A Captive of the Roman Eagles Part 25

"I ask you," the judge now began, "King Ebarbold, son--"

"Spare your words. Count of the Linzgau," interrupted the other, with a gloomy, but fearless glance. "It is all true. Kill me: you have the power to do so, therefore you have the right. I do not wish to live!

Had that been my desire, believe me, I might have fled into my own district or to the Roman camp long before you deprived me, by your men, of the royal insignia of my race or watched my every step, while you merely disarmed the insignificant fisherman. True, according to the new law of the league, you might have had me bound--me, the son of many kings, the descendant of a G.o.d! Since I have learned the disloyalty of my most faithful follower, my own old s.h.i.+eld-bearer, I feel a loathing for the times. I no longer wish to live among a people, according to a law, which permits the horrible thing to happen that the native of a district values its King, the follower his lord, less than the empty sound of the word 'league,' the brief authority of a Duke from another district. I am too old and too proud to learn this new law. You, old man, with your greed for power, long ago, in your b.l.o.o.d.y thoughts, dedicated me to your savage Odin."

"Not I, you yourself, son of Ebor."

"Well then--slay me."

"Not I. You yourself have separated yourself from your people by such doctrines. Yes, it is better for such men as you to die than to live: the district kings, if they offer defiance, must be sacrificed to Odin, who, as King of the people, is above all our G.o.ds and all our peoples."

"My family," said the King proudly, "runs back through a hundred ancestors to the G.o.ds: not to that crafty one, whose secret wiles you are imitating, who scatters runes of discord among peoples and princes.

We descend from the G.o.d of peace. Fro, who bestows fertility. He has set his golden-bristled boar for a sign upon the s.h.i.+elds and helmets of us, his sons. I have ever honored him and peace above all."

"Aha, the G.o.d Fro," replied the old Duke, now incensed, for he could ill brook hearing his Odin upbraided, "the G.o.d Fro will have little cause to rejoice, when he looks down on his descendant dangling from the withered yew, like the long-billed snipe that is caught in a snare.

For I ask the a.s.sembly,--his own words are the most open expression of guilt,--with what does the law threaten him?"

"The rope--the willow rope!" rang from a thousand voices. "The tree of shame! Hang him! Hang him up at once!"

"But between two dogs: wolves are too good for him."

A look of keen anguish flitted over the King's proud, bold face. He did not fear death, but disgrace. He shuddered slightly. The Duke had watched him intently.

"I, the judge," he now began slowly, "ought not to oppose this sentence, and the guilty man cannot. But consider, spearmen! It will bring little renown to our name among the other peoples, when the rumor spreads among them: a King of the Alemanni is swinging between the clouds and water for treason to the army. You have offered the humble fisherman the straw of hope that the Lofty One might save him from the death of shame, bear him to himself in Valhalla, or even--almost against possibility--after the fulfillment of the deed which you have a.s.signed to him, spare his life.

"Well then, this King's guilt, it is true, is far greater than that caused by the father's love for his child; but honor in him the descendant of the G.o.d of harvests! Do not rouse Fro to vengeance, lest for many years he should blast our crops. The G.o.d of the boar with golden bristles is easily angered! And remember, too, with grat.i.tude this man's father."

"A brave hero!" ran from lip to lip.

"He fell in the b.l.o.o.d.y battle of Strataburg, at the head of the wedge of his district. Fighting gallantly in the van of his people, he at last sank--fell backward on his s.h.i.+eld, with many wounds in his breast; for he, the man who had the wild-boar's courage, would not turn his back to the foe. This hero is now looking down from Valhalla upon us; his heart is throbbing anxiously at this impending sentence of disgrace. Alemanni, do not let him behold his son hanging between dogs.

Grant the King, as well as the fisherman, a deed of ransom!"

Ebarbold looked up with a grateful glance to the man whom he had so bitterly hated. The people were still silent: their wrath was fierce.

Then: "Suppose he should run away?"

"Suppose he should desert to the Romans in the midst of the battle?"

Two men uttered the questions at the same moment. A deep groan escaped the lips of the defiant King: "No one feared that from the fisherman!

They ought not to deem me so base." He struck his brow with his clenched hand.

Then Ebarvin, his accuser, stepped forward, saying:

"These questions were hard and undeserved. Few among our people will suspect that from the King of the Ebergau. He spoke truly: he might have fled long ago, but he would not escape. I believe him. I have known him ever since he learned to speak: he has never lied. He wants to die, from resentment against the people's league, and perhaps also from remorse and shame."

The King, deeply moved, hastily turned away from the speaker and closed his eyes, but instantly opened them again with a defiant look.

"Well then, I, a free man of unblemished reputation, with broad lands in the Ebergau--I answer for him with life and limb, property and honor. I will swear for him that any deed of arms imposed by the people to ransom him from the rope King Ebarbold will perform, or he will fall upon his s.h.i.+eld in doing it."

"I thank you, Ebarvin," said the tortured man, drawing himself up to his full height: this confidence was balm to his inmost soul.

"So be it! So be it!" shouted the mult.i.tude before the judge could put the question. "The Duke shall choose the deed!"

"Well then," said the latter without hesitation, "it _is_ chosen! In the Roman camp is a hero who is its head and its whole strength; if he fall, all their military power will be broken. Name the man!"

"Saturninus!" echoed from many voices. For the Tribune had repeatedly commanded the Roman troops in Germany, and many of the men now a.s.sembled on the Holy Mountain had formerly served beneath the Roman eagles.

"Ebarbold, bring us from the battle the head of Saturninus--and your guilt is pardoned. Will you do this, hero of the boar?"

"I will," replied the latter, with a deep sigh of relief. "Give me my sword; give me my weapons again." The s.h.i.+eld-bearer handed him the sheathed sword. Tearing the blade from the scabbard, he held its point toward the sun, saying: "I swear by this blade, the sacred symbol of the one-armed G.o.d of war, that, in the next battle, I will slay the Tribune, or fall by his sword."

Loud shouts of applause now burst forth. All, even those whose resentment at first had been most bitter, were heartily glad that, instead of a disgraceful punishment, an honorable deed of ransom had been found for the proud King.

The Duke gazed down at the surging throng with satisfaction.

CHAPTER x.x.xVII.

After allowing the excitement of the mult.i.tude time to find vent, the old Duke gave the twelve heralds a sign, and they hurried into the thick grove of oaks rustling behind the ash-tree. Then he struck the s.h.i.+eld, saying: "Justice has now been done according to righteous law and the n.o.ble will of the people.

"The judge has done his work: now listen to your Duke, army of the Alemanni!"

Deep silence instantly followed: all eyes rested intently upon Hariowald, who sprang up, took the s.h.i.+eld from the tree, slipped it on his left arm, and grasping the spear with his right hand, said from the high stone step, his voice, now in a totally different tone, ringing out with mighty resonance over the people:

"Many of you, I know,--and not the worst spearmen,--have silently dissented or openly grumbled because I have so long delayed leading you to battle. The foe was in the land, and we shrank into the forests; he was burning halls and huts, and we were watching the smoke and flames rise at a distance and remaining inactive. Gradually, even from the farthest districts, the men faithful to the league and obedient to the oath joined us: still the Duke delayed. And meanwhile the enemy was fortifying his camp. Yes, we knew it--any morning from the fortress on the opposite side of the lake the proud galleys might bring almost as many warriors as the camp already contained. Why did the old man still delay? When would he fight?"

"Yes, yes, why delay? When shall we go to battle?" Many voices impatiently repeated.

"He delayed," the Duke went on, his voice rising in tones of thunder, "because he did not wish to strike part, not even half, but all, all, as many as could be reached,--all the murderers, the burners of homes, whom the boy in the imperial purple has again sent from across the lake to attack our free people!

"To-morrow (faithful men reported it to me before the news reached the Roman General), early to-morrow morning the proud galleys will sail across the lake and anchor off the sh.o.r.e close to the camp; and to-morrow, after midnight, old Hariowald will lead you to storm the camp and the s.h.i.+ps at the same time!"

Then the long-repressed battle fury broke out in a terrible tumult; frantic shouts and wild clanking of weapons echoed through the air.

"Look," Hariowald continued, "the heralds are already bearing from the sacred grove of the G.o.ds of our country, from the mysterious gloom of the forest darkness, never illumined by a sunbeam, the victorious badges of our tribes and districts which they have taken from the ancient oaks."

A shout of joy, somewhat subdued by reverence, greeted the procession of twelve heralds, who now, in pairs, with measured tread, came from beyond the ash-tree and gave the badges to the representatives of the various districts and clans, who stepped forward from the circle to receive them.

Ebarvin seized the symbol of the Ebergau: the boar's head with threatening tusks fastened to a cross-pole on a lofty spear. Adalo grasped a similar shaft, which supported a pair of huge stag's antlers.

Almost all the monsters of the primeval forest and the animals sacred to the G.o.ds were used in a similar way. Beside the huge horns of the aurochs and the bison rose the broad antlers of the elk. Odin's wolf, Donar's bear, and Loki's fox opened their jaws threateningly. Zio's sword, pointing straight upward, surmounted a shaft painted blood-red; another had Donar's hammer between two zigzag red lightnings forged from iron; three lances bore each a horse's head and neck, and from the necks the manes--respectively black, red, and brown--still fluttered.

On other poles the bald eagle, the golden eagle, and the Alpine vulture spread their wings and extended their talons in att.i.tudes of menace. A winged dragon carved from wood had been covered with the skins of the ring adder and the copper adder, which rustled in the wind. And as, like the manes of the horses, the hair of the wild beasts had been left hanging in a strip from the head to the tail, and long red, yellow, and blue streamers fluttered from the cross-poles, there was no lack of the rustling, waving motion, to which we moderns are accustomed in banners.

Under these streamers was also many a trophy,--a fragment cut from a captured dragon standard, or a sc.r.a.p of a purple pennon which the Roman squadrons and cohorts had long carried under the _labarum_ or standard of the cross, for they had abjured the pagan eagles.

When the representatives of the districts and families had received their beloved and honored emblems and returned to the ranks, the Duke went on:

"Hail to you, ancient symbols of conflict and witnesses of victory!

Hail and greeting, ye emblems consecrated to the G.o.ds! In your presence, looking into the future, seized by the power of the G.o.ds invisibly hovering around you, I will venture to utter a prophecy: