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

him, give

out a very little, and take large credit for doing so; reckoning,

doubtless, on their own behalf the seven-fold usury which the

blessed text hath promised to charitable loans.”

“Give me an example of your meaning, Wamba,---I know nothing of

ciphers or rates of usage,” answered the Knight.

“Why,” said Wamba, “an your valour be so dull, you will please to

learn that those honest fellows balance a good deed with one not

quite so laudable; as a crown given to a begging friar with an

hundred byzants taken from a fat abbot, or a wench kissed in the

greenwood with the relief of a poor widow.”

“Which of these was the good deed, which was the felony?”

interrupted the Knight.

“A good gibe! a good gibe!” said Wamba; “keeping witty company

sharpeneth the apprehension. You said nothing so well, Sir

Knight, I will be sworn, when you held drunken vespers with the

bluff Hermit.---But to go on. The merry-men of the forest set

off the building of a cottage with the burning of a castle,---the

thatching of a choir against the robbing of a church,---the

setting free a poor prisoner against the murder of a proud

sheriff; or, to come nearer to our point, the deliverance of a

Saxon franklin against the burning alive of a Norman baron.

Gentle thieves they are, in short, and courteous robbers; but it

is ever the luckiest to meet with them when they are at the

worst.”

“How so, Wamba?” said the Knight.

“Why, then they have some compunction, and are for making up

matters with Heaven. But when they have struck an even balance,

Heaven help them with whom they next open the account! The

travellers who first met them after their good service at

Torquilstone would have a woeful flaying.---And yet,” said Wamba,

coming close up to the Knight’s side, “there be companions who

are far more dangerous for travellers to meet than yonder

outlaws.”

“And who may they be, for you have neither bears nor wolves, I

trow?” said the Knight.

“Marry, sir, but we have Malvoisin’s men-at-arms,” said Wamba;

“and let me tell you, that, in time of civil war, a halfscore of

these is worth a band of wolves at any time. They are now

expecting their harvest, and are reinforced with the soldiers

that escaped from Torquilstone. So that, should we meet with a

band of them, we are like to pay for our feats of arms.---Now, I

pray you, Sir Knight, what would you do if we met two of them?”

“Pin the villains to the earth with my lance, Wamba, if they

offered us any impediment.”

“But what if there were four of them?”

“They should drink of the same cup,” answered the Knight.

“What if six,” continued Wamba, “and we as we now are, barely two

---would you not remember Locksley’s horn?”

“What! sound for aid,” exclaimed the Knight, “against a score of

such ‘rascaille’ as these, whom one good knight could drive

before him, as the wind drives the withered leaves?”

“Nay, then,” said Wamba, “I will pray you for a close sight of

that same horn that hath so powerful a breath.”

The Knight undid the clasp of the baldric, and indulged his

fellow-traveller, who immediately hung the bugle round his own

neck.

“Tra-lira-la,” said he, whistling the notes; “nay, I know my

gamut as well as another.”

“How mean you, knave?” said the Knight; “restore me the bugle.”

“Content you, Sir Knight, it is in safe keeping. When Valour and

Folly travel, Folly should bear the horn, because she can blow

the best.”

“Nay but, rogue,” said the Black Knight, “this exceedeth thy

license---Beware ye tamper not with my patience.”

“Urge me not with violence, Sir Knight,” said the Jester, keeping

at a distance from the impatient champion, “or Folly will show a

clean pair of heels, and leave Valour to find out his way through

the wood as best he may.”

“Nay, thou hast hit me there,” said the Knight; “and, sooth to

say, I have little time to jangle with thee. Keep the horn an

thou wilt, but let us proceed on our journey.”

“You will not harm me, then?” said Wamba.

“I tell thee no, thou knave!”

“Ay, but pledge me your knightly word for it,” continued Wamba,

as he approached with great caution.

“My knightly word I pledge; only come on with thy foolish self.”

“Nay, then, Valour and Folly are once more boon companions,” said

the Jester, coming up frankly to the Knight’s side; “but, in

truth, I love not such buffets as that you bestowed on the burly

Friar, when his holiness rolled on the green like a king of the

nine-pins. And now that Folly wears the horn, let Valour rouse

himself, and shake his mane; for, if I mistake not, there are

company in yonder brake that are on the look-out for us.”

“What makes thee judge so?” said the Knight.

“Because I have twice or thrice noticed the glance of a motion

from amongst the green leaves. Had they been honest men, they

had kept the path. But yonder thicket is a choice chapel for the

Clerks of Saint Nicholas.”

“By my faith,” said the Knight, closing his visor, “I think thou

be’st in the right on’t.”

And in good time did he close it, for three arrows, flew at the

same instant from the suspected spot against his head and breast,

one of which would have penetrated to the brain, had it not been

turned aside by the steel visor. The other two were averted by

the gorget, and by the shield which hung around his neck.

“Thanks, trusty armourers,” said the Knight.---“Wamba, let us

close with them,”---and he rode straight to the thicket. He was

met by six or seven men-at-arms, who ran against him with their

lances at full career. Three of the weapons struck against him,

and splintered with as little effect as if they had been driven

against a tower of steel. The Black Knight’s eyes seemed to

flash fire even through the aperture of his visor. He raised

himself in his stirrups with an air of inexpressible dignity, and

exclaimed, “What means this, my masters!”---The men made no other

reply than by drawing their swords and attacking him on every

side, crying, “Die, tyrant!”

“Ha! Saint Edward! Ha! Saint George!” said the Black Knight,

striking down a man at every invocation; “have we traitors here?”

His opponents, desperate as they were, bore back from an arm

which carried death in every blow, and it seemed as if the terror

of his single strength was about to gain the battle against such

odds, when a knight, in blue armour, who had hitherto kept

himself behind the other assailants, spurred forward with his

lance, and taking aim, not at the rider but at the steed, wounded

the noble animal mortally.

“That was a felon stroke!” exclaimed the Black Knight, as the

steed fell to the earth, bearing his rider along with him.

And at this moment, Wamba winded the bugle, for the whole had

passed so speedily, that he had not time to do so sooner. The

sudden sound made the murderers bear back once more, and Wamba,

though so imperfectly weaponed, did not hesitate to rush in and

assist the Black Knight to rise.

“Shame on ye, false cowards!” exclaimed he in the blue harness,

who seemed to lead the assailants, “do ye fly from the empty

blast of a horn blown by a Jester?”

Animated by his words, they attacked the Black Knight anew, whose

best refuge was now to place his back against an oak, and defend

himself with his sword. The felon knight, who had taken another

spear, watching the moment when his formidable antagonist was

most closely pressed, galloped against him in hopes to nail him

with his lance against the tree, when his purpose was again

intercepted by Wamba. The Jester, making up by agility the want

of strength, and little noticed by the men-at-arms, who were

busied in their more important object, hovered on the skirts of

the fight, and effectually checked the fatal career of the Blue

Knight, by hamstringing his horse with a stroke of his sword.

Horse and man went to the ground; yet the situation of the Knight

of the Fetterlock continued very precarious, as he was pressed

close by several men completely armed, and began to be fatigued

by the violent exertions necessary to defend himself on so many

points at nearly the same moment, when a grey-goose shaft

suddenly stretched on the earth one of the most formidable of

his assailants, and a band of yeomen broke forth from the glade,

headed by Locksley and the jovial Friar, who, taking ready and

effectual part in the fray, soon disposed of the ruffians, all

of whom lay on the spot dead or mortally wounded. The Black

Knight thanked his deliverers with a dignity they had not

observed in his former bearing, which hitherto had seemed rather

that of a blunt bold soldier, than of a person of exalted rank.

“It concerns me much,” he said, “even before I express my full

gratitude to my ready friends, to discover, if I may, who have

been my unprovoked enemies.---Open the visor of that Blue Knight,

Wamba, who seems the chief of these villains.”

The Jester instantly made up to the leader of the assassins, who,

bruised by his fall, and entangled under the wounded steed, lay

incapable either of flight or resistance.

“Come, valiant sir,” said Wamba, “I must be your armourer as well

as your equerry---I have dismounted you, and now I will unhelm

you.”

So saying, with no very gentle hand he undid the helmet of the

Blue Knight, which, rolling to a distance on the grass, displayed

to the Knight of the Fetterlock grizzled locks, and a countenance

he did not expect to have seen under such circumstances.

“Waldemar Fitzurse!” he said in astonishment; “what could urge

one of thy rank and seeming worth to so foul an undertaking?”

“Richard,” said the captive Knight, looking up to him, “thou

knowest little of mankind, if thou knowest not to what ambition

and revenge can lead every child of Adam.”

“Revenge?” answered the Black Knight; “I never wronged thee---On

me thou hast nought to revenge.”

“My daughter, Richard, whose alliance thou didst scorn---was that

no injury to a Norman, whose blood is noble as thine own?”

“Thy daughter?” replied the Black Knight; “a proper cause of

enmity, and followed up to a bloody issue!---Stand back, my

masters, I would speak to him alone.---And now, Waldemar

Fitzurse, say me the truth---confess who set thee on this

traitorous deed.”

“Thy father’s son,” answered Waldemar, “who, in so doing, did but

avenge on thee thy disobedience to thy father.”

Richard’s eyes sparkled with indignation, but his better nature

overcame it. He pressed his hand against his brow, and remained

an instant gazing on the face of the humbled baron, in whose

features pride was contending with shame.

“Thou dost not ask thy life, Waldemar,” said the King.

“He that is in the lion’s clutch,” answered Fitzurse, “knows it

were needless.”

“Take it, then, unasked,” said Richard; “the lion preys not on

prostrate carcasses.---Take thy life, but with this condition,

that in three days thou shalt leave England, and go to hide thine

infamy in thy Norman castle, and that thou wilt never mention the

name of John of Anjou as connected with thy felony. If thou art

found on English ground after the space I have allotted thee,

thou diest---or if thou breathest aught that can attaint the

honour of my house, by Saint George! not the altar itself shall

be a sanctuary. I