" [Footnote: There was a general rumor abroad
that the end of the world was at hand, that the "one thousand years" of
prophecy had expired.]
"A great battle has been fought at a place they call Heathfield."
"Close by Hastings? Close to the landing-place? Harold must have flown
thither back from York. What a captain the man is, after all."
"Was. He is dead, and all the Godwinssons, and England lost."
If Torfrida had feared the effect of her news, her heart was lightened at
once as Hereward answered haughtily,--
"England lost? Sussex is not England, nor Wessex either, any more than
Harold was king thereof. England lost? Let the tanner try to cross the
Watling street, and he will find out that he has another stamp of
Englishmen to deal with."
"Hereward, Hereward, do not be unjust to the dead. Men say--the Normans
say--that they fought like heroes."
"I never doubted that; but it makes me mad--as it does all Eastern and
Northern men--to hear these Wessex churls and Godwinssons calling
themselves all England."
Torfrida shook her head. To her, as to most foreigners, Wessex and the
southeast counties were England; the most civilized; the most Norman; the
seat of royalty; having all the prestige of law, and order, and wealth.
And she was shrewd enough to see, that as it was the part of England which
had most sympathy with Norman civilization, it was the very part where the
Norman could most easily gain and keep his hold.
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