But can I cast this half-fainting creature away from me on the dark, hard earth, perhaps into some deep abyss?
Come, then, what will, thou, Lady Aslauga, knowest that I die an honourable death!" "Froda! Hildegardis!" breathed a gentle, well-known voice at the entrance, and recognising Edwald, Froda bore the lady towards him into the starlight, saying, "She will die of terror in our sight in this deep cavern.

Is the foe near at hand ?" "Most of them lie lifeless on the shore, or swim bleeding through the waves," said Edwald.

"Set your mind at rest, and repose yourself.

Are you wounded, beloved Froda ?" He gave this short account to his astonished companions--how, in the darkness, he had mixed with the Bohemians and pressed into the skiff, and that it had been easy to him on landing to disperse the robbers entirely, who supposed that they were attacked by one of their own crew, and thought themselves bewitched.

"They began at last to fall on one another"-- so he ended his history; "and we have only now to wait for the morning to conduct the lady home, for those who are wandering about of that owl-squadron will doubtless hide themselves from the eye of day." While speaking, he had skilfully and carefully arranged a couch of twigs and moss for Hildegardis, and when the wearied one, after uttering some gentle words of gratitude, had sunk into a slumber, he began, as well as the darkness would allow, to bind up the wounds of his friend.