"
Quoth the Sage: "Behind that ness shall ye come to the Rock
of the Fighting Man, which is the very Gate of the Mountains;
and I will not turn again nor bid you farewell till I have brought
you thither. And now time presses; for I would have you come
timely to that cavern, whereof I have taught you, before ye
fall on the first days of winter, or ye shall be hard bestead.
So now we will eat a morsel, and then use diligence that we
may reach the beginning of the rock-sea before nightfall."
So did they, and the Sage led them down by a slant-way
from off the ridge, which was toilsome but nowise perilous.
So about sunset they came down into the plain, and found a belt
of greensward, and waters therein betwixt the foot of the ridge
and the edge of the rock-sea. And as for the said sea,
though from afar it looked plain and unbroken, now that they
were close to, and on a level with it, they saw that it rose
up into cliffs, broken down in some places, and in others
arising high into the air, an hundred foot, it might be.
Sometimes it thrust out into the green shore below the fell,
and otherwhile drew back from it as it had cooled ages ago.
So they came to a place where there was a high wall of rock round three sides
of a grassy place by a stream-side, and there they made their resting-place,
and the night went calmly and sweetly with them.
CHAPTER 9
They Come Forth From the Rock-Sea
On the morrow the Sage led them straight into the rock-sea whereas it
seemed to them at first that he was but bringing them into a blind alley;
but at the end of the bight the rock-wall was broken down into a long
scree of black stones.
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