Far along the view, forest towered over forest, and sloping meadows, dotted with cottages, succeeded shelving fields, golden with wheat, or gay with vines; while many a pleasant hill-side arose from amid the embowering woods, with the peaceful summit sleeping in the sun-light, and the straight shadows of the still noon resting along the depths of the valley, from which it greenly ascended.
Along the edge of the horizon, amid the tall peaks of the far-off mountains, summer clouds, vast and gorgeous, lay basking in the sunlight, with their fantastic forms, of every hue and shape—now dark, now bright, now golden, now gray, and again white as the new-fallen snow—all clearly and delicately relieved by the back-ground of azure, transparent and glassy as the sky of some voluptuous dream.
The hour was still and solemn, with the peculiar silence and solemnity of the high noon; the broad banner floated heavily from the loftiest tower of the castle, unruffled by a whisper of the wind; and along the court-yard, and throughout the castle, a death-like silence reigned, which betokened any thing save the presence of numerous bodies of armed men within the castle walls.
The sentinels who waited at the castle gate, rested indolently upon their pikes, and glancing over the spacious court-yard, marked, with a look of discontent, the absence of all signs of animation from those walls which had so often rung with sounds of gay carousal and shouts of merriment. All was still and solemn where, in days by-gone, not a sound had awoke the echoes of the time-darkened walls save the loud laugh of the careless reveller, the merry carol of the minstrel, or the glee-song of the banquet hall.
A footstep—a mailed and booted footstep—broke the silence of the air, and presently, appearing from the shadow of the lofty hall door of the castle, a stout and strong-limbed soldier emerged into the light of the sun. As he descended the steps of stone, he paused for a moment, and glanced around the court-yard. Stout, without being bulky in figure, the person of the yeoman was marked by broad shoulders, a chest massive and prominent, arms that were all bone and muscle, and legs that discovered the bold and rugged outline of strong physical power, hardened by fatigue and toil.
He raised his cap of buff, surmounted by a dark plume, and plated with steel, from his brow, and the sunbeams fell upon a rugged countenance, darkened by the sun, and seamed by innumerable wrinkles, with a low, yet massive forehead, a nose short, straight, yet prominent, a wide mouth, with thin lips, and cheek-bones high and bold in outline, while his clear blue eyes, with their quick and varying glance, afforded a strange contrast to his toil-hardened and sunburnt features. Around his throat, and over his prominent chin, grew a thick and rugged beard, dark as his eyebrows in hue, while his hair, slightly touched by age, and worn short and close, gave a marked outline to his head, that completed the expression of dogged courage and blunt frankness visible in every lineament of his countenance.
Attired in doublet and hose of buff, defended by a plate of massive steel on the breast, with smaller plates on each arm and leg, the yeoman wore boots of slouching buckskin, while a broad belt of darkened leather, thrown over his manly chest, supported the short, straight sword, which depended from his left side.
Having glanced along the court-yard, and marked the sentinels waiting lazily beside the castle gate, the yeoman’s eye wandered to the banner which clung heavily around the towering staff, and then depositing his cap on his head with an air of discontent, as he again surveyed the castle yard—
“St. Withold!” he cried, in a voice as rugged as his face—“St. Withold! but some foul spell of the fiend’s own making has fallen upon these old walls! All dull—all dead—all leaden! Even yon flag, which kissed the breeze of the Holy Land, not three months agone, looks dull and drowsy. ‘Slife! a man might as well be dead as live in this manner. No feasting—no songs—no carousing! Ugh! A pest take it all, I say! No jousts—no tournaments—no mellays! The foul fiend take it, I say; and Sathanas wither the heathen hand that winged the poisoned javelin at my knightly Lord—Julian, Count of this gallant castle Di Albarone! The foul fiend wither the hand of the paynim dog, I say!”
“Ha, ha, ha! my good Robin,” laughed a clear and youthful voice, “by my troth, thou’rt sadly out of temper! What has ruffled thee, my buff-and-buckskin? Holy Mary—what a face!”