Page:Archaeological Journal, Volume 11.djvu/275

 ON THE LIFE AND DEATH OP EARL GODWINE. 239 and had espoused the daughter of King JEtlielred. If JEthelred could thus promote an utterly unworthy favourite, what should hinder the discerning Danish conqueror from doing the like by one in whom he perceived powers well calculated to prove the best support of an insecure dynasty 1 Nothing could be more likel}'' to reconcile the mass of the English people to the Danish sovereignty than the sight of one of themselves, an Englishman risen from the ranks, promoted to be the counsellor of the foreign monarch, and connected by marriage Avith the royal house "? And, as I have before remarked, the prominent position of Godwine at the death of Cnut is rather assumed than stated in most of our old chronicles. He appears as the leader of the English party, and the chief support of the deceased monarch's widow, but as to his parentage, and as to the means by which he obtained so high a position, nearly all our historians are silent. Thus far w^e might be inclined to accept the Scandinavian legend, as filhng up a singular gap in our own annals. But it may be answered that this general silence of our old records is broken by two, and those the most supposed trustworthy of their number. One of the most mony^'f*''tte conspicuous events in the troubled reign of ufcirand^F^io- iEthelred is the assemblage and dispersion of the '■"'®- great English fleet in the year 1009. With vast labour and expense a navy had been gathered together which w^as to brave the power of the Northmen upon their own element, and to guard England from all further fear of subjugation at the hands of her inveterate invaders. At the very moment of its assemblage Brihtric, the brother of the Ealdorman Eadric, accuses to the King " Child Wulfiioth, the South- Saxon ; " Wulfnoth flies with twenty ships and takes to piracy ; Brihtric, at the royal order, pursues him with eighty ships, but the fleet of Brihtric is scattered by a tempest, and the remnant attacked and burnt by Wulfnoth. Now, who was this " Child Wulfnoth the South Saxon 1 " Some copies of the Saxon Chronicle, followed by the printed editions, add to this description the words " father of Earl Godwine." But in other copies the words are wanting, nor do they occur either in Florence of Worcester, who evidently copies the Chronicle, or in Roger Wendover, or lloger de Hoveden who evidently copies Florence ; nor yet in the slightly VOL. XI. I I