; "strike, O King, for thy crown!"

Harold's hand griped Haco's arm convulsively; he lowered his axe, turned
round, and passed shudderingly away.

Both armies now paused from the attack; for both were thrown into great
disorder, and each gladly gave respite to the other, to re-form its own
shattered array.

The Norsemen were not the soldiers to yield because their leader was
slain--rather the more resolute to fight, since revenge was now added to
valour; yet, but for the daring and promptness with which Tostig had cut
his way to the standard, the day had been already decided.

During the pause, Harold summoning Gurth, said to him in great emotion,
"For the sake of Nature, for the love of God, go, O Gurth,--go to Tostig;
urge him, now Hardrada is dead, urge him to peace. All that we can
proffer with honour, proffer--quarter and free retreat to every Norseman
[248]. Oh, save me, save us, from a brother's blood!"

Gurth lifted his helmet, and kissed the mailed hand that grasped his own.

"I go," said he. And so, bareheaded, and with a single trumpeter, he
went to the hostile lines.

Harold awaited him in great agitation; nor could any man have guessed
what bitter and awful thoughts lay in that heart, from which, in the way
to power, tie after tie had been wrenched away. He did not wait long;
and even before Gurth rejoined him, he knew by an unanimous shout of
fury, to which the clash of countless shields chimed in, that the mission
had been in vain.

Tostig had refused to hear Gurth, save in presence of the Norwegian
chiefs; and when the message had been delivered, they all cried, "We
would rather fall one across the corpse of the other [249], than leave a
field in which our King was slain."

"Ye hear them," said Tostig; "as they speak, speak I."

"Not mine this guilt, too, O God!" said Harold, solemnly lifting his hand
on high. "Now, then, to duty."

By this time the Norwegian reinforcements had arrived from the ships, and
this for a short time rendered the conflict, that immediately ensued,
uncertain and critical. But Harold's generalship was now as consummate
as his valour had been daring. He kept his men true to their
irrefragable line. Even if fragments splintered off, each fragment threw
itself into the form of the resistless wedge. One Norwegian, standing on
the bridge of Stanford, long guarded that pass; and no less than forty
Saxons are said to have perished by his arm. To him the English King