Kitabı oku: «Heroines of the Crusades», sayfa 31
CHAPTER XIII.
TRANSLATION OF THE BIBLE
Each time the queen visited the laboratory of Alphonso, he made her acquainted with some new fact in philosophy, or some new device of alchemy, which awakened curiosity and gave rise to inquiry. The Spanish king, having made some discoveries in advance of the age, had fallen into the popular error of philosophers, that of repudiating all pre-established doctrines and maxims. Having laid down the theory that matter was eternal, and all external appearances the result of natural change, he was at infinite pains to account for all phenomena so as not to conflict with this proposition. The unbiased mind of Eleanora often detected in his assertions a vagueness of expression which passed for argument, but which evidently imposed less upon his auditors than upon himself.
“Nature,” said he, “arranges her work in circles: hence is the sky a dome, the earth a convex ball, and each minute atom of a globular form. The seasons roll their perpetual round, and as a ring hath neither beginning nor end, so must the material universe be eternal. The acorn groweth into the oak, and the oak again produceth the acorn; all outward manifestations are but parts in the great universal machine.”
Eleanora, who had been attentively regarding an ingenious invention of the king’s, interrupted this tirade, by remarking, “A few months before I left England, I visited the cell of friar Bacon, in Oxford. But I saw nothing in his laboratory so curious and wonderful as this work of my brother’s.”
The philosopher, flattered with the encomium, turned at once to exhibit the design of the machine. She followed his explanation with the greatest apparent interest; and when he had finished, replied, “In all these curious arrangements, I trace the wisdom of my brother; and it is that which gives me the greatest pleasure; and when I see the beneficent purposes for which it is designed, I feel a deeper veneration for the mind that could plan so skilfully.”
She took a bunch of flowers from the hand of Agnes and approached the king. “I have been observing,” said she, “the curious arrangement of these frail leaves, five green supporters, five yellow petals, five slender threads, and one central spire. I have gathered thousands of them in my rambles, and the same perfect number is found in every one. It has led me to inquire if Nature be not like my brother, a mathematician.”
The workings of Alphonso’s face showed how closely the simple truth of this proposition had driven home. “Nature,” said he, “is an active principle, whose changes neither add to, nor detract from, the original matter of the universe. The metals,” continued he, seeing she was about to respond, “the metals, my philosophical sister, form the basis of everything. I have detected iron in human blood, and a lustrous substance like that thou sawest in common ashes; hence do the alchemists believe that gold, the most precious of all, is scattered through nature, as the seeds of vegetation are scattered in earth, requiring only the proper gases to develop it and make it abundant as the pebbles on the shore.”
“And have these gases been able to effect the desirable changes?” inquired the queen.
“There are innumerable obstacles in the way of these momentous inquiries,” said the enthusiast. “Nature resists intrusion into her arcana, and I grieve to say, that we have not yet been able to bring about a definite result. Science has achieved only the procuring of the gases, while there remains still the nicer problem – to mix them in their right proportions, at their proper temperatures; for the nascent metal is more delicate than the embryo plant, and an excess of heat or cold destroys like frost or blight.”
“Ah, me!” said Eleanora, with a sigh; “before this great end be accomplished I fear me my brother will have passed away, and then all this toil and research will be lost.”
“My sister,” said Alphonso, abandoning his labors and seating himself, “thou hast unconsciously touched the thorn that rankles deepest in my breast. In nature, nothing seems made in vain; even decay produces new life, and man alone, the crowning work of all, seems made to no purpose.”
“I have sometimes thought,” said Eleanora, as if answering her own reflections, rather than replying to her brother’s remarks, “that man might perhaps be made for the pleasure of a higher order of intelligence, as the lower orders of creation seem formed for our gratification, and that all our miseries spring from an attempt to thwart this plan.”
“If thy thought be not the true solution of man’s destiny, I know not what end he serves in the great scheme of existence,” returned Alphonso, sadly; “I have passed through various vicissitudes of life, from the greatness of earthly state to the poverty of a prison, and I have derived more pleasure from the achievements of science than from all my hereditary honors. And yet even these do not satisfy the longings of my nature.”
“The scripture teaches us, that the superior intelligences find delight in benefitting mortals; and acting upon this hint the good have taught us, that to be blest ourselves we must seek to bless others,” said Eleanora.
“True,” replied the philosopher, breaking out once more into his old enthusiasm, “I have sometimes found alleviation from the weariness of my thoughts in the reflection, that the sciences in which I am engaged will one day exercise a wider and more perfect control over the destiny of the human race, than all the military orders backed by the sanction of ecclesiastical decrees. Science will open the door to Art; and her triumphant offspring, in a train of skillful inventions, shall pass on through long ages, breaking down the stern barriers of kingdoms, and uniting mankind in a common interest; war shall give place to useful Labor, and Science abrogating labor in its turn, shall satisfy the wants of the human race, accomplishing by a touch that which requires the might of thousands. Men shall then have leisure to perform the rites that lift the veil of Isis, and perhaps find means to question Nature even in the innermost recesses of her temple.”
“Oh! life! life!” said the philosopher, in an accent of despair, “why art thou so brief? Why must I die without discovering the sublime agencies?”
Eleanora waited in compassionate silence till her brother resumed in a calmer tone, “Think me not mad, my sister. If the feeble attempts of an imprisoned king, and a cloistered friar, can produce the wondrous results of which thou hast been witness, what shall the end be, when men free to pursue these investigations shall win the rich guerdon of fame and pecuniary reward? Thou hast heard, perchance, of the magician Albertus Magnus, who constructed a human figure, which performed the office of a servant; and of the stupid priest Thomas Aquinas, who, alarmed by the appearance of the automaton which opened the door and ushered him in with ceremonious obeisance, destroyed with one blow the work of years.”
“I can forgive his terror,” said Eleanora, “for I well remember my own affright, when the brazen head contrived by Friar Bacon, rolled along on the table towards me, and uttered ‘pax vobiscum’ with startling distinctness.”
“Albertus Magnus performed a still more astonishing work,” continued Alphonso. “At a banquet which he gave in the garden of his cloister, in the depth of winter, trees appeared covered with leaves and flowers, which vanished as if by enchantment, when the guests rose to depart.”
“By what means were these wonderful works produced?” said Eleanora, with astonishment.
“With the mode of this operation I am not familiar,” returned the philosopher. “Doubtless by some of the powerful agents alchemy reveals to its votaries.”
“And what dost thou consider the chief agent in the universe?” said Eleanora, with the air of one inquiring after truth.
“Nature,” returned the philosopher, emphatically.
“And will it pain my brother, if his unlearned sister call that great agent, who brings the flowers and leaves upon the trees in their season, by the name of God?”
“Certainly, the name can affect nothing,” replied Alphonso; “and if thy priest require it of thee, sin not against him, by a more liberal view.”
“And if the ignorant mass, who cannot be enlightened by thy theories, are restrained from vice by the thought that an Omniscient Being takes note of their actions, would it be well to free them from the necessary monitor?” inquired his sister.
“It is doubtless well for man to be deterred from evil by salutary fear, till he rises to more exalted capabilities,” replied Alphonso.
“And art willing,” suggested Eleanora, cautiously, “to administer to this wholesome necessity until thy divine philosophy become sufficiently perfected to renovate their character.”
“What priestly scheme hast thou in hand?” said her brother, regarding her with a look of mirthful curiosity.
“Thou knowest how dearly I love the Castilian language,” returned the queen, “and I would that my brother should perpetuate his fame by that which will benefit his subjects. The sight of thy Jewish scribes, suggested the thought that it would be easy for thee to procure the translation of the Scriptures into our mother tongue.”
The philosopher remained silent for a moment, and then answered, “knowest thou the effect of the measures thou proposest?”
“I conceive,” replied Eleanora, “that it will make thy people more virtuous and happy, and,” added she, mindful of his foible, “prepare them to receive all the additional light to which thy investigations may lead.”
“There will be another effect, which, perhaps thou dost not anticipate,” replied Alphonso. “It will overthrow the power of the priesthood; for as now each man inquires of his confessor concerning his duty, he will, if enabled to read the boasted oracles, claim the right to interpret for himself. But thy experiment shall be tried, and now I bethink me, those learned scribes which our benevolent son Sancho hath permitted us to employ in transcribing the laws of Spain into the language of Castile, shall be placed under thy direction for this important work.”
Thus the object for which Eleanora had so long and so patiently prayed and planned, progressed under the auspices of a man who affected to despise the truths he yet condescended to propagate; and while the philosopher gave critical attention to the correctness of the work, he found leisure to complete his Astronomical tables, and to commence the first general history of Spain.
CHAPTER XIV.
AN ACCIDENT
To the monotony of a winter which the absence of the gallant cavaliers had rendered doubly tedious to the ladies of the royal household, succeeded a balmy spring. The favorite haunt of Eleanora, by the side of a noisy stream, which escaping from its icy chain among the hills, hurried away through the ravine, leaping up to clasp the overhanging rock in its wild embrace, and showering its silver spray upon the weeping boughs that fringed its bank, was again carpeted with mossy green, and draped with the bright garniture of May.
The view from this romantic spot commanded upon the right the city of Burgos, built upon the declivity of a hill, and on the left, a flowery path leading along the bank of the stream, which it crossed by a foot-bridge, wound up the cliff till it entered upon extensive plains that stretched out to the west, and afforded rich pasturage for numerous flocks which fed upon the luxuriant herbage.
One sunny afternoon, Eleanora, becoming deeply absorbed in her brother’s history of the reign of their father, Ferdinand the Holy, allowed the maidens, protected by the squires and pages, to climb the prohibited cliff, which, ever since it had begun to assume its summer garb, had been a strong temptation to their footsteps. Occupied with her manuscript, she was unconscious of the lapse of time, but an occasional sound of merry voices, mingling harmoniously with the pleasant reflections that filled her mind, inspired her with a feeling of security and peace. It was nearly sunset when she finished her task, and the chill dews admonished her of the lateness of the hour; but when she raised her eyes, not a human being was within call. The sentinel page, presuming upon his mistress’ abstraction, had strolled across the bridge and ascended the hill after his companions, and the queen began to be alarmed lest the giddy party should defer their return till darkness had increased the danger of the mountain path. She gazed in every direction, and listened intently to every sound. The breeze rustled the branches, and the river gurgled on its way, but all else was still. Suddenly she perceived on the extremity of the cliff, the rocks of which sank sheer down to the water’s edge, her maidens hurrying to the rescue of a lamb, that, having strayed from the care of the shepherd, startled the echoes with its piteous cries. Agnes was foremost, and as she tripped along unconscious of the abyss which the pendant foliage concealed from her sight, and clasped the snowy foundling to her lovely breast, her slight figure bathed in the bright gold of the western sky seemed the impersonation of the angel of mercy. With a glad shout of exultation she turned to exhibit her prize, when the treacherous earth gave way beneath her feet, and with her fleecy burden she was precipitated into the stream, nearly opposite the spot which the queen, breathless with alarm, had just reached. Screams of helpless terror rent the air. The squires ran each in a different direction, hoping to find some point from which they could descend the cliff, while the poor girl floated rapidly down the stream, rising and sinking with the swelling waves. Quick as thought, Eleanora caught up a fallen branch that lay upon the bank, and extended it for her rescue. The drowning Agnes seized it with one hand, and the queen, with great exertion, had drawn her almost to the shore, when the frail support gave way, and the mad waters again enveloped her form. As she sank, the animal struggled from her grasp and gained the bank.
“Save her! Oh God in mercy save her!” exclaimed Eleanora, clasping her hands in agony. At this moment a solitary pedestrian turning an angle in the path, approached, and attracted by the cry of distress quickened his pace. “There! there!” exclaimed the queen, pointing with a frantic gesture to the spot where Agnes had disappeared. Without a word, the stranger threw his staff and cloak upon the ground, and plunged into the stream. But the rapacious tide had borne her beyond his reach. On he swam, buffeting the waves with a strong arm, now searching the depths, and now scanning the ruffled surface, till finding every effort unavailing, he paused amid the whirling eddies, as if irresolute to seek the shore or continue the fruitless search. At this moment a small fair hand gleamed in the water before him, vainly clasping the idle waves, as if reaching for the broken reed that had so deceived its hope. He grasped the tiny hand in his own, raised the sinking form, and, renerved by the joy of success, and the shouts of those who approached in tumultuous haste, by a few strokes of his powerful arm gained the shore. Every hand was extended for his assistance; but the stranger heeded not the proffered aid, and kneeling upon the velvet turf he pressed the senseless form in his arms, and regarded the face that lay so fixed and still upon his breast, with a mute anxiety that held his features almost as rigid as those on which he gazed. While the balance thus trembles between life and death, every voice is dumb and every breath suppressed. The queen hangs motionless over her unconscious favorite, and the attendants stand chilled and paralyzed with doubt and dread, till a sudden gleam of satisfaction irradiates the stranger’s face, and a faint sigh heaves the bosom of Agnes. “My God, I thank thee!” exclaims Eleanora, fervently, while every frame dilates with a full deep inspiration of returning hope. But the stranger, with an authoritative wave of his hand, repels all attempts to relieve him of his lovely charge. Gently he disengages the long silken locks that cling dripping to his arm, tenderly he raises her head to catch the breeze that fans her pallid cheek, and ’tis not till returning life quivers in the languid eyelids, that pressing his lips upon her snowy hand, he resigns her to her royal mistress. At once the maidens crowded around, some weeping and some laughing under the excess of the same emotion, eager to assist in the resuscitation of their lovely friend; and the squires and pages busied themselves in constructing a litter of boughs, upon which Agnes was conveyed to the palace.
Meanwhile, the innocent cause of the catastrophe crept shivering to the feet of the queen, who compassionately ordered one of the attendants to carry it forward; and thus while the shades of evening stretched over the landscape, the saddened party re-entered the streets of Burgos. In the general confusion the strange deliverer had disappeared, and no one knew the direction he had taken; but the ladies had not been so much occupied with their anxiety, that they had failed to mark his noble figure and princely bearing; and Eleanora remembered that his face was one of peculiar beauty, though marked by a scar, conspicuous upon the right cheek.
CHAPTER XV.
FREDERIC THE BITTEN
The slight illness that followed the accident which had so nearly proved fatal to the young Jewess, was attended by no dangerous symptoms, and the maidens amused her convalescence with conjectures concerning her mysterious deliverer. Their pleasantries acquired new zest, when they discovered that a rosy blush, no less than an evasive reply, answered their reiterated prediction that the stranger would one day return, no longer a simple knight, but a noble lord, or powerful prince, and claim the fair hand on which he imprinted his parting kiss. Thus the weeks wore away, and the affair at length ceased to be the engrossing topic of conversation: the inhabitants of the palace resumed their accustomed employments, and indulged in their usual rambles.
Eleanora received frequent despatches of the most satisfactory character from her husband. The Christian arms had been everywhere successful against the Moors, and the King of Arragon had added to his former conquests, Majorca and Valencia, together with numerous castles and churches taken from the Infidels. Edward proposed to return by sea to Bordeaux, where he appointed his queen to meet him within the following month.
But the tidings she received from Procida, through an ambassador that craved a private audience, created a more agitating interest than even the affairs of their own realm could awaken. At sight of the stranger, she recognized the saviour of Agnes, and her first impulse was to thank him for his generous exertions in behalf of her fair ward. But the grave formality of his manner checked the graceful condescension. He seemed but the bearer of a letter, and received her greeting merely as the messenger of Procida, and presuming upon his avowed character, she proceeded to peruse the despatch in his presence.
The epistle from the Jew commenced abruptly without date. It acquainted the queen with the rank and title of the bearer, “Frederic the Bitten,” Duke of Saxony, grandson of the illustrious Emperor of Germany, and commended him to her courtesy as the suitor of the young Agnes. Procida alluded darkly to negotiations and plots, which he trusted would accomplish the deliverance of his country, but towards the close of the epistle, the father triumphed over the conspirator, and the expressions of paternal love subdued the tone of vengeance to the accents of tenderness and apprehension.
“I was anxious my royal friend,” said he, “now that rugged winter has been smoothed by a softer breath, I was anxious to write and to address thee some grateful strain, as the first-fruits of the spring. But the mournful news presages to me new storms; my songs sink into tears. In vain do the heavens smile; in vain do the gardens and groves inspire me with unseasonable joy, and the returning concert of the birds tempt me to resume my own. I cannot behold with dry eyes the approaching desolation of my kind nurse Sicily. Which shall I choose for her, the yoke, or honor? I see that in the confusion of insurrection numbers of her innocent children must perish. Shall I then leave her under the power of the tyrant? Shall our beautiful Palermo be defiled by strangers? Shall the powerful and noble Messina rest in quiet with the foot of her oppressor on her neck; or shall I, while feigning peace, organize a war, rousing Sicily and the world to revenge? Revenge! at the word all thoughts of pity and tenderness leave me. The concentrated rage of Etna seems warring in my bosom; it heaves at sight of the miseries of my unhappy people. The island is full of preparations against the Greeks: but, when the sword is drawn, shall it not be buried in the breast of him who drains the life blood from his helpless subjects?
“But in that hour Procida may perish, and the King of Arragon fail to restore the sister of Manfred to her ancient rights. There will then remain of the house of Suabia only ‘Frederic the Bitten.’ If the daughter of Procida favor his suit, detain him till the ‘Ides of March’ be passed, for with Frederic, dies the last hope of the Hohenstaufen.”
Eleanora closed the letter and pondered a moment upon its contents. In the plan of Procida to detain Frederic from the approaching conflict in Sicily, she most readily acquiesced, but the difficulty of managing so delicate an affair became instantly apparent to her ready perception. When, however, she adroitly endeavored to draw from the young duke his knowledge of the purposes of Procida, her apprehension was relieved by discovering that the affair had been planned in such a manner as to require from her, neither entreaty nor subterfuge, since the wily Jew had exacted a promise from the young noble, that he would spend a twelvemonth, at the court of his cousin Edward, before he demanded the hand of Agnes in marriage. Procida had not indeed, left the duke ignorant of his ultimate purpose, but he had led him to look for its accomplishment at a much more distant date than that designated in the letter, and Frederic consequently feeling no anxiety for an immediate return to Sicily, readily accepted the queen’s invitation to form part of the royal escort to Bordeaux.
Eleanora in taking leave of her brother, was comforted with the thought, that he was occupied with a more healthful and profitable pursuit than were the abstruse researches into the mysteries of nature, in which she had found him engaged. She had also the satisfaction of knowing that the deposed monarch had laid aside all his ambitious projects for empire, and now busied his thoughts in calculating the immense advantage and glory that would accrue to mankind from the Castilian literature he had in preparation. The affectionate farewells were exchanged, and, accompanied by her two beautiful children, Beatrice and Berengaria, her maidens and the attendant squires, and a small band of Spanish cavaliers, among whom rode the Duke of Saxony, she set off to meet her lord in Aquitaine. In the genial society of the queen and her maidens, whose spirits were exhilarated by the exercise and incidents of the journey, Frederic seemed to breathe an atmosphere to which he had been unaccustomed, and which served to enliven his habitual gravity, and develop the gentler qualities of his naturally generous character. The maidens amused themselves with constant allusions to the happy accomplishment of their prediction, and the wit of the fair Agnes was sorely tested, in meeting and parrying their playful attacks. The courteous attentions of the duke, were so impartially distributed among the ladies, that not even jealousy itself could find cause for complaint; yet it was only the voice of Agnes that had power to rouse him from his frequent reveries, and when he spoke, his eye instinctively turned to read in her countenance approbation or dissent. Disciplined in the school of adversity, he manifested a strength and severity of character, tempered by a pensive tenderness, which showed that his mother’s wrongs had wrought in his heart a sentiment of sympathy for the suffering which made him hesitate to involve his country in the exterminating wars, that he foresaw would follow a renewal of the strife between the Guelphs and Ghibellines; and though he felt an enthusiastic admiration for the ardor and zeal of Procida, yet the unscrupulous Jew, who studied the character of all he met with reference to their availability in the approaching crisis, too accurately estimated the probity and truth of the young noble, to attempt to engage him in the dark plot for the overthrow of d’Anjou. Still he loved the duke, as the descendant of his great patron, and honored him for those qualities, of which he felt himself destitute; and thus it was with a feeling of joyful security, rather than of pride at the princely alliance, that he consented to bestow his only treasure upon the man, who least of all sympathised in the one purpose of his life.
The royal party arrived at Bordeaux a few days in advance of the King of England, and during these hours of leisure, Frederic unfolded to the queen the mystery of his first appearance in Burgos.
Procida had entrusted him with despatches for the King of Arragon; and to execute his commission with the more secresy, and at the same time to enjoy the freedom of the mountain solitudes, he travelled without retinue or insignia of rank. Thus he was leisurely pursuing his way along the bank of the stream, communing pleasantly with his own thoughts, when the cries of Eleanora attracted him, just in time to save Agnes from a watery grave. Time had so developed her loveliness that at first he failed to recognize in the fair being before him, the beautiful child he had been accustomed to admire in her father’s castle of Prochyta; but when the first flush of returning life glowed upon her countenance, his admiration became lost in a deeper emotion, and from that hour he determined to lay the ducal coronet of Saxony at the feet of the beautiful daughter of Sicily.
The return of the royal family was an era in the annals of English prosperity, from the number of valuables imported from Spain. In the catalogue of the queen’s plate, mention is made of a crystal fork, the parting gift of her brother Alphonso, from which the first idea of these articles of table luxury was derived: but the lamb, which had so nearly cost the life of Agnes, proved a benefit to the nation, whose value can never be estimated; and the shepherd of Cotswold to this day, has reason to bless the queen, who bestowed the cherished pet in an English fold.
During his southern campaign, King Edward had contracted an alliance between his eldest daughter Eleanora, and Alphonso, the young Prince of Arragon. The next sister, Joanna of Acre, who most of all resembled her mother in beauty and strength of character, was about the same time, married to the first peer of the realm, Gilbert the red Earl of Gloucester, and the third daughter wedded to John, the Duke of Brabant. At these nuptials the queen presented a golden cup of benison to each of the brides, inscribed with appropriate passages of Holy Writ; and though, in consequence of Frederic’s promise to her father, the betrothment between himself and Agnes could not then take place, Eleanora bestowed upon her lovely ward a similar gift, bearing these words, “Thou hast been unto me as a daughter.”
