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

demanded Locksley.

“His name,” said the hermit---“his name is Sir Anthony of

Scrabelstone---as if I would drink with a man, and did not know

his name!”

“Thou hast been drinking more than enough, friar,” said the

woodsman, “and, I fear, prating more than enough too.”

“Good yeoman,” said the knight, coming forward, “be not wroth

with my merry host. He did but afford me the hospitality which I

would have compelled from him if he had refused it.”

“Thou compel!” said the friar; “wait but till have changed this

grey gown for a green cassock, and if I make not a quarter-staff

ring twelve upon thy pate, I am neither true clerk nor good

woodsman.”

While he spoke thus, he stript off his gown, and appeared in a

close black buckram doublet and drawers, over which he speedily

did on a cassock of green, and hose of the same colour. “I pray

thee truss my points,” said he to Wamba, “and thou shalt have a

cup of sack for thy labour.”

“Gramercy for thy sack,” said Wamba; “but think’st thou it is

lawful for me to aid you to transmew thyself from a holy hermit

into a sinful forester?”

“Never fear,” said the hermit; “I will but confess the sins of my

green cloak to my greyfriar’s frock, and all shall be well

again.”

“Amen!” answered the Jester; “a broadcloth penitent should have a

sackcloth confessor, and your frock may absolve my motley doublet

into the bargain.”

So saying, he accommodated the friar with his assistance in tying

the endless number of points, as the laces which attached the

hose to the doublet were then termed.

While they were thus employed, Locksley led the knight a little

apart, and addressed him thus:---“Deny it not, Sir Knight---you

are he who decided the victory to the advantage of the English

against the strangers on the second day of the tournament at

Ashby.”

“And what follows if you guess truly, good yeoman?” replied the

knight.

“I should in that case hold you,” replied the yeoman, “a friend

to the weaker party.”

“Such is the duty of a true knight at least,” replied the Black

Champion; “and I would not willingly that there were reason to

think otherwise of me.”

“But for my purpose,” said the yeoman, “thou shouldst be as well

a good Englishman as a good knight; for that, which I have to

speak of, concerns, indeed, the duty of every honest man, but is

more especially that of a true-born native of England.”

“You can speak to no one,” replied the knight, “to whom England,

and the life of every Englishman, can be dearer than to me.”

“I would willingly believe so,” said the woodsman, “for never had

this country such need to be supported by those who love her.

Hear me, and I will tell thee of an enterprise, in which, if thou

be’st really that which thou seemest, thou mayst take an

honourable part. A band of villains, in the disguise of better

men than themselves, have made themselves master of the person of

a noble Englishman, called Cedric the Saxon, together with his

ward, and his friend Athelstane of Coningsburgh, and have

transported them to a castle in this forest, called Torquilstone.

I ask of thee, as a good knight and a good Englishman, wilt thou

aid in their rescue?”

“I am bound by my vow to do so,” replied the knight; “but I would

willingly know who you are, who request my assistance in their

behalf?”

“I am,” said the forester, “a nameless man; but I am the friend

of my country, and of my country’s friends---With this account of

me you must for the present remain satisfied, the more especially

since you yourself desire to continue unknown. Believe, however,

that my word, when pledged, is as inviolate as if I wore golden

spurs.”

“I willingly believe it,” said the knight; “I have been

accustomed to study men’s countenances, and I can read in thine

honesty and resolution. I will, therefore, ask thee no further

questions, but aid thee in setting at freedom these oppressed

captives; which done, I trust we shall part better acquainted,

and well satisfied with each other.”

“So,” said Wamba to Gurth,---for the friar being now fully

equipped, the Jester, having approached to the other side of the

hut, had heard the conclusion of the conversation,---“So we have

got a new ally ?---l trust the valour of the knight will be truer

metal than the religion of the hermit, or the honesty of the

yeoman; for this Locksley looks like a born deer-stealer, and the

priest like a lusty hypocrite.”

“Hold thy peace, Wamba,” said Gurth; “it may all be as thou dost

guess; but were the horned devil to rise and proffer me his

assistance to set at liberty Cedric and the Lady Rowena, I fear I

should hardly have religion enough to refuse the foul fiend’s

offer, and bid him get behind me.”

The friar was now completely accoutred as a yeoman, with sword

and buckler, bow, and quiver, and a strong partisan over his

shoulder. He left his cell at the head of the party, and, having

carefully locked the door, deposited the key under the threshold.

“Art thou in condition to do good service, friar,” said Locksley,

“or does the brown bowl still run in thy head?”

“Not more than a drought of St Dunstan’s fountain will allay,”

answered the priest; “something there is of a whizzing in my

brain, and of instability in my legs, but you shall presently see

both pass away.”

So saying, he stepped to the stone basin, in which the waters of

the fountain as they fell formed bubbles which danced in the

white moonlight, and took so long a drought as if he had meant to

exhaust the spring.

“When didst thou drink as deep a drought of water before, Holy

Clerk of Copmanhurst?” said the Black Knight.

“Never since my wine-butt leaked, and let out its liquor by an

illegal vent,” replied the friar, “and so left me nothing to

drink but my patron’s bounty here.”

Then plunging his hands and head into the fountain, he washed

from them all marks of the midnight revel.

Thus refreshed and sobered, the jolly priest twirled his heavy

partisan round his head with three fingers, as if he had been

balancing a reed, exclaiming at the same time, “Where be those

false ravishers, who carry off wenches against their will? May

the foul fiend fly off with me, if I am not man enough for a

dozen of them.”

“Swearest thou, Holy Clerk?” said the Black Knight.

“Clerk me no Clerks,” replied the transformed priest; “by Saint

George and the Dragon, I am no longer a shaveling than while my

frock is on my back---When I am cased in my green cassock, I

will drink, swear, and woo a lass, with any blithe forester in

the West Riding.”

“Come on, Jack Priest,” said Locksley, “and be silent; thou art

as noisy as a whole convent on a holy eve, when the Father Abbot

has gone to bed.---Come on you, too, my masters, tarry not to

talk of it---I say, come on, we must collect all our forces, and

few enough we shall have, if we are to storm the Castle of

Reginald Front-de-Boeuf.”

“What! is it Front-de-Boeuf,” said the Black Knight, “who has

stopt on the king’s highway the king’s liege subjects?---Is he

turned thief and oppressor?”

“Oppressor he ever was,” said Locksley.

“And for thief,” said the priest, “I doubt if ever he were even

half so honest a man as many a thief of my acquaintance.”

“Move on, priest, and be silent,” said the yeoman; “it were

better you led the way to the place of rendezvous, than say what

should be left unsaid, both in decency and prudence.”

CHAPTER XXI

Alas, how many hours and years have past,

Since human forms have round this table sate,

Or lamp, or taper, on its surface gleam’d!

Methinks, I hear the sound of time long pass’d

Still murmuring o’er us, in the lofty void

Of these dark arches, like the ling’ring voices

Of those who long within their graves have slept.

Orra, a Tragedy

While these measures were taking in behalf of Cedric and his

companions, the armed men by whom the latter had been seized,

hurried their captives along towards the place of security, where

they intended to imprison them. But darkness came on fast, and

the paths of the wood seemed but imperfectly known to the

marauders. They were compelled to make several long halts, and

once or twice to return on their road to resume the direction

which they wished to pursue. The summer morn had dawned upon

them ere they could travel in full assurance that they held the

right path. But confidence returned with light, and the

cavalcade now moved rapidly forward. Meanwhile, the following

dialogue took place between the two leaders of the banditti.

“It is time thou shouldst leave us, Sir Maurice,” said the

Templar to De Bracy, “in order to prepare the second part of thy

mystery. Thou art next, thou knowest, to act the Knight

Deliverer.”

“I have thought better of it,” said De Bracy; “I will not leave

thee till the prize is fairly deposited in Front-de-Boeuf’s

castle. There will I appear before the Lady Rowena in mine own

shape, and trust that she will set down to the vehemence of my

passion the violence of which I have been guilty.”

“And what has made thee change thy plan, De Bracy?” replied the

Knight Templar.

“That concerns thee nothing,” answered his companion.

“I would hope, however, Sir Knight,” said the Templar, “that this

alteration of measures arises from no suspicion of my honourable

meaning, such as Fitzurse endeavoured to instil into thee?”

“My thoughts are my own,” answered De Bracy; “the fiend laughs,

they say, when one thief robs another; and we know, that were he

to spit fire and brimstone instead, it would never prevent a

Templar from following his bent.”

“Or the leader of a Free Company,” answered the Templar, “from

dreading at the hands of a comrade and friend, the injustice he

does to all mankind.”

“This is unprofitable and perilous recrimination,” answered De

Bracy; “suffice it to say, I know the morals of the Temple-Order,

and I will not give thee the power of cheating me out of the fair

prey for which I have run such risks.”

“Psha,” replied the Templar, “what hast thou to fear?---Thou

knowest the vows of our order.”

“Right well,” said De Bracy, “and also how they are kept. Come,

Sir Templar, the laws of gallantry have a liberal interpretation

in Palestine, and this is a case in which I will trust nothing to

your conscience.”

“Hear the truth, then,” said the Templar; “I care not for your

blue-eyed beauty. There is in that train one who will make me a

better mate.”

“What! wouldst thou stoop to the waiting damsel?” said De Bracy.

“No, Sir Knight,” said the Templar, haughtily. “To the

waiting-woman will I not stoop. I have a prize among the

captives as lovely as thine own.”

“By the mass, thou meanest the fair Jewess!” said De Bracy.

“And if I do,” said Bois-Guilbert, “who shall gainsay me?”

“No one that I know,” said De Bracy, “unless it be your vow of

celibacy, or a cheek of conscience for an intrigue with a

Jewess.”

“For my vow,” said the Templar, “our Grand Master hath granted me

a dispensation. And for my conscience, a man that has slain

three hundred Saracens, need not reckon up every little failing,

like a village girl at