Harold : the Last of the Saxon Kings — Complete by Lytton (rm book recommendations .TXT) 📕
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- Author: Lytton
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But Edward, as ill-liking the form of the giant as the subject of his lay, said, pushing back his seat as far as he could:
“Nay, nay, we excuse thee, we excuse thee, tall man.” Nevertheless, the minstrel still knelt, and so, with a look of profound humility, did the priest. Then both slowly rose, and at a sign from the Duke, passed to the other side of the table, standing behind Fitzosborne’s chair.
“Clerk,” said William, eying deliberately the sallow face of the ecclesiastic; “I know thee of old; and if the Church have sent me an envoy, per la resplendar De, it should have sent me at least an abbot.”
“Hein, hein!” said Taillefer, bluntly, “vex not my bon camarade, Count of the Normans. Gramercy, thou wilt welcome him, peradventure, better than me; for the singer tells but of discord, and the sage may restore the harmony.”
“Ha!” said the Duke, and the frown fell so dark over his eyes that the last seemed only visible by two sparks of fire. “I guess, my proud Vavasours are mutinous. Retire, thou and thy comrade. Await me in my chamber. The feast shall not flag in London because the wind blows a gale in Rouen.”
The two envoys, since so they seemed, bowed in silence and withdrew.
“Nought of ill-tidings, I trust,” said Edward, who had not listened to the whispered communications that had passed between the Duke and his subjects. “No schism in thy Church? The clerk seemed a peaceful man, and a humble.”
“An there were schism in my Church,” said the fiery Duke, “my brother of Bayeux would settle it by arguments as close as the gap between cord and throttle.”
“Ah! thou art, doubtless, well read in the canons, holy Odo!” said the King, turning to the bishop with more respect than he had yet evinced towards that gentle prelate.
“Canons, yes, Seigneur, I draw them up myself for my flock conformably with such interpretations of the Roman Church as suit best with the Norman realm: and woe to deacon, monk, or abbot, who chooses to misconstrue them.” 61
The bishop looked so truculent and menacing, while his fancy thus conjured up the possibility of heretical dissent, that Edward shrank from him as he had done from Taillefer; and in a few minutes after, on exchange of signals between himself and the Duke, who, impatient to escape, was too stately to testify that desire, the retirement of the royal party broke up the banquet; save, indeed, that a few of the elder Saxons, and more incorrigible Danes, still steadily kept their seats, and were finally dislodged from their later settlements on the stone floors, to find themselves, at dawn, carefully propped in a row against the outer walls of the palace, with their patient attendants, holding links, and gazing on their masters with stolid envy, if not of the repose at least of the drugs that had caused it.
CHAPTER II.
“And now,” said William, reclining on a long and narrow couch, with raised carved work all round it like a box (the approved fashion of a bed in those days), “now, Sire Taillefer—thy news.”
There were then in the Duke’s chamber, the Count Fitzosborne, Lord of Breteuil, surnamed “the Proud Spirit”—who, with great dignity, was holding before the brazier the ample tunic of linen (called dormitorium in the Latin of that time, and night-rail in the Saxon tongue) in which his lord was to robe his formidable limbs for repose 62,—Taillefer, who stood erect before the Duke as a Roman sentry at his post,—and the ecclesiastic, a little apart, with arms gathered under his gown, and his bright dark eyes fixed on the ground.
“High and puissant, my liege,” then said Taillefer, gravely, and with a shade of sympathy on his large face, “my news is such as is best told briefly: Bunaz, Count d’Eu and descendant of Richard Sanspeur, hath raised the standard of revolt.”
“Go on,” said the Duke, clenching his hand.
“Henry, King of the French, is treating with the rebel, and stirring up mutiny in thy realm, and pretenders to thy throne.”
“Ha!” said the Duke, and his lip quivered; “this is not all.”
“No, my liege! and the worst is to come. Thy uncle Mauger, knowing that thy heart is bent on thy speedy nuptials with the high and noble damsel, Matilda of Flanders, has broken out again in thine absence—is preaching against thee in hall and from pulpit. He declares that such espousals are incestuous, both as within the forbidden degrees, and inasmuch as Adele, the lady’s mother, was betrothed to thine uncle Richard; and Mauger menaces excommunication if my liege pursues his suit! 63 So troubled is the realm, that I, waiting not for debate in council, and fearing sinister ambassage if I did so, took ship from thy port of Cherbourg, and have not flagged rein, and scarce broken bread, till I could say to the heir of Rolf the Founder—Save thy realm from the men of mail, and thy bride from the knaves in serge.”
“Ho, ho!” cried William; then bursting forth in full wrath, as he sprang from the couch. “Hearest thou this, Lord Seneschal? Seven years, the probation of the patriarch, have I wooed and waited; and lo, in the seventh, does a proud priest say to me, ‘Wrench the love from thy heart-strings!’—Excommunicate me—ME—William, the son of Robert the Devil! Ha, by God’s splendour, Mauger shall live to wish the father stood, in the foul fiend’s true likeness, by his side, rather than brave the bent brow of the son!”
“Dread my lord,” said Fitzosborne, desisting from his employ, and rising to his feet; “thou knowest that I am thy true friend and leal knight; thou knowest how I have aided thee in this marriage with the lady of Flanders, and how gravely I think that what pleases thy fancy will guard thy realm; but rather than brave the order of the Church, and the ban of the Pope, I would see thee wed to the poorest virgin in Normandy.”
William, who had been pacing the room like an enraged lion in his den, halted in amaze at this bold speech.
“This from thee, William Fitzosborne!—from thee! I tell thee, that if all the priests in Christendom, and all the barons in France, stood between me and my bride, I would hew my way through the midst. Foes invade my realm—let them; princes conspire against me—I smile in scorn; subjects mutiny—this strong hand can punish, or this large heart can forgive. All these are the dangers which he who governs men should prepare to meet; but man has a right to his love, as the stag to his hind. And he who wrongs me here, is foe and traitor to me, not as Norman Duke but as human being. Look to it—thou and thy proud barons, look to it!”
“Proud may thy barons be,” said Fitzosborne, reddening,
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