flower of his warriors perished. The return of the Britons to their ancient country never became probable again.

The provinces of Deira and Bernicia were united under the victorious Oswald, who mounted the Northumbrian throne in the year 484. His policy was wise, and his piety sincere. He obtained a teacher from Icolmkill,* to instruct his rude subjects; but as his temper was unfit for converting an irascible people, Aidan, a monk, was consecrated for the Northumbrian mission. The king approved of his exertions, and gave him Lindisfarn for the seat of his bishopric. In a few years the church of Northumberland was fixed on a solid and permanent foundation. Oswald also induced his father-in-law, the king of Wessex, to embrace Christianity, and the nation quickly followed their king's example. Not only the Saxons and Britons, but also the Picts and Scots, acknowledged the wisdom and power of Oswald. But the fate of Edwin awaited him, and the same prince was destined to be the minister of his death. In the field of Maser he fought with the warlike Penda and his Mercians. The pagans were victorious and Oswald was slain. His last words were repeated by the gratitude of the Northumbrians, and a proverb preserved them in the remembrance of their posterity. "Lord have mercy on the souls of my people," said Oswald, as he fell. The ferocity of Penda did not even spare the body of his adversary. The head and limbs were severed from the trunk and exposed on stakes. He proceeded through Northumberland, with devastations; but being unable to take the royal city of Bambrough, he destroyed the surrounding country, and then led back his army in order to oppose the East Anglians.

Oswy, the brother of Oswald, was elected king of Bernicia; and shortly after, he consented that Oswin, son of Osria, the kinsman of the renowned Edwin, should reign over Deira. Oswin, though distinguished for humanity and generosity, could not allay the jealousy of Oswy, which, in a few years broke into open hostility. Oswin shrunk from a mutual conflict, and concealed himself in the house of earl Humwald; but this perfidious thane betrayed him to Oswy, and suffered him to be murdered. The Deirans, however, maintained their independence, and placed Adelwald, the son of Oswald, on their throne,

The direful and active Penda continued to evince the most inveterate malignity against the Northumbrians of Bernicia. At the age of eighty, the pagan chief still courted the dismal smiles of Oden, and still delighted to prepare the banquet for the falcon and the wolf. Rejecting all negociations, he hastened with his veterans to add Oswy to the five monarchs whose funeral honours recorded him as their destroyer. Despair at last nerved the courage of Oswy, and with a chosen band of warriors, he advanced to meet the invading army. The hoary Penda had filled up the measure of his iniquities, and, with thirty vassal chiefs, perished before the resolute and valiant

* The illustrious Columba arrived from Ireland in A. D. 563, and founded the abbey of Iona, or Icolmkill. He laboured during thirty-five years in converting the Picts by his precepts, and meliorating the Scots by his example. The saints of this holy isle excelled in all the learning of the age, and "the princes of Northumbria acquired the lights of the gospel from the luminaries of Iona." As Aidan, the Scoto-Irish missionary, spoke English imperfectly, Oswald, who understood Gaelic, acted as interpreter between the preacher and his Anglo-Saxon subjects.-Bede, lib. iii. c. 4. Admnan. vit Columb. l. ii. c. 20,

Northumbrians. The king of Deira, though engaged against Oswy, neutrally awaited the decision of the battle, while a sudden inundation swept away multitudes of the Mercian troops, and contributed to produce a panic which ensured their destruction.*

The victorious Oswy, pursuing his success, subdued the kingdom of Mercia; but conceiving great friendship for Peada, the son of Penda, he invested him with the sovereignty of the southern Mercians. Peada received the hand of the daughter of Oswy, as the price of his conversion; but he was soon afterwards murdered by his wife. After his death the Mercian chiefs revolted from Oswy, drove away the Northumbrian magistrates, and presented the crown to Wulfhere, of the house of Penda, whom they had protected in secrecy, and who now successfully defended his independence against the Northumbrians.

664. Adelwald, king of Deira, having died, the powerful Oswy seized the throne of that kingdom. At this period a council was held at Whitby for determining the proper time of celebrating Easter. The dispute was conducted with great acrimony, and terminated in the retreat or expulsion of the Scottish and Pictish clergy. This circumstance, perhaps, had an influence in producing the subsequent wars between Northumbria and their northern neighbours.

Oswy died in the year 670, having reigned twenty-eight years. On his decease, Egfrid, his son, was placed over the united kingdom of Northumberland. The Picts, anxious to regain their independence, collected an immense army, and carried all the horrors of war into the territories of Egfrid; but he arrested their progress, and repulsed their hosts with great slaughter. Their general, Bernarth, fell, and the corses of his followers stopped the current of the river which flowed near the scene of action.† Animated with the spirit of ambition, the warlike Egfrid turned his arms against the Mercians, though Ethelred, their king, had married his sister. The hostile armies engaged on the Trent, where Elfuin, the brother of the aggressor, fell. More calamitous warfare impended from the exasperation of the combatants, when the aged archbishop Theodore interposed. His sacred function derived new weight from his character, and he established a pacification between the related combatants.

* The banks of the river then called Winwid, near Leeds, was the theatre of the conflict. (Camden Gib. 711.) Bede does not explicitly assert that Penda had thirty times the number of forces, but that it was so reported. The monks, says that venerable historian, ascribed this extraordinary victory to a vow made by Oswy before the battle. "If the Pagan," exclaimed he, "know not how to accept our offerings, let us present them to him who knows them well-to our Lord God." Accordingly he immediately vowed to consecrate his daughter to God, as a sacred virgin, and to give twelve portions of land for erecting the like number of monastries. After his victory he fulfilled his engagement, by building and endowing the monastries, and sending his daughter, Elfleda, to be educated a nun in the monastry of Whitby, whereof she died abbess, at the age of sixty years.-Bede, lib. iii. c. 24.

+ Eddius fills two rivers with the bodies, over which the victors passed dry shod.-Wilf. c. xix p. 71. ed. Gale.

Egfrid had conquered Lincolnshire, then a part of the Mercian kingdom, before Ethelrid's accession.... Bede, lib. i. c. 12.

In the year 648, Egbert sent Beorht, a warlike and sanguinary chieftain, to ravage the coast of Ireland. The peaceful inhabitants were murdered, their lands plundered, and many churches and monastries destroyed.* In the following year, the restless and ambitious king of Northumbria invaded the Picts. Brude, the Pictish king, retired before a superior force, till his pursuers were entangled in the defiles of the mountains, when his fierce warriors rushed to battle, and few of the Northumbrians escaped the slaughter. Egbert himself was found on the field by the conquerors, and honourably interred at Icolmkill. This disastrous expedition humbled the power of Northumberland to the dust. The tributary states acquired their independence, and this once formidable kingdom became at last a dismal arena of incessant usurpations.

Egfrid had married Edilthryda, the daughter of Anna, king of the East Angles. This singular female, at an early period of her life, had bound herself by a vow of virginity; but her pious wish was opposed by the policy of her friends, and she was compelled to marry Tondberct, a nobleman of great power. Her entreaties, however, moved the breast of her husband, and he respected her chastity. At his death her friends offered her in marriage to Egfrid, and she was conducted a reluctant victim to the Northumbrian court. Her constancy, however, triumphed over his passion, and after preserving her virginity during the space of twelve years, she obtained his permission to take tne veil in the monastry of Coldingham. Absence revived the affection of Egfrid; he repented his consent, and was preparing to take her by force, when she escaped to Ely, where she governed as abbess to her death. For her pious donations and exemplary austerities, she was canonized.†

Egfrid having died without children, Alfred, whom Oswy, his father, had rejected from the succession for his illegitimacy, was now admitted to the royal dignity. This worthy prince, the precursor of his great namesake, had been educated by the celebrated Wilfrid. Under his father he had governed Deira, and had contributed to the defeat of Penda. Refused the crown of his father, he voluntarily retired into Ireland, or to Icolmkill, where for fifteen years he lived a life of philosophic retirement. now governed the kingdom with the same virtue with which he had resigned it. Content with maintaining the integrity of his dominions, he reigned peaceably for nineteen years.

He

Alfred, in 705, was succeeded by his son Osrid, a child of eight years. A rebel, Edulf, usurped the sceptre, and besieged the royal infant, and his guardian, Berthfrid, in Bambrough, the metropolis of Northumberland: but before two months had elapsed, the usurper paid the forfeit of his treason. In 710, Berthfrid defeated the

* The Irish in that age were described as a mild, intelligent, and inoffensive people, which augmented the horror with which this cruel invasion was viewed. The historian of Llancarvan declares, that a remarkable earthquake annoyed the isle of Man. Both he and the Saxon chronicle unite to assure, that it rained blood in Britain and Ireland; that butter and milk became ruddy, and that soon afterwards the moon dressed herself in the sanguinary garment!!

+ Egfrid had no issue, which is generally attributed to his wife having adhered to her vow of chastity; but Lingard observes, that Egfrid was espoused to Edilthryda before he had reached his fourteenth year, and that he married a second wife, with whom he lived fourteen years.-Antiq. of the Anglo-Saxon Church, vol. 1. p. 18.

Picts with great slaughter, between Hæf, and Cære, in the field of Manan.* Osrid soon after emancipated himself from the restraints of his tutors, and indulged in the most vicious pursuits. In his nineteenth year, the ungovernable youth was assassinated at the lake of Windermere, by Cenrid and Osric, two of his kinsmen, who, perceiving the universal hatred which prevailed against him, presumed by his death, as he had no issue, they should obtain the diadem. Accordingly, both Cenrid and Osric reigned in succession; the former two years and the latter nine; but the events of this period are not recorded.

Northumberland being freed from the power of these ursurpers, the people, in the year 731, placed the crown upon the head of Ceolwulph: he was a lineal descendant of Ida, by Acca, his eldest illegitimate son. But he possessed neither the vigour nor the talent requisite for his station. Shortly after his elevation, he was seized, shorn, and shut up in a monastry. Escaping from his confinement, he re-ascended the throne, to witness the ravages of the Mercians, and to experience the incessant alarms of impending treason. After a reign of eight years, he voluntarily abandoned the disquieting crown, which he offered at the high altar in the cathedral church at Lindisfarn, where he assumed the cowl.†

In 737, Eadbert succeeded to the Northumbrian throne, when the realm was in the most relaxed and impotent state. Indolence and fanaticism pervaded the higher ranks; but the king, by entreaties and reproaches, rouzed the lethargic zealots from their fascination, and at length he succeeded in organizing a powerful army. Having reduced his distracted dominions to order, he subdued the Picts and Britons, repelled the aggressions of the Mercians, and then, imitating his predecessor, resigned his sovereignty, and sought the tranquillity of the cloister. He was the eighth king of England, who, within fifty years, had relinquished the crown for the cowl.

Eadbert had one son, Oswulf, who, on his father's abdication in 759, ascended the throne; but in the first year of his reign, he was slain by a conspiracy of his thanes. Mol Ethelwold, a nobleman of high rank, ventured to accept the crown. His title to the throne was contested by the descendants of Ida; but he slew Oswin, his principal opponent, in the neighbourhood of Melross, after a sanguinary conflict, which lasted for three days. After a troublesome reign of six years, Ethelwold resigned in favour of Alred, a prince of the house of Ida. This king, after reigning over a dis

* Gibson, in his Appendix to the Chronicle, conjectures that Hæf and Care were Care-house and Heefield, a little beyond the Wall.-p. 18.

+ About twenty-eight years before this time, Cenrid, of Mercia, and Offa, of Essex, abdicated their power, went to Rome, and assumed the monastic profession. Huntingdon observes, that the example of these two kings produced many thousands of imitators.

Simeon says the English kings offered him some part of their territories, provided he would retain his royal dignity. Huntingdon ascribes Eadbert's retreat to impressions made upon his mind by the violent deaths of Ethelbald of Mercia, and Sigebert of Wessex, contrasted with the peaceful exit of his predecessor, Ceolwulph.

§ Sim. Dun. p. 106. Some writers say, that Mol Ethelwold was assassinated by his successor,

satisfied people for ten years, was deserted by his family and nobles, and obliged to seek safety in flight.

Ethelred, the son of Mol Ethelwold, was, after the expulsion of this tyrant, elevated to the crown. But this mistaken man found no safety in his treacherous and vicious policy. Two of his ealdormen, Ethelred and Adelbald, having been the instruments, became apprehensive lest they should become the victims, of his cruelty. They therefore rebelled against him, defeated his troops, and finally expelled him from the kingdom.

The victorious chieftains bestowed the kingdom upon Alfwold, the brother of Alred. Though this prince was of an excellent disposition, such was the licentious spirit of the country, that two thanes raised an army, seized the king's ealdorman, Beorn, and his justiciary, and burnt them to ashes, because, in the estimation of the rebels, their administration of justice had been too severe. Shortly after, a powerful conspiracy was formed against the virtuous Alfwold, and he was treacherously killed by the ealdorman, Sigan. This crime was perpetrated at a place called Sythle-cester, or Chichester, and the royal remains were interred at Hexham, in the year 788.

A period of anarchy appears to have succeeded, which continued till the year 791, when the prevailing party agreed to raise Osred, the son of Alred, to the throne. But his reign was very short; the turbulent thanes confederated against him, and he was compelled to seek safety in the isle of Man.

Ethelred, conceiving the distractions in the state favoured his return, supported by a few desperate partizans, again ascended the throne. Thirsting for revenge, he left Eardulf weltering in his blood at the gate of a monastry; and in the following year he dragged both the children of Alfwold from the sanctuary at York, and slew them. The deposed Osred afterwards attempted to recover the crown, but his army deserted him, and he fell into the hands of Ethelred, and perished. This prince now endeavoured, by a marriage with the daughter of the powerful Offa, to secure his authority, and for this purpose he repudiated his previous wife. But his policy and his murders were equally vain, for his bloody career was now hastening to a close. Northumberland was suffering from famine, pestilence, and pirates, and all these evils were attributed to the imprudence, or wickedness of Ethelred. His subjects, therefore, whom he had assisted to brutalize, destroyed him in the fourth year of his restoration, and set up Osbald. After a reign of twenty-seven days they deposed Osbald, and he prudently withdrew from the pursuits of ambition, and obtained security in the cloister.

794. Eardulf, who had been recovered from his assassination by the charity of the monks, who found him apparently lifeless, near their cloister, was recalled from his exile and placed upon the throne. Thinking it politic to oppose the murderers of Ethelred, he defeated them in battle, and then turned his arms against their protector, the king of Mercia; but the clergy interfered, and procured a reconciliation. Yet Eardulf was afterwards surprised by his enemies and put into confinement.

These numerous and bloody revolutions had excited the notice of foreign nations. Charlemagne pronounced the Northumbrians more perfidious than the very pagans;

* Malms. 26 Lingard's Hist. of Eng. vol. i. p. 120.