The castle of Neroweg VI—a somber retreat, situated, like the eyrie of a bird of prey, on the brow of a steep mountain—dominated the country for many miles around. The moment the watchman, posted on the platform of the donjon, espied from afar a troop of travelers, he sounded his horn. Immediately the band of the count, thievish and ferocious, would sally from the manor. These bandits, not satisfied with demanding the dues of passage and traffic, habitually pillaged the travelers, often even massacred them, or took them to the castle to be tortured and compelled to pay ransom. The face of Gaul bristled with similar haunts, raised by the Frankish seigneurs under the reign of Charles the Great. They were impregnable fortresses, from the heights of which barons, counts, marquises and dukes defied the royal authority, and desolated the country. The history of the Count of Plouernel is that of all these seigneurs who issued from the race of the first conquerors of Gaul. In the year 818, a Neroweg, second son of the head of this Frankish family that had been richly endowed in Auvergne since Clovis, was one of the chieftains in the army of Louis the Pious, when he ravaged Brittany, then in revolt at the call of Morvan and Vortigern. That Neroweg, in reward for his services during that war, received from the King a fief of the lands and county of Plouernel, which had reverted to the crown by the death of its last beneficiary, who left no heirs. Neroweg, in return for the cession of the county of Plouernel, was to own himself a vassal of Louis the Pious, render him fealty and homage as to his king and suzerain seigneur, pay him tribute, and support him in his wars by marching at the head of the men of his seigniory. In the country of Plouernel, as in the other provincesof Gaul, certain colonists named villeins had succeeded in emancipating themselves and again became owners of parcels of land. Neroweg I. (the first of the name of this second branch of the family) did not revolt against the authority of the King. His son, however, Neroweg II., had a strong castle built on the summit of the mountain of Plouernel, assembled there a numerous band of determined men, and then, with most of the other seigneurs, he said to the King of the Franks: "I do not recognize your sovereignty; I will no longer be your vassal; I declare myself sovereign on my domain, like you are on yours. The serfs, villeins and townsmen of my county become my men; they, their lands, their property belong to me only; I shall tax them at my will and impose upon them tributes, rent and taille which they shall pay to me only; they will go to war for me alone, and against you, should you dare come and besiege me in my fortress of Plouernel." The King did not go, seeing that most of the seigneurs held the same language to the descendants of Charles the Great or of Hugh le Capet, whose kingdom was gradually reduced to the possession of the bare provinces that he was able to defend and preserve, arms in hand. Neroweg III. and Neroweg IV. did as their ancestor and remained independent, masters, absolute and hereditary, of the country of Plouernel. A large number of Frankish seigneurs seized in the same way other parts of the territory of Gaul. Robert thus became Count of (the country of) Paris; Milo, Count of (the country of) Tonnerre; Hugh, Count of (the country of) Maine; Burcharth, Sire of (the country of) Montmorency; Landry, Duke of (the country of) Nevers; Radulf, Count of (the country of) Beaugency; Enghilbert, Count of (the country of) Ponthieu; etc. These and a number of other seigneurs, descendants of the leudes of Clovis or of the chieftains of the bands of Charles Martel, dropping their Frankish names, or joining to them the Gaulish names of the regions that they took possession of, had themselves called "seigneurs," "sires," "dukes" or "counts," of Paris, of Plouernel,of Montmorency, of Nevers, of Tonnerre, of Ponthieu, etc., etc. During those centuries of wars and brigandage the Nerowegs had fortified their castle, while they lived on rapine and on the extortion of their villeins and their serfs. Neroweg V., surnamed "Towhead," from the color of his hair, and Neroweg VI., surnamed "Worse Than a Wolf" by the wretched people of his domains on account of his cruelty, proved themselves worthy of their ancestors.
The manor of Plouernel raises its front on the summit of a rocky and arid mountain, washed on its western slope by a swift running stream, while on the east it beetles over a narrow path constructed over immense marshes, drained by a canal that feeds the vast ponds of the abbey of Meriadek, located several leagues off, and one time part of the large holdings of the diocese of Nantes. If a traveler follows the overland route he is compelled to cross this jetty on his way from Angers to Nantes, unless he be willing to make a wide detour by journeying over the domains of the seigneur of Castel-Redon. The vessels that sail into the Loire through the river of Plouernel, whose waters bathe the foot of the hills, pass close under the castle. The location of the lair is skilfully chosen. It dominates the two only routes of communication between the most important towns of the region. A stockade half bars the river of Plouernel, and serves as a shelter for the barges of the seigneur. Merchant vessels being signaled from the top of the donjon, men in arms immediately embark, board the trader, collect navigation dues, and not infrequently pillage the cargo. No less dangerous is the overland route. A palisade, into which a gate is cut, bars the passage. It can be crossed only upon paying a toll, arbitrarily imposed upon the travelers by the count's men, who, moreover, sack the baggages at their ease. If they suspect a traveler of being able to pay ransom they drag him to prison and there torture him until he consents to ransom himself. The ill-starred ones who may be too poor to pay the toll demanded are, both men and women,forced to submit to obscene affronts, ridiculous or cruel, to the great amusement of the men of the seigneur. On one of the gentler slopes of the mountain, towards the north, the little city of Plouernel rises in tiers, built in a semi-circle and equidistant from the manor and the valley, where lie scattered the villages that the villeins and serfs inhabit. A narrow path, winding and steep, and bordered here and yonder by precipices, leads up to the first fortified enclosure, whose ramparts, thirty feet high by two feet thick and flanked with large towers of brick, constitute one mass with the rock that serves as their foundation, a rock hewn with the pick and surrounded by abysses. The dizzy path that winds above the precipices ends in a massive door covered with iron sheets and enormous nails. It is the only access to the interior of the first enclosure, a somber court, where the sun penetrates only at noon, being otherwise kept out by the height of the numerous structures that lean from within upon the ramparts. These structures are intended for the lodgement of the men-at-arms, for the masons, the chapel, the bakery, the forge and several other workshops—a mint among them. The Count of Plouernel coined money like the other feudal seigneurs, and, like them, he minted it to his liking. In the center of the court rises the principal donjon. That building, square, over a hundred feet high, crowned with a platform from which the country is far away disclosed, rests upon three tiers of subterraneous cells, surrounded by a ditch full of water furnished from springs that also serve as cisterns. The donjon seems to rise from the midst of a deep pit, in which half of this massive structure appears hidden, its upper part rising merely above the skirt of the ditch, over which falls a draw bridge. Few and narrow windows, irregularly cut into the four sides, and almost as narrow as mere loop-holes, yielded a gloomy light to the several stories and to the ground floor. The stonework of all these buildings, blackened by the inclemencies of the weather and by age, rendered still more dismal the aspect of this fortress.
A narrow spiral staircase, built of stone, led from the bottom of the basement to the platform that surmounted the donjon of the manor of Plouernel. The men at arms, charged with the lookout on the platform, never failed to cross themselves when passing the door of an alcove, situated on the last story of the donjon, that had for its annex one of the turrets that rose from the four corners of the platform. It was whispered that the narrow window of that turret seemed internally illuminated at night by a glow of the color of blood, and these sinister lights were attributed to the sorceries of Azenor the Pale, the concubine of Neroweg VI. The seigneur of Plouernel had gathered in the chamber of his mistress a mass of precious objects, the fruits of his raids. A passage, concealed by a purple curtain, fringed with gold, gave admission to another turret, whose upper part, roofed on a level with the platform, served as the post for the lookout. Azenor the Pale, about twenty-five years of age, was of a perfect beauty. Her face was pale and her sensuous lips were the color of her skin, whence her surname. A turban of rich purple silk fabric in the shape of a chin-cloth, served as a frame for the visage of the sorceress, while it left exposed the strands of her hair, black like her eyebrows and her large eyes. Her tunic of silver cloth was negligently thrown over her shoulders. Her bosom and arms were worthy of figuring beside that beautiful Greek statue that has survived the centuries, and which, rumor has it, is still admired in the palace of the Dukes of Aquitaine. The tunic of Azenor, reaching only to her knees, left exposed below its silver folds the skirt of her dress, purple like her turban.The woman was at this moment engaged in molding a bit of pliable wax into two little figures similar to the one inserted that very morning between the teeth of Pierrine the Goat at the moment of her death agony. One of the puppets wore a bishop's robe, the other a species of armor represented by a dull-colored bit of cloth resembling iron. Azenor the Pale was inserting a certain number of needles, disposed in cabalistic order, on the left side of the breast of the two puppets, when the door of the alcove opened behind her. Neroweg VI. entered his mistress' retreat, carefully closing the door after him.
The Count of Plouernel, surnamed "Worse than a Wolf," and at that time about fifty years of age, was of athletic frame. His hair no longer was dressed after the fashion of his ancestor, the Neroweg, leude of Clovis, nor after that of Neroweg, the "Terrible Eagle," savage chief of a savage tribe. The red hair of Neroweg VI., already grizzled, was shaven smooth to the middle of the temples and the skull, and then fell square down his neck and behind his ears. The men of war had themselves thus shaven in front to prevent their hair from interfering with their casque and standing in the way of the visor. Instead of cultivating long moustaches, like his ancestors, Neroweg VI. allowed to grow at full length only his thick and coarse beard, which thus framed in his savage countenance and his hooked nose. His heavy eyebrows met over his falcon eyes, round and piercing. Always ready for war upon his neighbors, or upon those troops of travelers that, at times, attempted to offer forcible resistance to the brigandage of the seigneurs, Neroweg VI. wore a casque, which he laid by on entering. His jacket and buff hose disappeared under a hauberk or iron coat of mail, held to his waist by a leathern belt, from which hung two swords, the shorter one at his right, the longer at his left. The hauberk guarded his arms down to the gauntlets, and fell slightly below his knees, which, like his legs, were protected by iron greaves, held together with leathern thongs. The face of Neroweg VI. betrayed agloomy and troubled mind. Azenor the Pale, still engaged in inserting the needles into the left sides of the wax figures, was murmuring certain words in a strange tongue, and seemed not to notice the arrival of the Count. He drew slowly near, and said in a hollow voice: "Well, now, Azenor, is the philter ready?"
Without answering, the sorceress continued her magic incantations, at the conclusion of which, holding up to Neroweg VI. the two puppets, representing a bishop and a warrior, she said: "Tell me again, which are the enemies whom you dread and hate the most?"
"The Bishop of Nantes and Draco, Sire of Castel-Redon. These are my worst enemies."
"Yesterday I shaped a figure like this. Has it been placed as I ordered, between the teeth of one about to expire on the gallows?"
"One of my serfs struck my bailiff. She was hanged this morning from my seigniorial forks. At the moment when she gave up the ghost, the executioner placed the wax puppet between her teeth. Your orders have been carried out."
"In keeping with my promise, your enemies will soon be in your power. Nevertheless, in order to complete the charm, these other two little figures will have to be buried under the root of a tree, that grows at the bank of a river, in which some man or woman was drowned."
"That's easily done. There are large old willows growing on the banks of my river, and often do my men drown in it the stubborn sailors, or the men or women who refuse to pay the toll for my rights of navigation."
"That magic spell must be cast by yourself. You will have to place these little figures in the designated place to-night, when the moon goes down, and you will pronounce three times the names of Jesus, of Astaroth and of Judas. The charm will then be at its full."
"I do not like to see the name of Christ mixed up in all this. Are you, perchance, seeking to lead me into some sacrilege?"
A sardonic smile played over the white lips of Azenor the Pale. "So far from that, I have placed the magic charm under the invocation of Christ; I pronounced a verse from the gospels with each needle that I buried in these puppets. The Lord will thus be our protector."
"Had you not driven me to kill my chaplain, I might have been able to consult him and learn from him whether I would be committing sacrilege."
"You killed the tonsured fellow because you suspected that holy man of improper relations with your wife, and of probably being the father of Guy——"
"Hold your tongue!" cried Neroweg, with a voice full of anger. "Hold your tongue, accursed woman! Since that murder I have had no chaplain. No priest, consents to dwell here. Enough of that. Is the philter ready?"
"Not yet. Have patience, seigneur Count."
"What else do you want to concoct it? You wanted the blood of a young child; the young son of one of my serfs has been delivered to you——"
"The child must be prepared for the sacrifice by magic formulas."
"In a word, can you tell me when will that marvelous philter, that you have promised me, be ready?"
"I shall work upon it this very night, during the hours between the rising and the going down of the moon; that's to say, for several hours."
"That's another delay! My ailment grows apace! I suspect you of having cast upon me the evil spell under which I struggle, and which drives me to deeds of furious folly."
"You are wrong in attributing to me such an influence over your fate."
"Was it not you who incited me to kill my eldest son Gonthram?"
"Your son tried to violate me. Of course I had to appeal to your intervention for protection against fresh outrages."
"Had not my equerry Eberhard the Tricky thrown himself between me and Gonthram, I would have killed my son on his return from the hunt. He has insisted that you offered to yield yourself to him if he consented to stab me to death."
"That was a dastardly calumny!"
"Perhaps I should have plunged my dagger in your heart and be done with you."
"And why did you not?"
"Because you read in the stars that our lives were bound together, and that your death would precede mine by only three days. But if I am to die of the distemper that oppresses me, a curse upon you, sorceress! You shall not survive me. Garin the Serf-eater is charged with my vengeance. Oh, you will not leave this castle alive!" Neroweg pressed his forehead with both hands and proceeded in a spirit more and more dejected as he spoke: "The philter—Will it heal me? Since you cast your diabolical spell upon me, the days seem endless. I am indifferent to everything. After I make the rounds of my domains, shut in among the seigniories of my neighbors, all of them my enemies; after I have ravaged their lands, burned their houses, killed their serfs; after I have levied ransom on the travelers, had justice executed by my bailiff, my provost and my hangman; after all that I feel sadder, wearier, more than ever tired of life. I have even surprised myself wishing for death!"
"You wage war, you eat, you drink, you hunt, you sleep and you take your female serfs to your bed when they marry. What is it you lack?"
"I am tired, cloyed with gross enjoyments. Wine tastes sour to me. I feel uneasy when I hunt in my forests, fearful of some ambush prepared by my neighbors. I find my donjon sepulchrallike a tomb. I choke under its stone vaults. If I leave the manor, I have ever under my eyes the same saddening landscape."
"Leave the country, you stupid and savage wolf!"
"Whither shall I go and be happier? Here I am master. What would my fate be elsewhere? During my absence, my neighbors would descend upon my domains like a flock of vultures. The devil! I am bound to my seigniory like my serfs to the glebe!"
"Your fate is that of all the nobles, your peers."
"But they are not weighed down by their existence like I. Only a few years ago, during the life of my wife Hermengarde, I attacked my neighbors as much for the pleasure of it as to appropriate their lands and to sack their castles. I went on the hunt for caravans of merchants with joy and spirit. I put the prisoners to the torture and delighted at their grimaces. In short, I felt that I lived; I was happy; I ate and drank enormously, and then fell asleep in the arms of one of my female serfs. The next morning I attended mass and departed for the chase, to battle or on a pillaging expedition; that is, on a new round of pleasures." After a moment's silence the seigneur of Plouernel added, with a sigh: "Those days I was a good Catholic! I practiced the faith of my fathers, and every morning, after mass, the chaplain gave me absolution for the deeds of the previous day! To-day, thanks to your wicked contrivances, all my beliefs are overthrown. I have become a pagan!—Aye, a pagan!"
"You, poor imbecile, who carry under your hauberk four relics blessed by the Pope!"
"Will you dare to mock me for my faith in relics?" bellowed Neroweg in a towering rage. "Without the relics that I carry about me you might by this time have dragged me to the bottom of hell, you worthy wife of Satan!"
"Maychance you speak truth, seigneur Count!"
"There is nothing human about you! Your lips are cold as marble; your kisses are frozen!"
"When a reciprocal love shall inflame my veins, then my lips will grow purple, and my kisses will be of fire!"
"Oh, I know it; you never loved me!"
"As well love a wolf of the forest as a Neroweg. You carried me off by force, and I have had to submit to your lust. The man whom I adore, whom I have long loved, even without seeing him, is William the Ninth, the handsome Duke of Aquitaine."
"William!" exclaimed Neroweg in an accent of ferocious jealousy. "That sacrilegious wretch, who carries on his shield the portrait of Malborgiane, his mistress!"
"William is a poet; he is young, handsome, bold, bright and gay. All women dream of, and all men dread him. You are his vassal. Woe unto you should you dare cross him! He would leave not one stone on the other in your castle. He would make you grovel on the ground on hands and knees; he would clap a saddle on you and ride on your back a hundred steps at a stretch, agreeable to the right of a sovereign over his revolted vassal. You are as far removed from the handsome Duke of Aquitaine as the dull buzzard is from the noble falcon that darts towards the sun making its golden bells tinkle!"
Neroweg uttered a cry of rage, and, drawing his dagger, rushed upon Azenor. But her marble figure remained impassive, her white lips curled in disdainful smile. "Kill me, coward knight, assassin!"
After a moment of savage irresolution, Neroweg returned his dagger to the scabbard: "Oh, damned be the day I captured you on the road to Angers. It is you who brought down the curse that rests upon this castle. But will ye, nill ye, you shall yourself break the spell you have thrown upon me and my children, who, like their father, are becoming somber and silent."
"That's the business of the philter, which I am preparing."
The conversation was at this point interrupted by two raps on the door from without. Neroweg asked roughly: "Who's that?"
"Seigneur Count," a voice answered, "you are waited to open the session of the court in the stone hall!"
Neroweg made a gesture of impatience, and, donning the iron casque which he had laid on a settee, replied: "Once the homage of my vassals pleased my vanity. To-day everything annoys, everything is irksome to me. Oh, sad is my life!"
"To-morrow, thanks to my philter, nothing more will weigh upon you—nor upon yours," observed Azenor, and, placing in the Count's hands the two little wax images, she added: "Your two enemies—the Sire of Castel-Redon and the Bishop of Nantes—will soon fall into your hands, provided you yourself place these magic figures where I have told you, while you pronounce three times the names of Judas, of Astaroth and of Jesus."
"It is hard for me to pronounce the name of Jesus in connection with this sorcery," remarked Neroweg, raising his head and receiving almost fearfully the two little figures. "To-night the philter; if not, you die to-morrow!" Then, bethinking himself, "Where is the child?"
"In that alcove," answered Azenor.
Neroweg walked towards the turret, raised the curtain and saw little Colombaik, the son of Fergan the Quarryman, lying on the floor. The innocent creature was sound asleep at the foot of a stand loaded with vases of bizarre form. The walls of the turret, paneled with marble slabs, rose bare to the ceiling, the floor of whose upper story was on a level with the platform of the donjon. Neroweg, after contemplating the child for an instant, stepped out of the donjon, double-locking the door after him, and taking care to withdraw the key and place it in his jerkin.
Eberhard the Tricky, one of the equerries of the seigneur of Plouernel, awaited his master outside of the retreat of Azenor, in company with Thiebold, justiciary provost of the seigniory. The latter addressed Neroweg, who was slowly descending the stone staircase.
"The chatelain of the fort of Ferte-Mehan signed the relinquishment of his fief of Haut-Menil at the third wedge struck into his knee by the gaoler. The Sire of Breuil-le-Haudoin died of the results of the torture. The Abbot Guilbert offers three hundred silver sous for his ransom. But he has not yet been put to the torture, and such offers mean nothing. We shall proceed in order."
"And then? What other cases are there?"
"That's all. There is to-day nothing else on hand."
While carrying on this conversation the Seigneur of Plouernel, his provost and his equerry, descended to the basement of the donjon-keep, at the corner where the staircase landed. A narrow window, guarded with enormous iron bars, alone lighted this vast hall, bare, somber and vaulted. In the inside yard several men-at-arms held themselves ready to mount their horses. Near the center of the hall, which served as a court of pleas, stood, according to custom, a large stone table, behind which ranged themselves the officers of the house of the Count—the master of the horse, the master of the chamber, the master of the dogs, of the falcons, of the table, and several other dignitaries. These people, instead of being paid by the seigneurs, bought from them these hereditary offices in their families, an inheritance that attimes became odd by the contrast it presented between the function and the incumbent. It happened that a post of runner, sold in fief to an agile and vigorous man, often descended as the inheritance of a son, as unfit for the post as a broken-winded ox. The seigneurs, with an eye to revenue, multiplied these offices all they could, and the purchasers yielded, not so much to the pride of belonging to the seigniorial households as to the desire of sheltering themselves from the master's lawlessness, and of sharing the fruits of his brigandage. In those dark days, the choice was between oppressing or being oppressed; submitting to the horrors of serfdom, or becoming the instruments of the feudal tyrants; joining them in doing violence, robbing and torturing one's fellows, or resigning oneself to undergo all these sufferings himself. Such were the sad results of the Frankish conquest. The seigneurs imposed servitude, the friars preached resignation, and the people of Gaul became cowardly, selfish and cruel. They rent themselves with their own hands by turning accomplices to their gaoler.
Besides the head domestics of Neroweg, present at these law courts,—which took the place of the Germanic "malhs" of the reign of Clovis—there was also the provost, the bailiff and the scribe of the seigniory. The latter, seated on a stool, his parchment rolls on his knees, his desk beside him, his pen between his teeth, awaited the opening of the session. The first domestics of the Count, respectful and timid, remained standing in a semi-circle behind their master. Since four of five centuries back, the class of the leudes, who, in the early days of the Frankish conquest, lived in common with and as equals of their chiefs, had ceased to exist. In the measure that the conquest became more firmly fixed, the titulary and beneficiary seigneurs of the soil of Gaul, shocked at the idea of equality contracted by their old companions in arms, evicted them little by little from the domains where chiefs and leudes had lived in common. The descendants of these obscure Frankish warriors, sacrificed to thepride and cupidity of the beneficiaries, soon fell into misery, and from misery into a servitude equal to that of the Gauls. Since then, Franks and Gauls—the former disinherited by ingratitude, the latter by conquest, and now joined in misery and servitude—felt a common hatred towards the church and the seigneurs. There were then but two classes—thecommon people, serfs, peasants and bourgeois or townsmen; andnobles, knights and seigneurs. The latter, isolating themselves ever more, lived like absolute sovereigns in their strongholds, having no equals, but only menials, the accomplices of their acts of brigandage; or serfs, stupefied by terror or besotted by the friars.
Gonthram and Guy, the two sons of Neroweg, the younger at the left, the elder at the right of their father, attended the court. The latter had just reached the age of knighthood, a glorious event, so dearly paid for by the serfs of the seigniory. Gonthram resembled his father greatly. A look at the whelp told what he would be when age would have made of him a wolf. Guy, the younger, seventeen years of age, recalled the sardonic and vindictive features of his mother, Hermangarde. These two youths, brought up in the midst of this life of strife, of rapine and of debauchery, left to the violence of their passions, disposing as masters over an abject population, had none of the charms that are the attribute of adolescence. Away in a corner of the hall stood several bourgeois of the little town of Plouernel, who had come to complain of the exactions of the Count's men; or to excuse themselves for failure to pay the imposts in money and goods that it had pleased their seigneur to lay upon them; or to plead that the dues credited to the seigneur had long been met or exceeded; or yet to announce that they had removed from their roofs the weather-vanes, placed there in ignorance of the seigniorial rights, and taken down the pigeon houses they had started to raise in violation of the prescriptions of the feudal law.
The court was also attended by noble vassals of Neroweg, owners of smaller fortified places or of manors, held under theCount of Plouernel, the suzerain of these fiefs, the same as Neroweg, a vassal of William IX., Duke of Aquitaine, held under that suzerain, who, as vassal of Philip I., in turn held of that French King, the supreme sovereign. This hierarchy of all feudal seigniories existed in name only, never in fact. The great vassals, veritable sovereigns, entrenched in their duchies, laughed at the impotent authority of the King. In turn, the sovereignty of the dukes was almost despised, contested or attacked by their vassals, who were absolute masters in their seigniories, as the dukes in their duchies. The immediate vassalage, however, such as rested on the vassals of the seigniory of Plouernel, was ever enforced in all its fullness and tyrannic severity. There, at any time, the implacable vengeance of the suzerain could reach directly the goods and chattels of the recalcitrant vassal. Among the people who had come from the city, from the fortified cities or from their manors, was a handsome young girl, accompanied by her mother. Sad and uneasy, the two exchanged alarmed looks when the seigneur of Plouernel, entering the law court with a somber mien, sat down on a throne, one son at his right, the other at his left, and ordered Garin the Serf-eater to call the roll of cases entered for the session.
The bailiff bore no further mark of the wound he had received from Pierrine the Goat than a plaster on his forehead. He took up a scroll and commenced calling up the list of cases:
"Gerhard, son of Hugh, who died last month, succeeds his father in the fief of Heute-Mont, held under the Count of Plouernel. He comes to acquit the right of relief, and to pledge fealty and homage to his suzerain."
Thereupon, a man still young, covered with a leather casque and carrying at his side a long sword, stepped forth from the group of persons who had come to the session of the court. He came forward holding in his hand a large purse filled with money, and placed it on the stone table, thus acquitting the right of relief due the seigneur by all vassals who take possessionof their inheritance. Then, upon a sign of the bailiff, the new castellan of Heute-Mont, taking off his casque and unbuckling the belt of his sword, placed himself humbly on both knees before the seigneur of Plouernel. The bailiff, however, noticing that the country squire, having come on horseback, retained his spurs, addressed him in an angry tone: "Vassal, dare you take the pledge of fealty and homage to your seigneur with the spurs at your heels?"
The young castellan repaired the incongruity by removing his spurs and dropping back upon his knees at the feet of Neroweg, with hands joined and head lowered, he humbly waited for his seigneur to pronounce the consecrated formula: "You acknowledge yourself my liege as the holder of a fief in my seigniory?"
"Yes, my seigneur."
"You swear upon your soul never to carry arms against me, and to serve and defend me against my enemies?"
"I swear it, my seigneur."
"Keep thy oath. At the first felonious infraction thy fief reverts to me!"
Gerhard rose, replaced his spurs and buckled on the belt of his sword, while casting a sad look upon the purse of money with which he had paid his right of relief.
After the lord of Heute-Mont, a richly dressed young girl stepped forward, uneasy, trembling and her eyes full of tears. Her mother, not less moved than herself, accompanied her. When both were a few steps from the stone table, the seigneur of Plouernel said to the damsel: "Have you decided to obey the orders of your suzerain?"
"Monseigneur," answered the young girl, in a feeble and suppliant voice, "it is impossible for me to resign myself to——"
She could not finish. Sobs smothered her words, and, breaking out in tears, she dropped her head upon the shoulder of her mother, who said to the Count: "My good seigneur, my daughter loves Eucher, one of your own vassals. Eucher loves mydaughter Yolande no less tenderly. The union of these two children would make the happiness of my life——"
"No! no!" interrupted the seigneur of Plouernel, in a towering rage. "By the death of her father Yolande holds a fief under my seigniory. Mine alone is the right to dispose of her in marriage. She must choose a husband from among the three men whom, according to our usage, I have designated. They are three Franks, that is, nobles—Richard, Enquerrand and Conrad. The eldest of them not being yet sixty years old, the age limit is observed. Does Yolande accept one of my three lieges for her husband?"
"Oh, seigneur," replied the mother imploringly, while the young girl sobbed aloud, "Richard is mean looking and blind of one eye; Conrad is a murderer; he killed his first wife in a fit of passion; Enquerrand is lame, wicked and feared by all who come near him, moreover, he is too old for my daughter, he will be sixty years within two months. None of them is fit for Yolande."
"Your daughter, accordingly, refuses to wed one of the three men presented by me?"
"Seigneur, she wishes no other husband than Eucher; and I may assure you the lad is worthy of the love of my daughter."
"The devil! We have had words enough. If your daughter insists upon refusing to select from among my men, and marries Eucher, the fief reverts to me. It is my right. I shall enforce it."
"In the name of heaven, monseigneur, if you appropriate our lands what shall we live on? Are we to beg our bread? Have pity upon us!"
Yolande raised her beautiful face, pale and wet with tears, took a step towards Neroweg, and said, with dignity: "Keep the heritage of my father. I prefer to live in poverty with him whom I love than to wed any of these men of yours who inspire me with horror."
"My daughter!" exclaimed the distracted mother, "disobedience to the seigneur of Plouernel means misery for us!"
"Marriage with one of the three men proposed, means death to me," answered the poor child.
"Seigneur, good seigneur!" resumed the stricken mother, "deign to allow Yolande to remain a spinster. You would not force her to the choice between our ruin and a marriage that horrifies her?"
"No fief can remain in the possession of a woman," was the sententious utterance of the bailiff. "Usage is opposed to it."
"We have had enough of words!" cried out Neroweg, stamping the ground with rage. "This young woman refuses to wed one of my men. The fief is now mine. Bailiff, you will this evening send a force to take possession of the house and all its contents. You will eject the two women."
"Mother, let's depart," said Yolande, proudly. "We once were free and happy; now we are no better than serfs. But I prefer their sad lot to that reserved for me by Count Neroweg in delivering me to one of his bandits."
Undoubtedly the seigneur of Plouernel would have revenged himself for the bitter reproaches of Yolande had he not been prevented by the sudden arrival of one of his men, who, running in all out of breath, brought news of the arrest of the Bishop of Nantes, who had appeared at the toll gate disguised as a mendicant friar, and was recognized by one of the guards.
"The Bishop of Nantes in my power!" exclaimed Neroweg. "Azenor predicted it. Her magic charm begins to operate!" He rose precipitately from his throne, and, followed by his sons and several of his equerries, ran to meet the bishop, his enemy, who was being led a prisoner, together with the other travelers captured by the armed guards posted at the toll gate. Bezenecq the Rich and his daughter Isoline accompanied Simon, the Bishop of Nantes, and the monk Jeronimo, clad like a prelate. After his vain efforts to induce the travelers not to cross theseigniory of Plouernel, the bishop had, nevertheless, joined them, not venturing to enter alone with Jeronimo upon the territory of the seigneur of Castel-Redon, and hoping he would pass unperceived amidst a numerous troop. Unhappily for him, among the guards at the gate was a soldier named Robin the Nantesian, who had lived in the city of Nantes, and where he had opportunity to see the leading personages among the inhabitants. He quickly pointed out Bezenecq the Rich as a townsman from whom it would be easy to extract a big ransom. Noticing, thereupon, a monk, who seemed anxious to keep his cowl over his head, he pulled the frock off the monk and recognized the Bishop of Nantes, a personal enemy of the Count. The men of Neroweg then seized the two friars, pinioned them, as well as Bezenecq and his daughter, and accepted the toll from the other passengers, whom they allowed to pursue their journey. The bourgeois of Nantes, bound upon his mule, with his daughter bathed in tears at the crupper, was carried to the castle, with the bishop and Jeronimo, their hands tied behind their backs, following on foot. When the captives arrived at the first court-yard of the castle, Bezenecq alighted from the saddle, and, freed from his bandages, he held up his daughter, ready to faint. The bishop, pale as death, leaned upon the arm of Jeronimo, whose resolute carriage betrayed no fears. Neroweg, accompanied by his sons, arrested his hurrying steps when he came close to the prisoners, and, addressing them, said, sardonically: "I greet you, Simon! I greet you, holy man, my father in Christ! I hardly looked for this joyful meeting!"
"I am at your mercy," answered the prelate; "the will of God be done. Do with me as you will."
"I shall avail myself of your leave," replied the seigneur of Plouernel. "Oh, this is a happy day to me!"
"I ask only one favor," rejoined the bishop, "the favor of keeping near me this poor monk until the moment of my death, that he may help me to die like a Christian."
"I do not mean to send you quite so soon to Paradise. I have other designs upon you," and beckoning to Garin the Serf-eater to draw near, the seigneur of Plouernel whispered a few words in his ear. The bailiff nodded affirmatively, crossed the drawbridge and entered the donjon.
During their father's brief dialogue with the bishop, Guy and Gonthram had not ceased to pursue Isoline with their lascivious looks, and the frightened young girl had hidden her face on the breast of her father. Robin the Nantesian, raising his voice, said to Neroweg, while placing his hand on the shoulder of the townsman: "This is one of the richest merchants of the city of Nantes. He is called Bezenecq the Rich. Forget not that he is worth his weight in gold."
The Count fastened his falcon eyes upon the captive, and, taking two steps toward him, said: "Your name is Bezenecq the Rich?"
"I am so called, noble seigneur," humbly answered the bourgeois. "If your men have arrested me in order to make me pay ransom, I only request not to be separated from my daughter. Hand me a parchment. I shall write to the depositary of my money to deliver a hundred gold sous to whomever of your men shall deliver my letter to him. You will have the sum upon the return of your messenger, and you will then return our liberty to myself and my daughter." Seeing that the Count shrugged his shoulders with a sardonic smile, the merchant added: "Illustrious seigneur, instead of one hundred gold sous I will give you two hundred. But, I pray you, for mercy's sake, have me taken with my daughter to some apartment where the poor child may recover from her fright and the fatigues of the journey." Isoline, more and more alarmed at the ardent looks of the two whelps, trembled convulsively. Neroweg, silent as before, looked from time to time towards the donjon as if awaiting the return of the bailiff. Bezenecq resumed with an effort: "Seigneur, if two hundred pieces of gold do not yet suffice you, I shall go asfar as three hundred. It means my ruin. But I resign myself to that, provided you set my daughter and myself free."
At that moment Garin the Serf-eater came out of the donjon, recrossed the draw bridge and spoke in an undertone to Neroweg, who, turning to the prisoners, said: "Come along, my guests! You will learn what I am to do with you. You are to have a chat with a certain dame of great powers of persuasion."
"Oh, you butcher! You mean to put me to the torture!" cried the bishop, horror stricken. "Jesus, my God, have pity upon me! Mercy! Mercy!"
"No weakness, Simon," whispered Jeronimo to him; "we must submit to the will of God. His ways are inscrutable."
"Let the bishop be taken to his lodging; the monk shall keep him company." The bishop emitted lamentable cries and essayed to resist the men who were dragging him into the donjon. "It is now your turn to step in, Bezenecq the Rich. Come, brother, resistance is useless."
"Have I not offered you three hundred gold sous for my ransom, Count of Plouernel?" asked the merchant. "If you do not find that sum enough I shall add another hundred gold pieces. I shall have given you my whole fortune!"
"Oh, worthy brother, in honor to the commerce of Nantes, I cannot admit that one of its wealthiest merchants is worth only four hundred gold sous!" Then, turning to his men: "Conduct my guest and his daughter to their quarters."
At the moment when the men of Neroweg were about to take hold of Bezenecq the Rich, Gonthram, brutally seizing the hand of Isoline, whom the merchant held fainting in his embrace, said: "I take this girl! She is my share of the ransom!"
"I also want her," cried out Guy, his eyes all aflame and advancing toward his brother with a menacing look. But Gonthram, little caring for the words and threats of his brother, made ready to seize the maid and carry her off. Guy then drew his sword. Gonthram in turn drew his, while the daughter ofthe townsman, distracted with terror, shrank within herself, inert, in a swoon.
"Guy! Gonthram! Put up your swords! This maid shall be none of yours," ordered Neroweg. "She shall not leave her father. In the presence of his daughter the bourgeois will prove more accommodating. Put back your swords! You, Garin," he went on, turning to the bailiff, "take this beauty in your arms, if she cannot walk, and carry her in with the old man."
Isoline, catching, despite her terror, the last words of Neroweg, rose to her feet with an effort and said to Garin in a suppliant voice: "For mercy's sake, my good seigneur, take me along with my father. I shall have strength to walk."
"Come," answered the bailiff, leading her to the draw bridge, while Guy and Gonthram, slowly returning their swords to their scabbards, exchanged such vindictive looks that the Count considered it necessary to remain near them in order to prevent a fresh outbreak.
Isoline, following Garin with unsteady step, crossed the draw bridge and entered the hall of the stone table, where still several vassals of the seigneur awaited the close of the session that had been interrupted by the arrival of the prisoners. At one of the corners of this hall was the stone staircase that led down in a spiral from the platform of the donjon to its lowest cells. Near the steps was a trap door. Two men of sinister figure, clad in goat skins and carrying lanterns in their hands, stood near the gaping opening. Bezenecq was loudly calling for his daughter, and resisting with all his force the men who were dragging him in. Seeing, however, his daughter advancing towards him, he ceased to offer resistance, but broke down, weeping.
"Hurry up, my rich townsman!" said Garin the Serf-eater to him; "my seigneur wishes that you and your daughter remain together." Then, turning to the gaolers who carried the lanterns: "Go down first and light our way." The gaolers obeyed, and soon the merchant and Isoline disappeared with them in the depths of the subterranean donjon.
The donjon cells of the manor of Plouernel consisted of three vaulted stories, the only daylight into which penetrated through three narrow slits opening upon the gigantic ditch, out of which rose the donjon itself. Within, apart from a massive door studded with iron, these cells consisted of stone only—they were roofed with stone, floored with stone, and the walls were of stone, ten feet thick. The cell, whither the Bishop of Nantes and the monk Jeronimo were taken, was at the very bottom of this subterraneous structure. A narrow loophole barely filtered through a pale ray of light into that semi-Stygian darkness. The walls sweated a greenish moisture. In the center of the dungeon stood a stone bed, intended for torture or death. Chains and heavy iron rings fastened to the headpiece, to the sides and the feet of the long stone slab, that rose three feet above the floor, announced the purpose of that funereal couch, on which were now seated the monk and the Bishop of Nantes. The latter, a prey at first to agonizing despair, had by degrees recovered his composure. His face, now almost serene with a melancholic good nature, contrasted with the somber severity of his companion. "I am now resigned to death," the prelate was saying to Jeronimo, "yet I confess, I feel my heart fail me at the thought of leaving my wife and children without protection in days as dark as these are."
"There you have one of the consequences of the marriage of priests," the monk answered. "How justly did Gregory VII. reason when he forced the councils to interdict marriage to the clergy!"
After a moment's silence the Bishop of Nantes resumed with a melancholy smile: "Stoics, like the philosophers of antiquity, let's consider at this very moment of imminent torture and death the dogmas that bear upon our present situation."
"Let's commence with the great question of the spiritual and temporal dominion of the church."
"It is a grand subject. I listen."
"In our days, for every twenty abbots or bishops who are sovereign in their abbeys or bishoprics, are there not a hundred dukes, counts, marquises or seigneurs, sovereign masters in their dukedoms, counties or seigniories?"
"Sad to say, 'tis so!"
"Did not a large portion of the estates, that proceeded from the gifts of Charles Martel, return to the hands of the clergy at the time of the terror the people were seized with at the thought of the end of the world,—a terror ably fomented by the church down to the year 1000, and prolonged to 1033 by dint of able maneuvers?"
"That's true, too. The terrified seigneurs abandoned to the church a large part of their goods, thinking the day of judgment was at hand. Since then, however, the same seigneurs, or their descendants, retook their rich donations from the clergy. The hatred that the Count Neroweg pursues me with has no other cause than the recovery of the lands that his grandfather bequeathed to my predecessor, at the time when those brutes expected to see the end of the world. The Count wages war against me to re-enter upon domains that once belonged to his family. The lance is rising against the holy water sprinkler."
"It has been so in all the other provinces. One of the causes of the wars of the seigneurs against the bishops and abbots has, for the last fifty years, been the recovery of the goods given to the Church on the occasion of the end of the world. In these impious strifes the seigneurs have almost always come out on top. The church was vanquished."
"It is a sad fact."
"In order to recover its omnipotence, the Church must again become richer than the seigneurs. She must, above all, rid herself forever of those brigands who dare reach out a sacrilegious hand towards the goods of the Church, and assault the priests of our Lord, the ministers of God."
"Alack, Jeronimo, it is a far way from the wish to the fact! The sword gets the best of the bishop's crook!"
"The distance is simply the journey from here to Jerusalem. That's all!"
The bishop regarded the monk with amazement, repeating without understanding the words: "The journey from here to Jerusalem!"
"I am a legate of Pope Urban II." proceeded Jeronimo. "As such, I am initiated in the policies of Rome. The French Pope Gerbert, and, after him, Gregory VII., conceived a great idea—to submit the peoples of Europe to the papal will. In order, however, to habituate them to a passive obedience, an ostensible purpose had to be held out. Gerbert conceived the thought of the deliverance of the tomb of Christ, which had fallen into the hands of the Saracens, the masters of Syria and Jerusalem. This pregnant thought, conceived in the head of Gerbert and hatched out by Gregory VII., was the subject of long cogitations on the part of their successors. The Popes recommended to the faithful the pilgrimage to Jerusalem, to which they attached special indulgences and privileges. The people of Germany, of Spain, of Gaul, of England, gradually began to hear Jerusalem, the Holy City, talked about. The pilgrimages multiplied. Long though the voyage was, it did not seem impossible; moreover, it insured indulgences for all crimes, and, above all, it was a pleasure trip for the mendicants, the vagabonds, the runaway serfs from the domains of their masters. The pilgrims found good lodgings in the abbeys; they picked up some little money in the cities, and obtained free passage on the Genoese or Venetianvessels as far as Constantinople, where they then departed for Jerusalem, traversing Syria and lodging over night from convent to convent. Arrived at the Holy City, they paid their devotions."
"And all that without any interference on the part of the Saracens. We must admit it among ourselves, Jeronimo, those miscreants showed themselves quite tolerant! The churches rose in peace beside the mosques; the Christians lived in tranquility, and the pilgrims were never incommoded."
"And it remained so," continued Jeronimo, "until the Saracens, exasperated by the anathemas hurled at the sectarians of Mahomet by the Catholic priests of Jerusalem, brought their hammer down upon the holy Temple of Solomon and demolished it—a demolition, however, that we avenged upon Jews by massacring them in the several countries of Europe. But after all, we cared little about the destruction of the Temple, or the safety of the Sepulchre. Our end was attained. The people had learned to know the road to Jerusalem. The sandals of the pilgrims had smoothed the road to the Holy Land to the Catholic peoples. The number of pilgrims increased from year to year. Often seigneurs, certain to obtain by means of that pious voyage the absolution of their crimes, joined the pilgrim vagabonds and beggars. That perpetual flux and reflux of peoples of all stations drew ever more the eyes of Europe to the Orient. The marvels narrated by the pilgrims upon the return from their long voyage, the relics that they brought back, the respect with which the Church surrounded them,—everything affected more and more the spirit of credulity and the vulgar imagination of the masses. Gregory VII. foresaw these results. He considered it opportune to preach the Holy War. The Church raised her voice: 'Shame and sorrow upon the Catholic world! The Sepulchre of the Saviour of man is in the power of the Saracens! Kings and seigneurs, march at the head of your peoples to the deliverance of the Sepulchre of Christ and the extermination of the infidels.'To that premature appeal Europe remained indifferent. The hour of the Crusades had not yet sounded. Since then, however, the idea has made progress, and to-day we are certain to find the minds disposed to second the Pope in his projects. Accordingly, Urban II. has not hesitated to leave Rome and come to preach the Crusade in Gaul, the Catholic countrypar excellence!"
"What say you? The Pope himself is coming to preach the Crusade! Can that be true, oh, my God!"
"His Holiness is bound for Auvergne, and he sends his emissaries into the other provinces."
"And who are the men invested with the confidence of the Pope, and charged with leading such an undertaking to a successful end?"
"One of them, Peter the Hermit, vulgarly called 'Cuckoo Peter,' is a monk who has twice accomplished the pilgrimage to Jerusalem. He is an ardent man, gifted with a savage eloquence that exercises upon the multitudes a powerful effect. Another emissary is Walter the Pennyless, a knight of adventure, bold Gascon, charged to seduce with the cheerfulness of his words and the exaggeration of his descriptions all those who might remain indifferent to the savage eloquence of Peter the Hermit."
"But what arguments will these emissaries advance in order to rouse the masses to these insensate migrations?"
"I shall answer that question presently. But let me remind you of the principal motives of the church to drive the people to the Crusades; to habituate Catholic Europe to rise at the voice of the Pope for the extermination of heretics; to switch off to Palestine a large number of the seigneurs who are contending with the Church for the goods of the earth and the dominion of the people,—to get rid of one's enemies."
"The idea is good, profound, politic. I can well see the object that the Pope has in view."
"Let me, furthermore, call your attention to a fact that renders necessary a large migration of the common people to the Holy Land. In Gaul, despite the private wars of the seigneurs and the sufferings of this century, the population of the serfs has multiplied to an extraordinary degree during the last fifty years."
"That is so. The serf population, decimated by the famines that reigned from 1000 to 1034, immediately began to recover with the years of plenty that followed upon those of dearth."
"Aided, above all, by the action of the Church when, desirous of repeopling her domains, stripped of its agricultural serfs, she caused the 'Armistice of God' to be proclaimed, interdicting the seigneurs and the bishops from levying war during three days of each week under penalty of excommunication."
"That plebeian increase brought on the formidable revolts of the serfs of Normandy and Brittany, when doggerels were sung containing strophes of unheard-of audacity, as you may judge from this one:
"And that's the truth, Jeronimo! Those songs of revolt gave the signal to terrible insurrections in Normandy and Brittany. But two or three millions of the rebels had their eyes put out, their feet and hands chopped off, and the revolt was stamped out. Those wicked people must be exterminated."
"In order to conjure away the return of similar uprisings, it is necessary to lead abroad the plebeian increase. The plebs grows threatening by reason of its numbers and the force thatnumbers carry with them. In order to weaken it, it will be enough to make it depart on the Crusade across Europe."
"Explain to me how the Crusades are expected to bring about the results that you consider needful, and that the exhortations of the papal emissaries are to invoke."
"Is it not evident that, for every thousand serfs who will leave Gaul to fight in Palestine, barely a hundred will arrive as far as Jerusalem? Those wretches, departing penniless, in rags, without provisions, carrying wife and children in their train, ravaging the regions they traverse—Germany, Hungary, Bohemia, Bulgaria, the countries of the Danube—because, in the course of so long a voyage, such multitudes cannot live without pillage along the route, three-fourths of them will have been exterminated by the inhabitants of the countries that they must cross, or will die of hunger and fatigue before being able to reach Jerusalem. The small number of them that will arrive before the Holy City will be still further decimated by the Saracens. It is safe to say that hardly any of those who leave will return. Thus we shall be rid of this vile and dangerous populace that dares rise against its masters, especially against the Church."
"It remains to be seen, Jeronimo, whether this plebs mass will be senseless enough to venture upon so distant and perilous a journey."
The monk answered: "Is not the lot of the villeins and the serfs on the lay or ecclesiastical seigniories the most wretched? And, of all the yokes, is not that of the glebe the heaviest, which forbids them to cross the boundaries of their own seigniory. When the Church will say to those myriads of people, chained down to the glebe: 'Go! You are free! March off to fight the Saracens in Palestine, the country of miracles, where you will gather an immense booty! Take no heed of provisions for the journey, God will provide! Above all, you will accomplish your eternal salvation!' the serfs will depart in mass, drawn by the desire to be free, the thirst for booty, the spirit of adventure,and by the pious ardor to deliver the Holy Sepulchre from the defilement of the infidels!"
"Jeronimo," rejoined the Bishop of Nantes, "the craving after freedom, the spirit of adventure, the hope of booty, may, perhaps, drive those wretches to Palestine. But desire to avenge the tomb of the Saviour from the pretended defilement of the infidels, is, meseems, too feeble a motive. We shall fail there."
"When this holy cause, thrice holy and eloquently preached by the Church, is furthermore backed by the thirst for freedom, the hope of booty, the certainty of gaining Paradise, and curiosity regarding the future, that, though unknown, could not be worse than the present, the attraction of the populace for Palestine will become irresistible."
"I grant it. But will the seigneurs consent to have their lands thus depopulated by allowing the serfs to depart for the Crusades?"
"As much as ourselves do the seigneurs dread the revolt of the serfs. In that we two have a common interest. Moreover, that plebs overflow, which it is the part of wisdom to empty out abroad, constitutes, at the highest, only one-third of the serfs. Only that third will depart."
"And who guarantees that many more will not yield to the attraction, that you consider irresistible, and will not go along?"
"This plebs mass has become craven through the habit of slavery that weighs it down since the Frankish conquest. Only a part of the village and country populations is sufficiently disposed to revolt. It is those very ones who are most impatient of the yoke, the most intelligent, the most venturesome, the most daring, and, consequently, the most dangerous, who will be the first to start for Palestine. Thus shall we be rid of those inciters of rebellion."
"That reasoning is correct."
"Thus only one-third of the rustic plebs will emigrate. Those who remain behind will suffice to cultivate the land. Being fewerto the task, their toil will increase. The ox that is heavily burdened, the ass that is heavily laden, does not kick. The danger of a new revolt will have been conjured off. The Church will resume her preponderance over both the plebs and the seigneurs."
"I admire, Jeronimo, the powerful combinations of the politics of the papacy. But one of the most important results of this policy would be to deliver us from a large number of those accursed seigneurs, always at war against us. Oh, they will not, like the serfs, be driven by the desire to escape a fearful lot, or of enjoying freedom. They, I fear, will remain at home."
"A large number of them are as anxious as their serfs to change their condition. After all, what is the life of these seigneurs? Is it not that of chiefs of brigands? Always at war; always on the watch, fearing to be attacked or surprised by their neighbors; unable but rarely to leave their seigniories except armed to the teeth; often not daring even to go on the hunt in their own domains; forced to entrench themselves in their lairs; these ferocious men are tired of such monotonous life. They will follow the stream."
"I have, indeed, often been struck by the expression of mortal tiredness reflected upon the faces of the seigneurs."
"This will be the language of the friars to these men steeped in crime, brutified almost as much as their own serfs, and all of them nursing at the bottom of their hearts a more or less profound fear of the devil: 'You are smothering in your castles of stone; you here wrangle over the meager spoils of some traveler, or over the barren lands of the Occident—lands peopled with wretches resembling animals rather than human beings. Leave the ungrateful soil and somber sky of the Occident! Go to Palestine, go to the Orient, the land of azure and of sunshine, fertile, splendid, radiant, studded with magnificent cities, palaces of marble, gilded cupolas, delicious gardens! There you will find the treasures for centuries accumulated by the Saracens, treasures so prodigious that they suffice to pave with gold, rubies,pearls and diamonds the whole road from Gaul to Jerusalem! God delivers into your hands that teeming soil, its palaces, its beautiful women, its treasures. Depart on the Holy War!' A large number of seigneurs will bite with all the snap of their heavy jaws at that bait glittering with all the fires of the sun of the Orient."
"You are right, Jeronimo," observed the Bishop of Nantes. "But do you not fear that the seigniorial station, thus stripped, shrunk and ruined, will leave the place open for the royalty, to-day without power, and that that royalty will not endeavor to share with us the dominion of the people, and will not even strive to dominate the Church?"
"We need not fear the rivalry of the Kings. Even their private interests are to us a safe guarantee of their submission to the will of the Pope, the representative of God on earth, the dispenser of eternal rewards or punishments."
"Oh, Jeronimo, your words have opened a new horizon before me. I see now the future of the Catholic Church in all her formidable majesty. I now cleave to life, and would wish to assist at that magnificent spectacle."
"This topic has a close bearing upon our present position of prisoners of Neroweg VI, and you must inspire yourself with it, Simon, to the end that you may regulate your conduct accordingly."
"Tell me what I am to do, Jeronimo. I can take no more precious a guide than you in all matters concerning our holy religion."
"Neroweg relies upon your torture to extort from you the possession of the domains of your diocese, which he has long coveted. Accede to all that he may demand. Peter the Hermit and Walter the Pennyless will not be long in arriving in this region to preach the Crusade. Neroweg will depart for Jerusalem, and will not be able to profit from the concessions you will have granted."
"But say he insists upon putting me to the torture to glut his thirst for revenge upon me! I shudder at the prospect."
The conversation between the Bishop of Nantes and the monk was here interrupted by a rumbling and weird noise, that seemed to proceed from the interior of the thick wall. The two prelates trembled with affright, and looked at each other. Then, drawing near the wall in the direction from which the noise came, they applied their ears with bated breath. But the noise slowly receded, and a few minutes later died away completely.
The dungeon of Bezenecq the Rich and his daughter, vaulted and floored with stone slabs like the other subterranean cells, but located on the second story of that redoubtable structure, received a somewhat better light from its narrow loop-hole. In the center of the cell stood a gridiron, six feet long, three wide, raised a good deal above the floor, and constructed of iron bars placed slightly apart from each other. Chains and rings, fastened to the gridiron, served to keep the victim in position. Near this instrument of punishment rose two other engines of torture, devised with ingenious ferocity. The one consisted of a projecting iron bar, in the nature of a gibbet about seven or eight feet above the floor, and terminating in an iron carcan that opened and closed at will. A heavy stone, weighing about two tons, and furnished with a ring and a strap to hang it by, lay at the foot of the gibbet. The other engine had the appearance of a gigantic prong, sharp and turned back similar to those used by butchers to hang their quarters of beef on. The slabs of the flooring, covered everywhere else with greenish moisture, wore a blood-red tint under the prong. Opposite to this instrument of punishment, there was grossly sculptured on the wall, a sort of grinning mask, hideous, half beast, half human; its eyes and the cavity of its gaping mouth, resembled deep black holes. Finally, close to the door of the cell stood a wooden box full of straw, and there lay the daughter of the townsman of Nantes, colorless like a corpse, and frozen with terror. At times her body shook with convulsive shivers, other times she remained motionless, her eyes shut, without, therefore, however, her tearsceasing to stream down her cheeks. Bezenecq the Rich, seated on the edge of the straw bed, his elbows on his knees and his forehead hidden in his hands, was saying to himself: "The seigneur of Plouernel.... A descendant of Neroweg!... Strange, fatal encounter!... Woe is us!"
"Oh, father," murmured the maid in a fainting voice, "this encounter is our sentence of death."
"The sentence of our ruin, but not of our death. Calm yourself, poor child, the seigneur of Plouernel knows not that our obscure family, descended from the Gallic chieftain Joel, who made a head against Cæsar, has been at strife with his own all through the past ages, since the Frankish conquest. But when that bailiff pronounced the name of Neroweg VI, which I had not heard mention during this ill-starred journey, and when, questioned by me, that man answered his master belonged to the ancient Frankish family of Neroweg, established in Auvergne since the conquest of Gaul by Clovis, I no longer had any doubts, and, despite myself, I shuddered at the recollection of our family records, which our father once read to us at Laon, and that have remained in that country, in the hands of Gildas, my elder brother."
"Oh, why did our grandfather leave Brittany. Our family lived there so happy."
"Dear child, our grandfather, who lived near the sacred stones of Karnac, the cradle of our family, could no longer endure the oppression of the Breton seigneurs, who had grown to be as cruel as their Frankish fellows. He sold his little havings, and embarked with his wife at Vannes on a merchant vessel bound for Abbeville. He settled down in that city, where he set up a modest trade. Later, my father moved into the province of Picardy, and settled at Laon, where my elder brother Gildas still carries on the currier's trade. Coming by sea from Abbeville to Nantes to traffic in the articles of our trade, manufactured in Laon, I became acquainted with your mother, thedaughter of the merchant to whom I was directed. Her parents did not wish to part from her. They made me promise not to leave Nantes. I became the partner of my wife's father, and grew rich in the business. Your mother then died. You were still a child. Her death was the greatest sorrow of my life. But you were left to me. You grew in gracefulness and beauty. Everything smiled upon me again. I was happy. And behold us now, while yielding to the wishes of your grandmother—" and Bezenecq interrupted himself with a cry of despair: "Oh, it is frightful!"
"But how could we have merited the terrible punishment that seems reserved to us?"
"Oh," replied the bourgeois of Nantes with a sigh, "my happiness rendered me forgetful of the misfortune of our brothers! I was selfish!"
"Dear father, you surely exaggerate the faults or errors of your life."
"Millions of serfs and villeins people the lands of the seigneurs and the clergy. Among them, some drag along a painful existence, that ends in death from exhaustion and misery; others are hanged from the patibulary forks. Those unhappy people are Gauls like ourselves. If some townsmen live in tranquility in the cities, when they have for seigneur so gentle a master as Simon of Nantes, millions of serfs and villeins, on the other hand, are devoted to all the miseries of life, and victims to the seigniories and the Church."
"But, father, it did not depend upon you to alleviate the ills of these wretched folks."
"My father spoke like a brave and generous man when he said to the bourgeoisie of the city of Laon: 'We are subject to the exactions of the bishop, our seigneur. But, after all, we townsmen enjoy certain franchises. It, therefore, devolves upon us, being more intelligent and less miserable than the serfs of the fields, to aid these to their deliverance by ourselves risingagainst the seigneurs, and thus setting the example of revolt against oppression. In the instances where, of their own accord, they rise as happened in Normandy, as happened in Picardy, as happened in Brittany, it is then our duty to place ourselves at their head, in order to insure the success of the insurrection. Is it not a shame; an unworthy timidity, to allow those unhappy men to be crushed and punished for a cause that is ours as much as theirs? Does not the tyranny of the nobles and the friars weigh upon us also. Are not we the prey of the feudal brigands the moment we leave the enclosure of the cities, where we suffer an amplitude of affronts?' But my father's words were not able to convince the townsmen to decide upon insurrection. They feared to risk their property and make their lot worse. Myself, having grown rich, sided with the self-seekers, and I echoed the views of the other merchants: 'No doubt, the condition of the serfs is horrible, but I can do nothing to improve it, and I dare not stake my life and fortune upon the result of an insurrection.' Our cowardly and selfish indifference increased the audacity of the seigneurs, until to-day we cannot set foot outside the cities without being exposed to the brigandage of the chatelains. Oh, my child, I am punished for having lacked energy and for disregarding the precepts of my father!"
"We are lost; there is no hope left!" exclaimed the maid, no longer able to restrain her sobs. "Death, a shocking death awaits us!" And Isoline, whose teeth chattered with terror, directed her father's attention, with a gesture, to the instruments of torture that furnished the cell. Hiding her face in her hands, she moaned convulsively.
"Isoline," rejoined Bezenecq imploringly and overcome with grief, "my beloved child, listen to the word of reason. Terror exaggerates. The aspect of this subterranean dungeon frightens. Oh, I understand that. But let's not lose all hope. When I shall have subscribed to all that the seigneur of Plouernel can exact from me, when I shall have consented to strip myself forhis benefit of all that I possess, what do you imagine he could still do? Of what use to him would it be to have me tortured? He entertains against me no personal hatred. He is after my wealth. I shall give it all, absolutely all."
"Good father, you are seeking to calm my spirit. I thank you a thousand times."
"Is not our fate sufficiently sad? Why make the reality still darker? I had hoped to give you a rich dower, to bequeath to you later my property, that would have insured the happiness of your children. And now I am about to be stripped of all. Our descendants will be reduced to poverty!"
"Oh, if only the seigneur of Plouernel grants us our lives, I would care little for that wealth that, for my sake, you bemoan."
"Nor shall I be less courageous than you," said Bezenecq, tenderly clasping the hands of his daughter: "I shall imagine I placed all my money on board a ship that went down. Once out of this infernal castle, dear child, we shall return to Nantes. I shall see my friend Thibault the Silversmith. He knows my aptitude for commerce. He will employ me, and will pay me a salary that will suffice for our needs. But it will be necessary, my pretty Isoline," Bezenecq proceeded, forcing a smile to calm his daughter, "it will then be necessary for you to sew our clothes with your own little white hands, and prepare our frugal meals. Instead of inhabiting our beautiful house on the place of Marche-Neuf, we shall take humble lodgings in the quarter of the ramparts. But, what of it, provided the heart is joyful! Moreover, I shall always have in my pocket a few deniers wherewith occasionally, on my return home, to buy you a new ribbon for your neck, my dear, sweet child, or a bouquet of roses to cheer your little bedroom."