CHAPTER X.HOW GYMBERT THE MARSHAL LOST HIS NAME AS A GOOD HUNTSMAN.
There was to be a great hunt on this next day after we came to Sutton, the stronghold palace.
It had been made ready beforehand--men driving the game from the farther hills and woodlands into the valley of the Lugg, and then drawing a line of nets and fires across a narrow place in its upper reaches, that the wild creatures might not stray beyond reach again.

I should hardly like to say how many thralls watched the sides of that valley from this barrier to a mile or two from the palace.

Nor do I know if all the tales they told of the countless head of game, deer and boar, wolf and fox, roe and wild white cattle, which had been driven for the kings, are true, but I will say that never have I seen such swarming woods as those through which we rode after the morning meal.
I had no thought that Offa seemed otherwise than as we met him yesterday, and I suppose that all thought, or perhaps all remembrance, of what he and his queen had talked of last night had gone from him.

Gay and friendly he was, and we heard him jesting lightly with Ethelbert as they led us.

With them went Gymbert, smooth and pleasant as ever; and he nodded to me as his eye lit on me, and smiled without trace of aught but friendliness.