Opening
THE WOLFE OF BADENOCH
A Historical Romance of the Fourteenth Century
BY SIR THOMAS DICK-LAUDER, Bart. Of Fountainhall
Complete Unabridged Edition
LONDON: HAMILTON, ADAMS & CO. GLASGOW: THOMAS D. MORISON 1886
PREFACE TO FIRST EDITION.
The “Wolfe of Badenoch” was advertised in June, 1825, at which time it was ready for the press. Since then, certain circumstances, easily guessed at, have subjected it, with many a more important work, to an embargo, from which critics may possibly say it should never have been liberated. The author himself had forgotten it, until now that it has been unexpectedly called for; and this must be his apology for that want of revision which he fears will be but too apparent.
The author has been accused of being an imitator of the Great Unknown. In his own defence, however, he must say, that he is far from being wilfully so. In truth, his greatest anxiety has been to avoid intruding profanely into the sacred haunts of that master enchanter. But let it be remembered, that the mighty spirit of the magician has already so filled the labyrinth of romance, that it is not easy to venture within its precincts without feeling his influence; and to say that, in exploring the intricacies of these wizard paths, one is to be denounced for unwittingly treading upon these flowers which have been pressed by his giant foot, amounts to a perfect prohibition of all entrance there.
In the “Wolfe of Badenoch,” the author has adhered strictly to historical fact, as far as history or historical character has been interwoven with his story. He has felt, indeed, that this scrupulosity has considerably fettered his invention; and, had circumstances permitted the public so to judge of his former production, some of the remarks thrown out upon it would have been spared.
[Note to the present edition.—The author of course refers here to Sir Walter Scott, at that time, one may almost say, inaugurating a new era in historical romance. The “Wolfe of Badenoch” was first published in 1827 under circumstances of disadvantage, from having to stand the contrast with the famous series of tales by the above distinguished author. It, nevertheless, passed successfully through this trying ordeal, and was most favourably reviewed in many critical publications, some of which ranked it alongside the best productions of Sir Walter Scott. A still more certain and gratifying estimate of its worth was the favourable hold it took on public opinion, the work being extensively read and successive editions speedily called for.]
I. PAGE
The Scottish Knights—Journeying Homewards—The Hostelry of Norham Towers, 17
Chapter II
The Host and the Hostess—Preparing the Evening Meal, 29
Chapter III
The Knights Invited to Norham Castle, 33
Chapter IV
The Evening Meal at the Castle—The Minstrel and the Tourney of Noyon—Master Haggerstone Fenwick the Ancient, 39
Chapter V
Night at the Castle—The Friar’s Visit to the Ancient, 47
Chapter VI
Making Love on the Ramparts, 54
Chapter VII
The Midnight Meeting in the Ancient’s Chamber—Strange Proposal—A Dreadful Alternative, 61
Chapter VIII
Arrival of Sir Rafe Piersie—The Challenge, 70
Chapter IX
The Combat—Departure of the Scots—Master Kyle Swears by St. Cuthbert, 77
Chapter X
The Home of the Hepbornes—Remembrances of Childhood—The Old Wolf-Hound, 84
Chapter XI
The Wolf Hunt—A Desperate Encounter, 90
Chapter XII
The Freaks of Love at Hailes Castle—The Tournament at Tarnawa Announced, 97
Chapter XIII
Sir Patrick Hepborne’s Departure for the North—Consternation at the Castle, 109
Chapter XIV
The Pursuit—Surprising the Camp, 115
Chapter XV
Norham Castle again—The Ancient’s Divination—Sir Walter Bewitched—The Franciscan Friar to the Rescue, 121
Chapter XVI
Raising the Devil—Delivered to the Flames, 126
Chapter XVII
Sir John’s Pursuit in Quest of the Missing Lady—The Forester’s Hunting Camp—Sir Miers de Willoughby’s Border Keep, 134
Chapter XVIII
The Horrors of the Dungeon, 140
Chapter XIX
Dawn in the Dungeon—An Appalling Sight—Rough Visitors, 147
Chapter XX
A Dreadful Situation—Daniel Throckle the Old Jailor, 153
Chapter XXI
Crooked-hold-him-fast—Making a Lantern of Burnstower Castle, 160
Chapter XXII
Waiting for the Spearmen—The Lady Isabella’s Tale—The Fight, 166
Chapter XXIII
Sir Patrick Hepborne’s Journey North—Passes through Edinburgh—King Robert II.—The Wilds of the Highlands—The Celtic Host, 171
Chapter XXIV
Savage-looking Visitors—Night in the Highland Hostelry— Wolf Dogs, 180
Chapter XXV
Wild Scottish Bisons—Fight with a Bull—Cold and Fatigue, 184
Chapter XXVI
The Evening Encampment—Treachery, 191
Chapter XXVII
Another Night attack—A Desperate Encounter, 198
Chapter XXVIII
Meeting the Wolfe of Badenoch—The Cavalcade, 205
Chapter XXIX
The Wolfe of Badenoch’s Hunting Encampment—Letter from King Robert—Arrival at the Wolfe’s Stronghold, 210
Chapter XXX
The Castle of Lochyndorbe—An Evening Episode on the Ramparts—The Wolfe’s Raid on the Bishop’s Lands, 224
Chapter XXXI
The Lady Mariota and the Page—The Fury of the Wolfe, 231
Chapter XXXII
Maurice’s Song—The Franciscan Friar—Excommunication, 238
Chapter XXXIII
The Water Pit Vault—Friar or Devil, which? 247
Chapter XXXIV
The Wolfe of Badenoch and the Earl of Moray, 251
Chapter XXXVI
The Castle of Tarnawa—Distinguished Guests, 260
Chapter XXXVII
The Banquet at the Castle—Alarm—Forres on Fire, 267
Chapter XXXVIII
The Burning of the Church and Town of Forres, 272
Chapter XXXIX
Sir Patrick and the Earl at Forres, 279
Chapter XL
In the Countess of Moray’s Apartments—Sir Patrick gets Quizzed, 283
Chapter XLI
Rory Spears, the Earl’s Henchman, 288
Chapter XLII
The Lovely English Damosel, 292
Chapter XLIII
Mustering for the Tournament—The Proclamation—The Procession at St. John’s Chapel, 293
Chapter XLIV
The Italian Armourer—The Knight of Cheviot, 304
Chapter XLV
The Tournament, 311
Chapter XLVI
The English Ambassador and the Gallant Lindsay, 321
Chapter XLVII
The Earl of Fife’s Council Meeting—The Challenge between the Scottish and English Knights, 326
Chapter XLVIII
The Departure from the Castle of Tarnawa—The Alarm of War, 333
Chapter XLIX
The Lord of Dirleton’s Tale—The Bishop of Moray and his Clergy, 342
Chapter L
The Mystery of the Lady Beatrice—Arrival of the Nobles and Men-at-arms at Aberdeen, 351
Chapter LI
King Robert at Aberdeen—Duncan MacErchar again, 356
Chapter LII
The Wolfe of Badenoch at Aberdeen—Father and Son, 366
Chapter LIII
The English Lady’s Departure from Tarnawa Castle—The Crafty Son of the Wolfe of Badenoch, 376
Chapter LIV
Sir Andrew’s Deep-laid Plot—An Unexpected Arrival, 384
Chapter LV
Travelling through the Wild Forest—A Dreadful Spectacle— Arrival at the River Tweed, 394
Chapter LVI
Old Acquaintances at the Hostel of Norham Tower—Great Gathering at Jedworth—The Council of War, 402
Chapter LVII
The Scots Besieging Newcastle—The Fight on the Walls, 415
Chapter LVIII
Combat between Douglas and Hotspur—The Fight for the Pennon, 426
Chapter LIX
The Battle at Otterbourne, 444
Chapter LX
The Bishop’s Army—Sorrow for the Fate of the Heroic Douglas, 459
Chapter LXI
The Field of Otterbourne after the Fight, 465
Chapter LXII
Withdrawal of the Scots Army—Obsequies of the Gallant Dead— The Mystery Solved, 471
Chapter LXIII
The Scottish Knights at the English Court—The Wealthy London Merchant—Combat on London Bridge, 485
Chapter LXIV
Lady de Vere and her lovely Guest—Innocence and Purity Endangered—The King’s Confessor and the Franciscan Friar, 506
Chapter LXV
In the Dungeons of the Tower of London, 525
Chapter LXVI
A Ship of Olden Times—Tempest Tossed—Arrival at the Maison Dieu in Elgin, 529
Chapter LXVII
The Wolfe of Badenoch again—The Burning of Elgin Cathedral, 536
Chapter LXVIII
The Bishop’s Palace at Spynie—The Wolfe gets a Surprise, 547
Chapter LXIX
Changes at the Castle of Lochyndorbe—The Wolfe tamed—Alarm for the Lady Beatrice, 555
Chapter LXX
Bishop Barr at Lochyndorbe Castle—Reception by the Wolfe, 566
Chapter LXXI
The Scottish Knights in London—Father Rushak’s Tale, 576
Chapter LXXII
At the Scottish Court—The Penitential Procession—Sir Patrick and the Friar, 582
Chapter LXXIII
Accusation made in presence of the King—The Challenge, 595
Chapter LXXIV
The Missing Lady Beatrice, 604
Chapter LXXV
The Ordeal of Battle, 608
Chapter LXXVI
The Friar’s Tale—The Two Combatants—Lady Eleanore’s explanation—All is well that ends well, 615
THE WOLFE OF BADENOCH.
Chapter I
The Scottish Knights—Journeying Homewards—The Hostelry of Norham Towers.
It was in the latter part of the fourteenth century that Sir Patrick Hepborne and Sir John Assueton—two young Scottish knights, who had been serving their novitiate of chivalry under the banners of Charles the Sixth of France, and who had bled their maiden lances against the Flemings at Rosebarque—were hastening towards the Border separating England from their native country. A truce then subsisting betwixt the kingdoms that divided Britain had enabled the two friends to land in Kent, whence they were permitted to prosecute their journey through the dominions of Richard II., attended by a circumscribed retinue of some ten or a dozen horsemen.
“These tedious leagues of English ground seem to lengthen under our travel,” said Sir John Assueton, breaking a silence that was stealing upon their march with the descending shades of evening. “Dost thou not long for one cheering glance of the silver Tweed, ere its stream shall have been forsaken by the last glimmer of twilight?”
“In sooth, I should be well contented to behold it,” replied Hepborne. “The night droops fast, and our jaded palfreys already lag their ears from weariness. Even our unbacked war-steeds, albeit they have carried no heavier burden than their trappings, have natheless lost some deal of their morning’s metal, and, judging from their sobered paces, methinks they would gladly exchange their gay chamfronts for the more vulgar hempen-halters of some well-littered stable.”
“Depardieux, but I have mine own sympathy with them,” said Assueton. “Saidst thou not that we should lie at Norham to-night?”
“Methought to cast the time and the distance so,” replied Hepborne; “and by those lights that twinkle from yonder dark mass, rising against that yellow streak in the sky, I should judge that I have not greatly missed in meting our day’s journey to that of the sun. Look between those groups of trees—nay, more to the right, over that swelling bank—that, if I mistake not, is the keep of Norham Castle, and those are doubtless the torches of the warders moving along the battlements. The watch must be setting ere this. Let us put on.”
“Thou dost not mean to crave hospitality from the captain of the strength, dost thou?” demanded Assueton.
“Such was my purpose,” replied Hepborne; “and the rather, that the good old knight, Sir Walter de Selby, hath a fair fame for being no churlish host.”
“Nay, if thou lovest me, Hepborne, let us shun the Castle,” said Assueton. “I have, ’tis true, heard of this same Sir Walter de Selby; and the world lies if he be not, indeed, as thou sayst, a hospitable old knight. But they say he hath damsels about him; and thou knowest I love not to doff mine armour only to don the buckram of etiquette; and to have mine invention put upon the rack to minister to woman’s vanity. Let us then to the village hostel, I entreat thee.”
“This strange unknightly disease of thine doth grow on thee, Assueton,” said Hepborne, laughing. “I have, indeed, heard that the widowed Sir Walter was left with one peerless daughter, who is doubtless the pride of her father’s hall; nay, I confess to thee, my friend, that the much-bruited tale of her beauty hath had its own share in begetting my desire to lodge me in Norham; but since thou wilt have it so, I am content to pleasure thee, trusting that this my ready penance of self-denial may count against the heavy score of my sins. But stay;—What may this be that lies fluttering here among the gorse?”
“Meseems it a wounded hawk,” said Assueton, stooping from his horse to look at it.
“In truth, ’tis indeed a fair falcon,” said Hepborne’s esquire, Mortimer Sang, as he dismounted to pick it up. “He gasps as if he were dying. Ha! by’r Lady, but he hath nommed a plump partridge; see here, it is dead in his talons.”
“He hath perchance come by some hurt in the swooping,” said Hepborne; “Canst thou discover any wound in him?”
“Nay, I can see nothing amiss in him,” replied Sang.
“I’ll warrant me, a well-reclaimed falcon,” said Hepborne, taking him from his esquire; “ay, and the pet of some fair damsel too, if I may guess from his silken jesses. But hold—he reviveth. I will put him here in the bosom of my surcoat, and so foster the small spark of life that may yet remain in him.”
At this moment their attention was arrested by the sound of voices; and, by the meagre light that now remained, they could descry two ladies, mounted on palfreys, and followed by two or three male attendants, who came slowly from behind a wooded knoll, a little to the left of the path before them. Their eyes were thrown on the ground, and they seemed to be earnestly engaged in looking for something they had lost.
“Alas, my poor bird!” said one of the ladies, “I fear I shall never see thee more.”
“Mary, ’tis vain to look for him by this lack of light,” said an esquire.
“Do thou thy duty and seek for him, Master Turnberry,” said the second lady, in a haughty tone.
“A murrain on’t!” said the esquire again; “this comes of casting a hawk at a fowl at sundown.”
“I tell thee he must be hereabouts,” said the second lady again; “it was over these trees that I saw him stoop.”
“Stoop! ay, I’ll be sworn I saw him stoop,” said the esquire. “But an I saw him not dash his brains ’gainst one of those gnarled elms, my name is not Thomas, and I have no eyes for falconry. He’s amortised, I promise thee.”
“Silence, Master Turnberry,” said the same lady again; “thou givest thy tongue larger license than doth well beseem thee.”
“By the Rood, but ’tis well to call silence,” replied the esquire, sulkily, “and to me too who did verily steal these two hours’ sport of hawking for thee at mine own proper peril.”
“Ay, stolen indeed were they on thy part, Master Turnberry,” replied the same lady; “but forget not that they were honestly bought of thee on ours.”
“Nay, then, bought or not,” said the esquire, “the last nail’s breadth of thy merchandize hath been unrolled to thee. We must e’en clip short, and haste us to Norham, else will Sir Walter’s grey beard become redder than a comet’s tail with ire. Thou knowest this has been but a testy day with him.”
“Peace with thy impudence, sir knave,” said the same lady hotly. “Dost thou dare thus to speak in presence of the Lady Eleanore de Selby? A greybeard’s ire shall never——”
“Nay, talk not so,” said the first lady, mildly interrupting her. “The honest squire equeary hath reason. Though it grieveth me to lose my poor falcon thus, we must e’en give him up, and haste us to the Castle.”
“Stay, stay, fair damsel,” cried Hepborne, urging his steed forward from the hollow bushy path where he and his party had hitherto remained concealed, from dread of alarming the ladies, a precaution which he now entirely forgot in his eagerness to approach her, whose person and manners had already bewitched him. “Stay, stay—fly not, lady—your hawk—your falcon!”
But the sudden appearance of armed men had so filled the ladies with alarm, that they had fled at his first word; and he now saw himself opposed by sturdy Squire Turnberry, who being too much taken by surprise to catch the knight’s meaning, and taking it for granted that his purpose was hostile, wheeled his horse round, and planting himself firmly in the midst of the path, at the head of the grooms, couched his hunting-spear, as if determined to prevent pursuit.
“What, ho! sir stranger knight—what seek ye, in the fiend’s name?” demanded the squire, sternly.
“Credit me no evil,” said Sir Patrick. “It galleth me sore that mine intemperate rudeness should have so frayed these beauteous damsels. Mine intent was but to restore the fair lady’s lost falcon, the which it was our chance to pick up in this hollow way. He had ta’en some unseen hurt in swooping at this partridge, which he had nommed.”
“Nay, by the mass, but I thought as much,” said the squire.
“Tell the lovely mistress of this fair bird, that Sir Patrick Hepborne willingly submits him to what penance she may enjoin for the alarm he caused her,” said the knight; “and tell, too, that he gave life to her expiring falcon, by cherishing it in his bosom.”
“I give thee thanks in mine own name, and that of the lady who owneth the hawk,” said the esquire. “Trust me, thy sin will be forgotten in the signal service thou hast done her. The bird, methinks, rouseth him as if there were no longer evil in him.”
“Yea, he proyneth and manteleth him as if rejoicing that he shall again embrace his lady’s wrist with his sengles,” said the knight. “Happy bird! depardieux, but he is to be envied. Tell his fair mistress, that if the small service it hath been my good fortune to render her, may merit aught of boon at her hands, let my reward be mine enlistment in that host of gallant knights who may have vowed devotion to her will.”
“Sir Knight,” said the squire, “I will bear thy courteous message to her who owneth the falcon; and if I tarry not longer to give the greater store of thanks, ’tis that the Lady Eleanore de Selby hath spurred away so fast, that I must have a fiend’s flight if I can catch her.” And turning his horse with these words he tarried not for further parlance.
“’Tis a strange adventure, Assueton,” said Hepborne to his friend, as they pursued their journey; “to meet thus with the peerless Eleanore de Selby at the very moment she formed the subject of our discourse.”
“’Tis whimsical enow,” said Assueton, drily; “yet it is nothing marvellous.”
“Albeit that the growing darkness left me but to guess at the excellence of her features, from the elegance of her person,” continued Hepborne, “yet do I confess myself more than half enamoured of her by very intuition. Didst thou observe that her attendant who talked so forwardly, though not devoid of grace, showed in her superior presence but as a mere mortal beside a goddess?”
“Nay,” replied Assueton, “though I do rarely measure or weigh the points of women, and am more versant in those of a battle-steed, yet methought that the attendant, as thou callest her, had the more noble port of the two.”
“Fie on thy judgment, Assueton,” cried Hepborne; “to prefer the saucy, pert demeanour of an over-indulged hand-maid, to the dignified deportment of gentle birth. The Lady Eleanore de Selby—she, I mean, in the reddish-coloured mantle, she who wept for the hawk—was as far above her companion in the elegance of her air, as heaven is above earth.”
“May be so,” replied Assueton with perfect indifference. “’Tis a question not worth the mooting.”
“To thee, perhaps, it may be of little interest,” said Hepborne; “but I could be well contented to be permitted to solve it in Norham Castle. Why wert thou born with feelings so much at war with what beseemeth a knight, as to make thee eschew all converse with those fair beings, the sun of whose beauty shineth but to brace up the otherwise damp and flaccid nerves of chivalrous adventure?”
“Nay, thou mightest as well demand of me why my raven locks are not as fair as thine,” said Assueton with a smile; “yea, or bid him who is born blind to will to see.”
“By Saint Baldrid, but I do pity thee as much as if thou wert blind,” said Hepborne. “Nay, what is it but to be blind, yea, to want every sense, to be thus unmoved with——”
“Ha! see where the broad bosom of Tweed at last glads our eyes, glistening yonder with the pale light that still lingers in the west,” exclaimed Assueton, overjoyed to avail himself of so happy an opportunity of interrupting his friend’s harangue.
“Yonder farther shadowy bank is Scotland—our country,” cried Hepborne, with deep feeling.
“God’s blessing on her hardy soil!” said Assueton, with enthusiasm.
“Amen!” said Hepborne. “To her shall we henceforth devote our arms, long enow wielded in foreign broils, where, in truth, heart did hardly go with hand.”
“But where lieth the hamlet of Norham?” inquired Assueton.
“Seest thou not where a few feeble rays are shed from its scattered tenements on the hither meadow below?” replied Hepborne. “Nay, thou mayest dimly descry the church yonder, sanctified by the shelter it did of erst yield to the blessed remains of the holy St. Cuthbert, what time the impious Danes drove them from Lindisferne.”
“But what, methinks, is most to thy present purpose, Sir Knight,” observed Mortimer Sang, “yonder brighter glede proceedeth, if I rightly guess, from the blazing hearth of Master Sylvester Kyle, as thirsty a tapster as ever broached a barrel, and one who, if he be yet alive, hath hardly, I wot, his make on either side the Border, for knavery and sharp wit.”
“Pray heaven his sharp wit may not have soured his ale,” muttered Roger Riddel, the laconic esquire of Sir John Assueton.
They now hastened down the hollow way that led to the village and soon found themselves in its simple street.
“Ay,” exclaimed Sang, “by St. Andrew, but old Kyle’s gate is right hospitably open. I promise ye, ’tis a good omen for Border quiet to find it so. So please thee, Sir Knight, shall I advance and give note of thine approach?”
“Do so,” said Hepborne, to the esquire, who immediately cantered forward.
“Ho! house there!” cried Sang, halting in the gateway. “Come forth, Monsieur, mine host of the hostel of Norham Tower. Where art thou, Mr. Sylvester Kyle? Where be thine hostlers, drawers, and underskinkers? Why do not all appear to do themselves honour by waiting on two most puissant knights, for I talk not of their esquires, or the other gentlemen soldiers of pregnant prowess, of the very least of whom it were an honour to undo the spur?”
By the time that Sang had ended his summons, the party were at the gate, and had leisure to survey the premises. A rude wall of considerable length faced the irregular street of the village, having the gateway in the centre. The thatch-roofed buildings within formed the other three sides of the quadrangular court. Those to the right were occupied as stables, and in those to the left were the kitchen, and various other domestic offices; whilst the middle part was entirely taken up by one large room, from whence gleamed the light of a great fire, that burned on a hearth in the midst, shedding around a common comfort on the motley parties of noisy ale-drinkers seated at different tables.
“What, ho! Sylvester, I say—what a murrain keeps thee?” cried Sang, although the portly form of the vintner already appeared within the aperture of the doorway, like a goodly portrait in a frame, his carbuncled face vying in lustre with the red flare of the torch he held high in his hand. “Gramercy, Master Kyle, so thou hast come at last. By the mass, but that paunch of thine is a right fair warrant for the goodness of thine ale, yet it will be well that it do come quicker when it be called for than thou hast.”
“Heyday, what a racket thou dost make, gaffer horseman!” cried Kyle. “But the emptiest vessel doth ever make the most din.”
“Tut, man, thou hast hit it for once with thy fool’s head,” replied Sang. “I am, as thou sayest, at this present, in very sober earnest, an empty vessel; yea, and for that matter, so are we all. But never trust me and we make not a din till we be filled. The sooner thou stoppest our music, then, the better for thine ears, seeing that if we be forced to pipe thus, and that thou dancest not more quickly to our call, thou mayest perchance lose them.”
“By the mass, but thy music is marvellously out of tune, good fellow,” replied the publican. “Thy screeching is like that of a cracked rebeck, the neck of which must be hard griped, and most cruelly pinched, ere its tone be softened. But of what strength is thy company?” continued he, whirling his torch around so as to obtain a general view of the group of horsemen. “By St. Cuthbert, I wish there may be stabling for ye all.”
“Stabling for us all, sir knave?” cried Sang; “marry, thou dost speak as if we were a herd of horses.”
“Cry you mercy, noble esquire,” rejoined Kyle. “An thou beest an ass, indeed, a halter and a hook at the gate-cheek may serve thy turn, and so peraunter I may find room for the rest.”
A smothered laugh among his comrades proclaimed Squire Sang’s defeat. The triumphant host ran to hold Sir Patrick Hepborne’s stirrup.
“By the Rood,” cried the squire, as he dismounted, with a good-natured chuckle at his own discomfiture—“by the Rood, but the rogue hath mastered me for this bout. But verily my wit is fasting, whilst his, I warrant, hath the full spirit of his potent ale in’t. Never trust me but I shall be even with him anon.”
“Master Kyle,” said Assueton, to their host, as he ushered his guests into the common room, “we should be glad to see some food. The rising sun looked upon our last meal; so bestir thyself, I pr’ythee, goodman, and let us know as soon as may be how we are to fare.”
“Room there, sirs, for two valiant knights,” cried Kyle, getting rid of the question by addressing himself to a party seated at a table near the hearth; “room, I say, gentlemen. What, are ye stocks, my masters?”
“Nay, treat not the good people so rudely,” said Hepborne, as some eight or ten persons were hastily vacating their places; “there is room enow for all. Go not thou, at least, old man,” continued he, addressing a minstrel who was following the rest, his snowy locks and beard hanging luxuriantly around a countenance which showed all the freshness of a green old age; “sit thee down, I do beseech thee, and vouchsafe us thy winning discourse. Where is the chevalier to whom a bard may not do honour?”
The minstrel’s heart was touched by Sir Patrick’s kind words; his full hazel eye beamed on him with gratitude; he put his hand to his breast, and modestly bowed his head.
“My time is already spent, most gentle knight,” said he. “Ere this I am looked for at the Castle; yet, ere I go hence, let me drink this cup of thanks for thy courtesy. To thee I wish tender love of fairest lady; and may thy lance, and the lance of thy brave companion, never be couched but to conquer.” And so draining the draught to the bottom, he again bowed, and immediately retired.
“So, Master Kyle,” said Assueton to the host, who returned at this moment, after having ascertained the country and quality of his new guests, “what hast thou in thy buttery?”
“Of a truth, Sir Knight, we are now but ill provided for sike guests,” replied Kyle. “Had it been thy luck to have sojourned here yestere’en, indeed, I wot ye mought ha’ been feasted. But arrives me my Lord Bishop of Durham at the Castle this morning; down comes me the seneschal with his buttery-men, and whips me off a whole beeve’s carcase; then in pour me the people of my Lord Bishop—clerks, lacqueys, and grooms; bolt goes me a leg of mutton here—crack goes me a venison pasty there—gobble goes me a salmon in this corner, whilst a whole flock of pullets are riven asunder in that; so that there has been nothing from sunrise till sundown but wagging of jaws.”
“Marry, these church-followers are wont to be stout knights of the trencher,” said Assueton, with a smile. “But let us have a supper from what may be left thee, and that without more ado.”
“Anon, courteous Sir Knight,” said Master Kyle, with a grin. “But, as I was a-saying, there hath been such stuffing; nay ye may know by the clinking of their cans that the rogues drink not fasting. By the mass, ’tis easy to guess from the seas of ale they are swallowing, what mountains of good provender they have to float in their stomachs. Why, yonder lantern-jaws i’ the corner, with a mouth that opens as if he would swallow another Jonas, and wangs like the famine-ground fangs of a starving wolf—that same fellow devoured me a couple of fat capons single-head; and that other churl——”
“Have done with thine impertinence, villain, said Assueton, interrupting him; “have done with thine impertinence, I say, and let us straightway have such fare as thou canst give, or by St. Andrew——”
“Nay, then, sweet sir,” replied the host, “there be yet reserved some delicate pig’s liver for myself and Mrs. Kyle, but they shall be forthwith cheerfully yielded to thy necessities.”
“Pestilence take thee, knave,” cried Assueton, “couldst thou not have set them down to us at once, without stirring up our appetites to greater keenness by thine enumeration of the good things that are gone? Come, come, despatch—our hunger is beyond nicety.”
Sir John Assueton now sat down to put in practice that patience of hunger, the exercise of which was one of the chief virtues of knighthood. As for Sir Patrick Hepborne, his attention was so entirely absorbed by a conversation that ensued at the adjoining table, to which the Bishop’s people had retired, that he altogether forgot his wants.
“And was it thy luck to see the Lady Eleanore de Selby, Master Barton?” demanded one of the persons of the dialogue; “Fame speaketh largely of her perfections.”
“Yea, Foster, I did indeed behold her,” replied the other, who seemed to be a person of more consequence than the rest. “When I entered the Castle-hall this morning, to receive the commands of my Lord the Bishop, she was seated between him and her father. They were alone, and the old knight was urging something to her in round soldier-like terms; but I gathered not the purport of his speech, for he broke off abruptly as I appeared.”
“And is she so rare a beauty as folks do call her?” demanded Foster.
“Verily, so much loveliness did never bless these eyes before,” replied Barton. “Yet was the sunshine of her face disturbed by clouds. Tear-drops, too, had dimmed the lustre of her charms. But methought they were more the offspring of a haughty spirit than of an afflicted heart.”
“Nay, of a truth, they do say that she lacketh not haughtiness,” observed Foster. “’Tis whispered that she hath already scorned some noble knights who would fain have wedded the heiress of the rich Sir Walter de Selby.”
“Nay, I warrant me she hath had suitors enow, and those no mean ones,” replied Barton. “What thinkest thou of Sir Rafe Piersie, brother to the gallant Hotspur? Marry, they say that he deigns to woo her with right serious intent.”
“Sayest thou so?” exclaimed Foster; “then must the old knight’s gold have glittered in the young knight’s eyes, that a proud-blooded Piersie should even him thus to the daughter of him who is but a soldier of Fortune.”
“Ay, and welcome, I ween, would the old knight’s hard-won wealth be to the empty coffers of a younger brother who hath never spared expense,” replied Barton.
“Yea, and high, I wot, mought Sir Walter’s hoar head be held with such a gallant for his son-in-law,” observed Foster again.
“Trust me,” said Barton, “he would joyfully part with all the golden fruits he hath gleaned from Scottish fields, to see this solitary scion from his old stock grafted on the goodly and towering tree of Northumberland. But they say that the Lady Eleanore is so hard to win, that she even scorns this high alliance; and if I might guess at matters the which to know are beyond my reach, I should say, hark ye, that this visit of our Right Reverend Lord Bishop to Sir Walter de Selby, hath something in it of the nature of an ambassage from the Piersie touching this same affair.”
“I do well know our Right Reverend Lord’s affection for that house,” said Foster.
“Nay, he doth stand related to the Piersie in no very distant degree,” replied Barton.
“Perchance this marriage treaty then had something to do with the lady’s tears,” observed Foster.
“Doubtless,” said Barton. “But I mistake if she carrieth not a high brow that will be ill to bend. Her doting father hath been ever too foolishly fond of her to thwart her will, till it hath waxed too strong for his opposing. She will never yield, I promise thee.”
“Then hath our Bishop lost his travel,” said Foster. “But when returneth our Reverend Lord homeward?”
“His present orders are for to-morrow,” replied Barton.
“How sayst thou, Assueton?” said Hepborne, in a whisper to his friend, after the conversation between the two strangers had dropped; “how sayst thou now? Did I right, think ye, to yield to thine importunity, to shun the hospitality of Norham Castle, that we might hostel it so vilely here i’ the nale of the Norham Tower? Dost thou not grieve for thy folly?”
“Why, faith,” replied Assueton, “to thee it may be cause of some regret; and I may grieve for thee, seeing that thou, an idolater of woman’s beauty, hast missed worshipping before the footstool of this haughty damsel. Thou mightest have caught a shred of ribbon from her fair hand, perchance, to have been treasured and worn in thy helmet; but, for mine own particular part, I despise such toys. Rough, unribboned steel, and the joyous neighing of my war-steed, are to me more pleasing than the gaudy paraments and puling parlance of love-sick maidens.”
“Nay, then, I do confess that my desire to behold this rare beauty hath much grown by what I have heard,” replied Hepborne. “Would that thou hadst been less indolently disposed, my friend. We might have been even now in the Castle; and ere we should have left it, who knows but we might have rescued this distressed damosel from an alliance she detesteth. Even after all these protestations to the contrary, thine icy heart mought have been thawed by the fire of her eyes, and the adventure mought have been thine own.”
“St. Andrew forbid!” replied Assueton. “I covet no such emprise. I trust my heart is love-proof. Have I not stood before the lightning-glances of the demoiselles of Paris, and may I not hold my breastplate to be good armour against all else?”
“Nay, boast not of this unknightly duresse of thine, Assueton,” replied Hepborne. “Trust me, thou wilt fall when thine hour cometh. But, by St. Baldrid, I would give this golden chain from my neck—nay, I would give ten times its worth, to be blessed with but a sight of her.”
“Ay,” said Assueton, “thou art like the moth, and wouldst hover round the lamp-fire till thy wings were singed.”
“Pshaw, Sir Adamant,” said Hepborne, “thou knowest I have skimmed through many a festal hall, blazing with bright eyes, and yet are my opinions as whole as thine. But I am not insensible to woman’s charms as thou art; and to behold so bright a star, perdie, I should care little to risk being scorched by coming within the range of its rays.”
“Nay, then, I do almost repent me that I hindered thee from thy design of quartering in the Castle,” said Assueton. “Thou mightest have levied new war on our ancient and natural foemen, by snatching an affianced bride from the big house of Northumberland.”
“Depardieux, but it were indeed a triumph, and worthy of a Scottish knight, to carry off the Lady Eleanore de Selby by her own consent from the proud Piersie,” said Hepborne. “But ’tis well enow to jest of.”
Whilst this dialogue was going on between the two friends, their esquires entered the place. Mortimer Sang, after reconnoitring the different tables, and perceiving that there were no convenient places vacant, except at that occupied by the attendants of the Bishop, went towards it, followed by his comrade Roger Riddel.
“By your good leave, courteous gentlemen,” said Sang, with a bow, at the same time filling up an empty space with his person; “I hope no objection to our joining your good company? Here, tapster,” cried he, at the same time throwing money on the table, “bring in a flagon of Rhenish, that we may wash away the dryness of new acquaintance.”
This cheering introduction of the two esquires was received with a smiling welcome on the part of those to whom it was addressed.
“Come ye from the south, Sir Squire?” demanded Barton, after the wine had silently circulated, to the great inward satisfaction of the partakers.
“Ay, truly, from the south, indeed,” replied Sang, lifting the flagon to his head.
“Then was I right, Richard, after all,” said Barton, addressing one of his fellows. “Did I not tell thee that these strangers had none of the loutish Scot in their gait?”
“Loutish Scot!” cried Sang, taking the flagon from his lips, and starting up fiercely; “What mean ye by loutish Scot?”
Barton eyed the tall figure, broad chest, and sinewy arms of the Scottish esquire.
“Nay, I meant thee not offence, Sir Squire,” replied he.
“Ha!” said Sang, regaining his good-humour; “then I take no offence where none is meant. Your Scot and your Southern are born foes to fight in fair field; yet I see no just cause against their drinking together in good fellowship when the times be fitting, albeit they may be called upon anon to crack each other’s sconces in battle broil. Thine hand,” said he, stretching his right across the table to the Bishop’s man, whilst he poised the flagon with his left. “Peraunter thou be’st a soldier, though of a truth that garb of thine would speak thee to be as much of a clerk as an esquire; but, indeed, an thy trade be arms, I am bold to say, that Scotland doth not hold a man who will do thee the petites politesses of the skirmish more handsomely than I shall, should chance ever throw us against each other. Meanwhile my hearty service to thee.”
“Spoke like a true man,” said Roger Riddel, taking the flagon from his friend. “Here, tapster, we lack wine.”
“Nay, Roger,” said Sang, “but we cannot drink thus fasting. What a murrain keeps that knave with the——Ha! he comes. Why, holy St. Andrew, what meanest thou, villain, by putting down this flinty skim-milk? Caitiff, dost take us for ostriches, to digest iron? Saw I not hogs’ livers a-frying for our supper?”
“Nay, good master Squire,” said the flaxen-polled lad of a tapster, “sure mistress says that the livers be meat for your masters.”
“Meat for our masters, sirrah!” replied Sang; “and can the hostel of Master Sylvester Kyle, famed from the Borders to the Calais Straits—can this far-famed house, I say, afford nothing better for a brace of Scottish knights, whose renown hath filled the world from Cattiness to the land of Egypt, than a fried hog’s liver? Avoid, sinner, avoid; out of my way, and let me go talk to this same hostess.”
So saying, he strode over the bench, and, kicking the rushes before him in his progress towards the door, made directly for the kitchen.
II. The Host and the Hostess—Preparing the Evening Meal
On entering the kitchen, Master Mortimer Sang found the hostess, a buxom dame with rosy cheeks, raven hair, and jet-black eyes, busily employed in cooking the food intended for the two knights. Having already had a glimpse of her, he remarked her to be of an age much too green for so wintry a husband as Sylvester Kyle; so checking his haste, he approached her with his best Parisian obeisance.
“Can it be,” said he, assuming an astonished air—“can it possibly be, that the cruel Master Sylvester Kyle doth permit so much loveliness to be melted over the vile fire of a kitchen, an ’twere a piece of butter, and that to fry a paltry pig’s liver withal?”
The dame turned round, looked pleased, smiled, flirted her head, and then went on frying. Sighing as if he were expiring his soul, Sang continued,—
“Ah, had it been my happy fate to have owned thee, what would I not have done to preserve the lustre of those charms unsullied?”
Mrs. Sylvester Kyle again looked round, again she smiled, again she flirted her head, and, leaving the frying-pan to fry in its own way, she dropped a curtsey, and called Master Sang a right civil and fair-spoken gentleman.
“Would that thou hadst been mine,” continued Sang, throwing yet more tenderness into his expression: “locked in these fond arms, thy beauty should have been shielded from every chance of injury.” So saying he suited the action to the word, and embracing Mrs. Kyle, he imprinted on her cheeks kisses, which, though burning enough in themselves, were cold compared to the red heat of the face that received them. Having thus paved the way to his purpose—
“What could possess thee, beauteous Mrs. Kyle,” said he, “to marry that gorbellied glutton of thine, a fellow who, to fill his own rapacious bowke, and fatten his own scoundrel carcase, starveth thee to death? I see it in thy sweet face, my fair hostess; ’tis vain to conceal it; the wretch is miserably poor; he feedeth thee not. The absolute famine that reigneth in his beggarly buttery, nay, rather flintery (for buttery it were ridiculous to call it), cannot suffice to afford one meal a-day to that insatiable maw of his, far less can it supply those cates and niceties befitting the stomach of an angel like thyself.”
Mrs. Kyle was whirled up to the skies by this rhapsody; Master Sylvester had never said anything half so fine. But her pride could not stand the hits the squire had given against the poverty of her larder.
“Nay thee now, but, kind sir,” said she, “we be’s not so bad off as all that; Master, my goodman Kyle hath as fat a buttery, I warrant thee, as e’er a publican in all the Borders.”
“Nay, nay, ’tis impossible, beautiful Mrs. Kyle,” said Mortimer again—“’tis impossible; else why these wretched pigs’ entrails for a couple of knights, of condition so high that they may be emperors before they die, if God give them good luck?”
“La, now there,” exclaimed Mrs. Kyle; “and did not Sylvester say that they were nought but two lousy Scots, and that any fare would do for sike loons. Well, who could ha’ thought, after all, that they could be emperors? An we had known that, indeed, we might ha’ gi’en them emperor’s fare. Come thee this way, kind sir, and I’ll let thee see our spense.”
This was the very point which the wily Master Sang had been aiming at. Seizing up a lamp, she led the way along a dark passage. As they reached the end of it, their feet sounded hollow on a part of the floor. Mrs. Kyle stopped, set down her lamp, slipped a small sliding plank into a groove in the side wall made to receive it, and exposed a ring and bolt attached to an iron lever. Applying her hand to this, she lifted a trap door, and disclosed a flight of a dozen steps or more, down which she immediately tripped, and Sang hesitated not a moment to follow her. But what a sight met his eyes when he reached the bottom! He found himself in a pretty large vault, hung round with juicy barons and sirloins of beef, delicate carcases of mutton, venison, hams, flitches, tongues, with all manner of fowls and game, dangling in most inviting profusion from the roof. It was here that Master Kyle preserved his stock-in-trade, in troublesome times, from the rapacity of the Border-depredators. Mortimer Sang feasted his eyes for some moments in silence, but they were allowed small time for their banquet.
A distant foot was heard at the farther extremity of the passage, and then the angry voice of Kyle calling his wife. Mortimer sprang to the top of the steps, just as mine host had reached the trap-door.
“Eh! what!” exclaimed Kyle with horror and surprise—“A man in the spense with my wife! Thieves! Murder!”
He had time to say no more, for Sang grappled him by the throat, as he was in the very act of stooping to shut the trap-door on him, and down he tugged the bulky host, like a huge sack; but, overpowered by the descent of such a mountain upon his head, he rolled over the steps with his burthen into the very middle of the vault. More afraid of her husband’s wrath than anxious for his safety, Mrs. Kyle put her lamp on the ground, jumped nimbly over the prostrate strugglers, and escaped. The active and Herculean Sang, rising to his knees, with his left hand pressed down the half-stunned publican, who lay on his back gasping for breath; then seizing the lamp with his right, he rose suddenly to his legs, and, regaining the trap-door in the twinkling of an eye, sat him down quietly on the floor to recover his own breath; and, taking the end of the lever in his hand, and half closing the aperture, he waited patiently till his adversary had so far recovered himself as to be able to come to a parley.
“So, Master Sylvester Kyle,” said the esquire, “thou art there, art thou—caught in thine own trap? So much for treating noble Scots, the flower of chivalry, with stinking hog’s entrails. By’r Lady, ’tis well for thee thou hast such good store of food there. Let me see; methinks thou must hold out well some week or twain ere it may begin to putrify. Thou hadst better fall to, then, whiles it be fresh; time enow to begin starving when it groweth distasteful. So wishing thee some merry meals ere thou diest, I shall now shut down the trap-door—bolt it fast—nail up the sliding plank—and as no one knoweth on’t but thy wife, who, kind soul, hath agreed to go off with me to Scotland to-night, thou mayest reckon on quiet slumbers for the next century.”
“Oh, good Sir Squire,” cried Kyle, wringing his hands like a maniac, “let me out, I beseech thee; leave me not to so dreadful a death. Thou and thy knights and all shall feast like princes; thou shalt float in sack and canary; thou shalt drink Rhinwyn in barrelfuls, and Malvoisie in hogsheads, to the very lowest lacquey of ye. No, merciful Sir Squire, thou canst not be so cruel—Oh, oh!”
“Hand me up,” said Sang, with a stern voice, “hand me up, I say, that venison, and these pullets there, that neat’s tongue, and a brace of the fattest of these ducks; I shall then consider whether thou art worthy of my most royal clemency.”
Mine host had no alternative but to obey. One by one the various articles enumerated by Sang were handed up to him, and deposited beside him on the floor of the passage.
“Take these flagons there,” said he, “and draw from each of these buts, that I may taste.—Ha! excellent, i’ faith, excellent.—Now, Sir knave, those of thy kidney mount up a ladder to finish their career of villainy, but thy fate lieth downwards; so down, descend, and mingle with thy kindred dirt.”
He slapped down the trap-door with tremendous force, bolted it firmly, and replaced the sliding plank, so that the wretch’s shrieks of horrible despair came deafened through the solid oak, and sounded but as the moaning of some deep subterranean stream.
Master Sang had some difficulty in piling up the provender he had acquired, and carrying it with the flagons to the kitchen. There he found Mrs. Kyle, who, in the apprehension of a terrible storm from her lord, was sitting in a corner drowned in tears.
“Cheer up, fair dame,” said Sang to the disconsolate Mrs. Kyle; “thou needest be under no fear of him to-night. I have left him in prison, and thou mayest relieve him thyself when thou mayest, and on thine own terms of capitulation. Meanwhile, hash up some of that venison, and dress these capons, and this neat’s tongue, for the knights, our masters, and make out a supper for my comrade and me and the rest as fast as may be. I’ll bear in the wine myself.”
Mrs. Kyle felt a small smack of disappointment to find that the so lately gallant esquire, after all he had said, should himself put such an office upon her; but she dried her eyes, and quickly begirding herself for her duty, set to work with alacrity.
III. The Knights Invited to Norham Castle
On the return of Mortimer Sang to the common room, he found that a new event had taken place in his absence. An esquire had arrived from the Castle, bearing a courteous message from Sir Walter de Selby, its captain, setting forth that it pained him to learn that Sir Patrick Hepborne and Sir John Assueton had not made experiment of his poor hospitality; that their names were already too renowned not to be well known to him; and that he trusted they would not refuse him the gratification of doing his best to entertain them, but would condescend to come and partake of such cheer and accommodation as Norham Castle could yield. An invitation so kind it was impossible to resist. Indeed, whatever Sir John Assueton might have felt, Sir Patrick Hepborne’s curiosity to see the fair maid of the Castle was too great to be withstood. The distance was but short, and Sir Walter’s messenger was to be their guide. Leaving their esquires and the rest of their retinue, therefore, to enjoy the feast so ingeniously provided for them by Sang, their horses were ordered out, and they departed.
The night was soft and tranquil. The moon was up, and her silvery light poured itself on the broad walls of the keep, and the extensive fortifications of Norham Castle, rising on the height before them, and was partially reflected from the water of the farther side of the Tweed, here sweeping wildly under the rocky eminence, and threw its shadow half-way across it. They climbed up the hollow way leading to the outer ditch, and were immediately challenged by the watch upon the walls. The password was given by their guide, the massive gate was unbarred, the portcullis lifted, and the clanging drawbridge lowered at the signal, and they passed under a dark archway to the door of the outer court of guard. There they were surrounded by pikemen and billmen, and narrowly examined by the light of torches; but the officer of the guard appeared, and the squire’s mission being known to him, they were formally saluted, and permitted to pass on. Crossing a broad area, they came to the inner gate, where they underwent a similar scrutiny.
They had now reached that part of the fortress where stood the barracks, the stables, and various other buildings necessarily belonging to so important a place; while in the centre arose the keep, huge in bulk, and adamant in strength, defended by a broad ditch, where not naturally rendered inaccessible by the precipitous steep, and approachable from one point only by a narrow bridge. Lights appeared from some of its windows, and sounds of life came faintly from within; but all was still in the buildings around them, the measured step of the sentinel on the wall above them forming the only interruption to the silence that prevailed.
The esquire proceeded to try the door of a stable, but it was locked.
“A pestilence take the fellow,” said he; “how shall I get the horses bestowed?—What, ho!—Turnberry—Tom Equerry, I say.”
“Why, what art thou?” cried the gruff voice of the sentinel on the wall; “what art thou, I say, to look for Tom Turnberry at this hour? By’r lackins, his toes, I’ll warrant me, are warm by the embers of Mother Rowlandson’s suttling fire. He’s at his ale, I promise thee.”
“The plague ride him, then,” muttered the squire; “how the fiend shall I find him? I crave pardon, Sirs Knights, but I must go look for this same varlet, or some of his grooms, for horses may not pass to the keep; and who knoweth but I may have to rummage half the Castle over ere I find him?” So saying, he left the two knights to their meditations.
He was hardly gone when they heard the sound of a harp, which came from a part of the walls a little way to the left of where they were then standing. The performer struck the chords, as if in the act of tuning the instrument, and the sound was interrupted from time to time. At last, after a short prelude, a Scottish air was played with great feeling.
“By the Rood of St. Andrew,” exclaimed Assueton, after listening for some time, “these notes grapple my heart, like the well-remembered voice of some friend of boyhood. May we not go nearer?”
“Let us tie our horses to these palisadoes, and approach silently, so as not to disturb the musician,” said Hepborne.
Having fastened the reins of their steeds, they moved silently in the direction whence the music proceeded, and soon came in sight of the performer.
On a part of the rampart, at some twenty yards’ distance, where the wall on the outside rose continuous with the rock overhanging the stream of the Tweed, they beheld two figures; and, creeping silently for two or three paces farther, they sheltered themselves from observation under the shadow of a tower, where they took their stand in the hope of the music being renewed. The moonlight was powerful, and they easily recognized the garb of the harper whom they had so lately seen at the hostel. He was seated on the horizontal ropes of one of those destructive implements of war called an onager or balista, which were still in use at that period, when guns were but rare in Europe. His harp was between his knees, his large and expressive features were turned upwards, and his long white locks swept backwards over his shoulders, as he was in the act of speaking to a woman who stood by him. The lady, for her very mien indicated that she was no common person, stood by the old man in a listening posture. She was enveloped in a mantle, that flowed easily over her youthful person, giving to it roundness of outline, without obscuring its perfections.
“By St. Dennis, Assueton,” whispered Hepborne to his friend, “’tis the Lady Eleanore de Selby. The world lies not; she is beautiful.”
“Nay, then, thine eyes must be like those of an owl, if thou canst tell by this light,” replied Assueton.
“I tell thee I caught one glance of her face but now, as the moonbeam fell on it,” said Hepborne; “’twas beauteous as that of an angel. But hold, they come this way.”
The minstrel arose, and the lady and he came slowly along the wall in the direction where the two knights were standing.
“Tush, Adam of Gordon,” said the lady, in a playful manner, as if in reply to something the harper had urged, “thou shalt never persuade me; I have not yet seen the knight—nay, I doubt me whether the knight has yet been born who can touch this heart. I would not lose its freedom for a world.”
“So, so,” whispered Assueton, “thou wert right, Master Barton; a haughty spirit enow, I’ll warrant me.”
“Hush,” said Hepborne, somewhat peevishly; “the minstrel prepares to give us music.”
The minstrel, who had again seated himself, ran his fingers in wild prelude over his chords, and graduating into a soft and tender strain, he broke suddenly forth in the following verses, adapted to its measure:—
Oh think not, lady, to despise The all-consuming fire of Love, For she who most his power defies Is sure his direst rage to prove. Was never maid, who dared to scorn The subtle god’s tyrannic sway, Whose heart was not more rudely torn By his relentless archery.
Do what thou canst, that destined hour Will come, when thou must feel Love’s dart; Then war not thus against his power, His fire will melt thine icy heart. Oh, let his glowing influence then Within thy bosom gently steal; For sooth, sweet maid, I say again, That all are doom’d Love’s power to feel.
“Why, Adam,” exclaimed the lady, as the minstrel concluded, “this is like a prophecy. What, dost thou really say that I must one day feel this fire thou talkest of? Trust me, old man, I am in love with thy sweet music, and thy sweet song; but for other love, I have never thought of any such, and thou art naughty, old man, to fill mine ears with that I would fain keep from having entrance there.”
“Nay, lady, say not so,” cried Adam of Gordon, earnestly; “thou knowest that love and war are my themes, and I cannot ope my lips, or touch my harp, but one or other must have way with me. How the subject came, I know not; but the verses were the extemporaneous effusion of my minstrel spirit.”
“Come, Hepborne,” whispered Assueton, “let us away; we may hear more of the lady’s secrets than consists with the honour of knights wilfully to listen to.”
“Nay, I could stay here for ever, Assueton,” replied Hepborne; “I am spell-bound. That ethereal creature, that enchantress, hast chained me to the spot; and wouldst thou not wish to have more of that old man’s melody? Methought his verses might have gone home to thee as well as to the lady.”
“Pshaw,” said Assueton, turning away, “dost think that I may be affected by the drivelling song of an old dotard? Trust me, I laugh at these silly matters.”
“Laugh while thou mayest, then,” replied Hepborne; “thou mayst weep anon. Yet, as thou sayst, we do but ill to stand listening here. Let us away then.”
When they reached the spot where their horses were tied, they found that the esquire who guided them to the Castle had but just returned with Master Turnberry, the equerry, whose state sufficiently betrayed the manner in which he had been spending his evening, and showed that the sentinel had not guessed amiss regarding him. He came staggering and grumbling along.
“Is’t not hard, think ye, that an honest man cannot be left to enjoy his evening’s ease undisturbed? I was but drinking a draught of ale, Master Harbuttle.”
“A draught of ale,” replied Harbuttle; “ay, something more than one draught, I take it, Master Thomas. But what makest thou with a torch in such a moonshiny night as this?”
“Moonshiny,” cried Turnberry, hiccuping; “moonshiny, indeed, why, ’tis as dark as a pit well. Fye, fye, Mr. Harbuttle, thou must have been drinking—thou must have been drinking, I say, since thou hast so much fire in thine eyes; for, to a sober, quiet, cool-headed man like myself, Master Harbuttle, the moon is not yet up. Fye, fye, thou hast been taking a cup of Master Sylvester Kyle’s tipple. ’Tis an abominable vice that thou hast fallen into; drink will be the ruin of thee.”
“Thou drunken sot, thou,” exclaimed Harbuttle, laughing, “dost not see the moon there, over the top of the keep?”
“That the moon!” cried Turnberry, holding up his torch as if to look for it; “well, well, to see now what drink will do—what an ass it will make of a sensible man; for, to give the devil his due, thou art no gnoffe when thou art sober, Master Harbuttle. That the moon! Why, that’s the lamp burning in Ancient Fenwick’s loophole window. Thou knowest he is always at his books—always at the black art. St. Cuthbert defend us from his incantations!”
“Amen!” said the squire usher, fervently crossing himself.
“But what a fiend’s this?” cried Turnberry; “here are two horses, one black and t’other white. I see that well enow, though thou mayn’t, yet thou would’st persuade me I don’t know the Wizard Ancient’s lamp from the moon. Give me hold of the reins.”
But as he stretched forth his hand to take them, he toppled over and fell sprawling among the horses’ feet, whence he was opportunely relieved by two of his own grooms, who arrived at that moment.
“Where hast thou been idling, varlets?” demanded Turnberry, as he endeavoured to steady himself, and assume the proper importance of authority; “drinking, varlets, drinking, I’ll be sworn—John Barleycorn will be the overthrow of Norham Castle. See, villains, that ye bestow these steeds in good litters, and that oats are not awanting. I’ll e’en return to my evening’s repose.”
At this moment the lady, followed by Adam of Gordon, came suddenly upon the group from a narrow gateway, at the bottom of a flight of steps that led from the rampart, and were close upon Hepborne and his friend before they perceived the two knights. The lady drew back at first from surprise, and seemed to hesitate for an instant whether she would advance or not. She pulled her hood so far over her face as to render it only partially visible; but the flame of Master Turnberry’s torch had flashed on it ere she did so, and Hepborne was ravished by the momentary glance he had of her beauty. The lady, on the other hand, had a full view of Sir Patrick’s features, for his vizor was up. The minstrel immediately recognized him.
“Lady,” said the old man, “these are the courteous stranger knights who came hither as the guests of Sir Walter de Selby.”
“In the name of Sir Walter de Selby, do I welcome them then,” said the lady, with a modest air. “Welcome, brave knights, to the Castle. But,” added she, hesitatingly, “in especial am I bound to greet with mine own guerdon of good thanks him who is called Sir Patrick Hepborne, to whose gentle care I am so much beholden for the safety of my favourite hawk.”
“Proudly do I claim these precious thanks as mine own rich treasure, most peerless lady,” exclaimed Sir Patrick, stepping forward with ardour. “Blessed be my good stars, which have thus so felicitously brought me, when least expecting such bliss, into the very presence of a demoiselle whose perfections have already been so largely rung in mine ears, short as hath yet been my time in Norham.”
“Methinks, Sir Knight,” replied the lady, in some confusion, “methinks that thy time, albeit short, might have been better spent in Norham than in listening to idle tales of me. Will it please thee to take this way? Sir Walter, ere this, doth look for thee in the banquet-hall.”
“Lady, the tale of thy charms was music to me,” said Sir Patrick; “yet hath it been but as some few notes of symphony to lure me to a richer banquet. Would that the gentle zephyrs, which do now chase the fleecy cloud from yonder moon, might unveil that face. Yet, alas! I have already seen but too much of its charms for my future peace.”
“Nay, Sir Knight,” replied the lady, “this fustian is but thrown away on me. Thy friend, perhaps, may talk more soberly—Shall I be thy guide, chevalier?” added she, addressing Assueton.
“No, no, no,” interrupted Hepborne, springing to her side; “I’ll go with thee, lady, though thou should’st condemn me to eternal silence.”
“Here, then, lieth thy way,” said the lady, hurrying towards the bridge communicating with the entrance to the keep; “and here come the lacqueys with lights.”
The squire, who had gone in before, now appeared at the door, with attendants and torches. Hepborne anxiously hoped to be blessed with a more satisfactory view of the lady’s face than accident had before given him; but as she approached the lights, she shrouded up her head more closely in her hood, yet not so entirely as to prevent her eyes from enjoying some stolen glances at the noble figure of Sir Patrick. She had no sooner got within the archway of the great door, however, than she took a lamp from an attendant, and, making a graceful obeisance to the two friends, disappeared in a moment, leaving Sir Patrick petrified with vexation and disappointment.
Chapter IV
The Evening Meal at the Castle—The Minstrel and the Tourney of Noyon—Master Haggerstone Fenwick the Ancient.
Sir Patrick Hepborne was roused from the astonishment the sudden disappearance of the lady had thrown him into, by the voice of the Squire Usher, who now came to receive them.
“This way, Sirs Knights,” cried he, showing them forwards, and up a staircase that led them at once into a large vaulted hall, lighted by three brazen lamps, hanging by massive chains from the dark wainscot roof, and heated by one great projecting chimney. A long oaken table, covered with pewter and wooden trenchers, with innumerable flagons and drinking vessels of the same materials, occupied the centre of the floor. About a third of its length, at the upper end, was covered with a piece of tapestry or carpet, and there the utensils were of silver. The upper portion of the table had massive high-backed carved chairs set around it, and these were furnished with cushions of red cloth, whilst long benches were set against it in other parts. The rest of the moveables in the hall consisted of various kinds of arms, such as helmets, burgonets, and bacinets—breastplates and back-pieces—pouldrons, vambraces, cuisses, and greaves—gauntlets, iron shoes, and spurs—cross-bows and long-bows, hanging in irregular profusion on the walls; whilst spears, pikes, battle-axes, truncheons, and maces, rested everywhere in numbers against them. The floor was strewed with clean rushes; and a dozen or twenty people, some of whom were warlike, and some clerical in their garb, were divided into conversational groups of two or three together.
Sir Walter de Selby, an elderly man, with a rosy countenance, and a person rather approaching to corpulency, clad in a vest and cloak of scarlet cloth, sat in tête-à-tête with a sedate and dignified person, whose dress at once declared him to be of the religious profession and episcopal rank.
“Welcome, brave knights,” said Sir Walter, rising to meet them as the Squire Usher announced them; “welcome, brave knights. But by St. George,” added he, with a jocular air, as he shook each of them cordially by the hand, “I should have weened that ye looked not to be welcomed here, seeing ye could prefer bestowing yourselves in the paltry hostelry of the village, rather than demanding from old Sir Walter de Selby that hospitality never refused by him to knights of good fame, such as thine. But ye do see I can welcome, ay, and welcome heartily too. My Lord Bishop of Durham, this is Sir Patrick Hepborne, and this, Sir John Assueton, Scottish knights of no mean degree or renown.” Sir Walter then made them acquainted with the chief personages of the company, some of whom were knights, and some churchmen of high rank.
After the usual compliments had passed, the Scottish knights were shown to apartments, where they unarmed, and were supplied with fitting robes and vestments. Sir Patrick Hepborne was happy in the expectation of being speedily introduced to the Lady Eleanore; but, on returning to the hall, he found that she had not yet appeared, and he was mortified to hear Sir Walter de Selby give immediate orders for the banquet.
“These gallant knights,” said he, “would, if I mistake not, rather eat than talk, after a long day’s fast. We shall have enow of converse anon. Bring in—bring in, I say.” And, seating himself at the head of the table, he placed the Lord Bishop on his right hand, and the two stranger knights on his left, while the other personages took their places of themselves, according to their acknowledged rank. Immediately after them came a crowd of guests of lesser note, who filled up the table to the farther extremity.
The entertainment consisted of enormous joints of meat, and trenchers full of game and poultry, borne in by numerous lacqueys, who panted under the loads they carried; and the dishes were arranged by the sewer, whose office it was to do so.
When the solid part of the feast had been discussed, and the mutilated fragments removed, Sir Walter called for a mazer of Malvoisie. The wine was brought him in a silver cup of no despicable manufacture, and he drank a health to the stranger knights; which was passed round successively to the Bishop and others, who sat at the upper end, and echoed from the lower part of the table by those who drank it in deep draughts of ale. Numerous pledges succeeded, with hearty carouse.
“Sir Walter,” said Hepborne, taking advantage of a pause in the conversation, “the fame of thy peerless daughter, the Lady Eleanore de Selby, hath reached our ears: Shall our eyes not be blessed with the sight of so much beauty? May we not look to see thy board graced with her presence ere the night passeth away?”
“Nay, Sir Knight,” replied Sir Walter, his countenance undergoing a remarkable change from gay to grave, “my daughter appeareth not to-night. But why is not the minstrel here?” exclaimed he aloud, as if wishing to get rid of Hepborne’s farther questioning; “why is not Adam of Gordon introduced? Let him come in; I love the old man’s music too well to leave him neglected. Yea, and of a truth, he doth to-night merit a double share of our regard, seeing that it is to him we do owe the honour of these distinguished Scottish guests. A chair for the minstrel, I say.”
A chair was accordingly set in a conspicuous place near the end of the hall. Adam entered, with his harp hanging on his arm, and, making an obeisance to the company, advanced towards the top of the table.
“Ay, ay, come away, old man; no music without wine; generous wine will breed new inspiration in thee: Here, drink,” said Sir Walter, presenting him with the mantling cup.
The minstrel bowed, and, drinking health to the good company, he quaffed it off. His tardy blood seemed quickened by the draught; he hastened to seat himself in the place appointed for him; and, striking two or three chords to ascertain the state of his instrument, he proceeded to play several airs of a martial character.
“Come, come, good Adam, that is very well,” said Sir Walter, as the harper paused to rest his fingers awhile—“so far thou hast done well; but my good wine must not ooze out at the points of thy fingers with unmeaning sounds. Come, we must have it mount to thy brain, and fill thee with inspiration. Allons! Come, drink again, and let the contents of this cup evaporate from thee in verse. Here, bear this brimming goblet to him: And then, dost thou hear, some tale of hardy dints of arms; ’tis that we look for. Nay, fear not for my Lord Bishop; I wot he hath worn the cuirass ere now.”
“Thou sayest truly, Sir Walter,” said the Bishop, rearing himself up to his full height, as if gratified by the remark; “on these our Eastern Marches there are few who have not tasted of war, however peaceful may have been their profession; and I cannot say but I have done my part, thanks be to Him who hath given me strength and courage.”
Adam quaffed off the contents of the cup that had been given him, and, seizing his harp again, he flourished a prelude, during which he kept his eyes thrown upwards, as if wrapt in consideration of his subject, and then dashed the chords from his fingers in a powerful accompaniment to the following verses:—
THE TOURNEY OF NOYON.
Proud was the bearing of fair Noyon’s chivalry, Brave in the lists did her gallants appear; Gay were their damosels, deck’d out in rivalry, Breathing soft sighs from the balconies near. Each to her knight, His bright helm to dight, Flung her love-knot, with vows for his prowess and might; And warm were the words Of their love-sick young lords, Mingling sweet with the tender harp’s heart-thrilling chords.
But long ere the trumpet’s shrill clamour alarming Told each stark chevalier to horse for the strife; Ere yet their hot steeds, in their panoply arming, Were led forth, their nostrils wide breathing with life; Ere the lists had been clear’d, The brave Knollis appear’d With his heroes, the standard of England who rear’d; But nor billman nor bowman Came there as a foeman, For peace had made friends of these stout English yeomen.
As afar o’er the meadows, with soldiers’ gear laden, They merrily marched for their dear native land; Their banners took sighs from full many a maiden, And trembled, as love-lorn each waved her white hand. But see from the troops Where a warrior swoops, From the speed of his courser his plume backward droops; ’Tis a bold Scottish Knight, Whose joy and delight Is to joust it in sport—or at outrance to fight.
His steed at the barrier’s limit he halted, And toss’d to his Squire the rich gold-emboss’d rein; Cased in steel as he was, o’er the high pales he vaulted, And, bowing, cried, “Messieurs Chevaliers, prey deign To lend me an ear— Lo, I’m singly come here, Since none of you dared against me to appear. One and all I defy, Nor fear I shall fly, Win me then, if you can—for my knighthood I try.”
Then a huge massive mace round his head quickly whirling, He charged their bright phalanx with furious haste, And some he laid prostrate, with heads sorely dirling, And some round the barrier swiftly he chased. Where’er he attacked, The French knighthood backed, Preux Chevalier le brave Jean de Roy he thwacked, Till his helmet rang well, Like the couvre-feu bell— By the Rood, but ’twas nearly his last passing knell.
Then Picardy’s pride, Le Chevalier de Lorris, He soon stretch’d on the sand in most pitiful case, And he rain’d on the rest, till they all danced a morris To the music he played on their mails with his mace. Till tired with his toil, He breathed him a while, And, bowing again, with a most courteous smile, “Adieu, Messieurs!” said he, “Je vous rend graces, Perdie! For the noble diversion you’ve yielded to me.”
Then some kind parting-blows round him willingly dealing, That on breastplates, and corslets, and helmets clang’d loud, Sending some ten or dozen to right and left reeling, He soon clear’d his way through the terrified crowd. O’er the pales then he bounded As all stood confounded. To the saddle he leap’d—and his horse’s heels sounded As he spurrd out of sight, Leaving proofs of his might, That had marr’d the bold jousting of many a knight.
Loud applause followed the minstrel’s merry performance, and Sir Walter de Selby called Adam towards him to reward him with another cup of wine.
“But thou hast not told us the name of thy mettlesome knight, old bard,” said he.
Adam looked over his shoulder, with a waggish smile, towards Sir John Assueton.
“’Twas a certain Scottish knight,” said he, “one whose heart was as easily wounded as his frame was invulnerable—one who was as remarkable for his devotion to the fair as for his prowess in the field. It was whispered at Noyon that the feat was done to give jovisaunce to a pair of bright eyes which looked that day from the balcony.”
“By St. Andrew, but thou art out there, goodman harper,” cried Assueton, caught in the trap so cunningly laid for him by the minstrel; “trust me, thou wert never more out in thy life. My heart was then, as it is now, as sound, entire, firm, and as hard as my cuirass. By’r Lady, I am not the man to be moved by a pair of eyes. No pair of eyes that ever lighted up a face could touch me; and as to that matter, a—a—” But observing a smile playing over the countenances of the guests, he recollected that he had betrayed himself, and stopped in some confusion. The harper turned round to the host—
“Sir Walter,” said he, “there never sat within this wall two more doughty or puissant knights than these. Both did feats of valour abroad that made Europe ring again. Sir John Assueton was indeed the true hero of my verses. As to his love I did but jest, for I wot ’tis well known he hath steeled himself against the passion, and hath never owned it. I but feigned, to draw him into a confession of the truth of my tale, the which his consummate modesty would never have permitted him to avow.”
Sir Walter called for a goblet of wine—
“To the health of the brave knight of Noyon!” cried he. “Well did we all know to whom the merry minstrel alluded.”
The health was received with loud applause, and compliments came so thick upon Assueton, that he blushed to receive them.
“Load me not thus, courteous knights, load me not thus, I beseech you, with your applause for a silly frolic. Here sits one,” said he, wishing to turn the tide from himself, and tapping Hepborne on the shoulder—“Here sits one, I say, who hath done feats of arms compared to which my boyish pranks are but an idle pastime. This is the Scottish knight who, at the fight of Rosebarque, did twice recover the flag of France from the Flemings, and of whom the whole army admitted that the success of that day belonged to the prowess of his single arm.”
This speech of Assueton’s had all the effect he desired. Sir Walter was well aware of the renown acquired by Hepborne upon that occasion, and there were even some at table who had witnessed his glorious feats of arms on that day. His modesty was now put to a severe trial in its turn, and goblets were quaffed in honour of him. He looked with a reproachful eye at his friend for having thus saved himself at his expense; and at last, to get rid of praises he felt to be oppressive, he signified to his host a wish to retire for the night. Accordingly the Squire Usher was called, and the two knights were shown to their apartments; soon after which the banquet broke up, leaving the Lord Bishop and Sir Walter in deep conference.
As Hepborne and Assueton passed up the narrow stair that led to the apartments appropriated to them, they were interrupted in their progress by a pair of limbs of unusual length, that were slowly descending. The confined and spiral nature of the stair kept the head and body belonging to them entirely out of view; and the huge feet were almost in Hepborne’s stomach before he was aware. He called out, and the limbs, halting for an instant, seemed to receive tardy instructions to retire, from the invisible head they were commanded by, which, judging of the extent of the whole person by the parts they saw, must have been, at that moment at least, in the second storey above them. The way being at last cleared, the two friends climbed to the passage leading to their apartments. Irresistible curiosity, however, induced them to linger for a moment on the landing-place to watch the descent of a figure so extraordinary. It came as if measured out by yards at a time. In the right hand was a lamp, carried as high as the roof of the stair would permit, to enable the bearer to steer his head under it without injury, and the light being thus thrown strongly upon the face, displayed a set of features hardly human.
The complexion was deadly pale, the forehead unusually low and broad, and the head was hung round with lank tangles of black hair. A pair of small fiery eyes smouldered, each within the profound of a deep cavity on either side of the nose, that, projecting a good inch or two nearly in a right angle from the forehead, dropped a perpendicular over the mouth, almost concealing the central part of that orifice, in which it was assisted by the enormous length of chin thrust out in a curve from below. The cheekbones were peculiarly enlarged, and the cheeks drawn lankly in; but the corners of the mouth, stretching far backwards, were preternaturally expanded, and, by a convulsive kind of twist, each was alternately opened wide, so that, in turn, they partially exhibited the tremendous grinders that filled the jaws. It is not to be supposed that Hepborne and Assueton could exactly note these particulars so circumstantially as we have done; but the uncouth figure moved with so much difficulty downwards, with a serpentizing sort of course, that they had leisure to remark quite enough to fill them with amazement.
The apparition, clad in a close black jerkin and culottes, had no sooner wormed itself down, than both knights eagerly demanded of the Squire Usher who and what it was.
“’Tis Master Haggerstone Fenwick, the Ancient,” replied he with a mysterious air.
“Nay,” said Assueton, “he surely is fitter for hoisting the broad banner of the Castle upon, than for carrying the colours in the field.”
“Why, as to that, Sir Knight,” said the Usher, “he might i’faith do well enough for the banner; and he would be always at hand too when wanted, seeing that he rarely or ever quitteth the top of the keep. He liveth in the small cap-room, where he must lig from corner to corner to be able to stretch himself; yet there he sitteth night and day, reading books of the black art, and never leaveth it, except when he cometh down as now, driven by hunger, the which he will sometimes defy for a day or two, and then he descendeth upon the buttery, like a wolf from the mountains, and at one meal will devour thee as much provender as would victual the garrison for a day, and then mounteth he again to his den. He is thought to possess terrible powers; and strange sights and horrible spectres have been seen to dance about the battlements near his dwelling.”
“Holy Virgin! and is all this believed by Sir Walter de Selby?” inquired Hepborne.
“Ay, truly,” said the Usher gravely; “most seriously believed (as why should it not?) by him, and all in the Castle. But I beseech thee, Sir Knight, let us not talk so freely of him. Holy St. Mary defend us! I wish he may not take offence at our stopping him in his way to his meal. Let us not talk more of him. I bid thee good night.”
“But tell me ere thou goest why we saw not that star of female beauty, the Lady Eleanore de Selby, at the banquet this evening?” demanded Hepborne.
“’Tis a fancy of her father’s, Sir Knight,” replied the Squire Usher, smiling; “and, if it may not offend thee, ’tis because he willeth not that the lady may marry her with a Scottish chevalier, that he ever doth forbid her entrance when any of thy nation are feasted in his hall.”
“It irketh me to think that we should have caused her banishment,” said Hepborne. “What, is she always wont to keep her chamber on like occasions?”
“Yea,” replied the Squire Usher, “ever save when the evening air is so bland as to suffer her to breathe it upon the rampart. She is often wont to listen to the minstrel’s notes there. But there are your chambers, Sirs Knights. The squires of your own bodies will be with you in the morning. Sir Walter hath issued orders for the admission of your retinue into the Castle. And he hopes you will sojourn with him as long as your affairs may give you sufferance. Good night, and may St. Andrew be with you.”
The two friends separated, and quickly laid themselves down to repose. The hardy and heart-whole Assueton slept soundly under the protection of his national saint, to whom he failed not to recommend himself, as a security against the incantations of the wizard. Nor did Sir Patrick Hepborne neglect to do the same; for these were times when the strongest minds were subject to such superstitions. But his thoughts soon wandered to a more agreeable subject. He recalled the lovely face he had seen, and he sighed to think that he had not been blessed with a somewhat less transitory glance of features which he would have wished to imprint for ever upon his mind.
“Why should her father thus banish her from the eyes of all Scotchmen? By the Rood, but it can and must be only from the paltry fear of his wealth going to fatten our northern soil. But I can tell him that there be Scots who would cheerfully take her for her individual merit alone, and leave her dross to those sordid minds who covet it.”
Such was Sir Patrick’s soliloquy, and, imperfect as his view of the lady had been, it was sufficient to conjure up a vision that hovered over his pillow, and disturbed his rest, in defiance of the good St. Andrew. Having lain some time awake, he heard the laborious ascent of the Ancient Fenwick to his dwelling in the clouds; but fatigue at length vanquished his restlessness, and he had been, for some hours, in a deep sleep, ere another and a much lighter footstep passed up in the same direction.
V. Night at the Castle—The Friar’s Visit to the Ancient
The Ancient Fenwick was sitting drawn together into a farther corner of his den. His everlasting lamp was raised on a pile of manuscript volumes near him, that it might throw more light on a large parchment roll that lay unfolded on the floor before him. His right elbow rested on the ground, and the enormous fingers of his hand embraced and supported his head; while his eyes, burning without meaning, like two small red fragments of ignited charcoal, could have been supposed to be occupied with the characters before them, only from the position of his face, which was so much turned down that the tangled hair, usually drooping from behind, was thrown forwards over his ears. He was so absorbed that he heard not the soft barefooted tread of the step on the stair, or as it approached his den along the vaulted roof of the keep.
The person who came thus to have midnight converse with him, stooped his head and body to enter the low and narrow doorway, and halted with his head thrust forward within it to contemplate the object he was about to address.
“Ancient Fenwick,” said he, after a pause of some moments.
Fenwick started at the sound of the voice, and looked towards the little doorway. A pair of keen eyes glared upon him from beneath a dark cowl; and, plunged as he had been in the mysteries of conjuration, it is not wonderful that he should have believed that the Devil himself had appeared to further his studies.
“Avaunt thee, Sathanas!” exclaimed he, speaking with the alternate sides of his mouth, and drawing himself yet more up into the corner—“I say unto thee, Sathanas, avaunt?”
“What?” said the figure, creeping into the place, and seating himself on the floor opposite to him, “what! Master Ancient Fenwick, dost thou wish to conjure up the Devil, and yet art afraid to look on him? I weened that thou hadst been a man of more courage than to be afraid of a friar coming to thee at midnight.”
Fenwick made an exertion to compose himself, seeing his visitor bore all the externals of a mortal about him.
“And what dost thou see in me,” said he, in his usual harsh, discordant, and sepulchral utterance, “that may lead thee to think differently!”
“Umph, why, nothing—nothing now,” said the monk, bending his brows, and throwing a penetrating glance from under them into the Ancient’s face; “nothing now, but methought, for a conjuror, thou wert rather taken unawares.”
“And who art thou, who thus darest to disturb my privacy?” demanded Fenwick, somewhat sternly, and advancing his body at the same time, from the more than ordinarily constrained attitude he had assumed.
The monk drew up his lips so as to display a set of long, white teeth, and raising his eyelids so as to show the white of his eye-balls, he glared at the Ancient for some time, and then slowly pronounced in a deep voice, “The Devil! what wouldst thou with me now?”
In a paroxysm of terror, Fenwick again drew himself up in his corner, with a force as if he would have pressed himself through the very wall; his teeth chattered in his head, and he sputtered so vehemently with the alternate corners of his mouth, that his words were unintelligible, except that of “Sathanas,” frequently repeated. The monk relaxed his features, and, with a scornful laugh, and a look of the most sovereign contempt—
“So,” said he, “thou must confess now that I proved thy courage to be in my power. I banished it with a look and a word. But ’tis not with thy courage I have to do at present; ’tis thy cunning I want.”
“Art thou then verily no devil?” demanded the Ancient, doubtingly.
“Tush, fool, I am a poor monk of the order of St. Francis; so calm thy craven fears, and listen to me.” He paused for some moments, to give Fenwick time to recollect himself, and when he saw that the latter had in some degree regained his composure: “Now listen to me, I say. Thou knowest doubtless that the Bishop of Durham came to Norham Castle this morning?” He waited for a reply.
“I did hear so,” answered the Ancient, “when I went down to take food.”
“Knowest thou what he came about?” demanded the Franciscan.
“I know not, I inquired not,” replied the Ancient.
“Then I will tell thee,” proceeded the Franciscan—“Sir Rafe Piersie, brother to the noble Hotspur, has stooped to fix his affection on the Lady Eleanore de Selby; he has deigned to court her for his bride, and has met with ready acceptance from her father. Not sufficiently sensible of this his great condescension, the lady has treated his high offer with neglect—with indifference. Her father, a weak man, though eager for so splendid an alliance, hath allowed himself to be trifled with by the silly girl, who hath done all she could to oppose it, though to the sacrifice of her own happiness. But Sir Rafe Piersie, being too much love-stricken, abandoneth not the demoiselle so easily. He therefore availeth himself of his ally the Bishop of Durham, to urge, through him, his suit with the lady, and to endeavour to stir up Sir Walter to a more determined bearing with his daughter, should she continue in her obstinacy. I shall not tell how I know, yet I do know, that the lady treated the proposals of the Bishop, as well as the name and person of the renowned Piersie, with contempt. His efforts to rouse Sir Walter de Selby to the assertion of his rights as a father, have, however, been more successful. The old man, who passionately desireth great connexion, even became irritated against her obstinacy. But Sir Rafe Piersie, wisely considering that a peaceful religious pastor was not the fittest instrument for his purpose, judgeth it right to put hotter and more efficient irons in the work. Unknown to the Bishop, and unknown to every one, therefore, he hath deputed me to seek thee and to urge thee to aid his plans. Now, Master Ancient Fenwick, thou hast the whole intricacies of the affair; thou understandest me, dost thou not?”
The Franciscan paused for a reply, and tried to read the face of him he was addressing; but it was in vain he tried it, for, except when very strongly excited by the passion of fear, or something equally forcible, the features of the Ancient were at all times illegible. After twisting and smacking the alternate corners of his mouth, which was always his prelude to speaking, and which even his actual utterance did not always go much beyond—
“Well,” said he, “and what can I do in this matter? What can magic do in it?”
“Magic!” exclaimed the Franciscan; “pshaw, fool that thou art, thinkest thou that thou canst impose upon me as thou dost on the common herd of mankind?—on one who hath dived into the arcana of nature as I have done? Thinkest thou that an active mind like mine hath not searched through all the books of these divinals—hath not toiled by the midnight lamp, and worked with their uncouth and horrible charms and incantations? Thinkest thou——”
“Hast thou so, brother?” exclaimed the Ancient, eagerly interrupting him; “hast thou in truth studied so deeply?” Then throwing his body earnestly forward, “Perhaps thou wilt clear up some small difficulties that have arisen in my path towards perfection in the invaluable art.”
The Franciscan paused. He saw at once that he had so far mistaken his man. The Ancient, whilst engaged in deceiving others, had also succeeded in deceiving himself, and was in truth a believer in the art he professed. To undertake the barren task of convincing him of his error was foreign to the Franciscan’s present purpose; and seeing that Fenwick, in his eagerness for an accession to his knowledge of magic, had mistaken the contemptuous expressions he had thrown out against it for the approbation and eulogy of an adept, he deemed it best to permit him to continue in his mistake, nay, rather to foster it. He therefore commenced a long and very mystical disquisition on necromancy, answering all his questions, and solving all his doubts, but in such a manner, that although Fenwick, at the moment, firmly believed they were solved, yet, when he afterwards came to look back into his mind, he could find nothing there but a vast chaos of smoke and ashes, from which he in vain tried to extract anything tangible or systematic.
But this is not to our point. The Franciscan gained all he wanted, in acquiring a certain ascendancy over his mind by pretended superiority of knowledge—an ascendancy which he afterwards hoped to bring to bear towards the object of his mission; and to this object he gradually led the Ancient back from the wide waste of enchantment he had been wandering over.
“Thou art indeed much more learned in the sublime art than I did at first suppose thee,” said the Franciscan at length, gravely; “thy study hath been well directed; and now that I have poured the mere drop of knowledge I possessed into the vast ocean flowing in thy capacious head, thou art well fit to be my master. Some of those ingredients I talked of are of high price; thou must buy them with gold.”
“Ah!” exclaimed Fenwick; “but where shall I find gold to buy them withal?”
The Franciscan groped in the canvas pouch that hung at his girdle of ropes, and, drawing forth a leathern bag, with a weight of broad gold pieces in it, he threw it down on the floor between the Ancient’s knees.
“There!” said he; “Sir Rafe Piersie sends thee that; ’tis to secure thee as his friend. Use thine art magic in his favour, to incline the haughty damosel to his wishes. Thou mayest do much with her father. ’Tis well known that the old knight looketh with awe upon thy powers. Thou art thyself aware that thou canst bend him as thou wilt; he doth hold thee as his oracle. Work upon his fears, then; work upon him, I say, to compel this marriage—a marriage the which is so well calculated to gratify his desire of high family alliance. He is ignorant that thou knowest of the negotiation; to find that thou dost, when he supposes that it is only known to the chief parties, will increase his veneration for thy skill. Exert thy power over him; he is weak, and thou mayest easily make him thy slave. Stimulate him to firmness, to severity, nay, if necessary, to harshness with his daughter. Thou knowest ’tis for his happiness, as well as for the happiness of the silly damosel, that she should be coarted. Then do thy best to screw him up to the pitch of determination that may secure her yielding. I leave it to thyself to find out what schemes and arguments thou must employ. The world lies if thou canst not invent enow to make him do as thou wouldst have him. Remember, the Piersie is thy friend, as thou mayst do him proper service. There are more bags of broad pieces in the same treasury that came from. And now I leave thee to the hatching of thy plans. Let them be quickly concerted, and speedily put in execution, for your Piersie never was famous for patience. Farewell, and may powerful spirits aid thee!”
The Franciscan gathered up his grey gown, drew his cowl over his face, and, creeping on hands and knees to the door, disappeared in a moment.
The Ancient remained for some minutes in stupid astonishment, with his back against his corner, and his vast length of limbs stretched across the floor. He almost doubted the reality of the vision that had appeared to him. He drew up his knees to his mouth, and the leathern bag appeared. He thought of the Devil as he seized it; and, as he poured the glittering gold into his broad palm, he almost expected to see the pieces change into dried leaves, cinders, slates, or some such rubbish. Twice or thrice the thought recurred that it might have been the Great Tempter himself who had visited him. The hour—the place—the difficulty of anything mortal reaching him there, through all the intricacies of a well-watched garrison—the great knowledge displayed by the unknown—all contributed to support the idea that his visitor was something more than man. Then, on the other hand, he remembered the friar’s bare feet, that were certainly human. He again looked at the broad pieces of gold; they were bright, and fresh, and heavy as he poised them. His confidence that they were genuine became stronger, and he slipped them into the bag, and the bag into an inner pocket of his black jerkin, resolving that they should be the test of the reality of the seeming friar.
The Ancient had been for many years plunged in the study of necromancy. His uncouth appearance, and awkward ungainly port, rendered him so unfit for the gay parade of war, that Sir Walter de Selby had more than once refused him that promotion to which he was entitled in the natural course of things, and of which he had been very ambitious. This rankled at his heart, and made him shun his fellows, slight the profession of arms, and take to those studies that, in so superstitious a period, met with the readiest belief and reverence, and from which he hoped to discover the means of gratifying both his ambition and his avarice. His necromantic fame, increased by tales hatched or embellished by the fertile imaginations of weak and superstitious minds, rapidly grew among all ranks; and Sir Walter de Selby was as firm a believer in his powers as the meanest soldier under his command. He readily excused the Ancient from all duty; so that, being thus left to the full and undisturbed possession of that solitary cap-house he had himself selected for his habitation, he became so immersed in his work that he rarely left it, except when driven by hunger to seek food. Living so entirely secluded as he did, it is not to be wondered at that he had hardly seen a female face. As for Lady Eleanore, he had never beheld her since her childhood, until a few days previous to the time we are now speaking of, when, having been led by some extraordinary accident beyond the walls of the keep, he had met her by chance in the court-yard; and the young lady was alarmed by the appearance of the strange monster, who blocked up her way to the bridge, and stood surveying her with his horrible eyes, that she fled from him precipitately. It must be admitted, then, that he was but little calculated to produce any favourable change on her mind in behalf of Sir Rafe Piersie, unless, indeed, it were by the art magic. With that brave old soldier of fortune, Sir Walter de Selby, he was much more likely to be successful, since the chief wish of his heart was that his daughter and his wealth should be the means of allying him with some family eminent for the grandeur of its name, as well as for its power and influence. It was a grievous disappointment to him that he had had no son; but as he had been denied this blessing, he now looked forward to having a grandson, who might give him good cause to be proud, from the high rank he should be entitled to hold in the splendid galaxy of English chivalry. He was far from being without affection for his daughter; yet his affection was in a great measure bottomed upon these his most earnest wishes and hopes; and of all this the Ancient, Mr. Haggerstone Fenwick, was very sufficiently aware.
VI. Making Love on the Ramparts
When Sir Patrick Hepborne and Sir John Assueton arose in the morning, they found their own squires and lacqueys in attendance. The busy note of preparation was in the Castle-yard, and they were told that the Bishop of Durham was just taking his departure.
The mitred ecclesiastic went off on an ambling jennet, accompanied by the knights and churchmen who had come with him, and followed by a long cavalcade of richly-attired attendants; and he was saluted by the garrison drawn up in array, and by the guards as he passed outwards. He was, moreover, attended by Sir Walter and his principal officers, who rode half a day’s journey with him. The two friends were thus left to entertain themselves until the evening. Assueton occupied himself in studying the defences of the place, whilst Hepborne loitered about the exterior of the keep, and the walls commanding a view of its various sides, in the hope of being again blessed with a sight of the Lady Eleanore.
As he was surveying the huge mass of masonry, so intently that a bystander might have supposed that he was taking an account of the number of stones it was composed of, the lady appeared at one of the high windows on the side facing the Tweed. The knight had his eyes turned in a different direction at the moment, so that she had a full and undisturbed view of him, as he stood nearly opposite to her on the rampart, for some time ere he perceived her. He turned suddenly round, and she instantly withdrew; but not before he had enjoyed another transient glimpse of that face which had already created so strong a sensation in his breast.
“Provoking!” thought Hepborne; “yet doth the very modesty of this angelic lady lead me the more to admire her. Unbending spirit, said that knave at the hostel? She is as gentle as a dove. Would I could behold her again.”
Sir Patrick stepped back upon the rampart so as to have a better view inwards, and he was gratified by observing that her figure was still within the deep window, though her face was obscured by its shade. He recognized the rose-coloured mantle she had formerly appeared in. He kissed his hand and bowed. He saw her alabaster arm relieve itself from the mantle, and beheld the falcon he had rescued seated on her glove. She stepped forward in such a manner to return his salute, that he enjoyed a sufficient view of her face to make him certain that he was not mistaken in the person. The lady pointed with a smile to her falcon, kissed it, waved an acknowledgment of his courtesy, and again retreating, disappeared.
As Sir Patrick was standing vainly hoping for her re-appearance, the old minstrel, Adam of Gordon, chanced to come by. Hepborne saluted him courteously.
“Canst thou tell me whose be those apartments that do look so cheerily over the Tweed into Scotland?” demanded he.
“Ay,” said the old man, “’tis, as thou sayest, a cheering prospect; ’tis the country of my birth, and the country of my heart; I love it as lover never loved mistress.”
“But whose apartments be those?” demanded Hepborne, bringing him back to the question.
“Those are the apartments of the Lady Eleanore de Selby,” replied the minstrel.
“Is it thy custom to play thy minstrelsy under the moonlight on the rampart, as thou didst yestere’en?” demanded Hepborne.
“Yea, I have pleasure in it,” said Adam, with a shrewd look.
“And art thou always so attended?” demanded Hepborne; “is thy music always wont to call that angel to thy side whom I last night beheld there?”
“So thou dost think her an angel, Sir Knight?” cried Adam, with pleasure glancing in his eyes.
“I do,” said Sir Patrick. “Already hath my heart been wounded by the mere momentary glances to which chance hath subjected me, and eagerly do I look for a cure from those eyes whence my hurt doth come. She is beautiful.”
“Yea,” said old Adam, “and she is an angel in soul as well as in form. But St. Andrew keep thee, Sir Knight, I must be gone;” and he hurried away without giving Hepborne time to reply.
Assueton now came up, and Sir Patrick detailed to him the occurrences we have just narrated, after which he walked about, looking every now and then impatiently towards the window.
“Would I could have but one more sight of the Lady Eleanore,” cried he; “her features have already become faint in my mind’s eye; would I might refresh the picture by one other gaze.” But the lady appeared not; and he became vexed, and even fretful, notwithstanding all his resolution to the contrary.
“Hepborne, my friend,” said Sir John Assueton, “why shouldst thou afflict thyself, and peak and pine for a silly girl? A knight of thy prowess in the field may have a thousand baubles as fair for the mere picking up; let it not irk thee that this trifle is beyond thy reach. Trust me, women are dangerous flowers to pluck, and have less of the rose about them than of the thorn.”
“Pshaw!” replied Hepborne, “thou knowest not what it is to love.”
“No, thank my good stars,” answered Assueton, “I do not, and I hope I shall never be so besotted; it makes a fool of a man. There, for instance, thou art raving about a damosel, of whose face thou hast seen so little that wert thou to meet her elsewhere thou couldst never tell her from another.”
“It is indeed true, Assueton,” replied Hepborne, “that I have seen but too little of her face; but I have seen enough of it to know that it is the face of an angel.”
In such converse as this did they spend the day until the evening’s banquet. Then Sir Walter exhibited the same hospitality towards his guests that had characterised him the night before; but he seemed to be less in spirits, nay, he was even sometimes peevish. Hepborne, too, being restless and unhappy, mirth and hilarity were altogether less prevalent at the upper end of the festal board than they had been the previous evening. The minstrel, however, was not forgotten, and was treated with the same personal attention as formerly; but he sang and played without eliciting more than an ordinary meed of applause. At last he struck some peculiarly powerful chords on the instrument, and as Hepborne turned his head towards him, in common with others, at the sound, old Adam caught his eye, and looking significantly, began to pour forth the following irregular and unpremeditated verse:—
’Twas thus that a minstrel address’d a young knight, Who was love-lorn, despairing, and wan with despite, What, Sir Knight, canst thou gain by these heart-rending sighs? The hero ne’er pines, but his destiny tries, And pushes his fate with his lance in the rest, Whether love or renown be his glorious quest. Let not those who droop for Love Fly in grief to wild Despair, She, wither’d witch, can ne’er remove The cruel unkindness of the fair. Then with the gladd’ning ray Of Hope’s bright star to cheer thee, Do thou still press thy way, Nor let obstructions fear thee. True love will even bear A hasty moment’s slighting, And boldly will it dare, Nor ever fear benighting. ’Twill often and again Return, though ill entreated; ’Twill blaze beneath the rain; Though frozen, ’twill be heated. When least thy thoughts are turn’d on joy, The smiling bliss is nigh; No happiness without alloy Beneath the radiant sky. But haste to-night, to meet thy love Upon the Castle-wall; Thou know’st not what thy heart may prove, What joy may thee befal.
These seemingly unmeaning verses passed unnoticed by all at table except by Hepborne, on whom they made a strong impression. He was particularly struck by the concluding stanza, containing an invitation which he could not help believing was meant to apply to himself. He resolved to visit the ramparts as soon as he could escape from the banquet. This he found it no very difficult matter to accomplish, for Sir Walter was abstracted, and evidently depressed with something that weighed on his spirits; so, taking advantage of this circumstance, Hepborne rose to retire at an early hour. His friend followed him, and, when left to the secresy of their own apartments—
“Assueton,” said Sir Patrick, “didst thou remark the glance, full of meaning, which the minstrel threw on me to-night? or didst thou note the purport of his ditty?”
“As for his glances,” replied Sir John, “I noticed nothing particular in them; your bards are in use to throw such around them, to collect their barren harvest of paltry praise; and as for his verses, or rather his rhymes, I thought them silly enow in conscience. But thou knowest I do rarely listen when love or its follies are the theme.”
“But I saw, and I listened,” replied Hepborne. “By St. Denis, they carried hints to me that I shall not neglect. I go to take the air on the ramparts, and hope to meet the angelic Eleanore de Selby there.”
“Art thou mad?” said Assueton. “What can old Adam have looked or said that can induce thee to go on such a fool’s errand? Thou hast but fancied; thy blind passion hath deceived thee.”
“I shall at least put his fancied hints to the proof,” said Hepborne, “though I should watch all night.”
“Then I wish thee a pleasant moonlight promenade,” said Assueton. “I’ll to my couch. To-morrow, I presume, we shall cross the Tweed, and yede us into Scotland. By St. Andrew, I would gladly meet again with those well-known faces whose smiles once reflected the happiness of my boyhood!”
“Go to-morrow!” exclaimed Hepborne, as if their so speedy departure was far from being agreeable in the contemplation; “surely thou wilt stay, Assueton, if thou seest that thy so doing may further my happiness?”
“Nay,” replied Assueton, “thou needst hardly fear that I will scruple to sacrifice my own wishes to thy happiness, Hepborne; but I confess I would that my happiness depended on some more stirring cause, and one in which we both could join.”
Here the friends parted. Hepborne, wrapped up in a cloak, stole gently down stairs, and slipping unperceived from the keep, bent his steps towards that part of the ramparts where he had formerly seen the lady. To his inexpressible joy, he saw the minstrel already on the spot. There were two ladies in company with the old man. As Sir Patrick passed near the base of the tower under which he and his friend had concealed themselves the night before, a huge figure began to rear itself from under it, throwing a shadow half-way across the court-yard. It looked as if the tower itself were in motion. He stood undaunted to observe it, as it gradually arose storey over storey. It was the Ancient Fenwick. His enormous face looked downwards upon Hepborne, and his red cinder-like eyes glared upon him as he sputtered out some unintelligible sounds from the corners of his mouth, and then moved away like a walking monument.
Whilst Hepborne’s attention was occupied in observing the retreat of the monster, who seemed to have secreted himself there for no good purpose, the minstrel, and the two ladies who were with him, had already walked down the rampart until they were lost within the shade of a projecting building. He began to fear that they were gone, but he soon saw one of them, whom he believed to be the attendant, emerge from the shadow and retire by a short way to the keep, whilst the other returned along the wall with the minstrel. As they stopped to converse, the lady leaned on one of the engines of war. A breeze from the Tweed threw back the hood of her mantle, and Hepborne could no longer doubt it was the Lady Eleanore de Selby he saw. Her long and beautiful hair streamed down, but she hastily arranged it with her fingers, and then came onwards with Adam of Gordon. Sir Patrick flew to the rampart and sprang on the wall. The lady was alarmed at first by his sudden appearance, but perceiving immediately that it was Sir Patrick Hepborne, she received him graciously yet modestly.
“The soft and perfumed air of this beauteous night,” said Hepborne, “and yonder lovely moon, lady, tempted me forth awhile; but what bliss is mine that I should thus meet with her who, in softness, sweetness, and beauty, doth excel the Queen of Night herself!”
“Sir Patrick Hepborne, thou art at thy fustian again,” replied the lady seriously. “This high-flown phrase of thine, well suited though it may have been to the pampered ears of Parisian damsels, sorteth but ill with plainness such as mine. Meseems,” continued she somewhat more playfully, “meseems as if the moon were thy favourite theme. Pray Heaven that head may be right furnished, the which hath the unstable planet so often at work within it.”
“And if I am mad, as thy words would imply,” said Hepborne, smiling, “’tis thou, lady, who must answer for my frenzy; for since I first saw thee last night, I have thought and dreamt of thee alone.”
“Nay, Sir Knight,” said the lady, blushing, “methinks it savours of a more constitutional madness to be so affected by so short a meeting. We were but some few minutes together, if I err not.”
“Ay, lady,” said Adam of Gordon, significantly; “but love will work miracles like this.”
“’Tis indeed true,” said the lady, with a sigh; and then, as if recollecting herself, she added, “I have indeed heard of such sudden affections.”
“Ay,” said Sir Patrick, “and that fair falcon of thine! Depardieux, I begin to believe that he was Cupid himself in disguise, for ever sith I gave the traitor lodgment in my bosom, it hath been affected with the sweet torment the urchin Love is wont to inflict. My heart’s disease began with thy hawk’s ensayning.”
“Nay, then, much as I love him,” said the lady, “yet should I hardly have purchased his health, I wot, at the price of that of the gallant knight who did so feelingly redeem it.”
“Heaven’s blessings on thee for thy charity, lady,” exclaimed Hepborne; “yet should I rejoice in my disease were it to awaken thy sympathy, so that thou mightest yield me the healing leechcraft that beameth from those eyes.”
“Verily, my youth doth lack experience in all such healing skill,” said the lady.
“Nay, ’tis a mystery most easily learned by the young,” replied Hepborne. “Thou dost possess the power to assuage, if not to heal, my wound,” added he tenderly. “Let me but be enlisted among the humblest of the captives whom thine eyes hath made subject to thy will; and albeit thy heart may be already given to another, spurn not the adoration of one whose sole wish is to live within the sphere of thy cheering influence, and to die in thy defence.”
“In truth, Sir Knight, these eyes have been guiltless of any such tyranny as thou wouldst charge them withal,” replied the lady, artlessly; “at least they have never wilfully so tyrannized. As for my heart, it hath never known warmer feeling than that which doth bind me to him to whom I owe the duty of a daughter.”
“Then is thy heart unenthralled,” cried Hepborne in an ecstacy, in the transport of which he threw himself on one knee before her who had produced it. “Refuse not, then, to accept my services as thy true and faithful knight. All I ask is, but to be allowed to devote my lance to thy service. Reject not these my vows. Cheer me with but one ray of hope, to nerve this arm to the doing of deeds worthy of the knight who calleth himself thy slave. I swear——”
“Swear not too rashly, Sir Knight,” said the lady, with a deep sigh, and with more of seriousness than she had yet displayed, “to one such as me, to one so obscure——”
“Obscure, lady!” cried Hepborne, interrupting her; “Hath not high Heaven stamped thee with that celestial face and form to place thee far above all reckonings of paltry pedigree? What, then, is that obscurity which may have dimmed the birth of so fair a star? What——”
“Nay,” said the lady, interrupting him with an air of uncommon dignity and animation, “obscure though mine origin may be, Sir Patrick, yet do I feel within me that which doth tell me that I might match with princes.”
“Lady, I well know thy high and justly-grounded pretensions,” said Hepborne, in a subdued tone; “yet scorn not mine humble devotion.”
“I scorn thee not, Sir Knight,” said the lady, with combined modesty and feeling, and again sighing deeply; “it would indeed ill become me to scorn any one, far less such as thee; nor is my heart insensible to the courtesy thou hast been pleased to show to one who——”
“Thanks, thanks, most peerless of thy sex,” cried Hepborne, gazing with ecstacy in her face, that burned with blushes even under the cold light of the moon.
“But in truth it beseemeth me not to stand talking idly with thee thus, Sir Knight,” said the lady, suddenly breaking off; “I must hie me to my chamber.”
“Oh, stay, sweet lady, stay—one moment stay!” cried Hepborne; “rob me not of thy presence until thou hast left me the cheering prospect of meeting thee to-morrow.”
“I hope Sir Walter hath induced thee and thy friend to tarry some longer space in Norham; if so, it will pleasure me to meet thee again,” said the lady, with a trembling voice.
“Then trust me I go not from Norham, betide me what may,” cried Sir Patrick, energetically. “But tell me, lady, I entreat thee, when these eyes may be again blest with thy presence; give me hope, the which is now the food I feed on.”
“Nay, in sooth, I can enter into no arrangements,” said the lady, with yet greater agitation; “but,” said she, starting away, “I have tarried here too long; in truth, Sir Patrick Hepborne, I must be gone; may the Holy Virgin be with thee, Sir Knight!”
“And may thou be guarded by kindred spirits like thyself!” cried Sir Patrick, earnestly clasping his hands, and following her with his eyes as she hastily retreated with old Adam.
Sir Patrick took several turns on the walls, giving way to the rapture which this meeting had occasioned him, and then hastened to regain his apartment, where he laid himself down not to repose, but to muse on the events of the evening.
“The minstrel was right,” thought he; “the good Adam’s prophecy did not deceive me. She admitted that her heart was free, and she confessed, as far as maiden modesty might permit her, that she is not altogether without an interest in me. She was pleased with the idea of our farther stay at Norham; and in her confusion she betrayed, that to meet me again would give her pleasure. And she shall meet me again—ay, and again; mine excellent Assueton’s patience must e’en bear some days’ longer trial, for go, at least, I shall not. Days, did I say? ha! but let events determine.” With such happy reflections, and yielding to a train of the most pleasing anticipation, he amused himself till he fell asleep.
Chapter VII
The Midnight Meeting in the Ancient’s Chamber—Strange Proposal—A Dreadful Alternative.
It was past the hour of midnight, when all in the Castle had been for some time still, save when the sentinels on the ramparts repeated their prolonged call, that a footstep was again heard upon the stair leading to the top of the keep. It was the heavy, slow step of Sir Walter de Selby. He carried a lamp in his hand, and often stopped to breathe; but at last he made his way to the roof, and sought the aerial den of the monstrous Ancient. He went thither, deluded man, imagining that he went of his own free will; but the crafty Ancient had taken secret measures to insure his coming.
When the good old knight had sought the little private oratory within his chamber, immediately after his attendants had retired, he was fearfully dismayed by observing a blue lambent light flitting over the surface of an ancient shield that hung above a small altar within a dark Gothic recess. In that age of ignorance, a circumstance so unaccountable might have shaken the firmest nerves; but it had been the shield of his father, a bold moss-trooper, and from him he had learned that this was the ill-omened warning sign that was always said to appear to foretell some dire calamity affecting him or his issue. With extreme agitation of mind he at once recurred to recent events for an explanation of it. During his ride with the Bishop of Durham, that prelate had repeated the arguments he had employed the day before, particularly in the long conference they had held after the banquet, to fortify him in the resolution of pressing the Lady Eleanore into a marriage with Sir Rafe Piersie; and, indeed, Sir Walter’s heart was so eagerly set on the accomplishment of a union in every respect equal to his most sanguine wishes, that little eloquence was necessary to convince him of the propriety of urging his daughter to it by every means in his power. Nay, although she was his only child, and that he so doted on her as to have got into a habit of yielding to every wish she expressed, yet this was a point on which he was very easily brought to adopt a determined line of conduct with her. She had somewhat provoked him, too, by the license she had given her tongue in presence of the Bishop, when she indulged herself in ridiculing the very august person he was proposing to her as a husband; and the knight’s passion at the moment had so far got the better of his affection, that he spoke to her with a degree of harshness he had never used before. His after conversations with the Bishop had now brought him to the determination of compelling the Lady Eleanore to a marriage so much to her advantage, and so flattering to his own hopes of high alliance. So firmly was he fixed in this resolution, that, in a meeting he had with his daughter after his return from accompanying the Bishop, he withstood all her entreaties, and steeled himself against all her grief, and all her spirited remonstrances. After such an interview, it is not surprising that Sir Walter should have immediately supposed that the menacing prodigy, which now appeared before his eyes, had some reference to the purposed marriage of the Lady Eleanore. On all similar occasions of threatened misfortune, he had been for some years accustomed to apply for counsel to the cunning Ancient Fenwick, whom he believed to possess supernatural powers of foretelling and averting the greatest calamities; nay, he had more than once been convinced of the happy effects of his interference in his behalf. His impatience to seek him at present, therefore, was such that he could hardly restrain himself until he had reason to think that all eyes in the Castle were closed but his own. He paced his chamber in a state bordering on distraction, stopping from time to time at the door of the oratory to regard the terrific warning, and wringing his hands as he beheld it still flitting and playing over the surface of the shield.
He was no sooner certain, however, that he might move from his apartment without risk of observation, than he seized his lamp, and, as we have seen, sought the lonely cap-house of the Ancient. The small door of the place was closed. So strongly were men’s minds bound by the thraldom of superstition in those days, that the gallant Sir Walter de Selby, who had so often faced the foe like a lion in the field, and who would even now have defended the Castle of Norham to the uttermost extremity, yea, so long as one stone of its walls remained upon another—this brave old warrior, I say, absolutely trembled as he tapped at the door of the wretched Ancient Haggerstone Fenwick, who once formed his most common subject of jest. He tapped, but no answer was returned; he listened, but not a sound was heard. He tapped again—and again he tapped louder. He called the Ancient by his name; but still all was profound silence. He hesitated for some moments, in doubt what to do. At last he brought himself to the determination of pushing the door up. He bent down on his knees to force it, and it yielded before his exertions; but the sight which met his eyes so appalled him, that he was unable at first to advance.
The Ancient Fenwick, to all appearance dead, lay stretched, with his arms and legs extended on the floor. His face had the leaden hue of death on it; and a small orb, composed of a number of points of bluish lambent flame, like that so ominously illuminating the shield, flitted on his forehead—a book of necromancy lay open on the floor—his lamp burned on the usual pile of volumes—and, on a temporary altar, composed of several folios, raised one above the other against the wall, were placed a human skull, and thigh bones, and an hour-glass. Immediately over these a number of cabalistical figures were described with charcoal on the plaster; and a white rod seemed, from the position it lay in, to have been pointed towards them, and to have fallen from his hand, as if he had been suddenly struck down in the very act of conjuration.
Sir Walter was so overpowered with horror and superstitious fear, that some moments elapsed ere he could summon up resolution to creep into the place and examine the body more narrowly. He looked down on the hidous ghastly face, over which the magical flame still flitted. The small fiery eye-balls glared—but they were still; not a feature moved, nor was there the slightest sound or appearance of respiration. Scarcely bearing to behold such a spectacle, the old knight looked timorously around him, afraid that the demon, who had done this fearful work upon his disciple, might appear to annihilate him also. In truth his terrors so far overcame him, that he was just about to retreat hastily, when he observed a certain spasmodic twitch about the mouth, which soon afterwards became powerfully convulsed, writhing from side to side, and throwing the whole features of the countenance into the most fearful contortions. By degrees, the convulsion seemed to extend itself along the muscles of the body, arms, and limbs, until the whole frame was thrown into violent agitation; unintelligible sputtering sounds came from the alternate corners of the mouth; and Sir Walter quaked to hear the name of “Sathanas” often repeated energetically. At last, by a convulsion stronger than the rest, the head and body were erected, and, after a little time, the Ancient seemed to recover the use of his senses, and the command over his muscles, as well as of his powers of utterance.
“What, Master Ancient Fenwick, hath befallen thee?” exclaimed Sir Walter, in a voice almost indistinct from trepidation; “tell me, I beseech thee, what hath happened.”
“My brain burneth,” cried the Ancient, with a hideous yell, and striking his forehead with the palms of both hands, after which the flame no longer appeared. Then, after a pause, “Where am I?” said he, staring wildly around, “Where am I? Ha! I see I am again in the world of men. What?” exclaimed he, with surprise, on beholding Sir Walter, “art thou here? How camest thou to this place?”
“My friend,” replied the old knight, “my excellent friend, I came to consult thee; I came to take counsel from thy superhuman knowledge—thy knowledge gathered from converse with the spirits of another world.”
“Another world!” exclaimed the Ancient, in a sepulchral voice—“in another world, didst thou say? Ay, I have indeed long had converse here, face to face, with some of its blackest inmates: but never till this night,” added he, shuddering, “did I visit its fiery realms.”
“Where hast thou been, then?” asked the knight, in a tone of alarm.
“In hell!” cried the Ancient, with a horrible voice that chilled the very blood in Sir Walter’s brains. “Yes,” continued he, “I have visited those dreadful abodes; but I may not tell their awful secrets. Some, it is true, I am permitted to disclose, if I can bring myself to speak of them—of things on which depend the fate of thyself and thy daughter, and deeply affecting thy country’s weal.”
“What, good Ancient, hast thou learned, that may affect me or my daughter? I do beseech thee, let me straightway be informed. The blue fire burns on my father’s shield to-night; some dreadful calamity impends.”
“Ha! saidst thou so?” cried the Ancient, with a sudden start. “The blue fire, saidst thou? Signs meet then; prodigies combine to overwhelm thee.”
“They do, indeed, most terribly,” said the knight, shuddering with alarm.
“Their portent is direful,” said the Ancient, groaning deeply.
“In mercy tell me by what means they may be averted,” anxiously inquired Sir Walter.
“Nay,” said the Ancient, with a desponding air, “’tis thyself who art bringing them on thine own head.” Then, after a long pause—“Thou art about to marry thy daughter to the brother of the Piersie?”
“By what miracle knowest thou this?” demanded Sir Walter, in amazement.
“Ask me not by what miracle I know this,” replied the Ancient, “after what thou hast thyself witnessed. Have I not been in the world below? Do I not know all things? Do I not know that Sir Rafe Piersie hath sought the hand of the Lady Eleanore?—that he hath been scorned by her?—that even the Lord Bishop of Durham’s influence hath been employed by him to incline thee to the match; and that, overcome by his counsels, thou art about to compel thy daughter to accept of his hand? Yea, all this do I know, to the veriest item of the conversation held between thee; and now, canst thou doubt whence I have had this knowledge?”
Sir Walter replied not, but groaned deeply.
“Sit down by me,” said the Ancient, “and listen to me. ’Tis registered in the dread Book of Fate,” continued he solemnly, “that if this marriage be concluded, consequences the most direful will result from it. First, thy daughter shall produce a son, of countenance so inhuman, that it shall be liker that of a wild boar than a man; and the monstrous birth will produce the death of the mother. Then the child shall grow up, and wax exceeding strong, so that his might shall overmatch that of the most powerful men. But though his mind shall not ripen in proportion, yet shall his passions terribly expand themselves; and, after murdering thee, from whom he shall have sprung, he shall gather unto himself a host of demons of his own stamp, and lay waste the fair face of England, cruelly slaying and oppressing its innocent people for the space of ten years, when he shall be at last overthrown by a Scottish army, which being brought against him, shall subdue and enslave our nation.”
The white hairs of the aged Sir Walter bristled on his head as he listened to this dreadful prophecy. The scourge with which his country was menaced was worse, in his eyes, than even his own unhappy fate.
“Tell me, oh tell me, most excellent Ancient,” said he, in the agony of despair, “tell me, I entreat thee, how this awful mass of approaching misery may be averted.”
“There is only one way to shield yourself and mankind from the threatened curse,” replied the Ancient tardily, and rather as if he felt difficulty in bringing it out; “there is only one course to pursue, but it is such that, slave as thou art to the prejudices of the world, it is vain to hope that even the dread of these impending calamities will induce thee to adopt it.”
“Talk not so, good Ancient, talk not so,” cried the old knight impatiently, “There is nothing I would not do—Holy Virgin, forgive me!—there is nothing I would not do honestly to prevent this threatened curse from arising, to the destruction of my family and my country.”
“Sayest thou so?” said the Ancient, calmly shaking his head, as if in doubt; “I will put thee to the proof then. It is written, as I have already declared, in the Book of the Fates of men, that this marriage shall take place, and that from it shall proceed this two-edged sword, to smite both thee and England, unless thou shalt bestow thy daughter on one whom—but thou wilt never condescend——”
“Nay,” impatiently interrupted the knight, “better she should marry any honest man of good family than that she should be suffered to match so proudly only to be the mother of destruction to herself, to me, and to her country.”
“Thou sayest well,” calmly replied the Ancient; “but the Fates have not left the choice of her mate to thee or to her. Yet hear me patiently, and thou shalt know all. Thou art not ignorant that I have long abjured the pitiful affairs of men. ’Tis now more than fifteen years since, quitting their society, I have devoted myself to those studies by which thou hast more than once benefited. I have sacrificed all earthly prospects and enjoyments for the sake of that sublime knowledge which doth enable me to foresee and control coming events; and it is to me a reward in itself so great, as to make every other appear despicable in comparison with it. But though I have forsworn the world, yet cannot I rid myself of attachment to thee; my early feelings must tie me to thee and thine for ever. Thou hast had proofs of this devotion too often, to require me to repeat that it doth exist; but I am now prepared to give thee a demonstration of it yet stronger than any thou hast hitherto received from me.”
“Kind, excellent Ancient,” exclaimed the grateful Sir Walter, “I well know the care with which thou hast watched over the welfare of my house; I feel the magnitude of the debt I owe thee, and ’tis with gratitude I acknowledge it. What is it, I beseech thee, thou canst do?”
“Yes,” exclaimed the Ancient, with a show of much feeling, “yes; I will sacrifice myself. I will come forth again into the haunts of deceitful and cold-blooded men. I will give up all I prize—my quiet, my solitude—to save thee and thine from the destruction that impendeth. On my part there shall be no failure, however at war with my habits and inclinations the sacrifice may be. ’Tis upon thyself, therefore—upon thine own decision—that thine own fate, and the fate of thy daughter, and of thy country, must depend.”
“Name, name, I entreat thee, the terms!” cried the anxious old knight; “name the conditions that I must fulfil; tell me what I must do, and no time shall be lost in carrying it into effect.”
The Ancient paused for some moments, during which he looked into the face of the knight with his fiery inexpressive eyes, and then, with slow and solemn, though harsh utterance—“I must espouse thy daughter, the Lady Eleanore!” said he. “The Fates have willed it so; no other remedy doth now remain against the overwhelming destruction thou art doomed to behold.”
This fatal declaration—this dreadful contrast to all those hopes of splendid alliance which had filled Sir Walter’s thoughts, came upon him like a thunderbolt, and was perfectly annihilating. He could not stand the bitter alternative that was thus presented to him. Overcome by his feelings, he threw himself back among the straw composing the lair of the monster he had been listening to, and, covering his eyes with the palms of his hands, he, hardy soldier as he was, burst into a flood of tears.
A grim meteor smile of inward satisfaction shot over the pallid face of the impostor.
“Ay,” said he, “no one can expect thee to match thy daughter with such as me. Better that she should give birth to ten thousand such demons as her fated marriage with the brother of the Piersie is infallibly destined to produce—better that she should die, and thou be cruelly murdered by the parricidal hand of thine inhuman grandchild, than that thou shouldst call such a wretch as me son. Thy determination hath been well taken; ’tis like a good soldier, as thou art, to brave the Fates. I thank thee, too, for mine emancipation from the vow I had resolved to subject myself to for thy sake. My time, and my quiet, and my solitude, shall be again mine own, and my darling studies shall receive no interruption.”
“Is there no other alternative?” cried the distracted father, rising with energy from the position he had thrown himself into.
“None!” replied the Ancient. “But that thou mayest be ignorant of no tittle of what it so deeply concerns thee to know,” continued he after a pause, “it is destined that if ever I do so espouse me, my son shall be the most perfect model of bravery and of virtue that ever England saw; and that, taking the proud name of de Selby, he shall wax exceeding mighty, and, leading a small band of gallant youths, march into Scotland as a conqueror, until at last, dethroning the monarch of the North, he shall himself be proclaimed king of that country, and, uniting himself by marriage with the King of England, he and his posterity shall reign for twelve centuries. To look farther into futurity is denied; but enow hath been told thee to point out the way that doth lie before thee. The space of three days and three hours is given thee to choose thy daughter’s destiny. And now,” continued the Ancient, putting out his hand to the hour-glass, and solemnly inverting it; “and now the stream of thy time beginneth to run; see how the sand floweth down—a portion of it hath already glided away; so will the rest, till the period assigned thee be irrecoverably gone. ’Twere better that thou shouldst retire to thy chamber, to weigh well the fates of thy daughter, for the balance of her destinies is in thine hand.”
The impostor paused. The agitated mind of Sir Walter de Selby had eagerly grasped at the flattering picture which the Ancient had so cunningly reserved to the last, and which was so perfectly in harmony with every wish of the old man’s heart. In his contemplation of it, he had almost forgotten the uncouth son-in-law destined to make him the grandfather of a hero, who was to raise the glory of his country’s arms so high, and who was at last to become a King of Scotland. His pride was peculiarly flattered by the notion of the name of de Selby being retained to become eventually royal; and he began to reason with himself as he sat, that it was but stooping to present humiliation in order to rise to the summit of human ambition. The crafty Ancient saw the working of his mind, from its operation on his honest countenance, as well as if he had been thinking audibly.
“Such proud prospects of an issue so glorious tempt not me,” said he. “These dark volumes, and the retirement of this unseemly chamber, whence the stars can be most easily conversed with, are to me worth a world of such. But for thee, if thou demandest it of me, the sacrifice shall be made; and shouldst thou make me the humble instrument of the salvation and exaltation of thyself and issue, it would,” said he, with an affectation of extreme humility, “be no more, after all, than burying good seed in the soil of a dunghill, to see it buxion with the more vigour, shoot the more aloft, and rear its proud head far above the meagre plants on higher but more sterile spots. But it is matter worthy of grave thought. Yet judge me not as I seem—the poor, the wretched inmate of this owlet’s nest. Why am I so? Even because I despise all those gewgaws men esteem most valuable, and covet only that most precious of all jewels—the perfection of knowledge. Thinkest thou that it would not help me to all the rest, were it my pleasure to command them? Thinkest thou that I could not command worldly wealth and honours, were I to fancy such baubles? Wouldst thou have me conjure up gold? Lo!—there!” said he, plucking the leathern bag from his jerkin, and emptying the shining contents of it on the ground, to the astonishment of Sir Walter; “a little midnight labour would raise me up a hoard that might purchase the earth itself. But what is the vile dross to me? Nay, I would not inundate the wretched world with that which hath already caused sufficient human misery. To pour out more would be to breed a more accursed scourge than e’en thy grandson Piersie will prove.”
“Talk not of him,” exclaimed the knight in terror; “the very thought of his existence is racking to me. I want not time for consideration on a point so plain. I do now resolve me on the alliance with thee. Sir Rafe Piersie comes to-morrow morning; I shall break with him abruptly—and then, my resolution being taken, my daughter must yield to the irresistible decrees of Fate.”
With these words Sir Walter rose to his knees, and snatching up his lamp, scrambled hastily to the door, and stole softly down to his apartment. He looked with fear and trembling into the oratory, when, to his extreme relief, he saw that the ominous flame had left the fatal shield, and he retired to his couch in a state of comparative composure.
“So,” said the Ancient, in grim soliloquy, after Sir Walter’s footsteps had died away on the stairs—“so the hook is in thy nose, and thou shalt feel the power, as well as the vengeance, of him thou didst despise and make thy mock of. Thou didst thwart mine ambition; but my helm ere long shall tower amid the proudest crests of chivalry, and wealth and honours, yea, and the haughty smile of beauty too, shall be at my will. This is indeed to rise by mine abasement, even beyond the highest soaring of those early hopes which this man did so cruelly level with the earth. The thought is ecstasy.”
VIII. Arrival of Sir Rafe Piersie—The Challenge
Sir John Assueton was early astir next morning, for his head was so filled with the remembrance of those friends and scenes of his youth, he now hoped to revisit after a long absence, that he was impatient to depart from Norham Castle. He had already given orders to the squires to hold themselves in readiness, and he had visited the stable, where Blanche-etoile neighed a recognition to his master, and was spoken to with the kindness of a friend. The knight then ascended the ramparts to enjoy a short promenade; and there he was soon afterwards joined by Hepborne, who came springing towards him, urged by an unusual flow of spirits.
“Good morrow, Hepborne,” said Assueton; “I am glad to see thee so alert this morning. I have looked at our steeds; they are as courageous as lions, and as gamesome as kids. They will carry us into Scotland with as much spirit as we shall ride them thither. After breaking our fast, and bestowing our meed of thanks on the good old knight for his hospitality, we may yet make our way o’er many a good mile of Scottish ground ere yonder new-born sun shall sink in the west.”
“Nay, my dear Assueton,” said Hepborne, “what need hast thou for such haste? Hadst thou some fair damsel in Scotland—some lady bright, who, with her swan-like neck stretched towards the mid-day sun, looketh day after day from her lofty towernet, with anxious eyes, in the hope of descrying thee, her true and constant Knight—hadst thou such a fair one as this, I say, impatience might indeed become thee; but what reason hast thou, despiser of the lovely sex as thou art, to long for a change of position? By the Rood of St. Andrew, I begin to believe that thou art no such woman-hater as thou wouldst pretend, and that all this seeming coldness of thine is nothing but thy laudable constancy to some Scottish maid, who hath thine early-pledged vows of love in keeping.”
“Thou art welcome to rally me as it may please thee, Hepborne,” replied Assueton, with a smile: “but, on the faith and honour of my knighthood, I have not seen the maiden for whom I would go three ells from my intended path, except for common knightly courtesy, or to redress some grievous wrong. Nay, nay, thou knowest my natural duresse—that my heart is adamant to all such weak impressions. Perdie, I cannot understand how any such affect the good, hardy, soldier-like bosom, though I do observe the melancholy truth exampled forth, in daily occurrence, with those around me. But I perceive thy drift, my politic friend. To assail is the best tactique against being assailed. Thou camest forth conscience-stricken, and being well aware that thy foolish fondness of this masquing damosel of the Castle here would come under my gentle lash, to divert the attack against thyself, thou dost begin to skirmish against me. But I see well enow ’tis the Lady Eleanore’s attraction that would keep thee here.”
“It is e’en so, I candidly confess it,” replied Hepborne. “I candidly confess it, dost mark me? so, throwing myself at thy feet, I cry for quarter.”
“Nay, an thou dost disarm me thus,” replied Assueton, “I can say no more.”
“Oh, Assueton, Assueton, my bel ami,” said Hepborne, enthusiastically, “I was the happiest of human beings last night. I did indeed meet her on the ramparts. Old Adam of Gordon was a good seer; nay, perchance, though as to that I know not, he may have been Cupid’s messenger. Yet, hold! Depardieux, I do her most foul wrong in so supposing; for she hath too much maiden modesty to have been guilty of so much boldness. But, be that as it may, her words—her looks—were kind and most encouraging. She did blushingly confess that her heart had known no other affection than that which she bears towards her venerable father. She half admitted that I was not altogether indifferent to her; she did utter a hope that we should remain her father’s guests for some longer space; yea, and she even admitted that to see me again would give her pleasure. Then her accents were so sweet, and her demeanour so gentle—Oh, Assueton, she is in very truth an angel! But what is all this to thee, thou Knight of Adamant? I forgot that I might as well speak to the stones of these walls of amorets and love passages, as to Sir John Assueton.”
“Thou art right, i’ faith, Hepborne,” replied Assueton; “they say walls have ears, whilst I, in good earnest, may with truth enow be said to have none for such matters, since they do irk whenever the theme of love is handled in their hearing. Yet my friendship for thee bids me listen to thy ravings, and compassion for thy disease makes me watch the progress of its symptoms, as I should do those of any other fever. From all thou hast said, then, I would gather that thou wouldst fain loiter off another day or two, to catch fresh smiles and deeper wounds from the Lady Eleanore. Is’t not so, Hepborne?”
“In truth, Assueton,” replied Sir Patrick, “her whole deportment towards me last night hath buoyed me up with hope, yea, and hath even led me to flatter myself that I am not indifferent to her, Scot though I be. At so critical a period, then, I cannot go, my dear Assueton; and I am sure thy good nature will never allow thee to abandon thy friend in the crisis of his distemper.”
“No, Hepborne,” said Assueton, laughing, “I shall certainly not be so little of a Christian knight as to abandon thee when thine estate is so dangerous. Well, then, I must wait thy time, I suppose. But parfoy I must have some rounds of the tiltyard, were it but to joust at the quintaine, or Blanche-etoile and I too will lose our occupation. Wilt thou not take a turn with me for exercise? But soft—I need not talk to thee of any such thing, for yonder comes the cause of thy malady.”
“By St. Dennis, it is she indeed!” exclaimed Hepborne: “that is the very mantle she wore. But who is that cavalier on whose arm she hangs so freely?” added he with a jealous tone and air.
“St. Genevieve! but he is a tall, proper, handsome knight,” said Assueton.
“Pshaw?” said Hepborne pettishly, “I see nothing handsome about him; meseems he hath the air of a sturdy swineherd.”
“Is not that the Lady Eleanore de Selby?” inquired Assueton of a sentinel who walked on the ramparts at some little distance from where the knights then stood.
“Ay, in truth, it is she,” replied the man, stopping to look at her.
“And who may yonder knight be with whom she holds converse?” demanded Hepborne eagerly.
“By the mass, I know not, Sir Knight,” replied the man as he turned to tread back his measured pace; “I never saw him before, that I knows on.”
But notwithstanding the unfavourable remark which jealousy had made Hepborne cast on the stranger’s appearance, he could not help secretly confessing that the knight with whom the Lady Eleanore had come forth from the keep, and on whose arm she was now leaning with so little reserve, was indeed very handsome, even noble-looking. An esquire waited for him at the end of the bridge, with two magnificently-caparisoned black horses. The lady seemed to be a drag on his steps, and to keep him back, as it were, with a thousand last words, as if with a desire of prolonging the few remaining minutes of their converse. On his part he displayed signs of the tenderest affection for her; and after they had crossed the bridge tardily together, she threw herself upon his mailed neck, and he enfolded her in his arms, both remaining locked together for some moments in a last embrace. The warrior then tore himself from her, and vaulting on his steed, struck the pointed steel into his sides, and galloped off at a desperate pace. The lady, leaning on the balustrades of the bridge, rested there a little space, and then turning slowly towards the door of the keep, disappeared.
The two knights commanded a full though distant view of this scene of dumb show, from the part of the rampart where they then stood. Assueton turned his eyes with compassion upon his friend to observe its effect upon him. He was standing like a marble statue, still gazing on the spot where it had been acted—his eyes fixed in his head as with apathetical stupor. At length, after remaining in the same attitude for several minutes, he struck his forehead violently with the palms of his hands, and addressing his friend in hurried accents—“Assueton, Assueton,” said he, “didst thou see? didst thou mark! Oh, woman, woman, woman! But it mattereth not. Assueton, let our horses be ordered; I will forth with thee for Scotland even now; ay, even now. Thou wert indeed right, my friend; there is more of thorns than of roses about them all. Thou wert wise, Assueton; but I am cured now—nay, I am as sane as thyself. Our horses, Assueton—our squires and cortege. Let us not lose a moment; we may despatch good store of Scottish miles ere we sleep.”
“Nay, let us not be guilty of doing violence to the courtesy of knighthood,” replied Assueton; “Sir Walter de Selby hath used much fair hospitality towards us. It beseems us not to leave Norham Castle without giving thanks to the good old governor in person, and bidding him adieu. Besides, ’twere as well, methinks, to go with less suspicious haste, lest we may be misjudged; and, indeed, Sir Walter can have hardly left his couch as yet.”
“Ay, ay, true—thou sayest true, my friend,” said Hepborne, interrupting him keenly. “I had forgotten. Her father not yet astir, and she taking leave of her lover so tenderly at such an hour. Oh, damnable! He came, doubtless, last night, and has been i’ the keep without the old man’s knowledge. So, all her deep and long drawn suspires were but the offspring of her fears lest her leman should break faith.”
“Come, come, Hepborne, my bel ami, compose thyself,” said Sir John; “thou must not let this appear within; ’tis but a short hour sacrificed to common civility, and then let us boune us for Scotland.”
“Thou sayest well, Assueton,” said Hepborne, recollecting himself after a short pause, during which he sighed deeply; “I must endeavour to command myself; my passion too much enchafeth me. The good old man hath indeed been to us kindness itself. How cruel that he should be so deceived in his daughter! I pity him from the bottom of my soul. My wounds will soon be healed—war-toil must be their confecture; but his, alas! are yet to be opened, for now they do fester all unwist to him, and when they do burst forth, I fear me they may well out his life’s blood. But come,” added he, rousing himself, “let’s in.”
They turned their steps towards the keep, but before they had descended from the ramparts their ears were struck with the sound of a bugle, and as they looked over the walls they descried a long cavalcade of knights, esquires, grooms, lacqueys, and spearmen, advancing with lances and pennons up the hollow way leading towards the outer gate of the Castle. The party soon came thundering over the drawbridge, and were saluted by the guards as they passed. At the head of the troop rode the proud Sir Rafe Piersie. The array of the very meanest of his people was magnificent; but his armour and his horse-gear shone like the sun, and glittered with the splendour of their embossments. They passed into the inner courtyard; loud rang the bugle of announcement, and the ear was assailed by the neighing of hot steeds, the clattering and pawing of impatient hoofs, the champing of foam-covered bits, the jingling of chains, and the clinking of spurs; whilst a rout of soldiers and grooms, with Master Thomas Turnberry at their head, ran clustering around them. The squires of the Castle, with the hoary seneschal and a host of lacqueys, came forth from the keep, and ushered in Sir Rafe Piersie and his suite.
Hepborne and Assueton soon afterwards followed, and, on reaching the banquet-hall, they found Sir Walter de Selby in the act of receiving and welcoming his newly-arrived guest, whose supercilious air, when addressing the plain, honest old soldier by no means prepossessed the two Scottish knights in his favour. Sir Walter introduced them to Piersie, and he received them with the same offensive hauteur. There is something in such a deportment that provokes even the humble man to put on haughtiness. Hepborne, from late events, was not prepared to be in the most condescending humour, so that he failed not to carry his head fully three inches higher than he had done since he became an inmate of the Castle of Norham. Nor was Assueton at all behind him in stateliness.
The table was covered with the morning’s meal, and but little conversation passed during the time it was going on. Sir Walter de Selby seemed to be more reserved, and even less disposed to risk his words than he had been the previous night.
“I marvel much, Sir Governor,” said Sir Rafe Piersie with a haughty sneer—“Methinks ’tis marvellously strange, I say, that thou hast as yet said nothing touching the object of the visit I have thus paid thee. Am I, or am I not, to have this girl of thine? Depardieux, there hath been more ambassage about this affair than might have brought home and wedded a queen of England. The damsel, I am informed, knew not her own mind, and thou were weak enough to suffer thyself to be blown about by her wayward whimsies; but my kinsman, the Bishop of Durham, tells me that, having at last brought thine own determination up to the proper point, thou art finally resolved she shall be mine. Marry, a matter of great exertion, truly, to accept of Sir Rafe Piersie as a husband for Eleanore de Selby!”
“My mind has indeed been made up, Sir Rafe Piersie,” said the old knight, “and would to Heaven, beausir, that it could have been made up differently; for, certes, it doleth me sorely to be driven to answer thee as I must of needscost do. I should not have broached this matter till privacy had put the seal on our converse: but, since thou hast opened it, I am forced to tell thee that, since I saw the Bishop of Durham, obstacles have appeared which render it impossible for me to give thee my daughter, the Lady Eleanore, to wife. She is affianced to another.”
“So,” thought Hepborne, the ideas passing rapidly through his mind, “her father knows of the attachment between her and the knight who left her this morning. Then, perhaps, she has been less to blame than I thought; yet why were her words and manner such, last night, towards me, as to mislead me into the idea that I had reason to hope? Oh, deceitful woman, never satisfied with the success of thy springes as long as there is a foolish bird to catch. So! thou must have me limed to? But, grammercy, I have escaped thy toils.”
Such were Hepborne’s thoughts; but what Sir Rafe Piersie’s were during the pause of astonishment he was thrown into, may be best gathered from the utterance he gave them.
“What is this I hear? has a limb of the noble Piersie been brought here to be insulted? Thou art a false old papelarde; and were it not for those hoary hairs of thine, by the beard of St. Barnabas, I would brain thee with this gauntlet;” and saying so, he dashed it down on the board, making it ring again.
Hepborne and Assueton both started up, and stretched out their hands eagerly to seize it.
“Ah, thou art always lucky, Hepborne,” said Assueton, much disappointed to see that his friend had snatched it before him.
“Sir Rafe Piersie,” said Hepborne, “in behalf of this good old knight, whom thou hast so grossly insulted at his own board, I defy thee to instant and mortal debate; and in thy teeth I return the opprobrious epithets thou didst dare to throw in his face; and here, I say, thou liest!” and with these words he threw down his gauntlet.
“And who art thou?” said his antagonist, taking it up; “who art thou, young cockerel, who crowest so loud? By St. George, but thou showest small share of wisdom to pit thyself thus against Sir Rafe Piersie. But fear not, thou shalt have thy will. Was thy darreigne for instant fight, saidst thou? In God’s name, let us to horse then without farther parley. Let Sir Richard de Lacy here, and thine eager friend there, be the judges of the field; and as for the place, the Norham meadow below will do as well for thine overthrow as any other; thou wilt have easy galloping ere thou dost meet it. What, defy Sir Rafe Piersie to combat of outrance, and give him the lie, too! Thou art doomed, young man, thou art doomed; thine insolence hath put thee beyond the pale of my mercy. By the holy Rood, thou must be the young cock-sparrow the old dotard hath chosen as a mate for his pretty popelot, else thou never couldst have been so bold.”
“I am not so fortunate,” replied Hepborne, with calm and courteous manner.
“And what may thy name and title be, then?” demanded Piersie, with yet greater hauteur.
“My name,” replied he, with a dignified bow, “is Sir Patrick Hepborne.”
“Ha! then, by my faith, thou hast some good Northern blood in thee,” replied Piersie; “thou art less unworthy of my lance than I did ween thou wert. Thy father is a right doughty Scot; and, if I mistake not, I have heard of some deeds of thine done in France, which have made thine honours and renomie to bud and buxion rathely. But ’tis a warm climate they have sprouted in, and such early and unnatural shoots are wont to be air-drawn and unhealthy; and albeit they may vegetate under the more southern sun, they are often withered by the blasts of the North as soon as they appear amongst us. But come, come, my horse, Delaval—my horse and gear, I say;” and, leaving the hall hastily, he sought a chamber where he might prepare himself for single combat.
Chapter IX
The Combat—Departure of the Scots—Master Kyle Swears by St. Cuthbert.
Hepborne was not slow on his part, and in a very short time the Castle-yard was again in commotion, and grooms and esquires were seen running in all directions, bringing out horses and buckling on trappings. Hepborne’s gallant steed Beaufront was led proudly forth from his stall by Mortimer Sang, and was no sooner backed by his master than he pranced, neighed, and spurned the ground, as if he had guessed of the nature of the work he had to do. Attended by Assueton and their small party of followers, Sir Patrick rode slowly down to the mead of Norham, extending from under the elevated ground on which the Castle stood, for a considerable way to the westward, between the village and the bank of the Tweed. Here he halted, and patiently awaited the arrival of his opponent. Piersie came in all his pomp, mounted on a dapple-grey horse, of remarkable strength, figure, and action. Both horse and rider were splendidly arrayed, and his friends and people came crowding after him, boasting loudly of the probable issue of the combat. Sir Walter de Selby came last, attended by some few officers, esquires, and meaner people, and joined Hepborne’s party, stationed towards one end of the field, Sir Rafe Piersie’s having filed off and taken post towards the other extremity of it. Little time was lost in preparation. The two judges placed themselves opposite to the middle of the space, and there the combatants met and measured lances.
The bugle-mot gave them warning, so turning their steeds round, they each rode back about a furlong towards their respective parties, and, suddenly wheeling at the second sound of the bugle, they ran their furious course against each other with lance in rest. The shock was tremendous. The clash of their armour echoed from the very walls of the neighbouring Castle; nor had the oldest and most experienced men-at-arms who were there present ever seen anything like it. Sir Patrick Hepborne received his adversary’s lance, with great adroitness, on his shield, at such an angle that it glanced off broken in shivers; yet the force was so great that it had almost turned him in his saddle. But he, on his part, had borne his point so stoutly, so steadily, and so truly, that, taking his adversary in the centre of the body, he tossed him entirely over the croupe of his horse. Piersie lay stunned by the fall; and Sir Patrick, checking Beaufront in his career, made a circuit around his prostrate adversary, and speedily dismounting, went up to him, and kneeling on the ground beside him, lifted up his head, and opened his vizor and beaver to give him freer air. Sir Richard de Lacy and Assueton came up.
“Sir Richard,” said Hepborne, “thou seest his life is in mine hands; and after the bragging and insolent threats he used towards me, perhaps I might be deemed well entitled to use the privileges of my victory, and take it. But I engaged in this affair only to wipe off the disgrace thrown on this good old knight, Sir Walter de Selby, in whose hospitality I and my brother-in-arms have so liberally shared; and the blot having been thus removed, by God’s blessing on mine arm, I leave Piersie his life, that he may use it against me when next we meet in fair fight in bloody field, should the jarring rights of our two countries summon us against each other. But through thee, his friend, I do most solemnly enjoin him that, on the honour of a knight, he shall hold Sir Walter de Selby as acquitted of all intention of doing him any injury or insult in the matter of the marriage he contemplated with the Lady Eleanore, and that he think not of doing Sir Walter violence on that account.”
For all this Sir Richard de Lacy immediately pledged himself in name of Sir Rafe Piersie; and the discomfited knight, who was still insensible, having been lifted up by his esquires, was straightway borne towards the Castle. As they were carrying him away, Mortimer Sang, who had by chance caught the dapple-grey steed, as he scoured past him on the field after his rider’s overthrow, trotted up to the group leading him by the bridle. The worthy esquire had heard and treasured up the taunts and boasting of Piersie’s people, as they were approaching the field.
“Hath any of ye lost perchance a pomely grise-coloured horse, my masters?” exclaimed he; “here is a proper powerful destrier, if he had been but well backed. Hast thou no varlet of a pricksoure squire who can ride him? Here, take him, some of ye; and, hark ye, let his saddle be better filled the next time ye do come afield.”
Piersie’s men were too much crestfallen to return his jibes, so he rode back to the group that surrounded the conqueror, chuckling over his triumph. The good old Sir Walter de Selby, his eyes running over with gratitude, approached Sir Patrick Hepborne, and embraced him cordially.
“The time hath been,” said he, “the time hath been, Sir Patrick, when it pleased Heaven to permit me to reap the same guerdon of inward satisfaction thou art now feeling, and could the weight of a few years have been lifted from off this hoar head, by God’s blessing, thou shouldst not have had this noble chance of gathering fame at the cost of Sir Rafe Piersie. As it is, I thank thee heartily for thy gallant defence of an old man, as well as for the generous use thou hast made of thy victory. Come, let us to the Castle, that by my treatment of thee, and Sir Rafe Piersie, I may forthwith prove my gratitude to the one and my forgiveness of the other.
“Thanks, most hospitable knight,” said Sir Patrick, “I beseech thee in mine own name, and that of my friend, to receive our poor thanks for thy kind reception of us at Norham. But now our affairs demand our return to our own country; nay, had it not been for this unlooked-for deed of arms, we had been ere now some miles beyond that broad stream. We boune us now for Scotland. Farewell, and may the holy St. Cuthbert keep thee in health and safety. We may yet haply meet again.”
Sir Walter de Selby was grieved to find that all his efforts to detain the two knights were ineffectual.
“Since it is thy will, then, to pleasure me no longer with thy good company and presence, Sirs Knights, may the blessed Virgin and the holy St. Andrew guide you in safety to your friends; and may you find those you love in the good plight you would wish them to be.” And saying so, he again cordially embraced both the knights, and slowly returned towards the Castle with his attendants.
The bustle and commotion occasioned by the appearance of the knights and their followers on the mead of Norham, the sound of the bugle, and the clash of the shock, had brought out many of the inhabitants of the village to see what was a-doing. Amongst these was the black-eyed Mrs. Kyle, who came up to Master Mortimer Sang, and laying hold of his bridle-rein—
“When goest thou for Scotland?” said she anxiously.
“Even now, fair dame,” said he calmly.
“Then go I with thee, Sir Squire,” returned she. “Let me have a seat on that batt-horse; I can ride right merrily there.”
“Nay, my most beautiful Mrs. Kyle,” replied Sang, “that may in no wise be, seeing I am an honest virtuous esquire, not one of those false faitors who basely run away with other men’s wives. Thou canst not with me, I promise thee.”
“Yea, but thou didst promise to take me,” cried Mrs. Kyle, a flood of tears bursting from her eyes, as she began to reproach Sang, with a voice half-chocked by the violence of her sobbing. “So false foiterer that thou art, I—I—I—I must be foredone by thee, must I, after all thy losengery and flattery? Here have I kept goodman Kyle all this time i’ the vault, ygraven, as a body may say, that I mought the more sickerly follow thee when thou wentest. Oh, what will become of me? I am but as one dead.”
“Why, thou cruel giglet, thou,” cried Sang, “didst thou in very truth mean to go off to Scotland with me, and leave thy poor husband ygraven i’ the vault to die the most horrible of deaths? Did not I tell thee to let him out at thy leisure and on thine own good terms? By the mass, a pretty leisure hast thou taken, and pretty terms hast thou resolved to yield him.”
“Nay, judge not so hastily, good Sir Squire,” replied Mrs. Kyle. “That I would boune me to Scotland is sure enow; but, as to leaving Sylvester Kyle to die a cruel death, Thomas Tapster here knows that I taught him the use of the sliding plank and the clicket of the trap door, and that Master Sylvester was to receive his franchise as soon as Tweed should be atween us. But what shall I do? I can never go back to the Norham Tower again; goodman Sylvester will surely amortise me attenes when he doth get freedom.”
“Squire,” said Hepborne, “thou must e’en get thee back to the village, and make her peace with the bear her husband: we shall wait for thee at the ferry-boat.”
“Nay, as for that matter,” said Sang, “I must go back at any rate, for I have yet to pay the rascal for the excellent supper we had of him, and for the herborow of our party for the night we spent there. Come along then, Dame Kyle, I see thou art not quite so savage as I took thee to be.”
They soon reached the hostel, and Master Mortimer Sang, dismounting from his horse in the yard, entered, and strode along the passage to the place where he knew the trap-door to be, and, sliding aside the plank that covered its fastenings, he hoisted up the lever.
“Sylvester Kyle, miserable lossel wight,” cried he, “art thou yet alive? Sinner that thou art, I have compassion on thee, and albeit thou hast been there but some short space—small guerdon for thy wicked coulpe, seeing thou art in the midst of so great a mountance of good provender and drink, with which to fill thine enormous bowke—I condescend to let thee come forth. Come up, come up, I say, and show thy face, that we may hold parley as to the terms of thine enlargement.”
A groaning was heard from the farther end of the place, and by and by Sylvester’s head appeared above the steps, his countenance wearing the most miserable expression. Horrible fear of the agonizing death he had thought himself doomed to die had prevented him from touching food; but the anxious workings of his mind had done even more mortification upon him than a starvation of a fortnight could have accomplished. The red in his face was converted into a deadly pale copper hue, for even death itself could never have altogether extinguished the flame in his nose; his teeth projected beyond his lips, and chattered against each other from the cold he had undergone: and his eyes stared in their sockets, from the united effects of want and terror.
“Should it please me to give thee the franchise, thou agroted lorrel, thou,” said the Squire, “wilt thou give me thy promise to comport thyself more honestly in time to come, to have done with all knavery and chinchery, and to give thy very best to all Scots who may, in time to come, chance to honour thy hostelry with their presence?”
“Oh, good Sir Squire,” replied the host, “anything—I will promise anything that thou mayest please.”
“Nay, nay, Sir Knave,” cried Sang, “horrow tallowcatch that thou art—no generals—swear me in particulars—item by item, dost thou hear, as thou framest thy reckonings? If thou dost not down goeth the trap-door again, and I leave thee here to meditate and ypend my proposal, until my return from the Holy Wars, whether I am boune. By that time thou wilt be more humble, and more coming to my terms. Swear.”
“I swear, by the holy St. Cuthbert,” replied the host, “that all Scots shall henceforth be entertained with the best meats and drinks the nale of the Norham Tower can afford, yea, alswa the best herborow it can yield them.”
“’Tis well,” said Sang; “swear me next, then, and let the oath be strong, that thou wilt never again score double.”
“Nay, Master Squire, that is a hard oath for a tapster to take; ’tis warring against the very nicest mystery of my vocation,” said Kyle.
“No matter, Sir Knave,” said Sang, “I shall not have my terms agrutched by thee. An thou swearest not this, down thou goest, and I leave thee to settle scores with a friend of thine below, with whom thou wilt find the single reckoning of thy sins a hard enough matter for thee to pay.”
“Oh, for mercy’s sake, touch not the trap-door, Sir Squire, and I will swear anything,” cried Kyle, much alarmed at seeing Sang’s brawny arm preparing to turn it over upon his head.
“Well, thou horrow lossel,” cried Sang, “dost thou swear thou wilt never more cheat, or score double?”
“I do, I do,” said the host; “by the holy Rood, I swear that I will never cheat or score double again. God help me,” cried he, after a pause, “how shall I eschew it, and what shall I do without it?”
“Now, thou prince of knaves,” cried Sang, “thou hast yet one more serment to swallow. Swear by the blessed Virgin, that thou wilt receive thy wife back into thy bosom, and abandoning thy former harshness towards her, that thou wilt kindly cherish her, and do thy possible to comfort and pleasure her, forgetting all that may have hitherto happened amiss between ye. I restore her to thee pure. She was not to blame for my being in the vault with her. The coulpe was all thine own. Thou madest me ravenous with hunger by thy villainous chinchery. My nose, through very want, became as sharp in scent as that of a sleuth-hound. I winded the steam that came from the trap-door, yea, from the very common room where I sat. I ran it up hot foot, and descending the stair, I had but just begun to feast mine eyes with that thou hadst denied to my stomach, when thy pestiferous voice was heard. Thy wife is as virtuous and innocent as the child unborn. So swear, I say.”
Master Sylvester Kyle shook his head wofully, and looked very far from satisfied; but he had no alternative; he swore as the squire wished him to do, and then was permitted to issue from his subterranean prison.
“And now, Sir Knave,” said Sang, “do but note my extreme clemency. Thou wouldst have starved me, the knights, and our good company, because we were Scots, for the which grievous sin I did put thee in a prison full of goodly provender and rich drinks; whence I now let thee forth, with thy greedy carcase crammed to bursting, and thy whole person plump and fair as a capon. Do but behold him, I beseech ye, how round he looks. Now get thee to thine augrim-stones, and cast up thine account withal. Thou knowest pretty well what we have had, for thou didst give me the victuals and wine with thine own hand.”
“Nay, good Sir Squire,” said Kyle, glad to escape, “take it all, in God’s name, as a free gift, and let us part good friends.”
“Nay, nay,” said Master Sang, “we take no such beggarly treats, we Scottish knights and squires. Come, come—thy reckoning, thy reckoning, dost hear? No more words; my master doth wait, and I must haste to join him.”
Kyle, with his wife’s assistance, and that of the pebbles or augrim-stones, by which accounts were usually made out in those days, scored up the first fair reckoning he had ever made in his life, and Sang paid it without a word.
“And now,” said he, “let us, as thou saidst, Master Kyle, let us e’en part good friends. Bring me a stirrup-cup of thy best.”
The host hastened to fetch a cup of excellent Rhenish. They drank to each other, and shook hands with perfect cordiality; and the squire, smacking the pouting lips of Mrs. Kyle, mounted his horse, and rode away to join his party.
As the knights and their small retinue were crossing the Tweed in the ferry-boat, Hepborne cast his eyes up to the keep of the Castle, towering high above them, and frowning defiance upon Scotland. A white hand appeared from a narrow window, and waved a handkerchief; and, by a sort of natural impulse, he was about to have waved and kissed his fervently in return.
“Pshaw!” said he, pettishly checking himself, for being so ready to yield to the impulse of his heart. The white hand and handkerchief waved again—and again it waved ere he reached the Scottish shore; but he manfully resisted all temptation, and gave no sign of recognition.
As he mounted, however, he looked once more. The hand was still there, streaming the little speck of white. His resolution gave way—he waved his hand, and his eyes filling with tears, he dashed the rowels of his spurs against the sides of his steed, sprang off at full gallop, and was immediately lost amongst the oak copse through which lay their destined way.
Chapter X
The Home of the Hepbornes—Remembrances of Childhood—The Old Wolf-Hound.
After tarrying for a little while at the small town of Dunse, the two knights pursued their journey over the high ridge of Lammermoor, and early on the second day they reached Hailes Castle, the seat of the Hepbornes, a strong fortress, standing on the southern banks of the river Tyne, in the heart of the fertile county of East Lothian. At the period we are now speaking of, the varied surface of the district surrounding the place was richly though irregularly wooded; and even the singular isolated hill of Dunpender, rising to the southward of it, had gigantic oaks growing about its base, and towering upon its sides, amidst thick hazel and other brushwood, wherever they could find soil enough to nourish them.
Sir Patrick Hepborne had been particularly silent during their march. The events which took place at Norham, and the conviction he felt that the Lady Eleanore de Selby had indirectly endeavoured to draw him into an attachment for her, when her heart either was or ought to have been engaged to another, made him unhappy. It was needless to inquire why it should have done so, since he was ever and anon congratulating himself on having escaped uninjured from the toils of one so unworthy of him. But the truth was he had not escaped uninjured; he had “tane a hurt” from her, of a nature too serious to be of very easy cure. Assueton, who had never felt the tender passion, and who had consequently very little sympathy for it, had more than once complained of the unwonted dulness of his companion, who used to be so full of life and cheerfulness, and had made several vain attempts to rouse him, until at last, despairing of success, he amused himself in jesting with Master Mortimer Sang, who possessed a never-failing spring of good humour.
As they drew near the domains of Sir Patrick Hepborne the elder, however, a thousand spots, and things, and circumstances, began to present themselves in succession, and to force themselves on the attention of the love-sick knight, awakening warm associations with the events of his youthful days, and overpowering, for a time, his melancholy. To these he began to give utterance in a language his friend could not only comprehend, but participate in the feelings they naturally gave rise to.
“Assueton,” said he, “it was here, in this very wood, that I took my first lessons in the merry art of woodcraft; in yonder hollow were the rethes and pankers spread to toyle the deer; and, see there, under yonder ancient tree, was I first planted with my little cross-bow, as a lymer, to have my vantage of the game. It was Old Gabriel Lindsay, then a jolly forester, who put me there, and taught me how to behave me. He is now my father’s seneschal, if, as I hope, he be yet alive. He was a hale man then, and though twenty years older than my father, he had a boy somewhat younger than myself, who took up his father’s trade of forester, just before I went to France. Alas, the old tree has had a fearful skathe of firelevin since last I saw it. See what a large limb hath been rent from its side. Dost see the river glancing yonder below, through the green-wood? Ay, now we see it better. In yonder shallow used I to wade when a child, with my little hauselines tucked up above my knees. I do remember well, I was so engaged one hot summer’s day, when, swelled by some sudden water-spout or upland flood, I saw the liquid wall come sweeping onwards, ready to overwhelm me. I ran in childish fear, but ere I reached the strand it came, and overtaking my tottering steps, hurried me with it into yonder pool. I sank, and rose, and sank again. I remember e’en now how quickly the ideas passed through my infant mind, as I was whirling furiously round and round by the force of the eddy, vainly struggling and gasping for life, now below and now on the surface of the water. I thought of the dreadful death I was dying; I thought of the misery about to befall my father and mother—nay, strange as it may seem, I saw them in my mind’s eye weeping in distraction over my pale and dripping corpse, and all this was intermixed with flitting hopes of rescue, that were but the flash amidst the darkness of the storm. The recollections of the five or six years I could remember of my past childhood were all condensed into the short period of as many minutes; for that was all the time my lucky stars permitted me to remain in jeopardy, till Gabriel Lindsay came, and, plunging into the foaming current, dragged me half dead to the shore. Full many a time have I sithence chosen that very pool as a pleasure bayne wherein to exercise my limbs in swimming, when hardier boyhood bid me defy the flood.”
“My dear friend,” said Assueton, “trust me, I do envy thee thine indulgence in those remembrances excited by the scenes of thy childhood; they make me more eager than ever to revel in those that await me around my paternal boure. I shall be thy father’s guest to-night; but I can no longer delay returning to my paternal possessions, and in especial to my widowed mother, who doubtless longs to embrace me. I must leave thee to-morrow.”
“Nay, Assueton, thou didst promise to bestow upon me three or four days at least,” said Hepborne: “let me not then have thy promise amenused. To rob me of so large a portion of thy behote were, methinks, but unkind.”
“I did promise, indeed,” said Assueton, “but I wist not of the time we should waste at Norham. I must e’en go to-morrow, Hepborne; but, trust me, I shall willingly boune me back again some short space hence.”
Hepborne was not lacking in argument to overcome his friend’s intentions, but he could gain no more than a promise, reluctantly granted, that his departure should be postponed until the morning after the following day.
“But see, Assueton,” said Hepborne, “there are the outer towers and gateway of the Castle, and behold how its proud barbicans rise beyond them. As I live, there is Flo, my faithful old wolf-dog, lying sunning himself against the wall. He is the fleetest allounde in all these parts for taking down the deer at a view. What ho, boy, Flo, Flo! What means the brute, he minds me not?” continued Hepborne, riding up to him: “I wot he was never wont to be so litherly; he used to fly at my voice with all the swiftness of the arrow, which he is named after. Ah! now I see, he is half-blind; and peraunter he is deaf too, for he seems as if he heard me not. But, fool that I am, I forget that some years have passed away sith I saw him last, and that old age must ere this have come upon him. ’Twas but a week before I left home, Assueton, that he killed a wolf. But let us hasten in, I am impatient to embrace my father, and my dear mother, and my sister Isabelle.”
Loud rang the bugle-blast in the court-yard of the Castle. Throwing his reins to his esquire, Hepborne sprang from his horse, and running towards the doorway, whence issued a crowd of domestics, alarmed by the summons, he grasped the hand of an old white-headed man, who presented the feeble remains of having been once tall and powerful, but who was now bent and tottering with age.
“My worthy Gabriel,” said he in an affectionate tone and manner, and with a tear trembling in his eye, “dost thou not know me? How fares my father, my mother, and my sister, the Lady Isabelle?”
The old man looked at him for some moments, with his hand held up as a pent-house to his dim eyes.
“Holy St. Giles!” exclaimed he at last, “art thou indeed my young master? Art thou then alive and sound? Well, who would hae thought, they that saw me last winter, when I was so ill, that I would hae lived to hae seen this blessed day!”
“But tell me, Gabriel,” cried Hepborne, interrupting him, “tell me where are they all; I suppose I shall find them in the banquet hall above?”
“Stop thee, stop thee, Sir Patrick,” said the old seneschal, “thy father and the Lady Isabelle rode to the green-wood this morning. There was a great cry about a route of wolves that have been wrecking doleful damage on the shepens; they do say, that some of the flocks hae been sorely herried by them; so my master and the Lady Isabelle rode forth with the sleuth-hounds, and the alloundes, and the foresters; and this morning, ere the sun saw the welkin, my boy rode away to lay out the rethes and the pankers. I wot, thou remembers thee of my son Robert? He is head forester now. Thy noble father, Heaven’s blessing and the Virgin’s be about him, did that for him; may long life and eternal joy be his guerdon for all his good deeds to me and mine! And Ralpho Proudfoot was but ill content to see my Rob get the place aboon him; so Ralpho yode his ways, and hath oft sithes threatened some malure to Rob; but as to that——”
“Nay, my good Gabriel,” said Hepborne, impatiently interrupting him, “but where, I entreat thee, is my mother?”
A cloud instantly overcast the face of the venerable domestic; he hesitated and stammered—
“Nay, then, my dear young master, thou hast not heard of the doleful tidings?”
“What doleful tidings? Quick, speak, old man. My mother! is she ill? Good God, thou art pale. Oh, thy face doth speak too intelligibly—my mother, my beloved mother, is no more!”
The old man burst into tears. He could not command a single word; but the grief and agitation he could not hide was enough for Sir Patrick Hepborne. In a choked and hollow voice—
“Assueton,” said he, “walk up this way, so please thee; there is the banquet-hall; I must retire into this apartment for some moments. If thou hadst known my mother—my excellent, my tenderly affectionate mother—my mother, by whose benignant and joy-beaming eyes I looked to be now greeted withal—thou wouldst pardon me for being thus unmanned. But I shall be more composed anon.”
And with these words, and with an agitation he could not hide, he burst away into an adjacent chamber, where he shut himself in, that he might give way to his emotions without interruption.
It was his mother’s private room. In the little oratory opening from the farther end of it, was her prie-dieu and crucifix, and on the floor opposite to it was the very velvet cushion on which he found her kneeling, and offering up her fervent orisons to Heaven on his behalf, as he entered her apartment to embrace her for the last time, the morning he left Hailes for France. He remembered that his heart was then bounding with delight at the prospect of breaking into the world, and figuring among knights and warriors, amidst all the gay splendour of the French Court. Alas! he little thought then he was embracing her for the last time. He now looked round the chamber, and her missal-books, with a thousand trifles he had seen her use, called up her graceful figure and gentle expression fresh before his eyes. He wept bitterly, and, seating himself in the chair she used, wasted nearly an hour in giving way to past recollections, and indulging in the grief they occasioned. At last his sorrow began to exhaust itself, and he became more composed. The cushion and the little altar again caught his eye, and, rising from the chair, he prostrated himself before the emblem of the Saviour’s sufferings and the Christian’s faith and hope, pouring out his soul in devotional exercise. As his head was buried in the velvet drapery of the prie-dieu, and his eyes covered, his imagination pictured the figure of his mother floating over him in seraphic glory. He started up, almost expecting to see his waking vision realized; but it was no more than the offspring of his fancy, and he again seated himself on his mother’s chair, to dry his eyes and to compose his agitated bosom.
Though still deeply afflicted, he now felt himself able to command his feelings, and he left his mother’s apartment to rejoin Assueton. At the door he met old Gabriel Lindsay, and he being now able to ask, and the hoary seneschal to tell, the date and circumstances of his mother’s death, he learned that she had been carried off by a sudden illness about three months previous to his arrival. The firmness of the warrior now returned upon him, and, with a staid but steady countenance, he rejoined his friend.
“Assueton,” said he, “if thou art disposed to ramble with me, it would give me ease to go forth a little. Let us doff our mail, and put on less cumbrous hunting-garbs and gippons, and go out into the woods. We may chance to hear their hunting-horns, and so fall in with them; else we may loiter idling it here till nightfall ere they return.”
Assueton readily agreed; and both having trimmed themselves for active exercise, and armed themselves with hunting-spears, and with the anelace, a kind of wood-knife or falchion, usually worn, together with the pouch, hanging from the girdlestead of the body, they left the Castle, with the intent of taking the direction they were informed the hunting-party had gone in. As they passed from the outer gateway, the great rough old wolf-hound again attracted his master’s attention.
“Alas! poor old Flo,” said Hepborne, going up to him, and stooping to caress him, “thou canst no more follow me as thou wert wont to do. Thou art now but as a withered and decayed log of oak—thou who used, whenever I appeared, to dart hither and thither around me like a firelevin.”
The old dog began to lick his master’s hand, and to whine a dull recognition.
“I believe he doth hardly remember me,” said Hepborne, moving away; “he seems now to be little better than a clod of earth.”
The old dog, however, though he had scarcely stirred for many months before, began to whimper, and rearing up his huge body with great pain, as if in stretching each limb he required to break the bonds that age had rivetted every joint withal, and getting at last on his legs, he began to follow Sir Patrick, whining and wagging his tail. Hepborne, seeing his feeble state, did what he could to drive him back; but the dog persisted in following him.
“Poor old affectionate fellow,” said Hepborne, “go with me, then, thou shalt, though I should have to carry thee back. Assueton,” continued he, “let us climb the lofty height of Dunpender, whence we shall have such a view around us as may enable us to descry the hunting-party, if they be anywhere within the range of our ken.”
XI. The Wolf Hunt—A Desperate Encounter
They accordingly made their way through the intervening woods, lawns, and alleys, and ascended the steep side of the hill. From the summit, the beautiful vale of the Tyne was fully commanded, and the extent and variety of the prospect was such as to occupy them for some time in admiration of it. Hepborne discovered a thousand spots and points in it connected with old stories of his youth. He touched on all these in succession to Assueton, his heart overflowing with his feelings, and his eyes with the remembrance of his beloved mother, whose image was continually recurring to him. He made his friend observe the distant eminences in parts of Scotland afar off; and Assueton, amongst others, was overjoyed to descry the blue top of that hill at the base of which he had been born, and whither his heart bounded to return.
“Hark,” said Hepborne, suddenly interrupting the enthusiastic greeting his friend was wafting towards his distant home—“hark! methinks I hear the sound of bugles echoing faintly through the woods below; dost thou not hear?”
“I do,” said Assueton, “and methinks I also hear the yelling note of the sleuth-hounds.”
“That bugle-mot was my father’s,” said Hepborne; “I know it full well; I could swear to it anywhere. Nay, yonder they ride. Dost not see them afar off yonder, sweeping across the green alures and avenues, where the wood-shaws are thinnest? Now they cross the wide lawnde yonder—and now they are lost amid the shade of these oakshaws. They come this way; let us hasten downward; we shall have ill luck an we meet them not at the bottom of the hill.”
Hepborne was so eager to embrace his father, that, forgetting his friend was a stranger to the perplexities of the way, he darted off, and descended through the brushwood, leaving Assueton to follow him as he best might. Assueton, in his turn, eager to overtake Hepborne, put down the point of his hunting-spear to aid him in vaulting over an opposing bush. There was a knot in the ashen shaft, and it snapt asunder with his weight. He threw it away, and, guided by the distant sounds of the bugle-blasts and the yells of the hounds, he pressed precipitately down the steep, but in his ignorance he took a direction different from that pursued by Hepborne.
As he was within a few yards of the bottom of the hill, he saw an enormous wolf making towards him, the oblique and sinister eyes of the animal flashing fire, his jaws extended, and tongue lolling out. Assueton regretted the loss of his hunting-spear, but judging him to be much spent, he resolved to attack him. He squatted behind a bush directly in the animal’s path, and springing at him as he passed, he grappled him by the throat with both hands, and held him with the grasp of fate. The furious wolf struggled with all his tremendous strength, and before Assueton could venture to let go one hand to draw out his anelace, he was overbalanced by the weight of the creature, and they rolled over and over each other down the remainder of the grassy declivity, the knight still keeping his hold, conscious that the moment he should lose it he must inevitably be torn in pieces. There they lay tumbling and writhing on the ground, the exertions of the wolf being so violent, as frequently to lift Assueton and drag him on his back along the green sward. Now he gained his knees, and, pressing down his savage foe, he at last ventured to lose his right hand to grope for his anelace; but it was gone—it had dropped from the sheath; and, casting a glance around him, he saw it glittering on the grass, at some yards’ distance. There was no other mode of recovering it but by dragging the furious beast towards it, and this he now put forth all his strength to endeavour to effect. He tugged and toiled, and even succeeded so far as to gain a yard or two; but his grim foe was only rendered more ferocious in his resistance, by the additional force he employed. The wolf made repeated efforts to twist his neck round to bite, and more than once succeeded in wounding Assueton severely in the left arm, the sleeve of which was entirely torn off. As the beast lay on his back too, pinned firmly down towards his head, he threw up his body, and thrust his hind feet against Assueton’s face, so as completely to blind his eyes, and by a struggle more violent than any he had made before, he threw him down backwards.
The situation of the bold and hardy knight was now most perilous, for, though he still kept his grasp, he lay stretched on the ground; and whilst the wolf, standing over him, was now able to bring all his sinews to bear against him, from having his feet planted firmly on the ground, Assueton, from his position, was unable to use his muscles with much effect. The panting and frothy jaws, and the long sharp tusks of the infuriated beast, were almost at his throat, and the only salvation that remained for him, was to prevent his fastening on by it, by keeping the head of the brute at a distance by the strength of his arms. The muscles of the neck of a wolf are well known to be so powerful, that they enable the animal to carry off a sheep with ease; so that, with all his vigour of nerve, Assueton had but a hopeless chance for it. Still he held, and still they struggled, when the tramp of a horse was heard, and a lady came galloping by under the trees. She no sooner observed the dreadful strife between the savage wolf and the knight, than, alighting nimbly from her palfrey, she couched the light hunting-spear she carried, and ran it through the heart of the half-choked animal. The blood spurted over the prostrate cavalier, and the huge carcase fell on him, with the eyes glaring in the head, and the teeth grinding together in the agony of death.
The bold Assueton, sore toil-spent with the length of the contest, threw the now irresisting body of the creature away from him, and instantly recovered his legs. All bloody and covered with foam as he was, he bowed gracefully to his preserver, and gazed at her for some time ere he could find breath to give his gratitude utterance. She was lovely as the morning. Her fair hair, broken loose from the thraldom of its braiding bodkins by the agitation of riding, streamed from beneath a hunting hat she wore, and fell in flowing ringlets over the black mantle that hung from her shoulder. Her mild and angelic soul spoke in expressive language through her blue eyes, though they were more than half veiled by her modest eyelids. Her full fresh lips were half open, and her bosom heaved with her high breathing from the exercise she had been undergoing, and the unwonted exertion she had so lately made, and her cheek was gently flushed by the consciousness of the glorious deed she had achieved.
“Sir Knight,” inquired she, timidly though anxiously, “I hope thou hast tane no hurt from the caitiff salvage? Thou dost bleed, meseems?”
“Nay, lady,” said Assueton, at last able to speak, “I bleed not; ’tis the blood of the brute yonder. Perdie, thy bold and timely aid did rid me of a strife that mought have ended sorely to my mischaunce. Verily, thou camest like an angel to my rescue, and my poor thanks are but meagre guerdon for the heroic deed thou didst adventure to effect it. Do I not speak to the sister of my friend, Sir Patrick Hepborne? Do I not address the fair Lady Isabelle?”
“Patrick Hepborne?” inquired she eagerly; “art thou, indeed, the friend of my brother? Welcome, Sir Knight; thou art welcome to me, as thou wilt be to my father. What tidings hast thou of my gallant brother?”
“Even those, I ween, beauteous lady, which shall give thee belchier,” said Assueton; “my friend is well as thou wouldst wish him; nay, more, he is here with me. We parted but now above yonder at the crop of the hill. I lost him in the thickets on its side, just before I encountered with gaffer wolf yonder.”
“Pray Heaven,” said Isabelle, with alarm in her countenance, “that he may not meet with some of the wolves we drove hither before us. Thou seemest to be altogether without weapon, Sir Knight; perhaps he is equally defenceless.”
“Nay, lady,” replied Assueton, “I broke a faithless rotten shafted hunting-spear ere I came down, and I lost my anelace from my girdlestead as I was struggling with the wolf. Sir Patrick has both, I warrant thee, and will make a better use of them than I did. Shall we seek him, so please ye?”
“Oh, yes,” cried the Lady Isabelle joyfully; “how I long to clasp my dear brother in these arms. But hold, Sir Knight,” said she, her face again assuming an air of anxiety, “thou dost bleed, maugre all thou didst say. Truly thy left arm is most grievously torn by the miscreant wolf; let me bind it up with this rag here.” And notwithstanding all Assueton’s protestations to the contrary, she took off a silken scarf, and bound up his wounds very tenderly, even exposing her own lovely neck to the sun, that she might effect her charitable purpose.
“And now,” said she, “let’s on in the direction my father took; he and my brother may have probably met ere this. Hey, Robert,” cried she to a forester who appeared at the moment, “whither went my father?”
“This way, lady,” said he, pointing in a particular direction; “I heard his bugle-mot but now.”
“Charge thyself with the spoils of this wolf, Robert,” said the Lady Isabelle; “I do mean to have his felt hung up in the hall, in remembrance of the bold and desperate conflict, waged without aid of steel against him, by dint of thewes and sinews alone, by this valiant knight; ’tis a monster for size, the make of which is, I trow, rarely seen.”
“Nay, lady,” cried Assueton, “rather hang up his spoils in commemoration of thine own brave deed; for it was thou who killed him. And had it not been for thee, gaffer wolf might, ere now, have made a dinner of me.”
“In truth, Sir Knight,” replied Isabelle, “hadst thou not held him by the throat so starkly, I trow I should have had little courage to have faced him.”
The lady vaulted on her palfrey, and Assueton, his left arm decorated with her scarf, and holding her bridle with his right, walked by the side of the palfrey, like a true lady’s knight, unwittingly engaged, for the first time in his life, in pleasing dialogue with a beautiful woman.
Sir Patrick Hepborne, who thought only of seeing his father, had rushed down the steep of Dunpender in the hope of meeting him somewhere near the base of the hill, for the sound of the chase evidently came that way. His old dog Flo had difficulty in following him; and stumbling over the stumps of trees, and the stones that lay in his way, he was at last completely left behind. As Sir Patrick had nearly reached the bottom of the steep, he too observed a large wolf making up the hill. The animal came at a lagging pace, and was evidently much blown. Hepborne hurled his hunting-spear at him without a moment’s delay, wounding him desperately in the neck; and, eager to make sure of him with his anelace, rushed forward, without perceiving a sudden declivity, where there was a little precipitous face of rock, over which he fell headlong, and rolling downwards his head came in contact with the trunk of an oak, at the foot of which he lay stunned and senseless. The wolf, writhing for sometime with the agony of the wound he had received, succeeded at last in extricating himself from the spearhead, and then observing the man from whose hand he had received it, lying at his mercy on the ground near him, he was about to take instant vengeance on him, when he was suddenly called on to defend himself against a new assailant.
This was no other than poor Flo, who, having followed his master’s track as fast as his old legs could carry him, came up at the very moment the gaunt animal was about to fasten his jaws on him. His ancient spirit grew young within him as he beheld his master’s danger. He sprang on the wolf with an energy and fury which no one who had seen him that morning could have believed him capable of, and, seizing his ferocious adversary by the throat, a bloody combat ensued between them.
Hepborne having gradually recovered from his swoon, and hearing the noise of the fight, roused himself, and, getting upon his legs, beheld with astonishment the miraculous exertions his faithful dog was making in his defence, and the deadly strife that was waging between him and the wolf. The fierce and powerful animal was much an overmatch for the good allounde, who had already received some dreadful bites, but still fought with unabated resolution. Hepborne ran to his rescue, and burying his anelace in the wolf’s body, killed him outright. But his help came too late for poor old Flo, who licked the kind hand that was stretched out to succour and caress him, and, turning upon his side, raised his dim eyes towards his master’s face, and slowly closed them in death.
Hepborne lifted him up, all streaming with blood, and, carrying him to a fountain a few paces off, bathed his head and his gaping wounds, with the vain hope that the water might revive him; but life was extinct. Sir Patrick laid him on the ground, and wept over him as if he had been a friend.
The sound of the horns now came nearer, the yell of the dogs approached, and by and by some of the hounds appeared, and ran in upon their already inanimate prey. Immediately behind them came Sir Patrick Hepborne the elder, a powerful, noble-looking man, in full vigour of life, mounted on a gallant grey, and with a crowd of foresters at his back. He took off his hunting hat to wipe his brow as he halted, and though he displayed a bald forehead, the hinder part of his head was covered with luxuriant black hair, on which age’s winter had not yet shed a single particle of snow. His beard and moustaches were of the same raven hue; and his eyes, though mild, were lofty and penetrating in their expression.
“How now, young man,” said he to his son, as he reined up his steed, “what, hast thou killed the wolf?”
“My father!” cried the younger Sir Patrick, starting up and running to his stirrup.
“My son!” exclaimed the delighted and astonished Sir Patrick the elder; and, vaulting from his horse, they were immediately locked in each other’s arms.
It was some minutes before either father or son could articulate anything but broken sentences. The minds of both reverted to the overwhelming loss they had sustained since they last saw each other, and they both wept bitterly.
“My dear boy, forgive me,” said the father; “but these tears are—we have lost—but yet I see thou hast already gathered the sad intelligence. ’Tis now three months—Oh, bitter affliction!—but she is a saint above, my dear Patrick.”
Again they enclasped each other, and, giving way to their feelings, the two warriors wept on each other’s bosoms, till the rude group of foresters around them were melted into tears at the spectacle. Sir Patrick the elder was the first to regain command of himself, and the first use he made of the power of speech was to put a thousand questions to his son. The younger knight satisfied him as to everything, and concluded by giving him the history of his accident, and the glorious but afflicting death of his faithful old allounde.
“Poor fellow,” said the elder Sir Patrick, going up to the spot where he lay, and dropping a tear of gratitude over him—“poor fellow, he has died as a hero ought to do—nobly, in stark stoure in the field. Let him be forthwith yirded, dost hear me, on the spot where he fell; I shall have a stone erected over him, in grateful memorial of his having died for his master.”
Some of the foresters, who had implements for digging out the vermin of the chase, instantly executed this command, and the two knights tarried until they had themselves laid his body in the grave dug for him.
“And now let us go look for Isabelle and thy friend Sir John Assueton,” said the elder Sir Patrick. “Sound thy bugles, my merry men, and let us down to the broad-lawnde, where we shall have the best chance of meeting.”
They had no sooner entered the beautiful glade among the woods alluded to by the elder knight, than the younger Sir Patrick descried his sister, the Lady Isabelle, coming riding on her palfrey, and his friend Assueton leading her bridle-rein. He ran forward to embrace her, and she, instantly recognizing him, sprang from the saddle into his arms. The meeting between the brother and sister was rendered as affecting by the remembrance of the loss of their mother, as that of the father and son had been. But the elder Sir Patrick having mastered his feelings, soon contributed to soothe theirs. The younger Sir Patrick introduced his friend Assueton to his father, and after their compliments of courtesy were made, the adventures of both parties detailed, and mutual congratulations had taken place between them—
“Come,” said the elder Sir Patrick, “come Isabelle, get thee to horse again, and let us straightway to the Castle. The welkin reddens i’ the west, and the sun is about to hide his head among yonder amber clouds; let us to the Castle, I say. I trow we shall have enow of food for talk for the rest of the evening. We shall have the spoils of these wolves hung up in the hall, in memorial of the strange events of this day—of the gallantry of the Lady Isabelle, who so nobly rescued Sir John Assueton, and of the courage and fidelity of the attached old allounde Flo, who so nobly died in defence of his master.”
The bugles sounded a mot, and the elder Sir Patrick, with his son walking by his side, moved forward at the head of the troop. The Lady Isabelle sprang into her saddle, and Sir John Assueton, never choosing to resign the reign he had grasped, led her palfrey as before, and again glided into the same train of conversation with her which he had formerly found so fascinating. The foresters, grooms, and churls who formed the hunting suite, some on foot and others on horseback, armed with every variety of hunting-gear, followed in the rear of march, and in this order they returned to the Castle.