CHAPTER IV.
It so chanced, while this interview took place between Githa and the
Earl, that Gurth, hawking in the woodlands round Hilda's house, turned
aside to visit his Danish kinswoman. The prophetess was absent, but
he was told that Edith was within; and Gurth, about to be united to a
maiden who had long won his noble affections, cherished a brother's
love for his brother's fair betrothed. He entered the gynoecium, and
there still, as when we were first made present in that chamber, sate
the maids, employed on a work more brilliant to the eye, and more
pleasing to the labour, than that which had then tasked their active
hands. They were broidering into a tissue of the purest gold the
effigy of a fighting warrior, designed by Hilda for the banner of Earl
Harold: and, removed from the awe of their mistress, as they worked
their tongues sang gaily, and it was in the midst of song and laughter
that the fair young Saxon lord entered the chamber. The babble and
the mirth ceased at his entrance; each voice was stilled, each eye
cast down demurely. Edith was not amongst them, and in answer to his
inquiry the eldest of the maidens pointed towards the peristyle
without the house.
The winning and kindly thegn paused a few moments, to admire the
tissue and commend the work, and then sought the peristyle.
Near the water-spring that gushed free and bright through the Roman
fountain, he found Edith, seated in an attitude of deep thought and
gloomy dejection. She started as he approached, and, springing
forward to meet him, exclaimed:
"O Gurth, Heaven hath sent thee to me, I know well, though I cannot
explain to thee why, for I cannot explain it to myself; but know I do,
by the mysterious bodements of my own soul, that some great danger is
at this moment encircling thy brother Harold. Go to him, I pray, I
implore thee, forthwith; and let thy clear sense and warm heart be by
his side."
"I will go instantly," said Gurth, startled. "But do not suffer, I
adjure thee, sweet kinswoman, the superstition that wraps this place,
as a mist wraps a marsh, to infect thy pure spirit. In my early youth
I submitted to the influence of Hilda; I became man, and outgrew it.
Much, secretly, has it grieved me of late, to see that our kinswoman's
Danish lore has brought even the strong heart of Harold under his
spell; and where once he only spoke of duty, I now hear him speak of
fate."
"Alas! alas!" answered Edith, wringing her hands; "when the bird hides
its head in the brake, doth it shut out the track of the hound? Can
we baffle fate by refusing to heed its approaches? But we waste
precious moments. Go, Gurth, dear Gurth! Heavier and darker, while
we speak, gathers the cloud on my heart."
Gurth said no more, but hastened to remount his steed; and Edith
remained alone by the Roman fountain, motionless and sad, as if the
nymph of the old religion stood there to see the lessening stream well
away from the shattered stone, and know that the life of the nymph was
measured by the ebb of the stream.
Gurth arrived in London just as Harold was taking a boat for the
palace of Westminster, to seek the King; and, after interchanging a
hurried embrace with his mother, he accompanied Harold to the palace,
and learned his errand by the way. While Harold spoke, he did not
foresee any danger to be incurred by a friendly visit to the Norman
court; and the interval that elapsed between Harold's communication
and their entrance into the King's chamber, allowed no time for mature
and careful reflection.
Edward, on whom years and infirmity had increased of late with rapid
ravage, heard Harold's request with a grave and deep attention, which
he seldom vouchsafed to earthly affairs. And he remained long silent
after his brother-in-law had finished;--so long silent, that the Earl,
at first, deemed that he was absorbed in one of those mystic and
abstracted reveries, in which, more and more as he grew nearer to the
borders of the World Unseen, Edward so strangely indulged. But,
looking more close, both he and Gurth were struck by the evident
dismay on the King's face, while the collected light of Edward's cold
eye showed that his mind was awake to the human world. In truth, it
is probable that Edward, at that moment, was recalling rash hints, if
not promises, to his rapacious cousin of Normandy, made during his
exile. And, sensible of his own declining health, and the tender
years of the young Edgar, he might be musing over the terrible
pretender to the English throne, whose claims his earlier indiscretion
might seem to sanction.
Whatever his thoughts, they were dark and sinister, as at length he
said, slowly:
"Is thine oath indeed given to thy mother, and doth she keep thee to
it?"
"Both, O King," answered Harold, briefly.
"Then I can gainsay thee not. And thou, Harold, art a man of this
living world; thou playest here the part of a centurion; thou sayst
'Come,' and men come--'Go,' and men move at thy will. Therefore thou
mayest well judge for thyself. I gainsay thee not, nor interfere
between man and his vow. But think not," continued the King in a more
solemn voice, and with increasing emotion, "think not that I will
charge my soul that I counselled or encouraged this errand. Yea, I
foresee that thy journey will lead but to great evil to England, and
sore grief or dire loss to thee." [175]
"How so, dear lord and King?" said Harold, startled by Edward's
unwonted earnestness, though deeming it but one of the visionary
chimeras habitual to the saint. "How so? William thy cousin hath
ever borne the name of one fair to friend, though fierce to foe. And
foul indeed his dishonour, if he could meditate harm to a man trusting
his faith, and sheltered by his own roof-tree."
"Harold, Harold," said Edward, impatiently, "I know William of old.
Nor is he so simple of mind, that he will cede aught for thy pleasure,
or even to my will, unless it bring some gain to himself [176]. I say
no more.--Thou art cautioned, and I leave the rest to Heaven."
It is the misfortune of men little famous for worldly lore, that in
those few occasions when, in that sagacity caused by their very
freedom from the strife and passion of those around, they seem almost
prophetically inspired,--it is their misfortune to lack the power of
conveying to others their own convictions; they may divine, but they
cannot reason: and Harold could detect nothing to deter his purpose,
in a vague fear, based on no other argument than as vague a perception
of the Duke's general character. But Gurth, listening less to his
reason than his devoted love for his brother, took alarm, and said,
after a pause:
"Thinkest thou, good my King, that the same danger were incurred if
Gurth, instead of Harold, crossed the seas to demand the hostages?"
"No," said Edward, eagerly, "and so would I counsel. William would
not have the same objects to gain in practising his worldly guile upon
thee. No; methinks that were the prudent course."
"And the ignoble one for Harold," said the elder brother, almost
indignantly. "Howbeit, I thank thee, gratefully, dear King, for thy
affectionate heed and care. And so the saints guard thee!"
On leaving the King, a warm discussion between the brothers took
place. But Gurth's arguments were stronger than those of Harold, and
the Earl was driven to rest his persistence on his own special pledge
to Githa. As soon, however, as they had gained their home, that plea
was taken from him; for the moment Gurth related to his mother
Edward's fears and cautions, she, ever mindful of Godwin's preference
for the Earl, and his last commands to her, hastened to release Harold
from his pledge; and to implore him at least to suffer Gurth to be his
substitute to the Norman court. "Listen dispassionately," said Gurth;
"rely upon it that Edward has reasons for his fears, more rational
than those he has given to us. He knows William from his youth
upward, and hath loved him too well to hint doubts of his good faith
without just foundation. Are there no reasons why danger from William
should be special against thyself? While the Normans abounded in the
court, there were rumours that the Duke had some designs on England,
which Edward's preference seemed to sanction: such designs now, in the
altered state of England, were absurd--too frantic, for a prince of
William's reputed wisdom to entertain. Yet he may not unnaturally
seek to regain the former Norman influence in these realms. He knows
that in you he receives the most powerful man in England; that your
detention alone would convulse the country from one end of it to the
other; and enable him, perhaps, to extort from Edward some measures
dishonourable to us all. But against me he can harbour no ill design
--my detention would avail him nothing. And, in truth, if Harold be
safe in England, Gurth must be safe in Rouen? Thy presence here at
the head of our armies guarantees me from wrong. But reverse the
case, and with Gurth in England, is Harold safe in Rouen? I, but a
simple soldier, and homely lord, with slight influence over Edward, no
command in the country, and little practised of speech in the stormy
Witan,--I am just so great that William dare not harm me, but not so
great that he should even wish to harm me."
"He detains our kinsmen, why not thee!" said Harold.
"Because with our kinsmen he has at least the pretext that they were
pledged as hostages: because I go simply as guest and envoy. No, to
me danger cannot come. Be ruled, dear Harold."
"Be ruled, O my son," cried Githa, clasping the Earl's knees, "and do
not let me dread in the depth of the night to see the shade of Godwin,
and hear his voice say, 'Woman, where is Harold?'"
It was impossible for the Earl's strong understanding to resist the
arguments addressed to it; and, to say truth, he had been more
disturbed that he liked to confess by Edward's sinister forewarnings.
Yet, on the other hand, there were reasons against his acquiescence in
Gurth's proposal. The primary, and, to do him justice, the strongest,
was in his native courage and his generous pride. Should he for the
first time in his life shrink from a peril in the discharge of his
duty; a peril, too, so uncertain and vague? Should he suffer Gurth to
fulfil the pledge he himself had taken? And granting even that Gurth
were safe from whatever danger he individually might incur, did it
become him to accept the proxy? Would Gurth's voice, too, be as
potent as his own in effecting the return of the hostages?
The next reasons that swayed him were those he could not avow. In
clearing his way to the English throne, it would be of no mean
importance to secure the friendship of the Norman Duke, and the Norman
acquiescence in his pretensions; it would be of infinite service to
remove those prepossessions against his House, which were still rife
with the Normans, who retained a bitter remembrance of their
countrymen decimated [177], it was said, with the concurrence if not
at the order of Godwin, when they accompanied the ill-fated Alfred to
the English shore, and who were yet sore with their old expulsion from
the English court at the return of his father and himself.
Though it could not enter into his head that William, possessing no
party whatever in England, could himself aspire to the English crown,
yet at Edward's death, there might be pretenders whom the Norman arms
could find ready excuse to sanction. There was the boy Atheling, on
the one side, there was the valiant Norwegian King Hardrada on the
other, who might revive the claims of his predecessor Magnus as heir
to the rights of Canute. So near and so formidable a neighbour as the
Court of the Normans, every object of policy led him to propitiate;
and Gurth, with his unbending hate of all that was Norman, was not, at
least, the most politic envoy he could select for that end. Add to
this, that despite their present reconciliation, Harold could never
long count upon amity with Tostig: and Tostig's connection with
William, through their marriages into the House of Baldwin, was full
of danger to a new throne, to which Tostig would probably be the most
turbulent subject: the influence of this connection how desirable to
counteract! [178]
Nor could Harold, who, as patriot and statesman, felt deeply the
necessity of reform and regeneration in the decayed edifice of the
English monarchy, willingly lose an occasion to witness all that
William had done to raise so high in renown and civilisation, in
martial fame and commercial prosperity, that petty duchy, which he had
placed on a level with the kingdoms of the Teuton and the Frank.
Lastly, the Normans were the special darlings of the Roman Church.
William had obtained the dispensation to his own marriage with
Matilda; and might not the Norman influence, duly conciliated, back
the prayer which Harold trusted one day to address to the pontiff, and
secure to him the hallowed blessing, without which ambition lost its
charm, and even a throne its splendour?
All these considerations, therefore, urged the Earl to persist in his
original purpose: but a warning voice in his heart, more powerful than
all, sided with the prayer of Githa, and the arguments of Gurth. In
this state of irresolution, Gurth said seasonably:
"Bethink thee, Harold, if menaced but with peril to thyself, thou
wouldst have a brave man's right to resist us; but it was of 'great
evil to England' that Edward spoke, and thy reflection must tell thee,
that in this crisis of our country, danger to thee is evil to England
--evil to England thou hast no right to incur."
"Dear mother, and generous Gurth," said Harold, then joining the two
in one embrace, "ye have well nigh conquered. Give me but two days to
ponder well, and be assured that I will not decide from the rash
promptings of an ill-considered judgment."
Farther than this they could not then move the Earl; but Gurth was
pleased shortly afterwards to see him depart to Edith, whose fears,
from whatever source they sprang, would, he was certain, come in aid
of his own pleadings.
But as the Earl rode alone towards the once stately home of the
perished Roman, and entered at twilight the darkening forest-land, his
thoughts were less on Edith than on the Vala, with whom his ambition
had more and more connected his soul. Perplexed by his doubts, and
left dim in the waning lights of human reason, never more
involuntarily did he fly to some guide to interpret the future, and
decide his path.
As if fate itself responded to the cry of his heart, he suddenly came
in sight of Hilda herself, gathering leaves from elm and ash amidst
the woodland.
He sprang from his horse and approached her.
"Hilda," said he, in a low but firm voice, "thou hast often told me
that the dead can advise the living. Raise thou the Scin-laeca of the
hero of old--raise the Ghost, which mine eye, or my fancy, beheld
before, vast and dim by the silent bautastein, and I will stand by thy
side. Fain would I know if thou hast deceived me and thyself; or if,
in truth, to man's guidance Heaven doth vouchsafe saga and rede from
those who have passed into the secret shores of Eternity."
"The dead," answered Hilda, "will not reveal themselves to eyes
uninitiate save at their own will, uncompelled by charm and rune. To
me their forms can appear distinct through the airy flame; to me, duly
prepared by spells that purge the eye of the spirit, and loosen the
walls of the flesh. I cannot say that what I see in the trance and
the travail of my soul, thou also wilt behold; or even when the vision
hath passed from my sight, and the voice from my ear, only memories,
confused and dim, of what I saw and heard, remain to guide the waking
and common life. But thou shalt stand by my side while I invoke the
phantom, and hear and interpret the words which rush from my lips, and
the runes that take meaning from the sparks of the charmed fire. I
knew ere thou camest, by the darkness and trouble of Edith's soul,
that some shade from the Ash-tree of Life had fallen upon thine."
Then Harold related what had passed, and placed before Hilda the
doubts that beset him.
The Prophetess listened with earnest attention; but her mind, when not
under its more mystic influences, being strongly biassed by its
natural courage and ambition, she saw at a glance all the advantages
towards securing the throne predestined to Harold, which might be
effected by his visit to the Norman court, and she held in too great
disdain both the worldly sense and the mystic reveries of the monkish
king (for the believer in Odin was naturally incredulous of the
visitation of the Christian saints) to attach much weight to his
dreary predictions.
The short reply she made was therefore not calculated to deter Harold
from the expedition in dispute. But she deferred till the following
night, and to wisdom more dread than her own, the counsels that should
sway his decision.
With a strange satisfaction at the thought that he should, at least,
test personally the reality of those assumptions of preternatural
power which had of late coloured his resolves and oppressed his heart,
Harold then took leave of the Vala, who returned mechanically to her
employment; and, leading his horse by the reins, lowly continued his
musing way towards the green knoll and its heathen ruins. But ere he
gained the hillock, and while his thoughtful eyes were bent on the
ground, he felt his arm seized tenderly--turned--and beheld Edith's
face full of unutterable and anxious love.
With that love, indeed, there was blended so much wistfulness, so much
fear, that Harold exclaimed:
"Soul of my soul, what hath chanced? what affects thee thus?"
"Hath no danger befallen thee?" asked Edith falteringly, and gazing on
his face with wistful, searching eyes. "Danger! none, sweet
trembler," answered the Earl, evasively.
Edith dropped her eager looks, and clinging to his arm, drew him on
silently into the forest land. She paused at last where the old
fantastic trees shut out the view of the ancient ruins; and when,
looking round, she saw not those grey gigantic shafts which mortal
hand seemed never to have piled together, she breathed more freely.
"Speak to me," then said Harold, bending his face to hers; "why this
silence?"
"Ah, Harold!" answered his betrothed, "thou knowest that ever since we
have loved one another, my existence hath been but a shadow of thine;
by some weird and strange mystery, which Hilda would explain by the
stars or the fates, that have made me a part of thee, I know by the
lightness or gloom of my own spirit when good or ill shall befall
thee. How often, in thine absence, hath a joy suddenly broke upon me;
and I felt by that joy, as by the smile of a good angel, that thou
hast passed safe through some peril, or triumphed over some foe! And
now thou askest me why I am so sad;--I can only answer thee by saying,
that the sadness is cast upon me by some thunder gloom on thine own
destiny."
Harold had sought Edith to speak of his meditated journey, but seeing
her dejection he did not dare; so he drew her to his breast, and chid
her soothingly for her vain apprehensions. But Edith would not be
comforted; there seemed something weighing on her mind and struggling
to her lips, not accounted for merely by sympathetic forebodings; and
at length, as he pressed her to tell all, she gathered courage and
spoke:
"Do not mock me," she said, "but what secret, whether of vain folly or
of meaning fate, should I hold from thee? All this day I struggled in
vain against the heaviness of my forebodings. How I hailed the sight
of Gurth thy brother! I besought him to seek thee--thou hast seen
him."
"I have!" said Harold. "But thou wert about to tell me of something
more than this dejection."
"Well," resumed Edith, "after Gurth left me, my feet sought
involuntarily the hill on which we have met so often. I sate down
near the old tomb, a strange weariness crept on my eyes, and a sleep
that seemed not wholly sleep fell over me. I struggled against it, as
if conscious of some coming terror; and as I struggled, and ere I
slept, Harold,--yes, ere I slept,--I saw distinctly a pale and
glimmering figure rise from the Saxon's grave. I saw--I see it still!
Oh, that livid front, those glassy eyes!"
"The figure of a warrior?" said Harold, startled.
"Of a warrior, armed as in the ancient days, armed like the warrior
that Hilda's maids are working for thy banner. I saw it; and in one
hand it held a spear, and in the other a crown."
"A crown!--Say on, say on."
"I saw no more; sleep, in spite of myself, fell on me, a sleep full of
confused and painful--rapid and shapeless images, still at last this
dream rose clear. I beheld a bright and starry shape, that seemed as
a spirit, yet wore thine aspect, standing on a rock; and an angry
torrent rolled between the rock and the dry safe land. The waves
began to invade the rock, and the spirit unfurled its wings as to
flee. And then foul things climbed up from the slime of the rock, and
descended from the mists of the troubled skies, and they coiled round
the wings and clogged them."
"Then a voice cried in my ear,--'Seest thou not on the perilous rock
the Soul of Harold the Brave?--seest thou not that the waters engulf
it, if the wings fail to flee? Up, Truth, whose strength is in
purity, whose image is woman, and aid the soul of the brave!' I
sought to spring to thy side; but I was powerless, and behold, close
beside me, through my sleep as through a veil, appeared the shafts of
the ruined temple in which I lay reclined. And, methought, I saw
Hilda sitting alone by the Saxon's grave, and pouring from a crystal
vessel black drops into a human heart which she held in her hands: and
out of that heart grew a child, and out of that child a youth, with
dark mournful brow. And the youth stood by thy side and whispered to
thee: and from his lips there came a reeking smoke, and in that smoke
as in a blight the wings withered up. And I heard the Voice say,
'Hilda, it is thou that hast destroyed the good angel, and reared from
the poisoned heart the loathsome tempter!' And I cried aloud, but it
was too late; the waves swept over thee, and above the waves there
floated an iron helmet, and on the helmet was a golden crown--the
crown I had seen in the hand of the spectre!"
"But this is no evil dream, my Edith," said Harold, gaily.
Edith, unheeding him, continued:
"I started from my sleep. The sun was still high--the air lulled and
windless. Then through the shafts and down the hill there glided in
that clear waking daylight, a grisly shape like that which I have
heard our maidens say the witch-hags, sometimes seen in the forest,
assume; yet in truth, it seemed neither of man nor woman. It turned
its face once towards me, and on that hideous face were the glee and
hate of a triumphant fiend. Oh, Harold, what should all this
portend?"
"Hast thou not asked thy kinswoman, the diviner of dreams?"
"I asked Hilda, and she, like thee, only murmured, 'The Saxon crown!'
But if there be faith in those airy children of the night, surely, O
adored one, the vision forebodes danger, not to life, but to soul; and
the words I heard seemed to say that thy wings were thy valour, and
the Fylgia thou hadst lost was,--no, that were impossible--"
"That my Fylgia was TRUTH, which losing, I were indeed lost to thee.
Thou dost well," said Harold, loftily, "to hold that among the lies of
the fancy. All else may, perchance, desert me, but never mine own
free soul. Self-reliant hath Hilda called me in mine earlier days,
and wherever fate casts me,--in my truth, and my love, and my
dauntless heart, I dare both man and the fiend."
Edith gazed a moment in devout admiration on the mien of her hero-
lover, then she drew closer and closer to his breast, consoled and
believing.
