'Twas time to look about me now, for this was a madman. I
defended myself with my fork, but 'twould not do. At last, in short, I
was forced to pistol him and get on horseback again, and with all the
speed I could make, get away to the wood to our men.
If my two fellow-spies had not been behind, I had never known what was
the meaning of this quarrel of the three countrymen, but my cripple
had all the particulars. For he being behind us, as I have already
observed, when he came up to the first fellow who began the fray, he
found him beginning to come to himself. So he gets off, and pretends
to help him, and sets him up upon his breech, and being a very merry
fellow, talked to him: "Well, and what's the matter now?" says he to
him. "Ah, wae's me," says the fellow, "I is killed." "Not quite, mon,"
says the cripple. "Oh, that's a fau thief," says he, and thus they
parleyed. My cripple got him on's feet, and gave him a dram of his
aqua-vitae bottle, and made much of him, in order to know what was the
occasion of the quarrel. Our disguised woman pitied the fellow too,
and together they set him up again upon his horse, and then he told
him that that fellow was got upon one of his brother's horses who
lived at Wetherby.
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