Cnut’s law,--in each case law meaning system of government. His importance as a king is marked by the respect shown him on his pilgrimage to Rome in the year 1027. There, as he tells his people in a letter which he sent them, he negotiated with the Pope, the Emperor, and King Rudolph of Burgundy, for the free passage of English pilgrims and merchants; he received large gifts from the Emperor, and made the Pope promise to lessen his extortions upon granting the Pallium or Archiepiscopal cloak. His daughter by Queen Emma, Gunhild, was, moreover, thought a fitting wife for Henry, afterwards the Emperor Henry III. Cnut died still young in 1035. [Sidenote: Disputed succession.] [Sidenote: Importance of Earl Godwine.] [Sidenote: Harold. 1037.] [Sidenote: Harthacnut. 1040.] With him fell his plans, both of the Scandinavian Empire and of good government in England. His sons, Harold and Harthacnut, in no way inherited his greatness; they appear to have been little better than savage barbarians. The succession was disputed between them. Godwine and the West Saxons obtained the South of England for Harthacnut, while Harold reigned in the North. But as Harthacnut did not come to England, but remained in his kingdom of Denmark, Godwine was the practical ruler. This great Earl, whose sympathies were wholly national, was accused of putting to death Alfred, the son of Æthelred and Emma, who seems to have taken advantage of the absence of Harthacnut to aim at re-establishing himself in Wessex. But as the actual murderers were the men of Harold whom Godwine had opposed, it would seem that the charge was a false one. The continued absence of Harthacnut enabled Harold to secure the whole of the kingdom, over which he reigned for two years. On his death, in 1040, Harthacnut stepped unopposed into his position. His short reign was marked by no great events. Godwine, having cleared himself by oath and by compurgation (in which a large number of Earls and Thegns joined) of the charge of murdering Alfred, remained in power. A tyrannical use of the King’s House-carls in collecting a tax produced an outbreak in Worcester, which was punished with brutal severity. And when the King fell dead, while drinking at a bridal feast, the English were glad to be rid of a line of such barbarous sovereigns, and to restore the House of Cerdic in the person of the late king’s half-brother Edward, who, in the absence of direct descendants of the Danish house, entered almost unopposed on the kingdom. [Sidenote: Edward the Confessor. 1042.] [Sidenote: Rivalry between Godwine and the French party.] [Sidenote: Godwine banished. 1051.] [Sidenote: Return and death of Godwine. 1052.]