§ 1. The First Expedition of Tostig. May, 1066

We left King Harold of England undisputed master of his whole Kingdom. He had won over the malecontents of Northumberland; he had held his Easter Feast and Gemót at Westminster; and the hearts of England and of the world had been stirred and affrighted by the awful token which shone over them in the heavens. It was about the beginning of May, perhaps before the warning star had ceased blazing, that the misfortunes of this terrible |May, 1066.| year began. The first blow came from the traitor Tostig. |Tostig lands in Wight.| He came from beyond sea—that is, as we have seen, from Normandy with the licence of William—and, at the head of his ships manned with Flemish or Norman adventurers, he sailed first to the Isle of Wight. The inhabitants, willingly or unwillingly—far more probably the latter—supplied him with money and provisions.^[929] He then sailed along the |His ravages in Sussex and Kent.| South Saxon and Kentish coast, the coast along which, fourteen years before, he had sailed with his father in his glorious return. He thus passed on as far as Sandwich, marking his course, wherever he went, by ceaseless and wanton ravage; he did harm everywhere where he might.^[930] |Great preparations of Harold. May–September.| But King Harold was now making ready for the great struggle. No view of his position can be more false than that which describes him as making light of the danger from Normandy, and as making no preparation for defence except with a view to the expected invasion from Norway.^[931] The truth is exactly opposite. The King was busily engaged in preparations for the defence of his Kingdom against the Norman before there was any reason to look forward to any sort of danger from the Northman. To Harold at least his great rival’s purpose was known from the beginning. He was already, as his panegyrist tells us, labouring by land and by sea for the defence of his country.^[932] He was gathering such a land-force and such a sea-force as no King |He hastens from London to Sandwich.| had ever before gathered in this land.^[933] He was still in London^[934]—that is probably at Westminster—when he heard the news of his brother’s appearance at Sandwich. He therefore hastened his preparations, and leaving London, probably under the command of Leofwine, as Earl of the neighbouring shires, he himself hastened to Sandwich. |Tostig sails from Sandwich,| But before the King reached Sandwich, Tostig had sailed from thence, taking with him a body of the sailors of that haven, some by their own consent and some by force.^[935] It is only among professional sailors, who might be tempted by promises of pay and plunder, that the rebel Earl seems to have found any English followers. The cruise of Tostig along these shores must have struck him as a sad contrast to those days of hope when the whole population of the maritime shires came flocking to the coast ready to live and die with Earl Godwine.^[936] With his force thus increased to |and ravages Lindesey.| sixty ships, Tostig sailed northwards; he then entered the Humber and ravaged the coast of Lindesey in the Earldom of his enemy Eadwine.^[937] Here he acted like Swend himself, or like the earlier destroyers of the days of Ælfred. He burned |He is driven from Lindesey by Eadwine and Morkere,| towns and slew many good men. The two Northern Earls were not wanting to their duty on this occasion. Indeed their interest and their duty too exactly coincided to allow of any remissness. They had no chance of finding their own profit in treason, like the traitors of an earlier time. Eadwine and Morkere hastened to the suffering districts with the levies of the country, and drove away Tostig and his plunderers.^[938] The sailors who had followed him, willingly and unwillingly, from Sandwich, now forsook him.^[939] The one class saw no further chance of pay or plunder; the others were doubtless glad of the opportunity to escape |and takes refuge in Scotland.| from a service which they disliked. Tostig, with twelve small vessels,^[940] now sailed for Scotland and sought shelter with his sworn brother King Malcolm. The tie of brotherhood had not preserved Northumberland from ravage while Tostig was still discharging his duty as an English Earl;^[941] but his position of hostility to his country now earned him a hearty welcome at the Scottish court. Malcolm received his brother, and supplied his force with provisions; and Tostig remained under his protection during the whole summer.