[478] Hoveden 1196, p. 436.
[479] Hoveden 1196, p. 346. He calls the king of Man, Reginald, son of Somarled. Reginald, the son of Godfrey, was at that time king of Man; and the son of Somarled was hardly more than a subordinate king of the Sudreys, as he had been defeated in a contest for superiority by his brother Angus in 1192 (Chron. Man). An account of some of these transactions is also contained in the Flatey Book (Col. de Reb. Alb., p. 351–54), but it is confused. For instance, after beginning with the death of Harald the younger, the book makes the elder Harald yield Caithness to Harald the younger after the expedition of William to Eystein’s Dal. The account of this expedition must therefore have been misplaced; and it probably ought to be referred to the time of William’s first invasion of Caithness. Some idea may be formed of the formidable power of these northern magnates from the fact that Harald collected 6000 men to oppose William; whose army when he invaded England in 1174, only appears to have numbered 8000.
[480] “His tongue was cut out, and a knife stuck into his eyes. The bishop invoked the Virgin Saint Trodlheima during his torments. Then he went up a hill, and a woman brought him to the place where St. Trodlheima rests. There the bishop got recovery both of his speech and sight”—Flatey Book. Ignorant of the merits of the Virgin Saint, Fordun only says, “Usus linguæ et alterius occulorum in aliquo sibi remansit.” A certain Dr. John Stackbolle profited by a similar miracle in Ireland, he having recovered his sight and speech before the altar of our Lady of Novan, after his tongue had been cut out, and his eyes torn out, by order of Sir Thomas Bathe. (Statute of Kilkenny, p. 25, note U; in Tracts relating to Ireland, I.A.S., vol. 2.)
[481] Fordun, l. 8, c. 59–62. Flatey Book, Col. de Reb. Alb., p. 351–54.
[482] Chron. Mel. 1198, 1201, 1205.
[483] Hoveden 1199, p. 450–51.
[484] Hoveden 1199, p. 451.
[485] Hoveden 1199, p. 453.
[486] Hoveden 1200, p. 454, 461. From the distinguished deputation which John dispatched to William when the king of Scotland came to Lincoln, it is not improbable that one of the reasons why William had hitherto refused to meet John was a reluctance on the part of the latter to carry out Richard’s Charter of Privileges. In the Introduction to Robertson’s Index, p. xii., No. 3, is the following entry:—“Charta Johannis Regis Angliæ, missa Willielmo Regi Scotiæ de tractatu maritagii inter Regem Franciæ et filiam Willielmi Regis Scotiæ.” There is some mistake here (probably an error of a copyist), for Philip Augustus was never in a condition during the reign of John to marry one of William’s daughters. But if the tractatus maritagii alludes to the proposed betrothal of Alexander to a French princess, the charter may have been a confirmation by John of Richard’s Charter of Privileges, dispatched in haste with the deputation to bring about a reconciliation with William, and to break off the proposed alliance with France.
[487] Hoveden 1200, p. 461. William swore upon the archbishop’s cross, because there was no “sacred book” at hand, says the Bridlington Chronicle in Documents, etc., relating to Hist. Scot., No. xxi., sec. 35, p. 66. The decision of the question about the counties was again put off till the following Michaelmas, and it is difficult to say whether it was ever again raised during the reign of William, as after the conclusion of Hoveden’s work, no other chronicler alludes to the subject. Wendover succeeds to Hoveden, whose loss is great for the historian of Scotland; as the manner in which Wendover supplies his place can be appreciated from the description of the meeting at Lincoln, in which the latter, after copying the account of his predecessor, characteristically omits the reservation, “Salvo jure suo!” The want of a northern chronicler is very much felt, as it will be generally found that the monastic writers are most accurate in their narration of events that occurred in their own neighbourhood. From exalting Brompton, who wrote at the close of the fourteenth century, to the position of a contemporary writer, and from some other similar oversights, Dr. Lingard’s version of these transactions is singularly inaccurate. Vide Appendix L, pt. 2.