The Wolfe of Badenoch: A Historical Romance of the Fourteenth Century

by Sir Thomas Dick Lauder

The pursuivant at the end of the lists where the Knight of [[314]]Cheviot appeared, now responded to him who had given forth the challenge.

“Oyez! oyez! oyez! The gallant Knight of Cheviot is here, and ready to answer the darreigne of the good squire, Mortimer Sang.”

“Laissez les aller” cried the herald from the platform under the Royal balcony; the trumpet sounded, and the barriers at both ends of the lists were immediately dropped.

The lists, as was very commonly the case in those times, were double; that is to say, they were divided towards the middle, for about two-fourths of their length, by a longitudinal barrier of wood of about four feet high. This was for the purpose of separating the horses of the combatants from each other, to save them from injury; for each knight, taking a different side of the wooden wall, ran his career close to it, and tilted at his adversary over it, without risk of the steeds meeting in shock, as in the undivided lists.

No sooner were the barriers withdrawn, than Mortimer Sang spurred his courser, sprang forward, and swept along like a whirlwind. The huge animal ridden by the gigantic and ponderous Knight of Cheviot was slow in getting into motion, and came on blowing and snorting, with a heavy lumbering gallop, that shook the very ground. The esquire had already ridden along one-half of the wall of division ere his antagonist had reached a third of the distance. His lance was firmly and truly pointed against the immense body that approached, and every eye was intently watching for the issue of a joust that promised to be unexampled in the annals of chivalry. Both steeds were steadily maintaining the line in which each had started. The enormous tilting-lance of the knight, as it came on, resembled the bolt-sprit of some vessel driven before the wind, and, blunt though it was, the annihilation of the esquire appeared certain to the spectators. The collision was within a few yards of taking place, when, to the astonishment of all, the Knight of Cheviot suddenly dropped his lance, and, seizing the bridle of his charger with both hands, exerted all his strength to pull him aside, and succeeded in making him bolt away from the thrust of his opponent. That it was an intentional effort and no accident was evident to every one. A general hiss, mingled with loud hootings broke, from the balconies and galleries. Mortimer Sang, exasperated at the shameful and cowardly conduct of him on whom he had so sanguinely hoped to prove his prowess, checked the straight course of his horse’s career, and, sweeping around in a narrow circle, ran him at the wooden barrier, and, leaping [[315]]him desperately over it, rode furiously, lance in rest, against the dastard Knight of Cheviot, who had hardly yet reined up his steed.

Shouts of applause followed this spirited manoeuvre of Sang’s. The base knight heard them, looked around, beheld the esquire coming, and began immediately to fly towards the gates of the lists. “Halt,” cried Mortimer aloud, “halt, thou craven. What! fearest thou a blunt lance? Halt, thou mountain of Cheviot, halt, I say, that I may climb to thine uppermost peak to tweak thee by the nose, that I may pluck thy prickly crest from thy foggy head, and stick it beneath the tail of the draff-horse that beareth thee; halt, coward, that I may forthwith blot out thy rising sun, that thou mayst no more dare to shine.”

But the Knight of Cheviot stayed not to look behind him. His legs played upon the sides of his horse like some piece of powerful machinery, and he spurred off as if the devil had been after him, the animal exhibiting a pace which no one could have believed was in him. The marshalmen would have stopped him in his way to the gate, but to have essayed to arrest the progress of a huge rock, just parted from the summit of some lofty Alp, and spinning along the plain with all the impetus derived from its descent, could not have been a more irrational or more hopeless attempt, or one more pregnant with certain destruction to those who made it. The way was cleared before him; but the gate was shut. Neither horse nor man seemed to regard the obstruction, however; it appeared as if both were influenced by the same blind fear. They ran against it with so great an impetus, that its strong bars and rails yielded before the shock, and were strewed upon the plain. Away flew the fugitive across the Meads, and on Sang urged furiously after him. The shouts from the lists were redoubled. Down rushed crowds of the populace from the scaffolds, and away they poured with a hue and cry after the chase.

The flying giant had much the start of Sang, but the superior speed of the squire’s well-bred courser was fast lessening this advantage. It was in vain that he attempted to double and wheel, for Sang, cutting sharply round, only gained the more on him. He stretched his course straight for the forest, but all saw that he must be speedily overtaken. Sang neared him, and couching his lance, planted himself firmly in his saddle. A single bound of his horse brought him within reach of the knight, and giving him an alert and vigorous push in the rear with his blunt weapon, he threw his unwieldy body forward on his horse’s neck, so that, encumbered by the weight, the animal stumbled [[316]]a step or two, and then losing his fore legs, rolled himself and hurled his rider forward upon the sod.

Ancient Æsop hath told us of a certain tortoise, that, being carried into the clouds by an eagle, was dropped thence on a rock. It is easy to conceive how the various compartments of the creature’s natural armour must have been rent from each other by the fall. So it was with the Knight of Cheviot. The descent of such a mountain was no light matter. Large as his armour was, its various pieces were far from meeting each other over the immense limbs and joints they should have enclosed; and the leathern latchets which laced them together being somewhat aged, they, and even the rivets, gave way with the shock; and the fastenings of the helmet and of the different plates bursting asunder, and there being no shirt of mail beneath them, the Knight of Cheviot lay sprawling among the ruins of his defences, in a black jerkin and hauselines. The active Sang would have been upon him in a trice, but, filled with astonishment, he reined up his steed and halted to wonder. Nor was superstitious fear altogether without its influence in arresting him in his first intention of seizing the dastard impostor, who had thus disgraced the name of knight, as well as the lists in which he had dared to show himself, and of having him dragged to that summary punishment inflicted on such occasions by the laws of chivalry. His eyes stared with an amazement that was almost incredulous of the reality of what they beheld. He whom he saw struggling on the ground was the wizard, Ancient Haggerstone Fenwick, whom he had once accidentally seen at Norham, and of whose supernatural powers he had then heard enough to fill him now with temporary awe, at this his unexpected appearance. Sang raised his own vizor and rubbed his eyes, and when he saw that it was really the face and figure of the Ancient which he beheld, he for a moment suspected that it was some demoniacal trick of enchantment that had been played him to rob him of the fame he had hoped to earn. Rage got the better of every feeling of superstition.

“Ha!” exclaimed he, “be’st thou wizard or devil, I’ll wrestle with thee;” and flinging himself from his horse, he strode towards the struggling Knight of Cheviot.