ly, apart from all the other children, and
employed in needlework.

When Alred approached the Atheling, with a blending of reverent obeisance
and paternal cordiality, the boy carelessly cried, in a barbarous jargon,
half German, half Norman-French:

"There, come not too near, you scare my hawk. What are you doing? You
trample my toys, which the good Norman bishop William sent me as a gift
from the Duke. Art thou blind, man?"

"My son," said the prelate kindly, "these are the things of
childhood--childhood ends sooner with princes than with common men.
Leave thy lure and thy toys, and welcome these noble thegns, and address
them, so please you, in our own Saxon tongue."

"Saxon tongue!--language of villeins! not I. Little do I know of it,
save to scold a ceorl or a nurse. King Edward did not tell me to learn
Saxon, but Norman! and Godfroi yonder says, that if I know Norman well,
Duke William will make me his knight. But I don't desire to learn
anything more to-day." And the child turned peevishly from thegn and
prelate.

The three Saxon lords interchanged looks of profound displeasure and
proud disgust. But Harold, with an effort over himself, approached, and
said winningly:

"Edgar the Atheling, thou art not so young but thou knowest already that
the great live for others. Wilt thou not be proud to live for this fair
country, and these noble men, and to speak the language of Alfred the
Great?"

"Alfred the Great! they always weary me with Alfred the Great," said the
boy, pouting. "Alfred the Great, he is the plague of my life! if I am
Atheling, men are to live for me, not I for them; and if you tease me any
more, I will run away to Duke William in Rouen; Godfroi says I shall
never be teased there!"

So saying, already tired of hawk and lure, the child threw himself on the
floor with the other children, and snatched the toys from their hands.

The serious Margaret then rose quietly, and went to her brother, and
said, in good Saxon:

"Fie! if you behave thus, I shall call you NIDDERING!" At the threat of
that word, the vilest in the language--that word which the lowest ceorl
would forfeit life rather than endure--a threat applied to the Atheling
of England, the descendant of Saxon heroes--the three thegns drew close,
and watched the boy, hoping to see that he would start to his feet with
wrath and in shame.

"Call me what you will, silly sister," said the child, indifferently, "I
am not so Saxon as