been a force of William's training; we first hear of the Norman
bowmen at Varaville. These two ways of fighting were brought each
one to perfection by the leaders on each side. They had not yet
been tried against one another. At Stamfordbridge Harold had
defeated an enemy whose tactics were the same as his own. William
had not fought a pitched battle since Val-es-dunes in his youth.
Indeed pitched battles, such as English and Scandinavian warriors
were used to in the wars of Edmund and Cnut, were rare in
continental warfare. That warfare mainly consisted in the attack
and defence of strong places, and in skirmishes fought under their
walls. But William knew how to make use of troops of different
kinds and to adapt them to any emergency. Harold too was a man of
resources; he had gained his Welsh successes by adapting his men to
the enemy's way of fighting. To withstand the charge of the Norman
horsemen, Harold clave to the national tactics, but he chose for
the place of battle a spot where those tactics would have the
advantage. A battle on the low ground would have been favourable
to cavalry; Harold therefore occupied and fenced in a hill, the
hill of Senlac, the site in after days of the abbey and town of
Battle, and there awaited the Norman attack. The Norman horsemen
had thus to make their way up the hill under the shower of the
English javelins, and to meet the axes as soon as they reached the
barricade. And these tactics were thoroughly successful, till the
inferior troops were tempted to come down from the hill and chase
the Bretons whom they had driven back. This suggested to William
the device of the feigned flight; the English line of defence was
broken, and the advantage of ground was lost. Thus was the great
battle lost. And the war too was lost by the deaths of Harold and
his brothers, which left England without leaders, and by the
unyielding valour of Harold's immediate following. They were slain