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+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Prince and the Page, by Charlotte M.
+Yonge, Illustrated by Adrian Stokes
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
+other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions 
+whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
+the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at 
+www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
+to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Prince and the Page
+       A Story of the Last Crusade
+
+
+Author: Charlotte M. Yonge
+
+
+
+Release Date: July 28, 2019  [eBook #3696]
+[This file was first posted July 24, 2001]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: UTF-8
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PRINCE AND THE PAGE***
+
+
+Transcribed from the 1909 Macmillan and Co. edition by David Price, email
+ccx074@pglaf.org
+
+                          [Picture: Book cover]
+
+
+
+
+
+                                   THE
+                           PRINCE AND THE PAGE
+
+
+                       A STORY OF THE LAST CRUSADE
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                             BY THE AUTHOR OF
+                         “THE HEIR OF REDCLYFFE,”
+                                   ETC.
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                   WITH A FRONTISPIECE BY ADRIAN STOKES
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                        MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED
+                       ST. MARTIN’S STREET, LONDON
+                                   1909
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+                     RICHARD CLAY AND SONS, LIMITED,
+                       BREAD STREET HILL, E.C. AND
+                             BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.
+
+  _First Edition printed_ 1865 (_Pott_ 8_vo_).  _Reprinted_ 1873, 1875,
+                             1877, 1878, 1881
+ (_Globe_ 8_vo_), _March and November_ 1883, 1886.  _Second Edition_ 1891
+                             (_Crown_ 8_vo_)
+          _Reprinted_ 1893, 1898, 1899, 1901, 1903, 1906, 1909.
+                        _Shilling Edition_, 1908.
+
+                         [Picture: Frontispiece]
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+IN these days of exactness even a child’s historical romance must point
+to what the French term its _pièces justficatives_.  We own that ours do
+not lie very deep.  The picture of Simon de Montfort drawn by his wife’s
+own household books, as quoted by Mrs. Everett Green in her Lives of the
+Princesses, and that of Edward I. in Carte’s History, and more recently
+in the Greatest of the Plantagenets, furnished the two chief influences
+of the story.  The household accounts show that Earl Simon and Eleanor of
+England had five sons.  Henry fell with his father at Evesham.  Simon and
+Guy deeply injured his cause by their violence, and after holding out
+Kenilworth against the Prince, retired to the Continent, where they
+sacrilegiously murdered Henry, son of the King of the Romans—a crime so
+much abhorred in Italy that Dante represents himself as meeting them in
+torments in the _Inferno_, not however before Guy had become the founder
+of the family of the Counts of Monforte in the Maremma.  Richard, the
+fourth son, appears in the household books as possessing dogs, and having
+garments bought for him; but his history has not been traced after his
+mother left England.  The youngest son, Amaury, obtained the hereditary
+French possessions of the family, and continued the line of Montfort as a
+French subject.  Eleanor, the only daughter, called the Demoiselle de
+Montfort, married, as is well known, the last native prince of Wales, and
+died after a few years.
+
+The adventure of Edward with the outlaw of Alton Wood is one of the stock
+anecdotes of history, and many years ago the romance of the encounter led
+the author to begin a tale upon it, in which the outlaw became the
+protector of one of the proscribed family of Montfort.  The commencement
+was placed in one of the manuscript magazines which are so often the
+amusement of a circle of friends.  It was not particularly correct in its
+details, and the hero bore the peculiarly improbable name of Wilfred (by
+which he has since appeared in the _Monthly Packet_).  The story slept
+for many years in MS., until further reading and thought had brought
+stronger interest in the period, and for better or for worse it was taken
+in hand again.  Joinville, together with the authorities quoted by
+Sismondi, assisted in picturing the arrival of the English after the
+death of St. Louis, and the murder of Henry of Almayne is related in all
+crusading histories; but for Simon’s further career, and for his
+implication in the attempt on Edward’s life at Acre, the author is alone
+responsible, taking refuge in the entire uncertainty that prevails as to
+the real originator of the crime, and perhaps an apology is likewise due
+to Dante for having reversed his doom.
+
+For the latter part of the story, the old ballad of The Blind Beggar of
+Bethnal Green, gives the framework.  That ballad is believed to be
+Elizabethan in date, and the manners therein certainly are scarcely
+accordant with the real thirteenth century, and still less with our
+notions of the days of chivalry.  Some liberties therefore have been
+taken with it, the chief of them being that Bessee is not permitted to go
+forth to seek her fortune in the inn at Romford, and the readers are
+entreated to believe that the alteration was made by the traditions which
+repeated Henry de Montfort’s song.
+
+It was the late Hugh Millar who alleged that the huge stone under which
+Edward sleeps in Westminster Abbey agrees in structure with no rocks
+nearer than those whence the mighty stones of the Temple at Jerusalem
+were hewn, and there is no doubt that earth and stones were frequently
+brought by crusaders from the Holy Land with a view to the hallowing of
+their own tombs.
+
+The author is well aware that this tale has all the incorrectnesses and
+inconsistencies that are sure to attend a historical tale; but the dream
+that has been pleasant to dream may be pleasant to listen to; and there
+can be no doubt that, in spite of all inevitable faults, this style of
+composition does tend to fix young people’s interest and attention on the
+scenes it treats of, and to vivify the characters it describes; and if
+this sketch at all tends to prepare young people’s minds to look with
+sympathy and appreciation on any of the great characters of our early
+annals, it will have done at least one work.
+
+_December_ 12_th_, 1865.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I
+THE STATELY HUNTER
+
+
+    “‘Now who are thou of the darksome brow
+          Who wanderest here so free?’
+    “‘Oh, I’m one that will walk the green green woods,
+          Nor ever ask leave of thee.’”—S. M.
+
+A FINE EVENING—six centuries ago—shed a bright parting light over Alton
+Wood, illuminating the gray lichens that clung to the rugged trunks of
+the old oak trees, and shining on the smoother bark of the graceful
+beech, with that sidelong light that, towards evening, gives an especial
+charm to woodland scenery.  The long shadows lay across an open green
+glade, narrowing towards one end, where a path, nearly lost amid dwarf
+furze, crested heather, and soft bent-grass, led towards a hut, rudely
+constructed of sods of turf and branches of trees, whose gray crackling
+foliage contrasted with the fresh verdure around.  There was no endeavour
+at a window, nor chimney; but the door of wattled boughs was carefully
+secured by a long twisted withe.
+
+A halbert, a broken arrow, a deer-skin pegged out on the ground to dry, a
+bundle of faggots, a bare and blackened patch of grass, strewn with wood
+ashes, were tokens of recent habitation, though the reiterations of the
+nightingale, the deep tones of the blackbird and the hum of insects, were
+the only sounds that broke the stillness.
+
+Suddenly the silence was interrupted by a clear, loud, ringing whistle,
+repeated at brief intervals and now and then exchanged for the
+call—“Leonillo!  Leon!”  A footstep approached, rapidly overtaken and
+passed by the rushing gallop of a large animal; and there broke on the
+scene a large tawny hound, prancing, bounding, and turning round
+joyfully, pawing the air, and wagging his tail, in welcome to the figure
+who followed him.
+
+This was a youth thirteen years old, wearing such a dress as was usual
+with foresters—namely, a garment of home-spun undyed wool, reaching to
+the knee, and there met by buskins of deer-skin, with the dappled hair
+outside; but the belt which crossed one shoulder was clasped with gold,
+and sustained a dagger, whose hilt and sheath were of exquisite
+workmanship.  The cap on his head was of gray rabbit-skin, but a heron’s
+plume waved in it; the dark curling locks beneath were carefully
+arranged; and the port of his head and shoulders, the mould of his limbs,
+the cast of his features, and the fairness of his complexion, made his
+appearance ill accord with the homeliness of his garb.  In one hand he
+carried a bow over his shoulder; in the other he held by the ears a
+couple of dead rabbits, with which he playfully tantalized the dog,
+holding them to his nose, and then lifting them high aloft, while the
+hound, perfectly entering into the sport, leapt high after them with open
+mouth, and pretended to seize them, then bounded and careered round his
+young master with gay short barks, till both were out of breath; and the
+boy, flinging the rabbits on the turf, threw himself down on it, with one
+arm upon the neck of the panting dog, whose great gasps, like a sobbing
+of laughter, heaved his whole frame.
+
+“Ay, good Leonillo, take your rest!” said the boy: “we have done yeoman’s
+service to-day, and shown ourselves fit to earn our own livelihood!  We
+are outlaws now, my lion of the Pyrenees; and you at least lead a merrier
+life than in the castle halls, when we hunted for sport, and not for
+sustenance!  Well-a-day, my Leon!”—as the creature closed his mouth, and
+looked wistfully up at him with almost human sympathy and
+intelligence—“would that we knew where are all that were once wont to go
+with us to the chase!  But for them, I would be well content to be a bold
+forester all my days!  Better so, than to be ever vexed and crossed in
+every design for the country’s weal—distrusted above—betrayed beneath!
+Alack! alack! my noble father, why wert thou wrecked in every hope—in
+every aim!”
+
+These murmurings were broken off as Leonillo suddenly crested his head,
+and changed his expression of repose for one of intense listening.
+
+“Already!” exclaimed the boy, springing to his feet, as Leonillo bounded
+forward to meet a stout hardy forester, who was advancing from the
+opposite end of the glade.  This was a man of the largest and most sinewy
+mould, his face tanned by sun and wind to a uniform hard ruddy brown, and
+his shaggy black hair untrimmed, as well as his dark bristly beard.  His
+jerkin was of rough leather, crossed by a belt, sustaining sword and
+dagger; a bow and arrows were at his back; a huge quarter-staff in his
+hand; and his whole aspect was that of a ferocious outlaw, whose hand was
+against every man.
+
+But the youth started towards him gleefully, as if the very sight of him
+had dispelled all melancholy musings, and shouted merrily,
+“Welcome—welcome, Adam!  Why so early home?  Have the Alton boors turned
+surly? or are the King’s prickers abroad, and the neighbourhood
+unwholesome for bold clerks of St. Nicholas?”
+
+“Worse!” was the gruff mutter in reply.  “Down, Leon: I am in no mood for
+thy freaks!”
+
+“What is it, Adam?  Have the keepers carried their complaints to the
+King, of the venison we have consumed, with small thanks to him?”
+
+“Prince Edward is at Alton!  What think you of that, Sir?  Come to seek
+through copse and brake for the arrant deer-stealer and outlaw, and all
+his gang!”
+
+“Why, there’s preferment for you!” said the boy, laughing.  “High game
+for the heir of the throne!  And his gang!  Hold up your head, Leonillo:
+you and I come in for a share of the honour!”
+
+“Hold up your head!” said the outlaw bitterly.  “You may chance to hold
+it as high as your father’s is, for all your gibes and jests, my young
+Lord, if the Longshanks gets a hold of you, which our Lady forefend.”
+
+“Nay, I think better of my Cousin Longshanks.  I loved him well when I
+was his page at Hereford: he was tenderer to me than ever my brothers
+were; and I scarce think he would hang, draw, and quarter me now.”
+
+“You may try, if you are not the better guided.”
+
+“How did you hear these tidings?” inquired the boy, changing his mood to
+a graver one.
+
+“From the monk to whom you confessed a fortnight back.  Did you let him
+know your lineage?”
+
+“How could I do otherwise?”
+
+“He looked like a man who would keep a secret; and yet—”
+
+“Shame—shame to doubt the good father!”
+
+“Nay, I do not say that I do; but I would have the secret in as few men’s
+power as may be.  Nevertheless, I thank the good brother.  He called out
+to me as he saw me about to enter the town, that if I had any tenderness
+for my own life, I had best not show myself there; and he went on to tell
+me how the Prince was come to his hunting-lodge, with hawk and hound
+indeed, but for the following of men rather than bird or beast.”
+
+“And what would you have me do?”
+
+“Be instantly on the way to the coast, ere the search begins; and there,
+either for love of Sir Simon the righteous or for that gilt knife of
+yours, we may get ferried over to the Isle of Wight, whence—But what ails
+the dog!  Whist, Leonillo!  Hold your throat: I can hear naught but your
+clamour!”
+
+The hound was in fact barking with a tremendous lion-like note; and when,
+on reiterated commands from his master and the outlaw, he changed it for
+a low continuous growling like distant thunder, a step and a rustling of
+the boughs became audible.
+
+“They are upon us already!” cried the boy, snatching up and stringing his
+bow.
+
+“Leave me to deal with him!” returned the outlaw.  “Off to Alton: the
+good father will receive you to sanctuary!”
+
+“Flee!—never!” cried the boy.  “You teaching my father’s son to flee!”
+
+“Tush!—’tis but one!” said the outlaw.  “He is easily dealt with; and he
+shall have no time to call his fellows.”
+
+So saying, the forester strode forward into the wood, where a tall figure
+was seen through the trees; and with uplifted quarter-staff, dealt a blow
+of sudden and deadly force as soon as the stranger came within its sweep,
+totally without warning.  The power of the stroke might have felled an
+ox, and would have at once overthrown the new-comer, but that he was a
+man of unusual stature; and this being unperceived in the outlaw’s haste,
+the blow lighted on his left shoulder instead of on his head.
+
+“Ha, caitiff!” he exclaimed; and shortening the hunting-pole in his hand,
+he returned the stroke with interest, but the outlaw had already prepared
+himself to receive the blow on his staff.  For some seconds there was a
+rapid exchange; and all that the boy could detect in the fierce flourish
+of weapons was, that his champion was at least equally matched.  The
+height of the stranger was superior; and his movements, if less quick and
+violent, had an equableness that showed him a thorough master of his
+weapon.  But ere the lad had time to cross the heather to the scene of
+action, the fight was over; the outlaw lay stunned and motionless on the
+ground, and the gigantic stranger was leaning on his hunting-pole,
+regarding him with a grave unmoved countenance, the fair skin of which
+was scarcely flushed by the exertion.
+
+“Spare him! spare him!” cried the boy, leaping forwards.  “I am the prey
+you seek!”
+
+“Well met, my young Lord,” was the stern reply.  “You have found yourself
+a worthy way of life, and an honourable companion.”
+
+“Honourable indeed, if faithfulness be honour!” replied the boy.  “Myself
+I yield, Sir; but spare him, if yet he lives!—O Adam, my only friend!” he
+sobbed, as kneeling over him, he raised his head, undid his collar, and
+parted the black locks, to seek for the mark of the blow, whence blood
+was fast oozing.
+
+“He lives—he will do well enough,” said the hunter.  “Now, tell me,
+boy—what brought you here?”
+
+“The loving fidelity of this man!” was the prompt reply:—“a Poitevin, a
+falconer at Kenilworth, who found me sore wounded on the field at
+Evesham, and ever since has tended me as never vassal tended lord; and
+now—now hath he indeed died for me!” and the boy, endeavouring to raise
+the inanimate form, dropped heavy tears on the senseless face.
+
+“True,” rigidly spoke the hunter, though there was somewhat of a
+quivering of the muscles of the cheek discernible amid the curls of his
+chestnut beard: “robbery is not the wonted service demanded of
+retainers.”
+
+“Poor Adam!” said the youth with a flash of spirit, “at least he never
+stripped the peaceful homestead and humble farmer, like the royal
+purveyors!”
+
+“Ha—young rebel!” exclaimed the hunter.  “Know you what you say?”
+
+“I reck not,” replied the boy: “you have slain my father and my brothers,
+and now you have slain my last and only friend.  Do as you will with
+me—only for my mother’s sake, let it not be a shameful death; and let my
+sister Eleanor have my poor Leonillo.  And let me, too, leave this gold
+with the priest of Alton, that my true-hearted loving Adam may have fit
+burial and masses.”
+
+“I tell thee, boy, he is in no more need of a burial than thou or I.  I
+touched him warily.  Here—his face more to the air.”
+
+And the stranger bent down, and with his powerful strength lifted the
+heavy form of Adam, so that the boy could better support him.  Then
+taking some wine from the hunting-flask slung to his own shoulder, he
+applied some drops to the bruise.  The smart produced signs of life, and
+the hunter put his flask into the boy’s hand, saying, “Give him a
+draught, and then—” he put his finger to his own lips, and stood somewhat
+apart.
+
+Adam opened his eyes, and made some inarticulate murmurs; then, the
+liquor being held to his lips, he drank, and with fresh vigour raised
+himself.
+
+“The boy!—where is he?  What has chanced?  Is it you, Sir?  Where is the
+rogue?  Fled, the villain?  We shall have the Prince upon us next!  I
+must after him, and cut his story short!  Your hand, Sir!”
+
+“Nay, Adam—your hurt!”
+
+“A broken head!  Tush, ’tis naught!  Here, your hand!  Canst not lend a
+hand to help a man up in your own service?” he added testily, as stiff
+and dizzy he sat up and tried to rise.  “You might have sent an arrow to
+stop his traitorous tongue; but there is no help in you!” he added,
+provoked at seeing a certain embarrassment about the youth.  “Desert me
+at this pinch!  It is not like his father’s son!” and he was sinking
+back, when at sight of the hunter he stumbled eagerly to his feet, but
+only to stagger against a tree.
+
+“You are my prisoner!” said the calm deep voice.
+
+“Well and good,” said Adam surlily.  “But let the lad go free: he is a
+yeoman’s son, who came but to bear me company.”
+
+“And learn thy trade?  Goodly lessons in falling unawares on the King’s
+huntsmen, and sending arrows after them!  Fair breeding, in sooth!”
+repeated the stranger, standing with his arms crossed upon his mighty
+breadth of chest, and looking at Adam with a still, grave, commanding
+blue eye, that seemed to pierce him and hold him down, as it were, and a
+countenance whose youthfulness and perfect regularity of feature did but
+enhance its exceeding severity of expression.  “You know the meed of
+robbery and murder?”
+
+“A halter and a bough,” said Adam readily.  “Well and good; but I tell
+thee that concerns not the boy—since,” he added bitterly, “he is too meek
+and tender so much as to lift a hand in his own cause!  He has never
+crossed the laws.”
+
+“I understand you, friend,” said the hunter: “he is a valued charge—maybe
+the son of one of the traitor barons.  Take my advice—yield him to the
+King’s justice, and secure your own pardon.”
+
+“Out, miscreant!” shouted Adam; and was about to spring at him again, but
+the powerful arm collared him, and he recognized at once that he was like
+a child in that grasp.  He ground his teeth with rage and muttered, “That
+a fellow with such thews should give such dastardly counsel, and _he_
+yonder not lift a finger to aid!”
+
+“Wilt follow me,” composedly demanded the stranger, “with hands free? or
+must I bind them?”
+
+“Follow?” replied Adam, ruefully looking at the boy with eyes full of
+reproach—“ay, follow to any gallows thou wilt—and the nearest tree were
+the best!  Come on!”
+
+“I have no warrant,” returned the grave hunter.
+
+“Tush! what warrant is needed for hanging a well-known outlaw—made so by
+the Prince’s tender mercies?  The Prince will thank thee, man, for
+ridding the realm of the robber who fell on the treasurer bearing the
+bags from Leicester!”
+
+And meanwhile, with uncouth cunning, Adam was striving to telegraph by
+winks and gestures to the boy who had so grievously disappointed him,
+that the moment of his own summary execution would be an excellent one
+for his companion’s escape.
+
+But the eye, so steady yet so quick under its somewhat drooping eyelid,
+detected the simple stratagem.
+
+“I trow the Prince might thank me more for bringing in this charge of
+thine.”
+
+“Small thanks, I trow, for laying hands on a poor orphan—the son of a
+Poitevin man-at-arms—that I kept with me for love of his father, though
+he is fitter for a convent than the green wood!” added Adam, with the
+same sound of keen reproach and disappointment in his voice.
+
+“That shall we learn at Guildford,” replied the stranger.  “There are
+means of teaching a man to speak.”
+
+“None that will serve with me,” stoutly responded Adam.
+
+“That shall we see,” was the brief answer.
+
+And he signed to his prisoners to move on before him, taking care so to
+interpose his stately person between them, that there should be no
+communication by word, far less by look.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II
+THE LADY OF THE FOREST
+
+
+    “Behold how mercy softeneth still
+          The haughtiest heart that beats:
+    Pride with disdain may he answered again,
+          But pardon at once defeats!”—S. M.
+
+THE so-called forest was in many parts mere open heath, thickly adorned
+by the beautiful purple ling, blending into a rich carpet with the dwarf
+furze, and backed by thickets of trees in the hollows of the ground.
+
+Across this wild country the tall forester conducted his captives in
+silence—moving along with a pace that evidently cost him so little
+exertion, and was so steady and even, that his companions might have
+supposed it slow, had they only watched it, and not been obliged to keep
+up with it.  Light of foot as the youth was, he was at times reduced to
+an almost breathless run; and Adam plodded along, with strides that
+worked his arms and shoulders in sympathy.
+
+After about three miles, when the boy was beginning to feel as if he must
+soon be in danger of lagging, they came into a dip of the ground where
+stood a long, low, irregular building, partly wood and partly stone,
+roofed with shingle in some parts, in others with heather.  The last
+addition, a deep porch, still retained the fresh tints of the bark on the
+timber sides, and the purple of the ling that roofed it.
+
+Sheds and out-houses surrounded it; dogs in couples, horses, grooms, and
+foresters, were congregated in the background; but around this new porch
+were gathered a troop of peasant women, children, and aged men.  The fine
+bald brow and profile of the old peasant, the eager face of the
+curly-haired child, the worn countenance of the hard-tasked mother, were
+all uplifted towards the doorway, in which stood, slightly above them, a
+lady, with two long plaited flaxen tresses descending on her shoulders,
+under a black silken veil, that disclosed a youthful countenance, full of
+pure calm loveliness, of a simple but dignified and devotional
+expression, that might have befitted an angel of charity.  A priest and a
+lady were dispensing loaves and warm garments to the throng around; but
+each gift was accompanied by a gentle word from the lady, framed with
+difficulty to their homely English tongue, but listened to even by
+uncomprehending ears like a strain of Church music.
+
+Adam had expected the forester to turn aside to the group of servants,
+but in blank amazement saw him lead the way through the poor at the gate;
+and advancing to the porch with a courteous bending of his head, he said
+in the soft Provençal—far more familiar than English to Adam’s ears—“Hast
+room for another suppliant, mi Dona?”
+
+The sweet fair face lighted up with a sudden sunbeam of joy; and a
+musical voice replied.  “Welcome, my dearest Lord: much did I need thee
+to hear the plaints of some of these thy lieges, which my ears can scarce
+understand!  But why art thou alone? or rather, why thus strangely
+accompanied?”
+
+“These are the captives won by my single arm, whom, according to all laws
+of chivalry, thine own true knight thus lays at thy feet, fair lady mine,
+to be disposed of at thine own gracious will and pleasure.”
+
+And a smile of such sweetness lightened his features, that a murmur of
+“Blessings on his comely face!” ran through the assembly; and Adam
+indulged in a gruff startled murmur of “’Tis the Prince, or the devil
+himself!” while his young master, comprehending the gesture of the
+Prince, and overborne by the lovely winning graces of the Princess,
+stepped forward, doffing his cap and bending his knee, and signing to
+Adam to follow his example.
+
+“Thou hast been daring peril again!” said the Princess, holding her
+husband’s arm, and looking up into his face with lovingly reproachful yet
+exulting eyes.  “Yet I will not be troubled!  Naught is danger to thee!
+And yet alone and unarmed to encounter such a sturdy savage as I see
+yonder!  But there is blood on his brow!  Let his hurt be looked to ere
+we speak of his fate.”
+
+“He is at thy disposal, mi Dona,” returned Edward: “thou art the judge of
+both, and shall decide their lot when thou hast heard their tale.”
+
+“It can scarce be a very dark one,” replied Eleanor, “or thou wouldst
+never have led them to such a judge!”  Then turning to the prisoners, she
+began to say in her foreign English, “Follow the good father, friends—”
+when she broke off at fuller sight of the boy’s countenance, and
+exclaimed in Provençal, “I know the like of that face and mien!”
+
+“Truly dost thou know it,” her husband replied; “but peace till thou hast
+cleared thy present court, and we can be private.—Follow the priest,” he
+added, “and await the Princess’s pleasure.”
+
+They obeyed; and the priest led them through a side-door, through which
+they could still hear Eleanor’s sweet Castillian voice laying before her
+husband her difficulties in comprehending her various petitioners.  The
+priest being English, was hardly more easily understood than his flock;
+and her lady spoke little but _langue d’oui_, the Northern French, which
+was as little serviceable in dealing with her Spanish and Provençal as
+with the rude West-Saxon-English.  Edward’s deep manly tones were to be
+heard, however, now interrogating the peasants in their own tongue, now
+briefly interpreting to his wife in Provençal; and a listener could
+easily gather that his hand was as bounteous, his heart as merciful, as
+hers, save where attacks on the royal game had been requited by the
+trouble complained of; and that in such cases she pleaded in vain.
+
+The captives, whom her husband had surrendered to her mercy, had been led
+into a great, long, low hall, with rudely-timbered sides, and rough beams
+to the roof, with a stone floor, and great open fire, over which a
+man-cook was chattering French to his bewildered English scullion.  An
+oak table, and settles on either side of it, ran the whole length of the
+hall; and here the priest bade the two prisoners seat themselves.  They
+obeyed—the boy slouching his cap over his face, averting it, and keeping
+as far as possible from the group of servants near the fire.  The priest
+called for bread, meat, and beer, to be set before them; and after a
+moment’s examination of Adam’s bruise, applied the simple remedy that was
+all it required, and left them to their meal.  Adam took this opportunity
+to growl in an undertone, “Does _he_ there know you?”  The reply was a
+nod of assent.  “And you knew him?”  Another nod; and then the boy,
+looking heedfully round, added in a quick, undertone, “Not till you were
+down.  Then he helped me to restore you.  You forgive me, Adam, now?” and
+he held out his hand, and wrung the rugged one of the forester.
+
+“What should I forgive!  Poor lad! you could not have striven in the
+Longshanks’ grasp!  I was a fool not to guess how it was, when I saw you
+not knowing which way to look!”
+
+“Hush!” broke in the youth with uplifted hand, as a page of about his own
+age came daintily into the hall, gathering his green robe about him as if
+he disdained the neighbourhood, and holding his head high under his
+jaunty tall feathered cap.
+
+“Outlaws!” he said, speaking English, but with a strong foreign accent,
+and as if it were a great condescension, “the gracious Princess summons
+you to her presence.  Follow me!”
+
+The colour rushed to the boy’s temples, and a retort was on his lips, but
+he struggled to withhold it; and likewise speaking English, said, “I
+would we could have some water, and make ourselves meeter for her
+presence.”
+
+“Scarce worth the pains,” returned the page.  “As if thou couldst ever be
+meet for her presence!  She had rather be rid of thee promptly, than wait
+to be regaled with thy May-day braveries—honest lad!”
+
+Again the answer was only restrained with exceeding difficulty; and there
+was a scornful smile on the young prisoner’s cheek, that caused the page
+to exclaim angrily, “What means that insolence, malapert boy?”
+
+But there was no time for further strife; for the door was pushed open,
+and the Prince’s voice called, “Hamlyn de Valence, why tarry the
+prisoners?”
+
+“Only, Sir,” returned Hamlyn, “that this young robber is offended that he
+hath not time to deck himself out in his last stolen gold chain, to
+gratify the Princess!”
+
+“Peace, Hamlyn,” returned the Prince: “thou speakest thou knowest not
+what.—Come hither, boy,” he added, laying his hand on his young captive’s
+shoulder, and putting him through the door with a familiarity that
+astonished Hamlyn—all the more, when he found that while both prisoners
+were admitted, he himself was excluded!
+
+Princess Eleanor was alone in another chamber of the sylvan lodge, hung
+with tapestry representing hunting scenes, the floor laid with
+deer-skins, and deer’s antlers projecting from the wall, to support the
+feminine properties that marked it as her special abode.  She was
+standing when they entered; and was turning eagerly with outstretched
+hand and face of recognition, when Prince Edward checked her by saying,
+“Nay, the cause is not yet tried:” and placing her in a large carved
+oaken chair, where she sat with a lily-like grace and dignity, half
+wondering, but following his lead, he proceeded, “Sit thou there, fair
+dame, and exercise thy right, as judge of the two captives whom I place
+at thy feet.”
+
+“And you, my Lord?” she asked.
+
+“I stand as their accuser,” said Edward.  “Advance, prisoners!—Now, most
+fair judge, what dost thou decree for the doom of Adam de Gourdon, rebel
+first, and since that the terror of our royal father’s lieges, the robber
+of his treasurers, the rifler of our Cousin Pembroke’s jewellery, the
+slayer of our deer?”
+
+“Alas! my Lord, why put such questions to me,” said Eleanor imploringly,
+“unless, as I would fain hope, thou dost but jest?”
+
+“Do I speak jest, Gourdon?” said Edward, regarding Adam with a lion-like
+glance.
+
+“’Tis all true,” growled Adam.
+
+“And,” proceeded the Prince, “if thy gentle lips refuse to utter the doom
+merited by such deeds, what wilt thou say to hear that, not content with
+these traitorous deeds of his own, he fosters the treason of others?
+Here stands a young rebel, who would have perished at Evesham, but for
+the care and protection of this Gourdon—who healed his wounds, guarded
+him, robbed for him, for him spurned the offer of amnesty, and finally,
+set on thine own husband in Alton Wood—all to shelter yonder young
+traitor from the hands of justice!  Speak the sentence he merits, most
+just of judges!”
+
+“The sentence he merits?” said Eleanor, with swimming eyes.  “Oh! would
+that I were indeed monarch, to dispense life or death!  What he merits he
+shall have, from my whole heart—mine own poor esteem for his fidelity,
+and our joint entreaties to the King for his pardon!  Brave man—thou
+shalt come with me to seek thy pardon from King Henry!”
+
+“Thanks, Lady,” said Adam with rude courtesy; “but it were better to seek
+my young lord’s.”
+
+“My own dear young cousin!” exclaimed Eleanor, laying aside her assumed
+judicial power, and again holding out her hands to him, “we deemed you
+slain!”
+
+“Yes, come hither,” said Edward, “my jailer at Hereford—the rebel who
+drew his maiden sword against his King and uncle—the outlaw who would try
+whether Leicester fits as well as Huntingdon with a bandit life!  What
+hast thou to say for thyself, Richard de Montfort?”
+
+“That my fate, be it what it may, must not stand in the way of Adam’s
+pardon!” said Richard, standing still, without response to the Princess’s
+invitation.  “My Lord, you have spoken much of his noble devotion to me
+for my father’s sake; but you know not the half of what he has done and
+dared for me.  Oh! plead for him, Lady!”
+
+“Plead for him!” said Eleanor: “that will I do with all my heart; and
+well do I know that the good old King will weep with gratitude to him for
+having preserved the life of his young nephew.  Yes, Richard, oft have we
+grieved for thee, my husband’s kind young companion in his captivity, and
+mourned that no tidings could be gained of thee!”
+
+It was not Richard who replied to this winning address.  He stood
+flushed, irresolute, with eyes resolutely cast down, as if to avoid
+seeing the Princess’s sweet face.
+
+Adam, however, spoke: “Then, Lady, I am indeed beholden to you; provided
+that the boy is safe.”
+
+“He is safe,” said Prince Edward.  “His age is protection sufficient.—My
+young cousin, thou art no outlaw: thine uncle will welcome thee gladly;
+and a career is open to thee where thou mayst redeem the honour of thy
+name.”
+
+The colour came with deeper crimson to the boy’s cheek, as he answered in
+a choked voice, “My father’s name needs no redemption!”
+
+Simultaneously a pleading interjection from the Princess, and a warning
+growl from De Gourdon, admonished Richard that he was on perilous ground;
+but the Prince responded in a tone of deep feeling, “Well said, Richard:
+the term does not befit that worthy name.  I should have said that I
+would fain help thee to maintain its honour.  My page once, wilt thou be
+so again? and one day my knight—my trusty baron?”
+
+“How can I?” said Richard, still in the same undertone, subdued but
+determined: “it was you who slew him and my brothers!”
+
+“Nay, nay!” exclaimed the Princess: “the poor boy thinks all his kindred
+are slain!”
+
+“And they are not!” cried Richard, raising his face with sudden
+animation.  “They are safe?”
+
+“Thy brother Henry died with—with the Earl,” said Eleanor; “but all the
+rest are safe, and in France.”
+
+“And my mother and sister?” asked Richard.
+
+“They are likewise abroad,” said the Prince.  “And, Richard, thou art
+free to join them if thou wilt.  But listen first to me.  We tarry yet
+two days at this forest lodge: remain with us for that space—thy name and
+rank unknown if thou wilt—and if thou shalt still look on me as guilty of
+thy father’s death, and not as a loving kinsman, who honoured him deeply,
+I will send thee safely to the coast, with letters to my uncle, the King
+of France.”
+
+Richard raised his head with a searching glance, to see whether this were
+invitation or command.
+
+“Thou art my captive,” said Eleanor softly, coming towards him with a
+young matron’s caressing manner to a boy whom she would win and
+encourage.
+
+“Not captive, but guest,” said Edward; but Richard perceived in the tones
+that no choice was left him, as far as these two days were concerned.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III
+ALTON LODGE
+
+
+    “Ever were his sons hawtayn,
+    And bold for their vilanye;
+    Bothe to knight and sweyn
+    Did they vilanye.”
+
+                                       _Old Ballad of Simon de Montforte_.
+
+FOR the first time for many a month, Richard de Montfort lay down to
+sleep in a pallet bed, instead of a couch of heather; but his heart was
+ill at ease.  He was the fourth son of the great Earl of Leicester, Simon
+de Montfort; and for the earlier years of his life, he had been under the
+careful training of the excellent chaplain, Adam de Marisco, a pupil and
+disciple of the great Robert Grostête, Bishop of Lincoln.  His elder
+brothers had early left this wholesome control; pushed forward by the sad
+circumstances that finally drove their father to take up arms against the
+King, and strangers to the noble temper that actuated him in his
+championship of the English people, they became mere lawless
+rebels—fiercely profiting by his elevation, not for the good of the
+people, but for their own gratification.
+
+Richard had been still a mere boy under constant control, and being
+intelligent, spirited, and docile, had been an especial favourite with
+his father.  To him the great Earl had been the model of all that was
+admirable, wise, and noble; deeply religious, just, and charitable, and
+perfect in all the arts of chivalry and accomplishments of peace—a tender
+and indulgent father, and a firm and wise head of a household—he had been
+ardently loved and looked up to by the young son, who had perhaps more in
+common with him by nature than any other of the family.
+
+Wrongs and injuries had been heaped upon Montfort by the weak and fickle
+King, who would far better have understood him, if, like the selfish
+kinsmen who encircled the throne, he had struggled for his own advantage,
+and not for the maintenance of the Great Charter.  Richard was too young
+to remember the early days when his elder brothers had been companions,
+almost on equal terms, to their first cousins, the King’s sons; his whole
+impression of his parents’ relations with the court was of injustice and
+perfidy from the King and his counsellors, vehemently blamed by his
+mother and brothers, but sometimes palliated by his father, who almost
+always, even at the worst, pleaded the King’s helplessness, and Prince
+Edward’s honourable intentions.  Understanding little of the rights of
+the case, Richard only saw his father as the maintainer of the laws, and
+defender of the oppressed against covenant breakers; and when the appeal
+to arms was at length made, he saw the white cross assumed by his father
+and brothers, in full belief that the war in defence of Magna Carta was
+indeed as sacred as a crusade, and he had earnestly entreated to be
+allowed to bear arms; but he had been deemed as yet too young, and thus
+had had no share in the victory of Lewes, save the full triumph in it
+that was felt by all at Kenilworth.  Afterwards, when sent to be Prince
+Edward’s page at Hereford, he was prepared to regard his royal cousin as
+a ferocious enemy, and was much taken by surprise to find him a graceful
+courtly knight, peculiarly gentle in manner, loving music, romances, and
+all chivalrous accomplishments; and far from the pride and haughtiness
+that had been the theme of all the vassals who assembled at Kenilworth,
+he was gracious to all, and distinguished his young page by treating him
+as a kinsman and favourite companion; showing him indeed far more
+consideration than ever he had received from his unruly turbulent
+brothers.
+
+When Edward had effected his escape, and had joined the Mortimers and
+Clares, Richard had gone home, where his expressions of affection for the
+Prince were listened to by his father, indeed, with a well-pleased though
+melancholy smile, and an augury that one day his brave godson would shake
+off the old King’s evil counsellors, and show himself in his true and
+noble colouring.  His brothers, however, laughed and chid any word about
+the Prince’s kindness.  Edward’s flattery and seduction, they declared,
+had won the young De Clare from their cause.  And in vain did their
+father assure them that they had lost the alliance of the house of
+Gloucester solely by their own over-bearing injustice—a tyranny worse
+than had been exercised under the name of the King.
+
+With Henry of Winchester in their hands, however, theirs seemed the loyal
+cause; and Richard had, by the influence of his elders, been made ashamed
+of his regard for the Prince, and looked upon it as a treacherous
+rebellion, when Edward mustered his forces, and fell upon Leicester and
+his followers.  His father had mournfully yielded to the boy’s entreaty
+to remain with him, instead of being sent away with his mother and the
+younger ones for security: an honourable death, said the Earl, might be
+better for him than an outlawed and proscribed life.  And thus Richard
+had heard his father’s exclamation on marking the well-ordered advance of
+the Royalists: “They have learnt this style from me.  Now, God have mercy
+on our souls, for our bodies are the Prince’s!”
+
+And when Henry, his eldest son, spoke words of confidence, entreating him
+not to despair, he had answered, “I do not, my son; but your presumption,
+and the pride of thy brothers, have brought me to this pass.  I firmly
+believe I shall die for the cause of God and justice.”
+
+Richard had shared his father’s last Communion, received his last
+blessing, and had stood beside him in the desperate ring, which in true
+English fashion died on the field of battle, but never was driven from
+it.  Since that time, the boy’s life had been a wandering amid outlaws
+and peasants—all in one mind of bitter hatred to the court for its cruel
+vexations and oppressions, and of intense love and regret for their
+champion, Sir Simon the Righteous, of whose beneficence tales were
+everywhere told, rising at every step into greater wonder, until at
+length they were enhanced into miracles, wrought by his severed head and
+hands.  Each day had made the boy prouder of his father’s memory, more
+deeply incensed against the Court party that had brought about his fall;
+and keen and bitter were his feelings at finding himself in the hands of
+the Prince himself.  He chafed all the more at feeling the ascendency
+which Edward’s lofty demeanour and personal kindness had formerly exerted
+over him, reviving again by force of habit; he hated himself for not
+having at once challenged his father’s murderer; so as, if he could not
+do more, to have died by his hand; and he despised himself the more, for
+knowing that all he could have said would have been good-naturedly put
+down by the Prince; all he could have done would have been but like a
+gnat’s efforts against that mighty strength.  Then how despicable it was
+to be sensible, in spite of himself, that this atmosphere of courtly
+refinement was far more natural to him—the son of a Provençal noble, and
+of a princess mother—than the rude forest life he had lately led.  The
+greenwood liberty had its charms; and he had truly loved Adam de Gourdon;
+but the soft tones and refined accents were like a note of home to him;
+and though he had never seen the Princess before—she having been sent to
+the Court of St. Louis during the troubles—yet the whole of the interview
+gave him an inexplicable sense of being again among kindred and friends.
+He told himself that it was base, resolved that he would show himself
+determined to cast in his lot with his exiled brethren, and made up his
+mind to maintain a dignified silence during these two days, and at the
+end of them to leave with the Prince a challenge, to be fought out when
+he should have attained manly strength and skill in arms.
+
+In pursuance of this resolution, he appeared at the morning mass and meal
+still grave and silent, and especially avoiding young Hamlyn de Valence,
+who, as the son of one of the half brothers of Henry III., stood in the
+same relationship to Prince Edward and to Richard, whose mother was the
+sister of King Henry.  Probably Hamlyn had had a hint from the Prince,
+for though he regarded young Montfort with no friendly eyes, he yielded
+him an equality of precedence, which hardly consorted with Richard’s rude
+forest garments.
+
+The chase was the order of the day.  The Prince rode forth with a boar
+spear to hunt one of these monsters of the wood, of which vague reports
+had reached him, unconfirmed, till Adam de Gourdon had undertaken to show
+him the creature’s lair.  He had proposed to Richard to join the hunt;
+but the boy, firm to his resolution of accepting no favour from him, that
+could be helped, had refused as curtly as he could; and then, not without
+a feeling of disappointment, had stood holding Leonillo in, as the
+gallant train of hunters rode down the woodland glade, and he figured to
+himself the brave sport in which they would soon be engaged.
+
+The most part of the day was spent by him in lying under a tree, with his
+dog by his side, thinking over the scenes of his earlier life, which had
+passed by his childish mind like those of a drama, in which he had no
+part nor comprehension, but which now, with clearer perceptions, he
+strove to recall and explain to himself.  Ever his father’s stately
+figure was the centre of his recollections, whether receiving tidings of
+infractions of engagements, taking prompt measures for action, or
+striving to repress the violence of his sons and partizans, or it might
+be gazing on his younger boys with sad anxiety.  Richard well remembered
+his saying, when he heard that his sons, Simon and Guy, had been
+plundering the merchant ships in the Channel: “Alas! alas! when I was
+more loyal to the law than to the Crown, I little deemed that I was
+rearing a brood who would scorn all law and loyalty!”
+
+And well too did Richard recollect that when the proposal had been made
+that he should become the attendant of the Prince at Hereford, his father
+had told him that here he would see the mirror of all that was knightly
+and virtuous; and had added, on the loud outcry of the more prejudiced
+brothers: “It is only the truth.  Were it not that the King’s folly and
+his perjured counsellors had come between my nephew Edward and his better
+self, we should have in him a sovereign who might fitly be reckoned as a
+tenth worthy.  It is his very duty to a misruled father that has ranged
+him against us.”
+
+“Yet,” thought Richard, “on the man who thus thought and spoke of him the
+Prince could make savage warfare; nay, offer his senseless corpse foul
+despite.  How can I tarry these two days in such keeping?  I had
+rather—if he will still keep me—be a captive in his lowest dungeon, than
+eat of his bread as a guest!  By our Lady, I will tell him so to his
+face!  I will none of his favours!  Alone I will go to the coast—alone
+make my way to Simon and Guy, with no letters to the French king!  All
+kings, however saintly they may be called, are in league, and make common
+cause; as said my poor brother Henry, when the Mise of Lewes was to be
+laid before this Frenchman!  I will none of them!  Pshaw! is this the
+Princess coming?  I trust she will not see me.  I want none of her fair
+words.”
+
+He had prepared himself to be ungracious; but his courtly breeding was
+too much of an instinct with him for him not to rise, doff his cap, and
+stand aside, as Eleanor of Castille slowly moved towards the woodland
+path, with her graceful Spanish step, followed, but at some distance, by
+two of her women.  She turned as she was passing him, and smiled with a
+sweet radiance that would have won him instantly, had he not heard his
+elder brothers sneer at the cheap coin of royal smiles.  He only bowed;
+but Leonillo was more accessible, and started forward to pay his homage
+of dignified blandishments to the queenly sweetness that pleased his
+canine appreciation.  Richard was forced to step forth, call him in, and
+make his excuses; but the Princess responded by praises of the noble
+animal, and caresses, to which Leonillo replied with a grand gratitude,
+that showed him as nobly bred as his young master.
+
+“Thou art a gallant creature,” said Eleanor, her hand upon the proud
+head; “and no doubt as faithful as beautiful!”
+
+“Faithful to the death, Lady,” replied Richard warmly.
+
+“He is thine own, I trow,” said the Princess,—“not thy groom’s?  I
+remember, that when thy brave father brought my lord and me back from our
+bridal at Burgos, he procured two hounds in the Pyrenees, of meseems,
+such a breed.”
+
+“True, Lady; they were the parents of my Leonillo,” said Richard,
+gratified, in spite of himself.
+
+“How well I remember,” continued Eleanor, “that first sight of the great
+Earl.  My brothers had teased me for going so far north, and told me the
+English were mere rude islanders—boorish, and unlettered; but, child as I
+was, scarce eleven years old, I could perceive the nobleness of the Earl.
+‘If all thy new subjects be like him,’ said my brother to me, ‘thou wilt
+reign over a race of kings.’  And how good he was to me when I wept at
+leaving my home and friends!  How he framed his tongue to speak my own
+Castillian to me; how he comforted me, when the Queen, my mother-in-law,
+required more dignity of me than I yet knew how to assume; and how he
+chid my boy bridegroom for showing scant regard for his girl bride!” said
+Eleanor, smiling at the recollection, as the beloved wife of eleven years
+could well afford to do.  “I mind me well that he found me weeping,
+because my Edward had tied the scarf I gave him on the neck of one of
+those very dogs, and the fatherly counsel he gave me.  Ah, Leonillo, thy
+wise wistful face brings back many thoughts to my mind!  I am glad I may
+honour thee for fidelity!”
+
+“Indeed you may, Lady,” said Richard.  “It was he that above all saved my
+life.”
+
+“Prithee let me hear,” said the Princess, who had already so moved on,
+while herself speaking, as to draw Richard into walking with her along
+the path that had been cleared under the beech trees.  “We have so much
+longed to know thy fate.”
+
+“I cannot tell you much, Lady,” returned Richard.  “The last thing I
+recollect on that dreadful day was, that my father asked for quarter—for
+us—for my brother Henry and me.  We heard the reply: ‘No quarter for
+traitors!’ and Henry fell before us a dead man.  My father shouted, ‘By
+the arm of St. James, it is time for me to die!’  I saw him, with his
+sword in both hands, cut down a wild Welshman who was rushing on me.
+Then I saw no more, till in the moonlight I was awakened by this dog’s
+cool tongue licking the blood from my face, and heard his low whining
+over me.”
+
+“Good dog, good dog!” murmured Eleanor, caressing the animal.  “And thou,
+Richard, thou wert sorely wounded?”
+
+“Sorely,” said Richard; “my side had been pierced with a lance, a Welsh
+two-handed sword had broken through my helmet, and well-nigh cleft my
+skull; and the men-at-arms, riding over me I suppose, must have broken my
+leg, for I could not move: and oh! I felt it hard that I had yet to die.
+Then, Lady, came lights and murmuring voices.  They were Mortimer’s
+plundering Welsh robbers.  I heard their wild gibbering tongue; and I
+knew how it would be with me, should they see the white cross on my
+breast.  But, Lady, Leonillo stood over me.  His lion bark chased them
+aside; and when one bolder than the rest came near the mound where we
+lay, good Leonillo flew at his savage throat.  I heard the struggle as I
+lay—the growls of the dog, the howls of the man; and then they were cut
+short.  And next I heard de Gourdon’s gruff voice commending the good
+hound, whose note had led him to the spot, from the woods, where he was
+hiding after the battle.  The faithful beast sprang from him, and in a
+moment more had led him to me.  Then—ah, then, Lady! when Adam had freed
+me from my broken helm, and lifted me in his arms, what a sight had I!
+Oh, what a field that harvest moon shone upon! how thickly heaped was
+that little mound!  And there was my father’s face up-turned in the white
+moonlight!  O Lady, never in hall or bower could it have been so
+peaceful, or so majestic!  I bade Adam lay me down by his side, and keep
+guard through the night with Leonillo; but he said that the plunderers
+would come in numbers too great for him, and that he must care for the
+living rather than the dead; and withstand him as I would, he bore me
+away.  O Lady, Lady, foul wrong was done when we were gone!”
+
+“Think not on that,” said Eleanor; “it bitterly grieved my lord that so
+it should have been.  Thou knowest, I hope, that he was the chief mourner
+when those honoured limbs were laid in the holy ground at Evesham Abbey.
+They told me, who saw him that day, that his weeping for his godfather
+and his Cousin Henry overcame all joy in his victory.  And I can assure
+thee, dear Richard, that when, three months after, I came to him at
+Canterbury, just after he had been with thy mother at Dover, even then he
+was sad and mournful.  He said that the wisest and best baron in England
+had been made a rebel of, and then slain; and he was full of sorrow for
+thee, only then understanding from thy mother that thou hadst been in the
+battle at all, and that nothing had been heard of thee.  He said thou
+wert the most like to thy father of all his sons; and truly I knew thee
+at once by thine eyes, Richard.  Where wast thou all these months?”
+
+“At first,” said Richard, “I was in an anchoret’s cell, in the wall of a
+church.  So please you, Madame, I must not name names; but when Adam,
+bearing me faint and well-nigh dying on his back, saw the twinkling light
+in the churchyard, he knocked, and entreated aid.  The good anchoret
+pitied my need at first, and when he learnt my name, he gave me shelter
+for my father’s sake, the friend of all religious men.  I lay on his
+little bed, in the chamber in the wall, till I could again walk.
+Meanwhile, Adam watched in the woods at hand, and from time to time came
+at night to see how I fared, and bring me tidings.  Simon was still
+holding out Kenilworth, and we hoped to join him there; but when we set
+forth I was still lame, and too feeble to go far in a day; and we fell in
+with—within short, with a band of robbers, who detained us, half as
+guests, half as captives.  They needed Adam’s stout arm; and there was a
+shrewd, gray, tough old fellow, who had been in Robin Hood’s band, and
+was looked up to as a sort of prince among them, who was bent on making
+us one with them.  Lady, you would smile to hear how the old man used to
+sit by me as I lay on the rushes, and talk of outlawry, as Father Adam de
+Marisco used to talk of learning—as a good and noble science, decaying
+for want of spirit and valour in these days.  It was all laziness, he
+said; barons and princes must needs have their wars, and use up all the
+stout men that were fit to bend a bow in a thicket.  If the Prince went
+on at this rate, he said, there would soon be not an honest outlaw to be
+found in England!  But he was a kind old man, and very good to me; and he
+taught me how to shoot with the long bow better than ever our master at
+Odiham could.  However, I could not brook the spoiler’s life, and the
+band did not trust me; so, as we found that Kenilworth had fallen, as
+soon as my strength had returned to me, we stole away from the outlaws,
+and came southwards, hoping to find my mother at Odiham.  Hearing that
+Odiham too was gone from us, we have lurked in Alton Wood till means
+should serve us for reaching the coast.”
+
+“Till thou hast found the friend who has longed for thee, and sought for
+thee,” replied Eleanor.  “What didst thou do, young Richard, to win my
+husband’s heart so entirely in his captivity?”
+
+“I know not, Lady, why he should take thought for me,” bluntly said
+Richard, with a return of the sensation of being coaxed and talked over.
+
+“Methinks I can tell thee one cause,” returned the Princess.  “Was there
+not a time when thou didst overhear him concerting with Thomas de Clare
+the plan of an escape, and thou didst warn them that thou wast at hand;
+ay, and yet didst send notice to thy father?”
+
+“Yes,” answered Richard with surprise; “I could do no other.”
+
+“Even so,” said Eleanor.  “And thus didst thou win the esteem of thy
+kinsman.  ‘The stripling is loyal and trustworthy,’ he has said to me;
+‘pity that such a heart should be pierced in an inglorious field.  Would
+that I could find him, and strive to return to him something of what his
+father’s care hath wrought for me.’  Richard, trust me, it would be a
+real joy and lightening of his grief to have thee with him.”
+
+“Grief, Madame!” repeated Richard.  “I little thought he grieved for my
+father, who, but for him, would be—” and a sob checked him, as the
+contrast rose before him of the great Earl and beautiful Countess
+presiding over their large family and princely household, and the
+scattered ruined state of all at present.
+
+“He shall answer that question himself,” said Eleanor.  “See, here he
+comes to meet us by the beechwood alley.”
+
+And in fact, a form, well suited to its setting within the stately aisles
+of the beech trees, was pacing towards them.  The chase had ended, and
+hearing that his wife had walked forth into the wood, the Prince had come
+by another path to meet her, and his rare and beautiful smile shone out
+as he saw who was her companion.  “Art making friends with my young
+cousin?” he said affectionately.
+
+“I would fain do so,” replied Eleanor; “but alas, my Lord! he feels that
+there is a long dark reckoning behind, that stands in the way of our
+friendship.”
+
+Richard looked down, and did not speak.  The Princess had put his thought
+into words.
+
+“Richard,” said the Prince, “I feel the same.  It is for that very cause
+that I seek to have thee with me.  Hear me.  Thou art grown older, and
+hast seen man’s work and man’s sorrows, since I left thee on the
+hill-side at Hereford.  Thou canst see, perchance, that a question hath
+two sides—though it is not given to all men to do so.  Hearken then.—Thy
+father was the greatest man I have known—nay, but for the thought of my
+uncle of France, I should say the holiest.  He was my teacher in all
+knightly doings, and in all kingly thoughts, such as I pray may be with
+me through life.  It was from him I learnt that this royal, this noble
+power, is not given to exalt ourselves, but as a trust for the welfare of
+others.  It was the spring of action that was with him through life.”
+
+“It was,” murmured Richard, calling to mind many a saying of his
+father’s.
+
+“And fain would he have impressed it on all around,” added Edward: “but
+there were others who deemed that kingly power was but a means of
+enjoyment, and that restraint was an outrage on the crown.  They drew one
+way, the Earl drew the other, and, as his noble nature prompted him, made
+common cause with the injured.  It skills not to go through the past.
+Those whom he joined had selfish aims, and pushed him on; and as the
+crown had been led to invade the rights of the vassals, so the vassals
+invaded my father’s rights.  Oaths were extorted, though both sides knew
+they could never be observed; and between violences, now on one side, now
+on the other, the right course could scarce be kept.  The Earl imagined
+that, with my father in his hands, removed from all other influences, he
+could give England the happy days they talk of her having enjoyed under
+my patron St. Edward; but, as thou knowest, Richard, the authority he
+held, being unlawful, was unregarded, and its worst transgressors came
+out of his own bosom.  He could not enforce the terms on which I had
+yielded myself—he could not even prevent my father from being a mere
+captive; and for the English folk, their miseries were but multiplied by
+the tyrants who had arisen.”
+
+“It was no doing of his,” said Richard, with cheek hotly glowing.
+
+“None know that better than I,” said the Prince; “but if he had snatched
+the bridle from a feeble hand, it was only to find that the steed could
+not be ruled by him.  What was left for me but to break my bonds, and
+deliver my father, in the hope that, being come to man’s estate, I might
+set matters on a surer footing?  I had hoped—I had greatly hoped, so to
+rule affairs, that the Earl might own that his training had not been lost
+on his nephew, and that the Crown might be trusted not to infringe the
+Charter.  I had hoped that he might yet be my wisest counsellor.  But,
+Richard, I too had supporters who outran my commands.  Bitter hatred and
+malice had been awakened, and cruel resolves that none should be spared.
+When I returned from bearing my father, bleeding and dismayed, from the
+battle, whither he had been cruelly led, it was to find that my orders
+had been disobeyed—that there had been foul and cruel slaughter; and that
+all my hopes that my uncle of Leicester would forgive me and look
+friendly on me were ended!”
+
+The Prince’s lip trembled as he spoke, and tears glistened in his eyes;
+and the evident struggle to repress his feelings, brought home deeply and
+forcibly the conviction to Richard that his sorrow was genuine.
+
+He could not speak for some seconds; then he added: “I marvel not that I
+am looked on among you as guilty of his blood.  Simon and Guy regard me
+as one with whom they are at deadly feud, and cannot understand that it
+was their own excesses that armed those merciless hands against him.
+Even my aunt shrank from me, and implored my mercy as though I were a
+ruthless tyrant.  But thou, Richard, thou hast inherited enough of thy
+father’s mind to be able to understand how unwillingly was my share in
+his fall, and how great would be my comfort and joy in being good kinsman
+to one of his sons.”
+
+The strong man’s generous pleading was most touching.  Richard bowed his
+head; the Princess watched him eagerly.  The boy spoke at last in
+perplexity.  “My Lord, you know better than I.  Would it be knightly,
+would it be honourable?”
+
+The Princess started in some indignation at such a question to her
+husband; but Edward understood the boy better, and said, “That which is
+most Christian is most knightly.”  Then pausing: “Ask thine heart,
+Richard; which would thy father choose for thee—to live in such guidance
+as I hope will ever be found in my household, or to share the wandering,
+I fear me freebooting, life of thy brothers?”
+
+Richard could not forget how his father had sternly withheld him from
+going with Simon to besiege Pevensey.  He knew that these two brethren
+had long been a pain and grief to his father; and began to understand
+that the nephew, with whom the Earl’s last battle had been fought, was
+nevertheless his truest pupil.
+
+“Thou wilt remain,” said Edward decisively; “and let us strive one day to
+bring to pass the state of things for which thy father and I fought
+alike, though, alas! in opposite ranks.”
+
+“If my mother consents,” said Richard, his head bent down, and uttering
+the words with the more difficulty, because he felt so strongly drawn
+towards his cousin, who never seemed so mighty as in his condescension.
+
+“Then, Richard de Montfort,” said Edward gravely, “let us render to one
+another the kiss of peace, as kinsmen who have put away all thought of
+wrong between them.”
+
+Richard looked up; and the Prince bending his lofty head, there was
+exchanged between them that solemn embrace, which in the early middle
+ages was the deepest token of amity.
+
+And with that kiss, it was as though the soul of Richard de Montfort were
+knit to the soul of Edward of England with the heart-whole devotion,
+composed of affection and loyal homage to a great character, which ever
+since the days of the bond between the son of the doomed King of Israel
+and the youthful slayer of the Philistine champion, has been one of the
+noblest passions of a young heart.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV
+THE TRANSLATION
+
+
+    “Now in gems their relics lie,
+    And their names in blazonry,
+    And their forms in storied panes
+    Gleam athwart their own loved fanes.”
+
+                                                       _Lyra Innocentium_.
+
+IF novelty has its charms, so has old age, and to us the great abbey
+church of Westminster has become doubly beloved by long generations of
+affection, and doubly beautiful by the softening handiwork of time and of
+smoke.
+
+Yet what a glorious sight must it not have been when it was fresh from
+the hands of the builder, the creamy stone clear and sharp at every
+angle, and each moulding and flower true and perfect as the chisel had
+newly left it.  The deep archway of the west front opened in stately
+magnificence, and yet with a light loftiness hitherto unknown in England,
+and somewhat approaching to the style in which the great French
+cathedrals were then rising.  And its accompaniments were, on the one
+hand the palace and hall, on the other hand the monastery, with its high
+walled courts and deep-browed cloisters, its noble refectory and vaulted
+kitchen, the herbarium or garden, shady with trees, and enriched with
+curious plants of Palestine, sloping down to the broad and majestic
+Thames, pure and blue as he pursued his silver winding way through
+emerald meadows and softly rising hills clothed with copses and woods.
+To the east, seated upon her hills, stood the crowned and battlemented
+city, the massive White Tower rising above the fortifications.
+
+The autumn brilliance of October, 1269, never enlightened a more gorgeous
+scene than when it shone upon the ceremony still noted in our Calendar as
+the Translation of King Edward.  Buried at first in his own low-browed
+heavy-arched Norman structure, which he had built, as he believed, at the
+express bidding of St. Peter; the Confessor, whose tender-hearted and
+devout nature had, by force of contrast with those of his fierce foreign
+successors, come to assume a saintly halo in the eyes not merely of the
+English, but of their Angevin lords themselves, was, now to reign on
+almost equal terms with the great Apostle himself, as one of the
+hallowing patrons of the Abbey—nay, since at least his relics were entire
+and undoubted, as its chief attraction.
+
+The new chapel in his especial honour, behind the exquisite bayed apsidal
+chancel, was at length complete; and on this day he was to take
+possession of it.  An ark of pure gold, chased and ornamented with the
+surpassing grace of that period of perfect taste, had received the
+royally robed corpse, which Churchmen averred lay calm and beautiful,
+untainted by decay; and this was now uplifted by the arms of King Henry
+himself, of Richard King of the Romans his brother, and of the two
+princes, Edward and Edmund.
+
+It was a striking sight to see those two pairs of brothers.  The two
+kings, nearly of an age, and so fondly attached that they could hardly
+brook a separation, till the death of the one broke the wearied heart of
+the other, were both gray-haired prematurely-aged men, of features that
+time instead of hardening had rendered more feeble and uncertain.  Their
+faces were much alike, but Henry might be known from Richard by a certain
+inequality in the outline of his eyebrows; and their dress, though both
+alike wore long flowing gowns, the side seams only coming down as far as
+the thigh so as to allow play for the limbs, so far differed that Henry’s
+was of blue, with the English lions embroidered in red and gold on his
+breast, and Richard was in the imperial purple, or rather scarlet, and
+the eagle of the empire on his breast testified to the futile election
+which he had purchased with the wealth of his Cornish mines.  Both the
+elders together, with all their best will and their simple faith in the
+availing merit of the action they were performing, would have been
+physically incapable of proceeding many steps with their burden, but for
+the support it received from the two younger men who sustained the feet
+of the saint, using some dexterity in adapting their strength so that the
+coffin might be carried evenly.
+
+One was the hunter we have already seen in Alton Wood.  His features wore
+their characteristic stamp of deep awe and enthusiasm, and even as he
+slowly and calmly moved, sustaining the chief of the weight with scarcely
+an effort of his giant strength, his head towering high above all those
+around, his eyes might be observed to be seeing, though not marking, what
+was before them, but to be fixed as though the soul were in
+contemplation, far far away.  He did not see in the present scene four
+princes rendering homage to a royal saint, who, from personal connection
+and by a brilliant display of devotion, might be propitiated into
+becoming a valuable patron amid intercessor; still less did it present
+itself to him as a pageant in which he was to bow his splendid powers,
+mental and bodily, to aid two feeble-minded old men to totter under the
+gold-cased corpse of a still more foolish and mischievous prince, dead
+two hundred years back.  No, rather thought and eye were alike upon the
+great invisible world, the echo of whose chants might perchance be
+ringing on his ear; that world where holy kings cast their crowns before
+the Throne, and where the lamb-like spirit of the Confessor might be
+joining in the praise, and offering these tokens of honour to Him to whom
+all honour and praise and glory and blessing are due.
+
+Of shorter stature, darker browed, of less regular feature and less clear
+complexion, so as to look as if he were the elder of the brothers, Prince
+Edmund moved by his side, using much exertion, and bending with the
+effort, so as to increase the slight sloop that had led to his historical
+nickname of the Crouchback, though some think this was merely taken from
+his crusading cross.  He bore the arms of Sicily, to which he had not yet
+resigned his claim.  His eye wandered, but not far away, like that of his
+brother.  It was in search of his young betrothed, the Lady Aveline of
+Lancaster, the fair young heiress to whom he was to owe the great earldom
+that was a fair portion for a younger brother even of royalty.
+
+All the four were bare-footed, and both princes were in robes much
+resembling that of their father, except that upon the left shoulder of
+each might be seen, in white cloth, the two lines of the Cross, that
+marked them as pilgrims and Crusaders, already on the eve of departure
+for the Holy Land.
+
+The shrine where the golden coffin was to rest is substantially the same
+in our own day, with its triple-cusped arches below, the stage of six and
+stage of four above them, and the twisted columns in imitation of that
+which was supposed to have come from the Beautiful Gate of the Temple.
+But at that time it was a glittering fabric of mosaic work, in gold,
+lapis-lazuli, and precious stones, aided here and there by fragments of
+coloured glass, the only part of the costly workmanship that has come
+down to us.  Around this shrine the preceding members of the procession
+had taken their places.  Archbishop Boniface of Savoy was there, old age
+ennobling a countenance that once had been light and frivolous, and all
+his bishops in the splendour of their richest copes, solidly embroidered
+with absolute scenes and portraits in embroidery, with tall mitres worked
+with gold wire and jewels, and crosiers of beauteous workmanship in gold,
+ivory, and enamel.  Mitred abbots, no less glorious in array, stood in
+another rank; the scarlet-mantled Grand Prior of the Hospital, and the
+white-cloaked Templar, made a link between the ecclesiastic and the
+warrior.  Priests and monks, selected for their voices’ sake, clustered
+in every available space; and, in full radiance, on a stage on the
+further side, were seated the ladies of the court, mostly with their hair
+uncovered, and surrounded by a garland of precious stones.  Queen Eleanor
+of Provence, still bent on youthfulness, looked somewhat haggard in this
+garb; but it well became Beatrix von Falkmorite, the young German girl
+whom Richard King of the Romans had wedded in his old age for the sake of
+her fair face.  Smiling, plump, and rosy, she sat opening her wide blue
+eyes, wearing her emerald and ruby wreath as though it had been a coronal
+of daisies, and gazing with childish whisperings as she watched the
+movements of her king, and clung for direction and help in her own part
+of the pageant to the Princess Eleanor, who sat beside her, little the
+elder in years, less beautiful in colouring, but how far surpassing her
+in queenly pensive grace and dignity!  Leaning on Eleanor’s lap was a
+bright-eyed, bright-haired boy of four years old, watching with puzzled
+looks the brilliant ceremony, which he only half understood, and his
+glances wandering between his father and the blue and white robed little
+acolytes who stood nearest to the shrine, holding by chains the silver
+censers, which from time to time sent forth a fragrant vapour, curling
+round the heads of the nearest figures, and floating away in the lofty
+vaultings of the roof.
+
+The actual ceremony could only be beheld by a favoured few; the official
+clergy, the many connections of royalty, and the chief nobility, filled
+the church to overflowing, but the rest of the world repaid itself by
+making a magnificent holiday.  Good-natured King Henry had been permitted
+by his son, who had now, though behind the scenes, assumed the reins of
+government, to spend freely, and make a feast to his heart’s content.
+Roasting and boiling were going on on a fast and furious scale, not only
+in the palace and abbey, but in booths erected in the fields; and tables
+were spreading and rushes strewing for the accommodation of all ranks.
+Near the entrance of the Abbey, the trains of the personages within
+awaited their coming forth in some sort of order, the more reverent
+listening to the sounds from within, and bending or crossing themselves
+as the familiar words of higher notes of praise rose loud enough to reach
+their ears; but for the most part, the tones and gestures were as various
+as the appearance of the attendants.  Here were black Benedictines, there
+white Augustinians clustered round the sleek mules of their abbots; there
+scornful dark Templars, in their black and white, sowed the seeds of
+hatred against their order, and scarlet Hospitaliers looked bright and
+friendly even while repelling the jostling of the crowd.  A hoary old
+squire, who had been with the King through all his troubles, kept
+together his immediate attendants; a party of boorish-looking Germans
+waited for Richard of Cornwall; and the slender, richly-caparisoned
+palfreys of the ladies were in charge of high-born pages, who sometimes,
+with means fair or foul, pushed back the throng, sometimes themselves
+became enamoured of its humours.
+
+For not only had the neighbouring city of London poured forth her
+merchants and artizans, to gaze, wonder, and censure the extravagance—not
+only had beggars of every degree been attracted by the largesse that
+Henry delighted to dispense, and peasants had poured in from all the
+villages around, but no sort of entertainment was lacking.  Here were
+minstrels and story-tellers gathering groups around them; here was the
+mountebank, clearing a stage in which to perform feats of jugglery,
+tossing from one hand to another a never-ending circle of balls,
+balancing a lance upon his nose, with a popinjay on its point; here were
+a bevy of girls with strange garments fastened to their ankles, who would
+dance on their hands instead of their feet, while their uplifted toes
+jangled little bells.
+
+Peasant and beggar, citizen and performer, sightseer and professional,
+all alike strove to get into the space before the great entrance, where
+the procession must come forth to gratify the eyes of the gazers, and
+mayhap shower down such bounty as the elder mendicants averred had been
+given when Prince Edward (the saints defend him!) had been weighed at
+five years old, and, to avert ill luck, the counterbalance of pure gold
+had been thrown among the poor to purchase their prayers.
+
+His weight in gold at his present stature could hardly be expected by the
+wildest imaginations, but hungry eyes had been estimating the weight of
+his little heir, and discontented lips had declared that the child was of
+too slender make to be ever worth so much to them as his father.  Yet a
+whisper of the possibility had quickly been magnified to a certainty of
+such a largesse, and the multitude were thus stimulated to furious
+exertions to win the most favourable spot for gathering up such a golden
+rain as even little Prince Henry’s counterpoise would afford; and ever as
+time waxed later, the throng grew denser and more unruly, and the
+struggle fiercer and more violent.
+
+The screams and expostulations of the weak, elbowed and trampled down,
+mingled with more festive sounds; and the attendants who waited on the
+river in the large and beautifully-ornamented barges which were the usual
+conveyances of distinguished personages, began to agree with one another
+that if they saw less than if they were on the bank, they escaped a
+considerable amount of discomfort as well as danger.
+
+“For,” murmured one of the pages, “I suppose it would be a dire offence
+to the Prince to lay about among the churls as they deserve.”
+
+“Ay, truly, among Londoners above all,” was the answer of his companion,
+whom the last four years had rendered considerably taller than when we
+saw him last.
+
+“Not that there is much love lost between them.  He hath never forgotten
+the day when they pelted the Queen with rotten eggs, and sang their
+ribald songs; nor they the day he rode them down at Lewes like corn
+before the reaper.”
+
+“And lost the day,” muttered the other page; then added, “The less love,
+the more cause for caution.”
+
+“Oh yes, we know you are politic, Master Richard,” was the sneering
+reply, “but you need not fear my quarrelling with your citizen friends.
+I would not be the man to face Prince Edward if I had made too free with
+any of the caitiffs.”
+
+“Hark! Master Hamlyn, the tumult is louder than ever,” interposed an
+elderly man of lower rank, who was in charge of the stout rowers in the
+royal colours of red and gold.  “Young gentlemen, the Mass must be ended;
+it were better to draw to the stairs, than to talk of you know not what,”
+he muttered.
+
+Hamlyn de Valence, who held the rudder, steered towards the wide stone
+steps that descended to the river, nearest to the apse in which “St.
+Peter’s Abbey Church” terminated before Henry VII. had added his chapel.
+At that moment a louder burst of sound, half imprecation, half shriek,
+was heard; there was a heavy splash a little way above, and a small blue
+bundle was seen on the river, apparently totally unheeded by the frantic
+crowd on the bank.  No sooner was it seen by Richard, however, than he
+threw back his mantle and sprang out of the barge.  There was a loud cry
+from the third page, a little fellow of nine or ten years old; but
+Richard gallantly swam out, battled with the current, and succeeded in
+laying hold of a young child, with whom he made for the barge, partly
+aided by the stream; but he was breathless, and heartily glad to reach
+the boat and support himself against the gunwale.
+
+“A pretty boat companion you!” said Hamlyn maliciously.  “How are we to
+take you in, over the velvet cushions?”
+
+The little page gave an expostulating cry.
+
+“Hold the child an instant, John,” gasped Richard, raising it towards his
+younger friend; “I will but recover breath, and then land and seek out
+her friends.”
+
+“How is this?” said a voice above them; and looking up, they found that
+while all had been absorbed in the rescue, the Prince, with his little
+son in his arms and his wife hanging on his arm, had come to the stone
+stairs, and was looking down.  “Richard overboard!”
+
+“A child fell over the bank, my Lord,” eagerly shouted the little John,
+with cap in hand, “and he swam out to pick it up.”
+
+“Into the barge instantly, Richard,” commanded the Prince.  “’Tis as much
+as his life is worth to remain in this cold stream!”
+
+And truly Richard was beginning to feel as much.  He was assisted in by
+two of the oarsmen, and the barge then putting towards the steps, the
+Princess was handed into her place, and began instantly to ask after the
+poor child.  It had not been long enough in the water to lose its
+consciousness, though it had hitherto been too much frightened to cry;
+but it no sooner opened a wide pair of dark eyes to find itself in
+strange hands, than it set up a lamentable wail, calling in broken
+accents for “Da-da.”
+
+“Let me take it ashore at once, gracious lady,” said Richard, revived by
+a draught of wine from the stores provided for the long day; “I will find
+its friends.”
+
+“Nay,” said the Princess, “it were frenzy to take it thus in its wet
+garments; and frenzy to remain in thine, Richard.”  As she spoke, the
+Prince and the other persons of the suite had embarked, and the barge was
+pushing away from the steps.  “Give the child to me,” she added, holding
+out her arms, and disregarding a remonstrance from one of her ladies,
+disregarding too the sobs and struggles of the child, whom she strove to
+soothe, while hastily removing the little thing’s soaked blue frock and
+hood, and wrapping it up in a warm woollen cloak.  “It is a pretty little
+maiden,” she said, “and not ill cared for.  Some mother’s heart must be
+bursting for her!—Hush thee! hush thee, little one; we will take thee
+home and clothe thee, and then thou shalt go to thy mother,” she added,
+in better English than she had spoken four years earlier in Alton Wood.
+But the child still cried for her da-da, and the Princess asked again,
+“What is thy father’s name, little maid?”
+
+“Père,” she answered, with a peculiar accent that made the Prince say,
+“That is a Provençal tongue.”
+
+“They are Provençal eyes likewise,” added Eleanor.  “See how like their
+hue is to Richard’s own;” and in Provençal she repeated the question what
+the father’s name and the child’s own might be.  But “Père” again, and
+“Bessee, pretty Bessee,” was all the answer she obtained, the last in
+unmistakable English.
+
+“I thought,” said Eleanor, “that it was only my own children that scarce
+knew whether they spoke English, Languédoc, or Languéd’ouì.”
+
+“It was the same with us, Lady,” said Richard.  “Father Adam was wont to
+say we were a little Babel.”
+
+The child looked towards him on hearing his voice, and held out her hands
+to go to him, reiterating an entreaty to be taken to her father.
+
+“She is probably the child of some minstrel or troubadour,” said the
+Prince.  “We will send in search of him as soon as we have reached the
+Savoy.”
+
+The Savoy Palace had been built for Queen Eleanor’s obnoxious uncle,
+Prince Thomas of Savoy, and had recently been purchased by the Queen
+herself, as a wedding gift for her son Edmund; but in the meantime Edward
+and his family were occupying it during their stay near Westminster, and
+their barge was brought up to the wide stairs of its noble court.
+Richard was obliged to give up the child to the Princess and her ladies,
+though she shrieked after him so pertinaciously, that Eleanor called to
+him to return so soon as he should have changed his garments.
+
+In a few minutes he again appeared, and found the little girl dressed in
+a little garment of one of the royal children, but totally insensible to
+the honour, turning away from all the dainties offered to her, and
+sobbing for her father, much to the indignation of the two little
+princes, Henry and John, who stood hand in hand staring at her.  She flew
+to him directly, with a broken entreaty that she might be taken to her
+father.  Again they tried questioning her, but Richard, whether speaking
+English or Provençal, always succeeded in obtaining readier and more
+comprehensible replies than did the Princess.  Whether she recognized him
+as her preserver, or whether his language had a familiar tone, she seemed
+exclusively attracted by him; and he it was who learnt that she lived at
+home—far off—on the Green near the red monks, and that her father could
+not see—he would be lost without Bessee to lead him.  And the little
+creature, hardly three years old if so much, was evidently in the
+greatest trouble at her father having lost her guidance and protection.
+
+Richard, touched and flattered by the little maiden’s exclusive
+preference, and owning in her Provençal eyes and speech something
+strangely like his own young sister Eleanor, entreated permission to be
+himself the person to take her in search of her friends.  The Princess
+added her persuasions, declaring it would be cruel to send the poor
+little thing with another stranger, and that his Provençal tongue was
+needed in order to discovering her father among the troubadours.
+
+Edward yielded to her persuasion, adding, however, that Richard must take
+two men-at-arms with him, and gravely bidding him be on his guard.  Nor
+would he permit him to be accompanied by little John de Mohun, who, half
+page, half hostage, had lately been added to the Princess’s train, and
+being often bullied and teased by Hamlyn and his fellows, had vehemently
+attached himself to Richard, and now entreated in vain to go with him on
+the adventure.  In fact, Prince Edward was a stern disciplinarian,
+equally severe against either familiarity or insolence towards the
+external world, and especially towards any one connected with London.  If
+Richard ever gave him any offence, it was by a certain freedom of manner
+towards inferiors, such as the Earl of Leicester had diligently
+inculcated on his family, but which more than once had excited a shade of
+vexation on the Prince’s part.  Even after Richard had reached the door,
+he was called back and commanded on no pretext to loiter or enter on any
+dispute, and if his search should detain him late, to sleep at the Tower,
+rather than be questioned and stopped at any of the gates which were
+guarded at night by the citizens.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V
+THE OLD KNIGHT OF THE HOSPITAL
+
+
+    “The warriors of the sacred grave,
+          Who looked to Christ for laws.”
+
+                                                          _Lord Houghton_.
+
+RICHARD summoned a small boat, and with two stout men-at-arms, of whom
+Adam de Gourdon was one, prepared again to cross the river.  Leonillo ran
+down the stone stairs with a wistful look of entreaty and it occurred to
+both Richard and Adam, that, could the child only lead them to the place
+where her father had sat, the dog’s scent might prove their most
+efficient guide.
+
+Little Bessee seemed quite comforted when on her way back to her father,
+and sat on Richard’s knee, eating the comfits with which the Princess had
+provided her, and making him cut a figure that seemed somewhat to amaze
+the other boat-loads whom they encountered on the river.
+
+When they landed, the throng was more dispersed, but revelry and sports
+of all kinds were going on fast and furiously; each door of the Abbey was
+besieged by hungry crowds receiving their dole, and Richard’s inquiries
+for a blind man who had lost his child were little heeded, or met with no
+satisfactory answer.  Bessee herself was bewildered, and incapable of
+finding her father’s late station; and Richard was becoming perplexed,
+and doubtful whether he ought to take her back, as well as somewhat put
+out of countenance by the laughter of Thomas de Clare, and other young
+nobles, who rallied him on his strange charge.
+
+At last the little girl’s face lightened as at sight of something
+familiar.  “Good red monks,” she said.  “They give Bessee soup—make
+father well.”
+
+With a ray of hope, Richard advanced to a party of Brethren of St. John,
+who were mounting at the Abbey gate to return to their house at
+Spitalfields, and doffing his bonnet, intimated a desire to address the
+tall old war-worn knight with a benevolent face, who was adjusting his
+scarlet cloak, before mounting a gray Arab steed looking as old and
+worthy as himself.
+
+“Ha! a young Crusader, I perceive,” was the greeting of the old knight,
+as his eye fell on the white cross on Richard’s mantle.  “Welcome,
+brother!  Dost thou need counsel on thy goodly Eastern way?”
+
+“Thanks, reverend Sir,” returned Richard, “but my present purpose was to
+seek for the father of this little one, who fell into the river in the
+press.  She pointed to you, saying she had received your bounty.”
+
+“It is Blind Hal’s child, Sir Robert!” exclaimed a serving-brother in
+black, coming eagerly forward; “the villeins on the green told me the
+poor knave was distraught at having lost his child in the throng!”
+
+“What brought he her there for?” exclaimed Sir Robert.  “Poor fool! his
+wits must have forsaken him!”
+
+“The child had a craving to see the show,” replied the Brother, “so Hob
+the cobbler told me; and all went well till my Lord of Pembroke’s
+retainers forced all right and left to make way in the crowd.  Hal was
+thrown down, and the child thrust away till they feared she had fallen
+over the bank.  Hob and his wife were fain to get the poor man away, for
+his moans and fierce words were awful: and he was not a little hurt in
+the scuffle, so I e’en gave them leave to lay him in the cart that
+brought up your reverence’s vestments, and the gear we lent the Abbey for
+the show.”
+
+“Right, Brother Hilary,” said Sir Robert; “and now the poor knave will
+have his best healing.—He must have been a good soldier once,” he added
+to Richard; “but he is a mere fragment of a man, wasted in your Earl of
+Leicester’s wars.”
+
+“Where dwells he?” asked Richard, keenly interested in all his father’s
+old followers; “I would fain restore him his child.”
+
+“In a hut on Bednall Green,” answered the serving-brother; “but twice or
+thrice a week he comes to the Spital to have his hurts looked to.”
+
+“Ay! we tell him his little witch must soon be shut out!  She turns the
+heads of all our brethren,” said Sir Robert, smiling.  “Wild work she
+makes with our novices.”
+
+“Wilder with our Knights Commanders, maybe, Sir,” retorted, laughing, a
+fair open-faced youth in his novitiate.  “I shall some day warn Hal how
+our brethren, the Templars, are said to play at ball with tender babes on
+their lances.”
+
+“No scandal about our brethren of the Temple, Rayland,” said Sir Robert,
+looking grave for a moment.—“Young Sir, it would be a favour if you would
+ride with us; we would gladly show you the way to Bednall Green.”
+
+“I should rejoice to go, Sir,” returned Richard, “but I am of Prince
+Edward’s household—Richard Fowen; and my horse is on the other side of
+the river.”
+
+“That is soon remedied,” said Sir Robert, who seemed to have taken a
+great fancy to Richard, either for the sake of his crossed shoulder, or
+of his kindness to the little plaything of the Spital.  “Our young
+brother, Engelbert von Fuchstein, has leave to tarry this night with his
+brother in the train of the King of the Romans, and his horse is at your
+service, if you will do our poor Spital the favour to tarry there this
+night, and ride it back in the morn to meet him at Westminster.”
+
+Richard knew that this invitation might be safely accepted without danger
+of giving umbrage to the Prince, who was on the best terms with the
+Knights of the Hospital.  He therefore dismissed Gourdon and the other
+man-at-arms with a message explaining the matter; and warmly thanking the
+old Grand Prior, laid one hand on the saddle of the great ponderous beast
+that was led up to him, and vaulted on its back without touching the
+stirrup.
+
+“Well done, my young master,” said Sir Robert, “it is easy to see you are
+of the Prince’s household.”
+
+“I cannot yet do as the Prince can,” said Richard,—“take this leap in
+full armour.”
+
+“No; and let me give you a bit of counsel, fair Sir.  Such pastimes are
+very well for the tiltyard, but they should be laid aside in the blessed
+Land, and strength reserved for the one cause and purpose.”  He crossed
+himself; and in the meantime, Bessee intimated her imperious purpose of
+not riding before Brother Hilary, but being perched before Richard on the
+enormous cream-coloured animal, whence he was looking down from a
+considerable elevation upon Sir Robert on his slender Arab.
+
+“These are the German monsters that our brethren bring over,” said Sir
+Robert.  “Mark me, young brother, cumber not yourself with these beasts
+of Europe, which are good for nothing but food for foul birds in the
+East.  Purvey yourself of an Arab as soon as you land.  There is a rogue
+at Acre, one Ali by name, who will not cheat you more than is reasonable,
+so you mention my name to him, Sir Robert Darcy, at your service.”
+
+“Thanks, reverend Father,” returned Richard, “but I am but a landless
+page, and the Prince mounts me.  Said you this poor man had been wounded
+in the late wars?”
+
+“Ay, hacked and hewed worse than by the Infidels themselves!  Woeful it
+is that here, at home, men’s blood should be wasted on your own petty
+feuds.  This same Barons’ war now hath cost as much downright courage as
+would have brought us back to Jerusalem, and all thrown away, without a
+cause, with no honour, no hope.”
+
+“Not without a cause,” Richard could not help saying.
+
+“Nay,” said the old knight; “no cause is worth the taking of a life, save
+the cause of the Holy Sepulchre.  What be these matters of taxes and laws
+to ask a man to shed his blood for?  Alack, the temper of the
+cross-bearer is dying out!  I pray I may not see this Crusade end like
+half those I have beheld—and the cross on the shoulder become no better
+than a mockery.”
+
+“That may scarcely be with such leaders as the Prince and the King of
+France,” said Richard.
+
+“Well, well, the Prince is untried; and for King Louis, he is as holy a
+man as ever lived since King Godfrey of blessed memory, but he has bad
+luck, ever bad luck.  The Saints forefend, but I trow he will listen to
+some crazy counsel from Rome, belike, or some barefooted hermit—very
+holy, no doubt, but who does not know a Greek from a Saracen, or a
+horse’s head from his tail—and will go to some pestilential hole like
+that foul Egyptian swamp, where we stayed till our skin was the colour of
+an old boot, in hopes of converting the Sultan of Babylon, or the Old Man
+of the Mountain, or what not, and there he will stay till the flower of
+his forces have wasted away.”
+
+“Were you in Egypt with King Louis?” eagerly exclaimed Richard.
+
+“Ay, marry, was I, and a goodly land it is; but I saw many a good
+man-at-arms perish miserably in a marsh, who might have been the saving
+of the Holy City.  Why, I myself have never been the same man since!
+Never could do a month’s service out of the infirmary at Acre, though
+after all there’s no work I like so well as the hospital business, and
+for the last five years I have had to stay here training young brethren!
+Oh, young man!  I envy you your first stroke for the Holy Sepulchre!
+Would that the Grand-Master would hear my entreaty.  I am too old to be
+worth sparing, and I would fain have one more chance of dying under the
+banner of the Order!—But I am setting you a bad example, son Raynal; a
+Hospitalier has no will.—And look you, young Sir Page, if you stay out at
+sunset in that clime, ’tis all up with you.  And you should veil your
+helmet well, or the sun smites on your head as deadly as a flake of Greek
+fire.”
+
+So rambled on good old Sir Robert Darcy, Grand Prior of England, a
+perfect dragon among the Saracens, but everywhere else the mildest and
+most benevolent of men; his discourse strangely mingling together the
+deepest enthusiasm with a business-like common-sense appreciation of ways
+and means, and with minute directions, precautions, and anecdotes,
+gathered from his practical experience both as captain in the field,
+priest in the Church, and surgeon in the hospital, and all seen from the
+most sunshiny point of view.
+
+Meanwhile, they were riding along the Strand, a beautiful open road, with
+grassy borders shelving down to the Thames.  They passed through the City
+of London.  The Hospital lay beyond the walls, but the Marshes of
+Moorfields that protected them were not passable without a long circuit;
+and the fortified gates stood open at Temple Bar, where the Hospitaliers,
+looking towards the Round Church and stately buildings of the Preceptory,
+saluted the white-cloaked figures moving about it, with courtesy grim and
+distant in all but Sir Robert Darcy, who could not even hate a Templar, a
+creature to the ordinary Hospitalier far more detestable than a Saracen.
+On then, up ground beginning to rise, below which the little muddy stream
+called the Flete stagnated along its way, meandering to the Thames.
+Thatched hovels and wooden booths left so narrow a passage that the
+horsemen were forced to move in single file, and did not gain a clearer
+space even when the stone houses of merchants began to stand thick on
+Ludgate Hill, their carved wooden balconies so projecting, that it would
+seem to have been an object with the citizens to be able to shake hands
+across the street.  The city was comparatively empty and quiet, as all
+the world were keeping holiday at Westminster; but even as it was, the
+passengers seemed to swarm in the streets, and knots of persons who had
+been unable to witness the spectacle, sat with gazing children upon the
+stairs outside the houses, to admire the fragments of the pageant that
+came their way.  Acclamations of delight greeted the appearance of the
+scarlet-mantled Hospitaliers, such as Richard had often heard in his
+boyhood, when riding in his father’s train, but far less frequently since
+he had been a part of the Prince’s retinue.  And equally diverse was the
+merry nod and smile of Sir Robert to each gaping shouting group of little
+ones, from the stately distant courtesy with which Edward returned the
+popular salutations.  He could be gracious—he could not be friendly
+except to a few.
+
+They passed the capitular buildings of St. Paul’s, with the beautiful
+cathedral towering over them, and in its rear, numerous booths for the
+purchase of rosaries—recent inventions then of St. Dominic, the great
+friend of Richard’s stern grandfather, the persecutor of the Albigenses.
+Sir Robert drew up, and declared he must buy one for the little maid as a
+remembrance of the day, and then found she was fast asleep; but he
+nevertheless purchased a black-beaded chaplet, giving for it one of the
+sorely-clipped coins of King Henry.
+
+“Prithee let me have one likewise, holy Sir,” quoth Richard, “in memory
+of the talk that hath taught me so much of the import of my crusading
+vow.”
+
+“Thou shalt bring me for it one of the olive of Bethlehem,” said Sir
+Robert; “I have given away all I brought from the East.  They are so
+great a boon to our poor sick folk that I wish I had brought twice as
+many, but to me they have always a Saracen look.  Your Moslem always
+fingers one much of the same fashion as he parleys.”
+
+Ludgate, freshly built, and adorned with new figures to represent the
+fabulous King Lud, was not yet closed for the night; and the party came
+forth beyond the walls, with the desolate Moorfields to their left, and
+before them a number of rising villages clustered round their churches.
+
+The Hospital, a grand fortified monastery, was already to be seen over
+the fields; but Sir Robert, sending home the rest of his troop, turned
+aside with Richard and Brother Hilary towards the common, with a border
+of cottages around it, which went by the name of Bednall Green.
+
+Brother Hilary knew the hut inhabited by Blind Hal, and led the way to
+it.  Low and mud-built, thatched, and with a wattled door, it had a
+wretched appearance; but the old woman who came to the door was not ill
+clad.  “Blessings on you, holy Father!” she cried; “do I see the child,
+my lamb, my lady-bird!  Would that she may come in time to cheer her poor
+father!”
+
+“How is it with him then, Gammer?” demanded Sir Robert, springing to the
+ground with the alacrity of a doctor anxious about his patient.
+
+“Ill, very ill, Sir.  Whether the horse’s feet hurt his old wound, or
+whether it be the loss of the child, he hath done nought but moan and
+rave, and lie as one dead ever since they brought him home.  He is lying
+in one of the dead swoons now!  It were not well that the child saw him.”
+
+But Bessee, awakening with a cry of joy, saw her borne, and struggled to
+go to her father, whose name she called on with all her might,
+disregarding the caresses of the old woman, and the endeavour made by
+Richard to restrain without alarming her, while Sir Robert went into the
+hut to endeavour to restore the sufferer.
+
+Suddenly a cry broke from within; and Richard, turning at the voice,
+beheld the blind man sitting up on his pallet with arms outstretched.
+“My child!—My Father! hast thou brought her to visit me in limbo?” he
+cried.
+
+“He raves!” said Richard, using his strength to withhold the child, who
+broke out into a shriek.
+
+“Nay, nay! she doth not abide here!” he exclaimed.  “Her spirit is pure!
+My sins are not visited on her beyond the grave!”
+
+“Thou art on the earthly side of the grave still, my son,” said Sir
+Robert, at the same time as Bessee sprang from Richard, and nestled on
+his breast, clinging to his neck.
+
+“My babe—my Bessee!” he exclaimed, gathering her close to him.  “Living,
+living, indeed!  Yet how may it be!  Surely this is the other world.
+That voice sounds not among the living!”
+
+“It is the voice of the youth who saved thy child,” said the Grand Prior.
+
+“Speak again!  Let him speak again!” implored the beggar.
+
+“Can I do aught for you, good man?” asked Richard.
+
+Again there was a strange start and thrill of amazement.
+
+“Only for Heaven’s sake tell me who thou art!”
+
+“A page of Prince Edward’s good man.  I am called Richard Fowen!  And
+who, for Heaven’s sake, are you?” added Richard, as Leonillo, who had
+been smelling about and investigating, threw himself on the blind man in
+a transport of caresses.  “Off, Leon—off!” cried Richard.  “It is but a
+dog!—Fear not, little one!—Tell me, tell me,” he added, trembling, as he
+knelt before the miserable object, holding back the eager Leonillo with
+one arm round his neck, “who art thou, thou ghost of former times?”
+
+“Knowst me not, Richard?” returned a suppressed voice in Provençal.
+
+“Henry!  Henry!” exclaimed Richard, and fell upon the foot of the low
+bed, weeping bitterly.  “Is it come to this?”
+
+“Ay, even to this,” said the blind man, “that two sons of one father meet
+unknown—one with a changed name, the other with none at all, neither with
+the honoured one they were born to.”
+
+“Alack, alack!” was all Richard could say at the first moment, as he
+lifted himself up to look again at the first-born of his parents, the
+head of the brave troop of brethren, the gay, handsome, imperious young
+Lord de Montfort, whose proud head and gallant bearing he had looked at
+with a younger brother’s imitative deference.  What did he see but a
+wreck of a man, sitting crouched on the wretched bed, the left arm a mere
+stump, a bandage where the bright sarcastic eyes used to flash forth
+their dark fire, deep scars on all the small portion of the face that was
+visible through the over-grown masses of hair and beard, so plentifully
+sprinkled with white, that it would have seemed incredible that this man
+was but eight months older than the Prince, whose rival he had always
+been in personal beauty and activity.  The beautiful child, clasped close
+to his breast, her face buried on his shoulder under his shaggy locks,
+was a strange contrast to his appearance, but only added to the look of
+piteous helplessness and desolation, as she hung upon him in her alarm at
+the agitation around her.
+
+Richard had long been accustomed to think of his brother as dead; but
+such a spectacle as this was far more terrible to him, and his cheek
+blanched at the shock, as he gasped again, “Thou here, and thus! thou
+whom I thought slain!”
+
+“Deem me so still,” said his brother, “even as I deem the royal minion
+dead to me.”
+
+“Nay, Henry, thou knowst not.”
+
+“Who is present?” interrupted the blind man, raising his head and tossing
+back his hair with a gesture that for the first time gave Richard a sense
+that his eldest brother was indeed before him.  “Methought I heard
+another voice.”
+
+“I am here, fair son,” replied the old knight, “Father Robert of the
+Hospital!  I will either leave thee, or keep thy secret as though it were
+thy shrift; but thou art sore spent, and mayst scarce talk more.”
+
+“Weariness and pain are past, Father, with my little one again in my
+bosom,” said Henry; “and there are matters that must be spoken between me
+and this young brother of mine ere he quits this hut;” and his voice
+resumed its old authoritative tone towards Richard.  “Said you that he
+had saved my child?”
+
+“He drew me from the river, Father,” said Bessee looking up.  “There was
+nothing to stand on, and it was so cold!  And he took me in his arms and
+pulled me out, and put me in a boat; and the lady pulled off my blue
+coat, and put this one on me.  Feel it, Father; oh, so pretty, so warm!”
+
+“It was the Princess,” said Richard; but Henry, not noticing, continued,
+
+“Thou hast earned my pardon, Richard,” and held out his remaining hand,
+somewhere towards the height where his brother’s used to be.
+
+Sir Robert smiled, saying, “Thou dost miscalculate thy brother’s stature,
+son.”  And at the same moment Richard, who was now little short of his
+Cousin Edward in height, was kneeling by Henry, accepting and returning
+his embrace with agitation and gratitude, such as showed how their
+relative positions in the family still maintained their force; but
+Richard still asserted his independence so as to say, “When you have
+heard all, brother you will see that there is no need of pardoning me.”
+
+Henry, however, as perhaps Sir Robert had foreseen, instead of answering
+put his hand to his side, and sank back in a paroxysm of pain, ending in
+another swoon.  The child stood by, quiet and frightened but too much
+used to similar occurrences to be as much terrified as was Richard, who
+thought his brother dying; but calling in the serving-brother, the old
+Hospitalier did all that was needed, and the blind man presently
+recovered and explained in a feeble voice that he had been jostled,
+thrown down, and trodden on, at the moment when he lost his hold of his
+little daughter; and this was evidently renewing his sufferings from the
+effect of an injury received in battle.  “And what took thee there, son?”
+said Sir Robert, somewhat sharply.
+
+“The harvest, Father,” answered Henry, rousing himself to speak with a
+certain sarcasm in his tone.  “It is the beggars’ harvest wherever King
+Henry goes.  We brethren of the wallet cannot afford to miss such
+windfalls.”
+
+“A beggar!” exclaimed Richard in horror.
+
+“And what art thou?” retorted Henry, with a sudden fierceness.
+
+“Listen, young men,” said Sir Robert, “this I know, my patient there will
+soon be nothing if ye continue in this strain.  A litter shall bring him
+to the infirmary.”
+
+“Nay,” said Henry hastily, “not so, good Father.  Here I abide, hap what
+may.”
+
+“And I abide with him,” said Richard.
+
+“Not so, I say,” returned the Hospitalier, “unless thou wouldst slay him
+outright.  Return to the Spital with me; and at morn, if he have
+recovered himself, unravel these riddles as thou and he will.”
+
+“It is well, Father,” said Henry.  “Go with him, Richard; but mark me.
+Be silent as the grave, and see me again.”
+
+And reluctant as he was, Richard was forced to comply.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI
+THE BEGGAR EARL
+
+
+    “Along with the nobles that fell at that tyde,
+    His eldest son Henrye, who fought by his syde,
+    Was felde by a blow he receivde in the fight;
+    A blow that for ever deprivde him of sight.”
+
+                                                             _Old Beggar_.
+
+THE chapel at the Spital was open to all who chose to attend.  The deep
+choir was filled with the members of the Order, half a dozen knights in
+the stalls, and the novices and serving-brothers so ranged as to give
+full effect to the body of voice.  Richard knelt on the stone floor
+outside the choir, intending after early mass to seek his brother; but to
+his surprise he found the blind man with his child at his feet in what
+was evidently his accustomed place, just within the door.  His hair and
+beard were now arranged, his appearance was no longer squalid; but when
+he rose to depart, guided in part by the child, but also groping with a
+stick, he looked even more helpless than on his bed, and Richard sprang
+forward to proffer an arm for his support.
+
+“Flemish cloth and frieze gown,” said the object of his solicitude in a
+strange gibing voice; “court page and street beggar—how now, my master?”
+
+“Lord Earl and elder brother,” returned Richard, “thine is my service
+through life.”
+
+“Mine?  Ho, ho!  That much for thy service!” with a disdainful gesture of
+his fingers.  “A strapping lad like thee would be the ruin of my trade.
+I might as well give up bag and staff at once.”
+
+“Nay, surely, wilt thou not?” exclaimed Richard in broken words from his
+extreme surprise.  “The King and Prince only long to pardon and restore,
+and—”
+
+“And thou wouldst well like to lord it at Kenilworth, earl in all but the
+name?  Thou mayst do so yet without being cumbered with me or mine!”
+
+“Thou dost me wrong, Henry,” said Richard, much distressed.  “I love the
+Prince, for none so truly honoured our blessed father as he, and for his
+sake he hath been most kind lord to me; but thou art the head of my
+house, my brother, and with all my heart do I long to render thee such
+service as—as may lighten these piteous sufferings.”
+
+“I believe thee, Richard; thou wert ever an honest simple-hearted lad,”
+said Henry, in a different tone; “but the only service thou canst render
+me is to let me alone, and keep my secret.  Here—I feel that we are at
+the stone bench, where I bask in the sun, and lay out my dish for the
+visitors of the gracious Order.—Here, Bessee, child, put the dish down,”
+he added, retaining his hold of his brother, as if to feel whether
+Richard winced at this persistence in his strange profession.  The little
+girl obeyed, and betook herself to the quiet sports of a lonely child,
+amusing herself with Leonillo, and sometimes returning to her father and
+obtaining his attention for a few moments, sometimes prattling to some
+passing brother of the Order, who perhaps made all the more of the pretty
+creature because this might be called an innocent breach of discipline.
+“And now, Master Page,” said Henry in his tone of authority, yet with
+some sarcasm, “let us hear how long-legged Edward finished the work he
+had began on thee at Hereford—made thee captive in the battle, eh?”
+
+Richard briefly narrated his life with Gourdon, and his capture by the
+Prince, adding, “My mother was willing I should remain with him; she bade
+me do anything rather than join Simon and Guy; and verily, brother, save
+that the Prince is less free of speech, his whole life seems moulded upon
+our blessed father’s—”
+
+“Speak not of them in the same breath,” cried Henry hastily.  “And
+wherefore—if such be his honour to him whom he slew and mutilated—art
+thou to disown thy name, and stand before him like some chance
+foundling?”
+
+“That was the King’s doing,” said Richard.  “The Prince was averse to it,
+but King Henry, though he wept over me and called me his dear nephew,
+made it his special desire that he might not hear the name of Montfort;
+and the Prince, though overruling him in all that pertains to matters of
+state, is most dutiful in all lesser matters.  I hoped at least to be
+called Fitz Simon, but some mumble of the King turned it into Fowen, and
+so it has continued.  I believe no one at court is really ignorant of my
+lineage; but among the people, Montfort is still a trumpet-call, and the
+King fears to hear it.”
+
+“Well he may!” laughed Henry.  “Rememberest thou, Richard, the sorry
+figure our good uncle cut, when we armed him so courteously, and put him
+on his horse to meet the rebels at Evesham—how he durst not hang back,
+and loved still less to go onward, and kept calling me his loving nephew
+all the time?”
+
+“Ah!  Henry—but didst thou not hear my father mutter, when he saw the
+crowned helm under the standard, that it was ill done, and no good could
+come of seething the kid in the mother’s milk?  And verily, had not the
+Prince been carrying his father from the field, I trow the Mortimers had
+not refused us quarter, nor had their cruel will of us.”
+
+“Oh ho! thou art come to have opinions of thine own!” laughed Henry, with
+the scoff of a senior unable to brook that his younger brother should
+think for himself.  Yet this tone was so familiar to Richard’s ears, that
+it absolutely encouraged him to a nearer step to intimacy.  He said, “But
+how scapedst thou, Henry?  I could have sworn that I saw thee fall, skull
+and helmet cleft, a dead man!”
+
+Instead of answering, Henry put his hand under the chin of his child, who
+was leaning against him, and holding up her face to his brother, said,
+“Thou canst see this child’s face?  Tell me what like she is.”
+
+“Like little Eleanor, like Amaury.  The home-look of her eyes won my
+heart at once.  Even the Princess remarked their resemblance to mine.
+Think of Eleanor and thy mind’s eye will see her.”
+
+“No other likeness?” said the blind man wistfully; “but no—thou wast at
+Hereford when she was at Odiham.”
+
+“Who?”
+
+He grasped Richard’s hand, and under his breath uttered the name
+“Isabel.”
+
+“Isabel Mortimer!” exclaimed Richard, who had been, of course, aware of
+his brother’s betrothal, when the two families of Montfort and Mortimer
+had been on friendly terms; “we heard she had taken the veil!”
+
+“And so thou sawst me slain!” said Henry de Montfort dryly.
+
+“But how—how was it?” asked Richard eagerly.
+
+“Men sometimes tie knots faster than they intend,” said Henry.  “When
+Roger Mortimer took Simon’s doings in wrath, and vowed that his sister
+should never wed a Montfort, he knew not what he did.  He and his proud
+wife could flout and scorn my Isabel—they might not break her faith to
+me.  Thou knowst, perhaps, Richard, since thou art hand and glove with
+our foes, that like a raven to the slaughter, the Lady Mortimer came as
+near the battle-field as her care for her dainty person would allow; and
+there was one whom she brought with her.  And, gentle dame, what doth she
+do but carry her sister-in-law a sweet and womanly gift?  What thinkst
+thou it was, Richard?”
+
+“I fear I know,” said Richard, choked; “my father’s hand.”
+
+“Nay, that was a choicer morsel reserved for my lady countess herself.
+It was mine own, with our betrothal-ring thereon.  Now, quoth that loving
+sister, might Isabel resume her ring.  No plighted troth could be her
+excuse any longer for refusing to wed my Lord of Gloucester.  Then rose
+up my love, ‘It beckons me!’ she said, and bade them leave it with her.
+They deemed that it was for death that it beckoned.  So mayhap did she.
+I wot Countess Maud had little grieved.  But little dreamed they of her
+true purpose—my perfect jewel of constant love—namely, to restore the
+lopped hand to the poor corpse, that it might likewise have Christian
+burial.  Her old nurse, Welsh Winny, was as true to her as she was to me;
+and forth they sped, fearless of the spoilers, and made their way at
+nightfall even to the Abbey Church, where Edward, less savage than the
+fair countess, had caused us to be laid before the altar, awaiting our
+burial in the vaults.”
+
+“Thou wert senseless all this time?”
+
+“Ay, and so continued.  The pang when my hand was severed had roused me
+for a few moments, but only to darkness; and my effort to speak had been
+rewarded with as many Welsh knives as could pierce my flesh at once.”
+
+“And thou didst not bleed to death?”
+
+“The swoon checked my blood.  And the monks of Evesham must have
+staunched and bandaged so as to make a decent corpse of me.  Had they had
+a man-at-arms among them, they would have known that mine were not the
+wounds of a dead but of a living man.  The old nurse knew it, when my
+sweet lady would needs unbind my wrist, to place my hand in its right
+place.  An old crone such as Welsh Winny never stirs without her cordial
+potion.  They poured it into my lips—and if I were never more to awake to
+the light of day, I awoke to the sound that was yet dearer to me—while,
+alas! it still was left to me.”
+
+He became silent, till Richard’s question drew him on.
+
+“What with their care and support, when once on my feet I found strength
+to stumble out of the chapel and gain shelter in the woods ere day; and I
+believe the monks got credit for their zeal in casting out the
+excommunicate body.”
+
+“Not credit,” said Richard; “the Prince was full of grief, more
+especially as they all disavowed the deed.  But, brother, art thou
+excommunicate still?”
+
+“Far from it, most pious Crusader.  If seas of holy wells could assoil
+me, I should be pure enough.  My sweet Isabel deemed that some such
+washing might bring back mine eyesight; and from one to another we
+wandered as my limbs could bear it.  And at St. Winifred’s there was a
+priest who told us strange tales of the miracles wrought in the Mortimer
+household by my father’s severed hand; nay, that it had so worked on Lord
+Mortimer’s sister, that she had left the vanities of the world, and gone
+into a nunnery.  He seemed so convinced of my father’s saintliness, and
+so honest a fellow, that Isabel insisted on unbosoming ourselves to him
+under seal of confession.  No longer was the old nurse to be my mother
+and she my sister; and the good man made no difficulties, but absolved
+me, and wedded me to the truest, most loving wife that ever blessed a man
+bereft of all else.”
+
+“And you begged!  O Henry, the noble lady—”
+
+“At first we had the knightly chain and spurs in which the monks had
+kindly pranked me up.  Isabel too had worn a few jewels; but after all, a
+palmer need never hunger.  My father always said no trade was so well
+paid as begging, under King Henry, and verily we found it so.  She used
+at times to gather berries and thread them for chaplets to sell at the
+holy wells; but I trow sheer beggary throve better!”
+
+“But wherefore?  Even had pardon not been ready, Simon held out
+Kenilworth for months.”
+
+Henry laughed his dry laugh.
+
+“Simple boy, dost think I would trust Simon with an elder brother whose
+hand could no longer keep his head?”
+
+“And my mother—”
+
+“She had always hated the Mortimers, even when the contract was matter of
+policy.  Would I have taken my sweet Isabel to abide her royal scorn, it
+might be incredulity of our marriage?  Though for that matter it is more
+unimpeachable than her own!  Nay, nay, out of ken and out of reach was
+our only security from our kin on either side, unless we desired that my
+head should follow my hand as a dainty dish for Countess Maud.”
+
+“How could the lady brook it?”
+
+“She dyed her fair skin with walnut, wore russet gown and hood, and was a
+very nightingale for blitheness and sweet song through that first year,”
+said Henry; “blither than ever when that little one was born in the
+sunshiny days of Whitsuntide.  I tell thee, those were happier days than
+ever I passed as Lord de Montfort at Kenilworth.  But after that, the
+bruised hurt in my side, which had never healed when the cleaner gashes
+did, became more painful and troublesome.  Holy wells did nothing for it;
+and she wasted with watching it, as though my pain had been hers.  Naught
+would serve her but coming here, because she had been told that the
+Knights of St. John had better experience of old battle-wounds than any
+men in the realm.  Much ado had we to get here—the young babe in her
+arms, and I well-nigh distraught with pain.  We crept into this same hut,
+and I had a weary sickness throughout the winter—living, I know not how,
+by the bounty of the Spital, and by the works of her fingers, which Winny
+would take out to sell on feast-days in the city.  Oh that eyes had been
+left me to note how she pined away! but I had scarce felt how thin and
+bony were her tender fingers ere the blasts of the cruel March wind
+finished the work.”
+
+“Alack! alack! poor Henry,” said Richard; “never, never was lady of
+romaunt so noble, and so true!”
+
+“No more,” said Henry hastily, leaning his brow on the top of his staff.
+“Come hither, Bessee,” he added after a brief pause; “say thy prayer for
+thy blessed mother, child.”
+
+And holding out his one hand, he inclosed her two clasped ones within it,
+as the little voice ran over an utterly unintelligible form of childishly
+clipped Latin, sounding, however, sweet and birdlike from the very
+liberties the little memory had taken in twisting its mellifluous words
+into a rhythm of her own.  And there was catchword enough for Richard to
+recognize and follow it, with bonnet doffed, and crossing himself.
+
+“And now,” he said, “surely the need for secrecy is ended.  The land is
+tranquil, the King ruled by the Prince, the Prince owning all the past
+folly and want of faith that goaded our father into resistance.
+Wherefore not seek his willing favour?  Thou art ever a pilgrim.  Be with
+us in the crusade.  Who knows what the Jordan waves may effect for thee?”
+
+“No, no,” grimly laughed Henry.  “Dost think any favour would make it
+tolerable to be wept over and pitied by the King—pitied by _the King_,”
+he repeated in ineffable disgust; “or to be the show of the court, among
+all that knew me of old, when I _was_ a man?  Hob the cobbler, and Martin
+the bagster, are better company than Pembroke and Gloucester, and I meet
+with more humours on Cheapside than I should at Winchester—more regard
+too.  Why, they deem me threescore years old at least, and I am a very
+oracle of wisdom among them.  Earl of Leicester, forsooth! he would be
+nobody compared with Blind Hal!  And as to freedom—with child and staff
+the whole country and city are before me—no shouts to dull retainers, and
+jackanape pages to set my blind lordship on horseback, without his bridle
+hand, and lead him at their will anywhere but at his own.
+
+“All this I can understand for thyself,” said Richard; “but for thy
+child’s sake canst thou not be moved?”
+
+“My child, quotha?  What, when her Uncle Simon is true grandson to King
+John?”
+
+Richard started.  “I cannot believe what thou sayest of Simon,” he
+answered in displeasure.
+
+“One day thou wilt,” calmly answered Henry; “but I had rather not have it
+proved upon the heiress of Leicester and Montfort.”
+
+“Leicester is forfeit—Simon an outlawed man.”
+
+“If the humour for pardon is set in, Cousin Edward is no man to do things
+by halves.  If he owned me at all, the lands would be mine again, and
+such a bait would be smelt out by Simon were he at the ends of the earth.
+Or if not, that poor child would be granted to any needy kinsman or
+grasping baron that Edward wanted to portion.  My child shall be my own,
+and none other’s.  Better a beggar’s brat than an earl’s heiress!”
+
+“She is a lovely little maiden.  I know not how thou canst endure letting
+her grow up in poverty, an alien from her birth and rank.”
+
+“Poverty,” Henry laughed.  “Little knowest thou of the jolly beggar’s
+business!  I would fain wager thee, Richard, that pretty Bessee’s
+marriage-portion shall be a heavier bag of gold than the Lady Elizabeth
+de Montfort would gather by all the aids due to her father from his
+vassals—and won moreover without curses.”
+
+“But who would be the bridegroom?”
+
+“Her own choice, not the King’s,” answered Henry briefly.
+
+“And this is all,” said Richard, perceiving that according to the
+previous day’s agreement the cream-coloured elephant of a German horse
+was being led forth for his use, and Sir Robert preparing to accompany
+him.  “I must leave thee in this strange condition?”
+
+“Ay, that must thou.  Betray me, and thou shalt have the curse of the
+head of thine house.  Had thy voice not become so strangely like my
+father’s, I had never made myself known to thee.”
+
+“I will see thee again.”
+
+“That will be as thou canst.  I trow Edward hardly gives freedom enough
+to his pages for them to pay visits unknown,” replied Henry, with a
+strange sneering triumph in his own wild liberty.
+
+“If aught ails thee, if I can aid thee, swear to me that thou wilt send
+to me.”
+
+Henry laughed with somewhat of a tone of mockery, adding, “Well,
+well—keep thou thy plight to me so long as I want thee not, and I will
+keep mine to thee if ever I should need thee.  Now away with thee.  I
+hear the horses impatient for thee; and what would be the lot of the
+beggar if he were seen chattering longer with a lordly young page than
+might suffice for his plaint?  I hear voices.  Put a tester in my dish,
+fair Sir, for appearance’ sake.  Thou hast it not? aha—I told thee I was
+the richer as well as the freer man.  What’s that?  That is no ring of
+coin.”
+
+“’Tis a fair jewel, father, green and sparkling,” cried Bessee.
+
+“Nay, nay, I’ll have none of it.  Some token from thy new masters?  Ha,
+boy?”
+
+“From the Princess, on New Year’s Day,” replied Richard.  “But keep it,
+oh, keep it, Henry; it breaks my heart to leave thee thus.”
+
+“Keep it!  Not I.  What wouldst say to thy dainty dame?  Nor should I get
+half its value from the Jews.  No, no, take back thy jewel, Sir Page;
+I’ll not put thee in need of telling more lies than becomes thine
+office.”
+
+Richard glowed with irritation; but what was the use of anger with a
+blind beggar?  And while Henry bestowed far more demonstration of
+affection on Leonillo than on his brother, it became needful to mount and
+ride off, resolving to tell the Prince and Princess, what would be no
+falsehood, that the child belonged to a Kenilworth man-at-arms, sorely
+wounded at Evesham, and at present befriended by the Knights of St. John.
+
+Old Sir Robert Darcy knew so much that it was needful to confide fully in
+him; and he gave Richard some satisfaction by a promise to watch over his
+brother as far as was possible with a man of such uncertain vagrant
+habits; and he likewise engaged to let him know, even in the Holy Land,
+of any change in the beggar’s condition; and this, considering the
+wide-spread connections of the Order, and that some of its members were
+sure to be in any crusading army, was all that Richard could reasonably
+hope.
+
+“Canst write?” asked Sir Robert.
+
+“Yea, Father.”
+
+“I could once!  But if there be need to send thee a scroll, I’ll take
+care it is writ by a trusty hand.”
+
+More than this Richard could not hope.  There had always been a strange
+self-willed wildness of character about his eldest brother, who, though
+far less violent and overbearing in actual deed than the two next in age,
+Simon and Guy, had contrived to incur even greater odium than they, by
+his mocking careless manner and love of taunts and gibing.  Simon de
+Montfort the elder had indeed strangely failed in the bringing up of his
+sons.  Whether it were that their royal connection had inflated them with
+pride, or that the King’s indulgence had counteracted the good effects of
+the admirable education provided for them at home, they had done little
+justice to their parentage, or to their tutor, the excellent Robert
+Grostête.  Perhaps the Earl himself was too affectionate: perhaps his
+occupation in public affairs hindered him from enforcing family
+discipline.  At any rate, neither of the elder three could have been
+naturally endowed with his largeness of mind, and high unselfish views.
+He was a man before his age; not only deeply pious, but with a devoted
+feeling for justice and mercy carried into all the details of life, till
+his loyalty to the law overcame his loyalty to the King.  Simon and Guy,
+on the other hand, were commonplace young nobles of the thirteenth
+century, heedless of all but themselves, and disdaining all beneath them;
+and when their father had seized the reins of government in order to
+enforce the laws that the King would not observe, they saw in his
+elevation a means of gratifying themselves, and being above all law.  The
+cry throughout England had been that Simon’s “sons made themselves vile,
+and he restrained them not.”
+
+Henry de Montfort had not indeed, like his brothers, plundered the ships
+in the Channel, extorted money from peaceful yeomen, nor insulted the
+poor old captive King to his face; but his deference had been more
+galling than their defiance; his scornful smiles and keen cutting jests
+had mortally offended many a partizan; and when positive work was to be
+done, Simon with all his fierceness and cruelty was far more to be
+depended on than Henry, who might at any time fly off upon some
+incalculable freak.  To Richard’s boyish recollection, if Simon had been
+the most tyrannical towards him in deed, Henry had been infinitely more
+annoying and provoking in the lesser arts of teasing.
+
+And looking back on the past, he could understand how intolerable a life
+of helplessness would be among the equals whom Henry had so often stung
+with his keen wit, and that to a man of his peculiar tone of mind there
+was infinitely more liberty in thus sinking to the lowest depths, where
+his infirmities were absolute capital to him, than in being hedged about
+with the restraints of his rank.  Any way, it was impossible to
+interfere, even for the child’s sake, and all Richard could do to console
+himself was to look forward to his return from the Crusade an esquire or
+even a knight, with exploits that Henry might respect—a standing in the
+Court that would give him some right to speak—perhaps in time a home and
+lady wife to whom his brother would intrust his child, who would then be
+growing out of a mere toy.  Or might not his services win him a fresh
+grant of the earldom, and could he not then prove his sincerity by laying
+it at the true Earl’s feet?
+
+Pretty Bessee, too!  Richard remembered stories current in the family, of
+their grandmother, Amicia, Countess of Leicester in her own right, being
+forced when a young girl to wed the stern grim old persecuting Simon de
+Montfort, and how vain had been her struggles against her doom.  He lost
+himself in graceful romantic visions of the young knight whose love he
+would watch and foster, and whose marriage to his lovely niece should be
+securely concluded ere her rank should be made known, when her guardian
+uncle would yield all to her.  And from that day forth Richard looked out
+with keen eyes among the playfellows of the little princes for Bessee’s
+future knight.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII
+AMONG THE RUINS OF CARTHAGE
+
+
+    “But man is more than law, and I may have
+    Some impress of myself upon the world;
+    One poor brief life, helping to feed the flame
+    Of chivalry, and keep alive the truth
+    That courage, honour, mercy, make a knight.”
+
+                                                _Queen Isabel_, _by S. M._
+
+“LAND in sight!  Cheer up, John, my man!” said Richard, leaning over a
+bundle of cloaks that lay on the deck of a Genoese galley.
+
+The cross floated high aloft, accompanied by the lions of English
+royalty; the bulwark was hung round with blazoned shields, and the
+graceful white sails were filled by a gay breeze that sent the good ship
+dancing over the crested waves of the Mediterranean, in company with many
+another of her gallant sisters, crowded with the chivalry of England.
+
+Woeful was however the plight of great part of that chivalry.  Merrily
+merrily bounded the bark, but her sport felt very like death to many of
+her freight, and among others to poor little John de Mohun.
+
+His father, Baron Mohun of Dunster, had been deeply implicated in the
+Barons’ Wars, and had been a personal friend of the Earl of Leicester,
+from whom he had only separated himself in consequence of the outrageous
+exactions and acts of insolence perpetrated by the young Montforts.  He
+had indeed received a disabling wound while fighting on the Prince’s side
+at Evesham; but his submission had been thought so insecure that his son
+and heir had been required of him, ostensibly as page, but really as
+hostage.
+
+In spite of his Norman surname, little John of Dunster was, at twelve
+years old, a sturdy thoroughgoing English lad, with the strongest
+possible hatred to all foreigners, whom with grand indifference to
+natural history he termed “locusts sucking the blood of Englishmen.”  Not
+a word or command would he understand except in his mother tongue; and no
+blows nor reproofs had sufficed to tame his sturdy obstinacy.  The other
+pages had teased, fagged, and bullied him to their hearts’ content,
+without disturbing his determination to go his own way; and his only
+friend and protector had been Richard, whom, under the name of Fowen, he
+took for a genuine Englishman, and loved with all his heart.  If anything
+would ever cure him of his wilful awkwardness and dogged bashfulness, it
+was likely to be the kindness of Richard—above all, in the absence of the
+tormentors, for Hamlyn de Valence alone of the other pages had been
+selected to attend upon the Prince in this expedition; and he, though
+scornful and peremptory, did not think the boy worthy of his attention,
+and did not actively tease him.
+
+At present Hamlyn de Valence, as well as most others of the passengers,
+lay prostrate; scarcely alive even to the assurance of Richard, who had
+still kept his feet, that the outline of the hills was quickly becoming
+distinct, and that they were fast entering the gulf where lay the fleet
+that had brought the crusaders of France and Sicily, whom they hoped to
+join in the conquest and conversion of Tunis.  On arriving at Aigues
+Mortes, they had found that the French King had already sailed for
+Sicily; and following him thither, learnt that his brother, Charles of
+Anjou, had persuaded him to begin his crusade by a descent on Tunis, to
+which the Sicilian crown was said to have some claim; that he had sailed
+thither at once, and Charles had followed him so soon as the Genoese
+transports could return for the Sicilian troops.
+
+“I see the masts!” exclaimed Richard; “the bay is crowded with them!
+There must be a goodly force.  Yonder are two headlands; within them we
+shall have smoother water—see—”
+
+“What strikes thee so suddenly silent?” growled one of the muffled
+figures stretched on deck.
+
+“The ensigns are but half-mast high, my Lord,” returned Richard in an
+awe-struck voice; “the lilies of France are hung drooping downward.”
+
+“These plaguy southern winds at their tricks,” muttered at first Earl
+Gilbert of Gloucester, for he it was who had spoken, though Richard had
+not known him to be so near; then sitting up, he came to a fuller view:
+“Hm—it looks ill!  Thou canst keep thy feet, Fowen, or what do they call
+thee?  Down with thee to the cabin, and let the Prince know.”
+
+Stepping across the prostrate forms, and meeting with vituperations as he
+trode, Richard made his way to the ladder that led below, and notified
+his presence behind the curtain that veiled the royal cabin.  He was
+summoned to enter at once.  The Prince was endeavouring to write at a
+swinging-table, the Princess lay white and resigned on a couch, attended
+on by Dame Idonea (or more properly Iduna) Osbright, a lady who had lost
+her husband in a former Crusade, and had ever since been a sort of
+high-born head nurse in the palace.  A Danish skald, who had once been at
+the English court, had said that she seemed to have eaten her namesake’s
+apple of immortality, without her apple of beauty, for no one could ever
+remember to have seen her other than a tiny dried-up old witch, with keen
+gray eyes, a sharp tongue, an ever ready foot and hand, and a frame
+utterly unaffected by any of the influences so sinister to far younger
+and stronger ones.  Devoted to all the royal family, her special passion
+was for Prince Edmund, who, in his mother’s repugnance to his deformity,
+had been left almost entirely to her, and she had accompanied the
+Princess Eleanor all the more willingly from her desire to look after her
+favourite nursling.
+
+“There, Lady,” said Edward to his wife, “the tossing is all but over;
+here is Richard come to tell us that we are nigh on land.”
+
+“Even so, my Lord,” returned Richard; “we are entering the gulf, but my
+Lord of Gloucester has sent me to report to you that in all the ships the
+colours are trailing.”
+
+“Sayst thou?” exclaimed the Prince, hastily laying aside his writing
+materials.  “Fear not, _mi Dona_, I will return anon and tell thee how it
+is.  We are in smoother water already.”
+
+“So much smoother that I will come with thee out of this stifling cabin,”
+said Eleanor.  “O would that we had been in time for thee to have
+counselled thine uncles—”
+
+“We will see what we have to grieve for ere we bemoan ourselves,” said
+the Prince.  “My good uncle of France would put his whole fleet in
+mourning for one barefooted friar!”
+
+“Depend on it, my Lord, ’tis mourning for something in earnest,”
+interposed Dame Iduna; “I said it was not for nothing that a single pyot
+came and rocked up his ill-omened tail while we were taking horse for
+this expedition, and my Lady there was kissing the little ones at home,
+nor that a hare ran over our road at Bagshot—”
+
+“Well, Dame,” interposed the Prince good-humouredly, seeing his wife
+somewhat affected by the list of omens, “I know you have a horse-shoe in
+your luggage, so you will come safe off, whoever does not!”
+
+“And what matters what my luck is,” returned the Dame, “an old beldame
+such as me, so long as you and your brother come off safe, and find the
+blessed princes at home well and sound?  Would that we were out of this
+sandy hole, or that any one would resolve me why we cannot go straight to
+Jerusalem when we are about it!”
+
+The Dame had delayed them while she spoke, in order to adjust the
+Princess’s muffler over her somewhat dishevelled locks; but Eleanor
+seeing that her husband was impatient, put a speedy end to her
+operations, and took his arm.
+
+Meantime the vessel had come within the Gulf of Goletta, and others of
+the passengers had revived, and were standing on deck to watch their
+entrance into the very harbour that two thousand years before had
+sheltered the storm-tossed fleet of Æneas; but if the Trojan had there
+found a wooded haven, the groves and sylvan shades must long since have
+been destroyed, for to the new-comers the bay appeared inclosed by spits
+of sand, though there was a rising ground in front that cut off the view.
+In the centre of the bay was a low sandy islet, covered with remains of
+masonry, and with a fort in the midst.  On this was mounted the French
+banner, but likewise drooping; and all around it lay the ships with
+furled sails and trailing ensigns, giving them an inexpressibly
+mysterious look of woe, like living creatures with folded wings and
+vailed crests, lying on the face of the waters in a silent sleep of
+sorrow.  There was an awe of suspense that kept each one on the deck
+silent, unable to utter the conjecture that weighed upon his breast.
+
+A boat was already putting off, and its quick movements seemed to mar the
+solemn stillness, as, impelled by the regular strokes of a dozen dark
+handsome Genoese mariners with gaily-tinted caps, it shot towards the
+vessel.  A Genoese captain in graver garb sat at the helm, and as they
+came alongside, a whisper, almost a shudder, seemed to thrill upwards
+from the boat to the crew, and through them to the passengers, “_Il Rè_!”
+“_il Rè santo_,” “_il Rè di Francia_.”  It seemed to have pervaded the
+whole ship even before the Genoese had had time to take the rope flung to
+him and to climb up the ship’s side, where as his fellow-captain greeted
+him, he asked hastily for the _Principe Inglese_.
+
+For Edward had not come forward, but was standing with his back against
+the mainmast, with colourless cheek and eyes set and fixed.  Eleanor
+looked up to him in silence, aware that he was mastering vehement
+agitation, and would endure no token of sympathy or sorrow that would
+unnerve him when dignity required firmness.  To him, Louis IX., the
+husband of his mother’s sister, had been the guiding friend and noble
+pattern denied to him in his father; and Eleanor, intrusted to his
+uncle’s care during the troubles of England, a maiden wife in her first
+years of womanhood, had been formed and moulded by that holy and upright
+influence.  To both the loss was as that of a father; and the murmur
+among the sailors was to them as a voice saying, “Knowest thou that God
+will take away thy master from thy head to-day?”  For the moment,
+however, the Princess’s sole thought was how her husband would bear it,
+and she watched anxiously till the struggle was over, in the space of a
+few seconds, and he met the Genoese with his usual reserved courtesy; and
+returning his salutation, signed to him to communicate his tidings.
+
+They were however brief, for the captain had held by his ship, and all he
+knew was that deadly sickness, fever, and plague had raged in the camp.
+The Papal Legate was dead, and the good King of France.  His son was dead
+too, and many another beside.
+
+“Which son?”
+
+“Not the eldest—he lay sick, but there were hopes of him; but the little
+one—he had been carried on board his ship, but it had not saved him.”
+
+“Poor little Tristan!” sighed Eleanor; “true Cross-bearer, born in one
+hapless Crusade to die in another.”
+
+“The King of Sicily?” demanded Edward between his teeth.
+
+“He had arrived the very day of his brother’s death,” said the Genoese;
+“and when he had seen how matters stood, he had concluded a truce with
+the King of Tunis, and intended to sail as soon as the new King of France
+could bear to be moved.”
+
+In the meantime the vessel had been anchored, and preparations were made
+for landing; but the Princes impatience to hear details would not brook
+even the delay of waiting till his horse could be set ashore.  He
+committed to the Earl of Gloucester the charge of encamping his men on
+the island, left a message with him for his brother Edmund, who was in
+another ship, and perceiving that Richard had suffered the least of all
+his suite, summoned him to attend him in the boat which was at once
+lowered.
+
+This would have been a welcome call had not Richard found that poor
+little John de Mohun had not revived like the other passengers, but still
+lay inert and sometimes moaning.  All Richard could do was to beg the
+groom specially attached to the pages’ service, to have a care of the
+little fellow, and get him sheltered in a tent as soon as possible; but
+the Prince never suffered any hesitation in obeying him, and it was
+needful to hurry at once into the boat.
+
+Without a word, the Prince with long swift strides, in the light of the
+sinking sun, walked up the low hill, the same where erst the pious Æneas
+climbed with his faithful Achates following.  From the brow the Trojan
+prince had beheld the rising city in the valley—the English prince came
+on its desolation.  Yet nature had made the vale lovely—green with
+well-watered verdure, fields of beauteous green maize, graceful date
+palms, and majestic cork trees; and among them were white flat-roofed
+Moorish houses; but many a black stain on the fair landscape told of the
+fresh havoc of an invading army.
+
+Utterly blotted out was Carthage.  Half demolished, half choked with
+sand, the city of Dido, the city of Hannibal, the city of Cyprian—all had
+vanished alike, and nothing remained erect but a Moorish fortress, built
+up with fragments of the huge stones of the old Phoenicians, intermixed
+with the friezes and sculptures of Græcising Rome, and the whole fabric
+in the graceful Saracenic taste; while completing the strange mixture of
+periods, another of those mournful French banners drooped from the
+battlements, and around it spread the white tents of the armies of France
+and the Two Sicilies, like it with trailing banners; an orphaned
+plague-stricken host in a ruined city.
+
+While the Prince paused for a moment’s glance, a party of knights came
+spurring up the hill, who had been ordered off to meet him on the first
+intelligence that his fleet was in sight, but had been taken by surprise
+by his alertness.
+
+They met with bowed heads and dejected mien; and there was one who hid
+his face and wept aloud as he exclaimed, “Ah!  Messire, our holy King
+loved you well!”
+
+“Alas, beau sire Guillaume de Porçeles!” was all that Edward could say,
+as with tears in his eyes he held out his hand to the good Provençal
+knight, adding, “Let me hear!”
+
+The knight, leading his horse and walking by Edward’s side, told how the
+King had been induced to make his descent on Tunis, from some wild hope
+of the king’s conversion, which had been magnified by Charles of Anjou,
+from his dislike to let so gallant an army pass by without endeavouring
+to obtain some personal advantage to his own realm of Sicily.  Though a
+vassal of Beatrix of Provence, the Sire de Porçeles was no devoted
+admirer of her husband, Charles of Anjou, and spoke with no concealment
+of the unhappy perversion of the Crusade.  Charles of Anjou was
+all-powerful with the court of Rome, and in crusading matters Louis
+deemed it right absolutely to surrender to the ecclesiastical power all
+that judgment which had made him so prudent and wise a king at home,
+while his crusades were lamentable failures.  Thus in him it had been a
+piece of obedient self-denial not to press forward to the Holy Sepulchre;
+but to land in this malarious bay to fulfil aims that, had he but used
+his common sense, he would have seen to be merely those of private
+ambition.  There it had been one scene of wasting sickness.  A few deeds
+of arms had been done to refresh the spirits of the French, such as the
+taking of the fort of Carthage, and now and then a skirmish of some
+foraging party; but in general the Moors launched their spears and fled
+without staying for combat.  Many who had hid themselves in the vaults
+and cellars of Carthage had been dragged out and put to death, and their
+bodies had aided in breeding pestilence.  Name after name fell from the
+lips of the knight, like the roll of warriors fallen in a great battle,
+when
+
+    “They melted from the field like snow,
+    Their king, their lords, their mightiest low.”
+
+And the last foreign embassy that ever reached Louis IX. had been that of
+the Greek Emperor Michael Palæologos, come to set before him the savage
+barbarities perpetrated upon Christians by this brother—
+
+    “Who had spoilt the purpose of his life.”
+
+It was as Charles entered the port, that Louis, lying on a bed of ashes,
+with his hands crossed upon his breast, and the words, “O Jerusalem,
+Jerusalem!” entered not the Jerusalem of his earthly schemes, but the
+Jerusalem of his true aspirations.
+
+“Shall we conduct you to my Lord the King of Sicily?” asked De Porçeles.
+
+“No!” said Edward, with bitter sternness; “to my uncle of France.”
+
+“Down, down, my Lord, and all of you instantly,” shouted Porçeles
+suddenly, throwing himself face downwards on the ground.  Edward was too
+good a soldier not to follow the injunction instantaneously, and Richard
+did the same, as well as all the knights who had come up with Porçeles.
+Even the horses buried their noses in the hot sandy soil.  A strange
+rushing roaring sound passed over them; there was a sense of intense
+suffocation, then of heat, pricking, and irritation.  The Provençals were
+rising; and the Prince and his page doing the same, shook off a plentiful
+load of sand, and beheld, careering furiously away, between them and the
+western sun, what looked like a purple column, reaching from earth to
+heaven, and bespangled with living gold-dust, whirling round in giddy
+spirals, and all the time fleeting so fast that it was diminishing every
+moment, and was gone in a wink of the eye.
+
+“Is it enchantment?” gasped Richard to the squire nearest him, as he
+strove to clear his eyes from the sand and gaze after the wonder.
+
+“Worse than enchantment,” quoth the squire; “it is a sand whirlwind.”
+
+They were soon crossing the ditch that had been dug around the camp among
+the ruins, and passed through lanes of tents erected among the thick
+foliage that mantled the broken walls; here and there tracks of mosaic
+pavement; of temples to Dido or Anna peeping forth beneath either the
+luxuriant vegetation or the heavy sand-drifts; or columns of the new
+Carthage lying veiled by acanthus; or remnants of churches destroyed by
+Genseric—all alike disregarded by the sickly drooping figures that moved
+feebly about among them, regarding them as little save stumbling-blocks.
+
+A Moorish house in the midst of a once well-laid-out garden, now trampled
+and destroyed, was the place to which the Provençal knight led the
+English Prince.  Entering the doorway of a court, where a fountain
+sparkled in the midst of a marble pavement, they saw the richly-latticed
+stone doorway of the house guarded by two figures in armour like iron
+statues; and passing between them, they came into the principal chamber,
+marble-floored, and with a divan of cushions round it; but full in the
+midst of the room lay a coffin, covered with the lilied banner, and the
+standard of the Cross; the crowned helmet, good sword, knightly spurs,
+and cross-marked shield lying upon it; solemn forms in armour guarded it,
+and priests knelt and chanted prayers and psalms around it.  Within were
+only the bones of Louis, which were to be taken to St. Denis.  The flesh,
+which had been removed by being boiled in wine and spices, was already on
+its way to Palermo in a vessel whose melancholy ensigns would have
+announced the loss to the English had they not passed it in the night.
+
+Long did Edward kneel beside the remains of his uncle, with his face
+hidden and thoughts beyond our power to trace.  Richard’s heart was full
+of that strange question “Wherefore?”  Wherefore should the best and
+purest schemes planned by the highest souls fall over like a crested wave
+and become lost?  So it had been, he would have said, with the Round
+Table under Arthur, so with England’s rights beneath his own noble
+father, so with the Crusade under such leaders as Edward of England and
+Louis of France.  Did he mark the answer in those Psalms that the priests
+were singing around—
+
+    “Qui seminant in lacrymis, in exultatione metent,
+    Euntes ibant et flebant mittentes semina sua,
+    Venientes autem venient cum exultatione portantes manipulos suos.”
+    {100}
+
+Surely we may believe that Simon of Leicester and Louis of France were
+alike beyond grief at their marred visions, their errors of deed or of
+judgment were washed away, and their true purpose was accepted, both
+waiting the harvest when their works should follow them, and it should
+have been made manifest that the effect of what they had been and had
+suffered had told far more on future generations than what they had
+wrought out in their own lifetime.
+
+It was at that moment that the sensation that an eye was upon him caused
+Richard to raise his eyes from the floor.  One of the armed figures, who
+had hitherto stood as still as suits of armour in a castle hall, had
+partially lowered the visor of the helmet, and eyes, nose, and a part of
+the cheeks were visible.  Richard looked up, and they were those of his
+father! was it a delusion of his fancy?  He closed his eyes and looked
+again.  Again it was the deep brown Montfort eye, the clearly-cut nose,
+the embrowned skin!  He glanced at the bearings on the shield.  Behold,
+it was his own—the red field and white lion rampant with a forked tail,
+which he had not seen for so long.
+
+Almost at the same moment another person entered the chamber—a man with a
+sallow complexion, narrow French features, sharp gray eyes, and a certain
+royal bearing that even a cunning shrewdness of expression could not
+destroy.  His face was composed to a look of melancholy, and he crossed
+himself and knelt down near Edward to await the conclusion of his
+devotions.  Edward, who knelt absorbed in grief, with his cloak partly
+over his face, apparently did not perceive him, and after two or three
+unheeded endeavours at attracting notice, he at length rose and said in a
+low voice, “My fair nephew.”  For a moment the Prince lifted up his face,
+and Richard had rather have died than have encountered that glance of
+mournful reproof; then hiding his face in his hands again, he continued
+his devotions.
+
+When these were ended he rose from his knees; and when out of the
+death-chamber bowed his bead and with grave courtesy exchanged greetings
+with Charles of Anjou, asking at the same time to see his young cousin
+Philippe, the new King of France.
+
+An inquiry from an attendant elicited that Philippe had just dropped
+asleep under the influence of a potion from his leech.
+
+“Then, fair nephew,” said Charles of Sicily, “be content with your old
+uncle, and come to my apartments, where I will set before you the
+necessities that have led me to conclude the truce that is baffling your
+eager desire of deeds of arms.”
+
+“Pardon me, royal uncle,” returned Edward, “I must see my camp set up.
+It is already late, and I must take order that my troops mingle not where
+contagion might seize them.  Another time,” he added, “I may brook the
+argument better.”
+
+Charles of Anjou did not press him further.  There was that in his face
+and voice which betokened that his fierce indignation and overpowering
+grief were scarcely restrained, and that a word of excuse in his present
+mood would but have roused the lion.
+
+Horses had been provided for him and his attendant.  He flung himself on
+his steed at once, and Richard was obliged to follow without a moment’s
+opportunity of making inquiry about the wonderful apparition he had seen
+in the chamber of death.
+
+For some distance Edward galloped rapidly over the sandy soil, then
+drawing up his horse when he had come to the brow from which he could see
+on the one side the valley of Carthage, on the other the bay, he made an
+exclamation which Richard took for a summons, and he came up asking if he
+were called.  “No, boy, no!  I only spoke my thoughts aloud!  Failure and
+success!  We’ve seen them both to-day—in the two kings!  What thinkst
+thou of them?”
+
+“Better be wrecked than work the wreck, my Lord,” said Richard.
+
+“Ay! but why surrender the wit to the worker of the wreck?” said Edward.
+Then knitting his brow, “Two holy men have I known who did not blind
+their wit for their conscience’ sake—two alone—did it fare better with
+them?  One was the good Bishop of Lincoln—the other thou knowst, Richard!
+Well, one goes after another—first good Bishop Grostête, then the Lord of
+Leicester, and now mine uncle of France; and if earth is to have no
+better than such as it pleases the Saints to leave in it, it will not be
+worth staying in much longer.”
+
+“My Lord,” said Richard, coming near, “methought I saw my father’s face
+under a visor—one of the knightly guards beside the holy King.”
+
+“Well might thy fancy call him up in such a presence,” said Edward.
+“They twain had hearts in the same place above, though they saw the world
+below on different sides, and knew each other little, and loved each
+other less, in life.  That’s all at an end now!  Well, back to our camp
+to make the best of the world they have left behind them!”  And then in a
+tone that Richard was not meant to hear, “While _mi dona_ Leonor remains
+to me there is something saintly and softening still in this world!
+Heaven help me—ay, and all my foes—were she gone from it too!”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII
+RICHARD’S WRAITH
+
+
+    “No distance breaks the tie of blood;
+    Brothers are brothers evermore;
+    Nor wrong, nor wrath of deadliest mood,
+    That magic may o’erpower.”—_Christian Year_.
+
+IT was nearly dark when the Prince and the Page landed on the island, and
+found the tents already set up in their due order and rank, according to
+the discipline that no one durst transgress where Edward was the
+commander.
+
+Richard attended him to his pavilion, and being there dismissed until
+supper-time, crossed the square space which was always left around the
+royal banner, to the tent at the southern corner, which was regularly
+appropriated to the pages’ use.  On lifting its curtain he was, however,
+dismayed to see a kirtle there, and imagining that he must have fallen
+upon the ladies’ quarters, he was retreating with an apology; when the
+sharp voice of Dame Idonea called out, “Oh yes, Master Page! ’tis you
+that are at home here.  I was merely tarrying till ’twas the will of one
+of you to come in and look to the poor child.”
+
+And little John of Dunster called from a couch of mantles, “Richard, oh!
+is it he at last?”
+
+“It is I,” said Richard, advancing into the light of a brass lamp, hung
+by chains from the top of the tent.  “This is kind indeed, Lady!  But is
+he indeed so ill at ease?”
+
+“How should he be otherwise, with none of you idle-pated pages casting a
+thought to him?”
+
+“I was grieved to leave him—but the Prince summoned me,” began Richard.
+
+“Beshrew thee!  Tell me not of princes, as though there were no one whom
+thou couldst bid to have a care of the little lad!”
+
+“I did bid Piers—,” Richard made another attempt.
+
+“Piers, quotha?  Why didst not bid the Jackanapes that sits on the
+luggage?  A proper warder for a sick babe!”
+
+“I am no babe!” here burst out John; “I am twelve years old come
+Martinmas, and I need no tendance but Richard’s.”
+
+“Ha, ha!  So those are all the thanks we ladies get, when we are not
+young and fair!” laughed Dame Idonea, rather amused.
+
+“I want no women, young or old,” petulantly repeated John; “I want
+Richard.—Lift me up, Richard; take away this cloak.”
+
+“For his life, no!” returned the Dame; “he has the heats and the chills
+on him, and to let him take cold would be mere slaughter.”
+
+“Alas!” said Richard, “I hoped nothing ailed him but the sea, and that
+landing would make all well.”
+
+“As if the sea ever made a child shiver and burn by turns!  Nay, ’tis the
+trick of the sun in these parts.  Strange that the sun himself should be
+a mere ally of the Infidel!  I tell thee, if the child is ever to see
+Dunster again, thou must watch him well, keep him from the sun by day and
+the chill by night; or he’ll be like the poor creatures in the French
+camp out there, whom, I suppose, you found in fine case.”
+
+“Alack yes, Lady!”
+
+“I’ve seen it many a time; and all their disorders will be creeping into
+our camp next.  Tell me, is it even as they told us, one king dead and
+the other dying?”
+
+Richard began to wonder whether he should ever get her out of his tent,
+for she insisted on his telling her every possible particular—who had
+died, who had lived, who was sick, who well; and as from the close
+connection between the English, French, and Sicilian courts, whose queens
+were all sisters, she knew who every one was, and accounted for the
+history of each person she inquired after, back to the last
+generation—happy if it were not to the third—her conversation was not
+quickly over.  She ended at last, by desiring Richard to give her patient
+some of a febrifuge, which she had brought with her, every two hours, and
+when it was all spent, or in case of any change in the boy’s state, to
+summon her from the ladies’ tent; adding, however, “But what’s the use of
+leaving a pert springald like thee in charge?  Thou wilt sleep like a
+very dormouse, I’ll warrant!  I’d best call Mother Jugge.”
+
+“Oh no, no!” cried John; to whom the attendance of Mother Jugge would
+have been a worse indignity than the being nursed by Dame Idonea; “let me
+have no one but Richard!  Richard knows all I want.—Richard, leave me not
+again.”
+
+“Ay, ay; a little lad ever hangs to a bigger, were he to torture the life
+out of him.  Small thanks for us women after our good looks be past.  But
+I’ll look in on the child in early morn, thanks or no thanks; for I know
+his mother well, and if I can help it, the hyenas shall not make game of
+his bones, as I hear them doing by the French yonder.”
+
+John strove to say that, indeed, he thanked her, and had been infinitely
+comforted and refreshed by her care, and that all he meant was to express
+his distaste to Mother Jugge, the lavender (_i.e._ laundress), and his
+desire for Richard Fowen’s company; but he was little attended to, and
+apparently more than half offended, the brisk old lady trotted away.
+
+That island was a dreary place; without a tree or any shelter from the
+glare of sun and sea, whose combined influences threatened blindness,
+sun-stroke, or at the very least blistered the faces of those who stepped
+beyond their tents by day.  The Prince’s orders, however, strictly
+confined his army within its bounds, except that at twilight parties were
+sent ashore for water and provisions, under strict orders, however, to
+hold no parley with any one from the French or Sicilian camps, lest they
+should bring home the infection of the pestilence; and always under the
+command of some trustworthy knight, able and willing to enforce the
+command.
+
+The Prince himself refused all participation in the counsels of Charles
+of Anjou, and confined himself, like his men, entirely to the fleet and
+island.  Charles contrived to spread a report, that his displeasure was
+solely due to his disappointment at being balked of fighting with the
+Tunisians; and that instead of indignant grief at the perversion of the
+wrecked Crusade, he was only showing the sullenness of an aggrieved
+swordsman.  Even young Philippe le Hardi, a dull, heavy, ignorant youth,
+was led to suppose this was the cause of his offence, and though daily
+inquiries were sent through the Genoese crews for his health, he made no
+demonstration of willingness to see his cousin of England.
+
+Thus Richard had no opportunity of ascertaining whether there were any
+basis for the strange impression he had received in St. Louis’s
+death-chamber.  It would have been an act of disobedience, not soon
+overlooked by the Prince, had one of his immediate suite transgressed his
+commands, and indeed, so strict was the discipline, that it would
+scarcely have been possible to make the attempt.  Besides, Richard’s time
+was entirely engrossed between his duties in attending on the Prince, and
+his care of little John of Dunster, who had a sharp attack of fever, and
+was no doubt only carried through it by the experienced skill of Dame
+Idonea Osbright, and by Richard’s tender nursing.  Somehow the dame’s
+heart was not won, even by the elder page’s dutiful care and obedience to
+all her directions.  Partly she viewed him as a rival in the affections
+of the patient—who, poor little fellow, would in his companion’s absence
+be the child he was, and let her treat him like his mother, or old nurse,
+chattering to her freely about home, and his home-sick longings; whereas
+the instant any male companion appeared, he made it a point of honour to
+be the manly warrior and crusader, just succeeding so far as to be sullen
+instead of plaintive; though when left to Richard, he could again relax
+his dignity, and become natural and affectionate.  But besides this
+species of jealousy, Richard suspected that Lady Osbright knew, or at
+least guessed, his own parentage, and disliked him for it accordingly.
+She had never forgotten the distress and degradation of his mother’s
+stolen marriage, nor forgiven his father for it; she had often stung the
+proud heart of his brother Henry, when he shared the nursery of his
+cousins the princes; and her sturdy English dislike of foreigners, and
+her strong narrow personal loyalty, had alike resulted in the most
+vehement hatred of the Earl of Leicester, whose head she would assuredly
+have welcomed with barbarous exultation, worthy of her Danish ancestors.
+Little chance, then, was there that she would regard with favour his son
+under a feigned name, fostered in the Prince’s own court and camp.
+
+She was a constraint, and almost a vexation, to Richard, and he heartily
+wished that the boy’s recovery would free his tent from her.  The boy did
+recover favourably, in spite of all the discomforts of the island, and
+was decidedly convalescent when, after nearly ten days’ isolation on the
+island, Edward drew out his whole force upon the shore to do honour to
+the embarkation of the relics of Louis IX.  It was one of the most solemn
+and melancholy pageants that could be conceived.  A wide lane of mailed
+soldiers was drawn up, Sicilians and Provençals on the one side, and on
+the other, English and the Knights of the two Orders.  All stood, or sat
+on horseback in shining steel, guarding the way along which were carried
+the coffins.  In memory, perhaps, of Louis’s own words, “I, your leader,
+am going first,” his remains headed the procession, closely followed by
+those of his young son; and behind it marched his two brothers, Charles
+and Alfonse, and his son-in-law, the King of Navarre (the two latter
+already bearing the seeds of the fatal malady), and the three English
+princes, Edward, Edmund, and Henry of Almayne, each followed by his
+immediate suite.  The long line of coffins of French counts and nobles,
+whose lives had in like manner been sacrificed, brought up the rear; and
+alas! how many nameless dead must have been left in the ruins!
+
+Each coffin when brought to the shore was placed in a boat, and with
+muffled oars transplanted to the vessel ready to receive it, while the
+troops remained drawn up on the shore.  The procession that ensued was
+almost more mournful.  It was still of biers, but these were not of the
+dead but of the living, and again the foremost was the King of France,
+while next to him came his sister, the Queen of Navarre.  Edward went
+down to his litter, as it was brought on the beach, and offered him his
+arm as he feebly stepped forth to enter the boat.  Philippe looked up to
+his tall cousin, and wrung his hands as he murmured, “Alas! what is to be
+the end of all this?”  Edward made kind and cheerful reply, that things
+would look better when they met at Trapani, and then almost lifted the
+young king into his boat.  Poor youth, he had not yet seen the end!  He
+was yet to lose his wife, his brother-in-law, and his uncle and aunt, ere
+he should see his home again.
+
+Richard and Hamlyn de Valence, as part of the Prince’s train, had moved
+in the procession; and they were for the rest of the day in close
+attendance on their lord, conveying his numerous orders for the
+embarkation of the troops on the morrow, on their return to Sicily.  It
+was not till night-fall that Richard returned to his tent, where John of
+Dunster was sitting on the sand at the door, eagerly watching for him.
+“Well, Jack, my lad, how hast thou sped?” asked he, advancing.  “Couldst
+see our doleful array?”
+
+“Is it thou, indeed, this time?” said the boy, catching at his cloak.
+
+“Why, who should it be?”
+
+“Thy wraith!  Thy double-ganger has been here Richard.”
+
+“What, dreaming again?”
+
+“No no!  I am well, I am strong.  But this _is_ the land of enchantment!
+Thou knowst it is.  Did we not see a fleet of fairy boats sailing on the
+sea? and a leaf eat up a fly here on this very tent pole?  And did not
+the Fay Morgaine show us towns and castles and churches in the sea?  Thou
+didst not call me light-headed then, Richard; thou sawest it too!”
+
+“But this wraith of mine!  Where didst see it?”
+
+“In this tent.  I was lying on the sand, trying if I could make it hold
+enough to build a castle of it, when the curtain was put back, and there
+thou stoodest, Richard!”
+
+“Well, did I speak or vanish?”
+
+“Oh, thou spakest—I mean the _thing_ spake, and it said, ‘Is this the
+tent of the young Lord of Montfort?’  How now—what have I said?”
+
+“Whom did he ask for?” demanded Richard breathlessly.
+
+“Montfort—young Lord de Montfort!” replied John; “I know it was, for he
+said it twice over.”
+
+“And what didst thou answer?”
+
+“What should I answer?  I said we had no Montforts here; for they were
+all dishonoured traitors, slain and outlawed.”
+
+Richard could not restrain a sudden indignant exclamation that startled
+the boy.  “Every one says so!  My father says so!” he returned, somewhat
+defiantly.
+
+“Not of the Earl,” said Richard, recollecting himself.
+
+“He said every one of the young Montforts was a foul traitor, and
+man-sworn tyrant, as bad as King John had been ere the Charter,” repeated
+John hotly, “and their father was as bad, since he would give no redress.
+Thou knowst how they served us in Somerset and Devon!”
+
+“I have heard, I have heard,” said Richard, cutting short the story, and
+controlling his own burning pain, glad that the darkness concealed his
+face.  “No more of that; but tell me, what said this stranger?”
+
+“Thou thinkest it was really a stranger, and not thy wraith?” said John
+anxiously.  “I hope it was, for Dame Idonea said if it were a wraith, it
+betokened that thou wouldst not—live long—and oh, Richard!  I could not
+spare thee!”
+
+And the little fellow came nestling up to his friend’s breast in an
+access of tenderness, such as perhaps he would have disdained save in the
+darkness.
+
+“Did Dame Idonea see him?” asked Richard.
+
+“No; but she came in soon after he had vanished.”
+
+“Vanished!  What, like Fay Morgaine’s castles?  Tell me in sooth, John;
+it imports me to know.  What did this stranger, when thou spakest thus of
+the House of Montfort?”
+
+“He answered,” said John; “he did not answer courteously—he said, that I
+was a malapert little ass, and demanded again where this young Montfort’s
+tent was.  So then I said, that if a Montfort dared to show his traitor’s
+face in this camp, the Prince would hang him as high as Judas; for I
+wanted to be rid of him, Richard! it was so dreadful to see thy face, and
+hear thy voice talking French, and asking for dead traitors.”
+
+“French!” said Richard.  “Methought thou knewst no French!”
+
+“I—I have heard it long now, more’s the pity,” faltered John, “and—and
+I’d have spoken anything to be rid of that shape.”
+
+“And wert thou rid?  What befell then?”
+
+“It cursed the Prince, and King, and all of them,” said John with a
+shudder; “it looked black and deadly, and I crossed myself, and said the
+Blessed Name, and no doubt it writhed itself and went off in brimstone
+and smoke, for I shut my eyes, and when I looked up again it was gone!”
+
+“Gone!  Didst look after him?”
+
+“Oh, no!  Earthly things are all food for a brave man’s sword,” said
+Master John, drawing himself up very valiantly, “but wraiths and things
+from beneath—they do scare the very heart out of a man.  And I lay, I
+don’t know how, till Dame Idonea came in; and she said either the foul
+fiend had put on thy shape because he boded thee ill, or it was one of
+the traitor brood looking for his like.”
+
+“Tell me, John,” said Richard anxiously; “surely he was not in all points
+like me.  Had he our English white cross?”
+
+“I cannot say as to the cross,” said John; “meseemed it was all
+you—yourself—and that was all—only I thought your voice was strange and
+hollow—and—now I think of it—yes—he was bearded—brown bearded.  And,”
+with a sudden thought, “stand up, prithee, in the opening of the tent;”
+and then taking his post where he had been sitting at the time of the
+apparition, “He was not so tall as thou art.  Thy head comes above the
+fold of the curtain, and his, I know, did not touch it, for I saw the
+light over it.  Then thou dost not think it was thy wraith?” he added
+anxiously.
+
+“I think my wraith would have measured me more exactly both in stature
+and in age,” said Richard lightly.  “But how did Leonillo comport
+himself?  He brooks not a stranger in general; and dogs cannot endure the
+presence of a spirit.”
+
+“Ah! but he fawned upon this one, and thrust his nose into his hand,”
+said John, “and I think he must have run after him; for it was so long
+ere he came back to me, that I had feared greatly he was gone, and oh,
+Richard! then I must have gone too!  I could never have met you without
+Leonillo.”
+
+By this time Richard had little doubt that the visitor must have been one
+of his brothers, Simon or Guy, who were not unlikely to be among the
+Provençals, in the army of Charles of Anjou.  He had not been thought to
+resemble them as a boy, but he had observed how much more alike brothers
+appear to strangers than they do to their own family; and he knew by
+occasional observations from the Prince, as well as from his brother
+Henry’s recognition of his voice, that the old Montfort characteristics
+must be strong in himself.  He would not, however, avow his belief to
+John of Dunster.  Secrecy on his own birth had been enjoined on him by
+his uncle the King; and disobedience to the old man’s most trifling
+commands was always sharply resented by the Prince; nor was the boy’s
+view of the House of Montfort very favourable to such a declaration.
+Richard really loved the brave little fellow, and trusted that some day
+when the discovery must be made, it would be coupled with some exploit
+that would show it was no name to be ashamed of.  So he only told the boy
+that he had no doubt the stranger was a foreign knight, who had once
+known the old Leicester family; but bade him mention the circumstance to
+no one.  He feared, however, that the caution came too late, since Dame
+Idonea was not only an inveterate gossip, but was likely to hold in
+direful suspicion any one who had been inquired for by such a name.
+
+The personal disappointment of having missed his brother was great.
+Richard was very lonely.  The Princes, and Hamlyn de Valence, were the
+only persons who knew his secret, and both by Prince Edmund and De
+Valence he was treated with indifference or dislike.  Edward himself,
+though the object of his fervent affection, and his protector in all
+essentials, was of a reserved nature, and kept all his attendants at a
+great distance.  On very rare occasions, when his feelings had been
+strongly stirred—as in the instance of his visit to his uncle’s
+death-chamber—he might sometimes unbend; and momentary flashes from the
+glow of his warm deep heart went further in securing the love and
+devotion of those around him, than would the daily affability of a lower
+nature; but in ordinary life, towards all concerned with him except his
+nearest relations, he was a strict, cold, grave disciplinarian, ever
+just, though on the side of severity, and stern towards the slightest
+neglect or breach of observance, nor did he make any exception in favour
+of Richard.  If the youth seldom received one of his brief annihilating
+reproofs, it was because they were scarcely ever merited; but he had
+experienced that any want of exactitude in his duties was quite as
+severely visited as if he had not been the Prince’s close kinsman,
+romantically rescued by him, and placed near his person by his special
+desire.  And Eleanor, with all her gentle courtesy and kindness, was
+strictly withheld by her husband from pampering or cockering his pages;
+nor did she ever transgress his will.
+
+The atmosphere was perhaps bracing, but it was bleak: and there were
+times when Richard regretted his acceptance of the Prince’s offer, and
+yearned after family ties, equality, and freedom.  Simon and Guy had
+never been kind to him, but at least they were his brothers, and with
+them disguise and constraint would be over—he should, too, be in
+communication with his mother and sister.  He was strongly inclined to
+cast in his lot with them, and end this life of secrecy, and distrust
+from all around him save one, and his loyal love ill requited even by
+that one.  It grieved him keenly that one of his brothers should have
+been repulsed from his tent; an absolutely famished longing for fraternal
+intercourse gained possession of him, and as he lay on his pallet that
+night in the dark, he even shed tears at the thought of the greeting and
+embrace that he had missed.
+
+Still he had hopes for the future.  There must be meetings and
+possibilities of inquiries passing between the three armies, and he would
+let no opportunity go by.  The next day, however, there was no chance.
+The English troops were embarked in their vessels, and after a short and
+prosperous passage were again landed at Trapani, the western angle of
+Sicily.  The French had sailed first, but were not in harbour when the
+English came in; and the Sicilians, who had brought up the rear, arrived
+the next day, but still there was no tidings of the French.  Towards the
+evening, however, the royal vessel bearing Philippe III. came into
+harbour, and all the rest were in sight, when at sunset a frightful storm
+arose, and the ships were in fearful case.  Many foundered, many were
+wrecked on the rocky islets around the port, and the French army was
+almost as much reduced in numbers as it had been by the Plague of
+Carthage.
+
+Charles of Anjou remained himself in the town of Trapani, but knowing the
+evils of crowding a small space with troops, he at once sent his men
+inland, and Richard was again disappointed of the hope of seeing or
+hearing of his brothers; for the Prince still forbade all intercourse
+with the shattered remnant of the French army, justly dreading that they
+might still carry about them the seeds of the infection of the camp.
+
+The three heads of the Crusade, however, met in the Castle of Trapani to
+hold council on their future proceedings.  The place was the
+state-chamber of the castle.
+
+Each prince had brought with him a single attendant, and the three stood
+in waiting near the door, in full view of their lords, though out of
+earshot.  It was an opportunity that Richard could not bear to miss of
+asking for his brothers, unheard by any of those English ears who would
+be suspicious about his solicitude for the House of Montfort.  A
+lively-looking Neapolitan lad was the attendant of King Charles; and in
+spite of all the perils of attempting conversation while thus waiting,
+Richard had—while the princes were greeting one another, and taking their
+seats—ventured the question, whether any of the sons of the English Earl
+of Leicester were in the Sicilian army.  Of Earl of Leicester the Italian
+knew nothing; but Count of Montfort was a more familiar sound.  “Si, si,
+vero!”  Sicily had rung with it; and Count Rosso Aldobrandini, of the
+Maremma Toscana, had given his only daughter and heiress to the banished
+English knight, Guido di Monforte, who had served in the king’s army as a
+Provençal.
+
+Richard’s heart beat high.  Guy a well-endowed count, with a castle,
+lands, and home!  He would have asked where Guy now was, and how far off
+was the Maremma; but the conference between the princes was actually
+commencing, and silence became necessary on the part of their attendants.
+
+They could only hear the murmur of voices; but could discern plainly the
+keen looks and animated gestures of Charles of Anjou, the sickly sullen
+indifference of Philippe, and the majestic gravity of Edward, whose noble
+head towered above the other two as if he were their natural judge.
+Charles was, in fact, trying to persuade the others to sail with him for
+Greece, and there turn their forces on the unfortunate Michael
+Palæologos, who had lately recovered Constantinople, the Empire that
+Charles hoped to win for himself, the favoured champion of Rome.
+
+Philippe merely replied that he had had enough of crusading, he was sick
+and weary, he must go home and bury his father, and get himself crowned.
+Charles might be then seen trying a little hypocrisy; and telling
+Philippe that his saintly father would only have wished to speed him on
+the way of the Cross.  Then that trumpet voice of Edward, whose tones
+Richard never missed, answered, “What is the way of the Cross, fair
+uncle?”
+
+It was well known that Louis IX. had refused to crusade against
+Christians, even Greek Christians, and Philippe soon sheltered himself
+under the plea that had not at first occurred to his dull mind.  In
+effect, he laid particulars before his uncle, that quickly made it plain
+that the French army was in too miserable a condition to do anything but
+return home; and Charles then addressed his persuasions to
+Edward—striving to convince him in the first place of the sanctity of a
+war against Greek heretics, and when Edward proved past being persuaded
+that arms meant for the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre ought not to be
+employed against Christians who reverenced it, he tried to demonstrate
+the uselessness of hoping to conquer the Holy Land, even by such a
+Crusade as had been at first planned, far less with the few attached to
+Edward’s individual banner.  Long did the king argue on.  His low voice
+was scarcely audible, even without the words; but Edward’s brief,
+ringing, almost scornful, replies, never failed to reach Richard’s ear,
+and the last of them was, “It skills not, my fair uncle.  For the Holy
+Land I am vowed to fight, and thither would I go had I none with me but
+Fowen, my groom!”
+
+And withal his eye lit on Richard, with a look of certainty of response;
+of security that here was one to partake his genuine ardour, and of
+refreshment in the midst of his disgust with the selfish uncle and
+sluggish cousin.  That look, that half smile, made the youth’s heart
+bound once more.  Yes, with him he would go to the ends of the earth!
+What was the freedom of Guy’s castle, to the following of such a lord and
+leader in such a cause?
+
+Richard could have thrown himself at his feet, and poured forth pledges
+of fidelity.  But in ten minutes he was following home the
+unapproachable, silent, cold warrior.
+
+And the lack of any outlet for his aspirations turned them back upon
+themselves, with a strange sense of bitterness and almost of resentment.
+Leonillo alone, as the creature lay at his feet, and looked up into his
+face with eyes of deep wistful meaning, seemed to him to have any feeling
+for him; and Leonillo became the recipient of many an outpouring of
+something between discontent and melancholy.  Leonillo, the sole remnant
+of his home!  He burnt for that Holy Land where he was to win the name
+and fame lacking to him; but there was to be long delay.
+
+Fain would the Prince have proceeded at once to Palestine; but the
+Genoese, from whom, in the abeyance of the English navy, he had been
+obliged to hire his transports, absolutely refused to sail for the East
+until after the three winter months; and he was therefore obliged to
+remain in Sicily.  King Charles invited him to spend Christmas at the
+court at Syracuse or Naples, in hopes, perhaps, of persuading him to the
+Greek expedition; but Edward was far too much displeased with the Angevin
+to accept his hospitality; recollecting, perhaps, that such a sojourn had
+been little beneficial to his great-uncle Cœur de Lion’s army.  He
+decided upon staying where he was, in the remotest corner of Sicily, and
+keeping his three hundred crusaders as much to themselves and to strict
+military discipline as possible, maintaining them at his own cost, and
+avoiding as far as he could all transactions with the cruel and violent
+Provençal adventurers, with whom Charles had filled the island.
+
+Thus Richard found his hopes of obtaining further intelligence about his
+brothers entirely passing away.  He did, indeed, venture on one day
+saying to the Prince, “My Lord, I hear that my brother Guy hath become a
+Neapolitan count!”
+
+“A Tuscan robber would be nearer the mark!” coldly replied Edward.
+
+“And,” added Richard, “methought, while the host is in winter quarters, I
+would venture on craving your license, my Lord, to visit him?”
+
+“Thou hast thy choice, Richard,” answered the Prince, with grave
+displeasure; “loyalty and honour with me, or lawlessness and violence
+with thy brother.  Both cannot be thine!”
+
+And returning to his study of the Lais of Marie de France, he made it
+evident that he would hear no more, and left Richard to a sharp struggle;
+in which hot irritation and wounded feeling would have carried him away
+at once from the stern superior who required the sacrifice of all his
+family, and gave not a word of sympathy in return.  It was the crusading
+vow alone that detained the youth.  He could not throw away his pledge to
+the wars of the Cross, and it was plain that if he went now to seek out
+Guy, he should never be allowed to return to the crusading army.  But
+that vow once fulfilled, proud Edward should see, that not merely
+sufferance but friendliness was needed to bind the son of his father’s
+sister to his service.  The brother at Bednall Green was right, this
+bondage was worse than beggary.  Nor, under the influence of these
+feelings, had Richard’s service the alacrity and affection for which it
+had once been remarkable: the Prince rebuked his short-comings
+unsparingly, and thus added to the sense of injury that had caused them;
+Hamlyn de Valence sneered, and Dame Idonea took good care to point out
+both the youth’s neglects and his sullenness, and to whisper
+significantly that she did not wonder, considering the stock he came of.
+A soothing word or gentle excuse from the kind-hearted Princess were the
+only gleams of comfort that rendered the present state of things
+endurable.
+
+Just after Christmas arrived a vessel with reinforcements from home.
+Among them came a small body of Hospitaliers, with the novice Raynal at
+their head, now a full-blown knight, in dazzling scarlet and white, as
+Sir Reginald Ferrers.  Richard at once recognized him, when he came to
+present himself to the Prince, and was very desirous of learning whether
+he knew aught of that other brother, so mysteriously hidden in obscurity.
+Sir Raynal on his side seemed to share the desire; he exchanged a
+friendly glance with the page, and when the formality of the reception
+was over sought him out, saying, “I have a greeting for you, Master
+Fowen.”
+
+“From Sir Robert Darcy?” asked Richard.  “How fares it with the kind old
+knight?”
+
+“Excellent well!  Nay, nothing fares amiss with Father Robert!” said the
+young knight, smiling.  “Everything is the very best that could have
+befallen him—to hear him speak.  He is the very sunshine of the Spital,
+and had he been ordered on this Crusade, I think all the hamlets round
+would have risen to withhold him.”
+
+“Ah!” said Richard, hoping he was acting indifference; “said he aught of
+the little maiden with the blind father?”
+
+“Pretty Bessee and Blind Hal of Bednall Green?  Verily, that was the
+purport of my message.  The poor knave hath been sorely sick and more
+cracked than ever this autumn; insomuch that Father Robert spent whole
+nights with him; and though he be better now, and as much in his senses
+as e’er he will be, such another access is like to make an end of him.
+Now, Father Robert saith that you, Sir Page, know who the poor man is by
+birth, and that he prays you to send him word what had best be done with
+the child, in case either of his death or of his getting so frenzied as
+to be unable to take care of her.”
+
+“Send him word!” repeated Richard in perplexity.
+
+“We shall certainly have some one returning soon to the Spital,” replied
+Sir Raynal.  “Indeed, methinks some of the princes will be like to
+return, for the old King of the Romans is failing fast, and King Henry
+implored that the Prince of Almayne would come to hearten him.”
+
+“Then must I write to Sir Robert?” said Richard; “mine is scarce a
+message for word of mouth.”
+
+“So he said it was like to be,” returned the knight, “and he took thought
+to send you a slip of parchment, knowing, he said, that such things are
+not wont to be found in a crusader’s budget.  Moreover, if ink be
+wanting, he bade me tell you that there’s a fish in these seas, with many
+arms, and very like the foul fiend, that carries a bag of ink as good as
+any scrivener’s.”
+
+“I have seen the monster,” said Richard, who had often been down to the
+beach to see the unlading of the fishermen’s boats, and to share little
+John of Dunster’s unfailing marvel, that the Mediterranean should produce
+such outlandish creatures, so alien to his Bristol Channel experiences.
+
+And the very next time the boats came in, Richard made his way to the
+shore, on the beautiful, rocky, broken coast; and presently encountered a
+sepia, which fully justified Sir Robert’s comparison, lying at the bottom
+of a boat.  The fisherman intended it for his own dinner, when all his
+choicer fish should have gone to supply the Friday’s meal of the English
+chivalry; and he was a good deal amazed when the young gentleman, making
+his Provençal as like Sicilian as he could, began to traffic with him for
+it, and at last made him understand that it was only its ink-bag that he
+wanted.
+
+The said ink, secured in a shell, was brought home by Richard, together
+with a couple of the largest sea-bird’s quills that he could find—and
+which he shaped with his dagger, as best he might, in remembrance of
+Father Adam de Marisco’s writing lessons.  He meditated what should be
+the language of his letter, which was not likely to be secure from the
+eyes of the few who could read it; and finally decided that English was
+the tongue known to the fewest readers, who, if they knew letters at all,
+were sure to be acquainted with French and Latin.
+
+On a strip of parchment, then, about nine inches long and three wide, he
+proceeded to indite, in upright cramped letters, with many contractions,
+nearly in such terms as these—
+
+    REVEREND AND KNIGHTLY FATHER,
+
+    The good ghostly father and knight, Sir Raynald Ferrers, hath borne
+    to me your tidings of my brother’s sickness, and of all your goodness
+    to him—whereof I pray that our blessed Lady and good St. John may
+    reward you, for I can only pray for you.  Touching his poor little
+    daughter, in case of his death or frenzy, which the Saints of their
+    mercy forefend, I would entreat you of your goodness to place her in
+    some nunnery, but without making known her name and quality until my
+    return; so Heaven bring me home safe.  But an if I should be slain in
+    this Eastern land, then were it most for the little one’s good to
+    present her to the gracious lady Princess, by whom she would be most
+    lovingly and naturally cared for; and would be more safe than with
+    such as might shun to own her rights of blood and heirship.  Commend
+    me to my brother, if so be that he cares to hear of me; and tell him
+    that Guy hath wedded the lady of a castle in the land of Italy.  And
+    so praying you, ghostly father, for your blessing, I greet you well,
+    and rest your grateful bedesman and servant,
+
+                                                     RICHARD OF LEICESTER.
+
+    Given at the Prince’s camp at Drepanum, in the realm of Sicilia, on
+    the octave of the Epiphany, in the year of grace MCCLXX.; and so our
+    Lord have you heartily in His keeping.
+
+Letter-writing was a mighty task; and Richard’s extemporary implements
+were not of the best.  He laboured hard over his composition, kneeling
+against a chest in the tent.  When at length he raised his head, he
+encountered a face full of the most utter amazement.  Little John of
+Dunster had come into the tent, and stood gazing at him with open eyes
+and gaping mouth, as if he were perpetrating an incantation.  Richard
+could not help laughing.
+
+“Why, Jack, dost think I am framing a spell for thee?”
+
+“Writing!” gasped John, relieving his distended mouth by at length
+closing it.
+
+“Wherefore not?  Did not I see the chaplain teaching thee to write at
+Guildford?”
+
+“Ay—but that was when I was a babe!  Writing!  Why, my father never
+writes!”
+
+“But the Prince does.  Thou hast seen him write.  Come now,” added
+Richard: “if thou wilt, I will help thee to write a letter to send thy
+greetings home to Dunster.  Thy father and mother will be right glad to
+hear thou hast ’scaped that African fever.”
+
+“They!—They’d think me no better than a French monk!” said John.  “And
+none of them could read it either!  I’ll never write!  My grandsire only
+set his cross to the great charter!”
+
+And John retreated—in fear perhaps that Richard would sully his manhood
+with a writing lesson!
+
+The letter was rolled up in a scroll, bound with a silken thread, and
+committed to the charge of Sir Raynald Ferrers, who was going shortly to
+be commandery of his Order at Castel San Giovanni, whence he had no doubt
+of being able to send the letter safely to Sir Robert Darcy, at the Grand
+Priory.
+
+It would perhaps have been more expeditious to have intrusted the letter
+to one of the suite of Prince Henry of Almayne, who had been recalled by
+the tidings of the state of his father’s health; but Richard dreaded
+betraying his brother’s secret too much to venture on confiding the
+missive to any of this party—none of whom were indeed likely to wish to
+oblige him.  Hamlyn de Valence was going with Henry as his esquire; and
+his absence seemed to Richard like the beginning of better days.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX
+ASH WEDNESDAY
+
+
+    “Mostrocci un ombra da l’ un canto sola
+    Dicendo ‘Colui feese in grembo a Dio
+    Lo cuor che’n su Tamigi ancor si cola.’”
+
+                                                        DANTE.  _Inferno_.
+
+SHROVETIDE had come, and the Prince had, before leaving Trapani, been
+taking some share in the entertainments of the Carnival.  Personally, his
+grave reserve made gaieties distasteful to him; and the disastrous
+commencement of the Crusade weighed on his spirits.  But when state and
+show were necessary, he provided for them with royal bounty and
+magnificence, and caused them to be regulated with the admirable taste of
+that age of exceeding beauty in which he lived.
+
+Thus, in this festal season, banquets were provided, and military shows
+took place, for the benefit of the Sicilian nobility and of the citizens
+of Trapani, on such a scale, that the English rose high in general
+esteem; and many were the secret wishes that Edmund of Lancaster rather
+than Charles of Anjou had been able to make good the grant from the Pope.
+
+Splendid were the displays, and no slight toil did they involve on the
+part of the immediate train of the Prince, few in number as they were,
+and destitute of the appliances of the resident court.  Richard hurrying
+hither and thither, and waiting upon every one, had little of the
+diversion of the affair; but he would willingly have taken treble the
+care and toil in the relief it was to be free from the prying mistrustful
+eyes of Hamlyn de Valence.  Looking after little John of Dunster was,
+however, no small part of his trouble; the urchin was so certain to get
+into some mischief if left to himself—now treading on a lady’s train, now
+upsetting a flagon of wine, now nearly impaling himself upon the point of
+a whole spitful of ortolans that were being handed round to the company,
+now becoming uncivilly deaf upon his French ear.  Altogether, it was a
+relief to Richard’s mind when he stumbled upon the little fellow fast
+asleep, even though it was in the middle of the Princess’s violet velvet
+and ermine mantle, which she had laid down in order to tread a stately
+measure with Sire Guillaume de Porçeles.
+
+After all Richard’s exertions that evening, it was no wonder that the
+morning found him fast asleep at the unexampled hour of eight!  His
+wakening was a strange one.  His little fellow-page was standing beside
+him with a strange frightened yet important air.
+
+“What is the matter, John?  It is late?  Is the Prince gone to Mass?  Has
+he missed me?” cried Richard, starting up in dismay, for unpunctuality
+was a great offence with Edward.
+
+“He is gone to Mass,” said John, “but, before he comes back,” he came
+near and lowered his voice, “Hob Longbow sent me to say you had better
+flee.”
+
+“Flee!  Boy, why should I flee?  Are _your_ senses fleeing?”
+
+“O Richard,” cried John, his face clearing up, “then it is not true!  You
+are not one of the traitor Montforts!”
+
+“If I were a hundred Montforts, what has that to do with it?”
+
+“Then all is well,” exclaimed the boy.  “I said you were no such thing!
+I’ll tell Hob he lied in his throat.”
+
+“If he said I was a traitor, verily he did; but as to being a
+Montfort—But, how now, John, what means all this?”
+
+“Then it is so!  O Richard, Richard, you cannot be one of them!  You
+cannot have written that letter to warn them to murder Prince Henry.”
+
+“To murder Prince Henry!” Richard stood transfixed.  “Not the Prince’s
+little son!”
+
+“Oh no, Prince Henry of Almayne!  At Viterbo!  Hamlyn de Valence saw it.
+He is come back.  It was in the Cathedral.  O Richard—at the elevation of
+the Host!  Guy and Simon de Montfort fell on him, stabbed him to the
+heart, and rushed out.  Then they came back again, and dragged him by the
+hair of his head into the mire, and shouted that so their father had been
+dragged through the streets of Evesham.  And then they went off to the
+Maremma!  And,” continued the boy breathlessly, “Hob Long-bow is on
+guard, and he bade me tell you, that for love of your father he will let
+you pass; and then you can hide; if only you can go ere the Prince comes
+forth.”
+
+“Hide!  Wherefore should I hide?  This is most horrible, but it is no
+deed of mine!” said Richard.  “Who dares to think it is?”
+
+“Then you are none of them!  You had no part in it!  I shall tell Hob he
+is a villain—”
+
+“Stay,” said Richard, laying a detaining hand on the boy.  “Why does Hob
+think me in danger?  Is anything stirring against me?”
+
+“They all—all of poor Prince Henry’s meiné, that are come back with
+Hamlyn—say that you are a Montfort too, and—oh! do not look so
+fierce!—that you sent a letter to warn your brethren where to meet, and
+fall on the Prince.  And the murderers being fled, they are keen to have
+your life; and, Richard, you know I saw you write the letter.”
+
+“That you saw me write a letter, is as certain as that my name is
+Montfort,” said Richard, “but I am not therefore leagued with traitors or
+murderers!  In the church, saidst thou?  Oh, well that the Prince forbade
+me to visit Guy!”
+
+“Then you will not flee?”
+
+“No, forsooth.  I will stay and prove my innocence.”
+
+“But you are a Montfort!  And I saw you write the letter.”
+
+“Did you speak of my having written the letter?” asked Richard, pausing.
+
+The boy hung his head, and muttered something about Dame Idonea.
+
+By this time, even if Richard had thought of flight, it would have been
+impossible.  Two archers made their presence apparent at the entrance of
+the tent, and in brief gruff tones informed Richard that the Prince
+required his presence.  The space between his tent and the royal pavilion
+was short, but in those few steps Richard had time to glance over the
+dangers of his position, and take up his resolution though with a certain
+stunned sense that nothing could be before the member of a proscribed
+family, but failure, suspicion, and ruin.
+
+The two brothers, Edward and Edmund, with the Earl of Gloucester, and
+their other chief councillors, were assembled; and there were looks of
+deep concern on the faces of all, making Edward’s more than ever like a
+rigid marble statue; while Edmund had evidently been weeping bitterly,
+though his features were full of fierce indignation.  Hamlyn de Valence,
+and a few other members of the murdered Prince’s suite, stood near in
+deep mourning suits.
+
+“Richard de Montfort,” said Prince Edward, looking at him with a
+sorrowful reproachful sternness that went to his heart, “we have sent for
+you to answer for yourself, on a grave charge.  You have heard of that
+which has befallen?”
+
+“I have heard, my Lord, of a foul crime which my soul abhors.  I trust
+none present here think me capable of sharing in it!  Whoever dares to
+accuse me, shall be answered by my sword!” and he glanced fiercely at
+Hamlyn.
+
+“Hold!” said Edward severely, “no one is so senseless as to accuse you of
+taking actual part in a crime that took place beyond the sea; but there
+is only too much reason to believe that you have been tampered with by
+your brothers.”
+
+Then, as his brother Edmund made some suggestion to him, he added, “Is
+John de Mohun of Dunster here?”
+
+“Yea, my Lord,” said the little boy, coming forward, with a flush on his
+face, and a bold though wistful look, “but verily Richard is no traitor,
+be he who he may!”
+
+“That is not what we wished to ask of you,” said the Prince, too sad and
+earnest to be amused even for a moment.  “Tell us whom you said, even
+now, you had seen in the tent you shared with him in Africa.”
+
+“I said I had seen his wraith,” said John.
+
+No smile lighted upon the Prince’s features; they were as serious as
+those of the boy, as he commented, “His likeness—his exact likeness—you
+mean.”
+
+“Ay,” said the boy; “but Richard proved to me after, that it had been
+less tall, and was bearded likewise.  So I hoped it did not bode him
+ill.”
+
+“Worse, I fear, than if it had in sooth been his double,” said Gloucester
+to Prince Edmund.  The Prince added the question whether this visitor had
+spoken; and John related the inquiry for Richard by the name of Montfort,
+and his own reply, which elicited a murmur of amused applause among the
+bystanders.
+
+The Prince, however, continued in the same grave manner to draw from the
+little witness his account of Richard’s injunction to secresy; and then
+asked about the letter-writing, of which John gave his plain account.
+The Prince then said, “Speak now, Hamlyn.”
+
+“This, then, I have to add, my Lord, that I, as all the world, remarked
+that Richard de Montfort consorted much with Sir Reginald de Ferrières,
+who, as we all remember, is the son of a family deeply concerned in the
+Mad Parliament.  By Sir Reginald, on his arrival at Castel San Giovanni,
+a messenger is despatched, bearing letters to the Hospital at Florence,
+and it is immediately after his arrival there, that the two Montforts
+speed from the Maremma to the unhappy and bloody Mass at Viterbo.”
+
+“You hear, Richard!” said the Prince.  “I bade you choose between me and
+your brothers.  Had you believed me that you could not serve both, it had
+been better for you.  I credit not that you incited them to the
+assassination; but your tidings led them to perpetrate it.  I cannot
+retain the spy of the Montforts in my camp.”
+
+“My Lord,” said Richard, at last finding space for speech, “I deny all
+collusion with my brothers.  I have neither seen, spoken with, nor sent
+to them by letter nor word.”
+
+“Then to whom was this letter?” demanded the Prince.
+
+“To Sir Robert Darcy, the Grand Prior of England,” answered Richard.
+
+A murmur of incredulous amazement was heard.
+
+“The purport?” continued Edward.
+
+“That, my Lord, it consorts not with my duty to tell.”
+
+“Look here, Richard,” interposed Gilbert of Gloucester, “this is an
+unlikely tale.  You can have no cause for secresy, save in connection
+with these brothers; and if you will point to some way of clearing
+yourself of being art and part in this foul act of murder, you may be
+sent scot free from the camp; but if you wilfully maintain this denial,
+what can we do but treat you as a traitor?  No obstinacy!  What can a lad
+like you have to say to good old Sir Robert Darcy, that all the world
+might not know?”
+
+“My Lord of Gloucester,” said Richard, “I am bound in honour not to
+reveal the matters between me and Sir Robert; I can only declare on the
+faith of a Christian gentleman that I have neither had, nor attempted to
+have, any dealings with either of my brothers, Guy or Simon; and if any
+man says I have, I will prove his falsehood on his body.”  And Richard
+flung down his glove before the Prince.
+
+At the same moment Hamlyn de Valence sprang forward.
+
+“Then, Richard de Montfort, I take up the gage.  I give thee the lie in
+thy throat, and will prove on thy body that thou art a man-sworn traitor,
+in league with thy false brethren.”
+
+“I commit me to the judgment of God,” said Richard, looking upwards.
+
+“My Lord,” said Hamlyn, “have we your permission to fight out the
+matter?”
+
+“You have,” said Edward, “since to that holy judgment Richard hath
+appealed.”
+
+But the Prince looked far from contented with the appeal.  He allowed the
+preliminaries of place and time to be fixed without his interposition;
+and when the council broke up, he fixed his clear deep eyes upon Richard
+in a manner which seemed to the boy to upbraid him with the want of
+confidence, for which, however, he would not condescend to ask.  Richard
+felt that, let the issue of the combat be what it would, he had lost that
+full trust on the part of the Prince, which had hitherto been his one
+drop of comfort; and if he were dismissed from the camp, he should be
+more than ever desolate, for his soul could scarce yet bring itself to
+grasp the horror of the crime of his brothers.
+
+The combat could not take place for two days—waiting, on one, in order
+that Hamlyn might have time to rest, and recover his full strength after
+his voyage, and the next, because it was Ash Wednesday.  In the meantime
+Richard was left solitary; under no restraint, but universally avoided.
+The judicial combat did not make him uneasy; the two youths had often
+measured their strength together, and though Hamlyn was the elder,
+Richard was the taller, and had inherited something of the Plantagenet
+frame, so remarkable in those two
+
+    Lords of the biting axe and beamy spear,
+
+“wide conquering Edward” and “Lion Richard”; and each believed in the
+righteousness of his own cause sufficiently to have implicit confidence
+that the right would be shown on his side.
+
+In fact, Richard soon understood that though Prince Edward, with a sense
+of the value of definite evidence far in advance of the time, and
+befitting the English Justinian, had only allowed the charge to be
+brought against him which could in a manner be substantiated, yet that
+the general belief went much further.  Proved to be a Montfort, and to
+have written a letter, he was therefore convicted, by universal consent,
+of a league with his brothers for the revenge of their house; to have
+instigated the assassination at Viterbo, and to be only biding his time
+for the like act at Trapani.  Even the Prince was deeply offended by his
+silence, and imputed it to no good motive; trust and affection were gone,
+and Richard felt no tie to retain him where he was, save his duty as a
+crusader.  Let him fail in the combat, and the best he could look for
+would be to be ignominiously branded and expelled: let him gain, and he
+much doubted whether, though the ordeal of battle was always respected,
+he would regain his former position.  With keen suffering and
+indignation, he rebelled against Edward’s harshness and distrust.  He—who
+had brought him there—who ought to have known him better!  Moreover,
+there was the crushing sense of the guilt of his brothers; guilt most
+horrible in its sacrilegious audacity, and doubly shocking to the
+feelings of a family where the grim sanctity of the first Simon de
+Montfort, and the enlightened devotion of the second, formed such a
+contrast to the savage outrage of him who now bore their name.  Richard,
+as with bare feet and ashes whitening his dark locks he knelt on the cold
+stones of the dark Norman church at Trapani, wept hot and bitter tears of
+humiliation over the family crimes that had brought them so low; prayed
+in an agony for repentance for his brothers; and for himself, some
+opening for expiating their sin against at least the generous royal
+family.  “O! could I but die for my Prince, and know that he forgave and
+they repented!”
+
+Only when on his way back to the camp was he sensible of the murmurs of
+censure at his hypocrisy in joining the penitential procession at all.
+Dame Idonea, in a complete suit of sackcloth, was informing her friends
+that she had made a vow not to wash her face till the whole adder brood
+of Montfort had been crushed; and that she trusted to see the beginning
+of justice done to-morrow.  She had offered a candle to St. James to that
+effect, hoping to induce him to turn away his patronage from the family.
+
+Every one, knight or squire, shrank away from Richard, if he did but look
+towards them; and he was seriously discomfited by the difficulty of
+obtaining a godfather for the combat.  No one chose even to be asked,
+lest they might be suspected of approving of the murder of Prince Henry;
+and the unhappy page re-entered his tent with the most desolate sense of
+being abandoned by heaven and man.
+
+Fastened upon the pole of the tent by an arrowhead, a small scroll of
+parchment met his eyes.  He read in English—“A steed and a lance are
+ready for the lioncel who would rather avenge his father than lick the
+tyrant’s feet.  A guide awaits thee.”
+
+Some weeks since, this might have been a tempting summons; but now the
+sickening sense of the sacrilegious murder, and of the life of outlawry
+utterly unrestrained, passed over Richard.  Yet, if he should not accept
+the offer, what was before him?  A shameful death, perhaps; if he failed
+in the ordeal, disgrace, captivity, or expulsion; if he succeeded,
+bondage and distrust for ever.  Some new accusation! some deeper fall!
+
+There was a low growl from Leonillo; the hangings of the tent were
+raised, and an archer bending his head said, “A word with you, Sir.”
+
+“Who art thou?” demanded Richard.
+
+“Hob Longbow, Sir.  Remember you not old passages—in the forest,
+there—and Master Adam?”
+
+Richard did remember the archer in the days of his outlaw life, in a very
+different capacity.
+
+“You were grown so tall, Sir, and so hand and glove with the Longshanks,
+that Nick Dustifoot and I knew not an if it were yourself—but now your
+name is out, and the wind is in another quarter”—he grinned, then seeing
+Richard impatient of the approach to familiarity, “You did not know Nick
+Dustifoot?  He was one of young Sir Simon’s men-at-arms, you see, and
+took to the woods, like other folk, after Kenilworth was given up, till
+stout men were awanting for this Crusade.  And he knew Sir Guy when he
+came to the camp yon by Tunis, and spake with him; moreover, he went in
+the train of him of Almayne to Viterbo, and had speech again with Sir
+Simon, who gave him this scroll.  And if you will meet him at the Syren’s
+Rock to-night, my Lord Richard, he will bring you to those who will
+conduct you to Sir Guy’s brave castle, where he laughs kings and counts
+to scorn!  We have the guard, and will see you safe past the gates of the
+camp.”
+
+The way to liberty was open: Richard deliberated.  The atmosphere of
+distrust and suspicion under the Prince’s coldness was well-nigh
+unbearable.  Danger faced him for the next day!  Disgrace was everywhere.
+Should he leave it behind, where, at least, he would not hear and feel
+it?  Should he, when all had turned from him, meet a brotherly welcome?
+
+Then came back on him the thought of what Simon and Guy had made
+themselves; the thought of his father’s grief at former doings of theirs,
+which had fallen so far short of the atrocity of this.  He knew that his
+father had rather have seen each one of his five sons slain, or helpless
+cripples like the firstborn, than have been thus avenged.  Nay, had he
+this morning prayed for the pardon of a crime, to which he would thus
+become a consenting party?
+
+He looked up resolutely.  “No, Hob Longbow.  Hap what hap, my part can
+never be with those who have stained the Church with blood.  Let my
+brothers know that my heart yearned to them before, but now all is over
+between us.  I can only bear the doom they have brought upon me!”
+
+It was not possible to remain and argue.  A tent was a dangerous place
+for secret conferences, and Hob Longbow could only growl, “As you will,
+Sir.  Now nor you nor any one else can say I have not done my charge.”
+
+“Alack, alack!” sighed Richard, “would that, my honour once redeemed,
+Hamlyn might make an end of me!  But for thee, my poor Leonillo, I have
+no comforter or friend!” and he flung his arms round the dog’s neck.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X
+THE COMBAT
+
+
+    “And now with sae sharp of steele
+    They ’gan to lay on load.”
+
+                                                            _Sir Cauline_.
+
+HEAVY-hearted and pale-cheeked with his rigidly observed fast, Richard
+armed himself in early morning, and set forth to the chapel tent, where
+the previous solemnities had to be observed.  He had made up his mind to
+make an earnest appeal to the Earl of Gloucester, for the sake of the old
+friendship with his father, to become his godfather in the combat, as one
+whose character stood too high to be injured by connection with him.
+Even this plan was frustrated, for Hamlyn de Valence entered, led by Earl
+Gilbert as his sponsor.  Should he turn to his one other friend, the
+Prince himself?  Nay, the Prince was umpire and judge.  Never stood
+warrior so lonely.  Little John of Dunster crept up to his side; and but
+for fear of injuring the child, he would almost have asked him to be his
+sponsor.  At that moment, however, the tramp of horses’ feet was heard,
+and Sir Reginald de Ferrières, with his squires, galloped up to the tent.
+
+The young Hospitalier held out his hand cordially.  “In time, I hope,”
+said he; “I have ridden ever since Lauds at Castel San Giovanni, hoping
+to be with you, so as to stand by you in this matter.”
+
+“It was kindly done of you,” said Richard, tears of gratitude swelling in
+his eyes, as he wrung Sir Raynald’s hand.  “I have not even a godfather
+for the fight!  How could you know of my need?”
+
+“Some of our brethren came over from the camp, for our Ash Wednesday
+procession, and spoke of the stress you were in—that your Montfort
+lineage was out, and that you were thought to have writ a letter—but
+stay, there’s no time for words; methinks here’s the Prince and all his
+train.”
+
+Sir Raynald went through the solemnity of presenting Richard de Montfort
+as about to fight in defence of his own innocence.  The Prince coldly
+accepted the presentation.  Richard knew that Sir Raynald was deemed
+anything but a satisfactory sponsor; but the young knight’s hearty
+sympathy, a sort of radiance caught from good old Sir Robert, was too
+comforting not to be reposed on.
+
+Each champion then confessed.  Raynald heard Richard’s shrift, and nearly
+wept over it—it was the first the young priestly knight had received, and
+he could scarcely clear his voice to speak the words of absolution.  Even
+as they left the confessional, he grasped Richard’s hand and said, “Cast
+in thy lot with us!  St. John will find thee father and home and
+brethren!”
+
+And a gleam of joy and hope flashed on the youth’s heart, and shone
+brighter as he participated in the solemn Mass in preparation for the
+combat.  This over, each champion made oath of the justice of his quarrel
+in the hands of his godfather before the Prince: Hamlyn de Valence
+swearing that to the best of his belief, Richard de Montfort was a
+traitor, in league with his brothers, and art and part in the murder of
+Prince Henry of Almayne, and offering to prove it on his body; while on
+the other hand Richard swore that he was a true and faithful liegeman to
+the King, free from all intercourse with his brethren, and sackless of
+the death of Prince Henry.
+
+Then each mounted on horseback, the trumpets sounded, the sponsors led
+them to their places, and the Prince’s clear voice exclaimed, “And so God
+show the right.”  One glance of pitying sympathy would have filled
+Richard’s arm with fresh vigour.
+
+The two youths closed with shivered lances, and horses reeling from the
+shock.  Backing their steeds, each received a fresh lance.  Again they
+met; Richard felt the point of Hamlyn’s lance glint against his
+breastplate, glide down, enter, make its way into his flesh; but at the
+same instant his lance was pushing, driving, bearing on Hamlyn before
+him; the sheer force in his Plantagenet shoulders was telling now, the
+very pain seemed as it were to add to the energy with which he pressed
+on—on, till the hostile spear dropped from his own side, and Hamlyn was
+borne backwards over the croup of the staggering horse, till he fell with
+crashing ringing armour upon the ground.  Little John clapped his hands,
+and shouted for joy; but no one responded.
+
+Richard leapt down in another second, and stood over him.  “Yield thee,
+Hamlyn de Valence.  Confess that thou hast slandered me with an
+ungrounded accusation.”
+
+Hamlyn had no choice.  “Let me rise,” he said sullenly; “I will confess,
+so thou letst me open my visor.”
+
+And Richard standing aside, Hamlyn spoke out in a dogged formal tone.  “I
+hereby own, that by the judgment of Heaven, Richard de Montfort hath
+cleared himself of all share in the foul murder of Lord Henry, whose soul
+Heaven assoilzie.  Also that he hath disproven the charge of leaguing
+with his brethren.”
+
+Richard was the victor, but where were the gratulations?  Young John’s
+hearty but slender hurrah was lost in the general silence.
+
+The Prince reared his stately form, and said, “The judgment of Heaven is
+final.  Richard de Montfort is pronounced free of all penalty for treason
+in the matter of the death of our dear cousin, and is free to go where he
+will.”
+
+Cold as ice was the Prince’s face.  That Richard meant murder to Henry,
+he had never believed; but that he had hankered after his brothers, and
+held dangerous communings with them, was evidently still credited and
+unforgiven.  The very form of words was a dismissal—and the youth’s heart
+was wrung.
+
+He stood, looking earnestly up as the Prince moved from his place,
+without a glance towards him.  The next moment Raynald’s kind hand was on
+his shoulder, and his voice saying, “Well fought, brother, a brave
+stroke!  Come with me, thou art hurt.”
+
+“Would it were to the death!” murmured Richard dreamily, as Raynald,
+throwing his arm round him, led him away; but before they had reached the
+tent there was a plunging rush and scampering behind them, and John of
+Dunster came dashing up.  “I knew it!  I knew it!” he cried.  “I knew he
+would overset spiteful Hamlyn!  Hurrah!  They can’t keep me away now,
+Richard—now the judgment of Heaven has gone for you!”
+
+Richard smiled, and put his gauntleted hand caressingly on the boy’s
+shoulder.
+
+“I was afraid,” added John, “that you would think me like the rest of
+them.  Miscreants, all!  Not one would shout for you—you, the victor!
+They don’t heed the judgment of Heaven one jot.  And that’s what they
+call being warriors of the Cross!  If the Prince were a true-born
+Englishman, he would be ashamed of himself.  But never heed, Richard.
+Why don’t you speak to me?  Are you angered that I told of the letter?
+Indeed, I never guessed—”
+
+“Hush, varlet,” said Sir Raynald, “see you not that he has neither breath
+nor voice to speak?  If you wish to do him a service, hie to our
+tents—down yonder, to the east, where you see the eight-pointed cross—”
+
+“I know, Sir,” said John, perfectly civil on hearing accents as English
+as his own.
+
+“And bring up Brother Bartlemy, he is a better infirmarer than I.  Bid
+him from me bring his salves and bandages.”
+
+Richard was barely conscious when he reached the tent, as much from rigid
+fasting and sleeplessness as from the actual loss of blood.  His friend
+disarmed him tenderly, and revived him with bread and wine, silencing a
+half-murmured scruple about Lenten diet with the dispensation due to
+sickness.  The wound was not likely to be serious or disabling, and the
+cares of the Hospitalier and his infirmarer had presently set their
+patient so much at ease that he dropped into a sound sleep, having
+scarcely said a word, beyond a few faintly uttered thanks, since he had
+fought the combat.
+
+At first his sleep was profound, but by and by the associations of blows
+and wounds carried him back to the field of Evesham.  The wild _mêlée_
+was renewed, he heard the voice of his father, but always in that strange
+distressing manner peculiar to dreams of the departed, always far away,
+and just beyond his reach, ever just about to give him the succour he
+needed, but ever withheld.  The thunderstorm that broke over the
+contending armies roared again in his ears; and then again recurred the
+calm still night, when he had lain helpless on the battle-field; even the
+caress of Leonillo, and his low growl, were vividly repeated; but as the
+dog moved, it was to Richard as if the form of his father rose up in its
+armour from the dark field, and said in a deep hollow voice, “Well
+fought, my son; I will give thee knighthood.”  Then Richard thought he
+was kneeling before his father, and hearing that same voice saying, “My
+son, be true and loyal.  In the name of God and St. James.  I dub thee
+knight of death!” and looking up, he beheld under the helmet, not Simon
+de Montfort’s face but the Prince’s.  He awoke with a start of
+disappointment—and there stood Edward himself, leaning against the
+tent-pole, looking down at him!
+
+He sprang on his feet, scarcely knowing whether he slept or woke; but
+Edward said, in that voice that at times was so ineffably sweet, “Be
+still, Richard; I fear me thou hast suffered a wrong, and I am come to
+repair it, as far as I can!  Lay thee down again.”
+
+And the Prince seated himself on the oaken chest; while Richard, after a
+few words, sat down on his couch.
+
+“Is this the letter about which there has been such a coil?” said Edward,
+giving him the scroll in its sepia ink.
+
+“It is!” replied Richard in amazement and dismay.
+
+“The only letter thou didst write?”
+
+“The only one,” repeated Richard.
+
+“And,” added Edward, “it concerns thy brother Henry.”
+
+Richard turned even paler than before, and could not suppress a gasp of
+dismay.  “My Lord, make me not forsworn!”
+
+“Listen to me, Richard,” said Edward.  “My sweet lady gave me no rest
+about thee.  She held that I had withdrawn my trust over lightly, for
+what was no blame to thine heart; and that having set thee here apart
+from thy natural friends, we owed thee more notice than I have been wont
+to think wholesome for untried striplings.  Others, and I among them,
+held that Raynald Ferrers’ friendship and countenance showed thee
+stubbornly set on old connections, and many thought the letter to the
+Grand Prior Darcy a mere excuse.  But when Hamlyn fell, and I still held
+that thou wert merely cleared from wilful share in the deadly crime of
+which I had never held thee guilty, then she spake more earnestly.  She
+of her own will sent for Raynald Ferrers to our tent, and called me to
+speak with him, sure that, even though his family had been our foes, he
+was too honourable a knight to have espoused thy cause without good
+reason.  Then it was that he told us of thine interest for the blind
+beggar whose child thou didst save, and of the Grand Prior’s message.
+Also, as full exculpation of thee, he gave me the letter, which, having
+failed to find a home-bound messenger at San Giovanni, he had brought
+back to the camp.  And now, Richard, what can I say more, than that I did
+thee wrong, and pray thee to give me thy hand in pardon?”
+
+Richard hid his face and sobbed, completely overwhelmed by the simple
+dignity of the humility of such a man as Edward.  He held the Prince’s
+hand to his lips, and exclaimed, “Oh, how—how could I have ever felt
+discontent, or faltered? not in truth—oh, no—but in trust and patience?
+Oh! my Lord, that I could die for you!”
+
+“Not yet,” said Edward, smiling; “we have much to do together first.  And
+now tell me, Richard, this beggar is indeed Henry?”
+
+Richard hung his head.
+
+“What, thou mayst not betray him?”
+
+“I am under an oath, my Lord.”
+
+“Nay, I know well-nigh all, Richard.  I did indeed see my dear old
+comrade laid in Evesham Church, so as it broke my heart to see him,
+bleeding from many wounds, and even his hand lopped by the savage
+Mortimers.  Then, as I bent down, and gave his brow a last kiss, it
+struck me, for a moment, that the touch was not that of a dead man’s
+skin.  But I looked again at the deadly wounds of head and breast, and
+thought it would be but cruelty to strive to bring back the glimmer of
+life only to—to see the ruin of his house; and all that he could not be
+saved from.  O Richard, to no man in either host could the day of Evesham
+have been so sore, as to me, who had to sit in the gate, to gladden men’s
+hearts, like holy King David, when he would fain have been weeping for
+his son!  But in early morning came Abbot William of Whitchurch to my
+chamber, and with much secrecy told me that the corpse of Henry de
+Montfort had been stolen from the church by night, praying me to excuse
+that the monks, wearied out with the day of alarms, and the care of our
+wounded, had not kept better watch.  Then knew I that some one had been
+less faithless than I, and I hoped that poor Henry was at least dying in
+peace; I had never deemed that he could survive.  But when I saw thy
+billet, and heard Ferrers’ tale, I had no further doubt, remembering
+likewise how strangely familiar was the face of that little one at
+Westminster.”
+
+“Yes, my Lord, it was even as a strange, wild, wilful, blind beggar that
+I found poor Henry; and heavy was the curse he laid me under, should I
+make him known to you.  He calls himself thus a freer and happier man
+than he could be even were he pardoned and reinstated; and he can indulge
+his vein of mockery.”
+
+“I dare be sworn that consoles him for all,” said Edward, nearly
+laughing.  “So long as he could utter his gibe, Henry little recked which
+way the world passed round him; and I trow he has found some mate of low
+degree, that he would be loth to produce in open day.”
+
+“Not so, my Lord: it is so wild a tale of true love that I can sometimes
+scarce believe a minstrel did not sing it to me!”  And Richard told the
+history of Isabel Mortimer’s fidelity.  The Prince was deeply touched,
+and then remembered the marked manner in which the Baron of Mortimer had
+replied to his inquiry, in what convent he had bestowed Henry de
+Montfort’s betrothed.  “She is dead, my Lord, dead to us.”  Then he added
+suddenly, “So that black-eyed babe is the heiress of Leicester and all
+the honours of Montfort!”
+
+“It is one of the causes for Henry’s resolve to be secret,” said Richard.
+“I thought it harsh and distrustful then, but he dreaded Simon’s
+knowledge of her.”
+
+“We will find a way of securing her from Simon,” said the Prince.  “But
+fear not, Richard, Henry’s secret shall be safe with me!  I have kept his
+secrets before now,” he added, with a smile.  “Only, when we are at home
+again—so it please the Saints to spare us—thou shalt strive to show him
+cause to trust my Lady with his child, if he doth not seek to breed her
+up to scrip and wallet.  I see such is thy counsel in this scroll, and it
+is well.”
+
+“How could I say other?” said Richard, “and now, more than ever!  I long
+to thank the gracious Princess this very evening.”
+
+“Thy wound?’ said the Prince.
+
+“My wound is naught, I scarce feel it.”
+
+“Then,” said the Prince, “unless the leech gainsay it, it would be as
+well to be at our pavilion this evening, that men may see thou art not in
+any disgrace.  Rest then till supper-time.”  And as he spoke he rose to
+depart, but Richard made a gesture of entreaty.  “So please your Grace,
+grant me a few farther words.  I sware, and truly, that I had heard
+nothing from my brothers when I was accused of writing that letter to
+them.  But see here, what yester-morn was pinned to that tent-pole.”
+
+He gave Edward the scroll, at which the Prince looked half smiling.  “So!
+A dagger in store for me too, is there?  Well, my cousins have a goodly
+thirst for vengeance!  Hast thou any suspicion how this billet came
+here?”
+
+“Ay, my Lord; and for that cause I would warn you against two of the
+archers, one of whom was in Simon’s troop, and went with the late prince
+to Viterbo.  I gave them no promise of silence.”
+
+“You spoke with them?”
+
+“With one, who was charged to let me through the outposts to a spot where
+means were provided for bringing me to Guy.”
+
+“And thou,” said Edward, smiling, “didst choose to bide the buffet?”
+
+“Sir,” said Richard, “I did indeed long after my brethren when Guy had
+been so near me in Africa; but now, I would far rather die than cast in
+my lot with them.”
+
+“Thou art wise,” said Edward; “not merely right, but wise.  I have sent
+Gloucester to my uncle of Sicily with such messages that he will scarce
+dare to leave them scatheless!  Then, at supper-time we meet again—in
+thine own name, Richard, and as my kinsman and esquire.  Thou shalt bear
+thine own name and arms.  I will cause a mourning suit to be sent to
+thee—thou art equally of kin with myself to poor Henry—and shalt mourn
+him with Edmund and me at the requiem to-morrow.  So will it best be
+manifest to the camp, that we exempt thee from all blame.”  Again he was
+departing, when Richard added—“The archers, my Lord—were it not good to
+dismiss them?”
+
+“Tush,” said Edward; “tell me not their names.  So soon as the wind
+veers, they will be beyond Guy’s reach; and if I were to stand on my
+guard against every man who loved thy father better than mine, what good
+would my life do me?  The poor knaves will be true enough when they see a
+Saracen before them!”
+
+And away went Edward, to be glanced at as he passed through the camp, as
+a severe, hard, cruel tyrant.  Had he only been gay, open-hearted, and
+careless, he might have hung both the guilty archers, and a dozen
+innocent ones into the bargain, and yet have never won the character for
+harshness and unmercifulness that he had acquired even while condoning
+many a dire offence, simply from his stern gravity, and his punctilious
+exactitude in matters of discipline.  But the evils of a lax and
+easy-going court had been so fatal, and had produced such suffering, that
+it was no marvel that he had adopted a rule of iron; and in the pain and
+distress of seeing his closest friends, the noblest subjects in the
+realm, pushed into a rebellion where he had himself to maintain his
+father’s cause, and then to watch, without being able to hinder, the
+mean-spirited revenge of his own partizans, his manner had acquired that
+silent reserve and coldness which made him feared and hated by the many,
+while intensely beloved by the few.  Even towards those few it was
+absolutely difficult to him to unbend, as he had done in this hour of
+effusion towards Richard; and the youth was proportionably moved and
+agitated with fervent gratitude and affection.
+
+He had scarcely had so happy an evening since he had been a boy at
+Odiham.  He was indeed feeble and dizzy at times, but with a far from
+painful languor; and the Princess, enjoying the permission to follow the
+dictates of her own heart, was kind to him with a motherly or sisterly
+kindness, could not bear to receive from him his wonted attendance, but
+made him lie upon the cushions at her feet, and when out of hearing of
+every one, talked of the faithful Isabel, and of “pretty Bessee,” on whom
+she already looked as the companion of her little Eleanor, whom she had
+left at home.
+
+It might be questioned whether Richard did not undergo more in watching
+little John de Mohun’s endeavours at waiting than he would have suffered
+from doing it himself.  And not a few dissatisfied glances were levelled
+at the favoured stripling, besides the literally as well as figuratively
+sour glances of Dame Idonea.
+
+Edward, being of course unable to betray his real grounds for acquitting
+Richard, had only deigned to inform Prince Edmund that he knew all, and
+was perfectly satisfied.  Now Prince Edmund, as well as all the old court
+faction, deemed Edward’s regard for the Barons’ party an unreasonable
+weakness that they durst not indeed combat openly, but which angered them
+as a species of disaffection to his own cause.  The outer world thought
+him a tyrant, but there was an inner world to whom he appeared weakly
+good-natured and generous; and this inner world thought Richard had
+successfully hoodwinked him!
+
+Therefore Edmund of Lancaster desired to adopt Hamlyn de Valence as his
+own squire, to save him from association with Richard; and both prince
+and squire, and all the rest of the train, made it perfectly evident to
+the young Montfort that he was barely tolerated out of respect for the
+Prince.
+
+But Richard in his joy could have borne worse than this, for the Prince
+had not relaxed in his kindness, and made his young cousin’s wound an
+excuse for showing him more tenderness and consideration than he would
+otherwise have thought befitting.  Moreover, an esquire, as Richard had
+now become, might be in much closer relations of intimacy with his master
+than was possible to a page; and the day that had begun so sadly was like
+the dawn of a brighter period.
+
+Sir Raynald Ferrers had been invited to the Prince’s pavilion, but the
+rules of his Order did not permit his joining a secular entertainment in
+Lent, and he did not admit either the camp life or the gravity of the
+Prince’s mourning household as a dispensation.  However, when Richard,
+leaning fondly on little John’s ready shoulder, crossed to his own tent,
+he found his good friend waiting there to attend to his wound, which Sir
+Raynald professed to regard as an excellent subject to practise upon, and
+likewise to hear whether all had been cleared up, and had gone right with
+him.
+
+“Though,” he said, “I could not doubt of it when that fair and lovely
+Princess had taken your matters in hand.  Tell me, Richard, have you
+secular men many such dames as that abroad in the world?”
+
+“Not many such as she,” said Richard, smiling.
+
+“Well, I have not spoken to a female thing, save perhaps pretty Bessee,
+since I went into the Spital, ten years ago; and verily the sound of the
+lady’s voice was to me as if St. Margaret had begun talking to me!  And
+so wise and clear of wit too.  I thought women were feather-pated wilful
+beings, from whom there was no choice but to shut oneself up!  I trow,
+that now all is well with thee, thou wilt scarce turn a thought again
+towards our brotherhood, where to glance at such a being becomes a sin.”
+And Raynald crossed himself, with an effort to recall his wonted
+asceticism.
+
+“Ladies’ love is not like to be mine,” said Richard, laughing, as one not
+yet awake to the force of the motive.  “No!  Gladly would I be one of
+your noble brotherhood, where alone have I met with kindness—but, Sir
+Raynald, my first duty under Heaven must be to redeem my father’s name,
+by my service to the Prince.  My brothers think they uphold it by deadly
+revenge.  I want to show what a true Montfort can be with such a master
+as my father never had!  And, Raynald, I cannot but fear that further
+schemes of vengeance may be afloat.  The Prince is too fearless to take
+heed to himself, and who is so bound to watch for him as I?”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI
+THE VIEW FROM CARMEL
+
+
+    “On her who knew that love can conquer death;
+       Who, kneeling with one arm about her king,
+    Drew forth the poison with her balmy breath,
+          Sweet as new buds in spring.”—TENNYSON.
+
+A YEAR had elapsed since the crusaders had landed in Palestine; Nazareth
+had been taken, and the Christian host were encamped upon the plain
+before Acre, according to their Prince’s constant habit of preferring to
+keep his troops in the open field, rather than to expose them to the
+temptations of the city—which was, alas! in a state most unworthy of the
+last stronghold of Latin Christianity in the Holy Land.
+
+It was on a scorching June day, Whitsun Tuesday, in the exquisite beauty
+of an early summer in the mountains of the Levant—when “the flowers
+appear on the earth, the time of the singing of birds is come, and the
+voice of the turtle is heard in our land; the fig tree putteth forth her
+green figs, and the vines with the tender grape give a good smell,”—that
+Richard de Montfort was descending the wooded sides of Mount Carmel.
+
+Anxious tidings had of late come from England respecting the health of
+the little Prince John; and Princess Eleanor was desirous of offering
+gifts and obtaining prayers on his behalf, on the part of the good
+Fathers of the convent associated with the memory of the great Prophet
+who had raised the dead child to life.  She herself, however, was at the
+time unfit for a mountain ride; and Prince Edward, who was a lay brother
+of the Carmelite order, and had fully intended himself to go and offer
+his devotions for his child, was so unwell on that day, from the feverish
+heat of the summer, that he could not expose himself to the sun; and
+Richard was therefore despatched on the part of the royal pair.  He had
+ascended in the cool of the morning, setting forth before sunrise, and
+attending the regular Mass.  The good Fathers would fain have detained
+him till the heat of the day should be past; but his anxiety not to
+overpass in the slightest degree the time fixed by the Prince, made him
+resolved on setting out so soon as his errand was sped.
+
+Unspeakably beautiful was his ride—through rocky dells filled with
+copsewood, among which jessamine, lilies, and exquisite flowers were
+peeping up, and the coney, the fawn, and other animals, made Leonillo
+prick his ears and wistfully seek from his master’s eye permission to
+dash off in pursuit.  Or the “oaks of Carmel,” with many a dark-leaved
+evergreen, towered in impenetrable thicket, and at an opening glade might
+be beheld on the north-east, “that goodly mountain Lebanon” rising in a
+thick clothing of wood; and beyond, in sharp cool softness, the white
+cone of rain-distilling Hermon.  Far to the west lay the glorious
+glittering sheet of the Mediterranean; but nearer, almost beneath his
+feet, was the curving bay and harbour of Ptolemais, filled with white
+sails, the white city of Acre full of fortresses and towers; while on the
+plain beside it, green with verdure as Richard’s own home greenwood of
+Odiham, lay the white tents of the Christian army, in so clear an
+atmosphere that he could see the flash of the weapons of the men on
+guard, and almost distinguish the blazonry of the banners.
+
+Richard dismounted to gather some roses and jessamine for the Princess,
+and to collect some of the curious fossil echini, which he believed to be
+olives turned to stone by the Prophet Elijah, as a punishment to a
+churlish peasant who refused him a meal.  He thought that such treasures
+would be a welcome addition to the store he was accumulating for the good
+old Grand Prior.  He gave his horse to Hob Longbow, his only attendant
+except a young Sicilian lad.  This same Longbow had stuck to him with a
+pertinacity that he could not shake off, and in truth had hitherto
+justified the Prince’s prediction that he would be a brave and faithful
+fellow when his allegiance was no further disturbed by the proximity of
+the outlawed Montforts.  There had been nothing to lead Richard to think
+he ought to indicate either him or Nick Dustifoot to the Prince as the
+persons who had been connected with Guy in Italy.
+
+Presently Leonillo bounded forward, and Richard became aware of the
+figure of a man in light armour standing partly hidden among the
+brushwood, but looking down intently into the Christian camp.  The dog
+leapt up, fawning on the stranger with demonstrations of rapture; and he,
+turning in haste, stood face to face with Richard.
+
+“Here!” was his exclamation, and a grasp was instantly laid upon his
+sword.
+
+“Simon!” burst from Richard’s lips at the same moment, “dost not know
+me?”
+
+“Thou, boy?” and the hold was relaxed.  “What lucky familiar sent thee
+hither?  What—thou art grown such a huge fellow that I had well-nigh
+struck thee down for Longshanks himself, had it not been for thy voice.
+Thou hast his very bearing.”
+
+“Simon!” again repeated Richard, in his extremity of amazement.  “What
+dost thou?  How camest thou here?  Whence—?”
+
+“That thou shalt soon see,” said Simon.  “A right free and merry home and
+company have we up yonder,”—and he pointed towards Mount Lebanon.
+
+“Thou and Guy?”
+
+“No, no; Guy turned craven.  Could not endure our wanderings in the
+marshes and hills, pined for his wife forsooth, fell sick, and must needs
+go and give himself up to the Pope; so he sings the penitential psalms
+night and day.”
+
+“And we heard thou wast dead at Siena.”
+
+“Thou hearest many a false tale,” said Simon.  “Of my death thou shalt
+judge, if thou wilt turn thy horse and ride with me to our hill-fort of
+Ain Gebel, in Galilee.  They say ’tis the very one which King David or
+King Herod, whichever it was, could only take by letting down his
+men-at-arms in boxes!  I should like to see the boxes that we could not
+send skimming down the abyss!  And a wondrous place they have left
+us—vaults as cool as a convent wine-cellar, fountains out of the rock,
+marble columns.”
+
+“But, brother, for whom do you hold it?  For the King of Cyprus or—?”
+
+“For myself, boy!  For King Simon, an it like you better!  None can touch
+me or my merry band there, and a goodly company we are—pilgrims grown
+wiser, and runaway captives, and Druses, and bold Arabs too: and the
+choicest of many a heretic Armenian merchants’ caravan is ours, and of
+many a Saracen village; corn and wine, fair dames, and Damascus blades,
+and Arab steeds.  Nothing has been wanting to me but thee and vengeance,
+and both are, I hope, on the way!”
+
+“Not I, certainly!” said Richard, shrinking back in horror: “I—a sworn
+crusader!”
+
+“Tush, what are we but crusaders too, boy?  ’Tis all service against the
+Moslem!  Thy patron saint sent thee to me to-day from special care for
+thy safety.”
+
+“How so!” exclaimed Richard.  “If peril threaten my Lord, I must be with
+him at once.”
+
+“Much hast thou gained by hanging on upon him,” said Simon scornfully,
+glancing at Richard’s heels; “not so much as a pair of gilt spurs!
+Creeping after him like a hound, thou hast not even the bones!”
+
+“I have all I seek,” said Richard.  “I have his brotherly kindness.  I
+have the opportunity of redeeming my name.  Nay, I should even regret any
+honour that took me from the services I now perform.  Simon, didst thou
+but know his love for our father!”
+
+“Silence, base caitiff!” thundered Simon; “I know his deeds, and that is
+enough for me!  Look here, mean-spirited as thou wert to be taken with
+his hypocrisy, I have pity on thee yet.  I would spare thee what awaits
+thee in the camp!”
+
+“For heaven’s sake, Simon, dost know of any attack of the Emir?  The
+Princess must at once be conveyed into the town!  As thou art a man, a
+Christian, speak plainly!”
+
+“Foolish lad, the infidels are quiet enough!  No peril threatens the
+camp!  Only if thou wilt run thy head into it, thou art like to find it
+too hot to hold thee!”
+
+“I am afraid of no accusations,” said Richard; “my Lord knows and trusts
+me.”
+
+Simon laughed a loud ringing scornful laugh.
+
+“Wilful will to water,” he said.  “Well, thou besotted lad, if it be not
+too late when thou getst into the hands of Crookbacked Edmund and Red
+Gilbert, remember the way to Galilee, that is all!”
+
+“I tell thee, Simon,” said Richard, turning round and fully facing him;
+“I would rather perish an innocent man by the hands of the Provost
+Marshal, than darken my soul with thy counsels of blood.  O Simon!  What
+thy purpose may be I know not; but canst thou deem it faithfulness to our
+father, saint as he was, to live this dark wild life, so utterly
+abhorrent to him?”
+
+“Let those look to that who slew him, and made me such as I am,” returned
+Simon, turning from him, and gazing steadfastly down into the camp.
+Suddenly a gleam of fierce exultation lighted up his face, and again
+facing Richard he exclaimed, “Yes, go home, tame cringing spaniel, and
+see whether a Montfort is still in favour below there!  See if proud
+Edward is still ready to meet thy fawning with his scornful patronage!
+See if the honour of a murdered father has not been left in better hands
+than thine!  And when thou hast had thy lesson, find the way to Ain
+Gebel, or ask Nick Dustifoot.”
+
+Richard, with a startled exclamation, looked down, but could discern
+nothing unusual in the camp.  The royal banner hung in heavy folds over
+the Prince’s pavilions, and all was evidently still in the same noontide
+repose, or rather exhaustion, to which the Syrian sun reduced even the
+hardy active Englishmen.  “What mean you?” he began; but Simon was no
+longer beside him.  He called, but echo alone answered; and all he could
+do was to throw himself on his horse, and hurry down the mountain side,
+with a vague presentiment of evil, and a burning desire to warn his lord
+or share his peril.
+
+He understood Simon’s position.  Many of the almost inaccessible rocks,
+where the sons of Anak had built their Cyclopean fortresses, and which
+had been abodes of almost fabulous beauty and strength in the Herodian
+days, had been resorted to again by the crusaders, and had served as
+isolated strongholds whence to annoy the enemy.  Frightfully lawless had,
+in too many instances, been the life there led, more especially by the
+Levant-born sons of Europeans; and in the universal disorganization of
+the Kingdom of Jerusalem, that took place in consequence of the disputed
+rights of Cyprus and Hohenstaufen, most of them had become free from all
+control.  If the garrisons bore the Christian name at all, it chiefly was
+as an excuse for preying on all around; but too often they were renegades
+of every variety of nation, drawn together by the vilest passions,
+commanded by some reckless adventurer, and paying a species of allegiance
+to any power that either endangered them, or afforded them the hopes of
+plunder.  Bloodthirsty and voluptuous alike, they were viewed with equal
+terror by the Frank pilgrim, the Syriac villager, the Armenian merchant,
+and the Saracen hadji—whose ransom and whose spoil enriched their
+chambers, with all that the licentious tastes of East and West united
+could desire.  There were comparatively few of these nests of iniquity in
+these latter days of the Crusades, but some still survived; and Richard
+had seen some of their captains with their followers at the siege of
+Nazareth, where the atrocities they had committed had been such as to
+make the English army stand aghast.  As a member of such a crew, Simon
+could hardly fail to find means of attempting that revenge on which it
+was but too evident that he was still bent; and Richard, as every
+possible risk rose before him, urged his horse to perilous speed down the
+steep descent, and chid every obstacle, though in fact the descent which
+ordinarily occupied two hours, for men who cared for their own necks, was
+effected by him in a quarter of the time.  He came to the entrenched
+camp.  The entrance, where the Prince made so strict a point of keeping a
+sentinel, was completely unguarded.  The foremost tents were empty, but
+there was a sound as of the murmuring voices of numbers towards the
+centre of the camp.  The next moment he met Hamlyn de Valence riding
+quickly, and followed by two attendants.
+
+“Hamlyn! a moment!” he gasped.  “Has aught befallen the Prince?”
+
+“You were aware of it, then!” said Hamlyn, checking his horse, and
+looking him full in the face.
+
+“Answer me, for Heaven’s sake!  Is all well with the Princes?”
+
+“As well as your house desires—or it may be somewhat better,” said
+Hamlyn; “but let me pass.  I am on an errand of life or death.”
+
+So saying, Hamlyn dashed forwards; and Richard, in double alarm, made his
+way to the space in the centre of the camp, where he found himself on the
+outskirts of a crowd, talking in the various tongues of English, French,
+and Lingua Franca.  “He lives—the good Princess—the dogs of
+infidels—poison—” were the words he caught.  He flung himself from his
+horse, and was about to interrogate the nearest man, when John of Dunster
+came hurrying towards him from the tents, and threw himself upon him,
+sobbing with agitation and dismay.
+
+“What is it?  Speak, John!  The Prince!”
+
+“Oh, if you had but been there!  It will not cease bleeding.  O Richard,
+he looks worse than my father when he came home!”
+
+“Let me hear!  Where?  How is he hurt?”
+
+“In the arm and brow,” said the boy.
+
+“The arm!” said Richard, much relieved.
+
+“Ah, but they say the dagger is poisoned!  Stay, Richard, I’ll tell you
+all.  Dame Idonea turned me out of the tent, and she will not let any one
+in.  It was thus—even now the Prince was lying on the day-bed in his own
+outer tent, no one else there save myself.  I believe everybody was
+asleep, I know I was—when Nick Dustifoot called me, and bade me tell the
+Prince there was a messenger from the Emir of Joppa, asking to see him.
+So the Prince roused himself up, and bade him come in.  He was one of
+those quick-eyed Moorish-looking infidels, in the big turbans and great
+goat’s hair cloaks; and he went down on his knees, and hit the ground
+with his forehead, and said Salam aleikum—traitor that he was—and gave
+the Prince a letter.  Well, the Prince muttered something about his head
+aching so sorely that he could scarce see the writing, and had just put
+up his hand to shade his eyes from the light, when the dog was out with a
+dagger and fell on him!  The Prince’s arm being raised, caught the
+stroke, you see; and that moment his foot was up,” said John, acting the
+kick, “and down went the rogue upon his back!  And I—I threw myself right
+down over him!”
+
+“Did you, my brave little fellow?  Well done of you!” cried Richard.
+
+“And the Prince wrested the dagger out of the rogue’s hand, only he tore
+his own forehead sorely, as the point flew up with the shock—and then
+stabbed the villain to the heart—see how the blood rushed over me!  Then
+the Prince pulled me up, and called me a brave lad, and set me on my
+feet, and asked me if I were sure I was not hurt.  And by that time the
+archers were coming in, when all was over; and Long Robin must needs
+snatch up a joint stool and have a stroke at the Moor’s head.  I trow the
+Prince was wrath with the cowardly clown for striking a dead man.  He
+said I alone had been any aid!”
+
+“‘Well?” anxiously asked Richard, gathering intense alarm as he saw that
+the boy’s trouble still exceeded his elation, even at such commendation
+as this.
+
+“But then,” said John sadly, “even while he called it nothing, there came
+a dizziness over him.  And even then the Princess had heard the outcry,
+and came in haste with Dame Idonea.  And so soon as the Dame had picked
+up the dagger and looked well at it, and smelt it, she said there was
+poison on it.  No sooner did the Princess hear that, than, without one
+word, she put her lips to his arm to suck forth the venom.  He was for
+withholding her, but the Dame said that was the only safeguard for his
+life; and she looked—oh, so imploring!”
+
+“Blessings on the sweet Princess and true wife!” cried the men-at-arms,
+great numbers of whom had gathered round the little eye-witness to hear
+his account.
+
+“And so is he saved?” said Richard, with a long breath.
+
+“Ah! but,” said John, his eyes beginning to fill with tears, “there is
+the Grand Master of the Templars come now, and he says that to suck the
+poison is of no avail; and that nothing will save him but cutting away
+the living flesh as I would carve the wing of a bustard; and Dame Idonea
+says that is just the way King Cœur de Lion died, and the Princess is
+weeping, and the wound will not stop bleeding; and Hamlyn is gone to Acre
+for a surgeon, and they are all wrangling, and Dame Idonea boxed my ears
+at last, and said I was gaping there.”  The boy absolutely burst into
+sobs and tears, and at the same moment a growl arose among the archers,
+of “Curses on the Moslem hounds!  Not one shall escape!  Death to every
+captive in our hands!”
+
+“Nay, nay,” exclaimed Richard, looking up in horror; “the poor captives
+are utterly guiltless!  Far more justly make me suffer,” murmured he
+sadly.
+
+“All tarred with the same stick,” said the nearest; “serve them as they
+deserve.”
+
+“Think,” added Richard, “if the Prince would see no dishonour done to the
+dead carcase of the murderer himself, would he be willing to have ill
+worked on living men, sackless of the wrong?  English turning
+butchers—that were fit work for Paynims.”
+
+“No, no, not one shall live to laugh at our Edward’s fall,” burst out the
+men; and a voice among them added, “Sure the young squire seems to know a
+vast deal about the guilty and the guiltless—the Montfort!  Ay!  Away
+with all foes to our Edward—”
+
+“Best withdraw yourself, Sir,” said Hob Longbow; “their blood is up.
+Baulk them of their prey, and they will set on you next.”
+
+Richard just then beheld a person from whose interposition he had much
+greater hopes, namely the Earl of Gloucester, who, though still a young
+man, was the chief English noble in the camp, and whose special charge
+the Saracen captives were.  He hurried towards him, and asked tidings of
+the Prince.
+
+“Ill tidings, I trow,” said the Earl, bitterly.  “Ay, Richard de
+Montfort, you had best take heed to yourself, he was your best friend;
+and a sore lookout it is for us all.  Between the old dotard his father
+and the poor babes his children, England is in woeful plight.  Would that
+your father’s wits were among us still!  There’s some curse on this
+fools’ errand of a Crusade, for here is the sixth prince it hath slain,
+and well if we lose not our Princess too.  But what is all this uproar!”
+
+“The men-at-arms, my Lord,” said Richard, “fierce to visit the crime on
+the captives.”
+
+“A good riddance!” said Earl Gilbert; “the miscreants eat as much as ten
+score yeomen, and my knaves are weary with guarding them.  If this matter
+brings all the pagans in Palestine on our hands, we shall have enough to
+do without looking after this nest of heathens.”
+
+“But would the Prince have it so?”
+
+“I fear me the Prince is like to have little will in the matter!  No, no,
+I’m not the man to order a butchery, but if the honest fellows must needs
+shed blood for blood, I’m not going to meddle between them and the
+heathen wolves.”
+
+Assuredly nothing was to be done with the Red de Clare, and Richard
+pushed on, with throbbing dismayed heart, to the tent, dreading to behold
+the condition of him whom he best loved and honoured on earth.  The tent
+was crowded, but Richard’s unusual height enabled him to see, over the
+heads of those nearest, that Edward was sitting on the edge of his couch,
+his wife and Dame Idonea endeavouring to check the flow of blood from his
+wound.  The elbow of his other arm was on his knee, and his head on his
+hand, but the opening of the curtain let in the light; he looked up, and
+Richard saw how deathly white his face had become, and the streaks of
+blood from the scratch upon his brow.  He greeted Richard, however, with
+the look of recognition to which his young squire had now become used—not
+exactly a smile, but a well-satisfied welcome; and though he spoke low
+and feebly to his brother who stood near him, Richard caught the words
+with a thrill of emotion.
+
+“Let him near me, Edmund.  He hath a ready hand, and may aid thee, sweet
+wife.  Thou art wearying thyself.”  Then, as Richard approached, “Thou
+hast sped well!  I looked not for thee so soon.”
+
+“Alack, my Lord!” said Richard, “I hurried on to warn you.  Ah! would I
+had been in time!”
+
+“Thy little pupil, John, did all man could do,” said Edward, languidly
+smiling.  “But what—hast aught in charge to say to me?  Be brief, for I
+am strangely dizzy.”
+
+“My Lord,” said Richard, “the archers and men-at-arms are furiously wrath
+with the Saracens.  They would wreak their vengeance on the prisoners,
+who at least are guiltless!”
+
+“The knaves!” exclaimed Edward promptly.  “Why looks not Gloucester to
+this?”
+
+“My Lord, the Earl saith that he would not command the slaughter, but
+that he will not forbid it.”
+
+“Saints and angels!” burst forth the Prince, and to the amazement of all,
+he started at once on his feet, and striding through the bystanders to
+the opening of the tent, he looked out on the crowd, who were already
+rushing towards the inclosure where their victims were penned.  Raising
+his mighty voice as in a battle-day, he called aloud to them to halt,
+turn back, and hear him.  They turned, and beheld the lofty form in the
+entrance of the tent, wrapped in a long loose robe, which, as well as his
+hair, was profusely stained with blood, his wan face, however, making
+that marble dignity and sternness of his even more awful and majestic as
+he spoke aloud.  “So, men, you would have me go down to my grave
+blood-stained and accursed by the death of guiltless captives?  And I
+pray you, what is to be the lot of our countrymen, now on pilgrimage to
+Jerusalem, if you thus deal with our prisoners, taken in war?  Senseless
+bloody-minded hounds that ye are, mark my words.  The life of one of you
+for the life of a Saracen captive; and should I die, I lay my curse on ye
+all, if every man of them be not set free the hour my last breath is
+drawn.  Do you hear me, ye cravens?”
+
+Unsparing, unconciliatory as ever, even when most merciful and generous,
+Edward turned, but reeled as he re-entered the tent, and his dizziness
+recurring, needed the support of both his brother and Richard to lay him
+down on the couch.
+
+The Grand Master of the Temple renewed his assurance that this was a
+token of the poison, and Eleanor was unheeded when she declared that her
+dear lord had been affected in the same manner before his wound, ever
+since indeed the Whit Sunday when he had ridden home from the great
+Church of St. John of Acre in the full heat of the sun.
+
+Dame Idonea was muttering the mediæval equivalent for fiddlesticks, as
+plain as her respect for the Temple would allow her.
+
+At that moment the leech whom Hamlyn had been sent into the town to
+summon, made his appearance, and fully confirmed the Templar’s opinion.
+Neither the wizened Greek physician, nor the dignified Templar,
+considered the soft but piteous assurance of the wife that the venom had
+at once been removed by her own lips as more than mere feminine folly,
+and Dame Idonea’s real experience of knights thus saved, and on the other
+hand of the fatal consequences of rude surgery in such a climate, were
+disregarded as an old woman’s babble.  Her voice waxed shrill and angry,
+and her antagonists’ replies in Lingua Franca, mixed with Arabic, Latin,
+and Greek, rang through the tent, till the Prince could bear it no
+longer.
+
+“Peace,” he said, with an asperity unlike his usual stern patience, “I
+had liefer brook your knives than your tongues!  Without further
+jangling, tell me clearly, learned physician, the peril of either
+submitting or not submitting to your steel.”
+
+The Greek told, with as little tergiversation as was in his nature, that
+he viewed a refusal as certain death, but several times Dame Idonea was
+bursting out upon him, and Edward had to hold up his finger to silence
+her.
+
+“Now, kind lady,” quoth he, “let me hear the worst you foretell for me
+from your experience.”
+
+Dame Idonea did not spare him either the fate of Cœur de Lion, the
+dangers of fever and pain, and above all “of that strange enchantment
+that binds the teeth together and forbids a man to swallow his food.”
+Poor Eleanor looked at him imploringly all the time, but as none of them
+had ever heard of the circulation of the blood, they could not tell that
+her simple remedy had been truly efficacious, and that if it had been
+otherwise the incisions would now come too late.  Thus the balance of
+prudence made itself appear to be on the side of the physician, and for
+him the Prince decided.  “Mi Doña,” he said, ever his most caressing term
+for her, “it must be so!  I think not lightly of what thou hast done for
+me, but, as matters stand, too much hangs upon this life of mine for me
+not to be bound to run no needless risk for fear of a little pain.  If I
+live and speak now, next to highest Heaven it is owing to thee; and when
+we came on this holy war, sweet Eleanor, didst thou not promise to hinder
+me from naught that a true warrior of the Cross ought to undergo?  And is
+this the land to shrink from the Cross?”
+
+Alas! to Eleanor the pang was the belief in the uselessness of his
+suffering and danger.  She never withstood his will, but physically she
+was weak, and her weeping was piteous in its silence.  Edward bade his
+brother lead her away; and Edmund, after the usual fashion, vented his
+own perplexity and distress upon the most submissive person in his way.
+He assumed more resistance on the part of his gentle sister-in-law than
+she made, and carrying her from the tent, roughly told her, silent as she
+was, that it was better that she should scream and cry than all England
+wail and lament.
+
+And so Eleanor’s devoted deed, the true saving of her husband, has lived
+on as a mere delusive tradition, weakly credited by the romantic, while
+the credit of his recovery has been retained by the Knight-Templars’
+leech.  Not a sound was uttered by the Prince while under those hands;
+but when his wife was permitted to return to him, she found him in a dead
+faint, and the silver reliquary she had left with him crushed flat and
+limp between his fingers.
+
+Richard had given his attendance all the time, and for several hours
+afterwards, during which the Princess hung over her husband, endeavouring
+to restore him from the state of exhaustion in which he scarcely seemed
+conscious of anything but her presence.  Late in the evening, some one
+came to the entrance of the tent, and beckoned to the young squire; he
+came out expecting to receive some message, but to his extreme surprise
+found himself in the grasp of the Provost Marshal.
+
+“On what charge?” he demanded, so soon as he was far enough beyond the
+precincts of his tent not to risk a disturbance.
+
+“By the command of the council.  On the charge of being privy to the
+attempt on the Prince’s life.”
+
+“By whom preferred?” asked Richard.
+
+“By the Lord Hamlyn de Valence.”
+
+Richard attempted not another word.  In effect the condition of the
+Prince seemed to him so hopeless that his most acute suffering at the
+moment was in the being prevented from ministering to him, or watching
+for a last word or look of recognition.  He had no heart for
+self-vindication, even if he had not known its utter futility with men
+who had been prejudiced against him from the outset.  Nor had he the
+opportunity, for the Provost Marshal conducted him at once to the tent
+where he was to be in ward for the night, a heap of straw for him to lie
+upon, and a guard of half a dozen archers outside; and there was he left
+to his despairing prayers for the Prince’s life.  He could dwell on
+nothing else, there was no room in his mind for any thought but of that
+glory of manhood thus laid low, and of the anguish of the sweet face of
+the Princess.
+
+“Sir—!” there was a low murmur near him—“now is the time.  I have brought
+an archer’s gown and barrett, and we may easily get past the yeomen.”
+These last words were uttered, as on hands and knees a figure whose dark
+outline could barely be discerned, crept under the border of the tent.
+
+“Who art thou?” hastily inquired Richard.
+
+“You should know me, Sir,—I have done you many a good turn, and served
+your house truly.”
+
+“Talk not of truth, thou traitor,” said Richard, recognizing Dustifoot’s
+voice.  “Knowst thou that but for the Prince’s clemency thou hadst a year
+ago been out of the reach of the cruel evil thou hast now shared in.”
+
+“Nay, now, Lord Richard,” returned the man, “you should not treat thus an
+honest fellow that would fain do you service.”
+
+“I need no service such as thine,” returned Richard.  “Thy service has
+made my brothers murderers, and brought ruin and woe unspeakable upon the
+land.”
+
+“Beshrew me,” muttered the man, “but one would have thought the young
+damoiseau would have had more feeling about his father’s death!  But I
+swore to do Sir Simon’s bidding, so that is no concern of mine; and he
+bade me, if any one strove to lay hands on you, Sir, to lead you down to
+Kishon Brook, where he will meet us with a plump of spears.”
+
+“Meet him then,” said Richard, “and say to him that if from his crag
+above, on Carmel, he sees me hung on the gallows tree as a traitor, he
+may count that I am willingly offered for our family sin!  Ay, and that
+if he thinks an old man’s hairs brought down to the grave, a
+broken-hearted wife, helpless orphans, and a land without a head, to be a
+grateful offering to my father, let him enjoy the thought of how the
+righteous Earl would have viewed all the desolation that will fall on
+England without the one—one scholar who knew how to value and honour his
+lessons.”
+
+“Hush!  Sir,” hastily interposed Dustifoot; but it was too late, the
+murmur of voices had already been caught by the guard, and quick as he
+was to retreat, their torches discovered him as he was creeping out, and
+he was dragged back by the feet, and the light held up to his face, while
+many voices proclaimed him as the rogue who had been foremost in
+admitting the assassin to the royal tent.  It was from the tumult of
+voices that Richard first understood that on examining the body of the
+murderer, it had been ascertained that he was neither a Bedouin nor one
+of the assassins belonging to the Old Man of the Mountain, but an
+European, probably a Provençal; and this, added to Hamlyn’s
+representation of Richard’s words, together with what the Earls of
+Lancaster and Gloucester recollected, had directed the suspicion upon
+himself.  And here was, as it seemed, undeniable evidence of his
+connection with the plot!
+
+The miserable Dustifoot, vainly imploring his intercession, was tied hand
+and foot, and the guard returned to the outside of the tent, except one
+archer, who thought it needful to bring in his torch, and keep the
+prisoners in sight.
+
+The night passed wearily, and with morning Dustifoot was removed to a
+place of captivity more befitting his degree; but of the Prince, Richard
+only heard that he continued to be in great danger.  No attempt on the
+part of the council was made to examine their prisoner; and Richard
+suspected, as time wore on, that no one chose to act in this time of
+suspense for fear of incurring the lion-like wrath of Edward in the event
+of his recovery, but that in case of his death, small would be his own
+chances of life.  Death had fewer horrors for the lonely boy than it
+would have had for one with whom life had been brighter.  In battle for
+the Cross, or in shielding his Prince’s life, it would have been welcome,
+but death, branded with vile ingratitude, as a traitor to that master,
+was abhorrent.  Shrunk up in the corner of the tent, half asleep after
+the night’s vigil, yet too miserable for the entire oblivion of rest,
+Richard spent the day in dull despair, listening for sounds without with
+an intensity of attention that seemed to pervade every limb, and yet with
+snatches of sleep that brought dreams more intolerable than the reality
+which they yet seemed to enhance.
+
+At last, however, the sultry closeness of the day subsided, the Angelus
+bell sounded far off from the churches and convents of Acre, and near
+from the chapel tent, and the devotions that it proclaimed were not ended
+when Richard heard the cry of the crusading watch—“Remember the Holy
+Sepulchre.”
+
+Yes, the Holy Sepulchre might not be recovered and reached by the English
+army, but it might still be remembered, and therein be laid down all
+struggles of the will, all rebellious agony, at the being misunderstood,
+misused, vituperated, all suffering might there be offered up; nor could
+the most ignominious death stand between him and the thought of that Holy
+Tomb, and of the joy beyond.—Son of a man who, sorely tried, had drawn
+his sword against his king, brother of wilful murderers, perhaps to die
+innocent was the best fate he could hope; and in accordance with the
+doctrine of his time, he hoped that his death might serve as a part of a
+sacrifice for the family guilt.  Nay, the Prince gone, wherefore should
+he wish to live?
+
+“Don’t you see?  The Prince’s signet!  He said I should bring him!  Clown
+that thou art, hast no eyes nor ears?  What, don’t you know me?  I am the
+young lord of Dunster, the Prince’s foot-page.  It is his command.”
+
+And amid some perplexed mutterings from the guard, little John of Dunster
+burst into the tent.  “Up, up,” he cried, “you are to come to the Prince
+instantly.”
+
+“How fares he?”—Richard’s one question of the day.
+
+“Sorely ill at ease,” said the boy, “but he wants you, he calls for you,
+and no one would tell him where you were, so I spoke out at last, and he
+bade me take his ring and bring you, for ’tis his pleasure.  Come now,
+for the Earl of Lancaster and Hamlyn are gone to take the Princess to
+Acre, and my Lord of Gloucester has taken his red head off to sleep, and
+no one is there but old Raymond and some of the grooms.
+
+“The Princess gone!”
+
+“Ay, and Dame Idonea with her.  So we shall hear no more of King Cœur de
+Lion.  Hamlyn swears she was on his crusade.  Do you think she was,
+Richard? nobody knows how old she is.”
+
+Richard was a great deal too anxious to ask questions himself, to be able
+to answer this query.  And as the yeomen let him pass them, only begging
+him to bear him out with the Princes, he hastily gathered from the boy
+all that he could tell.  The Prince had, it appeared, been in a most
+suffering state from pain and fever all the night and the ensuing day,
+and had hardly noticed any one but his devoted wife, who had attended him
+unremittingly, until with the cooler air of evening she saw him slightly
+revived, but was herself so completely spent, and so unwell, as to be
+incapable of opposing his decision that she should at once be carried
+into the city to receive the succours her state demanded.  When she was
+gone, Edward, who had perhaps sought to spare her the sight of his last
+agony, had roused himself to make his will, and choose protectors for his
+father and young children; and it was after this that his inquiries
+became urgent for Richard de Montfort.  He was at length answered by the
+indignant little foot-page; and greatly resenting the action of the
+council, he had, as John said, “frowned and spoken like himself,” and
+sent the little fellow in quest of the young esquire.
+
+The tent was nearly dark, and Richard could only see the outline of the
+tall form laid prostrate, but the voice he had feared never to hear
+again, spoke, though slowly and wearily, and a hand was held out.
+“Welcome, cousin,” he said.  “Poor boy, they must needs have at thee ere
+the breath was out of my body; but for that, at least, they shall wait,
+and longer if my word and will can avail after I am gone.  What has given
+them occasion against thee, Richard?”
+
+“Alas! my Lord, you are too ill at ease to vex yourself with my matters.”
+
+“Nay, but I must see thee righted, Richard; there are services for thee
+to do to me.  Hark thee!  I have bequeathed thee thy mother’s lands at
+Odiham, which my father gave to me.  So mayest thou do for Henry whate’er
+he will brook,” he added, with a languid smile, holding Richard’s hand in
+such a manner as to impress that though his words came very tardily, he
+did not mean to be interrupted.  “Methinks Henry will not grudge a kindly
+thought and a few prayers for his old comrade.  And, Richard, strive to
+be near my poor boys; strive that they be bred in strict self-rule, and
+let them hear of the purposes thy father left to me: I think thou knowst
+them or canst divine them better than any other near me.  Thou _shall_ be
+with them if—if Heaven and the blessed Saints bear my sweet wife through
+this trouble.  She will love and trust thee.”
+
+Edward’s voice broke down in a half-strangled sob between grief and pain;
+he could not contemplate the thought of his wife, and weakness had broken
+down much of his power over himself.  He did not speak at once, or invite
+an answer; and when he did, his words were an exclamation of despairing
+weariness at the trumpet of a gnat that hovered above him.
+
+Richard presently understood that the thin goats’ hair curtains which
+even the crusaders had learnt to adopt from their Oriental neighbours as
+protections against these enemies, being continually disarranged to give
+the Prince drink or to put cool applications to his wound, the winged
+foes were sure to enter, and with their exasperating hum further destroy
+all chance of rest.  The Prince had not slept since he had been wounded,
+and was well-nigh distraught with wakefulness, and with the continual
+suffering, which was only diminished at the first moment that a cold
+lotion touched his arm.  The Hospitaliers had sent in some ice from Mount
+Hermon, but no one knew how to apply it, and even Dame Idonea had
+despised it.
+
+Fortunately, however, Richard had spent a few weeks on his first arrival
+in the infirmary of the Knights of St. John, and before his recovery had
+become familiar with their treatment of both ice and mosquito curtains;
+and when Edmund of Lancaster came into the tent cautiously in early dawn,
+he could hardly credit his eyes, for the squire whom he believed to be in
+close custody was beside his brother, holding the cold applications on
+the arm, and it was impossible to utter inquiry or remonstrance, for the
+Prince was in the profoundest, most tranquil slumber.
+
+Nor did he awake till the camp was astir in the morning with the activity
+that in this summer time could only be exerted before the sun had come to
+his full strength.  Then, when at length he opened his eyes, he
+pronounced himself to be greatly refreshed; and the physician at the same
+time found the state of the wound greatly improved.  A cheerful answer
+was returned by the patient to the message of anxious inquiry sent from
+his Princess at Acre and then looking up kindly at Richard, he said,
+“Boy, if my wife saved my life once, I think thou hast saved it a second
+time.”
+
+“Brother!” here broke in the Earl of Lancaster, “I would not grieve you,
+but for your own safety you ought to know of the grave suspicion that has
+fallen on this youth.”
+
+“I know that you all have suspected him from the first, Edmund,” returned
+the Prince coolly, “but I little expected that the first hour of my
+sickness would be spent in slaking your hatred of him.”
+
+“You do not know the reasons, brother,” said Edmund, confused; “nor are
+you in a state to hear them.”
+
+“Wherefore not?” said Edward.  “Thanks to him, I have my wits clear and
+cool, and ere the day is older his cause shall be heard.  Fetch
+Gloucester, fetch the rest of the council, and let me hear your witnesses
+against him!  What! do you think I could rest or amend while I know not
+whether I have a traitor or not beside me?”
+
+There could be no doubt that Edward was fully himself after his night’s
+rest, determined and prompt as ever.  No one durst withstand him, and
+Edmund went to take measures for his being obeyed.  Meantime, the Prince
+grasped Richard by the wrist, and looking him through with the keen blue
+eyes that seemed capable of piercing any disguise, he said, “Boy, hast
+thou aught that thou wouldst tell to thy kinsman Edward in this strait,
+that thou couldst not say to the Prince in council?”
+
+“Sir,” said Richard, with choking voice, “I was on my way to give that
+very warning, when I found that the blow had fallen.  My Lord,” he added,
+lowering his tone, as he knelt by the Prince’s couch, “Simon lives; I met
+him on Mount Carmel.”
+
+“I thought so,” muttered the Prince.  “And this is his work?”
+
+Richard hurriedly told the circumstances of the encounter, a matter on
+which he had the less scruple as Simon was entirely out of reach.  He had
+hardly completed his narration when Prince Edmund returned, and with him
+came others of the council.  Edmund was followed by his squire, Hamlyn;
+and some of the archers were left without.  Richard had told his tale,
+but had had no assurance of how the Prince would act upon it, nor how far
+the brand of shame might be made to rest on him and his unhappy house.
+He had avowed his brother’s guilt to the Prince; alas! must it again be
+blazoned through the camp?
+
+The greetings and inquiries of the new arrivals were hastily got over by
+the Prince, who lay—holding truly a bed of justice—partly raised by his
+cushions, with bloodless cheeks indeed, but with flashing eyes, and lips
+set to all their wonted resoluteness.
+
+“Let me hear, my Lords,” he said, “wherefore—so soon as I was
+disabled—you thought it meet to put mine own body squire and kinsman in
+ward?”
+
+“Sir,” said the Provost Marshal, “these knaves of mine have let an
+accomplice escape who peradventure might have been made to tell more.”
+
+“An accomplice?  Of whom?” demanded the Prince.
+
+“Of the—the assassin, my Lord, on whom your own strong hand inflicted
+chastisement.  This Dustifoot, who was the yeoman on guard by your tent,
+and introduced him to your presence, was seized by the villains at night,
+endeavouring to hold converse with this gentleman, and was by them taken
+into custody, whence, I grieve to say, he hath escaped.”
+
+“Give his guard due punishment!” said Edward shortly.  “But how concerns
+this the Lord Richard de Montfort’s durance?”
+
+“Sir,” added the Earl of Gloucester, “is it known to you that the dog of
+a murderer was yet no Moslem?”
+
+“What of that?” sharply demanded Edward.
+
+“There can scarcely be a doubt,” continued the red-haired Earl, “that an
+attempt on your life, my Lord, could only come from one quarter.”
+
+“Oh,” dryly replied Edward, “good cause for you to be willing that the
+Saracen captives should be massacred.”
+
+“Sir, I did not then know that the miscreant was not of their faith,”
+said Gloucester.  “I now believe that the same revenge that caused the
+death of Lord Henry of Almayne has now nearly quenched the hope of
+England, that if you will not be warned, my Lord, worse evil may yet
+betide.”
+
+Gloucester spoke with much feeling, but Edward did not show himself
+touched; he only said, “All this may be very well, but my question is not
+answered—Why was my squire put in ward?”
+
+“Speak, Hamlyn,” said Edmund of Lancaster; “say to the Prince what thou
+didst tell me.”
+
+Hamlyn stood forth, excusing himself for the painful task of accusing his
+kinsman, but seeing the Prince’s impatient frown, he came to the point,
+and declared that Richard de Montfort, on meeting him speeding to Acre,
+had eagerly asked him if aught had befallen the Prince, and had looked
+startled and confused on being taxed with being aware of what had taken
+place.
+
+“Well!” said Edward.
+
+Gloucester next beckoned a yeoman forward, who, much confused under the
+Prince’s keen eye, stammered out that he did not wish to harm the young
+gentleman, but that he had seemed mighty anxious to spare the Pagan
+hounds of prisoners, and had even been heard to say that their revenge
+would better fall on himself.
+
+“And is this all for which you had laid hands on him?” said the Prince,
+looking from one to the other.
+
+“Nay, brother,” said Edmund.  “It might have been unmarked by thee, but
+in the first hour myself and others heard him speak of having made speed
+to warn thee, but finding it too late.  Therefore did we conclude that it
+were well to have him in ward, lest, as in the former unhappy matter, he
+should have been conversant with traitors, and thus that we might obtain
+intelligence from him.  Remember likewise the fellow who was found in the
+tent.”
+
+“So!” said Edward, “an honourable youth hath been treated as a traitor,
+because of another springald’s opinion of his looks, and because a few
+yeomen thought he seemed over-anxious to save a few wretched captives,
+whom they knew to be guiltless.  Will there ever come a time when
+Englishmen will learn what _is_ witness?”
+
+“His name and lineage, brother,” began Edmund.
+
+“That, gentles, is the witness upon which the wolf slew the lamb for
+fouling the stream.”
+
+“Then you will not examine him?” asked Gloucester.
+
+“Not as a suspected felon,” said Edward.  “One who by your own evidence
+was heedless of himself in seeking to save the helpless—nay, who spake of
+hasting to warn me—scarce merits such usage.  What consorts with his
+honour and my safety, I can trust to him to tell me as true friend and
+liegeman!” and the confiding smile with which he looked at Richard was
+like a sunbeam in a dark cloud.
+
+“My Lord Prince,” objected Gloucester, “we cannot think that this is for
+your safety.”
+
+“See here, Gloucester,” said Edward.  “Till my arm can keep my head
+again, double the guards, and search all envoys, under whatever pretext
+they may enter; but never for the rest of thy life brand a man with
+imprisonment till you have reasonable proof against him.  Thanks for your
+care of me, my Lords, but I can scarce yet brook long converse.  The
+council is dismissed.”
+
+Richard, infinitely relieved, could hardly wait till he could safely
+speak to the Prince to express his gratitude and joy that he had been not
+only defended, but freed from all examination, so as to have been spared
+from denouncing his brother, and that the family had been spared from
+this additional stigma.  Edward, who like all reserved men could not
+endure the expression of thanks, even while their utter omission would
+have been wounding, cut him short.
+
+“Tush, boy, Simon is as much my cousin as thy brother, and I would not
+help to throw fresh stains on the name that, but for my father’s selfish
+counsellors, would stand highest at home!  Besides,” he added, as one
+half ashamed of his generosity and willing to qualify it, “supposing it
+got abroad that he had aimed this stroke at the heir of England—why, then
+England’s honour would be concerned, and we should have stout Gilbert de
+Clare and all the rest of them wild to storm Simon in his Galilean
+fastness, without King Herod’s boxes, I trow.  Then would all the Druses,
+and the Maronites, and the Saracens, and the half-breeds, the worst of
+the whole, come down on them in some impassable gorge, and the troops I
+have taken such pains to keep in health and training would leave their
+bones in those doleful passes; and not for the sake of the Holy
+Sepulchre, but of my private quarrel.  No, no, Richard, we will keep our
+own counsel, and do our best that Simon may not get another chance,
+before I can move within the walls of Acre; and then we will spread our
+sails, and pray that the Holy Land may make a holier man of him.”
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII
+THE GARDEN OF THE HOSPITAL
+
+
+    “And who is yon page lying cold at his knee?”—SCOTT.
+
+EDWARD differed from Cœur de Lion in this, that he was one of the most
+abstemious men in his army, and disciplined himself at least as rigidly
+as he did other people.  And it was probably on this account that he did
+not fulfil Dame Idonea’s predictions, but recovered favourably, and by
+the end of a fortnight was able, in the first coolness of early morning,
+to ride gently into the city of Acre, where a few days previously the
+Princess Eleanor had given birth to a daughter.  She was christened Joan
+on the day of her father’s arrival, and afterwards became the special
+spoilt favourite of Edward, whose sternness gave place to excessive
+fondness among his children.  Moreover, she in the end became the wife of
+that same red-haired Earl Gilbert of Gloucester, who at this time stood
+holding his wax taper, and looking at the small swaddled morsel of
+royalty with all a bachelor’s contempt for infancy, and little dreaming
+that he beheld his future Countess.
+
+Prince Edward had accepted the invitation of Sir Hugh de Revel, Grand
+Master of the Order of St. John, to take up his quarters in the
+Commandery of the brotherhood; and Richard was greatly relieved to have
+him there, since no watch or ward in the open camp could be so secure as
+this double fortress, protected in the first place by the walls of the
+city, and in the second by those of the Hospital itself, with its strict
+military and monastic discipline.
+
+A wonderful place was that Hospital—infirmary, monastery, and castle, all
+in one, and with a certain Eastern grace and beauty of its own.  The deep
+massive walls, heavy towers, and portcullised gateway, were in the most
+elaborate and majestic style of defensive architecture; and the main
+building rose to a great height, filled with galleries of small, bare,
+rigid-looking cells, just large enough for a knight, his pallet, and his
+armour.  Below was a noble vaulted hall, the walls hung with well-tried
+hawberks, and shields and helmets which had stood many a dint; captured
+crescents and green banners waved as trophies over crooked scymetars and
+Damascus blades inlaid with sentences from the Koran in gold, and twisted
+cuirasses rich with barbaric gold and gems; the blazoned arms of the
+noblest families of France, Spain, England, Germany, and Italy, decked
+the panels and brightened the windows; while the stone pulpit for the
+reader showed that it was still a convent refectory.
+
+The chapel was grave and massive, but at the same time gorgeous with
+colouring suited to eyes accustomed to Oriental brightness of hue; the
+chancel walls were inlaid with the porphyry, jasper, and marble, of
+exquisite tints, that came from the mountains around; the shrines were
+touched with gold, and the roofs and vaultings painted with fretwork of
+unapproachable brilliance and purity of tints; yet all harmonizing
+together, as only Eastern colouring can harmonize, and giving a sense of
+rest and coolness.
+
+Within those huge thick walls, whose windows, sunk deep into their solid
+mass, only let in threads of jewelled light, under their solemn circular
+richly carved brows, between those marble pillars; the elder ones, round
+and solid, with Romanesque mighty strength; the new graceful clusters of
+shining blood-red marble shafts, surrounding a slender white one, all
+banded together with gold, under the vaults of the stone roof, upon the
+mosaic floor—there was always a still refreshing coolness, like the
+“shadow of a great rock in a weary land.”  One transept had a window
+communicating with the upper room of the Infirmary, so that the sick who
+there lay in their beds might take part in the services in the chapel.
+
+The outer court, with the great fortified gateway towards the street, was
+a tilt-yard, where martial exercises took place as in any other castle;
+but pass through the great hall to the inner court, of which the chapel
+formed one side, and where could such cloisters have been found in the
+West?  Their heavy columns and deep-browed arches clinging against the
+thick walls, afforded unfailing shelter from the sun, and their coolness
+was increased by the marble of the pavement, inlaid in rich intricate
+mosaics.
+
+Extending around the interior of the external wall, they enclosed an
+exquisite Eastern garden, perfumed with flowering shrubs, shady with
+trees, and lovely with tall white lilies, hollyhocks, purple irises,
+stars of Bethlehem, and many another Eastern flower, which would send
+forth seeds or roots for the supply of the trim gardens of Western
+convents.  The soft bubbling of fountains gave a sense of delicious
+freshness; doves flew hither and thither, and their soft murmuring was
+heard in the branches; and at certain openings in their foliage might be
+seen the azure of the Mediterranean, which little John of Dunster
+persisted in calling too blue—why could it not be a sober proper-coloured
+sea like his own Bristol Channel?
+
+Richard was very happy here.  There was something of the same charm as in
+modern days is experienced in staying at a college.  The brethren were
+thorough monks in religious observance, but they were also high-bred
+nobles, and had seen many wild adventures, and hard-fought battles, and
+moreover, had entertained in turn almost every variety of pilgrim who had
+visited the Holy Land; so that none could have been found who had more of
+interest to tell, or more friendly hospitable kindness towards their
+guests.  Richard was a favourite there, not only as a friend of Reginald
+Ferrers, but as acquainted with the Grand Prior, Sir Robert Darcy, whose
+memory was still green in Palestine.  Tales of his feats of mighty
+strength still lingered at Acre; how he had held together, by his single
+arm, the gates of a house in the retreat from Damietta, against a whole
+troop of Mamelukes, until every Christian had left it on the other side,
+and then had slowly followed them, not a Moslem daring to attack him; how
+he had borne off wounded knights on his back, and on sultry marches would
+load himself with the armour of any one who was exhausted, and never fail
+to declare it was exactly what he liked best!  More than once it had been
+intimated that Richard de Montfort would be gladly accepted as a brother
+of the Order; and he often thought over the offer, but not only was he
+unwilling to separate himself from the Prince, but he felt it needful at
+any rate to return to England to judge of the condition of his brother
+Henry, ere becoming one of an Order where he could no longer dispose of
+himself.
+
+He was resolved never to quit the Prince till he had seen him beyond the
+reach of any machination of his brother’s, nor indeed was it easy to
+think of parting at all, for Edward, who had relaxed all coldness of
+manner towards him ever since the affair at Trapani, had now become
+warmly affectionate and confidential.  The Prince was still far from
+having regained his usual health, his arm was still in a scarf, and was
+often painful, and the least exposure to the sun brought on violent
+headache, which some attributed to the poison in the scratch on his
+forehead, but the Hospitaliers, more reasonably, ascribed to a slight
+sun-stroke.  Their character of infirmarers rendered them especially
+considerate hosts, and they never overwhelmed their guest with the stiff
+formalities of courtesy for his rank’s sake, but allowed him to follow
+his inclination, and this led him to spend great part of his time in a
+pavilion, a thoroughly Eastern erection, which stood in the garden, at
+the top of the white marble steps leading to a fountain of delicious
+sparkling water, and sheltered from the sun by the dark solid horizontal
+branches of a noble Cedar of Lebanon, which tradition connected with the
+visit of the Empress Helena.  Here, lying upon mats placed on the steps,
+the convalescent Prince would rest for hours, sometimes holding converse
+with the Grand Master, or counsel with his visitors from the camp; but
+more often in the dreamy repose of recovery, silent or talking to Richard
+of matters that lay deep within his heart; but which, perhaps, nothing
+but this softening species of waking dream would have drawn from him.  He
+would dwell on those two hero models of his boyhood, so diverse, yet so
+closely connected together by their influence upon his character, Louis
+of France, and Simon of Leicester; and of the impression both had left,
+that judgment, mercy, faith, and the subject’s welfare, were the primary
+duties of a sovereign—an idea only now and then glimpsed by the feudal
+sovereigns, who thought that the people lived for them rather than they
+for the people.  And when, as in England, the King’s good-nature had been
+abused by swarms of foreign-born relations, who had not even his claims
+on the people, no wonder the yoke had been galling beyond endurance.  Of
+the end Edward could not bear to think—of the broken friendships—the
+enmity of kindred—the faults on either side that had embittered the
+strife, till he had been forced to become the sword in the hands of the
+royal party to liberate his father—and with consequences that had so far
+out-run his powers of controlling them.  To make England the land of law,
+peace, and order, that Simon de Montfort would fain have seen it, was his
+present aspiration; and then, he said, when all was purified at home, it
+might yet be permitted to him to return and win back the Holy City,
+Jerusalem, to the Christian world.  In the meantime, as a memorial of
+this, his earnest longing, he was causing, at great expense and labour,
+one of the huge stones of the Temple to be transported over the hills,
+and embarked on board a ship, to carry home with him.  Richard, meantime,
+learnt to know and love his Prince with a more devoted love, if that were
+possible, and to grieve the more at the persistent hatred of his
+brothers, who, utterly uncomprehending their father’s high purposes
+themselves, sought blindly to slake their vengeance for the ruin they had
+themselves provoked, and upon one who mourned him far more truly than
+they could ever do.
+
+A few days had thus passed, when Richard was one day called by his
+friend, Sir Raynald, into the Infirmary, to speak a few kind words to a
+dying English pilgrim, who had come from his native country, and confided
+to him his dearly-purchased palm and scallop shell, to be conveyed to his
+aged mother.
+
+As Richard was passing along the great lofty chamber, two rows of beds
+were arranged; one of the patients rather hastily, as it seemed to him,
+enveloped himself in his coverlet, leaving nothing visible but a great
+black patch which seemed to cover the whole side of his face.
+
+“That is a strange varlet,” said Raynald, as they passed him; “it is an
+old wound that the patch covers, not what has brought him here; and what
+the nature of his ailment may be, not one of our infirmarers can make
+out; his tongue is purple, and he hath such strange shiverings and
+contortions in all his limbs, that they are at their wits’ end, and some
+hold that he must have undergone some sorcery in his passage through the
+Infidel domains.”
+
+“He came from the East, then?” asked Richard.
+
+“Yea, verily.  We have many more sick among the returning than the
+out-going pilgrims.”
+
+“And what is his nation?”
+
+“Nay; all the scanty words he hath spoken have been in Lingua Franca, and
+he hath been in such trances and trembling fits that it hath not been
+easy to question him.  Nor is it our custom to trouble a pilgrim with
+inquiries.”
+
+“How did he enter?” said Richard.
+
+“Brother Antonio found him yester-eve cast down, gasping for breath, by
+the gate of the Hospital, just able to entreat for the love of St. John
+to be admitted.  He had all the tokens of a pilgrim about him, and seemed
+better at first, walked lustily to bath and bed, and did not show himself
+helpless; but I much suspect his disease is the work of the Arch Enemy,
+for he is always at his worst if one of our Brethren in full orders comes
+near him.  You saw how he cowered and hid himself when I did but pass
+through the hall.  I shall speak to the Preceptor, and see if it were not
+best to try what exorcism will do.”
+
+There was something in all this that made Richard vaguely uneasy.  After
+the recent attack upon the Prince, he suspected all that he did not fully
+understand; and though in the guarded precincts of the Hospital he had
+once dismissed his anxiety, it returned upon him in redoubled force.  He
+thought of Nick Dustifoot, but that worthy was of a uniform tint of
+whitey brown, skin, hair and all; and Richard had assured himself that
+the strange patient had black hair and a brown skin, but that was all
+that he could guess at.  The exorcism would, however, be an effectual
+means of disclosing the “myster wight’s” person, and it sometimes
+included measures so strong, that few pretences could hold out against
+them.  But it was too serious and complicated a ceremony to be got up at
+short notice; and when they met in the Refectory for supper, Raynald told
+Richard that the Grand Master intended to make a personal inspection next
+day, before deciding on using his spiritual weapons.
+
+“And then!” cried John of Dunster, dancing round, “you will let me be
+there!  Pray, good Father, let me be there!  Oh, I hope there will be a
+rare smell of brimstone, and the foul fiend will come out with huge
+claws, and a forked tail.  I don’t care to see him if he only comes out
+like a black crow; I can see crows enough in the trees at Dunster.”
+
+“Peace, John; this is no place for idle talk,” said Richard gravely.
+“Stand aside, here comes the Prince.”
+
+The Prince had spent a fatiguing day over the terms of the ten years, ten
+months, ten weeks, ten days, ten hours, and ten minutes’ truce with the
+Emir of Joppa; he ate little, and after the meal, took Richard’s arm, and
+craved leave from the Grand Master to seek the fresh air beneath the
+cedar tree.  And when there, he could not endure the return to the
+closeness of his own apartment, but declared his intention of sleeping in
+the pavilion.  He dismissed his attendants, saying he needed no one but
+Richard, who, since his illness, had always slept upon cushions at his
+feet.
+
+Where was Richard?
+
+He presently appeared, carrying on one arm a mantle, and over the other
+shoulder the Prince’s immense two-handled sword; while his own sword was
+in his belt.  Leonillo followed him.
+
+“How now!” said Edward, “are we to have a joust?  Dost look for phantom
+Saracens out of yonder fountain, such as my Doña tells me rise out of the
+fair wells in Castille, wring their hands and pray for baptism?”
+
+“You said your hand should keep your head, my Lord,” said Richard; “this
+is but a lone place.”
+
+“What! amid all the guards of the good Fathers!  Well, old comrade,” as
+he took his sword in his right hand; “I am glad to handle thee once more,
+and I hope soon to grasp thee as I am wont, with both hands.  Lay it
+down, Richard.  There—thanks—that is well.  I wonder what my father would
+have thought if one of his many crusading vows had led him hither.
+Should we ever have had him back again?  How well this dreamy leisure
+would have suited him!  It would almost make a troubadour of a rough
+warrior like me.  See the towers and pinnacles against the sky, and the
+lights within the windows—and the stars above like lamps of gold, and the
+moonshine sparkling on the bubbles of the water, ever floating off, yet
+ever in the same place.  Were the good old man here, how peacefully would
+he sing, and pray, and dream, free from debts, parliament and barons.
+Ah! had his kinsmen let him keep his vow, it had been happier for us
+all.”
+
+So mused the Prince, and with a weary smile resigned himself to rest.
+
+But Richard was too full of vague uneasiness to sleep.  He could not
+dismiss from his mind the thought of the unknown pilgrim, and was
+resolved to relax no point of vigilance until the full investigation
+should have satisfied him that his fears were unfounded.  He had been
+accustomed to watching and broken rest during the Prince’s illness, and
+though he durst not pace up and down for fear of disturbing the
+sleeper—nay, could hardly venture a movement—he strained his eyes into
+the twilight, and told his beads fervently; but sleep hung on him like a
+spell, and even while sitting upright there were strange dreams before
+him, and one that he had had before, though with a variation.  It was the
+field of Evesham once more; but this time the strange pilgrim rose in his
+dark wrappings before him, and suddenly developed into that same shadowy
+form of his father, who again struck him on the shoulder with his sword,
+and dubbed him again “The Knight of Death.”
+
+Hark! there was a growl from Leonillo; a footstep, a dark figure—the
+pilgrim himself!  Richard shouted aloud, grasped at his sword, and flung
+himself forward.
+
+“Montfort’s vengeance!”  The sound rang in his ears as a sharp pang
+thrilled through his side; the hot blood welled up, and he was dashed to
+the ground; but even in falling he heard the Prince’s “What treason is
+this?” and felt the rising of the mighty form.  At the same moment the
+murderer was in the grasp of that strong right hand, and was dragged
+forward into the full light of the lamp that hung from the roof of the
+pavilion.
+
+“Thou!” he gasped.  “Who—what?”
+
+“Richard!” exclaimed the Prince, and relaxing his hold, “Simon de
+Montfort, thou hast slain thy brother!”
+
+The sudden shock and awe had overwhelmed Simon, who was indeed
+weaponless, since his dagger remained in Richard’s wound.  He silently
+assisted the Prince in lifting Richard to the cushions of the couch, and
+the low groan convinced them that he lived: looked anxiously for the
+wound.  The dagger had gone deep between the ribs, and little but the
+haft could be seen.
+
+“Poisoned?” Edward asked, looking up at Simon.
+
+“No.  It failed once.  He may live,” said Simon, with bent brows and
+folded arms.
+
+“No, no.  My death-blow!” gasped Richard, with sobbing breath.  “Best so,
+if—Oh, could I but speak!”
+
+The Prince raised him, supporting his head on his own broad breast and
+shoulder, and signed to Simon to hold to his lips the cup of water that
+stood near.  Richard slightly revived, and in this posture breathed more
+easily.
+
+“He might yet live.  Call speedy aid!” said the Prince, who seemed to
+have utterly forgotten that he was practically alone with his persevering
+and desperate enemy.
+
+“Wait!  Oh, wait!” cried Richard, holding out his hand; “it would be
+vain; but it will be all joy did I but know that there will be no more of
+this.  Simon, he loved my father—he has spared thee again and again.”
+
+“Simon,” said the Prince, “for this dear youth’s sake and thy father’s, I
+raise no hand against thee.  Bitter wrong has been done to thy house, by
+what persons, and how provoked, it skills not now to ask.  Twice thy fury
+has fallen on the guiltless.  Enough blood has been shed.  Let there be
+peace henceforth.”
+
+Simon stood moody, with folded arms, and Richard groaned, and essayed to
+speak.
+
+“Peace, boy,” tenderly said Edward; “and thou, Simon, hear me.  I loved
+thy father, and knew the upright noble spirit that arrayed him against
+us.  Heaven is my witness that I would have given my life to have been
+able to save him on yon wretched battle-field.  But he fell in fair
+fight, in helm and corselet, like a good knight.  Peace be with him!
+Surely in this land of pardon and redemption his son and nephew may cease
+to seek one another’s blood for his sake!  Cheer thy brother by letting
+him feel his brave deed hath not been fruitless.  Free thou shalt go—do
+what thou wilt; no word of mine shall betray that this deed is thine.”
+
+“Lay aside thy purpose,” entreated Richard.  “Bind him by oath, my Lord.”
+
+“Nay,” said the Prince.  “Here, on foreign soil, the strife lies between
+the cousins, the sons of Henry and of Eleanor; and if Simon must needs
+still slake his revenge in my blood, he may have better success another
+time.  Or, so soon as I can wear my armour again, I offer him a fair
+combat in the lists, man to man; better so than staining his soul with
+privy murder—but I had far rather that it should be peace between us—and
+that thou shouldst see it.”  And Edward, still supporting Richard on his
+breast, held out his right hand to Simon, adding, “Let not thy brother’s
+blood be shed in vain.”
+
+Richard made a gesture of agonized entreaty.
+
+“My father—my father!” he said.  “He forgave—he hated blood; Simon, didst
+but know—”
+
+“I see,” said Simon impatiently, “that Heaven and earth alike are set
+against my purpose.  Fear not for his days, Richard, they are safe from
+me, and here is my hand upon it.”
+
+The tone was sullen and grudging, and Richard looked scarcely comforted;
+but the Prince was in haste that he should be succoured at once, and even
+while receiving Simon’s unwilling hand, said, “We lose time.  Speed near
+enough to the Spital to be heard, and shout for aid.  Then seek thine own
+safety.  I will say no more of thy share in this matter.”
+
+Simon lingered one moment.  “Boy,” he said, “I told thee thou wast over
+like him.  Live, live if thou canst!  Alas!  I had thought to make surer
+work this time; but thou dost pardon me the mischance?”
+
+“More than pardon—thank thee—since he is safe,” whispered Richard, and as
+Simon bent over him the boy crossed his brow, and returned a look of
+absolute joy.
+
+Simon sped away; and the Prince, when left alone with Richard, put no
+restraint upon the warmth of his feelings, and his tears fell fast and
+freely.
+
+“Boy, boy,” he said; “I little thought thou wast to bear what was meant
+for me!”  And then, with tenderness that would have seemed foreign to his
+nature, he inquired into the pain that Richard was suffering, tried to
+make his position more easy, and lamented that he could not venture to
+draw out the weapon until the leeches should come.
+
+“It has been my best hope,” said Richard; “and now that it should have
+been thus.  With your goodness I have nothing—nothing to wish.  Sir
+Raynald will be here—I have only my charge for Henry to give him—and poor
+Leonillo!”
+
+“I will bear thy charges to Henry,” said the Prince.  “Nor shall he think
+thou didst betray his secret.  I will watch over him so far as he will
+let me, and do all I may for his child.  Yet it may be thou wilt still
+return.  I hear the stir in the House.  They will be here anon.  Thou
+must live, Richard, my friend, where I have few friends.  I thought to
+have knighted thee, boy, when thou hadst won fame.  Oh, would that I had
+shown thee more of my love while it was time!”
+
+“All, all I hoped or longed for I have,” murmured Richard.  “If you see
+Henry, my Lord, bear him my greetings—and to poor Adam—yea, and my
+mother.  Oh! would that I could make them all know your kindness and my
+joy—that it should be thus!”
+
+By this time the whole Hospital was astir, and the knights and lay
+brethren came flocking out in consternation and dread of finding their
+royal host himself murdered within their cloisters.
+
+Great was the confusion, and eager the search for the assassin, while
+others crowded round the Prince, who still would not give up his post of
+supporting the sufferer in his arms, while a few moments’ examination
+convinced the experienced infirmarers that the wound was mortal, and that
+the extraction of the dagger would but hasten death, which could not be
+other than very near.  Indeed, Richard already spoke with such difficulty
+that only the Prince’s ear could detect his entreaty that Raynald Ferrers
+might act as his priest.  Raynald was already near, only withheld by the
+crowd of knights of higher degree who had thronged before him.  Richard
+looked up to him with a face that in all its mortal agony seemed to ask
+congratulation.  The power of making confession was gone, and when
+Raynald would have offered to take him in his own arms, both he and the
+Prince showed disinclination to the move.  So thus they still remained,
+while the young knightly priest spoke the words of Absolution, and then,
+across the solemn darkness of the garden, amid the light of tapers, the
+Host was borne from the Chapel, while the low subdued chant of the
+brethren swelled up through the night air.  Poor little John of Dunster,
+with his arms round Leonillo’s neck, to keep him from disturbing his
+master, knelt, sobbing as though his heart would break, but trying to
+stifle the sounds as the priest’s voice came grave and full on the silent
+air, responded to by the gathered tones of the brethren: the fountain
+bubbled on, and the wakening birds began to stir in the trees.
+
+Once more Richard opened his eyes, looked up at his Prince, and smiled.
+That smile remained while Edward kissed his brow with fervour, laid him
+down on the cushions, and rising to his feet, bowed his head to the Grand
+Master, but did not even strive to speak, and gravely walked across the
+cloister, with a slow though steady step, to his own chamber.  No one saw
+him again till the sun was high, when, with looks as composed as ever, he
+went forth to lay his page’s head in the grave, and thence visit and calm
+the fears of his Princess.
+
+Search had everywhere been made for the assassin, but no traces of him
+were found.  Only the strange pilgrim had vanished in the confusion; and
+the Prince never contradicted the Grand Master in his indignation that a
+Moslem hound should have assumed such a disguise.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII
+THE BEGGAR AND THE PRINCE
+
+
+    “This favour only, that thou would’st stand out of my sunshine.”
+
+                                                                 DIOGENES.
+
+IT was the last week of August, 1274, the morrow of the most splendid
+coronation that England had ever beheld, either for the personal
+qualities and appearance of the sovereigns, or for the magnificence of
+the adornments, and the bounteous feasting of multitudes.
+
+A whole fortnight of entertainments to rich and poor had been somewhat
+exhausting, even to the guests; and the suburbs of London wore an
+unusually sleepy and quiescent appearance in the hot beams of the August
+sun.  Bethnal Green lay very silent, parched, and weary, not even
+enlivened by its usual gabbling flocks of geese, all of whom, poor
+things! except the patriarchal gander, and one or two of his ladies, had
+gone to the festival—but to return no more!
+
+One of those who had been in the midst of the pageant, and had returned
+unscathed, was Blind Hal of Bethnal Green.  Many a coin had gone into his
+scrip—uncontested king of the beggars as he was; many a savoury morsel
+had been conveyed to him and his child by his admiring brethren of the
+wallet; with many a gibing scoff had he driven from the field presuming
+mendicants, not of his own fraternity; and with half-bitter, half-amused
+remarks, had he listened to the rapturous descriptions of the splendours
+of king, queen, and their noble suite.  And pretty Bessee had clung fast
+to his hand, and discreetly guided him through every maze of the crowd,
+with the strange dexterity of a child bred up in throngs.  And now tired
+out with the long-continued festivities, the beggar sat in front of his
+hut, basking in the sun, and more than half asleep; while Bessee, her lap
+full of heather-blossoms and long bents of grass, was endeavouring to
+weave herself chains, bracelets, and coronals, in imitation of those
+which had recently dazzled her eyes.
+
+She had just encircled her dark auburn locks with a garland of purple
+heather, studded here and there with white or gold, when, starting upon
+her little bare but delicately clean pink feet, she laid her hand on her
+father’s lap, and said, “Father, hark!  I see two of the good red monks
+coming!”
+
+“Well, child; and wherefore waken me?  They are after their own affairs,
+I trow.  Moreover, I hear no horses’ feet.”
+
+“They are not riding,” said Bessee; “and they are walking this way.  They
+have a dog, too!  Oh, such a gallant glorious dog, father!  Ah,” cried
+she joyfully, “’tis the good Father Grand Prior!” and she was about to
+start forward, but the blind man’s ear could now distinguish the
+foot-falls; and holding her fast, he almost gasped—“And the other,
+child—who is he?”
+
+“No knight at our Spital!  A stranger, father.  So tall, so tall!  His
+mantle hardly reaches his knee his robe leaves his ankles bare.  O
+father, they are coming.  Let me go to meet dear good Father Robert!  But
+what—Oh, is the fit coming?  Father Robert will stop it!”
+
+“Hush thy prattle,” said the beggar, clutching her fast, and listening as
+one all ear; and by this time the two knights were close at hand, the
+taller holding the dog, straining in a leash, while the good Grand Prior
+spoke.  “How fares it with thee, friend?  And thou, my pretty one?  No
+mishaps among the throng?”
+
+“None,” returned Hal; “though the King and his suite _did_ let loose five
+hundred chargers in the crowd at their dismounting, to trample down
+helpless folk, and be caught by rogues.  Largesse they called it!  Fair
+and convenient largesse—easily providing for those that received it!”
+
+“No harm was done,” briefly but sharply exclaimed the strange knight; and
+the blind man, who had, as little Bessee at least perceived, been turning
+his acute ear in that direction all the time he had been speaking, now
+let his features light up with sudden perception.
+
+But Sir Robert Darcy, thinking that he only now became aware of the
+stranger’s presence, said, “A knight is here from the East, who brings
+thee tidings, my son.”
+
+Sir Robert would have said more, but the beggar standing up, cut him
+short, by saying, “So, cousin, you have yet to learn the vanity of
+disguises and feignings towards a blind man.”
+
+“Nay, fair cousin,” was the answer, “my feigning was not towards you; but
+I doubted me whether you would have the world see me visit you in my
+proper character.  Will not you give me a hand, Henry?”
+
+“First say to me,” said Henry, embracing with his maimed arm his staff,
+planted in front of him defiantly, and still holding tight his little
+daughter in his hand, “what brings you here to break into the peace of
+the poor remnant of a man you have left?”
+
+“I come,” said Edward patiently, “to fulfil my last—my parting promise,
+to one who loved us both—and gave his life for me.”
+
+“Loved you, ay! and well enough to betray me to you!” said Henry
+bitterly.
+
+“No, Henry de Montfort, ten thousand times no!” said Edward.  “I would
+maintain in the lists the honour and loyalty of my Richard towards you
+and me and all others.  His faithfulness to you brought him into peril of
+death and disgrace in the wretched matter of poor Henry of Almayne; and
+he would have met both rather than have broken his faith.”
+
+“Then,” said Henry, still with the same mocking tone, “how was it that my
+worthless existence became known to his Grace?”
+
+“I knew of your having vanished from Evesham Abbey,” returned Edward:
+“and thus knowing, I understood a letter, the writing of which had
+brought suspicion on Richard, and which was brought back to me when we
+were seeking into—”
+
+“Into the deed of Simon and Guy,” said Henry.  “Poor Henry!  It was a
+foul crime; and Father Robert can bear me witness that I did penance for
+it, when that kindly heart of his was laid in St. Peter’s Abbey.”
+
+“Then, Henry, thou own’st thy kinship to us still,” said Edward
+earnestly.  “Give me thine hand, man, and let me embrace my lovely little
+kinswoman—a queen in her trappings.  Ah, Henry!  Heaven hath dealt
+lovingly with thee in sparing thee thy child!”
+
+“You have children left!” said Henry quickly, and not withholding a
+hand—which, be it remarked, was as delicately shaped and well kept as
+that which took it.
+
+Twice had the beggar received a dole at Westminster at the obsequies of
+Edward’s little sons; yea, though he and all his brethren of the dish had
+all the winter before had alms given them to purchase their prayers for
+the health of the last.
+
+“Three—but three out of six,” answered Edward; “nor dare I reckon on the
+life of the frail babe that England hailed yesterday as my heir.  I
+sometimes deem that the blight of broken covenants has fallen on my
+sons.”
+
+“They were none of your breaking,” said Henry.
+
+“Say’st thou so!” exclaimed Edward, looking up, with the animation of a
+man hearing an acquittal from a quarter whose sincerity he could
+thoroughly trust.
+
+But Henry made no courtly answer.  “Pshaw! no living man that had to deal
+with or for your father could keep a covenant.  You were but the
+spear-point of the broken reed, good cousin; and we pitied and excused
+you accordingly.”
+
+“Your father did,” said Edward hoarsely.  He could brook pity from the
+great Simon better than from the blind beggar.
+
+“Ay, marry, that did he,” returned Henry, “as he closed his visor that
+last morn, after looking out on that wild Welsh border scum that my fair
+brother-in-law had marshalled against us.  ‘By the arm of St. James,’
+said he, ‘if Edward take not heed, that rascaille will deal with us in a
+way that will be worse for him than for us!’”
+
+“A true foreboding,” said the King.  “Henry, do thou come and be with me.
+All are gone!  Scarce a face that I left in England has welcomed me on my
+return.  Come, thou, in what guise thou wilt—earl, counsellor, or
+bedesman—only be with me, and speak to me thy father’s words.”
+
+“Who—I, my Lord?” returned Henry.  “I am no man to speak my father’s
+words!  They flew high over my head, and were only caught by grave youths
+such as yourself.  I, who was never trusted with so much as a convoy.
+No, no; all the counsel I shall ever give, is to the beggars, which
+coat-of-arms is like to rain clipped silver, and which honest round penny
+pieces!  Poor Richard! he bore the best brain of us all, and might have
+served your purpose.  Sit down, and tell me of the lad.—Bessee, little
+one, bring out the joint-stool for the holy Father.”
+
+And Henry de Montfort made way on the rude bench outside his hut, with
+all the ease and courtesy of the Earl of Leicester receiving his kinsman
+the King.  But meantime, the dog, which had been straining in the leash,
+held by Edward throughout the conference, leapt forward, and vehemently
+solicited the beggar’s caresses.  “Ah, Leonillo!” he said, recognizing
+him at once, “thou hast lost thy master!  Poor dog! thou art the one
+truly loyal to thy master’s blood!”
+
+“It was Richard’s charge to take him to thee,” said Edward: “but if he be
+burdensome to thee, I would gladly cherish him, or would commit him to
+faithful Gourdon, with whom he might be happier.  Since he lost his
+master the poor hound hath much pined away, and will take food from none
+but me, or little John of Dunster.”
+
+Leonillo, however, who seemed to have an unfailing instinct for a
+Montfort, was willingly accepting the eager and delighted attentions of
+the little girl; though he preferred those of her father, and cowered
+down beneath his hand, with depressed ears and gently waving tail, as
+though there were something in the touch and voice that conferred what
+was as near bliss as the faithful creature could enjoy without his deity
+and master.
+
+Meantime, the Grand Prior discreetly removed his joint-stool out of
+hearing of the two cousins, and called the little maid to rehearse to him
+the Credo and Ave, with their English equivalents—a task that pretty
+Bessee highly disapproved after the fortnight’s dissipation, and would
+hardly have performed for one less beloved of children than Father
+Robert.
+
+The good Grand Prior knew that the King would have much to say that would
+beseem no ear save his kinsman’s; and in effect Edward told what none
+besides would ever hear respecting the true author of the attempts on his
+own life.
+
+“Spiteful fox.  Such Simon ever was!” was the beggar’s muttered comment.
+“Well that he knows not of my poor child!  So, cousin, thou hast kept his
+counsel,” he added in a different tone.  “I thank thee in the name of
+Montfort and Leicester.  It was well and nobly done.”
+
+And Henry de Montfort held out his hand with the dignity of head of the
+family whose honour Edward had shielded.
+
+“It was for thy father’s sake and Richard’s,” said Edward, receiving the
+acknowledgment as it was meant.
+
+“Ah, well,” said Henry, relapsing into his usual half-scoffing tone; “in
+that boy our Montfort blood seems to have run clear of the taint it got
+from the she-fiend of Anjou.”
+
+“Thy share was from a mocking fiend!” returned the King.
+
+“Ay, and a fair portion it is!” said the beggar.  “My jest and my song
+have borne me through more than my sword and spurs ever did—and have been
+more to me than English earldom or French county.  Poor Richard!” he
+added with feeling; “I told him his was the bondage and mine the
+freedom!”
+
+“Alas!  I fear that so it was,” said Edward.  “My favour only embittered
+his foes.  Had I known how it would end, I had never taken him to me; but
+my heart yearned to my uncle’s goodly son.”
+
+“Maybe it is well,” said Henry.  “Had the boy grown up verily like my
+father, thou and he might have fallen out; or if not—why, you knights and
+nobles ride in miry bloody ways, and ’tis a wonder if even the best of
+you does not bring his harness home befouled and besmirched—not as
+shining bright as he took it out.  Well, what didst thou with the poor
+lad?  Cut him in fragments?  You mince your best loved now as fine as if
+they were traitors.”
+
+“No,” said Edward; “the boy lies sleeping in the Church of St. John, at
+Acre.  I rose from my sickbed that I might lay him in his grave as a
+brother.  Lights burn round him, and masses are said; and the brethren
+were left in charge to place his effigy on his tomb, in carven stone.
+One day I trust to see it.  My brother Alexander of Scotland, Llewellyn
+of Wales, and I, have sworn to one another to bring all within these four
+seas into concord and good order; and then we may look for such a
+blessing on our united arms as may bear us onward to Jerusalem!  Then
+come with us, Henry, and let us pray together at Richard’s grave.”
+
+“I may safely promise,” said Henry, smiling, “if this same Crusade is to
+be when peace and order are within the four seas.  Moreover, thou wilt
+have ruined my trade by that time!”
+
+“Nay, Henry, cease fooling.  See—if thou wilt not be thyself, I will find
+thee a lodge in any park of mine.  None shall know who thou art; but thou
+shalt have free range, and—”
+
+“And weary of my life!  No, no, cousin.  I am in thy power now; and thou
+canst throw me into prison as the attainted Lord de Montfort.  Do so if
+thou wilt; but I were fooling indeed to give up my free range, my power,
+my authority, to be a poor suspected, pitied, maimed pensioner on thy
+bounty.  Park, quotha! with none to speak to from morn to night.  I can
+have my will of any park of thine I please, whenever I choose!”
+
+Edward would have persisted, but Henry silenced him effectually, with a
+sarcastic hint that his favours had done little for Richard.  Then the
+King prayed at least that he would consider his child; but to the
+proposal of taking her to the palace, Henry returned an indignant
+negative: “He had seen enough of the court ladies,” he said.
+
+A hot glow of anger lighted Edward’s cheek, for he loved his mother; but
+the blind beggar could not be the subject of his wrath, and he merely
+said, “Thou didst not know my wife!”
+
+“Ay, I will believe the court as perfect as thou thinkest to make the
+isle; but Bessee shall not bide there.  She is the blind beggar’s child,
+and such shall she remain.  Send me to a dungeon, as I said, and thou
+canst pen her in a convent, or make her a menial to thy princesses, as
+thou wilt; but while my life and my freedom are my own I keep my child.”
+
+“I could find it in my heart to arrest thee,” said Edward, “when I look
+at that beautiful child, and think to what thou wouldst bring her.”
+
+“She is fair then,” said the beggar eagerly.
+
+“Fair!  She is the loveliest child mine eyes have looked on: though some
+of mine own have been very lovely.  But she hath the very features of our
+royal line—though with eyes deep and dark, like thy father’s, or my
+Richard’s—and a dark glow of sunny health on her fair skin.  She bears
+her, too, right royally.  Henry, thou canst not wreck the fate of a child
+like that.”
+
+“No, assuredly,” said Henry dryly.  “I have not done so ill by her
+hitherto, by thine own showing, that I should not be trusted with her for
+the future.”
+
+“The parting would be bitter,” began Edward “but thou shouldst see her
+often.”
+
+“Slay me, and make her a ward of the crown,” said Henry.  “Otherwise I
+will need no man’s leave for seeing my daughter.  But ask her.  If she
+will go with thee, I will say no more.”
+
+King Edward was fond of children—most indulgent to his own, and kind to
+all little ones, who, attracted by the sweetness which his stern, grave,
+beautiful countenance would assume when he looked at them—always made
+friends with him readily.  So he trusted to this fascination in the case
+of the little Lady Elizabeth.  He held out his hands to her, and claimed
+her as his cousin; and she came readily to him, and stood between his
+knees.  “Little cousin,” he said, “wilt thou come home with me, to be
+with my two little maids, the elder much of thine age?”
+
+“You are a red monk!” said Bessee, amazed.
+
+“That’s his shell, Bessee,” said her father; “he has come a-masking, and
+forgot his part.”
+
+“I don’t like masking,” said Bessee, trying to get away.
+
+“Then we will mask no more,” said Edward.  “Thou hast looked in my face
+long enough with those great black eyes.  Dost know me, child?”
+
+Bessee cast the black eyes down, and coloured.
+
+“Dost know me?” he repeated.
+
+“I think,” she whispered at last, “that you are masking still.  You are
+like—like the King that was crowned at the Abbey.”
+
+“Well said, little maid!  And shall I take thee home, and give thee
+pearls and emeralds to braid thy locks, instead of these heath-bells?”
+
+“Father,” said Bessee, trying to withdraw her little hands out of
+Edward’s large one, which held both fast.  “O father, is he masking
+still?”
+
+“No, child; it is the King indeed,” said Henry.  “Hear what he saith to
+thee.”
+
+And again Edward spoke of all that would tempt a child.
+
+“Father,” said Bessee, “if father comes!”
+
+“No, Bessee,” said her father; “I have done with palaces.  No places they
+for blind beggars.”
+
+“Oh, let me go! let me go!” cried Bessee, struggling.  And as the King
+released her hands, she flew to her father.  “He would lose himself
+without me!  I must be with father.  O King, go away!  Father, don’t let
+him take me!  Let me cry for Jock of the Wooden Spoon, and Trig One Leg,
+and Hedgerow Wat!”
+
+“Hush, hush, Bess!” said Henry, not desirous that his royal cousin should
+understand the strength of his body-guard of honour.  “The King here is
+as trusty and loyal as the boldest beggar among us.  He only gave thee
+thy choice between him and me!”
+
+“Thee, thee, father.  He can’t want me.  He has two eyes and two hands,
+and a queen and two little girls; and thou hast only me!” and she clung
+round her father’s neck.
+
+“Little one,” said Edward, “thou need’st not shrink from me.  I will not
+take thee away.  Thy father hath a treasure, and ’tis his part to strive
+not to throw it away.  Only should either thou or he ever condescend so
+far as to seek for counsel with this poor cousin of thine, send this
+token to me, and I will be with thee.”
+
+But it was full nine years ere Edward saw that jewel again.  Meantime he
+was not entirely without knowledge of his kinsman.  On every great
+occasion the figure, conspicuous for the scrupulous cleanliness of the
+dark russet gown, and the careful arrangement of the hair and beard, and
+the fillet which covered the eyes, as well as for a lordly bearing, that
+even the stoop of blindness could not disguise, was to be seen dominating
+over all the other beggars, sitting on the steps of church or palace
+gates, as if they had been a throne; troubling himself little to beg, but
+exchanging shrewd remarks with all who addressed him, and raising many a
+laugh among the bystanders.  Leonillo lay contented at his feet; but
+after just enough time had elapsed to show that he cared not for the
+King’s remonstrance, he ceased to be accompanied by his little daughter,
+and was led by a boy in her stead.
+
+The King, making inquiries of the Grand Prior, learnt that pretty Bessee
+was daily deposited at the sisterhood of Poor Clares, where she remained
+while her father was out on his begging expeditions, and learnt such
+breeding as convents then gave.
+
+“In sooth,” said Sir Robert, “honest Hal believes it is all for good-will
+and charity and love to the pretty little wench; and so it is in great
+part: but methought it best to give a hint to the mother prioress that
+the child came of good blood.  She is a discreet lady, and knows how to
+deal with her; and truly she tells me their house has prospered since the
+little one came to them.  Every feast-day morn have they found their
+alms-dish weightier with coin than ever she knew it before.”
+
+When Edward repeated this intelligence to his queen, she recollected Dame
+Idonea’s gossiping information—that brave Sir Robert, the flower of the
+House of Darcy, had only entered the Order of St. John, when fair Alda
+Braithwayte, in the strong enthusiasm of the Franciscan preaching, had
+pleaded a vow of virginity against all suitors, and had finally become a
+Sister of the Poor Clares.  And after all his wars and wanderings, the
+regulations of his Order had ended by bringing the Hospitalier in his old
+age into the immediate neighbourhood of Prioress Alda; and into that
+distant business intercourse that the heads of religious houses had from
+time to time to carry on together.
+
+The world passed on.  Eleanor de Montfort came from France, and the King
+himself acted the part of a father to her at her marriage with Llewellyn
+of Wales.  He knew—though she little guessed—that the beggar, by whom her
+jewelled train swept with rustling sound, was the first-born of her
+father’s house, and should have held her hand.  Two years only did that
+marriage last; Eleanor died, leaving an infant daughter; and Llewellyn
+soon after was in arms against the English.  Perhaps Edward bethought him
+of his cousin’s ironical promise to go with him to the East after the
+pacification of the whole island, when he found himself obliged to summon
+the fierce Pyrenean to pursue the wild Welsh in their mountains.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV
+THE QUEEN OF THE DEW-DROPS
+
+
+    “This is the prettiest low-born lass that ever
+    Ran on a green sward.”—_Winter’s Tale_.
+
+IT was the summer of 1283; the babe of Carnarvon had been accepted as the
+native prince, speaking no tongue but Welsh, and Edward had since been
+employed in establishing his dominion over Wales.  His Whitsuntide was
+kept by the Queen’s special entreaty at St. Winifred’s Well.  Such
+wonders had been told her of the miracles wrought by this favourite Welsh
+saint, that she hoped that by early placing her little Welsh-born son
+under such protection, she might secure for him healthier and longer life
+than had been the share of his brethren.
+
+So to Holy-well went the court and army.  Some lodged in the convent
+attached to the well; but many and many more dwelt in tents, or lodged in
+cottages, or raised huts of boughs of trees.  Noble ladies of Eleanor’s
+suite were glad to obtain a lodging in rude Welsh huts; and as the
+weather was beautiful, there was plenty of gay feasting, dancing, and
+jousting on the greensward, when the religious observances of the day
+were over.  Pilgrims thronged from all parts, attracted both by the
+presence of the court and the unusual tranquillity of Wales; and for
+nearly a mile around the Holy-well it was like one great motley fair,
+resorted to by persons of all stations.  Beggars of course were there in
+numbers, and among them the unfailing blind beggar of Bethnal Green, who
+always made a pilgrimage in the summer to some station of easy access
+from London, but whom some wondered to see at such a distance.
+
+“Had he scented that the court was coming?” asked the young nobles.
+
+“Not he; he never haunted courts.  He would have kept away had he known
+that such a gabbling flock of popinjays were on the wing thither!”
+
+But the young gallants were chiefly bent on speculating on the vision of
+loveliness that had flashed on the eyes of some early visitants at the
+well.  A maiden in a dark pilgrim dress, and broad hat, which, however,
+could not entirely conceal a glowing complexion, at once rich and pure;
+perfect features, magnificent dark eyes and hair, and a tall form, which,
+though very youthful, was of unmistakable dignity and grace.  She was
+always at the well exceedingly early in the morning, moving slowly round
+it on her beautiful bare feet, and never looking up from the string of
+dark beads—the larger ones of amber, which she held in her fingers—as her
+lips conned over the prayers connected with each.  No ring was on the
+delicate hand, no ear-ring in the ear; there was no ornament in the
+dress, but such a garb was wont to be assumed by ladies of any rank when
+performing a vow; and its simplicity at once enhanced her beauty, and
+added to the general curiosity.  Between four and six in the dewy
+freshness of morning seemed to be her time for devotion; and though the
+habits of the court were early, it was only the first astir who caught a
+sight of this Queen of the Dew-drops, as it was the fashion to call her.
+Late comers never caught sight of her, and affected incredulity when the
+younger and more active knights and squires raved about her.  Then it was
+reported that the King himself had been seen speaking to her; and
+thereupon excitement grew the more intense, because Edward’s exclusive
+devotion to his Queen had been such, that from his youth up the most
+determined scandal had never found a wandering glance to note in him.
+
+She was the Princess of France—of Navarre—of Aragon—in disguise; nay, at
+the Whit-Sunday banquet there were those who cast anxious glances to the
+door, expecting that, in the very land of King Arthur, she would walk in
+like his errant dames at Pentecost, to demand a champion.  And when a
+joust was given on the sward, young Sir John de Mohun, the Lord of
+Dunster, announced his intention of tilting in honour of no one save the
+Queen of the Dew-drops.  The ladies of the court were rather scandalized,
+and appealed to the King whether the choice of an unknown girl, of no
+acknowledged rank, should be permitted; but the King, strict punctilious
+man as he was, only laughed, and adjudged the Queen of the Dew-drops to
+be fully worthy of the honour.
+
+After this, early rising became the fashion of Holy-well.  All the
+gentlemen got up early to look at the Queen of the Dew-drops; and all the
+ladies got up early to see that the gentlemen did not get into mischief;
+and the maiden’s devotions became far from solitary; but she moved on,
+with a sort of superb unconcern, never lifting the dark fringes that
+veiled the eyes so steadily fixed on the beads that dropped through her
+fingers, until, as she finished, she raised up her head with a
+straightforward fearless look at the way she was going, so completely
+self-possessed that no one ventured to accost her, and to follow her at
+less than such a respectful distance, that she was always lost sight of
+in the wood.
+
+At last, late one evening, there was a sudden start of exultant
+satisfaction among some of the young men who were lounging on the green;
+for the most part not the nobles of the court, but certain young
+merchants of London and Bristol, who had followed the course of
+pilgrimage by the magnetism of fashionable resort.  The Queen of the
+Dew-drops was seen, carrying a pitcher!  Up started four or five
+gallants, offering assistance, and standing round her, wrangling with one
+another, and besetting her steps.
+
+“Let me pass, gentles,” she said with dignity, “I am carrying wine in
+haste to my father.”
+
+“Nay, fair one, you pass not our bounds without toll,” said the portliest
+of the set.
+
+“Hush, rudesby; fair dames in disguise must be treated after other sort.”
+
+Every variety of half-insulting compliment was pouring upon her; but she,
+with head erect, and steady foot, still quietly moved on, taking no
+notice, till a hand was laid on her pitcher.
+
+“Let go!” then she said in no terrified voice.  “Let go, Sir, or I can
+summon help.”
+
+And as if to realize her words, the intrusive hand was thrust aside by a
+powerful arm, and a voice exclaimed—
+
+“This lady is to pass free, Sir!  None of your insolence!”
+
+“A court-gallant,” passed round the hostile bourgeoise; “none of your
+court airs, Sir.”
+
+“No airs—but those of an honest Englishman, who will not see a woman
+cowardly beset!”
+
+“Will Silk-jerkin not bide a buffet!” quoth the bully of the party,
+clenching his fist.
+
+“As many as thou wilt,” returned Silk-jerkin, “so soon as I have seen the
+lady safe home!”
+
+“Ho! ho!—a fetch that!” and the fellow, a coarse rude-looking man, though
+rather expensively dressed, flourished his fist in the face of the young
+man, but was requited that instant with a round blow that levelled him
+with the ground.  The others fell back from the tall strong-limbed,
+open-faced youth, and the girl took the opportunity of moving forward,
+swiftly indeed, but so steadily as to betray no air of terror.  Meantime,
+the young gentleman’s voice might be heard, assuring his adversaries that
+he was ready to encounter one or all of them so soon as he had escorted
+the lady safe home.  Perhaps she hoped that another attack would delay
+him; but if so, her expectations were disappointed, for in a second or
+two his quick firm tread followed her, and just as she had gained the
+mazy wood-path, he was beside her.
+
+“Thanks, Sir,” she said, “for the service you have done me, but I am now
+in safety.”
+
+“Nay, Lady, do me the grace of letting me bear your load.”
+
+“Thanks,” again she said; “but I feel no weight.”
+
+“But my knighthood does, seeing you thus laden.”
+
+“Spare your knighthood the sight, then,” she said smiling, and looking up
+with a glance of brightness, such as her hitherto sedate face had never
+before revealed to him.
+
+“That cannot be!” he exclaimed with fervency.  “You bid me in vain leave
+you till I see you safe; and while with you, all laws of courtesy call on
+me to bear your burthen!  So, Lady—”
+
+And he laid his hand upon the leathern thong that sustained the pitcher;
+but at that moment three or four heaps of rags, that had been lying under
+the trees by the woodland path, erected themselves, and one in especial,
+whom the young knight had observed as a frightful cripple seated by day
+near the well, now came forward brandishing his crutch in a formidable
+manner, and uttering a howl of defiance.  But the lady silenced him at
+once—
+
+“Peace, good Trig, nothing is amiss!  It is only this gentleman’s
+courtesy.  He hath done me good service on the green yonder!”
+
+And as her strange body-guard retreated growling, she, perhaps to show
+her confidence, resigned her pitcher into the knight’s hand.
+
+“So, fair Queen of the Dew-drops,” he said, half bewildered, “thou dost
+work miracles!”
+
+“Ay, when the dew is on the grass, and the nightingale sings,” she
+returned gaily; “by day the enchantment is over.”
+
+By this time they had reached a low turf hut; and the maiden, turning at
+the door, held out her hand, and said, “Thanks, fair Sir, I must enter my
+enchanted palace alone; but grammercy for thy kind service, and
+farewell.”
+
+The maiden and the pitcher vanished.  The knight watched the rude door in
+vain—he only saw a few streaks of light through the boards.  Then he
+bethought him of questioning her guards, but when he reached their tree
+they were gone.  It was fast growing dark, and he was one of the King’s
+personal attendants, and subject to the strict regulations of his
+household; so, dazed and bewildered as he was, he walked hastily back to
+the hospice, where the King and Queen lodged.  Supper had already begun,
+and the glare of lights dazzled his eyes.  In his bewilderment, he served
+the King with mustard instead of honey from the great silver ship full of
+condiments, in the centre of the table.
+
+“How’s this, Sir John?” said the King, who always had a kindly corner in
+his heart for this young knight.  “Are these the idle days of thy Crusade
+come again?”
+
+“I could well-nigh think so!” half-whispered Sir John.
+
+“He looks moonstruck!” cried that spoilt ten years old damsel, Joan of
+Acre, clasping her hands with mischievous fun.  “Oh! has he seen the
+Queen of the Dew-drops?”
+
+“What dost thou know of the Queen of the Dew-drops, my Lady Malapert?”
+said King Edward, marking the red flush that mounted to the very brow of
+the downright young knight.
+
+“Oh, I know that she is at the well every morning, and is as lovely as
+the dawn!  Ay, and vanishes so soon as the sun is up; but not ere she has
+bewitched every knight of them all!  And did not my Lord of Dunster hold
+the field in her honour against all comers?  No wonder she appears to
+him.—Oh! tell us, Sir John! what like was she?”
+
+“Hush, Joan,” said Queen Eleanor, bending forward, “no infanta in my time
+ever said so much in a breath.”
+
+“No, Lady-mother; because you had to speak whole mouthfuls of grave
+Castillian words.  Now, good English can be run off in a breath.  Reyna
+del Rocio—that’s more majestic, but not so like fairyland as Queen of the
+Dew-drops!”
+
+Princess Joan’s mouth was effectually stopped this time.
+
+The adventure of the evening had led to the discovery of the hut of the
+Queen of the Dew-drops.  The young knight had as usual been betimes at
+the well, but the maiden did not appear there.  Then he questioned the
+cripple—who by day was an absolute helpless cripple—but the man utterly
+denied all knowledge of any such circumstance.  He, why, poor wretch that
+he was, he never hobbled further than the shed close behind the well; he
+would give the world if he could get as far as the wood—he knew nothing
+about ladies or pilgrims—such a leg as his was enough to think about.
+And the display to which he forthwith treated the Knight of Dunster was
+highly convincing as to his incapacity.
+
+Into the wood wandered the much-confused knight, recognizing, step by
+step, the path of the night before.  The turf hut was before him—the door
+was open—and in the doorway sat the maiden herself, spinning, the distaff
+by her side, the spindle dancing on the ground, and the pilgrim’s hat no
+longer hiding her beauteous brow and wealth of dark braided hair.  But,
+intolerable sight, seven or eight of last night’s loungers were dispersed
+hither and thither in the bushes, gazing with all their eyes,
+endeavouring to attract her attention; some by conversations with one
+another; one richly-dressed Gascon squire, of the train of Edward’s ally,
+the Count de Béarn, by singing a Provençal love ditty; while a merchant
+of Bristol set up a counter attempt with a long doleful English ballad.
+All the time the fair spinster sat in the doorway, with the utmost
+gravity, twisting her thread and twirling her spindle; but it might be
+observed that she had so placed herself as to have full command of the
+door, and to be able to shut herself in whenever she chose.
+
+No one had yet ventured to accost her.  There was something in her air
+that rendered it almost impossible for any one to force himself upon her,
+and a sort of fear mingled with the impression she made.  However, the
+young knight, although a bashful man by nature, had one advantage in his
+court breeding, and another in the acquaintance he had made last night.
+He walked straight up, and doffing his velvet cap, began, “Greet you
+well, fair Queen.  I could not but take your challenge to see whether
+your power lasted when the dew was off.”
+
+The damsel rose with due courtesy as he approached, but ere she had
+attempted an answer, nay, even before the words were out of his mouth,
+the Gascon was shouting in French that this was no fair play, he had
+stolen a march; and the merchant had sprung forward saying, “Girl,
+beware, court gallants mean not well by country wenches.”
+
+“Thou liest in thy throat,” burst forth the knight.  “Discourteous
+lubber, to call such a queen of beauty a country wench!”
+
+“Listen to me, girl.”
+
+“Lady, hear me.”
+
+“Hearken not to the popinjay foreigner.”
+
+These, and many more tumultuary exclamations, threats, and entreaties,
+crowded on one another, and the various speakers were laying hand on
+staff or sword, and glaring angrily on one another, when the word
+“Peace,” in the maiden’s clear silvery notes, sounded among them.  They
+all turned as she stood in the doorway, drawn up to her full height.
+
+“Peace,” she said; “I can have no brawling here!  My father was
+grievously sick yesterday, and is still ill at ease.  One by one speak
+your business, and begone.  You first, Sir,” to the Gascon, she said in
+French.
+
+“Ah! fair Lady, what business could be mine, save to tell you how lovely
+you are?”
+
+“You have said,” she answered, without a blush, waving him aside.  “Now
+you, Sir,” to the tuneful merchant of Bristol.
+
+“I told you, Madam, he meant not well.  Those aliens never do.”
+
+“You too have said,” she answered.
+
+The merchant would have persisted, but a London merchant, a much more
+substantial and considerable character, pushed him aside, and the numbers
+being all against him, he was forced to give way.
+
+“Young woman,” said the merchant, “you are plainly of better birth and
+breeding than you choose to affect.  Now I am thinking of getting
+married.  I have ships at sea, and stuffs and jewels coming from Venice
+and Araby; and I am like to be Lord Mayor ere long; but there’s that I
+like in your face and discreet bearing, and I’ll make you my wife, and
+give you all my keys—your father willing!”
+
+“Your turn’s out, old burgher,” said a big, burly, and much younger man,
+pressing forward.  “Pretty wench!  I’m not like to be Lord Mayor, nor
+nothing of that sort; but I’m a score of years nigher thine age, and a
+lusty fellow to boot, that could floor any man at single-stick, within
+the four seas.  Ay, and have been thought comely too, though Joyce o’ the
+haugh did play me false; and I come o’ this pilgrimage just to be merry
+and forget it.  If thou wilt take me, and come back to spite Joyce, thou
+shalt be hostess of the Black Bull, at Brentford, where all the great
+folk from the North ever put up when they come to town; the merriest and
+richest hostel, and will have the comeliest host and hostess round about
+London town!”
+
+The lady bowed her head.  Perhaps those rosy lips were trying hard to
+keep from laughing.
+
+“A hostel’s no place for a discreet dame to bide in,” put forth an honest
+voice.  “Maiden, I know not who or what you are, but I came o’ this
+pilgrimage to please my old mother, who said I might do my soul good, and
+bring home a wife—better over the moor than over the mixen—and I know she
+would give thee a right good welcome.  I’m Baldric of the Cheddar Cliff,
+and we have held our land ever since the old days, or ever the Norman
+kings came here.  Three hundred kine, woman, and seven score swine, and
+many an acre of good corn land under the hill.”
+
+The lady had never looked up while these suitors were speaking.  When
+Baldric of Cheddar had done, she gave one furtive glance through her long
+eyelashes, as if to see if there were any more, and then her cheek
+flushed.  There still remained the knight.  Some others had slunk away
+when brought to such close quarters, but he stepped forth more
+hesitatingly, and said, “Lady, I know not whether the bare rock and
+castle I have to offer can weigh against the ships, the hostel, or the
+swine.  I have few of either; I am but a poor baron, but such as I am, I
+am wholly yours.  Thine eyes have bound me to you for ever, and all I
+seek is leave to make myself better known, and to ask that your noble
+father may not deem me wholly unworthy to be your suitor.”
+
+The lady trembled a little, but she held her place in the doorway.
+“Gentles,” she said, “I thank ye for the honour ye have done me, but I
+may not dispose of mine own self.  My father is ill at ease, and can see
+no one; but he bids me tell you that he will meet all who have aught to
+say to him, under the trysting tree at Bethnal Green, the day after the
+Midsummer feast.”
+
+With these words she retired into her hut, and closed the door.  She was
+seen again no more that day; and on the next the hut stood open, empty,
+and deserted.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV
+THE BEGGAR’S DOWRY
+
+
+    “‘But first you shall promise and have it well knowne
+    The gold that you drop shall all be your owne;’
+    With that they replyed, ‘Contented we bee;’
+    ‘Then here’s,’ quoth the beggar, ‘for pretty Bessee.’”
+
+                                                             _Old Ballad_.
+
+THE day after Midsummer had come, and towards the fine elm tree that then
+adorned the centre of Bethnal Green, three horsemen were wending their
+way.  Each had his steed a good deal loaded: each looked about him
+anxiously.
+
+“By St. Boniface,” said one, “the girl’s father is not there.  Saucy
+little baggage, was she deluding us all?”
+
+“Belike he is bringing too long a train of mules with her dowry to make
+much speed,” quoth the merchant.  “He will think it needful to collect
+all his gear to meet the offers of Master Lambert of Cripple-gate.  Ha!
+Sir Knight, well met!  You are going to try your venture!”
+
+“I must!  So it were not all enchantment,” said the knight, almost
+breathlessly, gazing round him.  “Yet,” he said, almost to himself,
+“those eyes had a soul and memories that ne’er came out of fairyland!”
+
+“Ha!” exclaimed the innkeeper, “there’s old Blind Hal under the tree!
+I’ll tell him to get out of our way.  Hal!” he shouted, “here’s a tester
+for thee, but thou’st best keep out of the way of the mules.”
+
+“What mules, Master Samson?” coolly demanded Hal, who had comfortably
+established himself under the tree with his back against the trunk.
+
+“The mules that the brave burgess is going to bring his daughter’s dowry
+on.  They are cranky brutes, Hal; bad customers for blind men—best let me
+give thee a hand out of the way.”
+
+“But who is this burgess that you talk of?” asked the beggar.
+
+“The father of the pilgrim lass that prayed at St. Winifred’s Well,” said
+Samson.
+
+“And was called Queen of the Dew-drops?”
+
+“Ay, ay, old fellow!  Thou knowest every bird that flies!  She is to be
+my wife, I tell thee, and a right warm corner shall she keep for thee at
+the Black Bull, for thou canst make sport for the guests right well.”
+
+“I hope she will keep a warm corner for me,” said the beggar; “for no man
+will treat for her marriage save myself.”
+
+“Thou!  Old man, who sent thee here to insult us?” cried the merchant.
+
+“None, Master Lambert.  I trysted you to meet me here if you purposed
+still to seek my child in marriage.”
+
+“Thy child?” cried all three, vehemently.
+
+“My child!” answered the beggar.  “Mine own lawful child.”
+
+There was a silence.  Presently Samson growled, “I mind me he used to
+have a little black-eyed brat with him.”
+
+“Caitiff!” exclaimed the merchant; “I’ll have thy old vagabond bones in
+the Fleet for daring so to cheat his Grace’s lieges.”
+
+“If you can prove a cheat against me I will readily abye it, Sir,”
+returned the beggar.
+
+“Palming a beggar’s brat off for a noble dame.”
+
+“So please you, Sir,” interrupted the beggar, “keep truth with you.  What
+did the child or I ever profess, save what we were?  No foul words here.
+I trysted you to meet me here, anent her marriage.  Have you any offers
+to make me?”
+
+“Aye, of a cell in the Fleet if you persist in your insolence!” cried the
+merchant.
+
+“Thanks,” quietly said the beggar.  “And you, Master Samson?”
+
+“’Tis a sweet pretty lass,” said Samson, ruefully; “and pity of her too,
+but you see a man like me must look to his credit.  I’ll give her twenty
+marks to help her to a husband, Hal, only let her keep out of my sight
+for ever and a day.”
+
+“I thought I heard another voice,” said the beggar.  “I trow the third
+suitor has made off without further ado.”
+
+“Not so, fair Sir,” said a voice close to him, thick and choked with
+feeling.  “Your daughter is too dear to me for me thus to part, even were
+mine honour not pledged.”
+
+“Sir knight,” interfered the merchant, “you will get into a desperate
+coil with your friends.”
+
+“I am my own master,” answered the knight.  “My parents are dead.  I am
+of age, and, Sir, I offer myself and all that is mine to your fair
+daughter, as I did at Saint Winifred’s Well, as one bound both by honour
+and love.”
+
+“It is spoken honourably,” said Hal; “but, Sir, canst thou answer me with
+her dowry?  Tell down coin for coin.”
+
+He held up a heavy leathern bag.  The knight, who had come prepared, took
+down another such bag from his saddle-bow.  Down went one silver piece
+from the knight.  Down went another from the beggar.
+
+“Stay, stay,” cried Samson.  “I can play at that game too.”
+
+“No, no, Master Samson,” said the beggar; “your pretensions are resigned.
+Your chance is over.”
+
+Mark after mark—crown after crown—all the Dunster rents; all the old
+hoards, with queer figures of Saxon kings, lay on the grass, still for
+each the beggar had rained down its fellow, and inexhaustible seemed the
+bags that he sat upon.  Samson bit his lips, and the merchant muttered
+with vexation.  It could not be fairly come by: he must be the president
+of a den of robbers; it should be looked to.
+
+The last bag of the knight lay thin and exhausted; the beggar clutched
+one bursting with repletion.
+
+“I could not put the lands and castle of Dunster into a bag and add
+thereto,” said the knight, at last.  “Would that I could, my sword, my
+spurs, and knightly blood to boot, and lay them at your daughter’s feet.”
+
+“Let them weigh in the balance,” said the beggar; “and therewith thy
+truth to thy word.”
+
+“And will you own me?” exclaimed the knight.  “Will you take me to your
+daughter?”
+
+“Nay, I said not so,” returned Blind Hal.  “I am not in such haste.  Come
+back on this day week, when I shall have learnt whether thou art worthy
+to match with my child.”
+
+“Worthy!” John of Dunster chafed and bit his lips at such words from a
+beggar.
+
+“Ay, worthy,” repeated the beggar, guessing his irritation.  “I like thee
+well, as a man of thy word, so far, but I must know more of him who is to
+mate with my pretty Bessee.”
+
+It was that evening that a page entered the royal apartments, and giving
+a ring to the King, informed him that a blind beggar had sent it in, and
+entreated to speak with him.
+
+“Pray him to come hither,” said the King; “and lead him carefully.  Thou,
+Joan, hadst better seek thy mother and sister.”
+
+“O sweet father,” cried Joan, “don’t order me off.  This can be no state
+business.  Prithee let me hear it.”
+
+“That must be as my guest pleases, Joan,” he answered; “and thou must be
+very discreet, or we shall have him reproaching me for trying to rule the
+realm when I cannot rule my own house.”
+
+“Father, I verily think you are afraid of that beggar!  I am sure he is
+as mysterious as the Queen of the Dew-drops!” cried the mischievous girl.
+
+The curtain over the doorway was drawn back, and the beggar was led into
+the chamber.  The King advanced to meet him, and took his hand to lead
+him to a seat.  “Good morrow to thee,” he said; “cousin, I am glad thou
+art come at last to see me.”
+
+“Thanks, my Lord,” said the beggar, with more of courtly tone than when
+they had met before, and yet Joan thought she had never seen her father
+addressed so much as an equal; “are any here present with you?”
+
+“Only my wilful little crusading daughter, Joan,” said Edward, beckoning
+to her, and putting her proud reluctant fingers into the hand of the
+beggar, who bent and raised them to his lips—as the fashion then
+was—while the maiden reddened and looked to her father, but saw him only
+smiling; “she shall leave us,” he added, “if thy matters are for my
+private ear.  In what can I aid thee?”
+
+“In this matter of daughters,” answered the beggar; “not that I need aid
+of yours, but counsel.  I would know if the heir of old Reginald
+Mohun—John, I think they call him—be a worthy mate for my wench.”
+
+Joan had in the meantime placed herself between her father’s knees, where
+she stood regarding this wonderful beggar with the most unmitigated
+astonishment.
+
+“John of Dunster!” said the King, stroking down Joan’s hair, “thou knowst
+his lineage as well as I, cousin.”
+
+“His lineage, true,” replied Henry; “but look you, my Lord, my child, the
+light of mine eyes, may not go from me without being assured that it is
+to one who will, I say, not equal her in birth, but will be a faithful
+and loving lord to her.”
+
+“Hath he sought her?” asked the King.
+
+“Even so, my liege.  The maid is scarce sixteen; I thought to have kept
+her longer; but so it was—old Winny, her mother’s old nurse, fell sick
+and died in the winter; and the Dominican, who came to shrive her, must
+needs craze the poor fool with threats that she did a deadly sin in
+bringing my sweet wife and me together; and for all the Grand Prior, who,
+monk as he is, has a soldier’s sense, could say of the love that
+conquered death, nothing would serve the poor woman to die in peace till
+my Bessee had vowed to make a six weeks’ station at her patroness’s well,
+where we were wedded, and pray for her soul and her blessed mother’s.  So
+there we journeyed for our summer roaming; and all had been well, had you
+not come down on us with all the idle danglers of the court to gaze and
+rhyme and tilt about the first fair face they saw.  Even then so discreet
+was the girl that no more had befallen, but as ill-luck would have it, my
+old Evesham keepsake,” touching his side, “burst forth again one evening,
+and left me so spent, that Bessee sent the boy to get me a draught of
+wine.  The boy—mountebank as he is—lost her groat, and played truant; and
+she, poor wench, got into such fear for me that she went herself, and
+fell in with a sort of insolent masterful rogues, from whom this young
+knight saved her.  I took her home safe enough after that, and thought to
+be rid of the knaves when they saw my wallet; and so truly I am, all save
+this lad!”
+
+“O father! it is true love!” whispered Joan.
+
+“What hast to do with true love, popinjay?  And so John of Dunster came
+undaunted to the breach, did he, Henry?”
+
+“Not a whit dismayed he!  Now either that is making light of his honour,
+or ’tis an honour higher than most lads understand.  Cousin, I would have
+the child be loved as her father and mother loved!  And methinks she
+affects this blade.  The child hath been less like my merry lark since we
+met him.  A plague on the springalds!  But you know him.  Has he your
+good word?”
+
+“John of Dunster?” said the King.  “Henry, didst thou not know for whose
+sake I had loved and proved him?  He was Richard’s pupil.  I was forced
+to take the child with me, for old Sir Reginald had been unruly enough,
+and I thought would be the less troublesome to my father were his son in
+my keeping.  But I half repented when I saw what a small urchin it was,
+to be cast about among grooms and pages!  But Richard aided the little
+uncouth varlet, nursed him when sick, guarded him when well, trained him
+to be loyal and steadfast.  The little fellow came bravely to my aid in
+my grapple with the traitor before Acre; and when the blow had fallen on
+Richard, the boy’s grief was such that I loved him ever after.  And of
+late I have had no truer trustier warrior.  I warrant me he was too shy
+to tell thee that I knighted him last year in the midst of some of the
+best feats of arms I ever beheld against the Welsh!  Whatever John de
+Mohun saith is sooth, and I would rather mate my daughter with him than
+with many a man of fairer speech.”
+
+“Then shall he have my pretty Bessee!” said the beggar, lingering over
+the words.  “But one boon I would further ask, cousin; that thou breathe
+no word to him of my having sought thee.”
+
+The young Lord of Dunster had not been noted for choiceness of apparel;
+but when he repaired to the trysting-tree, none could have found fault
+with the folds of his long crimson tunic, worked with the black and gold
+colours of his family, nor with the sit of the broad belt that sustained
+his sword, assuredly none with his beautiful sleek black charger.
+
+But under the tree stood not the blind beggar, but the beggar’s boy.
+
+“Blind Hal bids you meet him at the Spital, at your good pleasure,” said
+the boy; and like the mountebank he was, tumbled three times head over
+heels.
+
+John de Mohun looked round and about, and saw no alternative but to obey.
+All his love was required to endure so strange a father-in-law, who did
+not seem in the least grateful for the honour intended to his daughter;
+but the knight’s word was pledged, and he rode towards the Hospital.
+
+The court of the Hospital was full of steeds and serving-men.  A strange
+conviction came over John that he saw the King’s strong white charger—ay,
+and the palfreys of the elder princesses; and he asked the lay-brother
+who offered to take his horse, if the King were there.  The brother only
+replied by motioning him towards the inner quadrangle.
+
+He passed on accordingly, and as he went, the bells broke forth into a
+merry peal.  On the top of the steps leading to the arched doorway, he
+saw a scarlet cluster of knights, and among them the Grand Prior, robed
+as for Mass.  A space was clear within the deep porch, and there stood
+the beggar in his russet suit.
+
+“Sir John de Mohun of Dunster,” he said, “thou art come hither to espouse
+my daughter?”
+
+“I hope, so, Sir,” said John, somewhat taken by surprise.
+
+“Come hither, maiden,” said her father.
+
+The cluster of knights opened, and from within the church there appeared
+before the astonished bridegroom the stately form of King Edward, leading
+in his hand the dark-tressed, dark-haired maiden, dressed in spotless
+white, the only adornment she wore a circlet of diamonds round her
+flowing dark hair—the Queen indeed of the Dew-drops.  And behind her
+walked with calm dignity the beautiful Princess Eleanor, now nearly a
+woman, holding with a warning hand the merry mischievous Joan.
+
+Well might John of Dunster stand dazzled and amazed, but hesitation or
+delay there was none.  Then and there, by the Grand Prior himself, was
+the ceremony performed, without a word of further explanation.  The rite
+over, when the bridegroom took the bride’s hand to follow, as all were
+marshalled on their way, he knew not whither, she looked up to him
+through her dark eyelashes, and murmured, “They would not have it
+otherwise!”
+
+“Deem you that I would?” said the knight fervently, pressing her hand.
+
+“I deemed that you should know all—who I am,” she faltered.
+
+“My wife, the Lady of Dunster.  That is all I need to know,” replied Sir
+John, with the honest trustworthy look that showed it was indeed enough
+to secure his heart-whole love and reverence.
+
+The great hall of the Spital was decked for the bridal feast.  The bride
+and bridegroom were placed at the head of the table, and the King gave up
+his place beside the bride to her blind father.  All the space within the
+cloister without was strewn with rushes, where sat and feasted the whole
+fraternity of beggars; and well did the Grand Prior and his knights do
+their part in the entertainment.
+
+Then when the banquet was drawing to its close, the blind beggar bade the
+boy that waited near him fetch his harp.  And, as had often before been
+his practice, he sang in a deep manly voice, to the boy’s accompaniment
+on his harp.  But the song that then he sang had never been heard before,
+nor was its exact like ever heard again; though tradition has handed down
+a few of the main features, and (as may be seen by this veracious
+narration) somewhat vulgarized them:—
+
+    “A poore beggar’s daughter did dwell on a greene,
+    Who might for her faireness have well been a queene;
+    A blithe bonny lasse and a dainty was she,
+    And many one callèd her pretty Bessee.”
+
+Even the King, who had so well guarded the secret, was entirely
+unprepared to hear the Montfort parentage thus publicly avowed; and the
+bride, who had as little known of her father’s intentions, sat with
+downcast eyes, blushing and tearful, while the beggar’s recitative went
+briefly and somewhat tremulously over his resuscitation, under the hands
+of the fair and faithful Isabel.  Her hand was held by her bridegroom
+from the first, with a pressure meant to assure her that no discovery
+could alter his love and regard; but when the name of Montfort sounded on
+his ear, the hand wrung hers with anxiety; and when the entire tale had
+been told, and the last chord was dying away, he murmured, “Look up at
+me, my loveliest.  Now I know why I first loved thine eyes.  Thou art
+dearer to me than ever, for the sake of my first and best friend!”
+
+His words were only for herself.  The King was saying aloud,
+
+“Well sung, fair cousin!  A health, my Lords and Knights, for Sir Henry
+de Montfort, Earl of Leicester.”
+
+“Not so, Lords and Knights!” called this strange personage, the only one
+who would thus have contradicted the King; “the Earl of Leicester has
+long ago been dead, as you have heard.  If you drink, let it be to Blind
+Hal of Bethnal Green.”
+
+Nor could all the entreaties of daughter, son-in-law, nor King, move him
+from his purpose of living and dying as Blind Hal, the beggar.  He had
+tasted too long of liberty, he said, to put himself under constraint.  To
+live in Somersetshire, as his daughter wished, would have been banishment
+and solitude to one used to divert himself with every humour of the city;
+and to be, as he declared, a far more complete king of the beggars than
+ever his cousin Edward was over England.  All he would consent to, was
+that a room in a lodge in Windsor Park should be set apart for him under
+charge of Adam de Gourdon, who had been present at this scene, and was
+infinitely rejoiced at the sight of a scion of the House of Montfort.
+For the rest, he bade every one to forget his avowal, which, as he said,
+he had only made that the blanch lion might share with the Mohun cross;
+and as he added to Princess Eleanor, “that you court dames may never
+flout at pretty Bessee!  Had the Cheddar Yeoman been the true man, none
+had ever known that she was a Montfort.”
+
+“Would you have given her to the Cheddar Yeoman?” burst out Joan
+furiously.
+
+“That he will say so, to anger thee, is certain, Joan,” said the King.
+“Farewell, Henry.  Remember, I hold thee bound to be my comrade when I
+can return to the Holy War.”
+
+“Ay, when you have tamed Scotland, even as you have tamed Wales,”
+returned Henry.
+
+“No fear of my good brother Alexander’s realm needing such taming.
+Heaven forbid!” said Edward.
+
+But the beggar parted from him with a laugh.
+
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI
+THE PAGE’S MEMORY
+
+
+    The pure calm picture of a blameless friend.
+
+                                                        _Lyra Apostolica_.
+
+TEN years later, King Edward was walking in the park at Windsor with slow
+and weary steps.  His rich dark brown hair and beard were lined with
+gray, his face was not only grave but worn and melancholy, and more
+severe than ever.  The sorrow of his life, his queen’s death, had fallen
+on him, and with her had gone much of softening influence; the only son
+who had been spared to him was, though a mere child, grieving him by the
+wayward frivolities not of a strong but of a weak nature; he had wrought
+much for his country’s good, but had often been thwarted and never
+thanked; his mercies and benefits were forgotten, his justice counted as
+harshness, and hatred and opposition had met him everywhere.  Above all,
+and weighting him perhaps most severely, was that his first step beyond
+his just bounds had been taken in the North.  John Baliol was indeed
+king, but Edward in his zeal for discipline had bound Scotland with
+obligations—for her good indeed, but beyond his just right to impose; and
+the sense of aggression was embittering him against the Scottish
+resistance, while at the same time adding to his sadness.
+
+A knight came forth from one of the paths that led into that along which
+he was pacing with folded arms, and unwilling to break upon his mood,
+stood waiting, till Edward himself looked up and asked impatiently, “So,
+Sir John, what now?  Another outbreak of those intolerable Scotch?”
+
+“Not so, my Lord; but the Bailiff of Acre awaits to see you.”
+
+“Bailiff of Acre!  What is the Bailiff of Acre to me?  I cannot hear all
+their importunities for a crusade!  Heaven knows how gladly I would
+hasten to the Holy War, if these savage Scots would give me peace at
+home.  I am weary of their solicitations.  Cannot you tell him I would be
+private, John?”
+
+“My Lord, he says he has matter for your private ear, concerning one whom
+you met in Palestine—and, my Lord, you will sure remember him—Sir
+Reginald Ferrers.”
+
+“The friend of Richard!” said Edward, with a changed countenance.  “Bring
+him with you to your father-in-law’s lodge, John.  If there be aught to
+hear of the House of Montfort, it concerns him and you likewise.  I was
+on my way thither.”
+
+In a short time the woodland lodge, in one of the most beautiful glades
+of Windsor Forest, beheld the King seated on a bench placed beneath a
+magnificent oak, standing alone in its own glade, and beside him the
+Blind Beggar in his russet suit; far less changed than his royal cousin
+during these years.  Since Edward’s great sorrow, Henry de Montfort had
+held less apart from him; and whenever the King was at leisure to snatch
+a short retirement at one of his hunting lodges, he always sent an
+intimation to the beggar, who would journey down on a sober ass, and
+under the care of De Gourdon, now the chief of the hunting staff, would
+meet the King in some sylvan glade.  Why it was a comfort to Edward to be
+with him, it would be hard to say; probably from the habit of old
+fellowship, for Henry’s humour had not grown more courtly or less
+caustic.
+
+From under the trees came John de Mohun, now a brave, stout,
+hearty-looking English baron; and with him, wrapped in a battered and
+soiled scarlet mantle, a war-worn soldier, his complexion tanned to deep
+brown, his hair bleached with toil and sun, a scar on his cheek, a halt
+on his step—altogether a man in whom none would have recognized the
+bright, graceful, high-spirited young Hospitalier of twenty years since.
+Only when he spoke, and the smiling light beamed in his eye, could he be
+known for Sir Reginald Ferrers.
+
+He would have bent his knee, but Edward took his hand, and bowing his own
+bared head said, “It is we who should crave a blessing from you, holy
+Father, last defender of the sacred land.”
+
+“Alas, my Lord,” said Sir Raynald, as he made the gesture of blessing;
+“Heaven’s will he done!  Had we but been worthier!  Sir,” he added, “I am
+in no guise for a royal presence, but I have been sent home from Cyprus
+to recover from my wounds; and I had a message for you which I deemed you
+would gladly hear before I had joined mine Order.”
+
+“A message?” said Edward.
+
+“A message from a dying penitent, craving pardon,” replied Sir Raynald.
+
+“If it concerns the House of Montfort, speak on,” said Edward.  “None are
+so near to it as those present with me!”
+
+“Thou hast guessed right, my Lord King!” replied Sir Raynald.  “It does
+concern that House.  Have I your license to tell my tale at some length?”
+
+Edward gave permission; and a seat having been brought, Sir Raynald
+proceeded to speak of that last Siege of Acre, when, amid the
+multitudinous tribunals of mixed races, and the many sanctuaries which
+sheltered crime, the unhappy city had become a disgrace to the Christian
+name.  The Sultan Malek Seraf was concentrating his forces on it; all the
+unwarlike inhabitants had been sent away; and the Knights of the two
+Orders, with the King of Cyprus and his troops, had shut themselves up
+for their last resistance—when among the mercenaries, who enrolled
+themselves in the pay of the Hospitaliers, came a sunburnt warrior, who
+had evidently had long experience of Eastern warfare, though his speech
+was English, French, or Provençal, according to the person who addressed
+him.  Fierce and dreadful was the daily strife; the new soldier fought
+well, but he was not noticed, till one night.  “Ah, Sir!” said the
+Hospitalier, “even then our holy and beautiful house was in dire
+confusion, our garden trodden down and desolate!  One night, I heard
+strange choking sobs as of one in anguish.  I deemed that one of our
+wounded had in delirium wandered into the garden, and was dying there.
+But I found—at the foot of the stone cross we set beside the fountain,
+where the attempt on you, Sir, was made—this warrior lying, so writhing
+with anguish, that I could scarce believe it was grief, not pain, that
+thus wrought with him!  I lifted him up, and spake of repentance and
+pardon.  No pardon for him, he said; it was here that he had slain his
+brother!  I spake long and earnestly with him, but he called himself
+sacrilegious murderer again and again.  Nay, he had even—when after that
+wretched night you wot of, Sir, he left our House—in his despair and hope
+to leave remorse behind, he had become a Moslem, and fought in the
+Saracen ranks.  All hope he spurned.  No mercy for him, was his cry!  I
+would have deemed so—but oh! I thought of Richard’s parting hope; I
+remembered our German brethren’s tale, how the Holy Father, the Pope,
+said there was as little hope of pardon as that his staff should bud and
+blossom; and lo, in one night it bore bud and flower.  I besought him for
+Richard’s sake to let me strive in prayer for him.  All day we fought on
+the walls—all night, beside Richard’s cross, did he lie and weep and
+groan, and I would pray till strength failed both of us.  Day after day,
+night after night, and still the miserable man looked gray with despair,
+and still he told me that he knew Absolution would but mock his doom.  He
+could fear, but could not sorrow.  And still I spoke of the Saviour’s
+love of man—and still I prayed, and all our house prayed with me, though
+they knew not who the sinner was for whom I besought their prayers.  At
+last—it was the day when the towers on the walls had been won—I came back
+from the breach, and scarce rested to eat bread, ere I went on to the
+Cedar and the Cross.  Beside it knelt Sir Simon.  ‘Father,’ he said, ‘I
+trust that the pardon that takes away the sin of the world, will take
+away mine.  Grant me Absolution.’  He was with us when, ere dawn, such of
+us as still lived met for our last mass in our beautiful chapel.  He went
+forth with us to the wall.  By and by, the command was given that we
+should make a sally upon the enemy’s camp.  We went back for the last
+time to our house to fetch our horses; I knew there could be no return,
+and went for one last look into our chapel, and at Richard’s tomb.  Upon
+it lay the knight, horribly scathed with Greek fire—he had dragged him
+there to die.  He was dead, but his looks were upward; his face was as
+calm as Richard’s was, my Lord, when we laid him down by the fountain.
+And now his message, my Lord.  He bade me say, if I survived the siege,
+that he had often cursed you for the worse revenge of letting him live to
+his remorse—now he blessed you for sparing him to repent.”
+
+“And Richard’s grave has passed to the Infidels!” said Edward, after a
+long silence.
+
+“Even as the graves of our brethren—the holiest Grave of all,” said the
+Knight Hospitalier.
+
+“Cheer up and hope, Father,” said the King.  “Let me see peace and order
+at home, and we will win back Acre, ay and Jerusalem, from the Infidels.
+Alas! our young hopes and joys may never return; but, home purified, then
+may God bless our arms beneath the Cross.”
+
+                                * * * * *
+
+Fifteen years more, and in the beautiful Westminster Abbey, amid the
+gorgeous tombs, there stood four sorrowful figures.  A sturdy knight,
+with bowed head and mournful look, carefully guided a white-haired,
+white-bearded old man, while a beautiful matronly lady was handed by her
+tall handsome son.
+
+Among the richly inlaid shrines and monuments, they sought out one the
+latest of all, but consisting of one enormous block of stone, with no
+ornament save one slender band of inscription.
+
+“Ah!” said the knight, “well do I remember the shipping of that stone
+from Acre, little guessing its purpose!”
+
+“Then it is indeed a stone from the ruined Temple of Jerusalem,” said the
+lady.  “Read the inscription, my Son.”
+
+The young man read and translated—
+
+“Edwardus Primus.           Malleus Scotorum       Pactum serva.
+Edward the First.       The Hammer of the Scots.   Keep covenant.”
+
+“It was scarce worth while to bring a stone from Jerusalem, to mark it
+with ‘the Hammer of the Scots!’” said the lady.
+
+“Alas, my cousin Edward!” sighed the beggar.  “Ever with a great scheme,
+ever going earnestly on to its fulfilment; with a mind too far above
+those of other men to be understood or loved as thou shouldst have been!
+Alack, that the Scottish temptation came between thee and the brightness
+of thy glory!  Art thou indeed gone—like Richard—to Jerusalem; and shall
+I yet follow thee there?  Let us pray for the peace of his soul,
+children; for a greater and better man lies here than England knows or
+heeds.”
+
+
+
+
+FOOTNOTES
+
+
+{100}  Psalm cxxvi. 6, 7.
+
+
+
+
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+<meta http-equiv="Content-Type" content="text/html; charset=US-ASCII" />
+<title>The Prince and the Page, by Charlotte M. Yonge</title>
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+<pre>
+
+The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Prince and the Page, by Charlotte M.
+Yonge, Illustrated by Adrian Stokes
+
+
+This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere in the United States and most
+other parts of the world at no cost and with almost no restrictions 
+whatsoever.  You may copy it, give it away or re-use it under the terms of
+the Project Gutenberg License included with this eBook or online at 
+www.gutenberg.org.  If you are not located in the United States, you'll have
+to check the laws of the country where you are located before using this ebook.
+
+
+
+
+Title: The Prince and the Page
+       A Story of the Last Crusade
+
+
+Author: Charlotte M. Yonge
+
+
+
+Release Date: July 28, 2019  [eBook #3696]
+[This file was first posted July 24, 2001]
+
+Language: English
+
+Character set encoding: ISO-646-US (US-ASCII)
+
+
+***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PRINCE AND THE PAGE***
+</pre>
+<p>Transcribed from the 1909 Macmillan and Co. edition by David
+Price, email ccx074@pglaf.org</p>
+<p style="text-align: center">
+<a href="images/cover.jpg">
+<img alt=
+"Book cover"
+title=
+"Book cover"
+ src="images/cover.jpg" />
+</a></p>
+<h1><span class="GutSmall">THE</span><br />
+PRINCE AND THE PAGE</h1>
+<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">A STORY OF
+THE LAST CRUSADE</span></p>
+
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall">BY THE
+AUTHOR OF</span><br />
+&ldquo;THE HEIR OF REDCLYFFE,&rdquo;<br />
+<span class="GutSmall">ETC.</span></p>
+
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center">WITH A FRONTISPIECE BY ADRIAN
+STOKES</p>
+
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center">MACMILLAN AND CO., LIMITED<br />
+ST. MARTIN&rsquo;S STREET, LONDON<br />
+<span class="GutSmall">1909</span></p>
+
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall"><span
+class="smcap">Richard Clay and Sons</span></span><span
+class="GutSmall">, </span><span class="GutSmall"><span
+class="smcap">Limited</span></span><span
+class="GutSmall">,</span><br />
+<span class="GutSmall">BREAD STREET HILL, E.C. AND</span><br />
+<span class="GutSmall">BUNGAY, SUFFOLK.</span></p>
+<p style="text-align: center"><span class="GutSmall"><i>First
+Edition printed</i></span><span class="GutSmall"> 1865
+(</span><span class="GutSmall"><i>Pott</i></span><span
+class="GutSmall"> 8</span><span
+class="GutSmall"><i>vo</i></span><span class="GutSmall">).&nbsp;
+</span><span class="GutSmall"><i>Reprinted</i></span><span
+class="GutSmall"> 1873, 1875, 1877, 1878, 1881</span><br />
+<span class="GutSmall">(</span><span
+class="GutSmall"><i>Globe</i></span><span class="GutSmall">
+8</span><span class="GutSmall"><i>vo</i></span><span
+class="GutSmall">), </span><span class="GutSmall"><i>March and
+November</i></span><span class="GutSmall"> 1883, 1886.&nbsp;
+</span><span class="GutSmall"><i>Second Edition</i></span><span
+class="GutSmall"> 1891 (</span><span
+class="GutSmall"><i>Crown</i></span><span class="GutSmall">
+8</span><span class="GutSmall"><i>vo</i></span><span
+class="GutSmall">)</span><br />
+<span class="GutSmall"><i>Reprinted</i></span><span
+class="GutSmall"> 1893, 1898, 1899, 1901, 1903, 1906,
+1909.</span><br />
+<span class="GutSmall"><i>Shilling Edition</i></span><span
+class="GutSmall">, 1908.</span></p>
+<p style="text-align: center">
+<a href="images/fpb.jpg">
+<img alt=
+"Frontispiece"
+title=
+"Frontispiece"
+ src="images/fps.jpg" />
+</a></p>
+<h2>PREFACE</h2>
+<p><span class="smcap">In</span> these days of exactness even a
+child&rsquo;s historical romance must point to what the French
+term its <i>pi&egrave;ces justficatives</i>.&nbsp; We own that
+ours do not lie very deep.&nbsp; The picture of Simon de Montfort
+drawn by his wife&rsquo;s own household books, as quoted by Mrs.
+Everett Green in her Lives of the Princesses, and that of Edward
+I. in Carte&rsquo;s History, and more recently in the Greatest of
+the Plantagenets, furnished the two chief influences of the
+story.&nbsp; The household accounts show that Earl Simon and
+Eleanor of England had five sons.&nbsp; Henry fell with his
+father at Evesham.&nbsp; Simon and Guy deeply injured his cause
+by their violence, and after holding out Kenilworth against the
+Prince, retired to the Continent, where they sacrilegiously
+murdered Henry, son of the King of the Romans&mdash;a crime so
+much abhorred in Italy that Dante represents himself as meeting
+them in torments in the <i>Inferno</i>, not however before Guy
+had become the founder of the family of the Counts of Monforte in
+the Maremma.&nbsp; Richard, the fourth son, appears in the
+household books as possessing dogs, and having garments bought
+for him; but his history has not been traced after his mother
+left England.&nbsp; The youngest son, Amaury, obtained the
+hereditary French possessions of the family, and continued the
+line of Montfort as a French subject.&nbsp; Eleanor, the only
+daughter, called the Demoiselle de Montfort, married, as is well
+known, the last native prince of Wales, and died after a few
+years.</p>
+<p>The adventure of Edward with the outlaw of Alton Wood is one
+of the stock anecdotes of history, and many years ago the romance
+of the encounter led the author to begin a tale upon it, in which
+the outlaw became the protector of one of the proscribed family
+of Montfort.&nbsp; The commencement was placed in one of the
+manuscript magazines which are so often the amusement of a circle
+of friends.&nbsp; It was not particularly correct in its details,
+and the hero bore the peculiarly improbable name of Wilfred (by
+which he has since appeared in the <i>Monthly Packet</i>).&nbsp;
+The story slept for many years in MS., until further reading and
+thought had brought stronger interest in the period, and for
+better or for worse it was taken in hand again.&nbsp; Joinville,
+together with the authorities quoted by Sismondi, assisted in
+picturing the arrival of the English after the death of St.
+Louis, and the murder of Henry of Almayne is related in all
+crusading histories; but for Simon&rsquo;s further career, and
+for his implication in the attempt on Edward&rsquo;s life at
+Acre, the author is alone responsible, taking refuge in the
+entire uncertainty that prevails as to the real originator of the
+crime, and perhaps an apology is likewise due to Dante for having
+reversed his doom.</p>
+<p>For the latter part of the story, the old ballad of The Blind
+Beggar of Bethnal Green, gives the framework.&nbsp; That ballad
+is believed to be Elizabethan in date, and the manners therein
+certainly are scarcely accordant with the real thirteenth
+century, and still less with our notions of the days of
+chivalry.&nbsp; Some liberties therefore have been taken with it,
+the chief of them being that Bessee is not permitted to go forth
+to seek her fortune in the inn at Romford, and the readers are
+entreated to believe that the alteration was made by the
+traditions which repeated Henry de Montfort&rsquo;s song.</p>
+<p>It was the late Hugh Millar who alleged that the huge stone
+under which Edward sleeps in Westminster Abbey agrees in
+structure with no rocks nearer than those whence the mighty
+stones of the Temple at Jerusalem were hewn, and there is no
+doubt that earth and stones were frequently brought by crusaders
+from the Holy Land with a view to the hallowing of their own
+tombs.</p>
+<p>The author is well aware that this tale has all the
+incorrectnesses and inconsistencies that are sure to attend a
+historical tale; but the dream that has been pleasant to dream
+may be pleasant to listen to; and there can be no doubt that, in
+spite of all inevitable faults, this style of composition does
+tend to fix young people&rsquo;s interest and attention on the
+scenes it treats of, and to vivify the characters it describes;
+and if this sketch at all tends to prepare young people&rsquo;s
+minds to look with sympathy and appreciation on any of the great
+characters of our early annals, it will have done at least one
+work.</p>
+<p><i>December</i> 12<i>th</i>, 1865.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER I<br />
+THE STATELY HUNTER</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;&lsquo;Now who are thou of the darksome
+brow<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Who wanderest here so
+free?&rsquo;<br />
+&ldquo;&lsquo;Oh, I&rsquo;m one that will walk the green green
+woods,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Nor ever ask leave of
+thee.&rsquo;&rdquo;&mdash;S. M.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>A <span class="smcap">fine evening</span>&mdash;six centuries
+ago&mdash;shed a bright parting light over Alton Wood,
+illuminating the gray lichens that clung to the rugged trunks of
+the old oak trees, and shining on the smoother bark of the
+graceful beech, with that sidelong light that, towards evening,
+gives an especial charm to woodland scenery.&nbsp; The long
+shadows lay across an open green glade, narrowing towards one
+end, where a path, nearly lost amid dwarf furze, crested heather,
+and soft bent-grass, led towards a hut, rudely constructed of
+sods of turf and branches of trees, whose gray crackling foliage
+contrasted with the fresh verdure around.&nbsp; There was no
+endeavour at a window, nor chimney; but the door of wattled
+boughs was carefully secured by a long twisted withe.</p>
+<p>A halbert, a broken arrow, a deer-skin pegged out on the
+ground to dry, a bundle of faggots, a bare and blackened patch of
+grass, strewn with wood ashes, were tokens of recent habitation,
+though the reiterations of the nightingale, the deep tones of the
+blackbird and the hum of insects, were the only sounds that broke
+the stillness.</p>
+<p>Suddenly the silence was interrupted by a clear, loud, ringing
+whistle, repeated at brief intervals and now and then exchanged
+for the call&mdash;&ldquo;Leonillo!&nbsp; Leon!&rdquo;&nbsp; A
+footstep approached, rapidly overtaken and passed by the rushing
+gallop of a large animal; and there broke on the scene a large
+tawny hound, prancing, bounding, and turning round joyfully,
+pawing the air, and wagging his tail, in welcome to the figure
+who followed him.</p>
+<p>This was a youth thirteen years old, wearing such a dress as
+was usual with foresters&mdash;namely, a garment of home-spun
+undyed wool, reaching to the knee, and there met by buskins of
+deer-skin, with the dappled hair outside; but the belt which
+crossed one shoulder was clasped with gold, and sustained a
+dagger, whose hilt and sheath were of exquisite
+workmanship.&nbsp; The cap on his head was of gray rabbit-skin,
+but a heron&rsquo;s plume waved in it; the dark curling locks
+beneath were carefully arranged; and the port of his head and
+shoulders, the mould of his limbs, the cast of his features, and
+the fairness of his complexion, made his appearance ill accord
+with the homeliness of his garb.&nbsp; In one hand he carried a
+bow over his shoulder; in the other he held by the ears a couple
+of dead rabbits, with which he playfully tantalized the dog,
+holding them to his nose, and then lifting them high aloft, while
+the hound, perfectly entering into the sport, leapt high after
+them with open mouth, and pretended to seize them, then bounded
+and careered round his young master with gay short barks, till
+both were out of breath; and the boy, flinging the rabbits on the
+turf, threw himself down on it, with one arm upon the neck of the
+panting dog, whose great gasps, like a sobbing of laughter,
+heaved his whole frame.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, good Leonillo, take your rest!&rdquo; said the boy:
+&ldquo;we have done yeoman&rsquo;s service to-day, and shown
+ourselves fit to earn our own livelihood!&nbsp; We are outlaws
+now, my lion of the Pyrenees; and you at least lead a merrier
+life than in the castle halls, when we hunted for sport, and not
+for sustenance!&nbsp; Well-a-day, my Leon!&rdquo;&mdash;as the
+creature closed his mouth, and looked wistfully up at him with
+almost human sympathy and intelligence&mdash;&ldquo;would that we
+knew where are all that were once wont to go with us to the
+chase!&nbsp; But for them, I would be well content to be a bold
+forester all my days!&nbsp; Better so, than to be ever vexed and
+crossed in every design for the country&rsquo;s
+weal&mdash;distrusted above&mdash;betrayed beneath!&nbsp; Alack!
+alack! my noble father, why wert thou wrecked in every
+hope&mdash;in every aim!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>These murmurings were broken off as Leonillo suddenly crested
+his head, and changed his expression of repose for one of intense
+listening.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Already!&rdquo; exclaimed the boy, springing to his
+feet, as Leonillo bounded forward to meet a stout hardy forester,
+who was advancing from the opposite end of the glade.&nbsp; This
+was a man of the largest and most sinewy mould, his face tanned
+by sun and wind to a uniform hard ruddy brown, and his shaggy
+black hair untrimmed, as well as his dark bristly beard.&nbsp;
+His jerkin was of rough leather, crossed by a belt, sustaining
+sword and dagger; a bow and arrows were at his back; a huge
+quarter-staff in his hand; and his whole aspect was that of a
+ferocious outlaw, whose hand was against every man.</p>
+<p>But the youth started towards him gleefully, as if the very
+sight of him had dispelled all melancholy musings, and shouted
+merrily, &ldquo;Welcome&mdash;welcome, Adam!&nbsp; Why so early
+home?&nbsp; Have the Alton boors turned surly? or are the
+King&rsquo;s prickers abroad, and the neighbourhood unwholesome
+for bold clerks of St. Nicholas?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Worse!&rdquo; was the gruff mutter in reply.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Down, Leon: I am in no mood for thy freaks!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What is it, Adam?&nbsp; Have the keepers carried their
+complaints to the King, of the venison we have consumed, with
+small thanks to him?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Prince Edward is at Alton!&nbsp; What think you of
+that, Sir?&nbsp; Come to seek through copse and brake for the
+arrant deer-stealer and outlaw, and all his gang!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Why, there&rsquo;s preferment for you!&rdquo; said the
+boy, laughing.&nbsp; &ldquo;High game for the heir of the
+throne!&nbsp; And his gang!&nbsp; Hold up your head, Leonillo:
+you and I come in for a share of the honour!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hold up your head!&rdquo; said the outlaw
+bitterly.&nbsp; &ldquo;You may chance to hold it as high as your
+father&rsquo;s is, for all your gibes and jests, my young Lord,
+if the Longshanks gets a hold of you, which our Lady
+forefend.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, I think better of my Cousin Longshanks.&nbsp; I
+loved him well when I was his page at Hereford: he was tenderer
+to me than ever my brothers were; and I scarce think he would
+hang, draw, and quarter me now.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You may try, if you are not the better
+guided.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How did you hear these tidings?&rdquo; inquired the
+boy, changing his mood to a graver one.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;From the monk to whom you confessed a fortnight
+back.&nbsp; Did you let him know your lineage?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How could I do otherwise?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He looked like a man who would keep a secret; and
+yet&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Shame&mdash;shame to doubt the good father!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, I do not say that I do; but I would have the
+secret in as few men&rsquo;s power as may be.&nbsp; Nevertheless,
+I thank the good brother.&nbsp; He called out to me as he saw me
+about to enter the town, that if I had any tenderness for my own
+life, I had best not show myself there; and he went on to tell me
+how the Prince was come to his hunting-lodge, with hawk and hound
+indeed, but for the following of men rather than bird or
+beast.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And what would you have me do?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Be instantly on the way to the coast, ere the search
+begins; and there, either for love of Sir Simon the righteous or
+for that gilt knife of yours, we may get ferried over to the Isle
+of Wight, whence&mdash;But what ails the dog!&nbsp; Whist,
+Leonillo!&nbsp; Hold your throat: I can hear naught but your
+clamour!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The hound was in fact barking with a tremendous lion-like
+note; and when, on reiterated commands from his master and the
+outlaw, he changed it for a low continuous growling like distant
+thunder, a step and a rustling of the boughs became audible.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;They are upon us already!&rdquo; cried the boy,
+snatching up and stringing his bow.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Leave me to deal with him!&rdquo; returned the
+outlaw.&nbsp; &ldquo;Off to Alton: the good father will receive
+you to sanctuary!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Flee!&mdash;never!&rdquo; cried the boy.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;You teaching my father&rsquo;s son to flee!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Tush!&mdash;&rsquo;tis but one!&rdquo; said the
+outlaw.&nbsp; &ldquo;He is easily dealt with; and he shall have
+no time to call his fellows.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>So saying, the forester strode forward into the wood, where a
+tall figure was seen through the trees; and with uplifted
+quarter-staff, dealt a blow of sudden and deadly force as soon as
+the stranger came within its sweep, totally without
+warning.&nbsp; The power of the stroke might have felled an ox,
+and would have at once overthrown the new-comer, but that he was
+a man of unusual stature; and this being unperceived in the
+outlaw&rsquo;s haste, the blow lighted on his left shoulder
+instead of on his head.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ha, caitiff!&rdquo; he exclaimed; and shortening the
+hunting-pole in his hand, he returned the stroke with interest,
+but the outlaw had already prepared himself to receive the blow
+on his staff.&nbsp; For some seconds there was a rapid exchange;
+and all that the boy could detect in the fierce flourish of
+weapons was, that his champion was at least equally
+matched.&nbsp; The height of the stranger was superior; and his
+movements, if less quick and violent, had an equableness that
+showed him a thorough master of his weapon.&nbsp; But ere the lad
+had time to cross the heather to the scene of action, the fight
+was over; the outlaw lay stunned and motionless on the ground,
+and the gigantic stranger was leaning on his hunting-pole,
+regarding him with a grave unmoved countenance, the fair skin of
+which was scarcely flushed by the exertion.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Spare him! spare him!&rdquo; cried the boy, leaping
+forwards.&nbsp; &ldquo;I am the prey you seek!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well met, my young Lord,&rdquo; was the stern
+reply.&nbsp; &ldquo;You have found yourself a worthy way of life,
+and an honourable companion.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Honourable indeed, if faithfulness be honour!&rdquo;
+replied the boy.&nbsp; &ldquo;Myself I yield, Sir; but spare him,
+if yet he lives!&mdash;O Adam, my only friend!&rdquo; he sobbed,
+as kneeling over him, he raised his head, undid his collar, and
+parted the black locks, to seek for the mark of the blow, whence
+blood was fast oozing.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He lives&mdash;he will do well enough,&rdquo; said the
+hunter.&nbsp; &ldquo;Now, tell me, boy&mdash;what brought you
+here?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The loving fidelity of this man!&rdquo; was the prompt
+reply:&mdash;&ldquo;a Poitevin, a falconer at Kenilworth, who
+found me sore wounded on the field at Evesham, and ever since has
+tended me as never vassal tended lord; and now&mdash;now hath he
+indeed died for me!&rdquo; and the boy, endeavouring to raise the
+inanimate form, dropped heavy tears on the senseless face.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;True,&rdquo; rigidly spoke the hunter, though there was
+somewhat of a quivering of the muscles of the cheek discernible
+amid the curls of his chestnut beard: &ldquo;robbery is not the
+wonted service demanded of retainers.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Poor Adam!&rdquo; said the youth with a flash of
+spirit, &ldquo;at least he never stripped the peaceful homestead
+and humble farmer, like the royal purveyors!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ha&mdash;young rebel!&rdquo; exclaimed the
+hunter.&nbsp; &ldquo;Know you what you say?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I reck not,&rdquo; replied the boy: &ldquo;you have
+slain my father and my brothers, and now you have slain my last
+and only friend.&nbsp; Do as you will with me&mdash;only for my
+mother&rsquo;s sake, let it not be a shameful death; and let my
+sister Eleanor have my poor Leonillo.&nbsp; And let me, too,
+leave this gold with the priest of Alton, that my true-hearted
+loving Adam may have fit burial and masses.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I tell thee, boy, he is in no more need of a burial
+than thou or I.&nbsp; I touched him warily.&nbsp; Here&mdash;his
+face more to the air.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And the stranger bent down, and with his powerful strength
+lifted the heavy form of Adam, so that the boy could better
+support him.&nbsp; Then taking some wine from the hunting-flask
+slung to his own shoulder, he applied some drops to the
+bruise.&nbsp; The smart produced signs of life, and the hunter
+put his flask into the boy&rsquo;s hand, saying, &ldquo;Give him
+a draught, and then&mdash;&rdquo; he put his finger to his own
+lips, and stood somewhat apart.</p>
+<p>Adam opened his eyes, and made some inarticulate murmurs;
+then, the liquor being held to his lips, he drank, and with fresh
+vigour raised himself.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The boy!&mdash;where is he?&nbsp; What has
+chanced?&nbsp; Is it you, Sir?&nbsp; Where is the rogue?&nbsp;
+Fled, the villain?&nbsp; We shall have the Prince upon us
+next!&nbsp; I must after him, and cut his story short!&nbsp; Your
+hand, Sir!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, Adam&mdash;your hurt!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A broken head!&nbsp; Tush, &rsquo;tis naught!&nbsp;
+Here, your hand!&nbsp; Canst not lend a hand to help a man up in
+your own service?&rdquo; he added testily, as stiff and dizzy he
+sat up and tried to rise.&nbsp; &ldquo;You might have sent an
+arrow to stop his traitorous tongue; but there is no help in
+you!&rdquo; he added, provoked at seeing a certain embarrassment
+about the youth.&nbsp; &ldquo;Desert me at this pinch!&nbsp; It
+is not like his father&rsquo;s son!&rdquo; and he was sinking
+back, when at sight of the hunter he stumbled eagerly to his
+feet, but only to stagger against a tree.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You are my prisoner!&rdquo; said the calm deep
+voice.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well and good,&rdquo; said Adam surlily.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;But let the lad go free: he is a yeoman&rsquo;s son, who
+came but to bear me company.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And learn thy trade?&nbsp; Goodly lessons in falling
+unawares on the King&rsquo;s huntsmen, and sending arrows after
+them!&nbsp; Fair breeding, in sooth!&rdquo; repeated the
+stranger, standing with his arms crossed upon his mighty breadth
+of chest, and looking at Adam with a still, grave, commanding
+blue eye, that seemed to pierce him and hold him down, as it
+were, and a countenance whose youthfulness and perfect regularity
+of feature did but enhance its exceeding severity of
+expression.&nbsp; &ldquo;You know the meed of robbery and
+murder?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A halter and a bough,&rdquo; said Adam readily.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well and good; but I tell thee that concerns not the
+boy&mdash;since,&rdquo; he added bitterly, &ldquo;he is too meek
+and tender so much as to lift a hand in his own cause!&nbsp; He
+has never crossed the laws.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I understand you, friend,&rdquo; said the hunter:
+&ldquo;he is a valued charge&mdash;maybe the son of one of the
+traitor barons.&nbsp; Take my advice&mdash;yield him to the
+King&rsquo;s justice, and secure your own pardon.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Out, miscreant!&rdquo; shouted Adam; and was about to
+spring at him again, but the powerful arm collared him, and he
+recognized at once that he was like a child in that grasp.&nbsp;
+He ground his teeth with rage and muttered, &ldquo;That a fellow
+with such thews should give such dastardly counsel, and <i>he</i>
+yonder not lift a finger to aid!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Wilt follow me,&rdquo; composedly demanded the
+stranger, &ldquo;with hands free? or must I bind them?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Follow?&rdquo; replied Adam, ruefully looking at the
+boy with eyes full of reproach&mdash;&ldquo;ay, follow to any
+gallows thou wilt&mdash;and the nearest tree were the best!&nbsp;
+Come on!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I have no warrant,&rdquo; returned the grave
+hunter.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Tush! what warrant is needed for hanging a well-known
+outlaw&mdash;made so by the Prince&rsquo;s tender mercies?&nbsp;
+The Prince will thank thee, man, for ridding the realm of the
+robber who fell on the treasurer bearing the bags from
+Leicester!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And meanwhile, with uncouth cunning, Adam was striving to
+telegraph by winks and gestures to the boy who had so grievously
+disappointed him, that the moment of his own summary execution
+would be an excellent one for his companion&rsquo;s escape.</p>
+<p>But the eye, so steady yet so quick under its somewhat
+drooping eyelid, detected the simple stratagem.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I trow the Prince might thank me more for bringing in
+this charge of thine.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Small thanks, I trow, for laying hands on a poor
+orphan&mdash;the son of a Poitevin man-at-arms&mdash;that I kept
+with me for love of his father, though he is fitter for a convent
+than the green wood!&rdquo; added Adam, with the same sound of
+keen reproach and disappointment in his voice.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That shall we learn at Guildford,&rdquo; replied the
+stranger.&nbsp; &ldquo;There are means of teaching a man to
+speak.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;None that will serve with me,&rdquo; stoutly responded
+Adam.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That shall we see,&rdquo; was the brief answer.</p>
+<p>And he signed to his prisoners to move on before him, taking
+care so to interpose his stately person between them, that there
+should be no communication by word, far less by look.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER II<br />
+THE LADY OF THE FOREST</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Behold how mercy softeneth still<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; The haughtiest heart that
+beats:<br />
+Pride with disdain may he answered again,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; But pardon at once
+defeats!&rdquo;&mdash;S. M.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">The</span> so-called forest was in many
+parts mere open heath, thickly adorned by the beautiful purple
+ling, blending into a rich carpet with the dwarf furze, and
+backed by thickets of trees in the hollows of the ground.</p>
+<p>Across this wild country the tall forester conducted his
+captives in silence&mdash;moving along with a pace that evidently
+cost him so little exertion, and was so steady and even, that his
+companions might have supposed it slow, had they only watched it,
+and not been obliged to keep up with it.&nbsp; Light of foot as
+the youth was, he was at times reduced to an almost breathless
+run; and Adam plodded along, with strides that worked his arms
+and shoulders in sympathy.</p>
+<p>After about three miles, when the boy was beginning to feel as
+if he must soon be in danger of lagging, they came into a dip of
+the ground where stood a long, low, irregular building, partly
+wood and partly stone, roofed with shingle in some parts, in
+others with heather.&nbsp; The last addition, a deep porch, still
+retained the fresh tints of the bark on the timber sides, and the
+purple of the ling that roofed it.</p>
+<p>Sheds and out-houses surrounded it; dogs in couples, horses,
+grooms, and foresters, were congregated in the background; but
+around this new porch were gathered a troop of peasant women,
+children, and aged men.&nbsp; The fine bald brow and profile of
+the old peasant, the eager face of the curly-haired child, the
+worn countenance of the hard-tasked mother, were all uplifted
+towards the doorway, in which stood, slightly above them, a lady,
+with two long plaited flaxen tresses descending on her shoulders,
+under a black silken veil, that disclosed a youthful countenance,
+full of pure calm loveliness, of a simple but dignified and
+devotional expression, that might have befitted an angel of
+charity.&nbsp; A priest and a lady were dispensing loaves and
+warm garments to the throng around; but each gift was accompanied
+by a gentle word from the lady, framed with difficulty to their
+homely English tongue, but listened to even by uncomprehending
+ears like a strain of Church music.</p>
+<p>Adam had expected the forester to turn aside to the group of
+servants, but in blank amazement saw him lead the way through the
+poor at the gate; and advancing to the porch with a courteous
+bending of his head, he said in the soft
+Proven&ccedil;al&mdash;far more familiar than English to
+Adam&rsquo;s ears&mdash;&ldquo;Hast room for another suppliant,
+mi Dona?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The sweet fair face lighted up with a sudden sunbeam of joy;
+and a musical voice replied.&nbsp; &ldquo;Welcome, my dearest
+Lord: much did I need thee to hear the plaints of some of these
+thy lieges, which my ears can scarce understand!&nbsp; But why
+art thou alone? or rather, why thus strangely
+accompanied?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;These are the captives won by my single arm, whom,
+according to all laws of chivalry, thine own true knight thus
+lays at thy feet, fair lady mine, to be disposed of at thine own
+gracious will and pleasure.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And a smile of such sweetness lightened his features, that a
+murmur of &ldquo;Blessings on his comely face!&rdquo; ran through
+the assembly; and Adam indulged in a gruff startled murmur of
+&ldquo;&rsquo;Tis the Prince, or the devil himself!&rdquo; while
+his young master, comprehending the gesture of the Prince, and
+overborne by the lovely winning graces of the Princess, stepped
+forward, doffing his cap and bending his knee, and signing to
+Adam to follow his example.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou hast been daring peril again!&rdquo; said the
+Princess, holding her husband&rsquo;s arm, and looking up into
+his face with lovingly reproachful yet exulting eyes.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Yet I will not be troubled!&nbsp; Naught is danger to
+thee!&nbsp; And yet alone and unarmed to encounter such a sturdy
+savage as I see yonder!&nbsp; But there is blood on his
+brow!&nbsp; Let his hurt be looked to ere we speak of his
+fate.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He is at thy disposal, mi Dona,&rdquo; returned Edward:
+&ldquo;thou art the judge of both, and shall decide their lot
+when thou hast heard their tale.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It can scarce be a very dark one,&rdquo; replied
+Eleanor, &ldquo;or thou wouldst never have led them to such a
+judge!&rdquo;&nbsp; Then turning to the prisoners, she began to
+say in her foreign English, &ldquo;Follow the good father,
+friends&mdash;&rdquo; when she broke off at fuller sight of the
+boy&rsquo;s countenance, and exclaimed in Proven&ccedil;al,
+&ldquo;I know the like of that face and mien!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Truly dost thou know it,&rdquo; her husband replied;
+&ldquo;but peace till thou hast cleared thy present court, and we
+can be private.&mdash;Follow the priest,&rdquo; he added,
+&ldquo;and await the Princess&rsquo;s pleasure.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>They obeyed; and the priest led them through a side-door,
+through which they could still hear Eleanor&rsquo;s sweet
+Castillian voice laying before her husband her difficulties in
+comprehending her various petitioners.&nbsp; The priest being
+English, was hardly more easily understood than his flock; and
+her lady spoke little but <i>langue d&rsquo;oui</i>, the Northern
+French, which was as little serviceable in dealing with her
+Spanish and Proven&ccedil;al as with the rude
+West-Saxon-English.&nbsp; Edward&rsquo;s deep manly tones were to
+be heard, however, now interrogating the peasants in their own
+tongue, now briefly interpreting to his wife in Proven&ccedil;al;
+and a listener could easily gather that his hand was as
+bounteous, his heart as merciful, as hers, save where attacks on
+the royal game had been requited by the trouble complained of;
+and that in such cases she pleaded in vain.</p>
+<p>The captives, whom her husband had surrendered to her mercy,
+had been led into a great, long, low hall, with rudely-timbered
+sides, and rough beams to the roof, with a stone floor, and great
+open fire, over which a man-cook was chattering French to his
+bewildered English scullion.&nbsp; An oak table, and settles on
+either side of it, ran the whole length of the hall; and here the
+priest bade the two prisoners seat themselves.&nbsp; They
+obeyed&mdash;the boy slouching his cap over his face, averting
+it, and keeping as far as possible from the group of servants
+near the fire.&nbsp; The priest called for bread, meat, and beer,
+to be set before them; and after a moment&rsquo;s examination of
+Adam&rsquo;s bruise, applied the simple remedy that was all it
+required, and left them to their meal.&nbsp; Adam took this
+opportunity to growl in an undertone, &ldquo;Does <i>he</i> there
+know you?&rdquo;&nbsp; The reply was a nod of assent.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And you knew him?&rdquo;&nbsp; Another nod; and then the
+boy, looking heedfully round, added in a quick, undertone,
+&ldquo;Not till you were down.&nbsp; Then he helped me to restore
+you.&nbsp; You forgive me, Adam, now?&rdquo; and he held out his
+hand, and wrung the rugged one of the forester.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What should I forgive!&nbsp; Poor lad! you could not
+have striven in the Longshanks&rsquo; grasp!&nbsp; I was a fool
+not to guess how it was, when I saw you not knowing which way to
+look!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hush!&rdquo; broke in the youth with uplifted hand, as
+a page of about his own age came daintily into the hall,
+gathering his green robe about him as if he disdained the
+neighbourhood, and holding his head high under his jaunty tall
+feathered cap.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Outlaws!&rdquo; he said, speaking English, but with a
+strong foreign accent, and as if it were a great condescension,
+&ldquo;the gracious Princess summons you to her presence.&nbsp;
+Follow me!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The colour rushed to the boy&rsquo;s temples, and a retort was
+on his lips, but he struggled to withhold it; and likewise
+speaking English, said, &ldquo;I would we could have some water,
+and make ourselves meeter for her presence.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Scarce worth the pains,&rdquo; returned the page.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;As if thou couldst ever be meet for her presence!&nbsp;
+She had rather be rid of thee promptly, than wait to be regaled
+with thy May-day braveries&mdash;honest lad!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Again the answer was only restrained with exceeding
+difficulty; and there was a scornful smile on the young
+prisoner&rsquo;s cheek, that caused the page to exclaim angrily,
+&ldquo;What means that insolence, malapert boy?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>But there was no time for further strife; for the door was
+pushed open, and the Prince&rsquo;s voice called, &ldquo;Hamlyn
+de Valence, why tarry the prisoners?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Only, Sir,&rdquo; returned Hamlyn, &ldquo;that this
+young robber is offended that he hath not time to deck himself
+out in his last stolen gold chain, to gratify the
+Princess!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Peace, Hamlyn,&rdquo; returned the Prince: &ldquo;thou
+speakest thou knowest not what.&mdash;Come hither, boy,&rdquo; he
+added, laying his hand on his young captive&rsquo;s shoulder, and
+putting him through the door with a familiarity that astonished
+Hamlyn&mdash;all the more, when he found that while both
+prisoners were admitted, he himself was excluded!</p>
+<p>Princess Eleanor was alone in another chamber of the sylvan
+lodge, hung with tapestry representing hunting scenes, the floor
+laid with deer-skins, and deer&rsquo;s antlers projecting from
+the wall, to support the feminine properties that marked it as
+her special abode.&nbsp; She was standing when they entered; and
+was turning eagerly with outstretched hand and face of
+recognition, when Prince Edward checked her by saying,
+&ldquo;Nay, the cause is not yet tried:&rdquo; and placing her in
+a large carved oaken chair, where she sat with a lily-like grace
+and dignity, half wondering, but following his lead, he
+proceeded, &ldquo;Sit thou there, fair dame, and exercise thy
+right, as judge of the two captives whom I place at thy
+feet.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And you, my Lord?&rdquo; she asked.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I stand as their accuser,&rdquo; said Edward.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Advance, prisoners!&mdash;Now, most fair judge, what dost
+thou decree for the doom of Adam de Gourdon, rebel first, and
+since that the terror of our royal father&rsquo;s lieges, the
+robber of his treasurers, the rifler of our Cousin
+Pembroke&rsquo;s jewellery, the slayer of our deer?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alas! my Lord, why put such questions to me,&rdquo;
+said Eleanor imploringly, &ldquo;unless, as I would fain hope,
+thou dost but jest?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Do I speak jest, Gourdon?&rdquo; said Edward, regarding
+Adam with a lion-like glance.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;&rsquo;Tis all true,&rdquo; growled Adam.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And,&rdquo; proceeded the Prince, &ldquo;if thy gentle
+lips refuse to utter the doom merited by such deeds, what wilt
+thou say to hear that, not content with these traitorous deeds of
+his own, he fosters the treason of others?&nbsp; Here stands a
+young rebel, who would have perished at Evesham, but for the care
+and protection of this Gourdon&mdash;who healed his wounds,
+guarded him, robbed for him, for him spurned the offer of
+amnesty, and finally, set on thine own husband in Alton
+Wood&mdash;all to shelter yonder young traitor from the hands of
+justice!&nbsp; Speak the sentence he merits, most just of
+judges!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The sentence he merits?&rdquo; said Eleanor, with
+swimming eyes.&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh! would that I were indeed monarch,
+to dispense life or death!&nbsp; What he merits he shall have,
+from my whole heart&mdash;mine own poor esteem for his fidelity,
+and our joint entreaties to the King for his pardon!&nbsp; Brave
+man&mdash;thou shalt come with me to seek thy pardon from King
+Henry!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thanks, Lady,&rdquo; said Adam with rude courtesy;
+&ldquo;but it were better to seek my young
+lord&rsquo;s.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My own dear young cousin!&rdquo; exclaimed Eleanor,
+laying aside her assumed judicial power, and again holding out
+her hands to him, &ldquo;we deemed you slain!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Yes, come hither,&rdquo; said Edward, &ldquo;my jailer
+at Hereford&mdash;the rebel who drew his maiden sword against his
+King and uncle&mdash;the outlaw who would try whether Leicester
+fits as well as Huntingdon with a bandit life!&nbsp; What hast
+thou to say for thyself, Richard de Montfort?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That my fate, be it what it may, must not stand in the
+way of Adam&rsquo;s pardon!&rdquo; said Richard, standing still,
+without response to the Princess&rsquo;s invitation.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;My Lord, you have spoken much of his noble devotion to me
+for my father&rsquo;s sake; but you know not the half of what he
+has done and dared for me.&nbsp; Oh! plead for him,
+Lady!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Plead for him!&rdquo; said Eleanor: &ldquo;that will I
+do with all my heart; and well do I know that the good old King
+will weep with gratitude to him for having preserved the life of
+his young nephew.&nbsp; Yes, Richard, oft have we grieved for
+thee, my husband&rsquo;s kind young companion in his captivity,
+and mourned that no tidings could be gained of thee!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>It was not Richard who replied to this winning address.&nbsp;
+He stood flushed, irresolute, with eyes resolutely cast down, as
+if to avoid seeing the Princess&rsquo;s sweet face.</p>
+<p>Adam, however, spoke: &ldquo;Then, Lady, I am indeed beholden
+to you; provided that the boy is safe.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He is safe,&rdquo; said Prince Edward.&nbsp; &ldquo;His
+age is protection sufficient.&mdash;My young cousin, thou art no
+outlaw: thine uncle will welcome thee gladly; and a career is
+open to thee where thou mayst redeem the honour of thy
+name.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The colour came with deeper crimson to the boy&rsquo;s cheek,
+as he answered in a choked voice, &ldquo;My father&rsquo;s name
+needs no redemption!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Simultaneously a pleading interjection from the Princess, and
+a warning growl from De Gourdon, admonished Richard that he was
+on perilous ground; but the Prince responded in a tone of deep
+feeling, &ldquo;Well said, Richard: the term does not befit that
+worthy name.&nbsp; I should have said that I would fain help thee
+to maintain its honour.&nbsp; My page once, wilt thou be so
+again? and one day my knight&mdash;my trusty baron?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How can I?&rdquo; said Richard, still in the same
+undertone, subdued but determined: &ldquo;it was you who slew him
+and my brothers!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, nay!&rdquo; exclaimed the Princess: &ldquo;the
+poor boy thinks all his kindred are slain!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And they are not!&rdquo; cried Richard, raising his
+face with sudden animation.&nbsp; &ldquo;They are
+safe?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thy brother Henry died with&mdash;with the Earl,&rdquo;
+said Eleanor; &ldquo;but all the rest are safe, and in
+France.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And my mother and sister?&rdquo; asked Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;They are likewise abroad,&rdquo; said the Prince.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And, Richard, thou art free to join them if thou
+wilt.&nbsp; But listen first to me.&nbsp; We tarry yet two days
+at this forest lodge: remain with us for that space&mdash;thy
+name and rank unknown if thou wilt&mdash;and if thou shalt still
+look on me as guilty of thy father&rsquo;s death, and not as a
+loving kinsman, who honoured him deeply, I will send thee safely
+to the coast, with letters to my uncle, the King of
+France.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard raised his head with a searching glance, to see
+whether this were invitation or command.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou art my captive,&rdquo; said Eleanor softly, coming
+towards him with a young matron&rsquo;s caressing manner to a boy
+whom she would win and encourage.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not captive, but guest,&rdquo; said Edward; but Richard
+perceived in the tones that no choice was left him, as far as
+these two days were concerned.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER III<br />
+ALTON LODGE</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Ever were his sons hawtayn,<br />
+And bold for their vilanye;<br />
+Bothe to knight and sweyn<br />
+Did they vilanye.&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><i>Old Ballad of Simon de
+Montforte</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">For</span> the first time for many a
+month, Richard de Montfort lay down to sleep in a pallet bed,
+instead of a couch of heather; but his heart was ill at
+ease.&nbsp; He was the fourth son of the great Earl of Leicester,
+Simon de Montfort; and for the earlier years of his life, he had
+been under the careful training of the excellent chaplain, Adam
+de Marisco, a pupil and disciple of the great Robert
+Grost&ecirc;te, Bishop of Lincoln.&nbsp; His elder brothers had
+early left this wholesome control; pushed forward by the sad
+circumstances that finally drove their father to take up arms
+against the King, and strangers to the noble temper that actuated
+him in his championship of the English people, they became mere
+lawless rebels&mdash;fiercely profiting by his elevation, not for
+the good of the people, but for their own gratification.</p>
+<p>Richard had been still a mere boy under constant control, and
+being intelligent, spirited, and docile, had been an especial
+favourite with his father.&nbsp; To him the great Earl had been
+the model of all that was admirable, wise, and noble; deeply
+religious, just, and charitable, and perfect in all the arts of
+chivalry and accomplishments of peace&mdash;a tender and
+indulgent father, and a firm and wise head of a
+household&mdash;he had been ardently loved and looked up to by
+the young son, who had perhaps more in common with him by nature
+than any other of the family.</p>
+<p>Wrongs and injuries had been heaped upon Montfort by the weak
+and fickle King, who would far better have understood him, if,
+like the selfish kinsmen who encircled the throne, he had
+struggled for his own advantage, and not for the maintenance of
+the Great Charter.&nbsp; Richard was too young to remember the
+early days when his elder brothers had been companions, almost on
+equal terms, to their first cousins, the King&rsquo;s sons; his
+whole impression of his parents&rsquo; relations with the court
+was of injustice and perfidy from the King and his counsellors,
+vehemently blamed by his mother and brothers, but sometimes
+palliated by his father, who almost always, even at the worst,
+pleaded the King&rsquo;s helplessness, and Prince Edward&rsquo;s
+honourable intentions.&nbsp; Understanding little of the rights
+of the case, Richard only saw his father as the maintainer of the
+laws, and defender of the oppressed against covenant breakers;
+and when the appeal to arms was at length made, he saw the white
+cross assumed by his father and brothers, in full belief that the
+war in defence of Magna Carta was indeed as sacred as a crusade,
+and he had earnestly entreated to be allowed to bear arms; but he
+had been deemed as yet too young, and thus had had no share in
+the victory of Lewes, save the full triumph in it that was felt
+by all at Kenilworth.&nbsp; Afterwards, when sent to be Prince
+Edward&rsquo;s page at Hereford, he was prepared to regard his
+royal cousin as a ferocious enemy, and was much taken by surprise
+to find him a graceful courtly knight, peculiarly gentle in
+manner, loving music, romances, and all chivalrous
+accomplishments; and far from the pride and haughtiness that had
+been the theme of all the vassals who assembled at Kenilworth, he
+was gracious to all, and distinguished his young page by treating
+him as a kinsman and favourite companion; showing him indeed far
+more consideration than ever he had received from his unruly
+turbulent brothers.</p>
+<p>When Edward had effected his escape, and had joined the
+Mortimers and Clares, Richard had gone home, where his
+expressions of affection for the Prince were listened to by his
+father, indeed, with a well-pleased though melancholy smile, and
+an augury that one day his brave godson would shake off the old
+King&rsquo;s evil counsellors, and show himself in his true and
+noble colouring.&nbsp; His brothers, however, laughed and chid
+any word about the Prince&rsquo;s kindness.&nbsp; Edward&rsquo;s
+flattery and seduction, they declared, had won the young De Clare
+from their cause.&nbsp; And in vain did their father assure them
+that they had lost the alliance of the house of Gloucester solely
+by their own over-bearing injustice&mdash;a tyranny worse than
+had been exercised under the name of the King.</p>
+<p>With Henry of Winchester in their hands, however, theirs
+seemed the loyal cause; and Richard had, by the influence of his
+elders, been made ashamed of his regard for the Prince, and
+looked upon it as a treacherous rebellion, when Edward mustered
+his forces, and fell upon Leicester and his followers.&nbsp; His
+father had mournfully yielded to the boy&rsquo;s entreaty to
+remain with him, instead of being sent away with his mother and
+the younger ones for security: an honourable death, said the
+Earl, might be better for him than an outlawed and proscribed
+life.&nbsp; And thus Richard had heard his father&rsquo;s
+exclamation on marking the well-ordered advance of the Royalists:
+&ldquo;They have learnt this style from me.&nbsp; Now, God have
+mercy on our souls, for our bodies are the
+Prince&rsquo;s!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And when Henry, his eldest son, spoke words of confidence,
+entreating him not to despair, he had answered, &ldquo;I do not,
+my son; but your presumption, and the pride of thy brothers, have
+brought me to this pass.&nbsp; I firmly believe I shall die for
+the cause of God and justice.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard had shared his father&rsquo;s last Communion, received
+his last blessing, and had stood beside him in the desperate
+ring, which in true English fashion died on the field of battle,
+but never was driven from it.&nbsp; Since that time, the
+boy&rsquo;s life had been a wandering amid outlaws and
+peasants&mdash;all in one mind of bitter hatred to the court for
+its cruel vexations and oppressions, and of intense love and
+regret for their champion, Sir Simon the Righteous, of whose
+beneficence tales were everywhere told, rising at every step into
+greater wonder, until at length they were enhanced into miracles,
+wrought by his severed head and hands.&nbsp; Each day had made
+the boy prouder of his father&rsquo;s memory, more deeply
+incensed against the Court party that had brought about his fall;
+and keen and bitter were his feelings at finding himself in the
+hands of the Prince himself.&nbsp; He chafed all the more at
+feeling the ascendency which Edward&rsquo;s lofty demeanour and
+personal kindness had formerly exerted over him, reviving again
+by force of habit; he hated himself for not having at once
+challenged his father&rsquo;s murderer; so as, if he could not do
+more, to have died by his hand; and he despised himself the more,
+for knowing that all he could have said would have been
+good-naturedly put down by the Prince; all he could have done
+would have been but like a gnat&rsquo;s efforts against that
+mighty strength.&nbsp; Then how despicable it was to be sensible,
+in spite of himself, that this atmosphere of courtly refinement
+was far more natural to him&mdash;the son of a Proven&ccedil;al
+noble, and of a princess mother&mdash;than the rude forest life
+he had lately led.&nbsp; The greenwood liberty had its charms;
+and he had truly loved Adam de Gourdon; but the soft tones and
+refined accents were like a note of home to him; and though he
+had never seen the Princess before&mdash;she having been sent to
+the Court of St. Louis during the troubles&mdash;yet the whole of
+the interview gave him an inexplicable sense of being again among
+kindred and friends.&nbsp; He told himself that it was base,
+resolved that he would show himself determined to cast in his lot
+with his exiled brethren, and made up his mind to maintain a
+dignified silence during these two days, and at the end of them
+to leave with the Prince a challenge, to be fought out when he
+should have attained manly strength and skill in arms.</p>
+<p>In pursuance of this resolution, he appeared at the morning
+mass and meal still grave and silent, and especially avoiding
+young Hamlyn de Valence, who, as the son of one of the half
+brothers of Henry III., stood in the same relationship to Prince
+Edward and to Richard, whose mother was the sister of King
+Henry.&nbsp; Probably Hamlyn had had a hint from the Prince, for
+though he regarded young Montfort with no friendly eyes, he
+yielded him an equality of precedence, which hardly consorted
+with Richard&rsquo;s rude forest garments.</p>
+<p>The chase was the order of the day.&nbsp; The Prince rode
+forth with a boar spear to hunt one of these monsters of the
+wood, of which vague reports had reached him, unconfirmed, till
+Adam de Gourdon had undertaken to show him the creature&rsquo;s
+lair.&nbsp; He had proposed to Richard to join the hunt; but the
+boy, firm to his resolution of accepting no favour from him, that
+could be helped, had refused as curtly as he could; and then, not
+without a feeling of disappointment, had stood holding Leonillo
+in, as the gallant train of hunters rode down the woodland glade,
+and he figured to himself the brave sport in which they would
+soon be engaged.</p>
+<p>The most part of the day was spent by him in lying under a
+tree, with his dog by his side, thinking over the scenes of his
+earlier life, which had passed by his childish mind like those of
+a drama, in which he had no part nor comprehension, but which
+now, with clearer perceptions, he strove to recall and explain to
+himself.&nbsp; Ever his father&rsquo;s stately figure was the
+centre of his recollections, whether receiving tidings of
+infractions of engagements, taking prompt measures for action, or
+striving to repress the violence of his sons and partizans, or it
+might be gazing on his younger boys with sad anxiety.&nbsp;
+Richard well remembered his saying, when he heard that his sons,
+Simon and Guy, had been plundering the merchant ships in the
+Channel: &ldquo;Alas! alas! when I was more loyal to the law than
+to the Crown, I little deemed that I was rearing a brood who
+would scorn all law and loyalty!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And well too did Richard recollect that when the proposal had
+been made that he should become the attendant of the Prince at
+Hereford, his father had told him that here he would see the
+mirror of all that was knightly and virtuous; and had added, on
+the loud outcry of the more prejudiced brothers: &ldquo;It is
+only the truth.&nbsp; Were it not that the King&rsquo;s folly and
+his perjured counsellors had come between my nephew Edward and
+his better self, we should have in him a sovereign who might
+fitly be reckoned as a tenth worthy.&nbsp; It is his very duty to
+a misruled father that has ranged him against us.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Yet,&rdquo; thought Richard, &ldquo;on the man who thus
+thought and spoke of him the Prince could make savage warfare;
+nay, offer his senseless corpse foul despite.&nbsp; How can I
+tarry these two days in such keeping?&nbsp; I had rather&mdash;if
+he will still keep me&mdash;be a captive in his lowest dungeon,
+than eat of his bread as a guest!&nbsp; By our Lady, I will tell
+him so to his face!&nbsp; I will none of his favours!&nbsp; Alone
+I will go to the coast&mdash;alone make my way to Simon and Guy,
+with no letters to the French king!&nbsp; All kings, however
+saintly they may be called, are in league, and make common cause;
+as said my poor brother Henry, when the Mise of Lewes was to be
+laid before this Frenchman!&nbsp; I will none of them!&nbsp;
+Pshaw! is this the Princess coming?&nbsp; I trust she will not
+see me.&nbsp; I want none of her fair words.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>He had prepared himself to be ungracious; but his courtly
+breeding was too much of an instinct with him for him not to
+rise, doff his cap, and stand aside, as Eleanor of Castille
+slowly moved towards the woodland path, with her graceful Spanish
+step, followed, but at some distance, by two of her women.&nbsp;
+She turned as she was passing him, and smiled with a sweet
+radiance that would have won him instantly, had he not heard his
+elder brothers sneer at the cheap coin of royal smiles.&nbsp; He
+only bowed; but Leonillo was more accessible, and started forward
+to pay his homage of dignified blandishments to the queenly
+sweetness that pleased his canine appreciation.&nbsp; Richard was
+forced to step forth, call him in, and make his excuses; but the
+Princess responded by praises of the noble animal, and caresses,
+to which Leonillo replied with a grand gratitude, that showed him
+as nobly bred as his young master.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou art a gallant creature,&rdquo; said Eleanor, her
+hand upon the proud head; &ldquo;and no doubt as faithful as
+beautiful!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Faithful to the death, Lady,&rdquo; replied Richard
+warmly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He is thine own, I trow,&rdquo; said the
+Princess,&mdash;&ldquo;not thy groom&rsquo;s?&nbsp; I remember,
+that when thy brave father brought my lord and me back from our
+bridal at Burgos, he procured two hounds in the Pyrenees, of
+meseems, such a breed.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;True, Lady; they were the parents of my
+Leonillo,&rdquo; said Richard, gratified, in spite of
+himself.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How well I remember,&rdquo; continued Eleanor,
+&ldquo;that first sight of the great Earl.&nbsp; My brothers had
+teased me for going so far north, and told me the English were
+mere rude islanders&mdash;boorish, and unlettered; but, child as
+I was, scarce eleven years old, I could perceive the nobleness of
+the Earl.&nbsp; &lsquo;If all thy new subjects be like
+him,&rsquo; said my brother to me, &lsquo;thou wilt reign over a
+race of kings.&rsquo;&nbsp; And how good he was to me when I wept
+at leaving my home and friends!&nbsp; How he framed his tongue to
+speak my own Castillian to me; how he comforted me, when the
+Queen, my mother-in-law, required more dignity of me than I yet
+knew how to assume; and how he chid my boy bridegroom for showing
+scant regard for his girl bride!&rdquo; said Eleanor, smiling at
+the recollection, as the beloved wife of eleven years could well
+afford to do.&nbsp; &ldquo;I mind me well that he found me
+weeping, because my Edward had tied the scarf I gave him on the
+neck of one of those very dogs, and the fatherly counsel he gave
+me.&nbsp; Ah, Leonillo, thy wise wistful face brings back many
+thoughts to my mind!&nbsp; I am glad I may honour thee for
+fidelity!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Indeed you may, Lady,&rdquo; said Richard.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;It was he that above all saved my life.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Prithee let me hear,&rdquo; said the Princess, who had
+already so moved on, while herself speaking, as to draw Richard
+into walking with her along the path that had been cleared under
+the beech trees.&nbsp; &ldquo;We have so much longed to know thy
+fate.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I cannot tell you much, Lady,&rdquo; returned
+Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;The last thing I recollect on that dreadful
+day was, that my father asked for quarter&mdash;for us&mdash;for
+my brother Henry and me.&nbsp; We heard the reply: &lsquo;No
+quarter for traitors!&rsquo; and Henry fell before us a dead
+man.&nbsp; My father shouted, &lsquo;By the arm of St. James, it
+is time for me to die!&rsquo;&nbsp; I saw him, with his sword in
+both hands, cut down a wild Welshman who was rushing on me.&nbsp;
+Then I saw no more, till in the moonlight I was awakened by this
+dog&rsquo;s cool tongue licking the blood from my face, and heard
+his low whining over me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Good dog, good dog!&rdquo; murmured Eleanor, caressing
+the animal.&nbsp; &ldquo;And thou, Richard, thou wert sorely
+wounded?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sorely,&rdquo; said Richard; &ldquo;my side had been
+pierced with a lance, a Welsh two-handed sword had broken through
+my helmet, and well-nigh cleft my skull; and the men-at-arms,
+riding over me I suppose, must have broken my leg, for I could
+not move: and oh! I felt it hard that I had yet to die.&nbsp;
+Then, Lady, came lights and murmuring voices.&nbsp; They were
+Mortimer&rsquo;s plundering Welsh robbers.&nbsp; I heard their
+wild gibbering tongue; and I knew how it would be with me, should
+they see the white cross on my breast.&nbsp; But, Lady, Leonillo
+stood over me.&nbsp; His lion bark chased them aside; and when
+one bolder than the rest came near the mound where we lay, good
+Leonillo flew at his savage throat.&nbsp; I heard the struggle as
+I lay&mdash;the growls of the dog, the howls of the man; and then
+they were cut short.&nbsp; And next I heard de Gourdon&rsquo;s
+gruff voice commending the good hound, whose note had led him to
+the spot, from the woods, where he was hiding after the
+battle.&nbsp; The faithful beast sprang from him, and in a moment
+more had led him to me.&nbsp; Then&mdash;ah, then, Lady! when
+Adam had freed me from my broken helm, and lifted me in his arms,
+what a sight had I!&nbsp; Oh, what a field that harvest moon
+shone upon! how thickly heaped was that little mound!&nbsp; And
+there was my father&rsquo;s face up-turned in the white
+moonlight!&nbsp; O Lady, never in hall or bower could it have
+been so peaceful, or so majestic!&nbsp; I bade Adam lay me down
+by his side, and keep guard through the night with Leonillo; but
+he said that the plunderers would come in numbers too great for
+him, and that he must care for the living rather than the dead;
+and withstand him as I would, he bore me away.&nbsp; O Lady,
+Lady, foul wrong was done when we were gone!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Think not on that,&rdquo; said Eleanor; &ldquo;it
+bitterly grieved my lord that so it should have been.&nbsp; Thou
+knowest, I hope, that he was the chief mourner when those
+honoured limbs were laid in the holy ground at Evesham
+Abbey.&nbsp; They told me, who saw him that day, that his weeping
+for his godfather and his Cousin Henry overcame all joy in his
+victory.&nbsp; And I can assure thee, dear Richard, that when,
+three months after, I came to him at Canterbury, just after he
+had been with thy mother at Dover, even then he was sad and
+mournful.&nbsp; He said that the wisest and best baron in England
+had been made a rebel of, and then slain; and he was full of
+sorrow for thee, only then understanding from thy mother that
+thou hadst been in the battle at all, and that nothing had been
+heard of thee.&nbsp; He said thou wert the most like to thy
+father of all his sons; and truly I knew thee at once by thine
+eyes, Richard.&nbsp; Where wast thou all these months?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;At first,&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;I was in an
+anchoret&rsquo;s cell, in the wall of a church.&nbsp; So please
+you, Madame, I must not name names; but when Adam, bearing me
+faint and well-nigh dying on his back, saw the twinkling light in
+the churchyard, he knocked, and entreated aid.&nbsp; The good
+anchoret pitied my need at first, and when he learnt my name, he
+gave me shelter for my father&rsquo;s sake, the friend of all
+religious men.&nbsp; I lay on his little bed, in the chamber in
+the wall, till I could again walk.&nbsp; Meanwhile, Adam watched
+in the woods at hand, and from time to time came at night to see
+how I fared, and bring me tidings.&nbsp; Simon was still holding
+out Kenilworth, and we hoped to join him there; but when we set
+forth I was still lame, and too feeble to go far in a day; and we
+fell in with&mdash;within short, with a band of robbers, who
+detained us, half as guests, half as captives.&nbsp; They needed
+Adam&rsquo;s stout arm; and there was a shrewd, gray, tough old
+fellow, who had been in Robin Hood&rsquo;s band, and was looked
+up to as a sort of prince among them, who was bent on making us
+one with them.&nbsp; Lady, you would smile to hear how the old
+man used to sit by me as I lay on the rushes, and talk of
+outlawry, as Father Adam de Marisco used to talk of
+learning&mdash;as a good and noble science, decaying for want of
+spirit and valour in these days.&nbsp; It was all laziness, he
+said; barons and princes must needs have their wars, and use up
+all the stout men that were fit to bend a bow in a thicket.&nbsp;
+If the Prince went on at this rate, he said, there would soon be
+not an honest outlaw to be found in England!&nbsp; But he was a
+kind old man, and very good to me; and he taught me how to shoot
+with the long bow better than ever our master at Odiham
+could.&nbsp; However, I could not brook the spoiler&rsquo;s life,
+and the band did not trust me; so, as we found that Kenilworth
+had fallen, as soon as my strength had returned to me, we stole
+away from the outlaws, and came southwards, hoping to find my
+mother at Odiham.&nbsp; Hearing that Odiham too was gone from us,
+we have lurked in Alton Wood till means should serve us for
+reaching the coast.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Till thou hast found the friend who has longed for
+thee, and sought for thee,&rdquo; replied Eleanor.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;What didst thou do, young Richard, to win my
+husband&rsquo;s heart so entirely in his captivity?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I know not, Lady, why he should take thought for
+me,&rdquo; bluntly said Richard, with a return of the sensation
+of being coaxed and talked over.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Methinks I can tell thee one cause,&rdquo; returned the
+Princess.&nbsp; &ldquo;Was there not a time when thou didst
+overhear him concerting with Thomas de Clare the plan of an
+escape, and thou didst warn them that thou wast at hand; ay, and
+yet didst send notice to thy father?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Yes,&rdquo; answered Richard with surprise; &ldquo;I
+could do no other.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Even so,&rdquo; said Eleanor.&nbsp; &ldquo;And thus
+didst thou win the esteem of thy kinsman.&nbsp; &lsquo;The
+stripling is loyal and trustworthy,&rsquo; he has said to me;
+&lsquo;pity that such a heart should be pierced in an inglorious
+field.&nbsp; Would that I could find him, and strive to return to
+him something of what his father&rsquo;s care hath wrought for
+me.&rsquo;&nbsp; Richard, trust me, it would be a real joy and
+lightening of his grief to have thee with him.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Grief, Madame!&rdquo; repeated Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+little thought he grieved for my father, who, but for him, would
+be&mdash;&rdquo; and a sob checked him, as the contrast rose
+before him of the great Earl and beautiful Countess presiding
+over their large family and princely household, and the scattered
+ruined state of all at present.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He shall answer that question himself,&rdquo; said
+Eleanor.&nbsp; &ldquo;See, here he comes to meet us by the
+beechwood alley.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And in fact, a form, well suited to its setting within the
+stately aisles of the beech trees, was pacing towards them.&nbsp;
+The chase had ended, and hearing that his wife had walked forth
+into the wood, the Prince had come by another path to meet her,
+and his rare and beautiful smile shone out as he saw who was her
+companion.&nbsp; &ldquo;Art making friends with my young
+cousin?&rdquo; he said affectionately.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I would fain do so,&rdquo; replied Eleanor; &ldquo;but
+alas, my Lord! he feels that there is a long dark reckoning
+behind, that stands in the way of our friendship.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard looked down, and did not speak.&nbsp; The Princess had
+put his thought into words.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Richard,&rdquo; said the Prince, &ldquo;I feel the
+same.&nbsp; It is for that very cause that I seek to have thee
+with me.&nbsp; Hear me.&nbsp; Thou art grown older, and hast seen
+man&rsquo;s work and man&rsquo;s sorrows, since I left thee on
+the hill-side at Hereford.&nbsp; Thou canst see, perchance, that
+a question hath two sides&mdash;though it is not given to all men
+to do so.&nbsp; Hearken then.&mdash;Thy father was the greatest
+man I have known&mdash;nay, but for the thought of my uncle of
+France, I should say the holiest.&nbsp; He was my teacher in all
+knightly doings, and in all kingly thoughts, such as I pray may
+be with me through life.&nbsp; It was from him I learnt that this
+royal, this noble power, is not given to exalt ourselves, but as
+a trust for the welfare of others.&nbsp; It was the spring of
+action that was with him through life.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It was,&rdquo; murmured Richard, calling to mind many a
+saying of his father&rsquo;s.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And fain would he have impressed it on all
+around,&rdquo; added Edward: &ldquo;but there were others who
+deemed that kingly power was but a means of enjoyment, and that
+restraint was an outrage on the crown.&nbsp; They drew one way,
+the Earl drew the other, and, as his noble nature prompted him,
+made common cause with the injured.&nbsp; It skills not to go
+through the past.&nbsp; Those whom he joined had selfish aims,
+and pushed him on; and as the crown had been led to invade the
+rights of the vassals, so the vassals invaded my father&rsquo;s
+rights.&nbsp; Oaths were extorted, though both sides knew they
+could never be observed; and between violences, now on one side,
+now on the other, the right course could scarce be kept.&nbsp;
+The Earl imagined that, with my father in his hands, removed from
+all other influences, he could give England the happy days they
+talk of her having enjoyed under my patron St. Edward; but, as
+thou knowest, Richard, the authority he held, being unlawful, was
+unregarded, and its worst transgressors came out of his own
+bosom.&nbsp; He could not enforce the terms on which I had
+yielded myself&mdash;he could not even prevent my father from
+being a mere captive; and for the English folk, their miseries
+were but multiplied by the tyrants who had arisen.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It was no doing of his,&rdquo; said Richard, with cheek
+hotly glowing.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;None know that better than I,&rdquo; said the Prince;
+&ldquo;but if he had snatched the bridle from a feeble hand, it
+was only to find that the steed could not be ruled by him.&nbsp;
+What was left for me but to break my bonds, and deliver my
+father, in the hope that, being come to man&rsquo;s estate, I
+might set matters on a surer footing?&nbsp; I had hoped&mdash;I
+had greatly hoped, so to rule affairs, that the Earl might own
+that his training had not been lost on his nephew, and that the
+Crown might be trusted not to infringe the Charter.&nbsp; I had
+hoped that he might yet be my wisest counsellor.&nbsp; But,
+Richard, I too had supporters who outran my commands.&nbsp;
+Bitter hatred and malice had been awakened, and cruel resolves
+that none should be spared.&nbsp; When I returned from bearing my
+father, bleeding and dismayed, from the battle, whither he had
+been cruelly led, it was to find that my orders had been
+disobeyed&mdash;that there had been foul and cruel slaughter; and
+that all my hopes that my uncle of Leicester would forgive me and
+look friendly on me were ended!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The Prince&rsquo;s lip trembled as he spoke, and tears
+glistened in his eyes; and the evident struggle to repress his
+feelings, brought home deeply and forcibly the conviction to
+Richard that his sorrow was genuine.</p>
+<p>He could not speak for some seconds; then he added: &ldquo;I
+marvel not that I am looked on among you as guilty of his
+blood.&nbsp; Simon and Guy regard me as one with whom they are at
+deadly feud, and cannot understand that it was their own excesses
+that armed those merciless hands against him.&nbsp; Even my aunt
+shrank from me, and implored my mercy as though I were a ruthless
+tyrant.&nbsp; But thou, Richard, thou hast inherited enough of
+thy father&rsquo;s mind to be able to understand how unwillingly
+was my share in his fall, and how great would be my comfort and
+joy in being good kinsman to one of his sons.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The strong man&rsquo;s generous pleading was most
+touching.&nbsp; Richard bowed his head; the Princess watched him
+eagerly.&nbsp; The boy spoke at last in perplexity.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;My Lord, you know better than I.&nbsp; Would it be
+knightly, would it be honourable?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The Princess started in some indignation at such a question to
+her husband; but Edward understood the boy better, and said,
+&ldquo;That which is most Christian is most
+knightly.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then pausing: &ldquo;Ask thine heart,
+Richard; which would thy father choose for thee&mdash;to live in
+such guidance as I hope will ever be found in my household, or to
+share the wandering, I fear me freebooting, life of thy
+brothers?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard could not forget how his father had sternly withheld
+him from going with Simon to besiege Pevensey.&nbsp; He knew that
+these two brethren had long been a pain and grief to his father;
+and began to understand that the nephew, with whom the
+Earl&rsquo;s last battle had been fought, was nevertheless his
+truest pupil.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou wilt remain,&rdquo; said Edward decisively;
+&ldquo;and let us strive one day to bring to pass the state of
+things for which thy father and I fought alike, though, alas! in
+opposite ranks.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;If my mother consents,&rdquo; said Richard, his head
+bent down, and uttering the words with the more difficulty,
+because he felt so strongly drawn towards his cousin, who never
+seemed so mighty as in his condescension.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then, Richard de Montfort,&rdquo; said Edward gravely,
+&ldquo;let us render to one another the kiss of peace, as kinsmen
+who have put away all thought of wrong between them.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard looked up; and the Prince bending his lofty head,
+there was exchanged between them that solemn embrace, which in
+the early middle ages was the deepest token of amity.</p>
+<p>And with that kiss, it was as though the soul of Richard de
+Montfort were knit to the soul of Edward of England with the
+heart-whole devotion, composed of affection and loyal homage to a
+great character, which ever since the days of the bond between
+the son of the doomed King of Israel and the youthful slayer of
+the Philistine champion, has been one of the noblest passions of
+a young heart.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IV<br />
+THE TRANSLATION</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Now in gems their relics lie,<br />
+And their names in blazonry,<br />
+And their forms in storied panes<br />
+Gleam athwart their own loved fanes.&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><i>Lyra Innocentium</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">If</span> novelty has its charms, so has
+old age, and to us the great abbey church of Westminster has
+become doubly beloved by long generations of affection, and
+doubly beautiful by the softening handiwork of time and of
+smoke.</p>
+<p>Yet what a glorious sight must it not have been when it was
+fresh from the hands of the builder, the creamy stone clear and
+sharp at every angle, and each moulding and flower true and
+perfect as the chisel had newly left it.&nbsp; The deep archway
+of the west front opened in stately magnificence, and yet with a
+light loftiness hitherto unknown in England, and somewhat
+approaching to the style in which the great French cathedrals
+were then rising.&nbsp; And its accompaniments were, on the one
+hand the palace and hall, on the other hand the monastery, with
+its high walled courts and deep-browed cloisters, its noble
+refectory and vaulted kitchen, the herbarium or garden, shady
+with trees, and enriched with curious plants of Palestine,
+sloping down to the broad and majestic Thames, pure and blue as
+he pursued his silver winding way through emerald meadows and
+softly rising hills clothed with copses and woods.&nbsp; To the
+east, seated upon her hills, stood the crowned and battlemented
+city, the massive White Tower rising above the
+fortifications.</p>
+<p>The autumn brilliance of October, 1269, never enlightened a
+more gorgeous scene than when it shone upon the ceremony still
+noted in our Calendar as the Translation of King Edward.&nbsp;
+Buried at first in his own low-browed heavy-arched Norman
+structure, which he had built, as he believed, at the express
+bidding of St. Peter; the Confessor, whose tender-hearted and
+devout nature had, by force of contrast with those of his fierce
+foreign successors, come to assume a saintly halo in the eyes not
+merely of the English, but of their Angevin lords themselves,
+was, now to reign on almost equal terms with the great Apostle
+himself, as one of the hallowing patrons of the Abbey&mdash;nay,
+since at least his relics were entire and undoubted, as its chief
+attraction.</p>
+<p>The new chapel in his especial honour, behind the exquisite
+bayed apsidal chancel, was at length complete; and on this day he
+was to take possession of it.&nbsp; An ark of pure gold, chased
+and ornamented with the surpassing grace of that period of
+perfect taste, had received the royally robed corpse, which
+Churchmen averred lay calm and beautiful, untainted by decay; and
+this was now uplifted by the arms of King Henry himself, of
+Richard King of the Romans his brother, and of the two princes,
+Edward and Edmund.</p>
+<p>It was a striking sight to see those two pairs of
+brothers.&nbsp; The two kings, nearly of an age, and so fondly
+attached that they could hardly brook a separation, till the
+death of the one broke the wearied heart of the other, were both
+gray-haired prematurely-aged men, of features that time instead
+of hardening had rendered more feeble and uncertain.&nbsp; Their
+faces were much alike, but Henry might be known from Richard by a
+certain inequality in the outline of his eyebrows; and their
+dress, though both alike wore long flowing gowns, the side seams
+only coming down as far as the thigh so as to allow play for the
+limbs, so far differed that Henry&rsquo;s was of blue, with the
+English lions embroidered in red and gold on his breast, and
+Richard was in the imperial purple, or rather scarlet, and the
+eagle of the empire on his breast testified to the futile
+election which he had purchased with the wealth of his Cornish
+mines.&nbsp; Both the elders together, with all their best will
+and their simple faith in the availing merit of the action they
+were performing, would have been physically incapable of
+proceeding many steps with their burden, but for the support it
+received from the two younger men who sustained the feet of the
+saint, using some dexterity in adapting their strength so that
+the coffin might be carried evenly.</p>
+<p>One was the hunter we have already seen in Alton Wood.&nbsp;
+His features wore their characteristic stamp of deep awe and
+enthusiasm, and even as he slowly and calmly moved, sustaining
+the chief of the weight with scarcely an effort of his giant
+strength, his head towering high above all those around, his eyes
+might be observed to be seeing, though not marking, what was
+before them, but to be fixed as though the soul were in
+contemplation, far far away.&nbsp; He did not see in the present
+scene four princes rendering homage to a royal saint, who, from
+personal connection and by a brilliant display of devotion, might
+be propitiated into becoming a valuable patron amid intercessor;
+still less did it present itself to him as a pageant in which he
+was to bow his splendid powers, mental and bodily, to aid two
+feeble-minded old men to totter under the gold-cased corpse of a
+still more foolish and mischievous prince, dead two hundred years
+back.&nbsp; No, rather thought and eye were alike upon the great
+invisible world, the echo of whose chants might perchance be
+ringing on his ear; that world where holy kings cast their crowns
+before the Throne, and where the lamb-like spirit of the
+Confessor might be joining in the praise, and offering these
+tokens of honour to Him to whom all honour and praise and glory
+and blessing are due.</p>
+<p>Of shorter stature, darker browed, of less regular feature and
+less clear complexion, so as to look as if he were the elder of
+the brothers, Prince Edmund moved by his side, using much
+exertion, and bending with the effort, so as to increase the
+slight sloop that had led to his historical nickname of the
+Crouchback, though some think this was merely taken from his
+crusading cross.&nbsp; He bore the arms of Sicily, to which he
+had not yet resigned his claim.&nbsp; His eye wandered, but not
+far away, like that of his brother.&nbsp; It was in search of his
+young betrothed, the Lady Aveline of Lancaster, the fair young
+heiress to whom he was to owe the great earldom that was a fair
+portion for a younger brother even of royalty.</p>
+<p>All the four were bare-footed, and both princes were in robes
+much resembling that of their father, except that upon the left
+shoulder of each might be seen, in white cloth, the two lines of
+the Cross, that marked them as pilgrims and Crusaders, already on
+the eve of departure for the Holy Land.</p>
+<p>The shrine where the golden coffin was to rest is
+substantially the same in our own day, with its triple-cusped
+arches below, the stage of six and stage of four above them, and
+the twisted columns in imitation of that which was supposed to
+have come from the Beautiful Gate of the Temple.&nbsp; But at
+that time it was a glittering fabric of mosaic work, in gold,
+lapis-lazuli, and precious stones, aided here and there by
+fragments of coloured glass, the only part of the costly
+workmanship that has come down to us.&nbsp; Around this shrine
+the preceding members of the procession had taken their
+places.&nbsp; Archbishop Boniface of Savoy was there, old age
+ennobling a countenance that once had been light and frivolous,
+and all his bishops in the splendour of their richest copes,
+solidly embroidered with absolute scenes and portraits in
+embroidery, with tall mitres worked with gold wire and jewels,
+and crosiers of beauteous workmanship in gold, ivory, and
+enamel.&nbsp; Mitred abbots, no less glorious in array, stood in
+another rank; the scarlet-mantled Grand Prior of the Hospital,
+and the white-cloaked Templar, made a link between the
+ecclesiastic and the warrior.&nbsp; Priests and monks, selected
+for their voices&rsquo; sake, clustered in every available space;
+and, in full radiance, on a stage on the further side, were
+seated the ladies of the court, mostly with their hair uncovered,
+and surrounded by a garland of precious stones.&nbsp; Queen
+Eleanor of Provence, still bent on youthfulness, looked somewhat
+haggard in this garb; but it well became Beatrix von Falkmorite,
+the young German girl whom Richard King of the Romans had wedded
+in his old age for the sake of her fair face.&nbsp; Smiling,
+plump, and rosy, she sat opening her wide blue eyes, wearing her
+emerald and ruby wreath as though it had been a coronal of
+daisies, and gazing with childish whisperings as she watched the
+movements of her king, and clung for direction and help in her
+own part of the pageant to the Princess Eleanor, who sat beside
+her, little the elder in years, less beautiful in colouring, but
+how far surpassing her in queenly pensive grace and
+dignity!&nbsp; Leaning on Eleanor&rsquo;s lap was a bright-eyed,
+bright-haired boy of four years old, watching with puzzled looks
+the brilliant ceremony, which he only half understood, and his
+glances wandering between his father and the blue and white robed
+little acolytes who stood nearest to the shrine, holding by
+chains the silver censers, which from time to time sent forth a
+fragrant vapour, curling round the heads of the nearest figures,
+and floating away in the lofty vaultings of the roof.</p>
+<p>The actual ceremony could only be beheld by a favoured few;
+the official clergy, the many connections of royalty, and the
+chief nobility, filled the church to overflowing, but the rest of
+the world repaid itself by making a magnificent holiday.&nbsp;
+Good-natured King Henry had been permitted by his son, who had
+now, though behind the scenes, assumed the reins of government,
+to spend freely, and make a feast to his heart&rsquo;s
+content.&nbsp; Roasting and boiling were going on on a fast and
+furious scale, not only in the palace and abbey, but in booths
+erected in the fields; and tables were spreading and rushes
+strewing for the accommodation of all ranks.&nbsp; Near the
+entrance of the Abbey, the trains of the personages within
+awaited their coming forth in some sort of order, the more
+reverent listening to the sounds from within, and bending or
+crossing themselves as the familiar words of higher notes of
+praise rose loud enough to reach their ears; but for the most
+part, the tones and gestures were as various as the appearance of
+the attendants.&nbsp; Here were black Benedictines, there white
+Augustinians clustered round the sleek mules of their abbots;
+there scornful dark Templars, in their black and white, sowed the
+seeds of hatred against their order, and scarlet Hospitaliers
+looked bright and friendly even while repelling the jostling of
+the crowd.&nbsp; A hoary old squire, who had been with the King
+through all his troubles, kept together his immediate attendants;
+a party of boorish-looking Germans waited for Richard of
+Cornwall; and the slender, richly-caparisoned palfreys of the
+ladies were in charge of high-born pages, who sometimes, with
+means fair or foul, pushed back the throng, sometimes themselves
+became enamoured of its humours.</p>
+<p>For not only had the neighbouring city of London poured forth
+her merchants and artizans, to gaze, wonder, and censure the
+extravagance&mdash;not only had beggars of every degree been
+attracted by the largesse that Henry delighted to dispense, and
+peasants had poured in from all the villages around, but no sort
+of entertainment was lacking.&nbsp; Here were minstrels and
+story-tellers gathering groups around them; here was the
+mountebank, clearing a stage in which to perform feats of
+jugglery, tossing from one hand to another a never-ending circle
+of balls, balancing a lance upon his nose, with a popinjay on its
+point; here were a bevy of girls with strange garments fastened
+to their ankles, who would dance on their hands instead of their
+feet, while their uplifted toes jangled little bells.</p>
+<p>Peasant and beggar, citizen and performer, sightseer and
+professional, all alike strove to get into the space before the
+great entrance, where the procession must come forth to gratify
+the eyes of the gazers, and mayhap shower down such bounty as the
+elder mendicants averred had been given when Prince Edward (the
+saints defend him!) had been weighed at five years old, and, to
+avert ill luck, the counterbalance of pure gold had been thrown
+among the poor to purchase their prayers.</p>
+<p>His weight in gold at his present stature could hardly be
+expected by the wildest imaginations, but hungry eyes had been
+estimating the weight of his little heir, and discontented lips
+had declared that the child was of too slender make to be ever
+worth so much to them as his father.&nbsp; Yet a whisper of the
+possibility had quickly been magnified to a certainty of such a
+largesse, and the multitude were thus stimulated to furious
+exertions to win the most favourable spot for gathering up such a
+golden rain as even little Prince Henry&rsquo;s counterpoise
+would afford; and ever as time waxed later, the throng grew
+denser and more unruly, and the struggle fiercer and more
+violent.</p>
+<p>The screams and expostulations of the weak, elbowed and
+trampled down, mingled with more festive sounds; and the
+attendants who waited on the river in the large and
+beautifully-ornamented barges which were the usual conveyances of
+distinguished personages, began to agree with one another that if
+they saw less than if they were on the bank, they escaped a
+considerable amount of discomfort as well as danger.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;For,&rdquo; murmured one of the pages, &ldquo;I suppose
+it would be a dire offence to the Prince to lay about among the
+churls as they deserve.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, truly, among Londoners above all,&rdquo; was the
+answer of his companion, whom the last four years had rendered
+considerably taller than when we saw him last.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not that there is much love lost between them.&nbsp; He
+hath never forgotten the day when they pelted the Queen with
+rotten eggs, and sang their ribald songs; nor they the day he
+rode them down at Lewes like corn before the reaper.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And lost the day,&rdquo; muttered the other page; then
+added, &ldquo;The less love, the more cause for
+caution.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh yes, we know you are politic, Master Richard,&rdquo;
+was the sneering reply, &ldquo;but you need not fear my
+quarrelling with your citizen friends.&nbsp; I would not be the
+man to face Prince Edward if I had made too free with any of the
+caitiffs.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hark! Master Hamlyn, the tumult is louder than
+ever,&rdquo; interposed an elderly man of lower rank, who was in
+charge of the stout rowers in the royal colours of red and
+gold.&nbsp; &ldquo;Young gentlemen, the Mass must be ended; it
+were better to draw to the stairs, than to talk of you know not
+what,&rdquo; he muttered.</p>
+<p>Hamlyn de Valence, who held the rudder, steered towards the
+wide stone steps that descended to the river, nearest to the apse
+in which &ldquo;St. Peter&rsquo;s Abbey Church&rdquo; terminated
+before Henry VII. had added his chapel.&nbsp; At that moment a
+louder burst of sound, half imprecation, half shriek, was heard;
+there was a heavy splash a little way above, and a small blue
+bundle was seen on the river, apparently totally unheeded by the
+frantic crowd on the bank.&nbsp; No sooner was it seen by
+Richard, however, than he threw back his mantle and sprang out of
+the barge.&nbsp; There was a loud cry from the third page, a
+little fellow of nine or ten years old; but Richard gallantly
+swam out, battled with the current, and succeeded in laying hold
+of a young child, with whom he made for the barge, partly aided
+by the stream; but he was breathless, and heartily glad to reach
+the boat and support himself against the gunwale.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A pretty boat companion you!&rdquo; said Hamlyn
+maliciously.&nbsp; &ldquo;How are we to take you in, over the
+velvet cushions?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The little page gave an expostulating cry.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hold the child an instant, John,&rdquo; gasped Richard,
+raising it towards his younger friend; &ldquo;I will but recover
+breath, and then land and seek out her friends.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How is this?&rdquo; said a voice above them; and
+looking up, they found that while all had been absorbed in the
+rescue, the Prince, with his little son in his arms and his wife
+hanging on his arm, had come to the stone stairs, and was looking
+down.&nbsp; &ldquo;Richard overboard!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A child fell over the bank, my Lord,&rdquo; eagerly
+shouted the little John, with cap in hand, &ldquo;and he swam out
+to pick it up.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Into the barge instantly, Richard,&rdquo; commanded the
+Prince.&nbsp; &ldquo;&rsquo;Tis as much as his life is worth to
+remain in this cold stream!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And truly Richard was beginning to feel as much.&nbsp; He was
+assisted in by two of the oarsmen, and the barge then putting
+towards the steps, the Princess was handed into her place, and
+began instantly to ask after the poor child.&nbsp; It had not
+been long enough in the water to lose its consciousness, though
+it had hitherto been too much frightened to cry; but it no sooner
+opened a wide pair of dark eyes to find itself in strange hands,
+than it set up a lamentable wail, calling in broken accents for
+&ldquo;Da-da.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Let me take it ashore at once, gracious lady,&rdquo;
+said Richard, revived by a draught of wine from the stores
+provided for the long day; &ldquo;I will find its
+friends.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said the Princess, &ldquo;it were frenzy to
+take it thus in its wet garments; and frenzy to remain in thine,
+Richard.&rdquo;&nbsp; As she spoke, the Prince and the other
+persons of the suite had embarked, and the barge was pushing away
+from the steps.&nbsp; &ldquo;Give the child to me,&rdquo; she
+added, holding out her arms, and disregarding a remonstrance from
+one of her ladies, disregarding too the sobs and struggles of the
+child, whom she strove to soothe, while hastily removing the
+little thing&rsquo;s soaked blue frock and hood, and wrapping it
+up in a warm woollen cloak.&nbsp; &ldquo;It is a pretty little
+maiden,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;and not ill cared for.&nbsp; Some
+mother&rsquo;s heart must be bursting for her!&mdash;Hush thee!
+hush thee, little one; we will take thee home and clothe thee,
+and then thou shalt go to thy mother,&rdquo; she added, in better
+English than she had spoken four years earlier in Alton
+Wood.&nbsp; But the child still cried for her da-da, and the
+Princess asked again, &ldquo;What is thy father&rsquo;s name,
+little maid?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;P&egrave;re,&rdquo; she answered, with a peculiar
+accent that made the Prince say, &ldquo;That is a
+Proven&ccedil;al tongue.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;They are Proven&ccedil;al eyes likewise,&rdquo; added
+Eleanor.&nbsp; &ldquo;See how like their hue is to
+Richard&rsquo;s own;&rdquo; and in Proven&ccedil;al she repeated
+the question what the father&rsquo;s name and the child&rsquo;s
+own might be.&nbsp; But &ldquo;P&egrave;re&rdquo; again, and
+&ldquo;Bessee, pretty Bessee,&rdquo; was all the answer she
+obtained, the last in unmistakable English.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I thought,&rdquo; said Eleanor, &ldquo;that it was only
+my own children that scarce knew whether they spoke English,
+Langu&eacute;doc, or Langu&eacute;d&rsquo;ou&igrave;.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It was the same with us, Lady,&rdquo; said
+Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;Father Adam was wont to say we were a
+little Babel.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The child looked towards him on hearing his voice, and held
+out her hands to go to him, reiterating an entreaty to be taken
+to her father.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;She is probably the child of some minstrel or
+troubadour,&rdquo; said the Prince.&nbsp; &ldquo;We will send in
+search of him as soon as we have reached the Savoy.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The Savoy Palace had been built for Queen Eleanor&rsquo;s
+obnoxious uncle, Prince Thomas of Savoy, and had recently been
+purchased by the Queen herself, as a wedding gift for her son
+Edmund; but in the meantime Edward and his family were occupying
+it during their stay near Westminster, and their barge was
+brought up to the wide stairs of its noble court.&nbsp; Richard
+was obliged to give up the child to the Princess and her ladies,
+though she shrieked after him so pertinaciously, that Eleanor
+called to him to return so soon as he should have changed his
+garments.</p>
+<p>In a few minutes he again appeared, and found the little girl
+dressed in a little garment of one of the royal children, but
+totally insensible to the honour, turning away from all the
+dainties offered to her, and sobbing for her father, much to the
+indignation of the two little princes, Henry and John, who stood
+hand in hand staring at her.&nbsp; She flew to him directly, with
+a broken entreaty that she might be taken to her father.&nbsp;
+Again they tried questioning her, but Richard, whether speaking
+English or Proven&ccedil;al, always succeeded in obtaining
+readier and more comprehensible replies than did the
+Princess.&nbsp; Whether she recognized him as her preserver, or
+whether his language had a familiar tone, she seemed exclusively
+attracted by him; and he it was who learnt that she lived at
+home&mdash;far off&mdash;on the Green near the red monks, and
+that her father could not see&mdash;he would be lost without
+Bessee to lead him.&nbsp; And the little creature, hardly three
+years old if so much, was evidently in the greatest trouble at
+her father having lost her guidance and protection.</p>
+<p>Richard, touched and flattered by the little maiden&rsquo;s
+exclusive preference, and owning in her Proven&ccedil;al eyes and
+speech something strangely like his own young sister Eleanor,
+entreated permission to be himself the person to take her in
+search of her friends.&nbsp; The Princess added her persuasions,
+declaring it would be cruel to send the poor little thing with
+another stranger, and that his Proven&ccedil;al tongue was needed
+in order to discovering her father among the troubadours.</p>
+<p>Edward yielded to her persuasion, adding, however, that
+Richard must take two men-at-arms with him, and gravely bidding
+him be on his guard.&nbsp; Nor would he permit him to be
+accompanied by little John de Mohun, who, half page, half
+hostage, had lately been added to the Princess&rsquo;s train, and
+being often bullied and teased by Hamlyn and his fellows, had
+vehemently attached himself to Richard, and now entreated in vain
+to go with him on the adventure.&nbsp; In fact, Prince Edward was
+a stern disciplinarian, equally severe against either familiarity
+or insolence towards the external world, and especially towards
+any one connected with London.&nbsp; If Richard ever gave him any
+offence, it was by a certain freedom of manner towards inferiors,
+such as the Earl of Leicester had diligently inculcated on his
+family, but which more than once had excited a shade of vexation
+on the Prince&rsquo;s part.&nbsp; Even after Richard had reached
+the door, he was called back and commanded on no pretext to
+loiter or enter on any dispute, and if his search should detain
+him late, to sleep at the Tower, rather than be questioned and
+stopped at any of the gates which were guarded at night by the
+citizens.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER V<br />
+THE OLD KNIGHT OF THE HOSPITAL</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;The warriors of the sacred grave,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Who looked to Christ for
+laws.&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><i>Lord Houghton</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">Richard</span> summoned a small boat, and
+with two stout men-at-arms, of whom Adam de Gourdon was one,
+prepared again to cross the river.&nbsp; Leonillo ran down the
+stone stairs with a wistful look of entreaty and it occurred to
+both Richard and Adam, that, could the child only lead them to
+the place where her father had sat, the dog&rsquo;s scent might
+prove their most efficient guide.</p>
+<p>Little Bessee seemed quite comforted when on her way back to
+her father, and sat on Richard&rsquo;s knee, eating the comfits
+with which the Princess had provided her, and making him cut a
+figure that seemed somewhat to amaze the other boat-loads whom
+they encountered on the river.</p>
+<p>When they landed, the throng was more dispersed, but revelry
+and sports of all kinds were going on fast and furiously; each
+door of the Abbey was besieged by hungry crowds receiving their
+dole, and Richard&rsquo;s inquiries for a blind man who had lost
+his child were little heeded, or met with no satisfactory
+answer.&nbsp; Bessee herself was bewildered, and incapable of
+finding her father&rsquo;s late station; and Richard was becoming
+perplexed, and doubtful whether he ought to take her back, as
+well as somewhat put out of countenance by the laughter of Thomas
+de Clare, and other young nobles, who rallied him on his strange
+charge.</p>
+<p>At last the little girl&rsquo;s face lightened as at sight of
+something familiar.&nbsp; &ldquo;Good red monks,&rdquo; she
+said.&nbsp; &ldquo;They give Bessee soup&mdash;make father
+well.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>With a ray of hope, Richard advanced to a party of Brethren of
+St. John, who were mounting at the Abbey gate to return to their
+house at Spitalfields, and doffing his bonnet, intimated a desire
+to address the tall old war-worn knight with a benevolent face,
+who was adjusting his scarlet cloak, before mounting a gray Arab
+steed looking as old and worthy as himself.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ha! a young Crusader, I perceive,&rdquo; was the
+greeting of the old knight, as his eye fell on the white cross on
+Richard&rsquo;s mantle.&nbsp; &ldquo;Welcome, brother!&nbsp; Dost
+thou need counsel on thy goodly Eastern way?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thanks, reverend Sir,&rdquo; returned Richard,
+&ldquo;but my present purpose was to seek for the father of this
+little one, who fell into the river in the press.&nbsp; She
+pointed to you, saying she had received your bounty.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It is Blind Hal&rsquo;s child, Sir Robert!&rdquo;
+exclaimed a serving-brother in black, coming eagerly forward;
+&ldquo;the villeins on the green told me the poor knave was
+distraught at having lost his child in the throng!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What brought he her there for?&rdquo; exclaimed Sir
+Robert.&nbsp; &ldquo;Poor fool! his wits must have forsaken
+him!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The child had a craving to see the show,&rdquo; replied
+the Brother, &ldquo;so Hob the cobbler told me; and all went well
+till my Lord of Pembroke&rsquo;s retainers forced all right and
+left to make way in the crowd.&nbsp; Hal was thrown down, and the
+child thrust away till they feared she had fallen over the
+bank.&nbsp; Hob and his wife were fain to get the poor man away,
+for his moans and fierce words were awful: and he was not a
+little hurt in the scuffle, so I e&rsquo;en gave them leave to
+lay him in the cart that brought up your reverence&rsquo;s
+vestments, and the gear we lent the Abbey for the
+show.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Right, Brother Hilary,&rdquo; said Sir Robert;
+&ldquo;and now the poor knave will have his best
+healing.&mdash;He must have been a good soldier once,&rdquo; he
+added to Richard; &ldquo;but he is a mere fragment of a man,
+wasted in your Earl of Leicester&rsquo;s wars.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Where dwells he?&rdquo; asked Richard, keenly
+interested in all his father&rsquo;s old followers; &ldquo;I
+would fain restore him his child.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;In a hut on Bednall Green,&rdquo; answered the
+serving-brother; &ldquo;but twice or thrice a week he comes to
+the Spital to have his hurts looked to.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay! we tell him his little witch must soon be shut
+out!&nbsp; She turns the heads of all our brethren,&rdquo; said
+Sir Robert, smiling.&nbsp; &ldquo;Wild work she makes with our
+novices.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Wilder with our Knights Commanders, maybe, Sir,&rdquo;
+retorted, laughing, a fair open-faced youth in his
+novitiate.&nbsp; &ldquo;I shall some day warn Hal how our
+brethren, the Templars, are said to play at ball with tender
+babes on their lances.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No scandal about our brethren of the Temple,
+Rayland,&rdquo; said Sir Robert, looking grave for a
+moment.&mdash;&ldquo;Young Sir, it would be a favour if you would
+ride with us; we would gladly show you the way to Bednall
+Green.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I should rejoice to go, Sir,&rdquo; returned Richard,
+&ldquo;but I am of Prince Edward&rsquo;s household&mdash;Richard
+Fowen; and my horse is on the other side of the river.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That is soon remedied,&rdquo; said Sir Robert, who
+seemed to have taken a great fancy to Richard, either for the
+sake of his crossed shoulder, or of his kindness to the little
+plaything of the Spital.&nbsp; &ldquo;Our young brother,
+Engelbert von Fuchstein, has leave to tarry this night with his
+brother in the train of the King of the Romans, and his horse is
+at your service, if you will do our poor Spital the favour to
+tarry there this night, and ride it back in the morn to meet him
+at Westminster.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard knew that this invitation might be safely accepted
+without danger of giving umbrage to the Prince, who was on the
+best terms with the Knights of the Hospital.&nbsp; He therefore
+dismissed Gourdon and the other man-at-arms with a message
+explaining the matter; and warmly thanking the old Grand Prior,
+laid one hand on the saddle of the great ponderous beast that was
+led up to him, and vaulted on its back without touching the
+stirrup.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well done, my young master,&rdquo; said Sir Robert,
+&ldquo;it is easy to see you are of the Prince&rsquo;s
+household.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I cannot yet do as the Prince can,&rdquo; said
+Richard,&mdash;&ldquo;take this leap in full armour.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No; and let me give you a bit of counsel, fair
+Sir.&nbsp; Such pastimes are very well for the tiltyard, but they
+should be laid aside in the blessed Land, and strength reserved
+for the one cause and purpose.&rdquo;&nbsp; He crossed himself;
+and in the meantime, Bessee intimated her imperious purpose of
+not riding before Brother Hilary, but being perched before
+Richard on the enormous cream-coloured animal, whence he was
+looking down from a considerable elevation upon Sir Robert on his
+slender Arab.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;These are the German monsters that our brethren bring
+over,&rdquo; said Sir Robert.&nbsp; &ldquo;Mark me, young
+brother, cumber not yourself with these beasts of Europe, which
+are good for nothing but food for foul birds in the East.&nbsp;
+Purvey yourself of an Arab as soon as you land.&nbsp; There is a
+rogue at Acre, one Ali by name, who will not cheat you more than
+is reasonable, so you mention my name to him, Sir Robert Darcy,
+at your service.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thanks, reverend Father,&rdquo; returned Richard,
+&ldquo;but I am but a landless page, and the Prince mounts
+me.&nbsp; Said you this poor man had been wounded in the late
+wars?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, hacked and hewed worse than by the Infidels
+themselves!&nbsp; Woeful it is that here, at home, men&rsquo;s
+blood should be wasted on your own petty feuds.&nbsp; This same
+Barons&rsquo; war now hath cost as much downright courage as
+would have brought us back to Jerusalem, and all thrown away,
+without a cause, with no honour, no hope.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not without a cause,&rdquo; Richard could not help
+saying.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said the old knight; &ldquo;no cause is
+worth the taking of a life, save the cause of the Holy
+Sepulchre.&nbsp; What be these matters of taxes and laws to ask a
+man to shed his blood for?&nbsp; Alack, the temper of the
+cross-bearer is dying out!&nbsp; I pray I may not see this
+Crusade end like half those I have beheld&mdash;and the cross on
+the shoulder become no better than a mockery.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That may scarcely be with such leaders as the Prince
+and the King of France,&rdquo; said Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well, well, the Prince is untried; and for King Louis,
+he is as holy a man as ever lived since King Godfrey of blessed
+memory, but he has bad luck, ever bad luck.&nbsp; The Saints
+forefend, but I trow he will listen to some crazy counsel from
+Rome, belike, or some barefooted hermit&mdash;very holy, no
+doubt, but who does not know a Greek from a Saracen, or a
+horse&rsquo;s head from his tail&mdash;and will go to some
+pestilential hole like that foul Egyptian swamp, where we stayed
+till our skin was the colour of an old boot, in hopes of
+converting the Sultan of Babylon, or the Old Man of the Mountain,
+or what not, and there he will stay till the flower of his forces
+have wasted away.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Were you in Egypt with King Louis?&rdquo; eagerly
+exclaimed Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, marry, was I, and a goodly land it is; but I saw
+many a good man-at-arms perish miserably in a marsh, who might
+have been the saving of the Holy City.&nbsp; Why, I myself have
+never been the same man since!&nbsp; Never could do a
+month&rsquo;s service out of the infirmary at Acre, though after
+all there&rsquo;s no work I like so well as the hospital
+business, and for the last five years I have had to stay here
+training young brethren!&nbsp; Oh, young man!&nbsp; I envy you
+your first stroke for the Holy Sepulchre!&nbsp; Would that the
+Grand-Master would hear my entreaty.&nbsp; I am too old to be
+worth sparing, and I would fain have one more chance of dying
+under the banner of the Order!&mdash;But I am setting you a bad
+example, son Raynal; a Hospitalier has no will.&mdash;And look
+you, young Sir Page, if you stay out at sunset in that clime,
+&rsquo;tis all up with you.&nbsp; And you should veil your helmet
+well, or the sun smites on your head as deadly as a flake of
+Greek fire.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>So rambled on good old Sir Robert Darcy, Grand Prior of
+England, a perfect dragon among the Saracens, but everywhere else
+the mildest and most benevolent of men; his discourse strangely
+mingling together the deepest enthusiasm with a business-like
+common-sense appreciation of ways and means, and with minute
+directions, precautions, and anecdotes, gathered from his
+practical experience both as captain in the field, priest in the
+Church, and surgeon in the hospital, and all seen from the most
+sunshiny point of view.</p>
+<p>Meanwhile, they were riding along the Strand, a beautiful open
+road, with grassy borders shelving down to the Thames.&nbsp; They
+passed through the City of London.&nbsp; The Hospital lay beyond
+the walls, but the Marshes of Moorfields that protected them were
+not passable without a long circuit; and the fortified gates
+stood open at Temple Bar, where the Hospitaliers, looking towards
+the Round Church and stately buildings of the Preceptory, saluted
+the white-cloaked figures moving about it, with courtesy grim and
+distant in all but Sir Robert Darcy, who could not even hate a
+Templar, a creature to the ordinary Hospitalier far more
+detestable than a Saracen.&nbsp; On then, up ground beginning to
+rise, below which the little muddy stream called the Flete
+stagnated along its way, meandering to the Thames.&nbsp; Thatched
+hovels and wooden booths left so narrow a passage that the
+horsemen were forced to move in single file, and did not gain a
+clearer space even when the stone houses of merchants began to
+stand thick on Ludgate Hill, their carved wooden balconies so
+projecting, that it would seem to have been an object with the
+citizens to be able to shake hands across the street.&nbsp; The
+city was comparatively empty and quiet, as all the world were
+keeping holiday at Westminster; but even as it was, the
+passengers seemed to swarm in the streets, and knots of persons
+who had been unable to witness the spectacle, sat with gazing
+children upon the stairs outside the houses, to admire the
+fragments of the pageant that came their way.&nbsp; Acclamations
+of delight greeted the appearance of the scarlet-mantled
+Hospitaliers, such as Richard had often heard in his boyhood,
+when riding in his father&rsquo;s train, but far less frequently
+since he had been a part of the Prince&rsquo;s retinue.&nbsp; And
+equally diverse was the merry nod and smile of Sir Robert to each
+gaping shouting group of little ones, from the stately distant
+courtesy with which Edward returned the popular
+salutations.&nbsp; He could be gracious&mdash;he could not be
+friendly except to a few.</p>
+<p>They passed the capitular buildings of St. Paul&rsquo;s, with
+the beautiful cathedral towering over them, and in its rear,
+numerous booths for the purchase of rosaries&mdash;recent
+inventions then of St. Dominic, the great friend of
+Richard&rsquo;s stern grandfather, the persecutor of the
+Albigenses.&nbsp; Sir Robert drew up, and declared he must buy
+one for the little maid as a remembrance of the day, and then
+found she was fast asleep; but he nevertheless purchased a
+black-beaded chaplet, giving for it one of the sorely-clipped
+coins of King Henry.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Prithee let me have one likewise, holy Sir,&rdquo;
+quoth Richard, &ldquo;in memory of the talk that hath taught me
+so much of the import of my crusading vow.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou shalt bring me for it one of the olive of
+Bethlehem,&rdquo; said Sir Robert; &ldquo;I have given away all I
+brought from the East.&nbsp; They are so great a boon to our poor
+sick folk that I wish I had brought twice as many, but to me they
+have always a Saracen look.&nbsp; Your Moslem always fingers one
+much of the same fashion as he parleys.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Ludgate, freshly built, and adorned with new figures to
+represent the fabulous King Lud, was not yet closed for the
+night; and the party came forth beyond the walls, with the
+desolate Moorfields to their left, and before them a number of
+rising villages clustered round their churches.</p>
+<p>The Hospital, a grand fortified monastery, was already to be
+seen over the fields; but Sir Robert, sending home the rest of
+his troop, turned aside with Richard and Brother Hilary towards
+the common, with a border of cottages around it, which went by
+the name of Bednall Green.</p>
+<p>Brother Hilary knew the hut inhabited by Blind Hal, and led
+the way to it.&nbsp; Low and mud-built, thatched, and with a
+wattled door, it had a wretched appearance; but the old woman who
+came to the door was not ill clad.&nbsp; &ldquo;Blessings on you,
+holy Father!&rdquo; she cried; &ldquo;do I see the child, my
+lamb, my lady-bird!&nbsp; Would that she may come in time to
+cheer her poor father!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How is it with him then, Gammer?&rdquo; demanded Sir
+Robert, springing to the ground with the alacrity of a doctor
+anxious about his patient.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ill, very ill, Sir.&nbsp; Whether the horse&rsquo;s
+feet hurt his old wound, or whether it be the loss of the child,
+he hath done nought but moan and rave, and lie as one dead ever
+since they brought him home.&nbsp; He is lying in one of the dead
+swoons now!&nbsp; It were not well that the child saw
+him.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>But Bessee, awakening with a cry of joy, saw her borne, and
+struggled to go to her father, whose name she called on with all
+her might, disregarding the caresses of the old woman, and the
+endeavour made by Richard to restrain without alarming her, while
+Sir Robert went into the hut to endeavour to restore the
+sufferer.</p>
+<p>Suddenly a cry broke from within; and Richard, turning at the
+voice, beheld the blind man sitting up on his pallet with arms
+outstretched.&nbsp; &ldquo;My child!&mdash;My Father! hast thou
+brought her to visit me in limbo?&rdquo; he cried.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He raves!&rdquo; said Richard, using his strength to
+withhold the child, who broke out into a shriek.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, nay! she doth not abide here!&rdquo; he
+exclaimed.&nbsp; &ldquo;Her spirit is pure!&nbsp; My sins are not
+visited on her beyond the grave!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou art on the earthly side of the grave still, my
+son,&rdquo; said Sir Robert, at the same time as Bessee sprang
+from Richard, and nestled on his breast, clinging to his
+neck.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My babe&mdash;my Bessee!&rdquo; he exclaimed, gathering
+her close to him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Living, living, indeed!&nbsp; Yet
+how may it be!&nbsp; Surely this is the other world.&nbsp; That
+voice sounds not among the living!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It is the voice of the youth who saved thy
+child,&rdquo; said the Grand Prior.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Speak again!&nbsp; Let him speak again!&rdquo; implored
+the beggar.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Can I do aught for you, good man?&rdquo; asked
+Richard.</p>
+<p>Again there was a strange start and thrill of amazement.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Only for Heaven&rsquo;s sake tell me who thou
+art!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A page of Prince Edward&rsquo;s good man.&nbsp; I am
+called Richard Fowen!&nbsp; And who, for Heaven&rsquo;s sake, are
+you?&rdquo; added Richard, as Leonillo, who had been smelling
+about and investigating, threw himself on the blind man in a
+transport of caresses.&nbsp; &ldquo;Off, Leon&mdash;off!&rdquo;
+cried Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;It is but a dog!&mdash;Fear not,
+little one!&mdash;Tell me, tell me,&rdquo; he added, trembling,
+as he knelt before the miserable object, holding back the eager
+Leonillo with one arm round his neck, &ldquo;who art thou, thou
+ghost of former times?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Knowst me not, Richard?&rdquo; returned a suppressed
+voice in Proven&ccedil;al.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Henry!&nbsp; Henry!&rdquo; exclaimed Richard, and fell
+upon the foot of the low bed, weeping bitterly.&nbsp; &ldquo;Is
+it come to this?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, even to this,&rdquo; said the blind man,
+&ldquo;that two sons of one father meet unknown&mdash;one with a
+changed name, the other with none at all, neither with the
+honoured one they were born to.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alack, alack!&rdquo; was all Richard could say at the
+first moment, as he lifted himself up to look again at the
+first-born of his parents, the head of the brave troop of
+brethren, the gay, handsome, imperious young Lord de Montfort,
+whose proud head and gallant bearing he had looked at with a
+younger brother&rsquo;s imitative deference.&nbsp; What did he
+see but a wreck of a man, sitting crouched on the wretched bed,
+the left arm a mere stump, a bandage where the bright sarcastic
+eyes used to flash forth their dark fire, deep scars on all the
+small portion of the face that was visible through the over-grown
+masses of hair and beard, so plentifully sprinkled with white,
+that it would have seemed incredible that this man was but eight
+months older than the Prince, whose rival he had always been in
+personal beauty and activity.&nbsp; The beautiful child, clasped
+close to his breast, her face buried on his shoulder under his
+shaggy locks, was a strange contrast to his appearance, but only
+added to the look of piteous helplessness and desolation, as she
+hung upon him in her alarm at the agitation around her.</p>
+<p>Richard had long been accustomed to think of his brother as
+dead; but such a spectacle as this was far more terrible to him,
+and his cheek blanched at the shock, as he gasped again,
+&ldquo;Thou here, and thus! thou whom I thought slain!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Deem me so still,&rdquo; said his brother, &ldquo;even
+as I deem the royal minion dead to me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, Henry, thou knowst not.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Who is present?&rdquo; interrupted the blind man,
+raising his head and tossing back his hair with a gesture that
+for the first time gave Richard a sense that his eldest brother
+was indeed before him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Methought I heard another
+voice.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I am here, fair son,&rdquo; replied the old knight,
+&ldquo;Father Robert of the Hospital!&nbsp; I will either leave
+thee, or keep thy secret as though it were thy shrift; but thou
+art sore spent, and mayst scarce talk more.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Weariness and pain are past, Father, with my little one
+again in my bosom,&rdquo; said Henry; &ldquo;and there are
+matters that must be spoken between me and this young brother of
+mine ere he quits this hut;&rdquo; and his voice resumed its old
+authoritative tone towards Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;Said you that he
+had saved my child?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He drew me from the river, Father,&rdquo; said Bessee
+looking up.&nbsp; &ldquo;There was nothing to stand on, and it
+was so cold!&nbsp; And he took me in his arms and pulled me out,
+and put me in a boat; and the lady pulled off my blue coat, and
+put this one on me.&nbsp; Feel it, Father; oh, so pretty, so
+warm!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It was the Princess,&rdquo; said Richard; but Henry,
+not noticing, continued,</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou hast earned my pardon, Richard,&rdquo; and held
+out his remaining hand, somewhere towards the height where his
+brother&rsquo;s used to be.</p>
+<p>Sir Robert smiled, saying, &ldquo;Thou dost miscalculate thy
+brother&rsquo;s stature, son.&rdquo;&nbsp; And at the same moment
+Richard, who was now little short of his Cousin Edward in height,
+was kneeling by Henry, accepting and returning his embrace with
+agitation and gratitude, such as showed how their relative
+positions in the family still maintained their force; but Richard
+still asserted his independence so as to say, &ldquo;When you
+have heard all, brother you will see that there is no need of
+pardoning me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Henry, however, as perhaps Sir Robert had foreseen, instead of
+answering put his hand to his side, and sank back in a paroxysm
+of pain, ending in another swoon.&nbsp; The child stood by, quiet
+and frightened but too much used to similar occurrences to be as
+much terrified as was Richard, who thought his brother dying; but
+calling in the serving-brother, the old Hospitalier did all that
+was needed, and the blind man presently recovered and explained
+in a feeble voice that he had been jostled, thrown down, and
+trodden on, at the moment when he lost his hold of his little
+daughter; and this was evidently renewing his sufferings from the
+effect of an injury received in battle.&nbsp; &ldquo;And what
+took thee there, son?&rdquo; said Sir Robert, somewhat
+sharply.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The harvest, Father,&rdquo; answered Henry, rousing
+himself to speak with a certain sarcasm in his tone.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;It is the beggars&rsquo; harvest wherever King Henry
+goes.&nbsp; We brethren of the wallet cannot afford to miss such
+windfalls.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A beggar!&rdquo; exclaimed Richard in horror.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And what art thou?&rdquo; retorted Henry, with a sudden
+fierceness.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Listen, young men,&rdquo; said Sir Robert, &ldquo;this
+I know, my patient there will soon be nothing if ye continue in
+this strain.&nbsp; A litter shall bring him to the
+infirmary.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said Henry hastily, &ldquo;not so, good
+Father.&nbsp; Here I abide, hap what may.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And I abide with him,&rdquo; said Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not so, I say,&rdquo; returned the Hospitalier,
+&ldquo;unless thou wouldst slay him outright.&nbsp; Return to the
+Spital with me; and at morn, if he have recovered himself,
+unravel these riddles as thou and he will.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It is well, Father,&rdquo; said Henry.&nbsp; &ldquo;Go
+with him, Richard; but mark me.&nbsp; Be silent as the grave, and
+see me again.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And reluctant as he was, Richard was forced to comply.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VI<br />
+THE BEGGAR EARL</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Along with the nobles that fell at that
+tyde,<br />
+His eldest son Henrye, who fought by his syde,<br />
+Was felde by a blow he receivde in the fight;<br />
+A blow that for ever deprivde him of sight.&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><i>Old Beggar</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">The</span> chapel at the Spital was open
+to all who chose to attend.&nbsp; The deep choir was filled with
+the members of the Order, half a dozen knights in the stalls, and
+the novices and serving-brothers so ranged as to give full effect
+to the body of voice.&nbsp; Richard knelt on the stone floor
+outside the choir, intending after early mass to seek his
+brother; but to his surprise he found the blind man with his
+child at his feet in what was evidently his accustomed place,
+just within the door.&nbsp; His hair and beard were now arranged,
+his appearance was no longer squalid; but when he rose to depart,
+guided in part by the child, but also groping with a stick, he
+looked even more helpless than on his bed, and Richard sprang
+forward to proffer an arm for his support.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Flemish cloth and frieze gown,&rdquo; said the object
+of his solicitude in a strange gibing voice; &ldquo;court page
+and street beggar&mdash;how now, my master?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Lord Earl and elder brother,&rdquo; returned Richard,
+&ldquo;thine is my service through life.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Mine?&nbsp; Ho, ho!&nbsp; That much for thy
+service!&rdquo; with a disdainful gesture of his fingers.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;A strapping lad like thee would be the ruin of my
+trade.&nbsp; I might as well give up bag and staff at
+once.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, surely, wilt thou not?&rdquo; exclaimed Richard in
+broken words from his extreme surprise.&nbsp; &ldquo;The King and
+Prince only long to pardon and restore, and&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And thou wouldst well like to lord it at Kenilworth,
+earl in all but the name?&nbsp; Thou mayst do so yet without
+being cumbered with me or mine!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou dost me wrong, Henry,&rdquo; said Richard, much
+distressed.&nbsp; &ldquo;I love the Prince, for none so truly
+honoured our blessed father as he, and for his sake he hath been
+most kind lord to me; but thou art the head of my house, my
+brother, and with all my heart do I long to render thee such
+service as&mdash;as may lighten these piteous
+sufferings.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I believe thee, Richard; thou wert ever an honest
+simple-hearted lad,&rdquo; said Henry, in a different tone;
+&ldquo;but the only service thou canst render me is to let me
+alone, and keep my secret.&nbsp; Here&mdash;I feel that we are at
+the stone bench, where I bask in the sun, and lay out my dish for
+the visitors of the gracious Order.&mdash;Here, Bessee, child,
+put the dish down,&rdquo; he added, retaining his hold of his
+brother, as if to feel whether Richard winced at this persistence
+in his strange profession.&nbsp; The little girl obeyed, and
+betook herself to the quiet sports of a lonely child, amusing
+herself with Leonillo, and sometimes returning to her father and
+obtaining his attention for a few moments, sometimes prattling to
+some passing brother of the Order, who perhaps made all the more
+of the pretty creature because this might be called an innocent
+breach of discipline.&nbsp; &ldquo;And now, Master Page,&rdquo;
+said Henry in his tone of authority, yet with some sarcasm,
+&ldquo;let us hear how long-legged Edward finished the work he
+had began on thee at Hereford&mdash;made thee captive in the
+battle, eh?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard briefly narrated his life with Gourdon, and his
+capture by the Prince, adding, &ldquo;My mother was willing I
+should remain with him; she bade me do anything rather than join
+Simon and Guy; and verily, brother, save that the Prince is less
+free of speech, his whole life seems moulded upon our blessed
+father&rsquo;s&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Speak not of them in the same breath,&rdquo; cried
+Henry hastily.&nbsp; &ldquo;And wherefore&mdash;if such be his
+honour to him whom he slew and mutilated&mdash;art thou to disown
+thy name, and stand before him like some chance
+foundling?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That was the King&rsquo;s doing,&rdquo; said
+Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;The Prince was averse to it, but King
+Henry, though he wept over me and called me his dear nephew, made
+it his special desire that he might not hear the name of
+Montfort; and the Prince, though overruling him in all that
+pertains to matters of state, is most dutiful in all lesser
+matters.&nbsp; I hoped at least to be called Fitz Simon, but some
+mumble of the King turned it into Fowen, and so it has
+continued.&nbsp; I believe no one at court is really ignorant of
+my lineage; but among the people, Montfort is still a
+trumpet-call, and the King fears to hear it.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well he may!&rdquo; laughed Henry.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Rememberest thou, Richard, the sorry figure our good uncle
+cut, when we armed him so courteously, and put him on his horse
+to meet the rebels at Evesham&mdash;how he durst not hang back,
+and loved still less to go onward, and kept calling me his loving
+nephew all the time?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ah!&nbsp; Henry&mdash;but didst thou not hear my father
+mutter, when he saw the crowned helm under the standard, that it
+was ill done, and no good could come of seething the kid in the
+mother&rsquo;s milk?&nbsp; And verily, had not the Prince been
+carrying his father from the field, I trow the Mortimers had not
+refused us quarter, nor had their cruel will of us.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh ho! thou art come to have opinions of thine
+own!&rdquo; laughed Henry, with the scoff of a senior unable to
+brook that his younger brother should think for himself.&nbsp;
+Yet this tone was so familiar to Richard&rsquo;s ears, that it
+absolutely encouraged him to a nearer step to intimacy.&nbsp; He
+said, &ldquo;But how scapedst thou, Henry?&nbsp; I could have
+sworn that I saw thee fall, skull and helmet cleft, a dead
+man!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Instead of answering, Henry put his hand under the chin of his
+child, who was leaning against him, and holding up her face to
+his brother, said, &ldquo;Thou canst see this child&rsquo;s
+face?&nbsp; Tell me what like she is.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Like little Eleanor, like Amaury.&nbsp; The home-look
+of her eyes won my heart at once.&nbsp; Even the Princess
+remarked their resemblance to mine.&nbsp; Think of Eleanor and
+thy mind&rsquo;s eye will see her.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No other likeness?&rdquo; said the blind man wistfully;
+&ldquo;but no&mdash;thou wast at Hereford when she was at
+Odiham.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Who?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>He grasped Richard&rsquo;s hand, and under his breath uttered
+the name &ldquo;Isabel.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Isabel Mortimer!&rdquo; exclaimed Richard, who had
+been, of course, aware of his brother&rsquo;s betrothal, when the
+two families of Montfort and Mortimer had been on friendly terms;
+&ldquo;we heard she had taken the veil!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And so thou sawst me slain!&rdquo; said Henry de
+Montfort dryly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But how&mdash;how was it?&rdquo; asked Richard
+eagerly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Men sometimes tie knots faster than they intend,&rdquo;
+said Henry.&nbsp; &ldquo;When Roger Mortimer took Simon&rsquo;s
+doings in wrath, and vowed that his sister should never wed a
+Montfort, he knew not what he did.&nbsp; He and his proud wife
+could flout and scorn my Isabel&mdash;they might not break her
+faith to me.&nbsp; Thou knowst, perhaps, Richard, since thou art
+hand and glove with our foes, that like a raven to the slaughter,
+the Lady Mortimer came as near the battle-field as her care for
+her dainty person would allow; and there was one whom she brought
+with her.&nbsp; And, gentle dame, what doth she do but carry her
+sister-in-law a sweet and womanly gift?&nbsp; What thinkst thou
+it was, Richard?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I fear I know,&rdquo; said Richard, choked; &ldquo;my
+father&rsquo;s hand.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, that was a choicer morsel reserved for my lady
+countess herself.&nbsp; It was mine own, with our betrothal-ring
+thereon.&nbsp; Now, quoth that loving sister, might Isabel resume
+her ring.&nbsp; No plighted troth could be her excuse any longer
+for refusing to wed my Lord of Gloucester.&nbsp; Then rose up my
+love, &lsquo;It beckons me!&rsquo; she said, and bade them leave
+it with her.&nbsp; They deemed that it was for death that it
+beckoned.&nbsp; So mayhap did she.&nbsp; I wot Countess Maud had
+little grieved.&nbsp; But little dreamed they of her true
+purpose&mdash;my perfect jewel of constant love&mdash;namely, to
+restore the lopped hand to the poor corpse, that it might
+likewise have Christian burial.&nbsp; Her old nurse, Welsh Winny,
+was as true to her as she was to me; and forth they sped,
+fearless of the spoilers, and made their way at nightfall even to
+the Abbey Church, where Edward, less savage than the fair
+countess, had caused us to be laid before the altar, awaiting our
+burial in the vaults.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou wert senseless all this time?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, and so continued.&nbsp; The pang when my hand was
+severed had roused me for a few moments, but only to darkness;
+and my effort to speak had been rewarded with as many Welsh
+knives as could pierce my flesh at once.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And thou didst not bleed to death?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The swoon checked my blood.&nbsp; And the monks of
+Evesham must have staunched and bandaged so as to make a decent
+corpse of me.&nbsp; Had they had a man-at-arms among them, they
+would have known that mine were not the wounds of a dead but of a
+living man.&nbsp; The old nurse knew it, when my sweet lady would
+needs unbind my wrist, to place my hand in its right place.&nbsp;
+An old crone such as Welsh Winny never stirs without her cordial
+potion.&nbsp; They poured it into my lips&mdash;and if I were
+never more to awake to the light of day, I awoke to the sound
+that was yet dearer to me&mdash;while, alas! it still was left to
+me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>He became silent, till Richard&rsquo;s question drew him
+on.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What with their care and support, when once on my feet
+I found strength to stumble out of the chapel and gain shelter in
+the woods ere day; and I believe the monks got credit for their
+zeal in casting out the excommunicate body.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not credit,&rdquo; said Richard; &ldquo;the Prince was
+full of grief, more especially as they all disavowed the
+deed.&nbsp; But, brother, art thou excommunicate
+still?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Far from it, most pious Crusader.&nbsp; If seas of holy
+wells could assoil me, I should be pure enough.&nbsp; My sweet
+Isabel deemed that some such washing might bring back mine
+eyesight; and from one to another we wandered as my limbs could
+bear it.&nbsp; And at St. Winifred&rsquo;s there was a priest who
+told us strange tales of the miracles wrought in the Mortimer
+household by my father&rsquo;s severed hand; nay, that it had so
+worked on Lord Mortimer&rsquo;s sister, that she had left the
+vanities of the world, and gone into a nunnery.&nbsp; He seemed
+so convinced of my father&rsquo;s saintliness, and so honest a
+fellow, that Isabel insisted on unbosoming ourselves to him under
+seal of confession.&nbsp; No longer was the old nurse to be my
+mother and she my sister; and the good man made no difficulties,
+but absolved me, and wedded me to the truest, most loving wife
+that ever blessed a man bereft of all else.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And you begged!&nbsp; O Henry, the noble
+lady&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;At first we had the knightly chain and spurs in which
+the monks had kindly pranked me up.&nbsp; Isabel too had worn a
+few jewels; but after all, a palmer need never hunger.&nbsp; My
+father always said no trade was so well paid as begging, under
+King Henry, and verily we found it so.&nbsp; She used at times to
+gather berries and thread them for chaplets to sell at the holy
+wells; but I trow sheer beggary throve better!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But wherefore?&nbsp; Even had pardon not been ready,
+Simon held out Kenilworth for months.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Henry laughed his dry laugh.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Simple boy, dost think I would trust Simon with an
+elder brother whose hand could no longer keep his
+head?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And my mother&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;She had always hated the Mortimers, even when the
+contract was matter of policy.&nbsp; Would I have taken my sweet
+Isabel to abide her royal scorn, it might be incredulity of our
+marriage?&nbsp; Though for that matter it is more unimpeachable
+than her own!&nbsp; Nay, nay, out of ken and out of reach was our
+only security from our kin on either side, unless we desired that
+my head should follow my hand as a dainty dish for Countess
+Maud.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How could the lady brook it?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;She dyed her fair skin with walnut, wore russet gown
+and hood, and was a very nightingale for blitheness and sweet
+song through that first year,&rdquo; said Henry; &ldquo;blither
+than ever when that little one was born in the sunshiny days of
+Whitsuntide.&nbsp; I tell thee, those were happier days than ever
+I passed as Lord de Montfort at Kenilworth.&nbsp; But after that,
+the bruised hurt in my side, which had never healed when the
+cleaner gashes did, became more painful and troublesome.&nbsp;
+Holy wells did nothing for it; and she wasted with watching it,
+as though my pain had been hers.&nbsp; Naught would serve her but
+coming here, because she had been told that the Knights of St.
+John had better experience of old battle-wounds than any men in
+the realm.&nbsp; Much ado had we to get here&mdash;the young babe
+in her arms, and I well-nigh distraught with pain.&nbsp; We crept
+into this same hut, and I had a weary sickness throughout the
+winter&mdash;living, I know not how, by the bounty of the Spital,
+and by the works of her fingers, which Winny would take out to
+sell on feast-days in the city.&nbsp; Oh that eyes had been left
+me to note how she pined away! but I had scarce felt how thin and
+bony were her tender fingers ere the blasts of the cruel March
+wind finished the work.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alack! alack! poor Henry,&rdquo; said Richard;
+&ldquo;never, never was lady of romaunt so noble, and so
+true!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No more,&rdquo; said Henry hastily, leaning his brow on
+the top of his staff.&nbsp; &ldquo;Come hither, Bessee,&rdquo; he
+added after a brief pause; &ldquo;say thy prayer for thy blessed
+mother, child.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And holding out his one hand, he inclosed her two clasped ones
+within it, as the little voice ran over an utterly unintelligible
+form of childishly clipped Latin, sounding, however, sweet and
+birdlike from the very liberties the little memory had taken in
+twisting its mellifluous words into a rhythm of her own.&nbsp;
+And there was catchword enough for Richard to recognize and
+follow it, with bonnet doffed, and crossing himself.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And now,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;surely the need for
+secrecy is ended.&nbsp; The land is tranquil, the King ruled by
+the Prince, the Prince owning all the past folly and want of
+faith that goaded our father into resistance.&nbsp; Wherefore not
+seek his willing favour?&nbsp; Thou art ever a pilgrim.&nbsp; Be
+with us in the crusade.&nbsp; Who knows what the Jordan waves may
+effect for thee?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, no,&rdquo; grimly laughed Henry.&nbsp; &ldquo;Dost
+think any favour would make it tolerable to be wept over and
+pitied by the King&mdash;pitied by <i>the King</i>,&rdquo; he
+repeated in ineffable disgust; &ldquo;or to be the show of the
+court, among all that knew me of old, when I <i>was</i> a
+man?&nbsp; Hob the cobbler, and Martin the bagster, are better
+company than Pembroke and Gloucester, and I meet with more
+humours on Cheapside than I should at Winchester&mdash;more
+regard too.&nbsp; Why, they deem me threescore years old at
+least, and I am a very oracle of wisdom among them.&nbsp; Earl of
+Leicester, forsooth! he would be nobody compared with Blind
+Hal!&nbsp; And as to freedom&mdash;with child and staff the whole
+country and city are before me&mdash;no shouts to dull retainers,
+and jackanape pages to set my blind lordship on horseback,
+without his bridle hand, and lead him at their will anywhere but
+at his own.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;All this I can understand for thyself,&rdquo; said
+Richard; &ldquo;but for thy child&rsquo;s sake canst thou not be
+moved?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My child, quotha?&nbsp; What, when her Uncle Simon is
+true grandson to King John?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard started.&nbsp; &ldquo;I cannot believe what thou
+sayest of Simon,&rdquo; he answered in displeasure.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;One day thou wilt,&rdquo; calmly answered Henry;
+&ldquo;but I had rather not have it proved upon the heiress of
+Leicester and Montfort.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Leicester is forfeit&mdash;Simon an outlawed
+man.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;If the humour for pardon is set in, Cousin Edward is no
+man to do things by halves.&nbsp; If he owned me at all, the
+lands would be mine again, and such a bait would be smelt out by
+Simon were he at the ends of the earth.&nbsp; Or if not, that
+poor child would be granted to any needy kinsman or grasping
+baron that Edward wanted to portion.&nbsp; My child shall be my
+own, and none other&rsquo;s.&nbsp; Better a beggar&rsquo;s brat
+than an earl&rsquo;s heiress!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;She is a lovely little maiden.&nbsp; I know not how
+thou canst endure letting her grow up in poverty, an alien from
+her birth and rank.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Poverty,&rdquo; Henry laughed.&nbsp; &ldquo;Little
+knowest thou of the jolly beggar&rsquo;s business!&nbsp; I would
+fain wager thee, Richard, that pretty Bessee&rsquo;s
+marriage-portion shall be a heavier bag of gold than the Lady
+Elizabeth de Montfort would gather by all the aids due to her
+father from his vassals&mdash;and won moreover without
+curses.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But who would be the bridegroom?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Her own choice, not the King&rsquo;s,&rdquo; answered
+Henry briefly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And this is all,&rdquo; said Richard, perceiving that
+according to the previous day&rsquo;s agreement the
+cream-coloured elephant of a German horse was being led forth for
+his use, and Sir Robert preparing to accompany him.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I must leave thee in this strange condition?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, that must thou.&nbsp; Betray me, and thou shalt
+have the curse of the head of thine house.&nbsp; Had thy voice
+not become so strangely like my father&rsquo;s, I had never made
+myself known to thee.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I will see thee again.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That will be as thou canst.&nbsp; I trow Edward hardly
+gives freedom enough to his pages for them to pay visits
+unknown,&rdquo; replied Henry, with a strange sneering triumph in
+his own wild liberty.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;If aught ails thee, if I can aid thee, swear to me that
+thou wilt send to me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Henry laughed with somewhat of a tone of mockery, adding,
+&ldquo;Well, well&mdash;keep thou thy plight to me so long as I
+want thee not, and I will keep mine to thee if ever I should need
+thee.&nbsp; Now away with thee.&nbsp; I hear the horses impatient
+for thee; and what would be the lot of the beggar if he were seen
+chattering longer with a lordly young page than might suffice for
+his plaint?&nbsp; I hear voices.&nbsp; Put a tester in my dish,
+fair Sir, for appearance&rsquo; sake.&nbsp; Thou hast it not?
+aha&mdash;I told thee I was the richer as well as the freer
+man.&nbsp; What&rsquo;s that?&nbsp; That is no ring of
+coin.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;&rsquo;Tis a fair jewel, father, green and
+sparkling,&rdquo; cried Bessee.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, nay, I&rsquo;ll have none of it.&nbsp; Some token
+from thy new masters?&nbsp; Ha, boy?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;From the Princess, on New Year&rsquo;s Day,&rdquo;
+replied Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;But keep it, oh, keep it, Henry; it
+breaks my heart to leave thee thus.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Keep it!&nbsp; Not I.&nbsp; What wouldst say to thy
+dainty dame?&nbsp; Nor should I get half its value from the
+Jews.&nbsp; No, no, take back thy jewel, Sir Page; I&rsquo;ll not
+put thee in need of telling more lies than becomes thine
+office.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard glowed with irritation; but what was the use of anger
+with a blind beggar?&nbsp; And while Henry bestowed far more
+demonstration of affection on Leonillo than on his brother, it
+became needful to mount and ride off, resolving to tell the
+Prince and Princess, what would be no falsehood, that the child
+belonged to a Kenilworth man-at-arms, sorely wounded at Evesham,
+and at present befriended by the Knights of St. John.</p>
+<p>Old Sir Robert Darcy knew so much that it was needful to
+confide fully in him; and he gave Richard some satisfaction by a
+promise to watch over his brother as far as was possible with a
+man of such uncertain vagrant habits; and he likewise engaged to
+let him know, even in the Holy Land, of any change in the
+beggar&rsquo;s condition; and this, considering the wide-spread
+connections of the Order, and that some of its members were sure
+to be in any crusading army, was all that Richard could
+reasonably hope.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Canst write?&rdquo; asked Sir Robert.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Yea, Father.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I could once!&nbsp; But if there be need to send thee a
+scroll, I&rsquo;ll take care it is writ by a trusty
+hand.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>More than this Richard could not hope.&nbsp; There had always
+been a strange self-willed wildness of character about his eldest
+brother, who, though far less violent and overbearing in actual
+deed than the two next in age, Simon and Guy, had contrived to
+incur even greater odium than they, by his mocking careless
+manner and love of taunts and gibing.&nbsp; Simon de Montfort the
+elder had indeed strangely failed in the bringing up of his
+sons.&nbsp; Whether it were that their royal connection had
+inflated them with pride, or that the King&rsquo;s indulgence had
+counteracted the good effects of the admirable education provided
+for them at home, they had done little justice to their
+parentage, or to their tutor, the excellent Robert
+Grost&ecirc;te.&nbsp; Perhaps the Earl himself was too
+affectionate: perhaps his occupation in public affairs hindered
+him from enforcing family discipline.&nbsp; At any rate, neither
+of the elder three could have been naturally endowed with his
+largeness of mind, and high unselfish views.&nbsp; He was a man
+before his age; not only deeply pious, but with a devoted feeling
+for justice and mercy carried into all the details of life, till
+his loyalty to the law overcame his loyalty to the King.&nbsp;
+Simon and Guy, on the other hand, were commonplace young nobles
+of the thirteenth century, heedless of all but themselves, and
+disdaining all beneath them; and when their father had seized the
+reins of government in order to enforce the laws that the King
+would not observe, they saw in his elevation a means of
+gratifying themselves, and being above all law.&nbsp; The cry
+throughout England had been that Simon&rsquo;s &ldquo;sons made
+themselves vile, and he restrained them not.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Henry de Montfort had not indeed, like his brothers, plundered
+the ships in the Channel, extorted money from peaceful yeomen,
+nor insulted the poor old captive King to his face; but his
+deference had been more galling than their defiance; his scornful
+smiles and keen cutting jests had mortally offended many a
+partizan; and when positive work was to be done, Simon with all
+his fierceness and cruelty was far more to be depended on than
+Henry, who might at any time fly off upon some incalculable
+freak.&nbsp; To Richard&rsquo;s boyish recollection, if Simon had
+been the most tyrannical towards him in deed, Henry had been
+infinitely more annoying and provoking in the lesser arts of
+teasing.</p>
+<p>And looking back on the past, he could understand how
+intolerable a life of helplessness would be among the equals whom
+Henry had so often stung with his keen wit, and that to a man of
+his peculiar tone of mind there was infinitely more liberty in
+thus sinking to the lowest depths, where his infirmities were
+absolute capital to him, than in being hedged about with the
+restraints of his rank.&nbsp; Any way, it was impossible to
+interfere, even for the child&rsquo;s sake, and all Richard could
+do to console himself was to look forward to his return from the
+Crusade an esquire or even a knight, with exploits that Henry
+might respect&mdash;a standing in the Court that would give him
+some right to speak&mdash;perhaps in time a home and lady wife to
+whom his brother would intrust his child, who would then be
+growing out of a mere toy.&nbsp; Or might not his services win
+him a fresh grant of the earldom, and could he not then prove his
+sincerity by laying it at the true Earl&rsquo;s feet?</p>
+<p>Pretty Bessee, too!&nbsp; Richard remembered stories current
+in the family, of their grandmother, Amicia, Countess of
+Leicester in her own right, being forced when a young girl to wed
+the stern grim old persecuting Simon de Montfort, and how vain
+had been her struggles against her doom.&nbsp; He lost himself in
+graceful romantic visions of the young knight whose love he would
+watch and foster, and whose marriage to his lovely niece should
+be securely concluded ere her rank should be made known, when her
+guardian uncle would yield all to her.&nbsp; And from that day
+forth Richard looked out with keen eyes among the playfellows of
+the little princes for Bessee&rsquo;s future knight.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VII<br />
+AMONG THE RUINS OF CARTHAGE</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;But man is more than law, and I may have<br
+/>
+Some impress of myself upon the world;<br />
+One poor brief life, helping to feed the flame<br />
+Of chivalry, and keep alive the truth<br />
+That courage, honour, mercy, make a knight.&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><i>Queen Isabel</i>, <i>by S.
+M.</i></p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>&ldquo;<span class="smcap">Land</span> in sight!&nbsp; Cheer
+up, John, my man!&rdquo; said Richard, leaning over a bundle of
+cloaks that lay on the deck of a Genoese galley.</p>
+<p>The cross floated high aloft, accompanied by the lions of
+English royalty; the bulwark was hung round with blazoned
+shields, and the graceful white sails were filled by a gay breeze
+that sent the good ship dancing over the crested waves of the
+Mediterranean, in company with many another of her gallant
+sisters, crowded with the chivalry of England.</p>
+<p>Woeful was however the plight of great part of that
+chivalry.&nbsp; Merrily merrily bounded the bark, but her sport
+felt very like death to many of her freight, and among others to
+poor little John de Mohun.</p>
+<p>His father, Baron Mohun of Dunster, had been deeply implicated
+in the Barons&rsquo; Wars, and had been a personal friend of the
+Earl of Leicester, from whom he had only separated himself in
+consequence of the outrageous exactions and acts of insolence
+perpetrated by the young Montforts.&nbsp; He had indeed received
+a disabling wound while fighting on the Prince&rsquo;s side at
+Evesham; but his submission had been thought so insecure that his
+son and heir had been required of him, ostensibly as page, but
+really as hostage.</p>
+<p>In spite of his Norman surname, little John of Dunster was, at
+twelve years old, a sturdy thoroughgoing English lad, with the
+strongest possible hatred to all foreigners, whom with grand
+indifference to natural history he termed &ldquo;locusts sucking
+the blood of Englishmen.&rdquo;&nbsp; Not a word or command would
+he understand except in his mother tongue; and no blows nor
+reproofs had sufficed to tame his sturdy obstinacy.&nbsp; The
+other pages had teased, fagged, and bullied him to their
+hearts&rsquo; content, without disturbing his determination to go
+his own way; and his only friend and protector had been Richard,
+whom, under the name of Fowen, he took for a genuine Englishman,
+and loved with all his heart.&nbsp; If anything would ever cure
+him of his wilful awkwardness and dogged bashfulness, it was
+likely to be the kindness of Richard&mdash;above all, in the
+absence of the tormentors, for Hamlyn de Valence alone of the
+other pages had been selected to attend upon the Prince in this
+expedition; and he, though scornful and peremptory, did not think
+the boy worthy of his attention, and did not actively tease
+him.</p>
+<p>At present Hamlyn de Valence, as well as most others of the
+passengers, lay prostrate; scarcely alive even to the assurance
+of Richard, who had still kept his feet, that the outline of the
+hills was quickly becoming distinct, and that they were fast
+entering the gulf where lay the fleet that had brought the
+crusaders of France and Sicily, whom they hoped to join in the
+conquest and conversion of Tunis.&nbsp; On arriving at Aigues
+Mortes, they had found that the French King had already sailed
+for Sicily; and following him thither, learnt that his brother,
+Charles of Anjou, had persuaded him to begin his crusade by a
+descent on Tunis, to which the Sicilian crown was said to have
+some claim; that he had sailed thither at once, and Charles had
+followed him so soon as the Genoese transports could return for
+the Sicilian troops.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I see the masts!&rdquo; exclaimed Richard; &ldquo;the
+bay is crowded with them!&nbsp; There must be a goodly
+force.&nbsp; Yonder are two headlands; within them we shall have
+smoother water&mdash;see&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What strikes thee so suddenly silent?&rdquo; growled
+one of the muffled figures stretched on deck.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The ensigns are but half-mast high, my Lord,&rdquo;
+returned Richard in an awe-struck voice; &ldquo;the lilies of
+France are hung drooping downward.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;These plaguy southern winds at their tricks,&rdquo;
+muttered at first Earl Gilbert of Gloucester, for he it was who
+had spoken, though Richard had not known him to be so near; then
+sitting up, he came to a fuller view: &ldquo;Hm&mdash;it looks
+ill!&nbsp; Thou canst keep thy feet, Fowen, or what do they call
+thee?&nbsp; Down with thee to the cabin, and let the Prince
+know.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Stepping across the prostrate forms, and meeting with
+vituperations as he trode, Richard made his way to the ladder
+that led below, and notified his presence behind the curtain that
+veiled the royal cabin.&nbsp; He was summoned to enter at
+once.&nbsp; The Prince was endeavouring to write at a
+swinging-table, the Princess lay white and resigned on a couch,
+attended on by Dame Idonea (or more properly Iduna) Osbright, a
+lady who had lost her husband in a former Crusade, and had ever
+since been a sort of high-born head nurse in the palace.&nbsp; A
+Danish skald, who had once been at the English court, had said
+that she seemed to have eaten her namesake&rsquo;s apple of
+immortality, without her apple of beauty, for no one could ever
+remember to have seen her other than a tiny dried-up old witch,
+with keen gray eyes, a sharp tongue, an ever ready foot and hand,
+and a frame utterly unaffected by any of the influences so
+sinister to far younger and stronger ones.&nbsp; Devoted to all
+the royal family, her special passion was for Prince Edmund, who,
+in his mother&rsquo;s repugnance to his deformity, had been left
+almost entirely to her, and she had accompanied the Princess
+Eleanor all the more willingly from her desire to look after her
+favourite nursling.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;There, Lady,&rdquo; said Edward to his wife, &ldquo;the
+tossing is all but over; here is Richard come to tell us that we
+are nigh on land.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Even so, my Lord,&rdquo; returned Richard; &ldquo;we
+are entering the gulf, but my Lord of Gloucester has sent me to
+report to you that in all the ships the colours are
+trailing.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sayst thou?&rdquo; exclaimed the Prince, hastily laying
+aside his writing materials.&nbsp; &ldquo;Fear not, <i>mi
+Dona</i>, I will return anon and tell thee how it is.&nbsp; We
+are in smoother water already.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;So much smoother that I will come with thee out of this
+stifling cabin,&rdquo; said Eleanor.&nbsp; &ldquo;O would that we
+had been in time for thee to have counselled thine
+uncles&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;We will see what we have to grieve for ere we bemoan
+ourselves,&rdquo; said the Prince.&nbsp; &ldquo;My good uncle of
+France would put his whole fleet in mourning for one barefooted
+friar!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Depend on it, my Lord, &rsquo;tis mourning for
+something in earnest,&rdquo; interposed Dame Iduna; &ldquo;I said
+it was not for nothing that a single pyot came and rocked up his
+ill-omened tail while we were taking horse for this expedition,
+and my Lady there was kissing the little ones at home, nor that a
+hare ran over our road at Bagshot&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well, Dame,&rdquo; interposed the Prince
+good-humouredly, seeing his wife somewhat affected by the list of
+omens, &ldquo;I know you have a horse-shoe in your luggage, so
+you will come safe off, whoever does not!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And what matters what my luck is,&rdquo; returned the
+Dame, &ldquo;an old beldame such as me, so long as you and your
+brother come off safe, and find the blessed princes at home well
+and sound?&nbsp; Would that we were out of this sandy hole, or
+that any one would resolve me why we cannot go straight to
+Jerusalem when we are about it!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The Dame had delayed them while she spoke, in order to adjust
+the Princess&rsquo;s muffler over her somewhat dishevelled locks;
+but Eleanor seeing that her husband was impatient, put a speedy
+end to her operations, and took his arm.</p>
+<p>Meantime the vessel had come within the Gulf of Goletta, and
+others of the passengers had revived, and were standing on deck
+to watch their entrance into the very harbour that two thousand
+years before had sheltered the storm-tossed fleet of &AElig;neas;
+but if the Trojan had there found a wooded haven, the groves and
+sylvan shades must long since have been destroyed, for to the
+new-comers the bay appeared inclosed by spits of sand, though
+there was a rising ground in front that cut off the view.&nbsp;
+In the centre of the bay was a low sandy islet, covered with
+remains of masonry, and with a fort in the midst.&nbsp; On this
+was mounted the French banner, but likewise drooping; and all
+around it lay the ships with furled sails and trailing ensigns,
+giving them an inexpressibly mysterious look of woe, like living
+creatures with folded wings and vailed crests, lying on the face
+of the waters in a silent sleep of sorrow.&nbsp; There was an awe
+of suspense that kept each one on the deck silent, unable to
+utter the conjecture that weighed upon his breast.</p>
+<p>A boat was already putting off, and its quick movements seemed
+to mar the solemn stillness, as, impelled by the regular strokes
+of a dozen dark handsome Genoese mariners with gaily-tinted caps,
+it shot towards the vessel.&nbsp; A Genoese captain in graver
+garb sat at the helm, and as they came alongside, a whisper,
+almost a shudder, seemed to thrill upwards from the boat to the
+crew, and through them to the passengers, &ldquo;<i>Il
+R&egrave;</i>!&rdquo; &ldquo;<i>il R&egrave; santo</i>,&rdquo;
+&ldquo;<i>il R&egrave; di Francia</i>.&rdquo;&nbsp; It seemed to
+have pervaded the whole ship even before the Genoese had had time
+to take the rope flung to him and to climb up the ship&rsquo;s
+side, where as his fellow-captain greeted him, he asked hastily
+for the <i>Principe Inglese</i>.</p>
+<p>For Edward had not come forward, but was standing with his
+back against the mainmast, with colourless cheek and eyes set and
+fixed.&nbsp; Eleanor looked up to him in silence, aware that he
+was mastering vehement agitation, and would endure no token of
+sympathy or sorrow that would unnerve him when dignity required
+firmness.&nbsp; To him, Louis IX., the husband of his
+mother&rsquo;s sister, had been the guiding friend and noble
+pattern denied to him in his father; and Eleanor, intrusted to
+his uncle&rsquo;s care during the troubles of England, a maiden
+wife in her first years of womanhood, had been formed and moulded
+by that holy and upright influence.&nbsp; To both the loss was as
+that of a father; and the murmur among the sailors was to them as
+a voice saying, &ldquo;Knowest thou that God will take away thy
+master from thy head to-day?&rdquo;&nbsp; For the moment,
+however, the Princess&rsquo;s sole thought was how her husband
+would bear it, and she watched anxiously till the struggle was
+over, in the space of a few seconds, and he met the Genoese with
+his usual reserved courtesy; and returning his salutation, signed
+to him to communicate his tidings.</p>
+<p>They were however brief, for the captain had held by his ship,
+and all he knew was that deadly sickness, fever, and plague had
+raged in the camp.&nbsp; The Papal Legate was dead, and the good
+King of France.&nbsp; His son was dead too, and many another
+beside.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Which son?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not the eldest&mdash;he lay sick, but there were hopes
+of him; but the little one&mdash;he had been carried on board his
+ship, but it had not saved him.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Poor little Tristan!&rdquo; sighed Eleanor; &ldquo;true
+Cross-bearer, born in one hapless Crusade to die in
+another.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The King of Sicily?&rdquo; demanded Edward between his
+teeth.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He had arrived the very day of his brother&rsquo;s
+death,&rdquo; said the Genoese; &ldquo;and when he had seen how
+matters stood, he had concluded a truce with the King of Tunis,
+and intended to sail as soon as the new King of France could bear
+to be moved.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>In the meantime the vessel had been anchored, and preparations
+were made for landing; but the Princes impatience to hear details
+would not brook even the delay of waiting till his horse could be
+set ashore.&nbsp; He committed to the Earl of Gloucester the
+charge of encamping his men on the island, left a message with
+him for his brother Edmund, who was in another ship, and
+perceiving that Richard had suffered the least of all his suite,
+summoned him to attend him in the boat which was at once
+lowered.</p>
+<p>This would have been a welcome call had not Richard found that
+poor little John de Mohun had not revived like the other
+passengers, but still lay inert and sometimes moaning.&nbsp; All
+Richard could do was to beg the groom specially attached to the
+pages&rsquo; service, to have a care of the little fellow, and
+get him sheltered in a tent as soon as possible; but the Prince
+never suffered any hesitation in obeying him, and it was needful
+to hurry at once into the boat.</p>
+<p>Without a word, the Prince with long swift strides, in the
+light of the sinking sun, walked up the low hill, the same where
+erst the pious &AElig;neas climbed with his faithful Achates
+following.&nbsp; From the brow the Trojan prince had beheld the
+rising city in the valley&mdash;the English prince came on its
+desolation.&nbsp; Yet nature had made the vale lovely&mdash;green
+with well-watered verdure, fields of beauteous green maize,
+graceful date palms, and majestic cork trees; and among them were
+white flat-roofed Moorish houses; but many a black stain on the
+fair landscape told of the fresh havoc of an invading army.</p>
+<p>Utterly blotted out was Carthage.&nbsp; Half demolished, half
+choked with sand, the city of Dido, the city of Hannibal, the
+city of Cyprian&mdash;all had vanished alike, and nothing
+remained erect but a Moorish fortress, built up with fragments of
+the huge stones of the old Phoenicians, intermixed with the
+friezes and sculptures of Gr&aelig;cising Rome, and the whole
+fabric in the graceful Saracenic taste; while completing the
+strange mixture of periods, another of those mournful French
+banners drooped from the battlements, and around it spread the
+white tents of the armies of France and the Two Sicilies, like it
+with trailing banners; an orphaned plague-stricken host in a
+ruined city.</p>
+<p>While the Prince paused for a moment&rsquo;s glance, a party
+of knights came spurring up the hill, who had been ordered off to
+meet him on the first intelligence that his fleet was in sight,
+but had been taken by surprise by his alertness.</p>
+<p>They met with bowed heads and dejected mien; and there was one
+who hid his face and wept aloud as he exclaimed, &ldquo;Ah!&nbsp;
+Messire, our holy King loved you well!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alas, beau sire Guillaume de Por&ccedil;eles!&rdquo;
+was all that Edward could say, as with tears in his eyes he held
+out his hand to the good Proven&ccedil;al knight, adding,
+&ldquo;Let me hear!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The knight, leading his horse and walking by Edward&rsquo;s
+side, told how the King had been induced to make his descent on
+Tunis, from some wild hope of the king&rsquo;s conversion, which
+had been magnified by Charles of Anjou, from his dislike to let
+so gallant an army pass by without endeavouring to obtain some
+personal advantage to his own realm of Sicily.&nbsp; Though a
+vassal of Beatrix of Provence, the Sire de Por&ccedil;eles was no
+devoted admirer of her husband, Charles of Anjou, and spoke with
+no concealment of the unhappy perversion of the Crusade.&nbsp;
+Charles of Anjou was all-powerful with the court of Rome, and in
+crusading matters Louis deemed it right absolutely to surrender
+to the ecclesiastical power all that judgment which had made him
+so prudent and wise a king at home, while his crusades were
+lamentable failures.&nbsp; Thus in him it had been a piece of
+obedient self-denial not to press forward to the Holy Sepulchre;
+but to land in this malarious bay to fulfil aims that, had he but
+used his common sense, he would have seen to be merely those of
+private ambition.&nbsp; There it had been one scene of wasting
+sickness.&nbsp; A few deeds of arms had been done to refresh the
+spirits of the French, such as the taking of the fort of
+Carthage, and now and then a skirmish of some foraging party; but
+in general the Moors launched their spears and fled without
+staying for combat.&nbsp; Many who had hid themselves in the
+vaults and cellars of Carthage had been dragged out and put to
+death, and their bodies had aided in breeding pestilence.&nbsp;
+Name after name fell from the lips of the knight, like the roll
+of warriors fallen in a great battle, when</p>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;They melted from the field like snow,<br />
+Their king, their lords, their mightiest low.&rdquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>And the last foreign embassy that ever reached Louis IX. had
+been that of the Greek Emperor Michael Pal&aelig;ologos, come to
+set before him the savage barbarities perpetrated upon Christians
+by this brother&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Who had spoilt the purpose of his
+life.&rdquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>It was as Charles entered the port, that Louis, lying on a bed
+of ashes, with his hands crossed upon his breast, and the words,
+&ldquo;O Jerusalem, Jerusalem!&rdquo; entered not the Jerusalem
+of his earthly schemes, but the Jerusalem of his true
+aspirations.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Shall we conduct you to my Lord the King of
+Sicily?&rdquo; asked De Por&ccedil;eles.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No!&rdquo; said Edward, with bitter sternness;
+&ldquo;to my uncle of France.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Down, down, my Lord, and all of you instantly,&rdquo;
+shouted Por&ccedil;eles suddenly, throwing himself face downwards
+on the ground.&nbsp; Edward was too good a soldier not to follow
+the injunction instantaneously, and Richard did the same, as well
+as all the knights who had come up with Por&ccedil;eles.&nbsp;
+Even the horses buried their noses in the hot sandy soil.&nbsp; A
+strange rushing roaring sound passed over them; there was a sense
+of intense suffocation, then of heat, pricking, and
+irritation.&nbsp; The Proven&ccedil;als were rising; and the
+Prince and his page doing the same, shook off a plentiful load of
+sand, and beheld, careering furiously away, between them and the
+western sun, what looked like a purple column, reaching from
+earth to heaven, and bespangled with living gold-dust, whirling
+round in giddy spirals, and all the time fleeting so fast that it
+was diminishing every moment, and was gone in a wink of the
+eye.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Is it enchantment?&rdquo; gasped Richard to the squire
+nearest him, as he strove to clear his eyes from the sand and
+gaze after the wonder.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Worse than enchantment,&rdquo; quoth the squire;
+&ldquo;it is a sand whirlwind.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>They were soon crossing the ditch that had been dug around the
+camp among the ruins, and passed through lanes of tents erected
+among the thick foliage that mantled the broken walls; here and
+there tracks of mosaic pavement; of temples to Dido or Anna
+peeping forth beneath either the luxuriant vegetation or the
+heavy sand-drifts; or columns of the new Carthage lying veiled by
+acanthus; or remnants of churches destroyed by Genseric&mdash;all
+alike disregarded by the sickly drooping figures that moved
+feebly about among them, regarding them as little save
+stumbling-blocks.</p>
+<p>A Moorish house in the midst of a once well-laid-out garden,
+now trampled and destroyed, was the place to which the
+Proven&ccedil;al knight led the English Prince.&nbsp; Entering
+the doorway of a court, where a fountain sparkled in the midst of
+a marble pavement, they saw the richly-latticed stone doorway of
+the house guarded by two figures in armour like iron statues; and
+passing between them, they came into the principal chamber,
+marble-floored, and with a divan of cushions round it; but full
+in the midst of the room lay a coffin, covered with the lilied
+banner, and the standard of the Cross; the crowned helmet, good
+sword, knightly spurs, and cross-marked shield lying upon it;
+solemn forms in armour guarded it, and priests knelt and chanted
+prayers and psalms around it.&nbsp; Within were only the bones of
+Louis, which were to be taken to St. Denis.&nbsp; The flesh,
+which had been removed by being boiled in wine and spices, was
+already on its way to Palermo in a vessel whose melancholy
+ensigns would have announced the loss to the English had they not
+passed it in the night.</p>
+<p>Long did Edward kneel beside the remains of his uncle, with
+his face hidden and thoughts beyond our power to trace.&nbsp;
+Richard&rsquo;s heart was full of that strange question
+&ldquo;Wherefore?&rdquo;&nbsp; Wherefore should the best and
+purest schemes planned by the highest souls fall over like a
+crested wave and become lost?&nbsp; So it had been, he would have
+said, with the Round Table under Arthur, so with England&rsquo;s
+rights beneath his own noble father, so with the Crusade under
+such leaders as Edward of England and Louis of France.&nbsp; Did
+he mark the answer in those Psalms that the priests were singing
+around&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Qui seminant in lacrymis, in exultatione
+metent,<br />
+Euntes ibant et flebant mittentes semina sua,<br />
+Venientes autem venient cum exultatione portantes manipulos
+suos.&rdquo; <a name="citation100"></a><a href="#footnote100"
+class="citation">[100]</a></p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>Surely we may believe that Simon of Leicester and Louis of
+France were alike beyond grief at their marred visions, their
+errors of deed or of judgment were washed away, and their true
+purpose was accepted, both waiting the harvest when their works
+should follow them, and it should have been made manifest that
+the effect of what they had been and had suffered had told far
+more on future generations than what they had wrought out in
+their own lifetime.</p>
+<p>It was at that moment that the sensation that an eye was upon
+him caused Richard to raise his eyes from the floor.&nbsp; One of
+the armed figures, who had hitherto stood as still as suits of
+armour in a castle hall, had partially lowered the visor of the
+helmet, and eyes, nose, and a part of the cheeks were
+visible.&nbsp; Richard looked up, and they were those of his
+father! was it a delusion of his fancy?&nbsp; He closed his eyes
+and looked again.&nbsp; Again it was the deep brown Montfort eye,
+the clearly-cut nose, the embrowned skin!&nbsp; He glanced at the
+bearings on the shield.&nbsp; Behold, it was his own&mdash;the
+red field and white lion rampant with a forked tail, which he had
+not seen for so long.</p>
+<p>Almost at the same moment another person entered the
+chamber&mdash;a man with a sallow complexion, narrow French
+features, sharp gray eyes, and a certain royal bearing that even
+a cunning shrewdness of expression could not destroy.&nbsp; His
+face was composed to a look of melancholy, and he crossed himself
+and knelt down near Edward to await the conclusion of his
+devotions.&nbsp; Edward, who knelt absorbed in grief, with his
+cloak partly over his face, apparently did not perceive him, and
+after two or three unheeded endeavours at attracting notice, he
+at length rose and said in a low voice, &ldquo;My fair
+nephew.&rdquo;&nbsp; For a moment the Prince lifted up his face,
+and Richard had rather have died than have encountered that
+glance of mournful reproof; then hiding his face in his hands
+again, he continued his devotions.</p>
+<p>When these were ended he rose from his knees; and when out of
+the death-chamber bowed his bead and with grave courtesy
+exchanged greetings with Charles of Anjou, asking at the same
+time to see his young cousin Philippe, the new King of
+France.</p>
+<p>An inquiry from an attendant elicited that Philippe had just
+dropped asleep under the influence of a potion from his
+leech.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then, fair nephew,&rdquo; said Charles of Sicily,
+&ldquo;be content with your old uncle, and come to my apartments,
+where I will set before you the necessities that have led me to
+conclude the truce that is baffling your eager desire of deeds of
+arms.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Pardon me, royal uncle,&rdquo; returned Edward,
+&ldquo;I must see my camp set up.&nbsp; It is already late, and I
+must take order that my troops mingle not where contagion might
+seize them.&nbsp; Another time,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;I may
+brook the argument better.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Charles of Anjou did not press him further.&nbsp; There was
+that in his face and voice which betokened that his fierce
+indignation and overpowering grief were scarcely restrained, and
+that a word of excuse in his present mood would but have roused
+the lion.</p>
+<p>Horses had been provided for him and his attendant.&nbsp; He
+flung himself on his steed at once, and Richard was obliged to
+follow without a moment&rsquo;s opportunity of making inquiry
+about the wonderful apparition he had seen in the chamber of
+death.</p>
+<p>For some distance Edward galloped rapidly over the sandy soil,
+then drawing up his horse when he had come to the brow from which
+he could see on the one side the valley of Carthage, on the other
+the bay, he made an exclamation which Richard took for a summons,
+and he came up asking if he were called.&nbsp; &ldquo;No, boy,
+no!&nbsp; I only spoke my thoughts aloud!&nbsp; Failure and
+success!&nbsp; We&rsquo;ve seen them both to-day&mdash;in the two
+kings!&nbsp; What thinkst thou of them?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Better be wrecked than work the wreck, my Lord,&rdquo;
+said Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay! but why surrender the wit to the worker of the
+wreck?&rdquo; said Edward.&nbsp; Then knitting his brow,
+&ldquo;Two holy men have I known who did not blind their wit for
+their conscience&rsquo; sake&mdash;two alone&mdash;did it fare
+better with them?&nbsp; One was the good Bishop of
+Lincoln&mdash;the other thou knowst, Richard!&nbsp; Well, one
+goes after another&mdash;first good Bishop Grost&ecirc;te, then
+the Lord of Leicester, and now mine uncle of France; and if earth
+is to have no better than such as it pleases the Saints to leave
+in it, it will not be worth staying in much longer.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; said Richard, coming near,
+&ldquo;methought I saw my father&rsquo;s face under a
+visor&mdash;one of the knightly guards beside the holy
+King.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well might thy fancy call him up in such a
+presence,&rdquo; said Edward.&nbsp; &ldquo;They twain had hearts
+in the same place above, though they saw the world below on
+different sides, and knew each other little, and loved each other
+less, in life.&nbsp; That&rsquo;s all at an end now!&nbsp; Well,
+back to our camp to make the best of the world they have left
+behind them!&rdquo;&nbsp; And then in a tone that Richard was not
+meant to hear, &ldquo;While <i>mi dona</i> Leonor remains to me
+there is something saintly and softening still in this
+world!&nbsp; Heaven help me&mdash;ay, and all my foes&mdash;were
+she gone from it too!&rdquo;</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER VIII<br />
+RICHARD&rsquo;S WRAITH</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;No distance breaks the tie of blood;<br />
+Brothers are brothers evermore;<br />
+Nor wrong, nor wrath of deadliest mood,<br />
+That magic may o&rsquo;erpower.&rdquo;&mdash;<i>Christian
+Year</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">It</span> was nearly dark when the Prince
+and the Page landed on the island, and found the tents already
+set up in their due order and rank, according to the discipline
+that no one durst transgress where Edward was the commander.</p>
+<p>Richard attended him to his pavilion, and being there
+dismissed until supper-time, crossed the square space which was
+always left around the royal banner, to the tent at the southern
+corner, which was regularly appropriated to the pages&rsquo;
+use.&nbsp; On lifting its curtain he was, however, dismayed to
+see a kirtle there, and imagining that he must have fallen upon
+the ladies&rsquo; quarters, he was retreating with an apology;
+when the sharp voice of Dame Idonea called out, &ldquo;Oh yes,
+Master Page! &rsquo;tis you that are at home here.&nbsp; I was
+merely tarrying till &rsquo;twas the will of one of you to come
+in and look to the poor child.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And little John of Dunster called from a couch of mantles,
+&ldquo;Richard, oh! is it he at last?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It is I,&rdquo; said Richard, advancing into the light
+of a brass lamp, hung by chains from the top of the tent.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;This is kind indeed, Lady!&nbsp; But is he indeed so ill
+at ease?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How should he be otherwise, with none of you idle-pated
+pages casting a thought to him?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I was grieved to leave him&mdash;but the Prince
+summoned me,&rdquo; began Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Beshrew thee!&nbsp; Tell me not of princes, as though
+there were no one whom thou couldst bid to have a care of the
+little lad!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I did bid Piers&mdash;,&rdquo; Richard made another
+attempt.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Piers, quotha?&nbsp; Why didst not bid the Jackanapes
+that sits on the luggage?&nbsp; A proper warder for a sick
+babe!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I am no babe!&rdquo; here burst out John; &ldquo;I am
+twelve years old come Martinmas, and I need no tendance but
+Richard&rsquo;s.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ha, ha!&nbsp; So those are all the thanks we ladies
+get, when we are not young and fair!&rdquo; laughed Dame Idonea,
+rather amused.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I want no women, young or old,&rdquo; petulantly
+repeated John; &ldquo;I want Richard.&mdash;Lift me up, Richard;
+take away this cloak.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;For his life, no!&rdquo; returned the Dame; &ldquo;he
+has the heats and the chills on him, and to let him take cold
+would be mere slaughter.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alas!&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;I hoped nothing ailed
+him but the sea, and that landing would make all well.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;As if the sea ever made a child shiver and burn by
+turns!&nbsp; Nay, &rsquo;tis the trick of the sun in these
+parts.&nbsp; Strange that the sun himself should be a mere ally
+of the Infidel!&nbsp; I tell thee, if the child is ever to see
+Dunster again, thou must watch him well, keep him from the sun by
+day and the chill by night; or he&rsquo;ll be like the poor
+creatures in the French camp out there, whom, I suppose, you
+found in fine case.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alack yes, Lady!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I&rsquo;ve seen it many a time; and all their disorders
+will be creeping into our camp next.&nbsp; Tell me, is it even as
+they told us, one king dead and the other dying?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard began to wonder whether he should ever get her out of
+his tent, for she insisted on his telling her every possible
+particular&mdash;who had died, who had lived, who was sick, who
+well; and as from the close connection between the English,
+French, and Sicilian courts, whose queens were all sisters, she
+knew who every one was, and accounted for the history of each
+person she inquired after, back to the last
+generation&mdash;happy if it were not to the third&mdash;her
+conversation was not quickly over.&nbsp; She ended at last, by
+desiring Richard to give her patient some of a febrifuge, which
+she had brought with her, every two hours, and when it was all
+spent, or in case of any change in the boy&rsquo;s state, to
+summon her from the ladies&rsquo; tent; adding, however,
+&ldquo;But what&rsquo;s the use of leaving a pert springald like
+thee in charge?&nbsp; Thou wilt sleep like a very dormouse,
+I&rsquo;ll warrant!&nbsp; I&rsquo;d best call Mother
+Jugge.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh no, no!&rdquo; cried John; to whom the attendance of
+Mother Jugge would have been a worse indignity than the being
+nursed by Dame Idonea; &ldquo;let me have no one but
+Richard!&nbsp; Richard knows all I want.&mdash;Richard, leave me
+not again.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, ay; a little lad ever hangs to a bigger, were he to
+torture the life out of him.&nbsp; Small thanks for us women
+after our good looks be past.&nbsp; But I&rsquo;ll look in on the
+child in early morn, thanks or no thanks; for I know his mother
+well, and if I can help it, the hyenas shall not make game of his
+bones, as I hear them doing by the French yonder.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>John strove to say that, indeed, he thanked her, and had been
+infinitely comforted and refreshed by her care, and that all he
+meant was to express his distaste to Mother Jugge, the lavender
+(<i>i.e.</i> laundress), and his desire for Richard Fowen&rsquo;s
+company; but he was little attended to, and apparently more than
+half offended, the brisk old lady trotted away.</p>
+<p>That island was a dreary place; without a tree or any shelter
+from the glare of sun and sea, whose combined influences
+threatened blindness, sun-stroke, or at the very least blistered
+the faces of those who stepped beyond their tents by day.&nbsp;
+The Prince&rsquo;s orders, however, strictly confined his army
+within its bounds, except that at twilight parties were sent
+ashore for water and provisions, under strict orders, however, to
+hold no parley with any one from the French or Sicilian camps,
+lest they should bring home the infection of the pestilence; and
+always under the command of some trustworthy knight, able and
+willing to enforce the command.</p>
+<p>The Prince himself refused all participation in the counsels
+of Charles of Anjou, and confined himself, like his men, entirely
+to the fleet and island.&nbsp; Charles contrived to spread a
+report, that his displeasure was solely due to his disappointment
+at being balked of fighting with the Tunisians; and that instead
+of indignant grief at the perversion of the wrecked Crusade, he
+was only showing the sullenness of an aggrieved swordsman.&nbsp;
+Even young Philippe le Hardi, a dull, heavy, ignorant youth, was
+led to suppose this was the cause of his offence, and though
+daily inquiries were sent through the Genoese crews for his
+health, he made no demonstration of willingness to see his cousin
+of England.</p>
+<p>Thus Richard had no opportunity of ascertaining whether there
+were any basis for the strange impression he had received in St.
+Louis&rsquo;s death-chamber.&nbsp; It would have been an act of
+disobedience, not soon overlooked by the Prince, had one of his
+immediate suite transgressed his commands, and indeed, so strict
+was the discipline, that it would scarcely have been possible to
+make the attempt.&nbsp; Besides, Richard&rsquo;s time was
+entirely engrossed between his duties in attending on the Prince,
+and his care of little John of Dunster, who had a sharp attack of
+fever, and was no doubt only carried through it by the
+experienced skill of Dame Idonea Osbright, and by Richard&rsquo;s
+tender nursing.&nbsp; Somehow the dame&rsquo;s heart was not won,
+even by the elder page&rsquo;s dutiful care and obedience to all
+her directions.&nbsp; Partly she viewed him as a rival in the
+affections of the patient&mdash;who, poor little fellow, would in
+his companion&rsquo;s absence be the child he was, and let her
+treat him like his mother, or old nurse, chattering to her freely
+about home, and his home-sick longings; whereas the instant any
+male companion appeared, he made it a point of honour to be the
+manly warrior and crusader, just succeeding so far as to be
+sullen instead of plaintive; though when left to Richard, he
+could again relax his dignity, and become natural and
+affectionate.&nbsp; But besides this species of jealousy, Richard
+suspected that Lady Osbright knew, or at least guessed, his own
+parentage, and disliked him for it accordingly.&nbsp; She had
+never forgotten the distress and degradation of his
+mother&rsquo;s stolen marriage, nor forgiven his father for it;
+she had often stung the proud heart of his brother Henry, when he
+shared the nursery of his cousins the princes; and her sturdy
+English dislike of foreigners, and her strong narrow personal
+loyalty, had alike resulted in the most vehement hatred of the
+Earl of Leicester, whose head she would assuredly have welcomed
+with barbarous exultation, worthy of her Danish ancestors.&nbsp;
+Little chance, then, was there that she would regard with favour
+his son under a feigned name, fostered in the Prince&rsquo;s own
+court and camp.</p>
+<p>She was a constraint, and almost a vexation, to Richard, and
+he heartily wished that the boy&rsquo;s recovery would free his
+tent from her.&nbsp; The boy did recover favourably, in spite of
+all the discomforts of the island, and was decidedly convalescent
+when, after nearly ten days&rsquo; isolation on the island,
+Edward drew out his whole force upon the shore to do honour to
+the embarkation of the relics of Louis IX.&nbsp; It was one of
+the most solemn and melancholy pageants that could be
+conceived.&nbsp; A wide lane of mailed soldiers was drawn up,
+Sicilians and Proven&ccedil;als on the one side, and on the
+other, English and the Knights of the two Orders.&nbsp; All
+stood, or sat on horseback in shining steel, guarding the way
+along which were carried the coffins.&nbsp; In memory, perhaps,
+of Louis&rsquo;s own words, &ldquo;I, your leader, am going
+first,&rdquo; his remains headed the procession, closely followed
+by those of his young son; and behind it marched his two
+brothers, Charles and Alfonse, and his son-in-law, the King of
+Navarre (the two latter already bearing the seeds of the fatal
+malady), and the three English princes, Edward, Edmund, and Henry
+of Almayne, each followed by his immediate suite.&nbsp; The long
+line of coffins of French counts and nobles, whose lives had in
+like manner been sacrificed, brought up the rear; and alas! how
+many nameless dead must have been left in the ruins!</p>
+<p>Each coffin when brought to the shore was placed in a boat,
+and with muffled oars transplanted to the vessel ready to receive
+it, while the troops remained drawn up on the shore.&nbsp; The
+procession that ensued was almost more mournful.&nbsp; It was
+still of biers, but these were not of the dead but of the living,
+and again the foremost was the King of France, while next to him
+came his sister, the Queen of Navarre.&nbsp; Edward went down to
+his litter, as it was brought on the beach, and offered him his
+arm as he feebly stepped forth to enter the boat.&nbsp; Philippe
+looked up to his tall cousin, and wrung his hands as he murmured,
+&ldquo;Alas! what is to be the end of all this?&rdquo;&nbsp;
+Edward made kind and cheerful reply, that things would look
+better when they met at Trapani, and then almost lifted the young
+king into his boat.&nbsp; Poor youth, he had not yet seen the
+end!&nbsp; He was yet to lose his wife, his brother-in-law, and
+his uncle and aunt, ere he should see his home again.</p>
+<p>Richard and Hamlyn de Valence, as part of the Prince&rsquo;s
+train, had moved in the procession; and they were for the rest of
+the day in close attendance on their lord, conveying his numerous
+orders for the embarkation of the troops on the morrow, on their
+return to Sicily.&nbsp; It was not till night-fall that Richard
+returned to his tent, where John of Dunster was sitting on the
+sand at the door, eagerly watching for him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well,
+Jack, my lad, how hast thou sped?&rdquo; asked he,
+advancing.&nbsp; &ldquo;Couldst see our doleful array?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Is it thou, indeed, this time?&rdquo; said the boy,
+catching at his cloak.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Why, who should it be?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thy wraith!&nbsp; Thy double-ganger has been here
+Richard.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What, dreaming again?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No no!&nbsp; I am well, I am strong.&nbsp; But this
+<i>is</i> the land of enchantment!&nbsp; Thou knowst it is.&nbsp;
+Did we not see a fleet of fairy boats sailing on the sea? and a
+leaf eat up a fly here on this very tent pole?&nbsp; And did not
+the Fay Morgaine show us towns and castles and churches in the
+sea?&nbsp; Thou didst not call me light-headed then, Richard;
+thou sawest it too!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But this wraith of mine!&nbsp; Where didst see
+it?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;In this tent.&nbsp; I was lying on the sand, trying if
+I could make it hold enough to build a castle of it, when the
+curtain was put back, and there thou stoodest,
+Richard!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well, did I speak or vanish?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh, thou spakest&mdash;I mean the <i>thing</i> spake,
+and it said, &lsquo;Is this the tent of the young Lord of
+Montfort?&rsquo;&nbsp; How now&mdash;what have I said?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Whom did he ask for?&rdquo; demanded Richard
+breathlessly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Montfort&mdash;young Lord de Montfort!&rdquo; replied
+John; &ldquo;I know it was, for he said it twice over.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And what didst thou answer?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What should I answer?&nbsp; I said we had no Montforts
+here; for they were all dishonoured traitors, slain and
+outlawed.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard could not restrain a sudden indignant exclamation that
+startled the boy.&nbsp; &ldquo;Every one says so!&nbsp; My father
+says so!&rdquo; he returned, somewhat defiantly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not of the Earl,&rdquo; said Richard, recollecting
+himself.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He said every one of the young Montforts was a foul
+traitor, and man-sworn tyrant, as bad as King John had been ere
+the Charter,&rdquo; repeated John hotly, &ldquo;and their father
+was as bad, since he would give no redress.&nbsp; Thou knowst how
+they served us in Somerset and Devon!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I have heard, I have heard,&rdquo; said Richard,
+cutting short the story, and controlling his own burning pain,
+glad that the darkness concealed his face.&nbsp; &ldquo;No more
+of that; but tell me, what said this stranger?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou thinkest it was really a stranger, and not thy
+wraith?&rdquo; said John anxiously.&nbsp; &ldquo;I hope it was,
+for Dame Idonea said if it were a wraith, it betokened that thou
+wouldst not&mdash;live long&mdash;and oh, Richard!&nbsp; I could
+not spare thee!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And the little fellow came nestling up to his friend&rsquo;s
+breast in an access of tenderness, such as perhaps he would have
+disdained save in the darkness.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Did Dame Idonea see him?&rdquo; asked Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No; but she came in soon after he had
+vanished.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Vanished!&nbsp; What, like Fay Morgaine&rsquo;s
+castles?&nbsp; Tell me in sooth, John; it imports me to
+know.&nbsp; What did this stranger, when thou spakest thus of the
+House of Montfort?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He answered,&rdquo; said John; &ldquo;he did not answer
+courteously&mdash;he said, that I was a malapert little ass, and
+demanded again where this young Montfort&rsquo;s tent was.&nbsp;
+So then I said, that if a Montfort dared to show his
+traitor&rsquo;s face in this camp, the Prince would hang him as
+high as Judas; for I wanted to be rid of him, Richard! it was so
+dreadful to see thy face, and hear thy voice talking French, and
+asking for dead traitors.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;French!&rdquo; said Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;Methought
+thou knewst no French!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I&mdash;I have heard it long now, more&rsquo;s the
+pity,&rdquo; faltered John, &ldquo;and&mdash;and I&rsquo;d have
+spoken anything to be rid of that shape.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And wert thou rid?&nbsp; What befell then?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It cursed the Prince, and King, and all of them,&rdquo;
+said John with a shudder; &ldquo;it looked black and deadly, and
+I crossed myself, and said the Blessed Name, and no doubt it
+writhed itself and went off in brimstone and smoke, for I shut my
+eyes, and when I looked up again it was gone!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Gone!&nbsp; Didst look after him?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh, no!&nbsp; Earthly things are all food for a brave
+man&rsquo;s sword,&rdquo; said Master John, drawing himself up
+very valiantly, &ldquo;but wraiths and things from
+beneath&mdash;they do scare the very heart out of a man.&nbsp;
+And I lay, I don&rsquo;t know how, till Dame Idonea came in; and
+she said either the foul fiend had put on thy shape because he
+boded thee ill, or it was one of the traitor brood looking for
+his like.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Tell me, John,&rdquo; said Richard anxiously;
+&ldquo;surely he was not in all points like me.&nbsp; Had he our
+English white cross?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I cannot say as to the cross,&rdquo; said John;
+&ldquo;meseemed it was all you&mdash;yourself&mdash;and that was
+all&mdash;only I thought your voice was strange and
+hollow&mdash;and&mdash;now I think of it&mdash;yes&mdash;he was
+bearded&mdash;brown bearded.&nbsp; And,&rdquo; with a sudden
+thought, &ldquo;stand up, prithee, in the opening of the
+tent;&rdquo; and then taking his post where he had been sitting
+at the time of the apparition, &ldquo;He was not so tall as thou
+art.&nbsp; Thy head comes above the fold of the curtain, and his,
+I know, did not touch it, for I saw the light over it.&nbsp; Then
+thou dost not think it was thy wraith?&rdquo; he added
+anxiously.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I think my wraith would have measured me more exactly
+both in stature and in age,&rdquo; said Richard lightly.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;But how did Leonillo comport himself?&nbsp; He brooks not
+a stranger in general; and dogs cannot endure the presence of a
+spirit.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ah! but he fawned upon this one, and thrust his nose
+into his hand,&rdquo; said John, &ldquo;and I think he must have
+run after him; for it was so long ere he came back to me, that I
+had feared greatly he was gone, and oh, Richard! then I must have
+gone too!&nbsp; I could never have met you without
+Leonillo.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>By this time Richard had little doubt that the visitor must
+have been one of his brothers, Simon or Guy, who were not
+unlikely to be among the Proven&ccedil;als, in the army of
+Charles of Anjou.&nbsp; He had not been thought to resemble them
+as a boy, but he had observed how much more alike brothers appear
+to strangers than they do to their own family; and he knew by
+occasional observations from the Prince, as well as from his
+brother Henry&rsquo;s recognition of his voice, that the old
+Montfort characteristics must be strong in himself.&nbsp; He
+would not, however, avow his belief to John of Dunster.&nbsp;
+Secrecy on his own birth had been enjoined on him by his uncle
+the King; and disobedience to the old man&rsquo;s most trifling
+commands was always sharply resented by the Prince; nor was the
+boy&rsquo;s view of the House of Montfort very favourable to such
+a declaration.&nbsp; Richard really loved the brave little
+fellow, and trusted that some day when the discovery must be
+made, it would be coupled with some exploit that would show it
+was no name to be ashamed of.&nbsp; So he only told the boy that
+he had no doubt the stranger was a foreign knight, who had once
+known the old Leicester family; but bade him mention the
+circumstance to no one.&nbsp; He feared, however, that the
+caution came too late, since Dame Idonea was not only an
+inveterate gossip, but was likely to hold in direful suspicion
+any one who had been inquired for by such a name.</p>
+<p>The personal disappointment of having missed his brother was
+great.&nbsp; Richard was very lonely.&nbsp; The Princes, and
+Hamlyn de Valence, were the only persons who knew his secret, and
+both by Prince Edmund and De Valence he was treated with
+indifference or dislike.&nbsp; Edward himself, though the object
+of his fervent affection, and his protector in all essentials,
+was of a reserved nature, and kept all his attendants at a great
+distance.&nbsp; On very rare occasions, when his feelings had
+been strongly stirred&mdash;as in the instance of his visit to
+his uncle&rsquo;s death-chamber&mdash;he might sometimes unbend;
+and momentary flashes from the glow of his warm deep heart went
+further in securing the love and devotion of those around him,
+than would the daily affability of a lower nature; but in
+ordinary life, towards all concerned with him except his nearest
+relations, he was a strict, cold, grave disciplinarian, ever
+just, though on the side of severity, and stern towards the
+slightest neglect or breach of observance, nor did he make any
+exception in favour of Richard.&nbsp; If the youth seldom
+received one of his brief annihilating reproofs, it was because
+they were scarcely ever merited; but he had experienced that any
+want of exactitude in his duties was quite as severely visited as
+if he had not been the Prince&rsquo;s close kinsman, romantically
+rescued by him, and placed near his person by his special
+desire.&nbsp; And Eleanor, with all her gentle courtesy and
+kindness, was strictly withheld by her husband from pampering or
+cockering his pages; nor did she ever transgress his will.</p>
+<p>The atmosphere was perhaps bracing, but it was bleak: and
+there were times when Richard regretted his acceptance of the
+Prince&rsquo;s offer, and yearned after family ties, equality,
+and freedom.&nbsp; Simon and Guy had never been kind to him, but
+at least they were his brothers, and with them disguise and
+constraint would be over&mdash;he should, too, be in
+communication with his mother and sister.&nbsp; He was strongly
+inclined to cast in his lot with them, and end this life of
+secrecy, and distrust from all around him save one, and his loyal
+love ill requited even by that one.&nbsp; It grieved him keenly
+that one of his brothers should have been repulsed from his tent;
+an absolutely famished longing for fraternal intercourse gained
+possession of him, and as he lay on his pallet that night in the
+dark, he even shed tears at the thought of the greeting and
+embrace that he had missed.</p>
+<p>Still he had hopes for the future.&nbsp; There must be
+meetings and possibilities of inquiries passing between the three
+armies, and he would let no opportunity go by.&nbsp; The next
+day, however, there was no chance.&nbsp; The English troops were
+embarked in their vessels, and after a short and prosperous
+passage were again landed at Trapani, the western angle of
+Sicily.&nbsp; The French had sailed first, but were not in
+harbour when the English came in; and the Sicilians, who had
+brought up the rear, arrived the next day, but still there was no
+tidings of the French.&nbsp; Towards the evening, however, the
+royal vessel bearing Philippe III. came into harbour, and all the
+rest were in sight, when at sunset a frightful storm arose, and
+the ships were in fearful case.&nbsp; Many foundered, many were
+wrecked on the rocky islets around the port, and the French army
+was almost as much reduced in numbers as it had been by the
+Plague of Carthage.</p>
+<p>Charles of Anjou remained himself in the town of Trapani, but
+knowing the evils of crowding a small space with troops, he at
+once sent his men inland, and Richard was again disappointed of
+the hope of seeing or hearing of his brothers; for the Prince
+still forbade all intercourse with the shattered remnant of the
+French army, justly dreading that they might still carry about
+them the seeds of the infection of the camp.</p>
+<p>The three heads of the Crusade, however, met in the Castle of
+Trapani to hold council on their future proceedings.&nbsp; The
+place was the state-chamber of the castle.</p>
+<p>Each prince had brought with him a single attendant, and the
+three stood in waiting near the door, in full view of their
+lords, though out of earshot.&nbsp; It was an opportunity that
+Richard could not bear to miss of asking for his brothers,
+unheard by any of those English ears who would be suspicious
+about his solicitude for the House of Montfort.&nbsp; A
+lively-looking Neapolitan lad was the attendant of King Charles;
+and in spite of all the perils of attempting conversation while
+thus waiting, Richard had&mdash;while the princes were greeting
+one another, and taking their seats&mdash;ventured the question,
+whether any of the sons of the English Earl of Leicester were in
+the Sicilian army.&nbsp; Of Earl of Leicester the Italian knew
+nothing; but Count of Montfort was a more familiar sound.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Si, si, vero!&rdquo;&nbsp; Sicily had rung with it; and
+Count Rosso Aldobrandini, of the Maremma Toscana, had given his
+only daughter and heiress to the banished English knight, Guido
+di Monforte, who had served in the king&rsquo;s army as a
+Proven&ccedil;al.</p>
+<p>Richard&rsquo;s heart beat high.&nbsp; Guy a well-endowed
+count, with a castle, lands, and home!&nbsp; He would have asked
+where Guy now was, and how far off was the Maremma; but the
+conference between the princes was actually commencing, and
+silence became necessary on the part of their attendants.</p>
+<p>They could only hear the murmur of voices; but could discern
+plainly the keen looks and animated gestures of Charles of Anjou,
+the sickly sullen indifference of Philippe, and the majestic
+gravity of Edward, whose noble head towered above the other two
+as if he were their natural judge.&nbsp; Charles was, in fact,
+trying to persuade the others to sail with him for Greece, and
+there turn their forces on the unfortunate Michael
+Pal&aelig;ologos, who had lately recovered Constantinople, the
+Empire that Charles hoped to win for himself, the favoured
+champion of Rome.</p>
+<p>Philippe merely replied that he had had enough of crusading,
+he was sick and weary, he must go home and bury his father, and
+get himself crowned.&nbsp; Charles might be then seen trying a
+little hypocrisy; and telling Philippe that his saintly father
+would only have wished to speed him on the way of the
+Cross.&nbsp; Then that trumpet voice of Edward, whose tones
+Richard never missed, answered, &ldquo;What is the way of the
+Cross, fair uncle?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>It was well known that Louis IX. had refused to crusade
+against Christians, even Greek Christians, and Philippe soon
+sheltered himself under the plea that had not at first occurred
+to his dull mind.&nbsp; In effect, he laid particulars before his
+uncle, that quickly made it plain that the French army was in too
+miserable a condition to do anything but return home; and Charles
+then addressed his persuasions to Edward&mdash;striving to
+convince him in the first place of the sanctity of a war against
+Greek heretics, and when Edward proved past being persuaded that
+arms meant for the recovery of the Holy Sepulchre ought not to be
+employed against Christians who reverenced it, he tried to
+demonstrate the uselessness of hoping to conquer the Holy Land,
+even by such a Crusade as had been at first planned, far less
+with the few attached to Edward&rsquo;s individual banner.&nbsp;
+Long did the king argue on.&nbsp; His low voice was scarcely
+audible, even without the words; but Edward&rsquo;s brief,
+ringing, almost scornful, replies, never failed to reach
+Richard&rsquo;s ear, and the last of them was, &ldquo;It skills
+not, my fair uncle.&nbsp; For the Holy Land I am vowed to fight,
+and thither would I go had I none with me but Fowen, my
+groom!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And withal his eye lit on Richard, with a look of certainty of
+response; of security that here was one to partake his genuine
+ardour, and of refreshment in the midst of his disgust with the
+selfish uncle and sluggish cousin.&nbsp; That look, that half
+smile, made the youth&rsquo;s heart bound once more.&nbsp; Yes,
+with him he would go to the ends of the earth!&nbsp; What was the
+freedom of Guy&rsquo;s castle, to the following of such a lord
+and leader in such a cause?</p>
+<p>Richard could have thrown himself at his feet, and poured
+forth pledges of fidelity.&nbsp; But in ten minutes he was
+following home the unapproachable, silent, cold warrior.</p>
+<p>And the lack of any outlet for his aspirations turned them
+back upon themselves, with a strange sense of bitterness and
+almost of resentment.&nbsp; Leonillo alone, as the creature lay
+at his feet, and looked up into his face with eyes of deep
+wistful meaning, seemed to him to have any feeling for him; and
+Leonillo became the recipient of many an outpouring of something
+between discontent and melancholy.&nbsp; Leonillo, the sole
+remnant of his home!&nbsp; He burnt for that Holy Land where he
+was to win the name and fame lacking to him; but there was to be
+long delay.</p>
+<p>Fain would the Prince have proceeded at once to Palestine; but
+the Genoese, from whom, in the abeyance of the English navy, he
+had been obliged to hire his transports, absolutely refused to
+sail for the East until after the three winter months; and he was
+therefore obliged to remain in Sicily.&nbsp; King Charles invited
+him to spend Christmas at the court at Syracuse or Naples, in
+hopes, perhaps, of persuading him to the Greek expedition; but
+Edward was far too much displeased with the Angevin to accept his
+hospitality; recollecting, perhaps, that such a sojourn had been
+little beneficial to his great-uncle C&oelig;ur de Lion&rsquo;s
+army.&nbsp; He decided upon staying where he was, in the remotest
+corner of Sicily, and keeping his three hundred crusaders as much
+to themselves and to strict military discipline as possible,
+maintaining them at his own cost, and avoiding as far as he could
+all transactions with the cruel and violent Proven&ccedil;al
+adventurers, with whom Charles had filled the island.</p>
+<p>Thus Richard found his hopes of obtaining further intelligence
+about his brothers entirely passing away.&nbsp; He did, indeed,
+venture on one day saying to the Prince, &ldquo;My Lord, I hear
+that my brother Guy hath become a Neapolitan count!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A Tuscan robber would be nearer the mark!&rdquo; coldly
+replied Edward.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And,&rdquo; added Richard, &ldquo;methought, while the
+host is in winter quarters, I would venture on craving your
+license, my Lord, to visit him?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou hast thy choice, Richard,&rdquo; answered the
+Prince, with grave displeasure; &ldquo;loyalty and honour with
+me, or lawlessness and violence with thy brother.&nbsp; Both
+cannot be thine!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And returning to his study of the Lais of Marie de France, he
+made it evident that he would hear no more, and left Richard to a
+sharp struggle; in which hot irritation and wounded feeling would
+have carried him away at once from the stern superior who
+required the sacrifice of all his family, and gave not a word of
+sympathy in return.&nbsp; It was the crusading vow alone that
+detained the youth.&nbsp; He could not throw away his pledge to
+the wars of the Cross, and it was plain that if he went now to
+seek out Guy, he should never be allowed to return to the
+crusading army.&nbsp; But that vow once fulfilled, proud Edward
+should see, that not merely sufferance but friendliness was
+needed to bind the son of his father&rsquo;s sister to his
+service.&nbsp; The brother at Bednall Green was right, this
+bondage was worse than beggary.&nbsp; Nor, under the influence of
+these feelings, had Richard&rsquo;s service the alacrity and
+affection for which it had once been remarkable: the Prince
+rebuked his short-comings unsparingly, and thus added to the
+sense of injury that had caused them; Hamlyn de Valence sneered,
+and Dame Idonea took good care to point out both the
+youth&rsquo;s neglects and his sullenness, and to whisper
+significantly that she did not wonder, considering the stock he
+came of.&nbsp; A soothing word or gentle excuse from the
+kind-hearted Princess were the only gleams of comfort that
+rendered the present state of things endurable.</p>
+<p>Just after Christmas arrived a vessel with reinforcements from
+home.&nbsp; Among them came a small body of Hospitaliers, with
+the novice Raynal at their head, now a full-blown knight, in
+dazzling scarlet and white, as Sir Reginald Ferrers.&nbsp;
+Richard at once recognized him, when he came to present himself
+to the Prince, and was very desirous of learning whether he knew
+aught of that other brother, so mysteriously hidden in
+obscurity.&nbsp; Sir Raynal on his side seemed to share the
+desire; he exchanged a friendly glance with the page, and when
+the formality of the reception was over sought him out, saying,
+&ldquo;I have a greeting for you, Master Fowen.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;From Sir Robert Darcy?&rdquo; asked Richard.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;How fares it with the kind old knight?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Excellent well!&nbsp; Nay, nothing fares amiss with
+Father Robert!&rdquo; said the young knight, smiling.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Everything is the very best that could have befallen
+him&mdash;to hear him speak.&nbsp; He is the very sunshine of the
+Spital, and had he been ordered on this Crusade, I think all the
+hamlets round would have risen to withhold him.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said Richard, hoping he was acting
+indifference; &ldquo;said he aught of the little maiden with the
+blind father?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Pretty Bessee and Blind Hal of Bednall Green?&nbsp;
+Verily, that was the purport of my message.&nbsp; The poor knave
+hath been sorely sick and more cracked than ever this autumn;
+insomuch that Father Robert spent whole nights with him; and
+though he be better now, and as much in his senses as e&rsquo;er
+he will be, such another access is like to make an end of
+him.&nbsp; Now, Father Robert saith that you, Sir Page, know who
+the poor man is by birth, and that he prays you to send him word
+what had best be done with the child, in case either of his death
+or of his getting so frenzied as to be unable to take care of
+her.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Send him word!&rdquo; repeated Richard in
+perplexity.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;We shall certainly have some one returning soon to the
+Spital,&rdquo; replied Sir Raynal.&nbsp; &ldquo;Indeed, methinks
+some of the princes will be like to return, for the old King of
+the Romans is failing fast, and King Henry implored that the
+Prince of Almayne would come to hearten him.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then must I write to Sir Robert?&rdquo; said Richard;
+&ldquo;mine is scarce a message for word of mouth.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;So he said it was like to be,&rdquo; returned the
+knight, &ldquo;and he took thought to send you a slip of
+parchment, knowing, he said, that such things are not wont to be
+found in a crusader&rsquo;s budget.&nbsp; Moreover, if ink be
+wanting, he bade me tell you that there&rsquo;s a fish in these
+seas, with many arms, and very like the foul fiend, that carries
+a bag of ink as good as any scrivener&rsquo;s.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I have seen the monster,&rdquo; said Richard, who had
+often been down to the beach to see the unlading of the
+fishermen&rsquo;s boats, and to share little John of
+Dunster&rsquo;s unfailing marvel, that the Mediterranean should
+produce such outlandish creatures, so alien to his Bristol
+Channel experiences.</p>
+<p>And the very next time the boats came in, Richard made his way
+to the shore, on the beautiful, rocky, broken coast; and
+presently encountered a sepia, which fully justified Sir
+Robert&rsquo;s comparison, lying at the bottom of a boat.&nbsp;
+The fisherman intended it for his own dinner, when all his
+choicer fish should have gone to supply the Friday&rsquo;s meal
+of the English chivalry; and he was a good deal amazed when the
+young gentleman, making his Proven&ccedil;al as like Sicilian as
+he could, began to traffic with him for it, and at last made him
+understand that it was only its ink-bag that he wanted.</p>
+<p>The said ink, secured in a shell, was brought home by Richard,
+together with a couple of the largest sea-bird&rsquo;s quills
+that he could find&mdash;and which he shaped with his dagger, as
+best he might, in remembrance of Father Adam de Marisco&rsquo;s
+writing lessons.&nbsp; He meditated what should be the language
+of his letter, which was not likely to be secure from the eyes of
+the few who could read it; and finally decided that English was
+the tongue known to the fewest readers, who, if they knew letters
+at all, were sure to be acquainted with French and Latin.</p>
+<p>On a strip of parchment, then, about nine inches long and
+three wide, he proceeded to indite, in upright cramped letters,
+with many contractions, nearly in such terms as these&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p><span class="smcap">Reverend and Knightly
+Father</span>,</p>
+<p>The good ghostly father and knight, Sir Raynald Ferrers, hath
+borne to me your tidings of my brother&rsquo;s sickness, and of
+all your goodness to him&mdash;whereof I pray that our blessed
+Lady and good St. John may reward you, for I can only pray for
+you.&nbsp; Touching his poor little daughter, in case of his
+death or frenzy, which the Saints of their mercy forefend, I
+would entreat you of your goodness to place her in some nunnery,
+but without making known her name and quality until my return; so
+Heaven bring me home safe.&nbsp; But an if I should be slain in
+this Eastern land, then were it most for the little one&rsquo;s
+good to present her to the gracious lady Princess, by whom she
+would be most lovingly and naturally cared for; and would be more
+safe than with such as might shun to own her rights of blood and
+heirship.&nbsp; Commend me to my brother, if so be that he cares
+to hear of me; and tell him that Guy hath wedded the lady of a
+castle in the land of Italy.&nbsp; And so praying you, ghostly
+father, for your blessing, I greet you well, and rest your
+grateful bedesman and servant,</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><span class="smcap">Richard of
+Leicester</span>.</p>
+<p>Given at the Prince&rsquo;s camp at Drepanum, in the realm of
+Sicilia, on the octave of the Epiphany, in the year of grace
+<span class="GutSmall">MCCLXX</span>.; and so our Lord have you
+heartily in His keeping.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>Letter-writing was a mighty task; and Richard&rsquo;s
+extemporary implements were not of the best.&nbsp; He laboured
+hard over his composition, kneeling against a chest in the
+tent.&nbsp; When at length he raised his head, he encountered a
+face full of the most utter amazement.&nbsp; Little John of
+Dunster had come into the tent, and stood gazing at him with open
+eyes and gaping mouth, as if he were perpetrating an
+incantation.&nbsp; Richard could not help laughing.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Why, Jack, dost think I am framing a spell for
+thee?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Writing!&rdquo; gasped John, relieving his distended
+mouth by at length closing it.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Wherefore not?&nbsp; Did not I see the chaplain
+teaching thee to write at Guildford?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay&mdash;but that was when I was a babe!&nbsp;
+Writing!&nbsp; Why, my father never writes!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But the Prince does.&nbsp; Thou hast seen him
+write.&nbsp; Come now,&rdquo; added Richard: &ldquo;if thou wilt,
+I will help thee to write a letter to send thy greetings home to
+Dunster.&nbsp; Thy father and mother will be right glad to hear
+thou hast &rsquo;scaped that African fever.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;They!&mdash;They&rsquo;d think me no better than a
+French monk!&rdquo; said John.&nbsp; &ldquo;And none of them
+could read it either!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll never write!&nbsp; My
+grandsire only set his cross to the great charter!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And John retreated&mdash;in fear perhaps that Richard would
+sully his manhood with a writing lesson!</p>
+<p>The letter was rolled up in a scroll, bound with a silken
+thread, and committed to the charge of Sir Raynald Ferrers, who
+was going shortly to be commandery of his Order at Castel San
+Giovanni, whence he had no doubt of being able to send the letter
+safely to Sir Robert Darcy, at the Grand Priory.</p>
+<p>It would perhaps have been more expeditious to have intrusted
+the letter to one of the suite of Prince Henry of Almayne, who
+had been recalled by the tidings of the state of his
+father&rsquo;s health; but Richard dreaded betraying his
+brother&rsquo;s secret too much to venture on confiding the
+missive to any of this party&mdash;none of whom were indeed
+likely to wish to oblige him.&nbsp; Hamlyn de Valence was going
+with Henry as his esquire; and his absence seemed to Richard like
+the beginning of better days.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER IX<br />
+ASH WEDNESDAY</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;Mostrocci un ombra da l&rsquo; un canto
+sola<br />
+Dicendo &lsquo;Colui feese in grembo a Dio<br />
+Lo cuor che&rsquo;n su Tamigi ancor si cola.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><span
+class="smcap">Dante</span>.&nbsp; <i>Inferno</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">Shrovetide</span> had come, and the Prince
+had, before leaving Trapani, been taking some share in the
+entertainments of the Carnival.&nbsp; Personally, his grave
+reserve made gaieties distasteful to him; and the disastrous
+commencement of the Crusade weighed on his spirits.&nbsp; But
+when state and show were necessary, he provided for them with
+royal bounty and magnificence, and caused them to be regulated
+with the admirable taste of that age of exceeding beauty in which
+he lived.</p>
+<p>Thus, in this festal season, banquets were provided, and
+military shows took place, for the benefit of the Sicilian
+nobility and of the citizens of Trapani, on such a scale, that
+the English rose high in general esteem; and many were the secret
+wishes that Edmund of Lancaster rather than Charles of Anjou had
+been able to make good the grant from the Pope.</p>
+<p>Splendid were the displays, and no slight toil did they
+involve on the part of the immediate train of the Prince, few in
+number as they were, and destitute of the appliances of the
+resident court.&nbsp; Richard hurrying hither and thither, and
+waiting upon every one, had little of the diversion of the
+affair; but he would willingly have taken treble the care and
+toil in the relief it was to be free from the prying mistrustful
+eyes of Hamlyn de Valence.&nbsp; Looking after little John of
+Dunster was, however, no small part of his trouble; the urchin
+was so certain to get into some mischief if left to
+himself&mdash;now treading on a lady&rsquo;s train, now upsetting
+a flagon of wine, now nearly impaling himself upon the point of a
+whole spitful of ortolans that were being handed round to the
+company, now becoming uncivilly deaf upon his French ear.&nbsp;
+Altogether, it was a relief to Richard&rsquo;s mind when he
+stumbled upon the little fellow fast asleep, even though it was
+in the middle of the Princess&rsquo;s violet velvet and ermine
+mantle, which she had laid down in order to tread a stately
+measure with Sire Guillaume de Por&ccedil;eles.</p>
+<p>After all Richard&rsquo;s exertions that evening, it was no
+wonder that the morning found him fast asleep at the unexampled
+hour of eight!&nbsp; His wakening was a strange one.&nbsp; His
+little fellow-page was standing beside him with a strange
+frightened yet important air.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What is the matter, John?&nbsp; It is late?&nbsp; Is
+the Prince gone to Mass?&nbsp; Has he missed me?&rdquo; cried
+Richard, starting up in dismay, for unpunctuality was a great
+offence with Edward.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He is gone to Mass,&rdquo; said John, &ldquo;but,
+before he comes back,&rdquo; he came near and lowered his voice,
+&ldquo;Hob Longbow sent me to say you had better flee.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Flee!&nbsp; Boy, why should I flee?&nbsp; Are
+<i>your</i> senses fleeing?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;O Richard,&rdquo; cried John, his face clearing up,
+&ldquo;then it is not true!&nbsp; You are not one of the traitor
+Montforts!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;If I were a hundred Montforts, what has that to do with
+it?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then all is well,&rdquo; exclaimed the boy.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I said you were no such thing!&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll tell Hob
+he lied in his throat.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;If he said I was a traitor, verily he did; but as to
+being a Montfort&mdash;But, how now, John, what means all
+this?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then it is so!&nbsp; O Richard, Richard, you cannot be
+one of them!&nbsp; You cannot have written that letter to warn
+them to murder Prince Henry.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;To murder Prince Henry!&rdquo; Richard stood
+transfixed.&nbsp; &ldquo;Not the Prince&rsquo;s little
+son!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh no, Prince Henry of Almayne!&nbsp; At Viterbo!&nbsp;
+Hamlyn de Valence saw it.&nbsp; He is come back.&nbsp; It was in
+the Cathedral.&nbsp; O Richard&mdash;at the elevation of the
+Host!&nbsp; Guy and Simon de Montfort fell on him, stabbed him to
+the heart, and rushed out.&nbsp; Then they came back again, and
+dragged him by the hair of his head into the mire, and shouted
+that so their father had been dragged through the streets of
+Evesham.&nbsp; And then they went off to the Maremma!&nbsp;
+And,&rdquo; continued the boy breathlessly, &ldquo;Hob Long-bow
+is on guard, and he bade me tell you, that for love of your
+father he will let you pass; and then you can hide; if only you
+can go ere the Prince comes forth.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hide!&nbsp; Wherefore should I hide?&nbsp; This is most
+horrible, but it is no deed of mine!&rdquo; said Richard.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Who dares to think it is?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then you are none of them!&nbsp; You had no part in
+it!&nbsp; I shall tell Hob he is a villain&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Stay,&rdquo; said Richard, laying a detaining hand on
+the boy.&nbsp; &ldquo;Why does Hob think me in danger?&nbsp; Is
+anything stirring against me?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;They all&mdash;all of poor Prince Henry&rsquo;s
+mein&eacute;, that are come back with Hamlyn&mdash;say that you
+are a Montfort too, and&mdash;oh! do not look so
+fierce!&mdash;that you sent a letter to warn your brethren where
+to meet, and fall on the Prince.&nbsp; And the murderers being
+fled, they are keen to have your life; and, Richard, you know I
+saw you write the letter.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That you saw me write a letter, is as certain as that
+my name is Montfort,&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;but I am not
+therefore leagued with traitors or murderers!&nbsp; In the
+church, saidst thou?&nbsp; Oh, well that the Prince forbade me to
+visit Guy!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then you will not flee?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, forsooth.&nbsp; I will stay and prove my
+innocence.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But you are a Montfort!&nbsp; And I saw you write the
+letter.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Did you speak of my having written the letter?&rdquo;
+asked Richard, pausing.</p>
+<p>The boy hung his head, and muttered something about Dame
+Idonea.</p>
+<p>By this time, even if Richard had thought of flight, it would
+have been impossible.&nbsp; Two archers made their presence
+apparent at the entrance of the tent, and in brief gruff tones
+informed Richard that the Prince required his presence.&nbsp; The
+space between his tent and the royal pavilion was short, but in
+those few steps Richard had time to glance over the dangers of
+his position, and take up his resolution though with a certain
+stunned sense that nothing could be before the member of a
+proscribed family, but failure, suspicion, and ruin.</p>
+<p>The two brothers, Edward and Edmund, with the Earl of
+Gloucester, and their other chief councillors, were assembled;
+and there were looks of deep concern on the faces of all, making
+Edward&rsquo;s more than ever like a rigid marble statue; while
+Edmund had evidently been weeping bitterly, though his features
+were full of fierce indignation.&nbsp; Hamlyn de Valence, and a
+few other members of the murdered Prince&rsquo;s suite, stood
+near in deep mourning suits.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Richard de Montfort,&rdquo; said Prince Edward, looking
+at him with a sorrowful reproachful sternness that went to his
+heart, &ldquo;we have sent for you to answer for yourself, on a
+grave charge.&nbsp; You have heard of that which has
+befallen?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I have heard, my Lord, of a foul crime which my soul
+abhors.&nbsp; I trust none present here think me capable of
+sharing in it!&nbsp; Whoever dares to accuse me, shall be
+answered by my sword!&rdquo; and he glanced fiercely at
+Hamlyn.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hold!&rdquo; said Edward severely, &ldquo;no one is so
+senseless as to accuse you of taking actual part in a crime that
+took place beyond the sea; but there is only too much reason to
+believe that you have been tampered with by your
+brothers.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Then, as his brother Edmund made some suggestion to him, he
+added, &ldquo;Is John de Mohun of Dunster here?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Yea, my Lord,&rdquo; said the little boy, coming
+forward, with a flush on his face, and a bold though wistful
+look, &ldquo;but verily Richard is no traitor, be he who he
+may!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That is not what we wished to ask of you,&rdquo; said
+the Prince, too sad and earnest to be amused even for a
+moment.&nbsp; &ldquo;Tell us whom you said, even now, you had
+seen in the tent you shared with him in Africa.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I said I had seen his wraith,&rdquo; said John.</p>
+<p>No smile lighted upon the Prince&rsquo;s features; they were
+as serious as those of the boy, as he commented, &ldquo;His
+likeness&mdash;his exact likeness&mdash;you mean.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay,&rdquo; said the boy; &ldquo;but Richard proved to
+me after, that it had been less tall, and was bearded
+likewise.&nbsp; So I hoped it did not bode him ill.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Worse, I fear, than if it had in sooth been his
+double,&rdquo; said Gloucester to Prince Edmund.&nbsp; The Prince
+added the question whether this visitor had spoken; and John
+related the inquiry for Richard by the name of Montfort, and his
+own reply, which elicited a murmur of amused applause among the
+bystanders.</p>
+<p>The Prince, however, continued in the same grave manner to
+draw from the little witness his account of Richard&rsquo;s
+injunction to secresy; and then asked about the letter-writing,
+of which John gave his plain account.&nbsp; The Prince then said,
+&ldquo;Speak now, Hamlyn.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;This, then, I have to add, my Lord, that I, as all the
+world, remarked that Richard de Montfort consorted much with Sir
+Reginald de Ferri&egrave;res, who, as we all remember, is the son
+of a family deeply concerned in the Mad Parliament.&nbsp; By Sir
+Reginald, on his arrival at Castel San Giovanni, a messenger is
+despatched, bearing letters to the Hospital at Florence, and it
+is immediately after his arrival there, that the two Montforts
+speed from the Maremma to the unhappy and bloody Mass at
+Viterbo.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You hear, Richard!&rdquo; said the Prince.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I bade you choose between me and your brothers.&nbsp; Had
+you believed me that you could not serve both, it had been better
+for you.&nbsp; I credit not that you incited them to the
+assassination; but your tidings led them to perpetrate it.&nbsp;
+I cannot retain the spy of the Montforts in my camp.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; said Richard, at last finding space for
+speech, &ldquo;I deny all collusion with my brothers.&nbsp; I
+have neither seen, spoken with, nor sent to them by letter nor
+word.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then to whom was this letter?&rdquo; demanded the
+Prince.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;To Sir Robert Darcy, the Grand Prior of England,&rdquo;
+answered Richard.</p>
+<p>A murmur of incredulous amazement was heard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The purport?&rdquo; continued Edward.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That, my Lord, it consorts not with my duty to
+tell.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Look here, Richard,&rdquo; interposed Gilbert of
+Gloucester, &ldquo;this is an unlikely tale.&nbsp; You can have
+no cause for secresy, save in connection with these brothers; and
+if you will point to some way of clearing yourself of being art
+and part in this foul act of murder, you may be sent scot free
+from the camp; but if you wilfully maintain this denial, what can
+we do but treat you as a traitor?&nbsp; No obstinacy!&nbsp; What
+can a lad like you have to say to good old Sir Robert Darcy, that
+all the world might not know?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My Lord of Gloucester,&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;I am
+bound in honour not to reveal the matters between me and Sir
+Robert; I can only declare on the faith of a Christian gentleman
+that I have neither had, nor attempted to have, any dealings with
+either of my brothers, Guy or Simon; and if any man says I have,
+I will prove his falsehood on his body.&rdquo;&nbsp; And Richard
+flung down his glove before the Prince.</p>
+<p>At the same moment Hamlyn de Valence sprang forward.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then, Richard de Montfort, I take up the gage.&nbsp; I
+give thee the lie in thy throat, and will prove on thy body that
+thou art a man-sworn traitor, in league with thy false
+brethren.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I commit me to the judgment of God,&rdquo; said
+Richard, looking upwards.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; said Hamlyn, &ldquo;have we your
+permission to fight out the matter?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You have,&rdquo; said Edward, &ldquo;since to that holy
+judgment Richard hath appealed.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>But the Prince looked far from contented with the
+appeal.&nbsp; He allowed the preliminaries of place and time to
+be fixed without his interposition; and when the council broke
+up, he fixed his clear deep eyes upon Richard in a manner which
+seemed to the boy to upbraid him with the want of confidence, for
+which, however, he would not condescend to ask.&nbsp; Richard
+felt that, let the issue of the combat be what it would, he had
+lost that full trust on the part of the Prince, which had
+hitherto been his one drop of comfort; and if he were dismissed
+from the camp, he should be more than ever desolate, for his soul
+could scarce yet bring itself to grasp the horror of the crime of
+his brothers.</p>
+<p>The combat could not take place for two days&mdash;waiting, on
+one, in order that Hamlyn might have time to rest, and recover
+his full strength after his voyage, and the next, because it was
+Ash Wednesday.&nbsp; In the meantime Richard was left solitary;
+under no restraint, but universally avoided.&nbsp; The judicial
+combat did not make him uneasy; the two youths had often measured
+their strength together, and though Hamlyn was the elder, Richard
+was the taller, and had inherited something of the Plantagenet
+frame, so remarkable in those two</p>
+<blockquote><p>Lords of the biting axe and beamy spear,</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>&ldquo;wide conquering Edward&rdquo; and &ldquo;Lion
+Richard&rdquo;; and each believed in the righteousness of his own
+cause sufficiently to have implicit confidence that the right
+would be shown on his side.</p>
+<p>In fact, Richard soon understood that though Prince Edward,
+with a sense of the value of definite evidence far in advance of
+the time, and befitting the English Justinian, had only allowed
+the charge to be brought against him which could in a manner be
+substantiated, yet that the general belief went much
+further.&nbsp; Proved to be a Montfort, and to have written a
+letter, he was therefore convicted, by universal consent, of a
+league with his brothers for the revenge of their house; to have
+instigated the assassination at Viterbo, and to be only biding
+his time for the like act at Trapani.&nbsp; Even the Prince was
+deeply offended by his silence, and imputed it to no good motive;
+trust and affection were gone, and Richard felt no tie to retain
+him where he was, save his duty as a crusader.&nbsp; Let him fail
+in the combat, and the best he could look for would be to be
+ignominiously branded and expelled: let him gain, and he much
+doubted whether, though the ordeal of battle was always
+respected, he would regain his former position.&nbsp; With keen
+suffering and indignation, he rebelled against Edward&rsquo;s
+harshness and distrust.&nbsp; He&mdash;who had brought him
+there&mdash;who ought to have known him better!&nbsp; Moreover,
+there was the crushing sense of the guilt of his brothers; guilt
+most horrible in its sacrilegious audacity, and doubly shocking
+to the feelings of a family where the grim sanctity of the first
+Simon de Montfort, and the enlightened devotion of the second,
+formed such a contrast to the savage outrage of him who now bore
+their name.&nbsp; Richard, as with bare feet and ashes whitening
+his dark locks he knelt on the cold stones of the dark Norman
+church at Trapani, wept hot and bitter tears of humiliation over
+the family crimes that had brought them so low; prayed in an
+agony for repentance for his brothers; and for himself, some
+opening for expiating their sin against at least the generous
+royal family.&nbsp; &ldquo;O! could I but die for my Prince, and
+know that he forgave and they repented!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Only when on his way back to the camp was he sensible of the
+murmurs of censure at his hypocrisy in joining the penitential
+procession at all.&nbsp; Dame Idonea, in a complete suit of
+sackcloth, was informing her friends that she had made a vow not
+to wash her face till the whole adder brood of Montfort had been
+crushed; and that she trusted to see the beginning of justice
+done to-morrow.&nbsp; She had offered a candle to St. James to
+that effect, hoping to induce him to turn away his patronage from
+the family.</p>
+<p>Every one, knight or squire, shrank away from Richard, if he
+did but look towards them; and he was seriously discomfited by
+the difficulty of obtaining a godfather for the combat.&nbsp; No
+one chose even to be asked, lest they might be suspected of
+approving of the murder of Prince Henry; and the unhappy page
+re-entered his tent with the most desolate sense of being
+abandoned by heaven and man.</p>
+<p>Fastened upon the pole of the tent by an arrowhead, a small
+scroll of parchment met his eyes.&nbsp; He read in
+English&mdash;&ldquo;A steed and a lance are ready for the
+lioncel who would rather avenge his father than lick the
+tyrant&rsquo;s feet.&nbsp; A guide awaits thee.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Some weeks since, this might have been a tempting summons; but
+now the sickening sense of the sacrilegious murder, and of the
+life of outlawry utterly unrestrained, passed over Richard.&nbsp;
+Yet, if he should not accept the offer, what was before
+him?&nbsp; A shameful death, perhaps; if he failed in the ordeal,
+disgrace, captivity, or expulsion; if he succeeded, bondage and
+distrust for ever.&nbsp; Some new accusation! some deeper
+fall!</p>
+<p>There was a low growl from Leonillo; the hangings of the tent
+were raised, and an archer bending his head said, &ldquo;A word
+with you, Sir.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Who art thou?&rdquo; demanded Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hob Longbow, Sir.&nbsp; Remember you not old
+passages&mdash;in the forest, there&mdash;and Master
+Adam?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard did remember the archer in the days of his outlaw
+life, in a very different capacity.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You were grown so tall, Sir, and so hand and glove with
+the Longshanks, that Nick Dustifoot and I knew not an if it were
+yourself&mdash;but now your name is out, and the wind is in
+another quarter&rdquo;&mdash;he grinned, then seeing Richard
+impatient of the approach to familiarity, &ldquo;You did not know
+Nick Dustifoot?&nbsp; He was one of young Sir Simon&rsquo;s
+men-at-arms, you see, and took to the woods, like other folk,
+after Kenilworth was given up, till stout men were awanting for
+this Crusade.&nbsp; And he knew Sir Guy when he came to the camp
+yon by Tunis, and spake with him; moreover, he went in the train
+of him of Almayne to Viterbo, and had speech again with Sir
+Simon, who gave him this scroll.&nbsp; And if you will meet him
+at the Syren&rsquo;s Rock to-night, my Lord Richard, he will
+bring you to those who will conduct you to Sir Guy&rsquo;s brave
+castle, where he laughs kings and counts to scorn!&nbsp; We have
+the guard, and will see you safe past the gates of the
+camp.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The way to liberty was open: Richard deliberated.&nbsp; The
+atmosphere of distrust and suspicion under the Prince&rsquo;s
+coldness was well-nigh unbearable.&nbsp; Danger faced him for the
+next day!&nbsp; Disgrace was everywhere.&nbsp; Should he leave it
+behind, where, at least, he would not hear and feel it?&nbsp;
+Should he, when all had turned from him, meet a brotherly
+welcome?</p>
+<p>Then came back on him the thought of what Simon and Guy had
+made themselves; the thought of his father&rsquo;s grief at
+former doings of theirs, which had fallen so far short of the
+atrocity of this.&nbsp; He knew that his father had rather have
+seen each one of his five sons slain, or helpless cripples like
+the firstborn, than have been thus avenged.&nbsp; Nay, had he
+this morning prayed for the pardon of a crime, to which he would
+thus become a consenting party?</p>
+<p>He looked up resolutely.&nbsp; &ldquo;No, Hob Longbow.&nbsp;
+Hap what hap, my part can never be with those who have stained
+the Church with blood.&nbsp; Let my brothers know that my heart
+yearned to them before, but now all is over between us.&nbsp; I
+can only bear the doom they have brought upon me!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>It was not possible to remain and argue.&nbsp; A tent was a
+dangerous place for secret conferences, and Hob Longbow could
+only growl, &ldquo;As you will, Sir.&nbsp; Now nor you nor any
+one else can say I have not done my charge.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alack, alack!&rdquo; sighed Richard, &ldquo;would that,
+my honour once redeemed, Hamlyn might make an end of me!&nbsp;
+But for thee, my poor Leonillo, I have no comforter or
+friend!&rdquo; and he flung his arms round the dog&rsquo;s
+neck.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER X<br />
+THE COMBAT</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;And now with sae sharp of steele<br />
+They &rsquo;gan to lay on load.&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><i>Sir Cauline</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">Heavy</span>-hearted and pale-cheeked with
+his rigidly observed fast, Richard armed himself in early
+morning, and set forth to the chapel tent, where the previous
+solemnities had to be observed.&nbsp; He had made up his mind to
+make an earnest appeal to the Earl of Gloucester, for the sake of
+the old friendship with his father, to become his godfather in
+the combat, as one whose character stood too high to be injured
+by connection with him.&nbsp; Even this plan was frustrated, for
+Hamlyn de Valence entered, led by Earl Gilbert as his
+sponsor.&nbsp; Should he turn to his one other friend, the Prince
+himself?&nbsp; Nay, the Prince was umpire and judge.&nbsp; Never
+stood warrior so lonely.&nbsp; Little John of Dunster crept up to
+his side; and but for fear of injuring the child, he would almost
+have asked him to be his sponsor.&nbsp; At that moment, however,
+the tramp of horses&rsquo; feet was heard, and Sir Reginald de
+Ferri&egrave;res, with his squires, galloped up to the tent.</p>
+<p>The young Hospitalier held out his hand cordially.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;In time, I hope,&rdquo; said he; &ldquo;I have ridden ever
+since Lauds at Castel San Giovanni, hoping to be with you, so as
+to stand by you in this matter.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It was kindly done of you,&rdquo; said Richard, tears
+of gratitude swelling in his eyes, as he wrung Sir
+Raynald&rsquo;s hand.&nbsp; &ldquo;I have not even a godfather
+for the fight!&nbsp; How could you know of my need?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Some of our brethren came over from the camp, for our
+Ash Wednesday procession, and spoke of the stress you were
+in&mdash;that your Montfort lineage was out, and that you were
+thought to have writ a letter&mdash;but stay, there&rsquo;s no
+time for words; methinks here&rsquo;s the Prince and all his
+train.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Sir Raynald went through the solemnity of presenting Richard
+de Montfort as about to fight in defence of his own
+innocence.&nbsp; The Prince coldly accepted the
+presentation.&nbsp; Richard knew that Sir Raynald was deemed
+anything but a satisfactory sponsor; but the young knight&rsquo;s
+hearty sympathy, a sort of radiance caught from good old Sir
+Robert, was too comforting not to be reposed on.</p>
+<p>Each champion then confessed.&nbsp; Raynald heard
+Richard&rsquo;s shrift, and nearly wept over it&mdash;it was the
+first the young priestly knight had received, and he could
+scarcely clear his voice to speak the words of absolution.&nbsp;
+Even as they left the confessional, he grasped Richard&rsquo;s
+hand and said, &ldquo;Cast in thy lot with us!&nbsp; St. John
+will find thee father and home and brethren!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And a gleam of joy and hope flashed on the youth&rsquo;s
+heart, and shone brighter as he participated in the solemn Mass
+in preparation for the combat.&nbsp; This over, each champion
+made oath of the justice of his quarrel in the hands of his
+godfather before the Prince: Hamlyn de Valence swearing that to
+the best of his belief, Richard de Montfort was a traitor, in
+league with his brothers, and art and part in the murder of
+Prince Henry of Almayne, and offering to prove it on his body;
+while on the other hand Richard swore that he was a true and
+faithful liegeman to the King, free from all intercourse with his
+brethren, and sackless of the death of Prince Henry.</p>
+<p>Then each mounted on horseback, the trumpets sounded, the
+sponsors led them to their places, and the Prince&rsquo;s clear
+voice exclaimed, &ldquo;And so God show the right.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+One glance of pitying sympathy would have filled Richard&rsquo;s
+arm with fresh vigour.</p>
+<p>The two youths closed with shivered lances, and horses reeling
+from the shock.&nbsp; Backing their steeds, each received a fresh
+lance.&nbsp; Again they met; Richard felt the point of
+Hamlyn&rsquo;s lance glint against his breastplate, glide down,
+enter, make its way into his flesh; but at the same instant his
+lance was pushing, driving, bearing on Hamlyn before him; the
+sheer force in his Plantagenet shoulders was telling now, the
+very pain seemed as it were to add to the energy with which he
+pressed on&mdash;on, till the hostile spear dropped from his own
+side, and Hamlyn was borne backwards over the croup of the
+staggering horse, till he fell with crashing ringing armour upon
+the ground.&nbsp; Little John clapped his hands, and shouted for
+joy; but no one responded.</p>
+<p>Richard leapt down in another second, and stood over
+him.&nbsp; &ldquo;Yield thee, Hamlyn de Valence.&nbsp; Confess
+that thou hast slandered me with an ungrounded
+accusation.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Hamlyn had no choice.&nbsp; &ldquo;Let me rise,&rdquo; he said
+sullenly; &ldquo;I will confess, so thou letst me open my
+visor.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And Richard standing aside, Hamlyn spoke out in a dogged
+formal tone.&nbsp; &ldquo;I hereby own, that by the judgment of
+Heaven, Richard de Montfort hath cleared himself of all share in
+the foul murder of Lord Henry, whose soul Heaven assoilzie.&nbsp;
+Also that he hath disproven the charge of leaguing with his
+brethren.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard was the victor, but where were the gratulations?&nbsp;
+Young John&rsquo;s hearty but slender hurrah was lost in the
+general silence.</p>
+<p>The Prince reared his stately form, and said, &ldquo;The
+judgment of Heaven is final.&nbsp; Richard de Montfort is
+pronounced free of all penalty for treason in the matter of the
+death of our dear cousin, and is free to go where he
+will.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Cold as ice was the Prince&rsquo;s face.&nbsp; That Richard
+meant murder to Henry, he had never believed; but that he had
+hankered after his brothers, and held dangerous communings with
+them, was evidently still credited and unforgiven.&nbsp; The very
+form of words was a dismissal&mdash;and the youth&rsquo;s heart
+was wrung.</p>
+<p>He stood, looking earnestly up as the Prince moved from his
+place, without a glance towards him.&nbsp; The next moment
+Raynald&rsquo;s kind hand was on his shoulder, and his voice
+saying, &ldquo;Well fought, brother, a brave stroke!&nbsp; Come
+with me, thou art hurt.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Would it were to the death!&rdquo; murmured Richard
+dreamily, as Raynald, throwing his arm round him, led him away;
+but before they had reached the tent there was a plunging rush
+and scampering behind them, and John of Dunster came dashing
+up.&nbsp; &ldquo;I knew it!&nbsp; I knew it!&rdquo; he
+cried.&nbsp; &ldquo;I knew he would overset spiteful
+Hamlyn!&nbsp; Hurrah!&nbsp; They can&rsquo;t keep me away now,
+Richard&mdash;now the judgment of Heaven has gone for
+you!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard smiled, and put his gauntleted hand caressingly on the
+boy&rsquo;s shoulder.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I was afraid,&rdquo; added John, &ldquo;that you would
+think me like the rest of them.&nbsp; Miscreants, all!&nbsp; Not
+one would shout for you&mdash;you, the victor!&nbsp; They
+don&rsquo;t heed the judgment of Heaven one jot.&nbsp; And
+that&rsquo;s what they call being warriors of the Cross!&nbsp; If
+the Prince were a true-born Englishman, he would be ashamed of
+himself.&nbsp; But never heed, Richard.&nbsp; Why don&rsquo;t you
+speak to me?&nbsp; Are you angered that I told of the
+letter?&nbsp; Indeed, I never guessed&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hush, varlet,&rdquo; said Sir Raynald, &ldquo;see you
+not that he has neither breath nor voice to speak?&nbsp; If you
+wish to do him a service, hie to our tents&mdash;down yonder, to
+the east, where you see the eight-pointed cross&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I know, Sir,&rdquo; said John, perfectly civil on
+hearing accents as English as his own.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And bring up Brother Bartlemy, he is a better
+infirmarer than I.&nbsp; Bid him from me bring his salves and
+bandages.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard was barely conscious when he reached the tent, as much
+from rigid fasting and sleeplessness as from the actual loss of
+blood.&nbsp; His friend disarmed him tenderly, and revived him
+with bread and wine, silencing a half-murmured scruple about
+Lenten diet with the dispensation due to sickness.&nbsp; The
+wound was not likely to be serious or disabling, and the cares of
+the Hospitalier and his infirmarer had presently set their
+patient so much at ease that he dropped into a sound sleep,
+having scarcely said a word, beyond a few faintly uttered thanks,
+since he had fought the combat.</p>
+<p>At first his sleep was profound, but by and by the
+associations of blows and wounds carried him back to the field of
+Evesham.&nbsp; The wild <i>m&ecirc;l&eacute;e</i> was renewed, he
+heard the voice of his father, but always in that strange
+distressing manner peculiar to dreams of the departed, always far
+away, and just beyond his reach, ever just about to give him the
+succour he needed, but ever withheld.&nbsp; The thunderstorm that
+broke over the contending armies roared again in his ears; and
+then again recurred the calm still night, when he had lain
+helpless on the battle-field; even the caress of Leonillo, and
+his low growl, were vividly repeated; but as the dog moved, it
+was to Richard as if the form of his father rose up in its armour
+from the dark field, and said in a deep hollow voice, &ldquo;Well
+fought, my son; I will give thee knighthood.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then
+Richard thought he was kneeling before his father, and hearing
+that same voice saying, &ldquo;My son, be true and loyal.&nbsp;
+In the name of God and St. James.&nbsp; I dub thee knight of
+death!&rdquo; and looking up, he beheld under the helmet, not
+Simon de Montfort&rsquo;s face but the Prince&rsquo;s.&nbsp; He
+awoke with a start of disappointment&mdash;and there stood Edward
+himself, leaning against the tent-pole, looking down at him!</p>
+<p>He sprang on his feet, scarcely knowing whether he slept or
+woke; but Edward said, in that voice that at times was so
+ineffably sweet, &ldquo;Be still, Richard; I fear me thou hast
+suffered a wrong, and I am come to repair it, as far as I
+can!&nbsp; Lay thee down again.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And the Prince seated himself on the oaken chest; while
+Richard, after a few words, sat down on his couch.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Is this the letter about which there has been such a
+coil?&rdquo; said Edward, giving him the scroll in its sepia
+ink.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It is!&rdquo; replied Richard in amazement and
+dismay.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The only letter thou didst write?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The only one,&rdquo; repeated Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And,&rdquo; added Edward, &ldquo;it concerns thy
+brother Henry.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard turned even paler than before, and could not suppress
+a gasp of dismay.&nbsp; &ldquo;My Lord, make me not
+forsworn!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Listen to me, Richard,&rdquo; said Edward.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;My sweet lady gave me no rest about thee.&nbsp; She held
+that I had withdrawn my trust over lightly, for what was no blame
+to thine heart; and that having set thee here apart from thy
+natural friends, we owed thee more notice than I have been wont
+to think wholesome for untried striplings.&nbsp; Others, and I
+among them, held that Raynald Ferrers&rsquo; friendship and
+countenance showed thee stubbornly set on old connections, and
+many thought the letter to the Grand Prior Darcy a mere
+excuse.&nbsp; But when Hamlyn fell, and I still held that thou
+wert merely cleared from wilful share in the deadly crime of
+which I had never held thee guilty, then she spake more
+earnestly.&nbsp; She of her own will sent for Raynald Ferrers to
+our tent, and called me to speak with him, sure that, even though
+his family had been our foes, he was too honourable a knight to
+have espoused thy cause without good reason.&nbsp; Then it was
+that he told us of thine interest for the blind beggar whose
+child thou didst save, and of the Grand Prior&rsquo;s
+message.&nbsp; Also, as full exculpation of thee, he gave me the
+letter, which, having failed to find a home-bound messenger at
+San Giovanni, he had brought back to the camp.&nbsp; And now,
+Richard, what can I say more, than that I did thee wrong, and
+pray thee to give me thy hand in pardon?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard hid his face and sobbed, completely overwhelmed by the
+simple dignity of the humility of such a man as Edward.&nbsp; He
+held the Prince&rsquo;s hand to his lips, and exclaimed,
+&ldquo;Oh, how&mdash;how could I have ever felt discontent, or
+faltered? not in truth&mdash;oh, no&mdash;but in trust and
+patience?&nbsp; Oh! my Lord, that I could die for you!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not yet,&rdquo; said Edward, smiling; &ldquo;we have
+much to do together first.&nbsp; And now tell me, Richard, this
+beggar is indeed Henry?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard hung his head.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What, thou mayst not betray him?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I am under an oath, my Lord.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, I know well-nigh all, Richard.&nbsp; I did indeed
+see my dear old comrade laid in Evesham Church, so as it broke my
+heart to see him, bleeding from many wounds, and even his hand
+lopped by the savage Mortimers.&nbsp; Then, as I bent down, and
+gave his brow a last kiss, it struck me, for a moment, that the
+touch was not that of a dead man&rsquo;s skin.&nbsp; But I looked
+again at the deadly wounds of head and breast, and thought it
+would be but cruelty to strive to bring back the glimmer of life
+only to&mdash;to see the ruin of his house; and all that he could
+not be saved from.&nbsp; O Richard, to no man in either host
+could the day of Evesham have been so sore, as to me, who had to
+sit in the gate, to gladden men&rsquo;s hearts, like holy King
+David, when he would fain have been weeping for his son!&nbsp;
+But in early morning came Abbot William of Whitchurch to my
+chamber, and with much secrecy told me that the corpse of Henry
+de Montfort had been stolen from the church by night, praying me
+to excuse that the monks, wearied out with the day of alarms, and
+the care of our wounded, had not kept better watch.&nbsp; Then
+knew I that some one had been less faithless than I, and I hoped
+that poor Henry was at least dying in peace; I had never deemed
+that he could survive.&nbsp; But when I saw thy billet, and heard
+Ferrers&rsquo; tale, I had no further doubt, remembering likewise
+how strangely familiar was the face of that little one at
+Westminster.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Yes, my Lord, it was even as a strange, wild, wilful,
+blind beggar that I found poor Henry; and heavy was the curse he
+laid me under, should I make him known to you.&nbsp; He calls
+himself thus a freer and happier man than he could be even were
+he pardoned and reinstated; and he can indulge his vein of
+mockery.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I dare be sworn that consoles him for all,&rdquo; said
+Edward, nearly laughing.&nbsp; &ldquo;So long as he could utter
+his gibe, Henry little recked which way the world passed round
+him; and I trow he has found some mate of low degree, that he
+would be loth to produce in open day.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not so, my Lord: it is so wild a tale of true love that
+I can sometimes scarce believe a minstrel did not sing it to
+me!&rdquo;&nbsp; And Richard told the history of Isabel
+Mortimer&rsquo;s fidelity.&nbsp; The Prince was deeply touched,
+and then remembered the marked manner in which the Baron of
+Mortimer had replied to his inquiry, in what convent he had
+bestowed Henry de Montfort&rsquo;s betrothed.&nbsp; &ldquo;She is
+dead, my Lord, dead to us.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then he added suddenly,
+&ldquo;So that black-eyed babe is the heiress of Leicester and
+all the honours of Montfort!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It is one of the causes for Henry&rsquo;s resolve to be
+secret,&rdquo; said Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;I thought it harsh and
+distrustful then, but he dreaded Simon&rsquo;s knowledge of
+her.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;We will find a way of securing her from Simon,&rdquo;
+said the Prince.&nbsp; &ldquo;But fear not, Richard,
+Henry&rsquo;s secret shall be safe with me!&nbsp; I have kept his
+secrets before now,&rdquo; he added, with a smile.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Only, when we are at home again&mdash;so it please the
+Saints to spare us&mdash;thou shalt strive to show him cause to
+trust my Lady with his child, if he doth not seek to breed her up
+to scrip and wallet.&nbsp; I see such is thy counsel in this
+scroll, and it is well.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How could I say other?&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;and
+now, more than ever!&nbsp; I long to thank the gracious Princess
+this very evening.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thy wound?&rsquo; said the Prince.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My wound is naught, I scarce feel it.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then,&rdquo; said the Prince, &ldquo;unless the leech
+gainsay it, it would be as well to be at our pavilion this
+evening, that men may see thou art not in any disgrace.&nbsp;
+Rest then till supper-time.&rdquo;&nbsp; And as he spoke he rose
+to depart, but Richard made a gesture of entreaty.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;So please your Grace, grant me a few farther words.&nbsp;
+I sware, and truly, that I had heard nothing from my brothers
+when I was accused of writing that letter to them.&nbsp; But see
+here, what yester-morn was pinned to that tent-pole.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>He gave Edward the scroll, at which the Prince looked half
+smiling.&nbsp; &ldquo;So!&nbsp; A dagger in store for me too, is
+there?&nbsp; Well, my cousins have a goodly thirst for
+vengeance!&nbsp; Hast thou any suspicion how this billet came
+here?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, my Lord; and for that cause I would warn you
+against two of the archers, one of whom was in Simon&rsquo;s
+troop, and went with the late prince to Viterbo.&nbsp; I gave
+them no promise of silence.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You spoke with them?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;With one, who was charged to let me through the
+outposts to a spot where means were provided for bringing me to
+Guy.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And thou,&rdquo; said Edward, smiling, &ldquo;didst
+choose to bide the buffet?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;I did indeed long
+after my brethren when Guy had been so near me in Africa; but
+now, I would far rather die than cast in my lot with
+them.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou art wise,&rdquo; said Edward; &ldquo;not merely
+right, but wise.&nbsp; I have sent Gloucester to my uncle of
+Sicily with such messages that he will scarce dare to leave them
+scatheless!&nbsp; Then, at supper-time we meet again&mdash;in
+thine own name, Richard, and as my kinsman and esquire.&nbsp;
+Thou shalt bear thine own name and arms.&nbsp; I will cause a
+mourning suit to be sent to thee&mdash;thou art equally of kin
+with myself to poor Henry&mdash;and shalt mourn him with Edmund
+and me at the requiem to-morrow.&nbsp; So will it best be
+manifest to the camp, that we exempt thee from all
+blame.&rdquo;&nbsp; Again he was departing, when Richard
+added&mdash;&ldquo;The archers, my Lord&mdash;were it not good to
+dismiss them?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Tush,&rdquo; said Edward; &ldquo;tell me not their
+names.&nbsp; So soon as the wind veers, they will be beyond
+Guy&rsquo;s reach; and if I were to stand on my guard against
+every man who loved thy father better than mine, what good would
+my life do me?&nbsp; The poor knaves will be true enough when
+they see a Saracen before them!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And away went Edward, to be glanced at as he passed through
+the camp, as a severe, hard, cruel tyrant.&nbsp; Had he only been
+gay, open-hearted, and careless, he might have hung both the
+guilty archers, and a dozen innocent ones into the bargain, and
+yet have never won the character for harshness and unmercifulness
+that he had acquired even while condoning many a dire offence,
+simply from his stern gravity, and his punctilious exactitude in
+matters of discipline.&nbsp; But the evils of a lax and
+easy-going court had been so fatal, and had produced such
+suffering, that it was no marvel that he had adopted a rule of
+iron; and in the pain and distress of seeing his closest friends,
+the noblest subjects in the realm, pushed into a rebellion where
+he had himself to maintain his father&rsquo;s cause, and then to
+watch, without being able to hinder, the mean-spirited revenge of
+his own partizans, his manner had acquired that silent reserve
+and coldness which made him feared and hated by the many, while
+intensely beloved by the few.&nbsp; Even towards those few it was
+absolutely difficult to him to unbend, as he had done in this
+hour of effusion towards Richard; and the youth was
+proportionably moved and agitated with fervent gratitude and
+affection.</p>
+<p>He had scarcely had so happy an evening since he had been a
+boy at Odiham.&nbsp; He was indeed feeble and dizzy at times, but
+with a far from painful languor; and the Princess, enjoying the
+permission to follow the dictates of her own heart, was kind to
+him with a motherly or sisterly kindness, could not bear to
+receive from him his wonted attendance, but made him lie upon the
+cushions at her feet, and when out of hearing of every one,
+talked of the faithful Isabel, and of &ldquo;pretty
+Bessee,&rdquo; on whom she already looked as the companion of her
+little Eleanor, whom she had left at home.</p>
+<p>It might be questioned whether Richard did not undergo more in
+watching little John de Mohun&rsquo;s endeavours at waiting than
+he would have suffered from doing it himself.&nbsp; And not a few
+dissatisfied glances were levelled at the favoured stripling,
+besides the literally as well as figuratively sour glances of
+Dame Idonea.</p>
+<p>Edward, being of course unable to betray his real grounds for
+acquitting Richard, had only deigned to inform Prince Edmund that
+he knew all, and was perfectly satisfied.&nbsp; Now Prince
+Edmund, as well as all the old court faction, deemed
+Edward&rsquo;s regard for the Barons&rsquo; party an unreasonable
+weakness that they durst not indeed combat openly, but which
+angered them as a species of disaffection to his own cause.&nbsp;
+The outer world thought him a tyrant, but there was an inner
+world to whom he appeared weakly good-natured and generous; and
+this inner world thought Richard had successfully hoodwinked
+him!</p>
+<p>Therefore Edmund of Lancaster desired to adopt Hamlyn de
+Valence as his own squire, to save him from association with
+Richard; and both prince and squire, and all the rest of the
+train, made it perfectly evident to the young Montfort that he
+was barely tolerated out of respect for the Prince.</p>
+<p>But Richard in his joy could have borne worse than this, for
+the Prince had not relaxed in his kindness, and made his young
+cousin&rsquo;s wound an excuse for showing him more tenderness
+and consideration than he would otherwise have thought
+befitting.&nbsp; Moreover, an esquire, as Richard had now become,
+might be in much closer relations of intimacy with his master
+than was possible to a page; and the day that had begun so sadly
+was like the dawn of a brighter period.</p>
+<p>Sir Raynald Ferrers had been invited to the Prince&rsquo;s
+pavilion, but the rules of his Order did not permit his joining a
+secular entertainment in Lent, and he did not admit either the
+camp life or the gravity of the Prince&rsquo;s mourning household
+as a dispensation.&nbsp; However, when Richard, leaning fondly on
+little John&rsquo;s ready shoulder, crossed to his own tent, he
+found his good friend waiting there to attend to his wound, which
+Sir Raynald professed to regard as an excellent subject to
+practise upon, and likewise to hear whether all had been cleared
+up, and had gone right with him.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Though,&rdquo; he said, &ldquo;I could not doubt of it
+when that fair and lovely Princess had taken your matters in
+hand.&nbsp; Tell me, Richard, have you secular men many such
+dames as that abroad in the world?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not many such as she,&rdquo; said Richard, smiling.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well, I have not spoken to a female thing, save perhaps
+pretty Bessee, since I went into the Spital, ten years ago; and
+verily the sound of the lady&rsquo;s voice was to me as if St.
+Margaret had begun talking to me!&nbsp; And so wise and clear of
+wit too.&nbsp; I thought women were feather-pated wilful beings,
+from whom there was no choice but to shut oneself up!&nbsp; I
+trow, that now all is well with thee, thou wilt scarce turn a
+thought again towards our brotherhood, where to glance at such a
+being becomes a sin.&rdquo;&nbsp; And Raynald crossed himself,
+with an effort to recall his wonted asceticism.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ladies&rsquo; love is not like to be mine,&rdquo; said
+Richard, laughing, as one not yet awake to the force of the
+motive.&nbsp; &ldquo;No!&nbsp; Gladly would I be one of your
+noble brotherhood, where alone have I met with
+kindness&mdash;but, Sir Raynald, my first duty under Heaven must
+be to redeem my father&rsquo;s name, by my service to the
+Prince.&nbsp; My brothers think they uphold it by deadly
+revenge.&nbsp; I want to show what a true Montfort can be with
+such a master as my father never had!&nbsp; And, Raynald, I
+cannot but fear that further schemes of vengeance may be
+afloat.&nbsp; The Prince is too fearless to take heed to himself,
+and who is so bound to watch for him as I?&rdquo;</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XI<br />
+THE VIEW FROM CARMEL</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;On her who knew that love can conquer
+death;<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp; Who, kneeling with one arm about her king,<br />
+Drew forth the poison with her balmy breath,<br />
+&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp;&nbsp; Sweet as new buds in
+spring.&rdquo;&mdash;<span class="smcap">Tennyson</span>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>A <span class="smcap">year</span> had elapsed since the
+crusaders had landed in Palestine; Nazareth had been taken, and
+the Christian host were encamped upon the plain before Acre,
+according to their Prince&rsquo;s constant habit of preferring to
+keep his troops in the open field, rather than to expose them to
+the temptations of the city&mdash;which was, alas! in a state
+most unworthy of the last stronghold of Latin Christianity in the
+Holy Land.</p>
+<p>It was on a scorching June day, Whitsun Tuesday, in the
+exquisite beauty of an early summer in the mountains of the
+Levant&mdash;when &ldquo;the flowers appear on the earth, the
+time of the singing of birds is come, and the voice of the turtle
+is heard in our land; the fig tree putteth forth her green figs,
+and the vines with the tender grape give a good
+smell,&rdquo;&mdash;that Richard de Montfort was descending the
+wooded sides of Mount Carmel.</p>
+<p>Anxious tidings had of late come from England respecting the
+health of the little Prince John; and Princess Eleanor was
+desirous of offering gifts and obtaining prayers on his behalf,
+on the part of the good Fathers of the convent associated with
+the memory of the great Prophet who had raised the dead child to
+life.&nbsp; She herself, however, was at the time unfit for a
+mountain ride; and Prince Edward, who was a lay brother of the
+Carmelite order, and had fully intended himself to go and offer
+his devotions for his child, was so unwell on that day, from the
+feverish heat of the summer, that he could not expose himself to
+the sun; and Richard was therefore despatched on the part of the
+royal pair.&nbsp; He had ascended in the cool of the morning,
+setting forth before sunrise, and attending the regular
+Mass.&nbsp; The good Fathers would fain have detained him till
+the heat of the day should be past; but his anxiety not to
+overpass in the slightest degree the time fixed by the Prince,
+made him resolved on setting out so soon as his errand was
+sped.</p>
+<p>Unspeakably beautiful was his ride&mdash;through rocky dells
+filled with copsewood, among which jessamine, lilies, and
+exquisite flowers were peeping up, and the coney, the fawn, and
+other animals, made Leonillo prick his ears and wistfully seek
+from his master&rsquo;s eye permission to dash off in
+pursuit.&nbsp; Or the &ldquo;oaks of Carmel,&rdquo; with many a
+dark-leaved evergreen, towered in impenetrable thicket, and at an
+opening glade might be beheld on the north-east, &ldquo;that
+goodly mountain Lebanon&rdquo; rising in a thick clothing of
+wood; and beyond, in sharp cool softness, the white cone of
+rain-distilling Hermon.&nbsp; Far to the west lay the glorious
+glittering sheet of the Mediterranean; but nearer, almost beneath
+his feet, was the curving bay and harbour of Ptolemais, filled
+with white sails, the white city of Acre full of fortresses and
+towers; while on the plain beside it, green with verdure as
+Richard&rsquo;s own home greenwood of Odiham, lay the white tents
+of the Christian army, in so clear an atmosphere that he could
+see the flash of the weapons of the men on guard, and almost
+distinguish the blazonry of the banners.</p>
+<p>Richard dismounted to gather some roses and jessamine for the
+Princess, and to collect some of the curious fossil echini, which
+he believed to be olives turned to stone by the Prophet Elijah,
+as a punishment to a churlish peasant who refused him a
+meal.&nbsp; He thought that such treasures would be a welcome
+addition to the store he was accumulating for the good old Grand
+Prior.&nbsp; He gave his horse to Hob Longbow, his only attendant
+except a young Sicilian lad.&nbsp; This same Longbow had stuck to
+him with a pertinacity that he could not shake off, and in truth
+had hitherto justified the Prince&rsquo;s prediction that he
+would be a brave and faithful fellow when his allegiance was no
+further disturbed by the proximity of the outlawed
+Montforts.&nbsp; There had been nothing to lead Richard to think
+he ought to indicate either him or Nick Dustifoot to the Prince
+as the persons who had been connected with Guy in Italy.</p>
+<p>Presently Leonillo bounded forward, and Richard became aware
+of the figure of a man in light armour standing partly hidden
+among the brushwood, but looking down intently into the Christian
+camp.&nbsp; The dog leapt up, fawning on the stranger with
+demonstrations of rapture; and he, turning in haste, stood face
+to face with Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Here!&rdquo; was his exclamation, and a grasp was
+instantly laid upon his sword.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Simon!&rdquo; burst from Richard&rsquo;s lips at the
+same moment, &ldquo;dost not know me?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou, boy?&rdquo; and the hold was relaxed.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;What lucky familiar sent thee hither?&nbsp;
+What&mdash;thou art grown such a huge fellow that I had well-nigh
+struck thee down for Longshanks himself, had it not been for thy
+voice.&nbsp; Thou hast his very bearing.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Simon!&rdquo; again repeated Richard, in his extremity
+of amazement.&nbsp; &ldquo;What dost thou?&nbsp; How camest thou
+here?&nbsp; Whence&mdash;?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That thou shalt soon see,&rdquo; said Simon.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;A right free and merry home and company have we up
+yonder,&rdquo;&mdash;and he pointed towards Mount Lebanon.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou and Guy?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, no; Guy turned craven.&nbsp; Could not endure our
+wanderings in the marshes and hills, pined for his wife forsooth,
+fell sick, and must needs go and give himself up to the Pope; so
+he sings the penitential psalms night and day.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And we heard thou wast dead at Siena.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou hearest many a false tale,&rdquo; said
+Simon.&nbsp; &ldquo;Of my death thou shalt judge, if thou wilt
+turn thy horse and ride with me to our hill-fort of Ain Gebel, in
+Galilee.&nbsp; They say &rsquo;tis the very one which King David
+or King Herod, whichever it was, could only take by letting down
+his men-at-arms in boxes!&nbsp; I should like to see the boxes
+that we could not send skimming down the abyss!&nbsp; And a
+wondrous place they have left us&mdash;vaults as cool as a
+convent wine-cellar, fountains out of the rock, marble
+columns.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But, brother, for whom do you hold it?&nbsp; For the
+King of Cyprus or&mdash;?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;For myself, boy!&nbsp; For King Simon, an it like you
+better!&nbsp; None can touch me or my merry band there, and a
+goodly company we are&mdash;pilgrims grown wiser, and runaway
+captives, and Druses, and bold Arabs too: and the choicest of
+many a heretic Armenian merchants&rsquo; caravan is ours, and of
+many a Saracen village; corn and wine, fair dames, and Damascus
+blades, and Arab steeds.&nbsp; Nothing has been wanting to me but
+thee and vengeance, and both are, I hope, on the way!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not I, certainly!&rdquo; said Richard, shrinking back
+in horror: &ldquo;I&mdash;a sworn crusader!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Tush, what are we but crusaders too, boy?&nbsp;
+&rsquo;Tis all service against the Moslem!&nbsp; Thy patron saint
+sent thee to me to-day from special care for thy
+safety.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How so!&rdquo; exclaimed Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;If peril
+threaten my Lord, I must be with him at once.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Much hast thou gained by hanging on upon him,&rdquo;
+said Simon scornfully, glancing at Richard&rsquo;s heels;
+&ldquo;not so much as a pair of gilt spurs!&nbsp; Creeping after
+him like a hound, thou hast not even the bones!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I have all I seek,&rdquo; said Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+have his brotherly kindness.&nbsp; I have the opportunity of
+redeeming my name.&nbsp; Nay, I should even regret any honour
+that took me from the services I now perform.&nbsp; Simon, didst
+thou but know his love for our father!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Silence, base caitiff!&rdquo; thundered Simon; &ldquo;I
+know his deeds, and that is enough for me!&nbsp; Look here,
+mean-spirited as thou wert to be taken with his hypocrisy, I have
+pity on thee yet.&nbsp; I would spare thee what awaits thee in
+the camp!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;For heaven&rsquo;s sake, Simon, dost know of any attack
+of the Emir?&nbsp; The Princess must at once be conveyed into the
+town!&nbsp; As thou art a man, a Christian, speak
+plainly!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Foolish lad, the infidels are quiet enough!&nbsp; No
+peril threatens the camp!&nbsp; Only if thou wilt run thy head
+into it, thou art like to find it too hot to hold
+thee!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I am afraid of no accusations,&rdquo; said Richard;
+&ldquo;my Lord knows and trusts me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Simon laughed a loud ringing scornful laugh.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Wilful will to water,&rdquo; he said.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Well, thou besotted lad, if it be not too late when thou
+getst into the hands of Crookbacked Edmund and Red Gilbert,
+remember the way to Galilee, that is all!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I tell thee, Simon,&rdquo; said Richard, turning round
+and fully facing him; &ldquo;I would rather perish an innocent
+man by the hands of the Provost Marshal, than darken my soul with
+thy counsels of blood.&nbsp; O Simon!&nbsp; What thy purpose may
+be I know not; but canst thou deem it faithfulness to our father,
+saint as he was, to live this dark wild life, so utterly
+abhorrent to him?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Let those look to that who slew him, and made me such
+as I am,&rdquo; returned Simon, turning from him, and gazing
+steadfastly down into the camp.&nbsp; Suddenly a gleam of fierce
+exultation lighted up his face, and again facing Richard he
+exclaimed, &ldquo;Yes, go home, tame cringing spaniel, and see
+whether a Montfort is still in favour below there!&nbsp; See if
+proud Edward is still ready to meet thy fawning with his scornful
+patronage!&nbsp; See if the honour of a murdered father has not
+been left in better hands than thine!&nbsp; And when thou hast
+had thy lesson, find the way to Ain Gebel, or ask Nick
+Dustifoot.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard, with a startled exclamation, looked down, but could
+discern nothing unusual in the camp.&nbsp; The royal banner hung
+in heavy folds over the Prince&rsquo;s pavilions, and all was
+evidently still in the same noontide repose, or rather
+exhaustion, to which the Syrian sun reduced even the hardy active
+Englishmen.&nbsp; &ldquo;What mean you?&rdquo; he began; but
+Simon was no longer beside him.&nbsp; He called, but echo alone
+answered; and all he could do was to throw himself on his horse,
+and hurry down the mountain side, with a vague presentiment of
+evil, and a burning desire to warn his lord or share his
+peril.</p>
+<p>He understood Simon&rsquo;s position.&nbsp; Many of the almost
+inaccessible rocks, where the sons of Anak had built their
+Cyclopean fortresses, and which had been abodes of almost
+fabulous beauty and strength in the Herodian days, had been
+resorted to again by the crusaders, and had served as isolated
+strongholds whence to annoy the enemy.&nbsp; Frightfully lawless
+had, in too many instances, been the life there led, more
+especially by the Levant-born sons of Europeans; and in the
+universal disorganization of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, that took
+place in consequence of the disputed rights of Cyprus and
+Hohenstaufen, most of them had become free from all
+control.&nbsp; If the garrisons bore the Christian name at all,
+it chiefly was as an excuse for preying on all around; but too
+often they were renegades of every variety of nation, drawn
+together by the vilest passions, commanded by some reckless
+adventurer, and paying a species of allegiance to any power that
+either endangered them, or afforded them the hopes of
+plunder.&nbsp; Bloodthirsty and voluptuous alike, they were
+viewed with equal terror by the Frank pilgrim, the Syriac
+villager, the Armenian merchant, and the Saracen
+hadji&mdash;whose ransom and whose spoil enriched their chambers,
+with all that the licentious tastes of East and West united could
+desire.&nbsp; There were comparatively few of these nests of
+iniquity in these latter days of the Crusades, but some still
+survived; and Richard had seen some of their captains with their
+followers at the siege of Nazareth, where the atrocities they had
+committed had been such as to make the English army stand
+aghast.&nbsp; As a member of such a crew, Simon could hardly fail
+to find means of attempting that revenge on which it was but too
+evident that he was still bent; and Richard, as every possible
+risk rose before him, urged his horse to perilous speed down the
+steep descent, and chid every obstacle, though in fact the
+descent which ordinarily occupied two hours, for men who cared
+for their own necks, was effected by him in a quarter of the
+time.&nbsp; He came to the entrenched camp.&nbsp; The entrance,
+where the Prince made so strict a point of keeping a sentinel,
+was completely unguarded.&nbsp; The foremost tents were empty,
+but there was a sound as of the murmuring voices of numbers
+towards the centre of the camp.&nbsp; The next moment he met
+Hamlyn de Valence riding quickly, and followed by two
+attendants.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hamlyn! a moment!&rdquo; he gasped.&nbsp; &ldquo;Has
+aught befallen the Prince?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You were aware of it, then!&rdquo; said Hamlyn,
+checking his horse, and looking him full in the face.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Answer me, for Heaven&rsquo;s sake!&nbsp; Is all well
+with the Princes?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;As well as your house desires&mdash;or it may be
+somewhat better,&rdquo; said Hamlyn; &ldquo;but let me
+pass.&nbsp; I am on an errand of life or death.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>So saying, Hamlyn dashed forwards; and Richard, in double
+alarm, made his way to the space in the centre of the camp, where
+he found himself on the outskirts of a crowd, talking in the
+various tongues of English, French, and Lingua Franca.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;He lives&mdash;the good Princess&mdash;the dogs of
+infidels&mdash;poison&mdash;&rdquo; were the words he
+caught.&nbsp; He flung himself from his horse, and was about to
+interrogate the nearest man, when John of Dunster came hurrying
+towards him from the tents, and threw himself upon him, sobbing
+with agitation and dismay.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What is it?&nbsp; Speak, John!&nbsp; The
+Prince!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh, if you had but been there!&nbsp; It will not cease
+bleeding.&nbsp; O Richard, he looks worse than my father when he
+came home!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Let me hear!&nbsp; Where?&nbsp; How is he
+hurt?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;In the arm and brow,&rdquo; said the boy.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The arm!&rdquo; said Richard, much relieved.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ah, but they say the dagger is poisoned!&nbsp; Stay,
+Richard, I&rsquo;ll tell you all.&nbsp; Dame Idonea turned me out
+of the tent, and she will not let any one in.&nbsp; It was
+thus&mdash;even now the Prince was lying on the day-bed in his
+own outer tent, no one else there save myself.&nbsp; I believe
+everybody was asleep, I know I was&mdash;when Nick Dustifoot
+called me, and bade me tell the Prince there was a messenger from
+the Emir of Joppa, asking to see him.&nbsp; So the Prince roused
+himself up, and bade him come in.&nbsp; He was one of those
+quick-eyed Moorish-looking infidels, in the big turbans and great
+goat&rsquo;s hair cloaks; and he went down on his knees, and hit
+the ground with his forehead, and said Salam
+aleikum&mdash;traitor that he was&mdash;and gave the Prince a
+letter.&nbsp; Well, the Prince muttered something about his head
+aching so sorely that he could scarce see the writing, and had
+just put up his hand to shade his eyes from the light, when the
+dog was out with a dagger and fell on him!&nbsp; The
+Prince&rsquo;s arm being raised, caught the stroke, you see; and
+that moment his foot was up,&rdquo; said John, acting the kick,
+&ldquo;and down went the rogue upon his back!&nbsp; And I&mdash;I
+threw myself right down over him!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Did you, my brave little fellow?&nbsp; Well done of
+you!&rdquo; cried Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And the Prince wrested the dagger out of the
+rogue&rsquo;s hand, only he tore his own forehead sorely, as the
+point flew up with the shock&mdash;and then stabbed the villain
+to the heart&mdash;see how the blood rushed over me!&nbsp; Then
+the Prince pulled me up, and called me a brave lad, and set me on
+my feet, and asked me if I were sure I was not hurt.&nbsp; And by
+that time the archers were coming in, when all was over; and Long
+Robin must needs snatch up a joint stool and have a stroke at the
+Moor&rsquo;s head.&nbsp; I trow the Prince was wrath with the
+cowardly clown for striking a dead man.&nbsp; He said I alone had
+been any aid!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;&lsquo;Well?&rdquo; anxiously asked Richard, gathering
+intense alarm as he saw that the boy&rsquo;s trouble still
+exceeded his elation, even at such commendation as this.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But then,&rdquo; said John sadly, &ldquo;even while he
+called it nothing, there came a dizziness over him.&nbsp; And
+even then the Princess had heard the outcry, and came in haste
+with Dame Idonea.&nbsp; And so soon as the Dame had picked up the
+dagger and looked well at it, and smelt it, she said there was
+poison on it.&nbsp; No sooner did the Princess hear that, than,
+without one word, she put her lips to his arm to suck forth the
+venom.&nbsp; He was for withholding her, but the Dame said that
+was the only safeguard for his life; and she looked&mdash;oh, so
+imploring!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Blessings on the sweet Princess and true wife!&rdquo;
+cried the men-at-arms, great numbers of whom had gathered round
+the little eye-witness to hear his account.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And so is he saved?&rdquo; said Richard, with a long
+breath.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ah! but,&rdquo; said John, his eyes beginning to fill
+with tears, &ldquo;there is the Grand Master of the Templars come
+now, and he says that to suck the poison is of no avail; and that
+nothing will save him but cutting away the living flesh as I
+would carve the wing of a bustard; and Dame Idonea says that is
+just the way King C&oelig;ur de Lion died, and the Princess is
+weeping, and the wound will not stop bleeding; and Hamlyn is gone
+to Acre for a surgeon, and they are all wrangling, and Dame
+Idonea boxed my ears at last, and said I was gaping
+there.&rdquo;&nbsp; The boy absolutely burst into sobs and tears,
+and at the same moment a growl arose among the archers, of
+&ldquo;Curses on the Moslem hounds!&nbsp; Not one shall
+escape!&nbsp; Death to every captive in our hands!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, nay,&rdquo; exclaimed Richard, looking up in
+horror; &ldquo;the poor captives are utterly guiltless!&nbsp; Far
+more justly make me suffer,&rdquo; murmured he sadly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;All tarred with the same stick,&rdquo; said the
+nearest; &ldquo;serve them as they deserve.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Think,&rdquo; added Richard, &ldquo;if the Prince would
+see no dishonour done to the dead carcase of the murderer
+himself, would he be willing to have ill worked on living men,
+sackless of the wrong?&nbsp; English turning butchers&mdash;that
+were fit work for Paynims.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, no, not one shall live to laugh at our
+Edward&rsquo;s fall,&rdquo; burst out the men; and a voice among
+them added, &ldquo;Sure the young squire seems to know a vast
+deal about the guilty and the guiltless&mdash;the Montfort!&nbsp;
+Ay!&nbsp; Away with all foes to our Edward&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Best withdraw yourself, Sir,&rdquo; said Hob Longbow;
+&ldquo;their blood is up.&nbsp; Baulk them of their prey, and
+they will set on you next.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard just then beheld a person from whose interposition he
+had much greater hopes, namely the Earl of Gloucester, who,
+though still a young man, was the chief English noble in the
+camp, and whose special charge the Saracen captives were.&nbsp;
+He hurried towards him, and asked tidings of the Prince.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ill tidings, I trow,&rdquo; said the Earl,
+bitterly.&nbsp; &ldquo;Ay, Richard de Montfort, you had best take
+heed to yourself, he was your best friend; and a sore lookout it
+is for us all.&nbsp; Between the old dotard his father and the
+poor babes his children, England is in woeful plight.&nbsp; Would
+that your father&rsquo;s wits were among us still!&nbsp;
+There&rsquo;s some curse on this fools&rsquo; errand of a
+Crusade, for here is the sixth prince it hath slain, and well if
+we lose not our Princess too.&nbsp; But what is all this
+uproar!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The men-at-arms, my Lord,&rdquo; said Richard,
+&ldquo;fierce to visit the crime on the captives.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A good riddance!&rdquo; said Earl Gilbert; &ldquo;the
+miscreants eat as much as ten score yeomen, and my knaves are
+weary with guarding them.&nbsp; If this matter brings all the
+pagans in Palestine on our hands, we shall have enough to do
+without looking after this nest of heathens.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But would the Prince have it so?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I fear me the Prince is like to have little will in the
+matter!&nbsp; No, no, I&rsquo;m not the man to order a butchery,
+but if the honest fellows must needs shed blood for blood,
+I&rsquo;m not going to meddle between them and the heathen
+wolves.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Assuredly nothing was to be done with the Red de Clare, and
+Richard pushed on, with throbbing dismayed heart, to the tent,
+dreading to behold the condition of him whom he best loved and
+honoured on earth.&nbsp; The tent was crowded, but
+Richard&rsquo;s unusual height enabled him to see, over the heads
+of those nearest, that Edward was sitting on the edge of his
+couch, his wife and Dame Idonea endeavouring to check the flow of
+blood from his wound.&nbsp; The elbow of his other arm was on his
+knee, and his head on his hand, but the opening of the curtain
+let in the light; he looked up, and Richard saw how deathly white
+his face had become, and the streaks of blood from the scratch
+upon his brow.&nbsp; He greeted Richard, however, with the look
+of recognition to which his young squire had now become
+used&mdash;not exactly a smile, but a well-satisfied welcome; and
+though he spoke low and feebly to his brother who stood near him,
+Richard caught the words with a thrill of emotion.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Let him near me, Edmund.&nbsp; He hath a ready hand,
+and may aid thee, sweet wife.&nbsp; Thou art wearying
+thyself.&rdquo;&nbsp; Then, as Richard approached, &ldquo;Thou
+hast sped well!&nbsp; I looked not for thee so soon.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alack, my Lord!&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;I hurried
+on to warn you.&nbsp; Ah! would I had been in time!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thy little pupil, John, did all man could do,&rdquo;
+said Edward, languidly smiling.&nbsp; &ldquo;But what&mdash;hast
+aught in charge to say to me?&nbsp; Be brief, for I am strangely
+dizzy.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My Lord,&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;the archers and
+men-at-arms are furiously wrath with the Saracens.&nbsp; They
+would wreak their vengeance on the prisoners, who at least are
+guiltless!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The knaves!&rdquo; exclaimed Edward promptly.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Why looks not Gloucester to this?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My Lord, the Earl saith that he would not command the
+slaughter, but that he will not forbid it.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Saints and angels!&rdquo; burst forth the Prince, and
+to the amazement of all, he started at once on his feet, and
+striding through the bystanders to the opening of the tent, he
+looked out on the crowd, who were already rushing towards the
+inclosure where their victims were penned.&nbsp; Raising his
+mighty voice as in a battle-day, he called aloud to them to halt,
+turn back, and hear him.&nbsp; They turned, and beheld the lofty
+form in the entrance of the tent, wrapped in a long loose robe,
+which, as well as his hair, was profusely stained with blood, his
+wan face, however, making that marble dignity and sternness of
+his even more awful and majestic as he spoke aloud.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;So, men, you would have me go down to my grave
+blood-stained and accursed by the death of guiltless
+captives?&nbsp; And I pray you, what is to be the lot of our
+countrymen, now on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, if you thus deal with
+our prisoners, taken in war?&nbsp; Senseless bloody-minded hounds
+that ye are, mark my words.&nbsp; The life of one of you for the
+life of a Saracen captive; and should I die, I lay my curse on ye
+all, if every man of them be not set free the hour my last breath
+is drawn.&nbsp; Do you hear me, ye cravens?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Unsparing, unconciliatory as ever, even when most merciful and
+generous, Edward turned, but reeled as he re-entered the tent,
+and his dizziness recurring, needed the support of both his
+brother and Richard to lay him down on the couch.</p>
+<p>The Grand Master of the Temple renewed his assurance that this
+was a token of the poison, and Eleanor was unheeded when she
+declared that her dear lord had been affected in the same manner
+before his wound, ever since indeed the Whit Sunday when he had
+ridden home from the great Church of St. John of Acre in the full
+heat of the sun.</p>
+<p>Dame Idonea was muttering the medi&aelig;val equivalent for
+fiddlesticks, as plain as her respect for the Temple would allow
+her.</p>
+<p>At that moment the leech whom Hamlyn had been sent into the
+town to summon, made his appearance, and fully confirmed the
+Templar&rsquo;s opinion.&nbsp; Neither the wizened Greek
+physician, nor the dignified Templar, considered the soft but
+piteous assurance of the wife that the venom had at once been
+removed by her own lips as more than mere feminine folly, and
+Dame Idonea&rsquo;s real experience of knights thus saved, and on
+the other hand of the fatal consequences of rude surgery in such
+a climate, were disregarded as an old woman&rsquo;s babble.&nbsp;
+Her voice waxed shrill and angry, and her antagonists&rsquo;
+replies in Lingua Franca, mixed with Arabic, Latin, and Greek,
+rang through the tent, till the Prince could bear it no
+longer.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Peace,&rdquo; he said, with an asperity unlike his
+usual stern patience, &ldquo;I had liefer brook your knives than
+your tongues!&nbsp; Without further jangling, tell me clearly,
+learned physician, the peril of either submitting or not
+submitting to your steel.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The Greek told, with as little tergiversation as was in his
+nature, that he viewed a refusal as certain death, but several
+times Dame Idonea was bursting out upon him, and Edward had to
+hold up his finger to silence her.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Now, kind lady,&rdquo; quoth he, &ldquo;let me hear the
+worst you foretell for me from your experience.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Dame Idonea did not spare him either the fate of C&oelig;ur de
+Lion, the dangers of fever and pain, and above all &ldquo;of that
+strange enchantment that binds the teeth together and forbids a
+man to swallow his food.&rdquo;&nbsp; Poor Eleanor looked at him
+imploringly all the time, but as none of them had ever heard of
+the circulation of the blood, they could not tell that her simple
+remedy had been truly efficacious, and that if it had been
+otherwise the incisions would now come too late.&nbsp; Thus the
+balance of prudence made itself appear to be on the side of the
+physician, and for him the Prince decided.&nbsp; &ldquo;Mi
+Do&ntilde;a,&rdquo; he said, ever his most caressing term for
+her, &ldquo;it must be so!&nbsp; I think not lightly of what thou
+hast done for me, but, as matters stand, too much hangs upon this
+life of mine for me not to be bound to run no needless risk for
+fear of a little pain.&nbsp; If I live and speak now, next to
+highest Heaven it is owing to thee; and when we came on this holy
+war, sweet Eleanor, didst thou not promise to hinder me from
+naught that a true warrior of the Cross ought to undergo?&nbsp;
+And is this the land to shrink from the Cross?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Alas! to Eleanor the pang was the belief in the uselessness of
+his suffering and danger.&nbsp; She never withstood his will, but
+physically she was weak, and her weeping was piteous in its
+silence.&nbsp; Edward bade his brother lead her away; and Edmund,
+after the usual fashion, vented his own perplexity and distress
+upon the most submissive person in his way.&nbsp; He assumed more
+resistance on the part of his gentle sister-in-law than she made,
+and carrying her from the tent, roughly told her, silent as she
+was, that it was better that she should scream and cry than all
+England wail and lament.</p>
+<p>And so Eleanor&rsquo;s devoted deed, the true saving of her
+husband, has lived on as a mere delusive tradition, weakly
+credited by the romantic, while the credit of his recovery has
+been retained by the Knight-Templars&rsquo; leech.&nbsp; Not a
+sound was uttered by the Prince while under those hands; but when
+his wife was permitted to return to him, she found him in a dead
+faint, and the silver reliquary she had left with him crushed
+flat and limp between his fingers.</p>
+<p>Richard had given his attendance all the time, and for several
+hours afterwards, during which the Princess hung over her
+husband, endeavouring to restore him from the state of exhaustion
+in which he scarcely seemed conscious of anything but her
+presence.&nbsp; Late in the evening, some one came to the
+entrance of the tent, and beckoned to the young squire; he came
+out expecting to receive some message, but to his extreme
+surprise found himself in the grasp of the Provost Marshal.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;On what charge?&rdquo; he demanded, so soon as he was
+far enough beyond the precincts of his tent not to risk a
+disturbance.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;By the command of the council.&nbsp; On the charge of
+being privy to the attempt on the Prince&rsquo;s life.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;By whom preferred?&rdquo; asked Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;By the Lord Hamlyn de Valence.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard attempted not another word.&nbsp; In effect the
+condition of the Prince seemed to him so hopeless that his most
+acute suffering at the moment was in the being prevented from
+ministering to him, or watching for a last word or look of
+recognition.&nbsp; He had no heart for self-vindication, even if
+he had not known its utter futility with men who had been
+prejudiced against him from the outset.&nbsp; Nor had he the
+opportunity, for the Provost Marshal conducted him at once to the
+tent where he was to be in ward for the night, a heap of straw
+for him to lie upon, and a guard of half a dozen archers outside;
+and there was he left to his despairing prayers for the
+Prince&rsquo;s life.&nbsp; He could dwell on nothing else, there
+was no room in his mind for any thought but of that glory of
+manhood thus laid low, and of the anguish of the sweet face of
+the Princess.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sir&mdash;!&rdquo; there was a low murmur near
+him&mdash;&ldquo;now is the time.&nbsp; I have brought an
+archer&rsquo;s gown and barrett, and we may easily get past the
+yeomen.&rdquo;&nbsp; These last words were uttered, as on hands
+and knees a figure whose dark outline could barely be discerned,
+crept under the border of the tent.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Who art thou?&rdquo; hastily inquired Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You should know me, Sir,&mdash;I have done you many a
+good turn, and served your house truly.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Talk not of truth, thou traitor,&rdquo; said Richard,
+recognizing Dustifoot&rsquo;s voice.&nbsp; &ldquo;Knowst thou
+that but for the Prince&rsquo;s clemency thou hadst a year ago
+been out of the reach of the cruel evil thou hast now shared
+in.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, now, Lord Richard,&rdquo; returned the man,
+&ldquo;you should not treat thus an honest fellow that would fain
+do you service.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I need no service such as thine,&rdquo; returned
+Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;Thy service has made my brothers murderers,
+and brought ruin and woe unspeakable upon the land.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Beshrew me,&rdquo; muttered the man, &ldquo;but one
+would have thought the young damoiseau would have had more
+feeling about his father&rsquo;s death!&nbsp; But I swore to do
+Sir Simon&rsquo;s bidding, so that is no concern of mine; and he
+bade me, if any one strove to lay hands on you, Sir, to lead you
+down to Kishon Brook, where he will meet us with a plump of
+spears.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Meet him then,&rdquo; said Richard, &ldquo;and say to
+him that if from his crag above, on Carmel, he sees me hung on
+the gallows tree as a traitor, he may count that I am willingly
+offered for our family sin!&nbsp; Ay, and that if he thinks an
+old man&rsquo;s hairs brought down to the grave, a broken-hearted
+wife, helpless orphans, and a land without a head, to be a
+grateful offering to my father, let him enjoy the thought of how
+the righteous Earl would have viewed all the desolation that will
+fall on England without the one&mdash;one scholar who knew how to
+value and honour his lessons.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hush!&nbsp; Sir,&rdquo; hastily interposed Dustifoot;
+but it was too late, the murmur of voices had already been caught
+by the guard, and quick as he was to retreat, their torches
+discovered him as he was creeping out, and he was dragged back by
+the feet, and the light held up to his face, while many voices
+proclaimed him as the rogue who had been foremost in admitting
+the assassin to the royal tent.&nbsp; It was from the tumult of
+voices that Richard first understood that on examining the body
+of the murderer, it had been ascertained that he was neither a
+Bedouin nor one of the assassins belonging to the Old Man of the
+Mountain, but an European, probably a Proven&ccedil;al; and this,
+added to Hamlyn&rsquo;s representation of Richard&rsquo;s words,
+together with what the Earls of Lancaster and Gloucester
+recollected, had directed the suspicion upon himself.&nbsp; And
+here was, as it seemed, undeniable evidence of his connection
+with the plot!</p>
+<p>The miserable Dustifoot, vainly imploring his intercession,
+was tied hand and foot, and the guard returned to the outside of
+the tent, except one archer, who thought it needful to bring in
+his torch, and keep the prisoners in sight.</p>
+<p>The night passed wearily, and with morning Dustifoot was
+removed to a place of captivity more befitting his degree; but of
+the Prince, Richard only heard that he continued to be in great
+danger.&nbsp; No attempt on the part of the council was made to
+examine their prisoner; and Richard suspected, as time wore on,
+that no one chose to act in this time of suspense for fear of
+incurring the lion-like wrath of Edward in the event of his
+recovery, but that in case of his death, small would be his own
+chances of life.&nbsp; Death had fewer horrors for the lonely boy
+than it would have had for one with whom life had been
+brighter.&nbsp; In battle for the Cross, or in shielding his
+Prince&rsquo;s life, it would have been welcome, but death,
+branded with vile ingratitude, as a traitor to that master, was
+abhorrent.&nbsp; Shrunk up in the corner of the tent, half asleep
+after the night&rsquo;s vigil, yet too miserable for the entire
+oblivion of rest, Richard spent the day in dull despair,
+listening for sounds without with an intensity of attention that
+seemed to pervade every limb, and yet with snatches of sleep that
+brought dreams more intolerable than the reality which they yet
+seemed to enhance.</p>
+<p>At last, however, the sultry closeness of the day subsided,
+the Angelus bell sounded far off from the churches and convents
+of Acre, and near from the chapel tent, and the devotions that it
+proclaimed were not ended when Richard heard the cry of the
+crusading watch&mdash;&ldquo;Remember the Holy
+Sepulchre.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Yes, the Holy Sepulchre might not be recovered and reached by
+the English army, but it might still be remembered, and therein
+be laid down all struggles of the will, all rebellious agony, at
+the being misunderstood, misused, vituperated, all suffering
+might there be offered up; nor could the most ignominious death
+stand between him and the thought of that Holy Tomb, and of the
+joy beyond.&mdash;Son of a man who, sorely tried, had drawn his
+sword against his king, brother of wilful murderers, perhaps to
+die innocent was the best fate he could hope; and in accordance
+with the doctrine of his time, he hoped that his death might
+serve as a part of a sacrifice for the family guilt.&nbsp; Nay,
+the Prince gone, wherefore should he wish to live?</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Don&rsquo;t you see?&nbsp; The Prince&rsquo;s
+signet!&nbsp; He said I should bring him!&nbsp; Clown that thou
+art, hast no eyes nor ears?&nbsp; What, don&rsquo;t you know
+me?&nbsp; I am the young lord of Dunster, the Prince&rsquo;s
+foot-page.&nbsp; It is his command.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And amid some perplexed mutterings from the guard, little John
+of Dunster burst into the tent.&nbsp; &ldquo;Up, up,&rdquo; he
+cried, &ldquo;you are to come to the Prince instantly.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How fares he?&rdquo;&mdash;Richard&rsquo;s one question
+of the day.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sorely ill at ease,&rdquo; said the boy, &ldquo;but he
+wants you, he calls for you, and no one would tell him where you
+were, so I spoke out at last, and he bade me take his ring and
+bring you, for &rsquo;tis his pleasure.&nbsp; Come now, for the
+Earl of Lancaster and Hamlyn are gone to take the Princess to
+Acre, and my Lord of Gloucester has taken his red head off to
+sleep, and no one is there but old Raymond and some of the
+grooms.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The Princess gone!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, and Dame Idonea with her.&nbsp; So we shall hear no
+more of King C&oelig;ur de Lion.&nbsp; Hamlyn swears she was on
+his crusade.&nbsp; Do you think she was, Richard? nobody knows
+how old she is.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard was a great deal too anxious to ask questions himself,
+to be able to answer this query.&nbsp; And as the yeomen let him
+pass them, only begging him to bear him out with the Princes, he
+hastily gathered from the boy all that he could tell.&nbsp; The
+Prince had, it appeared, been in a most suffering state from pain
+and fever all the night and the ensuing day, and had hardly
+noticed any one but his devoted wife, who had attended him
+unremittingly, until with the cooler air of evening she saw him
+slightly revived, but was herself so completely spent, and so
+unwell, as to be incapable of opposing his decision that she
+should at once be carried into the city to receive the succours
+her state demanded.&nbsp; When she was gone, Edward, who had
+perhaps sought to spare her the sight of his last agony, had
+roused himself to make his will, and choose protectors for his
+father and young children; and it was after this that his
+inquiries became urgent for Richard de Montfort.&nbsp; He was at
+length answered by the indignant little foot-page; and greatly
+resenting the action of the council, he had, as John said,
+&ldquo;frowned and spoken like himself,&rdquo; and sent the
+little fellow in quest of the young esquire.</p>
+<p>The tent was nearly dark, and Richard could only see the
+outline of the tall form laid prostrate, but the voice he had
+feared never to hear again, spoke, though slowly and wearily, and
+a hand was held out.&nbsp; &ldquo;Welcome, cousin,&rdquo; he
+said.&nbsp; &ldquo;Poor boy, they must needs have at thee ere the
+breath was out of my body; but for that, at least, they shall
+wait, and longer if my word and will can avail after I am
+gone.&nbsp; What has given them occasion against thee,
+Richard?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alas! my Lord, you are too ill at ease to vex yourself
+with my matters.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, but I must see thee righted, Richard; there are
+services for thee to do to me.&nbsp; Hark thee!&nbsp; I have
+bequeathed thee thy mother&rsquo;s lands at Odiham, which my
+father gave to me.&nbsp; So mayest thou do for Henry
+whate&rsquo;er he will brook,&rdquo; he added, with a languid
+smile, holding Richard&rsquo;s hand in such a manner as to
+impress that though his words came very tardily, he did not mean
+to be interrupted.&nbsp; &ldquo;Methinks Henry will not grudge a
+kindly thought and a few prayers for his old comrade.&nbsp; And,
+Richard, strive to be near my poor boys; strive that they be bred
+in strict self-rule, and let them hear of the purposes thy father
+left to me: I think thou knowst them or canst divine them better
+than any other near me.&nbsp; Thou <i>shall</i> be with them
+if&mdash;if Heaven and the blessed Saints bear my sweet wife
+through this trouble.&nbsp; She will love and trust
+thee.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Edward&rsquo;s voice broke down in a half-strangled sob
+between grief and pain; he could not contemplate the thought of
+his wife, and weakness had broken down much of his power over
+himself.&nbsp; He did not speak at once, or invite an answer; and
+when he did, his words were an exclamation of despairing
+weariness at the trumpet of a gnat that hovered above him.</p>
+<p>Richard presently understood that the thin goats&rsquo; hair
+curtains which even the crusaders had learnt to adopt from their
+Oriental neighbours as protections against these enemies, being
+continually disarranged to give the Prince drink or to put cool
+applications to his wound, the winged foes were sure to enter,
+and with their exasperating hum further destroy all chance of
+rest.&nbsp; The Prince had not slept since he had been wounded,
+and was well-nigh distraught with wakefulness, and with the
+continual suffering, which was only diminished at the first
+moment that a cold lotion touched his arm.&nbsp; The Hospitaliers
+had sent in some ice from Mount Hermon, but no one knew how to
+apply it, and even Dame Idonea had despised it.</p>
+<p>Fortunately, however, Richard had spent a few weeks on his
+first arrival in the infirmary of the Knights of St. John, and
+before his recovery had become familiar with their treatment of
+both ice and mosquito curtains; and when Edmund of Lancaster came
+into the tent cautiously in early dawn, he could hardly credit
+his eyes, for the squire whom he believed to be in close custody
+was beside his brother, holding the cold applications on the arm,
+and it was impossible to utter inquiry or remonstrance, for the
+Prince was in the profoundest, most tranquil slumber.</p>
+<p>Nor did he awake till the camp was astir in the morning with
+the activity that in this summer time could only be exerted
+before the sun had come to his full strength.&nbsp; Then, when at
+length he opened his eyes, he pronounced himself to be greatly
+refreshed; and the physician at the same time found the state of
+the wound greatly improved.&nbsp; A cheerful answer was returned
+by the patient to the message of anxious inquiry sent from his
+Princess at Acre and then looking up kindly at Richard, he said,
+&ldquo;Boy, if my wife saved my life once, I think thou hast
+saved it a second time.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Brother!&rdquo; here broke in the Earl of Lancaster,
+&ldquo;I would not grieve you, but for your own safety you ought
+to know of the grave suspicion that has fallen on this
+youth.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I know that you all have suspected him from the first,
+Edmund,&rdquo; returned the Prince coolly, &ldquo;but I little
+expected that the first hour of my sickness would be spent in
+slaking your hatred of him.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You do not know the reasons, brother,&rdquo; said
+Edmund, confused; &ldquo;nor are you in a state to hear
+them.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Wherefore not?&rdquo; said Edward.&nbsp; &ldquo;Thanks
+to him, I have my wits clear and cool, and ere the day is older
+his cause shall be heard.&nbsp; Fetch Gloucester, fetch the rest
+of the council, and let me hear your witnesses against him!&nbsp;
+What! do you think I could rest or amend while I know not whether
+I have a traitor or not beside me?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>There could be no doubt that Edward was fully himself after
+his night&rsquo;s rest, determined and prompt as ever.&nbsp; No
+one durst withstand him, and Edmund went to take measures for his
+being obeyed.&nbsp; Meantime, the Prince grasped Richard by the
+wrist, and looking him through with the keen blue eyes that
+seemed capable of piercing any disguise, he said, &ldquo;Boy,
+hast thou aught that thou wouldst tell to thy kinsman Edward in
+this strait, that thou couldst not say to the Prince in
+council?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; said Richard, with choking voice, &ldquo;I
+was on my way to give that very warning, when I found that the
+blow had fallen.&nbsp; My Lord,&rdquo; he added, lowering his
+tone, as he knelt by the Prince&rsquo;s couch, &ldquo;Simon
+lives; I met him on Mount Carmel.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I thought so,&rdquo; muttered the Prince.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And this is his work?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard hurriedly told the circumstances of the encounter, a
+matter on which he had the less scruple as Simon was entirely out
+of reach.&nbsp; He had hardly completed his narration when Prince
+Edmund returned, and with him came others of the council.&nbsp;
+Edmund was followed by his squire, Hamlyn; and some of the
+archers were left without.&nbsp; Richard had told his tale, but
+had had no assurance of how the Prince would act upon it, nor how
+far the brand of shame might be made to rest on him and his
+unhappy house.&nbsp; He had avowed his brother&rsquo;s guilt to
+the Prince; alas! must it again be blazoned through the camp?</p>
+<p>The greetings and inquiries of the new arrivals were hastily
+got over by the Prince, who lay&mdash;holding truly a bed of
+justice&mdash;partly raised by his cushions, with bloodless
+cheeks indeed, but with flashing eyes, and lips set to all their
+wonted resoluteness.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Let me hear, my Lords,&rdquo; he said,
+&ldquo;wherefore&mdash;so soon as I was disabled&mdash;you
+thought it meet to put mine own body squire and kinsman in
+ward?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; said the Provost Marshal, &ldquo;these
+knaves of mine have let an accomplice escape who peradventure
+might have been made to tell more.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;An accomplice?&nbsp; Of whom?&rdquo; demanded the
+Prince.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Of the&mdash;the assassin, my Lord, on whom your own
+strong hand inflicted chastisement.&nbsp; This Dustifoot, who was
+the yeoman on guard by your tent, and introduced him to your
+presence, was seized by the villains at night, endeavouring to
+hold converse with this gentleman, and was by them taken into
+custody, whence, I grieve to say, he hath escaped.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Give his guard due punishment!&rdquo; said Edward
+shortly.&nbsp; &ldquo;But how concerns this the Lord Richard de
+Montfort&rsquo;s durance?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sir,&rdquo; added the Earl of Gloucester, &ldquo;is it
+known to you that the dog of a murderer was yet no
+Moslem?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What of that?&rdquo; sharply demanded Edward.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;There can scarcely be a doubt,&rdquo; continued the
+red-haired Earl, &ldquo;that an attempt on your life, my Lord,
+could only come from one quarter.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh,&rdquo; dryly replied Edward, &ldquo;good cause for
+you to be willing that the Saracen captives should be
+massacred.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sir, I did not then know that the miscreant was not of
+their faith,&rdquo; said Gloucester.&nbsp; &ldquo;I now believe
+that the same revenge that caused the death of Lord Henry of
+Almayne has now nearly quenched the hope of England, that if you
+will not be warned, my Lord, worse evil may yet
+betide.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Gloucester spoke with much feeling, but Edward did not show
+himself touched; he only said, &ldquo;All this may be very well,
+but my question is not answered&mdash;Why was my squire put in
+ward?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Speak, Hamlyn,&rdquo; said Edmund of Lancaster;
+&ldquo;say to the Prince what thou didst tell me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Hamlyn stood forth, excusing himself for the painful task of
+accusing his kinsman, but seeing the Prince&rsquo;s impatient
+frown, he came to the point, and declared that Richard de
+Montfort, on meeting him speeding to Acre, had eagerly asked him
+if aught had befallen the Prince, and had looked startled and
+confused on being taxed with being aware of what had taken
+place.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well!&rdquo; said Edward.</p>
+<p>Gloucester next beckoned a yeoman forward, who, much confused
+under the Prince&rsquo;s keen eye, stammered out that he did not
+wish to harm the young gentleman, but that he had seemed mighty
+anxious to spare the Pagan hounds of prisoners, and had even been
+heard to say that their revenge would better fall on himself.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And is this all for which you had laid hands on
+him?&rdquo; said the Prince, looking from one to the other.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, brother,&rdquo; said Edmund.&nbsp; &ldquo;It might
+have been unmarked by thee, but in the first hour myself and
+others heard him speak of having made speed to warn thee, but
+finding it too late.&nbsp; Therefore did we conclude that it were
+well to have him in ward, lest, as in the former unhappy matter,
+he should have been conversant with traitors, and thus that we
+might obtain intelligence from him.&nbsp; Remember likewise the
+fellow who was found in the tent.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;So!&rdquo; said Edward, &ldquo;an honourable youth hath
+been treated as a traitor, because of another springald&rsquo;s
+opinion of his looks, and because a few yeomen thought he seemed
+over-anxious to save a few wretched captives, whom they knew to
+be guiltless.&nbsp; Will there ever come a time when Englishmen
+will learn what <i>is</i> witness?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;His name and lineage, brother,&rdquo; began Edmund.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That, gentles, is the witness upon which the wolf slew
+the lamb for fouling the stream.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then you will not examine him?&rdquo; asked
+Gloucester.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not as a suspected felon,&rdquo; said Edward.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;One who by your own evidence was heedless of himself in
+seeking to save the helpless&mdash;nay, who spake of hasting to
+warn me&mdash;scarce merits such usage.&nbsp; What consorts with
+his honour and my safety, I can trust to him to tell me as true
+friend and liegeman!&rdquo; and the confiding smile with which he
+looked at Richard was like a sunbeam in a dark cloud.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My Lord Prince,&rdquo; objected Gloucester, &ldquo;we
+cannot think that this is for your safety.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;See here, Gloucester,&rdquo; said Edward.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Till my arm can keep my head again, double the guards, and
+search all envoys, under whatever pretext they may enter; but
+never for the rest of thy life brand a man with imprisonment till
+you have reasonable proof against him.&nbsp; Thanks for your care
+of me, my Lords, but I can scarce yet brook long converse.&nbsp;
+The council is dismissed.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard, infinitely relieved, could hardly wait till he could
+safely speak to the Prince to express his gratitude and joy that
+he had been not only defended, but freed from all examination, so
+as to have been spared from denouncing his brother, and that the
+family had been spared from this additional stigma.&nbsp; Edward,
+who like all reserved men could not endure the expression of
+thanks, even while their utter omission would have been wounding,
+cut him short.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Tush, boy, Simon is as much my cousin as thy brother,
+and I would not help to throw fresh stains on the name that, but
+for my father&rsquo;s selfish counsellors, would stand highest at
+home!&nbsp; Besides,&rdquo; he added, as one half ashamed of his
+generosity and willing to qualify it, &ldquo;supposing it got
+abroad that he had aimed this stroke at the heir of
+England&mdash;why, then England&rsquo;s honour would be
+concerned, and we should have stout Gilbert de Clare and all the
+rest of them wild to storm Simon in his Galilean fastness,
+without King Herod&rsquo;s boxes, I trow.&nbsp; Then would all
+the Druses, and the Maronites, and the Saracens, and the
+half-breeds, the worst of the whole, come down on them in some
+impassable gorge, and the troops I have taken such pains to keep
+in health and training would leave their bones in those doleful
+passes; and not for the sake of the Holy Sepulchre, but of my
+private quarrel.&nbsp; No, no, Richard, we will keep our own
+counsel, and do our best that Simon may not get another chance,
+before I can move within the walls of Acre; and then we will
+spread our sails, and pray that the Holy Land may make a holier
+man of him.&rdquo;</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XII<br />
+THE GARDEN OF THE HOSPITAL</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;And who is yon page lying cold at his
+knee?&rdquo;&mdash;<span class="smcap">Scott</span>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">Edward</span> differed from C&oelig;ur de
+Lion in this, that he was one of the most abstemious men in his
+army, and disciplined himself at least as rigidly as he did other
+people.&nbsp; And it was probably on this account that he did not
+fulfil Dame Idonea&rsquo;s predictions, but recovered favourably,
+and by the end of a fortnight was able, in the first coolness of
+early morning, to ride gently into the city of Acre, where a few
+days previously the Princess Eleanor had given birth to a
+daughter.&nbsp; She was christened Joan on the day of her
+father&rsquo;s arrival, and afterwards became the special spoilt
+favourite of Edward, whose sternness gave place to excessive
+fondness among his children.&nbsp; Moreover, she in the end
+became the wife of that same red-haired Earl Gilbert of
+Gloucester, who at this time stood holding his wax taper, and
+looking at the small swaddled morsel of royalty with all a
+bachelor&rsquo;s contempt for infancy, and little dreaming that
+he beheld his future Countess.</p>
+<p>Prince Edward had accepted the invitation of Sir Hugh de
+Revel, Grand Master of the Order of St. John, to take up his
+quarters in the Commandery of the brotherhood; and Richard was
+greatly relieved to have him there, since no watch or ward in the
+open camp could be so secure as this double fortress, protected
+in the first place by the walls of the city, and in the second by
+those of the Hospital itself, with its strict military and
+monastic discipline.</p>
+<p>A wonderful place was that Hospital&mdash;infirmary,
+monastery, and castle, all in one, and with a certain Eastern
+grace and beauty of its own.&nbsp; The deep massive walls, heavy
+towers, and portcullised gateway, were in the most elaborate and
+majestic style of defensive architecture; and the main building
+rose to a great height, filled with galleries of small, bare,
+rigid-looking cells, just large enough for a knight, his pallet,
+and his armour.&nbsp; Below was a noble vaulted hall, the walls
+hung with well-tried hawberks, and shields and helmets which had
+stood many a dint; captured crescents and green banners waved as
+trophies over crooked scymetars and Damascus blades inlaid with
+sentences from the Koran in gold, and twisted cuirasses rich with
+barbaric gold and gems; the blazoned arms of the noblest families
+of France, Spain, England, Germany, and Italy, decked the panels
+and brightened the windows; while the stone pulpit for the reader
+showed that it was still a convent refectory.</p>
+<p>The chapel was grave and massive, but at the same time
+gorgeous with colouring suited to eyes accustomed to Oriental
+brightness of hue; the chancel walls were inlaid with the
+porphyry, jasper, and marble, of exquisite tints, that came from
+the mountains around; the shrines were touched with gold, and the
+roofs and vaultings painted with fretwork of unapproachable
+brilliance and purity of tints; yet all harmonizing together, as
+only Eastern colouring can harmonize, and giving a sense of rest
+and coolness.</p>
+<p>Within those huge thick walls, whose windows, sunk deep into
+their solid mass, only let in threads of jewelled light, under
+their solemn circular richly carved brows, between those marble
+pillars; the elder ones, round and solid, with Romanesque mighty
+strength; the new graceful clusters of shining blood-red marble
+shafts, surrounding a slender white one, all banded together with
+gold, under the vaults of the stone roof, upon the mosaic
+floor&mdash;there was always a still refreshing coolness, like
+the &ldquo;shadow of a great rock in a weary land.&rdquo;&nbsp;
+One transept had a window communicating with the upper room of
+the Infirmary, so that the sick who there lay in their beds might
+take part in the services in the chapel.</p>
+<p>The outer court, with the great fortified gateway towards the
+street, was a tilt-yard, where martial exercises took place as in
+any other castle; but pass through the great hall to the inner
+court, of which the chapel formed one side, and where could such
+cloisters have been found in the West?&nbsp; Their heavy columns
+and deep-browed arches clinging against the thick walls, afforded
+unfailing shelter from the sun, and their coolness was increased
+by the marble of the pavement, inlaid in rich intricate
+mosaics.</p>
+<p>Extending around the interior of the external wall, they
+enclosed an exquisite Eastern garden, perfumed with flowering
+shrubs, shady with trees, and lovely with tall white lilies,
+hollyhocks, purple irises, stars of Bethlehem, and many another
+Eastern flower, which would send forth seeds or roots for the
+supply of the trim gardens of Western convents.&nbsp; The soft
+bubbling of fountains gave a sense of delicious freshness; doves
+flew hither and thither, and their soft murmuring was heard in
+the branches; and at certain openings in their foliage might be
+seen the azure of the Mediterranean, which little John of Dunster
+persisted in calling too blue&mdash;why could it not be a sober
+proper-coloured sea like his own Bristol Channel?</p>
+<p>Richard was very happy here.&nbsp; There was something of the
+same charm as in modern days is experienced in staying at a
+college.&nbsp; The brethren were thorough monks in religious
+observance, but they were also high-bred nobles, and had seen
+many wild adventures, and hard-fought battles, and moreover, had
+entertained in turn almost every variety of pilgrim who had
+visited the Holy Land; so that none could have been found who had
+more of interest to tell, or more friendly hospitable kindness
+towards their guests.&nbsp; Richard was a favourite there, not
+only as a friend of Reginald Ferrers, but as acquainted with the
+Grand Prior, Sir Robert Darcy, whose memory was still green in
+Palestine.&nbsp; Tales of his feats of mighty strength still
+lingered at Acre; how he had held together, by his single arm,
+the gates of a house in the retreat from Damietta, against a
+whole troop of Mamelukes, until every Christian had left it on
+the other side, and then had slowly followed them, not a Moslem
+daring to attack him; how he had borne off wounded knights on his
+back, and on sultry marches would load himself with the armour of
+any one who was exhausted, and never fail to declare it was
+exactly what he liked best!&nbsp; More than once it had been
+intimated that Richard de Montfort would be gladly accepted as a
+brother of the Order; and he often thought over the offer, but
+not only was he unwilling to separate himself from the Prince,
+but he felt it needful at any rate to return to England to judge
+of the condition of his brother Henry, ere becoming one of an
+Order where he could no longer dispose of himself.</p>
+<p>He was resolved never to quit the Prince till he had seen him
+beyond the reach of any machination of his brother&rsquo;s, nor
+indeed was it easy to think of parting at all, for Edward, who
+had relaxed all coldness of manner towards him ever since the
+affair at Trapani, had now become warmly affectionate and
+confidential.&nbsp; The Prince was still far from having regained
+his usual health, his arm was still in a scarf, and was often
+painful, and the least exposure to the sun brought on violent
+headache, which some attributed to the poison in the scratch on
+his forehead, but the Hospitaliers, more reasonably, ascribed to
+a slight sun-stroke.&nbsp; Their character of infirmarers
+rendered them especially considerate hosts, and they never
+overwhelmed their guest with the stiff formalities of courtesy
+for his rank&rsquo;s sake, but allowed him to follow his
+inclination, and this led him to spend great part of his time in
+a pavilion, a thoroughly Eastern erection, which stood in the
+garden, at the top of the white marble steps leading to a
+fountain of delicious sparkling water, and sheltered from the sun
+by the dark solid horizontal branches of a noble Cedar of
+Lebanon, which tradition connected with the visit of the Empress
+Helena.&nbsp; Here, lying upon mats placed on the steps, the
+convalescent Prince would rest for hours, sometimes holding
+converse with the Grand Master, or counsel with his visitors from
+the camp; but more often in the dreamy repose of recovery, silent
+or talking to Richard of matters that lay deep within his heart;
+but which, perhaps, nothing but this softening species of waking
+dream would have drawn from him.&nbsp; He would dwell on those
+two hero models of his boyhood, so diverse, yet so closely
+connected together by their influence upon his character, Louis
+of France, and Simon of Leicester; and of the impression both had
+left, that judgment, mercy, faith, and the subject&rsquo;s
+welfare, were the primary duties of a sovereign&mdash;an idea
+only now and then glimpsed by the feudal sovereigns, who thought
+that the people lived for them rather than they for the
+people.&nbsp; And when, as in England, the King&rsquo;s
+good-nature had been abused by swarms of foreign-born relations,
+who had not even his claims on the people, no wonder the yoke had
+been galling beyond endurance.&nbsp; Of the end Edward could not
+bear to think&mdash;of the broken friendships&mdash;the enmity of
+kindred&mdash;the faults on either side that had embittered the
+strife, till he had been forced to become the sword in the hands
+of the royal party to liberate his father&mdash;and with
+consequences that had so far out-run his powers of controlling
+them.&nbsp; To make England the land of law, peace, and order,
+that Simon de Montfort would fain have seen it, was his present
+aspiration; and then, he said, when all was purified at home, it
+might yet be permitted to him to return and win back the Holy
+City, Jerusalem, to the Christian world.&nbsp; In the meantime,
+as a memorial of this, his earnest longing, he was causing, at
+great expense and labour, one of the huge stones of the Temple to
+be transported over the hills, and embarked on board a ship, to
+carry home with him.&nbsp; Richard, meantime, learnt to know and
+love his Prince with a more devoted love, if that were possible,
+and to grieve the more at the persistent hatred of his brothers,
+who, utterly uncomprehending their father&rsquo;s high purposes
+themselves, sought blindly to slake their vengeance for the ruin
+they had themselves provoked, and upon one who mourned him far
+more truly than they could ever do.</p>
+<p>A few days had thus passed, when Richard was one day called by
+his friend, Sir Raynald, into the Infirmary, to speak a few kind
+words to a dying English pilgrim, who had come from his native
+country, and confided to him his dearly-purchased palm and
+scallop shell, to be conveyed to his aged mother.</p>
+<p>As Richard was passing along the great lofty chamber, two rows
+of beds were arranged; one of the patients rather hastily, as it
+seemed to him, enveloped himself in his coverlet, leaving nothing
+visible but a great black patch which seemed to cover the whole
+side of his face.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That is a strange varlet,&rdquo; said Raynald, as they
+passed him; &ldquo;it is an old wound that the patch covers, not
+what has brought him here; and what the nature of his ailment may
+be, not one of our infirmarers can make out; his tongue is
+purple, and he hath such strange shiverings and contortions in
+all his limbs, that they are at their wits&rsquo; end, and some
+hold that he must have undergone some sorcery in his passage
+through the Infidel domains.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He came from the East, then?&rdquo; asked Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Yea, verily.&nbsp; We have many more sick among the
+returning than the out-going pilgrims.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And what is his nation?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay; all the scanty words he hath spoken have been in
+Lingua Franca, and he hath been in such trances and trembling
+fits that it hath not been easy to question him.&nbsp; Nor is it
+our custom to trouble a pilgrim with inquiries.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How did he enter?&rdquo; said Richard.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Brother Antonio found him yester-eve cast down, gasping
+for breath, by the gate of the Hospital, just able to entreat for
+the love of St. John to be admitted.&nbsp; He had all the tokens
+of a pilgrim about him, and seemed better at first, walked
+lustily to bath and bed, and did not show himself helpless; but I
+much suspect his disease is the work of the Arch Enemy, for he is
+always at his worst if one of our Brethren in full orders comes
+near him.&nbsp; You saw how he cowered and hid himself when I did
+but pass through the hall.&nbsp; I shall speak to the Preceptor,
+and see if it were not best to try what exorcism will
+do.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>There was something in all this that made Richard vaguely
+uneasy.&nbsp; After the recent attack upon the Prince, he
+suspected all that he did not fully understand; and though in the
+guarded precincts of the Hospital he had once dismissed his
+anxiety, it returned upon him in redoubled force.&nbsp; He
+thought of Nick Dustifoot, but that worthy was of a uniform tint
+of whitey brown, skin, hair and all; and Richard had assured
+himself that the strange patient had black hair and a brown skin,
+but that was all that he could guess at.&nbsp; The exorcism
+would, however, be an effectual means of disclosing the
+&ldquo;myster wight&rsquo;s&rdquo; person, and it sometimes
+included measures so strong, that few pretences could hold out
+against them.&nbsp; But it was too serious and complicated a
+ceremony to be got up at short notice; and when they met in the
+Refectory for supper, Raynald told Richard that the Grand Master
+intended to make a personal inspection next day, before deciding
+on using his spiritual weapons.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And then!&rdquo; cried John of Dunster, dancing round,
+&ldquo;you will let me be there!&nbsp; Pray, good Father, let me
+be there!&nbsp; Oh, I hope there will be a rare smell of
+brimstone, and the foul fiend will come out with huge claws, and
+a forked tail.&nbsp; I don&rsquo;t care to see him if he only
+comes out like a black crow; I can see crows enough in the trees
+at Dunster.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Peace, John; this is no place for idle talk,&rdquo;
+said Richard gravely.&nbsp; &ldquo;Stand aside, here comes the
+Prince.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The Prince had spent a fatiguing day over the terms of the ten
+years, ten months, ten weeks, ten days, ten hours, and ten
+minutes&rsquo; truce with the Emir of Joppa; he ate little, and
+after the meal, took Richard&rsquo;s arm, and craved leave from
+the Grand Master to seek the fresh air beneath the cedar
+tree.&nbsp; And when there, he could not endure the return to the
+closeness of his own apartment, but declared his intention of
+sleeping in the pavilion.&nbsp; He dismissed his attendants,
+saying he needed no one but Richard, who, since his illness, had
+always slept upon cushions at his feet.</p>
+<p>Where was Richard?</p>
+<p>He presently appeared, carrying on one arm a mantle, and over
+the other shoulder the Prince&rsquo;s immense two-handled sword;
+while his own sword was in his belt.&nbsp; Leonillo followed
+him.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How now!&rdquo; said Edward, &ldquo;are we to have a
+joust?&nbsp; Dost look for phantom Saracens out of yonder
+fountain, such as my Do&ntilde;a tells me rise out of the fair
+wells in Castille, wring their hands and pray for
+baptism?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You said your hand should keep your head, my
+Lord,&rdquo; said Richard; &ldquo;this is but a lone
+place.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What! amid all the guards of the good Fathers!&nbsp;
+Well, old comrade,&rdquo; as he took his sword in his right hand;
+&ldquo;I am glad to handle thee once more, and I hope soon to
+grasp thee as I am wont, with both hands.&nbsp; Lay it down,
+Richard.&nbsp; There&mdash;thanks&mdash;that is well.&nbsp; I
+wonder what my father would have thought if one of his many
+crusading vows had led him hither.&nbsp; Should we ever have had
+him back again?&nbsp; How well this dreamy leisure would have
+suited him!&nbsp; It would almost make a troubadour of a rough
+warrior like me.&nbsp; See the towers and pinnacles against the
+sky, and the lights within the windows&mdash;and the stars above
+like lamps of gold, and the moonshine sparkling on the bubbles of
+the water, ever floating off, yet ever in the same place.&nbsp;
+Were the good old man here, how peacefully would he sing, and
+pray, and dream, free from debts, parliament and barons.&nbsp;
+Ah! had his kinsmen let him keep his vow, it had been happier for
+us all.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>So mused the Prince, and with a weary smile resigned himself
+to rest.</p>
+<p>But Richard was too full of vague uneasiness to sleep.&nbsp;
+He could not dismiss from his mind the thought of the unknown
+pilgrim, and was resolved to relax no point of vigilance until
+the full investigation should have satisfied him that his fears
+were unfounded.&nbsp; He had been accustomed to watching and
+broken rest during the Prince&rsquo;s illness, and though he
+durst not pace up and down for fear of disturbing the
+sleeper&mdash;nay, could hardly venture a movement&mdash;he
+strained his eyes into the twilight, and told his beads
+fervently; but sleep hung on him like a spell, and even while
+sitting upright there were strange dreams before him, and one
+that he had had before, though with a variation.&nbsp; It was the
+field of Evesham once more; but this time the strange pilgrim
+rose in his dark wrappings before him, and suddenly developed
+into that same shadowy form of his father, who again struck him
+on the shoulder with his sword, and dubbed him again &ldquo;The
+Knight of Death.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Hark! there was a growl from Leonillo; a footstep, a dark
+figure&mdash;the pilgrim himself!&nbsp; Richard shouted aloud,
+grasped at his sword, and flung himself forward.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Montfort&rsquo;s vengeance!&rdquo;&nbsp; The sound rang
+in his ears as a sharp pang thrilled through his side; the hot
+blood welled up, and he was dashed to the ground; but even in
+falling he heard the Prince&rsquo;s &ldquo;What treason is
+this?&rdquo; and felt the rising of the mighty form.&nbsp; At the
+same moment the murderer was in the grasp of that strong right
+hand, and was dragged forward into the full light of the lamp
+that hung from the roof of the pavilion.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou!&rdquo; he gasped.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Who&mdash;what?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Richard!&rdquo; exclaimed the Prince, and relaxing his
+hold, &ldquo;Simon de Montfort, thou hast slain thy
+brother!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The sudden shock and awe had overwhelmed Simon, who was indeed
+weaponless, since his dagger remained in Richard&rsquo;s
+wound.&nbsp; He silently assisted the Prince in lifting Richard
+to the cushions of the couch, and the low groan convinced them
+that he lived: looked anxiously for the wound.&nbsp; The dagger
+had gone deep between the ribs, and little but the haft could be
+seen.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Poisoned?&rdquo; Edward asked, looking up at Simon.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No.&nbsp; It failed once.&nbsp; He may live,&rdquo;
+said Simon, with bent brows and folded arms.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, no.&nbsp; My death-blow!&rdquo; gasped Richard,
+with sobbing breath.&nbsp; &ldquo;Best so, if&mdash;Oh, could I
+but speak!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The Prince raised him, supporting his head on his own broad
+breast and shoulder, and signed to Simon to hold to his lips the
+cup of water that stood near.&nbsp; Richard slightly revived, and
+in this posture breathed more easily.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He might yet live.&nbsp; Call speedy aid!&rdquo; said
+the Prince, who seemed to have utterly forgotten that he was
+practically alone with his persevering and desperate enemy.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Wait!&nbsp; Oh, wait!&rdquo; cried Richard, holding out
+his hand; &ldquo;it would be vain; but it will be all joy did I
+but know that there will be no more of this.&nbsp; Simon, he
+loved my father&mdash;he has spared thee again and
+again.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Simon,&rdquo; said the Prince, &ldquo;for this dear
+youth&rsquo;s sake and thy father&rsquo;s, I raise no hand
+against thee.&nbsp; Bitter wrong has been done to thy house, by
+what persons, and how provoked, it skills not now to ask.&nbsp;
+Twice thy fury has fallen on the guiltless.&nbsp; Enough blood
+has been shed.&nbsp; Let there be peace henceforth.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Simon stood moody, with folded arms, and Richard groaned, and
+essayed to speak.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Peace, boy,&rdquo; tenderly said Edward; &ldquo;and
+thou, Simon, hear me.&nbsp; I loved thy father, and knew the
+upright noble spirit that arrayed him against us.&nbsp; Heaven is
+my witness that I would have given my life to have been able to
+save him on yon wretched battle-field.&nbsp; But he fell in fair
+fight, in helm and corselet, like a good knight.&nbsp; Peace be
+with him!&nbsp; Surely in this land of pardon and redemption his
+son and nephew may cease to seek one another&rsquo;s blood for
+his sake!&nbsp; Cheer thy brother by letting him feel his brave
+deed hath not been fruitless.&nbsp; Free thou shalt go&mdash;do
+what thou wilt; no word of mine shall betray that this deed is
+thine.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Lay aside thy purpose,&rdquo; entreated Richard.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Bind him by oath, my Lord.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay,&rdquo; said the Prince.&nbsp; &ldquo;Here, on
+foreign soil, the strife lies between the cousins, the sons of
+Henry and of Eleanor; and if Simon must needs still slake his
+revenge in my blood, he may have better success another
+time.&nbsp; Or, so soon as I can wear my armour again, I offer
+him a fair combat in the lists, man to man; better so than
+staining his soul with privy murder&mdash;but I had far rather
+that it should be peace between us&mdash;and that thou shouldst
+see it.&rdquo;&nbsp; And Edward, still supporting Richard on his
+breast, held out his right hand to Simon, adding, &ldquo;Let not
+thy brother&rsquo;s blood be shed in vain.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Richard made a gesture of agonized entreaty.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My father&mdash;my father!&rdquo; he said.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;He forgave&mdash;he hated blood; Simon, didst but
+know&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I see,&rdquo; said Simon impatiently, &ldquo;that
+Heaven and earth alike are set against my purpose.&nbsp; Fear not
+for his days, Richard, they are safe from me, and here is my hand
+upon it.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The tone was sullen and grudging, and Richard looked scarcely
+comforted; but the Prince was in haste that he should be
+succoured at once, and even while receiving Simon&rsquo;s
+unwilling hand, said, &ldquo;We lose time.&nbsp; Speed near
+enough to the Spital to be heard, and shout for aid.&nbsp; Then
+seek thine own safety.&nbsp; I will say no more of thy share in
+this matter.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Simon lingered one moment.&nbsp; &ldquo;Boy,&rdquo; he said,
+&ldquo;I told thee thou wast over like him.&nbsp; Live, live if
+thou canst!&nbsp; Alas!&nbsp; I had thought to make surer work
+this time; but thou dost pardon me the mischance?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;More than pardon&mdash;thank thee&mdash;since he is
+safe,&rdquo; whispered Richard, and as Simon bent over him the
+boy crossed his brow, and returned a look of absolute joy.</p>
+<p>Simon sped away; and the Prince, when left alone with Richard,
+put no restraint upon the warmth of his feelings, and his tears
+fell fast and freely.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Boy, boy,&rdquo; he said; &ldquo;I little thought thou
+wast to bear what was meant for me!&rdquo;&nbsp; And then, with
+tenderness that would have seemed foreign to his nature, he
+inquired into the pain that Richard was suffering, tried to make
+his position more easy, and lamented that he could not venture to
+draw out the weapon until the leeches should come.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It has been my best hope,&rdquo; said Richard;
+&ldquo;and now that it should have been thus.&nbsp; With your
+goodness I have nothing&mdash;nothing to wish.&nbsp; Sir Raynald
+will be here&mdash;I have only my charge for Henry to give
+him&mdash;and poor Leonillo!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I will bear thy charges to Henry,&rdquo; said the
+Prince.&nbsp; &ldquo;Nor shall he think thou didst betray his
+secret.&nbsp; I will watch over him so far as he will let me, and
+do all I may for his child.&nbsp; Yet it may be thou wilt still
+return.&nbsp; I hear the stir in the House.&nbsp; They will be
+here anon.&nbsp; Thou must live, Richard, my friend, where I have
+few friends.&nbsp; I thought to have knighted thee, boy, when
+thou hadst won fame.&nbsp; Oh, would that I had shown thee more
+of my love while it was time!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;All, all I hoped or longed for I have,&rdquo; murmured
+Richard.&nbsp; &ldquo;If you see Henry, my Lord, bear him my
+greetings&mdash;and to poor Adam&mdash;yea, and my mother.&nbsp;
+Oh! would that I could make them all know your kindness and my
+joy&mdash;that it should be thus!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>By this time the whole Hospital was astir, and the knights and
+lay brethren came flocking out in consternation and dread of
+finding their royal host himself murdered within their
+cloisters.</p>
+<p>Great was the confusion, and eager the search for the
+assassin, while others crowded round the Prince, who still would
+not give up his post of supporting the sufferer in his arms,
+while a few moments&rsquo; examination convinced the experienced
+infirmarers that the wound was mortal, and that the extraction of
+the dagger would but hasten death, which could not be other than
+very near.&nbsp; Indeed, Richard already spoke with such
+difficulty that only the Prince&rsquo;s ear could detect his
+entreaty that Raynald Ferrers might act as his priest.&nbsp;
+Raynald was already near, only withheld by the crowd of knights
+of higher degree who had thronged before him.&nbsp; Richard
+looked up to him with a face that in all its mortal agony seemed
+to ask congratulation.&nbsp; The power of making confession was
+gone, and when Raynald would have offered to take him in his own
+arms, both he and the Prince showed disinclination to the
+move.&nbsp; So thus they still remained, while the young knightly
+priest spoke the words of Absolution, and then, across the solemn
+darkness of the garden, amid the light of tapers, the Host was
+borne from the Chapel, while the low subdued chant of the
+brethren swelled up through the night air.&nbsp; Poor little John
+of Dunster, with his arms round Leonillo&rsquo;s neck, to keep
+him from disturbing his master, knelt, sobbing as though his
+heart would break, but trying to stifle the sounds as the
+priest&rsquo;s voice came grave and full on the silent air,
+responded to by the gathered tones of the brethren: the fountain
+bubbled on, and the wakening birds began to stir in the
+trees.</p>
+<p>Once more Richard opened his eyes, looked up at his Prince,
+and smiled.&nbsp; That smile remained while Edward kissed his
+brow with fervour, laid him down on the cushions, and rising to
+his feet, bowed his head to the Grand Master, but did not even
+strive to speak, and gravely walked across the cloister, with a
+slow though steady step, to his own chamber.&nbsp; No one saw him
+again till the sun was high, when, with looks as composed as
+ever, he went forth to lay his page&rsquo;s head in the grave,
+and thence visit and calm the fears of his Princess.</p>
+<p>Search had everywhere been made for the assassin, but no
+traces of him were found.&nbsp; Only the strange pilgrim had
+vanished in the confusion; and the Prince never contradicted the
+Grand Master in his indignation that a Moslem hound should have
+assumed such a disguise.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIII<br />
+THE BEGGAR AND THE PRINCE</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;This favour only, that thou would&rsquo;st
+stand out of my sunshine.&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><span
+class="smcap">Diogenes</span>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">It</span> was the last week of August,
+1274, the morrow of the most splendid coronation that England had
+ever beheld, either for the personal qualities and appearance of
+the sovereigns, or for the magnificence of the adornments, and
+the bounteous feasting of multitudes.</p>
+<p>A whole fortnight of entertainments to rich and poor had been
+somewhat exhausting, even to the guests; and the suburbs of
+London wore an unusually sleepy and quiescent appearance in the
+hot beams of the August sun.&nbsp; Bethnal Green lay very silent,
+parched, and weary, not even enlivened by its usual gabbling
+flocks of geese, all of whom, poor things! except the patriarchal
+gander, and one or two of his ladies, had gone to the
+festival&mdash;but to return no more!</p>
+<p>One of those who had been in the midst of the pageant, and had
+returned unscathed, was Blind Hal of Bethnal Green.&nbsp; Many a
+coin had gone into his scrip&mdash;uncontested king of the
+beggars as he was; many a savoury morsel had been conveyed to him
+and his child by his admiring brethren of the wallet; with many a
+gibing scoff had he driven from the field presuming mendicants,
+not of his own fraternity; and with half-bitter, half-amused
+remarks, had he listened to the rapturous descriptions of the
+splendours of king, queen, and their noble suite.&nbsp; And
+pretty Bessee had clung fast to his hand, and discreetly guided
+him through every maze of the crowd, with the strange dexterity
+of a child bred up in throngs.&nbsp; And now tired out with the
+long-continued festivities, the beggar sat in front of his hut,
+basking in the sun, and more than half asleep; while Bessee, her
+lap full of heather-blossoms and long bents of grass, was
+endeavouring to weave herself chains, bracelets, and coronals, in
+imitation of those which had recently dazzled her eyes.</p>
+<p>She had just encircled her dark auburn locks with a garland of
+purple heather, studded here and there with white or gold, when,
+starting upon her little bare but delicately clean pink feet, she
+laid her hand on her father&rsquo;s lap, and said, &ldquo;Father,
+hark!&nbsp; I see two of the good red monks coming!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well, child; and wherefore waken me?&nbsp; They are
+after their own affairs, I trow.&nbsp; Moreover, I hear no
+horses&rsquo; feet.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;They are not riding,&rdquo; said Bessee; &ldquo;and
+they are walking this way.&nbsp; They have a dog, too!&nbsp; Oh,
+such a gallant glorious dog, father!&nbsp; Ah,&rdquo; cried she
+joyfully, &ldquo;&rsquo;tis the good Father Grand Prior!&rdquo;
+and she was about to start forward, but the blind man&rsquo;s ear
+could now distinguish the foot-falls; and holding her fast, he
+almost gasped&mdash;&ldquo;And the other, child&mdash;who is
+he?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No knight at our Spital!&nbsp; A stranger,
+father.&nbsp; So tall, so tall!&nbsp; His mantle hardly reaches
+his knee his robe leaves his ankles bare.&nbsp; O father, they
+are coming.&nbsp; Let me go to meet dear good Father
+Robert!&nbsp; But what&mdash;Oh, is the fit coming?&nbsp; Father
+Robert will stop it!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hush thy prattle,&rdquo; said the beggar, clutching her
+fast, and listening as one all ear; and by this time the two
+knights were close at hand, the taller holding the dog, straining
+in a leash, while the good Grand Prior spoke.&nbsp; &ldquo;How
+fares it with thee, friend?&nbsp; And thou, my pretty one?&nbsp;
+No mishaps among the throng?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;None,&rdquo; returned Hal; &ldquo;though the King and
+his suite <i>did</i> let loose five hundred chargers in the crowd
+at their dismounting, to trample down helpless folk, and be
+caught by rogues.&nbsp; Largesse they called it!&nbsp; Fair and
+convenient largesse&mdash;easily providing for those that
+received it!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No harm was done,&rdquo; briefly but sharply exclaimed
+the strange knight; and the blind man, who had, as little Bessee
+at least perceived, been turning his acute ear in that direction
+all the time he had been speaking, now let his features light up
+with sudden perception.</p>
+<p>But Sir Robert Darcy, thinking that he only now became aware
+of the stranger&rsquo;s presence, said, &ldquo;A knight is here
+from the East, who brings thee tidings, my son.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Sir Robert would have said more, but the beggar standing up,
+cut him short, by saying, &ldquo;So, cousin, you have yet to
+learn the vanity of disguises and feignings towards a blind
+man.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, fair cousin,&rdquo; was the answer, &ldquo;my
+feigning was not towards you; but I doubted me whether you would
+have the world see me visit you in my proper character.&nbsp;
+Will not you give me a hand, Henry?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;First say to me,&rdquo; said Henry, embracing with his
+maimed arm his staff, planted in front of him defiantly, and
+still holding tight his little daughter in his hand, &ldquo;what
+brings you here to break into the peace of the poor remnant of a
+man you have left?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I come,&rdquo; said Edward patiently, &ldquo;to fulfil
+my last&mdash;my parting promise, to one who loved us
+both&mdash;and gave his life for me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Loved you, ay! and well enough to betray me to
+you!&rdquo; said Henry bitterly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, Henry de Montfort, ten thousand times no!&rdquo;
+said Edward.&nbsp; &ldquo;I would maintain in the lists the
+honour and loyalty of my Richard towards you and me and all
+others.&nbsp; His faithfulness to you brought him into peril of
+death and disgrace in the wretched matter of poor Henry of
+Almayne; and he would have met both rather than have broken his
+faith.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then,&rdquo; said Henry, still with the same mocking
+tone, &ldquo;how was it that my worthless existence became known
+to his Grace?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I knew of your having vanished from Evesham
+Abbey,&rdquo; returned Edward: &ldquo;and thus knowing, I
+understood a letter, the writing of which had brought suspicion
+on Richard, and which was brought back to me when we were seeking
+into&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Into the deed of Simon and Guy,&rdquo; said
+Henry.&nbsp; &ldquo;Poor Henry!&nbsp; It was a foul crime; and
+Father Robert can bear me witness that I did penance for it, when
+that kindly heart of his was laid in St. Peter&rsquo;s
+Abbey.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then, Henry, thou own&rsquo;st thy kinship to us
+still,&rdquo; said Edward earnestly.&nbsp; &ldquo;Give me thine
+hand, man, and let me embrace my lovely little kinswoman&mdash;a
+queen in her trappings.&nbsp; Ah, Henry!&nbsp; Heaven hath dealt
+lovingly with thee in sparing thee thy child!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You have children left!&rdquo; said Henry quickly, and
+not withholding a hand&mdash;which, be it remarked, was as
+delicately shaped and well kept as that which took it.</p>
+<p>Twice had the beggar received a dole at Westminster at the
+obsequies of Edward&rsquo;s little sons; yea, though he and all
+his brethren of the dish had all the winter before had alms given
+them to purchase their prayers for the health of the last.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Three&mdash;but three out of six,&rdquo; answered
+Edward; &ldquo;nor dare I reckon on the life of the frail babe
+that England hailed yesterday as my heir.&nbsp; I sometimes deem
+that the blight of broken covenants has fallen on my
+sons.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;They were none of your breaking,&rdquo; said Henry.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Say&rsquo;st thou so!&rdquo; exclaimed Edward, looking
+up, with the animation of a man hearing an acquittal from a
+quarter whose sincerity he could thoroughly trust.</p>
+<p>But Henry made no courtly answer.&nbsp; &ldquo;Pshaw! no
+living man that had to deal with or for your father could keep a
+covenant.&nbsp; You were but the spear-point of the broken reed,
+good cousin; and we pitied and excused you
+accordingly.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Your father did,&rdquo; said Edward hoarsely.&nbsp; He
+could brook pity from the great Simon better than from the blind
+beggar.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, marry, that did he,&rdquo; returned Henry,
+&ldquo;as he closed his visor that last morn, after looking out
+on that wild Welsh border scum that my fair brother-in-law had
+marshalled against us.&nbsp; &lsquo;By the arm of St.
+James,&rsquo; said he, &lsquo;if Edward take not heed, that
+rascaille will deal with us in a way that will be worse for him
+than for us!&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A true foreboding,&rdquo; said the King.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Henry, do thou come and be with me.&nbsp; All are
+gone!&nbsp; Scarce a face that I left in England has welcomed me
+on my return.&nbsp; Come, thou, in what guise thou
+wilt&mdash;earl, counsellor, or bedesman&mdash;only be with me,
+and speak to me thy father&rsquo;s words.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Who&mdash;I, my Lord?&rdquo; returned Henry.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I am no man to speak my father&rsquo;s words!&nbsp; They
+flew high over my head, and were only caught by grave youths such
+as yourself.&nbsp; I, who was never trusted with so much as a
+convoy.&nbsp; No, no; all the counsel I shall ever give, is to
+the beggars, which coat-of-arms is like to rain clipped silver,
+and which honest round penny pieces!&nbsp; Poor Richard! he bore
+the best brain of us all, and might have served your
+purpose.&nbsp; Sit down, and tell me of the lad.&mdash;Bessee,
+little one, bring out the joint-stool for the holy
+Father.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And Henry de Montfort made way on the rude bench outside his
+hut, with all the ease and courtesy of the Earl of Leicester
+receiving his kinsman the King.&nbsp; But meantime, the dog,
+which had been straining in the leash, held by Edward throughout
+the conference, leapt forward, and vehemently solicited the
+beggar&rsquo;s caresses.&nbsp; &ldquo;Ah, Leonillo!&rdquo; he
+said, recognizing him at once, &ldquo;thou hast lost thy
+master!&nbsp; Poor dog! thou art the one truly loyal to thy
+master&rsquo;s blood!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It was Richard&rsquo;s charge to take him to
+thee,&rdquo; said Edward: &ldquo;but if he be burdensome to thee,
+I would gladly cherish him, or would commit him to faithful
+Gourdon, with whom he might be happier.&nbsp; Since he lost his
+master the poor hound hath much pined away, and will take food
+from none but me, or little John of Dunster.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Leonillo, however, who seemed to have an unfailing instinct
+for a Montfort, was willingly accepting the eager and delighted
+attentions of the little girl; though he preferred those of her
+father, and cowered down beneath his hand, with depressed ears
+and gently waving tail, as though there were something in the
+touch and voice that conferred what was as near bliss as the
+faithful creature could enjoy without his deity and master.</p>
+<p>Meantime, the Grand Prior discreetly removed his joint-stool
+out of hearing of the two cousins, and called the little maid to
+rehearse to him the Credo and Ave, with their English
+equivalents&mdash;a task that pretty Bessee highly disapproved
+after the fortnight&rsquo;s dissipation, and would hardly have
+performed for one less beloved of children than Father
+Robert.</p>
+<p>The good Grand Prior knew that the King would have much to say
+that would beseem no ear save his kinsman&rsquo;s; and in effect
+Edward told what none besides would ever hear respecting the true
+author of the attempts on his own life.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Spiteful fox.&nbsp; Such Simon ever was!&rdquo; was the
+beggar&rsquo;s muttered comment.&nbsp; &ldquo;Well that he knows
+not of my poor child!&nbsp; So, cousin, thou hast kept his
+counsel,&rdquo; he added in a different tone.&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+thank thee in the name of Montfort and Leicester.&nbsp; It was
+well and nobly done.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And Henry de Montfort held out his hand with the dignity of
+head of the family whose honour Edward had shielded.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It was for thy father&rsquo;s sake and
+Richard&rsquo;s,&rdquo; said Edward, receiving the acknowledgment
+as it was meant.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ah, well,&rdquo; said Henry, relapsing into his usual
+half-scoffing tone; &ldquo;in that boy our Montfort blood seems
+to have run clear of the taint it got from the she-fiend of
+Anjou.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thy share was from a mocking fiend!&rdquo; returned the
+King.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, and a fair portion it is!&rdquo; said the
+beggar.&nbsp; &ldquo;My jest and my song have borne me through
+more than my sword and spurs ever did&mdash;and have been more to
+me than English earldom or French county.&nbsp; Poor
+Richard!&rdquo; he added with feeling; &ldquo;I told him his was
+the bondage and mine the freedom!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alas!&nbsp; I fear that so it was,&rdquo; said
+Edward.&nbsp; &ldquo;My favour only embittered his foes.&nbsp;
+Had I known how it would end, I had never taken him to me; but my
+heart yearned to my uncle&rsquo;s goodly son.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Maybe it is well,&rdquo; said Henry.&nbsp; &ldquo;Had
+the boy grown up verily like my father, thou and he might have
+fallen out; or if not&mdash;why, you knights and nobles ride in
+miry bloody ways, and &rsquo;tis a wonder if even the best of you
+does not bring his harness home befouled and besmirched&mdash;not
+as shining bright as he took it out.&nbsp; Well, what didst thou
+with the poor lad?&nbsp; Cut him in fragments?&nbsp; You mince
+your best loved now as fine as if they were traitors.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No,&rdquo; said Edward; &ldquo;the boy lies sleeping in
+the Church of St. John, at Acre.&nbsp; I rose from my sickbed
+that I might lay him in his grave as a brother.&nbsp; Lights burn
+round him, and masses are said; and the brethren were left in
+charge to place his effigy on his tomb, in carven stone.&nbsp;
+One day I trust to see it.&nbsp; My brother Alexander of
+Scotland, Llewellyn of Wales, and I, have sworn to one another to
+bring all within these four seas into concord and good order; and
+then we may look for such a blessing on our united arms as may
+bear us onward to Jerusalem!&nbsp; Then come with us, Henry, and
+let us pray together at Richard&rsquo;s grave.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I may safely promise,&rdquo; said Henry, smiling,
+&ldquo;if this same Crusade is to be when peace and order are
+within the four seas.&nbsp; Moreover, thou wilt have ruined my
+trade by that time!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, Henry, cease fooling.&nbsp; See&mdash;if thou wilt
+not be thyself, I will find thee a lodge in any park of
+mine.&nbsp; None shall know who thou art; but thou shalt have
+free range, and&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And weary of my life!&nbsp; No, no, cousin.&nbsp; I am
+in thy power now; and thou canst throw me into prison as the
+attainted Lord de Montfort.&nbsp; Do so if thou wilt; but I were
+fooling indeed to give up my free range, my power, my authority,
+to be a poor suspected, pitied, maimed pensioner on thy
+bounty.&nbsp; Park, quotha! with none to speak to from morn to
+night.&nbsp; I can have my will of any park of thine I please,
+whenever I choose!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Edward would have persisted, but Henry silenced him
+effectually, with a sarcastic hint that his favours had done
+little for Richard.&nbsp; Then the King prayed at least that he
+would consider his child; but to the proposal of taking her to
+the palace, Henry returned an indignant negative: &ldquo;He had
+seen enough of the court ladies,&rdquo; he said.</p>
+<p>A hot glow of anger lighted Edward&rsquo;s cheek, for he loved
+his mother; but the blind beggar could not be the subject of his
+wrath, and he merely said, &ldquo;Thou didst not know my
+wife!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, I will believe the court as perfect as thou
+thinkest to make the isle; but Bessee shall not bide there.&nbsp;
+She is the blind beggar&rsquo;s child, and such shall she
+remain.&nbsp; Send me to a dungeon, as I said, and thou canst pen
+her in a convent, or make her a menial to thy princesses, as thou
+wilt; but while my life and my freedom are my own I keep my
+child.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I could find it in my heart to arrest thee,&rdquo; said
+Edward, &ldquo;when I look at that beautiful child, and think to
+what thou wouldst bring her.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;She is fair then,&rdquo; said the beggar eagerly.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Fair!&nbsp; She is the loveliest child mine eyes have
+looked on: though some of mine own have been very lovely.&nbsp;
+But she hath the very features of our royal line&mdash;though
+with eyes deep and dark, like thy father&rsquo;s, or my
+Richard&rsquo;s&mdash;and a dark glow of sunny health on her fair
+skin.&nbsp; She bears her, too, right royally.&nbsp; Henry, thou
+canst not wreck the fate of a child like that.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, assuredly,&rdquo; said Henry dryly.&nbsp; &ldquo;I
+have not done so ill by her hitherto, by thine own showing, that
+I should not be trusted with her for the future.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The parting would be bitter,&rdquo; began Edward
+&ldquo;but thou shouldst see her often.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Slay me, and make her a ward of the crown,&rdquo; said
+Henry.&nbsp; &ldquo;Otherwise I will need no man&rsquo;s leave
+for seeing my daughter.&nbsp; But ask her.&nbsp; If she will go
+with thee, I will say no more.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>King Edward was fond of children&mdash;most indulgent to his
+own, and kind to all little ones, who, attracted by the sweetness
+which his stern, grave, beautiful countenance would assume when
+he looked at them&mdash;always made friends with him
+readily.&nbsp; So he trusted to this fascination in the case of
+the little Lady Elizabeth.&nbsp; He held out his hands to her,
+and claimed her as his cousin; and she came readily to him, and
+stood between his knees.&nbsp; &ldquo;Little cousin,&rdquo; he
+said, &ldquo;wilt thou come home with me, to be with my two
+little maids, the elder much of thine age?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You are a red monk!&rdquo; said Bessee, amazed.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That&rsquo;s his shell, Bessee,&rdquo; said her father;
+&ldquo;he has come a-masking, and forgot his part.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I don&rsquo;t like masking,&rdquo; said Bessee, trying
+to get away.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then we will mask no more,&rdquo; said Edward.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Thou hast looked in my face long enough with those great
+black eyes.&nbsp; Dost know me, child?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Bessee cast the black eyes down, and coloured.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Dost know me?&rdquo; he repeated.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I think,&rdquo; she whispered at last, &ldquo;that you
+are masking still.&nbsp; You are like&mdash;like the King that
+was crowned at the Abbey.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well said, little maid!&nbsp; And shall I take thee
+home, and give thee pearls and emeralds to braid thy locks,
+instead of these heath-bells?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Father,&rdquo; said Bessee, trying to withdraw her
+little hands out of Edward&rsquo;s large one, which held both
+fast.&nbsp; &ldquo;O father, is he masking still?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, child; it is the King indeed,&rdquo; said
+Henry.&nbsp; &ldquo;Hear what he saith to thee.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And again Edward spoke of all that would tempt a child.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Father,&rdquo; said Bessee, &ldquo;if father
+comes!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, Bessee,&rdquo; said her father; &ldquo;I have done
+with palaces.&nbsp; No places they for blind beggars.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh, let me go! let me go!&rdquo; cried Bessee,
+struggling.&nbsp; And as the King released her hands, she flew to
+her father.&nbsp; &ldquo;He would lose himself without me!&nbsp;
+I must be with father.&nbsp; O King, go away!&nbsp; Father,
+don&rsquo;t let him take me!&nbsp; Let me cry for Jock of the
+Wooden Spoon, and Trig One Leg, and Hedgerow Wat!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hush, hush, Bess!&rdquo; said Henry, not desirous that
+his royal cousin should understand the strength of his body-guard
+of honour.&nbsp; &ldquo;The King here is as trusty and loyal as
+the boldest beggar among us.&nbsp; He only gave thee thy choice
+between him and me!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thee, thee, father.&nbsp; He can&rsquo;t want me.&nbsp;
+He has two eyes and two hands, and a queen and two little girls;
+and thou hast only me!&rdquo; and she clung round her
+father&rsquo;s neck.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Little one,&rdquo; said Edward, &ldquo;thou
+need&rsquo;st not shrink from me.&nbsp; I will not take thee
+away.&nbsp; Thy father hath a treasure, and &rsquo;tis his part
+to strive not to throw it away.&nbsp; Only should either thou or
+he ever condescend so far as to seek for counsel with this poor
+cousin of thine, send this token to me, and I will be with
+thee.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>But it was full nine years ere Edward saw that jewel
+again.&nbsp; Meantime he was not entirely without knowledge of
+his kinsman.&nbsp; On every great occasion the figure,
+conspicuous for the scrupulous cleanliness of the dark russet
+gown, and the careful arrangement of the hair and beard, and the
+fillet which covered the eyes, as well as for a lordly bearing,
+that even the stoop of blindness could not disguise, was to be
+seen dominating over all the other beggars, sitting on the steps
+of church or palace gates, as if they had been a throne;
+troubling himself little to beg, but exchanging shrewd remarks
+with all who addressed him, and raising many a laugh among the
+bystanders.&nbsp; Leonillo lay contented at his feet; but after
+just enough time had elapsed to show that he cared not for the
+King&rsquo;s remonstrance, he ceased to be accompanied by his
+little daughter, and was led by a boy in her stead.</p>
+<p>The King, making inquiries of the Grand Prior, learnt that
+pretty Bessee was daily deposited at the sisterhood of Poor
+Clares, where she remained while her father was out on his
+begging expeditions, and learnt such breeding as convents then
+gave.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;In sooth,&rdquo; said Sir Robert, &ldquo;honest Hal
+believes it is all for good-will and charity and love to the
+pretty little wench; and so it is in great part: but methought it
+best to give a hint to the mother prioress that the child came of
+good blood.&nbsp; She is a discreet lady, and knows how to deal
+with her; and truly she tells me their house has prospered since
+the little one came to them.&nbsp; Every feast-day morn have they
+found their alms-dish weightier with coin than ever she knew it
+before.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>When Edward repeated this intelligence to his queen, she
+recollected Dame Idonea&rsquo;s gossiping information&mdash;that
+brave Sir Robert, the flower of the House of Darcy, had only
+entered the Order of St. John, when fair Alda Braithwayte, in the
+strong enthusiasm of the Franciscan preaching, had pleaded a vow
+of virginity against all suitors, and had finally become a Sister
+of the Poor Clares.&nbsp; And after all his wars and wanderings,
+the regulations of his Order had ended by bringing the
+Hospitalier in his old age into the immediate neighbourhood of
+Prioress Alda; and into that distant business intercourse that
+the heads of religious houses had from time to time to carry on
+together.</p>
+<p>The world passed on.&nbsp; Eleanor de Montfort came from
+France, and the King himself acted the part of a father to her at
+her marriage with Llewellyn of Wales.&nbsp; He knew&mdash;though
+she little guessed&mdash;that the beggar, by whom her jewelled
+train swept with rustling sound, was the first-born of her
+father&rsquo;s house, and should have held her hand.&nbsp; Two
+years only did that marriage last; Eleanor died, leaving an
+infant daughter; and Llewellyn soon after was in arms against the
+English.&nbsp; Perhaps Edward bethought him of his cousin&rsquo;s
+ironical promise to go with him to the East after the
+pacification of the whole island, when he found himself obliged
+to summon the fierce Pyrenean to pursue the wild Welsh in their
+mountains.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XIV<br />
+THE QUEEN OF THE DEW-DROPS</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;This is the prettiest low-born lass that
+ever<br />
+Ran on a green sward.&rdquo;&mdash;<i>Winter&rsquo;s
+Tale</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">It</span> was the summer of 1283; the babe
+of Carnarvon had been accepted as the native prince, speaking no
+tongue but Welsh, and Edward had since been employed in
+establishing his dominion over Wales.&nbsp; His Whitsuntide was
+kept by the Queen&rsquo;s special entreaty at St.
+Winifred&rsquo;s Well.&nbsp; Such wonders had been told her of
+the miracles wrought by this favourite Welsh saint, that she
+hoped that by early placing her little Welsh-born son under such
+protection, she might secure for him healthier and longer life
+than had been the share of his brethren.</p>
+<p>So to Holy-well went the court and army.&nbsp; Some lodged in
+the convent attached to the well; but many and many more dwelt in
+tents, or lodged in cottages, or raised huts of boughs of
+trees.&nbsp; Noble ladies of Eleanor&rsquo;s suite were glad to
+obtain a lodging in rude Welsh huts; and as the weather was
+beautiful, there was plenty of gay feasting, dancing, and
+jousting on the greensward, when the religious observances of the
+day were over.&nbsp; Pilgrims thronged from all parts, attracted
+both by the presence of the court and the unusual tranquillity of
+Wales; and for nearly a mile around the Holy-well it was like one
+great motley fair, resorted to by persons of all stations.&nbsp;
+Beggars of course were there in numbers, and among them the
+unfailing blind beggar of Bethnal Green, who always made a
+pilgrimage in the summer to some station of easy access from
+London, but whom some wondered to see at such a distance.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Had he scented that the court was coming?&rdquo; asked
+the young nobles.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not he; he never haunted courts.&nbsp; He would have
+kept away had he known that such a gabbling flock of popinjays
+were on the wing thither!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>But the young gallants were chiefly bent on speculating on the
+vision of loveliness that had flashed on the eyes of some early
+visitants at the well.&nbsp; A maiden in a dark pilgrim dress,
+and broad hat, which, however, could not entirely conceal a
+glowing complexion, at once rich and pure; perfect features,
+magnificent dark eyes and hair, and a tall form, which, though
+very youthful, was of unmistakable dignity and grace.&nbsp; She
+was always at the well exceedingly early in the morning, moving
+slowly round it on her beautiful bare feet, and never looking up
+from the string of dark beads&mdash;the larger ones of amber,
+which she held in her fingers&mdash;as her lips conned over the
+prayers connected with each.&nbsp; No ring was on the delicate
+hand, no ear-ring in the ear; there was no ornament in the dress,
+but such a garb was wont to be assumed by ladies of any rank when
+performing a vow; and its simplicity at once enhanced her beauty,
+and added to the general curiosity.&nbsp; Between four and six in
+the dewy freshness of morning seemed to be her time for devotion;
+and though the habits of the court were early, it was only the
+first astir who caught a sight of this Queen of the Dew-drops, as
+it was the fashion to call her.&nbsp; Late comers never caught
+sight of her, and affected incredulity when the younger and more
+active knights and squires raved about her.&nbsp; Then it was
+reported that the King himself had been seen speaking to her; and
+thereupon excitement grew the more intense, because
+Edward&rsquo;s exclusive devotion to his Queen had been such,
+that from his youth up the most determined scandal had never
+found a wandering glance to note in him.</p>
+<p>She was the Princess of France&mdash;of Navarre&mdash;of
+Aragon&mdash;in disguise; nay, at the Whit-Sunday banquet there
+were those who cast anxious glances to the door, expecting that,
+in the very land of King Arthur, she would walk in like his
+errant dames at Pentecost, to demand a champion.&nbsp; And when a
+joust was given on the sward, young Sir John de Mohun, the Lord
+of Dunster, announced his intention of tilting in honour of no
+one save the Queen of the Dew-drops.&nbsp; The ladies of the
+court were rather scandalized, and appealed to the King whether
+the choice of an unknown girl, of no acknowledged rank, should be
+permitted; but the King, strict punctilious man as he was, only
+laughed, and adjudged the Queen of the Dew-drops to be fully
+worthy of the honour.</p>
+<p>After this, early rising became the fashion of
+Holy-well.&nbsp; All the gentlemen got up early to look at the
+Queen of the Dew-drops; and all the ladies got up early to see
+that the gentlemen did not get into mischief; and the
+maiden&rsquo;s devotions became far from solitary; but she moved
+on, with a sort of superb unconcern, never lifting the dark
+fringes that veiled the eyes so steadily fixed on the beads that
+dropped through her fingers, until, as she finished, she raised
+up her head with a straightforward fearless look at the way she
+was going, so completely self-possessed that no one ventured to
+accost her, and to follow her at less than such a respectful
+distance, that she was always lost sight of in the wood.</p>
+<p>At last, late one evening, there was a sudden start of
+exultant satisfaction among some of the young men who were
+lounging on the green; for the most part not the nobles of the
+court, but certain young merchants of London and Bristol, who had
+followed the course of pilgrimage by the magnetism of fashionable
+resort.&nbsp; The Queen of the Dew-drops was seen, carrying a
+pitcher!&nbsp; Up started four or five gallants, offering
+assistance, and standing round her, wrangling with one another,
+and besetting her steps.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Let me pass, gentles,&rdquo; she said with dignity,
+&ldquo;I am carrying wine in haste to my father.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, fair one, you pass not our bounds without
+toll,&rdquo; said the portliest of the set.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hush, rudesby; fair dames in disguise must be treated
+after other sort.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Every variety of half-insulting compliment was pouring upon
+her; but she, with head erect, and steady foot, still quietly
+moved on, taking no notice, till a hand was laid on her
+pitcher.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Let go!&rdquo; then she said in no terrified
+voice.&nbsp; &ldquo;Let go, Sir, or I can summon help.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And as if to realize her words, the intrusive hand was thrust
+aside by a powerful arm, and a voice exclaimed&mdash;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;This lady is to pass free, Sir!&nbsp; None of your
+insolence!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A court-gallant,&rdquo; passed round the hostile
+bourgeoise; &ldquo;none of your court airs, Sir.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No airs&mdash;but those of an honest Englishman, who
+will not see a woman cowardly beset!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Will Silk-jerkin not bide a buffet!&rdquo; quoth the
+bully of the party, clenching his fist.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;As many as thou wilt,&rdquo; returned Silk-jerkin,
+&ldquo;so soon as I have seen the lady safe home!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ho! ho!&mdash;a fetch that!&rdquo; and the fellow, a
+coarse rude-looking man, though rather expensively dressed,
+flourished his fist in the face of the young man, but was
+requited that instant with a round blow that levelled him with
+the ground.&nbsp; The others fell back from the tall
+strong-limbed, open-faced youth, and the girl took the
+opportunity of moving forward, swiftly indeed, but so steadily as
+to betray no air of terror.&nbsp; Meantime, the young
+gentleman&rsquo;s voice might be heard, assuring his adversaries
+that he was ready to encounter one or all of them so soon as he
+had escorted the lady safe home.&nbsp; Perhaps she hoped that
+another attack would delay him; but if so, her expectations were
+disappointed, for in a second or two his quick firm tread
+followed her, and just as she had gained the mazy wood-path, he
+was beside her.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thanks, Sir,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;for the service
+you have done me, but I am now in safety.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, Lady, do me the grace of letting me bear your
+load.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thanks,&rdquo; again she said; &ldquo;but I feel no
+weight.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But my knighthood does, seeing you thus
+laden.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Spare your knighthood the sight, then,&rdquo; she said
+smiling, and looking up with a glance of brightness, such as her
+hitherto sedate face had never before revealed to him.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That cannot be!&rdquo; he exclaimed with
+fervency.&nbsp; &ldquo;You bid me in vain leave you till I see
+you safe; and while with you, all laws of courtesy call on me to
+bear your burthen!&nbsp; So, Lady&mdash;&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And he laid his hand upon the leathern thong that sustained
+the pitcher; but at that moment three or four heaps of rags, that
+had been lying under the trees by the woodland path, erected
+themselves, and one in especial, whom the young knight had
+observed as a frightful cripple seated by day near the well, now
+came forward brandishing his crutch in a formidable manner, and
+uttering a howl of defiance.&nbsp; But the lady silenced him at
+once&mdash;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Peace, good Trig, nothing is amiss!&nbsp; It is only
+this gentleman&rsquo;s courtesy.&nbsp; He hath done me good
+service on the green yonder!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>And as her strange body-guard retreated growling, she, perhaps
+to show her confidence, resigned her pitcher into the
+knight&rsquo;s hand.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;So, fair Queen of the Dew-drops,&rdquo; he said, half
+bewildered, &ldquo;thou dost work miracles!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, when the dew is on the grass, and the nightingale
+sings,&rdquo; she returned gaily; &ldquo;by day the enchantment
+is over.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>By this time they had reached a low turf hut; and the maiden,
+turning at the door, held out her hand, and said, &ldquo;Thanks,
+fair Sir, I must enter my enchanted palace alone; but grammercy
+for thy kind service, and farewell.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The maiden and the pitcher vanished.&nbsp; The knight watched
+the rude door in vain&mdash;he only saw a few streaks of light
+through the boards.&nbsp; Then he bethought him of questioning
+her guards, but when he reached their tree they were gone.&nbsp;
+It was fast growing dark, and he was one of the King&rsquo;s
+personal attendants, and subject to the strict regulations of his
+household; so, dazed and bewildered as he was, he walked hastily
+back to the hospice, where the King and Queen lodged.&nbsp;
+Supper had already begun, and the glare of lights dazzled his
+eyes.&nbsp; In his bewilderment, he served the King with mustard
+instead of honey from the great silver ship full of condiments,
+in the centre of the table.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;How&rsquo;s this, Sir John?&rdquo; said the King, who
+always had a kindly corner in his heart for this young
+knight.&nbsp; &ldquo;Are these the idle days of thy Crusade come
+again?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I could well-nigh think so!&rdquo; half-whispered Sir
+John.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;He looks moonstruck!&rdquo; cried that spoilt ten years
+old damsel, Joan of Acre, clasping her hands with mischievous
+fun.&nbsp; &ldquo;Oh! has he seen the Queen of the
+Dew-drops?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What dost thou know of the Queen of the Dew-drops, my
+Lady Malapert?&rdquo; said King Edward, marking the red flush
+that mounted to the very brow of the downright young knight.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Oh, I know that she is at the well every morning, and
+is as lovely as the dawn!&nbsp; Ay, and vanishes so soon as the
+sun is up; but not ere she has bewitched every knight of them
+all!&nbsp; And did not my Lord of Dunster hold the field in her
+honour against all comers?&nbsp; No wonder she appears to
+him.&mdash;Oh! tell us, Sir John! what like was she?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hush, Joan,&rdquo; said Queen Eleanor, bending forward,
+&ldquo;no infanta in my time ever said so much in a
+breath.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, Lady-mother; because you had to speak whole
+mouthfuls of grave Castillian words.&nbsp; Now, good English can
+be run off in a breath.&nbsp; Reyna del Rocio&mdash;that&rsquo;s
+more majestic, but not so like fairyland as Queen of the
+Dew-drops!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Princess Joan&rsquo;s mouth was effectually stopped this
+time.</p>
+<p>The adventure of the evening had led to the discovery of the
+hut of the Queen of the Dew-drops.&nbsp; The young knight had as
+usual been betimes at the well, but the maiden did not appear
+there.&nbsp; Then he questioned the cripple&mdash;who by day was
+an absolute helpless cripple&mdash;but the man utterly denied all
+knowledge of any such circumstance.&nbsp; He, why, poor wretch
+that he was, he never hobbled further than the shed close behind
+the well; he would give the world if he could get as far as the
+wood&mdash;he knew nothing about ladies or pilgrims&mdash;such a
+leg as his was enough to think about.&nbsp; And the display to
+which he forthwith treated the Knight of Dunster was highly
+convincing as to his incapacity.</p>
+<p>Into the wood wandered the much-confused knight, recognizing,
+step by step, the path of the night before.&nbsp; The turf hut
+was before him&mdash;the door was open&mdash;and in the doorway
+sat the maiden herself, spinning, the distaff by her side, the
+spindle dancing on the ground, and the pilgrim&rsquo;s hat no
+longer hiding her beauteous brow and wealth of dark braided
+hair.&nbsp; But, intolerable sight, seven or eight of last
+night&rsquo;s loungers were dispersed hither and thither in the
+bushes, gazing with all their eyes, endeavouring to attract her
+attention; some by conversations with one another; one
+richly-dressed Gascon squire, of the train of Edward&rsquo;s
+ally, the Count de B&eacute;arn, by singing a Proven&ccedil;al
+love ditty; while a merchant of Bristol set up a counter attempt
+with a long doleful English ballad.&nbsp; All the time the fair
+spinster sat in the doorway, with the utmost gravity, twisting
+her thread and twirling her spindle; but it might be observed
+that she had so placed herself as to have full command of the
+door, and to be able to shut herself in whenever she chose.</p>
+<p>No one had yet ventured to accost her.&nbsp; There was
+something in her air that rendered it almost impossible for any
+one to force himself upon her, and a sort of fear mingled with
+the impression she made.&nbsp; However, the young knight,
+although a bashful man by nature, had one advantage in his court
+breeding, and another in the acquaintance he had made last
+night.&nbsp; He walked straight up, and doffing his velvet cap,
+began, &ldquo;Greet you well, fair Queen.&nbsp; I could not but
+take your challenge to see whether your power lasted when the dew
+was off.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The damsel rose with due courtesy as he approached, but ere
+she had attempted an answer, nay, even before the words were out
+of his mouth, the Gascon was shouting in French that this was no
+fair play, he had stolen a march; and the merchant had sprung
+forward saying, &ldquo;Girl, beware, court gallants mean not well
+by country wenches.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou liest in thy throat,&rdquo; burst forth the
+knight.&nbsp; &ldquo;Discourteous lubber, to call such a queen of
+beauty a country wench!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Listen to me, girl.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Lady, hear me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hearken not to the popinjay foreigner.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>These, and many more tumultuary exclamations, threats, and
+entreaties, crowded on one another, and the various speakers were
+laying hand on staff or sword, and glaring angrily on one
+another, when the word &ldquo;Peace,&rdquo; in the maiden&rsquo;s
+clear silvery notes, sounded among them.&nbsp; They all turned as
+she stood in the doorway, drawn up to her full height.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Peace,&rdquo; she said; &ldquo;I can have no brawling
+here!&nbsp; My father was grievously sick yesterday, and is still
+ill at ease.&nbsp; One by one speak your business, and
+begone.&nbsp; You first, Sir,&rdquo; to the Gascon, she said in
+French.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ah! fair Lady, what business could be mine, save to
+tell you how lovely you are?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You have said,&rdquo; she answered, without a blush,
+waving him aside.&nbsp; &ldquo;Now you, Sir,&rdquo; to the
+tuneful merchant of Bristol.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I told you, Madam, he meant not well.&nbsp; Those
+aliens never do.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;You too have said,&rdquo; she answered.</p>
+<p>The merchant would have persisted, but a London merchant, a
+much more substantial and considerable character, pushed him
+aside, and the numbers being all against him, he was forced to
+give way.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Young woman,&rdquo; said the merchant, &ldquo;you are
+plainly of better birth and breeding than you choose to
+affect.&nbsp; Now I am thinking of getting married.&nbsp; I have
+ships at sea, and stuffs and jewels coming from Venice and Araby;
+and I am like to be Lord Mayor ere long; but there&rsquo;s that I
+like in your face and discreet bearing, and I&rsquo;ll make you
+my wife, and give you all my keys&mdash;your father
+willing!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Your turn&rsquo;s out, old burgher,&rdquo; said a big,
+burly, and much younger man, pressing forward.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Pretty wench!&nbsp; I&rsquo;m not like to be Lord Mayor,
+nor nothing of that sort; but I&rsquo;m a score of years nigher
+thine age, and a lusty fellow to boot, that could floor any man
+at single-stick, within the four seas.&nbsp; Ay, and have been
+thought comely too, though Joyce o&rsquo; the haugh did play me
+false; and I come o&rsquo; this pilgrimage just to be merry and
+forget it.&nbsp; If thou wilt take me, and come back to spite
+Joyce, thou shalt be hostess of the Black Bull, at Brentford,
+where all the great folk from the North ever put up when they
+come to town; the merriest and richest hostel, and will have the
+comeliest host and hostess round about London town!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The lady bowed her head.&nbsp; Perhaps those rosy lips were
+trying hard to keep from laughing.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A hostel&rsquo;s no place for a discreet dame to bide
+in,&rdquo; put forth an honest voice.&nbsp; &ldquo;Maiden, I know
+not who or what you are, but I came o&rsquo; this pilgrimage to
+please my old mother, who said I might do my soul good, and bring
+home a wife&mdash;better over the moor than over the
+mixen&mdash;and I know she would give thee a right good
+welcome.&nbsp; I&rsquo;m Baldric of the Cheddar Cliff, and we
+have held our land ever since the old days, or ever the Norman
+kings came here.&nbsp; Three hundred kine, woman, and seven score
+swine, and many an acre of good corn land under the
+hill.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The lady had never looked up while these suitors were
+speaking.&nbsp; When Baldric of Cheddar had done, she gave one
+furtive glance through her long eyelashes, as if to see if there
+were any more, and then her cheek flushed.&nbsp; There still
+remained the knight.&nbsp; Some others had slunk away when
+brought to such close quarters, but he stepped forth more
+hesitatingly, and said, &ldquo;Lady, I know not whether the bare
+rock and castle I have to offer can weigh against the ships, the
+hostel, or the swine.&nbsp; I have few of either; I am but a poor
+baron, but such as I am, I am wholly yours.&nbsp; Thine eyes have
+bound me to you for ever, and all I seek is leave to make myself
+better known, and to ask that your noble father may not deem me
+wholly unworthy to be your suitor.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The lady trembled a little, but she held her place in the
+doorway.&nbsp; &ldquo;Gentles,&rdquo; she said, &ldquo;I thank ye
+for the honour ye have done me, but I may not dispose of mine own
+self.&nbsp; My father is ill at ease, and can see no one; but he
+bids me tell you that he will meet all who have aught to say to
+him, under the trysting tree at Bethnal Green, the day after the
+Midsummer feast.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>With these words she retired into her hut, and closed the
+door.&nbsp; She was seen again no more that day; and on the next
+the hut stood open, empty, and deserted.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XV<br />
+THE BEGGAR&rsquo;S DOWRY</h2>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;&lsquo;But first you shall promise and have
+it well knowne<br />
+The gold that you drop shall all be your owne;&rsquo;<br />
+With that they replyed, &lsquo;Contented we bee;&rsquo;<br />
+&lsquo;Then here&rsquo;s,&rsquo; quoth the beggar, &lsquo;for
+pretty Bessee.&rsquo;&rdquo;</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><i>Old Ballad</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">The</span> day after Midsummer had come,
+and towards the fine elm tree that then adorned the centre of
+Bethnal Green, three horsemen were wending their way.&nbsp; Each
+had his steed a good deal loaded: each looked about him
+anxiously.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;By St. Boniface,&rdquo; said one, &ldquo;the
+girl&rsquo;s father is not there.&nbsp; Saucy little baggage, was
+she deluding us all?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Belike he is bringing too long a train of mules with
+her dowry to make much speed,&rdquo; quoth the merchant.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;He will think it needful to collect all his gear to meet
+the offers of Master Lambert of Cripple-gate.&nbsp; Ha!&nbsp; Sir
+Knight, well met!&nbsp; You are going to try your
+venture!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I must!&nbsp; So it were not all enchantment,&rdquo;
+said the knight, almost breathlessly, gazing round him.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Yet,&rdquo; he said, almost to himself, &ldquo;those eyes
+had a soul and memories that ne&rsquo;er came out of
+fairyland!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ha!&rdquo; exclaimed the innkeeper,
+&ldquo;there&rsquo;s old Blind Hal under the tree!&nbsp;
+I&rsquo;ll tell him to get out of our way.&nbsp; Hal!&rdquo; he
+shouted, &ldquo;here&rsquo;s a tester for thee, but thou&rsquo;st
+best keep out of the way of the mules.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What mules, Master Samson?&rdquo; coolly demanded Hal,
+who had comfortably established himself under the tree with his
+back against the trunk.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The mules that the brave burgess is going to bring his
+daughter&rsquo;s dowry on.&nbsp; They are cranky brutes, Hal; bad
+customers for blind men&mdash;best let me give thee a hand out of
+the way.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;But who is this burgess that you talk of?&rdquo; asked
+the beggar.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The father of the pilgrim lass that prayed at St.
+Winifred&rsquo;s Well,&rdquo; said Samson.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And was called Queen of the Dew-drops?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, ay, old fellow!&nbsp; Thou knowest every bird that
+flies!&nbsp; She is to be my wife, I tell thee, and a right warm
+corner shall she keep for thee at the Black Bull, for thou canst
+make sport for the guests right well.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I hope she will keep a warm corner for me,&rdquo; said
+the beggar; &ldquo;for no man will treat for her marriage save
+myself.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou!&nbsp; Old man, who sent thee here to insult
+us?&rdquo; cried the merchant.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;None, Master Lambert.&nbsp; I trysted you to meet me
+here if you purposed still to seek my child in
+marriage.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thy child?&rdquo; cried all three, vehemently.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My child!&rdquo; answered the beggar.&nbsp; &ldquo;Mine
+own lawful child.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>There was a silence.&nbsp; Presently Samson growled, &ldquo;I
+mind me he used to have a little black-eyed brat with
+him.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Caitiff!&rdquo; exclaimed the merchant;
+&ldquo;I&rsquo;ll have thy old vagabond bones in the Fleet for
+daring so to cheat his Grace&rsquo;s lieges.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;If you can prove a cheat against me I will readily abye
+it, Sir,&rdquo; returned the beggar.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Palming a beggar&rsquo;s brat off for a noble
+dame.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;So please you, Sir,&rdquo; interrupted the beggar,
+&ldquo;keep truth with you.&nbsp; What did the child or I ever
+profess, save what we were?&nbsp; No foul words here.&nbsp; I
+trysted you to meet me here, anent her marriage.&nbsp; Have you
+any offers to make me?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Aye, of a cell in the Fleet if you persist in your
+insolence!&rdquo; cried the merchant.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thanks,&rdquo; quietly said the beggar.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;And you, Master Samson?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;&rsquo;Tis a sweet pretty lass,&rdquo; said Samson,
+ruefully; &ldquo;and pity of her too, but you see a man like me
+must look to his credit.&nbsp; I&rsquo;ll give her twenty marks
+to help her to a husband, Hal, only let her keep out of my sight
+for ever and a day.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I thought I heard another voice,&rdquo; said the
+beggar.&nbsp; &ldquo;I trow the third suitor has made off without
+further ado.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not so, fair Sir,&rdquo; said a voice close to him,
+thick and choked with feeling.&nbsp; &ldquo;Your daughter is too
+dear to me for me thus to part, even were mine honour not
+pledged.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sir knight,&rdquo; interfered the merchant, &ldquo;you
+will get into a desperate coil with your friends.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I am my own master,&rdquo; answered the knight.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;My parents are dead.&nbsp; I am of age, and, Sir, I offer
+myself and all that is mine to your fair daughter, as I did at
+Saint Winifred&rsquo;s Well, as one bound both by honour and
+love.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;It is spoken honourably,&rdquo; said Hal; &ldquo;but,
+Sir, canst thou answer me with her dowry?&nbsp; Tell down coin
+for coin.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>He held up a heavy leathern bag.&nbsp; The knight, who had
+come prepared, took down another such bag from his
+saddle-bow.&nbsp; Down went one silver piece from the
+knight.&nbsp; Down went another from the beggar.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Stay, stay,&rdquo; cried Samson.&nbsp; &ldquo;I can
+play at that game too.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No, no, Master Samson,&rdquo; said the beggar;
+&ldquo;your pretensions are resigned.&nbsp; Your chance is
+over.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Mark after mark&mdash;crown after crown&mdash;all the Dunster
+rents; all the old hoards, with queer figures of Saxon kings, lay
+on the grass, still for each the beggar had rained down its
+fellow, and inexhaustible seemed the bags that he sat upon.&nbsp;
+Samson bit his lips, and the merchant muttered with
+vexation.&nbsp; It could not be fairly come by: he must be the
+president of a den of robbers; it should be looked to.</p>
+<p>The last bag of the knight lay thin and exhausted; the beggar
+clutched one bursting with repletion.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I could not put the lands and castle of Dunster into a
+bag and add thereto,&rdquo; said the knight, at last.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Would that I could, my sword, my spurs, and knightly blood
+to boot, and lay them at your daughter&rsquo;s feet.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Let them weigh in the balance,&rdquo; said the beggar;
+&ldquo;and therewith thy truth to thy word.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And will you own me?&rdquo; exclaimed the knight.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Will you take me to your daughter?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Nay, I said not so,&rdquo; returned Blind Hal.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;I am not in such haste.&nbsp; Come back on this day week,
+when I shall have learnt whether thou art worthy to match with my
+child.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Worthy!&rdquo; John of Dunster chafed and bit his lips
+at such words from a beggar.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, worthy,&rdquo; repeated the beggar, guessing his
+irritation.&nbsp; &ldquo;I like thee well, as a man of thy word,
+so far, but I must know more of him who is to mate with my pretty
+Bessee.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>It was that evening that a page entered the royal apartments,
+and giving a ring to the King, informed him that a blind beggar
+had sent it in, and entreated to speak with him.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Pray him to come hither,&rdquo; said the King;
+&ldquo;and lead him carefully.&nbsp; Thou, Joan, hadst better
+seek thy mother and sister.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;O sweet father,&rdquo; cried Joan, &ldquo;don&rsquo;t
+order me off.&nbsp; This can be no state business.&nbsp; Prithee
+let me hear it.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That must be as my guest pleases, Joan,&rdquo; he
+answered; &ldquo;and thou must be very discreet, or we shall have
+him reproaching me for trying to rule the realm when I cannot
+rule my own house.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Father, I verily think you are afraid of that
+beggar!&nbsp; I am sure he is as mysterious as the Queen of the
+Dew-drops!&rdquo; cried the mischievous girl.</p>
+<p>The curtain over the doorway was drawn back, and the beggar
+was led into the chamber.&nbsp; The King advanced to meet him,
+and took his hand to lead him to a seat.&nbsp; &ldquo;Good morrow
+to thee,&rdquo; he said; &ldquo;cousin, I am glad thou art come
+at last to see me.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thanks, my Lord,&rdquo; said the beggar, with more of
+courtly tone than when they had met before, and yet Joan thought
+she had never seen her father addressed so much as an equal;
+&ldquo;are any here present with you?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Only my wilful little crusading daughter, Joan,&rdquo;
+said Edward, beckoning to her, and putting her proud reluctant
+fingers into the hand of the beggar, who bent and raised them to
+his lips&mdash;as the fashion then was&mdash;while the maiden
+reddened and looked to her father, but saw him only smiling;
+&ldquo;she shall leave us,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;if thy matters
+are for my private ear.&nbsp; In what can I aid thee?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;In this matter of daughters,&rdquo; answered the
+beggar; &ldquo;not that I need aid of yours, but counsel.&nbsp; I
+would know if the heir of old Reginald Mohun&mdash;John, I think
+they call him&mdash;be a worthy mate for my wench.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Joan had in the meantime placed herself between her
+father&rsquo;s knees, where she stood regarding this wonderful
+beggar with the most unmitigated astonishment.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;John of Dunster!&rdquo; said the King, stroking down
+Joan&rsquo;s hair, &ldquo;thou knowst his lineage as well as I,
+cousin.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;His lineage, true,&rdquo; replied Henry; &ldquo;but
+look you, my Lord, my child, the light of mine eyes, may not go
+from me without being assured that it is to one who will, I say,
+not equal her in birth, but will be a faithful and loving lord to
+her.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Hath he sought her?&rdquo; asked the King.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Even so, my liege.&nbsp; The maid is scarce sixteen; I
+thought to have kept her longer; but so it was&mdash;old Winny,
+her mother&rsquo;s old nurse, fell sick and died in the winter;
+and the Dominican, who came to shrive her, must needs craze the
+poor fool with threats that she did a deadly sin in bringing my
+sweet wife and me together; and for all the Grand Prior, who,
+monk as he is, has a soldier&rsquo;s sense, could say of the love
+that conquered death, nothing would serve the poor woman to die
+in peace till my Bessee had vowed to make a six weeks&rsquo;
+station at her patroness&rsquo;s well, where we were wedded, and
+pray for her soul and her blessed mother&rsquo;s.&nbsp; So there
+we journeyed for our summer roaming; and all had been well, had
+you not come down on us with all the idle danglers of the court
+to gaze and rhyme and tilt about the first fair face they
+saw.&nbsp; Even then so discreet was the girl that no more had
+befallen, but as ill-luck would have it, my old Evesham
+keepsake,&rdquo; touching his side, &ldquo;burst forth again one
+evening, and left me so spent, that Bessee sent the boy to get me
+a draught of wine.&nbsp; The boy&mdash;mountebank as he
+is&mdash;lost her groat, and played truant; and she, poor wench,
+got into such fear for me that she went herself, and fell in with
+a sort of insolent masterful rogues, from whom this young knight
+saved her.&nbsp; I took her home safe enough after that, and
+thought to be rid of the knaves when they saw my wallet; and so
+truly I am, all save this lad!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;O father! it is true love!&rdquo; whispered Joan.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;What hast to do with true love, popinjay?&nbsp; And so
+John of Dunster came undaunted to the breach, did he,
+Henry?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not a whit dismayed he!&nbsp; Now either that is making
+light of his honour, or &rsquo;tis an honour higher than most
+lads understand.&nbsp; Cousin, I would have the child be loved as
+her father and mother loved!&nbsp; And methinks she affects this
+blade.&nbsp; The child hath been less like my merry lark since we
+met him.&nbsp; A plague on the springalds!&nbsp; But you know
+him.&nbsp; Has he your good word?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;John of Dunster?&rdquo; said the King.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Henry, didst thou not know for whose sake I had loved and
+proved him?&nbsp; He was Richard&rsquo;s pupil.&nbsp; I was
+forced to take the child with me, for old Sir Reginald had been
+unruly enough, and I thought would be the less troublesome to my
+father were his son in my keeping.&nbsp; But I half repented when
+I saw what a small urchin it was, to be cast about among grooms
+and pages!&nbsp; But Richard aided the little uncouth varlet,
+nursed him when sick, guarded him when well, trained him to be
+loyal and steadfast.&nbsp; The little fellow came bravely to my
+aid in my grapple with the traitor before Acre; and when the blow
+had fallen on Richard, the boy&rsquo;s grief was such that I
+loved him ever after.&nbsp; And of late I have had no truer
+trustier warrior.&nbsp; I warrant me he was too shy to tell thee
+that I knighted him last year in the midst of some of the best
+feats of arms I ever beheld against the Welsh!&nbsp; Whatever
+John de Mohun saith is sooth, and I would rather mate my daughter
+with him than with many a man of fairer speech.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then shall he have my pretty Bessee!&rdquo; said the
+beggar, lingering over the words.&nbsp; &ldquo;But one boon I
+would further ask, cousin; that thou breathe no word to him of my
+having sought thee.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The young Lord of Dunster had not been noted for choiceness of
+apparel; but when he repaired to the trysting-tree, none could
+have found fault with the folds of his long crimson tunic, worked
+with the black and gold colours of his family, nor with the sit
+of the broad belt that sustained his sword, assuredly none with
+his beautiful sleek black charger.</p>
+<p>But under the tree stood not the blind beggar, but the
+beggar&rsquo;s boy.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Blind Hal bids you meet him at the Spital, at your good
+pleasure,&rdquo; said the boy; and like the mountebank he was,
+tumbled three times head over heels.</p>
+<p>John de Mohun looked round and about, and saw no alternative
+but to obey.&nbsp; All his love was required to endure so strange
+a father-in-law, who did not seem in the least grateful for the
+honour intended to his daughter; but the knight&rsquo;s word was
+pledged, and he rode towards the Hospital.</p>
+<p>The court of the Hospital was full of steeds and
+serving-men.&nbsp; A strange conviction came over John that he
+saw the King&rsquo;s strong white charger&mdash;ay, and the
+palfreys of the elder princesses; and he asked the lay-brother
+who offered to take his horse, if the King were there.&nbsp; The
+brother only replied by motioning him towards the inner
+quadrangle.</p>
+<p>He passed on accordingly, and as he went, the bells broke
+forth into a merry peal.&nbsp; On the top of the steps leading to
+the arched doorway, he saw a scarlet cluster of knights, and
+among them the Grand Prior, robed as for Mass.&nbsp; A space was
+clear within the deep porch, and there stood the beggar in his
+russet suit.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Sir John de Mohun of Dunster,&rdquo; he said,
+&ldquo;thou art come hither to espouse my daughter?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I hope, so, Sir,&rdquo; said John, somewhat taken by
+surprise.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Come hither, maiden,&rdquo; said her father.</p>
+<p>The cluster of knights opened, and from within the church
+there appeared before the astonished bridegroom the stately form
+of King Edward, leading in his hand the dark-tressed, dark-haired
+maiden, dressed in spotless white, the only adornment she wore a
+circlet of diamonds round her flowing dark hair&mdash;the Queen
+indeed of the Dew-drops.&nbsp; And behind her walked with calm
+dignity the beautiful Princess Eleanor, now nearly a woman,
+holding with a warning hand the merry mischievous Joan.</p>
+<p>Well might John of Dunster stand dazzled and amazed, but
+hesitation or delay there was none.&nbsp; Then and there, by the
+Grand Prior himself, was the ceremony performed, without a word
+of further explanation.&nbsp; The rite over, when the bridegroom
+took the bride&rsquo;s hand to follow, as all were marshalled on
+their way, he knew not whither, she looked up to him through her
+dark eyelashes, and murmured, &ldquo;They would not have it
+otherwise!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Deem you that I would?&rdquo; said the knight
+fervently, pressing her hand.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;I deemed that you should know all&mdash;who I
+am,&rdquo; she faltered.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My wife, the Lady of Dunster.&nbsp; That is all I need
+to know,&rdquo; replied Sir John, with the honest trustworthy
+look that showed it was indeed enough to secure his heart-whole
+love and reverence.</p>
+<p>The great hall of the Spital was decked for the bridal
+feast.&nbsp; The bride and bridegroom were placed at the head of
+the table, and the King gave up his place beside the bride to her
+blind father.&nbsp; All the space within the cloister without was
+strewn with rushes, where sat and feasted the whole fraternity of
+beggars; and well did the Grand Prior and his knights do their
+part in the entertainment.</p>
+<p>Then when the banquet was drawing to its close, the blind
+beggar bade the boy that waited near him fetch his harp.&nbsp;
+And, as had often before been his practice, he sang in a deep
+manly voice, to the boy&rsquo;s accompaniment on his harp.&nbsp;
+But the song that then he sang had never been heard before, nor
+was its exact like ever heard again; though tradition has handed
+down a few of the main features, and (as may be seen by this
+veracious narration) somewhat vulgarized them:&mdash;</p>
+<blockquote><p>&ldquo;A poore beggar&rsquo;s daughter did dwell
+on a greene,<br />
+Who might for her faireness have well been a queene;<br />
+A blithe bonny lasse and a dainty was she,<br />
+And many one call&egrave;d her pretty Bessee.&rdquo;</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p>Even the King, who had so well guarded the secret, was
+entirely unprepared to hear the Montfort parentage thus publicly
+avowed; and the bride, who had as little known of her
+father&rsquo;s intentions, sat with downcast eyes, blushing and
+tearful, while the beggar&rsquo;s recitative went briefly and
+somewhat tremulously over his resuscitation, under the hands of
+the fair and faithful Isabel.&nbsp; Her hand was held by her
+bridegroom from the first, with a pressure meant to assure her
+that no discovery could alter his love and regard; but when the
+name of Montfort sounded on his ear, the hand wrung hers with
+anxiety; and when the entire tale had been told, and the last
+chord was dying away, he murmured, &ldquo;Look up at me, my
+loveliest.&nbsp; Now I know why I first loved thine eyes.&nbsp;
+Thou art dearer to me than ever, for the sake of my first and
+best friend!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>His words were only for herself.&nbsp; The King was saying
+aloud,</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Well sung, fair cousin!&nbsp; A health, my Lords and
+Knights, for Sir Henry de Montfort, Earl of Leicester.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not so, Lords and Knights!&rdquo; called this strange
+personage, the only one who would thus have contradicted the
+King; &ldquo;the Earl of Leicester has long ago been dead, as you
+have heard.&nbsp; If you drink, let it be to Blind Hal of Bethnal
+Green.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Nor could all the entreaties of daughter, son-in-law, nor
+King, move him from his purpose of living and dying as Blind Hal,
+the beggar.&nbsp; He had tasted too long of liberty, he said, to
+put himself under constraint.&nbsp; To live in Somersetshire, as
+his daughter wished, would have been banishment and solitude to
+one used to divert himself with every humour of the city; and to
+be, as he declared, a far more complete king of the beggars than
+ever his cousin Edward was over England.&nbsp; All he would
+consent to, was that a room in a lodge in Windsor Park should be
+set apart for him under charge of Adam de Gourdon, who had been
+present at this scene, and was infinitely rejoiced at the sight
+of a scion of the House of Montfort.&nbsp; For the rest, he bade
+every one to forget his avowal, which, as he said, he had only
+made that the blanch lion might share with the Mohun cross; and
+as he added to Princess Eleanor, &ldquo;that you court dames may
+never flout at pretty Bessee!&nbsp; Had the Cheddar Yeoman been
+the true man, none had ever known that she was a
+Montfort.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Would you have given her to the Cheddar Yeoman?&rdquo;
+burst out Joan furiously.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;That he will say so, to anger thee, is certain,
+Joan,&rdquo; said the King.&nbsp; &ldquo;Farewell, Henry.&nbsp;
+Remember, I hold thee bound to be my comrade when I can return to
+the Holy War.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ay, when you have tamed Scotland, even as you have
+tamed Wales,&rdquo; returned Henry.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;No fear of my good brother Alexander&rsquo;s realm
+needing such taming.&nbsp; Heaven forbid!&rdquo; said Edward.</p>
+<p>But the beggar parted from him with a laugh.</p>
+<h2>CHAPTER XVI<br />
+THE PAGE&rsquo;S MEMORY</h2>
+<blockquote><p>The pure calm picture of a blameless friend.</p>
+<p style="text-align: right"><i>Lyra Apostolica</i>.</p>
+</blockquote>
+<p><span class="smcap">Ten</span> years later, King Edward was
+walking in the park at Windsor with slow and weary steps.&nbsp;
+His rich dark brown hair and beard were lined with gray, his face
+was not only grave but worn and melancholy, and more severe than
+ever.&nbsp; The sorrow of his life, his queen&rsquo;s death, had
+fallen on him, and with her had gone much of softening influence;
+the only son who had been spared to him was, though a mere child,
+grieving him by the wayward frivolities not of a strong but of a
+weak nature; he had wrought much for his country&rsquo;s good,
+but had often been thwarted and never thanked; his mercies and
+benefits were forgotten, his justice counted as harshness, and
+hatred and opposition had met him everywhere.&nbsp; Above all,
+and weighting him perhaps most severely, was that his first step
+beyond his just bounds had been taken in the North.&nbsp; John
+Baliol was indeed king, but Edward in his zeal for discipline had
+bound Scotland with obligations&mdash;for her good indeed, but
+beyond his just right to impose; and the sense of aggression was
+embittering him against the Scottish resistance, while at the
+same time adding to his sadness.</p>
+<p>A knight came forth from one of the paths that led into that
+along which he was pacing with folded arms, and unwilling to
+break upon his mood, stood waiting, till Edward himself looked up
+and asked impatiently, &ldquo;So, Sir John, what now?&nbsp;
+Another outbreak of those intolerable Scotch?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Not so, my Lord; but the Bailiff of Acre awaits to see
+you.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Bailiff of Acre!&nbsp; What is the Bailiff of Acre to
+me?&nbsp; I cannot hear all their importunities for a
+crusade!&nbsp; Heaven knows how gladly I would hasten to the Holy
+War, if these savage Scots would give me peace at home.&nbsp; I
+am weary of their solicitations.&nbsp; Cannot you tell him I
+would be private, John?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;My Lord, he says he has matter for your private ear,
+concerning one whom you met in Palestine&mdash;and, my Lord, you
+will sure remember him&mdash;Sir Reginald Ferrers.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;The friend of Richard!&rdquo; said Edward, with a
+changed countenance.&nbsp; &ldquo;Bring him with you to your
+father-in-law&rsquo;s lodge, John.&nbsp; If there be aught to
+hear of the House of Montfort, it concerns him and you
+likewise.&nbsp; I was on my way thither.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>In a short time the woodland lodge, in one of the most
+beautiful glades of Windsor Forest, beheld the King seated on a
+bench placed beneath a magnificent oak, standing alone in its own
+glade, and beside him the Blind Beggar in his russet suit; far
+less changed than his royal cousin during these years.&nbsp;
+Since Edward&rsquo;s great sorrow, Henry de Montfort had held
+less apart from him; and whenever the King was at leisure to
+snatch a short retirement at one of his hunting lodges, he always
+sent an intimation to the beggar, who would journey down on a
+sober ass, and under the care of De Gourdon, now the chief of the
+hunting staff, would meet the King in some sylvan glade.&nbsp;
+Why it was a comfort to Edward to be with him, it would be hard
+to say; probably from the habit of old fellowship, for
+Henry&rsquo;s humour had not grown more courtly or less
+caustic.</p>
+<p>From under the trees came John de Mohun, now a brave, stout,
+hearty-looking English baron; and with him, wrapped in a battered
+and soiled scarlet mantle, a war-worn soldier, his complexion
+tanned to deep brown, his hair bleached with toil and sun, a scar
+on his cheek, a halt on his step&mdash;altogether a man in whom
+none would have recognized the bright, graceful, high-spirited
+young Hospitalier of twenty years since.&nbsp; Only when he
+spoke, and the smiling light beamed in his eye, could he be known
+for Sir Reginald Ferrers.</p>
+<p>He would have bent his knee, but Edward took his hand, and
+bowing his own bared head said, &ldquo;It is we who should crave
+a blessing from you, holy Father, last defender of the sacred
+land.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alas, my Lord,&rdquo; said Sir Raynald, as he made the
+gesture of blessing; &ldquo;Heaven&rsquo;s will he done!&nbsp;
+Had we but been worthier!&nbsp; Sir,&rdquo; he added, &ldquo;I am
+in no guise for a royal presence, but I have been sent home from
+Cyprus to recover from my wounds; and I had a message for you
+which I deemed you would gladly hear before I had joined mine
+Order.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A message?&rdquo; said Edward.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;A message from a dying penitent, craving pardon,&rdquo;
+replied Sir Raynald.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;If it concerns the House of Montfort, speak on,&rdquo;
+said Edward.&nbsp; &ldquo;None are so near to it as those present
+with me!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Thou hast guessed right, my Lord King!&rdquo; replied
+Sir Raynald.&nbsp; &ldquo;It does concern that House.&nbsp; Have
+I your license to tell my tale at some length?&rdquo;</p>
+<p>Edward gave permission; and a seat having been brought, Sir
+Raynald proceeded to speak of that last Siege of Acre, when, amid
+the multitudinous tribunals of mixed races, and the many
+sanctuaries which sheltered crime, the unhappy city had become a
+disgrace to the Christian name.&nbsp; The Sultan Malek Seraf was
+concentrating his forces on it; all the unwarlike inhabitants had
+been sent away; and the Knights of the two Orders, with the King
+of Cyprus and his troops, had shut themselves up for their last
+resistance&mdash;when among the mercenaries, who enrolled
+themselves in the pay of the Hospitaliers, came a sunburnt
+warrior, who had evidently had long experience of Eastern
+warfare, though his speech was English, French, or
+Proven&ccedil;al, according to the person who addressed
+him.&nbsp; Fierce and dreadful was the daily strife; the new
+soldier fought well, but he was not noticed, till one
+night.&nbsp; &ldquo;Ah, Sir!&rdquo; said the Hospitalier,
+&ldquo;even then our holy and beautiful house was in dire
+confusion, our garden trodden down and desolate!&nbsp; One night,
+I heard strange choking sobs as of one in anguish.&nbsp; I deemed
+that one of our wounded had in delirium wandered into the garden,
+and was dying there.&nbsp; But I found&mdash;at the foot of the
+stone cross we set beside the fountain, where the attempt on you,
+Sir, was made&mdash;this warrior lying, so writhing with anguish,
+that I could scarce believe it was grief, not pain, that thus
+wrought with him!&nbsp; I lifted him up, and spake of repentance
+and pardon.&nbsp; No pardon for him, he said; it was here that he
+had slain his brother!&nbsp; I spake long and earnestly with him,
+but he called himself sacrilegious murderer again and
+again.&nbsp; Nay, he had even&mdash;when after that wretched
+night you wot of, Sir, he left our House&mdash;in his despair and
+hope to leave remorse behind, he had become a Moslem, and fought
+in the Saracen ranks.&nbsp; All hope he spurned.&nbsp; No mercy
+for him, was his cry!&nbsp; I would have deemed so&mdash;but oh!
+I thought of Richard&rsquo;s parting hope; I remembered our
+German brethren&rsquo;s tale, how the Holy Father, the Pope, said
+there was as little hope of pardon as that his staff should bud
+and blossom; and lo, in one night it bore bud and flower.&nbsp; I
+besought him for Richard&rsquo;s sake to let me strive in prayer
+for him.&nbsp; All day we fought on the walls&mdash;all night,
+beside Richard&rsquo;s cross, did he lie and weep and groan, and
+I would pray till strength failed both of us.&nbsp; Day after
+day, night after night, and still the miserable man looked gray
+with despair, and still he told me that he knew Absolution would
+but mock his doom.&nbsp; He could fear, but could not
+sorrow.&nbsp; And still I spoke of the Saviour&rsquo;s love of
+man&mdash;and still I prayed, and all our house prayed with me,
+though they knew not who the sinner was for whom I besought their
+prayers.&nbsp; At last&mdash;it was the day when the towers on
+the walls had been won&mdash;I came back from the breach, and
+scarce rested to eat bread, ere I went on to the Cedar and the
+Cross.&nbsp; Beside it knelt Sir Simon.&nbsp;
+&lsquo;Father,&rsquo; he said, &lsquo;I trust that the pardon
+that takes away the sin of the world, will take away mine.&nbsp;
+Grant me Absolution.&rsquo;&nbsp; He was with us when, ere dawn,
+such of us as still lived met for our last mass in our beautiful
+chapel.&nbsp; He went forth with us to the wall.&nbsp; By and by,
+the command was given that we should make a sally upon the
+enemy&rsquo;s camp.&nbsp; We went back for the last time to our
+house to fetch our horses; I knew there could be no return, and
+went for one last look into our chapel, and at Richard&rsquo;s
+tomb.&nbsp; Upon it lay the knight, horribly scathed with Greek
+fire&mdash;he had dragged him there to die.&nbsp; He was dead,
+but his looks were upward; his face was as calm as
+Richard&rsquo;s was, my Lord, when we laid him down by the
+fountain.&nbsp; And now his message, my Lord.&nbsp; He bade me
+say, if I survived the siege, that he had often cursed you for
+the worse revenge of letting him live to his remorse&mdash;now he
+blessed you for sparing him to repent.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;And Richard&rsquo;s grave has passed to the
+Infidels!&rdquo; said Edward, after a long silence.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Even as the graves of our brethren&mdash;the holiest
+Grave of all,&rdquo; said the Knight Hospitalier.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Cheer up and hope, Father,&rdquo; said the King.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Let me see peace and order at home, and we will win back
+Acre, ay and Jerusalem, from the Infidels.&nbsp; Alas! our young
+hopes and joys may never return; but, home purified, then may God
+bless our arms beneath the Cross.&rdquo;</p>
+
+<div class="gapspace">&nbsp;</div>
+<p>Fifteen years more, and in the beautiful Westminster Abbey,
+amid the gorgeous tombs, there stood four sorrowful
+figures.&nbsp; A sturdy knight, with bowed head and mournful
+look, carefully guided a white-haired, white-bearded old man,
+while a beautiful matronly lady was handed by her tall handsome
+son.</p>
+<p>Among the richly inlaid shrines and monuments, they sought out
+one the latest of all, but consisting of one enormous block of
+stone, with no ornament save one slender band of inscription.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Ah!&rdquo; said the knight, &ldquo;well do I remember
+the shipping of that stone from Acre, little guessing its
+purpose!&rdquo;</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Then it is indeed a stone from the ruined Temple of
+Jerusalem,&rdquo; said the lady.&nbsp; &ldquo;Read the
+inscription, my Son.&rdquo;</p>
+<p>The young man read and translated&mdash;</p>
+<table>
+<tr>
+<td><p>&ldquo;Edwardus Primus.</p>
+</td>
+<td><p style="text-align: center">Malleus Scotorum</p>
+</td>
+<td><p>Pactum serva.</p>
+</td>
+</tr>
+<tr>
+<td><p>Edward the First.</p>
+</td>
+<td><p style="text-align: center">The Hammer of the Scots.</p>
+</td>
+<td><p>Keep covenant.&rdquo;</p>
+</td>
+</tr>
+</table>
+<p>&ldquo;It was scarce worth while to bring a stone from
+Jerusalem, to mark it with &lsquo;the Hammer of the
+Scots!&rsquo;&rdquo; said the lady.</p>
+<p>&ldquo;Alas, my cousin Edward!&rdquo; sighed the beggar.&nbsp;
+&ldquo;Ever with a great scheme, ever going earnestly on to its
+fulfilment; with a mind too far above those of other men to be
+understood or loved as thou shouldst have been!&nbsp; Alack, that
+the Scottish temptation came between thee and the brightness of
+thy glory!&nbsp; Art thou indeed gone&mdash;like Richard&mdash;to
+Jerusalem; and shall I yet follow thee there?&nbsp; Let us pray
+for the peace of his soul, children; for a greater and better man
+lies here than England knows or heeds.&rdquo;</p>
+<h2>FOOTNOTES</h2>
+<p><a name="footnote100"></a><a href="#citation100"
+class="footnote">[100]</a>&nbsp; Psalm cxxvi. 6, 7.</p>
+<p>***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE PRINCE AND THE PAGE***</p>
+<pre>
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+
+
+
+
+
+This etext was produced by David Price, email ccx074@coventry.ac.uk,
+from the 1909 Macmillan and Co. edition.
+
+
+
+
+
+THE PRINCE AND THE PAGE
+
+by Charlotte M. Yonge
+
+
+
+
+PREFACE
+
+
+
+In these days of exactness even a child's historical romance must
+point to what the French term its pieces justficatives.  We own that
+ours do not lie very deep.  The picture of Simon de Montfort drawn by
+his wife's own household books, as quoted by Mrs. Everett Green in
+her Lives of the Princesses, and that of Edward I. in Carte's
+History, and more recently in the Greatest of the Plantagenets,
+furnished the two chief influences of the story.  The household
+accounts show that Earl Simon and Eleanor of England had five sons.
+Henry fell with his father at Evesham.  Simon and Guy deeply injured
+his cause by their violence, and after holding out Kenilworth against
+the Prince, retired to the Continent, where they sacrilegiously
+murdered Henry, son of the King of the Romans--a crime so much
+abhorred in Italy that Dante represents himself as meeting them in
+torments in the Inferno, not however before Guy had become the
+founder of the family of the Counts of Monforte in the Maremma.
+Richard, the fourth son, appears in the household books as possessing
+dogs, and having garments bought for him; but his history has not
+been traced after his mother left England.  The youngest son, Amaury,
+obtained the hereditary French possessions of the family, and
+continued the line of Montfort as a French subject.  Eleanor, the
+only daughter, called the Demoiselle de Montfort, married, as is well
+known, the last native prince of Wales, and died after a few years.
+
+The adventure of Edward with the outlaw of Alton Wood is one of the
+stock anecdotes of history, and many years ago the romance of the
+encounter led the author to begin a tale upon it, in which the outlaw
+became the protector of one of the proscribed family of Montfort.
+The commencement was placed in one of the manuscript magazines which
+are so often the amusement of a circle of friends.  It was not
+particularly correct in its details, and the hero bore the peculiarly
+improbable name of Wilfred (by which he has since appeared in the
+Monthly Packet).  The story slept for many years in MS., until
+further reading and thought had brought stronger interest in the
+period, and for better or for worse it was taken in hand again.
+Joinville, together with the authorities quoted by Sismondi, assisted
+in picturing the arrival of the English after the death of St. Louis,
+and the murder of Henry of Almayne is related in all crusading
+histories; but for Simon's further career, and for his implication in
+the attempt on Edward's life at Acre, the author is alone
+responsible, taking refuge in the entire uncertainty that prevails as
+to the real originator of the crime, and perhaps an apology is
+likewise due to Dante for having reversed his doom.
+
+For the latter part of the story, the old ballad of The Blind Beggar
+of Bethnal Green, gives the framework.  That ballad is believed to be
+Elizabethan in date, and the manners therein certainly are scarcely
+accordant with the real thirteenth century, and still less with our
+notions of the days of chivalry.  Some liberties therefore have been
+taken with it, the chief of them being that Bessee is not permitted
+to go forth to seek her fortune in the inn at Romford, and the
+readers are entreated to believe that the alteration was made by the
+traditions which repeated Henry de Montfort's song.
+
+It was the late Hugh Millar who alleged that the huge stone under
+which Edward sleeps in Westminster Abbey agrees in structure with no
+rocks nearer than those whence the mighty stones of the Temple at
+Jerusalem were hewn, and there is no doubt that earth and stones were
+frequently brought by crusaders from the Holy Land with a view to the
+hallowing of their own tombs.
+
+The author is well aware that this tale has all the incorrectnesses
+and inconsistencies that are sure to attend a historical tale; but
+the dream that has been pleasant to dream may be pleasant to listen
+to; and there can be no doubt that, in spite of all inevitable
+faults, this style of composition does tend to fix young people's
+interest and attention on the scenes it treats of, and to vivify the
+characters it describes; and if this sketch at all tends to prepare
+young people's minds to look with sympathy and appreciation on any of
+the great characters of our early annals, it will have done at least
+one work.
+
+December 12th, 1865.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER I--THE STATELY HUNTER
+
+
+
+"'Now who are thou of the darksome brow
+  Who wanderest here so free?'
+"'Oh, I'm one that will walk the green green woods,
+  Nor ever ask leave of thee.'"--S. M.
+
+A fine evening--six centuries ago--shed a bright parting light over
+Alton Wood, illuminating the gray lichens that clung to the rugged
+trunks of the old oak trees, and shining on the smoother bark of the
+graceful beech, with that sidelong light that, towards evening, gives
+an especial charm to woodland scenery.  The long shadows lay across
+an open green glade, narrowing towards one end, where a path, nearly
+lost amid dwarf furze, crested heather, and soft bent-grass, led
+towards a hut, rudely constructed of sods of turf and branches of
+trees, whose gray crackling foliage contrasted with the fresh verdure
+around.  There was no endeavour at a window, nor chimney; but the
+door of wattled boughs was carefully secured by a long twisted withe.
+
+A halbert, a broken arrow, a deer-skin pegged out on the ground to
+dry, a bundle of faggots, a bare and blackened patch of grass, strewn
+with wood ashes, were tokens of recent habitation, though the
+reiterations of the nightingale, the deep tones of the blackbird and
+the hum of insects, were the only sounds that broke the stillness.
+
+Suddenly the silence was interrupted by a clear, loud, ringing
+whistle, repeated at brief intervals and now and then exchanged for
+the call--"Leonillo!  Leon!"  A footstep approached, rapidly
+overtaken and passed by the rushing gallop of a large animal; and
+there broke on the scene a large tawny hound, prancing, bounding, and
+turning round joyfully, pawing the air, and wagging his tail, in
+welcome to the figure who followed him.
+
+This was a youth thirteen years old, wearing such a dress as was
+usual with foresters--namely, a garment of home-spun undyed wool,
+reaching to the knee, and there met by buskins of deer-skin, with the
+dappled hair outside; but the belt which crossed one shoulder was
+clasped with gold, and sustained a dagger, whose hilt and sheath were
+of exquisite workmanship.  The cap on his head was of gray rabbit-
+skin, but a heron's plume waved in it; the dark curling locks beneath
+were carefully arranged; and the port of his head and shoulders, the
+mould of his limbs, the cast of his features, and the fairness of his
+complexion, made his appearance ill accord with the homeliness of his
+garb.  In one hand he carried a bow over his shoulder; in the other
+he held by the ears a couple of dead rabbits, with which he playfully
+tantalized the dog, holding them to his nose, and then lifting them
+high aloft, while the hound, perfectly entering into the sport, leapt
+high after them with open mouth, and pretended to seize them, then
+bounded and careered round his young master with gay short barks,
+till both were out of breath; and the boy, flinging the rabbits on
+the turf, threw himself down on it, with one arm upon the neck of the
+panting dog, whose great gasps, like a sobbing of laughter, heaved
+his whole frame.
+
+ "Ay, good Leonillo, take your rest!" said the boy:  "we have done
+yeoman's service to-day, and shown ourselves fit to earn our own
+livelihood!  We are outlaws now, my lion of the Pyrenees; and you at
+least lead a merrier life than in the castle halls, when we hunted
+for sport, and not for sustenance!  Well-a-day, my Leon!"--as the
+creature closed his mouth, and looked wistfully up at him with almost
+human sympathy and intelligence--"would that we knew where are all
+that were once wont to go with us to the chase!  But for them, I
+would be well content to be a bold forester all my days!  Better so,
+than to be ever vexed and crossed in every design for the country's
+weal--distrusted above--betrayed beneath!  Alack! alack! my noble
+father, why wert thou wrecked in every hope--in every aim!"
+
+These murmurings were broken off as Leonillo suddenly crested his
+head, and changed his expression of repose for one of intense
+listening.
+
+"Already!" exclaimed the boy, springing to his feet, as Leonillo
+bounded forward to meet a stout hardy forester, who was advancing
+from the opposite end of the glade.  This was a man of the largest
+and most sinewy mould, his face tanned by sun and wind to a uniform
+hard ruddy brown, and his shaggy black hair untrimmed, as well as his
+dark bristly beard.  His jerkin was of rough leather, crossed by a
+belt, sustaining sword and dagger; a bow and arrows were at his back;
+a huge quarter-staff in his hand; and his whole aspect was that of a
+ferocious outlaw, whose hand was against every man.
+
+But the youth started towards him gleefully, as if the very sight of
+him had dispelled all melancholy musings, and shouted merrily,
+"Welcome--welcome, Adam!  Why so early home?  Have the Alton boors
+turned surly? or are the King's prickers abroad, and the
+neighbourhood unwholesome for bold clerks of St. Nicholas?"
+
+"Worse!" was the gruff mutter in reply.  "Down, Leon:  I am in no
+mood for thy freaks!"
+
+"What is it, Adam?  Have the keepers carried their complaints to the
+King, of the venison we have consumed, with small thanks to him?"
+
+"Prince Edward is at Alton!  What think you of that, Sir?  Come to
+seek through copse and brake for the arrant deer-stealer and outlaw,
+and all his gang!"
+
+"Why, there's preferment for you!" said the boy, laughing.  "High
+game for the heir of the throne!  And his gang!  Hold up your head,
+Leonillo:  you and I come in for a share of the honour!"
+
+"Hold up your head!" said the outlaw bitterly.  "You may chance to
+hold it as high as your father's is, for all your gibes and jests, my
+young Lord, if the Longshanks gets a hold of you, which our Lady
+forefend."
+
+"Nay, I think better of my Cousin Longshanks.  I loved him well when
+I was his page at Hereford:  he was tenderer to me than ever my
+brothers were; and I scarce think he would hang, draw, and quarter me
+now."
+
+"You may try, if you are not the better guided."
+
+"How did you hear these tidings?" inquired the boy, changing his mood
+to a graver one.
+
+"From the monk to whom you confessed a fortnight back.  Did you let
+him know your lineage?"
+
+"How could I do otherwise?"
+
+"He looked like a man who would keep a secret; and yet--"
+
+"Shame--shame to doubt the good father!"
+
+"Nay, I do not say that I do; but I would have the secret in as few
+men's power as may be.  Nevertheless, I thank the good brother.  He
+called out to me as he saw me about to enter the town, that if I had
+any tenderness for my own life, I had best not show myself there; and
+he went on to tell me how the Prince was come to his hunting-lodge,
+with hawk and hound indeed, but for the following of men rather than
+bird or beast."
+
+"And what would you have me do?"
+
+"Be instantly on the way to the coast, ere the search begins; and
+there, either for love of Sir Simon the righteous or for that gilt
+knife of yours, we may get ferried over to the Isle of Wight, whence-
+-But what ails the dog!  Whist, Leonillo!  Hold your throat:  I can
+hear naught but your clamour!"
+
+The hound was in fact barking with a tremendous lion-like note; and
+when, on reiterated commands from his master and the outlaw, he
+changed it for a low continuous growling like distant thunder, a step
+and a rustling of the boughs became audible.
+
+"They are upon us already!" cried the boy, snatching up and stringing
+his bow.
+
+"Leave me to deal with him!" returned the outlaw.  "Off to Alton:
+the good father will receive you to sanctuary!"
+
+"Flee!--never!" cried the boy.  "You teaching my father's son to
+flee!"
+
+"Tush!--'tis but one!" said the outlaw.  "He is easily dealt with;
+and he shall have no time to call his fellows."
+
+So saying, the forester strode forward into the wood, where a tall
+figure was seen through the trees; and with uplifted quarter-staff,
+dealt a blow of sudden and deadly force as soon as the stranger came
+within its sweep, totally without warning.  The power of the stroke
+might have felled an ox, and would have at once overthrown the new-
+comer, but that he was a man of unusual stature; and this being
+unperceived in the outlaw's haste, the blow lighted on his left
+shoulder instead of on his head.
+
+"Ha, caitiff!" he exclaimed; and shortening the hunting-pole in his
+hand, he returned the stroke with interest, but the outlaw had
+already prepared himself to receive the blow on his staff.  For some
+seconds there was a rapid exchange; and all that the boy could detect
+in the fierce flourish of weapons was, that his champion was at least
+equally matched.  The height of the stranger was superior; and his
+movements, if less quick and violent, had an equableness that showed
+him a thorough master of his weapon.  But ere the lad had time to
+cross the heather to the scene of action, the fight was over; the
+outlaw lay stunned and motionless on the ground, and the gigantic
+stranger was leaning on his hunting-pole, regarding him with a grave
+unmoved countenance, the fair skin of which was scarcely flushed by
+the exertion.
+
+"Spare him! spare him!" cried the boy, leaping forwards.  "I am the
+prey you seek!"
+
+"Well met, my young Lord," was the stern reply.  "You have found
+yourself a worthy way of life, and an honourable companion."
+
+"Honourable indeed, if faithfulness be honour!" replied the boy.
+"Myself I yield, Sir; but spare him, if yet he lives!--O Adam, my
+only friend!" he sobbed, as kneeling over him, he raised his head,
+undid his collar, and parted the black locks, to seek for the mark of
+the blow, whence blood was fast oozing.
+
+"He lives--he will do well enough," said the hunter.  "Now, tell me,
+boy--what brought you here?"
+
+"The loving fidelity of this man!" was the prompt reply:- "a
+Poitevin, a falconer at Kenilworth, who found me sore wounded on the
+field at Evesham, and ever since has tended me as never vassal tended
+lord; and now--now hath he indeed died for me!" and the boy,
+endeavouring to raise the inanimate form, dropped heavy tears on the
+senseless face.
+
+"True," rigidly spoke the hunter, though there was somewhat of a
+quivering of the muscles of the cheek discernible amid the curls of
+his chestnut beard:  "robbery is not the wonted service demanded of
+retainers."
+
+"Poor Adam!" said the youth with a flash of spirit, "at least he
+never stripped the peaceful homestead and humble farmer, like the
+royal purveyors!"
+
+"Ha--young rebel!" exclaimed the hunter.  "Know you what you say?"
+
+"I reck not," replied the boy:  "you have slain my father and my
+brothers, and now you have slain my last and only friend.  Do as you
+will with me--only for my mother's sake, let it not be a shameful
+death; and let my sister Eleanor have my poor Leonillo.  And let me,
+too, leave this gold with the priest of Alton, that my true-hearted
+loving Adam may have fit burial and masses."
+
+"I tell thee, boy, he is in no more need of a burial than thou or I.
+I touched him warily.  Here--his face more to the air."
+
+And the stranger bent down, and with his powerful strength lifted the
+heavy form of Adam, so that the boy could better support him.  Then
+taking some wine from the hunting-flask slung to his own shoulder, he
+applied some drops to the bruise.  The smart produced signs of life,
+and the hunter put his flask into the boy's hand, saying, "Give him a
+draught, and then--" he put his finger to his own lips, and stood
+somewhat apart.
+
+Adam opened his eyes, and made some inarticulate murmurs; then, the
+liquor being held to his lips, he drank, and with fresh vigour raised
+himself.
+
+"The boy!--where is he?  What has chanced?  Is it you, Sir?  Where is
+the rogue?  Fled, the villain?  We shall have the Prince upon us
+next!  I must after him, and cut his story short!  Your hand, Sir!"
+
+"Nay, Adam--your hurt!"
+
+"A broken head!  Tush, 'tis naught!  Here, your hand!  Canst not lend
+a hand to help a man up in your own service?" he added testily, as
+stiff and dizzy he sat up and tried to rise.  "You might have sent an
+arrow to stop his traitorous tongue; but there is no help in you!" he
+added, provoked at seeing a certain embarrassment about the youth.
+"Desert me at this pinch!  It is not like his father's son!" and he
+was sinking back, when at sight of the hunter he stumbled eagerly to
+his feet, but only to stagger against a tree.
+
+"You are my prisoner!" said the calm deep voice.
+
+"Well and good," said Adam surlily.  "But let the lad go free:  he is
+a yeoman's son, who came but to bear me company."
+
+"And learn thy trade?  Goodly lessons in falling unawares on the
+King's huntsmen, and sending arrows after them!  Fair breeding, in
+sooth!" repeated the stranger, standing with his arms crossed upon
+his mighty breadth of chest, and looking at Adam with a still, grave,
+commanding blue eye, that seemed to pierce him and hold him down, as
+it were, and a countenance whose youthfulness and perfect regularity
+of feature did but enhance its exceeding severity of expression.
+"You know the meed of robbery and murder?"
+
+"A halter and a bough," said Adam readily.  "Well and good; but I
+tell thee that concerns not the boy--since," he added bitterly, "he
+is too meek and tender so much as to lift a hand in his own cause!
+He has never crossed the laws."
+
+"I understand you, friend," said the hunter:  "he is a valued charge-
+-maybe the son of one of the traitor barons.  Take my advice--yield
+him to the King's justice, and secure your own pardon."
+
+"Out, miscreant!" shouted Adam; and was about to spring at him again,
+but the powerful arm collared him, and he recognized at once that he
+was like a child in that grasp.  He ground his teeth with rage and
+muttered, "That a fellow with such thews should give such dastardly
+counsel, and HE yonder not lift a finger to aid!"
+
+"Wilt follow me," composedly demanded the stranger, "with hands free?
+or must I bind them?"
+
+"Follow?" replied Adam, ruefully looking at the boy with eyes full of
+reproach--"ay, follow to any gallows thou wilt--and the nearest tree
+were the best!  Come on!"
+
+"I have no warrant," returned the grave hunter.
+
+"Tush! what warrant is needed for hanging a well-known outlaw--made
+so by the Prince's tender mercies?  The Prince will thank thee, man,
+for ridding the realm of the robber who fell on the treasurer bearing
+the bags from Leicester!"
+
+And meanwhile, with uncouth cunning, Adam was striving to telegraph
+by winks and gestures to the boy who had so grievously disappointed
+him, that the moment of his own summary execution would be an
+excellent one for his companion's escape.
+
+But the eye, so steady yet so quick under its somewhat drooping
+eyelid, detected the simple stratagem.
+
+"I trow the Prince might thank me more for bringing in this charge of
+thine."
+
+"Small thanks, I trow, for laying hands on a poor orphan--the son of
+a Poitevin man-at-arms--that I kept with me for love of his father,
+though he is fitter for a convent than the green wood!" added Adam,
+with the same sound of keen reproach and disappointment in his voice.
+
+"That shall we learn at Guildford," replied the stranger.  "There are
+means of teaching a man to speak."
+
+"None that will serve with me," stoutly responded Adam.
+
+"That shall we see," was the brief answer.
+
+And he signed to his prisoners to move on before him, taking care so
+to interpose his stately person between them, that there should be no
+communication by word, far less by look.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER II--THE LADY OF THE FOREST
+
+
+
+"Behold how mercy softeneth still
+  The haughtiest heart that beats:
+Pride with disdain may he answered again,
+  But pardon at once defeats!"--S. M.
+
+The so-called forest was in many parts mere open heath, thickly
+adorned by the beautiful purple ling, blending into a rich carpet
+with the dwarf furze, and backed by thickets of trees in the hollows
+of the ground.
+
+Across this wild country the tall forester conducted his captives in
+silence--moving along with a pace that evidently cost him so little
+exertion, and was so steady and even, that his companions might have
+supposed it slow, had they only watched it, and not been obliged to
+keep up with it.  Light of foot as the youth was, he was at times
+reduced to an almost breathless run; and Adam plodded along, with
+strides that worked his arms and shoulders in sympathy.
+
+After about three miles, when the boy was beginning to feel as if he
+must soon be in danger of lagging, they came into a dip of the ground
+where stood a long, low, irregular building, partly wood and partly
+stone, roofed with shingle in some parts, in others with heather.
+The last addition, a deep porch, still retained the fresh tints of
+the bark on the timber sides, and the purple of the ling that roofed
+it.
+
+Sheds and out-houses surrounded it; dogs in couples, horses, grooms,
+and foresters, were congregated in the background; but around this
+new porch were gathered a troop of peasant women, children, and aged
+men.  The fine bald brow and profile of the old peasant, the eager
+face of the curly-haired child, the worn countenance of the hard-
+tasked mother, were all uplifted towards the doorway, in which stood,
+slightly above them, a lady, with two long plaited flaxen tresses
+descending on her shoulders, under a black silken veil, that
+disclosed a youthful countenance, full of pure calm loveliness, of a
+simple but dignified and devotional expression, that might have
+befitted an angel of charity.  A priest and a lady were dispensing
+loaves and warm garments to the throng around; but each gift was
+accompanied by a gentle word from the lady, framed with difficulty to
+their homely English tongue, but listened to even by uncomprehending
+ears like a strain of Church music.
+
+Adam had expected the forester to turn aside to the group of
+servants, but in blank amazement saw him lead the way through the
+poor at the gate; and advancing to the porch with a courteous bending
+of his head, he said in the soft Provencal--far more familiar than
+English to Adam's ears--"Hast room for another suppliant, mi Dona?"
+
+The sweet fair face lighted up with a sudden sunbeam of joy; and a
+musical voice replied.  "Welcome, my dearest Lord:  much did I need
+thee to hear the plaints of some of these thy lieges, which my ears
+can scarce understand!  But why art thou alone? or rather, why thus
+strangely accompanied?"
+
+"These are the captives won by my single arm, whom, according to all
+laws of chivalry, thine own true knight thus lays at thy feet, fair
+lady mine, to be disposed of at thine own gracious will and
+pleasure."
+
+And a smile of such sweetness lightened his features, that a murmur
+of "Blessings on his comely face!" ran through the assembly; and Adam
+indulged in a gruff startled murmur of "'Tis the Prince, or the devil
+himself!" while his young master, comprehending the gesture of the
+Prince, and overborne by the lovely winning graces of the Princess,
+stepped forward, doffing his cap and bending his knee, and signing to
+Adam to follow his example.
+
+"Thou hast been daring peril again!" said the Princess, holding her
+husband's arm, and looking up into his face with lovingly reproachful
+yet exulting eyes.  "Yet I will not be troubled!  Naught is danger to
+thee!  And yet alone and unarmed to encounter such a sturdy savage as
+I see yonder!  But there is blood on his brow!  Let his hurt be
+looked to ere we speak of his fate."
+
+"He is at thy disposal, mi Dona," returned Edward:  "thou art the
+judge of both, and shall decide their lot when thou hast heard their
+tale."
+
+"It can scarce be a very dark one," replied Eleanor, "or thou wouldst
+never have led them to such a judge!"  Then turning to the prisoners,
+she began to say in her foreign English, "Follow the good father,
+friends--" when she broke off at fuller sight of the boy's
+countenance, and exclaimed in Provencal, "I know the like of that
+face and mien!"
+
+"Truly dost thou know it," her husband replied; "but peace till thou
+hast cleared thy present court, and we can be private.--Follow the
+priest," he added, "and await the Princess's pleasure."
+
+They obeyed; and the priest led them through a side-door, through
+which they could still hear Eleanor's sweet Castillian voice laying
+before her husband her difficulties in comprehending her various
+petitioners.  The priest being English, was hardly more easily
+understood than his flock; and her lady spoke little but langue
+d'oui, the Northern French, which was as little serviceable in
+dealing with her Spanish and Provencal as with the rude West-Saxon-
+English.  Edward's deep manly tones were to be heard, however, now
+interrogating the peasants in their own tongue, now briefly
+interpreting to his wife in Provencal; and a listener could easily
+gather that his hand was as bounteous, his heart as merciful, as
+hers, save where attacks on the royal game had been requited by the
+trouble complained of; and that in such cases she pleaded in vain.
+
+The captives, whom her husband had surrendered to her mercy, had been
+led into a great, long, low hall, with rudely-timbered sides, and
+rough beams to the roof, with a stone floor, and great open fire,
+over which a man-cook was chattering French to his bewildered English
+scullion.  An oak table, and settles on either side of it, ran the
+whole length of the hall; and here the priest bade the two prisoners
+seat themselves.  They obeyed--the boy slouching his cap over his
+face, averting it, and keeping as far as possible from the group of
+servants near the fire.  The priest called for bread, meat, and beer,
+to be set before them; and after a moment's examination of Adam's
+bruise, applied the simple remedy that was all it required, and left
+them to their meal.  Adam took this opportunity to growl in an
+undertone, "Does HE there know you?"  The reply was a nod of assent.
+"And you knew him?"  Another nod; and then the boy, looking heedfully
+round, added in a quick, undertone, "Not till you were down.  Then he
+helped me to restore you.  You forgive me, Adam, now?" and he held
+out his hand, and wrung the rugged one of the forester.
+
+"What should I forgive!  Poor lad! you could not have striven in the
+Longshanks' grasp!  I was a fool not to guess how it was, when I saw
+you not knowing which way to look!"
+
+"Hush!" broke in the youth with uplifted hand, as a page of about his
+own age came daintily into the hall, gathering his green robe about
+him as if he disdained the neighbourhood, and holding his head high
+under his jaunty tall feathered cap.
+
+"Outlaws!" he said, speaking English, but with a strong foreign
+accent, and as if it were a great condescension, "the gracious
+Princess summons you to her presence.  Follow me!"
+
+The colour rushed to the boy's temples, and a retort was on his lips,
+but he struggled to withhold it; and likewise speaking English, said,
+"I would we could have some water, and make ourselves meeter for her
+presence."
+
+"Scarce worth the pains," returned the page.  "As if thou couldst
+ever be meet for her presence!  She had rather be rid of thee
+promptly, than wait to be regaled with thy May-day braveries--honest
+lad!"
+
+Again the answer was only restrained with exceeding difficulty; and
+there was a scornful smile on the young prisoner's cheek, that caused
+the page to exclaim angrily, "What means that insolence, malapert
+boy?"
+
+But there was no time for further strife; for the door was pushed
+open, and the Prince's voice called, "Hamlyn de Valence, why tarry
+the prisoners?"
+
+"Only, Sir," returned Hamlyn, "that this young robber is offended
+that he hath not time to deck himself out in his last stolen gold
+chain, to gratify the Princess!"
+
+"Peace, Hamlyn," returned the Prince:  "thou speakest thou knowest
+not what.--Come hither, boy," he added, laying his hand on his young
+captive's shoulder, and putting him through the door with a
+familiarity that astonished Hamlyn--all the more, when he found that
+while both prisoners were admitted, he himself was excluded!
+
+Princess Eleanor was alone in another chamber of the sylvan lodge,
+hung with tapestry representing hunting scenes, the floor laid with
+deer-skins, and deer's antlers projecting from the wall, to support
+the feminine properties that marked it as her special abode.  She was
+standing when they entered; and was turning eagerly with outstretched
+hand and face of recognition, when Prince Edward checked her by
+saying, "Nay, the cause is not yet tried:" and placing her in a large
+carved oaken chair, where she sat with a lily-like grace and dignity,
+half wondering, but following his lead, he proceeded, "Sit thou
+there, fair dame, and exercise thy right, as judge of the two
+captives whom I place at thy feet."
+
+"And you, my Lord?" she asked.
+
+"I stand as their accuser," said Edward.  "Advance, prisoners!--Now,
+most fair judge, what dost thou decree for the doom of Adam de
+Gourdon, rebel first, and since that the terror of our royal father's
+lieges, the robber of his treasurers, the rifler of our Cousin
+Pembroke's jewellery, the slayer of our deer?"
+
+"Alas! my Lord, why put such questions to me," said Eleanor
+imploringly, "unless, as I would fain hope, thou dost but jest?"
+
+"Do I speak jest, Gourdon?" said Edward, regarding Adam with a lion-
+like glance.
+
+"'Tis all true," growled Adam.
+
+"And," proceeded the Prince, "if thy gentle lips refuse to utter the
+doom merited by such deeds, what wilt thou say to hear that, not
+content with these traitorous deeds of his own, he fosters the
+treason of others?  Here stands a young rebel, who would have
+perished at Evesham, but for the care and protection of this Gourdon-
+-who healed his wounds, guarded him, robbed for him, for him spurned
+the offer of amnesty, and finally, set on thine own husband in Alton
+Wood--all to shelter yonder young traitor from the hands of justice!
+Speak the sentence he merits, most just of judges!"
+
+"The sentence he merits?" said Eleanor, with swimming eyes.  "Oh!
+would that I were indeed monarch, to dispense life or death!  What he
+merits he shall have, from my whole heart--mine own poor esteem for
+his fidelity, and our joint entreaties to the King for his pardon!
+Brave man--thou shalt come with me to seek thy pardon from King
+Henry!"
+
+"Thanks, Lady," said Adam with rude courtesy; "but it were better to
+seek my young lord's."
+
+"My own dear young cousin!" exclaimed Eleanor, laying aside her
+assumed judicial power, and again holding out her hands to him, "we
+deemed you slain!"
+
+"Yes, come hither," said Edward, "my jailer at Hereford--the rebel
+who drew his maiden sword against his King and uncle--the outlaw who
+would try whether Leicester fits as well as Huntingdon with a bandit
+life!  What hast thou to say for thyself, Richard de Montfort?"
+
+"That my fate, be it what it may, must not stand in the way of Adam's
+pardon!" said Richard, standing still, without response to the
+Princess's invitation.  "My Lord, you have spoken much of his noble
+devotion to me for my father's sake; but you know not the half of
+what he has done and dared for me.  Oh! plead for him, Lady!"
+
+"Plead for him!" said Eleanor:  "that will I do with all my heart;
+and well do I know that the good old King will weep with gratitude to
+him for having preserved the life of his young nephew.  Yes, Richard,
+oft have we grieved for thee, my husband's kind young companion in
+his captivity, and mourned that no tidings could be gained of thee!"
+
+It was not Richard who replied to this winning address.  He stood
+flushed, irresolute, with eyes resolutely cast down, as if to avoid
+seeing the Princess's sweet face.
+
+Adam, however, spoke:  "Then, Lady, I am indeed beholden to you;
+provided that the boy is safe."
+
+"He is safe," said Prince Edward.  "His age is protection
+sufficient.--My young cousin, thou art no outlaw:  thine uncle will
+welcome thee gladly; and a career is open to thee where thou mayst
+redeem the honour of thy name."
+
+The colour came with deeper crimson to the boy's cheek, as he
+answered in a choked voice, "My father's name needs no redemption!"
+
+Simultaneously a pleading interjection from the Princess, and a
+warning growl from De Gourdon, admonished Richard that he was on
+perilous ground; but the Prince responded in a tone of deep feeling,
+"Well said, Richard:  the term does not befit that worthy name.  I
+should have said that I would fain help thee to maintain its honour.
+My page once, wilt thou be so again? and one day my knight--my trusty
+baron?"
+
+"How can I?" said Richard, still in the same undertone, subdued but
+determined:  "it was you who slew him and my brothers!"
+
+"Nay, nay!" exclaimed the Princess:  "the poor boy thinks all his
+kindred are slain!"
+
+"And they are not!" cried Richard, raising his face with sudden
+animation.  "They are safe?"
+
+"Thy brother Henry died with--with the Earl," said Eleanor; "but all
+the rest are safe, and in France."
+
+"And my mother and sister?" asked Richard.
+
+"They are likewise abroad," said the Prince.  "And, Richard, thou art
+free to join them if thou wilt.  But listen first to me.  We tarry
+yet two days at this forest lodge:  remain with us for that space--
+thy name and rank unknown if thou wilt--and if thou shalt still look
+on me as guilty of thy father's death, and not as a loving kinsman,
+who honoured him deeply, I will send thee safely to the coast, with
+letters to my uncle, the King of France."
+
+Richard raised his head with a searching glance, to see whether this
+were invitation or command.
+
+"Thou art my captive," said Eleanor softly, coming towards him with a
+young matron's caressing manner to a boy whom she would win and
+encourage.
+
+"Not captive, but guest," said Edward; but Richard perceived in the
+tones that no choice was left him, as far as these two days were
+concerned.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER III--ALTON LODGE
+
+
+
+"Ever were his sons hawtayn,
+And bold for their vilanye;
+Bothe to knight and sweyn
+Did they vilanye."
+Old Ballad of Simon de Montforte.
+
+For the first time for many a month, Richard de Montfort lay down to
+sleep in a pallet bed, instead of a couch of heather; but his heart
+was ill at ease.  He was the fourth son of the great Earl of
+Leicester, Simon de Montfort; and for the earlier years of his life,
+he had been under the careful training of the excellent chaplain,
+Adam de Marisco, a pupil and disciple of the great Robert Grostete,
+Bishop of Lincoln.  His elder brothers had early left this wholesome
+control; pushed forward by the sad circumstances that finally drove
+their father to take up arms against the King, and strangers to the
+noble temper that actuated him in his championship of the English
+people, they became mere lawless rebels--fiercely profiting by his
+elevation, not for the good of the people, but for their own
+gratification.
+
+Richard had been still a mere boy under constant control, and being
+intelligent, spirited, and docile, had been an especial favourite
+with his father.  To him the great Earl had been the model of all
+that was admirable, wise, and noble; deeply religious, just, and
+charitable, and perfect in all the arts of chivalry and
+accomplishments of peace--a tender and indulgent father, and a firm
+and wise head of a household--he had been ardently loved and looked
+up to by the young son, who had perhaps more in common with him by
+nature than any other of the family.
+
+Wrongs and injuries had been heaped upon Montfort by the weak and
+fickle King, who would far better have understood him, if, like the
+selfish kinsmen who encircled the throne, he had struggled for his
+own advantage, and not for the maintenance of the Great Charter.
+Richard was too young to remember the early days when his elder
+brothers had been companions, almost on equal terms, to their first
+cousins, the King's sons; his whole impression of his parents'
+relations with the court was of injustice and perfidy from the King
+and his counsellors, vehemently blamed by his mother and brothers,
+but sometimes palliated by his father, who almost always, even at the
+worst, pleaded the King's helplessness, and Prince Edward's
+honourable intentions.  Understanding little of the rights of the
+case, Richard only saw his father as the maintainer of the laws, and
+defender of the oppressed against covenant breakers; and when the
+appeal to arms was at length made, he saw the white cross assumed by
+his father and brothers, in full belief that the war in defence of
+Magna Carta was indeed as sacred as a crusade, and he had earnestly
+entreated to be allowed to bear arms; but he had been deemed as yet
+too young, and thus had had no share in the victory of Lewes, save
+the full triumph in it that was felt by all at Kenilworth.
+Afterwards, when sent to be Prince Edward's page at Hereford, he was
+prepared to regard his royal cousin as a ferocious enemy, and was
+much taken by surprise to find him a graceful courtly knight,
+peculiarly gentle in manner, loving music, romances, and all
+chivalrous accomplishments; and far from the pride and haughtiness
+that had been the theme of all the vassals who assembled at
+Kenilworth, he was gracious to all, and distinguished his young page
+by treating him as a kinsman and favourite companion; showing him
+indeed far more consideration than ever he had received from his
+unruly turbulent brothers.
+
+When Edward had effected his escape, and had joined the Mortimers and
+Clares, Richard had gone home, where his expressions of affection for
+the Prince were listened to by his father, indeed, with a well-
+pleased though melancholy smile, and an augury that one day his brave
+godson would shake off the old King's evil counsellors, and show
+himself in his true and noble colouring.  His brothers, however,
+laughed and chid any word about the Prince's kindness.  Edward's
+flattery and seduction, they declared, had won the young De Clare
+from their cause.  And in vain did their father assure them that they
+had lost the alliance of the house of Gloucester solely by their own
+over-bearing injustice--a tyranny worse than had been exercised under
+the name of the King.
+
+With Henry of Winchester in their hands, however, theirs seemed the
+loyal cause; and Richard had, by the influence of his elders, been
+made ashamed of his regard for the Prince, and looked upon it as a
+treacherous rebellion, when Edward mustered his forces, and fell upon
+Leicester and his followers.  His father had mournfully yielded to
+the boy's entreaty to remain with him, instead of being sent away
+with his mother and the younger ones for security:  an honourable
+death, said the Earl, might be better for him than an outlawed and
+proscribed life.  And thus Richard had heard his father's exclamation
+on marking the well-ordered advance of the Royalists:  "They have
+learnt this style from me.  Now, God have mercy on our souls, for our
+bodies are the Prince's!"
+
+And when Henry, his eldest son, spoke words of confidence, entreating
+him not to despair, he had answered, "I do not, my son; but your
+presumption, and the pride of thy brothers, have brought me to this
+pass.  I firmly believe I shall die for the cause of God and
+justice."
+
+Richard had shared his father's last Communion, received his last
+blessing, and had stood beside him in the desperate ring, which in
+true English fashion died on the field of battle, but never was
+driven from it.  Since that time, the boy's life had been a wandering
+amid outlaws and peasants--all in one mind of bitter hatred to the
+court for its cruel vexations and oppressions, and of intense love
+and regret for their champion, Sir Simon the Righteous, of whose
+beneficence tales were everywhere told, rising at every step into
+greater wonder, until at length they were enhanced into miracles,
+wrought by his severed head and hands.  Each day had made the boy
+prouder of his father's memory, more deeply incensed against the
+Court party that had brought about his fall; and keen and bitter were
+his feelings at finding himself in the hands of the Prince himself.
+He chafed all the more at feeling the ascendency which Edward's lofty
+demeanour and personal kindness had formerly exerted over him,
+reviving again by force of habit; he hated himself for not having at
+once challenged his father's murderer; so as, if he could not do
+more, to have died by his hand; and he despised himself the more, for
+knowing that all he could have said would have been good-naturedly
+put down by the Prince; all he could have done would have been but
+like a gnat's efforts against that mighty strength.  Then how
+despicable it was to be sensible, in spite of himself, that this
+atmosphere of courtly refinement was far more natural to him--the son
+of a Provencal noble, and of a princess mother--than the rude forest
+life he had lately led.  The greenwood liberty had its charms; and he
+had truly loved Adam de Gourdon; but the soft tones and refined
+accents were like a note of home to him; and though he had never seen
+the Princess before--she having been sent to the Court of St. Louis
+during the troubles--yet the whole of the interview gave him an
+inexplicable sense of being again among kindred and friends.  He told
+himself that it was base, resolved that he would show himself
+determined to cast in his lot with his exiled brethren, and made up
+his mind to maintain a dignified silence during these two days, and
+at the end of them to leave with the Prince a challenge, to be fought
+out when he should have attained manly strength and skill in arms.
+
+In pursuance of this resolution, he appeared at the morning mass and
+meal still grave and silent, and especially avoiding young Hamlyn de
+Valence, who, as the son of one of the half brothers of Henry III.,
+stood in the same relationship to Prince Edward and to Richard, whose
+mother was the sister of King Henry.  Probably Hamlyn had had a hint
+from the Prince, for though he regarded young Montfort with no
+friendly eyes, he yielded him an equality of precedence, which hardly
+consorted with Richard's rude forest garments.
+
+The chase was the order of the day.  The Prince rode forth with a
+boar spear to hunt one of these monsters of the wood, of which vague
+reports had reached him, unconfirmed, till Adam de Gourdon had
+undertaken to show him the creature's lair.  He had proposed to
+Richard to join the hunt; but the boy, firm to his resolution of
+accepting no favour from him, that could be helped, had refused as
+curtly as he could; and then, not without a feeling of
+disappointment, had stood holding Leonillo in, as the gallant train
+of hunters rode down the woodland glade, and he figured to himself
+the brave sport in which they would soon be engaged.
+
+The most part of the day was spent by him in lying under a tree, with
+his dog by his side, thinking over the scenes of his earlier life,
+which had passed by his childish mind like those of a drama, in which
+he had no part nor comprehension, but which now, with clearer
+perceptions, he strove to recall and explain to himself.  Ever his
+father's stately figure was the centre of his recollections, whether
+receiving tidings of infractions of engagements, taking prompt
+measures for action, or striving to repress the violence of his sons
+and partizans, or it might be gazing on his younger boys with sad
+anxiety.  Richard well remembered his saying, when he heard that his
+sons, Simon and Guy, had been plundering the merchant ships in the
+Channel:  "Alas! alas! when I was more loyal to the law than to the
+Crown, I little deemed that I was rearing a brood who would scorn all
+law and loyalty!"
+
+And well too did Richard recollect that when the proposal had been
+made that he should become the attendant of the Prince at Hereford,
+his father had told him that here he would see the mirror of all that
+was knightly and virtuous; and had added, on the loud outcry of the
+more prejudiced brothers:  "It is only the truth.  Were it not that
+the King's folly and his perjured counsellors had come between my
+nephew Edward and his better self, we should have in him a sovereign
+who might fitly be reckoned as a tenth worthy.  It is his very duty
+to a misruled father that has ranged him against us."
+
+"Yet," thought Richard, "on the man who thus thought and spoke of him
+the Prince could make savage warfare; nay, offer his senseless corpse
+foul despite.  How can I tarry these two days in such keeping?  I had
+rather--if he will still keep me--be a captive in his lowest dungeon,
+than eat of his bread as a guest!  By our Lady, I will tell him so to
+his face!  I will none of his favours!  Alone I will go to the coast-
+-alone make my way to Simon and Guy, with no letters to the French
+king!  All kings, however saintly they may be called, are in league,
+and make common cause; as said my poor brother Henry, when the Mise
+of Lewes was to be laid before this Frenchman!  I will none of them!
+Pshaw! is this the Princess coming?  I trust she will not see me.  I
+want none of her fair words."
+
+He had prepared himself to be ungracious; but his courtly breeding
+was too much of an instinct with him for him not to rise, doff his
+cap, and stand aside, as Eleanor of Castille slowly moved towards the
+woodland path, with her graceful Spanish step, followed, but at some
+distance, by two of her women.  She turned as she was passing him,
+and smiled with a sweet radiance that would have won him instantly,
+had he not heard his elder brothers sneer at the cheap coin of royal
+smiles.  He only bowed; but Leonillo was more accessible, and started
+forward to pay his homage of dignified blandishments to the queenly
+sweetness that pleased his canine appreciation.  Richard was forced
+to step forth, call him in, and make his excuses; but the Princess
+responded by praises of the noble animal, and caresses, to which
+Leonillo replied with a grand gratitude, that showed him as nobly
+bred as his young master.
+
+"Thou art a gallant creature," said Eleanor, her hand upon the proud
+head; "and no doubt as faithful as beautiful!"
+
+"Faithful to the death, Lady," replied Richard warmly.
+
+"He is thine own, I trow," said the Princess,--"not thy groom's?  I
+remember, that when thy brave father brought my lord and me back from
+our bridal at Burgos, he procured two hounds in the Pyrenees, of
+meseems, such a breed."
+
+"True, Lady; they were the parents of my Leonillo," said Richard,
+gratified, in spite of himself.
+
+"How well I remember," continued Eleanor, "that first sight of the
+great Earl.  My brothers had teased me for going so far north, and
+told me the English were mere rude islanders--boorish, and
+unlettered; but, child as I was, scarce eleven years old, I could
+perceive the nobleness of the Earl.  'If all thy new subjects be like
+him,' said my brother to me, 'thou wilt reign over a race of kings.'
+And how good he was to me when I wept at leaving my home and friends!
+How he framed his tongue to speak my own Castillian to me; how he
+comforted me, when the Queen, my mother-in-law, required more dignity
+of me than I yet knew how to assume; and how he chid my boy
+bridegroom for showing scant regard for his girl bride!" said
+Eleanor, smiling at the recollection, as the beloved wife of eleven
+years could well afford to do.  "I mind me well that he found me
+weeping, because my Edward had tied the scarf I gave him on the neck
+of one of those very dogs, and the fatherly counsel he gave me.  Ah,
+Leonillo, thy wise wistful face brings back many thoughts to my mind!
+I am glad I may honour thee for fidelity!"
+
+"Indeed you may, Lady," said Richard.  "It was he that above all
+saved my life."
+
+"Prithee let me hear," said the Princess, who had already so moved
+on, while herself speaking, as to draw Richard into walking with her
+along the path that had been cleared under the beech trees.  "We have
+so much longed to know thy fate."
+
+"I cannot tell you much, Lady," returned Richard.  "The last thing I
+recollect on that dreadful day was, that my father asked for quarter-
+-for us--for my brother Henry and me.  We heard the reply:  'No
+quarter for traitors!' and Henry fell before us a dead man.  My
+father shouted, 'By the arm of St. James, it is time for me to die!'
+I saw him, with his sword in both hands, cut down a wild Welshman who
+was rushing on me.  Then I saw no more, till in the moonlight I was
+awakened by this dog's cool tongue licking the blood from my face,
+and heard his low whining over me."
+
+"Good dog, good dog!" murmured Eleanor, caressing the animal.  "And
+thou, Richard, thou wert sorely wounded?"
+
+"Sorely," said Richard; "my side had been pierced with a lance, a
+Welsh two-handed sword had broken through my helmet, and well-nigh
+cleft my skull; and the men-at-arms, riding over me I suppose, must
+have broken my leg, for I could not move:  and oh! I felt it hard
+that I had yet to die.  Then, Lady, came lights and murmuring voices.
+They were Mortimer's plundering Welsh robbers.  I heard their wild
+gibbering tongue; and I knew how it would be with me, should they see
+the white cross on my breast.  But, Lady, Leonillo stood over me.
+His lion bark chased them aside; and when one bolder than the rest
+came near the mound where we lay, good Leonillo flew at his savage
+throat.  I heard the struggle as I lay--the growls of the dog, the
+howls of the man; and then they were cut short.  And next I heard de
+Gourdon's gruff voice commending the good hound, whose note had led
+him to the spot, from the woods, where he was hiding after the
+battle.  The faithful beast sprang from him, and in a moment more had
+led him to me.  Then--ah, then, Lady! when Adam had freed me from my
+broken helm, and lifted me in his arms, what a sight had I!  Oh, what
+a field that harvest moon shone upon! how thickly heaped was that
+little mound!  And there was my father's face up-turned in the white
+moonlight!  O Lady, never in hall or bower could it have been so
+peaceful, or so majestic!  I bade Adam lay me down by his side, and
+keep guard through the night with Leonillo; but he said that the
+plunderers would come in numbers too great for him, and that he must
+care for the living rather than the dead; and withstand him as I
+would, he bore me away.  O Lady, Lady, foul wrong was done when we
+were gone!"
+
+"Think not on that," said Eleanor; "it bitterly grieved my lord that
+so it should have been.  Thou knowest, I hope, that he was the chief
+mourner when those honoured limbs were laid in the holy ground at
+Evesham Abbey.  They told me, who saw him that day, that his weeping
+for his godfather and his Cousin Henry overcame all joy in his
+victory.  And I can assure thee, dear Richard, that when, three
+months after, I came to him at Canterbury, just after he had been
+with thy mother at Dover, even then he was sad and mournful.  He said
+that the wisest and best baron in England had been made a rebel of,
+and then slain; and he was full of sorrow for thee, only then
+understanding from thy mother that thou hadst been in the battle at
+all, and that nothing had been heard of thee.  He said thou wert the
+most like to thy father of all his sons; and truly I knew thee at
+once by thine eyes, Richard.  Where wast thou all these months?"
+
+"At first," said Richard, "I was in an anchoret's cell, in the wall
+of a church.  So please you, Madame, I must not name names; but when
+Adam, bearing me faint and well-nigh dying on his back, saw the
+twinkling light in the churchyard, he knocked, and entreated aid.
+The good anchoret pitied my need at first, and when he learnt my
+name, he gave me shelter for my father's sake, the friend of all
+religious men.  I lay on his little bed, in the chamber in the wall,
+till I could again walk.  Meanwhile, Adam watched in the woods at
+hand, and from time to time came at night to see how I fared, and
+bring me tidings.  Simon was still holding out Kenilworth, and we
+hoped to join him there; but when we set forth I was still lame, and
+too feeble to go far in a day; and we fell in with--within short,
+with a band of robbers, who detained us, half as guests, half as
+captives.  They needed Adam's stout arm; and there was a shrewd,
+gray, tough old fellow, who had been in Robin Hood's band, and was
+looked up to as a sort of prince among them, who was bent on making
+us one with them.  Lady, you would smile to hear how the old man used
+to sit by me as I lay on the rushes, and talk of outlawry, as Father
+Adam de Marisco used to talk of learning--as a good and noble
+science, decaying for want of spirit and valour in these days.  It
+was all laziness, he said; barons and princes must needs have their
+wars, and use up all the stout men that were fit to bend a bow in a
+thicket.  If the Prince went on at this rate, he said, there would
+soon be not an honest outlaw to be found in England!  But he was a
+kind old man, and very good to me; and he taught me how to shoot with
+the long bow better than ever our master at Odiham could.  However, I
+could not brook the spoiler's life, and the band did not trust me;
+so, as we found that Kenilworth had fallen, as soon as my strength
+had returned to me, we stole away from the outlaws, and came
+southwards, hoping to find my mother at Odiham.  Hearing that Odiham
+too was gone from us, we have lurked in Alton Wood till means should
+serve us for reaching the coast."
+
+"Till thou hast found the friend who has longed for thee, and sought
+for thee," replied Eleanor.  "What didst thou do, young Richard, to
+win my husband's heart so entirely in his captivity?"
+
+"I know not, Lady, why he should take thought for me," bluntly said
+Richard, with a return of the sensation of being coaxed and talked
+over.
+
+"Methinks I can tell thee one cause," returned the Princess.  "Was
+there not a time when thou didst overhear him concerting with Thomas
+de Clare the plan of an escape, and thou didst warn them that thou
+wast at hand; ay, and yet didst send notice to thy father?"
+
+"Yes," answered Richard with surprise; "I could do no other."
+
+"Even so," said Eleanor.  "And thus didst thou win the esteem of thy
+kinsman.  'The stripling is loyal and trustworthy,' he has said to
+me; 'pity that such a heart should be pierced in an inglorious field.
+Would that I could find him, and strive to return to him something of
+what his father's care hath wrought for me.'  Richard, trust me, it
+would be a real joy and lightening of his grief to have thee with
+him."
+
+"Grief, Madame!" repeated Richard.  "I little thought he grieved for
+my father, who, but for him, would be--" and a sob checked him, as
+the contrast rose before him of the great Earl and beautiful Countess
+presiding over their large family and princely household, and the
+scattered ruined state of all at present.
+
+"He shall answer that question himself," said Eleanor.  "See, here he
+comes to meet us by the beechwood alley."
+
+And in fact, a form, well suited to its setting within the stately
+aisles of the beech trees, was pacing towards them.  The chase had
+ended, and hearing that his wife had walked forth into the wood, the
+Prince had come by another path to meet her, and his rare and
+beautiful smile shone out as he saw who was her companion.  "Art
+making friends with my young cousin?" he said affectionately.
+
+"I would fain do so," replied Eleanor; "but alas, my Lord! he feels
+that there is a long dark reckoning behind, that stands in the way of
+our friendship."
+
+Richard looked down, and did not speak.  The Princess had put his
+thought into words.
+
+"Richard," said the Prince, "I feel the same.  It is for that very
+cause that I seek to have thee with me.  Hear me.  Thou art grown
+older, and hast seen man's work and man's sorrows, since I left thee
+on the hill-side at Hereford.  Thou canst see, perchance, that a
+question hath two sides--though it is not given to all men to do so.
+Hearken then.--Thy father was the greatest man I have known--nay, but
+for the thought of my uncle of France, I should say the holiest.  He
+was my teacher in all knightly doings, and in all kingly thoughts,
+such as I pray may be with me through life.  It was from him I learnt
+that this royal, this noble power, is not given to exalt ourselves,
+but as a trust for the welfare of others.  It was the spring of
+action that was with him through life."
+
+"It was," murmured Richard, calling to mind many a saying of his
+father's.
+
+"And fain would he have impressed it on all around," added Edward:
+"but there were others who deemed that kingly power was but a means
+of enjoyment, and that restraint was an outrage on the crown.  They
+drew one way, the Earl drew the other, and, as his noble nature
+prompted him, made common cause with the injured.  It skills not to
+go through the past.  Those whom he joined had selfish aims, and
+pushed him on; and as the crown had been led to invade the rights of
+the vassals, so the vassals invaded my father's rights.  Oaths were
+extorted, though both sides knew they could never be observed; and
+between violences, now on one side, now on the other, the right
+course could scarce be kept.  The Earl imagined that, with my father
+in his hands, removed from all other influences, he could give
+England the happy days they talk of her having enjoyed under my
+patron St. Edward; but, as thou knowest, Richard, the authority he
+held, being unlawful, was unregarded, and its worst transgressors
+came out of his own bosom.  He could not enforce the terms on which I
+had yielded myself--he could not even prevent my father from being a
+mere captive; and for the English folk, their miseries were but
+multiplied by the tyrants who had arisen."
+
+"It was no doing of his," said Richard, with cheek hotly glowing.
+
+"None know that better than I," said the Prince; "but if he had
+snatched the bridle from a feeble hand, it was only to find that the
+steed could not be ruled by him.  What was left for me but to break
+my bonds, and deliver my father, in the hope that, being come to
+man's estate, I might set matters on a surer footing?  I had hoped--I
+had greatly hoped, so to rule affairs, that the Earl might own that
+his training had not been lost on his nephew, and that the Crown
+might be trusted not to infringe the Charter.  I had hoped that he
+might yet be my wisest counsellor.  But, Richard, I too had
+supporters who outran my commands.  Bitter hatred and malice had been
+awakened, and cruel resolves that none should be spared.  When I
+returned from bearing my father, bleeding and dismayed, from the
+battle, whither he had been cruelly led, it was to find that my
+orders had been disobeyed--that there had been foul and cruel
+slaughter; and that all my hopes that my uncle of Leicester would
+forgive me and look friendly on me were ended!"
+
+The Prince's lip trembled as he spoke, and tears glistened in his
+eyes; and the evident struggle to repress his feelings, brought home
+deeply and forcibly the conviction to Richard that his sorrow was
+genuine.
+
+He could not speak for some seconds; then he added:  "I marvel not
+that I am looked on among you as guilty of his blood.  Simon and Guy
+regard me as one with whom they are at deadly feud, and cannot
+understand that it was their own excesses that armed those merciless
+hands against him.  Even my aunt shrank from me, and implored my
+mercy as though I were a ruthless tyrant.  But thou, Richard, thou
+hast inherited enough of thy father's mind to be able to understand
+how unwillingly was my share in his fall, and how great would be my
+comfort and joy in being good kinsman to one of his sons."
+
+The strong man's generous pleading was most touching.  Richard bowed
+his head; the Princess watched him eagerly.  The boy spoke at last in
+perplexity.  "My Lord, you know better than I.  Would it be knightly,
+would it be honourable?"
+
+The Princess started in some indignation at such a question to her
+husband; but Edward understood the boy better, and said, "That which
+is most Christian is most knightly."  Then pausing:  "Ask thine
+heart, Richard; which would thy father choose for thee--to live in
+such guidance as I hope will ever be found in my household, or to
+share the wandering, I fear me freebooting, life of thy brothers?"
+
+Richard could not forget how his father had sternly withheld him from
+going with Simon to besiege Pevensey.  He knew that these two
+brethren had long been a pain and grief to his father; and began to
+understand that the nephew, with whom the Earl's last battle had been
+fought, was nevertheless his truest pupil.
+
+"Thou wilt remain," said Edward decisively; "and let us strive one
+day to bring to pass the state of things for which thy father and I
+fought alike, though, alas! in opposite ranks."
+
+"If my mother consents," said Richard, his head bent down, and
+uttering the words with the more difficulty, because he felt so
+strongly drawn towards his cousin, who never seemed so mighty as in
+his condescension.
+
+"Then, Richard de Montfort," said Edward gravely, "let us render to
+one another the kiss of peace, as kinsmen who have put away all
+thought of wrong between them."
+
+Richard looked up; and the Prince bending his lofty head, there was
+exchanged between them that solemn embrace, which in the early middle
+ages was the deepest token of amity.
+
+And with that kiss, it was as though the soul of Richard de Montfort
+were knit to the soul of Edward of England with the heart-whole
+devotion, composed of affection and loyal homage to a great
+character, which ever since the days of the bond between the son of
+the doomed King of Israel and the youthful slayer of the Philistine
+champion, has been one of the noblest passions of a young heart.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IV--THE TRANSLATION
+
+
+
+"Now in gems their relics lie,
+And their names in blazonry,
+And their forms in storied panes
+Gleam athwart their own loved fanes."
+Lyra Innocentium.
+
+If novelty has its charms, so has old age, and to us the great abbey
+church of Westminster has become doubly beloved by long generations
+of affection, and doubly beautiful by the softening handiwork of time
+and of smoke.
+
+Yet what a glorious sight must it not have been when it was fresh
+from the hands of the builder, the creamy stone clear and sharp at
+every angle, and each moulding and flower true and perfect as the
+chisel had newly left it.  The deep archway of the west front opened
+in stately magnificence, and yet with a light loftiness hitherto
+unknown in England, and somewhat approaching to the style in which
+the great French cathedrals were then rising.  And its accompaniments
+were, on the one hand the palace and hall, on the other hand the
+monastery, with its high walled courts and deep-browed cloisters, its
+noble refectory and vaulted kitchen, the herbarium or garden, shady
+with trees, and enriched with curious plants of Palestine, sloping
+down to the broad and majestic Thames, pure and blue as he pursued
+his silver winding way through emerald meadows and softly rising
+hills clothed with copses and woods.  To the east, seated upon her
+hills, stood the crowned and battlemented city, the massive White
+Tower rising above the fortifications.
+
+The autumn brilliance of October, 1269, never enlightened a more
+gorgeous scene than when it shone upon the ceremony still noted in
+our Calendar as the Translation of King Edward.  Buried at first in
+his own low-browed heavy-arched Norman structure, which he had built,
+as he believed, at the express bidding of St. Peter; the Confessor,
+whose tender-hearted and devout nature had, by force of contrast with
+those of his fierce foreign successors, come to assume a saintly halo
+in the eyes not merely of the English, but of their Angevin lords
+themselves, was, now to reign on almost equal terms with the great
+Apostle himself, as one of the hallowing patrons of the Abbey--nay,
+since at least his relics were entire and undoubted, as its chief
+attraction.
+
+The new chapel in his especial honour, behind the exquisite bayed
+apsidal chancel, was at length complete; and on this day he was to
+take possession of it.  An ark of pure gold, chased and ornamented
+with the surpassing grace of that period of perfect taste, had
+received the royally robed corpse, which Churchmen averred lay calm
+and beautiful, untainted by decay; and this was now uplifted by the
+arms of King Henry himself, of Richard King of the Romans his
+brother, and of the two princes, Edward and Edmund.
+
+It was a striking sight to see those two pairs of brothers.  The two
+kings, nearly of an age, and so fondly attached that they could
+hardly brook a separation, till the death of the one broke the
+wearied heart of the other, were both gray-haired prematurely-aged
+men, of features that time instead of hardening had rendered more
+feeble and uncertain.  Their faces were much alike, but Henry might
+be known from Richard by a certain inequality in the outline of his
+eyebrows; and their dress, though both alike wore long flowing gowns,
+the side seams only coming down as far as the thigh so as to allow
+play for the limbs, so far differed that Henry's was of blue, with
+the English lions embroidered in red and gold on his breast, and
+Richard was in the imperial purple, or rather scarlet, and the eagle
+of the empire on his breast testified to the futile election which he
+had purchased with the wealth of his Cornish mines.  Both the elders
+together, with all their best will and their simple faith in the
+availing merit of the action they were performing, would have been
+physically incapable of proceeding many steps with their burden, but
+for the support it received from the two younger men who sustained
+the feet of the saint, using some dexterity in adapting their
+strength so that the coffin might be carried evenly.
+
+One was the hunter we have already seen in Alton Wood.  His features
+wore their characteristic stamp of deep awe and enthusiasm, and even
+as he slowly and calmly moved, sustaining the chief of the weight
+with scarcely an effort of his giant strength, his head towering high
+above all those around, his eyes might be observed to be seeing,
+though not marking, what was before them, but to be fixed as though
+the soul were in contemplation, far far away.  He did not see in the
+present scene four princes rendering homage to a royal saint, who,
+from personal connection and by a brilliant display of devotion,
+might be propitiated into becoming a valuable patron amid
+intercessor; still less did it present itself to him as a pageant in
+which he was to bow his splendid powers, mental and bodily, to aid
+two feeble-minded old men to totter under the gold-cased corpse of a
+still more foolish and mischievous prince, dead two hundred years
+back.  No, rather thought and eye were alike upon the great invisible
+world, the echo of whose chants might perchance be ringing on his
+ear; that world where holy kings cast their crowns before the Throne,
+and where the lamb-like spirit of the Confessor might be joining in
+the praise, and offering these tokens of honour to Him to whom all
+honour and praise and glory and blessing are due.
+
+Of shorter stature, darker browed, of less regular feature and less
+clear complexion, so as to look as if he were the elder of the
+brothers, Prince Edmund moved by his side, using much exertion, and
+bending with the effort, so as to increase the slight sloop that had
+led to his historical nickname of the Crouchback, though some think
+this was merely taken from his crusading cross.  He bore the arms of
+Sicily, to which he had not yet resigned his claim.  His eye
+wandered, but not far away, like that of his brother.  It was in
+search of his young betrothed, the Lady Aveline of Lancaster, the
+fair young heiress to whom he was to owe the great earldom that was a
+fair portion for a younger brother even of royalty.
+
+All the four were bare-footed, and both princes were in robes much
+resembling that of their father, except that upon the left shoulder
+of each might be seen, in white cloth, the two lines of the Cross,
+that marked them as pilgrims and Crusaders, already on the eve of
+departure for the Holy Land.
+
+The shrine where the golden coffin was to rest is substantially the
+same in our own day, with its triple-cusped arches below, the stage
+of six and stage of four above them, and the twisted columns in
+imitation of that which was supposed to have come from the Beautiful
+Gate of the Temple.  But at that time it was a glittering fabric of
+mosaic work, in gold, lapis-lazuli, and precious stones, aided here
+and there by fragments of coloured glass, the only part of the costly
+workmanship that has come down to us.  Around this shrine the
+preceding members of the procession had taken their places.
+Archbishop Boniface of Savoy was there, old age ennobling a
+countenance that once had been light and frivolous, and all his
+bishops in the splendour of their richest copes, solidly embroidered
+with absolute scenes and portraits in embroidery, with tall mitres
+worked with gold wire and jewels, and crosiers of beauteous
+workmanship in gold, ivory, and enamel.  Mitred abbots, no less
+glorious in array, stood in another rank; the scarlet-mantled Grand
+Prior of the Hospital, and the white-cloaked Templar, made a link
+between the ecclesiastic and the warrior.  Priests and monks,
+selected for their voices' sake, clustered in every available space;
+and, in full radiance, on a stage on the further side, were seated
+the ladies of the court, mostly with their hair uncovered, and
+surrounded by a garland of precious stones.  Queen Eleanor of
+Provence, still bent on youthfulness, looked somewhat haggard in this
+garb; but it well became Beatrix von Falkmorite, the young German
+girl whom Richard King of the Romans had wedded in his old age for
+the sake of her fair face.  Smiling, plump, and rosy, she sat opening
+her wide blue eyes, wearing her emerald and ruby wreath as though it
+had been a coronal of daisies, and gazing with childish whisperings
+as she watched the movements of her king, and clung for direction and
+help in her own part of the pageant to the Princess Eleanor, who sat
+beside her, little the elder in years, less beautiful in colouring,
+but how far surpassing her in queenly pensive grace and dignity!
+Leaning on Eleanor's lap was a bright-eyed, bright-haired boy of four
+years old, watching with puzzled looks the brilliant ceremony, which
+he only half understood, and his glances wandering between his father
+and the blue and white robed little acolytes who stood nearest to the
+shrine, holding by chains the silver censers, which from time to time
+sent forth a fragrant vapour, curling round the heads of the nearest
+figures, and floating away in the lofty vaultings of the roof.
+
+The actual ceremony could only be beheld by a favoured few; the
+official clergy, the many connections of royalty, and the chief
+nobility, filled the church to overflowing, but the rest of the world
+repaid itself by making a magnificent holiday.  Good-natured King
+Henry had been permitted by his son, who had now, though behind the
+scenes, assumed the reins of government, to spend freely, and make a
+feast to his heart's content.  Roasting and boiling were going on on
+a fast and furious scale, not only in the palace and abbey, but in
+booths erected in the fields; and tables were spreading and rushes
+strewing for the accommodation of all ranks.  Near the entrance of
+the Abbey, the trains of the personages within awaited their coming
+forth in some sort of order, the more reverent listening to the
+sounds from within, and bending or crossing themselves as the
+familiar words of higher notes of praise rose loud enough to reach
+their ears; but for the most part, the tones and gestures were as
+various as the appearance of the attendants.  Here were black
+Benedictines, there white Augustinians clustered round the sleek
+mules of their abbots; there scornful dark Templars, in their black
+and white, sowed the seeds of hatred against their order, and scarlet
+Hospitaliers looked bright and friendly even while repelling the
+jostling of the crowd.  A hoary old squire, who had been with the
+King through all his troubles, kept together his immediate
+attendants; a party of boorish-looking Germans waited for Richard of
+Cornwall; and the slender, richly-caparisoned palfreys of the ladies
+were in charge of high-born pages, who sometimes, with means fair or
+foul, pushed back the throng, sometimes themselves became enamoured
+of its humours.
+
+For not only had the neighbouring city of London poured forth her
+merchants and artizans, to gaze, wonder, and censure the
+extravagance--not only had beggars of every degree been attracted by
+the largesse that Henry delighted to dispense, and peasants had
+poured in from all the villages around, but no sort of entertainment
+was lacking.  Here were minstrels and story-tellers gathering groups
+around them; here was the mountebank, clearing a stage in which to
+perform feats of jugglery, tossing from one hand to another a never-
+ending circle of balls, balancing a lance upon his nose, with a
+popinjay on its point; here were a bevy of girls with strange
+garments fastened to their ankles, who would dance on their hands
+instead of their feet, while their uplifted toes jangled little
+bells.
+
+Peasant and beggar, citizen and performer, sightseer and
+professional, all alike strove to get into the space before the great
+entrance, where the procession must come forth to gratify the eyes of
+the gazers, and mayhap shower down such bounty as the elder
+mendicants averred had been given when Prince Edward (the saints
+defend him!) had been weighed at five years old, and, to avert ill
+luck, the counterbalance of pure gold had been thrown among the poor
+to purchase their prayers.
+
+His weight in gold at his present stature could hardly be expected by
+the wildest imaginations, but hungry eyes had been estimating the
+weight of his little heir, and discontented lips had declared that
+the child was of too slender make to be ever worth so much to them as
+his father.  Yet a whisper of the possibility had quickly been
+magnified to a certainty of such a largesse, and the multitude were
+thus stimulated to furious exertions to win the most favourable spot
+for gathering up such a golden rain as even little Prince Henry's
+counterpoise would afford; and ever as time waxed later, the throng
+grew denser and more unruly, and the struggle fiercer and more
+violent.
+
+The screams and expostulations of the weak, elbowed and trampled
+down, mingled with more festive sounds; and the attendants who waited
+on the river in the large and beautifully-ornamented barges which
+were the usual conveyances of distinguished personages, began to
+agree with one another that if they saw less than if they were on the
+bank, they escaped a considerable amount of discomfort as well as
+danger.
+
+"For," murmured one of the pages, "I suppose it would be a dire
+offence to the Prince to lay about among the churls as they deserve."
+
+"Ay, truly, among Londoners above all," was the answer of his
+companion, whom the last four years had rendered considerably taller
+than when we saw him last.
+
+"Not that there is much love lost between them.  He hath never
+forgotten the day when they pelted the Queen with rotten eggs, and
+sang their ribald songs; nor they the day he rode them down at Lewes
+like corn before the reaper."
+
+"And lost the day," muttered the other page; then added, "The less
+love, the more cause for caution."
+
+"Oh yes, we know you are politic, Master Richard," was the sneering
+reply, "but you need not fear my quarrelling with your citizen
+friends.  I would not be the man to face Prince Edward if I had made
+too free with any of the caitiffs."
+
+"Hark! Master Hamlyn, the tumult is louder than ever," interposed an
+elderly man of lower rank, who was in charge of the stout rowers in
+the royal colours of red and gold.  "Young gentlemen, the Mass must
+be ended; it were better to draw to the stairs, than to talk of you
+know not what," he muttered.
+
+Hamlyn de Valence, who held the rudder, steered towards the wide
+stone steps that descended to the river, nearest to the apse in which
+"St. Peter's Abbey Church" terminated before Henry VII. had added his
+chapel.  At that moment a louder burst of sound, half imprecation,
+half shriek, was heard; there was a heavy splash a little way above,
+and a small blue bundle was seen on the river, apparently totally
+unheeded by the frantic crowd on the bank.  No sooner was it seen by
+Richard, however, than he threw back his mantle and sprang out of the
+barge.  There was a loud cry from the third page, a little fellow of
+nine or ten years old; but Richard gallantly swam out, battled with
+the current, and succeeded in laying hold of a young child, with whom
+he made for the barge, partly aided by the stream; but he was
+breathless, and heartily glad to reach the boat and support himself
+against the gunwale.
+
+"A pretty boat companion you!" said Hamlyn maliciously.  "How are we
+to take you in, over the velvet cushions?"
+
+The little page gave an expostulating cry.
+
+"Hold the child an instant, John," gasped Richard, raising it towards
+his younger friend; "I will but recover breath, and then land and
+seek out her friends."
+
+"How is this?" said a voice above them; and looking up, they found
+that while all had been absorbed in the rescue, the Prince, with his
+little son in his arms and his wife hanging on his arm, had come to
+the stone stairs, and was looking down.  "Richard overboard!"
+
+"A child fell over the bank, my Lord," eagerly shouted the little
+John, with cap in hand, "and he swam out to pick it up."
+
+"Into the barge instantly, Richard," commanded the Prince.  "'Tis as
+much as his life is worth to remain in this cold stream!"
+
+And truly Richard was beginning to feel as much.  He was assisted in
+by two of the oarsmen, and the barge then putting towards the steps,
+the Princess was handed into her place, and began instantly to ask
+after the poor child.  It had not been long enough in the water to
+lose its consciousness, though it had hitherto been too much
+frightened to cry; but it no sooner opened a wide pair of dark eyes
+to find itself in strange hands, than it set up a lamentable wail,
+calling in broken accents for "Da-da."
+
+"Let me take it ashore at once, gracious lady," said Richard, revived
+by a draught of wine from the stores provided for the long day; "I
+will find its friends."
+
+"Nay," said the Princess, "it were frenzy to take it thus in its wet
+garments; and frenzy to remain in thine, Richard."  As she spoke, the
+Prince and the other persons of the suite had embarked, and the barge
+was pushing away from the steps.  "Give the child to me," she added,
+holding out her arms, and disregarding a remonstrance from one of her
+ladies, disregarding too the sobs and struggles of the child, whom
+she strove to soothe, while hastily removing the little thing's
+soaked blue frock and hood, and wrapping it up in a warm woollen
+cloak.  "It is a pretty little maiden," she said, "and not ill cared
+for.  Some mother's heart must be bursting for her!-- Hush thee! hush
+thee, little one; we will take thee home and clothe thee, and then
+thou shalt go to thy mother," she added, in better English than she
+had spoken four years earlier in Alton Wood.  But the child still
+cried for her da-da, and the Princess asked again, "What is thy
+father's name, little maid?"
+
+"Pere," she answered, with a peculiar accent that made the Prince
+say, "That is a Provencal tongue."
+
+"They are Provencal eyes likewise," added Eleanor.  "See how like
+their hue is to Richard's own;" and in Provencal she repeated the
+question what the father's name and the child's own might be.  But
+"Pere" again, and "Bessee, pretty Bessee," was all the answer she
+obtained, the last in unmistakable English.
+
+"I thought," said Eleanor, "that it was only my own children that
+scarce knew whether they spoke English, Languedoc, or Langued'oui."
+
+"It was the same with us, Lady," said Richard.  "Father Adam was wont
+to say we were a little Babel."
+
+The child looked towards him on hearing his voice, and held out her
+hands to go to him, reiterating an entreaty to be taken to her
+father.
+
+"She is probably the child of some minstrel or troubadour," said the
+Prince.  "We will send in search of him as soon as we have reached
+the Savoy."
+
+The Savoy Palace had been built for Queen Eleanor's obnoxious uncle,
+Prince Thomas of Savoy, and had recently been purchased by the Queen
+herself, as a wedding gift for her son Edmund; but in the meantime
+Edward and his family were occupying it during their stay near
+Westminster, and their barge was brought up to the wide stairs of its
+noble court.  Richard was obliged to give up the child to the
+Princess and her ladies, though she shrieked after him so
+pertinaciously, that Eleanor called to him to return so soon as he
+should have changed his garments.
+
+In a few minutes he again appeared, and found the little girl dressed
+in a little garment of one of the royal children, but totally
+insensible to the honour, turning away from all the dainties offered
+to her, and sobbing for her father, much to the indignation of the
+two little princes, Henry and John, who stood hand in hand staring at
+her.  She flew to him directly, with a broken entreaty that she might
+be taken to her father.  Again they tried questioning her, but
+Richard, whether speaking English or Provencal, always succeeded in
+obtaining readier and more comprehensible replies than did the
+Princess.  Whether she recognized him as her preserver, or whether
+his language had a familiar tone, she seemed exclusively attracted by
+him; and he it was who learnt that she lived at home--far off--on the
+Green near the red monks, and that her father could not see--he would
+be lost without Bessee to lead him.  And the little creature, hardly
+three years old if so much, was evidently in the greatest trouble at
+her father having lost her guidance and protection.
+
+Richard, touched and flattered by the little maiden's exclusive
+preference, and owning in her Provencal eyes and speech something
+strangely like his own young sister Eleanor, entreated permission to
+be himself the person to take her in search of her friends.  The
+Princess added her persuasions, declaring it would be cruel to send
+the poor little thing with another stranger, and that his Provencal
+tongue was needed in order to discovering her father among the
+troubadours.
+
+Edward yielded to her persuasion, adding, however, that Richard must
+take two men-at-arms with him, and gravely bidding him be on his
+guard.  Nor would he permit him to be accompanied by little John de
+Mohun, who, half page, half hostage, had lately been added to the
+Princess's train, and being often bullied and teased by Hamlyn and
+his fellows, had vehemently attached himself to Richard, and now
+entreated in vain to go with him on the adventure.  In fact, Prince
+Edward was a stern disciplinarian, equally severe against either
+familiarity or insolence towards the external world, and especially
+towards any one connected with London.  If Richard ever gave him any
+offence, it was by a certain freedom of manner towards inferiors,
+such as the Earl of Leicester had diligently inculcated on his
+family, but which more than once had excited a shade of vexation on
+the Prince's part.  Even after Richard had reached the door, he was
+called back and commanded on no pretext to loiter or enter on any
+dispute, and if his search should detain him late, to sleep at the
+Tower, rather than be questioned and stopped at any of the gates
+which were guarded at night by the citizens.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER V--THE OLD KNIGHT OF THE HOSPITAL
+
+
+
+"The warriors of the sacred grave,
+   Who looked to Christ for laws."
+Lord Houghton.
+
+Richard summoned a small boat, and with two stout men-at-arms, of
+whom Adam de Gourdon was one, prepared again to cross the river.
+Leonillo ran down the stone stairs with a wistful look of entreaty
+and it occurred to both Richard and Adam, that, could the child only
+lead them to the place where her father had sat, the dog's scent
+might prove their most efficient guide.
+
+Little Bessee seemed quite comforted when on her way back to her
+father, and sat on Richard's knee, eating the comfits with which the
+Princess had provided her, and making him cut a figure that seemed
+somewhat to amaze the other boat-loads whom they encountered on the
+river.
+
+When they landed, the throng was more dispersed, but revelry and
+sports of all kinds were going on fast and furiously; each door of
+the Abbey was besieged by hungry crowds receiving their dole, and
+Richard's inquiries for a blind man who had lost his child were
+little heeded, or met with no satisfactory answer.  Bessee herself
+was bewildered, and incapable of finding her father's late station;
+and Richard was becoming perplexed, and doubtful whether he ought to
+take her back, as well as somewhat put out of countenance by the
+laughter of Thomas de Clare, and other young nobles, who rallied him
+on his strange charge.
+
+At last the little girl's face lightened as at sight of something
+familiar.  "Good red monks," she said.  "They give Bessee soup--make
+father well."
+
+With a ray of hope, Richard advanced to a party of Brethren of St.
+John, who were mounting at the Abbey gate to return to their house at
+Spitalfields, and doffing his bonnet, intimated a desire to address
+the tall old war-worn knight with a benevolent face, who was
+adjusting his scarlet cloak, before mounting a gray Arab steed
+looking as old and worthy as himself.
+
+"Ha! a young Crusader, I perceive," was the greeting of the old
+knight, as his eye fell on the white cross on Richard's mantle.
+"Welcome, brother!  Dost thou need counsel on thy goodly Eastern
+way?"
+
+"Thanks, reverend Sir," returned Richard, "but my present purpose was
+to seek for the father of this little one, who fell into the river in
+the press.  She pointed to you, saying she had received your bounty."
+
+"It is Blind Hal's child, Sir Robert!" exclaimed a serving-brother in
+black, coming eagerly forward; "the villeins on the green told me the
+poor knave was distraught at having lost his child in the throng!"
+
+"What brought he her there for?" exclaimed Sir Robert.  "Poor fool!
+his wits must have forsaken him!"
+
+"The child had a craving to see the show," replied the Brother, "so
+Hob the cobbler told me; and all went well till my Lord of Pembroke's
+retainers forced all right and left to make way in the crowd.  Hal
+was thrown down, and the child thrust away till they feared she had
+fallen over the bank.  Hob and his wife were fain to get the poor man
+away, for his moans and fierce words were awful:  and he was not a
+little hurt in the scuffle, so I e'en gave them leave to lay him in
+the cart that brought up your reverence's vestments, and the gear we
+lent the Abbey for the show."
+
+"Right, Brother Hilary," said Sir Robert; "and now the poor knave
+will have his best healing.--He must have been a good soldier once,"
+he added to Richard; "but he is a mere fragment of a man, wasted in
+your Earl of Leicester's wars."
+
+"Where dwells he?" asked Richard, keenly interested in all his
+father's old followers; "I would fain restore him his child."
+
+"In a hut on Bednall Green," answered the serving-brother; "but twice
+or thrice a week he comes to the Spital to have his hurts looked to."
+
+"Ay! we tell him his little witch must soon be shut out!  She turns
+the heads of all our brethren," said Sir Robert, smiling.  "Wild work
+she makes with our novices."
+
+"Wilder with our Knights Commanders, maybe, Sir," retorted, laughing,
+a fair open-faced youth in his novitiate.  "I shall some day warn Hal
+how our brethren, the Templars, are said to play at ball with tender
+babes on their lances."
+
+"No scandal about our brethren of the Temple, Rayland," said Sir
+Robert, looking grave for a moment.--"Young Sir, it would be a favour
+if you would ride with us; we would gladly show you the way to
+Bednall Green."
+
+"I should rejoice to go, Sir," returned Richard, "but I am of Prince
+Edward's household--Richard Fowen; and my horse is on the other side
+of the river."
+
+"That is soon remedied," said Sir Robert, who seemed to have taken a
+great fancy to Richard, either for the sake of his crossed shoulder,
+or of his kindness to the little plaything of the Spital.  "Our young
+brother, Engelbert von Fuchstein, has leave to tarry this night with
+his brother in the train of the King of the Romans, and his horse is
+at your service, if you will do our poor Spital the favour to tarry
+there this night, and ride it back in the morn to meet him at
+Westminster."
+
+Richard knew that this invitation might be safely accepted without
+danger of giving umbrage to the Prince, who was on the best terms
+with the Knights of the Hospital.  He therefore dismissed Gourdon and
+the other man-at-arms with a message explaining the matter; and
+warmly thanking the old Grand Prior, laid one hand on the saddle of
+the great ponderous beast that was led up to him, and vaulted on its
+back without touching the stirrup.
+
+"Well done, my young master," said Sir Robert, "it is easy to see you
+are of the Prince's household."
+
+"I cannot yet do as the Prince can," said Richard,--"take this leap
+in full armour."
+
+"No; and let me give you a bit of counsel, fair Sir.  Such pastimes
+are very well for the tiltyard, but they should be laid aside in the
+blessed Land, and strength reserved for the one cause and purpose."
+He crossed himself; and in the meantime, Bessee intimated her
+imperious purpose of not riding before Brother Hilary, but being
+perched before Richard on the enormous cream-coloured animal, whence
+he was looking down from a considerable elevation upon Sir Robert on
+his slender Arab.
+
+"These are the German monsters that our brethren bring over," said
+Sir Robert.  "Mark me, young brother, cumber not yourself with these
+beasts of Europe, which are good for nothing but food for foul birds
+in the East.  Purvey yourself of an Arab as soon as you land.  There
+is a rogue at Acre, one Ali by name, who will not cheat you more than
+is reasonable, so you mention my name to him, Sir Robert Darcy, at
+your service."
+
+"Thanks, reverend Father," returned Richard, "but I am but a landless
+page, and the Prince mounts me.  Said you this poor man had been
+wounded in the late wars?"
+
+"Ay, hacked and hewed worse than by the Infidels themselves!  Woeful
+it is that here, at home, men's blood should be wasted on your own
+petty feuds.  This same Barons' war now hath cost as much downright
+courage as would have brought us back to Jerusalem, and all thrown
+away, without a cause, with no honour, no hope."
+
+"Not without a cause," Richard could not help saying.
+
+"Nay," said the old knight; "no cause is worth the taking of a life,
+save the cause of the Holy Sepulchre.  What be these matters of taxes
+and laws to ask a man to shed his blood for?  Alack, the temper of
+the cross-bearer is dying out!  I pray I may not see this Crusade end
+like half those I have beheld--and the cross on the shoulder become
+no better than a mockery."
+
+"That may scarcely be with such leaders as the Prince and the King of
+France," said Richard.
+
+"Well, well, the Prince is untried; and for King Louis, he is as holy
+a man as ever lived since King Godfrey of blessed memory, but he has
+bad luck, ever bad luck.  The Saints forefend, but I trow he will
+listen to some crazy counsel from Rome, belike, or some barefooted
+hermit--very holy, no doubt, but who does not know a Greek from a
+Saracen, or a horse's head from his tail--and will go to some
+pestilential hole like that foul Egyptian swamp, where we stayed till
+our skin was the colour of an old boot, in hopes of converting the
+Sultan of Babylon, or the Old Man of the Mountain, or what not, and
+there he will stay till the flower of his forces have wasted away."
+
+"Were you in Egypt with King Louis?" eagerly exclaimed Richard.
+
+"Ay, marry, was I, and a goodly land it is; but I saw many a good
+man-at-arms perish miserably in a marsh, who might have been the
+saving of the Holy City.  Why, I myself have never been the same man
+since!  Never could do a month's service out of the infirmary at
+Acre, though after all there's no work I like so well as the hospital
+business, and for the last five years I have had to stay here
+training young brethren!  Oh, young man!  I envy you your first
+stroke for the Holy Sepulchre!  Would that the Grand-Master would
+hear my entreaty.  I am too old to be worth sparing, and I would fain
+have one more chance of dying under the banner of the Order!--But I
+am setting you a bad example, son Raynal; a Hospitalier has no will.-
+-And look you, young Sir Page, if you stay out at sunset in that
+clime, 'tis all up with you.  And you should veil your helmet well,
+or the sun smites on your head as deadly as a flake of Greek fire."
+
+So rambled on good old Sir Robert Darcy, Grand Prior of England, a
+perfect dragon among the Saracens, but everywhere else the mildest
+and most benevolent of men; his discourse strangely mingling together
+the deepest enthusiasm with a business-like common-sense appreciation
+of ways and means, and with minute directions, precautions, and
+anecdotes, gathered from his practical experience both as captain in
+the field, priest in the Church, and surgeon in the hospital, and all
+seen from the most sunshiny point of view.
+
+Meanwhile, they were riding along the Strand, a beautiful open road,
+with grassy borders shelving down to the Thames.  They passed through
+the City of London.  The Hospital lay beyond the walls, but the
+Marshes of Moorfields that protected them were not passable without a
+long circuit; and the fortified gates stood open at Temple Bar, where
+the Hospitaliers, looking towards the Round Church and stately
+buildings of the Preceptory, saluted the white-cloaked figures moving
+about it, with courtesy grim and distant in all but Sir Robert Darcy,
+who could not even hate a Templar, a creature to the ordinary
+Hospitalier far more detestable than a Saracen.  On then, up ground
+beginning to rise, below which the little muddy stream called the
+Flete stagnated along its way, meandering to the Thames.  Thatched
+hovels and wooden booths left so narrow a passage that the horsemen
+were forced to move in single file, and did not gain a clearer space
+even when the stone houses of merchants began to stand thick on
+Ludgate Hill, their carved wooden balconies so projecting, that it
+would seem to have been an object with the citizens to be able to
+shake hands across the street.  The city was comparatively empty and
+quiet, as all the world were keeping holiday at Westminster; but even
+as it was, the passengers seemed to swarm in the streets, and knots
+of persons who had been unable to witness the spectacle, sat with
+gazing children upon the stairs outside the houses, to admire the
+fragments of the pageant that came their way.  Acclamations of
+delight greeted the appearance of the scarlet-mantled Hospitaliers,
+such as Richard had often heard in his boyhood, when riding in his
+father's train, but far less frequently since he had been a part of
+the Prince's retinue.  And equally diverse was the merry nod and
+smile of Sir Robert to each gaping shouting group of little ones,
+from the stately distant courtesy with which Edward returned the
+popular salutations.  He could be gracious--he could not be friendly
+except to a few.
+
+They passed the capitular buildings of St. Paul's, with the beautiful
+cathedral towering over them, and in its rear, numerous booths for
+the purchase of rosaries--recent inventions then of St. Dominic, the
+great friend of Richard's stern grandfather, the persecutor of the
+Albigenses.  Sir Robert drew up, and declared he must buy one for the
+little maid as a remembrance of the day, and then found she was fast
+asleep; but he nevertheless purchased a black-beaded chaplet, giving
+for it one of the sorely-clipped coins of King Henry.
+
+"Prithee let me have one likewise, holy Sir," quoth Richard, "in
+memory of the talk that hath taught me so much of the import of my
+crusading vow."
+
+"Thou shalt bring me for it one of the olive of Bethlehem," said Sir
+Robert; "I have given away all I brought from the East.  They are so
+great a boon to our poor sick folk that I wish I had brought twice as
+many, but to me they have always a Saracen look.  Your Moslem always
+fingers one much of the same fashion as he parleys."
+
+Ludgate, freshly built, and adorned with new figures to represent the
+fabulous King Lud, was not yet closed for the night; and the party
+came forth beyond the walls, with the desolate Moorfields to their
+left, and before them a number of rising villages clustered round
+their churches.
+
+The Hospital, a grand fortified monastery, was already to be seen
+over the fields; but Sir Robert, sending home the rest of his troop,
+turned aside with Richard and Brother Hilary towards the common, with
+a border of cottages around it, which went by the name of Bednall
+Green.
+
+Brother Hilary knew the hut inhabited by Blind Hal, and led the way
+to it.  Low and mud-built, thatched, and with a wattled door, it had
+a wretched appearance; but the old woman who came to the door was not
+ill clad.  "Blessings on you, holy Father!" she cried; "do I see the
+child, my lamb, my lady-bird!  Would that she may come in time to
+cheer her poor father!"
+
+"How is it with him then, Gammer?" demanded Sir Robert, springing to
+the ground with the alacrity of a doctor anxious about his patient.
+
+"Ill, very ill, Sir.  Whether the horse's feet hurt his old wound, or
+whether it be the loss of the child, he hath done nought but moan and
+rave, and lie as one dead ever since they brought him home.  He is
+lying in one of the dead swoons now!  It were not well that the child
+saw him."
+
+But Bessee, awakening with a cry of joy, saw her borne, and struggled
+to go to her father, whose name she called on with all her might,
+disregarding the caresses of the old woman, and the endeavour made by
+Richard to restrain without alarming her, while Sir Robert went into
+the hut to endeavour to restore the sufferer.
+
+Suddenly a cry broke from within; and Richard, turning at the voice,
+beheld the blind man sitting up on his pallet with arms outstretched.
+"My child!--My Father! hast thou brought her to visit me in limbo?"
+he cried.
+
+"He raves!" said Richard, using his strength to withhold the child,
+who broke out into a shriek.
+
+"Nay, nay! she doth not abide here!" he exclaimed.  "Her spirit is
+pure!  My sins are not visited on her beyond the grave!"
+
+"Thou art on the earthly side of the grave still, my son," said Sir
+Robert, at the same time as Bessee sprang from Richard, and nestled
+on his breast, clinging to his neck.
+
+"My babe--my Bessee!" he exclaimed, gathering her close to him.
+"Living, living, indeed!  Yet how may it be!  Surely this is the
+other world.  That voice sounds not among the living!"
+
+"It is the voice of the youth who saved thy child," said the Grand
+Prior.
+
+"Speak again!  Let him speak again!" implored the beggar.
+
+"Can I do aught for you, good man?" asked Richard.
+
+Again there was a strange start and thrill of amazement.
+
+"Only for Heaven's sake tell me who thou art!"
+
+"A page of Prince Edward's good man.  I am called Richard Fowen!  And
+who, for Heaven's sake, are you?" added Richard, as Leonillo, who had
+been smelling about and investigating, threw himself on the blind man
+in a transport of caresses.  "Off, Leon--off!" cried Richard.  "It is
+but a dog!--Fear not, little one!--Tell me, tell me," he added,
+trembling, as he knelt before the miserable object, holding back the
+eager Leonillo with one arm round his neck, "who art thou, thou ghost
+of former times?"
+
+"Knowst me not, Richard?" returned a suppressed voice in Provencal.
+
+"Henry!  Henry!" exclaimed Richard, and fell upon the foot of the low
+bed, weeping bitterly.  "Is it come to this?"
+
+"Ay, even to this," said the blind man, "that two sons of one father
+meet unknown--one with a changed name, the other with none at all,
+neither with the honoured one they were born to."
+
+"Alack, alack!" was all Richard could say at the first moment, as he
+lifted himself up to look again at the first-born of his parents, the
+head of the brave troop of brethren, the gay, handsome, imperious
+young Lord de Montfort, whose proud head and gallant bearing he had
+looked at with a younger brother's imitative deference.  What did he
+see but a wreck of a man, sitting crouched on the wretched bed, the
+left arm a mere stump, a bandage where the bright sarcastic eyes used
+to flash forth their dark fire, deep scars on all the small portion
+of the face that was visible through the over-grown masses of hair
+and beard, so plentifully sprinkled with white, that it would have
+seemed incredible that this man was but eight months older than the
+Prince, whose rival he had always been in personal beauty and
+activity.  The beautiful child, clasped close to his breast, her face
+buried on his shoulder under his shaggy locks, was a strange contrast
+to his appearance, but only added to the look of piteous helplessness
+and desolation, as she hung upon him in her alarm at the agitation
+around her.
+
+Richard had long been accustomed to think of his brother as dead; but
+such a spectacle as this was far more terrible to him, and his cheek
+blanched at the shock, as he gasped again, "Thou here, and thus! thou
+whom I thought slain!"
+
+"Deem me so still," said his brother, "even as I deem the royal
+minion dead to me."
+
+"Nay, Henry, thou knowst not."
+
+"Who is present?" interrupted the blind man, raising his head and
+tossing back his hair with a gesture that for the first time gave
+Richard a sense that his eldest brother was indeed before him.
+"Methought I heard another voice."
+
+"I am here, fair son," replied the old knight, "Father Robert of the
+Hospital!  I will either leave thee, or keep thy secret as though it
+were thy shrift; but thou art sore spent, and mayst scarce talk
+more."
+
+"Weariness and pain are past, Father, with my little one again in my
+bosom," said Henry; "and there are matters that must be spoken
+between me and this young brother of mine ere he quits this hut; and
+his voice resumed its old authoritative tone towards Richard.  "Said
+you that he had saved my child?"
+
+"He drew me from the river, Father," said Bessee looking up.  "There
+was nothing to stand on, and it was so cold!  And he took me in his
+arms and pulled me out, and put me in a boat; and the lady pulled off
+my blue coat, and put this one on me.  Feel it, Father; oh, so
+pretty, so warm!"
+
+"It was the Princess," said Richard; but Henry, not noticing,
+continued,
+
+"Thou hast earned my pardon, Richard," and held out his remaining
+hand, somewhere towards the height where his brother's used to be.
+
+Sir Robert smiled, saying, "Thou dost miscalculate thy brother's
+stature, son."  And at the same moment Richard, who was now little
+short of his Cousin Edward in height, was kneeling by Henry,
+accepting and returning his embrace with agitation and gratitude,
+such as showed how their relative positions in the family still
+maintained their force; but Richard still asserted his independence
+so as to say, "When you have heard all, brother you will see that
+there is no need of pardoning me."
+
+Henry, however, as perhaps Sir Robert had foreseen, instead of
+answering put his hand to his side, and sank back in a paroxysm of
+pain, ending in another swoon.  The child stood by, quiet and
+frightened but too much used to similar occurrences to be as much
+terrified as was Richard, who thought his brother dying; but calling
+in the serving-brother, the old Hospitalier did all that was needed,
+and the blind man presently recovered and explained in a feeble voice
+that he had been jostled, thrown down, and trodden on, at the moment
+when he lost his hold of his little daughter; and this was evidently
+renewing his sufferings from the effect of an injury received in
+battle.  "And what took thee there, son?" said Sir Robert, somewhat
+sharply.
+
+"The harvest, Father," answered Henry, rousing himself to speak with
+a certain sarcasm in his tone.  "It is the beggars' harvest wherever
+King Henry goes.  We brethren of the wallet cannot afford to miss
+such windfalls."
+
+"A beggar!" exclaimed Richard in horror.
+
+"And what art thou?" retorted Henry, with a sudden fierceness.
+
+"Listen, young men," said Sir Robert, "this I know, my patient there
+will soon be nothing if ye continue in this strain.  A litter shall
+bring him to the infirmary."
+
+"Nay," said Henry hastily, "not so, good Father.  Here I abide, hap
+what may."
+
+"And I abide with him," said Richard.
+
+"Not so, I say," returned the Hospitalier, "unless thou wouldst slay
+him outright.  Return to the Spital with me; and at morn, if he have
+recovered himself, unravel these riddles as thou and he will."
+
+"It is well, Father," said Henry.  "Go with him, Richard; but mark
+me.  Be silent as the grave, and see me again."
+
+And reluctant as he was, Richard was forced to comply.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VI--THE BEGGAR EARL
+
+
+
+"Along with the nobles that fell at that tyde,
+His eldest son Henrye, who fought by his syde,
+Was felde by a blow he receivde in the fight;
+A blow that for ever deprivde him of sight."
+Old Beggar.
+
+The chapel at the Spital was open to all who chose to attend.  The
+deep choir was filled with the members of the Order, half a dozen
+knights in the stalls, and the novices and serving-brothers so ranged
+as to give full effect to the body of voice.  Richard knelt on the
+stone floor outside the choir, intending after early mass to seek his
+brother; but to his surprise he found the blind man with his child at
+his feet in what was evidently his accustomed place, just within the
+door.  His hair and beard were now arranged, his appearance was no
+longer squalid; but when he rose to depart, guided in part by the
+child, but also groping with a stick, he looked even more helpless
+than on his bed, and Richard sprang forward to proffer an arm for his
+support.
+
+"Flemish cloth and frieze gown," said the object of his solicitude in
+a strange gibing voice; "court page and street beggar--how now, my
+master?"
+
+"Lord Earl and elder brother," returned Richard, "thine is my service
+through life."
+
+"Mine?  Ho, ho!  That much for thy service!" with a disdainful
+gesture of his fingers.  "A strapping lad like thee would be the ruin
+of my trade.  I might as well give up bag and staff at once."
+
+"Nay, surely, wilt thou not?" exclaimed Richard in broken words from
+his extreme surprise.  "The King and Prince only long to pardon and
+restore, and--"
+
+"And thou wouldst well like to lord it at Kenilworth, earl in all but
+the name?  Thou mayst do so yet without being cumbered with me or
+mine!"
+
+"Thou dost me wrong, Henry," said Richard, much distressed.  "I love
+the Prince, for none so truly honoured our blessed father as he, and
+for his sake he hath been most kind lord to me; but thou art the head
+of my house, my brother, and with all my heart do I long to render
+thee such service as--as may lighten these piteous sufferings."
+
+"I believe thee, Richard; thou wert ever an honest simple-hearted
+lad," said Henry, in a different tone; "but the only service thou
+canst render me is to let me alone, and keep my secret.  Here--I feel
+that we are at the stone bench, where I bask in the sun, and lay out
+my dish for the visitors of the gracious Order.--Here, Bessee, child,
+put the dish down," he added, retaining his hold of his brother, as
+if to feel whether Richard winced at this persistence in his strange
+profession.  The little girl obeyed, and betook herself to the quiet
+sports of a lonely child, amusing herself with Leonillo, and
+sometimes returning to her father and obtaining his attention for a
+few moments, sometimes prattling to some passing brother of the
+Order, who perhaps made all the more of the pretty creature because
+this might be called an innocent breach of discipline.  "And now,
+Master Page," said Henry in his tone of authority, yet with some
+sarcasm, "let us hear how long-legged Edward finished the work he had
+began on thee at Hereford--made thee captive in the battle, eh?"
+
+Richard briefly narrated his life with Gourdon, and his capture by
+the Prince, adding, "My mother was willing I should remain with him;
+she bade me do anything rather than join Simon and Guy; and verily,
+brother, save that the Prince is less free of speech, his whole life
+seems moulded upon our blessed father's--"
+
+"Speak not of them in the same breath," cried Henry hastily.  "And
+wherefore--if such be his honour to him whom he slew and mutilated--
+art thou to disown thy name, and stand before him like some chance
+foundling?"
+
+"That was the King's doing," said Richard.  "The Prince was averse to
+it, but King Henry, though he wept over me and called me his dear
+nephew, made it his special desire that he might not hear the name of
+Montfort; and the Prince, though overruling him in all that pertains
+to matters of state, is most dutiful in all lesser matters.  I hoped
+at least to be called Fitz Simon, but some mumble of the King turned
+it into Fowen, and so it has continued.  I believe no one at court is
+really ignorant of my lineage; but among the people, Montfort is
+still a trumpet-call, and the King fears to hear it."
+
+"Well he may!" laughed Henry.  "Rememberest thou, Richard, the sorry
+figure our good uncle cut, when we armed him so courteously, and put
+him on his horse to meet the rebels at Evesham--how he durst not hang
+back, and loved still less to go onward, and kept calling me his
+loving nephew all the time?"
+
+"Ah!  Henry--but didst thou not hear my father mutter, when he saw
+the crowned helm under the standard, that it was ill done, and no
+good could come of seething the kid in the mother's milk?  And
+verily, had not the Prince been carrying his father from the field, I
+trow the Mortimers had not refused us quarter, nor had their cruel
+will of us."
+
+"Oh ho! thou art come to have opinions of thine own!" laughed Henry,
+with the scoff of a senior unable to brook that his younger brother
+should think for himself.  Yet this tone was so familiar to Richard's
+ears, that it absolutely encouraged him to a nearer step to intimacy.
+He said, "But how scapedst thou, Henry?  I could have sworn that I
+saw thee fall, skull and helmet cleft, a dead man!"
+
+Instead of answering, Henry put his hand under the chin of his child,
+who was leaning against him, and holding up her face to his brother,
+said, "Thou canst see this child's face?  Tell me what like she is."
+
+"Like little Eleanor, like Amaury.  The home-look of her eyes won my
+heart at once.  Even the Princess remarked their resemblance to mine.
+Think of Eleanor and thy mind's eye will see her."
+
+"No other likeness?" said the blind man wistfully; "but no--thou wast
+at Hereford when she was at Odiham."
+
+"Who?"
+
+He grasped Richard's hand, and under his breath uttered the name
+"Isabel."
+
+"Isabel Mortimer!" exclaimed Richard, who had been, of course, aware
+of his brother's betrothal, when the two families of Montfort and
+Mortimer had been on friendly terms; "we heard she had taken the
+veil!"
+
+"And so thou sawst me slain!" said Henry de Montfort dryly.
+
+"But how--how was it?" asked Richard eagerly.
+
+"Men sometimes tie knots faster than they intend," said Henry.  "When
+Roger Mortimer took Simon's doings in wrath, and vowed that his
+sister should never wed a Montfort, he knew not what he did.  He and
+his proud wife could flout and scorn my Isabel--they might not break
+her faith to me.  Thou knowst, perhaps, Richard, since thou art hand
+and glove with our foes, that like a raven to the slaughter, the Lady
+Mortimer came as near the battle-field as her care for her dainty
+person would allow; and there was one whom she brought with her.
+And, gentle dame, what doth she do but carry her sister-in-law a
+sweet and womanly gift?  What thinkst thou it was, Richard?"
+
+"I fear I know," said Richard, choked; "my father's hand."
+
+"Nay, that was a choicer morsel reserved for my lady countess
+herself.  It was mine own, with our betrothal-ring thereon.  Now,
+quoth that loving sister, might Isabel resume her ring.  No plighted
+troth could be her excuse any longer for refusing to wed my Lord of
+Gloucester.  Then rose up my love, 'It beckons me!' she said, and
+bade them leave it with her.  They deemed that it was for death that
+it beckoned.  So mayhap did she.  I wot Countess Maud had little
+grieved.  But little dreamed they of her true purpose--my perfect
+jewel of constant love--namely, to restore the lopped hand to the
+poor corpse, that it might likewise have Christian burial.  Her old
+nurse, Welsh Winny, was as true to her as she was to me; and forth
+they sped, fearless of the spoilers, and made their way at nightfall
+even to the Abbey Church, where Edward, less savage than the fair
+countess, had caused us to be laid before the altar, awaiting our
+burial in the vaults."
+
+"Thou wert senseless all this time?"
+
+"Ay, and so continued.  The pang when my hand was severed had roused
+me for a few moments, but only to darkness; and my effort to speak
+had been rewarded with as many Welsh knives as could pierce my flesh
+at once."
+
+"And thou didst not bleed to death?"
+
+"The swoon checked my blood.  And the monks of Evesham must have
+staunched and bandaged so as to make a decent corpse of me.  Had they
+had a man-at-arms among them, they would have known that mine were
+not the wounds of a dead but of a living man.  The old nurse knew it,
+when my sweet lady would needs unbind my wrist, to place my hand in
+its right place.  An old crone such as Welsh Winny never stirs
+without her cordial potion.  They poured it into my lips--and if I
+were never more to awake to the light of day, I awoke to the sound
+that was yet dearer to me--while, alas! it still was left to me."
+
+He became silent, till Richard's question drew him on.
+
+"What with their care and support, when once on my feet I found
+strength to stumble out of the chapel and gain shelter in the woods
+ere day; and I believe the monks got credit for their zeal in casting
+out the excommunicate body."
+
+"Not credit," said Richard; "the Prince was full of grief, more
+especially as they all disavowed the deed.  But, brother, art thou
+excommunicate still?"
+
+"Far from it, most pious Crusader.  If seas of holy wells could
+assoil me, I should be pure enough.  My sweet Isabel deemed that some
+such washing might bring back mine eyesight; and from one to another
+we wandered as my limbs could bear it.  And at St. Winifred's there
+was a priest who told us strange tales of the miracles wrought in the
+Mortimer household by my father's severed hand; nay, that it had so
+worked on Lord Mortimer's sister, that she had left the vanities of
+the world, and gone into a nunnery.  He seemed so convinced of my
+father's saintliness, and so honest a fellow, that Isabel insisted on
+unbosoming ourselves to him under seal of confession.  No longer was
+the old nurse to be my mother and she my sister; and the good man
+made no difficulties, but absolved me, and wedded me to the truest,
+most loving wife that ever blessed a man bereft of all else."
+
+"And you begged!  O Henry, the noble lady--"
+
+"At first we had the knightly chain and spurs in which the monks had
+kindly pranked me up.  Isabel too had worn a few jewels; but after
+all, a palmer need never hunger.  My father always said no trade was
+so well paid as begging, under King Henry, and verily we found it so.
+She used at times to gather berries and thread them for chaplets to
+sell at the holy wells; but I trow sheer beggary throve better!"
+
+"But wherefore?  Even had pardon not been ready, Simon held out
+Kenilworth for months."
+
+Henry laughed his dry laugh.
+
+"Simple boy, dost think I would trust Simon with an elder brother
+whose hand could no longer keep his head?"
+
+"And my mother--"
+
+"She had always hated the Mortimers, even when the contract was
+matter of policy.  Would I have taken my sweet Isabel to abide her
+royal scorn, it might be incredulity of our marriage?  Though for
+that matter it is more unimpeachable than her own!  Nay, nay, out of
+ken and out of reach was our only security from our kin on either
+side, unless we desired that my head should follow my hand as a
+dainty dish for Countess Maud."
+
+"How could the lady brook it?"
+
+"She dyed her fair skin with walnut, wore russet gown and hood, and
+was a very nightingale for blitheness and sweet song through that
+first year," said Henry; "blither than ever when that little one was
+born in the sunshiny days of Whitsuntide.  I tell thee, those were
+happier days than ever I passed as Lord de Montfort at Kenilworth.
+But after that, the bruised hurt in my side, which had never healed
+when the cleaner gashes did, became more painful and troublesome.
+Holy wells did nothing for it; and she wasted with watching it, as
+though my pain had been hers.  Naught would serve her but coming
+here, because she had been told that the Knights of St. John had
+better experience of old battle-wounds than any men in the realm.
+Much ado had we to get here--the young babe in her arms, and I well-
+nigh distraught with pain.  We crept into this same hut, and I had a
+weary sickness throughout the winter--living, I know not how, by the
+bounty of the Spital, and by the works of her fingers, which Winny
+would take out to sell on feast-days in the city.  Oh that eyes had
+been left me to note how she pined away! but I had scarce felt how
+thin and bony were her tender fingers ere the blasts of the cruel
+March wind finished the work."
+
+"Alack! alack! poor Henry," said Richard; "never, never was lady of
+romaunt so noble, and so true!"
+
+"No more," said Henry hastily, leaning his brow on the top of his
+staff.  "Come hither, Bessee," he added after a brief pause; "say thy
+prayer for thy blessed mother, child."
+
+And holding out his one hand, he inclosed her two clasped ones within
+it, as the little voice ran over an utterly unintelligible form of
+childishly clipped Latin, sounding, however, sweet and birdlike from
+the very liberties the little memory had taken in twisting its
+mellifluous words into a rhythm of her own.  And there was catchword
+enough for Richard to recognize and follow it, with bonnet doffed,
+and crossing himself.
+
+"And now," he said, "surely the need for secrecy is ended.  The land
+is tranquil, the King ruled by the Prince, the Prince owning all the
+past folly and want of faith that goaded our father into resistance.
+Wherefore not seek his willing favour?  Thou art ever a pilgrim.  Be
+with us in the crusade.  Who knows what the Jordan waves may effect
+for thee?"
+
+"No, no," grimly laughed Henry.  "Dost think any favour would make it
+tolerable to be wept over and pitied by the King--pitied by THE
+KING," he repeated in ineffable disgust; "or to be the show of the
+court, among all that knew me of old, when I WAS a man?  Hob the
+cobbler, and Martin the bagster, are better company than Pembroke and
+Gloucester, and I meet with more humours on Cheapside than I should
+at Winchester--more regard too.  Why, they deem me threescore years
+old at least, and I am a very oracle of wisdom among them.  Earl of
+Leicester, forsooth! he would be nobody compared with Blind Hal!  And
+as to freedom--with child and staff the whole country and city are
+before me--no shouts to dull retainers, and jackanape pages to set my
+blind lordship on horseback, without his bridle hand, and lead him at
+their will anywhere but at his own.
+
+"All this I can understand for thyself," said Richard; "but for thy
+child's sake canst thou not be moved?"
+
+"My child, quotha?  What, when her Uncle Simon is true grandson to
+King John?"
+
+Richard started.  "I cannot believe what thou sayest of Simon," he
+answered in displeasure.
+
+"One day thou wilt," calmly answered Henry; "but I had rather not
+have it proved upon the heiress of Leicester and Montfort."
+
+"Leicester is forfeit--Simon an outlawed man."
+
+"If the humour for pardon is set in, Cousin Edward is no man to do
+things by halves.  If he owned me at all, the lands would be mine
+again, and such a bait would be smelt out by Simon were he at the
+ends of the earth.  Or if not, that poor child would be granted to
+any needy kinsman or grasping baron that Edward wanted to portion.
+My child shall be my own, and none other's.  Better a beggar's brat
+than an earl's heiress!"
+
+"She is a lovely little maiden.  I know not how thou canst endure
+letting her grow up in poverty, an alien from her birth and rank."
+
+"Poverty," Henry laughed.  "Little knowest thou of the jolly beggar's
+business!  I would fain wager thee, Richard, that pretty Bessee's
+marriage-portion shall be a heavier bag of gold than the Lady
+Elizabeth de Montfort would gather by all the aids due to her father
+from his vassals--and won moreover without curses."
+
+"But who would be the bridegroom?"
+
+"Her own choice, not the King's," answered Henry briefly.
+
+"And this is all," said Richard, perceiving that according to the
+previous day's agreement the cream-coloured elephant of a German
+horse was being led forth for his use, and Sir Robert preparing to
+accompany him.  "I must leave thee in this strange condition?"
+
+"Ay, that must thou.  Betray me, and thou shalt have the curse of the
+head of thine house.  Had thy voice not become so strangely like my
+father's, I had never made myself known to thee."
+
+"I will see thee again."
+
+"That will be as thou canst.  I trow Edward hardly gives freedom
+enough to his pages for them to pay visits unknown," replied Henry,
+with a strange sneering triumph in his own wild liberty.
+
+"If aught ails thee, if I can aid thee, swear to me that thou wilt
+send to me."
+
+Henry laughed with somewhat of a tone of mockery, adding, "Well,
+well--keep thou thy plight to me so long as I want thee not, and I
+will keep mine to thee if ever I should need thee.  Now away with
+thee.  I hear the horses impatient for thee; and what would be the
+lot of the beggar if he were seen chattering longer with a lordly
+young page than might suffice for his plaint?  I hear voices.  Put a
+tester in my dish, fair Sir, for appearance' sake.  Thou hast it not?
+aha--I told thee I was the richer as well as the freer man.  What's
+that?  That is no ring of coin."
+
+"'Tis a fair jewel, father, green and sparkling," cried Bessee.
+
+"Nay, nay, I'll have none of it.  Some token from thy new masters?
+Ha, boy?"
+
+"From the Princess, on New Year's Day," replied Richard.  "But keep
+it, oh, keep it, Henry; it breaks my heart to leave thee thus."
+
+"Keep it!  Not I.  What wouldst say to thy dainty dame?  Nor should I
+get half its value from the Jews.  No, no, take back thy jewel, Sir
+Page; I'll not put thee in need of telling more lies than becomes
+thine office."
+
+Richard glowed with irritation; but what was the use of anger with a
+blind beggar?  And while Henry bestowed far more demonstration of
+affection on Leonillo than on his brother, it became needful to mount
+and ride off, resolving to tell the Prince and Princess, what would
+be no falsehood, that the child belonged to a Kenilworth man-at-arms,
+sorely wounded at Evesham, and at present befriended by the Knights
+of St. John.
+
+Old Sir Robert Darcy knew so much that it was needful to confide
+fully in him; and he gave Richard some satisfaction by a promise to
+watch over his brother as far as was possible with a man of such
+uncertain vagrant habits; and he likewise engaged to let him know,
+even in the Holy Land, of any change in the beggar's condition; and
+this, considering the wide-spread connections of the Order, and that
+some of its members were sure to be in any crusading army, was all
+that Richard could reasonably hope.
+
+"Canst write?" asked Sir Robert.
+
+"Yea, Father."
+
+"I could once!  But if there be need to send thee a scroll, I'll take
+care it is writ by a trusty hand."
+
+More than this Richard could not hope.  There had always been a
+strange self-willed wildness of character about his eldest brother,
+who, though far less violent and overbearing in actual deed than the
+two next in age, Simon and Guy, had contrived to incur even greater
+odium than they, by his mocking careless manner and love of taunts
+and gibing.  Simon de Montfort the elder had indeed strangely failed
+in the bringing up of his sons.  Whether it were that their royal
+connection had inflated them with pride, or that the King's
+indulgence had counteracted the good effects of the admirable
+education provided for them at home, they had done little justice to
+their parentage, or to their tutor, the excellent Robert Grostete.
+Perhaps the Earl himself was too affectionate:  perhaps his
+occupation in public affairs hindered him from enforcing family
+discipline.  At any rate, neither of the elder three could have been
+naturally endowed with his largeness of mind, and high unselfish
+views.  He was a man before his age; not only deeply pious, but with
+a devoted feeling for justice and mercy carried into all the details
+of life, till his loyalty to the law overcame his loyalty to the
+King.  Simon and Guy, on the other hand, were commonplace young
+nobles of the thirteenth century, heedless of all but themselves, and
+disdaining all beneath them; and when their father had seized the
+reins of government in order to enforce the laws that the King would
+not observe, they saw in his elevation a means of gratifying
+themselves, and being above all law.  The cry throughout England had
+been that Simon's "sons made themselves vile, and he restrained them
+not."
+
+Henry de Montfort had not indeed, like his brothers, plundered the
+ships in the Channel, extorted money from peaceful yeomen, nor
+insulted the poor old captive King to his face; but his deference had
+been more galling than their defiance; his scornful smiles and keen
+cutting jests had mortally offended many a partizan; and when
+positive work was to be done, Simon with all his fierceness and
+cruelty was far more to be depended on than Henry, who might at any
+time fly off upon some incalculable freak.  To Richard's boyish
+recollection, if Simon had been the most tyrannical towards him in
+deed, Henry had been infinitely more annoying and provoking in the
+lesser arts of teasing.
+
+And looking back on the past, he could understand how intolerable a
+life of helplessness would be among the equals whom Henry had so
+often stung with his keen wit, and that to a man of his peculiar tone
+of mind there was infinitely more liberty in thus sinking to the
+lowest depths, where his infirmities were absolute capital to him,
+than in being hedged about with the restraints of his rank.  Any way,
+it was impossible to interfere, even for the child's sake, and all
+Richard could do to console himself was to look forward to his return
+from the Crusade an esquire or even a knight, with exploits that
+Henry might respect--a standing in the Court that would give him some
+right to speak--perhaps in time a home and lady wife to whom his
+brother would intrust his child, who would then be growing out of a
+mere toy.  Or might not his services win him a fresh grant of the
+earldom, and could he not then prove his sincerity by laying it at
+the true Earl's feet?
+
+Pretty Bessee, too!  Richard remembered stories current in the
+family, of their grandmother, Amicia, Countess of Leicester in her
+own right, being forced when a young girl to wed the stern grim old
+persecuting Simon de Montfort, and how vain had been her struggles
+against her doom.  He lost himself in graceful romantic visions of
+the young knight whose love he would watch and foster, and whose
+marriage to his lovely niece should be securely concluded ere her
+rank should be made known, when her guardian uncle would yield all to
+her.  And from that day forth Richard looked out with keen eyes among
+the playfellows of the little princes for Bessee's future knight.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VII--AMONG THE RUINS OF CARTHAGE
+
+
+
+"But man is more than law, and I may have
+Some impress of myself upon the world;
+One poor brief life, helping to feed the flame
+Of chivalry, and keep alive the truth
+That courage, honour, mercy, make a knight."
+Queen Isabel, by S. M.
+
+"Land in sight!  Cheer up, John, my man!" said Richard, leaning over
+a bundle of cloaks that lay on the deck of a Genoese galley.
+
+The cross floated high aloft, accompanied by the lions of English
+royalty; the bulwark was hung round with blazoned shields, and the
+graceful white sails were filled by a gay breeze that sent the good
+ship dancing over the crested waves of the Mediterranean, in company
+with many another of her gallant sisters, crowded with the chivalry
+of England.
+
+Woeful was however the plight of great part of that chivalry.
+Merrily merrily bounded the bark, but her sport felt very like death
+to many of her freight, and among others to poor little John de
+Mohun.
+
+His father, Baron Mohun of Dunster, had been deeply implicated in the
+Barons' Wars, and had been a personal friend of the Earl of
+Leicester, from whom he had only separated himself in consequence of
+the outrageous exactions and acts of insolence perpetrated by the
+young Montforts.  He had indeed received a disabling wound while
+fighting on the Prince's side at Evesham; but his submission had been
+thought so insecure that his son and heir had been required of him,
+ostensibly as page, but really as hostage.
+
+In spite of his Norman surname, little John of Dunster was, at twelve
+years old, a sturdy thoroughgoing English lad, with the strongest
+possible hatred to all foreigners, whom with grand indifference to
+natural history he termed "locusts sucking the blood of Englishmen."
+Not a word or command would he understand except in his mother
+tongue; and no blows nor reproofs had sufficed to tame his sturdy
+obstinacy.  The other pages had teased, fagged, and bullied him to
+their hearts' content, without disturbing his determination to go his
+own way; and his only friend and protector had been Richard, whom,
+under the name of Fowen, he took for a genuine Englishman, and loved
+with all his heart.  If anything would ever cure him of his wilful
+awkwardness and dogged bashfulness, it was likely to be the kindness
+of Richard--above all, in the absence of the tormentors, for Hamlyn
+de Valence alone of the other pages had been selected to attend upon
+the Prince in this expedition; and he, though scornful and
+peremptory, did not think the boy worthy of his attention, and did
+not actively tease him.
+
+At present Hamlyn de Valence, as well as most others of the
+passengers, lay prostrate; scarcely alive even to the assurance of
+Richard, who had still kept his feet, that the outline of the hills
+was quickly becoming distinct, and that they were fast entering the
+gulf where lay the fleet that had brought the crusaders of France and
+Sicily, whom they hoped to join in the conquest and conversion of
+Tunis.  On arriving at Aigues Mortes, they had found that the French
+King had already sailed for Sicily; and following him thither, learnt
+that his brother, Charles of Anjou, had persuaded him to begin his
+crusade by a descent on Tunis, to which the Sicilian crown was said
+to have some claim; that he had sailed thither at once, and Charles
+had followed him so soon as the Genoese transports could return for
+the Sicilian troops.
+
+"I see the masts!" exclaimed Richard; "the bay is crowded with them!
+There must be a goodly force.  Yonder are two headlands; within them
+we shall have smoother water--see--"
+
+"What strikes thee so suddenly silent?" growled one of the muffled
+figures stretched on deck.
+
+"The ensigns are but half-mast high, my Lord," returned Richard in an
+awe-struck voice; "the lilies of France are hung drooping downward."
+
+"These plaguy southern winds at their tricks," muttered at first Earl
+Gilbert of Gloucester, for he it was who had spoken, though Richard
+had not known him to be so near; then sitting up, he came to a fuller
+view:  "Hm--it looks ill!  Thou canst keep thy feet, Fowen, or what
+do they call thee?  Down with thee to the cabin, and let the Prince
+know."
+
+Stepping across the prostrate forms, and meeting with vituperations
+as he trode, Richard made his way to the ladder that led below, and
+notified his presence behind the curtain that veiled the royal cabin.
+He was summoned to enter at once.  The Prince was endeavouring to
+write at a swinging-table, the Princess lay white and resigned on a
+couch, attended on by Dame Idonea (or more properly Iduna) Osbright,
+a lady who had lost her husband in a former Crusade, and had ever
+since been a sort of high-born head nurse in the palace.  A Danish
+skald, who had once been at the English court, had said that she
+seemed to have eaten her namesake's apple of immortality, without her
+apple of beauty, for no one could ever remember to have seen her
+other than a tiny dried-up old witch, with keen gray eyes, a sharp
+tongue, an ever ready foot and hand, and a frame utterly unaffected
+by any of the influences so sinister to far younger and stronger
+ones.  Devoted to all the royal family, her special passion was for
+Prince Edmund, who, in his mother's repugnance to his deformity, had
+been left almost entirely to her, and she had accompanied the
+Princess Eleanor all the more willingly from her desire to look after
+her favourite nursling.
+
+"There, Lady," said Edward to his wife, "the tossing is all but over;
+here is Richard come to tell us that we are nigh on land."
+
+"Even so, my Lord," returned Richard; "we are entering the gulf, but
+my Lord of Gloucester has sent me to report to you that in all the
+ships the colours are trailing."
+
+"Sayst thou?" exclaimed the Prince, hastily laying aside his writing
+materials.  "Fear not, mi Dona, I will return anon and tell thee how
+it is.  We are in smoother water already."
+
+"So much smoother that I will come with thee out of this stifling
+cabin," said Eleanor.  "O would that we had been in time for thee to
+have counselled thine uncles--"
+
+"We will see what we have to grieve for ere we bemoan ourselves,"
+said the Prince.  "My good uncle of France would put his whole fleet
+in mourning for one barefooted friar!"
+
+"Depend on it, my Lord, 'tis mourning for something in earnest,"
+interposed Dame Iduna; "I said it was not for nothing that a single
+pyot came and rocked up his ill-omened tail while we were taking
+horse for this expedition, and my Lady there was kissing the little
+ones at home, nor that a hare ran over our road at Bagshot--"
+
+"Well, Dame," interposed the Prince good-humouredly, seeing his wife
+somewhat affected by the list of omens, "I know you have a horse-shoe
+in your luggage, so you will come safe off, whoever does not!"
+
+"And what matters what my luck is," returned the Dame, "an old
+beldame such as me, so long as you and your brother come off safe,
+and find the blessed princes at home well and sound?  Would that we
+were out of this sandy hole, or that any one would resolve me why we
+cannot go straight to Jerusalem when we are about it!"
+
+The Dame had delayed them while she spoke, in order to adjust the
+Princess's muffler over her somewhat dishevelled locks; but Eleanor
+seeing that her husband was impatient, put a speedy end to her
+operations, and took his arm.
+
+Meantime the vessel had come within the Gulf of Goletta, and others
+of the passengers had revived, and were standing on deck to watch
+their entrance into the very harbour that two thousand years before
+had sheltered the storm-tossed fleet of AEneas; but if the Trojan had
+there found a wooded haven, the groves and sylvan shades must long
+since have been destroyed, for to the new-comers the bay appeared
+inclosed by spits of sand, though there was a rising ground in front
+that cut off the view.  In the centre of the bay was a low sandy
+islet, covered with remains of masonry, and with a fort in the midst.
+On this was mounted the French banner, but likewise drooping; and all
+around it lay the ships with furled sails and trailing ensigns,
+giving them an inexpressibly mysterious look of woe, like living
+creatures with folded wings and vailed crests, lying on the face of
+the waters in a silent sleep of sorrow.  There was an awe of suspense
+that kept each one on the deck silent, unable to utter the conjecture
+that weighed upon his breast.
+
+A boat was already putting off, and its quick movements seemed to mar
+the solemn stillness, as, impelled by the regular strokes of a dozen
+dark handsome Genoese mariners with gaily-tinted caps, it shot
+towards the vessel.  A Genoese captain in graver garb sat at the
+helm, and as they came alongside, a whisper, almost a shudder, seemed
+to thrill upwards from the boat to the crew, and through them to the
+passengers, "Il Re!" "il Re santo," "il Re di Francia."  It seemed to
+have pervaded the whole ship even before the Genoese had had time to
+take the rope flung to him and to climb up the ship's side, where as
+his fellow-captain greeted him, he asked hastily for the Principe
+Inglese.
+
+For Edward had not come forward, but was standing with his back
+against the mainmast, with colourless cheek and eyes set and fixed.
+Eleanor looked up to him in silence, aware that he was mastering
+vehement agitation, and would endure no token of sympathy or sorrow
+that would unnerve him when dignity required firmness.  To him, Louis
+IX., the husband of his mother's sister, had been the guiding friend
+and noble pattern denied to him in his father; and Eleanor, intrusted
+to his uncle's care during the troubles of England, a maiden wife in
+her first years of womanhood, had been formed and moulded by that
+holy and upright influence.  To both the loss was as that of a
+father; and the murmur among the sailors was to them as a voice
+saying, "Knowest thou that God will take away thy master from thy
+head to-day?"  For the moment, however, the Princess's sole thought
+was how her husband would bear it, and she watched anxiously till the
+struggle was over, in the space of a few seconds, and he met the
+Genoese with his usual reserved courtesy; and returning his
+salutation, signed to him to communicate his tidings.
+
+They were however brief, for the captain had held by his ship, and
+all he knew was that deadly sickness, fever, and plague had raged in
+the camp.  The Papal Legate was dead, and the good King of France.
+His son was dead too, and many another beside.
+
+"Which son?"
+
+"Not the eldest--he lay sick, but there were hopes of him; but the
+little one--he had been carried on board his ship, but it had not
+saved him."
+
+"Poor little Tristan!" sighed Eleanor; "true Cross-bearer, born in
+one hapless Crusade to die in another."
+
+"The King of Sicily?" demanded Edward between his teeth.
+
+"He had arrived the very day of his brother's death," said the
+Genoese; "and when he had seen how matters stood, he had concluded a
+truce with the King of Tunis, and intended to sail as soon as the new
+King of France could bear to be moved."
+
+In the meantime the vessel had been anchored, and preparations were
+made for landing; but the Princes impatience to hear details would
+not brook even the delay of waiting till his horse could be set
+ashore.  He committed to the Earl of Gloucester the charge of
+encamping his men on the island, left a message with him for his
+brother Edmund, who was in another ship, and perceiving that Richard
+had suffered the least of all his suite, summoned him to attend him
+in the boat which was at once lowered.
+
+This would have been a welcome call had not Richard found that poor
+little John de Mohun had not revived like the other passengers, but
+still lay inert and sometimes moaning.  All Richard could do was to
+beg the groom specially attached to the pages' service, to have a
+care of the little fellow, and get him sheltered in a tent as soon as
+possible; but the Prince never suffered any hesitation in obeying
+him, and it was needful to hurry at once into the boat.
+
+Without a word, the Prince with long swift strides, in the light of
+the sinking sun, walked up the low hill, the same where erst the
+pious AEneas climbed with his faithful Achates following.  From the
+brow the Trojan prince had beheld the rising city in the valley--the
+English prince came on its desolation.  Yet nature had made the vale
+lovely--green with well-watered verdure, fields of beauteous green
+maize, graceful date palms, and majestic cork trees; and among them
+were white flat-roofed Moorish houses; but many a black stain on the
+fair landscape told of the fresh havoc of an invading army.
+
+Utterly blotted out was Carthage.  Half demolished, half choked with
+sand, the city of Dido, the city of Hannibal, the city of Cyprian--
+all had vanished alike, and nothing remained erect but a Moorish
+fortress, built up with fragments of the huge stones of the old
+Phoenicians, intermixed with the friezes and sculptures of Graecising
+Rome, and the whole fabric in the graceful Saracenic taste; while
+completing the strange mixture of periods, another of those mournful
+French banners drooped from the battlements, and around it spread the
+white tents of the armies of France and the Two Sicilies, like it
+with trailing banners; an orphaned plague-stricken host in a ruined
+city.
+
+While the Prince paused for a moment's glance, a party of knights
+came spurring up the hill, who had been ordered off to meet him on
+the first intelligence that his fleet was in sight, but had been
+taken by surprise by his alertness.
+
+They met with bowed heads and dejected mien; and there was one who
+hid his face and wept aloud as he exclaimed, "Ah!  Messire, our holy
+King loved you well!"
+
+"Alas, beau sire Guillaume de Porceles!" was all that Edward could
+say, as with tears in his eyes he held out his hand to the good
+Provencal knight, adding, "Let me hear!"
+
+The knight, leading his horse and walking by Edward's side, told how
+the King had been induced to make his descent on Tunis, from some
+wild hope of the king's conversion, which had been magnified by
+Charles of Anjou, from his dislike to let so gallant an army pass by
+without endeavouring to obtain some personal advantage to his own
+realm of Sicily.  Though a vassal of Beatrix of Provence, the Sire de
+Porceles was no devoted admirer of her husband, Charles of Anjou, and
+spoke with no concealment of the unhappy perversion of the Crusade.
+Charles of Anjou was all-powerful with the court of Rome, and in
+crusading matters Louis deemed it right absolutely to surrender to
+the ecclesiastical power all that judgment which had made him so
+prudent and wise a king at home, while his crusades were lamentable
+failures.  Thus in him it had been a piece of obedient self-denial
+not to press forward to the Holy Sepulchre; but to land in this
+malarious bay to fulfil aims that, had he but used his common sense,
+he would have seen to be merely those of private ambition.  There it
+had been one scene of wasting sickness.  A few deeds of arms had been
+done to refresh the spirits of the French, such as the taking of the
+fort of Carthage, and now and then a skirmish of some foraging party;
+but in general the Moors launched their spears and fled without
+staying for combat.  Many who had hid themselves in the vaults and
+cellars of Carthage had been dragged out and put to death, and their
+bodies had aided in breeding pestilence.  Name after name fell from
+the lips of the knight, like the roll of warriors fallen in a great
+battle, when
+
+
+"They melted from the field like snow,
+Their king, their lords, their mightiest low."
+
+
+And the last foreign embassy that ever reached Louis IX. had been
+that of the Greek Emperor Michael Palaeologos, come to set before him
+the savage barbarities perpetrated upon Christians by this brother -
+
+
+"Who had spoilt the purpose of his life."
+
+
+It was as Charles entered the port, that Louis, lying on a bed of
+ashes, with his hands crossed upon his breast, and the words, "O
+Jerusalem, Jerusalem!" entered not the Jerusalem of his earthly
+schemes, but the Jerusalem of his true aspirations.
+
+"Shall we conduct you to my Lord the King of Sicily?" asked De
+Porceles.
+
+"No!" said Edward, with bitter sternness; "to my uncle of France."
+
+"Down, down, my Lord, and all of you instantly," shouted Porceles
+suddenly, throwing himself face downwards on the ground.  Edward was
+too good a soldier not to follow the injunction instantaneously, and
+Richard did the same, as well as all the knights who had come up with
+Porceles.  Even the horses buried their noses in the hot sandy soil.
+A strange rushing roaring sound passed over them; there was a sense
+of intense suffocation, then of heat, pricking, and irritation.  The
+Provencals were rising; and the Prince and his page doing the same,
+shook off a plentiful load of sand, and beheld, careering furiously
+away, between them and the western sun, what looked like a purple
+column, reaching from earth to heaven, and bespangled with living
+gold-dust, whirling round in giddy spirals, and all the time fleeting
+so fast that it was diminishing every moment, and was gone in a wink
+of the eye.
+
+"Is it enchantment?" gasped Richard to the squire nearest him, as he
+strove to clear his eyes from the sand and gaze after the wonder.
+
+"Worse than enchantment," quoth the squire; "it is a sand whirlwind."
+
+They were soon crossing the ditch that had been dug around the camp
+among the ruins, and passed through lanes of tents erected among the
+thick foliage that mantled the broken walls; here and there tracks of
+mosaic pavement; of temples to Dido or Anna peeping forth beneath
+either the luxuriant vegetation or the heavy sand-drifts; or columns
+of the new Carthage lying veiled by acanthus; or remnants of churches
+destroyed by Genseric--all alike disregarded by the sickly drooping
+figures that moved feebly about among them, regarding them as little
+save stumbling-blocks.
+
+A Moorish house in the midst of a once well-laid-out garden, now
+trampled and destroyed, was the place to which the Provencal knight
+led the English Prince.  Entering the doorway of a court, where a
+fountain sparkled in the midst of a marble pavement, they saw the
+richly-latticed stone doorway of the house guarded by two figures in
+armour like iron statues; and passing between them, they came into
+the principal chamber, marble-floored, and with a divan of cushions
+round it; but full in the midst of the room lay a coffin, covered
+with the lilied banner, and the standard of the Cross; the crowned
+helmet, good sword, knightly spurs, and cross-marked shield lying
+upon it; solemn forms in armour guarded it, and priests knelt and
+chanted prayers and psalms around it.  Within were only the bones of
+Louis, which were to be taken to St. Denis.  The flesh, which had
+been removed by being boiled in wine and spices, was already on its
+way to Palermo in a vessel whose melancholy ensigns would have
+announced the loss to the English had they not passed it in the
+night.
+
+Long did Edward kneel beside the remains of his uncle, with his face
+hidden and thoughts beyond our power to trace.  Richard's heart was
+full of that strange question "Wherefore?"  Wherefore should the best
+and purest schemes planned by the highest souls fall over like a
+crested wave and become lost?  So it had been, he would have said,
+with the Round Table under Arthur, so with England's rights beneath
+his own noble father, so with the Crusade under such leaders as
+Edward of England and Louis of France.  Did he mark the answer in
+those Psalms that the priests were singing around -
+
+
+"Qui seminant in lacrymis, in exultatione metent,
+Euntes ibant et flebant mittentes semina sua,
+Venientes autem venient cum exultatione portantes manipulos suos."
+{1}
+
+
+Surely we may believe that Simon of Leicester and Louis of France
+were alike beyond grief at their marred visions, their errors of deed
+or of judgment were washed away, and their true purpose was accepted,
+both waiting the harvest when their works should follow them, and it
+should have been made manifest that the effect of what they had been
+and had suffered had told far more on future generations than what
+they had wrought out in their own lifetime.
+
+It was at that moment that the sensation that an eye was upon him
+caused Richard to raise his eyes from the floor.  One of the armed
+figures, who had hitherto stood as still as suits of armour in a
+castle hall, had partially lowered the visor of the helmet, and eyes,
+nose, and a part of the cheeks were visible.  Richard looked up, and
+they were those of his father! was it a delusion of his fancy?  He
+closed his eyes and looked again.  Again it was the deep brown
+Montfort eye, the clearly-cut nose, the embrowned skin!  He glanced
+at the bearings on the shield.  Behold, it was his own--the red field
+and white lion rampant with a forked tail, which he had not seen for
+so long.
+
+Almost at the same moment another person entered the chamber--a man
+with a sallow complexion, narrow French features, sharp gray eyes,
+and a certain royal bearing that even a cunning shrewdness of
+expression could not destroy.  His face was composed to a look of
+melancholy, and he crossed himself and knelt down near Edward to
+await the conclusion of his devotions.  Edward, who knelt absorbed in
+grief, with his cloak partly over his face, apparently did not
+perceive him, and after two or three unheeded endeavours at
+attracting notice, he at length rose and said in a low voice, "My
+fair nephew."  For a moment the Prince lifted up his face, and
+Richard had rather have died than have encountered that glance of
+mournful reproof; then hiding his face in his hands again, he
+continued his devotions.
+
+When these were ended he rose from his knees; and when out of the
+death-chamber bowed his bead and with grave courtesy exchanged
+greetings with Charles of Anjou, asking at the same time to see his
+young cousin Philippe, the new King of France.
+
+An inquiry from an attendant elicited that Philippe had just dropped
+asleep under the influence of a potion from his leech.
+
+"Then, fair nephew," said Charles of Sicily, "be content with your
+old uncle, and come to my apartments, where I will set before you the
+necessities that have led me to conclude the truce that is baffling
+your eager desire of deeds of arms."
+
+"Pardon me, royal uncle," returned Edward, "I must see my camp set
+up.  It is already late, and I must take order that my troops mingle
+not where contagion might seize them.  Another time," he added, "I
+may brook the argument better."
+
+Charles of Anjou did not press him further.  There was that in his
+face and voice which betokened that his fierce indignation and
+overpowering grief were scarcely restrained, and that a word of
+excuse in his present mood would but have roused the lion.
+
+Horses had been provided for him and his attendant.  He flung himself
+on his steed at once, and Richard was obliged to follow without a
+moment's opportunity of making inquiry about the wonderful apparition
+he had seen in the chamber of death.
+
+For some distance Edward galloped rapidly over the sandy soil, then
+drawing up his horse when he had come to the brow from which he could
+see on the one side the valley of Carthage, on the other the bay, he
+made an exclamation which Richard took for a summons, and he came up
+asking if he were called.  "No, boy, no!  I only spoke my thoughts
+aloud!  Failure and success!  We've seen them both to-day--in the two
+kings!  What thinkst thou of them?"
+
+"Better be wrecked than work the wreck, my Lord," said Richard.
+
+"Ay! but why surrender the wit to the worker of the wreck?" said
+Edward.  Then knitting his brow, "Two holy men have I known who did
+not blind their wit for their conscience' sake--two alone--did it
+fare better with them?  One was the good Bishop of Lincoln--the other
+thou knowst, Richard!  Well, one goes after another--first good
+Bishop Grostete, then the Lord of Leicester, and now mine uncle of
+France; and if earth is to have no better than such as it pleases the
+Saints to leave in it, it will not be worth staying in much longer."
+
+"My Lord," said Richard, coming near, "methought I saw my father's
+face under a visor--one of the knightly guards beside the holy King."
+
+"Well might thy fancy call him up in such a presence," said Edward.
+"They twain had hearts in the same place above, though they saw the
+world below on different sides, and knew each other little, and loved
+each other less, in life.  That's all at an end now!  Well, back to
+our camp to make the best of the world they have left behind them!"
+And then in a tone that Richard was not meant to hear, "While mi dona
+Leonor remains to me there is something saintly and softening still
+in this world!  Heaven help me--ay, and all my foes--were she gone
+from it too!"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER VIII--RICHARD'S WRAITH
+
+
+
+"No distance breaks the tie of blood;
+Brothers are brothers evermore;
+Nor wrong, nor wrath of deadliest mood,
+That magic may o'erpower."--Christian Year.
+
+It was nearly dark when the Prince and the Page landed on the island,
+and found the tents already set up in their due order and rank,
+according to the discipline that no one durst transgress where Edward
+was the commander.
+
+Richard attended him to his pavilion, and being there dismissed until
+supper-time, crossed the square space which was always left around
+the royal banner, to the tent at the southern corner, which was
+regularly appropriated to the pages' use.  On lifting its curtain he
+was, however, dismayed to see a kirtle there, and imagining that he
+must have fallen upon the ladies' quarters, he was retreating with an
+apology; when the sharp voice of Dame Idonea called out, "Oh yes,
+Master Page! 'tis you that are at home here.  I was merely tarrying
+till 'twas the will of one of you to come in and look to the poor
+child."
+
+And little John of Dunster called from a couch of mantles, "Richard,
+oh! is it he at last?"
+
+"It is I," said Richard, advancing into the light of a brass lamp,
+hung by chains from the top of the tent.  "This is kind indeed, Lady!
+But is he indeed so ill at ease?"
+
+"How should he be otherwise, with none of you idle-pated pages
+casting a thought to him?"
+
+"I was grieved to leave him--but the Prince summoned me," began
+Richard.
+
+"Beshrew thee!  Tell me not of princes, as though there were no one
+whom thou couldst bid to have a care of the little lad!"
+
+"I did bid Piers--," Richard made another attempt.
+
+"Piers, quotha?  Why didst not bid the Jackanapes that sits on the
+luggage?  A proper warder for a sick babe!"
+
+"I am no babe!" here burst out John; "I am twelve years old come
+Martinmas, and I need no tendance but Richard's."
+
+"Ha, ha!  So those are all the thanks we ladies get, when we are not
+young and fair!" laughed Dame Idonea, rather amused.
+
+"I want no women, young or old," petulantly repeated John; "I want
+Richard.--Lift me up, Richard; take away this cloak."
+
+"For his life, no!" returned the Dame; "he has the heats and the
+chills on him, and to let him take cold would be mere slaughter."
+
+"Alas!" said Richard, "I hoped nothing ailed him but the sea, and
+that landing would make all well."
+
+"As if the sea ever made a child shiver and burn by turns!  Nay, 'tis
+the trick of the sun in these parts.  Strange that the sun himself
+should be a mere ally of the Infidel!  I tell thee, if the child is
+ever to see Dunster again, thou must watch him well, keep him from
+the sun by day and the chill by night; or he'll be like the poor
+creatures in the French camp out there, whom, I suppose, you found in
+fine case."
+
+"Alack yes, Lady!"
+
+"I've seen it many a time; and all their disorders will be creeping
+into our camp next.  Tell me, is it even as they told us, one king
+dead and the other dying?"
+
+Richard began to wonder whether he should ever get her out of his
+tent, for she insisted on his telling her every possible particular--
+who had died, who had lived, who was sick, who well; and as from the
+close connection between the English, French, and Sicilian courts,
+whose queens were all sisters, she knew who every one was, and
+accounted for the history of each person she inquired after, back to
+the last generation--happy if it were not to the third--her
+conversation was not quickly over.  She ended at last, by desiring
+Richard to give her patient some of a febrifuge, which she had
+brought with her, every two hours, and when it was all spent, or in
+case of any change in the boy's state, to summon her from the ladies'
+tent; adding, however, "But what's the use of leaving a pert
+springald like thee in charge?  Thou wilt sleep like a very dormouse,
+I'll warrant!  I'd best call Mother Jugge."
+
+"Oh no, no!" cried John; to whom the attendance of Mother Jugge would
+have been a worse indignity than the being nursed by Dame Idonea;
+"let me have no one but Richard!  Richard knows all I want.--Richard,
+leave me not again."
+
+"Ay, ay; a little lad ever hangs to a bigger, were he to torture the
+life out of him.  Small thanks for us women after our good looks be
+past.  But I'll look in on the child in early morn, thanks or no
+thanks; for I know his mother well, and if I can help it, the hyenas
+shall not make game of his bones, as I hear them doing by the French
+yonder."
+
+John strove to say that, indeed, he thanked her, and had been
+infinitely comforted and refreshed by her care, and that all he meant
+was to express his distaste to Mother Jugge, the lavender (i.e.
+laundress), and his desire for Richard Fowen's company; but he was
+little attended to, and apparently more than half offended, the brisk
+old lady trotted away.
+
+That island was a dreary place; without a tree or any shelter from
+the glare of sun and sea, whose combined influences threatened
+blindness, sun-stroke, or at the very least blistered the faces of
+those who stepped beyond their tents by day.  The Prince's orders,
+however, strictly confined his army within its bounds, except that at
+twilight parties were sent ashore for water and provisions, under
+strict orders, however, to hold no parley with any one from the
+French or Sicilian camps, lest they should bring home the infection
+of the pestilence; and always under the command of some trustworthy
+knight, able and willing to enforce the command.
+
+The Prince himself refused all participation in the counsels of
+Charles of Anjou, and confined himself, like his men, entirely to the
+fleet and island.  Charles contrived to spread a report, that his
+displeasure was solely due to his disappointment at being balked of
+fighting with the Tunisians; and that instead of indignant grief at
+the perversion of the wrecked Crusade, he was only showing the
+sullenness of an aggrieved swordsman.  Even young Philippe le Hardi,
+a dull, heavy, ignorant youth, was led to suppose this was the cause
+of his offence, and though daily inquiries were sent through the
+Genoese crews for his health, he made no demonstration of willingness
+to see his cousin of England.
+
+Thus Richard had no opportunity of ascertaining whether there were
+any basis for the strange impression he had received in St. Louis's
+death-chamber.  It would have been an act of disobedience, not soon
+overlooked by the Prince, had one of his immediate suite transgressed
+his commands, and indeed, so strict was the discipline, that it would
+scarcely have been possible to make the attempt.  Besides, Richard's
+time was entirely engrossed between his duties in attending on the
+Prince, and his care of little John of Dunster, who had a sharp
+attack of fever, and was no doubt only carried through it by the
+experienced skill of Dame Idonea Osbright, and by Richard's tender
+nursing.  Somehow the dame's heart was not won, even by the elder
+page's dutiful care and obedience to all her directions.  Partly she
+viewed him as a rival in the affections of the patient--who, poor
+little fellow, would in his companion's absence be the child he was,
+and let her treat him like his mother, or old nurse, chattering to
+her freely about home, and his home-sick longings; whereas the
+instant any male companion appeared, he made it a point of honour to
+be the manly warrior and crusader, just succeeding so far as to be
+sullen instead of plaintive; though when left to Richard, he could
+again relax his dignity, and become natural and affectionate.  But
+besides this species of jealousy, Richard suspected that Lady
+Osbright knew, or at least guessed, his own parentage, and disliked
+him for it accordingly.  She had never forgotten the distress and
+degradation of his mother's stolen marriage, nor forgiven his father
+for it; she had often stung the proud heart of his brother Henry,
+when he shared the nursery of his cousins the princes; and her sturdy
+English dislike of foreigners, and her strong narrow personal
+loyalty, had alike resulted in the most vehement hatred of the Earl
+of Leicester, whose head she would assuredly have welcomed with
+barbarous exultation, worthy of her Danish ancestors.  Little chance,
+then, was there that she would regard with favour his son under a
+feigned name, fostered in the Prince's own court and camp.
+
+She was a constraint, and almost a vexation, to Richard, and he
+heartily wished that the boy's recovery would free his tent from her.
+The boy did recover favourably, in spite of all the discomforts of
+the island, and was decidedly convalescent when, after nearly ten
+days' isolation on the island, Edward drew out his whole force upon
+the shore to do honour to the embarkation of the relics of Louis IX.
+It was one of the most solemn and melancholy pageants that could be
+conceived.  A wide lane of mailed soldiers was drawn up, Sicilians
+and Provencals on the one side, and on the other, English and the
+Knights of the two Orders.  All stood, or sat on horseback in shining
+steel, guarding the way along which were carried the coffins.  In
+memory, perhaps, of Louis's own words, "I, your leader, am going
+first," his remains headed the procession, closely followed by those
+of his young son; and behind it marched his two brothers, Charles and
+Alfonse, and his son-in-law, the King of Navarre (the two latter
+already bearing the seeds of the fatal malady), and the three English
+princes, Edward, Edmund, and Henry of Almayne, each followed by his
+immediate suite.  The long line of coffins of French counts and
+nobles, whose lives had in like manner been sacrificed, brought up
+the rear; and alas! how many nameless dead must have been left in the
+ruins!
+
+Each coffin when brought to the shore was placed in a boat, and with
+muffled oars transplanted to the vessel ready to receive it, while
+the troops remained drawn up on the shore.  The procession that
+ensued was almost more mournful.  It was still of biers, but these
+were not of the dead but of the living, and again the foremost was
+the King of France, while next to him came his sister, the Queen of
+Navarre.  Edward went down to his litter, as it was brought on the
+beach, and offered him his arm as he feebly stepped forth to enter
+the boat.  Philippe looked up to his tall cousin, and wrung his hands
+as he murmured, "Alas! what is to be the end of all this?"  Edward
+made kind and cheerful reply, that things would look better when they
+met at Trapani, and then almost lifted the young king into his boat.
+Poor youth, he had not yet seen the end!  He was yet to lose his
+wife, his brother-in-law, and his uncle and aunt, ere he should see
+his home again.
+
+Richard and Hamlyn de Valence, as part of the Prince's train, had
+moved in the procession; and they were for the rest of the day in
+close attendance on their lord, conveying his numerous orders for the
+embarkation of the troops on the morrow, on their return to Sicily.
+It was not till night-fall that Richard returned to his tent, where
+John of Dunster was sitting on the sand at the door, eagerly watching
+for him.  "Well, Jack, my lad, how hast thou sped?" asked he,
+advancing.  "Couldst see our doleful array?"
+
+"Is it thou, indeed, this time?" said the boy, catching at his cloak.
+
+"Why, who should it be?"
+
+"Thy wraith!  Thy double-ganger has been here Richard."
+
+"What, dreaming again?"
+
+'No no!  I am well, I am strong.  But this IS the land of
+enchantment!  Thou knowst it is.  Did we not see a fleet of fairy
+boats sailing on the sea? and a leaf eat up a fly here on this very
+tent pole?  And did not the Fay Morgaine show us towns and castles
+and churches in the sea?  Thou didst not call me light-headed then,
+Richard; thou sawest it too!"
+
+"But this wraith of mine!  Where didst see it?"
+
+"In this tent.  I was lying on the sand, trying if I could make it
+hold enough to build a castle of it, when the curtain was put back,
+and there thou stoodest, Richard!"
+
+"Well, did I speak or vanish?"
+
+"Oh, thou spakest--I mean the THING spake, and it said, 'Is this the
+tent of the young Lord of Montfort?'  How now--what have I said?"
+
+"Whom did he ask for?" demanded Richard breathlessly.
+
+"Montfort--young Lord de Montfort!" replied John; "I know it was, for
+he said it twice over."
+
+"And what didst thou answer?"
+
+"What should I answer?  I said we had no Montforts here; for they
+were all dishonoured traitors, slain and outlawed."
+
+Richard could not restrain a sudden indignant exclamation that
+startled the boy.  "Every one says so!  My father says so!" he
+returned, somewhat defiantly.
+
+"Not of the Earl," said Richard, recollecting himself.
+
+"He said every one of the young Montforts was a foul traitor, and
+man-sworn tyrant, as bad as King John had been ere the Charter,"
+repeated John hotly, "and their father was as bad, since he would
+give no redress.  Thou knowst how they served us in Somerset and
+Devon!"
+
+"I have heard, I have heard," said Richard, cutting short the story,
+and controlling his own burning pain, glad that the darkness
+concealed his face.  "No more of that; but tell me, what said this
+stranger?"
+
+"Thou thinkest it was really a stranger, and not thy wraith?" said
+John anxiously.  "I hope it was, for Dame Idonea said if it were a
+wraith, it betokened that thou wouldst not--live long--and oh,
+Richard!  I could not spare thee!"
+
+And the little fellow came nestling up to his friend's breast in an
+access of tenderness, such as perhaps he would have disdained save in
+the darkness.
+
+"Did Dame Idonea see him?" asked Richard.
+
+"No; but she came in soon after he had vanished."
+
+"Vanished!  What, like Fay Morgaine's castles?  Tell me in sooth,
+John; it imports me to know.  What did this stranger, when thou
+spakest thus of the House of Montfort?"
+
+"He answered," said John; "he did not answer courteously--he said,
+that I was a malapert little ass, and demanded again where this young
+Montfort's tent was.  So then I said, that if a Montfort dared to
+show his traitor's face in this camp, the Prince would hang him as
+high as Judas; for I wanted to be rid of him, Richard! it was so
+dreadful to see thy face, and hear thy voice talking French, and
+asking for dead traitors."
+
+"French!" said Richard.  "Methought thou knewst no French!"
+
+"I--I have heard it long now, more's the pity," faltered John, "and--
+and I'd have spoken anything to be rid of that shape."
+
+"And wert thou rid?  What befell then?"
+
+"It cursed the Prince, and King, and all of them," said John with a
+shudder; "it looked black and deadly, and I crossed myself, and said
+the Blessed Name, and no doubt it writhed itself and went off in
+brimstone and smoke, for I shut my eyes, and when I looked up again
+it was gone!"
+
+"Gone!  Didst look after him?"
+
+"Oh, no!  Earthly things are all food for a brave man's sword," said
+Master John, drawing himself up very valiantly, "but wraiths and
+things from beneath--they do scare the very heart out of a man.  And
+I lay, I don't know how, till Dame Idonea came in; and she said
+either the foul fiend had put on thy shape because he boded thee ill,
+or it was one of the traitor brood looking for his like."
+
+"Tell me, John," said Richard anxiously; "surely he was not in all
+points like me.  Had he our English white cross?"
+
+"I cannot say as to the cross," said John; "meseemed it was all you--
+yourself--and that was all--only I thought your voice was strange and
+hollow--and--now I think of it--yes--he was bearded--brown bearded.
+And," with a sudden thought, "stand up, prithee, in the opening of
+the tent;" and then taking his post where he had been sitting at the
+time of the apparition, "He was not so tall as thou art.  Thy head
+comes above the fold of the curtain, and his, I know, did not touch
+it, for I saw the light over it.  Then thou dost not think it was thy
+wraith?" he added anxiously.
+
+"I think my wraith would have measured me more exactly both in
+stature and in age," said Richard lightly.  "But how did Leonillo
+comport himself?  He brooks not a stranger in general; and dogs
+cannot endure the presence of a spirit."
+
+"Ah! but he fawned upon this one, and thrust his nose into his hand,"
+said John, "and I think he must have run after him; for it was so
+long ere he came back to me, that I had feared greatly he was gone,
+and oh, Richard! then I must have gone too!  I could never have met
+you without Leonillo."
+
+By this time Richard had little doubt that the visitor must have been
+one of his brothers, Simon or Guy, who were not unlikely to be among
+the Provencals, in the army of Charles of Anjou.  He had not been
+thought to resemble them as a boy, but he had observed how much more
+alike brothers appear to strangers than they do to their own family;
+and he knew by occasional observations from the Prince, as well as
+from his brother Henry's recognition of his voice, that the old
+Montfort characteristics must be strong in himself.  He would not,
+however, avow his belief to John of Dunster.  Secrecy on his own
+birth had been enjoined on him by his uncle the King; and
+disobedience to the old man's most trifling commands was always
+sharply resented by the Prince; nor was the boy's view of the House
+of Montfort very favourable to such a declaration.  Richard really
+loved the brave little fellow, and trusted that some day when the
+discovery must be made, it would be coupled with some exploit that
+would show it was no name to be ashamed of.  So he only told the boy
+that he had no doubt the stranger was a foreign knight, who had once
+known the old Leicester family; but bade him mention the circumstance
+to no one.  He feared, however, that the caution came too late, since
+Dame Idonea was not only an inveterate gossip, but was likely to hold
+in direful suspicion any one who had been inquired for by such a
+name.
+
+The personal disappointment of having missed his brother was great.
+Richard was very lonely.  The Princes, and Hamlyn de Valence, were
+the only persons who knew his secret, and both by Prince Edmund and
+De Valence he was treated with indifference or dislike.  Edward
+himself, though the object of his fervent affection, and his
+protector in all essentials, was of a reserved nature, and kept all
+his attendants at a great distance.  On very rare occasions, when his
+feelings had been strongly stirred--as in the instance of his visit
+to his uncle's death-chamber--he might sometimes unbend; and
+momentary flashes from the glow of his warm deep heart went further
+in securing the love and devotion of those around him, than would the
+daily affability of a lower nature; but in ordinary life, towards all
+concerned with him except his nearest relations, he was a strict,
+cold, grave disciplinarian, ever just, though on the side of
+severity, and stern towards the slightest neglect or breach of
+observance, nor did he make any exception in favour of Richard.  If
+the youth seldom received one of his brief annihilating reproofs, it
+was because they were scarcely ever merited; but he had experienced
+that any want of exactitude in his duties was quite as severely
+visited as if he had not been the Prince's close kinsman,
+romantically rescued by him, and placed near his person by his
+special desire.  And Eleanor, with all her gentle courtesy and
+kindness, was strictly withheld by her husband from pampering or
+cockering his pages; nor did she ever transgress his will.
+
+The atmosphere was perhaps bracing, but it was bleak:  and there were
+times when Richard regretted his acceptance of the Prince's offer,
+and yearned after family ties, equality, and freedom.  Simon and Guy
+had never been kind to him, but at least they were his brothers, and
+with them disguise and constraint would be over--he should, too, be
+in communication with his mother and sister.  He was strongly
+inclined to cast in his lot with them, and end this life of secrecy,
+and distrust from all around him save one, and his loyal love ill
+requited even by that one.  It grieved him keenly that one of his
+brothers should have been repulsed from his tent; an absolutely
+famished longing for fraternal intercourse gained possession of him,
+and as he lay on his pallet that night in the dark, he even shed
+tears at the thought of the greeting and embrace that he had missed.
+
+Still he had hopes for the future.  There must be meetings and
+possibilities of inquiries passing between the three armies, and he
+would let no opportunity go by.  The next day, however, there was no
+chance.  The English troops were embarked in their vessels, and after
+a short and prosperous passage were again landed at Trapani, the
+western angle of Sicily.  The French had sailed first, but were not
+in harbour when the English came in; and the Sicilians, who had
+brought up the rear, arrived the next day, but still there was no
+tidings of the French.  Towards the evening, however, the royal
+vessel bearing Philippe III. came into harbour, and all the rest were
+in sight, when at sunset a frightful storm arose, and the ships were
+in fearful case.  Many foundered, many were wrecked on the rocky
+islets around the port, and the French army was almost as much
+reduced in numbers as it had been by the Plague of Carthage.
+
+Charles of Anjou remained himself in the town of Trapani, but knowing
+the evils of crowding a small space with troops, he at once sent his
+men inland, and Richard was again disappointed of the hope of seeing
+or hearing of his brothers; for the Prince still forbade all
+intercourse with the shattered remnant of the French army, justly
+dreading that they might still carry about them the seeds of the
+infection of the camp.
+
+The three heads of the Crusade, however, met in the Castle of Trapani
+to hold council on their future proceedings.  The place was the
+state-chamber of the castle.
+
+Each prince had brought with him a single attendant, and the three
+stood in waiting near the door, in full view of their lords, though
+out of earshot.  It was an opportunity that Richard could not bear to
+miss of asking for his brothers, unheard by any of those English ears
+who would be suspicious about his solicitude for the House of
+Montfort.  A lively-looking Neapolitan lad was the attendant of King
+Charles; and in spite of all the perils of attempting conversation
+while thus waiting, Richard had--while the princes were greeting one
+another, and taking their seats--ventured the question, whether any
+of the sons of the English Earl of Leicester were in the Sicilian
+army.  Of Earl of Leicester the Italian knew nothing; but Count of
+Montfort was a more familiar sound.  "Si, si, vero!"  Sicily had rung
+with it; and Count Rosso Aldobrandini, of the Maremma Toscana, had
+given his only daughter and heiress to the banished English knight,
+Guido di Monforte, who had served in the king's army as a Provencal.
+
+Richard's heart beat high.  Guy a well-endowed count, with a castle,
+lands, and home!  He would have asked where Guy now was, and how far
+off was the Maremma; but the conference between the princes was
+actually commencing, and silence became necessary on the part of
+their attendants.
+
+They could only hear the murmur of voices; but could discern plainly
+the keen looks and animated gestures of Charles of Anjou, the sickly
+sullen indifference of Philippe, and the majestic gravity of Edward,
+whose noble head towered above the other two as if he were their
+natural judge.  Charles was, in fact, trying to persuade the others
+to sail with him for Greece, and there turn their forces on the
+unfortunate Michael Palaeologos, who had lately recovered
+Constantinople, the Empire that Charles hoped to win for himself, the
+favoured champion of Rome.
+
+Philippe merely replied that he had had enough of crusading, he was
+sick and weary, he must go home and bury his father, and get himself
+crowned.  Charles might be then seen trying a little hypocrisy; and
+telling Philippe that his saintly father would only have wished to
+speed him on the way of the Cross.  Then that trumpet voice of
+Edward, whose tones Richard never missed, answered, "What is the way
+of the Cross, fair uncle?"
+
+It was well known that Louis IX. had refused to crusade against
+Christians, even Greek Christians, and Philippe soon sheltered
+himself under the plea that had not at first occurred to his dull
+mind.  In effect, he laid particulars before his uncle, that quickly
+made it plain that the French army was in too miserable a condition
+to do anything but return home; and Charles then addressed his
+persuasions to Edward--striving to convince him in the first place of
+the sanctity of a war against Greek heretics, and when Edward proved
+past being persuaded that arms meant for the recovery of the Holy
+Sepulchre ought not to be employed against Christians who reverenced
+it, he tried to demonstrate the uselessness of hoping to conquer the
+Holy Land, even by such a Crusade as had been at first planned, far
+less with the few attached to Edward's individual banner.  Long did
+the king argue on.  His low voice was scarcely audible, even without
+the words; but Edward's brief, ringing, almost scornful, replies,
+never failed to reach Richard's ear, and the last of them was, "It
+skills not, my fair uncle.  For the Holy Land I am vowed to fight,
+and thither would I go had I none with me but Fowen, my groom!"
+
+And withal his eye lit on Richard, with a look of certainty of
+response; of security that here was one to partake his genuine
+ardour, and of refreshment in the midst of his disgust with the
+selfish uncle and sluggish cousin.  That look, that half smile, made
+the youth's heart bound once more.  Yes, with him he would go to the
+ends of the earth!  What was the freedom of Guy's castle, to the
+following of such a lord and leader in such a cause?
+
+Richard could have thrown himself at his feet, and poured forth
+pledges of fidelity.  But in ten minutes he was following home the
+unapproachable, silent, cold warrior.
+
+And the lack of any outlet for his aspirations turned them back upon
+themselves, with a strange sense of bitterness and almost of
+resentment.  Leonillo alone, as the creature lay at his feet, and
+looked up into his face with eyes of deep wistful meaning, seemed to
+him to have any feeling for him; and Leonillo became the recipient of
+many an outpouring of something between discontent and melancholy.
+Leonillo, the sole remnant of his home!  He burnt for that Holy Land
+where he was to win the name and fame lacking to him; but there was
+to be long delay.
+
+Fain would the Prince have proceeded at once to Palestine; but the
+Genoese, from whom, in the abeyance of the English navy, he had been
+obliged to hire his transports, absolutely refused to sail for the
+East until after the three winter months; and he was therefore
+obliged to remain in Sicily.  King Charles invited him to spend
+Christmas at the court at Syracuse or Naples, in hopes, perhaps, of
+persuading him to the Greek expedition; but Edward was far too much
+displeased with the Angevin to accept his hospitality; recollecting,
+perhaps, that such a sojourn had been little beneficial to his great-
+uncle Coeur de Lion's army.  He decided upon staying where he was, in
+the remotest corner of Sicily, and keeping his three hundred
+crusaders as much to themselves and to strict military discipline as
+possible, maintaining them at his own cost, and avoiding as far as he
+could all transactions with the cruel and violent Provencal
+adventurers, with whom Charles had filled the island.
+
+Thus Richard found his hopes of obtaining further intelligence about
+his brothers entirely passing away.  He did, indeed, venture on one
+day saying to the Prince, "My Lord, I hear that my brother Guy hath
+become a Neapolitan count!"
+
+"A Tuscan robber would be nearer the mark!" coldly replied Edward.
+
+"And," added Richard, "methought, while the host is in winter
+quarters, I would venture on craving your license, my Lord, to visit
+him?"
+
+"Thou hast thy choice, Richard," answered the Prince, with grave
+displeasure; "loyalty and honour with me, or lawlessness and violence
+with thy brother.  Both cannot be thine!"
+
+And returning to his study of the Lais of Marie de France, he made it
+evident that he would hear no more, and left Richard to a sharp
+struggle; in which hot irritation and wounded feeling would have
+carried him away at once from the stern superior who required the
+sacrifice of all his family, and gave not a word of sympathy in
+return.  It was the crusading vow alone that detained the youth.  He
+could not throw away his pledge to the wars of the Cross, and it was
+plain that if he went now to seek out Guy, he should never be allowed
+to return to the crusading army.  But that vow once fulfilled, proud
+Edward should see, that not merely sufferance but friendliness was
+needed to bind the son of his father's sister to his service.  The
+brother at Bednall Green was right, this bondage was worse than
+beggary.  Nor, under the influence of these feelings, had Richard's
+service the alacrity and affection for which it had once been
+remarkable:  the Prince rebuked his short-comings unsparingly, and
+thus added to the sense of injury that had caused them; Hamlyn de
+Valence sneered, and Dame Idonea took good care to point out both the
+youth's neglects and his sullenness, and to whisper significantly
+that she did not wonder, considering the stock he came of.  A
+soothing word or gentle excuse from the kind-hearted Princess were
+the only gleams of comfort that rendered the present state of things
+endurable.
+
+Just after Christmas arrived a vessel with reinforcements from home.
+Among them came a small body of Hospitaliers, with the novice Raynal
+at their head, now a full-blown knight, in dazzling scarlet and
+white, as Sir Reginald Ferrers.  Richard at once recognized him, when
+he came to present himself to the Prince, and was very desirous of
+learning whether he knew aught of that other brother, so mysteriously
+hidden in obscurity.  Sir Raynal on his side seemed to share the
+desire; he exchanged a friendly glance with the page, and when the
+formality of the reception was over sought him out, saying, "I have a
+greeting for you, Master Fowen."
+
+"From Sir Robert Darcy?" asked Richard.  "How fares it with the kind
+old knight?"
+
+"Excellent well!  Nay, nothing fares amiss with Father Robert!" said
+the young knight, smiling.  "Everything is the very best that could
+have befallen him--to hear him speak.  He is the very sunshine of the
+Spital, and had he been ordered on this Crusade, I think all the
+hamlets round would have risen to withhold him."
+
+"Ah!" said Richard, hoping he was acting indifference; "said he aught
+of the little maiden with the blind father?"
+
+"Pretty Bessee and Blind Hal of Bednall Green?  Verily, that was the
+purport of my message.  The poor knave hath been sorely sick and more
+cracked than ever this autumn; insomuch that Father Robert spent
+whole nights with him; and though he be better now, and as much in
+his senses as e'er he will be, such another access is like to make an
+end of him.  Now, Father Robert saith that you, Sir Page, know who
+the poor man is by birth, and that he prays you to send him word what
+had best be done with the child, in case either of his death or of
+his getting so frenzied as to be unable to take care of her."
+
+"Send him word!" repeated Richard in perplexity.
+
+"We shall certainly have some one returning soon to the Spital,"
+replied Sir Raynal.  "Indeed, methinks some of the princes will be
+like to return, for the old King of the Romans is failing fast, and
+King Henry implored that the Prince of Almayne would come to hearten
+him."
+
+"Then must I write to Sir Robert?" said Richard; "mine is scarce a
+message for word of mouth."
+
+"So he said it was like to be," returned the knight, "and he took
+thought to send you a slip of parchment, knowing, he said, that such
+things are not wont to be found in a crusader's budget.  Moreover, if
+ink be wanting, he bade me tell you that there's a fish in these
+seas, with many arms, and very like the foul fiend, that carries a
+bag of ink as good as any scrivener s.
+
+"I have seen the monster," said Richard, who had often been down to
+the beach to see the unlading of the fishermen's boats, and to share
+little John of Dunster's unfailing marvel, that the Mediterranean
+should produce such outlandish creatures, so alien to his Bristol
+Channel experiences.
+
+And the very next time the boats came in, Richard made his way to the
+shore, on the beautiful, rocky, broken coast; and presently
+encountered a sepia, which fully justified Sir Robert's comparison,
+lying at the bottom of a boat.  The fisherman intended it for his own
+dinner, when all his choicer fish should have gone to supply the
+Friday's meal of the English chivalry; and he was a good deal amazed
+when the young gentleman, making his Provencal as like Sicilian as he
+could, began to traffic with him for it, and at last made him
+understand that it was only its ink-bag that he wanted.
+
+The said ink, secured in a shell, was brought home by Richard,
+together with a couple of the largest sea-bird's quills that he could
+find--and which he shaped with his dagger, as best he might, in
+remembrance of Father Adam de Marisco's writing lessons.  He
+meditated what should be the language of his letter, which was not
+likely to be secure from the eyes of the few who could read it; and
+finally decided that English was the tongue known to the fewest
+readers, who, if they knew letters at all, were sure to be acquainted
+with French and Latin.
+
+On a strip of parchment, then, about nine inches long and three wide,
+he proceeded to indite, in upright cramped letters, with many
+contractions, nearly in such terms as these -
+
+
+REVEREND AND KNIGHTLY FATHER,
+
+The good ghostly father and knight, Sir Raynald Ferrers, hath borne
+to me your tidings of my brother's sickness, and of all your goodness
+to him--whereof I pray that our blessed Lady and good St. John may
+reward you, for I can only pray for you.  Touching his poor little
+daughter, in case of his death or frenzy, which the Saints of their
+mercy forefend, I would entreat you of your goodness to place her in
+some nunnery, but without making known her name and quality until my
+return; so Heaven bring me home safe.  But an if I should be slain in
+this Eastern land, then were it most for the little one's good to
+present her to the gracious lady Princess, by whom she would be most
+lovingly and naturally cared for; and would be more safe than with
+such as might shun to own her rights of blood and heirship.  Commend
+me to my brother, if so be that he cares to hear of me; and tell him
+that Guy hath wedded the lady of a castle in the land of Italy.  And
+so praying you, ghostly father, for your blessing, I greet you well,
+and rest your grateful bedesman and servant,
+
+RICHARD OF LEICESTER.
+
+Given at the Prince's camp at Drepanum, in the realm of Sicilia, on
+the octave of the Epiphany, in the year of grace MCCLXX.; and so our
+Lord have you heartily in His keeping.
+
+
+Letter-writing was a mighty task; and Richard's extemporary
+implements were not of the best.  He laboured hard over his
+composition, kneeling against a chest in the tent.  When at length he
+raised his head, he encountered a face full of the most utter
+amazement.  Little John of Dunster had come into the tent, and stood
+gazing at him with open eyes and gaping mouth, as if he were
+perpetrating an incantation.  Richard could not help laughing.
+
+"Why, Jack, dost think I am framing a spell for thee?"
+
+"Writing!" gasped John, relieving his distended mouth by at length
+closing it.
+
+"Wherefore not?  Did not I see the chaplain teaching thee to write at
+Guildford?"
+
+"Ay--but that was when I was a babe!  Writing!  Why, my father never
+writes!"
+
+"But the Prince does.  Thou hast seen him write.  Come now," added
+Richard:  "if thou wilt, I will help thee to write a letter to send
+thy greetings home to Dunster.  Thy father and mother will be right
+glad to hear thou hast 'scaped that African fever."
+
+"They!--They'd think me no better than a French monk!" said John.
+"And none of them could read it either!  I'll never write!  My
+grandsire only set his cross to the great charter!"
+
+And John retreated--in fear perhaps that Richard would sully his
+manhood with a writing lesson!
+
+The letter was rolled up in a scroll, bound with a silken thread, and
+committed to the charge of Sir Raynald Ferrers, who was going shortly
+to be commandery of his Order at Castel San Giovanni, whence he had
+no doubt of being able to send the letter safely to Sir Robert Darcy,
+at the Grand Priory.
+
+It would perhaps have been more expeditious to have intrusted the
+letter to one of the suite of Prince Henry of Almayne, who had been
+recalled by the tidings of the state of his father's health; but
+Richard dreaded betraying his brother's secret too much to venture on
+confiding the missive to any of this party--none of whom were indeed
+likely to wish to oblige him.  Hamlyn de Valence was going with Henry
+as his esquire; and his absence seemed to Richard like the beginning
+of better days.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER IX--ASH WEDNESDAY
+
+
+
+"Mostrocci un ombra da l' un canto sola
+Dicendo 'Colui feese in grembo a Dio
+Lo cuor che'n su Tamigi ancor si cola.'"
+DANTE.  Inferno.
+
+Shrovetide had come, and the Prince had, before leaving Trapani, been
+taking some share in the entertainments of the Carnival.  Personally,
+his grave reserve made gaieties distasteful to him; and the
+disastrous commencement of the Crusade weighed on his spirits.  But
+when state and show were necessary, he provided for them with royal
+bounty and magnificence, and caused them to be regulated with the
+admirable taste of that age of exceeding beauty in which he lived.
+
+Thus, in this festal season, banquets were provided, and military
+shows took place, for the benefit of the Sicilian nobility and of the
+citizens of Trapani, on such a scale, that the English rose high in
+general esteem; and many were the secret wishes that Edmund of
+Lancaster rather than Charles of Anjou had been able to make good the
+grant from the Pope.
+
+Splendid were the displays, and no slight toil did they involve on
+the part of the immediate train of the Prince, few in number as they
+were, and destitute of the appliances of the resident court.  Richard
+hurrying hither and thither, and waiting upon every one, had little
+of the diversion of the affair; but he would willingly have taken
+treble the care and toil in the relief it was to be free from the
+prying mistrustful eyes of Hamlyn de Valence.  Looking after little
+John of Dunster was, however, no small part of his trouble; the
+urchin was so certain to get into some mischief if left to himself--
+now treading on a lady's train, now upsetting a flagon of wine, now
+nearly impaling himself upon the point of a whole spitful of ortolans
+that were being handed round to the company, now becoming uncivilly
+deaf upon his French ear.  Altogether, it was a relief to Richard's
+mind when he stumbled upon the little fellow fast asleep, even though
+it was in the middle of the Princess's violet velvet and ermine
+mantle, which she had laid down in order to tread a stately measure
+with Sire Guillaume de Porceles.
+
+After all Richard's exertions that evening, it was no wonder that the
+morning found him fast asleep at the unexampled hour of eight!  His
+wakening was a strange one.  His little fellow-page was standing
+beside him with a strange frightened yet important air.
+
+"What is the matter, John?  It is late?  Is the Prince gone to Mass?
+Has he missed me?" cried Richard, starting up in dismay, for
+unpunctuality was a great offence with Edward.
+
+"He is gone to Mass," said John, "but, before he comes back," he came
+near and lowered his voice, "Hob Longbow sent me to say you had
+better flee."
+
+"Flee!  Boy, why should I flee?  Are YOUR senses fleeing?"
+
+"O Richard," cried John, his face clearing up, "then it is not true!
+You are not one of the traitor Montforts!"
+
+"If I were a hundred Montforts, what has that to do with it?"
+
+"Then all is well," exclaimed the boy.  "I said you were no such
+thing!  I'll tell Hob he lied in his throat."
+
+"If he said I was a traitor, verily he did; but as to being a
+Montfort--But, how now, John, what means all this?"
+
+"Then it is so!  O Richard, Richard, you cannot be one of them!  You
+cannot have written that letter to warn them to murder Prince Henry."
+
+"To murder Prince Henry!" Richard stood transfixed.  "Not the
+Prince's little son!"
+
+"Oh no, Prince Henry of Almayne!  At Viterbo!  Hamlyn de Valence saw
+it.  He is come back.  It was in the Cathedral.  O Richard--at the
+elevation of the Host!  Guy and Simon de Montfort fell on him,
+stabbed him to the heart, and rushed out.  Then they came back again,
+and dragged him by the hair of his head into the mire, and shouted
+that so their father had been dragged through the streets of Evesham.
+And then they went off to the Maremma!  And," continued the boy
+breathlessly, "Hob Long-bow is on guard, and he bade me tell you,
+that for love of your father he will let you pass; and then you can
+hide; if only you can go ere the Prince comes forth."
+
+"Hide!  Wherefore should I hide?  This is most horrible, but it is no
+deed of mine!" said Richard.  "Who dares to think it is?"
+
+"Then you are none of them!  You had no part in it!  I shall tell Hob
+he is a villain--"
+
+"Stay," said Richard, laying a detaining hand on the boy.  "Why does
+Hob think me in danger?  Is anything stirring against me?"
+
+"They all--all of poor Prince Henry's meine, that are come back with
+Hamlyn--say that you are a Montfort too, and--oh! do not look so
+fierce!--that you sent a letter to warn your brethren where to meet,
+and fall on the Prince.  And the murderers being fled, they are keen
+to have your life; and, Richard, you know I saw you write the
+letter."
+
+"That you saw me write a letter, is as certain as that my name is
+Montfort," said Richard, "but I am not therefore leagued with
+traitors or murderers!  In the church, saidst thou?  Oh, well that
+the Prince forbade me to visit Guy!"
+
+"Then you will not flee?"
+
+"No, forsooth.  I will stay and prove my innocence."
+
+"But you are a Montfort!  And I saw you write the letter."
+
+"Did you speak of my having written the letter?" asked Richard,
+pausing.
+
+The boy hung his head, and muttered something about Dame Idonea.
+
+By this time, even if Richard had thought of flight, it would have
+been impossible.  Two archers made their presence apparent at the
+entrance of the tent, and in brief gruff tones informed Richard that
+the Prince required his presence.  The space between his tent and the
+royal pavilion was short, but in those few steps Richard had time to
+glance over the dangers of his position, and take up his resolution
+though with a certain stunned sense that nothing could be before the
+member of a proscribed family, but failure, suspicion, and ruin.
+
+The two brothers, Edward and Edmund, with the Earl of Gloucester, and
+their other chief councillors, were assembled; and there were looks
+of deep concern on the faces of all, making Edward's more than ever
+like a rigid marble statue; while Edmund had evidently been weeping
+bitterly, though his features were full of fierce indignation.
+Hamlyn de Valence, and a few other members of the murdered Prince's
+suite, stood near in deep mourning suits.
+
+"Richard de Montfort," said Prince Edward, looking at him with a
+sorrowful reproachful sternness that went to his heart, "we have sent
+for you to answer for yourself, on a grave charge.  You have heard of
+that which has befallen?"
+
+"I have heard, my Lord, of a foul crime which my soul abhors.  I
+trust none present here think me capable of sharing in it!  Whoever
+dares to accuse me, shall be answered by my sword!" and he glanced
+fiercely at Hamlyn.
+
+"Hold!" said Edward severely, "no one is so senseless as to accuse
+you of taking actual part in a crime that took place beyond the sea;
+but there is only too much reason to believe that you have been
+tampered with by your brothers."
+
+Then, as his brother Edmund made some suggestion to him, he added,
+"Is John de Mohun of Dunster here?"
+
+"Yea, my Lord," said the little boy, coming forward, with a flush on
+his face, and a bold though wistful look, "but verily Richard is no
+traitor, be he who he may!"
+
+"That is not what we wished to ask of you," said the Prince, too sad
+and earnest to be amused even for a moment.  "Tell us whom you said,
+even now, you had seen in the tent you shared with him in Africa."
+
+"I said I had seen his wraith," said John.
+
+No smile lighted upon the Prince's features; they were as serious as
+those of the boy, as he commented, "His likeness--his exact likeness-
+-you mean."
+
+"Ay," said the boy; "but Richard proved to me after, that it had been
+less tall, and was bearded likewise.  So I hoped it did not bode him
+ill."
+
+"Worse, I fear, than if it had in sooth been his double," said
+Gloucester to Prince Edmund.  The Prince added the question whether
+this visitor had spoken; and John related the inquiry for Richard by
+the name of Montfort, and his own reply, which elicited a murmur of
+amused applause among the bystanders.
+
+The Prince, however, continued in the same grave manner to draw from
+the little witness his account of Richard's injunction to secresy;
+and then asked about the letter-writing, of which John gave his plain
+account.  The Prince then said, "Speak now, Hamlyn."
+
+"This, then, I have to add, my Lord, that I, as all the world,
+remarked that Richard de Montfort consorted much with Sir Reginald de
+Ferrieres, who, as we all remember, is the son of a family deeply
+concerned in the Mad Parliament.  By Sir Reginald, on his arrival at
+Castel San Giovanni, a messenger is despatched, bearing letters to
+the Hospital at Florence, and it is immediately after his arrival
+there, that the two Montforts speed from the Maremma to the unhappy
+and bloody Mass at Viterbo."
+
+You hear, Richard!" said the Prince.  "I bade you choose between me
+and your brothers.  Had you believed me that you could not serve
+both, it had been better for you.  I credit not that you incited them
+to the assassination; but your tidings led them to perpetrate it.  I
+cannot retain the spy of the Montforts in my camp."
+
+"My Lord," said Richard, at last finding space for speech, "I deny
+all collusion with my brothers.  I have neither seen, spoken with,
+nor sent to them by letter nor word."
+
+"Then to whom was this letter?" demanded the Prince.
+
+"To Sir Robert Darcy, the Grand Prior of England," answered Richard.
+
+A murmur of incredulous amazement was heard.
+
+"The purport?" continued Edward.
+
+"That, my Lord, it consorts not with my duty to tell."
+
+"Look here, Richard," interposed Gilbert of Gloucester, "this is an
+unlikely tale.  You can have no cause for secresy, save in connection
+with these brothers; and if you will point to some way of clearing
+yourself of being art and part in this foul act of murder, you may be
+sent scot free from the camp; but if you wilfully maintain this
+denial, what can we do but treat you as a traitor?  No obstinacy!
+What can a lad like you have to say to good old Sir Robert Darcy,
+that all the world might not know?"
+
+"My Lord of Gloucester," said Richard, "I am bound in honour not to
+reveal the matters between me and Sir Robert; I can only declare on
+the faith of a Christian gentleman that I have neither had, nor
+attempted to have, any dealings with either of my brothers, Guy or
+Simon; and if any man says I have, I will prove his falsehood on his
+body."  And Richard flung down his glove before the Prince.
+
+At the same moment Hamlyn de Valence sprang forward.
+
+"Then, Richard de Montfort, I take up the gage.  I give thee the lie
+in thy throat, and will prove on thy body that thou art a man-sworn
+traitor, in league with thy false brethren."
+
+"I commit me to the judgment of God," said Richard, looking upwards.
+
+"My Lord," said Hamlyn, "have we your permission to fight out the
+matter?"
+
+"You have," said Edward, "since to that holy judgment Richard hath
+appealed."
+
+But the Prince looked far from contented with the appeal.  He allowed
+the preliminaries of place and time to be fixed without his
+interposition; and when the council broke up, he fixed his clear deep
+eyes upon Richard in a manner which seemed to the boy to upbraid him
+with the want of confidence, for which, however, he would not
+condescend to ask.  Richard felt that, let the issue of the combat be
+what it would, he had lost that full trust on the part of the Prince,
+which had hitherto been his one drop of comfort; and if he were
+dismissed from the camp, he should be more than ever desolate, for
+his soul could scarce yet bring itself to grasp the horror of the
+crime of his brothers.
+
+The combat could not take place for two days--waiting, on one, in
+order that Hamlyn might have time to rest, and recover his full
+strength after his voyage, and the next, because it was Ash
+Wednesday.  In the meantime Richard was left solitary; under no
+restraint, but universally avoided.  The judicial combat did not make
+him uneasy; the two youths had often measured their strength
+together, and though Hamlyn was the elder, Richard was the taller,
+and had inherited something of the Plantagenet frame, so remarkable
+in those two
+
+
+Lords of the biting axe and beamy spear,
+
+
+"wide conquering Edward" and "Lion Richard"; and each believed in the
+righteousness of his own cause sufficiently to have implicit
+confidence that the right would be shown on his side.
+
+In fact, Richard soon understood that though Prince Edward, with a
+sense of the value of definite evidence far in advance of the time,
+and befitting the English Justinian, had only allowed the charge to
+be brought against him which could in a manner be substantiated, yet
+that the general belief went much further.  Proved to be a Montfort,
+and to have written a letter, he was therefore convicted, by
+universal consent, of a league with his brothers for the revenge of
+their house; to have instigated the assassination at Viterbo, and to
+be only biding his time for the like act at Trapani.  Even the Prince
+was deeply offended by his silence, and imputed it to no good motive;
+trust and affection were gone, and Richard felt no tie to retain him
+where he was, save his duty as a crusader.  Let him fail in the
+combat, and the best he could look for would be to be ignominiously
+branded and expelled:  let him gain, and he much doubted whether,
+though the ordeal of battle was always respected, he would regain his
+former position.  With keen suffering and indignation, he rebelled
+against Edward's harshness and distrust.  He--who had brought him
+there--who ought to have known him better!  Moreover, there was the
+crushing sense of the guilt of his brothers; guilt most horrible in
+its sacrilegious audacity, and doubly shocking to the feelings of a
+family where the grim sanctity of the first Simon de Montfort, and
+the enlightened devotion of the second, formed such a contrast to the
+savage outrage of him who now bore their name.  Richard, as with bare
+feet and ashes whitening his dark locks he knelt on the cold stones
+of the dark Norman church at Trapani, wept hot and bitter tears of
+humiliation over the family crimes that had brought them so low;
+prayed in an agony for repentance for his brothers; and for himself,
+some opening for expiating their sin against at least the generous
+royal family.  "O! could I but die for my Prince, and know that he
+forgave and they repented!"
+
+Only when on his way back to the camp was he sensible of the murmurs
+of censure at his hypocrisy in joining the penitential procession at
+all.  Dame Idonea, in a complete suit of sackcloth, was informing her
+friends that she had made a vow not to wash her face till the whole
+adder brood of Montfort had been crushed; and that she trusted to see
+the beginning of justice done to-morrow.  She had offered a candle to
+St. James to that effect, hoping to induce him to turn away his
+patronage from the family.
+
+Every one, knight or squire, shrank away from Richard, if he did but
+look towards them; and he was seriously discomfited by the difficulty
+of obtaining a godfather for the combat.  No one chose even to be
+asked, lest they might be suspected of approving of the murder of
+Prince Henry; and the unhappy page re-entered his tent with the most
+desolate sense of being abandoned by heaven and man.
+
+Fastened upon the pole of the tent by an arrowhead, a small scroll of
+parchment met his eyes.  He read in English--"A steed and a lance are
+ready for the lioncel who would rather avenge his father than lick
+the tyrant's feet.  A guide awaits thee."
+
+Some weeks since, this might have been a tempting summons; but now
+the sickening sense of the sacrilegious murder, and of the life of
+outlawry utterly unrestrained, passed over Richard.  Yet, if he
+should not accept the offer, what was before him?  A shameful death,
+perhaps; if he failed in the ordeal, disgrace, captivity, or
+expulsion; if he succeeded, bondage and distrust for ever.  Some new
+accusation! some deeper fall!
+
+There was a low growl from Leonillo; the hangings of the tent were
+raised, and an archer bending his head said, "A word with you, Sir."
+
+"Who art thou?" demanded Richard.
+
+"Hob Longbow, Sir.  Remember you not old passages--in the forest,
+there--and Master Adam?"
+
+Richard did remember the archer in the days of his outlaw life, in a
+very different capacity.
+
+"You were grown so tall, Sir, and so hand and glove with the
+Longshanks, that Nick Dustifoot and I knew not an if it were
+yourself--but now your name is out, and the wind is in another
+quarter"--he grinned, then seeing Richard impatient of the approach
+to familiarity, "You did not know Nick Dustifoot?  He was one of
+young Sir Simon's men-at-arms, you see, and took to the woods, like
+other folk, after Kenilworth was given up, till stout men were
+awanting for this Crusade.  And he knew Sir Guy when he came to the
+camp yon by Tunis, and spake with him; moreover, he went in the train
+of him of Almayne to Viterbo, and had speech again with Sir Simon,
+who gave him this scroll.  And if you will meet him at the Syren's
+Rock to-night, my Lord Richard, he will bring you to those who will
+conduct you to Sir Guy's brave castle, where he laughs kings and
+counts to scorn!  We have the guard, and will see you safe past the
+gates of the camp."
+
+The way to liberty was open:  Richard deliberated.  The atmosphere of
+distrust and suspicion under the Prince's coldness was well-nigh
+unbearable.  Danger faced him for the next day!  Disgrace was
+everywhere.  Should he leave it behind, where, at least, he would not
+hear and feel it?  Should he, when all had turned from him, meet a
+brotherly welcome?
+
+Then came back on him the thought of what Simon and Guy had made
+themselves; the thought of his father's grief at former doings of
+theirs, which had fallen so far short of the atrocity of this.  He
+knew that his father had rather have seen each one of his five sons
+slain, or helpless cripples like the firstborn, than have been thus
+avenged.  Nay, had he this morning prayed for the pardon of a crime,
+to which he would thus become a consenting party?
+
+He looked up resolutely.  "No, Hob Longbow.  Hap what hap, my part
+can never be with those who have stained the Church with blood.  Let
+my brothers know that my heart yearned to them before, but now all is
+over between us.  I can only bear the doom they have brought upon
+me!"
+
+It was not possible to remain and argue.  A tent was a dangerous
+place for secret conferences, and Hob Longbow could only growl, "As
+you will, Sir.  Now nor you nor any one else can say I have not done
+my charge."
+
+"Alack, alack!" sighed Richard, "would that, my honour once redeemed,
+Hamlyn might make an end of me!  But for thee, my poor Leonillo, I
+have no comforter or friend!" and he flung his arms round the dog's
+neck.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER X--THE COMBAT
+
+
+
+"And now with sae sharp of steele
+They 'gan to lay on load."
+Sir Cauline.
+
+Heavy-hearted and pale-cheeked with his rigidly observed fast,
+Richard armed himself in early morning, and set forth to the chapel
+tent, where the previous solemnities had to be observed.  He had made
+up his mind to make an earnest appeal to the Earl of Gloucester, for
+the sake of the old friendship with his father, to become his
+godfather in the combat, as one whose character stood too high to be
+injured by connection with him.  Even this plan was frustrated, for
+Hamlyn de Valence entered, led by Earl Gilbert as his sponsor.
+Should he turn to his one other friend, the Prince himself?  Nay, the
+Prince was umpire and judge.  Never stood warrior so lonely.  Little
+John of Dunster crept up to his side; and but for fear of injuring
+the child, he would almost have asked him to be his sponsor.  At that
+moment, however, the tramp of horses' feet was heard, and Sir
+Reginald de Ferrieres, with his squires, galloped up to the tent.
+
+The young Hospitalier held out his hand cordially.  "In time, I
+hope," said he; "I have ridden ever since Lauds at Castel San
+Giovanni, hoping to be with you, so as to stand by you in this
+matter."
+
+"It was kindly done of you," said Richard, tears of gratitude
+swelling in his eyes, as he wrung Sir Raynald's hand.  "I have not
+even a godfather for the fight!  How could you know of my need?"
+
+"Some of our brethren came over from the camp, for our Ash Wednesday
+procession, and spoke of the stress you were in--that your Montfort
+lineage was out, and that you were thought to have writ a letter--but
+stay, there's no time for words; methinks here's the Prince and all
+his train."
+
+Sir Raynald went through the solemnity of presenting Richard de
+Montfort as about to fight in defence of his own innocence.  The
+Prince coldly accepted the presentation.  Richard knew that Sir
+Raynald was deemed anything but a satisfactory sponsor; but the young
+knight's hearty sympathy, a sort of radiance caught from good old Sir
+Robert, was too comforting not to be reposed on.
+
+Each champion then confessed.  Raynald heard Richard's shrift, and
+nearly wept over it--it was the first the young priestly knight had
+received, and he could scarcely clear his voice to speak the words of
+absolution.  Even as they left the confessional, he grasped Richard's
+hand and said, "Cast in thy lot with us!  St. John will find thee
+father and home and brethren!"
+
+And a gleam of joy and hope flashed on the youth's heart, and shone
+brighter as he participated in the solemn Mass in preparation for the
+combat.  This over, each champion made oath of the justice of his
+quarrel in the hands of his godfather before the Prince:  Hamlyn de
+Valence swearing that to the best of his belief, Richard de Montfort
+was a traitor, in league with his brothers, and art and part in the
+murder of Prince Henry of Almayne, and offering to prove it on his
+body; while on the other hand Richard swore that he was a true and
+faithful liegeman to the King, free from all intercourse with his
+brethren, and sackless of the death of Prince Henry.
+
+Then each mounted on horseback, the trumpets sounded, the sponsors
+led them to their places, and the Prince's clear voice exclaimed,
+"And so God show the right."  One glance of pitying sympathy would
+have filled Richard's arm with fresh vigour.
+
+The two youths closed with shivered lances, and horses reeling from
+the shock.  Backing their steeds, each received a fresh lance.  Again
+they met; Richard felt the point of Hamlyn's lance glint against his
+breastplate, glide down, enter, make its way into his flesh; but at
+the same instant his lance was pushing, driving, bearing on Hamlyn
+before him; the sheer force in his Plantagenet shoulders was telling
+now, the very pain seemed as it were to add to the energy with which
+he pressed on--on, till the hostile spear dropped from his own side,
+and Hamlyn was borne backwards over the croup of the staggering
+horse, till he fell with crashing ringing armour upon the ground.
+Little John clapped his hands, and shouted for joy; but no one
+responded.
+
+Richard leapt down in another second, and stood over him.  "Yield
+thee, Hamlyn de Valence.  Confess that thou hast slandered me with an
+ungrounded accusation."
+
+Hamlyn had no choice.  "Let me rise," he said sullenly; "I will
+confess, so thou letst me open my visor."
+
+And Richard standing aside, Hamlyn spoke out in a dogged formal tone.
+"I hereby own, that by the judgment of Heaven, Richard de Montfort
+hath cleared himself of all share in the foul murder of Lord Henry,
+whose soul Heaven assoilzie.  Also that he hath disproven the charge
+of leaguing with his brethren."
+
+Richard was the victor, but where were the gratulations?  Young
+John's hearty but slender hurrah was lost in the general silence.
+
+The Prince reared his stately form, and said, "The judgment of Heaven
+is final.  Richard de Montfort is pronounced free of all penalty for
+treason in the matter of the death of our dear cousin, and is free to
+go where he will."
+
+Cold as ice was the Prince's face.  That Richard meant murder to
+Henry, he had never believed; but that he had hankered after his
+brothers, and held dangerous communings with them, was evidently
+still credited and unforgiven.  The very form of words was a
+dismissal--and the youth's heart was wrung.
+
+He stood, looking earnestly up as the Prince moved from his place,
+without a glance towards him.  The next moment Raynald's kind hand
+was on his shoulder, and his voice saying, "Well fought, brother, a
+brave stroke!  Come with me, thou art hurt."
+
+"Would it were to the death!" murmured Richard dreamily, as Raynald,
+throwing his arm round him, led him away; but before they had reached
+the tent there was a plunging rush and scampering behind them, and
+John of Dunster came dashing up.  "I knew it!  I knew it!" he cried.
+"I knew he would overset spiteful Hamlyn!  Hurrah!  They can't keep
+me away now, Richard--now the judgment of Heaven has gone for you!"
+
+Richard smiled, and put his gauntleted hand caressingly on the boy's
+shoulder.
+
+"I was afraid," added John, "that you would think me like the rest of
+them.  Miscreants, all!  Not one would shout for you--you, the
+victor!  They don't heed the judgment of Heaven one jot.  And that's
+what they call being warriors of the Cross!  If the Prince were a
+true-born Englishman, he would be ashamed of himself.  But never
+heed, Richard.  Why don't you speak to me?  Are you angered that I
+told of the letter?  Indeed, I never guessed--"
+
+"Hush, varlet," said Sir Raynald, "see you not that he has neither
+breath nor voice to speak?  If you wish to do him a service, hie to
+our tents--down yonder, to the east, where you see the eight-pointed
+cross--"
+
+"I know, Sir," said John, perfectly civil on hearing accents as
+English as his own.
+
+"And bring up Brother Bartlemy, he is a better infirmarer than I.
+Bid him from me bring his salves and bandages."
+
+Richard was barely conscious when he reached the tent, as much from
+rigid fasting and sleeplessness as from the actual loss of blood.
+His friend disarmed him tenderly, and revived him with bread and
+wine, silencing a half-murmured scruple about Lenten diet with the
+dispensation due to sickness.  The wound was not likely to be serious
+or disabling, and the cares of the Hospitalier and his infirmarer had
+presently set their patient so much at ease that he dropped into a
+sound sleep, having scarcely said a word, beyond a few faintly
+uttered thanks, since he had fought the combat.
+
+At first his sleep was profound, but by and by the associations of
+blows and wounds carried him back to the field of Evesham.  The wild
+melee was renewed, he heard the voice of his father, but always in
+that strange distressing manner peculiar to dreams of the departed,
+always far away, and just beyond his reach, ever just about to give
+him the succour he needed, but ever withheld.  The thunderstorm that
+broke over the contending armies roared again in his ears; and then
+again recurred the calm still night, when he had lain helpless on the
+battle-field; even the caress of Leonillo, and his low growl, were
+vividly repeated; but as the dog moved, it was to Richard as if the
+form of his father rose up in its armour from the dark field, and
+said in a deep hollow voice, "Well fought, my son; I will give thee
+knighthood."  Then Richard thought he was kneeling before his father,
+and hearing that same voice saying, "My son, be true and loyal.  In
+the name of God and St. James.  I dub thee knight of death!" and
+looking up, he beheld under the helmet, not Simon de Montfort's face
+but the Prince's.  He awoke with a start of disappointment--and there
+stood Edward himself, leaning against the tent-pole, looking down at
+him!
+
+He sprang on his feet, scarcely knowing whether he slept or woke; but
+Edward said, in that voice that at times was so ineffably sweet, "Be
+still, Richard; I fear me thou hast suffered a wrong, and I am come
+to repair it, as far as I can!  Lay thee down again."
+
+And the Prince seated himself on the oaken chest; while Richard,
+after a few words, sat down on his couch.
+
+"Is this the letter about which there has been such a coil?" said
+Edward, giving him the scroll in its sepia ink.
+
+"It is!" replied Richard in amazement and dismay.
+
+"The only letter thou didst write?"
+
+"The only one," repeated Richard.
+
+"And," added Edward, "it concerns thy brother Henry.
+
+Richard turned even paler than before, and could not suppress a gasp
+of dismay.  "My Lord, make me not forsworn!"
+
+"Listen to me, Richard," said Edward.  "My sweet lady gave me no rest
+about thee.  She held that I had withdrawn my trust over lightly, for
+what was no blame to thine heart; and that having set thee here apart
+from thy natural friends, we owed thee more notice than I have been
+wont to think wholesome for untried striplings.  Others, and I among
+them, held that Raynald Ferrers' friendship and countenance showed
+thee stubbornly set on old connections, and many thought the letter
+to the Grand Prior Darcy a mere excuse.  But when Hamlyn fell, and I
+still held that thou wert merely cleared from wilful share in the
+deadly crime of which I had never held thee guilty, then she spake
+more earnestly.  She of her own will sent for Raynald Ferrers to our
+tent, and called me to speak with him, sure that, even though his
+family had been our foes, he was too honourable a knight to have
+espoused thy cause without good reason.  Then it was that he told us
+of thine interest for the blind beggar whose child thou didst save,
+and of the Grand Prior's message.  Also, as full exculpation of thee,
+he gave me the letter, which, having failed to find a home-bound
+messenger at San Giovanni, he had brought back to the camp.  And now,
+Richard, what can I say more, than that I did thee wrong, and pray
+thee to give me thy hand in pardon?"
+
+Richard hid his face and sobbed, completely overwhelmed by the simple
+dignity of the humility of such a man as Edward.  He held the
+Prince's hand to his lips, and exclaimed, "Oh, how--how could I have
+ever felt discontent, or faltered? not in truth--oh, no--but in trust
+and patience?  Oh! my Lord, that I could die for you!"
+
+"Not yet," said Edward, smiling; "we have much to do together first.
+And now tell me, Richard, this beggar is indeed Henry?"
+
+Richard hung his head.
+
+"What, thou mayst not betray him?"
+
+"I am under an oath, my Lord."
+
+"Nay, I know well-nigh all, Richard.  I did indeed see my dear old
+comrade laid in Evesham Church, so as it broke my heart to see him,
+bleeding from many wounds, and even his hand lopped by the savage
+Mortimers.  Then, as I bent down, and gave his brow a last kiss, it
+struck me, for a moment, that the touch was not that of a dead man's
+skin.  But I looked again at the deadly wounds of head and breast,
+and thought it would be but cruelty to strive to bring back the
+glimmer of life only to--to see the ruin of his house; and all that
+he could not be saved from.  O Richard, to no man in either host
+could the day of Evesham have been so sore, as to me, who had to sit
+in the gate, to gladden men's hearts, like holy King David, when he
+would fain have been weeping for his son!  But in early morning came
+Abbot William of Whitchurch to my chamber, and with much secrecy told
+me that the corpse of Henry de Montfort had been stolen from the
+church by night, praying me to excuse that the monks, wearied out
+with the day of alarms, and the care of our wounded, had not kept
+better watch.  Then knew I that some one had been less faithless than
+I, and I hoped that poor Henry was at least dying in peace; I had
+never deemed that he could survive.  But when I saw thy billet, and
+heard Ferrers' tale, I had no further doubt, remembering likewise how
+strangely familiar was the face of that little one at Westminster."
+
+"Yes, my Lord, it was even as a strange, wild, wilful, blind beggar
+that I found poor Henry; and heavy was the curse he laid me under,
+should I make him known to you.  He calls himself thus a freer and
+happier man than he could be even were he pardoned and reinstated;
+and he can indulge his vein of mockery."
+
+"I dare be sworn that consoles him for all," said Edward, nearly
+laughing.  "So long as he could utter his gibe, Henry little recked
+which way the world passed round him; and I trow he has found some
+mate of low degree, that he would be loth to produce in open day."
+
+"Not so, my Lord:  it is so wild a tale of true love that I can
+sometimes scarce believe a minstrel did not sing it to me!"  And
+Richard told the history of Isabel Mortimer's fidelity.  The Prince
+was deeply touched, and then remembered the marked manner in which
+the Baron of Mortimer had replied to his inquiry, in what convent he
+had bestowed Henry de Montfort's betrothed.  "She is dead, my Lord,
+dead to us."  Then he added suddenly, "So that black-eyed babe is the
+heiress of Leicester and all the honours of Montfort!"
+
+"It is one of the causes for Henry's resolve to be secret," said
+Richard.  "I thought it harsh and distrustful then, but he dreaded
+Simon's knowledge of her."
+
+"We will find a way of securing her from Simon," said the Prince.
+"But fear not, Richard, Henry's secret shall be safe with me!  I have
+kept his secrets before now," he added, with a smile.  "Only, when we
+are at home again--so it please the Saints to spare us--thou shalt
+strive to show him cause to trust my Lady with his child, if he doth
+not seek to breed her up to scrip and wallet.  I see such is thy
+counsel in this scroll, and it is well."
+
+"How could I say other?" said Richard, "and now, more than ever!  I
+long to thank the gracious Princess this very evening."
+
+"Thy wound?' said the Prince.
+
+"My wound is naught, I scarce feel it."
+
+"Then," said the Prince, "unless the leech gainsay it, it would be as
+well to be at our pavilion this evening, that men may see thou art
+not in any disgrace.  Rest then till supper-time."  And as he spoke
+he rose to depart, but Richard made a gesture of entreaty.  "So
+please your Grace, grant me a few farther words.  I sware, and truly,
+that I had heard nothing from my brothers when I was accused of
+writing that letter to them.  But see here, what yester-morn was
+pinned to that tent-pole."
+
+He gave Edward the scroll, at which the Prince looked half smiling.
+"So!  A dagger in store for me too, is there?  Well, my cousins have
+a goodly thirst for vengeance!  Hast thou any suspicion how this
+billet came here?"
+
+"Ay, my Lord; and for that cause I would warn you against two of the
+archers, one of whom was in Simon's troop, and went with the late
+prince to Viterbo.  I gave them no promise of silence."
+
+"You spoke with them?"
+
+"With one, who was charged to let me through the outposts to a spot
+where means were provided for bringing me to Guy."
+
+"And thou," said Edward, smiling, "didst choose to bide the buffet?"
+
+"Sir," said Richard, "I did indeed long after my brethren when Guy
+had been so near me in Africa; but now, I would far rather die than
+cast in my lot with them."
+
+"Thou art wise," said Edward; "not merely right, but wise.  I have
+sent Gloucester to my uncle of Sicily with such messages that he will
+scarce dare to leave them scatheless!  Then, at supper-time we meet
+again--in thine own name, Richard, and as my kinsman and esquire.
+Thou shalt bear thine own name and arms.  I will cause a mourning
+suit to be sent to thee--thou art equally of kin with myself to poor
+Henry--and shalt mourn him with Edmund and me at the requiem to-
+morrow.  So will it best be manifest to the camp, that we exempt thee
+from all blame."  Again he was departing, when Richard added--"The
+archers, my Lord--were it not good to dismiss them?"
+
+"Tush," said Edward; "tell me not their names.  So soon as the wind
+veers, they will be beyond Guy's reach; and if I were to stand on my
+guard against every man who loved thy father better than mine, what
+good would my life do me?  The poor knaves will be true enough when
+they see a Saracen before them!"
+
+And away went Edward, to be glanced at as he passed through the camp,
+as a severe, hard, cruel tyrant.  Had he only been gay, open-hearted,
+and careless, he might have hung both the guilty archers, and a dozen
+innocent ones into the bargain, and yet have never won the character
+for harshness and unmercifulness that he had acquired even while
+condoning many a dire offence, simply from his stern gravity, and his
+punctilious exactitude in matters of discipline.  But the evils of a
+lax and easy-going court had been so fatal, and had produced such
+suffering, that it was no marvel that he had adopted a rule of iron;
+and in the pain and distress of seeing his closest friends, the
+noblest subjects in the realm, pushed into a rebellion where he had
+himself to maintain his father's cause, and then to watch, without
+being able to hinder, the mean-spirited revenge of his own partizans,
+his manner had acquired that silent reserve and coldness which made
+him feared and hated by the many, while intensely beloved by the few.
+Even towards those few it was absolutely difficult to him to unbend,
+as he had done in this hour of effusion towards Richard; and the
+youth was proportionably moved and agitated with fervent gratitude
+and affection.
+
+He had scarcely had so happy an evening since he had been a boy at
+Odiham.  He was indeed feeble and dizzy at times, but with a far from
+painful languor; and the Princess, enjoying the permission to follow
+the dictates of her own heart, was kind to him with a motherly or
+sisterly kindness, could not bear to receive from him his wonted
+attendance, but made him lie upon the cushions at her feet, and when
+out of hearing of every one, talked of the faithful Isabel, and of
+"pretty Bessee," on whom she already looked as the companion of her
+little Eleanor, whom she had left at home.
+
+It might be questioned whether Richard did not undergo more in
+watching little John de Mohun's endeavours at waiting than he would
+have suffered from doing it himself.  And not a few dissatisfied
+glances were levelled at the favoured stripling, besides the
+literally as well as figuratively sour glances of Dame Idonea.
+
+Edward, being of course unable to betray his real grounds for
+acquitting Richard, had only deigned to inform Prince Edmund that he
+knew all, and was perfectly satisfied.  Now Prince Edmund, as well as
+all the old court faction, deemed Edward's regard for the Barons'
+party an unreasonable weakness that they durst not indeed combat
+openly, but which angered them as a species of disaffection to his
+own cause.  The outer world thought him a tyrant, but there was an
+inner world to whom he appeared weakly good-natured and generous; and
+this inner world thought Richard had successfully hoodwinked him!
+
+Therefore Edmund of Lancaster desired to adopt Hamlyn de Valence as
+his own squire, to save him from association with Richard; and both
+prince and squire, and all the rest of the train, made it perfectly
+evident to the young Montfort that he was barely tolerated out of
+respect for the Prince.
+
+But Richard in his joy could have borne worse than this, for the
+Prince had not relaxed in his kindness, and made his young cousin's
+wound an excuse for showing him more tenderness and consideration
+than he would otherwise have thought befitting.  Moreover, an
+esquire, as Richard had now become, might be in much closer relations
+of intimacy with his master than was possible to a page; and the day
+that had begun so sadly was like the dawn of a brighter period.
+
+Sir Raynald Ferrers had been invited to the Prince's pavilion, but
+the rules of his Order did not permit his joining a secular
+entertainment in Lent, and he did not admit either the camp life or
+the gravity of the Prince's mourning household as a dispensation.
+However, when Richard, leaning fondly on little John's ready
+shoulder, crossed to his own tent, he found his good friend waiting
+there to attend to his wound, which Sir Raynald professed to regard
+as an excellent subject to practise upon, and likewise to hear
+whether all had been cleared up, and had gone right with him.
+
+"Though," he said, "I could not doubt of it when that fair and lovely
+Princess had taken your matters in hand.  Tell me, Richard, have you
+secular men many such dames as that abroad in the world?"
+
+"Not many such as she," said Richard, smiling.
+
+"Well, I have not spoken to a female thing, save perhaps pretty
+Bessee, since I went into the Spital, ten years ago; and verily the
+sound of the lady's voice was to me as if St. Margaret had begun
+talking to me!  And so wise and clear of wit too.  I thought women
+were feather-pated wilful beings, from whom there was no choice but
+to shut oneself up!  I trow, that now all is well with thee, thou
+wilt scarce turn a thought again towards our brotherhood, where to
+glance at such a being becomes a sin."  And Raynald crossed himself,
+with an effort to recall his wonted asceticism.
+
+"Ladies' love is not like to be mine," said Richard, laughing, as one
+not yet awake to the force of the motive.  "No!  Gladly would I be
+one of your noble brotherhood, where alone have I met with kindness--
+but, Sir Raynald, my first duty under Heaven must be to redeem my
+father's name, by my service to the Prince.  My brothers think they
+uphold it by deadly revenge.  I want to show what a true Montfort can
+be with such a master as my father never had!  And, Raynald, I cannot
+but fear that further schemes of vengeance may be afloat.  The Prince
+is too fearless to take heed to himself, and who is so bound to watch
+for him as I?"
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XI--THE VIEW FROM CARMEL
+
+
+
+"On her who knew that love can conquer death;
+   Who, kneeling with one arm about her king,
+Drew forth the poison with her balmy breath,
+      Sweet as new buds in spring."--TENNYSON.
+
+A year had elapsed since the crusaders had landed in Palestine;
+Nazareth had been taken, and the Christian host were encamped upon
+the plain before Acre, according to their Prince's constant habit of
+preferring to keep his troops in the open field, rather than to
+expose them to the temptations of the city--which was, alas! in a
+state most unworthy of the last stronghold of Latin Christianity in
+the Holy Land.
+
+It was on a scorching June day, Whitsun Tuesday, in the exquisite
+beauty of an early summer in the mountains of the Levant--when "the
+flowers appear on the earth, the time of the singing of birds is
+come, and the voice of the turtle is heard in our land; the fig tree
+putteth forth her green figs, and the vines with the tender grape
+give a good smell,"--that Richard de Montfort was descending the
+wooded sides of Mount Carmel.
+
+Anxious tidings had of late come from England respecting the health
+of the little Prince John; and Princess Eleanor was desirous of
+offering gifts and obtaining prayers on his behalf, on the part of
+the good Fathers of the convent associated with the memory of the
+great Prophet who had raised the dead child to life.  She herself,
+however, was at the time unfit for a mountain ride; and Prince
+Edward, who was a lay brother of the Carmelite order, and had fully
+intended himself to go and offer his devotions for his child, was so
+unwell on that day, from the feverish heat of the summer, that he
+could not expose himself to the sun; and Richard was therefore
+despatched on the part of the royal pair.  He had ascended in the
+cool of the morning, setting forth before sunrise, and attending the
+regular Mass.  The good Fathers would fain have detained him till the
+heat of the day should be past; but his anxiety not to overpass in
+the slightest degree the time fixed by the Prince, made him resolved
+on setting out so soon as his errand was sped.
+
+Unspeakably beautiful was his ride--through rocky dells filled with
+copsewood, among which jessamine, lilies, and exquisite flowers were
+peeping up, and the coney, the fawn, and other animals, made Leonillo
+prick his ears and wistfully seek from his master's eye permission to
+dash off in pursuit.  Or the "oaks of Carmel," with many a dark-
+leaved evergreen, towered in impenetrable thicket, and at an opening
+glade might be beheld on the north-east, "that goodly mountain
+Lebanon" rising in a thick clothing of wood; and beyond, in sharp
+cool softness, the white cone of rain-distilling Hermon.  Far to the
+west lay the glorious glittering sheet of the Mediterranean; but
+nearer, almost beneath his feet, was the curving bay and harbour of
+Ptolemais, filled with white sails, the white city of Acre full of
+fortresses and towers; while on the plain beside it, green with
+verdure as Richard's own home greenwood of Odiham, lay the white
+tents of the Christian army, in so clear an atmosphere that he could
+see the flash of the weapons of the men on guard, and almost
+distinguish the blazonry of the banners.
+
+Richard dismounted to gather some roses and jessamine for the
+Princess, and to collect some of the curious fossil echini, which he
+believed to be olives turned to stone by the Prophet Elijah, as a
+punishment to a churlish peasant who refused him a meal.  He thought
+that such treasures would be a welcome addition to the store he was
+accumulating for the good old Grand Prior.  He gave his horse to Hob
+Longbow, his only attendant except a young Sicilian lad.  This same
+Longbow had stuck to him with a pertinacity that he could not shake
+off, and in truth had hitherto justified the Prince's prediction that
+he would be a brave and faithful fellow when his allegiance was no
+further disturbed by the proximity of the outlawed Montforts.  There
+had been nothing to lead Richard to think he ought to indicate either
+him or Nick Dustifoot to the Prince as the persons who had been
+connected with Guy in Italy.
+
+Presently Leonillo bounded forward, and Richard became aware of the
+figure of a man in light armour standing partly hidden among the
+brushwood, but looking down intently into the Christian camp.  The
+dog leapt up, fawning on the stranger with demonstrations of rapture;
+and he, turning in haste, stood face to face with Richard.
+
+"Here!" was his exclamation, and a grasp was instantly laid upon his
+sword.
+
+"Simon!" burst from Richard's lips at the same moment, "dost not know
+me?"
+
+"Thou, boy?" and the hold was relaxed.  "What lucky familiar sent
+thee hither?  What--thou art grown such a huge fellow that I had
+well-nigh struck thee down for Longshanks himself, had it not been
+for thy voice.  Thou hast his very bearing."
+
+"Simon!" again repeated Richard, in his extremity of amazement.
+"What dost thou?  How camest thou here?  Whence--?"
+
+"That thou shalt soon see," said Simon.  "A right free and merry home
+and company have we up yonder,"--and he pointed towards Mount
+Lebanon.
+
+"Thou and Guy?"
+
+"No, no; Guy turned craven.  Could not endure our wanderings in the
+marshes and hills, pined for his wife forsooth, fell sick, and must
+needs go and give himself up to the Pope; so he sings the penitential
+psalms night and day."
+
+"And we heard thou wast dead at Siena."
+
+"Thou hearest many a false tale," said Simon.  "Of my death thou
+shalt judge, if thou wilt turn thy horse and ride with me to our
+hill-fort of Ain Gebel, in Galilee.  They say 'tis the very one which
+King David or King Herod, whichever it was, could only take by
+letting down his men-at-arms in boxes!  I should like to see the
+boxes that we could not send skimming down the abyss!  And a wondrous
+place they have left us--vaults as cool as a convent wine-cellar,
+fountains out of the rock, marble columns."
+
+"But, brother, for whom do you hold it?  For the King of Cyprus or--
+?"
+
+"For myself, boy!  For King Simon, an it like you better!  None can
+touch me or my merry band there, and a goodly company we are--
+pilgrims grown wiser, and runaway captives, and Druses, and bold
+Arabs too:  and the choicest of many a heretic Armenian merchants'
+caravan is ours, and of many a Saracen village; corn and wine, fair
+dames, and Damascus blades, and Arab steeds.  Nothing has been
+wanting to me but thee and vengeance, and both are, I hope, on the
+way!"
+
+"Not I, certainly!" said Richard, shrinking back in horror:  "I--a
+sworn crusader!"
+
+"Tush, what are we but crusaders too, boy?  'Tis all service against
+the Moslem!  Thy patron saint sent thee to me to-day from special
+care for thy safety."
+
+"How so!" exclaimed Richard.  "If peril threaten my Lord, I must be
+with him at once."
+
+"Much hast thou gained by hanging on upon him," said Simon
+scornfully, glancing at Richard's heels; "not so much as a pair of
+gilt spurs!  Creeping after him like a hound, thou hast not even the
+bones!"
+
+"I have all I seek," said Richard.  "I have his brotherly kindness.
+I have the opportunity of redeeming my name.  Nay, I should even
+regret any honour that took me from the services I now perform.
+Simon, didst thou but know his love for our father!"
+
+"Silence, base caitiff!" thundered Simon; "I know his deeds, and that
+is enough for me!  Look here, mean-spirited as thou wert to be taken
+with his hypocrisy, I have pity on thee yet.  I would spare thee what
+awaits thee in the camp!"
+
+"For heaven's sake, Simon, dost know of any attack of the Emir?  The
+Princess must at once be conveyed into the town!  As thou art a man,
+a Christian, speak plainly!"
+
+"Foolish lad, the infidels are quiet enough!  No peril threatens the
+camp!  Only if thou wilt run thy head into it, thou art like to find
+it too hot to hold thee!"
+
+"I am afraid of no accusations," said Richard; "my Lord knows and
+trusts me."
+
+Simon laughed a loud ringing scornful laugh.
+
+"Wilful will to water," he said.  "Well, thou besotted lad, if it be
+not too late when thou getst into the hands of Crookbacked Edmund and
+Red Gilbert, remember the way to Galilee, that is all!"
+
+"I tell thee, Simon," said Richard, turning round and fully facing
+him; "I would rather perish an innocent man by the hands of the
+Provost Marshal, than darken my soul with thy counsels of blood.  O
+Simon!  What thy purpose may be I know not; but canst thou deem it
+faithfulness to our father, saint as he was, to live this dark wild
+life, so utterly abhorrent to him?"
+
+"Let those look to that who slew him, and made me such as I am,"
+returned Simon, turning from him, and gazing steadfastly down into
+the camp.  Suddenly a gleam of fierce exultation lighted up his face,
+and again facing Richard he exclaimed, "Yes, go home, tame cringing
+spaniel, and see whether a Montfort is still in favour below there!
+See if proud Edward is still ready to meet thy fawning with his
+scornful patronage!  See if the honour of a murdered father has not
+been left in better hands than thine!  And when thou hast had thy
+lesson, find the way to Ain Gebel, or ask Nick Dustifoot."
+
+Richard, with a startled exclamation, looked down, but could discern
+nothing unusual in the camp.  The royal banner hung in heavy folds
+over the Prince's pavilions, and all was evidently still in the same
+noontide repose, or rather exhaustion, to which the Syrian sun
+reduced even the hardy active Englishmen.  "What mean you?" he began;
+but Simon was no longer beside him.  He called, but echo alone
+answered; and all he could do was to throw himself on his horse, and
+hurry down the mountain side, with a vague presentiment of evil, and
+a burning desire to warn his lord or share his peril.
+
+He understood Simon's position.  Many of the almost inaccessible
+rocks, where the sons of Anak had built their Cyclopean fortresses,
+and which had been abodes of almost fabulous beauty and strength in
+the Herodian days, had been resorted to again by the crusaders, and
+had served as isolated strongholds whence to annoy the enemy.
+Frightfully lawless had, in too many instances, been the life there
+led, more especially by the Levant-born sons of Europeans; and in the
+universal disorganization of the Kingdom of Jerusalem, that took
+place in consequence of the disputed rights of Cyprus and
+Hohenstaufen, most of them had become free from all control.  If the
+garrisons bore the Christian name at all, it chiefly was as an excuse
+for preying on all around; but too often they were renegades of every
+variety of nation, drawn together by the vilest passions, commanded
+by some reckless adventurer, and paying a species of allegiance to
+any power that either endangered them, or afforded them the hopes of
+plunder.  Bloodthirsty and voluptuous alike, they were viewed with
+equal terror by the Frank pilgrim, the Syriac villager, the Armenian
+merchant, and the Saracen hadji--whose ransom and whose spoil
+enriched their chambers, with all that the licentious tastes of East
+and West united could desire.  There were comparatively few of these
+nests of iniquity in these latter days of the Crusades, but some
+still survived; and Richard had seen some of their captains with
+their followers at the siege of Nazareth, where the atrocities they
+had committed had been such as to make the English army stand aghast.
+As a member of such a crew, Simon could hardly fail to find means of
+attempting that revenge on which it was but too evident that he was
+still bent; and Richard, as every possible risk rose before him,
+urged his horse to perilous speed down the steep descent, and chid
+every obstacle, though in fact the descent which ordinarily occupied
+two hours, for men who cared for their own necks, was effected by him
+in a quarter of the time.  He came to the entrenched camp.  The
+entrance, where the Prince made so strict a point of keeping a
+sentinel, was completely unguarded.  The foremost tents were empty,
+but there was a sound as of the murmuring voices of numbers towards
+the centre of the camp.  The next moment he met Hamlyn de Valence
+riding quickly, and followed by two attendants.
+
+"Hamlyn! a moment!" he gasped.  "Has aught befallen the Prince?"
+
+"You were aware of it, then!" said Hamlyn, checking his horse, and
+looking him full in the face.
+
+"Answer me, for Heaven's sake!  Is all well with the Princes?"
+
+"As well as your house desires--or it may be somewhat better," said
+Hamlyn; "but let me pass.  I am on an errand of life or death."
+
+So saying, Hamlyn dashed forwards; and Richard, in double alarm, made
+his way to the space in the centre of the camp, where he found
+himself on the outskirts of a crowd, talking in the various tongues
+of English, French, and Lingua Franca.  "He lives--the good Princess-
+-the dogs of infidels--poison--" were the words he caught.  He flung
+himself from his horse, and was about to interrogate the nearest man,
+when John of Dunster came hurrying towards him from the tents, and
+threw himself upon him, sobbing with agitation and dismay.
+
+"What is it?  Speak, John!  The Prince!"
+
+"Oh, if you had but been there!  It will not cease bleeding.  O
+Richard, he looks worse than my father when he came home!"
+
+"Let me hear!  Where?  How is he hurt?"
+
+"In the arm and brow," said the boy.
+
+"The arm!" said Richard, much relieved.
+
+"Ah, but they say the dagger is poisoned!  Stay, Richard, I'll tell
+you all.  Dame Idonea turned me out of the tent, and she will not let
+any one in.  It was thus--even now the Prince was lying on the day-
+bed in his own outer tent, no one else there save myself.  I believe
+everybody was asleep, I know I was--when Nick Dustifoot called me,
+and bade me tell the Prince there was a messenger from the Emir of
+Joppa, asking to see him.  So the Prince roused himself up, and bade
+him come in.  He was one of those quick-eyed Moorish-looking
+infidels, in the big turbans and great goat's hair cloaks; and he
+went down on his knees, and hit the ground with his forehead, and
+said Salam aleikum--traitor that he was--and gave the Prince a
+letter.  Well, the Prince muttered something about his head aching so
+sorely that he could scarce see the writing, and had just put up his
+hand to shade his eyes from the light, when the dog was out with a
+dagger and fell on him!  The Prince's arm being raised, caught the
+stroke, you see; and that moment his foot was up," said John, acting
+the kick, "and down went the rogue upon his back!  And I--I threw
+myself right down over him!"
+
+"Did you, my brave little fellow?  Well done of you!" cried Richard.
+
+"And the Prince wrested the dagger out of the rogue's hand, only he
+tore his own forehead sorely, as the point flew up with the shock--
+and then stabbed the villain to the heart--see how the blood rushed
+over me!  Then the Prince pulled me up, and called me a brave lad,
+and set me on my feet, and asked me if I were sure I was not hurt.
+And by that time the archers were coming in, when all was over; and
+Long Robin must needs snatch up a joint stool and have a stroke at
+the Moor's head.  I trow the Prince was wrath with the cowardly clown
+for striking a dead man.  He said I alone had been any aid!"
+
+"'Well?" anxiously asked Richard, gathering intense alarm as he saw
+that the boy's trouble still exceeded his elation, even at such
+commendation as this.
+
+"But then," said John sadly, "even while he called it nothing, there
+came a dizziness over him.  And even then the Princess had heard the
+outcry, and came in haste with Dame Idonea.  And so soon as the Dame
+had picked up the dagger and looked well at it, and smelt it, she
+said there was poison on it.  No sooner did the Princess hear that,
+than, without one word, she put her lips to his arm to suck forth the
+venom.  He was for withholding her, but the Dame said that was the
+only safeguard for his life; and she looked--oh, so imploring!"
+
+"Blessings on the sweet Princess and true wife!" cried the men-at-
+arms, great numbers of whom had gathered round the little eye-witness
+to hear his account.
+
+"And so is he saved?" said Richard, with a long breath.
+
+"Ah! but," said John, his eyes beginning to fill with tears, "there
+is the Grand Master of the Templars come now, and he says that to
+suck the poison is of no avail; and that nothing will save him but
+cutting away the living flesh as I would carve the wing of a bustard;
+and Dame Idonea says that is just the way King Coeur de Lion died,
+and the Princess is weeping, and the wound will not stop bleeding;
+and Hamlyn is gone to Acre for a surgeon, and they are all wrangling,
+and Dame Idonea boxed my ears at last, and said I was gaping there."
+The boy absolutely burst into sobs and tears, and at the same moment
+a growl arose among the archers, of "Curses on the Moslem hounds!
+Not one shall escape!  Death to every captive in our hands!"
+
+"Nay, nay," exclaimed Richard, looking up in horror; "the poor
+captives are utterly guiltless!  Far more justly make me suffer,"
+murmured he sadly.
+
+"All tarred with the same stick," said the nearest; "serve them as
+they deserve."
+
+"Think," added Richard, "if the Prince would see no dishonour done to
+the dead carcase of the murderer himself, would he be willing to have
+ill worked on living men, sackless of the wrong?  English turning
+butchers--that were fit work for Paynims."
+
+"No, no, not one shall live to laugh at our Edward's fall," burst out
+the men; and a voice among them added, "Sure the young squire seems
+to know a vast deal about the guilty and the guiltless--the Montfort!
+Ay!  Away with all foes to our Edward--"
+
+"Best withdraw yourself, Sir," said Hob Longbow; "their blood is up.
+Baulk them of their prey, and they will set on you next."
+
+Richard just then beheld a person from whose interposition he had
+much greater hopes, namely the Earl of Gloucester, who, though still
+a young man, was the chief English noble in the camp, and whose
+special charge the Saracen captives were.  He hurried towards him,
+and asked tidings of the Prince.
+
+"Ill tidings, I trow," said the Earl, bitterly.  "Ay, Richard de
+Montfort, you had best take heed to yourself, he was your best
+friend; and a sore lookout it is for us all.  Between the old dotard
+his father and the poor babes his children, England is in woeful
+plight.  Would that your father's wits were among us still!  There's
+some curse on this fools' errand of a Crusade, for here is the sixth
+prince it hath slain, and well if we lose not our Princess too.  But
+what is all this uproar!"
+
+"The men-at-arms, my Lord," said Richard, "fierce to visit the crime
+on the captives."
+
+"A good riddance!" said Earl Gilbert; "the miscreants eat as much as
+ten score yeomen, and my knaves are weary with guarding them.  If
+this matter brings all the pagans in Palestine on our hands, we shall
+have enough to do without looking after this nest of heathens."
+
+"But would the Prince have it so?"
+
+"I fear me the Prince is like to have little will in the matter!  No,
+no, I'm not the man to order a butchery, but if the honest fellows
+must needs shed blood for blood, I'm not going to meddle between them
+and the heathen wolves."
+
+Assuredly nothing was to be done with the Red de Clare, and Richard
+pushed on, with throbbing dismayed heart, to the tent, dreading to
+behold the condition of him whom he best loved and honoured on earth.
+The tent was crowded, but Richard's unusual height enabled him to
+see, over the heads of those nearest, that Edward was sitting on the
+edge of his couch, his wife and Dame Idonea endeavouring to check the
+flow of blood from his wound.  The elbow of his other arm was on his
+knee, and his head on his hand, but the opening of the curtain let in
+the light; he looked up, and Richard saw how deathly white his face
+had become, and the streaks of blood from the scratch upon his brow.
+He greeted Richard, however, with the look of recognition to which
+his young squire had now become used--not exactly a smile, but a
+well-satisfied welcome; and though he spoke low and feebly to his
+brother who stood near him, Richard caught the words with a thrill of
+emotion.
+
+"Let him near me, Edmund.  He hath a ready hand, and may aid thee,
+sweet wife.  Thou art wearying thyself."  Then, as Richard
+approached, "Thou hast sped well!  I looked not for thee so soon."
+
+"Alack, my Lord!" said Richard, "I hurried on to warn you.  Ah! would
+I had been in time!"
+
+"Thy little pupil, John, did all man could do," said Edward,
+languidly smiling.  "But what--hast aught in charge to say to me?  Be
+brief, for I am strangely dizzy."
+
+"My Lord," said Richard, "the archers and men-at-arms are furiously
+wrath with the Saracens.  They would wreak their vengeance on the
+prisoners, who at least are guiltless!"
+
+"The knaves!" exclaimed Edward promptly.  "Why looks not Gloucester
+to this?"
+
+"My Lord, the Earl saith that he would not command the slaughter, but
+that he will not forbid it."
+
+"Saints and angels!" burst forth the Prince, and to the amazement of
+all, he started at once on his feet, and striding through the
+bystanders to the opening of the tent, he looked out on the crowd,
+who were already rushing towards the inclosure where their victims
+were penned.  Raising his mighty voice as in a battle-day, he called
+aloud to them to halt, turn back, and hear him.  They turned, and
+beheld the lofty form in the entrance of the tent, wrapped in a long
+loose robe, which, as well as his hair, was profusely stained with
+blood, his wan face, however, making that marble dignity and
+sternness of his even more awful and majestic as he spoke aloud.
+"So, men, you would have me go down to my grave blood-stained and
+accursed by the death of guiltless captives?  And I pray you, what is
+to be the lot of our countrymen, now on pilgrimage to Jerusalem, if
+you thus deal with our prisoners, taken in war?  Senseless bloody-
+minded hounds that ye are, mark my words.  The life of one of you for
+the life of a Saracen captive; and should I die, I lay my curse on ye
+all, if every man of them be not set free the hour my last breath is
+drawn.  Do you hear me, ye cravens?"
+
+Unsparing, unconciliatory as ever, even when most merciful and
+generous, Edward turned, but reeled as he re-entered the tent, and
+his dizziness recurring, needed the support of both his brother and
+Richard to lay him down on the couch.
+
+The Grand Master of the Temple renewed his assurance that this was a
+token of the poison, and Eleanor was unheeded when she declared that
+her dear lord had been affected in the same manner before his wound,
+ever since indeed the Whit Sunday when he had ridden home from the
+great Church of St. John of Acre in the full heat of the sun.
+
+Dame Idonea was muttering the mediaeval equivalent for fiddlesticks,
+as plain as her respect for the Temple would allow her.
+
+At that moment the leech whom Hamlyn had been sent into the town to
+summon, made his appearance, and fully confirmed the Templar's
+opinion.  Neither the wizened Greek physician, nor the dignified
+Templar, considered the soft but piteous assurance of the wife that
+the venom had at once been removed by her own lips as more than mere
+feminine folly, and Dame Idonea's real experience of knights thus
+saved, and on the other hand of the fatal consequences of rude
+surgery in such a climate, were disregarded as an old woman's babble.
+Her voice waxed shrill and angry, and her antagonists' replies in
+Lingua Franca, mixed with Arabic, Latin, and Greek, rang through the
+tent, till the Prince could bear it no longer.
+
+"Peace," he said, with an asperity unlike his usual stern patience,
+"I had liefer brook your knives than your tongues!  Without further
+jangling, tell me clearly, learned physician, the peril of either
+submitting or not submitting to your steel."
+
+The Greek told, with as little tergiversation as was in his nature,
+that he viewed a refusal as certain death, but several times Dame
+Idonea was bursting out upon him, and Edward had to hold up his
+finger to silence her.
+
+"Now, kind lady," quoth he, "let me hear the worst you foretell for
+me from your experience."
+
+Dame Idonea did not spare him either the fate of Coeur de Lion, the
+dangers of fever and pain, and above all "of that strange enchantment
+that binds the teeth together and forbids a man to swallow his food."
+Poor Eleanor looked at him imploringly all the time, but as none of
+them had ever heard of the circulation of the blood, they could not
+tell that her simple remedy had been truly efficacious, and that if
+it had been otherwise the incisions would now come too late.  Thus
+the balance of prudence made itself appear to be on the side of the
+physician, and for him the Prince decided.  "Mi Dona," he said, ever
+his most caressing term for her, "it must be so!  I think not lightly
+of what thou hast done for me, but, as matters stand, too much hangs
+upon this life of mine for me not to be bound to run no needless risk
+for fear of a little pain.  If I live and speak now, next to highest
+Heaven it is owing to thee; and when we came on this holy war, sweet
+Eleanor, didst thou not promise to hinder me from naught that a true
+warrior of the Cross ought to undergo?  And is this the land to
+shrink from the Cross?"
+
+Alas! to Eleanor the pang was the belief in the uselessness of his
+suffering and danger.  She never withstood his will, but physically
+she was weak, and her weeping was piteous in its silence.  Edward
+bade his brother lead her away; and Edmund, after the usual fashion,
+vented his own perplexity and distress upon the most submissive
+person in his way.  He assumed more resistance on the part of his
+gentle sister-in-law than she made, and carrying her from the tent,
+roughly told her, silent as she was, that it was better that she
+should scream and cry than all England wail and lament.
+
+And so Eleanor's devoted deed, the true saving of her husband, has
+lived on as a mere delusive tradition, weakly credited by the
+romantic, while the credit of his recovery has been retained by the
+Knight-Templars' leech.  Not a sound was uttered by the Prince while
+under those hands; but when his wife was permitted to return to him,
+she found him in a dead faint, and the silver reliquary she had left
+with him crushed flat and limp between his fingers.
+
+Richard had given his attendance all the time, and for several hours
+afterwards, during which the Princess hung over her husband,
+endeavouring to restore him from the state of exhaustion in which he
+scarcely seemed conscious of anything but her presence.  Late in the
+evening, some one came to the entrance of the tent, and beckoned to
+the young squire; he came out expecting to receive some message, but
+to his extreme surprise found himself in the grasp of the Provost
+Marshal.
+
+"On what charge?" he demanded, so soon as he was far enough beyond
+the precincts of his tent not to risk a disturbance.
+
+"By the command of the council.  On the charge of being privy to the
+attempt on the Prince's life."
+
+"By whom preferred?" asked Richard.
+
+"By the Lord Hamlyn de Valence."
+
+Richard attempted not another word.  In effect the condition of the
+Prince seemed to him so hopeless that his most acute suffering at the
+moment was in the being prevented from ministering to him, or
+watching for a last word or look of recognition.  He had no heart for
+self-vindication, even if he had not known its utter futility with
+men who had been prejudiced against him from the outset.  Nor had he
+the opportunity, for the Provost Marshal conducted him at once to the
+tent where he was to be in ward for the night, a heap of straw for
+him to lie upon, and a guard of half a dozen archers outside; and
+there was he left to his despairing prayers for the Prince's life.
+He could dwell on nothing else, there was no room in his mind for any
+thought but of that glory of manhood thus laid low, and of the
+anguish of the sweet face of the Princess.
+
+"Sir--!" there was a low murmur near him--"now is the time.  I have
+brought an archer's gown and barrett, and we may easily get past the
+yeomen."  These last words were uttered, as on hands and knees a
+figure whose dark outline could barely be discerned, crept under the
+border of the tent.
+
+"Who art thou?" hastily inquired Richard.
+
+"You should know me, Sir,--I have done you many a good turn, and
+served your house truly."
+
+"Talk not of truth, thou traitor," said Richard, recognizing
+Dustifoot's voice.  "Knowst thou that but for the Prince's clemency
+thou hadst a year ago been out of the reach of the cruel evil thou
+hast now shared in."
+
+"Nay, now, Lord Richard," returned the man, "you should not treat
+thus an honest fellow that would fain do you service."
+
+"I need no service such as thine," returned Richard.  "Thy service
+has made my brothers murderers, and brought ruin and woe unspeakable
+upon the land."
+
+"Beshrew me," muttered the man, "but one would have thought the young
+damoiseau would have had more feeling about his father's death!  But
+I swore to do Sir Simon's bidding, so that is no concern of mine; and
+he bade me, if any one strove to lay hands on you, Sir, to lead you
+down to Kishon Brook, where he will meet us with a plump of spears."
+
+"Meet him then," said Richard, "and say to him that if from his crag
+above, on Carmel, he sees me hung on the gallows tree as a traitor,
+he may count that I am willingly offered for our family sin!  Ay, and
+that if he thinks an old man's hairs brought down to the grave, a
+broken-hearted wife, helpless orphans, and a land without a head, to
+be a grateful offering to my father, let him enjoy the thought of how
+the righteous Earl would have viewed all the desolation that will
+fall on England without the one--one scholar who knew how to value
+and honour his lessons."
+
+"Hush!  Sir," hastily interposed Dustifoot; but it was too late, the
+murmur of voices had already been caught by the guard, and quick as
+he was to retreat, their torches discovered him as he was creeping
+out, and he was dragged back by the feet, and the light held up to
+his face, while many voices proclaimed him as the rogue who had been
+foremost in admitting the assassin to the royal tent.  It was from
+the tumult of voices that Richard first understood that on examining
+the body of the murderer, it had been ascertained that he was neither
+a Bedouin nor one of the assassins belonging to the Old Man of the
+Mountain, but an European, probably a Provencal; and this, added to
+Hamlyn's representation of Richard's words, together with what the
+Earls of Lancaster and Gloucester recollected, had directed the
+suspicion upon himself.  And here was, as it seemed, undeniable
+evidence of his connection with the plot!
+
+The miserable Dustifoot, vainly imploring his intercession, was tied
+hand and foot, and the guard returned to the outside of the tent,
+except one archer, who thought it needful to bring in his torch, and
+keep the prisoners in sight.
+
+The night passed wearily, and with morning Dustifoot was removed to a
+place of captivity more befitting his degree; but of the Prince,
+Richard only heard that he continued to be in great danger.  No
+attempt on the part of the council was made to examine their
+prisoner; and Richard suspected, as time wore on, that no one chose
+to act in this time of suspense for fear of incurring the lion-like
+wrath of Edward in the event of his recovery, but that in case of his
+death, small would be his own chances of life.  Death had fewer
+horrors for the lonely boy than it would have had for one with whom
+life had been brighter.  In battle for the Cross, or in shielding his
+Prince's life, it would have been welcome, but death, branded with
+vile ingratitude, as a traitor to that master, was abhorrent.  Shrunk
+up in the corner of the tent, half asleep after the night's vigil,
+yet too miserable for the entire oblivion of rest, Richard spent the
+day in dull despair, listening for sounds without with an intensity
+of attention that seemed to pervade every limb, and yet with snatches
+of sleep that brought dreams more intolerable than the reality which
+they yet seemed to enhance.
+
+At last, however, the sultry closeness of the day subsided, the
+Angelus bell sounded far off from the churches and convents of Acre,
+and near from the chapel tent, and the devotions that it proclaimed
+were not ended when Richard heard the cry of the crusading watch--
+"Remember the Holy Sepulchre."
+
+Yes, the Holy Sepulchre might not be recovered and reached by the
+English army, but it might still be remembered, and therein be laid
+down all struggles of the will, all rebellious agony, at the being
+misunderstood, misused, vituperated, all suffering might there be
+offered up; nor could the most ignominious death stand between him
+and the thought of that Holy Tomb, and of the joy beyond.--Son of a
+man who, sorely tried, had drawn his sword against his king, brother
+of wilful murderers, perhaps to die innocent was the best fate he
+could hope; and in accordance with the doctrine of his time, he hoped
+that his death might serve as a part of a sacrifice for the family
+guilt.  Nay, the Prince gone, wherefore should he wish to live?
+
+"Don't you see?  The Prince's signet!  He said I should bring him!
+Clown that thou art, hast no eyes nor ears?  What, don't you know me?
+I am the young lord of Dunster, the Prince's foot-page.  It is his
+command."
+
+And amid some perplexed mutterings from the guard, little John of
+Dunster burst into the tent.  "Up, up," he cried, "you are to come to
+the Prince instantly."
+
+"How fares he?"--Richard's one question of the day.
+
+"Sorely ill at ease," said the boy, "but he wants you, he calls for
+you, and no one would tell him where you were, so I spoke out at
+last, and he bade me take his ring and bring you, for 'tis his
+pleasure.  Come now, for the Earl of Lancaster and Hamlyn are gone to
+take the Princess to Acre, and my Lord of Gloucester has taken his
+red head off to sleep, and no one is there but old Raymond and some
+of the grooms.
+
+"The Princess gone!"
+
+"Ay, and Dame Idonea with her.  So we shall hear no more of King
+Coeur de Lion.  Hamlyn swears she was on his crusade.  Do you think
+she was, Richard? nobody knows how old she is."
+
+Richard was a great deal too anxious to ask questions himself, to be
+able to answer this query.  And as the yeomen let him pass them, only
+begging him to bear him out with the Princes, he hastily gathered
+from the boy all that he could tell.  The Prince had, it appeared,
+been in a most suffering state from pain and fever all the night and
+the ensuing day, and had hardly noticed any one but his devoted wife,
+who had attended him unremittingly, until with the cooler air of
+evening she saw him slightly revived, but was herself so completely
+spent, and so unwell, as to be incapable of opposing his decision
+that she should at once be carried into the city to receive the
+succours her state demanded.  When she was gone, Edward, who had
+perhaps sought to spare her the sight of his last agony, had roused
+himself to make his will, and choose protectors for his father and
+young children; and it was after this that his inquiries became
+urgent for Richard de Montfort.  He was at length answered by the
+indignant little foot-page; and greatly resenting the action of the
+council, he had, as John said, "frowned and spoken like himself," and
+sent the little fellow in quest of the young esquire.
+
+The tent was nearly dark, and Richard could only see the outline of
+the tall form laid prostrate, but the voice he had feared never to
+hear again, spoke, though slowly and wearily, and a hand was held
+out.  "Welcome, cousin," he said.  "Poor boy, they must needs have at
+thee ere the breath was out of my body; but for that, at least, they
+shall wait, and longer if my word and will can avail after I am gone.
+What has given them occasion against thee, Richard?"
+
+"Alas! my Lord, you are too ill at ease to vex yourself with my
+matters."
+
+"Nay, but I must see thee righted, Richard; there are services for
+thee to do to me.  Hark thee!  I have bequeathed thee thy mother's
+lands at Odiham, which my father gave to me.  So mayest thou do for
+Henry whate'er he will brook," he added, with a languid smile,
+holding Richard's hand in such a manner as to impress that though his
+words came very tardily, he did not mean to be interrupted.
+"Methinks Henry will not grudge a kindly thought and a few prayers
+for his old comrade.  And, Richard, strive to be near my poor boys;
+strive that they be bred in strict self-rule, and let them hear of
+the purposes thy father left to me:  I think thou knowst them or
+canst divine them better than any other near me.  Thou SHALL be with
+them if--if Heaven and the blessed Saints bear my sweet wife through
+this trouble.  She will love and trust thee."
+
+Edward's voice broke down in a half-strangled sob between grief and
+pain; he could not contemplate the thought of his wife, and weakness
+had broken down much of his power over himself.  He did not speak at
+once, or invite an answer; and when he did, his words were an
+exclamation of despairing weariness at the trumpet of a gnat that
+hovered above him.
+
+Richard presently understood that the thin goats' hair curtains which
+even the crusaders had learnt to adopt from their Oriental neighbours
+as protections against these enemies, being continually disarranged
+to give the Prince drink or to put cool applications to his wound,
+the winged foes were sure to enter, and with their exasperating hum
+further destroy all chance of rest.  The Prince had not slept since
+he had been wounded, and was well-nigh distraught with wakefulness,
+and with the continual suffering, which was only diminished at the
+first moment that a cold lotion touched his arm.  The Hospitaliers
+had sent in some ice from Mount Hermon, but no one knew how to apply
+it, and even Dame Idonea had despised it.
+
+Fortunately, however, Richard had spent a few weeks on his first
+arrival in the infirmary of the Knights of St. John, and before his
+recovery had become familiar with their treatment of both ice and
+mosquito curtains; and when Edmund of Lancaster came into the tent
+cautiously in early dawn, he could hardly credit his eyes, for the
+squire whom he believed to be in close custody was beside his
+brother, holding the cold applications on the arm, and it was
+impossible to utter inquiry or remonstrance, for the Prince was in
+the profoundest, most tranquil slumber.
+
+Nor did he awake till the camp was astir in the morning with the
+activity that in this summer time could only be exerted before the
+sun had come to his full strength.  Then, when at length he opened
+his eyes, he pronounced himself to be greatly refreshed; and the
+physician at the same time found the state of the wound greatly
+improved.  A cheerful answer was returned by the patient to the
+message of anxious inquiry sent from his Princess at Acre and then
+looking up kindly at Richard, he said, "Boy, if my wife saved my life
+once, I think thou hast saved it a second time."
+
+"Brother!" here broke in the Earl of Lancaster, "I would not grieve
+you, but for your own safety you ought to know of the grave suspicion
+that has fallen on this youth."
+
+"I know that you all have suspected him from the first, Edmund,"
+returned the Prince coolly, "but I little expected that the first
+hour of my sickness would be spent in slaking your hatred of him."
+
+"You do not know the reasons, brother," said Edmund, confused; "nor
+are you in a state to hear them."
+
+"Wherefore not?" said Edward.  "Thanks to him, I have my wits clear
+and cool, and ere the day is older his cause shall be heard.  Fetch
+Gloucester, fetch the rest of the council, and let me hear your
+witnesses against him!  What! do you think I could rest or amend
+while I know not whether I have a traitor or not beside me?"
+
+There could be no doubt that Edward was fully himself after his
+night's rest, determined and prompt as ever.  No one durst withstand
+him, and Edmund went to take measures for his being obeyed.
+Meantime, the Prince grasped Richard by the wrist, and looking him
+through with the keen blue eyes that seemed capable of piercing any
+disguise, he said, "Boy, hast thou aught that thou wouldst tell to
+thy kinsman Edward in this strait, that thou couldst not say to the
+Prince in council?"
+
+"Sir," said Richard, with choking voice, "I was on my way to give
+that very warning, when I found that the blow had fallen.  My Lord,"
+he added, lowering his tone, as he knelt by the Prince's couch,
+"Simon lives; I met him on Mount Carmel."
+
+"I thought so," muttered the Prince.  "And this is his work?"
+
+Richard hurriedly told the circumstances of the encounter, a matter
+on which he had the less scruple as Simon was entirely out of reach.
+He had hardly completed his narration when Prince Edmund returned,
+and with him came others of the council.  Edmund was followed by his
+squire, Hamlyn; and some of the archers were left without.  Richard
+had told his tale, but had had no assurance of how the Prince would
+act upon it, nor how far the brand of shame might be made to rest on
+him and his unhappy house.  He had avowed his brother's guilt to the
+Prince; alas! must it again be blazoned through the camp?
+
+The greetings and inquiries of the new arrivals were hastily got over
+by the Prince, who lay--holding truly a bed of justice--partly raised
+by his cushions, with bloodless cheeks indeed, but with flashing
+eyes, and lips set to all their wonted resoluteness.
+
+"Let me hear, my Lords," he said, "wherefore--so soon as I was
+disabled--you thought it meet to put mine own body squire and kinsman
+in ward?"
+
+"Sir," said the Provost Marshal, "these knaves of mine have let an
+accomplice escape who peradventure might have been made to tell
+more."
+
+"An accomplice?  Of whom?" demanded the Prince.
+
+"Of the--the assassin, my Lord, on whom your own strong hand
+inflicted chastisement.  This Dustifoot, who was the yeoman on guard
+by your tent, and introduced him to your presence, was seized by the
+villains at night, endeavouring to hold converse with this gentleman,
+and was by them taken into custody, whence, I grieve to say, he hath
+escaped."
+
+"Give his guard due punishment!" said Edward shortly.  "But how
+concerns this the Lord Richard de Montfort's durance?"
+
+"Sir," added the Earl of Gloucester, "is it known to you that the dog
+of a murderer was yet no Moslem?"
+
+"What of that?" sharply demanded Edward.
+
+"There can scarcely be a doubt," continued the red-haired Earl, "that
+an attempt on your life, my Lord, could only come from one quarter."
+
+"Oh," dryly replied Edward, "good cause for you to be willing that
+the Saracen captives should be massacred."
+
+"Sir, I did not then know that the miscreant was not of their faith,"
+said Gloucester.  "I now believe that the same revenge that caused
+the death of Lord Henry of Almayne has now nearly quenched the hope
+of England, that if you will not be warned, my Lord, worse evil may
+yet betide."
+
+Gloucester spoke with much feeling, but Edward did not show himself
+touched; he only said, "All this may be very well, but my question is
+not answered--Why was my squire put in ward?"
+
+"Speak, Hamlyn," said Edmund of Lancaster; "say to the Prince what
+thou didst tell me."
+
+Hamlyn stood forth, excusing himself for the painful task of accusing
+his kinsman, but seeing the Prince's impatient frown, he came to the
+point, and declared that Richard de Montfort, on meeting him speeding
+to Acre, had eagerly asked him if aught had befallen the Prince, and
+had looked startled and confused on being taxed with being aware of
+what had taken place.
+
+"Well!" said Edward.
+
+Gloucester next beckoned a yeoman forward, who, much confused under
+the Prince's keen eye, stammered out that he did not wish to harm the
+young gentleman, but that he had seemed mighty anxious to spare the
+Pagan hounds of prisoners, and had even been heard to say that their
+revenge would better fall on himself.
+
+"And is this all for which you had laid hands on him?" said the
+Prince, looking from one to the other.
+
+"Nay, brother," said Edmund.  "It might have been unmarked by thee,
+but in the first hour myself and others heard him speak of having
+made speed to warn thee, but finding it too late.  Therefore did we
+conclude that it were well to have him in ward, lest, as in the
+former unhappy matter, he should have been conversant with traitors,
+and thus that we might obtain intelligence from him.  Remember
+likewise the fellow who was found in the tent."
+
+"So!" said Edward, "an honourable youth hath been treated as a
+traitor, because of another springald's opinion of his looks, and
+because a few yeomen thought he seemed over-anxious to save a few
+wretched captives, whom they knew to be guiltless.  Will there ever
+come a time when Englishmen will learn what IS witness?"
+
+"His name and lineage, brother," began Edmund.
+
+"That, gentles, is the witness upon which the wolf slew the lamb for
+fouling the stream."
+
+"Then you will not examine him?" asked Gloucester.
+
+"Not as a suspected felon," said Edward.  "One who by your own
+evidence was heedless of himself in seeking to save the helpless--
+nay, who spake of hasting to warn me--scarce merits such usage.  What
+consorts with his honour and my safety, I can trust to him to tell me
+as true friend and liegeman!" and the confiding smile with which he
+looked at Richard was like a sunbeam in a dark cloud.
+
+"My Lord Prince," objected Gloucester, "we cannot think that this is
+for your safety."
+
+"See here, Gloucester," said Edward.  "Till my arm can keep my head
+again, double the guards, and search all envoys, under whatever
+pretext they may enter; but never for the rest of thy life brand a
+man with imprisonment till you have reasonable proof against him.
+Thanks for your care of me, my Lords, but I can scarce yet brook long
+converse.  The council is dismissed."
+
+Richard, infinitely relieved, could hardly wait till he could safely
+speak to the Prince to express his gratitude and joy that he had been
+not only defended, but freed from all examination, so as to have been
+spared from denouncing his brother, and that the family had been
+spared from this additional stigma.  Edward, who like all reserved
+men could not endure the expression of thanks, even while their utter
+omission would have been wounding, cut him short.
+
+"Tush, boy, Simon is as much my cousin as thy brother, and I would
+not help to throw fresh stains on the name that, but for my father's
+selfish counsellors, would stand highest at home!  Besides," he
+added, as one half ashamed of his generosity and willing to qualify
+it, "supposing it got abroad that he had aimed this stroke at the
+heir of England--why, then England's honour would be concerned, and
+we should have stout Gilbert de Clare and all the rest of them wild
+to storm Simon in his Galilean fastness, without King Herod's boxes,
+I trow.  Then would all the Druses, and the Maronites, and the
+Saracens, and the half-breeds, the worst of the whole, come down on
+them in some impassable gorge, and the troops I have taken such pains
+to keep in health and training would leave their bones in those
+doleful passes; and not for the sake of the Holy Sepulchre, but of my
+private quarrel.  No, no, Richard, we will keep our own counsel, and
+do our best that Simon may not get another chance, before I can move
+within the walls of Acre; and then we will spread our sails, and pray
+that the Holy Land may make a holier man of him."
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XII--THE GARDEN OF THE HOSPITAL
+
+
+
+"And who is yon page lying cold at his knee?"--SCOTT.
+
+Edward differed from Coeur de Lion in this, that he was one of the
+most abstemious men in his army, and disciplined himself at least as
+rigidly as he did other people.  And it was probably on this account
+that he did not fulfil Dame Idonea's predictions, but recovered
+favourably, and by the end of a fortnight was able, in the first
+coolness of early morning, to ride gently into the city of Acre,
+where a few days previously the Princess Eleanor had given birth to a
+daughter.  She was christened Joan on the day of her father's
+arrival, and afterwards became the special spoilt favourite of
+Edward, whose sternness gave place to excessive fondness among his
+children.  Moreover, she in the end became the wife of that same red-
+haired Earl Gilbert of Gloucester, who at this time stood holding his
+wax taper, and looking at the small swaddled morsel of royalty with
+all a bachelor's contempt for infancy, and little dreaming that he
+beheld his future Countess.
+
+Prince Edward had accepted the invitation of Sir Hugh de Revel, Grand
+Master of the Order of St. John, to take up his quarters in the
+Commandery of the brotherhood; and Richard was greatly relieved to
+have him there, since no watch or ward in the open camp could be so
+secure as this double fortress, protected in the first place by the
+walls of the city, and in the second by those of the Hospital itself,
+with its strict military and monastic discipline.
+
+A wonderful place was that Hospital--infirmary, monastery, and
+castle, all in one, and with a certain Eastern grace and beauty of
+its own.  The deep massive walls, heavy towers, and portcullised
+gateway, were in the most elaborate and majestic style of defensive
+architecture; and the main building rose to a great height, filled
+with galleries of small, bare, rigid-looking cells, just large enough
+for a knight, his pallet, and his armour.  Below was a noble vaulted
+hall, the walls hung with well-tried hawberks, and shields and
+helmets which had stood many a dint; captured crescents and green
+banners waved as trophies over crooked scymetars and Damascus blades
+inlaid with sentences from the Koran in gold, and twisted cuirasses
+rich with barbaric gold and gems; the blazoned arms of the noblest
+families of France, Spain, England, Germany, and Italy, decked the
+panels and brightened the windows; while the stone pulpit for the
+reader showed that it was still a convent refectory.
+
+The chapel was grave and massive, but at the same time gorgeous with
+colouring suited to eyes accustomed to Oriental brightness of hue;
+the chancel walls were inlaid with the porphyry, jasper, and marble,
+of exquisite tints, that came from the mountains around; the shrines
+were touched with gold, and the roofs and vaultings painted with
+fretwork of unapproachable brilliance and purity of tints; yet all
+harmonizing together, as only Eastern colouring can harmonize, and
+giving a sense of rest and coolness.
+
+Within those huge thick walls, whose windows, sunk deep into their
+solid mass, only let in threads of jewelled light, under their solemn
+circular richly carved brows, between those marble pillars; the elder
+ones, round and solid, with Romanesque mighty strength; the new
+graceful clusters of shining blood-red marble shafts, surrounding a
+slender white one, all banded together with gold, under the vaults of
+the stone roof, upon the mosaic floor--there was always a still
+refreshing coolness, like the "shadow of a great rock in a weary
+land."  One transept had a window communicating with the upper room
+of the Infirmary, so that the sick who there lay in their beds might
+take part in the services in the chapel.
+
+The outer court, with the great fortified gateway towards the street,
+was a tilt-yard, where martial exercises took place as in any other
+castle; but pass through the great hall to the inner court, of which
+the chapel formed one side, and where could such cloisters have been
+found in the West?  Their heavy columns and deep-browed arches
+clinging against the thick walls, afforded unfailing shelter from the
+sun, and their coolness was increased by the marble of the pavement,
+inlaid in rich intricate mosaics.
+
+Extending around the interior of the external wall, they enclosed an
+exquisite Eastern garden, perfumed with flowering shrubs, shady with
+trees, and lovely with tall white lilies, hollyhocks, purple irises,
+stars of Bethlehem, and many another Eastern flower, which would send
+forth seeds or roots for the supply of the trim gardens of Western
+convents.  The soft bubbling of fountains gave a sense of delicious
+freshness; doves flew hither and thither, and their soft murmuring
+was heard in the branches; and at certain openings in their foliage
+might be seen the azure of the Mediterranean, which little John of
+Dunster persisted in calling too blue--why could it not be a sober
+proper-coloured sea like his own Bristol Channel?
+
+Richard was very happy here.  There was something of the same charm
+as in modern days is experienced in staying at a college.  The
+brethren were thorough monks in religious observance, but they were
+also high-bred nobles, and had seen many wild adventures, and hard-
+fought battles, and moreover, had entertained in turn almost every
+variety of pilgrim who had visited the Holy Land; so that none could
+have been found who had more of interest to tell, or more friendly
+hospitable kindness towards their guests.  Richard was a favourite
+there, not only as a friend of Reginald Ferrers, but as acquainted
+with the Grand Prior, Sir Robert Darcy, whose memory was still green
+in Palestine.  Tales of his feats of mighty strength still lingered
+at Acre; how he had held together, by his single arm, the gates of a
+house in the retreat from Damietta, against a whole troop of
+Mamelukes, until every Christian had left it on the other side, and
+then had slowly followed them, not a Moslem daring to attack him; how
+he had borne off wounded knights on his back, and on sultry marches
+would load himself with the armour of any one who was exhausted, and
+never fail to declare it was exactly what he liked best!  More than
+once it had been intimated that Richard de Montfort would be gladly
+accepted as a brother of the Order; and he often thought over the
+offer, but not only was he unwilling to separate himself from the
+Prince, but he felt it needful at any rate to return to England to
+judge of the condition of his brother Henry, ere becoming one of an
+Order where he could no longer dispose of himself.
+
+He was resolved never to quit the Prince till he had seen him beyond
+the reach of any machination of his brother's, nor indeed was it easy
+to think of parting at all, for Edward, who had relaxed all coldness
+of manner towards him ever since the affair at Trapani, had now
+become warmly affectionate and confidential.  The Prince was still
+far from having regained his usual health, his arm was still in a
+scarf, and was often painful, and the least exposure to the sun
+brought on violent headache, which some attributed to the poison in
+the scratch on his forehead, but the Hospitaliers, more reasonably,
+ascribed to a slight sun-stroke.  Their character of infirmarers
+rendered them especially considerate hosts, and they never
+overwhelmed their guest with the stiff formalities of courtesy for
+his rank's sake, but allowed him to follow his inclination, and this
+led him to spend great part of his time in a pavilion, a thoroughly
+Eastern erection, which stood in the garden, at the top of the white
+marble steps leading to a fountain of delicious sparkling water, and
+sheltered from the sun by the dark solid horizontal branches of a
+noble Cedar of Lebanon, which tradition connected with the visit of
+the Empress Helena.  Here, lying upon mats placed on the steps, the
+convalescent Prince would rest for hours, sometimes holding converse
+with the Grand Master, or counsel with his visitors from the camp;
+but more often in the dreamy repose of recovery, silent or talking to
+Richard of matters that lay deep within his heart; but which,
+perhaps, nothing but this softening species of waking dream would
+have drawn from him.  He would dwell on those two hero models of his
+boyhood, so diverse, yet so closely connected together by their
+influence upon his character, Louis of France, and Simon of
+Leicester; and of the impression both had left, that judgment, mercy,
+faith, and the subject's welfare, were the primary duties of a
+sovereign--an idea only now and then glimpsed by the feudal
+sovereigns, who thought that the people lived for them rather than
+they for the people.  And when, as in England, the King's good-nature
+had been abused by swarms of foreign-born relations, who had not even
+his claims on the people, no wonder the yoke had been galling beyond
+endurance.  Of the end Edward could not bear to think--of the broken
+friendships--the enmity of kindred--the faults on either side that
+had embittered the strife, till he had been forced to become the
+sword in the hands of the royal party to liberate his father--and
+with consequences that had so far out-run his powers of controlling
+them.  To make England the land of law, peace, and order, that Simon
+de Montfort would fain have seen it, was his present aspiration; and
+then, he said, when all was purified at home, it might yet be
+permitted to him to return and win back the Holy City, Jerusalem, to
+the Christian world.  In the meantime, as a memorial of this, his
+earnest longing, he was causing, at great expense and labour, one of
+the huge stones of the Temple to be transported over the hills, and
+embarked on board a ship, to carry home with him.  Richard, meantime,
+learnt to know and love his Prince with a more devoted love, if that
+were possible, and to grieve the more at the persistent hatred of his
+brothers, who, utterly uncomprehending their father's high purposes
+themselves, sought blindly to slake their vengeance for the ruin they
+had themselves provoked, and upon one who mourned him far more truly
+than they could ever do.
+
+A few days had thus passed, when Richard was one day called by his
+friend, Sir Raynald, into the Infirmary, to speak a few kind words to
+a dying English pilgrim, who had come from his native country, and
+confided to him his dearly-purchased palm and scallop shell, to be
+conveyed to his aged mother.
+
+As Richard was passing along the great lofty chamber, two rows of
+beds were arranged; one of the patients rather hastily, as it seemed
+to him, enveloped himself in his coverlet, leaving nothing visible
+but a great black patch which seemed to cover the whole side of his
+face.
+
+"That is a strange varlet," said Raynald, as they passed him; "it is
+an old wound that the patch covers, not what has brought him here;
+and what the nature of his ailment may be, not one of our infirmarers
+can make out; his tongue is purple, and he hath such strange
+shiverings and contortions in all his limbs, that they are at their
+wits' end, and some hold that he must have undergone some sorcery in
+his passage through the Infidel domains."
+
+"He came from the East, then?" asked Richard.
+
+"Yea, verily.  We have many more sick among the returning than the
+out-going pilgrims."
+
+"And what is his nation?"
+
+"Nay; all the scanty words he hath spoken have been in Lingua Franca,
+and he hath been in such trances and trembling fits that it hath not
+been easy to question him.  Nor is it our custom to trouble a pilgrim
+with inquiries."
+
+"How did he enter?" said Richard.
+
+"Brother Antonio found him yester-eve cast down, gasping for breath,
+by the gate of the Hospital, just able to entreat for the love of St.
+John to be admitted.  He had all the tokens of a pilgrim about him,
+and seemed better at first, walked lustily to bath and bed, and did
+not show himself helpless; but I much suspect his disease is the work
+of the Arch Enemy, for he is always at his worst if one of our
+Brethren in full orders comes near him.  You saw how he cowered and
+hid himself when I did but pass through the hall.  I shall speak to
+the Preceptor, and see if it were not best to try what exorcism will
+do."
+
+There was something in all this that made Richard vaguely uneasy.
+After the recent attack upon the Prince, he suspected all that he did
+not fully understand; and though in the guarded precincts of the
+Hospital he had once dismissed his anxiety, it returned upon him in
+redoubled force.  He thought of Nick Dustifoot, but that worthy was
+of a uniform tint of whitey brown, skin, hair and all; and Richard
+had assured himself that the strange patient had black hair and a
+brown skin, but that was all that he could guess at.  The exorcism
+would, however, be an effectual means of disclosing the "myster
+wight's" person, and it sometimes included measures so strong, that
+few pretences could hold out against them.  But it was too serious
+and complicated a ceremony to be got up at short notice; and when
+they met in the Refectory for supper, Raynald told Richard that the
+Grand Master intended to make a personal inspection next day, before
+deciding on using his spiritual weapons.
+
+"And then!" cried John of Dunster, dancing round, "you will let me be
+there!  Pray, good Father, let me be there!  Oh, I hope there will be
+a rare smell of brimstone, and the foul fiend will come out with huge
+claws, and a forked tail.  I don't care to see him if he only comes
+out like a black crow; I can see crows enough in the trees at
+Dunster."
+
+"Peace, John; this is no place for idle talk," said Richard gravely.
+"Stand aside, here comes the Prince."
+
+The Prince had spent a fatiguing day over the terms of the ten years,
+ten months, ten weeks, ten days, ten hours, and ten minutes' truce
+with the Emir of Joppa; he ate little, and after the meal, took
+Richard's arm, and craved leave from the Grand Master to seek the
+fresh air beneath the cedar tree.  And when there, he could not
+endure the return to the closeness of his own apartment, but declared
+his intention of sleeping in the pavilion.  He dismissed his
+attendants, saying he needed no one but Richard, who, since his
+illness, had always slept upon cushions at his feet.
+
+Where was Richard?
+
+He presently appeared, carrying on one arm a mantle, and over the
+other shoulder the Prince's immense two-handled sword; while his own
+sword was in his belt.  Leonillo followed him.
+
+"How now!" said Edward, "are we to have a joust?  Dost look for
+phantom Saracens out of yonder fountain, such as my Dona tells me
+rise out of the fair wells in Castille, wring their hands and pray
+for baptism?"
+
+"You said your hand should keep your head, my Lord," said Richard;
+"this is but a lone place."
+
+"What! amid all the guards of the good Fathers!  Well, old comrade,"
+as he took his sword in his right hand; "I am glad to handle thee
+once more, and I hope soon to grasp thee as I am wont, with both
+hands.  Lay it down, Richard.  There--thanks--that is well.  I wonder
+what my father would have thought if one of his many crusading vows
+had led him hither.  Should we ever have had him back again?  How
+well this dreamy leisure would have suited him!  It would almost make
+a troubadour of a rough warrior like me.  See the towers and
+pinnacles against the sky, and the lights within the windows--and the
+stars above like lamps of gold, and the moonshine sparkling on the
+bubbles of the water, ever floating off, yet ever in the same place.
+Were the good old man here, how peacefully would he sing, and pray,
+and dream, free from debts, parliament and barons.  Ah! had his
+kinsmen let him keep his vow, it had been happier for us all."
+
+So mused the Prince, and with a weary smile resigned himself to rest.
+
+But Richard was too full of vague uneasiness to sleep.  He could not
+dismiss from his mind the thought of the unknown pilgrim, and was
+resolved to relax no point of vigilance until the full investigation
+should have satisfied him that his fears were unfounded.  He had been
+accustomed to watching and broken rest during the Prince's illness,
+and though he durst not pace up and down for fear of disturbing the
+sleeper--nay, could hardly venture a movement--he strained his eyes
+into the twilight, and told his beads fervently; but sleep hung on
+him like a spell, and even while sitting upright there were strange
+dreams before him, and one that he had had before, though with a
+variation.  It was the field of Evesham once more; but this time the
+strange pilgrim rose in his dark wrappings before him, and suddenly
+developed into that same shadowy form of his father, who again struck
+him on the shoulder with his sword, and dubbed him again "The Knight
+of Death."
+
+Hark! there was a growl from Leonillo; a footstep, a dark figure--the
+pilgrim himself!  Richard shouted aloud, grasped at his sword, and
+flung himself forward.
+
+"Montfort's vengeance!"  The sound rang in his ears as a sharp pang
+thrilled through his side; the hot blood welled up, and he was dashed
+to the ground; but even in falling he heard the Prince's "What
+treason is this?" and felt the rising of the mighty form.  At the
+same moment the murderer was in the grasp of that strong right hand,
+and was dragged forward into the full light of the lamp that hung
+from the roof of the pavilion.
+
+"Thou!" he gasped.  "Who--what?"
+
+"Richard!" exclaimed the Prince, and relaxing his hold, "Simon de
+Montfort, thou hast slain thy brother!"
+
+The sudden shock and awe had overwhelmed Simon, who was indeed
+weaponless, since his dagger remained in Richard's wound.  He
+silently assisted the Prince in lifting Richard to the cushions of
+the couch, and the low groan convinced them that he lived:  looked
+anxiously for the wound.  The dagger had gone deep between the ribs,
+and little but the haft could be seen.
+
+"Poisoned?" Edward asked, looking up at Simon.
+
+"No.  It failed once.  He may live," said Simon, with bent brows and
+folded arms.
+
+"No, no.  My death-blow!" gasped Richard, with sobbing breath.  "Best
+so, if--Oh, could I but speak!"
+
+The Prince raised him, supporting his head on his own broad breast
+and shoulder, and signed to Simon to hold to his lips the cup of
+water that stood near.  Richard slightly revived, and in this posture
+breathed more easily.
+
+"He might yet live.  Call speedy aid!" said the Prince, who seemed to
+have utterly forgotten that he was practically alone with his
+persevering and desperate enemy.
+
+"Wait!  Oh, wait!" cried Richard, holding out his hand; "it would be
+vain; but it will be all joy did I but know that there will be no
+more of this.  Simon, he loved my father--he has spared thee again
+and again."
+
+"Simon," said the Prince, "for this dear youth's sake and thy
+father's, I raise no hand against thee.  Bitter wrong has been done
+to thy house, by what persons, and how provoked, it skills not now to
+ask.  Twice thy fury has fallen on the guiltless.  Enough blood has
+been shed.  Let there be peace henceforth."
+
+Simon stood moody, with folded arms, and Richard groaned, and essayed
+to speak.
+
+"Peace, boy," tenderly said Edward; "and thou, Simon, hear me.  I
+loved thy father, and knew the upright noble spirit that arrayed him
+against us.  Heaven is my witness that I would have given my life to
+have been able to save him on yon wretched battle-field.  But he fell
+in fair fight, in helm and corselet, like a good knight.  Peace be
+with him!  Surely in this land of pardon and redemption his son and
+nephew may cease to seek one another's blood for his sake!  Cheer thy
+brother by letting him feel his brave deed hath not been fruitless.
+Free thou shalt go--do what thou wilt; no word of mine shall betray
+that this deed is thine."
+
+"Lay aside thy purpose," entreated Richard.  "Bind him by oath, my
+Lord."
+
+"Nay," said the Prince.  "Here, on foreign soil, the strife lies
+between the cousins, the sons of Henry and of Eleanor; and if Simon
+must needs still slake his revenge in my blood, he may have better
+success another time.  Or, so soon as I can wear my armour again, I
+offer him a fair combat in the lists, man to man; better so than
+staining his soul with privy murder--but I had far rather that it
+should be peace between us--and that thou shouldst see it."  And
+Edward, still supporting Richard on his breast, held out his right
+hand to Simon, adding, "Let not thy brother's blood be shed in vain."
+
+Richard made a gesture of agonized entreaty.
+
+"My father--my father!" he said.  "He forgave--he hated blood; Simon,
+didst but know--"
+
+"I see," said Simon impatiently, "that Heaven and earth alike are set
+against my purpose.  Fear not for his days, Richard, they are safe
+from me, and here is my hand upon it."
+
+The tone was sullen and grudging, and Richard looked scarcely
+comforted; but the Prince was in haste that he should be succoured at
+once, and even while receiving Simon's unwilling hand, said, "We lose
+time.  Speed near enough to the Spital to be heard, and shout for
+aid.  Then seek thine own safety.  I will say no more of thy share in
+this matter."
+
+Simon lingered one moment.  "Boy," he said, "I told thee thou wast
+over like him.  Live, live if thou canst!  Alas!  I had thought to
+make surer work this time; but thou dost pardon me the mischance?"
+
+"More than pardon--thank thee--since he is safe," whispered Richard,
+and as Simon bent over him the boy crossed his brow, and returned a
+look of absolute joy.
+
+Simon sped away; and the Prince, when left alone with Richard, put no
+restraint upon the warmth of his feelings, and his tears fell fast
+and freely.
+
+"Boy, boy," he said; "I little thought thou wast to bear what was
+meant for me!"  And then, with tenderness that would have seemed
+foreign to his nature, he inquired into the pain that Richard was
+suffering, tried to make his position more easy, and lamented that he
+could not venture to draw out the weapon until the leeches should
+come.
+
+"It has been my best hope," said Richard; "and now that it should
+have been thus.  With your goodness I have nothing--nothing to wish.
+Sir Raynald will be here--I have only my charge for Henry to give
+him--and poor Leonillo!"
+
+"I will bear thy charges to Henry," said the Prince.  "Nor shall he
+think thou didst betray his secret.  I will watch over him so far as
+he will let me, and do all I may for his child.  Yet it may be thou
+wilt still return.  I hear the stir in the House.  They will be here
+anon.  Thou must live, Richard, my friend, where I have few friends.
+I thought to have knighted thee, boy, when thou hadst won fame.  Oh,
+would that I had shown thee more of my love while it was time!"
+
+"All, all I hoped or longed for I have," murmured Richard.  "If you
+see Henry, my Lord, bear him my greetings--and to poor Adam--yea, and
+my mother.  Oh! would that I could make them all know your kindness
+and my joy--that it should be thus!"
+
+By this time the whole Hospital was astir, and the knights and lay
+brethren came flocking out in consternation and dread of finding
+their royal host himself murdered within their cloisters.
+
+Great was the confusion, and eager the search for the assassin, while
+others crowded round the Prince, who still would not give up his post
+of supporting the sufferer in his arms, while a few moments'
+examination convinced the experienced infirmarers that the wound was
+mortal, and that the extraction of the dagger would but hasten death,
+which could not be other than very near.  Indeed, Richard already
+spoke with such difficulty that only the Prince's ear could detect
+his entreaty that Raynald Ferrers might act as his priest.  Raynald
+was already near, only withheld by the crowd of knights of higher
+degree who had thronged before him.  Richard looked up to him with a
+face that in all its mortal agony seemed to ask congratulation.  The
+power of making confession was gone, and when Raynald would have
+offered to take him in his own arms, both he and the Prince showed
+disinclination to the move.  So thus they still remained, while the
+young knightly priest spoke the words of Absolution, and then, across
+the solemn darkness of the garden, amid the light of tapers, the Host
+was borne from the Chapel, while the low subdued chant of the
+brethren swelled up through the night air.  Poor little John of
+Dunster, with his arms round Leonillo's neck, to keep him from
+disturbing his master, knelt, sobbing as though his heart would
+break, but trying to stifle the sounds as the priest's voice came
+grave and full on the silent air, responded to by the gathered tones
+of the brethren:  the fountain bubbled on, and the wakening birds
+began to stir in the trees.
+
+Once more Richard opened his eyes, looked up at his Prince, and
+smiled.  That smile remained while Edward kissed his brow with
+fervour, laid him down on the cushions, and rising to his feet, bowed
+his head to the Grand Master, but did not even strive to speak, and
+gravely walked across the cloister, with a slow though steady step,
+to his own chamber.  No one saw him again till the sun was high,
+when, with looks as composed as ever, he went forth to lay his page's
+head in the grave, and thence visit and calm the fears of his
+Princess.
+
+Search had everywhere been made for the assassin, but no traces of
+him were found.  Only the strange pilgrim had vanished in the
+confusion; and the Prince never contradicted the Grand Master in his
+indignation that a Moslem hound should have assumed such a disguise.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIII--THE BEGGAR AND THE PRINCE
+
+
+
+"This favour only, that thou would'st stand out of my sunshine."
+DIOGENES.
+
+It was the last week of August, 1274, the morrow of the most splendid
+coronation that England had ever beheld, either for the personal
+qualities and appearance of the sovereigns, or for the magnificence
+of the adornments, and the bounteous feasting of multitudes.
+
+A whole fortnight of entertainments to rich and poor had been
+somewhat exhausting, even to the guests; and the suburbs of London
+wore an unusually sleepy and quiescent appearance in the hot beams of
+the August sun.  Bethnal Green lay very silent, parched, and weary,
+not even enlivened by its usual gabbling flocks of geese, all of
+whom, poor things! except the patriarchal gander, and one or two of
+his ladies, had gone to the festival--but to return no more!
+
+One of those who had been in the midst of the pageant, and had
+returned unscathed, was Blind Hal of Bethnal Green.  Many a coin had
+gone into his scrip--uncontested king of the beggars as he was; many
+a savoury morsel had been conveyed to him and his child by his
+admiring brethren of the wallet; with many a gibing scoff had he
+driven from the field presuming mendicants, not of his own
+fraternity; and with half-bitter, half-amused remarks, had he
+listened to the rapturous descriptions of the splendours of king,
+queen, and their noble suite.  And pretty Bessee had clung fast to
+his hand, and discreetly guided him through every maze of the crowd,
+with the strange dexterity of a child bred up in throngs.  And now
+tired out with the long-continued festivities, the beggar sat in
+front of his hut, basking in the sun, and more than half asleep;
+while Bessee, her lap full of heather-blossoms and long bents of
+grass, was endeavouring to weave herself chains, bracelets, and
+coronals, in imitation of those which had recently dazzled her eyes.
+
+She had just encircled her dark auburn locks with a garland of purple
+heather, studded here and there with white or gold, when, starting
+upon her little bare but delicately clean pink feet, she laid her
+hand on her father's lap, and said, "Father, hark!  I see two of the
+good red monks coming!"
+
+"Well, child; and wherefore waken me?  They are after their own
+affairs, I trow.  Moreover, I hear no horses' feet."
+
+"They are not riding," said Bessee; "and they are walking this way.
+They have a dog, too!  Oh, such a gallant glorious dog, father!  Ah,"
+cried she joyfully, "'tis the good Father Grand Prior!" and she was
+about to start forward, but the blind man's ear could now distinguish
+the foot-falls; and holding her fast, he almost gasped--"And the
+other, child--who is he?"
+
+"No knight at our Spital!  A stranger, father.  So tall, so tall!
+His mantle hardly reaches his knee his robe leaves his ankles bare.
+O father, they are coming.  Let me go to meet dear good Father
+Robert!  But what--Oh, is the fit coming?  Father Robert will stop
+it!"
+
+"Hush thy prattle," said the beggar, clutching her fast, and
+listening as one all ear; and by this time the two knights were close
+at hand, the taller holding the dog, straining in a leash, while the
+good Grand Prior spoke.  "How fares it with thee, friend?  And thou,
+my pretty one?  No mishaps among the throng?"
+
+"None," returned Hal; "though the King and his suite DID let loose
+five hundred chargers in the crowd at their dismounting, to trample
+down helpless folk, and be caught by rogues.  Largesse they called
+it!  Fair and convenient largesse--easily providing for those that
+received it!"
+
+"No harm was done," briefly but sharply exclaimed the strange knight;
+and the blind man, who had, as little Bessee at least perceived, been
+turning his acute ear in that direction all the time he had been
+speaking, now let his features light up with sudden perception.
+
+But Sir Robert Darcy, thinking that he only now became aware of the
+stranger's presence, said, "A knight is here from the East, who
+brings thee tidings, my son."
+
+Sir Robert would have said more, but the beggar standing up, cut him
+short, by saying, "So, cousin, you have yet to learn the vanity of
+disguises and feignings towards a blind man."
+
+"Nay, fair cousin," was the answer, "my feigning was not towards you;
+but I doubted me whether you would have the world see me visit you in
+my proper character.  Will not you give me a hand, Henry?"
+
+"First say to me," said Henry, embracing with his maimed arm his
+staff, planted in front of him defiantly, and still holding tight his
+little daughter in his hand, "what brings you here to break into the
+peace of the poor remnant of a man you have left?"
+
+"I come," said Edward patiently, "to fulfil my last--my parting
+promise, to one who loved us both--and gave his life for me."
+
+"Loved you, ay! and well enough to betray me to you!" said Henry
+bitterly.
+
+"No, Henry de Montfort, ten thousand times no!" said Edward.  "I
+would maintain in the lists the honour and loyalty of my Richard
+towards you and me and all others.  His faithfulness to you brought
+him into peril of death and disgrace in the wretched matter of poor
+Henry of Almayne; and he would have met both rather than have broken
+his faith."
+
+"Then," said Henry, still with the same mocking tone, "how was it
+that my worthless existence became known to his Grace?"
+
+"I knew of your having vanished from Evesham Abbey," returned Edward:
+"and thus knowing, I understood a letter, the writing of which had
+brought suspicion on Richard, and which was brought back to me when
+we were seeking into--"
+
+"Into the deed of Simon and Guy," said Henry.  "Poor Henry!  It was a
+foul crime; and Father Robert can bear me witness that I did penance
+for it, when that kindly heart of his was laid in St. Peter's Abbey."
+
+"Then, Henry, thou own'st thy kinship to us still," said Edward
+earnestly.  Give me thine hand, man, and let me embrace my lovely
+little kinswoman--a queen in her trappings.  Ah, Henry!  Heaven hath
+dealt lovingly with thee in sparing thee thy child!"
+
+"You have children left!" said Henry quickly, and not withholding a
+hand--which, be it remarked, was as delicately shaped and well kept
+as that which took it.
+
+Twice had the beggar received a dole at Westminster at the obsequies
+of Edward's little sons; yea, though he and all his brethren of the
+dish had all the winter before had alms given them to purchase their
+prayers for the health of the last.
+
+"Three--but three out of six," answered Edward; "nor dare I reckon on
+the life of the frail babe that England hailed yesterday as my heir.
+I sometimes deem that the blight of broken covenants has fallen on my
+sons."
+
+"They were none of your breaking," said Henry.
+
+"Say'st thou so!" exclaimed Edward, looking up, with the animation of
+a man hearing an acquittal from a quarter whose sincerity he could
+thoroughly trust.
+
+But Henry made no courtly answer.  "Pshaw! no living man that had to
+deal with or for your father could keep a covenant.  You were but the
+spear-point of the broken reed, good cousin; and we pitied and
+excused you accordingly."
+
+"Your father did," said Edward hoarsely.  He could brook pity from
+the great Simon better than from the blind beggar.
+
+"Ay, marry, that did he," returned Henry, "as he closed his visor
+that last morn, after looking out on that wild Welsh border scum that
+my fair brother-in-law had marshalled against us.  'By the arm of St.
+James,' said he, 'if Edward take not heed, that rascaille will deal
+with us in a way that will be worse for him than for us!'"
+
+"A true foreboding," said the King.  "Henry, do thou come and be with
+me.  All are gone!  Scarce a face that I left in England has welcomed
+me on my return.  Come, thou, in what guise thou wilt--earl,
+counsellor, or bedesman--only be with me, and speak to me thy
+father's words."
+
+"Who--I, my Lord?" returned Henry.  "I am no man to speak my father's
+words!  They flew high over my head, and were only caught by grave
+youths such as yourself.  I, who was never trusted with so much as a
+convoy.  No, no; all the counsel I shall ever give, is to the
+beggars, which coat-of-arms is like to rain clipped silver, and which
+honest round penny pieces!  Poor Richard! he bore the best brain of
+us all, and might have served your purpose.  Sit down, and tell me of
+the lad.--Bessee, little one, bring out the joint-stool for the holy
+Father."
+
+And Henry de Montfort made way on the rude bench outside his hut,
+with all the ease and courtesy of the Earl of Leicester receiving his
+kinsman the King.  But meantime, the dog, which had been straining in
+the leash, held by Edward throughout the conference, leapt forward,
+and vehemently solicited the beggar's caresses.  "Ah, Leonillo!" he
+said, recognizing him at once, "thou hast lost thy master!  Poor dog!
+thou art the one truly loyal to thy master's blood!"
+
+"It was Richard's charge to take him to thee," said Edward:  "but if
+he be burdensome to thee, I would gladly cherish him, or would commit
+him to faithful Gourdon, with whom he might be happier.  Since he
+lost his master the poor hound hath much pined away, and will take
+food from none but me, or little John of Dunster."
+
+Leonillo, however, who seemed to have an unfailing instinct for a
+Montfort, was willingly accepting the eager and delighted attentions
+of the little girl; though he preferred those of her father, and
+cowered down beneath his hand, with depressed ears and gently waving
+tail, as though there were something in the touch and voice that
+conferred what was as near bliss as the faithful creature could enjoy
+without his deity and master.
+
+Meantime, the Grand Prior discreetly removed his joint-stool out of
+hearing of the two cousins, and called the little maid to rehearse to
+him the Credo and Ave, with their English equivalents--a task that
+pretty Bessee highly disapproved after the fortnight's dissipation,
+and would hardly have performed for one less beloved of children than
+Father Robert.
+
+The good Grand Prior knew that the King would have much to say that
+would beseem no ear save his kinsman's; and in effect Edward told
+what none besides would ever hear respecting the true author of the
+attempts on his own life.
+
+"Spiteful fox.  Such Simon ever was!" was the beggar's muttered
+comment.  "Well that he knows not of my poor child!  So, cousin, thou
+hast kept his counsel," he added in a different tone.  "I thank thee
+in the name of Montfort and Leicester.  It was well and nobly done."
+
+And Henry de Montfort held out his hand with the dignity of head of
+the family whose honour Edward had shielded.
+
+"It was for thy father's sake and Richard's," said Edward, receiving
+the acknowledgment as it was meant.
+
+"Ah, well," said Henry, relapsing into his usual half-scoffing tone;
+"in that boy our Montfort blood seems to have run clear of the taint
+it got from the she-fiend of Anjou."
+
+"Thy share was from a mocking fiend!" returned the King.
+
+"Ay, and a fair portion it is!" said the beggar.  "My jest and my
+song have borne me through more than my sword and spurs ever did--and
+have been more to me than English earldom or French county.  Poor
+Richard!" he added with feeling; "I told him his was the bondage and
+mine the freedom!"
+
+"Alas!  I fear that so it was," said Edward.  "My favour only
+embittered his foes.  Had I known how it would end, I had never taken
+him to me; but my heart yearned to my uncle's goodly son."
+
+"Maybe it is well," said Henry.  "Had the boy grown up verily like my
+father, thou and he might have fallen out; or if not--why, you
+knights and nobles ride in miry bloody ways, and 'tis a wonder if
+even the best of you does not bring his harness home befouled and
+besmirched--not as shining bright as he took it out.  Well, what
+didst thou with the poor lad?  Cut him in fragments?  You mince your
+best loved now as fine as if they were traitors."
+
+"No," said Edward; "the boy lies sleeping in the Church of St. John,
+at Acre.  I rose from my sickbed that I might lay him in his grave as
+a brother.  Lights burn round him, and masses are said; and the
+brethren were left in charge to place his effigy on his tomb, in
+carven stone.  One day I trust to see it.  My brother Alexander of
+Scotland, Llewellyn of Wales, and I, have sworn to one another to
+bring all within these four seas into concord and good order; and
+then we may look for such a blessing on our united arms as may bear
+us onward to Jerusalem!  Then come with us, Henry, and let us pray
+together at Richard's grave."
+
+"I may safely promise," said Henry, smiling, "if this same Crusade is
+to be when peace and order are within the four seas.  Moreover, thou
+wilt have ruined my trade by that time!"
+
+"Nay, Henry, cease fooling.  See--if thou wilt not be thyself, I will
+find thee a lodge in any park of mine.  None shall know who thou art;
+but thou shalt have free range, and--"
+
+"And weary of my life!  No, no, cousin.  I am in thy power now; and
+thou canst throw me into prison as the attainted Lord de Montfort.
+Do so if thou wilt; but I were fooling indeed to give up my free
+range, my power, my authority, to be a poor suspected, pitied, maimed
+pensioner on thy bounty.  Park, quotha! with none to speak to from
+morn to night.  I can have my will of any park of thine I please,
+whenever I choose!"
+
+Edward would have persisted, but Henry silenced him effectually, with
+a sarcastic hint that his favours had done little for Richard.  Then
+the King prayed at least that he would consider his child; but to the
+proposal of taking her to the palace, Henry returned an indignant
+negative:  "He had seen enough of the court ladies," he said.
+
+A hot glow of anger lighted Edward's cheek, for he loved his mother;
+but the blind beggar could not be the subject of his wrath, and he
+merely said, "Thou didst not know my wife!"
+
+"Ay, I will believe the court as perfect as thou thinkest to make the
+isle; but Bessee shall not bide there.  She is the blind beggar's
+child, and such shall she remain.  Send me to a dungeon, as I said,
+and thou canst pen her in a convent, or make her a menial to thy
+princesses, as thou wilt; but while my life and my freedom are my own
+I keep my child."
+
+"I could find it in my heart to arrest thee," said Edward, "when I
+look at that beautiful child, and think to what thou wouldst bring
+her."
+
+"She is fair then," said the beggar eagerly.
+
+"Fair!  She is the loveliest child mine eyes have looked on:  though
+some of mine own have been very lovely.  But she hath the very
+features of our royal line--though with eyes deep and dark, like thy
+father's, or my Richard's--and a dark glow of sunny health on her
+fair skin.  She bears her, too, right royally.  Henry, thou canst not
+wreck the fate of a child like that."
+
+"No, assuredly," said Henry dryly.  "I have not done so ill by her
+hitherto, by thine own showing, that I should not be trusted with her
+for the future."
+
+"The parting would be bitter," began Edward "but thou shouldst see
+her often."
+
+"Slay me, and make her a ward of the crown," said Henry.  "Otherwise
+I will need no man's leave for seeing my daughter.  But ask her.  If
+she will go with thee, I will say no more."
+
+King Edward was fond of children--most indulgent to his own, and kind
+to all little ones, who, attracted by the sweetness which his stern,
+grave, beautiful countenance would assume when he looked at them--
+always made friends with him readily.  So he trusted to this
+fascination in the case of the little Lady Elizabeth.  He held out
+his hands to her, and claimed her as his cousin; and she came readily
+to him, and stood between his knees.  "Little cousin, he said, "wilt
+thou come home with me, to be with my two little maids, the elder
+much of thine age?"
+
+"You are a red monk!" said Bessee, amazed.
+
+"That's his shell, Bessee," said her father; "he has come a-masking,
+and forgot his part."
+
+"I don't like masking," said Bessee, trying to get away.
+
+"Then we will mask no more," said Edward.  "Thou hast looked in my
+face long enough with those great black eyes.  Dost know me, child?"
+
+Bessee cast the black eyes down, and coloured.
+
+"Dost know me?" he repeated.
+
+"I think," she whispered at last, "that you are masking still.  You
+are like--like the King that was crowned at the Abbey."
+
+"Well said, little maid!  And shall I take thee home, and give thee
+pearls and emeralds to braid thy locks, instead of these heath-
+bells?"
+
+"Father," said Bessee, trying to withdraw her little hands out of
+Edward's large one, which held both fast.  "O father, is he masking
+still?"
+
+"No, child; it is the King indeed," said Henry.  "Hear what he saith
+to thee."
+
+And again Edward spoke of all that would tempt a child.
+
+"Father," said Bessee, "if father comes!"
+
+"No, Bessee," said her father; "I have done with palaces.  No places
+they for blind beggars."
+
+"Oh, let me go! let me go!" cried Bessee, struggling.  And as the
+King released her hands, she flew to her father.  "He would lose
+himself without me!  I must be with father.  O King, go away!
+Father, don't let him take me!  Let me cry for Jock of the Wooden
+Spoon, and Trig One Leg, and Hedgerow Wat!"
+
+"Hush, hush, Bess!" said Henry, not desirous that his royal cousin
+should understand the strength of his body-guard of honour.  "The
+King here is as trusty and loyal as the boldest beggar among us.  He
+only gave thee thy choice between him and me!"
+
+"Thee, thee, father.  He can't want me.  He has two eyes and two
+hands, and a queen and two little girls; and thou hast only me!" and
+she clung round her father's neck.
+
+"Little one," said Edward, "thou need'st not shrink from me.  I will
+not take thee away.  Thy father hath a treasure, and 'tis his part to
+strive not to throw it away.  Only should either thou or he ever
+condescend so far as to seek for counsel with this poor cousin of
+thine, send this token to me, and I will be with thee."
+
+But it was full nine years ere Edward saw that jewel again.  Meantime
+he was not entirely without knowledge of his kinsman.  On every great
+occasion the figure, conspicuous for the scrupulous cleanliness of
+the dark russet gown, and the careful arrangement of the hair and
+beard, and the fillet which covered the eyes, as well as for a lordly
+bearing, that even the stoop of blindness could not disguise, was to
+be seen dominating over all the other beggars, sitting on the steps
+of church or palace gates, as if they had been a throne; troubling
+himself little to beg, but exchanging shrewd remarks with all who
+addressed him, and raising many a laugh among the bystanders.
+Leonillo lay contented at his feet; but after just enough time had
+elapsed to show that he cared not for the King's remonstrance, he
+ceased to be accompanied by his little daughter, and was led by a boy
+in her stead.
+
+The King, making inquiries of the Grand Prior, learnt that pretty
+Bessee was daily deposited at the sisterhood of Poor Clares, where
+she remained while her father was out on his begging expeditions, and
+learnt such breeding as convents then gave.
+
+"In sooth," said Sir Robert, "honest Hal believes it is all for good-
+will and charity and love to the pretty little wench; and so it is in
+great part:  but methought it best to give a hint to the mother
+prioress that the child came of good blood.  She is a discreet lady,
+and knows how to deal with her; and truly she tells me their house
+has prospered since the little one came to them.  Every feast-day
+morn have they found their alms-dish weightier with coin than ever
+she knew it before."
+
+When Edward repeated this intelligence to his queen, she recollected
+Dame Idonea's gossiping information--that brave Sir Robert, the
+flower of the House of Darcy, had only entered the Order of St. John,
+when fair Alda Braithwayte, in the strong enthusiasm of the
+Franciscan preaching, had pleaded a vow of virginity against all
+suitors, and had finally become a Sister of the Poor Clares.  And
+after all his wars and wanderings, the regulations of his Order had
+ended by bringing the Hospitalier in his old age into the immediate
+neighbourhood of Prioress Alda; and into that distant business
+intercourse that the heads of religious houses had from time to time
+to carry on together.
+
+The world passed on.  Eleanor de Montfort came from France, and the
+King himself acted the part of a father to her at her marriage with
+Llewellyn of Wales.  He knew--though she little guessed--that the
+beggar, by whom her jewelled train swept with rustling sound, was the
+first-born of her father's house, and should have held her hand.  Two
+years only did that marriage last; Eleanor died, leaving an infant
+daughter; and Llewellyn soon after was in arms against the English.
+Perhaps Edward bethought him of his cousin's ironical promise to go
+with him to the East after the pacification of the whole island, when
+he found himself obliged to summon the fierce Pyrenean to pursue the
+wild Welsh in their mountains.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XIV--THE QUEEN OF THE DEW-DROPS
+
+
+
+"This is the prettiest low-born lass that ever
+Ran on a green sward." --Winter's Tale.
+
+It was the summer of 1283; the babe of Carnarvon had been accepted as
+the native prince, speaking no tongue but Welsh, and Edward had since
+been employed in establishing his dominion over Wales.  His
+Whitsuntide was kept by the Queen's special entreaty at St.
+Winifred's Well.  Such wonders had been told her of the miracles
+wrought by this favourite Welsh saint, that she hoped that by early
+placing her little Welsh-born son under such protection, she might
+secure for him healthier and longer life than had been the share of
+his brethren.
+
+So to Holy-well went the court and army.  Some lodged in the convent
+attached to the well; but many and many more dwelt in tents, or
+lodged in cottages, or raised huts of boughs of trees.  Noble ladies
+of Eleanor's suite were glad to obtain a lodging in rude Welsh huts;
+and as the weather was beautiful, there was plenty of gay feasting,
+dancing, and jousting on the greensward, when the religious
+observances of the day were over.  Pilgrims thronged from all parts,
+attracted both by the presence of the court and the unusual
+tranquillity of Wales; and for nearly a mile around the Holy-well it
+was like one great motley fair, resorted to by persons of all
+stations.  Beggars of course were there in numbers, and among them
+the unfailing blind beggar of Bethnal Green, who always made a
+pilgrimage in the summer to some station of easy access from London,
+but whom some wondered to see at such a distance.
+
+"Had he scented that the court was coming?" asked the young nobles.
+
+"Not he; he never haunted courts.  He would have kept away had he
+known that such a gabbling flock of popinjays were on the wing
+thither!"
+
+But the young gallants were chiefly bent on speculating on the vision
+of loveliness that had flashed on the eyes of some early visitants at
+the well.  A maiden in a dark pilgrim dress, and broad hat, which,
+however, could not entirely conceal a glowing complexion, at once
+rich and pure; perfect features, magnificent dark eyes and hair, and
+a tall form, which, though very youthful, was of unmistakable dignity
+and grace.  She was always at the well exceedingly early in the
+morning, moving slowly round it on her beautiful bare feet, and never
+looking up from the string of dark beads--the larger ones of amber,
+which she held in her fingers--as her lips conned over the prayers
+connected with each.  No ring was on the delicate hand, no ear-ring
+in the ear; there was no ornament in the dress, but such a garb was
+wont to be assumed by ladies of any rank when performing a vow; and
+its simplicity at once enhanced her beauty, and added to the general
+curiosity.  Between four and six in the dewy freshness of morning
+seemed to be her time for devotion; and though the habits of the
+court were early, it was only the first astir who caught a sight of
+this Queen of the Dew-drops, as it was the fashion to call her.  Late
+comers never caught sight of her, and affected incredulity when the
+younger and more active knights and squires raved about her.  Then it
+was reported that the King himself had been seen speaking to her; and
+thereupon excitement grew the more intense, because Edward's
+exclusive devotion to his Queen had been such, that from his youth up
+the most determined scandal had never found a wandering glance to
+note in him.
+
+She was the Princess of France--of Navarre--of Aragon--in disguise;
+nay, at the Whit-Sunday banquet there were those who cast anxious
+glances to the door, expecting that, in the very land of King Arthur,
+she would walk in like his errant dames at Pentecost, to demand a
+champion.  And when a joust was given on the sward, young Sir John de
+Mohun, the Lord of Dunster, announced his intention of tilting in
+honour of no one save the Queen of the Dew-drops.  The ladies of the
+court were rather scandalized, and appealed to the King whether the
+choice of an unknown girl, of no acknowledged rank, should be
+permitted; but the King, strict punctilious man as he was, only
+laughed, and adjudged the Queen of the Dew-drops to be fully worthy
+of the honour.
+
+After this, early rising became the fashion of Holy-well.  All the
+gentlemen got up early to look at the Queen of the Dew-drops; and all
+the ladies got up early to see that the gentlemen did not get into
+mischief; and the maiden's devotions became far from solitary; but
+she moved on, with a sort of superb unconcern, never lifting the dark
+fringes that veiled the eyes so steadily fixed on the beads that
+dropped through her fingers, until, as she finished, she raised up
+her head with a straightforward fearless look at the way she was
+going, so completely self-possessed that no one ventured to accost
+her, and to follow her at less than such a respectful distance, that
+she was always lost sight of in the wood.
+
+At last, late one evening, there was a sudden start of exultant
+satisfaction among some of the young men who were lounging on the
+green; for the most part not the nobles of the court, but certain
+young merchants of London and Bristol, who had followed the course of
+pilgrimage by the magnetism of fashionable resort.  The Queen of the
+Dew-drops was seen, carrying a pitcher!  Up started four or five
+gallants, offering assistance, and standing round her, wrangling with
+one another, and besetting her steps.
+
+"Let me pass, gentles," she said with dignity, "I am carrying wine in
+haste to my father."
+
+"Nay, fair one, you pass not our bounds without toll," said the
+portliest of the set.
+
+"Hush, rudesby; fair dames in disguise must be treated after other
+sort."
+
+Every variety of half-insulting compliment was pouring upon her; but
+she, with head erect, and steady foot, still quietly moved on, taking
+no notice, till a hand was laid on her pitcher.
+
+"Let go!" then she said in no terrified voice.  "Let go, Sir, or I
+can summon help."
+
+And as if to realize her words, the intrusive hand was thrust aside
+by a powerful arm, and a voice exclaimed -
+
+"This lady is to pass free, Sir!  None of your insolence!"
+
+"A court-gallant," passed round the hostile bourgeoise; "none of your
+court airs, Sir."
+
+"No airs--but those of an honest Englishman, who will not see a woman
+cowardly beset!"
+
+"Will Silk-jerkin not bide a buffet!" quoth the bully of the party,
+clenching his fist.
+
+"As many as thou wilt," returned Silk-jerkin, "so soon as I have seen
+the lady safe home!"
+
+"Ho! ho!--a fetch that!" and the fellow, a coarse rude-looking man,
+though rather expensively dressed, flourished his fist in the face of
+the young man, but was requited that instant with a round blow that
+levelled him with the ground.  The others fell back from the tall
+strong-limbed, open-faced youth, and the girl took the opportunity of
+moving forward, swiftly indeed, but so steadily as to betray no air
+of terror.  Meantime, the young gentleman's voice might be heard,
+assuring his adversaries that he was ready to encounter one or all of
+them so soon as he had escorted the lady safe home.  Perhaps she
+hoped that another attack would delay him; but if so, her
+expectations were disappointed, for in a second or two his quick firm
+tread followed her, and just as she had gained the mazy wood-path, he
+was beside her.
+
+"Thanks, Sir," she said, "for the service you have done me, but I am
+now in safety."
+
+"Nay, Lady, do me the grace of letting me bear your load."
+
+"Thanks," again she said; "but I feel no weight."
+
+"But my knighthood does, seeing you thus laden."
+
+"Spare your knighthood the sight, then," she said smiling, and
+looking up with a glance of brightness, such as her hitherto sedate
+face had never before revealed to him.
+
+"That cannot be!" he exclaimed with fervency.  "You bid me in vain
+leave you till I see you safe; and while with you, all laws of
+courtesy call on me to bear your burthen!  So, Lady--"
+
+And he laid his hand upon the leathern thong that sustained the
+pitcher; but at that moment three or four heaps of rags, that had
+been lying under the trees by the woodland path, erected themselves,
+and one in especial, whom the young knight had observed as a
+frightful cripple seated by day near the well, now came forward
+brandishing his crutch in a formidable manner, and uttering a howl of
+defiance.  But the lady silenced him at once -
+
+"Peace, good Trig, nothing is amiss!  It is only this gentleman's
+courtesy.  He hath done me good service on the green yonder!"
+
+And as her strange body-guard retreated growling, she, perhaps to
+show her confidence, resigned her pitcher into the knight's hand.
+
+"So, fair Queen of the Dew-drops," he said, half bewildered, "thou
+dost work miracles!"
+
+"Ay, when the dew is on the grass, and the nightingale sings," she
+returned gaily; "by day the enchantment is over."
+
+By this time they had reached a low turf hut; and the maiden, turning
+at the door, held out her hand, and said, "Thanks, fair Sir, I must
+enter my enchanted palace alone; but grammercy for thy kind service,
+and farewell."
+
+The maiden and the pitcher vanished.  The knight watched the rude
+door in vain--he only saw a few streaks of light through the boards.
+Then he bethought him of questioning her guards, but when he reached
+their tree they were gone.  It was fast growing dark, and he was one
+of the King's personal attendants, and subject to the strict
+regulations of his household; so, dazed and bewildered as he was, he
+walked hastily back to the hospice, where the King and Queen lodged.
+Supper had already begun, and the glare of lights dazzled his eyes.
+In his bewilderment, he served the King with mustard instead of honey
+from the great silver ship full of condiments, in the centre of the
+table.
+
+"How's this, Sir John?" said the King, who always had a kindly corner
+in his heart for this young knight.  "Are these the idle days of thy
+Crusade come again?"
+
+"I could well-nigh think so!" half-whispered Sir John.
+
+"He looks moonstruck!" cried that spoilt ten years old damsel, Joan
+of Acre, clasping her hands with mischievous fun.  "Oh! has he seen
+the Queen of the Dew-drops?"
+
+"What dost thou know of the Queen of the Dew-drops, my Lady
+Malapert?" said King Edward, marking the red flush that mounted to
+the very brow of the downright young knight.
+
+"Oh, I know that she is at the well every morning, and is as lovely
+as the dawn!  Ay, and vanishes so soon as the sun is up; but not ere
+she has bewitched every knight of them all!  And did not my Lord of
+Dunster hold the field in her honour against all comers?  No wonder
+she appears to him.--Oh! tell us, Sir John! what like was she?"
+
+"Hush, Joan," said Queen Eleanor, bending forward, "no infanta in my
+time ever said so much in a breath."
+
+"No, Lady-mother; because you had to speak whole mouthfuls of grave
+Castillian words.  Now, good English can be run off in a breath.
+Reyna del Rocio--that's more majestic, but not so like fairyland as
+Queen of the Dew-drops!"
+
+Princess Joan's mouth was effectually stopped this time.
+
+The adventure of the evening had led to the discovery of the hut of
+the Queen of the Dew-drops.  The young knight had as usual been
+betimes at the well, but the maiden did not appear there.  Then he
+questioned the cripple--who by day was an absolute helpless cripple--
+but the man utterly denied all knowledge of any such circumstance.
+He, why, poor wretch that he was, he never hobbled further than the
+shed close behind the well; he would give the world if he could get
+as far as the wood--he knew nothing about ladies or pilgrims--such a
+leg as his was enough to think about.  And the display to which he
+forthwith treated the Knight of Dunster was highly convincing as to
+his incapacity.
+
+Into the wood wandered the much-confused knight, recognizing, step by
+step, the path of the night before.  The turf hut was before him--the
+door was open--and in the doorway sat the maiden herself, spinning,
+the distaff by her side, the spindle dancing on the ground, and the
+pilgrim's hat no longer hiding her beauteous brow and wealth of dark
+braided hair.  But, intolerable sight, seven or eight of last night's
+loungers were dispersed hither and thither in the bushes, gazing with
+all their eyes, endeavouring to attract her attention; some by
+conversations with one another; one richly-dressed Gascon squire, of
+the train of Edward's ally, the Count de Bearn, by singing a
+Provencal love ditty; while a merchant of Bristol set up a counter
+attempt with a long doleful English ballad.  All the time the fair
+spinster sat in the doorway, with the utmost gravity, twisting her
+thread and twirling her spindle; but it might be observed that she
+had so placed herself as to have full command of the door, and to be
+able to shut herself in whenever she chose.
+
+No one had yet ventured to accost her.  There was something in her
+air that rendered it almost impossible for any one to force himself
+upon her, and a sort of fear mingled with the impression she made.
+However, the young knight, although a bashful man by nature, had one
+advantage in his court breeding, and another in the acquaintance he
+had made last night.  He walked straight up, and doffing his velvet
+cap, began, "Greet you well, fair Queen.  I could not but take your
+challenge to see whether your power lasted when the dew was off."
+
+The damsel rose with due courtesy as he approached, but ere she had
+attempted an answer, nay, even before the words were out of his
+mouth, the Gascon was shouting in French that this was no fair play,
+he had stolen a march; and the merchant had sprung forward saying,
+"Girl, beware, court gallants mean not well by country wenches."
+
+"Thou liest in thy throat," burst forth the knight.  "Discourteous
+lubber, to call such a queen of beauty a country wench!"
+
+"Listen to me, girl."
+
+"Lady, hear me."
+
+"Hearken not to the popinjay foreigner."
+
+These, and many more tumultuary exclamations, threats, and
+entreaties, crowded on one another, and the various speakers were
+laying hand on staff or sword, and glaring angrily on one another,
+when the word "Peace," in the maiden's clear silvery notes, sounded
+among them.  They all turned as she stood in the doorway, drawn up to
+her full height.
+
+"Peace," she said; "I can have no brawling here!  My father was
+grievously sick yesterday, and is still ill at ease.  One by one
+speak your business, and begone.  You first, Sir," to the Gascon, she
+said in French.
+
+"Ah! fair Lady, what business could be mine, save to tell you how
+lovely you are?"
+
+"You have said," she answered, without a blush, waving him aside.
+"Now you, Sir," to the tuneful merchant of Bristol.
+
+"I told you, Madam, he meant not well.  Those aliens never do."
+
+"You too have said," she answered.
+
+The merchant would have persisted, but a London merchant, a much more
+substantial and considerable character, pushed him aside, and the
+numbers being all against him, he was forced to give way.
+
+ "Young woman," said the merchant, "you are plainly of better birth
+and breeding than you choose to affect.  Now I am thinking of getting
+married.  I have ships at sea, and stuffs and jewels coming from
+Venice and Araby; and I am like to be Lord Mayor ere long; but
+there's that I like in your face and discreet bearing, and I'll make
+you my wife, and give you all my keys--your father willing!"
+
+"Your turn's out, old burgher," said a big, burly, and much younger
+man, pressing forward.  "Pretty wench!  I'm not like to be Lord
+Mayor, nor nothing of that sort; but I'm a score of years nigher
+thine age, and a lusty fellow to boot, that could floor any man at
+single-stick, within the four seas.  Ay, and have been thought comely
+too, though Joyce o' the haugh did play me false; and I come o' this
+pilgrimage just to be merry and forget it.  If thou wilt take me, and
+come back to spite Joyce, thou shalt be hostess of the Black Bull, at
+Brentford, where all the great folk from the North ever put up when
+they come to town; the merriest and richest hostel, and will have the
+comeliest host and hostess round about London town!"
+
+The lady bowed her head.  Perhaps those rosy lips were trying hard to
+keep from laughing.
+
+"A hostel's no place for a discreet dame to bide in," put forth an
+honest voice.  "Maiden, I know not who or what you are, but I came o'
+this pilgrimage to please my old mother, who said I might do my soul
+good, and bring home a wife--better over the moor than over the
+mixen--and I know she would give thee a right good welcome.  I'm
+Baldric of the Cheddar Cliff, and we have held our land ever since
+the old days, or ever the Norman kings came here.  Three hundred
+kine, woman, and seven score swine, and many an acre of good corn
+land under the hill."
+
+The lady had never looked up while these suitors were speaking.  When
+Baldric of Cheddar had done, she gave one furtive glance through her
+long eyelashes, as if to see if there were any more, and then her
+cheek flushed.  There still remained the knight.  Some others had
+slunk away when brought to such close quarters, but he stepped forth
+more hesitatingly, and said, "Lady, I know not whether the bare rock
+and castle I have to offer can weigh against the ships, the hostel,
+or the swine.  I have few of either; I am but a poor baron, but such
+as I am, I am wholly yours.  Thine eyes have bound me to you for
+ever, and all I seek is leave to make myself better known, and to ask
+that your noble father may not deem me wholly unworthy to be your
+suitor."
+
+The lady trembled a little, but she held her place in the doorway.
+"Gentles," she said, "I thank ye for the honour ye have done me, but
+I may not dispose of mine own self.  My father is ill at ease, and
+can see no one; but he bids me tell you that he will meet all who
+have aught to say to him, under the trysting tree at Bethnal Green,
+the day after the Midsummer feast."
+
+With these words she retired into her hut, and closed the door.  She
+was seen again no more that day; and on the next the hut stood open,
+empty, and deserted.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XV--THE BEGGAR'S DOWRY
+
+
+
+"'But first you shall promise and have it well knowne
+The gold that you drop shall all be your owne;'
+With that they replyed, 'Contented we bee;'
+'Then here's,' quoth the beggar, 'for pretty Bessee.'"
+Old Ballad.
+
+The day after Midsummer had come, and towards the fine elm tree that
+then adorned the centre of Bethnal Green, three horsemen were wending
+their way.  Each had his steed a good deal loaded:  each looked about
+him anxiously.
+
+"By St. Boniface," said one, "the girl's father is not there.  Saucy
+little baggage, was she deluding us all?"
+
+"Belike he is bringing too long a train of mules with her dowry to
+make much speed," quoth the merchant.  "He will think it needful to
+collect all his gear to meet the offers of Master Lambert of Cripple-
+gate.  Ha!  Sir Knight, well met!  You are going to try your
+venture!"
+
+"I must!  So it were not all enchantment," said the knight, almost
+breathlessly, gazing round him.  "Yet," he said, almost to himself,
+"those eyes had a soul and memories that ne'er came out of
+fairyland!"
+
+"Ha!" exclaimed the innkeeper, "there's old Blind Hal under the tree!
+I'll tell him to get out of our way.  Hal!" he shouted, "here's a
+tester for thee, but thou'st best keep out of the way of the mules."
+
+"What mules, Master Samson?" coolly demanded Hal, who had comfortably
+established himself under the tree with his back against the trunk.
+
+"The mules that the brave burgess is going to bring his daughter's
+dowry on.  They are cranky brutes, Hal; bad customers for blind men--
+best let me give thee a hand out of the way."
+
+"But who is this burgess that you talk of?" asked the beggar.
+
+"The father of the pilgrim lass that prayed at St. Winifred's Well,"
+said Samson.
+
+"And was called Queen of the Dew-drops?"
+
+"Ay, ay, old fellow!  Thou knowest every bird that flies!  She is to
+be my wife, I tell thee, and a right warm corner shall she keep for
+thee at the Black Bull, for thou canst make sport for the guests
+right well."
+
+"I hope she will keep a warm corner for me," said the beggar; "for no
+man will treat for her marriage save myself."
+
+"Thou!  Old man, who sent thee here to insult us?" cried the
+merchant.
+
+"None, Master Lambert.  I trysted you to meet me here if you purposed
+still to seek my child in marriage."
+
+"Thy child?" cried all three, vehemently.
+
+"My child!" answered the beggar.  "Mine own lawful child."
+
+There was a silence.  Presently Samson growled, "I mind me he used to
+have a little black-eyed brat with him."
+
+"Caitiff!" exclaimed the merchant; "I'll have thy old vagabond bones
+in the Fleet for daring so to cheat his Grace's lieges."
+
+"If you can prove a cheat against me I will readily abye it, Sir,"
+returned the beggar.
+
+"Palming a beggar's brat off for a noble dame."
+
+"So please you, Sir," interrupted the beggar, "keep truth with you.
+What did the child or I ever profess, save what we were?  No foul
+words here.  I trysted you to meet me here, anent her marriage.  Have
+you any offers to make me?"
+
+"Aye, of a cell in the Fleet if you persist in your insolence!" cried
+the merchant.
+
+"Thanks," quietly said the beggar.  "And you, Master Samson?"
+
+"'Tis a sweet pretty lass," said Samson, ruefully; "and pity of her
+too, but you see a man like me must look to his credit.  I'll give
+her twenty marks to help her to a husband, Hal, only let her keep out
+of my sight for ever and a day."
+
+"I thought I heard another voice," said the beggar.  "I trow the
+third suitor has made off without further ado."
+
+"Not so, fair Sir," said a voice close to him, thick and choked with
+feeling.  "Your daughter is too dear to me for me thus to part, even
+were mine honour not pledged."
+
+"Sir knight," interfered the merchant, "you will get into a desperate
+coil with your friends."
+
+"I am my own master," answered the knight.  "My parents are dead.  I
+am of age, and, Sir, I offer myself and all that is mine to your fair
+daughter, as I did at Saint Winifred's Well, as one bound both by
+honour and love."
+
+"It is spoken honourably," said Hal; "but, Sir, canst thou answer me
+with her dowry?  Tell down coin for coin."
+
+He held up a heavy leathern bag.  The knight, who had come prepared,
+took down another such bag from his saddle-bow.  Down went one silver
+piece from the knight.  Down went another from the beggar.
+
+"Stay, stay," cried Samson.  "I can play at that game too."
+
+"No, no, Master Samson," said the beggar; "your pretensions are
+resigned.  Your chance is over."
+
+Mark after mark--crown after crown--all the Dunster rents; all the
+old hoards, with queer figures of Saxon kings, lay on the grass,
+still for each the beggar had rained down its fellow, and
+inexhaustible seemed the bags that he sat upon.  Samson bit his lips,
+and the merchant muttered with vexation.  It could not be fairly come
+by:  he must be the president of a den of robbers; it should be
+looked to.
+
+The last bag of the knight lay thin and exhausted; the beggar
+clutched one bursting with repletion.
+
+"I could not put the lands and castle of Dunster into a bag and add
+thereto," said the knight, at last.  "Would that I could, my sword,
+my spurs, and knightly blood to boot, and lay them at your daughter's
+feet."
+
+"Let them weigh in the balance," said the beggar; "and therewith thy
+truth to thy word."
+
+"And will you own me?" exclaimed the knight.  "Will you take me to
+your daughter?"
+
+"Nay, I said not so," returned Blind Hal.  "I am not in such haste.
+Come back on this day week, when I shall have learnt whether thou art
+worthy to match with my child."
+
+"Worthy!" John of Dunster chafed and bit his lips at such words from
+a beggar.
+
+"Ay, worthy," repeated the beggar, guessing his irritation.  "I like
+thee well, as a man of thy word, so far, but I must know more of him
+who is to mate with my pretty Bessee."
+
+It was that evening that a page entered the royal apartments, and
+giving a ring to the King, informed him that a blind beggar had sent
+it in, and entreated to speak with him.
+
+"Pray him to come hither," said the King; "and lead him carefully.
+Thou, Joan, hadst better seek thy mother and sister."
+
+"O sweet father," cried Joan, "don't order me off.  This can be no
+state business.  Prithee let me hear it."
+
+"That must be as my guest pleases, Joan," he answered; "and thou must
+be very discreet, or we shall have him reproaching me for trying to
+rule the realm when I cannot rule my own house."
+
+"Father, I verily think you are afraid of that beggar!  I am sure he
+is as mysterious as the Queen of the Dew-drops!" cried the
+mischievous girl.
+
+The curtain over the doorway was drawn back, and the beggar was led
+into the chamber.  The King advanced to meet him, and took his hand
+to lead him to a seat.  "Good morrow to thee," he said; "cousin, I am
+glad thou art come at last to see me."
+
+"Thanks, my Lord," said the beggar, with more of courtly tone than
+when they had met before, and yet Joan thought she had never seen her
+father addressed so much as an equal; "are any here present with
+you?"
+
+"Only my wilful little crusading daughter, Joan," said Edward,
+beckoning to her, and putting her proud reluctant fingers into the
+hand of the beggar, who bent and raised them to his lips--as the
+fashion then was--while the maiden reddened and looked to her father,
+but saw him only smiling; "she shall leave us," he added, "if thy
+matters are for my private ear.  In what can I aid thee?"
+
+"In this matter of daughters," answered the beggar; "not that I need
+aid of yours, but counsel.  I would know if the heir of old Reginald
+Mohun--John, I think they call him--be a worthy mate for my wench."
+
+Joan had in the meantime placed herself between her father's knees,
+where she stood regarding this wonderful beggar with the most
+unmitigated astonishment.
+
+"John of Dunster!" said the King, stroking down Joan's hair, "thou
+knowst his lineage as well as I, cousin."
+
+"His lineage, true," replied Henry; "but look you, my Lord, my child,
+the light of mine eyes, may not go from me without being assured that
+it is to one who will, I say, not equal her in birth, but will be a
+faithful and loving lord to her."
+
+"Hath he sought her?" asked the King.
+
+"Even so, my liege.  The maid is scarce sixteen; I thought to have
+kept her longer; but so it was--old Winny, her mother's old nurse,
+fell sick and died in the winter; and the Dominican, who came to
+shrive her, must needs craze the poor fool with threats that she did
+a deadly sin in bringing my sweet wife and me together; and for all
+the Grand Prior, who, monk as he is, has a soldier's sense, could say
+of the love that conquered death, nothing would serve the poor woman
+to die in peace till my Bessee had vowed to make a six weeks' station
+at her patroness's well, where we were wedded, and pray for her soul
+and her blessed mother's.  So there we journeyed for our summer
+roaming; and all had been well, had you not come down on us with all
+the idle danglers of the court to gaze and rhyme and tilt about the
+first fair face they saw.  Even then so discreet was the girl that no
+more had befallen, but as ill-luck would have it, my old Evesham
+keepsake," touching his side, "burst forth again one evening, and
+left me so spent, that Bessee sent the boy to get me a draught of
+wine.  The boy--mountebank as he is--lost her groat, and played
+truant; and she, poor wench, got into such fear for me that she went
+herself, and fell in with a sort of insolent masterful rogues, from
+whom this young knight saved her.  I took her home safe enough after
+that, and thought to be rid of the knaves when they saw my wallet;
+and so truly I am, all save this lad!"
+
+"O father! it is true love!" whispered Joan.
+
+"What hast to do with true love, popinjay?  And so John of Dunster
+came undaunted to the breach, did he, Henry?"
+
+"Not a whit dismayed he!  Now either that is making light of his
+honour, or 'tis an honour higher than most lads understand.  Cousin,
+I would have the child be loved as her father and mother loved!  And
+methinks she affects this blade.  The child hath been less like my
+merry lark since we met him.  A plague on the springalds!  But you
+know him.  Has he your good word?"
+
+"John of Dunster?" said the King.  "Henry, didst thou not know for
+whose sake I had loved and proved him?  He was Richard's pupil.  I
+was forced to take the child with me, for old Sir Reginald had been
+unruly enough, and I thought would be the less troublesome to my
+father were his son in my keeping.  But I half repented when I saw
+what a small urchin it was, to be cast about among grooms and pages!
+But Richard aided the little uncouth varlet, nursed him when sick,
+guarded him when well, trained him to be loyal and steadfast.  The
+little fellow came bravely to my aid in my grapple with the traitor
+before Acre; and when the blow had fallen on Richard, the boy's grief
+was such that I loved him ever after.  And of late I have had no
+truer trustier warrior.  I warrant me he was too shy to tell thee
+that I knighted him last year in the midst of some of the best feats
+of arms I ever beheld against the Welsh!  Whatever John de Mohun
+saith is sooth, and I would rather mate my daughter with him than
+with many a man of fairer speech."
+
+"Then shall he have my pretty Bessee!" said the beggar, lingering
+over the words.  "But one boon I would further ask, cousin; that thou
+breathe no word to him of my having sought thee."
+
+The young Lord of Dunster had not been noted for choiceness of
+apparel; but when he repaired to the trysting-tree, none could have
+found fault with the folds of his long crimson tunic, worked with the
+black and gold colours of his family, nor with the sit of the broad
+belt that sustained his sword, assuredly none with his beautiful
+sleek black charger.
+
+But under the tree stood not the blind beggar, but the beggar's boy.
+
+"Blind Hal bids you meet him at the Spital, at your good pleasure,"
+said the boy; and like the mountebank he was, tumbled three times
+head over heels.
+
+John de Mohun looked round and about, and saw no alternative but to
+obey.  All his love was required to endure so strange a father-in-
+law, who did not seem in the least grateful for the honour intended
+to his daughter; but the knight's word was pledged, and he rode
+towards the Hospital.
+
+The court of the Hospital was full of steeds and serving-men.  A
+strange conviction came over John that he saw the King's strong white
+charger--ay, and the palfreys of the elder princesses; and he asked
+the lay-brother who offered to take his horse, if the King were
+there.  The brother only replied by motioning him towards the inner
+quadrangle.
+
+He passed on accordingly, and as he went, the bells broke forth into
+a merry peal.  On the top of the steps leading to the arched doorway,
+he saw a scarlet cluster of knights, and among them the Grand Prior,
+robed as for Mass.  A space was clear within the deep porch, and
+there stood the beggar in his russet suit.
+
+"Sir John de Mohun of Dunster," he said, "thou art come hither to
+espouse my daughter?"
+
+"I hope, so, Sir," said John, somewhat taken by surprise.
+
+"Come hither, maiden," said her father.
+
+The cluster of knights opened, and from within the church there
+appeared before the astonished bridegroom the stately form of King
+Edward, leading in his hand the dark-tressed, dark-haired maiden,
+dressed in spotless white, the only adornment she wore a circlet of
+diamonds round her flowing dark hair--the Queen indeed of the Dew-
+drops.  And behind her walked with calm dignity the beautiful
+Princess Eleanor, now nearly a woman, holding with a warning hand the
+merry mischievous Joan.
+
+Well might John of Dunster stand dazzled and amazed, but hesitation
+or delay there was none.  Then and there, by the Grand Prior himself,
+was the ceremony performed, without a word of further explanation.
+The rite over, when the bridegroom took the bride's hand to follow,
+as all were marshalled on their way, he knew not whither, she looked
+up to him through her dark eyelashes, and murmured, "They would not
+have it otherwise!"
+
+"Deem you that I would?" said the knight fervently, pressing her
+hand.
+
+"I deemed that you should know all--who I am," she faltered.
+
+"My wife, the Lady of Dunster.  That is all I need to know," replied
+Sir John, with the honest trustworthy look that showed it was indeed
+enough to secure his heart-whole love and reverence.
+
+The great hall of the Spital was decked for the bridal feast.  The
+bride and bridegroom were placed at the head of the table, and the
+King gave up his place beside the bride to her blind father.  All the
+space within the cloister without was strewn with rushes, where sat
+and feasted the whole fraternity of beggars; and well did the Grand
+Prior and his knights do their part in the entertainment.
+
+Then when the banquet was drawing to its close, the blind beggar bade
+the boy that waited near him fetch his harp.  And, as had often
+before been his practice, he sang in a deep manly voice, to the boy's
+accompaniment on his harp.  But the song that then he sang had never
+been heard before, nor was its exact like ever heard again; though
+tradition has handed down a few of the main features, and (as may be
+seen by this veracious narration) somewhat vulgarized them:-
+
+
+"A poore beggar's daughter did dwell on a greene,
+Who might for her faireness have well been a queene;
+A blithe bonny lasse and a dainty was she,
+And many one called her pretty Bessee."
+
+
+Even the King, who had so well guarded the secret, was entirely
+unprepared to hear the Montfort parentage thus publicly avowed; and
+the bride, who had as little known of her father's intentions, sat
+with downcast eyes, blushing and tearful, while the beggar's
+recitative went briefly and somewhat tremulously over his
+resuscitation, under the hands of the fair and faithful Isabel.  Her
+hand was held by her bridegroom from the first, with a pressure meant
+to assure her that no discovery could alter his love and regard; but
+when the name of Montfort sounded on his ear, the hand wrung hers
+with anxiety; and when the entire tale had been told, and the last
+chord was dying away, he murmured, "Look up at me, my loveliest.  Now
+I know why I first loved thine eyes.  Thou art dearer to me than
+ever, for the sake of my first and best friend!"
+
+His words were only for herself.  The King was saying aloud,
+
+"Well sung, fair cousin!  A health, my Lords and Knights, for Sir
+Henry de Montfort, Earl of Leicester."
+
+"Not so, Lords and Knights!" called this strange personage, the only
+one who would thus have contradicted the King; "the Earl of Leicester
+has long ago been dead, as you have heard.  If you drink, let it be
+to Blind Hal of Bethnal Green."
+
+Nor could all the entreaties of daughter, son-in-law, nor King, move
+him from his purpose of living and dying as Blind Hal, the beggar.
+He had tasted too long of liberty, he said, to put himself under
+constraint.  To live in Somersetshire, as his daughter wished, would
+have been banishment and solitude to one used to divert himself with
+every humour of the city; and to be, as he declared, a far more
+complete king of the beggars than ever his cousin Edward was over
+England.  All he would consent to, was that a room in a lodge in
+Windsor Park should be set apart for him under charge of Adam de
+Gourdon, who had been present at this scene, and was infinitely
+rejoiced at the sight of a scion of the House of Montfort.  For the
+rest, he bade every one to forget his avowal, which, as he said, he
+had only made that the blanch lion might share with the Mohun cross;
+and as he added to Princess Eleanor, "that you court dames may never
+flout at pretty Bessee!  Had the Cheddar Yeoman been the true man,
+none had ever known that she was a Montfort."
+
+"Would you have given her to the Cheddar Yeoman?" burst out Joan
+furiously.
+
+"That he will say so, to anger thee, is certain, Joan," said the
+King.  "Farewell, Henry.  Remember, I hold thee bound to be my
+comrade when I can return to the Holy War."
+
+"Ay, when you have tamed Scotland, even as you have tamed Wales,"
+returned Henry.
+
+"No fear of my good brother Alexander's realm needing such taming.
+Heaven forbid!" said Edward.
+
+But the beggar parted from him with a laugh.
+
+
+
+CHAPTER XVI--THE PAGE'S MEMORY
+
+
+
+The pure calm picture of a blameless friend.
+Lyra Apostolica.
+
+Ten years later, King Edward was walking in the park at Windsor with
+slow and weary steps.  His rich dark brown hair and beard were lined
+with gray, his face was not only grave but worn and melancholy, and
+more severe than ever.  The sorrow of his life, his queen's death,
+had fallen on him, and with her had gone much of softening influence;
+the only son who had been spared to him was, though a mere child,
+grieving him by the wayward frivolities not of a strong but of a weak
+nature; he had wrought much for his country's good, but had often
+been thwarted and never thanked; his mercies and benefits were
+forgotten, his justice counted as harshness, and hatred and
+opposition had met him everywhere.  Above all, and weighting him
+perhaps most severely, was that his first step beyond his just bounds
+had been taken in the North.  John Baliol was indeed king, but Edward
+in his zeal for discipline had bound Scotland with obligations--for
+her good indeed, but beyond his just right to impose; and the sense
+of aggression was embittering him against the Scottish resistance,
+while at the same time adding to his sadness.
+
+A knight came forth from one of the paths that led into that along
+which he was pacing with folded arms, and unwilling to break upon his
+mood, stood waiting, till Edward himself looked up and asked
+impatiently, "So, Sir John, what now?  Another outbreak of those
+intolerable Scotch?"
+
+"Not so, my Lord; but the Bailiff of Acre awaits to see you."
+
+"Bailiff of Acre!  What is the Bailiff of Acre to me?  I cannot hear
+all their importunities for a crusade!  Heaven knows how gladly I
+would hasten to the Holy War, if these savage Scots would give me
+peace at home.  I am weary of their solicitations.  Cannot you tell
+him I would be private, John?"
+
+"My Lord, he says he has matter for your private ear, concerning one
+whom you met in Palestine--and, my Lord, you will sure remember him--
+Sir Reginald Ferrers."
+
+"The friend of Richard!" said Edward, with a changed countenance.
+"Bring him with you to your father-in-law's lodge, John.  If there be
+aught to hear of the House of Montfort, it concerns him and you
+likewise.  I was on my way thither."
+
+In a short time the woodland lodge, in one of the most beautiful
+glades of Windsor Forest, beheld the King seated on a bench placed
+beneath a magnificent oak, standing alone in its own glade, and
+beside him the Blind Beggar in his russet suit; far less changed than
+his royal cousin during these years.  Since Edward's great sorrow,
+Henry de Montfort had held less apart from him; and whenever the King
+was at leisure to snatch a short retirement at one of his hunting
+lodges, he always sent an intimation to the beggar, who would journey
+down on a sober ass, and under the care of De Gourdon, now the chief
+of the hunting staff, would meet the King in some sylvan glade.  Why
+it was a comfort to Edward to be with him, it would be hard to say;
+probably from the habit of old fellowship, for Henry's humour had not
+grown more courtly or less caustic.
+
+From under the trees came John de Mohun, now a brave, stout, hearty-
+looking English baron; and with him, wrapped in a battered and soiled
+scarlet mantle, a war-worn soldier, his complexion tanned to deep
+brown, his hair bleached with toil and sun, a scar on his cheek, a
+halt on his step--altogether a man in whom none would have recognized
+the bright, graceful, high-spirited young Hospitalier of twenty years
+since.  Only when he spoke, and the smiling light beamed in his eye,
+could he be known for Sir Reginald Ferrers.
+
+He would have bent his knee, but Edward took his hand, and bowing his
+own bared head said, "It is we who should crave a blessing from you,
+holy Father, last defender of the sacred land."
+
+"Alas, my Lord," said Sir Raynald, as he made the gesture of
+blessing; "Heaven's will he done!  Had we but been worthier!  Sir,"
+he added, "I am in no guise for a royal presence, but I have been
+sent home from Cyprus to recover from my wounds; and I had a message
+for you which I deemed you would gladly hear before I had joined mine
+Order."
+
+"A message?" said Edward.
+
+"A message from a dying penitent, craving pardon," replied Sir
+Raynald.
+
+"If it concerns the House of Montfort, speak on," said Edward.  "None
+are so near to it as those present with me!"
+
+"Thou hast guessed right, my Lord King!" replied Sir Raynald.  "It
+does concern that House.  Have I your license to tell my tale at some
+length?"
+
+Edward gave permission; and a seat having been brought, Sir Raynald
+proceeded to speak of that last Siege of Acre, when, amid the
+multitudinous tribunals of mixed races, and the many sanctuaries
+which sheltered crime, the unhappy city had become a disgrace to the
+Christian name.  The Sultan Malek Seraf was concentrating his forces
+on it; all the unwarlike inhabitants had been sent away; and the
+Knights of the two Orders, with the King of Cyprus and his troops,
+had shut themselves up for their last resistance--when among the
+mercenaries, who enrolled themselves in the pay of the Hospitaliers,
+came a sunburnt warrior, who had evidently had long experience of
+Eastern warfare, though his speech was English, French, or Provencal,
+according to the person who addressed him.  Fierce and dreadful was
+the daily strife; the new soldier fought well, but he was not
+noticed, till one night.  "Ah, Sir!" said the Hospitalier, "even then
+our holy and beautiful house was in dire confusion, our garden
+trodden down and desolate!  One night, I heard strange choking sobs
+as of one in anguish.  I deemed that one of our wounded had in
+delirium wandered into the garden, and was dying there.  But I found-
+-at the foot of the stone cross we set beside the fountain, where the
+attempt on you, Sir, was made--this warrior lying, so writhing with
+anguish, that I could scarce believe it was grief, not pain, that
+thus wrought with him!  I lifted him up, and spake of repentance and
+pardon.  No pardon for him, he said; it was here that he had slain
+his brother!  I spake long and earnestly with him, but he called
+himself sacrilegious murderer again and again.  Nay, he had even--
+when after that wretched night you wot of, Sir, he left our House--in
+his despair and hope to leave remorse behind, he had become a Moslem,
+and fought in the Saracen ranks.  All hope he spurned.  No mercy for
+him, was his cry!  I would have deemed so--but oh! I thought of
+Richard's parting hope; I remembered our German brethren's tale, how
+the Holy Father, the Pope, said there was as little hope of pardon as
+that his staff should bud and blossom; and lo, in one night it bore
+bud and flower.  I besought him for Richard's sake to let me strive
+in prayer for him.  All day we fought on the walls--all night, beside
+Richard's cross, did he lie and weep and groan, and I would pray till
+strength failed both of us.  Day after day, night after night, and
+still the miserable man looked gray with despair, and still he told
+me that he knew Absolution would but mock his doom.  He could fear,
+but could not sorrow.  And still I spoke of the Saviour's love of
+man--and still I prayed, and all our house prayed with me, though
+they knew not who the sinner was for whom I besought their prayers.
+At last--it was the day when the towers on the walls had been won--I
+came back from the breach, and scarce rested to eat bread, ere I went
+on to the Cedar and the Cross.  Beside it knelt Sir Simon.  'Father,'
+he said, 'I trust that the pardon that takes away the sin of the
+world, will take away mine.  Grant me Absolution.'  He was with us
+when, ere dawn, such of us as still lived met for our last mass in
+our beautiful chapel.  He went forth with us to the wall.  By and by,
+the command was given that we should make a sally upon the enemy's
+camp.  We went back for the last time to our house to fetch our
+horses; I knew there could be no return, and went for one last look
+into our chapel, and at Richard's tomb.  Upon it lay the knight,
+horribly scathed with Greek fire--he had dragged him there to die.
+He was dead, but his looks were upward; his face was as calm as
+Richard's was, my Lord, when we laid him down by the fountain.  And
+now his message, my Lord.  He bade me say, if I survived the siege,
+that he had often cursed you for the worse revenge of letting him
+live to his remorse--now he blessed you for sparing him to repent."
+
+"And Richard's grave has passed to the Infidels!" said Edward, after
+a long silence.
+
+"Even as the graves of our brethren--the holiest Grave of all," said
+the Knight Hospitalier.
+
+"Cheer up and hope, Father," said the King.  "Let me see peace and
+order at home, and we will win back Acre, ay and Jerusalem, from the
+Infidels.  Alas! our young hopes and joys may never return; but, home
+purified, then may God bless our arms beneath the Cross."
+
+
+Fifteen years more, and in the beautiful Westminster Abbey, amid the
+gorgeous tombs, there stood four sorrowful figures.  A sturdy knight,
+with bowed head and mournful look, carefully guided a white-haired,
+white-bearded old man, while a beautiful matronly lady was handed by
+her tall handsome son.
+
+Among the richly inlaid shrines and monuments, they sought out one
+the latest of all, but consisting of one enormous block of stone,
+with no ornament save one slender band of inscription.
+
+"Ah!" said the knight, "well do I remember the shipping of that stone
+from Acre, little guessing its purpose!"
+
+"Then it is indeed a stone from the ruined Temple of Jerusalem," said
+the lady.  "Read the inscription, my Son."
+
+The young man read and translated -
+
+
+"Edwardus Primus.  Malleus Scotorum          Pactum serva.
+Edward the First.  The Hammer of the Scots.  Keep covenant."
+
+
+"It was scarce worth while to bring a stone from Jerusalem, to mark
+it with 'the Hammer of the Scots!'" said the lady.
+
+"Alas, my cousin Edward!" sighed the beggar.  "Ever with a great
+scheme, ever going earnestly on to its fulfilment; with a mind too
+far above those of other men to be understood or loved as thou
+shouldst have been!  Alack, that the Scottish temptation came between
+thee and the brightness of thy glory!  Art thou indeed gone--like
+Richard--to Jerusalem; and shall I yet follow thee there?  Let us
+pray for the peace of his soul, children; for a greater and better
+man lies here than England knows or heeds."
+
+
+
+Footnotes:
+
+{1}  Psalm cxxvi. 6, 7.
+
+
+
+
+
+End of Project Gutenberg Etext The Prince and the Page, by Charlotte M. Yonge
+
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