Ivanhoe, Walter Scott [the lemonade war series txt] 📗
- Author: Walter Scott
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another.”
Wamba did him the service he required, and they rode side by side
for some time, during which Gurth maintained a moody silence. At
length he could repress his feelings no longer.
“Friend Wamba,” said he, “of all those who are fools enough to
serve Cedric, thou alone hast dexterity enough to make thy folly
acceptable to him. Go to him, therefore, and tell him that
neither for love nor fear will Gurth serve him longer. He may
strike the head from me---he may scourge me---he may load me with
irons---but henceforth he shall never compel me either to love or
to obey him. Go to him, then, and tell him that Gurth the son of
Beowulph renounces his service.”
“Assuredly,” said Wamba, “fool as I am, I shall not do your
fool’s errand. Cedric hath another javelin stuck into his
girdle, and thou knowest he does not always miss his mark.”
“I care not,” replied Gurth, “how soon he makes a mark of me.
Yesterday he left Wilfred, my young master, in his blood. To-day
he has striven to kill before my face the only other living
creature that ever showed me kindness. By St Edmund, St Dunstan,
St Withold, St Edward the Confessor, and every other Saxon saint
in the calendar,” (for Cedric never swore by any that was not of
Saxon lineage, and all his household had the same limited
devotion,) “I will never forgive him!”
“To my thinking now,” said the Jester, who was frequently wont to
act as peace-maker in the family, “our master did not propose to
hurt Fangs, but only to affright him. For, if you observed, he
rose in his stirrups, as thereby meaning to overcast the mark;
and so he would have done, but Fangs happening to bound up at the
very moment, received a scratch, which I will be bound to heal
with a penny’s breadth of tar.”
“If I thought so,” said Gurth---“if I could but think so---but
no---I saw the javelin was well aimed---I heard it whizz through
the air with all the wrathful malevolence of him who cast it, and
it quivered after it had pitched in the ground, as if with regret
for having missed its mark. By the hog dear to St Anthony, I
renounce him!”
And the indignant swineherd resumed his sullen silence, which no
efforts of the Jester could again induce him to break.
Meanwhile Cedric and Athelstane, the leaders of the troop,
conversed together on the state of the land, on the dissensions
of the royal family, on the feuds and quarrels among the Norman
nobles, and on the chance which there was that the oppressed
Saxons might be able to free themselves from the yoke of the
Normans, or at least to elevate themselves into national
consequence and independence, during the civil convulsions which
were likely to ensue. On this subject Cedric was all animation.
The restoration of the independence of his race was the idol of
his heart, to which he had willingly sacrificed domestic
happiness and the interests of his own son. But, in order to
achieve this great revolution in favour of the native English, it
was necessary that they should be united among themselves, and
act under an acknowledged head. The necessity of choosing their
chief from the Saxon blood-royal was not only evident in itself,
but had been made a solemn condition by those whom Cedric had
intrusted with his secret plans and hopes. Athelstane had this
quality at least; and though he had few mental accomplishments or
talents to recommend him as a leader, he had still a goodly
person, was no coward, had been accustomed to martial exercises,
and seemed willing to defer to the advice of counsellors more
wise than himself. Above all, he was known to be liberal and
hospitable, and believed to be good-natured. But whatever
pretensions Athelstane had to be considered as head of the Saxon
confederacy, many of that nation were disposed to prefer to the
title of the Lady Rowena, who drew her descent from Alfred, and
whose father having been a chief renowned for wisdom, courage,
and generosity, his memory was highly honoured by his oppressed
countrymen.
It would have been no difficult thing for Cedric, had he been so
disposed, to have placed himself at the head of a third party, as
formidable at least as any of the others. To counterbalance
their royal descent, he had courage, activity, energy, and, above
all, that devoted attachment to the cause which had procured him
the epithet of The Saxon, and his birth was inferior to none,
excepting only that of Athelstane and his ward. These qualities,
however, were unalloyed by the slightest shade of selfishness;
and, instead of dividing yet farther his weakened nation by
forming a faction of his own, it was a leading part of Cedric’s
plan to extinguish that which already existed, by promoting a
marriage betwixt Rowena and Athelstane. An obstacle occurred to
this his favourite project, in the mutual attachment of his ward
and his son and hence the original cause of the banishment of
Wilfred from the house of his father.
This stern measure Cedric had adopted, in hopes that, during
Wilfred’s absence, Rowena might relinquish her preference, but in
this hope he was disappointed; a disappointment which might be
attributed in part to the mode in which his ward had been
educated. Cedric, to whom the name of Alfred was as that of a
deity, had treated the sole remaining scion of that great monarch
with a degree of observance, such as, perhaps, was in those days
scarce paid to an acknowledged princess. Rowena’s will had been
in almost all cases a law to his household; and Cedric himself,
as if determined that her sovereignty should be fully
acknowledged within that little circle at least, seemed to take a
pride in acting as the first of her subjects. Thus trained in
the exercise not only of free will, but despotic authority,
Rowena was, by her previous education, disposed both to resist
and to resent any attempt to control her affections, or dispose
of her hand contrary to her inclinations, and to assert her
independence in a case in which even those females who have been
trained up to obedience and subjection, are not infrequently apt
to dispute the authority of guardians and parents. The opinions
which she felt strongly, she avowed boldly; and Cedric, who could
not free himself from his habitual deference to her opinions,
felt totally at a loss how to enforce his authority of guardian.
It was in vain that he attempted to dazzle her with the prospect
of a visionary throne. Rowena, who possessed strong sense,
neither considered his plan as practicable, nor as desirable, so
far as she was concerned, could it have been achieved. Without
attempting to conceal her avowed preference of Wilfred of
Ivanhoe, she declared that, were that favoured knight out of
question, she would rather take refuge in a convent, than share a
throne with Athelstane, whom, having always despised, she now
began, on account of the trouble she received on his account,
thoroughly to detest.
Nevertheless, Cedric, whose opinions of women’s constancy was far
from strong, persisted in using every means in his power to bring
about the proposed match, in which he conceived he was rendering
an important service to the Saxon cause. The sudden and romantic
appearance of his son in the lists at Ashby, he had justly
regarded as almost a death’s blow to his hopes. His paternal
affection, it is true, had for an instant gained the victory over
pride and patriotism; but both had returned in full force, and
under their joint operation, he was now bent upon making a
determined effort for the union of Athelstane and Rowena,
together with expediting those other measures which seemed
necessary to forward the restoration of Saxon independence.
On this last subject, he was now labouring with Athelstane, not
without having reason, every now and then, to lament, like
Hotspur, that he should have moved such a dish of skimmed milk to
so honourable an action. Athelstane, it is true, was vain
enough, and loved to have his ears tickled with tales of his high
descent, and of his right by inheritance to homage and
sovereignty. But his petty vanity was sufficiently gratified by
receiving this homage at the hands of his immediate attendants,
and of the Saxons who approached him. If he had the courage to
encounter danger, he at least hated the trouble of going to seek
it; and while he agreed in the general principles laid down by
Cedric concerning the claim of the Saxons to independence, and
was still more easily convinced of his own title to reign over
them when that independence should be attained, yet when the
means of asserting these rights came to be discussed, he was
still “Athelstane the Unready,” slow, irresolute,
procrastinating, and unenterprising. The warm and impassioned
exhortations of Cedric had as little effect upon his impassive
temper, as red-hot balls alighting in the water, which produce a
little sound and smoke, and are instantly extinguished.
If, leaving this task, which might be compared to spurring a
tired jade, or to hammering upon cold iron, Cedric fell back to
his ward Rowena, he received little more satisfaction from
conferring with her. For, as his presence interrupted the
discourse between the lady and her favourite attendant upon the
gallantry and fate of Wilfred, Elgitha failed not to revenge
both her mistress and herself, by recurring to the overthrow of
Athelstane in the lists, the most disagreeable subject which
could greet the ears of Cedric. To this sturdy Saxon, therefore,
the day’s journey was fraught with all manner of displeasure and
discomfort; so that he more than once internally cursed the
tournament, and him who had proclaimed it, together with his own
folly in ever thinking of going thither.
At noon, upon the motion of Athelstane, the travellers paused in
a woodland shade by a fountain, to repose their horses and
partake of some provisions, with which the hospitable Abbot had
loaded a sumpter mule. Their repast was a pretty long one; and
these several interruptions rendered it impossible for them to
hope to reach Rotherwood without travelling all night, a
conviction which induced them to proceed on their way at a more
hasty pace than they had hitherto used.
CHAPTER XIX
A train of armed men, some noble dame
Escorting, (so their scatter’d words discover’d,
As unperceived I hung upon their rear,)
Are close at hand, and mean to pass the night
Within the castle.
Orra, a Tragedy
The travellers had now reached the verge of the wooded country,
and were about to plunge into its recesses, held dangerous at
that time from the number of outlaws whom oppression and poverty
had driven to despair, and who occupied the forests in such large
bands as could easily bid defiance to the feeble police of the
period. From these rovers, however, notwithstanding the lateness
of the hour Cedric and Athelstane accounted themselves secure, as
they had in attendance ten servants, besides Wamba and Gurth,
whose aid could not be counted upon, the one being a jester and
the other a captive. It may be added, that in travelling thus
late through the forest, Cedric and Athelstane relied on their
descent and character, as well as their courage. The outlaws,
whom the severity of the forest laws had reduced to this roving
and desperate mode of life, were chiefly peasants and yeomen of
Saxon descent, and were generally supposed to respect the persons
and property of their countrymen.
As the travellers journeyed on their way, they were alarmed by
repeated cries for assistance; and when they rode up to the place
from whence they came, they were surprised to find a horse-litter
placed upon the ground, beside
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