A great sigh of relief, mingled with wild cheers of satisfaction, greeted this effective termination of the fight, and the king was evidently not ill-pleased.
“Pick him up, some of you,” he said, pointing to the prostrate Gunrig, “and carry him to the palace. See that he is well cared for. Go, Branwen, and see that everything is properly done for him.”
Branwen at once left the stand, and the king, descending into the arena, proceeded to congratulate the victor.
Before he could do so, however, to his unbounded surprise, the queen also descended with her daughter and threw her arms round the prince’s neck, while Hafrydda seized his hand and covered it with kisses.
“Body of me! am I dreaming?” cried the king, after a few moments of speechless amazement.
“Oh! Bladud,” exclaimed the queen, looking up in his smiling face, “did you really think you could deceive your own mother? Fie, fie, I would have recognised you if you had come with your face painted black.”
By this time the king had recovered, and realised the fact that his long-lost son had returned home. He strode towards him, and, grasping his hand, essayed to speak, but something in his throat rendered speech impossible. King Hudibras was a stern man, however, and scorned to show womanly weakness before his people. He turned suddenly round, kicked a few courtiers out of his way, remounted the platform, and, in a loud voice, announced the conclusion of the sports.
Great was the rejoicing among the people assembled there, when the news spread that the long-lost Prince Bladud had returned home, and that the tall youth who had defeated Gunrig was he, and they cheered him with even more zest and energy than they had at the moment of his victory.
Meanwhile Gunrig, having been conveyed to the residence of the king, was laid on a couch. The palace was, we need scarcely say, very unlike our modern palaces, being merely a large hut or rude shanty of logs, surrounded by hundreds of similar but smaller huts, which composed this primitive town. The couch on which the chief lay was composed of brushwood and leaves. But Gunrig did not lie long upon it. He was a tough man, as well as a stout, and he had almost recovered consciousness when the princess, returning from the games, arrived to assist her friend in attending to the king’s commands.
She found Branwen about to enter the chamber, in which the chief lay, with a bandage.