a most particular and weighty reason for wishing to go," said
the sturdy knight.

"I can well believe it," returned Sir Nigel; "I have met no man who is
quicker to follow where honor leads."

"Nay, it is not for honor that I go, Nigel."

"For what then?"

"For pullets."

"Pullets?"

"Yes, for the rascal vanguard have cleared every hen from the
country-side. It was this very morning that Norbury, my squire,
lamed his horse in riding round in quest of one, for we have a bag of
truffles, and nought to eat with them. Never have I seen such locusts as
this vanguard of ours. Not a pullet shall we see until we are in front
of them; so I shall leave my Winchester runagates to the care of the
provost-marshal, and I shall hie south with you, Nigel, with my truffles
at my saddle-bow."

"Oliver, Oliver, I know you over-well," said Sir Nigel, shaking his
head, and the two old soldiers rode off together to their pavilion.

CHAPTER XXXV. HOW SIR NIGEL HAWKED AT AN EAGLE.

To the south of Pampeluna in the kingdom of Navarre there stretched
a high table-land, rising into bare, sterile hills, brown or gray in
color, and strewn with huge boulders of granite. On the Gascon side of
the great mountains there had been running streams, meadows, forests,
and little nestling villages. Here, on the contrary, were nothing but
naked rocks, poor pasture, and savage, stone-strewn wastes. Gloomy
defiles or barrancas intersected this wild country with mountain
torrents dashing and foaming between their rugged sides. The clatter
of waters, the scream of the eagle, and the howling of wolves the only
sounds which broke upon the silence in that dreary and inhospitable
region.

Through this wild country it was that Sir Nigel and his Company pushed
their way, riding at times through vast defiles where the brown, gnarled
cliffs shot up on either side of them, and the sky was but a long
winding blue slit between the clustering lines of box which fringed the
lips of the precipices; or, again leading their horses along the narrow
and rocky paths worn by the muleteers upon the edges of the chasm, where
under their very elbows they could see the white streak which marked
the _gave_ which foamed a thousand feet below them. So for two days they
pushed their way through the wild places of Navarre, past Fuente,
over the rapid Ega, through Estella, until upon a winter's evening the
mountains fell away from in front of them, and they saw the broad bl