The Norman infantry had now recoiled, and the turn of the cavalry was come. The choicest chivalry of Normandy, however, strove in vain uphill against the English defences, and many a horse and his mail-clad rider fell beneath the axes. Harold’s choice of a battle-ground and his defensive tactics were fully justified, and the Battle of Senlac would have been his but for the fatal impetuosity of a portion of his less disciplined troops, who, seeing the panic and headlong flight of the Norman army, broke their ranks in pursuit. The temptation was great, for everywhere the Normans were in flight, and the awful cry had been raised among them that William himself was dead. It was only by removing his helmet and disclosing his face that his men were assured of his existence. “Madmen!” he cried. “Why flee ye? Death is behind, victory before you. I live, and by God’s grace I will conquer,” and so saying he forced those immediately around him back into the fray.
This incident has been carefully pictured in the Bayeux Tapestry, where we see “the Duke comforting his young soldiers” by disclosing his face, while his standard-bearer draws attention to him. The impressiveness of the scene is perhaps a little marred by the grotesque drawing, and by the extraordinary likeness of “the Duke” to Mr. Arthur Roberts, and of one of the “young soldiers” to accepted caricatures of Mr. Austen Chamberlain.
“DUKE WILLIAM COMFORTS HIS YOUNG SOLDIERS.”
Central incident of the Battle of Hastings. From the Bayeux Tapestry.
Meanwhile the flying Norman infantry had in other parts of the field turned upon their pursuers, and here the sword proved the better weapon, for the rash English were cut to pieces. Then, somewhere about three o’clock in the afternoon, began the most terrible attack of that dreadful day, in the desperate charge made by William, his brothers Odo and Robert, and their attendant knights, against the sturdy group around Harold and the English standard. William, on horseback, sought out the English King, and might have met him face to face, had not the King’s brother, Gurth, flung a spear at him, which, although it missed the greater mark, brought down his horse. Unlucky, ill-aimed blow! It brought Gurth and William face to face, afoot, and presently the English Earl was lying dead from a blow of the Duke’s mace. Near by, and almost at the same time, fell Harold’s other brother, Leofwin. The English fortunes were indeed running low, but the battle was not yet decided. Still that devoted phalanx of axemen hewed down most of those who approached, and the day was neither lost nor won. It was then that the ill-judged pursuit made by the English a little earlier bore bitter fruit—the sorrow of it! William had noted its effect, and now that his direct attacks were like to fail, he had recourse to the wily trick of a feigned flight. Accordingly, to his instructions, a wing of his army turned tail and fled, as though in panic; and immediately, learning nothing from that earlier disaster, a portion of the English came down after them. It was the turning-point of the day, for the ground the English had left was just the one end of the hill where the rise was appreciably less steep, and more easily to be charged up by the Norman cavalry. The fight down in the valley between the pretended fugitives and their pursuers meanwhile went forward with varying fortunes. The flying Frenchmen turned, as before, but this time the English seized on an outlying hill, and although they fell, they fell in company with their foes. In their turn, they inveigled the French horsemen into charging upon them into an unsuspected ravine, where they fell in a mass and were despatched to the last man, so that the old chroniclers tell us, and the Bayeux Tapestry shows, how the hollow was filled with the dead.
LAST STAND OF THE ENGLISH.
Bayeux Tapestry.
William and the pick of his army now beset the hill from its western slope, thus left open by the descent of the pursuing English, and here, and along the ridge to the very spot where Harold stood, wielding his axe with the best of them beneath his standard, the fight stubbornly continued. The autumn day was now fast drawing to its close, and the battle might have been still undecided that night, had it not been for an inspiration that seized William. His archers had hitherto not made any great impression. He now ordered them to shoot their arrows into the air, so that they might descend with terrific force upon the heads of the English; and this done, the execution was dreadful. Many were struck in the eye by the falling shafts, among them Harold, the English King himself. An arrow pierced his right eye, and as he agonisedly strove to withdraw it, the shaft broke. Let us not enlarge upon this dreadful end of the patriot King, who was presently discovered and slain by the Norman knights as he lay upon the ground at the foot of his royal banner.