Danes, Saxons and Normans Part 24

This disputation, like most disputations of the kind, came to nought, and Rufus was not called upon to redeem his pledge of becoming a convert. He did, however, contrive to turn the conversion of others to account. When a Jew happened to be brought to a knowledge of the truth, Rufus was quite ready, on certain terms, to lay his commands on the convert to return to Judaism. In this way, which ill became the king of a Christian people, he obtained considerable sums of money.

On one occasion a wealthy old Jew, whose son had seen the error of his ways, and embraced Christianity, appeared at the king's court, told his tale of woe, and entreated a.s.sistance.

"I am sore troubled," said the Hebrew; "I am bowed down with grief. O king," he continued, presenting Rufus with sixty marks, "command my son to return to the faith of his fathers."

"Ay," said Rufus, clutching the money; "bring your son to me, and I will bring him to reason."

The old Jew retired, and soon after returned with his son. The young Israelite, however, was unabashed as he entered the Red King's presence, conscious of the goodness of his cause.

"Young man," said Rufus, by way of settling the business in as few words as possible, "I command you, without delay, to return to the religion of your nation."

"King," said the young Israelite, in a tone of mournful reproach, "I marvel that you can give such advice. Being a Christian, you ought to feel it your duty rather to persuade me to remain steadfast to Christianity."

"Dog!" stammered out Rufus, in a loud tone; "get out of my sight without delay, or it will be the worse for thee."

The convert went his way, and the old Jew remained, deeply mortified at the result of the royal mediation, for which he had paid so high a price. But even at that instant his intense love of gold, prevailing over all considerations of propriety, prompted an attempt to recover his sixty marks.

"Since, O king," he said, "you have not persuaded my son to return to his religion, it would be but fair to restore to me the gold I gave to that end."

"Nay," answered the king, with his usual oath; "I have taken trouble enough, and have done work enough, for the gold, and more. And yet I would like to show you how kindly I can deal. Therefore you shall have one-half of the sixty marks, and in conscience you cannot deny me the other."

[Ill.u.s.tration: Andiron.]

XLVIII.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Death of Malcolm Canmore, the Scottish King]

RUFUS AND THE SCOTS.

While William Rufus, having set honour and decency at defiance, was playing the part of a tyrant and oppressor in England, he ever and anon gave indications, not to be mistaken, of a desire to play the part of a usurper in Normandy.

Repairing to the Continent, with some idea of taking possession of his brother's duchy, Rufus expelled from Normandy the unfortunate heir of the Saxon kings, who had returned from Apulia. Homeless and well-nigh desperate, Edgar Atheling once more sought refuge in Scotland; and Malcolm Canmore, irritated, perhaps, at the treatment with which his brother-in-law had met, resolved on making Rufus feel his enmity.

"Years since," said the King of Scots, "I was fain to recognise William the Norman as my liege lord; and I acknowledge Robert Curthose as the heir of William the Norman; but as for this Red King, I can only recognise him as a usurper, and he shall only know me as a foe."

Rufus was still in Normandy, when intelligence reached him that Malcolm, accompanied by the Atheling, had, in the month of May, 1091, crossed the frontier; and he was seriously alarmed at tidings of an invasion that might lead to important consequences. Under such circ.u.mstances he perceived the policy of going craftily to work; and, after patching up a peace with his brother Robert, prevailed on the Norman duke to attend him to England, and aid in bringing Malcolm to reason. It was in the autumn of 1091 when, with Curthose by his side, an army at his back, and a fleet at sea, Rufus moved northward to try conclusions with the royal Scot.

On hearing of the approach of the King of England, Malcolm fell back in some dismay. Nevertheless, Rufus was not quite in a position to congratulate himself on the success of his expedition. In fact, everything went wrong. The weather proved altogether unfavourable.

Before the close of September, the English fleet was destroyed by a storm; and, soon after Michaelmas, the army began to suffer so fearfully from cold and want, that there appeared little prospect of the enterprise having other than a disastrous termination.

While such was the state of affairs, Malcolm Canmore, turning to bay, sent a messenger to the English camp with expressions of friends.h.i.+p to Curthose, and of scornful defiance to Rufus. Curthose, however, with characteristic generosity, stood firmly by Rufus at this crisis.

Mounting his steed, he rode to the Scottish camp, had an interview with Edgar Atheling, persuaded the Saxon prince that, for all parties, peace was the wisest policy, and finally succeeded in negotiating a treaty between the two kings.

Rufus now deemed himself secured against Malcolm's hostility; and scarcely had Curthose rendered this service when the Norman duke began to experience the gross ingrat.i.tude of the Red King. In utter disgust, Curthose resolved forthwith to leave England, and, crossing the sea, he established himself at Rouen with the intention of securing himself against further hostility.

Meanwhile Rufus, while keeping his court at Gloucester, fell so sick, that physicians despaired of his life. Stretched on a bed of suffering, the Red King became extremely penitent and anxious to atone for his sins. While in this frame of mind, William invited Malcolm Canmore to come and settle all disputes. But ere the King of Scots reached Gloucester, Rufus was in a fair way of recovering, and in no mood to sacrifice either to justice or righteousness. Without even condescending to see Malcolm, he disdainfully ordered him to submit his disputes to his peers, the Anglo-Norman n.o.bles; and Malcolm--his blood boiling at the treatment with which he had met--returned home, vowing to make the Red King repent his insolence.

No sooner, accordingly, did Malcolm reach Scotland, than he a.s.sembled a great army, and marched towards England. Attended by his eldest son, Edward, he entered Northumberland, ravaged the country with fire and sword, advanced as far as Alnwick, invested the castle of Ivo de Vesci, and besieged that stronghold so closely that the garrison lost all hope.

It was the month of November, 1093--a Sunday, and the day of St.

Brice. The rain had fallen in torrents; the river Alne was in flood; and the garrison had given way to perplexity and despair. No chance of the siege being raised, or of escape by any other means, could be entertained; and the remembrance of the savage cruelty of the Scots under Malcolm, twenty years earlier, filled every heart with consternation. In this emergency, Hammond Morael, of Bamburgh, a soldier of courage and determination, undertook to deliver the garrison, or die in the attempt. Mounting a fleet steed, he issued from the castle, and, carrying the keys on the point of his spear, he rode towards the Scottish camp. On being challenged, he professed his willingness to surrender the keys of the fortress, but demanded permission to present them to the King of Scots in person. Malcolm, informed of Hammond's approach, immediately came forth; and Morael, spurring forward, pierced the Scottish king through the heart.

A loud cry arose as Malcolm fell, and the Scotch camp was in commotion. Hammond, however, had well calculated his danger and his chances of escape. Turning rein without the delay of an instant, he gave his horse the spur, galloped towards a wood, made for the Alne, then swollen with rain, and, das.h.i.+ng in at all hazards, escaped by swimming the river at a place long afterwards known as "Hammond's Ford."

While the Scots, amazed at the unexpected fall of their king, were in confusion, the soldiers forming the garrison of Alnwick availed themselves of the circ.u.mstance. Sallying, they made a fierce attack; and the Scots, put to the rout, either fell by the sword, or were drowned in attempting to pa.s.s the river. Among the warriors slain on this occasion was Malcolm's son Edward, a young prince of great promise.

The rout of the Scots was so sudden, and their dispersion so complete, that the victors, without opposition, took possession of Malcolm's body. But though left in the hands of the foe, the corpse was not denied a Christian's grave. Placed in a cart by the Northumbrians, it was conveyed to Tynemouth, and there laid, with funereal honours, in the priory of St. Oswin, a famous religious house, which Robert de Moubray had wrested from the monks of St. Cuthbert, and bestowed on the monks of St. Alban's.

In the meantime, news that Malcolm and his son had fallen at Alnwick reached the Scottish court, and overwhelmed Queen Margaret with grief.

Nothing seemed sufficient to console the royal lady for the loss she had sustained. Indeed, she is said to have prayed that she might not survive them, and to have expired within three days of the catastrophe which made her a widow.

The children of Malcolm Canmore and Margaret Atheling, when thus deprived of both parents, were in no enviable plight. The courtiers, being for the most part Normans and Saxons, were regarded and hated by the Scots as strangers or foreigners; and the only man capable of protecting the royal children was their uncle, Donald Bane. But that prince proved the reverse of generous. Instead of maintaining the interests of the eldest of his nephews, he resolved on availing himself of his nephew's nonage to seize the crown.

It was not difficult for Donald Bane to realize his aspirations. The prejudices of the Scots as to the laws of succession, and the claims of Magnus, King of Norway, were in his favour. Without scruple he gratified the patriotism of the Scots by declaring for the banishment of all Normans and Saxons; and at the same time he purchased the support of the Norwegian king by ceding to him the Western Isles.

Having thus strengthened his claims, Donald Bane mounted the Scottish throne.

When affairs reached this stage, the Normans and Saxons escaped from Scotland with all convenient speed. With Normans and Saxons to England went Edgar Atheling; and with Atheling, to the country over which his sires had reigned, went the children of Malcolm and Margaret, to seek refuge in the land of their maternal ancestors till the occurrence of events calculated to lead to their restoration to home and country.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Tynemouth.]

XLIX.

[Ill.u.s.tration]

ROBERT DE MOUBRAY

About the spring of 1095, William Rufus was menaced with ruin. It was Robert de Moubray, Earl of Northumberland--a man who possessed two hundred and eighty manors--whose influence the Red King now had to dread.

Not without bitter grumbling had the Norman barons. .h.i.therto submitted to the law by which the Norman king retained the exclusive right of hunting in the forests of England. Nevertheless, this privilege was maintained by Rufus as vigorously as ever it had been by the mighty Conqueror. The Saxons contemptuously called him "The Wild Beast Herd,"

while the Normans conspired to take off his crown, and place it on the head of Stephen, Earl of Albemarle, son of the Conqueror's sister. At the head of this conspiracy, which included several of the highest Norman n.o.bles, Robert de Moubray n.o.bly placed himself.

Rufus was not altogether unaware of the conspiracy formed by the Anglo-Norman barons to overturn the throne. Indeed, Moubray drew suspicion on himself by failing to appear at court on the occasion of a great a.s.sembly of knights and barons at Easter. In order to bring matters to a crisis, Rufus issued a proclamation that, at the feast of Whitsuntide, every great landholder should attend, or be excluded from the public peace. Moubray, instead of presenting himself, sent Rufus a message, which sounded like a defiance.

"I will not attend," said the Norman earl, "unless the king sends me hostages, and a safe-conduct to protect me going and returning."

"By St. Luke's face!" cried Rufus, stammering with rage, "if he will not come to me, I will go to him!"

According to this threat, the Red King mustered an army and marched northward. Besieging the castle of Tynemouth, which was held by a garrison commanded by Moubray's brother, he, after two months, took that fortress, and then marched on to Bamburgh, where Moubray was spending his time in the company of a young woman of great beauty, whom he had recently married. But Rufus, discovering that Bamburgh was quite impregnable, erected near it a stronghold called Malvoisin, or "Ill Neighbour," and, placing therein a strong garrison to keep that of Bamburgh in check, returned southward with the bulk of his army.

Meanwhile Moubray had established communications with the garrison of Newcastle, and conceived the hope of making himself master of that stronghold. With this object, he one night set out from Bamburgh, attended by thirty horse; but, unfortunately for his scheme, he was observed by the garrison of Malvoisin, closely pursued, and forced to take refuge in the priory of Tynemouth. At that place, after being besieged and wounded in the leg, he was taken prisoner with his comrades.