thus it was that aelfwine escaped beyond hope from that , island , but the man of the sea was his pilot and steersman , and so they came after few days to a land but little known.~ and the folk that dwell there are a strange folk , and none know how they came thither in the west , yet are they accounted among the kindreds of men , albeit their land is on the outer borders of the regions of mankind , lying yet further toward the setting sun beyond the harbourless isles and further to the north than is that isle whereon aelfwine was cast away .