“Why should we trouble what he may think or say?”
“Because the Witan has not yet met, and until it has gone through the form, the mere form, of recognising your title, you are not actually king. Dunstan has some influence. Suppose he should use it for Edgar?”
“Edgar, the pale-faced little priestling!”
“All the better for that in Dunstan’s eyes. Nay, be advised, my king; keep all things quiet until the coronation is over, then let Dunstan know who you are and who he is.”
“Indeed I will. He shall have cause to rue his insolent behaviour the other night.”
“Bide your time, my liege; and now the great officers of state require your presence below.”
A few days later a sorrowful procession entered the old city of Winchester, the capital of Wessex, and once a favourite residence of Edred, now to be his last earthly resting place. Much had the citizens loved him; and as the long train defiled into the open space around the old minster—old, even then—the vast assemblage, grouped beneath the trees around the sacred precincts, lifted up their voices and joined in the funeral hymn, while many wept tears of genuine sorrow. It was awe inspiring, that burst of tuneful wailing, as the monks entered the sacred pile, and it made men’s hearts thrill with the sense of the unseen world into which their king had entered, and where, as they believed, their supplications might yet follow him.
There were the chief mourners—Edwy and Edgar—and they followed the royal corpse, the latter greatly afflicted, and shedding genuine tears of sorrow—and the royal household. All the nobility of Wessex, and many of the nobles from Mercia and other provinces, were gathered together, and amidst the solemn silence of the vast crowd, Dunstan performed the last sad and solemn rites with a broken voice; while the archbishop—Odo the Good, as he was frequently called—assisted in the dread solemnity.
It was over; the coffin was lowered to the royal vaults to repose in peace, the incenses had ceased to float dreamily beneath the lofty roof,[xi] the various lights which had borne part in the ceremony were extinguished, the choral anthem had ceased, for Edred slept with his fathers.
And outside, the future king was welcomed with loud cries of “God save King Edwy, and make him just as Alfred, pious as Edred, and warlike as Athelstane!”