rown, and been overthrown oft enough.
Yet again, who shall judge me? for I must tell thee, that were I fairly
judged, I should be deemed no ill spear, even when I came not
uppermost: for in all these games are haps which no man may foresee."

"Well, then," said David, "all will go well with thee for this time:
for my lord will judge thee, and if it be seen that thou hast spoken
truly, and art more than a little deft at the play, he will be like to
make the best of thee, since thou art already paid for." Ralph laughed:
yet as though the jest pleased him but little; and they fell to talk of
other matters. And so David departed, and Ralph slept.

CHAPTER 35

Ralph Cometh To the Vale of the Tower

But when it was morning Ralph awoke, and saw that the sun was shining
brightly; so he cast his shirt on him, and went out at once, and turned
his face eastward, and, scarce awake, said to himself that the clouds
lay heavy in the eastward heavens after last night's haze: but
presently his eyes cleared, and he saw that what he had taken for
clouds was a huge wall of mountains, black and terrible, that rose up
sharp and clear into the morning air; for there was neither cloud nor
mist in all the heavens.

Now Ralph, though he were but little used to the sight of great
mountains, yet felt his heart rather rise than fall at the sight of
them; for he said: "Surely beyond them lieth some new thing for me,
life or death: fair fame or the forgetting of all men." And it was
long that he could not take his eyes off them.

As he looked, came up the Captain Otter, and said: "Well, Knight, thou
hast seen them this morn, even if ye die ere nightfall." Said Ralph:
"What deemest thou to lie beyond them?"

"Of us none knoweth surely," said Otter; "whiles I deem that if one
were to get to the other side there would be a great plain like to
this: whiles that there is naught save mountains beyond, and yet again
mountains, like the waves of a huge stone sea. Or whiles I think that
one would come to an end of the world, to a place where is naught but a
ledge, and then below it a gulf filled with nothing but the howling of
winds, and the depth of darkness. Moreover this is my thought, that
all we of these parts should be milder men and of better conditions, if
yonder terrible wall were away. It is as if we were thralls of the
great mountains."

Said Ralph, "Is this then the Wall of the World?" "It may well be so,"
said Otter; "but t