HISTORY OF MARINE ARCHITECTURE.

' 64 -

who have written of the long voyages which were made under the Saxonkings may be inferred from it. Athelstan decreed, soon after he succeeded tothe crown, that “ every merchant who made three voyages to the Mediterra-nean on his own account, should be raised to honour, and enjoy the privilegesof a gentleman.”

The reigns of Edmund and Edred, brothers of Athelstan, and of Edwy,eldest son of Edmund, including together a period of fifteen years, furnish nomaterials to the present purpose. The former of these princes having usedthe power which he derived from the wisdom and bravery of his predecessor,in compelling the king of Scots, and the Anglo-Saxon chieftains of the northof England, to make peace on his own terms, was stabbed at a banquet by anoutlaw, whom he had imprudently seized with his own hands. The Nor-thumbrians, upon his death, broke their treaty, and the reign of Edred waspassed in skirmishing with that bold people, as was that of his nephew Edwyin disputes with the Monks, who had lately begun to display in this island thegrowing features of that gigantic power, which during so many subsequentcenturies enthralled Europe. After causing the disaffection of the subject,they carried their insolence to such a height, as to prohibit the marriage ofthe sovereign with Elgiva, because she was of royal blood. The king, pos-sessed of every quality that in times of less danger, with respect to spiritualconcerns, could render a sovereign amiable in the eyes of his countrymen, andserviceable to his country, in vain attempted to stem the torrent of this abo-minable tyranny. His queen was forcibly torn from his arms; and after•suffering every indignity that could possibly have been inflicted on the mostcontemptible criminal, was most inhumanly and savagely massacred. Thesefeuds may seem to bear no affinity whatever to the science of Marine Archi-tecture ; but the mention of them becomes, as it were, unavoidably necessary,as they naturally account for that dereliction of naval pursuits which took placeduring this period.

The accession of Ed°;ar, a name too familiar to a Briton to be forgotten,and, at the same time, too popular to be passed over with neglect, appeared topromise a revival of those interesting scenes which took place under the aus-pices of Alfred, and have become so peculiarly gr.ateful to a British mind.Having mounted the throne at an age when he could not be said to havereached manhood, and manifested a wisdom, a political prudence, rarely to befound even in venerable age, he immediately adopted the most obvious m*ans

of