Wert thou as sound in limb as thou art in wind, thou wouldst feel thyself on the road ere thou knewest thou hadst taken leave of the saddle--did I but give the mare the sign she knows.' 'By God's grace,' said the cavalier, 'she shall be mine, and teach me the trick of it.' Richard answered only with a grim laugh, and again, but more gently this time, quickened the mare's pace.

Little more had passed between them when the six-sided towers of Raglan rose on their view.
Richard had, from childhood, been familiar with their aspect, especially that of the huge one called the Yellow Tower, but he had never yet been within the walls that encircled them.

At any time during his life, almost up to the present hour, he might have entered without question, for the gates were seldom closed and never locked, the portcullises, sheathed in the wall above, hung moveless in their rusty chains, and the drawbridges spanned the moat from scarp to counterscarp, as if from the first their beams had rested there in solid masonry.

And still, during the day, there was little sign of change, beyond an indefinable presence of busier life, even in the hush of the hot autumnal noon.

But at night the drawbridges rose and the portcullises descended--each with its own peculiar creak, and jar, and scrape, setting the young rooks cawing in reply from every pinnacle and tree-top--never later than the last moment when the warder could see anything larger than a cat on the brow of the road this side the village.