The Witana-gemot was assembled in the great hall of Westminster in all
its imperial pomp.
It was on his throne that the King sate now--and it was the sword that
was in his right hand. Some seated below, and some standing beside,
the throne, were the officers of the Basileus [84] of Britain. There
were to be seen camararius and pincerna, chamberlain and cupbearer;
disc thegn and hors thegn [85]; the thegn of the dishes, and the thegn
of the stud; with many more, whose state offices may not impossibly
have been borrowed from the ceremonial pomp of the Byzantine court;
for Edgar, King of England, had in the old time styled himself the
Heir of Constantine. Next to these sat the clerks of the chapel, with
the King's confessor at their head. Officers were they of higher note
than their name bespeaks, and wielders, in the trust of the Great
Seal, of a power unknown of old, and now obnoxious to the Saxon. For
tedious is the suit which lingers for the king's writ and the king's
seal; and from those clerks shall arise hereafter a thing of torture
and of might, which shall grind out the hearts of men, and be called
CHANCERY! [86]
Below the scribes, a space was left on the floor, and farther down sat
the chiefs of the Witan. Of these, first in order, both from their
spiritual rank and their vast temporal possessions, sat the lords of
the Church; the chairs of the prelates of London and Canterbury were
void. But still goodly was the array of Saxon mitres, with the harsh,
hungry, but intelligent face of Stigand,--Stigand the stout and the
covetous; and the benign but firm features of Alred, true priest and
true patriot, distinguished amidst all. Around each prelate, as stars
round a sun, were his own special priestly retainers, selected from
his diocese. Farther still down the hall are the great civil lords
and viceking vassals of the "Lord-Paramount." Vacant the chair of the
King of the Scots, for Siward hath not yet had his wish; Macbeth is in
his fastnesses, or listening to the weird sisters in the wold; and
Malcolm is a fugitive in the halls of the Northumbrian earl. Vacant
the chair of the hero Gryffyth, son of Llewelyn, the dread of the
marches, Prince of Gwyned, whose arms had subjugated all Cymry. But
there are the lesser sub-kings of Wales, true to the immemorial
schisms amongst themselves, which destroyed the realm of Ambrosius,
and rendered vain the arm of Arthur. With their torques of gold, and
wild eyes, and hair cut round ears and brow [87], they stare on the
scene.
On the same bench with these sub-kings, distinguished from them by
height of stature, and calm collectedness of mien, no less than by
their caps of maintenance and furred robes, are those props of strong
thrones and terrors of weak--the earls to whom shires and counties
fall, as hyde and carricate to the lesser thegns. But three of these
were then present, and all three the foes of Godwin,--Siward, Earl of
Northumbria; Leofric of Mercia (that Leofric whose wife Godiva yet
lives in ballad and song); and Rolf, Earl of Hereford and
Worcestershire, who, strong in his claim of "king's blood," left not
the court with his Norman friends. And on the same benches, though a
little apart, are the lesser earls, and that higher order of thegns,
called king's thegns.
Not far from these sat the chosen citizens from the free burgh of
London, already of great weight in the senate [88],--sufficing often
to turn its counsels; all friends were they of the English Earl and
his house. In the same division of the hall were found the bulk and
true popular part of the meeting--popular indeed--as representing not
the people, but the things the people most prized-valour and wealth;
the thegn landowners, called in the old deeds the "Ministers:" they
sate with swords by their side, all of varying birth, fortune, and
connection, whether with king, earl, or ceorl. For in the different
districts of the old Heptarchy, the qualification varied; high in East
Anglia, low in Wessex; so that what was wealth in the one shire was
poverty in the other. There sate, half a yeoman, the Saxon thegn of
Berkshire or Dorset, proud of his five hydes of land; there, half an
ealderman, the Danish thegn of Norfolk or Ely, discontented with his
forty; some were there in right of smaller offices under the crown;
some traders, and sons of traders, for having crossed the high seas
three times at their own risk; some could boast the blood of Offa and
Egbert; and some traced but three generations back to neatherd and
ploughman; and some were Saxons and some were Danes: and some from the
western shires were by origin Britons, though little cognisant of
their race. Farther down still, at the extreme end of the hall,
crowding by the open doors, filling up the space without, were the
ceorls themselves, a vast and not powerless body; in these high courts
(distinct from the shire gemots, or local senates)--never called upon
to vote or to speak or to act, or even to sign names to the doom, but
only to shout "Yea, yea," when the proceres pronounced their sentence.
Yet not powerless were they, but rather to the Witan what public
opinion is to the Witan's successor, our modern parliament: they were
opinion! And according to their numbers and their sentiments, easily
known and boldly murmured, often and often must that august court of
basileus and prelate, vassal-king and mighty earl, have shaped the
council and adjudged the doom.
And the forms of the meeting had been duly said and done; and the King
had spoken words no doubt wary and peaceful, gracious and exhortatory;
but those words--for his voice that day was weak--travelled not beyond
the small circle of his clerks and his officers; and a murmur buzzed
through the hall, when Earl Godwin stood on the floor with his six
sons at his back; and you might have heard the hum of the gnat that
vexed the smooth cheek of Earl Rolf, or the click of the spider from
the web on the vaulted roof, the moment before Earl Godwin spoke.
"If," said he, with the modest look and downcast eye of practised
eloquence, "If I rejoice once more to breathe the air of England, in
whose service, often perhaps with faulty deeds, but at all times with
honest thoughts, I have, both in war and council, devoted so much of
my life that little now remains--but (should you, my king, and you,
prelates, proceres, and ministers so vouchsafe) to look round and
select that spot of my native soil which shall receive my bones;--if I
rejoice to stand once more in that assembly which has often listened
to my voice when our common country was in peril, who here will blame
that joy? Who among my foes, if foes now I have, will not respect the
old man's gladness? Who amongst you, earls and thegns, would not
grieve, if his duty bade him say to the grey-haired exile, 'In this
English air you shall not breathe your last sigh--on this English soil
you shall not find a grave!' Who amongst you would not grieve to say
it?" (Suddenly he drew up his head and faced his audience.) "Who
amongst you hath the courage and the heart to say it? Yes, I rejoice
that I am at last in an assembly fit to judge my cause, and pronounce
my innocence. For what offence was I outlawed? For what offence were
I, and the six sons I have given to my land, to bear the wolf's
penalty, and be chased and slain as the wild beasts? Hear me, and
answer!"
"Eustace, Count of Boulogne, returning to his domains from a visit to
our lord the King, entered the town of Dover in mail and on his war
steed; his train did the same. Unknowing our laws and customs (for I
desire to press light upon all old grievances, and will impute ill
designs to none) these foreigners invade by force the private
dwellings of citizens, and there select their quarters. Ye all know
that this was the strongest violation of Saxon right; ye know that the
meanest ceorl hath the proverb on his lip, 'Every man's house is his
castle.' One of the townsmen acting on this belief,--which I have yet
to learn was a false one,--expelled from his threshold a retainer of
the French Earl's. The stranger drew his sword and wounded him; blows
followed--the stranger fell by the arm he had provoked. The news
arrives to Earl Eustace; he and his kinsmen spur to the spot; they
murder the Englishman on his hearth-stone.--"
Here a groan, half-stifled and wrathful, broke from the ceorls at the
end of the hall. Godwin held up his hand in rebuke of the
interruption, and resumed.
"This deed done, the outlanders rode through the streets with their
drawn swords; they. butchered those who came in their way; they
trampled even children under their horses' feet. The burghers armed.
I thank the Divine Father, who gave me for my countrymen those gallant
burghers! They fought, as we English know how to fight; they slew
some nineteen or score of these mailed intruders; they chased them
from the town. Earl Eustace fled fast. Earl Eustace, we know, is a
wise man: small rest took he, little bread broke he, till he pulled
rein at the gate of Gloucester, where my lord the King then held
court. He made his complaint. My lord the King, naturally hearing
but one side, thought the burghers in the wrong; and, scandalised that
such high persons of his own kith should be so aggrieved, he sent for
me, in whose government the burgh of Dover is, and bade me chastise,
by military execution, those who had attacked the foreign Count. I
appeal to the great Earls whom I see before me--to you, illustrious
Leofric; to you, renowned Siward--what value would ye set on your
earldoms, if ye had not the heart and the power to see right done to
the dwellers therein?"
"What was the course I proposed? Instead of martial execution, which
would involve the whole burgh in one sentence, I submitted that the
reeve and gerefas of the burgh should be cited to appear before the
King, and account for the broil. My lord, though ever most clement
and loving to his good people, either unhappily moved against me, or
overswayed by the foreigners, was counselled to reject this mode of
doing justice, which our laws, as settled under Edgar and Canute,
enjoin. And because I would not,--and I say in the presence of all,
because I, Godwin, son of Wolnoth, durst not, if I would, have entered
the free burgh of Dover with mail on my back and the doomsman at my
right hand, these outlanders induced my lord the King to summon me to
attend in person (as for a sin of my own) the council of the Witan,
convened at Gloucester, then filled with the foreigners, not, as I
humbly opined, to do justice to me and my folk of Dover, but to secure
to this Count of Boulogne a triumph over English liberties, and
sanction his scorn for the value of English lives."
"I hesitated, and was menaced with outlawry; I armed in self-defence,
and in defence of the laws of England; I armed, that men might not be
murdered on their hearth-stones, nor children trampled under the hoofs
of a stranger's war-steed. My lord the King gathered his troops round
'the cross and the martlets.' Yon noble earls, Siward and Leofric,
came to that standard, as (knowing not then my cause) was their duty
to the Basileus of Britain. But when they knew my cause, and saw with
me the dwellers of the land, against me the outland aliens, they
righteously interposed. An armistice was concluded; I agreed to refer
all matters to a Witan held where it is held this day. My troops were
disbanded; but the foreigners induced my lord not only to retain his
own, but to issue his Herr-bann for the gathering of hosts far and
near, even allies beyond the seas. When I looked to London for the
peaceful Witan, what saw I? The largest armament that had been
collected in this reign--that armament headed by Norman knights. Was
this the meeting where justice could be done mine and me?
Nevertheless, what was my offer? That I and my six sons would attend,
provided the usual sureties, agreeable to our laws, from which only
thieves [89] are excluded, were given that we should come and go life-
free and safe. Twice this offer was made, twice refused; and so I and
my sons were banished. We went;--we have returned!"
"And in arms," murmured Earl Rolf, son-in-law to that Count Eustace of
Boulogne, whose violence had been temperately and truly narrated. [90]
"And in arms," repeated Godwin: "true; in arms against the foreigners
who had thus poisoned the ear of our gracious King; in arms, Earl
Rolf; and at the first clash of those arms, Franks and foreigners have
fled. We have no need of arms now. We are amongst our countrymen,
and no Frenchman interposes between us and the ever gentle; ever
generous nature of our born King."
"Peers and proceres, chiefs of this Witan, perhaps the largest ever
yet assembled in man's memory, it is for you to decide whether I and
mine, or the foreign fugitives, caused the dissensions in these
realms; whether our banishment was just or not; whether in our return
we have abused the power we possessed. Ministers, on those swords by
your sides there is not one drop of blood! At all events, in
submitting to you our fate, we submit to our own laws and our own
race. I am here to clear myself, on my oath, of deed and thought of
treason. There are amongst my peers as king's thegns, those who will
attest the same on my behalf, and prove the facts I have stated, if
they are not sufficiently notorious. As for my sons, no crime can be
alleged against them, unless it be a crime to have in their veins that
blood which flows in mine--blood which they have learned from me to
shed in defence of that beloved land to which they now ask to be
recalled."
The Earl ceased and receded behind his children, having artfully, by
his very abstinence from the more heated eloquence imputed to him
often as a fault and a wile, produced a powerful effect upon an
audience already prepared for his acquittal.
But now as, from the sons, Sweyn the eldest stepped forth; with a
wandering eye and uncertain foot, there was a movement like a shudder
amongst the large majority of the audience, and a murmur of hate or of
horror.
The young Earl marked the sensation his presence produced, and stopped
short. His breath came thick; he raised his right hand, but spoke
not. His voice died on his lips; his eyes roved wildly round with a
haggard stare more imploring than defying. Then rose, in his
episcopal stole, Alred the bishop, and his clear sweet voice trembled
as he spoke.
"Comes Sweyn, son of Godwin, here to prove his innocence of treason
against the King?--if so, let him hold his peace; for if the Witan
acquit Godwin, son of Wolnoth, of that charge, the acquittal includes
his House. But in the name of the holy Church here represented by its
fathers, will Sweyn say, and fasten his word by oath, that he is
guiltless of treason to the King of Kings--guiltless of sacrilege that
my lips shrink to name? Alas, that the duty falls on me,--for I loved
thee once, and love thy kindred now. But I am God's servant before
all things"--the prelate paused, and gathering up new energy, added in
unfaltering accents, "I charge thee here, Sweyn the outlaw, that,
moved by the fiend, thou didst bear off from God's house and violate a
daughter of the Church--Algive, Abbess of Leominster!"
"And I," cried Siward, rising to the full height of his stature, "I,
in the presence of these proceres, whose proudest title is milites or
warriors--I charge Sweyn, son of Godwin, that, not in open field and
hand to hand, but by felony and guile, he wrought the foul and
abhorrent murder of his cousin, Beorn the Earl!"
At these two charges from men so eminent, the effect upon the audience
was startling. While those not influenced by Godwin raised their
eyes, sparkling with wrath and scorn, upon the wasted, yet still noble
face of the eldest born, even those most zealous on behalf of that
popular House evinced no sympathy for its heir. Some looked down
abashed and mournful--some regarded the accused with a cold, unpitying
gaze. Only perhaps among the ceorls, at the end of the hall, might be
seen some compassion on anxious faces; for before those deeds of crime
had been bruited abroad, none among the sons of Godwin more blithe of
mien and bold of hand, more honoured and beloved, than Sweyn the
outlaw. But the hush that succeeded the charges was appalling in its
depth. Godwin himself shaded his face with his mantle, and only those
close by could see that his breast heaved and his limbs trembled. The
brothers had shrunk from the side of the accused, outlawed even
amongst his kin--all save Harold, who, strong in his blameless name
and beloved repute, advanced three strides, amidst the silence, and,
standing by his brother's side, lifted his commanding brow above the
seated judges, but he did not speak.
Then said Sweyn the Earl, strengthened by such solitary companionship
in that hostile assemblage,--"I might answer that for these charges in
the past, for deeds alleged as done eight long years ago, I have the
King's grace, and the inlaw's right; and that in the Witans over which
I as earl presided, no man was twice judged for the same offence.
That I hold to be the law, in the great councils as the small."
"It is! it is!" exclaimed Godwin: his paternal feelings conquering his
prudence and his decorous dignity. "Hold to it, my son!"
"I hold to it not," resumed the young earl, casting a haughty glance
over the somewhat blank and disappointed faces of his foes, "for my
law is here"--and he smote his heart--"and that condemns me not once
alone, but evermore! Alred, O holy father, at whose knees I once
confessed my every sin,--I blame thee not that thou first, in the
Witan, liftest thy voice against me, though thou knowest that I loved
Algive from youth upward; she, with her heart yet mine, was given in
the last year of Hardicanute, when might was right, to the Church. I
met her again, flushed with my victories over the Walloon kings, with
power in my hand and passion in my veins. Deadly was my sin!--But
what asked I? that vows compelled should be annulled; that the love of
my youth might yet be the wife of my manhood. Pardon, that I knew not
then how eternal are the bonds ye of the Church have woven round those
of whom, if ye fail of saints, ye may at least make martyrs!"
He paused, and his lip curled, and his eye shot wild fire; for in that
moment his mother's blood was high within him, and he looked and
thought, perhaps, as some heathen Dane, but the flash of the firmer
man was momentary, and humbly smiting his breast, he murmured,--
"Avaunt, Satan!--yea, deadly was my sin! And the sin was mine alone;
Algive, if stained, was blameless; she escaped--and--and died!"
"The King was wroth; and first to strive against my pardon was Harold
my brother, who now alone in my penitence stands by my side: he strove
manfully and openly; I blamed him not: but Beorn, my cousin, desired
my earldom; and he strove against me, wilily and in secret,--to my
face kind, behind my back despiteful. I detected his falsehood, and
meant to detain, but not to slay him. He lay bound in my ship; he
reviled and he taunted me in the hour of my gloom; and when the blood
of the sea-kings flowed in fire through my veins. And I lifted my axe
in ire; and my men lifted theirs, and so,--and so!--Again I say--
Deadly was my sin! Think not that I seek now to make less my guilt,
as I sought when I deemed that life was yet long, and power was yet
sweet. Since then I have known worldly evil, and worldly good,--the
storm and the shine of life; I have swept the seas, a sea-king; I have
battled with the Dane in his native land; I have almost grasped in my
right hand, as I grasped in my dreams, the crown of my kinsman,
Canute;--again, I have been a fugitive and an exile;--again, I have
been inlawed, and Earl of all the lands from Isis to the Wye [91].
And whether in state or in penury,--whether in war or in peace, I have
seen the pale face of the nun betrayed, and the gory wounds of the
murdered man. Wherefore I come not here to plead for a pardon, which
would console me not, but formally to dissever my kinsmen's cause from
mine, which alone sullies and degrades it;--I come here to say, that,
coveting not your acquittal, fearing not your judgment, I pronounce
mine own doom. Cap of noble, and axe of warrior, I lay aside for
ever; barefooted, and alone, I go hence to the Holy Sepulchre; there
to assoil my soul, and implore that grace which cannot come from man!
Harold, step forth in the place of Sweyn the first-born! And ye
prelates and peers, milites and ministers, proceed to adjudge the
living! To you, and to England, he who now quits you is the dead!"
He gathered his robe of state over his breast as a monk his gown, and
looking neither to right nor to left, passed slowly down the hall,
through the crowd, which made way for him in awe and silence; and it
seemed to the assembly as if a cloud had gone from the face of day.
And Godwin still stood with his face covered by his robe.
And Harold anxiously watched the faces of the assembly, and saw no
relenting.
And Gurth crept to Harold's side.
And the gay Leofwine looked sad.
And the young Wolnoth turned pale and trembled.
And the fierce Tostig played with his golden chain.
And one low sob was heard, and it came from the breast of Alred the
meek accuser,--God's firm but gentle priest.