CHAPTER IX.

AT THE MORT.

From the start of the hunt, the Emperor of the Franks had rushed headlong on the heels of the hounds. Amael, at first somewhat uneasy at the disappearance of his grandson in the midst of so large a concourse of cavaliers, was taken by accident towards that part of the forest whither the stag was leading the hounds from cover to cover. Amael even had the opportunity to assist, shortly before nightfall, at the killing of the stag, which, exhausted with fatigue after four hours of breathless running, turned at bay before the hounds when they had reached him at last, and strove to defend himself against them with the aid of the magnificent spread of antlers that crowned his head. The Emperor had not for a moment lost track of the hounds. He followed them speedily at the mort, together with a few others of the hunters. Jumping from his horse, he ran limping towards the animal at bay that already had gored several hounds with his sharp horns. Choosing with an experienced eye the opportune moment, Charles drew his hunting knife, and, rushing upon the desperate animal, plunged the weapon into the stag just above its shoulder, threw it down and then abandoned it to the hounds, that fiercely precipitated themselves upon the warm quarry and devoured it amidst the sonorous fanfare of the hunters' horns that thus announced the close of the chase and called their scattered fellows to reassemble. With his bloody knife in his hand, and after having contemplated with lively satisfaction the wild pack now red at their nozzles and contending with one another for the shreds of the stag's flesh, the Emperor's eyes fell upon Amael, to whom he called out gaily:

"Eh, seigneur Breton--am I not a bold hunter?"

"You will pardon my sincerity, but I find that at this moment the Emperor of the Franks, with his long knife in his hand, and his boots and coat spattered with blood, looks more like a butcher than like an illustrious monarch."

"I feel happy, nevertheless, and consequently inclined to be indulgent, seigneur Breton," replied the Emperor, laughing; then, lowering his voice, he observed to Amael: "Now, see how the clothes of the seigneurs of my court look."

In fact, most of the Emperor's seigneurs and officers, now hastening in on horseback to his presence from all sides of the thickets in response to the horns, presented an appearance that contrasted sadly with that which they had presented a few hours before. Magnificently attired at the start of the hunt, those seigneurs, who looked so resplendent in their rich tunics of silk, now presented a sight that was as ridiculous as it was pitiful. The embroideries on their tunics, at first so rich in color, were now frayed, soiled with mud, and torn by the branches of the trees and the thorns of the briars; the feathers that floated proudly from their caps, now drooped, wet, broken and draggled, resembling long, dislocated, and limp fish-bones; the boots of oriental leather had vanished under a thick coat of slush, and not a few of them, torn by the thorns, exposed their owners' hose, not infrequently also their skin itself. They shivered and looked distressed. Charles, on the contrary, simply and warmly dressed in his thick sheep-skin coat, which reached down over his boots of rough leather, and his head covered with his badger-skin bonnet, rubbed his hands with a cunning look of satisfaction in his eyes at the sight of his courtiers shivering with the cold and the wet. After contemplating the spectacle for a moment, Charles made a sign of intelligence to Amael and said to him in an undertone:

"Just before breaking ranks for the hunt, I recommended you to observe the magnificence of the costumes of these coxcombs, who are as vain as Asiatic peacocks, and even more devoid of brains than the bird whose spoils they wear. Look at them now--the fine fellows!" Amael smiled approvingly, while the Emperor, shrugging his shoulders, turned to the seigneurs with his squalling voice: "Oh, ye most foolish of people, which is at this moment the most precious and useful of all our raiment? Mine, which I bought with barely a sou? Or yours, which you have had to pay for through the nose?"

At this judicious raillery, the courtiers remained silent and confused, while the Emperor, placing both his hands on his spacious paunch, roared out aloud.

"Charles," Amael said to him unheard by the others, "I prefer to hear you speak with that sly wisdom than to see you disemboweling stags."

But the Emperor did not answer the aged Breton. He suddenly interrupted the discourse, extending his hand towards a group of nearby serfs, and crying out:

"Oh! Look at that pretty girl!"

Amael followed with his eyes the direction indicated by Charles and saw amid several of the woodcutter slaves of the forest who had been attracted by curiosity to see the hunt, a young girl barely covered in rags, but of remarkable beauty. A much younger child of about ten or eleven years held her by the hand. A poor old woman, as wretchedly clad as the girl, was in the company of the two. The Emperor of the Franks, whose large eyes glistened like carbuncles with the fire of lust, repeated, addressing Amael:

"By the cape of St. Martin! The girl is beautiful. Is it that your hundred years on your back render you insensible to the sight of such rare beauty, seigneur Breton? What a beautiful girl!"

"Charles, the misery of that creature strikes me more strongly than her beauty."

"You are very commiserate, seigneur Breton--so am I. Linen and silk should clothe so charming a figure. No doubt she is the daughter of some woodman slave. I can tell you, one runs at times across wonderfully beautiful girls in the forest. More than once I have dropped the chase in the middle of the heat to pursue another scent. But in honor to truth, I have never seen such a charmer before. It must be her good star that brought her across the path of Charles." Without removing his eyes from the young girl, Charles called to one of the seigneurs in his suite: "Eh! Burchard. Come here; I have orders for you."

The seigneur Burchard quickly alighted from his horse and hastened to obey the call of the Emperor. The latter, moving a few steps away from Amael, whispered a few words in the ear of the seigneur, who, showing himself greatly honored with the mission given him by his master, bowed respectfully, and, leading his horse by the bridle, approached the old woman and the two younger girls who stood by her, motioned to them to follow him, and vanished with his charge behind the group of hunters. A deep flush colored the cheeks of Amael; he puckered his brows, and his features became expressive of as much indignation as disgust. At that same instant Amael noticed that the Emperor was looking about him with a certain degree of uneasiness and calling out aloud:

"Where are my little girls? Can they have lost track of the hunt?"

"August Emperor," said one of the officers, "Richulff, who accompanied your august daughters, told me that when the rain began to fall some of them concluded to return to Aix-la-Chapelle, while the others decided to seek the shelter of the pavilion, where you ordered supper to be held ready."

"Think of the timorous bodies! I wager that my little Thetralde is not among the Amazons who are afraid of a drop of water, and who hastened back to the palace. As they are all safe, I shall not worry. Let us hasten to the pavilion ourselves, because I am ravenously hungry." And remounting his horse, the Emperor added: "We shall find at the pavilion the damsels who have preferred to sup with their father. The stout-hearted lasses shall be well feasted, and I shall bestow rich presents upon them."

Seeing that Charles was manifesting some slight uneasiness on the score of his daughters, Amael, in turn, began to feel preoccupied with regard to Vortigern, whom, for some time, he had been searching for with his eyes among the groups of the approaching knights. As his eyes fell upon Octave, who just then came running in at a gallop, the aged Breton inquired from him with no little anxiety:

"Octave, have you seen my grandson anywhere?"

"We parted company almost at the very start of the hunt."

"He is not with us," proceeded Amael with increasing uneasiness. "Night is here and he is not familiar with the paths of the forest."

"Oh! Oh! seigneur Breton," put in the Emperor of the Franks, who, immediately upon remounting his horse, had drawn near the aged man and overheard his question to the young Roman, "you seem to feel uneasy about your youngster. Well, what if he should have lost his way this evening? He will find it again to-morrow. Do you fear he will die of one night spent in the forest? Is not hunting the school of war? Come, come! Be at ease. Besides, who knows," added Charles with a roguish air. "Mayhap he encountered some pretty woodcutter's daughter in some of the huts of the forest. It is like his years. You surely do not mean to make a monk of him? Pretty lassies are meant for handsome lads."