give to the wide plain of his encampment all the order of a host
prepared. And William, having now mounted on a rising ground, turned
from the spears on the hill tops, to his own fast forming lines on the
plain, and said with a stern smile:

"Methinks the Saxon usurper, if he be among those on the height of yon
hills, will vouchsafe us time to breathe! St. Michael gives his crown
to our hands, and his corpse to the crow, if he dare to descend."

And so indeed, as the Duke with a soldier's eye foresaw from a
soldier's skill, so it proved. The spears rested on the summits. It
soon became evident that the English general perceived that here there
was no Hardrada to surprise; that the news brought to his ear had
exaggerated neither the numbers, nor the arms, nor the discipline of
the Norman; and that the battle was not to the bold but to the wary.

"He doth right," said William, musingly; "nor think, O my Quens, that
we shall find a fool's hot brain under Harold's helmet of iron. How
is this broken ground of hillock and valley named in our chart? It is
strange that we should have overlooked its strength, and suffered it
thus to fall into the hands of the foe. How is it named? Can any of
ye remember?"

"A Saxon peasant," said De Graville, "told me that the ground was
called Senlac [256] or Sanglac, or some such name, in their musicless
jargon."

"Grammercy!" quoth Grantmesnil, "methinks the name will be familiar
eno' hereafter; no jargon seemeth the sound to my ear--a significant
name and ominous,--Sanglac, Sanguelac--the Lake of Blood."