`` Alas , I have no cunning , '' said I. ' `` Not yet , '' said he , hopping abroad , foot in stirrup , and poking his horse in the belly with his toe . `` Not yet , but I think thou hast a good teacher . Farewell ! Hold the Manor and live . Lose the Manor and hang , '' he said , and spurred out , his shield-straps squeaking behind him . ` So , children , here was I , little more than a boy , and Santlache fight not two days old , left alone with my thirty men-at-arms , in a land I knew not , among a people whose tongue I could not speak , to hold down the land which I had taken from them . ' ` And that was here at home ? ' said Una . ` Yes , here . See ! From the Upper Ford , Weland 's Ford , to the Lower Ford , by the Belle Allée , west and east it ran half a league . From the Beacon of Brunanburgh behind us here , south and north it ran a full league -- and all the woods were full of broken men from Santlache , Saxon thieves , Norman plunderers , robbers , and deer-stealers . A hornets ' nest indeed ! ` When De Aquila had gone , Hugh would have thanked me for saving their lives ; but the Lady Ælueva said that I had done it only for the sake of receiving the Manor . ' `` How could I know that De Aquila would give it me ? '' I said . `` If I had told him I had spent my night in your halter he would have burned the place twice over by now . '' ' `` If any man had put my neck in a rope , '' she said , `` I would have seen his house burned thrice over before I would have made terms . '' ' `` But it was a woman , '' I said ; and I laughed , and she wept and said that I mocked her in her captivity . ' `` Lady , '' said I , `` there is no captive in this valley except one , and he is not a Saxon . ''
` At this she cried that I was a XXXXX thief , who came with false , sweet words , having intended from the first to turn her out in the fields to beg her bread .
Allée Aquila Brunanburgh Hugh Norman Saxon Una Weland shield-straps Ælueva