“Let us see the cause of this cursed clamor,” he said. “Here is a letter which has just been brought in, and, if I mistake not, it is in Saxon.”
He looked at it, turning it round and round as if he had some hopes of coming at the meaning by inverting the position of the paper, and then handed it to De Bracy.
“It may be magic spells for aught I know,” said De Bracy, who possessed his full proportion of the ignorance which characterized the chivalry of the period.
“Give it to me,” said the Templar. “We have that of the priestly character that we have some knowledge to enlighten our valor.”
“Let us profit by your most reverend knowledge, then,” returned De Bracy. “What says the scroll?”
“It is a formal letter of defiance,” answered Bois-Guilbert; “but, by our Lady of Bethlehem, if it be not a foolish jest, it is the most extraordinary [v]cartel that ever went across the drawbridge of a baronial castle.”
“Jest!” exclaimed Front-de-Boeuf. “I would gladly know who dares jest with me in such a matter! Read it, Sir Brian.”
The Templar accordingly read as follows:
“I, Wamba, the son of Witless, jester to a noble and free-born man, Cedric of Rotherwood, called the Saxon: and I, Gurth, the son of Beowulph, the swineherd—”
“Thou art mad!” cried Front-de-Boeuf, interrupting the reader.