Near Thieves’ Hole the mare stopped: the stranger was there.

Thinking any price was now better than none, the farmer agreed to sell. “How much will you give?” he said.

“Enough. Now Come with me.”

By Seven Firs and Goldenstone they went, to Stormy Point and Saddlebole. And they halted before a great rock embedded in the hillside. The old man lifted his staff and lightly touched the rock, and it split with the noise of thunder.

At this, the farmer toppled from his plunging horse and, on his knees, begged the other to have mercy on him and let him go his way unharmed. The horse should stay; he did not want her. Only spare his life, that was enough.

The wizard, for such he was, commanded the farmer to rise. “I promise you safe conduct,” he said. “Do not be afraid: for living wonders you shall see here.”

Beyond the rock stood a pair of iron gates. These the wizard opened, and took the farmer and his horse down a narrow tunnel deep into the hill. A light, subdued but beautiful, marked their way. The passage ended, and they stepped into a cave, and there a wondrous sight met the farmer’s eyes—a hundred and forty knights in silver armour, and by the side of all but one a milk-white mare.

“Here they lie in enchanted sleep,” said the wizard, “until a day will come—and come it will—when England shall be in direst peril, and England’s mother’s weep. Then out from the hill these must ride and, in a battle thrice lost, thrice won, upon the plain, drive the enemy into the sea.”

The farmer, dumb with awe, turned with the wizard into a further cavern, and here mounds of gold and silver and precious stones lay strewn along the ground.

“Take what you can carry in payment for the horse.” And when the farmer had crammed his pockets (ample as his lands!), his shirt, and his fists with jewels. the wizard hurried him up the long tunnel and thrust him out of the gates. The farmer stumbled, the thunder rolled, he looked, and there was only the rock above him. He was alone on the hill, near Stormy Point. The broad full moon was up, and it was night.