'
Therewith he cast off his raiment, and they gave him the weapons and
wished him good speed, and he went his way twixt moonlight and
shadow; but the Burgdalers went to sleep when they had set a watch.
Early in the morning they awoke, and the sun was shining and the
thrushes singing in the thorn-brake, and all seemed fair and
peaceful, and a little haze still hung about the face of the burg
over the river. So they went down to the water and washed the night
from off them; and thence the most part of them went back to their
lair among the thorn-bushes: but four of them went up the dale into
the oak-wood to shoot a buck, and five more they sent out to watch
their skirts around them; and Face-of-god with old Stone-face went
over a ford of the stream, and came on to the lower slope of the
burg, and so went up it to the top. Thence they looked about to see
if aught were stirring, but they saw little save the waste and the
wood, which on the north-east was thick of big trees stretching out a
long way. Their own lair was clear to see over its bank and the
bushes thereof, and that misliked Face-of-god, lest any foe should
climb the burg that day.
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