that the warlike Duke of Normandy would not be likely to forget the
promise, and that trouble might come to England from over the sea.

Harold, then, they not only regarded as their present ruler, but
as their future king, and as the national leader and champion.
Edward had no children. The royal house was extinct save for Edward
the Atheling, who, like the present king, had lived all his life
abroad, and could have no sympathy with Englishmen. There being,
then, no one of the royal house available, who but Harold, the head
of the great house of Godwin, the earl of the West Saxons, the
virtual ruler of England, could be chosen? The English kings,
although generally selected from the royal house, ruled rather by
the election of the people as declared by their representatives in
the Witan than by their hereditary right. The prince next in
succession by blood might, at the death of the sovereign, be called
king, but he was not really a monarch until elected by the Witan
and formally consecrated.

It had been nine months after he had been acclaimed to the throne
by the people of London that King Edward had been elected king by
the Witan, and formally enthroned. Thus, then, the fact that Harold
did not belong to the royal family mattered but little in the eyes
of Englishmen. To them belonged the right of choosing their own
monarch, and if they chose him, who was to say them nay?

Wulf felt uncomfortable as he followed the stately figure into the
inner room, but he faced the Earl as the door closed behind him
with as fearless a look as that with which he had stood before the
haughty prelate of London. A slight smile played upon Harold's face
as he looked down upon the boy.