slaying his guards.

The king took his wife, the mother of his sons, and what he might
[of good] and saved himself and fled in the darkness of the
night, unknowing whither he should go. When travel grew sore upon
them, there met them robbers by the way, who took all that was
with them, [even to their clothes], so that there was left unto
each of them but a shirt and trousers; yea, they left them
without victual or camels or [other] riding-cattle, and they
ceased not to fare on afoot, till they came to a coppice, to wit,
a garden of trees, on the shore of the sea. Now the road which
they would have followed was crossed by an arm of the sea, but it
was scant of water. So, when they came to that place, the king
took up one of his children and fording the water with him, set
him down on the other bank and returned for his other son. Him
also he set by his brother and returning for their mother, took
her up and passing the water with her, came to the place [where
he had left his children], but found them not. Then he looked at
the midst of the island and saw there an old man and an old
woman, engaged in making themselves a hut of reeds. So he put
down his wife over against them and set off in quest of his
children, but none gave him news of them and he went round about
right and left, but found not the place where they were.

Now the children had entered the coppice, to make water, and
there was there a forest of trees, wherein, if a horseman
entered, he might wander by the week, [before finding his way
out], for none knew the first thereof from the last. So the boys
entered therein and knew not how they should return and went
astray in that wood, to an end that was willed of God the Most