So Gilbert Warde left England, a wanderer,
disinherited of all that should have been his, owing all that he had to
Lambert de Clare, Abbot of Sheering, in the shape of mail and other
armour, with such fine clothes as a young nobleman should have with him
on a journey, two horses, and a purse of which the contents should last
him several months on his travels. For attendants he had with him a
fair-haired Saxon lad who had run away from Stoke to Sheering, and had
refused to leave Gilbert, whom he looked upon as his lawful master; and
there was with him, too, a dark-skinned youth of his own age, a
foundling, christened Dunstan by the monks after a saint of their
order, brought up and taught at the abbey, who seemed to know neither
whose child he was nor whence he came, but could by no means be induced
to enter the novitiate so long as the world had room for wanderers and
adventurers. He was a gifted fellow, quick to learn and tenacious to
remember, speaking Latin and Norman French and English Saxon as well as
any monk in the abbey, quick of hand and light of foot, with daring
black eyes in which the pupils could hardly be found, while the whites
were of a cold, blue grey and often bloodshot; and he had short,
straight black hair, and a face that made one think of a young falcon.
He had begged so hard to be allowed to go with Gilbert, and it was so
evident that he was not born to wear out a church pavement with his
knees, that the abbot had given his consent.
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