`` Nay , the saints bless us ! Master John , ye called him , '' said the host . `` Well , I thought none evil . He is gone . I saw him -- her -- I saw her in the stable a good hour agone ; ' a was saddling a grey horse . '' `` Now , by the rood ! '' cried Sir Daniel , `` the wench was worth five hundred pound to me and more . '' `` Sir knight , '' observed the messenger , with bitterness , `` while that ye are here , roaring for five hundred pounds , the realm of England is elsewhere being lost and won . '' `` It is well said , '' replied Sir Daniel . `` Selden , fall me out with six cross-bowmen ; hunt me her down . I care not what it cost ; but , at my returning , let me find her at the Moat House . Be it upon your head . And now , sir messenger , we march . '' And the troop broke into a good trot , and Selden and his six men were left behind upon the street of Kettley , with the staring villagers . CHAPTER II -- IN THE FEN It was near six in the May morning when Dick began to ride down into the fen upon his homeward way . The sky was all blue ; the jolly wind blew loud and steady ; the windmill-sails were spinning ; and the willows over all the fen rippling and whitening like a field of corn . He had been all night in the saddle , but his heart was good and his body sound , and he rode right merrily . The path went down and down into the marsh , till he lost sight of all the neighbouring landmarks but Kettley windmill on the knoll behind him , and the extreme top of Tunstall Forest far before . On either hand there were great fields of blowing reeds and willows , pools of water shaking in the wind , and treacherous bogs , as green as emerald , to tempt and to betray the traveller . The path lay almost straight through the morass .
It was already very ancient ; its foundation had been laid by Roman soldiery ; in the lapse of ages much of it had sunk , and every here and there , for a few hundred yards , it lay submerged below the stagnant waters of the XXXXX .
England Forest Kettley cross-bowmen fen hour left rood wench windmill-sails