Then he rushed at him with his head down, like a battering-ram, but as soon as his head touched the Miserable it was cut open, and the blood ran down over his face.
And his father and mother, his sister and the wounded brother, threw themselves on their knees and asked his forgiveness, begging him, since he had become so powerful, to bring them riches and honour.
“That I will,” said he.
X. How the Miserable robbed a Lombard goldsmith, and of the pleasant speech of the ladies and gentlewomen.
On the morrow, armed only with the sickle, for he despised other arms on account of the strength which the spell gave him, Halewyn took the body of the maid to the Gallows-field and there hanged it on the tree.
Then he rode off to the city of Ghent.
And the ladies, gentlewomen and maidens of the town, seeing him pass by on his black horse, said among themselves: “Who is this fair horseman?”
“’Tis,” he cried right proudly, “Siewert Halewyn, who was called the Ill-favoured one.”
“Nay, nay,” said the bolder among them, “you are making fun of us, My Lord, or else you have been changed by a fairy.”