In the high-vaulted refectory, the small arched windows of which looked out into the garden of the monastery, and were darkened by a row of lime-trees, sat the heavy-built abbot Johan in his laced leathern arm-chair, with a lamp before him, at the supper-table, holding a kind of instructive discourse for the edification of the humbly-listening brethren of the order and the pupils of the monastery. Nearest him sat eleven monks in black cloaks, among whom Peter Porter took his place as the twelfth. The same number of little boys, who were educating as monks, and wore black benedictine mantles, as well as the brethren of the order, took the lowest place at the table, and eagerly partook of the repast, while, however, they seemed to listen very attentively to the abbot's discourse. On the entrance of the travellers the dignified prelate half rose from his seat, with a look of annoyance, and bade them welcome in St. Peter's and St. Bent's name, but almost without vouchsafing them a glance, and in a tone which betrayed that it was only in compliance with the rules of his order that he received such self-invited guests. However, when the two tall knights approached him nearer, with a reverent and courteous salutation, and the lamp on the table lit up Sir Niels Brock's martial visage, the abbot's proud bearing and repulsive looks suddenly changed. He signed a blessing over the knight and his companions, and, with courteous condescension, besought them to be seated, while he hastily, with a side-wink of the eye, laid his finger on his mouth, and continued to address them as strangers.
Besides the twelve brethren of the order and the monkishly-clad children, there sat a person at the table, also in a black benedictine mantle, but without the hood and complete dress of the order. He had hastily risen on the entrance of the travellers, and appeared about to withdraw; but, on hearing Sir Niels Brock's powerful voice, he turned round to the newly-arrived guests, and nodded familiarly to Brock. It now appeared that this person bore not the tonsure, and was even adorned with a warrior-like beard; his forehead and eye-brows were hidden by his yellowish red and combed down hair.
Brock started, and greeted him with surprise, but in silence.
"A guest from the world who hath sought safety in the dress of our holy order and the sanctuary of the monastery," said the abbot. "I can, therefore, only present him to you without mention of his name, as I also have received you in the holy Bent's and St. Peter's name, without asking of your name in the world, or the object of your journey."
"Your hospitality and high mindedness are well known throughout the country, pious sir," said Brock, with another obeisance. "We are not, it is true, among the persecuted. The object of our journey also is no secret; but we equally acknowledge, with thanks and reverence, the shelter these holy walls afford from storms of all kinds."
"From the hour in which, by God's grace, I received the bishop's mitre and the holy crosier," resumed the abbot, with the air of a prince of the church, but with stooping head, and a kind of studied rhetorical tone, "be it said without all vain self-commendation, and to the honour of the Most High!--from the time St. Peter and his holy heir set me a ruler over these souls, and over this asylum of the pious and oppressed, I have striven according to my poor ability in the spirit of St. Benedict of Nurcia, and with the pious will of St. Benedict of Anianes before mine eyes, to give succour and protection to all travellers and pilgrims, and all outlawed and persecuted persons, against the wild turbulence of nature, as well as against human ferocity and the violence and persecution of an ungodly world. You just now interrupted me in a godly discourse, my guests! I spoke of the Church's might and authority, which is now so scandalously assaulted by the blind children of this world in our ungodly times. I was inculcating the duties of our holy order on the children, and for the edification of my dependents, on occasion of the crying deeds of violence and injustice we daily hear of and see before our eyes. You have also surely heard how shamelessly and treacherously the king's men have dealt with the outlawed Count Jacob's men in Halland, and what an outrageous and arbitrary act the royal vassal, Jonas Fries, hath lately perpetrated here, on the boundary of my abbey's consecrated ground and territory?"
"What I have heard is almost past belief, pious Father Abbot," answered Brock; "but the matter is related very differently by the friends of freedom and those of despotism. Rumour hath indeed possibly exaggerated the stern vassal's despotic act."
"My fugitive guest, who sits there, can bear testimony to the truth," said the abbot. "The unhappy victim to the lawlessness and barbarity of that royal vassal was his good friend and comrade."
"It is as true as that I stand here," began the warrior-like personage in the monk's cloak, and rose from his seat. His accent sounded half-Norwegian; the combed-down hair slipped aside for an instant from his brow, and over his wild fiery eye a pair of bristly meeting eye-brows and a large red scar were visible. "Thus are law and justice now upheld in Denmark," he continued. "I had come down hither in reliance on truce and treaty, but truth and justice are no longer recognised, where the friends of freedom are outlawed. My comrade had saved my life, and freed me from a degrading captivity; he was, like myself, in the service of the Norwegian king. Three days since he was taken captive at my side in broad day-light, by Sir Jonas Fries himself, and dragged to his castle.--I escaped to the sanctuary of the abbey; but when I yesterday, with the pious abbot's men, would have liberated my unhappy comrade, we found him hanged, without law or sentence, on Jonas Fries's closed castle gate."
"Ha, indeed! the more madly they act the sooner they will have to account for it," exclaimed Brock, in a powerful martial tone, and striking his large battle sword against the flagged floor. "The master who hath such zealous servants may fare badly at last--that deed of violence shall prove a firebrand----"