hostile cities, while the highway between Pavia and Cremona rang with the
war-cries of the partisans of Otho, the Guelf. So, secretly, and at
midnight, the Pavian escort rode with the boy out through their city
gates, and moved cautiously along the valley of the Po, to where, at the
ford of the Lambro, the knights of Cremona waited in the dark of an early
Sunday morning to receive their precious charge. And none too soon did
they reach the ford; for, scarcely was the young emperor spurring on
toward Cremona, when the Milanese troops, in hot pursuit, dashed down upon
the returning Pavian escort, and routed it with great loss. But the boy
rode on unharmed; and soon Cremona, since famous for its wonderful
violins, hailed the young adventurer, so says the record, "as if he were
an angel of the Lord."
From Cremona on to Mantua, and then on to Verona, the boy was passed along
by friendly hands and vigilant escorts, until straight before him the
mighty wall of the Alps rose, as if to bar his further progress. But
through the great hill-rifts stretched the fair valley of the Adige; and
from Verona, city of palaces, to red-walled Trent, the boy and his
Veronese escort hurried on along the banks of the swift-flowing river.
Midway between the two cities, his escort turned back; and with but a
handful of followers the young monarch demanded admittance at the gates of
the old Roman town, which, overhung by great Alpine precipices, guards the
southern entrance to the Tyrol. Trent received him hesitatingly; and,
installed in the bishop's palace, he and his little band sought fair
escort up the valley and over the Brenner pass, the highway into Germany.
But now came dreary news.
"My lord King," said the wavering Bishop of Trent, undecided which side to
favor, "'t is death for you to cross the Brenner. From Innspruck down to
Botzen the troops of Otho of Brunswick line the mountain ways, and the
Guelf himself, so say my coursermen, is speeding on to trap your
Mightiness within the walls of Trent."
Here was a dilemma. But trouble, which comes to "Mightinesses," as well as
to untitled boys and girls, must be boldly faced before it can be
overcome.
"My Liege," said the Knight of Suabia, stout Anselm von Justingen, "before
you lie the empire and renown; behind you Italy and defeat. Which shall it
be?"
"The empire or death!" said the resolute boy.
"But Otho guards the Brenner pass, my lords," said the bishop.
"Is there none other road but this?" asked Frederick.
"None," replied Von Justingen, "save, indeed, the hunter's track across
the western mountains to the Grisons and St. Gall. But it is beset with
perils and deep with ice and snow."
"The greater the dangers faced, the greater the glory gained," said plucky
young Frederick. "Now, who will follow me, come danger or come death,
across the mountains yonder to the empire and to fortune?" and every man
of his stout little company vowed to follow him, and to stand by their
young master, the Emperor-elect.
So it was that, in the first months of the early fall, with a meagre train
of forty knights, the boy emperor boldly climbed the rugged Alpine
slopes, mounting higher and higher, and braving the dangers of glacier and
avalanche, blind paths and storm and cold, pressed manfully on toward the
peril of an uncertain empire.
But though the risk was great, no one was merrier than he. His inseparable
falcon flew at many a quarry, and his hunting-horn echoed gayly from cliff
to cliff. And when a mighty _urus_, almost the last of the great Alpine
elks, fell beneath his spear, a shout of joy went up, as German and
Italian knights hailed him as a worthy successor of the greatest of
Hohenstaufen huntsmen, his grandfather Barbarossa, the old Kaiser Red
Beard.
Thus, in much peril, but safely and swiftly, the Alpine heights were
crossed, and down the rugged slopes the travel-worn band descended to the
valley of the Plessaur and the quaint old town of Coire. Coming all
unannounced into the little town, the fair face and frank ways of the boy
captivated the good Bishop of Coire, whose word was law in that mountain
land. Still they pushed on, and, winding along the fair valley of the
Rhine, struck across the hills toward the queer old abbey-town of St.
Gall; and, with only sixty knights and a few spearmen of Appenzell, the
young monarch climbed the steps of the Ruppen, the last of the Alpine
passes that had separated him from the land of his forefathers.
But now comes the word that Otho and his knights, hurrying around from
Bregenz, are on the track of the boy, and certain of his capture. On
through St. Gall and along the gleaming lake-side the young emperor
hurries, and, riding down the last of the Alpine slopes, he sees in the
distance the walls of the strong old city of Constance glittering in the
sun.
"Ride ye forward, my lords," said the sturdy Von Justingen to the Bishop
of Coire and the Abbot of St. Gall, who rode with the king. "Gain ye due
welcome for the emperor. For if the Bishop of Constance waver in his
allegiance, and we may not win fair entrance into Constance town, we are
lost indeed," and accompanied by the Archbishop of Bari and ten trusty
knights the two mountain prelates rode on ahead.
Soon a messenger who has been sent forward comes spurring back. "Haste ye,
my Liege!" he cries. "Otho is already in sight; his pennons have been seen
by the look-out on the city towers."
The hurrying hoofs of the royal train clatter over the drawbridge and
through the great gate. Constance is won! but, hard behind, a cloud of
dust marks the swift approach of young Frederick's laggard rival, Otho,
the Guelf.
His herald's trumpet sounds a summons, and the still hesitating Bishop of
Constance with the Archbishop of Bari and the Abbot of St. Gall, backed by
the spearmen of the city band, stand forward on the walls.
"What ho, there, warders of the gate!" came the summons of the herald;
"open, open ye the gates of Constance to your master and lord, Otho the
Emperor!"
The thronging spear-tips and the swaying crests of Otho's two hundred
knights flashed in the sun, and the giant form of the big Brunswicker
strode out before his following. The sight of his dreaded master almost
awed the Bishop of Constance into submission, but the voice of young
Frederick's stanch friend and comrade, Berard, Archbishop of Bari, rang
out clear and quick.
"Tell thy master, Otho of Brunswick," he said, "that Constance gates open
only at the bidding of their rightful lord, Frederick of Hohenstaufen,
Emperor of the Romans and King of Sicily. And say thou, too, O herald,
that I, Berard, Archbishop of Bari, and Legate of our lord the Pope, do at
his command now cut off and excommunicate Otho of Brunswick from the
fellowship of all true men and the protection of the Church!"
Otho, deeply enraged at this refusal and denunciation, spurred furiously
forward, and his knights laid spears in rest to follow their leader; but
the words of excommunication decided the wavering Bishop of Constance to
side with the boy sovereign, and he commanded hastily: "Ho, warders; up
drawbridge--quick!"
The great chains clanked and tightened, the heavy drawbridge rose in air,
and Otho of Brunswick saw the portcullised gate of Constance drop heavily
before his very eyes, and knew that his cause was lost.
By just so narrow a chance did young Frederick of Hohenstaufen win his
empire.
And now it was won indeed. From every part of Germany came princes,
nobles, and knights flocking to the imperial standard. Otho retired to his
stronghold in Brunswick; and on the fifth of December, 1212, in the old
Roemer, or council-house, of Frankfort, five thousand knights with the
electors of Germany welcomed the "Boy from Sicily." Four days after, in
the great cathedral of Mayence, the pointed arches and rounded dome of
which rose high above the storied Rhine, the sad little prince of but five
years back was solemnly crowned in presence of a glittering throng, which
with cheers of welcome hailed him as Emperor supreme.
And here we leave him. Only seventeen, Frederick of Hohenstaufen--the
beggar prince, the friendless orphan of Palermo, after trials and dangers
and triumphs stranger than those of any prince of fairy tales or "Arabian
Nights"--entered upon a career of empire that has placed him in history as
"one of the most remarkable figures of the Middle Ages."
Schooled by the hardships and troubles of his unhappy childhood, the poor
little "Child of Apulia" developed into a courageous and energetic youth,
and into a man of power and action and imperial renown. Years passed away,
and, on the thirteenth of December, 1250, he died at his hunting-lodge of
Firenzuola, in his loved Apulian kingdom. A gray old man stood beside the
dying monarch's bed--Berard, Archbishop of Palermo and Bari, the only
survivor of that dauntless band which, nearly forty years before, had
crossed the trackless Alps determined to win Germany or die. The "Boy
from Sicily," who had started upon the "quest for his heritage" unheralded
and almost unknown, died the most powerful monarch of his day in all the
Christian world, unsurpassed in outward splendor, the possessor of six
royal crowns--Germany, Burgundy, Lombardy, Sicily, Jerusalem, and the Holy
Roman Empire.
A man of magnificent gifts--a great scholar, a far-seeing statesman and
law-maker, a valiant and victorious Crusader, a mighty Emperor, but with
all the weaknesses and cruel ways that marked the monarchs of those hard
old days--this story of his remarkable and romantic boyhood comes down to
us as a lesson of triumph over obstacles, showing us, as do so many nobler
lives than his, how out of distress and trouble and actual hardships, any
boy of energy and spirit may rise to eminence and lofty achievement. The
age is passed when kings and princes rise so far above their fellow-men.
All may be kings and princes in their special callings if they but have
persistent and unflinching determination, and the boy of to-day has it in
his power to become, even as did young Frederick of Hohenstaufen, the Boy
Emperor, something great in his day and generation--perhaps even be
acknowledged, as was he, though from far higher motives, _Stupor Mundi
Fredericus_--"Frederick the Wonder of the World!"
FOOTNOTES:
[O] _El Aaziz_, an Arabic phrase for "the excellent" or "most noble one."
[P] Apulia--Southern Italy.
[Q] The _Sirocco_ is a fierce south-easterly wind of Sicily and the
Mediterranean.
[Illustration]
VII.
HARRY OF MONMOUTH: THE BOY GENERAL.
(_Afterward King Henry the Fifth of England._)
[A.D. 1402.]
A tapestried chamber in the gray old pile known as Berkhampstead Castle.
The bright sunlight of an early English spring streaming through the
latticed window plays upon the golden head of a fair young maid of ten,
who, in a quaint costume of gold-striped taffeta and crimson velvet, looks
in evident dismay upon the antics of three merry boys circling around her,
as she sits in a carved and high-backed oaken chair. In trim suits of
crimson, green, and russet velvet, with curious hanging sleeves and long,
pointed shoes, they range themselves before the trembling little maiden,
while the eldest lad, a handsome, lithe, and active young fellow of
fourteen, sings in lively and rollicking strain:
"Oh, I am King Erik of Denmark,
_Tarran, tarran, tarra_!
Oh, I am King Erik of Denmark,
_Tarran, tarran, tarra_!
Oh, I am King Erik of Denmark shore--
A frosty and crusty old Blunderbore--
With ships and knights a-sailing o'er,
To carry Philippa to Elsinore!"
And then with a rousing shout the three boys swooped down upon the
beleaguered little damsel and dragged her off to the dim stone staircase
that led to the square tower of the keep.
"Have done, have done, Harry," pleaded the little girl as she escaped from
her captors. "Master Lionel, thou surely shouldst defend a princess in
distress."
"Ay, Princess, but our tutor, Master Rothwell, says that I am to obey my
Liege and Prince, and him alone," protested gay young Lionel, "and sure he
bade me play the trumpeter of King Erik."
"A plague on King Erik," cried Philippa, seeking refuge behind the
high-backed chair. "I wish I had ne'er heard of him and his kingdom of
Denmark. O Harry! nurse Joanna tells me that they do eat but frozen
turnips and salted beef in his dreadful country, and that the
queen-mother, Margaret, wears a gambison[R] and hauberk[S] like to a
belted knight."
"Why, of course she does," assented the mischievous Harry; and, drawing a
solemn face he added: "Yes--and she eats a little girl, boiled with
lentils, every saint's day as a penance. That's why they want an English
wife for Erik, for, seest thou, there are so many saints' days that there
are not left in Denmark wee damsels enough for the queen's penance."
But the sight of pretty Philippa's woful tears stayed her brother's
teasing.
"There, there," he said, soothingly; "never mind my fun, Philippa. This
Erik is not so bad a knight I'll warrant me, and when thou art Queen of
Denmark, why, I shall be King of England, and my trumpeter, Sir Lionel
here, shall sound a gallant defiance as I come
"'Sailing the sea to Denmark shore
With squires and bowmen a hundred score,
If ever this frosty old Blunderbore
Foul treateth Philippa at Elsinore,'
and thus will we gallop away with the rescued queen," he added, as seizing
Philippa in his arms he dashed around the room followed by his companions.
But while the four were celebrating, in a wild dance of "all hands
around," the fancied rescue of the misused queen, the tapestry parted and
Sir Hugh de Waterton, the governor of the king's children, entered.
"My lord Prince," he said, "the king thy father craves thy presence in the
council-room."
"So; I am summoned," said the Prince; "good Sir Hugh, I will to the king
at once. That means 'good-by,' Sis; for to-morrow I am off to the Welsh
wars to dance with the lords-marchers and Owen Glendower, to a far
different strain. Yield not to these leaguering Danes, Philippa, but if
thou dost, when I am back from the Welsh wars, I'll hie me over sea
"'With golden nobles in goodly store
To ransom Philippa at Elsinore,'"
and, kissing his sister fondly, Harry of Monmouth, Prince of Wales,
parted the heavy arras and descended to the council-room.
* * * * *
And now the scene changes. Months have passed since that jolly romp in the
old castle, among the hills of Hertfordshire, and under a wet and angry
sky we stand within the king's tent, glad to escape from the driving
storm.
To young Lionel Langley, as he peeped through the outer curtains of the
tent and watched the floods of rain, it seemed as if all the mountains in
the shires of Brecon and Radnor had turned themselves into water-spouts to
drench and drown the camp of the English invaders, as it lay soaked and
shivering there in the marches[T] of Wales. King Henry's tent, we learn
from an old chronicle, was "picchid on a fayre playne," but Lionel thought
it any thing but fair as he turned from the dismal prospect.
"Rain, rain, rain," he grumbled, throwing himself down by the side of
stout Humfrey Wallys, archer in the king's guard; "why doth it always rain
in this fateful country? Why can it not blow over? Why,--why must we stay
cooped up under these soaking tent-tops, with ne'er a sight of fun or
fighting?"
"Ah, why, why, why?" said the good-natured archer, "'t is ever why? with
thee, Sir Questioner. But, if thou be riddling, ask us something easier.
Why doth a cow lie down? Why is it fool's fun to give alms to a blind man?
How many calves' tails doth it take to reach to the moon?"
"H'm," grunted Lionel, "thy riddles be as stale as Michaelmas mutton. I
can answer them all."
"So--canst thou, young shuttle-brain?" cried the archer, "then, by the
mass, thou shalt. Answer now, answer," he demanded, as he tripped up young
Lionel's feet and pinned him to the ground with a pikestaff, "answer, or I
will wash thy knowing face in my sack-leavings. Why doth a cow lie down?"
"Faith, because she cannot sit," lazily answered Lionel.
"Hear the lad! He doth know it, really. Well--why is it not wise to give
alms to a blind man?" demanded Humfrey.
"Because," responded the boy, "even if thou didst, he would be glad could
he see thee hanged--as would I also!"
"Thou young knave! Now--how many calves' tails will it take to reach the
moon?"
"O Humfrey, ease up thy pikestaff, man; I can barely fetch my breath--how
many? Why, one,--if it be long enough," and, wriggling from his captor,
the nimble Lionel tripped him up in turn, and, in sheer delight at his
discomfiture, turned a back somersault and landed almost on the toes of
two unhelmeted knights, who came from the inner pavilion of the royal
tent.
"Why, how now, young tumble-foot--dost thou take this for a mummer's
booth, that thou dost play thy pranks so closely to thy betters?" a quick
voice demanded, and in much shame and confusion Lionel withdrew himself
hastily from the royal feet of his "most dread sovereign and lord," King
Henry the Fourth, of England.
"Pardon, my Liege," he stammered, "I did but think to stretch my stiffened
legs."
"So; thou art tent-weary, too," said the king; and then asked: "And where
learn'dst thou that hand-spring?"
"So please your Majesty, from my lord Prince," the boy replied.
"Ay, that thou didst, I'll warrant me," said the king, good-humoredly. "In
aught of prank or play, or tumbler's trick, 't is safe to look to young
Harry of Monmouth as our pages' sponsor. But where lags the lad, think
you, my lord?" he asked, turning to his companion, the Earl of
Westmoreland. "We should, methinks, have had post from him ere this."
"'T is this fearful weather stays the news, your Majesty," replied the
earl. "No courserman could pass the Berwyn and Plinlimmon hills in so wild
a storm."
"Ay, wild indeed," said the king, peering out through the parted curtains.
"I am fain almost to believe these men of Wales, who vaunt that the false
Glendower is a black necromancer who can call to his aid the dread demons
of the air. Hark to that blast," he added, as a great gust of wind shook
the royal tent. "'T is like a knight's defiance, and, like true knights,
let us answer it. Hollo, young Lionel, be thou warder of thy king, and
sound an answering blast."
Lionel, who was blest with the strong lungs of healthy boyhood, grasped
the trumpet, and a defiant peal rang through the royal tent. But it was an
unequal contest, for instantly, as chronicles old Capgrave, "there blew
suddenly so much wynd, and so impetuous, with a gret rain, that the Kyng's
tent was felled, and a spere cast so violently, that, an the Kyng had not
been armed, he had been ded of the strok."
From all sides came the rush of help, and the king and his attendants were
soon rescued, unharmed from the fallen pavilion. But Humfrey, the stout
old archer, muttered, as he rubbed his well-thumped pate: "Good sooth, 't
is, truly, the art magic of Glendower himself. It payeth not to trifle
with malignant spirits. Give me to front an honest foe, and not these
hidden demons of the air."
As if satisfied with its victory over a mortal king, the fury of the storm
abated, and that afternoon Lionel entered the royal presence with the
announcement: "Tidings, my lord King; tidings from the noble Prince of
Wales! a courier waits without."
"Bid him enter," said the king, and, all bespattered and dripping from his
ride through the tempest, the courier entered and, dropping on his knee,
presented the king a writing from the prince.
"At last!" said Henry, as he hastily scanned the note; "a rift in these
gloomy clouds. Break we our camp, my lord Westmoreland, and back to
Hereford town. We do but spend our strength to little use awaiting a wily
foe in these flooded plains. This billet tells me that Sir Harry Percy
and my lord of Worcester, with our son the Prince, have cooped up the
rebels in the Castle of Conway, and that Glendower himself is in the
Snowdon Hills. As for thee, young Sir Harlequin," he added, turning to
Lionel, "if thou wouldst try thy mettle in other ways than in tumbler's
tricks and in defiance of the wind, thou mayst go with Sir Walter Blount
to thy tutor, the Prince, and the Welsh wars in the north."
Next day, the camp was broken up, and, in high spirits, Lionel, with the
small company of knights and archers detached for service in the north,
left the southern marches for the camp of the prince.
It was the year of grace 1402. Henry of Lancaster, usurping the crown and
power of the unfortunate King Richard II., ruled now as Henry IV., "by the
grace of God, King of England and of France and Lord of Ireland." But
"uneasy lies the head that wears a crown," and, king though he was--"Most
Excellent, Most Dread, and Most Sovereign Lord," as his subjects addressed
him--he was lord and sovereign over a troubled and distracted realm.
Scotland, thronging the Lowlands, poured her bonnets and pikes across the
northern border; France, an ever-watchful enemy, menaced the slender
possessions in Calais and Aquitaine; traitors at home plotted against the
life of the king; and the men of Wales, rallying to the standard of their
countryman, Owen Glendower, who styled himself the Prince of Wales, forced
the English to unequal and disadvantageous battle among their hills and
valleys. So the journey of Lionel to the north was a careful and cautious
one; and, constantly on their guard against ambushes, surprises, and
sudden assaults, the little band of archers and men-at-arms among whom he
rode pushed their watchful way toward the Vale of Conway. They were just
skirting the easterly base of the Snowdon Hills, where, three thousand
feet above them, the rugged mountain peaks look down upon the broad and
beautiful Vale of Conway, when a noise of crackling branches ahead
startled the wary archer, Wallys, and he said to Lionel:
"Look to thine arms, lad; there may be danger here. But no," he added, as
the "view halloo" of the hunters rose in air, "'t is but the merry chase.
Hold here, and let us see the sport."
Almost as he spoke, there burst from the thicket, not a hundred yards
away, a splendid red deer, whose spreading antlers proclaimed him to be a
"stag of twelve" or "stag-royal." Fast after him dashed the excited
hunters; but, leading them all, spurred a sturdy young fellow of eager
fifteen--tall and slender, but quick and active in every movement, as he
yielded himself to the free action of his horse and cheered on the hounds.
The excitement was contagious, and Lionel, spite of the caution of his
friend the archer, could not restrain himself. His "view halloo" was
shouted with boyish impetuosity as, fast at the heels of the other young
hunter, he spurred his willing horse. But now the deer turned to the right
and made for a distant thicket, and Lionel saw the young hunter spring
from his lagging steed, and, with a stout cord reeled around his arm, dash
after the stag afoot, while hounds and hunters panted far behind.
It was a splendid race of boy and beast. The lad's quick feet seemed
scarcely to touch the ground, every spring bringing him nearer and nearer
to his noble prey. There is a final spurt; the coil of cord flies from the
hunter's arm, as his quick fling sends it straight in air; the noose
settles over the broad antlers of the buck; the youth draws back with a
sudden but steady jerk, and the defeated deer drops to earth, a doomed and
panting captive.
"There is but one lad in all England can do that!" cried enthusiastic
Lionel, as with a loud huzza, he spurred toward the spot so as to be "in
at the death."
"Lend me thy knife, page," the boy hunter demanded, as Lionel sprang from
his horse, "mine I think hath leaped from my belt into yonder pool."
Flash! gleamed the sharp steel in air; deep to the hilt it plunged into
the victim's throat, and, kneeling on the body of the dying stag, Harry of
Monmouth, Prince of Wales, the fleetest and most fearless of England's
youthful hunters, looked up into Lionel's admiring face.
"Hey O!" he cried. "Sure, 't is Lionel Langley! Why, how far'st thou, lad,
and how cam'st thou here?"
"I come, my Lord," Lionel replied, "with Sir Walter Blount's following of
squires and archers, whom his Majesty, the King, hath sent to thy
succour."
"You are right welcome all," said Prince Harry, "and you come in good
stead, for sure we need your aid. But wind this horn of mine, Lionel, and
call in the hunt." And as Lionel's notes sounded loud and clear, the rest
of the chase galloped up, and soon the combined trains rode on to the
English camp in the Vale of Conway.