The Talisman

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Sir Kenneth remained as if spellbound, while this unlovely pair,
moving round the chapel close to each other, appeared to perform
the duty of sweeping it, like menials; but as they used only one
hand, the floor was not much benefited by the exercise, which
they plied with such oddity of gestures and manner as befitted
their bizarre and fantastic appearance. When they approached
near to the knight in the course of their occupation, they ceased
to use their brooms; and placing themselves side by side,
directly opposite to Sir Kenneth, they again slowly shifted the
lights which they held, so as to allow him distinctly to survey
features which were not rendered more agreeable by being brought
nearer, and to observe the extreme quickness and keenness with
which their black and glittering eyes flashed back the light of
the lamps. They then turned the gleam of both lights upon the
knight, and having accurately surveyed him, turned their faces to
each other, and set up a loud, yelling laugh, which resounded in
his ears. The sound was so ghastly that Sir Kenneth started at
hearing it, and hastily demanded, in the name of God, who they
were who profaned that holy place with such antic gestures and
elritch exclamations.

"I am the dwarf Nectabanus," said the abortion-seeming male, in a
voice corresponding to his figure, and resembling the voice of
the night-crow more than any sound which is heard by daylight.

"And I am Guenevra, his lady and his love," replied the female,
in tones which, being shriller, were yet wilder than those of her
companion.

"Wherefore are you here?" again demanded the knight, scarcely
yet assured that they were human beings which he saw before him.

"I am," replied the male dwarf, with much assumed gravity and
dignity, "the twelfth Imaum. I am Mohammed Mohadi, the guide and
the conductor of the faithful. A hundred horses stand ready
saddled for me and my train at the Holy City, and as many at the
City of Refuge. I am he who shall bear witness, and this is one
of my houris."

"Thou liest!" answered the female, interrupting her companion,
in tones yet shriller than his own; "I am none of thy houris, and
thou art no such infidel trash as the Mohammed of whom thou
speakest. May my curse rest upon his coffin! I tell thee, thou
ass of Issachar, thou art King Arthur of Britain, whom the
fairies stole away from the field of Avalon; and I am Dame
Guenevra, famed for her beauty."

"But in truth, noble sir," said the male, "we are distressed
princes, dwelling under the wing of King Guy of Jerusalem, until
he was driven out from his own nest by the foul infidels
--Heaven's bolts consume them!"

"Hush," said a voice from the side upon which the knight had
entered--"hush, fools, and begone; your ministry is ended."

The dwarfs had no sooner heard the command than, gibbering in
discordant whispers to each other, they blew out their lights at
once, and left the knight in utter darkness, which, when the
pattering of their retiring feet had died away, was soon
accompanied by its fittest companion, total silence.

The knight felt the departure of these unfortunate creatures a
relief. He could not, from their language, manners, and
appearance, doubt that they belonged to the degraded class of
beings whom deformity of person and weakness of intellect
recommended to the painful situation of appendages to great
families, where their personal appearance and imbecility were
food for merriment to the household. Superior in no respect to
the ideas and manners of his time, the Scottish knight might, at
another period, have been much amused by the mummery of these
poor effigies of humanity; but now their appearance,
gesticulations, and language broke the train of deep and solemn
feeling with which he was impressed, and he rejoiced in the
disappearance of the unhappy objects.

A few minutes after they had retired, the door at which he had
entered opened slowly, and remaining ajar, discovered a faint
light arising from a lantern placed upon the threshold. Its
doubtful and wavering gleam showed a dark form reclined beside
the entrance, but without its precincts, which, on approaching it
more nearly, he recognized to be the hermit, crouching in the
same humble posture in which he had at first laid himself down,
and which, doubtless, he had retained during the whole time of
his guest's continuing in the chapel.

"All is over," said the hermit, as he heard the knight
approaching, "and the most wretched of earthly sinners, with him
who should think himself most honoured and most happy among the
race of humanity, must retire from this place. Take the light,
and guide me down the descent, for I must not uncover my eyes
until I am far from this hallowed spot."

The Scottish knight obeyed in silence, for a solemn and yet
ecstatic sense of what he had seen had silenced even the eager

workings of curiosity. He led the way, with considerable
accuracy, through the various secret passages and stairs by which
they had ascended, until at length they found themselves in the
outward cell of the hermit's cavern.

"The condemned criminal is restored to his dungeon, reprieved
from one miserable day to another, until his awful Judge shall at
length appoint the well-deserved sentence to be carried into
execution."

As the hermit spoke these words, he laid aside the veil with
which his eyes had been bound, and looked at it with a suppressed
and hollow sigh. No sooner had he restored it to the crypt from
which he had caused the Scot to bring it, than he said hastily
and sternly to his companion; "Begone, begone--to rest, to rest.
You may sleep--you can sleep--I neither can nor may."

Respecting the profound agitation with which this was spoken, the
knight retired into the inner cell; but casting back his eye as
he left the exterior grotto, he beheld the anchorite stripping
his shoulders with frantic haste of their shaggy mantle, and ere
he could shut the frail door which separated the two compartments
of the cavern, he heard the clang of the scourge and the groans
of the penitent under his self-inflicted penance. A cold shudder
came over the knight as he reflected what could be the foulness
of the sin, what the depth of the remorse, which, apparently,
such severe penance could neither cleanse nor assuage. He told
his beads devoutly, and flung himself on his rude couch, after a
glance at the still sleeping Moslem, and, wearied by the various
scenes of the day and the night, soon slept as sound as infancy.
Upon his awaking in the morning, he held certain conferences with
the hermit upon matters of importance, and the result of their
intercourse induced him to remain for two days longer in the
grotto. He was regular, as became a pilgrim, in his devotional
exercises, but was not again admitted to the chapel in which he
had seen such wonders.

CHAPTER VI.

Now change the scene--and let the trumpets sound,
For we must rouse the lion from his lair. OLD PLAY.

The scene must change, as our programme has announced, from the
mountain wilderness of Jordan to the camp of King Richard of
England, then stationed betwixt Jean d'Acre and Ascalon, and
containing that army with which he of the lion heart had promised
himself a triumphant march to Jerusalem, and in which he would
probably have succeeded, if not hindered by the jealousies of the
Christian princes engaged in the same enterprise, and the offence
taken by them at the uncurbed haughtiness of the English monarch,
and Richard's unveiled contempt for his brother sovereigns, who,
his equals in rank, were yet far his inferiors in courage,
hardihood, and military talents. Such discords, and particularly
those betwixt Richard and Philip of France, created disputes and
obstacles which impeded every active measure proposed by the
heroic though impetuous Richard, while the ranks of the Crusaders
were daily thinned, not only by the desertion of individuals, but
of entire bands, headed by their respective feudal leaders, who
withdrew from a contest in which they had ceased to hope for
success.

The effects of the climate became, as usual, fatal to soldiers
from the north, and the more so that the dissolute license of the
Crusaders, forming a singular contrast to the principles and
purpose of their taking up arms, rendered them more easy victims
to the insalubrious influence of burning heat and chilling dews.
To these discouraging causes of loss was to be added the sword of
the enemy. Saladin, than whom no greater name is recorded in
Eastern history, had learned, to his fatal experience, that his
light-armed followers were little able to meet in close encounter
with the iron-clad Franks, and had been taught, at the same time,
to apprehend and dread the adventurous character of his
antagonist Richard. But if his armies were more than once routed
with great slaughter, his numbers gave the Saracen the advantage
in those lighter skirmishes, of which many were inevitable.

As the army of his assailants decreased, the enterprises of the
Sultan became more numerous and more bold in this species of
petty warfare. The camp of the Crusaders was surrounded, and
almost besieged, by clouds of light cavalry, resembling swarms of
wasps, easily crushed when they are once grasped, but furnished
with wings to elude superior strength, and stings to inflict harm
and mischief. There was perpetual warfare of posts and foragers,
in which many valuable lives were lost, without any corresponding
object being gained; convoys were intercepted, and communications
were cut off. The Crusaders had to purchase the means of
sustaining life, by life itself; and water, like that of the well
of Bethlehem, longed for by King David, one of its ancient
monarchs, was then, as before, only obtained by the expenditure
of blood.

These evils were in a great measure counterbalanced by the stern
resolution and restless activity of King Richard, who, with some
of his best knights, was ever on horseback, ready to repair to
any point where danger occurred, and often not only bringing
unexpected succour to the Christians, but discomfiting the
infidels when they seemed most secure of victory. But even the
iron frame of Coeur de Lion could not support without injury the
alternations of the unwholesome climate, joined to ceaseless
exertions of body and mind. He became afflicted with one of
those slow and wasting fevers peculiar to Asia, and in despite of
his great strength and still greater courage, grew first unfit to
mount on horseback, and then unable to attend the councils of war
which were from time to time held by the Crusaders. It was
difficult to say whether this state of personal inactivity was
rendered more galling or more endurable to the English monarch by
the resolution of the council to engage in a truce of thirty days
with the Sultan Saladin; for on the one hand, if he was incensed
at the delay which this interposed to the progress of the great
enterprise, he was, on the other, somewhat consoled by knowing
that others were not acquiring laurels while he remained inactive
upon a sick-bed,

That, however, which Coeur de Lion could least excuse was the
general inactivity which prevailed in the camp of the Crusaders
so soon as his illness assumed a serious aspect; and the reports
which he extracted from his unwilling attendants gave him to
understand that the hopes of the host had abated in proportion to
his illness, and that the interval of truce was employed, not in
recruiting their numbers, reanimating their courage, fostering
their spirit of conquest, and preparing for a speedy and
determined advance upon the Holy City, which was the object of
their expedition, but in securing the camp occupied by their
diminished followers with trenches, palisades, and other
fortifications, as if preparing rather to repel an attack from a
powerful enemy so soon as hostilities should recommence, than to
assume the proud character of conquerors and assailants.

The English king chafed under these reports, like the imprisoned
lion viewing his prey from the iron barriers of his cage.
Naturally rash and impetuous, the irritability of his temper
preyed on itself. He was dreaded by his attendants and even the
medical assistants feared to assume the necessary authority which
a physician, to do justice to his patient, must needs exercise
over him. One faithful baron, who, perhaps, from the congenial
nature of his disposition, was devoutly attached to the King's
person, dared alone to come between the dragon and his wrath, and
quietly, but firmly, maintained a control which no other dared
assume over the dangerous invalid, and which Thomas de Multon
only exercised because he esteemed his sovereign's life and
honour more than he did the degree of favour which he might lose,
or even the risk which he might incur, in nursing a patient so
intractable, and whose displeasure was so perilous.

Sir Thomas was the Lord of Gilsland, in Cumberland, and in an age
when surnames and titles were not distinctly attached, as now, to
the individuals who bore them, he was called by the Normans the
Lord de Vaux; and in English by the Saxons, who clung to their
native language, and were proud of the share of Saxon blood in
this renowned warrior's veins, he was termed Thomas, or, more
familiarly, Thom of the Gills, or Narrow Valleys, from which his
extensive domains derived their well-known appellation.

This chief had been exercised in almost all the wars, whether
waged betwixt England and Scotland, or amongst the various
domestic factions which then tore the former country asunder, and
in all had been distinguished, as well from his military conduct
as his personal prowess. He was, in other respects, a rude
soldier, blunt and careless in his bearing, and taciturn--nay,
almost sullen--in his habits of society, and seeming, at least,
to disclaim all knowledge of policy and of courtly art. There
were men, however, who pretended to look deeply into character,
who asserted that the Lord de Vaux was not less shrewd and
aspiring than he was blunt and bold, and who thought that, while
he assimilated himself to the king's own character of blunt
hardihood, it was, in some degree at least, with an eye to
establish his favour, and to gratify his own hopes of deep-laid
ambition. But no one cared to thwart his schemes, if such he
had, by rivalling him in the dangerous occupation of daily
attendance on the sick-bed of a patient whose disease was
pronounced infectious, and more especially when it was remembered
that the patient was Coeur de Lion, suffering under all the
furious impatience of a soldier withheld from battle, and a
sovereign sequestered from authority; and the common soldiers, at
least in the English army, were generally of opinion that De Vaux
attended on the King like comrade upon comrade, in the honest and
disinterested frankness of military friendship contracted between
the partakers of daily dangers.

It was on the decline of a Syrian day that Richard lay on his
couch of sickness, loathing it as much in mind as his illness
made it irksome to his body. His bright blue eye, which at all
times shone with uncommon keenness and splendour, had its
vivacity augmented by fever and mental impatience, and glanced
from among his curled and unshorn locks of yellow hair as
fitfully and as vividly as the last gleams of the sun shoot
through the clouds of an approaching thunderstorm, which still,
however, are gilded by its beams. His manly features showed the
progress of wasting illness, and his beard, neglected and
untrimmed, had overgrown both lips and chin. Casting himself
from side to side, now clutching towards him the coverings, which
at the next moment he flung as impatiently from him, his tossed
couch and impatient gestures showed at once the energy and the
reckless impatience of a disposition whose natural sphere was
that of the most active exertion.

Beside his couch stood Thomas de Vaux, in face, attitude, and
manner the strongest possible contrast to the suffering monarch.
His stature approached the gigantic, and his hair in thickness
might have resembled that of Samson, though only after the
Israelitish champion's locks had passed under the shears of the
Philistines, for those of De Vaux were cut short, that they might
be enclosed under his helmet. The light of his broad, large
hazel eye resembled that of the autumn morn; and it was only
perturbed for a moment, when from time to time it was attracted
by Richard's vehement marks of agitation and restlessness. His
features, though massive like his person, might have been
handsome before they were defaced with scars; his upper lip,
after the fashion of the Normans, was covered with thick
moustaches, which grew so long and luxuriantly as to mingle with
his hair, and, like his hair, were dark brown, slightly brindled
with grey. His frame seemed of that kind which most readily
defies both toil and climate, for he was thin-flanked, broad-chested, long-armed, deep-breathed, and strong-
limbed. He had
not laid aside his buff-coat, which displayed the cross cut on
the shoulder, for more than three nights, enjoying but such
momentary repose as the warder of a sick monarch's couch might by
snatches indulge. This Baron rarely changed his posture, except
to administer to Richard the medicine or refreshments which none
of his less favoured attendants could persuade the impatient
monarch to take; and there was something affecting in the kindly
yet awkward manner in which he discharged offices so strangely
contrasted with his blunt and soldierly habits and manners.

The pavilion in which these personages were, had, as became the
time, as well as the personal character of Richard, more of a
warlike than a sumptuous or royal character. Weapons offensive
and defensive, several of them of strange and newly-invented
construction, were scattered about the tented apartment, or
disposed upon the pillars which supported it. Skins of animals
slain in the chase were stretched on the ground, or extended
along the sides of the pavilion; and upon a heap of these silvan
spoils lay three ALANS, as they were then called (wolf-
greyhounds, that is), of the largest size, and as white as snow.
Their faces, marked with many a scar from clutch and fang, showed
their share in collecting the trophies upon which they reposed;
and their eyes, fixed from time to time with an expressive
stretch and yawn upon the bed of Richard, evinced how much they
marvelled at and regretted the unwonted inactivity which they
were compelled to share. These were but the accompaniments of
the soldier and huntsman; but on a small table close by the bed
was placed a shield of wrought steel, of triangular form, bearing
the three lions passant first assumed by the chivalrous monarch,
and before it the golden circlet, resembling much a ducal
coronet, only that it was higher in front than behind, which,
with the purple velvet and embroidered tiara that lined it,
formed then the emblem of England's sovereignty. Beside it, as
if prompt for defending the regal symbol, lay a mighty curtal-axe, which would have wearied the arm of
any other than Coeur de
Lion.

In an outer partition of the pavilion waited two or three
officers of the royal household, depressed, anxious for their
master's health, and not less so for their own safety, in case of
his decease. Their gloomy apprehensions spread themselves to the
warders without, who paced about in downcast and silent
contemplation, or, resting on their halberds, stood motionless on
their post, rather like armed trophies than living warriors.

"So thou hast no better news to bring me from without, Sir
Thomas!" said the King, after a long and perturbed silence,
spent in the feverish agitation which we have endeavoured to
describe. "All our knights turned women, and our ladies become
devotees, and neither a spark of valour nor of gallantry to
enlighten a camp which contains the choicest of Europe's
chivalry--ha!"

"The truce, my lord," said De Vaux, with the same patience with
which he had twenty times repeated the explanation--"the truce
prevents us bearing ourselves as men of action; and for the
ladies, I am no great reveller, as is well known to your Majesty,
and seldom exchange steel and buff for velvet and gold--but thus
far I know, that our choicest beauties are waiting upon the
Queen's Majesty and the Princess, to a pilgrimage to the convent
of Engaddi, to accomplish their vows for your Highness's
deliverance from this trouble."

"And is it thus," said Richard, with the impatience of
indisposition, "that royal matrons and maidens should risk
themselves, where the dogs who defile the land have as little
truth to man as they have faith towards God?"

"Nay, my lord," said De Vaux, "they have Saladin's word for their
safety."

"True, true!" replied Richard; "and I did the heathen Soldan
injustice--I owe him reparation for it. Would God I were but fit
to offer it him upon my body between the two hosts--Christendom
and heathenesse both looking on!"

As Richard spoke, he thrust his right arm out of bed naked to the
shoulder, and painfully raising himself in his couch, shook his
clenched hand, as if it grasped sword or battle-axe, and was then
brandished over the jewelled turban of the Soldan. It was not
without a gentle degree of violence, which the King would scarce
have endured from another, that De Vaux, in his character of
sick-nurse, compelled his royal master to replace himself in the
couch, and covered his sinewy arm, neck, and shoulders with the
care which a mother bestows upon an impatient child.

"Thou art a rough nurse, though a willing one, De Vaux," said the
King, laughing with a bitter expression, while he submitted to
the strength which he was unable to resist; "methinks a coif
would become thy lowering features as well as a child's biggin
would beseem mine. We should be a babe and nurse to frighten
girls with."

"We have frightened men in our time, my liege," said De Vaux;
"and, I trust, may live to frighten them again. What is a fever-fit, that we should not endure it patiently, in
order to get rid
of it easily?"

"Fever-fit!" exclaimed Richard impetuously; "thou mayest think,
and justly, that it is a fever-fit with me; but what is it with
all the other Christian princes--with Philip of France, with that
dull Austrian, with him of Montserrat, with the Hospitallers,
with the Templars--what is it with all them? I will tell thee.
It is a cold palsy, a dead lethargy, a disease that deprives them
of speech and action, a canker that has eaten into the heart of
all that is noble, and chivalrous, and virtuous among them--that
has made them false to the noblest vow ever knights were sworn to
--has made them indifferent to their fame, and forgetful of their
God!"

"For the love of Heaven, my liege," said De Vaux, "take it less
violently--you will be heard without doors, where such speeches
are but too current already among the common soldiery, and
engender discord and contention in the Christian host. Bethink
you that your illness mars the mainspring of their enterprise; a
mangonel will work without screw and lever better than the
Christian host without King Richard."

"Thou flatterest me, De Vaux," said Richard, and not insensible
to the power of praise, he reclined his head on the pillow with a
more deliberate attempt to repose than he had yet exhibited. But
Thomas de Vaux was no courtier; the phrase which had offered had
risen spontaneously to his lips, and he knew not how to pursue
the pleasing theme so as to soothe and prolong the vein which he
had excited. He was silent, therefore, until, relapsing into his
moody contemplations, the King demanded of him sharply,
"Despardieux! This is smoothly said to soothe a sick man; but
does a league of monarchs, an assemblage or nobles, a convocation
of all the chivalry of Europe, droop with the sickness of one
man, though he chances to be King of England? Why should
Richard's illness, or Richard's death, check the march of thirty
thousand men as brave as himself? When the master stag is struck
down, the herd do not disperse upon his fall; when the falcon
strikes the leading crane, another takes the guidance of the
phalanx. Why do not the powers assemble and choose some one to
whom they may entrust the guidance of the host?"

"Forsooth, and if it please your Majesty," said De Vaux, "I hear
consultations have been held among the royal leaders for some
such purpose."

"Ha!" exclaimed Richard, his jealousy awakened, giving his
mental irritation another direction, "am I forgot by my allies
ere I have taken the last sacrament? Do they hold me dead
already? But no, no, they are right. And whom do they select as
leader of the Christian host?"

"Rank and dignity," said De Vaux, "point to the King of France."

"Oh, ay," answered the English monarch, "Philip of France and
Navarre--Denis Mountjoie--his most Christian Majesty! Mouth-filling words these! There is but one risk -
-that he might
mistake the words EN ARRIERE for EN AVANT, and lead us back to
Paris, instead of marching to Jerusalem. His politic head has
learned by this time that there is more to be gotten by
oppressing his feudatories, and pillaging his allies, than
fighting with the Turks for the Holy Sepulchre."

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