better conditioned, prepared themselves for arms. It was after completing his thirteenth year that Wilfrid, who had not then decided on a religious life, began to think of quitting the paternal roof. He obtained such arms, horses, and garments for himself and his boys, as were necessary to enable him to present himself to the royal notice. With these he travelled till he reached the queen of the province. He met there some of the nobles at her court, whom he had attended at his father's house. They praised him, and introduced him to the queen, by whom he was graciously received. As he afterwards chose the path of devotion, she recommended him to one of the nobles who accompanied the king, but who was induced, by the pressure of a paralytic disease, to exchange the court for the cloister.i

66

The Anglo-Saxons distinguished the period between childhood and manhood by the term cnihthade, knighthood. It is stated in Ina's laws, "that a cniht of ten winters old might give evidence;"i and Bede's expression, of a boy about eight years old, is translated by Alfred, "pær eahta pintɲa cnich." A king also mentions of a circumstance, that he saw it cniht wesende, being a cniht, or while a boy. It will be considered in another place how far the term bore the meaning of chivalry among the AngloSaxons. A daughter was under the power of her parents till the age of thirteen or fourteen, when she had the disposal of her person herself: at fifteen, a son had the right of choosing his path of life, and might then become a monk, but not before.m

In this season of cnihthood, or youth, we find them striving to excel each other at a horse-race. A person in Bede describes himself as one of a party, who on their journey came to a spacious plain, adapted to a horse-course. The young men were desirous to prove their horses in the greater course, or, as the Saxon translator expresses it, that we might run and try which had the swiftest horse. The individual spoken of at last joined them; but his animated horse, attempting to clear a concavity in the way, by a violent leap, the youth was thrown senseless against a stone, and with difficulty brought to life."

The Saxon youth seem to have been accustomed to habits of docility and obedience. The word cniht was also used to express a servant; and Wilfrid is characterized as having in his youth attentively ministered to all his father's visiters, whether royal attendants or their servants.P

The education of the Saxons was much assisted by the emigrations or visits of Irish ecclesiastics. We have mentioned

i Eddius, p. 44.

Bede, lib. v. c. 18. Alf. Transl. 635.

1 Bede. Alf. Transl. p. 518.

n Bede, lib. v. c. 6.

P Eddius, p. 44.

j Wilkins, Leg. p. 16.

m 1 Wilk. Concil. 130.

• Gen. xxiv. 65. Luke, xii. 45.

Maildulf at Malmsbury; it is also intimated, in Dunstan's life, that some Irishmen had settled at Glastonbury, whose books Dunstan diligently studied. This great, but ambitious man, was arraigned in his youth for studying the vain songs of his pagan ancestors, and the frivolous charms of histories.

After the prevalence of Christianity, a portion of the youth was taken into the monasteries. We have a description, in Saxon, of the employment of the boys there. One of these, in answer to the question, What have you done to-day?' says,

6

"Many things. When I heard the knell, I rose from my bed and went to church, and sang the song for before-day with the brethren, and afterwards of All Saints, and, at the dawn of day, the song of praise. After these, I said the first and seventh Psalms, with the litany and first mass. Afterwards, before noon, we did the mass for the day, and after this, at mid-day, we sang, and ate, and drank, and slept, and again we rose and sang the noon, and now we are here before thee, ready to hear what thou shalt say to us.”

The interrogation proceeds:

'When will ye sing the evening or the night song?" "When it is time."'Wert thou flogged to-day?" "No."- No?" 66 Every one knows whether he has been flogged to-day or not." Where do you sleep? "In the sleepingroom with the brethren." Who rouses you to the song before day?" "Sometimes I hear the knell and rise; sometimes my master wakes me, sternly, with his rod."

On being questioned why they learnt so industriously, he is made to reply,

"Because we would not be like the stupid animals, who know nothing but their grass and water.”r

66

That they used personal castigation in their education is frequently intimated. Alcuin, in the preface to his Dialectica, adds a warm exhortation to his young contemporaries to improve themselves by education. "O ye, who enjoy the youthful age, so fitted for your lessons! Learn. Be docile. Lose not the day in idle things. The passing hour, like the wave, never returns again. Let your early years flourish with the study of the virtues, that your age may shine with great honours. Use these happy days. Learn, while young, the art of eloquence, that you may be a safeguard and defender of those whom you value. Acquire the conduct and manners so beautiful in youth, and your name will become celebrated through the world. But as I wish

a MS. Cleop. B. 13.

MS. Tib. A. 3.

Thus Alcuin :-"As scourges teach children to learn the ornament of wisdom, and to accustom themselves to good manners." p. 1631. He says to the brethren of York Minster, where he was educated: "You cherished the weak mind of my infancy with maternal affection. You sustained my wanton day of childhood with pious patience. You brought me to the perfect age of manhood by the disciplines of paternal castigation, and confirmed my mind by the erudition of sacred instruction." p. 1627.

you not to be sluggish; so neither be proud. I worship the recesses of the devout and humble breast." Oper. p. 1353.

We have a short sketch of the better kind of intellectual education in Alcuin's description of the studies which, after he was invited from England by Charlemagne, he superintended at Tours, It is not expressed in the best taste, but it shows the studies that were valued in the eighth century. He writes to the emperor:

"According to your exhortations and kind wish, I endeavour to administer, in the schools of St. Martin, to some the honey of the Sacred Writings: I try to inebriate others with the wine of the ancient classics. I begin to nourish some with the apples of Grammatical subtlety. I strive to illuminate many by the arrangement of the Stars, as from the painted roof of a lofty palace.

"But," he adds, "I want those more exquisite books of scholastic erudition which I had in my own country. May it then please your wisdom, that I send some of our youths to procure what we need; and to convey into France the flowers of Britain, that they may not be locked up in York only, but that their fragrance and fruit may adorn, at Tours, the gardens and streams of the Loire.' "t

Some of the Anglo-Saxons, if we may judge from Alcuin, had a high and just idea of the efficacy of literary education in meliorating the temper, and in forming a noble character; and it appears that the sentiments of Charlemagne were as enlightened as those of his preceptor. Alcuin says to him:

"Yet as you wish that the fierceness of your youths should be mitigated by the sweetness of all kinds of poetry, you have provided for this with the wisest counsel. Sometimes the asperity of the mind does not feel the effects of sagacious advice, and sometimes the continued gentleness of the temper tends to enervate the spirit. But among these diseases the prudent temperament will arise from the middle path; now softening the swelling fury of the soul, and now rousing its slothfulness. This kind of virtue is peculiarly necessary to warriors. We read in ancient history, that a wise command of temper ought to guide and govern every thing that is done.""

In another place he expatiates ardently on the benefit of lettered education.

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'Nothing tends to acquire more nobly a happy life; nothing is more pleasant for our recreation, nor more powerful against vice; nothing is more laudable in the highest ranks, nor more necessary for the due government of a state; nothing is more efficacious in forming life to the most becoming manners, than Wisdom, Study, and Knowledge!"-He adds, “Exhort, O King! all the noble youths in your palace to acquire and possess these advantages by their daily studies, that their blooming spring may so profit from them as to lead them to an honoured old age, and a blessed immortality.”

t Alc. Ep. p. 1463.

"Alc. Ep. p. 1473.

17*

▾ Ibid. p. 1464.

CHAPTER III.

Their Food.

THEIR food was that mixture of animal and vegetable diet which always attends the progress of civilization. They reared various sorts of corn in inclosed and cultivated lands, and they fed domesticated cattle for the uses of their table.

For their animal food they had oxen, sheep, and great abundance of swine; they used likewise, fowls, deer, goats, and hares; but though the horned cattle are not unfrequently mentioned in their grants and wills, and were often the subjects of exchange, yet the animals most numerously stated are the swine. The country in all parts abounded with wood; and woods are not often particularized without some notice of the swine which they contained, or were capable of maintaining. They also frequently appear in wills. Thus Alfred, a nobleman, gives to his relations a hide of land with one hundred swine; and he directs one hundred swine to be given for his soul to one minister, and the same number to another; and to his two daughters he gives two thousand swine.' So Elfhelm gives land to St. Peter's at Westminster, on the express condition that they feed two hundred of these animals for his wife.b

They ate various kinds of fish; but, of this description of their animal food, the species which is most profusely noticed is the eel. They used eels as abundantly as swine. Two grants are mentioned, each yielding one thousand eels, and by another two thousand were received as an annual rent. Four thousand eels were a yearly present from the monks of Ramsay to those of Peterborough. We read of two places purchased for twentyone pounds, wherein sixteen thousand of these fish were caught every year; and, in one charta, twenty fishermen are stated, who furnished, during the same period, sixty thousand eels to the monastery.f Eel dikes are often mentioned in the boundaries of their lands.

In the dialogues composed by Elfric to instruct the AngloSaxon youths in the Latin language, which are yet preserved to us, we have some curious information concerning the manners

a Will. in App. Sax. Dict.

3 Gale, 477.

Dugdale Mon. p. 244.

8 In the Cotton Library, MS. Tib. A. 3.

b Ibid.

d Ibid. 456.

f Ibid. p. 235.

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and trades of our ancestors. In one colloquy the fisherman is asked, What gettest thou by thine art?' Big loaves, clothing, and money."How do you take them?" "I ascend my ship, and cast my net into the river; I also throw in a hook, a bait, and a rod."Suppose the fishes are unclean?" "I throw the unclean out, and take the clean for food."- Where do you sell your fish?” “In the city." Who buys them?" The citizens; I cannot take so many as I can sell.”—What fishes do you take?' “Eels, haddocks, minnows, and eel-pouts, skate, and lampreys, and whatever swims in the river."—Why do you not fish in the sea?" "Sometimes I do; but rarely, because a great ship is necessary there."- What do you take in the sca?" Herrings and salmons, porpoises, sturgeons, oysters, and crabs, muscles, winkles, cockles, flounders, plaice, lobsters, and such like."Can you take a whale?" "No, it is dangerous to take a whale; it is safer for me to go to the river with my ship than to go with many ships to hunt whales."Why?" Because it is more pleasant to me to take fish which I can kill with one blow; yet many take whales without danger, and then they get a great price, but I dare not, from the fearfulness of my mind."

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This extract shows the uniformity of human taste on the main articles of food. Fish was such a favourite diet, that the supply never equalled the demand, and the same fishes were then in request which we select, though our taste has declined for the porpoises. The porpoise is mentioned in a convention between an archbishop and the clergy at Bath, which enumerate six of them under the name of mere-swine, or the sea-swine, and thirty thousand herrings

In the earlier periods of the Anglo-Saxon colonization, their use of fish was more limited: for we read in Bede, that Wilfrid rescued the people of Sussex from famine in the eighth century by teaching them to catch fish: "For though the sea and their rivers abounded with fish, they had no more skill in the art than to take eels. The servants of Wilfrid threw into the sea nets made out of those by which they had obtained eels, and thus directed them to a new source of plenty." It may account for Wilfrid's superior knowledge, to remark, that he had travelled over the continent to Rome.

It is an article in the Penitentiale of Egbert, that fish might be bought though dead.' The same treatise allows herrings to be

The Saxon names for these are, ælar, hacodaɲ, mýnar, æleputan, rceotan, lampɲedan. MS. Tib. A. 3.

i benincgarleaxar, meɲerpyn, гtiɲian, ortɲean cɲabban, murlan, pine pinclan, ræ coccar, Fage, Floc, lopýr

than. MS. ib.

i MS. CCC. apud. Cantab. Miscell. G. p. 73. 11 Wilkins's Conc. p. 123.

Bede, lib. iv. c. 13.