CHAPTER VII.


Harold passed into the Queen's ante-chamber. Here the attendance was
small and select compared with the crowds which we shall see presently
in the ante-room to the King's closet; for here came chiefly the more
learned ecclesiastics, attracted instinctively by the Queen's own
mental culture, and few indeed were they at that day (perhaps the most
illiterate known in England since the death of Alfred [117]); and here
came not the tribe of impostors, and the relic-venders, whom the
infantine simplicity and lavish waste of the Confessor attracted.
Some four or five priests and monks, some lonely widow, some orphan
child, humble worth, or protected sorrow, made the noiseless levee of
the sweet, sad Queen.

The groups turned, with patient eyes, towards the Earl as he emerged
from that chamber, which it was rare indeed to quit unconsoled, and
marvelled at the flush in his cheek; and the disquiet on his brow; but
Harold was dear to the clients of his sister; for, despite his
supposed indifference to the mere priestly virtues (if virtues we call
them) of the decrepit time, his intellect was respected by yon learned
ecclesiastics; and his character, as the foe of all injustice, and the
fosterer of all that were desolate, was known to yon pale-eyed widow
and yon trembling orphan.

In the atmosphere of that quiet assembly, the Earl seemed to recover