with anxious hope to the crown. He first vanquished Griffin king of the Welsh, as I have before related, in battle; and, afterwards, when he was again making formidable efforts to recover his power, deprived him of his head; appointing as his successors, two of his own adherents, that is, the brothers of this Griffin, Blegent and Rivallo, who had obtained liis favour by their submission. The same year Tosty arrived on the Humber, from Flanders, with a fleet of sixty ships, and infested with piratical depredations those parts which were adjacent to the mouth of the river; but being quickly driven from the province by the joint force of the brothers, Edwin and Morcar, he set sail towards Scotland; where meeting with Harold Harfager king of Norway, then meditating an attack on England with three hundred ships, he put himself under his command. Both, then, with united forces, laid waste the country beyond the Humber; and falling on the brothers, reposing after their recent victory and suspecting no attack of the land, they first routed, and then shut them up in York. Harold, on hearing this, proceeded thither with all his forces, and, each nation making every possible exertion, a bloody encounter followed: but the English obtained the advantage, and put the Norwegians to flight. Yet, however reluctantly posterity may believe it, one single Norwegian for a long time delayed the triumph of so many, and such great men. For standing on the entrance of the bridge, which is called Standford Brigge,[1] after having killed several of our party, he prevented the whole from passing over. Being invited to surrender, with the assurance that a man of such courage should experience the amplest clemency from the English, he derided those who entreated him; and immediately, with stern countenance, reproached the set of cowards who were unable to resist an individual. No one approaching nearer, as they thought it unadvisable to come to close quarters with a man who had desperately rejected every means of safety, one of the king's followers aimed an iron javelin at him from a distance; and transfixed him as he was boastfully flourishing about, and too incautious from his security, so that he yielded the victory to the English. The army immediately
- ↑ The battle of Stanford-bridge was fought on the 25th of September, 1066. See Saxon. Chron. p. 440.
