The young king had found favour in the eyes of the queen of East Anglia, and she reasoned with Redwald, and boldly showed him how base an act it would be, to give up their guest to the man who, having robbed him of his kingdom, now sought to take away his life. "A king should not violate his faith," said she, "for gold, for good faith is his noblest ornament." Redwald's heart seems ever to have guided him aright when he admitted not fear into the counsel, so he nobly resolved, instead of giving up his guest, to fight for him, and in place of basely selling his life, to win him back the province he had been driven from. And, after such a resolve, he doubtless felt himself more worthy of the title of the Bretwalda of Britain. We regret that Time has not even spared us the name of this noble Saxon queen, that we might add one more woman to the list of these angelic immortalities, who stand like stars upon the brow of the deep midnight, that then hung so darkly above the clouded cliffs of Albion. When Redwald had once decided, he began to act; he waited not to be attacked, but, with such forces as he could muster, rushed at once to the boundary of the Deiri. He met Ethelfrith, ere he was wholly provided for his coming, on the banks of the river Idel, near Retford, in Nottinghamshire, at that time probably a portion of the kingdom he had wrested from Edwin. Redwald had his guest, his honour, and his kingdom to fight for: Edwin his life, and the possessions he inherited from his father--Ethelfrith, a long-cherished vengeance to appease--a kingdom he had seized upon without any one having before dared to dispute his claim--and East Anglia, now a fair prize, if he could but win it: he had a bad cause, yet not a doubt about obtaining the victory, for he had many a time driven the Picts and Scots, with whole hosts of the Cymry, banded together, before him, further to the north than any, excepting the Romans, had ever before done. His dreams had never been broken by the thought of a defeat, even when the monks of Bangor were praying against him; he conquered, and drove the British kings before him like withered leaves before a storm when the yellow Autumn is waning into Winter. No Christian fire had ever burnt upon his pagan altars--to Woden, the god of battles, had his sacrifices ever been offered up. Redwald, more vacillating, kept two altars in the temple in which he worshipped,--one dedicated to the grim idol which his warriors still believed in--the other where he at times knelt beside his fair queen, and sent up his wavering prayers, between the shrine of Woden, and the True God. No truer picture was probably ever drawn of the state of these truly pagan and half-Christian Saxons in the early times, than is here presented; that mingled fear of offending Woden, while the heart yearned for the love of Him whom they believed to be the Giver of all good, for God and good were in their language the same.