William de Warrenne and Gundrada his wife, the daughter of the mighty
Conqueror, were travelling on the Continent and made a pilgrimage to
the famous Abbey of Clairvaux, presided over by the great abbot, poet,
and preacher of the age, Saint Bernard. So much did they admire all
they saw and heard, so sweet was the contrast of monastic peace to
their life of ceaseless turmoil, that they determined to found such a
house of God on their newly-acquired domains in Sussex, after the
fashion of Clairvaux.
Already they had superseded the wooden Saxon church of Saint Pancras,
the boy martyr of ancient Rome, which they found at Lewes, by a stone
building, and now upon its site they began to erect a mightier edifice
by far, upon proportions which would entail the labour of generations.
A wondrous and beautiful priory arose; it covered forty acres, its
church was as big as a cathedral, a magnificent cruciform pile—one
hundred and fifty feet long, sixty-five feet in height from pavement to
roof; there were twenty-four massive pillars in the nave {14}, each
thirty feet in circumference; but it was not until the time of their
grandson, the third earl, that it was dedicated. Nor indeed were its
comely proportions enhanced by the two western towers until the very
date of our tale, nearly two centuries later. Then it lived on in its
beauty, a joy to successive generations, until the vandals of Thomas
Cromwell, trained to devastation, so completely destroyed it in a few
brief weeks that the next generation had almost forgotten its site
{15}.
The first monks were foreigners, by the advice of Lanfranc, and, as a
great favour, Saint Bernard sent three of his own brethren from
Clairvaux, who taught the good people of Lewes to sing “_Jesu dulcis
memoria_.” Loth though we are to confess it, there can be little doubt
that the foreigners were a great advance in learning and piety upon the
monks before the Conquest; the first prior, Lanzo, was conspicuous for
his many virtues and sweet ascetic disposition.
There the bones of the founders were laid to rest beneath the gorgeous
fabric they had founded, and there they had hoped to await the day of
doom and righteous retribution. But alas! poor Normans! in the
sixteenth century old Harry pulled the grand church down above their
heads; in the nineteenth the navvies, making the railroad, disinterred
their bones. But they respected the dead, the names William and
Gundrada were upon the coffins which their profane mattocks unearthed,
and the reader may see them at Southover Church.
In the freshness of a May morning Hubert and his new uncle, Sir
Nicholas Harengod, dismounted at the gate of the priory, having left
their train at the hostelry up in the town.
“Canst thou tell us whether the brother of Saint John, Roger erst of
Walderne, is tarrying within?”
“Certes he is, but just now he heareth the Chapter Mass—few services or
offices doth he miss, and like Saint James of old, his knees are worn
as hard as the knees of camels.”
“We would fain see him—here is his son.”
“By our lady, not to mention Saint Pancras, a well-favoured stripling.
And thou?”
“I am Sir Nicholas of Walderne,” said he of that query, with some
importance, which was quite lost upon the janitor.
“Walderne! Some place in the woods may be. Well, get you, worshipful
sirs, to the hospitium, where we feed all hungry folk at the hour of
noon, and I will strive to find the good brother.”
The splendid group of buildings, of which only a few half-demolished
walls remain, rose before them, on each side of the great quadrangle
which they now entered; the chapter house, where the brethren met for
counsel; the refectory, where they fed; the dormitory, where they
slept; the scriptory, where they copied those beautiful manuscripts
which antiquarians love to obtain; the infirmary, where the sick were
tended; and lastly, the hospitium or guest house, where all travellers
and pilgrims were welcome.
They entered the hospitium, where the noontide meal was about to be
served. It was plain but ample; solid joints, huge loaves, ale, and
even wine in moderation. Some twenty sat down to the hospitable board.
During the “noon meat” a homily was read. When the meal was over a lay
brother came and beckoned Sir Nicholas and Hubert to follow him. He led
them to the cloisters and knocked at the door of a cell.
“Come in,” said a deep voice.
Could this be the father Hubert had so longed to know, clad in a long
dark dress, with haggard and worn features, which, however, still
preserved their native nobility?
At the sight of his visitors he showed an emotion he vainly endeavoured
to repress, under an affectation of self control. He greeted Sir
Nicholas kindly, but embraced his fair son, while tears he could not
repress streamed down his worn cheeks.
“This is then my Hubert. Ah, how like thy short-lived mother! She lives
again in thee, my boy.”
“But, my father, I trust thy courage and valour have descended to me
also. They do not call me girlish at Kenilworth.”
“Such as I have to bequeath is, I trust, thine. Thy mother came of a
race more addicted to lute and harp than sword or spear. It was the
worse for them in their dire need, when the stern father of him who
shelters thee harried their land with fire and sword.
“But we waste time. Sit down and let the eyes of the father, weary of
the world, gaze upon the boy in whom he lives again.”
For a few moments there was silence, during which Roger seemed
struggling to overcome an emotion which overpowered him.
“I was thinking of the sunny land of Provence, and was there again with
one dearly loved, who was only spared to me a few short months. She
died in giving thee birth, my Hubert; had she lived, I had not become
the wreck I am.
“So thou desirest to go forth into the world, my son?”
“As thou didst also, my father.”
“But I trust under other auspices. Tell me not of my giddy youth.
Dearly did I pay the price of youthful folly and unseemly strife. Thou,
too, my boy, must buy experience; God grant more cheaply than I bought
mine.”
There he shuddered.
“My boy, hast thou ever wished to be a warrior of the Cross—a
crusader?”
“Often, oh how often. In that way I would fain serve God.”
The monk soldier smiled.
“And how wouldst thou attempt to convert the infidel?”
“At the first blasphemy he uttered I would cut him down, cleave him to
the chine.”
“Such our knights generally hold to be the better way, for their arms
were readier than their tongues, but I never heard that they saved the
souls of the heathen thereby.”
“No one wants to see them in heaven, I should think. Let them go to
their own place.”
“It is wrong, I know it is. It must be. There is a better way—come with
me, boy, I would fain show thee something.”
He led the wondering boy into the garden of the monastery. There in the
centre arose an artificial mount, and upon it stood a cross—the figure
of the Redeemer, bending, as in death, from the rood. It was called
“The Calvary,” and men came there to pray.
The father bent his knee—the son did the same.
“Now, my boy, whom did He die for but His enemies? Even for His
murderers He cried, ‘Father, forgive them!’ And you would fain slay
them.”
Hubert was silent.
“When thou art struck—”
“No one ever struck me without getting it back, at least no boy of my
own age,” interrupted Hubert.
“And He said, ‘When thou art smitten on one cheek, turn the other to
the smiter.’”
“But, my father, must we all be like that? I am sure I couldn’t be that
sort of Christian; even the good earl Simon is not, nor Martin either.
Perhaps the chaplain is—do you think so?”
“Who is Martin?”
“The best boy I know, but I have seen him fight.”
“Well, and thou may’st fight nay, must, as the world goes, in a good
cause, and there is a sword which thou must bear unsullied through the
conflict. But if thou avengest thine own private wrongs, as I did, or
bearest rancour against thy personal foes, never wilt thou deliver me.”
“Deliver thee?”
“Yes, my child. I am under a curse, because on the very day of the
great sacrifice on the Cross, on a Friday, I slew a man who had
insulted me. He died unhouselled, unanointed, unannealed, and his ghost
ever haunts my midnight hour.”
“Even here, in this holy, consecrated place?”
“Even in the very church itself.”
“Can any one else see it?”
“They have never done so. Perhaps as thou art of my blood, it might be
permitted thee.”
“I will try. Let me stay this night with thee, and watch by thy side in
the church.”
“Thou shalt be blessed in the deed. I will ask Sir Nicholas to tarry
the night if he can do so.”
“Or I might ride back alone tomorrow.”
“The forest is dangerous; the outlaws abound.”
“That for the outlaws, _hujus facio_;” and Hubert snapped his fingers.
It was about the only scrap of Latin he cared for.
The father smiled sadly.
“Come, we are keeping Sir Nicholas waiting;” and they returned to the
great quadrangle, where they found that worthy striding up and down
with some impatience.
“We must be off at once, brother, Hubert and I. The woods are not over
safe after nightfall.”
“I must ask thee to spare me my son a while. I would fain make his
further acquaintance.”
“Come back with us to Walderne, then. The lad would soon die of the
gloom of a monastery.”
“I spent four years in one, and the earl found me alive at the end,”
said Hubert.
“Nay, my brother, I may not leave the priory now.”
“But how long wilt thou keep the boy?”
“Only till tomorrow.”
“Well, I may tarry till tomorrow, but not at the monastery. My old
crony, the De Warrenne up at the castle, will lodge me, and I will
return for the lad after the Chapter Mass, at nine.”
Of all forms of architecture the Norman appears to the writer the most
awe inspiring. Its massive round pillars, its bold, but simple arch,
have an effect upon the mind more imposing and solemnising, if we may
coin the word, than the more florid architecture of the decorated
period, which may aptly be described as “Gothic run to seed.” Such a
stern and simple structure was the earlier priory church of Lewes, in
the days of which we write.
A little before midnight two forms entered the south transept by a
little wicket door. There was a black darkness over the heavens that
night, and a high wind moaned and shrieked about the upper turrets of
the stately fane. Oh, how solemn was the inner aspect at that dread
hour, lighted only by the seven lamps, which, typical of the Seven
Spirits of God, burned in the choir, pendent from the roof.
One timorous glance Hubert gave into the dark recesses of the aisles
and transept, into the dim space overhead, as if he almost expected to
hear the flapping of ghostly pinions in the portentous gloom. A sense
of mystery daunted his spirit as he followed his sire by the light of a
feeble lamp, carried in the hand, amidst the tall columns which rose
like tree trunks around, each shaft appearing to rise farther than the
sight could penetrate, ere it gave birth to the arch from its summit.
Dead crusaders lay around in stone, and strove with grim visage to draw
the sword and smite the worshippers of Mohammed, as if in the very act
they had been petrified by a new Gorgon’s head. The steps of the
intruders seemed sacrilegious, breaking the solemn stillness of the
night as the father led the son into the chapel of the patron saint of
his order:
Who propped the Virgin in her faint,
The loved Apostle John.
There the horror-stricken Hubert heard the dismal tale which we have
already related, and that his unhappy father believed himself yet
visited each night by the ghost of the man he had slain. And also that
it was fixed in his poor diseased brain that the apparition would not
rest until the crusade, vowed by the Sieur de Fievrault, but cut short
by his fall, should be made by proxy, and that the proxy must be one
_sans peur et sans reproche_. And that this reparation made, the poor
spirit, according to the belief of the age, released from purgatorial
fires, might enter Paradise and reappear no more between the hours of
midnight and cock crowing to trouble the living.
“What an absurd story,” the sceptic may say. No doubt it is to us, but
a man must live in his own age, and there was nought absurd or
improbable to young Hubert in it all.
And when the weird tale was finished, and the hour of midnight tolled
boom! boom! boom! from the tower above, every stroke sent a thrill
through the heart of the youth. That dread hour, when, as men thought,
the powers of darkness had the world to themselves, when a thousand
ghosts shrieked on the hollow wind, when midnight hags swept through
the tainted air, and goblins gibbered in sepulchres.
Just then Hubert caught his father’s glance, and it made each separate
hair erect itself:
Like quills upon the fretful porcupine.
“Father,” cried the boy, “what art thou gazing at? what aileth thee? I
see nought amiss.”
Words came from the father’s lips, not in reply to his son, but as if
to some object unseen by all besides.
“Yes, unhappy ghost, I may dare thy livid terrors now. My son, thy
proxy, is by my side, pure and shameless, brave and trustworthy. He
shall carry thy sword to the holy soil and dye it ‘deep in Paynim
blood.’ Then thou and I may rest in peace.”
“Father, I see nought.”
“Not there, between those pillars?”
“What is it?”
“A dead man, with a sword wound in his open breast, which he displays.
His eyes live, yea, and the wound lives.”
“No, father, there is nothing.”
“Then go and stand between those pillars, and prove it to me to be
void.”
Hubert hesitated. He would sooner have fought a hundred boyish battles
with fist, quarterstaff, or even deadly weapons—but this—
“Ah, thou darest not. Nay, I blame thee not, yet thou didst say there
was nothing.”
Hubert could not resist that pleading tone in which the sire seemed to
ask release from his own delusion. He went with determined step, and
stood on the indicated spot.
“He is gone. He fled before thee. The omen is good. Thou shalt deliver
thy sire—let us pray together.”
Sire and son knelt until the first note of the matin song just before
daybreak (it was the month of May) broke the utterance of the father
and, we fear we must own it, the sleep of the son.
_Domine labia mea aperies
Et os meum annuntiabit laudem Tuam_.
The sombre-robed monks were in the choir, the organ rolling out its
deep notes in accompaniment to the plain song of the _Venite
exultemus_, which then, as now, preceded the psalms for the day. Then
came the hymn:
Lo night and clouds and darkness wrap
The world in dark array;
The morning dawns, the sun breaks in,
Hence, hence, ye shades—away {16}!
“Come, Hubert, dear son, worthy of thy sainted mother. We will praise
Him, too, for He has lifted the darkness from my heart.”