st that Algar and Harold were ever opposed in
the Witan, and hot words thou hast heard pass between them!"

"Marry, yes! But Algar was as little match for Earl Harold in speech as
in sword play."

Now again one of the listeners started, (but it was not the same as the
one before,) and muttered an angry exclamation.

"Yet is he a troublesome foe," said Godrith, who did not hear the sound
Vebba had provoked, "and a thorn in the side both of the Earl and of
England; and sorrowful for both England and Earl was it, that Harold
refused to marry Aldyth, as it is said his father, wise Godwin,
counselled and wished."

"Ah! but I have heard scops and harpers sing pretty songs that Harold
loves Edith the Fair, a wondrous proper maiden, they say!"

"It is true; and for the sake of his love, he played ill for his
ambition."

"I like him the better for that," said the honest Kent man: "why does he
not marry the girl at once? she hath broad lands, I know, for they run
from the Sussex shore into Kent."

"But they are cousins five times removed, and the Church forbids the
marriage; nevertheless Harold lives only for Edith; they have exchanged
the true-lofa [145], and it is whispered that Harold hopes the Atheling,
when he comes to be King, will get him the Pope's dispensation. But to
return to Algar; in a day most unlucky he gave his daughter to Gryffyth,
the most turbulent sub-king the land ever knew, who, it is said, will not
be content till he has won all Wales for himself without homage or
service, and the Marches to boot. Some letters between him and Earl
Algar, to whom Harold had secured the earldom of the East Angles, were
discovered, and in a Witan at Winchester thou wilt doubtless have heard,
(for thou didst not, I know, leave thy lands to attend it,) that Algar
[146] was outlawed."

"Oh, yes, these are stale tidings; I heard thus much from a palmer--and
then Algar got ships from the Irish, sailed to North Wales, and beat
Rolf, the Norman Earl, at Hereford. Oh, yes, I heard that, and," added
the Kent man, laughing, "I was not sorry to hear that my old Earl Algar,
since he is a good and true Saxon, beat the cowardly Norman,--more shame
to the King for giving a Norman the ward of the Marches!"

"It was a sore defeat to the King and to England," said Godrith, gravely.
"The great Minster of Hereford built by King Athelstan was burned and
sacked by the Welch; and the crown itself was in danger, when Harold came
up at