they could any where there find. They then sent after Morkar, son of Earl Elgar, [between whom and Harold there had long been a factious rivalry, that had harassed the country with the ravages of civil war,] and chose him for their earl. He went south with all the shire, and with Nottinghamshire, and Derbyshire, and Lincolnshire, till he came to Northampton, where his brother Edwin came to meet him with the men that were in his earldom. Many Britons also came with them. Harold also there met them, on whom they imposed an errand to King Edward, sending also messengers with him, and demanding that they might have Morcar for their earl." [Badon that hi moston habban Morkere heomto Eorle,-bidding that they must have, &c.] "This the king granted, and sent back Harold to them, to Northampton, on the eve of St. Simon and St. Jude, and announced to them the same, and confirmed it by hand, and renewed there the laws of Knute."

"Then Earl Tostige and his wife, and all they who acted with them, went south over sea with him to Earl Baldwin, who received them all; and they were there all the winter."

One more extract from the genuine Chronicle, and we have done with the Saxon clergy.

"A.D. 1056. The worthy Bishop Athelstan died on the 4th before the ides of February, and his body lies at Hereford. [In his new church which he had built from the foundation.] To him succeeded Leofgar, who was Earl Harold's mass priest. He wore his knapsack in his priesthood, until he was a bishop. He abandoned his chrism and his rood, his ghostly weapons,-and took to his spear and his sword, after his bishophood, and so marched to the field against Griffin, the Welsh king. But he was there slain, and his priests with him, and Elnoth, the sheriff, and many other good men with them."

This, as the translator observes, was no uncommon thing among the Saxon clergy, bishops, and all. The tone of elevated diction, in which the writer (a monastic) describes the military enterprise of Leofgar and his companions, testifies his admiration. The Latin historians [Norman monks] have omitted most of these interesting particulars; but Matthew of Westminster eulogises the bishop as a lover of the clergy, a sustainer of the poor, the defender of widows and orphans, the upholder of the oppressed, and a pattern of saintly chastity; no faint commendation for one who was at priest and a soldier. Wulfstan, however, Archbishop of York in 948, &c. the perpetual fomenter and joint leader of the troubles, perjuries, and insurrections, in Northumbria, during the time of Edward the Elder, and some other of the martial bishops and clergy of that and succeeding ages, will scarcely be considered as entitled to equal praise. We turn back, however, to the period of the Heptarchy

once a

for one interesting extract, (not ill adapted, perhaps, for dramatic effect,) which will place in a conspicuous point of view not only the turbulent spirit of the times, but the lax principle of regal tenure and succession to which we have previously alluded. And it is the more particularly entitled to distinguished notice, not only because "the minuteness of the narrative, combined with the simplicity of it, proves that it was written at no great distance of time from the event;" but because "it is the first narration of any length that occurs in the older MSS. of the Saxon Chronicle."

"A.D. 755. This year Cynewulf, with the consent of the West-Saxon council, deprived Sebright, his relative, for unrighteous deeds, of his kingdom, except Hampshire; which he retained, until he slew the alderman who remained the longest with him. Then Cynewulf drove him to the forest of Andred, where he remained, until a swain stabbed him at Privett, and revenged the Alderman Cumbra. The same Cynewulf fought many hard battles with the Welsh; and, about one and thirty winters after he had the kingdom, he was desirous of expelling a prince called Cyneard, who was the brother of Sebright. But he having understood that the king was gone, thinly attended, on a visit to a lady at Merton, rode after him, and beset him therein; surrounding the town without, ere the attendants of the king were aware of him. When the king found this, he went out of doors, and defended himself with courage; till, having looked on the etheling, he rushed out upon him, and wounded him severely. Then were they all fighting against the king, until they had slain him. As soon as the king's thanes in the lady's bower heard the tumult, they ran to the spot, whoever was then ready. The etheling immediately offered them life and rewards; which none of them would accept, but continued fighting together against him till they all lay dead, except one British hostage, and he was severely wounded. When the king's thanes that were behind heard in the morning that the king was slain, they rode to the spot, Osric, his alderman, and Wiverth, his thane, and the men that he had left behind; and they met the etheling at the town where the king lay slain. The gates, however, were locked against them, which they attempted to force; but he promised them their own choice of money and land, if they would grant him the kingdom; reminding them, that their relatives were already with him, who would never desert him. To which they answered, that no relative could be dearer to them than their lord, and that they would never follow his murderer. Then they besought their relatives to depart from him safe and sound. They replied, that the same request was made to their comrades that were formerly with the king, and we are as regardless of the result, they rejoined, as our comrades who with the king were slain. Then they continued fighting at the gates, till they rushed in, and slew the etheling and all the men that were with him; except one, who was the godson of the alderman,

and whose life they spared, though he was often wounded. This same Cynewulf reigned one and thirty winters. His body lies at Winchester, and that of the etheling at Axminster. Their paternal pedigree goeth into a direct line to Čerdic."

But the subject connected with the Saxon Heptarchy, which historical criticism is perhaps most called upon to elucidate, is that of the accession of Egbert to the throne of Wessex, and the real extent of that supremacy or influence which he ultimately obtained over the other kingdoms. Our popular historians have, without exception, agreed to consider him as having put a final end to the federal government (if federal it may be called) of the Anglo-Saxons, and to have permanently united the states of the Heptarchy into one consolidated kingdom; and some of them have even amused us with a pompous romance of his coronation at Winchester, as king of all England. Nothing, however, can be more certain, than that no such title was ever accorded to, or assumed by him, in any public act, of which there is any document remaining. Nor was any such power of united domination bequeathed by him to his posterity, or enjoyed by that posterity during the three successive generations.

Alfred the Great, in his will, still extant, calls himself, and in the introduction to his laws is stiled, not King of England (and of England most assuredly he never was king), but King of the West Saxons: nor does the title ever appear to .have been assumed, or virtually to have belonged to any Saxon sovereign, prior to the great Athelstan, the illegitimate grandson of that illustrious hero and legislator.

With respect to Egbert, the notices in the Chronicle are, as usual, brief and detached, but they are such as, together with the few to the same purpose that occur in the succeeding reigns, will not only place this subject in the clearest point of view, but throw an instructive light upon occurrences of higher antiquity, which are worthy of more notice than has been yet bestowed upon them.

Egbert, as it is well known, ascended the throne of Wes sex in the year 800, upon the death of his jealous predecessor, Beorhtric the mention of whose forthferde (departure the usual phrase, on such occasions, of our barbarous ancestors!) is preceded, as usual, by omens and portents of the sky.

The first notice of his accumulation of power over the other states is as follows.—

“A. D. 823. This year a battle was fought between the Welsh in Cornwall and the people of Devonshire, a Camelford; and in the course of the same year, Egbert, King of the West Saxons, and

Bernwulf, King of Mercia, fought a battle at Wilton, in which Egbert gained the victory, but there was great slaughter on both sides. Then sent he his son Ethelwulf into Kent, with a large detachment from the main body of the army, accompanied by his bishop, Elstan, and his alderman, Wulfherd; who drove Baldred, the king, northward over the Thames. Whereupon the men of Kent immediately submitted to him; as did also the inhabitants of Surrey, and Sussex, and Essex; who had been unlawfully kept from their allegiance by his relatives. The same year, also, the King of the East Angles and his subjects besought King Egbert to give them peace and protection against the terror of the Mercians; whose king, Bernwulf, they slew in the course of the same year."

Thus far it is evident, that nothing in reality was added by Egbert to the dominion of Wessex, except the protective superiority over the kingdom of the East Angles; for Surrey and Sussex (the kingdom of the South Saxons), seem to have been incorporated with the West Saxons by Ina in 725. They had been reduced to a state of dependence by his predecessor Ceadwulla in 688. Nor had Ina, on the death of their tributary king, Authum, permitted the throne to be filled again, but had driven Ealdbert, their Etheling, into exile (probably on the disturbances in 722); and on the renewal of insurrection in 725 had defeated and slain him. They had revolted again, it is true, during the troubles and disorders in Wessex, arising out of the tyranny and deposition of Sigebryht; but seem to have been subdued by Cynewulf-for we hear no more of their former king, Osmond, or any successor to him afterwards..

And as for Essex (that petty kingdom, the alternate prey of the neighbouring states of Wessex, Kent, and Mercia), we have no record of its distinct existence, either in the Chronicle or elsewhere, after the accession of Swithred in 746,-save that in 799 it is briefly mentioned, that "Siru, King of the East Saxons, went to Rome ;" and from the language of the passage we have quoted, it seems evident, that his kingship had been merely tributary, or dependent. We find, however, that in 827" King Ecgbright conquered the Mercian kingdom, and all that is south of the Humber. And he was the eighth king (eahtetha cyning) who was the Bret-walda." We give the word exactly as it stands in the Chronicle, using only the modern instead of the Saxon characters; and we quote, in the same way, the different modes in which it is written in various MSS. as Bryten-wealda, Briten-walda, Bryten-weald, Bretean-woelda,-which Mr. Ingram, somewhat too largely, and we might say hypothetically, translates "sovereign of all the British dominions." Surely the conquest, however absolute, of all the Saxon states, south of the Humber, would not render the King of Wessex sovereign of all the British dominions, or

even of the entire Heptarchy. And though we should admit (what indeed is very probable) that Wales was in a state of, at least, comparative subjugation; and adopt the statement of Rapin (apparently confirmed, indeed, by the concluding paragraph of the passage from which we have digressed) that Andred and the Northumbrians, unable to make head against him, submitted to him, and accepted the same terms granted to the Mercians and East Anglians," this would, after all, not make him King of England; or vest him with any other authority than that which had been enjoyed at different periods by several precedent princes of the Heptarchy. The Saxon Chronicle, indeed, in the very passage we are referring to (whatever may be the just and adequate translation of the title Bryten-wealda wielder, or chief potentate of Britain, we should say ;) so far from adorning him with the comprehensive title of King of England, or of having effected the final dissolution of the Heptarchy, expressly puts him on the same footing with seven precedent potentates: one of whom, Edwin the Great, of Northumbria, perhaps possessed a larger, and has been celebrated for a more benignant dominion than himself.

"Ella, King of the South Saxons (continues the Chronicle), was the first who possessed so large a territory; the second was Ceawlin, King of the West Saxons; the third was Ethelbert, King of Kent; the fourth was Redwald, King of the East-Angles; the fifth was Edwin, King of the Northumbrians; the sixth was Oswald, who succeeded him; the seventh was Oswry, the brother of Oswald; the eighth was Egbert, King of the West-Saxons. This same Egbert led an army against the Northumbrians, as far as Dore, where they met him, and offered terms of obedience and subjection, on the acceptance t of which they returned home."

Yet it has never entered into the imagination of any of our historians to deck any one of the seven precedent chiefs of the Heptarchy with the titles either of sovereigns of all the British dominions, or Kings of England: although the extent of the authority of Edwin, in particular, has been sufficiently attested, and the good purposes to which he applied it, by the venerable Bede and other ancient writers of our annals, in terms that ought to have endeared him to remembrance: being the first of our Saxon kings commemorated for the virtues of civil government, and the strict execution of justice. Rapin, indeed, and Hume (who in this part of his history seems merely to have abridged him, and never even to have looked into the authorities he pretends to quote) seem to confine the influence of these virtues to his own Northumbrian dominions-which stretched, however, from Edinburgh and the Lothians to the