"There then the Weder Geats wrought for their ruler dead A cairn on the ocean cliff widespread and lofty, Visible far and near by vessels' wandering crews. They built in ten days' space the hero's monument, And wrought with shining swords the earthen rampart wall, So that the wisest men worthy might deem it. Then in that cairn they placed necklets and rings and gems Which from the dragon's hoard brave men had taken. Back to the earth they gave treasures of ancient folk, Gold to the gloomy mould, where it now lieth Useless to sons of men as it e'er was of yore. Then round the mound there rode twelve manly warriors, Chanting their bitter grief, singing the hero dead, Mourning their noble king in fitting words of woe! They praised his courage high and his proud, valiant deeds, Honoured him worthily, as it is meet for men Duly to praise in words their friendly lord and king When his soul wanders forth far from its fleshly home. So all the Geat chiefs, Beowulf's bodyguard, Wept for their leader's fall: sang in their loud laments That he of earthly kings mildest to all men was, Gentlest, most gracious, most keen to win glory." CHAPTER II: THE DREAM OF MAXEN WLEDIG The Position of Constantine It would seem that the Emperor Constantine the Great loomed very large in the eyes of mediæval England. Even in Anglo-Saxon times many legends clustered round his name, so that Cynewulf, the religious poet of early England, wrote the poem of "Elene" mainly on the subject of his conversion. The story of the Vision of the Holy Cross with the inscription _In hoc signo vinces_ was inspiring to a poet to whom the heathen were a living reality, not a distant abstraction; and Constantine's generosity to the Church of Rome and its bishop Sylvester added another element of attraction to his character in the mediæval mind. It is hardly surprising that other legends of his conversion and generosity should have sprung up, which differ entirely from the earlier and more authentic record. Thus "the moral Gower" has preserved for us an alternative legend of the cause of Constantine's conversion, which forms a good illustration of the virtue of pity in the "Confessio Amantis." Whence this later legend sprang we have no knowledge, for nothing in the known history of Constantine warrants our regarding him as a disciple of mercy, but its existence shows that the mediæval mind was busied with his personality. Another most interesting proof of his importance to Britain is given in the following legend of "The Dream of Maxen Wledig," preserved in the "Mabinogion." This belongs to the Welsh patriotic legends, and tends to glorify the marriage of the British Princess Helena with the Roman emperor, by representing it as preordained by Fate. The fact that the hero of the Welsh saga is the Emperor Maxentius instead of