Had you not been able to join us, we should have remained in the turret and sold our lives to the last, as, putting aside the question that we could never return to our homes, having let our dear lord die here, we should not, in our ignorance of the language and customs of the country, have ever been able to make our way across it.

We knew, however, that before this turret was carried we could show these Germans how five Englishmen, when brought to bay, can sell their lives." They had not much difficulty in obtaining food in the forest, for game abounded, and they could kill as many deer as seemed fit to them.

As Cnut said, it was difficult to believe that they were not back again in the forest near Evesham, so similar was their life to that which they had led three years before.

To Cnut and the archers, indeed, it was a pleasanter time than any which they had passed since they had left the shores of England, and they blithely marched along, fearing little any pursuit which might be set on foot, and, indeed, hearing nothing of their enemies.

After six days' travel they came upon a rude village, and here Cuthbert learned from the people--with much difficulty, however, and pantomime, for neither could understand a word spoken by the other--that they were now in one of the Swiss cantons, and therefore secure from all pursuit by the Germans.