"For often when they go to plough The ploughshare turns them out, 'And many thousand men,' quoth he, 'Were slain in that great victory.'"
Many a lance and sword, and gilt spur, beautifully enamelled, which once decked the heel of a noble knight, have been found in our fields, and remind us of those battles which were fought so long ago.
"The knights are dust, Their good swords rust, Their souls are with the saints, we trust."
Sometimes the spectres of armed knights and warriors are supposed to haunt these scenes of ancient slaughter, and popular superstition has handed down the memory of the battles which were fought so long ago. It tells us of the mythical records of the fights of King Arthur and his Knights of the Round Table by the banks of the River Douglas, which ran with blood for three days, so terrible was the slaughter. It tells us how stubbornly the Britons resisted the Roman armies, so that on one occasion not one Briton was left to tell the tale of their defeat.
When we visit the site of some battle with the history book in our hand, it is possible to imagine the lonely hillside peopled again with the dense ranks of English archers, or hear the clanging of the armour as the men-at-arms charged for "St. George and merry England"; and the air will be full again of the battle-cries, of the groans of the wounded and the shouts of the victors.
Visit the scene of the battle of Hastings. Here on the high ground, flanked by a wood, stood the brave English, under the leadership of Harold, with his banner, woven with gold and jewels, shining conspicuously in the morning sunlight. Here they stood in the form of a wedge; there they turned the Normans, and put them to flight. Then the Normans rallied, pretended to fly, decoyed the brave English from their position, and by stratagem succeeded in defeating them at last. Or go to the Madingley Windmill, near Cambridge, and see the fifteen miles of rich drained cornfields which intervene between "Ely's stately fane" and the spot on which you are standing. Here read Kingsley's well-known story of _Hereward; or, The Last of the English_, and instead of the rich cornfields you will see that black abyss of mud and bottomless slime into which sank the flower of Norman chivalry as they tried to cross that treacherous bog to conquer the gallant Hereward and to plunder the monastery of Ely, the last stronghold of the English. On they came, thousands upon thousands, rushing along the floating bridge which they had formed, until at last it gave way beneath the weight, and the black slime swallowed up the miserable wretches.