Page:Great Men and Famous Women Volume 5.djvu/98

 66 WORKMEN AND HEROES from nine in the morning till past nightfall, on October 14, 1066. The English fought with the most stubborn courage, and the battle was only lost by their al- lowing the pretended flight of the Normans to draw them from their impregnable position on the crest of the hill, ringed with an unbroken shield wall. On its slope, right in front of the Norman army, waved the golden dragon of Wessex, as well as the king's own standard, a fighting man wrought upon it in gold. Here Harold stood with his mighty two-handed axe, and hewed down the Normans as they came. Before nightfall he fell, pierced through the eye with an arrow. His housecarls fought where they stood till they fell one by one ; his brothers, Gurth and Leofwin, died beside him. The king's body was found upon the field, recognized only by a former mistress, the fair Eadgyth Swanneshals ("Edith of the swan's neck"). At first, William ordered it to be buried on the rocks at Hastings, but seems after to have permitted it to be removed to Harold's own church at Waltham. Than Harold, no braver or more heroic figure ever filled a throne ; no king ever fought more heroically for his crown. If he failed, it was because he had to bow his head to fate, and in his death he saved all the honor of his family and his race. His tragic story has given a subject for a romance to Lytton, and for a stately drama to Tennyson, THE CID Bv HENRY G. HEWLETT (1026-1099) T narratives concerning the life and exploits of the Cid are, to a great extent, merely poetic. Yet it has been wisely said, that much which must be re- jected as not fact may still be accepted as truth ; that is, there is often to be found under the husks of legend and myth, a sound kernel of historical reality. This may be the case with respect to the Cid, who probably was a warrior so remark- able for genius or bravery above his fel- lows that he gathered up in a single fame the reputation of many others, with whose deeds he was credited, and whom, as a ! class, he accordingly represents in history. Spain, long one of the most flourish- ing provinces of the Roman Empire, was among the first to fall under the sway of the Visigoths, a warlike but enlight- ened race, which soon embraced Christianity. For three centuries the country