THE TALISMAN
By Sir Walter Scott
INTRODUCTION TO THE TALISMAN.
The “Betrothed” did not greatly please one or two friends, who thought
that it did not well correspond to the general title of “The Crusaders.”
They urged, therefore, that, without direct allusion to the manners of
the Eastern tribes, and to the romantic conflicts of the period, the
title of a “Tale of the Crusaders” would resemble the playbill, which
is said to have announced the tragedy of Hamlet, the character of
the Prince of Denmark being left out. On the other hand, I felt the
difficulty of giving a vivid picture of a part of the world with which
I was almost totally unacquainted, unless by early recollections of
the Arabian Nights' Entertainments; and not only did I labour under the
incapacity of ignorance--in which, as far as regards Eastern manners, I
was as thickly wrapped as an Egyptian in his fog--but my contemporaries
were, many of them, as much enlightened upon the subject as if they had
been inhabitants of the favoured land of Goshen. The love of travelling
had pervaded all ranks, and carried the subjects of Britain into all
quarters of the world. Greece, so attractive by its remains of art, by
its struggles for freedom against a Mohammedan tyrant, by its very name,
where every fountain had its classical legend--Palestine, endeared
to the imagination by yet more sacred remembrances--had been of late
surveyed by British eyes, and described by recent travellers. Had I,
therefore, attempted the difficult task of substituting manners of my
own invention, instead of the genuine costume of the East, almost every
traveller I met who had extended his route beyond what was anciently
called “The Grand Tour,” had acquired a right, by ocular inspection, to
chastise me for my presumption. Every member of the Travellers' Club who
could pretend to have thrown his shoe over Edom was, by having done so,
constituted my lawful critic and corrector. It occurred, therefore,
that where the author of Anastasius, as well as he of Hadji Baba, had
described the manners and vices of the Eastern nations, not only with
fidelity, but with the humour of Le Sage and the ludicrous power of
Fielding himself, one who was a perfect stranger to the subject must
necessarily produce an unfavourable contrast. The Poet Laureate also,
in the charming tale of “Thalaba,” had shown how extensive might be
the researches of a person of acquirements and talent, by dint of
investigation alone, into the ancient doctrines, history, and manners of
the Eastern countries, in which we are probably to look for the cradle
of mankind; Moore, in his “Lalla Rookh,” had successfully trod the
same path; in which, too, Byron, joining ocular experience to extensive
reading, had written some of his most attractive poems. In a word, the
Eastern themes had been already so successfully handled by those who
were acknowledged to be masters of their craft, that I was diffident of
making the attempt.
These were powerful objections; nor did they lose force when they
became the subject of anxious reflection, although they did not finally
prevail. The arguments on the other side were, that though I had no hope
of rivalling the contemporaries whom I have mentioned, yet it occurred
to me as possible to acquit myself of the task I was engaged in without
entering into competition with them.
The period relating more immediately to the Crusades which I at last
fixed upon was that at which the warlike character of Richard I., wild
and generous, a pattern of chivalry, with all its extravagant virtues,
and its no less absurd errors, was opposed to that of Saladin, in which
the Christian and English monarch showed all the cruelty and violence
of an Eastern sultan, and Saladin, on the other hand, displayed the deep
policy and prudence of a European sovereign, whilst each contended
which should excel the other in the knightly qualities of bravery and
generosity. This singular contrast afforded, as the author conceived,
materials for a work of fiction possessing peculiar interest. One of the
inferior characters introduced was a supposed relation of Richard Coeur
de Lion--a violation of the truth of history which gave offence to Mr.
Mills, the author of the “History of Chivalry and the Crusades,” who was
not, it may be presumed, aware that romantic fiction naturally includes
the power of such invention, which is indeed one of the requisites of
the art.
Prince David of Scotland, who was actually in the host, and was the hero
of some very romantic adventures on his way home, was also pressed into
my service, and constitutes one of my DRAMATIS PERSONAE.
It is true I had already brought upon the field him of the lion heart.
But it was in a more private capacity than he was here to be exhibited
in the Talisman--then as a disguised knight, now in the avowed character
of a conquering monarch; so that I doubted not a name so dear to
Englishmen as that of King Richard I. might contribute to their
amusement for more than once.
I had access to all which antiquity believed, whether of reality or
fable, on the subject of that magnificent warrior, who was the proudest
boast of Europe and their chivalry, and with whose dreadful name the
Saracens, according to a historian of their own country, were wont to
rebuke their startled horses. “Do you think,” said they, “that King
Richard is on the track, that you stray so wildly from it?” The most
curious register of the history of King Richard is an ancient romance,
translated originally from the Norman; and at first certainly having a
pretence to be termed a work of chivalry, but latterly becoming stuffed
with the most astonishing and monstrous fables. There is perhaps no
metrical romance upon record where, along with curious and genuine
history, are mingled more absurd and exaggerated incidents. We have
placed in the Appendix to this Introduction the passage of the romance
in which Richard figures as an ogre, or literal cannibal.
A principal incident in the story is that from which the title is
derived. Of all people who ever lived, the Persians were perhaps most
remarkable for their unshaken credulity in amulets, spells, periapts,
and similar charms, framed, it was said, under the influence of
particular planets, and bestowing high medical powers, as well as the
means of advancing men's fortunes in various manners. A story of this
kind, relating to a Crusader of eminence, is often told in the west of
Scotland, and the relic alluded to is still in existence, and even yet
held in veneration.
Sir Simon Lockhart of Lee and Gartland made a considerable figure in the
reigns of Robert the Bruce and of his son David. He was one of the chief
of that band of Scottish chivalry who accompanied James, the Good Lord
Douglas, on his expedition to the Holy Land with the heart of King
Robert Bruce. Douglas, impatient to get at the Saracens, entered into
war with those of Spain, and was killed there. Lockhart proceeded to the
Holy Land with such Scottish knights as had escaped the fate of their
leader and assisted for some time in the wars against the Saracens.
The following adventure is said by tradition to have befallen him:--
He made prisoner in battle an Emir of considerable wealth and
consequence. The aged mother of the captive came to the Christian camp,
to redeem her son from his state of captivity. Lockhart is said to have
fixed the price at which his prisoner should ransom himself; and the
lady, pulling out a large embroidered purse, proceeded to tell down the
ransom, like a mother who pays little respect to gold in comparison of
her son's liberty. In this operation, a pebble inserted in a coin, some
say of the Lower Empire, fell out of the purse, and the Saracen matron
testified so much haste to recover it as gave the Scottish knight a
high idea of its value, when compared with gold or silver. “I will not
consent,” he said, “to grant your son's liberty, unless that amulet be
added to his ransom.” The lady not only consented to this, but explained
to Sir Simon Lockhart the mode in which the talisman was to be used,
and the uses to which it might be put. The water in which it was dipped
operated as a styptic, as a febrifuge, and possessed other properties as
a medical talisman.
Sir Simon Lockhart, after much experience of the wonders which it
wrought, brought it to his own country, and left it to his heirs, by
whom, and by Clydesdale in general, it was, and is still, distinguished
by the name of the Lee-penny, from the name of his native seat of Lee.
The most remarkable part of its history, perhaps, was that it so
especially escaped condemnation when the Church of Scotland chose to
impeach many other cures which savoured of the miraculous, as occasioned
by sorcery, and censured the appeal to them, “excepting only that to
the amulet, called the Lee-penny, to which it had pleased God to annex
certain healing virtues which the Church did not presume to condemn.” It
still, as has been said, exists, and its powers are sometimes resorted
to. Of late, they have been chiefly restricted to the cure of persons
bitten by mad dogs; and as the illness in such cases frequently arises
from imagination, there can be no reason for doubting that water which
has been poured on the Lee-penny furnishes a congenial cure.
Such is the tradition concerning the talisman, which the author has
taken the liberty to vary in applying it to his own purposes.
Considerable liberties have also been taken with the truth of history,
both with respect to Conrade of Montserrat's life, as well as his death.
That Conrade, however, was reckoned the enemy of Richard is agreed both
in history and romance. The general opinion of the terms upon which they
stood may be guessed from the proposal of the Saracens that the Marquis
of Montserrat should be invested with certain parts of Syria, which they
were to yield to the Christians. Richard, according to the romance which
bears his name, “could no longer repress his fury. The Marquis he said,
was a traitor, who had robbed the Knights Hospitallers of sixty thousand
pounds, the present of his father Henry; that he was a renegade, whose
treachery had occasioned the loss of Acre; and he concluded by a solemn
oath, that he would cause him to be drawn to pieces by wild horses, if
he should ever venture to pollute the Christian camp by his presence.
Philip attempted to intercede in favour of the Marquis, and throwing
down his glove, offered to become a pledge for his fidelity to the
Christians; but his offer was rejected, and he was obliged to give way
to Richard's impetuosity.”--HISTORY OF CHIVALRY.
Conrade of Montserrat makes a considerable figure in those wars, and was
at length put to death by one of the followers of the Scheik, or Old Man
of the Mountain; nor did Richard remain free of the suspicion of having
instigated his death.
It may be said, in general, that most of the incidents introduced in
the following tale are fictitious, and that reality, where it exists, is
only retained in the characters of the piece.
ABBOTSFORD, 1st July, 1832
APPENDIX TO INTRODUCTION.
While warring in the Holy Land, Richard was seized with an ague.
The best leeches of the camp were unable to effect the cure of the
King's disease; but the prayers of the army were more successful. He
became convalescent, and the first symptom of his recovery was a violent
longing for pork. But pork was not likely to be plentiful in a country
whose inhabitants had an abhorrence for swine's flesh; and
“Though his men should be hanged,
They ne might, in that countrey,
For gold, ne silver, ne no money,
No pork find, take, ne get,
That King Richard might aught of eat.
An old knight with Richard biding,
When he heard of that tiding,
That the king's wants were swyche,
To the steward he spake privyliche--
“Our lord the king sore is sick, I wis,
After porck he alonged is;
Ye may none find to selle;
No man be hardy him so to telle!
If he did he might die.
Now behoves to done as I shall say,
Tho' he wete nought of that.
Take a Saracen, young and fat;
In haste let the thief be slain,
Opened, and his skin off flayn;
And sodden full hastily,
With powder and with spicery,
And with saffron of good colour.
When the king feels thereof savour,
Out of ague if he be went,
He shall have thereto good talent.
When he has a good taste,
And eaten well a good repast,
And supped of the BREWIS [Broth] a sup,
Slept after and swet a drop,
Through Goddis help and my counsail,
Soon he shall be fresh and hail.'
The sooth to say, at wordes few,
Slain and sodden was the heathen shrew.
Before the king it was forth brought:
Quod his men, 'Lord, we have pork sought;
Eates and sups of the brewis SOOTE,[Sweet]
Thorough grace of God it shall be your boot.'
Before King Richard carff a knight,
He ate faster than he carve might.
The king ate the flesh and GNEW [Gnawed] the bones,
And drank well after for the nonce.
And when he had eaten enough,
His folk hem turned away, and LOUGH.[Laughed]
He lay still and drew in his arm;
His chamberlain him wrapped warm.
He lay and slept, and swet a stound,
And became whole and sound.
King Richard clad him and arose,
And walked abouten in the close.”
An attack of the Saracens was repelled by Richard in person, the
consequence of which is told in the following lines:--
“When King Richard had rested a whyle,
A knight his arms 'gan unlace,
Him to comfort and solace.
Him was brought a sop in wine.
'The head of that ilke swine,
That I of ate!' (the cook he bade,)
'For feeble I am, and faint and mad.
Of mine evil now I am fear;
Serve me therewith at my soupere!'
Quod the cook, 'That head I ne have.'
Then said the king, 'So God me save,
But I see the head of that swine,
For sooth, thou shalt lesen thine!'
The cook saw none other might be;
He fet the head and let him see.
He fell on knees, and made a cry--
'Lo, here the head! my Lord, mercy!'”
The cook had certainly some reason to fear that his master would be
struck with horror at the recollection of the dreadful banquet to which
he owed his recovery; but his fears were soon dissipated.
“The swarte vis [Black face] when the king seeth,
His black beard and white teeth,
How his lippes grinned wide,
'What devil is this?' the king cried,
And 'gan to laugh as he were wode.
'What! is Saracen's flesh thus good?
That never erst I nought wist!
By God's death and his uprist,
Shall we never die for default,
While we may in any assault,
Slee Saracens, the flesh may take,
And seethen and roasten and do hem bake,
[And] Gnawen her flesh to the bones!
Now I have it proved once,
For hunger ere I be wo,
I and my folk shall eat mo!”'
The besieged now offered to surrender, upon conditions of safety to the
inhabitants; while all the public treasure, military machines, and arms
were delivered to the victors, together with the further ransom of
one hundred thousand bezants. After this capitulation, the following
extraordinary scene took place. We shall give it in the words of the
humorous and amiable George Ellis, the collector and the editor of these
Romances:--
“Though the garrison had faithfully performed the other articles of
their contract, they were unable to restore the cross, which was not
in their possession, and were therefore treated by the Christians
with great cruelty. Daily reports of their sufferings were carried to
Saladin; and as many of them were persons of the highest distinction,
that monarch, at the solicitation of their friends, dispatched an
embassy to King Richard with magnificent presents, which he offered
for the ransom of the captives. The ambassadors were persons the most
respectable from their age, their rank, and their eloquence. They
delivered their message in terms of the utmost humility; and without
arraigning the justice of the conqueror in his severe treatment of their
countrymen, only solicited a period to that severity, laying at his feet
the treasures with which they were entrusted, and pledging themselves
and their master for the payment of any further sums which he might
demand as the price of mercy.
“King Richard spake with wordes mild.
'The gold to take, God me shield!
Among you partes [Divide] every charge.
I brought in shippes and in barge,
More gold and silver with me,
Than has your lord, and swilke three.
To his treasure have I no need!
But for my love I you bid,
To meat with me that ye dwell;
And afterward I shall you tell.
Thorough counsel I shall you answer,
What BODE [Message] ye shall to your lord bear.
“The invitation was gratefully accepted. Richard, in the meantime, gave
secret orders to his marshal that he should repair to the prison,
select a certain number of the most distinguished captives, and, after
carefully noting their names on a roll of parchment, cause their heads
to be instantly struck off; that these heads should be delivered to the
cook, with instructions to clear away the hair, and, after boiling
them in a cauldron, to distribute them on several platters, one to
each guest, observing to fasten on the forehead of each the piece of
parchment expressing the name and family of the victim.
“'An hot head bring me beforn,
As I were well apayed withall,
Eat thereof fast I shall;
As it were a tender chick,
To see how the others will like.'
“This horrible order was punctually executed. At noon the guests were
summoned to wash by the music of the waits. The king took his seat
attended by the principal officers of his court, at the high table, and
the rest of the company were marshalled at a long table below him.
On the cloth were placed portions of salt at the usual distances, but
neither bread, wine, nor water. The ambassadors, rather surprised at
this omission, but still free from apprehension, awaited in silence
the arrival of the dinner, which was announced by the sound of pipes,
trumpets, and tabours; and beheld, with horror and dismay, the unnatural
banquet introduced by the steward and his officers. Yet their sentiments
of disgust and abhorrence, and even their fears, were for a time
suspended by their curiosity. Their eyes were fixed on the king, who,
without the slightest change of countenance, swallowed the morsels as
fast as they could be supplied by the knight who carved them.
“Every man then poked other;
They said, 'This is the devil's brother,
That slays our men, and thus hem eats!'
“Their attention was then involuntarily fixed on the smoking heads
before them. They traced in the swollen and distorted features the
resemblance of a friend or near relation, and received from the
fatal scroll which accompanied each dish the sad assurance that this
resemblance was not imaginary. They sat in torpid silence, anticipating
their own fate in that of their countrymen; while their ferocious
entertainer, with fury in his eyes, but with courtesy on his lips,
insulted them by frequent invitations to merriment. At length this first
course was removed, and its place supplied by venison, cranes, and other
dainties, accompanied by the richest wines. The king then apologized to
them for what had passed, which he attributed to his ignorance of their
taste; and assured them of his religious respect for their characters as
ambassadors, and of his readiness to grant them a safe-conduct for their
return. This boon was all that they now wished to claim; and
“King Richard spake to an old man,
'Wendes home to your Soudan!
His melancholy that ye abate;
And sayes that ye came too late.
Too slowly was your time y-guessed;
Ere ye came, the flesh was dressed,
That men shoulden serve with me,
Thus at noon, and my meynie.
Say him, it shall him nought avail,
Though he for-bar us our vitail,
Bread, wine, fish, flesh, salmon, and conger;
Of us none shall die with hunger,
While we may wenden to fight,
And slay the Saracens downright,
Wash the flesh, and roast the head.
With 0 [One] Saracen I may well feed
Well a nine or a ten
Of my good Christian men.
King Richard shall warrant,
There is no flesh so nourissant
Unto an English man,
Partridge, plover, heron, ne swan,
Cow ne ox, sheep ne swine,
As the head of a Sarazyn.
There he is fat, and thereto tender,
And my men be lean and slender.
While any Saracen quick be,
Livand now in this Syrie,
For meat will we nothing care.
Abouten fast we shall rare,
And every day we shall eat
All as many as we may get.
To England will we nought gon,
Till they be eaten every one.'”
ELLIS'S SPECIMENS OF EARLY ENGLISH METRICEL ROMANCES.
The reader may be curious to know owing to what circumstances so
extraordinary an invention as that which imputed cannibalism to the King
of England should have found its way into his history. Mr. James, to
whom we owe so much that is curious, seems to have traced the origin of
this extraordinary rumour.
“With the army of the cross also was a multitude of men,” the same
author declares, “who made it a profession to be without money. They
walked barefoot, carried no arms, and even preceded the beasts of burden
in their march, living upon roots and herbs, and presenting a spectacle
both disgusting and pitiable.
“A Norman, who, according to all accounts, was of noble birth, but who,
having lost his horse, continued to follow as a foot soldier, took
the strange resolution of putting himself at the head of this race
of vagabonds, who willingly received him as their king. Amongst the
Saracens these men became well known under the name of THAFURS (which
Guibert translates TRUDENTES), and were beheld with great horror
from the general persuasion that they fed on the dead bodies of their
enemies; a report which was occasionally justified, and which the king
of the Thafurs took care to encourage. This respectable monarch was
frequently in the habit of stopping his followers, one by one, in a
narrow defile, and of causing them to be searched carefully, lest the
possession of the least sum of money should render them unworthy of the
name of his subjects. If even two sous were found upon any one, he
was instantly expelled the society of his tribe, the king bidding him
contemptuously buy arms and fight.
“This troop, so far from being cumbersome to the army, was infinitely
serviceable, carrying burdens, bringing in forage, provisions, and
tribute; working the machines in the sieges; and, above all, spreading
consternation among the Turks, who feared death from the lances of the
knights less than that further consummation they heard of under the
teeth of the Thafurs.” [James's “History of Chivalry.”]
It is easy to conceive that an ignorant minstrel, finding the taste and
ferocity of the Thafurs commemorated in the historical accounts of the
Holy Wars, has ascribed their practices and propensities to the Monarch
of England, whose ferocity was considered as an object of exaggeration
as legitimate as his valour.
ABBOTSFORD, 1st July, 1832.
TALES OF THE CRUSADERS. TALE II.--THE TALISMAN.
CHAPTER I.
They, too, retired
To the wilderness, but 'twas with arms.
PARADISE REGAINED.
The burning sun of Syria had not yet attained its highest point in
the horizon, when a knight of the Red Cross, who had left his distant
northern home and joined the host of the Crusaders in Palestine, was
pacing slowly along the sandy deserts which lie in the vicinity of the
Dead Sea, or, as it is called, the Lake Asphaltites, where the waves of
the Jordan pour themselves into an inland sea, from which there is no
discharge of waters.
The warlike pilgrim had toiled among cliffs and precipices during the
earlier part of the morning. More lately, issuing from those rocky
and dangerous defiles, he had entered upon that great plain, where
the accursed cities provoked, in ancient days, the direct and dreadful
vengeance of the Omnipotent.
The toil, the thirst, the dangers of the way, were forgotten, as the
traveller recalled the fearful catastrophe which had converted into an
arid and dismal wilderness the fair and fertile valley of Siddim, once
well watered, even as the Garden of the Lord, now a parched and blighted
waste, condemned to eternal sterility.
Crossing himself, as he viewed the dark mass of rolling waters, in
colour as in duality unlike those of any other lake, the traveller
shuddered as he remembered that beneath these sluggish waves lay the
once proud cities of the plain, whose grave was dug by the thunder of
the heavens, or the eruption of subterraneous fire, and whose remains
were hid, even by that sea which holds no living fish in its bosom,
bears no skiff on its surface, and, as if its own dreadful bed were the
only fit receptacle for its sullen waters, sends not, like other lakes,
a tribute to the ocean. The whole land around, as in the days of Moses,
was “brimstone and salt; it is not sown, nor beareth, nor any grass
groweth thereon.” The land as well as the lake might be termed dead, as
producing nothing having resemblance to vegetation, and even the very
air was entirely devoid of its ordinary winged inhabitants, deterred
probably by the odour of bitumen and sulphur which the burning sun
exhaled from the waters of the lake in steaming clouds, frequently
assuming the appearance of waterspouts. Masses of the slimy and
sulphureous substance called naphtha, which floated idly on the sluggish
and sullen waves, supplied those rolling clouds with new vapours, and
afforded awful testimony to the truth of the Mosaic history.
Upon this scene of desolation the sun shone with almost intolerable
splendour, and all living nature seemed to have hidden itself from the
rays, excepting the solitary figure which moved through the flitting
sand at a foot's pace, and appeared the sole breathing thing on the wide
surface of the plain. The dress of the rider and the accoutrements of
his horse were peculiarly unfit for the traveller in such a country. A
coat of linked mail, with long sleeves, plated gauntlets, and a steel
breastplate, had not been esteemed a sufficient weight of armour; there
were also his triangular shield suspended round his neck, and his barred
helmet of steel, over which he had a hood and collar of mail, which
was drawn around the warrior's shoulders and throat, and filled up the
vacancy between the hauberk and the headpiece. His lower limbs were
sheathed, like his body, in flexible mail, securing the legs and thighs,
while the feet rested in plated shoes, which corresponded with the
gauntlets. A long, broad, straight-shaped, double-edged falchion, with
a handle formed like a cross, corresponded with a stout poniard on the
other side. The knight also bore, secured to his saddle, with one end
resting on his stirrup, the long steel-headed lance, his own proper
weapon, which, as he rode, projected backwards, and displayed its little
pennoncelle, to dally with the faint breeze, or drop in the dead calm.
To this cumbrous equipment must be added a surcoat of embroidered cloth,
much frayed and worn, which was thus far useful that it excluded the
burning rays of the sun from the armour, which they would otherwise have
rendered intolerable to the wearer. The surcoat bore, in several places,
the arms of the owner, although much defaced. These seemed to be a
couchant leopard, with the motto, “I sleep; wake me not.” An outline of
the same device might be traced on his shield, though many a blow had
almost effaced the painting. The flat top of his cumbrous cylindrical
helmet was unadorned with any crest. In retaining their own unwieldy
defensive armour, the Northern Crusaders seemed to set at defiance the
nature of the climate and country to which they had come to war.
The accoutrements of the horse were scarcely less massive and unwieldy
than those of the rider. The animal had a heavy saddle plated with
steel, uniting in front with a species of breastplate, and behind with
defensive armour made to cover the loins. Then there was a steel axe,
or hammer, called a mace-of-arms, and which hung to the saddle-bow. The
reins were secured by chain-work, and the front-stall of the bridle was
a steel plate, with apertures for the eyes and nostrils, having in the
midst a short, sharp pike, projecting from the forehead of the horse
like the horn of the fabulous unicorn.
But habit had made the endurance of this load of panoply a second
nature, both to the knight and his gallant charger. Numbers, indeed,
of the Western warriors who hurried to Palestine died ere they became
inured to the burning climate; but there were others to whom that
climate became innocent and even friendly, and among this fortunate
number was the solitary horseman who now traversed the border of the
Dead Sea.
Nature, which cast his limbs in a mould of uncommon strength, fitted
to wear his linked hauberk with as much ease as if the meshes had been
formed of cobwebs, had endowed him with a constitution as strong as his
limbs, and which bade defiance to almost all changes of climate, as well
as to fatigue and privations of every kind. His disposition seemed, in
some degree, to partake of the qualities of his bodily frame; and as
the one possessed great strength and endurance, united with the power of
violent exertion, the other, under a calm and undisturbed semblance, had
much of the fiery and enthusiastic love of glory which constituted the
principal attribute of the renowned Norman line, and had rendered
them sovereigns in every corner of Europe where they had drawn their
adventurous swords.
It was not, however, to all the race that fortune proposed such tempting
rewards; and those obtained by the solitary knight during two years'
campaign in Palestine had been only temporal fame, and, as he was taught
to believe, spiritual privileges. Meantime, his slender stock of money
had melted away, the rather that he did not pursue any of the ordinary
modes by which the followers of the Crusade condescended to recruit
their diminished resources at the expense of the people of Palestine--he
exacted no gifts from the wretched natives for sparing their possessions
when engaged in warfare with the Saracens, and he had not availed
himself of any opportunity of enriching himself by the ransom of
prisoners of consequence. The small train which had followed him from
his native country had been gradually diminished, as the means of
maintaining them disappeared, and his only remaining squire was at
present on a sick-bed, and unable to attend his master, who travelled,
as we have seen, singly and alone. This was of little consequence to the
Crusader, who was accustomed to consider his good sword as his safest
escort, and devout thoughts as his best companion.
Nature had, however, her demands for refreshment and repose even on
the iron frame and patient disposition of the Knight of the Sleeping
Leopard; and at noon, when the Dead Sea lay at some distance on his
right, he joyfully hailed the sight of two or three palm-trees, which
arose beside the well which was assigned for his mid-day station. His
good horse, too, which had plodded forward with the steady endurance of
his master, now lifted his head, expanded his nostrils, and quickened
his pace, as if he snuffed afar off the living waters which marked the
place of repose and refreshment. But labour and danger were doomed to
intervene ere the horse or horseman reached the desired spot.
As the Knight of the Couchant Leopard continued to fix his eyes
attentively on the yet distant cluster of palm-trees, it seemed to him
as if some object was moving among them. The distant form separated
itself from the trees, which partly hid its motions, and advanced
towards the knight with a speed which soon showed a mounted horseman,
whom his turban, long spear, and green caftan floating in the wind, on
his nearer approach showed to be a Saracen cavalier. “In the desert,”
saith an Eastern proverb, “no man meets a friend.” The Crusader was
totally indifferent whether the infidel, who now approached on his
gallant barb as if borne on the wings of an eagle, came as friend or
foe--perhaps, as a vowed champion of the Cross, he might rather have
preferred the latter. He disengaged his lance from his saddle, seized
it with the right hand, placed it in rest with its point half elevated,
gathered up the reins in the left, waked his horse's mettle with
the spur, and prepared to encounter the stranger with the calm
self-confidence belonging to the victor in many contests.
The Saracen came on at the speedy gallop of an Arab horseman, managing
his steed more by his limbs and the inflection of his body than by any
use of the reins, which hung loose in his left hand; so that he was
enabled to wield the light, round buckler of the skin of the rhinoceros,
ornamented with silver loops, which he wore on his arm, swinging it as
if he meant to oppose its slender circle to the formidable thrust of the
Western lance. His own long spear was not couched or levelled like that
of his antagonist, but grasped by the middle with his right hand, and
brandished at arm's-length above his head. As the cavalier approached
his enemy at full career, he seemed to expect that the Knight of the
Leopard should put his horse to the gallop to encounter him. But the
Christian knight, well acquainted with the customs of Eastern warriors,
did not mean to exhaust his good horse by any unnecessary exertion; and,
on the contrary, made a dead halt, confident that if the enemy advanced
to the actual shock, his own weight, and that of his powerful charger,
would give him sufficient advantage, without the additional momentum
of rapid motion. Equally sensible and apprehensive of such a probable
result, the Saracen cavalier, when he had approached towards the
Christian within twice the length of his lance, wheeled his steed to the
left with inimitable dexterity, and rode twice around his antagonist,
who, turning without quitting his ground, and presenting his front
constantly to his enemy, frustrated his attempts to attack him on an
unguarded point; so that the Saracen, wheeling his horse, was fain to
retreat to the distance of a hundred yards. A second time, like a hawk
attacking a heron, the heathen renewed the charge, and a second time
was fain to retreat without coming to a close struggle. A third time he
approached in the same manner, when the Christian knight, desirous to
terminate this illusory warfare, in which he might at length have been
worn out by the activity of his foeman, suddenly seized the mace which
hung at his saddle-bow, and, with a strong hand and unerring aim,
hurled it against the head of the Emir, for such and not less his enemy
appeared. The Saracen was just aware of the formidable missile in time
to interpose his light buckler betwixt the mace and his head; but the
violence of the blow forced the buckler down on his turban, and though
that defence also contributed to deaden its violence, the Saracen was
beaten from his horse. Ere the Christian could avail himself of this
mishap, his nimble foeman sprung from the ground, and, calling on his
steed, which instantly returned to his side, he leaped into his seat
without touching the stirrup, and regained all the advantage of which
the Knight of the Leopard hoped to deprive him. But the latter had
in the meanwhile recovered his mace, and the Eastern cavalier, who
remembered the strength and dexterity with which his antagonist had
aimed it, seemed to keep cautiously out of reach of that weapon of which
he had so lately felt the force, while he showed his purpose of waging a
distant warfare with missile weapons of his own. Planting his long spear
in the sand at a distance from the scene of combat, he strung, with
great address, a short bow, which he carried at his back; and putting
his horse to the gallop, once more described two or three circles of
a wider extent than formerly, in the course of which he discharged six
arrows at the Christian with such unerring skill that the goodness of
his harness alone saved him from being wounded in as many places. The
seventh shaft apparently found a less perfect part of the armour, and
the Christian dropped heavily from his horse. But what was the surprise
of the Saracen, when, dismounting to examine the condition of his
prostrate enemy, he found himself suddenly within the grasp of the
European, who had had recourse to this artifice to bring his enemy
within his reach! Even in this deadly grapple the Saracen was saved by
his agility and presence of mind. He unloosed the sword-belt, in which
the Knight of the Leopard had fixed his hold, and, thus eluding his
fatal grasp, mounted his horse, which seemed to watch his motions with
the intelligence of a human being, and again rode off. But in the last
encounter the Saracen had lost his sword and his quiver of arrows, both
of which were attached to the girdle which he was obliged to abandon. He
had also lost his turban in the struggle.
These disadvantages seemed to incline the Moslem to a truce. He
approached the Christian with his right hand extended, but no longer in
a menacing attitude.
“There is truce betwixt our nations,” he said, in the lingua franca
commonly used for the purpose of communication with the Crusaders;
“wherefore should there be war betwixt thee and me? Let there be peace
betwixt us.”
“I am well contented,” answered he of the Couchant Leopard; “but what
security dost thou offer that thou wilt observe the truce?”
“The word of a follower of the Prophet was never broken,” answered the
Emir. “It is thou, brave Nazarene, from whom I should demand security,
did I not know that treason seldom dwells with courage.”
The Crusader felt that the confidence of the Moslem made him ashamed of
his own doubts.
“By the cross of my sword,” he said, laying his hand on the weapon as
he spoke, “I will be true companion to thee, Saracen, while our fortune
wills that we remain in company together.”
“By Mohammed, Prophet of God, and by Allah, God of the Prophet,” replied
his late foeman, “there is not treachery in my heart towards thee. And
now wend we to yonder fountain, for the hour of rest is at hand, and
the stream had hardly touched my lip when I was called to battle by thy
approach.”
The Knight of the Couchant Leopard yielded a ready and courteous assent;
and the late foes, without an angry look or gesture of doubt, rode side
by side to the little cluster of palm-trees.