Although they appear to have been ignorant of the use of letters, yet there is but little doubt that they used certain signs, or characters, which they were able to interpret. Some of these Runic hieroglyphics seem to have been engraven upon their swords. Their war-songs were committed to memory, and it is probable that many a one ranked high amongst their minstrels, who possessed no other talent than that of remembering and repeating these ancient lays. It might be that they were just enabled to form characters clear enough in their resemblance to some natural object, which, when inscribed upon the rugged monumental stone, bore some allusion to the name or bravery of the chief whose memory it perpetuated. Their only books seem to have been the bark of trees; the rind of the beech their favourite register; a tablet on which the rustic chronicler of the present day still makes the mark of his fair one's name, in characters only legible to himself. In point of civilization, they were at this time centuries behind the Britons, and an old author, describing them about the fifth century, says, "You see amongst them as many piratical leaders as you behold rowers, for they all command, obey, teach, and learn the art of pillage. Hence, after your greatest caution, still greater care is requisite. This enemy is fiercer than any other; if you be unguarded, they attack; if prepared, they elude you. They despise the opposing, and destroy the unwary; if they pursue, they overtake; if they fly, they escape. Shipwrecks discipline them, not deter; they do not merely know, they are familiar with, all the dangers of the sea; a tempest gives them security and success, for it divests the meditated land of the apprehension of a descent. In the midst of waves and threatening rocks they rejoice at their peril, because they hope to surprise." "Dispersed into many bodies," adds Zosimus, "they plundered by night, and when day appeared, they concealed themselves in the woods, feasting on the booty they had gained."[2]
When the Saxons first approached the British coast, they issued out from the mouth of the Elbe, in wicker boats covered with leather, which seem to have been but little better than the coracles used by the ancient Britons. These were so light, that they found but little difficulty in carrying them overland, from one river or creek to another, then paddling their way under cover of the banks, wherever sufficient water was to be found, until at last they came unaware upon the natives. The chiules or keels which they possessed at the time they were called upon to aid Vortigern, were capable of containing above a hundred men each, a wonderful improvement on the frail barks with which they first ventured into the British seas. Such as we have here described them, were the tribe destined to overthrow an ancient race, whom the Romans never wholly subjugated.
[CHAPTER IX.]
HENGIST—HORSA—ROWENA AND VORTIGERN.
"They bargained for Thanet with Hengist and Horsa,
Their aggrandizement was to us disgraceful,
After the destroying secret with the slaves at the confluent stream,
Conceive the intoxication at the great banquet of Mead,
Conceive the deaths in the great hour of necessity;
Conceive the fierce wounds—the tears of the women—
The grief that was excited by the weak chief (Vortigern);
Conceive the sadness that will be revolving to us,
When the brawlers of Thanet shall be our princes."
Ancient Welsh Poem—Seventh Century.
We have no account of the preliminary arrangements between the British king, and the Saxon chiefs, when the latter arrived with three ships, and landed at Ebbs-fleet, a spot which now lies far inland, though at that period the Wanstum was navigable for large vessels, and formed a broad barrier between the Island of Thanet and the mainland of Kent. Vortigern and his chieftains were assembled in council when the Saxons appeared, and Hengist and Horsa were summoned before them. The Saxon ships, which contained about three hundred soldiers, were drawn up beside the shore, where the adventurers anxiously awaited the issue of the interview between their leaders and the British king. Such a meeting as this could scarcely result from chance; the time of landing—the assembled council—the attendance of Hengist and Horsa, all bear evidence of some previous understanding between the parties, similar to what we have before alluded to. Vortigern first interrogated the Saxons as to the nature of their creed; Hengist enumerated the names of the gods they worshipped, and further added, that they also dedicated the fourth and sixth days in the week to Woden and Frea. Inference might be drawn from the reply of Vortigern, that the Britons were already Christians, though such a conclusion ought, doubtless, to be limited in its application to the inhabitants of our island, for we have evidence that all were not.
It was agreed that the Saxons were to assist the Britons, to drive the Scots and Picts out of the island—that for such service they were to receive food and clothing, and when not engaged in war they were to be stationed in Ruithina, for by that name was the Isle of Thanet called by the ancient Britons. There is no evidence that Vortigern intended to give up this island, at that period, to the Saxons; the arrangement he made had nothing new in it. Centuries before, the Britons had crossed the sea, and fought in the wars of the Gauls; they had also aided the Romans: it was a common custom for one nation to hire the assistance of another; when the time of service was over, the soldiers either returned to their own country, or settled down amongst the native tribes, whom they had defended, as in Britain, many of the Romans and Gauls had done before-time. In this case, however, the result proved very different, though it would have been difficult for any one endowed with the keenest penetration to have foreseen that three small ships, probably containing in all not more than three hundred men, and these willing to render assistance on very humble terms, should point out a way over the waves, by which their companions in arms should come, and conquer, and take possession of a country which it had cost the Romans so many years of hard warfare to subjugate. The Saxons appear to have done their duty; fighting was their every-day trade: their robust natures had received no touch of Roman refinement, they earned their bread with the points of their swords, and the blows of their heavy battle-axes; they drove back the northern hordes beyond the Roman walls, and they soon grew into great favour with the Britons. All this was very natural to a nation now making rapid progress in civilization, and one wealthy enough to pay others for fighting its battles—it was a much easier life to sit comfortably in their walled cities, to follow the chase, and enjoy the luxury of the bath, than to be chasing the Picts and Scots from one county to another, through forests and morasses, and over hills and dales, day after day; but to do this securely more aid was required. Hengist and Horsa had left numbers of their countrymen behind, who would willingly fight on the same terms which they had accepted. Vortigern agreed to the proposition they made, and more Saxons were speedily sent for. Seventeen ships soon arrived, and on the deck of one of these vessels, from the stern of which the banner of the white horse waved, stood a conqueror whose long silken locks blew out in the breeze, unencumbered by either helmet or crest, who bore neither sword, spear, shield nor battle-axe, but was armed only with a pair of beautiful blue eyes, and a face of such strange and surpassing beauty as had never before been mirrored in our island waves: such was the Saxon Princess Rowena, destined to win more broad acres from the Britons without striking a single blow, than all the northern barbarians had ever gained by their numberless invasions. On the landing of his daughter, accompanied by so many of her countrymen, a great feast would, of course, be held to celebrate the event, and there Vortigern and the British chiefs would, beyond doubt, be assembled to welcome their new allies; there is nothing remarkable in such an occurrence, nor in Rowena drinking to her father's royal guest, nor in the island king falling at once in love with the beautiful barbarian. Her drinking his health in a tongue to which he was a stranger, her natural bashfulness, on first standing in the presence of the British king—her confusion when she found her language was not understood by him—all, doubtless, contributed to make her look more interesting. Then above all to know that the blood of Woden flowed in her veins, that she had descended from a hero, whose renown in battle had raised him to the grandeur of a god, in the idolatrous estimation of his own countrymen; all these things coupled together had surely romance and poetry enough about them, aided by such a beautiful countenance, to turn a calmer brain than Vortigern's, heated as his was by love and wine. He had no peace until he married her; her image seems to have haunted his memory, and caused him more uneasiness until she became his wife, than all the inroads of the northern hordes had hitherto done. Even before this period, all had gone on smoothly and evenly between the Britons and the Saxons; but now Love himself had landed amongst the last-comers, and received the warmest welcome of them all. Who could dream that he but heralded the way for slaughter, conquest, and death to follow in, or that the beauty he accompanied should be the cause of bloodshed between the Saxons and the Britons?—yet so it was.
