Harold pressed him for some other answer, and he replied, “Take it, Harold, if such be thy will, but the gift will be thy ruin. Against the Duke and his barons no might of thine will avail thee.”
“Fear not for me,” replied Harold, joyfully; “I fear neither Norman, nor aught else.”
“May it fall to the most worthy!” was the faint answer of Edward. His thoughts began to wander, and he uttered many passages of Scripture speaking of desolation and destruction, which were afterward regarded by his subjects as the last prophecies of their saintly king. He died two days afterward, and, on the feast of Epiphany, 1066, Harold assumed the crown. The coronation was solemnized by Alfred, Archbishop of York; but whether the absence of the Primate Stigand was occasioned by his dislike to the usurpation, or by the sentence of excommunication under which he had been laid by the Pope, is not known. Be that as it may, there was little joy to welcome the accession of Harold; the people were full of melancholy forebodings, excited by the predictions of King Edward, as well as by the appearance of a comet, then supposed to denote the approach of misfortune; the great earls, Edwin and Morkar, were his enemies, the nobles envied him, and stood aloof, significantly relating a story of his boyhood, when he is said to have met with a severe fall in a foolish attempt to fly from the top of a tower with wings of his own contrivance. There is a Spanish proverb which, in truth, suited Harold well: “The ant found wings for her destruction.” The bitterest of all his enemies was his own brother, Tostig, who, having been banished partly by his means, on account of his misgovernment of Northumbria, was living in Flanders, whence, the instant he heard of Harold’s coronation, he hastened with the tidings to Normandy; and not thinking William’s preparations speedy enough to satisfy the impatience of his hatred, he went to Norway, where he found a willing ally in Harald Hardrada, the last sea-king.
A curious story is told of the childhood of this Harald Hardrada, who was the half-brother of the kingly St. Olaf, being the son of the haughty Aasta and the peaceful Sigurd Syr. When Harald was about three years old, St. Olaf was on a visit to his mother, and calling to his little brothers, took the two eldest, Guttorm and Halfdan, one on each knee, and looked at them, with a fierce countenance, at which both the little boys were frightened, and ran away to hide themselves. He then took Harald on his knee, and put on the same fierce look at him, but the child looked boldly up in his face in return. As a further trial of his courage, the king pulled his hair, upon which the little fellow undauntedly pulled the king’s whiskers, and Olaf said, “Thou wilt be revengeful, some day, my friend.”
The next day, Olaf found his little brothers at play; the two eldest building little barns and enclosing cornfields, and Harald lying by the side of a pool of water, in which he was floating small chips of wood.
“What are these?” asked the king.
“My ships of war,” said little Harald.
“Ha! my friend,” said the King, “the time may come when thou wilt command ships.”
He then called the other two, and asked Guttorm what he would like best to have.
“Corn land,” said he.