He is fitter to do the juggling tricks of the Norman chivalry than to maintain the fame and honour of his English ancestry with the glaive and brown-bill, the good old weapons of his country." "If to maintain the honour of ancestry," said Rowena, who was present, "it is sufficient to be wise in council and brave in execution--to be boldest among the bold, and gentlest among the gentle, I know no voice, save his father's---" "Be silent, Lady Rowena!--on this subject only I hear you not.

Prepare yourself for the Prince's festival: we have been summoned thither with unwonted circumstance of honour and of courtesy, such as the haughty Normans have rarely used to our race since the fatal day of Hastings.
Thither will I go, were it only to show these proud Normans how little the fate of a son, who could defeat their bravest, can affect a Saxon." "Thither," said Rowena, "do I NOT go; and I pray you to beware, lest what you mean for courage and constancy, shall be accounted hardness of heart." "Remain at home, then, ungrateful lady," answered Cedric; "thine is the hard heart, which can sacrifice the weal of an oppressed people to an idle and unauthorized attachment.

I seek the noble Athelstane, and with him attend the banquet of John of Anjou." He went accordingly to the banquet, of which we have already mentioned the principal events.

Immediately upon retiring from the castle, the Saxon thanes, with their attendants, took horse; and it was during the bustle which attended their doing so, that Cedric, for the first time, cast his eyes upon the deserter Gurth.

The noble Saxon had returned from the banquet, as we have seen, in no very placid humour, and wanted but a pretext for wreaking his anger upon some one.
"The gyves!" he said, "the gyves!--Oswald--Hundibert!--Dogs and villains!--why leave ye the knave unfettered ?" Without daring to remonstrate, the companions of Gurth bound him with a halter, as the readiest cord which occurred.