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She went to Flanders, and there sent to Hardicanute, urging him by the most earnest importunities to come to England and assert his claims to the crown. He was doubly bound to do it now, she said, as the blood of his murdered brother called for retribution, and he could have no honorable rest or peace until he had avenged it.
Egbert. Ethelwolf. Ethelbald and Ethelbert. Ethered. Alfred the Great. Edward the Elder. Athelstan. Edmund.-Edred. Edwy. Edgar. Edward the Martyr Ethelred. Settlement of the Normans. Edmund Ironside. Canute. Harold Harefoot. Hardicanute. Edward the Confessor. Harold First Saxon Government. Succession of the Kings. The Wittenagemot. The Aristocracy. The several Orders of Men. Courts of Justice.
"Edward, the other son of Emma, escaped again to Normandy; whence, after the death of Harold and Hardicanute, he made no scruple of applying to my protection and favor, though he had before prosecuted me with all the vengeance he was able, for the murder of his brother; but in all great affairs private relation must yield to public interest.
Hardicanute, deterred, perhaps, by the extent of the support which the claims of Harold were receiving, did not venture to come to England, and Emma and Godwin, and those who would have taken their side, having no royal head to lead them, gave up their opposition, and acquiesced in Harold's reign.
On the other hand, Hardicanute had the suffrages of the English, who, on account of his being born among them of Queen Emma, regarded him as their countryman; he was favoured by the articles of treaty with the Duke of Normandy; and, above all, his party was espoused by Earl Godwin, the most powerful nobleman in the kingdom, especially in the province of Wessex, the chief seat of the ancient English.
His mother Emma, however, who only cared for her last son Hardicanute, instead of assisting him, as he expected, opposed him so strongly with all her influence that he was very soon glad to get safely back. His brother Alfred was not so fortunate. Here, he and his men halted in the evening to rest, having still the Earl in their company; who had ordered lodgings and good cheer for them.
He died on the 14th of April, 1039; little regretted or esteemed by his subjects, and left the succession open to his brother, Hardicanute.
When Hardicanute dropped down dead at a marriage banquet, it was Godwin who placed Edward upon the throne; and that great Earl must either have been conscious of his innocence of the murder of Edward's brother, or assured of his own irresponsible power, when he said to the prince who knelt at his feet, and, fearful of the difficulties in his way, implored the Earl to aid his abdication of the throne and return to Normandy.
"It is time lost," muttered Cedric apart and impatiently, "to speak to him of aught else but that which concerns his appetite! The soul of Hardicanute hath taken possession of him, and he hath no pleasure save to fill, to swill, and to call for more. Alas!" said he, looking at Athelstane with compassion, "that so dull a spirit should be lodged in so goodly a form!
Alred, O holy father, at whose knees I once confessed my every sin, I blame thee not that thou first, in the Witan, liftest thy voice against me, though thou knowest that I loved Algive from youth upward; she, with her heart yet mine, was given in the last year of Hardicanute, when might was right, to the Church.
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