Opening material · Part 3

_KING OSWALD OF NORTHUMBRIA, OR THE BRITON'S REVENGE._

Northumbria having been subdued by Pagan Mercia, Oswald raises there again the Christian standard. Penda wages war against him, in alliance with Cadwallon, a Cambrian prince who hates the Saxon conquerors the more bitterly when become Christians. Encouraged by St. Columba in a vision, Oswald with a small force vanquishes the hosts of Cadwallon, who is slain. He sends to Iona for monks of St. Columba's order, converts his country to the Faith, and dies for her. The earlier British race expiates its evil revenge.

The agony was over which but late Had shook to death Northumbrian realm new-raised By Edwin, dear to God. The agony At last was over; but the tear flowed on: The Faith of Christ had fallen once more to dust, That Faith which spoused with golden marriage ring The land to God, when Coiffi, horsed and mailed, Chief Priest himself, hurled at the Temple's wall His lance, and quivering left it lodged therein. The agony had ceased; yet Rachael's cry Still pierced the childless region. Penda's sword Had swept it, Mercia's Christian-hating King; Fiercelier Cadwallon's, Cambria's Christian Prince, Christian in vain. The British wrong like fire Burned in his heart. Well-nigh two hundred years That British race, they only of the tribes By Rome subdued, sustained unceasing war 'Gainst those barbaric hordes that, nursed long since 'Mid Teuton woods, when Rome her death-wound felt, And '_Habet_' shrilled from every trampled realm, Rushed forth in ruin o'er her old domain:-- That race against the Saxon still made head; Large remnant yet survived. The Western coast Was theirs; old sea-beat Cornwall's granite cliffs, And purple hills of Cambria; northward thence Strathclyde, from towered Carnegia's winding Dee To Morecombe's shining sands, and those fair vales, Since loved by every muse, where silver meres Slept in the embrace of yew-clad mountain walls; With tracts of midland Britain and the East. Remained the memory of the greatness lost; The Druid circles of the olden age; The ash-strewn cities radiant late with arts Extinct this day; bath, circus, theatre Mosaic-paved; the Roman halls defaced; The Christian altars crushed. That last of wrongs The vanquished punished with malign revenge: Never had British priest to Saxon preached; And when that cry was heard, 'The Saxon King Edwin hath bowed to Christ,' on Cambrian hills Nor man nor woman smiled. They had not lacked The timely warning. From his Kentish shores Augustine stretched to them paternal hands: Later, he sought them out in synod met, Their custom, under open roof of heaven. 'The Mother of the Churches,' thus he spake, 'Commands--implores you! Seek from her, and win The Sacrament of Unity Divine! Thus strengthened, be her strength! With her conjoined, Subdue your foe to Christ!' He sued in vain. The British bishops hurled defiance stern Against his head, while Cambrian peaks far off Darkened, and thunder muttered. From his seat, Slowly and sadly as the sun declined At last, though late, that Roman rose and stretched A lean hand t'ward that circle, speaking thus: 'Hear then the sentence of your God on sin! Because ye willed not peace, behold the sword! Because ye grudged your foe the Faith of Christ, Nor holp to lead him on the ways of life, For that cause from you by the Saxon hand Your country shall be taken!' Edwin slain, Far off in exile dwelt his nephews long, Oswald and Oswy. Alba gave them rest, Alba, not yet called Scotland. Ireland's sons, Then Scoti named, had warred on Alba's Picts: Columba's Gospel vanquished either race; Won both to God. It won not less those youths, In boyhood Oswald, Oswy still a child. That child was wild and hot, and had his moods, Despotic now, now mirthful. Mild as Spring Was Oswald's soul, majestic and benign; Thoughtful his azure eyes, serene his front; He of his ravished sceptre little recked; The shepherds were his friends; the mountain deer Would pluck the ivy fearless from his hand: In gladness walked he till Northumbria's cry Smote on his heart. 'Why rest I here in peace,' Thus mused he, 'while my brethren groan afar?' By night he fled with twelve companion youths, Christians like him, and reached his native land. Too fallen it seemed to aid him. On he passed; The ways were desolate, yet evermore A slender band around his footsteps drew, Less seeking victory than an honest death. Oft gazed their King upon them; murmured oft, 'Few hands--true hearts!' Sudden aloud he cried, 'Plant here the royal Standard, friends, and hence Let sound the royal trumpet.' Stern response Reached him ere long: not Mercia's realm alone; Cambria that heard the challenge joined the war: Cambria, upon whose heart the ancestral woe, For ever with the years, like letters graved On growing pines, grew larger and more large;-- To Penda forth she stretched a hand blood-red; Christian with Pagan joined, an unblest bond, A league accursed. The indomitable hate Compelled that league. Still from his cave the Seer Admonished, 'Set the foe against the foe; Slay last the conqueror!' and from rock and hill The Bard cried, 'Vengeance!' In the bardic clan That hatred of their country's ancient bane Lived like a faith. One night it chanced a tarn, Secreted high 'mid cold and moonless hills, Bursting its bank down burst. That valley's Bard Clomb to the church-roof from his buried house: Thence rang his song,--'twas 'Vengeance!--Vengeance' still! That torrent reached the roof: he clomb the tower: The torrent mounted: on the bleak hill-side All night the dalesmen, wailing o'er their drowned, Amid the roar of winds and downward rocks, Still heard that war-song, 'Vengeance! Blood for blood!' At last the tower fell flat, and winter morn Shone on the waters only. Three short weeks Dinned with alarums passed; in Mercia still Lay Penda, sickness-struck, when, face to face, The Cambrian host and Oswald's little band Exulting met at sunset near a height Then 'Heaven-Field' named, but later 'Oswald's Field,' Backed by that Wall the Roman built of old His fence from sea to sea. There Oswald stood: There raised with hands outstretched a mighty Cross, Strong-based, and deep in earth: his comrades twelve Around it heaped the soil, while priests white-stoled Chanted 'Vexilla Regis.' Work and rite Complete, the King knelt down and made his prayer: 'True God Eternal, look upon this Cross, The sole now standing on Northumbria's breast, And help Thine own, though few, who trust in Thee!'

That night before his tent the wanderer sate Listening the circling sentinel, or bay Of wakeful hound remote, or downward course Of streams from moorland hills. Before his view His whole life rose: his father's angry brow; The eyes all-wondrous, and all-tender hand Of her, his mother, striving evermore To keep betwixt her husband and her sire Unbroken bond: his exiled days returned, The kind that pitied them, the rude that jeered; Lastly, that monk whose boast was evermore Columba of Iona, Columkille; That monk who made him Christian. 'Come what may,' Thus Oswald mused, 'I have not lived in vain: Lose I or win, a kingdom there remains; Though not on earth!' A tear the vision dimmed As thus he closed, 'My mother will be there!' Then sank his lids in slumber. On his sleep-- Was this indeed but dream?--a glory brake: Columba, dear to Oswald from his youth, Columba, clad in glory as the sun, Beside him stood, and spake: 'Be strong! On earth There lives not who can guess the might of prayer: What then is prayer on high?' The saintly Shape Heavenward his hands upraised, while rose to heaven His stature, towering ever high and higher, Warlike and priestly both. As morning cloud Blown by a mighty wind his robe ran forth, Then stood, a golden wall that severance made 'Twixt Oswald's band and that unnumbered host. Again he spake, 'Put on thee heart of man And fight: though few, thy warriors shall not die In darkness of an unbelieving land, But live, and live to God.' The vision passed: By Oswald's seat his warriors stood and cried, 'The Bull-horn! Hark!' The monarch told them all: They answered, 'Let thy God sustain thy throne:-- Thenceforth our God is He.' The sun uprose: Ere long the battle joined. Three dreadful hours Doubtful the issue hung. Fierce Cambria's sons With chief and clan, with harper and with harp, Though terrible yet mirthful in their mood, Rushed to their sport. Who mocked their hope that day? Did Angels help the just? Their falling blood, Say, leaped it up once more, each drop a man Their phalanx to replenish? Backward driven, Again that multitudinous foe returned With clangour dire; futile, again fell back Down dashed, like hailstone showers from palace halls Where princes feast secure. Astonishment Smote them at last. Through all those serried ranks, Compact so late, sudden confusions ran Like lines divergent through a film of ice Stamped on by armèd heel, or rifts on plains Prescient of earthquake underground. Their chiefs Sounded the charge;--in vain: Distrust, Dismay, Ill Gods, the darkness lorded of that hour: Panic to madness turned. Cadwallon sole From squadron on to squadron speeding still As on a wingèd steed--his snow-white hair Behind him blown--a mace in either hand-- Stayed while he might the inevitable rout; Then sought his death, and found. Some fated Power Mightier than man's that hour dragged back his hosts Against their will and his; as when the moon, Shrouded herself, drags back the great sea-tides That needs must follow her receding wheels Though wind and wave gainsay them, breakers wan Thundering indignant down nocturnal shores, And city-brimming floods against their will Down drawn to river-mouths. In after days Who scaped made oath that in the midmost fight The green earth sickened with a brazen glare While darkness held the skies. They saw besides On Heaven-Field height a Cross, and, at its foot, A sworded warrior vested like a priest, Who still in stature high and higher towered As raged the battle. Higher far that Cross Above him rose, barring with black the stars That bickered through the eclipse's noonday night, And ever from its bleeding arms sent forth Thick-volleyed lightnings, azure fork and flame, Through all that headlong host. At eventide, Where thickest fight had mingled, Oswald stood With raiment red as his who treads alone The wine-vat when the grapes are all pressed out, Yet scathless and untouched. His mother's smile Was radiant on his pure and youthful face, Joyous, but not exulting. At his foot Cadwallon lay, with four-score winters white, A threatening corse: not death itself could shake The mace from either rigid hand close-clenched, Or smooth his brow. Above him Oswald bent, Then spake: 'He also loved his native land: Bear him with honour hence to hills of Wales, And lay him with his Fathers.' Thus was raised In righteousness King Oswald's throne. But he, Mindful in victory of Columba's word, Thus mused, 'The Master is as he that serves: How shall I serve this people?' O'er the waves Then sent he of his Twelve the eldest three: They to Iona sailed, and standing there In full assembly of Iona's saints Addressed them: 'To Columba Oswald thus: Let him that propped the King on Heaven-Field's height, That held the battle-balance high that day, Unite my realm to Christ!' The monks replied, 'Such mission should be Aidan's.' Aidan went. With gladness Oswald met him, and with gifts: But Aidan said, 'Entreat me not to dwell There where Paulinus dwelt, the man of God, In thy chief city, York. Thy race is fierce; And meekness only can subdue the proud: Thy people first I want;--through them the great. Grant me some island 'mid the raging main, Humble and low, not cheered by smiling meads, Where with my brethren I may watch with God, Henceforth my only aid.' Oswald replied, 'Let Lindisfarne be thine. That rock-based keep Built by my grandsire Ida o'er it peers: I shall be near thee though I see thee not.'

Then Aidan on the Isle of Lindisfarne Upreared that monastery which ruled in Christ So long the Northern realm. A plain rock-girt Level it lies and low: nor flower nor fruit Gladdens its margin: thin its sod, and bleak: Twice, day by day, the salt sea hems it round: And twice a day the melancholy sands, O'er-wailed by sea-bird, and with sea-weed strewn, Replace the lonely ocean. Sacred Isles That westward, eastward, guard the imperial realm, Iona! Lindisfarne! With you compared How poor that lilied Delos of old Greece, For all its laurel bowers and nightingales! England's great hands were ye to God forth stretched Through adverse climes, beneath the Boreal star, That took His Stigmata. In sanctity Were her foundations laid. Her later crowns Of Freedom first, of Science, and of Song She owes them all to you! In Lindisfarne Aidan, and his, rejoicing dwelt with God: Amid the winter storm their anthems rose; And from their sanctuary lamp the gleam Far shone from wave to wave. On starless nights From Bamborough's turret Oswald watched it long, Before his casement kneeling--first alone, Companioned later. Kineburga there Beside him knelt ere long, his tender bride, Young, beauteous, modest, noble. 'Not for them,' Thus spake the newly wedded, 'not for them, For man's sake severed from the world of men, In ceaseless vigil warring upon sin, Ah, not for them the flower of life, the harp, High feast, or bridal torch!' Purer perchance _Their_ bridal torch burned on because from far That sacred lamp had met its earliest beam!

There Aidan lived, and wafted, issuing thence, O'er wilds Bernician and fierce battle-fields The strength majestic of his still retreat, The puissance of a soul whose home was God. 'What man is this,' the warriors asked, 'that moves Unarmed among us; lifts his crucifix, And says, "Ye swords, lie prone"?' The revelling crew Rose from their cups: 'He preaches abstinence: Behold, the man is mortified himself: The moonlight of his watchings and his fasts He carries on his face.' When Princes forced Largess upon him, he replied, 'I want Not yours but you;' and with their gifts redeemed The orphan slave. The poor were as his children: He to the beggar stinted not his hand Nor, giving, said 'Be brief.' Such seed bare fruit:-- God in the dark, primeval woods had reared A race whose fierceness had its touch of ruth; Brave, cordial, chaste, and simple. Reverence That race preserved: Reverence advanced to Love: The ties of life it honoured: lit from heaven They wore a meaning new. The Faith of Christ Banished the bestial from the heart of man; Restored the Hope divine. In all his toils Oswald with Aidan walked. Impartial law, Not licence, not despotic favour, stands To Truth auxiliar true. Such laws were his: Yet not through such alone he worked for Truth; Function he claimed more high. When Aidan preached; In forest depths when thousands girt him round; When countless eyes, a clinging weight, were bent Upon his lips--all knew they spake from God,-- The King, with monks from Ireland knit of old, Beside the Bishop stood; each word he spake Changed to the Saxon tongue. Earth were not earth, If reign like Oswald's lasted. Penda lived; Nor e'er from Oswald turned for eight long years An eye like some swart planet feared of man, Omen of wars or plague. Cadwallon's fate, Ally ill-starred, that fought without his aid, O'er-flushed old hatred with a fiery shame: Cadwallon nightly frowned above his dreams. The tyrant watched his time. At Maserfield The armies met. There on Northumbria's day Settled what seemed, yet was not, endless night There Faith and Virtue, deathless, seemed to die: There holy Oswald fell. For God he fought, Fought for his country. Walled with lances round, A sheaf of arrows quivering in his breast, One moment yet he stood. 'Preserve,' he cried, 'My country, God!' then added, gazing round, 'And these my soldiers: make their spirits thine!' Thus perished good King Oswald, King and Saint; Saint by acclaim of nations canonised Ere yet the Church had spoken. Year by year The Hexham monks to Heaven-Field, where of old Had stood that 'Cross which conquered,' made repair, With chanted psalm; and pilgrims daily prayed Where died the just and true. Not vain their vows: In righteousness foundations had been laid: The earthquake reached them not. The Dane passed by High up the Norman glittered: but beneath, On Faith profounder based, and gentler Law The Saxon realm lived on. But never more From Heaven-Field's wreck the Briton raised his head Britain thenceforth was England. His the right; The land was his of old; and in God's House His of the island races stood first-born: Not less he sinned through hate, esteeming more Memories of wrong than forward-looking hopes And triumphs of the Truth. For that cause God His face in blessing to the younger turned, More honouring Pagans who in ignorance erred, Than those who, taught of God, concealed their gift, Divorcing Faith from Love. Natheless they clung, That remnant spared, to rocky hills of Wales With eagle clutch, whoe'er in England ruled, From Horsa's day to Edward's. Centuries eight In gorge or vale sea-lulled they held their own, By native monarchs swayed, while native harps Rang out from native cliffs defiant song Wild as their singing pines. Heroic Land! Freedom was thine; the torrent's plunge; the peak; The pale mist past it borne! Heroic Race! Caractacus was thine, and Galgacus, And Boadicea, greater by her wrongs Than by her lineage. Battle-axe of thine Rang loud and long on Roman helms ere yet Hengist had trod the island. Thine that King World-famed, who led to fifty war-fields forth 'Gainst Saxon hosts his sinewy, long-haired race Unmailed, yet victory-crowned; that King who left Tintagel, Camelot, and Lyonnesse, Immortal names, though wild as elfin notes From phantom rocks echoed in fairy land-- Great Arthur! Year by year his deeds were sung, While he in Glastonbury's cloister slept, First by the race he died for, next by those Their children, exiles in Armoric Gaul, By Europe's minstrels then, from age to age; But ne'er by ampler voice, or richlier toned Than England lists to-day. Race once of Saints! Thine were they, Ninian thine and Kentigern, Iltud and Beino, yea and David's self, Thy crown of Saints, and Winifred, their flower, Who fills her well with healing virtue still. Cadoc was thine, who to his Cambrian throne Preferred that western convent at Lismore, Yet taught the British Princes thus to sing: 'None loveth Song that loves not Light and Truth: None loveth Light and Truth that loves not Justice: None loveth Justice if he loves not God: None loveth God that lives not blest and great.'

_CEADMON THE COWHERD, THE FIRST ENGLISH POET._

Ceadmon, a cowherd, being at a feast, declares when the harp reaches him, that he cannot sing. As he sleeps, a divine Voice commands him to sing. He obeys, and the gift of song is imparted to him. Hilda, Abbess of Whitby, enrolls him among her monks; and in later years he sings the revolt of the Fallen Angels, and many Christian mysteries, thus becoming the first English poet.

Alone upon the pleasant bank of Esk Ceadmon the Cowherd stood. The sinking sun Reddened the bay, and fired the river-bank, And flamed upon the ruddy herds that strayed Along the marge, clear-imaged. None was nigh: For that cause spake the Cowherd, 'Praise to God! He made the worlds; and now, by Hilda's hand Planteth a crown on Whitby's holy crest: Daily her convent towers more high aspire: Daily ascend her Vespers. Hark that strain! He stood and listened. Soon the flame-touched herds Sent forth their lowings, and the cliffs replied, And Ceadmon thus resumed: 'The music note Rings through their lowings dull, though heard by few! Poor kine, ye do your best! Ye know not God, Yet man, his likeness, unto you is God, And him ye worship with obedience sage, A grateful, sober, much-enduring race That o'er the vernal clover sigh for joy, With winter snows contend not. Patient kine, What thought is yours, deep-musing? Haply this, "God's help! how narrow are our thoughts, and few! Not so the thoughts of that slight human child Who daily drives us with her blossomed rod From lowland valleys to the pails long-ranged!" Take comfort, kine! God also made your race! If praise from man surceased, from your broad chests That God would perfect praise, and, when ye died, Resound it from yon rocks that gird the bay: God knoweth all things. Let that thought suffice!'

Thus spake the ruler of the deep-mouthed kine: They were not his; the man and they alike A neighbour's wealth. He was contented thus: Humble he was in station, meek of soul, Unlettered, yet heart-wise. His face was pale; Stately his frame, though slightly bent by age: Slow were his eyes, and slow his speech, and slow His musing step; and slow his hand to wrath; A massive hand, but soft, that many a time Had succoured man and woman, child and beast, And yet could fiercely grasp the sword. At times As mightily it clutched his ashen goad When like an eagle on him swooped some thought: Then stood he as in dream, his pallid front Brightening like eastern sea-cliffs when a moon Unrisen is near its rising. Round the bay Meantime, as twilight deepened, many a fire Up-sprang, and horns were heard. Around the steep With bannered pomp and many a tossing plume Advancing slow a cavalcade made way. Oswy, Northumbria's king, the foremost rode, Oswy triumphant o'er the Mercian host, Invoking favour on his sceptre new; With him an Anglian prince, student long time In Bangor of the Irish, and a monk Of Frankish race far wandering from the Marne: They came to look on Hilda, hear her words Of far-famed wisdom on the Interior Life; For Hilda thus discoursed: 'True life of man Is life within: inward immeasurably The being winds of all who walk the earth; But he whom sense hath blinded nothing knows Of that wide greatness: like a boy is he, A boy that clambers round some castle's wall In search of nests, the outward wall of seven, Yet nothing knows of those great courts within, The hall where princes banquet, or the bower Where royal maids discourse with lyre and lute, Much less its central church, and sacred shrine Wherein God dwells alone.' Thus Hilda spake; And they that gazed upon her widening eyes Low whispered, each to each, 'She speaks of things Which she hath seen and known.' On Whitby's height The royal feast was holden: far below, A noisier revel dinned the shore; therein The humbler guests made banquet. Many a tent Gleamed on the yellow sands by ripples kissed; And many a savoury dish sent up its steam; The farmer from the field had brought his calf; Fishers that increase scaled which green-gulfed seas From womb crystalline, teeming, yield to man; And Jock, the woodsman, from his oaken glades The tall stag, arrow-pierced. In gay attire Now green, now crimson, matron sat and maid: Each had her due: the elder, reverence most, The lovelier that and love. Beside the board The beggar lacked not place. When hunger's rage, Sharpened by fresh sea-air, was quelled, the jest Succeeded, and the tale of foreign lands; Yet, boast who might of distant chief renowned, His battle-axe, or fist that felled an ox, The Anglian's answer was 'our Hilda' still: 'Is not her prayer trenchant as sworded hosts? Her insight more than wisdom of the seers? What birth like hers illustrious? Edwin's self, Dëira's exile, next Northumbria's king, Her kinsman was. Together bowed they not When he of holy hand, missioned from Rome, Paulinus, o'er them poured the absolving wave And joined to Christ? Kingliest was she, that maid Who spurned earth-crowns!' More late the miller rose-- He ruled the feast, the miller old, yet blithe-- And cried, 'A song!' So song succeeded song, For each man knew that time to chant his stave, But no man yet sang nobly. Last the harp Made way to Ceadmon, lowest at the board: He pushed it back, answering, 'I cannot sing:' The rest around him flocked with clamour, 'Sing!' And one among them, voluble and small, Shot out a splenetic speech: 'This lord of kine, Our herdsman, grows to ox! Behold, his eyes Move slow, like eyes of oxen!' Slowly rose Ceadmon, and spake: 'I note full oft young men Quick-eyed, but small-eyed, darting glances round Now here, now there, like glance of some poor bird, That light on all things and can rest on none: As ready are they with their tongues as eyes; But all their songs are chirpings backward blown On winds that sing God's song, by them unheard: My oxen wait my service: I depart.' Then strode he to his cow-house in the mead, Displeased though meek, and muttered, 'Slow of eye! My kine are slow: if rapid I, my hand Might tend them worse.' Hearing his step, the kine Turned round their hornèd fronts; and angry thoughts Went from him as a vapour. Straw he brought, And strewed their beds; and they, contented well, Laid down ere long their great bulks, breathing deep Amid the glimmering moonlight. He, with head Propped on a favourite heifer's snowy flank, Rested, his deer-skin o'er him drawn. Hard days Bring slumber soon. His latest thought was this: 'Though witless things we are, my kine and I, Yet God it was who made us.' As he slept, Beside him stood a Man Divine, and spake: 'Ceadmon, arise, and sing,' Ceadmon replied, 'My Lord, I cannot sing, and for that cause Forth from the revel came I. Once, in youth, I willed to sing the bright face of a maid, And failed, and once a gold-faced harvest-field, And failed, and once the flame-eyed face of war, And failed again.' To him the Man Divine, 'Those themes were earthly. Sing!' And Ceadmon said, 'What shall I sing, my Lord?' Then answer came, 'Ceadmon, stand up, and sing thy song of God.'

At once obedient, Ceadmon rose, and sang; And help was with him from great thoughts of old Yearly within his silent nature stored, That swelled, collecting like a flood which bursts In spring its icy bar. The Lord of all He sang; that God beneath whose hand eterne, Then when He willed forth-stretched athwart the abyss, Creation like a fiery chariot ran, Forth-borne on wheels of ever-living stars: Him first he sang. The builder, here below, From fair foundations rears at last the roof; But Song, a child of heaven, begins with heaven, The archetype divine, and end of all; More late descends to earth. He sang that hymn, 'Let there be light, and there was light;' and lo! On the void deep came down the seal of God And stamped immortal form. Clear laughed the skies; From circumambient deeps the strong earth brake, Both continent and isle; while downward rolled The sea-surge summoned to his home remote. Then came a second vision to the man There standing 'mid his oxen. Darkness sweet, He sang, of pleasant frondage clothed the vales, And purple glooms ambrosial cast from hills Now by the sun deserted, which the moon, A glory new-created in her place, Silvered with virgin beam, while sang the bird Her first of love-songs on the branch first-flower'd-- Not yet the lion stalked. And Ceadmon sang O'er-awed, the Father of all humankind Standing in garden planted by God's hand, And girt by murmurs of the rivers four, Between the trees of Knowledge and of Life, With eastward face. In worship mute of God, Eden's Contemplative he stood that hour, Not her Ascetic, since, where sin is none, No need for spirit severe. And Ceadmon sang God's Daughter, Adam's Sister, Child, and Bride, Our Mother Eve. Lit by the matin star, That nearer drew to earth and brighter flashed To meet her gaze, that snowy Innocence Stood up with queenly port: she turned; she saw Earth's King, mankind's great Father: taught by God, Immaculate, unastonished, undismayed, In love and reverence to her Lord she drew, And, kneeling, kissed his hand: and Adam laid That hand, made holier, on that kneeler's head, And spake; 'For this shall man his parents leave, And to his wife cleave fast.' When Ceadmon ceased, Thus spake the Man Divine: 'At break of day Seek out some prudent man, and say that God Hath loosed thy tongue; nor hide henceforth thy gift.' Then Ceadmon turned, and slept among his kine Dreamless. Ere dawn he stood upon the shore In doubt: but when at last o'er eastern seas The sun, long wished for, like a god upsprang, Once more he found God's song upon his mouth Murmuring high joy; and sought an ancient friend, And told him all the vision. At the word He to the Abbess with the tidings sped, And she made answer, 'Bring me Ceadmon here.'

Then clomb the pair that sea-beat mount of God Fanned by sea-gale, nor trod, as others used, The curving way, but faced the abrupt ascent, And halted not, so worked in both her will, Till now between the unfinished towers they stood Panting and spent. The portals open stood: Ceadmon passed in alone. Nor ivory decked, Nor gold, the walls. That convent was a keep Strong 'gainst invading storm or demon hosts, And naked as the rock whereon it stood, Yet, as a church, august. Dark, high-arched roofs Slowly let go the distant hymn. Each cell Cinctured its statued saint, the peace of God On every stony face. Like caverned grot Far off the western window frowned: beyond, Close by, there shook an autumn-blazoned tree: No need for gems beside of storied glass.

He entered last that hall where Hilda sat Begirt with a great company, the chiefs Far ranged from end to end. Three stalls, cross-crowned, Stood side by side, the midmost hers. The years Had laid upon her brows a hand serene; There left alone a blessing. Levelled eyes Sable, and keen, with meditative might Conjoined the instinct and the claim to rule: Firm were her lips and rigid. At her right Sat Finan, Aidan's successor, with head Snow-white, and beard that rolled adown a breast Never by mortal passion heaved in storm, A cloister of majestic thoughts that walked, Humbly with God. High in the left-hand stall Oswy was throned, a man in prime, with brow Less youthful than his years. Exile long past, Or deepening thought of one disastrous deed, Had left a shadow in his eyes. The strength Of passion held in check looked lordly forth From head and hand: tawny his beard; his hair Thick-curled and dense. Alert the monarch sat Half turned, like one on horseback set that hears, And he alone, the advancing trump of war. Down the long gallery strangers thronged in mass, Dane or Norwegian, huge of arm through weight Of billows oar-subdued, with stormy looks Wild as their waves and crags; Southerns keen-browed; Pure Saxon youths, fair-fronted, with mild eyes, These less than others strove for nobler place, And Pilgrim travel-worn. Behind the rest, And higher-ranged in marble-arched arcade, Sat Hilda's sisterhood. Clustering they shone, White-veiled, and pale of face, and still and meek, An inly-bending curve, like some young moon Whose crescent glitters o'er a dusky strait. In front were monks dark-stoled: for Hilda ruled, Though feminine, two houses, one of men: Upon two chasm-divided rocks they stood, To various service vowed, though single Faith:-- Not ever, save at rarest festival, Their holy inmates met. 'Is this the man Favoured, though late, with gift of song?' thus spake Hilda with gracious smile. Severer then She added: 'Son, the commonest gifts of God He counts His best, and oft temptation blends With ampler boon. Yet sing! That God who lifts The violet from the grass could draw not less Song from the stone hard by. That strain thou sang'st, Once more rehearse it.' Ceadmon from his knees Arose and stood. With princely instinct first The strong man to the Abbess bowed, and next To that great twain, the bishop and the king, Last to that stately concourse each side ranged Down the long hall; then, dubious, answered thus: 'Great Mother, if that God who sent the song Vouchsafe me to recall it, I will sing; But I misdoubt it lost.' Slowly his face Down-drooped, and all his body forward bent While brooding memory, step by step, retraced Its backward way. Vainly long time it sought The starting-point. Then Ceadmon's large, soft hands Opening and closing worked; for wont were they, In musings when he stood, to clasp his goad, And plant its point far from him, thereupon Propping his stalwart weight. Customed support Now finding not, unwittingly those hands Reached forth, and on Saint Finan's crosier-staff Settling, withdrew it from the old bishop's grasp; And Ceadmon leant thereon, while passed a smile From chief to chief to see earth's meekest man The spiritual sceptre claim of Lindisfarne. They smiled; he triumphed: soon the Cowherd found That first fair corner-stone of all his song; Thence rose the fabric heavenward. Lifting hands, Once more his lordly music he rehearsed, The void abyss at God's command forth-flinging Creation like a Thought: where night had reigned, The universe of God. The singing stars Which with the Angels sang when earth was made Sang in his song. From highest shrill of lark To ocean's moaning under cliffs low-browed, And roar of pine-woods on the storm-swept hills, No tone was wanting; while to them that heard Strange images looked forth of worlds new-born, Fair, phantom mountains, and, with forests plumed Heaven-topping headlands, for the first time glassed In waters ever calm. O'er sapphire seas Green islands laughed. Fairer, the wide earth's flower, Eden, on airs unshaken yet by sighs From bosom still inviolate forth poured Immortal sweets that sense to spirit turned. In part those noble listeners _made_ that song! Their flashing eyes, their hands, their heaving breasts, Tumult self-stilled, and mute, expectant trance, 'Twas these that gave their bard his twofold might-- That might denied to poets later born Who, singing to soft brains and hearts ice-hard, Applauded or contemned, alike roll round A vainly-seeking eye, and, famished, drop A hand clay-cold upon the unechoing shell, Missing their inspiration's human half.

Thus Ceadmon sang, and ceased. Silent awhile The concourse stood, for all had risen, as though Waiting from heaven its echo. Each on each Gazed hard and caught his hands. Fiercely ere long Their gratulating shout aloft had leaped But Hilda laid her finger on her lip, Or provident lest praise might stain the pure, Or deeming song a gift too high for praise. She spake: 'Through help of God thy song is sound: Now hear His Holy Word, and shape therefrom A second hymn, and worthier than the first.'

She spake, and Finan standing bent his head Above the sacred tome in reverence stayed Upon his kneeling deacon's hands and brow, And sweetly sang five verses, thus beginning, '_Cum esset desponsata_,' and was still; And next rehearsed them in the Anglian tongue: Then Ceadmon took God's Word into his heart, And ruminating stood, as when the kine, Their flowery pasture ended, ruminate; And was a man in thought. At last the light Shone from his dubious countenance, and he spake: 'Great Mother, lo! I saw a second Song! T'wards me it sailed; but with averted face, And borne on shifting winds. A man am I Sluggish and slow, that needs must muse and brood; Therefore those verses till the sun goes down Will I revolve. If song from God be mine Expect me here at morn.' The morrow morn In that high presence Ceadmon stood and sang A second song, and worthier than his first; And Hilda said, 'From God it came, not man; Thou therefore live a monk among my monks, And sing to God.' Doubtful he stood--'From youth My place hath been with kine; their ways I know, And how to cure their griefs,' Smiling she spake, 'Our convent hath its meads, and kine; with these Consort each morn: at noon to us return.' Then Ceadmon knelt, and bowed, and said, 'So be it:' And aged Finan, and Northumbria's king Oswy, approved; and all that host had joy.

Thus in that convent Ceadmon lived, a monk, Humblest of all the monks, save him that knelt In cell close by, who once had been a prince. Seven times a day he sang God's praises, first When earliest dawn drew back night's sable veil With trembling hand, revisiting the earth Like some pale maid that through the curtain peers Round her sick mother's bed, misdoubting half If sleep lie there, or death; latest when eve Through nave and chancel stole from arch to arch, And laid upon the snowy altar-step At last a brow of gold. In later years, By ancient yearnings driven, through wood and vale He tracked Dëirean or Bernician glades To holy Ripon, or late-sceptred York, Not yet great Wilfred's seat, or Beverley: The children gathered round him, crying, 'Sing!' They gave him inspiration with their eyes, And with his conquering music he returned it. Oftener he roamed that strenuous eastern coast To Jarrow and to Wearmouth, sacred sites The well-beloved of Bede, or northward more To Bamborough, Oswald's keep. At Coldingham His feet had rest; there where St. Ebba's Cape That ends the lonely range of Lammermoor, Sustained for centuries o'er the wild sea-surge In region of dim mist and flying bird, Fronting the Forth, those convent piles far-kenned, The worn-out sailor's hope. Fair English shores, Despite those blinding storms of north and east, Despite rough ages blind with stormier strife, Or froz'n by doubt, or sad with worldly care, A fragrance as of Carmel haunts you still Bequeathed by feet of that forgotten Saint Who trod you once, sowing the seed divine! Fierce tribes that kenned him distant round him flocked; On sobbing sands the fisher left his net, His lamb the shepherd on the hills of March, Suing for song. With wrinkled face all smiles, Like that blind Scian circling Grecian coasts, If God the song accorded, Ceadmon sang; If God denied it, after musings deep He answered, 'I am of the kine and dumb;'-- The man revered his art, and fraudful song Esteemed as fraudful coin. Music denied, He solaced them with tales wherein, so seemed it, Nature and Grace, inwoven, like children played, Or like two sisters o'er one sampler bent, Braided one text. Ever the sorrowful chance Ending in joy, the human craving still, Like creeper circling up the Tree of Life, Lifted by hand unseen, witnessed that He, Man's Maker, is the Healer too of man, And life His school parental. Parables He shewed in all things. 'Mark,' one day he cried, 'Yon silver-breasted swan that stems the lake Taking nor chill nor moisture! Such the soul That floats o'er waters of a world corrupt, Itself immaculate still.' Better than tale They loved their minstrel's harp. The songs he sang Were songs to brighten gentle hearts; to fire Strong hearts with holier courage; hope to breathe Through spirits despondent, o'er the childless floor Or widowed bed, flashing from highest heaven A beam half faith, half vision. Many a tear, His own, and tears of those that listened, fell Oft as he sang that hand, lovely as light, Forth stretched, and gathering from forbidden boughs That fruit fatal to man. He sang the Flood, Sin's doom that quelled the impure, yet raised to height Else inaccessible, the just. He sang That patriarch facing at divine command The illimitable waste--then, harder proof, Lifting his knife o'er him, the seed foretold; He sang of Israel loosed, the ten black seals Down pressed on Egypt's testament of woe, Covenant of pride with penance; sang the face Of Moses glittering from red Sinai's rocks, The Tables twain, and Mandements of God. On Christian nights he sang that jubilant star Which led the Magians to the Bethlehem crib By Joseph watched, and Mary. Pale, in Lent, Tremulous and pale, he told of Calvary, Nor added word, but, as in trance, rehearsed That Passion fourfold of the Evangelists, Which, terrible and swift--not like a tale-- With speed of things which must be done, not said, A river of bale, from guilty age to age Along the astonied shores of common life Annual makes way, the history of the world, Not of one day, one People. To its fount That stream he tracked, that primal mystery sang Which, chanted later by a thousand years, Music celestial, though with note that jarred, Some wandering orb troubling its starry chime, Amazed the nations, 'There was war in heaven: Michael and they, his angels, warfare waged With Satan and his angels.' Brief that war, That ruin total. Brief was Ceadmon's song: Therein the Eternal Face was undivulged: Therein the Apostate's form no grandeur wore: The grandeur was elsewhere. Who hate their God Change not alone to vanquished but to vile. On Easter morns he sang the Saviour Risen, Eden Regained. Since then on England's shores Though many sang, yet no man sang like him.

O holy House of Whitby! on thy steep Rejoice, howe'er the tempest, night or day, Afflict thee, or the hand of Time to earth Drag down thine airy arches long suspense; Rejoice, for Ceadmon in thy cloisters knelt, And singing paced beside thy sounding sea! Long years he lived; and with the whitening hair More youthful grew in spirit, and more meek; Yea, those that saw him said he sang within Then when the golden mouth but seldom breathed Sonorous strain, and when--that fulgent eye No longer bright--still on his forehead shone Not flame but purer light, like that last beam Which, when the sunset woods no longer burn, Maintains high place on Alpine throne remote, Or utmost beak of promontoried cloud, And heavenward dies in smiles. Esteem of men Daily he less esteemed, through single heart More knit with God. To please a sickly child He sang his latest song, and, ending, said, 'Song is but body, though 'tis body winged: The soul of song is love: the body dead, The soul should thrive the more.' That Patmian Sage Whose head had lain upon the Saviour's breast, Who in high vision saw the First and Last, Who heard the harpings of the Elders crowned, Who o'er the ruins of the Imperial House And ashes of the twelve great Cæsars dead Witnessed the endless triumph of the Just, To humbler life restored, and, weak through age, But seldom spake, and gave but one command, The great '_Mandatum Novum_' of his Lord, 'My children, love each other!' Like to his Was Ceadmon's age. Weakness with happy stealth Increased upon him: he was cheerful still: He still could pace, though slowly, in the sun, Still gladsomely converse with friends who wept, Still lay a broad hand on his well-loved kine.

The legend of the last of Ceadmon's days:-- That hospital wherein the old monks died Stood but a stone's throw from the monastery: 'Make there my couch to-night,' he said, and smiled: They marvelled, yet obeyed. There, hour by hour, The man, low-seated on his pallet-bed, In silence watched the courses of the stars, Or casual spake at times of common things, And three times played with childhood's days, and twice His father named. At last, like one that, long Compassed with good, is smit by sudden thought Of greater good, thus spake he: 'Have ye, sons, Here in this house the Blessed Sacrament?' They answered, wrathful, 'Father, thou art strong; Shake not thy children! Thou hast many days!' 'Yet bring me here the Blessed Sacrament,' Once more he said. The brethren issued forth Save four that silent sat waiting the close. Ere long in grave procession they returned, Two deacons first, gold-vested; after these That priest who bare the Blessed Sacrament, And acolytes behind him, lifting lights. Then from his pallet Ceadmon slowly rose And worshipped Christ, his God, and reaching forth His right hand, cradled in his left, behold! Therein was laid God's Mystery. He spake: 'Stand ye in flawless charity of God T'ward me, my sons; or lives there in your hearts Memory the least of wrong?' The monks replied: 'Father, within us lives nor wrong, nor wrath, But love, and love alone.' And he: 'Not less Am I in charity with you, my sons, And all my sins of pride, and other sins, Humbly I mourn.' Then, bending the old head O'er the old hand, Ceadmon received his Lord To be his soul's viaticum, in might Leading from life that seems to life that is; And long, unpropped by any, kneeling hung And made thanksgiving prayer. Thanksgiving made, He sat upon his bed, and spake: 'How long Ere yet the monks begin their matin psalms?' 'That hour is nigh,' they answered; he replied, 'Then let us wait that hour,' and laid him down With those kine-tending and harp-mastering hands Crossed on his breast, and slept. Meanwhile the monks, The lights removed in reverence of his sleep, Sat mute nor stirred such time as in the Mass Between '_Orate Fratres_' glides away, And '_Hoc est Corpus Meum_.' Northward far The great deep, seldom heard so distant, roared Round those wild rocks half way to Bamborough Head; For now the mightiest spring-tide of the year, Following the magic of a maiden moon, Approached its height. Nearer, that sea which sobbed In many a cave by Whitby's winding coast, Or died in peace on many a sandy bar From river-mouth to river-mouth outspread, They heard, and mused upon eternity That circles human life. Gradual arose A softer strain and sweeter, making way O'er that sea-murmur hoarse; and they were ware That in the black far-shadowing church whose bulk Up-towered between them and the moon, the monks Their matins had begun. A little sigh That moment reached them from the central gloom Guarding the sleeper's bed; a second sigh Succeeded: neither seemed the sigh of pain: And some one said, 'He wakens.' Large and bright Over the church-roof sudden rushed the moon, And smote the cross above that sleeper's couch, And smote that sleeper's face. The smile thereon Was calmer than the smile of life. Thus died Ceadmon, the earliest bard of English song.

_KING OSWY OF NORTHUMBRIA, OR THE WIFE'S VICTORY_.

Oswy, King of Bernicia, being at war with his kinsman Oswin, slays him unarmed. He refuses to repent of this sin; yet at last, subdued by the penitence, humility, and charity of Eanfleda, his wife, repents likewise, and builds a monastery over the grave of Oswin. Afterwards he becomes a great warrior and dies a saint.

Young, beauteous, brave--the bravest of the brave-- Who loved not Oswin? All that saw him loved: Aidan loved most, monk of Iona's Isle, Northumbria's bishop next, from Lindisfarne Ruling in things divine. One morn it chanced That Oswin, noting how with staff in hand Old Aidan roamed his spiritual realm, footbare, Wading deep stream, and piercing thorny brake, Sent him a horse--his best. The Saint was pleased; But, onward while he rode, and, musing, smiled To think of these his honours in old age, A beggar claimed his alms. 'Gold have I none,' Aidan replied; 'this horse be thine!' The King, Hearing the tale, was grieved. 'Keep I, my lord, No meaner horses fit for beggar's use That thus my best should seem a thing of naught?' The Saint made answer: 'Beggar's use, my King! What was that horse? The foal of some poor mare! The least of men--the sinner--is God's child!' Then dropped the King on both his knees, and cried: 'Father, forgive me!' As they sat at meat Oswin was mirthful, and at jest and tale His hungry thanes laughed loud. But great, slow tears In silence trickled down old Aidan's face: These all men marked; yet no man question made. At last to one beside him Aidan spake In Irish tongue, unknown to all save them, 'God will not leave such meekness long on earth.'

Who loved not Oswin? Not alone his realm, Dëira, loved him, but Bernician lords Whose monarch, Oswy, was a man of storms, Fierce King albeit in youth baptized to Christ; At heart half pagan. Swift as northern cloud Through summer skies, he swept with all his host Down on the rival kingdom. Face to face The armies stood. But Oswin, when he marked His own a little flock 'mid countless wolves, Addressed them thus: 'Why perish, friends, for me? From exile came I: for my people's sake To exile I return, or gladlier die: Depart in peace.' He rode to Gilling Tower; And waited there his fate. Thither next day King Oswy marched, and slew him. Twelve days passed; Then Aidan, while through green Northumbria's woods Pensive he paced, steadying his doubtful steps, Felt death approaching. Giving thanks to God, The old man laid him by a church half raised Amid great oaks and yews, and, leaning there His head against the buttress, passed to God. They made their bishop's grave at Lindisfarne; But Oswin rested at the mouth of Tyne Within a wave-girt, granite promontory Where sea and river meet. For many an age The pilgrim from far countries came in faith To that still shrine--they called it 'Oswin's Peace,'-- Thither the outcast fled for sanctuary: The sick man there found health. Thus Oswin lived, Though dead, a benediction in the land.

What gentlest form kneels on the rain-washed ground From Gilling's keep a stone's-throw? Whose those hands Now pressed in anguish on a bursting heart, Now o'er a tearful countenance spread in shame? What purest mouth, but roseless for great woe, With zeal to youthful lovers never known Presses a new-made grave, and through the blades Of grass wind-shaken breathes her piteous prayer? Save from remorse came ever grief like hers? Yet how could ever sin, or sin's remorse, Find such fair mansion? Oswin's grave it is; And she that o'er it kneels is Eanfleda, Kinswoman of the noble dead, and wife To Oswin's murderer--Oswy. Saddest one And sweetest! Lo, that cloud which overhung Her cradle swathes once more in deeper gloom Her throne late won, and new-decked bridal bed. This was King Edwin's babe, whose natal star Shone on her father's pathway doubtful long, Shone there a line of light, from pagan snares Leading to Christian baptism. Penda heard-- Penda, that drew his stock from Odin's loins, Penda, that drank his wine from skulls of foes, Penda, fierce Mercia's king. He heard, and fell In ruin on the region. Edwin dead, Paulinus led the widow and her babe Back to that Kentish shore whereon had reigned Its grandsire Ethelbert. The infant's feet Pattered above the pavement of that church In Canterbury by Augustine raised; The child grew paler when Gregorian chants Shook the dim roofs. Gladly the growing girl Hearkened to stories of her ancestress Clotilda, boast of France, but weeping turned From legends whispered by her Saxon nurse Of Loke, the Spirit accursed that slanders gods, And Sinna, Queen of Hell. The years went by; The last had brought King Oswy's embassage With suit obsequious, 'Let the princess share With me her father's crown.' To simple hearts Changes come gently. Soon, all trust, she stood Before God's altar with her destined lord: Adown her finger while the bride-ring ran So slid into her heart a true wife's love: Rooted in faith, it ripened day by day-- And now the end was this! There as she knelt A strong foot clanged behind her. 'Weeping still! Up, wife of mine! If Oswin had not died His gracious ways had filched from me my realm, The base so loved his meekness!' Turning not She answered low: 'He died an unarmed man:' And Oswy: 'Fool that fought not when he might; At least his slaughtered troop had decked his grave! I scorned him for his grief that men should die; And, scorning him, I hated; yea, for that His blood is on my sword!' The priests of God Had faced the monarch and denounced his crime: They might as well have preached to ocean waves: He felt no anger: he but deemed them mad, And smiling went his way. Thus autumn passed: The queen--he knew it--when alone wept on: Near him the pale face smiled; the voice was sweet; Loving the service; the obedience full: Neither by words, by silence, nor by looks She chid him. Like some penitent she walked That mourns her own great sin. Yet Oswy's heart, Remorseless thus, had moods of passionate love: A warrior of his host, Tosti by name, Lay low, plague-stricken: kith and kin had fled: Whole days the king sustained upon his knees The sufferer's head, and cheered his heart with songs Of Odin, strangely blent with Christian hymns, While ofttimes stormy bursts of tears descended Upon that face upturned. Ministering he sat Till death the vigil closed. One winter night From distant chase belated he returned, And passed by Oswin's grave. The snow, new-fallen, Whitened the precinct. In the blast she knelt, While coldly glared the broad and bitter moon Upon those flying flakes that on her hair Settled, or on her thin, light raiment clung. She heard him not draw nigh. She only beat Her breast, and, praying, wept: 'Our sin, our sin!' There as the monarch stood a change came o'er him: Old, exiled days in Alba as a dream Redawned upon his spirit, and that look In Aidan's eyes when, binding first that cross Long by his pupil craved, around his neck, He whispered: 'He who serveth Christ, his Lord, Must love his fellow-man.' As when a stream, The ice dissolved, grows audible once more, So came to him those words. They dragged him down: He knelt beside his wife, and beat his breast, And said, 'My sin, my sin!' Till earliest morn Glimmered through sleet that twain wept on, prayed on:-- Was it the rising sun that lit at last The fair face upward lifted;--kindled there A lovelier dawn than o'er it blushed when first Dropped on her bridegroom's breast? Aloud she cried: 'Our prayer is heard: our penitence finds grace:' Then added: 'Let it deepen till we die! A monastery build we on this grave: So from this grave, while fleet the years, that prayer Shall rise both day and night, till Christ returns To judge the world--a prayer for him who died; A prayer for one who sinned, but sins no more.'

Where Gilling's long and lofty hill o'erlooks For leagues the forest-girdled plain, ere long A monastery stood. That self-same day In tears the penitential work began; In tears the sod was turned. The rugged brows Of March relaxed 'neath April's flying kiss: Again the violet rose, the thrush was loud; Mayday had come. Around that hallowed spot Full many a warrior met; some Christians vowed; Some muttering low of Odin. Near to these Stood one of lesser stature, keener eye, More fiery gesture. Splenetic, he marked, Christian albeit himself, those Christian walls By Saxon converts raised:--he was a Briton. Invisibly that morn a dusky crape O'erstretched the sky; and slowly swayed the bough Heavy with midnight rains. Through mist the woods Let out the witchery of their young fresh green Backed by the dusk of ruddy oaks that still Reserved at heart the old year's stubbornness, Yet blent it with that purple distance glimpsed Beyond the forest alleys. In a tent Finan sang Mass: his altar was that stone Which told where Oswin died. Before it knelt The king, the queen: alone their angels know Their thoughts that hour! The sacred rite complete, They raised their brows, and, hand-in-hand, made way To where, beyond the portal, shone blue skies, Nature's long-struggling smile at last divulged. The throng--with passion it had prayed for each-- Divided as they passed. In either face They saw the light of that conceded prayer, The peace of souls forgiven. From that day forth Hourly in Oswy's spirit soared more high The one true greatness. Flaming heats of soul, Through faith subjected to a law divine, Like fire, man's vassal, mastering iron ore, Learned their true work. The immeasurable strength Had found at once its master and its end, And, balanced thus while weighted, soared to God. In all his ways he prospered, work and word Yoked to one end. Till then the Kingdoms Seven, Opposed in interests as diverse in name, Had looked on nothing like him. Now, despite Mercia that frowned, they named him king of kings, Bretwalda; and the standard of the Seven In peace foreran his feet. The Spirits of might Before his vanguard winged their way in war, Scattering the foe; and in his peacefuller years Upon the aerial hillside high and higher The golden harvest clomb, waving delight On eyes upraised from winding rivers clear That shone with milky sails. His feet stood firm, For with his growing greatness ever grew His penitence. Still sang the cloistered choir, Year after year pleading o'er Oswin's tomb, 'To him who perished grant thy Vision, Lord; To him the slayer, penitence and peace; Let Oswin pray for Oswy:' Oswin prayed.

What answered Penda when the tidings came Of Oswy glorying in the yoke of Christ, Of Oswy's victories next? Grinding his teeth, He spake what no man heard. Then rumour rose Of demon-magic making Oswy's tongue Fell as his sword. 'Within the sorcerer's court,' It babbled, 'stood the brave East Saxon king: Upon his shoulder Oswy laid a hand Accursed and whispered in his ear. The king, Down sank, perforce, a Christian!' Lightning flashed From under Penda's gray and shaggy brows;-- 'Forth to Northumbria, son,' he cried, 'and back; And learn if this be true.' That son obeyed, Peada, to whose heart another's heart, Alcfrid's, King Oswy's son, was knit long since As David's unto Jonathan's. One time A tenderer heart had leaned, or seemed to lean, Motioning that way, Alfleda's, Alcfrid's sister, Younger than he six years. 'Twas so no more: No longer on Peada's eyes her eyes Rested well-pleased: not now the fearless hand Tarried in his contented. 'Sir and king,' Peada thus to Oswy spake, 'of old Thy child--then child indeed--would mount my knee; Now, when I seek her, like a swan she fleets That arches back its neck 'twixt snowy wings, And, swerving, sideway drifts. My lord and king, The child is maiden: give her me for wife!' Oswy made answer: 'He that serves not Christ Can wed no child of mine.' Alfleda then Dropping her broidery lifted on her sire Gently the dewy light of childlike eyes And spake, 'But he in time will worship Christ!' Then, without blush or tremor, to her work Softly returned. Silent her mother smiled. That moment, warned of God, from Lindisfarne Finan, unlooked for, entered. Week by week Reverend and mild he preached the Saviour-Lord: Grave-eyed, with listening face and forehead bowed, The prince gave ear, not like that trivial race Who catch the sense ere spoken, smile assent, And in a moment lose it. On his brow At times the apprehension dawned, at times Faded. Oft turned he to his Mercian lords:-- 'How trow ye, friends? He speaks of what he knows! Good tidings these! Each evening while I muse Distinct they shine like yonder mountain range; Each morning, mists conceal them.' Passed a month; Then suddenly, as one that wakes from dream, Peada rose: 'Far rather would I serve Thy Christ,' he said, 'and thus Alfleda lose, Than win Alfleda, and reject thy Christ.' He spake: old Finan first gave thanks to God, Who grants the pure heart valour to believe, Then took his hand and led him to that Cross On Heaven-Field raised beneath the Roman Wall, That cross King Oswald's standard in the fight, That cross Cadwallon's sentence as he fell, 'That cross which conquered;'--there to God baptized; Likewise his thanes and earls. Meantime, far off In Penda's palace-keep the revel raged, High feast of rites impure. At banquet sat The monarch and his chiefs; chant followed chant Bleeding with wars foregone. The day went by, And, setting ere its time, a sanguine sun Dipped into tumult vast of gathering storm That soon incumbent leant from tower to tower And shook them to their base. As high within The gladness mounted, meeting storm with storm, Till cried that sacrificial priest whose knife Had pierced the warrior victim's willing throat That morn, 'Already with the gods we feast! Hark! round Valhalla swell the phantom wars!' Ere ceased the shout applausive, from his seat Uprose the warrior Saxo, in his hand The goblet, in the other Alp, his sword, Pointing to heaven. 'To Odin health!' he cried; 'Would that this hour he rode into this hall! He should not hence depart till blood of his Had reddened Sleipner's flank, his snow-white steed: This sword would shed that blood!' Warriors sixteen Leaped up in wrath, and for a moment rage Rocked the huge hall. But Saxo waved his sword, And, laughing, shouted, 'Odin's sons, be still! Count it no sin to battle with high gods! Great-hearted they! They give the blow and take! To Odin who was ever leal as I?' As sudden as it rose the tumult fell: So ceased the storm without: but with it ceased The rapture and the madness, and the shout: The wine-cup still made circuit; but the song Froze in mid-air. Strange shadow hung o'er all: Neighbour to neighbour whispered: courtiers slid Through doors scarce open. Rumour had arrived, If true or false none knew. The morrow morn From Penda's court the bravest fled in fear, Questioning with white lips, 'Will he slay his son?' Or skulked at distance. Penda by the throat Catching a white-cheeked courtier, cried: 'The truth! What whisper they in corners?' On his knees That courtier made confession. Penda then, 'Live, since my son is yet a living man! A Christian, say'st thou? Let him serve his Christ! That man whom ever most I scorned is he Who vows him to the service of some god, Yet breaks his laws; for that man walks, a lie. My son shall live, and after me shall reign: Northumbrian realm shall die!' Thus Penda spake And sent command from tower and town to blow Instant the trumpet of his last of wars, Fanning from Odin's hall with airs ice-cold Of doom the foes of Odin. 'Man nor child,' He sware,' henceforth shall tread Northumbrian soil, Nor hart nor hind: I spare the creeping worm: My scavenger is he,' The Mercian realm Rose at his call, innumerable mass Of warriors iron-armed. East Anglia sent Her hosts in aid. Apostate Ethelwald, Though Oswy's nephew, joined the hostile league, And thirty chiefs beside that ruled by right Princedom or province. Mightier far than these Old Cambria, brooding o'er the ancestral wrong, The Saxon's sin original, met his call, And vowed her to the vengeance. Bravest hearts Hate most the needless slaughter. Oswy mused: 'Long since too much of blood is on this hand: Shall I for pride or passion risk once more Northumbria, my mother;--rudely stain Her pretty babes with blood?' To Penda then, Camped on the confines of the adverse realms, He sent an embassage of reverend men, Warriors and priests. Before them, staff in hand, Peaceful, with hoary brows and measured tread, Twelve heralds paced. Twelve caskets bare they heaped With gems and gold, and thus addressed the King: 'Lord of the Mercian realm, renowned in arms! Our lord, Northumbria's monarch, bids thee hail: He never yet in little thing or great Hath wronged thy kingdom; yet thy peace he woos: Accept the gifts he sends thee, and, thus crowned, Depart content.' Penda with backward hand Waved them far from him, and vouchsafed no word. In sadness they returned: but Oswy smiled Hearing their tale, and said: 'My part is done: Let God decide the event,' He spake, and took The caskets twelve, and placed them, side by side, Before the altar of his chiefest church, And vowed to raise to God twelve monasteries, In honour of our Lord's Apostles Twelve, On greenest upland, or in sylvan glade Where purest stream kisses the richest mead. His vow recorded, sudden through the church Ran with fleet foot a lady mazed with joy, Crying, 'A maiden babe! and lo, the queen Late dying lives and thrives!' That eve the king Bestowed on God the new-born maiden babe, Laying her cradled 'mid those caskets twelve, Six at each side; and said: 'For her nor throne Nor marriage bower! She in some holy house Shall dwell the Bride of Christ. But thou, just God, This day avenge my people!' Windwaed field Heard, distant still, that multitudinous foe Trampling the darksome ways. With pallid face Morning beheld their standards, raven-black-- Penda had thus decreed, before him sending Northumbria's sentence. On a hill, thick-set Stood Oswy's army, small, yet strong in faith, A wedge-like phalanx, fenced by rocks and woods; A river in its front. His standards white Sustained the Mother-Maid and Babe Divine: From many a crag his altars rose, choir-girt, And crowned by incense wreath. An hour ere noon, That river passed, in thunder met the hosts; But Penda, straitened by that hilly tract, Could wield not half his force. Sequent as waves On rushed they: Oswy's phalanx like a cliff Successively down dashed them. Day went by: At last the clouds dispersed: the westering sun Glared on the spent eyes of those Mercian ranks Which in their blindness each the other smote, Or, trapped by hidden pitfalls, fell on stakes, And died blaspheming. Little help that day Gat they from Cambria. She on Heaven-Field height Had felt her death-wound, slow albeit to die. The apostate Ethelwald in panic fled: The East Anglians followed. Swollen by recent rains, And choked with dead, the river burst its bound, And raced along the devastated plain Till cry of drowning horse and shriek of man Rang far and farther o'er that sea of death, A battle-field but late. This way and that Briton or Mercian where he might escaped Through flood or forest. Penda scorned to fly: Thrice with extended arms he met and cursed The fugitives on rushing. As they passed He flung his crownèd helm into the wave, And bit his brazen shield, above its rim Levelling a look that smote with chill like death Their hearts that saw it. Yet one moment more He sat like statue on some sculptured horse With upraised hand, close-clenched, denouncing Heaven: Then burst his mighty heart. As stone he fell Dead on the plain. Not less in after times Mercian to Mercian said, 'Without a wound King Penda died, although on battle-field, Therefore with Odin Penda shares not feast.' Thus pagan died old Penda as he lived: Yet Penda's sons were Christian, kindlier none; His daughters nuns; and lamb-like Mercia's House, Lion one while, made end. King Oswy raised His monasteries twelve: benigner life Around them spread: wild waste, and robber bands Vanished: the poor were housed, the hungry fed: And Oswy sent his little new-born babe Dewed with her mother's tear-drops, Eanfleda, Like some young lamb with fillet decked and flower, Yet dedicated not to death, but life, To Hilda sent on Whitby's sea-washed hill, Who made her Bride of Christ. The years went by, And Oswy, now an old king, glory-crowned, His country from the Mercian thraldom loosed And free from north to south, in heart resolved A pilgrim, Romeward faring with bare feet, To make his rest by Peter's tomb and Paul's. God willed not thus: within his native realm The sickness unto death clasped him with hold Gentle but firm. Long sleepless, t'ward the close Amid his wanderings smiling, from the couch He stretched a shrivelled hand, and pointing said, 'Who was it fabled she had died in age? In all her youthful beauty holy and pure, Lo, where she kneels upon the wintry ground, The snow-flakes circling round her, yet with face Bright as a star!' so spake the king, and taking Into his heart that vision, slept in peace. His daughter, abbess then on Whitby's height, Within her church interred her father's bones Beside her grandsire's, Edwin. Side by side They rested, one Bernicia's king, and one Dëira's--great Northumbrian sister realms; Long foes, yet blended by that mingling dust.

_THE VENGEANCE OF THE MONKS OF BARDENEY_.

Osthryda, Queen of Mercia, translates the relics of her uncle, Oswald of Northumberland, to the Abbey of Bardeney. The monks refuse them admittance because King Oswald had conquered and kept for one year Lindsay, a province of Mercia. Though hourly expecting the destruction of their Abbey, they will yield neither to threats nor to supplications, nor even to celestial signs and wonders. At last, being convinced by the reasoning of a devout man, they repent of their anger.

Silent, with gloomy brows in conclave sat The monks of Bardeney, nigh the eastern sea;-- Rumour, that still outruns the steps of ill, Smote on their gates with news: 'Osthryda comes To bury here her royal uncle's bones, Northumbrian Oswald.' Oswald was a Saint; Had loosed from Pagan bonds that Christian land His own by right. But Oswald had subdued Lindsay, a Mercian province; and the monks Were sons of Mercia leal and true. Osthryda, Northumbrian born, had wedded Mercia's King; Therefore the monks of Bardeney pondered thus: 'This Mercian Queen spurns her adopted country! Must Mercia therefore build her conqueror's tomb? Though earth and hell cried "Ay," it should not be!' Thus mused the brethren till the sun went down: Then lo! beyond a vista in the woods Drew nigh a Bier, black-plumed, with funeral train: Thereon the stern monks gazed, and gave command To close the Abbey's gate. Beside that gate Tent-roofed that Bier remained. Before them soon Stood up the royal herald. Thus he spake: 'Ye sacred monks of Bardeney's Abbey, hail! Osthryda, wife of Ethelred our King, Prays that God's peace may keep this House forever. The Queen has hither brought, by help of God, King Oswald's bones, and sues for them a grave Within this hallowed precinct.' Answer came: 'King Oswald, living, was Northumbria's King; King Oswald, by the pride of life seduced, Wrested from Mercia's sceptre Lindsay's soil; Therefore in Lindsay's soil King Oswald, dead, May never find repose.' Before them next Three earls advanced full-armed, and spake loud-voiced: 'Our Queen is consort of the Mercian King; Ye, monks, are Mercian subjects! Sirs, beware! Our King and Queen have loved you well till now, And ranked your abbey highest in their realm: But hearts ingrate can sour the mood of love; And Ethelred, though mild as summer skies When mildly used, once angered'----Answer came: 'We know it, and await our doom, content: If Mercia's King contemns his realm, more need That Mercia's priests her confessors should die: In Bardeney's church King Oswald ne'er shall rest: Ye have your answer, Earls!' Through that dim hall Ere long a gentler embassage made way, Three priests; arrived, they knelt, and, reverent, spake: 'Fathers and brethren, Oswald was a Saint! He loosed his native land from pagan thrall: Churches and convents everywhere he built: His relics, year by year, grow glorious more Through miracles and signs. Fathers revered, Within this sanctuary beloved of God Vouchsafe his dust interment!' They replied: 'We know that Oswald is a Saint with God: We know he freed his realm from pagan thrall; We know that churches everywhere he built; We know that from his relics Grace proceeds As light from sun and moon. In heaven a crown Rests on Saint Oswald's head: yet here on earth King Oswald's foot profaned our Mercian bound: Therefore in Mercian earth he finds not grave.' Silent those priests withdrew. An hour well-nigh Went by in silence. Then with forehead crowned And mourner's veil, and step of one that mourns, The Queen advanced, a lady at each side, And 'mid the circle stood, and thus implored: 'Not as your Sovereign come I, holy Sirs, Since all are equal in the House of God; Nor stand I here a stranger. Many a day In this your church, I knelt, while yet a child; Then too, as now, within my breast there lived The tenderest of its ardours and the best, Zeal for my kinsman's fame. That time how oft I heard my Father, Oswy, cry aloud, "O Brother, had I walked but in thy ways My foot had never erred!" In maiden youth I met with one who shared my loyal zeal, Mercian himself: 'twas thus he won my heart: My royal husband shared it; shares this hour My trust that 'mid the altars reared by us To grace this chiefest Minster of our realm May rest the relics of our household Saint-- To spurn them from your threshold were to shame.' She spake: benign and soft the answering voice: 'Entreat us not, thou mourner true and kind, Lest we, by pity from the straight path drawn, Sin more than thou. Thou know'st what thing love is, Thus loving one who died before thy birth! Up to the measure of high love and fit Thou lov'st him for this cause, because thy heart Hath never rested on base love and bad: Lady, a sterner severance monks have made: Not base and bad alone do they reject, But lesser good for better and for best: Therefore what yet remains they love indeed: A single earthly love is theirs unblamed, Their Country! Lo, the wild-bird loves her nest, Lions their caves:--to us God gave a Country. What heart of man but loves that mother-land Whose omnipresent arms are round him still In vale and plain; whose voice in every stream; Whose breath his forehead cools; whose eyes with joy Regard her offspring issuing forth each morn On duteous tasks; to rest each eve returning? And who that loves her but must hate her foes? Lady, accept God's Will, nor strive by prayer To change it. In our guest-house rest this night, Thou, and thy train.'

Severe the Queen replied: 'Yea, in thy guest-house I will lodge this night, Unvanquished, undiscouraged, not to cease From prayer: of that be sure. I make henceforth My prayer to God, not man. To Him I pray, That Lord of all, Who changes at His will The stony heart to flesh.' She spake: then turned On those old faces, keenlier than before, Her large slow eyes; and instant in her face The sadness deepened: but the wrath was gone. That sadness said, 'Love then as deep as mine, And grief like mine, in other breasts may spring From source how different!' Long she gazed, like child That knows not she is seen to gaze, with looks As though she took that hoary-headed band Into her sorrowing heart. Silent she sighed; Then passed into the guest-house with her train: There prayed all night for him, that Saint in heaven Ill-honoured upon earth. Within their church Meantime the monks the 'Dies Iræ' sang, The yellow tapers ranged as round a corse, And Penitential Psalms in order due. Their rite was for the living: ere the time They sang the obsequies of sentenced men, Foreboding wrath to come. Sad Fancy heard The flames up-rushing o'er their convent home, The ruin of their church late-built, the wreck It might be of their Order. Fierce they knew That Mercian royal House! Against their King They hurled no ban: venial they deemed his crime: 'He moves within the limits of his right, Though wrongly measuring right. He sees but this, His subjects break his laws. Some sin of youth It may be hides from him a right more high:'-- Thus spake they in their hearts. While rival thus The brethren and the Queen sent up their prayer, And sacred night hung midway in her course, Behold, there fell from God tempest and storm Buffeting that abbey's walls. The woods around, Devastated by stress of blast on blast, Howled like the howling of wild beasts when fire Invests their ambush, and their cubs late-born Blaze in red flame. Trembling, the strong-built towers Echoed the woodland moans. All night the Queen, Propped by those two fair Seraphs, Faith and Love, Prayed on in hope, or hearing not that storm, Or mindful that where danger most abounds There God is nearest still. Meantime the Tent Covering that royal Bier, unshaken stood Beside the unyielding abbey-gates close-barred, Like something shielded by a heavenly charm: When morning came, shattered all round it lay Both trunk and bough; but in the rising sun The storm-drop shook not on that snowy shrine.