may'st know me for thy liege lady, my brave tassel-gentle! I take thee, and thy master with thee, but I fear he is by far less well reclaimed than thee!' 

 

 CHAPTER V. 

 SAXON AND NORMAN. 

 The little village of Exning in Suffolk was once an important place, the seat of the royal palace of the kings and queens of East Anglia, wherein was born the celebrated St. Etheldreda, who was the foundress of the monastery of Ely; and its state did not entirely disappear till A.D. 1200, when a plague broke out which desolated the population, and a New Market was set up a few miles from it, which still bears that name, and is the well-known racing centre. 

A.D.

 Ralph de Guader, as Earl of East Anglia, became the lord of this ancient palace of the East Anglian royal family, and, as it was in his day the fashion for weddings to take place at the house of the bridegroom, it was here that preparations were made for his union with Emma Fitzosbern. 

 It was in every way convenient for Ralph's purposes. Situated on the extreme verge of his estates, jutting out towards the west, whence his bride must come, it was the very nearest point at which she could enter his domain; near also to Northampton and Huntingdon, over which Waltheof Siwardsson was earl, regarding whom, as we know, De Guader had deep-laid schemes. The celebrity it bore as the time-honoured residence of the East Anglian royalty, and the birthplace of one of the best-beloved of Saxon saints, endeared it to the hearts of the Saxon nobles and thegns, whom it was Ralph's policy to conciliate, and of whom he had invited to the banquet all who still possessed any remnant of their former wealth, and many who had little left but names to conjure with. 

 Divers Breton nobles and knights also held manors in the neighbourhood, and De Guader had in his own following a strong body of Breton mercenaries, and took care to bid the leading men amongst them, and all he could gather of his mother's countrymen having settlements in England, to the feast. Many Normans also were invited, men who were known to be discontented with their share of the spoil of fair lands and deer forests and riches of various kinds distributed after the Conquest, or who, like De Guader and Hereford, were smarting under William's tyrannous whims. Last, but most important amongst the guests, were the members of the Saxon Church, many of whom came to the bridal, including 

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