nging
their national songs, and draining huge horns of ale and wine round
their campfires. The Normans, when they had looked to their arms and
horses, confessed themselves to the priests, with whom their camp was
thronged, and received the sacrament by thousands at a time.

On Saturday, the 14th of October, was fought the great battle.

It is not difficult to compose a narrative of its principal incidents
from the historical information which we possess, especially if aided by
an examination of the ground. But it is far better to adopt the
spirit-stirring words of the old chroniclers, who wrote while the
recollections of the battle were yet fresh, and while the feelings and
prejudices of the combatants yet glowed in the bosoms of living men.

Robert Wace, the Norman poet, who presented his _Roman de Rou_ to Henry
II, is the most picturesque and animated of the old writers, and from
him we can obtain a more vivid and full description of the conflict than
even the most brilliant romance-writer of the present time can supply.
We have also an antique memorial of the battle more to be relied on than
either chronicler or poet (and which confirms Wace's narrative
remarkably) in the celebrated Bayeux tapestry, which represents the
principal scenes of Duke William's expedition and of the circumstances
connected with it, in minute though occasionally grotesque details, and
which was undoubtedly the production of the same age in which the battle
took place, whether we admit or reject the legend that Queen Matilda and
the ladies of her court wrought it with their own hands in honor of the
royal Conqueror.

Let us therefore suffer the old Norman chronicler to transport our
imaginations to the fair Sussex scenery northwest of Hastings, as it
appeared on that October morning. The Norman host is pouring forth from
its tents, and each troop and each company is forming fast under the
banner of its leader. The masses have been sung, which were finished
betimes in the morning; the barons have all assembled round Duke
William; and the Duke has ordered that the army shall be formed in three
divisions, so as to make the attack upon the Saxon position in three
places.

The Duke stood on a hill where he could best see his men; the barons
surrounded him, and he spake to them proudly. He told them how he
trusted them, and how all that he gained should be theirs, and how sure
he felt of conquest, for in all the world there was not so brave an