Edgar's after-life showed that he belonged to that class of men who, as a rule slothful and listless, can yet on occasion act with energy, and who act most creditably on behalf of others.But William had no need to fear him, and he was easily turned into a friend and a dependant.Edgar, first of Englishmen by descent, was hardly an Englishman by birth.William had now to deal with the Englishman who stood next to Edgar in dignity and far above him in personal estimation.We have reached the great turning-point in William's reign and character, the black and mysterious tale of the fate of Waltheof.The Earl of Northumberland, Northampton, and Huntingdon, was not the only earl in England of English birth.The earldom of the East-Angles was held by a born Englishman who was more hateful than any stranger.Ralph of Wader was the one Englishman who had fought at William's side against England.He often passes for a native of Britanny, and he certainly held lands and castles in that country; but he was Breton only by the mother's side.For Domesday and the Chronicles show that he was the son of an elder Earl Ralph, who had been STALLER or master of the horse in Edward's days, and who is expressly said to have been born in Norfolk.The unusual name suggests that the elder Ralph was not of English descent.He survived the coming of William, and his son fought on Senlac among the countrymen of his mother.This treason implies an unrecorded banishment in the days of Edward or Harold.
Already earl in 1069, he had in that year acted vigorously for William against the Danes.But he now conspired against him along with Roger, the younger son of William Fitz-Osbern, who had succeeded his father in the earldom of Hereford, while his Norman estates had passed to his elder brother William.What grounds of complaint either Ralph or Roger had against William we know not; but that the loyalty of the Earl of Hereford was doubtful throughout the year 1074 appears from several letters of rebuke and counsel sent to him by the Regent Lanfranc.At last the wielder of both swords took to his spiritual arms, and pronounced the Earl excommunicate, till he should submit to the King's mercy and make restitution to the King and to all men whom he had wronged.Roger remained stiff-necked under the Primate's censure, and presently committed an act of direct disobedience.The next year, 1075, he gave his sister Emma in marriage to Earl Ralph.This marriage the King had forbidden, on some unrecorded ground of state policy.Most likely he already suspected both earls, and thought any tie between them dangerous.The notice shows William stepping in to do, as an act of policy, what under his successors became a matter of course, done with the sole object of making money.The BRIDE-ALE--the name that lurks in the modern shape of BRIDAL--was held at Exning in Cambridgeshire; bishops and abbots were guests of the excommunicated Roger; Waltheof was there, and many Breton comrades of Ralph.In their cups they began to plot how they might drive the King out of the kingdom.Charges, both true and false, were brought against William; in a mixed gathering of Normans, English, and Bretons, almost every act of William's life might pass as a wrong done to some part of the company, even though some others of the company were his accomplices.Above all, the two earls Ralph and Roger made a distinct proposal to their fellow-earl Waltheof.King William should be driven out of the land; one of the three should be King;the other two should remain earls, ruling each over a third of the kingdom.Such a scheme might attract earls, but no one else; it would undo William's best and greatest work; it would throw back the growing unity of the kingdom by all the steps that it had taken during several generations.
Now what amount of favour did Waltheof give to these schemes?
Weighing the accounts, it would seem that, in the excitement of the bride-ale, he consented to the treason, but that he thought better of it the next morning.He went to Lanfranc, at once regent and ghostly father, and confessed to him whatever he had to confess.
The Primate assigned his penitent some ecclesiastical penances; the Regent bade the Earl go into Normandy and tell the whole tale to the King.Waltheof went, with gifts in hand; he told his story and craved forgiveness.William made light of the matter, and kept Waltheof with him, but seemingly not under restraint, till he came back to England.
Meanwhile the other two earls were in open rebellion.Ralph, half Breton by birth and earl of a Danish land, asked help in Britanny and Denmark.Bretons from Britanny and Bretons settled in England flocked to him.King Swegen, now almost at the end of his reign and life, listened to the call of the rebels, and sent a fleet under the command of his son Cnut, the future saint, together with an earl named Hakon.The revolt in England was soon put down, both in East and West.The rebel earls met with no support save from those who were under their immediate influence.The country acted zealously for the King.Lanfranc could report that Earl Ralph and his army were fleeing, and that the King's men, French and English, were chasing them.In another letter he could add, with some strength of language, that the kingdom was cleansed from the filth of the Bretons.At Norwich only the castle was valiantly defended by the newly married Countess Emma.Roger was taken prisoner; Ralph fled to Britanny; their followers were punished with various mutilations, save the defenders of Norwich, who were admitted to terms.The Countess joined her husband in Britanny, and in days to come Ralph did something to redeem so many treasons by dying as an armed pilgrim in the first crusade.
