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that the holy man repaired to Glastonbury in the days of St. Alphege, the holy bishop, by whom he was ordained. Now the bishop died in 951, and St. Neot in 877. This anachronism entirely destroys the supposition that the legend could have been founded upon authentic documents.

In the history compiled by the noble Ethelweard we have a very abridged translation of the Saxon Chronicle. The author was a descendant, perhaps a grandchild, of King Æthelred, who lived in the reign of King Edgar. In the first three books, or rather sections, it contains a condensed summary of the Saxon history, from the arrival of Hengist and Horsa, to the reign of Ethelwulf: the last and fourth section treats upon the history of his successors until Egbert. Ethelweard's style is so inflated and turgid as to be frequently unintelligible. The extreme corruption of the text, of which no rectification can be expected from critical sagacity, the only MS. having perished, has evidently increased the obscurity of this writer, who may almost always be characterized as an abridger of the Saxon Chronicle.

Besides the foregoing chronicles, which may be considered as Anglo-Saxon authorities, there are several writers who flourished after the Conquest, whose works, so far as they relate to AngloSaxon history, must be considered in great measure as borrowed from Anglo-Saxon chronicles. Florence of Worcester, who wrote in the reign of Henry I., translated the Saxon Chronicle, generally from the existing text, with the most scrupulous fidelity. These translated passages he engrafted on the universal chronology usually ascribed to Marinus Scotus, who, descended from a collateral relation of venerable Bede, was professed in a monastery in the kingdom of Burgundy.

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Mr. Gorham by a very able hand. It happened one day that the holy man went secretly in early morning to his pool of water, and there performed his devotions and psalm-songs in the water with naked limbs, as his custom was. Then heard he suddenly a noise of many horsemen; and with much speed he hastened from the well, for he would not that his devotions should be known to any earthly man in his life-time; but only to the One who ruleth over all. And, in his way, he dropped one of his shoes; and he brought the other with him to his oratory. And when he had finished his psalms, and his reading, and his prayers with all carefulness, he bethought him of his other shoe, that he had lost it by the way. He called to his servant, and bade him fetch his shoe. And he was obedient to the bidding of his father, and readily went to the pool. And there, by the way, a wonderful circumstance he met with: that is, that a fox, which is the most crafty of all beasts, running over hills and dales, with eyes wondrously sharp looking hither and thither, chanced to come suddenly to the place where the holy man had bathed his feet; and he lighted upon the shoe, and thought to run away with it. Then the Lord of righteousness looked thereupon, and would not that his servant should be molested even in so small a thing. And he sent a sleep on the fox, so that he gave up his life, having the thongs of the shoe in his ugly mouth. The servant then approached thereto, and took the shoe, and brought it to the boly man, and told him all that had happened. Then the holy man greatly wondered at this, and charged the servant that he should tell this to no one till his life's end."

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Where the Chronicle of Asser begins, Florence deserts the Saxon Chronicle, and transcribes the work of the British prelate, almost without alteration, returning to the Saxon Chronicle as soon as Asser concludes. Some notices are extracted from Bede. The facts, of which the original sources cannot be ascertained, are very few, but important, and occur chiefly in the early part of this history. They are generally of that class which we may suppose to have been derived from the Saxon genealogies. Though the! great mass of information afforded by Florence is extant in the Saxon Chronicle, still his work is extremely valuable. He understood the ancient Saxon language well-better, perhaps, than any of his contemporaries ;-and he has furnished us with accurate translation from a text which seems to have been the best of its kind.

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Another writer, whom we shall designate by the epithet which has been given to him of 'Florilegus,' composed his work by enlarging and interpolating another universal chronicle similar to that of Marinus Scotus, so as to make it a history of England from the period when its memorials, real or suppositious, could be found. This edition having been again interpolated and continued by other unknown writers, it becomes impossible to ascertain the person by whom any of the insertions were made, or to fix the original date of the compilation; though, from the consideration of detached passages, it may be inferred that the parent text was compiled before the first half of the twelfth century. This chronicle is usually ascribed to Matthew of Westminster: this personage, as! we have already observed, never existed, and the choice of the name seems to have arisen from a confused lemma or colophon relating to the well-known Matthew Paris, of whose chronicle the latter part of the work now under consideration is an abridgment. Thus circumstanced, the chronicle must evidently be received with caution. The copious additions from Geoffrey of Monmouth, and from the lives of the Saints, may, for the present, be put out of the question; but, rejecting these romantic tales, there will remain some facts relating to Anglo-Saxon history not extant in the existing Saxon chronicles. We are inclined to consider most of them as genuine relics of antiquity. Indeed we are rather inclined to believe that he is anterior to Florence, and that certain passages in the latter, not found in the Saxon Chronicle, were borrowed by him from Florilegus. Florilegus has retained and quoted a sufficient number of Anglo-Saxonisms, and of Anglo-Saxon phrases, to show that he was in possession of Saxon materials, which he consulted: to the best of his ability. He has not used them with the fidelity of Florence of Worcester, for his knowledge of the Anglo-Saxon language was imperfect, but still he is not guilty of any intentional falsification,

the evident relationship of Anglo Saxon and Scandinavian poetry. Following in some measure the path of Hardouin, he maintains that the Norwegian Scallds never existed. The wild theology of the Asi is asserted to be a gratuitous invention—the materials gathered and distorted from classical poetry and the rabbinical reveries of the Talmud. It would be less paradoxical to support a contrary theory, and to suppose that the Anglo-Saxon poetry was influenced by intercourse with Scandinavia. Northern Scallds were welcome guests at the courts of the English kings, and even in the days of Snorro, the similarity between the languages of England and Norway was so evident as to induce him to maintain their primitive identity. The historical poetry of the Anglo-Saxons appears to have embraced every possible variety, from the most fanciful romance to the mere colouring of praise and description. In the lays of Horne Childe, of Haveloke, and of Attla, king of East Anglia, all of Anglo-Saxon origin, though now existing only in versions of recent date, an historical name, or a well known locality may be discovered, but the entire. superstructure is the invention of the minstrel. Not unfrequently; a connexion may be discerned with the songs of the heroic age, which constituted the web both of the Teutonic Helden Buch', and the historical songs of the Edda.' Haveloke, so long lamented as lost, has lately been brought to light amongst the untouched stores of the Bodleian library. Perhaps the Tale of Wade' will in like manner reappear. The local traditions respecting his castle and his grave, indicate that Wade, the Northumbrian chieftain, had been confounded with Vade, the giant of the Wilkina-Saga.

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Historical songs preserved by memory and recitation were very popular. Every age added to their number. If the fleeting genealogy of song could be discovered, we should probably find that the humble ballads of the persecuted minstrels, even down to the period when they were declared by act of parliament to be rogues, vagabonds, and sturdy beggars,' were often derived from these strains. One favourite ballad related to the fortunes of Gunhilda, the sister of king Canute, how she was espoused to Henry, the emperor of Almaine; how, like so many other fair. Queens, she was accused of naughtiness; and how, like all such fair Queens in romance, the wicked informer was defeated and slain in single combat, the defender of the calumniated Gunhilda being the very Mimecan, or Mimetan, who had accompanied her from merry England. This tale, of which the outline is preserved

For this discovery we are indebted to Mr. Frederick Madden, who contemplates publishing this very interesting memorial. Mr. Madden is also in possession of a third English version of the gest of King Horne, unknown to Ritson.

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by Florilegus' and Malmesbury, is entirely lost in verse; but it is remarkable that the dwarf Mimretand, the least of men,' is the hero of one of the Kæmpe viser of the Danes, to whom Gunhillda and her fortunes seem to be entirely unknown. Malmesbury, who often appeals to ancient ballads, carefully distinguishes their authority from more faithful chronicles. Athelstane, the Lord of Earls, the Giver of Bracelets,' was the hero of an entire cycle. Many of the particulars of his life, as given by Malmesbury, have no other source; and his character, like that of Charlemagne, became that of a mythical monarch. Malmesbury enables us to pause before we adopt the statements derived from the tale of the gleeman. In older and less critical writers, the reader is not thus warned, and in the midst of the gravest narrations we may sometimes discover, or at least suspect, these pleasing fictions. Alfred and Anlaf, both disguised as harpers, both using the same identical stratagem for the same identical purpose, and both meeting with the same success, had probably their common prototype in some good Knight well taught of harp and song.'

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The poems which rank above the mere ballad are entitled to a reasonable share of credit. Notwithstanding the pompous diction of the well known ode on the battle of Brunnaburgh, it betrays no falsification or inaccuracy. Beortnoth, the strenuous adversary of the Danish invaders, who holds such a conspicuous place in history, is the hero of a poem of this description. The fragments of these historical poems enable us to judge of the merit of the class, and give us reason to deplore that so small a portion has been preserved.

The information derived, more or less directly, from poetry forms an essential element of ancient history, and the use to which it can be applied must often be a subject of consideration. In the metrical chronicle or metrical biography we may find a narrative almost as veracious as plain prose, allowing only for the occasional colouring of poetical phraseology, and the urgency of the laws of verse. The more these productions approach to the rhapsody or the epic, the more will anachronisms and incongruities increase, and the greater will be the necessity of submitting the assumed facts to the rigid test of chronology. If the date of the event or the age of the individual cannot be ascertained with a reasonable degree of certainty, the battle and the hero must be expunged from the page of history. Time is the essence of history, in its true and peculiar sense; and unless the facts can be arranged in their natural order, they cease to possess their authentic warranty. How far the fragments and incidents inscribed the scattered Sibylline leaves of the poet can be applied in

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falsification, and, therefore, when he narrates probable facts it is fair to conclude that he is equally veracious, although the Saxon original of his chronicle be not extant.

It is important to establish the character of Florilegus with respect to such insertions, because he comes before us in a questionable shape, and he is sometimes considered as a mere copyist of Florence of Worcester; but there are many parallel passages to show that Florilegus translated from a Saxon chronicle, and that he did not copy from Florence. We do not say that he translated from the Saxon Chronicle, because his text was probably not one of those which we now possess, though in many paragraphs it agreed with them without variation; and several passages can be pointed out which show that the chronicle of Florilegus is an independent translation. The translation is intended to be literal: and the errors are incontrovertible testimonies that the writer had at least the merit of original research.

Simon of Durham, the precentor of the Cathedral, and to whom we owe the preservation of the history of the see, seems to have been nearly contemporary with Florence of Worcester. His chronicle of the deeds of the English kings' commences with the death of Bede, and is continued to the death of Stephen. Simon was peculiarly attentive to the history of the kingdom of Northumbria, and he has inserted various particulars of the events and revolutions of that turbulent state which are absent in other chronicles. In no part of the island did the Danes effect so thorough a destruction of the church establishment as in Northumbria. And after the age of Bede the history of the kingdom, except when connected with the events of Mercia and Wessex, is almost entirely lost. Jarrow, and Durham, and Lindisfarne, the ancient seats of religion and learning, were plundered and destroyed, all their libraries perished, and the few, but important, details of internal history given by Simon were probably preserved only by their entry in the blank leaf of some sacred volume which a monk was enabled to bear with him in his flight from the scene of desolation. The passages to which we allude are so minute and particular as to leave no doubt of their authenticity, and at the same time they are so scantily dispersed in the text, of which the greatest part is translated from the Saxon chronicle or borrowed from Asser, as to convince us that they. cannot have been extracted from any ample and perfect chronicle..

All the foregoing works are strictly chronological, the events are narrated in the natural order without any artificial system or. arrangement. A more ambitious attempt is made in the history of Henry, Archdeacon of Huntingdon. Abandoning the simple plan of his predecessors, he divided his history into books, treat

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