Bill Nyes Comic History of England | Page 5

and after two or three patent-pails-full of wassail would get him to give her
another county or two, until soon the Briton saw that the Saxon had a mortgage on the
throne, and after it was too late, he said that immigration should have been restricted.
[Illustration: ROWENA CAPTIVATES VORTIGERN.]
Kent became the first Saxon kingdom, and remained a powerful state for over a century.
More Saxons now came, and brought with them yet other Saxons with yet more children,
dogs, vodka, and thirst. The breath of a Saxon in a cucumber-patch would make a peck of
pickles per moment.
The Angles now came also and registered at the leading hotels. They were destined to
introduce the hyphen on English soil, and plant the orchards on whose ancestral branches
should ultimately hang the Anglo-Saxon race, the progenitors of the eminent aristocracy
of America.
Let the haughty, purse-proud American--in whose warm life current one may trace the
unmistakable strains of bichloride of gold and trichinae--pause for one moment to gaze at
the coarse features and bloodshot eyes of his ancestors, who sat up at nights drenching
their souls in a style of nepenthe that it is said would remove moths, tan, freckles, and
political disabilities.
[Illustration: ETHELBERT, KING OF KENT, PROCLAIMED "BRETWALDA."]

The seven states known as the Saxon Heptarchy were formed in the sixth and seventh
centuries, and the rulers of these states were called "Bretwaldas," or Britain-wielders.
Ethelbert, King of Kent, was Bretwalda for fifty years, and liked it first-rate.
[Illustration: AUGUSTINE KINDLY RECEIVED BY ETHELBERT, KING OF KENT.]
A very good picture is given here showing the coronation of Ethelbert, copied from an
old tin-type now in the possession of an aged and somewhat childish family in
Philadelphia who descended from Ethelbert and have made no effort to conceal it.
Here also the artist has shown us a graphic picture of Ethelbert supported by his
celebrated ingrowing moustache receiving Augustine. They both seem pleased to form
each other's acquaintance, and the greeting is a specially appetizing one to the true lover
of Art for Art's sake.
For over one hundred and fifty years the British made a stubborn resistance to the
encroachments of these coarse people, but it was ineffectual. Their prowess, along with a
massive appetite and other hand baggage, soon overran the land of Albion. Everywhere
the rude warriors of northern Europe wiped the dressing from their coarse red whiskers
on the snowy table-cloth of the Briton.
[Illustration: THEY WIPED THEIR COARSE RED WHISKERS ON THE SNOWY
TABLE-CLOTH.]
In West Wales, or Dumnonia, was the home of King Arthur, so justly celebrated in song
and story. Arthur was more interesting to the poet than the historian, and probably as a
champion of human rights and a higher civilization should stand in that great galaxy
occupied by Santa Claus and Jack the Giant-Killer.
The Danes or Jutes joined the Angles also at this time, and with the Saxons spread terror,
anarchy, and common drunks all over Albion. Those who still claim that the Angles were
right Angles are certainly ignorant of English history. They were obtuse Angles, and
when bedtime came and they tried to walk a crack, the historian, in a spirit of mischief,
exclaims that they were mostly a pack of Isosceles Try Angles, but this doubtless is mere
badinage.
They were all savages, and their religion was entirely unfit for publication. Socially they
were coarse and repulsive. Slaves did the housework, and serfs each morning changed the
straw bedding of the lord and drove the pigs out of the boudoir. The pig was the great
social middle class between the serf and the nobility: for the serf slept with the pig by day,
and the pig slept with the nobility at night.
And yet they were courageous to a degree (the Saxons, not the pigs). They were fearless
navigators and reckless warriors. Armed with their rude meat-axes and one or two
Excalibars, they would take something in the way of a tonic and march right up to the
mouth of the great Thomas catapult, or fall in the moat with a courage that knew not,
recked not of danger.

Christianity was first preached in Great Britain in 597 A.D., at the suggestion of Gregory,
afterwards Pope, who by chance saw some Anglican youths exposed for sale in Rome.
They were fine-looking fellows, and the good man pitied their benighted land. Thus the
Roman religion was introduced into England, and was first to turn the savage heart
towards God.
[Illustration: EGBERT GAINS A GREAT VICTORY OVER THE FRENCH
INVADERS.]
Augustine was very kindly received by Ethelbert, and invited up to the house. Augustine
met with great success, for the king experienced religion and was baptized, after which
many of his subjects repented and accepted salvation on learning