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At the king's death, if not before, that opportunity would be sure to present itself. Harold would be certainly chosen king by the people of London and by the West Saxons, but almost as certainly would his claim be disputed by the earls of Mercia on one hand, and by Tostig and the Danes on the other.
He was consecrated after the maner of other kings his ancestors by Athelred the archbishop of Canturburie. This Edward was not so learned as his father, but in princelie power more high and honorable, for he ioined the kingdome of Eastangles and Mercia with other vnto his dominion, as after shall be shewed, and vanquished the Danes, Scots, and Welshmen, to his great glorie and high commendation.
"Has it so?" said Ingvar, and his eyes flashed. "Where is your help to come from? Do you look to Ethelred? He is busy in Wessex with more of us heathen. Where is Mercia? It is ours. Will Kent help you?"
There were the earls of Mercia, who bore no great love to the house of Godwin, and who resented the ascendency of the West Saxons.
But even while Cædmon was singing the glories of Northumbria and of the Irish Church were passing away. The revival of Mercia was as rapid as its fall. Only a few years after Penda's defeat the Mercians threw off Oswin's yoke and set Wulfhere, a son of Penda, on their throne. They were aided in their revolt, no doubt, by a religious strife which was now rending the Northumbrian realm.
In spite however of this rapid recovery of its strength by Mercia, Northumbria remained the dominant state in Britain: and Ecgfrith, who succeeded Oswiu in 670, so utterly defeated Wulfhere when war broke out between them that he was glad to purchase peace by the surrender of Lincolnshire.
His father and mine had been close friends, and we two had played and hunted together many a time, until the jealousy of Bertric drove him to seek refuge with Offa of Mercia. I thought him there yet. "Yield yourselves," said Thorleif, "and we will speak in peace of ransom. I will come on board with a score of men, and harm none."
If you learn what Carl can teach you, you will, if you can raise a thousand followers, walk through Wessex into Mercia, and thence home by East Anglia to London town, and there sit with three crowns on your head the greatest king that has been in England yet. For your folk know no more of fighting, though they are brave enough, than a herd of cattle.
Nor was the name ill chosen, as it turned out, for all men knew by this time that the queen was the wisest adviser in all the council of Mercia in aught to do with the greatness of the kingdom. "I have ever had it in my mind that she would get through that voyage in safety," Thrond said. "Ran would not have her." "What do you mean?" "Lad, I saw her start thereon, or so I think.
He himself said to me yesterday, 'If these Mercian earls are ready to defy the head of the royal line of England, think you that they will ever recognize the sway of a member of my father's house?" "And what said you, Wulf?" "I said that I did not doubt the ill-will of the Mercian earls, but that I doubted whether Mercia would follow them if they strove to break up the kingdom.
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