“Who is Barleycorn?” asked I.
“He who has’t in charge to keep the paths of the woods,” said he.
Presently we reached the heart of the wood, which was a tangle of great stalks and creepers in marshy ground. Here plants did grow on the very boughs of the trees having the strangest flowers that ever I saw. For one was in shape like a jug; another like a panakin; others were as monstrous insect-creatures seen in dreams. The trees looked starved and wan. The air was hot and heavy, as in a close sick-chamber.
Soon the wood became clearer and lighter; and, coming presently round a thicket, I spied a glimmering portal of day.
As we emerged, there came a man running. His clothes were ragged and slovenly. He came on, running and panting, like a hunted creature. His face shone with sweat that glistened upon his beard in drops, like dew. His eyes were bright, and roamed about.
Thus he came on directly towards me; and, had I not stepped to one side, he would have run me down. He went on without taking any notice of us.
“He hath been terror-struck,” said Ambrose, as I stood staring round on the man. “He was a traitor. ’Twas his punishment.”
And he told me the man had tried to escape by night to a merchant-ship that lay off the island, and that the ghost had appeared to him while he swam in the sea.
The running man was now screened by a promontory of the wood, but his voice sounded intermittently in a sort of shrieking very horrible to hear.
I felt a weight come over me, and a sort of horror of the sunlight.