CHAPTER XXVIII
This wandering race, sever'd from other men, Boast yet their intercourse with human arts; The seas, the woods, the deserts, which they haunt, Find them acquainted with their secret treasures: And unregarded herbs, and flowers, and blossoms, Display undreamt-of powers when gather'd by them.
_The Jew._
Our history must needs retrograde for the space of a few pages, to inform the reader of certain passages material to his understanding the rest of this important narrative. His own intelligence may indeed have easily anticipated that, when Ivanhoe sunk down, and seemed abandoned by all the world, it was the importunity of Rebecca which prevailed on her father to have the gallant young warrior transported from the lists to the house which for the time the Jews inhabited in the suburbs of Ashby.
It would not have been difficult to have persuaded Isaac to this step in any other circumstances, for his disposition was kind and grateful. But he had also the prejudices and scrupulous timidity of his persecuted people, and those were to be conquered.
``Holy Abraham!'' he exclaimed, ``he is a good youth, and my heart bleeds to see the gore trickle down his rich embroidered hacqueton, and his corslet of goodly price---but to carry him to our house! ---damsel, hast thou well considered?---he is a Christian, and by our law we may not deal with the stranger and Gentile, save for the advantage of our commerce.''
``Speak not so, my dear father,'' replied Rebecca; ``we may not indeed mix with them in banquet and in jollity; but in wounds and in misery, the Gentile becometh the Jew's brother.''
``I would I knew what the Rabbi Jacob Ben Tudela would opine on it,'' replied Isaac;---``nevertheless, the good youth must not bleed to death. Let Seth and Reuben bear him to Ashby.''
``Nay, let them place him in my litter,'' said Rebecca; ``I will mount one of the palfreys.''
``That were to expose thee to the gaze of those dogs of Ishmael and of Edom,'' whispered Isaac, with a suspicious glance towards the crowd of knights and squires. But Rebecca was already busied in carrying her charitable purpose into effect, and listed not what he said, until Isaac, seizing the sleeve of her mantle, again exclaimed, in a hurried voice---``Beard of Aaron!---what if the youth perish! ---if he die in our custody, shall we not be held guilty of his blood, and be torn to pieces by the multitude?''
``He will not die, my father,'' said Rebecca, gently extricating herself from the grasp of Isaac ``he will not die unless we abandon him; and if so, we are indeed answerable for his blood to God and to man.''
``Nay,'' said Isaac, releasing his hold, ``it grieveth me as much to see the drops of his blood, as if they were so many golden byzants from mine own purse; and I well know, that the lessons of Miriam, daughter of the Rabbi Manasses of Byzantium whose soul is in Paradise, have made thee skilful in the art of healing, and that thou knowest the craft of herbs, and the force of elixirs. Therefore, do as thy mind giveth thee---thou art a good damsel, a blessing, and a crown, and a song of rejoicing unto me and unto my house, and unto the people of my fathers.''
The apprehensions of Isaac, however, were not ill founded; and the generous and grateful benevolence of his daughter exposed her, on her return to Ashby, to the unhallowed gaze of Brian de Bois-Guilbert. The Templar twice passed and repassed them on the road, fixing his bold and ardent look on the beautiful Jewess; and we have already seen the consequences of the admiration which her charms excited when accident threw her into the power of that unprincipled voluptuary.
Rebecca lost no time in causing the patient to be transported to their temporary dwelling, and proceeded with her own hands to examine and to bind up his wounds. The youngest reader of romances and romantic ballads, must recollect how often the females, during the dark ages, as they are called, were initiated into the mysteries of surgery, and how frequently the gallant knight submitted the wounds of his person to her cure, whose eyes had yet more deeply penetrated his heart.
But the Jews, both male and female, possessed and practised the medical science in all its branches, and the monarchs and powerful barons of the time frequently committed themselves to the charge of some experienced sage among this despised people, when wounded or in sickness. The aid of the Jewish physicians was not the less eagerly sought after, though a general belief prevailed among the Christians, that the Jewish Rabbins were deeply acquainted with the occult sciences, and particularly with the cabalistical art, which had its name and origin in the studies of the sages of Israel. Neither did the Rabbins disown such acquaintance with supernatural arts, which added nothing (for what could add aught?) to the hatred with which their nation was regarded, while it diminished the contempt with which that malevolence was mingled. A Jewish magician might be the subject of equal abhorrence with a Jewish usurer, but he could not be equally despised. It is besides probable, considering the wonderful cures they are said to have performed, that the Jews possessed some secrets of the healing art peculiar to themselves, and which, with the exclusive spirit arising out of their condition, they took great care to conceal from the Christians amongst whom they dwelt.
The beautiful Rebecca had been heedfully brought up in all the knowledge proper to her nation, which her apt and powerful mind had retained, arranged, and enlarged, in the course of a progress beyond her years, her sex, and even the age in which she lived. Her knowledge of medicine and of the healing art had been acquired under an aged Jewess, the daughter of one of their most celebrated doctors, who loved Rebecca as her own child, and was believed to have communicated to her secrets, which had been left to herself by her sage father at the same time, and under the same circumstances. The fate of Miriam had indeed been to fall a sacrifice to the fanaticism of the times; but her secrets had survived in her apt pupil.
Rebecca, thus endowed with knowledge as with beauty, was universally revered and admired by her own tribe, who almost regarded her as one of those gifted women mentioned in the sacred history. Her father himself, out of reverence for her talents, which involuntarily mingled itself with his unbounded affection, permitted the maiden a greater liberty than was usually indulged to those of her sex by the habits of her people, and was, as we have just seen, frequently guided by her opinion, even in preference to his own.
When Ivanhoe reached the habitation of Isaac,
he was still in a state of unconsciousness, owing to
the profuse loss of blood which had taken place during
his exertions in the lists. Rebecca examined
the wound, and having applied to it such vulnerary
remedies as her art prescribed, informed her father
that if fever could be averted, of which the great
bleeding rendered her little apprehensive, and if
the healing balsam of Miriam retained its virtue,
there was nothing to fear for his guest's life, and
that he might with safety travel to York with them
on the ensuing day. Isaac looked a little blank at
this annunciation. His charity would willingly have
stopped short at Ashby, or at most would have left
the wounded Christian to be tended in the house
where he was residing at present, with an assurance
to the Hebrew to whom it belonged, that all expenses
should be duly discharged. To this, however,
Rebecca opposed many reasons, of which we
shall only mention two that had peculiar weight
with Isaac. The one was, that she would on no
account put the phial of precious balsam into the
hands of another physician even of her own tribe,
lest that valuable mystery should be discovered;
the other, that this wounded knight, Wilfred of
Ivanhoe, was an intimate favourite of Richard
C
``Thou art speaking but sooth, Rebecca,'' said
Isaac, giving way to these weighty arguments---``it
were an offending of Heaven to betray the secrets
of the blessed Miriam; for the good which Heaven
giveth, is not rashly to be squandered upon
others, whether it be talents of gold and shekels of
silver, or whether it be the secret mysteries of a wise
physician---assuredly they should be preserved to
those to whom Providence hath vouchsafed them.
And him whom the Nazarenes of England call the
Lion's Heart, assuredly it were better for me to
fall into the hands of a strong lion of Idumea than
into his, if he shall have got assurance of my dealing
with his brother. Wherefore I will lend ear
to thy counsel, and this youth shall journey with
us unto York, and our house shall be as a home to
him until his wounds shall be healed. And if he of
the Lion Heart shall return to the land, as is now
noised abroad, then shall this Wilfred of Ivanhoe
be unto me as a wall of defence, when the king's
displeasure shall burn high against thy father. And
if he doth not return, this Wilfred may natheless
repay us our charges when he shall gain treasure
by the strength of his spear and of his sword, even
as he did yesterday and this day also. For the
youth is a good youth, and keepeth the day which
he appointeth, and restoreth that which he borroweth,
and succoureth the Israelite, even the child of
my father's house, when he is encompassed by
strong thieves and sons of Belial.''
It was not until evening was nearly closed that
Ivanhoe was restored to consciousness of his situation.
He awoke from a broken slumber, under the
confused impressions which are naturally attendant
on the recovery from a state of insensibility. He
was unable for some time to recall exactly to memory
the circumstances which had preceded his fall
in the lists, or to make out any connected chain of
the events in which he had been engaged upon the
yesterday. A sense of wounds and injury, joined
to great weakness and exhaustion, was mingled
with the recollection of blows dealt and received,
of steeds rushing upon each other, overthrowing
and overthrown---of shouts and clashing of arms,
and all the heady tumult of a confused fight. An
effort to draw aside the curtain of his conch was in
some degree successful, although rendered difficult
by the pain of his wound.
To his great surprise he found himself in a room
magnificently furnished, but having cushions instead
of chairs to rest upon, and in other respects
partaking so much of Oriental costume, that he
began to doubt whether he had not, during his
sleep, been transported back again to the land of
Palestine. The impression was increased, when,
the tapestry being drawn aside, a female form,
dressed in a rich habit, which partook more of the
Eastern taste than that of Europe, glided through
the door which it concealed, and was followed by
a swarthy domestic.
As the wounded knight was about to address
this fair apparition, she imposed silence by placing
her slender finger upon her ruby lips, while the
attendant, approaching him, proceeded to uncover
Ivanhoe's side, and the lovely Jewess satisfied herself
that the bandage was in its place, and the
wound doing well. She performed her task with
a graceful and dignified simplicity and modesty,
which might, even in more civilized days, have
served to redeem it from whatever might seem repugnant
to female delicacy. The idea of so young
and beautiful a person engaged in attendance on a
sick-bed, or in dressing the wound of one of a different
sex, was melted away and lost in that of a
beneficent being contributing her effectual aid to
relieve pain, and to avert the stroke of death. Rebecca's
few and brief directions were given in the
Hebrew language to the old domestic; and he, who
had been frequently her assistant in similar cases,
obeyed them without reply.
The accents of an unknown tongue, however
harsh they might have sounded when uttered by
another, had, coming from the beautiful Rebecca,
the romantic and pleasing effect which fancy ascribes
to the charms pronounced by some beneficent
fairy, unintelligible, indeed, to the ear, but, from
the sweetness of utterance, and benignity of aspect,
which accompanied them, touching and affecting to
the heart. Without making an attempt at further
question, Ivanhoe suffered them in silence to take
the measures they thought most proper for his recovery;
and it was not until those were completed,
and this kind physician about to retire. that his curiosity
could no longer be suppressed.---``Gentle
maiden,'' be began in the Arabian tongue, with
which his Eastern travels had rendered him familiar,
and which he thought most likely to be understood
by the turban'd and caftan'd damsel who stood before
him---``I pray you, gentle maiden, of your
courtesy------''
But here he was interrupted by his fair physician,
a smile which she could scarce suppress dimpling
for an instant a face, whose general expression
was that of contemplative melancholy. ``I am of
England, Sir Knight, and speak the English tongue,
although my dress and my lineage belong to another
climate.''
``Noble damsel,''---again the Knight of Ivanhoe
began; and again Rebecca hastened to interrupt
him.
``Bestow not on me, Sir Knight,'' she said, ``the
epithet of noble. It is well you should speedily
know that your handmaiden is a poor Jewess, the
daughter of that Isaac of York, to whom you were
so lately a good and kind lord. It well becomes
him, and those of his household, to render to you
such careful tendance as your present state necessarily
demands.''
I know not whether the fair Rowena would have
been altogether satisfied with the species of emotion
with which her devoted knight had hitherto
gazed on the beautiful features, and fair form, and
lustrous eyes, of the lovely Rebecca; eyes whose
brilliancy was shaded, and, as it were, mellowed, by
the fringe of her long silken eyelashes, and which
a minstrel would have compared to the evening
star darting its rays through a bower of jessamine.
But Ivanhoe was too good a Catholic to retain the
same class of feelings towards a Jewess. This
Rebecca had foreseen, and for this very purpose she
had hastened to mention her father's name and lineage;
yet---for the fair and wise daughter of Isaac
was not without a touch of female weakness---she
could not but sigh internally when the glance of
respectful admiration, not altogether unmixed with
tenderness, with which Ivanhoe had hitherto regarded
his unknown benefactress, was exchanged
at once for a manner cold, composed, and collected,
and fraught with no deeper feeling than that which
expressed a grateful sense of courtesy received from
an unexpected quarter, and from one of an inferior
race. It was not that Ivanhoe's former carriage expressed
more than that general devotional homage
which youth always pays to beauty; yet it was
mortifying that one word should operate as a spell
to remove poor Rebecca, who could not be supposed
altogether ignorant of her title to such homage,
into a degraded class, to whom it could not be honourably
rendered.
But the gentleness and candour of Rebecca's
nature imputed no fault to Ivanhoe for sharing in
the universal prejudices of his age and religion. On
the contrary the fair Jewess, though sensible her
patient now regarded her as one of a race of reprobation,
with whom it was disgraceful to hold any
beyond the most necessary intercourse, ceased not
to pay the same patient and devoted attention to
his safety and convalescence. She informed him of
the necessity they were under of removing to York,
and of her father's resolution to transport him thither,
and tend him in his own house until his health
should be restored. Ivanhoe expressed great repugnance
to this plan, which he grounded on unwillingness
to give farther trouble to his benefactors.
``Was there not,'' he said, ``in Ashby, or near
it, some Saxon franklin, or even some wealthy peasant,
who would endure the burden of a wounded
countryman's residence with him until he should
be again able to bear his armour?---Was there no
convent of Saxon endowment, where he could be
received?---Or could he not be transported as far as
Burton, where he was sure to find hospitality with
Waltheoff, the Abbot of St Withold's, to whom
he was related?''
``Any, the worst of these harbourages,'' said
Rebecca, with a melancholy smile, ``would unquestionably
be more fitting for your residence than the
abode of a despised Jew; yet, Sir Knight, unless
you would dismiss your physician, you cannot
change your lodging. Our nation, as you well
know, can cure wounds, though we deal not in inflicting
them; and in our own family, in particular,
are secrets which have been handed down since the
days of Solomon, and of which you have already
experienced the advantages. No Nazarene---I
crave your forgiveness, Sir Knight---no Christian
leech, within the four seas of Britain, could enable
you to bear your corslet within a month.''
``And how soon wilt thou enable me to brook
it?'' said Ivanhoe, impatiently.
``Within eight days, if thou wilt be patient and
conformable to my directions,'' replied Rebecca.
``By Our Blessed Lady,'' said Wilfred, ``if it
be not a sin to name her here, it is no time for me
or any true knight to be bedridden; and if thou
accomplish thy promise, maiden, I will pay thee
with my casque full of crowns, come by them as I
may.''
``I will accomplish my promise,'' said Rebecca,
and thou shalt bear thine armour on the eighth
day from hence, if thou will grant me but one boon
in the stead of the silver thou dost promise me.''
`If it be within my power, and such as a true
Christian knight may yield to one of thy people,''
replied Ivanhoe, ``I will grant thy boon blithely
and thankfully.''
``Nay,'' answered Rebecca, ``I will but pray of
thee to believe henceforward that a Jew may do
good service to a Christian, without desiring other
guerdon than the blessing of the Great Father who
made both Jew and Gentile.''
``It were sin to doubt it, maiden,'' replied Ivanhoe;
``and I repose myself on thy skill without
further scruple or question, well trusting you will
enable me to bear my corslet on the eighth day.
And now, my kind leech, let me enquire of the news
abroad. What of the noble Saxon Cedric and his
household?---what of the lovely Lady---'' He
stopt, as if unwilling to speak Rowena's name in
the house of a Jew---``Of her, I mean, who was
named Queen of the tournament?''
``And who was selected by you, Sir Knight, to
hold that dignity, with judgment which was admired
as much as your valour,'' replied Rebecca.
The blood which Ivanhoe had lost did not prevent
a flush from crossing his cheek, feeling that
he had incautiously betrayed a deep interest in
Rowena by the awkward attempt he had made to
conceal it.''
``It was less of her I would speak,'' said he,
``than of Prince John; and I would fain know
somewhat of a faithful squire, and why he now attends
me not?''
``Let me use my authority as a leech,'' answered
Rebecca, ``and enjoin you to keep silence, and
avoid agitating reflections, whilst I apprize you of
what you desire to know. Prince John hath broken
off the tournament, and set forward in all haste towards
York, with the nobles, knights, and churchmen
of his party, after collecting such sums as they
could wring, by fair means or foul, from those who
are esteemed the wealthy of the land. It is said be
designs to assume his brother's crown.''
``Not without a blow struck in its defence,''
said Ivanhoe, raising himself upon the couch, ``if
there were but one true subject in England I will
fight for Richard's title with the best of them---
ay, one or two, in his just quarrel!''
``But that you may be able to do so,'' said Rebecca
touching his shoulder with her hand, ``you
must now observe my directions, and remain quiet.''
``True, maiden,'' said Ivanhoe, ``as quiet as
these disquieted times will permit---And of Cedric
and his household?''
``His steward came but brief while since,'' said
the Jewess, ``panting with haste, to ask my father
for certain monies, the price of wool the growth of
Cedric's flocks, and from him I learned that Cedric
and Athelstane of Coningsburgh had left Prince
John's lodging in high displeasure, and were about
to set forth on their return homeward.''
``Went any lady with them to the banquet?''
said Wilfred.
``The Lady Rowena,'' said Rebecca, answering
the question with more precision than it had been
asked---``The Lady Rowena went not to the
Prince's feast, and, as the steward reported to us,
she is now on her journey back to Rotherwood,
with her guardian Cedric. And touching your
faithful squire Gurth------''
``Ha!'' exclaimed the knight, ``knowest thou
his name?---But thou dost,'' he immediately added,
``and well thou mayst, for it was from thy
hand, and, as I am now convinced, from thine own
generosity of spirit, that he received but yesterday
a hundred zecchins.''
``Speak not of that,'' said Rebecca, blushing
deeply; ``I see how easy it is for the tongue to
betray what the heart would gladly conceal.''
``But this sum of gold,'' said Ivanhoe, gravely,
``my honour is concerned in repaying it to your
father.''
``Let it be as thou wilt,'' said Rebecca, ``when
eight days have passed away; but think not, and
speak not now, of aught that may retard thy recovery.''
``Be it so, kind maiden,'' said Ivanhoe; ``I were
most ungrateful to dispute thy commands. But
one word of the fate of poor Gurth, and I have done
with questioning thee.''
``I grieve to tell thee, Sir Knight,'' answered
the Jewess, `` that he is in custody by the order of
Cedric.''---And then observing the distress which
her communication gave to Wilfred, she instantly
added, ``But the steward Oswald said, that if nothing
occurred to renew his master's displeasure
against him, he was sure that Cedric would pardon
Gurth, a faithful serf, and one who stood high
in favour, and who had but committed this error
out of the love which he bore to Cedric's son. And
he said, moreover, that he and his comrades, and
especially Wamba the Jester, were resolved to
warn Gurth to make his escape by the way, in case
Cedric's ire against him could not be mitigated.''
``Would to God they may keep their purpose!''
said Ivanhoe; ``but it seems as if I were destined
to bring ruin on whomsoever hath shown kindness
to me. My king, by whom I was honoured and
distinguished, thou seest that the brother most
indebted to him is raising his arms to grasp his
crown;---my regard hath brought restraint and
trouble on the fairest of her sex;---and now my
father in his mood may slay this poor bondsman
but for his love and loyal service to me!---Thou
seest, maiden, what an ill-fated wretch thou dost
labour to assist; be wise, and let me go, ere the
misfortunes which track my footsteps like slot-hounds,
shall involve thee also in their pursuit.''
``Nay,'' said Rebecca, ``thy weakness and thy
grief, Sir Knight, make thee miscalculate the purposes
of Heaven. Thou hast been restored to thy
country when it most needed the assistance of a
strong hand and a true heart, and thou hast humbled
the pride of thine enemies and those of thy
king, when their horn was most highly exalted .
and for the evil which thou hast sustained, seest
thou not that Heaven has raised thee a helper and
a physician, even among the most despised of the
land?---Therefore, be of good courage, and trust
that thou art preserved for some marvel which thine
arm shall work before this people. Adieu---and
having taken the medicine which I shall send thee
by the hand of Reuben, compose thyself again to
rest, that thou mayest be the more able to endure
the journey on the succeeding day.''
Ivanhoe was convinced by the reasoning, and
obeyed the directions, of Rebecca. The drought
which Reuben administered was of a sedative and
narcotic quality, and secured the patient sound and
undisturbed slumbers. In the morning his kind
physician found him entirely free from feverish
symptoms, and fit to undergo the fatigue of a
journey.
He was deposited in the horse-litter which had
brought him from the lists, and every precaution
taken for his travelling with ease. In one circumstance
only even the entreaties of Rebecca were
unable to secure sufficient attention to the accommodation
of the wounded knight. Isaac, like the
enriched traveller of Juvenal's tenth satire, had
ever the fear of robbery before his eyes, conscious
that he would be alike accounted fair game by the
marauding Norman noble, and by the Saxon outlaw.
He therefore journeyed at a great rate, and
made short halts, and shorter repasts, so that he
passed by Cedric and Athelstane who had several
hours the start of him, but who had been delayed
by their protracted feasting at the convent of Saint
Withold's. Yet such was the virtue of Miriam's
balsam, or such the strength of Ivanhoe's constitution,
that he did not sustain from the hurried journey
that inconvenience which his kind physician
had apprehended.
In another point of view, however, the Jew's
haste proved somewhat more than good speed. The
rapidity with which he insisted on travelling, bred
several disputes between him and the party whom
he had hired to attend him as a guard. These men
were Saxons, and not free by any means from the
national love of ease and good living which the
Normans stigmatized as laziness and gluttony. Reversing
Shylock's position, they had accepted the
employment in hopes of feeding upon the wealthy
Jew, and were very much displeased when they
found themselves disappointed, by the rapidity with
which he insisted on their proceeding. They remonstrated
also upon the risk of damage to their
horses by these forced marches. Finally, there arose
betwixt Isaac and his satellites a deadly feud, concerning
the quantity of wine and ale to be allowed
for consumption at each meal. And thus it happened,
that when the alarm of danger approached,
and that which Isaac feared was likely to come upon
him, he was deserted by the discontented mercenaries
on whose protection he had relied, without
using the means necessary to secure their attachment.
In this deplorable condition the Jew, with his
daughter and her wounded patient, were found by
Cedric, as has already been noticed, and soon afterwards
fell into the power of De Bracy and his confederates.
Little notice was at first taken of the
horse-litter, and it might have remained behind but
for the curiosity of De Bracy, who looked into it
under the impression that it might contain the object
of his enterprise, for Rowena had not unveiled
herself. But De Bracy's astonishment was considerable,
when he discovered that the litter contained
a wounded man, who, conceiving himself to have
fallen into the power of Saxon outlaws, with whom
his name might be a protection for himself and his
friends, frankly avowed himself to be Wilfred of
Ivanhoe.
The ideas of chivalrous honour, which, amidst his
wildness and levity, never utterly abandoned De
Bracy, prohibited him from doing the knight any
injury in his defenceless condition, and equally interdicted
his betraying him to Front-de-B
``A wounded companion!'' he replied in great
wrath and astonishment. ``No wonder that churls
and yeomen wax so presumptuous as even to lay
leaguer before castles, and that clowns and swineherds
send defiances to nobles, since men-at-arms
have turned sick men's nurses, and Free Companions
are grown keepers of dying folk's curtains,
when the castle is about to be assailed.---To the
battlements, ye loitering villains!'' he exclaimed,
raising his stentorian voice till the arches around
rung again, ``to the battlements, or I will splinter
your bones with this truncheon!''
The men sulkily replied, ``that they desired
nothing better than to go to the battlements, providing
Front-de-B
``The dying man, knaves!'' rejoined the Baron;
``I promise thee we shall all be dying men an we
stand not to it the more stoutly. But I will relieve
the guard upon this caitiff companion of yours.---
Here, Urfried---hag---fiend of a Saxon witch---
hearest me not?---tend me this bedridden fellow
since he must needs be tended, whilst these knaves
use their weapons.---Here be two arblasts, comrades,
with windlaces and quarrells*---to the barbican with
* The arblast was a cross-bow, the windlace the machine
* used in bending that weapon, and the quarrell, so called from
* its square or diamond-shaped head, was the bolt adapted to it.
you, and see you drive each bolt through a Saxon
brain.''
The men, who, like most of their description,
were fond of enterprise and detested inaction, went
joyfully to the scene of danger as they were commanded,
and thus the charge of Ivanhoe was transferred
to Urfried, or Ulrica. But she, whose brain
was burning with remembrance of injuries and with
hopes of vengeance, was readily induced to devolve
upon Rebecca the care of her patient.
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