Goose-Skin—"Let them come! Oxhorns! I already feel bold and brave! So far from fearing danger, I would court it! Yes, I defy ye, giants, enchanters, and demons—dare to appear before me! Just dare!"
Mylio and Goose-Skin separate, the latter dancing and singing. Their journey to Languedoc is successfully made.
PART II.
THE ALBIGENSIAN HERETICS.
CHAPTER I.
THE PERFECT'S HOME.
Son of Joel, you have been made acquainted with the morals of the noble ladies, of the seigneurs and of the abbots of the north of Gaul. To judge by their ardor in undertaking the Crusade preached by Abbot Reynier against Languedoc, the country infected by a devilish heresy, as the monk said, they must be good Catholics. Oh, Fergan, my ancestor! A century ago, you had occasion to shudder at the sight of the gigantic butchery committed by the Crusaders in Jerusalem, where seventy thousand defenceless Saracens were massacred within two days. The monstrosities of the old Crusaders are now repeated in Gaul herself. A war of extermination has been declared by the Pope, not now against the Saracens, but against the sons of our own country. You shall now be acquainted with the morals of these heretics of Languedoc, these honest and industrious people upon whose heads all the furies are to be unchained.
Lavaur, a flourishing city of the country of Albigeois, lies not far from Albi. Sacrovir le Brenn, the son of Colombaik, and grandson of Fergan the Quarryman, who was a tanner like his father, amassed a little property and settled down with his wife and children near Lavaur towards the year 1060. There he purchased a small tract of land which he cultivated with the aid of his children. One of these died young; the other grew to manhood, married and had a son named Conan le Brenn, who was the father of Karvel the Perfect and Mylio the Trouvere.
The scene is placed in the humble but bright home of Karvel. The house is situated at the extreme end of one of the suburbs of Lavaur, a fortified town about seven leagues from Toulouse, the capital of the marquisate of the same name, whose titulary master now is Raymond VII.
Karvel exercises the profession of physician. He consolidated his father's heritage with a farmer who, together with his family, occupies one part of the house, while the other part is reserved to Karvel and his wife. Karvel is seated in a spacious chamber the narrow windows of which, made of small glass squares that are held fast in a frame of lead, open upon a meadow crossed by the river Agout. The Agout flows not far from the ramparts of Lavaur. A long table, littered with parchments, stands in the center of the chamber. On little shelves, ranged along the walls, are vases with leaves or flowers, or filled with bulbs of medicinal plants. In a corner is a stove over which several copper vessels, used in the distillation of certain herbs, are held over the fire by iron tripods. Morise, Karvel's wife, is attending to these, while Karvel himself, leaning over the table, is poring over some manuscripts on the art of healing.