Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II

C >> Charlotte Mary Yonge >> Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II

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This was his first feeling, but when he saw William's disappointment,
he added, that he hoped the choice of the English might fall on his
obedient son.

"And what do you give me, father?" broke in Henry.

"A treasure of 5,000 pounds of silver," was the answer.

"What good will the treasure do me," cried Henry, "if I have neither
land, nor house, nor home?"

"Take comfort, my son," said his father; "it may be that one day thou
shalt be greater than all."

These words he spoke in the spirit of foreboding, no doubt perceiving
in Henry a sagacity and self-command which in the struggle of life was
certain to give him the advantage of his elder brothers; but then,
alarmed lest what he had said might be construed as acknowledging
Henry's superior claim as having been born a king's son, he felt it
needful to back up Rufus's claim, and bade a writ be prepared commanding
Lanfranc to crown William King of England. Affixing his signet, he
kissed and blessed his favorite, and sent him off at once to secure the
English throne. Henry, too, hurried away to secure his 5,000 pounds, and
the dying man was left alone, struggling between terror and hope.

He left sums of money for alms, masses, and prayers; and as an act
of forgiveness, released his captives--Earl Morcar, Ulfnoth, the
unfortunate hostage, Siward, and Roger de Breteuil, and all the rest;
but he long excepted his brother Odo, and only granted his liberation on
the earnest persuasion of the other brother, the Count of Mortagne.

He slept uneasily at night, awoke when the bells were ringing for lauds,
lifted up his hands in prayer, and breathed his last on the 8th of
September, 1087.

His sons were gone, his attendants took care of themselves, his servants
plundered the chamber and bed, and cast on the floor uncovered the
mortal remnant of their once dreaded master. And though the clergy
soon recollected themselves, and attended to the obsequies of their
benefactor, carrying the corpse to his own Abbey at Caen, yet even
there, as has already been said, the cry of the despoiled refused to the
Conqueror even the poor boon of a grave.

CAMEO XII.

THE CROWN AND THE MITRE.

_Kings of England_.
1087. William II.
1100. Henry I.

_King of France_.
1059. Philippe I.

_Emperors of Germany_.
1080. Heinrich IV.
1105. Heinrich V.

_Popes of Rome_.
1066. Victor III.
1073. Gregory VII.
1088. Urban II.
1099. Paschal II.

Great struggles took place in the eleventh century, between the
spiritual and temporal powers. England was the field of one branch
of the combat, between Bishop and King; but this cannot be properly
understood without reference to the main conflict in Italy, between Pope
and Emperor.

The Pope, which word signifies Father, or Patriarch, of Rome, had from
the Apostolic times been always elected, like all other bishops, by the
general consent of the flock, both clergy and people; and, after the
conversion of Constantine, the Emperor, as first lay member of the
Church, of course had a powerful voice in the election, could reject any
person of whom he disapproved, or nominate one whom he desired to see
chosen, though still subject to the approval of clergy and people.

This power was, however, seldom exercised by the emperors at Rome, after
the seat of empire had been transferred to Constantinople, and their
power over Italy was diminishing through their own weakness and the
German conquests. The election continued in the hands of the Romans,
and in general, at this time, their choice was well-bestowed; the popes
were, many of them, saintly men, and, by their wisdom and authority,
often guarded Rome from the devastations with which it was threatened by
the many barbarous nations who invaded Italy. So it continued until Pope
Zaccaria quarrelled with Astolfo, King of Lombardy, and summoned the
Carlovingian princes from France to protect him. These Italian wars
resulted in Charles-le-Magne taking for himself the crown of Lombardy,
and in his being chosen Roman Emperor of the West, by the citizens of
Rome, under the influence of the Pope; while he, on his side, conferred
on the pope temporal powers such as none of his predecessors had enjoyed.

From thenceforth the theory was, that the Pope was head of the Western
Church, with archbishops, bishops, clergy, and laity, in regular
gradations under him; while the Emperor was in like manner head of the
State, kings, counts, barons, and peasants, in different orders below
him; the Church ruling the souls, the State the bodies of men, and the
two chieftains working hand in hand, each bearing a mission from above;
the Emperor, as a layman, owning himself inferior to the Pope, yet the
Pope acknowledging the temporal power of the crowned monarch.

This was a grand theory, but it fell grievously short in the practice.
The city of Rome, with its worn-out civilization, was a most corrupt
place; and now that the Papacy conferred the highest dignity and
influence, it began to be sought by very different men, and by very
different means, from those that had heretofore prevailed. Bribery and
every atrocious influence swayed the elections, and the wickedness of
some of the popes is almost incredible. At last the emperors interfered
to check the dreadful crimes and profanity at Rome, and thus the
nomination of the Pope fell absolutely into their hands, and was taken
from the Romans, to whom it belonged.

In the earlier part of the eleventh century, a deacon of Rome, named
Hildebrand, formed the design of freeing the See of St. Peter from the
subjection of the emperors, and at the same time of saving it from the
disgraceful power of the populace. The time was favorable, for the
Emperor, Henry IV., was a child, and the Pope, Stephen II., was ready to
forward all Hildebrand's views.

In the year 1059 was held the famous Lateran Council [Footnote: So
called from being convoked in the Church at the Lateran gate, on the
spot where St. John was miraculously preserved from the boiling oil.] of
the Roman clergy, in which it was enacted, that no benefice should be
received from the hands of any layman, but that all bishops should be
chosen by the clergy of the diocese; and though they in many cases held
part of the royal lands, they were by no means to receive investiture
from the sovereign, nor to pay homage. The tokens of investiture were
the pastoral staff, fashioned like a shepherd's crook, and the ring by
which the Bishop was wedded to his See, and these were to be no longer
taken from the monarch's hands. The choice of the popes was given to the
seventy cardinal or principal clergy of the diocese, who were chiefly
the ministers of the different parish churches, and in their hands it
has remained ever since.

Hildebrand himself was elected Pope in 1073, and took the name of
Gregory VII. He bore the brunt of the battle by which it was necessary
to secure the privileges he had asserted for the clergy. Henry IV.
of Germany was a violent man, and a furious struggle took place. The
Emperor took it on himself to depose the Pope, the Pope at the same time
sentenced the Emperor to abstain from the exercise of his power, and his
subject; elected another prince in his stead.

At one time Gregory compelled Henry to come barefooted to implore
absolution; at another, Henry besieged Rome, and Gregory was only
rescued from him by the Normans of Apulia, and was obliged to leave
Rome, and retire under their protection to Apulia, where he died in
1085, after having devoted his whole life to the fulfilment of his great
project of making the powers of this world visibly submit themselves to
the dominion of the Church.

The strife did not end with Gregory's death. Henry IV. was indeed
dethroned by his wicked son, but no sooner did this very son, Henry V.,
come to the crown, than he struggled with the Pope as fiercely as his
father had done.

It was not till after this great war in Germany that the question began
in any great degree to affect England. Archbishop Lanfranc, as an
Italian, thought and felt with Gregory VII.; and the Normans, both here
and in Italy, were in general the Pope's best friends; so that, though
William the Conqueror refused to make oath to become the warrior of the
Pope, Church affairs in general made no great stir in his lifetime, and
the question was not brought to issue.

The face of affairs was, however, greatly changed by the death of the
Conqueror in 1087. William Rufus was a fierce, hot-tempered man, without
respect for religion, delighting in revelry, and in being surrounded
with boisterous, hardy soldiers, whom he paid lavishly, though at the
same time he was excessively avaricious.

He had made large promises of privileges to the Saxons, in order to
obtain their support in case his elder brother Robert had striven to
assert his claims; but all these were violated, and when Lanfranc
remonstrated, he scoffingly asked whether the Archbishop fancied a king
could keep all his promises.

Lanfranc had been his tutor, had conferred on him the order of
knighthood and had hitherto exercised some degree of salutary influence
over him; but seeing all his efforts in vain, he retired to Canterbury,
and there died on the 24th of May, 1089.

Then, indeed, began evil days for the Church of England. William seized
all the revenues of the See of Canterbury, and kept them in his own
hands, instead of appointing a successor to Lanfranc, and he did the
same with almost every other benefice that fell vacant, so that at one
period he thus was despoiling all at once--the archbishopric, four
bishops' sees, and thirteen abbeys. At the same time, the miseries he
inflicted on the country were dreadful; his father's cruel forest laws
were enforced with double rigor, and the oppression of the Saxons was
terrible, for they were absolutely without the least protection from
any barbarities his lawless soldiery chose to inflict upon them. Every
oppressive baron wreaked his spite against his neighbors with impunity,
and Ivo Taillebois [Footnote: See "The Camp of Refuge."] was not long
in showing his malice, as usual, against Croyland Abbey.

A fire had accidentally broken out which consumed all the charters,
except some which were fortunately in another place, where they had been
set aside by Abbot Ingulf, that the younger monks might learn to read
the old Saxon character, and among these was happily the original grant
of the lands of Turketyl, signed by King Edred, and further confirmed by
the great seal of William I.

Ivo Taillebois, hearing of the fire, and trusting that all the
parchments had been lost together, sent a summons to the brethren to
produce the deeds by which they held their lands. They despatched a lay
brother called Trig to Spalding, with Turketyl's grant under his charge.
The Normans glanced over it, and derided it. "Such barbarous writings,"
they said, "could do nothing;" but when Trig produced the huge seal,
with William the Conqueror's effigy, still more "stark" and rigid than
Sir Ivo had known him in his lifetime, there was no disputing its
validity, and the court of Spalding was baffled. However, Taillebois
sent some of his men to waylay the poor monk, and rob him of his
precious parchment, intending then again to require the brotherhood
to prove their rights by its production; but brother Trig seems to have
been a wary man, and, returning by a by-path, avoided pursuit, and
brought the charter safely home. A short time after, Ivo offended the
king, and was banished, much to the joy of the Fen country.

Rapine and oppression were in every corner of England and Normandy, the
two brothers Robert and William setting the example by stripping their
youngest brother, Henry, of the castle he had purchased with his
father's legacy. One knight, two squires, and a faithful chaplain, alone
would abide by the fortunes of the landless prince. The chaplain, Roger
le Poer, had been chosen by Henry, for a reason from which no one could
have expected the fidelity he showed his prince in his misfortunes,
nor his excellent conduct afterward when sharing the prosperity of his
master. He was at first a poor parish priest of Normandy, and Henry,
chancing to enter his church, found him saying mass so quickly, that,
quite delighted, the prince exclaimed, "Here's a priest for me!" and
immediately took him into his service. Nevertheless, Roger le Poer was
an excellent adviser, an upright judge, and a good bishop. It was he who
commenced the Cathedral of Salisbury, where it now stands, removing it
from the now deserted site of Old Sarum.

Robert had not added much to the tranquillity of the country by
releasing his uncle, the turbulent old Bishop Odo, who was continually
raising quarrels between him and William. Odo's old friend, Earl Hugh
the Wolf, of Chester, [Footnote: See the "Camp of Refuge."] was at this
time better employed than most of the Norman nobles. He was guarding the
frontier against the Welsh, and at the same time building the heavy red
stone pile which is now the Cathedral of Chester, and which he intended
as the Church of a monastery of Benedictines. Fierce old Hugh was a
religious man, and had great reverence and affection for one of the
persons in all the world most unlike himself--Anselm, the Abbot of Bec.

Anselm was born at Aosta, in Piedmont, of noble parents, and was well
brought up by his pious mother, Ermengarde, under whose influence he
applied himself to holy learning, and was anxious to embrace a religious
life. She died when he was fifteen years of age, and his father was
careless and harsh. Anselm lost his love for study, and fell into
youthful excesses, but in a short time her good lessons returned upon
him, and he repented earnestly. His father, however, continued so
unkind, and even cruel, that he was obliged to leave the country, and
took refuge, first in Burgundy and then in Normandy, where he sought the
instruction of his countryman, Lanfranc, then Abbot of Bec.

He learnt, at Bec, that his father was dead, and decided on taking the
vows in that convent. There he remained for many years, highly revered
for his piety and wisdom, and, in fact, regarded as almost a saint.
In 1092, Hugh the Wolf was taken ill, and, believing he should never
recover, sent to entreat the holy Abbot to come and give him comfort
on his death-bed. Anselm came, but on his arrival found the old Earl
restored, and only intent on the affairs of his new monastery, the
regulation of which he gladly submitted to Anselm. The first Abbot was
one of the monks of Bec, and Earl Hugh himself afterward gave up his
country to his son Richard, and assumed the monastic habit there.

Whilst Anselm was on his visit to the Earl of Chester, there was some
conversation about him at Court, and some one said that the good Abbot
was so humble that he had no desire for any promotion or dignity. "Not
for the Archbishopric?" shouted the King, with a laugh of derision;
"but"--and he swore an oath--"other Archbishop than me there shall be
none."

Some of the clergy about this time requested William to permit prayers
to be offered in the churches, that he might be directed to make a fit
choice of a Primate. He laughed, and said the Church might ask what she
pleased; she would not hinder him from doing what he pleased.

He knew not what Power he was defying. That power, in the following
spring, stretched him on a bed of sickness, despairing of life, and in
an agony of remorse at his many fearful sins, especially filled with
terror at his sacrilege, and longing to free himself from that patrimony
of the Church which seemed to be weighing down his soul.

Anselm was still with Hugh the Wolf, probably at Gloucester, where the
King's illness took place. A message came to summon him without delay to
the royal chamber, there to receive the pastoral staff of Canterbury. He
would not hear of it; he declared he was unfit, he was an old man, and
knew nothing of business, he was weak, unable to govern the Church in
such times. "The plough should be drawn by animals of equal strength,"
said he to the bishops and other friends who stood round, combatting his
scruples, and exulting that the king's heart was at length touched.
"Would you yoke a feeble old sheep with a wild young bull?"

Without heeding his objections, the Norman clergy by main force dragged
him into the room where lay the Red King, in truth like to a wild bull
in a net, suffering from violent fever, and half mad with impatience
and anguish of mind. He would not hear Anselm's repeated refusals, and
besought him to save him. "You will ruin me," he said. "My salvation is
in your hands. I know God will never have mercy on me if Canterbury is
not filled."

Still Anselm wept, imploring him to make another choice; but the bishops
carried him up to the bedside, and actually forced open his clenched
hand to receive the pastoral staff which William held out to him. Then,
half fainting, he was carried away to the Cathedral, where they chanted
the _Te Deum_, and might well have also sung, "The king's heart is in
the hand of the Lord, as the rivers of water."

But though William had thus been shown how little his will availed when
he openly defied the force of prayer, his stubborn disposition was
unchanged, and he recovered only to become more profane than ever.
Gundulf, Bishop of Rochester, when congratulating him on his
restoration, expressed a hope that he would henceforth show more regard
to the Most High. "Bishop," he returned, as usual with an oath, "I will
pay no honor to Him who has brought so much evil on me."

A war at this time broke out between William and his brother Robert, and
the King ordered all his bishops to pay him large sums to maintain his
forces. Canterbury had been so wasted with his extortions that Anselm
could hardly raise 500 marks, which he brought the King, warning him
that this was the last exaction with which he meant to comply. "Keep
your money and your foul tongue to yourself," answered William; and
Anselm gave the money to the poor.

Shortly after, Anselm expostulated with William on the wretched state of
the country, where the Christian religion had almost perished; but the
King only said he would do what he would with his own, and that his
father had never met with such language from Lanfranc. Anselm was
advised to offer him treasure to make his peace, but this he would not
do; and William, on hearing of his refusal, broke out thus: "Tell him
that as I hated him yesterday, I hate him more to day, and will hate him
daily more and more. Let him keep his blessings to himself; I will have
none of them."

The next collision was respecting the Pallium, the scarf of black wool
with white crosses; woven from the wool of the lambs blessed by the Pope
on St. Agnes' day, which, since the time of St. Augustine, had always
been given by the Pope to the English Primate. Anselm, who had now been
Archbishop for two years, asked permission to go and receive it; but as
it was in the midst of the dispute between Emperor and Pope, there was
an Antipope, as pretenders to that dignity were called--one Guibert,
appointed by Henry IV. of Germany, besides Urban II., who had been
chosen by the Cardinals, and whose original Christian name was really
Odo. William went into a great fury on hearing that Anselm regarded
Urban as the true Pope, without having referred to himself, convoked
the clergy and laity at Rockingham, and called on them to depose the
Archbishop. The bishops, all but Gundulf of Rochester, were in favor of
the King, and renounced their obedience to the Primate; but the nobles
showed themselves resolved to protect him, whereupon William adjourned
the council, and sent privately to ask what might be gained by
acknowledging Urban as Pope.

Urban sent a legate to England with the Pallium. The King first tried
to make him depose Anselm, and then to give him the Pallium instead of
investing the Archbishop with it; but the legate, by way of compromise,
laid it on the altar at Canterbury, whence Anselm took it up.

Two years more passed, and Anselm came to beg permission to go to Rome
to consult with the Pope on the miserable state of the Church. William
said he might go, but if he did, he himself should take all the manors
of Canterbury again, and the bishops warned him they should be on the
king's side.

"You have answered well," said Anselm; "go to your lord; I will hold to
my God."

William banished him for life; but just before he departed, he came to
the King, saying, "I know not when I shall see you again, and if you
will take it, I would fain give you my blessing--the blessing of a
father to his son."

For one moment the Red King was touched; he bowed his head, and the old
man made the sign of the cross on his brow; but no sooner was Anselm
gone forth from his presence, than his heart was again hardened, and he
so interfered with his departure, that he was forced to leave England in
the dress of a pilgrim, with only his staff and wallet.

In Italy, Anselm was able to live in quiet study, write and pray in
peace. He longed to resign his archbishopric, but the Pope would
not consent; and when Urban was about to excommunicate the King, he
prevailed to prevent the sentence from being pronounced.

William was left to his own courses, and to his chosen friend Ralph, a
low-born Norman priest, beloved by the King partly for his qualities as
a boon companion, partly for his ingenuity as an extortioner. He was
universally known by the nickname of Flambard, or the Torch, and was
bitterly hated by men of every class. He was once very nearly murdered
by some sailors, who kidnapped him, and carried him on board a large
ship. Some of them quarrelled about the division of his robes, a storm
arose, and he so worked on their fears that they at length set him on
shore, where William was so delighted to see him that he gave him the
bishopric of Durham, the richest of all, because the bishop was also an
earl, and was charged to defend the frontier against the Scots.

He had promised to relax the forest laws, but this was only one of his
promises made to be broken; and he became so much more strict in his
enforcement of them than even the Conqueror, that he acquired the
nickname of Ranger of the Woods and Keeper of the Deer. Dogs in the
neighborhood of his forests were deprived of their claws, and there was
a scale of punishments for poachers of any rank, extending from the loss
of a hand, or eye, to that of life itself. In 1099, another Richard,
an illegitimate son of Duke Robert of Normandy, was killed in the New
Forest by striking his head against the branch of a tree; and a belief
in a family fate began to prevail, so much so that Bishop Gundulf warned
the King against hunting there; but William, as usual, laughed him to
scorn, and in the summer of 1100 took up his residence in his lodge of
Malwood, attended by his brother Henry, and many other nobles.

On the last night of July a strange sound was heard--the King calling
aloud on St. Mary; and when his attendants came into his chamber, they
found him crossing himself, in terror from a frightful dream. He bade
them bring lights, and make merry, that he might not fall asleep again;
but there were other dreamers. With morning a monk arrived to tell that
he had had a vision presaging the King's death; but William brayed his
own misgivings, and laughed, saying the man dreamt like a monk. "Give
him a hundred pence, and bid him dream better luck next time."

Yet his spirits were subdued all the morning, and it was not till wine
had excited him that he returned to his vein of coarse, reckless mirth.
He called his hunters round him, ordered the horses, and asked for his
new arrows--long, firm, ashen shafts. Three he stuck in his belt, the
other three he held out to a favorite comrade, Walter Tyrrel, Lord de
Poix, saying, "Take them, Wat, for a good marskman should have good
arrows."

Some one ventured to remind him of his dream, but his laugh was ready.
"Do they take me for a Saxon, to be frighted because an old woman dreams
or sneezes?"

The hunters rode off, Walter Tyrrel alone with the King. By-and-by a
cry rang through the forest that the King was slain. There was an eager
gathering into the beech-shaded dell round the knoll of Stoney Cross,
where, beneath an oak tree, lay the bleeding corpse of the Red
William, an arrow in his heart. Terror fell on some, the hope of
self-aggrandizement actuated others. Walter Tyrrel never drew rein till
he came to the coast, and there took ship for France, whence he went
to the holy wars. Prince Henry rode as fast in the opposite direction.
William de Breteuil (eldest son of Fitz-Osborn) galloped off to secure
his charge, the treasury at Winchester, and; when he arrived, found the
prince before him, trying to force the keepers to give him the keys,
which they refused to do except at their master's bidding.

Breteuil, who, as well as Henry, had sworn that Robert should reign if
William died childless, tried to defend his rights, but was overpowered
by some friends of Henry, who now came up to the forest; and the next
morning the prince set off to London, taking with him the crown, and
caused the Bishop of London to anoint and crown him four days after his
brother's death.