ainst his own people in the great battle of
Brunanburgh, [iv] where Athelstane so gloriously conquered the allied
Danes, Scots, and Welsh, he was taken prisoner.

The victor king sat in judgment upon the recreant, surrounded by his
chief nobility and vassal kings. The guilt of the prisoner was evident,
nay undenied, and the respect in which his sire was held alone delayed
the doom of a cruel death from being pronounced upon him.

While the council yet deliberated, Offa appeared amongst them, and, like
a second Brutus, took his place amongst his peers. Disclaiming all
personal interest in the matter, he sternly proposed that the claims of
justice should be satisfied.

Yet they hesitated to shed Oswald's blood: the alternative they adopted
was perhaps not more merciful--although a common doom in those times.
They selected a crazy worm-eaten boat, and sent the criminal to sea,
without sail, oar, or rudder, with a loaf of bread and cruse of water,
the wind blowing freshly from off the land.

Oswald was never heard of again; but after his supposed death,
information was brought to his father that the outlaw had been married
to a Danish woman, and had left a son--an orphan--for the mother
died in childbirth.

Offa resolved to seek the boy, and to adopt him, as if in reparation for
the past. The effort he had made had cost him a bitter pang, and the
father's heart was well-nigh broken. For a time the inquiries were
unsuccessful. It was discovered that the mother was dead, that she had
died before the tragedy, but not a word could be learned respecting the
boy, and many had begun to doubt his existence, when, after years had
elapsed, one of the executioners of the cruel doom deposed on his
deathbed that a boy of some ten summers had appeared on the beach, had
called the victim "father," and had so persistently entreated to share
his doom, that they had allowed him to do so, but had concealed the
fact, rightly fearing blame, if not punishment. The priest who had
attended his dying bed, and heard his last confession, bore the tidings
to Offa at the penitent's desire.

The old thane never seemed to lift up his head again: the sacrifice his
sense of duty had exacted from him had been too great for a heart
naturally full of domestic affection, and he sank and died after a few
months in the arms of his younger and beloved son Ella.

The foundation of the neighbouring priory and church of St. Wilfred had
been the consolation o