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

into Assyrian bondage?---I have seen but

little of him myself, but our cellarer and treasurer have dealt

largely with him, and report says that his house at York is so

full of gold and silver as is a shame in any Christian land.

Marvel it is to all living Christian hearts that such gnawing

adders should be suffered to eat into the bowels of the state,

and even of the holy church herself, with foul usuries and

extortions.”

“Hold, father,” said the Jew, “mitigate and assuage your choler.

I pray of your reverence to remember that I force my monies upon

no one. But when churchman and layman, prince and prior, knight

and priest, come knocking to Isaac’s door, they borrow not his

shekels with these uncivil terms. It is then, Friend Isaac, will

you pleasure us in this matter, and our day shall be truly kept,

so God sa’ me?---and Kind Isaac, if ever you served man, show

yourself a friend in this need! And when the day comes, and I

ask my own, then what hear I but Damned Jew, and The curse of

Egypt on your tribe, and all that may stir up the rude and

uncivil populace against poor strangers!”

“Prior,” said the Captain, “Jew though he be, he hath in this

spoken well. Do thou, therefore, name his ransom, as he named

thine, without farther rude terms.”

“None but ‘latro famosus’---the interpretation whereof,” said the

Prior, “will I give at some other time and tide---would place a

Christian prelate and an unbaptized Jew upon the same bench. But

since ye require me to put a price upon this caitiff, I tell you

openly that ye will wrong yourselves if you take from him a penny

under a thousand crowns.”

“A sentence!---a sentence!” exclaimed the chief Outlaw.

“A sentence!---a sentence!” shouted his assessors; “the Christian

has shown his good nurture, and dealt with us more generously

than the Jew.”

“The God of my fathers help me!” said the Jew; “will ye bear to

the ground an impoverished creature?---I am this day childless,

and will ye deprive me of the means of livelihood?”

“Thou wilt have the less to provide for, Jew, if thou art

childless,” said Aymer.

“Alas! my lord,” said Isaac, “your law permits you not to know

how the child of our bosom is entwined with the strings of our

heart---O Rebecca! laughter of my beloved Rachel! were each leaf

on that tree a zecchin, and each zecchin mine own, all that mass

of wealth would I give to know whether thou art alive, and

escaped the hands of the Nazarene!”

“Was not thy daughter dark-haired?” said one of the outlaws; “and

wore she not a veil of twisted sendal, broidered with silver?”

“She did!---she did!” said the old man, trembling with eagerness,

as formerly with fear. “The blessing of Jacob be upon thee!

canst thou tell me aught of her safety?”

“It was she, then,” said the yeoman, “who was carried off by the

proud Templar, when he broke through our ranks on yester-even.

I had drawn my bow to send a shaft after him, but spared him even

for the sake of the damsel, who I feared might take harm from the

arrow.”

“Oh!” answered the Jew, “I would to God thou hadst shot, though

the arrow had pierced her bosom!---Better the tomb of her fathers

than the dishonourable couch of the licentious and savage

Templar. Ichabod! Ichabod! the glory hath departed from my

house!”

“Friends,” said the Chief, looking round, “the

old man is but a Jew, natheless his grief touches me.---Deal

uprightly with us, Isaac---will paying this ransom of a thousand

crowns leave thee altogether penniless?”

Isaac, recalled to think of his worldly goods, the love of which,

by dint of inveterate habit, contended even with his parental

affection, grew pale, stammered, and could not deny there might

be some small surplus.

“Well---go to---what though there be,” said the Outlaw, “we will

not reckon with thee too closely. Without treasure thou mayst as

well hope to redeem thy child from the clutches of Sir Brian de

Bois-Guilbert, as to shoot a stag-royal with a headless shaft.

---We will take thee at the same ransom with Prior Aymer, or

rather at one hundred crowns lower, which hundred crowns shall be

mine own peculiar loss, and not light upon this worshipful

community; and so we shall avoid the heinous offence of rating a

Jew merchant as high as a Christian prelate, and thou wilt have

six hundred crowns remaining to treat for thy daughter’s ransom.

Templars love the glitter of silver shekels as well as the

sparkle of black eyes.---Hasten to make thy crowns chink in the

ear of De Bois-Guilbert, ere worse comes of it. Thou wilt find

him, as our scouts have brought notice, at the next Preceptory

house of his Order.---Said I well, my merry mates?”

The yeomen expressed their wonted acquiescence in their leader’s

opinion; and Isaac, relieved of one half of his apprehensions, by

learning that his daughter lived, and might possibly be ransomed,

threw himself at the feet of the generous Outlaw, and, rubbing

his beard against his buskins, sought to kiss the hem of his

green cassock. The Captain drew himself back, and extricated

himself from the Jew’s grasp, not without some marks of contempt.

“Nay, beshrew thee, man, up with thee! I am English born, and

love no such Eastern prostrations---Kneel to God, and not to a

poor sinner, like me.”

“Ay, Jew,” said Prior Aymer; “kneel to God, as represented in the

servant of his altar, and who knows, with thy sincere repentance

and due gifts to the shrine of Saint Robert, what grace thou

mayst acquire for thyself and thy daughter Rebecca? I grieve for

the maiden, for she is of fair and comely countenance,---I beheld

her in the lists of Ashby. Also Brian de Bois-Guilbert is one

with whom I may do much---bethink thee how thou mayst deserve my

good word with him.”

“Alas! alas!” said the Jew, “on every hand the spoilers arise

against me---I am given as a prey unto the Assyrian, and a prey

unto him of Egypt.”

“And what else should be the lot of thy accursed race?” answered

the Prior; “for what saith holy writ, ‘verbum Domini projecerunt,

et sapientia est nulla in eis’---they have cast forth the word of

the Lord, and there is no wisdom in them; ‘propterea dabo

mulieres eorum exteris’---I will give their women to strangers,

that is to the Templar, as in the present matter; ‘et thesauros

eorum haeredibus alienis’, and their treasures to others---as in

the present case to these honest gentlemen.”

Isaac groaned deeply, and began to wring his hands, and to

relapse into his state of desolation and despair. But the leader

of the yeomen led him aside.

“Advise thee well, Isaac,” said Locksley, “what thou wilt do in

this matter; my counsel to thee is to make a friend of this

churchman. He is vain, Isaac, and he is covetous; at least he

needs money to supply his profusion. Thou canst easily gratify

his greed; for think not that I am blinded by thy pretexts of

poverty. I am intimately acquainted, Isaac, with the very iron

chest in which thou dost keep thy money-bags---What! know I not

the great stone beneath the apple-tree, that leads into the

vaulted chamber under thy garden at York?” The Jew grew as pale

as death---“But fear nothing from me,” continued the yeoman, “for

we are of old acquainted. Dost thou not remember the sick yeoman

whom thy fair daughter Rebecca redeemed from the gyves at York,

and kept him in thy house till his health was restored, when thou

didst dismiss him recovered, and with a piece of money?---Usurer

as thou art, thou didst never place coin at better interest than

that poor silver mark, for it has this day saved thee five

hundred crowns.”

“And thou art he whom we called Diccon Bend-the-Bow?” said Isaac;

“I thought ever I knew the accent of thy voice.”

“I am Bend-the-Bow,” said the Captain, “and Locksley, and have a

good name besides all these.”

“But thou art mistaken, good Bend-the-Bow, concerning that same

vaulted apartment. So help me Heaven, as there is nought in it

but some merchandises which I will gladly part with to you---one

hundred yards of Lincoln green to make doublets to thy men, and a

hundred staves of Spanish yew to make bows, and a hundred silken

bowstrings, tough, round, and sound---these will I send thee for

thy good-will, honest Diccon, an thou wilt keep silence about the

vault, my good Diccon.”

“Silent as a dormouse,” said the Outlaw; “and never trust me but

I am grieved for thy daughter. But I may not help it---The

Templars lances are too strong for my archery in the open field

---they would scatter us like dust. Had I but known it was

Rebecca when she was borne off, something might have been done;

but now thou must needs proceed by policy. Come, shall I treat

for thee with the Prior?”

“In God’s name, Diccon, an thou canst, aid me to recover the

child of my bosom!”

“Do not thou interrupt me with thine ill-timed avarice,” said the

Outlaw, “and I will deal with him in thy behalf.”

He then turned from the Jew, who followed him, however, as

closely as his shadow.

“Prior Aymer,” said the Captain, “come apart with me under this

tree. Men say thou dost love wine, and a lady’s smile, better

than beseems thy Order, Sir Priest; but with that I have nought

to do. I have heard, too, thou dost love a brace of good dogs

and a fleet horse, and it may well be that, loving things which

are costly to come by, thou hatest not a purse of gold. But I

have never heard that thou didst love oppression or cruelty.

---Now, here is Isaac willing to give thee the means of pleasure

and pastime in a bag containing one hundred marks of silver, if

thy intercession with thine ally the Templar shall avail to

procure the freedom of his daughter.”

“In safety and honour, as when taken from me,” said the Jew,

“otherwise it is no bargain.”

“Peace, Isaac,” said the Outlaw, “or I give up thine interest.

---What say you to this my purpose, Prior Aymer?”

“The matter,” quoth the Prior, “is of a mixed condition; for, if

I do a good deal on the one hand, yet, on the other, it goeth to

the vantage of a Jew, and in so much is against my conscience.

Yet, if the Israelite will advantage the Church by giving me

somewhat over to the building of our dortour,*

“Dortour”, or dormitory.

I will take it on my conscience to aid him in the matter of his

daughter.”

“For a score of marks to the dortour,” said the Outlaw,---“Be

still, I say, Isaac!---or for a brace of silver candlesticks to

the altar, we will not stand with you.”

“Nay, but, good Diccon Bend-the-Bow”---said Isaac, endeavouring

to interpose.

“Good Jew---good beast---good earthworm!” said the yeoman, losing

patience; “an thou dost go on to put thy filthy lucre in the

balance with thy daughter’s life and honour, by Heaven, I will

strip thee of every maravedi thou hast in the world, before three

days are out!”

Isaac shrunk together, and was silent.

“And what pledge am I to have for all this?” said the Prior.

“When Isaac returns successful through your mediation,” said the

Outlaw, “I swear by Saint Hubert, I will see that he pays thee

the money in good silver, or I will reckon with him for it in

such sort, he had better have paid twenty such sums.”

“Well then, Jew,” said