the dusk above the lake of Tara; so the kings of England shunned to
enter Oxford, and to come within the walls of Frideswyde the maiden.
Harold died there, as we have seen, but there he was not buried. His
body was laid at Westminster, where it could not rest, for his
enemies dug it up, and cast it forth upon the fens, or threw it into
the river. Many years later, when Henry III. entered Oxford, not
without fear, the curse of Frideswyde lighted also upon him. He came
in 1263, with Edward the prince, and misfortune fell upon him, so
that his barons defeated and took him prisoner at the battle of
Lewes. The chronicler of Oseney Abbey mentions his contempt of
superstitions, and how he alone of English kings entered the city:
"Quod nullus rex attemptavit a tempore Regis Algari," an error, for
Harold attemptavit, and died. When Edward I. was king, he was less
audacious than his father, and in 1275 he rode up to the East Gate
and turned his horse's head about, and sought a lodging outside the
town, reflexis habenis equitans extra moenia aulam regiain in
suburbio positam introivit. In 1280, however, he seems to have
plucked up courage and attended a Chapter of Dominicans in Oxford.

The last of the meetings between North and South was held at Oxford
in October 1065. "In urle quae famoso nomine Oxnaford nuncupatur,"
to quote a document of Cnut's. (Cod. Dipl. DCCXLVI. in 1042.) There
the Northumbrian rebels met Harold in the last days of Edward the
Confessor. With this meeting we leave that Oxford before the
Conquest, of which possibly not one stone, or one rafter, remains.
We look back through eight hundred years on a city, rich enough, it
seems, and powerful, and we see the narrow streets full of armed
bands of men--men that wear the cognisance of the horse or of the
raven, that carry short swords, and are quick to draw them; men that
dress in short kirtles of a bright colour, scarlet or blue; that wear