on their protection, and
that they, esteemed by the world as outlaws, were his chosen
guardians. They felt indeed, now, that they were not outlaws, but
patriots fighting against successful tyrants--the foes of their
country; even as the brave Hereward (so they had heard) was
fighting in the Camp of Refuge, amongst the fens of East Anglia.

And for Wilfred, the representative of a house which had ruled them
for centuries, the son of their lamented lord, who had died so
bravely at Senlac, they would one and all, if necessary, lay down
their lives.

On the morrow, at eventide, Father Kenelm returned from Aescendune,
horror struck, and brought the news of the burning of the abbey and
the lamentable fate of his brethren.

There was not an Englishman whose heart was not moved with
indignation and pity, nor one who failed to lay the burden of the
deed where our readers have long since, we doubt not, laid it--on
the head of Hugo.

Hence those terrible reprisals our pages have recorded--hence no
mercy was shown to the merciless; and the war between the baron and
his revolted dependants became one of extermination.

Every day brought accessions to their number; they were in
communication with similar centres of disaffection in all parts of
the midlands; and they confidently hoped for the day when the
Normans should be expelled, and England be England again.

So Wilfred regarded his banishment in the forest as a temporary one
at the best, and no longer looked for the aid of Normans, lay or
ecclesiastical, to avenge his mother's wrongs and his own; he would
vindicate them by the strong hand.

He was now eighteen years of age, practised in all manly sports and
warlike exercises, braced by daily use to support fatigue in mind
and body, and every day rendered him more qualified to be the
leader of his own people in the desperate warfare which lay between
them and their rights.

He shared their hardships, fared as they did, exposed himself as
far as they would permit him to every peril, and was modest enough
(unlike his Norman rival) to be guided by the advice of his elders,
the wisest of his late father's retainers.

One fault--and one the youthful reader will, we fear, look very
lightly upon--was gaining upon him--a deep and deadly hatred to
everything Norman. It was even rumoured that, like Hannibal of old,
he had vowed an undying hostility to the foes of his country and
his house; if so, our pages will show how he kept