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Updated: May 10, 2025
Again I say, failing the Atheling, whom could we choose but Harold, brother-in-law to the King: descended through Githa from the royalties of the Norse, the head of all armies under the Herr-ban, the chief who has never fought without victory, yet who has always preferred conciliation to conquest the first counsellor in the Witan the first man in the realm who but Harold? answer me, staring Vebba?"
It so chanced, while this interview took place between Githa and the Earl, that Gurth, hawking in the woodlands round Hilda's house, turned aside to visit his Danish kinswoman. The prophetess was absent, but he was told that Edith was within; and Gurth, about to be united to a maiden who had long won his noble affections, cherished a brother's love for his brother's fair betrothed.
"How so, kinswoman, how so?" said Githa, awed yet charmed in the awe, and drawing her chair nearer to the mournful sorceress. "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.
Ere Harold could reply, Githa exclaimed: "Leave there thy right hand on my child's head, and say, simply: 'By my troth and my plight, if the Duke detain Wolnoth, son of Githa, against just plea, and King's assent to his return, I, Harold, will, failing letter and nuncius, cross the seas, to restore the child to the mother." Harold hesitated.
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.
"No!" said William, fiercely, "we take no gold for a traitor's body; no, not if Githa, the usurper's mother, offered us its weight in the shining metal; unburied be the Accursed of the Church, and let the birds of prey feed their young with his carcase!"
Edith is " "Well," said Githa, kindly, for she sympathised with that love which Godwin would have condemned, "though she grieved deeply after thy departure, and would sit for hours gazing into space, and moaning. But even ere Hilda divined thy safe return, Edith knew it; I was beside her at the time; she started up, and cried, 'Harold is in England! 'How?
"Be ruled, O my son," cried Githa, clasping the Earl's knees, "and do not let me dread in the depth of the night to see the shade of Godwin, and hear his voice say, 'Woman, where is Harold?" It was impossible for the Earl's strong understanding to resist the arguments addressed to it; and, to say truth, he had been more disturbed that he liked to confess by Edward's sinister forewarnings.
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.
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.
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