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Updated: May 14, 2025
His fall checked the onset, and the English king, hearing of his death, offered his brother an armistice. Tostig refused this and led his men back to the fray, which was resumed with all its old fury. But Tostig, too, was slain, and the king's brother-in-law, who arrived with reinforcements from the ships, met with the same fate.
"Tostig holdeth high feast and revel, for to-day we took a rich booty at the ford beyond Bassingthorp merchants out of Winisfarne, with pack-horses well laden and there were women also in especial, one very fair. Her, Tostig bore hither. But a while since, when he bade them bring her to him, behold she had stabbed herself with her bodkin. So is she dead and Tostig raging.
"Well," quoth the honest Kent man, "I hope, nevertheless, that Algar, will sow his wild oats, and leave the Walloons to grow the hemp for their own halters; for, though he is not of the height of our Harold, he is a true Saxon, and we liked him well enow when he ruled us. And how is our Earl's brother Tostig esteemed by the Northmen?
"When he marched north against the King of Norway and Tostig I felt no doubt he would return victorious; but night after night I have had evil dreams, and though I pray continually my spirit has no relief. I have never feared for him before. I have always felt sure that whoever died Harold would be spared for the sake of England, but I have no such feeling now.
Meanwhile, Tostig embarked at Harfleur; but instead of sailing to the northern coasts of England, he made for one of the Flemish ports: and there, under various pretences, new manned the Norman vessels with Flemings, Fins, and Northmen.
He paused and calculated, waiting so long that Tostig, in his impatience, went to Norway, and tried to find a prompter for Harold. Messages in the meantime passed between Normandy and England without effect. William claimed the performance of the oaths at Rouen, and Harold denied any obligation to him, offering to be his ally if he would renounce the throne, but otherwise defying him as an enemy.
The bitterest of all his enemies was his own brother, Tostig, who, having been banished partly by his means, on account of his misgovernment of Northumbria, was living in Flanders, whence, the instant he heard of Harold's coronation, he hastened with the tidings to Normandy; and not thinking William's preparations speedy enough to satisfy the impatience of his hatred, he went to Norway, where he found a willing ally in Harald Hardrada, the last sea-king.
Evading the watch kept by the English fleet they crossed the sea, landed, and plundered and ravaged a considerable extent of country, and then retired, Tostig being enraged that William of Normandy was unwilling to send an expedition to act in concert with him until the whole of his plans were prepared and his great army ready for sea. Normandy indeed had been converted into a vast camp.
Harold's renegade brother, Earl Tostig, had excited the Norse King to this enterprise, the importance of which has naturally been eclipsed by the superior interest attached to the victorious expedition of Duke William, but which was on a scale of grandeur which the Scandinavian ports had rarely, if ever, before witnessed.
Harold's renegade brother, Earl Tostig, had excited the Norse king to this enterprise, the importance of which has naturally been eclipsed by the superior interest attached to the victorious expedition of Duke William, but which was on a scale of grandeur which the Scandinavian ports had rarely, if ever, before witnessed.
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