Go and tell this, if thou wilt, to the king, whose envoy thou boastest to be." Hastings returned to the Gallo-Frankish army, and Rollo prepared to march on Paris.

Hastings had gone back somewhat troubled in mind.

Now there was amongst the Franks one Count Tetbold (Thibault), who greatly coveted the countship of Chartres, and he said to Hastings, "Why slumberest thou softly?
Knowest thou not that King Charles doth purpose thy death by cause of all the Christian blood that thou didst aforetime unjustly shed?
Bethink thee of all the evil thou hast done him, by reason whereof he purposeth to drive thee from his land.

Take heed to thyself that thou be not smitten unawares." Hastings, dismayed, at once sold to Tetbold the town of Chartres, and, removing all that belonged to him, departed to go and resume, for all that appears, his old course of life.
[Illustration: PARIS BESIEGED BY THE NORMANS----259] On the 25th of November, 885, all the forces of the North-men formed a junction before Paris; seven hundred huge barks covered two leagues of the Seine, bringing, it is said, more than thirty thousand men.

The chieftains were astonished at sight of the new fortifications of the city, a double wall of circumvallation, the bridges crowned with towers, and in the environs the ramparts of the abbeys of St.Denis and St.
Germain solidly rebuilt.