Guthlac's name as the
saviors of England, and went home again, chanting so sweetly their thanks
to Heaven for their safety, that the wild Vikings were awed, and agreed
that St. Guthlac's men were wise folk and open-hearted, and that it was a
shame to do them harm.
But plunder they must have.
"And plunder you shall have!" said Hereward, as a sudden thought struck
him. "I will show you the way to the Golden Borough,--the richest minster
in England; and all the treasures of the Golden Borough shall be yours, if
you will treat Englishmen as friends, and spare the people of the fens."
It was a great crime in the eyes of men of that time. A great crime, taken
simply, in Hereward's own eyes. But necessity knows no law. Something the
Danes must have, and ought to have; and St. Peter's gold was better in
their purses than in that of Thorold and his French monks.
So he led them across the fens and side rivers, till they came into the
old Nene, which men call Catwater and Muscal now.
As he passed Nomanslandhirne, and the mouth of the Crowland river, he
trembled, and trusted that the Danes did not know that they were within
three miles of St. Guthlac's sanctuary. But they went on ignorant, and up
the Muscal till they saw St. Peter's towers on the wooded rise, and behind
them the great forest which now is Milton Park.
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