Though now, by the departure of her husband, she was to be freed from his rigorous superintendence, and obtain free scope to execute her labours of love in secret or openly, when and where it pleased her, yet she loved her imperious husband so faithfully and sincerely, that she could not part from him without the deepest sorrow. Ah! she foreboded but too well, that in this world she should not see him any more. And for the enjoyment of him in the other, the aspect of affairs was little better. A canonised Saint has such preferment there, that all other Saints compared with her are but a heavenly mob.
High as the Landgraf had been stationed in this sublunary world, it was a question whether, in the courts of Heaven, he might be found worthy to kneel on the footstool of her throne, and raise his eyes to his former bedmate. Yet, many vows as she made, many good works as she did, much as her prayers in other cases had availed with all the Saints, her credit in the upper world was not sufficient to stretch out her husband's term a span. He died on this march, in the bloom of life, of a malignant fever, at Otranto, before he had acquired the knightly merit of chining a single Saracen. While he was preparing for departure, and the time was come for him to give the world his blessing, he called Count Ernst from among his other servants and vassals to his bedside; appointed him commander of the troops which he himself had led thus far, and made him swear that he would not return till he had thrice drawn his sword against the Infidel. Then he took the holy viaticum from the hands of his marching chaplain; and ordering as many masses for his soul, as might have brought himself and all his followers triumphantly into the New Jerusalem, he breathed his last. Count Ernst had the corpse of his lord embalmed: he enclosed it in a silver coffin, and sent it to the widowed lady, who wore mourning for her husband like a Roman Empress, for she never laid her weeds aside while she continued in this world.
Count Ernst of Gleichen forwarded the pilgrimage as much as possible, and arrived in safety with his people in the camp at Ptolemais. Here, it was rather a theatrical emblem of war than a serious campaign that met his view. For as on our stages, when they represent a camp or field of battle, there are merely a few tents erected in the foreground, and a little handful of players scuffling together; but in the distance many painted tents and squadrons to assist the illusion, and cheat the eye, the whole being merely intended for an artificial deception of the senses; so also was the crusading army a mixture of fiction and reality. Of the numerous heroic hosts that left their native country, it was always the smallest part that reached the boundaries of the land they had gone forth to conquer. But few were devoured by the swords of the Saracens. These Infidels had powerful allies, whom they sent beyond their frontiers, and who made brisk work among their enemies, though getting neither wages nor thanks for their good service. These allies were, Hunger and Nakedness, Perils by land and water and among bad brethren, Frost and Heat, Pestilence and malignant Boils; and the grinding Home-sickness also fell at times like a heavy Incubus upon the steel harness, and crushed it together like soft pasteboard, and spurred the steed to a quick return. Under these circumstances, Count Ernst had little hope of speedily fulfilling his oath, and thrice dyeing his knightly sword in unbelieving blood, as must be done before he thought of returning. For three days' journey round the camp, no Arab archer was to be seen; the weakness of the Christian host lay concealed behind its bulwarks and entrenchments; they did not venture out to seek the distant enemy, but waited for the slow help of his slumbering Holiness, who, since the wakeful night that gave rise to this Crusade, had enjoyed unbroken sleep, and about the issue of the Holy War had troubled himself very little.
In this inaction, as inglorious to the Christian army, as of old that loitering was to the Greeks before the walls of bloody but courageous Troy, where the godlike Achilles, with his confederates, moped so long about his fair Briseis,—the chivalry of Christendom kept up much jollity and recreation in their camp, to kill lazy time, and scare away the blue devils; the Italians, with song and harping, to which the nimble-footed Frenchmen danced; the solemn Spaniards with chess; the English with cock-fighting; the Germans with feasting and wassail.
Count Ernst, taking small delight in any of these pastimes, amused himself with hunting; made war on the foxes in the dry wildernesses, and pursued the shy chamois into the barren mountains. The knights of his train "disagreed" with the glowing sun by day, and the damp evening air under the open sky, and sneaked to a side when their lord called for his horses; therefore, in his hunting expeditions, he was generally attended only by his faithful Squire, named the mettled Kurt, and a single groom. Once, his eagerness in clambering after the chamois, had carried him to such a distance, that the sun was dipping in the Mid-sea wave before he thought of returning; and, fast as he hastened homewards, night came upon him at a distance from the camp. The appearance of some treacherous ignes fatui, which he mistook for the watch-fires, led him off still farther. On discovering his error, he resolved to rest beneath a tree till daybreak. The trusty Squire prepared a bed of soft moss for his lord, who, wearied by the heat of the day, fell asleep before he could lift his hand to bless himself, according to custom, with the sign of the cross. But to the mettled Kurt there came no wink of sleep, for he was by nature watchful like a bird of darkness; and though this gift had not belonged to him, his faithful care for his lord would have kept him waking. The night, as usual in the climate of Asia, was serene and still; the stars twinkled in pure diamond light; and solemn silence, as in the Valley of Death, reigned over the wide desert. No breath of air was stirring, yet the nocturnal coolness poured life and refreshment over herb and living thing. But about the third watch, when the morning star had begun to announce the coming day, there arose a din in the dusky remoteness, like the voice of a forest stream rushing over some steep precipice. The watchful squire listened eagerly, and sent his other senses also out for tidings, as his sharp eye could not pierce the veil of darkness. He hearkened, and snuffed at the same time, like a bloodhound, for a scent came towards him as of sweet-smelling herbs and trodden grass, and the strange noise appeared to be approaching. He laid his ear to the ground, and heard a trampling as of horses' hoofs, which led him to conclude that the Infernal Chase was hunting in these parts. A cold shudder passed over him, and his terror grew extreme. He shook his master from sleep; and the latter, having roused himself, soon saw that here another than a spectral host was to be fronted. Whilst his groom girded up the horses, the Count had his harness buckled on in all haste.
The dim shadows gradually withdrew, and the advancing morning tinted the eastern hem of the horizon with purple light. The Count now discovered, what he had anticipated, a host of Saracens approaching, all equipped for fight, to snatch some booty from the Christians. To escape their hands was hopeless, and the hospitable tree in the wide solitary plain gave no shelter to conceal horse and man behind it. Unluckily the massy steed was not a Hippogryph, but a heavy-bodied Frieslander, to which, by reason of its make, the happy talent of bearing off its master on the wings of the wind had not been allotted; therefore the gallant hero gave his soul to the keeping of God and the Holy Virgin, and resolved on dying like a knight. He bade his servants follow him, and sell their lives as dear as might be. Thereupon he pricked the Frieslander boldly forward, and dashed right into the middle of the hostile squadron, who had been expecting no such sudden onset from a single knight. The Pagans started in astonishment, and flew asunder like light chaff when scattered by the wind. But seeing that the enemy was only three men strong, their courage rose, and there began an unequal battle, in which valour was surpassed by number. The Count meanwhile kept plunging yarely through the ranks; the point of his lance gleamed death and destruction to the Infidel; and when it found its man, he flew inevitably from his saddle. Their Captain himself, who ran at him with grim fury, his manly arm laid low, and with his victorious spear transfixed him writhing in the dust, as St. George of England did the Dragon. The mettled Kurt went on with no less briskness; though availing little for attack, he was a master in the science of dispatching, and sent all to pot who did not make resistance; as a modern critic butchers the defenceless rabble of the lame and halt, who venture with such courage in our days into the literary tilt-yard: and if now and then some fainting invalid, with furious aim, like an exasperated Reviewer-hunter, did hurl a stone at him with enfeebled fist, he heeded it little; for he knew well that his basnet and iron jack would turn a moderate thump. The groom, too, did his best to make clear ground about him, and kept his master's back unharmed. But as nine gad-flies will beat the strongest horse; four Caffre bulls an African lion; and, by the common tale, one troop of mice an archbishop, as the Mäusethurm, or Mouse-tower, on the Rhine, by Hübner's account, gives open testimony; so the Count of Gleichen, after doing knightly battle, was at length overpowered by the number of his enemies. His arm grew weary, his lance was shivered into splinters, his sword became blunt, and his Friesland horse at last staggered down upon the gory battle-field. The Knight's fall was the watch-word of victory; a hundred valiant arms stormed in on him to wrench away his sword, and his hand had no longer any strength for resistance. As the mettled Kurt observed the Knight come down, his own courage sank also, and along with it the pole-axe, wherewith he had so magnanimously hammered in the Saracenic skulls. He surrendered at discretion, and pressingly entreated quarter. The groom stood in blank rumination; bore himself enduringly; and awaited with oxlike equanimity the stroke of some mace upon his basnet, which should crush him to the ground.
But the Saracens were less inhuman victors than the conquered could have expected; they disarmed their three prisoners of war, and did them no bodily harm whatever. This mild usage took its rise not in any movement of philanthropy, but in mere spy's-mercy: from a dead enemy there is nothing to be learnt, and the special object of this roaming troop had been to get correct intelligence about the state of matters in the Christian host at Ptolemais. The captives, being questioned and heard, were next, according to the Asiatic fashion, furnished with slave-fetters; and as a ship was just then lying ready to set sail for Alexandria, the Bey of Asdod sent them off with it as a present to the Sultan of Egypt, to confirm at Court their description of the Christian resources and position. The rumour of the bold Frank's valour had arrived before him at the gates of Grand Cairo; and so pugnacious a prisoner might, on entering the hostile metropolis, have merited as pompous a reception as the Twelfth of April saw bestowed upon the Comte de Grasse in London, where the merry capital emulously strove to let the conquered sea-hero feel the honour which their victory had done him: but Moslem self-conceit allows no justice to foreign merit. Count Ernst, in the garb of a felon, loaded with heavy chains, was quietly locked into the Grated Tower, where the Sultan's slaves were wont to be kept.
Here, in long painful nights, and mournful solitary days, he had time and leisure to survey the grim stony aspect of his future life; and it required as much steadfastness and courage to bear up under these contemplations, as to tilt it on the battle-field among a wandering horde of Arabs. The image of his former domestic happiness kept hovering before his eyes; he thought of his gentle wife, and the tender shoots of their chaste love. Ah! how he cursed the miserable feud of Mother-church with the Gog and Magog of the East, which had robbed him of his fair lot in existence, and fettered him in slave-shackles never to be loosed! In such moments he was ready to despair altogether; and his piety had well-nigh made shipwreck on this rock of offence.
In the days of Count Ernst there was current, among anecdotic persons, a wondrous story of Duke Henry the Lion, which at that period, as a thing that had occurred within the memory of man, found great credence in the German Empire. The Duke, so runs the tale, while proceeding over sea to the Holy Land, was, in a tempest, cast away upon a desert part of the African coast; where, escaping alone from shipwreck, he found shelter and succour in the den of a hospitable Lion. This kindness in the savage owner of the cave had its origin not in the heart, but in the left hind-paw; while hunting in the Libyan wilderness, he had run a thorn into his foot, which so tormented him, that he could hardly move, and had entirely forgotten his natural voracity. The acquaintance being formed, and mutual confidence established between the parties, the Duke assumed the office of chirurgeon to the royal beast, and laboriously picked out the thorn from his foot. The patient rapidly recovered, and, mindful of the service, entertained his lodger with his best from the produce of his plunder; and, though a Lion, was as friendly and officious towards him as a lap-dog.
The Duke, however, soon grew weary of the cold collations of his four-footed landlord, and began to long for the flesh-pots of his own far-distant kitchen; for in readying the game handed in to him, he by no means rivalled his Brunswick cook. Then the home-sickness came upon him like a heavy load; and seeing no possibility of ever getting back to his paternal heritage, the thought of this so grieved his soul, that he wasted visibly, and pined like a wounded hart. Thereupon the Tempter, with his wonted impudence in desert places, came before him, in the figure of a little swart wrinkled manikin, whom the Duke at first sight took for an ourang-outang; but it was the Devil himself, Satan in proper person, and he grinned, and said: "Duke Henry, what ails thee? If thou trust to me, I will put an end to all thy sorrow, and take thee home to thy wife to sup with her this night in the Castle of Brunswick; for a lordly supper is making ready there, seeing she is about to wed another man, having lost hope of thy life."