ersaries, according to Diodorus Siculus; and as Francis I. will do
later when at feud with Charles V. He was to die in an expedition
undertaken out of revenge for an epigram of the king of France, and to
make good his retort.

The evening of the 14th of October, 1066, saw the fate of England
decided. The issue of the battle was doubtful. William, by a series of
ingenious ideas, secured the victory. His foes were the victims of his
cleverness; they were "ingenio circumventi, ingenio victi."[137] He
ordered his soldiers to simulate a flight; he made his archers shoot
upwards, so that the arrows falling down among the Saxons wrought great
havoc. One of them put out Harold's eye; the English chief fell by his
standard, and soon after the battle was over, the most memorable ever
won by an army of Frenchmen.

The duke had vowed to erect on the field of the fight an abbey to St.
Martin of Tours. He kept his word, but the building never bore among men
the name of the saint; it received and has retained to this day the
appellation of "Battle." Its ruins, preserved with pious care, overlook
the dales where the host of the Conqueror gathered for the attack. Far
off through the hills, then covered by the yellowing leaves of the
forest of Anderida, glistens, between earth and sky, the grey sea that
brought over the Norman fleet eighteen centuries ago. Heaps of stones,
overgrown with ivy, mark the place where Harold fell, the last king of
English blood who ever sat upon the throne of Great Britain. It is a
secluded spot; large cedars, alders, and a tree with white foliage form
a curtain, and shut off from the outer world the scene of the terrible
tragedy. A solemn silence reigns; nothing is visible through the
branches, save the square tower of the church of Battle, and the only
sound that floats upwards is that of the old clock striking the hours.
Ivy and climbing roses cling to the grey stones and fall in light
clusters along the low walls of the crypt; the roses shed their leaves,
and the soft autumn breeze scatters the white petals on the grass,
amidst fragments to which is attached one of the greatest memories in
the history of humanity.

The consequences of "the Battle" were indeed immense, far more important
than those of Agincourt or Austerlitz: a whole nation was transformed
and became a new one. The vanquished Anglo-Saxons no more knew how to
defend themselves and unite against the French than they had formerly
known how