GRANITE AND SORREL 47 



seat of his barony or honour. On such a day mayhap 

 he sought within the glens and forests of that wild 

 region for a site whereon his castle should rise ; on 

 such a day, with the April gold gleaming between the 

 showers, with the ripe catkins of the hazel shedding 

 their pollen on his horse's chamfron, with the new- 

 born glory of the larches scenting the air, and bud 

 breaking on oak and elm, he may have moved stoutly 

 forward while he crushed the wood anemones and 

 primroses under his horse's feet, and wetted with 

 sweet sap and the colourless blood of spring flowers 

 those ironshod hoofs that not long before were stamp- 

 ing- life out of wounded men. 



The thrushes sang then as now, and the frightened 

 blackbird flew before with an alarm-cry as shrill as 

 the jolt and clink of chain on mail. Forward passed 

 Ralph and his cavalcade, where the ivy hid red ridges 

 of broken earth, rotting wood, and dead fern ; and 

 then a little plateau opened in the forest — a lime- 

 stone crag jutted on the hill, and the Norman eagle 

 cast his eyes to right and left, above and below, 

 estimated the strength of the position with the quick 

 judgment of a man of war, saw that it was good, 

 and cried that here his eyrie should presently be 

 built. So the banner, with the Pomeroy lion upon 

 it, was planted in the wood ; the sleep of that primeval 

 forest departed, and anon, wrought of limestone and 

 granite, arose a grim pile, squat and stern, with a 

 thousand eyes from which were ever ready to dart 

 the crossbow's bolt, with watch towers and great 



