HAROLD SETS SAIL FROM IRELAND.

209

southern shore of the Bristol Channel, where no doubt large traces of the ancient British blood and language still remained.1 The country was left, through the absence of its Earl Odda with the fleet, without any single responsible chief. But it soon appeared that, from whatever cause, the wishes of the people of this part of the Kingdom were not favourable to the enterprise of Harold and Leofwine. Possibly the prevalence of Celtic blood in the district may have made its inhabitants less zealous in the cause of the English deliverer than the inhabitants of the purely English shires. Possibly the evil deeds of Swegen, of whose government Somerset had been a part, may have made men who had lived under his rule less attached to the whole House of Godwine than those who had lived under the rule of Harold or of Godwine himself. And we must remember that, up to this time, Harold had done nothing to win for himself any special renown or affection beyond the bounds of his own East-Anglian Earldom. As yet he shone simply with a glory reflected from that of his father. And his enterprise bore in some points an ill look. He had not shared the place of exile of his father, nor had he taken any part in his father's attempts to bring about a peaceful restoration. He had gone, determined from the first on an armed return, to a land which might almost be looked on as an enemy's country. He now came back at the head of a force whose character could not fail to strike Englishmen with suspicion and dread. We are therefore not surprised to hear that the men of Somerset and Devon met him in arms. He landed on the borders of those two shires, in a wild and hilly region, which to this day remains thinly peopled, cut off from the chief centres even of local life, the last place within the borders of South Britain where the wild stag still finds a shelter. The high ground of Exmoor, and the whole neighbouring hilly region, reaches its highest 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,2 reaching along the whole shore, shows that the

1 The language of the Biographer is here remarkable. He had just before spoken of the people of the East and South of England as "Orientales sive Australes Angli." He now calls the point where Harold landed "Occidentalium Britonum sive Anglorum fines." So marked a change of expression cannot be accidental; it must point to the VOL. II.

still debateable character of large parts of Somerset and Devon, neither purely Welsh nor purely English. Compare the significant use of the word "Britanni" by Thietmar, commented on in vol. i. p. 463.

2 I do not remember any mention in any ancient writer of this submarine forest on the Somersetshire coast; but a forest of Р

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.1 A landing in this remote region could contribute but little to the advancement 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 peaceful supplies if a friendly country afforded them, but ready also to provide for his followers by force, if force was needed for his purpose. But the whole neighbourhood was hostile; a large force was gathered together from both the border shires, and 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. 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 there would have been nothing wonderful in their success, even if the irregular levies of the shires greatly exceeded their own numbers. Harold now plundered without opposition, and carried off what he would in the way of goods, cattle, and men. He then sailed to the south-west, he

the same kind on the other side of the Bristol 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.

1 The Abingdon and Worcester Chronicles (1052) have simply "neh Sumersætan gemæran and Dafenascîre" (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." Porlock is also mentioned in the wars of

Eadward the Elder, Chronn. 915.
2 See Appendix Z.

3 The Worcester and Abingdon Chronicles (1052) give the numbers; "And þær ofsloh má þonne xxx. godera þegena ("nobilibus ministris," Flor.) butan oðrum folce."

4 Chronn. Ab. and Wig. "Eger ge of Sumersæton ge of Defenescîre."

5 Chron. Petrib. "And nam him on erfe and on mannum and on æhtum, swa him gewearð." Were these captives dealt with as conscripts or galley-slaves, or, considering whence the fleet came, were they intended for the Irish slave-trade?

HAROLD LANDS AT PORLOCK.

211

doubled the Land's End,' and sailed along the English Channel to meet his father.

This event is the chief stain which mars the renown of Harold, and which dims the otherwise glorious picture of the return of Godwine and his house. Harold's own age 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 ways than one, the penalty of his greatness. We instinctively judge Harold by a stricter standard than any 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.

Harold and Leofwine were thus on their way to meet their father. Meanwhile the revolution was going on with all speed on the other side of England. Godwine had 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. 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

5

1 Chronn. Ab. and Wig. "And sona æfter pan for abutan Penwiðsteort." Chron. Petrib. "And gewende him þa eastweard to his feder."

2 Vita Eadw. 405. See Appendix Z. 3 On the narratives of Godwine's return, see Appendix AA.

66

* Chron. Petrib. 1052. "Da gewende Godwine eorl út fram Brycge mid his scipum to Yseran;" so the Biographer (405), "paratâ multiplici classe in fluvio Hysara.'

"

It is clearly not Gesoriacum or Boulogne, as Mr. Earle makes it in his Glossary.

5 Chron. Petrib. "And let ût ane dæge ær midsumeres mæsse æfene ["mediante æstate," Vit. Eadw.] pæt he com to Næsse, be is be suðan Rumenea.”

6 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

Godwine 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 put back to Sandwich, while Godwine retired to his old quarters in Flanders. Great discontent seems to have followed this mishap on the King's side. The blame was clearly laid on the Earls and on the force which they commanded. Eadward perhaps had not learned the lesson of Cnut, and he may have 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.3 To London accordingly the fleet returned, but it was found easier to get rid of the old force than to bring together 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.1

The coast was now clear for Godwine's return, and his friends in England were doubtless not slow to apprize 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 deemed it better 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

ætbærst, and him sylfan gebearh þær þær he pa mihte." So Florence; "Quo in loco potuit se occultavit." But Peterborough says expressly, " And gewende pa Godwine eorl út agean þæt 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.

3 Chron. Petrib. "And sceolde man setton oðre eorlas and oore hasæton to pam 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. 4 See vol. i. p. 260 note,

GODWINE ON THE SOUTHERN COAST.

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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 to him or kept in check by fear of the ruling powers. From Flanders he sailed straight for the Isle of Wight, as a convenient central spot in which to await the coming of his sons from Ireland. He seems to have cruised along the coast between Wight and Portland, and to have harried the country without scruple wherever supplies were refused to him.1 But of armed resistance, such as Harold had met with at Porlock, we hear nothing, and there is nothing which implies that a single life was lost on either side. At last the nine ships of Harold, rich with the plunder of Devon and Somerset, joined the fleet of his father at Portland. We need hardly stop to dwell on the mutual joy of father, sons, and brothers, meeting again after so many toils and dangers, and with so fair a hope of restoration for themselves and of deliverance for their country. It is more important to note that, from this time, we are expressly told that all systematic ravaging ceased; provisions however were freely taken wherever need demanded. But as the united fleet steered its course eastward towards Sandwich, the true feeling of the nation showed itself more and more plainly. As the deliverer sailed along the South-Saxon coast, the sea-faring men of every haven hastened to join his banners. From Kent, from Hastings, from inland Surrey and from comparatively distant Essex, from those purely Saxon lands, whence the Briton had vanished, and where the Dane had never settled, came up the voice of England to welcome the men who had come to set her free. At every step men pressed to the shore, eager to swell the force of the patriots, with one voice pledging themselves to the national cause, and raising the spirit-stirring cry, "We will live and die with Earl Godwine." At Pevensey, at Hythe, at Folkestone, at Dover, at Sandwich, provisions were freely supplied, hostages were freely given, every ship in their havens was freely placed at the bidding of their lawful Earl. The great body of the fleet sailed round the Forelands, entered the mouth of the Thames, and advanced right upon London. A detachment, we are told, lagged behind, and did great damage in the Isle of Sheppey, burning the town of King's Middleton. They

6

mid him woldon licgan and lybban." I transfer these empathic words hither from the earlier place which they have in the Abingdon and Worcester Chronicles, and in Florence. See Appendix AA.

6 That hostages should have been taken from such a friendly population is a speaking comment on the inveterate custom of taking hostages on all occasions.