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At last the Normans burst in at the centre, each baron and knight striving to be the first to pluck down the standards, the one the king's own cognizance, the other the national banner, that waved side by side. One after another the thanes were smitten down. Not one asked for quarter, not one turned his back upon the foe.
Soon they came within sight of the fair palace Heorot, and the warder showed them the way to Hrothgar's court, and then bade them farewell, and returned to keep watch upon the coast. Then the bold thanes marched forward to Heorot, their armor and their weapons glittering as they went.
The rest of the day was spent in distributing the newly fashioned arms to those who needed them, and in arranging the men in bands under their own thanes, or, in their absence, such leaders as the king appointed. Upon the following morning the army started, marching in a north-easterly direction against the great camp of the Danes at Chippenham.
In the meantime, still hoping that peace might in some way be preserved, Harold sent messages to all the thanes of importance in Wessex, ordering them to prepare to march to London with the whole of their retainers and levies, as soon as they received orders to get in motion.
Baron de Burg, on the day after their arrival at Westminster, led the two young thanes to the private apartment of the king. He received them graciously. "There are none of your nation," he said, "whose homage I more gladly accept. You fought valiantly before under my banner, and will, I am sure, be ready to do so again should occasion arise.
It was on a yule-day, that Arthur lay in London; then were come to him men of all his kingdoms, of Britain, of Scotland, of Ireland, of Iceland, and of all the lands that Arthur had in hand; and all the highest thanes, with horses and with swains. There were come seven kings' sons, with seven hundred knights; without the folk that obeyed Arthur.
Immediately after David's death, King William the Lion, who had, in 1211, suppressed a rebellion in Moray of the Thanes of Ross under Guthred son of Donald Ban MacWilliam whom a few years later he captured and beheaded, came to Moray again; and, about the 1st of August 1214, King William demanded, and received Earl John's daughter, whose name is not known, as a hostage for her father's loyalty, and a guarantee of the peace then made, under which John was probably recognised as earl and as entitled to his reduced territory.
On that we thanked him for his words, and we followed him out to the hall. And there the thanes shouted and cheered as he came, and still more when he prayed them to follow him to victory or a warrior's death. And that they swore to do, not loudly, but in such sort that none could mistake that they would surely do so.
And at that she gave a little plaintive cry, and would have taken his arm, saying for us to hear that he was surely distraught. "Thanes, tell me what is wrong!" she said. "We have no need to tell you," said Sighard savagely, and unheeding the warning grasp of the priest on his arm. "What has been done is your doing." "What mean you?" she flashed on him with a terrible look.
We were with the fierce man, with Arthur the king, we have brought thee writs, words exceeding great Arthur is the keenest man that we ever looked on, and he is wondrous powerful, and his thanes are bold, there is every knave as if he were knight, there is every swain as if he were rich thane, there are the knights as if it were kings, meat there is most abundant, and men most bold, and the fairest women that dwell alive; and Arthur the bold himself fairest over all!