University of Virginia Library

SIR HUGUES DE COUCY;
A Chivalric Legend of the Low Countries.
1200.

1. CHAPTER I.
THE ROUTIER.

It wanted an hour or two perhaps of sunset, on a lowering
September evening, when a small group of men and horses
were assembled on an elevated knoll, commanding an extensive
view of the country, which at that period was mostly covered
by unbroken forest; although a large and seemingly much-travelled
road could be seen at intervals, for a distance of
many miles, with here and there the dark square outlines of a
church-tower, or of some castellated mansion, distinctly visible
above the trees, among which the causeway wandered devious.
All else was wild and savage. The huge beech forest, a portion
of the great wood of Ardennes, which, little circumscribed
in that day of its limits as described by the great Roman,
swept off in solid masses to the eastward, to join beyond the
Rhine the vaster solitudes of the Hercynian forest — clothed
every hill and hollow for many a league around with dense
and shadowy woodland. Except the line of road, and the

scattered buildings, and here and there a wreath of smoke
curling up blue and ghostly in the distance, above some sylvan
hamlet or small borough town, nothing could be discovered
even to the misty, ill-defined horizon, but one vast sea of waving
branches, now tinged with the first solemn tints of autumn.
The knoll, which had been occupied by the party grouped
around its summit as a post of observation, was admirably
adapted for that purpose; rising abruptly from the top of a gentle
hill, to the height of at least two hundred feet, and being
the only elevation of the kind for many a league of distance.
The top of it was bare, and covered with thin grass sprouting
up scantily from the crevices of the sandstone rock which
composed it, but the sides were well clothed with luxuriant
coppice, high enough to conceal the head of the tallest man,
and very intricate and tangled. Immediately around its base
the high-road wheeled, after ascending the gentle slope on the
eastern side, and was soon lost to view in a deep-wooded valley
to the westward.

The group which occupied this station consisted of four
armed men with their horses; beside a monk, as he appeared
from his gray frock and tonsured head, mounted upon a sleek,
well-favored mule. The principal personage of the party was
one well meriting from his appearance, for it was singular in
the extreme, a brief description. He was above six feet in
height, and gaunt almost to meagerness, but with extremely
broad, square shoulders, and arms of disproportionate length
terminating in huge, bony hands. His face was even more remarkable
than his person, and his accoutrements, and dress
perhaps exceeded both. He had a very high but narrow forehead,
ploughed deeply by the lines of fierce and fiery passions.
His deep set eye (for he had but one, the left having been
utterly destroyed by a wound, the scar of which severing the
eyebrow near the insertion of the nose, seamed his whole

cheek, and might be traced by a white line far through the
thick and matted beard which clothed his chin jaw), gleamed
out with a sinister and lurid glare from beneath his shaggy,
overhanging brow. His nose had been originally of the keenest
aquiline, high, thin, and well shaped; but its bridge had been
broken years before by a cross-cut which had completely severed
it, and which, though skilfully healed, had left a strange
and disfiguring depression. His mouth, as far as could be
judged from the vast crop of mustache and beard which covered
all the lower half of his countenance with a tangled mass
of red, grizzled hair, was well cut, bold, and decided, but the
whole aspect of the man was strangely repulsive and disgusting.
There was an air of reckless and undaunted courage, it
is true, stamped on his scarred and weather-beaten features;
but it was their sole redeeming trait, and it, too, was so mixed
up and blended with effrontery, and pride, and cruelty, and
brute licentiousness, that it was lost and obscured, except when
it would flash out at rare intervals in time of deadly peril, and
banish for a moment by its brightness the clouds of baser passions.
His dress had been in the first instance, a splended suit
of complete tilting armor of the most ponderous description;
but many parts of it had been lost or broken, and replaced by
others of inferior quality and construction. Thus while he
still retained the corslet and plastron with the gorget and vant
braces of fluted Milan steel, painted to suit the caprice of the
wearer, of a deep blood-red, his cuishes, and the splents which
protected his leg from the knee downward, were of plain Flemish
iron, once brightly polished, but now sordid and defaced
with rust, and recent blood-stains. His head was covered
by a heavy casque, with cerveilliere and avantaille of steel, of
a different construction from his breastplate, but like it lacquered
with dark crimson, and throwing a dreadful and unnatural
reflection from its raised visor over a face which needed
no additions to render it in the last degree appalling. He had
an iron chain across his shoulders instead of a baldric, to which
was attached a long two-edged straight broad-sword. The
belt about his waist was filled with knives and daggers of every
shape and size; and pitched into the ground beside his horse,
a powerful and active charger, with a steel demipique and an
axe slung at the saddlebow, but unencumbered by defensive
armor, stood his long lance with its steel head and crimson
pennon. He had gauntlets on his hands, and spurs upon his
heels, but they were not the gilded spurs of knighthood, nor
was there any plume or crest on his burgonet, nor any bearings
on the plain, blood-red shield which hung about his neck.
The other three armed persons, who stood at little way aloof,
were ordinary men-at-arms of the period, ruffianly-looking fellows
enough, and with none of that gallant and spirited demeanor
which marked the chivalric soldier of the day. They
were powerful athletic men, however, strongly and completely,
though variously, armed one with the corslet and steel bonnet,
brassards and taslets, of a well-appointed trooper, one with the
hauberk and mail hose which were becoming at that time somewhat
obsolete — and the third in a brigantine or shirt of light
chain armor on the body, his limbs protected by the usual defences
of plate, and his head by a stout iron morion. They all
wore broad-swords and long lances, and several daggers in
their belts; beside which they had each a long bow and a
sheaf of arrows at his back. Their horses were stout, active
animals, in good condition, though somewhat low in flesh, and
the whole appearance of both men and beasts, although decidedly
irregular, was soldier-like and serviceable. The priest
who sat upon his mule, chatting sociably with the leader of
the party, was a round oily-looking little figure, with a soft,
sneering smile and a twinkle of marvellous shrewdness in his
quick, dark eye; altogether, however, he was as unclerical
looking a personage as ever drew a cowl over a tonsored head,
and it is probable at least, that had his garment been subjected
to a close scrutiny, some most unpriest-like appendages might
there have been encountered.

“Well, priest — well! well!” said the red leader, interrupting
him impatiently, in the middle of a prolix description, “but
what said Talebard?”

“Talebard Talebardin,” answered the little monk, pompously,
“sent greeting to the Rouge Batard, and prayed that he would
give him the rencontre, with as many men and horses as he can
make, at the stone cross in the backwood near Braine-la-Leud,
on the third morning. It seems he hath got tidings of a strong
castle, weakly guarded, with a fair châtelaine within, and store
of wealth to boot. Her lord hath ridden forth to join John
Lackland at Mirepoix!”

“By God's head, and I will,” returned the other, “and there
is little time enough to spare. The third morning — may the
fiend else receive me! — is to-morrow. Ho! Jean Lenoir
draw your belt tight, and mount your trotting gelding, and ride
for life to Wavre on the Dyle, Bras-de-fer must be there, ere
this, with thirty lances — spare not for spurring, and bid him
bring his men up with all speed, and meet me at the broken
bridge! You know the place — begone! I look for you ere
midnight.”

“But my fair son and penitent,” interposed the monk, “how,
if we spare Lenoir, shall we be able to deal with the goodly
company of merchants, and win the pretty demoiselles I told
you of, and the rich sumpter mules? we shall he but three
men-at-arms, and they have four armed serving-men!”

“Jean must go, monk,” the other answered sharply, “Jean
must go, and forthwith, by God! but he shall leave his bow
and shafts with you, and you shall strip the gray frock off, and

don the cold iron, as you have done before! — but were the
demoiselles so lovely?”

“Else may I never more kiss ruby lips, or drain a foaming
flagon,” answered the worthy monk, stripping off, as he spoke,
his gray frock, and showing himself dressed in a suit of close-fitting
chamois leather, with a light jazeran, or coat-of-mail,
covering all his body, and a belt round his waist, well stored
with poniards and stilettoes. In a moment or two he had
rolled up his clerical dress, and deposited it in a little wallet
fastened to the crupper of his saddle; from which, after a
moment's fumbling, he brought out a strong pothelmed of black
iron. With this he speedily covered his shaven crown, and
taking the bow and quiver, which the trooper resigned to him
as he spurred his horse down the side of the hill appeared in
a style far more suitable to his real profession than he had done
before the alteration of his dress.

Scarcely had he finished his preparations, before, casting
his eye down the road to the eastward, he exclaimed: “Now,
by the good saint Martin! — here come the knaves. Look
here, Messire! here, over that big chestnut, you may perceive
the fluttering of their garments down in the valley of the stream!
We have no time to spare — they will be here within ten minutes.”

“Right, by our lady! Right monk!” cried the Rouge Batard,
“and for your tidings you shall choose you a paramour, as
soon as I am served.”

“Not so, by God!” interrupted one of the others, “it is my
turn this bout — the unfrocked priest gets ever in the luck on't.
When we look Ferté-sous-jouarre, last Whitsuntide, the brightest
eye and the rosiest cheek of the lot fell to our confrere
Benedict!”

“Look sharp, lad — look sharp, André,” returned the chief,
with a sinister glare of his single eye, and a malignant sneer,

“lest instead of red lips, and white arms to clasp your neck,
you find a hempen knot to grace it, for by the God that made
you, dispute one other word of mine, and you shall swing for
it! To horse! to horse!” he added, seeing that his reproof
was effectual, and that no further admonitions were required.
“You, monk, lead, André and Le Balafré down to the thicket
just below the angle of the road at the hill foot. The moment
they come, give them a flight of arrows, and see you make
sure of the men-at-arms. Shoot each into the face, under the
eyeball, if you may; and then charge, sword in hand, and shout
our war-cry. I will be with you on the word. Away! be
steady, sure, and silent!”

Not a word more was needed; the priest and his companions
scrambled down into the road, and rode off as quickly as
was consistent with complete silence, while he who was called
the Rouge Batard led his horse slowly down the side of the
steep knoll; and, having reached the road just as his followers
disappeared round an abrupt turn of the causeway, tightened
his girths carefully, and sprang into the saddle without putting
hand to mane, or foot to stirrup, his horse standing motionless
all the while as a carved statue. Settling himself firmly in his
demipique, he lowered the visor over his hideous features;
loosened his broadsword in its scabbard, and, seeing that the
battle-axe which was suspended at the saddle-bow was ready
to his grasp, laid his long lance into its rest, and, keeping the
point elevated, walked his horse gently down the sandy road.

His seat was firm and graceful; his hand light, delicate, and
easy; and as the noble animal which bore him curvetted down
the gentle slope, despite the singular color of his harness, its
want of complete uniformity and neatness, and the ruffianism
of his whole appearance, it could not be denied that he was an
accomplished horseman, and altogether a showy, martial-looking
soldier.

In a few moments he reached the spot where he had placed
his ambuscade, and halted. It was indeed a place adapted for
the purpose — the road, which here was perfectly level, ran
between almost impervious thickets of hazel, ash, and alders,
much interfaced with creepers and wild briers; and was overhung
with timber-trees, so that at noonday it was ever twilight
there; and in the early evening, profound darkness. The
causeway at this point turned suddenly, directly at right angles,
so that of two parties travelling in opposite directions, neither
could see or suspect the approach of the other till they were
in close contact; and here, well knowing that his men lay in
the thicket close before him, the Routier halted, with his lance
in the rest, and eye, ear, heart, on the alert, ready to dash in
on the travellers at the first signal of the robber-priest. His
horse, endowed as it would seem with an instinctive knowledge
of what was in the wind, did not so much as champ its
bits, much less paw up the ground, or neigh, or whinny. Not
a sound was to be heard in the wooded defile except the hoarse
cooing of a distant wood pigeon, the wild, laughter-like scream
of the green-headed woodpecker, and the tinkling gurgle of a
little rivulet which crossed the road some fifty yards below.

The company which was approaching, and which had been
accurately reconnoitred by the priest during their noontide
halt at the little village of Merk-Braine, consisted of no less
than twelve individuals, beside a long train of sumpter mules
loaded with costly merchandise. First rode, well mounted on
stout, black, Flemish horses, four of the ordinary armed servants
or retainers of the day, dressed in strong doublets of
buff-leather, with morions and breastplates, and heavy halberds
in their hands, and long swords girded on their thighs. Close
upon these came three persons, the principals evidently of the
party, riding abreast; and as it would seem engaged in earnest
conversation. He on the right hand side was a tall, portly

figure, with a broad brow and handsome features; but his hair
was already tinged with many a streak of gray, and the deep
lines of thought and care upon his cheek and forehead told as
distinctly as words could have done, that he had spent long.
years amid the toils and trials of the world; and that two thirds
at least of his mortal course had been run through whether for
good or evil. Next to him, curbing lightly a beautiful Spanish
jennet; there rode as lovely a girl as ever man's eyes looked
upon. Still in her early youth, there was no stain, no blight
of sin or passion on her sweet innocent features; her full,
black eye danced with an eloquent and lightsome mirth, and
there was a continual smile on her ripe, ruby lips; her form
was tall and slender, yet exquisitely rounded in all its flowing
outlines; and so symmetrically full, that her young, glowing
bust might have been chosen for a sculptor's model. As near
to her upon the left as he could guide his eager horse, hanging
on every word she uttered as though his soul were balanced
on the low, soft sound, and gazing into her eyes with an
impassioned, earnest tenderness, was a fine, noble looking
youth of twenty-five or twenty-six years; handsomely clad in
a pourpoint of morone colored velvet, with a rapier at his side,
and a richly-mounted poniard in his girdle. These were again
followed by two serving-women, fair, buxom-looking lasses,
with the dark eyes and rich complexions of the sunny south;
and an old steward, or major-domo, riding unarmed beside
them. The train was brought up by two common grooms, or
serving-men, without any weapons, either offensive or defensive,
driving a string of laden mules, the whole forming the
retinue, as the quick eye of the Routier's emissary had not
failed to detect, of a rich Fleming merchant, travelling with
his family and chattels toward the capital of France.

Just as they neared the lurking-place of the banditti, the
fair girl raised her eyes to the fast darkening heaven, and a

slight shiver running through her graceful form, “Uncle,” she
said, addressing the elder rider, “I would we were at our halting-place
for the night. I know not why it is — for never did
I feel aught like it before — but there comes over me a secret
dread and horror, as I look out into these dreary woods, and
see the shadows of approaching night darkening the giant trees.
Is there no peril here?”

“None, my girl,” replied the portly burgher, “no peril, or I
would not have exposed you to it. That fierce marauder, Talebard
Talebardin, as he calls himself, and his more barbarous
associate, the Red Bastard, have marched away, as I learned
beyond all doubt, ere we crossed the frontier, to join the bad
king John, at Mirepoix, where he is even now in arms against
his brother's son. And the great Philip, as I hear, is hurrying
hitherward with such a train of bannerets and barons as
has made all the roads secure as the streets of Paris. But we
will trot on, for the night is darkening, and we have four
leagues yet to traverse ere we reach Braine-la — God of heaven!
what have we here!”

His last words were caused by a fierce and discordant yell
from the thicket, accompanied by the simultaneous twang of
three bowstrings, and the deadly whistling of the gray goose
shafts; and almost instantly — before, indeed, the words had
well left his lips — three of the four men-at-arms fell headlong
to the earth, each shot in the face with a barbed arrow, and,
after a few seconds' struggle, lay cold and senseless as the
clods around them. The remaining trooper set spurs to his
horse, and drove furiously forward, accompanied by the chargers
of his slains companions, which, freed from all restraint
and mad with terror, tossing their heads aloft, and yerking out
their heels, dashed diverse into the deep forest.

What has occupied many lines to relate, occurred almost
with the speed of light; and, while the long ear-piercing shriek

yet quivered on the lips of Marguerite Beaufroy, her uncle
snatched her bridle-rein, and, putting spurs to his own horse,
struck into a furious gallop, crying, “Ride, ride! for life! for
life! we are waylaid — God aid us!” But as he did so, from
the thicket forth charged Le Balafré and his companion, followed
by the pretended monk. Cutting into the middle of the
train they separated the younger merchant from his fair cousin
and his father, rode down the old steward, and one attacking
the youth, sword in hand, while the others coolly cut down and
stabbed the unarmed servitors, were masters of the field in five
minutes' space. For a moment or more it seemed as though
the first fugitives were about to escape; for they had already
interposed a considerable space between themselves and the
ruffians, and were just wheeling round the angle of the wood,
when, full in front rose the appalling war-cry, well known by
fame through every province of fair France, “Ha! ha! Saint
Diable pour le Rouge Batard!” — and as the awful sound smote
on the ears of the trembling voyagers, a scene of no less terror
presented itself to their eyes, the fearful form of the Red Routier
charging in full career against their servant, who scarce
had power to wield his halberd, so utterly had terror overcome
his heart and palsied his strong arm. One instant — one loud
thundering crash, with a wild cry of mortal anguish ringing
above the clang and clatter — and the short strife was over.
Man and horse rolled in the dust, one to rise no more, and still
with lance unbroken and in rest, its point and pennon reeking
with the hot life-blood, the Rouge Batard came on. But as he
came, he saw that all the strife was over, excepting the protracted
struggle between La Balafré and the young lover. He
jerked his lance up quickly, when its head was within a foot
of the elder merchant's breast; and curbed his charger up so
suddenly that he stood motionless, thrown almost on his haunches,
scarce a yard distant from the Spanish jennet of the unhappy
Marguerite. “Hold your hands! — all!” he shouted, “hear
you me not, La Balafré? Hold your hands, man! And you
Sir Fool, down with your silly sword, before worse come of
it! Sweet lady, I salute you,” he continued, “by God but thou
art wondrous fair, and worthy to be, as thou shalt, ere long, the
world-famed mistress of Le Rouge Batard. You sirs,” he went
on speaking very rapidly, addressing the merchants, “down
from your horses, on the instant! Point out to these good men
the costliest and least bulky of your wares, yield up your purses
and your jewels, and, seeing we have lost no blood, we will be
merciful to day, and suffer you to go at large, reserving to ourselves
your demoiselles, whom, by the spirit of thunder, we
will console right worthily.”

“That thou shalt never do, dog!” cried the young man, aiming
with the words a tremendous blow at the head of the
Routier. Sparks of fire flashed from the dinted casque of the
Red Bastard, and his head was bent forward almost to the
saddle-bow; but ere his bold assailant could repeat the blow
he had set spurs to his charger, and, letting fall his own lance,
seized the youth by the throat with the tremendous gripe of
his gauntlet, and, throttling him for a moment savagely, lifted
him clear out of the saddle and hurled him to the earth with
such violence that he lay stunned and motionless. “Take
that,” he said, with a bitter sneer, “take that, to teach you
manners! And, since you deign not to accept our mercy, by
Heaven, you shall fare the worse of it. Hold my horse, monk,”
he added, as he leaped to the ground, and stood up to the prostrate
youth. “Who is that groaning there?” he exclaimed, as
a faint acclamation of pain reached his ear, from the old steward,
who, sorely bruised and shaken by his fall, was just recovering
his senses. “Par Dieu! I can not hear myself think
for the noise. Jump down from your horse, Le Balafré, and
cut his throat at once; cut it close under the jaws, down to

the back-bone; that will stop his cursed clamor; and then
come hither with your knife.”

The brutal mandate was executed in an instant, despite the
feeble struggles of the old man, and the screams of the servant-girls,
who were so near the wretched being that his blood
literally spirted over their feet and the hems of their dresses;
and then, bearing the deadly instrument, a huge double-edged
knife, with a blade of a hand's-breadth, and two-feet in length,
still reeking with the evidence of slaughter, the scarred and
savage ruffian approached his chief; who, with his vizor raised,
stood perfectly unmoved and calm, contemplating his victims
with an air of quiet, easy satisfaction. The man looked at
him for a sign, and he replied to the look; “Wait! wait a little
while! he is coming to — and it were pity he should die without
feeling it!”

“O God! O God! be merciful — spare him, thou man of
blood — spare him, and I will bless thee, pray for thee, love
thee! yea, bribe thee to the deed of mercy, with all I hold on
earth!” exclaimed the lovely Marguerite, flinging herself from
her horse before his knees, and clasping them in agony as she
grovelled at his feet; while her uncle heaped offer upon offer
of ransoms that on a foughten field would have bought dearly
an earl's freedom.

“By all that's holy,” answered the brute, “but thou art wondrous
beautiful!” and with the words he raised her from the
ground, and held her for a moment's space at his arms' length,
gazing with a critical eye into her pale but lovely face; then
drawing her suddenly to him, he clasped her to his breast in
the closest embrace, and pressed a long, full kiss on her reluctant
lips. “Thou art most wondrous fair, and thy lip is as soft
and fragrant as a rosebud! I would do much to earn the love
of one so beautiful; but thou hast nothing, sweet one, wherewith
to bribe me, save thine own person, and that is mine already,

as thou shalt learn ere long! Cease thy absurd, unmeaning
prayers, old man, they are of no avail. Balafré, the good
youth, is alive enough to feel now!” and, at his word, the ruffian
knelt down coolly, and plunged his weapon three several times
into the bosom of his unresisting victim, while with one fearful,
shivering shriek, Marguerite fainted in the arms of the Red
Bastard.

“That is well! that is well! now seeing that this worthy
senior hath somewhat more of sense than young hopeful, we
will give him a choice for life. Gag him, and tie him to yon
chestnut-tree; if he survive till morning, without the wolves
discovering him, he may live yet many a day. Look sharp,
my men! Bring out your mule, monk, and bear me this fair
dame before you. Carefully, sir — and, mark me, see that you
do not dare so much as look or breathe upon her lovingly!
The maids will ride on with us, on their own hackneys; and,
hark ye, silly hussies, no wrong shall be done to you, save that
women in their hearts deem no wrong, phrase it as they may!
so ye keep silent! but just shriek once again, and ye shall
share the fate of that old dotard. André, and you, Le Balafré,
bring up the mules. Away! away! or we shall scarce meet
Talebard by daybreak!”

His orders were performed upon the instant, and to the very
letter. The terrified girls ceased from their painful sobbings;
the old man, in despite of desperate resistance, was made fast
to the tree; and the monk, bearing on his saddle-bow the lovely
maiden, still, happily for her, insensible, the Rouge Batard
mounted his potent charger, and, with his captives and his
booty, rode at a rapid pace into the forest, the depths of which
were now as dark as midnight.

2. CHAPTER II.
THE KNIGHT.

There is a little hostelrie in the village of Merk-Braine,
which bears the marks to this day of the most extreme antiquity;
and which, if it be not the same that offered hospitality to travellers
in the days of Philip Augustus — those glorious days of
old knight-errantry! — occupies at least the same position, and
discharges the same functions now, as did its scarcely ruder
prototype long centuries ago.

It was, at the period of which I write, a wretched clay-built
hut, with unglazed lattices; a ragged porch of old worm-eaten
timber; a bush, or dray branch rather, over the door; and a
broken flagon suspended from a pole at the gable, to indicate
to passers-by the character of the tenement. Uninviting, however,
as was the exterior of the building, and unpromising of
better cheer within, so rude were the accommodations of the
age, and so threatening the aspect of the evening — for it was
autumn, and the equinoctial storm, which had for some time
past been brewing, seemed now about to burst in earnest —
that an acclamation of pleasure rose to the lips of the leader
of a little party of horse, as he drew in his bridle at the door,
and shouted for the hostler

He was a tall and powerful man, of some six or eight and
thirty years, with a bold, manly countenance, sun-burnt and
darkened by exposure to all weathers; a full, well-opened eye,
of a bright sparkling blue, and a quantity of close-curled auburn
locks clustering round his temples. His beard and mustaches
— for he wore both — were considerable darker than his hair;

but the latter were so small and closely trimmed, as to detract
nothing from the effect of his well-cut firm mouth, which with
his ample brow, was decidedly the finest feature of his face.
His dress was the superb attire of a baron of that day in his
complete war-harness, except that he wore on his head only a
low cap of black velvet, trimmed round the brim with ermine,
while his casque was suspended from the saddle-bow of his
principal attendant. He was then sheathed from the throat
downward, in panoply of palated Milan steel, polished till it
glanced to every beam of light like a Venetian mirror; yet it
glanced not with the cold lustre of plain burnished iron; for in
the tempering of the metal, it had been wrought to a rich, purplish
blue, resembling not a little the finest modern enamel,
and was moreover engrailed, to use the technical term, with
threads of golden wire, so exquisitely welded, in patterns of
rare arabesque, into the harder steel, that the two substances
were perfectly incorporated. It must not be supposed, however,
that the whole of this superb suit was exposed to the
sunshine, which, reflected from its surface, would have been
intolerable to the wearer, or to the rain, which would, ere long,
have dimmed its polish; nothing, in fact, was visible of the
armor, except the gorget defending the neck, the brassards,
vantbraces, and gauntlets on the arms, and the splents covering
the legs from the knee downward; for all the chest and thighs
of the rider were clad, above the mail, in a surcoat, or loose
frock, of fine white Flanders cloth, fringed with deep bullion,
and having a chained dragon — the well-known cognizance of
the counts of Tankarville — emblazoned on the breast, on thick
embroideries of gold. The splendid warrior, however, carried
no offensive weapon, with the exception of a richly-mounted
dagger at his girdle; nor was he horsed on his ponderous
charger, but on a slight and delicate Arabian, of a deep iron
gray, whose springy limbs and slender pasterns would have
seemed utterly inadequate to bear the weight of so large a man
sheathed in so ponderous a harness, had not its wild, large eye,
its red, expanded nostril, and its proud, tremulous snort, as it
chafed against the curb, proclaimed it full of the indomitable
spirit of its desert sires. His attendants were three in number.
An old dark veteran, with hair as white as snow, but with a
ruddy, sun-burnt face, radiant with health and animation —
who, mounted on a strong, black charger, bore, in addition to his
own accoutrements, his master's lance and helmet. The other
two were ordinary men-at-arms of the period; armed indeed
with unusual exactness, and mounted on beasts that might have
borne a king to battle. Of these, one carried the two-handed
broadsword of the knight, with its embroidered baldric, and
the small heater-shaped shield, embossed with the same bearing
as his surcoat; the other led his destrier, a tall, full-blooded
Andalusian red-roan, with snow-white mane and tail, barded
for battle. Ponderous, indeed, was the burthen, of both man
and horse, in those days; for the knight's charger bore, in addition
to its huge plated demipique, a chamfort covering the
forehead, connected to a series of stout plates running down
the vertebræ of the neck, and fastened to the saddle-bow; a
poitrel of fluted steel protecting the whole chest and counter,
and the bard proper, guarding the loins and croupe, from the
cantle of the saddle to the tail. All his armature was wrought
point device, to match the harness of the rider, and, like that,
was covered by a housing, as it was termed, of white cloth
rickly laced, and decorated in several places with the same
figure of the chained dragon. From the pommel of the saddle
were slung, one on either hand, a battle-axe of Damascene
steel, and a heavy mace-at-arms. The reins of the bridle
were not composed of leather, but of two plates of metal, a
hand's breadth wide in the centre, but tapering toward the bit
to which they were attached by solid rings, and toward the
hand-piece, where they were connected by a stout thong of
bull's hide.

Such were the persons, and such their attire, who lighted
down, a short space before sunset, at the door of the village
tavern, seemingly not a little pleased to have attained its shelter
before the storm should burst, which was already howling
through the forest.

“Matthieu,” exclaimed the knight, as he sprang down from
his palfrey, with a clang and clatter that might have been heard
half a mile off, “Matthieu, good friend, let the men take the
bridles off, and feed the chargers; but bid them on no terms
unbard them, nor lay their armor off themselves. These woods
of Soignies and Ardenne are rarely free of brigands; and
though we have heard tell that those infernal miscreants, Talebard
Talebardin, and the Rouge Batard, have fallen back into
Normandy, before King Philip's host, I hold it likelier far that
they would tarry here in force, to waylay the small parties, such
as mine and five hundred others, which are all straggling up
to the rendezvous at Mirepoix. Look to it, old companion;
and then come in and see what cheer we may find for the night;
sorry enough, I trow; but `better,' as the adage goes, `a beggar's
cassock, that no covering in a storm.' ”

And with these words he entered the single room, which
occupied the whole ground floor of the cabin, serving for
kitchen, hall, and parlor; wherein he found an old and withered
crone, as deaf, apparently, as a stone-wall; for she took
no notice whatever of his entrance, her back being turned as
he stooped under the low doorway, though he made noise
enough, with his jingling spurs and clashing harness, to have
aroused the seven sleepers

“What ho! good dame,” he cried, “canst give us somewhat
to eat, and a drink of good strong wine to warm us this cold
night?” And as he spoke, he flung himself into a huge, old-fashioned

settee, by the hearth, the woman gazing at him all
the time with an air of stupid bewilderment, which excited his
mirth to such a degree that he laughed, literally, till the tears
ran down his cheeks; increasing her confusion and dismay by
every succeeding peal of merriment. At length, after sundry
ineffectual efforts, interrupted by fresh shouts of laughter, he
made her comprehend his meaning; and, that once done, she
speedily produced some cold provisions, with a flask or two of
wine, very superior in quality to what could have been expected,
from the appearance of the hut. The joints, however, of roast
boar's flesh, and the venison pastry, which composed the principal
parts of the entertainment, had all suffered considerable
dilapidation; and it was in apologizing for this, that the old
woman let fall some expressions which aroused in an instant
the jealousy of the wary soldier.

“It was a party,” she said, “from Ghent, or Bruges, or
Antwerp it might be, that had passed by at noon with a great
train of merchandise; and such an angel of a lady, so young, and
soft, and tender, and kind-spoken! Poor thing,” she added,
“poor thing! 'twas pity they had rid forth into the forest; but the
Lord's will be done; and if it be his pleasure, sure he can guard
them from the peril —”

“Peril! what peril, dame?” shouted the count, so loudly
that she failed not to hear and comprehend him; “what peril
they should run I know not, unless it be a late ride into Braine-la-Lead;
and it may be a ducking, which, I trow, will scarcely
drown this beautiful bourgeoise. Ha! say what peril?”

“Well, well! she knew not,” she made answer; “the forest
never was over-safe; besides the gray monk of Soignies was
here as they came up, and mingled with their train, and questioned
closely of their route. God send it be all well: I be a
poor, old, helpless thing, and know naught of their doings.”

“By our lady of Bonsecours!” muttered the knight between

his teeth, “but it seems to me thou dost know over-much for
honesty;” and then — “Whose doings, mother?” he continued;
“and who is this gray monk of Soignies? or what hath he to
make with their well-doing?”

“Nay, nay! I know not; all the world, I thought, had heard
tell of the gray brother — all the world twenty leagues round.”

“But happening not to dwell within twenty leagues round,
I have not heard tell of the gray brother; so now, I prithee,
dame, enlighten me.”

But by no exhortation, or even threats, could he extort another
word from her; for she had apparently relapsed into
impenetrable deafness, and sat crooning some old ballad over
the hearth, a picture of the most utter imbecility. The knight
pondered for a few minutes deeply; and once he half rose from
his seat, as if to order out his horses; but when he reflected
on the distance they had journeyed without any bait, he sank
down again in the settee, drained a deep draught of wine, and
with his eyes fixed on the embers of the wood-fire, continued
in a fit of musing, until he was interrupted by the entrance of
the old ecuyer Matthieu, and the two men-at-arms, from the
stable.

Bidding his followers take care of themselves, and get to
their food quickly, for he should start again so soon as the
steeds had eaten up their provender, he was again relapsing
into thought, when his squire addressed him suddenly —

“Where be the servants of the inn, beau sire?”

“There be none, Matthieu,” answered the knight very quickly;
“not a soul, save this cursed old witch, who, whether she
be deaf or no, simple or over-quick, by mine honor I am at
loss to tell!”

“Nor be there any hostlers in the stable-yard; though there
be forty stalls of stabling, and corn and hay sufficient for a
squadron, and plenty of dry litter, and signs enow of many

horses! Nor is there, for so much as I can learn, one man in
the whole village — if village one may call this heap of filthy
hovels. Not a soul have I seen, but one foxy-headed boy, who
ran away and hid himself, so that we could not find him.”

“I fancy, my good Matthieu,” replied the count quite coolly,
“I fancy we have fallen into a precious den of routiers and
ecorcheurs. The hag let out, I know not what of travellers
who had passed by at noon, and were all like to come to evil;
but I could make naught out of her.”

“So, please you, beau sire,” interrupted one of the men-at-arms,
who had been listening attentively, their own suspicions
having been much awakened; “so, please you, beau sire, but
that I have heard say you do not like such doings, I could
find a way to make her hear, though she were as deaf as the
grave, and answer, too, though she were as dumb as a hedgehog.”

“How so, Clement Mareuil?” asked his master, sternly.
“How could you make this wretched old hag hear, if the
drums of ears be palsied?”

“Easily, beau sire, easily! let me but tie your bunch of
matches between her fingers, and just light the ends, I warrant
me she will tell all her secrets that you shall hear them a
league distant. When I was carrying a free lance in Schoenvelt's
light battalion —”

“Hark thee, Clements,” interrupted the knight; “I have
heard say that Schoenvelt's light battalion was little better than
a band of tondeurs. Himself, I know, though a fierce champion,
and a manly, to have been at the best a barbarous marauder.
Now, mark me! Let me hear such words as these
once more! much more let me hear of your doing deviltries,
such as you phrase so glibely! and, were you the best spear
in Flanders, I would strip you of my bearings, and scourge
you with my stirrup leathers, till your back should be more

tender than your mercy! For shame! you a soldier, and
talk of torturing a woman!”

“Nay, nay, beau sire,” answered the man, much abashed;
“pardon me, for I meant no evil. Every one knows that all
the villains hereabout are in league with the gray monk of
Soignies and the Red Bastard. I warrant me this old hag
knows all their haunts as well as I know.”

“Methinks you know too much, Clement,” interposed Matthieu,
“of these routiers thyself. I warrant me, thou countest
fellowship with this Red Bastard!”

“No, no, sir! not so bad as that,” replied the soldier, looking
very much confused; “not I, indeed — though, to say
truly,” he continued, when I served Shoenvelt, there was a
proper man-at-arms among his free companions, as hideous as
the foul fiend to look upon, and as cruel, too, to say the least
of it! and I have heard say he is the man who now bears that
soubriquet. He was base-born, I know; and his hair was as
red as a fox's brush, and twice as coarse. He was a stout
lance, and a right bold rider; but God forbid that I should
count fellowship with such an utter devil!”

“And who is the gray monk of Soignies, sirrah? since
thou knowest all about it,” the knight demanded; “this old
jade spoke of him but now.”

“Ah! ah! I thought so, beau sire. I said as much a while
since. Why, the gray monk is one whom, but that he walks
the earth in human shape, and that I saw him once well nigh
killed in a mêlée, I would swear was the arch enemy of man!
Why, beau sire, it was he who forced the knight of Vitry's
castle, and crucified him over the altar of his own chapel,
while his men violated his wife and his two sisters before his
very eyes!”

“To horse!” exclaimed the knight, springing to his feet;
“to horse, then, on the instant! Away, Clement and Raoul;

screw on my casque, Matthieu, and hang my shield about my
neck, and belt me with my espaldron, else shall more villanies
be done this night. To horse, my men, right hastily!”

With the first words of their master the men-at-arms hurried
to the stable to fetch out their chargers, but ere five minutes
had elapsed they both returned, dragging in between them a
stolid-looking, red-haired boy, whom they swore they had
caught on the point of knocking a large spike-nail — which
they produced, together with a hammer, as evidence of the
fact — into the hoof of the knight's roan charger. The old woman's
eye lightened, as the boy was dragged in, for a moment;
but she instantly resumed her appearance of stupidity, and sat,
as before, rocking herself to and fro, and droning over an old
song, careless, apparently, and ignorant of all that passed before
her.

“How now, young villain! For what wouldst thou have
lamed my war-horse?” cried the count, now excited into a
paroxysm of fury. “Speak out! speak out! or, by the God
that made me, base peasant, I will flog thee till all thy bones
are bare, and hang thee afterward, head downward, over those
slow wood-ashes. Speak, or an — thou diest not — my name
is not Hugues de Coucy!”

The boy glared up into his face with an air of stubborn resolution,
but spoke not, nor made any sign.

“Off with thy sword-belt, Clement. Mareuil, bind him to
yon door-post, and lash him till he find his tongue.” His
orders were obeyed upon the instant. The first blow of the
heavy thong fell on the naked shoulders of the peasant, and
instantly a broad, long, livid wheal rose on the withering flesh!
a second, and the blood spirted to the ceiling, as if from a
sword-cut! a third time Clement's arm was raised, and the
stubborn sufferer cowered beneath the lash; when the old hag
sprung up — “A thousand curses on thee, fool! Why dost

not tell them that the gray brother gave thee ten Flemish
florins to lame the horse of every traveller should come up ere
sunset, that none might interrupt their doings in the forest?
And now thou knowest it all, sir knight, and much good may
it do thee! for long ere you reach the great chestnut they will
have slain the men-at-arms, and rifled the rich goods, and
worked their will on the wenches! Ha! ha! ha! now go
thy way, sir knight, and make the best on't!”

“Not I, by Heavens, till I have found a guide.”

“There is no better in the country, beau sire,” interrupted
Matthieu, “than Clement. He knows this province for thirty
leagues around, as well as ere a fox that it earths in the forest.
Is it not so, Mareuil?”

“Ay, is it,” answered the vassal, “seeing I was born in it
myself. Yes, yes, beau sire, I can lead you to the great
chestnut, and to the headless cross in the beech woods, and to
the broken bridge, and to every other haunt of these marauders.”

“How didst thou gain this knowledge, Clement? Hast
thou, indeed, consorted with these canaille? Then thou art no
more man of Hugues de Coucy! Off with my cognizances,
sirrah! Get thy ways hence, and deem it mercy I let thee
go alive!”

“No, no! beau sire! These same ecorcheurs, tondeurs, and
pilleurs, as they now call them, were once good honest foresters,
ere the wars made them first fierce soldiers, and then
disbanded depredators, and now barbarous banditti. Many a
deer I've struck with them by moonlight; and all their haunts
and trysting trees I know of old, though twenty years have
passed since I saw Ardenne.”

“Away, then! en avant! Cry Tankarville to horse, and to
the rescue!” And in five minutes space they had buckled on
their weapons, and mounted their war-horses, and rode off at

a long, hard trot along the very road, by which the Flemish
merchants had passed, four hours before, into the forest.

“The foul fiend follow ye, and hunt ye to perdition!” exclaimed
the woman, as they rode off clanging from the door,
“and if ye reach the headless cross at daybreak, ye shall find
horse enough to harry ye!”

Dark waxed the night and darker, as they pursued their
way with unabated zeal; and the wind rose, and roared among
the tall trees of the forest, and whirled whole flights of leaves
and many a broken branch away before its furious sweep, and
the clouds blotted the faint stars; and, save that now and then
a flash of lurid lightning flickered across the moonless sky, it
had been palpable and solid gloom.

Onward they rode, still onward! and still the night waxed
wilder. No rain fell from the scudding clouds, but the fierce
wind raved awfully, and the thunder muttered in one continual
dull reverberation from every quarter of the firmament, and the
whole sky was one incessant blaze of blue and sulphurous fire.
The deep road through the forest was illuminated bright as at
noonday; and so full was the atmosphere of the electric fluid,
that a faint lambent flame played constantly about the armor
of the men, and flickered on the points of their weapons — an
awful and appalling sight! yet, as it seemed, innocuous!

Still onward! They rode onward! Night had no terror —
not even such a night as this — for one like Hugues de Coucy,
when his high valor was spurred to its mettle by a high purpose.
Onward! and now they passed the great chestnut-tree,
a landmark known for leagues, but all around was silent
and deserted. They wheeled around an angle of the road,
the lightnings blazed across the causeway, and showed a scene
that might have struck a chill to the most fiery heart. Five
horses were there plunging to and fro, and writhing in minute
agony, hamstrung by the banditti, who had not spared the

time, or who had lacked the will, to save them hours of torture.
Beneath the feet of these, mangled and maimed by their
incessant plungings, but, happily, insensible to any pain or
outrage, lay in their curdled gore eight human bodies! Four
stout-armed serving-men, three of them shot into their faces
with barbed arrows, one of them slain outright by a spear-thrust,
a youthful gentleman, an aged steward, or seneschal,
and two unarmed grooms, hacked with unnumbered wounds —
all foully, barbarously slaughtered!

The knight pulled up his charger on the spot; and, at the
moment, a loud cry for aid fell on his sharpened ear.

“Who calls?” he cried, “who calls for succor? In God's
name it is here!”

“I, Arnold Marillon, of Bruges,” he replied, in a faint voice
from the forest, “I am bound here to the oak-tree!”

“Good Lord! mine ancient friend, Marillon! Hold my
horse, Clement Mareuil — hold my horse! Follow, Matthieu!
Be of good cheer, fair master Marillon. It is thine old friend
Hugues de Coucy, whose ransom thou didst pay, in past years,
to Ferrand, earl of Flanders! — all shall yet be well with thee
— ay, by St. Paul, and well avenged!”

In another moment the old man was released from his
bonds, and refreshed by a draught of wine from a huge bottiau,
or leather bottle, which hung at the squire's pommel, was
speedily able to recount his grievances.

A few words told the fatal story. At early evening they
had been ambushed by a band of four robbers only; three of
their armed retainers had been shot down in the first onset,
the other speared by the Red Bastard, and then,” he added,
half suffocated as he spoke by fierce and passionate grief,
“and then they slaughtered, in cold blood, my sister's son —
my dear, my fair-haired William! they slaughtered my old
faithful steward! they slaughtered my poor valets! and they

have dragged away my girl, my hope, my more than life! —
Marguerite de Beaufroy — to infamy, and agony, and death!”

“Clement, canst thou guide us farther?”

“To the Red Bastard's presence!”

“Come, then, kind Marillon, take one more draught of wine,
mount on Grey Termagant, and ride with us right hopefully.
What has been done can be, ay, and shall be avenged! but
can not be amended. What is undone as yet, as yet may be
prevented. God and the good saints aid us! and thou mayst
yet embrace thy niece ere daybreak.”

Not a word was more spoken, nor a moment of time wasted.
The old merchant was mounted without delay; and, although
weak and worn by suffering and sorrow, he rode on stoutly by
the side of his deliverer.

All night they rode; but, just as day was breaking, they
reached the summit of a little hill overlooking a marshy valley
intersected by a cross-road, with a thick beech-wood occupying
all the bottom land, and a broken cross of stone in the
centre of the causeway. Before they reached the summit of
the hill, the voice of Clement warned the knight that now or
never they should meet the formidable Routier; and, in effect,
as they crossed the brow, they came in view of the party —
four horsemen, fully though irregularly armed, and three female
figures bent to their saddles with fatigue, and prevented from
falling only by the bonds that fettered them. The clatter of
the knight's approach had warned them of their coming danger;
and sending the women forward to the cross, the brigands
drew themselves up across the road, in readiness to dispute
the passage.

“Tankarville to the rescue! St. Paul! St. Paul for Tankarville;”
and down the gentle slope thundered the knight and
his attendants; while with equal spirit the robbers spurred their
steeds to meet them.

“Ha! ha! Saynct Diable!” but his awful war-cry was cut
short, for the Red Bastard, conspicuous by his crimson panoply
and dauntless bearing, had singled out De Coucy, and
charged him with lance in rest with singular prowess; but
though he charged his lance with perfect skill, striking the
very centre of the knight's vizor, and shivering the stout ash-pole
to atoms up to the very grasp, De Coucy no more wavered
in his saddle, than he had done for the buffet of a lady's fan!
While his lanced-head pierced sheer through shield and plastron,
corselet and shirt of mail, and spitting the marauder through
and through came out at his back-piece, the shaft snapping
short some two feet from the champion's gauntlet! though slain
outright, the routier sat his horse stiffly; and, as the knight's
charger still swept on, he was in the act of passing Hugues,
when the latter, not perceiving that he was slain, stood up in
his stirrups and smote him such a blow on the head-piece with
the truncheon of his broken lance, that all the fastenings of the
vizor burst, the avantaille flew open, and the hideous face of
the Red Routier was displayed, livid with the hues of death, and
writhing with the anguish of the parting struggle! De Coucy's
followers had fared as well as he, for two of the marauders,
the antagonists of Clement Mareuil and old Matthieu, were
killed in the first shock; but the priest shivered his spear fairly
with Raoul and passing by him unharmed, darted into the
beechwood, and escaped.

For a moment it seemed as though the field were won, and
the women rescued; it was, however, but for a moment! for
scarcely was that onset over, before the thundering sound of a
large body of armed horse came down the two cross-roads,
blended with the clangor of dissonant horns, and wild yells,
and savage outcries.

“Ha! ha! Saynct Diable!” Talebard Talebardin to the
rescue!” and, wheeling down like lightning through both avenues,

thirty of forty savage-looking, irregular horse drove, with
their spears in rest, against the little party of De Coucy.

The champion's lance was broken; yet undaunted, he encountered
the front rank; three lances shivered against his
coat of proof, but shook him not a hair's breadth in his stirrups.
Three sweeping blows of his two-handed sword! and three
steeds ran masterless, while their riders rolled under the hoofs
in the death struggle. But one man, though a hero, can not
succeed against a host. As he raised his sword for a fourth
stroke, a thundering blow of a mace or battle-axe was dealt him
from behind, and at the same instant a lance point was driven
through the eye into his charger's brain. Down he went,
horse and man, and when he recovered his senses from the
shock, a man in plain, bright armor was kneeling on his breast;
and the point of a dagger, thrust between the bars of his avantaille,
was razing the skin of his face.

“Yield thee, sir knight, or die! Yield! rescue or no rescue!”

“To whom must I yield me! though it avail me naught to
ask it?” inquired the haughty baron, retaining all his pride and
all his fiery valor.

“To me — Talebard Talebardin!”

“I! — I! — I, Hugues de Coucy, yield me to such a slave as
thou art — to a murtherer of old men in cold blood — a violator
of ladies — a torturer of babes and suckling! sacrilegious dog!
base knave! thief! traitor! liar! vassal! do thy worst, I defy
thee!”

“Ha! my most noble baron, is it thou?” answered the ruffian
perfectly unmoved. “I might have guessed as much, by
thy bold bearing — Nay! nay! we do not stick such lambs as
thou art, for their flesh's sake, we save them for their ransoms!
Here, Croquart, Picard, Jean Le Noir, bind this sweet baron,
hand and foot; and strip him of his gay feathers straightway;
but harm him not upon your lives. By all the fiends in hell,

his ransom will bring fifty thousand crowns of the sun right
readily! So that is briefly settled!”

And with the words, he rose from the chest of the knight;
and resigning him to the hands of his subordinate ruffians,
walked off to examine the field of battle, and the booty which
had fallen into his hands. The latter comprised the miserable
Marguerite half rescued only to be again enthralled with her
two serving-women; the old merchant, Arnold Morillon, and
the stout baron Hugues de Coucy. Six of the routiers had
been slain, beside the Rouge Batard; four of the number by
the hand of Hugues! The men-at-arms, Raoul and Clement
had both died fighting to the last; but dead or living, Matthieu
de Montmesnil, the old esquire, was to be found nowhere.
And it is doubtful, whether, as the knight was borne away into
captivity, he did not regret more deeply than either his own
defeat or the seizure of the women, the disgrace of the veteran
warrior who had fought by the side of his father; and who according
to the rules of chivarly, should have died under shield
dauntless, rather than leave his lord, captive or dead, upon the
field of honor.

3. CHAPTER III.
THE ESQUIRE.

It was about eleven o'clock of the morning, on a fine clear
autumnal day, which had succeeded to a night of storm and
fury, that a single wayfarer might have been seen seated beside
the brink of a small consecrated well on the roadside between
Braine la Leud and Brussels. The road, at that period,
lay stretching far through an unbroken forest, which indeed
covered the whole face of the country for many a league in
circuit, with but a few small tracts of cultivated land, smiling
like sheltered oases amid the wide waste of green leaves and
waving fern, that clothed both vale and upland. It would
have been impossible for a poet's fancy to conceive, or painter's
hand to delineate a spot more singularly picturesque, more
lonely or romantic, than that which had been chosen for a
resting-place by the worn traveller, a small sequestered nook
between three short but abrupt hills, which closed it in on
every side save one, where down a narrow gorge, the head of
a broad valley, the waters of the little fountain welled with a
gentle murmur, soon to be lost in the turbulent channel of some
larger but not purer streamlet. The spring-head of this crystal
streamlet was sheltered from the sun and air by a small
vault of freestone, wrought in rich Gothic fret-work, and surmounted
by a cross of rare workmanship; an iron cup was
attached to the margin of the basin by a chain, and a stone
bench, over-canopied by a huge ash-tree, afforded a pleasant
resting-place to voyager or pilgrim. Behind the well
there rose a tall, rough bank of sand, within which was the

birthplace of those limpid waters, all overgrown with wildflowers,
and running with long wreaths of eglantine and honeysuckle,
and all around it the tall Titans of the forest reared
their great heads exulting in the sunshine, which bathed their
airy tops in floods of yellow lustre, while all their lower limbs
and moss-grown boles, and the soft, green sward at their feet,
were steeped in cool, blue shadows. The sandy road, which
wound through this deep solitude, seemed little travelled —
for no wheel-tracks and but few hoof-prints could be traced
along its yielding surface — not a sound was to be heard except
the gentle breath of the morning air whispering constantly
among the ash-leaves, and low gurgle of the rivulet, and now
and then the sudden song of the thrush or blackbird bursting
out from the thickets in a gush of liquid ecstasy, and hushed
almost immediately into repose and silence. So seldom, too,
it would appear, were human beings seen in that sylvan district,
that an unwonted tameness was perceptible among the
animal creation. Several small birds hopped down into the
road, and even ventured up to drink or lave their disordered
plumage in the little channel which wound across the path,
within a few yards of the man's feet who sat there silently; all
overdone with travel. Nay, more, a wild deer came out from
the copse on the farther side, and gazed about it for a moment,
and eyed the strange forms with some apparent apprehension;
but seeing that he moved not, drank its fill of the stream, and
only when the man raised his head from his hand whereon he
had been resting, did it bound away with startled speed into
the deeper woodlands.

It was the man himself who gave the point and character to
the scene; for he was such a one as least of all would have
been expected in that place. He was an old man, as could be
seen at once, even before he lifted up his face, for his hair
was as white as snow, though singularly long and abundant;

but, when he moved his dense and shaggy eyebrows, his large
mustache, and pointed beard, all of the same silvery hue,
confirmed the first impression, although the sunburnt and somewhat
ruddy hues of his complexion, and the full, bright black
eye, should have belonged to one many years his junior. His
dress was as much unsuited to a foot-traveller, as it was easy
to see he was; for, besides that he had no horse or any beast
of burden, his feet and lower limbs were all besmirched and
stained with clay and mud of twenty different colors, caught,
it would seem, from as many different sloughs and quagmires,
as his being there at all seemed old and unaccountable. It
was a complete suite of the heaviest horse-armor then in fashion,
consisting of a very solid corslet, or cuirass of plate, worn
over a loose shirt of chain-mail, the sleeves of which protected
his arms, while his legs and feet were guarded by hose of the
same material, and splendid shoes of steel. His helmet lay
on the ground beside him, with its crest bruised and dented,
and the avantaille wrenched quite away from the sockets.
Above his armor he wore a cassock of buff-leather, guarded on
the seams with lace, and embroidered on the breast with the
cognizance of a chained dragon — but it was sorely rent and
defaced, and cut quite through in many places, and dabbled
with fresh stains of gore, and soiled as if with clay. His
mail, moreover, was much battered; blood might be seen
oozing from beneath the rivets of his gorget, and trickling
down his right arm from the shoulder.

He was very faint, too, and weary, as it seemed from his uncertain,
vacillating movements; yet he did not wait a long time,
before having bathed his face and hands in the cool water, and
gathered up his battered casque and gauntlets, he arose from
his seat, and, supporting himself on the truncheon of a broken
lance, which was the only offensive weapon he carried, except
a long and formidable dagger at his belt, took the road,

dragging his legs wearily along, that led toward Brussels. He
had not, however, taken many steps before the tramp of a horse
coming down the road at a light gallop caught his ear, and the
next moment the rider crossed the brow of the hill, meeting
him face to face at a short distance off. It was a gay and
handsome boy, splendidly mounted on a bright blood bay Arab,
dressed in a gambesoon of fine white cloth, with horse of the
same fabric, and russet-leather buskins, all richly laced with
gold, and blazoned on the breast with the same bearing that
decked the old man's cassock. Under the gambesoon he had
a light shirt of linked mail, the edges of which were visible,
and the neck and sleeves, polished as bright as silver, but on
his head he wore only a cap of embroidered velvet with a tall
plume.

The moment his eye fell on the old man, staggering feebly
up the slope, he checked his horse and sprang from the saddle.

“Mother of God!” he cried in tones expressive of more
consternation than could be deemed befitting an eleve of chivalry.
— “Matthieu Montmesnil in this plight! Where is our
lord? Speak, man, where is Sir Hugues de Coucy?”

“Prisoner! — Ermold de Clermont. Prisoner to that base
villain, Talebard Talebardin!”

“Now, by St. Paul!” replied the boy, his face flushing fiery
red, “I scarce can credit mine own ears! Hugues de Coucy
yield him a prisoner to a churl — a base and cruel robber!
That would I not believe, though I did see it happen. Thou
art mad, Montmesnil, to say so.”

“I did not say so, Ermold,” answered the old man, in a
broken voice, “sooner would I bite out my tongue with my
teeth, that it should tell dishonor of the Coucy. Nathless,
prisoner he is, and to that same marauder. When he refused
to yield him, rescue or no rescue, they stripped his armor off
and bound him, hand and foot, and keep him for his ransom.”

“And thou didst see this? — Thou! thou! Matthieu de
Montmesnil! didst thou see our lord bound like a beast before
the shambles, and madest not in to rescue or die with him!
Now, by St. Paul! I do believe thy wounds have made thee
mad, that thou dost lie upon thyself — for from no other tongue
of man beside thine own would I believe thee coward, and
recreant, and traitor! nor do I now believe it. Oh! say, Mattheiu,
say it is false that thou hast spoken! Say anything but
that thou hast fled and left thy lord in durance!”

“I may say nothing but the truth,” returned the other perfectly
unmoved; “yet hear me out, Ermold — thus it fell out:
To be short, we found last night in the forest, good Master
Morillon of Bruges, bound to an oak-tree, and his fair nephew
and his train all foully slaughtered; and learned how that they
had been beset by the Rouge Batard; and the young lady,
Marguerite, carried off with her maidens. And so we mounted
Master Morillon upon Gray Termagant, and rode off all
night, and at the break of day came on the rogues in the little
vale of the headless cross, and charged them lustily. Our
lord bored the Red Bastard through and through, as a cook
spits an ortolan; and Clement de Mareuil and I, each slew his
man in the tourney; but Raoul broke his lance with the gray
monk of Soignies, and so the robber-priest 'scaped harmless.
And just at that same instant, while our steeds were blown
and all our lances splintered, lo! you, down came by the two
cross-roads, Talebard Talebardin, with thirty men or more,
yelling or howling like incarnate fiends, charged us in front and
rear, and bore us down in a moment. Sir Hugues slew three
men, at three blows, outright with his two-handed sword; and
I and the rest did our best — but the roan horse was thrust
into the eye with a spear-point, and our lord felled to the pummel
with a mace — and Clement and Raoul were slain in a
moment — and I was badly hurt, for my horse went down

rolling over me, when it was a minute ere I could get loose.
And ere I did so, Sir Hugues was fast bound; and so, when I
saw that his life was safe, and that there was no chance of
rescue — knowing right well that they would stick the 'squire
like a pig, though they might spare the knight — I crawled
into the thicket while the robbers were all thronging round our
lord; but ere I had got off a spear's length, the gray priest, who
was hurrying back to join his comrades, caught me fast by the
throat — but I put my dagger into him, up to the dudgeon hilt,
under his corslet rim. And here I am, no recreant nor coward!
hey, Ermold?”

“No, no; forgive me, Matthieu, the rash word, But I was
half distraught, when thou didst say our lord was prisoner to
the incarnate fiends. But how didst thou come hither — hast
walked six leagues since day-break in thine harness; and what
wilt thou now do, to get our good lord free?”

“Only five leagues, Ermold — only five leagues, or a little
over; and that were no great thing, but that my harness is, as
thou sayest, not the best gear for walking — and that being
wounded, I can not move so lustily as common; but for the rest,
I came hither, Master Ermold, first to meet thee, whom I knew
to be on the route by this time, with tidings from Sir Raimond
of Fontanges — not that thine arm is strong enough to do much
in a melée, but that thy heart is true, and thy wit somewhat
quick and pregnant. And now let us take counsel. And,
first, what news bringest thou from the beau sire Raimond?”

“That he will meet our lord the tenth day hence with sixty
lances, before the walls —”

“Too late! — the tenth day hence — too late for any purpose,”
answered the old man; “then must we on to Brussels;
though I trow the churl burghers will scarce unbuckle their
fat bags to pay Sir Hugues' ransom, much less take bow and
spear to save him.”

“No, no; that is no scheme at all. Besides, it is keen steel,
and not red gold, that must be ransom for De Coucy. We
must fall in and rescue him by the strong hand.”

“If the strong heart could make the strong hand, Ermold,”
said the old warrior, smiling with a half-melancholy glance of
admiration at the kindling eye and noble features of the gallant
boy, “then wert thou champion such as rarely has couched
lance in Flanders. But Heaven preserve thy wits; there be
thirty spears at least of these marauders; and we be an old
wounded man and a weak boy! 'Twill not do, Ermold, though
dearly would I buy it, if it would.”

“Ay! but it will, though — ay! but it will, though — for not
three miles hence, marching hitherward — I passed them an
hour since, for they rode slowly not to break down their
destries — are thirteen lances of Franche Compté, stont, free
companions, every one of them, under the leading of Geoffroy
`Tete-Noir.' I have two thousand gold crowns in my
wallet, and we will buy them to the deed, and win our master
from his chains, and save the beautiful Marguerite — God send
we may! — for she was very kind to me when I lay ill and
sorely hurt in Bruges, and gain ourselves high honor!”

“Brave boy! brave boy! 'twill do! turn thy nag straight,
ride like the wind to meet them, and bring them hither with
all good speed to the fountain; there will I tarry and bind my
wounds up something, for they shoot now, though I felt them
not a while since.”

No more words were needed; the page wheeled his fleet
Arab round, and touching him with the spur, darted away like
an arrow from the bow, and crossed the hill-top, and was out of
sight in a moment. The aged esquire in the meantime, dragged
himself back to the well, and, his immediate apprehensions
quelled, set about unriveting his armor and binding up his
wounds in earnest. As he did so, however, he muttered to

himself, “It is for the last time! the last, most surely! I but
must needs have all the strength I may for the stern struggle —
stern it will be, I warrant me! and then will I die under shield
freely, and willingly. Thou knowest!” he added, turning his
eyes reverentially upward, “so I may see him free!”

Scarcely had he finished his brief soliloquy, before the heavy
clang of armor was heard coming up the hill at the trot; and
shortly afterward the spear-heads and bright pennons of the
men-at-arms were seen glittering above the bushes; and then
the party wheeled into full view, fourteen stout cavaliers, all
well-armed in bright suits of Flanders iron, with two or three
led horses, and a mule or two loaded with pieces of spare
armor, lances, and provender, and several skins of wine. The
leader, a very powerful man, whose jet black hair, beard and
mustaches, curling in fierce luxuriance, justified fully his
soubriquet of Tête-Noir, was busied in deep converse with
Ermold the page, although by the heavy frown that lowered
on his brow, and the half-despondent look of the boy, it appeared
that he was not yet wrought to conviction.

As they reached the little hollow by the fountain, their
trumpet sounded a halt; and while the leader dismounted, and
strode up to question Montmesnil, the men picketed their horses,
and prepared for the morning meal.

At first the chief of the free companions appeared reluctant
to engage in the adventure, alleging the superior numbers of
the marauders, the difficulty of finding them, and the prejudices
of his men, who might not be willing to attack men of a class
from which — though considering themselves soldiers of honor
— they were not, after all, very far removed.

Here, however, it seems he counted without his host, for
one of the others, a sort of lieutenant or second in command,
called out loudly when he heard the words of his leader, denying,
with a fearful imprecation, that they had aught to do anything

in common with such low thieves as Talebardin. “Besides,”
he added, “it were foul sin and shame, to suffer such a
knight as Hugues de Coucy to linger in such durance without
blow stricken in the cause. Why, before God! we should be
held the shame and scorn of all France! No! no! Geoffroy,
let the page shell out the two thousand crowns here, and let
the 'squire pledge us his master's honor, provided we redeem
him man and armor, and set the damsels free — five thousand
more to be paid down in Brussels, at good St. Martin's tide —
and we will breakfast here, and ride right on and win him with
war weapons!”

The bargain was soon concluded, and after a hearty meal
the trumpet again blew to horse; and Matthieu being provided
with a fresh casque and other arms, and mounted on one of
the led chargers, they rode off at a round pace, for the vale of
the headless cross.

Two hours' hard riding brought them to the spot, which was
still marked distinctly with the dread tokens of the fray, several
dead horses lay upon the spot, among others the roan Andalusian
of the knight, despoiled of his rare armor and magnificent
housings, and the bodies of Clement and Raoul, where they
had fallen; and all the road was poached up by the hoofs of
the heavy chargers, and the gore stood in many a hoof-track
curdled and horrible. But fearful as such a spectacle would
be deemed now-a-days, it was of occurrence too frequent, at
that time, to create any wonder or disgust in the bosoms, even
of the young and delicate of either sex, much less in these
stern soldiers. They halted, however, on the spot, and examined
the ground very closely. And here they would probably
have been entirely at fault had they been soldiers of a more
regular order; for there was no distinct track from the place
leading away in any one direction, but, as it seemed, the whole
party had dispersed to every quarter of the compass, leaving

no clew whereby they might be followed to their haunts. It
was not long, however, before the sagacity of the free companions
detected the probable direction; and the troop again got
into motion, though their movements were now slower and far
more guarded than they had been heretofore. After crossing
the forest for about an hour, they reached a wide glade or
woodtrack, through which it was evident that the marauders
had passed, for the greensward was cut up by prints of hoofs,
which one of the free lances confidently asserted to be the
same as those he had examined in the vale of the cross. A
closer investigation proved that they must have passed very
recently, for a fresh blood-drop was discovered on the grass,
still wet, which must have fallen from some wounded rider or
spurgalled horse's flank.

Here, then, a second halt was held, and three or four of the
most sagacious men were sent off in different directions, to reconnoitre
the positions of the enemy. It was not many minutes
before the first returned, bearing the tidings that they were
close at hand, halted, as it seemed, for the evening, in a small
green savannah, half circled by a swampy streamlet. The
others soon came in confirming their comrade's tidings, and
bringing the further intelligence, that they were eight-and-twenty
men, well, although variously armed — that their horses were
picketed close by, while the troopers were feasting around a
fire which they had kindled — the knight heavily ironed, and
the females lying a short way aloof, under a clump of trees,
while some of the leaders of the party appeared to be throwing
dice for the possession of their fairer captives.

Few minutes were required to form the plan of action. It
was necessary to ford the brook a little way above the meadow,
where the routiers lay, so as to gain firm ground and space for
a charge; and before doing this, Geoffroy Tête-Noir examined
the girths and stirrup-leathers of every charger in his troop,

inspected all the arms in silence, and then, lowering his vizor,
mounted his strong charger. And here the indomitable valor
of old Matthieu shone out resplendent. He was so worn with
his wounds and weariness, that for the last ten miles he had
hardly been able to keep his saddle; but now he roused and
kindled to the fray, as an old war-horse to the blast of trumpets.
All prayers of Ermold, all exhortations of the condottierii, that
he would remain at rest till the fray was over, were unheeded
— scorned — before even Geoffroy Tête-Noir he rode in the
van.

They forded the stream with success, they wheeled around
the hill-side, and made ready for the onset, but in the meantime
the clash and clang of their coming, aroused the routiers,
and they sprang hastily to their arms. Most of them were
indeed mounted — but all were in confusion, and many scarcely
firm in their saddles, when the free companions poured like a
torrent down the hill — “Tête-Noir — Tête-Noir for Tankarville!
De Coucy to the rescue and charge home!”

The shock was terrible, the fight was fought out furiously.
The superior numbers, and the despair of the routiers, would
have perhaps counterbalanced the better horses, and more
complete equipment of the men-at-arms, but the disarray in
which they were taken, was fearfully against them; the giant
strength of Tête-Noir, the high and fiery valor of old Montmesnil,
and the mad impetuosity of the page Ermold, who
fought in his laced jerkin, foremost among the lances, swept
the marauders down like chaff before the whirlwind.

Ere yet the strife was ended, while the robbers, driven back
to the streamlet's brink, were striving desperately to escape,
and the free lances as desperately bearing them to the earth,
Matthieu had hewed his way through the mêlée, and reached
his liege lord, who had started up from the ground, but was
prevented by his bonds from joining in the fray. A stream of

gore was pouring from the old man's vizor, and from a dozen
rents in his plate armor, and he so staggered as he leaped to
the ground, that he had well nigh fallen; yet he rushed up to
Hugues de Coucy, and with his dagger wrenched out the rivets
from his manacles and fetters, and tore them from the limbs of
his loved lord. Then he sank down upon his knees and
clasped the knight's legs with his aged arms, and wet his feet
with honest, loyal tears.

“Thou art free — thou art free,” he cried, “my master! thou
art free, and I die rejoicing! yet say, before I die, thou pardonest
my leaving thee when captive, for to this end I left
thee, to this end only. Say, master, that I died thy true and
loyal 'squire!”

“No! by St. Paul of Tankarville,” the knight exclaimed,
“no! by St. Paul of Tankarville! — but a true knight and
loyal!” — and with the word he stooped and took the old man's
sword out of his hand, and striking him slightly on the shoulder,
he continued, “for with thine own sword — nor ever was a
better! — I dub thee knight — before the ladies, before God
and good St. George! Rise up, good knight and gallant —
Sir Matthieu de Montmesnil,” and he raised him to his feet as
he spoke, and opened his vizor, and kissed his ashy brow.
But a mighty gleam of exultation flashed over the features of
the dying man, and he gasped out with a faint voice, but joyous
accents, “A knight! a knight — and by the honored hand of
the Coucy! Too much — oh, too, too much!”

Then the count, seeing that his spirit was on the point of
taking flight, laid him on the ground softly, and took his hand
and knelt in tears beside him.

“When I am gone,” the old man feebly gasped, “make —
Ermold, thine esquire! — for though young, he is true, and —
and valiant! Bury my sword beside me — farewell — De
Coucy — and forget not old — old Matthieu!”

4. CHAPTER IV.
THE MEN-AT-ARMS.

The second morning after the defeat of the routiers, and
the death of Matthieu de Montmesnil, broke fair and cloudless;
there had been a smart hoar frost on the preceding night, and,
although the sun was already high in the heavens, the crystal
fretwork of the rime still glittered on the fern and briers,
bright as a warrior's mail; the air was clear and sharp, and
full of that invigorating freshness which is even more agreeable
to the senses of a healthful frame than the luxurious stillness
of a summer day, and all the forest, in which our scene still
lies, was alive with the gay notes of a thousand tiny warblers.

Faint, however, was the impression produced by the bright
sunshine, or the bracing gale, or the continued melody with
which the woods were vocal, on the spirits of the stout champion,
Hugues de Coucy, as he rode onward through the woody
passes, attended only by the page Ermold, deep sorrow brooding
on his bold lineaments and broad, fair brow. He was
sheathed once again from head to foot in his own splendid
panoply, which had been won back from the robbers, perfect
and uninjured; he backed, too, as before, the beautiful gray
Arab Termagant; but the three stout and valiant soldiers,
who had so lately followed him in all the pride and power of
noble manhood, now lay beneath the frozen earth, cold, voiceless,
deaf — even to the soul-stirring trumpets! and for the
superb charger, clad like its rider in complete war array, and
like him panting for the shock of battle, a slow and sober
mule, heavily laden with the demipique and bardings of the
slain destrier, plodded along with drooping crest and dogged

air, shrewdly exercising the patience of the young fiery page
who led him by the rein, with many an execration at the slow
gait from which neither blows nor caresses could compel him.
No word spoke Hugues, except at times a call to Ermold, “in
God's name to scourge on that lazy garron, else should night
fall and find them in the forest.” Thus passed the morning,
dully and wearily indeed; but as the sun reached the zenith,
the travellers gained the summit of a long sandy hill, whence
they might see the woodlands melting, as it were, gradually
into cultivated fields; and beyond these a wide tract of fertile
champaign, intersected by many broad streams of water, all
gleaming gayly to the sunlight; and in the middle ground of
the picture the tall Gothic steeples and grotesque towers,
which marked a city of the middle ages, shooting up into the
thin clear air, above the crowded roofs of Brussels.

“Soh! Ermold,” exclaimed the knight, halting, as he spoke,
to allow the boy to draw up abreast of him, “here, then, at
length is Brussels; and look you — to spare time which of
God's truth we do lack sorely — I with all speed shall gallop
forward; come on as best thou may, thou'lt find me at the
Lion d'Or, in the Place d'Armes. I must purvey myself a destrier,
and thee a coat of plate; an' if thou art to be hereafter
mine esquire, and fain I would, if it be possible, pick up some
two or three strong varlets to ride with us, till such time as my
brother Hubert bring up my loading with the broad banner of
our house. We must be on our route again forthwith, so we
would save the Chatelaine de Vermeuil an onslaught from
these cursed routiers, of which they spoke unguarded and unheeding,
the while I lay their captive.”

“Fear me not, my good lord,” replied the youth, coloring
high with pleasure, “I will make no delay on the road, and
shall be up, I warrant me, at the Golden Lion, ere you be
ready to set onward!”

The knight bowed his head in answer, and slackened the
rein of his fiery horse, which tarried not for any farther signal,
but darted away like an arrow shot from the long-bow of
an English archer, over rough and smooth, up the long steep
ascent, and down the headlong hill, at the same long unvarying
gallop. Not once, no, not for a moment, did he lag or
falter; not once did he suffer the reins to fall loose from his
rider's hand, but straining eagerly against the bit, swept forward
with a regular and gentle motion, like that of a bird
through the air, and within half an hour stood, without a pant
of his deep lungs, or a foam-spot on his housings, before the
barbican and moated walls of Brussels.

A few minutes were consumed in parleying with the captain
of the burgher-guard, who was on duty at the gates; but this ended,
no farther interruption occurred. So that before he had been
an hour absent from the page, the knight was installed in the best
chamber of the Lion d'Or, as a well-remembered and much-honored
guest, with a cold capon, and a flagon of Burgundy
wine mulled with spices, at his elbow, the jolly landlord assuring
him that he had sent for a maquignon, who would speedily
furnish him forthwith a charger, such as Duke Philip would
himself, God prosper him, be proud to mount in battle; and
that by good luck, the Herr Jacob Vanderneer, deacon of the
armorer's guild, was taking his nooning down below when his
worship dismounted, and that he had departed homeward in
some heat to load his journeyman with harness for the good
knight's inspection.

For once no mighty discrepance occurred between the
promise and performance; for scarcely was Sir Hugues' appetite
appeased, before the tramping of horses in the court,
under the windows, summoned him from his seat to inspect
the dealer's cattle. This worthy, stimulated by the hope of
high prices, and pretty well satisfied, by the great reputation

of the count of Tankarville for an accomplished cavalier, that
any of the ordinary tricks of the trade would be on this occasion
thrown away, had brought out in the first instance the
flower of his stables, resolving merely to atone for this deviation
from ordinary rules by demanding at least twice the value
of each particular animal. There were, indeed, several fine-looking
beasts among the dozen or fifteen which were paraded
to and fro by the grooms on the pavements; but one especially
caught the baron's eye as fully capable of supplying the
place of his lost Andalusian. It was a tall and powerful black
horse, with a white spot on the face, and one white foot behind;
and, as the practised judgment of Sir Hugues at once
determined, had no small intermixture of Barbary or Arab
blood with the best Flemish strain. The price demanded for
this charger, although after he had nearly kicked out the
brains of one groom, and had actually pulled a second out of
his saddle with his teeth, and shaken him as a terrier-dog
would a rat, the dealer admitted him to be a vicious devil —
which trait, however, he affected to consider as an advantage,
rather than the reverse to one so famed for horsemanship as
the sieur de Coucy — was even for that age stupendous.
Without seeming, however, to consider this, Hugues ordered
the black horse to be set aside, and proceeded to select a
second by no means inferior in blood or beauty, though somewhat
slighter made and lower than the first, which he judged
fit to carry Ermold in his new character of esquire. While
he was yet engaged in examining the chestnut, the landlord
touched him on the shoulder and presented three tall fellows,
whom he declared to be honest lads, well known to himself
two of whom had seen some service, and were eager to be
admitted to the preferment of following a lord so famous. The
first of these, him who had never served, the knight at once
rejected; and then, after asking a few questions of the others,
he desired the taller of the two, who was likewise the older
soldier, to jump up on the black horse, bare-backed as he was,
and ride him round the yard. The grooms laughed aloud at
the coolness with which the baron gave this order, as though
it were the easiest thing in the world, and the maquignon,
who was acquainted with the aspirant, cried out, “Have a
care! have a care, Giles! for he's as full of tricks, ay! and
as stubborn as a fiend.”

“And if he be the fiend himself, I care not, Master Andrew,”
answered the fellow; “for the foul fiend had to carry Master
Michael Scott, as men say, the Scottish magician, across the
seas from Salamanca to St. Andrew's, and I trow Master Scott
could hardly back a destrier with a free lance of Flanders.”

And with the words he strode up to the black charger, and
laying his hand on the mane, sprang, almost as it seemed without
an effort, to his back. In an instant the fierce brute reared
bolt upright, and positively leaped endlong into the air, alighting
on the pavement with such violence that sparks of fire
flashed from the stones under the dint of his hoofs; and scarce
had he alighted before he fell into a succession of plunges,
kicking and lounging to and fro like a very devil, but all to no
avail; for the trooper sat him as though he had been a portion
of the animal, till, having run through all the changes of its
vice, it became quiet for a few seconds' space, when he dismounted,
and walked back to his place with a well-satisfied
smile on his countenance, not in the least out of breath or discomposed
by his late exertion.

“Well ridden, Giles,” exclaimed the knight, “exceedingly
well ridden; now an' thou listest to follow faithfully my banner,
thou mayest do well in these wars.”

“So please you, beau sire,” answered the man, “I'll do my
best for it; and little doubt to win your favor, if honest bearing
and stout blows will win it!”

“That they will, that they will, good fellow,” answered Sir
Hugues; “never thou fear it! and thou, sir, wilt thou brook the
trial, and mount black Sathanas there?” he continued, turning
to the younger man.

“I will, Sir Hugues, I will,” he answered humbly; “for I
am not afraid; though, to say truth, a man may ride well, and
yet not be a match for yon black devil. But I will risk a fall
for it. No man shall say Francon Van Voorhis sought service
with the count of Tankarville, and when he might have gained,
lost it for lack of heart.”

As he finished speaking, he too crossed the yard, and succeeded
in mounting the formidable horse, which immediately
resorted to its old tricks, displaying no small degree of activity
and skill in controlling the first plunges. As if, however, he
had been but irritated by his rider's efforts to subdue him, snorting
and foaming till his black, glossy limbs were spotted as if
with snow-flakes, the mighty horse dashed to and fro, scattering
the grooms like sheep, and at length freeing his head by a
violent effort, and yerking out his heels a dozen times in succession,
hurled the youth Francon from his back, like a quoit
from the arm of a strong player. Luckily for the man, he fell
upon a heap of horse-litter, which had been swept out from the
inn-stables, else had he never moved limb any more! as it
was, he was sorely bruised; yet as he rose, lame and limping,
and shook the straws from his doublet, he laughed cheerfully,
and said: “Better luck next time, sieur horse, thou mayest
unseat me, but the fiend's in't if thou canst scare me.” And
he made as if he would have tried his fortune again; for he
offered to eatch the horse, which was careering furiously about
the court, no one daring to approach it; but as he did so, “That
will do, that will do, my lad,” cried the knight, “for one day,
at the least. Thou hast done well, and wilt do better yet, I
warrant me, ere thou hast followed the Coucy's banner a twelve-month.

Get thee in with thy fellow Giles; and mine host,
give them each a quart of Rhenish, and that presently. We
must to horse ere long — but now to conquer this swart demon,
which must be done at once, if we would have him useful.”
And instantly as the horse darted past him, he snatched the
halter with his right hand, and brought him up with a jerk that
threw him, for a moment, on his haunches; then, all armed as
he was in the heaviest panoply of the day, he vaulted to his
bare back at a single bound, and plunged the rowels of his
gilded spurs up to the head in his flanks. For a few moments
the struggle was tremendous; at first it seemed as if no human
power or skill could have controlled the frantic efforts of the
furious stallion; but as the knight sat firm, baffling each successive
plunge, and answering every kick with a corresponding
motion of his armed heels, it soon became evident that he must
be the master of the day; for, after a while, every plunge was
weaker than that which preceded it, and anon quite baffled and
subdued, panting and blown — the proud war-horse stood still.
Then the knight wheeled him round, and walked him to and fro,
and patted his high crest, drawing off the mailed gauntlet from his
hand; and again pricking him gently with the spur, put him
through all his paces, and passaged him around the court, winding
him to and fro with the least touch of the rein, as gently
as a lady's jennet. Then he dismounted, and standing by his
head, caressed him quietly for a few moments, and then walked
away toward the stables of the inn, the conquered destrier following
as peaceably behind him, as though he had been the
tamest cart-jade in the city. While this strange scene had
been in progress, Ermold de Clermont arrived at the inn-gates,
mounted as we have described him, on the bay Arab, and leading
the mule loaded with the bard and housings of the baron's
horse; and stood in silence looking on the good knight's prowess,
till the black stallion was completely vanquished. Then
he stepped up to Hugues, and took the bridle of his destrier,
and transmitted to the grooms of the hostlery, his lord's commands
to clean and rub down his new purchase thoroughly,
and arm him with the full horse-armor and housings, as speedily
as might be.

The countenance of the two troopers, who had not yet gone,
having waited to see how their new lord rode, evinced
how vastly he had risen in their estimation; and the elder of
the two kneeled down before him, as he returned from the
stables and said, “Hear me swear, beau sire, never to swerve
or falter, never to turn back from the deadliest brunt of battle,
never to draw the rein or sheath the sword, so long as you are
in the field before me; for here I vow myself your man, through
weal and wo for ever, in life and unto death! For if I leave
thy side, while thou art in the field and fighting, or if I die not
on thy body when thou liest under shield, full knightly, then
may my patron-saint desert me in mine utmost need; may good
Saint Peter lock heaven's gate against me; and hell receive
my soul! For sure thou art the noblest knight, the stoutest
leader, the completest champion, that couches spear in Christendom!”

The other, as he perceived his fellow's action, and heard
the vow which he uttered, threw himself on his knees beside
him and stretching out his arms, cried with a loud voice: “Me!
me! — me too! good knight; hear me, for I swear likewise” —
and all the while the big tears rolled down his sunburnt cheek,
and he sobbed audibly, so deeply did he feel the responsibility
of the service which he was undertaking; till, as Giles finished
his speech, he uttered a loud “amen! on my soul be the oath
— amen!”

A bright gleaming smile played over the animated features
of the knight, as he listened to the fervent exclamations, and
looked upon the agitated countenances of his followers; for

he was in truth well satisfied; knowing that in minds of low
and grovelling order there, are no springs of such enthusiasm,
and arguing thence that these his newly chosen men-at-arms
were moulded of the right metal for making chivalrous and
gallant soldiers.

“Well spoken, both of ye,” he answered, “well spoken, and
I thank ye for it; and if ye be true followers to the Coucy, trust
well that he to you will be true lord and loyal; and for the rest
of God's truth, I have seen some service, and, so the good
saints prosper me, shall see more ere I die; and if ye list to
lay lance in the rest among the foremost, ye shall not long lack
opportunity, nor, it may be, advancement. Go in now, go in
and refresh ye; and that done, we will fit ye with good plate-coats,
and tough lances, and we will ride forth this same night
upon adventure. But hold! hold! I would see your judgment
in this same article of horseflesh — choose, each of ye a charger
out of the lot before ye, and if your choosing like me, why
I will stand the upshot.”

With many thanks, the soldiers turned to the grateful task,
proceeding to the business with so much alacrity and readiness
as proved them, in their own estimation at the least,
masters of the art. It was not, however, till after much chaffering
with the maquignon, and much consultation with each
other, and much more examination than the knight had judged
necessary before choosing his own destrier, that they pitched
upon two powerful and well-bred horses, which meeting Sir
Hugues' approbation, were set apart with those which he had
already selected.

This matter of the horses having been thus satisfactorily arranged,
it remained only to equip them and their riders with
their necessary arms and housings; and scarcely had the hostlers
led away the chargers to get them fitted at the saddler's
with their steel-plated demipique and chainwork bridles, before

the deacon of the armorers reappeared, accompanied by four
or five stout serving-men, dividing among them the different
pieces of two complete suits of armor, suited as nearly as might
be guessed to the page Ermold; on trial, however, one of the
two proved quite too large; while the other, which fitted perfectly,
was pronounced by the knight to be of too splendid a
fashion for his esquire, being all engrailed with damasking of
silver.

“Ermold shall go with you,” he said, “good master armorer,
and I will trust to you to fit him forth becomingly, let the harness
be of plate — bright steel, but without ornament; if it be
of Alnayn rivet, or from a Milan forge, so much the better.
A close casque of the old fashion, with a fixed avantaille — and
see there be gusset of good mail, hooked firmly to the corslet
rim, and upper edge of the brassards, to guard the oxter from
arrow-shot or thrust of some sharp weapon, when the right
arm is raised. Dost mark me, ha? And ye, good fellows, go
with him likewise; fit them, I pray you, both, with your best
harness of burnished Flanders iron, complete — dost understand!
— complete from head to foot, steelboot and taslet, brassard,
vant-brace, and corslet, and see here! none of your open
morion or bacinets, but good stout cerveilleres, with beaver and
mailhood. That done, I will entreat you to commend them to
a leatherworker's, where they may get them each a cassock
of dressed hide to wear above their mail; white, mark you,
Ermold, and laid down on the seams with lace, and see ye
that the suits be of one pattern, that ye look orderly and near,
not loose, irregular companion. Furnish them, likewise, thou,
Herr Jacob, with double-handed swords, and dudgeon daggers
of a hand's breadth, and a good battle-axe apiece of ten pounds
weight or better. Now hurry, my men, hurry! for by the Lord
that lives the day is waning. Now, Vandenkopf,” he added,
turning to the landlord, “go in and speak with me, for I must

needs draw a bill on Master Morillon of Bruges, or if it like
your money-changers, better on the intendant of my estates of
Tankarville, to pay for these same steeds and harness!”

This would have been at that day, in any other state of
Europe, a task of no small difficulty, but even at an earlier date
than that of which we write, the intelligent and industrious
Flemings had been in the habit of using something analogous
to bills of exchange; the invention of which is variously attributed
to the Jews, the merchants of the low country, and the
traders of the Italian republics; and to one so famous as Hugues
de Coucy, there would have been no difficulty in raising even
a larger sum than he required among the opulent goldsmiths
and jewellers, who were in those days the bankers of Brussels.

The sun was still high above the western horizon, although
it was long past noon, so rapidly had De Coucy's men, eager
to gain the good opinion of a lord at the same time so liberal,
and, if report spoke true, so strict in the maintenance of discipline,
got through the task allotted to them, when the baron's
party issued forth by a different gate from that which had
admitted him, into the great plain beyond the city-walls.
They were not, perhaps, in all respects so complete a train
as that which had accompanied the baron previous to his
encounter with the Red Bastard, and his confederates,
but they afforded, notwithstanding, a noble spectacle; for the
horses were picked beasts, and the new men-at-arms tall, well-made
fellows, and good riders, bearing themselves erect and
proudly in their saddles beautifully equipped, and managing
their own chargers with ease and skill, while each led a spare
horse, the two Arabs before-mentioned, lightly equipped, and
loaded with spare armor and a few staves for lances. The
young esquire — for to that honorable station by dint of gallantry,
bold zeal, and approved fidelity, Ermold de Clermont
was now fairly inducted — wore his beaver up as he caracoled

gayly behind his liege lord, his whole face radiant, and his
eyes lightning with enthusiastic pleasure; so that no one
could doubt for a moment that his young high spirit would
effect far more than could be expected from his slender frame
and juvenile appearance.

They had not ridden far before the knight made a sign to
him; and when he rode up to him, desired him to relieve the
man-at-arms called Giles, of the horse he was leading, and
send him forward, as he would speak with him for a few
moments. The exchange was effected in a minute, and with
a deep obeisance the trooper trotted sharply up to his lord's
side.

“So, Giles,” the knight began, “Master Vandenkopf tells
me thou art a thorough guide for all this Netherlandish country.
Is it so, good fellow?”

“Nearly so, beau sire,” the man answered; “all on this
French frontier I do know foot by foot; and on the northern side
there are, I do believe, few better guides than I up to the Elbe
at least, and on the Rhine as far as to Cologne, so please
you.”

“Well, it does please me wondrous well! Now, sir,
where lies the chateau de Verneuil? How strong is it, and
how manned? Nigh to what town or hamlet, and what
chance of mustering men about it?”

“It lies some ten leagues hence northwesterly, in the very
thicket of the forest, not very far from Tirlemont and Hannut;
at least those are the nearest places to it. There be a few
small tenures round about it, and a little, oh, a very little village
at the hill-foot. Then, as for its strength, it is but
one square keep, with a few out-buildings in a court-yard, surrounded
by a low wall, with some half-dozen turrets at the
angles. The present seigneur has, indeed, dug a new moat,
and filled it from a neighboring rivulet, and built a low barbacan

over against the gate — but the Lord love you! it has no
strength at all. Why, twenty men might carry it, and as for
help, there is no help to be got nigher than Hannut, and that
must be four leagues. I have heard, too, that the sieur de
Floris — he is the chatelain, you know, sir — has ridden
thence some months ago to join the English queen at Mirepoix,
where she is waiting, as they say, her bad son, John's
arrival. I do believe there are but scant ten spears in the
chateau, and no better captain than the young lady!”

“And they will be attacked at daybreak, to-morrow, by forty
routiers at least, under that ruffian, Talebard!”

“Ha! Talebardin,” said the man, “and the Red Bastard, I
will warrant it, and like enough the gray priest, too! Well, beau
seigneur, however you may know it, of this be sure, if they do
attack the chateau, then they will carry it, most surely.”

“No, no! good fellow! the Red Bastard will couch lance
no more, nor the gray brother either, nor shall they carry the
chateau so readily.”

The trooper looked bewildered for a few seconds, as if he
were at a loss to comprehend De Coucy's meaning; and then
taking courage, asked, “How, my lord? — how shall they no
more couch lance when it is their trade alway?”

“Because my spear-point went in at his gorget-joint, and
came out through his back-piece, yesternoon — the Red Bastard's
I would say! — and as for the gray brother, my good
companion and true friend — a saint in heaven now — Mathieu
de Montmesnil slew him in the same hour beside the headless
cross.”

“Pardieu!” exclaimed the soldier, “but this shall be glad
news for Brussels. They have harassed its merchants sorely
these past years; and now, seigneur —”

“And now,” returned Hugues, “thou must guide me, as
straight as thou canst ride, to the chateau of Verneuil. I vow

to Heaven and good St. Paul, if we get thither ere they reach
the castle, they shall not win it scatheless. Is she so young,
this lady chatelaine — is she so young, Giles Ivernois?”

“Scarce eighteen years, beau sire, I've heard them tell!
She was but wed last Shrovetide. The sieur de Floris
brought her home from some place in France or Languedoc.
Her name, methinks, was De Navailles — Gabrielle de Navailles!”

“Ha! Tête de Dieu! Gabrielle de Navailles!” exclaimed
the knight, a deep red flush crossing his brow, and passing
instantly away, so as to leave him paler than before. “Ha! is
it so? So much the more need then of speed to rescue her,” he
added, muttering to himself in a low voice. “Well, guide me
thither straightway, and with all warrantable haste to boot.
I would be there by midnight.”

“And it is now four afternoon, I trow,” replied the trooper,
gazing toward the sun, the lower limb of which was already
sinking into the topmost boughs of the tall forest-trees. “We
must ride hard, then, beau sire; but we'll be there ere midnight,
my head on't. I fain would counter blows with Talebard. I
knew him long since when he was an honest man and a brave
soldier, as now he is a foul thief and accursed murderer. I
fain would counter blows with him. He is a stout lance, and
a valorous — a right good man-at-arms. Yet it should go hard
with me but I would match him. There were great los to be
won and glory, and no small guerdon either. Why, his head
now is worth forty pounds of silver well weighed out; and
under such a leader as monseigneur, I fear not we could win
it. Well! we will reach Verneuil ere midnight, or I'll die
for't.”

5. CHAPTER V.
THE CHATELAINE.

The knight's new follower failed not to make his promise
good, knowing, as it was evident he did, even before the sun
set, every foot of the country through which their route lay to
the château de Verneuil; but when the daylight had quite
faded from the face of the world, and the last faint reflection
of the vanished rays had ceased to tinge the fleecy night-clouds,
it became more and more apparent how perfectly he
was acquainted with every turn and winding of the devious
roads which traversed those wild tracts of moor, morass, and
forest; for he never paused nor doubted at the carrefours, or
intersections of some six or eight long avenues, cut through
the wide expanse of underwood, with here and there a giant
tree which for the most part covered that part of the country,
but led the way at a sharp steady trot, wheeling his horse to
this hand or to that with the decided confidence of a man
acquainted thoroughly with his direction, and with the nature
of the ground. More than one large strong brook and several
rivulets crossed their path, offering in one or two cases considerable
obstacles to their proceeding; but Giles Ivernois
never hesitated even for a moment, but either leaped them
boldly, or plunged into their well-known fords undaunted. At
about nine o'clock of the evening they halted at a small way-side
tavern, embosomed in the deep woodlands, and built as it
would seem for the convenience of belated hunters, in honor
of whom it rejoiced in the name and effigy of “the Bald-faced
Stag.” This solitary house, or hovel rather — for although

neat and even picturesque in appearance, it was in size but a
very cottage, the last on this side the hamlet of Verneuil, as
the man-at-arms informed his lord — was situated something
more than seven leagues from Brussels, and not above eight
miles at farthest from the small castle toward which they were
speeding.

“The road is good henceforward, beau sire,” replied the
trooper, in answer to a question from the baron; “better than
any we have seen yet this side Brussels. This country hereabout
lies over limestone, and for the most part it is under
tillage, our horses fresh and fed, we may right easily be there
within the hour.”

“Dismount, then, all,” cried Hugues, “for we shall need
each spark of fire that we can keep alight in their keen spirits.
Ermold, see that ye get a stoup or two of red wine, and bathe
their pastern joints and fetlocks. Have we some dozen slices
of raw beef, or venison better — if there be any in the house —
cut thin, and wrap in each slice of meat one of the cordial
balls of choice medicaments, I bade you bring from Tankarville.
Give one to every destrier; see them rubbed clean and
warm; then feed them with bread steeped in red wine, and
they shall be in spirits for the road, or e'er an hour be flown,
and livelier, I warrant them, than when we rode forth from the
city-gates.”

The young esquire responded by a bow only; but Giles
Ivernois, the elder man-at-arms, made answer, relying on his
skill in horse-flesh, “Under your favor, my good lord, a clove
of garlic, pounded with a handful of ginger, were added well
to the red wine. I would, though, we had here some of that
English drink they call brown beer or ale; bread steeped in
that is the most hearty food and sovereign'st thing for jaded
steeds I ever saw or heard of. They brew it out of barley,
beau sire!”

“Ha! and what knowest thou, good fellow, of England or of
English liquors?” asked the knight, laughing at the trooper's
freedom.

“So, please you, I heard tell of it the first from an old
equerry who rode erewhile with Richard of the Lion Heart.
I met with him in Guienne, many a winter since. He called
himself a Yorkshireman, though where Yorkshire lies I know
not, were I to hang for it, but I do know he was the cunningest
and skilfulest with horses of any man I ever did consort
with. He had store of wise saws, and wondrous remedies,
and some of them I have remembered ever since, this being one
of them. I proved it once in the Black forest, when I was
chased three days with thirty lances by the bad lord of Hohen-Zollern.
They brew beer there right potent, beau sire — and
Heaven be blessed for it and the three holy kings of Cologne!
I laid it to the ale, and the old Yorkshire equerry, that I escaped
them — for I fed my good beast at every halting-place
with rye-bread soaked in that black beer, and may I never
drain a flagon any more! if he became not so fond of it, that
he would drink a stoup opp-seyes, like a stanch toper!”

“I doubt it not — I doubt it not at all,” replied De Coucy;
“but as we shall find neither English ale, nor yet black German
beer here in the forest, we must make red wine do for it;
and hark ye, Giles and Francon, though the beer suit the
horses better, I doubt not but the men will find the grape-juice
full as pleasant.”

“Never fear, good my lord,” returned the soldier, “never
fear, we will do all your biddings to the utmost, and be in time
to garrison the chateau, and save the bright young lady, and
beat the villain routiers!” and with the words he followed his
companions to the stable, whither they had already led the
horses, while Hugues, who, for the last three days had tasted
little rest, entered the inn to seek such brief refreshment as

mine host of the Bald-faced Stag might offer. Short, however,
was the period which he devoted to repose; for ere an hour
had passed, he and his men were in their saddles and in rapid
motion with their good horses, not recruited only, but fuller, as
the knight had augured, of spirit and high fire than when they
had started on their journey some six hours before, during
which time they had carried each a tall and powerful cavalier
sheathed in so ponderous armor, that he weighed thirty stone
at the least reckoning.

The moon had risen, too, during their halt, and the roads
proving, as Giles had predicted, firm and in good condition,
they rattled on at a brisk pace keeping their steeds, however,
hard in hand with all their harness jingling merrily, and their
bright weapons flashing like diamonds in the misty moonlight.
A quarter of an hour brought them into the open country,
widely extended in rich plains, dotted with clusters of lofty
forest-trees, and bordered by soft, sloping hills, feathered with
hanging woods and many a waving coppice. No villages
were visible, however, in the glimmering light, nor did the
summit of a single steeple glitter out from the tufted tree-tops.
A few poor huts, dwellings of the degraded, wretched serfs,
who tilled — hereditary bondsmen — the vast demesnes of their
proud feudal lords, tending rich herds, the flesh of which was
never to be tasted by their famished children, and pressing the
rich grapes never to glad their hearts with their joy-giving
vintage — a few poor huts they passed, surrounded with styes
in long ranges; or, in some instances, with large folds for the
swine or sheep, which their inhabitants were forced to guard
at peril of their lives; but not another sign of human life
did they encounter. Suddenly, after they had ridden between
six or seven miles, and were just entering again a tract of
forest land, the deep loud clang of a heavy bell came booming

on the night-wind pealing from some unseen clock-tower the
last hour before midnight.

“There! there! beau sire, we are in time; that is the ban
cloche of the chateau; when we shall pass the second turn,
we shall be in the hamlet!”

“Ha!” cried the baron, “on, then, on! we have no time to
lose, for all it is not midnight.”

The road swept down a little sandy pitch, at the foot of
which ran a clear brawling trout-stream, wheeled short to the
left hand, and having crossed the stream by a steep, one-arched
bridge of brick, scaled the ascent on the opposite side, and
winding abruptly to the right, the dark ever-green pine-trees,
which clothed the banks of the gully scattering off diversely,
burst out into the little plain whereon were clustered round a
small rustic chapel, some twenty tidy-looking cottages with
cultivated stripes of garden-ground before the doors, and several
orchards interspersed with apple-trees, and a few vines
trained upon the latticed screens, the whole presenting a calm
and gentle picture of peaceful and domestic comfort. Scarcely
a bow-shot beyond these, its base and outer wall concealed
from the road by the close foliage of the still verdant orchards,
rose the gray weather-beaten tower of the keep, a tall square
building with a steep, flagged roof and projecting battlements,
having a circular bartizan at every angle, with a high flag-staff
rising from the ridge of the main dongeon. A loud vociferous
barking was set up by a dozen of deep-mouthed mastiffs,
as the little band of De Coucy rode clanging and clattering
round the hamlet, and many a male and female head was
thrust out of the latticed casements to note the character of
the intruders, and was as speedily withdrawn, reassured by the
appearance of the baron clad in his splendid surcoat. Within
five minutes they had cleared the village and its scattered
shrubbery, and stood before the barbacan of the chateau in full

view of its slight defences. It was, indeed, a place of but
little strength, as Giles Ivernois had stated, yet the knight
readily perceived that his new man-at-arms had somewhat
underrated its capabilities of defence; for the moat was not
only broad but very deep hewn out of the solid limestone rock
which lay beneath the soil at a few inches' depth, and the external
wall, though not high, was very strong, and built so
close upon the verge of the fosse, that it was quite impossible
to effect a lodgment at its base. The corps-de-logis was,
moreover, evidently framed with a view to stout defence, being
built in a hollow square with all the windows looking inward,
crenelled and looped on the exterior for shot of arbalast and
long-bow with the tall dongeon-keep in the centre of the
square, a citadel and last stronghold, commanding all the out-works.
So absolute, it would seem, was the security of the
inmates that no sentinel kept watch upon the barbacan, no
warder on the massy more; nor that alone! for all the clanging
sounds of the plate-armor, and the thick trampling of the destriers,
and all the baying of the watch-dogs had failed to rouse
one sleeper of the castle's guard.

After he had sat, something longer than a minute, silently
overlooking the defences of the place, the knight of Tankarville
lifted his bugle to his lips and wound a long, keen challenge,
which, to ears practised in the science of mots and enséangies
of ancient houses, would have conveyed the information
that the head of the bold De Coucys demanded entrance
at the gates. One, twice, however — nay, three times was
that keen call repeated, ere it found any ears to mark it; and
when at length the tardy warder did deign arouse him from
his slumbers, he also blew a challenge, so heedless was he or
so ignorant of his accustomed duties. Before, however, the
shrill flourish of his trumpets had ceased to wake the slumbering
echoes, De Coucy shouted loudly, “Ho! warder, up portcullis!

Unbar your gates, and down with your pont levis!
Open to a good friend and loyal. 'Tis I — I, Hugues of Tankarville.”

“I dare not, for my life, beau sire — nor could I, if I dared
— the keys are with the chatelaine!”

“Then wake her, sirrah, and that speedily; tell her the
knight of Tankarville beseeches of her courtesy that she will
presently admit him, with but three comrades, for reasons he
will show hereafter!”

“ 'Twere of no use, beau sire,” returned the warder; “the
sieur de Floris is abroad, and our fair ladye 'bideth since in
strict seclusion.”

“Dally not, slave, with me,” shouted De Coucy, shaking his
fist angrily at the man, who now showed himself half armed
upon the esplanade above the barbacan; “dally not, slave,
with me, but do my bidding! else, by the Lord that liveth! I
will break in perforce, and hang thee from the pinnacle to
feed the ravens of Verneuil.”

What reply would have come from the warder can not be
known, for ere he could reply the blaze of several torches
were visible upon the ramparts, and in a few moments Hugues
might clearly see upon the gate-house over against the barbacan
a female figure, wrapped in a hooded mantle furred
deeply with rich ermine, with several armed attendants, and
an old gray-haired seneschal beside her.

Low bowed Hugues de Coucy till the plumes of his waving
crest were mingled in strange contrast with the long, thin
mane of his coal-black charger; and when he raised himself
from that deep obeisance, he spoke with a voice, rich and clear
and manly, yet soft the while and soothing as the tones of the
southern lute.

“I pray you,” he said, “beautiful and gentle ladye, I pray
you of your courtesy aud charity, open your gates to one, who,

for so gentle deed, will ever rest your debtor — I, Hugues,
baron and count of Tankarville.”

“Sorry, am I, sir knight,” replied the lady; “sorry am I,
and very loathe to answer, but my good lord of Floris hath
ridden these four months past abroad, and I have bound me
by a vow that no strange knight, nor man-at-arms, nor even
priest nor friar, shall tarry after sunset beneath my castle-roof
till he return from peril. Pardon me, therefore, gentle knight,
pardon me in that I seem discourteous, and deem, I pray you,
my vow churlish, and not me!”

“Lady;” replied the Coucy, “lady, I do beseech you
ope to me, and by my faith, my knighthood, and mine honor!
thou shalt in naught infringe the strietness of thine honorable
vow. I ask not to set foot within thine hall — not to break
bread, or drain cup at thy board — I ask but leave to pass your
outer gates, to plant my pennon on your outer wall, to aid with
my good sword and such poor skill as I may boast, in the defence
of this your castle against the villain routiers of that
accursed ruffian, Talebardin, who will be at your gates with
sixty spears long before daybreak. God and the Virgin aid
us and blest St. Paul of Tankarville, we will beat off the dogs
who else will be too strong for ye, and the adventure done, we
will ride forth again asking no guerdon, e'en of thanks — no
benison, nor reward, save of our own good thoughts. Refuse
me this poor boon, and, lady, hear me swear, I, Hugues de
Tankarville, baron of Flanders, count of France, knight of
the empire — swear by my ladye-love, and by my patron-saint,
and by the bones and soul of my dead father, that, if I may
not on this field preserve your life and honor, I will at least
die for them; that if I may not win for Tankarville and Verneuil,
I will at least fall without stain, and draw my last breath
under shield nobly, and in a noble cause, fearless of aught on
earth and confident of heaven!”

“Good knight! good knight!” exclaimed the lady, “good
knight and noble if ever one was yet! Ride in! ride in! and
welcome. I do repose me on your honor — I do confide me
to your valor — I do trust fearlessly to your strong arm; — for
his arm must of need be strong whose spirit is so high and
holy. Let fall the gates there, knaves — lower the bride —
raise the portcullis grate! Room for the count of Tankarville!”
and with the words she left her stand upon the ramparts,
and came down hastily to meet the renowned and mighty
champion whose fame was rife through all the bounds of Christendom.

Meantime, the heavy grate of the barbacan was raised, and
the wide leaves of the gate flung open, and Hugues rode in
bowing his lofty crest beneath the pointed arch, followed by
his stout men-at-arms and his young spirited esquire. The
moment he had entered the dark vault, the stately warrior
leaped to the ground, and turning short to one of the men who
had admitted him, and who had of course heard all the previous
parley, “We have no time at all to lose,” he said, “good
fellow; so run down thou and summon all the serfs of the
hamlets, and all the freemen — if there be any in the place —
bound to man-service; bid them make haste as they would
live and prosper, for Talebardin and his routiers will be upon
them ere an hour, and ye have room enough within, I trow.
Get all the women in and children; these dogs spare neither
age nor sex! Haste thee, good fellow, for I will bear thee
out with thy good lady. Ermold, take thou my rein. Dismount
not, Ivernois, nor thou good Francon, I shall have need
of ye anon, for we will charge on their advance with a good
sally! So! so! Here comes the chatelaine!” and, as he
spoke the words, he lowered the beaver of his plumed helmet,
but keeping the avantaille still lowered, so that although his
mouth and all the lower part of his countenance was uncovered,

his eyes and brow were still concealed, so that a person
who knew him only by sight, without being acquainted with
his style or title, would have had some difficulty in recognising
him, and advanced to meet the lady chatelaine, who was
now standing in the arched gateway on the inner side of the
moat, surrounded by some six or eight men-at-arms, with the
old seneschal beforementioned, and a single handmaid at her
elbow. She was a delicate and slender girl, with nothing matronly
either of air or figure, not certainly above eighteen, and
of rare beauty, as might easily be seen; for her furred hood
had fallen back, and left the whole of her fair face and all her
classically-moulded head exposed to the full glare of the
torches, which lent a warmer tinge than common to those pale,
eloquent features. Hers was the beauty which, though not so
generally appreciated, must be pronounced far higher in the
scale of loveliness than mere voluptuous charms. Beauty it
was, indeed, of the first intellectual order; the high pale forehead
from which the dark, brown curls fell off in shadowy
masses; the slight expressive curve of the black eyebrows;
the long-cut eye of deep, clear gray, radiant and pure as a
transparent spring, yet calm and self-restrained; the classic,
almost stern profile, contrasted with the sweet arch of the rosy
lips; the bright, translucent paleness of the skin — all! all
were perfect — perfect in their unsensual, tranquil beauty,
while the expression of the whole was full of eloquence, of
mind, of music. She was a being whom, perhaps, ninety-nine
men out of every hundred would have passed by unheeded, as
cold and passionless, as a fair statue rich in proportions, rare
in grace, but senseless and inanimate, whom he, the hundredth,
would not have loved, but adored, idolized! as a thing almost
too pure, too spiritual, for any earthly worship. And so she
had been worshipped! and had returned that worship with the
young, trusting, innocent, devoted love of a free virgin heart!
She had been wooed and won, and plighted, and then ill days
and evil tongues had come between, and the frail thread
of true love had been broken — broken, alas! to reunite no
more

Two years had intervened, and they who had parted then
heart-broken lovers met for the first time now. She, the sad,
spirit-broken bride of an ill-matched and aged spouse. He,
the young, unknown knight of those past days, revealed as by
enchantment, noble, and chief, and champion. It boots not to
search back into their early fortunes; it now were profitless
alike and tedious. Enough they stood together. He knew
her as of old, and worshipped as he did then, and pitied as he
then did not. For he well knew the cruel arts by which her
late consent had been wrung from her to that most ill-assorted
wedlock. He knew her spirit true to himself alone, when all
beside was given to another. Yet did he know her pure and
innocent of soul as in her earliest maidenhood — a too true
wife to a passionless and aged lord. Therefore, concealed he
stood before her, and quelled his passions like a hero as he
was, resolved to add no sorrow to her sufferings by revelation
of the identity, all unsuspected and undereamed, of her young
nameless wooer with the renowned and far-famed baron who
had thus ridden to her rescue. And she received him as a
stranger; yet as a stranger known so well by the loud bruit
of his great deeds, that he was scarce less than an intimate,
even before he had approved himself a friend by this his gallant
aid. She prayed him raise his avantaille, and enter her
courtyard, and begged him once more to excuse her vow,
which must prohibit his admission to the hall. “Meanwhile,”
she added, “my vassals are even now preparing with earnest
speed such a pavilion as may suffice to shield a champion so
famed for hardihood of mood as the great Hugues de Tankarville,
and there, good knight and gentle, there may I tender you

the kiss of honorable welcome, the rights of courteous hospitality!”

“I, too, dear lady,” answered the Coucy, “I, too, must
plead a vow, and pray your pardon also for the semblance of
discourtesy. When first I learned by chance the purpose of
this dog banditti, I registered an oath in heaven never to raise
my vizor, nor to unbelt my weapon from my side, until the
slaves be scattered to the four winds of heaven, and you, dear
ladye of Verneuil, be scathless, even from fear. For the rest,
I beseech you waste no time in rearing gay pavilions, but let
each man-at-arms, and groom, and varlet of your household do
on his harness for defence. Let them fetch arbalasts and
quarrels, long bows, and sheaves of arrows to the wall, and let
them bend that great mangonel I see upon the ballium, and
suit it with a befitting stone. Your seneschal, if you permit
me to take the ordering of the day, should take post in the
keep, and when the villains show front clear of the forest, ring
the ban cloche in one continuous peal, and ply them from the
battlements with hail of flight-shot, arrow, and bolt, and bullet.
There must you be too, lady, with every woman of your
household, and such serfs of the hamlet as you may best rely
on — nay, I insist on't, and will lead you thither.” And, with
the words, he led the chatelaine to the door of the keep; and
as the villagers came in, he picked a dozen of the stoutest
vassals, and placing them under the guidance of the seneschal,
commanded him, as he regarded his young lady's life and
honor, to bar the gate of the dongeon on the inner side, and
open it no more, save at his bidding, or till the routiers should
be driven from the walls and utterly cut down. This done at
length, for Gabrielle, convinced after much instance, ceased to
remonstrate, Hugues took command of all the outworks, and,
having placed his little band — little, indeed! since he found
in the place only six men-at-arms and five stout serving-men,

to whom were added eight or ten half-armed vassals from the
village, on all the points of vantage — he joined his own men
in the barbacan, resolved to charge once with the lance before
he should be shut up within walls of stone, and sat there motionless
on his tall war-horse, until the stars paled in the azure
heavens, awaiting the approach of these fell desperadoes.

6. CHAPTER VI.
THE SERF.

The morning was already beginning to dawn palely, at least
a few faint streaks of light were visible from the summit of the
watch-tower, far on the verge of the eastern sky, when a dull
rustling sound made itself plainly heard above the rippling murmur
of the trout stream in the valley, and the sough of the
west wind in the evergreen branches of the pine wood. None
but a practised ear could have distinguished then, the character
of that far sound, but scarcely had it been audible a second
before Sir Hugues de Coucy turning half round, toward Ermold,
in his steel saddle, said in a clear, strong whisper; “Lo! they
come now; lower your vizors all, and follow me, silently though
and slowly!” and with the words, he drew down his own avantaille
and clasped it firmly to the beaver; then, gathering his reins
up with the left, and lowering the point of his long lance that it
should not strike the groinings of the barbacan, he rode forth
cautiously, accompanied by his young squire, and the two men-at-arms;
before he left the arch, however, he called to the warder
bidding him see the chains of the portcullis clear, and have
his yeomen ready to make fast the gates at once. “Be steady
now,” he said, “and forget not that deliberate valor is worth

ten times as much as headlong rashness. Break but your
lances fairly with these thieves, and draw off instantly, leaving
me last. Here they come, fifty horse at least, if I may judge
by the clash and clang; they will be here anon. Now do
your devoir!”

While speaking, he had drawn up his little band in line,
having Giles Ivernois on his right hand, and Ermold in the
centre, the other Flemish trooper holding the extreme left, close
to the high fence of an orchard. The road here made a little
sweep, of something better than a hundred yards, skirting the
verge of the moat and the castle wall which with its arbalasts
and mangonels commanded the whole traverse. It was, moreover,
very narrow, ascending in a gentle slope up to the outer
gate, giving the knight and his companions the ground of vantage
for a charge on the assailants.

Scarce had the knight of Tankarville completed his arrangements,
before the loud, deep note of the ban cloche, succeeded
by its continuous and deafening clangor, announced the presence
of Talebardin and his routiers upon the village green, although
they were not as yet visible to Hugues and his party,
in consequence of the cottages and gardens of the hamlet covering
their advance. A loud, shrill blast of bugles, blended
with the dull boomings of the Norman kettle-drum, rose high
and keen upon the morning air, quite overpowering for a
moment, the louder peal of the great bells, while at the signal
the broad banner of the house of Floris was displayed on the
battlements, and a sustained and well-directed flight of shafts
and quarrels, was poured upon the enemy from that commanding
elevation. In answer to the music of the garrison the wild
marauders set up simultaneously a yell of fierce defiance, which
had in its shrill tones, something so fiendish and unearthly that
it made the heart of the firmest thrill, and struck cold consternation
through the weaker spirits of the beleagured garrison

A moment afterward a flash as if of fire was seen springing up
through the dry thatch of one of the low hovels, another, and
another, and then a broad, red glare rushed up from all the
burning village, crimsoning the whole canopy of heaven, tinging
the dusky foliage and weatherbeaten trunks of the old
pines with a strange, ruddy lustre, and showing every loop-hole
and crenelle in the castle-walls, every serf, man-at-arms and
warder on the battlements, as clearly as if it had been noonday.
Directly afterward a shaft or two were shot against the walls
from the covert afforded by the scattering groups of fruit-trees
on the esplanade, but so well did the archers on the barbacan
perform their duty, pouring in shot of long and cross-bows,
with ever and anon a huge steel-headed beam launched from
the mighty mangonel, that the routiers in that quarter fell back
at once without so much as discovering the band of De Coucy,
which if it had not been cut off, must have been desperately
endangered, at the least if the marauders had made good their
charge, and taken a position midway between the barbacan and
the knight's party. Ten minutes or a quarter of an hour had
elapsed thus, when a fresh shout was set up from above the
gate. “Gare? gare! beau sire!” and a first flight of missiles
was launched against the spot where the road issued from the
hamlet. No more was necessary to set De Coucy on his
guard; “Now!” he exclaimed, “now! gentlemen!” couching
his lance as he did so, and pricking the flanks of his black
charger with the spur. At the next instant with their wild yell,
and their accursed war-cry, the robbers wheeled out from the
cottages at a hard gallop, and for the first time perceiving the
bold baron, bore down upon him in a solid column of sixty
horse at least, with levelled lances. So well, however, had
the knight taken his position, that four men only at a time could
come against him, the narrowness of the road making it quite
impossible for more than that number to array themselves in
front, with room sufficient for the management of their steeds,
and the wielding of their weapons. This, indeed, was the
only thing which gave the least chance of success to the defenders,
yet even with this chance, the odds were fearfully
against them, particularly when it is taken into the consideration,
that Ermold though of a high and dauntless spirit, and
from his boyhood upward trained to the use of arms, was in
years but a stripling, who therefore could not be expected to
cope with full-grown men on terms of equality or vantage.
The robbers, who formed the first rank, were evidently stout
and hardy men-at-arms — he who appeared their leader riding,
when they drew out of the cover of the burning village, on their
left flank, nearest the moat and therefore facing Ivernois. He
was a tall and powerful man, above six feet in height, and
limbed proportionally to his stature, completely cased in armor,
apparently of Spanish wormanship, not of bright steel, however,
but of plain, unrelieved, dead black. To this there was but
one exception, that the whole front and vizor of his helmet had
been wrought into the shape of a bare, grinning skull, colored
in the appropriate hues, while over this dread emblem of mortality,
there waved a tall, black plume, like those which now
are used to decorate the roofs of hearses; his shield which was
black likewise, to suit the rest of his armor, was blazoned with
a scull and cross-bones argent — the barding of his destrier a
huge black Flemish stallion were framed to match his rider's
panoply, and altogether it would have been difficult to find a
stouter or better appointed-cavalier, though there was something
awful and disgusting in the emblazonry he had adopted, with
the intention clearly of striking terror to the hearts of his opponents.
As soon as this formidable personage descried the
knight of Coucy, he shouted something to his nearest comrade,
the import of which was drowned by the thunder of the horses'
hoofs and the din of the plate-coats; but it was easy to perceive
what must have been the meaning of the cry, for spurring out
a little way before his rank, he passaged quickly to his right,
his comrade making the same movement to the left, and then
reined back immediately into the line, placing himself, as the
result of this manœuvre directly opposite to Hugues. The
three companions of the black rider, were all strong troopers
completely armed, and powerfully mounted; but their appointments
were in no respect to be compared to the accoutrements
of Talebardin, for he it was who bore that grisly frontlet, though
all but one had in some slight degree endeavored to increase
the terror which everywhere accompanied their presence by
some detestable and horrid signs of carnage. Thus one of them,
it was he who now couched his spear against Giles Ivernois, a
tall man in a brazen harness with a particolored feather of red
and purple, had hung about his neck, after the fashion of a
knightly chain, a string of human teeth, torn from the jaws of
living victims to force them to produce their real or suspected
treasures. The third; a slighter figure who wore a shirt of
dim and rusty mail, had decked his casque in lieu of crest or
plume with a thick, plated tress of beautiful soft, sunny hair,
dabbled in many places by dark stains of gore, which must have
been shorn from the head of some highborn and lovely female.
The fourth alone was armed in clear, bright steel, carefully
kept and polished, and had adopted no more odious emblem of
his calling than a green plume in his casque, and a green dragon
painted on his shield, seeming to indicate his Saxon origin.
Long as it has occupied us to describe the leaders of the routiers,
it did not take the great French champion five seconds
to run over all the details with his bright intellectual eye, before
he called aloud to his men, to bear them bravely, shouted
his war-cry of St. Paul, and dashed with his four lances against
the overwhelming force of the marauders.

Talebard Talebardin bore him like a man; his spear-head

struck full on the fess-point of De Coucy's shield, and bored
it through and through, but turned quite blunt and edgeless as
it encountered the fine temper of his Milan plastron, the tough
ash staff bursting into a hundred splinters up to the very grasp
of his gauntlet. Not so the champion's: he had charged his
lance full at the hollow socket of the skull-avantaille's right
eye, and had it entered there, the race of Talebardin had been
run on earth that moment; but just as they closed, the robber
seeing his peril, threw his head up sharply, so that the lance-point
struck below the eye just where the vizor met the beaver,
and tore the helmet, which remained upon the baron's spear,
quite off the ruffian's head. Still Talebard sat firmly in his
saddle till the knight's destrier plunged in, and striking with
the horn of his steel chamfront under the bardings of the other's
counter, forced him to rear up, and then hurled him backward,
falling upon his rider and overthrowing two more of the robbers
who rode next behind. The like success attended each
one of the Coucy's followers; Giles Ivernois' antagonist went
down, his throat transfixed above the gorget's rim, that the
steel-point came out, all stained and gory, under the edge of
his cerveilliere. Francon Von Voorhis broke his spear fairly
with the English rider, but better horsed than he, bore him
down by the shock, while strange to say, young Ermold, though
slighter in his frame and weaker from his years than any of the
others, charged with such prowess striking his man upon the
crest, that he hurled him ten feet out of his saddle, and his
own horse outmastering his bridle-arm drove on with his lance
still unbroken, and in its rest, and splintered it in full career
against the shield of a robber in the second rank bearing him
likewise to the ground. “Ha! a good lance! a good lance,
and a better blow,” shouted the baron, as he saw his young
esquire's fair exploit; “rein up now, rein up all, and back with
no delay. Giles Ivernois, take thou my lance and pitch it in
the wall above the barbacan. Back, back at once — hearest
thou not, Francon? Back both of you;” and though reluctantly
and slowly, both did fall back at his command, while he, unsheathing
his two-handed broadsword, prepared to cover their
retreat. Ermold, however, although he heard his lord's command,
and was all eager to obey, was so entangled in the melée,
that he could now by no means extricate himself; for his
unruly horse had dashed into the very centre of the robbers,
who were all in confusion reeling about and in complete disorder,
the whole of their front rank having been overthrown as
by a thunderbolt, with three men of the second, and four
horses. Well was it, therefore, for the gallant youth that they
were for the moment in so fearful disarray, and that his own
horse plunging to and fro with reckless fury augmented the
dismay, biting and kicking with his heels, and striking with
his forefeet at everything that came near him; for had it not
been so, he must have been beaten down and slain before the
champion could assist him. It was not long, however, that he
remained unaided, for shouting in a voice heard clearly over
all the din, “St. Paul! a Tankarville to the rescue!” the
baron, too, rushed into the disordered rout. The first blow
of his sweeping broadsword fell on the barded neck of a stout
war-horse, and breaking the strong plates, clove half way
through the neck, and laid both steed and rider prostrate on
the earth; the second drove in the helmet on the head of another,
and fracturing his skull, slew him upon the instant; the
third dashed down a third of his opponents, but broke the
weapon to the hilt, and left the warrior for the moment weaponless

Still the esquire was extricated from the press and rescued,
and bidding him ride in as sharply as he might, Hugues stopped
a moment to loosen his mace from the saddle-bow, then
galloped after him, leaving the routiers all in disarray, gathering

up their dead, and succording their wounded. Just at that
time, however, the archers on the barbacan who had been
quite unable to loose a shaft at all during the hand to hand encounter,
seemingly overlooked the count, or if they did not
overlook him, mistook him for one of the routiers, and discharged
a whole flight of arrows. Five or six took effect at
least upon the person of the knight, piercing his overcoat and
rebounding from his armor, but did not, such was the temper
of his panoply, wound him at all, however slightly. This, as
it seemed, however, did not satisfy them, for although did
Coucy shout with all the power of his lungs, shaking his
clinched fist angrily at the men on the walls, they followed up
their volley by bending the great mangonel against him, and
before Giles could hinder them, who had run up to the esplanade
above the barbacan, to pitch his master's lance upon the
wall, they turned the winch, and the huge engine was discharged.
The vast beam hurtled through the air, and striking
the knight's charger on the counter, buried itself in the body
of the animal, breaking its forelegs and killing it instantaneously
despite the heavy armor by which its chest was covered,
as could have been done by a modern cannon-ball.

The champion was pitched headlong, and his face striking
the ground first, he was completely stunned for the moment,
and lay there insensible with the blood streaming through
the bars of his avantaille from both nose and mouth, in
consequence of that rude concussion. Meantime, the robbers
had recovered altogether from the temporary disorder
into which they had been thrown, and rushed on in a body,
Talebard, who had regained his feet, running bare-headed
in front of all the horses to seize the prostrate champion,
nor did it appear possible at the moment that any timely
rescue could be made; for Ermold and the others within
the archway of the barbacan could not discover what was

to do without, and those on the esplanade were too far off to
give effectual assistance Giles Ivernois, indeed, rushed down
the steep stone stair, taking three steps at every clanking
stride; but he would have arrived too late, for undismayed by
the archery which was aimed at them from above, killing one
man outright and wounding several others, the routiers were
within three paces of De Coucy, who was beginning to move
faintly, as though he were recovering his consciousness, when
a man leaped the palings of the orchard and interposed himself
between the baron and the ruffians. He was a tall young
man of seven or eight and twenty years, magnificently formed
and having something of an untaught grace in his bearing.
He had no helmet on his head which was covered only by a
thick mass of jet-black curly hair, which set off admirably the
unburned hue of his expressive manly features. His eye was
dark and very brilliant, his brow broad and well developed,
and all his features fine and delicately shaped. In fact, he
was an eminently handsome man, not in form only but in feature,
and what is more remarkable, in the expression of his
features also, which was decidedly of an imaginative and intellectual
cast, with no small portion of firmness and undaunted
daring displaying itself in the vigorous outlines of his well-marked
mouth and massive jaws. His dress, however, was
much at variance with the distinguished beauty of his person;
it was the dark, coarse tunic of the cheapest serge belted about
the waist by a broad leathern strap, which was peculiar to the
serf or villeyn; his feet, too, like his head, and all his legs
from the limb downward were bare to the weather. He had
no weapons but a woodman's axe and a knife at his belt; yet
not for that did he shun to encounter a score of mail-clad veterans;
he waved the broad axe round his head, and, as the
robber-chief came on, he dealt him such a blow before he had
indeed observed the rescuer at all, that he had not by a half-instinctive
effort broken the force of the blow by his shield,
he never had moved limb any more. Luckily, at the same
moment wherein Talebard recoiled, and after staggering a
moment sank on his knee, a cross-bow bolt struck down the
next of the marauders, and profiting by the occasion, the young
man raised the count from the ground, and throwing him with
all his heavy panoply across his shoulders, he darted off with
him, as if he had been quite untrammelled by a load, toward
the barbacan, and was already leaving his pursuers far behind,
when Giles, and Ermold, and a dozen others, rushed forth and
hurried them within the arch, when the strong doors were
forced to in a moment and barred with jealous haste, while, at
the self-same point of time, the steel portcullis came clanging
down its groove of stone, and all was for the time secure.

The din, as it appeared, restored De Coucy to his senses
on the instant, for he leaped to his feet, raised his vizor, and
wiped away the blood from his beard and mustaches with his
mailed hand, exclaiming as he did so, “Where am I? — Ha!
That was a perilous mischance! — Where am I? — In the
barbacan? — Who brought me hither? — Was't thou, Ivernois?”
— “Not so, beau sire,” replied the veteran; “I was upon
the ballium when you fell; this youth here brought you off,
and brought you off, I will say, nobly. By the three kings of
Cologne, he dealt yon Talebard a blow, that, but for his shield
of proof, had split him to the chine!”

“Who art thou, then? Who art thou, my good youth, who
thus hast rescued Tankarville?”

“A serf, beau sire,” — the seneschal at once interrupted
him — “A mere Jacques Bonhomme — an ill-conditioned, insolent
serf — if one ever was on the lands of Verneuil. He has
been out marauding now, I warrant me, most likely leagued
with these same routiers, else how did it fall out he was not
in the hamlet with the rest, when all were called into the

castle? I prithee, beau sire, heed not the dog at all. I will
account with him so soon as our hands be free of this foul
scum without!”

“Nay, nay, not so, good friend,” replied the baron; “De
Coucy deals not so with his preserver;” but, as he spoke, the
din of axes plied fiercely on the outer gate fell on his ears,
and he perceived at once that a lodgment must have already
been effected by the routiers at the wall foot. “But of this
more anon!” he shouted. “Up to the esplanade! Bring
arbalasts and quarrels! — bring boiling oil, and pitch, and molten
lead! Cry Tankarville! St. Paul! — St. Paul for Tankarville!”
and he rushed up the stairs, leaving his rescuer forgotten
to the mercies of the seneschal, who thrust him instantly
into the dungeon of the castle, promising that he should
hang upon the morrow!

7. CHAPTER VII.
THE EXECUTION.

The Coucy was in time, and in time only, so fiercely did
the marauders assault the gates, which creaked already, and
bent beneath the storm of blows falling upon them like those
of the smith upon his clanging stithy.

In the haste of his followers to bring off the person of their
chivalric leader, and in the headlong rush of the routiers hoping
to capture him a second time, whether from forgetfulness,
or from the impossibility of securing it, the drawbridge had
been neglected, and the gates made fast, but in time to prevent
the enemy from entering in, pell-mell, with the defenders of
the place, so hardily did they advance under the deadly hail
of missiles which were poured against them.

The drawbridge they carried, almost unopposed, and a
dozen of the bravest establishing themselves under the deep
arch of the ballium, where they were sheltered from all means
of annoyance by the besieged men-at-arms, commenced thundering
on the portcullis bars, with that din which had aroused
the Coucy to the full possession of his faculties, while the remainder
arrayed in line on the farther verge of the moat, kept
up so incessant a volley of cloth-yard arrows, many of them
being English archers, free companions who had of late become
marauders, that not a man could show himself upon the
battlements without being made a target for a dozen of fork-headed
shafts. Three or four of the light-armed vassals, unprotected
by proof armor, had been shot dead or mortally
wounded at the first volley, and the earliest care of De Coucy

was to withdraw them entirely from the front, under orders to
hold themselves sheltered perfectly behind the coignes and
angles of the battlements, and to shoot as sharply as they
might through the crenelles with their cross-bows, but on no
account to expose a limb to the tremendous shot of that underring
archery.

Himself, confident in his panoply, and absolutely dauntless
by disposition, he strode forward to the verge of the esplanade
and leaned far over the bartizan, so as to command a view of
what was in process below, exposing himself to the cloth-yard
arrows with a perfect contempt of death. Four or five of the
steel-points struck on his corslet, and bounded back blunted
into the moat; but one, more deadly aimed, found an air-hole
in his avantaille, and, the elastic bars opening a little to its
violent impulse, penetrated till the steel barbs were wedged in
the narrow orifice, where it stood fixed, but not till it had
deeply cut the flesh on his left temple, and drawn a long
stream of scarlet blood, which flowed out through the orifices
of the vizor, and stained his bright gorget with its fearful hue.
A wild, triumphant cheer from the banditti hailed the appearance
of De Coucy's gore; for it was rarely that a knight's
panoply of Spanish or Italian steel was pierced by any lighter
weapon than the couched lance, or severed unless by the
sheer sweep of the two-handed sword, or the contusing blow
of battle-axe or mace, and they hailed the champion's wound
as a proof that he was not, at the best, invincible.

It was scarcely for a moment, however, that they were permitted
to rejoice, for it required but a single effort of the iron
fingers of the knight to wrench the arrow-head from the unbroken
avantaille and the wound was too trivial even to require
stanching.

Almost before it was extricated, four of the vassals of Verneuil
appeared on the bartizan bearing, supported from two

massive iron bars, which they carried two and two upon their
shoulders, a huge iron kettle containing at least a dozen gallons
of boiling oil, the dense unsavory wreaths of its thick
smoke curling upward like the reek of a witch's caldron.

“Ha! ha! St. Paul for Tankarville!” shouted the champion.
“Now will we scatter them. Look to your bows, men,
and your arbalasts. See that when the fiery stream scatters
them from beneath the arch, you suffer none to regain its shelter!
Now, then, my merry men, poise it right here above the
channel of the Machicolles. So! so! Now thrust a lever
under it; hook on that chain to the handle, and await the
the word! Attention!” There was, as is usual in old feudal
castles, a broad, deep gutter or canal, running all round the
esplanade of the gate-house within the battlements, opening
through some twenty wide-mouthed vents into as many perpendicular
funnels or spouts, known architecturally as Machicolations,
so framed as to discharge showers of any liquid, or
fluid substance upon the heads of such persons as should be
collected within the embrasure of the archway below.

This archway contained a space of about eighteen feet in
depth by a width of ten or twelve, closed on the right and left
by the solid flanks of the castle wall, inwardly by the portcullis
and iron-gates, and outwardly by the moat, where it should
have been blockaded by the drawbridge, had it been raised, as
it ought to have been, in the teeth of the assailants. This,
however, not being done, above a dozen of the boldest of the
banditti had established themselves under the vault. And
where, being under cover and out of reach of the defenders'
missiles, they supposed themselves secure, and had already
seriously damaged the grated portcullis, many bars of which
had yielded to the furious blows of their battle-axes.

The quick glance of the knight during the moment he leaned
over the battlements, sufficed to render him master of the

facts that were in progress; and, at his word the vassals and
some half dozen of the men-at-arms mustering under the shelter
of the angular battlements and bartizans, held their arbalasts
ready bent with the square-headed quarrels in their tubes, and
their long-bows half drawn with the shafts notched upon the
string, expecting the scattering and backward rush of the enemy,
which should place them at their mercy.

The caldron was slung directly over the heads of the unsuspecting
routiers; the knight had armed himself with a huge
iron crow-bar, the lever, usually worked by two men of the
enormous mangonel, or trebuchet, over the gates, and now he
waved it high over his helmet, shouting in tones high as a
trumpet's, “In God's name let go! St. Paul for Tankarville!
St. Paul!”

So terribly did his voice ring downward through the machicolles,
that one of the banditti was startled and looked upward.
On the instant, though too late, he perceived the lurid glare
of the seething caldron, and the reeking steam above it,
through the narrow funnel — he foresaw the fate that awaited
them.

His eyes glaring, his finger pointed upward, his terrified
mouth wide open, he shrieked, “Oil! oil! Beware of the
oil!” He was yet in the act of shrieking, when the huge
kettle was overset into the conduit, and down rushed through
each one of the twenty funnels a hissing scathing torrent that
literally blasted everything which it encountered, as if it had
been the fire of heaven.

The miserable wretch — whose speech it cut short in mid accents,
smiting him full in the staring eyes and open mouth —
reeled out senseless, blind, speechless, dead probably to all
consciousness of pain — whirled madly round and round upon
the drawbridge for an instant, and then plunged in his agonies
into the deep moat where his life and tortures ended. Two

more, full upon whose heads the fiery deluge had descended,
fell dead where they stood, scalded through their panoply of
proof, while half a dozen others staggered out with an appalling
yell, all scathed and writhing in torture, only to meet instant
death from the shafts of the infuriated archers on the
walls, not one of whom missed his aim in that hideous emergency.

“St. Paul! St. Paul! for Tankarville!” and forth sprang
the great champion, De Coucy, to consummate the ruin. Under
the base of a huge pinnacle of wrought freestone that
crowned the right hand buttress of the keep he thrust the point
of his ponderous lever, bearing upon it with the whole concentrated
force of his practised powers and great bodily weight,
that the vast mass rocked and tottered.

At the same instant, prompt to comprehend and further
every hint or movement of his captain, Giles Ivernois snatched
up a gigantic sledge-hammer, part also of the apparatus of the
trebuchet, and swinging it round his head delivered such a
blow on the top of the pinnacle, just in the point of time when
the knight unheaved its base, that it went down headlong, and,
had not one of his comrades caught him round the body, the
stout man-at-arms would have followed the falling mass, precipitated
by the impetus of his own mighty effort.

He was arrested on the very verge barely in time, but sheer
down rushed the immense stone, hurtling through the air, and
alighting exactly midway of the planks upon the draw-bridge,
dashed it to atoms with a thundering crash, so that no fragment
was left of six feet in length, and that all communication between
the castle and the farther bank of the moat was cut off,
and, consequently, that Talebard Talebardin and three of his
best men who still remained under the vault of the barbacan,
the boiling oil having fallen behind them, were left as prisoners
immersed between the bridgeless moat and the castle gates.

Ten minutes had scarcely elapsed, since the Coucy had
rushed, clanking in his plate and mail, up the steps to the esplanade,
though it has occupied more time to relate than it did
to enact the events crowded into so brief a space; and now
he rushed down again with Ermold de Marcy and Giles Ivernois,
and Francon Von Voorhis at his heels, resolute to rescue
his prisoners let what might come of it.

“Kill him not,” he cried, “kill him not, on your lives. For
he shall hang in his steel coat over the gate of Verneuil, as
the Lord liveth, and as I live to swear it by my patron-saint,
St. Paul! Now throw the gates wide open into the moat
with the others, but, on your lives, save Talebardin.”

As he passed through the court-yard toward the gate, he
strode across a narrow iron grating, and, as he did so, a faint
voice, as if from a great depth below the surface, came up
heavily to his ears, “Rescue, lord count of Tankarville; rescue
for rescue, as you are belted knight and Norman noble!”

The men, who followed at his heels, heard the dolorous
cry; but whether their leader heard it or no, they knew not;
for he gave no sign, but steadily rushed forward, with the fury
of vengeance in his heart, and laying his own hand the first
on the bars of the castle-gate, swung back the largest on its
pivot. Another moment, and, his men seconding him, the
heavy leaves revolved, grating hoarsely on their hinges, and
instantly in rushed, mad with despair, the four routiers.

It might be, that they only hoped to die by the soldiers'
weapon; it might be that they yet had a thought to master the
Coucy, and so to win the castle. Whatever were their hopes,
they endured but for a moment; for, though they fought resolutely
with their short weapons, they were opposed to the
long lances which the men of Tankarville had snatched up,
and the three followers of Talebardin were borne headlong

into the moat, and there, carried down by the weight of their
armor, miserably perished.

Nor did their chief fare better; for as he forced his way in,
striking tremendous blows in all directions, the champion
dealt him one blow on the crown of his cervalliere, so justly
calculated, that it dashed the stout casque to shivers, and
brought him down, as he intended, stunned but not slain. The
gates were secured again; and, before he recovered his senses,
the routier was fettered hand and foot, and dragged rudely
up to the esplanade, where to expiate his crimes by an
unsoldierly and slavish death.

But before the knight followed up the stair, he paused above
the grating whence that said voice had issued, and cried
aloud cheerily —

“Who cried for rescue on the Tankarville? If you be
wronged in anything, speak now and have redress, or be for
ever silent. Who cried upon the Tankarville?”

“It is I, beau sire,” replied the voice; “I, whose good
luck it was, not an hour since, to bring you off from the routiers!”

“Splendor of God!” cried the count, his eyes seeming to
flash fire through the bars of his vizor, and he stamped violently
on the ground as he spoke — “Splendor of God! who has
dared do this thing, or who am I that living man should do the
Coucy this dishonor!”

“It is the seneschal, beau sire,” replied Ermold. “He
has some grudge against this brave youth, and swore a foul
oath, though you heard it not, that he should hang to-morrow!”

“Sooner himself, vile knave!” replied the Coucy. “He
shall change places with the lad, or ere an hour. Go find the
chatelaine de Verneuil, Ermold de Marcy; greet her from me
as from the count of Tankarville, not from Sir Hugues de
Coucy, mark me! show her how this has come to pass, and

crave of her, as my boon, the instant freedom of the serf, for it
comports not with the honor of the Tankarville to owe life to a
slave. With the seneschal, pray her that she take order, as
she shall judge the best. Tell her, meanwhile, from me to
fear nothing. The peril is overpast already; and, ere another
sun, not one of these villains shall pollute the village with his
presence.”

He said no more, but ascended to the platform, where the
routier stood bareheaded, and bound hand and foot, with a
stout cord about his neck, the end of which was in the hand
of the valiant man-at-arms, Giles Ivernois. The robber was pale
as death already, even to his lips; yet his eye was bright and
firm, and his demeanor steady. The pride of the soldier overmastered
the terrors of the robber; and he was resolute to die
dauntless.

He even affected a smile, as the champion approached him
— “Well, beau sire de Coucy,” he said half insolently, “I
would have held you to ransom when I had you in my power;
and I now look to you for the like courtesy at your hands.
As a good man-at-arms, and knowing my own worth, I fix my
ransom at twenty thousand crowns of the sun, and the surrender
of my strong castle Trequier, in Brittany. My men
shall draw off at once, and I will remain myself your hostage
for due performance of the contract, until the whole be paid.”

“Ay! indeed will you, Talebard Talebardin,” returned the
knight gravely. “Even if you could give me Paris, in lieu
of your strong castle of Trequier, and all Guienne, Poitou, and
Brittany, in lieu of your twenty thousand crowns of the sun,
you should hang under this blessed sun of heaven, and your
carcase should lie in yonder moat until the day of judgment,
when the archangel's trumpet shall awaken it unto perdition
everlasting!”

“Proud lord, thou liest!” shouted the equally proud robber,

gnashing his teeth between rage and anguish. “Proud lord,
thou liest! to thy teeth, I tell thee so; even as I defy thee.
And if I do go hence to perdition, as thou sayest, I care not —
for I shall meet thee there, thou feudal tyrant, thou lewd lord,
and cruel conqueror! I summon thee to hell, and that within
twelve hours; and now to hell or heaven as it may be! but
not, liar, by the halter or the gallows! Ha! ha! Talebard!
Talebard! Sainct Diable for Talebardin!”

And as he ended, before any one suspected his intention, he
darted forward with so sudden a jerk, and so strong an impetus,
that he snatched the end of the halter out of the hands of
Ivernois, and bounded forward to the battlements as eagerly as
if to banquet-board, or to bridal bed.

Quick, however, as he was, both of intent and action, there
was one quicker yet than he; for, as he darted to the sheer
descent, with the end of the halter trailing behind him over
the platform, the Coucy set his mailed foot on it, half arresting
it as it ran out; and, even before the robber took his death-spring,
he had seized the slack in his hands and flung it round
the flag-staff, where it was instantly secured by the men-at-arms.

Talebard leaped into mid air, utterly unconscious that his
suicidal purpose was frustrated, until the noose checked him,
and he was dashed heavily against the castle-wall, whence he
rebounded again and again in his clashing panoply, until his
foul soul went to its appointed place, winged on a grisly imprecation,
which was the last word, on earth, of Talebard
Talebardin.

8. CHAPTER VIII.
DEATH UNDER SHIELD.

As the spirit of the murderer and villain passed away,
whither we dare not say, the kettledrums and trumpets rang
out triumphantly, and the loud shout of “Verneuil, Verneuil,
and Tankarville! and so perish all the foes of the gentle Norman
race!” rose wildly and triumphantly into the air, and the
great tocsin of the castle tolled dismally, the death alarum of
the dishonored dead.

A moment or two later, Ermold de Marcy and an elderly
man dressed in black velvet, the chamberlain of the castle,
made their appearance on the ramparts, conducting the young
serf, who had been instantly liberated from his dungeon at the
knight's request, but who still wore an iron collar about his
neck, to which had been attached a small light chain of the
same metal.

The chamberlain bowed low as he approached the count,
and when he stood before him holding the serf by the chain —
“Fair sir,” he said, “lord count of Tankarville, knight of
St. Denys, and the Holy Ghost, peer of France, noble of the
Roman empire, these from Gabrielle, chatelaine de Verneuil,
gratefully greeting. She thanks you for herself and for her
lord now absent in the field, the sieur de Floris, who present
would have known better how to entreat you; she thanks you
for her life, and, more than life, for her honor. She admits
that she owes you all, the castle she inhabits, the lands she
holds in fee or in fief, herself and all that belongs to her, from
her and hers unto you and yours for ever. And now through

my hands, she thus gives you handsel of the same, the castle
and the lands of Verneuil, to herself of her own right heretofore
pertaining, with all its dues and droits and service, and
vert and venison, and men and maids, serfs of the soil for ever,
here in the person of this man, Henri le Noir of this hamlet
of Verneuil, and seeing that he is serf of the soil and may not
be moved thence, ten roods of ground now set off to his occupation,
and the cabin he inhabits — to you and yours, Count
Hugues de Tankarville, to have and to hold, to give or to sell,
to head or to hang, at your pleasure. Hear this, all ye who
are present, and bear witness, now and always!”

Then the knight received the chain into his hands, and uncovering
his head, made answer: “I, Hugues count de Tankarville,
knight of St. Denys, and the Holy Ghost, peer of
France, noble of the German, do gratefully accept the thanks
of the chatelaine, and this her homage and transfer of her
castle and lands of Verneuil, with all droits and dues and services
thereunto appertaining — and more especially this handsel
of the same, this man Henri le Noir, and these ten roods
of ground now set off to his occupation, and this cabin he inhabits,
and him and these I take and accept from her and hers
unto me and mine, to have and to hold, to give or to sell, to
head or to hang, as to us shall seem good for ever. But all
besides these, the lands and castle of Verneuil, with its dues
and droits, its services, its verts and venison, its men and
maids, serfs of the soil, I restore and make over from me and
mine unto her and hers, as it were sin and shame, unworthy
of stricken knight and belted noble, to deprive so bright and
beautiful a lady of anything of her beholdings.”

Then he stooped down toward the serf, who was kneeling
at his feet, and taking both his hands into his own — “Henri
le Noir,” he asked solemnly, “although you may not contest
it, seeing that it is lawfully performed and duly, do you accept

the transfer from the chatelaine of Verneuil, your lady, to me
Count Hugues of Tankarville, your lord, from hers to be mine
so long as you shall live, to be true servant to me and mine
till death.”

“I do,” replied the man steadily, “and I will be true man
to you, lord count, so aid me God! for ever.

“An armorer and a file,” cried the count, turning to Ivernois.
“And give me a white wand, that of this serf, with
Heaven's good blessing, we make this day a freeman. Bring
trumpets, too, and a pursuivant, if there be one.”

Then as the wand was placed in his hand, seeing that the
armorer stood ready with his file, and that in the absence of a
regular armorer Ermold de Marcy had assumed the office, he
touched the man lightly on the head and on both shoulders
with the rod, exclaiming, “Henri le Noir, serf thou art not,
nor villeyn, any longer, but freeman and landholder and vassal
of the Tankarville, for my ten roods of land I give thee in Verneuil,
from me and mine unto thee and thine for ever, only
thou shalt do homage to, for the same, and serve me with man-service
in the field, one hundred days in the year, when my
broad banner shall be displayed and my trumpets blown for
Tankarville. Sound now and make proclamation.”

A shrill blast was blown up at the word, and Ermold de
Marcy made loud proclamation.

Then Henri le Noir again placed both his hands in the
hands of his feudal lord, and swore him fealty and faith, and
did him homage for his land.

And again the trumpet sounded, and again Ermold made
proclamation.

And the armorer filed away the iron collar from his neck,
and the white wand with which his lord had manumitted him
was placed in his hand, and a sharp sword was girded about
his waist, and he who had knelt down but a few short minutes'

space before, a serf and slave, whose life his lord might take
at any moment, with reason or without reason, arose a free
cultivator, a free owner of the soil, a free man-at-arms, capable
even to be stricken a knight, or by the emperor to be made
noble and to be endowed with coat-armor.

And so strange was in those day the admixture of ferocity
with gentleness and even grace in the doings of chivalry, that
even in the midst of the fury and frenzy of that desperate feud,
the condottieri, mere brigands as they were and banditti, without
the walls, panting as they were to avenge their leader's
death, offered no interruption to the ceremony, shot no arrow
upon the walls, but stood there silent and reverent spectators of
the impressive scene, for they had recognised the person of
the manumitted serf, as he who had performed the gallant deed
of arms and rescued the champion, and soldiers before they became
routiers, the soldier-spirit was still predominant among
them, and they could both themselves honor valor, and rejoice
to see it rewarded by the brave and noble.

Therefore they now stood silent and observant, nor that
only, but when the trumpets and kettle-drums struck upon the
battlements in honor of the new-made freeman, their bugles
sent back an answering flourish, and their voices sent forth a
full-mouthed cheer, even while the carcase of their late chief
Talebardin wavered in the wind, like the vilest carrion swaying
from the castle-walls.

Within a minute or two of the completion of the ceremonial,
and almost at the same instant, the hard galloping of horses
was heard by the beleaguered garrison from two several directions,
of one, and apparently the nearer of the two, the sounds
came down the road, by which the Lord of Tankarville had
gained the fortalice of Verneuil, and by which the routiers had
subsequently come down upon them — the other seemed to be
approaching by a strong by-path leading down through the

woods from the higher ground to the rearward of the castle,
where there was a small postern gate or sallyport, unprovided
with a drawbridge, the want of which was supplied in time of
need by a plank run out from the open door and guided across
the moat by a rope from the battlements. On this side, not
being sufficiently strong in numbers to invest the place regularly,
and having neither ladders nor any other engines by aid
of which they might hope to cross the deep wet ditch or to
scale the blank walls, the routiers had bestowed no more attention,
after the first reconnoitring parties had examined, and
reported it impracticable.

But now as the Coucy noted the distant horse-hoof, which
seemed to be drowned to the ears of the marauders by the
nearer clang which was approaching them, then he conceived
the idea that reinforcements to the robbers and relief to himself
were at once approaching, and in this he was confirmed,
when his acute sense of hearing, long sharpened by experience
of every warlike stratagem, perceived that the rider, whoever
he was, had left the beaten track, probably from fearing
its betrayal of his approach, and was making his way through
the wood-paths, where the mossy soil gave no tidings to ears
that were not awake to particular suspicion.

Without a moment's delay the chief despatched Ermold de
Marcy to keep watch on the rearward esplanade, and immediately
afterward ordered Henri le Noir, who now as a landholder
had received the title of Henri of Verneuil, to arm
himself cap-a-pie as a man-at-arms, and then to go hold himself
in readiness at the postern to admit any friendly messenger,
should one arrive, while he himself kept a jealous out-look
on the proceedings of the marauders.

It was soon seen that his forebodings were correct, for within
five minutes after his sending Ermold to the rear, a horseman
galloped down to join the marauders, and was received

with a burst of savage merriment and congratulation that
proved him an old and favorite companion.

While he was yet observing what should follow, one of the
menials of the place came up requesting the Count de Tankarville,
on the part of his young esquire, that he would be
pleased to join him at the postern on matters of great moment.

The rider, whose approach they had heard, had shown himself
on foot on the farther bank of the castle ditch, leaving his
horse picketed in the pinewood, and being recognised by
Henri of Verneuil, had hastily disarmed himself, swum the
moat, and been admitted at the postern. He was the chosen
page of the Sieur de Floris, who it appeared in crossing the
country in quite a different direction toward Mirepoix, had
learned that a roving band under the famous, or rather infamous,
Aymerigot Marcel was on its way with twenty spears to
attempt a surprise of Verneuil; and suspecting in no wise that
this was a concerted movement, and that the castle was already
beset, he had sent on his page to warn the people of
their peril, and to announce his coming by daybreak at the
latest with fifty lances to the rescue.

Even while he was speaking with the page, a loud blast on
a trumpet blowing a point of parley, as it was termed, recalled
him to the bartizan, and he found there on the esplanade, with
a white flag displayed and a trumpeter at his side, the Green
Rider, who now alone survived of the leaders of the free companions,
having succeeded by the death of Talebardin to the
chief command of the band.

He now summoned the garrison in form, with all the frankness
and not a little of the courtesy of a soldier — it was he
whom De Coucy had remarked from the first onslaught as
bearing no disgraceful emblems of butchery or bloodshed, beyond
the harness of a man-at-arms, with the green plume and
the cognizance of the white dragon on his shield, by which he

easily distinguished him as a Saxon outlaw, said to be a bastard
of high descent, known far and wide through France as
a free rider by the title of the green esquire, a soldier of much
renown in the field, who had never tainted his fair fame by
any deeds of cruelty or treason, and whose worst censure was
that he had at times associated with those incarnate fiends,
Talebard Talebardin and the Rouge Batard.

He now addressing De Coucy with deep reverence, and
something almost of humility in his demeanor, announced to
him that he had just received the tidings of the approach of
Aymerigot Marcel with such a reinforcement of men-at-arms,
besides ladders and military engines, as would place the garrison
entirely at their mercy.

“He will be here, my lord,” he continued, “before midnight;
and, believe me, he here, defence is hopeless. However, when
Aymerigot is in the field, you may have heard, beau sire,
mercy is not either to sex or age — regard is not to beauty or
to valor — but torture and violation, the rack, gibbet, and the
firebrand, to the bravest, and the fairest. Therefore I do beseech
you, noble sir, accept the terms of composition which I
offer you, while I have yet the power to offer and you the
time to profit by them. March out in all safety and honor,
with all your arms and apparel and effects, your mules and
horses, men and maids, and the chatelaine of Verneuil, and go
whither you will under safe conduct, leaving to us the castle
only and the fixtures. Go! only for God's sake and the
lady's! Go! beau sire de Tankarville! and I, even I, free
companion though I be, will bear witness to the nobleness of
your defence, to your undaunted valor, and untainted honor!”

“And what shall vouch that the safe conduct will be respected?”
replied the knight, with a grave inclination of his
head, as if somewhat moved by the manner of the green
rider.

“The honor of an Englishman,” replied the free companion,
raising his vizor, and showing the fair skin, blue eyes, and
auburn hair of his race; “and who shall question that?”

“Not I, good fellow,” said the knight. “But now mark
me, surrender I may not, nor march out save with lance in rest
and trumpets sounding, the charge from any place I have determined
to defend. But trust me, sir esquire, in guerdon for this
thou hast done, on mine honor! thou shalt die as a soldier
under shield by the lance of De Coucy, and not as a robber by
the hangman and the cord!”

“Grammercy! for your courtesy, beau sire,” answered the
other with a smile that was almost a sneer — “and, in requital
of it, I pledge my word, that you shall be harassed by no
treacherous night attack, but we will fight it out to-morrow
by fair daylight, with the sun to look upon the deeds of brave
men, and the free air to bear their fame upward to heaven; and
while I breathe, good knight, no harm shall light upon your
chatelaine.”

And therewith they parted, to meet but once again, and then
no more for ever.

All that day and half of the long night, they toiled in the
court-yard, knight and esquire, man-at-arms and vassal, squaring
the mighty beams and hewing solid planks, forging stout
chains and ponderous hinges, till ere the castle clocks tolled
midnight, a new drawbridge lay ready on the pavement, with
all prepared to raise it at an instant's notice.

Horses were fed and saddled, armors were polished, weapons
ground, torches and cressets were extinguished, and save
the count of Tankarville himself, and the warders on the walls,
all else lay down to snatch an hour's repose before the desperate
affray which all foresaw with the coming dawn.

He, with a dim foreboding of he knew not what, prayed
fervently before the altar in the castle-chapel, and made confession,

although there was no human ear to listen, no human
lip to pronounce absolution.

At one hour after midnight, the tramp of many horses, and
the dash and clang of harness, announced the arrival of Aymerigot,
and half suspicious of treason, the knight aroused his
garrison, got them under arms silently and in darkness.

But for once the routiers kept faith — the din ceased in the
encampment, the lights went out one by one, and silence of
dewy night fell over tent and bivouac as peacefully as if the
deadliest of foes were not almost arrayed beneath it face to
face.

An hour later, the Tankarville himself dismissed the page
of Floris, as he had come, by the postern, with instructions to
bring up his lord with his lances on the rear of the free companions,
as soon as might be. Then with the aid of his best
men, the great gates were opened silently, the new chains rove
through the iron pulleys and hooked to the outer end of the
pont-levis, which was slowly and guardedly thrust forward, until
the hinges fell into their sockets, the huge bolts were driven
in, and the bridge, hauled up to its supports, stood as if by
magic, even as it had stood the previous morning, when it admitted
the brave train of Tankarville.

The night passed speedily, and the gray dawn was nigh,
and the watchwords and orders of the freebooters arming in
their huts came to the ears of the garrison, but came winged
with no terrors, for in the dim, dewy twilight they might discern
a lance with the pennoncelle of Floris pitched in the
ground before the postern, telling of aid at hand.

The vassals and the half-armed serving-men mustered upon
the ramparts, but in the court-yard champed and pawed twelve
powerful war-horses, backed by twelve champions all in steel,
with De Coucy at the head, his broad banner displayed, and
his lance-points erected — while four stout grooms manned the

chains of the pont-levis, and stood to the bars of the great
gate.

The sun rose, and with a wild, discordant yell, and the barbarous
blast of horns and bugles, the free companions formed
for the assault, some bearing ladders, others mantelets and
pavesses, and covered by a cloud of archers.

Up went the banners of Verneuil and Floris, and awoke the
din of the tocsin, the deep roar of the kettledrums, and the clear
flourish of the Norman trumpets, seeming to defy earth and
heaven.

Then, bearing terror to the souls of the routiers, another
Norman trumpet answered, and a tremendous shout arouse —
“Floris for Verneuil! Floris to the rescue!”

Down went the drawbridge in their front, and forth, lance in
rest, banner displayed, and trumpet sounding to the charge,
forth came De Coucy and his men — “St. Paul! St. Paul!” —
while down the pine hills, in their rear, poured the fresh
lances of De Floris.

Aymerigot wheeled with his own band to meet the lord of
Verneuil; the green esquire charged his lance gallantly and
well, and met De Coucy fair in full career. His lance caught
in the bars of De Coucy's casque unhelmed him, but the
knight's spear-point struck the free-rider's shield on the chief,
bored through shield, plastron, and cuirass, and breaking in
his bosom, hurled him dead to the earth. But the Coucy's
charger, wearied and overdone, went down untouched, and
rolling over its lord's right thigh, pinned him to the ground,
that he could not arise, and the next moment Aymerigot and
his party, unable to endure the shock of the lances of Verneuil,
passed over him in disarray and disorder, the brigand chief
bringing up the rear.

But, as he passed, his eye fell upon the dismounted champion,
and swinging his two-handed sword on high, he cut him down

with a ghastly blow, shearing his left shoulder, through plate
and mail, almost asunder.

They bore him into the castle, into the presence of the lady
he had so long and fondly loved — he had so nobly rescued.
They unhelmed him — he was pale, speechless; but his eye
was as bright as ever — his senses had not wavered. She
recognised him — fell fainting on his bosom — her right hand
clasped in his cold fingers, her lips pressed to his own in a
last, chaste, permitted kiss, the crucifix of his God before his
glazing eyes, under shield, in steel harness, nobly, happily,
his great sould passed away! —

He had feared God, loved his lady, held honor ever in his
eye — and without a taint on his fame — pure lover, loyal noble,
gallant knight — he went fearless and faithful to his last account.

Honor to the brave! — rest to the ashes! Pray for the soul
of De Coucy!