Louder and louder grew the roar.

“Throw yourselves down against the wall of rock,” Cuthbert shouted, himself setting the example.

A moment afterwards, from above, a mighty mass of rock and snow poured over like a cascade, with a roar and sound which nigh stunned them.  For minutes—­it seemed for hours to them—­the deluge of snow and rock continued.  Then, as suddenly as it had begun, it ceased, and a silence as of death reigned over the place.

“Arise,” Cuthbert said; “the danger, methinks, is past.  It was what men call an avalanche—­a torrent of snow slipping down from the higher peaks.  We have had a narrow escape indeed.”

By this time the knight whom they had rescued was able to speak, and raising his visor, he returned his deepest thanks to those who had come so opportunely to his aid.

“I was well nigh exhausted,” he said, “and it was only my armour which saved me from being torn to pieces.  A score of them had hold of me; but, fortunately, my mail was of Milan proof, and even the jaws and teeth of these enormous beasts were unable to pierce it.”

“The refuge is near at hand,” Cuthbert said.  “It is but a few yards round yonder point.  It is well that we heard your voice.  I fear that your horse has fallen a victim.”

Assisting the knight, who, in spite of his armour, was sorely bruised and exhausted, they made their way back to the refuge.  Cnut and the archers were all bleeding freely from various wounds inflicted upon them in the struggle, breathless and exhausted from their exertions, and thoroughly awe-struck by the tremendous phenomenon of which they had been witnesses, and which they had only escaped from their good fortune in happening to be in a place so formed that the force of the avalanche had swept over their heads The whole of the road, with the exception of a narrow piece four feet in width, had been carried away.  Looking upwards, they saw that the forest had been swept clear, not a tree remaining in a wide track as far as they could see up the hill.  The great bowlders which had strewn the hill-side, and many of which were as large as houses, had been swept away like straws before the rush of snow, and for a moment they feared that the refuge had also been carried away.  Turning the corner, however, they saw to their delight that the limits of the avalanche had not extended so far, the refuges, as they afterwards learned, being so placed as to be sheltered by overhanging cliffs from any catastrophe of this kind.

They found the guide upon his knees, muttering his prayers before a cross, which he had formed of two sticks laid crosswise on the ground before him; and he could scarce believe his eyes when they entered, so certain had he considered it that they were lost.  There were no longer any signs of the wolves.  The greater portion, indeed, of the pack had been overwhelmed by the avalanche, and the rest, frightened and scared, had fled to their fastnesses in the woods.