A Mirror of Faith :: :: University of Virginia Library

It is the morn of battle-day;
the Christian hosts confess;
And Prelates stand, with lifted hand,
to comfort and to bless;
King Oswald heareth hunting-mass,
for fast comes on the foe;
And fearful in the rising sun
the Mercian standards glow;
And good Birinus, numbered since
amongst the Blessèd, saith,
“God speed the men that fight to-day
for country and for faith!”

The Paynim host carouseth high
on metheglin and ale;
Quoth Penda of the bloody hand,
“Lords Ealdormen, waes hail!
By Thor, for whom our fathers fought,
there lies an easy prey,
Unless the God Whom Christians serve,
defend them well to-day.”
So spake the fool, and praised his gods
of brass, and wood, and stone;
And wilt Thou not, O Lord of Hosts,
arise and save Thine Own?

“Lord Prelate,” quoth King Oswald then,
“I see yon sun arise;
Who nevermore, I know it well,
shall mark it mount the skies:
God guard His Church, whate'er His Will
appointeth unto me!
He shield that Woden's shrine should stand
where now His temples be!”
King Oswald's cheek is ghastly pale,
and yet his heart beats high:
“Preserve my people's souls, O Lord!
although their King must die!”

The hosts move on: the Christian priests
are bending on the knee;
To Paynim charms and hellish rites
the Mercian augurs flee:
‘King Anna, with East Anglia,
before our puissance fell;
King Edwin, with Northumbria,
of Penda's deeds can tell:
And yet right well they served their God,
and gave Him gold and land;
And who are these, that He should save
King Oswald from our hand?’

King Penda from the battle-field
returns in proud array;
King Oswald's corpse they mangle sore,
and mock the senseless clay:
The fierce insulter of the Faith
in pomp and glory reigns;

A nameless tomb, and hurried rites
the Blessed Martyr gains.
Fearful and terrible Thy works,
Whose glory ne'er decays;
Righteous and marvellous to men,
O King of Saints, Thy ways!

Hunting-mass was an abbreviated kind of Mass, used when the urgency of war, and, alas! too often when the pleasures of the chase, interfered with the full forms. S. Ethelred's behaviour, on an urgent occasion, in insisting on the whole office, we shall presently have occasion to notice.

S. Birinus was sent into Wessex by Pope Honorius. Having baptized Cynegils, he was placed by that prince in the city of Dorchester, of which he was the first Bishop. His connexion with S. Oswald arose from the latter having married a daughter of King Cynegils.

This is an anachronism. Anna was not overthrown by Penda till twelve years afterwards. Penda, after having thus vanquished three excellent monarchs, Edwin, S. Oswald, and Anna was himself defeated and slain by Oswy, King of Northumbria, in the great battle of Winwidfield.

S. Oswald fell on August 5; and that day was, till the Reformation, celebrated by the English Church in his memory.