He spurred his horse on to a quicker pace. The wood became thicker, and heavy clouds were sailing towards the moon. It was intensely dark; the pine-trees had assumed a strange weird look, and everything was silent around. Willingly would Master Spazzo now have listened to the voice of the cuckoo, but the nightly disturber of peace had flown away, and the solitary rider began to shiver.
An unshapely cloud now stealthily approached the moon, and had soon covered her up entirely. Then, Master Spazzo recollected that his nurse had told him in his early infancy, how the bad wolf Hati and Monagarm the moon-dog, persecuted the radiant astre. Looking up, he clearly recognised, both wolf and moon-dog in the sky. They had just taken hold with their teeth, of the gentle comforter of belated travellers;--Master Spazzo was convulsed with pity. He drew his sword.
"Vince luna! conquer, oh moon!" cried he, at the top of his voice, and rattling his sword against his greaves. "Vince luna, vince luna!"
His cries were loud, and his jingling metal sounded fierce enough, but the cloud-monsters did not loosen their hold on the moon; only the chamberlain's horse became frightened, and galloped at full speed through the dark wood with him.
When Master Spazzo awoke on the next morning, he found himself lying at the foot of the Hunnic mound. On the meadow, he saw his mantle, whilst his black steed Falada, was indulging in a morning walk, at some distance. The saddle was hanging down on one side, and the reins were torn. Falada, however, was eating the young grass and flowers with evident enjoyment. Slowly the exhausted man lifted his head, and looked about yawning. The convent-tower of Reichenau was mirrored in the distant lake, as peacefully as if nothing whatever had happened. He tore up a bunch of grass, and held the dewy blades to his forehead. "Vince luna!" said he with a bitter sweet smile. He had got a racking headache.
CHAPTER XIX.
[Burkhard the Cloister-Pupil.]
Rudimann the cellarer, was no bad logician. A roll of parchment-leaves in the jaws of a salmon, must beget curiosity. Whilst Master Spazzo had been drinking the cloister-wine, his mistress and Praxedis sat in their private room, spelling out Gunzo's libel. Ekkehard's pupils had learned enough Latin to understand the chief part, and what remained grammatically obscure, they guessed at, and what they could not guess, they interpreted as well as they could. Praxedis was indignant.
"Is the race of scholars then everywhere like that at Byzantium?" exclaimed she. "First, a gnat is metamorphosed into an elephant, and then a great war is made against the self-created monster! The present from the Reichenau is as sour as vinegar," puckering up her lovely mouth, just as when she had tasted Wiborad's crab-apples.
Dame Hadwig was beset by strange feelings. A certain something told her, that the spirit which pervaded Gunzo's libel was not a good one, and yet she felt some satisfaction at Ekkehard's humiliation.