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Updated: June 11, 2025
On the same bench with these sub-kings, distinguished from them by height of stature, and calm collectedness of mien, no less than by their caps of maintenance and furred robes, are those props of strong thrones and terrors of weak the earls to whom shires and counties fall, as hyde and carricate to the lesser thegns.
And this done, Harold, turning to Haco, and the thegns round him, said joyously: "By Heaven's help we shall yet win this day. And know you not that it is my fortunate day the day on which, hitherto, all hath prospered with me, in peace and in war the day of my birth?" "Of your birth!" echoed Haco in surprise. "Ay did you not know it?" "Nay! strange! it is also the birthday of Duke William!
Thou hast all which the sons of Woden dreamed in their dreams of Valhalla! Thus saying, the form receded slowly, slowly, still gazing on me with its sad eyes. I stretched forth my hand to detain it, and in my grasp was a shadowy sceptre. And, lo! round me, as if from the earth, sprang up thegns and chiefs, in their armour; and a board was spread, and a wassail was blithe around me.
Accustomed to an atmosphere of practical state-craft in the Norman court, with faculties sharpened from boyhood by vigilance and meditation, he exercised an extraordinary influence over the simple understandings of the homely clergy and the uncultured thegns.
The custom of enslaving captives would render pure Teutonic blood among the lower classes of a tribe the exception and not the rule; while the custom of chiefs choosing the 'thegns, 'gesitha, or 'comites, who lived and died as their companions-in-arms, from among the most valiant of the unfree, would tend to produce a mixed blood in the upper classes also, and gradually assimilate the whole mass to the manners and laws of their Teutonic lords.
Like the kings of Egypt, he had built his tomb. Within the palace, if possible, still greater was the agitation; more dread the suspense. Lobbies, halls, corridors, stairs, ante-rooms, were filled with churchmen and thegns. Nor was it alone for news of the King's state that their brows were so knit, that their breath came and went so short.
Then, turning to each of the thegns successively he gave to each his post and his duty; and that done, converse grew more general. The many things needful that had been long rotting in neglect under the Monk-king, and now sprung up, craving instant reform, occupied them long and anxiously.
The larger the band of such "comrades," the more power and repute it gave their lord. It was from among the chiefs whose war-band was strongest that the leaders of the host were commonly chosen; and as these leaders grew into kings, the number of their thegns naturally increased. The rank of the "comrades" too rose with the rise of their lord.
"How!" said Godrith, reddening, "thinkest thou so meanly of us thegns of Middlesex as to deem we cannot entertain thus humbly a friend from a distance? Ye Kent men I know are rich. But keep your pennies to buy stuffs for your wife, my friend." The Kent man, seeing he had displeased his companion, did not press his liberal offer, put up his purse, and suffered Godrith to pay the reckoning.
Who among my foes, if foes now I have, will not respect the old man's gladness? Who amongst you, earls and thegns, would not grieve, if his duty bade him say to the grey-haired exile, 'In this English air you shall not breathe your last sigh on this English soil you shall not find a grave! Who amongst you would not grieve to say it?"
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