Harold : the Last of the Saxon Kings — Volume 04

By Edward Bulwer-Lytton

Edward Bulwer-Lytton was a well known English novelist in the 19th century, and he's been immortalized for coining famous phrases like  "pursuit of the almighty dollar" and "the pen is mightier than the sword".


In addition to being a politician, he wrote across all genres, from horror stories to historical fiction and action titles.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Krill Press
• Release date: Dec 30, 2015
• ISBN: 9781518353567

Edward Bulwer-Lytton

Edward Bulwer-Lytton, engl. Romanschriftsteller und Politiker, ist bekannt geworden durch seine populären historischen/metaphysischen und unvergleichlichen Romane wie „Zanoni“, „Rienzi“, „Die letzten Tage von Pompeji“ und „Das kommende Geschlecht“. Ihm wird die Mitgliedschaft in der sagenumwobenen Gemeinschaft der Rosenkreuzer nachgesagt. 1852 wurde er zum Kolonialminister von Großbritannien ernannt.

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HAROLD : THE LAST OF THE SAXON KINGS — VOLUME 04

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Edward Bulwer-Lytton

SILVER SCROLL PUBLISHING

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Copyright © 2015 by Edward Bulwer-Lytton

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

BOOK IV.: THE HEATHEN ALTAR AND THE SAXON CHURCH.: CHAPTER I.

CHAPTER II.

CHAPTER III.

CHAPTER IV.

CHAPTER V.

CHAPTER VI.

CHAPTER VII.

Harold : the Last of the Saxon Kings — Volume 04

By

Edward Bulwer-Lytton

Harold : the Last of the Saxon Kings — Volume 04

Published by Silver Scroll Publishing

New York City, NY

First published circa 1873

Copyright © Silver Scroll Publishing, 2015

All rights reserved

Except in the United States of America, this book is sold subject to the condition that it shall not, by way of trade or otherwise, be lent, re-sold, hired out, or otherwise circulated without the publisher’s prior consent in any form of binding or cover other than that in which it is published and without a similar condition including this condition being imposed on the subsequent purchaser.

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BOOK IV.: THE HEATHEN ALTAR AND THE SAXON CHURCH.: CHAPTER I.

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WHILE HAROLD SLEEPS, LET US here pause to survey for the first time the greatness of that House to which Sweyn’s exile had left him the heir. The fortunes of Godwin had been those which no man not eminently versed in the science of his kind can achieve. Though the fable which some modern historians of great name have repeated and detailed, as to his early condition as the son of a cow-herd, is utterly groundless [99], and he belonged to a house all-powerful at the time of his youth, he was unquestionably the builder of his own greatness. That he should rise so high in the early part of his career was less remarkable than that he should have so long continued the possessor of a power and state in reality more than regal.

But, as has been before implied, Godwin’s civil capacities were more prominent than his warlike. And this it is which invests him with that peculiar interest which attracts us to those who knit our modern intelligence with the past. In that dim world before the Norman deluge, we are startled to recognise the gifts that ordinarily distinguish a man of peace in a civilised age.

His father, Wolnoth, had been Childe [100] of the South Saxons, or thegn of Sussex, a nephew of Edric Streone, Earl of Mercia, the unprincipled but able minister of Ethelred, who betrayed his master to Canute, by whom, according to most authorities, he was righteously, though not very legally, slain as a reward for the treason.

I promised, said the Dane king, to set thy head higher than other men’s, and I keep my word. The trunkless head was set on the gates of London.

Wolnoth had quarrelled with his uncle Brightric, Edric’s brother, and before the arrival of Canute, had betaken himself to the piracy of a sea chief, seduced twenty of the king’s ships, plundered the southern coasts, burnt the royal navy, and then his history disappears from the chronicles; but immediately afterwards the great Danish army, called Thurkell’s Host, invaded the coast, and kept their chief station on the Thames. Their victorious arms soon placed the country almost at their command. The traitor Edric joined them with a power of more than 10,000 men; and it is probable enough that the ships of Wolnoth had before this time melted amicably into the armament of the Danes. If this, which seems the most likely conjecture, be received, Godwin, then a mere youth, would naturally have commenced his career in the cause of Canute; and as the son of a formidable chief of thegn’s rank, and even as kinsman to Edric, who, whatever his crimes, must have retained a party it was wise to conciliate, Godwin’s favour with Canute, whose policy would lead him to show marked distinction to any able Saxon follower, ceases to be