Now it happened this year that the rains ceased much earlier than was usual, and that the summer sun, as if impatient for empire, began to rule and to dry up the wet ground long before the season of spring was passed. There fell very little rain after the quinquane of Pasche,[170] but after the feast of Saint Walburga the Virgin there fell no rain at all, and the weather became uncommonly dry and hot. It was pleasant to the eye to see the waters of the Cam, the Ouse, the Welland, the Nene, the Witham, and the other rivers retiring as it were into their natural beds, and flowing very smoothly and clearly towards the great Wash; to see green meadows re-appear where pools and meres had been, and flocks and herds beginning to graze where boats and skerries and men walking upon tall stilts had been seen but a few weeks before; to see, as far as the eye could reach, a beautiful green prospect, with rich pastures, gliding rivers, and adornments of woods and islands. But if this was pleasant to the eye, it was not conducive to the security of the Saxon chiefs. On the vigil of Saint Bede the Venerable, priest and confessor, which falls on the twenty-seventh of the decades of May, Eustache of Ambleville, a Norman captain of high repute, who had come over with William and the first incomers, and had fought at the battle of Hastings, arrived at Cam-Bridge with more soldiers, and with orders from William to take the entire command of all the forces collected in the camp and castle. Eustache was so confident of an easy victory that he would not allow himself to think of the possibility of any defeat or reverse. As he looked from the top of the keep towards Ely, he said, triumphantly, “The waters are gone, and I am come. The Camp of Refuge is no more! In three days’ time we shall be feasting in the hall of this rebellious abbat, who hath so long defied us!” The other knights that were to follow him in this adventure were just as confident as Eustache of Ambleville, and the men-at-arms were already calculating how they should divide the spoil that was to be made at Ely. Little did they think how the shrine-boxes had all been emptied! Less still did they think of the great loss of goods they themselves were going to sustain!