the abbey of Peterborough.  William had bribed the Danish commanders to forsake their English allies, and he allowed them to ravage the coast.  A later bribe took them back to Denmark; but not till they had shown themselves in the waters of Ely.  The people, largely of Danish descent, flocked to them, thinking, as the Chronicler says, that they would win the whole land.  The movement was doubtless in favour of the kingship of Swegen.  But nothing was done by Danes and English together save to plunder Peterborough abbey.  Hereward, said to have been the nephew of Turold’s English predecessor, doubtless looked on the holy place, under a Norman abbot, as part of the enemy’s country.

The name of Hereward has gathered round it such a mass of fiction, old and new, that it is hard to disentangle the few details of his real history.  His descent and birth-place are uncertain; but he was assuredly a man of Lincolnshire, and assuredly not the son of Earl Leofric.  For some unknown cause, he had been banished in the days of Edward or of Harold.  He now came back to lead his countrymen against William.  He was the soul of the movement of which the abbey of Ely became the centre.  The isle, then easily defensible, was the last English ground on which the Conqueror was defied by Englishmen fighting for England.  The men of the Fenland were zealous; the monks of Ely were zealous; helpers came in from other parts of England.  English leaders left their shelter in Scotland to share the dangers of their countrymen; even Edwin and Morkere at last plucked up heart to leave William’s court and join the patriotic movement.  Edwin was pursued; he was betrayed by traitors; he was overtaken and slain, to William’s deep grief, we are told.  His brother reached the isle, and helped in its defence.  William now felt that the revolt called for his own presence and his full energies.  The isle was stoutly attacked and stoutly defended, till, according to one version, the monks betrayed the stronghold to the King.  According to another, Morkere was induced to surrender by promises of mercy which William failed to fulfil.  In any case, before the year 1071 was ended, the isle of Ely was in William’s hands.  Hereward alone with a few companions made their way out by sea.  William was less merciful than usual; still no man was put to death.  Some were mutilated, some imprisoned; Morkere and other chief men spent the rest of their days in bonds.  The temper of the Conqueror had now fearfully hardened.  Still he could honour a valiant enemy; those who resisted to the last fared best.  All the legends of Hereward’s later days speak of him as admitted to William’s peace and favour.  One makes him die quietly, another kills him at the hands of Norman enemies, but not at William’s bidding or with William’s knowledge.  Evidence a little better suggests that he bore arms for his new sovereign beyond the sea; and an entry in Domesday also suggests that he held lands under Count Robert of Mortain in Warwickshire.  It would suit William’s policy, when he received Hereward to his favour, to make him exchange lands near to the scene of his exploits for lands in a distant shire held under the lordship of the King’s brother.