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Oswolf, son of Eadbert, was slain in a sedition, a year after his accession to the crown; and Mollo, who was not of the royal family, seized the crown. He perished by the treachery of Ailred, a prince of the blood; and Ailred, having succeeded in his design upon the throne, was soon after expelled by his subjects. Ethelred, his successor, the son of Mollo, underwent a like fate.
Celwold, the next king, the brother of Ailred, was deposed and slain by the people, and his place was filled by Osred, his nephew, who, after a short reign of a year, made way for Ethelbert, another son of Mollo, whose death was equally tragical with that of almost all his predecessors.
The chief interest, for our purpose, attaching to the battle of the Standard, is connected with the light it throws upon the racial complexion of the country seventy years after the Norman Conquest. Our chief authorities are the Hexham chroniclers and Ailred of Rivaulx , English writers of the twelfth century. They speak of David's host as composed of Angli, Picti, and Scoti.
But, on leaving the pavilion, they had missed Edith; she had gone from them alone, and was lost in that dreadful wilderness. And Ailred said despondingly: "Perchance we may already have seen the corpse we search for, and not recognised it; for the face may be mutilated with wounds.
"And see," said Ailred, eagerly, as he drew out a leathern pouch, "we have brought with us all the gold that our poor crypts contained, for we misdoubted this day," and he poured out the glittering pieces at the Conqueror's feet.
The two brethren of Waltham, Osgood and Ailred, had arrived a little after daybreak at the spot in which, about half a mile, to the rear of Harold's palisades, the beasts of burden that had borne the heavy arms, missiles, luggage, and forage of the Saxon march, were placed in and about the fenced yards of a farm.
As he carried the instrument to the spot indicated by Ailred, the baron presented the minstrel to his daughter. Humbert behaved with becoming reverence. He took his station a few feet from the table, between Sir Sandrit and his daughter, and began to prelude with decision and great sweetness. Gilbert stood behind him, with his back to the baron and his face to the Lady Margaret.
Meanwhile, he was man enough not to require that anything should be added to Torfrida's penance; and that was enough to prove him a man in those days, at least for a churchman, as it proved Archbishop or St. Ailred to be, a few years after, in the case of the nun of Watton, to be read in Gale's "Scriptores Anglicaniae." Then he showed the letter to Alftruda.
The supposed miracle of the sacred Image bowing over the kneeling King, had spread dismay through the cloisters of both nunnery and abbey; and so intense was the disquietude of the two brothers, Osgood and Ailred, in the simple and grateful affection they bore their royal benefactor, that they had obeyed the impulse of their tender credulous hearts, and left the monastery with the dawn, intending to follow the King's march , and watch and pray near the awful battle-field.
Before the drawbridge was gained, Humbert had recovered himself, and was prepared to put forth all his daring and skill to extricate themselves from the consequences of this perilous adventure. "Ho! warder!" he cried, in a confident tone, "a minnesinger Ailred of Zurich and his harp-bearer, wet and fasting. Shelter in the name of God!"
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