Chapter XIII: William the Lion--1165–1214 (1)

Peace reigned throughout the northern borders of England during the absence of her king in the Holy Land; and when Richard languished in the dungeons of the emperor, William contributed two thousand marks towards his ransom. [Sidenote: A. D. 1193.] No countenance was afforded by the Scottish sovereign to the intrigues of Philip and John; but upon the release of the royal captive, Earl David of Huntingdon was the first to declare in his favour, and uniting with the Earl of Chester, [Sidenote: A. D. 1194.] whose sister he had married, he joined in besieging the strong castle of Nottingham on behalf of the liberated king.[451]

Early in April, and shortly after the Council of Nottingham, William met the king of England at Clipston, passing the remainder of the month in his company. He soon found an opportunity for urging a restoration of the dignities and honors which had belonged, as he maintained, to his predecessors, putting forward a formal claim upon the earldom of Northumberland, and the Honor of Lancaster, together with the counties of Cumberland and Westmoreland--the whole territory, in short, which had once been held by his father, Earl Henry. Richard returned an evasive answer, alleging that he must consult his barons: and after the council held at Northampton, in Easter week, he replied that, in his present circumstances, it was impossible to listen to William’s demands; as concession on his part would be attributed to his fear of the French war, rather than to his affection for the Scottish king. As a set off to a reply which was tantamount to a refusal, he conferred upon William a charter of privileges, specifying that whenever the king of Scotland attended the English court, the whole of his expenses should be defrayed out of the English exchequer; and providing that he should be escorted, both in arriving and on his return, by the bishops and sheriffs of the different dioceses and counties, through which it was necessary for him to pass in the course of his progress. William was obliged to be satisfied with this concession; and he assisted, in token of amity, at the second coronation of Richard, bearing, upon this occasion, the principal sword of state.[452]

Another opportunity soon occurred for again advancing his claims. After the conclusion of the coronation, the bishop of Durham resigned his earldom of Northumberland into the hands of Richard, and the king was on the point of transferring it to Hugo Bardolf, when William hastened to offer 15,000 marks for the fief. The magnitude of the sum tempted Richard, who was seldom proof against an offer of this description, and, after a short deliberation, he consented to grant the earldom without the castles--or, in other words, the pecuniary, but not the political, advantages of the fief--a compromise which did not accord with the views of William. He made a final effort to obtain his object a few days before the departure of Richard for Normandy, but equally without success, for the latter would only hold out the hope that he might take the matter into consideration on his return from his expedition into France; and the Scottish king, towards the close of the month, retraced his steps towards the north in bitter chagrin at his failure.[453]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1195.]

In the course of the following year, William was seized with an alarming illness at Clackmannan, and, in the momentary expectation of death, assembling his leading nobles, he made known his intention of declaring as his successor Otho of Saxony, a son of Henry the Lion, and subsequently emperor of Germany, on the stipulation that the prince should marry his eldest daughter Margaret. The proposal was but coldly received by many of his nobility; Earl Patrick of Dunbar, as the spokesman of the dissentient party, maintaining that it was contrary to the custom of Scotland for the crown to descend in the female line, as long as there was a brother, or nephew, in the succession.[454] The question was terminated for the time by the recovery of the king; but he did not relinquish his purpose, and, at Christmas, he gave an audience at York to the archbishop of Canterbury, who was empowered by Richard to conduct the negotiations connected with the marriage in question. Lothian was to be the dowry of the Scottish princess, and the castles of that province were to be made over to the keeping of the English king; whilst Richard engaged to bestow the earldoms of Carlisle and Northumberland upon his nephew the Saxon prince, and to place all the castles of those fiefs in the hands of William.[455] But this convention was never destined to be carried out; the return of health, and the hopes of an heir, induced William to procrastinate; and the reasons which influenced him in entering upon the negotiation were finally removed, three years afterwards, when his queen presented him with a son.

It was in the year following this abortive negotiation about the marriage of his eldest daughter with the Prince of Saxony, that the attention of the king was directed to renewed commotions in the north; but, to explain the origin of these disturbances, it will be necessary to revert once more to the history of the Orkneys.

Paul and Erlend, the joint earls, who were deposed and sent prisoners to Norway by Magnus Barefoot, never revisited their native land. They died in exile; [Sidenote: A. D. 1199.] and about two years after Magnus lost his life in Ireland, Hacon, the son of Paul, who had rendered good service in the Irish expedition, [Sidenote: A. D. 1105.] obtained from the sons of the deceased king a grant of the earldom of the Orkneys. The sons of Erlend had been also carried off by the Norwegian king; but Magnus Erlendson, taking advantage of a moment, when he was unobserved, to plunge into the sea, swam to the neighbouring shore of Scotland, and thus escaped; whilst his brother Erlend, who remained on board, lost his life subsequently in battle.[456]

Magnus Erlendson remained quietly at the Court of Scotland until the departure of Sigurd Magnusson for Norway, when he sailed for the Orkneys to claim his share in the earldom. Hacon viewed his arrival with displeasure, but as the feeling of the islanders was in favour of his cousin, he consented to abide by the decision of the Norwegian Court, and Magnus was shortly afterwards confirmed in the possession of his father’s portion of the earldom. Little cordiality existed between the earls, and they were at length upon the brink of an open rupture, when it was agreed that they should meet upon the small islet of Egillsey for the arrangement of their mutual differences. To this spot, accordingly, Magnus repaired upon the appointed day, and, faithful to the conditions of the meeting, he brought with him only a few unarmed friends. Hacon arrived soon afterwards with a squadron of eight ships, filled with the rovers of the sea; and as the armed crews stepped upon the shore, the son of Erlend foresaw his doom. He met it with fortitude and resignation; his head was severed from his body; and the islanders, horror stricken at the perfidious murder, long venerated their favourite earl as a martyr and a saint.[457]

Success affording leisure for repentance, Hacon sought to expiate his crime by a pilgrimage to Jerusalem; and upon his death, some years afterwards, the earldom was divided between his two sons by different marriages, who were known respectively as Paul the Silent, and Harald the Eloquent. The latter, who was the younger, appears in some of the Scottish charters as earl of Caithness, a province which then, and long afterwards, seems to have extended as far as Dingwall.[458] The usual jealousy existed between the brothers, ceasing only with the life of Harald, who is said to have met his death in a mysterious and unaccountable manner, and, as was generally supposed, through wearing, by mistake, a poisoned garment intended for his half-brother Paul, who was an object of hatred and aversion to Helga and her sister Frakarka, the mother and aunt of Harald. The opportunity was not lost upon the surviving earl, who, very easily convinced of the guilt of Helga, banished her immediately from the islands. Her brother Ottir was lord of Thurso, and her sister also held large possessions on the mainland. To them accordingly she repaired, with her grandson Erlend Haroldson and her daughter Margaret, who was soon afterwards married to Madach, Earl of Atholl, one of the greatest nobles of the day, and a first cousin of David, who, at this period, occupied the throne of Scotland.[459]

Earl Paul was not destined to hold for any length of time undisputed possession of the whole earldom, for a competitor arose in the person of a descendant, and heir to the claims, of Erlend Thorfinson. In one of his numerous conflicts in the western seas, Magnus Barefoot lost an attached and faithful follower of the name of Kali, upon whose son he conferred large possessions in the Orkneys and elsewhere, with the hand of Gunhilda, the daughter of the elder Erlend. Gunhilda, after the death of her brothers, became the heiress of her father’s rights; and it was her son who now demanded his share of the earldom from the surviving son of Hacon. His real name was Kol, the same as that of his father, but he assumed the name of Rognwald, which was popular amongst the Orkneymen, from his supposed resemblance to Rognwald Brusison, who is said to have still lingered in the recollection of an aged Norwegian queen as the handsomest man of her time.[460]

Paul refused to listen to the claims of Rognwald, though they were supported by the authority of the Court of Norway; but Frakarka and her sister Helga willingly agreed to further his cause, promising to attack the earl from the mainland, whilst Rognwald assailed him from the sea. But Paul was on the alert, holding his ground successfully against both attacks; nor was it until some years later that Rognwald, to whom the Shetlanders steadily adhered, [Sidenote: A. D. 1135.] was enabled to extend his authority over the whole of the Orkneys, through the surprise and capture of Paul by the contrivance of the Earl of Atholl.[461]

The first step taken by the new earl was to identify his cause with the memory of his murdered uncle, whose aid had been invoked in support of the second and successful expedition. Policy as well as gratitude suggested that the fortunate result should be attributed to the intervention of the popular martyr, and Rognwald vowed that a lasting monument should hand down the remembrance of his murdered kinsman, and commemorate, at the same time, the manner in which the saint had interfered in his own behalf. In accordance with his vow a stately cathedral church arose at Kirkwall, which was dedicated in honour of St. Magnus; but it was a work far beyond the means of the earl, and to further its completion, he was obliged to restore their rights to the Odallers, who were permitted to regain their ancient privileges on payment of a large contribution in aid of the building.[462]

In the meantime the luckless Paul was conducted to the residence of the Earl of Atholl by his captor Sweyne Asleifason, a powerful nobleman of Caithness at feud with the earl on account of his banishment from the Orkneys. Here he was treated with the most ceremonious courtesy. The chair of state was resigned to him by Madach; the beautiful Margaret, surrounded by her ladies, received him with the cordial welcome of a sister; mummers and jesters relieved the monotony of the hour; and in the true spirit of northern hospitality the evening was devoted to drinking. Thus passed the leisure time of a Scottish nobleman in the twelfth century, when he was not engaged in the more stirring pursuits of war, or of the chase. One thing alone reminded the deposed earl of the real position in which he stood--the doors were invariably locked.[463]

Paul long maintained his reputation for taciturnity, but at length he appears to have spoken, and to the purpose; [Sidenote: A. D. 1137.] for two years after the accession of Rognwald, whilst that earl was celebrating with his friends some festive occasion in the month of July, their attention was attracted by the arrival of a vessel from the south with a venerable personage on board, whose purple cloak and quaintly trimmed beard aroused the curiosity of the Orkneymen, until the earl’s chaplain pronounced the mysterious stranger to be a Scottish bishop.[464] He was received with every mark of respect, and subsequently escorted to Egillsey, the residence of William, Bishop of the Orkneys; and the result of a conference between Rognwald and the two prelates was the admission of the claim of Harald Mac Madach to his uncle’s share in the earldom, in virtue of the resignation of Paul. The rights of Harald, then a child between four and five years of age, were confirmed at an amicable meeting, held in Caithness, by the leading chieftains of Atholl and the Orkneys, representing “the communities” of the respective earldoms;[465] [Sidenote: A. D. 1138.] and, in the following spring, he was consigned to the charge of Earl Rognwald, though his real supporters appear to have been Sweyne Asleifason and Thorbiorn, a grandson of Frakarka, married to the sister of Sweyne, and guardian to the youthful earl.[466]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1153.]

Fifteen years elapsed without any diminution in the friendship of Rognwald for his youthful colleague; Madach and his royal cousin sunk into the grave; and the elder earl departed for the Holy Land, leaving Harald in charge of the earldom.[467] The same year witnessed the last expedition, in which a Norwegian king enacted the part of a pirate in the western seas; Eystein, in a time of profound peace, inflicting upon the unoffending inhabitants of the English and Scottish coasts a repetition of the ravages of his heathen predecessors. Amongst the sufferers was Harald, who was surprised and captured off Thurso, but he regained his liberty at the price of several marks “in gold,” and an acknowledgment of his dependance upon Norway;[468] though he was less fortunate some years later, when his cousin Erlend Haraldson arrived to claim his share in the earldom. Erlend, who appears to have succeeded to the authority of his uncle, Ottir of Thurso, had taken advantage of the absence of Rognwald to obtain from the youthful king of Scotland, Malcolm the Fourth, a confirmation of his right to the half of Caithness, and he now demanded a similar division of the islands. Harald demurred to his claims unless they were confirmed by the Court of Norway, nor would he consent to acknowledge Erlend as his colleague, even after his rights were recognized by the Norwegian kings, till the defection of Sweyne Asleifason forced from him a reluctant acquiescence in this arrangement. Not content with depriving Harald of half the earldom, Erlend carried off the Earl’s mother, the still beautiful Margaret, bearing her to that singular fort of Mousa, in the Shetland Isles, of which the remains still exist to excite the curiosity of modern times; where he defended his prize with such tenacity, that he forced Harald to consent to their marriage, and this singular union of a nephew with his aunt is related in the Saga without a comment![469]

After a lengthened absence in the Holy Land, Rognwald returned from Palestine to find Erlend established in his place. In this dilemma the Bonders were assembled, whose unanimous verdict pronounced Rognwald to be the lawful representative of one line of their rulers; and as it then remained for them to determine which of the other earls was entitled to the remaining share in the islands, their decision was given in favour of Erlend. Their award was probably just, but Harald could hardly be expected to acquiesce in it. Retiring to the mainland he sought the assistance of his kinsmen, and when he reappeared in the Orkneys in the following spring, Rognwald immediately declared in favour of his early friend. But the redoubtable Sweyne Asleifason, who espoused the side of Erlend, long upheld the cause of the latter earl, by his courage and counsels, until the confederates, watching their opportunity, surprised and slew their rival whilst he was stupified by the effects of his potations.[470] Rognwald did not long survive their victory, falling a victim to the revenge of Thorbiorn, the former guardian of Harald, [Sidenote: A. D. 1158.] who waylaid and assassinated the earl whilst hunting in the dales of Caithness. His surviving colleague conveyed the body to Thurso, from whence, after a lapse of thirty years, [Sidenote: A. D. 1188.] it was removed to the cathedral church of Kirkwall, when the name of the murdered Rognwald was enrolled in the Calendar of the Saints.[471]

In this manner Harald found himself, at the age of five and twenty, in undisputed possession of the earldoms of Caithness and the Orkneys. In appearance, as well as in character, he must have resembled his maternal ancestor Thorfin; for, like that earl, he is described as “tall, strong, and hard-featured,”[472] and he raised his power, by his talents and military prowess, to a height unprecedented since the days of his formidable predecessor. To Sweyne Asleifason, his early friend and subsequent opponent, he appears to have been thoroughly reconciled. Sweyne was a genuine type of the chieftain of that era, a veritable representative of that numerous class which viewed, with such suspicious jealousy, the curtailment of their lawless liberty by the introduction of a novel system of government. The spring and autumn he dedicated to agriculture; a scanty crop was rudely sown and as rudely gathered in: the summer was devoted to a course of piracy; and the winter was spent in revelry. Such were still the habits of life amongst the chieftains of the north and west of Scotland; and in earlier times, as in Scandinavia and Northern Germany, the practice had been similar throughout the whole country, with the sole difference, that the dwellers upon the coasts were rovers by sea, and the inhabitants of the interior were plunderers by land.[473]

For nearly forty years Harald remained in the contented enjoyment of his two earldoms, acknowledging a nominal dependence upon the crowns of Scotland and Norway, but in all other respects as untrammelled as the most independent of his maternal ancestors. He was married to a sister of Duncan, Earl of Fife, and this connection with one of the firmest partizans of the reigning family may have kept him steady in his allegiance. At length, at the mature age of sixty and upwards, he transferred his affections to a daughter of Mac Heth, and he married the object of his elderly love after divorcing his former wife by one of those summary processes which lingered latest, with other barbarisms, in the extreme north. The union was inauspicious, as might have been expected; a daughter of Mac Heth could not fail to remind her husband of her hereditary claims upon Moray, and, yielding too readily to the suggestions of ambition, ere long Harald seized upon the province.[474]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1196]

It was the intelligence of these proceedings on the part of the earl that now brought William in haste from the south; for he had already suffered too much from such a cause to think lightly of a rebellion in the northern Highlands. Meeting Harald’s son, Thorfin, in the neighbourhood of Inverness, he defeated him with ease, killing Roderic, a partizan, apparently, of the family of Mac Heth;[475] whilst Harald retreated as the king advanced, until at length, despairing of success, he fled to his ships in the hope of escaping to the Orkneys. But the earl was doomed to misfortune; an adverse gale detained him in port, and he was compelled to become a reluctant eyewitness of the destruction of his castle at Thurso, and of the unwonted spectacle of a royal army ravaging the extremity of Caithness. Submission was now the only course left open, and he was fain to purchase the withdrawal of the hostile army by promising to surrender the enemies of the king, to place his son Thorfin as a hostage in the hands of William for his own fidelity, and to resign half the earldom of Caithness to Harald Ericson.[476]

Satisfied with the earl’s concessions, the king withdrew from his territories; again proceeding northwards as far as Nairn in the course of the same autumn, to await the fulfilment of the treaty. On his return from hunting late one evening, he found Earl Harald in attendance with two children, his nephews, whom he offered in the place of his own son as hostages for his fidelity and allegiance. Surprised at this evasion of their agreement, the king demanded the reason of it, remarking upon the absence of Thorfin, whom Harald had promised as a hostage. The earl’s reply was remarkable, though it could scarcely be considered satisfactory. Thorfin, he said, was his only son, and he was reluctant to part with the sole heir of his earldom; and as for the enemies of the king whom he had promised to deliver into his hands, they had actually accompanied him as far as the port of Lochloy, within a few miles of Nairn, when he had suffered them to escape, reflecting that their doom was certain if once surrendered to the king.[477] As it is impossible that the earl could have imagined for one moment that William would permit so palpable an evasion of their treaty, it can only be supposed that, repenting of his promise as he approached Nairn, he preferred braving the royal anger by conniving at the escape of his prisoners, to surrendering friends, and probably connections, of his own, or of his wife, to the certain doom of death; or the even worse alternative of perpetual imprisonment, with probable mutilation or loss of sight. William and his barons in council--the peers of the earl, before whom he was immediately arraigned--at once pronounced him guilty of a breach of fealty, declaring that he had thereby forfeited his liberty; and he was carried in the train of William to the south, and retained in custody until, upon the arrival of his son Thorfin, he was released from captivity, and permitted to return to the Orkneys.[478]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1197.]

But the earl had not yet reached the conclusion of his troubles; for Harald Ericson, after receiving a grant of half the earldom of Caithness from the king of Scotland, sailed to Norway, and obtained a recognition of his right, from King Suerer, to a similar partition of the Orkneys. This Harald, generally known as the younger earl, was a son of Ingigerda, the only child of Rognwald; but the elder Harald, unmindful of his early friend, seems to have ignored the claims of his heir to a partition of the earldom. A band of followers, however, was easily collected in Norway, and so little was the elder earl prepared for an attack, that, upon the arrival of his competitor in the Orkneys, he fled precipitately to Man. He was shortly followed by Harald Ericson; but again eluding pursuit, he returned suddenly to the Orkneys, visiting with summary vengeance all who had declared for the younger Harald. He had lost no time in the interval in gathering his own partizans, and, upon the return of his opponent from the Western Isles, he no longer shrunk from a contest for which he was now fully prepared.

The rival earls met near Wick, in Caithness; victory declared for the elder Harald, and the last descendant of Erlend Thorfinson perished upon the field of his defeat. Availing himself of the protection of the bishops of Ross and of St. Andrews, the conqueror sought the Scottish Court, and hastened to offer a large sum for the restitution of that portion of Caithness which had been conferred upon his deceased competitor. The king promised his consent if the earl would comply with his conditions, and agree to take back his former wife, and surrender Bonaver, the son of Ingemund, together with his chaplain, Lawrence, as additional hostages for his allegiance. Which of these conditions was distasteful to the earl the chronicler has failed to specify; but, in the opinion of Harald, half the earldom of Caithness would have been too dearly purchased at such a price; and upon the refusal of the proposed terms, William, without further parley, sold the fief to Ronald, king of Man.[479]

According to the usual custom of the age, Ronald placed his _Maors_, or deputies, over his newly acquired earldom, whilst Harald, retreating to the Orkneys, busied himself in preparations for the forcible recovery of his possessions; and suddenly reappearing in Caithness with an overpowering force, he drove out all who opposed him, treating the bishop of the diocese with savage cruelty for a supposed predilection to the cause of his rival.[480] Although Christmas was approaching, William lost no time in hastening to the scene of action, first retaliating the barbarities of the earl upon his unfortunate hostage Thorfin; but by the time the king reached Caithness, Harald had escaped to the Orkneys, returning immediately upon the departure of the royal army. William again marched to the north in the following spring, and again the earl sought refuge amongst his islands; but as such a fruitless contest was harassing to both parties, without being beneficial to either, it was at length terminated by Harald, who, [Sidenote: A. D. 1202.] placing himself under the safe conduct of the Bishop of St. Andrews, tendered his submission to the king at Perth, and was permitted, for a sum of 2000 pounds of silver, to enjoy his earldom in peace during the brief remainder of his life.[481]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1198.]

The six years over which these disturbances in the extreme north of Scotland extended had not been destitute of other events of importance, for, on the 24th of August 1198, the question of the succession to the Scottish throne had been finally set at rest by the birth of a prince, to whom the name of Alexander was given. [Sidenote: A. D. 1201] Three years afterwards, according to the usual custom of the age, William summoned the barons of his realm to swear fealty to his infant heir at Musselburgh; the Earl of Huntingdon imitating the example of the Scottish nobles, and performing homage to his youthful nephew about four years later.[482] [Sidenote: A. D. 1205] By the death of Richard, in the year following the birth of Alexander, [Sidenote: A. D. 1199] the relations between the English and Scottish kings had once more become unsettled. Doubt and mistrust overshadowed England, bishops and barons strengthening their castles, and preparing for the contest anticipated between the uncle and his nephew; whilst numbers of the continental vassals of the English crown openly declared for Arthur. Following the course invariably adopted upon such occasions by all aspirants to the crown, John possessed himself of the late king’s treasures at Chinon, and this important point secured, he dispatched the Archbishop of Canterbury across the Channel, with William the Mareschal, and Geoffry Fitz Peter, the Justiciary of England, empowering them to pledge his royal word to all whose allegiance appeared doubtful, that full justice should be rendered on the arrival of the king to every faithful adherent of his cause. William, as might have been expected, had seized upon the opportunity afforded by John’s uncertain position to revive his claims upon the northern counties; but the royal deputies, after the council held at Northampton, forbade the Scottish envoys, who had arrived there, to cross to Normandy, prevailing upon the Earl of Huntingdon, one of the principal of the dubious adherents who had been gained over at the recent meeting, to notify to his royal brother that he should await the arrival of the king. A similar request was conveyed directly from John by Eustace de Vesci, who bore a promise to his wife’s father--for Eustace had married Margaret, one of William’s natural daughters--that complete satisfaction should be afforded him in all that he sought, if he would only refrain from immediate hostilities.[483]

Soon after his coronation upon Ascension day, John gave audience to William de Hay, and the priors of May and Inchcolm, who, in the name of the Scottish king, demanded a full restitution of his “patrimony”--the northern counties; promising liege and faithful service if he gained his suit, but threatening, in case of refusal, to win his rights by the sword. The reply of John was characteristically evasive;--“If your king, my very dear cousin, will come in person, I will do him right in this and in all that he demands.” The bishop of St. Andrews, with Hugo Malebise, were made the bearers of this message to William, whilst, that no point of courtesy or ceremonial might be omitted, the bishop of Durham was directed to proceed at once to the frontiers and escort the Scottish king to the place of meeting.

John reached the appointed rendezvous at Nottingham upon Whitsunday, but the king of Scotland declined to come, only sending word by Malebise and the bishop that, if his demands were not immediately granted, he would resent the refusal by a declaration of war. John stipulated for a further truce of forty days, promising a final answer at the end of that time; but after collecting a powerful army, and placing the counties in question under the charge of William d’Estoteville, he hastened to embark for Normandy within a fortnight, leaving the Scottish envoys, who had hurried after him to the coast, to convey what answer they pleased to their king.[484]

At length perceiving that the promises of John had been merely subterfuges for gaining time, William prepared to put his threats into execution; but the proper season for action had already passed away, and the English barons, not yet disgusted by the falsehood and tyranny of John, had for the present declared in his favour. A natural feeling of anxiety oppressed the mind of William as he recalled the events of his early manhood, and remembered the consequences of his former war with England. His kingdom was still unsettled, his health was beginning to fail, whilst his heir was still a mere child, and Scotland had hardly yet recovered from the disastrous state of anarchy into which she had been plunged by the capture of her king at Alnwick. Impressed with gloomy forebodings, the king determined upon passing the night by the shrine of his sainted ancestress at Dunfermline; where his reluctance to engage in hostilities assuming the form of a warning dream, he dismissed his army on the following morning, assuring them that he had been forbidden by a heavenly vision to attempt the invasion of England.[485]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1200.]

William had given up all present thoughts of open war, but he refused to listen to any overtures from John, declining to meet the English king at York in the following Lent, whilst he cultivated an alliance with Philip of France, and a marriage was negotiated between the young prince of Scotland and an infant French princess, the daughter of Agnes de Meranie.[486] The rumour of this alliance seriously alarmed John, and after the second of his numerous coronations, he dispatched a distinguished embassy with letters of safe conduct to the borders, to propose an interview with the king of Scotland, and to escort him for this purpose to Lincoln. With the Bishop of Durham and the Sheriff of Northumberland were associated the Earl of Hereford and the Lords de Vesci and de Ros, the nephew and sons-in-law of William, who, with the Earls of Huntingdon and Norfolk, and a brilliant retinue of other barons, awaited the arrival of the Scottish king on the frontiers, and conducted him, with every mark of respect, to the place of meeting. Here, upon a neighbouring hill, which was at that time without the city of Lincoln, William performed homage to John “for his right saving his own right;” [Sidenote: 22d Nov.] swearing fealty upon the cross of the Archbishop of Canterbury--a breach of the usual custom, explained by one of the chroniclers as arising “because there was no sacred book at hand.” The question about the northern counties was again brought forward for discussion, but with no satisfactory result, although a final decision was again promised at the end of another six months; and the king of Scotland, who had in reality gained nothing beyond his ordinary feudal advantages by his journey, was obliged to rest contented with the empty honour of returning to his own kingdom under the same distinguished escort that had accompanied him to Lincoln.[487]

The interview between the kings had not been of a nature to promote any real feeling of cordiality; for William had again proved from experience that the promises of John were merely empty words, whilst he had permitted his crafty rival to discover how little real importance he need attach to the threats of a Scottish war. No more dangerous knowledge could have been acquired by a prince of such a character as John, who, in his subsequent transactions with the Scottish king, turned this backwardness to his own account, evidently presuming upon the reluctance of William to venture upon the chances of a war.

A rupture, however, had almost occurred through the contemplated erection of a castle at the mouth of the Tweed, for the purpose of commanding the Scottish burgh of Berwick, with its important fortress; thus endangering the prosperity of the foremost commercial town in Scotland, and neutralizing the cession of one of the keys of the Lothians, restored by the charter of Cœur de Lion. It was impossible for William to overlook so dangerous an encroachment, and whenever the English attempted to begin the building, the Scots drove them away by force, levelling their work with the ground; proceedings which were more than once repeated, until, upon his return from the disastrous campaign of 1203, John hastened to the north of England, [Sidenote: A. D. 1204.] where he was met upon the frontiers at Norham by William, who was hardly recovered from one of those dangerous attacks of illness to which his advancing years appear to have rendered him liable. The conference was stormy, and the kings parted in anger; but John was either too much occupied with the French war to add another to the list of his open enemies, or he treated the whole affair with his usual fickle levity, and in spite of the hostile character of their interview, their kingdoms remained in a state of nominal peace.[488]

However averse he might have been to risk the chances of hostilities, William was evidently a very cool friend to England during the next five years, eagerly testifying his devotion to the papal see when the interdict was levelled against John, and receiving in return from Pope Innocent a bull, or rescript, fully confirming every liberty and immunity that had at any time been conferred upon the king, church, or kingdom of Scotland, by the head of the Roman Church.[489] He appears, also, to have set on foot a negotiation for procuring a foreign alliance for one of his children;[490] [Sidenote: A. D. 1209.] but the fears of John were by this time aroused, and he marched with an immense army to the north, in the determination of calling William to account for destroying his castle at Tweedmouth, for aiming at an alliance with his open enemies, and for negotiating the intended marriage without consulting the suzerain of whom he held his English fiefs. To guard against the chances of invasion, William occupied a strong position in the neighbourhood of Roxburgh, where he gave audience to the envoys of John, who, upon reaching Norham, dispatched a safe conduct to the Scottish king, with a requisition to meet him at Newcastle; but three days after his arrival at the place of meeting, and before their conference had resulted in any satisfactory conclusion, it was unexpectedly interrupted by the sudden illness of the Scottish king, and all further proceedings were broken off after a temporary truce had been arranged.[491]

The return of health revived the reluctance of William to yield to the demands of John, and, after ascertaining the sentiments of his baronage and clergy in a council held at Stirling, he dispatched the bishops of St. Andrews and Glasgow, with William Comyn and Philip de Valoniis, the Justiciary and Chamberlain of Scotland, charged with so decided an answer to the English king, that John’s fury was aroused to the utmost pitch, and he issued immediate orders for the assemblage of his army, and the reconstruction of the castle at Tweedmouth. William, upon learning the result of his embassy, hurried from Forfar towards the Lothians, deputing the bishop of St. Andrews to convey a qualified refusal to the incensed John. Arrived at Edinburgh, the king was met by Sayer de Quinci, Earl of Winchester, and Robert de Ros, who had already reached the future Scottish capital, and dwelt upon the wrath of their royal master, and the magnitude of the army with which he was hurrying, by forced marches, to the north.[492]

Without awaiting the return of the bishop of St. Andrews, William dispatched a third embassy to avert, if possible, the impending war; and when the bishop reached his royal master at Traquair with intelligence that the English army was fast approaching the borders, the reverend envoy was commissioned, for the third time, to return in the utmost haste to John, and to use every effort to delay his advance until the Scottish army could be concentrated upon the frontiers.[493]

By the time John reached Bamborough, towards the close of July, his formidable preparations for hostilities had fully attained the end upon which he had probably calculated, by working upon the fears of his opponent. A brave and warlike army was ranged along either frontier, prompt and ready for a contest, but advancing years and increasing infirmities had bowed the once fierce and haughty spirit of the Scottish king, who was now as averse to risk the chances of war as, in early manhood, he had been eager in courting its dangers. Under such circumstances the result could not long remain in doubt, and William, yielding his consent to the conditions imposed by John, covenanted to pay 15,000 marks for his “good will” (in other words for peace, and for the confirmation of his fiefs and privileges, which appear to have been in danger of forfeiture), and for the performance of certain conditions specified in their mutual charters. Hostages were to be given by the Scottish king for the payment of the stated sum within two years.[494] Two of his daughters, Margaret and Isabella--the third was probably under age--were to be delivered into the charge of John, and to be suitably married according to the tenure of their secret arrangement; whilst, in return, one of the articles of the treaty provided against the erection of a castle at Tweedmouth at any future period. The final settlement of the treaty took place at Northampton, and, within ten days from its completion, the Scottish princesses were placed in the hands of the English Justiciary at Carlisle.[495]

From the date of this arrangement a close alliance existed between the kings, and still further to cement their union, [Sidenote: A. D. 1210.] the prince of Scotland proceeded in the following year as far as Alnwick, where, upon the 10th of May, he performed homage to John as liegeman for all the fiefs held by his father of the English crown; and it was probably upon this occasion that the English king, after receiving the half of the sum of 15,000 marks, in token of amity remitted the payment of the remainder.[496]

William, however, in his anxiety to avoid an encounter with John, appears to have deeply offended many of his own powerful subjects, to several of whom the English connection had all along been distasteful. All the advantages of the English fiefs belonged solely to the royal family; and as it was of little or no importance to many of the Scots that the brother of their king should enjoy the earldom of Huntingdon, or that their sovereign should be received with certain ceremonies whenever he absented himself from his own dominions to attend the English Court, they looked with jealousy and discontent at the concessions extorted from William, through his double anxiety to prevent hostilities, and to avoid the forfeiture of his English fiefs and privileges. The treaty concluded at Northampton had been in direct contradiction to the wishes of the nation, and ere long William discovered that, in his solicitude to avert the evils of a foreign war, he had re-kindled the embers of civil discord at home.

The discontent must have been widely disseminated which first threatened to explode in the south. Thomas de Colvill, a powerful baron in constant attendance at the court of Scotland, was accused of conspiring against his liege lord, and detained in Edinburgh Castle until he was permitted to redeem his treason by the payment of a fine, and was subsequently dispatched, in a species of honourable captivity, as a hostage to the king of England.[497] The storm which had thus threatened the southern, or feudalized, division of the kingdom was shortly destined to burst in all its fury upon the distant north and west, where a Mac William still existed in the person of Godfrey, one of the sons of Donald Bane. Ireland, as usual, had been his home when he was not amongst the western isles of Scotland, where he had never ceased to assert the claims of his family; and either Godfrey, or some of his partizans, had probably been amongst those “enemies of the king” whom the Earl of Caithness had suffered to escape at Lochloy. No time could have been more favourable for the revival of his pretensions than a period of general discontent, and his partizans in Ross, with all the disaffected clans of the neighbouring provinces, invited him to cross from Ireland, with promises of their warmest support.[498]

But in the course of the same autumn, and before the arrival of Godfrey, the lives of William and his family were threatened by an unexpected danger from a totally different quarter. The king, with his brother and the prince of Scotland, was staying with the court at Perth, when a sudden inundation, occasioned by a spring tide meeting the swollen waters of the Tay, menaced the town and its inhabitants with destruction. The old hill-fort at the junction of the Almond with the Tay was swept away in the deluge, carrying along with it many houses, and destroying the bridge and an old chapel, whilst the royal party were at one time in imminent danger, escaping with difficulty the fury of the flood.[499]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1211]

It was winter when Mac William arrived in Ross, and six months elapsed before an army could be dispatched to operate with effect against him, the king following by easy marches, as well as his debilitated condition would allow. Each party pursuing their usual tactics, the campaign was opened on the royal side by the construction of two forts, or rather, perhaps, by the repair of the buildings, which had been raised in the previous war to command the most important points in the district;[500] whilst Godfrey, carefully avoiding a battle, endeavoured to harass the royal army by continued surprises and night attacks. Steadily pursuing the course which he had proposed to follow in his campaign against Donald Bane, the king placed 4000 men under the command of the Earls of Atholl and Buchan, with Malcolm of Mar and Thomas the Durward, ordering them to penetrate the recesses of the mountains in every direction, and force Mac William to an encounter. Godfrey’s place of strength was upon an island, where he had collected his treasure and supplies; and here he was at length discovered and brought to bay by the royal leaders. The struggle was most obstinate, for the rebels were animated by despair; victory, however, declared for the royal arms, Godfrey with a few of his companions escaping, though with difficulty, amongst the clefts and thickets of the neighbouring mountains.[501]

Satisfied with his success, William returned with the main body of his army to the south, leaving Earl Malcolm of Fife in charge of Moray. His departure was the signal for the reappearance of Godfrey, who suddenly presented himself in force before one of the royal castles, and commenced preparations for a siege. Alarmed at the prospect of an attack, and the probable consequences of its success, the garrison offered to capitulate on condition that their lives were spared; and as Godfrey willingly agreed to their terms, they were permitted to depart in safety, and the fort was burnt to the ground.[502]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1212.]

The tidings of Godfrey’s proceedings reached William in the winter, when any hope of taking the field amongst the northern mountains with the least probability of success was frustrated by the unusual severity of the season; and as he had calculated upon his forts securing the advantages gained in the preceding campaign, he was incensed and embarrassed at this unexpected loss. A renewal of such a doubtful contest as the struggle in which he had been engaged with his cousin, the elder Mac William, was an anxious prospect at his time of life, and he naturally felt inclined to draw yet closer the ties connecting him with his English ally.[503] Ere the winter passed away the two kings met once more, and for the last time, at Durham; their conference was adjourned from that place to Norham, where the queen of Scotland is said to have exerted her influence with both parties to obtain the treaty of mutual alliance, which was concluded upon this occasion. [Sidenote: 7th Feb.] Both kings are said to have agreed, that, in case of the death of either, the survivor should be bound to protect and support the youthful heir in securing the rights of his crown; William conceding to John the privilege of marrying his son Alexander, now in his fourteenth year, according to his own pleasure during the next six years, so that the alliance was suitable to the dignity of the Scottish crown; at the same time confirming his own, and his son’s, liege homage to the English prince Henry, saving their fealty to John. The Scottish prince then accompanied the king of England, upon his return, to the south, and received the honor of knighthood at St. Brides in Clerkenwell, where John held high festival in Mid-Lent.[504]

[Sidenote: 4th Mar.]

With his mind set at rest upon the subject of the English alliance, William prepared to bend all his remaining energies to the suppression of the dangerous rebellion in the north. About the middle of June a considerable force was dispatched to the scene of action, the prince of Scotland accompanying the army to prove himself worthy of his golden spurs; and the reserve was to have followed by easy marches, under the immediate orders of the king, when its departure was arrested by the welcome intelligence of the capture of the head of the rebellion. The Earl of Fife, during a temporary absence from his command, left the province under the charge of the Justiciary, William Comyn, Earl of Buchan, into whose hands the adherents of Mac William, terror-stricken apparently at the magnitude of the royal preparations, had just surrendered their leader. The earl had already reached Kincardine with his prisoner, whom he was in haste to present to William before death robbed him of his prize--for Godfrey had resolutely refused all nourishment since his capture--when he was met by a significant message from the king, that he had no desire to see his enemy; and the unfortunate Mac William was at once beheaded, and hung up by the feet, lest starvation should anticipate his doom.[505]

[Sidenote: A. D. 1213]

The ensuing winter once more found John upon the Scottish frontier. Whilst on the march in the preceding summer to repress the revolt of Llewellyn, he had received letters from William, as well as from his own natural daughter Joanna, the wife of the Welsh prince, warning him against the intentions of his own barons, if he involved himself in the intricacies of a mountain warfare in Wales.[506] The coincidence of the arrival of similar warnings from quarters so far apart, aroused his fears lest the intelligence should be true; and returning in haste to London, he sent to his principal barons, demanding hostages for their allegiance and good faith. All obeyed the royal command except Eustace de Vesci and Robert Fitz Walter; the former, too deeply implicated apparently to entrust himself within the power of John, at once seeking refuge with his father-in-law in Scotland. The flight of De Vesci was amongst the causes which brought John to the north, for it appears that he had already written to William to claim the fugitive as a traitor. Norham, as usual, was the place chosen for the conference; but William, who had been for some time detained at Newbattle by another severe attack of illness, was unable to proceed farther than Haddington; and John, who had every reason for desiring, at this period of his reign, to draw still closer the bonds of union between himself and his fellow king, earnestly adjured him to depute the young Prince Alexander in his place, holding out magnificent promises to induce compliance. The aged king was inclined to send his son, some of his advisers agreeing with him; but the majority of his council strongly opposed the project, objecting to entrust the heir of Scotland within the power of John, of whose intentions they were, not unnaturally, suspicious. They were fearful, also, lest the English king should detain Alexander as a hostage for the delivery of De Vesci, and as William eventually deferred to their opinion, John was obliged to relinquish all hope of a conference, and return disappointed to the south.[507]

During William’s contest with Earl Harald, Olave, the earl’s brother-in-law, and John Halkelson, sailed from the Orkneys to assist the son of the Norwegian Regent Erling in placing Sigurd Magnusson upon his father’s throne. Their fate was most unfortunate; the flower of the Orkneys assembled around the banner of Olave perishing, with both their leaders, in the disastrous battle of Floravagr; and their ill-omened expedition entailing the wrath of the conqueror upon Harald, who only made his peace with the indignant Sverer by yielding up to Norway the whole of the Shetland Isles. It was a diminished and impaired dominion, therefore, which Harald, upon his death in 1206, left as an inheritance between his three sons; [Sidenote: A. D. 1206.] Heinrek succeeding to his claims upon Ross, whilst David and John divided his possessions in Caithness and the Orkneys, the latter, upon the death of David, becoming the sole possessor of both his father’s earldoms.[508] To ensure the submission of Earl John to his authority, William, during the summer of 1214, proceeded as far as Moray, [Sidenote: A. D. 1214.] when the earl, unwilling to provoke the hostility of his sovereign, yielded at once to his terms, giving up his daughter and heiress as a hostage for his fidelity and allegiance. The king then returned by easy journeys towards the south, but he had far over-taxed his feeble strength, having risen from a bed of sickness to ensure the tranquil succession of his son. As he approached the Forth he expressed a wish to be carried to Stirling, a place for which he appears to have felt an especial fondness; and here he lingered over the autumn within the walls of that royal castle, from whence his failing sight could gaze upon one of the fairest prospects of his native land. He was never destined to see another year, and on Thursday, the 4th of December, he breathed his last, expiring in the seventy-third year of his age, and within five days of entering upon the fiftieth of a chequered and eventful reign.[509]