"Per la resplendar De [12], bold dame," cried the knight by the side
of Edward, while a lurid flush passed over his cheek of bronze; "but
thou art too glib of tongue for a subject, and pratest overmuch of
Woden, the Paynim, for the lips of a Christian matron."

Hilda met the flashing eye of the knight with a brow of lofty scorn,
on which still a certain terror was visible. "Child," she said,
putting her hand upon Edith's fair locks; "this is the man thou shalt
see but twice in thy life;--look up, and mark well!"

Edith instinctively raised her eyes, and, once fixed upon the knight,
they seemed chained as by a spell. His vest, of a cramoisay so dark,
that it seemed black beside the snowy garb of the Confessor, was edged
by a deep band of embroidered gold; leaving perfectly bare his firm,
full throat--firm and full as a column of granite,--a short jacket or
manteline of fur, pendant from the shoulders, left developed in all
its breadth a breast, that seemed meet to stay the march of an army;
and on the left arm, curved to support the falcon, the vast muscles
rose, round and gnarled, through the close sleeve.

In height, he was really but little above the stature of many of those
present; nevertheless, so did his port [13], his air, the nobility of
his large proportions, fill the eye, that he seemed to tower
immeasurably above the rest.

His countenance was yet more remarkable than his form; still in the
prime of youth, he seemed at the first glance younger, at the second
older, than he was. At the first glance younger; for his face was
perfectly shaven, without even the moustache which the Saxon courtier,
in imitating the Norman, still declined to surrender; and the smooth