Ralph stood looking at him as he got smaller on the long
white road, and wondering what this might mean, and how
the unknown man should know him, if he did know him.
But presently he let his wonder run off him, and went his ways
into the church, wherein he found his good lord and friend
St. Nicholas, and so said a paternoster before his altar,
and besought his help, and made his offering; and then departed
and gat to horse again, and rode softly the way to the downs,
for the day was hot.
The way was steep and winding, with a hollow cup of the hills below it,
and above it a bent so steep that Ralph could see but a few yards of it
on his left hand; but when he came to the hill's brow and could look
down on the said bent, he saw strange figures on the face thereof,
done by cutting away the turf so that the chalk might show clear. A tree
with leaves was done on that hill-side, and on either hand of it a beast
like a bear ramping up against the tree; and these signs were very ancient.
This hill-side carving could not be seen from the thorp beneath,
which was called Netherton, because the bent looked westward down into
the hollow of the hill abovesaid; but from nigher to Wulstead they
were clear to see, and Ralph had often beheld them, but never so nigh:
and that hill was called after them Bear Hill. At the top of it was
an earth-work of the ancient folk, which also was called Bear Castle.
And now Ralph rode over the hill's brow into it; for the walls had been
beaten down in places long and long ago.
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