[304] We have surely passed the bounds of history when Robert, accompanied by two other knights, charges the enemy, slays the foremost (“fortissimi qui ante aciem quasi defensores stabant”), puts Donald and the rest to flight, “et sic incruentam victoriam, Deo propitio, meritis sancti Cuthberti feliciter obtinuit.” The Chronicler says that Eadgar “þet land mid stranglicum feohte gewann.”
[305] Fordun, v. 26. “Ab ipso quidem ipse Donaldus captus est et cæcatus, ac carceri perpetuo damnatur.” “Ipso” is the younger Eadgar; this treatment of Donald would have been more pardonable in the elder. See more in Robertson, i. 159.
[306] See Robertson, i. 159, and N. C. vol. i. p. 529; vol. ii. p. 449; vol. iii. p. 431; vol. iv. p. 170.
[307] See Mon. Angl. v. 163, 165.
[308] Will. Malms. v. 400. “Captus vel perpetuis compedibus detentus, ingenue pœnituit; et ad mortem veniens, cum ipsis vinculis se tumulari mandavit, professus se plexum merito pro fratricidii delicto.” Cf. the burial of Grimbald in N. C. vol. ii. p. 273.
[309] Chron. Petrib. 1097. “Eadgar æþeling … þone cyng Dufenal út adræfde, and his mæg Eadgar, se wæs Melcolmes sunu cynges and Margarite þære cwenan, he þær on þæs cynges Willelmes heldan to cynge sette.” I do not find the words in Italics represented either by Fordun or by Mr. Robertson. They are not forgotten by Sir F. Palgrave, English Commonwealth, ii. cccxxxiv.
[310] The Chronicler tells us that Eadgar “syþþan ongean into Engleland fór.” And he had just before drawn a vivid picture of the state of England; “Ðis wæs on eallon þingan swiðe hefigtyme geár, and ofer geswincfull on ungewederan, þa man oððe tilian sceolde oððe eft tilða gegaderian, and on ungyldan þa næfre ne ablunnon.”
[311] Fordun, v. 26.
[312] Ib. This grant is made “episcopo et suis successoribus Dunelmensibus,” in distinction to the grant of Coldingham, which was “monachis Dunelmensibus.”
[313] Ib. “De licentia regis ad terram a rege sibi datam in Laudonia moratus est, et dum castellum ibidem ædificare niteretur, a provincialibus subito et baronibus tandem Dunelmensibus circumventus, eodem Ranulfo episcopo agente, captus est; in qua tamen captione magnam suæ virtutis memoriam apud totius regionis incolas dereliquit.”