Ivanhoe: A Romance
world of pleasure opens to thee—to me a new career of fame. Let them
speak the doom which I despise, and erase the name of Bois-Guilbert
from their list of monastic slaves! I will wash out with blood whatever
blot they may dare to cast on my scutcheon.”
“Tempter,” said Rebecca, “begone!—Not in this last extremity canst thou
move me one hair’s-breadth from my resting place—surrounded as I am by
foes, I hold thee as my worst and most deadly enemy—avoid thee, in the
name of God!”
Albert Malvoisin, alarmed and impatient at the duration of their
conference, now advanced to interrupt it.
“Hath the maiden acknowledged her guilt?” he demanded of Bois-Guilbert;
“or is she resolute in her denial?”
“She is indeed resolute,” said Bois-Guilbert.
“Then,” said Malvoisin, “must thou, noble brother, resume thy place to
attend the issue—The shades are changing on the circle of the
dial—Come, brave Bois-Guilbert—come, thou hope of our holy Order, and
soon to be its head.”
As he spoke in this soothing tone, he laid his hand on the knight’s
bridle, as if to lead him back to his station.
“False villain! what meanest thou by thy hand on my rein?” said Sir
Brian, angrily. And shaking off his companion’s grasp, he rode back to
the upper end of the lists.
“There is yet spirit in him,” said Malvoisin apart to Mont-Fitchet,
“were it well directed—but, like the Greek fire, it burns whatever
approaches it.”
The Judges had now been two hours in the lists, awaiting in vain the
appearance of a champion.
“And reason good,” said Friar Tuck, “seeing she is a Jewess—and yet, by
mine Order, it is hard that so young and beautiful a creature should
perish without one blow being struck in her behalf! Were she ten times
a witch, provided she were but the least bit of a Christian, my
quarter-staff should ring noon on the steel cap of yonder fierce
Templar, ere he carried the matter off thus.”
It was, however, the general belief that no one could or would appear
for a Jewess, accused of sorcery; and the knights, instigated by
Malvoisin, whispered to each other, that it was time to declare the
pledge of Rebecca forfeited. At this instant a knight, urging his horse
to speed, appeared on the plain advancing towards the lists. A hundred
voices exclaimed, “A champion! a champion!” And despite the
prepossessions and prejudices of the multitude, they shouted
unanimously as the knight rode into the tiltyard. The second glance,
however, served to destroy the hope that his timely arrival had
excited. His horse, urged for many miles to its utmost speed, appeared
to reel from fatigue, and the rider, however undauntedly he presented
himself in the lists, either from weakness, weariness, or both, seemed
scarce able to support himself in the saddle.
To the summons of the herald, who demanded his rank, his name, and
purpose, the stranger knight answered readily and boldly, “I am a good
knight and noble, come hither to sustain with lance and sword the just
and lawful quarrel of this damsel, Rebecca, daughter of Isaac of York;
to uphold the doom pronounced against her to be false and truthless,
and to defy Sir Brian de Bois-Guilbert, as a traitor, murderer, and
liar; as I will prove in this field with my body against his, by the
aid of God, of Our Lady, and of Monseigneur Saint George, the good
knight.”
“The stranger must first show,” said Malvoisin, “that he is good
knight, and of honourable lineage. The Temple sendeth not forth her
champions against nameless men.”
“My name,” said the Knight, raising his helmet, “is better known, my
lineage more pure, Malvoisin, than thine own. I am Wilfred of Ivanhoe.”
“I will not fight with thee at present,” said the Templar, in a changed
and hollow voice. “Get thy wounds healed, purvey thee a better horse,
and it may be I will hold it worth my while to scourge out of thee this
boyish spirit of bravado.”
“Ha! proud Templar,” said Ivanhoe, “hast thou forgotten that twice
didst thou fall before this lance? Remember the lists at Acre—remember
the Passage of Arms at Ashby—remember thy proud vaunt in the halls of
Rotherwood, and the gage of your gold chain against my reliquary, that
thou wouldst do battle with Wilfred of Ivanhoe, and recover the honour
thou hadst lost! By that reliquary and the holy relic it contains, I
will proclaim thee, Templar, a coward in every court in Europe—in every
Preceptory of thine Order—unless thou do battle without farther delay.”
Bois-Guilbert turned his countenance irresolutely towards Rebecca, and
then exclaimed, looking fiercely at Ivanhoe, “Dog of a Saxon! take thy
lance, and prepare for the death thou hast drawn upon thee!”
“Does the Grand Master allow me the combat?” said Ivanhoe.
“I may not deny what thou hast challenged,” said the Grand Master,
“provided the maiden accepts thee as her champion. Yet I would thou
wert in better plight to do battle. An enemy of our Order hast thou
ever been, yet would I have thee honourably met with.”
“Thus—thus as I am, and not otherwise,” said Ivanhoe; “it is the
judgment of God—to his keeping I commend myself.—Rebecca,” said he,
riding up to the fatal chair, “dost thou accept of me for thy
champion?”
“I do,” she said—“I do,” fluttered by an emotion which the fear of
death had been unable to produce, “I do accept thee as the champion
whom Heaven hath sent me. Yet, no—no—thy wounds are uncured—Meet not
that proud man—why shouldst thou perish also?”
But Ivanhoe was already at his post, and had closed his visor, and
assumed his lance. Bois-Guilbert did the same; and his esquire
remarked, as he clasped his visor, that his face, which had,
notwithstanding the variety of emotions by which he had been agitated,
continued during the whole morning of an ashy paleness, was now become
suddenly very much flushed.
The herald, then, seeing each champion in his place, uplifted his
voice, repeating thrice—“Faites vos devoirs, preux chevaliers!” After
the third cry, he withdrew to one side of the lists, and again
proclaimed, that none, on peril of instant death, should dare, by word,
cry, or action, to interfere with or disturb this fair field of combat.
The Grand Master, who held in his hand the gage of battle, Rebecca’s
glove, now threw it into the lists, and pronounced the fatal signal
words, “Laissez aller”.
The trumpets sounded, and the knights charged each other in full
career. The wearied horse of Ivanhoe, and its no less exhausted rider,
went down, as all had expected, before the well-aimed lance and
vigorous steed of the Templar. This issue of the combat all had
foreseen; but although the spear of Ivanhoe did but, in comparison,
touch the shield of Bois-Guilbert, that champion, to the astonishment
of all who beheld it reeled in his saddle, lost his stirrups, and fell
in the lists.
Ivanhoe, extricating himself from his fallen horse, was soon on foot,
hastening to mend his fortune with his sword; but his antagonist arose
not. Wilfred, placing his foot on his breast, and the sword’s point to
his throat, commanded him to yield him, or die on the spot.
Bois-Guilbert returned no answer.
“Slay him not, Sir Knight,” cried the Grand Master, “unshriven and
unabsolved—kill not body and soul! We allow him vanquished.”
He descended into the lists, and commanded them to unhelm the conquered
champion. His eyes were closed—the dark red flush was still on his
brow. As they looked on him in astonishment, the eyes opened—but they
were fixed and glazed. The flush passed from his brow, and gave way to
the pallid hue of death. Unscathed by the lance of his enemy, he had
died a victim to the violence of his own contending passions.
“This is indeed the judgment of God,” said the Grand Master, looking
upwards—“‘Fiat voluntas tua!’”
CHAPTER XLIV
So! now ’tis ended, like an old wife’s story.
WEBSTER
When the first moments of surprise were over, Wilfred of Ivanhoe
demanded of the Grand Master, as judge of the field, if he had manfully
and rightfully done his duty in the combat? “Manfully and rightfully
hath it been done,” said the Grand Master. “I pronounce the maiden free
and guiltless—The arms and the body of the deceased knight are at the
will of the victor.”
“I will not despoil him of his weapons,” said the Knight of Ivanhoe,
“nor condemn his corpse to shame—he hath fought for Christendom—God’s
arm, no human hand, hath this day struck him down. But let his
obsequies be private, as becomes those of a man who died in an unjust
quarrel.—And for the maiden—”
He was interrupted by a clattering of horses’ feet, advancing in such
numbers, and so rapidly, as to shake the ground before them; and the
Black Knight galloped into the lists. He was followed by a numerous
band of men-at-arms, and several knights in complete armour.
“I am too late,” he said, looking around him. “I had doomed
Bois-Guilbert for mine own property.—Ivanhoe, was this well, to take on
thee such a venture, and thou scarce able to keep thy saddle?”
“Heaven, my Liege,” answered Ivanhoe, “hath taken this proud man for
its victim. He was not to be honoured in dying as your will had
designed.”
“Peace be with him,” said Richard, looking steadfastly on the corpse,
“if it may be so—he was a gallant knight, and has died in his steel
harness full knightly. But we must waste no time—Bohun, do thine
office!”
A Knight stepped forward from the King’s attendants, and, laying his
hand on the shoulder of Albert de Malvoisin, said, “I arrest thee of
High Treason.”
The Grand Master had hitherto stood astonished at the appearance of so
many warriors.—He now spoke.
“Who dares to arrest a Knight of the Temple of Zion, within the girth
of his own Preceptory, and in the presence of the Grand Master? and by
whose authority is this bold outrage offered?”
“I make the arrest,” replied the Knight—“I, Henry Bohun, Earl of Essex,
Lord High Constable of England.”
“And he arrests Malvoisin,” said the King, raising his visor, “by the
order of Richard Plantagenet, here present.—Conrade Mont-Fitchet, it is
well for thee thou art born no subject of mine.—But for thee,
Malvoisin, thou diest with thy brother Philip, ere the world be a week
older.”
“I will resist thy doom,” said the Grand Master.
“Proud Templar,” said the King, “thou canst not—look up, and behold the
Royal Standard of England floats over thy towers instead of thy Temple
banner!—Be wise, Beaumanoir, and make no bootless opposition—Thy hand
is in the lion’s mouth.”
“I will appeal to Rome against thee,” said the Grand Master, “for
usurpation on the immunities and privileges of our Order.”
“Be it so,” said the King; “but for thine own sake tax me not with
usurpation now. Dissolve thy Chapter, and depart with thy followers to
thy next Preceptory, (if thou canst find one), which has not been made
the scene of treasonable conspiracy against the King of England—Or, if
thou wilt, remain, to share our hospitality, and behold our justice.”
“To be a guest in the house where I should command?” said the Templar;
“never!—Chaplains, raise the Psalm, ‘Quare fremuerunt Gentes?’—Knights,
squires, and followers of the Holy Temple, prepare to follow the banner
of ‘Beau-seant!’”
The Grand Master spoke with a dignity which confronted even that of
England’s king himself, and inspired courage into his surprised and
dismayed followers. They gathered around him like the sheep around the
watch-dog, when they hear the baying of the wolf. But they evinced not
the timidity of the scared flock—there were dark brows of defiance, and
looks which menaced the hostility they dared not to proffer in words.
They drew together in a dark line of spears, from which the white
cloaks of the knights were visible among the dusky garments of their