As the memory of these strange legends crept over the confused mind of Robin the Rough, he gave utterance to a faint shriek.
It was returned back to him in a thousand echoes, swelling one after the other; now like the sound of repeated claps of thunder, and again dying away fainter and yet fainter, as though many voices were engaged in a hushed and whispering conversation.
“Avaunt thee, fiend! avaunt thee!” cried the stout yeoman, as he still strove to keep himself upon the surface of the water. “Holy Mary, holy Paul, holy Peter!” continued he, between his struggles, “an’ ye save me from these pestilent devils, I will—”
Here the yeoman plunged under the waters, and the sentence was unfinished.
“I will, by St. Withold, I will!” cried he, as he rose to the surface, “place at the altar of the first chapel at which I may arrive after my deliverance, a wax taper, in honor of all three of you.”
The yeoman struck his arms boldly through the flood, as he continued:
“And, an’ ye work out my deliverance, I’ll never ask a boon of ye again.”
Here he gave another bold push.
“I’ll never ask a boon of ye more, but stick like a good christian to my own native saint—even the good St. Withold!”
Here, satisfied that his duty to heaven was done, the yeoman strove to gain some rock, or other object, upon which he might rest his body, much disjointed as it was by his fall of terror.