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They were to set off on their return early on the morrow, Meinhard and Odo with them; but when they at length escaped from the barbarian orgies, they had little expectation that their companions would join them in the morning.

However, the two Goths and their followers were on the alert as soon as they, and as cool-headed as if they had touched no drop of wine.

Old Odo disdained a mule, and would let no hand save his own guide his horse.  Verronax and Lucius constituted themselves his guides, and whenever he permitted the slightest assistance, it was always from the Arvernian, whom he seemed to regard as a sort of adopted son.

He felt over his weapons, and told him long stories, of which Verronax understood only a word or two here and there, though the old man seemed little concerned thereat.  Now and then he rode along chanting to himself an extemporary song, which ran somewhat thus—

Maids who choose the slain,Disappointed now.The Hawk of the Mountain,The Wolf of the West,Meet in fierce combat.Sinks the bold Wolf-cub,Folds his wing the Falcon!Shall the soft priestlingStep before him to Valhal,Cheating Lok’s daughterOf weak-hearted prey?Lo! the Wolf wakens.Valkyr relaxes,Waits for a battlefield,Wolf-cub to claim.Friendly the Falcon,Friendly the Gray-Wolf.

So it ran on, to the great scandal of Lucius, who longed for better knowledge of the Gothic tongue to convince the old man of the folly of his heathen dreams.  Meinhard, who was likewise rather shocked, explained that the father and son had been recent arrivals, who had been baptized because Euric required his followers to embrace his faith, but with little real knowledge or acceptance on the part of the father.  Young Odorik had been a far more ardent convert; and, after the fashion of many a believer, had taken up the distinctions of sect rather than of religion, and, zealous in the faith he knew, had thought it incumbent on him to insult the Catholics where they seemed to him idolatrous.

A message on the road informed the travellers that they would find Odorik at the villa.  Thither then they went, and soon saw the whole household on the steps in eager anticipation.  A tall young figure, with a bandage still round his fair flowing locks, came down the steps as Verronax helped the blind man to dismount; and Odo, with a cry of ‘My son!’ with a ring of ecstasy in the sound, held the youth to his breast and felt him all over.

“Are we friends?” said Odorik, turning to Verronax, when his father released him.

“That is as thou wiliest,” returned the Arvernian gravely.

“Know then,” said Odorik, “that I know that I erred.  I knew not thy Lord when I mocked thine honour to Him.  Father, we had but half learnt the Christian’s God.  I have seen it now.  It was not thy blow, O Arvernian! that taught me; but the Master who inspired yonder youth to offer his life, and who sent the maiden there to wait upon her foe.  He is more than man.  I own in him the Eternal Creator, Redeemer, and Lord!”

“Yea,” said Sidonius to his friend Æmilius, “a great work hath been wrought out.  Thus hath the parable of actual life led this zealous but half-taught youth to enter into the higher truth.  Lucius will be none the worse priest for having trodden in the steps of Him who was High-priest and Victim.  Who may abide strict Divine Justice, had not One stood between the sinner and the Judge?  Thus ‘Mercy and Truth have met together; Righteousness and Peace have kissed each other.’”

THE CAT OF CAT COPSE

A HAMPSHIRE TRADITION

IThe Dane! the Dane!  The heathen DaneIs wasting Hampshire’s coast again—From ravaged church and plundered farmFlash the dread beacons of alarm—   Fly, helpless peasants, fly!Ytene’s green banks and forest shades,Her heathery slopes and gorse-clad glades   Re-echo to the cry—Where is the King, whose strong right handHath oft from danger freed the land?Nor fleet nor covenant availsTo drive aloof those pirate sails,   In vain is Alfred’s sword;Vain seems in every sacred faneThe chant—‘From fury of the Dane,   Deliver us, good Lord.’IIThe long keels have the Needles past,Wight’s fairest bowers are flaming fast;From Solent’s waves rise many a mast,With swelling sails of gold and red,Dragon and serpent at each head,Havoc and slaughter breathing forth,Steer on these locusts of the north.Each vessel bears a deadly freight;Each Viking, fired with greed and hate,His axe is whetting for the strife,And counting how each Christian lifeShall win him fame in Skaldic lays,And in Valhalla endless praise.For Hamble’s river straight they steer;Prayer is in vain, no aid is near—Hopeless and helpless all must die.Oh, fainting heart and failing eye,Look forth upon the foe once more!Why leap they not upon the shore?Why pause their keels upon the strand,As checked by some resistless hand?The sail they spread, the oars they ply,Yet neither may advance nor fly.IIIWho is it holds them helpless there?’Tis He Who hears the anguished prayer;   ’Tis He Who to the waveHath fixed the bound—mud, rock, or sand—To mark how far upon the strand   Its foaming sweep may rave.What is it, but the ebbing tide,That leaves them here, by Hamble’s side,So firm embedded in the mudNo force of stream, nor storm, nor flood,Shall ever these five ships bear forthTo fiords and islets of the north;A thousand years shall pass away,And leave those keels in Hamble’s bay.IVIll were it in my rhyme to tellThe work of slaughter that befell;In sooth it was a savage time—Crime ever will engender crime.Each Viking, as he swam to land,Fell by a Saxon’s vengeful hand;Turn we from all that vengeance wild—Where on the deck there cowered a child,And, closely to his bosom prest,A snow-white kitten found a nest.That tender boy, with tresses fair,Was Edric, Egbert’s cherished heir;The plaything of the homestead he,Now fondled on his grandame’s knee;Or as beside the hearth he sat,Oft sporting with his snow-white cat;Now by the chaplain taught to read,And lisp his Pater and his Creed;Well nurtured at his mother’s side,And by his father trained to ride,To speak the truth, to draw the bow,And all an English Thane should know,His days had been as one bright dream—As smooth as his own river’s stream!Until, at good King Alfred’s call,Thane Egbert left his native hall.VThen, five days later, shout and yell,And shrieks and howls of slaughter fell,Upon the peaceful homestead came.’Mid flashing sword, and axe, and flame,Snatched by a Viking’s iron grasp,From his slain mother’s dying clasp,Saved from the household’s flaming grave,Edric was dragged, a destined slave,Some northern dame to serve, or heedThe flocks that on the Sæter feed.Still, with scarce conscious hold he clungTo the white cat, that closely hungSeeking her refuge in his arm,Her shelter in the wild alarm—And who can tell how oft his moanWas soothed by her soft purring tone?Time keeping with retracted claw,Or patting with her velvet paw;Although of home and friends bereft,Still this one comforter was left,So lithe, so swift, so soft, so white,She might have seemed his guardian sprite.   The rude Danes deemed her such;And whispered tales of ‘disir’ boundTo human lords, as bird or hound.Nor one ’mid all the fleet was found   To hurt one tender paw.And when the captive knelt to prayNone would his orisons gainsay;For as they marked him day by day,   Increased their wondering awe.VICrouched by the mast, the child and cat,Through the dire time of slaughter sat,   By terror both spellbound;But when night came, a silence drearFell on the coast; and far or near,No voice caught Edric’s wakeful ear,   Save water’s lapping sound.He wandered from the stern to prow,Ate of the stores, and marvelled how   He yet might reach the ground;Till low and lower sank the tide,Dark banks of mud spread far and wide   Around that fast-bound wreck.Then the lone boy climbed down the ship,To cross the mud by bound and skip,   His cat upon his neck.Light was his weight and swift his leap,Now would he softly tread, now creep,For treacherous was the mud, and deepFrom stone to weed, from weed to plank,Leaving a hole where’er he sank;With panting breath and sore taxed strengthThe solid earth he felt at length.Sheltered within the copse he lay,When dawn had brightened into day,For when one moment there was seen,His red cap glancing ’mid the green,   A fearful cry arose—“Here lurks a Dane!”  “The Dane seek out”With knife and axe, the rabble routMade the copse ring with yell and shout   To find their dreaded foes.And Edric feared to meet a stroke,Before they knew the tongue he spoke.Hid ’mid the branches of an oak,   He heard their calls and blows.Of food he had a simple store,And when the churls the chase gave o’er,And evening sunk upon the vale,With rubbing head and upright tail,Pacing before him to and fro,Puss lured him on the way to go—Coaxing him on, with tender wile,O’er heath and down for many a mile.Ask me not how her course she knows.He from Whom every instinct flowsHath breathed into His creatures power,Giving to each its needful dower;And strive and question as we will,We cannot trace the inborn skill,Nor fathom how, where’er she roam,The cat ne’er fails to find her home.VIIWhat pen may dare to paint the woe,When Egbert saw his home laid low?Where, by the desolated hearth,The mother lay who gave him birth,And, close beside, his fair young wife,And servants, slain in bootless strife—   Mournful the King stood near.Alfred, who came to be his guest,And deeply rued that his behestHad all unguarded left that nest,   To meet such ruin drear.With hand, and heart, and lip, he gaveAll king or friend, both true and brave,Could give, one pang of grief to save,   To comfort, or to cheer—As from the blackened walls they drewEach corpse, and laid with reverence due;And then it was that Egbert knew   All save the child were here.King Alfred’s noble head was bent,A monarch’s pain his bosom rent;Kindly he wrung Thane Egbert’s hand—“Lo! these have won the blissful land,Where foeman’s shout is heard no more,Nor wild waves beat upon the shore;Brief was the pang, the strife is o’er—   They are at peace, my friend!Safe, where the weary are at rest;Safe, where the banish’d and opprest   Find joys that never end.”Thane Egbert groaned, and scarce might speakFor tears that ploughed his hardy cheek,   As his dread task was done.And for the slain, from monk and priestRose requiems that never ceased,   While still he sought his son.“Oh, would to Heaven!” that father said,“There lay my darling calmly dead,Rather than as a thrall be bred—   His Christian faith undone.”“Nay, life is hope!” bespake the King,“God o’er the child can spread His wingAnd shield him in the Northman’s powerSafe as in Alswyth’s guarded bower;Treaty and ransom may be foundTo win him back to English ground.”VIIIThe funeral obsequies were o’er,   But lingered still the Thane,Hanging around his home once more,   Feeding his bitter pain.The King would fain with friendly forceUrge him anew to mount his horse,Turn from the piteous sight away,And fresh begin life’s saddened day,His loved ones looking yet to greet,Where ne’er shall part the blest who meet.Just then a voice that well he knew,A sound that mixed the purr and mew,   Went to the father’s heart.On a large stone King Alfred satAgainst his buskin rubbed a cat,   Snow-white in every part,Though drenched and soiled from head to tail.The poor Thane’s tears poured down like hail—“Poor puss, in vain thy loving wail,”   Then came a joyful start!A little hand was on his cloak—“Father!” a voice beside him spoke,   Emerging from the wood.All travel-stained, and marked with mire,With trace of blood, and toil, and fire,Yet safe and sound beside his sire,   Edric before them stood.And as his father wept for joy,King Alfred blessed the rescued boy,   And thanked his Maker good!Who doth the captive’s prayer fulfil,Making His creatures work His will   By means not understood.

NOTE.—The remains of the five Danish vessels still lie embedded in the mud of the Hamble River near Southampton, though parts have been carried off and used as wood for furniture in the farm-houses.  The neighbouring wood is known as Cat Copse, and a tradition has been handed down that a cat, and a boy in a red cap, escaped from the Danish ships, took refuge there.

DE FACTO AND DE JURE

I.  DE FACTO

The later summer sunbeams lay on an expanse of slightly broken ground where purple and crimson heather were relieved by the golden blossoms of the dwarf gorse, interspersed with white stars of stitch-wort.  Here and there, on the slopes, grew stunted oaks and hollies, whose polished leaves gleamed white with the reflection of the light; but there was not a trace of human habitation save a track, as if trodden by horses’ feet, clear of the furze and heath, and bordered by soft bent grass, beginning to grow brown.

Near this track—for path it could hardly be called—stood a slender lad waiting and watching, a little round cap covering his short-cut brown hair, a crimson tunic reaching to his knee, leggings and shoes of deerhide, and a sword at his side, fastened by a belt of the like skin, guarded and clasped with silver.  His features were delicate, though sunburnt, and his eyes were riveted on the distance, where the path had disappeared amid the luxuriant spires of ling.

A hunting-horn sounded, and the youth drew himself together into an attitude of eager attention; the baying of hounds and trampling of horses’ hoofs came nearer and nearer, and by and by there came in view the ends of boar-spears, the tall points of bows, a cluster of heads of men and horses—strong, sturdy, shaggy, sure-footed creatures, almost ponies, but the only steeds fit to pursue the chase on this rough and encumbered ground.

Foremost rode, with ivory and gold hunting-horn slung in a rich Spanish baldrick, and a slender gilt circlet round his green hunting-cap, a stout figure, with a face tanned to a fiery colour, keen eyes of a dark auburn tint, and a shock of hair of the same deep red.

At sight of him, the lad flung himself on his knees on the path, with the cry, “Haro!  Haro!  Justice, Sir King!”

“Out of my way, English hound!” cried the King.  “This is no time for thy Haro.”

“Nay, but one word, good fair King!  I am French—French by my father’s side!” cried the lad, as there was a halt, more from the instinct of the horse than the will of the King.  ‘Bertram de Maisonforte!  My father married the Lady of Boyatt, and her inheritance was confirmed to him by your father, brave King William, my Lord; but now he is dead, and his kinsman, Roger de Maisonforte, hath ousted her and me, her son and lawful heir, from house and home, and we pray for justice, Sir King?’

‘Ha, Roger, thou there!  What say’st thou to this bold beggar!’ shouted the Red King.

‘I say,’ returned a black, bronzed hunter, pressing to the front, ‘that what I hold of thee, King William, on tenure of homage, and of two good horses and staunch hounds yearly, I yield to no English mongrel churl, who dares to meddle with me.’

‘Thou hear’st, lad,’ said Rufus, with his accustomed oath, ‘homage hath been done to us for the land, nor may it be taken back.  Out of our way, or—’

‘Sir! sir!’ entreated the lad, grasping the bridle, ‘if no more might be, we would be content if Sir Roger would but leave my mother enough for her maintenance among the nuns of Romsey, and give me a horse and suit of mail to go on the Holy War with Duke Robert.’

‘Ho! ho! a modest request for a beggarly English clown!’ cried the King, aiming a blow at the lad with his whip, and pushing on his horse, so as almost to throw him back on the heath.  ‘Ho! ho! fit him out for a fool’s errand!’

‘We’ll fit him!  We’ll teach him to take the cross at other men’s expense!’ shouted the followers, seizing on the boy.

‘Nay; we’ll bestow his cross on him for a free gift!’ exclaimed Roger de Maisonforte.

And Bertram, struggling desperately in vain among the band of ruffians, found his left arm bared, and two long and painful slashes, in the form of the Crusader’s cross, inflicted, amid loud laughter, as the blood sprang forth.

‘There, Sir Crusader,’ said Roger, grinding his teeth over him.  ‘Go on thy way now—as a horse-boy, if so please thee, and know better than to throw thy mean false English pretension in the face of a gentle Norman.’

Men, horses, dogs, all seemed to trample and scoff at Bertram as he fell back on the elastic stems of the heath and gorse, whose prickles seemed to renew the insults by scratching his face.  When the King’s horn, the calls, the brutal laughter, and the baying of the dogs had begun to die away in the distance, he gathered himself together, sat up, and tried to find some means of stanching the blood.  Not only was the wound in a place hard to reach, but it had been ploughed with the point of a boar-spear, and was grievously torn.  He could do nothing with it, and, as he perceived, he had further been robbed of his sword, his last possession, his father’s sword.

The large tears of mingled rage, grief, and pain might well spring from the poor boy’s eyes in his utter loneliness, as he clenched his hand with powerless wrath, and regained his feet, to retrace, as best he might, his way to where his widowed mother had found a temporary shelter in a small religious house.

The sun grew hotter and hotter, Bertram’s wound bled, though not profusely, the smart grew upon him, his tongue was parched with thirst, and though he kept resolutely on, his breath came panting, his head grew dizzy, his eyes dim, his feet faltered, and at last, just as he attained a wider and more trodden way, he dropped insensible by the side of the path, his dry lips trying to utter the cry, “Lord, have mercy on me!”

II.  DE JURE

When Bertram de Maisonforte opened his eyes again cold waters were on his face, wine was moistening his lips, the burning of his wound was assuaged by cooling oil, while a bandage was being applied, and he was supported on a breast and in arms, clad indeed in a hauberk, but as tenderly kind as the full deep voice that spoke in English, “He comes round.  How now, my child?”

“Father,” murmured Bertram, with dreamy senses.

“Better now; another sup from the flask, David,” again said the kind voice, and looking up, he became aware of the beautiful benignant face, deep blue eyes, and long light locks of the man in early middle age who had laid him on his knee, while a priest was binding his arm, and a fair and graceful boy, a little younger than himself, was standing by with the flask of wine in his hand, and a face of such girlish beauty that as he knelt to hold the wine to his lips, Bertram asked—

“Am I among the Angels?”

“Not yet,” said the elder man.  “Art thou near thine home?”

“Alack!  I have no home, kind sir,” said Bertram, now able to raise himself and to perceive that he was in the midst of a small hand of armed men, such as every knight or noble necessarily carried about with him for protection.  There was a standard with a dragon, and their leader himself was armed, all save his head, and, as Bertram saw, was a man of massive strength, noble stature, and kingly appearance.

“What shall we do for thee?” he asked.  “Who hath put thee in this evil case?”

Bertram gave his name, and at its Norman sound there was a start of repulsion from the boy.  “French after all!” he exclaimed.

“Nay, David,” said the leader, “if I mind me rightly, the Lady Elftrud of Boyatt wedded a brave Norman of that name.  Art thou her son?  I see something of her face, and thou hast an English tongue.”

“I am; I am her only son!” exclaimed Bertram; and as he told of his wrongs and the usage he had met with, young David cried out with indignation—

“Uncle, uncle, how canst thou suffer that these things should be?  Here are our faithful cnihts.  Let us ride to the forest.  Wherefore should it not be with Red William and his ruffians as with Scottish Duncan and Donald?”

“Hush thee, David, my nephew.  Thou knowest that may not be.  But for thee, young Bertram, we will see what can be done.  Canst sit a horse now?”

“Yea, my lord, full well.  I know not what came over me, even now,” said Bertram, much ashamed of the condition in which he had been found.

A sumpter horse was found for him, the leader of the party saying that they would go on to his own home, where the youth’s wound should be looked to, and they could then decide what could be done for him.

Bertram was still so far faint, suffering, weak, and weary, that he was hardly awake to curiosity as to his surroundings, and had quite enough to do to keep his seat in the saddle, and follow in the wake of the leader’s tall white horse, above which shone his bright chain mail and his still brighter golden locks, so that the exhausted boy began in some measure to feel as if he were following St. Michael on his way to some better world.

Now and then the tall figure turned to see how it was with him, and as he drooped more with fatigue and pain, bade one of the retainers keep beside him and support him.

Thus at length the cavalcade left the heathery expanse and reached a valley, green with meadow-land and waving corn, with silvery beards of barley rippling in the evening light, and cows and sheep being gathered for the night towards a dwelling where the river had been trained to form a moat round low green ramparts enclosing a number of one-storied thatched houses and barns, with one round tower, a strong embattled gateway, and at a little distance a square church tower, and other cottages standing outside.

A shout of ecstasy broke out from the village as the advancing party was seen and recognised.  Men, women, and children, rudely but substantially clad, and many wearing the collar of the thrall, ran out from their houses, baring their heads, bowing low, and each in turn receiving some kind word or nod of greeting from the lord whom they welcomed, while one after another of his armed followers turned aside, and was absorbed into a happy family by wife or parent.  A drawbridge crossed the moat, and there was a throng of joyful servants in the archway—foremost a priest, stretching out his hands in blessing, and a foreign-looking old woman, gray-haired and dark-eyed, who gathered young David into her embrace as he sprang from his horse, calling him her heart’s darling and her sunshine, and demanding, with a certain alarm, where were his brothers.

“In Scotland, dear Nurse Agnes—even where they should be,” was David’s answer.  “We are conquerors, do you see!  Edgar is a crowned and anointed King—seated on the holy stone of Scone, and Alexander is beside him to fight for him!”

“It is even so, nurse,” said the elder man, turning from the priest, to whom he had more briefly spoken; “God hath blessed our arms, and young Edgar has his right.  God shield him in it!  And now, nurse, here is a poor youth who needs thy care, after one of Red William’s rough jests.”

III.  KING AT HOME

Weary, faint, and feverish as Bertram de Maisonforte was, he was past caring for anything but the relief of rest, cool drink, and the dressing of his wound; nor did he even ask where he was until he awoke in broad daylight the next morning, to the sound of church bells, to the sight of a low but spacious chamber, with stone walls, deerskins laid on the floor, and the old nurse standing by him with a cup of refreshing drink, and ready to attend to his wound.

It was then that, feeling greatly refreshed, he ventured upon asking her in whose house he was, and who was the good lord who had taken pity on him.

“Who should it be save him who should be the good lord of every Englishman,” she replied, “mine own dear foster-son, the princely Atheling—he who takes up the cause of every injured man save his own?”

Bertram was amazed, for he had only heard Normans speak of Edgar Atheling, the heir of the ancient race, as a poor, tame-spirited, wretched creature, unable to assert himself, and therefore left unmolested by the conquerors out of contempt.  He proceeded to ask what the journey was from which the Atheling was returning, and the nurse, nothing loth, beguiled the tendance on his arm by explaining how she had long ago travelled from Hungary with her charges, Edgar, Margaret, and Christina; how it had come about that the crown, which should have been her darling’s, had been seized by the fierce duke from beyond the sea; how Edgar, then a mere child, had been forced to swear oaths of fealty by which he held himself still bound; how her sweetest pearl of ladies, her jewel Margaret, had been wedded to the rude wild King of Scots, and how her gentle sweetness and holiness had tamed and softened him, so that she had been the blessing of his kingdom till he and his eldest son had fallen at Alnwick while she lay a-dying; how the fierce savage Scots had risen and driven forth her young children; and how their uncle the Atheling had ridden forth, taken them to his home, bred them in all holiness and uprightness and good and knightly courage, and when Edgar and Alexander, the two eldest, were full grown, had gone northward with them once more, and had won back, in fair field, the throne of their father Malcolm.