again renewed his challenge. A second rode forth and shared
the same fate. The rest of the English horsemen stared at each other
aghast; the shouting, singing, juggling giant seemed to them not knight,
but demon; and that single incident, preliminary to all other battle, in
sight of the whole field, might have sufficed to damp the ardour of the
English, had not Leofwine, who had been despatched by the King with a
message to the entrenchments, come in front of the detachment; and, his
gay spirit roused and stung by the insolence of the Norman, and the
evident dismay of the Saxon riders, without thought of his graver duties,
he spurred his light half-mailed steed to the Norman giant; and, not even
drawing his sword, but with his spear raised over his head, and his form
covered by his shield, he cried in Romance tongue, "Go and chaunt to the
foul fiend, O croaking minstrel!" Taillefer rushed forward, his sword
shivered on the Saxon shield, and in the same moment he fell a corpse
under the hoofs of his steed, transfixed by the Saxon spear.

A cry of woe, in which even William (who, proud of his poet's
achievements, had pressed to the foremost line to see this new encounter)
joined his deep voice, wailed through the Norman ranks; while Leofwine
rode deliberately towards them, halted a moment, and then flung his spear
in the midst with so deadly an aim, that a young knight, within two of
William, reeled on his saddle, groaned, and fell.

"How like ye, O Normans, the Saxon gleeman?" said Leofwine, as he turned
slowly, regained the detachment, and bade them heed carefully the orders
they had received, viz., to avoid the direct charge of the Norman horse,
but to take every occasion to harass and divert the stragglers; and then
blithely singing a Saxon stave, as if inspired by Norman minstrelsy, he
rode into the entrenchments.

CHAPTER VIII.

The two brethren of Waltham, Osgood and Ailred, had arrived a little
after daybreak at the spot in which, about half a mile, to the rear of
Harold's palisades, the beasts of burden that had borne the heavy arms,
missiles, luggage, and forage of the Saxon march, were placed in and
about the fenced yards of a farm. And many human beings, of both sexes
and various ranks, were there assembled, some in breathless expectation,
some in careless talk, some in fervent prayer.

The master of the farm, his sons, and the able-bodied ceorls in his
employ, had joined the forces of the King,