refore I do not mind saying that I
have been fairly afraid--how felt you?"

"I would I might never be so frightened again," I answered, for
truly I had made myself so at one with this brave man that I had
forgotten that there was little fear for myself, as I have said,
unless that it had been Rorik's crew who had found us, for only a
few of them knew me.

We came now to a place where the trees thinned away on the brow of
a hill, and I could see the broad waters of the haven through their
trunks. We had reached the crest of that little cliff over which
Wilfrith's heathen had cast themselves in the great famine from
which he saved them.

"Let us see the last of Bosham," the prior said sadly. So we crept
through the fern and long grass, and lying down looked out over
haven and village. Even if a prying Dane looked our way he would
hardly see us thus hidden, or if he did would take us but for
villagers and care not.

Now I saw that the tide was on the turn, and that Halfden's
ship--my own ship, as I have ever thought her--had hauled out, and
her boats waited for the last of the crew at the wharf side. But
Rorik's ship was there still, and her men were busy rigging a crane
of spars as though they would lower some heavy thing on board her.
Nor could I guess what that might be.

Then I looked at the village, which was burning here and there, and
at the monastery. They had not fired the church, and the Danes
clustered round the tower doorway, busied with something, and I
could see them well, for the smoke from the burning buildings blew
away from us.

Now I asked the prior what heavy things worth carrying away might
be in the monastery.

"Naught," he said; "since they have drunk all the ale that was in
the cask or two we had.

"But," he added, "there is the great bell, it is the only weighty
thing else."

Then I knew what was toward, and said:

"I fear, Father, that your bell is going to be taken to become
metal for mail shirts, and axe heads, and arrowheads, and helms."

"Holy St. Wilfrith!" cried the monk, in great grief; "would that we
could have saved it. There is no such bell in all England, and if
they take it, many a sailor will miss its call through fog and
driving mist, and many a shepherd on yonder downs will wait for its
ringing, and be the wearier for lack thereof."

"Never have I seen bell too large for one man to handle," I said;
"this must be a wondrous bell!"

So it was, he told me, and while