Ivanhoe: A Romance
he dragged out of a recess a bundle of forage, which he spread before
the knight’s charger, and immediately afterwards shook down a quantity
of dried fern in the corner which he had assigned for the rider’s
couch. The knight returned him thanks for his courtesy; and, this duty
done, both resumed their seats by the table, whereon stood the trencher
of pease placed between them. The hermit, after a long grace, which had
once been Latin, but of which original language few traces remained,
excepting here and there the long rolling termination of some word or
phrase, set example to his guest, by modestly putting into a very large
mouth, furnished with teeth which might have ranked with those of a
boar both in sharpness and whiteness, some three or four dried pease, a
miserable grist as it seemed for so large and able a mill.
The knight, in order to follow so laudable an example, laid aside his
helmet, his corslet, and the greater part of his armour, and showed to
the hermit a head thick-curled with yellow hair, high features, blue
eyes, remarkably bright and sparkling, a mouth well formed, having an
upper lip clothed with mustachoes darker than his hair, and bearing
altogether the look of a bold, daring, and enterprising man, with which
his strong form well corresponded.
The hermit, as if wishing to answer to the confidence of his guest,
threw back his cowl, and showed a round bullet head belonging to a man
in the prime of life. His close-shaven crown, surrounded by a circle of
stiff curled black hair, had something the appearance of a parish
pinfold begirt by its high hedge. The features expressed nothing of
monastic austerity, or of ascetic privations; on the contrary, it was a
bold bluff countenance, with broad black eyebrows, a well-turned
forehead, and cheeks as round and vermilion as those of a trumpeter,
from which descended a long and curly black beard. Such a visage,
joined to the brawny form of the holy man, spoke rather of sirloins and
haunches, than of pease and pulse. This incongruity did not escape the
guest. After he had with great difficulty accomplished the mastication
of a mouthful of the dried pease, he found it absolutely necessary to
request his pious entertainer to furnish him with some liquor; who
replied to his request by placing before him a large can of the purest
water from the fountain.
“It is from the well of St Dunstan,” said he, “in which, betwixt sun
and sun, he baptized five hundred heathen Danes and Britons—blessed be
his name!” And applying his black beard to the pitcher, he took a
draught much more moderate in quantity than his encomium seemed to
warrant.
“It seems to me, reverend father,” said the knight, “that the small
morsels which you eat, together with this holy, but somewhat thin
beverage, have thriven with you marvellously. You appear a man more fit
to win the ram at a wrestling match, or the ring at a bout at
quarter-staff, or the bucklers at a sword-play, than to linger out your
time in this desolate wilderness, saying masses, and living upon
parched pease and cold water.”
“Sir Knight,” answered the hermit, “your thoughts, like those of the
ignorant laity, are according to the flesh. It has pleased Our Lady and
my patron saint to bless the pittance to which I restrain myself, even
as the pulse and water was blessed to the children Shadrach, Meshech,
and Abednego, who drank the same rather than defile themselves with the
wine and meats which were appointed them by the King of the Saracens.”
“Holy father,” said the knight, “upon whose countenance it hath pleased
Heaven to work such a miracle, permit a sinful layman to crave thy
name?”
“Thou mayst call me,” answered the hermit, “the Clerk of Copmanhurst,
for so I am termed in these parts—They add, it is true, the epithet
holy, but I stand not upon that, as being unworthy of such
addition.—And now, valiant knight, may I pray ye for the name of my
honourable guest?”
“Truly,” said the knight, “Holy Clerk of Copmanhurst, men call me in
these parts the Black Knight,—many, sir, add to it the epithet of
Sluggard, whereby I am no way ambitious to be distinguished.”
The hermit could scarcely forbear from smiling at his guest’s reply.
“I see,” said he, “Sir Sluggish Knight, that thou art a man of prudence
and of counsel; and moreover, I see that my poor monastic fare likes
thee not, accustomed, perhaps, as thou hast been, to the license of
courts and of camps, and the luxuries of cities; and now I bethink me,
Sir Sluggard, that when the charitable keeper of this forest-walk left
those dogs for my protection, and also those bundles of forage, he left
me also some food, which, being unfit for my use, the very recollection
of it had escaped me amid my more weighty meditations.”
“I dare be sworn he did so,” said the knight; “I was convinced that
there was better food in the cell, Holy Clerk, since you first doffed
your cowl.—Your keeper is ever a jovial fellow; and none who beheld thy
grinders contending with these pease, and thy throat flooded with this
ungenial element, could see thee doomed to such horse-provender and
horse-beverage,” (pointing to the provisions upon the table,) “and
refrain from mending thy cheer. Let us see the keeper’s bounty,
therefore, without delay.”
The hermit cast a wistful look upon the knight, in which there was a
sort of comic expression of hesitation, as if uncertain how far he
should act prudently in trusting his guest. There was, however, as much
of bold frankness in the knight’s countenance as was possible to be
expressed by features. His smile, too, had something in it irresistibly
comic, and gave an assurance of faith and loyalty, with which his host
could not refrain from sympathizing.
After exchanging a mute glance or two, the hermit went to the further
side of the hut, and opened a hutch, which was concealed with great
care and some ingenuity. Out of the recesses of a dark closet, into
which this aperture gave admittance, he brought a large pasty, baked in
a pewter platter of unusual dimensions. This mighty dish he placed
before his guest, who, using his poniard to cut it open, lost no time
in making himself acquainted with its contents.
“How long is it since the good keeper has been here?” said the knight
to his host, after having swallowed several hasty morsels of this
reinforcement to the hermit’s good cheer.
“About two months,” answered the father hastily.
“By the true Lord,” answered the knight, “every thing in your hermitage
is miraculous, Holy Clerk! for I would have been sworn that the fat
buck which furnished this venison had been running on foot within the
week.”
The hermit was somewhat discountenanced by this observation; and,
moreover, he made but a poor figure while gazing on the diminution of
the pasty, on which his guest was making desperate inroads; a warfare
in which his previous profession of abstinence left him no pretext for
joining.
“I have been in Palestine, Sir Clerk,” said the knight, stopping short
of a sudden, “and I bethink me it is a custom there that every host who
entertains a guest shall assure him of the wholesomeness of his food,
by partaking of it along with him. Far be it from me to suspect so holy
a man of aught inhospitable; nevertheless I will be highly bound to you
would you comply with this Eastern custom.”
“To ease your unnecessary scruples, Sir Knight, I will for once depart
from my rule,” replied the hermit. And as there were no forks in those
days, his clutches were instantly in the bowels of the pasty.
The ice of ceremony being once broken, it seemed matter of rivalry
between the guest and the entertainer which should display the best
appetite; and although the former had probably fasted longest, yet the
hermit fairly surpassed him.
“Holy Clerk,” said the knight, when his hunger was appeased, “I would
gage my good horse yonder against a zecchin, that that same honest
keeper to whom we are obliged for the venison has left thee a stoup of
wine, or a runlet of canary, or some such trifle, by way of ally to
this noble pasty. This would be a circumstance, doubtless, totally
unworthy to dwell in the memory of so rigid an anchorite; yet, I think,
were you to search yonder crypt once more, you would find that I am
right in my conjecture.”
The hermit only replied by a grin; and returning to the hutch, he
produced a leathern bottle, which might contain about four quarts. He
also brought forth two large drinking cups, made out of the horn of the
urus, and hooped with silver. Having made this goodly provision for
washing down the supper, he seemed to think no farther ceremonious
scruple necessary on his part; but filling both cups, and saying, in
the Saxon fashion, “‘Waes hael’, Sir Sluggish Knight!” he emptied his
own at a draught.
“‘Drink hael’, Holy Clerk of Copmanhurst!” answered the warrior, and
did his host reason in a similar brimmer.
“Holy Clerk,” said the stranger, after the first cup was thus
swallowed, “I cannot but marvel that a man possessed of such thews and
sinews as thine, and who therewithal shows the talent of so goodly a
trencher-man, should think of abiding by himself in this wilderness. In
my judgment, you are fitter to keep a castle or a fort, eating of the
fat and drinking of the strong, than to live here upon pulse and water,
or even upon the charity of the keeper. At least, were I as thou, I
should find myself both disport and plenty out of the king’s deer.
There is many a goodly herd in these forests, and a buck will never be
missed that goes to the use of Saint Dunstan’s chaplain.”
“Sir Sluggish Knight,” replied the Clerk, “these are dangerous words,
and I pray you to forbear them. I am true hermit to the king and law,
and were I to spoil my liege’s game, I should be sure of the prison,
and, an my gown saved me not, were in some peril of hanging.”
“Nevertheless, were I as thou,” said the knight, “I would take my walk
by moonlight, when foresters and keepers were warm in bed, and ever and
anon,—as I pattered my prayers,—I would let fly a shaft among the herds
of dun deer that feed in the glades—Resolve me, Holy Clerk, hast thou
never practised such a pastime?”
“Friend Sluggard,” answered the hermit, “thou hast seen all that can
concern thee of my housekeeping, and something more than he deserves
who takes up his quarters by violence. Credit me, it is better to enjoy
the good which God sends thee, than to be impertinently curious how it
comes. Fill thy cup, and welcome; and do not, I pray thee, by further
impertinent enquiries, put me to show that thou couldst hardly have
made good thy lodging had I been earnest to oppose thee.”
“By my faith,” said the knight, “thou makest me more curious than ever!
Thou art the most mysterious hermit I ever met; and I will know more of
thee ere we part. As for thy threats, know, holy man, thou speakest to
one whose trade it is to find out danger wherever it is to be met
with.”
“Sir Sluggish Knight, I drink to thee,” said the hermit; “respecting
thy valour much, but deeming wondrous slightly of thy discretion. If
thou wilt take equal arms with me, I will give thee, in all friendship
and brotherly love, such sufficing penance and complete absolution,
that thou shalt not for the next twelve months sin the sin of excess of
curiosity.”
The knight pledged him, and desired him to name his weapons.
“There is none,” replied the hermit, “from the scissors of Delilah, and
the tenpenny nail of Jael, to the scimitar of Goliath, at which I am
not a match for thee—But, if I am to make the election, what sayst
thou, good friend, to these trinkets?”
Thus speaking, he opened another hutch, and took out from it a couple
of broadswords and bucklers, such as were used by the yeomanry of the