I shall follow my father's, and fight for Sweyn Ulfsson, and
no man else."
"And I," said Waltheof, "shall follow the anointed of the Lord."
"The anointed of Gospatrick and two or three boys!" said Hereward.
"Knights! Turn your horses' heads. Right about face, all! We are going
back to the Bruneswold, to live and die free Danes."
And to Waltheof's astonishment, who had never before seen discipline, the
knights wheeled round; the men-at-arms followed them; and Waltheof and the
Atheling were left to themselves on Lincoln Heath.
CHAPTER XXIV.
HOW ARCHBISHOP ALDRED DIED OF SORROW.
In the tragedies of the next few months Hereward took no part; but they
must be looked at near, in order to understand somewhat of the men who
were afterwards mixed up with him for weal or woe.
When William went back to the South, the confederates, Child Edgar the
Atheling, Gospatrick, and their friends, had come south again from Durham.
It was undignified; a confession of weakness. If a Norman had likened them
to mice coming out when the cat went away, none could blame him. But so
they did; and Osbiorn and his Danes, landing in Humber-mouth, "were met"
(says the Anglo-Saxon chronicle) "by Child Edgar and Earl Waltheof and
Marlesweyn, and Earl Gospatrick with the men of Northumberland, riding and
marching joyfully with an immense army"; not having the spirit of
prophecy, or foreseeing those things which were coming on the earth.
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