nd. And yet to the banners of this "unknown"
chieftain there flocked the discontented heroism of England, men
ranking from the noble to the peasant, and including such great
figures as Morcar, Edwine, and Waltheof. I always think, too, that the
little band of Berkshire men, who started across the country to join
Hereward in the fens, and were intercepted and cut to pieces by a
Norman troop,[43] give us more than a passing glimpse at the
estimation in which Hereward was held by his countrymen. Such a man
commanding so much, in face of so much, could not have been the
unknown person which history makes him.

How then can we ascertain why he was held in such estimation? History
being quite silent, tradition steps into the gap. It is the tradition
recorded in post-Herewardian times, be it noted. In this great body of
tradition, contained in a Latin MS. of the twelfth century, he
journeys to Scotland, where he slew a bear and saved the people whom
it had oppressed; from thence to Cornwall, where he fought and slew a
great champion, the lover of the princess; from thence to Ireland,
where he assisted the King in war, and back again to Cornwall to
rescue again the princess from a distasteful wooer, and, finally, to
Flanders. Even in the camp of the Norman, which he visits in
traditional fashion, he has an adventure with witches which takes us
to the worship of wells. Much of his adventure is but the application
of well-known traditional events,[44] and it is important to note that
the geography of the supposed travels belongs to the very home of
tradition, the unknown territories of the Celts, Ireland, Cornwall,
and Scotland.

Now all this tradition is certainly not true of Hereward. But what it
does is to certify to his greatness in the eyes of his countrymen, to
show that his countrymen were anxious to explain why he was so great
in A.D. 1070, and why before that date he was unknown to them. This is
an important point to have gained. It shows the vacuum which was
occupied by tradition because contemporary, or nearly contemporary,
thought required it to be filled up. The popular mind abhors a vacuum
as much as the material world of nature does. It will fill it with its
own conceptions, if it cannot fill it with recognised facts. Hereward
must have been a famous man when he took his stand in the fens of Ely.
That his biographers explain his fame by the application of ancient
traditions is only saying that his countrymen reck