As soon as the word "coward" had been p.r.o.nounced by Sir Ludwig, his opponent, uttering a curse far too horrible to be inscribed here, had wheeled back his powerful piebald, and brought his lance to the rest.
"Ha! Beauseant!" cried he. "Allah humdillah!" "Twas the battle-cry in Palestine of the irresistible Knights Hospitallers. "Look to thyself, Sir Knight, and for mercy from heaven! I will give thee none."
"A Bugo for Katzenellenbogen!" exclaimed Sir Ludwig, piously: that, too, was the well-known war-cry of his princely race.
"I will give the signal," said the old hermit, waving his pipe.
"Knights, are you ready? One, two, three. LOS!" (let go.)
At the signal, the two steeds tore up the ground like whirlwinds; the two knights, two flashing perpendicular ma.s.ses of steel, rapidly converged; the two lances met upon the two shields of either, and shivered, splintered, shattered into ten hundred thousand pieces, which whirled through the air here and there, among the rocks, or in the trees, or in the river. The two horses fell back trembling on their haunches, where they remained for half a minute or so.
"Holy Buffo! a brave stroke!" said the old hermit. "Marry, but a splinter wellnigh took off my nose!" The honest hermit waved his pipe in delight, not perceiving that one of the splinters had carried off the head of it, and rendered his favorite amus.e.m.e.nt impossible. "Ha! they are to it again! O my! how they go to with their great swords! Well stricken, gray! Well parried, piebald! Ha, that was a slicer! Go it, piebald! go it, gray!--go it, gray! go it, pie--Peccavi! peccavi!" said the old man, here suddenly closing his eyes, and falling down on his knees. "I forgot I was a man of peace." And the next moment, muttering a hasty matin, he sprung down the ledge of rock, and was by the side of the combatants.
The battle was over. Good knight as Sir Gottfried was, his strength and skill had not been able to overcome Sir Ludwig the Hombourger, with RIGHT on his side. He was bleeding at every point of his armor: he had been run through the body several times, and a cut in tierce, delivered with tremendous dexterity, had cloven the crown of his helmet of Damascus steel, and pa.s.sing through the cerebellum and sensorium, had split his nose almost in twain.
His mouth foaming--his face almost green--his eyes full of blood--his brains spattered over his forehead, and several of his teeth knocked out,--the discomfited warrior presented a ghastly spectacle, as, reeling under the effects of the last tremendous blow which the Knight of Hombourg dealt, Sir Gottfried fell heavily from the saddle of his piebald charger; the frightened animal whisked his tail wildly with a shriek and a snort, plunged out his hind legs, trampling for one moment upon the feet of the prostrate Gottfried, thereby causing him to shriek with agony, and then galloped away riderless.
Away! ay, away!--away amid the green vineyards and golden cornfields; away up the steep mountains, where he frightened the eagles in their eyries; away down the clattering ravines, where the flashing cataracts tumble; away through the dark pine-forests, where the hungry wolves are howling away over the dreary wolds, where the wild wind walks alone; away through the plashing quagmires, where the will-o"-the-wisp slunk frightened among the reeds; away through light and darkness, storm and sunshine; away by tower and town, high-road and hamlet. Once a turnpike-man would have detained him; but, ha! ha! he charged the pike, and cleared it at a bound. Once the Cologne Diligence stopped the way: he charged the Diligence, he knocked off the cap of the conductor on the roof, and yet galloped wildly, madly, furiously, irresistibly on! Brave horse! gallant steed! snorting child of Araby! On went the horse, over mountains, rivers, turnpikes, apple-women; and never stopped until he reached a livery-stable in Cologne where his master was accustomed to put him up.
CHAPTER VI.
THE CONFESSION.
But we have forgotten, meanwhile, that prostrate individual. Having examined the wounds in his side, legs, head, and throat, the old hermit (a skilful leech) knelt down by the side of the vanquished one and said, "Sir Knight, it is my painful duty to state to you that you are in an exceedingly dangerous condition, and will not probably survive."
"Say you so, Sir Priest? then "tis time I make my confession. Hearken you, Priest, and you, Sir Knight, whoever you be."
Sir Ludwig (who, much affected by the scene, had been tying his horse up to a tree), lifted his visor and said, "Gottfried of G.o.desberg! I am the friend of thy kinsman, Margrave Karl, whose happiness thou hast ruined; I am the friend of his chaste and virtuous lady, whose fair fame thou hast belied; I am the G.o.dfather of young Count Otto, whose heritage thou wouldst have appropriated. Therefore I met thee in deadly fight, and overcame thee, and have wellnigh finished thee. Speak on."
"I have done all this," said the dying man, "and here, in my last hour, repent me. The Lady Theodora is a spotless lady; the youthful Otto the true son of his father--Sir Hildebrandt is not his father, but his UNCLE."
"Gracious Buffo!" "Celestial Bugo!" here said the hermit and the Knight of Hombourg simultaneously, clasping their hands.
"Yes, his uncle; but with the BAR-SINISTER in his scutcheon. Hence he could never be acknowledged by the family; hence, too, the Lady Theodora"s spotless purity (though the young people had been brought up together) could never be brought to own the relationship."
"May I repeat your confession?" asked the hermit.
"With the greatest pleasure in life: carry my confession to the Margrave, and pray him give me pardon. Were there--a notary-public present," slowly gasped the knight, the film of dissolution glazing over his eyes, "I would ask--you--two--gentlemen to witness it. I would gladly--sign the deposition--that is, if I could wr-wr-wr-wr-ite!" A faint shuddering smile--a quiver, a gasp, a gurgle--the blood gushed from his mouth in black volumes . . . .
"He will never sin more," said the hermit, solemnly.
"May heaven a.s.soilzie him!" said Sir Ludwig. "Hermit, he was a gallant knight. He died with harness on his back and with truth on his lips: Ludwig of Hombourg would ask no other death. . . . ."
An hour afterwards the princ.i.p.al servants at the Castle of G.o.desberg were rather surprised to see the n.o.ble Lord Louis trot into the court-yard of the castle, with a companion on the crupper of his saddle.
"Twas the venerable hermit of Rolandseck, who, for the sake of greater celerity, had adopted this undignified conveyance, and whose appearance and little dumpy legs might well create hilarity among the "pampered menials" who are always found lounging about the houses of the great.
He skipped off the saddle with considerable lightness however; and Sir Ludwig, taking the reverend man by the arm and frowning the jeering servitors into awe, bade one of them lead him to the presence of his Highness the Margrave.
"What has chanced?" said the inquisitive servitor. "The riderless horse of Sir Gottfried was seen to gallop by the outer wall anon. The Margrave"s Grace has never quitted your lordship"s chamber, and sits as one distraught."
"Hold thy prate, knave, and lead us on!" And so saying, the Knight and his Reverence moved into the well-known apartment, where, according to the servitor"s description, the wretched Margrave sat like a stone.
Ludwig took one of the kind broken-hearted man"s hands, the hermit seized the other, and began (but on account of his great age, with a prolixity which we shall not endeavor to imitate) to narrate the events which we have already described. Let the dear reader fancy, while his Reverence speaks, the glazed eyes of the Margrave gradually lighting up with attention; the flush of joy which mantles in his countenance--the start--the throb--the almost delirious outburst of hysteric exultation with which, when the whole truth was made known, he clasped the two messengers of glad tidings to his breast, with an energy that almost choked the aged recluse! "Ride, ride this instant to the Margravine--say I have wronged her, that it is all right, that she may come back--that I forgive her--that I apologize if you will"--and a secretary forthwith despatched a note to that effect, which was carried off by a fleet messenger.
"Now write to the Superior of the monastery at Cologne, and bid him send me back my boy, my darling, my Otto--my Otto of roses!" said the fond father, making the first play upon words he had ever attempted in his life. But what will not paternal love effect? The secretary (smiling at the joke) wrote another letter, and another fleet messenger was despatched on another horse.
"And now," said Sir Ludwig, playfully, "let us to lunch. Holy hermit, are you for a snack?"
The hermit could not say nay on an occasion so festive, and the three gentles seated themselves to a plenteous repast; for which the remains of the feast of yesterday offered, it need not be said, ample means.
"They will be home by dinner-time," said the exulting father. "Ludwig!
reverend hermit! we will carry on till then." And the cup pa.s.sed gayly round, and the laugh and jest circulated, while the three happy friends sat confidentially awaiting the return of the Margravine and her son.
But alas! said we not rightly at the commencement of a former chapter, that betwixt the lip and the raised wine-cup there is often many a spill? that our hopes are high, and often, too often, vain? About three hours after the departure of the first messenger, he returned, and with an exceedingly long face knelt down and presented to the Margrave a billet to the following effect:--
"CONVENT OF NONNENWERTH, Friday Afternoon.
"SIR--I have submitted too long to your ill-usage, and am disposed to bear it no more. I will no longer be made the b.u.t.t of your ribald satire, and the object of your coa.r.s.e abuse. Last week you threatened me with your cane! On Tuesday last you threw a wine-decanter at me, which hit the butler, it is true, but the intention was evident. This morning, in the presence of all the servants, you called me by the most vile, abominable name, which heaven forbid I should repeat! You dismissed me from your house under a false accusation. You sent me to this odious convent to be immured for life. Be it so! I will not come back, because, forsooth; you relent. Anything is better than a residence with a wicked, coa.r.s.e, violent, intoxicated, brutal monster like yourself. I remain here for ever and blush to be obliged to sign myself
"THEODORA VON G.o.dESBERG.
"P.S.--I hope you do not intend to keep all my best gowns, jewels, and wearing-apparel; and make no doubt you dismissed me from your house in order to make way for some vile hussy, whose eyes I would like to tear out. T. V. G."
CHAPTER VII.
THE SENTENCE.
This singular doc.u.ment, ill.u.s.trative of the pa.s.sions of women at all times, and particularly of the manners of the early ages, struck dismay into the heart of the Margrave.
"Are her ladyship"s insinuations correct?" asked the hermit, in a severe tone. "To correct a wife with a cane is a venial, I may say a justifiable practice; but to fling a bottle at her is ruin both to the liquor and to her."
"But she sent a carving-knife at me first," said the heartbroken husband. "O jealousy, cursed jealousy, why, why did I ever listen to thy green and yellow tongue?"
"They quarrelled; but they loved each other sincerely," whispered Sir Ludwig to the hermit: who began to deliver forthwith a lecture upon family discord and marital authority, which would have sent his two hearers to sleep, but for the arrival of the second messenger, whom the Margrave had despatched to Cologne for his son. This herald wore a still longer face than that of his comrade who preceded him.
"Where is my darling?" roared the agonized parent. "Have ye brought him with ye?"
"N--no," said the man, hesitating.
"I will flog the knave soundly when he comes," cried the father, vainly endeavoring, under an appearance of sternness, to hide his inward emotion and tenderness.
"Please, your Highness," said the messenger, making a desperate effort, "Count Otto is not at the convent."
"Know ye, knave, where he is?"