THE FIFTEEN DECISIVE BATTLES OF THE WORLD; FROM MARATHON TO WATERLOO. BY E. S. CREASY, M.A., PROFESSOR OF ANCIENT AND MODERN HISTORY IN UNIVERSITY COLLEGE, London; Those few battles, of which a contrary event would have essentially varied IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. II. LONDON: RICHARD BENTLEY, NEW BURLINGTON STREET, 1851. 223. b. 59. JOAN OF ARC'S VICTORY OVER THE ENGLISH AT ORLEANS, Synopsis of Events between Joan of Arc's Victory at THE DEFEAT OF THE SPANISH ARMADA, A.D. 1588 Synopsis of Events between the Defeat of the Spanish THE FIFTEEN DECISIVE BATTLES OF THE WORLD. CHAPTER VIII. THE BATTLE OF HASTINGS, 1066 Eis vos la Bataille assemblée, Roman de Rou, 13183. ARLETTA's pretty feet twinkling in the brook made her the mother of William the Conqueror. Had she not thus fascinated Duke Robert the Liberal of Normandy, Harold would not have fallen at Hastings, no Anglo-Norman dynasty could have arisen, no British empire. The reflection is Sir Francis Palgrave's: * and it is emphatically true. If any one should write a history of "Decisive loves that have materially influenced the drama of the world in all its subsequent scenes," the daughter of the tanner of Falaise * "History of Normandy and England," vol. i. p. 526. VOL. II. B |