"Palmer," cried the duke, "tell my valiant lords that you have seen me carried towards Paradise on the backs of fiends."
The fate of Duke Robert was never clearly ascertained; but from his pilgrimage to Jerusalem it is certain that he did not return to Normandy. Within a year of his departure, indeed, news reached Rouen that the pilgrim-duke had breathed his last at Nice; and the Normans, though without implicitly believing the report, gradually came to think of him as one who had gone to his long home.
With news of the death of Robert the Magnificent came the crisis of the fate of "William the Bastard." Notwithstanding the oath taken with so much ceremony, the Norman barons were in no humour to submit to a boy – and to a boy, especially, who was illegitimate.
It was in vain that the guardians of young William exerted all their energies to establish his power. One pretender after another was put down by the strong hand. But the old Norman seigneurs, who had submitted with reluctance to the rule of legitimate princes, steeled their hearts against the humiliation of bending their knees to a bastard.
Among the nobles of Normandy, by far the haughtiest and most turbulent were the seigneurs of Bessi and Cotentin. These men were proud to excess of their Norwegian descent, and very tenacious of their Scandinavian traditions and customs. Indeed, they treated with something like contempt the conversion of the Normans to Christianity, carried pagan devices on their shields, and rode into battle with the old Scandinavian war-cry of "Thor aide!" Rejoicing, above all things, in the purity of their blood, these ancient seigneurs not only talked with ridicule of the idea of submitting to the son of Arlette, but formed a strong league, marshalled their fighting men, and prepared to display their banners and seize William's person.
When this conspiracy was formed, William had attained his seventeenth year, and, utterly unconscious of his danger, was residing in a castle unprepared for defence. The Counts of Bessi and Cotentin were making ready to mount their war-steeds and secure their prey, when one of their household fools stole away during the night, reached the castle where William was, clamoured for admittance in a loud voice, and would not be silenced till led to the young duke's presence. On getting audience of William, the fool hastily told him of his peril, and warned him to fly instantly.
"What say you?" asked William in surprise.
"I tell you," answered the fool, "that your enemies are coming, and, if you don't fly without delay, you'll be slain."
After some further questioning, William resolved to take the fool's advice, and mounting, spurred rapidly towards the Castle of Falaise. But he was imperfectly acquainted with the country; and he had not ridden far when he missed his way. William reined up his steed, and halted in perplexity and dismay; and his alarm was increased by hearing sounds as of enemies following at no great distance. Fortunately, at that moment, however, he met a peasant, who, by pointing out the way to the fugitive, and setting the pursuers off in a wrong direction, enabled the duke to reach Falaise in safety.
At that time, Henry, grandson of Hugh Capet, figured as King of France, and wore the diadem which his grandsire had torn from the head of the heirs of Charlemagne. In other days, Henry had been protected against the enmity of an imperious mother and a turbulent brother by Robert the Magnificent; and when William hastened to the French court, Henry, moved by the young duke's tale of distress, and remembering Robert's services, promised to give all the aid in his power. Ere long he redeemed his pledge by leading a French army against the insurgents. The result was the defeat of the rebel lords in a pitched battle at the "Val des Dunes," near Caen, and a victory which, for a time, gave security to Arlette's son on the ducal throne of Rollo.
William's youth was so far fortunate. His friends regarded him with idolatry; and his enemies, forced to admit that he seemed not unworthy of his position, became quiescent. The day on which he mounted his horse without placing foot in stirrup was hailed with joy; and the day on which he received knighthood was kept as a holiday throughout Normandy.
As time passed on, William showed himself very ambitious, and somewhat vindictive. He made war on his neighbours in Maine and Britanny on slender provocations, and resented without mercy any offensive allusion to his maternal parentage. One day, when he was besieging the town of Alençon, the inhabitants, to annoy him, beat leather skins on the walls, in allusion to the occupation of his grandfather, and shouted, "Hides, hides!" William, in bitter rage, revenged himself by causing the hands and feet of all his prisoners to be cut off, and thrown by the slingers over the walls into the town.
But, whatever William's faults, he was loved and respected by his friends. Nor could the duke's worst enemy deny that he looked a prince of whom any people might well have been proud. In person he was scarce above the ordinary height; but so grand was his air, and so majestic his bearing, that he seemed to tower above ordinary mortals. His strength of arm was prodigious; and few were the warriors in that age who could even bend his bow. His face was sufficiently handsome to command the admiration of women, and his aspect sufficiently stern to awe men into submission to his will. No prince in Europe was more capable of producing an impression on a beholder than, at the age of twenty-five, was the warrior destined to attempt and accomplish that mighty exploit since celebrated as the Norman Conquest of England.
III.
THE DANES IN ENGLAND
At the time when William the Norman was making good his claim to the Dukedom won by Rolfganger, the Saxons had been settled in England for nearly six centuries. During that long period, however, the country had frequently been exposed to the horrors of civil war and to the inroads of those ruthless Northmen, who "replunged into barbarism the nations over which they swept."
It was about the year 451 that the Saxons, with huge axes on their shoulders, set foot on the shores of Britain. At that period – when the ancient Britons, left by the Roman conquerors at the mercy of the Picts and Scots, were complaining that the barbarians drove them to the sea, and that the sea drove them back to the barbarians – there anchored off the coast of Kent three bulky ships, commanded by Hengist and Horsa, two Saxon chiefs, who claimed descent from Woden, their god of war, and boasted of some military skill acquired when fighting in the ranks of Rome. From Hengist and Horsa, still worshippers of Thor and Woden, the Britons implored aid against the Picts and Scots; and the Saxon chiefs, calling over a band of their countrymen, speedily drove the painted Caledonians to their mountains and fastnesses.
After having rescued the Britons from their northern neighbours, the Saxons did not exhibit any haste to leave the country which they had delivered. Indeed, these mighty sons of Woden rather seemed ambitious of making Britain their own; and Hengist, having settled in Lincolnshire, gave a great feast. Among other guests who on this occasion came to the Saxon's stronghold was Vortigern, a King among the Britons, and, his eye being arrested and his heart inflamed by the grace and beauty of Rowena, the daughter of Hengist, while she presented the wassail-cup on bended knee, he became so desperately enamoured that he never rested till the fair and fascinating Saxon was his wife. After the marriage of Vortigern and Rowena, the Saxons plainly intimated their intention of being masters of Britain, and, the sword having been drawn, the two races – the Saxons and the Celts – commenced that struggle which lasted for more than a hundred and fifty years, during which King Arthur and the Knights of his Round Table are said to have wrought those marvellous exploits which have been celebrated by chroniclers and bards.
At length, however, the Saxons, in spite of prolonged resistance, established their supremacy, and, during the existence of the Saxon Heptarchy, which included the whole country, subject to seven Princes, the conquerors of Britain became converts to Christianity, and members of the Catholic Church; and, abandoning the worship of Thor and Woden, they endeavoured to show their zeal by erecting churches and monasteries.
As time passed on, Egbert, King of Wessex, in 827 prevailed over all rivals, formed the separate provinces into a single state, and reigned as King of England. But while the Saxons were still engaged in putting down the Celts and cutting each other to pieces, a band of grim adventurers one morning sailed into the port of Teignmouth. In the discharge of his duty, a Saxon magistrate proceeded to the shore