two straggling houses which stood in the outskirts of the
village, he found himself in a deep lane, running between two
banks overgrown with hazel and holly, while here and there a
dwarf oak flung its arms altogether across the path. The lane
was moreover much rutted and broken up by the carriages which had
recently transported articles of various kinds to the tournament;
and it was dark, for the banks and bushes intercepted the light
of the harvest moon.

From the village were heard the distant sounds of revelry, mixed
occasionally with loud laughter, sometimes broken by screams, and
sometimes by wild strains of distant music. All these sounds,
intimating the disorderly state of the town, crowded with
military nobles and their dissolute attendants, gave Gurth some
uneasiness. "The Jewess was right," he said to himself. "By
heaven and St Dunstan, I would I were safe at my journey's end
with all this treasure! Here are such numbers, I will not say of
arrant thieves, but of errant knights and errant squires, errant
monks and errant minstrels, errant jugglers and errant jesters,
that a man with a single merk would be in danger, much more a
poor swineherd with a whole bagful of zecchins. Would I were out
of the shade of these infernal bushes, that I might at least see
any of St Nicholas's clerks before they spring on my shoulders."

Gurth accordingly hastened his pace, in order to gain the open
common to which the lane led, but was not so fortunate as to
accomplish his object. Just as he had attained the upper end of
the lane, where the underwood was thickest, four men sprung upon
him, even as his fears anticipated, two from each side of the
road, and seized him so fast, that resistance, if at first