The History of Chivalry Volume II Part 16

[Sidenote: But little martial chivalry in Italy.]

[Sidenote: Condottieri.]

The growth and developement of chivalry in subsequent times were checked by political circ.u.mstances. Of them the chief was the formation of the republics in the north of Italy during the twelfth century. The power of the feudal n.o.bility was far less than in any other country, and the n.o.bles were the humble allies of the towns.[229] The citizens trusted rather to the security of their fortifications than their own strength in the field, for their infantry could not resist the charges of Italian cavalry; and, except such n.o.bles as were in alliance with them, their force consisted of infantry. The superiority of the chivalric array of the various lords and feudal princes of Italy to the militia of the cities[230] was one great cause of that great political revolution,--the change of the republics into tyrannies. The power of knights over armed burghers having been experienced, and the towns not possessing in sufficient numbers a force of cavalry, the practice arose of hiring the service of bodies of lancers, who were commonly gentlemen of small fortune but of great pretensions, and who found war the readiest way of gratifying their proud and luxurious desires. In the fourteenth century another great change occurred in the military affairs of Italy. I shall lay it before my readers in the lucid diction of the English historian of that country. "The successive expeditions of Henry VII., of Louis of Bavaria, and of John of Bohemia, had filled Italy with numerous bands of German cavalry, who, on the retirement of their sovereigns, were easily tempted to remain in a rich and beautiful country, where their services were eagerly demanded, and extravagantly paid. The revolution in the military art, which in the preceding century established the resistless superiority of a mounted gens-d'armerie over the burgher infantry, had habituated every state to confide its security to bodies of mercenary cavalry; and the Lombard tyrants in particular, who founded their power upon these forces, were quick in discovering the advantage of employing foreign adventurers, who were connected with their disaffected subjects by no ties of country or community of language. Their example was soon universally followed, native cavalry fell into strange disrepute; and the Italians, without having been conquered in the field, unaccountably surrendered the decision of their quarrels and the superiority in courage and military skill, to mercenaries of other countries. When this custom of employing foreign troops was once introduced, new swarms of adventurers were continually attracted from beyond the Alps to reap the rich harvest of pay and booty which were spread before them. In a country so perpetually agitated by wars among its numerous states, they found constant occupation, and, what they loved more, unbridled licence. Ranging themselves under the standards of chosen leaders--the condottieri, or captains of mercenary bands,--they pa.s.sed in bodies of various strength from one service to another, as their terms of engagement expired, or the temptation of higher pay invited; their chieftains and themselves alike indifferent to the cause which they supported; alike faithless, rapacious, and insolent. Upon every trifling disgust they were ready to go over to the enemy: their avarice and treachery were rarely proof against seduction; and, though their regular pay was five or six times greater in the money of the age than that of modern armies, they exacted a large gratuity for every success. As they were usually opposed by troops of the same description, whom they regarded rather as comrades than enemies, they fought with little earnestness, and designedly protracted their languid operations to ensure the continuance of their emoluments. But while they occasioned each other little loss, they afflicted the country which was the theatre of contest with every horror of warfare: they pillaged, they burnt, they violated, and ma.s.sacred with devilish ferocity."[231]

Gradually these foreign condottieri, when not engaged in the service of any particular power, levied war like independent sovereigns; and Italy had fresh reason to repent the jealousy which had made her distrust her own sons. They fought with tenfold more fury now that the contest was no longer carried on by one troop of condottieri against another, but against the Italians themselves, to whom no tie of nature bound them; and so far was any cavaleresque generosity from mitigating the horrors of their wars, that one adventurer, Werner was his name, and Germany his country, declared, by an inscription which was blazoned on his corslet, that he was "the enemy of G.o.d, of pity, and of mercy." But the power of these foreign condottieri was not perpetual. Nature rose to vindicate her rights; and there were many daring spirits among the Italians, who, if not emulous of the fame, were jealous of the dominion of strangers. The company of Saint George, founded by Alberico de Barbiano, a marauding chief of Romagna, was the school of Italian generals. In the fifteenth century, the force of every state was led by an Italian, if not a native citizen; and when the Emperor Robert crossed the Alps with the gens-d'armerie of Germany, the Milanese, headed by Jacopo del Verme, encountered him near Brescia, and overthrew all his chivalry.

[Sidenote: Chivalry in the north of Italy.]

In northern Italy no knightlike humanities softened the vindictiveness of the Italian mind. Warriors never admitted prisoners to ransom. The annals of their contests are dest.i.tute of those graceful courtesies which shed such a beautiful l.u.s.tre over the contests of England and France. No cavalier ever thought of combating for his lady's sake, and a lady's favour was never blended with his heraldic insignia. There were no regular defiances to war as in other countries: honour, that animating principle of chivalry, was not known; the object of the conquest was regarded to the exclusion of fame and military distinction. Stratagems were as common as open and glorious battle; and private injuries were revenged by a.s.sa.s.sination and not by the fair and manly joust a l'outrance: and yet when a man pledged his word for the performance of any act, and wished his sincerity to be believed, he always swore by the parola di cavaliere, e non di cortigiano; so general and forcible was the acknowledgment of chivalry's moral superiority. I know nothing in the history of the middle ages more dark with crime than the wars of the Italians,--nothing that displays by contrast more beautifully the graces of chivalry; and yet the Italian condottieri were brave to the very height of valour. Before them the German chivalry quailed, as it had formerly done before the militia of the towns.

[Sidenote: Italians excellent armourers, but bad knights.]

In the deep feelings and ardent and susceptible imaginations of the Italians, chivalry, it might seem, could have raised her fairest triumph; but chivalry had no fellowship with a mercenary spirit, and sordid gain was the only motive of the Italian soldiers. Their acute and intelligent minds preceded most other people in military inventions. To them, in particular, is to be attributed the introduction of the long and pointed sword, against which the hauberk, or coat of mail, was no protection. They took the lead in giving the tone to military costume: they were the most ingenious people of Europe during the middle ages; and their superior skill in the mechanical arts was every where acknowledged. The reader of English history may remember, that in the reign of Richard II. the Earl of Derby, afterwards Henry IV., sent to Milan for his armour, on account of his approaching combat with Thomas, Duke of Norfolk. Sir Galeas, Duke of Milan, not only gave the messenger the best in his collection, but allowed four Milanese armourers to accompany him to England, in order that the Earl might be properly and completely accomplished. The Milanese armour preserved its reputation even in times when other countries had acquired some skill in the mechanical arts. In 1481 the Duke of Brittany purchased various cuira.s.ses at Milan; and in the accounts of jousts and tournaments frequent mention is made of the superior temper and beauty of Italian harness.[232]

[Sidenote: Chivalry in the south of Italy.]

In the south of Italy chivalry had a longer and brighter reign. Some of its customs were introduced by the Lombards when they established their kingdom at Beneventum; and others were planted by the Normans, that people of chivalric adventurousness. Knighthood was an order of the state of high consideration, and much coveted; but its glories were sometimes tarnished by the admission of unworthy members; and, in the year 1252, the Emperor Frederic II. was obliged to issue a decree, at Naples, forbidding any one to receive it who was not of gentle birth.

The most complete impression, however, of the chivalric character, on the minds of the Italians, was made by the house of Anjou, when Charles and his Frenchmen conquered Naples in 1266. The south of Italy seems to have been far less advanced in civilisation than the commercial towns of the north; but the Angevine monarchs made Naples one blaze of splendid luxury.

Nothing had been seen in Italy so brilliant as the cavalcade of Charles.

The golden collars of the French lords,--the surcoats and pennons, and plumed steeds of the knights,--the carriage of the Queen, covered with blue velvet, and ornamented with golden lilies,--surpa.s.sed in magnificence all former shows.[233] The entry of Charles was a festival; and on that occasion the honour of knighthood was conferred on all persons who solicited it. The kings of the house of Anjou pretended to revive the regulations of Frederic II.; but they soon relaxed them, and gave the military girdle to the commonalty who could not prove that their forefathers had been knights.

[Sidenote: Curious circ.u.mstances attending knighthood at Naples.]

When a person was invested at Naples, the bishop, or other ecclesiastic who a.s.sisted at the inauguration, not only commanded the recipient to defend the church, and regard the usual obligations of chivalry, but he exhorted him not to rise in arms against the King from any motive, or under any circ.u.mstances. This curious clause was added to the exhortation: "If you should be disloyal to your sovereign, to him who is going to make you a knight, you ought first to return him the girdle with which you are immediately to be honoured; and then you may make war against him, and none will reproach you with treachery; otherwise, you will be reputed infamous, and worthy of death." An instance of the fear of this imputation of treachery occurred when the Princes of Besignano and Melfi, the Duke of Atri, and the Count of Maddolini, returned to Louis XII., King of France, the collar of St. Michael, (with which he had honoured them,) when Ferdinand the Catholic took possession of the kingdom.[234]

Knighthood was much solicited, on account of its privileges, as well as of its t.i.tular distinction. It exempted the fortunate wearer from the payment of taxes, and gave him the power of enjoying the royal and n.o.ble amus.e.m.e.nt of the chase. But the Angevine monarchs were so prodigal in granting the honour of knighthood, that it ceased to be a distinction; and in the reign of the last princes of that house the order had degenerated into a vain and empty t.i.tle.

[Sidenote: Mode of creating knights in Italy generally.]

Such was the general state of chivalry in northern and southern Italy; but there were some circ.u.mstances common to every part of the peninsula. The n.o.bility invested each other with festive and religious ceremonies, with the bath[235], the watching of arms, and the sacred and military shows, or with a simple stroke of a sword, and the exhortation, "Sii un valoroso cavaliere," two ancient knights buckling on his golden spurs. In the year 1294, Azzo, Marquis of Este, was knighted by Gerard, Lord of Camino, at a public solemnity held at Ferrara. Cane, Lord of Verona, in 1328, gave the honour of knighthood to thirty-eight young n.o.bles, and presented them with golden belts, and beautiful war-horses.[236] In Italy there was the usual array of knights and squires, of cavalieri and scudieri; but I can find no mention of pages distinct from the squires, and attending their lords; except, indeed, they were the domicelli, or donzelli, who, however, are supposed by Muratori to have been the squires of n.o.ble rank. All the armour-bearers of the knights were not n.o.ble or of gentle birth, or we should not very often meet, in the Italian annalists of the middle ages, the expression "honourable squires."

In the fourteenth century knights had four t.i.tles, agreeably to the various modes of their creation:--Cavalieri Bagnati, or Knights of the Bath, who were made with the grandest ceremonies, and supposed, from their immersion, to be freed from all vice and impurity; the Cavalieri di Corredo, or those who were invested with a deep-green dress, and a golden garland; the Cavalieri di Scudo, or those who were created either by people or n.o.bility; and the Cavalieri d'Arme were those who were made either before or during battle.[237]

Many orders of knighthood were known in Italy: some (but their history is not interesting) were peculiar to it; and others, such as the order of the knights of Saint John and of the Temple, had their preceptories and commanderies in that country. And, to enlarge upon a circ.u.mstance alluded to in another place, it is curious to notice the dexterity with which chivalry accommodated itself to the manners and usages of any particular society. The commercial cities in the north of Italy vied in power with, and were superior in wealth to, the feudal n.o.bility. Chivalry was esteemed as a graceful decoration by every cla.s.s of men, and by none with more ardour than by new families, whom opulence had raised into civic consideration. The strictness of the principles of knighthood opposed their invest.i.ture; but those principles, were made to give way; and commercial pride was satisfied with the concession of aristocratical haughtiness, that the _sons_ of men in trade might become brothers of the orders of chivalry.

[Sidenote: Political use of knighthood.]

The decoration of simple knighthood, however, was given indiscriminately without regard to birth or station. Every city a.s.sumed the power of bestowing it; and after a great battle it was showered with indiscriminate profusion upon those who had displayed their courage, whether they were armed burghers or condottieri. And this was a wise measure of the Italian cities: for there was always an obligation expressed or implied on the part of knights of fidelity to the person from whom they received the honour.[238] It is amusing to observe, that, in the year 1378, a Florentine mob paused in its work of murder and rapine to play with the graceful ensigns of chivalry; and, in imitation of the power of the city, they insisted on investing their favourites with knighthood.

[Sidenote: Chivalric literature.]

Chivalry had, perhaps, greater influence on the literature and manners of the Italians than on their military usages. Wandering minstrels from France and Spain chaunted in the streets of Italy tales of warriors' deeds and lady-love, particularly the stories of Roland and Oliver, the paladins of Charlemagne, who were also the subject of song and recitation, even by the stage-players on the earliest theatre at Milan.[239] Much of the popular literature of Italy consisted of romances; and the chief topics of them were the exploits both in arms and amours of Charlemagne and his paladins: though on one occasion Buovo d'Antina, a hero of chivalry, who fought and loved prior to the time of those heroes, was the theme of Tuscan verse. The wars of Charlemagne and his paladins with the Saracens were afterwards sung by the n.o.bler muse of Pulci and Boiardo, and then by Ariosto, who, not confining himself to the common stores of romantic fiction, has borrowed as freely from the tales regarding Arthur and the British and Armoric knights as from those relating to Charlemagne and the peers of France, and has thrown over the whole the graceful mantle of Oriental sorcery. The chivalric duties of converting the heathens, of adoring the ladies, of fighting in the cause of heaven and woman, were thus presented to the minds of the Italians; and the Homer of Ferrara roused the courage, or softened into love or pity, the hearts of knights and ladies, by singing the wars and loves of days which his poetry rendered bright and golden.

[Sidenote: Chivalric sports.]

These were the literary amus.e.m.e.nts of Italy; the subjects of recitation in the baronial hall, and of solitary perusal in the lady's bower: with these works the Italians nourished their imaginations; and a chivalric taste was diffused over the manners of public and private life. The amus.e.m.e.nt of hawking, which, as we have seen, the fathers of chivalric Italy had introduced, was indulged in at every court; and the Ferrarese princes were generally attended in the field by a hundred falconers, so proud and magnificent was their display. Every great event was celebrated by a tournament or a triumphal show. Dante speaks of the tournament as the familiar amus.e.m.e.nt of the fourteenth century.

----"e vidi gir gualdane, Ferir torniamenti, e correr giostra."

Inferno, c. 22.

So early as the year 1166, on occasion of the interview between Frederic Barbarossa and Pope Alexander at Venice, chivalric and civic pomp celebrated their friendship. Two centuries afterwards, the recovery of Cyprus presented a fair opportunity for military display. Knights flocked to Venice from England, France, and every country of the West, and manifested their prowess in the elegant, yet perilous, encounter of the tournament. There was a pageant, or grand triumphal show, of a splendid procession of knights cased in steel, and adorned with the favours of the ladies. The scene-painter and the mechanist combined their talents to give an allegorical representation of the Christian's victory over Islamism: the knights moved amidst the scenic decorations, and by their gallant bearing swelled with n.o.ble pride the hearts of the spectators.

The sports of chivalry were so elegant and graceful that we might have supposed the refined Italians would have embraced them in all their circ.u.mstances. But the arena of the Coliseum, so admirably adapted for a tournament, was used for Moorish games. The matrons and virgins of Rome, arrayed in all their bravery, were seated in its ample galleries, and beheld, not a gallant and hurtless encounter between two parties of knights with lances of courtesy, but a succession of sanguinary conflicts between cavaliers and bulls. Only one solitary circ.u.mstance gave an air of chivalry to the scene, and prevents us from mingling the bull-feast of the Coliseum, on the 1st of September, 1332, with the horrid spectacles of cla.s.sic times. Each knight wore a device, and fancied himself informed by the spirit of chivalry, and the presence of the ladies. "I burn under the ashes," was the motto of him who had never told his pa.s.sion. "I adore Lavinia, or Lucretia," was written on the shield of the knight who wished to be thought the servant of love, and yet dared not avow the real name of his mistress.[240]

CHAP. VII.

ON THE MERITS AND EFFECTS OF CHIVALRY.

We are now arrived at that part of our subject where we may say with the poet,

"The knights are dust, And their good swords are rust: Their souls are with the saints, we trust."

With Italy the historical tracing ceases of that system of principles which for so many centuries formed or influenced the character of Europe.

Its rude beginnings may be marked in the patriarchal manners which preceded every known frame of artificial life, and have been shaped and modified by the legislator and the moralist. The ties of fraternity or companionship in arms, respect to elders, devotion to women, military education and military invest.i.ture, were the few and simple elements of chivalry, and in other times would have formed the foundation of other systems of manners. But a new and mighty spirit was now influencing the world, and bending to its purposes every principle and affection.

Christianity, with its sanct.i.ties and humanities, gave a form and character to chivalry. He who was invested with the military belt was no longer the mere soldier of ambition and rapine, but he was taught to couch his lance for objects of defence and protection, rather than for those of hostility. He was the friend of the distressed, of widows and orphans, and of all who suffered from tyranny and oppression. The doctrine of Christian benevolence, that all who name the name of Christ are brothers, gave beauty and grace to the principles of fraternity, which were the Gothic inheritance of knights, and therefore the wars of the middle ages were distinguished for their humanities. A cavalier was kind and courteous to his prisoner, because he saw in him a brother; and while the system of ancient manners would have limited this feeling to people of one nation, a knight did not bound his humanity by country or soil, for Christian chivalry was spread over most parts of Europe, and formed mankind into one band, one order of men. From the same principle all the courtesies of private life were communicated to strangers; and gentleness of manners, and readiness of service, expanded from a private distinction into an universal character. Since, by the Christian religion, woman was restored to the rank in the moral world which nature had originally a.s.signed her, the feelings of respect for the s.e.x, which were entertained in the early and unsophisticated state of Europe, were heightened by the new sanctions of piety. It was a principle, as well as a feeling and a love, to guard and cherish woman; and many of the amenities of chivalry proceeded from her mild influence and example.

The patriarchal system of manners, shaped and sanctioned by Christianity, formed the fabric of chivalry; and romance, with its many-coloured hues, gave it light and beauty. The early ages of Europe gaily moved in all the wildness and vigour of youth; imagination freshened and heightened every pleasure; the world was a vision, and life a dream. The common and palpable value of an object was never looked at, but every thing was viewed in its connection with fancy and sentiment. Prudence and calculation were not suffered to check n.o.ble aspirations: army after army traversed countries, and crossed the sea to the Holy Land, reckless of pain or danger: duties were not cautiously regarded with a view to limit the performance of them; for every principle was not only practised with zeal, but the same fervid wish to do well lent it new obligations. From these feelings proceeded all the graceful refinements, all the romance of chivalry: knighthood itself became a pledge for virtue; and as into the proud and lofty imagination of a true cavalier nothing base could enter, he did not hesitate to confide in the word of his brother of chivalry, on his pledging his honour to the performance of any particular action. There was no legal or other positive punishment consequent on the violation of his word; and, therefore, the matter being left to imagination and feeling, the contempt of his fellow-knights could be the only result of recreancy. The knight looked to fame as one of the guerdons of his toils: this value of the opinions of others taught him to dread shame and disgrace; and thus that fine sense of morality, that voluntary submission to its maxims which we call honour, became a part of knighthood.

The genius of chivalry was personal, inasmuch as each knight, when not following the banner of his sovereign, was in himself an independent being, acting from his own sense of virtue, and not deriving counsel from, or sharing opprobrium with, others. This independence of action exalted his character; and, nourished by that pride and energy of soul which belong to man in an early state of society, all the higher and sterner qualities of the mind,--dignity, uncompromising fidelity to obligations, self-denial, and generousness, both of sentiment and conduct,--became the virtues of chivalry.

All the religious devotion of a cavalier to woman existed in his mind, independently of, or superadded to, his oath of knighthood. She was not merely the object of his protection, but of his respect and idolatry. His love was the n.o.ble homage of strength to beauty. Something supernaturally powerful had been ascribed to her by the fathers of modern Europe; and this appeal to the imagination was not lost. In some ages and countries it reigned in all its religious force; in others it was refined into gentleness and courtesy: but every where, and at every time, the firmest confidence in woman's truth accompanied it, or supplied its stead; and the opinion of her virtue, which this feeling implied, had a corresponding influence on his own manners.

The triumph of chivalry over all preceding systems of opinions was complete, when imagination refined the fierceness of pa.s.sion into generous and gentle affection,--a refinement so perfect and beautiful, that subsequent times, with all their vaunted improvements in letters and civilisation, are obliged to revert their eyes to the by-gone days of the shield and the lance for the most pleasing and graceful pictures of lady-love.

From these elements, and by means of these principles, sprang the fair and goodly system of chivalry, which extended itself, as we have seen, over most of the states of Europe, blending with the strongest pa.s.sions and dearest affections of the heart, influencing the manners of private life, and often determining the character of political events. In England and France its power was most marked and decided; in Spain it was curiously blended with Oriental feelings; Germany was not much softened by its impressions; and in Italy the bitterness of private war admitted but few of its graces. It is difficult to define the precise period of its duration, for it rose in the mists and gloom of barbarism; and the moment of its setting was not regarded, for other lights were then playing on the moral horizon, and fixing the attention of the world. In the part, entirely historical, of the present work, the reader must have remarked, that sometimes the decay of chivalry was gradual, and not apparently occasioned by external means; while in other countries its extinction was manifestly hastened by causes which sprang not from any seeds of weakness in itself. But, viewing the subject in its great and leading bearings, it may be observed, that chivalry was coeval with the middle ages of Europe, and that its power ceased when new systems of warfare were matured, when the revival of letters was complete and general, and the reformation of religion gave a new subject for the pa.s.sions and imagination.

This attempt to describe a history of chivalry has proved, at least, that chivalry was no dream of poets and romancers, and that the feudal system was not the only form of real life during the middle ages. Sismondi, in his work on the Literature of the South, contends that chivalry was an ideal world. He then admits, that sometimes the virtues of chivalry were not entirely poetical fictions, but that they existed in the minds of the people, without, however, producing any effect on their lives. His reasons for his opinions are, that it is impossible to distinguish the countries where chivalry prevailed; that it is represented to us as remote both in time and place; and while one cla.s.s of authors give accounts of the general corruption of their age, writers of after times refer to those very days, and adorn them with every virtue and grace.

Now, much of this reasoning is erroneous. That past ages should be praised at the expence of the present is no uncommon a circ.u.mstance, whether in morals or poetry. We have proved that the countries where chivalry prevailed are clearly distinguishable, and the degree of its influence can likewise be marked. M. Sismondi does not argue as if he had been aware that there ever had existed such a writer as Froissart; who does not refer to old times for his pictures of arms and amours, but describes the chivalric character of his own age.

Notwithstanding the light and beauty which chivalry cast over the world, the system has been more frequently condemned than praised. The objectors have rested their opinion on a sentence, said to be witty, of an old English author, that errant knights were arrant knaves, or on a few pa.s.sages of reprehension which are scattered through the works of middle-age literature. Sainte Palaye has founded his condemnation of chivalry upon the remark of Pierre de Blois, a writer of the twelfth century, that the horses of knights groan under the burden, not of weapons, but of wine; not with lances, but cheeses; not with swords, but with bottles; not with spears, but with spits.[241] Not many years afterwards, John of Salisbury also says, that some knights appear to think that martial glory consists in shining in elegant dress, and attaching their silken garments so tightly to their body, that they may seem part of their flesh. When they ride on their ambling palfreys they think themselves so many Apollos. If they should unite for a martial chevisance, their camp will resemble that of Thais, rather than that of Hannibal.

Every one is most courageous in the banqueting hall, but in the battle he desires to be last. They would rather shoot their arrows at an enemy than meet him hand to hand. If they return home unwounded, they sing triumphantly of their battles, and declare that a thousand deaths hovered over them. The first places at supper are awarded to them. Their feasts are splendid, and engrossed by self-indulgence: they avoid labour and exercise like a dog or a snake. All the dangers and difficulties of chivalry they resign to those who serve them, and in the mean time they so richly gild their shields, and adorn their camps, that every one of them looks not a scholar but a chieftain of war.[242]

All this splenetic declamation involves charges of c.o.xcombry, luxury, and cowardice. That knights were often guilty of the first offence is probable enough, for all their minute attention to the form and fashion of armour could not but attach their minds too strongly to the effect of their personal appearance. Graced also with the scarf of his sovereign-mistress, the knight well might caracole his gallant steed with an air of self-complacency: but a censure on such matters comes with little propriety from monks, who, according to Chaucer, were wont to tie their beads under their chin with a true lover's knot.

The personal indulgence of the knights was not the luxury of the cloister,--idle, gross, and selfish,--but it was the high and rich joviality of gay and ardent souls. They were boon or good companions in the hall, as well as in the battle-field. If their potations were deep, they surely were not dull; for the wine-cup was crowned and quaffed to the honour of beauty; and minstrelsy, with its sweetest melodies, threw an air of sentiment over the scene. How long their repasts lasted history has not related: but we have seen, in the life of that great and mighty English knight, Sir Walter Manny, that when the trumpet sounded to horse, cavaliers overthrew, in gay disorder, every festival-appliance, in their impatience to don their harness, and mount their war-steeds; and we also saw that a cup of rich Gascon wine softened the pride and anger of Sir John Chandos, and, awakening in him the feelings of chivalric generosity, impelled him to succour the Earl of Pembroke. In sooth, at the festivals of cavaliers all the n.o.ble feelings of chivalry were displayed. In those hours of dilatation of the heart, no appeal was made in vain to the principles of knighthood.

Even so late as the year 1462, when the sun of chivalry was nearly set, at a high festival which the Duke of Burgundy gave, at Brussels, to the lords and ladies of the country, two heralds entered the hall, introducing a stranger, who declared that he brought with him letters of credence from the n.o.ble lady his mistress. The letters were then delivered by him to the officer of the Duke, who read them aloud. Their purport was, that the lady complained of a certain powerful neighbour, who had threatened to dispossess her of her lands, unless she could find some knight that, within a year, would successfully defend her against him in single combat.

The stranger then demanded a boon of the Duke; and His Grace, like a true son of chivalry, accorded it, without previously requiring its nature. The request was, that he should procure for the lady three knights, to be immediately trained to arms; that out of these three the lady should be permitted to choose her champion. Then, and not before, she would disclose her name. As soon as the stranger concluded, a burst of joyful approval rang through the hall. Three knights (and the famous b.a.s.t.a.r.d of Burgundy was of the number) immediately declared themselves candidates for the honour of defending the unknown fair. Their prowess was acknowledged by all the cavaliers present, and they affixed their seals to the articles.[243]