THE KING’S BRIDE.

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BY J. H. DANA.

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There is no scenery in England more beautiful than that to be found in portions of the New Forest. Huge gray old oaks, gnarled, and twisted, and aspiring to heaven; deep glens, overshadowed by canopies of leaves, through which the light but faintly struggles; vast arcades, stretching far away in the distance, and buried in religious gloom; wild wood roads, that wind hither and thither among the giant trees in fanciful contortions; and open, sunny glades, intersected by sparkling streamlets, waving with verdant grass, and now and then disclosing a fairy cottage nestled in the edge of the forest, are to this day, the characteristics of this favorite hunting ground of the conqueror and his immediate successors. There is a solitude about this old labyrinthine chace, which is perfectly bewitching. You may travel for miles, in the more secluded parts of the forest, without meeting a human being, or seeing the smoke of a single cottage curling among the foliage; but on every hand you will behold trees growing in the wildest luxuriance, and tread on a sward as soft and thick as the richest velvet. You will, for a space, hear nothing but the sound of a nut rattling to the ground, or the song of some wood bird down in a brake; and then you will rouse the deer from their retreat, a rustle will be heard down in the under-growth, and you will catch a sight of the noble herd, perchance, as they go trotting away into the darker recesses of the forest.

Such is the New Forest now, and such it was eight centuries ago, on a bright sunny morning, towards the end of summer. The hour was still early, for the dew yet sparkled in the grass, or pattered down from the foliage as the wind stirred among the forest branches. The scene was one of the loveliest the chace afforded—a bright glade embosomed in the most silent depths of the forest. The whole of this open space was carpeted with the thickest and greenest grass, varying in hue, at every breath of the balmy wind over the undulated surface. On one side, the glade was bounded by a gentle elevation, covered with stately oaks, whose giant branches, spreading out far and wide, buried their trunks in the obscurity of a constant twilight—and on the other three sides the ground either extended itself in a plain, or sloped so gently off, that the descent was nearly imperceptible. Thousands of wild flowers spangled the surface of the glade, some flaunting proudly on the air, and some modestly hiding under the long grass, yet all sending forth the most delicious perfume—while innumerable birds, of every variety of plumage, hopped from twig to twig, or skimmed across the glade, filling the air with untold harmonies,—and high in the heaven, a solitary lark, lingering there long after his fellows had departed, poured forth his lay with such sweet, such liquid harmony, that a stranger, unaccustomed to his song, and unable to distinguish his tiny form far up in the sunny ether, might well have fancied those unrivalled notes the breathings of an unseen cherubim.

Such was the scene on which there now gazed two beings, both beautiful, but one surpassingly so. The elder of the two might have been one and thirty, and both his face and figure were moulded in the noblest style of manly beauty. His broad brow, chiselled features, and commanding port, bespoke him one born to rule, although the simple and somewhat mean garb he wore argued that he was not rich in this world’s goods. The attire of his companion was richer, but less gay, and she wore the veil of a novice. Her face, however, made up in loveliness for whatever absence of ornament there was in her dress, and indeed she might well have challenged the world to produce her rival. The fair delicate skin through which the blue veins could be seen meandering, the snowy brow that seemed made for the temple of the loveliest and purest thoughts, the golden hair that lay in wreathes upon the forehead, and the blue eye whose azure depths seemed to conceal mysteries as pure and rapturing as those of heaven, made up a countenance of overpowering beauty, even without that expression, so high and seraphic, which beamed with her every word, and threw over each lineament of her face a loveliness almost divine. Her figure was like that of a sylph, yet full and rounded in every limb; and beneath her dress peeped forth one of the most delicate feet that ever trod green sward. She was perhaps eighteen, though she might have been younger. She sat now on a low bank, at the very edge of the forest, while her companion reclined at her feet, holding one of her tiny hands in his broad palm, and gazing up into her eyes with a look of the deepest, yet most respectful passion. Nor were the maiden’s orbs averted from his gaze, for ever and anon she would twine her fingers playfully yet half sadly in his locks, and return his look with all a woman’s tenderness.

“Yes, sweet one,” said the hunter, as if continuing a conversation, “I have sometimes, during our separation for the last six long months, almost desponded, especially when I heard how urgent my brother was that you should wed his favorite Warren, and when I reflected that your aunt, the good abbess Christiana, was so hostile to my suit. But I did you injustice, dear one, and thus,” and he kissed the hands of his companion again and again, “I sue for pardon. God only knows,” he added in a sadder tone, “whether I shall ever have my rights. They sneer at me now as a landless prince, and that purse-proud Surrey hath no better name for me than Deer’s-foot, because I am not always able to follow the hunt with a steed. But so long as thou art true to me, sweet Maud, all these will be as nothing; and the time may come when we shall yet be happy.”

“Fear not, Beauclerk,” said the princess—for it was Matilda of Scotland who spoke, and he whom she addressed was the younger son of the conqueror, the penniless dependent of him whom men called the Red King, “fear not—all, as you say, will be well. I feel it, I know it. Do you believe in presentiments, dear Henry?” and pushing aside her lover’s thick locks, she held her hand on his forehead, and looked with her sunny orbs full into his eyes, as if she would playfully read his very soul.

“Presentiments trouble me not much, despite what the books say thereof,” answered the frank hunter, “I trust rather to my sword and my good right arm, though forsooth, they availed me little when I was cooped up in St. Michael’s Mount by my two kingly and loving brothers. Aye! presentiments and prophesies, and such things, trouble me but little, or I would e’en have consolation now, in all my troubles, in calling to mind the words of my father—the saints assoilzie his memory!—since dying, he said, ‘that I should be inheritor of all his honors, and should excel both Robert and William in riches and power.’ By St. George, the riches had best come soon, for I gave my last mark away this morning. No, kind Maud, I place little faith in presentiments. But you sigh. If it pains you that I credit them not, why, then I am the most devout believer in all England,” and again he pressed that fair hand to his lips, “why do you ask the question?”

“Because,” said the princess, blushing at his eagerness, “I have had a presentiment that we should yet be happy, and that full soon. I know not how it is to happen; but of this I am assured, we shall live for brighter days. The abbess threatens me with the veil if I do not wed Surrey, and even now forces me, in her presence, to wear a tissue of horse-hair; but though I can as yet see no escape from the alternative, I am not the less certain that it will never be mine to choose. So now, despond no more, dear Beauclerk.”

“Thanks, thanks, for your cheering homily,” said the young prince laughing, for her sanguine words had affected him with an unusual gaiety. “I can hunt now with some spirit. Little does Surrey think, while he is getting ready for the chase and perhaps sneering at me as a laggard for not being up to set out with the rest, that I have stolen out into the forest to meet her for whom he would give the whole of his broad lands.”

What answer the princess might have made to this somewhat vain-glorious speech, we know not, but at this instant a party appeared on the scene in the guise of a knight, somewhat advanced in years, and as he approached hastily, he said:

“You must forgive me, my dear lady, if I urge you to take horse. The abbess knows your journey will have consumed but a day, and that you should have reached Wilton last night, and I shall have a hard task to excuse your protracted stay without betraying you. The men-at-arms are drawn up but a little space off, and, though they are all my servitors, it is best that they should know nothing to reveal. The prince here will understand me.”

“Assuredly, Sir John; and if he they call Beauclerk ever attains power, he will not forget those who befriended the landless prince. I will bring up Maud in an instant.”

The knight bowed, and retreated into the wood. A few parting words were exchanged betwixt the lovers, a few tears were shed by Maud, which were kissed off by the prince, and then, with one long, last embrace, they tore themselves asunder, and in a few minutes the princess had rejoined her train. Prince Henry stood looking vacantly in the direction where she had disappeared, until the sound of her beast’s tramp had died in the distance, when, slowly mounting his steed, who had awaited its master in a neighboring copse, he entered one of the forest roads, and proceeded leisurely onwards. He had journeyed thus about half an hour when he heard a hunting horn sound close by him, and directly he beheld approaching the gallant array of his brother.

“Ha! my good cousin Deer’s-foot, well met,” said the Earl of Surrey; “we have been looking for you. I told your friend here, who swore you were yet abed, that we should meet you afoot in the forest before the day was over—and thereon we have laid a wager. I trow we have neither won. It would be but fair to give you the bet, would it not?” said the gay Earl with a half concealed sneer, as he glanced from his own rich suit to the prince’s garb.

“You may both want yet, fair sirs, all you can spare,” answered the prince; “but let us see who will be first in at the death. You were always apt at that, my lord,” and he turned to the royal treasurer.

“Ay, and shall maintain my reputation, your highness,” said Breteuil, recollecting he addressed almost a beggar; “and, if I may judge by your steed, even against yourself.”

“We shall see—we shall see,” said the prince. “I lay you a new steed, my lord, I distance you to-day.”

“Done,” said the treasurer, laughing; “you have thrown away your horse. But here is the king, and lo!” and as he spoke the horn announced that a stag had been roused, “the game is afoot.”

At the word the eager sportsmen gave spur to their steeds, and the cavalcade swept gaily off in the chase.

Never had a more gallant array than that which now followed the royal stag, woke up the echoes of the forest. Knights and squires, priests and pages, warriors and ecclesiastics, princes of the blood royal and high officers of state, pressed forward in the chase, now scouring along the level plain, now dashing away through the arcades of the forest, and now plunging recklessly through brake and dell, as the hounds dogged the flight of the noble animal into his once secure retreat. Yet it was well worthy of note how compactly the hunters kept around the king, none venturing to outstrip him, and only a few of the oldest maintaining an even rein with him.

Often during the chase the prince and Breteuil passed and repassed each other, and at every recognition Henry would gaily remind the treasurer of his wager. At length, however, the pursuit became more hot, the king gave rein to his steed and pressed on, and in passing some broken ground the royal party became separated, and those who were younger or better mounted than the rest swept on ahead. Among these was Prince Henry, who, though his steed was none of the best, kept up a not ignoble pace, until at length his arbalast caught against a tree, and he was nearly thrown from his horse. He checked his steed at once, and recovered his cross-bow, but the string was broken, rendering the weapon useless.

“Ha! My gallant prince,” said the treasurer, as he swept by; “you can scarcely hit your game now, even if you keep on. I trow your steed is mine.”

“A malison on the string,” said the prince bitterly; “there is nothing left for me except to sneak back to Winchester. But, no! I bethink me now there is a forester’s hut somewhere nigh here. Ah! yonder is its smoke curling over the tree-tops. I will hie me there, and get a new string. If the stag turns at the dell below, he will head up this way, and I may yet win my wager, for, the saints know, I can ill afford to lose my only steed.”

With these words the prince again gave spurs to his horse, and was soon before the forester’s hut.

“Ho! there, within,” he exclaimed; “a string for the prince. Marry, old mistress, have they never a keeper here better than you?”

These words were addressed to an old woman who met him at the threshold of the hut as he dismounted, and who appeared to be the only human being inhabiting the cabin. And she was one who might well occasion the prince’s exclamation of surprise. Her skin was like that of a corpse; her eyes were sunk deep into her head; her hair was grizzled and gray; her long bony fingers might have been those of a skeleton, and when she spoke, her hollow sepulchral tones made even the courageous prince shudder. She seemed to pay no regard to her visitor’s inquiry for a string, but fastening her basilisk-like eyes upon him, she said or rather chaunted, in Norman French, a rude lay, of which the following verses are a translation:

“Hasty news to thee I bring,

Henry, thou art now a king;

Mark the words, and heed them well,

Which to thee in sooth I tell,

And recall them in the hour

Of thy royal state and power.”

For the space of almost a minute after she had ceased, the prince gazed speechlessly on this novel being, awed alike by her strange demeanor, and her sepulchral eye. Nor were the words she chaunted without effect on her hearer. It was a superstitious age, and though few men of his day were less influenced by the supernatural than Henry, there was something in the sybil’s look which chilled his heart with a strange feeling, half fear, half awe. He had not recovered from his surprise, when a horseman rushed wildly up to the hut, and the prince had scarcely recognized one of his warmest friends, Beaumont, when that gentleman breathlessly exclaimed:

“The king is slain!—Tyrell’s arrow glanced from a bow and struck your royal brother to his heart!”

The words of Beaumont acted on the prince like the charm which dissipates a spell. He started, as if aroused from some strange dream, looked a moment in wild surprise at his companion, and gradually comprehending the strange and sudden transition in his fortunes, he sprung with a bound into his saddle, and plunging his rowels up to the heel in his horse’s side, exclaimed:

“Then this is no place for me—follow to Winchester, Beaumont,—and now for a crown and Maud!”

The next instant his horse’s hoofs were thundering across the stones, as he galloped furiously to the capital.

History relates how he reached Winchester, with his steed bathed in foam, and, without slackening his pace, dashed up to the door of the royal treasury, a few minutes in advance of Breteuil. History also tells how the energy of the young prince broke through the meshes of the wily traitor, and secured for Beauclerk the crown; but it does not add that, after the unwilling treasurer had surrendered the keys of the regalia, his new master said, half laughingly and half ironically, to the haughty peer who had so often neglected him when only a prince—

“Ah, my lord! did I not say I would win the race? I trow your steed is mine!”

The discomfited Breteuil bit his lip and was silent, but that night his best charger was sent to the royal stables; while the rest of the hunters, who were now fast pouring in from the chase, with the populace which at the first news of the Red King’s death had begun to shout “King Henry,” gathered around their young monarch and filled the air with their acclamations.

“Maud is right,” said the king to himself, as he beheld the enthusiasm displayed by his people, “to say nothing of the old sybil. Ah! what will my sweet one think when she hears this?”

Three months later and all the chivalry of the realm was gathered in the church at Westminster, while the populace without thronged every avenue to that princely cathedral. Never indeed had a prouder assemblage met at any royal ceremonial. The church blazed with jewels. Nobles in their robes of state; bishops and archbishops with mitre and crozier; countesses whose beauty out-dazzled their diamonds; knights and squires and pages of every rank; burghers with their chains of gold; men-at-arms encased in steel; halberdiers and archers; yeomen with quarter staffs, and foresters with arbalasts; men of every situation of life, and bright ladies, whose loveliness was beyond compare, were gathered in the gorgeously ornamented church, amid the waving of banners, the sound of music, the rustling of costly robes, and the smoke of ascending incense, to gaze on the marriage of their monarch to his fair and blushing bride. And there she stood before the altar in all her virgin beauty, her fair blue eyes suffused with tears of joy; while her manly lover stood at her side, the proudest cavalier in all that bright array. And when the archbishop ascended the pulpit, and demanded if any one there objected to the union, the whole audience shouted aloud “that the matter was rightly settled;” then again pealed forth the anthem, and again the incense rose in clouds to the fretted roof. The music ceased, the words were said, the crown was placed on the brow of the princess, and the hunter of the forest, amid the acclamations of his people, pressed to his heart the King’s Bride.

“Do you believe in presentiments now?” said the young queen, half laughing, to her royal husband when they reached the palace.

“I am a convert to your faith whatever it may be, sweet one. Nay! you shall preach no sermon over my retraction, for thus I forbid the homily,” and the king drew the blushing Maud towards him and fondly kissed her.

Many an iron monarch has, since then, sat on the English throne, and many a fair princess has been led by her lover to the altar, but never has a happier or more beautiful pair wore the regal crown in the realm of our ancestors.