第85章
"Holy Buffo! a brave stroke!" said the old hermit. "Marry, but a splinter wellnigh took off my nose!" The honest hermit waved his pipe in delight, not perceiving that one of the splinters had carried off the head of it, and rendered his favorite amusement impossible. "Ha! they are to it again! O my! how they go to with their great swords! Well stricken, gray! Well parried, piebald!
Ha, that was a slicer! Go it, piebald! go it, gray!--go it, gray!
go it, pie-- Peccavi! peccavi!" said the old man, here suddenly closing his eyes, and falling down on his knees. "I forgot I was a man of peace." And the next moment, muttering a hasty matin, he sprung down the ledge of rock, and was by the side of the combatants.
The battle was over. Good knight as Sir Gottfried was, his strength and skill had not been able to overcome Sir Ludwig the Hombourger, with RIGHT on his side. He was bleeding at every point of his armor: he had been run through the body several times, and a cut in tierce, delivered with tremendous dexterity, had cloven the crown of his helmet of Damascus steel, and passing through the cerebellum and sensorium, had split his nose almost in twain.
His mouth foaming--his face almost green--his eyes full of blood--his brains spattered over his forehead, and several of his teeth knocked out,--the discomfited warrior presented a ghastly spectacle, as, reeling under the effects of the last tremendous blow which the Knight of Hombourg dealt, Sir Gottfried fell heavily from the saddle of his piebald charger; the frightened animal whisked his tail wildly with a shriek and a snort, plunged out his hind legs, trampling for one moment upon the feet of the prostrate Gottfried, thereby causing him to shriek with agony, and then galloped away riderless.
Away! ay, away!--away amid the green vineyards and golden cornfields; away up the steep mountains, where he frightened the eagles in their eyries; away down the clattering ravines, where the flashing cataracts tumble; away through the dark pine-forests, where the hungry wolves are howling away over the dreary wolds, where the wild wind walks alone; away through the plashing quagmires, where the will-o'-the-wisp slunk frightened among the reeds; away through light and darkness, storm and sunshine; away by tower and town, high-road and hamlet. Once a turnpike-man would have detained him; but, ha! ha! he charged the pike, and cleared it at a bound. Once the Cologne Diligence stopped the way: he charged the Diligence, he knocked off the cap of the conductor on the roof, and yet galloped wildly, madly, furiously, irresistibly on! Brave horse! gallant steed! snorting child of Araby! On went the horse, over mountains, rivers, turnpikes, apple-women; and never stopped until he reached a livery-stable in Cologne where his master was accustomed to put him up.
CHAPTER VI.
THE CONFESSION.
But we have forgotten, meanwhile, that prostrate individual.
Having examined the wounds in his side, legs, head, and throat, the old hermit (a skilful leech) knelt down by the side of the vanquished one and said, "Sir Knight, it is my painful duty to state to you that you are in an exceedingly dangerous condition, and will not probably survive.""Say you so, Sir Priest? then 'tis time I make my confession.
Hearken you, Priest, and you, Sir Knight, whoever you be."Sir Ludwig (who, much affected by the scene, had been tying his horse up to a tree), lifted his visor and said, "Gottfried of Godesberg! I am the friend of thy kinsman, Margrave Karl, whose happiness thou hast ruined; I am the friend of his chaste and virtuous lady, whose fair fame thou hast belied; I am the godfather of young Count Otto, whose heritage thou wouldst have appropriated.
Therefore I met thee in deadly fight, and overcame thee, and have wellnigh finished thee. Speak on.""I have done all this," said the dying man, "and here, in my last hour, repent me. The Lady Theodora is a spotless lady; the youthful Otto the true son of his father--Sir Hildebrandt is not his father, but his UNCLE.""Gracious Buffo!" "Celestial Bugo!" here said the hermit and the Knight of Hombourg simultaneously, clasping their hands.
"Yes, his uncle; but with the BAR-SINISTER in his scutcheon. Hence he could never be acknowledged by the family; hence, too, the Lady Theodora's spotless purity (though the young people had been brought up together) could never be brought to own the relationship.""May I repeat your confession?" asked the hermit.
"With the greatest pleasure in life: carry my confession to the Margrave, and pray him give me pardon. Were there--a notary-public present," slowly gasped the knight, the film of dissolution glazing over his eyes, "I would ask--you--two--gentlemen to witness it. Iwould gladly--sign the deposition--that is, if I could wr-wr-wr-wr-ite!" A faint shuddering smile--a quiver, a gasp, a gurgle--the blood gushed from his mouth in black volumes . . . .
"He will never sin more," said the hermit, solemnly.
"May heaven assoilzie him!" said Sir Ludwig. "Hermit, he was a gallant knight. He died with harness on his back and with truth on his lips: Ludwig of Hombourg would ask no other death. . . . ."An hour afterwards the principal servants at the Castle of Godesberg were rather surprised to see the noble Lord Louis trot into the court-yard of the castle, with a companion on the crupper of his saddle. 'Twas the venerable hermit of Rolandseck, who, for the sake of greater celerity, had adopted this undignified conveyance, and whose appearance and little dumpy legs might well create hilarity among the "pampered menials" who are always found lounging about the houses of the great. He skipped off the saddle with considerable lightness however; and Sir Ludwig, taking the reverend man by the arm and frowning the jeering servitors into awe, bade one of them lead him to the presence of his Highness the Margrave.