Ivanhoe by Walter Scott (top 10 ebook reader .txt) 📕

“There is yet one chance of life left to me,” said Rebecca, “even by your own fierce laws. Life has been miserable⁠—miserable, at least, of late⁠—but I will not cast away the gift of God, while he affords me the means of defending it. I deny this charge⁠—I maintain my innocence, and I declare the falsehood of this accusation⁠—I challenge the privilege of trial by combat, and will appear by my champion.”

“And who, Rebecca,” replied the Grand Master, “will lay lance in rest for a sorceress? who will be the champion of a Jewess?”

“God will raise me up a champion,” said Rebecca⁠—“It cannot be that in merry England⁠—the hospitable, the generous, the free, where so many are ready to peril their lives for honour, there will not be found one to fight for justice. But it is enough that I challenge the trial by combat⁠—there lies my gage.”

She took her embroidered glove from her hand, and flung it down before the Grand Master with an air of mingled simplicity and dignity, which excited universal surprise and admiration.

—There I throw my gage,
To prove it on thee to the extremest point
Of martial daring.

Even Lucas Beaumanoir himself was affected by the mien and appearance of Rebecca. He was not originally a cruel or even a severe man; but with passions by nature cold, and with a high, though mistaken, sense of duty, his heart had been gradually hardened by the ascetic life which he pursued, the supreme power which he enjoyed, and the supposed necessity of subduing infidelity and eradicating heresy, which he conceived peculiarly incumbent on him. His features relaxed in their usual severity as he gazed upon the beautiful creature before him, alone, unfriended, and defending herself with so much spirit and courage. He crossed himself twice, as doubting whence arose the unwonted softening of a heart, which on such occasions used to resemble in hardness the steel of his sword. At length he spoke.

“Damsel,” he said, “if the pity I feel for thee arise from any practice thine evil arts have made on me, great is thy guilt. But I rather judge it the kinder feelings of nature, which grieves that so goodly a form should be a vessel of perdition. Repent, my daughter⁠—confess thy witchcrafts⁠—turn thee from thine evil faith⁠—embrace this holy emblem, and all shall yet be well with thee here and hereafter. In some sisterhood of the strictest order, shalt thou have time for prayer and fitting penance, and that repentance not to be repented of. This do and live⁠—what has the law of Moses done for thee that thou shouldest die for it?”

“It was the law of my fathers,” said Rebecca; “it was delivered in thunders and in storms upon the mountain of Sinai, in cloud and in fire. This, if ye are Christians, ye believe⁠—it is, you say, recalled; but so my teachers have not taught me.”

“Let our chaplain,” said Beaumanoir, “stand forth, and tell this obstinate infidel⁠—”

“Forgive the interruption,” said Rebecca, meekly; “I am a maiden, unskilled to dispute for my religion, but I can die for it, if it be God’s will.⁠—Let me pray your answer to my demand of a champion.”

“Give me her glove,” said Beaumanoir. “This is indeed,” he continued, as he looked at the flimsy texture and slender fingers, “a slight and frail gage for a purpose so deadly!⁠—Seest thou, Rebecca, as this thin and light glove of thine is to one of our heavy steel gauntlets, so is thy cause to that of the Temple, for it is our Order which thou hast defied.”

“Cast my innocence into the scale,” answered Rebecca, “and the glove of silk shall outweigh the glove of iron.”

“Then thou dost persist in thy refusal to confess thy guilt, and in that bold challenge which thou hast made?”

“I do persist, noble sir,” answered Rebecca.

“So be it then, in the name of Heaven,” said the Grand Master; “and may God show the right!”

“Amen,” replied the Preceptors around him, and the word was deeply echoed by the whole assembly.

“Brethren,” said Beaumanoir, “you are aware that we might well have refused to this woman the benefit of the trial by combat⁠—but though a Jewess and an unbeliever, she is also a stranger and defenceless, and God forbid that she should ask the benefit of our mild laws, and that it should be refused to her. Moreover, we are knights and soldiers as well as men of religion, and shame it were to us upon any pretence, to refuse proffered combat. Thus, therefore, stands the case. Rebecca, the daughter of Isaac of York, is, by many frequent and suspicious circumstances, defamed of sorcery practised on the person of a noble knight of our holy Order, and hath challenged the combat in proof of her innocence. To whom, reverend brethren, is it your opinion that we should deliver the gage of battle, naming him, at the same time, to be our champion on the field?”

“To Brian de Bois-Guilbert, whom it chiefly concerns,” said the Preceptor of Goodalricke, “and who, moreover, best knows how the truth stands in this matter.”

“But if,” said the Grand Master, “our brother Brian be under the influence of a charm or a spell⁠—we speak but for the sake of precaution, for to the arm of none of our holy Order would we more willingly confide this or a more weighty cause.”

“Reverend father,” answered the Preceptor of Goodalricke, “no spell can effect the champion who comes forward to fight for the judgment of God.”

“Thou sayest right, brother,” said the Grand Master. “Albert Malvoisin, give this gage of battle to Brian de Bois-Guilbert.⁠—It is our charge to thee, brother,” he continued, addressing himself to Bois-Guilbert, “that thou do thy battle manfully, nothing doubting that the good cause shall triumph.⁠—And do thou, Rebecca, attend, that we assign thee the third day from the present to find a champion.”

“That is but