ENGLAND UNDER WILLIAM THE SECOND, CALLED RUFUS
William the Red, in breathless haste, secured the three great forts of
Dover, Pevensey, and Hastings, and made with hot speed for Winchester,
where the Royal treasure was kept. The treasurer delivering him the
keys, he found that it amounted to sixty thousand pounds in silver,
besides gold and jewels. Possessed of this wealth, he soon persuaded
the Archbishop of Canterbury to crown him, and became William the
Second, King of England.
Rufus was no sooner on the throne, than he ordered into prison again
the unhappy state captives whom his father had set free, and directed a
goldsmith to ornament his father’s tomb profusely with gold and silver.
It would have been more dutiful in him to have attended the sick
Conqueror when he was dying; but England itself, like this Red King,
who once governed it, has sometimes made expensive tombs for dead men
whom it treated shabbily when they were alive.
The King’s brother, Robert of Normandy, seeming quite content to be
only Duke of that country; and the King’s other brother, Fine-Scholar,
being quiet enough with his five thousand pounds in a chest; the King
flattered himself, we may suppose, with the hope of an easy reign. But
easy reigns were difficult to have in those days. The turbulent Bishop
Odo (who had blessed the Norman army at the Battle of Hastings, and
who, I dare say, took all the credit of the victory to himself) soon
began, in concert with some powerful Norman nobles, to trouble the Red
King.
The truth seems to be that this bishop and his friends, who had lands
in England and lands in Normandy, wished to hold both under one
Sovereign; and greatly preferred a thoughtless good-natured person,
such as Robert was, to Rufus; who, though far from being an amiable man
in any respect, was keen, and not to be imposed upon. They declared in
Robert’s favour, and retired to their castles (those castles were very
troublesome to kings) in a sullen humour. The Red King, seeing the
Normans thus falling from him, revenged himself upon them by appealing
to the English; to whom he made a variety of promises, which he never
meant to perform—in particular, promises to soften the cruelty of the
Forest Laws; and who, in return, so aided him with their valour, that
Odo was besieged in the Castle of Rochester, and forced to abandon it,
and to depart from England for ever: whereupon the other rebellious
Norman nobles were soon reduced and scattered.
Then, the Red King went over to Normandy, where the people suffered
greatly under the loose rule of Duke Robert. The King’s object was to
seize upon the Duke’s dominions. This, the Duke, of course, prepared to
resist; and miserable war between the two brothers seemed inevitable,
when the powerful nobles on both sides, who had seen so much of war,
interfered to prevent it. A treaty was made. Each of the two brothers
agreed to give up something of his claims, and that the longer-liver of
the two should inherit all the dominions of the other. When they had
come to this loving understanding, they embraced and joined their
forces against Fine-Scholar; who had bought some territory of Robert
with a part of his five thousand pounds, and was considered a dangerous
individual in consequence.
St. Michael’s Mount, in Normandy (there is another St. Michael’s Mount,
in Cornwall, wonderfully like it), was then, as it is now, a strong
place perched upon the top of a high rock, around which, when the tide
is in, the sea flows, leaving no road to the mainland. In this place,
Fine-Scholar shut himself up with his soldiers, and here he was closely
besieged by his two brothers. At one time, when he was reduced to great
distress for want of water, the generous Robert not only permitted his
men to get water, but sent Fine-Scholar wine from his own table; and,
on being remonstrated with by the Red King, said ‘What! shall we let
our own brother die of thirst? Where shall we get another, when he is
gone?’ At another time, the Red King riding alone on the shore of the
bay, looking up at the Castle, was taken by two of Fine-Scholar’s men,
one of whom was about to kill him, when he cried out, ‘Hold, knave! I
am the King of England!’ The story says that the soldier raised him
from the ground respectfully and humbly, and that the King took him
into his service. The story may or may not be true; but at any rate it
is true that Fine-Scholar could not hold out against his united
brothers, and that he abandoned Mount St. Michael, and wandered
about—as poor and forlorn as other scholars have been sometimes known
to be.
The Scotch became unquiet in the Red King’s time, and were twice
defeated—the second time, with the loss of their King, Malcolm, and his
son. The Welsh became unquiet too. Against them, Rufus was less
successful; for they fought among their native mountains, and did great
execution on the King’s troops. Robert of Normandy became unquiet too;
and, complaining that his brother the King did not faithfully perform
his part of their agreement, took up arms, and obtained assistance from
the King of France, whom Rufus, in the end, bought off with vast sums
of money. England became unquiet too. Lord Mowbray, the powerful Earl
of Northumberland, headed a great conspiracy to depose the King, and to
place upon the throne, Stephen, the Conqueror’s near relative. The plot
was discovered; all the chief conspirators were seized; some were
fined, some were put in prison, some were put to death. The Earl of
Northumberland himself was shut up in a dungeon beneath Windsor Castle,
where he died, an old man, thirty long years afterwards. The Priests in
England were more unquiet than any other class or power; for the Red
King treated them with such small ceremony that he refused to appoint
new bishops or archbishops when the old ones died, but kept all the
wealth belonging to those offices in his own hands. In return for this,
the Priests wrote his life when he was dead, and abused him well. I am
inclined to think, myself, that there was little to choose between the
Priests and the Red King; that both sides were greedy and designing;
and that they were fairly matched.
The Red King was false of heart, selfish, covetous, and mean. He had a
worthy minister in his favourite, Ralph, nicknamed—for almost every
famous person had a nickname in those rough days—Flambard, or the
Firebrand. Once, the King being ill, became penitent, and made Anselm,
a foreign priest and a good man, Archbishop of Canterbury. But he no
sooner got well again than he repented of his repentance, and persisted
in wrongfully keeping to himself some of the wealth belonging to the
archbishopric. This led to violent disputes, which were aggravated by
there being in Rome at that time two rival Popes; each of whom declared
he was the only real original infallible Pope, who couldn’t make a
mistake. At last, Anselm, knowing the Red King’s character, and not
feeling himself safe in England, asked leave to return abroad. The Red
King gladly gave it; for he knew that as soon as Anselm was gone, he
could begin to store up all the Canterbury money again, for his own
use.
By such means, and by taxing and oppressing the English people in every
possible way, the Red King became very rich. When he wanted money for
any purpose, he raised it by some means or other, and cared nothing for
the injustice he did, or the misery he caused. Having the opportunity
of buying from Robert the whole duchy of Normandy for five years, he
taxed the English people more than ever, and made the very convents
sell their plate and valuables to supply him with the means to make the
purchase. But he was as quick and eager in putting down revolt as he
was in raising money; for, a part of the Norman people objecting—very
naturally, I think—to being sold in this way, he headed an army against
them with all the speed and energy of his father. He was so impatient,
that he embarked for Normandy in a great gale of wind. And when the
sailors told him it was dangerous to go to sea in such angry weather,
he replied, ‘Hoist sail and away! Did you ever hear of a king who was
drowned?’
You will wonder how it was that even the careless Robert came to sell
his dominions. It happened thus. It had long been the custom for many
English people to make journeys to Jerusalem, which were called
pilgrimages, in order that they might pray beside the tomb of Our
Saviour there. Jerusalem belonging to the Turks, and the Turks hating
Christianity, these Christian travellers were often insulted and ill
used. The Pilgrims bore it patiently for some time, but at length a
remarkable man, of great earnestness and eloquence, called Peter the
Hermit, began to preach in various places against the Turks, and to
declare that it was the duty of good Christians to drive away those
unbelievers from the tomb of Our Saviour, and to take possession of it,
and protect it. An excitement such as the world had never known before
was created. Thousands and thousands of men of all ranks and conditions
departed for Jerusalem to make war against the Turks. The war is called
in history the first Crusade, and every Crusader wore a cross marked on
his right shoulder.
All the Crusaders were not zealous Christians. Among them were vast
numbers of the restless, idle, profligate, and adventurous spirit of
the time. Some became Crusaders for the love of change; some, in the
hope of plunder; some, because they had nothing to do at home; some,
because they did what the priests told them; some, because they liked
to see foreign countries; some, because they were fond of knocking men
about, and would as soon knock a Turk about as a Christian. Robert of
Normandy may have been influenced by all these motives; and by a kind
desire, besides, to save the Christian Pilgrims from bad treatment in
future. He wanted to raise a number of armed men, and to go to the
Crusade. He could not do so without money. He had no money; and he sold
his dominions to his brother, the Red King, for five years. With the
large sum he thus obtained, he fitted out his Crusaders gallantly, and
went away to Jerusalem in martial state. The Red King, who made money
out of everything, stayed at home, busily squeezing more money out of
Normans and English.
After three years of great hardship and suffering—from shipwreck at
sea; from travel in strange lands; from hunger, thirst, and fever, upon
the burning sands of the desert; and from the fury of the Turks—the
valiant Crusaders got possession of Our Saviour’s tomb. The Turks were
still resisting and fighting bravely, but this success increased the
general desire in Europe to join the Crusade. Another great French Duke
was proposing to sell his dominions for a term to the rich Red King,
when the Red King’s reign came to a sudden and violent end.
You have not forgotten the New Forest which the Conqueror made, and
which the miserable people whose homes he had laid waste, so hated. The
cruelty of the Forest Laws, and the torture and death they brought upon
the peasantry, increased this hatred. The poor persecuted country
people believed that the New Forest was enchanted. They said that in
thunder-storms, and on dark nights, demons appeared, moving beneath the
branches of the gloomy trees. They said that a terrible spectre had
foretold to Norman hunters that the Red King should be punished there.
And now, in the pleasant season of May, when the Red King had reigned
almost thirteen years; and a second Prince of the Conqueror’s
blood—another Richard, the son of Duke Robert—was killed by an arrow in
this dreaded Forest; the people said that the second time was not the
last, and that there was another death to come.
It was a lonely forest, accursed in the people’s hearts for the wicked
deeds that had been done to make it; and no man save the King and his
Courtiers and Huntsmen, liked to stray there. But, in reality, it was
like any other forest. In the spring, the green leaves broke out of the
buds; in the summer, flourished heartily, and made deep shades; in the
winter, shrivelled and blew down, and lay in brown heaps on the moss.
Some trees were stately, and grew high and strong; some had fallen of
themselves; some were felled by the forester’s axe; some were hollow,
and the rabbits burrowed at their roots; some few were struck by
lightning, and stood white and bare. There were hill-sides covered with
rich fern, on which the morning dew so beautifully sparkled; there were
brooks, where the deer went down to drink, or over which the whole herd
bounded, flying from the arrows of the huntsmen; there were sunny
glades, and solemn places where but little light came through the
rustling leaves. The songs of the birds in the New Forest were
pleasanter to hear than the shouts of fighting men outside; and even
when the Red King and his Court came hunting through its solitudes,
cursing loud and riding hard, with a jingling of stirrups and bridles
and knives and daggers, they did much less harm there than among the
English or Normans, and the stags died (as they lived) far easier than
the people.
Upon a day in August, the Red King, now reconciled to his brother,
Fine-Scholar, came with a great train to hunt in the New Forest.
Fine-Scholar was of the party. They were a merry party, and had lain
all night at Malwood-Keep, a hunting-lodge in the forest, where they
had made good cheer, both at supper and breakfast, and had drunk a deal
of wine. The party dispersed in various directions, as the custom of
hunters then was. The King took with him only Sir Walter Tyrrel, who
was a famous sportsman, and to whom he had given, before they mounted
horse that morning, two fine arrows.
The last time the King was ever seen alive, he was riding with Sir
Walter Tyrrel, and their dogs were hunting together.
It was almost night, when a poor charcoal-burner, passing through the
forest with his cart, came upon the solitary body of a dead man, shot
with an arrow in the breast, and still bleeding. He got it into his
cart. It was the body of the King. Shaken and tumbled, with its red
beard all whitened with lime and clotted with blood, it was driven in
the cart by the charcoal-burner next day to Winchester Cathedral, where
it was received and buried.
Sir Walter Tyrrel, who escaped to Normandy, and claimed the protection
of the King of France, swore in France that the Red King was suddenly
shot dead by an arrow from an unseen hand, while they were hunting
together; that he was fearful of being suspected as the King’s
murderer; and that he instantly set spurs to his horse, and fled to the
sea-shore. Others declared that the King and Sir Walter Tyrrel were
hunting in company, a little before sunset, standing in bushes opposite
one another, when a stag came between them. That the King drew his bow
and took aim, but the string broke. That the King then cried, ‘Shoot,
Walter, in the Devil’s name!’ That Sir Walter shot. That the arrow
glanced against a tree, was turned aside from the stag, and struck the
King from his horse, dead.
By whose hand the Red King really fell, and whether that hand
despatched the arrow to his breast by accident or by design, is only
known to God. Some think his brother may have caused him to be killed;
but the Red King had made so many enemies, both among priests and
people, that suspicion may reasonably rest upon a less unnatural
murderer. Men know no more than that he was found dead in the New
Forest, which the suffering people had regarded as a doomed ground for
his race.