thoughts were their companions as they undressed and made ready for bed;
and hardly were they settled there before the door opened, and the old
bard Wenwynwyn entered.

This old man was almost like a father to these boys, and Llewelyn and
Howel were particularly attached to him and he to them. He shared to the
full their ardent love for their country and their untempered hatred of
the English race. He saw, as they did, nothing but ill in the
temporizing attitude now to be found amongst the smaller Welsh
chieftains with regard to the claims made by the English monarch; and
much of the fierce hostility to be found in the boys had been the result
of the lessons instilled into their mind by the wild-eyed, passionate
old bard, one of the last of a doomed race.

"Wenwynwyn, is it thou?"

"Ay, boys, it is I. You did well to abstain from sitting at meat with
the stranger tonight. The meat went nigh to choke me that was swallowed
in his presence."

"How long stays he, contaminating our pure air?"

"He himself is off by sunrise tomorrow, and Res Vychan goes with him. He
leaves behind the little maid in the care of thy mother."

A strange smile crossed the face of the old man, invisible in the darkness.

"Strange for the parent bird to leave the dove in the nest of the hawk
-- the eyry of the eagle."