s oft they did, they always sold them for what they would bring
to the plain-dwellers; or else slew them, or held them to ransom, but
never brought them home to their stead. Howbeit, when they took
children, as whiles befell, they sometimes brought them home, and made
them very children of their Folk with many uncouth prayers and worship
of their Gods, who were indeed, as they deemed, but forefathers of the
Folk.

Now Ralph, he and his, being known for friends, these wild men could
not make enough of them, and as it were, compelled them to abide there
three days, feasting them, and making them all the cheer they might.
And they showed the wayfarers their manner of hunting, both of the hart
and the boar, and of wild bulls also. At first Ralph somewhat loathed
all this (though he kept a pleasant countenance toward his host), for
sorely he desired the fields of Upmeads and his father's house. But at
last when the hunt was up in the mountains, and especially of the wild
bulls, the heart and the might in him so arose that he enforced himself
to do well, and the wild men wondered at his prowess, whereas he was
untried in this manner of sports, and they deemed him one of the Gods,
and said that their kinsman had done well to get him so good a friend.
Both Ursula and the Sage withheld them from this hunting, and Ursula
abode with the women, who told her much of their ways of life, and
stories of old time; frank and free they were, and loved her much, and
she was fain of such manly-minded women after the sleight and lies of
the poor thralls of Utterbol.

On the fourth day the wayfarers made them ready and departed; and the
chief of the Folk went with them with a chosen band of weaponed men,
partly for the love of his guests, and partly that he might see the
Goldburg men-at-arms safe back to the road unto the plain and the
Midhouse of the Mountains, for they went now by other ways, which
missed the said House. On this journey naught befell to tell of, and
they all came down safe into the plain.

There the Goldburg men took their wage, and bidding farewell, turned
back with the wild men, praising Ralph much for his frankness and open
hand. As for the wild men, they exceeded in their sorrow for the
parting, and many of them wept and howled as though they had seen him
die before their faces. But all that came to an end, and presently
their cheer was amended, and their merry speech and laughter came down
from the pass unto t