Have you ever thought about what fiction is? Probably, such a question may seem surprising: and so everything is clear. Every person throughout his life has to repeatedly create the works he needs for specific purposes - statements, autobiographies, dictations - using not gypsum or clay, not musical notes, not paints, but just a word. At the same time, almost every person will be very surprised if he is told that he thereby created a work of fiction, which is very different from visual art, music and sculpture making. However, everyone understands that a student's essay or dictation is fundamentally different from novels, short stories, news that are created by professional writers. In the works of professionals there is the most important difference - excogitation. But, oddly enough, in a school literature course, you don’t realize the full power of fiction. So using our website in your free time discover fiction for yourself. The Monastery by Walter Scott (free novels to read .txt) 📖
- Author: Walter Scott
Book online «The Monastery by Walter Scott (free novels to read .txt) 📖». Author Walter Scott
When each had made a feint or two, there was a pause in the conflict, both as if by one assent dropping their swords' point, and looking on each other for a moment without speaking. At length Halbert Glendinning, who felt perhaps more uneasy on account of his family than he had done before he had displayed his own courage, and proved the strength of his antagonist, could not help saying, “Is the subject of our quarrel, Sir Knight, so mortal, that one of our two bodies must needs fill up that grave? or may we with honour, having proved ourselves against each other, sheathe our swords and depart friends?”
“Valiant and most rustical Audacity,” said the Southron knight, “to no man on earth could you have put a question on the code of honour, who was more capable of rendering you a reason. Let us pause for the space of one venue, until I give you my opinion on this dependence, {Footnote: Dependence—A phrase among the brethren of the sword for an existing quarrel.} for certain it is, that brave men should not run upon their fate like brute and furious wild beasts, but should slay each other deliberately, decently, and with reason. Therefore, if we coolly examine the state of our dependence, we may the better apprehend whether the sisters three have doomed one of us to expiate the same with his blood—Dost thou understand me?”
“I have heard Father Eustace,” said Halbert, after a moment's recollection, “speak of the three furies, with their thread and their shears.”
“Enough—enough,”—interrupted Sir Piercie Shafton, crimsoning with a new fit of rage, “the thread of thy life is spun!”
And with these words he attacked with the utmost ferocity the Scottish youth, who had but just time to throw himself into a posture of defence. But the rash fury of the assailant, as frequently happens, disappointed its own purpose; for, as he made a desperate thrust, Halbert Glendinning avoided it, and ere the knight could recover his weapon, requited him (to use his own language) with a resolute stoccata, which passed through his body, and Sir Piercie Shafton fell to the ground.
Chapter the Twenty-Second. Yes, life hath left him—every busy thought, Each fiery passion, every strong affection, All sense of outward ill and inward sorrow, Are fled at once from the pale trunk before me; And I have given that which spoke and moved, Thought, acted, suffer'd as a living man, To be a ghastly form of bloody clay, Soon the foul food for reptiles. OLD PLAY.
I believe few successful duellists (if the word successful can be applied to a superiority so fatal) have beheld their dead antagonist stretched on the earth at their feet, without wishing they could redeem with their own blood that which it has been their fate to spill. Least of all could such indifference be the lot of so young a man as Halbert Glendinning, who, unused to the sight of human blood, was not only struck with sorrow, but with terror, when he beheld Sir Piercie Shafton lie stretched on the green-sward before him, vomiting gore as if impelled by the strokes of a pump. He threw his bloody sword on the ground, and hastened to kneel and support him, vainly striving, at the same time, to stanch his wound, which seemed rather to bleed inwardly than externally.
The unfortunate knight spoke at intervals, when the syncope would permit him, and his words, so far as intelligible, partook of his affected and conceited, yet not ungenerous character.
“Most rustical youth,” he said, “thy fortune hath prevailed over knightly skill—and Audacity hath overcome Condescension, even as the kite hath sometimes hawked at and struck down the falcon-gentle.—Fly and save thyself!—Take my purse—it is in the nether pocket of my carnation-coloured hose—and is worth a clown's acceptance. See that my mails, with my vestments, be sent to the Monastery of Saint Mary's”—(here his voice grew weak, and his mind and recollection seemed to waver)—“I bestow the cut velvet jerkin, with close breeches conforming—for—oh!—the good of my soul.”
“Be of good comfort, sir,” said Halbert, half distracted with his agony of pity and remorse. “I trust you shall yet do well—Oh for a leech!”
“Were there twenty physicians, O most generous Audacity, and that were a grave spectacle—I might not survive, my life is ebbing fast.—Commend me to the rustical nymph whom I called my Discretion—O Claridiana!—true empress of this bleeding heart—which now bleedeth in sad earnest!—Place me on the ground at my length, most rustical victor, born to quench the pride of the burning light of the most felicitous court of Feliciana—O saints and angels—-knights and ladies—masques and theatres—quaint devices—chain-work and broidery—love, honour, and beauty!——”
While muttering these last words, which slid from him, as it were unawares, while doubtless he was calling to mind the glories of the English court, the gallant Sir Piercie Shafton stretched out his limbs—groaned deeply, shut his eyes, and became motionless.
The victor tore his hair for very sorrow, as he looked on the pale countenance of his victim. Life, he thought, had not utterly fled, but without better aid than his own, he saw not how it could be preserved.
“Why,” he exclaimed in vain penitence, “why did I provoke him to an issue so fatal! Would to God I had submitted to the worst insult man could receive from man, rather than be the bloody instrument of this bloody deed—and doubly cursed be this evil-boding spot, which, haunted as I knew it to be by a witch or a devil, I yet chose
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