I NOW enter upon a singularly interesting section of my journey. I am approaching the last stronghold the AngloSaxons held against the conquering Normans. Before me-I get a glimpse of its towers almost as soon as I have left Littleport, though it is still some miles distant-is a glorious fane of the fens-that fane which arose on the site of St. Etheldreda's Saxon church. Near it was the Saxons' Camp of Refuge. On and around this famous fen isle were done some of the bravest deeds of which England can boast. Here, Hereward the Wake performed some of his most wonderful exploits. Here, a handful of brave men, commanding a few fenmen unskilled in arms, and the fragments of a scattered force, held out against the most successful warrior of his time. Here, treachery at last effected what force and strategic skill could not accomplish, and reaped its due reward. Some historians would have us

CH. XI

HEREWARD THE WAKE

307

believe that Hereward is a mythical personage and that the famous exploits attributed to him are as fabulous as those of Munchausen ; but Hereward has won for himself a place in English hearts from which historians can never dislodge him, and here in the heart of Fenland, amid the scenes made famous by the records of his daring deeds, it is useless to deny that he ever existed or was the hero men believe him to have been. If you are a doubter, there are men here ready to take you to Bourn and show you the foundations of Hereward's ancestral home; and they will tell you that the Wakes of Northamptonshire can trace their descent from the most famous Wake of all. They will point out, too, the scenes of his chief conflicts with the Normans; and it is, in their opinion, only the most foolish of sceptics who will question the accuracy of the old monks' tales. How, they will ask, can modern investigators judge of these things when they cannot avail themselves of the chronicles to which Robert of Swaffham and other medieval writers had access? and why should we always doubt what we cannot clearly understand and prove? For my own part, I am content to accept the story of Hereward as it has been handed down to us, believing that there is more fact than fiction in the traditions upon which the old chroniclers relied and Kingsley based his fascinating romance. There must have been something wonderful and heroic about the Anglo-Saxon warrior to enshrine him so firmly in English hearts, and I do not envy the man who, after crossing the wide fens amid which the “last of the English" lay in wait for the Norman bands, can set foot on the Isle of Ely and attempt to discredit the stories which are as much a part of it as its glorious fane.

Now as to Hereward. It was at Bourn, in Lincolnshire, that he first saw the light. He was the son of the lord of the manor of Bourn. In his youth he displayed so turbulent a disposition that his father was compelled to obtain from Edward the Confessor an order for his banishment. So he left England, and for some years was a soldier of fortune, content to run any risks

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THE COMING OF HEREWARD

CH. XI

so long as his life was eventful and adventurous. His fearlessness and uninterrupted success in arms soon won him fame, not only among the men of the armies with which he served, but in his native Fenland, where there were many who longed for his return home and aid in ridding them of an aggressive foe. It was not, however, until he heard that his father was dead and his lands had fallen into Norman hands that he turned his back on Flanders and his face towards his native land. Here, he soon made his presence felt ; and the Fenland Saxons, hearing that he had, with the aid of his servants, driven the Normans from his house and lands at Bourn, came to him and told him of their hard case.

This they did because they recognised in him a man born to be a leader of men, and one who, having had experience of warfare in many lands, was capable of successfully matching his skill against the Conqueror and his men-at-arms. Having heard what the Saxons had to say, Hereward soon made his way to Ely, where, in the Camp of Refuge, abbots, knights, common soldiers and many of the Saxons of the fens awaited his coming. He found them nearly all inspired with the same determined spirit; ready to fight to the last rather than submit to the hated foe. All around them lay the Normans, who, though they could not find a path through the swamps and so gain a footing on the Isle, were ever on the alert to capture or slay stragglers from the camp. Luckily the soil of the Isle was very different to that of the trackless fens, so the Saxons experienced few of the hardships usually felt by besieged garrisons; providing the enemy approached no nearer they might well have been content that the siege should last for ever. "Within the Isle," says Robert of Swaffham, "there is no pressure by reason of the number of their army, and they are not pressed by the enemy; seeing that, though blockaded, the ploughman does not take his hand from the plough, nor does the reaper's right hand waver in the harvest, nor does the hunter neglect his hunting spears, nor does the fowler cease from lying in wait for birds by the banks of

310

THE CAMP OF REFUGE

CHAP.

the rivers and in the woods; for the inhabitants are well and plentifully supplied with all sorts of living creatures. For at the time when the water-fowl change their feathers and appearance, there I have often seen men bring many little birds, sometimes a hundred, occasionally two hundred and more, and very often not less than a thousand from one single piece of water. And from the woods that are in the Isle, in the same way, at one time of the year there is a great supply of herons, to say nothing of the abundance of wild animals and cattle. Then again from the waters round the Isle, it is very well known that they abound in every kind of fish." So, except that after a time they may have drained the last drop of wine from the abbot's cellars, the case of the "last of the English," who, after the death of Harold, fled to this fenland fastness, was not such a very hard one after all. Still, they were glad when Hereward arrived, for the monks were not likely to get them out of difficulties, and the knights and men-at-arms had tried and failed.

King William was at that time encamped at Brandon, no doubt on the dry heathlands there; and Hereward, soon after his arrival on the Isle, thought it would be as well that someone should go and see what was going on in the Norman camp. Finding no one on the Isle fitted to undertake the journey, he determined to make it himself. Saddling his lean and ugly, but speedy mare Swallow, he set out to cross the fens. Meeting a potter, he changed clothes with him, and, taking his pots also, assumed his business and speech, and so gained admission into his enemies' headquarters. He found lodgings in the house of a reputed witch, whom, during the night, he heard planning how she might discover a path that would bring the invaders to the Isle. In the morning he went about the camp crying his wares, and was at length brought by some servants into the king's kitchen. While he was bartering with the servants a man cried out that never before had he seen a man so much like Hereward as the potter. Hearing this the servants com