CHAPTER XLIII.
A ROYAL VISIT.
THE countenance of the King of France did not belie his heart. He was sad, and much more dejected than when he was in captivity and chains at Mansourah, bullied by the Saracens, and threatened with the bernicles. Nor was there any affectation in his continuing to wear the cross on his shoulder; as he proved, sixteen years later, when he undertook his ill-fated expedition to Tunis, and died, on a bed of ashes, amid the ruins of Carthage, looking up to heaven, and exclaiming with his latest breath, 'I will enter into Thy house; I will worship in Thy holy tabernacle!'
Meanwhile the saint-king appeared inconsolable, and refused to be comforted. Even the affectionate welcome accorded him by his people failed to dispel his gloom or cheer his soul. Day and night he brooded over his defeats and disasters, and sighed dolefully as his memory recalled the humiliation to which, in his person, the cause of Christianity had been exposed at the hands of the Moslem.
Fortunately, at that time, Henry, King of England, being at Bordeaux, offered Louis a visit; and the saintly monarch, rousing himself to welcome his royal brother-in-law, made preparations for his reception. Moreover, when Henry's approach was announced, Louis mounted and went forth to meet his guest; and, ere long, the King of England with a magnificent train appeared in sight.
Henry was considerably older than Louis. Indeed, he had now attained the age of forty-seven. But his frame was vigorous; he had always enjoyed robust health; and, as he had taken life easily, time and trouble had not wrought so much havoc on him as on the French monarch. He was of the middle height, and compactly built, and would have been accounted handsome, but that one of his eyelids hung down in such a way as to conceal part of the eyeball, and rather spoiled a face which otherwise would have been pleasant to look upon. But, such as his person was, Henry did not neglect its adornment. He had all a Plantagenet's love of splendour, and the gorgeousness of his dress was such as to excite the wonder of his contemporaries. By his right hand rode his spouse, Eleanor of Provence, sister of the Queen of France, no longer young, but still preserving, in face and form, much of the beauty and grace which, twenty years earlier, made the name of the second daughter of Raymond Berenger celebrated at the courts of Europe.
Behind the King and Queen of England, on a black steed, which he bestrode with remarkable grace, rode their son, Edward, taller by the head and shoulders than other tall men, and already, though not out of his teens, renowned as one of the bravest and handsomest princes in Christendom. With him was his very juvenile wife, Eleanor of Castille, whom he had recently espoused at Burgos, and brought over the Pyrenees to Bordeaux, on his way to England.
But the procession did not stop here; for, as the chronicler tells us, 'the King of England had in his own retinue a thousand handsome horses, ridden by men of dignity and rank, besides waggons and sumpter cattle, as well as a large number of choice horses, so that the unusual novelty of the array caused great astonishment to the French.'