Hereward the Wake, Last of the English
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Book Description
General Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1895 Original Publisher: Macmillan Subjects: Great Britain Fiction / Classics Fiction / Historical Fiction / Literary Fiction / Biographical Literary Criticism / European / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or ...
MoreGeneral Books publication date: 2009 Original publication date: 1895 Original Publisher: Macmillan Subjects: Great Britain Fiction / Classics Fiction / Historical Fiction / Literary Fiction / Biographical Literary Criticism / European / English, Irish, Scottish, Welsh Notes: This is a black and white OCR reprint of the original. It has no illustrations and there may be typos or missing text. When you buy the General Books edition of this book you get free trial access to Million-Books.com where you can select from more than a million books for free. Excerpt: CHAPTER IV HOW HEREWARD TOOK SERVICE WITH RANALD, KING OF WATERFORD The coasts of Ireland were in a state of comparative peace in the middle of the eleventh century. The ships of Loghlin, seen far out at sea, no longer drove the population shrieking inland. Heathen Danes, whether fair-haired Fiongall from Norway, or brown-haired Dubhgall from Denmark proper, no longer burned convents, tortured monks for their gold, or (as at Clonmacnoise) set a heathen princess, Oda, wife of Thorkill, son of Harold Haarfagre, aloft on the high altar to receive the homage of the conquered. The Scandinavian invaders had become Christianised, and civilised also -- owing to their continual intercourse with foreign nations -- more highly than the Irish whom they had overcome. That was easy ; for early Irish civilisation seems to have existed only in the convents and for the religious ; and when they were crushed, mere barbarism was left behind. And now the same process went on in the east of Ireland, which went on a generation or two later in the east and north of Scotland. The Danes began to settle down into peaceful colonists and traders. Ireland was poor ; and the convents plundered once could not be plundered again. The Irish were desperately brave. Ill-armed and almost naked, they were as perfect in the arts of forest warfare as those modern Maories whom they so much resembled ; and though their black skenes and ...
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