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Little did the affectionate wife think, whilst employed over this task, that her domestic tribute of regard should become an historical memento of her country, and blazon forth her illustrious husband's deeds, and her own unwearying affection, to ages upon ages hereafter to be born. For independently of the interest which may be attached to this tapestry as a pledge of feminine affection, a token of housewifely industry, and a specimen of ancient stitchery, it derives more historic value as the work of the Conqueror's wife, than if it were the production of a later time. For it holds good with these historical tapestries as with the written histories and romances of the middle ages;-authors wrote and ladies wrought (we mean no pun) their characters, not in the costume of the times in which the action or event celebrated took place, but in that in which they were at the time engaged; and thus, had Matilda the Empress worked this tapestry, it is more than probable that she would have introduced the armorial bearings which were in her time becoming common, and especially the Norman leopards, of which in the tapestry there is not the slightest trace. In her time too the hair was worn so long as to excite the censures of the church, whilst at the time of the Conquest the Normans almost shaved their heads; and this circumstance, more than the want of beards, is supposed by Mr. Stothard* to have led to the surmise of the Anglo-Saxon spies that the Normans were all priests. This circumstance is faithfully depicted in the tapestry, where also the chief weapon seen is a lance, which was little used after the Conquest. These peculia

*Archæol. vol. xix.

rities, with several others which have been commented on by antiquarian writers, seem to establish the date of this production as coeval with the action which it represents, and therefore invaluable as an historical document.

"It is, perhaps," says one of the learned writers on the Bayeux tapestry, "a characteristic of the literature of the present age to deduce history from sources of second-rate authority; from ballads and pictures rather than from graver and severer records. Unquestionably this is the preferable course, if amusement, not truth, be the object sought for. Nothing can be more delightful than to read the reigns of the Plantagenets in the dramas of Shakspeare, or the tales of later times in the ingenious fictions of the author of Waverley. those who would draw historical facts from their hiding-places must be content to plod through many a ponderous worm-eaten folio, and many a halflegible and still less intelligible manuscript.

But

"Yet," continues he, "if the Bayeux tapestry be not history of the first class, it is, perhaps, something better. It exhibits genuine traits, elsewhere sought in vain, of the costume and manners of that age which, of all others, if we except the period of the Reformation, ought to be the most interesting to that age which gave us a new race of monarchs, bringing with them new landholders, new laws, and almost a new language.

us;

"As in the magic pages of Froissart, we here behold our ancestors of each race in most of the occupations of life, in courts and camps, in pastime and in battle, at feasts and on the bed of sickness. These

are characteristics which of themselves would call forth a lively interest; but their value is greatly enhanced by their connection with one of the most important events in history, the main subject of the whole design."

This magnificent piece of work is 227 feet in length by 20 inches in width, is now usually kept at the Town-hall in Rouen, and is treasured as the most precious relic. It was formerly the theme of some long and learned dissertations of antiquarian historians, amongst whom Montfaucon, perhaps, ranks most conspicuous.

Still so little local interest does it excite, that Mr. Gurney, in 1814, was nearly leaving Bayeux without seeing it because he did not happen to ask for it by the title of "Toile de St. Jean," and so his request was not understood; and Ducarel, in his "Tour," says, "The priests of this cathedral to whom we addressed ourselves for a sight of this remarkable piece of antiquity, knew nothing of it; the circumstance only of its being annually hung up in their church led them to understand what we wanted; no person there knowing that the object of our inquiry any ways related to William the Conqueror, whom to this day they call Duke William.

During the French Revolution its surrender was demanded for the purpose of covering the guns; fortunately, however, a priest succeeded in concealing it until that storm was overpast.

Bonaparte better knew its value. It was displayed for some time in Paris, and afterwards at some seaport towns. M. Denon had the charge of it committed to him by Bonaparte, but it was afterwards.

restored to Bayeux. It was at the time of the usur. per's threatened invasion of our country that so much value was attached to, and so much pains taken to exhibit this roll. "Whether," says Dibdin, "at such a sight the soldiers shouted, and, drawing their glittering swords,

Clashed on their sounding shields the din of war,— confident of a second representation of the same subject by a second subjugation of our country—is a point which has not been exactly detailed to me! But the supposition may not be considered very violent when I inform you that I was told by a casual French visitor of the tapestry, that pour cela, si Bonaparte avait eu le courage, le résultat auroit été comme autrefois.' Matters, however, have taken. rather a different turn."

6

The tapestry is coiled round a machine like that which lets down the buckets to a well, and a female unrols and explains it. It is worked in different coloured worsteds on white cloth, to which time has given the tinge of brown holland; the parts intended to represent flesh are left untouched by the needle. The colours are somewhat faded, and not very multitudinous. Perhaps it is the little variety of colours which Matilda and her ladies had at their disposal which has caused them to depict the horses of any colour" blue, green, red, or yellow." The outline, too, is of course stiff and rude.* At the top and bottom of the main work is a narrow alle

*The attempts to imitate the human figure were, at this period, stiff and rude but arabesque patterns were now chiefly worked; and they were rich and varied.

gorical border; and each division or different action or event is marked by a branch or tree extending the whole depth of the tapestry; and most frequently each tableau is so arranged that the figures at the end of one and the beginning of the next are turned from each other, whilst above each the subject of the scene and the names of the principal actors are wrought in large letters. The subjects of the border vary; some of Æsop's fables are depicted on it, sometimes instruments of agriculture, sometimes fanciful and grotesque figures and borders; and during the heat of the battle of Hastings, when, as Montfaucon says, "le carnage est grand." the appropriate device of the border is a layer of dead men.

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From the fury of the Normans, good Lord deliver us," was, we are told, in the ninth, tenth, and eleventh centuries a petition in the Litanies of all nations.* For long did England sorrow under their "fury," though in time the Conquest produced advantageous results to the kingdom at large. Whether this Norman subjugation was in accordance with the will of the monarch Edward, or whether it was entirely the result of Duke William's ambition, must now ever remain in doubt. Harold asserted that Edward the Confessor appointed him his successor (of which, however, he could not produce proof); to this must be opposed the improbability of Edward thus ennobling a family of whom he felt, and with such abundant cause, so jealous.

Probably the old chronicler (Fabyan) has hit the mark when he says, "This Edgarre (the rightful

*Henry III., 554.

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