However this might be, the knights were once more supplied with lances, the trumpets sounded for the third time; anger and impatience rather than their former courtesy were now visible in every attitude and gesture. The spectators knew not well how or where their lances struck on this meeting. Folko’s silver-grey steed recoiled and reared, then seemed to tremble and totter from the violence of the shock; but the knight, bending over his neck, still spurred him on, in a light gallop. On the other hand, Archimbald’s black charger fell down on his knees, but instantly rose again with a violent plunge; then, no longer tamed by the efforts of his now almost powerless master, careered about through the ring, in all the madness of ungovernable rage, so that he and his strangely-attired rider seemed like demons rather than mortal beings. At length with a tremendous bound he leapt through the torches and disappeared! Thereafter, from some distance, amid the deep rayless gloom, one heard by the crash of his armour that Count Archimbald had been thrown to the ground. Folko remained for some time motionless in his place; then he dismounted, gently stroked the mane of his silver-grey steed, threw away the fragment of his broken lance, and, drawing his sword, that gleamed like a flame in the torch-light, stepped into the middle of the circle. No one came to oppose him; and from without in the darkness were heard the anxious murmuring of voices, and the running to and fro of servants, now busied about their fallen master. At last Folko called out in a loud tone, “My Lord Count von Waldeck, your unruly horse bore you, against your will, out of the circle. This must not be reckoned against you; but you shall have a fair opportunity to make good with your sword that which you have lost in our contest with the lance. I shall therefore wait for you here.” For a long time, however, all was silent. At last a squire called out,--“My Lord has fainted.” “He cannot fight again!” cried another voice. “We must bring him to the nearest convent to be cured by the monks,” said a third; and immediately thereafter was heard the slow and mournful trampling of the horses as they bore away the now helpless champion across the meadow.