Philip Augustus; or, The Brothers in Arms

by G. P. R. James

For some way, the traveller rode on in quiet, seeming to exercise himself in giving additional ugliness to his features, by screwing them into every sort of form, till he became aware that he was watched by a party of men, whose appearance had nothing in it very consolatory to the journeyer of those days.

The road through the valley was narrow; the hills, rising rapidly on each side, were steep and rugged; and the party which we have mentioned was stationed at some two or three hundred yards before him, consisting of about ten or twelve archers, who, lurking behind a mass of stones and bushes, seemed prepared to impose a toll upon the highway through the valley.

The traveller, however, pursued his journey, though he very well comprehended their aim and object, nor did he exhibit any sign of fear or alarm beyond the repeated wriggling of his nose, till such time as he beheld one of the foremost of the group begin to fit an arrow to his bowstring, and take a clear step beyond the bushes. Then, suddenly reversing his position on the horse, which was proceeding at an easy canter, he placed his head on the saddle, and his feet in the air; and in this position advanced quietly on his way, not at all unlike one of those smart and active gentlemen who may be seen nightly in the spring-time circumambulating the area of Astley's Amphitheatre.

The feat which he performed, however simple and legitimate at present, was quite sufficiently extraordinary in those days, to gain him the reputation of a close intimacy with Satan, even if it did not make him pass for Satan himself.

The thunderstruck archer dropped his arrow, exclaiming, "'Tis the devil!" to which conclusion most of his companions readily assented. Nevertheless, one less ceremonious than the rest started forward and bent his own bow for the shot. "If he be the devil," cried he, "the more reason to give him an arrow in his liver: what matters it to us whether he be devil or saint, so he have a purse?" As he spoke, he drew his bow to the full extent of his arm, and raised the arrow to his eye. But at the very moment the missile twanged away from the string, the strange horseman we have described let himself fall suddenly across his mare, much after the fashion of a sack of wheat, and the arrow whistled idly over him. Then, swinging himself up again into his natural position, he turned his frightful countenance to the routiers, and burst into a loud horse-laugh that had something in its ringing coppery tone truly unearthly.

"Fools!" cried he, riding close up to the astonished plunderers. "Do you think to hurt me? Why, I am your patron saint, the Devil. Do not you know your lord and master? But, poor fools, I will give you a morsel. Lay ye a strong band between Vic le Comte and the lake Pavin, and watch there till ye see a fine band of pilgrims coming down. Skin them! skin them, if ye be true thieves. Leave them not a besant to bless themselves!"

Here one of the thieves, moved partly by a qualm of conscience, partly by bodily fear at holding a conversation with a person he most devoutly believed to be the Prince of Darkness, signed himself with the cross,--an action, not at all unusual amongst the plunderers of that age, who, so far from casting off the bonds of religion at the same time that they threw off all the other ties of civil society, were often but the more superstitious and credulous from the very circumstances of their unlawful trade. However, no sooner did the horseman see the sign, than he affected to start. "Ha!" cried he. "You drive me away; but we shall meet again, good friends--we shall meet again, and trust me, I will give you a warm reception. Haw, haw, haw, haw!" and, contorting his face into a most horrible grin, he poured forth one of his fiendlike laughs, and galloped off at full speed.

"Jesu Maria!" cried one of the routiers, "it is the fiend certainly--I will give him an arrow, for heaven's benison!" But whether it was that the bowman's hand trembled, or that the horseman was too far distant, certain it is, he rode on in safety, and did not even know that he had been again shot at.

"I will give the half of the first booty I make to our lady of Mount Ferrand," cried one of the robbers, thinking to appease Heaven and guard against Satan, by sharing the proceeds of his next breach of the decalogue with the priest of his favourite saint.

"And I will lay out six sous of Paris on a general absolution!" cried another, whose faith was great in the potency of papal authority.