t they made no stay, nor did they quicken their pace
much; because they knew that they should come to Bearham before night-
fall, and they would not meet the Romans way-worn and haggard; but they
rode on steadily, a terrible company of wrathful men.

They passed by the dwellings of the kindreds, though save for the
Galtings the houses on the east side of the water between the Bearings
and the wild-wood road were but small; for the thicket came somewhat near
to the water and pinched the meadows. But the Galtings were great
hunters and trackers of the wild-wood, and they of the Geddings, the
Erings and the Withings, which were smaller Houses, lived somewhat on the
take of fish from Mirkwood-water (as did the Laxings also of the Nether-
mark), for thereabout were there goodly pools and eddies, and sun-warmed
shallows therewithal for the spawning of the trouts; as there were eyots
in the water, most of which tailed off into a gravelly shallow at their
lower ends.

Now as the riders of the Goths came over against the dwellings of the
Withings, they saw people, mostly women, driving up the beasts from the
meadow towards the garth; but upon the tofts about their dwellings were
gathered many folk, who had their eyes turned toward the token of ravage
that hung in the sky above the fair plain; but when these beheld the
riding of the host, they tossed up their arms to them and whatever they
bore in them, and the sound of their shrill cry (for they were all women
and young lads) came down the wind to the ears of the riders. But down
by the river on a swell of the ground were some swains and a few thralls,
and among them some men armed and a-horseback; and these, when they
perceived the host coming on turned and rode to meet them; and as they
drew near they shouted as men overjoyed to meet their kindred; and indeed
the fighting-men of their own House were riding in the host. And the
armed men were three old men, and one very old with marvellous long white
hair, and four long lads of some fifteen winters, and four stout carles
of the thralls bearing bows and bucklers, and these rode behind the
swains; so they found their own kindred and rode amongst them.

But when they were all jingling and clashing on together, the dust
arising from the sun-dried turf, the earth shaking with the thunder of
the horse-hoofs, then the heart of the long-hoary one stirred within him
as he bethought him of the days of his youth, and to his old nostri