"God help thee, thou sinful boy!" said the Abbot.

"Hereward, Hereward! Come back!" cried Brand.

But the boy had spurred his horse through the gateway, and was far down
the road.

"Leofric, my friend," said Brand, sadly, "this is my sin, and no man's
else. And heavy penance will I do for it, till that lad returns in peace."

"Your sin?"

"Mine, Abbot. I persuaded his mother to send him hither to be a monk.
Alas! alas! How long will men try to be wiser than Him who maketh men?"

"I do not understand thee," quoth the Abbot. And no more he did.

It was four o'clock on a May morning, when Hereward set out to see the
world, with good armor on his back, good weapon by his side, good horse
between his knees, and good money in his purse. What could a lad of
eighteen want more, who under the harsh family rule of those times had
known nothing of a father's, and but too little of a mother's, love? He
rode away northward through the Bruneswald, over the higher land of
Lincolnshire, through primeval glades of mighty oak and ash, holly and
thorn, swarming with game, which was as highly preserved then as now,
under Canute's severe forest laws. The yellow roes stood and stared at him
knee-deep in the young fern; the pheasant called his hens out to feed in
the dewy grass; the blackbird and thrush sang out from every bough; the
wood-lark trilled above the high oak-tops, and sank down on them as his