Thus incited, with Hob calling out to him to take heart of grace,
while Simon made a feint of trying to beat Mother Dolly, Hal started
forward and dealt a blow sufficient to make Simon cry out, 'Ha, well
struck, sir, if you had had a better grip of your lance! I even feel
it through my buff coat.'

He spoke as though it had been a kiss; but oh! and alack! why were
these rough and dreary exercises all that these guardians--yea, and
even Sir Lancelot and his mother--thought worth his learning, when
there was so much more that awoke his delight and interest? Was it
really childish to heed these things? Yet even to his young,
undeveloped brain it seemed as if there must be mysteries in sky and
sea, the unravelling of which would make life more worth having than
the giving and taking of blows, which was all they heeded.




CHAPTER VIII. THE HERMIT



No hermit e'er so welcome crost
A child's lone path in woodland lost.--KEBLE.


Hal had wandered farther than his wont, rather hoping to be out of
call if Simon arrived to give him a lesson in chivalrous sports. He
found himself on the slope of one of the gorges down which smaller
streams rushed in wet weather to join the Derwent. There was a sound