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

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strange reply of Bois-Guilbert, gave Rebecca leisure to examine

and instantly to destroy the scroll unobserved. When the whisper

had ceased, the Grand Master spoke.

“Rebecca, thou canst derive no benefit from the evidence of this

unhappy knight, for whom, as we well perceive, the Enemy is yet

too powerful. Hast thou aught else to say?”

“There is yet one chance of life left to me,” said Rebecca, “even

by your own fierce laws. Life has been miserable---miserable, at

least, of late---but I will not cast away the gift of God, while

he affords me the means of defending it. I deny this charge---I

maintain my innocence, and I declare the falsehood of this

accusation---I challenge the privilege of trial by combat, and

will appear by my champion.”

“And who, Rebecca,” replied the Grand Master, “will lay lance in

rest for a sorceress? who will be the champion of a Jewess?”

“God will raise me up a champion,” said Rebecca---“It cannot be

that in merry England---the hospitable, the generous, the free,

where so many are ready to peril their lives for honour, there

will not be found one to fight for justice. But it is enough

that I challenge the trial by combat---there lies my gage.”

She took her embroidered glove from her hand, and flung it down

before the Grand Master with an air of mingled simplicity and

dignity, which excited universal surprise and admiration.

CHAPTER XXXVIII

------There I throw my gage,

To prove it on thee to the extremest point

Of martial daring.

Richard II

Even Lucas Beaumanoir himself was affected by the mien and

appearance of Rebecca. He was not originally a cruel or even a

severe man; but with passions by nature cold, and with a high,

though mistaken, sense of duty, his heart had been gradually

hardened by the ascetic life which he pursued, the supreme power

which he enjoyed, and the supposed necessity of subduing

infidelity and eradicating heresy, which he conceived peculiarly

incumbent on him. His features relaxed in their usual severity

as he gazed upon the beautiful creature before him, alone,

unfriended, and defending herself with so much spirit and

courage. He crossed himself twice, as doubting whence arose the

unwonted softening of a heart, which on such occasions used to

resemble in hardness the steel of his sword. At length he spoke.

“Damsel,” he said, “if the pity I feel for thee arise from any

practice thine evil arts have made on me, great is thy guilt.

But I rather judge it the kinder feelings of nature, which

grieves that so goodly a form should be a vessel of perdition.

Repent, my daughter---confess thy witchcrafts---turn thee from

thine evil faith---embrace this holy emblem, and all shall yet be

well with thee here and hereafter. In some sisterhood of the

strictest order, shalt thou have time for prayer and fitting

penance, and that repentance not to be repented of. This do and

live---what has the law of Moses done for thee that thou

shouldest die for it?”

“It was the law of my fathers,” said Rebecca; “it was delivered

in thunders and in storms upon the mountain of Sinai, in cloud

and in fire. This, if ye are Christians, ye believe---it is, you

say, recalled; but so my teachers have not taught me.”

“Let our chaplain,” said Beaumanoir, “stand forth, and tell this

obstinate infidel---”

“Forgive the interruption,” said Rebecca, meekly; “I am a maiden,

unskilled to dispute for my religion, but I can die for it, if it

be God’s will.---Let me pray your answer to my demand of a

champion.”

“Give me her glove,” said Beaumanoir. “This is indeed,” he

continued, as he looked at the flimsy texture and slender

fingers, “a slight and frail gage for a purpose so deadly!

---Seest thou, Rebecca, as this thin and light glove of thine is

to one of our heavy steel gauntlets, so is thy cause to that of

the Temple, for it is our Order which thou hast defied.”

“Cast my innocence into the scale,” answered Rebecca, “and the

glove of silk shall outweigh the glove of iron.”

“Then thou dost persist in thy refusal to confess thy guilt, and

in that bold challenge which thou hast made?”

“I do persist, noble sir,” answered Rebecca.

“So be it then, in the name of Heaven,” said the Grand Master;

“and may God show the right!”

“Amen,” replied the Preceptors around him, and the word was

deeply echoed by the whole assembly.

“Brethren,” said Beaumanoir, “you are aware that we might well

have refused to this woman the benefit of the trial by combat

---but though a Jewess and an unbeliever, she is also a stranger

and defenceless, and God forbid that she should ask the benefit

of our mild laws, and that it should be refused to her.

Moreover, we are knights and soldiers as well as men of religion,

and shame it were to us upon any pretence, to refuse proffered

combat. Thus, therefore, stands the case. Rebecca, the daughter

of Isaac of York, is, by many frequent and suspicious

circumstances, defamed of sorcery practised on the person of a

noble knight of our holy Order, and hath challenged the combat in

proof of her innocence. To whom, reverend brethren, is it your

opinion that we should deliver the gage of battle, naming him, at

the same time, to be our champion on the field?”

“To Brian de Bois-Guilbert, whom it chiefly concerns,” said the

Preceptor of Goodalricke, “and who, moreover, best knows how the

truth stands in this matter.”

“But if,” said the Grand Master, “our brother Brian be under the

influence of a charm or a spell---we speak but for the sake of

precaution, for to the arm of none of our holy Order would we

more willingly confide this or a more weighty cause.”

“Reverend father,” answered the Preceptor of Goodalricke, “no

spell can effect the champion who comes forward to fight for the

judgment of God.”

“Thou sayest right, brother,” said the Grand Master. “Albert

Malvoisin, give this gage of battle to Brian de Bois-Guilbert.

---It is our charge to thee, brother,” he continued, addressing

himself to Bois-Guilbert, “that thou do thy battle manfully,

nothing doubting that the good cause shall triumph.---And do

thou, Rebecca, attend, that we assign thee the third day from the

present to find a champion.”

“That is but brief space,” answered Rebecca, “for a stranger, who

is also of another faith, to find one who will do battle,

wagering life and honour for her cause, against a knight who is

called an approved soldier.”

“We may not extend it,” answered the Grand Master; “the field

must be foughten in our own presence, and divers weighty causes

call us on the fourth day from hence.”

“God’s will be done!” said Rebecca; “I put my trust in Him, to

whom an instant is as effectual to save as a whole age.”

“Thou hast spoken well, damsel,” said the Grand Master; “but well

know we who can array himself like an angel of light. It remains

but to name a fitting place of combat, and, if it so hap, also of

execution.---Where is the Preceptor of this house?”

Albert Malvoisin, still holding Rebecca’s glove in his hand, was

speaking to Bois-Guilbert very earnestly, but in a low voice.

“How!” said the Grand Master, “will he not receive the gage?”

“He will---he doth, most Reverend Father,” said Malvoisin,

slipping the glove under his own mantle. “And for the place of

combat, I hold the fittest to be the lists of Saint George

belonging to this Preceptory, and used by us for military

exercise.”

“It is well,” said the Grand Master.---“Rebecca, in those lists

shalt thou produce thy champion; and if thou failest to do so, or

if thy champion shall be discomfited by the judgment of God, thou

shalt then die the death of a sorceress, according to doom.---Let

this our judgment be recorded, and the record read aloud, that no

one may pretend ignorance.”

One of the chaplains, who acted as clerks to the chapter,

immediately engrossed the order in a huge volume, which contained

the proceedings of the Templar Knights when solemnly assembled on

such occasions; and when he had finished writing, the other read

aloud the sentence of the Grand Master, which, when translated

from the Norman-French in which it was couched, was expressed as

follows.---

“Rebecca, a Jewess, daughter of Isaac of York, being attainted of

sorcery, seduction, and other damnable practices, practised on a

Knight of the most Holy Order of the Temple of Zion, doth deny

the same; and saith, that the testimony delivered against her

this day is false, wicked, and disloyal; and that by lawful

‘essoine’*

“Essoine” signifies excuse, and here relates to the appellant’s privilege of appearing by her champion, in excuse of her own person on account of her sex.

of her body as being unable to combat in her own behalf, she doth

offer, by a champion instead thereof, to avouch her case, he

performing his loyal ‘devoir’ in all knightly sort, with such

arms as to gage of battle do fully appertain, and that at her

peril and cost. And therewith she proffered her gage. And the

gage having been delivered to the noble Lord and Knight, Brian de

Bois-Guilbert, of the Holy Order of the Temple of Zion, he was

appointed to do this battle, in behalf of his Order and himself,

as injured and impaired by the practices of the appellant.

Wherefore the most reverend Father and puissant Lord, Lucas

Marquis of Beaumanoir, did allow of the said challenge, and of

the said ‘essoine’ of the appellant’s body, and assigned the

third day for the said combat, the place being the enclosure

called the lists of Saint George, near to the Preceptory of

Templestowe. And the Grand Master appoints the appellant to

appear there by her champion, on pain of doom, as a person

convicted of sorcery or seduction; and also the defendant so to

appear, under the penalty of being held and adjudged recreant in

case of default; and the noble Lord and most reverend Father

aforesaid appointed the battle to be done in his own presence,

and according to all that is commendable and profitable in such a

case. And may God aid the just cause!”

“Amen!” said the Grand Master; and the word was echoed by all

around. Rebecca spoke not, but she looked up to heaven, and,

folding her hands, remained for a minute without change of

attitude. She then modestly reminded the Grand Master, that she

ought to be permitted some opportunity of free communication with

her friends, for the purpose of making her condition known to

them, and procuring, if possible, some champion to fight in her

behalf.

“It is just and lawful,” said the Grand Master; “choose what

messenger thou shalt trust, and he shall have free communication

with thee in thy prison-chamber.”

“Is there,” said Rebecca, “any one here, who, either for love of

a good cause, or for ample hire, will do the errand of a

distressed being?”

All were silent; for none thought it safe, in the presence of the

Grand Master, to avow any interest in the calumniated prisoner,

lest he should be suspected of leaning towards Judaism. Not even

the prospect of reward, far less any feelings of compassion

alone, could surmount this apprehension.

Rebecca stood for a few moments in indescribable anxiety, and

then exclaimed, “Is it really thus?---And, in English land, am I

to be deprived of the poor chance of safety which remains to me,

for want of an act of charity which would not be refused to the

worst criminal?”

Higg, the son of Snell, at length replied, “I am but a maimed