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Title: The Iron Arrow Head or The Buckler Maiden
A Tale of the Northman Invasion
Author: Eugène Sue
Translator: Daniel De Leon
Release Date: November 26, 2010 [EBook #34452]
Language: English
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THE IRON ARROW HEAD
THE FULL SERIES OF
The Mysteries of the People
"OR"
History of a Proletarian Family
Across the Ages
By EUGENE SUE
_Consisting of the Following Works:_
THE GOLD SICKLE; or, _Hena the Virgin of the Isle of Sen._
THE BRASS BELL; or, _The Chariot of Death._
THE IRON COLLAR; or, _Faustina and Syomara._
THE SILVER CROSS; or, _The Carpenter of Nazareth._
THE CASQUE'S LARK; or, Victoria, the Mother of the Camps.
THE PONIARD'S HILT; or, _Karadeucq and Ronan._
THE BRANDING NEEDLE; or, _The Monastery of Charolles._
THE ABBATIAL CROSIER; or, _Bonaik and Septimine._
THE CARLOVINGIAN COINS; or, _The Daughters of Charlemagne._
THE IRON ARROW-HEAD; or, _The Buckler Maiden._
THE INFANT'S SKULL; or, _The End of the World._
THE PILGRIM'S SHELL; or, _Fergan the Quarryman._
THE IRON PINCERS; or, _Mylio and Karvel._
THE IRON TREVET; or, _Jocelyn the Champion._
THE EXECUTIONER'S KNIFE; or, _Joan of Arc._
THE POCKET BIBLE; or, _Christian the Printer._
THE BLACKSMITH'S HAMMER; or, _The Peasant Code._
THE SWORD OF HONOR; or, _The Foundation of the French Republic._
THE GALLEY SLAVE'S RING; or, _The Family Lebrenn._
Published Uniform With This Volume By
THE NEW YORK LABOR NEWS CO.
28 CITY HALL PLACE NEW YORK CITY
THE
IRON ARROW HEAD
:: :: OR :: ::
THE BUCKLER MAIDEN
A Tale of the Northman Invasion
By EUGENE SUE
TRANSLATED FROM THE ORIGINAL FRENCH
By DANIEL DE LEON
NEW YORK LABOR NEWS COMPANY. 1909
Copyright, 1908, by the
NEW YORK LABOR NEWS CO.
INDEX
TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE v
CHAPTER.
I. ROTHBERT, COUNT OF PARIS 1
II. FATHER FULTRADE 11
III. GAELO AND SHIGNE 23
IV. A BERSERKER 33
V. THE ABBEY OF ST. DENIS 43
VI. SISTER AGNES 58
VII. KOEMPE! 68
VIII. THE RESCUE 74
IX. THE NORTHMAN SEA-KING 78
X. ROLF'S COURTSHIP 83
XI. BRENN--KARNAK 88
XII. ARCHBISHOP FRANCON 101
XIII. THE WEDDING OF ROLF 112
XIV. ON THE SWAN'S ROUTE 128
EPILOGUE 129
TRANSLATOR'S PREFACE
The invasion of the Normans, or Northmen, or Norsemen--called throughout
this brilliant story the Northmans--bears characteristics that
distinguish it markedly from all the other European invasions. With all
the others the migrations were brought on by home changes of soil and
waterways that drove the invaders westward. War was only a means, the
goal was bread. With the Northman invasion it was otherwise. The goal
was war and adventure. This simple circumstance places a wholly
different stamp upon the Northman invaders. It explains the impulse they
gave to oratory, poetry, music and the fine arts. Their rush from the
frozen north through Europe--conquering and transforming England;
carving for themselves large domains out of the French territory, then
held in the imbecile hands of the imbecile successors of Charlemagne;
startling the populations of southern Italy and Sicily--acted like a
leaven through all the territories that they traversed. And they
traversed none without raising its tone with their poetic-barbarian
spirit.
This story, the tenth of the Eugene Sue series "_The Mysteries of the
People; or, History of a Proletarian Family Across the Ages,_" is a
matchless sketch of the Northman. It reproduces his uncouthness
illumined with his brilliant latent qualities. The characteristics of
the Northman invader have for their setting the physical and
intellectual dullness of the Frankish conquerors of Gaul. The clash of
the two reproduces a historic picture, or a page of history, that is
unique.
The fears entertained by Charlemagne and expressed in the preceding
story--"_The Carlovingian Coins; or, The Daughters of Charlemagne_"--are
verified in this. A race of bold and adventurous invaders steps upon the
scene of France, shocking the ruling class, arousing the ruled, and
introducing a fresh breath into the land.
The Northman invasion of France reads, even in the driest work of
history, like a rollicking Norse tale. That spirit is preserved in this
charming historic novel, which is as instructive as it is entertaining,
and in which again a descendant of the conquered race of Joel witnesses
the degradation of the second royal house of France preparatorily to the
witnessing, a few generations later, by another descendant of Joel, of
the downfall of that second dynasty and the rise of the third, narrated
in the following story, "_The Infant's Skull; or, The End of the
World._"
DANIEL DE LEON.
New York, July, 1908.
THE IRON ARROW HEAD
CHAPTER I.
ROTHBERT, COUNT OF PARIS.
The house of Master Eidiol, the dean of the Skippers' or Mariners' Guild
of Paris, was situated not far from the port of St. Landry and of the
ramparts of that part of the town that is known as the _Cité_, which is
bathed by the two branches of the Seine, and is flanked with towers at
the entrance of the large and the small bridge, its only means of access
from the suburban portions of the larger Paris. No one could cross the
bridge without paying toll to the bishop, the ecclesiastical feudal lord
of the _Cité_. Like all other houses of the common people, Master
Eidiol's was constructed of wooden slats held together by means of
cross-beams; it was only two storeys high, and was roofed with thatch.
Only the basilicas, the rich abbeys of St. Germain-des-Prés, of St.
Germain-d'Auxerre and others, as also the residences of the counts, the
viscounts and the bishops of Paris were built of stone and covered with
lead, not infrequently with gilded roofings. In the upper storey of
Master Eidiol's house, Martha, his wife, was engaged on some needlework,
seated near her daughter Anne the Sweet, who was busy spinning.
Agreeable to a new-fangled style of the time which, started by the royal
families and their grandees, descended to the common towns-people,
Eidiol had given a surname to his children. He called his daughter Anne,
"the Sweet," for there was nothing in the world milder or sweeter than
this child, whose nature was as angelic as her face. His son Guyrion,
Eidiol surnamed "the Plunger", because the daring lad, a skipper like
his father, was one of the most skilful divers that ever cut across the
swift waters of the Seine. Anne the Sweet spun her hemp at the side of
her mother, a good old woman of more than sixty years, delicate in
appearance, clad in black, and wearing a number of relics around her
neck. Pointing to the cheerful rays of the May sun that entered through
the little lead-bordered glass squares of the narrow window of her
chamber, Martha observed to her daughter:
"What a beautiful spring day. We may perhaps see to-day Father Fultrade,
the worthy leader of the choir at St. Denis, out taking a ride on his
fine horse."
"By this beautiful May day, I would prefer to go on foot! Do you
remember, mother, how Rustic the Gay wagered with my brother a tame
quail that he would walk two leagues in an hour? And how he won the
wager, and gave me the quail?"
"How foolish you are! Do you imagine that so distinguished a personage
as the leader of the choir at St. Denis could afford to walk two leagues
and more, like other common people?"
"But Father Fultrade is still young enough, big enough, and robust
enough to walk any such distance. Rustic the Gay would do it in a little
more than half an hour."
"Rustic is not Father Fultrade! What a holy man! It is from him I have
all these sacred relics that I wear. He gave them to me when he lived in
this town as the priest of the Church of Notre Dame, and great favorite
with Seigneur Rothbert, the Count of the City of Paris. Alas! Without
these sacred relics I would certainly have died of that violent cough,
which has not yet quite left me."
"Poor mother, that cough does not cease to cause uneasiness to my
father, my brother and myself. And yet you might now be wholly healed of
it if you would only consent to try the remedy that has been so highly
recommended to us."
"What remedy?"
"The one that the skippers of the port use. They put some tar in a bowl
of water, boil it, and drink it down warm. Rustic the Gay has told us of
the wonderful cures that he knows the potions to have effected."
"You are always talking about Rustic the Gay."
"I?" ingenuously answered the young girl, turning her candid face toward
her mother and without betraying the slightest embarrassment. "If I
frequently talk to you about him it is unintentional."
"I believe you, my child. But how can you expect that any human medicine
could cure me completely, when my distemper resists the relics? You
might as well try to make me believe that any human power could return
to me the dear little girl, who, alas! disappeared from our side ten
years before the birth of your brother. Let us bow before the will of
God!"
"Poor little sister! I weep over her absence, although I have never
known her."
"My poor little daughter could have taken my place near you. She would
now be old enough to be your mother."
A loud noise, interspersed with cries and proceeding from the street,
interrupted at this point the conversation between Martha and her
daughter.
"Oh! Mother," exclaimed Anne with a shudder, "it may be another
penitent whom the mob is falling upon with insults and blows! Only
yesterday, an unfortunate fellow whom they were pursuing in that way
remained bleeding and half dead upon the street. His clothes were in
shreds and his flesh not much better."
"That's right!" answered Martha with a nod of her head. "It was just! I
like to see these penitents thoroughly punished. If they are penitents
it is because they have been convicted of impiousness, or of lack of
faith. I can not pity impious people."
"But, mother, is not the penance that the church imposes upon them in
expiation of their sins severe enough? They must walk bare-footed, with
irons to their limbs, for two or three years, often longer, dressed in
sack-cloth, their heads covered with ashes, and they are compelled to
beg their bread, seeing that the sentence forbids them to work."
"My child, these penitents, upon whom the mobs love to shower blows,
should bless each wound that they receive. Each wound brings them nearer
to salvation. But hark! The noise and the tumult increase. Open the
window. Let us see what is going on in the street."
Anne and her mother rose and hastened to the narrow window, through
which Martha quickly put her head, while her daughter, leaning on her
shoulder, hesitated to look out. Happily for the tender-hearted child it
was not one of those savage hunts in which the good Christians took
delight against the penitents whom they regarded as unclean animals. The
narrow street, bordered with thatched wooden houses, like the one of
Eidiol, offered but a strait passage. A severe rainfall on the previous
day had so soaked the earth that a heavy wagon, driven by two teams of
oxen and loaded high with lumber, sank into the mud up to the hub of
one of the wheels. Too heavy to be pulled out of the deep mud, the
outfit completely blocked the passage, and stood in the way of several
knights, who were riding from the opposite direction, with Rothbert, the
Count of Paris and Duke of France, and brother of Eudes, who had himself
proclaimed King, in prejudice of Charles the Simple, the weak descendant
of Charles the Great, who now, in the year 912, reigned over France.
Escorted by five or six knights Rothbert found his way blocked by the
wagon which, despite all that its driver could do, remained motionless
where it had stuck fast. The count, a man of haughty and flinty
countenance, always armed with casque and cuirass, together with iron
leggings, thigh-pieces and gloves, as if marching to war, now rode a
black horse. He hurled imprecations upon the wagon, the teams of oxen
and the poor serf who drove them, and who, frightened by the threats of
the seigneur, hid himself under the wagon. More and more enraged at the
obstacle in his path, the Count of Paris called out to one of his men:
"Prick the vile slave with the point of your lance and force him to
crawl out from under the wagon. Prick him in the chest; prick him in the
head. Prick hard!"
The knight alighted with his lance, and stooping to the ground sought to
reach the serf, who, bent down upon his hands and knees, jumped back and
to the sides in order to escape the point of the lance. The Frank grew
nettled, began to blaspheme and was angrily prodding with his lance
under the wagon, when unexpectedly he felt a severe blow dealt to his
weapon and immediately saw a hook fastened to a long pole swung under
the wagon, while a firm and sonorous voice cried to him:
"If the knights of the count have their lances, the skippers of Paris
have their iron hooks!"
At the sight of the sharp iron and the sound of the threatening words,
the knight leaped back, while Count Rothbert cried out, pale with rage:
"Where is the villain who dares to threaten one of my men?"
The hook disappeared immediately, and a moment later a tall lad of manly
countenance, wearing a cloth coat and the wide breeches of the skippers
of the port, jumped with one bound on top of the lumber with which the
wagon was loaded, stood up boldly, holding in his hand the long
iron-tipped pole with which he had defended the teamster against the
knight, and challenged the question of the count:
"He who prevented a poor serf from being struck through with lance
thrusts is I! My name is Guyrion the Plunger. I am a skipper of Paris. I
fear neither you nor your men!"
"My brother!" screamed the tender Anne, affrighted and leaning out of
the window; "for the love of God, Guyrion, do not defy the knights!"
The impetuous young man, however, taking no notice of the fears of his
sister and mother, continued to defy the count's men from the height of
the wagon, while brandishing his redoubtable weapon:
"Who wishes to try the assault?" and half turning toward the
horror-stricken serf who had crouched behind the wagon, "Save yourself,
poor man; your master will come himself and reclaim his oxen."
The slave promptly took the wise advice and disappeared. The Count of
Paris, on the other hand, ever more enraged, shook his iron gauntleted
fist at Guyrion the Plunger, and yelled furiously at his men:
"Do you allow yourselves to be insulted by that vile scamp? Alight, all
of you, and seize the river crawfish!"
"Crawfish, no! Scorpion, yes! And here is my dart!" answered Guyrion,
brandishing in his powerful hand the redoubtable hook, which, deftly
handled, became so terrible a weapon that the count's knights, looking
from the corners of their eyes at the rapid gyrations of the nautical
implement, descended from their horses with cautious slowness. Leaning
heavily out of the window, Martha and her daughter were imploring
Guyrion to desist from the dangerous contest, when suddenly a new
personage, grey of hair and beard, and likewise dressed in the garb of a
skipper, climbed upon the wagon behind the bold youth, and placing his
hand on Guyrion's shoulder, said to him deliberately:
"My son, do not expose yourself to the anger of these soldiers."
Guyrion turned around surprised at the presence of his father. The
latter, however, bade him with a sign of authority to keep silent, and
lowering the hook with which the young skipper was armed, the old man
addressed the Count of Paris:
"Rothbert, I arrived only this moment from the port of St Landry, and
have just learned what has happened. My son has yielded to the
impetuosity of his age; he is wrong. But your men also were wrong in
trying to wound an inoffensive serf with their lances. All of us here,
myself, my son and our neighbors will put our shoulders to the wheels of
this wagon and push it out of the rut in which it is fast. We shall make
room for you to pass. That should have been done from the first;" and
turning to his son, who obeyed him unwillingly, "come, Guyrion," said
he, "step down from the wagon! Step down!"
The sensible words of the old skipper did not seem to allay the rage of
the Count of Paris. The latter continued to speak in angry tones and in
a low voice to his men, while, thanks to the efforts of Eidiol, Guyrion
and several of their neighbors, the wheel was raised from the deep rut
into which it had sunk, and the wagon was finally drawn to one side of
the street. The passage was now open to Rothbert and his knights. But
while one of them held the bridles of his companions' horses, the
others, instead of remounting, rushed upon Eidiol and his son. Both,
taken by surprise, and before their neighbors could bring them help,
were speedily overpowered, thrown to the ground, and to the utter dismay
of Martha and Anne, were held prisoners by the count's men. Upon
beholding the old skipper and his son thus maltreated, the two women
left their window precipitately, and rushing out of the house threw
themselves at the feet of Rothbert, imploring his mercy for the two
prisoners. Eidiol saw the action of his wife and daughter, and frowning
with indignation, cried out to them:
"Rise to your feet, my wife! Rise to your feet, my daughter! Go back
into the house!"
Not daring to disobey the aged man, both Martha and Anne rose and
returned sobbing into the house.
"Rothbert," resumed Eidiol, when his wife and daughter had re-entered
the house, "you have no right to hold us prisoners. Thanks to God, we
are not left to the utter mercy of our masters, like the serfs of the
field. We enjoy certain franchises in the city. If we are guilty, we
must, as skippers, be tried before the bourgeois Court of the water
merchants."
"The officer whose duty it is to lop off the ears of bandits of your
kind at the cross of Trahoir, will furnish you with a practical proof of
my right to un-ear you," was the sententious answer made to Eidiol by
the count as he remounted his horse. "Back into the saddle," the count
ordered his men. "Two of you shall follow me; the others will take the
two prisoners to the jail of the Chatelet; my provost will pass sentence
upon them; and to-morrow--to the gallows! They shall both be hanged high
and short."
"Seigneur count," broke in a man, who stepped forward out of the crowd
that had in the meanwhile been gathering in the narrow thoroughfare,
"Seigneur count, I am the sergeant of the Bishop of Paris."
"I see as much by your garb; what is it you want?"
"The jurisdiction of the left side of this street belongs to my
seigneur, the bishop. I claim the prisoners. This crowd will lend me
their physical assistance, if need be, to take the prisoners to the
bishop's court, where they will be judged by our own provost, as is our
right."
"If the left side of the street belongs to the jurisdiction of the
bishop, the right is under my authority," cried the Count of Paris. "I
shall keep the prisoners, and shall bring them before my own court."
"Seigneur, that would be your right if the crime had been committed on
the side of the street that is subject to your fief--"
"The two scamps," Rothbert went on to say, interrupting the sergeant,
"were on top of a wagon that obstructed the street in its whole
breadth. There can be no question of right side or left."
"In that case, seigneur count, the culprits belong to the bishop as well
as to yourself."
"And I," rejoined Eidiol, "claim that only the bourgeois court has
jurisdiction over us."
"I care a fig for the bourgeois court, and not a whit more for the
bishop's court!" cried the count. "The prisoners are mine! Make room
there, canaille!"
Both the sergeant and Eidiol were about to reiterate and insist upon
their respective rights, when a new personage, before whom the crowd
fell devoutly upon their knees, stepped upon the scene.
CHAPTER II.
FATHER FULTRADE.
The personage whose bare appearance had imposed silence upon the crowd
was no sooner discovered by the bishop's sergeant than the latter cried
out to him:
"Good Father Fultrade, come to my assistance! You will be better able
than myself to convince the seigneur count of the bishop's priority of
right over these prisoners."
Father Fultrade, the leader of the choir at St. Denis, whom the sergeant
addressed, was an able-bodied monk of not more than thirty years of age.
He was riding slowly up the street, distributing from his high perch
benedictions to the right and left with a hand hirsute up to the nails.
The monk had the frame of a Hercules, a rubicund face, scarlet ears,
and, despite the ordinances of the councils that commended the clergy to
be clean shaven, wore a long beard, that was as black as his thick
eyebrows and that reached down to his robust chest. Having heard the
appeal of the bishop's sergeant and also recognizing the Count of Paris
on horseback, Father Fultrade alighted from his own mount, confided the
reins to a young boy who bowed down devoutly before him, and pushed his
way quickly toward Rothbert through the crowd that was rapidly swelling
in numbers and growing more and more excited. Some were loudly taking
sides with the judicial claims advanced by the bishop's sergeant, others
with those of the skippers, while a small minority sustained the
pretensions of the count. The count realized the situation that he was
in. Aware that, different from the serfs of the fields, whom nothing
protected against the oppression of the seigneurs, the dwellers in the
cities, however miserable their plight might be, at least enjoyed some
few franchises which it was often prudent to respect; anxious, moreover,
to gain the support of the monk to his side, Rothbert controlled his
choler and cordially addressed the latter:
"You are welcome, Fultrade! You are a learned man. You will certainly
agree with me in the matter of these two scamps. Think of it, they had
the audacity to insult me. And now they demand to be tried by the
bourgeois court, while the bishop's sergeant claims them as his
prisoners. I maintain that they fall under the jurisdiction of my own
provost."
The monk looked at the prisoners, recognized Eidiol and his son, gave
them an affectionate greeting with his eyes and turned to Rothbert:
"Seigneur count, there is a way of conciliating all interested. You are
the offended party, be charitable; set the prisoners at liberty. Do not
deny my prayer," the monk hastened to add in answer to a gesture of
impatience from the count. "When I was the priest of Notre Dame, you
often tendered me your good offices. Grant grace to these two men for my
sake. I have known them long. I can vouch for their repentance. Mercy
and pity for them!"
"Fultrade!" impetuously broke out Guyrion the Plunger, little pleased at
the intercession of the monk, "say nothing about my repentance! No, I do
not repent! If I only had my hands free, I would thrust my hook into
the bellies of these cowards, who require three of them to hold one
man!"
"You hear the wretch!" said the count to the monk.
"Rothbert," resumed Eidiol, making a sign to his son to keep quiet,
"youth is hot-headed and deserves indulgence. But I, whose beard is
white, demand of you, not mercy, but justice. Order us taken to the
bourgeois court!"
"Noble count," Fultrade whispered to Rothbert, "do not irritate this
rabble; we may need it any time; are we not in the spring of the year?"
And lowering his voice still more he added: "Is it not at this season of
the year that the Northman pirates are in the habit of ascending the
river as far as Paris? If the rabble is irritated, instead of repelling
the invader, it will lie low, and then we, the churchmen and the
seigneurs, will be obliged to pay whatever ransom those pagans may
choose to exact."
The monk's words seemed to have some effect upon the Count of Paris. He
reflected for a moment, but soon again recovered from the apprehensions
that the chanter had awakened, and remarked:
"Nothing indicates a fresh descent of the Northmans. Their vessels have
not been signalled this year at the mouth of the Seine."
"Do not these accursed pirates swoop down upon us with the suddenness of
a tempest? Out of prudence and out of policy, count, show yourself
merciful towards these two men."
Rothbert still hesitated to accept the clergyman's proposition, which
wounded his pride, when his eyes accidentally fell upon the house of
Eidiol, at the entrance of which Martha and Anne the Sweet stood weeping
and trembling. Suddenly recollecting that the two women had only shortly
before interceded for the culprits, and noticing now for the first time
the angelic beauty of the old skipper's daughter, the count smiled
sarcastically at the monk and said to him:
"By all the saints! What a fool I was! The girl explains to me the
motive of your charity towards the two scamps."
"What does the motive of charity matter?" answered the chanter,
exchanging smiles with the seigneur.
"Very well, be it so!" finally said Rothbert, who had in the meantime
again alighted. He beckoned one of his men to lead his horse back to
him, and while remounting observed to the chanter:
"It is not to any apprehension on the score of the Northmans that I
yield. In granting to you grace for these two scamps, I am only guided
by the desire to render you agreeable to your mistress, a dainty
strawberry to be plucked."
"Noble seigneur, the girl is my spiritual daughter. _Honni soit qui mal
y pense._"
"Tell that to others, you expert catcher of young birds in their nests,"
replied Rothbert, swinging himself into his saddle; and raising his
voice he proceeded, addressing his men who held Eidiol and Guyrion, "Let
the fellows go; but if they ever dare to cross my path, I shall want you
to break the shafts of your lances upon their backs."
The Count of Paris, before whom the crowd parted, departed at a gallop.
A few words whispered in the ear of the bishop's sergeant caused this
dignitary also to renounce his purpose of lodging a complaint against
Eidiol and Guyrion and his renunciation was obtained all the more
quickly seeing that the count, the aggrieved party, had pardoned the
offence. The crowd dispersed. The old skipper, accompanied by his son,
re-entered his house, whither Fultrade preceded him with a solemn and
patronizing air.
The instant the monk stepped into the house, Martha threw herself at his
feet, with tears in her eyes, exclaiming:
"Thanks be to you, my holy father in God! You have delivered back to me
my husband and my son!"
"Rise, good woman," answered Fultrade, "I have only obeyed Christian
charity. Your son has been very imprudent. Let him be wiser hereafter."
Saying this the monk moved towards the wooden staircase that led to the
upper rooms, and said to Eidiol's wife: "Martha, let us go upstairs with
your daughter, I want to speak to you both on holy matters."
"Fultrade," said the old skipper, who, no less than his son, seemed to
dislike the sight of the monk in his house, "I had justice on my side in
this dispute with the count; nevertheless, I thank you for your good
intentions. But, my good wife, before turning your thoughts to holy
matters, you will be kind enough to let my son and myself have a pot of
beer and a piece of bread and bacon for immediate consumption. Then I
wish you to prepare some provisions for us, because within an hour we
have to sail down to the lower Seine, where we shall remain until
to-morrow evening."
While he was making the announcement of his speedy departure, Eidiol
observed, without however taking any particular notice of the
circumstance, that the monk, otherwise impassible, seemed slightly to
thrill with joy. The old man's attention was immediately drawn away from
Fultrade by his daughter's caresses.
"What, father!" exclaimed Anne the Sweet, with a sad look and throwing
her arms around her father's neck, "Are you to leave us so soon, and
with my brother, too? Do you really expect to remain a whole day out of
the house?"
"We have a cargo to take to the little port of St. Audoin," answered
Eidiol. "Do not feel alarmed, my dear child, we shall surely be back
to-morrow." And again addressing his wife, "Come, Martha, let us have
something to eat, fetch us a pot of beer and get the provisions ready.
We have not much time left."
"Could you not wait a little while, my friend--good Father Fultrade
wishes to speak to me and Anne upon some sacred matters?"
"Well, then, let my daughter stay with me," answered the old skipper
with some impatience. "She will be able to attend to us."
The monk made a sign to Martha to accept her husband's proposition, and
she followed the holy man into the upper chamber where the two remained
alone.
"Martha," the monk hastened to say the instant the two were seated, "I
have but a few minutes to spend here. The fervent piety of yourself and
your daughter deserves a reward. The treasures of the Abbey of St. Denis
have just received from our holy father in Rome a relic of inestimable
value--a lock from the hair of our Lord Jesus Christ, cut by a lad at
the wedding feast of Cana."
"Good God! What a divine treasure!"
"Doubly divine! The faithful, lucky enough to be able to touch this
matchless relic, will not be only temporarily relieved of their
ailments, they will be forever healed of all sorts of fevers."
"Healed forever!" exclaimed Martha, clasping her hands in ecstatic
wonderment. "Healed forever of all sorts of dangerous fevers!"
"Besides, thanks to the doubly miraculous virtue of the relic, even
those who have always enjoyed health, are preserved from all future
sicknesses."
"Oh, good father! What an immense concourse of people will not
immediately crowd to your abbey, in order to profit by such miraculous
blessings."
"It is for that reason that, in reward to your piety, I wish that you
and your daughter be the first to approach the treasure. The seigneurs
and the grandees will come only after you. I have reserved the first
admission for you two."
"For the like of us, poor women!"
"'The last shall be the first, and the first shall be the last'--so hath
our Redeemer said. A magnificent case is being prepared for the relic.
It is not to be offered to the adoration of the faithful until the
goldsmith's work is ready. But I mean to introduce you two secretly, you
and your daughter, this very evening, into the oratory of the Abbot of
St. Denis, where the relic has been temporarily deposited."
"Oh! How bounden I shall be to you! I shall be forever healed of my
fevers, and my daughter will never be ill! And do you think that this
miraculous relic, this lock of hair, may be powerful enough to enable me
to find again my little daughter, my little girl, who, when still a
child, disappeared from this place, about thirty years ago?"
"Nothing is impossible to faith. But in order to enjoy the blessings of
the relic, you will have to make haste. I accompanied our abbot to St.
Germain-d'Auxerre. He will remain there only until to-morrow. It will,
accordingly, be imperative for you and your daughter to come with me to
St. Denis this very evening. Towards nightfall I shall wait for you
near the tower of the Little Bridge. You will both ride at the crupper
of my horse; we shall depart for the abbey; I shall introduce you two
into the oratory of the abbot, where you will make your devotions, and
then, after you have spent the night in the house of one of our female
serfs you can both return to Paris in the morning."
"Oh, holy father in Christ! How impenetrable are the designs of
Providence! My husband, who has not the faith in relics that we have,
would surely have opposed our pious pilgrimage. But this very night he
will be absent!"
"Martha, neither your husband nor your son are on the road to their
salvation. You must redouble your own piety to the end that you may be
more surely able to intercede for them with the Lord. I forbid you to
mention our pilgrimage either to Eidiol or your son."
"I shall obey you, good father. Is it not to the end of living longer at
their side that I wish to go and adore that incomparable relic?"
"It is then agreed. Towards nightfall, you and your daughter will wait
for me on the other side of the Little Bridge. Understood?"
"Myself and Anne will wait for you, holy father, well muffled in our
capes."
Fultrade left the room, descended the staircase with meek gravity, and
before leaving the house said to the old skipper, while affecting not to
look at Anne the Sweet:
"May the Lord prosper your voyage, Eidiol."
"Thanks for the good wish, Fultrade," answered Eidiol, "but my voyage
could not choose but be favorable. We are to descend the Seine; the
current carries us; my vessel has been freshly scraped; my ash-tree
oars are new, my sailors are young and vigorous, and I am an old pilot
myself."
"All that is nothing without the will of the Lord," answered the monk
with a look of severity, while following with lustful side glances the
movements of Anne, who was ascending the stairs to fetch from the upper
chambers the great coats which her father and brother wished to take
along for use during the night on the water. "No!" continued Fultrade,
"without the will of the Lord, no voyage can be favorable; God wills all
things."
"By the wine of Argenteuil, which you sold to us at such dear prices in
the church of Notre Dame, when we used to go there and play dice, Father
Fultrade, how like a sage you are now talking!" cried Rustic the Gay,
whose name well fitted his looks. The worthy lad, having learned at the
Port of St. Landry about the arrest of the dean of the Skippers' or
Mariners' Guild of Paris, had hastened to the spot, greatly alarmed
about Martha and her daughter, to whom he came to offer his services.
"Oh, Father Fultrade!" the young and merry fellow went on to say, "what
good broiled steaks, what delicate sausages did you not use to sell us
in the rear of the little chapel of St. Gratien where you kept your
tap-room! How often have I not seen monks, vagabonds and soldiers
wassailing there with the gay lassies of Four-Banal street! What giddy
whirls did they not use to dance in front of your hermitage!"
"Thanks be to God, Father Fultrade needs no longer to sell wine and
broiled steaks!" put in Martha with marked impatience at the jests of
Rustic the Gay, and annoyed at seeing the young skipper endeavor to
humiliate the holy man with the recollection of the former traffic in
wine and victuals in which he had indulged as was the habit with the
priests of lower rank. "Father Fultrade is now the leader of the choir
of St. Denis and one of the high dignitaries of the Church. Hold your
tongue, brainless boy!"
"Martha, let the fool talk!" replied the monk disdainfully, walking to
the door. "The true Christian preaches humility. I am not ashamed of
having kept a tap-room. The end justifies the means. All that is done in
the temple of the Lord is sanctified."
"What, Father Fultrade!" exclaimed Rustic the Gay, "Is everything
sanctified?--even debauchery?"
The monk left the house shrugging his shoulders and without uttering a
word. But Martha, angered at the lad's language, addressed him with
bitterness in her tone:
"Rustic, if all you come here for is to humiliate our good Father
Fultrade, you may dispense with putting your feet over our threshold.
Shame upon speakers of evil!"
"Come, come, dear wife," said Eidiol, "calm yourself. After all, the lad
has only said the truth. Is it not a fact that the lower clergy traffic
in wine and food, even in pretty girls?"
"Thanks be to the Lord!" answered Martha. "At least what is drunk and
what is eaten on the premises of holy places is sanctified, as the
venerable Father Fultrade has just said. Is it not better to go and
drink there than in the taverns where Satan spreads his nets?"
"Adieu, good wife! I do not care to discuss such subjects. Nevertheless
it does seem strange to me, despite the general custom, to see the house
of the Lord turned into a tavern."
"Oh, my God! My poor husband!" exclaimed Martha, sighing and painfully
affected by the obduracy of her husband. "Is the custom not general? In
all the chapels there is feasting done."
"It is the custom; I admit it; I said so before, dear wife. Let us not
quarrel over it. But where is Anne? She has not returned from above;"
and stepping towards the staircase, the old man twice called out his
daughter's name.
"Here I am, father," answered the blonde girl with her sweet voice, and
she descended with her father's and brother's great coats on her arm.
The preparations for departure were soon ended by Eidiol, his son, and
Rustic the Gay, all the quicker and more cheerful for the hand that Anne
took in them. A large hamper was filled with provisions and the men took
leave of the women folks.
"Adieu, dear wife; adieu, dear daughter, till to-morrow. Forget not to
lock the street door well to-night. Penitent marauders are dangerous
fellows. There is no worse breed of thieves."
"The Lord will watch over us," answered Martha, dropping her eyes before
her husband.
"Adieu, good mother," said Guyrion, in turn. "I regret to have caused
you the fright of this forenoon. My father was right. I was too quick
with my hook against the lances of the Franks."
"Thanks to God, my son," replied Martha with unction, "our good Father
Fultrade happened along, like an angel sent by God to save you. Blessed
be he for his intervention!"
"If the angels look like him, what a devil of a face must not the demons
have!" murmured Rustic the Gay, taking charge of the hamper, while
Guyrion threw two spare oars and his redoubtable hook over his shoulder.
At the moment when, following last upon the steps of Eidiol and his son,
Rustic the Gay was leaving the house, Anne the Sweet approached the
young man and said to him in a low voice:
"Rustic, keep good watch over my father and my brother. Mother and
myself will pray to God for you three."
"Anne," answered the young skipper in his usual merry voice and yet in a
penetrating tone: "I love your father like my own; Guyrion like a
brother; I have a stout heart and equally stout arms; I would die for
all of you. I can tell you no more."
Rustic exchanged a last parting look with the young girl, whose face
turned cherry-red with joy and girlish embarrassment. He ran to catch up
with Eidiol and Guyrion, and all three disappeared at the next turning
of the street from the lingering looks of Martha and Anne, who lovingly
followed them with their eyes and called after them: "A pleasant
voyage!"
CHAPTER III.
GAELO AND SHIGNE.
On the very day when Master Eidiol, bound for the small port of St.
Audoin, descended the Seine on board his trading vessel, two other
craft, proceeding from the opposite direction, were ascending the river
with forceful strokes of oars. Both these craft were of unusual
shape--they were narrow, about thirty feet long, and rose only slightly
above the water's line. They resembled sea-serpents. Their prows, shaped
like their poops, enabled them to advance or retreat without the
necessity of turning about, but by merely placing the rudders forward or
aft, according as the maritime maneuver demanded. These craft, supplied
with a single mast and square sail, the latter of which was now clawed
fast to the cross beam, there being only little wind, manned with twelve
oarsmen, a steersman and a captain--the two "_holkers_" as these craft
were called by the Northmans, were so light that the pirates could carry
them on their shoulders for a long distance and set them floating again.
Although the two _holkers_ were of equal build and swiftness they
resembled each other only in the sense that a robust man may be said to
resemble a lissome lass. One of them, painted black, had for its prow
ornament a sea eagle painted red; its beak and talons were of polished
iron. On the top of the mast a weather vane, or, as they called it,
"_eire-wire_," also representing a sea eagle engraved on a metal sheet,
turned at the slightest breeze, the direction of which was indicated by
the fluttering of a light red streamer placed on the starboard side of
the _holker_ and carrying the same sea bird embroidered in black. Just
below the rail, which was pierced with the holes necessary for the
operation of the oars, a row of iron bucklers glistened in the rays of
the setting sun, which also played upon the pirates' polished armor,
that consisted of little iron scales, which, covering them from head to
foot, imparted to the wearers the appearance of gigantic fishes.
Fierce people were these pirates! Sailing over the main from the shores
of Sweden, Norway and Denmark, they arrived only after some days'
journey at the coasts of Gaul. They boasted in their "sagas," or popular
songs, of "never having slept under a board roof, or having emptied
their cups near a sheltered fireplace." Pillaging churches, castles and
abbeys, turning chapels into stables, cutting shirts and breeches for
themselves out of altar-cloths, ravaging everything that they
encountered--in this style, as they expressed themselves, they "sang the
mass of the lances, beginning at dawn with the matins and closing at
dusk with the vespers." To conduct his vessel as a skilful knight
manages his horse, to be able to run over its oars while in motion, and
to be able to hurl three successive javelins at the plate on the top of
the mast, receive them back in his own hands and hurl them up again
without once missing his aim--such were some of the essential
accomplishments for an able pirate.
"Let us then
Defy the weather,"
so ran their sea song,
"For the tempest
Is our servant,
Helps our oars and
Fills our sails,
Wafts us where we
Wish to go.
"Where we land we
Eat the repast
There prepared for
Us by others;
Slay our host and
Fire his dwelling,
And resume the
Azure swan route."
These Northmans had for their divinity Odin, the God of the North, who
promised to the brave, killed in battle, a home in Walhalla, the
brilliant residence of the celestial heroes. Nevertheless, relying more
on their own intrepidity than upon the aid of their God, they never
invoked him. "My brother in arms and myself," thus did Gunkator, a
famous sea-king who frequently ravaged the castles and churches of Gaul,
speak of himself and his fellow pirates; "my brother in arms and myself
never sacrifice to the Gods; we place our faith only upon our oars and
our own strength; we get along very well in that way." Several of the
chiefs of these pirates claimed to have issued from the embraces of
Trolls, sea sprites, and the Ases and Dwalines, gentle fairies, who
delighted in dancing by the light of the moon on the ice of the
northern lakes, or in disporting themselves among the snow-covered
branches of the tall fir-trees.
Well might Gaëlo, who was in command of the black _holker_ with the
sea-eagle ornament at its prow, trust to his own strength; it matched
his bravery, and his bravery matched his skilfulness. Nevertheless, what
surpassed his skilfulness, his bravery, and his strength, was the
masculine beauty of the young pirate chief, as, with one hand resting on
his harpoon, covered from head to foot in his flexible armor of iron
scales, Gaëlo stood in the prow of his vessel. From his belt hung by his
side his long sword and his ivory horn whose notes were well known of
the pirates. His pointed casque, almost devoid of visor, exposed his
features, browned by the sea air, because no less than the heroes of the
Saga, Gaëlo "never slept under a roof, nor emptied his cup near a
sheltered fireplace." It was easy to surmise from the intrepidity of his
eyes, and the curve of his lip that he also had often "from dawn to dusk
sung the mass of the lances," perchance also carved his own shirt from
some altar-cloth, and, who knows, more than once, burnt down an abbey
after having eaten the abbot's supper. But he certainly never killed the
abbot, if the latter was defenceless and offered no resistance. No; the
noble cast of Gaëlo's face bore no trace of ferocity. Though he was of
those who practiced the principle of Trodd the Dane of the country of
Garderig: "A good pirate never seeks for shelter during a tempest, and
never binds his wounds before the end of the fray; he must attack an
enemy single-handed, defend himself against two, never yield to three
and flee without shame before four"--though Gaëlo followed this maxim,
he also practiced this other given by the good chief. Half to his
fellow champions: "Women must not be killed, nor must little children be
tossed in the air to be received for amusement upon the points of your
lances." No; Gaëlo had not a ferocious face. Far from that, particularly
at this moment did his face denote the most tender sentiments. His eyes
snapped with the fire of gentleness as from time to time he turned his
head towards the other _holker_ that was vying with his own in
swiftness.
Indeed, never before did pirate vessel present to a mariner's eyes a
more charming sight! Constructed in the same proportions as Gaëlo's,
only finer and more dashing, the second _holker_ was painted white. The
spare oars and the bucklers ranged in a row like those of the black
_holker_ were of azure blue. A gilded swan ornamented its prow. On the
top of its mast a swan with outspread wings and engraved upon a sheet of
polished copper, responded to the rising evening breeze, which also
raised a streamer of azure blue embroidered with a white swan.
Within-board, swords, pikes and axes, symmetrically ranked, hung within
easy reach of the rowers, who were clad in flexible armor, not of
scales, but of iron mail, with casques with short visors on their heads.
Like Gaëlo, the chief of this second _holker_ was standing near the
craft's prow, with one hand upon a long harpoon which its holder
frequently used in order to turn the vessel's head aside whenever it
grazed the edges of several islets, grown with willows, that lay in the
vessel's course. This Northman chief, slenderer but as tall as Gaëlo,
was a woman, a virgin of twenty years, known as the Beautiful Shigne.
Like the female warriors whom she chieftained, Shigne wore an armor of
steel mail so fine and flexible that it might have been taken for a grey
silk. This species of tunic descended from the maid's neck to just
above her knees, and fitted so closely that it betrayed the robust
contours of her bosom. An embroidered belt gathered the coat of mail
around her waist, from the belt hung, on one side, her ivory horn, on
the other her sword. No less plainly outlined were the Beautiful
Shigne's nether limbs, likewise encased in flexible iron mail. Her shoes
were made of the skin of the sea-lion, and they were tightly laced
around her ankles.
The warrior maid had laid her casque at her feet. Her hair, of a pale
blonde, parted over her wide forehead and cut short at the neck, framed
in with its ringlets a daring white face slightly tinged with the rose.
The cold azure of the northern heaven seemed to be reflected in her
large, clear, blue and limpid eyes. Her aquiline nose, her serious and
haughty mouth, imparted an austere expression to her masculine beauty.
Before now the sagas had sung the bravery of the Beautiful Shigne, one
of the bravest of the "Buckler Maidens" or "_Skoldmoë_" as the Northmans
called them. The number of these female warriors was considerable in
those countries of the North. They took part in the expeditions of the
pirates, and not infrequently excelled them in daring. There was nothing
more savage or more indomitable than these haughty beings. One instance,
taken from a thousand others, will convey an idea of their character.
Thoborge, the daughter of the pirate Eric, a young "Buckler Maiden,"
beautiful and chaste, always armed, always ready for the combat, had
refused all applicants for her hand. She chased them away with contempt,
wounded and even killed several of them when they presumed to talk to
her of love. Sigurd, a pirate of renown, attacked Thoborge in her home
on the isle of Garderig, where she had entrenched herself with her
female companions in arms. She resisted heroically. A large number of
pirates and of "Buckler Maidens" met their death at that battle. Sigurd
having at last seriously wounded Thoborge with the blow of a battle axe,
she confessed herself vanquished and espoused the pirate.
Of such a nature was the savage chastity of these brave daughters of the
North. The Beautiful Shigne indicated that she was worthy of her stock.
An orphan since the death of her father and mother, both of whom were
killed at a sea battle, the young female warrior-maid had been adopted
by Rolf, an old Northman pirate chief, who was celebrated for his
numerous excursions into Gaul. This year he had come in less than a
fortnight from his northern seas to the mouth of the Seine, and was now
ascending the river with the intent to lay siege to Paris at the head of
a fleet of two thousand ships of war that were leisurely advancing under
the strokes of their oars and were preceded by the _holkers_ of Gaëlo
and Shigne. The two had the lead of the fleet by about one league. It
was the result of a challenge.
"The arms of my virgins are more robust than those of your champions,"
the Beautiful Shigne had said to Gaëlo. "I challenge your _holker_ to
compete in swiftness with mine. The arms of your champions will be tired
out before my virgin mates begin to slacken the strokes of their oars."
"Shigne, I accept the challenge. But if the test turns against you, will
you allow my _holker_ to do battle side by side with yours in this war?"
"You must be looking for help from me in case of danger," Shigne
answered, smiling haughtily; saying which, she motioned to her mates to
bend more vigorously to their oars and to start on the race.
Gaëlo issued a like order to his men, and the two _holkers_ rapidly
rowed away and ahead of the Northman fleet, each trying to gain the lead
of the other. For a long stretch the Buckler Maidens had the advantage,
but thanks to their redoubled efforts, Gaëlo's "Champions," as the
Northman chieftains styled their men, recovered the lost distance. The
sun was now sinking behind the wooded hills of one of the islets of the
Seine when the two craft were speeding forward abreast of each other and
with equal swiftness.
"Shigne, the sun is going down," observed the pirate Gaëlo. "Our vessels
are exactly abreast of each other, and the arms of my champions are not
yet tired."
"Their strength is great, seeing that they held up against my virgins,"
was the answer that the heroine made, accompanying the words with a
disdainful smile.
"Do your words mean praise for my champions, or do they imply mockery?
Explain your thoughts more clearly."
"Had we not a battle on hand with the Franks, my reply to you would be
an invitation to land on one of these islets and to fight, seven against
seven. You would soon enough discover whether my virgins are a match for
your champions or not."
"Must you, then, be vanquished in order to be pleased?"
"I do not know--I never have been vanquished. Orwarold asked my hand
from Rolf, our chief. Rolf answered him: 'I give you Shigne if you can
take her; I shall have her to-morrow on the isle of Garin, alone and
armed; go there.' Orwarold came; we fought; he wounded me in my arm with
a sword thrust; I killed him. Later, Olaf wished to marry me. But just
as the combat was to begin he said: 'Woman, I have not the courage to
raise my sword against you.'"
"Shigne, be just. The sagas have sung the prowesses of Olaf; he is brave
among the bravest. If he did not battle with you, it was not out of
cowardice, but out of love."
The Amazon laughed disdainfully, and rejoined: "I slashed Olaf's face
with the point of my sword, that was my answer to him."
"Your heart is colder than the ice of your native land! You reject my
love because I am of the Gallic race!"
"I care not about your race! Olaf and Orwarold were, like myself, born
on an island of Denmark. They could not vanquish me. The one tried and
failed, and lost his life for his presumption; the other did not dare.
The one I killed, the other's face I marked for life."
"Promise me, at least, that you will be no other's wife."
"An easy promise. Where is the warrior powerful and brave enough to
vanquish me?"
"And if you were vanquished, would you not be filled with anger? Would
you not ever after hate the victor?"
"No! I could only admire his courage!"
"Shigne, you and I could not cross swords in combat. Either you would
kill me, or I would have to kill you; in either case you would be lost
to me for a wife. But, seeing a combat is thus interdicted to us--would
you at least love me if I accomplished some great deed of valor? If the
sagas of your country sang my name side by side with the names of the
most renowned warriors?"
"Your bravery will never throw mine into amazement."
"Yesterday an old Gallic fugitive serf notified old Rolf that the
Franks had fortified the abbey of St. Denis in such a manner that it was
impregnable."
"There is no fortress, town or abbey that is impregnable. All that may
happen is that we may be detained several days before the monastery of
St. Denis, which Rolf had expected to capture by surprise. It is an
important post. It lies close to Paris."
"Will you love me if I seize the abbey of St. Denis, single-handed with
my companions?"
The face of the Buckler Maiden became purple. The throbs of her marble
bosom raised the mail of her armor. Straightening up to her full length,
she haughtily answered Gaëlo: "I will capture the abbey of St. Denis,
reputed to be impregnable."
Immediately upon these words, the Beautiful Shigne ordered her virgins
to row back and join the fleet of Rolf, whither the white hull of her
_holker_ darted like an arrow.
CHAPTER IV.
A BERSERKER.
Following with saddened eyes the light _holker_ that carried away the
warrior maid, Gaëlo remained silent and pensive, while his champions
rested upon their oars. The steersman, a man of about thirty years, of a
merry face and clad in the coat and wide breeches of the skippers of the
Seine, was named Simon Large-Ears. He owed his surname to an enormous
pair of ears, that stood out far from his temples, and which were as red
as his nose. Simon, once a serf of the fisheries attached to the abbey
of St. Paterne, had, jointly with three other companions, who were
seated on the oarsmen's benches, and who wore the Northman pointed
casque and cuirass of iron scales, run away to the pirates and offered
them their services in the capacity of pilot and oarsmen, the moment
that the numerous Northman fleet had appeared at the mouth of the Seine.
Simon and his comrades, as well as many other Gallic serfs, who availed
themselves of the opportunity to drop their servitude and revenge upon
their masters the ill-treatment that the latter subjected them to, only
demanded from their Northman allies a share of the prospective booty.[1]
Leaning on his harpoon, silent and pensive, Gaëlo contemplated the
_holker_ of the Beautiful Shigne as it rowed back and became indistinct
in the light mist that frequently rises at sunset from the surface of
the river's waters. Simon Large-Ears, seated at the poop, and, as pilot,
holding the rudder in his hand, said to one of his companions surnamed
Robin Jaws, by reason of his lower jaw-bones protruding like a
Molossian's:
"Did you hear the conversation between the Beautiful Shigne and Gaëlo?
What savage she-devils are these Northman virgins! They must be courted
with rough sword whacks, caressed with battle-axe cracks, and their
hearts can be reached only by boring through their breasts, and if you
don't, then these furies make you wed death. How do you like such
betrothals?"
"I would prefer to court one of those African lionesses of which Ibrahim
the Saracen was telling us the other day," and turning towards his
bench-mate, a gigantic Northman of a beard so blonde that it seemed
almost white, Robin said: "Helloa, Lodbrog! If all the women of your
race receive their lovers in that manner, there must be more dead bodies
than new-born ones in your country."
"Yes--but the children of these virgin warriors, whom none possesses
until after he has vanquished his chosen one with the sword, become men,
everyone of whom are worth ten others in vigor and bravery," answered
the giant gravely, and raising his enormous head he proceeded: "All such
children are born, like myself, berserkers."
"Aye, aye!" put in the other Northman oarsmen in a low voice and with an
accent of deference that bordered on fear. "Lodbrog was born a
berserker!"
"I do not deny it, comrades," replied Simon; "but by the devil! Explain
to me what 'berserker' means."
"A warrior who is always terrible to his enemies," explained one of the
Northmans, "and sometimes dangerous to his friends."
The giant Lodbrog nodded his head affirmatively, while Simon and Robin
looked at him in astonishment, not having understood the mysterious
words of the pirates. At this moment Gaëlo approached his men. He had
awakened from the profound revery into which the disappearance of the
Buckler Maiden plunged him. The Northman chieftain looked determined.
"My champions," said Gaëlo in a resonant voice, "we must be ahead of the
Beautiful Shigne and seize the abbey of St. Denis ourselves! Yours shall
be the booty, mine the glory!"
"Gaëlo," observed Simon, "when I heard you mention the feat to your
warrior maid, I, who am well acquainted with the abbey of St. Denis,
where I have recently been more than once, when I was a serf of the
fishery of St. Paterne, may hell consume it, I took your words simply as
a lover's jest. Guarded as the abbey is, and fortified with thick walls,
the place can resist five or six hundred determined men. How can you
think of taking it with only fifteen? Come, Gaëlo, you must give up the
plan."
"My braves," resumed Gaëlo, after a moment's silence, "if I were to tell
you that a serf, a swine-herd, is at this very hour a count, the
seigneur and master of a province that Charles the Bald, grandfather of
Charles the Simple, who is now king of the Franks, presented him with,
you would answer me: 'A serf, a swine-herd, become master and seigneur
of a province? It is impossible!'"
"By the faith of Large-Ears, that would, indeed, be my answer. A
swine-herd can never become a count!"
"You think not?" replied Gaëlo. "And who is the present Count of
Chartres and master of the country if not a pirate who one time was a
swine-herd at Trancout, a poor village located near Troyes?"[2]
"Oh! Oh! Chief," put in Robin Jaws, "you have Hastain in mind, the old
bandit who fought in the ranks of the Northman pirates! We know the
song:
"When he had sacked the Franks,
Saw all his ships full rigged,
Hastain of Rome heard tell,
Vowed he would go there.
Vowed he would take the place,
Plunder and pillage it,
And make of Rome the King
His friend Boern Iron Sides."
"Simon," said Gaëlo, interrupting Robin's song, "listen well with both
your large ears to the end of the song! Proceed my champion!"
"The song ends well," answered Robin, resuming the thread of the ballad:
"Down Into Italy,
Plundering, the pirates went,
Laded their ships with rich
Spoils of the Churches.
Then Hastain gave the word,
For the return to France,
And to the Frankish shores
Steered they their way back.
"But the old Frankish King,
Dreading the pirates' band,
Quoth unto Hastain then:
'Strike not the abbeys;
Touch not nor plunder them,
Nor the seigniorial burgs,--
I shall establish you
Count of the Chartres.'
"Hastain the pirate Chief,
Well with the offer pleased,
Answered agreeably,
'Lo, I am willing!'
Thus was the bargain struck,
Thus he became the Count
Of the vast Chartres land,
He, once a swine-herd!"
"By the devil and his horns! Long live Hastain! All is possible!" cried
Simon Large-Ears, saying which he joined his piercing voice to the deep
voices of the pirates, who, striking with their oars upon the row of
bucklers that hung from the sides of the _holker_, sang fit to rend the
welkin:
"Thus was the bargain struck,
Thus he became the Count
Of the vast Chartres land,
He, once a swine-herd!"
"And now," Gaëlo resumed after his champions had finished the martial
refrain, "if a swine-herd serf could become the master of a province,
do you hold it impossible for fifteen resolute champions to take
possession of the abbey of St. Denis, the richest abbey of all Gaul?"
"No! No!" cried the pirates fired with the prospect of pillage, and
again smiting with their oars the bucklers that hung from the sides of
the _holker_. "To St. Denis! To St. Denis! Death to its tonsured
masters! Pillage! Pillage! Fire and blood!"
The thundering voice of Lodbrog the Giant dominated the din that
proceeded from the Northmans' throats and the clangor of the smitten
shields. Standing on his bench and whirling in one hand his long oar
with the ease that he would have handled a reed, he bellowed at the top
of his voice: "To St. Denis! To St. Denis!" And intoxicating and lashing
himself into a fury with his own clamor, his savage features speedily
betokened a degree of exaltation that developed into a kind of delirium.
His eyes rolled rapidly in their orbits; his lips whitened with foam;
and finally, emitting a terrible cry, he bent his oar in his hands and
broke it in two as if it had been a cane.
At the sight of such a display of superhuman strength, the Northmans,
who had for some little while before been observing Lodbrog with anxious
looks, now cried out in chorus:
"Beware all! He is berserk! He will kill us all!" And before Gaëlo had
time to prevent it, all the pirates threw themselves upon the giant, and
by their united efforts rolled him overboard into the Seine.
Gaëlo had anchored his vessel at a short distance from one of the woody
islets, washed by the river. Lodbrog fell heels over head into the water
between the _holker_ and the nearby shore. With one bound the giant
leaped out of the river, which was deep and rapid at that spot, and
gained the shore, where he ran about shouting: "To St. Denis! To St
Denis!" The frenzy that possessed the giant increased ten-fold the man's
prodigious strength. He uprooted a twenty-foot poplar, and armed with
the tree as with a mace, smote and crushed the other trees within his
reach. The largest branches flew into splinters, the trunks broke in
two, and still the furious vertigo of the colossus was on the increase.
Not far from the shore stood the ruins of a house still partly covered
by its roof; its walls arrested for a moment the demented course of the
berserker. But the obstacle redoubled his rage. The trunk of the poplar
served him for a ram. Its repeated blows broke through a portion of the
lower wall, which thereupon came tumbling down with a great crash. Held
up by the iron work in the opposite wall, a portion of the roof still
remained in place. The giant clambered over the debris, grasped the
beams of the roof with both hands and shook them furiously, ever
bellowing: "To St. Denis! To St. Denis!" At last the beams yielded, and
the worm-eaten roof, still partly covered with tiles, sank down upon
Lodbrog with a deafening crash. For an instant the raging maniac
disappeared under a cloud of dust, but presently reappeared unscathed
from the falling timber and tiles. His casque and iron armor had
protected him. He mounted the heap of ruins, looked around, and seeing
nothing more to destroy, descended, pulled up the joists and beams,
lifted up enormous stones and hurled them about with the irresistible
force of those engines of war that are called catapults. Suddenly the
berserker was heard to emit a roar like that of a lion; he raised his
powerful arms heavenward, his body became rigid; for a moment he
remained motionless like a gigantic iron statue, and then, like a
colossus about to tumble from its base, swayed for an instant in air,
dropped to the ground and rolled like a solid block from the top of the
heap of ruins down to its foot, where he lay prone, seemingly as
inanimate as a corpse.
Gaëlo and the Northman pirates were not amazed at the frenzy of Lodbrog.
They knew well that many a Northman mariner was subject to these
frightful fits, frightful like the fury of the insane, a sort of
epilepsy peculiar to the berserkers, with whom the anticipation or the
ardor of battle, anger or drunkenness brought on the spell. Simon
Large-Ears and Robin Jaws, however, now witnessed the spectacle for the
first time; they gazed at it with surprise and affright. Finally, seeing
from the distance that Lodbrog lay unconscious and rigid amidst the
wreck that he had wrought, Simon cried:
"He is now fortunately dead! We have nothing more to fear!"
"The Northmans are right," put in Robin; "such frantic folks are as
dangerous to their friends as to their enemies. If that berserker had
remained among us in the _holker_, he would have strangled or drowned us
all!"
"After which he would have flung the vessel over his head like a wooden
shoe. He could have done it. I saw him flinging around beams and rocks
that must have surely weighed three times as much as any man," added
Large-Ears. "What an amount of strength all wasted! How he would have
scattered about death and desolation in the abbey of St. Denis, where he
thought he was fighting. After all, it is a pity that he is dead and
gone."
"He is not dead--weigh anchor, my champions! With two strokes of the
oars we can reach the isle, and presently you will see Lodbrog return to
himself as if awakening from a dream."
"By the horns of the devil!" exclaimed Simon. "Out of fear that he may
take to dreaming again and harpoon me, I prefer to stay on the vessel
with my friend Robin;" and Large-Ears never once took his eyes off the
berserker who continued motionless only a hundred feet from the shore
and in plain sight of his companions.
"The Northmans may go alone to the assistance of the maniac, if they so
desire," observed Robin as the _holker_ approached the shore. "It will
be a sweet sensation for Lodbrog to recognize the faces of folks from
his native land, when he regains consciousness, will it not?"
"It sometimes happens that fires, thought to be extinct, suddenly flame
up," Large-Ears rejoined sagely.
The vessel touched land, and Gaëlo and the Northmans approached the
colossus, not, however, without caution. One of the pirates took off his
casque, filled it half-full with water, threw into it a handful of sand
that he picked up from the shore and shook up the mixture, while his
companions vainly sought to raise Lodbrog into a sitting posture. The
body was rigid like a bar of iron. They found it impossible to extract
from his clenched fist a stone that he still held as firmly as in a vise
between his fingers. His face, surrounded by the borders of his casque,
was livid and motionless, his jaws were set, his lips were covered with
froth, his eyes fixed, dilated, glassy. The Northman, dipping out of his
casque the sand moistened with cold water, threw it by handfuls upon the
prostrate giant's face.
"Be careful!" called out Gaëlo. "You will blind him with the moist
sand."
"No, no!" confidently answered the pirate, redoubling his sandy douches.
"It is especially when the fine gravel enters the eye that the good
effect is produced."
The pirate's experience did not deceive him. Soon slight convulsive
tremors began to agitate the lines on Lodbrog's face. His rigid fingers
loosened and allowed the stone that they clenched to roll off. A few
minutes later his limbs became supple. One of the Northmans ran to the
river and dipped up some fresh water and dashed it in the berserker's
face. The latter was soon heard to mumble in a ruffled voice while he
rubbed his eyelids:
"My eyes burn me. Am I in the celestial Walhalla promised by Odin to
departed warriors?"
"You are here among your companions of war, my brave champion," Gaëlo
answered him. "You have broken down a score of huge trees and demolished
a house. Was that enough to limber up your strength? What do you still
want?"
"Oh! Oh!" mumbled the giant, shaking his enormous head, and without
ceasing to rub his eyes with his fists. "I am not at all surprised at
having played such havoc. I began to feel myself berserk when I cried
out, 'To St. Denis!' and all the time after I imagined myself
demolishing the abbey and slaughtering the monks and their soldiers. I
was trying to exterminate them all."
"Do not be disappointed, my Hercules," Gaëlo replied encouragingly. "The
moon will rise early; we shall row all night; to-morrow evening we shall
be at St. Denis, and day after to-morrow at Paris."
CHAPTER V.
THE ABBEY OF ST. DENIS.
The abbey of St. Denis resembled a vast fortified castle. The high and
thick walls that enclosed it, the only entrance through which was a
vaulted gate, covered with heavy sheets of iron and, like the walls,
pierced with narrow loop-holes through which the archers could reach the
enemy with their arrows, rendered the place safe against any surprise.
In order to take this fortress, large engines of war would be required
and a powerful attacking force.
Agreeable to her promise made to Father Fultrade, Martha and her
daughter Anne the Sweet found themselves towards nightfall at the
trysting place named by the monk. He also was on time. He arrived on his
large horse, an animal powerful enough to carry Eidiol's wife on its
crupper and in front of the saddle the young girl, whom the priest thus
had an opportunity to hold in his arms. Despite its robust neck and
haunches, the horse that bore the triple load could proceed only slowly
along the ancient Roman route, which, connecting Paris with Amiens, led
by the abbey of St. Denis. The nocturnal trip was long and made in
silence. Martha, proud of finding herself riding at the crupper of a
holy man, thought only of the relic whose divine influence was to
preserve her as well as her daughter from all present and future ills.
Anne had come with repugnance. The monk ever inspired her with a vague
sense of fear. The night was dark; the route uncertain. When, as it
happened from time to time, the horse seemed to take fright, the maid
felt Fultrade tighten his hold upon her, and his hot breath smite her
cheeks.
When, finally, the monk arrived with his two female traveling companions
at the massive gate of the abbey, he knocked in a particular manner. The
knock was speedily answered by the gleam of a lantern at the wicket; the
wicket was then opened; a few words were exchanged in a low voice
between the brother at the gate and Fultrade; the light went out; the
ponderous door turned on its hinges, leaving a passage for the new
arrivals, and then closed again when all three had entered.
Martha and her daughter stood in utter darkness. An invisible personage
took charge of the priest's horse and led it away. Fultrade then took
the arm of Martha and whispered to her:
"Give your hand to your daughter, and both follow me. Your arrival here
must be kept a profound secret."
After descending a steep staircase, and following for a considerable
time the windings of a vaulted passage-way, the monk stopped and groped
for the orifice of the lock of a door, which he opened.
"Step in, my dear daughters in Christ," said the monk; "you may wait for
me here; in the meantime say your prayers."
A few minutes later the door opened again, and returning without a
light, as before, the monk said:
"Martha, you will first adore the relic; your daughter's turn will come
after you."
"Oh! No!" cried Anne the Sweet in deep anxiety. "I will not remain alone
here in the dark! No! I wish to remain near my mother!"
"My child, fear nothing," said Martha reassuringly; "we are in a holy
abbey, and besides, under the protection of Father Fultrade."
"Moreover," interjected the monk, "one is never alone when thinking of
God. Your mother will be back shortly."
"Mother, I will not leave you--I am afraid," screamed the young girl.
It was in vain. Before Anne could find her mother in the dark to cling
to her, the girl felt a vigorous hand staying her off. Martha was
hurried out, and the door closed behind her and upon her daughter. More
and more affrighted, Anne screamed aloud. In vain again. The steps of
Fultrade and Martha receded. Soon all sound ceased, and a brooding
darkness reigned around the helpless girl. A minute later the blood
rushed to Anne's heart. Distinctly she heard near her, as if groping
about in the darkness, the respiration of one panting for breath.
Immediately she felt herself seized by two vigorous arms and raised from
the floor. The young girl strove to free herself and called aloud to her
mother for help. The struggle was so violent and the girl's outcry so
loud that it at first drowned the sound of a rap at the door. But the
rapping speedily became so vehement that it soon drowned the violent
struggle within and a voice was heard uttering at the door some Latin
words in a hurried tone and in accents of alarm. Anne felt herself
immediately delivered from the close embrace that terrified her, and
soon as released fell fainting to the floor. Someone passed by her,
opened and double-locked the door in great hurry, and ran away
precipitately.
While, aided by another monk, his accomplice, Fultrade was locking up
Martha and her daughter in separate subterranean cells of the abbey
where serfs and other culprits under the jurisdiction of the abbot were
usually confined, a great commotion reigned in another quarter of the
holy place. Monks, suddenly shaken from their slumbers, were running
about under the arches of the cloister, with torches in their hands. In
the center of one of the interior courtyards a score of horsemen were
seen. The sweat that streamed down the steeds gave evidence of the
length and precipitancy of a recent run. They had escorted to the abbey
the Count of Paris, who, arriving from his city in hot haste, proceeded
immediately to the apartment of Fortunat, the Abbot of St Denis. The
prelate, a man of shapeless obesity and with his eyes still half closed
with sleep, was hastily donning a long and warmly furred morning robe
that one of his servants was helping him into. Other menials of the
abbey were lighting the candles of two candelabra made of solid silver
and placed upon a richly ornamented table. There was nothing more
sumptuous than the abbot's bedroom. Having finally put on his gown, the
abbot rubbed his eyes, seated on the edge of his downy couch. Count
Rothbert, who had been taken to the abbot, was impatiently demanding
that Fultrade be called.
"Seigneur count, he has been sent for, but he was not in his cell,"
answered the abbot's chamberlain, who had accompanied the count to the
abbot's apartment and was followed by several of his fellow
officials--the marshal, the equerry, the butler and other dignitaries of
the abbey.
"Father Fultrade must be in church," put in a voice, "he must have gone
to early matins."
"Unless he remained in Paris, where I ran across him this morning,"
replied Rothbert. "Never was his presence more needed than here and
now!"
"Count," said the abbot gulping down a yawn, "none of my dear brothers
in Christ sleep outside of the abbey, unless sent on a mission by me.
Fultrade must surely have returned home this evening. Will you not
please to communicate to me the cause of this night alarm?"
"I shall give you news of a nature to make you open wide your eyes and
ears. The Northmans have reappeared at the mouth of the Seine. They are
advancing upon Paris with a fleet of vessels!"
Despite his enormous corpulence, Abbot Fortunat bounded up from his bed.
His triple chin shivered; his large red face was blanched; he clasped
his hands in terror; his lips trembled convulsively; but his fear
prevented him from articulating a single word. The other personages
attached to the abbey looked, like himself, terror-stricken at the
tidings brought by the count. Some moaned, others fell upon their knees
and invoked the intercession of the Lord. All, the abbot included, who
had finally found his voice, cried:
"Almighty God, have mercy upon us! Deliver us from these pagans! From
these demons! Alack! Alack! What ills are about to afflict the servitors
of your Church! What ravages! Our goods will be pillaged by these
sacrilegious wretches! Oh, Lord! Deliver us from the Northmans! Command
your angels to exterminate these pagans!"
In the midst of these exclamations Fultrade entered, at last. He looked
cross and irritated. His face was inflamed.
"Come in, Fultrade," the count called to him when he saw the monk appear
at the threshold of the abbot's apartment. "Come in; you are the only
man of thought and action in this place;" and turning to the abbot,
whose whimpering annoyed him, the count added: "Fortunat, quit your
lamentations! The hour calls for action, not for whines!"
The monks repressed their moans with difficulty, while the Count of
Paris, addressing Fultrade in particular, said:
"The moments are precious--the Northmans have appeared at the mouth of
the Seine. They are said to be under the command of one of their most
intrepid sea-kings, named Rolf. Their fleet is so numerous that it
covers the whole width of the mouth of the river. They can not now be
further away than ten or twelve leagues from here. The means to repel
them must be considered."
"And how comes it that we have not been apprised of the arrival of these
accursed men?" inquired Fultrade in a rage. "They have passed Rouen. How
comes it that the people of that city did not spread the alarm? There is
treason in this!"
"Oh! What do the people of Rouen care about the arrival of the pirates?
Not having been this time themselves attacked by the Northmans, they do
not concern themselves about the rest of the provinces. It was only this
evening that I was notified by some messengers of the seigneurs and
abbots, whose lands border on the Seine, that the Northmans were here.
They furthermore informed me that the vile rustic plebs, which has
nothing to lose, shows itself everywhere happy at the thought of the
ills that these pagans will inflict upon the Church and the seigneurs.
It is for us, accordingly, for us seigneurs and clergy, to join hands
and defend one another! We need not look for help from Charles the
Simple, who will think of nothing but the defence of his own royal
domain, if he be capable of even that. He will allow the Northmans to
plunder us to their hearts' content."
"Alack! Alack!" resumed the Abbot of St. Denis with a fresh outburst of
moans. "What direful calamities are again in store for us!--Did we not
see Charles the Bald grant the country of Chartres to that execrable
Hastain! to that chieftain of Northman pirates! to that vile revolted
serf! to that bandit, soiled with all crimes and abominable sacrileges!
Alack!--What horrible times these are in which we live!--What shall we
do, Oh, Lord!--What else can we do but invoke your holy name!"
"What we are to do?--It is plain! We must rely upon ourselves alone!
Organize ourselves for our own defence; arm our colonists and our
towns-people; and lead them out, under pain of death, to do battle with
the Northman!--You, Fultrade, are a man of energy and intelligence.
Immediately take horse and ride at full gallop with some of my officers
and a good escort, to summon in my name the bishops and abbots of my
duchy of France to arm their serfs and towns-men. A portion of these men
is to be left in the abbeys and castles as a garrison, the others are to
be marched to Paris in small detachments, to defend the Commune."
"Count, what are you thinking of!" exclaimed the abbot, raising his
hands to heaven. "At so dangerous a moment, would you send Father
Fultrade from my side!"
"You need not be afraid," answered Rothbert. "Before leaving Paris I
issued orders to one hundred of my men at arms to march hither at the
double quick, in order to defend this post which dominates the Seine."
"Alack!" murmured the abbot, breaking out in tears. "Already, five
times has this abbey been invaded, sacked and pillaged by these pagans.
Although the place has been surrounded by new fortifications, it never
could resist the Northmans! Alack! The thickest walls crumble down
before these demons! We are lost!"
"Fear is deranging your mind, Fortunat. I tell you again that nothing
short of a regular siege will take the place. My hundred soldiers will
suffice for the defence against these Northmans. And, now, Fultrade, to
horse! If you succeed in your mission you will receive from me a rich
bishopric in reward."
The monk had until then looked troubled and given but scant attention to
the words of the count. The moment, however, that he heard an abbey
promised to him his eyes brightened and his forehead smoothed. With
sparkling eyes he answered:
"Seigneur, if our holy abbot allows me, I shall carry out his orders and
yours. May heaven protect me! I trust I may be able to carry your
commission to a successful issue."
At this point one of the count's officers entered, saying:
"Agreeable to your orders, several archers whom our riders brought on
the cruppers of their horses were posted on the river bank. By the light
of the moon they noticed a large vessel ascending the Seine. They
compelled the sailors to land, threatening them, in case of refusal, to
treat them to a volley of arrows. The master of the vessel is being
brought in."
"Have him come here immediately," answered Rothbert; and turning to the
abbot he explained: "I have issued orders to allow no vessel to pass
without questioning the skippers. They may be able to furnish us with
some information on the fleet of the pirates; they may have picked up
something."
The master who was forthwith introduced was Eidiol, the dean of the
Skippers' Guild, who had been so brutally treated by the count on that
very day. Assuming a look of surprise, mingled with cordiality, Rothbert
said to Eidiol:
"I did not expect to see you quite so soon again, my trusty skipper!"
and waving his hand towards the aged man, he said to the abbot: "This
man is the dean of the honorable Skippers' and Mariners' Guild of
Paris."
Greatly astonished at the cordial and respectful reception that he now
received at the hand of Rothbert, who, that very forenoon had treated
him with so much contempt, Eidiol looked suspiciously at the count and
sought to explain to himself the cause of so sudden a change in his
favor. As to Fultrade, the monk at first seemed nailed to the floor with
stupefaction at the sight of the father of Anne the Sweet, but speedily
recovering his self-control, said to Rothbert:
"Time presses. I shall depart instantly on the mission that you have
charged me with."
"Make it clear to the seigneurs and the abbots that we can not choose
but win, provided we act concertedly."
The monk vanished, and redoubling his affability toward Eidiol, Rothbert
resumed: "Be welcome, my trusty skipper. You could not possibly have
arrived at a more opportune moment. Your advice will be useful to us."
"Your archers must, no doubt, have thought so, seeing they threatened to
let fly a volley of arrows at us if our vessel did not promptly land
where they ordered."
"Such severe measures are unavoidable at this moment, my worthy
skipper. No doubt you have heard the news? The Northmans have reappeared
at the mouth of the Seine."
"Oh!" exclaimed Eidiol with perfect indifference. "It is the Northmans,
is it? Yes, I have learned of their approach. I even know, from the
master of a lighter that was pulling up the river, that the pirates'
fleet dropped anchor this evening near the isle of Oissel, one of their
former and favorite rendezvous."
"By the sword of my great father, Rothbert the Strong!" cried Rothbert,
stupefied and indignant at the unconcern of the skipper with regard to
the invasion of the Northman pirates. "This upsets me! What do you mean
by such a display of apathy at the prospect of the terrible ills that
are about to fall over our heads?!"
"Oh, I am by no means unconcerned touching the arrival of the pirates.
Instead of descending the river as far as St. Audoin, whither I was
taking a cargo, I am now ascending the river to return to Paris, where I
thought my presence might be needed."
"That is right, my brave skipper! I was mistaken. You were not
indifferent but calm, like all brave people in sight of danger."
"To speak truly, I can not see wherein lies the danger."
"Are you not fleeing before the approach of those pagans?"
"No, I am not fleeing. I am returning to Paris to embrace my wife and
daughter. And I am all the happier about it, seeing I did not expect to
be with them again until to-morrow evening. I meant, after that, to take
council with my compères upon what to do."
"And who are your compères?"
"Why, of course, the deans of the other guilds of the city of Paris--of
the blacksmiths, carpenters, armorers, weavers, curriers, stone-cutters,
and others."
"Of course, the purpose of such a council is to organize the defense of
Paris against the pirates! Glory to you, my towns-men! I feel proud of
numbering such stalwarts as yourselves in my city!"
"Blessed be they who defend the Church! All their sins will be
remitted!" put in the abbot who, until now overwhelmed with grief and
fear, seemed to gather some hope from the words of the count.
"Oh!" repeated Rothbert, pointing proudly at Eidiol, "at the head of
such men, we shall be invincible!"
"And yet," replied the aged skipper, "only this forenoon, you were
ordering your knights to break their lances upon our backs!"
Rothbert bit his lips, puckered his brow, and answered with
embarrassment:
"You must excuse an accidental outburst of excitement."
"Your present glorifications contrast singularly with the insolent words
that you bestowed upon me this forenoon."
"Fortunat," rejoined the count, turning to the abbot and with difficulty
suppressing his anger: "This good fellow loves to banter. I think,
however, he should choose his time better. We must run to arms, not
joke, when these accursed Northmans threaten our peace."
"Well! well! They are not so deserving of curses, after all," remarked
Eidiol, smiling with nonchalance. "Thanks to these very Northmans, you
are now treating me with civility and courting my friendship. The noble
is flattering the villein!"
"Quit your raillery, old man!" commanded Rothbert, relapsing, despite
himself, into his wonted haughty and violent temper.
"Seigneur count, I am speaking to the point because I am in a hurry to
embrace my wife and daughter. It is now about twenty-seven years ago, in
the year 885, when the Northmans, under the lead of Hastain, to-day
master and Seigneur of the country of Chartres, invaded the country and
laid siege to Paris for the fifth or sixth time."
"On that occasion, at least, and it was the only time, the plebs of
Paris, under the command of Eudes, my brother, offered a brave
resistance, since when the pirates have no longer ravaged the city. It
will be so again now. I swear it to God, will ye, nill ye, villeins, you
shall be marched to the ramparts to give battle!"
"Until that year of which you speak, Paris had never offered any
resistance to the pirates. The reason was simple. The people, the guilds
and the artisans did not care to undertake the defence--"
"Yes, yes!" broke in Rothbert with concentrated rage "That plebs allowed
the churches, the abbeys and the castles to be pillaged and set on
fire!"
"The Northmans only plunder the rich. They surely do not care to load
their barks with our rags, our rough furniture and our sand-stone pots
when they can load them to overflowing with vases of gold and silver and
all manner of costly things with which the castles, the churches and the
abbeys are gorged. They attack the seigneurs. Let the seigneurs defend
themselves!"
"By the death of Christ! This old man has gone crazy!" cried Rothbert
beyond himself with rage and yet not daring fully to give a loose to his
pent-up anger. "How could we defend ourselves without the aid of the
people! Could I repel thirty thousand Northmans with the two thousand
soldiers that I keep in my duchy of France?"
"Oh, I know it! You can do nothing without the people. Your brother,
Count Eudes, knew it also. At the approach of the pirates he sought to
propitiate the people, and convoked the deans of the guilds at his
little castle of Paris. My father, the then dean of the skippers, said
to your brother: 'You, kings, seigneurs and clergymen, need us to
protect your goods from the pillage of the Northmans. Well, then, let us
strike a bargain. Lighten our taxes, render our lives less hard, and we
shall defend your riches.' 'Agreed!' answered Count Eudes, and certain
franchises and other measures of relief for the plebs of the city were
agreed on. On the morrow that good plebs rushed to the ramparts and
fought with intrepidity. Many of them were killed, many more were
wounded. My father and myself were among the latter. The Northmans were
repelled. But the danger being over, the King, the seigneurs and the
dignitaries of the Church forgot their promise."
While Eidiol spoke the Count of Paris controlled his indignation with
difficulty; finally he broke forth pale with rage: "Do you mean that
your plebs will refuse to defend the city?"
"I think so. We, the skippers, will take on board our vessels our own
families and those of our friends who are willing to follow us. We shall
sail out of the waters of Paris on one side while the Northmans enter by
the other, and we shall calmly ascend the Seine towards the Marne,
leaving you, seigneurs and abbots, to arrange matters with the Northmans
the best way you may know how."
"Listen to him! The infamous poltroon! Is your vile slave's heart moved
neither with anger nor shame at the bare idea of the disgrace of seeing
the foreigners, the Northmans, in Paris!"
At these insulting words a slight flush suffused Eidiol's face, a spark
of lightning glistened in his eyes. But the self-possessed old man
controlled himself and answered:
"Count, my grandfather read in the old parchments of our family that a
small colony of men of my race, now more than three centuries ago, lived
free and happy in a corner of Burgundy when the Arabs invaded and
ravaged Gaul[3]--"
"And that colony of cravens," broke in the count, "trembling before the
Arabs, like you now before the Northmans, of course left the pagans to
ravage, pillage and burn down the country!"
"Count," proceeded the old skipper proudly, "the people of that colony
were killed to the last man because they fought in defence of their
rights, their families, their soil and their liberty. But, seeing that
that handful of brave men were, with the single exception of the
indomitable Bretons, the only free men in all Gaul, the Arabs were able
to ravage the other provinces and to settle down in Languedoc. In this
century the same thing will happen with the Northmans. The population--a
horde of slaves on the field, a mass of wretched beings in the towns--is
indifferent to the ills that smite you--you rich seigneurs and prelates.
And now, adieu. I am in a hurry to return to Paris and embrace my wife
and daughter."
While Eidiol was uttering these last sentences, the count issued some
orders in a low voice to one of his officers, who thereupon hurriedly
left the apartment. The old man moved towards the door, but Rothbert,
motioning his men to bar the passage, cried in a menacing tone:
"You shall not go to introduce disturbance and revolt in my city of
Paris!" And addressing the abbot: "Have you a prison in the place?"
"We have cells, and quite strong, too, in which to keep the impious
criminals who dare resist our will."
"Let one of your clerks show the way to my men, who will lock this
insolent skipper in one of these cells of the abbey."
Eidiol was unable to suppress a first impulse of astonishment and
sorrow.
"My son," said he, "has remained on board of my vessel; allow me to see
him and apprise him of what has happened to me, that he may inform my
wife and daughter. They will otherwise feel uneasy at my absence."
"Your wishes," answered Rothbert with a cruel smile, "shall be
satisfied. I have sent to fetch the other skippers from your vessel."
"Treason!" cried Eidiol. "They will come confident that no harm is
meant, and a prison cell awaits them!"
"You have said it," replied the Count of Paris, and, pointing his finger
at Eidiol, he ordered his officers: "To prison with him!"
"My dear wife, my sweet daughter! How uneasy will you not feel when
to-morrow you see neither my son nor myself coming back home," murmured
the old man sadly, and, without offering any resistance, he followed the
officer who took him in charge and conducted him to the subterranean
cells of the abbey.
CHAPTER VI.
SISTER AGNES.
Shortly after the count's departure from the abbey, the reinforcement of
a hundred soldiers promised by him arrived at the place. Their captain
spent the night in preparing the fortifications for the defence. Under
the physical lash of their foreman, above all intimidated by the fear of
the fiery furnace of hell, the serfs and villeins transported to the
platform of the walls large stones, logs of wood and heavy beams,
intended to serve as projectiles against the expected assailants. They
were also made to carry heavy barrels of oil and pitch, which, boiled in
large caldrons, were held ready to be poured over the heads of the
enemy; besides a large number of bags full of chalk dust, whose
contents, dropped upon the besiegers, would serve to blind them.
During the night and part of the morning the cattle of the abbey's
domain were driven within its walls. Thither also a large number of the
abbey's serfs and villeins congregated, summoned by the abbot to its
defence. Many more, however, took to flight, determined to join the
Northmans the moment they disembarked and to glean whatever they could
in the wake of the invaders' tracks.
Many "Franks", as the free holders of little farms were styled, who
lived in the environs of St. Denis, bundled up their most valuable
havings and went for shelter behind the walls of the abbey. The
court-yards and galleries of the cloister became by the hour more
encumbered with a frightened crowd, whose baggage was piled up high
hither and thither, while cattle of every description were huddled close
together in the garden and on a spacious meadow that was enclosed within
the fortifications.
Finally, the abbot himself, helped by his canons who were armed with
spades and mattocks, was busily engaged in the work of hastily burying
under the ground of a little sequestered court all the rich
paraphernalia of the church--vases, reliquaries, chalices, monstrances,
statues, crosses, candelabra, chalice-covers, and other holy utensils
wrought in silver or solid gold, and enriched with costly
ornaments,--all proceeding from the toil and taxes of the serfs and
villeins. A small group of priests were upon their knees in the
basilica, imploring, amid moans, the assistance of heaven and invoking
all manner of maledictions upon the heads of the Northmans.
The larger part of the day had been spent in continual frights. The men
at the lookout, who kept watch on the ramparts above the gate, saw it
frequently open in order to give passage to belated serfs and herds of
cattle, or to wagons filled with the fodder needed for feeding the large
number of horses and other animals that had been crowded within the
walls. Two of these conveyances, loaded with hay, and each drawn by a
double yoke of oxen, were conducted by a man of sinister face and barely
dressed in rags. The man was well known in the abbey. So soon as he hove
in sight, a monk of large paunch, who was placed at the wicket of the
gate, cried:
"Blessings upon you and your load! We have so many cattle within that we
have been in fear of want of provender for them. Have you any tidings
of those pagan Northmans? Have their vessels been seen on the Seine? Are
they near or still far away?"
"They are said to be drawing nearer. But thanks to God, the abbey is
impregnable. Oh! A curse upon these Northmans!" answered the serf, whose
name was Savinien. As the man spoke, a strange smile flitted over his
careworn countenance; he cast a sly side-smile upon the load of hay that
was heaped up high on the wagons and added: "I have driven my oxen so
fast, in order to place myself at the order of our holy abbot, that, I
fear, the poor brutes are foundered.--See how heavy they breathe!"
"They will not have to blow long. They will be speedily killed to feed
the large number of noble Franks who have fled hither for refuge,"
replied the monk.
As the monk spoke, he began to remove, with the assistance of several
other brothers, the enormous iron bars and chains that reinforced the
massive gate from within. About to throw open the gate, however, he
heard, from a short distance without, mournful moans and canticles
rising from female voices. Such was the panic that the approach of the
Northmans threw the church people into, that the gate-monk, frightened
out of his senses by the feminine lamentations which were slowly drawing
nearer, did not venture, despite all insistence on the serfs part, to
open the gate of the abbey, and refused admittance even to Savinien's
welcome load. In the midst of the altercation between the monk and the
serf, there appeared from behind a clump of trees, that rose at a
distance from the abbey, a short procession of nuns distinguishable by
their black and white robes, as well as by the long veils that covered
their faces and that were intended to withdraw the saintly maids from
the gaze of the profane. Four of the nuns carried on a stretcher,
improvised of recently felled tree-branches, the inert body of one of
their companions. The pall-bearers, together with the other eight or ten
nuns who composed the funeral cortège, emitted incessant and
heart-rending lamentations. Another young nun, whose veil was partly
raised, preceded the body by a few steps, wringing her hands in despair,
and from time to time crying out distracted:
"Lord! Lord! Have mercy upon us! Our holy abbess is killed!"
Savinien, who, from the moment admission into the abbey was refused him,
had been casting increasingly anxious and uneasy looks at his load,
piously dropped down on his knees the moment he saw the mortuary
procession, led by the weepful nun, approach. Stepping more rapidly
ahead of her suite, the latter walked up to the gate of the abbey, and,
with a voice broken by sobs, cried through the wicket:
"My dear brothers, open this holy place of asylum to the poor lambs who
are fleeing before ravaging wolves. Already our venerable mother in God
has succumbed. We are carrying her mortal remains. Open the gate of the
sacred monastery!"
"Is that you, Sister Agnes?" inquired the big gate-monk through the
wicket "Are those Northman demons so near that they have invaded the
convent of St. Placida?"
"Alack, my dear brother! Last night, about a score of the accursed
pagans disembarked not far from our convent," answered the nun with an
outburst of sobs. "Awakened by the light of the flames that shot up from
the conflagration, and by the cries of terror of the serfs who occupied
the outside buildings, a few of us managed to throw on our clothes and
to flee in all haste with our holy abbess through a gate that opened on
the field. But alack! alack! so severe was the shock upon our venerable
mother, already enfeebled by disease, that after about a quarter of an
hour's march she fainted in our arms,--and immediately," proceeded
Sister Agnes after she had overcome a fresh fit of heart-rending sobs,
"immediately our venerable mother passed from the earth to heaven!--We
are bringing her body with us in order that the last rites may be
performed over her remains, and that they may be buried in consecrated
ground."
The gate-brother listened to the distressful tale, sobbing no less
loudly than Sister Agnes and smiting his chest. When she finished he
quickly opened the gate and sent one of his assistants to notify the
abbot of the misfortune. The body of the deceased mother-superior
entered the abbey, together with the nuns who accompanied it, and
followed by Savinien's two wagons of hay. The somber face of the serf
seemed to lighten up with a sinister joy, which he had no little
difficulty in suppressing, when at last he found himself within, and the
abbey gate closed behind him.
The fugitives who crowded the court-yard of the abbey dropped upon their
knees at the passage of the nuns. The latter, led by one of the monks,
marched to the parvis of the basilica, followed by the crowd who sang in
chorus the prayer that for fully a century had been repeated in all the
abbeys and all the castles of Gaul:
"Lord, have mercy upon us! Lord, deliver us from the Northmans! Lord,
exterminate the accursed pagans!"
The funeral cortège arrived at the entrance of the basilica and was
received by one of the deacons. The prelate had hastily donned his
sacerdotal robes. Priests bearing the cross aloft and carrying candles
stood behind the officiating prelate. They looked down-cast and pale,
and trembled. They repeated the funeral psalms with precipitation and
absent-mindedly. The evidence before them of the pirates' being nigh,
made them shudder. The first prayers being finished, the body, still
carried by the nuns upon the improvised stretcher of branches, was taken
to the choir and deposited upon the flagstones, not far from the
chanters' desk.
An indescribable disorder reigned in the interior of the vast church.
Monks, assisted by serfs, were in hot haste finishing the removal of the
precious ornaments of the splendid basilica. Ranged in the transepts, or
aisles, that extended to either side of the nave, were a number of
crypts, subterranean grooves, above which rose numerous mausoleums
erected to the memory of kings and queens of the stock of Clovis and of
Charles Martel. The frightened faces of the monks of St. Denis, the
lamentations that they uttered while at work removing the sacred
ornaments from the altars, the funeral chants that were sung in muffled
voices for the repose of the soul of the mother-superior, whose body had
just been carried into the church by the nuns, the moans of the noble
Franks and their families, who had taken refuge in the holy place--all
these lugubrious notes added fuel to the general feeling of dread.
Attracted, probably, more by curiosity than piety, the larger number of
the soldiers, who were sent by the Count of Paris for the defense of the
abbey, had followed the funeral procession into the church. These men of
war, savage, coarse and as impious as either the Northmans or the Arabs,
brusquely pushed their way forward as far as the choir where the body of
the mother-abbess lay surrounded by her nuns. Little affected by the
religious character of the ceremony or by the solemnity of the sacred
place, these soldiers fastened their licentious glances upon the
daughters of the Lord, whose faces they sought to discover across the
transparency of their lowered veils. On his knees beside one of these,
who, likewise on her knees and her forehead bowed down, seemed steeped
in prayer, Sigefred, a captain of the soldiers, made bold to touch the
elbow of the holy maid. The latter was for an instant startled, but
controlled herself, and remained silent. Encouraged by his success,
Sigefred quietly raised the veil which fell from the head of the nun
down to her waist, and carried his audacity to the point of sliding a
profane hand up to the collar of the maid's robe. No sooner had he
committed the indignity than he quickly withdrew his hand as if it had
touched a piece of burning coal.
"By the navel of the Pope!" growled Sigefred in an undertone, "This nun
has a skin of iron!"
The venturesome ruffian had no time for another word. He dropped dead,
stabbed with a dagger by the nun of the skin of iron. For an instant the
other soldiers remained dumb with stupefaction, seeking to explain how
the long and large sleeves of the saintly maid could conceal an arm and
hand whose epidermis seemed of metal.
"A miracle!" cried some of the witnesses of Sigefred's attempt. "A
miracle! The Lord protects the chastity of his virgins by covering them
with a tissue of steel mail!"
"Treason!" cried the less credulous warriors, drawing their swords.
"These nuns are soldiers dressed like women! Treason! To arms! To arms!
Revenge Sigefred! To the devil with miracles and maids!"
"_Skoldmoë!_" suddenly shouted with resonant voice the mother-abbess
whose funeral was being celebrated, and rising to her full length,
freeing herself from her long veil and dropping her black robe to her
feet, Shigne the Buckler Maiden stood there in her battle armor, with
her bold face framed in a hair-net of iron mail that replaced her usual
casque. "_Skoldmoë!_" she shouted again, repeating her war-cry. "Up, my
virgins! Mercy for the women! Exterminate the men! Kill them all, to the
last one!" and brandishing a double-edged axe, she bounded forward like
a panther and struck down one of the Frankish warriors who rushed upon
her.
"_Skoldmoë!_" cried back the other Buckler Maidens, likewise disengaging
themselves of their veils and their monastic robes, and like Shigne,
they forthwith charged upon the soldiers with their axes and swords.
The faithful, only a minute before absorbed in prayer, fled in dismay
towards the doors of the basilica; the monks hid themselves behind the
mausoleums over the royal crypts or embraced the altars--their last
refuge. The vault of the church resounded with cries of terror, with
hysterical moans, and with invocations to the Supreme Being, while above
the confused noise rose the din of the Northman virgins' battle-cry, the
thud of their heavy blows, the shrieks of the soldiers whom they smote.
Sister Agnes, who had introduced the pirate women into the abbey, was a
poor victim of sacerdotal authority. She had been compelled to enter the
convent of St. Placida. The previous night the Northman warrior maids
forced open the doors of the monastery. She saw her opportunity to
regain her freedom, and aided the Buckler Maidens in carrying out the
strategem which Shigne devised in order to capture the abbey of St.
Denis.
More numerous than the pirate women, the soldiers in the abbey strove to
break a passage through the frightened mass at the door and join their
comrades in the interior of the church in order to overpower their
assailants. But the prodigy of a combat with woman warriors, some of
whom were of surpassing beauty, struck the younger of the men with
amazement. Their arms were involuntarily stayed in the act of striking
the beautiful maids. These, on the contrary, fired by the example of
Shigne, who was making havoc among the soldiers with her battle-axe,
fought with matchless heroism. The older soldiers, being less
susceptible to the emotions of some of their younger companions at the
thought of a struggle to the death with young women, fell upon these
with fury. Several of Shigne's virgins were killed, others were wounded.
But the latter did not seem to feel their wounds, and only fought with
increased ardor.
The mêlée was still at its height when Fultrade arrived back at the
abbey from the mission that the Count of Paris had charged him with. The
noise of the battle in the church drew him thither. When he entered he
saw Shigne with her back against the mausoleum of Clovis battling with
intrepidity against two Frankish soldiers. The heroine whirled her
weapon with such agility and dexterity that every time her battle-axe
struck the swords of her two adversaries the sparks were made to fly by
the shock of the iron against the steel. During this struggle the sword
of one of the soldiers was broken. At the moment when Shigne was about
to let her axe descend upon his head and kill her disarmed adversary,
Fultrade, who had glided silently behind the mausoleum, seized her by
the legs. Thus taken by surprise, Shigne fell to the ground and dropped
her axe. The two Frankish soldiers threw themselves upon her and made
desperate efforts to keep her under their knees.
"_Skoldmoë!_--To me, my sisters!"
But the voice of the Buckler Maiden was drowned in the general clash of
arms and in the furious roars of the soldiers, mingled with the war-cry
of the other virgins who still continued the fray under the fretted
vaults of the basilica. In vain the heroine called to her companions.
Fultrade, who had knelt down beside her in order to assist the two
soldiers in keeping her on the floor, placed both his hands upon her
mouth, and yielding to his licentious instinct, whispered to the two men
at arms:
"Comrades, this witch is young and beautiful; let us drag her into the
crypt of this mausoleum; she shall be ours!"
The two Franks broke into a savage laugh of approval, and aided by
Fultrade dragged the Buckler Maiden, despite the superhuman resistance
that she offered, into a cavity that was dug under the mausoleum--an
underground nook perpetually lighted by a sepulchre lamp.
CHAPTER VII.
KOEMPE!
The monk and the two soldiers had barely stretched the Buckler Maiden
upon the slab-stones of the crypt, when an icy terror ran through their
frames. A noise, at first heard indistinctly, now smote their ears with
all its formidable meaning. It was the war-cry of the Northman pirates.
"_Koempe!" "Koempe!_" resounded from the court-yard of the abbey. The
cry grew louder; it invaded the church; it presently reached clear,
powerful, distinct into the underground recess of the crypt.
"Malediction upon us!" exclaimed the monk listening. "It is the war-cry
of the Northmans! They have invaded the abbey!"
"Where could they have entered by?" asked one of the soldiers with
chattering teeth. "The demons must have leaped out of hell!"
"To me, my virgins!" the warrior maid now cried with renewed vigor,
although still held pinioned to the ground under the knees of the monk
and the soldiers. "To me, my sisters! _Skoldmoë! Skoldmoë!_"
The last words of Shigne were answered by the sonorous voice of Gaëlo:
"Shigne, here I am!" and almost immediately the young pirate appeared at
the entrance of the crypt, followed by Simon Large-Ears, Robin Jaws and
Savinien, the serf who had driven the two wagons loaded with hay into
the abbey. All three shouted at the top of their voices: "_Koempe!_ To
death and to the sack! Pillage! Pillage!"
At the sight of the unexpected reinforcement that rushed to the aid of
their fair prisoner, Fultrade and his accomplices quitted their intended
victim. Shigne leaped to her feet, seized the sword of one of the
soldiers, plunged it into the breast of the monk, who dropped stone
dead, and, still trembling with rage and shame, rushed sword in hand
upon the young pirate.
"Either I shall kill you, or you will kill me, Gaëlo! You shall not be
allowed to say that you saw me exposed to extreme outrage!"
Stupefied at the sudden attack of a young woman to whose aid he had
hastened to come, Gaëlo at first contented himself with parrying
Shigne's blows, but wounded in the face by her weapon, he precipitated
himself upon her crying:
"Your will be done! Either you shall kill me, or I shall kill you!"
The combat between Gaëlo and Shigne was furious. Simon Large-Ears and
Robin Jaws, who had turned their first attention to the two soldiers
hidden in the remotest corner of the crypt under Clovis' mausoleum,
killed them both. As they stepped out, Simon Large-Ears said:
"These nuns who came whining to the gate of the abbey while we were
concealed under the hay of Savinien's wagons, turned to strategem like
ourselves in order to get in. Theirs was a feminine ruse!"
"Oh, Simon," answered Robin pointing to the Buckler Maiden and Gaëlo,
who were engaged in a deadly duel; "what a pity! To think of such a
magnificent lad and so beautiful a girl seeking to kill each other,
instead of making love!"
"And if they survive they will love each other but hobblingly. It is
clear that in their rage both will lose some member. Just watch the
blows that they deal to each other!"
Never had Gaëlo met more redoubtable an adversary than Shigne. To
inordinary strength she coupled skill, coolness and intrepidity. Carried
away by the ardor of the struggle, the pirate forgot his passionate
love. If he at all kept in mind that he was fighting with a woman, he
only felt all the more nettled at finding in her such indomitable powers
of resistance. After a long exchange of parried thrusts, Gaëlo succeeded
in dealing so violent a blow with his sword upon the virgin's skull that
neither her hair-net of linked iron, nor her thick head of hair, through
both of which the pirate's sword cut its way, could save her from a
severe scalp wound. The blood poured down Shigne's face, her weapon
slipped from her grasp, and she dropped down first upon both her knees
and then on her side.
"Unhappy me!" cried Gaëlo in despair. "I have killed her!" and kneeling
down beside the young woman, he raised her beautiful head, now pale,
bleeding and with eyes half closed.
"Gaëlo," murmured the Buckler Maiden in a fainting voice, "you were able
to vanquish me; I love you!" and her eyes closed.
Struck with sympathy, Simon and Robin approached Gaëlo to offer him
their services, when a new cry arose from the distance, and again
dominated the lingering clash of arms between the Northman pirates and
the small remnant of the rapidly diminishing garrison of the abbey. It
was the cry of "Berserk!" "Berserk!" warningly uttered by the pirates
themselves.
"Lodbrog the Giant is again in a fit of fury!" cried Simon Large-Ears in
terror. "The berserker is as terrible to his friends as to his enemies.
Gaëlo, the fray may roll this way; your sweetheart is perhaps not dead;
let us carry her into the crypt; she will be there safer than here."
Gaëlo hastened to follow Simon's advice. Raising the insensible warrior
maid in his arms, he laid her down gently in a remote corner of the
sepulchral recess.
A prodigious spectacle, a giant battle, was elsewhere taking place at
that moment. The Frankish soldiers posted on the ramparts had left their
posts to run to the assistance of their companions, first engaged by the
Buckler Maidens and subsequently attacked by the band under Gaëlo that
emerged out of Savinien's hay wagons. Until then, Lodbrog the berserker
had fought valiantly without his intellect being clouded. But the
intoxication of the battle, the odor of carnage, the sight of the
Frankish reinforcement that poured down from the ramparts and rushed
toward the main door of the basilica crying: "Death! Death! Kill the
Northmans!"--all this combined threw the giant into a new attack of
frenzy. Brandishing a spiked iron mace, the Northman, leaped forward
with a roar and dashed upon the compact group of Franks. Ten
blacksmiths' hammers beating upon ten anvils could not produce the
deafening sound produced by Lodbrog's mace falling, falling again,
rising only to fall again and again upon the casques and the armors of
the soldiers. Some sink to the earth, crushed under the thundering
blows, without uttering a sound: their skulls are ground into pulp
within their casques like nuts in their shells; others roll to the
ground emitting shrieks of pain and rage. The corpses are heaped up high
at the feet of Lodbrog. He mounts the heap. He mounts it as on a
pedestal, and his size assumes still more gigantic proportions. The tops
of the casques of the soldiers who still dare sustain the contest with
him, barely reach his belt. Gaëlo, who rushed out of the basilica,
thinking his aid needed in the general battle that he imagined was in
progress, arrived at the moment when the surviving soldiers were
surrounding the berserker, then at the climax of his fury. The spectacle
presented looked like assailants trying to scale a tower. Twenty arms
holding twenty swords rose at once to smite the giant. But towering
above those arms and swords appeared the cuirassed bust of the colossus,
and his iron mace rose and descended, splintering swords, cracking
heads, crushing limbs, pulverizing arms! Gaëlo, the others of his band
and the surviving Buckler Maidens precipitated themselves upon the rear
of the soldiers who besieged Lodbrog. Suddenly the berserker was heard
to emit a fresh roar, throw his mace into the air, stoop down and
immediately rise again holding a soldier by the hair and belt. Vainly
did the luckless Frank struggle to escape from the giant's clutch. He
was hurled wrathfully from on high against the handful of soldiers who
still assailed the Northman. Several of them rolled over the ground.
Lodbrog despatched them by trampling over their prostrate bodies with
his colossal feet like an enraged elephant that tramples upon and pounds
his victims to death. Thereupon, seeing no more enemies to fight, all
his opponents having been killed or wounded by himself or the other
pirates, but still a prey to his own vertigo of destruction, riddled
with wounds that he did not feel, but the gushing blood of which
reddened his armor that was broken through in twenty places, Lodbrog's
eyes fell upon a large black mausoleum just within the basilica. It was
the tomb of Fredegonde.[4] The giant rushed in headlong; he seized with
both his mighty hands one of the pillars that supported the entablature;
shook it; loosened it with an effort of superhuman strength; the pillar
yielded and carried down with it a portion of the architecture of the
mausoleum, which thereupon crumbled to the ground. The loud crash of the
ruin added fuel to the rage of the berserker. His eyes encountered the
sepulchral light that escaped from the crypt where the Beautiful Shigne
lay. The berserker rushed thither with the roar of a goaded bull, and
vanished from sight.
CHAPTER VIII.
THE RESCUE.
A night and almost a whole day had passed since Anne the Sweet, taken
into one of the underground cells of the abbey of St. Denis by Father
Fultrade, had escaped the outrageous purposes of the monk.
Deepest darkness reigned in the dungeon in which Anne the Sweet was
confined. The feelings of terror and despair that at first seized her at
being separated from her mother, had been followed by mental and
physical prostration. Her tears had run dry. Seated on the stone slabs
of the cell with her back to the wall, the young girl dropped into a
feverish slumber agitated by sinister dreams. One time, it was the monk
Fultrade who appeared before her, and then she awoke shuddering with
horror--a horror that was intensified by the brooding darkness around
her. At other times Anne dreamed that she had been forgotten in the
underground chamber, and felt herself a prey to the agonies of hunger
while her torture was rendered still more excruciating by the
heart-rending cries of her mother, likewise a prey to the torments of
famine. Suddenly the young girl was awakened from her cruel dreams by a
loud noise of voices and steps that tumultuously drew near. She leaped
up, listened, and recognizing the voices of Eidiol and of Guyrion the
Plunger, she bounded towards the door which she struck with all her
strength, crying:
"Father! Brother! Deliver me! Come, come to my help!"
"Step back from the door, my child!" answered the skipper. "We shall
break it in."
Beside herself with joy, the young girl fell back a few steps. Shaken
from its hinges by the blows of the iron bars that Eidiol and Guyrion
and Rustic the Gay wielded with energy, the door soon fell over and Anne
rushed into the arms of her father and brother; but looking around as if
missing someone she had expected to see, she asked with fear:
"And my mother? Where is my dear mother?"
"You will see her in an instant, my child. It is from her I just learned
about the treason of the infamous monk," answered the dean of the
Skippers' Guild, who could not bestow sufficient caresses upon the
daughter whom he feared to have lost. "When she saw me," continued the
happy father, "poor Martha felt such a pang that she lost consciousness.
Fortunately she returned to her senses, but her weakness is such that
she could not walk out of the cell in which she also was confined. It is
near by."
"But you here, father, in this abbey?" the young girl inquired, as soon
as her first emotions were calmed. "And you, too, brother? And you,
Rustic? Am I dreaming? Is it yourselves I see in this dungeon?"
"The Count of Paris posted some archers along the banks of the Seine in
order to stop all the vessels that ascended the river," the old man
explained. "Two of his soldiers took me to Rothbert. I had an
altercation with him, and he ordered me locked up here."
"And the traitor thereupon sent us one of his men to say that my father
wanted to see us immediately," added Guyrion; "we came without
suspecting any harm--"
"And we had hardly set foot inside the abbey," broke in Rustic the Gay,
"when the count's soldiers fell upon us unexpectedly and took us also
prisoners."
"But you are now free," replied Anne. "Who set you free?"
"The Northman pirates, my dear child."
"Great God!" cried the young girl affrighted and clasping her hands.
"Oh! father! were those pagans merciful to you?"
"Pagans who set us free are better than Christians who imprison us.
Moreover, these brave and wily folks entered the abbey by strategem, and
have slaughtered about a hundred Frankish soldiers, without counting the
monks whom they despatched."
"After which, sister," proceeded Guyrion, "they started to pillage the
basilica and the abbey. There is a heap of booty, as high as the portal
of the cloister, piled up in the court-yard."
"And then," said Rustic, "the Northmans descended into the cellar to
stave in the heads of the casks of wine that the abbot kept there. In
this way they landed at the entrance of the gallery that leads to these
underground dungeons. Expecting to find large treasures locked up there,
they broke in the door. They found us huddled together in the gallery.
Their chief, a magnificent young warrior whom they call Gaëlo, ordered
them to treat us well and to assist us in setting the rest of the
prisoners free. That is the history of our own deliverance."
"Thus, my child, we reached the cell in which your mother was confined,"
added Eidiol, again embracing Anne the Sweet.
"The young chief Gaëlo quitted us to join old Rolf, the chief of all the
Northman forces," rejoined Guyrion, "who had just disembarked near the
abbey. He entered the place and now holds it with a large body of men.
The pirates are now hastily throwing up earth-works above the abbey on
the side of Paris. Before sailing up towards the city they wish to
fortify themselves here so as to have a safe place of refuge."
"Halloa! Halloa, there! Where are the Parisian skippers?" Gaëlo's voice
was at this moment heard calling out from a distance. "Come here, my
worthy men; Rolf wishes to see you!"
"Young man," said Eidiol to the pirate who was approaching them, "we
thank you for having set us free. We shall follow you. But grant that my
son remain near his sister and mother, who, like ourselves, were locked
up in this underground prison. They need his protection."
"Let it be so," answered Gaëlo.
While Anne the Sweet and her brother walked to the cell where Martha
lay, the dean of the Skippers' Guild of Paris, together with Rustic the
Gay and his other men, followed Gaëlo to be presented to Rolf, who was
feasting in the apartment recently occupied by the gourmandizing and
craven Abbot of St. Denis. On their way thither, the young pirate left
Eidiol and his men for an instant, and ran to one of the lower
apartments of the abbey whither the Beautiful Shigne, whose wound,
although serious, was not mortal, had been transported and was being
tended. When Lodbrog the berserker, still under the spell of his vertigo
of fury dashed into the crypt of the mausoleum of Clovis where the
wounded warrior maid lay, the structure would inevitably have been
demolished had he not stumbled at the first step of the short stone
stairs that led down into the cell, and rolled to the bottom where he
fell prostrate, bleeding to death from the wounds that he had received,
not a few of which would have even singly proved mortal.
CHAPTER IX.
THE NORTHMAN SEA-KING.
Rolf, the Sea-King and supreme Chief of the Northman pirates, was a man
far advanced in years. His beard and hair, naturally of a yellow blonde,
were heavily streaked with grey. Numerous scars criss-crossed his face,
which was of a brick-red hue, tanned and copper-colored by the sun and
the sea air. His physiognomy was rendered hideous by a saber cut that
put out his left eye and cut his nose off to the bone. His single eye
glistened like a burning coal under its bushy eye-brow; his heavy lips,
half-hidden under his bristling moustache and by his shaggy beard,
imparted to his mouth a scoffing and sensuous expression. Rolf was of
middle size and of athletic frame. His arms were abnormally long. Like
his champions, the Northman Chieftain wore an armor of iron scales. But,
in order to feast and frolic more at ease, he had doffed his cuirass,
and now kept on only a jacket of reindeer-skin, blackened at several
places by the friction of his armor, and that fell open from time to
time, exposing his shirt and, under his shirt, a chest as hirsute as
that of the bears of the northern sea. The pirate chieftain was just
finishing his repast. Canons and a few other surviving dignitaries of
the abbot served Rolf upon their knees. The friars looked haggard and
were pale with fear. He allowed them to move about only on all fours, or
upon their knees when they were wanted to reach out dishes and wine
cups to him. Every time that the movements of these servitors seemed too
slow, either the pirates themselves, or former serfs of the abbey, who
now saw their opportunity to avenge the ill-treatments that they had
been subjected to, quickened, with kicks and sticks, the motions of the
holy men.
Rolf, just finishing his sumptuous feast, seemed to be in great good
humor. Half seas over with the old wines of Gaul, he was indulging
himself in the well upholstered easy-chair of the abbot. He had just
placed a woman on each knee, when, back from his call upon the Beautiful
Shigne, and at ease concerning her recovery, Gaëlo entered the
banquet-hall, accompanied by Eidiol, Rustic and the other skippers whom
he was to present to Rolf.
"So the priests of this place were keeping you prisoners!" remarked Rolf
to the skippers while wiping with the back of his hand his thick
moustache, still wet with wine. "You should side with us against the
church rats and the castle falcons!"
"We river-pikes can escape the rats and the falcons easy enough,"
answered Eidiol. "Nevertheless, we love to see the falcons transfixed
with arrows, and the rats drowned in their traps. We applaud your
victory over the monks of St. Denis."
"Are you of the city of Paris?"
"Yes, seigneur; I am the dean of the Skippers' Guild."
"Will the Parisians defend their city?"
"If you injure the poor folks, yes; if, however, all you mean to do is
to burn down the churches, levy ransoms on the rich abbeys and on the
palaces of the Frankish seigneurs, then the people will not budge."
"So, then, the good people of Paris will offer us no resistance. That
will be wise on their part. What with the reserve that I shall leave in
this fortified abbey, and my two thousand vessels that will ascend the
Seine as far as Paris, resistance could come neither from Count Rothbert
nor from Charles the Simple. Your King will pay us ransom, after which
we shall wing our flight towards the North on the tracks of the
swans,--unless I should take it into my head to settle down in this
country of Gaul, the same as my comrade Hastain did when he settled down
in the country of Chartres. He! He! my champions! I am growing old.
Perhaps I should settle down in this country, in some fat province rich
in pretty girls and good wine! Oh, my champions! As our saga sings: 'I
am an old sea-crow; for nearly forty years I have grazed with my wings
the fresh waters of rivers and the briny waves of the sea'. Now, then,
there must be an end of this, my brave champions! Charles the Simple has
a daughter called Ghisèle. She is a girl of fourteen, and pretty enough
to make one's head swim. Maybe I shall take the daughter of Charles the
Simple to wife and demand of him a whole province for dower. What think
you of this project?"
No less intoxicated than their chieftain, the pirates emitted loud roars
of laughter and answered vociferously:
"We shall drink to your wedding, old Rolf! A handsome maid belongs in
your couch. Glory to the husband of Ghisèle, the daughter of Charles the
Simple."
"The old brigand is drunk as a thrush in autumn, Master Eidiol; what
wild scheme is that which he pursues?" whispered Rustic to the old
skipper.
A great tumult interrupted the answer. The noise proceeded from without,
it grew louder and approached the apartment. Imprecations and threats
were vociferated wildly. Presently the door burst open and several
pirates rushed in, dragging after them Guyrion the Plunger, his face
bathed in blood.
"My son!" cried Eidiol running towards the lad. "My son is wounded!"
"And your mother--your sister--where are they?" added Rustic, rushing
upon the heels of the old skipper. "Oh! I fear me a great misfortune has
happened!"
"These bandits have killed my mother from whose arms they strove to drag
my sister," answered Guyrion in despair. "I sought to defend them--these
men struck me over the head with a saber and knocked me senseless!"
"My wife dead!" exclaimed the old man stupefied; and turning to the
chieftain of the pirates, he cried out in a thundering voice: "Rolf!
Justice! Justice! I demand vengeance!"
"Yes, Rolf, justice and vengeance!" cried several of the pirates who
rushed in with Guyrion. "This dog whom we bring here to you has killed
one of our companions. We want justice!"
Rolf, more and more under the influence of the heady wine, seeing that
he continued to empty cup after cup, answered in a husky voice: "Yes, my
champions; I shall order that justice be done. Only let me finish this
flagon of wine."
At the same moment other pirates rushed in. They carried Anne the Sweet
unconscious in their arms and deposited her at the feet of the Northman
chieftain saying:
"Old Rolf, here is a beautiful girl that we have reserved for you. She
belongs to your part of the booty."
Eidiol, Rustic, Guyrion and the other skippers in their company ran to
the rescue of Anne, but they were violently repelled and held back by
the pirates.
"My champions, I shall administer justice!" cried Rolf from his seat in
a maudlin voice; and addressing himself to Guyrion the Plunger, who,
forgetful of his wound that bathed his forehead in blood, looked
alternately with despairing eyes from his father to his sister who lay
prostrate in a swoon: "Who are you? Where do you come from? Answer,
young man!"
"He is my son," answered Eidiol, choking with rage. "He is a skipper,
like myself, and he came to join me at the abbey, where I was retained a
prisoner."
"And as truly as I have managed the oar since my childhood," cried
Rustic, "seeing that you, Rolf, and your men, ill-treat us poor people
in such a manner, our Skippers' Guild will call the other guilds of
Paris to arms against you."
Rolf received the threat with a loud roar of laughter. He rose, and
trying to steady himself upon his feet answered in a voice frequently
interrupted by hiccoughs:
"I pardon all these fellows; but I shall keep the girl. And now, you,
Parisians, return to your city; you are free. I forbid my champions do
you the least harm."
"Rolf!" cried Eidiol imploringly, "return my daughter to me! Allow us to
carry away in our vessel the body of my wife!"
"My champions, cast these dogs out at the gate of the abbey, and let
them hurry to announce to Charles the Simple that--I want--to marry his
daughter Ghisèle--Yes, I want that maid for my wife."
"Yes, yes! You shall wed the princess!" cried the pirates, delighted at
the whim of their chief; and dragging the Parisian skippers despite all
the resistance that they offered, drove them out of the abbey of St.
Denis at the point of their swords.
CHAPTER X.
ROLF'S COURTSHIP.
The large fleet of the pirates pulled from the banks on which the abbey
of St. Denis rose, and, driven by a favorable wind, steered for Paris
since early sunrise of the next morning. The fleet numbered more than
two thousand vessels, carrying twenty-five thousand combatants. The
sailing order was determined by the river's channel. The light vessels
of the draft of _holkers_ navigated close to the two banks; toward the
center of the river sailed the "_snekars_", vessels with twenty
oarsmen's benches; finally along the deepest part of the channel came
the "_drekars_", men-of-war that greatly resembled the Roman galleys.
Thick sheets of iron defended the flanks of the latter; a "_kastali_", a
semicircular wooden tower from eight to ten feet high, rose at their
poop. Posted upon the platform of these towers, the Northmans hurled
against their foe stones, bolts, javelins, fire-brands, heavy beams of
wood, and also fragile little vases filled with a corrosive dust that
blinded whoever sought to board them, while other pirates, armed with
long scythes, cut the cordage of the hostile ships.
The Northman vessels, that, ascending the Seine, made sail for Paris,
covered the river from bank to bank, and a full league in length. Its
waters disappeared under the mass of craft of all sizes, and all filled
with pirates. As the fleet moved up it presented the aspect of a huge
swarm of men, of casques, of arms, of cuirasses, of bucklers and of
uncouth figures, painted or gilded and placed either at the prow or the
poop of the vessels, sometimes on the tops of the masts. Pavilions of
all colors surmounted with large painted streamers on which fabulous
animals were depicted--winged dragons, double-headed eagles, fishes with
the heads of lions, and other monsters--floated in the wind. The savage
war-songs of the Northmans resounded far and wide, and were answered by
and mingled with the joyful cries of the revolted serfs who followed the
banks of the river and regulated their march by the progress of the
fleet. At last the Northmans reached a part of the river whence were
seen in the distance, across the evening haze, the steeples, towers and
walls of the city of Paris, enclosed within a fortified island, at the
extremity of which rose the cathedral. On the opposite sides, and along
either arm of the river, where the open fields and the suburbs lay, the
belfries of churches were discernible, as well as the numerous buildings
of the abbeys of St. Germain-d'Auxerre, St. Germain-des-Prés, and St.
Etienne-des-Grès, while further away along the distant horizon loomed
the high hill on which stood the basilica of St. Geneviève. At the sight
of the city that had during the last century been so often attacked,
ravaged, pillaged and levied ransom upon by the men of their race, the
Northmans uttered wild shouts of triumph, and cried out: "Paris!"
"Paris!"
The fleet was headed by the _drekar_ of Rolf the Sea-King. This vessel
was named Grimsnoth. Rolf captured it from another pirate after a
murderous combat. According to the saga of Gothrek, Grimsnoth surpassed
the other _drekars_ of the seas of the North by its beauty and size as
much as Rolf himself surpassed the other pirates by his valor. Indeed,
never yet was ship seen comparable with Grimsnoth. The _drekar_
resembled a gigantic dragon, whose copper head and scaly neck protruded
from the prow that represented the monster's massive breast equipped
with two folded and gilded wings, thrown backward and fashioned in such
manner as to represent the coil of the marine monster's tail. In the
middle of the huge square red sail of the _drekar_ another dragon was
designed. At its poop rose the _kastali_--the little semicircular
fortress in itself, constructed of strong smooth beams circled by iron
bands and pierced by narrow loop-holes through which the archers on the
inside could shoot their darts from cover, in case the foe attempted to
board the _drekar_. A wide platform, spacious enough to hold twenty
armed men, crowned the fortification, and had a belt of iron bucklers
for its parapet.
Old Rolf stood erect on top of his _kastali_. His mien was savage. It
looked inspired. His weapon and hands streamed blood. At his feet,
stretched out in a pool of blood, and still palpitating with its ebbing
life, lay the body of a white horse that was taken from the stables of
the Abbot of St. Denis, bound by the four feet, and raised with the aid
of pulleys and cordage to the platform of the _kastali_ in order to be
there solemnly sacrificed to Odin and the gods of the North. When the
sacrifice was done, the old pirate took his ivory horn and blew three
times, giving a particular intonation to each blast. The chief of each
vessel put his horn to his own lips and repeated the signal given by
Rolf. Thus the signal ran from mouth to mouth, from one end of the fleet
to the other. The war-songs of the pirates were hushed, and immediately,
obedient to the order given by the blast from their chief's horn, the
Northmans maneuvered their sails in such manner that their vessels
remained motionless on the current of the stream. The _holkers_ of Gaëlo
and of Shigne served as scouts to the _drekar_ of Rolf and sailed a
little distance ahead of him. The old pirate hailed the two young
leaders and ordered them to board his _drekar_. Both obeyed and crossed
over a narrow plank furnished with solid cramp-irons that was thrown out
to each of the _holkers_ from the sides of Grimsnoth. The Buckler
Maiden, still pale from the loss of blood, wore her head bandaged under
the iron hair-net that she used for a casque. At the moment when she was
about to ascend the _kastali_ of Rolf, Gaëlo said to the heroine:
"Shigne, war has its hazards; I may be killed to-morrow. Become my wife
this night. Let our union be consummated."
The Buckler Maiden blushed; her eyes, that never before were dropped at
the sight of man, now felt veiled by a mist before the ardent gaze of
Gaëlo; in a low and trembling voice she answered:
"Gaëlo, you vanquished me; I belong to you; I am proud that I do; I
could belong to no braver man. Rolf has been a father to me. I should
consult him on your request. If he says yes, I will say yes, and from
to-night I shall be yours." Without another word the warrior maid
preceded Gaëlo to the platform of the _kastali_ where the old pirate
stood awaiting them.
"Gaëlo," said Rolf, "you and Shigne shall precede the fleet; ply your
oars and reach Paris with your two _holkers_."
"Never shall I have obeyed you with greater joy."
"Order yourselves to be conducted before the Count of Paris. Shigne is
to say to him: 'The King of the Franks has a young and handsome
daughter. Rolf demands that daughter in marriage.'" The pirate thereupon
rubbed his beard, laughed aloud with his usual roar, and added: "I have
taken it into my head to wed a maid of royal race!" And addressing
Gaëlo, the pirate continued: "As to you, Gaëlo, you shall tell the Count
of Paris that I shall want, together with the daughter, and for dower,
the territory of Neustria. It is a rich and fertile region, and it is
washed by the sea, exactly suitable to a mariner who loves the ocean.
Old Hastain obtained from Charles the Bald the country of Chartres;
Rolf, the Chief of the Northmans will have Neustria, which we shall call
Northmandy, and where I shall establish you both, my champions!"
"We shall carry your orders to the Count of Paris, who, for all answer,
will have us stabbed, both of us, Shigne and myself."
"By Odin, he will not dare to! You will tell the count that my fleet
will cast anchor under the walls of Paris; and that if, to-morrow,
before sunset, you and Shigne are not back on my _drekar_, I shall set
the city on fire, sack it, and kill all its inhabitants. If to-morrow,
before the close of day, Charles the Simple has not granted me his
daughter, Neustria, and ten thousand pounds of silver for the ransom of
Paris, there will be left not one stone upon the other in the city. That
is my message."
"Rolf, we shall immediately depart to carry out your orders. To-morrow
we shall be either dead or back to you before sunset. I have requested
Shigne to accept me for her husband this very night. She answered
saying: 'I shall say yes, if Rolf says yes, and from to-night I shall be
yours.'!"
"Gaëlo," answered the old pirate with a sly look, "will wed the
Beautiful Shigne the day that Rolf weds Ghisèle, the daughter of the
King of the Franks! Go on the mission that I have charged you with--duty
and love, each in its season."
CHAPTER XI.
BRENN--KARNAK.
Upon quitting the _drekar_ of Rolf, Shigne and Gaëlo reembarked upon
their own _holkers_ and ordered their oarsmen to ply their oars
vigorously. The two _holkers_ glided swiftly over the water and they
were steered towards the fortified point of the island where Paris was
situated. The rest of the fleet followed slowly behind.
"Gaëlo," said Simon Large-Ears, keeping in swing with the quick and
vigorous stroke of his companions, "just look at those bands of serfs
who have been following us along the river bank since yesterday. Look at
them running like a pack of wolves hungering for the abbeys that we see
strewn hither and thither."
"I fear they mean to start the pillaging without waiting for us!"
exclaimed Robin Jaws in a tone of lamentation, which was soon joined by
the voices of the other pirates, who ceased rowing for a moment in order
to cast their angry looks at the ragged rabble rout. The latter, wholly
unconcerned by the indignation that they had provoked, ran apace
brandishing their staves, their forks and their scythes, and from time
to time emitting furious yells.
"If Lodbrog had not died like a true berserker, such a sight as this
would throw the fit of frenzy upon him. What evidences of misery do we
not see on all sides!"
"To your oars, my champions! To your oars!" cried Gaëlo. "You need not
worry about your share in the pillage. Now, however, row!" saying which
Gaëlo pointed to the _holker_ of Shigne which had taken the lead of
them, and he added: "Will you allow yourselves to be beaten by the
Buckler Maidens? Fall to, champions!"
Grumbling at Gaëlo's orders the pirates bent to their oars and strove to
overtake the white _holker_. On the right bank of the Seine there rose
large clumps of trees, planted in the middle of wide meadows that
belonged to the abbey of St. Germain-des-Prés. On the left side of the
river, the bank, which rose much higher than on the opposite side, made
a sharp turn and shut off the horizon. From the foot of the slope, a
jetty constructed of stones closely set together ran out some fifty feet
into the river. It was the breakwater of the port of Grève, now
deserted, but where vessels took refuge when the current was strong.
Propelled by their oars and steered so as just to clear the jetty, the
two _holkers_ were pushing vigorously forward, when, suddenly dashing
from behind the further side of the stone structure, a Parisian vessel
manned by Eidiol, Guyrion, Rustic the Gay and several other Gallic
skippers intercepted the progress of the Northman boats. The men on
board the vessel shot a volley of arrows at the Northmans, threw a
grappling iron into the _holker_ nearer to them, which happened to be
Gaëlo's, and as quickly taking up their cutlasses, pikes and axes leaped
forward resolutely to the fray, while Eidiol cried out to them:
"Exterminate the Northmans, but seize the two chiefs alive. They shall
serve us for hostages!"
At the moment of this unexpected attack, Shigne and Gaëlo, the latter of
whom was struck by a barbed arrow just below his armlet, were, as was
their wont, standing near the helm. Both dashed forward to engage the
Gauls, but the same instant that Eidiol issued the order to exterminate
the pirates, a cry of glad surprise went up from the _holker_ of the
Buckler Maidens, and immediately after, these words reached the ear of
the aged dean of the Skippers' Guild:
"Father! Father! Do not hurt these young warrior maids. Their chief has
protected me. She was taking me to Paris, back to you! She is charged
with a pacific mission," and standing up in the middle of the _holker_,
Anne the Sweet extended her arms to Eidiol.
"Guy! Rustic! Drop your arms," the old man cried. "Anne, my dear child,
is in the vessel of the warrior maids!"
Still under the excitement of the interrupted battle, Shigne ordered her
virgins to lay down their weapons, while Anne, with her arms still
extended towards Eidiol, cried out:
"Bless this warrior maid! Oh, my father! Thanks to her I have escaped
being outraged by the pirates!"
"How sorry I am for having shot that arrow at you!" Guyrion was at the
same moment saying to Gaëlo, whom he saw endeavoring to extract the
arrow that had struck him in the arm. "I now recognize you, worthy
pirate! It was you who opened the doors of our cells in the abbey of St.
Denis!"
Still with his cutlass in his hand and contemplating Simon, who was
making wry faces while holding his hand to one side of his bleeding
head, "I also regret to have cut off half the ear of this Northman, but
it stuck out clean beyond his casque!" exclaimed Rustic the Gay.
"Another meeting," cried Simon Large-Ears, shaking his fist at Rustic,
"it is that insolent tongue of yours that I mean to cut out, by the
faith of Simon!"
"Why, you are as little of a Northman as myself, honest pirate!"
exclaimed Rustic as he recognized his countryman. "My regret is then
only all the deeper for leaving you in so ridiculous a state. I should
have clipped off both your ears. But that can still be done."
Simon made no answer to the renewed joke. He was kept busy stanching the
flow of blood from his wound, which he washed with fresh water that he
dipped up from the river with his casque, while his friend Robin Jaws
tried to console him saying:
"If we only had here some fire; I would heat the point of my sword red,
and would quickly burn your wound dry."
Shortly after the boarding that was stopped so happily, the grappling
irons of the Parisian vessel were removed. Jumping from the _holker_ of
the Buckler Maiden on board her own father's vessel, Anne the Sweet
related to him, to Guyrion and to Rustic how she had recovered her
senses in the midst of the pirates who took her to Rolf just at the
moment when the warrior maid stepped into the apartment; how she threw
herself at Shigne's feet; how Shigne, touched with pity, obtained from
Rolf the freedom of his prisoner and took her to her own _holker_, where
she remained in safety until the unexpected encounter with her father.
Eidiol, in turn, informed Anne that, enraged at seeing her in the hands
of the Northmans, and knowing from experience that they were in the
habit of expediting some light craft ahead of the main fleet, he placed
himself in ambush behind the breakwater of the port of Grève, determined
to wreak vengeance for the death of Martha upon all the pirates whom he
could seize, and to keep their chiefs alive in order to exchange them
for Anne.
The two _holkers_, as well as the Parisian vessel, thereupon proceeded
jointly towards Paris, and disembarked all their crews upon the river
bank at a little distance from the ramparts. There the Northmans were to
await the return of Shigne and Gaëlo, who were charged with carrying the
will of Rolf to the Count of Paris.
At a point of the river bank whence the road led inland toward the city,
which could not be entered save by one of the bridges, both of which
were defended by towers, Eidiol said to Gaëlo:
"In order to reach the palace of the Count of Paris in safety both you
and your female companion should throw over your armor the hooded
great-coats of two of our skippers. Your quality of messengers from Rolf
might not be respected by the count's soldiers. You are both brave. But
what will bravery boot if you find yourselves two against a hundred? I
shall lead you as far as the palace. Once arrived there, you can demand
to see one of Rothbert's officers and he will enable you to carry out
your mission."
"I accept your offer, brave skipper," answered Gaëlo after exchanging a
few words in a low voice with Shigne. "I am anxious to succeed in the
mission that I am charged with. We wish to arrive as promptly as
possible before the count."
"Moreover," added Guyrion addressing the pirate, "I see by the way you
carry your arm that you suffer greatly from the wound I gave you. The
iron head of my arrow has remained in the wound. Step into our house
before you proceed to the palace. We shall dress your wound. Although my
mother's death is due to the Northmans, I may not forget that it was you
who delivered me, together with my companions and my father, from the
prison of the abbey, and that it is your friend who saved my sister
from the pollution of Rolf. Our gratitude is due you."
"I accept your proposal," answered the young man.
The Beautiful Shigne and Gaëlo threw over themselves the great-coats of
two of the skippers, left the river bank behind them, climbed the bluff
and took the road to the bridge. Towards the north the bright glare of a
fire struggled on the horizon with the light of the sinking sun. As they
drew nearer to the city, an ever louder tumult struck their ears, until
presently they found themselves in the midst of a mob of slaves that was
hurrying under the leadership of several clericals towards the gate of
the tower over the bridge, and taking to the city for safe-keeping the
treasures of sanctuaries that had been set on fire by bands of revolted
serfs. The docile serfs, whom the priests had in charge, bore on their
backs big cases filled with corn, altar ornaments of gold and silver,
statues of precious metals, massive shrines that glistened with precious
stones and some of which required seven serfs to carry. The priests
marched near the reliquaries, either moaning with grief, or frantically
ejaculating maledictions on the invaders and their seconders, the
revolted serfs. Among the serfs themselves, some joined in the
lamentations of the priests, but less anxious to mount the ramparts and
do battle with the Northmans, they answered the pressing urgings of the
clericals with the submissive exclamation: "The will of God be done!"
Within the city the emissaries of the Count of Paris were no more
successful in evoking the martial ardor of the people. In vain did the
count's men gallop through the city and call out: "To arms, villeins! To
arms, towns-folk! To the ramparts!" But villeins and towns-folk hurried
into their own frame houses and barricaded the doors.
After traversing several tortuous streets, Eidiol and his suite arrived
at the door of the skipper's house. Guyrion opened it, and Gaëlo,
Shigne, Rustic, Anne and her father were speedily gathered together in
the apartment on the lower floor, whose shutters they prudently closed.
"Light a lamp, sister," said Guyrion, "and let me have a cup with water,
some lint and oil;" and addressing Gaëlo, while Anne fetched the
materials required for dressing the Northman's wound, "roll up your
armlet; I shall extract the arrowhead; after the wound is washed with
cold water and covered with lint saturated in aromatic oil, you will
feel relieved."
Gaëlo removed his armor, rolled up the sleeve of his reindeer jacket,
and left his bleeding arm bare. In himself trying to extract the arrow
from his wound, the pirate had broken the shaft, leaving the sharp
arrowhead imbedded under the flesh. The operation of extraction was
thereby rendered more difficult. Nevertheless, Eidiol succeeded in
taking hold of a portion of the shaft that still obtruded above the
flesh, and by dint of no little dexterity finally drew out the arrowhead
itself. Greatly pained during the operation, Gaëlo felt relieved when
the missile was at last extracted. Before placing the lint on the wound,
the old skipper moistened a piece of cloth in water and was about to
wash away the clotted blood that covered almost all the upper arm, when
he uttered a cry of surprise, took a step back, gazed anxiously upon
Gaëlo and exclaimed with intense curiosity:
"Who burnt into your arm these two Gallic words:
'_Brenn_--_Karnak_'--that I see here? Speak, young man!"
"My father; he burnt the inscription into my arm shortly after my
birth."
"Where is your father?"
"He, as well as my mother, are dead."
"He surely was not of the Northman race?"
"No, although he was born in their country, and always went to battle
with them. He was of the Gallic race--"
"In what year did your father's father go to live among the Northmans?"
"Towards the middle of the last century."
"Was that not after a fresh and violent insurrection broke out in
Brittany, when the Bretons, in order to make a head against the Franks,
applied for aid from the Northmans, who happened to have their camp at
the mouth of the Loire?"
"Yes," answered Gaëlo. "But how come you to know all that? Who told you
of it?"
"What were the circumstances that induced your grandfather to join the
Northmans?"
"After the fresh insurrection of Armorica, which at first bade fair to
succeed, dissensions broke out among the Breton chiefs. Even my
grandfather's family was divided. In the course of a violent altercation
with one of his brothers, the two drew their swords. Wounded in that
fratricidal duel, my grandfather left Brittany forever, and embarked
with a troop of Northmans who were just then setting sail at the mouth
of the Loire to return to Denmark, where my father and myself were
born."
"Your grandfather's name was Ewrag," Eidiol proceeded with increasing
emotion; "he was the son of Vortigern,[5] one of the most valiant
companions-in-arms of Morvan, who heroically resisted the arms of Louis
the Pious on the moor of Kennor, the marsh of Peulven and across the
defiles of Armorica. Vortigern's grandfather was Amael, who lived to be
more than a hundred years, declined to be the jailor of the last
descendant of Clovis, and was one of the chiefs of the bands of Charles
Martel, the ancestor of Charles the Great, whose descendant reigns
to-day under the name of Charles the Simple."
"Old man!" cried Gaëlo, "who could have informed you so accurately on
the history of my family?"
"Your family is mine," answered Eidiol, over whose eyes the film of a
tear was gathering. "I am a descendant of Joel, the brenn of the tribe
of Karnak.[6] My grandfather was your grandfather's brother. That is our
kinship."
"What say you?" cried Gaëlo. "Are you really of Joel's stock, like
myself? Are we of the same family?"
"These words, which your father traced on your arm as a sign of
identification, are carried by me also, as well as by my son and my
daughter, obedient to the recommendation of Ronan the Vagre,[7] one of
our joint ancestors who lived in the days of Queen Brunhild."
"We are relatives!" cried Anne and Guyrion in chorus, drawing near to
Gaëlo, while Shigne and Rustic listened with redoubled interest to the
conversation between the old skipper and Gaëlo.
"We are relatives!" repeated Gaëlo looking alternately from Eidiol to
Anne and Guyrion, and turning to the warrior maid he proceeded: "Shigne,
I am doubly grateful to you; the young girl so magnanimously saved by
you happens to be my own relative."
"She shall be like a sister to me," answered the Buckler Maiden in her
grave and sonorous voice. "My sword will ever be ready in her defense."
"And in default of your sword, fair heroine," put in Rustic, "my two
arms joined to those of Master Eidiol and of my friend Guyrion will ever
protect Anne the Sweet, although it unfortunately happened that all our
three pairs of arms proved insufficient to defend the poor child from
Rolf."
"Good father," Gaëlo said to Eidiol, "please tell me for what reason you
left Brittany."
"Your grandfather, Ewrag, had two brothers, like himself, the sons of
Vortigern. When, on the occasion of the fatal dissension that you spoke
of, Ewrag quitted Brittany to settle down in the country of the
Northmans, his two brothers, Rosneven and Gomer, the latter of whom was
my grandfather, continued to live at the cradle of our family, near the
sacred stones of Karnak. Nominoë, Judicaël, Allan Strong-Beard were
successively elected the chiefs of Armorica. More than once during that
time did the Franks invade and ravage our country, but they never were
able to establish their conquest as firmly as they succeeded in doing in
the other regions of Gaul. The druid influence long kept alive among our
people an inveterate hatred for the foreigner. Unhappily, the perfidious
counsels of the Christian priests, coupled with the example set by the
Frankish seigneurs, who had gradually become by the right of conquest
the hereditary masters of both the land and the peoples of Gaul, at last
had their fatal effect upon the Breton chiefs themselves. Originally
elected by the free suffrage of the people, as was the ancient Gallic
custom, and chosen by reason of their bravery, wisdom and patriotism,
these chiefs sought to render their office hereditary in their own
families, in imitation of the seigneurs all over Gaul. The Christian
priests joined the Breton chiefs in their iniquitous scheme, and ordered
the people to submit to these new masters, as they had ordered them to
submit to Clovis and his leudes. By little and little Brittany lost her
old franchises. The chiefs, one time elective and temporary, now having
become hereditary and autocratic with the assistance of the clergy,
stripped the Breton people of almost all their rights. Nevertheless,
until now they have not degraded them to the point of treating them as
slaves or serfs. Of the two brothers of your grandfather, one, Gomer, my
own grandfather, saw the gradual debasement of Brittany with grief and
indignation. Gomer was a mariner. His home being in Vannes, like
Albinik's,[8] one of our ancestors, he often made trips to England and
also carried cargoes as far south as the mouths of the Somme and the
Seine. On one occasion he ascended the river as far as Paris. His trade
of mariner brought him in contact with the dean of the Skippers' Guild
of Paris, who had a pretty and bright daughter. My grandfather married
her. My father was born of that union. He also became a skipper. His
life was spent amidst the ordinary trials of our people, good and evil
successively alternating. I followed the same trade. My life has until
now been as happy as it is possible to be in these disturbed times. Only
two misfortunes have so far befallen me: the death of Martha, whom I
lost yesterday, and, about thirty years ago, the disappearance of a
daughter, the first born of all my children. Her name was Jeanike."
"And how did she come to disappear?"
"My wife, being sick at the time, confided the child to one of our
neighbors for a walk outside of the city. We never saw her again,
neither her nor the neighbor."
"Fortunately the children that are left to you must have alleviated your
grief," remarked Gaëlo. "But tell me, good father, did you ever have any
tidings from the branch of our family that remained in Brittany?"
"I learned from a traveler that the tyranny of the Breton seigneurs
rested ever heavier upon the people of Armorica, and that they are now
wholly ridden by the priests."
"Eidiol," said Gaëlo picking up the iron arrowhead which the old man
dropped on the floor after it was extracted from the arm of the young
pirate, "preserve this iron arrowhead. It will increase the number of
the relics of our family. Should you ever meet again those of our
relatives, who, perhaps, still live in Brittany, and who may have
preserved the legends left by our ancestors, add this relic to the
others together with the legend of our own times--"
Gaëlo was interrupted by a great noise on the street that seemed to be
drawing nearer and nearer. Presently the tramp of horses and clanking of
arms were distinguished. Rustic ran to open the upper panel of the door,
looked out, and turning to those within announced in a low voice:
"It is Count Rothbert passing with his men, accompanied by the
Archbishop of Rouen. He is no doubt coming back from the ramparts and is
returning to his castle."
"Good father," said Gaëlo gravely, and rolling down his armlet, "you
promised to accompany me and my companion to the palace of the Count of
Paris. Come; time presses. I am in a hurry to fulfil the singular
mission that has brought me to the city."
"What mission is that?"
"The Beautiful Shigne is to notify the count that Rolf, the Northman
pirate chieftain, demands Ghisèle, the daughter of Charles the Simple,
King of the French, for his wife; and I am to notify him that Rolf
demands Neustria for his dower."
Eidiol remained for a moment mute with stupor, and then cried out: "Such
is the termination of royal stocks! One of the descendants of Joel
declined to be the jailor of the last descendant of Clovis, and now
another descendant of Joel is commissioned to notify the successor of
Charles the Great that his daughter is demanded from him by an old
pirate, soiled with all manner of crimes, and to boot, one of the most
beautiful of the few provinces still left to the King!"
A few minutes later the Beautiful Shigne and Gaëlo, having again thrown
the hooded great-coats of two of the Parisian mariners over their own
casques and armor, marched under the guidance of Eidiol to the castle of
Count Rothbert, in order to carry to him the message of old Rolf.
CHAPTER XII.
ARCHBISHOP FRANCON.
One of the pavilions of the royal residence at Compiegne served as the
apartment of Ghisèle, the daughter of Charles the Simple, King of the
Franks. The young princess usually was in the company of her female
associates in the large hall on the first floor. A high and narrow
window, made of little glass squares, pierced a wall ten feet thick, and
opened upon the sombre and vast forest in the midst of which rose the
palace of Compiegne. This morning Ghisèle was engaged upon a piece of
tapestry. She had just completed her fourteenth year. Married at
sixteen, her father, Charles the Simple, was a parent at seventeen.
Ghisèle's face was childlike and mild. Her nurse, a woman of about
forty, handed to her the strands of woolen thread of different colors
which the princess used at her work. At the princess' feet, on a wooden
bench, sat Yvonne, her foster-sister. A little further away, several
young girls were busily spinning, or conversed in an undertone while
plying their needles.
"Jeanike," said Ghisèle to her nurse, "my father always comes to embrace
me in the morning; he has not yet come to-day."
"Count Rothbert and seigneur Francon, the Archbishop of Rouen, arrived
last night from Paris with a large escort. The chamberlain was sent to
wake up the King, your father. Since four in the morning he has been in
conversation with the count and the archbishop. The conference must be
on some very important matter."
"This night call makes me uneasy. I only hope it does not mean some bad
news."
"What bad news is there to be feared? The proverb runs: 'Can the
Northmans be in Paris?'" retorted the nurse smiling and shrugging her
shoulders. "Do not take alarm so quickly, my dear child."
"I know, Jeanike, that the Northmans are not in Paris. May God save us
from those pirates! May He hold them back in their frozen haunts."
"The chaplain was telling us the other day," put in Yvonne, "that they
have hoofs of goats and on their heads horns of oxen."
"Keep still! Keep still, Yvonne!" exclaimed Ghisèle with a shudder. "Do
not mention those pagans! Their bare name horrifies me! Alas, were they
not the cause of my mother's death?"
"It is true," answered the nurse sadly. "Oh, it was a fearful night in
which those demons, led by the accursed Rolf, attacked the castle of
Kersey-on-the-Oise after a rapid and unexpected ascent of the river. The
Queen, your mother, was nursing you at the time. She was so frightened
that her breasts dried and she died. It was upon that misfortune that
you shared my milk with my little Yvonne. Until that time I had felt
very wretched. A stray child, sold in her early years to the intendant
of the royal domain of Kersey, my fate improved when I became your
foster-mother. It helped my eldest son, Germain, to become one of the
chief foresters of the woods of Compiegne."
"Oh, nurse," replied Ghisèle with a sigh, her eyes filling with tears,
"everyone has his troubles! I am a King's daughter, but am motherless.
For pity's sake never mention in my hearing the name of those Northmans,
of those accursed pagans who deprived me of a mother's love!"
"Come, dear child, do not cry," said Jeanike affectionately and drying
the tears on Ghisèle's face, while the princess' foster-sister, kneeling
upon the little bench and unable to repress her own tears, looked at the
princess disconsolately.
At that moment the curtain over the farther door of the apartment was
pushed aside, and the King of the Franks, Charles the Simple, stepped
in. This descendant of Charles the great emperor, was then thirty-two
years of age. His bulging eyes, his retreating chin, his hanging lower
lip imparted to his physiognomy a look of such stupidity and dullness
that anyone would pronounce him a fool, at first sight. His long hair,
the symbol of royalty, framed in a puffed face that was fringed with a
sparse beard. The King looked profoundly downcast, and brusquely said to
Jeanike:
"Go out, nurse! Out of the room everybody!"
The King remained alone with Ghisèle. The child embraced her father
tenderly and looked to find in his presence the needed consolation for
the painful thoughts that the recollection of her mother had awakened in
her. Charles the Simple quietly submitted to the caresses of his
daughter, and said:
"Good morning, child; good morning. But why do you weep?"
"For very little, good father. I was feeling sad. Your sight banishes
my sadness. You are late this morning. My nurse tells me that last night
the Count of Paris arrived at the castle together with the Archbishop of
Rouen."
The King sighed, and nodded affirmatively with his head.
"They did not, I hope, bring you bad news, father?"
"Alas," answered Charles the Simple, sighing again and looking up at the
ceiling, "the tidings that they bring would be disastrous, aye, they
would, if I refuse to accept certain conditions!"
"And is it in your power to fulfil those conditions?" asked Ghisèle, and
the girl looked into her father's face with so childlike and mild a
countenance that Charles the Simple, but not wicked, seemed embarrassed
and touched. He dropped his eyes before his daughter and stammered:
"Those conditions! Oh, those conditions! They are hard! Oh, so very
hard! But--what is to be done? Fain would I resist. But I am forced to.
What would you have me do if I should be forced to do what should give
us pain?"
"You can not be commanded, you, the master, the sovereign, the King of
the Franks!"
"I, King of the Franks!" cried Charles the Simple with bitterness and
rage. "Is there, perchance, a King of the Franks in existence? The
counts, the dukes, the marquises, the bishops, the abbots--they are the
kings! Have not the seigneurs, for the last century, made themselves the
sovereign and hereditary masters of the counties and duchies which they
were simply put there to administer during their lives and in the name
of the King? Who is it that reigns in Vermandois? Is it I? No, it is
Count Herbert! Who reigns over the country of Melun? Is it I? No, it is
Count Errenger!--and over the country of Rheims? Archbishop Foulque;
and in Provence? Duke Louis the Blind; and in Lorraine? Duke Louis IV;
and in Burgundy? Duke Rodulf; and in Brittany? Duke Allan--Those are the
brigands, they and so many other thieves, small and large, who have
plucked us of one province after another; bit by bit they have
appropriated to themselves the royal heritage of our fathers. I tell you
this, my child, in order that you may understand that, however hard the
conditions may be that are imposed upon me, I must, alas! submit. The
seigneurs command, I obey. Am I in a condition to resist them? Are they
not intrenched in the fortified castles that they have made Gaul to
bristle with all over the face of the land? I barely can muster up
enough soldiers to defend the small domain that is left to me. Over what
region can I say that I reign to-day--I, the descendant of Charles the
Great, the redoubtable emperor who ruled over the world? I do not
possess the hundredth part of Gaul! Figure it out, Ghisèle, figure it
out, and you will see that there is nothing now left to me but the
Orleanois, Neustria, the country of Laon and my domains of Compiegne,
Fontainebleau, Braine and Kersey. How would you expect me to resist the
seigneurs, and that I say 'No!' when they order me to say 'Yes!' seeing
my forces are so trifling?" And Charles the Simple, stamping the floor
with rage, clenched his fists and cried out: "Oh, my poor Ghisèle! If we
only had our ancestor Charles the Great to defend us now, we would not
now be dictated to as we are! The brave emperor would march forth at the
head of his troops to crush the insolent seigneurs and archbishops in
their own lairs!--Alack! Alack! I have neither the courage, nor the
will, nor the power! They call me 'the Simple'!--They are right," added
the King overcome with sorrow and weeping profusely. "Yes, yes; I am a
simpleton! But a poor simpleton who is greatly to be pitied--especially
at this hour--my child!"
"Good father!" exclaimed Ghisèle, throwing herself on the neck of the
King whose face was bathed in tears. "Do not give way to grief so. Will
there not always be enough land left to you in which to live in peace
with your daughter who loves and your servants who are attached to you?"
The King looked fixedly at Ghisèle, and wiping his eyes with the back of
his hand said in a voice broken with sobs: "Do you know what Count
Rothbert--" but suddenly breaking off he proceeded with an explosion of
idle rage: "I abhor this family of the Counts of Paris! It is they who
robbed us of the duchy of France.--Those people are our most dangerous
enemies! Some fine day, that Rothbert will dethrone me absolutely, as
his brother Eudes dethroned Charles the Fat! Oh, felonious, impudent and
thieving family! With what joy would I not exterminate you, if I only
had the power of Charles the Great!--But I have no courage--I do not
even dare to order them to be killed. They are well aware of this--and
that is why they trample over me!" The King's voice was smothered by his
sobs. He could only add: "Shame and humiliation!"
"I conjure you, dear father; drive away these evil thoughts--But what
did that wicked Count Rothbert say to you?"
"First of all, he said to me that the Northmans were before Paris, and
in immense numbers."
"The Northmans!" cried Ghisèle turning pale and shuddering from head to
foot with fear. "The Northmans before Paris! Oh, woe, woe is us!" and
the child hid her face in her hands, while tears inundated her
countenance and her frame shook with convulsive sobs.
With his eyes fixed on the floor, not venturing to raise them lest they
should encounter his daughter's, Charles the Simple proceeded with a
tremulous voice:
"The Count of Paris, as I was saying, informed me that the Northmans
were before the city. 'What would you have me do against it?' I asked
him; 'I have neither soldiers nor men; you, seigneurs, who are the
masters of almost all Gaul, have nothing else to do but to defend your
own possessions; that is your concern.' Rothbert answered me: 'The
Northmans threaten to burn down Paris, massacre the people, and to
overrun Gaul ravaging and sacking the fields and towns. No resistance
can be offered them. The majority of the villeins and serfs refuse to
take the field against them. The soldiers at the disposal of us, the
seigneurs, are too few in number to pretend to combat the pirates. We
must treat with them.' I then, my little Ghisèle, said to the count:
'Very well, treat; that is your affair, seeing those pagans are before
your walls of Paris and in your duchy of France.' 'And so I did,'
Rothbert answered me; 'I treated in your name with the envoys of Rolf,
the Northman chief.'"
"With Rolf," murmured Ghisèle clasping her hands in horror. "With that
pirate! That felon steeped in crime and sacrilege! That monster who was
the cause of my mother's death!"
"Alas! To the desolation of us both, dear daughter, this accursed
Rothbert, aiming only at the protection of his city of Paris and of his
duchy of France from the clutches of the old Northman brigand, promised
in my name that I would relinquish Neustria to him--Neustria, the best
of the provinces left to me--and besides--"
As Ghisèle perceived that her father hesitated to finish the sentence,
she wiped his tears and asked; "And besides, what else do they demand,
father?"
Charles the Simple remained for a moment silent, and shuddered.
Presently, however, overcoming the imbecile weakness of his character,
he broke out into fresh tears, crying: "No! No! I will not! However much
of a simpleton I may be, that shall never be. No! For once, at least, in
my life I shall act the King!" And closing his daughter in his arms,
Charles the Simple covered her head with kisses and cried: "No! No! He
shall not have my Ghisèle! The insolence of that old brigand, to think
of marrying--the grand-daughter of Charles the Great--and she a child of
barely fourteen! Sooner than see you the wife of Rolf, I would kill
you--I would kill you on the spot. Oh, Lord God, have mercy upon me!"
Ghisèle heard her father's words almost without understanding them. She
was gazing upon him with mingled doubt and stupor when a new personage
stepped into the hall. It was Francon, Archbishop of Rouen. The man's
impassive face, cold and hard, resembled a marble mask. He approached
close to Ghisèle and her father, who still clung together in a close
embrace, and pointing with his hand to the curtain behind which he had
kept himself concealed up to then, said in his sharp, short style:
"Charles, I have heard everything."
"You spied upon me!" cried the King. "You have dared to surprise the
secrets of your master!"
"I mistrusted your weakness. After our interview with Rothbert, I
followed you. I have overheard everything;" and addressing himself to
the young girl who, trembling at every limb, had fallen back upon her
seat, the Archbishop of Rouen proceeded in a solemn and threatening
voice: "Ghisèle, your father told you the truth. He is King only in
name. The little territory that he still is master of is, like his
crown, at the mercy of the Frankish seigneurs. They will dethrone him
whenever it should please them, as they dethroned Charles the Fat and
crowned in his stead Eudes, the Count of Paris, only twenty-five years
ago."
"Yes! Yes! And there will be no lack for a bishop to consecrate the new
usurper, just as there was found one to consecrate Count Eudes, not so,
Francon?" cried Charles the Simple with bitterness. "Such is the
gratitude of the priests towards the descendants of the Frankish Kings
that have made the Church so rich!"
"The Church owes nothing to Kings; the Kings owe to the Church the
remission of their sins!" was the disdainful reply of the archbishop.
"The Kings have bestowed wealth upon the Church here below, on earth;
they have been rewarded a hundredfold in heaven and all eternity. Now,
Ghisèle, listen to what I have to say to you. If, by reason of your
refusal, or the refusal of your father, the Northman pagans should, as
they threaten to do, renew against Gaul the frightful and sacrilegious
warfare that we are all familiar with, but which they promise to put an
end to in the event of your father's consenting to grant your hand to
their chieftain Rolf and to relinquish Neustria to him, then you and
your father will be alone responsible for the frightful ills that will
anew desolate the land."
"Francon," put in Charles the Simple imploringly, "the seigneurs also
have provinces and daughters. Why could not they give to Rolf one of
their provinces and one of their daughters?"
"Rolf wants Neustria, and Neustria belongs to you; Rolf wants Ghisèle,
and Ghisèle is your daughter. The two sacrifices impose themselves upon
the King!"
"I to marry that monster who caused my mother's death!" cried Ghisèle.
"No! Never! Never! Rather would I die!"
"A curse, then, upon you in this world and the next!" shouted the
archbishop in a thundering voice. "Let the blood that is to flow in this
impious war fall upon your head and your father's! You will both have to
answer before God for all the acts of sacrilege that you can prevent!
You will both expiate these sins here on earth by the excommunication
that I shall hurl upon you, and after death in everlasting flames!
Charles, excommunicated and damned in this world shall be an object of
horror to all his subjects. The Church that consecrated him King, will
pronounce him damned and forfeit of his throne! His life will be ended
in a dungeon!"
The terror that took hold of Charles the Simple as the Archbishop of
Rouen spoke, now reached its height. He fell upon his knees at the
priest's feet and clasping his hands implored:
"Mercy! Mercy, holy father! I shall give Neustria to Rolf--but not my
daughter! She is barely fourteen years of age! Fourteen years! It is in
itself almost a crime to marry a child at that age! And, then, she is so
timid! Alas, to place her in that monster's bed would be to consign her
to death!" And the wretched sovereign sobbed convulsively, and still
implored: "Mercy! Mercy! Can you threaten me with eternal punishment
because I refuse to deliver my child to a bandit whom the Church has
excommunicated for his unspeakable crimes?"
"Rolf will be baptized!" answered the prelate solemnly. "The lustral
waters will wash away his soilure, and he will enter the nuptial couch
clad in the white robes of a catechumen, the symbol of innocence!"
"Help! Nurse, help! My daughter is dying!" cried Charles the Simple
leaping from the floor and convulsively straining in his arms the inert
body of Ghisèle, who pale and cold as a corpse, had swooned away in her
seat.
The prelate triumphed.
CHAPTER XIII.
THE WEDDING OF ROLF.
The city of Rouen was in gala. Large crowds of people filled the streets
and pressed eagerly towards the basilica whose bells were pealing at
their loudest. Among those who were wending their way towards the church
were Eidiol, his daughter Anne the Sweet, Guyrion the Plunger and Rustic
the Gay. They had left Paris two days before; they descended the Seine
as far as Rouen in the vessel of the dean of the guild of the skippers
of Paris. It was a trip of pleasure and profit. Eidiol sailed to Rouen
in order to convey thither a cargo of merchandise and to witness the
wedding of the daughter of Charles the Simple, King of the Franks, with
Rolf, the chieftain of the Northman pirates, but now elevated to the
rank of sovereign Duke of Neustria, which assumed the name of
Northmandy.
Such was the indifference of that wretched population of serfs and
villeins to the form of the yoke that oppressed them, that the people of
Rouen, the capital of Neustria, now named Northmandy, actually delighted
to see the great province in the hand of the pirates.
Eidiol and his family walked towards the square of the basilica,
intending to watch the nuptial procession at close quarters. Anne rested
on the arms of her father and brother. Rustic preceded them in order to
clear a passage for them across the crowd that became denser and more
compact as they drew nearer to the cathedral. Finally, after much
struggling, the family of Eidiol succeeded in securing a post at the
corner of a street that ran out into the square.
"Master Eidiol," said Rustic, "there is a milestone here. Let Anne stand
on it. She will be better able to see the procession, and she will be
free from the crush."
"No, Rustic," answered the young girl, "I would not dare to take that
place."
"Jump on the milestone yourself," said the old man, "in case we can not
see with our own eyes, we shall be able to see with yours. Myself and
Guyrion will stay close to Anne."
As Eidiol spoke the distant sound of clarions was heard mingling with
the redoubled clanging of the nearby bells, and a wild clamor of joy
went up from the crowd.
"Here is the procession," cried Rustic from his perch; "it has turned
into the square; clarion blowers on horseback head the march; they are
followed by Frankish cavaliers, armed with lances bearing streamers;
they carry painted gilt bucklers hanging from their necks. Oh, here come
the Northman pirates clad in their armor and carrying the standard of
old Rolf. The standard has a seagull with open beak and claws for its
device. Well may you screech your cry of triumph, old sea bird! Your
prey is magnificent: a province of Gaul and the daughter of a King!"
"Oh, Rustic, how can you joke in that way!" remarked Anne the Sweet in a
tone of sad yet affectionate reproach. "Poor little Ghisèle! To wed that
old monster! Do you see the poor girl? Poor victim!"
"No; I see nothing of her as yet. Ah, here come the female pirates! How
martial they look in their armor of steel scales, with their azure
bucklers on their arms! Now come the seigneurs of the suite of the Count
of Paris, in their long robes embroidered with gold and ornamented with
fur. Hold! They stop! They are looking back uneasily. What can have
happened?" and leaning against the wall Rustic raised himself on the
tips of his feet in order to see further. A minute later he cried: "Oh,
the poor girl! Anne, you were right! Although she is the daughter of a
King the girl is to be pitied. She looks like a victim led to death!"
"Is it of Ghisèle that you are talking, Rustic?" inquired the young
girl. "What has happened to her? How I pity the poor child!"
"She was marching, leaning on the arm of Charles the Simple and paler
than a corpse under her white bridal robe, when suddenly her strength
entirely failed her. She collapsed and fell in a swoon into the arms of
the seigneurs who stood near her."
"Oh, father!" said Anne the Sweet to Eidiol, her eyes moist with tears,
"Is not that wretched girl's fate shocking!"
"And yet less shocking than the fate of millions of the women of our own
race who have been violated by the seigneurs and the ecclesiastics.
Those wretched women left their master's couch only to return to the
exhausting and even crushing toils of servitude. Degraded, dejected,
bought and sold like cattle, dying of grief or under their master's
blows, ignorant of the joys of family life and depraved, they were
brutified by slavery. Such, for centuries past, has been the condition
of the women of our race, and still continues to be. How many millions
of the women of our class die macerated, body and soul!"
"Alas! This poor King's daughter is surely guiltless of all these
crimes! She is much to be pitied!"
"Master Eidiol," resumed Rustic, "Charles the Simple's daughter has
regained consciousness; she now walks again, sustained by her father and
the Count of Paris. Oh! Here comes Rolf! He wears a long white shirt
over his armor. Behind Rolf marches our relative Gaëlo, together with
the Beautiful Shigne. The procession has halted. It now resumes its
march to the basilica. The clergy, with Archbishop Francon at the head,
halt under the portal. Oh, Master Eidiol! I am dazzled! The precious
stones glisten on the gilded copes of the priests, on their gold mitres,
on the gold crosses! Gold, rubies, pearls, diamonds and emeralds glitter
everywhere! The large cross, carried before the clergy, seems to be of
massive gold! It is studded with precious stones! The wealth of
Golconda!"
"Oh, young man of Nazareth!" exclaimed Eidiol. "Oh, Jesus, the
carpenter! The friend of the poor in rags! You, whom our ancestress
Geneviève saw done to death in Jerusalem by the high priests of your
day! Would you acknowledge as your disciples these priests, these
bishops so gorgeously robed and surrounded by so much splendor? Oh,
clergy, ye modern generation of vipers!"
"Do you hear the chaunts of the priests and the sound of the portable
organs, Master Eidiol? The clarions break in between. The bells are
chiming with increased noise. The King, his daughter and old Rolf enter
the portal of the basilica. Gold censers are being swung right and left
and the smoke of incense mounts to the sky!"
"They burned incense to Clovis, the firebrand and blood-thirsty monster;
they burned incense to Charles the Great who dethroned the stock of
Clovis! And to-day they burn incense to Rolf, to Rolf the old pirate, to
Rolf the murderer, to Rolf the perpetrator of sacrilege! The god of the
priests is gold!"
The marriage of Rolf and Ghisèle was blessed and consecrated by
Archbishop Francon in the princely cathedral of Rouen. The prelate also
on the same day blessed the union of Shigne and Gaëlo. The ceremony of
Ghisèle's marriage was barely over when the wretched girl again swooned
away--the third time on that day--and was carried into an adjoining
chamber on the arms of her women in waiting. Rolf, Charles the Simple,
the Count of Paris, together with the seigneurs of their respective
suites proceeded to the vast hall of the chapter of the Archbishopric of
Rouen. On his head the gold crown of the Frankish Kings, in his hand his
scepter, and the long royal mantle trailing on the floor behind him,
Charles the Simple ascended and remained standing on an elevated dais.
The Archbishop of Rouen and the bishops of the neighboring dioceses
placed themselves to the right, while to the left of the King were
ranked Rothbert, Count of Paris and Duke of France, and the Viscounts of
Monthery, of Argenteuil, of Pontoise, together with many other Frankish
seigneurs, among and above whom towered the tall figure of Burchart,
seigneur of the country of Montmorency. At the foot of the dais, and
facing the King and this assemblage of seigneurs and prelates, stood
Rolf, accompanied by Gaëlo and Shigne, together with the leading
Northman chiefs. The old pirate still had on the white shirt of the
neophyte over his armor. His demeanor was triumphant, insolent and sly.
Charles the Simple, on the contrary, looked sad and dejected, and
furtively wiped away the tears that insisted on forcing themselves to
his eyes. Despite his imbecility, the man loved his daughter; and the
fate of Ghisèle overpowered him with grief.
Radiant with joy at having escaped the fresh disasters that Rolf had
threatened to overwhelm Gaul with, the Count of Paris, the Archbishop of
Rouen and all the other seigneurs and prelates enjoyed the abject state
of the King. Nevertheless, however abased and hollow his title, still
they envied it. Clad in the full magnificence of his episcopal robes,
Archbishop Francon descended the steps of the dais with majestic tread,
approached Rolf and said to him in a loud and solemn tone:
"It has pleased Charles, King of the Franks, to bestow upon you and your
men all the fields, forests, towns, burgs, villages, inhabitants and
cattle of Neustria--"
"If the King had refused to give me the province I would have taken it"
put in Rolf, calmly interrupting the prelate. "You baptized me and my
champions; we allowed ourselves to be dipped naked in a large basin of
water, like so many fishes; we allowed you to sprinkle us with salt
water, the genuine brine of the ocean; and we were then told to put long
white shirts over our armor. I simply humored you in your priestly
monkey shines."
"It is the sacred symbol of the purity of your soul, which has been
cleansed of its soilure by the holy immersion of baptism," replied the
archbishop. "Henceforth you are a Catholic and son of the Church of
Rome. It is a very distinguished honor done to you."
"Aye, but you demanded from me, in exchange, all the lands of the abbeys
of my new duchy of Northmandy for your Church. I have since learned
that they make up one-fourth of my province."
"The goods of the Church are the goods of God," retorted the archbishop
haughtily. "What is God's, is God's; no human power can lay hands on
it."
"Priest!" cried Rolf puckering his brows with mingled anger and slyness,
"take care lest the humor seize me to chase the whole pack of tonsured
gentry from their nests in the abbeys, in order to prove to you once
more that Rolf and his champions take and keep whatever it may please
Rolf and his champions to take or to keep, without asking leave of your
Church."
"To the devil with the man of the gold cap with two points!" chimed in
several voices from among the freshly baptized pirates. "By the white
horse of our god Thomarog! Does the fellow take us for fools? Death to
the tonsured knave!"
"Rolf!" said the Archbishop of Rouen insinuatingly in order to calm the
old pirate, "the light of our faith has not yet sufficiently dispelled
the darkness in which paganism held your soul imprisoned. I do not
threaten you--I shall remain faithful to our compact."
"That's then agreed!" replied Rolf. "It is give and take between us. If
your priests serve me well, they shall keep their lands. But I must
recoup myself for the property that I leave to your abbots;" and
addressing the King, who, wholly indifferent to the conversation that
was taking place before him, remained silent, somber and sad: "Charles,
you gave me Ghisèle and Neustria. That is not now enough. A King's
daughter should be more richly dowered. My duchy of Northmandy borders
on Brittany. I demand this province also, together with all its towns,
abbeys and dependencies."
"You want Brittany!" cried Charles the Simple, for the first time
awaking from his gloomy apathy. "Oh, you want Brittany! I give it to you
with all my heart! You can have it. Go and take possession of it. It
will be a bright day to me, the day that I shall hear that you set foot
in that country. I gladly make you a present of Armorica, with its
cities, abbeys and dependencies! All you have to do is to take
possession!"
Not a little astonished at the King's eagerness to grant him so
considerable a cession, the old pirate turned towards his men
inquiringly. Gaëlo whispered to him:
"Charles grants you the country of the Bretons because he knows that it
is impregnable, being defended by a race of indomitable men."
"There is nothing impregnable to you, my champions! You will take charge
of the task."
"Since six hundred years the Franks have been endeavoring to subjugate
that land, and they have not yet succeeded in establishing themselves
firmly in it. They have invaded it; they have vanquished its forces--but
never yet have they subjugated it."
"The Northmans will subjugate those who have resisted the Franks."
"Armorica," replied Gaëlo, "will be the grave of your best soldiers."
The old pirate shrugged his shoulders with incredulity and not a little
impatience; he took two steps towards the King and said: "Well, then,
Charles, that province also is mine--"
"Yes--yes. It is yours--Duke of Northmandy and of Brittany--provided you
can conquer it!"
"Rolf," resumed Gaëlo in a low voice, "renounce your pretensions over
Armorica--you will otherwise have reasons to regret your obstinacy."
"Rolf wills what he wills!" answered the pirate haughtily.
"From this day," replied Gaëlo resolutely, "you must no longer count me
among your men--"
The Northman chief was on the point of inquiring from the young warrior
the reason for his sudden resolution when the Archbishop of Rouen
addressed the pirate:
"Rolf, Charles has invested you with the sovereignty of the Duchies of
Northmandy and Brittany. You must now take the pledge of fealty and
homage to Charles, King of the Franks, as your suzerain seigneur. It is
the custom. Your investiture will not be complete until after this
formality."
"Very well; only waste no time about it. I am hungry, and I am anxious
to join my wife--the royal little girl must be waiting for me."
"Rolf, repeat after me the consecrated formula," said the Archbishop of
Rouen, and he pronounced deliberately and slowly the following words
which the Northman chief repeated in the measure that they fell from the
prelate's lips:
"In the name of the Father, the Son and the Holy Ghost, indivisible
Trinity, I, Rolf, Duke of Northmandy and of Brittany, swear fealty and
homage to Charles, King of the Franks. I swear absolute fealty to him,
to render him assistance in all things, and never to give, to his
prejudice, assistance to his enemies with my arms. I swear it in the
presence of the Divine Majesty and of the souls of the blissful, hoping
for eternal blessing as the reward for my fidelity. Amen!"
Charles the Simple listened to the oath of fealty and homage with gloomy
bitterness. He knew from experience the hollowness of the formula which
had been invented by the priests.
"Is it done, now?" asked the pirate of the archbishop. "This mummery
tires me."
"There is one more formality to be filled," answered the archbishop. "In
token of respect you must kiss the King's foot."
At these words, spoken loud enough by the Archbishop of Rouen to be
heard all over the spacious hall, there followed an explosion of hisses,
imprecations and threats from the assembled Northman warriors. They
revolted at the mere thought of the humiliating act that the archbishop
dared to exact from their chieftain. Rolf himself, whose face grew
purple with indignation, answered Francon's proposition with so
threatening a gesture that the archbishop took fright and retreated
precipitately from the immediate neighborhood of the Northman. However,
after a second's reflection, the pirate chieftain calmed with a sign the
tumultuous manifestations of his men, approached the archbishop, and
said in a savage tone, that but ill concealed the slyness that struggled
to the surface:
"Accordingly--I must kiss the feet of Charles?"
"Usage demands that you give to the King this mark of respect and
humility."
"My champions!" cried the Northman chieftain to his pirates, making them
a sign of intelligence, "Rolf will, agreeable to usage, prove the
magnitude of his respect for the Frankish Kings." Saying this, Rolf
stepped gravely towards the dais on which Charles stood and said to him:
"Let me have your foot!"
The poor simpleton reached his right foot to Rolf, but the old bandit,
instead of bending to bestow the kiss of humility upon his suzerain,
quickly seized the proffered limb by the ankle, and gave it so violent a
pull that Charles the Simple lost his balance and fell backwards,
measuring his full length on the floor of the dais. As the King rolled
over, Rolf broke out in his wonted guffaw and cried:
"This is the way that the Duke of Northmandy and Brittany shows his
respect for the King of the Franks."
The pirate's brutal horse-play was received with a loud outburst of joy
by his Northmans, while the Frankish seigneurs and prelates, so far from
thinking of avenging the outrage done to their King, remained silent and
motionless. The descendant of Charles, the great emperor, rose unaided,
weeping with humiliation and physical pain. He had hurt his head with
the fall. The blood flowed.
CHAPTER XIV.
ON THE SWAN'S ROUTE.
Eidiol, his son, his daughter, and Rustic the Gay, back from Rouen two
days past, were congregated in the evening at their humble home in
Paris. More than ever did they now realize the void made at their hearth
by the death of Martha, good housekeeper that she was. The street was
silent; the night dark. A rap was heard at the door. Rustic opened it
and Gaëlo, accompanied by Shigne, now his wife, stepped in, with their
cloaks closely wrapped over their armor. The old skipper had not met the
young couple since the night when they returned to Eidiol's house, in
order there to await the return of Count Rothbert, who departed in hot
haste to Compiegne in order to inform Charles the Simple of the pirate's
will.
"Good father," said Gaëlo to Eidiol, "my wife and I have come to bid you
good-bye and to bring you tidings that will no doubt cheer your heart. I
heard you deplore the sudden disappearance of a daughter, the first born
of all your children. She is not dead. I have seen her--"
"My daughter!" cried the old skipper in wonderment and clasping his
hands. "What! Jeanike is alive! You have seen her?"
"Where is our sister?" cried Anne and Guyrion at once. "Where can we see
her?"
"She is near Ghisèle, the wife of Rolf, Duke of Northmandy."
"Can it be possible!" again exclaimed Eidiol with increasing
astonishment. "And how does she come to be near Ghisèle?"
"According to her vague recollections, your daughter was carried off by
some of those mendicants who kidnap children in order to sell them. She
was disposed of to the intendant of the royal domain. It therefore
happened that she lived and grew up in Kersey-on-the-Oise. Later she was
married to a serf of the place. Jeanike was soon afterwards attached to
the palace among the domestics. There she gave birth to two children, a
boy, who now is a forester serf of the forest of Compiegne, and a girl
whom she had at her breast at the same time that the Queen-mother nursed
Ghisèle. The Queen having died of fright on the occasion of one of the
Northman descents upon Kersey, the baby was placed in charge of Jeanike,
whose own baby thus shared its nourishment with the princess. Jeanike,
as the princess' foster-mother, was afterwards manumitted; but she never
left the side of the poor creature, who to-day is the wife of Rolf."
"What a strange accident!" said Eidiol deeply moved. "But why did not
Jeanike accompany you hither? Did you not inform her that we were
relatives and that I lived in Paris?"
"Ghisèle is on her deathbed. The horror that Rolf inspires in her is
carrying her to the grave. She has requested your daughter not to leave
her. Jeanike could not refuse."
"Oh, brother!" said Anne the Sweet weeping with joy and sorrow, "the
sister whom we find again is also full of compassion for that unhappy
King's daughter."
"The woman who is cowardly enough to share the bed of a man whom she
hates deserves Ghisèle's fate," put in the Beautiful Shigne with savage
pride. "There must be no pity for despicable hearts!"
"Alas!" exclaimed Anne the Sweet timidly without venturing to raise her
eyes to the female warrior, "what could the unfortunate Ghisèle do?"
"Kill Rolf!" promptly answered the heroine. "And if she did not deem her
hand firm enough to strike the blow, she should have killed herself--"
"Gaëlo!" interrupted the old skipper, "your wife speaks like our mothers
of old, who preferred death to the shame of slavery. But how did you
happen to recognize my daughter?"
"After the ceremony of the marriage and of the investiture of the
Duchies of Northmandy and Brittany Rolf went to supper. He drank to the
point of intoxication and started for his wife's chamber. However little
I commiserate the royal races, the fate of Ghisèle touched me. I made
Rolf understand that his wife should be notified of his visit, and
taking the mission upon myself, I ordered a servant to conduct me to
Ghisèle's apartment. Her nurse received me. We were considering how, at
least for this first night, she might conceal the young bride, so as to
save her from the maudlin brutalities of Rolf. While speaking with
Jeanike, my eyes accidentally fell upon the words '_Brenn_--_Karnak_'
burnt into her arm which, as is the custom with the domestics, was half
bare--"
"I understand the rest!" broke in Eidiol. "Recognizing--"
"Yes; I soon was convinced that Jeanike was your daughter. I told her
so! Imagine her joy at the revelation! Unfortunately kept near the
bedside of the dying Ghisèle, Jeanike could not fly to you, as she
wanted. But you will soon see her, together with her daughter Yvonne and
her son Germain, the forester serf, provided he can obtain leave for a
day. And now, adieu. I depart happy at the thought that I leave in your
heart a good souvenir of myself, seeing that I have returned your
daughter to you. That souvenir will remain in your midst."
"Where are you going, Gaëlo?"
"I return to the land of the North with my beloved Shigne."
"And what do you purpose to do in that distant region?"
"War!" boldly answered the heroine wife. "Gaëlo and I are not of the
number of the cowards, who, forgetful of their vow never to sleep under
a roof, desert the combat of the ocean to live on land, as Rolf and his
companions are doing."
"Charles the Simple bestowed also the Duchy of Brittany upon Rolf.
Vainly did I predict to him that that region will be the grave of his
best followers, if they ever try to invade it. He has persisted in his
plans of conquest, and wished to give me the command of the fleet which
he intends sending to the coast of Armorica in order to take possession.
I could not dissuade him."
"And you refused to take charge of such a mission, my worthy Gaëlo?"
"Yes. But how singular are the events that accompany the Frankish
conquest of Gaul! One of our ancestors, Amael, the favorite of Charles
Martel, served the Franks. He knew how to atone for his error when
Charles proposed to him to invade Brittany, the sacred cradle of our
family. A century later, my grandfather, my own father and now myself
have, out of hatred for the Franks, fought against them, and now Rolf
proposes to me to be the leader in his war against Armorica. Oh!
Although ridden by the priests and oppressed by seigneurs of the Breton
race, Armorica still is free when compared with the other provinces of
Gaul. Sooner than seek to invade Brittany I would defend its existing
vestiges of freedom against the Northmans themselves."
"And what prevents you from obeying that generous prompting and going to
Brittany?"
"Old man!" put in the Beautiful Shigne. "Rolf's men are of my race.
Would you, for instance, fight the men of Brittany?"
"I can not but approve of your resolution," answered Eidiol upon a
moment's reflection.
"And now, before a last adieu," said Gaëlo placing a sealed roll in the
old skipper's hands, "keep these parchments. You will there find the
narrative of the adventures that have led to my wedding Shigne. You will
also find there some details on the customs of the Northman pirates, and
of the stratagem by the aid of which my companion and myself seized the
abbey of St. Denis. If, obedient to the behest of our ancestor Joel, you
or your son should some day write a chronicle intended to continue the
history of our family, you may narrate my life and join to the narrative
the iron arrowhead that you extracted from my wound. Our names will thus
be handed down to our descendants."
"Gaëlo, your wishes shall be fulfilled," answered the old skipper,
deeply moved. "However obscure my life has until now been, I always had
it in mind to narrate the events that have happened since the Northman
pirates made their first appearance under the walls of Paris. I shall
now do so, bringing the narrative down to the marriage of Rolf with the
daughter of Charles the Simple, and I shall supplement the story with
the notes that you have furnished me."
After a last and tender embrace, Gaëlo and the Beautiful Shigne left the
house of Eidiol. Their two _holkers_--one manned by the champions of
Gaëlo, the other by the Buckler Maidens--awaited the couple at the port
of St. Landry. With sails spread and swollen to the wind, the two light
craft speedily descended the Seine and took the azure route of the swans
across the billows of the northern sea.
EPILOGUE
I, Eidiol, wrote the preceding chronicle shortly after the departure of
Gaëlo. I used the notes he left me in the matters that relate to his
previous adventures, to the life of the Northman pirates and to the
Buckler Maidens.
The day after Gaëlo's departure I sailed to Rouen to meet my beloved
Jeanike. With joy I embraced her two children, Yvonne and Germain the
forester. After the tender pleasures of our first meeting Jeanike
narrated to me her conversation with Ghisèle, the conversation of the
latter with her father, and lastly the conversation of both with the
Archbishop of Rouen at the castle of Compiegne. My daughter had
overheard every word, and I have thus been enabled to reproduce with
accuracy all the facts connected with the marriage of the pirate Rolf
and Ghisèle, the ill-starred and now expiring daughter of King Charles.
I finished this narrative to-day, the eleventh day of August, in the
year 912, a happy day, because this morning I entrusted the fate of Anne
the Sweet to Rustic the Gay.
Alas, only my poor wife Martha was wanting to complete the joy at our
hearth.
THE END.
FOOTNOTES:
[1] "Often the fury of the Northmans was inspired less by their Odinic
fanaticism than by the vengeance of the revolted slave and by the rage
of the turn-coat"--Michelet, _History of France_, Vol. I, p. 395.
[2] "During these disastrous times [the Northman wars] the serf became
free, the free man became reduced to the estate of serf; they made a
valet of the lord, and a lord of the valet."--Abbon, _Siege of Paris by
the Northmans_, Vol. I, p. 5. Collected History of France.
[3] See "The Branding Needle" and "The Abbatial Crosier," of this
series.
[4] For the career of the notorious Fredegonde, see "The Branding
Needle," the seventh of this series.
[5] Vortigern appears as one of the leading characters in "The
Carlovingian Coins, or, The Daughters of Charlemagne," which immediately
precedes the present work.
[6] See the opening volume of this series, "The Gold Sickle."
[7] See "The Poniard's Hilt," number six of the series.
[8] Albinik, one of the sons of Joel, figures in the second volume of
this series, "The Brass Bell."
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