University of Virginia Library

5. CHAPTER V.
THE ROVER'S TALE.

“I was born of an ancient family in the north
of England—of blood as pure and noble, as flow
in the proudest veins of your Spain's proudest nobles.
My Saxon forefathers possessed the broad
demesne, beneath whose old oaks I grew up—as
firm as they of heart, and scarce less strong of
limb—centuries ere the Norman had drenched our
isle in gore. I know not, and I care not, how—
though they battled to the last for freedom—they
held their landships and lordships until, by time
and intermarriage, the names of Saxon and Norman
were forgotten; and from the mixture of
those hostile bloods arose the strongest, bravest,
wisest race of men that tread the surface of God's
earth. I know not, I care not! I only know,
that to me those broad lands descended through a
long race of honored ancestors. I only care that
I was born, and bred, and shall not die—an English
gentleman.

“I had a father, noble, and generous, and good
—a mother—who was indeed a mother, and who
is a saint in heaven!—a sister!—oh! such—such
a sister—ay! thou art fair, Teresa—wondrously,
exquisitely beautiful—but she was as far before
thee, as is the glorious sun before a farthing rush-light!
She was—but I can not—can not describe
her. No! not to my own void and aching heart,
that never hath been filled since—never even for
a moment! She was the comrade of my childish
joys, the soother of my boyish griefs—the dear
repository of my every hope or fear—the bright
encourager to all things high and noble—the true
unflinching friend—the only one! A few years
younger than myself she grew up to bright, glorious
womanhood under the kindred shelter of my
stronger youth—she was my all in all—oh God!
how I adored her.

“But I must on—while I was yet almost a boy,
the secret heart-burnings, the disaffections and
dissentions, which had so long been smouldering
darkly between the king and parliament, blazed
out into rebellion and fierce civil war. Both parties
flew to arms—the nobles and the gentry of
the land, with many of their yeomanry and tenants,
drew their swords for the king;—the citizens
and burghers, and not a few of the smaller
landholders, espoused the cause of parliament.

“Throughout the north the gentry, many of
whom were Catholics, were loyal to man—and
with the Vavasours and Musgraves, the Landales
and the Wentworths, my father buckled on his
arms to fight beneath the standard of his king—
and well he fought for it, from its first ominous
erection at. Worcester amid storm and tempest,
till it fell never more to rise upon the fatal moor
of Marston; where he too fell beside it, undauntedly
but vainly striving against the iron-clad invincibles
of Cromwell! Boy as I was, through
all those bloody fields, I fought beside my father's
bridle. Boy as I was, at Brentford I was thanked
by Charles himself before the leaders of the
army—boy as I was, when my bold father perished
in his stirrups, I slew the man who smote him
down, and drew off his retreating troop, sorely
diminished but unbroken. It is a long tale, but
suffice it, that Lilburn a few days afterward stormed,
sacked, and utterly destroyed the dwelling of
my fathers—that, overdone with weariness and
wo and watching, my mother wasted away, like
snow before the April sunshine, and died at length
of that worst malady a pined and broken heart.
Then, our lands became the heritage of others—
apportioned by the victor Independents to the least
scrupulous, and bravest of their creatures;—then
was our very name—a name coeval in proud fame
with England's story—proscribed, and outlawed.
As best I might, I cared for my loved sister's
safety. In the mean dwelling of an ancient servant
of our race, a humble fisherman upon the
western coast, in lowly guise and under a feigned
name, for years she was concealed in safety—
while I, rash, desperate and daring, fought fetlock-deep
in blood wherever banner waved, or
trump was blown in England—now in the ranks
of some united host, and under some renowned
and regular leader—now leading my own little
troop of undismayed adventurers through the wild
pleasures and yet wilder strifes of that guerilla
warfare—the fiercest and most feared of the king's
partisan commanders. Enough is told, when I
have said that not a single plot was planned, a
single insurrection fostered, but my head was busy
with its machinations. That I fought on with
Lucas, Lisle and Goring, till every hope was lost
—that in the siege of that loyal city Colchester, I
shed my blood in its defence till all was over;
and owed my safety then to wounds which fettered
me to my sick bed, and to the unbribed faith

of a poor laundress, who concealed me from the
hand of my inveterate pursuers. After long
months of suffering, and of precarious hiding, I
reached at length the cottage, where, without now
one hope of seeing me again on earth, my sister
lingered on in sad but patient sorrow; looking for
death alone to liberate her from the woes which
weighed her down to the brink, as it were, of that
wished-for grave, which, seeming to yawn ever to
receive her, opened not to her prayers. Alas!—
alas!—that it did not! Alas! that she died not
then, with the young freshness of her innocent
beauty pure as an angel's sigh—spotless as God's
own sunshine! But words are vain—sorrow is
vain—all! all is vain, save vengeance!

“It was deep night when I arrived at that lone
cottage—and oh! the ecstasy, the thrilling ecstasy,
that quivered through each nerve of my
rapt frame as once again I clasped that angel sister
to my heart—never again, as fondly I believed
and falsely, to be torn thence, while both had being!
Little time was there then for joy or sweet
affection—little enough for needful preparation,
and swift flight! The moon had risen before I
reached the cottage—before she set, the lugger
was afloat; manned by stout hands and trusty
hearts; her every sail distended by an auspicious
breeze; bearing us, bearing us forever, from nature's
sweetest names—our home, our country!
Long centuries before, my father's race had intermarried
with a high family of Spain—and, although
time had loosened the essential tie of
blood, friendly connection had been maintained
ever; and still, in name and courtesy at least if
not in very deed, the haughty family of English
Ringwoods were cousins to the proud Spanish clan,
whose head is—the Melendez de Aviles!

“Start not, Teresa! By the God who looks
upon us now—who looked of yore on that most
hellish crime—who shall anon look on that crime's
meet retribution. By the God—I say—the God
of both our fathers! the blood of thy race runs
even now, not as the lava of Vesuvius, through
every artery and vein of this my body! my body
that has lived through agonies and toils and perils,
which might have consumed nerves of brass and
thewes of tempered steel, which would have worn
out mine, but for the treasured oath of vengeance
that upheld me!

“But passion boots not. What is done, is done!
—what shall be, shall be! Friendly connection
had, I said, been maintained ever! Letters had
passed from age to age, presents been interchanged,
and mutual benefits done and requited. When
our Black Prince displayed his Lion banner in aid
of your King Pedro, my ancestor was rescued
from the wrath of that brave bastard, Henry de
Transtamara, by the Melendez of that day. When
Spain's armada was dispersed, scattered to the
four winds of heaven, by Frobisher and Drake
and Haskins, it was a Ringwood that redeemed
the chieftain of the Des Aviles; and sent him
home cumbered with gifts and ransom, free from
the dark tower of London. Allied in blood, allied
by mutual courtesies, my father—when first war
broke out—remitted treasures, plate, gold, and
store of jewels, to the faith of his Spanish kinsman.
Provident and prepared for either fortune,
he looked to Spain as an asylum, should the king's
cause be bucklered by bold hearts in vain. When
my good father fell—letters—fair letters full of
greeting—full of high courtesy and noble promise
—styling me `Dear and trusty cousin,' praying
me `of my love to deem his purse as mine—his
palace as my castle', were borne to me—fair seeming!
false! false letters! signed `Juan de Melendez
de Aviles.' Full of all honorable confidence,
full of all gratitude and love, now that even hope
was lost in England, I set sail; freely as to a second
country, for the bright shores of Spain! as
to a second home, for the proud halls of De Aviles!
Three days' fair sail, we made the Spanish coast!
another week, and in Madrid we were received,
received not as exiles and outlaws, but as most
honored friends, most esteemed kinsmen, by that
same Juan de Melendez—that same vile, heartless,
soulless thing, which thou callest father. Aye!
I recall it! all—all—every thing! The very palace
gates, upon the porphyry steps of which the
smooth-faced fiend received us—the very liveried
menials, who cringed so humbly to our bidding,
the very smile, the very gesture, yea more, the
very garb, with every small detail of plume, and
scarf and jeweled rapier, which he wore—all
gleam upon mine unforgetting eyes distinct and
palpable, as though they were depicted to my
outward sense by some rare limner's skill. He
was a noble gallant to the eye; witty, accomplished,
beautiful, and brave—nor, as I fondly
deemed, more fair than faithful. Every art, every
gentle knowledge, every superb accomplishment
were centered in his mind, his manner. To the
eye nothing—nothing of God's creation here on
earth could be more glorious, more transcendantly
surpassing man's estate, more godlike! In heart,
no thing on earth, no thing in the abyss of hell
could be more utterly corrupt, more base, more
superhumanly depraved and bad, more fiendish!
Yet years passed, ere I gained this knowledge,
years passed, and I believed him—nor was I even
then unwise in this world's wisdom—all that was
kind, and good, and noble. What wonder that
one younger than myself, artless and unsuspecting,
judging of others' faith by her guileless standard,

full of sweet fervent gratitude, betrayed into
security by her own very purity of soul, and by
the sanction of a brother's presence should have
believed as I! and loved! and—and—oh God!
that I must speak it—fallen! fallen! the victim
to a perjury so hellishly devised, so deep, so fathomless,
that wisest wisdom would have been all
at fault to sound it! The growing love of my
sweet sister, the constant and devoted wooing of
the enamored Juan I saw, and was well pleased
to see it. For—when I saw the liking mutual;
when I knew that my Teresa in purity of an unstained
descent was a match meet for kings; that
in the rescued treasures of my father's house she
had a fitting dowry; that in all else—beauty of
form and face, intellect, feeling, soul—she would
have been a prize for the choice of angels; when
I beheld and knew all this, I had no whisper of
false pride to bid me interpose between their inclinations
and their union! I had no doubts, no
fears, no hesitations! Juan, too, had a sister—a
fair, bright, artless being, of whom, if I did not
entirely love her, I had at least mused fervently
and deeply. Thoughts of a double link had crossed
my mind, as no impossible solution to the Gordian
knot of our entangled fortunes, not as a termination
to be gained by rash or sudden speed,
but as an end, which, other things agreeing, might
in due time crown all our cares with pure and
peaceful happiness. Thus days, and months rolled
on calm, undisturbed, and happy. At times
indeed a touch of wonder would come over me,
why—when their mutual feelings were so evident;
when my approval might have been known
even from my silence; when every thing was
suitable, and no cloud even on the remote horizon
threatened a storm which could divide them—
why they should so prolong their courtship—so
needlessly delay the consummation of their bliss.
Still, as they seemed to understand each other, I
deemed it equally indelicate and unwise, that I
without the shadow of a pretext should interfere
between them. Entirely unsuspicious, therefore,
and fearless even of the possibility of wrong, I left
things to their natural course.

“Meanwhile an opportunity at length occurred
for my advancement, my establishment in a befitting
rank, and active service; an expedition
was in course of preparation under the prince,
Don John, for the low countries, there to co-operate
with the great Conde, against the allied force
of the Cromwellians under Lockhart, and the
French Mazarinists under the great Turenne,
which had already reduced Gravelines, and Merrdyke,
and were now threatening Dunkirk. In
this fair expedition I was appointed to take part;
and in no humbler station than lieutenant-general
of the cavalry. This proud appointment was obtained
for me by the solicitations of Melendez, for
which—Heaven's hottest curses blight him!—I
deemed him worthy of my eternal gratitude.
Brief space was granted for my preparation—yet,
ere I started on my honorable duty, I opened my
heart freely both to Melendez and Teresa; and it
was settled that, the campaign ended, they at
least should be made man and wife; while Juan
plighted me his word that, should I prosper in
my wooing with his sister, his every aid should
be forthcoming. With a light heart I started; all
careless at the present, all confident of the bright
future. In a short time we reached the Netherlands,
and there my every faculty of mind or
body was engrossed by my military duties. It is
not now my purpose, for it avails us nothing, to
spin out long details concerning that disastrous
and disgraceful campaign, wherein we were out-witted,
out-manœuvred, and out-fought. First
came the defeat of Sandhills, whereat the English
standard waved on both sides, and victory
was once again decided by the stout fanatics of
the republic! then Dunkirk instantly surrendered!
then step by step were we beat back, town after
town admitting our victorious foes! Enough,
that at the Sandhills I was dismounted in the last
charge of the superior cavalry of Castelnan,
which broke us like a thunder shock! My right
arm shattered by a pistol shot, my helmet cloven,
and my skull laid bare by a long broadsword-cut,
a pike wound through the broken taslet of my
left thigh—twice I was galloped over by the contending
troopers in close melee, and left for dead
upon the field. Rescued by the attachment of a
veteran follower from the tender mercies of the
plunderers, I lay for weeks insensible, and for
weeks more in helpless agony till the campaign
was ended by a truce; and weak of frame, bent
and bowed by my half healed wounds, I slowly
journeyed homeward. Something I was indeed
discouraged, and something grieved, that during
my long illness, during my slow recovery, no
letters should have reached me whether from Juan
or my sister; yet even this might be explained by
the distracted state of the whole country; France
torn at the same time by civil strifes and foreign
warfare; the Netherlands divided into fractions,
filled with fierce bands of foreign soldiery; all
business at an end, and all communications interrupted.
Consoling myself with such thoughts as
these, for the neglect of my Spanish friends, I
journeyed, with all speed my frail health would
allow, toward Madrid. I reached that splendid
city; hurried through its deserted streets, for it
was midnight when I arrived, to the proud dwelling
of Melendez. The porter who replied to my

loud summons, after a pause strangely at variance
with the former promptness of attendance
which characterized all my friend's retainers—
knew me not at the first; so strangely was I altered
by the enfeebling nature of my wounds, and
by the great exhaustion consequent on my journeying
with those wounds yet unhealed—nor
when he recognized me, did he seem wholly unembarrassed
by my appearance. The family, he
told me—Don Juan, and the Lady Isidore, and
the English Senora had removed from the city
several months before; and were now dwelling
on a magnificent estate, of which I had heard
Melendez speak with rapture, situate on the lower
ridges of the southeastern Pyrenees. Worn out
with fatigue, I resolved to give myself a single
day's repose; in the course of which I learned
from the porter, that shortly after the removal of
the family from town, tidings had come that I had
been slain at the Sandhills; and that no subsequent
news had arrived concerning me, so that on
all hands I was believed dead; to which he cunningly
attributed his consternation at my unexpected
re-appearance; he also mentioned, as a
casual report, that it had come to his ears that my
sister had been married to the Conde de Aviles,
shortly before the tidings of my death in battle.
The following morning, so much of fever had
anxiety and toil produced, that I was miserably
ill, and utterly unable to rise from my couch,
much more to undertake a tedious journey. I
wrote, however, on the instant, both to my sister
and Don Juan; telling them all that had befallen
me, mentioning the reports which had encountered
me on my arrival, promising to make all due
speed to join them, and praying them to write me
instantly, as I was all anxiety and agitation. Ten
days elapsed before I was enabled to rise, and a
week more, before I could endure the motion of
a horse—yet not a line had come to hand to lighten
my curiosity, which was fast growing—why I
knew not—into a fixed presentiment of evil. At
length I was sufficiently recovered, and on a bright
autumnal morning, gallantly mounted and well
armed, followed by two stout English veterans, I
sallied forth from the portals of Melendez; hurrying
with the speed of fear toward the city gates.
Before I had reached there, however, I was surrounded
and arrested by a band of the holy brotherhood
according to a warrant of the all-powerful
Inquisition. Four months I languished in its
dungeons, often examined, often threatened with
the torture, forbidden any intercourse with those
without—in short entombed alive. At length,
when I had given up all hope of liberty, I was
discharged with no more of explanation than I
had received on my capture—what of that? there
was no possible redress! I had been denounced
to the Holy Inquisition—therefore arrested! The
charge had not been made out—therefore I was
discharged! and well for me, I ought to be content!
yea! thankful! and I was thankful—none
but the captive know the exceeding, the transcendant
bliss of freedom. I was free! I was strong!
for spare food and hard lodging had worked miracles
for the restoration of my health—I would
seek out my friends—fly to my sister!

“I repaired once more to the palace of my
friend—when, to my mighty wonder and yet
mightier rage, the porter dashed the wicket in my
face with a horse laugh—barred it within, and
grinning through its barred lattice to my teeth, he
bade me `go seek my sister in the Lazar House—
meet place for harlotry like hers!” Words cannot
express my rage, my madness. All availed nothing—madness,
rage, entreaty!—no farther answer
was returned to me—the wicket opened not
—all was contemptuous, scornful silence. At
length, dreading I know not what, I turned me to
the Lazar House, and there—there—oh God! there
I found her!—there in that den of guilt and misery,
dying by inches, worn, and wan, and wasted
—there on the sordid pallet vouchsafed by niggard
charity, in the last agonies of life, pale as the
sheeted snow, and shrunken till each bone of her
fair frame seemed struggling through the transparent
skin—there found I my sweet sister. She
died—happy at least to die upon a friendly bosom
—she died in blessing me, and praying, from Eternal
mercy, the pardon of her murderer. She died,
but not till she had faltered forth the tale of her
unprecedented ruin! The sun did not turn pale
in heaven—the earth yawned not, nor trembled—
nature held on its wonted course—God heard the
tale, as he had looked upon the deed—and the fell
villain prospered—prospered, and laughed in the
exulting pride of conscious strength, and high impunity
of wrong! All from the very first had
been premeditated—I was appointed to command,
merely that I might be removed from the scene
of destined outrage—a future period was appointed
for the marriage, merely to drown all possible suspicion.
Scarce was I gone, before the treachery
stirred into action; the first step was to find an
expert forger of handwriting; nor was this first
want long upgratified—a villain, triple dyed in
guilt, a disfrocked monk of Italy, the minister for
years of Juan's secret infamies, was pitched upon
for the foul deed; and foully he performed it. My
letters, regularly intercepted by Melendez, were
laid before him, one by one, as they arrived, till
he had learned the trick of my handwriting; so
that I scarce myself could mark the fraud. This
done, the work commenced—letter was forged on

letter, to that unhappy girl, urging her to delay
no longer the consummation of her nuptials—urging
her by a thousand specious pretexts, and at
length enjoining it upon her, as the last dying mandate
from a brother's death-bed, to be united on
the instant to Melendez. So specious was the plot,
that mortal wisdom scarcely could have fathomed
it. Her letters, like my own, were intercepted—
answered!—each argument refuted—each doubt
set aside—each apprehension banished!—moreover,
not my handwriting only, but my whole
turn of composition, my character of thought, my
style, had been so copied, that as I read the living
evidence of the lie, myself, I almost deemed them
mine. It is enough, that they prevailed!—a marriage,
a false marriage, performed by that same
villain monk, and witnessed by, her sex's shame,
the shameless Isidore, completed the accursed
plan. Innocent—innocent she fell! Fell, as an
angel might have fallen, and yet remained an angel.
Secure of his poor victim, flushed with success
and passion, he carried her to his castle in
the south; and till satiety had effaced passion, and
custom worn away the charms of novelty, had
treated her with at least the semblance of affection.
Soon, soon was the dream ended! My return
from the army struck the last blow to his
expiring love—if love that may be called, which
was in truth corrupt and brutal lust! The illness
which delayed me, deemed an auspicious chance—
with unexampled, aye! unheard brutality, in the
most public manner, in the most coarse revolting
language before his grinning menials and sycophantic
guests, he told that suffering angel of the
fraud—the fraud which had destroyed her! jeered
at her tears—yea! bade her convey her beauties
to some new lover, and some fresher market!
And when she clasped his knees in agonies of tearless
supplication, he spurned her; spurned her
with his foot, and bade his vassals cast her forth
into the wintry midnight. Alone, on foot, in the
light garments of the ball-room, without food, or
aid, or money—she was cast forth at midnight;
doubtless cast forth to perish. But so it was not
fated! through storm and snow she struggled on!
barefoot! begging her bread! She reached Madrid,
and fainting in the street, some charitable
hand conveyed her to the wretched dwelling,
where suffering, and wo, and utter desolation,
soon brought her to the long last home; sole refuge
of the wretched. She died! Died, I say,
died! but left me living; living alone for vengeance.
My tale is ended! it boots not to tell how,
when the second Charles regained his father's
throne, he yielded by base amnesty the lands
of his true followers, to the oppressors who
had seized them. A double outlaw, thence, have
I lived for vengeance—and though thus far thy
father hath escaped me, some have I had already,
more shall I have ere long—ay, to satiety!—

“Some have I had already!—and that, girl, not
a little. That monk I watched for weeks—for
months—(thy father, conscience-stricken, had fled
his country.) For months had I watched him, till
as he journeyed toward France, through the wild
passses of the Pyrenees, I swooped upon him. I
dragged him to the loneliest peak of those dread
summits—stripped him and bound him to a thunder-splintered
tree—it was the very height of
summer—placed food and water close before him
—so close that he could see! so far that he could
not reach it—no, not to save his soul! I left him
there to perish—yet watched him from a distance,
that none might succor or release him—
that I might hear his blasphemies, and mark his
agonies, and glut my soul's dear vengeance. He
perished—how, you may guess; he perished there,
and knew me ere he perished.

“Thine aunt—the Lady Isidore—married, as
thou knowest well, Teresa, the Conde di Ribiera;
and within three months after, was found dead—
pierced by three mortal wounds—in her own bridal
bed. I slew her!—I, Teresa—I!—I, Ringwood
the avenger! scaled the terrace at midnight
—entered her room and woke her—woke her to
die! One shriek rung through the silent house,
rousing its every inmate! I leaped from the balcony,
one moment ere the chamber-doors flew
open. Have I not been avenged?

“Before your father's eyes, your brother died
by the torture!

“Before your father's eyes, Teresa, you shall
be shown ere long!—shown—what he dared to
call my sister, and lied in calling her! Start not
—be sure of it; for it shall be! This only boon
I grant thee—grant to thy courage, girl, and nobleness
of heart!—that not now will I wrong
thee—nor by violence!—thou shalt consent to
thine own degradation! Meanwhile, rest here—
that state-room shall be thine; and the black girl,
Casandra, shall be restored to thee; fit garments
shall be furnished thee; thou shalt eat at my table.
Answer me not, girl!—not a word—it shall be so,
I say it shall!

“I must on deck, somewhat is moving there,
that needs my presence. Content thee, and farewell!”