I pray thee pardon me if I have done amiss, said Birdalone; but here have I a sick friend, a young man, and I would pray thee suffer him to abide here in this cave a little longer; for there hath been also another friend, a woman, but she hath gone out while I slept, belike to gather simples, for she is wise in leechcraft, and is tending the sick man. I pray thee humbly to suffer us lest we lose our friend. As she spake, she heard the carline chuckle softly, and at last she said: Why, Birdalone, my dear, dost thou not know me after all these years? Look on me again, look! and thou shalt see that I am not so much changed from what thou sawest me last night. I am still thine image, my dear, only I was the image of what thou wert, and now I the image of what thou shalt be when two score years and ten of happy life have worn for thee. Tell me, am I now aught like to thy mother in the flesh? How hast thou frighted me, mother, said Birdalone; I thought that my friend had forsaken me, and that perchance the new-comer was another witch like unto the old one, and that I was never to be at rest and happy. But as to my mother in the flesh, nay, thou art not now wholly like unto her; and sooth to say I shall be fainer when thou hast thine own shape of me young back again, for I love thee not so much as now thou art. The wood-wife laughed: Well, she said, thou shalt not see over-much of me in this shape; and that the less because of something I shall now tell thee, to wit, that I have been thinking the matter over, and I would have thee leave us twain together alone before the young man awaketh. I would have thee get thee home and abide him there; it shall not be long I promise thee; and this also, that he shall come home to thee sound in body and whole in limb.