“A brave song! Ha, ha, ha! By my faith a brave song! Where didst pick it up, Old Screech-Owl, eh?”
“Glow-worm is my name,” replied the other demurely,—“Glow-worm—ah! but this is rich earth! Look! what big, lusty clumps. He, he, he! How cold and pale he looks—he that I am to bury—See!”
“He doth look cold and pale!” muttered Balvardo. “Is the grave deep enough, Devil-darkness? Let’s house him in’ th’ earth without delay.”
“The grave scarce reaches to my middle—deeper let us dig it, noble captain—deeper!”
“I tell thee, Devil-darkness, I cannot look upon the cold and stony face of the dead! Deeper thou mayest dig the grave—but the body must be hidden from sight in the meanwhile. ‘Slife—I left my cloak in the vaults above, and I have no robe to throw over the coffin!”
“He—he—he, thou’rt a brave man, yet poor old Glow-worm knows more than thee! Look around the cell, most noble captain, and tell me what thou see’st!”
“I see the rough walls of stone, the roof of rock, the floor of clay. Not a whit more, by the Fiend!”
“Look again—pass thine eyes along the wall opposite yon oaken door. What see’st thou now, most noble captain?”
“I see a bolt of iron, rusted and time-eaten, projecting from the wall—”
“Wouldst know how to open a passage into the stone room, next to this cell? Move the bolt quickly to and fro, and yon massy stone will roll back into the stone-room! Thou canst lay the coffin within its walls, until the grave is deep enow.”