At which, when they would dismount, I went to help the maiden, and was pleased that she thanked me for the little trouble, looking at me shyly.

I think that I had not heard a more pleasant voice than hers, or so it seemed to me at the time.

She went into the house with her mother, and I was left with a remembrance of her words that bided with me; and I called myself foolish for thinking twice of the meeting.
Then the earl and Olaf and Relf began to speak of the best way in which to deal with these plunderers; and as I looked at the stout fair-haired thane it seemed to me that things must have been bad if he had had to fly.
It would seem that his place was some ten miles from Pevensea, lying at the head of a forest valley, down which was a string of the old hammer ponds that the Romans made when they worked the iron.

And the village, or town as he called it, was in the next valley, at the head of the little river Ashbourne, whose waters joined the river which makes the haven of Pevensea.

The town was very old, and had a few earthworks round it, though the place whereon it stood was strong by nature.