The feather'd songster, chanticleer,
Had wound his bugle-horn,
And told the early villager
The coming of the morn.
King Edward saw the ruddy streaks
Of light eclipse the grey,
And heard the raven's croaking throat
Proclaim the fated day.
“Thou'rt right,” he said, “for, by the God
That sits enthron'd on high,
Charles Baldwin, and his fellows twain,
This day shall surely die.”
CHATTERTON.
On the evening on which Sir Kenneth assumed his post, Richard, after the
stormy event which disturbed its tranquillity, had retired to rest in
the plenitude of confidence inspired by his unbounded courage and the
superiority which he had displayed in carrying the point he aimed at in
presence of the whole Christian host and its leaders, many of whom, he
was aware, regarded in their secret souls the disgrace of the Austrian
Duke as a triumph over themselves; so that his pride felt gratified,
that in prostrating one enemy he had mortified a hundred.
Another monarch would have doubled his guards on the evening after such
a scene, and kept at least a part of his troops under arms. But Coeur de
Lion dismissed, upon the occasion, even his ordinary watch, and assigned
to his soldiers a donative of wine to celebrate his recovery, and to
drink to the Banner of Saint George; and his quarter of the camp would
have assumed a character totally devoid of vigilance and military
preparation, but that Sir Thomas de Vaux, the Earl of Salisbury, and
other nobles, took precautions to preserve order and discipline among
the revellers.
The physician attended the King from his retiring to bed till midnight
was past, and twice administered medicine to him during that period,
always previously observing the quarter of heaven occupied by the
full moon, whose influences he declared to be most sovereign, or most
baleful, to the effect of his drugs. It was three hours after midnight
ere El Hakim withdrew from the royal tent, to one which had been pitched
for himself and his retinue. In his way thither he visited the tent of
Sir Kenneth of the Leopard, in order to see the condition of his first
patient in the Christian camp, old Strauchan, as the knight's esquire
was named. Inquiring there for Sir Kenneth himself, El Hakim learned
on what duty he was employed, and probably this information led him
to Saint George's Mount, where he found him whom he sought in the
disastrous circumstances alluded to in the last chapter.
It was about the hour of sunrise, when a slow, armed tread was heard
approaching the King's pavilion; and ere De Vaux, who slumbered beside
his master's bed as lightly as ever sleep sat upon the eyes of a
watch-dog, had time to do more than arise and say, “Who comes?” the
Knight of the Leopard entered the tent, with a deep and devoted gloom
seated upon his manly features.
“Whence this bold intrusion, Sir Knight?” said De Vaux sternly, yet in a
tone which respected his master's slumbers.
“Hold! De Vaux,” said Richard, awaking on the instant; “Sir Kenneth
cometh like a good soldier to render an account of his guard. To such
the general's tent is ever accessible.” Then rising from his slumbering
posture, and leaning on his elbow, he fixed his large bright eye upon
the warrior--“Speak, Sir Scot; thou comest to tell me of a vigilant,
safe, and honourable watch, dost thou not? The rustling of the folds of
the Banner of England were enough to guard it, even without the body of
such a knight as men hold thee.”
“As men will hold me no more,” said Sir Kenneth. “My watch hath neither
been vigilant, safe, nor honourable. The Banner of England has been
carried off.”
“And thou alive to tell it!” said Richard, in a tone of derisive
incredulity. “Away, it cannot be. There is not even a scratch on thy
face. Why dost thou stand thus mute? Speak the truth--it is ill jesting
with a king; yet I will forgive thee if thou hast lied.”
“Lied, Sir King!” returned the unfortunate knight, with fierce emphasis,
and one glance of fire from his eye, bright and transient as the flash
from the cold and stony flint. “But this also must be endured. I have
spoken the truth.”
“By God and by Saint George!” said the King, bursting into fury, which,
however, he instantly checked. “De Vaux, go view the spot. This fever
has disturbed his brain. This cannot be. The man's courage is proof. It
CANNOT be! Go speedily--or send, if thou wilt not go.”
The King was interrupted by Sir Henry Neville, who came, breathless, to
say that the banner was gone, and the knight who guarded it overpowered,
and most probably murdered, as there was a pool of blood where the
banner-spear lay shivered.
“But whom do I see here?” said Neville, his eyes suddenly resting upon
Sir Kenneth.
“A traitor,” said the King, starting to his feet, and seizing the
curtal-axe, which was ever near his bed--“a traitor! whom thou shalt see
die a traitor's death.” And he drew back the weapon as in act to strike.
Colourless, but firm as a marble statue, the Scot stood before him, with
his bare head uncovered by any protection, his eyes cast down to the
earth, his lips scarcely moving, yet muttering probably in prayer.
Opposite to him, and within the due reach for a blow, stood King
Richard, his large person wrapt in the folds of his camiscia, or ample
gown of linen, except where the violence of his action had flung the
covering from his right arm, shoulder, and a part of his breast,
leaving to view a specimen of a frame which might have merited his Saxon
predecessor's epithet of Ironside. He stood for an instant, prompt
to strike; then sinking the head of the weapon towards the ground,
he exclaimed, “But there was blood, Neville--there was blood upon the
place. Hark thee, Sir Scot--brave thou wert once, for I have seen
thee fight. Say thou hast slain two of the thieves in defence of the
Standard--say but one--say thou hast struck but a good blow in our
behalf, and get thee out of the camp with thy life and thy infamy!”
“You have called me liar, my Lord King,” replied Kenneth firmly; “and
therein, at least, you have done me wrong. Know that there was no blood
shed in defence of the Standard save that of a poor hound, which, more
faithful than his master, defended the charge which he deserted.”
“Now, by Saint George!” said Richard, again heaving up his arm. But De
Vaux threw himself between the King and the object of his vengeance, and
spoke with the blunt truth of his character, “My liege, this must not
be--here, nor by your hand. It is enough of folly for one night and day
to have entrusted your banner to a Scot. Said I not they were ever fair
and false?” [Such were the terms in which the English used to speak of
their poor northern neighbours, forgetting that their own encroachments
upon the independence of Scotland obliged the weaker nation to defend
themselves by policy as well as force. The disgrace must be divided
between Edward I. and Edward III., who enforced their domination over
a free country, and the Scots, who were compelled to take compulsory
oaths, without any purpose of keeping them.]
“Thou didst, De Vaux; thou wast right, and I confess it,” said Richard.
“I should have known him better--I should have remembered how the fox
William deceived me touching this Crusade.”
“My lord,” said Sir Kenneth, “William of Scotland never deceived; but
circumstances prevented his bringing his forces.”
“Peace, shameless!” said the King; “thou sulliest the name of a prince,
even by speaking it.--And yet, De Vaux, it is strange,” he added, “to
see the bearing of the man. Coward or traitor he must be, yet he abode
the blow of Richard Plantagenet as our arm had been raised to lay
knighthood on his shoulder. Had he shown the slightest sign of fear,
had but a joint trembled or an eyelid quivered, I had shattered his head
like a crystal goblet. But I cannot strike where there is neither fear
nor resistance.”
There was a pause.
“My lord,” said Kenneth--
“Ha!” replied Richard, interrupting him, “hast thou found thy speech?
Ask grace from Heaven, but none from me; for England is dishonoured
through thy fault, and wert thou mine own and only brother, there is no
pardon for thy fault.”
“I speak not to demand grace of mortal man,” said the Scot; “it is in
your Grace's pleasure to give or refuse me time for Christian shrift--if
man denies it, may God grant me the absolution which I would otherwise
ask of His church! But whether I die on the instant, or half an hour
hence, I equally beseech your Grace for one moment's opportunity to
speak that to your royal person which highly concerns your fame as a
Christian king.”
“Say on,” said the King, making no doubt that he was about to hear some
confession concerning the loss of the Banner.
“What I have to speak,” said Sir Kenneth, “touches the royalty of
England, and must be said to no ears but thine own.”
“Begone with yourselves, sirs,” said the King to Neville and De Vaux.
The first obeyed, but the latter would not stir from the King's
presence.
“If you said I was in the right,” replied De Vaux to his sovereign, “I
will be treated as one should be who hath been found to be right--that
is, I will have my own will. I leave you not with this false Scot.”
“How! De Vaux,” said Richard angrily, and stamping slightly, “darest
thou not venture our person with one traitor?”
“It is in vain you frown and stamp, my lord,” said De Vaux; “I venture
not a sick man with a sound one, a naked man with one armed in proof.”
“It matters not,” said the Scottish knight; “I seek no excuse to put off
time. I will speak in presence of the Lord of Gilsland. He is good lord
and true.”
“But half an hour since,” said De Vaux, with a groan, implying a mixture
of sorrow and vexation, “and I had said as much for thee!”
“There is treason around you, King of England,” continued Sir Kenneth.
“It may well be as thou sayest,” replied Richard; “I have a pregnant
example.”
“Treason that will injure thee more deeply than the loss of a hundred
banners in a pitched field. The--the--” Sir Kenneth hesitated, and at
length continued, in a lower tone, “The Lady Edith--”
“Ha!” said the King, drawing himself suddenly into a state of haughty
attention, and fixing his eye firmly on the supposed criminal; “what of
her? what of her? What has she to do with this matter?”
“My lord,” said the Scot, “there is a scheme on foot to disgrace your
royal lineage, by bestowing the hand of the Lady Edith on the
Saracen Soldan, and thereby to purchase a peace most dishonourable to
Christendom, by an alliance most shameful to England.”
This communication had precisely the contrary effect from that which Sir
Kenneth expected. Richard Plantagenet was one of those who, in Iago's
words, would not serve God because it was the devil who bade him; advice
or information often affected him less according to its real import,
than through the tinge which it took from the supposed character and
views of those by whom it was communicated. Unfortunately, the
mention of his relative's name renewed his recollection of what he had
considered as extreme presumption in the Knight of the Leopard, even
when he stood high in the roll of chivalry, but which, in his present
condition, appeared an insult sufficient to drive the fiery monarch into
a frenzy of passion.
“Silence,” he said, “infamous and audacious! By Heaven, I will have
thy tongue torn out with hot pincers, for mentioning the very name of
a noble Christian damsel! Know, degenerate traitor, that I was already
aware to what height thou hadst dared to raise thine eyes, and endured
it, though it were insolence, even when thou hadst cheated us--for thou
art all a deceit--into holding thee as of some name and fame. But now,
with lips blistered with the confession of thine own dishonour--that
thou shouldst NOW dare to name our noble kinswoman as one in whose fate
thou hast part or interest! What is it to thee if she marry Saracen or
Christian? What is it to thee if, in a camp where princes turn cowards
by day and robbers by night--where brave knights turn to paltry
deserters and traitors--what is it, I say, to thee, or any one, if I
should please to ally myself to truth and to valour, in the person of
Saladin?”
“Little to me, indeed, to whom all the world will soon be as nothing,”
answered Sir Kenneth boldly; “but were I now stretched on the rack, I
would tell thee that what I have said is much to thine own conscience
and thine own fame. I tell thee, Sir King, that if thou dost but
in thought entertain the purpose of wedding thy kinswoman, the Lady
Edith--”
“Name her not--and for an instant think not of her,” said the King,
again straining the curtal-axe in his gripe, until the muscles started
above his brawny arm, like cordage formed by the ivy around the limb of
an oak.
“Not name--not think of her!” answered Sir Kenneth, his spirits, stunned
as they were by self-depression, beginning to recover their elasticity
from this species of controversy. “Now, by the Cross, on which I place
my hope, her name shall be the last word in my mouth, her image the last
thought in my mind. Try thy boasted strength on this bare brow, and see
if thou canst prevent my purpose.”
“He will drive me mad!” said Richard, who, in his despite, was once more
staggered in his purpose by the dauntless determination of the criminal.
Ere Thomas of Gilsland could reply, some bustle was heard without,
and the arrival of the Queen was announced from the outer part of the
pavilion.
“Detain her--detain her, Neville,” cried the King; “this is no sight
for women.--Fie, that I have suffered such a paltry traitor to chafe me
thus!--Away with him, De Vaux,” he whispered, “through the back entrance
of our tent; coop him up close, and answer for his safe custody with
your life. And hark ye--he is presently to die--let him have a ghostly
father--we would not kill soul and body. And stay--hark thee--we will
not have him dishonoured--he shall die knightlike, in his belt and
spurs; for if his treachery be as black as hell, his boldness may match
that of the devil himself.”
De Vaux, right glad, if the truth may be guessed, that the scene ended
without Richard's descending to the unkingly act of himself slaying
an unresisting prisoner, made haste to remove Sir Kenneth by a private
issue to a separate tent, where he was disarmed, and put in fetters
for security. De Vaux looked on with a steady and melancholy attention,
while the provost's officers, to whom Sir Kenneth was now committed,
took these severe precautions.
When they were ended, he said solemnly to the unhappy criminal, “It is
King Richard's pleasure that you die undegraded--without mutilation of
your body, or shame to your arms--and that your head be severed from the
trunk by the sword of the executioner.”
“It is kind,” said the knight, in a low and rather submissive tone of
voice, as one who received an unexpected favour; “my family will not
then hear the worst of the tale. Oh, my father--my father!”
This muttered invocation did not escape the blunt but kindly-natured
Englishman, and he brushed the back of his large hand over his rough
features ere he could proceed.
“It is Richard of England's further pleasure,” he said at length, “that
you have speech with a holy man; and I have met on the passage hither
with a Carmelite friar, who may fit you for your passage. He waits
without, until you are in a frame of mind to receive him.”
“Let it be instantly,” said the knight. “In this also Richard is kind. I
cannot be more fit to see the good father at any time than now; for life
and I have taken farewell, as two travellers who have arrived at the
crossway, where their roads separate.”
“It is well,” said De Vaux slowly and solemnly; “for it irks me somewhat
to say that which sums my message. It is King Richard's pleasure that
you prepare for instant death.”
“God's pleasure and the King's be done,” replied the knight patiently.
“I neither contest the justice of the sentence, nor desire delay of the
execution.”
De Vaux began to leave the tent, but very slowly--paused at the door,
and looked back at the Scot, from whose aspect thoughts of the world
seemed banished, as if he was composing himself into deep devotion. The
feelings of the stout English baron were in general none of the most
acute, and yet, on the present occasion, his sympathy overpowered him in
an unusual manner. He came hastily back to the bundle of reeds on which
the captive lay, took one of his fettered hands, and said, with as much
softness as his rough voice was capable of expressing, “Sir Kenneth,
thou art yet young--thou hast a father. My Ralph, whom I left training
his little galloway nag on the banks of the Irthing, may one day attain
thy years, and, but for last night, would to God I saw his youth bear
such promise as thine! Can nothing be said or done in thy behalf?”
“Nothing,” was the melancholy answer. “I have deserted my charge--the
banner entrusted to me is lost. When the headsman and block are
prepared, the head and trunk are ready to part company.”
“Nay, then, God have mercy!” said De Vaux. “Yet would I rather than my
best horse I had taken that watch myself. There is mystery in it,
young man, as a plain man may descry, though he cannot see through
it. Cowardice? Pshaw! No coward ever fought as I have seen thee do.
Treachery? I cannot think traitors die in their treason so calmly. Thou
hast been trained from thy post by some deep guile--some well-devised
stratagem--the cry of some distressed maiden has caught thine ear, or
the laughful look of some merry one has taken thine eye. Never blush for
it; we have all been led aside by such gear. Come, I pray thee, make a
clean conscience of it to me, instead of the priest. Richard is merciful
when his mood is abated. Hast thou nothing to entrust to me?”
The unfortunate knight turned his face from the kind warrior, and
answered, “NOTHING.”
And De Vaux, who had exhausted his topics of persuasion, arose and left
the tent, with folded arms, and in melancholy deeper than he thought
the occasion merited--even angry with himself to find that so simple a
matter as the death of a Scottish man could affect him so nearly.
“Yet,” as he said to himself, “though the rough-footed knaves be
our enemies in Cumberland, in Palestine one almost considers them as
brethren.”