Their struggle had only helped to tighten their
bonds; and what wonder? There was among them neither unity nor plan nor
governing mind and will. Hereward's words had come true. The only man,
save Gospatrick, who had a head in England, was Harold Godwinsson: and he
lay in Waltham Abbey, while the monks sang masses for his soul.
Edwin, Morcar, and Waltheof trembled before a genius superior to their
own,--a genius, indeed, which had not its equal then in Christendom. They
came in and begged grace of the king. They got it. But Edwin's earldom was
forfeited, and he and his brother became, from thenceforth, desperate men.
Malcolm of Scotland trembled likewise, and asked for peace. The clans, it
is said, rejoiced thereat, having no wish for a war which could buy them
neither spoil nor land. Malcolm sent ambassadors to William, and took that
oath of fealty to the "Basileus of Britain," which more than one Scottish
king and kinglet had taken before,--with the secret proviso (which, during
the Middle Ages, seems to have been thoroughly understood in such cases by
both parties), that he should be William's man just as long as William
could compel him to be so, and no longer.
Then came cruel and unjust confiscations. Ednoth the standard-bearer had
fallen at Bristol, fighting for William against the Haroldssons, yet all
his lands were given away to Normans.
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