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Updated: June 15, 2025
"False Brithric!" echoed the wily tempter; "I will prove myself the true friend of the Atheling, if he will only give consent to the deed by which I will make him this very day the lord of England." "Impossible," cried the prince; "you have no power to raise me to the throne of my father Edward, albeit it is my lawful inheritance." "The usurper Athelstane knows that full well," observed Brithric.
When Brithric obtained possession of the government of Wessex, he enjoyed not that dignity without inquietude.
The eyes of Prince Edwin brightened at the words of Brithric, and he grasped the arrow which he had in his hand with the air of one who holds a sceptre. "Fie, Brithric," said Wilfrid, "how can you be so treacherous to your royal master as to speak of him with such disrespect, and to put such dangerous and criminal ideas into the mind of Prince Edwin?"
"And what are your reasons, Wilfrid, for denying your esteem to Brithric?" said the prince. "He is obliging, and often says very agreeable things to you." "It costs more to win my esteem than a few unmeaning compliments, which Brithric is accustomed to pay to every one with whom he is desirous of carrying his point," said Wilfrid.
It was only in his unrestrained confidence with his widowed mother that he ever uttered a complaint of the young Atheling, and then he spoke of him in sorrow, not in anger; for he rightly attributed much of Prince Edwin's unamiable conduct to the pernicious influence which the artful Brithric had, through flattery, obtained over his mind.
"And what should Brithric, who is the heir of the richest thane in my brother's court, want to gain of a poor, landless orphan who owes his sustenance and education to the compassion of King Athelstane?" retorted the prince, angrily. The pale cheek of Wilfrid flushed with unwonted crimson at this unexpected taunt from the lips of his young lord.
He grew weary of Wilfrid's admonitions, and frequently reproved him when he ventured to reason with him, or attempted to offer the counsel of a true friend. Brithric was, as I said before, much older than the prince or any of the royal wards.
"Ha!" cried the king, "I remember thee now; thou art the pale stripling who bore witness of my brother's innocence of the crime with which the false-tongued Brithric charged him!" "The same, my lord," said Wilfrid; "and God hath witnessed for my truth by preserving me from the waters of the great deep, to which thou didst commit me with my lord, Prince Edwin."
"Oh, Wilfrid, generous Wilfrid," cried Edwin, bursting into tears, "how nobly do you fulfill the precepts of your heavenly Master by returning good for evil!" Now Athelstane had been so deeply prejudiced against his unfortunate brother by the wicked Brithric, that he would not listen to Wilfrid's honest evidence.
The nobility and people of the neighbourhood, rising next day in arms, took revenge on Kynehard for the slaughter of their king, and put every one to the sword who had been engaged in that criminal enterprise. Brithric next obtained possession of the government, though remotely descended from the royal family, but he enjoyed not that dignity without inquietude.
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