Caswallan, Noblede and Josseline rose at the gladsome cries of the child and walked out towards two large wagons heavily laden with golden sheaves, and drawn by a yoke of oxen.
Morvan and Vortigern were seated in front of one of the wagons surrounded by a considerable number of men and lads belonging to the household, or to the tribe of the Chief of the Chiefs, carrying in their hands the sickles, the forks and the rakes used by the harvesters. At a little distance behind them came the shepherds with their flocks whose bells were heard clinking from the distance. Morvan, in the vigor of life, robust and thick-set, like most of the inhabitants of the Black Mountains, wore their rustic garb—wide breeches of coarse white material, and a linen shirt that exposed his sunburnt chest and neck. His long hair, auburn like his thick beard, framed his manly face. His forehead was high; his eyes intrepid and piercing. As to Vortigern, the maturer gravity of manhood, of husband and father, had succeeded the flower of youth. His looks were expressive of sweet delight at the sight of the two boys who had ran out to meet him. He jumped down from the wagon and embraced them affectionately while he looked for his wife and sister, who, accompanied by Caswallan, were not long in joining him.
"Dear wife, the harvest will be plentiful," said Morvan to Noblede, and pointing to the overloaded wagons, he added: "Have you ever seen more beautiful wheat, or more golden sheaves? Look at them and wonder!"
"Morvan," put in Josseline, "you are this year harvesting earlier than customary. We, of the region of Karnak would leave our wheat to ripen on the stalk fully two weeks longer. Not so, Vortigern?"
"No, my sweet Josseline," answered her husband, "I shall follow Morvan's example. We shall return home to-morrow, so as to start taking in the harvest as soon as possible."
"I am going to furnish you with still more matter for astonishment," Morvan proceeded. "Instead of leaving the sheaves in the barn that the grain may ripen, this wheat that you see there, and that was cropped only to-day, will be threshed this very night. Vortigern and myself will not be the only ones to ply the flails on the threshing-floor of the barn. So, then, Noblede, let us have supper early, and then to work!"
"What, Morvan!" exclaimed Josseline, "after this tiring day's work, spent in gathering in the crop, do you and Vortigern mean to spend the night at work, and threshing, at that?"
"It will be a cheerful night, my Josseline," put in Vortigern. "While we shall be threshing the wheat, you will sing us some songs, Caswallan will recite to us some old legend, and we shall stave in a barrel of hydromel to cheer the laborers who have come to join us. Work goes hand in hand with pleasure."
"Vortigern," the Christian druid said, smiling, "do you, perchance, think that my arms are so much enfeebled by old age that I could no longer wield a flail? I mean to help you at work."
"And we?" put in Josseline, laughing merrily, "we, the daughters and wives of the field-laborers, did we, perchance, lose the skill of carrying the wheat to the threshing-floor, or of bagging the grain?"