THE ALTAR OF PEACE
NO one could bear to waken the young Baron till the sun had risen high
enough to fall on his face and unclose his eyes.
“Mother” (ever his first word), “you have let me sleep too long.”
“Thou didst wake too long, I fear me.”
“I hoped you knew it not. Yes, my wound throbbed sore, and the wonders
of the day whirled round my brain like the wild huntsman’s chase.”
“And, cruel boy, thou didst not call to me.”
“What, with such a yesterday, and such a morrow for you? while, chance
what may, I can but lie still. I thought I must call, if I were still so
wretched, when the last moonbeam faded; but, behold, sleep came, and
therewith my Friedel sat by me, and has sung songs of peace ever since.”
“And hath lulled thee to content, dear son?”
“Content as the echo of his voice and the fulfilment of his hope can make
me,” said Ebbo.
And so Christina made her son ready for the day’s solemnities, arraying
him in a fine holland shirt with exquisite broidery of her own on the
collar and sleeves, and carefully disposing his long glossy, dark brown
hair so as to fall on his shoulders as he lay propped up by cushions.
She would have thrown his crimson mantle round him, but he repelled it
indignantly. “Gay braveries for me, while my Friedel is not yet in his
resting-place? Here—the black velvet cloak.”
“Alas, Ebbo! it makes thee look more of a corpse than a bridegroom. Thou
wilt scare thy poor little spouse. Ah! it was not thus I had fancied
myself decking thee for thy wedding.”
“Poor little one!” said Ebbo. “If, as your uncle says, mourning is the
seed of joy, this bridal should prove a gladsome one! But let her prove
a loving child to you, and honour my Friedel’s memory, then shall I love
her well. Do not fear, motherling; with the roots of hatred and jealousy
taken out of the heart, even sorrow is such peace that it is almost joy.”
It was over early for pain and sorrow to have taught that lesson, thought
the mother, as with tender tears she gave place to the priest, who was to
begin the solemnities of the day by shriving the young Baron. It was
Father Norbert, who had in this very chamber baptized the brothers, while
their grandmother was plotting the destruction of their godfather, even
while he gave Friedmund his name of peace,—Father Norbert, who had from
the very first encouraged the drooping, heart-stricken, solitary
Christina not to be overcome of evil, but to overcome evil with good.
A temporary altar was erected between the windows, and hung with the silk
and embroidery belonging to that in the chapel: a crucifix was placed on
it, with the shrine of the stone of Nicæa, one or two other relics
brought on St. Ruprecht’s cloister, and a beautiful mother-of-pearl and
gold pyx also from the abbey, containing the host. These were arranged
by the chaplain, Father Norbert, and three of his brethren from the
abbey. And then the Father Abbot, a kindly, dignified old man, who had
long been on friendly terms with the young Baron, entered; and after a
few kind though serious words to him, assumed a gorgeous cope stiff with
gold embroidery, and, standing by the altar, awaited the arrival of the
other assistants at the ceremony.
The slender, youthful-looking, pensive lady of the castle, in her wonted
mourning dress, was courteously handed to her son’s bedside by the
Emperor. He was in his plain buff leathern hunting garb, unornamented,
save by the rich clasp of his sword-belt and his gold chain, and his head
was only covered by the long silken locks of fair hair that hung round
his shoulders; but, now that his large keen dark blue eyes were gravely
restrained, and his eager face composed, his countenance was so majestic,
his bearing so lofty, that not all his crowns could have better marked
his dignity.
Behind him came a sunburnt, hardy man, wearing the white mantle and black
fleur-de-lis-pointed cross of the Teutonic Order. A thrill passed
through Ebbo’s veins as he beheld the man who to him represented the
murderer of his brother and both his grandfathers, the cruel oppressor of
his father, and the perpetrator of many a more remote, but equally
unforgotten, injury. And in like manner Sir Dankwart beheld the actual
slayer of his father, and the heir of a long score of deadly retribution.
No wonder then that, while the Emperor spoke a few words of salutation
and inquiry, gracious though not familiar, the two foes scanned one
another with a shiver of mutual repulsing, and a sense that they would
fain have fought it out as in the good old times.
However, Ebbo only beheld a somewhat dull, heavy, honest-looking visage
of about thirty years old, good-nature written in all its flat German
features, and a sort of puzzled wonder in the wide light eyes that stared
fixedly at him, no doubt in amazement that the mighty huge-limbed
Wolfgang could have been actually slain by the delicately-framed youth,
now more colourless than ever in consequence of the morning’s fast.
Schleiermacher was also present, and the chief followers on either hand
had come into the lower part of the room—Hatto, Heinz, and Koppel,
looking far from contented; some of the Emperor’s suite; and a few
attendants of Schlangenwald, like himself connected with the Teutonic
Order.
The Emperor spoke: “We have brought you together, Herr Graff von
Schlangenwald, and Herr Freiherr von Adlerstein, because ye have given us
reason to believe you willing to lay aside the remembrance of the foul
and deadly strifes of your forefathers, and to live as good Christians in
friendship and brotherhood.”
“Sire, it is true,” said Schlangenwald; and “It is true,” said Ebbo.
“That is well,” replied Maximilian. “Nor can our reign better begin than
by the closing of a breach that has cost the land some of its bravest
sons. Dankwart von Schlangenwald, art thou willing to pardon the heir of
Adlerstein for having slain thy father in free and honourable combat, as
well as, doubtless, for other deeds of his ancestors, more than I know or
can specify?”
“Yea, truly; I pardon him, my liege, as befits my vow.”
“And thou, Eberhard von Adlerstein, dost thou put from thee vengeance for
thy twin brother’s death, and all the other wrongs that thine house has
suffered?”
“I put revenge from me for ever.”
“Ye agree, further, then, instead of striving as to your rights to the
piece of meadow called the Debateable Strand, and to the wrecks of
burthens there cast up by the stream, ye will unite with the citizens of
Ulm in building a bridge over the Braunwasser, where, your mutual
portions thereof being decided by the Swabian League, toll may be taken
from all vehicles and beasts passing there over?”
“We agree,” said both knights.
“And I, also, on behalf of the two guilds of Ulm,” added Moritz
Schleiermacher.
“Likewise,” continued the Emperor, “for avoidance of debate, and to
consecrate the spot that has caused so much contention, ye will jointly
erect a church, where may be buried both the relatives who fell in the
late unhappy skirmish, and where ye will endow a perpetual mass for their
souls, and those of others of your two races.”
“Thereto I willingly agree,” said the Teutonic knight. But to Ebbo it
was a shock that the pure, gentle Friedmund should thus be classed with
his treacherous assassin; and he had almost declared that it would be
sacrilege, when he received from the Emperor a look of stern, surprised
command, which reminded him that concession must not be all on one side,
and that he could not do Friedel a greater wrong than to make him a cause
of strife. So, though they half choked him, he contrived to utter the
words, “I consent.”
“And in token of amity I here tear up and burn all the feuds of
Adlerstein,” said Schlangenwald, producing from his pouch a collection of
hostile literature, beginning from a crumpled strip of yellow parchment
and ending with a coarse paper missive in the clerkly hand of
burgher-bred Hugh Sorel, and bearing the crooked signatures of the last
two Eberhards of Adlerstein—all with great seals of the eagle shield
appended to them. A similar collection—which, with one or two other
family defiances, and the letters of investiture recently obtained at
Ulm, formed the whole archives of Adlerstein—had been prepared within
Ebbo’s reach; and each of the two, taking up a dagger, made extensive
gashes in these documents, and then—with no mercy to the future
antiquaries, who would have gloated over them—the whole were hurled into
the flames on the hearth, where the odour they emitted, if not grateful
to the physical sense, should have been highly agreeable to the moral.
“Then, holy Father Abbot,” said Maximilian, “let us ratify this happy and
Christian reconciliation by the blessed sacrifice of peace, over which
these two faithful knights shall unite in swearing good-will and
brotherhood.”
Such solemn reconciliations were frequent, but, alas were too often a
mockery. Here, however, both parties were men who felt the awe of the
promise made before the Pardon-winner of all mankind. Ebbo, bred up by
his mother in the true life of the Church, and comparatively apart from
practical superstitions, felt the import to the depths of his inmost
soul, with a force heightened by his bodily state of nervous
impressibility; and his wan, wasted features and dark shining eyes had a
strange spiritual beam, “half passion and half awe,” as he followed the
words of universal forgiveness and lofty praise that he had heard last in
his anguished trance, when his brother lay dying beside him, and leaving
him behind. He knew now that it was for this.
His deep repressed ardour and excitement were no small contrast to the
sober, matter-of-fact demeanour of the Teutonic knight, who comported
himself with the mechanical decorum of an ecclesiastic, but quite as one
who meant to keep his word. Maximilian served the mass in his royal
character as sub-deacon. He was fond of so doing, either from humility,
or love of incongruity, or both. No one, however, communicated except
the clergy and the parties concerned—Dankwart first, as being monk as
well as knight, then Eberhard and his mother; and then followed,
interposed into the rite, the oath of pardon, friendship, and brotherhood
administered by the abbot, and followed by the solemn kiss of peace.
There was now no recoil; Eberhard raised himself to meet the lips of his
foe, and his heart went with the embrace. Nay, his inward ear dwelt on
Friedmund’s song mingling with the concluding chants of praise.
The service ended, it was part of the pledge of amity that the reconciled
enemies should break their fast together, and a collation of white bread
and wine was provided for the purpose. The Emperor tried to promote free
and friendly talk between the two adversaries, but not with great
success; for Dankwart, though honest and sincere, seemed extremely dull.
He appeared to have few ideas beyond his Prussian commandery and its
routine discipline, and to be lost in a castle where all was at his sole
will and disposal, and he caught eagerly at all proposals made to him as
if they were new lights. As, for instance, that some impartial
arbitrator should be demanded from the Swabian League to define the
boundary; and that next Rogation-tide the two knights should ride or
climb it in company, while meantime the serfs should be strictly charged
not to trespass, and any transgressor should be immediately escorted to
his own lord.
“But,” quoth Sir Dankwart, in a most serious tone, “I am told that a
she-bear wons in a den on yonder crag, between the pass you call the
Gemsbock’s and the Schlangenwald valley. They told me the right in it
had never been decided, and I have not been up myself. To say truth, I
have lived so long in the sand plains as to have lost my mountain legs,
and I hesitated to see if a hunter could mount thither for fear of fresh
offence; but, if she bide there till Rogation-tide, it will be ill for
the lambs.”
“Is that all?” cried Maximilian. “Then will I, a neutral, kill your bear
for you, gentlemen, so that neither need transgress this new crag of
debate. I’ll go down and look at your bear spears, friend Ebbo, and be
ready so soon as Kasimir has done with his bridal.”
“That crag!” cried Ebbo. “Little good will it do either of us. Sire, it
is a mere wall of sloping rock, slippery as ice, and with only a stone or
matting of ivy here and there to serve as foothold.”
“Where bear can go, man can go,” replied the Kaisar.
“Oh, yes! We have been there, craving your pardon, Herr Graf,” said
Ebbo, “after a dead chamois that rolled into a cleft, but it is the worst
crag on all the hill, and the frost will make it slippery. Sire, if you
do venture it, I conjure you to take Koppel, and climb by the rocks from
the left, not the right, which looks easiest. The yellow rock, with a
face like a man’s, is the safer; but ach, it is fearful for one who knows
not the rocks.”
“If I know not the rocks, all true German rocks know me,” smiled
Maximilian, to whom the danger seemed to be such a stimulus that he began
to propose the bear-hunt immediately, as an interlude while waiting for
the bride.
However, at that moment, half-a-dozen horsemen were seen coming up from
the ford, by the nearer path, and a forerunner arrived with the tidings
that the Baron of Adlerstein Wildschloss was close behind with the little
Baroness Thekla.
Half the moonlight night had Sir Kasimir and his escort ridden; and,
after a brief sleep at the nearest inn outside Ulm, he had entered in
early morning, demanded admittance at the convent, made short work with
the Abbess Ludmilla’s arguments, claimed his daughter, and placing her on
a cushion before him on his saddle, had borne her away, telling her of
freedom, of the kind lady, and the young knight who had dazzled her
childish fancy.
Christina went down to receive her. There was no time to lose, for the
huntsman Kaisar was bent on the slaughter of his bear before dark, and,
if he were to be witness of the wedding, it must be immediate. He was in
a state of much impatience, which he beguiled by teasing his friend
Wildschloss by reminding him how often he himself had been betrothed, and
had managed to slip his neck out of the noose. “And, if my Margot be not
soon back on my hands, I shall give the French credit,” he said, tossing
his bear-spear in the air, and catching it again. “Why, this bride is as
long of busking her as if she were a beauty of seventeen! I must be off
to my Lady Bearess.”
Thus nothing could be done to prepare the little maiden but to divest her
of her mufflings, and comb out her flaxen hair, crowning it with a wreath
which Christina had already woven from the myrtle of her own girlhood,
scarcely waiting to answer the bewildered queries and entreaties save by
caresses and admonitions to her to be very good.
Poor little thing! She was tired, frightened, and confused; and, when
she had been brought upstairs, she answered the half smiling, half shy
greeting of her bridegroom with a shudder of alarm, and the exclamation,
“Where is the beautiful young knight? That’s a lady going to take the
veil lying under the pall.”
“You look rather like a little nun yourself,” said Ebbo, for she wore a
little conventual dress, “but we must take each other for such as we
are;” and, as she hid her face and clung to his mother, he added in a
more cheerful, coaxing tone, “You once said you would be my wife.”
“Ah, but then there were two of you, and you were all shining bright.”
Before she could be answered, the impatient Emperor returned, and brought
with him the abbot, who proceeded to find the place in his book, and to
ask the bridegroom for the rings. Ebbo looked at Sir Kasimir, who owned
that he should have brought them from Ulm, but that he had forgotten.
“Jewels are not plenty with us,” said Ebbo, with a glow of amusement and
confusion dawning on his cheek, such as reassured the little maid that
she beheld one of the two beautiful young knights. “Must we borrow?”
Christina looked at the ring she had first seen lying on her own
Eberhard’s palm, and felt as if to let it be used would sever the renewed
hope she scarcely yet durst entertain; and at the same moment Maximilian
glanced at his own fingers, and muttered, “None but this! Unlucky!” For
it was the very diamond which Mary of Burgundy had sent to assure him of
her faith, and summon him to her aid after her father’s death. Sir
Kasimir had not retained the pledge of his own ill-omened wedlock; but,
in the midst of the dilemma, the Emperor, producing his dagger, began to
detach some of the massive gold links of the chain that supported his
hunting-horn. “There,” said he, “the little elf of a bride can get her
finger into this lesser one and you—verily this largest will fit, and the
goldsmith can beat it out when needed. So on with you in St. Hubert’s
name, Father Abbot!”
Slender-boned and thin as was Ebbo’s hand, it was a very tight fit, but
the purpose was served. The service commenced; and fortunately, thanks
to Thekla’s conventual education, she was awed into silence and decorum
by the sound of Latin and the sight of an abbot. It was a strange
marriage, if only in the contrast between the pale, expressive face and
sad, dark eyes of the prostrate youth, and the frightened, bewildered
little girl, standing upon a stool to reach up to him, with her blue eyes
stretched with wonder, and her cheeks flushed and pouting with unshed
tears, her rosy plump hand enclosed in the long white wasted one that was
thus for ever united to it by the broken fragments of Kaisar Max’s chain.
The rite over, two attestations of the marriage of Eberhard, Freiherr von
Adlerstein, and Thekla, Freiherrinn von Adlerstein Wildschloss and
Felsenbach, were drawn up and signed by the abbot, the Emperor, Count
Dankwart, and the father and mother of the two contracting parties; one
to be committed to the care of the abbot, the other to be preserved by
the house of Adlerstein.
Then the Emperor, as the concluding grace of the ceremonial, bent to kiss
the bride; but, tired, terrified, and cross, Thekla, as if quite relieved
to have some object for her resentment, returned his attempt with a
vehement buffet, struck with all the force of her small arm, crying out,
“Go away with you! I know I’ve never married _you_!”
“The better for my eyes!” said the good-natured Emperor, laughing
heartily. “My Lady Bearess is like to prove the more courteous bride!
Fare thee well, Sir Bridegroom,” he added, stooping over Ebbo, and
kissing his brow; “Heaven give thee joy of this day’s work, and of thy
faithful little fury. I’ll send her the bearskin as her meetest
wedding-gift.”
And the next that was heard from the Kaisar was the arrival of a parcel
of Italian books for the Freiherr Eberhard, and for the little
Freiherrinn a large bundle, which proved to contain a softly-dressed
bearskin, with the head on, the eyes being made of rubies, a gold muzzle
and chain on the nose, and the claws tipped with gold. The Emperor had
made a point that it should be conveyed to the castle, snow or no snow,
for a yule gift.