"Even so; and since thou hast been so open to me I will return thy faith. I am Cædwalla; and now if thou wilt rest on thy oar, I will just push the boat to the shore, for I must get out here."
In a few minutes more the boat neared the beach, and, using his spear as a leaping pole again, Cædwalla sprang to the land, and, waving his hand, disappeared among the scrub on the top of the shingle bank.
CHAPTER II.
"FREELY YE HAVE RECEIVED—FREELY GIVE."
"So that's Cædwalla, is it! I have heard tell of him many a time! And if, poor youth, he had his due, he'd be King of Wessex and Bretwalda[1] to boot. And who is king now? Centwine is it, or Æscuin? Well, that I don't rightly know. Gytha, the old nurse who came from Readbryg,[2] now she told me that one of them had been killed at a fight with the king of Mercia. Anyhow, Cædwalla is the rightful heir, that I do know; but what's he doing here? Well, he can't do any harm to me and my boys, that's certain; and if he gets his own he may help us to pay out that Arwald over there. Well, well, we shall see. Here, Wulf, come and see what thou canst do with that oar again; we can't be far from Boseham now. It's a very good thing the tide hasn't covered the mud, or we should never see all these lakes[3] hereabouts. Let me see, that's the way to Boseham, down there. Why, there's a man fishing! he'll tell us the way. But he's a mighty odd-looking man. What's the matter with his head? Look, Wulf, he's got his hair cut off like a half moon on the top of his head."
[1] The title conferred on, or assumed by, the most powerful among the various Saxon kings, from Ælla of Sussex to Egbert of Wessex. The word occurs first in the "Chronicles" under the year 827, and probably meant "Wielder, of Britain." See Freeman's "Norman Conquest," note B in the Appendix, vol. i.
[2] Now Redbridge, at the head of Southampton Water.
[3] A lake is the local word for a creek running in among the mud banks.
As the boat passed slowly through the water, it took them some minutes before they came up to the fisherman, who was seated on three or four logs rudely nailed together with two cross planks, and moored by a rope to a stick stuck in the mud. The man had long hair, cut or shaved in a peculiar half moon on the top of his head, and wore a long loose robe made of coarse frieze and fastened round his waist by a cord. His feet were bare, and he was sitting on his raft placidly, feeling his line from time to time, and muttering to himself a low, monotonous chant.
"What's he saying, Biggun?"