Sometimes he would gaze down into the gardens below as if he were watching some one at whose folly he was thoroughly disgusted. Yet not a soul was to be seen. An attempt at geniality on our part was met in the most freezing manner. There was something really extraordinary about the man, and I incline to think he was either a patriot sustaining his country's honour by this simple means, or a person suffering from melancholy madness of a very aggravated type.
Even if he unlocked a door for us he studied the far distance till we had passed through. Then he re-locked the door and hurried on in front as if dreading we should ask him stupid questions. It may be he was horribly bored by this eternal round of the bulwarks with foolish tourists.
The longer we lingered on the ramparts of Carcassonne the more incredible it appeared that the town could ever be taken by the means of assault available in the thirteenth century. Yet taken we sadly knew that it was, and by Simon de Montfort!
That was virtually the end of the house of Toulouse and of the cause of the Albigenses.
The lower outer walls were as solid as they could be. Then between the outer and inner walls were stationed sentries and men-at-arms. But supposing these dangers to be overcome, and the foe to aspire to pass through the high inner walls, from whose battlements hundreds of arrows might be flying and boiling pitch be pouring, perhaps the assailant would rush up some cunning, wall-embedded staircase which seemed to promise access to the city or the ramparts. But instead of that it would turn out, after many windings and confused branchings, to be merely a blind passage fashioned thus on purpose to mislead an enemy and prevent his surprising the town. Moreover, even if the impossible were achieved and those vast walls scaled, there was still the castle or inner fortress, where the inhabitants could all collect in time of emergency and bid defiance to every foe except hunger and thirst.
THE RAMPARTS, CARCASSONNE.
By E. M. Synge.
Probably Count Raimon and his garrison expected to be able to hold out against de Montfort in spite of the invariable success of the latter. One can imagine with what ardour the preparations were made for the defence: every watch-tower and turret, every outlook and barbican haunted by anxious faces scanning the country.
And then the attack! The first assault was led by the prelates solemnly chanting the "Veni Creator," and the God of the Christians was called upon to fight on the side of slayers and torturers, of murderers of unarmed citizens and women and children. It was de Montfort who boasted: "Neither age nor sex have we spared; we have slain all!"