Hereward, the Last of the English by Charles Kingsley (i am reading a book .TXT) 📖

“But Harold Godwinsson is dead!”

“Dead! Who next? William of Normandy? The world seems coming to an end, as the monks say it will soon.” [Footnote: There was a general rumor abroad that the end of the world was at hand, that the “one thousand years” of prophecy had expired.]

“A great battle has been fought at a place they call Heathfield.”

“Close by Hastings? Close to the landing-place? Harold must have flown thither back from York. What a captain the man is, after all.”

“Was. He is dead, and all the Godwinssons, and England lost.”

If Torfrida had feared the effect of her news, her heart was lightened at once as Hereward answered haughtily,—

“England lost? Sussex is not England, nor Wessex either, any more than Harold was king thereof. England lost? Let the tanner try to cross the Watling street, and he will find out that he has another stamp of Englishmen to deal with.”

“Hereward, Hereward, do not be unjust to the dead. Men say—the Normans say—that they fought like heroes.”

“I never doubted that; but it makes me mad—as it does all Eastern and Northern men—to hear these Wessex churls and Godwinssons calling themselves all England.”

Torfrida shook her head. To her, as to most foreigners, Wessex and the southeast counties were England; the most civilized; the most Norman; the seat of royalty; having all the prestige of law, and order, and wealth. And she was shrewd enough to see, that as it was the part of England which had most sympathy with Norman civilization, it was the very part where the Norman could most easily gain and keep his hold. The event proved that Torfrida was right: but all she said was, “It is dangerously near to France, at least.”

“It is that. I would sooner see 100,000 French north of the Humber, than 10,000 in Kent and Sussex, where he can hurry over supplies and men every week. It is the starting-point for him, if he means to conquer England piecemeal.”

“And he does.”

“And he shall not!” and Hereward started up, and walked to and fro. “If all the Godwinssons be dead, there are Leofricssons left, I trust, and Siward’s kin, and the Gospatricks in Northumbria. Ah? Where were my nephews in the battle? Not killed too, I trust?”

“They were not in the battle.”

“Not with their new brother-in-law? Much he has gained by throwing away the Swan-neck, like a base hound as he was, and marrying my pretty niece. But where were they?”

“No man knows clearly. They followed him down as far as London, and then lingered about the city, meaning no man can tell what: but we shall hear—and I fear hear too much—before a week is over.”

“Heavens! this is madness, indeed. This is the way to be eaten up one by one! Neither to do the thing, nor leave it alone. If I had been there! If I had been there—”

“You would have saved England, my hero!” and Torfrida believed her own words.

“I don’t say that. Besides, I say that England is not lost. But there were but two things to do: either to have sent to William at once, and offered him the crown, if he would but guarantee the Danish laws and liberties to all north of the Watling street; and if he would, fall on the Godwinssons themselves, by fair means or foul, and send their heads to William.”

“Or what?”

“Or have marched down after him, with every man they could muster, and thrown themselves on the Frenchman’s flank in the battle; or between him and the sea, cutting him off from France; or—O that I had but been there, what things could I have done! And now these two wretched boys have fooled away their only chance—”

“Some say that they hoped for the crown themselves.

“Which?—not both? Vain babies!” And Hereward laughed bitterly. “I suppose one will murder the other next, in order to make himself the stronger by being the sole rival to the tanner. The midden cock, sole rival to the eagle! Boy Waltheof will set up his claim next, I presume, as Siward’s son; and then Gospatrick, as Ethelred Evil-Counsel’s great-grandson; and so forth, and so forth, till they all eat each other up, and the tanner’s grandson eats the last. What care I? Tell me about the battle, my lady, if you know aught. That is more to my way than their statecraft.”

And Torfrida told him all she knew of the great fight on Heathfield Down—which men call Senlac—and the Battle of Hastings. And as she told it in her wild, eloquent fashion, Hereward’s face reddened, and his eyes kindled. And when she told of the last struggle round the Dragon [Footnote: I have dared to differ from the excellent authorities who say that the standard was that of “A Fighting Man”; because the Bayeux Tapestry represents the last struggle as in front of a Dragon standard, which must be—as is to be expected—the old standard of Wessex, the standard of English Royalty. That Harold had also a “Fighting Man” standard, and that it was sent by William to the Pope, there is no reason to doubt. But if the Bayeux Tapestry be correct, the fury of the fight for the standard would be explained. It would be a fight for the very symbol of King Edward’s dynasty.] standard; of Harold’s mighty figure in the front of all, hewing with his great double-headed axe, and then rolling in gore and agony, an arrow in his eye; of the last rally of the men of Kent; of Gurth, the last defender of the standard, falling by William’s sword, the standard hurled to the ground, and the Popish Gonfanon planted in its place,—then Hereward’s eyes, for the first and last time for many a year, were flushed with noble tears; and springing up he cried: “Honor to the Godwinssons! Honor to the Southern men! Honor to all true English hearts! Why was I not there to go with them to Valhalla?”

Torfrida caught him round the neck. “Because you are here, my hero, to free your country from her tyrants, and win yourself immortal fame.”

“Fool that I am, I verily believe I am crying.”

“Those tears,” said she, as she kissed them away, “are more precious to Torfrida than the spoils of a hundred fights, for they tell me that Hereward still loves his country, still honors virtue, even in a foe.”

And thus Torfrida—whether from woman’s sentiment of pity, or from a woman’s instinctive abhorrence of villany and wrong,—had become there and then an Englishwoman of the English, as she proved by strange deeds and sufferings for many a year.

“Where is that Norseman, Martin?” asked Hereward that night ere he went to bed, “I want to hear more of poor Hardraade.”

“You can’t speak to him now, master. He is sound asleep this two hours; and warm enough, I will warrant.”

“Where?”

“In the great green bed with blue curtains, just above the kitchen.”