Besides his own dependence and the chiefs of his own kindred, many Saxon hinds, and not a few chiefs of name, began now to repair to Hereward’s standard. There came his old brother in arms Winter of Wisbech, who had never touched the mailed hand of the conqueror in sign of peace and submission; there came his distant relative Gherik, who bore on his brow the broad scar of an almost deadly wound he had gotten at Hastings; there came Alfric[141] and Rudgang, and Sexwold and Siward Beorn, that true Saxon soldier who had formerly been a companion to Edgar Etheling in his flight, and who had come back from Scotland because he could not bear to live in ease and plenty while his country was oppressed. Not one of these Saxon warriors but would stand against three Normans on foot! Hereward afterward gave proof, and more times than once, that he could keep his ground against seven! As for the hungry outlandish men the Conqueror was bringing from all the countries in southern Europe, to help him to do that which he boasted he had done in the one battle of Hastings, they were not men to face any of our lusty Saxons of the old race; but they fell before them in battle like reeds of the fen when trampled upon. But the skill and craft of these alien men were great: many of them were drawn from Italie, though not from the same part of that country which gave birth to Girolamo; and therefore were the services of the Salernitan the more valuable; and therefore was it that the young Lord of Brunn had need of all his own strategy, and of all the inborn and acquired qualities which made him the foremost captain of that age.