or not, hath kinglike fought and Who, king or fallen, His birthday, too, It seems but yester-even I held it with him in his English halls, His day, with all his rooftree ringing "Harold," When all men counted Harold would be king, WILLIAM. Thou art half English. Take them away! Malet, I vow to build a church to God Here on this hill of battle; let our high altar Stand where their standard fell . . . where these two lie. Take them away, I do not love to see them. Pluck the dead woman off the dead man, Malet! MALET. Faster than ivy. Must I hack her arms off? How shall I part them? WILLIAM. Leave them. Let them be! Bury him and his paramour together. He that was false in oath to me, it seems Was false to his own wife. We will not give him A Christian burial: yet he was a warrior, And wise, yea truthful, till that blighted vow Which God avenged to-day. Wrap them together in a purple cloak And lay them both upon the waste sea-shore And that the false Northumbrian held aloof, And save for that chance arrow which the Saints Sharpen'd and sent against him-who can tell?— I thought that all was lost. Since I knew battle, No, by the splendour of God-have I fought men Like Harold and his brethren, and his guard Of English. Every man about his king Fell where he stood. They loved him: and, pray God My Normans may but move as true with me To the door of death. Of one self-stock at first, Make them again one people-Norman, English; To grasp the world with, and a foot to stamp it... Flat. Praise the Saints. It is over. No more blood! |