With all these nations, all these natures, amalgamated in our own, it is no wonder that the literature of our isles contains many different ideals of heroism, changing according to nationality and epoch. Thus the physical valour of Beowulf is not the same quality as the valour of Havelok the Dane, though both are heroes of the strong arm; and the chivalry of Diarmit is not the same as the chivalry of Roland. Again, religion has its share in changing the ideals of a nation, and Constantine, the warrior of the Early English poem of "Elene," is far from being the same in character as the tender-hearted Constantine of "moral Gower's" apocryphal tale. The law-abiding nature of the earliest heroes, whose obedience to their king and their priest was absolute, differs almost entirely from the lawlessness of Gamelyn and Robin Hood, both of whom set church and king at defiance, and even account it a merit to revolt from the rule of both. It follows from this that we shall find our chosen heroes of very different types and characters; but we shall recognise that each represented to his own age an ideal of heroism, which that age loved sufficiently to put into literature, and perpetuate by the best means in its power. Of many another hero besides Arthur--of Barbarossa, of Hiawatha, even of Napoleon--has the tradition grown that he is not dead, but has passed away into the deathless land, whence he shall come again in his own time. As Tennyson has sung, "Great bards of him will sing Hereafter; and dark sayings from of old Ranging and ringing through the minds of men, And echoed by old folk beside their fires For comfort after their wage-work is done, Speak of the King." FOOTNOTES: [1] Lightfoot. [2] Swinburne. [3] Gerald Massey. [4] J. R. Denning. [5] W. W. Campbell. [6] _Ibid._ [7] C. Roberts. [8] T. Darcy McGee. [9] Tennyson. [10] Shakespeare, _Julius Cæsar_. [11] Tennyson. CHAPTER I: BEOWULF Introduction