“I was one of the last on the track, and saved only by a mere chance, or the grace of St. Owen, my patron.  I had dropped my quiver of arrows, and had gone back a few steps to fetch it; they brought me to the edge of the reedy marsh, and I was just returning, having found the quiver, when I heard a cry, followed by echoes as from a chain of sentinels all round the marsh—­’Fire the reeds!’ I ran back to the main land, climbed a tree which stood handy, and saw the marsh burst into fire in a hundred spots.  It was lighted all round, while our men were in the midst.  A chain of enemies surrounded it.  I did my best to warn our lord or to die with him.  I penetrated the marsh a little distance, when the flames beat me back—­man can’t fight fire.”

“Let us go to the castle, take what we can carry, and fly,” said Raoul; “they will be here soon, if they have destroyed our men; and there will be no safety nearer than Warwick for us.”

“Can we abandon our post?” asked one.

“Not till we are sure all is lost,” said another.

“Tristam, thou must remain here and watch, and warn us if any approach.”

“But how long shall I stay?” sobbed the alarmed boy.

“Nay, he is too young,” cried the fugitive from the marsh; “besides, it is needless.  I know they are all coming upon us—­they are thousands strong instead of hundreds, as that liar, the guide, stated.  We must fly ourselves, for the time, and bid the monks, the women, and children to fly also.”

“Shall we burn the castle, lest it fall into their hands as a stronghold?”

“Nay, that were to give up all; we shall return thither again, and that soon; leave it open for them.  The Norman lion will prove more than a match for the English wolf in the long run.”

“Onward, then—­home—­home.”

And the dispirited men returned to the castle.

It was manifestly useless to attempt to defend the place; all that could be done was to save their lives, and such “portable property” as could be removed on the instant.

So the old men only returned to warn their astonished comrades, and then gathering such household goods as they most valued, they loaded the horses and oxen which remained, and journeyed to bear the news to Warwick.

But before they went, Tristam was sent to warn the prior and his confreres at the priory of St. Denys that danger was at hand.

“I care not,” said that valiant prior of the Church Militant, “though as many Englishmen were in the woods as leaves on the trees; they shall be excommunicated if they interfere with us; our weapons are not carnal.”

So the Norman Prior and his monks shut their gates and remained, while through the forest road the men-at-arms escorted all the women and children of the village, the interlopers who had taken the place of the banished English, towards the town of Warwick, and its famous castle, where Henry de Beauchamp had recently been appointed governor by the Conqueror, the first Norman Earl of Warwick, and the ancestor of a famous line of warriors.  We have already met his countess at Aescendune, on the occasion of the dedication of the new priory.