Young Folks\' History of England
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Charlotte M. Yonge >> Young Folks\' History of England
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12 This E-text was created by Doug Levy, _littera scripta manet_
YOUNG FOLKS' HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
by CHARLOTTE M. YONGE.
CONTENTS.
CHAPTER.
1.--Julius Caesar. B.C. 55.
2.--The Romans in Britain. A.D. 41--418.
3.--The Angle Children. A.D. 597.
4.--The Northmen. A.D. 858--958.
5.--The Danish Conquest. A.D. 958--1035.
6.--The Norman Conquest. A.D. 1035--1066.
7.--William the Conqueror. A.D. 1066--1087.
8.--William II., Rufus. A.D. 1087--1100.
9.--Henry I., Beau-Clerc. A.D. 1100--1135.
10.--Stephen. A.D. 1135--1154.
11.--Henry II., Fitz-Empress. A.D. 1154--1189.
12.--Richard I., Lion-Heart. A.D. 1189--1199.
13.--John, Lackland. A.D. 1199--1216.
14.--Henry III., of Winchester. A.D. 1216--1272.
15.--Edward I., Longshanks. A.D. 1272--1307.
16.--Edward II., of Caernarvon. A.D. 1307--1327.
17.--Edward III. A.D. 1327--1377.
18.--Richard II. A.D. 1377--1399.
19.--Henry IV. A.D. 1399--1413.
20.--Henry V., of Monmouth. A.D. 1413--1423.
21.--Henry VI., of Windsor. A.D. 1423--1461.
22.--Edward IV. A.D. 1461--1483.
23.--Edward V. A.D. 1483.
24.--Richard III. A.D. 1483--1485.
25.--Henry VII. A.D. 1485--1509.
26.--Henry VIII. and Cardinal Wolsey. A.D. 1509--1529.
27.--Henry VIII. and his Wives. A.D. 1528--1547.
28.--Edward VI. A.D. 1547--1553.
29.--Mary I. A.D. 1553--1558.
30.--Elizabeth. A.D. 1558--1587.
31.--Elizabeth (continued). A.D. 1587--1602.
32.--James I., A.D. 1602--1625.
33.--Charles I., A.D. 1625--1645.
34.--The Long Parliament. A.D. 1649.
35.--Death of Charles I. A.D. 1649--1651.
36.--Oliver Cromwell. A.D. 1649--1660.
37.--Charles II. A.D. 1660--1685.
38.--James II. A.D. 1685--1688.
39.--William III., and Mary II. A.D. 1689--1702.
40.--Anne. A.D. 1702--1714.
41.--George I. A.D. 1714--1725.
42.--George II. A.D. 1725--1760.
43.--George III. A.D. 1760--1785.
44.--George III. (continued). A.D. 1785--1810.
45.--George III.--The Regency. A.D. 1810--1820.
46.--George IV. A.D. 1820-1839.
47.--William IV. A.D. 1830--1837.
48.--Victoria. A.D. 1837--1855.
49.--Victoria (continued). A.D. 1855--1860.
50.--Victoria (continued). A.D. 1860--1872.
YOUNG FOLKS' HISTORY OF ENGLAND.
CHAPTER I.
JULIUS CAESAR. B.C. 55.
Nearly two thousand years ago there was a brave captain whose name
was Julius Caesar. The soldiers he led to battle were very strong,
and conquered the people wherever they went. They had no gun or
gunpowder then; but they had swords and spears, and, to prevent
themselves from being hurt, they had helmets or brazen caps on their
heads, with long tufts of horse-hair upon them, by way of ornament,
and breast-plates of brass on their breasts, and on their arms they
carried a sort of screen, made of strong leather. One of them
carried a little brass figure of an eagle on a long pole, with a
scarlet flag flying below, and wherever the eagle was seen, they
all followed, and fought so bravely that nothing could long stand
against them.
When Julius Caesar rode at their head, with his keen, pale hook-nosed
face, and the scarlet cloak that the general always wore, they were so
proud of him, and so fond of him, that there was nothing they would
not do for him.
Julius Caesar heard that a little way off there was a country nobody
knew anything about, except that the people were very fierce and
savage, and that a sort of pearl was found in the shells of mussels
which lived in the rivers. He could not bear that there should be
any place that his own people, the Romans, did not know and subdue.
So he commanded the ships to be prepared, and he and his soldiers
embarked, watching the white cliffs on the other side of the sea
grow higher and higher as he came nearer and nearer.
When he came quite up to them, he found the savages were there in
earnest. They were tall men, with long red streaming hair, and such
clothes as they had were woollen, checked like plaid; but many had
their arms and breasts naked, and painted all over in blue patterns.
They yelled and brandished their darts, to make Julius Caesar and his
Roman soldiers keep away; but he only went on to a place where the
shore was not quite so steep, and there commanded his soldiers to
land. The savages had run along the shore too, and there was a
terrible fight; but at last the man who carried the eagle jumped down
into the middle of the natives, calling out to his fellows that they
must come after him, or they would lose their eagle. They all came
rushing and leaping down, and thus they managed to force back the
savages, and make their way to the shore.
There was not much worth having when they had made their way there.
Though they came again the next year, and forced their way a good
deal farther into the country, they saw chiefly bare downs, or heaths,
or thick woods. The few houses were little more than piles of stones,
and the people were rough and wild, and could do very little. The men
hunted wild boars, and wolves and stags, and the women dug the ground,
and raised a little corn, which they ground to flour between two
stones to make bread; and they spun the wool of their sheep, dyed it
with bright colors, and wove it into dresses. They had some strong
places in the woods, with trunks of trees, cut down to shut them in
from the enemy, with all their flocks and cattle; but Caesar did not
get into any of these. He only made the natives give him some of
their pearls, and call the Romans their masters, and then he went back
to his ships, and none of the set of savages who were alive when he
came saw him or his Romans any more.
Do you know who these savages were who fought with Julius Caesar?
They were called Britons. And the country he came to see? That was
our very own island, England, only it was not called so then. And the
place where Julius Caesar landed is called Deal, and, if you look at
the map where England and France most nearly touch one another, I
think you will see the name Deal, and remember it was there Julius
Caesar landed, and fought with the Britons.
It was fifty-five years before our blessed Saviour was born that
the Romans came. So at the top of this chapter stands B.C. (Before
Christ) 55.
CHAPTER II.
THE ROMANS IN BRITAIN. A.D. 41--418.
It was nearly a hundred years before any more of the Romans came to
Britain; but they were people who could not hear of a place without
wanting to conquer it, and they never left off trying till they had
done what they undertook.
One of their emperors, named Claudius, sent his soldiers to conquer
the island, and then came to see it himself, and called himself
Brittanicus in honor of the victory, just as if he had done it
himself, instead of his generals. One British chief, whose name
was Caractacus, who had fought very bravely against the Romans, was
brought to Rome, with chains on his hands and feet, and set before
them emperor. As he stood there, he said that, when he looked at all
the grand buildings of stone and marble in the streets, he could not
think why the Romans should want to take away the poor rough-stone
huts of the Britons. The wife of Caractacus, who had also been
brought a prisoner to Rome, fell upon her knees imploring for pity,
but the conquered chief asked for nothing and exhibited no signs of
fear. Claudius was kind to Caractacus; but the Romans went on
conquering Britain till they had won all the part of it that lies
south of the river Tweed; and, as the people beyond that point were
more fierce and savage still, a very strong wall, with a bank of
earth and deep ditch was made to keep them out, and always watched
by Roman soldiers.
The Romans made beautiful straight roads all over the country, and
they built towns. Almost all the towns whose names end in _chester_
were begun by the Romans, and bits of their walls are to be seen
still, built of very small bricks. Sometimes people dig up a bit of
the beautiful pavement of colored tiles, in patterns, which used to
be the floors of their houses, or a piece of their money, or one of
their ornaments.
For the Romans held Britain for four hundred years, and tamed the wild
people in the south, and taught them to speak and dress, and read and
write like themselves, so that they could hardly be known from the
Romans. Only the wild ones beyond the wall, and in the mountains,
were as savage as ever, and, now and then, used to come and steal the
cattle, and burn the houses of their neighbors who had learnt better.
Another set of wild people used to come over in boats across the North
Sea and German Ocean. These people had their home in the country that
is called Holstein and Jutland. They were tall men, and had blue eyes
and fair hair, and they were very strong, and good-natured in a rough
sort of way, though they were fierce to their enemies. There was a
great deal more fighting than any one has told us about; but the end
of it all was that the Roman soldiers were wanted at home, and though
the great British chief we call King Arthur fought very bravely, he
could not drive back the blue-eyed men in the ships; but more and more
came, till, at last, they got all the country, and drove the Britons,
some up into the North, some into the mountains that rise along the
West of the island, and some into its west point.
The Britons used to call the blue-eyed men Saxons; but they called
themselves Angles, and the country was called after them Angle-land.
Don't you know what it is called now? England itself, and the people
English. They spoke much the same language as we do, only more as
untaught country people, and they had not so many words, because they
had not so many things to see and talk about.
As to the Britons, the English went on driving them back till they
only kept their mountains. There they have gone on living ever since,
and talking their own old language. The English called them Welsh, a
name that meant strangers, and we call them Welsh still, and their
country Wales. They made a great many grand stories about their last
brave chief, Arthur, till, at last, they turned into a sort of fairy
tale. It was said that, when King Arthur lay badly wounded after his
last battle, he bade his friend fling his sword into the river, and
that then three lovely ladies came in a boat, and carried him away to
a secret island. The Welsh kept on saying, for years and years, that
one day king Arthur would wake up again, and give them back all
Britain, which used to be their own before the English got it for
themselves; but the English have had England now for thirteen hundred
years, and we cannot doubt they will keep it as long as the world
lasts.
It was about 400 years after our Lord was born that the Romans were
going and the English coming.
CHAPTER III.
THE ANGLE CHILDREN A.D. 597.
The old English who had come to Britain were heathen, and believed in
many false gods: the Sun, to whom they made Sunday sacred, as Monday
was to the moon, Wednesday to a great terrible god, named Woden, and
Thursday to a god named Thor, or Thunder. They thought a clap of
thunder was the sound of the great hammer he carried in his hand.
They thought their gods cared for people being brave, and that the
souls of those who died fighting gallantly in battle were the happiest
of all; but they did not care for kindness or gentleness.
Thus they often did very cruel things, and one of the worst that they
did was the stealing of men, women, and children from their homes, and
selling them to strangers, who made slaves of them. All England had
not one king. There were generally about seven kings, each with a
different part of the island and as they were often at war with one
another, they used to steal one another's subjects, and sell them to
merchants who came from Italy and Greece for them.
Some English children were made slaves, and carried to Rome, where
they were set in the market-place to be sold. A good priest, named
Gregory, was walking by. He saw their fair faces, blue eyes, and long
light hair, and, stopping, he asked who they were. "Angles," he was
told, "from the isle of Britain." "Angles?" he said, "they have angel
faces, and they ought to be heirs with the angels in heaven." From
that time this good man tried to find means to send teachers to teach
the English the Christian faith. He had to wait for many years, and,
in that time, he was made Pope, namely, Father-Bishop of Rome. At
last he heard that one of the chief English kings, Ethelbert of Kent,
had married Bertha, the daughter of the King of Paris, who was a
Christian, and that she was to be allowed to bring a priest with her,
and have a church to worship in.
Gregory thought this would make a beginning: so he sent a priest,
whose name was Augustine, with a letter to King Ethelbert and Queen
Bertha, and asked the King to listen to him. Ethelbert met Augustine
in the open air, under a tree at Canterbury, and heard him tell about
the true God, and JESUS CHRIST, whom He sent; and, after some time,
and a great deal of teaching, Ethelbert gave up worshiping Woden and
Thor, and believed in the true God, and was baptized, and many of his
people with him. Then Augustine was made Archbishop of Canterbury;
and, one after another, in the course of the next hundred years, all
the English kingdoms learnt to know God, and broke down their idols,
and became Christian.
Bishops were appointed, and churches were built, and parishes were
marked off--a great many of them the very same that we have now. Here
and there, when men and women wanted to be very good indeed, and to
give their whole lives to doing nothing but serving God, without any
of the fighting and feasting, the buying and selling of the outer
world, they built houses, where they might live apart, and churches,
where there might be services seven times a day. These houses were
named abbeys. Those for men were, sometimes, also called monasteries,
and the men in them were termed monks, while the women were called
nuns, and their homes convents of nunneries. They had plain dark
dresses, and hoods, and the women always had veils. The monks used
to promise that they would work as well as pray, so they used to build
their abbeys by some forest or marsh, and bring it all into order,
turning the wild place into fields, full of wheat. Others used to
copy out the Holy Scriptures and other good books upon parchment--
because there was no paper in those days, nor any printing--drawing
beautiful painted pictures at the beginning of the chapters, which
were called illuminations. The nun did needlework and embroidery,
as hangings for the altar, and garments for the priests, all bright
with beautiful colors, and stiff with gold. The English nuns' work
was the most beautiful to be seen anywhere.
There were schools in the abbeys, where boys were taught reading,
writing, singing, and Latin, to prepare them for being clergymen; but
not many others thought it needful to have anything to do with books.
Even the great men thought they could farm and feast, advise the king,
and consent to the laws, hunt or fight, quite as well without reading,
and they did not care for much besides; for, though they were
Christians, they were still rude, rough, ignorant men, who liked
nothing so well as a hunt or a feast, and slept away all the evening,
especially when they could get a harper to sing to them.
The English men used to wear a long dress like a carter's frock, and
their legs were wound round with strips of cloth by way of stockings.
Their houses were only one story, and had no chimneys--only a hole at
the top for the smoke to go out at; and no glass in the windows. The
only glass there was at all had been brought from Italy to put into
York Cathedral, and it was thought a great wonder. So the windows had
shutters to keep out the rain and wind, and the fire was in the middle
of the room. At dinner-time, about twelve o'clock, the lord and lady
of the house sat upon cross-legged stools, and their children and
servants sat on benches; and square bits of wood called trenchers,
were put before them for plates, while the servants carried round the
meat on spits, and everybody cut off a piece with his own knife and
at it without a fork. They drank out of cows' horns, if they had not
silver cups. But though they were so rough they were often good,
brave people.
CHAPTER IV.
THE NORTHMEN. A.D. 858--958.
There were many more of the light-haired, blue-eyed people on the
further side of the North Sea who worshiped Thor and Woden still, and
thought that their kindred in England had fallen from the old ways.
Besides, they liked to make their fortunes by getting what they could
from their neighbors. Nobody was thought brave or worthy, in Norway
or Denmark, who had not made some voyages in a "long keel," as a ship
was called, and fought bravely, and brought home gold cups and chains
or jewels to show where he had been. Their captains were called Sea
Kings, and some them went a great way, even into the Mediterranean
Sea, and robbed the beautiful shores of Italy. So dreadful was it
to see the fleet of long ships coming up to the shore, with a serpent
for the figure-head, and a raven as the flag, and crowds of fierce
warriors with axes in their hands longing for prey and bloodshed, that
where we pray in church that God would deliver us from lightning and
tempest, and battle and murder, our forefathers used to add, "From
the fury of the Northmen, good Lord deliver us."
To England these Northmen came in great swarms, and chiefly from
Denmark, so that they were generally call "the Danes." They burnt
the houses, drove off the cows and sheep, killed the men, and took
away the women and children to be slaves; and they were always most
cruel of all where they found an Abbey with any monks or nuns,
because they hated the Christian faith. By this time those seven
English kingdoms I told you of had all fallen into the hands of one
king. Egbert, King of the West Saxons, who reigned at Winchester,
is counted as the first king of all England. His four grandsons had
dreadful battles with the Danes all their lives, and the three eldest
all died quite young. The youngest was the greatest and best king
England ever had--Alfred the Truth-teller. As a child Alfred excited
the hopes and admiration of all who saw him, and while his brothers
were busy with their sports, it was his delight to kneel at his
mother's knee, and recite to her the Saxon ballads which his tutor
had read to him, inspiring him, at that early age, with the ardent
patriotism and the passionate love of literature which rendered his
character so illustrious. He was only twenty-two years old when he
came to the throne, and the kingdom was overrun everywhere with the
Danes. In the northern part some had even settled down and made
themselves at home, as the English had done four hundred years
before, and more and more kept coming in their ships: so that, though
Alfred beat them in battle again and again, there was no such thing
as driving them away. At last he had so very few faithful men left
him, that he thought it wise to send them away, and hide himself in
the Somersetshire marsh country. There is a pretty story told of
him that he was hidden in the hut of a poor herdsman, whose wife,
thinking he was a poor wandering soldier as he sat by the fire mending
his bow and arrows, desired him to turn the cakes she had set to bake
upon the hearth. Presently she found them burning, and cried out
angrily, "Lazy rogue! you can't turn the cakes, though you can eat
them fast enough."
However, that same spring, the brave English gained more victories;
Alfred came out of his hiding place and gathered them all together,
and beat the Danes, so that they asked for peace. He said he would
allow those who had settled in the North of England to stay there,
provided they would become Christians; and he stood godfather to
their chief, and gave him the name of Ethelstane. After this, Alfred
had stout ships built to meet the Danes at sea before they could come
and land in England; and thus he kept them off, so that for all the
rest of his reign, and that of his son and grandsons, they could do
very little mischief, and for a time left off coming at all, but went
to rob other countries that were not so well guarded by brave kings.
But Alfred was not only a brave warrior. He was a most good and holy
man, who feared God above all things, and tried to do his very best
for his people. He made good laws for them, and took care that every
one should be justly treated, and that nobody should do his neighbor
wrong without being punished. So many Abbeys had been burnt and the
monks killed by the Danes, that there were hardly any books to be had,
or scholars to read them. He invited learned men from abroad, and
wrote and translated books himself for them; and he had a school in
his house, where he made the young nobles learn with his own sons. He
built up the churches, and gave alms to the poor; and he was always
ready to hear the troubles of any poor man. Though he was always
working so hard, he had a disease that used to cause him terrible pain
almost every day. His last years were less peaceful than the middle
ones of his reign, for the Danes tried to come again; but he beat them
off by his ships at sea, and when he died at fifty-two years old, in
the year 901, he left England at rest and quiet, and we always think of
him as one of the greatest and best kings who ever reigned in England,
or in any other country. As long as his children after him and his
people went on in the good way he had taught them, all prospered with
them, and no enemies hurt them; and this was all through the reigns
of his son, his grandson, and great-grandsons. Their council of great
men was called by a long word that is in our English, "Wise Men's
Meeting," and there they settled the affairs of the kingdom. The
king's wife was not called queen, but lady; and what do you think
lady means? It means "loaf-giver"--giver of bread to her household
and the poor. so a lady's great work is to be charitable.
CHAPTER V.
THE DANISH CONQUEST. A.D. 958--1035.
The last very prosperous king was Alfred's great-grandson, Edgar, who
was owned as their over-lord by all the kings of the remains of the
Britons in Wales and Scotland. Once, eight of these kings came to
meet him at Chester, and rowed him in his barge along the river Dee.
It was the grandest day a king of England enjoyed for many years.
Edgar was called the peaceable, because there were no attacks by the
Danes at all through his reign. In fact, the Northmen and Danes had
been fighting among themselves at home, and these fights generally
ended in some one going off as a Sea-King, with all his friends, and
trying to gain a new home in some fresh country. One great party of
Northmen under a very tall and mighty chief named Rollo, had some time
before, thus gone to France, and forced the King to give them a great
piece of his country, just opposite to England, which was called after
them Normandy. There they learned to talk French, and grew like
Frenchmen, though they remained a great deal braver, and more spirited
than any of their neighbors.
There were continually fleets of Danish ships coming to England; and
the son of Edgar, whose name was Ethelred, was a helpless, cowardly
sort of man, so slow and tardy, that his people called him Ethelred
the Unready. Instead of fitting out ships to fight against the Danes,
he took the money the ships ought to have cost to pay them to go away
without plundering; and as to those who had come into the country
without his leave, he called them his guard, took them into his pay,
and let them live in the houses of the English, where they were very
rude, and gave themselves great airs, making the English feed them on
all their best meat, and bread, and beer, and always call them Lord
Danes. He made friends himself with the Northmen, or Normans, who
had settled in France, and married Emma, the daughter of their duke;
but none of his plans prospered: things grew worse and worse, and
his mind and his people's grew so bitter against the Danes, that
at last it was agreed that all over the South of England every
Englishman should rise up in one night and murder the Dane who
lodged in his house.
Among those Danes who were thus wickedly killed was the sister of the
King of Denmark. Of course he was furious when he heard of it, and
came over to England determined to punish the cruel, treacherous king
and people, and take the whole island for his own. He did punish the
people, killing, burning, and plundering wherever he went; but he
could never get the king into his hands, for Ethelred went off in the
height of the danger to Normandy, where he had before sent his wife
Emma, and her children, leaving his eldest son( child of his first
wife), Edmund Ironside, to fight for the kingdom as best he might.
The King of Denmark died in the midst of his English war; but his son
Cnut went on with the conquest he had begun, and before long Ethelred,
the Unready died, and Edmund Ironside was murdered, and Cnut became
King of England, as well as of Denmark. He became a Christian, and
married Emma, Ethelred's widow, though she was much older than himself.
He had been a hard and cruel man, but he now laid aside his evil ways,
and became a noble and wise and just king, a lover of churches and
good men; and the English seem to have been as well off under him as
if he had been one of their own kings. There is no king of whom more
pleasant stories are told. One is of his wanting to go to church at
Ely Abbey one cold Candlemas Day. Ely was on a hill in the middle of
a great marsh. The marsh was frozen over; not strong enough to bear,
and they all stood looking at it. Then out stepped a stout countryman,
who was so fat, that his nickname was The Pudding. "Are you all
afraid?" he said. "I will go over at once before the king." "Will
you," said the king, "then I will come after you, for whatever bears
you will bear me." Cnut was a little, slight man, and he got easily
over, and Pudding got a piece of land for his reward.
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