Wulf the Saxon

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WULF THE SAXON

A Story of the Norman Conquest

By G. A. HENTY

PREFACE.

Although the immediate results of the Battle of Hastings may have
been of less importance to the world than were those of some other
great battles, the struggle has, in the long run, had a greater
influence upon the destiny of mankind than any other similar event
that has ever taken place. That admixture of Saxon, Danish, and
British races which had come to be known under the general name of
English, was in most respects far behind the rest of Europe. The
island was, as it had always been,--except during the rule of two
or three exceptionally strong kings,--distracted by internal
dissensions. Broad lines of division still separated the North
from the South, and under weak Kings the powerful Earls became
almost independent. The enterprise that had distinguished their
Saxon and Danish ancestors seems to have died out. There was a
general indisposition to change, and except in her ecclesiastical
buildings, England made but little progress in civilization from
the time of Alfred to that of Harold. Its insular position cut it
off from taking part in that rapid advance which, beginning in
Italy, was extending throughout Europe. The arrival, however, of
the impetuous Norman race, securing as it did a close connection
with the Continent, quickened the intellect of the people, raised
their intelligence, was of inestimable benefit to the English, and
played a most important part in raising England among the nations.
Moreover, it has helped to produce the race that has peopled Northern
America, Australia, and the south of Africa, holds possession of
India, and stands forth as the greatest civilizer in the world. The
Conquest of England by the Normans was achieved without even a
shadow of right or justice. It was at the time an unmixed curse to
England; but now we can recognize the enormous benefits that accrued
when in his turn the Englishman conquered the Norman, and the foreign
invaders became an integral portion of the people they had overcome.
For the historical details of the story, I have only had to go to
Freeman's magnificent _History of the Norman Conquest of England_,
which I hope will be perused by all of my readers who are able to
obtain it.

G. A. HENTY

CONTENTS.

CHAP.

I. A QUARREL

II. COUNTRY LIFE

III. AT COURT

IV. A STORM

V. ROUEN

VI. RELEASE OF THE EARL

VII. THE OATH

VIII. TROUBLE WITH WALES

IX. IN THE WELSH VALLEYS

X. PORTHWYN

XI. THE SECRET PASSAGE

XII. EDITH

XIII. HAROLD, THE KING

XIV. WULF'S SUSPICIONS

XV. A MEETING BY THE RIVER

XVI. A VOYAGE NORTH

XVII. AN ATTEMPT AT ASSASSINATION

XVIII. THE NORTHERN INVASION

XIX. STAMFORD BRIDGE

XX. THE LANDING OF THE FOE

XXI. HASTINGS

XXII. THE LORD OF BRAMBER

ILLUSTRATIONS

THE LAST STAND AT HASTINGS

THE YOUNG THANE COMES BACK TO STEYNING

WULF AND HIS FOLLOWERS STORM LLEWELLYN'S STRONGHOLD

WULF LEAPT FORWARD AND CAUGHT THE UPLIFTED WRIST

WULF THE SAXON.

CHAPTER I.

A QUARREL.

The great Abbey of Westminster was approaching its completion; an
army of masons and labourers swarmed like bees upon and around it,
and although differing widely in its massive architecture, with
round Saxon windows and arches, from the edifice that was two or
three generations later to be reared in its place,--to serve as a
still more fitting tomb for the ashes of its pious founder,--it was
a stately abbey, rivalling the most famous of the English fanes of
the period.

From his palace hard by King Edward had watched with the deepest
interest the erection of the minster that was the dearest object
of his life. The King was surrounded by Normans, the people among
whom he had lived until called from his retirement to ascend the
throne of England, and whom he loved far better than those over
whom he reigned. He himself still lived almost the life of a recluse.
He was sincerely anxious for the good of his people, but took small
pains to ensure it, his life being largely passed in religious
devotions, and in watching over the rise of the abbey he had founded.

A town had risen around minster and palace, and here the workmen
employed found their lodgings, while craftsmen of all descriptions
administered to the wants both of these and of the nobles of Edward's
court.

From one of the side doors of the palace a page, some fifteen or
sixteen years of age, ran down the steps in haste. He was evidently
a Saxon by his fair hair and fresh complexion, and any observer of
the time would have seen that he must, therefore, be in the employment
of Earl Harold, the great minister, who had for many years virtually
ruled England in the name of its king.

The young page was strongly and sturdily built. His garb was an
English one, but with some admixture of Norman fashions. He wore
tightly-fitting leg coverings, a garment somewhat resembling a
blouse of blue cloth girded in by a belt at the waist, and falling
in folds to the knee. Over his shoulders hung a short mantle of
orange colour with a hood. On his head was a cap with a wide brim
that was turned up closely behind, and projected in a pointed shovel
shape in front. In his belt was a small dagger. He wore shoes of
light yellow leather fastened by bands over the insteps. As he ran
down the steps of the palace he came into sharp contact with another
page who had just turned the corner of the street.

"I crave your pardon, Walter Fitz-Urse," he said hurriedly, "but I
was in haste and saw you not."

The other lad was as clearly Norman as the speaker was
Saxon. He was perhaps a year the senior in point of age, and
taller by half a head, but was of slighter build. The expression
of his face differed as widely from that of the Saxon as did
his swarthy complexion and dark hair, for while the latter
face wore a frank and pleasant expression, that of the Norman
was haughty and arrogant.

"You did it on purpose," he said angrily, "and were we not
under the shadow of the palace I would chastise you as you
deserve."

The smile died suddenly out from the Saxon's face. "Chastise
me!" he repeated. "You would find it somewhat difficult,
Master Fitz-Urse. Do you think you are talking to a Norman
serf? You will please to remember you are in England; but if
you are not satisfied with my apology, I will ride with you a
few miles into the country, and we will then try with equal
arms where the chastisement is to fall."

The Norman put his hand to his dagger, but there was an
ominous growl from some men who had paused to listen to the
quarrel.

"You are an insolent boor, Wulf of Steyning, and some day
I will punish you as you deserve."

"Some day," the Saxon laughed, "we shall, I hope, see you
and all your tribe sent across the Channel. There are few of
us here who would not see your backs with pleasure."

"What is this?" an imperious voice demanded; and turning
round, Wulf saw William, the Norman Bishop of London, who,
followed by several monks and pages, had pushed his way
through the crowd. "Walter Fitz-Urse, what means this altercation?"

"The Saxon ran against me of set purpose, my lord," Walter Fitz-Urse
said, in tones of deep humility, "and because I complained he
challenged me to ride with him into the country to fight, and then
he said he hoped that some day all the Normans would be sent across
the Channel."

"Is this so?" the prelate said sternly to Wulf; "did you
thus insult not only my page, but all of us, his countrymen?"

"I ran against him by accident," Wulf said, looking up fearlessly
in the prelate's face. "I apologized, though I know not that I was
more in fault than he; but instead of taking my apology as one of
gentle blood should do, he spoke like a churl, and threatened me
with chastisement, and then I did say that I hoped he and all other
Normans in the land would some day be packed across the Channel."

"Your ears ought to be slit as an insolent varlet."

"I meant no insolence, my Lord Bishop; and as to the slitting of
my ears, I fancy Earl Harold, my master, would have something to
say on that score."

The prelate was about to reply, but glancing at the angry faces of
the growing crowd, he said coldly:

"I shall lay the matter before him. Come, Walter, enough of this.
You are also somewhat to blame for not having received more courteously
the apologies of this saucy page."

The crowd fell back with angry mutterings as he turned, and, followed
by Walter Fitz-Urse and the ecclesiastics, made his way along the
street to the principal entrance of the palace. Without waiting
to watch his departure, Wulf, the Saxon page, pushed his way through
the crowd, and went off at full speed to carry the message with
which he had been charged.

"Our king is a good king," a squarely-built man,--whose bare arms
with the knotted muscles showing through the skin, and hands begrimed
with charcoal, indicated that he was a smith,--remarked to a gossip
as the little crowd broke up, "but it is a grievous pity that he
was brought up a Norman, still more that he was not left in peace
to pass his life as a monk as he desired. He fills the land with
his Normans; soon as an English bishop dies, straightway a Norman
is clapped into his place. All the offices at court are filled
with them, and it is seldom a word of honest English is spoken in
the palace. The Norman castles are rising over the land, and his
favourites divide among them the territory of every English earl
or thane who incurs the king's displeasure. Were it not for Earl
Harold, one might as well be under Norman sway altogether."

"Nay, nay, neighbour Ulred, matters are not so bad as that. I dare
say they would have been as you say had it not been for Earl Godwin
and his sons. But it was a great check that Godwin gave them when
he returned after his banishment, and the Norman bishops and nobles
hurried across the seas in a panic. For years now the king has left
all matters in the hands of Harold, and is well content if only he
can fast and pray like any monk, and give all his thoughts and
treasure to the building of yonder abbey."

"We want neither a monk nor a Norman over us," the smith said
roughly, "still less one who is both Norman and monk I would rather
have a Dane, like Canute, who was a strong man and a firm one, than
this king, who, I doubt not, is full of good intentions, and is a
holy and pious monarch, but who is not strong enough for a ruler.
He leaves it to another to preserve England in peace, to keep in
order the great Earls of Mercia and the North, to hold the land
against Harold of Norway, Sweyn, and others, and, above all, to
watch the Normans across the water. A monk is well enough in a
convent, but truly 'tis bad for a country to have a monk as its
king."

"There have been some war-loving prelates, Ulred; men
as ambitious as any of the great earls, and more dangerous,
because they have learning."

"Ay, there have been great prelates," the smith agreed. "Look at
Lyfing of Worcester, to whom next only to Godwin the king owed his
throne. He was an Englishman first and a bishop afterwards, and was
a proof, if needed, that a man can be a great churchman and a great
patriot and statesman too. It was he rather than Godwin who overcame
the opposition of the Danish party, and got the Witan at last to
acquiesce in the choice of London and Wessex, and to give their
vote to Edward.

"Well was it he did so. For had he failed we should have had as
great a struggle in England as when Alfred battled against the
Danes. We of London and the men of Wessex under the great Earl were
bent upon being ruled by a prince of our own blood. The last two
Danish kings had shown us that anything is better than being governed
by the Northmen. It was Lyfing who persuaded the Earl of Mercia to
side with Wessex rather than with Northumbria, but since Lyfing,
what great Englishman have we had in the church? Every bishopric
was granted by Edward to Norman priests, until Godwin and his sons
got the upper hand after their exile. Since then most of them have
been given to Germans. It would seem that the king was so set against
Englishmen that only by bringing in foreigners can Harold prevent
all preferment going to Normans. But what is the consequence? They
say now that our church is governed from Rome, whereas before
Edward's time we Englishmen did not think of taking our orders from
Italy.

"There will trouble come of it all, neighbour. Perhaps not so long
as Edward reigns, but at his death. There is but one of the royal
race surviving, and he, like Edward, has lived all his life abroad.
There can be no doubt what the choice of Englishmen will be. Harold
has been our real ruler for years. He is wise and politic as well
as brave, and a great general. He is our own earl, and will assuredly
be chosen. Then we shall have trouble with the Normans. Already
they bear themselves as if they were our masters, and they will not
give up their hold without a struggle. Men say that William, their
duke, makes no secret of his hope to become master of England, in
which case God help us all. But that won't come as long as Harold
lives and Englishmen can wield sword and battle-axe. As for myself,
I have patched many a Norman suit of armour, but, by St. Swithin,
I shall have far more pleasure in marring than I have ever had in
mending them."

"Know you who were the boys who had that contention just now?"

"The Norman is a page of William, our Norman bishop; I know no more
of him than that The other is Wulf, who is a ward and page of Earl
Harold. His father was thane of Steyning in South Sussex, one of
Godwin's men, and at his death two years ago Harold took the lad
into his household, for he bore great affection for Gyrth, who had
accompanied him in his pilgrimage to Rome, and fought by his side
when he conquered the Welsh. It was there Gyrth got the wound that
at last brought about his death. Wulf has been to my smithy many
times, sometimes about matters of repairs to arms, but more often,
I think, to see my son Osgod. He had seen him once or twice in
calling at the shop, when one day Osgod, who is somewhat given to
mischief, was playing at ball, and drove it into the face of a son
of one of the Norman lords at court. The boy drew his dagger, and
there would have been blood shed, but Wulf, who was passing at the
time, and saw that the thing was a pure mishap and not the result
of set intention, threw himself between them.

"There was a great fuss over it, for the boy took his tale to his
father, who demanded that Osgod should be punished, and would
doubtless have gained his end had not Wulf spoken to Earl Harold,
who intervened in the matter and persuaded the Norman to let it
drop. Since then the boys have been great friends in their way.
Osgod is a year older than the young thane, and has already made
up his mind to be his man when he grows up, and he has got me to
agree to it, though I would rather that he had stuck to my handicraft.
Still, the prospect is not a bad one. Harold will be King of England,
Wulf will be a powerful thane, and will doubtless some day hold
high place at court, and as he seems to have taken a real liking
to Osgod, the boy may have good chances.

"Wulf will make a good fighting man one of these days. Harold sees
that all his pages are well instructed in arms, and the two boys
often have a bout with blunted swords when Wulf comes to my smithy;
and, by my faith, though I have taught Osgod myself, and he already
uses his arms well, the young thane is fully a match for him. You
would hardly believe that the boy can read as well as a monk, but
it is so. Earl Harold, you know, thinks a good deal of education,
and has founded a college at Waltham. He persuaded Wulf's father
to send him there, and, indeed, will take none as his pages unless
they can read. I see not what good reading can do to most men, but
doubtless for one who is at court and may hold some day a high post
there, it is useful to be able to read deeds and grants of estates,
instead of having to trust others' interpretation."

"I wondered to see you press forward so suddenly into the crowd,
neighbour, seeing that you are a busy man, but I understand now
that you had an interest in the affair."

"That had I. I was holding myself in readiness, if that Norman boy
drew his dagger, to give him such a blow across the wrist with my
cudgel that it would be long before he handled a weapon again. I
fear Wulf has got himself into trouble. The bishop will doubtless
complain to the king of the language used by one of Harold's pages,
and though the earl is well able to see that no harm comes to the
lad, it is likely he will send him away to his estates for a time.
For he strives always to avoid quarrels and disputes, and though
he will not give way a jot in matters where it seems to him that
the good of the realm is concerned, he will go much farther lengths
than most men would do in the way of conciliation. Look how he has
borne with Tostig and with the Earls of Mercia. He seems to have
no animosity in his nature, but is ready to forgive all injuries
as soon as pardon is asked."

The smith was not far wrong in his opinion as to what was likely
to happen. As soon as Wulf returned to the palace he was told that
the earl desired his presence, and he proceeded at once to the
apartment where Harold transacted public business. It was a hall
of considerable size; the floor was strewed with rushes; three
scribes sat at a table, and to them the earl dictated his replies
and decisions on the various matters brought before him. When he
saw Wulf enter he rose from his seat, and, beckoning to him to
follow, pushed aside the hangings across a door leading to an
apartment behind and went in. Wulf had no fear whatever of any
severe consequence to himself from his quarrel with Walter Fitz-Urse,
but he was ashamed that his thoughtlessness should have given the
slightest trouble to the earl, for, popular as he was among all
classes of men in southern England, Harold was an object of love
as well as respect to his dependents, and indeed to all who came
in close contact with him.

The earl was now forty-one years of age. He was very tall, and was
considered the strongest man in England. His face was singularly
handsome, with an expression of mingled gentleness and firmness.
His bearing was courteous to all. He united a frank and straightforward
manner with a polished address rare among his rough countrymen.
Harold had travelled more and farther than any Englishman of his
age. He had visited foreign courts and mingled with people more
advanced in civilization than were those of England or Normandy,
and was centuries ahead of the mass of his countrymen. He was an
ardent advocate of education, a strong supporter of the national
church, an upholder of the rights of all men, and although he
occasionally gave way to bursts of passion, was of a singularly
sweet and forgiving disposition.

King Edward was respected by his people because, coming after two
utterly worthless kings, he had an earnest desire for their good,
although that desire seldom led to any very active results. He was
a member of their own royal house. He was deeply religious. His
life was pure and simple, and although all his tastes and sympathies
were with the land in which he had been brought up, Englishmen
forgave him this because at least he was a Saxon, while his
predecessors had been Danes. But while they respected Edward, for
Harold, their real ruler, they felt a passionate admiration. He was
a worthy representative of all that was best in the Saxon character.
He possessed in an eminent degree the openness of nature, the frank
liberality, the indomitable bravery, and the endurance of hardship
that distinguished the race. He was Earl of the West Saxons, and
as such had special claims to their fealty.

London, it was true, did not lie in his earldom, but in that of his
brother Leofwyn, but Leofwyn and Harold were as one--true brothers
in heart and in disposition. The gentleness and courtesy of manner
that, although natural, had been softened and increased by Harold's
contact with foreigners, was not only pardoned but admired because
he was England's champion against foreigners. He had fought, and
victoriously, alike against the Norwegians, the Danes of Northumbria,
and the Welsh, and he struggled as sturdily, though peacefully,
against Norman influence in England. Already the dread of Norman
preponderance was present in the minds of Englishmen. It was no
secret that in his early days Edward had held out hopes, if he had
not given an actual promise, to William of Normandy that he should
succeed him. Of late the king had been somewhat weaned from his
Norman predilections, and had placed himself unreservedly in Harold's
hands, giving to the latter all real power while he confined himself
to the discharge of religious exercises, and to the supervision of
the building of his abbey, varied occasionally by hunting expeditions,
for he still retained a passionate love of the chase; but men knew
that the warlike Duke of Normandy would not be likely to forget the
promise, and that trouble might come to England from over the sea.

Harold, then, they not only regarded as their present ruler, but
as their future king, and as the national leader and champion.
Edward had no children. The royal house was extinct save for Edward
the Atheling, who, like the present king, had lived all his life
abroad, and could have no sympathy with Englishmen. There being,
then, no one of the royal house available, who but Harold, the head
of the great house of Godwin, the earl of the West Saxons, the
virtual ruler of England, could be chosen? The English kings,
although generally selected from the royal house, ruled rather by
the election of the people as declared by their representatives in
the Witan than by their hereditary right. The prince next in
succession by blood might, at the death of the sovereign, be called
king, but he was not really a monarch until elected by the Witan
and formally consecrated.

It had been nine months after he had been acclaimed to the throne
by the people of London that King Edward had been elected king by
the Witan, and formally enthroned. Thus, then, the fact that Harold
did not belong to the royal family mattered but little in the eyes
of Englishmen. To them belonged the right of choosing their own
monarch, and if they chose him, who was to say them nay?

Wulf felt uncomfortable as he followed the stately figure into the
inner room, but he faced the Earl as the door closed behind him
with as fearless a look as that with which he had stood before the
haughty prelate of London. A slight smile played upon Harold's face
as he looked down upon the boy.

"You are a troublesome varlet, Wulf, and the Lord Bishop has been
making serious complaint of you to the king. He says that you brawled
with his page, Walter Fitz-Urse; that you used insolent words against
his countrymen; and that you even withstood himself. What have you
to say to this?"

"The brawling was on the part of the bishop's page and not of mine,
my lord. I was running out to carry the message with which you
charged me to Ernulf of Dover when I ran against Fitz-Urse. That
was not my fault, but a pure mischance, nevertheless I expressed
my regret in fitting terms. Instead of accepting them, he spoke
insolently, talked of chastising me, and put his hand on the hilt
of his dagger. Then, my lord, I grew angry too. Why should I, the
page of Earl Harold, submit to be thus contemptuously spoken to by
this young Norman, who is but the page of an upstart bishop, and
whom, if your lordship will give permission, I would right willingly
fight, with swords or any other weapons. Doubtless, in my anger, I
did not speak respectfully of Walter's countrymen, and for this I
am sorry, since it has been the ground of complaint and of trouble
to you."

"In fact, Wulf, you spoke as a quarrelsome boy and not as the page
of one who has the cares of this kingdom on his shoulders, and whose
great desire is to keep peace between all parties," the earl put
in gravely.

For the first time Wulf hung his head:

"I was wrong, my lord."

"You were wrong, Wulf; it is not good always to say what we think;
and you, as my page, should bear in mind that here at court it
behoves you to behave and to speak not as a headstrong boy, but as
one whose words may, rightly or wrongly, be considered as an echo
of those you may have heard from me. And now to the third charge,
that you withstood the prelate; a matter that, in the king's eyes,
is a very serious one."

"The bishop would give ear to nought I had to say. He listened to
his own page's account and not to mine, and when I said in my defence
that though I did use the words about the Normans, I did so merely
as one boy quarrelling with the other, he said I ought to have my
ears slit. Surely, my lord, a free-born thane is not to be spoken
to even by a Norman bishop as if he were a Norman serf. I only
replied that before there was any slitting of ears your lordship
would have a say in the matter. So far, I admit, I did withstand
the bishop, and I see not how I could have made other reply."

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