"I have no wish to bend the bow to-day," said Wilfrid.

"Because you know that you must expose yourself to contempt by failing
to make your vaunt good," said Brithric; "but you shall not escape thus
lightly."

"Nothing but the express command of the prince, my master, will induce
me to bend my bow to-day," said Wilfrid.

"Wilfrid, son of Cendric, I, Edwin Atheling, command thee to shoot at
yonder mark," said the prince.

Wilfrid bowed his head in obedience to the mandate. He fitted the
arrow to the string, and stepping a pace backward, took his aim and
bent the bow. The arrow flew unerringly, and cleft in twain that of
Prince Edwin which already remained fixed in the centre of the mark.

This feat of skillful archery on the part of the page called forth no
shout, nor even a word of applause, from the partial group of
flatterers, who had so loudly commended the Atheling's less successful
shots. Their silence, however, was best pleasing to the modest
Wilfrid, who, without so much as casting a single triumphant glance
upon those who had insulted and reviled him, dropped his bow upon the
earth, and, bowing to his royal master, retired from the scene without
uttering a syllable.

From that day there was a visible change in the manners of the Atheling
toward his page, for his vanity had been piqued by this trifling
circumstance, of which the artful Brithric took advantage to irritate
his mind against Wilfrid. He now addressed him only in the language of