“Then I command,--I, Hereward, Lord of Bourne!--that this abbey be held against him and all Frenchmen, in the name of Swend Ulfsson, king of England, and of me. And he that admits a Frenchman therein, I will shave his crown for him so well, that he shall never need razor more. This I tell thee; and this I shall tell your monks before I go. And unless you obey the same, my dream will be fulfilled; and you will see Goldenbregh in a light low, and burning yourselves in the midst thereof.” “Swend Ulfsson? Swend of Denmark? What words are these?” cried Brand. “You will know within six months, uncle.” “I shall know better things, my boy, before six months are out.” “Uncle, uncle, do not say that.” “Why not? If this mortal life be at best a prison and a grave, what is it worth now to an Englishman?” “More than ever; for never had an Englishman such a chance of showing English mettle, and winning renown for the English name. Uncle, you must do something for me and my comrades ere we go.” “Well, boy?” “Make us knights.” “Knights, lad? I thought you had been a belted knight this dozen years?” “I might have been made a knight by many, after the French, fashion, many a year agone. I might have been knight when I slew the white bear. Ladies have prayed me to be knighted again and again since. Something kept me from it. Perhaps” (with a glance at Herluin) “I wanted to show that an English squire could be the rival and the leader of French and Flemish knights.” “And thou hast shown it, brave lad!” said Brand, clapping his great hands. “Perhaps I longed to do some mighty deed at last, which would give me a right to go to the bravest knight in all Christendom, and say, ‘Give me the accolade, then! Thou only art worthy to knight as good a man as thyself.’” “Pride and vainglory,” said Brand, shaking his head. “But now I am of a sounder mind. I see now why I was kept from being knighted,--till I had done a deed worthy of a true knight; till I had mightily avenged the wronged, and mightily succored the oppressed; till I had purged my soul of my enmity against my own kin, and could go out into the world a new man, with my mother’s blessing on my head.” “But not of the robbery of St. Peter,” said Herluin. The French monk wanted not for moral courage,--no French monk did in those days. And he proved it by those words. “Do not anger the lad, Prior; now, too, above all times, when his heart is softened toward the Lord.” “He has not angered me. The man is right. Here, Lord Abbot and Sir Prior, is a chain of gold, won in the wars. It is worth fifty times the sixteen pence which I stole, and which I repaid double. Let St. Peter take it, for the sins of me and my two comrades, and forgive. And now, Sir Prior, I do to thee what I never did for mortal man. I kneel, and ask thy forgiveness. Kneel, Winter! Kneel, Gwenoch!” And Hereward knelt.