Chivalry: Dizain des Reines

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SSAULTS, IS IN A LONG DUEL, WHEREIN TIME AND COMMON-SENSE ARE FLOUTED,

y of the

mptuously furnished and manned by many persons of dignity and wealth, in order suitably to escort the Princess Jehane into Brittany, where she was to marry

"King's daughter!" he sadly greeted her. "Duchess of Brittany! Countess of

t Lover." And in the green twilight, lit as yet by one low-hanging star alone, t

d her gray eyes were more brilliant than the star yonder. The boy'

is de Montfort. I think I shall die presently. I have prayed

ace more brutal. "Mine! mine!" he s

is very old. Is it wicked to think of that

sorry sustenance. Friend! ah, fair, sweet friend! the man is human and must die, but love, we r

ou I may be denied even the one bleak night of ease which Judas knows." The girl did not weep; dry-eyed she winged a pe

inging-girl was rehearsing, yonder behind the yew-hedge,

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and presently to Saillé, where old Jehan the Brave took her to wife

wers. She had fiery-hearted jewels, and shimmering purple cloths, and much furniture adroitly carven, and many tapestries of Samarcand and Baldach upon which were embroidered, by brown fingers that time had turned long ago to Asian

e Vicomte de Montbrison-a gaunt man, with preoccupied and troubled eyes-had summoned Antoine into Lyonnois and, after appropriate salu

Hengist), I merely tell you these two dwelt together at Montbrison for a decade: and the Vicomte swore at his nephew and predicted this or that dis

. "You will be leaving me!" the Vicomte growled; "now, in my decrepitude, you will be le

nged and powdered with many golden stars, when Riczi came again to her, and the rising saps of spring were exercising their august and formidable influence. She sat alone, by prearrangement, to one end of the high-ceiled and radiant apartment; midway

him at the first. Silent he stood before her, stil

zi, in a while, "have you,

ant; and her large eyes appeared to judge an immeasurable path, beyond him. Now her lips fluttered somewhat. "I am the Duchess of Brittany," she said,

ath. "You are that Jehane, whose

gly, "I have tasted too deep of wealth and power. I am

na when first I kissed you, and about us sang many b

ve swayed kin

ht in Pampeluna when last I kissed you? The

emeralds and sapphires and with many pearls. "Friend, the chain is heavy, yet I lack the will to cast it off. I lac

ord had pierced his breast. He touched the gold hilt of it and said, 'Take back your w

amentably true that after to-night we

me, Jehane, since God abhors nothing so much as unfaith. For your own sake, Jehane,-ah, no, not for

he austere woman rose. "Messire, you swore to me, long since, eternal service. I claim my right in domnei. Yonder-gray-bearded, the man in black and silver-is the Earl of Worcester, the King of England's ambassador, in common with

annot hurt me now. Yet I, at least, keep faith, and in your face I fling fa

se me brutally, even now to drag me from this da?s-!" Instead he went away from her smi

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of Jehane, married in his own person to the bloat King Henry, the fourth of that name to reign. This king was that same squinting Harry of Derby (called also Henry of Lancaster and Bolingbro

gemont,-do take you, Sire Henry of Lancaster, King of England and in title of France, and Lord of Ireland, to be my husband; and thereto I, Antoine Riczi, in the spirit of my s

of four silk belts studded with silver and gold, and with valuable clasps, of which the owner migh

d Riczi-"to boast to you of liberal e

s a deal of other pink-and-white flesh as yet unmortgaged-Boy with my brother's eyes!" the Vicomte said, in another voice; "I

es some five days out of the seven. The verses of Riczi were in the year of grace 1410 made public, not without acclamation; and thereafter the stripling Comte de Charolais, fu

at last, "that always you use as touchstone the brave deed you did at Eltham. It is necessary for a gentleman to serve his lady according to her commandments, but you perfor

because that old incendiary, the King of Darkness, daily added fuel to a smould

t. All my chattels and my acres appear to me to be bright vapors, and the more my dominion and my power increase, the more rancorously does my heart sustain its bitterness over having been robbed of that fair merchandise which is the King

er stepson Henry, the fifth monarch of that name to reign in Britain, had invaded France to support preposterous claims which the man advanced to the crown of that latter kingdom; and as the earth is altered by the advent of

reer of events, as a straw is borne away by a torrent, when the French lords marched with their vas

as ambassador. He got in London a fruitless audience of King Henry, whose demands were such as rendered a renewal of the war inevitable; and af

ofusely lighted by the sun, and made pretence to weave a tapestry. When the page had gone she rose and cast aside

immering gold robes; but all his other faculties found her desirable: and with a contained hatred he had perceived, as

e wheeled. "Friend, I think that God Himself has deigned to avenge you. All misery my reign has been. First Hotspur, then prim Worcester harried us. Came Glyndwyr afterward to prick us with his devils' horns. Followed the dreary ye

ave earned no more, O Jehane! whose only t

st, for all his lip-courtesy. And now he lacks the money to pay his troops, and I am the wealthiest person within his realm. I am a woman and alone in a foreign land. So I must wait, and wait, and wait, Antoine, till he devi

served, "that you disliked the metal

Friend, the chain is heavy, and I lack the power to cast it off. The Navarrese we know of wore no such perilous fetters. Ah, you should have mastered me at Vannes. You could h

et them, and you saw that she was of royal blood, for now the pride of many emperors blaze

ile methods wrought privily to destroy the King, the said Dame Jehane is by the King committed (all her attendants being removed) to the custody of Sir John Pelham, who will, at the King's ple

th a knife-!" She shrugged her shoulders, and the gold about her person glittered in the sunlight

he Vicomte said; "and I cam

me in the place of barons,-young Riczi had been none the less avenged. Bah! what do these so-little persons matter? Take now your petty vengeance! drink deep of it! and know that always within my heart the Navarrese has lived to shame m

Sodom! O bitter fruit!" the Vicomte thought; "O

enry, and readily obtained it. "Unhardy is unseely," the Vicomte said at this interview's conclusion. The tale tells that the Vicomte retu

ve's dupe, so heartily, so hastily, did he design to remove the discomforts of Queen Jehane, that now

uke of Burgundy, who loved the Vicomte as he loved no other man, had shifted his coat, forsaking France. These treacheries brought down the wavering scales of warfare, suddenly, with an aweful clangor

eatured females whom Pelham had provided for the Queen's attendance might speak to her of nothing that occurred without the gates of Pevensey, and she saw no other persons save her

fell out,-one of those grim attendants brought to her the first man, save the fat confessor, whom the Queen ha

ade, and justly made, of Queen Jehane, as I perceive you mean to do." She leaned backward in the chair, very coarsely clad in brown, but knowing that her coloring was excel

. Instead, madame, I come as the emissary of King Henry, now dying at Vincennes, and with letters to the lords and bishops of his council. Dying, the

y who would presently inherit the united realms of France and England, since in the supreme hour of triumph King Henry had been stricken with a mortal sickness, and now lay dying, or p

of England, since Dame Katharine is but a child." Jehane stood motionless save for the fine hands that plucked the air. "Mistress of Eu

the Vicomte suavely said, "and the Navarrese we know

od. It needed more than any death-bed repentance to frighten him into restoring my liberty." There was a silence. "You, a Fren

erson better fitted to patch up this dishonorable business o

mirched you, somehow. At last you have done something save consider ho

zure of Jehane's enormous wealth, had exhausted every resource. "And France I mean to have," the King said. "Now the world knows you enjoy the favor of the Comt

I fought beneath his loathed banner, until at Troyes we had trapped and slain the last loyal Frenchman. And to-day in France my lands are confiscate, and there is not an honest Frenchman but spits upon my name. All in

ess service above your life, above your honor.

ion. Yet I, at least, keep faith, and in your face I fling faith like a glove-outworn, it may be, and God knows, unclean! Yet I, at least, keep faith! Lands and wealth have I given, up for you, O king's daughter, a

For this love of ours has proven a tyrannous and evil lord. I have had everything, and upon each feast of will and sense the world afforded me this love has swept down, like a harpy-was it not a harpy you called the bird in that old poem of yours?-t

s he passed supperward through the green twil

the p

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an odd breathlessness, "Friend, when King Henry dies-and even now he dies-shall I not as

son to rule over England again, and over conqu

ger in the government." She came to him with conspicuous deliberation and rested her hands upon his breast. "Frien

r. The man's arms were about her, and of the man's face I cannot tell you. "King's daughte

at power for love of you, my all-incapable and soiled Antoine, was, as I now know, the end to which the Eternal Father created me. For, look you," she pleaded, "to surrender absolute dominion over half Europe is a sacrifice. Assure

through the sunlight of the world Love leads us, and through the filth of it Love leads us, but always in the end, if we but follow without swerving, Love leads upward. Yet, O God

d in hand," she answered;

OF THE N