Layamon

Brut Layamon

At Totnes Constantin the fair and all his host came ashore; thither
came the bold man--well was he brave!--and with him two thousand
knights such as no king possessed. Forth they gan march into London,
and sent after knights over all the kingdom, and every brave man, that
speedily he should come anon.

The Britons heard that, where they dwelt in the pits; in earth and in
stocks they hid them like badgers, in wood and in wilderness, in heath
and in fen, so that well nigh no man might find any Briton, except
they were in castle, or in burgh inclosed fast. When they heard of
this word, that Constantin was in the land, then came out of the
mountains many thousand men; they leapt out of the wood as if it were
deer. Many hundred thousand marched toward London, by street and by
weald all it forth pressed; and the brave women put on them men's
clothes, and they forth journeyed toward the army.

When the Earl Constantin saw all this folk come to him, then he was so
blithe as he was never before in life. Forth they took their way two
nights and a day, so that they came full truly to Melga and Wanis.
Together they rushed with stern strength, fought fiercely--the fated
fell! Ere the day were gone, slain was Wanis and Melgan, and Peohtes
enow, and Scots without number, Danes and Norwegians, Galloways and
Irish. The while that the day was light lasted ever this slaughter.