“Without a light,” he said, “this thoroughfare is dangerous. What is your name, old man?”
“My name is Cethru,” replied the aged churl.
“Cethru!” said the Prince. “Let it be your duty henceforth to walk with your lanthorn up and down this street all night and every night,”—and he looked at Cethru: “Do you understand, old man, what it is you have to do?”
The old man answered in a voice that trembled like a rusty flute:
“Aye, aye!—to walk up and down and hold my lanthorn so that folk can see where they be going.”
The Prince gathered up his reins; but the old man, lurching forward, touched his stirrup.
“How long be I to go on wi' thiccy job?”
“Until you die!”
Cethru held up his lanthorn, and they could see his long, thin face, like a sandwich of dried leather, jerk and quiver, and his thin grey hairs flutter in the draught of the bats' wings circling round the light.
“'Twill be main hard!” he groaned; “an' my lanthorn's nowt but a poor thing.”