Chapter I. THE ANGLO-SAXON HALL

It was the evening of Thursday, the fifth of October, in year of grace one thousand and sixty and six.

The setting sun was slowly sinking towards a dense bank of clouds, but as yet he gladdened the woods and hills around the old hall of Aescendune with his departing light.

The watchman on the tower gazed upon a fair scene outspread before him; at his feet rolled the river, broad and deep, spanned by a rude wooden bridge; behind him rose the hills, crowned with forest; on his right hand lay the lowly habitations of the tenantry, the farmhouses of the churls, the yet humbler dwellings of the thralls or tillers of the soil; the barns and stables were filled with the produce of a goodly harvest; the meadows full of sheep and oxen--a scene of rich pastoral beauty.

On his left hand a road led to the northeast, following at first the upward course of the river, until it left the stream and penetrated into the thick woodland.

Just as the orb of day was descending into the dense bank of cloud afore mentioned, the watchman marked the sheen of spear and lance, gilded by the departing rays, where the road left the forest. Immediately he blew the huge curved horn which he carried at his belt; and at the blast the inhabitants of the castle and village poured forth; loud shouts of joy rent the air--the deeper exclamations of the aged, the glad huzzas of children--and all hastened along the road to greet the coming warriors.

For well they knew that a glorious victory had gladdened the arms of old England; that at Stamford Bridge the proud Danes and Norwegians had sustained a crushing defeat, and been driven to seek refuge in their ships, and that these warriors, now approaching, were their own sons, husbands, or fathers, who had gone forth with Edmund, Thane of Aescendune, to fight under the royal banner of Harold, the hero king.

Who shall describe the meeting, the glad embraces, the half-delirious joy with which those home-bred soldiers were welcomed? No hirelings they, who fought for mere glory, or lust of gold, but husbands, fathers of families--men who had left the ploughshare and pruning hook to fight for hearth and altar.

"Home again"--home, saved from the fire and sword of the Northman, of whom tradition told so many dread stories--stories well known at Aescendune, where a young son of the then thane fifty years agone had died a martyr's death, pierced through and through by arrows, shot slowly to death because he would not save himself by denying his Lord { v}.

At that dismal period the whole district had been devastated with fire and sword, and there were old men amongst the crowd who well remembered the destruction of the former hall and village by the ferocious Danes. And now God had heard their litanies:"From the fury of the Northmen, good Lord deliver us,"and had averted the scourge through the stout battle-axes and valiant swords of these warrior peasants and their noble leaders, such as Edmund, son of Alfgar.

Amidst all this joy the Lady Winifred of Aescendune stood upon the steps of the great hall to receive her lord, fair as the lily, a true Englishwoman, a loving wife and tender mother.

And by her, one on each side, stood her two children, Wilfred and Edith. He was an English boy of the primitive type, with his brown hair, his sunburnt yet handsome features, the fruit of country air and woodland exercise; she, the daughter, a timid, retiring girl, her best type the lily, the image of her mother.

And now the noble rider, the thane and father, descended from his war steed, and threw himself into the arms of the faithful partner of his joys and sorrows, who awaited his embrace; there was a moment of almost reverential silence as he pressed her to his manly breast, and then arose a cry which made the welkin ring:

"Long life to Edmund and Winifred of Aescendune!"

The bonfires blazed and illuminated the night; the bells (there were three at S. Wilfred's priory hard by) rang with somewhat dissonant clamour; strains of music, which would seem very rough now, greeted the ears; but none the less hearty was the joy.

"The comet--what do you say of the comet now?"said one.

"That it boded ill to the Northmen,"was the reply of his neighbour.

They referred to that baleful visitor, the comet of 1066, which had turned night into day with its lurid and ghastly light, so that the very waves of the sea seemed molten in its beams, while the beasts of the field howled as if they scented the coming banquet of flesh afar off. We ll might they stand aghast who gazed upon this awful portent, which had seemed to set the southern heavens on fire.

The banquet was spread in the great hall, and the returned warriors supped with their lord ere they retired to gladden their own families. Little was said till the desire for eating and drinking was appeased. But the minstrels sang many a song of the glories of the English race, particularly of the thanes of Aescendune, and of the best and noblest warrior amongst them--Alfgar, the companion of the Ironside, the father of the present earl, who had been borne to his grave full of years and honour amidst the tears of his people, in the very last year of the Confessor.

But when the boards were removed, the thanks rendered to the God who had given all, the huge fire replenished, the wine and mead handed round, then Edmund the Thane rose amidst the expectant silence of his retainers.

"The health of Harold, our noble king, elected to that post by the suffrages of all true Englishmen! Nobler title no king on earth may claim."

It was drunk with acclamation.

"The memory of our brethren who went forth with us from Aescendune, and have left their bones at Stamford Bridge. We ep not for them, they have fallen in no unjust war, but for hearth and altar, for their country and their God; and this I swear, that while I rule at Aescendune, their souls shall never lack a mass at St. Wilfred's altar, nor their widows and orphans food and shelter."

This toast was drunk in solemn silence, and Edmund continued:

"Our toils are not yet over; we have one more battle to fight, and that may serve to free us from further need of fighting for the rest of our lives. William the Norman landed with sixty thousand men in Sussex, as many of you already know, while we were in Northumbria, or I trow he had never landed at all. The day after tomorrow we don our harness again to meet this new foe, but it will be child's play compared with that which is past. Shall we, who have conquered the awful Harold Hardrada, the victor of a hundred fights, fear these puny Frenchmen? They have come in a large fleet; a fishing boat will be too roomy to take them back; their bones will whiten and enrich the fields of Sussex for generations."

"The day after tomorrow!--start again the day after tomorrow, oh, my lord!"said a gentle, pleading voice.

"It must be so, my love; but why doubt that the God who has already given us such an earnest of victory will protect us still, and preserve us to each other?"

All the charm of the banquet was gone to the devoted wife, but young Wilfred pressed to his father's side.

"Thou wilt take me this time, father."

"Why, my boy, thou art barely fifteen, not old enough or strong enough yet to cope with men."

"But these Normans are hardly men."

"I fear me too much for thy tender age."

"Oh, father, let me go."

"Nay, thy mother needs thy care."

"But I must begin some day, and what day better than this? I can fight by thy side."

"The re is really little danger, my wife,"he said, in reply to the pleading looks of the mother;"I would not take him to meet the Danes, but there is less danger in these dainty Frenchmen. The grandson of Alfgar should be encouraged, not restrained, when he seeks to play the man, even as we repress not, but stimulate the first feeble attempts of the young falcon to strike its prey."

The Lady Winifred said no more at the time, for the duties of a host demanded her lord's care. The moon was high in the heavens ere the last song was sung, the last tale told, and the guests dismissed with these parting words:

"And now, my merry men all, your own homes claim your presence. One day ye may safely give to rest; the day after tomorrow we march again; for Harold will complete his levies on the 10th, and we must not be behind. Goodnight! Saints and angels guard your well-deserved rest."

The brief period of rest passed rapidly away, and the last night came--the last before departure for the fatal field of Senlac. Oh, how little did the Englishmen who left their homes with such confidence dream of the fatal collapse of their fame and glory which awaited them! They fell into the fatal error of underestimating their foe. Had it been otherwise, a host had assembled which had crushed the foreign invader; whereas there were few thanes in the midlands, and scarce any in the northern shires, who thought it worth while to follow Harold to Sussex.

So there were many who cried,"We have defended the northern shores and beaten the Danes; let the men of Sussex take their turn with these puny Frenchmen; we will turn out fast enough if they be beaten."

Alas! it was too late to"turn out"when the only Englishman whose genius equalled that of William lay dead on the fatal field, and there was no king in Israel.

Amidst the general confidence begotten of the victory at Stamford Bridge there were some upon whom the dread shadow of the future had fallen, and who realised the crisis; foremost amongst these was the patriot king himself. He knew the foe, and was perhaps the only man in the country who did; he knew that civilisation had only sharpened the genius of the descendants of Rollo, without abating one jot of their prowess; that they were more terrible now than when they ravaged Normandy, two centuries earlier.

Yet he flinched not from the struggle.

And amidst all the confidence of her dependants, some such shadow seemed to have fallen on the Lady Winifred. An unaccountable presentiment of evil weighed upon her spirits. She could not leave her husband one moment while he was yet spared to her; ever and anon she was surprised into tender words of endearment, foreign to the general tenor of her daily life, which partook of the reserve of an unemotional age.

She begged hard that Wilfred might remain at home, but only prevailed so far as to obtain a promise that he should not actually enter the battle, and with this she was forced to rest content, to the great delight of the boy.

That last night--how brief it seemed! How frequent the repetition of the same loving words! How fervent the aspiration for the day of their happy reunion, the danger over!--how chilling the unexpressed, unspoken doubt, whether it would ever take place! Yet it seemed folly to doubt, after Stamford Bridge.

The supper, ordinarily, in those times, the social meal of the day, was comparatively a silent one. The very tones of the harp seemed modulated in a minor key, contrasting strongly with the jubilant notes of the previous night; and at an early hour, the husband and wife retired to their bower, to sit long in the narrow embrasure of the window, looking out on the familiar moonlit scene, her head on his breast, ere they retired to rest.

"Dear heart, thou seemest dull tonight, and yet thou wert not so when we parted for the last fight. Thou didst thy best then to cheer thy lord."

"I know not why it is, but a chill foreboding seems to distress my spirits now, my Edmund; it must be mere weakness, but I feel as if I should never sit by thy dear side again."

"We are in God's hands, my dear one, and must trust all to Him. I go forth at the call of duty, and thou couldst not bid me to stay at home that men may call me'niddering.'"

"Nay, nay, my lord, forgive thy wife's weakness; but why take Wilfred too?"

"He will be in no danger; he shall tarry with old Guthlac by the stuff. The re will be many present like him, and whatever may chance to me or others, there can be no danger to them, for victory must follow our Harold. Hadst thou seen him at the Bridge thou couldst not doubt; he is the Ironside alive again, and as great as a general as a warrior.

"And now, dearest, a faint heart is faithlessness to God; let us commit ourselves in prayer to Him, and sleep together in peace."

The eastern sky was aglow with the coming dawn when they arose. Soon all was bustle in the precincts, the neighing of horses, the clatter of arms; then came the hasty meal, the long lingering farewell; and the husband and father rode away with his faithful retainers; his boy, full of spirits, by his side, waving his plumed cap to mother and sister as they watched the retiring band until lost in the distance.

They retired, the Lady Winifred and her daughter Edith, to the summit of the solitary tower, which arose over the entrance gate of the hall; there, with eyes fast filling with tears, they watched the departing band as it entered into the forest, then gorgeous with all the tints of autumn, the golden tints of the ash and elm, the reddish-brown of the beech--all combining to make a picture, exceeding even the tender hues of spring in beauty.

But all this loveliness was the beauty of decay, the prelude to the fall of the leaf; the forests were but arrayed in their richest garb for the coming death of winter.

Into these forests, prophetic in their hues of decay, glided the brilliant train of Edmund, the last English lord of Aescendune.

Farewell, noble hearts! Happier far ye who go forth to die for your country than they who shall live to witness her captivity.