Part 2 (2/2)
?Meanwhile the messenger had reached Charlemagne at Cologne with the news of the renewal of the war. Whilst all his barons are summoned, the Emperor starts in haste himself for Saxony with ten thousand men.
Baldwin was seated in his tower, looking out upon a league of hostile tents, complaining to Sebile, who ?comforts him as a worthy lady,?
bidding him trust in his uncle?s succour. She is the first to descry the French host and to point it out to her husband. ?Ah, G.o.d!? said Charles?s nephew, ?fair Father Creator, yet will I avenge me of the pagan people.? He goes down from his palace, and cries to his men, ?Arm ye, knights! Charles is returned.?
?The besieged prepare at once for a sally. Sebile places the helmet on her husband?s head and kisses him, never to see him more alive.
The enemy are disarmed; three thousand of them are killed by the time Baldwin cuts his way to his uncle, to whom, as his liege lord, he makes complaint against the Saxons. The Emperor?s answer contains little but philosophic comfort: ?Fair nephew, so goes war; when your day comes, know that you will die; your father died, you will not escape. Yonder are your enemies, of whom you complain; I give you leave, go and strike them.? Uncle and nephew both perform wonders. But Berard is killed by Feramor, one of Guiteclin?s sons, and the standard which he bore disappears under him. Baldwin engages Feramor; each severely wounds the other; the fight is so well contested that Baldwin offers to divide the land with him if he will make peace. The Saxon spurns the offer, and is killed.
?But ?Baldwin is wounded in the breast grievously; from thence to the spur his body is b.l.o.o.d.y.? Saxons, Lusatians, Hungarians perceive that his blows lessen and fall slow. ?Montjoie!? he cries many a time, but the French hear him not. ?When Baldwin sees that he will have no succour, as a boar he defends himself with his sword.... Who should have seen the proud countenance of the king, how he bears and defends himself against the paynim, great pity should surely take his heart.? Struck with fifteen wounds, his horse killed under him, he offers battle on foot. They dare not approach, but they fling their swords at him, and then go and hide beneath a rock. Baldwin, feeling death approaching, ?from the fair eyes of his head begins to weep? for sorrow and rage. He now addresses an elaborate last prayer to G.o.d; but whilst he is on his knees, looking toward the East, a Saxon comes to cut off his head.
Baldwin, furious, seizes his sword, which had fallen from his hand on the green gra.s.s, and with a last blow cleaves the Saxon to the shoulders, then dies.
?The news is carried to the Emperor, who laments his ill fate. Rest he has never had; the paynim folk have killed him the flower of his friends, Roland at Roncevaux and now Baldwin. ?Ha, G.o.d! send me death, without making long delay!? He draws his sword, and is about to kill himself when Naymes of Bavaria restrains him and bids him avenge his nephew?s death. The old man, however, exposes his life with such recklessness, the struggle is so unequal, that Naymes himself has to persuade him to leave the battle and enter the city until the Herupe n.o.bles come to his aid. ?Dead is Count Roland and Count Oliver, and all the twelve peers, who used to help in daunting that pride which makes us bend so; no longer at your right hand is Baldwin the warrior; the paynim have killed him and Berard the light; G.o.d has their souls.... If you are killed ... in your death alone a hundred thousand will die.?
?They lead him away, unwilling, from the field. Baldwin?s corpse is carried by him on his s.h.i.+eld. Sebile comes to meet the Emperor and asks of her husband. Charles bids her look at him. She faints to the ground.
There is true pathos (though somewhat wire-drawn) in her lament, when she comes to herself:
??Sir King Baldwin, for G.o.d?s sake, speak! I am your love, mistake me not. If I have offended you in aught, it shall be made amends for wholly to your pleasure; but speak to me. For you was my body baptized and lifted; my heart leans on you, and all my affections, and if you fail me, it will be ill done. Too soon it seems to me, if already you repent.
Baldwin, is it a trick? Are you deceiving me? Speak to me, friend, if you can.... I see your garments dyed and b.l.o.o.d.y, but I do not believe that you are killed; there is no man so bold or so outrageous who ever could kill you; he durst not do so. But I think by such a will you wish to try me, how I should behave if you were departed. Speak to me, for G.o.d?s sake who was born of virgin, and for that lady who kept chast.i.ty, and for the holy cross whereon Jesus suffered! Try me no more, friend, it is enough; I shall die now if you tarry longer,? ?Naymes,? says the king, ?take this lady away; if I see her grief any more, I shall go mad.?
?That night he ate no bread nor drank wine, but had the city watched, and rode the rounds himself, with helmet closed, his great buckler hanging to his neck, his sword in his fist. All the night it rained and blew; the water ran through the joints of his hauberk, and wetted his ermine pelisse beneath. His beard swayed, whiter than flax, his long moustache quivered; until dawn he lamented his nephew, and the twelve peers, and all his next-of-kin who were dead. From the gate at morn a Saxon, King Dyalas, defies the old man, swearing that he will wear his crown in Paris. The Emperor has the gate opened, and sallies forth to meet him. They engage in single combat; the old Emperor kills the Saxon?s horse, disarms him, and only spares his life on condition of his embracing Christianity and yielding himself prisoner.
?The rest of the poem has comparatively little interest. Old Naymes in turn kills his man?a brother of Guiteclin?in single combat, Dyalas, the Emperor?s new va.s.sal, ?armed in French fas.h.i.+on,? performs wonders in honour of his new allegiance. Finally the Herupese come up, and of course overthrow the Saxons. An abbey is founded on the field of battle, which Sebile enters; Dyalas, baptized as ?Guiteclin the convert,?
receives charge of the kingdom, and the Emperor returns, bearing with him the bodies of Baldwin and Berard; after which ?well was France in peace many a year and many a day; the Emperor found not any who should make him wroth.??
Fastrada: a Legend of Aix-la-Chapelle
Fastrada, we are told, was the fourth wife of the Emperor Charlemagne and the best beloved. Historians have judged that the lady was by no means worthy of the extraordinary affection bestowed upon her by her husband, some maintaining that she practised the arts of sorcery, others crediting her with political intrigues, and still others roundly a.s.serting that she was not so virtuous as she should have been.
History failing to account for Charlemagne?s devotion to his fourth wife, the task has devolved upon tradition. Once upon a time (so runs the tale), when Charlemagne dwelt at Zurich, he had a pillar erected before his house, and on the top of the pillar a bell was placed, so that any one desiring justice had but to ring it to be immediately conducted before the Emperor, there to have his case considered.
One day, just as Charlemagne was about to dine, the bell was rung loudly. He at once dispatched his attendants to bring the importunate claimant into his presence. A moment later they re-entered with the a.s.surance that no one waited outside. Even as they spoke the bell rang again, and again the attendants withdrew at the bidding of their royal master. Once more they returned with the information that none was to be seen. When the bell rang for the third time the Emperor himself rose from the table and went outside to satisfy himself as to the ringer?s ident.i.ty. This time the mystery was solved; for twining round the pillar was a great snake, which, before the astonished eyes of the Emperor and his suite, was l.u.s.tily pulling the bell-rope.
?Bring the snake before me,? said Charlemagne. ?Whether to man or beast, I may not refuse justice.?
Accordingly the snake was conducted with much ceremony into the Emperor?s presence, where it was distinctly observed to make a low obeisance. The Kaiser addressed the animal courteously, as though it were a human being, and inquired what it wanted. Whereupon the snake made a sign which the company took to indicate that it desired the Emperor to follow it. Charlemagne did not hesitate, but followed the creature to the sh.o.r.es of the lake, attended by all his courtiers.
Straight to its nest went the snake, and there, among the eggs, was an enormous toad, puffing out its bloated body and staring with gla.s.sy eyes at the company. The reason for the snake?s appeal was at once apparent.
?Take away that toad,? said the Emperor, as gravely as though he were p.r.o.nouncing judgment in an important human case; ?take away that toad and burn it. It has taken unlawful possession of the snake?s nest.?
The court listened to the Emperor?s decree in respectful silence, and immediately carried out the sentence. The company thereupon re-entered the royal abode, and thought no more of the incident.
On the following day, however, at about the same hour, the serpent entered the chamber in which Charlemagne sat, and glided swiftly toward the table. The attendants were somewhat astonished at the unexpected appearance, but the Kaiser motioned to them to stand aside, for he was very curious to see what the reptile would do. Raising itself till its head was on a level with the table, it dropped into his plate a magnificent diamond of the first water, gleaming with the purest light.
This done, the serpent bowed low, as on the previous occasion, and quitted the room as silently as it had entered.
The diamond, set in a gold ring of exquisite workmans.h.i.+p, Charlemagne presented to his wife, the beautiful Fastrada. But besides being a thing of beauty and of great value, the diamond was also a charm, for whoever received it from another received with it a wealth of personal affection. So was it with Charlemagne and Fastrada. On presenting the ring to his wife the Emperor straightway conceived for her a pa.s.sion far more intense than he had hitherto experienced. From that time to the day of her death he was her devoted slave, blind and deaf to all her faults.
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