Are ye willing that we should hear the message?
or would ye rather that we dismiss the messenger unheard, and pass at once, to rank and to sail, the war-cry of a Christian king, 'Holy Crosse and our Lady!'" The King ceased, his left hand grasping firm the leopard head carved on his throne, and his sceptre untrembling in his lifted hand.
A murmur of Notre Dame, Notre Dame, the war-cry of the Normans, was heard amongst the stranger-knights of the audience; but haughty and arrogant as those strangers were, no one presumed to take precedence, in England's danger, of men English born.
Slowly then rose Alred, Bishop of Winchester, the worthiest prelate in all the land.

[78] "Kingly son," said the bishop, "evil is the strife between men of the same blood and lineage, nor justified but by extremes, which have not yet been made clear to us.

And ill would it sound throughout England were it said that the King's council gave, perchance, his city of London to sword and fire, and rent his land in twain, when a word in season might have disbanded yon armies, and given to your throne a submissive subject, where now you are menaced by a formidable rebel.

Wherefore, I say, admit the nuncius." Scarcely had Alred resumed his seat, before Robert the Norman prelate of Canterbury started up,--a man, it was said, of worldly learning--and exclaimed: "To admit the messenger is to approve the treason.

I do beseech the King to consult only his own royal heart and royal honour.