Heroines of the Crusades
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“Struggling with weakness and pain, thy dying Elin pens this last earnest prayer. Let the damsel abide with thee. Let her be nurtured in the practice of those gentle virtues which her obdurate race have abjured.
“Commend me to Edward, our sovereign, and those fair daughters that cluster round thy board and gladden thy life with their smiles. Again let me beg a place in thy heart for my orphan child, and oh! remember in thy prayer the soul of the exile, who from thy lips first learned to hope in the mercy of Heaven.”
The letter bore the date of March, and it was now early June, and to Eleanora’s anxious inquiries for further tidings concerning the lady Elin and her child no answer could be given. The king however had better sources of information. Scarcely was he recovered from the fatigue of travel when the lords were summoned in council to deliberate upon the petition of David and Rodric, brothers of Llewellyn, who had applied to the English court for assistance.
From these barons Edward learned that the Welsh prince had violated the promise made to his princess on her death-bed, of conveying their daughter to the care of Eleanora, and that stimulated by the songs of the bards and the long-smothered anger of the malcontent barons, he had resolved to break his oath of allegiance to the King of England, and had dispossessed his brothers of their inheritance as a punishment for their loyalty.
The council decided to assist David and Rodric in the recovery of their possessions, and Edward not displeased with the occasion of making an absolute conquest of the country, advanced with his army into Wales.
The English at first suffered some reverses, but in the great battle of Builth, Llewellyn was slain, his forces put to flight, and the gold coronet taken from his head was offered by Prince Alphonso at the shrine of Edward the Confessor. But the war was not yet ended. Prince David now claiming the title of king, as the heir of his brother, assumed the command of the Welsh, and it needed the constant presence of Edward to keep down the rebellious spirit of the people. The same steadfast affection which had supported Eleanora during the tedious hours of her anxious sojourn in the wilds of Devon, and that had prompted her to brave the varied dangers of the Syrian campaign, led her now to follow her lord’s fortunes through the rugged defiles and rocky fastnesses of the Welsh mountains.
For her security, Edward built and fortified the strong castle of Caernarvon, which now, after the lapse of nearly six centuries, presents the same external appearance as on the day when Queen Eleanora first entered its stupendous gateway in company with her royal lord.
The battlements with which the walls were defended, stand unchanged in their hoary strength and grandeur, and the statue of Edward I., carved to the life, still protects the entrance of the castle, and with its drawn dagger, menaces the intruder who would venture within its guarded precincts. The eagle tower yet nestles in the defences of the rocks, though the royal fledglings have deserted the comfortless eyrie of Snowdon for the softer luxuries of Windsor Castle and Hampton Court, and the oaken cradle of the second Edward, suspended by ring and staples from carved supporters, yet occupies its little nook in the secluded chamber where his infant eyes first opened on the light. Eleanora’s experience of the conquering power of love, made her solicitous to employ a Welsh attendant for her son, but such was the fear which her husband’s name had inspired among the families of the fierce mountaineers that she was forced to abandon the project till accident procured for the amiable queen the domestic she needed not only, but threw into her hands the fate of Wales.
From the irregular surface of their territory the Welsh were necessarily a pastoral people, and their simple manner of life exposed them to certain defeat when the conquest of their country was steadily and prudently pursued by the well-trained warriors of England. But like the hardy sons of all mountainous districts, the Welsh seemed to inhale the spirit of liberty from the free breath of their native hills, and hunted as they were from one retreat to another, they still rallied around their ancient standard, and listened with rapture to predictions of their future greatness. Edward followed them with untiring patience through rugged defiles and rocky fastnesses till his heavy armed troops were ready to sink with fatigue.
Everywhere they found evidences of the straits to which the miserable inhabitants were reduced. Deserted hamlets, abandoned fields, and famishing animals, betokened the last extremity of suffering. It was just at night-fall when they came suddenly upon a strong body posted within the narrow precincts of a valley.
The lowing of the herds that began to suffer from the want of forage, was the first sound that attracted the attention of the English scouts, and by a circuitous path the whole detachment were conducted to a position commanding a full view of the enemy. The bivouac consisted of rude huts or booths, constructed for shelter rather than defence, in and around which sat barbarians in various attitudes of attention or repose.
The watch-fires gleamed luridly upon the wild figures that circled around them, with dark and frowning brows, while from the centre of the encampment echoed the sounds of hoarse voices, accompanied by the martial strains of music. The barbarous language made the song of the bards incomprehensible to the English, but they divined its spirit from the effect upon the rude auditors, who, at every pause in the agitating refrain, sprang to their feet, struck their spears upon their shields, and mingled their shrill voices in a responsive chorus of muttered vengeance.
In the enthusiasm which the patriotic songs awakened, Edward read the secret of the protracted resistance, and saw that the destruction of these bards would insure his conquest. The trumpets were immediately ordered to sound, and his army, wearied as they were, summoned their fainting energies and rushed to the conflict.
The Welsh, surprised in the midst of their fancied security, stood to their arms, and fought with the courage of desperation, the exhilarating strains of the bards rose to a shrill wail of agony, then sank in the voiceless silence of death.
This final strain of the national poetry, was the requiem of Welsh liberty. King David made his escape through the defile of a mountain followed by a few of his nobles, and the Earl of Devon, in attempting to cut off his retreat, surprised and captured a company of frightened females who had been lodged in the rocky fastness for greater security. With knightly courtesy he extended to his helpless captives every delicate attention that would soften the rigor of their fate.
His sympathies were especially excited by the distress of a woman of an appearance somewhat superior to her companions, who exhibited the greatest solicitude for the safety of a child that, all unconscious of the tumult, lay quietly sleeping in its cradle of twisted reeds.
De Courtenay approached, anxious to relieve her fears, when the nurse, expecting to be torn from her tender charge, exclaimed, in barbarous English, “Take not the princess from me! I promised the Lady Elin never to resign her save to the hands of the good Queen of England.”
“Comfort thee, good woman,” said the earl, kindly. “I will myself convey thee, with the babe, to Caernarvon, where thou mayest discharge thy trust by bestowing the little orphan with the royal friend of her mother.” Consigning the other captives to the care of his knights, he gave the nurse in charge to his groom, and himself carefully lifting the wicker cradle with its lovely occupant to the horse before him, led the way towards the castle.
Eleanora received the daughter of Elin de Montfort with tears of tender welcome, and lavished upon the child the same affection that she bestowed upon her own infant Edward. The little cousins were nurtured together, and the nurse soon became tenderly attached to both children, and conceived an almost reverential devotion to the pious queen; and as Eleanora gave her frequent opportunities for communion with the natives of the vicinity, she lost no occasion of publishing the virtues of her mistress.
She represented that Eleanora and little Edward were scarce inferior in beauty to the Madonna and child, and that they were as good as they were beautiful; and, she added, on her own responsibility, that since the queen treated Guendoline with as much affection as though she were her own daughter, there could be no doubt that she looked upon her as the future bride of the young prince.
Meantime, Edward had prospered in his military plans. David could never collect an army sufficient to face the English in the field, being chased from hill to hill, and hunted from one retreat to another, and was finally betrayed to his enemy and sent to England.
The Snowdon barons, deprived of their leader, and aware that their princess Guendoline was in possession of the English king, and somewhat mollified by the prognostication of her future greatness, at length obeyed the summons of Edward to a conference at Caernarvon. The hardy mountaineers agreed to tender their final submission to him as lord paramount, if he would appoint them a native Welshman for their prince, who could speak neither Saxon nor French, for those barbarous languages they declared they could never understand.
Edward graciously acceded to the request, and the preliminaries being arranged he brought from the eagle tower the little Edward, assuring them that he was a native of Wales, could speak neither of the reprobated tongues, and, under the tutelage of his lovely instructress Guendoline, would doubtless soon become a proficient in Welsh. “The fierce mountaineers little expected such a ruler. They had, however, no alternative but submission, and with as good grace as they might, kissed the tiny hand which was to sway their sceptre, and vowed fealty to the babe of the faithful Eleanora.”
CHAPTER X.
THE ASTRONOMER AND THE JEW
Peace being thus happily established, King Edward transferred the residence of his queen from the rugged strength of Caernarvon to the magnificent refinements of Conway castle; where, surrounded by her ladies and children, she enjoyed, for a brief period, a repose from anxiety and care.
Here seated in a chamber of state, whose windows of stained glass opened upon a terrace, commanding a beautiful view of the varied landscape, Eleanora passed her mornings, receiving those who were honored by being present at her levée, while her tire-women combed and braided the long silken tresses which shaded and adorned her serene and lovely features.
This condescension of the queen, had a most gracious and softening effect upon the rude customs of the Welsh, and the first aspirations of this semi-barbarous nation for christian refinement, date from the period in which they felt the winning influence of her gentle manners.
But though Eleanora was thus happy in her domestic relations, blessed in the love of her subjects, and thrice blessed in the consciousness of exercising her power for the happiness of others, she did not forget the kindred ties that bound her to her native Spain.
Indeed there seems to be this peculiarity, observable in the influence of the gospel on the character, a paradox in philosophy, but a fact in christian experience, that while it increases the intensity of the social affections, it expands the heart to the remoter relations of life, awakening a cordial response to the command, “Thou shalt love thy neighbor as thyself.”
For Eleanora to know that she could render assistance to another, was sufficient motive to arouse her activity; and constant habit made that an inspiring impulse, which had commenced in a rigid adherence to the requisitions of duty. When she learned, therefore, that her beloved brother Alphonso X. had been deposed by his undutiful son, Sancho, she besought her heroic husband to undertake the difficult task of his restoration.
Edward, whose principles of government were of a very different character from those of the royal philosopher, listened somewhat reluctantly to her anxious pleadings, but at last consented to accompany her into Castile.
The royal progress was one of the utmost pomp and splendor. Their cousin Philip received them in Paris with the greatest distinction. They reposed some months among the elegancies of Bordeaux, and thence journeyed across the Pyrenees to Burgos.
The brave Sancho welcomed them to his palace with unaffected pleasure, and listened with easy good-humor to the questions and remonstrances of the queen.
“My father,” said he, “is happier in the retirement of his prison, than he was ever in the administration of public affairs. In truth, he has for these last years been so occupied with the motions of Mars and Jupiter, that he has had little leisure to attend to the movements of his subjects, and, but for what seemeth my undutiful interposition, our fair Castile would have been one scene of anarchy and confusion.”
“But if my brother desired the repose of private life, he had surely the right to appoint his successor,” suggested Eleanora.
“Nay, concerning that, men differ in opinion,” replied Sancho. “Our ancestors, the Goths, confer the crown upon the second son, in preference to the heirs of the elder brother, and by this right I reign.”
“But by this right, thou takest from the prince all power,” returned the queen.
“And wherefore,” said Sancho, “should the word of a prince prevail against the will of the people, whose interest no king has a right to sacrifice to his ambition?”
“Certes, there is great semblance of truth in what thou sayest,” added Eleanora, thoughtfully; “and much I wonder me that, while some are born to such high estate, others in heart possessed of noble feelings are doomed to perpetual servitude. My poor brain has been ofttimes sadly puzzled in this matter; but when I bethink me of the miseries fair England suffered during the rebellion of Leicester, I content myself to believe the holy writ, ‘The powers that be, are ordained of God.’”
“Thy scripture well establishes my claim,” cried Sancho, laughing heartily.
Eleanora sighed. “Forgettest thou, brave Sancho,” said she, “that the God who gave to thee the estate and rule of king, (since thou dost so wrest my words to prove thy usurpation,) forgettest thou that He hath also ordained, ‘Thou shalt honor thy father?’”
“Nay, nay, my most gracious aunt, now thou accusest me beyond my desert. The wise Alphonso is not restrained from his clerkly studies, but – ”
“He is in prison,” interrupted Eleanora.
“It is my care,” continued Sancho, “to grant him everything, but freedom to disturb my kingdom. Jews and Arabs, his chosen friends, doctors of Salerno and Salamanca, friars and priests, (though, sooth to say for them, he careth little save as they bring him mouldy manuscripts from the monasteries,) jugglers and mummers, a worthy retinue, have free access to his presence. To-morrow thou mayest see the philosopher, surrounded by his motley courtiers, and methinks thou wilt then pronounce him as do others, either fool or madman.”
King Edward, who from conversation with the nobles of Castile, no less than with Sancho, had arrived at the same conclusion with his royal nephew, made no efforts to release Alphonso from his confinement, but gladly accepted an invitation to accompany the King of Castile on an expedition against the Moors in southern Spain.
During their absence Eleanora remained in Burgos, and devoted herself to the care of her brother, for whose sanity she began to entertain serious fears. Alphonso’s affection for his lovely sister so far prevailed over his excitable temperament, that he permitted her to enter his apartments at all hours without exhibiting any annoyance, and often turned aside from his abstruse studies to indulge in reminiscences of their youthful sports, and to satisfy her inquiries concerning his present pursuits.
Eleanora possessed that genial spirit which discovers something of interest in every occupation, and that exquisite tact which enabled her to insinuate a truth, even while seeming not to contradict an error; and it was soon apparent that, though the philosopher still uttered his absurdities with great complacency, – his temper became more tranquil, and his manners far more affable to all who approached him. The queen listened patiently to his tedious explanations of the motions of the planets, and exerted her utmost powers of perception to comprehend the diagrams which he contended were illustrative of the whole theory of Nature, and the great end and purpose of her solemn mysteries inscribed on the scroll of the heavens, forming an elder Scripture more authoritative than the divine oracles themselves.
“Thou seest, my sister,” said the enthusiast, “that our maturity like our childhood is amused by fables: hence do the ignorant believe that this great array of worlds was formed for the contemptible purpose of revolving around our insignificant planet, and all the glittering circle of the stars made to serve no better end than to enliven a winter night.”
“In truth the doctrine savors much of the arrogance of man,” gently returned the queen, “and reminds one of the false systems of a monarch who considers his subjects but tributaries to his pleasure.”
“False systems,” returned the astronomer, apparently unheeding the point of her remark, “have disgraced the world in every age. Pythagoras approached nearest the true idea, and yet was lost in the wilderness of error.”
“Heaven save us from a fate so evil,” solemnly ejaculated the queen.
“The philosopher, who rejecting the dogmas of the church, listens to the voice of Nature speaking to the ear of reason, is in no danger of error,” said Alphonso pompously. “Thy Mosaic Testament asserts that God created the heavens and the earth in six days; but they bear no marks of such creation. Their course is eternal. And as for appointing the glorious sun with no higher mission than to enlighten the earth, had the Almighty called me to his counsel, I would have taught Him a wiser plan of compassing day and night.”
Shocked at his impiety, Eleanora calmly replied, “The Holy Word which thou despisest, directs us to ‘prove all things.’ How canst thou sustain such assertions?”
Alphonso, pleased with what he considered her docility, lifted a small globe, and placing it at a convenient distance from the lamp, caused it to revolve upon its axis, making her observe that the regular vicissitudes of light and darkness were produced without any change in the position of the luminary.
“At what infinite expense,” said he, “would the lamp revolve around the globe to produce only the same effect, and to furnish only one world with light; while any number of globes might gyrate about the lamp without loss, save an occasional eclipse.”
Struck with the simplicity and evident truth of the illustration, Eleanora gazed admiringly upon her brother, but scarcely had she essayed to frame an answer, when the conversation was interrupted by the entrance of an individual – the expression of whose countenance awoke a painful association in her mind, although in vain she tasked her memory to decide where or when she had before beheld him. His figure, though concealed by a Spanish doublet, and slightly bent with age, had evidently been once tall and commanding, and his swarthy countenance was illuminated by keen black eyes, whose quick penetrating glance, seemed at once to fathom the purposes, and divine the thoughts of those about him; and a long flowing beard, somewhat inclining to gray, imparted an air of dignity to his whole appearance. With a profound, though silent salutation to the royal pair, he crossed the apartment, and carefully laying aside his cloak, quietly seated himself at a side table covered with manuscripts, and commenced his labors; while Alphonso answered the inquiring gaze of Eleanora, by remarking, “’Tis our excellent Procida, my trusty Hebrew scribe.”
“Hebrew or Arab,” said Eleanora, in a low tone, “I have seen that face before.”
At the sound of her voice the stranger looked up, while Eleanora placed her hands before her eyes, as if to shut out some dreadful vision.
“It cannot, cannot be,” she exclaimed, “but so looked the Jew, slain at my feet on that dreadful day when I first entered London.”
“My good Procida,” said Alphonso, misinterpreting her emotion, “I fear me we must dispense with thy presence, since my sister is too good a Christian to look upon a Jew, save with feelings of abhorrence.”
The Jew arose. “Nay, my good brother,” said the queen, “forgive this weakness. I would fain speak with thy friend.”
Procida came forward and stood in respectful silence waiting her commands.
“Hast ever been in London?” inquired she, earnestly regarding him.
“My noble queen recalls not then the face of Raymond Lullius, who coined rose nobles for her royal lord. She may, perhaps, remember the curiosity of the young Prince Alphonso, whose little hand no doubt still bears the scar of the melted metal he snatched from the crucible.”
At the mention of her son, the mother’s tears began to flow. “My sweet Alphonso sleeps in the tomb of his ancestors,” replied she, when she had somewhat recovered her composure; “but I mind me of the accident, though surely ’tis another scene that hath impressed thy features on my memory.”
“Your majesty refers to the slaughter of the Jews,” returned Procida, in a sorrowful tone, “and the victim slain at your feet was my aged father Ben-Abraham. Of all my family I alone escaped, through the timely interposition of the gallant Prince Edward.”
“Ah! now I comprehend thy haste to serve my brother,” interrupted Alphonso. “Thou must know, sweet sister mine,” said he, turning to the queen, “that the secrets of our art are for the learned alone, but king as I am, I found it impossible to prevent my worthy Procida from leaving my court to aid the English sovereign in increasing his revenue by transmuting mercury into gold.”
“It is then true that metals can be thus transmuted,” said Eleanora, with an incredulous smile.
The alchemists exchanged glances of intelligence, but Alphonso, remembering her ready appreciation of his astronomical theory, answered Procida’s hesitating look, with “Nay, ’tis but for once – our sister is an earnest seeker of truth, and if she comprehend will not betray our secret.” Thus saying, Alphonso threw open a door and conducted the queen, followed by Procida, into a small laboratory filled with all the mysterious appurtenances of his art. The learned doctor busied himself in clearing a space in the centre of the apartment and arranging in a circle sundry jars and a brazier, while the philosopher king, opening a cabinet, took thence some dried and withered sea-weed, which he threw into the brazier and kindled into a flame. The blazing kelp was soon reduced to ashes, which Procida carefully gathered into an old empty crucible, and set before the queen. Alphonso advancing took up the crucible, saying, “What seest thou, my sister?”
“A dull, gray powder,” she replied.
He then placed a tube from one of the jars within the crucible, and bidding her regard it attentively, submitted it to a chemical process which she did not understand, repeating his question.
“I now see,” replied Eleanora, with astonishment, “the dull powder transformed into little shining globules like silver.”
“Thou mayst take them in thine hand,” said the philosopher, after a pause; “they will not harm thee.”
With some timidity the wondering queen received the metallic drops, almost fearing that her brother was a necromancer as the priests affirmed.
“Canst judge if it be a metal?” said Alphonso, enjoying her confusion.
“My sight and touch assure me of the fact. Yet whence – ”
“Is it not a miracle,” interrupted the philosopher, laughing, “more real than thy fancied transubstantiation?”
A frown gathered on the serene brow of the lovely queen – but commiserating his impiety as sincerely as he pitied her ignorance, with forced gayety she replied, “Nay, heaven works not miracles by the hands of such unbelievers as thou. I fear me lest evil spirits have aided thee, as they did the Egyptians with their enchantments;” and she handed the globules to the philosopher.
“Keep them safely until the morrow,” said he, “they may form the basis of another experiment.”