The Cunning of the Dove

by Alfred Duggan

  Thus during that summer we lived happily. A stranger might suppose that the mighty King of the English ruled unquestioned, merely delegating day-to-day business to a trusted subordinate. It was not immediately apparent that if it came to a clash the minister must prevail.

  The King prayed, and hunted, and in the evening discussed learning and the wonders of the ancient world with his favourite Norman courtiers. If things were done in his name of which he might have disapproved they were not brought to his attention.

  One eminent member of the court was discontented – the Lady. Of all her brothers she liked Harold least; Tostig was her favourite. Yet in the new distribution of power Harold had all and his brothers nothing. The circumstances of their exile had divided the Godwinssons. Harold had joined the Dublin Vikings, the most bloodthirsty enemies of the English; he had taken Leofwin with him, but Leofwin was too young to have a mind of his own. Tostig had stayed with his father, waiting decorously in the Christian land of Flanders until the threat of civil war brought him home. As the Lady saw it, Tostig had behaved like a responsible statesman, and Harold like a ruthless Viking.

  ‘She won’t face facts,’ the King complained to me when we were alone one evening. ‘Like so many women, she makes a picture of the world as it ought to be, and then complains because reality disappoints her. She spoke to me again this afternoon, asking me to give Tostig a great Earldom. She won’t see that there isn’t one to give. Siward rules the north, and when he dies it must go to his son. Even Harold is not strong enough to disinherit that family. I rather like old Siward. He’s a barbarous hero from the old epics, perhaps a little out of place in modern civilised England; but you know where you are with him. He may be a killer, but he’s honest. In the same way Leofric is rooted in Mercia. He isn’t a man to make himself beloved like Siward, but the almsdeeds of Godiva will never be forgotten. Alfgar will inherit his mother’s popularity and his father’s prestige. With Harold in Wessex and the south, that means that all England is occupied.

  ‘Besides,’ he continued, ‘Harold is not quite such a ruffian as I had supposed. The Lady won’t see that even his past wickedness works in his favour. Since the battle of Porlock he is hated in the south-west, which means that his own Earldom wouldn’t follow him in revolt. He can never attempt to displace me, any more than I can get rid of him. Tostig, who hasn’t an enemy in the world, would be a much more dangerous minister. But there, you can’t argue with a woman. The Lady will never be convinced.’

  It seemed that all England was settled and at peace, under the rule of great Earls who would transmit their governments to their sons. Harold alone had no heir, because he was not yet married; though it was an open secret that he kept a favourite concubine in a fine house at Canterbury, and had bastards growing up all over the country. However, there were plenty of younger Godwinssons who could succeed him if necessary.

  There was also no heir of the house of Cerdic. Among the Godwinssons only Tostig agreed with the King’s choice of a successor. At every Council the question cropped up.

  Then someone remembered the refugees in Hungary. It must have been Harold who thought of them in the first place, but he was too cautious to appear as the originator of the idea. Bishop Aldred was the first to speak of them, one evening during the Christmas crownwearing of 1053.

  Bishop Aldred possessed every quality necessary to a statesman, except foresight. He could genuinely understand the point of view of an opponent, which made him good at arranging treaties; his memory was clear, he never delayed in answering letters, and in money matters he could not be cheated. But so long as no one was fighting he was satisfied; not true peace, but the mere absence of war, was his highest aim. He never asked himself whether by getting an agreement today he was laying the foundation of a savage war in the future; he had no policy except delay, and he negotiated as though all the great men who now ruled England would live for ever.

  That evening he spoke persuasively. The King was childless. In Hungary lived the son of the great English hero, Edmund Ironside. It was shameful that a genuine Cerdinga should be the pensioner of a foreign court. The young man must be weary of exile, and now that all England was at peace he should be invited to return. He might scruple to make the first approach, because that would look like begging for an English pension. But if the King would send a formal invitation he would surely hurry to revisit the land of his birth.

  When the Bishop finished speaking I saw Harold smile encouragement; the other Earls made not very enthusiastic noises of assent. No one would oppose in public such a harmless suggestion, though Ralph looked surly. The King stared up at the rafters, and I guessed that he was praying for guidance. He wanted this Hungarian to stay in Hungary, but he could not withstand the unanimous desire of his Council.

  ‘I know nothing about this Edward,’ he began, ‘except that he is the son of my half-brother Edmund. But if the King of the Hungarians keeps him in luxury he must be of good behaviour. I suppose my treasury ought to support him. Let me see, would you call the son of a half-brother a nephew or a half-nephew? Anyway, he is the only male Cerdinga living, except myself. Very well, we shall send him an invitation. But we must go carefully, for fear of offending powerful neighbours. We can’t write direct to the King of the Hungarians, you know. He owes allegiance to the Empire, and the Emperor would feel insulted. There is no hurry. This atheling has lived abroad since Sweyn the father of Canute overthrew my father, and a few more months will not matter. How would this do? Let us send an embassy to the Emperor, asking him to ask the King of the Hungarians to send Edward here. When everyone concerned has agreed, we can send a formal embassy. Who shall go as ambassador? Why not Bishop Aldred, since he was the first to show interest in this remote question?’

  The Bishop preened himself; it would be pleasant to visit the Emperor as envoy from a great and friendly King. Earl Harold looked less pleased, for the King would remove from the Council one of his most useful supporters. But it was a suggestion that no one could oppose. The clerks were ordered to begin the complicated draft of the ambassador’s instructions and to look up the precedents for his letter of credence to the Emperor.

  That night the Lady came into the chamber to chat with the King as he prepared for bed, and my lord returned once more to the subject of the Hungarian exile. ‘In Council I kept my temper, and I hope someone in Heaven made a note of it. It’s Harold’s idea that this atheling should return, and of course he would like to make him my successor. A foreigner from Hungary, knowing nothing of English affairs! He would be Harold’s tool, just as I was the tool of Godwin his father. But that sort of thing can’t go on generation after generation. Look at what happened to the Franks! The Merovings had even more prestige than the Cerdingas; in the old heathen days they had been sacred rulers, and they still observed the old ritual prohibitions against getting their hair cut or riding a horse. They were so sacred that they must have a Mayor of the Palace to make their mistakes for them, since a sacred King cannot make a mistake. Then the Mayors of the Palace took over, and there were no more Merovings. Of course that wasn’t the end of it. What the Carolings had taken by usurpation they lost to usurpers.’

  He spoke more rapidly. ‘That’s what will happen among the English, you mark my words, if the Godwinssons make themselves into hereditary chief ministers. But the world grows worse every year, and I expect it will happen more quickly than in France. Harold will rule for a few years in the name of this atheling. Then he will make himself King of the English. But his posterity will not keep the crown.’

  ‘He doesn’t think so far ahead as you suppose,’ answered the Lady. ‘This idea of bringing over the Hungarian was his, I grant you. But don’t you think he suggested it only to annoy, because he knew you wouldn’t like it? It pleases him sometimes to show that he’s master, but he’s clever, and cautious, and always makes sure of popular support before he suggests anything. He can’t hope to be King of the English himself; and he can hardly be plotting for his grandchildr
en, since he has never bothered to marry.’

  ‘That’s another thing,’ said the King, who could easily be persuaded to drop one grievance by the mention of another. ‘Your brother Harold is setting a shocking bad example, and I wish you could persuade him to stop. In Canute’s time marriage went clean out of fashion. He himself lived honestly enough with my mother, but half his Councillors kept to the old heathen ways. For the last twenty years and more every Bishop in England has been telling his flock to marry for life, or else live chaste. It’s a great pity that laymen should see the most famous English layman openly keeping a Danish concubine. I don’t ask Harold to observe all the Commandments all the time; there would be no harm done if he had one or two mistresses in the country and visited them quietly. But if he is going to live with one woman, why on earth can’t he marry her like a Christian?’

  ‘It’s late in the day to ask that of him,’ the Lady objected. ‘When the connection began Edith Swan-neck was very beautiful, and they are still fond of one another. But Harold would look ridiculous if he offered to marry a thirty-year-old concubine who had already borne his children. Besides, this Edith has no kin of any consequence. So long as my brother remains unmarried he has something in reserve. In a tight place he could marry into some great house, and gain an ally.’

  ‘Everything about Harold is unsatisfactory,’ my lord grumbled. ‘It’s hard luck that I should be landed with the worst of the Godwinssons as chief minister. If only Tostig had been born second instead of third! Or, for that matter, if you had been born a boy!’

  ‘Tostig and I will work together against Harold,’ the Lady answered in a soothing voice. ‘Somewhere you must find enough land to make Tostig a great Earl. Then we shall gradually overshadow Harold, without driving him to extremes or putting him outside the law. I don’t want to outlaw my brother, but I agree that he’s not worthy to rule England in your name.’

  The house of Godwin was now openly divided. The younger brothers, fascinated by Harold’s greatness, still clung to him; but Tostig and the Lady were firmly on the side of the King.

  Although the plan had been settled in principle at Christmas 1053 it was not until the following summer that Bishop Aldred was free to journey into the Empire. Presently he came back to say that the Emperor had sent word into Hungary, and that the atheling would come when he was ready. He implied that this would not be for some time; Bishop Aldred wove his complicated plans as though all his contemporaries were immortal.

  In the meantime a war had broken out in England, though we in the south were little affected. Malcolm, son and heir of the murdered King Duncan of the Scots, persuaded Earl Siward to join him in an attack on King Macbeth. The poets sing of it as a very great war. The Vikings of Orkney came in force to help the Scots, and in the battle thousands were slain on either side; though in the end the Northumbrians gained the victory. King Macbeth got away alive, but only to lurk for another year or two in the far north. Malcolm was anointed King on the old magic stone of the Scots. The Northumbrians took a great booty that made many of them rich for life. But what mattered to us in Wessex was that in the battle Osbern Siwardsson was killed.

  It was characteristic of Siward, that antique hero, that when he learned of the boy’s death he asked only how he had been killed. When they told him that the corpse was everything it should be, lying on its back with all its wounds in front, he went on to win the battle unmoved. Siward had another son to carry on his line; yet this Waltheof was a child, too young to govern an Earldom, and Siward was old.

  ‘At last there is an opening for Tostig,’ said the Lady when she heard the news.

  In the same autumn there happened a remarkable event, of which the like had not been known since the Romans left Britain; all the Welsh were united under one ruler. King Griffith of the North made war on King Griffith of the South, and killed him. The southern King left no son to succeed him, though he had kin to keep alive the family claim. The faithless Welsh submitted to the victor, who ruled without opposition from Chester to the Usk.

  It had been a restless year, and there was more trouble at the Lent Council in the following spring. In the first place Earl Siward was too ill to attend, and it was said that he would never recover. The great Earldom of Northumbria must go to a stranger. If Tostig were promoted, would that mean a doubling of the power of the Godwinssons, or would Harold find a rival who would presently surpass him? All the magnates were touchy and bad-tempered, and at the lower end of the hall their housecarles bickered until the chamberlains were hard put to it to keep the peace.

  The great man whose nerve was the first to break was not one of those we had been watching. While we feared a desperate quarrel among the Godwinssons, the housecarles of Earl Alfgar came storming through the passages, crying that they must load their master’s baggage without delay. Then the Council adjourned until next morning, and it was publicly proclaimed that the Earl of the East Angles had been outlawed for treason.

  I wish I could explain this episode, but I can’t. It is unlikely that Alfgar expected to get Northumbria, when obviously he must have English Mercia as soon as his father was dead. On the other hand, it would be a very strange coincidence if he happened to plot an independent treason when everyone was thinking about the succession to Earl Siward. I am not even sure that he was justly called a traitor. The King himself could not make up his mind on the point. On different occasions I heard him say that Alfgar had been condemned by false oaths, and that he had admitted his guilt. Perhaps his enemies slandered him while he was planning some other treason that was never discovered.

  At all events, if Alfgar was falsely convicted he had taken precautions against such a misfortune. Recently he had given his young daughter Edith in marriage to the much older Welsh King, and he used his five days of grace to flee not to the nearest seaport, but westward into Wales. His housecarles remained faithful to him, and the thanes of English Mercia would fight for the son of Leofric against all comers. He was soon at the head of a powerful army.

  In the middle of this crisis came news that Siward was dead and Northumbria without a ruler.

  Tostig was the only successor available, as even Harold must admit. Leofric was suspect, and his son Alfgar disqualified. Harold was by this time on bad terms with his brother, but he had to approve his appointment as Earl of the Northumbrians.

  When the King went to London to wear his crown at Pentecost 1055 the war had not yet begun, though it was known that King Griffith and Alfgar would invade before winter. All the Earls were free to come to the Council, even Tostig who had just taken possession of his new Earldom. He and Leofric brought their wives with them; for the Lady had come to London with the King, and merchants from oversea, knowing the movements of the court, had imported special cargoes of fine silk and Greek jewellery. It was a very gay crown-wearing, for those who enjoy the company of pretty women; and I enjoyed it also, for I like to see handsome clothes of the latest fashion.

  It seemed that in those days everyone was building churches. Earl Leofric, or rather Godiva his wife, had just finished their great foundation at Coventry; I have never seen it, but I am told it is very splendid. The Lady had rebuilt the chapel at Wilton, in gratitude for the community’s generous hospitality while her family were in exile. Oddly enough the most fashionable convent in England, with a membership drawn from noble houses, had hitherto made do with a little wooden chapel. Unkind neighbours whispered that this was because the nuns devoted all their spare money to the refectory, but I think it was just an example of the English habit of putting up with an old unsatisfatory building rather than bring in crowds of workmen to wander all over the place. Anyway, the Lady replaced the wooden chapel with a fine one of stone, taller than anything of the kind I had seen before. Bishop Hermann consecrated it in a ceremony of great splendour when the court passed by on the way to London. Everybody liked poor Bishop Hermann, though the affairs of his diocese were always in confusion. I remember the consecration, and the feast afterwards when
we ate sugar cakes cooked by the nuns themselves; and if the Lady had to pay some bills that she thought Bishop Hermann had paid already, the money was there and it was not enough to mar the feeling of festivity.

  In London we heard that even Earl Harold was contemplating the foundation of a great church; though in general he was stingy with the clergy, always disputing their immunity from taxation. Just to be different his new foundation at Waltham would not be a minster; instead he would put in canons who followed one of the new foreign rules.

  Of course Tostig had not yet had time to found anything in his new Earldom, but he talked largely of his plans when the magnates supped with the King on the eve of Pentecost. It was a cheerful and good-tempered gathering, even though Earl Leofric sighed from time to time at the absence of his son. While they were discussing the great shrines of Northumbria Judith joined in from the women’s table with a story of her own.

  ‘St. Cuthbert protects all the north, and so long as he stays with us we shall be safe from raiding Scots. But I wish they would find a better place for his relics. They have been moved often enough in the past. Do you know, lord King, that they are kept inside the monastic enclosure, so that no female may approach them?’

  ‘But they make an exception for the wives of rulers, don’t they? That’s the custom in most religious houses,’ said Bishop William in French from the high table. Bishop William had been recalled by his flock soon after his flight with Archbishop Robert; he was such a good Bishop, even though a Norman, that the Londoners could not get on without him. Now he was trying hard to learn English, in gratitude. He could understand the language, especially when spoken by Judith the Fleming, but he could not yet trust himself to speak it.