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

open his lodge after sunset, by alleging the multitude of

robbers and outlaws who were abroad, and who gave no honour to

Our Lady or St Dunstan, nor to those holy men who spent life in

their service.

“The poverty of your cell, good father,” said the knight, looking

around him, and seeing nothing but a bed of leaves, a crucifix

rudely carved in oak, a missal, with a rough-hewn table and two

stools, and one or two clumsy articles of furniture---“the

poverty of your cell should seem a sufficient defence against any

risk of thieves, not to mention the aid of two trusty dogs, large

and strong enough, I think, to pull down a stag, and of course,

to match with most men.”

“The good keeper of the forest,” said the hermit, “hath allowed

me the use of these animals, to protect my solitude until the

times shall mend.”

Having said this, he fixed his torch in a twisted branch of iron

which served for a candlestick; and, placing the oaken trivet

before the embers of the fire, which he refreshed with some dry

wood, he placed a stool upon one side of the table, and beckoned

to the knight to do the same upon the other.

They sat down, and gazed with great gravity at each other, each

thinking in his heart that he had seldom seen a stronger or more

athletic figure than was placed opposite to him.

“Reverend hermit,” said the knight, after looking long and

fixedly at his host, “were it not to interrupt your devout

meditations, I would pray to know three things of your holiness;

first, where I am to put my horse?---secondly, what I can have

for supper?---thirdly, where I am to take up my couch for the

night?”

“I will reply to you,” said the hermit, “with my finger, it being

against my rule to speak by words where signs can answer the

purpose.” So saying, he pointed successively to two corners of

the hut. “Your stable,” said he, “is there---your bed there;

and,” reaching down a platter with two handfuls of parched pease

upon it from the neighbouring shelf, and placing it upon the

table, he added, “your supper is here.”

The knight shrugged his shoulders, and leaving the hut, brought

in his horse, (which in the interim he had fastened to a tree,)

unsaddled him with much attention, and spread upon the steed’s

weary back his own mantle.

The hermit was apparently somewhat moved to compassion by the

anxiety as well as address which the stranger displayed in

tending his horse; for, muttering something about provender left

for the keeper’s palfrey, 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,