Not quite, for at such a time the sea looks as blue as the sky above it,
while here on this particular hot day, though the sky was as blue as a
sapphire stone, the hills were of a beautiful soft green, the grass
being short and soft, and as velvety as if Nature had been all over it
regularly with her own particular mowing-machine.
But the only mowing that had been done to that grass was by the cropping
teeth of the many flocks of sheep whose fleeces dotted the downs with
soft white where they nibbled away, watched by the shepherds in their
long smock frocks with turn-down collars and pleatings and gatherings on
breast and back, and slit up at the sides from the bottom so as to give
the men's legs room to move freely when they ran after a restive sheep
to hook him with the long crook they carried and bring him kicking and
struggling by hook or by crook to the grass.
It was just over a thousand years ago, and, in spite of all the changes
fashion has made, plenty of shepherds and farm labourers still wear the
simple old Saxon dress then worn by King Ethelwulf's serfs, though
without the girdle worn then.
There were four boys on the steepest slope of that hill-side--four
fair-haired, sun-browned, hearty-looking boys--and they wore smock
frocks, belted in at the waist, of fine, soft, woollen material, woven
out of the fleeces of the sheep; for they were King's sons, the sons of
the King whose flocks were feeding on the hill-side in Berkshire, where
he had his Court.
It was as peaceful there as it was soft and beautiful; for though news
came from time to time of the cruel acts of the fierce Norsemen who had
come across the sea in their great row and sailing galleys full of
fighting-men, they were far away from the King's home, so that Queen
Osburga felt no anxiety about her boys being out on the downs at play,
enjoying themselves and growing strong. This she loved to see; though,
being a very learned woman herself in days when noble people thought no
shame to have to say: "I cannot read or write," she sighed to find how
very little her four sons cared for such things as gave her delight.
They all loved to be out in the open air along with Cerda, the Saxon
jarl, one of the King's chief fighting-men, who urged them to learn how
to use the broadsword. After setting one of the men to make swords for
the boys--not of hard cutting steel, but of good tough ash-wood--and
then matching them two against two, he would sit a
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