Like ghosts they wandered, crost and then re-crost,

Nor pathway saw to forward move or back,

Nor means of exit found, nor even a desert-track.

XVIII.

“Cheer up, my friends,” said Nial; “whom the foe

“Hath ne’er made flinch the forest shall not quell.

“Full many a pine-branch waves at hand to show

“The way—no torch so fitly or so well.”

Then many a pine-branch torn, with resinous smell