He only added, "When we meet again, my son, thou mayst judge thy
king differently."
Wilfred left the ducal tent; the authority of Count Eustace
speedily procured the assistance of some Norman camp followers, and
the body was reverently removed from the heap of slain, and placed
upon a litter. Wilfred slept in the tent of Eustace, and in the
morning commenced his homeward journey, with the funeral cortege.
It is unnecessary to enter further into the details of that most
sad journey. Suffice it to say that he was able to transfer the
precious burden from Norman to English hands, and that he arrived
home in safety, whither Guthlac had preceded him, with the tidings
that all save himself had perished alike.
Therefore the return of Wilfred was like that of one dead and alive
again, lost and found; and the poor widow felt she had yet
something besides her daughter Edith to live for.
The immediate effects of the conquest were not felt for some few
weeks in the central parts of Mercia, and nought interfered with
the solemn function customary at funerals in those ages.
The second morning after the return of Wilfred was fixed for the
burial of the deceased thane, in the priory church which his father
had built in the place of an earlier structure burnt by the Danes
in 1006.
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