"But hear ye," said the Provost-Marshal, "this young fellow belongs not to you, and cannot share what you call your privileges."
"What well call our privileges, all shall admit to be such," said Cunningham.
"We will not hear them questioned!" was the universal cry of the Archers.
"Ye are mad, my masters," said Tristan l'Hermite – "No one disputes your privileges; but this youth is not one of you."
"He is my nephew," said the Balafré, with a triumphant air.
"But no Archer of the Guard, I think," retorted Tristan l'Hermite.
The Archers looked on each other in some uncertainty.
"Stand to it yet, comrade," whispered Cunningham to Balafré – "Say he is engaged with us."
"Saint Martin! you say well, fair countryman," answered Lesly; and, raising his voice, swore that he had that day enrolled his kinsman as one of his own retinue.
This declaration was a decisive argument.
"It is well, gentlemen," said the Provost Tristan, who was aware of the King's nervous apprehension of disaffection creeping in among his Guards – "You know, as you say, your privileges, and it is not my duty to have brawls with the King's Guards, if it is to be avoided. But I will report this matter for the King's own decision; and I would have you to be aware, that, in doing so, I act more mildly than perhaps my duty warrants me."
So saying, he put his troop into motion, while the Archers, remaining on the spot, held a hasty consultation what was next to be done.
"We must report the matter to Lord Crawford, our Captain, in the first place, and have the young fellow's name put on the roll."
"But, gentlemen, and my worthy friends and preservers," said Quentin, with some hesitation, "I have not yet determined whether to take service with you or no."
"Then settle in your own mind," said his uncle, "whether you choose to do so, or be hanged – for I promise you, that, nephew of mine as you are, I see no other chance of your 'scaping the gallows."
This was an unanswerable argument, and reduced Quentin at once to acquiesce in what he might have otherwise considered as no very agreeable proposal; but the recent escape from the halter, which had been actually around his neck, would probably have reconciled him to a worse alternative than was proposed.
"He must go home with us to our caserne," said Cunningham; "there is no safety for him out of our bounds, whilst these man-hunters are prowling about."
"May I not then abide for this night at the hostelry where I breakfasted, fair uncle?" said the youth – thinking, perhaps, like many a new recruit, that even a single night of freedom was something gained.
"Yes, fair nephew," answered his uncle, ironically, "that we may have the pleasure of fishing you out of some canal or moat, or perhaps out of a loop of the Loire, knit up in a sack, for the greater convenience of swimming – for that is like to be the end on't. – The Provost-Marshal smiled on us when we parted," continued he, addressing Cunningham, "and that is a sign his thoughts were dangerous."
"I care not for his danger," said Cunningham; "such game as we are beyond his bird-bolts. But I would have thee tell the whole to the Devil's Oliver, who is always a good friend to the Scottish Guard, and will see Father Louis before the Provost can, for he is to shave him to-morrow."
"But hark you," said Balafré, "it is ill going to Oliver empty-handed, and I am as bare as the birch in December."
"So are we all," said Cunningham – "Oliver must not scruple to take our Scottish words for once. We will make up something handsome among us against the next pay-day; and if he expects to share, let me tell you, the pay-day will come about all the sooner."
"And now for the Chateau," said Balafré; "and my nephew shall tell us by the way how he brought the Provost-Marshal on his shoulders, that we may know how to frame our report both to Crawford and Oliver."[12]
CHAPTER VII. THE ENROLMENT.
Justice of Peace.
– Here, hand me down the Statute – read the articles –
Swear, kiss the book – subscribe, and be a hero;
Drawing a portion from the public stock
For deeds of valour to be done hereafter –
Sixpence per day, subsistence and arrears.
An attendant upon the Archers having been dismounted, Quentin Durward was accommodated with his horse, and, in company of his martial countrymen, rode at a round pace towards the Castle of Plessis, about to become, although on his own part involuntarily, an inhabitant of that gloomy fortress, the outside of which had, that morning, struck him with so much surprise.
In the meanwhile, in answer to his uncle's repeated interrogations, he gave him an exact account of the accident which had that morning brought him into so much danger. Although he himself saw nothing in his narrative save what was affecting, he found it was received with much laughter by his escort.
"And yet it is no good jest either," said his uncle, "for what, in the devil's name, could lead the senseless boy to meddle with the body of a cursed misbelieving Jewish Moorish pagan?"
"Had he quarrelled with the Marshals-men about a pretty wench, as Michael of Moffat did, there had been more sense in it," said Cunningham.
"But I think it touches our honour, that Tristan and his people pretend to confound our Scottish bonnets with these pilfering vagabonds' tocques and turbands, as they call them," said Lindesay – "If they have not eyes to see the difference, they must be taught by rule of hand. But it's my belief, Tristan but pretends to mistake, that he may snap up the kindly Scots that come over to see their kinsfolks."
"May I ask, kinsman," said Quentin, "what sort of people these are of whom you speak?"
"In troth you may ask," said his uncle, "but I know not, fair nephew, who is able to answer you. Not I, I am sure, although I know, it may be, as much as other people; but they have appeared in this land within a year or two, just as a flight of locusts might do."[13]
"Ay," said Lindesay, "and Jacques Bonhomme, (that is our name for the peasant, young man, – you will learn our way of talk in time,) – honest Jacques, I say, cares little what wind either brings them or the locusts, so he but knows any gale that would carry them away again."
"Do they do so much evil?" asked the young man.
"Evil? – why, boy, they are heathens, or Jews, or Mahommedans at the least, and neither worship Our Lady nor the Saints" – (crossing himself) – "and steal what they can lay hands on, and sing, and tell fortunes," added Cunningham.
"And they say there are some goodly wenches amongst these women," said Guthrie; "but Cunningham knows that best."
"How, brother!" said Cunningham; "I trust ye mean me no reproach?"
"I am sure I said ye none," answered Guthrie.
"I will be judged by the company," said Cunningham. – "Ye said as much as that I, a Scottish gentleman, and living within pale of holy church, had a fair friend among these off-scourings of Heathenesse."
"Nay, nay," said Balafré, "he did but jest – We will have no quarrels among comrades."
"We must have no such jesting then," said Cunningham, murmuring as if he had been speaking to his own beard.
"Be there such vagabonds in other lands than France?" said Lindesay.
"Ay, in good sooth, are there – tribes of them have appeared in Germany, and in Spain, and in England," answered Balafré. "By the blessing of good Saint Andrew, Scotland is free of them yet."
"Scotland," said Cunningham, "is too cold a country for locusts, and too poor a country for thieves."
Note 12
Gipsies or Bohemians. In a former volume of this edition of the Waverley Novels, (Guy Mannering,) the reader will find some remarks on the gipsies as they are found in Scotland. But it is well known that this extraordinary variety of the human race exists in nearly the same primitive state, speaking the same languge, in almost all the kingdoms of Europe, and conforming in certain respects to the manners of the people around them, but yet remaining separated from them by certain material distinctions, in which they correspond with each other, and thus maintain their pretensions to be considered as a distinct race. Their first appearance in Europe took place in the beginning of the fifteenth century, when various bands of this singular people appeared in the different countries of Europe. They claimed an Egyptian descent, and their features attested that they were of Eastern origin. The account given by these singular people was, that it was appointed to them, as a penance, to travel for a certain number of years. This apology was probably selected as being most congenial to the superstitions of the countries which they visited. Their appearance, however, and manners, strongly contradicted the allegation that they travelled from any religious motive.
Their dress and accoutrements were at once showy and squalid; those who acted as captains and leaders of any horde, and such always appeared as their commanders, were arrayed in dresses of the most showy colours, such as scarlet or light green; were well mounted; assumed the title of dukes and counts, and affected considerable consequence. The rest of the tribe were most miserable in their diet and apparel, fed without hesitation on animals which had died of disease, and were clad in filthy and scanty rags, which hardly sufficed for the ordinary purposes of common decency. Their complexion was positively Eastern, approaching to that of the Hindoos.
Their manners were as depraved as their appearance was poor and beggarly. The men were in general thieves, and the women of the most abandoned character. The few arts which they studied with success, were of a slight and idle, though ingenious description. They practised working in iron, but never upon any great scale. Many were good sportsmen, good musicians, and masters, in a word, of all those trivial arts, the practice of which is little better than mere idleness. But their ingenuity never ascended into industry. Two or three other peculiarties seem to have distinguished them in all countries. Their pretensions to read fortunes, by palmistry and by astrology, acquired them sometimes respect, but oftener drew them under suspicion as sorcerers; and lastly, the universal accusation that they augmented their horde by stealing children, subjected them to doubt and exercration. From this it happened, that the pretension set up by these wanderers, of being pilgrims in the act of penance, although it was at first admitted, and in many instances obtained them protection from the governments of the countries through which they travelled, was afterwards totally disbelieved, and they were considered as incorrigible rogues and vagrants; they incurred almost everywhere sentence of banishment, and, where suffered to remain, were rather objects of persecution than of protection from the law.
There is a curious and accurate account of their arrival in France in the Journal of a Doctor of Theology, which is preserved and published by the learned Pasquier. The following is an extract: - "On August 27th, 1427, came to Paris twelve penitents, Penanciers, (penance doers,) as they called themselves, viz. a duke, an earl, and ten men, all on horseback, and calling themselves good Christians. They were of Lower Egypt, and gave out that, not long before, the Christians had subdued their country, and obliged them to embrace Christianity on pain of being put to death. Those who were baptized were great lords in their own country, and had a king and queen there. Soon after their conversion, the Saracens overran the country, and obliged them to renounce Christianity. When the Emperor of Germany, the King of Poland, and other Christian princes, heard of this, they fell upon them, and obliged the whole of them, both great and small, to quit the country, and go to the Pope at Rome, who enjoined them seven years' penance to wander over the world, without lying in a bed.
"They had been wandering five years when they came to Paris first; the principal people, and soon after the commonalty, about 100 or 120, reduced (according to their own account) from 1000 or 1200, when they went from home, the rest being dead, with their king and queen. They were lodged by the police at some distance from the city, at Chapel St. Denis.
"Nearly all of them had their ears bored, and wore two silver rings in each, which they said were esteemed ornaments in their country. The men were black, their hair curled; the women remarkably black, their only clothes a large old duffle garment, tied over the shoulders with a cloth or cord, and under it a miserable rocket. In short, they were the most poor miserable creatures that had ever been seen in France; and, notwithstanding their poverty, there were among them women who, by looking into people's hands, told their fortunes, and what was worse, they picked people's pockets of their money, and got it into their own, by telling these things through airy magic, et cætera."
Notwithstanding the ingenious account of themselves rendered by these gipsies, the Bishop of Paris ordered a friar, called Le Petit Jacobin, to preach a sermon, excommunicating all the men and women who had had recourse to these Bohemians on the subject of the future, and shown their hands for that purpose. They departed from Paris for Pontoise in the month of September.
Pasquier remarks upon this singular journal, that however the story of a penance savours of a trick, these people wandered up and down France, under the eye, and with the knowledge, of the magistrates, for more than a hundred years; and it was not till 1561, that a sentence of banishment was passed against them in that kingdom.
The arrival of the Egyptians (as these singular people were called) in various parts of Europe, corresponds with the period in which Timur or Tamerlane invaded Hindostan, affording its natives the choice between the Koran and death. There can be little doubt that these wanderers consisted originally of the Hindostanee tribes, who, displaced, and flying from the sabres of the Mahommedans, undertook this species of wandering life, without well knowing whither they were going. It is natural to suppose the band, as it now exists, is much mingled with Europeans, but most of these have been brought up from childhood among them, and learned all their practices.
It is strong evidence of this, that when they are in closest contact with the ordinary peasants around them, they still keep their language a mystery. There is little doubt, however, that it is a dialect of the Hindostanee, from the specimens produced by Grellman, Hoyland, and others, who have written on the subject. But the author has, besides their authority, personal occasion to know that an individual, out of mere curiosity, and availing himself with patience and assiduity of such opportunities as offered, has made himself capable of conversing with any gipsy whom he meets, or can, like the royal Hal, drink with any tinker in his own language. The astonishment excited among these vagrants on finding a stranger participant of their mystery, occasions very ludicrous scenes. It is to be hoped this gentleman will publish the knowledge he possesses on so singular a topic.
There are prudential reasons for postponing this disclosure at present; for although much more reconciled to society since they have been less the objects of legal persecution, the gipsies are still a ferocious and vindictive people.
But notwithstanding this is certainly the case, I cannot but add, from my own observation of nearly fifty years, that the manners of these vagrant tribes are much ameliorated; - that I have known individuals amongst them who have united themselves to civilized society, and maintain respectable characters, and that great alteration has been wrought in their cleanliness and general mode of life.
Note 13
See Note on the Gipsies or Bohemians, end of preceding Chapter.