Dane by birth), that the king quietly left
the coronation feast, while all the company
were there. Odo, much displeased, sent
his friend Dunstan to seek him. Dunstan
finding him in the company of his beautiful
young wife, ELGIVA, and her mother ETHELGIVA,
a good and virtuous lady, not only
grossly abused them, but dragged the young
king back into the feasting-hall by force.
Some, again, think Dunstan did this because
the young king's fair wife was his own
cousin, and the monks objected to people
marrying their own cousins; but, I believe he
did it, solely because he was an imperious,
audacious, ill-conditioned priest, who, having
loved a young lady himself before he became
a sour monk, hated all love now, and everything
belonging to it.

The young king was quite old enough to
feel this insult. Dunstan had been Treasurer
in the last reign, and he soon charged
Dunstan with having taken some of the last
king's money. The Glastonbury Abbot fled
to Belgium (very narrowly escaping some
pursuers who were sent to put out his eyes,
as you will wish they had, when you read
what follows), and his abbey was given to
priests who were married: whom he always,
both before and afterwards, opposed. But,
he quickly conspired with his friend, Odo the
Dane, to set up the king's young brother,
EDGAR, as his rival for the throne; and, not
content with this revenge, he caused the
beautiful queen Elgiva, though a lovely girl of
only seventeen or eighteen, to be stolen from
one of the Royal Palaces, branded in the
cheek with a red-hot iron, and sold into
slavery in Ireland. But, the Irish people
pitied and befriended her, and they said, "Let
us restore the girl-queen to the boy-king, and
make the young lovers happy!" and they
cured her of her cruel wound, and sent her
home as beautiful as before. But, the villain
Dunstan, and that other villain, Odo, caused
her to be waylaid at Gloucester as she was
joyfully hurrying to join her husband, and to
be hacked and hewn with swords, and to be
barbarously maimed and lamed, and left to
die. When Edwy the Fair (his people called
him so, because he was so young and handsome)
heard of her dreadful fate, he died of
a broken heart; and so the pitiful story of the
poor young wife and husband ends! Ah!
Better to have been two cottagers, in those
bad times, than king and queen of England,
though never so fair!

Then came the boy-king, EDGAR, called the
Peaceful, fifteen years old. Dunstan, being
still the real king, drove all married priests
out of the monasteries and abbeys, and
replaced them by stern, solitary, monks, like
himself, of the rigid order, called the
Benedictines. He made himself Archbishop of
Canterbury, for his greater glory, and
exercised such power over the neighbouring
British Princes, and so collected them about
the king, that, once, when the king held his
court at Chester, and went on the river Dee
to visit the monastery of St. John, the eight
oars of his boat were pulled (as the people used
to delight in relating in stories and songs) by
eight crowned kings, and steered by the King
of England. As he was very obedient to
Dunstan and the monks, they took great
pains to represent him as the best of kings.
But, he was really profligate, debauched, and
vicious. He once forcibly carried off a young
lady from the convent at Wilton; and Dunstan,
pretending to be very much shocked,
condemned him not to wear his crown upon his
head for seven years;—no great punishment,
I dare say, as it can hardly have been a more
comfortable ornament to wear, than a stew-
pan without a handle. His marriage with his
second wife, ELFRIDA, is one of the worst
events of his reign. Hearing of the beauty
of this lady, he despatched his favorite courtier,
ATHELWOLD, to her father's castle, in Devonshire,
to see if she were really as charming as
fame reported. Now, she was so exceedingly
beautiful, that Athelwold fell in love with
her himself, and married her; but, he told
the king that she was only rich—not handsome.
The king, suspecting the truth, when
they came home, resolved to pay the newly-
married couple a visit; and, suddenly, told
Athelwold to prepare for his immediate
coming. Athelwold, terrified, confessed to
his young wife what he had said and done,
and implored her to disguise her beauty by
some ugly dress or silly manner, that he
might be safe from the king's anger. She
promised that she would; but, she was a
proud, bad woman, who would far rather have
been a queen than the wife of a courtier.
She dressed herself in her best dress, and
adorned herself with her richest jewels; and,
when the king came, presently, he discovered
the cheat. So, he caused his false friend,
Athelwold, to be murdered in a wood, and
married his widow, this bad Elfrida. Six or
seven years afterwards, he died, and was
buried, as if he had been all that the monks
said he was, in the abbey of Glastonbury,
which he—or rather Dunstan for him—had
much enriched.

England, in one part of this reign, was
so troubled by wolves, which, driven out of
the open country, hid themselves in the
mountains of Wales when they were not
attacking travellers and animals, that the
tribute payable by the Welsh people was
forgiven them, on condition of their producing,
every year, three hundred wolves' heads.
And the Welshmen were so sharp upon the
wolves, to save their money, that in four
years there was not a wolf left.

Then, came the boy-king, EDWARD, called
the Martyr, from the manner of his death.
Elfrida had a son, named ETHELRED, for whom
she claimed the throne; but, Dunstan did not
choose to favor him, and made Edward king.
The boy was hunting, one day, down in
Dorsetshire, when he rode near to Corfe Castle,