As the gate was unbarred and the draw-bridge again lowered to allow the abbat and Sir Ingelric to go forth for Caversham, those of our knights and men-at-arms who had ridden at an earlier hour to make reconnaissance, came back with loose bridle to report that a great battalia of the rebels was advancing upon the town of Reading by the western road. "Then," quoth our abbat, "is there no time to lose;" and putting his foot in the bright silver stirrup, he got into his saddle without the least assistance, albeit he was a corpulent man, and had had podagra. Two of our knights and half of our men-at-arms rode after the lord abbat and Sir Ingelric of Huntercombe, but the rest tarried with us. "Remember," said the abbat, turning the head of his palfrey, and addressing the townfolk and the serfs, "remember well that ye be all true men unto King Stephen!" The poor people made a very feeble essay to shout "Long live King Stephen!" and then prayed that we would admit them in at the postern-gate if the rebels came nearer; which thing we did now promise them to do. The lord abbat and his party, riding away at a hard gallop, were soon seen crossing at Caversham bridge; and very soon after they had crossed, a goodly band of armed men was seen to take post on the opposite bank of the river, a little below the bridge. Except these armed men, not a man, woman, or child could be discovered anywhere; for the shepherds and cowherds had driven their flocks and herds to the other side of Thamesis, and all the serfs and labouring people had fled either to our abbey walls or unto Caversham Castle. Only yesterday morning our green meadows and fruitful corn-fields had been full of life and joy and thoughtless song, but now they were solitary, and as sad and still as the grave. The wind, which blew freshly from the westward, still brought with it hideous drifts of smoke, which dirtied the bright blue sky, and a coarse pungent smell, which overcame the sweet odours that were emitted by our flowering hedge-rows and by the myriads of flowers which grew in the bright green meads and along the moist banks by the river side. It was all a Tartarus now; but on that sunny, happy May morning of yesterday it was like being in paradise to stand on our outer turret and scent the breeze, and feast the eye on plain and hill, meadow, river, and woodland, and to hear the lark singing in the clear sky over our head, and the blackbird whistling in the brake at our feet. Not a bird of all that choir was left now: the foul smoke and the pungent smell had scared them all away, as Ætna and Vesuve are said to do when they vomit their sulphureous fires. I was roused from some meditations of this sort by the scream of a trumpet, and by a chorus of rude voices that shouted, "The Empress for England! Down with the usurper Stephen! Long life to the Queen, and death to all who gainsay it!"