throng when they were attempting to return to Pevensey which her father
must go to guard, because her horse was frightened and ran away, and
of how finally men took her by the arm and brought her to this castle,
saying that it was the safest place.

"Then here you must bide, Lady Blanche," I answered, cutting her short.
"Cling to me and I will save you if I can, even if it costs me my life."

Certainly she did cling to me for all the rest of that terrible day, as
will be seen.

From this height we saw Hastings beginning to burn, for the Frenchmen
had fired the town in sundry places, and being built of wood, it burnt
furiously. Also we saw and heard horrible scenes and sounds of rapine,
such as chance in this Christian world of ours where a savage foe finds
peaceful folk of another race at his mercy. In the houses people were
burnt; in the streets they were being murdered, or worse. Yes, even
children were murdered, for afterwards I saw the bodies of some of them.

Awhile later through the wreaths of smoke we perceived companies of the
French advancing to attack the Castle. There may have been three hundred
of them in all, and we did not count more than fifty men, some of
us ill-armed, together with a mob of aged people and many women and
children. What had become of the other men I do not know, but orders
had been shouted from all quarters, and some had gone this way and some
that. Some, too, I think, had fled, lacking leaders.

The French having climbed the hill, began to attack our ill-fenced
gateways, bringing up beams of timber to force them in. Those of us who
had bows shot some of them, though, their armour being good, for the