One day, being in a forest a few leagues from Dusseldorf, as Gerard was walking like one in a dream, thinking of Margaret, and scarce seeing the road he trode, his companion laid a hand on his shoulder, and strung his crossbow with glittering eye. “Hush!” said he, in a low whisper that startled Gerard more than thunder. Gerard grasped his axe tight, and shook a little: he heard a rustling in the wood hard by, and at the same moment Denys sprang into the wood, and his crossbow went to his shoulder, even as he jumped. Twang! went the metal string; and after an instant's suspense he roared, “Run forward, guard the road, he is hit! he is hit!” Gerard darted forward, and as he ran a young bear burst out of the wood right upon him; finding itself intercepted, it went upon its hind legs with a snarl, and though not half grown, opened formidable jaws and long claws. Gerard, in a fury of excitement and agitation, flung himself on it, and delivered a tremendous blow on its nose with his axe, and the creature staggered; another, and it lay grovelling, with Gerard hacking it. “Hallo! stop! you are mad to spoil the meat.” “I took it for a robber,” said Gerard, panting. “I mean, I had made ready for a robber, so I could not hold my hand.” “Ay, these chattering travellers have stuffed your head full of thieves and assassins; they have not got a real live robber in their whole nation. Nay, I'll carry the beast; bear thou my crossbow.” “We will carry it by turns, then,” said Gerard, “for 'tis a heavy load: poor thing, how its blood drips. Why did we slay it?” “For supper and the reward the baillie of the next town shall give us.” “And for that it must die, when it had but just begun to live; and perchance it hath a mother that will miss it sore this night, and loves it as ours love us; more than mine does me.” “What, know you not that his mother was caught in a pitfall last month, and her skin is now at the tanner's? and his father was stuck full of cloth-yard shafts t'other day, and died like Julius Caesar, with his hands folded on his bosom, and a dead dog in each of them?” But Gerard would not view it jestingly. “Why, then,” said he, “we have killed one of God's creatures that was all alone in the world-as I am this day, in this strange land.”