800 



EDWARD. 



ness of water colours, of which there are so many 

 specimens in Britain. He died in 1821. 



EDWARD the Elder, kinu r <>t' Knglaiul, s=on of 

 Alfred the Great, whom lit- succeeded in 901. Ethel- 

 wald, Uie son of Ins father's elder brother, claimed 

 the crown ; but this insurrection ended with the death 

 of Ethelwald in battle. The reign of Edward was 

 further distinmiMicd by successes over the Angli- 

 cised and foreign Danes. He fortified many inland 

 town*, acquired dominion over Northumbria and Kast 

 Anglia, and subdued several of the Welsh tribes. He 

 died, after a reitrn of twenty-four years, in 925. 



EDWARD, Mimamcd the MARTYR, king of Eng- 

 land, son of Edgar, succeeded his father, at the age 

 of fifteen, in 975. His step-mother, Elfridn, wished 

 to raise her own son, Ethelred, to the throne, but 

 was opposed by Dunstan, through whose exertions 

 Edward was peaceably crowned. His short reign was 

 chiefly distinguished by the disputes' between Dun- 

 stan and the foreign monks on one side, and the secu- 

 lar clergy on the other. The young king paid little 

 attention to anything but the chase, wluch led to his 

 unliappy death. Hunting one day in Dorsetshire, he 

 was separated from his attendants, and repaired to 

 Corfe castle, where Elfrida resided. After paying his 

 respects to her, he requested a glass of liquor, and, 

 as he was drinking on horseback, one ot Elfrida's 

 servants gave him a deep stab behind. He immedi- 

 ately set spurs to his horse, but, fainting from loss of 

 blood, he was dragged in the stirrup until he died. 

 The pity caused by his innocence and misfortune in- 

 duced the people to regard him as a martyr. He had 

 reigned four years. 



EDWARD, surnamed the CONFESSOR, younger son 

 of Ethelred II. On the death of his maternal brother, 

 Hardicanute the Dane, in 1041, he was called to the 

 throne, and thus renewed the Saxon line. He was 

 not the immediate heir, as his brother, Edmund Iron- 

 side, had left sons ; but, as he received the support 

 of Godwin, earl of Kent, on condition of marrying his 

 daughter, Editha, his claim was established. Edward 

 was a weak and superstitious, but well-intentioned 

 prince, who acquired the love of his subjects by his 

 monkish sanctity, and care in the administration 

 of justice. He gained the title of saint and con- 

 fessor by abstaining from nuptial connexion with his 

 queen. Having been educated in Normandy, lie in- 

 troduced so many natives of that country to liis court, 

 that the French language and manners became pre- 

 valent in England, to the great disgust of earl Godwin 

 and his sons. A rebellion took place, and Edward 

 was forced to dismiss his foreign favourites. Per- 

 ceiving that the youth and weakness of his son, Edgar 

 Atheling, would not secure the succession against the 

 power and ability of Harold, the son of Godwin, lie 

 turned his eyes upon his kinsman, William of Nor- 

 mandy, in whose favour it has been asserted, with 

 little probability, that he executed a will. He died 

 in 1066, leaving the point of the succession undeter- 

 mined ; and with him ended the Saxon line of kings. 

 Edward was the first English monarch who touched 

 for the king's evil. He caused a body of laws to be 

 compiled from those of Ethelbert, Ina, and Alfred, to 

 which the nation was long fondly attached. 



EDWARD I. (of the Norman line), king of Eng- 

 land, son of Henry III., was born at Winchester in 

 1239. The contests between his father and the 

 barons called him early into active life, and he finally 

 quelled all resistance to the royal authority, by the 

 decisive defeat of Leicester, at the battle of Eves- 

 ham, in 1265. He then proceeded to Palestine, 

 where he signalized his valour on many occasions, and 

 inspired so much terror, that an assassin was em- 

 ployed to' despatch him, from whom he received a 

 wound in the arm, which, as tradition reports, being 



supposed to be from a poisoned weapon, was sucked 

 by his faithful consort, Eleanor of Castile. On as- 

 suming the government, he acted with great vigour 

 in the repression of the lawlessness of the nobles, 

 anil the corruption in the administration of justice ; 

 but often evinced an arbitrary and grasping disposi- 

 tion. In 1276, he summoned Llewellyn, prince of 

 Wales, to do him homage, and, upon his refusal, ex- 

 cept on certain conditions, commenced the war 

 which ended in the annexation of that principality to 

 the English crown in 1283. Edward then spent 

 some time abroad, in mediating a peace between the 

 crowns of France and Arragon, and, on his return, 

 commenced his attempts to destroy the independence 

 of Scotland. The expense attendant upon this 

 strong, but unprincipled policy, was such that Kd- 

 ward was necessitated to use every expedient to raNe 

 supplies ; and, for this purpose, in the twenty-third 

 year of his reign, he summoned to parliament repnv 

 sentatives from all the boroughs in the kingdom : 

 this is therefore considered by some authors the true 

 epoch of the formation of a house of commons in 

 England. After his return from the Scottish expedi- 

 tion in 1296, which terminated in the capture of 

 Baliol, he became involved in a quarrel with his 

 clergy, who, supported by the pope, refused to sub- 

 mit to a tax which he had imposed on them. Edward 

 forced their compliance, by placing them out of the 

 protection of the law. His frequent expedients to 

 raise money at length produced great discontent 

 among the nobles, and people also, which obliged 

 him to confirm the great charter, and charter of 

 forests, and also to give other securities in favour of 

 public liberty. He then made a campaign in Flan- 

 ders against France, which terminated with the re- 

 covery of Guienne, and his second marriage with 

 Margaret, the sister of king Philip. Meantime new 

 commotions took place in Scotland, under the guid- 

 ance of the celebrated William Wallace. These 

 transactions recalled Edward from Flanders, who 

 hastened to the borders with an army of 100,000 

 men. The events of this interesting campaign can- 

 not be detailed here ; but the ignominious execution 

 of the brave Wallace, in 1303, as a traitor, forms a 

 blot in the character of Edward. Neither did it 

 avail; since Robert Bruce was able, in 1306, to 

 place himself at the head of a new confederacy. 

 Highly indignant at this determined spirit of resis- 

 tance, Edward vowed revenge against the whole 

 Scottish nation, and, assembling another army, was 

 on the point of passing the border, when he was 

 arrested by sickness, and died at Burgh-upon-Sands, 

 near Carlisle, July 7, 1307, in the sixty-ninth year of 

 his age, and thirty-ninth of his reign. Few princes 

 have exhibited more vigour in action, or policy in 

 council, than Edward I. His enterprises were 

 directed to permanent advantages, rather than to 

 mere personal ambition and temporal y splendour. 

 Nor was he less intent upon the internal improve- 

 ment of his kingdom than its external importance. 

 The laws of the realm obtained so much additional 

 order and precision during his reign, that he has 

 been called the English Justinian. He passed an 

 act of mortmain, protected and encouraged com- 

 merce ; and in his reign first originated the society 

 of merchant adventurers. The manners of this able 

 sovereign were courteous, and his person majestic, 

 although the disproportionate length of his legs gave 

 him the popular surname of Longshanks. He left a 

 son and three daughters by his first wife, Eleanor, 

 who died in 1290, and two sons by his second wife, 

 Margaret of France. 



EDWARD II., king of England, born at Caer- 

 narvon castle in 1284, and the first English prince of 

 Wales, succeeded his father, Edward I., in 1307. He 



