Meanwhile Ceolwulf had got on shore, and made the boat fast, and then slung the axe over his shoulder by a thong, and told Wulfstan to take one of the spears. But the monk advised him to put them down again, as no one was disposed to hurt them, and any signs of suspicion or defiance might arouse angry feelings.
"What is thy name, my boy?" said the superior monk to Eddie, whom he was now examining with the other monk, whom they had first met.
Ædric told his name, and the rank of his father, and what had happened. Such events in that lawless time were far too frequent to cause much surprise; but the monk seemed distressed nevertheless, more apparently at this fresh instance of the treachery, rapacity, and cruelty of man, than by reason of the actual circumstances related to him; for he sighed and murmured: "O generatio incredula et perversa quousque ero vobiscum!"
By this time another monk had joined the party, and now, under the directions of the abbot or superior, they carefully lifted Ædric out of the boat and up to the hut, before which the monk had been standing. They took him inside, and laid him down on a rough couch, in one corner, and then they gave him some bread and a little water.
"We will get better food presently," said the superior; "but there is great difficulty in getting food here at all now, and the people suffer much."
"Ah! thou mayst well say that," said the first monk, whom the superior addressed by the name of Malachi. "Ever since that fearsome summer, when everything died for want of water, after the sun was darkened, the dearth has been dreadful; and after the dearth and drought came the plague. Verily God hath visited us! but what we have ye are welcome to; for did not our blessed Master say: 'Beati misericordes quoniam ipsi misericordiam consequentur.'"
In attending to Ædric, the good monks had not forgotten Ceolwulf and Wulfstan, but had given them some of the same coarse fare they had set before Eddie.
"It strikes me," said Ceolwulf, "that these woods ought to produce something better than this; and, after we've had enough to satisfy our hunger, we will go out and see if we can't kill something."
"Oh, do let us, Biggun; they will think much more of us if we can bring them something we have killed."
The abbot of the little community, whose name was Dicoll, having finished his attention to Ædric's leg for the present, came and stood by Wulfstan, and, stroking him kindly on the head, said that now he knew who he was, and what accident had driven them on their shore, he should like to ask him what he was going to do. "Did they know that Edilwalch, the king, had an alliance with Arwald, and had received Wihtea[6] as a grant from King Wulfhere,[6] of Mercia, as a reward for his having been christened?"