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"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?
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?"
I know, too, that he will not keep it long, unless he learns that Northumbrians are free men, and not Wessex slaves." "And Algar our uncle is outlawed again, after King Edward had given him peaceably your father's earldom." "And why?" "Why was he outlawed two years ago?" "Because the Godwinssons hate him, I suppose."
Woe to those that join house to house, and field to field, like us, and the Godwinssons, and every man that could, till we 'stood alone in the land. 'Many houses, great and fair, shall be without inhabitants. It is all foretold in Holy Writ, Hereward, my son.
Lucky for young Waltheof, your uncle, if he gets it, if he, and you too, are not murdered within seven years; for I know Tosti's humor, when he has rivals in his way " "Algar will protect us," said one. "I tell you, Algar is no match for the Godwinssons. If the monk-king died to-morrow, neither his earldom nor his life would be safe.
He had hardened his heart, and made up his mind to show no kindness to his own kin. The day might come when they might need him; then it would be his turn. "Your father, as we told you, is dead." "So much the better for him, and the worse for England. And Harold and the Godwinssons, of course, are lords and masters far and wide?" "Tosti has our grandfather Siward's earldom." "I know that.
"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.
Now hearken unto me; and settle it in your mind, thou and William both, that your quarrel is against none but Harold and the Godwinssons, and their men of Wessex; but that if you go to cross the Watling street, and meddle with the free Danes, who are none of Harold's men " "Stay. Harold has large manors in Lincolnshire, and so has Edith his sister; and what of them, Sir Hereward?"
"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?"
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