The Legend of Ulenspiegel Volume Ii Part 7

"See, Messires," said Lamme, "how piteous he looks. He hath no love for the wood, my friend Ulenspiegel."

"I love," replied Ulenspiegel, "to see a lovely ash all leafy, growing in the sunshine in all it's native verdure; but I hate to the death those ugly sticks of wood still bleeding their sap, stripped of branches, without leaves or twigs, of fierce aspect and harsh of acquaintance."

"Art thou ready?" asked the provost.

"Ready," repeated Ulenspiegel, "ready for what? To be beaten. No, I am not, and have no desire to be, master stock-meester. Your beard is red and you have a formidable air; but I am fully persuaded that you have a kind heart and do not love to maltreat a poor fellow like me. I must tell it you, I love not to do it or see it; for a Christian man's back is a sacred temple which, even as his breast, encloseth the lungs wherewith we breathe the air of the good G.o.d. With what poignant remorse would you be gnawed if a brutal stroke of the stick were to break me in pieces."

"Make haste," said the stock-meester.

"Monseigneur," said Ulenspiegel, speaking to the Prince, "nothing presses, believe me; first should this stick be dried and seasoned, for they say that green wood entering living flesh imparts to it a deadly venom. Would Your Highness wish to see me die of this foul death? Monseigneur, I hold my faithful back at Your Highness' service; have it beaten with rods, lashed with the whip; but, if you would not see me dead, spare me, if it please you, the green wood."

"Prince, give him grace," said Messire de Hoogstraeten and Dieterich de Schooenbergh. The others smiled pityingly.

Lamme also said:

"Monseigneur, Monseigneur, show grace; green wood it is pure poison."

The Prince then said: "I pardon him."

Ulenspiegel, leaping several times high in air, struck on Lamme's belly and forced him to dance, saying:

"Praise Monseigneur with me, who saved me from the green wood."

And Lamme tried to dance, but could not, because of his belly.

And Ulenspiegel treated him to both eating and drinking.

XII

Not wishing to give battle, the duke without truce or respite harried the Silent as he wandered about the flat land between Juliers and the Meuse, everywhere sounding the river at Hondt, Mechelen, Elsen, Meersen, and everywhere finding it filled with traps and caltrops to wound men and horses that sought to pa.s.s over by fording.

At Stockem, the sounders found none of these engines. The prince gave orders for crossing. The reiters went over the Meuse and held themselves in battle order on the other bank, so as to protect the crossing on the side of the bishopric of Liege; then there formed up in line from one bank to the other, in this way breaking the current of the river, ten ranks of archers and musketeers, among whom was Ulenspiegel.

He had water up to his thighs, and often some treacherous wave would lift him up, himself and his horse.

He saw the foot soldiers cross, carrying a powder bag upon their headgear and holding their muskets high in air: then came the wagons, the hackbuts, linstocks, culverins, double culverins, falcons, falconets, serpentines, demi-serpentines, double serpentines, mortars, double mortars, cannon, demi-cannon, double cannon, sacres, little field pieces mounted on carriages drawn by two horses, able to manoeuvre at the gallop and in every way like those that were nicknamed the Emperor's Pistols; behind them, protecting the rear, landsknechts and reiters from Flanders.

Ulenspiegel looked about to find some warming drink. The archer Riesencraft, a High German, a lean, cruel, gigantic fellow, was snoring on his charger beside him, and as he breathed he spread abroad the perfume of brandy. Ulenspiegel, spying for a flask on his horse's crupper, found it hung behind on a cord like a baldric, which he cut, and he took the flask, and drank rejoicing. The archer companions said to him:

"Give us some."

He did so. The brandy being drunk, he knotted the cord that held the flask, and would have put it back about the soldier's breast. As he lifted his arm to pa.s.s it round, Riesencraft awoke. Taking the flask, he would have milked his cow as usual. Finding that it gave no more milk, he fell into mighty anger.

"Robber," said he, "what have you done with my brandy?"

Ulenspiegel replied:

"Drunk it. Among soaking hors.e.m.e.n, one man's brandy is everybody's brandy. Evil is the scurvy stingy one."

"To-morrow I will carve your carcase in the lists," replied Riesencraft.

"We will carve each other," answered Ulenspiegel, "heads, arms, legs, and all. But are you not constipated, that you have such a sour face?"

"I am," said Riesencraft.

"You want a purge, then," replied Ulenspiegel, "and not a duel."

It was agreed between them that they should meet next day, mounted and accoutred each as he pleased, and should cut up each other's bacon with a short stiff sword.

Ulenspiegel asked that for himself the sword might be replaced by a cudgel, which was granted him.

In the meanwhile, all the soldiers having crossed the river and falling into order at the voice of the colonels and the captains, the ten ranks of archers also crossed over.

And the Silent said:

"Let us march on Liege!"

Ulenspiegel was glad of this, and with all the Flemings, shouted out:

"Long life to Orange, let us march on Liege!"

But the foreigners, and notably the High Germans, said they were too much washed and rinsed to march. Vainly did the prince a.s.sure them that they were going to a certain victory, to a friendly city; they would listen to nothing, but lit great fires and warmed themselves in front of them, with their horses unharnessed.

The attack on the city was put off till next day when Alba, greatly astonished at the bold crossing, learned through his spies that the Silent One's soldiers were not yet ready for the a.s.sault.

Thereupon, he threatened Liege and all the country round about to put them to fire and sword, if the prince's friends made any movement there. Gerard de Groesbeke, the bishop's catchpoll, armed his troopers against the prince, who arrived too late, through the fault of the High Germans, who were afraid of a little water in their stockings.

XIII

Ulenspiegel and Riesencraft having taken seconds, the latter said that the two soldiers were to fight on foot to the death, if the conqueror wished, for such were Riesencraft's conditions.

The scene of the conflict was a little heath.

Early in the morning, Riesencraft donned his archer's array. He put on his salade with the throat piece, without visor, and a mail shirt with no sleeves. His other shirt being fallen into pieces, he put it in his salade to make lint of it if need was. He armed himself with an arbalest of good Ardennes wood, a sheaf of thirty quarrels, with along dagger, but not with a two-handed sword, which is the archer's sword. And he came to the field of battle mounted upon his charger, carrying his war saddle and the plumed chamfron, and all barded with iron.

Ulenspiegel made up for himself an armament for a n.o.bleman; his charger was a donkey; his saddle was the petticoat of a gay wench, his plumed chamfron was of osier, adorned above with goodly fluttering shavings. His barde was bacon, for, said he, iron costs too much, steel is beyond price, and as for bra.s.s in these later days, they have made so many cannon out of it that there is not enough left to arm a rabbit for battle. He donned for headgear a fine salade that had not yet been devoured by the snails; this salade was surmounted by a swan's feather, to make him sing if he was killed.

His sword, stiff and light, was a good long, stout cudgel of pinewood, at the end of which there was a besom of branches of the same tree. On the left hand of his saddle hung his knife, which was of wood likewise; on the right swung his good mace, which was of elderwood, surmounted with a turnip. His cuira.s.s was all holes and flaws.

When he arrived in this array, at the field of the duel, Riesencraft's seconds burst out laughing, but he himself remained unbending from his sour face.