A D. 925-955.]

ST. DUNSTAN.

63

Crown and the aristocracy—a man who found himself at the head of the most numerous and best organized of all the orders of the state, with abbeys and priories, bishoprics and monasteries, all plentifully endowed, and the Church confirmed in possession of the tithes of all England since the year 855-his powers were examined a little more closely, and his pretensions to superhuman wisdom not so patiently received.

This man was found in the reign we have now reached in the person of the famous Dunstan. There is a very close resemblance between his life and that of the still more famous Thomas à Beckett, whom we shall meet with in a future chapter, and we shall perceive that the methods of gaining influence over the common mind were the same in both cases, and pursued for the same purpose. He was presented to King Athelstane when he had just taken the clerical habit, and soon gained his majesty's affections by the variety and excellence of his accomplishments. He painted and carved; he worked in gold and precious stones; he wrote the most wonderful hand, and illustrated books with the most beautiful designs; and, above all, he composed the sweetest of tunes and sang the merriest of songs, accompanying himself on almost any instrument then known. Some people have supposed that he was also a ventriloquist, and availed himself of his powers of mimicry to make certain sounds appear to come from a harp which he hung up on the wall. But the deceit was found out by the enmity of the other courtiers, and Dunstan was turned out of the Court. He went down to the church at Glastonbury, built a small cell, and coiled himself up in it, to the surprise of the beholders. All his gay doings were forgotten as if they had never been. He wore hair shirts, and inflicted penances on himself, and fasted so much and slept so little that the Evil Spirit began to tempt him in hopes of interrupting so holy a life. He put his ill-omened countenance through the little hole that gave light to the cell, and

began some depreciating remarks; but Dunstan, who happened to be hammering some iron at the time, caught the visitor's nose in his red-hot tongs, and squeezed it till the enemy of mankind confessed himself defeated, and howled to be let go. Now it began to be whispered abroad that miracles had heralded the holy Dunstan's birth, and surrounded him in his youth, and expectation rose high of the grandeur of his future career.

Fuller than any one else of these expectations was Dunstan himself. Edmund, the king, thought that so powerful a champion should not be left in so humble a position, and made him abbot of Glastonbury. Edred would not be left behind his brother in recognising such merits, and offered to make him a bishop. Dunstan refused, and the king did not renew the offer. Immediately there was spread a report by the holy man himself, that three of the Apostles had appeared to him, and rebuked him for his folly in rejecting the poor see of Crediton, and commanding him to accept it if he had the chance given him once more, and not even to say "no" if the king asked him to accept the archbishopric of Canterbury. In proof of the reality of the visit and of the serious nature of their indignation, the repentant abbot showed the marks on his back which the rods of St. Peter and the other Apostles had left. Edred, moved perhaps by this extraordinary manifestation of the heavenly will, sent for the abbot, and made him his guide and counsellor in the affairs of state. Dunstan had only two objects in life-to introduce the new doctrine of celibacy among the clergy, and spread the papal power. Up to this time the English clergy married if they chose, though the popular prejudice against matrimony was skilfully kept up by the monks and the Pope. And a fortunate thing it is that they for a while succeeded in their design; for if the powerful office-bearers of the Church had been allowed to wed, they would soon have degenerated into a hereditary priesthood, in imitation of the hereditary nobility; and the

A.D. 955-958.]

REIGN OF EDWY.

65

endowments of the Church would have been taken from the people at large to swell the revenues of a few influential families.

§ 11. Madly hating marriage and madly worshipping the Pope, Dunstan determined to show his supremacy over the highest in the land when Edwy, the nephew of Edred, succeeded to the throne. The king was but sixteen years of age, and had given his hand, without consultation with the Church, to a noble maiden of the name of Elgiva. At the marriage festival, at which Dunstan was present, Edwy, tired of the noisy enjoyments of his nobles, retired to a room where Elgiva and her mother were awaiting him. Instantly the furious abbot rushed in search, tore the youth by main force back into the banqueting-hall, and made him ridiculous in the eyes of the drunken crowd.

Edwy perceived the danger he incurred if the abbot and his rabble of monks were not checked in their ambition. He banished Dunstan from Britain, and turned out the recluses of Glastonbury to make way for the married parish priests. But Dunstan had a coadjutor at home whom Edwy had not taken into account. This was Odo, Archbishop of Canterbury, who entered into the quarrel with all his heart. He therefore stirred up treason against the crown, and Mercia and Northumbria rebelled. When Edwy was weakened by the loss of the greater part of his kingdom, Odo proceeded more boldly. He seized the beautiful Elgiva, on pretence that she was some third or fourth cousin of her husband, and pronounced the marriage void. He then took precautions against the loveliness of his victim, which might still hold its empire over Edwy's heart; and he had her fair face scarred with hot irons till not a vestige of her faultless features remained. But youth and hope work more miracles than Dunstan, and a few months restored her cheeks to their colour and her skin to its freshness. She rejoined her husband, who never would acknowledge the divorce, and Odo kept no farther measures. The young couple were seized at Gloucester. The queen was

F

mangled beyond all hope of restoration to her former charms, and expired in the agonies of the torture. Edwy could not survive so great a sorrow, and died in a few months. Triumphing in his victory, and breathing vengeance against his foes, Dunstan came once more over the sea, and never cast a thought of pity on the victims of his zeal, who had both died before they were nineteen years of age.

§ 12. There was no farther opposition to the claims of the Church when Edwy's brother Edgar succeeded. He threw himself into the hands of Dunstan, promoted him to Worcester first, and finally to the primacy; and the object of the monk's efforts was attained. The Benedictine rulers were accepted in the English monasteries, and the country became tributary to Rome. With the help of this great ally, Edgar's authority was stretched farther than that of any of his predecessors. He summoned a meeting of his vassal kings at Chester. Eight subordinate rulers obeyed his command, and rowed him on the Dee in a boat steered by his royal hand. On this occasion he received the homage of Kenneth of Scotland, Malcolm of Cambria, Maccus of Man and the Hebrides, three chieftains of the Britons of Wales, and the kings of Galloway and Westmere (Stirlingshire and Argyle ?) Pouring forth his treasures in the erection of monasteries and churches, blindly submissive to the orders of his spiritual adviser, there is no wonder that the Church, which was the judge of men's behaviour, and the monks, who were the bestowers of fame, were lavish in their pardons and panegyrics of so liberal a benefactor.

Edgar heard of the beauty of a lady called Elfrida, and sent one of his nobles to ascertain if she deserved the praises given her by common report. Athelwold went, and was captivated with her charms. He offered her his hand, and, on his return to Edgar, described her as not worthy of her reputation; but informed him that, as she was wealthy and well born, he had married her himself. A short time after

A D. 958-975.]

EDGAR AND ST. DUNSTAN.

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wards, Edgar was hunting near Athelwold's house, and determined to see the bride. Athelwold hurried forward, and besought her to show to as little advantage as she could, and told her the circumstances of his mission. She prepared to receive the king, and dressed herself in the most becoming apparel. The king was captivated as his emissary had been, and the ambitious Elfrida perceived it was not yet too late to attain the dignity of which Athelwold's love had deprived her. The guilty pair speedily came to an understanding. Edgar availed himself of the first opportunity, and, stabbing Athelwold to death with a hunting spear, raised Elfrida, the unshrinking accomplice of the murder, to be the partner of his throne. We do not hear that the thunders which destroyed young Edwy for marrying his distant relation were launched. against this hideous crime of the obedient Edgar. Nor was he severely punished for one of the greatest outrages which a Christian could commit. He tore a beautiful nun from her convent by force, and was condemned to fast twice a week, and to abstain from wearing his crown for the space of seven years. For so ostentatious a potentate, who seems to have been childishly delighted with the appearances of authority, while the whole government was in the hands of Dunstan, the interdiction of that mark of sovereignty was perhaps as severe a punishment as any penance which could have been imposed.

This period is the turning-point of Anglo-Saxon history. The debaucheries and crimes of Edgar, and the fierce fanaticism of Dunstan, threw the whole nation into the utmost dissolution of morals combined with the bitterest polemical disputes. The thanes, or nobles, who resided in their distant demesnes, sided with the parish priests to whom they had been accustomed; and the peasantry also were satisfied with the married clergy, whose wives and sisters were of the same rank with themselves. But Dunstan banished the unhappy clergymen who preferred the mothers of their children to the