Ivanhoe: A Romance
war is a changeful mistress, and a home is sometimes desirable even to
the champion whose trade is wandering. Thou hast earned one in the
halls of Rotherwood, noble knight. Cedric has wealth enough to repair
the injuries of fortune, and all he has is his deliverer’s—Come,
therefore, to Rotherwood, not as a guest, but as a son or brother.”
“Cedric has already made me rich,” said the Knight,—“he has taught me
the value of Saxon virtue. To Rotherwood will I come, brave Saxon, and
that speedily; but, as now, pressing matters of moment detain me from
your halls. Peradventure when I come hither, I will ask such a boon as
will put even thy generosity to the test.”
“It is granted ere spoken out,” said Cedric, striking his ready hand
into the gauntleted palm of the Black Knight,—“it is granted already,
were it to affect half my fortune.”
“Gage not thy promise so lightly,” said the Knight of the Fetterlock;
“yet well I hope to gain the boon I shall ask. Meanwhile, adieu.”
“I have but to say,” added the Saxon, “that, during the funeral rites
of the noble Athelstane, I shall be an inhabitant of the halls of his
castle of Coningsburgh—They will be open to all who choose to partake
of the funeral banqueting; and, I speak in name of the noble Edith,
mother of the fallen prince, they will never be shut against him who
laboured so bravely, though unsuccessfully, to save Athelstane from
Norman chains and Norman steel.”
“Ay, ay,” said Wamba, who had resumed his attendance on his master,
“rare feeding there will be—pity that the noble Athelstane cannot
banquet at his own funeral.—But he,” continued the Jester, lifting up
his eyes gravely, “is supping in Paradise, and doubtless does honour to
the cheer.”
“Peace, and move on,” said Cedric, his anger at this untimely jest
being checked by the recollection of Wamba’s recent services. Rowena
waved a graceful adieu to him of the Fetterlock—the Saxon bade God
speed him, and on they moved through a wide glade of the forest.
They had scarce departed, ere a sudden procession moved from under the
greenwood branches, swept slowly round the silvan amphitheatre, and
took the same direction with Rowena and her followers. The priests of a
neighbouring convent, in expectation of the ample donation, or
“soul-scat”, which Cedric had propined, attended upon the car in which
the body of Athelstane was laid, and sang hymns as it was sadly and
slowly borne on the shoulders of his vassals to his castle of
Coningsburgh, to be there deposited in the grave of Hengist, from whom
the deceased derived his long descent. Many of his vassals had
assembled at the news of his death, and followed the bier with all the
external marks, at least, of dejection and sorrow. Again the outlaws
arose, and paid the same rude and spontaneous homage to death, which
they had so lately rendered to beauty—the slow chant and mournful step
of the priests brought back to their remembrance such of their comrades
as had fallen in the yesterday’s array. But such recollections dwell
not long with those who lead a life of danger and enterprise, and ere
the sound of the death-hymn had died on the wind, the outlaws were
again busied in the distribution of their spoil.
“Valiant knight,” said Locksley to the Black Champion, “without whose
good heart and mighty arm our enterprise must altogether have failed,
will it please you to take from that mass of spoil whatever may best
serve to pleasure you, and to remind you of this my Trysting-tree?”
“I accept the offer,” said the Knight, “as frankly as it is given; and
I ask permission to dispose of Sir Maurice de Bracy at my own
pleasure.”
“He is thine already,” said Locksley, “and well for him! else the
tyrant had graced the highest bough of this oak, with as many of his
Free-Companions as we could gather, hanging thick as acorns around
him.—But he is thy prisoner, and he is safe, though he had slain my
father.”
“De Bracy,” said the Knight, “thou art free—depart. He whose prisoner
thou art scorns to take mean revenge for what is past. But beware of
the future, lest a worse thing befall thee.—Maurice de Bracy, I say
BEWARE!”
De Bracy bowed low and in silence, and was about to withdraw, when the
yeomen burst at once into a shout of execration and derision. The proud
knight instantly stopped, turned back, folded his arms, drew up his
form to its full height, and exclaimed, “Peace, ye yelping curs! who
open upon a cry which ye followed not when the stag was at bay—De Bracy
scorns your censure as he would disdain your applause. To your brakes
and caves, ye outlawed thieves! and be silent when aught knightly or
noble is but spoken within a league of your fox-earths.”
This ill-timed defiance might have procured for De Bracy a volley of
arrows, but for the hasty and imperative interference of the outlaw
Chief. Meanwhile the knight caught a horse by the rein, for several
which had been taken in the stables of Front-de-Bœuf stood accoutred
around, and were a valuable part of the booty. He threw himself upon
the saddle, and galloped off through the wood.
When the bustle occasioned by this incident was somewhat composed, the
chief Outlaw took from his neck the rich horn and baldric which he had
recently gained at the strife of archery near Ashby.
“Noble knight.” he said to him of the Fetterlock, “if you disdain not
to grace by your acceptance a bugle which an English yeoman has once
worn, this I will pray you to keep as a memorial of your gallant
bearing—and if ye have aught to do, and, as happeneth oft to a gallant
knight, ye chance to be hard bested in any forest between Trent and
Tees, wind three mots 42 upon the horn thus, ‘Wa-sa-hoa!’ and it may
well chance ye shall find helpers and rescue.”
He then gave breath to the bugle, and winded once and again the call
which he described, until the knight had caught the notes.
“Gramercy for the gift, bold yeoman,” said the Knight; “and better help
than thine and thy rangers would I never seek, were it at my utmost
need.” And then in his turn he winded the call till all the greenwood
rang.
“Well blown and clearly,” said the yeoman; “beshrew me an thou knowest
not as much of woodcraft as of war!—thou hast been a striker of deer in
thy day, I warrant.—Comrades, mark these three mots—it is the call of
the Knight of the Fetterlock; and he who hears it, and hastens not to
serve him at his need, I will have him scourged out of our band with
his own bowstring.”
“Long live our leader!” shouted the yeomen, “and long live the Black
Knight of the Fetterlock!—May he soon use our service, to prove how
readily it will be paid.”
Locksley now proceeded to the distribution of the spoil, which he
performed with the most laudable impartiality. A tenth part of the
whole was set apart for the church, and for pious uses; a portion was
next allotted to a sort of public treasury; a part was assigned to the
widows and children of those who had fallen, or to be expended in
masses for the souls of such as had left no surviving family. The rest
was divided amongst the outlaws, according to their rank and merit, and
the judgment of the Chief, on all such doubtful questions as occurred,
was delivered with great shrewdness, and received with absolute
submission. The Black Knight was not a little surprised to find that
men, in a state so lawless, were nevertheless among themselves so
regularly and equitably governed, and all that he observed added to his
opinion of the justice and judgment of their leader.
When each had taken his own proportion of the booty, and while the
treasurer, accompanied by four tall yeomen, was transporting that
belonging to the state to some place of concealment or of security, the
portion devoted to the church still remained unappropriated.
“I would,” said the leader, “we could hear tidings of our joyous
chaplain—he was never wont to be absent when meat was to be blessed, or
spoil to be parted; and it is his duty to take care of these the tithes
of our successful enterprise. It may be the office has helped to cover
some of his canonical irregularities. Also, I have a holy brother of
his a prisoner at no great distance, and I would fain have the Friar to
help me to deal with him in due sort—I greatly misdoubt the safety of
the bluff priest.”
“I were right sorry for that,” said the Knight of the Fetterlock, “for
I stand indebted to him for the joyous hospitality of a merry night in
his cell. Let us to the ruins of the castle; it may be we shall there
learn some tidings of him.”
While they thus spoke, a loud shout among the yeomen announced the
arrival of him for whom they feared, as they learned from the
stentorian voice of the Friar himself, long before they saw his burly
person.
“Make room, my merry-men!” he exclaimed; “room for your godly father
and his prisoner—Cry welcome once more.—I come, noble leader, like an
eagle with my prey in my clutch.”—And making his way through the ring,
amidst the laughter of all around, he appeared in majestic triumph, his
huge partisan in one hand, and in the other a halter, one end of which
was fastened to the neck of the unfortunate Isaac of York, who, bent
down by sorrow and terror, was dragged on by the victorious priest, who
shouted aloud, “Where is Allan-a-Dale, to chronicle me in a ballad, or
if it were but a lay?—By Saint Hermangild, the jingling crowder is ever
out of the way where there is an apt theme for exalting valour!”
“Curtal Priest,” said the Captain, “thou hast been at a wet mass this
morning, as early as it is. In the name of Saint Nicholas, whom hast
thou got here?”
“A captive to my sword and to my lance, noble Captain,” replied the
Clerk of Copmanhurst; “to my bow and to my halberd, I should rather
say; and yet I have redeemed him by my divinity from a worse captivity.
Speak, Jew—have I not ransomed thee from Sathanas?—have I not taught
thee thy ‘credo’, thy ‘pater’, and thine ‘Ave Maria’?—Did I not spend
the whole night in drinking to thee, and in expounding of mysteries?”
“For the love of God!” ejaculated the poor Jew, “will no one take me
out of the keeping of this mad—I mean this holy man?”
“How’s this, Jew?” said the Friar, with a menacing aspect; “dost thou
recant, Jew?—Bethink thee, if thou dost relapse into thine infidelity,
though thou are not so tender as a suckling pig—I would I had one to
break my fast upon—thou art not too tough to be roasted! Be
conformable, Isaac, and repeat the words after me. ‘Ave Maria’!—”
“Nay, we will have no profanation, mad Priest,” said Locksley; “let us
rather hear where you found this prisoner of thine.”
“By Saint Dunstan,” said the Friar, “I found him where I sought for
better ware! I did step into the cellarage to see what might be rescued
there; for though a cup of burnt wine, with spice, be an evening’s
drought for an emperor, it were waste, methought, to let so much good
liquor be mulled at once; and I had caught up one runlet of sack, and
was coming to call more aid among these lazy knaves, who are ever to
seek when a good deed is to be done, when I was avised of a strong
door—Aha! thought I, here is the choicest juice of all in this secret
crypt; and the knave butler, being disturbed in his vocation, hath left
the key in the door—In therefore I went, and found just nought besides
a commodity of rusted chains and this dog of a Jew, who presently
rendered himself my prisoner, rescue or no rescue. I did but refresh
myself after the fatigue of the action, with the unbeliever, with one
humming cup of sack, and was proceeding to lead forth my captive, when,
crash after crash, as with wild thunder-dint and levin-fire, down
toppled the masonry of an outer tower, (marry beshrew their hands that
built it not the firmer!) and blocked up the passage. The roar of one