of arrows should be directed so as to fall on the heads of the closely packed Saxons. Then the fatal fortune of the day took place. An arrow pierced the eye of the English king, who fell at the moment to the ground. His brothers Gurth and Leofric fell with him, but he rallied and continued to fight. Now it was that twenty Norman Knights bound themselves with a vow to bear off the Saxon standard or perish in their attempt. In this hazardous enterprise many fell, but the rest hacking out a path with their swords, bore off the prize. In its defence the already wounded Harold fell. An armed man struck him on the ventail of his helmet and beat him to the ground, and as he sought to rise, a Knight struck him down again, cutting his thigh to the bone. The Abbey was afterwards raised on this site, and the high altar marked the spot where the Saxon king expired. From this time the tide of battle turned against the Saxons. The ruling spirit of the latter was dead, but his patriotic warriors still fought, more with the energy of despair than with the encouragement of hope. The battle continued until darkness set in, but after the fall of Harold it became a series of private combats which were only arrested by the arrival of night. The remnant of the Saxons fled to the woods, and William passed the night in the tent, feasting with his chiefs on the spot where the standard of Harold had waved throughout the day. The Sabbath sun rose on a gloomy picture. The Normans had lost 6,000 men, whilst the loss of the Saxons was never known. The melancholy rites of sepulchre had now to be performed, and Odo having laid aside his warlike baton, conducted the masses for the dead; which, being completed, William returned to his camp at Hastings.
There are great doubts as to the place in which Harold was buried. William of Malmsbury said his body was given up to his mother, to be buried at Waltham, and Wace says the same. But the greater number of the chroniclers state that he was buried on the cliff in the camp at Hastings, and one of them gives this inscription as carved on his tomb:-“By order of the Duke, you rest here King Harold, to guard the shore and sea”
“Oh! mighty Caesar, dost thou lie so low?
Are all thy conquests, glories, triumphs, spoils,
Shrunk to this little measure? Fare thee well.”
“The Normans advanced” (said the lecturer) “and before them rode a knight who played with his sword, and chanted the song of Roland and Charlemagne.” &c. It so happens a mere coincidence that a son of the present writer is named Roland and a grandson named Norman. But^nbsp;-
