Читать книгу Wager of Battle: A Tale of Saxon Slavery in Sherwood Forest - Henry William Herbert - Страница 8

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"As they sat in Englyshe wood,

Under the greenwode tree,

They thought they heard a woman wepe,

But her they mought not see."

Adam Bell, etc.

Leaving the warder lounging listlessly at his post, as in a well-settled district and in "piping times of peace," with no feudal enemies at hand, and no outlaws in the vicinity, none at least so numerous as to render any guard necessary, except as a matter of dignity and decorum, the two knights strolled down the sandy lane toward the village, or quarter of the serfs; who were not admitted generally to reside within the walls, partly as a precaution, lest, in case of some national affray, they might so far outnumber the Norman men-at-arms as to become dangerous, partly because they were not deemed fitting associates for the meanest of the feudal servitors.

The two gentlemen in question were excellent specimens of the Norman baron of the day, without, however, being heroes or geniuses, or in any particular—except perhaps for good temper and the lack of especial temptation toward evil—manifestly superior to others of their class, caste, and period. Neither of them was in any respect a tyrant, individually cruel, or intentionally an oppressor; but both were, as every one of us is at this day, used to look at things as we find them, through our own glasses, and to seek rather for what is the custom, than for what is right, and therefore ought to be; for what it suits us, and is permitted to us by law to do to others, than for what we should desire others to do unto us.

Reckless of life themselves, brought up from their cradles to regard pain as a thing below consideration, and death as a thing to be risked daily, they were not like to pay much regard to the mere physical sufferings of others, or to set human life at a value, such as to render it worth the preserving, when great stakes were to be won or lost on its hazard. Accustomed to set their own lives on the die, for the most fantastic whim of honor, or at the first call of their feudal suzerains, accustomed to see their Norman vassals fall under shield, and deem such death honorable and joyous, at their own slightest bidding, how should they have thought much of the life, far more of the physical or mental sufferings, of the Saxon serf, whom they had found, on their arrival in their newly-conquered England, a thing debased below the value, in current coin, of an ox, a dog, or a war-horse—a thing, the taking of whose life was compensated by a trivial fine, and whom they naturally came to regard as a dull, soulless, inanimate, stupid senseless animal, with the passions only, but without the intellect of the man. Of the two barons, Sir Yvo de Taillebois was the superior, both in intellect and culture; he was in easy circumstances also, while his far younger friend, Sir Philip de Morville, was embarrassed by the res angusta domi, and by the importunity of relentless creditors, which often drives men to do, as well as to suffer, extremes.

It was no hardness of nature or cruelty of disposition, therefore, which led either of these noble men—for they were noble, not in birth only, but in sentiment and soul, according to the notions of their age, which were necessarily their notions, and to the lights vouchsafed to them—to speak concerning the Saxon serfs, and act toward them, ever as if they were beasts of burden, worthy of care, kindness, and some degree of physical consideration, rather than like men, as themselves, endowed with hearts to feel and souls to comprehend. Had they been other than they were, they had been monsters; as it was, they were excellent men, as men went then, and go now, fully up to the spirit of their own times, and to the strain of morality and justice understood thereby, but not one whit above it. Therefore, Sir Yvo de Taillebois, finding himself indebted for his daughter's life to the hardihood and courage of the Saxon serf, whom he regarded much as he would have done his charger or his hound, desired, as a point of honor, rather than of gratitude, to secure to the serf an indemnity from toil, punishment, or want, during the rest of his life, just as he would have assigned a stall, with free rack and manger, to the superannuated charger which had saved his own life in battle; or given the run of kitchen, buttery, and hall, to the hound which had run the foremost of his pack. The sensibilities of the Saxon were as incomprehensible to him as those of the charger or the staghound, and he thought no more of considering him in his social or family relations, than the animals to which, in some sort, he likened him.

He would not, it is true, if asked as a philosophical truth, whether the life of a Saxon serf and of an Andalusian charger were equivalent, have replied in the affirmative; for he was, according to his lights, a Christian, and knew that a Saxon had a soul to be saved; nor would he have answered, that the colt of the high-bred mare, or the whelp of the generous brach, stood exactly in the same relation as the child of the serf to its human parent; but use had much deadened his perceptions to the distinction; and the impassive and stolid insensibility of the Saxon race, imbruted and degraded by ages of serfdom, caused him to overlook the faint and rarely seen displays of human sensibilities, which would have led him less to undervalue the sense and sentiment of his helpless fellow-countrymen. As it was, he would as soon have expected his favorite charger or best brood mare to pine hopelessly, and grieve as one who could not be consoled, at being liberated from spur and saddle, and turned out to graze at liberty forever in a free and fertile pasture, while its colts should remain in life-long bondage, as he would have supposed it possible for the Saxon serf to be affected beyond consolation by the death, the deportation, or the disasters of his family.

Nor, again, did he regard liberty or servitude in an abstract sense, apart from ideas of incarceration, torture, or extreme privation, as great and inherent right or wrong.

The serf owed him absolute service; the free laborer, or villeyn, service, in some sort, less absolute; his vassals, man-service, according to their degree, either in the field of daily labor, the hunting-field, or the battle-field; he himself owed service to his suzerain; his suzerain to the King. It was all service, and the difference was but in the degree; and if the service of the serf was degraded, it was a usual, a habitual degradation, to which, it might be presumed, he was so well accustomed, that he felt it not more than the charger his demipique, or the hawk his bells and jesses; and, for the most part, he did not feel it more, nor regret it, nor know the lack of liberty, save as connected with the absence of the fetters or the lash.

And this, indeed, is the great real evil of slavery, wheresoever and under whatsoever form it exists, that it is not more, but less, hurtful to the slave than to the master, and that its ill effects are in a much higher and more painful degree intellectual than physical; that, while it degrades and lowers the inferiors almost to the level of mere brutes, through the consciousness of degradation, the absence of all hope to rise in the scale of manhood, and the lack of every stimulus to ambition or exertion, it hardens the heart, and deadens the sensibilities of the master, and renders him, through the strange power of circumstance and custom, blind to the existence of wrongs, sufferings, and sorrows, at the mere narration of which, under a different phase of things, his blood would boil with indignation.

Such, then, was in some considerable degree, the state of mind, arising from habit and acquaintance with the constitution of freedom and slavery, intermingled every where in the then world, any thing to the contrary of which they had never seen nor even heard of, in which the two Norman lords took their way down the village street, if it could be so called, being a mere sandy tract, passable only to horsemen, or carts and vehicles of the very rudest construction, unarmed, except with their heavy swords, and wholly unattended, on an errand, as they intended, of liberality and mercy.

The quarter of the serfs of Sir Philip de Morville was, for the most part, very superior to the miserable collection of huts, liker to dog-houses than to any human habitation, which generally constituted the dwellings of this forlorn and miserable race; for the knight was, as it has been stated, an even-tempered and good-natured, though common-place man; and being endowed with rather an uncommon regard for order and taste for the picturesque, he consequently looked more than usual to the comfort of his serfs, both in allotting them small plots of garden-ground and orchards, and in bestowing on them building materials of superior quality and appearance.

All the huts, therefore, rudely framed of oak beams, having the interstices filled in with a cement of clay and ruddle, with thatched roofs and wooden lattices instead of windows, were whole, and for the most part weather-proof. Many of the inhabitants had made porches, covered with natural wild runners, as the woodbine and sweet-brier; all had made gardens in front, which they might cultivate in their hours of leisure, when the day's task-work should be done, and which displayed evidently enough, by their orderly or slovenly culture, the character and disposition of their occupants.

The few men whom the lords met on their way, mostly driving up beasts laden with fire-wood or forage to the cattle, for the day was not yet far spent, nor the hours devoted to toil well-nigh passed, were hale, strong, sturdy varlets, in good physical condition, strong-limbed, and giving plentiful evidences in their appearance of ample coarse subsistence; they were well-dressed, moreover, although in the plainest and coarsest habiliments, made, for the most part, of the tanned hides of beasts with the hair outward, or in some cases of cheap buff leather, their feet protected by clumsy home-made sandals, and their heads uncovered, save by the thick and matted elf-locks of their unkempt and dingy hair.

They louted low as their lord passed them by, but no gleam of recognition, much less any smile of respectful greeting, such as passes between the honored superior and the valued servant, played over their stolid and heavy countenance, begrimed for the most part with filth, and half-covered with disordered beards and unshorn mustaches.

Neither in form, motion, nor attire, did they show any symptom of misusage; there were no scars, as of the stripes, the stocks, or the fetters, on their bare arms and legs; they were in good physical condition, well-fed, warmly-lodged, sufficiently-clad—perhaps in the best possible condition for the endurance of continuous labor, and the performance of works requiring strength and patience, rather than agility or energetic exertion.

But so also were the mules, oxen, or horses, which they were employed in driving, and which, in all these respects, were fully equal to their drivers, while they had this manifest advantage over them, that they were rubbed down and curry-combed, and cleaned, and showed their hides glossy and sleek, and their manes free from scurf and burrs, which is far more than could be stated of their human companions, who looked for the most part as if their tanned and swart complexions were as innocent of water as were their beards and elf-locks of brush or currycomb.

In addition, however, to their grim and sordid aspect, and their evident ignorance, or carelessness, of their base appearance, there was a dull, sullen, dogged expression on all their faces—a look not despairing, nor even sorrowful, but perfectly impassive, as if they had nothing to hope for, or regret, or fear; the look of a caged bear, wearied and fattened out of his fierceness, not tamed, civilized, or controlled by any human teaching.

The stature and bearing, even of the freeborn and noble Saxon, in the day when his fair isle of Albion was his own, and he trod the soil its proud proprietor, had never been remarkable for its beauty, grace, or dignity. He was, for the most part, short, thick-set, sturdy-limbed, bull-necked, bullet-headed; a man framed more for hardihood, endurance, obstinate resolve, indomitable patience to resist, than for vivid energy, brilliant impulsive vigor, or ardor, whether intellectual or physical; but these men, though they neither lounged nor lagged behind, plodded along with a heavy, listless gait, their frowning brows turned earthward, their dull gray eyes rolling beneath their light lashes, meaningless and spiritless, and the same scowl on every gloomy face.

The younger women, a few of whom were seen about the doors or gardens, busied in churning butter, making cheese, or performing other duties of the farm and dairy, were somewhat more neatly, and, in some few cases, even tastefully attired. Some were of rare beauty, with a profusion of auburn, light brown, or flaxen hair, bright rosy complexions, large blue eyes, and voluptuous figures; and these bore certainly a more cheerful aspect, as the nature of woman is more hopeful than that of man, and a more gentle mood than their fellows; yet there were no songs enlivening their moments of rest or alleviating their hours of toil—no jests, no romping, as we are wont to see among young girls of tender years, occupied in the lighter and more feminine occupations of agricultural life.

Some one or two of these, indeed, smiled as they courtesied to their lord, but the smile was wan and somewhat sickly, nor seemed to come from the heart; it gave no pleasure, one would say, to her who gave—no pleasure to him who received it.

The little children, however, who tumbled about in the dust, or built mud-houses by the puddles in the road, were the saddest sight of all. Half-naked, sturdy-limbed, filthy little savages, utterly untaught and untamed, scarcely capable of making themselves understood, even in their own rude dialect; wild-eyed, and fierce or sullen-looking as it might, subject to no control or correction, receiving no education, no culture whatsoever—not so much even as the colt, which is broken at least to the menage, or the hound-puppy, which is entered at the quarry which he is to chase; ignorant of every moral or divine truth—ignorant even that each one of them was the possessor of a mortal body, far more of an immortal soul!

But not a thought of these things ever crossed the mind of the stately and puissant Normans. No impression such as these, which must needs now strike home to the soul of every chance beholder, had ever been made on their imaginations, by the sight of things, which, seeing every day, they had come to consider only as things which were customary, and were, therefore, right and proper—not the exception even to the rule, but the rule without exception.

So differently, indeed, did the circumstances above related strike Sir Yvo de Taillebois, that he even complimented his friend on the general comfort of his villenage, and the admirable condition of his people, the air of capacity of his men, and the beauty of his women; nay! he commented even upon the plump forms and brawny muscles of the young savages, who fled diverse from before their footsteps, shrieking and terrified at the lordly port and resounding strides of their masters, as indicative of their future strength, and probable size and stature.

And Philip replied, laughing, "Ay! ay! they are a stout and burly set of knaves and good workers on the main. The hinges of the stocks are rusted hard for want of use, and the whipping-post has not heard the crack of the boar's hide these two years or better; but then I work them lightly and feed them roundly, and I find that they do me the more work for it, and the better; besides, the food they consume is all of their own producing, and I have no use for it. They raise me twice as much now as I can expend, on this manor. Now I work my folk but ten hours to the day, and give them meat, milk, and cheese, daily, and have not flogged a man since Martinmas two twelvemonths; and I have thrice the profit of them that my friend and neighbor, Reginald Maltravers, has, though his thralls toil from matin to curfew, with three lenten days to the week, and the thong ever sounding. It is bad policy, I say, to over-do the work or under-do the feeding. Besides, poor devils, they have not much fun in life, and if you fill their bellies, you fill them with all the pleasure and contentment they are capable of knowing. But, hold! here is Kenric's home—the best cabin in the quarter, as the owner is the best man. Let us go in."

"And carry him a welcome cure for his aching bones," said Sir Yvo, as they entered the little gate of a pretty garden, which stretched from the door down to a reach of the winding stream, overshadowed by several large and handsome willows. "By my faith! he must needs be a good man," resumed the speaker—"why, it is as neat as a thane's manor, and neater, too, than many I have seen."

But as he spoke, the shrill and doleful wail of women came from the porch of the house. "Ah, well-a-day! ah, well-a-day! that I should live to see it. Soul of my soul, Kenric, my first-born and my best one—thou first borne in, almost a corpse; and then, my darling and delight—my fair-haired Edgar's son dead of this doleful fever. Ah, well-a-day! ah, well-a-day! Would God that I were dead also, most miserable that I am, of women!"

And then the manly voice of Kenric replied, but faint for his wounds and wavering for the loss of blood; "Wail not for me, mother," he said; "wail not for me, for I am strong yet, and like to live this many a day—until thy toils are ended, and then God do to me as seems him good. But, above all, I say to thee, wail not for Adhemar the white-haired. His weakness and his innocence are over, here on earth. He has never known the collar or the gyves—has never felt how bitter and how hard a thing it is to be the slave of the best earthly master! His dream—his fever-dream of life is over; he is free from yoke and chain; he has awoken out of human servitude, to be the slave of the everlasting God, whose strictest slavery is perfect liberty and perfect love."

But still the woman wailed—"Ah, well-a-day! ah, well-a-day! would God that I were dead, most miserable of mothers that I am!"

And the Norman barons stood unseen and silent, smitten into dumbness before the regal majesty of the slave's maternal sorrow, perhaps awakened to some dim vision of the truth, which never had dawned on them until that day, in the serf's quarter.