Fair Ellen that was so mildMore she beheld Triamour the child,Than all other men.
Fair Ellen that was so mildMore she beheld Triamour the child,Than all other men.
Fair Ellen that was so mildMore she beheld Triamour the child,Than all other men.
Fair Ellen that was so mild
More she beheld Triamour the child,
Than all other men.
Sir Triamour.
Long before the dawn had begun to grow gray in the east, Kenric had taken his way to the castle, by a direct path across the hills to a point on the lake shore, where there always lay a small ferry-boat, for the use of the castellan, his household, and vassals. Edith, to whom he had told all that he had extorted from Eadwulf, and who, like himself, clearly foresaw difficulty and danger at hand, arising from the conduct and flight of the ill-conditioned and ill-starred brother, went about her household work, most unusual for her, with a melancholy and despondent heart.
She, who while a serf had been constantly, almost recklessly gay, as one who had no sorrow for which to care, wore a grave brow, and carried a heavy heart. For liberty, if it give independence to the body and its true expansion to the soul, brings responsibility also, and care. She carolled this morning no blythe old Saxon ballads as she kneaded her barley cakes, or worked her overflowing churn; she had this morning no merry word with which to greet the verdurer's boys, as they came and went from her ample kitchen with messes for the hounds to the kennels, or raw meat for the eyasses in the mews; and they wondered not a little, for the kindness and merry humor of their young mistress had won their hearts, and they were grieved to see her downcast. She was restless, and unable, as it seemed, to settle herself to any thing, coming and going from one place to another, without much apparent object, and every half hour or so, opening the door and gazing wistfully down the valley, toward the sea, not across the hills over which her husband had bent his way.
It must have been nearly ten o'clock, in those unsophisticated days approaching nearly to the dinner hour, when something caught her eye at a distance, which instantly brought a bright light into it, and a clear, rich color to her cheek; and she clapped her hands joyously, crying, "I am so glad! so glad!" Then, hurrying into the house, she called to the boys, giving them quick, eager orders, and set herself to work arranging the house, strewing the floor with fresh green rushes, and decking the walls with holly branches, the bright-red berries of the mountain ash, wild asters, and such late wood-flowers as yet survived, with a spirit very different from the listless mood which had possessed her.
What was the vision that had so changed the tenor of her mind?
Winding through one of those green lanes—which form so exquisite a feature in the scenery of the lake country, with their sinuous, gray boundary stone walls, bordered with ashes, hazels, wild roses, and beds of tall fern at their base, while the walls themselves are overspread with small ferns, wild strawberries, the geranium, and rich lichens—there came a fair company, the persons of which were easily distinguished by Edith, in that clear atmosphere, when at a mile's distance from the cottage—a mile which was augmented into nearly three by the meanderings of the lane, corresponding with those of the brook.
In the front rode a lady, the Lady Guendolen, on a beautiful chestnut-colored Andalusian jennet, with snow-white mane and tail, herself splendidly attired in a dark murrey-colored skirt, passamented with black embroidery, and above it a surcoat or tunic, fitting the body closely a little way below the hips, of blue satin, embroidered in silver with the armorial bearings of her house—a custom as usual in those days with the ladies as with the knights of the great houses. Her head was covered with a small cap of blue velvet, with one white feather, and on her left hand, covered by a doe-skin hawking-glove, was set a superb gosshawk, unhooded, so familiar was he with his bright mistress, and held only by a pair of silver jesses, corresponding with the silver bells which decked his yellow legs, and jingled at his every motion. By her side, attending far more to his fair companion than to the fiery horse which he bestrode, was a young cavalier, bending over her with an air of the deepest tenderness, hanging on her words as if they were more than the sweetest music to his soul, and gazing on her with affection so obvious as to show him a permitted lover. He was a powerful, finely-formed young man, of six or eight-and-twenty years, with a frank open countenance, full of intellect, nobleness, and spirit, with an occasional shadow of deep thought, but hardly to be called handsome, unless it were for the expression, since the features, though well cut, were not regular, and the complexion was too much sun-burned and weather-hardened even for manly beauty.
Altogether he was, however, a remarkably attractive-looking person. He sat his horse superbly, as a king might sit his throne; his every motion was perfect majesty of grace; and when he smiled, so radiant was the glance lighting up the dark face, that he was, for the moment, actually handsome. He was dressed in a plain, dark hunting suit, with a bonnet and feather of the same hue, and untanned deer buskins, the only ornament he wore being a long blue scarf, of the same color as the surcoat of his mistress, and embroidered, probably by her hand, with the same bearings. The spurs in his buskins, however, were not gilded, and the light estoc, or sharp-pointed hunting-sword, which hung at his left side, showed by its form that he had not yet attained the honors of knighthood.
Aradas de Ratcliffe was the heir male of a line, one of the first and noblest which had settled in the lake country, in the beautiful vale of Rydal, but a little way distant to the northward from the lands of Sir Yvo de Taillebois. His father, a baron of great renown, had taken the Cross when far advanced in life, and proceeding to the Holy Land with that disastrous Second Crusade, led by Conrad III. the German Emperor, and Louis VII. of France, at the summoning of Pope Eugene III., had fallen in the first encounter with the infidels, and dying under shield, knight-like, had left his infant son with no other guardian than his mother, a noble lady of the house of Fitz Norman.
She had discharged her trust as became the character of her race; and so soon as the boy was of sufficient years, he was entered in the household of Sir Yvo de Taillebois, as the finest school in the whole realm for the aspirant to honor in arms.
Here, as page and esquire, he had served nearly twenty years of his life, first following his lord's stirrup, until he was perfect in the use of his arms, and old enough to wield them; then, fighting in his train, until he had proved himself of such stern fidelity and valor, that he became his favorite attendant, and most trusted man-at-arms.
In feudal days, it must be remembered that it was no disgrace to a scion of the highest family to serve his pagehood under a noble or knight of lineage and renown; on the contrary, it was both a condition that must be undergone, and one held as an honor to both parties; so much so, that barons of the greatest name and vastest demesnes in the realm would often solicit, and esteem it as a high favor, to have their sons ride as pages in the train of some almost landless knight, whose extraordinary prowess should have won him an extraordinary name.
These youths, moreover, as they were nobly born, so were they nobly entreated; nothing low or mean was suffered to come before them. Even in their services, nothing menial was required of them. To arm their lord for battle, to follow him to the tournament or to the field, where to rush in to his rescue if beaten down, to tend his hurts if wounded, to bear his messages, and guard his secrets as his own life, to wait on the ladies—these were the duties of a page in the twelfth century. Courage, truth, honor, fidelity unto death, courtesy, humility to the humble, haughtiness to the haughty—these were the lessons taught him. It may be doubted whether our teachings in the nineteenth are so far superior, and whether they bear so far better fruits in the end!
Be this, however, as it may, Aradas de Ratcliffe, having grown up in the same household with the beautiful Guendolen, though some twelve years her senior, had grown up to love her; and his promise of manhood being in no wise inferior to her beauty, his birth equal to her own, and his dead father an old and trusted friend of Sir Yvo, he was now riding by her side, not only as her surest defender, but as her affianced husband; it being settled, that so soon as the youthful esquire should have won his knightly spurs, the lands of Hawkshead, Coniston, and Yewdale, should be united with the adjoining demesnes of Rydal manor, dim with its grand old woods, by the union of the heiress of De Taillebois to the heir of the proud Ratcliffes.
And now they had ridden forth on this bright and fair autumnal morning, partly to fly their hawks at the herons, for which the grassy meads in the vale of Kentmere were famous, partly to visit the new home of Guendolen's favorite Edith, and more, in truth, than all, to enjoy the pleasure of a lovingtête-à-tête; for the girl who followed her lady kept discreetly out of ear-shot, and amused herself flirting with the single page who accompanied them; and the rest of the train, consisting of grooms, falconers, and varlets, bearing the hawks and leading the sumpter-mules, lagged considerably in the rear.
There was not, however, very much of gayety in the manner of either of the young people; the fair face of Guendolen was something paler than its use, and her glad eyes had a beseeching look, even while she smiled, and while her voice was playful; and there was a sorrowful shadow on the brow of Aradas, and he spoke in a grave, low tone, though it was full of gentleness and trust.
In truth, like Jacob of old, when he served for the daughters of Laban, the young esquire was waxing weary of the long servitude and the hope deferred. The temporary lull of war, which at that time prevailed over both England and the French provinces belonging to the crown, gave him no hope of speedily winning the desired spurs; and the bloody wars, which were in progress on the shores of the sister island, though fierce and sanguinary enough to satisfy the most eager for the perils and honors of the battle-field, were not so evidently favored by the monarch, or so clear from the taint of piracy, as to justify a cavalier, of untainted character and unbroken fortunes, in joining the invaders. But in this very year had the eyes of all the Christian world been strongly turned toward Palestine, where Baldwin IV., a minor, and a leper, and no match for the talents and power of the victorious Saladin, sat feebly on the throne of the strong crusading Kings of Jerusalem, which was now tottering to its fall, under the fierce assaults of the Mussulman.
Henry II. and Louis of France had sworn to maintain between them the peace of God, and to join in a third Crusade for the defense of the Tomb of Christ and the Holy City. In this war, Aradas saw the certainty of winning knighthood; but Guendolen, who would have armed her champion joyously, and buckled on his sword with her own hand, for any European conflict, shuddered at the tales of the poisoned sarbacanes and arrows with which report armed the gigantic Saracens—shuddered at the knives of the assassins of the mountains—at the pestilences which were known to brood over those arid shores; and yet more, at the strange monsters, dragons, and winged-serpents—nay, fiends and incarnate demons—with which superstitious horror peopled the solitudes which had witnessed the awful scenes of the Temptation, the Passion, and the Death, of the Son of God.
In short, she interposed her absolute nay, with the quiet but positive determination of a woman, and clinched it with a woman's argument.
"You do not love me, Aradas," she said; "I know you do not love me, or you would never think of speaking of that fearful country, or of taking the Cross—that country, from which no one ever returns alive—or, if he do return, returns so bent and bowed with plague and fever, or so hacked and mangled by the poisoned weapons of the savages, that he is an old man ere his prime, and dead before—— No, no! I will not hear of it! No, I will not! I will not love you, if you so much as breathe it to me again, Aradas!"
"That were a penalty," said the young man, half-sadly smiling; "but, can you help it, Guendolen?"
"Don't trust in that, sir," she said. "One can do any thing—every thing—by trying."
"Can one, pardie! I would you would show me, then, how to win these spurs of gold, by trying."
"I can. Be firm, be faithful, and, above all, be patient. Remember, without hope, without patience, there is no evidence of faith; without faith, there is, there can be, neither true chivalry nor true love. Besides, we are very young, we are very happy as we are; occasion will come up, perhaps is at hand even now; and—and—well, if I am worth having, I am worth waiting for, Beausire Aradas; and if you don't think so, by'r lady, you'd better bestow yourself where——"
"Whoop! whoop! So ho! He mounts! he mounts!" A loud shout from the rear of the party interrupted her. In the earnestness of their conversation, they had cleared the confines of the winding lane, and entered, without observing it, a beautiful stretch of meadow-land, intersected by small rivulets and water-courses, sloping down to the lake shore. Some of the grooms and varlets had spread out over the flat grass-land, beating the reeds with their hawking-poles, and cheering their merry spaniels. The shout was elicited by the sudden uprising of the great, long-necked hermit-fisher, from a broad reed belt by the stream-side, flapping his broad gray vans heavily on the light air, and stretching his long yellow legs far behind him, as he soared skyward, with his harsh, clanging cry.
All eyes were instantly turned to the direction of the shout, and every heart bounded at the sight of the quarry.
"Whoop! Diamond! whoop!" cried the young girl, as she cast off her gallant falcon; and then, seeing her lover throw off his long-winged peregrine to join in the flight, "A wager, Aradas. My glove on 'Diamond' against 'Helvellyn.' What will you wager, Beausire?"
"My heart!"
"Nay! I have that already. Else you swore falsely. Against your turquoise ring. I'll knot my kerchief with it."
"A wager! Now ride, Guendolen; ride; if you would see the wager won."
And they gave the head to their horses, and rode furiously. No riding is so desperate, it is said, no excitement so tremendous, as that of the short, fierce, reckless gallop in the chase where bird hunts bird through the boundless fields of air. Not even the tremendous burst and rally of the glorious hunts-up, with the heart-inspiring crash of the hounds, and the merry blare of the bugles, when the hart of grease has broken covert, and the pack are running him breast high.
In the latter, the heart may beat, the pulse may throb and quiver, but the eye is unoccupied, and free to direct the hand, to rule the courser's gallop, and mark the coming leap. In the former, the eye, as the heart, and the pulse, and the ear, are all bent aloft, up! up! with the straining, towering birds; while the steed must pick its own way over smooth or rough, and the rider take his leaps as they chance to come, unseen and unexpected. Such was the glorious mystery of Rivers!
The wind, what little of it there was when the heron rose, was from the southward, and the bird flew before it directly toward the cottage of Kenric, rising slowly but strongly into the upper regions of air. The two falcons, which were nearly half a mile astern of the quarry when they were cast off, flew almost, as it seemed, with the speed of lightning, in parallel lines about fifty yards apart, rising as he rose, and evidently gaining on him at every stroke of their long, sharp pinions, in pursuit. And in pursuit of those, their riders sitting well back in their saddles, and holding them hard by the head, the high-blooded horses tore across the marshy plain, driving fragments of turf high into the air at every stroke, and sweeping over the drains and water-courses which obstructed their career, like the unbridled wind. It was a glorious spectacle—a group of incomparable splendor, in coloring, in grace, in vivacity, motion, fire, sweeping through that panorama of magnificent mountain scenery.
The day was clear and sunny, the skies soft and transparently blue; but, ever and anon, huge clouds came driving over the scene, casting vast purple-shadows over the green meadows and the mirrored lake. One of these now came sweeping overhead, and toward it towered the contending birds. The heron, when he saw that he was pursued, uttered a louder and harsher cry, and began to scale the sky in great aërial circles. Silent, in smaller circles, towered the falcons, each emulous to out-top the others. Up! up! higher and higher! Neither victorious yet, neither vanquished. Now! now! the falcons are on a level with him, and again rings the clanging shriek of the wild water-bird, and he redoubles his last effort. He rises, he out-tops the hawks, and all vanish in an instant from the eyes of the pursuers, swallowed up in the depths of the great golden cloud.
Still the harsh clanking cry is heard; and now, as they and the cloud still drift northward, they reappear, now all descending, above the little esplanade before the cottage-door where Edith stands watching.
The heron is below, falling plumb through the air with his back downward, his wings flapping at random, his long neck trussed on his breast, and his sharp bill projecting upward, perilous as the point of a Moorish assagay. The falcons both above him, towering for the swoop, Aradas' Helvellyn the topmost.
He pointed to the birds with his riding-rod triumphantly, and glancing an arch look at his mistress, "Helvellyn has it," he said; "Palestine or no Palestine, on the stoop!"
"On the hawks!" she replied; "and heaven decide it!"
"I will wear the glove in my casque in the first career," and, as he spoke, the falcon closed his wings and came down with a swoop like lightning on the devoted quarry. The rush of his impetuous plunge, cleaving the air, was clearly audible, above the rustling of the leaves and the noise of the pursuers.
But the gallant heron met the shock unflinching, and Helvellyn, gallant Helvellyn, came down like a catapult upon the deadly beak of the fierce wader, and was impaled from breast to back in a second. There was a minute of wild convulsive fluttering, and then the heron shook off his assailant, who drifted slowly down, writhing and struggling, with all his beauteous plumes disordered and bedropped with gore, to the dull earth, while, with a clang of triumph, the victor once more turned to rise heavenward.
The cry of triumph was premature, for, even as it was uttered, brave Diamond made his stoop. Swift and sure as the bolt of Heaven, he found his aim, and, burying his keen singles to the sheath in the back of the tortured waterfowl, clove his skull at a single stroke of the trenchant bill.
"Hurrah! hurrah! brave Diamond," cried the delighted girl. "No Palestine! no Palestine! For this, your bells and jesses shall be of gold, beautiful Diamond, and your drink of the purest wine of Gascony."
And, giving head to her jennet, the first of all the train she reached the spot where the birds lay struggling on the grass within ten yards of Kenric's door, and, as she sprang from her saddle, was caught in the arms of Edith.
"God's blessings on you! welcome! welcome! dearest lady," cried the beautiful Saxon, raining down tears of gratitude.
"Thanks, Edith; but, quick! quick! help me save the falcon, lest the heronshaw hurt him. My life was at stake on his flight, and he has saved my life!"
"The heronshaw is dead enough, lady, he will hurt nothing more," said the Saxon, following her lady, nevertheless, to secure the gallant gosshawk, which in a moment sat pluming his ruffled feathers, and glaring at her triumphantly with his clear golden eye, as he arched his proud neck to her caresses, on the wrist of his fair mistress.
It seemed as though he knew that he had won her wager.
The hour of the noonday meal had now fully arrived, and the sumpter mules were soon brought up, and carpets spread on the turf, and flasks and barrels, pasties and brawns, and huge boars' heads unpacked in tempting profusion, and all preparations made for a meal in the open air.
But Edith pleaded so hard that her dear lady, to whom she owed more than life, whom she loved more than her own life, would honor her humble roof, would suffer the choicest of the viands to be borne into her pleasant, sunny room, and taste her home-brewed mead, that Guendolen, who was in rapture at her triumph, readily consented, and Aradas, who was pleased to see Guendolen happy, made no opposition.
So, while amid loud merriment, and the clang of flasks and beakers, and the clash of knives and trenchers, their train fared jovially and lustily without, they feasted daintily and happily within the Saxon's cottage.
And the sunny room was pleasant; and the light played cheerfully on the polished pewter trenchers on the dresser, and the varnished holly and scarlet berries, and bright wild-flowers on the wall; and the sparkling wood fire was not amiss after the gallop in the clear air; and Guendolen preferred the light, foaming mead of the Saxon housewife, to the wines of Gascony and Bordeaux; and all went happily and well.
Above all, Edith gained her point. She got occasion to tell the tale of Eadwulf's flight, arrival, and departure, and obtained a promise of protection for her husband, in case he should be brought in question for his share in his brother's escape; and even prevailed that no search should be made after Eadwulf, provided he would keep himself aloof, and commit no offense against the pitiless forest laws, or depredations on the people of the dales.
Many strange emotions of indignation, sympathy, horror, alternately swept through the mind of Guendolen, and were reflected from her eloquent eyes; and many times did Aradas twirl his thick mustache, and gripe his dagger's hilt, as they heard the vicissitudes of that strange tale—the base and dastardly murder of the noble and good Sir Philip de Morville; the slaying of the bailiff by the hand of Eadwulf, which thus came to look liker to lawful retribution than to mere homicide; the strange chances of the serf's escape; the wonderful wiles by which he had baffled the speed of horses and the scent of bloodhounds; and the final catastrophe of the sands, swallowing up, as it would seem, well-nigh all the slaughterers of Sir Philip, while sparing the panting and heart-broken fugitive. It was indeed a tale more strange and horrible than any thing, save truth.
They sat some time in silence, musing. Then suddenly, as by an impulse, their eyes met. Their meaning was the same.
"Yes!" he said, bowing his head gravely, in answer to what he read in her look, "there may be an occasion, and a very noble one."
"And for such an one, I will bind my glove on your casque, and buckle your sword to your side very gladly."
"Amen!" said he. "Be it as God wills. He will defend the right."
So, bidding their pretty hostess adieu, not leaving her without a token of their visit and good-will, they mounted and rode homeward, thinking no more of the sport; graver, perhaps, and more solemn in their manner; but, on the whole, happier and more hopeful than when they set forth in the morning.
And Edith, though she understood nothing of the impulses of their hearts, was grateful and content; and when her husband returned home, and, hanging about his neck, she told him what she had done, and how she had prospered, and received his approbation and caresses, was that night the happiest woman within the four seas that gird Britain.
Count.If thou be he, then thou art prisoner.Tal.Prisoner to whom?
Shakespeare.
For several days after the visit of the Lady Guendolen and her lover to the house of the verdurer of Kentmere, rumors, many of which had been afloat since the catastrophe on the sands, began to increase among the dalesmen, of strangers seen at intervals among the hills or in the scattered hamlets, seeming to observe every thing, but themselves carefully avoiding observation, asking many questions, but answering none, and leaving a general impression on the minds of all who saw them, that they were thus squandered, as it were, through the lake country, as spies, probably of some marauding band, but certainly with no good intent. These individuals bore no sort of resemblance, it was said, or affinity one to the other, nor seemed to have any league of community between them, yet there was an unanimous sentiment, wherever they came and went, which they ordinarily did in succession, that they were all acting on a common plan and with a common purpose, however dissimilar might be their garb, their occupation, or their immediate purpose. And widely dissimilar these were—for one of those suspected was in appearance a maimed beggar, displaying the scallop-shell of St. James of Compostella, in token that he had crossed the seas for his soul's good, and vowing that he had lost his left arm in a sanguinary conflict with the Saracens, who were besieging Jerusalem, in the valley of Jehoshaphat; a second was a dashing pedler, with gay wares for the village maidens, and costlier fabrics—lawns from Cyprus, and silks and embroideries of Ind, for the taste of nobler wearers; another seemed a mendicant friar, though of what order it was not by any means so evident, since, his tonsure excepted, his apparel gave token of very little else than raggedness and filth.
Nearly a week had passed thus, when, at a late hour in the afternoon, word was conveyed to the castle of Sir Yvo, under Hawkshead, by the bailiff, in person, of the little town of Kendal, which lay about midway between Kentmere and the bay, that a small body of horse, completely armed, having at their head a gentleman apparently of rank, had entered the town about mid-day, demanded quarters for the night for man and horse, and sent out one or two unarmed riders, as if to survey the country. In any part of England traversed by great roads, this would have created no wonder or surmise; for hundreds of such parties were to be seen on the great thoroughfares every day, few persons at that period journeying without weapons of offense and arms defensive, and gentlemen of rank being invariably attended by bodies of armed retainers, which were indeed rendered indispensable by the prevalence of private feuds and personal hostilities which were never wholly at an end between the proud barons, whose conterminous lands were constant cause of unneighborly bickerings and strife.
In these wild rural districts, however, it was quite different, where the roads merely gave access and egress to the country lying below the mountains, but opened no thoroughfare either for trade or travel, there being no means of approach from that side, even to Penrith or Carlisle, already towns of considerable magnitude, lying but a few miles distant across the vast and gloomy fells and mountains, except by the blindest of paths, known only to shepherds and outlaws, leading through tremendous passes, such as that terrible defile of Dunmailraise, famous to this day for its stern and savage grandeur. Hence it came, that, unless it were visitors to some of the few castles or priories in the lower valleys, such as Furness Abbey, Calder Abbey, Lannercost Priory, Gleaston Castle, the stronghold of the Flemings, Rydal, the splendid manor of the Ratcliffes, this fortalice of De Taillebois, at Hawkshead, and some strong places of the Dacres and Cliffords, yet farther to the east, not constituting in the whole a dozen within a circumference of fifty miles, no strangers were ever seen in these secluded valleys, without exciting wonder, and something of consternation.
So it was in this instance; and so urgent did it appear to Sir Yvo, that, although he was just sitting down to supper when his officer arrived—for Kendal was his manorial town, where he held his courts, leet and baron—that he put off the evening meal an hour, until he should have heard his report, and examined into all the circumstances of the case.
Then commending his bailiff for his discretion, he dismissed him, with orders to make all speed home again, without signifying at Kendal whither he had been, to give all heed and courteous attention to the strangers, keeping ever a sharp eye on their actions, and to expect himself in the burgh ere midnight.
This done, he returned to the hall, as calm as if nothing had occurred to move him, though he was indeed doubly moved, both as lord of the manor and sheriff of the country; and, merely whispering to Aradas to have fifty lances in the saddle within an hour, and to dispatch a messenger to have the horse-boats ready on the lake, opposite to Bowness, took his place at the board-head, with his fair child on his right, and the young esquire on the left, and carved the roe venison and moor fowl, and jested joyously, and quaffed his modicum of the pure light wines of Gascony, as if he had nothing on hand that night beyond a walk on the battlements, before retiring. So soon, however, as supper was over, he bade his page go up to his private apartment, and bidding Aradas look sharp, for there was little time to lose, he told Guendolen, with a smile, that he should make her chatelaine for the night, since he must ride across the lake to Kendal.
"To-night, father!" she exclaimed, astonished, "why, it is twenty miles; you will not be there before daybreak."
"Oh, yes, by midnight, girl, if we spur the sharper; and it is partly on your business that I go, too, child; for I fancy there is something afoot, that bodes no good to your friend Kenric; but we'll nip it in the bud, we'll nip it in the bud, by St. Agatha!"
"Ah!" said the girl, turning pale, "there will be danger, then——"
"Danger!" said the old knight, looking at her sharply, "danger, not a whit of it! It is but that villain d'Oilly, with a score of spears of Sherwood. I must take fifty lances with me, for, as sheriff, I must keep peace without spear-breaking; were it not for that, I would meet him spear to spear; and he should reckon with me, too, for poor Sir Philip, ere we parted, as he shall do yet, one day, although I see not how to force him to it. So now, kiss me, silly minion, and to bed with you while I go arm me."
And the stout old warrior strode up to his cabinet, whence he descended in half an hour, armedcap-a-piein chain mail, plate armor not having yet come into use, with his flat-topped casque on his head, his heater-shaped shield hung about his neck, and his huge, two-handed sword crossing his whole person, its cross-hilt appearing above his left shoulder, and its tip clashing against the spur on his right heel. As he entered the court of the castle, his men were all in their saddles, sitting firm as pillars of steel, each with his long lance secured by its sling and the socket attached to the stirrup, bearing a tall waxen torch in his right hand, making their mail-coats flash and twinkle in the clear light, as if they were compact of diamonds. Aradas was alone dismounted, holding the stirrup for his lord until he had mounted, when he sprang, all armed as he was, into the saddle. The banner-man at once displayed the square banner of his lord, the trumpeter made the old ramparts ring with the old gathering blast of the house of De Taillebois, and, two and two, the glittering men-at-arms, defiled through the castle gate, and wound down the steep hill side, long to be traced from the battlements, now seen, now lost among the woods and coppices, a line of sinuous light, creeping, like a huge glow-worm, over the dark champaign.
Before they reached the lake shore, however, the moon rose, round and red, from behind the Yorkshire fells; and, extinguishing their flambeaux, they pricked rapidly forward through the country, which, intricate as it was, soon became as light as at noonday.
On the other side of the lake, circumstances of a very different nature, though arising from the same causes, were occurring. Early in the afternoon, while Kenric was absent on his rounds, a single rider, plainly clad, and unarmed, except his sword, made his appearance, riding up the valley from the direction of Kendal, and soon pulling up at the cottage, inquired the road to Rydal. Then, on being informed that there was no pass through the hills in that direction, and that he ought to have turned off to the eastward, through a gap five miles below, he asked permission to dismount and rest himself and his horse awhile, a favor which Edith readily conceded. Oat cakes and cheese, then, as now, the peculiar dainties of the dalesmen, with home-brewed mead, were set before him, his horse was fed, and every act of hospitality which could be done to the most honored guest was extended to him.
He observed every thing, noted every thing, especially the crossbow which Eadwulf had brought with him on his late inopportune arrival, learned the name and station of his entertainer, and how he was the tenant of the Lord of Hawkshead, Yewdale, Coniston, and Kentmere, and verdurer of the forest in which he dwelt; and then, offering money, which was refused, mounted his horse, and rode back toward Kendal more rapidly then he came.
So soon as Kenric returned from his rounds, he was informed of all that had passed, when, simply observing, "Ha! it has come already, has it? I scarce expected it so soon," he bade one of the boys get the pony ready, and prepare himself to go round the lake to the castle, and then sat down with his wife to the evening meal, which she had prepared for him.
When they were alone, "Now, Edith, my dear," he said, "the time has come for which we have been so long waiting. I know for certain that Sir Foulke d'Oilly is in Kendal, and our good lord will know it likewise before this time. Therefore there is no danger that will not be prevented almost before it is begun. That I shall be taken, either by violence or by legal arrest, this night, is certain—though I think probably by violence, since no true caption may be made after sunset."
"Then, why not escape at once?" asked his fair wife, opening her great blue eyes wider than their wont. "Why not go straight to the castle, and place yourself in my lord's safeguard?"
"For two reasons, wife of mine, each in itself sufficient. First, this is my post, and I must hold it, until removed or forced from it. Second, my lord deems it best I should be taken now, and the matter ended. But this applies not to you or my mother. The Normans must find neither of you here; no woman, young or old, is safe where Foulke d'Oilly's men are about. You must wrap the old woman as warm as you may, and have her off on the pony to Ambleside as quickly as may be. Ralph shall go with you. I am on thorns and nettles until you are gone."
"I will never leave you, Kenric. It is useless to speak of it—never!"
"Oh! yes, you will, Edith," he answered, quietly. "Oh! yes, you will, for half a dozen reasons; though one is enough, for that matter. First, you will not see my mother dead through your obstinacy. Second, you will not stay to be outraged yourself, before my very eyes, without my having power to aid you——"
"Kenric!"
"It is mere truth, Edith. Thirdly, it is your duty to go; and last, it is my will that you go, and I never knew you refuse that."
"Nor ever will, Kenric; though it break my heart to do it."
"Tush! tush! girl; hearts are tough things, and do not break so easily; and when you kiss me to-morrow at the castle, you'll think of this no more. See, here's the boy with the pony and the pillion. Now, hurry, and coax my mother out, and get on your cloak and wimple, that's a good lass. I would not have you here when Foulke d'Oilly's riders come, no! not to be the Lord of Kentmere. Hurry! hurry!"
Many minutes had not passed, before, after a long embrace, and a flood of tears on the part of Edith, the two women mounted on the sturdy pony, the wife in the saddle, and the aged mother seated on a sort of high-backed pillion—made like the seat of an arm-chair—and secured by a broad belt to the waist of her daughter, took their way across the wooded hills toward Ambleside, the boy Ralph leading the animal by the head, and two brace of noble alans, his master's property, which Kenric did not choose to expose to the cupidity of his expected captors, gamboling in front, or following gravely at heel, according to their various qualities of age and temper.
The son and husband gazed after them wistfully, so long as they remained in sight; and when, as they crossed the last ridge of the low intermediate hills which divide the narrow glen of the upper Kent from the broader dale of Windermere, standing out in bold relief against the strong light of the western sky, Edith waved her kerchief, he drew his hard hand across his brow, turned into his desolate dwelling, and, sitting down by the hearth, was soon lost in gloomy meditation.
Darkness soon fell over lake and meadow, mountain and upland. Hundreds of stars were twinkling in the clear sky, to which a touch of frost, not unusual at this early season among those hill regions, had lent an uncommon brilliance, but the moon had not yet risen.
Kenric was now becoming restless and impatient, and, as is frequently the case when we are awaiting even the most painful things, which we know to be inevitable, he soon found himself wishing that the time would come, that he might know the worst, and feeling that the suspense was worse than almost any reality.
Several times he went to the door, and stood gazing down the valley, over the brown woods and gray, glimmering waters, to look and listen, if he might discover any signs of the coming danger. But his eyes could penetrate but a little way into the darkness, and no sounds came to his ears, but the deep sough of the west wind among the pine boughs of the mountain top, the hoarse ripple of the brook brawling against the boulders which lay scattered in its bed, and the hooting of the brown owls, answering each other from every ivy-bush and holly-brake on the wooded hill-sides.
Nothing could be more calm or peaceful than the scene, nothing less indicative of man's presence, much more of his violence and angry passions. Not even the baying of a solitary house-dog awoke the echoes, though oftentimes the wild, yelping bark of the fox came sharp from the moorland, and once the long-drawn howl of a wolf, that most hideous and unmistakable of savage cries, wailed down the pass like the voice of a spirit, ominous of evil.
The hunter's spirit was aroused in the watcher by the familiar sound. He listened intently, but it was heard no more, and, shaking his head, he muttered to himself, "He is up in the dark corrie under Norton pike; I noted the wool and bones of lambs, and the spoil of hares there, when I was last through it, but I laid the scathe to the foxes. I knew not we had a wolf so nigh us. Well, if they trap not me to-night, I'll see and trap that other thief to-morrow. And thinking of that, since they come not, I trow there is no courtesy compels me to sit up for them, and there's some thing in my head now that chimes a later hour than vespers. I'll take a night-cap, and lay me down on the settle. Gilbert, happy dog, has been asleep there on the hearth these two hours;" and, suiting the action to the word, he drew a mighty flagon of mead, quaffed it to the dregs, and, throwing a heavy wooden bar across the door, wrapped his cloak about him, and, casting himself on a settle in the chimney corner, was soon buried in deep slumber.
When he woke again, which he did with a sudden start, the moon was shining brightly through the latticed casements, and there were sounds on the air which he easily recognized as the clash of mail coats and the tramp of horses, coming up at a trot over the stony road. Looking out from a loop beside the door, he perceived at once that the moment he expected had arrived. Ten men, heavily armed, but wearing dark-colored surcoats over their mail, and having their helmets cased with felt, to prevent their being discovered by the glimmering of the steel in the moonlight, had ridden up to the foot of the little knoll on which the cottage stood, and were now concerting their future movements.
While he gazed, nine of the men dismounted, linking their horses, and leaving them in charge of the tenth. Four then filed off to keep watch, and prevent escape from the rear, or either end of the building; and then, at a given signal, the others marched up to the door, and the leader struck heavily on the panel with the haft of a heavy battle-ax, crying, "Open! on pain of death! open!"
"To whom? What seek you?" asked Kenric, whose hand was on the bar.
"To me, Foulke d'Oilly. I seek my fugitive villeyn, Eadwulf the Red. We have traced him hither. Open, on your peril, or take the consequence."
"The man is not here; natheless, I open," replied Kenric; and, with the word, he threw open the door; and the men-at-arms rushed in, brandishing their axes, as if they expected resistance. But the Saxon stood firm, tranquil, and impassive, on his hearthstone, and gave no pretext for violence.
"And who may you be, sirrah," cried the leader, checking the rudeness of his vassals for the moment, "who brave us thus?"
"Far be it from me," said he, "to brave a nobleman. I am a free Saxon man, Kenric, the son of Werewulf, tenant in fee to my Lord of Taillebois, and his verdurer and forester for this his manor of Kentmere."
"Thou liest," said one of the men-at-arms. "Thou art Eadwulf the Red, born thrall of Sir Philip de Morville, on his manor of Waltheofstow, and now of Sir Foulke d'Oilly, who has succeeded to the same."
"Thou liest!" replied Kenric, stoutly. "And I will prove it on thy body, with permission of Sir Foulke d'Oilly, with quarterstaff or gisarme, battle-ax or broadsword."
"Art sure this is he, Damian? Canst swear to the man? Is there any other here, who knows the features of the fellow Eadwulf, to witness them on oath? Light yonder cresset from the embers on the hearth; advance it to his face! Now, can you swear to him?"
The torch was thrust so rudely and so closely into his face, that it actually singed his beard; yet he started not, nor flinched a hair's breadth.
"I can," said the man who had first spoken, stubbornly. "That is Eadwulf the Red. I have seen him fifty times in the late Sir Philip's lifetime; and last, the day before he fled and slew your bailiff of Waltheofstow in the forest between Thurgoland and Bolterstone, in September. I will swear to him, as I live by bread, and hope to see Paradise."
"And I," exclaimed another of the men, after examining his features, whether deceived by the real similitude between them and his brother, which did amount to a strong family likeness, though the color of the hair and the expression of the two men were wholly dissimilar, or only desirous of gratifying his leader. "I know him as well as I do my own brother. I will swear to him any where."
"You would both swear falsely," said Kenric, coolly. "Eadwulf is my brother, son of Werewulf, son of Beowulf, once henchman to Waltheof, of Waltheofstow, and a free Saxon man before the Conquest."
"I will swear to him, also," cried a third man, who had snatched down the fatal crossbow and bolts from above the chimney. "Kenric and Eadwulf are but two names for one man; and here is the proof. This crossbow, with the name Kenric burned into the stock, is that which Eadwulf carried on the day when he fled; and these quarrels tally, point for point, with those which were found in the carcass of the deer he slew, and in the body of the bailiff he murdered!"
"Ha! What say you to that, sirrah?"
"That it is my crossbow; that my name is Kenric, by-named the Dark; that I am, as I said before, a free Saxon, and have dwelt here on Kentmere since the last days of July; so that I could have slain neither deer nor bailiff, between Thurgoland and Bolterstone, in September. That is all I have to say, Sir Foulke."
"And that is nothing," he replied. "So thou must go along with us. Wilt go peaceably, too, if thou art wise, and cravest no broken bones."
"Have you a writ ofNeifty4for me, Sir Foulke?" asked Kenric, respectfully, having been instructed by Sir Yvo.
"Tush! dog, what knowest thou ofNeifty? No, sirrah, I seize mine villeyn, of mine own right, with mine own hand. What sayst to that?"
"That you must seize me, to seize justly, by the sheriff; and I deny the villeynage, and claim trial."
"And I send you, and your denial, and yourNeifty, to the fiend who hatched them. You are my slave, my born slave; and in my dungeons of Waltheofstow will I prove it to you. Hugo, Raoul, Damian, seize him, handcuff his wrists behind him, drag him along if he resist."
"I resist not," said Kenric. "I yield to force, as I hold you all to witness; you above all, Gilbert," addressing the boy who stood staring, half-awake, while they were manacling his hands. "But I pray you, Sir Foulke, to take notice that in this you do great wrong to my good lord, Sir Yvo de Taillebois, both that he is the Lord of Hawkshead, Coniston, and Yewdale, and of this manor of Kentmere on which you now trespass, and that he is the sheriff of these counties of Lancaster and Westmoreland, where you wrongfully seize jurisdiction. And this I notify you, that he will seek the right at your hands, and that speedily."
"Dog! Saxon! slave! dirt of the earth! do you dare threaten me?" cried the fierce baron, purposely lashing himself into fury; and he strode up to the helpless man, whose arms were secured behind his back, and smote him in the mouth with his gauntleted-hand, that the blood gushed from his lips, and streamed over all the front of his leathern hunting-shirt.
"That, to teach thee manners. Now, then, bring him along, men; set him on the black gelding, chain his legs fast under the brute's belly, ride one of you at each side, and dash his brains out with your axes if he look like escaping. Away! away! I would be at Kendal before they ring the prime,5and at Lonsdale before matins.6So shall we be well among the Yorkshire fells before daybreak."
His words were obeyed without demur or delay, and within five minutes the Saxon was chained on the back of a vicious, ill-conditioned brute, with a savage ruffian on either side, glaring at him through the bars of their visors, as if they desired no better than a chance to brain him, in obedience with orders; and the whole party, their horses being quite fresh, were thundering down the dale at a pace that would bring them to Kendal long enough before midnight.
"The Sheriff, with a monstrous watch, is at the door."
King Henry IV.
Two hours' hard riding, considering that the riders were men armed in heavy mail, brought the party into the narrow, ill-paved streets of Kendal, at least two hours earlier than the time specified by Sir Foulke d'Oilly, and it was not above ten o'clock of the night when they pulled up before a long, low, thatched cabin, above the door of which, a bush and a bottle, suspended from a pole, gave note that it was a house of entertainment. Flinging his rein to one of half-a-dozen grooms and horse-boys, who were lounging about the gate, the knight raised the latch, and entered a long, smoky apartment, which seemed to occupy the whole ground floor of the building, affording room for the accommodation of fifty or sixty guests, on occasion of feasts, fairs, or holidays.
It was an area of thirty or forty feet in length, by ten or twelve in width, with bare rough-cast walls, and bare rafters overhead, blackened by the smoke which escaped from the ill-constructed chimneys at either end, and eddied overhead in a perennial canopy of sable. The floor, however, was strewed with fresh green rushes, green wreaths and branches were hung on the rough-cast walls, and a large earthen-vase or two of water-lilies and other showy wild-flowers adorned the board, which was covered with clean white napery of domestic fabric. At the upper end of this long table, half-a-dozen or eight men were supping on a chine of hill-kid, with roasted moor-fowl and wild-ducks, the landlord of the tavern being the bailiff of the town, and having his lord's license to take all small game, save bustard, heron, woodcock, and pheasant, for the benefit of his guest-table.
On the entrance of Sir Foulke, these men rose to their feet; and one, the best-armed and best-looking of the party, seeming to be a second esquire or equerry, asked him, in a subdued voice—
"What fortune, Sir Foulke; have you got the villeyn?"
"Safe enough, Fitz Hugh," replied the knight; "but he is no mere brute, as you fellows told me, but a perilous, shrewd, intelligent, clear-headed Saxon. He has been advised, too, in this matter, by some one well-skilled in the law, and was, I think, expecting our coming. I should not marvel much, if De Taillebois have notice of us. We must be in the saddle again as soon as possible. But I must have a morsel ere we start; I have not tasted aught since high-noon, and then it was but a beggarly oat-cake and a flask of mead. What have you there?"
"Some right good treble ale, beausire; let me fill you a tankard, and play cup-bearer for once." And, suiting the action to the word, he filled out a mighty horn of the liquid amber, capped with its snowy foam, and handed it to the knight, adding, "The supper is but fragments, but there is more at the fire now. I will go to the stables, and see the fresh horses saddled and caparisoned; and as I pass the buttery and tap, I will stir up the loitering knaves."
"Do so, Fitz Hugh," replied the other; "but hasten, Jesu Maria! hasten! I reckon but half done until we are out of this beggarly hole, and under way for merry Yorkshire. And hark you, Fitz Hugh, let them bring in the prisoner. We must have him along with us; and ten of the best men, lightly armed, and mounted on the pick of our stud. Ten more may tarry with the tired beasts we have just used, and bring them on with the baggage and sumpter horses to-morrow."
Then, as his officer left the hall to attend to his multifarious duties, he quaffed another huge flagon of the strong, heady ale; and, casting himself into a settle in the chimney-corner, what between the warmth of the fire, grateful after his hard ride in the chilly night air, and the fumes of the heady tankard, he sunk into a doze, from which he only aroused himself, when, half an hour afterward, in came a dozen clumsy village servants, stamping and clattering in their heavy-clouted shoes, and loaded the table with smoking platters and huge joints, of which, however coarse the cookery, the odors were any thing but unsavory.
To supper accordingly he now applied himself, two or three of the men who had been with him at the seizure of Kenric, crowding into the room and taking the lower end of the table, where another great fire was blazing, and others coming in and out in succession, until all were satisfied.
It is, however, remarkable, as in character with the sensual, self-indulgent, and unrestrained temperament of this most unworthy and unknightly Norman, his race being, of all the northern tribes, that least addicted to gluttony and drunkenness, and priding itself on moderation and decorum at the table, that, notwithstanding his earnest desire to depart from his somewhat perilous situation, he yet yielded to his appetites, and lingered over the board, though it offered nothing beyond coarse viands and strong ale, long after the horses were announced to be in readiness.
At length he rose, washed his hands, and calling his page to replace such portions of his armor as he had laid aside, was preparing to move in earnest, when the well-known clash of mail-coats and the thick trampling of a numerous squadron coming up the village street gave notice that he was surprised.
The next moment, a man-at-arms rushed into the room, with dismay in his face.
"Lances, my Lord of d'Oilly," he cried; "lances and a broad banner! There are full fifty of them coming up the street from the northward, and some of the grooms who were on the out-look report more spears to the south. We are surrounded."
"Call in the men hither from the stables, then; let them cut short their lances to six feet, and bring their maces and battle-axes; we can make a stout stand here, and command good terms at the worst."
Time, however, was short, and his orders were but partially obeyed, the men coming in by twos and threes from the stables in the rear, looking gloomy and dispirited, when a trumpet was blown clearly without, and, the cavalcade halting, in mass, in front of the hostelry, a fine deep voice was heard to cry;
"What men be these? Who dare lift spears, or display banners, in my town of Kendal, without license of me?"
"It is De Taillebois," said d'Oilly; "it avails nothing to resist. Throw the doors open."
But, as he spoke, the reply of his lieutenant was heard to the summons;
"We be Sir Foulke d'Oilly's men, and we dare lift spear and display banner, wheresoever our lord order us."
"Well said, good fellow!" answered the powerful voice of the old knight. "Go in, therefore, and tell your lord that the Sheriff of Lancaster is at the door, with fifty lances, to inforce the king's peace; and that he draw in his men at once, or ere worse come of it, and show cause what he makes here, in effeir of war, in my manor of Kendal, and the king's county of Westmoreland."
D'Oilly set his teeth hard, and smote the table with his gauntleted hand. "Curses on him," he muttered, "he hath me at advantage." Then, as he received the summons, "Pray the Lord of Taillebois," he said; "he will have the courtesy to set foot to ground, and enter in hither, that we hold conference."
Again the voice was heard without, "Ride to the bridge, Huon, at the town end, and call me Aradas."
There was a short pause, and then, as the gallop of a horse was heard coming up to the house, the orders were given to dismount, link bridles, and close up to the doors; and at the next instant, Sir Yvo entered, stooping his tall crest to pass the low-browed door, followed by his trusty squire, Aradas de Ratcliffe, and half-a-dozen others of his principal retainers, one or two of them wearing knightly crests upon their burgonets.
The first words the knight uttered, as he raised his avantaille and gazed about him, were "St. Agatha, how hot it is, and what a reek of peat-smoke and ale! Open those windows, some of you, to the street, and let us have a breath of heaven's fresh air. The Lord, he knows we need it."
In a moment, the thick-wooden shutters and lattices, which had been closed by those within on the first alarm of his coming, were cast wide open, and the spaces were filled at once by the stalwart forms and resolute faces of the men-at-arms of De Taillebois, in such numbers as to render treachery impossible, if it had been intended.
Then, for the first time, did Sir Yvo turn his eyes toward the intruder, who stood at the farther end of the hall, irresolute how to act, with his men clustered in a sullen group behind him, and the prisoner Kenric held firmly by the shoulders by two stout troopers.
"Ha! Sir Foulke d'Oilly," he said, with a slight inclination of his head. "To what do I owe the honor of receiving that noble baron in my poor manor of Kendal; and wherefore, if he come in courtesy and peace, do I not meet him rather in my own castle of Hawkshead, where I might show him fitting courtesy, than in this smoky den, fitter for Saxon churls than Norman nobles?"
"To be brief, my lord," replied d'Oilly, with a voice half conciliatory, half defiant, "I came neither in enmity, nor yet in courtesy, but to reclaim and seize my fugitive villeyn yonder, Eadwulf the Red, who hath not only killed deer in my chase of Fenton in the Forest, but hath murdered my bailiff of Waltheofstow, and now hath fled from me, against my will; and I find him here, hidden in an out corner of this your manor of Kentmere, in Kendal."
"There is some error here, Sir Foulke," said De Taillebois, firmly. "That man, whom I see some one hath brutally misused, of which more anon, is not called Eadwulf at all, but Kenric. Nor is he your serf, fair sir, nor any man's serf at all, or villeyn, but a free Englishman, as any who stands on this floor. I myself purchased and manumitted him in this July last past, for that he saved the life of my child, the Lady Guendolen, at risk of his own. Of this I pledge my honor, as belted knight and Norman noble."
"I know the fellow very well, Sir Yvo," answered the other, doggedly. "Four or five of my men here can swear to the knave; and we have proof positive that he is the man who shot a deer about daybreak, and murdered my bailiff on the thirteenth day of September last, in my forest between the meres of Thurgoland and Bolterstone, in Sherwood."
"The thirteenth day of last September?" said De Taillebois, thoughtfully. "Ha! Aradas, Fitz Adhelm, was't not on that day we ran the big mouse-colored hart royal, with the black talbots, from high Yewdale, past Grisdale pike, to the skirts of Skiddaw?"
"Surely it was, Sir Yvo," answered both the gentlemen in a breath.
"There is some error here, Sir Foulke," repeated the Sheriff, "but the law will decide it. And now, speaking of the law, Sir Baron, may I crave, by what right, or form of law, you have laid hands on this man, within the jurisdiction of my manor, and under the shadow of night? I say, by what warrant have you done this?"
"By the same right, and form, and warrant, by which, wherever I find my stolen goods, there I seize them! By the best law of right; that is, the law of might."
"The law of might has failed you, for this time, Sir Foulke."
"That is to say, you being stronger, at this present time, than I, will not allow me to carry off my villeyn, whom I have justly seized."
"Whom you have most unjustly, most illegally, seized, Sir Foulke. You know, as well as I, or ought to know, that if you proceed by seizure, it must be upon oath; and none can seize within this shire, but I, the sheriff of it. Or if you proceed by writde nativo habendo, no one can serve that writ, within this shire, but I, the sheriff of it. What! when a man can not seize and sell an ox or an ass, that is claimed by another, without due process of law, shall he seize and take, that which is the dearest thing any man hath, even as dear as the breath of his nostrils, his right to himself, his liberty, without any form at all? No, Sir Foulke, no! Our English law presumes every man free, till he be proved a slave; and no man, who claims freedom, can be deprived of freedom, no, not by my lord the King himself in counsel, except upon the verdict of an English jury. But do I understand aright? Does this man Eadwulf, or Kenric, claim to be free, or confess himself to be a villeyn?"
"I claim to be a freeman, Sir Yvo; and I demand liberty to prove it," cried Kenric. "I warned Sir Foulke d'Oilly, when he seized me in my cottage by Kentmere, as I can prove by the boy Gilbert, that I am a freeman, and that were I a villeyn and a fugitive, to make a true seizure, it must be made by the sheriff."
"Ha! thou didst—didst thou. Thou art learned in the law, it seems."
"It behooves an Englishman, beausire, to know the law by which to guard his liberty, seeing that it is the dearest thing he hath, under Heaven. But I am not learned; only I had good advice."
"So it seems. And you deny to be a villeyn, and claim to prove your liberty?"
"Before God, I do, and your worship."
"Summon my bailiff, Aradas; he is a justice of peace for the county, and will tell us what is needed. I will give you this benefit, Sir Foulke, though you are in no wise entitled to it. Because it is on my own ground, and on the person of my own man, you have made this seizure, I will allow it to stand good, as if made legally, in due form. Had it been made elsewhere, within the county, I would have held it null, and committed you for false imprisonment, and breach of the King's peace. But no man shall say I avenge my own private griefs by power of my office. Now, bailiff, art thou there?"
"So please you, Sir Yvo, I have been here all the evening, and am possessed of the whole case."
"Well, then, what needs this man Kenric?"
"A writ, my lord,de libertate probanda. I have it here, ready."
"Recite it to us then, in God's name, and make service of it; for I am waxing weary of this matter."
Thus exhorted, the bailiff lifted up his voice and read, pompously but distinctly, the following form; and then, bowing low, handed it to the sheriff, calling on two of the men-at-arms, whose names were subscribed, to witness the service: