Have you ever thought about what fiction is? Probably, such a question may seem surprising: and so everything is clear. Every person throughout his life has to repeatedly create the works he needs for specific purposes - statements, autobiographies, dictations - using not gypsum or clay, not musical notes, not paints, but just a word. At the same time, almost every person will be very surprised if he is told that he thereby created a work of fiction, which is very different from visual art, music and sculpture making. However, everyone understands that a student's essay or dictation is fundamentally different from novels, short stories, news that are created by professional writers. In the works of professionals there is the most important difference - excogitation. But, oddly enough, in a school literature course, you don’t realize the full power of fiction. So using our website in your free time discover fiction for yourself. Edwy the Fair or the First Chronicle of Aescendune<br />A Tale of the Days of Saint Dunstan by A. D. Crake (ebook reader with highlight function txt) 📖
- Author: A. D. Crake
Book online «Edwy the Fair or the First Chronicle of Aescendune<br />A Tale of the Days of Saint Dunstan by A. D. Crake (ebook reader with highlight function txt) 📖». Author A. D. Crake
Strange to say, now that the parental consent was gained, and no obstacle lay between him and the accomplishment of his ardent wish, he did not feel half so happy as he had expected to feel. Home affections seemed to increase as the hours rushed by which were to be his last in the bosom of his family; every familiar object became precious as the thought arose that it might be seen for the last time; favourites, both men and animals, had to be bidden farewell. There was the old forester, the gleeman, the warder, the gardener, the chamberlain, the cellarius, the cook (not an unimportant personage in Saxon households), the foster mother, his old nurse, and many a friend in the village. Then there were his favourite dogs, his pony, some pigeons he had reared; and all had some claim on his affection, home nurtured as he had been in a most kindly household.
But the appointed day came, the horse which was to bear him away stood at the door, another horse loaded with his personal effects stood near, for carriages were then unknown, neither would the roads have permitted their use, so changed were the times since the Roman period.
His father and mother, his brother and sister, stood without the drawbridge, where the last goodbye took place; tears started unbidden to his eyes—he was only fifteen—as he heard the parting blessing, and as his mother pressed him to her bosom.
Alfred and his sister Edith seemed almost broken hearted at the parting. But Elfric tried to bear up, and the end came.
The little cavalcade left the castle, two attendants, well armed and mounted, being his bodyguard.
Again and again he looked back; and when, after a journey of two miles, the envious woods closed in, and hid the dear familiar home from his sight, a strange sense of desolation rushed upon him, as if he were alone in the world.
The route taken by the cavalcade led them in the first place to Warwick, even then a flourishing Saxon town: this was the limit of Elfric’s previous wanderings, and when they left it for the south, the whole country was strange to him.
The royal messenger had business at the cathedral city of Dorchester, at the junction of the Tame and Isis, and they did not take the more direct route by the Watling Street, the most perfect Roman road remaining. The land was but thinly peopled, forests covered the greater portion, and desolate marshes much of the remainder; thus, through alternate forest and marsh, the travellers advanced along the ruinous remains of an old Roman crossroad, which had once afforded good accommodation to travellers, but had been suffered to fall into utter ruin and decay by the neglect of their successors, our own barbarous ancestors.
Originally it had been paved with stone, and causeways had been formed over marsh and mere, but the stones had been taken away, for the road formed the most accessible quarry in the neighbourhood. Here and there, however, it was still good, surviving the wear of centuries, and even the old mileposts of iron were still existing covered with rust, with the letters denoting so many Roman miles—or thousands of paces—still legible.
A few hours’ riding from Warwick brought them at the close of the day in sight of Beranbyrig (Banbury), where three centuries earlier a bloody battle had been fought, vi wherein success—almost for the last time—visited the British arms, and saved the Celtic race from expulsion for twenty years.
The spot was very interesting to Elfric, for here his ancestor Sebbald had fought by the side of the invading king, Cynric, the son of Cerdic, and had fallen “gloriously” on the field.
“Look,” said Anlaf, the guide, “at that sloping ground which rises to the northwest. There the Welsh (Britons) stood, formed in nine strong battalions. In that hollow they placed their archers, and here their javelin men and cavalry were arranged after the old Roman fashion. Our Englishmen were all in one battalion, and charged them fiercely, when they were thrown into confusion by the cunning tricks of the Welsh, who made up in craft what they wanted in manly courage.
“Look at this brook which flows to the river, it was running with blood that evening, and our men lay piled in huge heaps where they tried to scale the hill which you see yonder.”
“And did the Welsh gain the day so easily?” said Elfric, sorrowfully.
“I don’t wonder; they were fighting for their lives, and even a rat will fight if you get him into a corner; besides, they had all their best men here.”
“Do you know where Sebbald fell?” said Elfric, referring to his own ancestor.
“Just under this hillock, close by King Cynric, who fought like a lion to save the body, but was unable to do so. The Welsh were then gaining the day. Still, even his foes respected his valour, and gave your forefather a fair and honourable burial.”
Leaving the battlefield, they entered the Saxon town, which was defended on one side by the Cherwell, on the other by a mound and palisade, with an outer ditch supplied by the river. Here they found hospitable entertainment, and left on the morrow for the town of Kirtlington.
They left Beranbyrig early, and reached the village of Sutthun (King’s Sutton), where they perceived a great multitude of people collected around a well at the outskirts of the village.
“What are these people doing?” asked Elfric.
“Oh, do you not know?” replied Anlaf. “This is St. Rumbald’s well,” and he crossed himself piously.
“Who was St. Rumbald?” asked Elfric innocently.
“Oh, he was son of the king of Northumbria, and of his queen, the daughter of the old king Penda of Mercia, and the strange thing is that he is a saint although he only lived three days.”
“How could that be?”
“Why it was a miracle, you see. On the day after his birth he was taken to Braceleam (Brackley), where he was baptized, and after his baptism he actually preached an eloquent sermon to the people. They brought him back to Sutthun next day, where he died, having first blessed this well, so that many precious gifts of healing are shown thereat. His relics were removed first to Braceleam, then to Buccingaham (Buckingham), where his shrine is venerated by the faithful. But come, you must drink of the holy water.”
So they approached the spot, and, after much labour to get at the well, drank of the water, which had a brackish taste, and proceeded on their journey southward through Kirtlington, then a considerable city, although now a small village. It was their intention to pass by the cathedral city of Dorchester, where Wulfstan was then bishop, where they arrived on the second night of their journey.
It was the largest city Elfric had as yet seen, possessing several churches, of which only one now remains. The hand of the ruthless Danes had not yet been laid heavily upon it, and the magnificence of the sacred fanes, built by cunning architects from abroad, amazed the Mercian boy.
There was the tomb of the great Birinus, the apostle of Mercia, who had founded the see in the year 630 A.D., and to whose shrine multitudes of pilgrims flocked each year. But the remains of Roman greatness most astonished Elfric. The ruins of the amphitheatre situate near the river Tame were grand even in their decay, and all the imaginative faculties of the boy were aroused, as one of the most learned inhabitants described the scenes of former days, of which tradition had been preserved, the gladiatorial combats, the wild beast fights.
The heir of Æscendune found hospitality at the episcopal palace, where Wulfstan,vii once the turbulent Archbishop of York, held his court. The prelate seemed favourably impressed with his youthful guest, whom he dismissed with a warm commendation to Dunstan.
They left the city early in the morning, and passed through Bænesington (Benson), which having been originally taken from the Welsh by the Saxon chieftain Cuthulf, in the year 571, became the scene of the great victory of Offa, the Mercian king, over Cynewulf of Wessex in the year 777. One of Elfric’s ancestors had fought on the side of Offa, and the exploits of this doughty warrior had formed the subject of a ballad often sung in the winter evenings at Æscendune, so that Elfric explored the scene with great curiosity. Inferior to Dorchester, it was still a considerable town.
Late at night they reached Reading, where they slept, and started early on the morrow for London, where they arrived on the evening of the fourth day.
LONDON IN THE OLDEN TIME.
London, in the days of King Edred, differed widely from the stately and populous city we know in these days, and almost as widely from the elegant “Colonia Augusta,” or Londinium, of the Roman period. Narrow, crooked, and unpaved lanes wound between houses, or rather lowly cottages, built of timber, and roofed with thatch, so that it is not wonderful that a conflagration was an event to be dreaded.
Evidence met the eye on every side how utterly the first Englishmen had failed to preserve the cities they had conquered, and how far inferior they were in cultivation, or rather civilisation, to the softer race they had so ruthlessly expelled; for on every side broken pedestal and shattered column appeared clumsily imbedded in the rude domestic architecture of our forefathers.
St. Paul’s Cathedral rose on the hill once sacred to Diana but was wholly built within the ruins of the vast temple which had once occupied the site, and which, magnificent in decay, still surrounded it like an outwork. Further on were the wrecks of the citadel, where once the stern legionary had watched by day and night, and where Roman discipline and order had held sway, while the wall raised by Constantine, broken and imperfect, still rose on the banks of the river. Near the Ludgate was the palace of the Saxon king, and the ruins of an aqueduct overshadowed its humbler portal, while without the walls the river Fleet rolled, amidst vineyards and pleasant meadows dotted with houses, to join the mighty Thames.
Edred, the reigning king of England, was the brother of the murdered Edmund, and, in accordance with the custom of the day, had ascended the throne on the death of his brother, seeing that the two infant sons of the late king, Edwy and Edgar, were too young to reign, and the idea of hereditary right was not sufficiently developed in the minds of our forefathers to suggest the notion of a regency. It must also be remembered that, within certain limits, there was an elective power in the Witenagemot or Parliament, although generally limited in its scope to members of the royal family.
Edred was of very delicate constitution, and suffered from an inward disease which seldom allowed him an interval of rest and ease. Like so many sufferers he had found his consolation in religion, and the only crime ever laid to his charge (if it were a crime) was that he loved the Church too much. Still he had repeatedly proved that he was strong in purpose and will, and the insurgent Danes who had settled in Northumbria had owned his prowess. In the internal affairs of his kingdom he was chiefly governed by the advice of the great ecclesiastic and statesman, with whose name our readers will shortly become familiar.
Upon the morning after the arrival of Elfric in London, Edwy, the young prince, and his new companion, sat in a room on the upper floor of the palace, which had but two floors, and would have been considered in these days very deficient in architectural beauty.
The window of the room opened upon the river, and commanded a pleasant view of the woods and meadows on the Surrey side, then almost uninhabited, being completely unprotected in case of invasion, a contingency never long absent from the mind in the days of the sea kings.
A table covered with manuscripts, both in Latin and Anglo-Saxon, occupied the centre of the room, and there Elfric was seated, looking somewhat aimlessly at a Latin vocabulary, while Edwy was standing listlessly at the window. The “library,” if it deserved the name, was very unlike a modern library; books were few, and yet very expensive, so that perhaps there was no fuller collection in any layman’s house in the kingdom. There were Alfred’s translations into Anglo-Saxon, the “Chronicle of Orosius,” or the history of the World; the “History of the Venerable Bede,” both
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