One or two arrows, shot by men who found their wits sooner than the rest, pattered after us, and we gained the hilltop and the great cheer that went up from our few men who were there made the Danes halt and waver, and at last turn back to the open again.

We stayed on that hilltop for an hour.  Then the Danes were coming up in force, and there was no hope in staying, so we got back to the fort before they could cut us off.

Soon after this there was a general movement on the part of our foes, and before evening we were surrounded on all sides by strong posts, and it was plain that we were not to move from the fort.

Now this is not very large, but it is very strong—­the hill which has been fortified being some two hundred feet high, and steep sided as a house roof on all sides but the east, where the entrance must needs be.  But this again has outworks; and the road into the ramparts from the long slope of Cannington hill to the southward runs slantwise through them, so that the gap it makes in the first line is covered by the second.  And both upper and lower rampart go right round the circle of the hilltop, and are very strong, having been made by the British folk, who well understood such matters, and had such fighters as the old Romans and our own forefathers to deal with.  Some parts of the works were of piled stones, and the rest of earth, as the ground required.

There is but one way in which that fort could be taken by force, as I think, and that is by attacking on all sides at once, which needs a greater force than would ever be likely to come against it.  Moreover, on one side the marshy course of the Combwich stream would hinder any heavy onslaught.

So inside these ramparts were we with some six hundred men, and there we were watched by three times our number.  There was a strong post on Cannington hill, between us and Bridgwater; another—­and that the main body—­between us and the ships, on a little, sharp hill crest across a stony valley two bowshots wide that lay between it and the fort; and so we were well guarded.

At first this seemed of little moment, for we were to stay Hubba before the place; and for a while there was nothing but rejoicing over the return of the banner.  Then I found there was no water in the place, and that we had but what food each man happened to carry with him.  Presently that want of water became terrible, for our wounded began to cry for it piteously.  Maybe it was as well that we had few with us, because the field was left in the hands of the Danes.

Up and down among those few went Etheldreda and Alswythe and Thora, tending them and comforting them, where we had sent them—­to the highest point of the hilltop, inside the upper rampart; and I could see the flutter of their dresses now and then from where I watched beside Odda on the lower works.  I had spoken to neither since we came here.

Towards dusk I spoke to Odda, and he gave me twenty men; and gathering all the vessels of any sort that would hold water, we climbed over the rampart next the marsh, and stole down to the nearest pool and brought back all we could, using helms and leathern cloaks and the like, for want of buckets.  We got back safely that time, and I sent the same men again, thinking that there was no danger, and so not going myself.