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Poor Branwen felt dreadfully depressed when she thought of this termination, and was quite unlike her gay reckless self for a time; but a vague feeling of unbelief in such a catastrophe, and a determination to hope against hope kept her from giving way to absolute despair, and nerved her to vigorous exertion.

They found the Hebrew reading at his door. "Ho! Beniah, hast seen the girl Branwen pass this way to-day?" cried Gunrig as he came up. "I have not seen her pass," replied the Hebrew, in a tone so mild that the angry chief suspected him. "She's not in your hut, I suppose?" he added sharply.

That accounts, then, for the mystery of his manner and the strange way he has got of going about chuckling when there is nothing funny being said or done at least nothing that I can see!" "He's an old goose," remarked her friend. "Branwen," said the princess in a remonstrative tone, "is that the way to speak of your own father?"

And after you have opened that door, there you may no longer tarry, set forth then to London to bury the head, and go straight forward." So they cut off his head, and these seven went forward therewith. And Branwen was the eighth with them, and they came to land at Aber Alaw, in Talebolyon, and they sat down to rest.

Now, it occurred to Ortrud that the best way to wean her son from his evil ways would be to get him married to some gentle, pretty, affectionate girl, whose influence would be exerted in favour of universal peace instead of war, and the moment she set eyes on Branwen, she became convinced that her ambition was on the point of attainment.

"Can you not conceal me here till we have time to think what is best to be done?" asked Branwen simply, "for I will die rather than wed this this monster Gunrig!" The Hebrew smiled pitifully, for he saw in the maiden's face and bearing evidence of a brave, resolute spirit, which would not condescend to boasting, and had no thought of using exaggerated language.

Branwen at once left the stand, and the king, descending into the arena, proceeded to congratulate the victor. Before he could do so, however, to his unbounded surprise, the queen also descended with her daughter and threw her arms round the prince's neck, while Hafrydda seized his hand and covered it with kisses.

Then he said, with a sad smile, that he supposed there was nothing for it but to reveal one of his secrets to her. "I have not many secrets, Branwen," he said, "but the one which I am about to reveal to you is important. To make it known would be the ruin of me. Yet I feel that I may trust you, for surely you are a good girl."

Like their lords, they were profusely ornamented with precious metals and bands and loops of coloured cloth. Hafrydda and her companion Branwen allowed their hair to fall, after the manner of the times, in unrestrained freedom over their shoulders that of the former resembling a cataract of rippling gold, while that of the latter was a wavy mass of auburn.

"By the way," continued Bladud, who had resumed the drumstick, "has that fellow Gadarn found his daughter Branwen?" Beniah choked on a bone, or something, at that moment, and, looking at the prince with the strangest expression of face, and tears in his eyes, explained that he had not at least not to his, Beniah's, absolutely certain knowledge.