They were greeted with a shower of stones and javelins, which
slew many, but with unbroken front they pressed upwards until they reached
the palisade. Here a desperate struggle began. The Norman sword and spear
were met by the axes of the housecarls, and the clubs, spears, and forks of
the levies. In vain Norman, Breton, Frenchmen, and Fleming strove to break
the English line. The high position of the defenders gave them a great
advantage over their assailants, among whose crowded ranks the javelin-men
did great execution, while the Normans could receive little aid from their
archers. Both sides fought with obstinate valour. The Norman battle-cry was
"God help us!" the English "God Almighty and the Holy Cross!" The latter
invocation being to the relic at Waltham, which was the king's special
object of devotion.
With jeering cries too they greeted the efforts of their assailants to
cross the palisade and break their line. At last the Norman infantry fell
back broken and baffled, having suffered terrible loss, and now the knights
and horsemen, who formed the backbone of William's army, rode up the hill.
The duke himself, as well as his brother Odo, Bishop of Bayeau, who fought
beside him, had laid aside their Norman swords, and were armed with heavy
maces, weapons as formidable as the English axe. But the valour of the
horsemen, the strength of their armour, the length of their lances, and the
weight of their horses, availed no more against the shield-wall of the
housecarls than the infantry had done.
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