"'He that hath failed in a little thing
Hath a sign upon the brow;
And the Earls of the Great Army
Have no such seal to show....
... I am the first king known of heaven
That has been struck like a slave.'"
He takes the blow as a good omen:
"'For he that is struck for an ill servant
Should be a kind lord.'"
He collects his followers and they go roaring over the Roman wall and fall upon the Danes at Ethandune. In the first phase we see Alfred's men waking to the realisation of the high folly of the fight and despair clawing at their hearts.
"For the Saxon Franklin sorrowed
For the things that had been fair,
For the dear dead women, crimson clad,
And the great feasts and the friends he had;
But the Celtic prince's soul was sad
For the things that never were."
Alfred asks for his people's prayers and the Roman Mark proudly says:
"'Lift not my head from bloody ground,
Bear not my body home,
For all the earth is Roman earth
And I shall die in Rome.'"
Harold then comes forward in gay colours smoking with oil and musk, and taunts the ragged Colan with the rusty sword: he takes his bow and shoots an arrow at Colan, who sprang aside and whirled his sword round his head and let it sweep out of his hand on to Harold's head. The Dane fell dead and Alfred gave his own sword to Colan and himself seized a rude axe from a hind hard by and turned to the fray.
In Book VI., "The Slaying of the Chiefs," we are first shown Eldred breaking the sea of spears "As a tall ship breaks the sea."