He then signed the treaty, and Aya returned with it to the imperial camp.
A crowd was assembled on the bridge in Paris, for the news had gone abroad that the famous Bayard was to be drowned. Kaiser Karl was there also with his paladins.
BAYARD’S DEATH
The noble horse was led to the middle of the bridge, with iron weights fastened to its feet, and at a signal was suddenly pushed over the edge, and fell with a splash into the Seine. In spite of the weights upon its legs, it rose to the surface, once, twice, thrice.
“That horse is the devil incarnate,” cried the emperor furiously. “Ha, Count Reinold, beware, its eyes are fixed on you; if you are keeping it alive by any enchantment, it will be the worse for you. I will tear up the treaty.”
With a low cry of terror Aya flung her arms round her son, drawing down his head, so that he did not see how Bayard rose a fourth time, and then, not seeing its master’s face, sank, to rise no more.
The hero felt that all his happiness was gone with Bayard. He thrust his mother aside, flung at the emperor’s feet the letters patent entitling him to his fiefs, and breaking his sword Flammberg, threw it into the Seine, muttering,—
“Lie there with my Bayard, and may God forget to be gracious to me, if I ever mount a horse or draw a sword again.”
Then he turned, and fled into the depths of the wild forest, until at last he sank exhausted on the ground. There he remained for two days and a night, overwhelmed and mad with misery.