Vortigern and Rowena.
The Saxons were, shortly after, the sole possessors of the isle of Thanet, and the influence of Vortigern's pretty pagan wife was soon visible to the jealous eyes of the Britons. Hengist and Horsa began to demand more liberal supplies, and to cast a longing glance upon Kent; but the Britons had spirit enough to resist such a concession, and here we for a time lose sight of Vortigern and Rowena, though it is highly probable that they retreated into the isle of Thanet, then held by the Saxons, from the coming storm. Vortimer and Catigern, the two sons of Vortigern by a former marriage, now took the command of the Britons, with whom the Roman settlers in the island appear to have joined; all resolved to make head in one common cause, and to drive the Saxons out of Britain. Hengist and Horsa, to strengthen their force, formed a league with their old brothers in plunder, the Scots and Picts, and war once more broke out in the land, more terrible in its results than it had ever been in the struggles between the Britons and the Romans. What few fragments we find in the old Welsh bards, alluding to these ancient battles, are filled with dreadful descriptions, and awful images of slaughter. We are borne onward, from the shout of the onset, to the mighty shock when the opposing ranks close in battle, when blade clashes against blade, when dark frowning men sink with gory seams on their foreheads, and tall chieftains rock and struggle together in the combat, and as each knee is brought to the ground, it rests upon a bed of gore, while battle-axes, as they are uplifted, and glitter a moment in the air, shed down crimson drops. Then gloomy biers pass by, on which "red-men" are borne; and ravens come sweeping through the dim twilight which settles over that ancient battle-field, to prey upon the fallen warriors. Such wailings as these must have caused the heart of Vortigern to have beat painfully, even when the fair head of Rowena was pillowed upon it, and to have made him sigh, and regret that such beauty had been purchased at so great a sacrifice. At the battle of the Ford-of-Eagles, long after called Eaglesford, but now Aylesford, in Kent, did Horsa, the brother of Hengist, fall; he whose banner of the white-horse had waved over many a victorious field, and been the terror of the northern tribes, now fell to rise no more. On the side of the Britons, also perished Catigern, and a sore reproach must his death have been to his father, Vortigern, when he heard the tidings! for, alas, he was wasting the hours in soft dalliance with his blue-eyed idolater, while his sons were fighting and falling in defence of their country. Vortimer had now the sole command of the Britons, and, if the ancient bards are to be believed, it was by his hand that Horsa was slain. A sad pang must such a rumour as this have sent through the aching heart of poor Rowena, as she gazed upon her husband, and in him beheld the father of her uncle's murderer, the destroyer of her father's companion in arms—he who had shared the fortunes of Hengist, from the hour when first the prow of their ship ploughed together the sands on the British shore. One of our old chroniclers (Roger de Wendover) states that, on a future day, Rowena bitterly revenged the death of Horsa, by bribing one of Vortimer's servants to poison her son-in-law, and that thus fell, in the bloom of life, one of the noblest of the British warriors—a victim to the vengeance of his step-mother. Whether this is true or not, it is now impossible to decide, so much are the statements of our early historians at variance; one thing, however, is clear, the Saxons were defeated, and compelled to escape in their long chiules, or ships; nor do they appear to have returned until after the death of Vortimer, when, at the suggestion of Rowena, her father was again invited to Britain, and this time Hengist returned with a larger force than had hitherto landed in our island. When the Saxon landed, he made an offer of peace to the Britons, and invited the chiefs to a feast, which he gave on the occasion. Both parties were to come without their arms, such was the command issued by Hengist, and enforced on the part of the British leaders by Vortigern, who was also present. The treacherous Saxon had, however, given orders to his followers to conceal short swords or daggers under their garments, and when he gave the signal, to fall upon and slaughter every Briton present, with the exception of Vortigern. The feast commenced, the wine-cup circulated, the Saxon and British chiefs sat side by side; those who had fought together, face to face and hand to hand, were drinking from the same cup, for it appears to have been so contrived that a false-friend should be placed between every foe. Vortigern seems to have sat secure, and never once dreamed of the treachery that surrounded him; and, perhaps, even before the smile had well faded from Hengist's face, as he talked of the pleasant days that were yet in store for his unsuspecting son-in-law, he turned round and exclaimed: "Nimed eure saxes," "unsheath your swords," and in a few moments after three hundred British chiefs and nobles lay lifeless upon the ground. The motto prefixed to our present chapter is from one of the poems of Golyddan, a Welsh bard, who lived within a century or two after this cold-blooded massacre, a deed which must for many a long year afterwards have rankled in the minds of the Britons, and which their bards would never allow to slumber, whenever they sang the deeds of their departed chieftains. Doubtless Rowena was present at that bloody banquet, and with a cruel look confronted "the weak chief," as he stood pale and horror-stricken, glancing from father to daughter, and cursing the hour, as he looked into the face of the beautiful heathen, whose blue eyes could perchance gaze, without shrinking for a moment, upon those wan and clay-cold countenances that were now upturned in death. Though long years have passed away, and the hawthorns have put out their blossoms above a thousand times since the fatal May in which this terrible tragedy took place, still the eye of the imagination can scarcely conjure up the scene without a shiver. It is supposed to have been near Stonehenge where this cruel butchery took place, probably within the very circle of those Druidical monuments, some of which still stand, though at that period the whole temple was, doubtless, perfect. If, as we are led to believe, many of the British chieftains were Christians, there was something in keeping with the stern character of the Saxon pagans, in thus slaughtering their enemies in the presence of the very altars on which the islanders had formerly sacrificed to the gods they themselves worshipped, and such an act might, in their eyes, hallow even this savage revenge. To slaughter all who did not believe in their heathen creed, was with the Pagan Saxons a religious duty; they believed such acts were acceptable to their gods.
We shudder at the very thought of such a deed—nearly fourteen centuries have elapsed since the sands of Salisbury Plain drank in the blood of these victims. Yet we startle to see the dead thus piled together around the grey old stones which the footsteps of Time have all but worn away, as if we still looked calmly on while they were brought bleeding to our very thresholds. Still the historian of the past might mingle his sympathy, and carry back many a deed which has since then been done, to be rolled up and mourned over in the same great catalogue of cruelty. The shadows that move through the old twilight of time, bend under the weight of the "red-men" that are borne upon the bier. The form of Hengist seems to stand leaning upon the red pillars that mark the entrance to the Hall of Murder in Valhalla, as if wondering "why the chariot wheels so long delayed," and the guests that still tarried behind, hastened to the banquet of sculls, which stood awaiting their coming, in the halls of Odin. For such a deed stamps him as a fitting servitor in that horrible hall of slaughter.
At Crayford in Kent, another great battle was fought between the Saxons and the Britons, in which the latter were defeated with great slaughter, and so complete was the victory, that the remnant of the British army were compelled to retreat into London. But with all his success, Hengist was unable to keep possession of little more than the county of Kent, and the island of Thanet, and even this, it appears, he would have found it difficult to retain, but for the dissensions which were ever breaking out amongst the British chiefs. The Britons were able at this very time to send out twelve thousand armed men into Gaul, to war against the Visigoths, so that there can be but little doubt that, had unity reigned amongst them, they would have found no difficulty in driving out the Saxons, as they had done before-time. The island seems to have been so divided at this period, and under the command of so many different chiefs or kings, that they cared not to bring their united forces to bear upon one corner of the kingdom, especially that where the presence of Vortigern still appears to have been acknowledged; for it is probable that the British king, after the death of his son, settled down in his old age, amongst the Saxons, "a sadder and a wiser man." We even hope, in spite of his misdeeds, and the miseries into which his love for a fair face plunged the whole island of Britain, that there is no truth in the statements of our early Saxon historians, who have left it on record that he fled into Wales, where, hated alike "by slave and free-man, monk and layman, strong and weak, small and great," he at last perished with the fair Rowena, and all his family, in those flames which destroyed the fortress where he had sought shelter from his enemies. Yet many venerable names might be brought forward in support of this story of the terrible end of an ancient British king. A dreadful fate for fair Rowena, if true, and all the evidence is sadly in its favour, and from our hearts, we cannot help pitying the poor girl, who with downcast eyes, as she held the golden goblet in her hand, listened to the promises which the island monarch poured into her ears; who stepped from the deck of her father's galley, to share a throne, yet appears never to have forsaken her husband in all the varied vicissitudes of his chequered life; but through battle, flood, and fire, to have trod the same perilous path with him, hand in hand, sometimes, it may be, when alone, shedding tears at the remembrance of her father's cruelties, weeping one hour, for the death of her own friends, and the next, comforting Vortigern for the loss of those he mourned. We picture her, as in the joyousness of her heart she left her native home to meet her father—no mother appears to have accompanied her—and, pagan as she was, we know not how pure and holy the feelings of that heart might be; for, red with blood as the hands of Hengist were, they had, doubtless, many a time parted her silken ringlets, as he stooped down and imprinted a father's kiss upon her lips. Perhaps a tear stole down the deep furrows which time and care had ploughed in the weather-beaten countenance of Hengist, as he embraced her when she first landed on our island shore, as in her pure countenance he traced the image of her mother, whom he had once so fondly loved. Poor Rowena! she might have moved like a ministering angel, through all the terrors of those stormy times, her mild blue eyes beaming comfort on every woe-begone countenance on which they glanced—now soothing the restless slumber of her father, as he started up, dreaming of some new revenge, and by her falling tears, and low-breathed whispers, chasing away the dark demon from his couch; for even through the past, those gentle eyes seem to beam upon us, and the tears by which they are dimmed quench the cruel light, that when in anger, flashed from beneath her fringed eye-lids. Oh, Mercy! thou wouldst not leave that beautiful Saxon mother to perish shrieking amidst the surrounding flames! What crimes she had, sprang from her faith; she was nursed in a cruel creed; when the grim shadow of Odin fell not over and darkened her gentle heart, she was a fond woman, even as our mothers have ever been. But she is dead and gone. Hengist is now no more, and Eric, his son, reigns sole king over the white-cliffs, and green hills, and pastoral valleys of Kent, and the keels of other chiules are grating upon our chalky headlands. The grey curtain of Time again drops down over the dead which in fancy stood before us, and after the night of death is past, a new morning breaks, that
"Laughs aside the clouds with playful scorn."
[CHAPTER X.]
ELLA, CERDRIC, AND KING ARTHUR.
"He was a shield to his country:
The courteous leader of the army;
His course was a wheel in battle,
He was a city to old age;
The head, the noblest pillar of Britain;
An eagle to his foe in his thrust,
Brave as generous;
In the angry warfare, certain of victory."
Llywarch Hen., Sixth Century.