still in the town, and not improbably among the groups on the beach.

Landing of

in 1066.

It was in a different way that a prince from France landed at the same spot eight hundred years ago. Had I stood then on the shore looking southward through precisely such Septem- the Normans ber mist upon a motionless sea, I should have seen countless sails floating up in the offing; and, in the front of the fleet, an ornamented bark, with a great cross on its flag, a sail marked with a coat of arms of three lions, and on the prow a brazen child holding an arrow and a bow bent to shoot. The chronicler, William of Malmesbury, says the sails of the vessel were crimson. These were kept turned to the wind and aided by oars until finally the keel grated upon the shore; and the multitude of craft that followed, bringing sixty thousand men, ranging eastward and westward for miles on either hand, were beached one after another by their crews in a similar manner. Over their sides instantly sprang a multitude of archers; then of knights; then from the holds of the ships were led the horses, full of mettle from their long confinement, which pranced on the sand and filled the air with their neighing. Lastly, on the ship whose prow bore the brazen child, a tall, strong man approached the of Duke Wil side. His hair and beard were light, his face florid. It had power and decision, bespeaking a character fearless, enterprising, cruel. As he leaped down in his armor from the low vessel upon the wet sand, his foot slipped, and he fell forward upon his two hands. The thousands watching him from the decks of the vessels and from the beach sent up at

Appearance

liam.

once a cry of distress; for it was taken as a sign of evil omen. Several of the chroniclers say it was a knight standing by who gave a favorable turn to the incident by a sudden explanation; but I like best the account of Wace, in the fine old "Roman de Rou," whose father was a soldier in that host, and had, no doubt, told the whole story to the son. It is that the strong warrior sprang up vigorously, and holding on high his dripping hands full of wet sand: "See, my lords," he cried, "by the splendor of God, I have taken possession of England with both my hands. It is now mine, and what is mine is yours.' It was

Duke William of Normandy. How he and his followers looked, with their kite-shaped shields, their helmets with the "nasals" projecting down from the front, their chain-armor, their boots of steel or strips of variegated cloth wound about the leg from knee to ankle, -all this we know from the Bayeux tapestry. What they said and did was rehearsed at length by many a patient monk, and far more picturesquely by the minstrels, who told the tale to the sound of the harp many generations after, to King and noble. The Saxon King, Harold, was beset with enemies. He overthrew in the north a rival claimant; but it was at that very time that the crimson sail came leading the Norman fleet from the southward, when the Saxons, though victorious, were weakened and disorganized. Harold, however, hurried to meet the new enemy, leaving behind, in his impetuosity, all the strength of the northern counties. He made a hasty levy of forces in London and in the south, and came swiftly towards the coast, hoping to take William by surprise.

Difficult situation of Har

old.

Finding the hope vain, he drew up his army a few miles from the shore and waited for the Norman onset.

Turning from the calm sea and the beach which those historic keels had grated, I followed back on William's track to the scene of the engagement. I rode through farms and handsome estates where there was nothing to suggest what filled my own thoughts but the name of the station at which I finally alighted, -Battle. Thence I walked into the High Street of the little town, whose existence dates back even to the great day, when it was called Senlac. Each receding century had left its wave-mark on the little ridge where ran the principal street. The railroad depot was a wrinkle which to-day had made, and going from thence there were waifs deposited now by one time and now by another. There was a portico on which beaux of George the Fourth's time might have stood in surtouts and high stocks; old thatched roofs, with house-leek green among the weather-beaten mass, that came from a hundred years back; projecting upper stories from Cromwell's day. Close to the church I got glimpses of a lovely vicarage, withdrawn into quiet, whose shadow-dappled front had the elaborate gables and oriel windows above and below that marked it as Elizabethan, and the church itself was partly at least, from the Wars of the Roses. But at the end of the street rose a structure so massive and venerable that it subordinated to itself the whole of the little village. It was two-storied, guarded at the ends by solid turrets, and battlemented at the top. In the centre was a broad, low-arched gate, above which

Battle Abbey.

the front rose sixty feet into a huge square tower. The side of the gateway was sculptured with the heads of Norman kings and queens. Everywhere over the front the weather had eaten into the brown stone, so that it was marked and crow's-footed as an old man's face. There was no decrepitude, however, but the halest old age. I went up to a narrow open door close by the broader portal. I found the masonry was many feet in thickness, and the doorstep firm and serviceable, though deeply grooved by foot-beats. From the dim room beyond, lit by slits in the thick wall, a woman came forward to answer my inquiries. It was the gateway of famous Battle Abbey, built by William to commemorate the victory on the spot where he won it. Following the direction, I turned out of the High Street into a footpath, skirted the enclosure of a park, with a ravine to the right which once was full of wounded Saxons, and came out at last upon more open ground—a ridge of greensward, with now and then a tree, the ground from which descended to a little brook, then rose again into an answering ridge. The whole was traversed here and there by hedges, there were stacks about farmhouses; sometimes the brown thatch of cottages; to the left, the irregular line of the ruined abbey, with the fresher buildings of a nobleman's seat—all sweet under the subdued light of the autumn afternoon. I stood on the spot occupied by Harold's vanguard, the men of Kent.

I counsel all who make a pilgrimage to Hastings to take as a guide for the battle-field the old "Roman de Rou," either the translation, or, still better, the original Norman-French, as

The Roman de Rou.

Thierry gives it in an appendix.1 A little previous study will make it intelligible enough to a reader of ordinary French; and if it is crossed now and then by an obscurity, the fine chivalric picture is hardly injured. It is like the fierce beauty of a knight's face suggesting itself through helmet-bars; and the prompt iambics of the metre strike the ear with a vigorous music, like the rhythmic hoof-beat of a troop ranging for a charge. I could easily trace from point to point the progress of the battle. Right from my position had the handsome King, the idol of his people, run his simple entrenchment, a line of stakes between which osiers were twisted. This marked the front of the position; and about the knoll to the left, a stronger and higher enclosure of the same sort seems to have been made for the protection of the Saxon standard, the figure of a fighting man embroidered upon a banner and richly set with The two argems and gold. The Norman monk, Ordericus Vitalis, while condemning Harold as cruel and perjured, shows him in attractive colors. He had a fine mind and ready eloquence, was intrepid and courteous, stalwart in figure, and of great strength. He appears in the Bayeux tapestry in a tunic of iron rings, and probably on the battle day wore his crown upon his helmet, as was the custom of Kings of his race. The banner shone and sparkled above a strong, yellowhaired host, among whose weapons the two-handed axe was conspicuous. Their shields were round, with a boss in the centre. Probably, since the levies came in hastily at the King's call, some wore the

mies opposed.

1 Creasy gives much of it in the "Fifteen Decisive Battles of the World."