At the first sign of dawn Sir Richard Pendragon awoke, rose from his couch, and shook himself like a dog. He then announced that we must get upon our road at once, since our proximity to the King of Castile’s chief city was highly perilous. It was with a tender concern that we awakened the poor Count of Nullepart, who was still dozing fitfully. His face looked ashen pale in the grey morning light, but he gave us his assurance that he was fit to take the saddle. Whether this was the case or not, and his looks denied him, the Count of Nullepart was a brave man, and he disdained our aid in mounting his horse. But never was a path so difficult and painful as the one we took that day. We dared not descend the mountain to the public road, lest we fell in with our foes, but were compelled to move by stealth across an almost insurmountable country, like a company of robbers skulking from lawful men. In the soreness of our travail, which was such that on many occasions we had to dismount and lead our horses along places they could not take alone, we needed much resolution to support the pains of our journey. I know not what were the sufferings of our stricken companion, yet not a word of complaint escaped from his lips. As for Sir Richard Pendragon, his demeanour had become that of a brave man and a redoubtable leader. The face of peril had changed him from an insolent trifler who was prone to insult a noble country to one who had a natural love of leadership, and who took cognisance of all the haps to which we were like to be exposed. His prescience was indeed very great. Doubtless it was the fruit of a long acquaintance with the arduous business of war. And although he appeared to have been bred in the love of danger, and admitted now and again that “he had a passion to cut a throat,” he had also the highest respect for his own person, and further he had a faithful servant’s regard for the errand he had embraced. The sun was high at noon ere our wanderings brought us to a hamlet in which we were able to find food and rest. It was situated in a remote part, where our enemies were not likely to trouble us. Here it was that the Count of Nullepart had his wound dressed and artfully bandaged, and Sir Richard Pendragon procured a shirt greatly too small for him. In this place we lay in shelter for two hours from the great heat of the day. When towards evening we resumed our road in some refreshment of mind and body, we knew it better and embraced it with more certainty. Fortune attending on us, we came securely, a little after night had fallen, to a wayside inn. Here a rude but welcome hospitality was offered to us, and thus we lay in succour till the dawn.