but for very short periods, so that in six years from the time of his death the short-lived Danish dynasty came to close in England in 1042.

QUESTIONS.-Who were the Danes? In what parts of England did they settle? Name some of their chief leaders. What was their character? Who were the Danish kings of England?

THE NORMAN CONQUEST.

THE royal line of Alfred was restored to England for the space of twenty-four years in the person of Edward the Confessor-a prince more fitted for a convent than a throne. He married the daughter of Godwin, the powerful Earl of Kent, who, with his six sons as champions of the English cause, possessed great influence.

It must be remembered that Edward, before he was ten years old, had been taken to Normandy that he might be safe from the Danes. There during twenty-seven years his character had matured, and received impressions that would last through life; and when in his manhood he unwillingly assumed the crown of England, his heart was still in the land of his adoption. The number of Normans he invited over, bestowing on them estates and offices in the Church, and the preference he showed for their manners and language, were very sore points with his own subjects. Even while he lived, those Norman castles, which Englishmen hated and feared. were rising in the country.

And who were these Normans? Another branch of that irrepressible Teutonic race which has spread far and wide over the habitable earth. While some of them had been busy in securing England, others had turned their attention to France, where early in the tenth century the reigning monarch tried to stop their devastations by bestowing on the sea-king Rollo a large fief, to which these northmen gave the name of Normandy. Nearly a hundred years later, Ethelred II. of England, wedded Emma, sister to the Norman duke, and thus her son, Edward the Confessor, was cousin to William the Conqueror.

The kinship between Norman, Saxon, and Dane, was by this time lost sight of. As long as a common language that strong bond of union-was used by the Normans and their brethren in the north, the connection was in a measure kept up; but as the former gradually adopted the French language, old ties were weakened, and in England the Normans were looked upon as foreigners.

In spite of all drawbacks, however, Edward's reign had been one of unwonted peace and progress; but there were forebodings of trouble at his death, as he left no children. Edgar the Atheling, the representative of his house, was young, and having been brought up abroad, was almost unnoticed. William the Norman claimed the crown on the strength of a promise, which he said his cousin had once made to him; but Edward's sympathies had latterly been more true to his own people, and, when dying, he chose Earl Godwin's son Harold, who had been for some years his chief counsellor, and first in power in the realm, to be his successor. The fifth of January, 1066, which witnessed Edward's death, saw Harold elected king by the Witanagemot. The next day the Confessor was laid in his tomb in the newly-built and newly consecrated abbey, the West Minster; where too, before night fell, Harold was solemnly crowned.

William no sooner heard of Edward's death than he

made ready to invade England. His preparations were finished by September; and when, after weary waiting, the south wind blew, it bore his fleet across the channel to the coast of Sussex.

The news that the Normans had landed and were wasting the country, was brought to Harold at York. He had been obliged to march northwards to encounter the King of Norway, and his own faithless brother Tostig, whom he had defeated at the great battle of Stamford-bridge, three days before William disembarked near Pevensey.

At once, Harold hastily turned southward with a gallant following. The powerful Earls of Northumbria and Mercia answered but coldly to his call; but elsewhere brave men flocked to the standard of their king, and foremost were those of Kent and London. They knew what was at stake; they knew a day was coming which must decide whether or not England should pass into the hands of aliens.

Many courageous hearts felt misgivings; for Harold, several years before, when in William's power, had taken an oath binding himself in some way to support the duke. It is said that his brother Gurth implored him not to take part in the contest, and thus incur the guilt of perjury; but to let those fight whose consciences were clear. Harold, however, steadfastly refused to let others face a peril which he did not share.

The ancient ruins of the abbey of Battle now cover the spot where, on the memorable 14th of October, 1066, the first tremendous onslaught of the Normans was made on Harold's position at Senlac, a breezy hill on the Sussex downs, where he had unfurled his standard. There he stood with his two loyal brothers, Gurth and Leofwin, and the picked men of his army, who met the fierce attack firm as a solid wall.

We must not imagine this battle of Hastings to have been like one in modern times. There was then no gunpowder, no rapid firing of musketry, no deadly shells,

C

no thundering guns; but instead, broadswords, javelins, and lances, with showers of fatal Norman arrows cleaving the air, and the terrible English battle-axe ringing on coats of mail.

At first, Harold had the advantage, the enemy striving in vain to drive him from his strong position; but when some Norman soldiers feigned to flee, a body of English troops, forgetting the commands of their king, fell into the snare and rushed after them in headlong haste, thus weakening Harold's defence. William, taking advantage of their disordered ranks, renewed the attack, and turned the tide of victory. Still the furious fight went on, even when Harold and his brothers had all fallen beside their flag, and the best blood of England had been poured out like water round it; till night drew near, and in the gathering darkness, friend and foe could only be distinguished by their speech. Then at last the struggle was ended, and William the Norman had become William the Conqueror.

There was no one left under whom England could make a national resistance; and before this year of marvels closed, William was crowned in Westminster Abbey, with at least the appearance of an election. When the Norman soldiers outside heard the shouts of assent within, they thought that he was in danger, and immediately set fire to the neighbouring buildings. This caused great alarm to those in the abbey, and the whole assembly rushed out, leaving William and the bishops there alone. Even he trembled as the ceremony was completed, amid sounds of terror and tumult, and with the red flames lighting up the scene.

William began his reign well, and treated the English with moderation at first; but the usual results of conquest soon appeared. During his absence in Normandy, when his new subjects were smarting under the oppressive government of his half-brother Odo, and others of his nobles, a great effort was made to drive away the invaders, who had not yet taken possession of more than a fourth of the country.

William came back and put down a rising in the west, where the citizens of Exeter offered a manful resistance. It was in the district beyond the Humber, however, that the most strenuous opposition was offered to him. Both Scotland and Denmark promised help to the inhabitants, who inflicted a severe defeat on the Normans at Durham,- -a defeat which the Conqueror cruelly avenged by turning the fruitful land into a desert, and the peopled villages into lifeless ruins. If fire had fallen from heaven as of old upon the cities of the plain, the ruin could scarcely have been more complete. The ground was encumbered with the dead; many slain by the sword, more by famine and pestilence. Of the survivors, some sold themselves into slavery, that they might have food. Others took refuge in the great forests of Yorkshire; others again emigrated to Wales, Scotland, and Scandinavia, while a few sailed to Constantinople, and enrolled themselves among the troops of the Emperor of the East.

Yet these horrors did not prevent further struggles for freedom. In the fen country the valiant Hereward held the Normans at bay for years. William's conquest was indeed neither a rapid nor an easy one. It was seven years from the date of his first victory before he could say that England was subdued. He triumphed at last over all obstacles, but it was a dear-bought and hard-won success.

QUESTIONS.-Who were the Normans? Account for Edward's partiality for them. Who succeeded Edward? On what grounds did William of Normandy claim the crown? How did he enforce his claims? Give an account of the battle of Hastings. What were the results of the battle? What further resistance was offered to the Conqueror? Name some of the results of the Norman Conquest.