HOW GARGANTUA, WITH A BIG TREE, BROKE DOWN A CASTLE AND PASSED THE FORD
OF VEDE.
[Illustration: Initial G.]
Gargantua was a good son if ever there was one. The minute he read his
Father's letter begging him to come home, he ordered his great Mare
to be bridled and saddled. It was less than thirty minutes after this
that he was galloping on the road along with wise old Ponocrates, his
faithful Squire Gymnaste, and the pretty little page Eudemon. This
certainly was not a very strong escort, but Gargantua's single arm was
worth an army.
The servants followed slowly with his baggage, books, and philosophical
instruments.
Having got as far as Parillé, they were told how Picrochole had
taken Roche-Clermaud, and how his men had been robbing and pillaging
everywhere, and had been frightening everybody so much that nobody was
brave enough to tell on them. Another piece of news Gargantua heard at
Parillé. This was that one of Picrochole's fiercest officers, Captain
Tripet, had been sent to take possession of several points near the
Ford of Vede.
"Ho! ho! ho!" cried Gargantua. "Let us ride, then, as fast as we can to
the Ford of Vede."
"No, Prince," said Ponocrates; "what I would advise you to do is to
ride on a few miles farther, to the house of the Lord of Vauguyon. He
is an old friend of your royal Father, and can give us better counsel
than we can get in this place."
"Well, then, so be it," said Gargantua.
The whole party galloped swiftly to Vauguyon, where they were received
with open gates and a steaming supper. After wine had been drunk, and
the Lord of Vauguyon had settled down to talk, Gargantua was told that
all that had been said was true. Picrochole's soldiers were both at
Roche-Clermaud and the Ford of Vede. On hearing this, the Prince would
not wait to sleep, so anxious was he to rush to the help of his good
old Father. The Lord of Vauguyon tried to keep him in the Castle until
after a great storm, which then threatened, was over. It was of no use,
Gargantua would hear nothing.
"To your saddles, gentlemen!" he cried. "It is at the Ford we shall
hunt Picrochole's mannikins!"
[Illustration: GARGANTUA HURRIES HOME.]
Once more mounted on his great Mare he started for the Ford. His lips
were pressed close, and his eyes glared fiercely down from a height
greater than that of the tallest trees. "His Highness is very angry,"
Ponocrates whispered to Gymnaste. (For the first time he was afraid of
his pupil.) "His Highness is awful mad," Gymnaste whispered to Eudemon.
On getting near the Ford, what should Gargantua do but tear up a fine
and stately tree which he found growing by the roadside, stripping its
branches and leaves till he made it a bare pole of enormous length
and strength. "Just what I have been looking for!" he said to himself;
"this tree will serve me both as staff and lance."
All this was being done under a fearful tempest of rain. The storm
had burst, as the Lord of Vauguyon had foreseen. Ponocrates could
hardly sit on his horse, for the heavy drops fell like so much lead;
dainty little Eudemon was quite crushed, and could only keep himself
from falling by clasping his horse's neck; and all Gymnaste could do
to keep his spirits up and his blood warm was, every now and then, to
turn somersaults on the back of his horse, stand on his head, on the
tip of his thumb, and skip from side to side like a monkey. All this
time Gargantua, seated on his great Mare, did not feel the rain any
more than if it was not roaring and hissing around him, filling all the
streams along the road, and making a deluge around the Ford.
[Illustration: GYMNASTE WARMS HIMSELF.]
He was soon to see, however, that if he himself, being a Giant, could
stand this sudden flood, smaller men could not. The first thing he
heard on going a little farther, from some people who were running to
the high grounds for safety, was that the Ford was all swollen, and
that thousands of men had been drowned in it.
He could not understand this,--of course he could not, being a
Giant,--but what he did understand better was what that sly little page
Eudemon, who had galloped ahead to get shelter from the rain, told him.
The news Eudemon brought was that Picrochole's men were in a Castle
this side of the Ford, and that before his master could hope to reach
it he must take the Castle, or they would take him.
[Illustration: THE CASTLE OF ROCHE-CLERMAUD.]
In a little while they came near the Castle. The great, gloomy building
seemed deserted. Not a face was to be seen either from window or
turret. Riding alone to the front of it, Gargantua shouted out at the
top of his voice to those inside:--
"Are you there, or are you not? If you are there, don't stay! If you
are not there, I shall have all this trouble for nothing."
All the answer a bold cannoneer, who had not been seen, and who was
watching behind the ramparts, gave, was, after taking aim point-blank,
to fire his cannon off, the ball furiously striking Gargantua on the
right temple, but for all that not hurting him in the least.
[Illustration: CANNONADING GARGANTUA.]
"What is that?" he shouted. "How, are those fellows throwing
grape-seeds at us? If they are, the harvest will cost them dear,"
thinking that the balls were only grape-seeds.
On hearing his words--they could have been heard a mile off--those in
the Castle rushed pell-mell to the towers and ramparts, and fired
more than nine thousand and twenty-five shots from their falcons and
arquebuses, aiming each shot straight at Gargantua's head, which
towered high above the ramparts. The guns were well pointed, and the
balls hit the Giant so often that they began to bother him.
"Look here, Ponocrates, my friend," he called to Ponocrates, who had
just come up; "these flies are blinding my eyes! Jump down, please, and
get me the biggest branch you can find to drive them away."
All this time, he was fully convinced that the leaden balls and the big
stones hurled from the artillery were so many flies.
[Illustration: GARGANTUA DESTROYS THE CASTLE.]
Giants are always very hard-headed, and sometimes as simple as they are
hard-headed. Ponocrates, who knew better than that, told him what it
was that was falling around him. Then, for the first time, Gargantua
got really mad. He raised his big tree in proper position, and, turning
the head of his Mare well towards the Castle, rushed furiously against
the walls, tearing down all the towers and buttresses, and laying them
in ruins on the ground. Not one of all those in the Castle, who had
been laughing and making Gargantua their target from the ramparts,
escaped. Paying no more attention to the ruins he went on to the
mill-bridge, and found all the Ford, swollen by the rain, covered over
with corpses, and in such number that the dead bodies had actually
caused the water of the mill to stop running. Standing on the bank
the party waited a bit, not at all liking to ride over dead men. That
skipping monkey, Gymnaste, was the first to cross. He loudly swore that
his horse was afraid of nothing, and that at home the beast never could
get his feed without first stepping over a stuffed body, always put for
that purpose in his way.
This satisfied the others, who soon crossed after Gymnaste, and
Gargantua and his great Mare slowly followed, last of all.