Now Godwine would ever talk with me, for I could tell him of Olaf,
and also of the long war, and of the Norman court, so that we
became great friends. But he had no liking for Ethelred, which was
not wonderful, seeing that Wulfnoth his father had not a good word
to say for him.

At last, when Olaf told him plainly of the needs of England and of
her king, and of what he feared of the return of Cnut, Earl
Wulfnoth answered:

"Had you come to ask me to go a-viking with yourself, gladly would
I have joined with or followed you. Godwine my son has yet some
things to learn which a Norseman could teach him, and it would have
been well. But Ethelred holds me as a traitor; and while Edric
Streone is at his side I will not have aught to do with him. I will
drive any Dane out of my land, and that is all. Neither Ethelred
nor Cnut is aught to me. I and my son are earls of Sussex."

Then he rose up from his high seat and strode out of the hall,
bidding us follow him. He led us to the eastern gate, and climbed
to the broad top of the ramparts.

"See yonder," he said, and pointed eastward across the river and
marsh. "There is the hill where our standard has been raised time
after time since OElla and Cissa drove in flight the Welsh who had
raised theirs in the same place before us. There will I raise it
again against Cnut or Streone or any other of his men."

"Edric Streone is with King Ethelred," said Olaf; "he is not Cnut's