred of his officers, and then fomenting a quarrel at the
entertainment, the Britons were all killed in the affray by means of the
superior Saxon force which had been provided for the emergency. Vortigern himself was taken prisoner, and held a captive
until he ransomed himself by ceding three whole provinces to his captor. Hengist justified this demand by throwing the
responsibility of the feud upon his guests; and it is not, in fact, at all
improbable that they deserved their share of the condemnation.
The
famous King Arthur, whose Knights of the Round Table
have been so celebrated in ballads and tales, lived and flourished during these
wars between the Saxons and the Britons. He was a king of the Britons, and
performed wonderful exploits of strength and valor. He was of prodigious size
and muscular power, and of undaunted bravery. He slew giants, destroyed the
most ferocious wild beasts, gained very splendid victories in the battles that
he fought, made long expeditions into foreign countries, having once gone on a
pilgrimage to
Five
hundred years after his death, King [page 55] Henry the Second, having heard from an ancient British bard
that Arthur's body lay interred in the Abbey of Glastonbury, and that the spot
was marked by some small pyramids erected near it, and that the body would be
found in a rude coffin made of a hollowed oak, ordered search to be made. The
ballads and tales which had been then, for several centuries, circulating
throughout
The
bones of Arthur's wife were found near those of her husband. The hair was
apparently perfect when found, having all the freshness and beauty of life; but
a monk of the abbey, who was present at the disinterment, touched it and it
crumbled to dust.
Such
are the tales which the old chronicles tell of the good King Arthur, the last
and greatest representative of the power of the ancient British aborigines. It
is a curious illustration of the uncertainty which attends all the early
records of national history, that, notwithstanding all the above particularity
respecting the life and death of Arthur, it is a serious matter of dispute
among the learned in modern times whether any such person ever lived.
The
Danes.
The
landing of Hengist and Horsa,
the first of the Anglo-Saxons, took place in the year 449, according to the
commonly received chronology. It was more than two hundred years after this
before the Britons were entirely subdued, and the Saxon authority established
throughout the island, unquestioned and supreme. One or two centuries more
passed away, and then the Anglo-Saxons had, in their turn, to resist a new
horde of invaders, who came, as they themselves had done, across the
The
Saxons were not united under one general government when they came finally to
get settled in their civil polity. The English territory was divided, on the
contrary, into seven or eight separate kingdoms. These kingdoms were ruled by
as many separate dynasties, or lines of kings. They were connected with each
other by friendly relations and alliances, more [page 58] or less intimate, the whole system being known in history
by the name of the Saxon Heptarchy.
The
princes of these various dynasties showed in their dealings with one another,
and in their relations with foreign powers, the same characteristics of
boldness and energy as had always marked the action of the race. Even the
queens and princesses evinced, by their courage and decision, that Anglo-Saxon
blood lost nothing of its inherent qualities by flowing in female veins.
For
example, a very extraordinary story is told of one of these Saxon princesses. A
certain king upon the Continent, whose dominions lay between the Rhine and the
The
Anglo-Saxon princess was very indignant at this violation of his plighted faith
on the part of her suitor. She raised an army and equipped a fleet, and set
sail with the force which she had thus assembled across the
In
due time this division returned, reporting [page 60] that they had met and encountered Radiger,
and had entirely defeated him. They came back triumphing in their victory,
considering evidently, that the faithless lover had been well punished for his
offense. The princess, however, instead of sharing in their satisfaction,
ordered them to make a new incursion into the interior, and not to return
without bringing Radiger with them as their prisoner.
They did so; and after hunting the defeated and distressed king from place to
place, they succeeded, at last, in seizing him in a wood, and brought him in to
the princess's encampment. He began to plead for his life, and to make excuses
for the violation of his contract by urging the necessities of his situation
and his father's dying commands. The princess said she was ready to forgive him
if he would now dismiss her rival and fulfill his obligations to her. Radiger yielded to this demand; he repudiated his Frank
wife, and married the Anglo-Saxon lady in her stead.
Though
the Anglo-Saxon race continued thus to evince in all their transactions the
same extraordinary spirit and energy, and met generally with the same success
that had characterized them at the beginning, they seemed at [page 61] length to find their
equals in the Danes. These Danes, however, though generally designated by that
appellation in history, were not exclusively the natives of
Besides
the great leaders of the most powerful of these bands, there was
an infinite number of petty chieftains, who commanded single ships or small
detached squadrons. These were generally the younger sons of sovereigns or
chieftains who lived upon the land, the elder brothers remaining at home to
inherit the throne or the paternal inheritance. It was discreditable then, as
it is now in
These
younger sons went to sea at a very early age too. They were sent often at
twelve, that they might become early habituated to the exposures and dangers of
their dreadful combats, and of the wintery storms,
and inured to [page 63] the athletic exertions
which the sea rigorously exacts of all who venture within her dominion. When
they returned they were received with consideration and honor, or with neglect
and disgrace, according as they were more or less laden with booty and spoil.
In the summer months the land kings themselves would organize and equip naval
armaments for similar expeditions. They would cruise along the coasts of the
sea, to land where they found an unguarded point, and sack a town or burn a
castle, seize treasures, capture men and make them slaves, kidnap women, and
sometimes destroy helpless children with their spears in a manner too barbarous
and horrid to be described. On returning to their homes, they would perhaps
find their own castles burned and their own dwellings roofless, from the visit
of some similar horde.
Thus the seas of western Europe w