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+The Project Gutenberg EBook Harold, by Edward Bulwer-Lytton, Book 5.
+#104 in our series by Edward Bulwer-Lytton
+
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+
+Title: Harold, Book 5.
+       The Last Of The Saxon Kings
+
+Author: Edward Bulwer-Lytton
+
+Release Date: March 2005  [EBook #7676]
+[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule]
+[This file was first posted on April 8, 2003]
+
+Edition: 10
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ASCII
+
+
+
+
+
+*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HAROLD, BY LYTTON, BOOK 5 ***
+
+
+
+This eBook was produced by Tapio Riikonen
+and David Widger
+
+
+
+
+
+BOOK V.
+
+
+DEATH AND LOVE.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I.
+
+
+Harold, without waiting once more to see Edith, nor even taking leave
+of his father, repaired to Dunwich [124], the capital of his earldom.
+In his absence, the King wholly forgot Algar and his suit; and in the
+mean while the only lordships at his disposal, Stigand, the grasping
+bishop, got from him without an effort.  In much wrath, Earl Algar, on
+the fourth day, assembling all the loose men-at-arms he could find
+around the metropolis, and at the head of a numerous disorderly band,
+took his way into Wales, with his young daughter Aldyth, to whom the
+crown of a Welch king was perhaps some comfort for the loss of the
+fair Earl; though the rumour ran that she had long since lost her
+heart to her father's foe.
+
+Edith, after a long homily from the King, returned to Hilda; nor did
+her godmother renew the subject of the convent.  All she said on
+parting, was, "Even in youth the silver cord may be loosened, and the
+golden bowl may be broken; and rather perhaps in youth than in age,
+when the heart has grown hard, wilt thou recall with a sigh my
+counsels."
+
+Godwin had departed to Wales; all his sons were at their several
+lordships; Edward was left alone to his monks and relic-venders.  And
+so months passed.
+
+Now it was the custom with the old kings of England to hold state and
+wear their crowns thrice a year, at Christmas, at Easter, and at
+Whitsuntide; and in those times their nobles came round them, and
+there was much feasting and great pomp.
+
+So, in the Easter of the year of our Lord 1053, King Edward kept his
+court at Windshore [125], and Earl Godwin and his sons, and many
+others of high degree, left their homes to do honour to the King.  And
+Earl Godwin came first to his house in London--near the Tower
+Palatine, in what is now called the Fleet--and Harold the Earl, and
+Tostig, and Leofwine, and Gurth, were to meet him there, and go
+thence, with the full state of their sub-thegns, and cnehts, and
+house-carles, their falcons, and their hounds, as become men of such
+rank, to the court of King Edward.
+
+Earl Godwin sate with his wife, Githa, in a room out of the Hall,
+which looked on the Thames,--awaiting Harold, who was expected to
+arrive ere nightfall.  Gurth had ridden forth to meet his brother, and
+Leofwine and Tostig had gone over to Southwark, to try their band-dogs
+on the great bear, which had been brought from the north a few days
+before, and was said to have hugged many good hounds to death, and a
+large train of thegns and house-carles had gone with them to see the
+sport; so that the old Earl and his lady the Dane sate alone.  And
+there was a cloud upon Earl Godwin's large forehead, and he sate by
+the fire, spreading his hands before it, and looking thoughtfully on
+the flame, as it broke through the smoke which burst out into the
+cover, or hole in the roof.  And in that large house there were no
+less than three "covers," or rooms, wherein fires could be lit in the
+centre of the floor; and the rafters above were blackened with the
+smoke; and in those good old days, ere chimneys, if existing, were
+much in use, "poses, and rheumatisms, and catarrhs," were unknown, so
+wholesome and healthful was the smoke.  Earl Godwin's favourite hound,
+old, like himself, lay at his feet, dreaming, for it whined and was
+restless.  And the Earl's old hawk, with its feathers all stiff and
+sparse, perched on the dossal of the Earl's chair and the floor was
+pranked with rushes and sweet herbs--the first of the spring; and
+Githa's feet were on her stool, and she leaned her proud face on the
+small hand which proved her descent from the Dane, and rocked herself
+to and fro, and thought of her son Wolnoth in the court of the Norman.
+
+"Githa," at last said the Earl, "thou hast been to me a good wife and
+a true, and thou hast borne me tall and bold sons, some of whom have
+caused us sorrow, and some joy; and in sorrow and in joy we have but
+drawn closer to each other.  Yet when we wed thou wert in thy first
+youth, and the best part of my years was fled; and thou wert a Dane
+and I a Saxon; and thou a king's niece, and now a king's sister, and I
+but tracing two descents to thegn's rank."
+
+Moved and marvelling at this touch of sentiment in the calm earl, in
+whom indeed such sentiment was rare, Githa roused herself from her
+musings, and said, simply and anxiously:
+
+"I fear my lord is not well, that he speaks thus to Githa!"
+
+The Earl smiled faintly.
+
+"Thou art right with thy woman's wit, wife.  And for the last few
+weeks, though I said it not to alarm thee, I have had strange noises
+in my ears, and a surge, as of blood, to the temples."
+
+"O Godwin! dear spouse," said Githa, tenderly, "and I was blind to the
+cause, but wondered why there was some change in thy manner!  But I
+will go to Hilda to-morrow; she hath charms against all disease."
+
+"Leave Hilda in peace, to give her charms to the young; age defies
+Wigh and Wicca.  Now hearken to me.  I feel that my thread is nigh
+spent, and, as Hilda would say, my Fylgia forewarns me that we are
+about to part.  Silence, I say, and hear me.  I have done proud things
+in my day; I have made kings and built thrones, and I stand higher in
+England than ever thegn or earl stood before.  I would not, Githa,
+that the tree of my house, planted in the storm, and watered with
+lavish blood, should wither away."
+
+The old Earl paused, and Githa said, loftily:
+
+"Fear not that thy name will pass from the earth, or thy race from
+power.  For fame has been wrought by thy hands, and sons have been
+born to thy embrace; and the boughs of the tree thou hast planted
+shall live in the sunlight when we its roots, O my husband, are buried
+in the earth."
+
+"Githa," replied the Earl, "thou speakest as the daughter of kings and
+the mother of men; but listen to me, for my soul is heavy.  Of these
+our sons, or first-born, alas! is a wanderer and outcast--Sweyn, once
+the beautiful and brave; and Wolnoth, thy darling, is a guest in the
+court of the Norman, our foe.  Of the rest, Gurth is so mild and so
+calm, that I predict without fear that he will be warrior of fame, for
+the mildest in hall are ever the boldest in field.  But Gurth hath not
+the deep wit of these tangled times; and Leofwine is too light, and
+Tostig too fierce.  So wife mine, of these our six sons, Harold alone,
+dauntless as Tostig, mild as Gurth, hath his father's thoughtful
+brain.  And, if the King remains as aloof as now from his royal
+kinsman, Edward the Atheling, who"--the Earl hesitated and looked
+round--"who so near to the throne when I am no more, as Harold, the
+joy of the ceorls, and the pride of the thegns?--he whose tongue never
+falters in the Witan, and whose arm never yet hath known defeat in the
+field?"
+
+Githa's heart swelled, and her cheek grew flushed.
+
+"But what I fear the most," resumed the Earl, "is, not the enemy
+without, but the jealousy within.  By the side of Harold stands
+Tostig, rapacious to grasp, but impotent to hold--able to ruin,
+strengthless to save."
+
+"Nay, Godwin, my lord, thou wrongest our handsome son."
+
+"Wife, wife," said the Earl, stamping his foot, "hear me and obey me;
+for my words on earth may be few, and while thou gainsayest me the
+blood mounts to my brain, and my eyes see through a cloud."
+
+"Forgive me, sweet lord," said Githa, humbly.
+
+"Mickle and sore it repents me that in their youth I spared not the
+time from my worldly ambition to watch over the hearts of my sons; and
+thou wert too proud of the surface without, to look well to the
+workings within, and what was once soft to the touch is now hard to
+the hammer.  In the battle of life the arrows we neglect to pick up,
+Fate, our foe, will store in her quiver; we have armed her ourselves
+with the shafts--the more need to beware with the shield.  Wherefore,
+if thou survivest me, and if, as I forebode, dissension break out
+between Harold and Tostig, I charge thee by memory of our love, and
+reverence for my grave, to deem wise and just all that Harold deems
+just and wise.  For when Godwin is in the dust, his House lives alone
+in Harold.  Heed me now, and heed ever.  And so, while the day yet
+lasts, I will go forth into the marts and the guilds, and talk with
+the burgesses, and smile on their wives, and be, to the last, Godwin
+the smooth and the strong."
+
+So saying; the old Earl arose, and walked forth with a firm step; and
+his old hound sprang up, pricked its ears, and followed him; the
+blinded falcon turned its head towards the clapping door, but did not
+stir from the dossel.
+
+Then Githa again leant her cheek on her hand, and again rocked herself
+to and fro, gazing into the red flame of the fire,--red and fitful
+through the blue smoke,--and thought over her lord's words.  It might
+be the third part of an hour after Godwin had left the house, when the
+door opened, and Githa, expecting the return of her sons, looked up
+eagerly, but it was Hilda, who stooped her head under the vault of the
+door; and behind Hilda came two of her maidens, bearing a small cyst,
+or chest. The Vala motioned to her attendants to lay the cyst at the
+feet of Githa, and that done, with lowly salutation they left the
+room.
+
+The superstitions of the Danes were strong in Githa; and she felt an
+indescribable awe when Hilda stood before her, the red light playing
+on the Vala's stern marble face, and contrasting robes of funereal
+black.  But, with all her awe, Githa, who, not educated like her
+daughter Edith, had few feminine resources, loved the visits of her
+mysterious kinswoman.  She loved to live her youth over again in
+discourse on the wild customs and dark rites of the Dane; and even her
+awe itself had the charm which the ghost tale has to the child;--for
+the illiterate are ever children.  So, recovering her surprise, and
+her first pause, she rose to welcome the Vala, and said:
+
+"Hail, Hilda, and thrice hail!  The day has been warm and the way
+long; and, ere thou takest food and wine, let me prepare for thee the
+bath for thy form, or the bath for thy feet.  For as sleep to the
+young, is the bath to the old."
+
+Hilda shook her head.
+
+"Bringer of sleep am I, and the baths I prepare are in the halls of
+Valhalla.  Offer not to the Vala the bath for mortal weariness, and
+the wine and the food meet for human guests.  Sit thee down, daughter
+of the Dane, and thank thy new gods for the past that hath been thine.
+Not ours is the present, and the future escapes from our dreams; but
+the past is ours ever, and all eternity cannot revoke a single joy
+that the moment hath known."
+
+Then seating herself in Godwin's large chair, she leant over her seid-
+staff, and was silent, as if absorbed in her thoughts.
+
+"Githa," she said at last, "where is thy lord?  I came to touch his
+hands and to look on his brow."
+
+"He hath gone forth into the mart, and my sons are from home; and
+Harold comes hither, ere night, from his earldom."
+
+A faint smile, as of triumph, broke over the lips of the Vala, and
+then as suddenly yielded to an expression of great sadness.
+
+"Githa," she said, slowly, "doubtless thou rememberest in thy young
+days to have seen or heard of the terrible hell-maid Belsta?"
+
+"Ay, ay," answered Githa shuddering; "I saw her once in gloomy
+weather, driving before her herds of dark grey cattle.  Ay, ay; and my
+father beheld her ere his death, riding the air on a wolf, with a
+snake for a bridle.  Why askest thou?"
+
+"Is it not strange," said Hilda, evading the question, that Belsta,
+and Heidr, and Hulla of old, the wolf-riders, the men-devourers, could
+win to the uttermost secrets of galdra, though applied only to
+purposes the direst and fellest to man, and that I, though ever in the
+future,--I, though tasking the Nornas not to afflict a foe, but to
+shape the careers of those I love,--I find, indeed, my predictions
+fulfilled; but how often, alas! only in horror and doom!"
+
+"How so, kinswoman, how so?" said Githa, awed yet charmed in the awe,
+and drawing her chair nearer to the mournful sorceress.  "Didst thou
+not fortell our return in triumph from the unjust outlawry, and, lo,
+it hath come to pass? and hast thou not" (here Githa's proud face
+flushed) "foretold also that my stately Harold shall wear the diadem
+of a king?"
+
+"Truly, the first came to pass," said Hilda; "but----" she paused, and
+her eye fell on the cyst; then breaking off she continued, speaking to
+herself rather than to Githa--"And Harold's dream, what did that
+portend? the runes fail me, and the dead give no voice.  And beyond
+one dim day, in which his betrothed shall clasp him with the arms of a
+bride, all is dark to my vision--dark--dark.  Speak not to me, Githa;
+for a burthen, heavy as the stone on a grave, rests on a weary heart!"
+
+A dead silence succeeded, till, pointing with her staff to the fire,
+the Vala said, "Lo, where the smoke and the flame contend--the smoke
+rises in dark gyres to the air, and escapes, to join the wrack of
+clouds.  From the first to the last we trace its birth and its fall;
+from the heart of the fire to the descent in the rain, so is it with
+human reason, which is not the light but the smoke; it struggles but
+to darken us; it soars but to melt in the vapour and dew.  Yet, lo,
+the flame burns in our hearth till the fuel fails, and goes at last,
+none know whither.  But it lives in the air though we see it not; it
+lurks in the stone and waits the flash of the steel; it coils round
+the dry leaves and sere stalks, and a touch re-illumines it; it plays
+in the marsh--it collects in the heavens--it appals us in the
+lightning--it gives warmth to the air--life of our life, and the
+element of all elements.  O Githa, the flame is the light of the soul,
+the element everlasting; and it liveth still, when it escapes from our
+view; it burneth in the shapes to which it passes; it vanishes, but
+its never extinct."
+
+So saying, the Vala's lips again closed; and again both the women sate
+silent by the great fire, as it flared and flickered over the deep
+lines and high features of Githa, the Earl's wife, and the calm,
+unwrinkled, solemn face of the melancholy Vala.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II.
+
+
+While these conferences took place in the house of Godwin, Harold, on
+his way to London, dismissed his train to precede him to his father's
+roof, and, striking across the country, rode fast and alone towards
+the old Roman abode of Hilda.  Months had elapsed since he had seen or
+heard of Edith.  News at that time, I need not say, was rare and
+scarce, and limited to public events, either transmitted by special
+nuncius or passing pilgrim, or borne from lip to lip by the talk of
+the scattered multitude.  But even in his busy and anxious duties,
+Harold had in vain sought to banish from his heart the image of that
+young girl, whose life he needed no Vala to predict to him was
+interwoven with the fibres of his own.  The obstacles which, while he
+yielded to, he held unjust and tyrannical, obstacles allowed by his
+reluctant reason and his secret ambition--not sanctified by
+conscience--only inflamed the deep strength of the solitary passion
+his life had known; a passion that, dating from the very childhood of
+Edith, had, often unknown to himself, animated his desire of fame, and
+mingled with his visions of power.  Nor, though hope was far and dim,
+was it extinct.  The legitimate heir of Edward the Confessor was a
+prince living in the Court of the Emperor, of fair repute, and himself
+wedded; and Edward's health, always precarious, seemed to forbid any
+very prolonged existence to the reigning king.  Therefore, he thought
+that through the successor, whose throne would rest in safety upon
+Harold's support, he might easily obtain that dispensation from the
+Pope which he knew the present king would never ask--a dispensation
+rarely indeed, if ever, accorded to any subject, and which, therefore,
+needed all a king's power to back it.
+
+So in that hope, and fearful lest it should be quenched for ever by
+Edith's adoption of the veil and the irrevocable vow, with a beating,
+disturbed, but joyful heart he rode over field and through forest to
+the old Roman house.
+
+He emerged at length to the rear of the villa, and the sun, fast
+hastening to its decline, shone full upon the rude columns of the
+Druid temple.  And there, as he had seen her before, when he had first
+spoken of love and its barriers, he beheld the young maiden.
+
+He sprang from his horse, and leaving the well-trained animal loose to
+browse on the waste land, he ascended the knoll.  He stole noiselessly
+behind Edith, and his foot stumbled against the grave-stone of the
+dead Titan-Saxon of old.  But the apparition, whether real or fancied,
+and the dream that had followed, had long passed from his memory, and
+no superstition was in the heart springing to the lips, that cried
+"Edith" once again.
+
+The girl started, looked round, and fell upon his breast. It was some
+moments before she recovered consciousness, and then, withdrawing
+herself gently from his arms, she leant for support against the Teuton
+altar.
+
+She was much changed since Harold had seen her last: her cheek had
+grown pale and thin, and her rounded form seemed wasted; and sharp
+grief, as he gazed, shot through the soul of Harold.
+
+"Thou hast pined, thou hast suffered," said he, mournfully: "and I,
+who would shed my life's blood to take one from thy sorrows, or add to
+one of thy joys, have been afar, unable to comfort, perhaps only a
+cause of thy woe."
+
+"No, Harold," said Edith, faintly, "never of woe; always of comfort,
+even in absence.  I have been ill, and Hilda hath tried rune and charm
+all in vain.  But I am better, now that Spring hath come tardily
+forth, and I look on the fresh flowers, and hear the song of the
+birds."
+
+But tears were in the sound of her voice, while she spoke.
+
+"And they have not tormented thee again with the thoughts of the
+convent?"
+
+"They? no;--but my soul, yes.  O Harold, release me from my promise;
+for the time already hath come that thy sister foretold to me; the
+silver cord is loosened, and the golden bowl is broken, and I would
+fain take the wings of the dove, and be at peace."
+
+"Is it so?--Is there peace in the home where the thought of Harold
+becomes a sin?"
+
+"Not sin then and there, Harold, not sin.  Thy sister hailed the
+convent when she thought of prayer for those she loved."
+
+"Prate not to me of my sister!" said Harold, through his set teeth.
+"It is but a mockery to talk of prayer for the heart that thou thyself
+rendest in twain.  Where is Hilda?  I would see her."
+
+"She hath gone to thy father's house with a gift; and it was to watch
+for her return that I sate on the green knoll."
+
+The Earl then drew near and took her hand, and sate by her side, and
+they conversed long.  But Harold saw with a fierce pang that Edith's
+heart was set upon the convent, and that even in his presence, and
+despite his soothing words, she was broken-spirited and despondent.
+It seemed as if her youth and life had gone from her, and the day had
+come in which she said, "There is no pleasure."
+
+Never had he seen her thus; and, deeply moved as well as keenly stung,
+he rose at length to depart; her hand lay passive in his parting
+clasp, and a slight shiver went over her frame.
+
+"Farewell, Edith; when I return from Windshore, I shall be at my old
+home yonder, and we shall meet again."
+
+Edith's lips murmured inaudibly, and she bent her eyes to the ground.
+
+Slowly Harold regained his steed, and as he rode on, he looked behind
+and waved oft his hand.  But Edith sate motionless, her eyes still on
+the ground, and he saw not the tears that fell from them fast and
+burning; nor heard he the low voice that groaned amidst the heathen
+ruins, "Mary, sweet mother, shelter me from my own heart!"
+
+The sun had set before Harold gained the long and spacious abode of
+his father.  All around it lay the roofs and huts of the great Earl's
+special tradesmen, for even his goldsmith was but his freed ceorl.
+The house itself stretched far from the Thames inland, with several
+low courts built only of timber, rugged and shapeless, but filled with
+bold men, then the great furniture of a noble's halls.
+
+Amidst the shouts of hundreds, eager to hold his stirrup, the Earl
+dismounted, passed the swarming hall, and entered the room, in which
+he found Hilda and Githa, and Godwin, who had preceded his entry but a
+few minutes.
+
+In the beautiful reverence of son to father, which made one of the
+loveliest features of the Saxon character [126] (as the frequent want
+of it makes the most hateful of the Norman vices), the all-powerful
+Harold bowed his knee to the old Earl, who placed his hand on his head
+in benediction, and then kissed him on the cheek and brow.
+
+"Thy kiss, too, dear mother," said the younger Earl; and Githa's
+embrace, if more cordial than her lord's, was not, perhaps, more fond.
+
+"Greet Hilda, my son," said Godwin, "she hath brought me a gift, and
+she hath tarried to place it under thy special care.  Thou alone must
+heed the treasure, and open the casket.  But when and where, my
+kinswoman?"
+
+"On the sixth day after thy coming to the King's hall," answered
+Hilda, not returning the smile with which Godwin spoke,--"on the sixth
+day, Harold, open the chest, and take out the robe which hath been
+spun in the house of Hilda for Godwin the Earl.  And now, Godwin, I
+have clasped thine hand, and I have looked on thy brow, and my mission
+is done, and I must wend homeward."
+
+"That shalt thou not, Hilda," said the hospitable Earl; "the meanest
+wayfarer hath a right to bed and board in this house for a night and a
+day, and thou wilt not disgrace us by leaving our threshold, the bread
+unbroken, and the couch unpressed.  Old friend, we were young
+together, and thy face is welcome to me as the memory of former days."
+
+Hilda shook her head, and one of those rare, and for that reason most
+touching, expressions of tenderness of which the calm and rigid
+character of her features, when in repose, seemed scarcely
+susceptible, softened her eye, and relaxed the firm lines of her lips.
+
+"Son of Wolnoth," said she, gently, "not under thy roof-tree should
+lodge the raven of bode.  Bread have I not broken since yestere'en,
+and sleep will be far from my eyes to-night.  Fear not, for my people
+without are stout and armed, and for the rest there lives not the man
+whose arm can have power over Hilda."
+
+She took Harold's hand as she spoke, and leading him forth, whispered
+in his ear, "I would have a word with thee ere we part."  Then,
+reaching the threshold, she waved her hand thrice over the floor, and
+muttered in the Danish tongue a rude verse, which, translated, ran
+somewhat thus:
+
+    "All free from the knot
+       Glide the thread of the skein,
+     And rest to the labour,
+       And peace to the pain!"
+
+"It is a death-dirge," said Githa, with whitening lips, but she spoke
+inly, and neither husband nor son heard her words.
+
+Hilda and Harold passed in silence through the hall, and the Vala's
+attendants, with spears and torches, rose from the settles, and went
+before to the outer court, where snorted impatiently her black
+palfrey.
+
+Halting in the midst of the court, she said to Harold, in a low voice:
+
+"At sunset we part--at sunset we shall meet again.  And behold, the
+star rises on the sunset; and the star, broader and brighter, shall
+rise on the sunset then!  When thy hand draws the robe from the chest,
+think on Hilda, and know that at that hour she stands by the grave of
+the Saxon warrior, and that from the grave dawns the future.  Farewell
+to thee!"
+
+Harold longed to speak to her of Edith, but a strange awe at his heart
+chained his lips; so he stood silent by the great wooden gates of the
+rude house.  The torches flamed round him, and Hilda's face seemed
+lurid in the glare.  There he stood musing long after torch and ceorl
+had passed away, nor did he wake from his reverie till Gurth,
+springing from his panting horse, passed his arm round the Earl's
+shoulder, and cried:
+
+"How did I miss thee, my brother? and why didst thou forsake thy
+train?"
+
+"I will tell thee anon.  Gurth, has my father ailed?  There is that in
+his face which I like not."
+
+"He hath not complained of misease," said Gurth, startled; "but now
+thou speakest of it, his mood hath altered of late, and he hath
+wandered much alone, or only with the old hound and the old falcon."
+
+Then Harold turned back, and, his heart was full; and, when he reached
+the house, his father was sitting in the hall on his chair of state;
+and Githa sate on his right hand, and a little below her sate Tostig
+and Leofwine, who had come in from the bear-hunt by the river-gate,
+and were talking loud and merrily; and thegns and cnehts sate all
+around, and there was wassail as Harold entered.  But the Earl looked
+only to his father, and he saw that his eyes were absent from the
+glee, and that he was bending his head over the old falcon, which sate
+on his wrist.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III.
+
+
+No subject of England, since the race of Cerdic sate on the throne,
+ever entered the courtyard of Windshore with such train and such state
+as Earl Godwin.--Proud of that first occasion, since his return, to do
+homage to him with whose cause that of England against the stranger
+was bound, all truly English at heart amongst the thegns of the land
+swelled his retinue.  Whether Saxon or Dane, those who alike loved the
+laws and the soil, came from north and from south to the peaceful
+banner of the old Earl.  But most of these were of the past
+generation, for the rising race were still dazzled by the pomp of the
+Norman; and the fashion of English manners, and the pride in English
+deeds, had gone out of date with long locks and bearded chins.  Nor
+there were the bishops and abbots and the lords of the Church,--for
+dear to them already the fame of the Norman piety, and they shared the
+distaste of their holy King to the strong sense and homely religion of
+Godwin, who founded no convents, and rode to war with no relics round
+his neck.  But they with Godwin were the stout and the frank and the
+free, in whom rested the pith and marrow of English manhood; and they
+who were against him were the blind and willing and fated fathers of
+slaves unborn.
+
+Not then the stately castle we now behold, which is of the masonry of
+a prouder race, nor on the same site, but two miles distant on the
+winding of the river shore (whence it took its name), a rude building
+partly of timber and partly of Roman brick, adjoining a large
+monastery and surrounded by a small hamlet, constituted the palace of
+the saint-king.
+
+So rode the Earl and his four fair sons, all abreast, into the
+courtyard of Windshore [127].  Now when King Edward heard the tramp of
+the steeds and the hum of the multitudes, as he sate in his closet
+with his abbots and priests, all in still contemplation of the thumb
+of St. Jude, the King asked:
+
+"What army, in the day of peace, and the time of Easter, enters the
+gates of our palace?"
+
+Then an abbot rose and looked out of the narrow window, and said with
+a groan:
+
+"Army thou mayst well call it, O King!--and foes to us and to thee
+head the legions----"
+
+"Inprinis," quoth our abbot the scholar; "thou speakest, I trow, of
+the wicked Earl and his sons."
+
+The King's face changed.  "Come they," said he, "with so large a
+train?  This smells more of vaunt than of loyalty; naught--very
+naught."
+
+"Alack!" said one of the conclave, "I fear me that the men of Belial
+will work us harm; the heathen are mighty, and----"
+
+"Fear not," said Edward, with benign loftiness, observing that his
+guests grew pale, and himself, though often weak to childishness, and
+morally wavering and irresolute,--still so far king and gentleman,
+that he knew no craven fear of the body.  "Fear not for me, my
+fathers; humble as I am, I am strong in the faith of heaven and its
+angels."
+
+The Churchmen looked at each other, sly yet abashed; it was not
+precisely for the King that they feared.
+
+Then spoke Alred, the good prelate and constant peacemaker--fair
+column and lone one of the fast-crumbling Saxon Church.  "It is ill in
+you, brethren to arraign the truth and good meaning of those who
+honour your King; and in these days that lord should ever be the most
+welcome who brings to the halls of his king the largest number of
+hearts, stout and leal."
+
+"By your leave, brother Alred," said Stigand, who, though from motives
+of policy he had aided those who besought the King not to peril his
+crown by resisting the return of Godwin, benefited too largely by the
+abuses of the Church to be sincerely espoused to the cause of the
+strong-minded Earl; "By your leave, brother Alred, to every leal heart
+is a ravenous mouth; and the treasures of the King are well-nigh
+drained in feeding these hungry and welcomeless visitors.  Durst I
+counsel my lord I would pray him, as a matter of policy, to baffle
+this astute and proud Earl.  He would fain have the King feast in
+public, that he might daunt him and the Church with the array of his
+friends."
+
+"I conceive thee, my father," said Edward, with more quickness than
+habitual, and with the cunning, sharp though guileless, that belongs
+to minds undeveloped, "I conceive thee; it is good and most politic.
+This our orgulous Earl shall not have his triumph, and, so fresh from
+his exile, brave his King with the mundane parade of his power.  Our
+health is our excuse for our absence from the banquet, and, sooth to
+say, we marvel much why Easter should be held a fitting time for
+feasting and mirth.  Wherefore, Hugoline, my chamberlain, advise the
+Earl that to-day we keep fast till the sunset, when temperately, with
+eggs, bread, and fish, we will sustain Adam's nature.  Pray him and
+his sons to attend us--they alone be our guests."  And with a sound
+that seemed a laugh, or the ghost of a laugh, low and chuckling--for
+Edward had at moments an innocent humour which his monkish biographer
+disdained not to note [128],--he flung himself back in his chair.  The
+priests took the cue, and shook their sides heartily, as Hugoline left
+the room, not ill pleased, by the way, to escape an invitation to the
+eggs, bread, and fish.
+
+Alred sighed; and said, "For the Earl and his sons, this is honour;
+but the other earls, and the thegns, will miss at the banquet him whom
+they design but to honour, and----"
+
+"I have said," interrupted Edward, drily, and with a look of fatigue.
+
+"And," observed another Churchman, with malice, "at least the young
+Earls will be humbled, for they will not sit with the King and their
+father, as they would in the Hall, and must serve my lord with napkin
+and wine."
+
+"Inprinis," quoth our scholar the abbot, "that will be rare!  I would
+I were by to see.  But this Godwin is a man of treachery and wile, and
+my lord should beware of the fate of murdered Alfred, his brother!"
+
+The King started, and pressed his hands to his eyes.
+
+"How darest thou, Abbot Fatchere," cried Alred, indignantly; "How
+darest thou revive grief without remedy, and slander without proof?"
+
+"Without proof?" echoed Edward, in a hollow voice.  "He who could
+murder, could well stoop to forswear!  Without proof before man; but
+did he try the ordeals of God?--did his feet pass the ploughshare?--
+did his hand grasp the seething iron?  Verily, verily, thou didst
+wrong to name to me Alfred my brother!  I shall see his sightless and
+gore-dropping sockets in the face of Godwin, this day, at my board."
+
+The King rose in great disorder; and, after pacing the room some
+moments, disregardful of the silent and scared looks of his Churchmen,
+waved his hand, in sign to them to depart.  All took the hint at once
+save Alred; but he, lingering the last, approached the King with
+dignity in his step and compassion in his eyes.
+
+"Banish from thy breast, O King and son, thoughts unmeet, and of
+doubtful charity!  All that man could know of Godwin's innocence or
+guilt--the suspicion of the vulgar--the acquittal of his peers--was
+known to thee before thou didst seek his aid for thy throne, and didst
+take his child for thy wife.  Too late is it now to suspect; leave thy
+doubts to the solemn day, which draws nigh to the old man, thy wife's
+father!"
+
+"Ha!" said the king, seeming not to heed, or wilfully to misunderstand
+the prelate, "Ha! leave him to God;--I will!"
+
+He turned away impatiently; and the prelate reluctantly departed.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV.
+
+
+Tostig chafed mightily at the King's message; and, on Harold's attempt
+to pacify him, grew so violent that nothing short of the cold stern
+command of his father, who carried with him that weight of authority
+never known but to those in whom wrath is still and passion noiseless,
+imposed sullen peace on his son's rugged nature.  But the taunts
+heaped by Tostig upon Harold disquieted the old Earl, and his brow was
+yet sad with prophetic care when he entered the royal apartments.  He
+had been introduced into the King's presence but a moment before
+Hugoline led the way to the chamber of repast, and the greeting
+between King and Earl had been brief and formal.
+
+Under the canopy of state were placed but two chairs, for the King and
+the Queen's father; and the four sons, Harold, Tostig, Leofwine, and
+Gurth, stood behind.  Such was the primitive custom of ancient
+Teutonic kings; and the feudal Norman monarchs only enforced, though
+with more pomp and more rigour, the ceremonial of the forest
+patriarchs--youth to wait on age, and the ministers of the realm on
+those whom their policy had made chiefs in council and war.
+
+The Earl's mind, already embittered by the scene with his sons, was
+chafed yet more by the King's unloving coldness; for it is natural to
+man, however worldly, to feel affection for those he has served, and
+Godwin had won Edward his crown; nor, despite his warlike though
+bloodless return, could even monk or Norman, in counting up the old
+Earl's crimes, say that he had ever failed in personal respect to the
+King he had made; nor over-great for subject, as the Earl's power must
+be confessed, will historian now be found to say that it had not been
+well for Saxon England if Godwin had found more favour with his King,
+and monk and Norman less. [129]
+
+So the old Earl's stout heart was stung, and he looked from those
+deep, impenetrable eyes, mournfully upon Edward's chilling brow.
+
+And Harold, with whom all household ties were strong, but to whom his
+great father was especially dear, watched his face and saw that it was
+very flushed.  But the practised courtier sought to rally his spirits,
+and to smile and jest.
+
+From smile and jest, the King turned and asked for wine.  Harold,
+starting, advanced with the goblet; as he did so, he stumbled with one
+foot, but lightly recovered himself with the other; and Tostig laughed
+scornfully at Harold's awkwardness.
+
+The old Earl observed both stumble and laugh, and willing to suggest a
+lesson to both his sons, said--laughing pleasantly--"Lo, Harold, how
+the left foot saves the right!--so one brother, thou seest, helps the
+other!" [130]
+
+King Edward looked up suddenly.
+
+"And so, Godwin, also, had my brother Alfred helped me, hadst thou
+permitted."
+
+The old Earl, galled to the quick, gazed a moment on the King, and his
+cheek was purple, and his eyes seemed bloodshot.
+
+"O Edward!" he exclaimed, "thou speakest to me hardly and unkindly of
+thy brother Alfred, and often hast thou thus more than hinted that I
+caused his death."
+
+The King made no answer.
+
+"May this crumb of bread choke me," said the Earl, in great emotion,
+"if I am guilty of thy brother's blood!" [131]  But scarcely had the
+bread touched his lips, when his eyes fixed, the long warning symptoms
+were fulfilled.  And he fell to the ground, under the table, sudden
+and heavy, smitten by the stroke of apoplexy.
+
+Harold and Gurth sprang forward; they drew their father from the
+ground.  His face, still deep-red with streaks of purple, rested on
+Harold's breast; and the son, kneeling, called in anguish on his
+father: the ear was deaf.
+
+Then said the King, rising:
+
+"It is the hand of God: remove him!" and he swept from the room,
+exulting.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V.
+
+
+For five days and five nights did Godwin lie speechless [132].  And
+Harold watched over him night and day.  And the leaches [133] would
+not bleed him, because the season was against it, in the increase of
+the moon and the tides; but they bathed his temples with wheat flour
+boiled in milk, according to a prescription which an angel in a dream
+[134] had advised to another patient; and they placed a plate of lead
+on his breast, marked with five crosses, saying a paternoster over
+each cross; together with other medical specifics in great esteem
+[135].  But, nevertheless, five days and five nights did Godwin lie
+speechless; and the leaches then feared that human skill was in vain.
+
+The effect produced on the court, not more by the Earl's death-stroke
+than the circumstances preceding it, was such as defies description.
+With Godwin's old comrades in arms it was simple and honest grief; but
+with all those under the influence of the priests, the event was
+regarded as a direct punishment from Heaven.  The previous words of
+the King, repeated by Edward to his monks, circulated from lip to lip,
+with sundry exaggerations as it travelled: and the superstition of the
+day had the more excuse, inasmuch as the speech of Godwin touched near
+upon the defiance of one of the most popular ordeals of the accused,--
+viz. that called the "corsned," in which a piece of bread was given to
+the supposed criminal; if he swallowed it with ease he was innocent;
+if it stuck in his throat, or choked him, nay, if he shook and turned
+pale, he was guilty.  Godwin's words had appeared to invite the
+ordeal, God had heard and stricken down the presumptuous perjurer!
+
+Unconscious, happily, of these attempts to blacken the name of his
+dying father, Harold, towards the grey dawn succeeding the fifth
+night, thought that he heard Godwin stir in his bed.  So he put aside
+the curtain, and bent over him.  The old Earl's eyes were wide open,
+and the red colour had gone from his cheeks, so that he was pale as
+death.
+
+"How fares it, dear father?" asked Harold.
+
+Godwin smiled fondly, and tried to speak, but his voice died in a
+convulsive rattle.  Lifting himself up, however, with an effort, he
+pressed tenderly the hand that clasped his own, leant his head on
+Harold's breast, and so gave up the ghost.
+
+When Harold was at last aware that the struggle was over, he laid the
+grey head gently on the pillow; he closed the eyes, and kissed the
+lips, and knelt down and prayed.  Then, seating himself at a little
+distance, he covered his face with his mantle.
+
+At this time his brother Gurth, who had chiefly shared watch with
+Harold,--for Tostig, foreseeing his father's death, was busy
+soliciting thegn and earl to support his own claims to the earldom
+about to be vacant; and Leofwine had gone to London on the previous
+day to summon Githa who was hourly expected--Gurth, I say, entered the
+room on tiptoe, and seeing his brother's attitude, guessed that all
+was over.  He passed on to the table, took up the lamp, and looked
+long on his father's face.  That strange smile of the dead, common
+alike to innocent and guilty, had already settled on the serene lips;
+and that no less strange transformation from age to youth, when the
+wrinkles vanish, and the features come out clear and sharp from the
+hollows of care and years, had already begun.  And the old man seemed
+sleeping in his prime.
+
+So Gurth kissed the dead, as Harold had done before him, and came up
+and sate himself by his brother's feet, and rested his head on
+Harold's knee; nor would he speak till, appalled by the long silence
+of the Earl, he drew away the mantle from his brother's face with a
+gentle hand, and the large tears were rolling down Harold's cheeks.
+
+"Be soothed, my brother," said Gurth; "our father has lived for glory,
+his age was prosperous, and his years more than those which the
+Psalmist allots to man.  Come and look on his face, Harold, its calm
+will comfort thee."
+
+Harold obeyed the hand that led him like a child; in passing towards
+the bed, his eye fell upon the cyst which Hilda had given to the old
+Earl, and a chill shot through his veins.
+
+"Gurth," said he, "is not this the morning of the sixth day in which
+we have been at the King's Court?"
+
+"It is the morning of the sixth day."
+
+Then Harold took forth the key which Hilda had given him, and unlocked
+the cyst, and there lay the white winding-sheet of the dead, and a
+scroll.  Harold took the scroll, and bent over it, reading by the
+mingled light of the lamp and the dawn:
+
+"All hail, Harold, heir of Godwin the great, and Githa the king-born!
+Thou hast obeyed Hilda, and thou knowest now that Hilda's eyes read
+the future, and her lips speak the dark words of truth.  Bow thy heart
+to the Vala, and mistrust the wisdom that sees only the things of the
+daylight.  As the valour of the warrior and the song of the scald, so
+is the lore of the prophetess.  It is not of the body, it is soul
+within soul; it marshals events and men, like the valour--it moulds
+the air into substance, like the song.  Bow thy heart to the Vala.
+Flowers bloom over the grave of the dead.  And the young plant soars
+high, when the king of the woodland lies low!"
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI.
+
+
+The sun rose, and the stairs and passages without were filled with the
+crowds that pressed to hear news of the Earl's health.  The doors
+stood open, and Gurth led in the multitude to look their last on the
+hero of council and camp, who had restored with strong hand and wise
+brain the race of Cerdic to the Saxon throne.  Harold stood by the
+bed-head silent, and tears were shed and sobs were heard.  And many a
+thegn who had before half believed in the guilt of Godwin as the
+murderer of Alfred, whispered in gasps to his neighbour:
+
+"There is no weregeld for manslaying on the head of him who smiles so
+in death on his old comrades in life!"
+
+Last of all lingered Leofric, the great Earl of Mercia; and when the
+rest had departed, he took the pale hand, that lay heavy on the
+coverlid, in his own, and said:
+
+"Old foe, often stood we in Witan and field against each other; but
+few are the friends for whom Leofric would mourn as he mourns for
+thee.  Peace to thy soul!  Whatever its sins, England should judge
+thee mildly, for England beat in each pulse of thy heart, and with thy
+greatness was her own!"
+
+Then Harold stole round the bed, and put his arms round Leofric's
+neck, and embraced him.  The good old Earl was touched, and he laid
+his tremulous hands on Harold's brown locks and blessed him.
+
+"Harold," he said, "thou succeedest to thy father's power: let thy
+father's foes be thy friends.  Wake from thy grief, for thy country
+now demands thee,--the honour of thy House, and the memory of the
+dead.  Many even now plot against thee and thine.  Seek the King,
+demand as thy right thy father's earldom, and Leofric will back thy
+claim in the Witan."
+
+Harold pressed Leofric's hand, and raising it to his lips replied:
+"Be our Houses at peace henceforth and for ever."
+
+Tostig's vanity indeed misled him, when he dreamed that any
+combination of Godwin's party could meditate supporting his claims
+against the popular Harold--nor less did the monks deceive themselves,
+when they supposed that, with Godwin's death, the power of his family
+would fall.
+
+There was more than even the unanimity of the chiefs of the Witan, in
+favour of Harold; there was that universal noiseless impression
+throughout all England, Danish and Saxon, that Harold was now the sole
+man on whom rested the state--which, whenever it so favours one
+individual, is irresistible.  Nor was Edward himself hostile to
+Harold, whom alone of that House, as we have before said, he esteemed
+and loved.
+
+Harold was at once named Earl of Wessex; and relinquishing the earldom
+he held before, he did not hesitate as to the successor to be
+recommended in his place.  Conquering all jealousy and dislike for
+Algar, he united the strength of his party in favour of the son of
+Leofric, and the election fell upon him.  With all his hot errors, the
+claims of no other Earl, whether from his own capacities or his
+father's services, were so strong; and his election probably saved the
+state from a great danger, in the results of that angry mood and that
+irritated ambition with which he had thrown himself into the arms of
+England's most valiant aggressor, Gryffyth, King of North Wales.
+
+To outward appearance, by this election, the House of Leofric--uniting
+in father and son the two mighty districts of Mercia and the East
+Anglians--became more powerful than that of Godwin; for, in that last
+House, Harold was now the only possessor of one of the great earldoms,
+and Tostig and the other brothers had no other provision beyond the
+comparatively insignificant lordships they held before.  But if Harold
+had ruled no earldom at all, he had still been immeasurably the first
+man in England--so great was the confidence reposed in his valour and
+wisdom.  He was of that height in himself, that he needed no pedestal
+to stand on.
+
+The successor of the first great founder of a House succeeds to more
+than his predecessor's power, if he but know how to wield and maintain
+it.  For who makes his way to greatness without raising foes at every
+step? and who ever rose to power supreme, without grave cause for
+blame?  But Harold stood free from the enmities his father had
+provoked, and pure from the stains that slander or repute cast upon
+his father's name.  The sun of the yesterday had shone through cloud;
+the sun of the day rose in a clear firmament.  Even Tostig recognised
+the superiority of his brother; and after a strong struggle between
+baffled rage and covetous ambition, yielded to him, as to a father.
+He felt that all Godwin's House was centred in Harold alone; and that
+only from his brother (despite his own daring valour and despite his
+alliance with the blood of Charlemagne and Alfred, through the sister
+of Matilda, the Norman duchess,) could his avarice of power be
+gratified.
+
+"Depart to thy home, my brother," said Earl Harold to Tostig, "and
+grieve not that Algar is preferred to thee.  For, even had his claim
+been less urgent, ill would it have beseemed us to arrogate the
+lordships of all England as our dues.  Rule thy lordship with wisdom:
+gain the love of thy lithsmen.  High claims hast thou in our father's
+name, and moderation now will but strengthen thee in the season to
+come.  Trust on Harold somewhat, on thyself more.  Thou hast but to
+add temper and judgment to valour and zeal, to be worthy mate of the
+first earl in England.  Over my father's corpse I embraced my father's
+foe.  Between brother and brother shall there not be love, as the best
+bequest of the dead?"
+
+"It shall not be my fault, if there be not," answered Tostig, humbled
+though chafed.  And he summoned his men and returned to his domains.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII.
+
+
+Fair, broad, and calm set the sun over the western woodlands.  Hilda
+stood on the mound, and looked with undazzled eyes on the sinking orb.
+Beside her, Edith reclined on the sward, and seemed with idle hand
+tracing characters in the air.  The girl had grown paler still, since
+Harold last parted from her on the same spot, and the same listless
+and despondent apathy stamped her smileless lips and her bended head.
+
+"See, child of my heart," said Hilda, addressing Edith, while she
+still gazed on the western luminary, "see, the sun goes down to the
+far deeps, where Rana and Aegir [136] watch over the worlds of the
+sea; but with morning he comes from the halls of the Asas--the golden
+gates of the East--and joy comes in his train.  And yet then thinkest,
+sad child, whose years have scarce passed into woman, that the sun,
+once set, never comes back to life.  But even while we speak, thy
+morning draws near, and the dunness of cloud takes the hues of the
+rose!"
+
+Edith's hand paused from its vague employment, and fell droopingly on
+her knee;--she turned with an unquiet and anxious eye to Hilda, and
+after looking some moments wistfully at the Vala, the colour rose to
+her cheek, and she said in a voice that had an accent half of anger:
+
+"Hilda, thou art cruel!"
+
+"So is Fate!" answered the Vala.  "But men call not Fate cruel when it
+smiles on their desires.  Why callest thou Hilda cruel, when she reads
+in the setting sun the runes of thy coming joy!"
+
+"There is no joy for me," returned Edith, plaintively; and I have that
+on my heart," she added, with a sudden and almost fierce change of
+tone, "which at last I will dare to speak.  I reproach thee, Hilda,
+that thou hast marred all my life, that thou hast duped me with
+dreams, and left me alone in despair."
+
+"Speak on," said Hilda, calmly, as a nurse to a froward child.
+
+"Hast thou not told me, from the first dawn of my wondering reason,
+that my life and lot were inwoven with--with (the word, mad and
+daring, must out)--with those of Harold the peerless?  But for that,
+which my infancy took from thy lips as a law, I had never been so vain
+and so frantic!  I had never watched each play of his face, and
+treasured each word from his lips; I had never made my life but part
+of his life--all my soul but the shadow of his sun.  But for that, I
+had hailed the calm of the cloister--but for that, I had glided in
+peace to my grave.  And now--now, O Hilda--" Edith paused, and that
+break had more eloquence than any words she could command.  "And," she
+resumed quickly, "thou knowest that these hopes were but dreams--that
+the law ever stood between him and me--and that it was guilt to love
+him."
+
+"I knew the law," answered Hilda, "but the law of fools is to the wise
+as the cobweb swung over the brake to the wing of the bird.  Ye are
+sibbe to each other, some five times removed; and therefore an old man
+at Rome saith that ye ought not to wed.  When the shavelings obey the
+old man at home, and put aside their own wives and frillas [137], and
+abstain from the wine cup, and the chase, and the brawl, I will stoop
+to hear of their laws,--with disrelish it may be, but without scorn.
+[138]  It is no sin to love Harold; and no monk and no law shall
+prevent your union on the day appointed to bring ye together, form and
+heart."
+
+"Hilda! Hilda! madden me not with joy," cried Edith, starting up in
+rapturous emotion, her young face dyed with blushes, and all her
+renovated beauty so celestial that Hilda herself was almost awed, as
+if by the vision of Freya, the northern Venus, charmed by a spell from
+the halls of Asgard.
+
+"But that day is distant," renewed the Vala.
+
+"What matters! what matters!" cried the pure child of Nature; "I ask
+but hope.  Enough,--oh! enough, if we were but wedded on the borders
+of the grave!"
+
+"Lo, then," said Hilda, "behold, the sun of thy life dawns again!"
+
+As she spoke, the Vala stretched her arm, and through the intersticed
+columns of the fane, Edith saw the large shadow of a man cast over the
+still sward.  Presently into the space of the circle came Harold, her
+beloved.  His face was pale with grief yet recent; but, perhaps, more
+than ever, dignity was in his step and command on his brow, for he
+felt that now alone with him rested the might of Saxon England.  And
+what royal robe so invests with imperial majesty the form of a man as
+the grave sense of power responsible, in an earnest soul?
+
+"Thou comest," said Hilda, "in the hour I predicted; at the setting of
+the sun and the rising of the star."
+
+"Vala," said Harold, gloomily, "I will not oppose my sense to thy
+prophecies; for who shall judge of that power of which he knows not
+the elements? or despise the marvel of which he cannot detect the
+imposture?  But leave me, I pray thee, to walk in the broad light of
+the common day.  These hands are made to grapple with things palpable,
+and these eyes to measure the forms that front my way.  In my youth, I
+turned in despair or disgust from the subtleties of the schoolmen,
+which split upon hairs the brains of Lombard and Frank; in my busy and
+stirring manhood entangle me not in the meshes which confuse all my
+reason, and sicken my waking thoughts into dreams of awe.  Mine be the
+straight path and the plain goal!"
+
+The Vala gazed on him with an earnest look, that partook of
+admiration, and yet more of gloom; but she spoke not, and Harold
+resumed:
+
+"Let the dead rest, Hilda,--proud names with glory on earth and
+shadows escaped from our ken, submissive to mercy in heaven.  A vast
+chasm have my steps overleapt since we met, O Hilda--sweet Edith; a
+vast chasm, but a narrow grave."  His voice faltered a moment, and
+again he renewed,--" Thou weepest, Edith; ah, how thy tears console
+me!  Hilda, hear me!  I love thy grandchild--loved her by irresistible
+instinct since her blue eyes first smiled on mine.  I loved her in her
+childhood, as in her youth--in the blossom as in the flower.  And thy
+grandchild loves me.  The laws of the Church proscribe our marriage,
+and therefore we parted; but I feel, and thine Edith feels, that the
+love remains as strong in absence: no other will be her wedded lord,
+no other my wedded wife.  Therefore, with heart made soft by sorrow,
+and, in my father's death, sole lord of my fate, I return, and say to
+thee in her presence, 'Suffer us to hope still!'  The day may come
+when under some king less enthralled than Edward by formal Church
+laws, we may obtain from the Pope absolution for our nuptials--a day,
+perhaps, far off; but we are both young, and love is strong and
+patient: we can wait."
+
+"O Harold," exclaimed Edith, "we can wait!"
+
+"Have I not told thee, son of Godwin," said the Vala, solemnly, "that
+Edith's skein of life was inwoven with thine?  Dost thou deem that my
+charms have not explored the destiny of the last of my race?  Know
+that it is in the decrees of the fates that ye are to be united, never
+more to be divided.  Know that there shall come a day, though I can
+see not its morrow, and it lies dim and afar, which shall be the most
+glorious of thy life, and on which Edith and fame shall be thine,--the
+day of thy nativity, on which hitherto all things have prospered with
+thee.  In vain against the stars preach the mone and the priest: what
+shall be, shall be.  Wherefore, take hope and joy, O Children of Time!
+And now, as I join your hands, I betroth your souls."
+
+Rapture unalloyed and unprophetic, born of love deep and pure, shone
+in the eyes of Harold, as he clasped the hand of his promised bride.
+But an involuntary and mysterious shudder passed over Edith's frame,
+and she leant close, close, for support upon Harold's breast. And, as
+if by a vision, there rose distinct in her memory a stern brow, a form
+of power and terror--the brow and the form of him who but once again
+in her waking life the Prophetess had told her she should behold.  The
+vision passed away in the warm clasp of those protecting arms; and
+looking up into Harold's face, she there beheld the mighty and deep
+delight that transfused itself at once into her own soul.
+
+Then Hilda, placing one hand over their heads, and raising the other
+towards heaven, all radiant with bursting stars, said in her deep and
+thrilling tones:
+
+"Attest the betrothal of these young hearts, O ye Powers that draw
+nature to nature by spells which no galdra can trace, and have wrought
+in the secrets of creation no mystery so perfect as love,--Attest it,
+thou temple, thou altar!--attest it, O sun and O air!  While the forms
+are divided, may the souls cling together--sorrow with sorrow, and joy
+with joy.  And when, at length, bride and bridegroom are one,--O
+stars, may the trouble with which ye are charged have exhausted its
+burthen; may no danger molest, and no malice disturb, but, over the
+marriage-bed, shine in peace, O ye stars!"
+
+Up rose the moon.  May's nightingale called its mate from the
+breathless boughs; and so Edith and Harold were betrothed by the grave
+of the son of Cerdic.  And from the line of Cerdic had come, since
+Ethelbert, all the Saxon kings who with sword and with sceptre had
+reigned over Saxon England.
+
+
+
+
+
+*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK HAROLD, BY LYTTON, BOOK 5 ***
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