1 Thucydides says of the beginning of the Peloponnesian War -as it is still with some newspapers of our own day, which predict the result of a policy as positively as if they were edited by the Pythian priestess herself. The utterer of certain views gave them a special emphasis and solemnity by passing them off for prophecies. Certainly prophecies abounded. Giraldus Cambrensis wrote a Vaticinal History of the conquest of Ireland. Merlin's prophecies were then in full currency, and in Ireland those of Columbcille; and so some Northamptonshire wiseacre, as we may plausibly suppose, wishing to express his ideas of English prospects at that time, produced them in the shape of an oracle inscribed 'in tabulis lapideis'—an inscription just as genuine, no doubt, as that on the tombstone of King Arthur, then recently discovered' at Glastonbury-as genuine as the famous prophecy that was found in a bog,' 'Ireland shall be rul'd by an ass and a dog.' He might well think England was in a poor way at that time. But this prophet's prophecies are grotesque enough. Two-thirds of the English, it seems, were to find homes elsewhere, and those that remained were to be utterly miserable. This was typified by the exaltation of the hart in a town's midst. The nation was to lose its spirit; the xpadín λáporo was to possess its bosom. One part might prosper, but it would be far away. Another would pass into Ireland; of their fate our seer judiciously hints nothing. The other would 'dree their weird,' and a most wretched weird, in their own land. What suggested the Apulian reference was undoubtedly Richard's successes just at this time in South Italy and Sicily. On his way to Palestine he wintered in those parts. He was there from September 23, 1190, to April 10, 1191. No doubt the prophet had heard of his seizing La Bagnara, a castle in Calabria; of his occupying a monastery on the straits of Messina; of his building close by Messina (‘extra muros Messinae') his stout fortress of Mategriffon; of the splendid style in which he kept Christmas in that castle, and how generally, the Griffons well suppressed, 'gens Angliae in maxima habebatur reverentia in regno Siciliae'; and, hearing of these things, he rashly concluded—such is the manner of prophets—that the king would never come back, but would establish himself permanently in his new quarters, and leave his England to look after itself. The date of this allusion must certainly be some early month in 1191. The reference to Ireland is curious. Just twenty years before our veracious oracle spoke, a full beginning had been made of our unfortunate relations with that country. In November 1171-some seven centuries ago!-Henry II. had been acknowledged King at Cashel. But the conquest was far from complete. In 1177 Prince John was declared lord of Ireland, and the whole country was allotted to various nobles and knights, who undertook to complete it. In 1185, that worthless person-he, says an old poet, Quo pejor in orbe Non fuit, omnimoda vacuus virtute, Johannes himself visited the country, only to irritate the native chiefs by his insolence, plucking their beards-a deadly insult— when they offered him the kiss of peace. He was soon recalled. The thorough conquest of Ireland was never to be accomplished, but it was still talked of and planned. Perhaps our prophet thought that he who retained the title of Lord of Ireland would justify his title by a second visit that should be really effective. At all events the general feeling of the age, which the Here prophecy represents, is well brought before us by what Giraldus says in his 'last preface' to his Conquest of Ireland-the preface in which he dedicates the new edition of his work to his old pupil, who was by that time king: It has pleased God and your good fortune [thus he addresses King John] to send you several sons, both natural and legitimate, and you may have more hereafter. Two of these you may raise to the thrones of two kingdoms, and under them you amply provide for numbers of your followers by new grants of lands, especially in Ireland, a country which is still in a wild and unsettled state, a very small part of it being yet occupied and inhabited by our people. As in the Elizabethan age, so then, the English looked upon Ireland as a country not only to be annexed, but to be taken possession of—as a land whose native inhabitants were not more to be considered than the natives of Australia or Tasmania have been considered in later times. So a third part of the English people was to occupy and inhabit Ireland. As to the last part of the prophecy-a prophet was scarcely needed to tell England its outlook was not good in the year 1191. Its knight-errant of a king, after raising money by all and every means, had gone a crusading, not to return, as the event proved, for nearly four years. His intriguing brother John had been forbidden the country; but it was not to be hoped he would heed the prohibition longer than he could help; nor did he. And men's hearts might well sink within them. And those who looked facts in the face might confidently promise the land 'all manner of misery.' The date of the Here prophecy then is the year 1191, near the beginning of it, S V ROBERT OF BRUNNE (From the Academy, Jan. 8, 1887) ... IR FREDERICK MADDEN writes that 'it appears to us, from a long and attentive consideration' of the autobiographical passages in the Handlyng Synne and the Chronicle, that Robert Mannyng was born at Brunne, was a Canon of the Gilbertine Order, and for fifteen yearsthat is, from 1288 to 1303-professed in the Priory of Sempringham, . . . and that he afterwards removed to Brymwake in Kestevene, six miles from Sempringham, where he wrote the prologue to his first work.' And subsequent historians of literature have faithfully followed so distinguished an authority. Yet Sir Frederic's statement needs revision. It does not seem to have occurred to him to verify the existence of Brymwake. Was there ever such a place? And, if so, where? Now that the Brym is identical with Brunne, and the Wake some defining addition is an obvious suggestion; what is more, it is the fact. So I am assured by one who was mentioned to me as the best antiquarian authority on the part of Lincolnshire concerned-by the Bishop of Nottingham, whom I have the pleasure of now heartily thanking for the courtesy and kindness with which he has answered my inquiries. "Your "Brimwake," says Dr Trollope, 'is undoubtedly "Bourn-wake," so called from its lord Hugh Wac and his successors in days of old, as the Wake Deeping Estate is still called Deeping-Wake or Wakes, although this has passed into other hands. . . . There may have been this distinction between the terms Brymwake and Brun-viz., that the first represented the Wak lordship of Brun, and the second the remainder of the land in the parish as you no doubt know that through the wisdom of the Conqueror he seldom included the whole of a parish in his grants of lordships to his adherents, although he often granted several lordships in different localities to one person.' Thus the name Brimwake may be compared with such place-names as Stoke-Mandeville, Ashby-de-la-Zouch, Minshull-Vernon, Hurst-Monceaux, Witton-Gilbert, etc. And so Brimwake and Brunne in fact denote the same locality. Now in this locality there was only one monastery—viz., that-I, again quote Bishop Trollope-'founded by Baldwin Fitz-Gislebert or Gilbert (father of Emma, married to Hugo Wak or Wake) for Canons Regular, of St Austin, in 1138.' So that if Robert Manning was ever a member of Brunne or Brimwake Monastery, Madden errs when he asserts that he never changed his Order-that he was always a Gilbertine. But does Robert Manning inform us that he ever belonged to Brunne or Bourn Monastery? I think not, if we read his words carefully, and do not punctuate them as is commonly done. The words from the prologue to his Handlyng Synne are these: To alle Crystyn men vndir Sunne And speciali alle be name Pe felaushepe of Symprynghame |