to go very deeply into the
matter with any one to whom my words may give offence. How say you, Sir
William? Or you, my Lord of Angus? Or you, Sir Richard?"

"Nay, nay, Nigel!" cried Sir William. "This base peasant is too small
a matter for old comrades to quarrel over. But he hath betrayed us, and
certes he hath merited a dog's death."

"Hark ye, fellow," said Sir Nigel. "We give you one more chance to
find the path. We are about to gain much honor, Sir William, in this
enterprise, and it would be a sorry thing if the first blood shed were
that of an unworthy boor. Let us say our morning orisons, and it may
chance that ere we finish he may strike upon the track."

With bowed heads and steel caps in hand, the archers stood at their
horse's heads, while Sir Simon Burley repeated the Pater, the Ave, and
the Credo. Long did Alleyne bear the scene in mind--the knot of knights
in their dull leaden-hued armor, the ruddy visage of Sir Oliver, the
craggy features of the Scottish earl, the shining scalp of Sir Nigel,
with the dense ring of hard, bearded faces and the long brown heads of
the horses, all topped and circled by the beetling cliffs. Scarce had
the last deep "amen" broken from the Company, when, in an instant, there
rose the scream of a hundred bugles, with the deep rolling of drums and
the clashing of cymbals, all sounding together in one deafening uproar.
Knights and archers sprang to arms, convinced that some great host was
upon them; but the guide dropped upon his knees and thanked Heaven for
its mercies.

"We have found them, caballeros!" he cried. "This is their morning call.
If ye will but deign to follow me, I will set them before you ere a man
might tell his beads."

As he spoke he scrambled down one of the narrow ravines, and, climbing
over a low ridge at the further end, he led them into a short valley
with a stream purling down the centre of it and a very thick growth of
elder and of box upon either side. Pushing their way through the dense
brushwood, they looked out upon a scene which made their hearts beat
harder and their breath come faster.

In front of them there lay a broad plain, watered by two winding streams
and covered with grass, stretching away to where, in the furthest
distance, the towers of Burgos bristled up against the light blue
morning sky. Over all this vast meadow there lay a great city of
tents--thousands upon thousands of them, laid out in streets and in
squares like a well-or