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Not a word spoke De Graville; but his dark eye dwelt one minute with mingled pity and reverence on the King; then rising, he turned away; and slowly, as if he disdained to fly, strode back over the corpses of his countrymen. "Stay, all hands!" cried the King to his archers; "yon man hath tasted our salt, and done us good service of old. He hath paid his weregeld." Not a shaft was discharged.
"Well, man, I think not the worse of you for loyal love to your thegn, but there are those who would do so, and I advise you, brotherlike, that ears and nose are in peril if thou talkest thus indiscreetly." "Steel to steel, and hand to hand," said the Saxon, bluntly, touching the long knife in his leathern belt, "and he who sets gripe on Sexwolf son of Elfhelm, shall pay his weregeld twice over."
To stop which a man is allowed to purge himself by oath; his own and that of certain neighbours, twelve in general, who will swear their belief in his innocence. This was common to the northern nations, and was the origin of our trial by jury. If guilty, the offender has to pay the weregeld, or legal price, set upon the injury he has inflicted.
I have knelt at the Tomb; but no dove hath come forth from the cloud, no stream of grace hath re-baptised the child of wrath! They tell me now monk and priest tell me that I have atoned all my sins; that the dread weregeld is paid; that I may enter the world of men with a spirit free from the load, and a name redeemed from the stain. Think so, O brother!
"Choose whom thou wilt, Harold," said one of the young thegns, laughing, "but spare thy friends; and whomsoever thou choosest, pay his widow the weregeld." "Fair sirs," then said De Graville, "if ye think that I, though a stranger, could serve you as nuncius, it would be a pleasure to me to undertake this mission.
If but by one word thou widen the breach between me and the King, outlaw thou enterest England, outlaw shalt thou depart for earldom and broad lands; choose the bread of the stranger, and the weregeld of the wolf!" The young Saxon, haughty as he was, quailed at his father's thrilling voice, bowed his head, and retreated sullenly.
On the whole, woman's condition seems inferior to man's on some points: but superior on others. e.g. A woman's weregeld the price of her life is 1200 solidi; while the man's is only 900. For he can defend himself, but she cannot. On the other hand, if a man kill his wife, he pays only the 1200 solidi, and loses her dowry: but if she kill him, she dies. Again.
Next to them you have different sorts of slaves; Servus massarius, who seems to be also rusticanus, one who takes care of his lord's 'massa' or farm, and is allowed a peculium, it seems, some animals of his own, which he may not sell, though he may give them away. And again, servus doctus, an educated household slave, whose weregeld is higher than that of others.
"Choose whom thou wilt, Harold," said one of the young thegns, laughing, "but spare thy friends; and whomsoever thou choosest, pay his widow the weregeld." "Fair sirs," then said De Graville, "if ye think that I, though a stranger, could serve you as nuncius, it would be a pleasure to me to undertake this mission.
There were stake fences, which you must be careful in making, for if a horse stakes himself by leaping in, you pay nothing; but if he does so by leaping out, you pay the price of the horse. Moreover, you must leave no sharp stakes standing out of the hedge; for if a man or beast wounds himself thereby in passing, you have to pay full weregeld.
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