CONQUEST OF WALES.
The death of Joanna, mother of Eleanora, leaving the domains of Ponthieu
and Aumerle, made it necessary for the king and queen to visit France, to
do homage to Philip the Bold for their new possessions. They passed
several months on the continent ordering the affairs of their
feudaltories, but their return was hastened by tidings of fresh
disturbances in Wales.
On her arrival at Windsor her daughter, Joanna of Acre, presented the
queen with a letter which she said had been brought to the castle by a
strange-looking priest who refused for some time to give it into any hand
save that of Eleanora, but who was finally persuaded to intrust the
precious document to herself on her promise to deliver in person to her
mother. The letter was from Elin the Princess of Wales. It read as
follows:--"To my gracious sovereign Lady Eleanora of England the wife of
Llewellyn sendeth love and greeting.
"I had hoped once more to see the face of my noble mistress, and to visit
the scenes hallowed by the first happy hours of my sad life. I had thought
to crave thy blessing on my lovely infant, for my lord had promised that
on the return of spring we should be conveyed to England, and this hath
cheered me through the weary hours of sickness and languishing when my
heart hath pined for the sweet communion which I sometimes enjoyed in the
castle at Windsor. But the hills are already changing under the softening
airs of spring, and my step is more feeble and my breath more faint, and I
no longer indulge the anticipation of thanking thy goodness for the
pleasant thoughts with which thy holy counsels hath blessed my memory. But
I am resigned to die! and I know that before the flowers come forth my sad
heart will find rest in the grave. One anxiety alone disturbs the serenity
of my few remaining days.
"Already my little Guendoline returns her mother's smile. Who will cherish
her infant years and guide her youthful footsteps to those fountains of
peace which the light of thine example hath so lately revealed to my
erring sight?
"Struggling with weakness and pain, thy dying Elin pens this last earnest
prayer. Let the damsel abide with thee. Let her be nurtured in the
practice of those gentle virtues which her obdurate race have abjured.
"Commend me to Edward, our sovereign, and those fair daughters that
cluster round thy board and gladden thy life with their smiles. Again let
me beg a place in thy heart for my orphan child, and oh! remember in thy
prayer the soul of the exile, who from thy lips first learned to hope in
the mercy of Heaven."
The letter bore the date of March, and it was now early June, and to
Eleanora's anxious inquiries for further tidings concerning the lady Elin
and her child no answer could be given. The king however had better
sources of information. Scarcely was he recovered from the fatigue of
travel when the lords were summoned in council to deliberate upon the
petition of David and Rodric, brothers of Llewellyn, who had applied to
the English court for assistance.
From these barons Edward learned that the Welsh prince had violated the
promise made to his princess on her death-bed, of conveying their daughter
to the care of Eleanora, and that stimulated by the songs of the bards and
the long-smothered anger of the malcontent barons, he had resolved to
break his oath of allegiance to the King of England, and had dispossessed
his brothers of their inheritance as a punishment for their loyalty.
The council decided to assist David and Rodric in the recovery of their
possessions, and Edward not displeased with the occasion of making an
absolute conquest of the country, advanced with his army into Wales.
The English at first suffered some reverses, but in the great battle of
Builth, Llewellyn was slain, his forces put to flight, and the gold
coronet taken from his head was offered by Prince Alphonso at the shrine
of Edward the Confessor. But the war was not yet ended. Prince David now
claiming the title of king, as the heir of his brother, assumed the
command of the Welsh, and it needed the constant presence of Edward to
keep down the rebellious spirit of the people. The same steadfast
affection which had supported Eleanora during the tedious hours of her
anxious sojourn in the wilds of Devon, and that had prompted her to brave
the varied dangers of the Syrian campaign, led her now to follow her
lord's fortunes through the rugged defiles and rocky fastnesses of the
Welsh mountains.
For her security, Edward built and fortified the strong castle of
Caernarvon, which now, after the lapse of nearly six centuries, presents
the same external appearance as on the day when Queen Eleanora first
entered its stupendous gateway in company with her royal lord.
The battlements with which the walls were defended, stand unchanged in
their hoary strength and grandeur, and the statue of Edward I., carved to
the life, still protects the entrance of the castle, and with its drawn
dagger, menaces the intruder who would venture within its guarded
precincts. The eagle tower yet nestles in the defences of the rocks,
though the royal fledglings have deserted the comfortless eyrie of
Snowdon for the softer luxuries of Windsor Castle and Hampton Court, and
the oaken cradle of the second Edward, suspended by ring and staples from
carved supporters, yet occupies its little nook in the secluded chamber
where his infant eyes first opened on the light. Eleanora's experience of
the conquering power of love, made her solicitous to employ a Welsh
attendant for her son, but such was the fear which her husband's name had
inspired among the families of the fierce mountaineers that she was forced
to abandon the project till accident procured for the amiable queen the
domestic she needed not only, but threw into her hands the fate of Wales.
From the irregular surface of their territory the Welsh were necessarily a
pastoral people, and their simple manner of life exposed them to certain
defeat when the conquest of their country was steadily and prudently
pursued by the well-trained warriors of England. But like the hardy sons
of all mountainous districts, the Welsh seemed to inhale the spirit of
liberty from the free breath of their native hills, and hunted as they
were from one retreat to another, they still rallied around their ancient
standard, and listened with rapture to predictions of their future
greatness. Edward followed them with untiring patience through rugged
defiles and rocky fastnesses till his heavy armed troops were ready to
sink with fatigue.
Everywhere they found evidences of the straits to which the miserable
inhabitants were reduced. Deserted hamlets, abandoned fields, and
famishing animals, betokened the last extremity of suffering. It was just
at night-fall when they came suddenly upon a strong body posted within the
narrow precincts of a valley.
The lowing of the herds that began to suffer from the want of forage, was
the first sound that attracted the attention of the English scouts, and by
a circuitous path the whole detachment were conducted to a position
commanding a full view of the enemy. The bivouac consisted of rude huts or
booths, constructed for shelter rather than defence, in and around which
sat barbarians in various attitudes of attention or repose.
The watch-fires gleamed luridly upon the wild figures that circled around
them, with dark and frowning brows, while from the centre of the
encampment echoed the sounds of hoarse voices, accompanied by the martial
strains of music. The barbarous language made the song of the bards
incomprehensible to the English, but they divined its spirit from the
effect upon the rude auditors, who, at every pause in the agitating
refrain, sprang to their feet, struck their spears upon their shields, and
mingled their shrill voices in a responsive chorus of muttered vengeance.
In the enthusiasm which the patriotic songs awakened, Edward read the
secret of the protracted resistance, and saw that the destruction of these
bards would insure his conquest. The trumpets were immediately ordered to
sound, and his army, wearied as they were, summoned their fainting
energies and rushed to the conflict.
The Welsh, surprised in the midst of their fancied security, stood to
their arms, and fought with the courage of desperation, the exhilarating
strains of the bards rose to a shrill wail of agony, then sank in the
voiceless silence of death.
This final strain of the national poetry, was the requiem of Welsh
liberty. King David made his escape through the defile of a mountain
followed by a few of his nobles, and the Earl of Devon, in attempting to
cut off his retreat, surprised and captured a company of frightened
females who had been lodged in the rocky fastness for greater security.
With knightly courtesy he extended to his helpless captives every delicate
attention that would soften the rigor of their fate.
His sympathies were especially excited by the distress of a woman of an
appearance somewhat superior to her companions, who exhibited the greatest
solicitude for the safety of a child that, all unconscious of the tumult,
lay quietly sleeping in its cradle of twisted reeds.
De Courtenay approached, anxious to relieve her fears, when the nurse,
expecting to be torn from her tender charge, exclaimed, in barbarous
English, "Take not the princess from me! I promised the Lady Elin never to
resign her save to the hands of the good Queen of England."
"Comfort thee, good woman," said the earl, kindly. "I will myself convey
thee, with the babe, to Caernarvon, where thou mayest discharge thy trust
by bestowing the little orphan with the royal friend of her mother."
Consigning the other captives to the care of his knights, he gave the
nurse in charge to his groom, and himself carefully lifting the wicker
cradle with its lovely occupant to the horse before him, led the way
towards the castle.
Eleanora received the daughter of Elin de Montfort with tears of tender
welcome, and lavished upon the child the same affection that she bestowed
upon her own infant Edward. The little cousins were nurtured together, and
the nurse soon became tenderly attached to both children, and conceived an
almost reverential devotion to the pious queen; and as Eleanora gave her
frequent opportunities for communion with the natives of the vicinity, she
lost no occasion of publishing the virtues of her mistress.
She represented that Eleanora and little Edward were scarce inferior in
beauty to the Madonna and child, and that they were as good as they were
beautiful; and, she added, on her own responsibility, that since the queen
treated Guendoline with as much affection as though she were her own
daughter, there could be no doubt that she looked upon her as the future
bride of the young prince.
Meantime, Edward had prospered in his military plans. David could never
collect an army sufficient to face the English in the field, being chased
from hill to hill, and hunted from one retreat to another, and was finally
betrayed to his enemy and sent to England.
The Snowdon barons, deprived of their leader, and aware that their
princess Guendoline was in possession of the English king, and somewhat
mollified by the prognostication of her future greatness, at length obeyed
the summons of Edward to a conference at Caernarvon. The hardy
mountaineers agreed to tender their final submission to him as lord
paramount, if he would appoint them a native Welshman for their prince,
who could speak neither Saxon nor French, for those barbarous languages
they declared they could never understand.
Edward graciously acceded to the request, and the preliminaries being
arranged he brought from the eagle tower the little Edward, assuring them
that he was a native of Wales, could speak neither of the reprobated
tongues, and, under the tutelage of his lovely instructress Guendoline,
would doubtless soon become a proficient in Welsh. "The fierce
mountaineers little expected such a ruler. They had, however, no
alternative but submission, and with as good grace as they might, kissed
the tiny hand which was to sway their sceptre, and vowed fealty to the
babe of the faithful Eleanora."