“I am content,” replied the Saracen. “For the rest, hitherto, I have kept my secret in a house with a lock, whose key is lost, and whose door is sealed. So let it be henceforth between us. The peace of Allah rest upon Melech Ric, and may he die among his kindred.” As he arose to leave the tent the voice of the muezzein was heard through the camp calling, “To prayer, to prayer.” The noble chief paused upon the threshold, and turning his face toward Mecca, bowed his forehead to the dust, and reverently repeated the Mohammedan blessing.
Early on the subsequent day, the Latins prepared for departure, and there remained only the last formalities of ratifying the treaty. As the two monarchs, disdaining the common obligation of an oath, advanced to the centre of that fair and flowery meadow, and extended their hands above the parchment, they seemed the representatives of Mohammedan superstition and Christian enthusiasm, and a prophetic eye might have read in the appearance of these leaders of the belligerent powers, that for a century had caused the earth to tremble beneath their tread, the character and the destiny of the nations which they represented. The form and countenance of the Saracen, erect and calm, but lithe and wary, with a certain air of majesty and repose, indicated a consciousness of the decay of youthful vigor, but a sense of compensation however in the resources of wisdom and skill laid up in the storehouse of experience, for the necessities of declining years. In the compact and muscular frame, and sparkling eyes of Richard, were expressed that reckless spirit of pursuit, that ardor of passion, enthusiasm of love, romance, and religion, that steady self-reliance, born of conscious strength and indomitable will, which characterized the growing nations of Europe, and finally gave the dominion of the world to the Anglo-Saxon race. Grasping each other’s hands, these two exponents of Oriental tactics and European chivalry mutually pledged their faith to the treaty, and parted less like deadly foes, than faithful friends, who hoped to meet again.
CHAPTER XI.
| “He that can endure To follow with allegiance a fallen lord, Doth conquer him that did his master conquer, And earns a place i’ the story.” |
On his arrival at Acre, Richard learned that the friends of Conrad accused him as the instigator of the assassination, and that reports had been conveyed to Europe impeaching his honor as a king, and his fame as a warrior. Deeming it unsafe to attempt the passage in the Trenc-the-mere, he committed Berengaria and her ladies again to the care of Stephen de Turnham and his faithful Blondel, and saw them safely embarked for Navarre, Sept. 29, 1192. The following month, having provided for the safe return of the soldiers and pilgrims who had accompanied him on his fruitless expedition, he himself last of all, in the disguise of a Templar, sailed from the port of Acre. As the rocky heights of Lebanon and the lofty summit of Carmel faded from his view, he stretched his hands towards the receding shores, and while tears streamed from his eyes, prayed aloud, “Oh Holy Land, I commend thee to God; and, if his heavenly grace shall grant me so long to live, I trust that I shall return according to his good pleasure, and set thee free from all thine enemies.”
The voyage proved more disastrous than was common, even in those days of unpractised navigation. Many of the English vessels were wrecked upon the shores of Africa, others fortunately reached friendly ports whence the warriors returned by land to Britain. Six weeks after his departure from Acre, the vessel of Richard encountered a pirate ship off the coast of Barbary. Learning from the commander that his misfortunes had become known, and that the French lords were prepared to seize him as soon as he should land in Marseilles, he determined, as his ship was already unseaworthy, to pass up the Adriatic, and make his way through Germany. Landing not far from Venice with six companions, he pursued his route to the north. But news of the dispersion of his fleet had already reached Germany, and orders had been issued, that all travellers should be closely interrogated. His companions were arrested; but the monarch escaped, attended only by a boy who understood the language of the country, and conducted him to houses of entertainment, unfrequented by persons of rank. Thus resting by day and travelling by night, they reached the borders of the Danube. Secure in his disguise, the king began to enjoy the frank hilarity and hearty cheer of the inn kitchen, and with a good nature appropriate to his assumed character, assisted in the preparations for the evening repast. A loitering spy observing a costly jewel upon the finger of the pretended friar, at once reported the suspicious circumstance to the governor. A company of soldiers were immediately despatched to arrest him, the leader of which was an Austrian who had served under him in Palestine. The house was searched, and the landlord subjected to a close scrutiny concerning harboring a man of the description of the hunted monarch. “There be no such person here,” indignantly exclaimed the boor, “unless it be the Templar in the kitchen roasting fowls.” The officers immediately followed the hint, and surprised the fictitious palmer with the spit in his hand. The Austrian cavalier recognized, at once, the herculean frame and ruddy countenance of the king. “It is he. Seize him,” cried he to his minions. Notwithstanding a valiant resistance, Richard was overborne by numbers and conveyed to the castle of Tenebreuse, where for several months all trace of him was lost.
Meanwhile the vessel containing the princesses arrived safely at Naples, whence they journeyed to Rome. The enmity of Philip, and vague reports concerning the shipwreck of her husband, so terrified Berengaria that she remained here under the protection of the pope till the ensuing spring. During the carnival, the services of the royal ladies were in requisition for a brilliant masquerade. The affair, involving an uncommon call for bijouterie, the queen found no little amusement in searching the shops of the jewellers in pursuit of appropriate decorations. On one of these excursions her attention was attracted by the appearance of a boy clad in mean apparel who was offering a valuable jewel for sale. The eagerness and suspicion with which the shopman regarded it excited her curiosity, and stepping forward she recognized the signet ring of Richard. Hastily purchasing the precious talisman she ordered the youth to follow her, intending to question him further concerning his master; but when she reached her apartments, he had disappeared. She sent messengers in every direction, and caused the most searching inquiries to be made, but all in vain; he was nowhere to be found. Her anxiety for the fate of Richard, found vent in fruitless exertions and floods of tears. The mysterious circumstances reawakened all her superstitious apprehensions. She was convinced that the fatal ring which she had so foolishly given and so weakly allowed him to retain, had finally accomplished his prediction, “betrayed him to his direst foe, or drowned him in the sea.” At one moment she bewailed him as dead, at the next upbraided her friends for neglecting to deliver him from the dungeon in which she was positive the Duke of Austria had confined him. Blondel, whose devotion to his royal friend equalled her own, set off at once under the character of a wandering minstrel in search of his master.
At length the pope, moved by Berengaria’s distress, placed her under the escort of Count Raimond of Toulouse, the hero of the tournament, who, with a strong guard, conducted the queens across the country to Navarre. The valiant Raimond soon found it an easier and pleasanter task to soothe the mind of the lovely Joanna, than to listen to the unavailing complaints of the despairing Berengaria, and so resigned did he become to his grateful duties, that before they reached the end of their journey he had become a candidate for the office during life of sympathizer and protector.