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It was the forces of these Kings that met Ceawlin at Deorham, a village which lies northward of Bath, on a chain of hill overlooking the Severn valley, and whose defeat threw open the country of the three towns to the West Saxon army."
The ill-shaped Saxon corpses lay Heap'd up the witch-wife's horses' prey. She rides by night, at pools of blood, Where Friesland men in daylight stood, Her horses slake their thirst, and fly On to the field where Flemings lie." The old warrior half recited half sang these lines in a rich full voice, and then paused a few seconds, while a slight murmur arose from the earnest listeners around him.
Death took her hand and led her up to the same quadrille, at the head of which Harold the Saxon and Edith the Fair stood, and he placed himself and his partner exactly opposite to, and facing them. Thus Lyon Berners for the first time in the evening was obliged to see his wife, for of course he knew her by her dress, as she knew him by his dress.
Indeed, to acknowledge a disagreeable fact, there is a very great deal of reading in our day that is simply a substitute for the potations and "heavy-handed revel" of our Saxon ancestors. In both cases it is a spurious exaltation of feeling that is sought; in both cases those who for a moment seem to themselves larks ascending to meet the sun are but worms eating earth.
But the healthy beating up of a scab, he contended the "throwing of the fear of God into a scab," as he expressed it was the only right and proper thing to do. "Our folks never had to do such things," Saxon said finally. "They never had strikes nor scabs in those times." "You bet they didn't," Billy agreed "Them was the good old days. I'd liked to a-lived then." He drew a long breath and sighed.
Jennings had his own opinion about this. Mrs. Octagon as was proved by her early history was capable of doing much, when number one was in question, and Basil was an irresponsible, hysterical fool. In a moment of rage he might have "But no," said Jennings, breaking off this train of thought. "I can't see the truth. Miss Saxon knows it. You must ask her.
'When you shall come to be my age, young sir, Saxon answered, 'you may know better than to decry a comfortable country hostel. 'Very like, sir, very like! the gallant answered, with a careless laugh. 'For all that, being mine own age, I feel the wilds of Wiltshire and the inns of Bruton to be a sorry change after the Mall, and the fare of Pontack's or the Coca Tree.
Some few, not quite ignorant of the Saxon tongue, doffed their mail, and crept through forest and fell towards the sea-shore; others retained steed and arms, but shunned equally the high roads.
Presently two professors arrived; and one of them, glancing through the rooms, and seeing Freeman thus attired, asked the other, ``What sort of a costume do you call that? The answer came instantly, ``I don't know, unless it is the costume of a Saxon swineherd before the Conquest. In view of Freeman's studies on the Saxon and Norman periods and the famous toast of the dean of Wells, ``In honor of Professor Freeman, who has done so much to reveal to us the rude manners of our ancestors, the Yale professor's answer seemed much to the point.
He explained that he wanted her first to see Shaftesbury, a little old Wessex town that was three or four hundred years older than Salisbury, perched on a hill, a Saxon town, where Alfred had gathered his forces against the Danes and where Canute, who had ruled over all Scandinavia and Iceland and Greenland, and had come near ruling a patch of America, had died.
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