The Rival Heirs Part 41

"I know not. An hour ago I thought no power on earth could make me; but we have each suffered wrongs."

"Ye have."

"I do forgive, then; requiescat in pace."

"So shall it be well with thee before G.o.d," said the good prelate.

So Wilfred was buried in the vaults of St. Frideswide's church. The Archbishop Lanfranc celebrated the funeral ma.s.s. It was noticed with surprise that Bishop Geoffrey absented himself from the function and the subsequent burial rites.

The week ended, as all weeks come to an end. Lanfranc had gone to Canterbury. The Conqueror, a.s.sured by trusty reporters of the death of Wilfred, rejoiced that so satisfactory an accident had befallen, sparing all publicity and shame to one he could but admire, as he ever admired pluck and devotion.

Geoffrey alone remained a guest at a monastic foundation hard by St. Frideswide's.

The midnight bell has struck twelve--or, rather, has been struck twelve times by the s.e.xton, in the absence of machinery.

All is silence and gloom in the church of St. Frideswide, and upon the burial ground around.

Three m.u.f.fled figures stand in a recess of the cloisters.

"This is the door," said the s.e.xton; "but, holy St. Frideswide, to go down there tonight!"

"Thou forgettest I am a bishop; I can lay spirits if they arise."

The s.e.xton stood at the open door--a group of the bishop's retainers farther off--that iron door which never opened to inmate before.

Geoffrey and the Jew advanced to the grave, amidst stone coffins and recesses in the walls, where the dead lay, much as in the catacombs.

They stopped before a certain recess.

There, swathed in woollen winding sheets, lay the mute form of Wilfred of Aescendune.

"Let him see thee when he arises. The sight of this deathly place may slay him. He will awake as from sleep. Take this sponge--bathe well the brow; how the aromatic odour fills the vaults!"

A minute--no result. Another.

"Dog, hast thou deceived me and slain him? If so, thou shalt not escape."

"Patience," said the Jew.

A heavy sigh escaped the sleeper.

"Thank G.o.d, he lives," said the bishop.

"Where am I? Have I slept long?"

"With friends--all is well.

"Cover his face; now bear him out to the air."

A barque was leaving the ancient port of Pevensey, bound for the east. Two friends--one in the attire of a bishop, and a youth who looked like a recent convalescent--stood on the deck.

"Farewell to England--dear England," said the younger.

"Thou mayest revisit it after thou hast fulfilled thy desire to pray at thy Saviour's tomb, and to tread the holy soil His sacred Feet have trodden; but it must be years hence."

"My best prayers must be for thee."

"Tut, tut, my child; thy adventures form an episode I love to think of. See, Beachy Head recedes; anon thou shalt see the towers of Coutances Cathedral across the deep."

CHAPTER XXV. IN THE FOREST OF LEBANON.

Thirty years had pa.s.sed away since the events recorded in our last chapter, and the mighty Conqueror himself had gone to render an account of his stewardship to the Judge of all men.

The thoughts and aspirations of all Christian people were now attracted to far different subjects from the woes or wrongs of the English nation. The Crusades had begun. Peter the Hermit had moved all Christendom by his fiery eloquence, and sent them to avenge the wrongs the pilgrims of the cross had sustained from Turkish hands, and to free the holy soil from the sp.a.w.n of the false prophet.

Since the Caliph Omar received the capitulation of Jerusalem, in 637, and established therein the religion of Mahomed, no greater calamity had ever befallen Christendom than the conquest of Asia Minor, and subsequently Syria, by the Turks.

The latter event, which occurred about nine years after the Norman Conquest of England, transferred the government of Palestine, and the custody of the holy places, from a race which, although Mahometan, was yet tolerant, to a far fiercer and "anti-human"

government The "unspeakable Turk" had appeared on the scene of European politics.

For, under the milder rule of the Fatimite Caliphs, who reigned over Jerusalem from A.D. 969 to 1076, a peculiar quarter of the holy city had been a.s.signed to the Christians; a fair tribute secured them protection, and the Sepulchre of Christ, with the other scenes identified with the Pa.s.sion, were left in their hands.

Greeks and Latins alike enjoyed freedom of worship, and crowds of pilgrims flocked from all the western nations.

Then appeared our Turks on the scene. They first ravished Asia Minor from the weak grasp of the later Roman Empire, and established their capital and worship--the abomination of desolation--where the first great Christian council had drawn up the Nicene Creed, that is, at Nicaea in Bithynia.

Then, later on, under the Sultan Malek Shah, they attacked Syria and Egypt, and the Holy Land pa.s.sed under that blighting rule, which has ever since withered it in its grasp, with a few brief intervals.

And now the scene changed: the pilgrims, who through innumerable dangers had reached the holy city, only entered it to become the victims of contumely and savage insult, and often perished by brutal violence before they reached their goal--the Holy Sepulchre.

The very patriarch of Jerusalem was dragged by the hair and cast into a filthy dungeon, in order to exact a heavy ransom from the sympathy of his flock, and the tale of his sufferings harrowed all hearts.

For twenty years all this was borne.

At length came a pilgrim--then unknown to fame. He was a hermit, named Peter, and came from Picardy in France. He mingled his tears with those of the patriarch, to whom he obtained access.

"What can we do?" said the poor prelate. "The successors of Constantine are no match for the fiery Turk."

"I will rouse the martial nations of Europe in your cause," was the reply.

History tells how Peter the Hermit kept his word: how his fiery eloquence aroused and kindled all hearts; how Christendom sent forth her myriads, as under some potent spell.

At the council of Clermont, in November 1095, took place that famous scene in the presence of Pope Urban, when the cry, "G.o.d wills it," thrilled from myriad lips, and became the watchword of the Crusaders.