in their own country. The British farms were small, but regularly divided into meadow, arable, pasture, and woodland. The fields were usually enclosed; gardens and orchards were cultivated in favourable spots; and roads and paths united the large towns and scattered villages. Wheaten bread was not in general use; and when the corn crop failed, its substitutes were colewort and green pulse. The staple article of food was swine's flesh: beef and mutton were dainties; and sea and river fish were largely consumed. The garments of the AngloSaxons were linen and woollen: the fleece was spun in winter by the females of every family, whatever might be their rank; and in the term spinster, applied to an unmarried woman, the trace of this custom still remains. The Saxon ladies were very skilful with their needles, particularly in embroidery and ornamental work, probably not unlike those of which a noble specimen still remains in the celebrated Bayeux tapestry, whereon the whole events of the Norman conquest are curiously and minutely represented in a succession of pictures in needlework. The chaplain of William the Conqueror has left us an interesting account of the wealth of England at the time of the invasion: "That land abounds more than Normandy in the precious metals. If in fertility it may be termed the granary of Ceres, in riches it should be called the treasury of Arabia. The English women excel in the use of the needle, and in embroidering in gold: the men in every species of elegant workmanship. Moreover the best artists of Germany live amongst them; and merchants, who repair to distant countries, import the most valuable articles of foreign manufacture unknown in Normandy."

EXERCISES.

1. Describe the first acts of Canute. Whose daughter became wife of Malcolm king of Scotland? How did Canute avert the danger threatening him in Normandy?

2. How did Canute reward his warriors? What was the effect of his arrangement? Describe the manner in which he afterwards found it expedient to treat his followers. Describe his regulations. Relate the anecdote of his killing a soldier.

3. What was the conduct of Canute when his throne was peaceably established? How did he improve the condition of the natives? Mention his ecclesiastical endowments. What warlike operations did he carry on? Mention a remarkable occurrence showing his religious zeal.

4. How was the succession settled on the death of Canute? Who attempted to obtain the throne? Who espoused the cause of Hardicanute? Who was the Alfred who came from Normandy? What relation had Queen Emma to him and to Hardicanute? Describe Alfred's fate.

5. What difficulties did Harold encounter at his coronation? By whom was he succeeded? Describe an incident connected with Earl Godwin.

D

What proceedings took place at Worcester in consequence of Hardicanute's exactions? How did the line of Danish monarchs become extinct?

6. Whose son was Edward the Confessor? Whose daughter did he marry? Describe the character of his government. What was the first act of his administration? Give an account of the manner in which the Normans first got a footing in the country, and the effect they produced.

7. Who headed the party hostile to the Normans? Describe an incider.t connected with this hostility. What was the issue of the combat between the king and Earl Godwin? What was the fate of Godwin and his family? 8. Describe a visit to England by William the Norman in Edward's reign. Under what circumstances did Earl Godwin return? Whose son was Harold? Who was raised to power by Edward for the purpose of opposing Harold? What are the chief circumstances in the history of Algar?

?

9. What journey did Edward propose to undertake, and what was its object? Why were the people opposed to the king's leaving the country To whom did William of Normandy communicate his designs on the throne of England? When did Edward die, and how long had he reigned? Give some account of the influence of his reign over the people.

10. Who became Edward's successor? Who was the legitimate heir to the crown? What circumstances marked the commencement of Harold's reign? What was the conduct of William of Normandy? What means did he employ to induce the Norman lords to join him in his enterprise?

11. What was the danger with which Harold was threatened during William's preparations against England? In what battle were the invaders defeated? In what part of England did William land? Describe the leading features of the battle of Hastings. What was the result of the battle? 12. To what extent had the feudal system taken root among the Saxons before the Norman conquest? Describe generally the condition of society among them. How was the witenagemot constituted? Mention the names of some of the most distinguished men of the Saxon period.

13. What do we know about the money of the Saxons? Mention some peculiarities of their manners. What is known of Anglo-Saxon architecture? What mode of agriculture did they practise? How were the females employed?

CHAPTER VI.

EARLY HISTORY OF SCOTLAND.

Strathclyde Britons-The Highlands-The Picts and Scots-England and Scotland before the Norman Conquest-Diffusion of the Saxon Race through Scotland-The Danes-Macbeth-Conversion of Scotland to Christianity-St Columba.

1. THE Romans were so short a time masters of any considerable part of Scotland, that they could have left but few traces of their civilisation in the manners of the people. A portion, however, of those who had been longest under their sway, and who lived chiefly in the Roman province south of Antonine's Wall, held themselves as a separate kingdom from the rest of the country. They appear to have been a Celtic people of the original British race. The boundary of their kingdom,

but

which was called Strathclyde, is not accurately known, it is supposed to have included most of the western counties to the south of the river Clyde. Everything connected with even the greatest kings and heroes of this early period is doubtful; and some historians maintain that King Arthur, who, according to an ancient tradition, sleeps in fairy land, and will waken some day as emperor of Britain, was the king of these Strathclyde Britons. Northward of Strathclyde, we find that the same people who were spoken of by Tacitus as the Caledonians, were called Picts. There have been great antiquarian disputes whether these Picts were of Celtic race like the Irish and Highlanders, or of Gothic race like the English and Lowland Scots. And where so much learning has been displayed on both sides, it would not be safe to take a part. It would appear pretty certain, however, that, from a very early period, the inhabitants of all the east coast of Scotland, and indeed of nearly every part of the country except the present Highlands, were Goths. Not only in the southern counties, such as Ayr or Peebles, but in the lowlands of Aberdeenshire and Morayshire, the people are as purely Gothic in their origin as the Anglo-Saxons of England.

2. THE HIGHLANDS.-The first time that we find the name of Scotland given to North Britain is the year 934. It is a curious fact that before that time the Irish were called Scots, and it would appear that a few of these people, crossing over from their native island to Caledonia, transferred the name of their original nation to their new place of abode, which has ever since been known as Scotland.

These Irish Scots settled on the west coast of Scotland in considerable numbers about the year 360. It is stated that they were driven back to Ireland about the year 450, by the King of the Picts, Drust "of the hundred battles;" but this is not likely, as they are found to have been very numerous shortly after the year 500, when they chiefly inhabited Argyll, and were called Dalryads. They soon spread themselves over the islands on the west coast and the great mountain district commonly called the Highlands of Scotland, where they founded the race so different from the other inhabitants of Great Britain, called Highlanders or "The Gael."

3. THE PICTS AND SCOTS.-It was usual for the southern Britons to complain that the ravages from which they sought relief at the hands of the Saxons were inflicted on them by the Picts and the Scots; but perhaps they did not very accu

rately distinguish between their enemies, farther than to know that they came from the north. In the year 843, it is said that the whole of Scotland beyond the Forth and Clyde was reduced under the dominion of one monarch, called Kenneth MacAlpin. Wonderful stories are told of this event. It is related that Kenneth, who was king of the Scots, routed the Picts, gaining seven battles against them in one day, and that he concluded by putting the whole Pictish people to death except an old man and his son. It would appear that the reason why these two were spared was that the king desired to extract from them a secret which the Picts had preserved with great jealousy-namely, how to brew heather ale. The father, as the story goes, said he would tell the secret if his son were put to death. This was an odd request; but the Scots would do anything to know how to make the liquor they desired so much, and they complied. When his son was slain, the old man heroically leaped up, and said, now the secret should never be known-he was afraid that his son would be weak enough to tell it, and therefore he had tempted them to put him out of the way. It needs scarcely be said, that the old man himself was immediately slain. If this story of the extermination of the Picts were true, it would be unnecessary to inquire whether they were Goths or Celts. But the eminent antiquary Mr Pinkerton, far from believing even in the victory of the Scots, maintains the truth to have been precisely the reverse, and that they were the conquered party. However this may have been, it is certain that the Celtic Scots from Ireland, a century or two later, when we have authentic records, had no influence beyond the range of the present Highlands, and that the country called the Lowlands of Scotland was entirely occupied by a Gothic people.

Besides the Picts, the Scots, and the Strathclyde Britons, a part of Scotland was occupied by the Saxon kingdom of Northumbria, which extended along the south-east of Scotland as far as the Frith of Forth. When Edwin was bretwalda of the Saxon kingdoms, about the year 620, he ruled over Northumbria as a kingdom of the heptarchy, and Edwinsburgh or Edinburgh, afterwards the capital of Scotland, is said to have been named from him.

4. The young reader should be cautioned against supposing that before the Norman conquest England and Scotland were two compact nations, ever ready to go to war with each other, as they were afterwards. The people in Yorkshire and Lan

cashire were not more the enemies of the people of Scotland than of their neighbours on the other side in Kent or Essex. All through the island, tribes and districts were combining with each other, or separating according to circumstances. Sometimes the people north of the Tweed were, as we have found them, at war with those of the south. At other times nearly the whole of Scotland was united with England under one king. This was not by England's subjecting Scotland, but by a politic and able monarch combining together different states. The Saxons of England gradually diffused themselves through Scotland before the Norman conquest, but after that they came in great crowds. Edgar the Atheling found a refuge in Scotland, and his sister Margaret was married to King Malcolm. This naturally favoured the connexion of the Saxons with the northern kingdom, where they found a refuge from the tyranny of the Normans. From that time onwards

the kings of England felt a jealousy and dislike to Scotland as the head-quarters of the Saxons; but this feeling was not participated in by the people, who continued to be on a friendly footing with the kindred race in Scotland until the ambitious wars of the Edwards made the two nations each other's bitterest enemies for four hundred years.

Scotland, like England and Ireland, was long subject to the incursions of the Danes and other northern tribes, who settled on many parts of the coast, and served to increase the preponderance of the Gothic population. Before the year 900, the King of Norway had taken possession of Orkney and Shetland, and his empire subsequently spread over Caithness and Sutherland.

5. MACBETH. To speak of the early kings of Scotland individually would be to give little more than a catalogue of unpronounceable names such as Wrgust, Talorgan, Wrad, Feredech, and Domhnall. Macbeth, who ascended the throne in 1037, has been distinguished from the crowd, and made renowned all over the world by the genius of Shakspeare. It is said that, when returning from a victory which he had gained for his master Duncan, having to cross a wild heath in a stormy day, three witches made their appearance. In the words of the poet they are thus described by Banquo who attended him :

What are these,

So wither'd, and so wild in their attire,

That look not like the inhabitants o' the earth,