Cameos from English History, from Rollo to Edward II

A spur of William Rufus is still preserved at the forest town of Lyndhurst; Purkiss’s descendant still dwells at Minestead; part of the way by which he travelled is called the King’s Lane, and the oak long remained at Stoney Cross to mark the spot where the King fell; and when, in 1745, the remains of the wood mouldered away, a stone was set up in its place; but the last of the posterity of William the Conqueror’s “high deer” were condemned in the course of the year 1831.

  A Minestead churl, whose wonted trade  Was burning charcoal in the glade,  Outstretched amid the gorse  The monarch found: and in his wain  He raised, and to St. Swithin’s fane  Conveyed the bleeding corse.  And still—so runs our forest creed—  Flourish the pious woodman’s seed,  Even in the self-same spot:  One horse and cart, their little store,  Like their forefather’s, neither more  Nor less, their children’s lot.  And still in merry Tyndhurst hall  Red William’s stirrup decks the wall;  Who lists, the sight may see.  And a fair stone in green Mai wood,  Informs the traveller where stood  The memorable tree.  Thus in those fields the Red King died,  His father wasted in his pride,  For it is God’s command  Who doth another’s birthright rive,  The curse unto his blood shall cleave,  And God’s own word shall stand.

Who killed William Rufus? is a question to which the answer becomes more doubtful in proportion to our knowledge of history. Suspicion attached of course to Tyrrel, but he never owned that the shaft, either by design or accident, came from his bow, and no one was there to bear witness. Some think Henry Beauclerc might be guilty of the murder, and he was both unscrupulous enough and prompt enough in taking advantage of the circumstance, to give rise to the belief. Anselm was in Auvergne when he heard of the King’s death, and he is said to have wept at the tidings. He soon received a message from Henry inviting him to return to England, where he was received with due respect, and found that, outwardly at least, order and regularity were restored in Church matters, and the clergy possessed their proper influence. Great promises were made to them and to the Saxons; and the hated favorite of William, Ralph Flambard, was in prison in the Tower. However, he contrived to make his escape by the help of two barrels, one containing wine, with which he intoxicated his keepers, the other a rope, by which he let himself down from the window. He went to Robert of Normandy, remained with him some time, but at last made his peace with Henry, and in his old age was a tolerably respectable Bishop of Durham.

Anselm was in favor at court, owing to the influence of the “good Queen Maude,” and he tried to bring about a reformation of the luxuries then prevalent especially long curls, which had come into fashion with the Normans of late. Like St. Wulstan, he carried a knife to clip them, but without making much impression on the gay youths, till one of them happened to dream that the devil was strangling him with his own long hair, waked in a fright, cut it all off, and made all his friends do so too.

As long as Henry was afraid of having his crown disputed by Robert, he took care to remain on excellent terms with the Church, and Anselm supported him with all his influence when Robert actually asserted his rights; but when the danger was over, the strife between Church and State began again. In 1103, Henry appointed four bishops, and required Anselm to consecrate them, but as they all had received the staff and ring from the King, and paid homage for their lands, he considered that he could not do so, conformably with the decree of the Lateran Council against lay investiture. Henry was much displeased, and ordered the Archbishop of York to consecrate them; but two of them, convinced by Anselm, returned the staff and ring, and would not be consecrated by any one but their true primate.

Henry said that one archbishop must consecrate all or none, and the whole Church was in confusion. Anselm, though now very old, offered to go and consult the Pope, Paschal II., and the King consented; but when Paschal decided that lay investiture was unlawful, Henry was so much displeased that he forbade the archbishop to return to England.

The old man returned to his former Abbey of Bec, and thus remained in exile till 1107, when a general adjustment of the whole question took place. The bishops were to take from the altar the ring and staff, emblems of spiritual power, and to pay homage to the king for their temporal possessions. The election was to belong to the cathedral clergy, subject to the King’s approval. The usual course became that the King should send to the chapter a congé d’élire, that is, permission to elect, but accompanied by a recommendation of some particular person; and this nominee of the crown was so constantly chosen, that the custom of sending a congé d’élire has become only a form, which, however, is an assertion of the rights of the Church.

A similar arrangement with regard to the presentation of bishops was accepted in 1122 by Henry V. of Germany, who married Matilda, the daughter of Henry I.

After the arrangement in 1107, Anselm returned to England, and good Queen Maude came to meet him and show him every honor. His last year was spent at Canterbury, in a state of weakness and infirmity, terminated by his death on the 21st of April, 1109.

A gentle, studious man was the pious Anselm, our second Italian archbishop, thrust into the rude combat of the world against his will, and maintaining his cause and the cause of the Church with untiring meekness and quiet resolution.

CAMEO XIII. THE FIRST CRUSADE. (1095-1100.)

King of England.

William II.

King of France.

Philippe II.

Emperor of Germany.

Heinrich IV.

Pope.

Urban II.

In the November of 1095 was seen such a sight as the world never afforded before nor since. The great plain of La Limagne, in Auvergne, shut in by lofty volcanic mountains of every fantastic and rugged form, with the mighty Puy de Dome rising royally above them, was scattered from one boundary to the other with white tents, and each little village was crowded with visitants. The town of Clermont, standing on an elevation commanding the whole extent of the plain, was filled to overflowing, and contained a guest before whom all bowed in reverence—the Pope himself—Urban II., whom the nations of the West were taught to call the Father of Christendom. Four hundred Bishops and Abbots had met him there, other clergy to the amount of 4,000, and princes, nobles, knights, and peasants, in numbers estimated at 30,000. Every one’s eye was, however, chiefly turned on a spare and sunburnt man, of small stature, and rude, mean appearance, wearing a plain, dark serge garment, girt by a cord round his waist, his head and feet bare, and a crucifix in his hand. All looked on his austere face with the veneration they would have shown to a saint, and with the curiosity with which those are regarded who have dared many strange perils. He was Peter the Hermit, of Picardy, who had travelled on pilgrimage to Jerusalem; had there witnessed the dreadful profanities of the infidels, and the sufferings they inflicted on the faithful; had conversed with the venerable Patriarch Simeon; nay, it was said, while worshipping at the Holy Sepulchre, had heard a voice calling on him to summon the nations to the rescue of these holy spots. It was the tenth day of the council at Clermont, and in spite of the severe cold, the clergy assembled in the open air on the wide space in front of the dark stone cathedral, then, as now, unfinished. There was need that all should hear, and no building could contain the multitudes gathered at their summons. A lofty seat had been raised for the Pope, and Peter the Hermit stood by his side.

All was silence as the Hermit stood forth, and, crucifix in hand, poured forth his description of the blasphemy of the infidels, the desolation of the sacred places, and the misery of the Christians. He had seen the very ministers of God insulted, beaten, even put to, death: he had seen sacrilege, profanation, cruelty; and as he described them, his voice became stifle, and his eyes streamed with tears.

When he ceased, Urban arose, and strengthened each word he had spoken, till the whole assembly were weeping bitterly. “Yes, brethren,” said the Pope, “let us weep for our sins, which have provoked the anger of heaven; let us weep for the captivity of Zion. But woe to us if our barren pity leaves the inheritance of the Lord any longer in the hands of his foes.”

Then he called on them to take up arms for the deliverance of the Holy Land. “If you live,” said he, “you will possess the kingdoms of the East; if you die, you will be owned in heaven as the soldiers of the Lord; Let no love of home detain you; behold only the shame and sufferings of the Christians, hear only the groans of Jerusalem, and remember that the Lord has said, ‘He that loveth his father or mother more than Me is not worthy of Me. Whoso shall leave house, or father, or mother, or wife, or children, and all that he has, for My sake, shall receive an hundredfold, and in the world to come eternal life.’”

“Deus vult; Deus vult;”—It is God’s will—broke as with one voice from the assembly, echoing from the hills around, and pealing with a voice like thunder.

“Yes, it is God’s will,” again spoke Urban, “Let these words be your war-cry, and keep you ever in mind that the Lord of Hosts is with you.” Then holding on high the Cross—“Our Lord himself presents you His own Cross, the sign raised aloft to gather the dispersed of Israel. Bear it on your shoulders and your breast; let it shine on your weapons and your standards. It will be the pledge of victory or the palm of martyrdom, and remind you, that, as your Saviour died for you, so you ought to die for Him.” Outcries of different kinds broke out, but all were for the holy war. Adhemar de Monteil, Bishop of Puy, a neighboring See, first asked for the Cross, and thousands pressed after him, till the numbers of Crosses failed that had been provided, and the cardinals and other principal persons tore up their robes to furnish more.

The crusading spirit spread like circles from a stone thrown into the water, as the clergy of the council carried their own excitement to their homes, and the hosts who took the Cross were beyond all reckoning. On the right or wrong of the Crusades, it is useless as well as impossible to attempt to decide. It was doubtless a spirit of religion, and not of self-interest, that prompted them; they were positively the best way of checking the progress of Mahometanism and the incursions of its professors, and they were undertaken with far purer intentions than those with which they were carried on. That they afterward turned to great wickedness, is not to be denied; some of the degenerate Crusaders of the latter days were among the wickedest of mankind, and the misuse of the influence they gave the Popes became a source of some of the worst practices of the Papacy. Already Pope Urban was taking on him to declare that a man who perished in the Crusade was sure of salvation, and his doctrine was still further perverted and falsified till it occasioned endless evils.

Yet, in these early days, joined with many a germ of evil, was a grandeur of thought, a self-devotion, and truly religious spirit, which will hardly allow us to call the first Crusade other than a glorious and a Holy War.

It was time, politically speaking, to carry the war into the enemy’s quarters, and repress the second wave of Mahometan conquest. Islam [Footnote: Islam, meaning “the faith;” it is a barbarism to speak of the faith of Islam.] has often been called the religion of the sword, and Mahomet and his Arabic successors, under the first impulse, conquered Syria, Persia, Northern Africa, and Spain, and met their first check at Tours from Charles Martel. These, the Saracen Arabs, were a generous race, no persecutors, and almost friendly to the Christians, contenting themselves with placing them under restrictions, and exacting from them a small tribute. After the first great overflow, the tide had somewhat ebbed, and though a brave and cultivated people, they were everywhere somewhat giving way on their orders before the steady resistance of the Christians. Probably, if they had continued in Palestine, there would have been no Crusades.

But some little time before the eleventh century, a second flood began to rush from the East. A tribe of Tartars, called Turcomans, or Turks, embraced Mahometanism, and its precepts of aggression, joining with the warrior-spirit of the Tartar, impelled them forward.

They subdued and slaughtered the Saracens of Syria, made wide conquests in Asia Minor, winning towns of the Greek Empire beyond where the Saracens had ever penetrated, and began to threaten the borders of Christendom. They were very different masters from the Arabs. Active in body, but sluggish in mind, ignorant and cruel, they destroyed and overthrew what the Saracens had spared, disregarded law, and capriciously ill-treated and slaughtered their Christian subjects and the pilgrims who fell into their hands. It was against these savage Turks that the first Crusade was directed.

Peter the Hermit soon gathered together a confused multitude of peasants, women, and children, with whom he set out, together with a German knight named Walter, and called by his countrymen by the expressive name Habe Nichts, translated into French, Sans avoir, and less happily rendered in English, The Penniless. They were a poor, ignorant, half-armed set, who so little knew what they were undertaking, that at every town they came to they would ask if that was Jerusalem. Peter must either have been beyond measure thoughtless, or have expected a miracle to help him, for he set out to lead these poor creatures the whole length of Europe without provisions. They marauded on the inhabitants of the countries through which they passed; the inhabitants revenged themselves and killed them, and the whole wretched host were cut off, chiefly in Hungary and Bulgaria, and Peter himself seems to have been the only man who escaped.

A better-appointed army, consisting of the very flower of chivalry of Europe, had in the meantime assembled to follow the same path, though in a different manner.

First in name and honor was Godfrey de Bouillon, Duke of Lorraine, one of the most noble characters whom history records. He was pure in life, devotedly pious, merciful, gentle, and a perfect observer of his word, at the same time that his talents and wisdom were very considerable; he was a finished warrior, expert in every exercise of chivalry, of gigantic strength, and highly renowned as a leader. He had been loyal to the Emperor Henry IV. through the war which had taken place in consequence of his excommunication by Gregory VII. He had killed in battle the rebellious competitor for the imperial crown, who, when dying from a wound by which he had lost his right hand, exclaimed, “With this hand I swore fealty to Henry; cursed be they who led me to break my oath.” Godfrey had likewise been the first to scale the walls of Rome, when Henry IV. besieged Gregory there; but he, in common with many others of the besieging force, soon after suffered severely from malaria fever—the surest way in which modern Rome chastises her invaders; and thinking his illness a judgment for having taken part against the Pope, he vowed to make a pilgrimage to Jerusalem. Soon after, the Crusade was preached, and Godfrey was glad to fulfil his vow with his good sword in his hand, while Pope and princes wisely agreed that such a chieftain was the best they could choose for their expedition.

Many another great name was there: Raymond, the wise Count of Toulouse; the crafty Boemond, one of the Normans of Sicily; his gallant cousin, Tancred, a mirror of chivalry, the Achilles of the Crusade; but our limits will only allow us to dwell on those through whom the Crusade is connected with English history.

The Anglo-Normans had not been so forward in the Crusade as their enterprising nature would have rendered probable, but the fact was, that, with such a master as William Rufus, no one felt that he could leave his home in anything like security. Helie de la Flèche, Count de Maine, [Footnote: Robert of Normandy had been betrothed in his childhood to the heiress of Maine, but she died before she was old enough for the marriage to take place. In right of this intended marriage, the Norman Kings claimed Maine, though Helie was the next heir.] took the Cross, and asked William for some guarantee that his lands should not be molested. “You may go where you like,” said William; “I mean to have your city. What my father had, I will have.”

“It is mine by right,” said Helie; “I will plead it with you.”

“I will plead, too.” said William; “but my lawyers will be spears and arrows.”

“I have taken the Cross; my land is under Christ’s own protection.”

“I only warn you,” said William, “that if you go, I shall pay the good town of Mans a visit, with a thousand lances at my heel.”

So Helie stayed at home, and in two years’ time was made a prisoner when in a wood with only seven knights. Mans was seized, and he was brought before the King. “I have you now, my master,” said William.

“By chance,” said Helie; “but if I were free, I know what I would do.”

“What would you do, you knave?” said William. “Hence, go, fly, I give you leave to do all you can; and if you catch me, I ask nothing in return.”

Helie was set at liberty, and the next year, while William was absent in England, managed to retake Mans. The Red King was hunting in the New Forest when he heard the tidings; he turned his horse’s head and galloped away, as his father had once done, with the words, “He who loves me, will follow.” He threw himself into a ship, and ordered the sails to be set, though the wind was so boisterous that the sailors begged him to wait. “Fools,” he said, “did you ever hear of a drowned king?” He cruelly ravaged Maine, but could not take the city, and, having been slightly wounded, returned to meet his fate in the New Forest.

After this story, no one could wonder that it required a great deal of enthusiasm to persuade a man to leave his inheritance exposed to the grasp of the Red King, who, unlike other princes, set at nought the anathemas by which the Pope guarded the lands of absent Crusaders. Stephen, Count de Blois, the husband of William’s sister Adela, took the Cross. He was wise in counsel, and learned, and a letter which he wrote to his wife is one of the chief authorities for the early part of the expedition; but his health was delicate, and it was also said that his personal courage was not unimpeachable; at any rate, he soon returned home.

One of the foremost of the Crusaders was, however, our own Norman Prince, Robert Courtheuse. Every one knows the deep stain of disobedience on Robert’s early life; and yet so superior was he to his brothers in every point of character, that it is impossible not to regard him with a sort of affection, though the motto of his whole career might be, “Unstable as water, thou shalt not excel.”

Never was man more completely the tool of every villain who gained his ready ear. It was the whisper of evil counsellors that fired his jealousy of his young brothers, and drove him into rebellion against his father; the evil counsel of William led him to persecute Henry, loving him all the time: and when in possession of his dukedom, his careless, profuse habits kept him in constant poverty, while his idle good-nature left unpunished the enormities of the barons who made his country miserable.

But in generosity he never failed; he heartily loved his brothers, while duped and injured by them again and again; he always meant to be true and faithful, and never failed, except from hastiness and weakness; and while William was infidel, and Henry hypocritical, he was devout and sincere in faith, though miserably defective in practice.

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