Saxon’s vengeful hand;Turn we from all that vengeance wild—Where on the deck there cowered a child,And, closely to his bosom prest,A snow-white kitten found a nest.That tender boy, with tresses fair,Was Edric, Egbert’s cherished heir;The plaything of the homestead he,Now fondled on his grandame’s knee;Or as beside the hearth he sat,Oft sporting with his snow-white cat;Now by the chaplain taught to read,And lisp his Pater and his Creed;Well nurtured at his mother’s side,And by his father trained to ride,To speak the truth, to draw the bow,And all an English Thane should know,His days had been as one bright dream—As smooth as his own river’s stream!Until, at good King Alfred’s call,Thane Egbert left his native hall.

V

Then, five days later, shout and yell,And shrieks and howls of slaughter fell,Upon the peaceful homestead came.’Mid flashing sword, and axe, and flame,Snatched by a Viking’s iron grasp,From his slain mother’s dying clasp,Saved from the household’s flaming grave,Edric was dragged, a destined slave,Some northern dame to serve, or heedThe flocks that on the Sæter feed.Still, with scarce conscious hold he clungTo the white cat, that closely hungSeeking her refuge in his arm,Her shelter in the wild alarm—And who can tell how oft his moanWas soothed by her soft purring tone?Time keeping with retracted claw,Or patting with her velvet paw;Although of home and friends bereft,Still this one comforter was left,So lithe, so swift, so soft, so white,She might have seemed his guardian sprite.   The rude Danes deemed her such;And whispered tales of ‘disir’ boundTo human lords, as bird or hound.Nor one ’mid all the fleet was found   To hurt one tender paw.And when the captive knelt to prayNone would his orisons gainsay;For as they marked him day by day,   Increased their wondering awe.

VI

Crouched by the mast, the child and cat,Through the dire time of slaughter sat,   By terror both spellbound;But when night came, a silence drearFell on the coast; and far or near,No voice caught Edric’s wakeful ear,   Save water’s lapping sound.He wandered from the stern to prow,Ate of the stores, and marvelled how   He yet might reach the ground;Till low and lower sank the tide,Dark banks of mud spread far and wide   Around that fast-bound wreck.Then the lone boy climbed down the ship,To cross the mud by bound and skip,   His cat upon his neck.Light was his weight and swift his leap,Now would he softly tread, now creep,For treacherous was the mud, and deepFrom stone to weed, from weed to plank,Leaving a hole where’er he sank;With panting breath and sore taxed strengthThe solid 

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