VII.

But the lying prophecies of hope, and human CHAP. augury, have been the experience and the complaint of ages, and are never more fallacious than in ambition and war.

633.

634.

TRIUMPHANT with the fame of fourteen great battles and sixty skirmishes", Cadwallon despised Oswald, the brother and successor of Eanfrid, who rallied the Bernician forces, and attempted to become the deliverer of his country. With humble confidence the royal youth committed his cause to the arbitration of Providence, and calmly awaited the decision on the banks of the Denise. There, Oswald deCadwallon and the flower of his army were destroyed. The return of the Cymry to their ancient country never became probable again."

32 Llywarch Hen. p. 111.

33 The piety of Oswald previous to the battle is expressed by Bede. To his arrayed army he loudly exclaimed: "Let us kneel to the Omnipotent Lord, the existing and the true, and unite to implore his protection against a fierce and arrogant enemy. He knows that we have undertaken a just war for the safety of our people.". The army obeyed the royal mandate. Lib. iii. c. 2.

34 Camden places this battle at Dilston, formerly Devilston, on a small brook which empties into the Tyne, 854., Gib. ed.-Smith, with greater probability, marks Erringburn as the rivulet on which Cadwallon perished, and the fields either of Cockley, Hallington, or Bingfield, as the scene of conflict. App. to Bede, 721. The Angles called it Hefenfield, which name, according to tradition, Bingfield bore.

35 Although Jeffry admits Oswald to have conquered at Havenfield, yet he has sent Penda to be the person defeated there; and instead of suffering his Cadwallon to perish, inflames him with rage at the disaster, and despatches him like lightning in chase of Oswald, whom he permits Penda to kill; Cadwallon then became possessed of all Britain. Lib. xii. c. 10, 11. Such is the veracity of Jeffry's history! 36 The ancient bard Llywarch Hen. composed in his old age an elegy on Cadwallon, whose death he lived to witness; and thus speaks of his friend :

Fourteen great battles he fought
For Britain, the most beautiful;
And sixty skirmishes.

feats him.

CHAP. VIII.

The Reign, Actions, and Death of PENDA.- History of the ANGLO-
SAXON Octarchy to the Accession of ALFRED of NORTHUMBRIA.

ABOUT this time the kingdom of Mercia was not
only distinctly formed, but, by the extraordinary
ability of one man, was at the same time raised to
a greater eminence in the Saxon octarchy than any
of its preceding kings, even those who had be-
come Bretwaldas, had actually obtained. This
man was Penda, who, though not classed among
the Bretwaldas, would, if victory over the other
Anglo-Saxon states had given the dignity, have
possessed it more rightfully than any other. It has
been mentioned that several petty adventurers of
the Angles had successively penetrated into the in-
land districts, which became comprised in the king-
dom of Mercia, aud established settlements among
the Britons in these regions. In 586, one of them,
name Crida, also a descendant of Woden, began
to attain a regal pre-eminence'; but as we may
infer from an intimation of Nennius, that Penda
first separated Mercia from the kingdom of the
northern Angles, Crida must have been in subor-
dination to the kingdom of Deira, which formed its

1 Crida is the first Mercian chief that is mentioned in the documents which remain to us, with the title of king. He began to reign in 586. 3 Gale Script. p. 229. Hunt. 315. Lel. Collect. ii. p. 56. Ibid. i. p. 258. Leland, from an old Chronicle, observes, vol. i. p. 211., that the Trent divided Mercia into two kingdoms, the north and the south.

CHAP.
VIII.

A.D. 627-634.

Rise of

Penda.

BOOK
III.

634.

Oswald reigns in Northumbria.

northern frontier.2 In 627, Penda, the grandson of Crida, succeeded to the crown at that age, when men are usually more disposed to ease than activity. He was fifty years old before he became the king of Mercia, and he reigned thirty years3; but it was to the terror and destruction of several of the other Anglo-Saxon kings. Mercia had neither displayed power nor ability before his accession; but Penda's military talents and uncommon vigour speedily raised it to a decided and overwhelming preponderance. In the year after he attained the crown, we find him in a battle with Cynegils, and his son Cwichelm, in Wessex, at Cirencester. The conflict was undecided during the whole day, and in the ensuing morning the war was ended by a treaty. Five years afterwards, at the age of sixty, he joined Cadwallon, and defeated Edwin of Northumbria, in that battle in which this prince was slain.5

THE piety of Oswald was sincere, and influenced his conduct; he obtained a bishop from Icolm-kill to instruct his rude subjects; and he earnestly laboured to advance their moral tuition. His own example strenghened his recommendations on that essential duty, without which all human talents, and all human aggrandisement, are unavailing decorations. In the festival of Easter a silver dish

2 Nennius, p. 117. "Penda primus separavit regnum Merciorum a regno Nordorum." Ceorl acceded between Crida and Penda. Rad. Polych. p. 229. It was Ceorl's daughter Quenburga that Edwin married in his exile. Bede, lib. ii. c. 14.

3 Flor. Wig. dates his accession in 627, p. 232. Penda was the eleventh descendant from Woden, by his son Wihtlæg, ibid. and Hunt. 316.

4 Hunt. 316. Sax. Chron. 29. The pacification is mentioned by Flor. Wig. 233.; and Matt. West. 217.

5 See before, p. 350.

was laid before him, full of dainties. While the blessing was about to be pronounced, the servant appointed to relieve the poor, informed the king that the street was crowded with the needy, soliciting alms. Struck by the contrast, that while he was feasting with luxury, many of his subjects, beings of feelings, desires, and necessities like his own, were struggling with poverty; remembering the benevolent precepts of Christianity, and obeying the impulse of a kind temper, he ordered the food, untouched, to be given to the supplicants, and the silver dish to be divided among them." The beggar for one instant participated in the enjoyments of a king, and rank was, in that fierce and proud day, admonished to look with compassion on the misery which surrounds it.

A

OSWALD had the satisfaction of perceiving the blessings of Christianity diffused into Wessex. spirit so lowly and so charitable as his own, must have powerfully felt the beauties of its benign morality. He stood sponsor for Cynegils, who received baptism. The nation followed the example of the king."

CHAP.

VIII.

634.

642. Slain by

WHILE Oswald was benefiting his age by a display of those gentle virtues which above all others Penda. are fitted to meliorate the human character, the Mercian king was preparing to attack him. His invasion of Northumbria was fatal to the less warlike Oswald, who fell at Oswestry in Shropshire, in the thirty-eighth year of his age, and the ninth of his reign. Oswald breathed his last sigh in prayer for his friends.8

6 Bede, lib. iii. c. 6. Oswald was Nepos Edwini regis ex sorore Acha, ibid.As he united Deira and Bernicia, the Saxon states formed, during his reign, an hexarchy.

7 Bede, lib. iii. c. 7.

8 Ib. c. 9.