Their ready benevolence and untiring zeal originated and carried on the machinery which in our day requires the support of thousands of voluntary subscribers, and millions of involuntary taxpayers.

IX.

BATTLE OF SENLAC OR HASTINGS.-FREEMAN.

[The two sons of Cnut, Harold and Harthacnut, died childless, after brief and disgraceful reigns, and the nation restored the old line of kings in the person of Eadward, called the Confessor, son of Ethelred the Unready and a Norman princess. He had spent most of his youth at the Norman court. Weak, pious, well-intentioned, he was better fitted for a Norman monastery than for the English throne. His court became a gathering-place for Norman courtiers and ecclesiastics, whose influence, however, was largely counteracted by Earl Godwine, who had risen to power in the days of Cnut, and who had the chief management of affairs under Eadward, with one brief interval, until his death, in 1053. He was succeeded by his son, Earl Harold, who had married the king's sister. On the death of Eadward, without issue, early in 1066, Harold was elected to the vacant throne. His right was at once disputed by William, Duke of the Normans, on the ground that Eadward had promised him the crown, and that Harold had sworn to maintain William's claim. Though William's title had no legal basis, he determined to enforce it with the sword, and the two rivals met on the field of Hastings.]

MEANWHILE King Harold marshaled his army on the hill, to defend their strong post against the attack of the Normans. All were on foot; those who had horses made use of them only to carry them to the field, and got down when the time came for actual fighting. The army was made up of soldiers of two very different kinds. There was the king's personal following, his housecarls, his own thanes, and the picked troops generally, among them the men of London, who claimed to be the king's special guards, and the men of Kent, who claimed to strike the first blow in the battle. They

had armor much the same as that of the Normans, with javelins to hurl first of all, and for the close fight either the sword, the older English weapon, or more commonly the great Danish ax, which had been brought in by Cnut. This was wielded with both hands, and was the most fearful of all weapons if the blow reached its mark, but it left its bearer specially exposed while dealing the blow The men were ranged as closely together as the space needed for wielding their arms would let them; and, besides the palisade, the front ranks made a kind of inner defense with their shields, called the shield-wall. The Norman writers were specially struck with the close array of the English, and they speak of them as standing like trees in a wood. Besides these choice troops there were also the general levies of the neighboring lands, who came armed anyhow, with such weapons as they could get, the bow being the rarest of all. These inferior troops were placed to the right, on the least exposed part of the hill, while the king, with his choice troops, stood ready to meet Duke William himself. The king stood between his two ensigns, the national badge, the dragon of Wessex, and his own standard, a great flag with the figure of a fighting man wrought on it in gold. Close by the king stood his brothers, Gyrth and Leofwine, and his other kinsfolk.

By nine in the morning the Nermans had reached the hill of Senlac, and the fight began. But before the real attack. was made a juggler, or minstrel, in the Norman army, known as Taillefer, that is, the Cleaver of Iron, asked the duke's leave to strike the first blow. So he rode out, singing songs of Charlemagne, as the French call the Emperor Charles the Great, and of Roland, his paladin. Then he threw his sword up in the air and caught it again; he cut down two Englishmen, and then was cut down himself. After this mere bravado came the real work. First came a flight of arrows from each division of the Norman army. Then the heavyarmed foot pressed on, to make their way up the hill and to

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break down the palisade. But the English hurled their javelins at them as they came up, and cut them down with their axes when they came near enough for hand-strokes. The Normans shouted, "God help us!" the English shouted, God Almighty!" and the king's own war-cry of "Holy Cross" the Holy Cross of Waltham. William's heavyarmed foot pressed on along the whole line, the native Normans having to face King Harold's chosen troops in the center. The attack was vain; they were beaten back, and they could not break down the palisade. Then the horsemen themselves, the duke at their head, pressed on up the hillside. But all was in vain; the English kept their strong ground; the Normans had to fall back; the Bretons on the left actually turned and fled. Then the worse-armed and less-disciplined English troops could not withstand the temptation to come down from the hill and chase them. The whole line of the Norman army began to waver, and in many parts to give way. A tale spread that the duke was killed. William showed himself to his troops, and, with his words, looks, and blows, helped by his brother, the bishop, he brought them back to the fight. The flying Bretons now took heart; they turned and cut in pieces the English who were chasing them. Thus far the resistance of the English had been thoroughly successful, wherever they had obeyed the king's orders, and kept within their defenses. But the fault of those who had gone down to follow the enemy had weakened the line of defense, and had shown the Normans the true way of winning the day.

Now came the fiercest struggle of the whole day. The duke and his immediate following tried to break their way into the English inclosure at the very point where the king stood by his standard with his brothers. The two rivals were near coming face to face. At that moment Earl Gyrth hurled his spear, which missed the duke, but killed his horse and brought his rider to the ground. William then pressed

to the barricade on foot, and slew Gyrth in hand-to-hand fight. At the same time the king's other brother, Earl Leofwine, was killed. The duke mounted another horse, and again pressed on; but the barricade and the shield-wall withstood all attempts. On the right the attack of the French division had been more lucky; the palisade was partly broken down, But the English, with their axes and shields, still kept their ground, and the Normans were still unable to gain the top of the hill or to come near the standard.

The battle had now gone on for several hours, and Duke William saw that, unless he quite changed his tactics, he had no hope of overcoming the resistance of the English. They had suffered a great loss in the death of the two earls, and their defenses were weakened at some points; but the army, as a whole, held its ground as firmly as ever. William then tried a most dangerous stratagem, his taking to which shows. how little hope he now had of gaining the day by any direct attack. He saw that his only way was to bring the English down from the hill, as part of them had already come down. He, therefore, bade his men feign flight. The Normans obeyed; the whole host seemed to be flying. The irregular levies of the English on the right again broke their line; they ran down the hill, and left the part where its ascent was most easy open to the invaders. The Normans now turned on their pursuers, put most of them to flight, and were able to ride up the part of the hill which was left undefended, seemingly about three o'clock in the afternoon. The English had thus lost the advantage of the ground; they had now, on foot, with only the bulwark of their shields, to withstand the horsemen. This, however, they still did for some hours longer. But the advantage was now on the Norman side, and the battle changed into a series of single combats. The great object of the Normans was to cut their way to the standard, where King Harold still fought. Many men were killed in the attempt; the resistance of the English grew slacker, but yet,

when evening was coming on, they still fought on with their king at their head, and a new device of the duke's was needed to bring the battle to an end.

This new device was to bid his archers shoot in the air, that their arrows might fall, as he said, like bolts from heaven. They were, of course, bidden specially to aim at those who fought around the standard. Meanwhile twenty knights. bound themselves to lower or bear off the standard itself. The archers shot; the knights pressed on; and one arrow had the deadliest effect of all; it pierced the right eye of King Harold. He sank down by the standard; most of the twenty knights were killed, but four reached the king while he still breathed, slew him with many wounds, and carried off the two ensigns. It was now evening; but though the king was dead, the fight still went on. Of the king's own chosen troops it would seem that not a man either fled or was taken prisoner. All died at their posts, save a few wounded men who were cast aside as dead, but found strength to get away on the morrow. But the irregular levies fled, some of them on the horses of the slain men. Yet even in this last moment they knew how to revenge themselves on their conquerors. The Normans, ignorant of the country, pursued in the dark. The English were thus able to draw them to the dangerous place behind the hill, where not a few Normans were slain. But the duke himself came back to the hill, pitched his tent there, held his midnight feast, and watched there with his host all night.