she chose to style herself at home) looked so hard at him out of her
china-blue eyes, that Sir Wilfrid felt as if she was reading his
thoughts, and was fain to drop his own eyes into his flagon.
In a word, his life was intolerable. The dinner hour of the twelfth
century, it is known, was very early; in fact, people dined at ten
o'clock in the morning: and after dinner Rowena sat mum under her
canopy, embroidered with the arms of Edward the Confessor, working with
her maidens at the most hideous pieces of tapestry, representing the
tortures and martyrdoms of her favorite saints, and not allowing a soul
to speak above his breath, except when she chose to cry out in her own
shrill voice when a handmaid made a wrong stitch, or let fall a ball of
worsted. It was a dreary life. Wamba, we have said, never ventured to
crack a joke, save in a whisper, when he was ten miles from home; and
then Sir Wilfrid Ivanhoe was too weary and blue-devilled to laugh; but
hunted in silence, moodily bringing down deer and wild-boar with shaft
and quarrel.
Then he besought Robin of Huntingdon, the jolly outlaw, nathless, to
join him, and go to the help of their fair sire King Richard, with a
score or two of lances. But the Earl of Huntingdon was a very
different character from Robin Hood the forester. There was no more
conscientious magistrate in all the county than his lordship: he was
never known to miss church or quarter-sessions; he was the strictest
game-proprietor in all the Riding, and sent scores of poachers to
Botany Bay. "A man who has a stake in the country, my good Sir
Wilfrid," Lord Huntingdon said, with rather a patronizing air, (his
lordship had grown immensely fat since the King had taken him into
grace, and required a horse as strong as an elephant to mount him) "a
man with a stake in the country ought to stay in the country.
Property has its duties as well as its privileges, and a person of my
rank is bound to live on the land from which he gets his living."
"Amen!" sang out the Reverend--Tuck, his lordship's domestic chaplain,
who had also grown as sleek as the Abbot of Jorvaulx, who was as prim
as a lady in his dress, wore bergamot in his handkerchief, and had his
poll shaved and his beard curled every day. And so sanctified was his
Reverence grown, that he thought it was a shame to kill the pretty
deer, (though he ate of them still hugely, both in pasties and with
French beans and currant-jelly,) and being shown a quarter-staff upon a
certain occasion, handled it curiously, and asked what that ugly great
stick was?"
Lady Huntingdon, late Maid Marian, had still some of her old fun and
spirits, and poor Ivanhoe begged and prayed that she would come and
stay at Rotherwood occasionally, and _egayer the general dulness of
that castle. But her ladyship said that Rowena gave herself such airs,
and bored her so intolerably with stories of King Edward the Confessor,
that she preferred any place rather than Rotherwood, which was as dull
as if it had been at the top of Mount Athos.
The only person who visited it was Athelstane. "His Royal Highness the
Prince" Rowena of course called him, whom the lady received with royal
honors. She had the guns fired, and the footmen turned out with
presented arms when he arrived; helped him to all Ivanhoe's favorite
cuts of the mutton or the turkey, and forced her poor husband to light
him to the state bedroom, walking backwards, holding a pair of
wax-candles. At this hour of bedtime the Thane used to be in such a
condition, that he saw two pair of candles and two Ivanhoes reeling
before him. Let us hope it was not Ivanhoe that was reeling, but only
his kinsman's brains muddled with the quantities of drink which it was
his daily custom to consume. Rowena said it was the crack which the
wicked Bois Guilbert, "the Jewess's other lover, Wilfrid my dear," gave
him on his royal skull, which caused the Prince to be disturbed so
easily; but added, that drinking became a person of royal blood, and
was but one of the duties of his station.
Sir Wilfrid of Ivanhoe saw it would be of no avail to ask this man to
bear him company on his projected tour abroad; but still he himself was
every day more and more bent upon going and he long cast about for some
means of breaking to his Rowena his firm resolution to join the King.
He thought she would certainly fall ill if he communicated the news too
abruptly to her: he would pretend a journey to York to attend a grand
jury; then a call to London on law business or to buy stock; then he
would slip over to Calais by the packet, by degrees as it were; and so
be with the King before his wife knew that he was out of sight of
Westminster Hall.
Suppose your honor says you are going as your honor would say Bo! to a
goose, plump, short, and to the point," said Wamba the Jester who was
Sir Wilfrid's chief counselor and attendant "depend on't her Highness
would bear the news like a Christian woman."
"Tush, malapert! I will give thee the strap," said Sir Wilfrid, in a
fine tone of high-tragedy indignation. "Thou know est not the delicacy
of the nerves of high-born ladies. An she faint not, write me down
Hollander."
"I will wager my bauble against an Irish billet of exchange that she
will let your honor go off readily: that is, if you press not the
matter too strongly," Wamba answered, knowingly.
And this Ivanhoe found to his discomfiture: for one morning at
breakfast, adopting a _degage air, as he sipped his tea, he said, "My
love, I was thinking of going over to pay his Majesty a visit in
Normandy." Upon which, laying down her muffin, (which, since the royal
Alfred baked those cakes, had been the chosen breakfast cate of noble
Anglo-Saxons, and which a kneeling page tendered to her on a salver,
chased by the Florentine, Benvenuto Cellini,) "When do you think of
going, Wilfrid my dear?" the lady said; and the moment the tea-things
were removed, and the tables and their trestles put away, she set about
mending his linen, and getting ready his carpet-bag.
So Sir Wilfrid was as disgusted at her readiness to part with him as he
had been weary of staying at home, which caused Wamba the Fool to say,
"Marry, gossip, thou art like the man on shipboard, who, when the
boatswain flogged him, did cry out "Oh!" wherever the rope's-end fell
on him: which caused Master Boatswain to say, "Plague on thee, fellow,
and a pize on thee, knave, wherever I hit thee there is no pleasing
thee.""
And truly there are some backs which Fortune is always belaboring,"
thought Sir Wilfrid with a groan, "and mine is one that is ever
sore."
So, with a moderate retinue, whereof the knave Wamba made one, and a
large woollen comforter round his neck, which his wife's own white
fingers had woven, Sir Wilfrid of Ivanhoe left home to join the King
his master. Rowena, standing on the steps, poured out a series of
prayers and blessings, most edifying to hear, as her lord mounted his
charger, which his squires led to
the door. It was the duty of the
British female of rank," she said, "to suffer all all in the cause of
her sovereign. She would not fear loneliness during the campaign: she
would bear up against widowhood, desertion, and an unprotected
situation."
My cousin Athelstane will protect thee," said Ivanhoe, with profound
emotion, as the tears trickled down his base net and bestowing a chaste
salute upon the steel-clad warrior, Rowena modestly said "she hoped his
Highness would be so kind."
Then Ivanhoe's trumpet blew: then Rowena waved her pocket-handkerchief:
then the household gave a shout: then the pursuivant of the good
Knight, Sir Wilfrid the Crusader, flung out his banner (which was
argent, a gules cramoisy with three Moors impaled sable) then Wamba
gave a lash on his mule's haunch, and Ivanhoe, heaving a great sigh,
turned the tail of his war-horse upon the castle of his fathers.
As they rode along the forest, they met Athelstane the Thane powdering
along the road in the direction of Rotherwood on his great dray-horse
of a charger. "Good-by, good luck to you, old brick," cried the
Prince, using the vernacular Saxon. "Pitch into those Frenchmen; give
it 'em over the face and eyes; and I'll stop at home and take care of
Mrs. I."
"Thank you, kinsman," said Ivanhoe looking, however, not particularly
well pleased; and the chief's shaking hands, the train of each took its
different way Athelstane's to Rotherwood, Ivanhoe's towards his place
of embarkation.
The poor knight had his wish, and yet his face was a yard long and as
yellow as a lawyer's parchment; and having longed to quit home any time
these three years past, he found himself envying Athelstane, because,
forsooth, he was going to Rotherwood: which symptoms of discontent
being observed by the witless Wamba, caused that absurd madman to bring
his re beck over his shoulder from his back, and to sing
ATRA CURA.
"Before I lost my five poor wits,
I mind me of a Romish clerk,
Who sang how Care, the phantom dark,
Beside the belted horseman sits.
Methought I saw the griesly sprite
Jump up but now behind my Knight."
"Perhaps thou didst, knave," said Ivanhoe, looking over his shoulder;
and the knave went on with his jingle:
"And though he gallop as he may,
I mark that cursed monster black
Still sits behind his honor's back,
Tight squeezing of his heart al way
Like two black Templars sit they there,
Beside one crupper, Knight and Care.
"No knight am I with pennoned spear,
To prance upon a bold destrere:
I will not have black Care prevail
Upon my long-eared charger's tail,
For lo, I am a witless fool,
And laugh at Grief and ride a mule.
And his bells rattled as he kicked his mule's sides.
"Silence, fool!" said Sir Wilfrid of Ivanhoe, in a voice both majestic
and wrathful. "If thou know est not care and grief, it is because thou
know est not love, whereof they are the companions. Who can love
without an anxious heart? How shall there be joy at meeting, without
tears at parting?" ("I did not see that his honor or in lady shed many
anon," thought Wamba the Fool; but he was only a zany, and his mind was
not right.) "I would not exchange my very sorrows for thine
indifference," the knight continued. "Where there, is a sun, there
must be a shadow.
If the shadow offend me, shall I put out my eyes and live in the dark?
No! I am content with my fate, even such as it is. The Care of which
thou speak est hard though it may vex him, never yet rode down an
honest man. I can bear him on my shoulders, and make my way through
the world's press in spite of him; for my arm is strong, and my sword
is keen, and my shield has no stain on it; and my heart, though it is
sad, knows no guile." And here, taking a locket out of his waistcoat
(which was made of clian-mail), the knight kissed the token, put it
back under the waistcoat again, heaved a profound sigh, and stuck spurs
into his horse.
As for Wamba, he was munching a black pudding whilst Sir Wilfrid was
making the above speech, (which implied some secret grief on the
knight's part, that must have been perfectly unintelligible to the
fool,) and so did not listen to a single word of Ivanhoe's pompous
remarks. They travelled on by slow stages through the whole kingdom,
until they came to Dover, whence they took shipping for Calais. And in
this little voyage, being exceedingly sea-sick, and besides elated at
the thought of meeting his sovereign, the good knight cast away that
profound melancholy which had accompanied him during the whole of his
land journey.
CHAPTER II.
THE LAST DAYS OF THE LION.
FROM Calais Sir Wilfrid of Ivanhoe took the diligence across country to
Limoges, sending on Gurth, his squire, with the horses and the rest of
his attendants: with the exception of Wamba, who travelled not only as
the knight's fool, but as his valet, and who, perched on the roof of
the carriage, amused himself by blowing tunes upon the _conducteur's
French horn. The good King Richard was, as Ivanhoe learned, in the
Limousin, encamped before a little place called Chalus; the lord
whereof, though a vassal of the King's, was holding the castle against
his sovereign with a resolution and valor which caused a great fury and
annoyance on the part of the Monarch with the Lion Heart. For brave
and magnanimous as he was, the Lion-hearted one did not love to be
balked any more than another; and, like the royal animal whom he was
said to resemble, he commonly tore his adversary to pieces, and then,
perchance, had leisure to think how brave the latter had been. The
Count of Chalus had found, it was said, a pot of money; the royal
Richard wanted it. As the count denied that he had it, why did he not
open the gates of his castle at once? It was a clear proof that he was
guilty; and the King was determined to punish this rebel, and have his
money and his life too.
He had naturally brought no breaching guns with him, because those
instruments were not yet invented; and though he had assaulted the
place a score of times with the utmost fury, his Majesty had been
beaten back on every occasion, until he was so savage that it was
dangerous to approach the British Lion. The Lion's wife, the lovely
Berengaria, scarcely ventured to come near him. He flung the
joint-stools in his tent at the heads of the officers of state, and
kicked his aides-de-camp round his pavilion; and, in fact, a maid of
honor, who brought a sack-posset in to his Majesty from the Queen after
he came in from the assault, came spinning like a football out of the
royal tent just as Ivanhoe entered it.
"Send me my drum-major to flog that woman!" roared out the infuriate
King. "By the bones of St. Barnabas she has burned the sack! By St.
Wittikind, I will have her flayed alive. Ha, St.
George! ha, St. Richard!
whom have we here?" And he lifted up his
demi-culverin, or curt al-axe a weapon weighing about thirteen
hundredweight and was about to fling it at the intruder's head, when
the latter, kneeling gracefully on one knee, said calmly, "It is I, my
good liege, Wilfrid of Ivanhoe."
"What, Wilfrid of Templestowe, Wilfrid the married man, Wilfrid the
henpecked!" cried the King with a sudden burst of good-humor, flinging
away the culverin from him, as though it had been a reed (it lighted
three hundred yards off, on the foot of Hugo de Bunyon, who was smoking
a cigar at the door of his tent, and caused that redoubled warrior to
limp for some days after).
"What, Wilfrid my gossip? Art come to see the lion's den? There are
bones in it, man, bones and carsses, and the lion is angry," said the
King, with a terrific glare of his eyes. "But tush! we will talk of
that anon. Ho! bring two gallons of hypocras for the King and the
good Knight, Wilfrid of Ivanhoe. Thou art come in time, Wilfrid, for,
by St. Richard and St. George, we will give a grand assault
to-morrow. There will be bones broken, ha!"
"I care not, my liege," said Ivanhoe, pledging the sovereign
respectfully, and tossing off the whole contents of the bowl of
hypocras to his Highness's good health. And he at once appeared to be
taken into high favor; not a little to the envy of many of the persons
surrounding the King.
As his Majesty said, there was fighting and feasting in plenty before
Chalus. Day after day, the besiegers made assaults upon the castle,
but it was held so strongly by the Count of Chalus and his gallant
garrison, that each afternoon beheld the attacking-parties returning
disconsolately to their tents, leaving behind them many of their own
slain, and bringing back with them store of broken heads and maimed
limbs, received in the unsuccessful onset. The valor displayed by
Ivanhoe in all these contests was prodigious; and the way in which he
escaped death from the discharges of mangonels, catapults,
battering-rams, twenty-four pounders, boiling oil, and other artillery,
with which the besieged received their enemies, was remarkable. After
a day's fighting, Gurth and Wamba used to pick the arrows out of their
intrepid master's coat-of-mail, as if they had been so many almonds in
a pudding. "Twas well for the good knight, that under his first
coat-of-armor he wore a choice suit of Toledan steel, perfectly
impervious to arrow-shots, and given to him by a certain Jew, named
Isaac of York, to whom he had done some considerable services a few
years back.
If King Richard had not been in such a rage at the repeated failures of
his attacks upon the castle, that all sense of justice was blinded in
the lionhearted monarch, he would have been the first to acknowledge
the valor of Sir Wilfrid of Ivanhoe, and would have given him a Peerage
and the Grand Cross of the Bath at least a dozen times in the course of
the siege: for Ivanhoe led more than a dozen storming parties, and with
his own hand killed as many men (viz. two thousand three hundred and
fifty-one) within six, as were slain by the lion-hearted monarch
himself. But his Majesty was rather disgusted than pleased by his
faithful servant's prowess; and all the courtiers, who hated Ivanhoe
for his superior valor and dexterity (for he would kill you off a
couple of hundreds of them of Chalus, whilst the strongest champions of
the King's host could not finish more than their two dozen of a day),
poisoned the royal mind against Sir Wilfrid, and made the King look
upon his feats of arms with an evil eye. Roger de Backbite sneeringly
told the King that Sir Wilfrid had offered to bet an equal bet that he
would kill more men than Richard himself in the next assault: Peter de
Toadhole said that Ivanhoe stated everywhere that his Majesty was not
the man he used to be; that pleasures and drink had enervated him; that