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Woodstock; or, The Cavalier

S >> Sir Walter Scott >> Woodstock; or, The Cavalier




"By the mass, a heavy accusation," said Joceline, the bold recklessness
of whose temper could not be long overawed; "Odds pitlikins, is our
master's old favourite, Will of Stratford, to answer for every buss that
has been snatched since James's time?--a perilous reckoning truly--but I
wonder who is sponsible for what lads and lasses did before his day?"
"Scoff not," said the soldier, "lest I, being called thereto by the
voice within me, do deal with thee as a scorner. Verily, I say, that
since the devil fell from Heaven, he never lacked agents on earth; yet
nowhere hath he met with a wizard having such infinite power over men's
souls as this pestilent fellow Shakspeare. Seeks a wife a foul example
for adultery, here she shall find it--Would a man know how to train his
fellow to be a murderer, here shall he find tutoring--Would a lady marry
a heathen negro, she shall have chronicled example for it--Would any one
scorn at his Maker, he shall be furnished with a jest in this book--
Would he defy his brother in the flesh, he shall be accommodated with a
challenge--Would you be drunk, Shakspeare will cheer you with a cup--
Would you plunge in sensual pleasures, he will soothe you to indulgence,
as with the lascivious sounds of a lute. This, I say, this book is the
well-head and source of all those evils which have overrun the land like
a torrent, making men scoffers, doubters, deniers, murderers, makebates,
and lovers of the wine-pot, haunting unclean places, and sitting long at
the evening-wine. Away with him, away with him, men of England! to
Tophet with his wicked book, and to the Vale of Hinnom with his accursed
bones! Verily but that our march was hasty when we passed Stratford, in
the year 1643, with Sir William Waller; but that our march was hasty"--

"Because Prince Rupert was after you with his cavaliers," muttered the
incorrigible Joceline.

"I say," continued the zealous trooper, raising his voice and extending
his arm--"but that our march was by command hasty, and that we turned
not aside in our riding, closing our ranks each one upon the other as
becomes men of war, I had torn on that day the bones of that preceptor
of vice and debauchery from the grave, and given them to the next
dunghill. I would have made his memory a scoff and a hissing!"

"That is the bitterest thing he has said yet," observed the keeper.
"Poor Will would have liked the hissing worse than all the rest." "Will
the gentleman say any more?" enquired Phoebe in a whisper. "Lack-a-day,
he talks brave words, if one knew but what they meant. But it is a mercy
our good knight did not see him ruffle the book at that rate--Mercy on
us, there would certainly have been bloodshed.--But oh, the father--see
how he is twisting his face about!--Is he ill of the colic, think'st
thou, Joceline? Or, may I offer him a glass of strong waters?"

"Hark thee hither, wench!" said the keeper, "he is but loading his
blunderbuss for another volley; and while he turns up his eyes, and
twists about his face, and clenches his fist, and shuffles and tramples
with his feet in that fashion, he is bound to take no notice of any
thing. I would be sworn to cut his purse, if he had one, from his side,
without his feeling it."

"La! Joceline," said Phoebe, "and if he abides here in this turn of
times, I dare say the gentleman will be easily served."

"Care not thou about that," said Joliffe; "but tell me softly and
hastily, what is in the pantry?"

"Small housekeeping enough," said Phoebe; "a cold capon and some
comfits, and the great standing venison pasty, with plenty of spice--a
manchet or two besides, and that is all."

"Well, it will serve for a pinch--wrap thy cloak round thy comely
body--get a basket and a brace of trenchers and towels, they are
heinously impoverished down yonder--carry down the capon and the
manchets--the pasty must abide with this same soldier and me, and the
pie-crust will serve us for bread."

"Rarely," said Phoebe; "I made the paste myself--it is as thick as the
walls of Fair Rosamond's Tower."

"Which two pairs of jaws would be long in gnawing through, work hard as
they might," said the keeper. "But what liquor is there?"

"Only a bottle of Alicant, and one of sack, with the stone jug of strong
waters," answered Phoebe.

"Put the wine-flasks into thy basket," said Joceline, "the knight must
not lack his evening draught--and down with thee to the hut like a
lapwing. There is enough for supper, and to-morrow is a new day.--Ha! by
heaven I thought yonder man's eye watched us--No--he only rolled it
round him in a brown study--Deep enough doubtless, as they all are.--But
d--n him, he must be bottomless if I cannot sound him before the night's
out.--Hie thee away, Phoebe."

But Phoebe was a rural coquette, and, aware that Joceline's situation
gave him no advantage of avenging the challenge in a fitting way, she
whispered in his ear, "Do you think our knight's friend, Shakspeare,
really found out all these naughty devices the gentleman spoke of?"

Off she darted while she spoke, while Joliffe menaced future vengeance
with his finger, as he muttered, "Go thy way, Phoebe Mayflower, the
lightest-footed and lightest-hearted wench that ever tripped the sod in
Woodstock-park!--After her, Bevis, and bring her safe to our master at
the hut."

The large greyhound arose like a human servitor who had received an
order, and followed Phoebe through the hall, first licking her hand to
make her sensible of his presence, and then putting himself to a slow
trot, so as best to accommodate himself to the light pace of her whom he
convoyed, whom Joceline had not extolled for her activity without due
reason. While Phoebe and her guardian thread the forest glades, we
return to the Lodge.

The Independent now seemed to start as if from a reverie. "Is the young
woman gone?" said he.

"Ay, marry is she," said the keeper; "and if your worship hath farther
commands, you must rest contented with male attendance."

"Commands--umph--I think the damsel might have tarried for another
exhortation," said the soldier--"truly, I profess my mind was much
inclined toward her for her edification."

"Oh, sir," replied Joliffe, "she will be at church next Sunday, and if
your military reverence is pleased again to hold forth amongst us, she
will have use of the doctrine with the rest. But young maidens of these
parts hear no private homilies.--And what is now your pleasure? Will you
look at the other rooms, and at the few plate articles which have been
left?"

"Umph--no," said the Independent--"it wears late, and gets dark--thou
hast the means of giving us beds, friend?"

"Better you never slept in," replied the keeper.

"And wood for a fire, and a light, and some small pittance of
creature-comforts for refreshment of the outward man?" continued the
soldier.

"Without doubt," replied the keeper, displaying a prudent anxiety to
gratify this important personage.

In a few minutes a great standing candlestick was placed on an oaken
table. The mighty venison pasty, adorned with parsley, was placed on the
board on a clean napkin; the stone-bottle of strong waters, with a
blackjack full of ale, formed comfortable appendages; and to this meal
sate down in social manner the soldier, occupying a great elbow-chair,
and the keeper, at his invitation, using the more lowly accommodation of
a stool, at the opposite side of the table. Thus agreeably employed, our
history leaves them for the present.

* * * * *

CHAPTER THE FOURTH.


Yon path of greensward
Winds round by sparry grot and gay pavilion;
There is no flint to gall thy tender foot,
There's ready shelter from each breeze, or shower.--
But duty guides not that way--see her stand,
With wand entwined with amaranth, near yon cliffs.
Oft where she leads thy blood must mark thy footsteps,
Oft where she leads thy head must bear the storm.
And thy shrunk form endure heat, cold, and hunger;
But she will guide thee up to noble heights,
Which he who gains seems native of the sky,
While earthly things lie stretch'd beneath his feet,
Diminish'd, shrunk, and valueless--
ANONYMOUS.

The reader cannot have forgotten that after his scuffle with the
commonwealth soldier, Sir Henry Lee, with his daughter Alice, had
departed to take refuge in the hut of the stout keeper Joceline Joliffe.
They walked slow, as before, for the old knight was at once oppressed by
perceiving these last vestiges of royalty fall into the hands of
republicans, and by the recollection of his recent defeat. At times he
paused, and, with his arms folded on his bosom, recalled all the
circumstances attending his expulsion from a house so long his home. It
seemed to him that, like the champions of romance of whom he had
sometimes read, he himself was retiring from the post which it was his
duty to guard, defeated by a Paynim knight, for whom the adventure had
been reserved by fate. Alice had her own painful subjects of
recollection, nor had the tenor of her last conversation with her father
been so pleasant as to make her anxious to renew it until his temper
should be more composed; for with an excellent disposition, and much
love to his daughter, age and misfortunes, which of late came thicker
and thicker, had given to the good knight's passions a wayward
irritability unknown to his better days. His daughter, and one or two
attached servants, who still followed his decayed fortunes, soothed his
frailty as much as possible, and pitied him even while they suffered
under its effects.

It was a long time ere he spoke, and then he referred to an incident
already noticed. "It is strange," he said, "that Bevis should have
followed Joceline and that fellow rather than me."

"Assure yourself, sir," replied Alice, "that his sagacity saw in this
man a stranger, whom he thought himself obliged to watch circumspectly,
and therefore he remained with Joceline."

"Not so, Alice," answered Sir Henry; "he leaves me because my fortunes
have fled from me. There is a feeling in nature, affecting even the
instinct, as it is called, of dumb animals, which teaches them to fly
from misfortune. The very deer there will butt a sick or wounded buck
from the herd; hurt a dog, and the whole kennel will fall on him and
worry him; fishes devour their own kind when they are wounded with a
spear; cut a crow's wing, or break its leg, the others will buffet it to
death."

"That may be true of the more irrational kinds of animals among each
other," said Alice, "for their whole life is well nigh a warfare; but
the dog leaves his own race to attach himself to ours; forsakes, for his
master, the company, food, and pleasure of his own kind; and surely the
fidelity of such a devoted and voluntary servant as Bevis hath been in
particular, ought not to be lightly suspected."

"I am not angry with the dog, Alice; I am only sorry," replied her
father. "I have read, in faithful chronicles, that when Richard II. and
Henry of Bolingbroke were at Berkeley Castle, a dog of the same kind
deserted the King, whom he had always attended upon, and attached
himself to Henry, whom he then saw for the first time. Richard foretold,
from the desertion of his favourite, his approaching deposition. The dog
was afterwards kept at Woodstock, and Bevis is said to be of his breed,
which was heedfully kept up. What I might foretell of mischief from his
desertion, I cannot guess, but my mind assures me it bodes no good."

There was a distant rustling among the withered leaves, a bouncing or
galloping sound on the path, and the favourite dog instantly joined his
master.

"Come into court, old knave," said Alice, cheerfully, "and defend thy
character, which is wellnigh endangered by this absence." But the dog
only paid her courtesy by gamboling around them, and instantly plunged
back again, as fast as he could scamper.

"How now, knave?" said the knight; "thou art too well trained, surely,
to take up the chase without orders." A minute more showed them Phoebe
Mayflower approaching, her light pace so little impeded by the burden
which she bore, that she joined her master and young mistress just as
they arrived at the keeper's hut, which was the boundary of their
journey. Bevis, who had shot a-head to pay his compliments to Sir Henry
his master, had returned again to his immediate duty, the escorting
Phoebe and her cargo of provisions. The whole party stood presently
assembled before the door of the keeper's hut.

In better times, a substantial stone habitation, fit for the
yeoman-keeper of a royal walk, had adorned this place. A fair spring
gushed out near the spot, and once traversed yards and courts, attached
to well-built and convenient kennels and mews. But in some of the
skirmishes which were common during the civil wars, this little silvan
dwelling had been attacked and defended, stormed and burnt. A
neighbouring squire, of the Parliament side of the question, took
advantage of Sir Henry Lee's absence, who was then in Charles's camp,
and of the decay of the royal cause, and had, without scruple, carried
off the hewn stones, and such building materials as the fire left
unconsumed, and repaired his own manor-house with them. The
yeoman-keeper, therefore, our friend Joceline, had constructed, for his
own accommodation, and that of the old woman he called his dame, a
wattled hut, such as his own labour, with that of a neighbour or two,
had erected in the course of a few days. The walls were plastered with
clay, white-washed, and covered with vines and other creeping plants;
the roof was neatly thatched, and the whole, though merely a hut, had,
by the neat-handed Joliffe, been so arranged as not to disgrace the
condition of the dweller.

The knight advanced to the entrance; but the ingenuity of the architect,
for want of a better lock to the door, which itself was but of wattles
curiously twisted, had contrived a mode of securing the latch on the
inside with a pin, which prevented it from rising; and in this manner it
was at present fastened. Conceiving that this was some precaution of
Joliffe's old housekeeper, of whose deafness they were all aware, Sir
Henry raised his voice to demand admittance, but in vain. Irritated at
this delay, he pressed the door at once with foot and hand, in a way
which the frail barrier was unable to resist; it gave way accordingly,
and the knight thus forcibly entered the kitchen, or outward apartment,
of his servant. In the midst of the floor, and with a posture which
indicated embarrassment, stood a youthful stranger, in a riding-suit.

"This may be my last act of authority here," said the knight, seizing
the stranger by the collar, "but I am still Ranger of Woodstock for this
night at least--Who, or what art thou?"

The stranger dropped the riding-mantle in which his face was muffled,
and at the same time fell on one knee.

"Your poor kinsman, Markham Everard," he said, "who came hither for your
sake, although he fears you will scarce make him welcome for his own."

Sir Henry started back, but recovered himself in an instant, as one who
recollected that he had a part of dignity to perform. He stood erect,
therefore, and replied, with considerable assumption of stately
ceremony:

"Fair kinsman, it pleases me that you are come to Woodstock upon the
very first night that, for many years which have passed, is likely to
promise you a worthy or a welcome reception."

"Now God grant it be so, that I rightly hear and duly understand you,"
said the young man; while Alice, though she was silent, kept her looks
fixed on her father's face, as if desirous to know whether his meaning
was kind towards his nephew, which her knowledge of his character
inclined her greatly to doubt.

The knight meanwhile darted a sardonic look, first on his nephew, then
on his daughter, and proceeded--"I need not, I presume, inform Mr.
Markham Everard, that it cannot be our purpose to entertain him, or even
to offer him a seat in this poor hut."

"I will attend you most willingly to the Lodge," said the young
gentleman. "I had, indeed, judged you were already there for the
evening, and feared to intrude upon you. But if you would permit me, my
dearest uncle, to escort my kinswoman and you back to the Lodge, believe
me, amongst all which you have so often done of good and kind, you never
conferred benefit that will be so dearly prized."

"You mistake me greatly, Mr. Markham Everard," replied the knight. "It
is not our purpose to return to the Lodge to-night, nor, by Our Lady,
to-morrow neither. I meant but to intimate to you in all courtesy, that
at Woodstock Lodge you will find those for whom you are fitting society,
and who, doubtless, will afford you a willing welcome; which I, sir, in
this my present retreat, do not presume to offer to a person of your
consequence."

"For Heaven's sake," said the young man, turning to Alice, "tell me how
I am to understand language so misterious."

Alice, to prevent his increasing the restrained anger of her father,
compelled herself to answer, though it was with difficulty, "We are
expelled from the Lodge by soldiers."

"Expelled--by soldiers!" exclaimed Everard, in surprise--"there is no
legal warrant for this."

"None at all," answered the knight, in the same tone of cutting irony
which he had all along used, "and yet as lawful a warrant, as for aught
that has been wrought in England this twelvemonth and more. You are, I
think, or were, an Inns-of-Court-man--marry, sir, your enjoyment of your
profession is like that lease which a prodigal wishes to have of a
wealthy widow. You have already survived the law which you studied, and
its expiry doubtless has not been without a legacy--some decent
pickings, some merciful increases, as the phrase goes. You have deserved
it two ways--you wore buff and bandalier, as well as wielded pen and
ink--I have not heard if you held forth too."

"Think of me and speak of me as harshly as you will, sir," said Everard,
submissively. "I have but in this evil time, guided myself by my
conscience, and my father's commands."

"O, and you talk of conscience," said the old knight, "I must have mine
eye upon you, as Hamlet says. Never yet did Puritan cheat so grossly as
when he was appealing to his conscience; and as for thy _father_"--

He was about to proceed in a tone of the same invective, when the young
man interrupted him, by saying, in a firm tone, "Sir Henry Lee, you have
ever been thought noble--Say of me what you will, but speak not of my
father what the ear of a son should not endure, and which yet his arm
cannot resent. To do me such wrong is to insult an unarmed man, or to
beat a captive."

Sir Henry paused, as if struck by the remark. "Thou hast spoken truth in
that, Mark, wert thou the blackest Puritan whom hell ever vomited, to
distract an unhappy country."

"Be that as you will to think it," replied Everard; "but let me not
leave you to the shelter of this wretched hovel. The night is drawing to
storm--let me but conduct you to the Lodge, and expel those intruders,
who can, as yet at least, have no warrant for what they do. I will not
linger a moment behind them, save just to deliver my father's
message.--Grant me but this much, for the love you once bore me!"

"Yes, Mark," answered his uncle, firmly, but sorrowfully, "thou speakest
truth--I did love thee once. The bright-haired boy whom I taught to
ride, to shoot, to hunt--whose hours of happiness were spent with me,
wherever those of graver labours were employed--I did love that boy--ay,
and I am weak enough to love even the memory of what he was.--But he is
gone, Mark--he is gone; and in his room I only behold an avowed and
determined rebel to his religion and to his king--a rebel more
detestable on account of his success, the more infamous through the
plundered wealth with which he hopes to gild his villany.--But I am
poor, thou think'st, and should hold my peace, lest men say, 'Speak,
sirrah, when you should.'--Know, however, that, indigent and plundered
as I am, I feel myself dishonoured in holding even but this much talk
with the tool of usurping rebels.--Go to the Lodge, if thou wilt--yonder
lies the way--but think not that, to regain my dwelling there, or all
the wealth I ever possessed in my wealthiest days, I would accompany
thee three steps on the greensward. If I must be thy companion, it shall
be only when thy red-coats have tied my hands behind me, and bound my
legs beneath my horse's belly. Thou mayst be my fellow traveller then, I
grant thee, if thou wilt, but not sooner."

Alice, who suffered cruelly during this dialogue, and was well aware
that farther argument would only kindle the knight's resentment still
more highly, ventured at last, in her anxiety, to make a sign to her
cousin to break off the interview, and to retire, since her father
commanded his absence in a manner so peremptory. Unhappily, she was
observed by Sir Henry, who, concluding that what he saw was evidence of
a private understanding betwixt the cousins, his wrath acquired new
fuel, and it required the utmost exertion of self-command, and
recollection of all that was due to his own dignity, to enable him to
veil his real fury under the same ironical manner which he had adopted
at the beginning of this angry interview.

"If thou art afraid," he said, "to trace our forest glades by night,
respected stranger, to whom I am perhaps bound to do honour as my
successor in the charge of these walks, here seems to be a modest
damsel, who will be most willing to wait on thee, and be thy
bow-bearer.--Only, for her mother's sake, let there pass some slight
form of marriage between you--Ye need no license or priest in these
happy days, but may be buckled like beggars in a ditch, with a hedge for
a church-roof, and a tinker for a priest. I crave pardon of you for
making such an officious and simple request--perhaps you are a
ranter--or one of the family of Love, or hold marriage rites as
unnecessary, as Knipperdoling, or Jack of Leyden?"

"For mercy's sake, forbear such dreadful jesting, my father! and do you,
Markham, begone, in God's name, and leave us to our fate--your presence
makes my father rave."

"Jesting!" said Sir Henry, "I was never more serious--Raving!--I was
never more composed--I could never brook that falsehood should approach
me--I would no more bear by my side a dishonoured daughter than a
dishonoured sword; and this unhappy day hath shown that both can fail."

"Sir Henry," said young Everard, "load not your soul with a heavy crime,
which be assured you do, in treating your daughter thus unjustly. It is
long now since you denied her to me, when we were poor and you were
powerful. I acquiesced in your prohibition of all suit and intercourse.
God knoweth what I suffered--but I acquiesced. Neither is it to renew my
suit that I now come hither, and have, I do acknowledge, sought speech
of her--not for her own sake only, but for yours also. Destruction
hovers over you, ready to close her pinions to stoop, and her talons to
clutch--Yes, sir, look contemptuous as you will, such is the case; and
it is to protect both you and her that I am here."

"You refuse then my free gift," said Sir Henry Lee; "or perhaps you
think it loaded with too hard conditions?"

"Shame, shame on you, Sir Henry;" said Everard, waxing warm in his turn;
"have your political prejudices so utterly warped every feeling of a
father, that you can speak with bitter mockery and scorn of what
concerns your own daughter's honour?--Hold up your head, fair Alice, and
tell your father he has forgotten nature in his fantastic spirit of
loyalty.--Know, Sir Henry, that though I would prefer your daughter's
hand to every blessing which Heaven could bestow on me, I would not
accept it--my conscience would not permit me to do so, when I knew it
must withdraw her from her duty to you."

"Your conscience is over-scrupulous, young man;--carry it to some
dissenting rabbi, and he who takes all that comes to net, will teach
thee it is sinning against our mercies to refuse any good thing that is
freely offered to us."

"When it is freely offered, and kindly offered--not when the offer is
made in irony and insult--Fare thee well, Alice--if aught could make me
desire to profit by thy father's wild wish to cast thee from him in a
moment of unworthy suspicion, it would be that while indulging in such
sentiments, Sir Henry Lee is tyrannically oppressing the creature, who
of all others is most dependent on his kindness--who of all others will
most feel his severity, and whom, of all others, he is most bound to
cherish and support."

"Do not fear for me, Mr. Everard," exclaimed Alice, aroused from her
timidity by a dread of the consequences not unlikely to ensue, where
civil war sets relations, as well as fellow-citizens, in opposition to
each other.--"Oh, begone, I conjure you, begone! Nothing stands betwixt
me and my father's kindness, but these unhappy family divisions--but
your ill-timed presence here--for Heaven's sake, leave us!"

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