And the Goldburg folk are not very handy at a fray without their walls.
Forsooth within them it is another matter, and beside not even our
Lord of Utterbol would see Goldburg broken down, no, not for all
that he might win there."

"Is it deemed a holy place in the land, then?" said Ralph.

"I wot not the meaning of holy," said the other: "but all we
deem that when Goldburg shall fall, the world shall change,
so that living therein shall be hard to them that have not drunk
of the water of the Well at the World's End."

Ralph was silent a while and eyed the captain curiously:
then he said: "Have the Goldburgers so drunk?" Said the captain:
"Nay, nay; but the word goes that under each tower of Goldburg
lieth a youth and a maiden that have drunk of the water,
and might not die save by point and edge."

Then was Ralph silent again, for once more he fell
pondering the matter if he had been led away to be offered
as a blood offering to some of evil gods of the land.
But as he pondered a flourish of trumpets was blown,
and all men sprang up, and the captain said to Ralph:
"Now hath our Lord done his dinner and we must to horse."
Anon they were on the way again, and they rode long and saw little
change in the aspect of the land, neither did that cloudlike
token of the distant mountains grow any greater or clearer
to Ralph's deeming.