Page:A C Doyle - The White Company.djvu/201

Rh may hold the waist while ten lie aloft with stones and arbalests. How like you that?'

'Good, by my faith, good! But here comes my harness, and I must to work, for I cannot slip into it as I was wont when first I set my face to the wars.'

Meanwhile there had been bustle and preparation in all parts of the great vessel. The archers stood in groups about the decks, new-stringing their bows, and testing that they were firm at the nocks. Among them moved Aylward and other of the older soldiers, with a few whispered words of precept here and of warning there.

'Stand to it, my hearts of gold,' said the old bowman as he passed from knot to knot. 'By my hilt! we are in luck this journey. Bear in mind the old saying of the Company.' 'What is that, Aylward?' cried several, leaning on their bows and laughing at him.

Tis the master-bowyer's rede: "Every bow well bent. Every shaft well sent. Every stave well nocked. Every string well locked." There, with that jingle in his bead, a bracer on his left hand, a shooting glove on his right, and a farthing's-worth of wax in his girdle, what more doth a bowman need?'

'It would not be amiss,' said Hordle John, 'if under his girdle he had four farthings'-worth of wine!'

'Work first, wine afterwards, mon camarade. But it is time that we took our order, for methinks that between the Needle rocks and the Alum cliffs yonder I can catch a glimpse of the topmasts of the galleys. Hewett, Cook, Johnson, Cunningham, your men are of the poop-guard. Thornbury, Walters, Hackett, Baddlesmere, you are with Sir Oliver on the forecastle. Simon, you bide with your lord's banner; but ten men must go forward.'

Quietly and promptly the men took their places, lying flat upon their faces on the deck, for such was Sir Nigel's order. Near the prow was planted Sir Oliver's spear, with his arms—a boar's head gules upon a field of gold. Close by the