Purchase of this book includes free trial access to www.million-books.com where you can read more than a million books for free. This is an OCR edition with typos. Excerpt from book: it small and clear under the midday sun, as like as may be to a toy that a child would play with: and there was no man moving about it, but only the white pigeons flying this way and that upon the roofs. And it was lovely to him, for he saw it as a time that is past. Then he looked a little farther, and he saw the broad road, and dust kindling along it like smoke, and in the dust a great company riding: and they rode in order by two and by two, and their jogging was heavy, and Ywain remembered that these were the lords who had appointed to do business with him. And because of them the place was no longer lovely to him, and he turned away and ran quickly over the ridge, and when he could see them no more he laughed: and the boy also ran and laughed, and their laughter was as though they were both truants from school, escaping narrowly with fear and joy together. And on the other side of the ridge they cast themselves down upon the grass, and among the grass were thistles, and the thistles pricked them sharply, and they rolled and were pricked again, and laughed again and yet again. Then they set their shoulders against a bank, and sat still, looking to the country that was before them. On the one hand lay the sea near by, and upon it white sails of ships that were sailing marvellously, for though they were upon the sea yet they sailed, as it seemed, high above the land. And on the other side lay a thick wood that hid all the far country, and before the wood was a village and a tower. And Ywain knew that village well enough, cot and lot, barn and balk, and he thought not at all of the village, but only of the wood and the great depth of it and of what might be beyond. And so thinking he fell asleep. But when he awoke the sun was westering, and he looked again upon the...