ingled with shrieks. Sword, battle-axe, and spear did their
deadly work through and above the palisade; arrows rained down from
the roof and windows on the assailants, women and boys doing their
part in that manner, while the men did theirs with battle-axe and
sword on the bulwarks. In one or two places the palisade threatened to
give way, and at last three or four stakes were dragged out in one
spot, blow after blow of the axe was spent upon the yielding fabric,
and a breach was effected.

The Etheling perceived it, and rushed to the scene just as two or
three of the English, less used to arms, were yielding before the
ponderous weapons of the Danes. Throwing himself into the breach, his
practised arm made a desert around him. Of immense muscular strength,
his blows came down like the fabled hammer of Thor, crushing helmet
and breastplate alike before the well-tempered steel of his favourite
weapon. The foe were driven back, and for one moment he stood in the
breach alone.

Then and then only was he recognised.

"The gleeman! the false gleeman the Etheling Edmund!" in various
energetic cries, attested his fame, and the hatred of his foes.

"Yes, dogs, ye know me, and the prize ye have to win. Back, drunkards
and cannibals, back to your royal parricide with the gleeman's
greetings, and tell him Hela is waiting for him and his friend the
accursed Edric."

A shower of arrows was the only answer, but they missed the joints,
and rattled harmlessly from the well-tempered armour which Edmund
wore. Still the position was critical, and Alfgar, with gentle
violence, persuaded him to descend from his perilous position.

Here the attack was foiled, and foiled so decidedly, that the ditch
was actually half filled with corpses. Cries of distress arose from
the opposite side, but Edmund's arm restored the balance there, so
great was the influence of one man, and so great the power of physical
force in the desperate conflicts of that day.

Foiled at every point, the invaders were driven from the embankment.
It was evident that they had miscalculated the forces of the
defenders, and that they had advanced beyond their main body in
insufficient strength to take the place by assault. Could they have
supplied the place of the fallen by fresh men, until they had wearied
the defenders out, they would have succeeded, but they were evidently
not in strength to do this so they slowly yielded, until the deadly
struggle ceased, and sile