At the spot he had named, he found the page with the horse; but the sturdy groom, whose charge it was in the stable, stood there also, fully resolved to let no one mount him without sufficient authority: nor was it till the sight of the king's signet showed him in whose presence he stood, that he ceased his resistance. The groom, suddenly raised to an immense height, in his own conceit, by having become, in any way, a sharer in the king's secret, winked to the page, and held the stirrup while the monarch mounted.
Philip sprang into the saddle. Laying his finger on the aperture of the casque, to enjoin secrecy, and adding, in a stern tone, "On your life!" he turned his horse's head, and galloped away.
CHAPTER IV.
It is strange to read what countries once were, and to compare the pictures old chroniclers have handed down, with the scenes as they lie before us at present. In the neighbourhood of great capitals, however, it is, that the hand of man wages the most inveterate war with nature; and were I to describe the country through which Philip Augustus passed, as he rode quickly onward towards Mantes, the modern traveller who had followed that road would search his memory in vain for scenery that no longer exists. Deep marshes, ancient forests, many a steep hill and profound valley, with small scattered villages, "like angel visits, few and far between," surrounded the monarch on his onward way; and, where scarcely a hundred yards can now be traversed without meeting many and various of the biped race, Philip Augustus rode over long miles without catching a glimpse of the human form divine.
The king's heart beat high with the thoughts of seeing her he loved, were it but for one short casual glance at a distance; but, even independent of such feelings, he experienced a delight, a gladness, a freedom in the very knowledge that he was concealed from all the world; and that, while wrapped in the plain arms that covered him, he was liberated from all the slavery of dignity, and the importunity of respect. There was a degree of romance in the sensation of his independence, which we have all felt, more or less, at one time of our lives, even surrounded as we are by all the shackles of a most unromantic society, but which affected Philip to a thousandfold extent, both from his position as a king, and from the wild and chivalrous age in which he lived.
Thus he rode on, amidst the old shadowy oaks that overhung his path, meditating dreams and adventures that might almost have suited the knight of La Mancha, but which, in that age, were much more easily attainable than in the days of Cervantes.
Of course, all such ideas were much modified by Philip's peculiar cast of mind, and by his individual situation; but still the scenery, the sensation of being freed from restraint, and the first bland air, too, of the early spring, all had their effect; and as he had himself abandoned the tedious ceremonies of a court, his mind, in sympathy, as it seemed, quitted all the intricate and painful mazes of policy, to roam in bright freedom amidst the wilds of feeling and imagination.
Such dreams, however, did not produce a retarded pace, for it wanted little more than an hour to mid-day; a long journey of forty miles was before him, and his only chance of accomplishing his purpose was in arriving during those hours that Agnes might be supposed to wander alone in the forest, according to the account of the canon of St. Berthe's. Philip, therefore, spurred on at full speed, and, avoiding as much as possible the towns, arrived near the spot where Rosny now stands, towards three o'clock.
At that spot, the hills which confine the course of the Seine fall back in a semicircle from its banks, and leave it to wander through a wide rich valley for the distance of about half a league, before they again approach close to the river at Rolleboise.
There, however, the chalky banks become high and precipitous, leaving, in many places, but a narrow road between themselves and the water; though, at other spots, the river takes a wide turn away, and interposes a broad meadow between its current and the cliffs.