Ivanhoe, Walter Scott [philippa perry book .txt] 📗

and malignant eye of Front-de-Boeuf possessed some portion of that supposed power over his unfortunate prisoner. The Jew sat with his mouth agape, and his eyes fixed on the savage baron with such earnestness of terror, that his frame seemed literally to shrink together, and to diminish in size while encountering the fierce Norman’s fixed and baleful gaze. The unhappy Isaac was deprived not only of the power of rising to make the obeisance which his terror dictated, but he could not even doff his cap, or utter any word of supplication; so strongly was he agitated by the conviction that tortures and death were impending over him.

On the other hand, the stately form of the Norman appeared to dilate in magnitude, like that of the eagle, which ruffles up its plumage when about to pounce on its defenceless prey. He paused within three steps of the corner in which the unfortunate Jew had now, as it were, coiled himself up into the smallest possible space, and made a sign for one of the slaves to approach. The black satellite came forward accordingly, and, producing from his basket a large pair of scales and several weights, he laid them at the feet of Front-de-Boeuf, and again retired to the respectful distance, at which his companion had already taken his station.

The motions of these men were slow and solemn, as if there impended over their souls some preconception of horror and of cruelty. Front-de-Boeuf himself opened the scene by thus addressing his ill-fated captive.

“Most accursed dog of an accursed race,” he said, awaking with his deep and sullen voice the sullen echoes of his dungeon vault, “seest thou these scales?”

The unhappy Jew returned a feeble affirmative.

“In these very scales shalt thou weigh me out,” said the relentless Baron, “a thousand silver pounds, after the just measure and weight of the Tower of London.”

“Holy Abraham!” returned the Jew, finding voice through the very extremity of his danger, “heard man ever such a demand?⁠—Who ever heard, even in a minstrel’s tale, of such a sum as a thousand pounds of silver?⁠—What human sight was ever blessed with the vision of such a mass of treasure?⁠—Not within the walls of York, ransack my house and that of all my tribe, wilt thou find the tithe of that huge sum of silver that thou speakest of.”

“I am reasonable,” answered Front-de-Boeuf, “and if silver be scant, I refuse not gold. At the rate of a mark of gold for each six pounds of silver, thou shalt free thy unbelieving carcass from such punishment as thy heart has never even conceived.”

“Have mercy on me, noble knight!” exclaimed Isaac; “I am old, and poor, and helpless. It were unworthy to triumph over me⁠—It is a poor deed to crush a worm.”

“Old thou mayst be,” replied the knight; “more shame to their folly who have suffered thee to grow grey in usury and knavery⁠—Feeble thou mayst be, for when had a Jew either heart or hand⁠—But rich it is well known thou art.”

“I swear to you, noble knight,” said the Jew “by all which I believe, and by all which we believe in common⁠—”

“Perjure not thyself,” said the Norman, interrupting him, “and let not thine obstinacy seal thy doom, until thou hast seen and well considered the fate that awaits thee. Think not I speak to thee only to excite thy terror, and practise on the base cowardice thou hast derived from thy tribe. I swear to thee by that which thou dost not believe, by the gospel which our church teaches, and by the keys which are given her to bind and to loose, that my purpose is deep and peremptory. This dungeon is no place for trifling. Prisoners ten thousand times more distinguished than thou have died within these walls, and their fate hath never been known! But for thee is reserved a long and lingering death, to which theirs were luxury.”

He again made a signal for the slaves to approach, and spoke to them apart, in their own language; for he also had been in Palestine, where perhaps, he had learnt his lesson of cruelty. The Saracens produced from their baskets a quantity of charcoal, a pair of bellows, and a flask of oil. While the one struck a light with a flint and steel, the other disposed the charcoal in the large rusty grate which we have already mentioned, and exercised the bellows until the fuel came to a red glow.

“Seest thou, Isaac,” said Front-de-Boeuf, “the range of iron bars above the glowing charcoal?27 on that warm couch thou shalt lie, stripped of thy clothes as if thou wert to rest on a bed of down. One of these slaves shall maintain the fire beneath thee, while the other shall anoint thy wretched limbs with oil, lest the roast should burn.⁠—Now, choose betwixt such a scorching bed and the payment of a thousand pounds of silver; for, by the head of my father, thou hast no other option.”

“It is impossible,” exclaimed the miserable Jew⁠—“it is impossible that your purpose can be real! The good God of nature never made a heart capable of exercising such cruelty!”

“Trust not to that, Isaac,” said Front-de-Boeuf, “it were a fatal error. Dost thou think that I, who have seen a town sacked, in which thousands of my Christian countrymen perished by sword, by flood, and by fire, will blench from my purpose for the outcries or screams of one single wretched Jew?⁠—or thinkest thou that these swarthy slaves, who have neither law, country, nor conscience, but their master’s will⁠—who use the poison, or the stake, or the poniard, or the cord, at his slightest wink⁠—thinkest thou that they will have mercy, who do not even understand the language in which it is asked?⁠—Be wise, old man; discharge thyself of a portion of thy superfluous wealth; repay to the hands of a Christian a part of what thou hast acquired by the usury thou