IT was nine o’clock in the morning. The heralds went about everywhere,
shouting aloud, “Lace your helms, brave knights! lace your helms!”
The combatants got ready for the conflict. They examined for the last
time with the greatest care every minute point of their armour, and
made sure that their horses were properly equipped and saddled. These
precautions taken, they hurried off to the lists; the Saracens by the
southern gate, the Christians by the northern.
Charlemagne took his place in the Royal pavilion, with Himiltrude by
his side. Aude placed herself on the throne reserved for the Queen
of Beauty. Oghris laid himself at her feet, surveying the crowd with
wondering eyes.
The benches were crowded. The knights took their places. Trumpet-peal
and shout rent the air. The Emperor was in his place.
The heralds next proclaimed silence, read the conditions of the
tournament, and called on the knights to do their duty, for the honour
of Heaven, the Emperor, and the ladies. Then they called the two
leaders, Christian and Saracen, to take command of their forces.
Garlan the Bearded rode forth, and reviewed his men. Miton did the same,
and advanced into the centre of the lists. His novel style of armour
attracted some attention.
“What is this?” said Charlemagne. “Is Miton out of his senses, or does
he come here to seek certain death? Go instantly, and command him to
quit the lists.”
Ogier the Dane darted forward to convey the Royal command, but was
stopped by Turpin, who had heard Charles’s exclamation.
“Pardon me, sire, for thus suspending the execution of an order you have
given; but Miton is performing a vow. Your Majesty would find it vain to
forbid him the combat. Heaven alone is able to preserve him.” The severe
eye of the bishop met the supplicating looks of Mita, and her eyes
sought the ground.
Aude understood all, and wished to interpose.
“Sire, you will not suffer so brave a knight to be slain----”
Charlemagne shook his head sadly. “I know Miton, and nothing will
prevent him from carrying out his enterprise.”
Then turning towards the suite of the Queen of Beauty, he said--
“I have among you, ladies, a cruel foe, who thus devotes to death one of
my bravest knights. Let us say the prayer for the dead on behalf of the
victim of this relentless beauty.”
All rose, and repeated the supplication in a low voice, Turpin leading
them. The terrified Mita alone had not the power to rise. She sank on
her knees, and would have remained there motionless and overcome, had
not her sister raised her.
In the meantime Miton, ignorant of what was passing, and not even
hearing the shouts of the crowd, or the entreaties of his comrades, who
begged him not to devote himself in this way to destruction--
Miton, gay and proud, to think of the trial he was subjected to, had
made all his dispositions for the combat.
[Illustration: 091]
There were a hundred horsemen in the field--fifty on either side.
Their leaders drew them up in two lines of twenty-five. It was truly an
imposing sight--these brave fellows, clad in their glittering arms; in
firm and compact lines, planted well in their war-saddles. One might
have called them a column of iron. The horses, no less impatient than
their masters, whinnied and pawed the ground.
At last Charlemagne gave the signal.
“Charge!” shouted the heralds.
Scarcely were their voices heard ere the first rank of combatants dashed
forward. The two parties met halfway with an alarming crash. In vain did
the spectators attempt to make out the result of this first onset. They
were obliged to wait till the dust had blown off. The heart of Mita beat
very fast during those few seconds, but at last she beheld her knight
hand-to-hand with Garlan the Bearded. One half of the combatants were
stretched on the earth; some so sorely wounded, that their squires had
to come, raise them, and drag them out of the _mêlée_. Others, however,
got up without aid, and went to seek fresh adversaries.
Priamus had his spear broken, but he had kept his seat in the saddle.
Seeing Girars of Roussillon engaged with Corsablix, a wild chief
from the Atlas, he rushed towards them with uplifted blade. But the
Burgundian knight perceived his approach, and rapidly dashing at his
first opponent, he seized him by the throat, made him do service as a
shield against the blows of the King of Persia, and finally flung him, a
bleeding and mangled corpse, under the feet of the horses. Then, having
but one enemy to deal with, he determined to seize Priamus’s horse, and
made such good use of his feet, nails, and teeth, that in a twinkling
he was in the saddle; while the King of Persia, rolling in the dust,
yielded up his impious soul through twenty gaping wounds.
“Allah Akbar! Allah is great!” cried the Saracens.
“St. Denis, Montjoie! Montjoie!” cried the knights; and, lo! the second
rank flung itself into the conflict.
The blare of trumpets and Saracen horns, the beating of drums and gongs,
drowned the noise of groans and imprecations.
The dead and dying were once more dragged out. The wounded sought
shelter as best they could. Forty warriors yet remained to contest the
field--twenty-five Saracens and fifteen Franks.
For a quarter of an hour Miton and Garlan had fought together, with no
advantage on either side. With his keen blade the Count of Rennes had
cleft the casque of the Alcalde of Valentia, and would have split his
skull open but for the turban, which deadened the blow. Garlan had
hacked in pieces his adversary’s shield, and the corselet of cambric
began to be marbled with streaks of gore. Miton saw that the ranks of
his warriors were thinning, and was anxious to make an end of his foe in
order to hasten to their aid. He closed with him, knee to knee, foot to
foot, and, regardless of the danger to which he exposed himself, seized
Garlan by the gorget of his coat of mail, dragged him from his horse,
and then passing him from his right hand to his left, held the point of
his sword to his throat, and compelled him to yield to his mercy. Then
he sent the miscreant a foot beyond the barriers, and gave his charger
to Thierry, Duke of Ardennes, who had just been unhorsed.
Cha’chaân el Da’djah, Emir of Toledo, entertained the presumptuous idea
of avenging Garlan the Bearded, as if, because he had strangled a few
lions in the desert, ripped up a few elephants, and cut in pieces a
million or so of enemies, he could pretend to hope for, the conquest of
a French knight. He shouted his war-cry, and darted forward to meet
the Count of Rennes, brandishing, as he did so, a huge flail with seven
chains, the same with which Attila armed himself when fighting the
legions of Aétius. But the blow was delivered in empty air--dragged the
Emir forward, and made him lose his balance. Miton took advantage of
this miss to seize Cha’chaân el Da’djah by the leg, and dragged him from
his seat with such violence as to break the saddle, entangle him with
the harness, and throw the horse down on its side. Then the spectators
beheld a strange sight. The Count of Rennes grasped his foeman by the
ankles, rose in his stirrups, and, using the body as a mace, swung it
round his head, dashed into the thick of the fight, and began laying
about right and left at the Saracens with the Emir. Every time this
novel arm fell it encountered some weapon of defence, so that before
long little was left of it but shreds. After a time the mortal
instrument of war lost its weight, and became useless. When Miton flung
it away it had stretched eight Saracens on the plain.
He cast his eye over the field. Marganice, Governor of Carthagena, was
fighting with Roard of Limoges and Itiers of Clermont; Garnaille,
King of Ethiopia, confronted Lambert the Short and Humbert, Count of
Bourges; M’kamat Iladdada, Caliph of Mecca, was showing a bold front
to Riol of Mans, Hoël of Nantes, and Bazin of Geneva. Alis, King of
Morocco, was engaged with Pinabel; while Sangaran, who ruled at the
source of the Niger, Baimalanko, chief of the tribes on the borders
of the Dead Sea--each one of these two blacker than the other--and
Zunizum-Kalakh, King of Garbe, pressed hard on Aimery of Narbonne, who
was, however, giving them two blows for one.
Miton flew to his rescue, and in three minutes, and with twenty strokes
of his sword, had ridded him of his foes. Sangaran and Baimalanko fell
before his arm, and went to rejoin the Evil One whose livery they wore.
“Thanks, I owe you a similar service,” said Aimery to the Count of
Rennes. “I shall have finished with this villain in a few seconds. I am
not afraid of a single encounter, so leave me and go succour Pinabel,
who has scarce blood enough left to keep him alive.”
And, in truth, the nephew of Ganelon was fighting in the dark, for
he was blinded with his own blood. The King of Morocco, who saw a
new foeman coming towards him, determined to abandon the contest with
Pinabel and charge at once on Miton, a manouvre he accomplished so
rapidly that he took the latter by surprise. For four seconds the
Count of Rennes was exposed defenceless to the fury of Alis, and this
unguarded moment cost him a gash which laid open his left arm from
shoulder to elbow, and marked him with a purple chevron on the wrist.
Mita uttered a shriek as if she had received the blow, and hid her face
in her hands.
“See,” said Himiltrude, “what interest the little Mita takes in the
combat, sire. The wound the Count of Rennes has just received makes her
heart bleed.”
“Keep your nonsense to yourself, madam,” said the Emperor, who hated to
be interfered with at the wrong moment. “When men wield the sword,
women should not wag the tongue and he abruptly turned his back on his
consort. In point of fact, it was not a well-chosen time for talking.”
And now Riol of Mans had, with a dexterous back stroke, sent the head
of M’kamat Haddada flying, and this new kind of projectile had struck
Marganice, Governor of Carthagena, in the face, and so confused him that
he neglected to parry a furious blow aimed at him by Itiers of Clermont.
This really excusable oversight cost him his life. One sharp thrust
pinned him to his horse’s crupper like a butterfly on a cork.
[Illustration: 095]
Garnaille also perceived his end approaching. Lambert the Short gave him
no respite.
“It shall never be said,” cried, fiercely, the King of the Ethiopians,
“that I received my death-blow from a Christian hand.” Thereupon,
resting the pommel of his sword on the ground, he flung himself on the
point and expired shouting, “Allah!”
Aimery of Narbonne, a lad of sixteen, seemed to be playing with his
opponent.
“Dog!” exclaimed Zumzum-Ivalakh, “cannot you fight more steadily?”
“I will give you a lesson in politeness,” said Aimery, still smiling.
“First of all, I don’t approve of people addressing me without baring
their heads.” As he spoke, his sword sent the King of Garbe’s helm
flying. It was one of the famous casques of the ancient tribes of
Beni-Ad.
“Bravo, Pagan. Are not you afraid of getting sunburnt?”
A blow of the battle-axe, which shivered the Count of Narbonne’s shield,
was all the answer vouchsafed by Zumzum-Ivalakh.
“Bless me! he’s getting vicious,” said Aimery, without being in the
least put out. “We must teach him to say he’s sorry.”
His sword whirled in the air and smote off the wrist of the King of
Garbe, and so brought the combat to a close.
The King of Morocco alone continued to make resistance. Miton hastened
to dispatch him, for he felt his strength failing him. However, he would
receive aid from no quarter save Heaven. His shield was riven, his left
arm, laid open with a terrible gash, hung powerless by his side, and
every blow he dealt his enemy cost him five in return.
Mita had no eyes for any but the Count of Rennes. She lived with his
life, she suffered for his wounds, and she would have fallen dead had he
perished. How she blamed her cruel commands, and how she hated the King
of Morocco! In truth few men’s deaths have been as fervently prayed for
as his was.
Miton felt a cold sweat seize him; a mournful singing in his ears made
him fancy his end was approaching. He struggled against death, and gave
one last blow at his opponent, then fell senseless under his horse’s
hoofs. That blow was the last the Moorish king received. The sword
pierced his bosom, and the steel remained fast in the wound. He was
immediately seized with the death shudder, flung wide his arms, dropped
his weapons, and uttered so terrible a cry that his frightened steed ran
away at full speed straight ahead until he dashed against the walls
of the lists. His rider rolled in the dust. The King of Morocco was no
more.
Charlemagne sprang up beaming with joy.
“Ogier,” said he to the King of Denmark, “go bring me news of Miton, and
tell him how I prize his valour. I am, moreover, not the only one who
prizes him here, it appears. Well, little one,” he added, turning to
Mita, “you have perilous fancies. For this once all has turned out well,
but you must promise me not to tempt the devil a second time.”
Mita flung herself at the Emperor’s feet, and kissed his hand in
silence. Charlemagne smiled.
“Come,” said he, “rise, Countess of Rennes.”
[Illustration: 096]