In the fury and suddenness of the assault Cyneard was severely wounded, but he was saved from death by the interposition of his followers, who, though with much difficulty, and after a severe contest, at length slew the king. Such of his attendants as were with him, refusing to yield, and eager to avenge the death of their lord, shared the same fate. But whilst this was passing, the woman, who had been the occasion of all this, was shrieking aloud for assistance: and the king's thanes, who were not far off, hastened, each as quickly as he was able, to the spot. The Etheling first attempted to argue the case, and offered them their lives, and a sum of money to each; but it was all to no purpose, not one of them would listen to any compromise, and a general battle took place. The king's followers were all slain except one, a Briton, whom Cynewolf had formerly received as a hostage from the Welsh, and he also was severely wounded.

The next day, intelligence of the king's death was spread far and near, and others of the king's thanes, whom he had left behind him, hastened to the spot. Among these was Osric, an Alderman, and a thane named Wiferth. When they arrived at Merton, the Etheling was still there, and the gates were closed against them. Cyneard also began again to parley, for his object now was, and probably had been so from the first, to secure for himself the crown which had been once worn by his brother. To this end, he made large offers of land and money to the thanes, if they would consent to his wishes; pointing out to them also, that several of their kinsmen were on his side, ready to fight

This is the account given by the Saxon Chronicle: Malmesbury has blended together the transactions of the two days, and he calls Osric," Eric, a man famous for his old age and prudence."

in his cause. To this the king's party replied, that they loved their deceased master better than all their kinsmen, and they would never submit themselves to his murderer; but they earnestly advised those of their kinsmen who were with the Etheling, to leave him to his fate. To which Cyneard's men answered, that this proposition had been put the day before by themselves to those who had fought for the king, and not one of the king's men would accept it. Surely, therefore, they could not now do otherwise than follow so brave an example, and live or die with their lord.

These recriminations served only to exasperate the two parties, and a struggle ensued about the gate. The king's party at last forced their way in, and slew the Etheling with all his men, except one, who was the Alderman's godson: and even he hardly escaped with his life, for he was wounded in several places1.

The affray at Merton deprived of life both the rivals for the crown of Wessex, which was immediately occupied by Bertric, a descendant of the royal house of Cerdic. Three years afterwards, in 787, the new king married Edburga, daughter of Offa king of

The Saxon Chronicle mentions the Alderman's godson, and William of Malmesbury gives us the account of the British hostage who was saved alive from the battle of the preceding day. I have introduced both accounts into the narrative, but I suspect they are the same story.

In this massacre were slain no fewer than eighty-four persons, besides king Cynewolf and his rival Cyneard: it took place in the year 784; but it is curious, that both the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle and Ethelwerd relate it by anticipation, under the year 755, proving, even if the fact were otherwise doubtful, that these two chronicles have been copied the one from the other, or that both are derived from a

common source.

The romantic history of this incontinent and wicked princess

Mercia, by which event the two most powerful of the Saxon kingdoms were for a time cemented by an

has been handed down to us by Simeon of Durham in the following narrative.

"As the honoured daughter of so great a monarch, Edburga entertained the most ambitious views, living in kingly state like her father, and treating every one who approached her with vituperation: by which means she speedily became an object of detestation, not only to the nobles and magistrates, but to the whole people. The clergy in particular were the objects of her enmity, and she brought continual accusations against them before the king her husband, whom she had by her wiles so completely brought under her control, that those who were accused seldom escaped without suffering banishinent or death. If at any time she ever found the king deaf to her solicitations, she seized the earliest opportunity of taking off by poison the object of her malice. An instance of her wickedness occurred in the case of a young man who possessed great wealth, and was a favourite with the king.. Not being able to persuade her husband to listen to her accusations, she mixed the fatal cup which was to deprive the youth of life. But the king, unwittingly, tasted of its contents, and the chief duke at his court also drank thereof, by which means both of them perished from the effects of the deadly draught. The wicked queen who had concocted the poison, alarmed at the consequences, fled beyond the sea with all her treasures to the court of Charles, the famous king of France. Here she was introduced into his presence, and standing before him in the gallery of his palace, offered him a rich present from the treasures which she had brought. The king addressed her thus: Which would you rather have, Edburg, me, or my son who stands with me in the gallery?' Edburga, without thinking, replied hastily: 'If I had my choice, I would rather have him than you, because he is younger.' To which Charles is said to have answered: If you had chosen me, you should have had my son; but as you chose him, you shall have neither me nor him for your friend.' The king, however, on account of her abandoned character, placed her at the head of a famous convent, where she exchanged her secular robes for the habit of the nuns; and she here for a few years, under a specious exterior, discharged the duties of her station; but as her life had been depraved and execrable in her own country, so did she become still more

alliance, which probably saved Wessex from the subjugation to which its distracted state would otherwise naturally have exposed it. It would have been a fortunate circumstance for all the Saxon kingdoms, if this union could have been the nucleus of a general combination; for it was at this very time that an enemy, hitherto unknown, afterwards the harbinger of havoc and desolation, first landed upon the island.

The account of this event is given by the historian Ethelwerd', more fully than by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle. 66 Whilst the pious king Bertric was reigning over the western parts of the English, and the innocent people, dispersed throughout their fields, were enjoying themselves in tranquillity, and yoking their oxen to the plough, suddenly there arrived on the coast a fleet of Danes, not large, but of three ships only this was their first arrival. When this became known, the king's officer, who was already stopping in the town of Dorchester, leaped on his horse, and gallopped forward with a few men to the port, thinking

wicked and abandoned in the country where she was a sojourner. The poet says,

The summer's heat makes ripe the corn,
And fruits do autumn's head adorn;

The storms descend, when winter reigns,
And deluges th' extended plains.

But this abandoned woman could not be restrained, either by summer's heat or winter's cold, from the gratification of her passions. After a short time, she committed adultery with one of her own countrymen, .........and being expelled by king Charles, in much anguish and tribulation of mind, from the holy place of her residence, brought her life to a close in the midst of poverty, wretchedness, and contempt. She withdrew, accompanied by a single servant, to Pavia, where, after begging her bread from door to door in the cities and castles of that country, she at last miserably perished."

1 Ethelw. Chron. lib. iii.

that they were merchants rather than enemies, and, commanding them in an authoritative tone, ordered them to be made to go to the royal city; but he was slain on the spot by them, and all who were with him. The name of the officer was Beaduherd "." This act of aggression roused the neighbouring people to vengeance: the peasantry and others flocked together in large numbers, and the Danish marauders, neglecting their booty, took refuge in their ships", where they were safe from pursuit; for the AngloSaxons, during the three hundred years which they had spent in Britain, had lost all knowledge of maritime affairs.

After a reign of sixteen years, king Bertric died, and was succeeded by Egbert, the last surviving member of the royal house of Wessex. This young man, as we learn from William of Malmesbury, had been driven out of Wessex by the late king Bertric, who looked upon him as an impediment to his peaceful enjoyment of the sovereignty. "For both Bertric himself, and all the other kings of Wessex since the time of Ina, though justly proud of their royal origin from Cerdic, had nevertheless deviated somewhat from the right line of descent"," whereas Egbert, as it would appear, was descended from an elder branch, and, if the right of primogeniture were allowed, might be thought to possess a better claim than Bertric to their paternal sovereignty. It is not unlikely, also, that the

m

He is called reve, i. e. shire-reve or sheriff, by the Anglo-Saxon Chronicle: the Danes also are termed Northmen, and their country Hærethaland.

• In 802, for the generally received date, 800, is liable to many difficulties, which need not here be mentioned.

P Will. Malmes. i. 43.