We and somewhat more than half of our band turned into the orchards on the left of the road,through which the level rays of the low sun shone brightly.The others took up their position on the right side of it.We kept pretty near to the road till we had got through all the closes save the last,where we were brought up by a hedge and a dyke,beyond which lay a wide-open nearly treeless space,not of tillage,as at the other side of the place,but of pasture,the common grazing ground of the township.A little stream wound about through the ground,with a few willows here and there;there was only a thread of water in it in this hot summer tide,but its course could easily be traced by the deep blue-green of the rushes that grew plenteously in the bed.Geese were lazily wandering about and near this brook,and a herd of cows,accompanied by the town bull,were feeding on quietly,their heads all turned one way;while half a dozen calves marched close together side by side like a plump of soldiers,their tails swinging in a kind of measure to keep off the flies,of which there was great plenty.Three or four lads and girls were sauntering about,heeding or not heeding the cattle.They looked up toward us as we crowded into the last close,and slowly loitered off toward the village.Nothing looked like battle;yet battle sounded in the air;for now we heard the beat of the horse-hoofs of the men-at-arms coming on towards us like the rolling of distant thunder,and growing louder and louder every minute;we were none too soon in turning to face them.Jack Straw was on our side of the road,and with a few gestures and a word or two he got his men into their places.
Six archers lined the hedge along the road where the banner of Adam and Eve,rising above the grey leaves of the apple-trees,challenged the new-comers;and of the billmen also he kept a good few ready to guard the road in case the enemy should try to rush it with the horsemen.The road,not being a Roman one,was,you must remember,little like the firm smooth country roads that you are used to;it was a mere track between the hedges and fields,partly grass-grown,and cut up by the deep-sunk ruts hardened by the drought of summer.There was a stack of fagot and small wood on the other side,and our men threw themselves upon it and set to work to stake the road across for a rough defence against the horsemen.
What befell more on the road itself I had not much time to note,for our bowmen spread themselves out along the hedge that looked into the pasture-field,leaving some six feet between man and man;the rest of the billmen went along with the bowmen,and halted in clumps of some half-dozen along their line,holding themselves ready to help the bowmen if the enemy should run up under their shafts,or to run on to lengthen the line in case they should try to break in on our flank.The hedge in front of us was of quick.It had been strongly plashed in the past February,and was stiff and stout.It stood on a low bank;moreover,the level of the orchard was some thirty inches higher than that of the field.and the ditch some two foot deeper than the face of the field.The field went winding round to beyond the church,making a quarter of a circle about the village,and at the western end of it were the butts whence the folk were coming from shooting when I first came into the village street.
Altogether,to me who knew nothing of war the place seemed defensible enough.I have said that the road down which Long Gregory came with his tidings went north;and that was its general direction;but its first reach was nearly east,so that the low sun was not in the eyes of any of us,and where Will Green took his stand,and I with him,it was nearly at our backs.
