in him; the taste of the
Anglo-Saxons was directed more to peaceful enjoyments than to
ceaseless wars. At this moment too they were weakened by great losses
in the last bloody war; many of the most trustworthy and bravest had
fallen, others wavered in their fidelity; Harold had not been able to
put even the coasts in a state of defence; William landed without
resistance, to demand his crown from him. When reminded of his promise
Harold was believed to have answered in the very spirit of Anglo-Saxon
independence, that he had no right to make any such promise without
the consent of the Anglo-Saxon chiefs and people. And not to meet the
invading foe instantly at the sword's point would have seemed to him
disgraceful cowardice. And so William and Harold, the North French
knights and the national war-array of the Anglo-Saxons, encountered at
Hastings. Harold fell at the very beginning of the fight. The Normans,
according to their wont, knew how to separate their enemies by a
pretended flight, and then by a sudden return to surround and destroy
them in isolated bodies. It was the iron-clad, yet rapidly moving
cavalry, which decided the battle.[17]

William expected, now that his rival had fallen, to be recognised by
the Anglo-Saxons as their King. Instead of this the chiefs and the
capital raised Edgar the Aetheling, grandson of Edmund Ironsides, to
the throne: as though William would retire before a scion of the old
West-Saxon house, of which he professed to be the champion. He held
firmly to the transfer made to him by the last king without regard to
any third person, ratified as it was by the Roman See, and marched on
the capital.

Edgar was a boy, and the magnates were at variance as to who should
have the authority to exercise guardianship over him. When William
appeared before the city, and threatened the walls with his
siege-machines, it too lost courage. The embassy which it sent him was
amazed at the grandeur and splendour of his appearance, was convinced
as to the right which King Edward had transferred to him,[18] and
penetrated by the danger which a resistance, in itself hopeless, would
bring on the city. Aldermen and people abandoned Edgar, and recognised
William as King. There is an old story, that the county of Kent, on
capitulating, made good conditions for itself. To the nobles also, who
submitted by degrees, similar terms may have been accorded, but their
position was almost entirely altered. We need notic