the Duke of Normandy, had probably occasioned. He hastened, by quick marches, to reach this new invader; but though he was reinforced at London and other places with fresh troops, he found himself also weakened by the desertion of his old soldiers, who, from fatigue and discontent, secretly withdrew from their colours. His brother Gurth, a man of no less bravery and of more discretion than Harold, urged upon him that it would be better policy to prolong the war, or, at all events, for the king not to expose himself in the battle.
To these remonstrances Harold, flushed with the pride of recent victory, and listening only to his natural courage, turned a decided refusal. He was resolved, he said, to show to the nation who had elected him that he was worthy of their choice, and knew how to defend the crown he had won.
With this intention he gave orders to advance to meet the Normans, who by this time had removed their camp to Hastings, where they had erected fortifications.
So confident did the English monarch feel of success, that he sent a messenger to William, offering him a sum of money to quit the kingdom; not that, he said, he feared him, or aught that he and his army could do; but simply to avoid the effusion of blood, and spare the lives of their followers on either side. The offer was rejected with disdain. The Duke of Normandy possessed a courage as ardent as, and an ambition equal to, his own; added to which he was further excited by the personal hatred he bore to Harold, whose oath to assist William to the English throne and marry his daughter had been broken on both points.
Not to appear behindhand with his enemy in boasting, William despatched a counter proposition by a monk of Fescamp, named Hugues Margot, whose office secured him against any violence at the hands of the incensed Saxons. He haughtily called upon Harold either to resign his crown, hold it in fealty to him, submit their difference to the arbitration of the Pope, or decide their claims in single combat.
To this, Harold replied that the God of battles would soon decide between them.
Both parties now prepared for the contest which was to decide the possession of the kingdom; and the manner in which the night preceding the battle was passed, is either camp, illustrated the character of the two nations. The Saxons spent the hours in rioting and feasting, song and wassail; the Normans in silence and prayer.
On the morning of the 14th of October, 1066, the Duke of Normandy called to his tent the principal leaders and officers of his army, and addressed to them a discourse suited to the occasion.
He represented to them that the event which they and he had so long looked forward to was at hand, and that the fortune of the war now hung upon their swords; that a single action, in all probability, would decide it; that never army had greater motives for exerting a vigorous courage, whether they considered the prize that would attend their victory, or the inevitable destruction which must ensue in the event of their being discomfited; that if their veteran bands could once break the lines of the raw soldiers who had rashly dared to approach them, they could conquer a kingdom at one blow, and be justly entitled to the possession of it as the reward of their valour.
On the contrary, he pointed out the result in the event of a defeat—an enraged and merciless enemy in their rear, the sea to bar their retreat, and an ignominious death as the reward of their cowardice. "By collecting so numerous and brave a host," he added, "I have done all that is possible, humanly speaking, to ensure conquest; and the sacrilegious conduct of Harold, in breaking his oath to me, gives me just reason to believe that Heaven, and the saints who are witnesses to his perjury, will smile upon my endeavours."
This address was received with loud cheers; the duke commanded the signal to be given, and the entire army advanced, singing, according to William of Malmesbury, the war song, or hymn of Roland.
Harold, in the meanwhile, had not been idle, but had taken advantage of some rising ground to post his army, and dug trenches to secure his plans; it being his intention to stand on the defensive, and avoid, if possible, all action with the enemy's cavalry, to which his own was inferior. The Kentish men he placed in the van—a post they claimed as their right; whilst the king himself, accompanied by his two valiant brothers, Gurth and Leofwin, dismounting, placed himself at the head of the infantry, and expressed his resolution to conquer or to perish in the action. The first attack of the Normans was desperate, but was received with equal firmness by the English; and after a furious combat, the assailants, overcome by the difficulty of the ground, and hard pressed by the enemy, began first to relax their vigour, then to retreat; and confusion was spreading among the ranks, when William, who found himself on the brink of destruction, hastened with a select band to the relief of his dismayed forces. His presence revived their courage; the English were obliged to retire with loss; and the duke, ordering his second line to advance, renewed the attack with fresh forces and with redoubled vigour. Finding that the enemy, aided by the advantage of ground, and animated by the example of their prince, still made an obstinate resistance, he tried a stratagem, which was very delicate in its management, but which seemed advisable in his desperate situation, where, if he gained not a decisive victory, he was totally undone. He commanded his troops to make a hasty retreat, and to allure the enemy from their ground by the appearance of flight. The artifice succeeded; and the English, heated by the action, and sanguine in their hopes of victory, followed the Normans into the plain. William gave orders that at once the infantry should face about on their pursuers, and the cavalry make an assault on their wings; and both of them pursue the advantage which the surprise and terror of the enemy must give them in that critical moment. The English were repulsed with great slaughter, and driven back to the hill, where, being rallied by the bravery of Harold, they were able, notwithstanding their loss, to maintain their ground and continue the combat. The duke tried the same stratagem a second time with the same success; but, even after this double advantage, he still found a great body of the English, who, maintaining themselves in firm array, determined to dispute the battle to the last extremity. He ordered his heavy-armed infantry to make an assault on them; while his archers, placed behind, should gall those who were exposed by the situation of the ground, or who were intent on defending themselves against the swords and spears of the assailants. By this disposition he at last prevailed: Harold was slain by an arrow, while he was
