Part 17 (2/2)
”Here are German newspapers and a German book in your bag!” said the _chef_.
”Certainly. Why not? I have been in Germany.”
”Yet you say you are English?”
”Here is my pa.s.sport.” I extended one to him. He looked at it, shook his head, and said: ”It is a very old one of 1867.” That was true, and I had not had it _vised_ since.
”Then,” said the _chef_, ”this pa.s.sport is for you and your wife. Where is the wife?”
”Minding the babies. Thirteen of them--a handful,” said I.
I had to produce card-case, letters, all of which the _chef_ examined carefully, and yet he was not satisfied. Then, suddenly, a bright idea struck me.
”Monsieur!” said I, ”I see what you take me to be. It is true I have been sketching in Narbonne, and along the whole coast. Would you like to see my drawings? Here is the result of my studies in Narbonne: the very remarkable profile of a Narbonnaise girl, the face of a lady carved in the cathedral, of another in the museum, some sketches of children's clay toys found in Roman tombs, and sundry Gaulish and Merovingian bronzes; also! yes, see, a bone toothcomb discovered among the remains of the fortifications.”
The _chef_ laughed, especially over the beauties of Narbonne, ran his eye through the book, took it over to his a.s.sistant to look at and laugh over the wonderful girls' faces, returned it to me, and let me off.
”And the _vielle_,” said I, ”what do you think of that--”
”Mais! with the _vielle_ over your shoulder, and that book of sketches and thirteen babies--_a.s.surement_--you could only be an Englishman.”
CHAPTER XVIII.
CARCa.s.sONNE.
Siege of Carca.s.sonne by the Crusaders--Capture--Perfidy of legate--Death of the Viscount--Continuation of the war--Churches of New Carca.s.sonne--_La Cite_--A perfect Mediaeval fortified town--Disappointing--Visigoth fortifications--Later additions--The Cathedral--Tomb of Simon de Montfort.
The Viscount of Beziers was not in the city from which he took his t.i.tle when it fell. He had hurried on to Carca.s.sonne to prepare that for defence.
There he exerted himself with the utmost energy, with rage and despair, to be ready against the bloodthirsty, and yet blood-drunken ruffians who were pouring along the road from smoking Beziers, to do to Carca.s.sonne as they had done there. Pedro, king of Aragon, interfered; he appeared as mediator in the camp of the Crusaders. Carca.s.sonne was held as a fief under him as lord paramount. He pleaded the youth of the viscount, a.s.serted his fidelity to the Church, his abhorrence of the Albigensian heresy; it was no fault of his, he argued, that his subjects had lapsed into error, and he declared that the Viscount had authorised him to place his submission in the hands of the legate of Pope Innocent. But the Crusaders were snorting for plunder and murder. The only terms they would admit were that the young viscount might retire with twelve knights; the city must surrender at discretion.
The proud and gallant youth declared that he had rather be flayed alive than desert the least of his subjects. The first a.s.saults, though on one occasion led by the prelates chanting the 'Veni Creator' ended in failure.
[Ill.u.s.tration: Towers on the wall, Carca.s.sonne.]
Carca.s.sonne might have resisted successfully had it been properly provisioned, or had the viscount limited the number admitted within its walls. But mult.i.tudes of refugees had come there from all the country round. The wells failed. Disease broke out. The viscount was obliged to come to terms, to accept a free conduct from the officer of the legate, and he endeavoured to make terms for his subjects.
Most of the troops made their escape by subterranean pa.s.sages, and the defenceless city came into the power of the Crusaders. The citizens were stripped almost naked, and their houses given up to pillage, but their lives were spared, with the exception of some fifty who were hanged and four hundred who were burned alive. The viscount had given himself up on promise of safe conduct; but no promises, no oaths were held sacred in these wars of religion, and the perfidious legate seized him, cast him into a dungeon, and there he died a few months later of a broken spirit and the pestilential prison air.
The law of conquest was now to be put in force. The lands of the heretic the Pope was ready to bestow on such as had dutifully done his behest. The legate a.s.sembled the princ.i.p.al crusading n.o.bles, that they might choose among them one to act as lord over their conquests. The offer was made, successively, to the Duke of Burgundy, the Count of Nevers, and the Count of S. Pol; but they all three declined, saying scornfully that they had lands enough of their own without taking those of another. They were, perhaps, fearful of the perilous example of setting up the fiefs of France to the hazard of the sword. Simon de Montfort was less scrupulous, or more ambitious, and he took immediate possession of the lands that had been acquired. The Pope wrote to him and confirmed him in the hereditary possession of his new dominions, at the same time expressing to him a hope that, in concert with the legates, he would continue very zealous in the extirpation of the heretics.
From this time forth the war in southern France changed character, or, rather, it a.s.sumed a double character; with the war of religion was openly joined a war of conquest; it was no longer merely against the Albigenses and their heresies, it was against the native princes of the south of France, for the sake of their dominions, that the crusade was prosecuted.
If it came within my scope to speak about Toulouse, I should be constrained to tell more of this sanguinary story. I am thankful that I need not prosecute the hateful tale; but so much it was not possible for me to withhold from the reader, as it is with these memories that Carca.s.sonne and Beziers must be visited and looked at.
Carca.s.sonne is a double city, a city on a hill and another on the plain, each ancient, but that below with the modern element leavening it, that above wholly steeped in mediaevalism.
[Ill.u.s.tration: An entrance to Carca.s.sonne.]
<script>