C H AIV.1074 .

34# HISTORY OF ENGLAND.

p. first duty was to his sovereign and benefactor,his next to himself and his family; and that, ifhe seized not the opportunity of making atone-ment for his guilt, by revealing it, the temerityof the conspirators was so great, that they would ]give some other person the means of acquiringthe merit of the discovery. Waltheof, convincedby these arguments, went over to Normandy;but, though he was well received by the king, jand thanked for.his fidelity, the account, pre* <viously transmitted by Judith , had sunk deep :into William’s mind , and had destroyed all themerit of her husband’s repentance.

The conspirators , hearing of Waltheof sdeparture , immediately concluded their design tobe betrayed; and they flew to arms, before theirschemes were ripe for execution, and before thearrival of the Danes, in whose aid they placedtheir chief confidence. The earl of Hereford waschecked by Walter de Lacy, a great baron inthose parts , who , supported by the bishop ofWorcester and the abbot of Evesham , raisedsome forces, and prevented the earl from pastingthe Severne, or advancing into the heart of thekingdom. The earl of Norfolk was defeated athagadun, near Cambridge, by Odo, the regent,a stifled by Richard de Bienfaite , and William deWarrenne , the two justiciaries. The prisonerstaken in this action had their right foot cut off,as a punishment of their treason : The earl him-self escaped to Norwich , thence to Denmark;where the Danish fleet , which had made an