Four hundred vessels of the largest class, and more than twice that number of the transports of the day, were speedily assembled in the frith of Dives, a stream which falls into the sea between the Seine and Orne. There, for a month or better, by contrary winds and furious storms, they were detained inactive. At length, a southern breeze rose suddenly, and by its aid they made the harbor of Saint Valery; but there, again, they were detained by times more stormy than before; and, superstitious as all men of that period were, the soldiers soon began to tremble and to murmur; strange tales of dreams, and prodigies were circulated, and the spirit of that vast host, of late so confident and proud, sank hourly. At length, whether at the instigation of their own fanatical belief, or as a last resource, or hoping to distract the minds of men from gloomier considerations, the Norman chiefs appointed a procession round the harbor of Saint Valery; bearing the holiest relics, and among them, the bones of the good saint himself, the patron and nomenclator of the town; and ere the prayers were ended, lo! the wind shifted once again, and now blew steadily and fair, swelling the canvass with propitious breath, and driving out each vane and streamer at full length, toward their destined port.
The same storm, which had held William on his Norman coast, windbound and motionless, which he had cursed as unpropitious and disastrous, fifty times every day, for the last month, had been, in truth—so little is the foresight, and so ignorant the wisdom even of the most sagacious among mortals—had been, in truth, the agent by which his future conquest was to be effected. Those gales which pent the Norman galleys in their harbors, had forced the English fleet, shattered and storm-tossed, to put in for victuals and repairs, leaving the seas unguarded to the approach of the invaders. Nor was this all! Those self-same gales had wafted from the northward another fleet of foemen, the Norwegian host of the bold sea-king, Harold Hardrada, and the treacherous Tosti, the rebel brother of the Saxon monarch. Debarking in the Humber, they had laid waste the fertile borders of Northumberland and Yorkshire; had vanquished, in a pitched battle, Morcar and Edwin, and the youthful Waltheof—who had made head against them with their sudden levies, raised from the neighboring countries—had driven them into the walls of York, and there were now besieging them with little hope of rescue or relief. Meanwhile, the king, who had, for months, been lying in the southern portion of the realm, in Essex, Kent, or Sussex, awaiting, at the head of the best warriors of his kingdom, the arrival of his most inveterate foeman—summoned by news of this irruption, unexpected, yet, as it seemed most formidable, into his northern provinces, lulled into temporary carelessness by the long tarrying of his Norman enemy; and hoping, as it indeed seemed probable, that the prevailing wind would not change so abruptly, but that he might, by using some extraordinary diligence and speed, attack and overpower the besieging force at York, and yet return to Dover in time to oppose, with the united force of his whole nation, the disembarkation of the duke—had left his post and travelled with all speed toward York, leading the bravest and best-disciplined of his army against the fierce Norwegians, while the shores of Sussex remained comparatively naked and defenceless. A bloody and decisive battle fought at the bridge of Staneford, over the river Derwent, rewarded his activity and valor—a battle in which he displayed no less his generalship and valor, than the kind generosity and mercy of his nature. Riding, himself, in person, up to the hostile lines, before the first encounter, sheathed in the complete armor of the Norman chivalry—which, since his visit to the continent, he had adopted—“Where,” he cried, in his loudest tones, “is Tosti, son of Godwin?”
“Here stands he,” answered the rebel, from the centre of the Norwegian phalanx, which, with lowered spears, awaited the attack.
“Thy brother,” replied Harold, concealed by the frontlet of his barred helmet from all recognition, “sends thee his greeting—offers thee peace, and friendship, and all thine ancient honors.”
“Good words!” cried Tosti, “mighty good, and widely different from the insults he bestowed on me last year! But if I should accept the offer, what will he grant to Harold, son of Sigurd?”
“Seven feet of English earth,” replied the king; “or, since he be gigantic in his stature, he shall have somewhat more!”
“Let Harold, then address himself to battle,” answered Tosti. “None but a liar ever shall declare that Tosti, son of Godwin, has played a traitor’s part to Harold, son of Sigurd!”
There was no more of parley. With a shock, that was heard for leagues, the hosts encountered; and in the very first encounter, pierced by an arrow in the throat, Hardrada fell, and to his place succeeded that false brother and rebellious subject, Tosti, the Saxon. Again the generous Harold offered him peace and liberal conditions! again his offers were insultingly rejected! and once again, with a more deadly fury than before, the armies met, and, this time, fought it out, till not a leader or a chief of the Norwegian host was left alive, save Olaf, Harold’s son, and the prince bishop of the Orkneys—Tosti, himself, having at length obtained the fate he merited so richly. A third time peace and amity were offered, and now they were accepted; and swearing friendship to the English king for ever, the Norsemen left the fatal land, whereon yet weltered in their gore their king, the noblest of their chiefs, and twice five thousand of the bravest men of their brave nation. But glorious as that day was justly deemed—and widely as it was sung and celebrated by the Saxon bards—perfect as was the safety which it wrought to all the northern counties—and freely as it suffered Harold to turn his undivided forces against whatever foe might dare set hostile foot on English soil inviolate—still was that day decisive of his fate!—decisive of the victory of William, whose banners were already floating over the narrow seas in proud anticipation of their coming triumph!
It was a bright and beauteous morning in September, when the great fleet of William put to sea, the galley of the grand duke leading. She was a tall ship, of the largest tonnage then in use, well manned, and gallantly equipped; from the main-topmast streamed the consecrated banner of the pope, and from her peak, a broad flag with a blood-red cross. Her sails were, not as now, of plain white canvass, but gorgeously adorned with various colors, and blazoned with the rude incipient heraldry, which, though not then a science, was growing gradually into esteem and use. In several places might be seen depicted the three Lions, which were even then the arms of Normandy; and on her prow was carved, with the best skill of the French artist, a young child with a bended bow, and a shaft quivering on the string. Fair blew the breeze, and free the gallant ship careered before it—before the self-same wind which at the self-same moment was tossing on its joyous pinions the victorious banners of the Saxon king. Fair blew the breeze, and fast the ship of William sped through the curling billows—so fast that, ere the sun set in the sea, the fleet was hull down in the offing, though staggering along under all press of sail. Night sank upon the sea; and faster flew the duke; and as the morning broke, the chalky cliffs of Albion were in full view, at two or three leagues distance. William, who had slept all that night as soundly and as calmly as a child, stood on the deck ere it was light enough to see the largest object on the sea, one mile away. His first glance was toward the promised land, he was so swiftly nearing; his second, toward the offing, where he hoped to see his gallant followers. Brighter and brighter grew the morning, but not a speck was visible upon the clear horizon. “Up to the topmast, mariners,” cried the bold duke; “up to the topmast-head! And now what see ye?” he continued, as they sprang up in rapid emulation to that giddy height.
“Naught,” cried the first—“naught but the sea and sky!”