 | CHAPTER VII. The headsman, or, The Abbaye des Vignerons |  |
7. CHAPTER VII.
—and now the glee
Of the loud hills shakes with their mountain-mirth.
Byron.
It is necessary to recapitulate a little, in order
to connect events. The signs of the hour had
been gradually but progressively increasing. While
the lake was unruffled, a stillness so profound prevailed,
that sounds from the distant port, such as
the heavy fall of an oar, or a laugh from the waterman,
had reached the ears of those in the Winkelried,
and the strong charm of a calm at even. To
these succeeded the gathering in the heavens, and
the roaring of the winds, as they came rushing
down the sides of the Alps, in their first descent
into the basin of the Leman. As the sight grew
useless, except as it might study the dark omens
of the impending vault, the sense of hearing became
doubly acute, and it had been a powerful
agent in heightening the vague but acute apprehensions
of the travellers. The rushes of the
wind, which at first were broken, at intervals resembling
the roar of a chimney-top in a gale, had
soon reached the fearful grandeur of those aërial
wheelings of squadrons, to which we have more
than once alluded, passing off in dread mutterings,
that, in the deep quiet of all other things, bore a
close affinity to the rumbling of a surf upon the
sea-shore. The surface of the lake was first broken
after one of these symptoms, and it was this
infallible sign of a gale which had assured Maso
there was no time to lose. This movement of the
element in a calm is a common phenomenon on
waters that are much environed with elevated and
irregular head-lands, and it is a certain proof that
wind is on some distant portion of the sheet. It
occurs frequently on the ocean, too, where the
mariner is accustomed to find a heavy sea setting
in one direction, the effects of some distant storm,
while the breeze around him is blowing in its opposite.
It had been succeeded by the single rolling
swell, like the outer circle of waves produced
by dropping a stone into the water, and the regular
and increasing agitation of the lake, until the
element broke as in a tempest, and that seemingly
of its own volition, since not a breath of air was
stirring. This last and formidable symptom of
the force of the coming gust, however, had now
the three travellers and the patron fell from her
gangway, the Winkelried, to use a seaman's
phrase, was literally wallowing in the troughs of
the seas.
A dull unnatural light preceded the winds, and
notwithstanding the previous darkness, the nature
of the accident was fully apparent to all. Even
the untamed spirits that had just been bent upon
so fierce a sacrifice to their superstitious dread,
uttered cries of horror, while the piercing shriek
of Adelheid sounded, in that fearful moment, as
if beings of super-human attributes were riding in
the gale. The name of Sigismund was heard,
too, in one of those wild appeals that the frantic
suffer to escape them, in their despair. But the
interval between the plunge into the water and the
swoop of the tempest was so short, that, to the
senses of the travellers, the whole seemed the occurrence
of the same teeming moment.
Maso had completed his work on the forecastle,
had seen that other provisions which he had ordered
were duly made, and had reached the tiller,
just in time to witness and to understand all that
occurred. Adelheid and her female attendants
were already lashed to the principal masts, and
ropes were given to the others around her, as indispensable
precautions; for the deck of the bark,
now cleared of every particle of its freight, was
as exposed and as defenceless against the power
of the wind, as a naked heath. Such was the situation
of the Winkelried, when the omens of the
night changed to their dread reality.
Instinct, in cases of sudden and unusual danger
must do the office of reason. There was no necessity
to warn the unthinking but panic-struck
crowd to provide for their own safety, for every
man in the centre of the barge threw his body flat
taken care to provide for that purpose, with the
tenacity with which all who possess life cling to
the means of existence. The dogs gave beautiful
proofs of the secret and wonderful means that nature
has imparted, to answer the ends of their
creation. Old Uberto crouched, cowering, and
oppressed with a sense of helplessness, at the side
of his master, while the Newfoundland follower of
the mariner went leaping from gangway to gangway,
snuffing the heated air, and barking wildly,
as if he would challenge the elements to close for
the strife.
A vast body of warm air had passed unheeded
athwart the bark, during the minute that preceded
the intended sacrifice of Balthazar. It was the
forerunner of the hurricane, which had chased it
from the bed where it had been sleeping, since the
warm and happy noon-tide. Ten thousand chariots
at their speed could not have equalled the
rumbling that succeeded, when the winds came
booming over the lake. As if too eager to permit
anything within their fangs to escape, they brought
with them a wild, dull light, which filled while it
clouded the atmosphere, and which, it was scarcely
fanciful to imagine, had been hurried down, in
their vortex, from those chill glaciers, where they
had so long been condensing their forces for the
present descent. The waves were not increased,
but depressed by the pressure of this atmospheric
column, though it took up hogshead, of water from
their crests, scattering it in fine penetrating spray,
till the entire space between the heavens and the
earth seemed saturated with its particles.
The Winkelried received the shock at a moment
when the lee-side of her broad deck was wallowing
in the trough, and its weather was protruded
on the summit of a swell. The wind howled,
thwarted, and there was a roar under the wide
gangways, resembling that of lions. The reeling
vessel was raised in a manner to cause those on
board to believe it about to be lifted bodily from
the water, but the ceaseless rolling of the element
restored the balance. Maso afterwards affirmed
that nothing but this accidental position, which
formed a sort of lee, prevented all in the bark from
being swept from the deck, before the first gust of
the hurricane.
Sigismund had heard the heart-rending appeal
of Adelheid, and, notwithstanding the awful strife
of the elements and the fearful character of the
night, he alone breasted the shock on his feet.
Though aided by a rope, and bowed like a reed,
his herculean frame trembled under the shock, in a
way to render even his ability to resist seriously
doubtful. But, the first blast expended, he sprang
to the gangway, and leaped into the cauldron of
the lake unhesitatingly, and yet in the possession
of all his faculties. He was desperately bent on
saving a life so dear to Adelheid, or on dying in
the attempt.
Maso had watched the crisis with a seaman's
eye, a seaman's resources, and a seaman's coolness.
He had not refused to quit his feet, but
kneeling on one knee, he pressed the tiller down,
lashed it, and clinging to the massive timber, faced
the tempest with the steadiness of a water-god.
There was sublimity in the intelligence, deliberation,
and calculating skill, with which this solitary,
unknown, and nearly hopeless, mariner obeyed his
professional instinct, in that fearful concussion of
the elements, which, loosened from every restraint,
now appeared abandoned to their own wild and
fierce will. He threw aside his cap, pushed forward
his thick but streaming locks, as veils to protect
the wind, as the wary but sullen lion keeps his gaze
on the hostile elephant. A grim smile stole across
his features, when he felt the vessel settle again
into its watery bed, after that breathless moment
in which there had been reason to fear it might
actually be lifted from its proper element. Then
the precaution, which had seemed so useless and
incomprehensible to others, came in play. The
bark made a fearful whirl from the spot where it
had so long lain, yielding to the touch of the gust
like a vane turning on its pivot, while the water
gurgled several streaks on deck. But the cables
were no sooner taut than the numerous anchors
resisted, and brought the bark head to wind. Maso
felt the yielding of the vessel's stern, as she swung
furiously round, and he cheered aloud. The
trembling of the timbers, the dashing against the
pointed beak, and that high jet of water, which shot
up over the bows and fell heavily on the forecastle,
washing aft in a flood, were so many evidences
that the cables were true. Advancing from
his post, with some such dignity as a master of
fence displays in the exercise of his art, he shouted
for his dog.
“Nettuno!—Nettuno!—where art thou, brave
Nettuno?”
The faithful animal was whining near him, unheard
in that war of the elements. He waited only
for this encouragement to act. No sooner was
his master's voice heard, than, barking bravely, he
snuffed the gale, dashed to the side of the vessel,
and leaped into the boiling lake.
When Melchior de Willading and his friend returned
to the surface, after their plunge, it was
like men making their appearance in a world abandoned
to the infernal humors of the fiends of darkness.
The reader will understand it was at the
been detailed, for what we have taken so many
pages to describe in words, scarce needed a minute
of time in the accomplishment.
Maso knelt on the verge of the gangway, sustaining
himself by passing an arm around a shroud,
and, bending forward, he gazed into the cauldron
of the lake with aching eyes. Once or twice, he
thought he heard the stifled breathing of one who
struggled with the raging water; but, in that roar
of the winds, it was easy to be deceived. He
shouted encouragement to his dog, however, and
gathering a small rope rapidly, he made a heaving
coil of one of its ends. This he cast far from him,
with a peculiar swing and dexterity, hauling-in,
and repeating the experiments, steadily and with
unwearied industry. The rope was necessarily
thrown at hazard, for the misty light prevented
more than it aided vision; and the howling of the
powers of the air filled his ears with sounds that
resembled the laugh of devils.
In the cultivation of the youthful manly exercises,
neither of the old nobles had neglected the
useful skill of being able to buffet with the waves.
But both possessed what was far better, in such
a strait, than the knowledge of a swimmer, in that
self-command and coolness in emergencies which
they are apt to acquire, who pass their time in encountering
the hazards and in overcoming the
difficulties of war. Each retained a sufficiency
of recollection, therefore, on coming to the surface,
to understand his situation, and not to increase the
danger by the ill-directed and frantic efforts that
usually drown the frightened. The case was sufficiently
desperate, at the best, without the additional
risk of distraction, for the bark had already
drifted to some unseen spot, that, as respects them,
was quite unattainable. In this uncertainty, it
of waters, as likely to go wrong as right, and they
limited their efforts to mutual support and encouragement,
placing their trust in God.
Not so with Sigismund. To him the roaring
tempest was mute, the boiling and hissing lake had
no horrors, and he had plunged into the fathomless
Leman as recklessly as he could have leaped to
land. The shriek, the “Sigismund! oh, Sigismund!”
of Adelheid, was in his ears, and her cry
of anguish thrilled on every nerve. The athletic
young Swiss was a practised and expert swimmer,
or it is improbable that even these strong impulses
could have overcome the instinct of self-preservation.
In a tranquil basin, it would have been
no extraordinary or unusual feat for him to conquer
the distance between the Winkelried and the
shores of Vaud; but, like all the others, on casting
himself into the water, he was obliged to shape
his course at random, and this, too, amid such a
driving spray as rendered even respiration difficult.
As has been said, the waves were compressed into
their bed rather than augmented by the wind; but,
had it been otherwise, the mere heaving and settling
of the element, while it obstructs his speed,
offers a support rather than an obstacle to the
practised swimmer.
Notwithstanding all these advantages, the
strength of his impulses, and the numberless occasions
on which he had breasted the surges of the
Mediterranean, Sigismund, on recovering from his
plunge, felt the fearful chances of the risk he ran,
as the stern soldier meets the hazards of battle, in
which he knows if there is victory there is also
death. He dashed the troubled water aside, though
he swam blindly, and each stroke urged him farther
from the bark, his only hope of safety. He was
between dark rolling mounds, and, on rising to
to sink again within a similar shelter. The breaking
crests of the waves, which were glancing off
in foam, also gave him great annoyance, for such
was their force, that, more than once, he was hurled
helpless as a log before them. Still he swam
boldly, and with strength; nature having gifted
him with more than the usual physical energy of
man. But, uncertain in his course, unable to see
the length of his own body, and pressed hard upon
by the wind, even the spirit of Sigismund Steinbach
could not long withstand so many adverse
circumstances. He had already turned, wavering
in purpose, thinking to catch a glimpse of the bark
in the direction he had come, when a dark mass
floated immediately before his eyes, and he felt
the cold clammy nose of the dog, scenting about
his face. The admirable instinct, or we might
better say, the excellent training of Nettuno, told
him that his services were not needed here, and,
barking with wild delight, as if in mockery of the
infernal din of the tempest, he sheered aside, and
swam swiftly on. A thought flashed like lightning
on the brain of Sigismund. His best hope was in
the inexplicable faculties of this animal. Throwing
forward an arm, he seized the bushy tail of the
dog, and suffered himself to be dragged ahead, he
knew not whither, though he seconded the movement
with his own exertions. Another bark proclaimed
that the experiment was successful, and
voices, rising as it were from the water, close at
hand, announced the proximity of human beings.
The brunt of the hurricane was past, and the
washing of the waves, which had been stilled by
the roar and the revelry of the winds, again became
audible.
The strength of the two struggling old men was
sinking fast. The Signor Grimaldi had, thus far,
than himself in the water, and he continued
to cheer him with a hope he did not feel himself,
nobly refusing to the last to separate their fortunes.
“How dost find thyself, old Melchior?” he asked.
“Cheer thee, friend—I think there is succor
at hand.”
The water gurgled at the mouth of the baron,
who was near the gasp.
“'Tis late—bless thee, dearest Gaetano—God
be with my child—my Adelheid—poor Adelheid!”
The utterance of this precious name, under a
father's agony of spirit, most probably saved his
life. The sinewy arm of Sigismund, directed by
the words, grasped his dress, and he felt at once
that a new and preserving power had interposed
between him and the caverns of the lake. It was
time, for the water had covered the face of the
failing baron, ere the muscular arm of the youth
came to perform its charitable office.
“Yield thee to the dog, Signore,” said Sigismund,
clearing his mouth of water to speak calmly,
once assured of his own burthen; “trust to his
sagacity, and,—God keep us in mind!—all may
yet be well!”
The Signor Grimaldi retained sufficient presence
of mind to follow this advice, and it was probably
quite as fortunate that his friend had so far lost his
consciousness, as to become an unresisting burthen
in the hands of Sigismund.
“Nettuno!—gallant Nettuno!”—swept past them
on the gale for the first time, the partial hushing of
the winds permitting the clear call of Maso to reach
so far. The sound directed the efforts of Sigismund,
though the dog had swum steadily away
the moment he had the Genoese in his gripe, and
with a certainty of manner that showed he was at
no loss for a direction.
But Sigismund had taxed his powers too far.
He, who could have buffeted an ordinary sea for
hours, was now completely exhausted by the unwonted
exertions, the deadening influence of the
tempest, and the log-like weight of his burthen.
He would not desert the father of Adelheid, and
yet each fainting and useless stroke told him to
despair. The dog had already disappeared in the
darkness, and he was even uncertain again of the
true position of the bark. He prayed in agony for
a single glimpse of the rocking masts and yards,
or to catch one syllable of the cheering voice of
Maso. But in both his wishes were vain. In place
of the former, he had naught but the veiled misty
light, that had come on with the hurricane; and,
instead of the latter, his ears were filled with the
washing of the waves and the roars of the gusts.
The blasts now descended to the surface of the
lake, and now went whirling and swelling upward,
in a way to lead the listener to fancy that the
viewless winds might, for once, be seen. For a
single painful instant, in one of those disheartening
moments of despair that will come over the
stoutest, his hand was about to relinquish its hold
of the baron, and to make the last natural struggle
for life; but that fair and modest picture of maiden
loveliness and truth, which had so long haunted his
waking hours and adorned his night-dreams, interposed
to prevent the act. After this brief and
fleeting weakness, the young man seemed endowed
with new energy. He swam stronger, and with
greater apparent advantage, than before.
“Nettuno—gallant Nettuno!”—again drove over
him, bringing with it the chilling certainty, that,
turned from his course by the rolling of the water,
he had thrown away these desperate efforts, by
taking a direction which led him from the bark.
While there was the smallest appearance of success,
extinguish hope; but when the dire conviction
that he had been actually aiding, instead of diminishing,
the danger, pressed upon Sigismund, he
abandoned his efforts. The most he endeavored
or hoped to achieve, was to keep his own head and
that of his companion above the fatal element,
while he answered the cry of Maso with a shout
of despair.
“Nettuno!—gallant Nettuno!”—again flew past
on the gale.
This cry might have been an answer, or it might
merely be the Italian encouraging his dog to bear
on the body, with which it was already loaded.
Sigismund uttered a shout, which he felt must be
the last. He struggled desperately, but in vain:
the world and its allurements were vanishing from
his thoughts, when a dark line whirled over him,
and fell thrashing upon the very wave which covered
his face. An instinctive grasp caught it, and
the young soldier felt himself impelled ahead. He
had seized the rope which the mariner had not ceased
to throw, as the fisherman casts his line, and he
was at the side of the bark, before his confused
faculties enabled him to understand the means
employed for his rescue.
Maso took a hasty turn with the rope, and, stooping
forward, favored by a roll of the vessel, he
drew the Baron de Willading upon deck. Watching
his time, he repeated the experiment, always with
admirable coolness and dexterity, placing Sigismund
also in safety. The former was immediately
dragged senseless to the centre of the bark,
where he received those attentions that had just
been eagerly offered to the Signior Grimaldi, and
with the same happy results. But Sigismund
motioned all away from himself, knowing that
their cares were needed elsewhere. He staggered
exhaustion of his power, he fell at full length
on the wet planks. He long lay panting, speechless,
and unable to move, with a sense of death on
his frame.
“Nettuno! gallant, gallant Nettuno!”—shouted
the indefatigable Maso, still at his post on the gangway,
whence he cast his rope with unchanging
perseverance. The fitful winds, which had already
played so many fierce antics that eventful night,
sensibly lulled, and, giving one or two sighs, as if
regretting that they were about to be curbed again
by that almighty Master, from whose benevolent
hands they had so furtively escaped, as suddenly
ceased blowing. The yards creaked, swinging
loosely above the crowded deck, and the dull washing
of water filled the ear. To these diminished
sounds were to be added the barking of the dog,
who was still abroad in the darkness, and a struggling
noise like the broken and smothered attempts
of human voices. Although the time appeared an
age to all who awaited the result, scarcely five
minutes had elapsed since the accident occurred
and the hurricane had reached them. There was
still hope, therefore, for those who yet remained
in the water. Maso felt the eagerness of one who
had already been successful beyond his hopes, and,
in his desire to catch some guiding signal, he leaned
forward, till the rolling lake washed into his face.
“Ha! gallant—gallant Nettuno!”
Men certainly spoke, and that near him. But
the sounds resembled words uttered beneath a
cover. The wind whistled, too, though but for a
moment, and then it seemed to sail upward into
the dark vault of the heavens. Nettuno barked
audibly, and his master answered with another
shout, for the sympathy of man in his kind is
inextinguishable.
“My brave, my noble Nettuno!”
The stillness was now imposing, and Maso
heard the dog growl. This ill-omened signal
was undeniably followed by smothered voices.
The latter became clearer, as if the mocking winds
were willing that a sad exhibition of human frailty
should be known, or, what is more probable, violent
passion had awakened stronger powers of
speech. This much the mariner understood.
“Loosen thy grasp, accursed Baptiste!”
“Wretch, loosen thine own!”
“Is God naught with thee?”
“Why dost throttle so, infernal Nicklaus?”
“Thou wilt die damned!”
“Thou chokest—villain—pardon!—pardon!”
He heard no more. The merciful elements interposed
to drown the appalling strife. Once or
twice the dog howled, but the tempest came across
the Leman again in its might, as if the short pause
had been made merely to take breath. The winds
took a new direction; and the bark, still held by
its anchors, swung wide off from its former position,
tending in towards the mountains of Savoy.
During the first burst of this new blast, even Maso
was glad to crouch to the deck, for millions of infinitely
fine particles were lifted from the lake, and
driven on with the atmosphere with a violence to
take away his breath. The danger of being swept
before the furious tide of the driving element was
also an accident not impossible. When the lull
returned, no exertion of his faculties could catch a
single sound foreign to the proper character of
the scene, such as the plash of the water, and the
creaking of the long, swinging yards.
The mariner now felt a deep concern for his
dog He called to him until he grew hoarse, but
fruitlessly. The change of position, with the constant
and varying drift of the vessel, had carried
time was expended in summoning “Nettuno! gallant
Nettuno!” than had been consumed in the passage
of all the events which it has been necessary
to our object to relate so minutely, and always
with the same want of success. The mind of Maso
was pitched to a degree far above the opinions and
habits of those with whom his life brought him ordinarily
in contact, but as even fine gold will become
tarnished by exposure to impure air, he had
not entirely escaped the habitual weaknesses of the
Italians of his class. When he found that no cry
could recall his faithful companion, he threw himself
upon the deck in a paroxysm of passion, tore
his hair, and wept audibly.
“Nettuno! my brave, my faithful Nettuno!” he
said. “What are all these to me, without thee!
Thou alone lovedst me—thou alone hast passed
with me through fair and foul—through good and
evil, without change, or wish for another master!
When the pretended friend has been false, thou hast
remained faithful! When others were sycophants,
thou wert never a flatterer!”
Struck with this singular exhibition of sorrow,
the good Augustine, who, until now, like all the
others, had been looking to his own safety, or employed
in restoring the exhausted, took advantage
of the favorable change in the weather, and advanced
with the language of consolation.
“Thou hast saved all our lives, bold mariner,”
he said; “and there are those in the bark who
will know how to reward thy courage and skill.
Forget, then, thy dog, and indulge in a grateful
heart to Maria and the saints, that they have been
our friends and thine in this exceeding jeopardy.”
“Father, I have eaten with the animal—slept
with the animal—fought, swum, and made merry
with him, and I could now drown with him! What
dog? The gallant brute will die the death of despair,
swimming about in search of the bark in the
midst of the darkness, until even one of his high
breed and courage must suffer his heart to burst.”
“Christians have been called into the dread
presence, unconfessed and unshrived, to-night; and
we should bethink us of their souls, rather than indulge
in this grief in behalf of one that, however
faithful, ends but an unreasoning and irresponsible
existence.”
All this was thrown away upon Maso, who crossed
himself habitually at the allusion to the drowned,
but who did not the less bewail the loss of his dog,
whom he seemed to love, like the affection that
David bore for Jonathan, with a love surpassing
that of women. Perceiving that his counsel was
useless, the good Augustine turned away, to kneel
and offer up his own orisons of gratitude, and to
bethink him of the dead.
“Nettuno! povera, carissima bestia!” continued
Maso, “whither art thou swimming, in this infernal
quarrel between the air and water? Would I were
with thee, dog! No mortal shall ever share the love
I bore thee, povero Nettuno!—I will never take
another to my heart, like thee!”
The outbreaking of Maso's grief was sudden,
and it was brief in its duration. In this respect
it might be likened to the hurricane that had just
passed. Excessive violence, in both cases, appeared
to bring its own remedy, for the irregular
fitful gusts from the mountains had already ceased,
and were succeeded by a strong but steady gale
from the north; and the sorrow of Maso soon
ended its characteristic plaints, to take a more
continued and even character.
During the whole of the foregoing scenes, the
common passengers had crouched to the deck,
much of the time, from a positive inability to move,
without incurring the risk of being driven from
the defenceless vessel into the lake. But, as the
wind diminished in force, and the motion of the
bark became more regular, they rallied their
senses, like men who had been in a trance, and
one by one they rose to their feet. About this time
Adelheid heard the sound of her father's voice,
blessing her care, and consoling her sorrow. The
north wind blew away the canopy of clouds, and
the stars shone upon the angry Leman, bringing
with them some such promise of divine aid as the
pillar of fire afforded to the Israelites in their passage
of the Red Sea. Such an evidence of returning
peace brought renewed confidence. All in the
bark, passengers as well as crew, took courage at
the benignant signs, while Adelheid wept, in gratitude
and joy, over the gray hairs of her father.
Maso had now obtained complete command of
the Winkelried, as much by the necessity of the
case, as by the unrivalled skill and courage he had
manifested during the fearful minutes of their extreme
jeopardy. No sooner did he succeed in staying
his own grief, than he called the people about
him, and issued his orders for the new measures
that had become necessary.
All who have ever been subject to their influence
know that there is nothing more uncertain
than the winds. Their fickleness has passed into
a proverb; but their inconstancy, as well as their
power, from the fanning air to the destructive tornado,
are to be traced to causes that are sufficiently
clear, though hid in their nature from the
calculations of our forethought. The tempest of
the night was owing to the simple fact, that a condensed
and chilled column of the mountains had
pressed upon the heated substratum of the lake,
finding vent for its escape, had been obliged to let
in the cataract from above. As in all extraordinary
efforts, whether physical or moral, reaction
would seem to be a consequence of excessive action,
the currents of air, pushed beyond their proper
limits, were now setting back again, like a tide on
its reflux. This cause produced the northern gale
that succeeded the hurricane.
The wind that came from off the shores of Vaud
was steady and fresh. The barks of the Leman
are not constructed for beating to windward, and
it might even have been questioned, whether the
Winkelried would have borne her canvass against
so heavy a breeze. Maso, however, appeared to
understand himself thoroughly, and as he had acquired
the influence which hardihood and skill are
sure to obtain over doubt and timidity in situations
of hazard, he was obeyed by all on board with
submission, if not with zeal. No more was heard
of the headsman or of his supposed agency in the
storm; and, as he prudently kept himself in the
back-ground, so as not to endanger a revival of
the superstition of his enemies, he seemed entirely
forgotten.
The business of getting the anchors occupied a
considerable time, for Maso refused, now there
existed no necessity for the sacrifice, to permit a
yarn to be cut; but, released from this hold on the
water, the bark whirled away, and was soon driving
before the wind. The mariner was at the
helm, and, causing the head-sail to be loosened, he
steered directly for the rocks of Savoy. This
manœuvre excited disagreeable suspicions in the
minds of several on board, for the lawless character
of their pilot had been more than suspected in
the course of their short acquaintance, and the
coast towards which they were furiously rushing
fatal to all who came rudely upon its rocks. Half-an-hour
removed their apprehensions. When near
enough to the mountains to feel their deadening
influence on the gale, the natural effect of the eddies,
formed by their resistance to the currents, he
luffed-to and set his main-sail. Relieved by this
wise precaution, the Winkelried now wore her
canvass gallantly, and she dashed along the shore
of Savoy with a foaming beak, shooting past ravine,
valley, glen, and hamlet, as if sailing in air.
In less than an hour, St. Gingoulph, or the village
through which the dividing line between the
territories of Switzerland and those of the King
of Sardinia passes, was abeam, and the excellent
calculations of the sagacious Maso became still
more apparent. He had foreseen another shift of
wind, as the consequence of all this poise and counterpoise,
and he was here met by the true breeze
of the night. The last current came out of the
gorge of the Valais, sullen, strong, and hoarse,
bringing him, however, fairly to windward of his
port. The Winkelried was cast in season, and,
when the gale struck her anew, her canvass drew
fairly, and she walked out from beneath the mountains
into the broad lake, like a swan obeying its
instinct.
The passage across the width of the Leman, in
that horn of the crescent and in such a breeze, required
rather more than an hour. This time was
occupied among the common herd in self-felicitations,
and in those vain boastings that distinguish
the vulgar who have escaped an imminent danger
without any particular merit of their own. Among
those whose spirits were better trained and more
rebuked, there were attentions to the sufferers and
deep thanksgivings with the touching intercourse
of the grateful and happy. The late scenes, and
cast a shade upon their joy, but all inwardly
felt that they had been snatched from the jaws of
death.
Maso shaped his course by the beacon that still
blazed in the grate of old Roger de Blonay. With
his eye riveted on the luff of his sail, his hip bearing
hard against the tiller, and a heart that relieved
itself, from time to time, with bitter sighs, he ruled
the bark like a presiding spirit.
At length the black mass of the côtes of Vaud
took more distinct and regular forms. Here and
there, a tower or a tree betrayed its outlines
against the sky, and then the objects on the margin
of the lake began to stand out in gloomy relief
from the land. Lights flared along the strand, and
cries reached them from the shore. A dark shapeless
pile stood directly atwhart their watery path,
and, at the next moment, it took the aspect of a
ruined castle-like edifice. The canvass flapped
and was handed, the Winkelried rose and set more
slowly and with a gentler movement, and glided
into the little, secure, artificial haven of La Tour
de Peil. A forest of latine yards and low masts
lay before them, but, by giving the bark a rank
sheer, Maso brought her to her berth, by the side
of another lake craft, with a gentleness of collision
that, as the mariners have it, would not have broken
an egg.
A hundred voices greeted the travellers; for
their approach had been seen and watched with
intense anxiety. Fifty eager Vévaisans poured
upon her deck, in a noisy crowd, the instant it
was possible. Among others, a dark shaggy object
bounded foremost. It leaped wildly forward,
and Maso found himself in the embraces of Nettuno.
A little later, when delight and a more
human hair was discovered entangled in the teeth
of the dog, and the following week the bodies of
Baptiste and the peasant of Berne were found,
still clenched in the desperate death-gripe, washed
upon the shores of Vaud.
| CHAPTER VII. The headsman, or, The Abbaye des Vignerons | |