CHAPTER V.
The next day, as Harold was entering the palace of Westminster, with intent to seek the King's lady, his father met him in one of the corridors, and, taking him gravely by the hand said: "My son, I have much on my mind regarding thee and our House; come with me." "Nay," said the Earl, "by your leave let it be later.

For I have it on hand to see my sister, ere confessor, or monk, or schoolman, claim her hours!" "Not so, Harold," said the Earl, briefly.

"My daughter is now in her oratory, and we shall have time enow to treat of things mundane ere she is free to receive thee, and to preach to thee of things ghostly, the last miracle at St.Alban's, or the last dream of the King, who would be a great man and a stirring, if as restless when awake as he is in his sleep.

Come." Harold, in that filial obedience which belonged, as of course, to his antique cast of character, made no farther effort to escape, but with a sigh followed Godwin into one of the contiguous chambers.
"Harold," then said Earl Godwin, after closing the door carefully, "thou must not let the King keep thee longer in dalliance and idleness: thine earldom needs thee without delay.

Thou knowest that these East Angles, as we Saxons still call them, are in truth mostly Danes and Norsemen; people jealous and fierce, and free, and more akin to the Normans than to the Saxons.