How many years might it have been without sunlight or touch of dew or cool green leaves that it had loved?
And I was fain to climb down and take it up in my hand and set it free on the grass outside the house, where a dock spread its broad leaves.

It crawled under them in haste, and I saw it no more.

Then I found that Spray the smith was watching me, and he said a strange thing.
"That is a good deed, master," he said.

"I think that you shall never be in prison." "May I never be so," I answered, wondering.
"I am a forest-bred man," he said, "and I love all beasts," and then he turned away, and went to the men who were waiting for the earl's word.
And when all was ready Relf came to me and said that he would go to his own place with his men, and that he would ask me to take word to his wife and daughter that all was safe at home.

The outlaws had been too busy in the town to seek further for plunder, or had not cared to do so at once.