Ivanhoe by Walter Scott (world best books to read .TXT) 📖

the good steed and the rich armour, which leaves me

not a guilder’s profit, have you money to pay me?”

“Barely,” said Gurth, though the sum demanded was more reasonable

than he expected, “and it will leave my master nigh penniless.

Nevertheless, if such be your least offer, I must be content.”

“Fill thyself another goblet of wine,” said the Jew. “Ah! eighty

zecchins is too little. It leaveth no profit for the usages of

the moneys; and, besides, the good horse may have suffered wrong

in this day’s encounter. O, it was a hard and a dangerous

meeting! man and steed rushing on each other like wild bulls of

Bashan! The horse cannot but have had wrong.”

“And I say,” replied Gurth, “he is sound, wind and limb; and you

may see him now, in your stable. And I say, over and above, that

seventy zecchins is enough for the armour, and I hope a

Christian’s word is as good as a Jew’s. If you will not take

seventy, I will carry this bag” (and he shook it till the

contents jingled) “back to my master.”

“Nay, nay!” said Isaac; “lay down the talents---the shekels---the

eighty zecchins, and thou shalt see I will consider thee

liberally.”

Gurth at length complied; and telling out eighty zecchins upon

the table, the Jew delivered out to him an acquittance for the

horse and suit of armour. The Jew’s hand trembled for joy as he

wrapped up the first seventy pieces of gold. The last ten he

told over with much deliberation, pausing, and saying something

as he took each piece from the table, and dropt it into his

purse. It seemed as if his avarice were struggling with his

better nature, and compelling him to pouch zecchin after zecchin

while his generosity urged him to restore some part at least to

his benefactor, or as a donation to his agent. His whole speech

ran nearly thus:

“Seventy-one---seventy-two; thy master is a good youth

---seventy-three, an excellent youth---seventy-four---that piece

hath been clipt within the ring---seventy-five---and that looketh

light of weight ---seventy-six---when thy master wants money, let

him come to Isaac of York---seventy-seven---that is, with

reasonable security.” Here he made a considerable pause, and

Gurth had good hope that the last three pieces might escape the

fate of their comrades; but the enumeration proceeded.

---“Seventy-eight---thou art a good fellow---seventy-nine---and

deservest something for thyself------”

Here the Jew paused again, and looked at the last zecchin,

intending, doubtless, to bestow it upon Gurth. He weighed it

upon the tip of his finger, and made it ring by dropping it upon

the table. Had it rung too flat, or had it felt a hair’s breadth

too light, generosity had carried the day; but, unhappily for

Gurth, the chime was full and true, the zecchin plump, newly

coined, and a grain above weight. Isaac could not find in his

heart to part with it, so dropt it into his purse as if in

absence of mind, with the words, “Eighty completes the tale, and

I trust thy master will reward thee handsomely.---Surely,” he

added, looking earnestly at the bag, “thou hast more coins in

that pouch?”

Gurth grinned, which was his nearest approach to a laugh, as he

replied, “About the same quantity which thou hast just told over

so carefully.” He then folded the quittance, and put it under

his cap, adding,---“Peril of thy beard, Jew, see that this be

full and ample!” He filled himself unbidden, a third goblet of

wine, and left the apartment without ceremony.

“Rebecca,” said the Jew, “that Ishmaelite hath gone somewhat

beyond me. Nevertheless his master is a good youth---ay, and I

am well pleased that he hath gained shekels of gold and shekels

of silver, even by the speed of his horse and by the strength of

his lance, which, like that of Goliath the Philistine, might vie

with a weaver’s beam.”

As he turned to receive Rebecca’s answer, he observed, that

during his chattering with Gurth, she had left the apartment

unperceived.

In the meanwhile, Gurth had descended the stair, and, having

reached the dark antechamber or hall, was puzzling about to

discover the entrance, when a figure in white, shown by a small

silver lamp which she held in her hand, beckoned him into a side

apartment. Gurth had some reluctance to obey the summons. Rough

and impetuous as a wild boar, where only earthly force was to be

apprehended, he had all the characteristic terrors of a Saxon

respecting fawns, forest-fiends, white women, and the whole of

the superstitions which his ancestors had brought with them from

the wilds of Germany. He remembered, moreover, that he was in

the house of a Jew, a people who, besides the other unamiable

qualities which popular report ascribed to them, were supposed to

be profound necromancers and cabalists. Nevertheless, after a

moment’s pause, he obeyed the beckoning summons of the

apparition, and followed her into the apartment which she

indicated, where he found to his joyful surprise that his fair

guide was the beautiful Jewess whom he had seen at the

tournament, and a short time in her father’s apartment.

She asked him the particulars of his transaction with Isaac,

which he detailed accurately.

“My father did but jest with thee, good fellow,” said Rebecca;

“he owes thy master deeper kindness than these arms and steed

could pay, were their value tenfold. What sum didst thou pay my

father even now?”

“Eighty zecchins,” said Gurth, surprised at the question.

“In this purse,” said Rebecca, “thou wilt find a hundred.

Restore to thy master that which is his due, and enrich thyself

with the remainder. Haste---begone---stay not to render thanks!

and beware how you pass through this crowded town, where thou

mayst easily lose both thy burden and thy life.---Reuben,” she

added, clapping her hands together, “light forth this stranger,

and fail not to draw lock and bar behind him.” Reuben, a

dark-brow’d and black-bearded Israelite, obeyed her summons, with

a torch in his hand; undid the outward door of the house, and

conducting Gurth across a paved court, let him out through a

wicket in the entrance-gate, which he closed behind him with such

bolts and chains as would well have become that of a prison.

“By St Dunstan,” said Gurth, as he stumbled up the dark avenue,

“this is no Jewess, but an angel from heaven! Ten zecchins from

my brave young master---twenty from this pearl of Zion---Oh,

happy day!---Such another, Gurth, will redeem thy bondage, and

make thee a brother as free of thy guild as the best. And then

do I lay down my swineherd’s horn and staff, and take the

freeman’s sword and buckler, and follow my young master to the

death, without hiding either my face or my name.”

CHAPTER XI

1st Outlaw: Stand, sir, and throw us that you have about you;

If not, we’ll make you sit, and rifle you.

Speed: Sir, we are undone! these are the villains

That all the travellers do fear so much.

Val: My friends,---

1st Out: That’s not so, sir, we are your enemies.

2d Out: Peace! we’ll hear him.

3d Out: Ay, by my beard, will we;

For he’s a proper man.

Two Gentlemen of Verona

The nocturnal adventures of Gurth were not yet concluded; indeed

he himself became partly of that mind, when, after passing one or

two straggling houses which stood in the outskirts of the

village, he found himself in a deep lane, running between two

banks overgrown with hazel and holly, while here and there a

dwarf oak flung its arms altogether across the path. The lane

was moreover much rutted and broken up by the carriages which had

recently transported articles of various kinds to the tournament;

and it was dark, for the banks and bushes intercepted the light

of the harvest moon.

From the village were heard the distant sounds of revelry, mixed

occasionally with loud laughter, sometimes broken by screams, and

sometimes by wild strains of distant music. All these sounds,

intimating the disorderly state of the town, crowded with

military nobles and their dissolute attendants, gave Gurth some

uneasiness. “The Jewess was right,” he said to himself. “By

heaven and St Dunstan, I would I were safe at my journey’s end

with all this treasure! Here are such numbers, I will not say of

arrant thieves, but of errant knights and errant squires, errant

monks and errant minstrels, errant jugglers and errant jesters,

that a man with a single merk would be in danger, much more a

poor swineherd with a whole bagful of zecchins. Would I were out

of the shade of these infernal bushes, that I might at least see

any of St Nicholas’s clerks before they spring on my shoulders.”

Gurth accordingly hastened his pace, in order to gain the open

common to which the lane led, but was not so fortunate as to

accomplish his object. Just as he had attained the upper end of

the lane, where the underwood was thickest, four men sprung upon

him, even as his fears anticipated, two from each side of the

road, and seized him so fast, that resistance, if at first

practicable, would have been now too late.---“Surrender your

charge,” said one of them; “we are the deliverers of the

commonwealth, who ease every man of his burden.”

“You should not ease me of mine so lightly,” muttered Gurth,

whose surly honesty could not be tamed even by the pressure of

immediate violence,---“had I it but in my power to give three

strokes in its defence.”

“We shall see that presently,” said the robber; and, speaking to

his companions, he added, “bring along the knave. I see he would

have his head broken, as well as his purse cut, and so be let

blood in two veins at once.”

Gurth was hurried along agreeably to this mandate, and having

been dragged somewhat roughly over the bank, on the left-hand

side of the lane, found himself in a straggling thicket, which

lay betwixt it and the open common. He was compelled to follow

his rough conductors into the very depth of this cover, where

they stopt unexpectedly in an irregular open space, free in a

great measure from trees, and on which, therefore, the beams of

the moon fell without much interruption from boughs and leaves.

Here his captors were joined by two other persons, apparently

belonging to the gang. They had short swords by their sides, and

quarter-staves in their hands, and Gurth could now observe that

all six wore visors, which rendered their occupation a matter of

no question, even had their former proceedings left it in doubt.

“What money hast thou, churl?” said one of the thieves.

“Thirty zecchins of my own property,” answered Gurth, doggedly.

“A forfeit---a forfeit,” shouted the robbers; “a Saxon hath

thirty zecchins, and returns sober from a village! An undeniable

and unredeemable forfeit of all he hath about him.”

“I hoarded it to purchase my freedom,” said Gurth.

“Thou art an ass,” replied one of the thieves “three quarts of

double ale had rendered thee as free as thy master, ay, and freer

too, if he be a Saxon like thyself.”

“A sad truth,” replied Gurth; “but if these same thirty zecchins

will buy my freedom from you, unloose my hands, and I will pay

them to you.”

“Hold,” said one who seemed to exercise some authority over the

others; “this bag which thou bearest, as I can feel through thy

cloak, contains more coin than thou hast told us of.”

“It is the good knight my master’s,” answered Gurth, “of which,

assuredly, I would not have spoken a word, had you been satisfied

with working your will upon mine own property.”

“Thou art an honest fellow,” replied the robber, “I warrant thee;

and we worship not St Nicholas