Vanished Halls and Cathedrals of France

by George Wharton Edwards

"In Satan's name, Sir Golden Locks!" answered St. Amand scornfully, "thou hast a tongue like a ranting priest. What right hast thou to wear a sword, pray?—I have no mind for canticles to-day!"

Loud laughed the troop of cavaliers at this, and then was heard the voice of the rider in black from the South, whose great horse champed the bit and tossed its head restlessly.

"Come, let us away, St. Amand! What care have we for monastery bells and sniveling priests!—Let us to the noble chase for mass, with sound of the winding horn for organ note!"

"Well said, Sir Red Crest," replied St. Amand, with a loud laugh and a wave of his gauntleted hand. "Ventre son gris! Let us away then!"

The whole troop sprang forward at the word. Over the hills, through the ravines and deep ditches, and into the dark woods, ever rode the strangers, one at the right and one at the left of St. Amand. On the right, the fair young golden haired knight, and on the left, the black clad sinister man with the crimson hood.

All at once appeared among the great trunks of the beech trees an antlered deer white as the driven snow, which after one startled look at the furiously riding troop of men, sped away like the wind. With winding horn the hunters pursued it over the green meadows and up and down the hills, trampling corn fields and peasant gardens under foot all unmindful of what ill they did. Naught counted for these men but the chase, and ever St. Amand headed the band, and on his right rode the fair young blonde rider from the North and on his left the swarthy knight from the South.

Finally, with trembling limbs the antlered deer slackened its speed before the open door of a chapel in the midst of the wildwood. Here stood the frightened animal, its fur flicked with bloody foam, unable to stir a step further. From the open door of the chapel stepped a holy friar, who placed a sheltering arm about the panting animal's neck, and stood with uplifted arm warning back the band of hunters. In vain did the fairhaired stranger plead with Amand to spare the deer, for the jeering voice of the knight of the scarlet hood urged him on, and dismounting from his horse Count St. Amand pushed aside the monk and was about to run the animal through with his hunting knife, when there came a burst of thunder sound that shook the earth as though the heavens had fallen.

The Count was stunned: When he came to himself he was alone in a clear space in the forest; the chapel, the deer, the monk, all his band, including the two strangers, had vanished as though they had never been. Over all was a terrible silence. When St. Amand attempted to call, no sound came from his parched lips. Then came a blinding flash of lightning, which split the darkness, and on the wings of the rushing wind he heard a terrible voice in judgment.—"Even as thou hast flouted and mocked at the Lord thy God, and have had no compassion upon man nor beast, so shalt thou fly before the wrath of the Most High! Pass on then, thou accursed Knight, forever be thou the hunted by evil spirits until the end of the world!"

"And so," continues the legend, "since that day the wraith of that sinful Count St. Amand has haunted these hills and dales by night, and these great caverns underneath by day, the fiends of hell at his heels. After him fly these hideous fiends, driving him ever on towards the judgment that waits him on the last day."

As may be surmised, with such tales as this to hold over the youth of the valleys, the people hereabouts were most devout and God fearing. Here in this region have raged battles innumerable from the earliest days of history, with fire, famine and pestilence. It was all prosperous, when I last saw it, and charming to look upon. But now the beautiful orchards have been cut down by the invader, the homesteads have been burned, and the once happy peasants transported to hard labor in another country.