Now Ralph sat up and saw Ursula still sleeping; then he rose to his feet and
looked about him, and saw their two horses cropping the grass under the bent,
and beside them a man, tall and white bearded, leaning on his staff.
Ralph caught up his sword and went toward the man, and the sun gleamed
from the blade just as the hoary-one turned to him; he lifted up his staff
as if in greeting to Ralph, and came toward him, and even therewith Ursula
awoke and arose, and saw the greybeard at once; and she cried out:
"Take heed to thy sword, fellow-farer, for, praised be the saints,
this is the Sage of Swevenham!"
So they stood there together till the Sage came up to them and
kissed them both, and said: "I am glad that ye are come at last;
for I looked for you no later than this. So now mount your
horses and come with me straightway; because life is short
to them who have not yet drunk of the Well at the World's End.
Moreover if ye chance to come on the riders of Utterbol,
it shall go hard with you unless I be at hand."
Ralph saw of him that though he was an old hoar man to look on,
yet he was strong and sturdy, tall, and of goodly presence,
with ruddy cheeks, and red lips and bright eyes, and that the skin
of his face and hands was nowise wrinkled: but about his neck
was a pair of beads like unto his own gossip's gift.
So now they mounted at once, and with no more words he led them
about the bent, and they came in a little while into the wood again,
but this time it was of beech, with here and there an open place
sprinkled about with hollies and thorns; and they rode down the wide
slope of a long hill, and up again on the other side.
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