HAROLD LANDS AT PORLOCK. 317 description of the place within the borders of South Britain where the wild CHAP. IX. stag still finds a shelter. The high ground of Exmoor, and the whole neighbouring hilly region, reaches its highest country. point in the Beacon of Dunkery, a height whose Celtic name has an appropriate sound among the remains of primæval times with which it is crowned. It is the highest point in its own shire, and it is overtopped by no point in Southern England, except by some of the Tors of Dartmoor in the still further west. A descent, remarkably gradual for so great a height, leads down to the small haven of Porlock, placed on a bay of no great depth, but well defined by two bold headlands guarding it to the east and west. The coast has been subject to many changes. A submarine forest,1 reaching along the whole shore, shows that the sea must have made advances in earlier times. And there is as little doubt that it has again retreated, and that what is now an alluvial flat was, eight hundred years back, a shallow and muddy inlet, accessible to the light craft of those days. Harold therefore landed at a spot nearer than the present small harbour to the small town, or rather village, of Porlock.2 A landing in this Object of remote region could contribute but little to the advance- prise. ment of the general scheme of Godwine; the object of Harold must have been merely to obtain provisions for his crews. He came doubtless, as we shall find his father did also, ready for peaceable supplies if a friendly country afforded them, but ready also to provide for his followers 1 I do not remember any mention in any ancient writer of this submarine forest on the Somersetshire coast; but a forest of the same kind on the other side of the British Channel is spoken of by Giraldus, Exp. Hib. i. 36 (vol. v. p. 284 Dimock). In the year 1171 a violent storm laid it bare. 2 The Abingdon and Worcester Chronicles (1052) have simply "neh Sumersætan gemæran and Dafenascire" (see the same forms in the entries for the last year, and Appendix G); so Florence, "in confinio Sumersetaniæ et Dorsetaniæ," this last word being a mistake for Domnaniæ, as appears from the next sentence. The Peterborough Chronicle gives the name of the spot, "and com þa úp æt Portlocan." the enter victory at the coun try, and sails to join his father. CHAP. IX. by force, if force was needed for his purpose.' But the Harold's whole neighbourhood was hostile; a large force was Porlock; gathered together from both the border shires, and he plunders Harold, whether by his fault or by his misfortune, had to begin his enterprise of restoration and deliverance by fighting a battle with the countrymen whom he came to deliver. The exiles had the victory, but it is clear that they had to contend with a stout resistance on the part of a considerable body of men. More than thirty good Thegns and much other folk were slain.2 So large a number of Thegns collected at such a point shows that the force which they headed must have been gathered together, not merely from the immediate neighbourhood of Porlock, but from a considerable portion of the two shires. We may conceive that the system of beacons, which has been traced out over a long range of the hill-tops in the West of England, had done good service over the whole country long before the fleet of Harold had actually entered the haven of Porlock. But the crews of Harold's ships were doubtless picked men, and their success, over even a much larger force of irregular levies, would have been in no way wonderful. Harold now plundered without opposition, and carried off what he would in the way of goods, cattle, and men.4 He then sailed to the south-west, he doubled the Land's End, and sailed along the English Channel to meet his father. See Appendix R. 2 The Worcester and Abingdon Chronicles (1052) give the numbers; "And þær ofsloh má þonne xxx. godera þegena ("nobilibus ministris," Flor.) butan oðrum folce." 3 Chronn. Ab. and Wig. "Egder ge of Sumersæton ge of Defenescíre." 4 Chron. Petrib. "And nam him on orfe and on mannum and on æhtum, swa him geweard." Were these captives dealt with as conscripts or galley-slaves, or, considering whence the fleet came, were they intended for the Irish slave-trade? Chronn. Ab. and Wig. "And sona æfter ban for abutan Penwiðsteort." Chron. Petrib. "And gewende him ba eastweard to his feder." ESTIMATE OF HAROLD'S CONDUCT. 319 This event is the chief stain which mars the renown of CHAP. IX. Estimate of Harold, and which dims the otherwise glorious picture of Harold's the return of Godwine and his house. Harold's own age conduct. perhaps easily forgave the deed. No contemporary writer speaks of it with any marked condemnation; one contemporary writer even seems distinctly to look upon it as a worthy exploit. It was in truth nothing more than the ordinary course of a banished man. Harold acted hardly worse than Osgod Clapa; he did not act by any means so badly as Ælfgar. But a man who towers above his own generation must pay, in more than one way, the penalty of his greatness. We instinctively judge Harold by a stricter standard than that by which we judge Elfgar and Osgod Clapa. On such a character as his it is distinctly a stain to have resorted for one moment to needless violence, or to have shed one drop of English blood without good cause. The ravage and slaughter at Porlock distinctly throws a shade over the return of Godwine and over the fair fame of his son. It is a stain rather to be regretted than harshly to be condemned but it is a stain nevertheless. It is a stain which was fully wiped out by later labours and triumphs in the cause of England. Still we may well believe that the blood of those thirty good Thegns and of those other folk was paid for in after years by prayers and watchings and fastings before the Holy Rood of Waltham; we may well believe that it still lay heavy on the hero's soul as he marched forth to victory at Stamfordbridge and to more glorious overthrow at Senlac. d; sets sail. Harold and Leofwine were thus on their way to meet Godwine their father. Meanwhile the revolution was going on June 22, rapidly on the other side of England. 1 Vita Eadw. 405. See Appendix R. Godwine had 1052. 2 On the narratives of Godwine's return, see Appendix S His first appearance off the English coast. 3 CHAP. IX. gathered together a fleet in the Yser,' the river of Flanders which flows by Dixmuyden and Nieuport, and falls into the sea some way south-west of Bruges. He thence set sail, one day before Midsummer eve, and sailed straight to Dungeness, south of Romney.2 At Sandwich the Earls Ralph and Odda were waiting for him, and a land force had also been called out for the defence of the coast. Some friendly messenger warned the Earl of his danger, and he sailed westward to Pevensey. In Sussex he was in his own country, among his immediate possessions and his immediate followers, and he seems to have designed a landing on the very spot where a landing so fatal to his house was made fourteen years later. The King's ships followed after him, but a violent storm hindered either party from carrying out its designs. Neither side knew the whereabouts of the other; the King's fleet He returns put back to Sandwich, while Godwine retired to his old to Bruges. quarters in Flanders. Great discontent seems to have 5 1 Chron. Petrib. 1052. "Ɖa gewende Godwine eorl út fram Brycge mid his scipum to Yseran ;" so the Biographer (405), “paratâ multiplici classe in fluvio Hysarâ." It is clearly not Gesoriacum or Boulogne, as Mr. Earle makes it in his Glossary. 2 Chron. Petrib. "And let út ane dæge ær midsumeres mæsse æfene ["mediante æstate," Vit. Eadw.] bat he com to Næsse, be is be suðan Rumenea." 3 William of Malmesbury (ii. 199) makes Eadward himself present; "Nec segnem sensit Regem illa necessitas quin ipse in navi pernoctaret, et latronum exitus specularetur, sedulo explens consilio quod manu nequibat præ senio." Eadward was now fifty at the most, and his presence is hardly possible, according to the authentic narratives. Eadward's presence with the fleet is distinctly marked in 1049 (see above, p. 99), but not now. 4 Chron. Petrib. "And wearð þæt wæder swide strang þæt þa eorlas ne mihton gewitan hwet Godwine eorl gefaren hæfde." The ignorance could hardly fail to be mutual. So William of Malmesbury (u s.); “Quum cominùs ventum esset, et jam penè manus consererentur, nebula densissima repente coorta furentum obtutus confudit, miseramque mortalium audaciam compescuit." William had just got one of his fits of fine writing upon him. Chron. Ab. "He [Godwine] heom ætbærst, and him sylfan gebearh þær þær he þa mihte." So Florence; "Quo in loco potuit se occultavit." But Peterborough says expressly, "And gewende pa Godwine eorl út DISPERSION OF BOTH FLEETS. 321 followed this mishap on the King's side. The blame CHAP. IX. was clearly laid on the Earls and on the force which they commanded. Eadward may not have learned the lesson of Cnut, and he perhaps thought that the elements were bound to submit to his will. The fleet was ordered to return to London, where the King would put at its head other Earls, and would supply them with other rowers.1 To London accordingly the fleet returned, but it was found easier to get rid of the old force than to provide a new one; everything lagged behind; probably nobody was zealous in the cause; even if any were zealous, their zeal would, as ever happened in that age, give way beneath the irksomeness of being kept under arms without any hope of immediate action. At last the whole naval force, which was to guard the coast and keep out the returning traitor, gradually dispersed, and each man went to his own home.2 sails the ap- second time to Wight. The coast was now clear for Godwine's return, and Godwine his friends in England were doubtless not slow to prize him that his path was now open. He might now, it would seem, have sailed, without fear of any hindrance, from the mouth of the Yser to London Bridge. But, with characteristic wariness, he preferred not to make his great venture till he had strengthened his force by the addition of the ships of Harold and Leofwine, and till he had tried and made himself sure of the friendly feeling of a large part of England. In the first district however where he landed, he found the mass of the people either unfriendly agean bat he com eft to Brycge;" and so William of Malmesbury; 'Denique Godwinus ejusque comites eo unde venerant vento cogente reducti." Mark the cadence of an hexameter. 1 Chron. Petrib. "And sceolde man setton oore eorlas and oore hasæton to bam scipum." Mr. Thorpe translates "hasæton" by "chief officers," Mr. Earle by "rowers." I commonly bow to Mr. Earle's authority on such matters; but the other version seems to make better sense. |