Part 7 (1/2)

Why should not a man give a farm to his cousin when he died, especially when that cousin's wife, Matilda, was another cousin? Then Harold, Duke of Wess.e.x, had sworn by a whole tubful of relics of dead saints that when Edward died he would not stand in William's way.

That, too, was a great thing to do. A promise ought to be kept to the letter, and how much more a sacred oath like that!--although men do say that Harold did not know there was a relic within a mile of him at the time he gave the promise.

But that promise Harold had not kept. On the contrary, he had claimed, first, that when he made it he had been s.h.i.+pwrecked on the Norman coast; he was really a prisoner, and gave the promise that he might get away; which as a matter of honour but made a bad matter worse.

Then, more reasonably, from our point of view, he claimed that the kingdom of England belonged to the English, and was not his to give.

Englishmen had made _him_ King, not William, and that was the end of it,--an answer which was likely to drive William nearly wild. And it did. William swore a great oath that before he died he would be King of all England. And Ulf, with many another, promised to help him.

Then Ulf went straight back to his s.h.i.+p again and that very night set a double guard as anchor-watch, for never in all his life, he said, had he seen so many thieves together at one time, and so few honest men. All of those same thieves and the other few presently set sail across the channel; and, odd to say, to this day there are men who proudly claim that a very far back ancestor of theirs ”came over with William the Conqueror.” But perhaps they have made themselves believe that that particular person was one of those honest ones.

Ulf talked it over with young Wulf in the first watch that night.

”If England were one 'twould be a mad voyage,” he said. ”Mind thou this, Wulf, when thou art captain, one arrow can be broken. Two also.

But to break a bundle is another matter. This Harold is a strong man, but he has only a part of the country behind him. His own brother, Tostig, has raised a fleet against him, Thor knows where.”

”His brother?” and Wulf stared in amaze.

”So William says, and he is a fox. Tostig is a hothead; he cannot govern himself, so of course he cannot rule others. He was made lord of the Northumbrians because of his royal blood, but they were men, not thralls, and presently told him that his health would be better in another land. Then he looked to Harold to help him with an army, but Harold found the Northumbrians were so much in the right of it that Tostig's rule was over, for help him he could not with any show of justice. Now, then, Tostig is sailing with the King of Norway, to raid the northern coasts.”

”What! is Harold Hardrada of Norway with us too?”

”So William says. Harold Hardrada, the 'stern in council' is to strike at the mouth of the river Humber, while we land in the south country.

It is easier so.”

And it was. For the old story-tellers say that Harold of England marched with his army, night and day, to meet the raiders of Tostig; and with twenty of his house-guards he rode far ahead, hoping to meet and have peace with his brother and save England. Almost he succeeded, also, for he gave him a brother's welcome, a brother's love; promised him lands and a share in government; and Tostig was well-nigh persuaded. But he was in bad company. He had brought over this band of cutthroats, with the greatest of them all at their head, under promise of unlimited plunder. And now what about them? So he had to put the question to his brother.

”What shall be the share of my--friend, Harold Hardrada, who has come so far for me?” Then, they say, Harold of England gave a right royal answer. What was to be the share of this pirate?

”Seven feet of English ground for a grave. Or, as he is said to be a very tall man, perhaps we can allow him a little more.”

If you would like to know more about Harold Hardrada, and what he did in his youth among the Turks at Constantinople, you can read a great deal in Sir Walter Scott's novel, ”Count Robert of Paris,” some of which, perhaps, is true. But, great fighter though he was, now was the time for his last battle; and on September 25, 1066, at Stamford- bridge, Harold of England met him and put him into the ”seven feet of English ground” which he had promised him. It was a great victory, yet a sad one; for Tostig had refused the terms and fell fighting against his own countrymen, to be buried with the pirates whom he had captained. And in the South at Pevensey, four days later, William was landing.

Down came Harold from his victory, weary with fighting, weary with marching, yet sternly earnest to drive back the invaders and save the land from being harried, if he could. But October was half through before he met them at Hastings. All day long, on the 14th, they fought, and Harold held his own, though with the smaller army. Each man knew his place, and kept it, and William found them a wall of iron. At last his captains pa.s.sed the word for a false retreat. The Saxons of Harold, with cheers, broke ranks to pursue, when round wheeled the Normans like hawks and plunged among them. Then came the cras.h.i.+ng of battle-axe on helmet, and like a long, slow wave, the Norman line swept onward and the Saxon helms went down. A brief check around the summit of a hill, where Harold and his guards had rallied, --then arrows sped in flights upward to fall straight down among them.

Their ranks were broken. And one by one each fell like a soldier in soldierly fas.h.i.+on where he stood with the loved captain among them.

Just as, eight hundred years afterward in America fell the blue-clad soldiers around their general, Custer, fighting the Sioux Indians on the Western plains.

Thus William the Conqueror began to conquer England, and when he ended England was his own. Everywhere his captains built their castles, and where that captain was a Thorfin it was bad for the land. Still, now and then there was an Ulf among them, or one like him, who knew better how to govern; and all was well with them and theirs for many days.

Do you care to know what next the fragments of our Star beheld?

SPARK X.

HOW THE STAR SANG A SONG OF FREEDOM TO A CAPTIVE KING.

Once again all England was under one King. It was a sad time for the English, for the word of the Northman was the law, and wherever there seemed need for it, a grim, gray castle towered up solidly above the forest, with a great ditch, called a moat, dug around it; and behind that water and those walls of stone lived Normans, as they now were called.

Ulf, like the others, had his castle, and governed broad lands; but so well, and so well did Wulf and Wulf's son in his time, that nothing of note ever happened there, and therefore n.o.body ever heard of them. No man's house was burned by them with the owner in it. No one's cattle were carried off to the use of the castle without just payment. No one was killed without good cause, or what, in those days, was thought to be good cause. So this part of England lived long in placid quiet.