es the chief names in the three
Chronicles; the date of decease is given in each case.

Offa, 940.
* Oswald, 937.
+ Ragnar, 959.
* Ella, 959.
+ Elfric, 960.
+ Alfred, 998, m. Alftrude.
o Elfric, 975.
o Elfwyn, 1036, m. Hilda.
# Bertric, 1006.
# Ethelgiva, 1064, m. Alfgar.
@ Edmund, 1066, m. Winifred.
- Wilfred, 1122.
- Edith, 1124, m. Etienne, 1110.
@ Elfleda, 1030.
o Cuthbert, 1034 (Prior).
o Bertha, 1030, m. Herstan.
# Winifred, 1067.
+ Edgitha, 990.

vii This Herstan figures largely in "Alfgar the Dane." He
married Bertha, daughter of Alfred of Aescendune, the hero of the
"First Chronicle." See the genealogical table at the end of the
book.

viii
"By Thy Cross and Passion;
Good Lord, deliver her."

ix Poison amongst the Normans.

It may be thought by many readers that the poisoner's art could
never have flourished among so chivalrous a people as the Normans;
but the contrary was the case; and there are several instances of
such foul murders in the pages of the old chroniclers, sufficient
to justify the introduction of the scene in our story.

At the plot called the Bridal of Norwich, A.D. 1075, Roger, Earl of
Hereford, and Ralph, Earl of Norwich, did not scruple to accuse
William himself of the murder of Conan, Duke of Brittany, who,
finding that the duke was on the point of withdrawing all his
troops for the invasion of England, prepared to take advantage of
it by making a raid upon Normandy. It was said that William could
think of no other means of meeting the difficulty, than by causing
the gauntlets and helmet of the unfortunate Conan to be poisoned by
one of his chamberlains, who held lands in Normandy, and was under
William's influence. Conan, however, did not die till the 11th of
December, after the battle of Senlac, and the accusation is hard to
reconcile with the general character of William. Ordericus relates
that Walter, Count of Pontoise, and his wife, were murdered at
Falaise, when prisoners, by poison "treacherously administered by
their enemies," A.D. 1064.

x Anglo-Saxon Outlaws.

The true secret of the sympathy of the English people with such
noted outlaws as Robin Hood and Little John, and their companions,
is, that they were made such by Norman tyranny