though they might engage the monks to support the royal authority during his own reign, proved afterwards dangerous to his successors, and gave disturbance to the whole civil power. He seconded the policy of the court of Rome, in granting to some monasteries an exemption from episcopal jurisdiction. He allowed the convents, even those of royal foundation, to usurp the election of their own abbot; and he admitted the forgeries of ancient charters, by which, from the pretended grants of former kings, they assumed many privileges and immunities. These favours and indulgences procured him the highest panegyrics from the monks; yet nothing could more betray both his hypocrisy in inveighing against the licentiousness of the proscribed ecclesiastics, and the interested spirit of his partisans in bestowing such eulogies on his piety and virtues, than the usual tenor of his conduct, which was criminal to the last degree, and violated every law, human and divine. Though the eyes of the Benedictines were shut to his vices, and their tongues eloquent in his praise, this did not diminish their enormity. History, however, more faithful than the monastic annalists, has preserved some examples of his amours, from which a conjecture may be formed as to the rest.

The sanctity of the vail, even in the most barbarous times, was generally held to be an inviolable protection to the fair wearer; but in the indulgence of his passions, Edgar disregarded the restraints both of civil and religious institutions. He broke into a convent and carried off Wulfrith, a nun, and a lady of noble birth, and committed violence on her person. For this act of sacrilege he was reprimanded by Dunstan. The indulgent father, however, did not compel him to separate from his mistress, but he required him to do penance to the church, by abstaining from wearing his crown during seven years, and thus depriving himself so long of that vain ornament,-a punishment very unequal to that which had been inflicted on the unfortunate Edwy, who, for a marriage which, in the strictest sense, could only deserve the name of irregular, was expelled his kingdom, saw his queen barbarously mangled, loaded with calumnies, and represented to the world under the most odious suspicions. Accident or rumour proved the cause of another illicit connexion. Happening to pass through Andover, he lodged in the house of a nobleman, whose daughter, being endowed with all the graces of person and behaviour, made so deep an impression on his heart, that he resolved, by any expedient, to gratify his lawless desires. Courtship, or even marriage, formed no part o. his intentions, provided he could otherwise accomplish his purpose. He went immediately to the mother, declared the violence of his passion, and requested that the young lady might be allowed to pass that very night with him. The matron was a woman of strict virtue, and resolved not to ruin every hope in life, or dishonour her daughter and her family, by compliance with the transient humour of a libertine; but being well-aware of the impetuosity of the king's temper, and dreading the consequence of thwarting a tyrant's will, she thought it would be easier, as well as safer, to deceive than refuse him. She feigned, therefore, a submission to his wishes, but secretly ordered her attendant, a handsome waiting-maid, to personate her daughter, and

• Malni. 60.

steal into the king's bed-chamber when all the company had retired to rest. Darkness favoured the deception; but in the morning when the damsel, agreeably to the injunctions of her mistress, offered to retire, the king refused to permit her departure, and employed force and entreaties to detain her. The discovery of the fraud practised upon him, gave a new direction to his desires. From the daughter. his love was transferred to Elfleda-that was the name of the maid-whose charms had made a sudden and unexpected conquest of Edgar. She became his favourite mistress, and maintained her ascendancy over him till his marriage with Elfrida, the circumstances of which were more remarkable and more criminal than the preceding. This lady was daughter and heir of Olgar, or Ordgar, earl of Devonshire. Having been educated in the country, she had never made her appearance at court, but the fame of her beauty had filled all England. Edgar was far from being indifferent to rumours of this nature. His curiosity was inflamed by the frequent reports he heard in her praise; and reflecting on her noble birth, he determined, if he found her charms equal to their reputation, to obtain possession of her on honourable terms. This intention he imparted to his favourite, earl Athelwold, and sent him privately on a visit to Devonshire, on some pretext or other, to examine if the beauty of the lady was at all such as had been represented. Athelwold saw her, and found that the general report had fallen short of the truth. But the interview was fatal: it had inflamed him with the most vehement love, and he resolved to sacrifice to this new passion his fidelity to his master, and the trust committed to him. To Edgar he gave a very unfavourable account;-that it was the riches and high birth of the lady that must have been the reason of the admiration paid her; and that her charms, far from being in any way extraordinary, would have been overlooked in any woman of inferior station. Edgar was satisfied; and finding his thoughts diverted from this match, he took an opportunity of bespeaking the royal permission on his own behalf. He observed, that though the parentage and fortune of Elfrida had not produced on him, as on others, any illusion with regard to her beauty, he could not forbear reflecting that she would, on the whole, be an advantageous match for him, and might by her wealth and good qualities make him sufficient compensation for the homeliness of her person. Edgar, pleased with an expedient for advancing the worldly interests of his favourite, not only gave his approbation and exhorted him to execute his purpose, but forwarded his success by recommending him to the parents of the lady. The treacherous Athelwold was soon made happy in the possession of his mistress; and to avoid detection, he employed every artifice to detain her in the country, and especially to keep her from appearing at court. But favourites have many enemies. Athelwold was supplanted, and Edgar soon heard the truth. Before listening to the dictates of revenge, the king determined to satisfy himself with his own eyes, of the certainty and full extent of the earl's guilt. He informed him that he intended to pay him a visit in his castle, and be introduced to the acquaintance of his young wife. This honour it was impossible to decline, and Athelwold only craved leave to go before him a few hours, that his distinguished guest might have a more suitable reception. The whole matter was then revealed to Elfrida, and the trembling husband begged her, if she had any re

gard either to her own honour or his life, to conceal from Edgar, by every circumstance of dress and behaviour, that fatal beauty which had seduced him from fidelity to his king, and had betrayed into so many falsehoods. Elfrida promised compliance, though nothing was farther from her intention. She saw herself, then, for the first time, deprived of a crown and a royal consort by the passion of a faithless messenger, and knowing the force of her own charms, she did not yet despair of reaching that dignity. Instead of slovenliness or disguise, she appeared before the king with all the advantages which the richest attire and the most engaging airs could bestow. At once she excited in the royal heart the strongest attachment towards herself, and the most furious desire of revenge against the perfidious husband. He knew, however, how to dissemble these passions, and seducing Athelwold into a wood on pretence of hunting, he stabbed him with his own hand, and soon after-in 965-publicly married Elfrida.

Yet, amidst these defects, some traits of enlightened policy appear, which reflect credit on Edgar. The most important of these was his patronage of foreigners, who resorted to his court or his kingdom for the purposes of commerce. People from Saxony, Flanders, and Denmark, were attracted by his reputation or his encouragement; for he received them so well as to excite a censure from the monkish chroniclers, that he loved them too much.7 The same authorities tell

us, that they imported all the vices of their respective countries, and contributed to corrupt the simple manners of the natives; but as this simplicity of manners, so highly and often so injudiciously extolled, did not preserve them from cruelty and treachery-the most pernicious of all vices, and the most incident to a rude uncultivated people-we ought perhaps to deem their acquaintance with strangers rather an advantage, as it tended to enlarge their views, to extend their knowledge, and to cure them of those illiberal prejudices and rustic habits to which islanders are often subject. Edgar showed his care of trade by punishing, in a summary manner, the inhabitants of Thanet, who had seized and plundered some merchantmen coming from York. Another instance of his sound policy was the extirpation of wolves from England. He had taken great pains in hunting and pursuing these ravenous animals; and when he found that such as had escaped him had taken shelter in the moun. tains and forests of Wales, he exchanged the tribute of money, imposed on the Welsh princes by Athelstan, into three hundred wolves' heads annually. Such was their diligence in destroying them, that in four vears the tribute ceased for want of supply, and these ferocious animals have never since then been seen in this island. His reformation of the coinage was also a prudent measure. It had become so diminished in weight by the fraud of clipping, that the actual value was very inferior to the nominal. He therefore ordered new coins to be struck all over England. He was most attentive to the wants of the poor-the dictate of superstition, perhaps, rather than of charity; and his vigilant, police freed the kingdom from robbers. Edgar, though tyrannical, was generous to his friends. To Kenneth, king of Scotland, who visited him,

Lingard affects to doubt this story, and the preceding, both of which are given on the authority of Malmsbury.

* Hunt. 356.

Malin. 32.--Carad. 55.

he not only ceded the district of Lothian, extending from the Tweed to the Forth, but gave one hundred ounces of pure gold, and many silken ornaments, with rings and precious stones. An anecdote of these princes is recorded descriptive of the energetic character of Edgar. His person

was small and thin, and by no means indicative of his mental powers. Kenneth happened one day carelessly to remark, that it was wonderful so many provinces should obey a man so insignificant. These words were carried to the king; he immediately conducted the offender apart into a wood, and producing two weapons, bade him take his choice. "Our arms shall decide," said he, "which ought to obey the other; for it will be base to have asserted that at a feast, which you cannot support with your sword."o It was one of the conditions on which Kenneth received the county of Louth, that he should come every year to Edgar's principal feast; and for his accommodation several houses were provided for his entertainment during his journey. The hasty remark that had incurred the royal displeasure was brought to his recollection by this appeal to the laws of honour; he apologised for it as a joke. and the matter ended amicably.

Edgar expired in the thirty-third year of his age. He was twice married. By Elfleda, his first wife, he had Edward his successor, and a daughter, who became a nun. Elfrida bore him two sons, Edmund, who

died before him, and Ethelred. This monarch, as an acute historian has remarked, was rather the king of a great nation in a fortunate era, than a great prince himself. His actions display a character ambiguous and mixed. In some things he was liberal to profusion, in others mean, arrogant and vicious. His reign has been celebrated as the most glorious of all the Anglo-Saxon kings; but some allowance must be made for the hyperbolic praises of monastic gratitude by which it has been emblazoned. No other sovereign, indeed, converted his greatness into such personal pomp; and no other, we may add, was more unfortunate in his posterity. With his short life the gaudy pageant ceased; and all the vast dominions in which he had so ostentatiously exulted, vanished from his children's grasp. His eldest son perished by the intrigue of his beloved Elfrida,—another fell by the hand of an assassin,—and his youngest reigned only to show his own imbecility, and ruin the nation he had attempted to govern. On the whole, recollecting the advantages and facilities which Edgar inherited, we must say that it was the fortuitous chronology of his existence, rather than his own talents or wisdom, that has adorned his name with a celebrity, which less favourable circumstances denied to his predecessors.

The Northumbrian kings had extended their conquest to the Forth (Bede iv. 26), but there is little reason to believe that the possession of Lothian was easily retained at this time. Perhaps Kenneth demanded the cession of this district as a right rather than solicited it as a favour. Certain it is that it was finally ceded to him on the single condition that its inhabitants should be permitted to retain their language, laws, and eustoms. "Does not this sufficiently account," inquires Lingard, "for the prevalence of the English language in the Lowlands of Scotland ?**

10 Malm. 59.

Edward the Martyr.

BORN A. D. 959.-died A. D. 978.

EDWARD, surnamed the Martyr, was only fifteen years of age at the time of his father Edgar's death in 975. Though the eldest surviving son, his accession did not take place without much difficulty and opposition. He had indeed the advantage of being nominated successor in his father's will; he was approaching manhood, and might soon be able to take the reins of government into his own hands; he had the support of the principal nobility, who dreaded the imperious temper and ambitious aims of Elfrida; and as he seemed inclined to subserve the views of the new monks, his interest was espoused by Dunstan, whose character for sanctity had given him the highest credit with the people. But he had formidable obstacles on the other hand to encounter. Elfrida his step-mother attempted to secure the throne for her son, Ethelred, a child of seven years old. She affirmed that Edgar's marriage with the mother of Edward was liable to insuperable objections; and as she had possessed great influence with her husband, she had found means to attract adherents who seconded all her pretensions. Even in the church a faction had risen against him. Dunstan had succeeded in excluding the ancient ecclesiastics from their seats; but he had not reconciled the whole nation to the severity of the measure, or to his own administration; and on the death of the late king, an attempt was made to humble his power, and to restore the clergy. It was of vast importance to this aspiring prelate and the monks, to place on the throne a king favourable to their cause; and to cut off all hostile pretensions, Dunstan, as executor of the king's will, resolutely anointed and crowned the young prince at Kingston. This bold measure superseded the claims of Ethelred, and the whole country submitted to him without farther dispute. The quarrel, however, between the two religious systems became more vehement; and though Dunstan had got Edward crowned, he could not recover the alienated minds of the nobles whom his innovations and his arrogance had provoked. The secular clergy had many partisans in England who wished to support them in the possessions of their convents and of the ecclesiastical authority. On the first intelligence of Edgar's death, the governor or duke of Mercia expelled the Benedictine order from all the monasteries within his jurisdiction; while the dukes of East Anglia and Essex protected them within their respective territories, and insisted on the execution of the laws enacted in their favour. Nothing but tumult and confusion ensued. Elfrida joined the party of the seculars who had got hold of the monastic possessions, which they distributed to the governors in return for their support. Dunstan, on the other hand, expelled the clergy who had been reinstated; and to quiet the discontent which his violence had excited, as well as to maintain his own ascendancy, he had recourse to an infallible test in times of ignorance, the miraculous aid of superstition Different synods were convened, which, according to the practice of the age, consisted partly of ecclesiastics, and partly of nobility; yet the

'Mailros Chron. 151.-Eadmeri Vit. 220.

Ingulf. 54.-Malın. 61.