"What! is it thou, Owen of Bayeux?"
"I was that man a few hours agone. I doubt what I am now."
"What hast thou suffered, then? Where are the baron and his men?"
"Burnt in the Dismal Swamp?"
"Burnt?"
"Yes, burnt; I speak good French do I not?"
"Owen, Owen," cried the old Raoul, "do not mistake thy friends for foes! tell us what dreadful event has happened, to disturb thy reason."
"Would it were but disturbed! Oh that I should have lived to see this day!"
"Tell us," cried young Tristam, "tell us, Owen."
"A fate was on us, as on the Egyptians of old; only they perished by water, we by fire."