But meanwhile the question of the succession to the throne was becoming daily more pressing. Edward was evidently rapidly sinking into the grave. He had never loved his wife, Harold's sister, and had no children by her. The natural choice of the Witena-gemot would have been Edward, the son of Edward's elder brother, who had been sent to Hungary by the King of Sweden. Accordingly, an embassy was sent to Hungary, and in 1057 the Atheling, or member of the royal line, arrived with his children, Edgar, Margaret, and Christina. But the prospect of his one day becoming King of England, which would have solved a most difficult problem, was speedily cut short by his death within a few days. Of the royal family, Edgar, his son, was now the only direct male representative, and he, as being a mere boy, was hardly a candidate on whom the choice of the Witena-gemot would fall. It should be observed that Harold appears to have placed no obstacle in the way of the advent of the members of the house of Cerdic to England, and throughout he seems honestly to have acted for the best.
To look upon the election of Harold to the throne as in any sense a usurpation is to import purely modern ideas about royalty into days when hereditary descent was never for a moment recognised as giving an indefeasible right. To pass over the members of the royal line was no doubt an unusual measure, because there were as a rule some members of that line who were fully competent to succeed, but, failing such a candidate, the Witena-gemot were quite within their right in electing any one whom they believed to combine the necessary qualities of valour and statesmanship. And of all men in England, it could hardly be doubted that Harold was pre-eminently the possessor of the attributes that went in those days to make a good king. He was therefore tacitly designated as Edward's successor by universal consent; but in William of Normandy he had a dangerous and unscrupulous opponent who would hesitate to use no means that force or fraud might throw in his way. One effective instrument he had already acquired during his visit to England, and chance speedily placed a second in his path, of which he availed himself with equal dexterity.