CHAPTER V.
Their necromantic forms in vain Haunt us on the tented plain; We bid these spectre shapes avaunt, Ashtaroth and Termagaunt. WARTON.
The most profound silence, the deepest darkness, continued to brood formore than an hour over the chapel in which we left the Knight of theLeopard still kneeling, alternately expressing thanks to Heaven andgratitude to his lady for the boon which had been vouchsafed to him.His own safety, his own destiny, for which he was at all times littleanxious, had not now the weight of a grain of dust in his reflections.He was in the neighbourhood of Lady Edith; he had received tokens of hergrace; he was in a place hallowed by relics of the most awful sanctity.A Christian soldier, a devoted lover, could fear nothing, think ofnothing, but his duty to Heaven and his devoir to his lady.
At the lapse of the space of time which we have noticed, a shrillwhistle, like that with which a falconer calls his hawk, was heard toring sharply through the vaulted chapel. It was a sound ill suited tothe place, and reminded Sir Kenneth how necessary it was he should beupon his guard. He started from his knee, and laid his hand upon hisponiard. A creaking sound, as of a screw or pulleys, succeeded, and alight streaming upwards, as from an opening in the floor, showed thata trap-door had been raised or depressed. In less than a minute a long,skinny arm, partly naked, partly clothed in a sleeve of red samite,arose out of the aperture, holding a lamp as high as it could stretchupwards, and the figure to which the arm belonged ascended step by stepto the level of the chapel floor. The form and face of the being whothus presented himself were those of a frightful dwarf, with a largehead, a cap fantastically adorned with three peacock feathers, adress of red samite, the richness of which rendered his ugliness moreconspicuous, distinguished by gold bracelets and armlets, and a whitesilk sash, in which he wore a gold-hilted dagger. This singular figurehad in his left hand a kind of broom. So soon as he had stepped fromthe aperture through which he arose, he stood still, and, as if to showhimself more distinctly, moved the lamp which he held slowly overhis face and person, successively illuminating his wild and fantasticfeatures, and his misshapen but nervous limbs. Though disproportioned inperson, the dwarf was not so distorted as to argue any want of strengthor activity. While Sir Kenneth gazed on this disagreeable object, thepopular creed occurred to his remembrance concerning the gnomes orearthly spirits which make their abode in the caverns of the earth; andso much did this figure correspond with ideas he had formed of theirappearance, that he looked on it with disgust, mingled not indeed withfear, but that sort of awe which the presence of a supernatural creaturemay infuse into the most steady bosom.
The dwarf again whistled, and summoned from beneath a companion. Thissecond figure ascended in the same manner as the first; but it wasa female arm in this second instance which upheld the lamp from thesubterranean vault out of which these presentments arose, and it was afemale form, much resembling the first in shape and proportions,which slowly emerged from the floor. Her dress was also of red samite,fantastically cut and flounced, as if she had been dressed for someexhibition of mimes or jugglers; and with the same minuteness which herpredecessor had exhibited, she passed the lamp over her face and person,which seemed to rival the male's in ugliness. But with all this mostunfavourable exterior, there was one trait in the features of both whichargued alertness and intelligence in the most uncommon degree. Thisarose from the brilliancy of their eyes, which, deep-set beneath blackand shaggy brows, gleamed with a lustre which, like that in the eyeof the toad, seemed to make some amends for the extreme ugliness ofcountenance and person.
Sir Kenneth remained as if spellbound, while this unlovely pair, movinground the chapel close to each other, appeared to perform the duty ofsweeping it, like menials; but as they used only one hand, the floor wasnot much benefited by the exercise, which they plied with such oddity ofgestures and manner as befitted their bizarre and fantastic appearance.When they approached near to the knight in the course of theiroccupation, they ceased to use their brooms; and placing themselves sideby side, directly opposite to Sir Kenneth, they again slowly shifted thelights which they held, so as to allow him distinctly to survey featureswhich were not rendered more agreeable by being brought nearer, and toobserve the extreme quickness and keenness with which their black andglittering eyes flashed back the light of the lamps. They then turnedthe gleam of both lights upon the knight, and having accurately surveyedhim, turned their faces to each other, and set up a loud, yelling laugh,which resounded in his ears. The sound was so ghastly that Sir Kennethstarted at hearing it, and hastily demanded, in the name of God, whothey were who profaned that holy place with such antic gestures andelritch exclamations.
"I am the dwarf Nectabanus," said the abortion-seeming male, in a voicecorresponding to his figure, and resembling the voice of the night-crowmore than any sound which is heard by daylight.
"And I am Guenevra, his lady and his love," replied the female, in toneswhich, being shriller, were yet wilder than those of her companion.
"Wherefore are you here?" again demanded the knight, scarcely yetassured that they were human beings which he saw before him.
"I am," replied the male dwarf, with much assumed gravity and dignity,"the twelfth Imaum. I am Mohammed Mohadi, the guide and the conductor ofthe faithful. A hundred horses stand ready saddled for me and my trainat the Holy City, and as many at the City of Refuge. I am he who shallbear witness, and this is one of my houris."
"Thou liest!" answered the female, interrupting her companion, in tonesyet shriller than his own; "I am none of thy houris, and thou art nosuch infidel trash as the Mohammed of whom thou speakest. May my curserest upon his coffin! I tell thee, thou ass of Issachar, thou art KingArthur of Britain, whom the fairies stole away from the field of Avalon;and I am Dame Guenevra, famed for her beauty."
"But in truth, noble sir," said the male, "we are distressed princes,dwelling under the wing of King Guy of Jerusalem, until he was drivenout from his own nest by the foul infidels--Heaven's bolts consumethem!"
"Hush," said a voice from the side upon which the knight hadentered--"hush, fools, and begone; your ministry is ended."
The dwarfs had no sooner heard the command than, gibbering in discordantwhispers to each other, they blew out their lights at once, and left theknight in utter darkness, which, when the pattering of their retiringfeet had died away, was soon accompanied by its fittest companion, totalsilence.
The knight felt the departure of these unfortunate creatures a relief.He could not, from their language, manners, and appearance, doubt thatthey belonged to the degraded class of beings whom deformity of personand weakness of intellect recommended to the painful situation ofappendages to great families, where their personal appearance andimbecility were food for merriment to the household. Superior in norespect to the ideas and manners of his time, the Scottish knight might,at another period, have been much amused by the mummery of these pooreffigies of humanity; but now their appearance, gesticulations, andlanguage broke the train of deep and solemn feeling with which he wasimpressed, and he rejoiced in the disappearance of the unhappy objects.
A few minutes after they had retired, the door at which he had enteredopened slowly, and remaining ajar, discovered a faint light arising froma lantern placed upon the threshold. Its doubtful and wavering gleamshowed a dark form reclined beside the entrance, but without itsprecincts, which, on approaching it more nearly, he recognized to be thehermit, crouching in the same humble posture in which he had at firstlaid himself down, and which, doubtless, he had retained during thewhole time of his guest's continuing in the chapel.
"All is over," said the hermit, as he heard the knight approaching, "andthe most wretched of earthly sinners, with him who should think himselfmost honoured and most happy among the race of humanity, must retirefrom this place. Take the light, and guide me down the descent, for Imust not uncover my eyes until I am far from this hallowed spot."
The Scottish knight obeyed in silence, for a solemn and yet ecstaticsen
se of what he had seen had silenced even the eager workings ofcuriosity. He led the way, with considerable accuracy, through thevarious secret passages and stairs by which they had ascended, until atlength they found themselves in the outward cell of the hermit's cavern.
"The condemned criminal is restored to his dungeon, reprieved from onemiserable day to another, until his awful Judge shall at length appointthe well-deserved sentence to be carried into execution."
As the hermit spoke these words, he laid aside the veil with which hiseyes had been bound, and looked at it with a suppressed and hollow sigh.No sooner had he restored it to the crypt from which he had caused theScot to bring it, than he said hastily and sternly to his companion;"Begone, begone--to rest, to rest. You may sleep--you can sleep--Ineither can nor may."
Respecting the profound agitation with which this was spoken, the knightretired into the inner cell; but casting back his eye as he left theexterior grotto, he beheld the anchorite stripping his shoulders withfrantic haste of their shaggy mantle, and ere he could shut the fraildoor which separated the two compartments of the cavern, he heardthe clang of the scourge and the groans of the penitent under hisself-inflicted penance. A cold shudder came over the knight as hereflected what could be the foulness of the sin, what the depth of theremorse, which, apparently, such severe penance could neither cleansenor assuage. He told his beads devoutly, and flung himself on his rudecouch, after a glance at the still sleeping Moslem, and, wearied by thevarious scenes of the day and the night, soon slept as sound as infancy.Upon his awaking in the morning, he held certain conferences with thehermit upon matters of importance, and the result of their intercourseinduced him to remain for two days longer in the grotto. He was regular,as became a pilgrim, in his devotional exercises, but was not againadmitted to the chapel in which he had seen such wonders.