The third day after these doings, the farmer at Holt stood in his porch that opened westward on Tivarandardale. An old man was he, crooked like a mountain thorn. But a bright black eye he had, and the hair curled crisp yet above his brow. It was late afternoon and the sky overcast. Tousle-haired sheep-dogs slept before the door. Swallows gathered in the sky. Near to him sat a damosel, dainty as a meadow-pipit, lithe as an antelope; and she was grinding grain in a hand-mill, singing the while:
Grind, mill, grind,
Corinius grinds us all;
Kinging it in widowed Krothering.
The old man was furbishing a shield and morion-cap, and other tackle of war lay at his feet.
“I wonder thou wilt still be busy with thy tackle, O my father,” said she, looking up from her singing and grinding. “If ill tide ill again what should an old man do but grieve and be silent?”
“There shall be time for that hereafter,” said the old man. “But a little while is hand fain of blow.”
“They’ll be for firing the roof-tree, likely, if they come back,” said she, still grinding.
“Thou’rt a disobedient lass. If thou’dst but flit as I bade thee to the shiel-house up the dale, I’d force not a bean for their burnings.”
“Let it burn,” said she, “if he be taken. What avail then for thee or for me to be a-tarrying? Thou that art an old man and full of good days, and I that will not be left so.”