jecture, that Ache, the daughter of Elle, was the wife of Hussa, and the mother of Hereric, and afterwards became the wife of Æthelfrith; that Hereric, who had taken part with the Scots in A. D. 603, found shelter among the Britons until A. D. 615 or 616, when the fear of Æthelfrith caused Cerdic to put him to death; and that Eadwine invaded Cerdic's kingdom on this account.

A. D. 607. "Ceolwulf fought a very great battle against "the South Saxons; in which either army suffered very "severely; but the slaughter was more terrible on the South "Saxon side." 19

A. D. 611. Cynegils succeeded him. of his reign,

In the fourth year

A. D. 614, he associated his son Cwichelm with himself in the kingdom, and they fought with the Britons at Beamdune (Bampton in Oxfordshire). At the very beginning of the fight, panic seized the Britons, and they fled precipitately, leaving two thousand and sixty-two dead upon the field.20

Boece says that Æthelfrith was confederate with Cynegils on this occasion, and he and Fordun represent Cadwallo as

19 "Ceolwulfus inter multa bella contra multos facta, quæ causâ brevi"tatis prætermissa sunt, pugnam maximam habuit contra Sudsexas; in quâ uterque exercitus ineffabiliter contritus est. Clades tamen de"testabilior contigit Sudsexis." HEN. HUNT.

20 "Quarto autem regni sui anno, assumpsit secum filium suum Kich"elmum in regnum, et inierunt bellum contra Brittannos apud Beandune. "Cum igitur obviarent sibi acies terribiliter et pulcherrime, vexillis "inclinatis, in ipsâ primâ collisione invasit horror Brittannos, timentesque ❝aciem securium maximarum splendentium et framearum magnæ longitudinis, fugâ in principio, sero tamen, potiti sunt. Saxones igitur, sine "detrimento sui victores, numeravere mortuos Brittannorum, et inventi “sunt mortui duo millia et sexaginta duo." HEN. Hunt.

leader of the Britons. The latter says, that he went secretly, with few attendants, to seek the aid of Eugenius, (Eochadh Buidhe), king of the Scots; that, having received fair promises from him, he repaired to Ireland, and thence to Armorica, whence he returned immediately with a large army, placed at his disposal by king Salomon; and that he harassed the Saxons in many battles. Of these only the last is recorded, the famous battle of Chester; in which Æthelfrith, after having put to the sword a number of the monks of Bangor, (twelve hundred according to Bæda, two hundred according to the Brut), who had come to pray for the success of their countrymen, defeated the British army, but not without great loss on either side. Bæda and the Brut are agreed, that Brocmail, the governor of Chester, escaped by flight; but the latter says, that the slaughter of the monks occurred after the battle was fought, and the city taken; which seems more probable. Neither of these authorities supplies any indication of the date of the battle; except that the latter seems to fix A. D. 616, the year of the death of Æthelberht, king of Kent, as a limit, by saying that it was fought at his suggestion. However, it is recorded in the Annals of Cambria and Tighearnach, with particulars, which enable us to determine it with something like certainty. In the former we read:

:

"CLXIX year. The battle of Cair Legion, and there fell "Selim the son of Cinan. The rest of Jacob the son of "Beli."

66

Another copy connects the deaths of these princes. The Annals of Tighearnach say, under A. D. 613:— "The battle of Cairelegion, where the holy men were

slain, and Solon Mac Conian, king of the Britons, fell; and

"king Cetula fell there.

Etalfraich was the victor, who

"afterwards immediately died."

The record of the death of Cadwallo, whose presence at the battle of Bampton Fordun mentions; reasonable time allowed for his journeys to Scotland, Ireland, and Armorica, his return, and some battles previous to this; the statement that Æthelfrith died immediately after this battle; and the fact, that the Annals of Tighearnach are four years too early in their notices of this series of events; concur to fix A. D. 617, the year in which Æthelfrith was slain by Radwald, as the date of this battle. The Brut does not mention the death of Cadwallo, but, consistently with the statement that he fell in this battle, records, immediately afterwards, the election of another king Cadwan. Previous to this, however, Æthelfrith is said to have been defeated at Bangor, with the loss of ten thousand of his army, by Brochmail, Blederic, duke of Cornwall, Margaduc, king of Demetia, and Cadwan, and to have fled to his own dominions. Cadwan followed him, and passed the Humber, and a battle was on the point of being fought, when peace was made by the intercession of mutual friends, and Cadwan and Æthelfrith agreed each to allow the other to remain in undisturbed enjoyment of his territories.

The whole sequel in the Brut is disfigured with the grossest misstatements. Authentic materials may have formed the groundwork of the story, but these are unfortunately blended together in the most hopeless confusion. It is probably true that Æthelfrith discarded his first wife Bebbe, when he married Ache, but he was not the father of Eadwine. What is said of Cadwallo's being defeated, and visiting Scotland, Ire

land, and Armorica, Fordun relates more truly under A.D. 614. Aidan, the king of the Scots, is said to have been killed by Cadwallo, after the battle of Hatfield; he really died in A. D. 605; and Cadwallo is here, and throughout the whole story, confounded with his later namesake, who fell in the battle of Heavenfield, a. D. 634; yet he is made to survive it, and, by another confusion with Cadwaladr who fell a victim to the pestilence of A. D. 664-5,-is said to have died of sickness, after a reign of forty-eight years. Cadwaladr, in his turn, is confounded with the West-Saxon Cædwealh; and Ine, the successor of Cadwealh, and Ivar Vidfadme, his ally, are claimed as chiefs of the Britons; and, to conclude this extraordinary series of historical blunders, Offa, the king of the Mercians, is called Ethelstan by Layamon, (for it was he who renewed the tribute of Peter's pence, sixty-five years after it had been established by Ine).

What truth may be concealed under the story of Eadwine's having been educated at the court of Cadwan, I cannot divine. It cannot be true that Eadwine was born there, for he was two years old at the time of his father's death; and it is impossible that he could have been brought up in ignorance of the Christian faith, under the auspices of so religious a prince as Cadwan. He might indeed have sought refuge amongst the Britons, at the age of nineteen, in A. D. 605, and have formed an intimacy, as related, with Cadwallo; and the hostility, to which he fell a victim, may have originated in jealousy of the imperial state he affected, of which Bæda makes particular mention. These matters, however, must always remain involved in uncertainty. All that we really know of Eadwine's early years is, that at some period of his

A A

exile he must have taken refuge with Ceorl king of the Mercians, whose daughter he married; that the hostility of Æthelfrith pursued him from kingdom to kingdom; that Rædwald, king of the East Angles, eventually espoused his cause, and placed him on the throne of the united kingdoms of Deira and Bernicia, by his victory over Ethelfrith, in A. D. 617.

At the beginning of the seventh century, Anglo-Saxon history begins to assume a more distinct character. Eight kingdoms are established, and six of these,-Kent, Sussex, Wessex, and Mercia, founded in the fifth century, and Bernicia and Deira, in the sixth,—have a history more or less complete. The foundation of the kingdom of the East-Angles must have been about the beginning of the sixth century, and Wiwa was its first king, but his great grandson, Rædwald, is the first who figures in our annals; and Sleda, who married the sister of Ethelberht, is the first king of the East-Saxons whose name is recorded, although there is reason to believe that his great grandfather Bedca reigned in England. Henceforth, for more than a century, Venerable Bæda is our great historian, and although his immortal work leaves much to be desired with regard to the other kingdoms, the history of Northumbria, at least, (of which, during the fifth and sixth centuries, we already know more, than of the rest), is almost complete.

THE END.

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