"Wore the winter thence with naught that I need tell of,
only I thought much of the words that my mistress had spoken.
Spring came and went, and summer also, well nigh tidingless.
But one day as I drave the goats from our house there came
from the wood four men, a-horseback and weaponed, but so covered
with their armour that I might see little of their faces.
They rode past me to our house, and spake not to me, though they
looked hard at me; but as they went past I heard one say:
'If she might but be our guide to the Well at the World's End!'
I durst not tarry to speak with them, but as I looked over
my shoulder I saw them talking to my mistress in the door;
but meseemed she was clad but in poor homespun cloth instead of her
rich apparel, and I am far-sighted and clear-sighted. After this
the autumn and winter that followed it passed away tidingless.
CHAPTER 4
The Lady Tells of Her Deliverance
"Now I had outgrown my old fear, and not much befell to quicken it:
and ever I was as much out of the house as I could be.
But about this time my mistress, from being kinder to me than before,
began to grow harder, and ofttimes used me cruelly: but of her deeds
to me, my friend, thou shalt ask me no more than I tell thee.
On a day of May-tide I fared abroad with my goats, and went
far with them, further from the house than I had been as yet.
The day was the fairest of the year, and I rejoiced in it,
and felt as if some exceeding great good were about to befall me;
and the burden of fears seemed to have fallen from me.
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