The Montgomery advertiser., 1909-05-30
lADl G0DIA

lADl QUDIM
 She bound the ribbon around his hemet. and he shouted like the Ber- serker he was: T am Hereward. the Berserker. the brainhewer. the land thief, the sea thief. the feeder of wolf and raven! Aoii Aoi!'
 Torfrida shuddered. when she heard that wild battle cry. that fearsome slaughter call of the Vikings that we have softened to "Hurrahr' in our degenerate day. And when she look ed at the face of the Wake. the fiash- ing eye, the dilated nostril, she saw the temper of the man on whom she had thrown herself so utterly. But 1t did not deter her.
 She had many more things to endure from her bear of lover. Hereward. though he had been educated in Q monastery had all the roughness and rudenesses and ignorances of the wild rough dwellers in the narrow islands. Torfrida was one of the most learned persons of her day. So wise was she and so clever (except in loyel that people even in cultivated France call- ed her a sorceress. for the very pro- per and sufficient reason that she knew things that others did not.
 The nobles and knights at St. omer naQ ISAI D bOuCkle 4t lCacts .OA (t10L Ni1o- sic civilization without which good manners seem, even at the present day, almost beyond the reach of the white man. Hereward, drinking like Dane and a Viking. hoasted huge ly. roared rudely and quarreled swift ly. He would spring up at banQuets and chant his doughty deeds. And every time he sang the height of the Cornish giant increased by at least a foot and the stature of the fairy bear was doubled.
 The clever courtiers answered his boasts with wilder ones. which every body enjoyed except Hereward. who took them in deadly earnest and tried to outvie them. Then Torfrida grew sometimes quite contemptuous some times cold sometimes altogether fierce In secret she shed bitter tears espec- tally after some gallant had congratu- lated her before the whole court on the modesty and good breeding of her young savage,
 But she was a brave. good. true girl, and she loved him with all her heart, and she endured the poisoned words of envy and malice for his sake, andN quite patiently and humbly and bravely she set herself to teach and train her wild outlaw into the ideal of a perfect and true knight.
 If Hereward had searched through the world he could have found no wo- man better qualified for the task than his wise and learned Torfrida. And perhpas Torfrida could have found no more noble material on which to work than the Wake the wolf's head. the Viking, the bear-killer.
 He listened to her, first merely to humor her. because women are such fraiL foolish fond things, then he be- gan to wonder. and then to admire. and at last to learn. quite simply and with a humility as unconscious and brave as His boasting had been.
 He had relpases. to be sure. Once they told him that a horse breeder in that was the uRliest and fastest in the world. They challenged Here ward to get her. warning him that her owner had seven mems strength and would not sell her except the pur- chaser won a fight A Fleming cour- tier said with a sheer that Hereward would win. since he wore a magic ar nor that had been given to him by TorfrIda.
 Thereupon Hereward shook his great golden beard and roared that he would ride to the campaigns in Holland in his shirt and come back with the mare.
 In q moment he was Berserker Ha sent Torfrida'a armor to her with a message that he could do without 1t. Next day he rode away by the side of Robert, brother of Baldwin of Elan ders. with his long yellow curls float ing over his shoulders, golden spurs on his heels, but only a silxen shirt and silk hose for dress He looked boldly up at her as he passed. and laughed and rode on. Torfrida with drew and fell to the floor in a faint. She did not see him again for three quarters of 8 year, and she nearly lied with misery. Then one day there rodc into the courtyard of the castle a most unpleasant object. in a shirt brown with month-old blood. torn criss and cross. while half healed scars showed under every rent.
 Hair and beard of the creature were unkept. A heavy cut across the head nose, save that of Love. would have wrinkled itself and demanded per fume.
 But Torfrida ran to the brown-shirt- cd ragamuffin and threw her arms around his neck and laughed and cried and then never stirred or spoke, but just held him tight.
 Now" said Hereward, q will go wash myself and change this shirt. for certes I need It."
 Soon they were married. and Here ward lived right well. for he had done a good plundering in the wars and Torfrida was rich. and Count Baldwin made him Master of Knights. He kept forty of his galIent vikings in