Henry I.

round his bed, calling him to account for his misdeeds towards them. CAMEOXVI. Many other victims of his ambition might have been conjured up by his remorse. Such as the citizen of Rouen, spared by Robert, whom Henry threw from the top of a high tower, whither he had treacherously invited him; the Norman barons, with whom he had broken his faith; his gallant, generous brother, so cruelly betrayed and imprisoned; his persecuted nephew, William Clito; the unhappy troubadour, Lucas de Barré, whom he had blinded, for writing a satire on him, and who dashed out his brains in despair on the prison wall; and, almost the worst of all, the poor children of his illegitimate daughter Juliana, left to the ferocious revenge of Raoul de Harenc, by whom their eyes were put out, and their noses cut off. With such recollections as these to haunt his later years, no wonder Henry's nights were times of agony and wakefulness.

He tried to lose the thought of these horrors in activity, and was constantly passing between England and Normandy. It was in the latter country that he made his fatal supper of lampreys, after he had been fatigued with hunting all day. A violent fever came on at night, and he died on the 1st of December, 1135.

The court of Scotland presented a far different scene. David, the youngest of the children of St. Margaret, inherited the crown in 1124, on the death of his brother Alexander, and was treading in the same course as his mother, his sister Maude, and his brethren. He belonged indeed to a family of saints, and brought piety, firmness, cultivation, and a merciful temper to improve his rugged country. He was a brave warrior; but he loved the arts of peace, and one of his favourite amusements was gardening, budding and grafting trees. He administered strict justice, but shed tears as he ordered an execution; and was so tender-hearted and ready to hear the poor, that he would take his foot out of the stirrup when just ready for the chase, to listen to the humblest complaint. Though lively and social in temper, he spent some hours every evening alone, in prayer and meditation.

His wife was Matilda, daughter of that Earl Waltheof who was executed by William I. She had previously been married to a Norman knight, Simon de St. Liz, who died on pilgrimage, leaving her with two sons, Simon and Waltheof. Two sons were likewise born to David; but the eldest was killed in his infancy by an accident: and shortly after David took home, as a companion to the little Henry, Aelred, the son of a Saxon priest at Hexham.

These four boys were brought up "in the nurture of good learning," and in godliness; but their different tempers soon showed themselves. Simon, the little Earl of Northampton, while a child, was always playing at building castles, and bestriding the "truncheon of a spear," as a war-horse. Waltheof was a builder too, but his were churches, and his delight was in making the sign of the Cross and singing chants. It was still the same as they grew older; Waltheof ever drew more apart, and spent more time in reading and prayer. His step-father, the

Death of Henry I. 1135.

David I. of
Scotland.

CAMEOXVI. king, would take him to the chase, and tell him to bear his bow; but he often found his bow in the hands of another, and after a search discovered Waltheof reading or praying in a secret glade, or under a tree. "Your boy," he said to the Queen, "will either die young, or leave us for the cloister."

Aelred was Waltheof's chief friend; but, though very pious, he was more of a scholar, and read both romances of King Arthur and such works of Cicero as had found their way to Scotland. He was lively in conversation; David was fond of him, and used to tell him stories of his own younger days; and Aelred became the loving chronicler of this happy court.

Prince Henry had the same holy temper, coupled with the bold spirit that was needed by the heir of Scotland, and showed himself full of the noble qualities of his father and uncles. He was the true knight of the party, as bold as a lion, yet as strict and devout as a monk, even in the camp. Simon was no more than a rough, bold, tyrannical earl, and

soon took up his abode in England.

Ere long Aelred became a monk, and Waltheof was not slow in following his example. Both entered the Cistercian order, and led holy lives, avoiding all preferment,--a difficult matter for Waltheof, step-son to one king, and cousin to another. His brother Simon took such offence at his lowliness that he actually threatened to burn down the convent of Waldon, where Waltheof was living, because he thought it shame to see a descendant of Siward a common monk in a poor monastery.

However, in time promotion was thrust on them. Aelred became Abbot of Rivaux, and Waltheof Abbot of Melrose.

Of the King and his son more will be said in the next chapter.

EARL ROBERT of Gloucester was the son of Henry Beauclerc and of a beautiful Welsh princess named Nesta, who had fallen into his hands in the course of the war which he maintained for his brother William Rufus, on the borders of Wales. Henry was much attached to the boy, and gave him a princely education, by which he profited so as to become not only learned, but of a far purer and more chivalrous character than was often to be found among the great men of his time.

Henry I. provided for him, by giving to him the hand of the Lady Amabel Fitzaymon, heiress of Glamorgan, and a ward at the disposal of the crown, in whose right he became Earl of Gloucester.

Robert and his cousin, Stephen de Blois, both attended the deathbed of Henry I., and heard his dying words, “I leave to my children whatever I have gained. Let them do justice to those I have injured."

No sooner had the king expired than Stephen set off for England, where he was already very popular, partly on account of his courteous manners and goodly person, partly for the sake of his wife, Matilda of Boulogne, who was treading in the steps of her aunt, the good Queen Maude. He landed at Dover in the midst of a frightful thunder-storm, and though he found that city and Canterbury closed against him, he met with a joyful reception in London and Winchester. He bribed Hugh Bigod, the late king's seneschal, to swear that Henry had on his death-bed disinherited Maude, and left the kingdom to him; and the Archbishop, William de Corboil, was credulous enough to believe the tale, and crown the usurper: but the discovery of the falsehood hastened the old man's death.

While this was passing, Robert of Gloucester was conducting the funeral of his father; causing his body to be salted, instead of embalmed, and bringing it to England to be buried at Reading, an abbey that Henry had built and endowed for his burial-place. It is now completely ruined, and few vestiges remain to show what the buildings were, far less any trace of the tomb of the scholarly and cruel son of the Conqueror.

CAMEO
XVII.

Stephen,

1135.

CAMEO
XVII.

Geoffrey and
Maude seize
Normandy.

David I. invades England, 1137.

The Empress Maude was at the same time attending her husband, Geoffrey Plantagenet, in a dangerous illness, and thus Stephen was enabled to obtain possession of both England and Normandy, and received the submission of all the nobles. The Earl of Gloucester, thinking resistance vain, took the oath of fealty; reserving, however, the right of recalling it, if any injury was offered to him or to his property. The next year Geoffrey de Bel raised an army, and entered Normandy; but was met there by Stephen, wounded, and forced to retreat, leaving only a few castles still holding out for the Empress. Stephen was besieging that of Bertran, with an army composed partly of Normans and partly of natives of his wife's county of Boulogne, when, while he was taking his mid-day sleep, a quarrel arose between the two brothers. Waking in haste, and alarmed for his Boulognais, he took part against the Normans, calling out, "Down with the traitors!" The Normans were greatly offended, and having retired to their tents, they held a council together, and ended by making him the following plain-spoken address :

"Sir, a folly is better ended than continued. By ill advice we took you for our lord for a little while. If you blame us for it you will not be wrong. You have beaten our men, and called us traitors. Certes, we were traitors when we left our rightful lady for a stranger. We have held with you against our lady the Empress, and we repent, for we have sinned against God and man: but we will no longer continue in the sin; and therefore we bid you mount, and leave this host, for we will not suffer you to remain in this country, unless it be the will of our lady the Empress."

Stephen begged them to let him remain till the next day; but they swore that, if he did, it should be the worse for him, and immediately escorted him beyond the bounds of Normandy. They then brought back Maude, with her husband and children; and the dukedom continued in the hands of Geoffrey as long as he lived.

At the same time David, King of Scotland, recollecting the oath to Maude, which he and Stephen had together sworn, took up arms in her cause, and invaded England, forcing the inhabitants to take the oath of allegiance. His troops were a fearfully wild, untamed race, undisciplined and cruel, and it was a dreadful thing to let loose such a host of savage marauders without any possibility of restraining them. The Galwegians, Picts by race, were the worst; but the Highlanders and Borderers were also dreadfully cruel and the English armed to protect themselves against the inroad of their ancient foes.

The clergy of the North even deemed it a sacred war, and by the authority of Thurstan, Archbishop of York, gathered their flocks, and came, each priest at the head of his parishioners, to the place of assembly at York, where three days were spent in prayer and fasting; and then the old Archbishop administered to them an oath never to desert each other, and dismissed them with his blessing. Raoul, Bishop of Durham, was deputed by him to take the lead, and to have the charge of the consecrated standards of St. Cuthbert of Durham, St. Peter of

York, St. John of Beverley, and St. Wilfred of Ripon.
These were
all suspended from one pole, like the mast of a vessel, surmounted by
a cross, in the centre of which was fixed a silver casket, containing the
consecrated wafer of the Holy Sacrament. The pole was fixed into a
four-wheeled car, on which the Bishop stood. Such cars were much
used in Italy, where each city had its own consecrated Gonfalone, on its
caroccio, hung with scarlet cloth and drawn by oxen. The English
collected under this sacred standard were the stout peasants of the
North, the bowmen of Yorkshire and Nottinghamshire, each with a
bow of his own height, and a sheaf of arrows two cubits long; and
there were also many barons of Norman birth, of whom Walter
L'Espec was the leader. Some of these barons held their lands under
David of Scotland, as Earl of Cumberland, and two of them, Bernard
Baliol and Robert Bruce, the last an old friend of the King, went to
the Scottish camp, to remonstrate with him. Bruce begged him to
retreat, described the horrors committed by his wild Scots, told him of
the strength of the English force, and ended by declaring with tears
that it would now become his duty to renounce his allegiance, and array
himself against his beloved prince. Good King David shed tears, but
William Macdonochie, the fierce lord of Galloway, burst out with the
exclamation, "Bruce, thou art a false traitor!" and the insulted baron
renounced all he held in Scotland, gave up his allegiance, and rode
back to the English army, at Northampton, bringing tidings that the
Scots were coming.

66

The host arrayed itself around their car, where the sacred standard waved above their head, and the Bishop of Durham addressed them from beneath it, reminding them of former victories. Walter L'Espec was the first to respond. Grasping the hand of the Earl of Albemarle, he exclaimed, "I pledge thee my troth that to-day I will overcome the Scots or die!" 'So swear we all," cried the other barons; and the whole host knelt down, the Bishop pronounced over them the words of absolution, they replied with one mighty sound of united voices, "Amen!" and arose. The Knights and Squires sat with gathered reins and lances in rest, the yeomen stood each with his good yew bow ready strung, awaiting the onslaught.

66

Less union was there in the hostile army, where it might be said that there was no authority, for David was unable to restrain his wild subjects from the North and West. The men of Galloway insisted on beginning the attack; but as they wore no defensive armour, and had no weapons but long thin pikes, besides being more fierce than steady, the king hesitated. 'Why trust to a plate of steel or rings of iron?” exclaimed Malise of Strathern. "I, who wear no armour, will go as far as any one with breast-plate of mail." "You brag of what you dare not do!" said the Norman Alan de Percy. But the king found himself obliged to yield the precedence to the Galwegians, trusting far more to the lowland knights and men-at-arms, whom he arrayed under his gallant son, Prince Henry, while he himself commanded the reserve of Northern Scots.

САМЕО
XVII.

Battle of the
Standard,

1137.