“The reverend impostor!” he exclaimed to himself; “the hoary hypocrite! He spoke of the unbelieving husband converted by the believing wife; and what do I know but that the traitor exhibited to the Saracen, accursed of God, the beauties of Edith Plantagenet, that the hound might judge if the princely Christian lady were fit to be admitted into the haram of a misbeliever? If I had yonder infidel Ilderim, or whatsoever he is called, again in the gripe with which I once held him fast as ever hound held hare, never again should HE at least come on errand disgraceful to the honour of Christian king or noble and virtuous maiden. But I--my hours are fast dwindling into minutes--yet, while I have life and breath, something must be done, and speedily.”
He paused for a few minutes, threw from him his helmet, then strode down the hill, and took the road to King Richard's pavilion.
The feather'd songster, chanticleer, Had wound his bugle-horn, And told the early villager The coming of the morn. King Edward saw the ruddy streaks Of light eclipse the grey, And heard the raven's croaking throat Proclaim the fated day. “Thou'rt right,” he said, “for, by the God That sits enthron'd on high, Charles Baldwin, and his fellows twain, This day shall surely die.” CHATTERTON.
On the evening on which Sir Kenneth assumed his post, Richard, after the stormy event which disturbed its tranquillity, had retired to rest in the plenitude of confidence inspired by his unbounded courage and the superiority which he had displayed in carrying the point he aimed at in presence of the whole Christian host and its leaders, many of whom, he was aware, regarded in their secret souls the disgrace of the Austrian Duke as a triumph over themselves; so that his pride felt gratified, that in prostrating one enemy he had mortified a hundred.
Another monarch would have doubled his guards on the evening after such a scene, and kept at least a part of his troops under arms. But Coeur de Lion dismissed, upon the occasion, even his ordinary watch, and assigned to his soldiers a donative of wine to celebrate his recovery, and to drink to the Banner of Saint George; and his quarter of the camp would have assumed a character totally devoid of vigilance and military preparation, but that Sir Thomas de Vaux, the Earl of Salisbury, and other nobles, took precautions to preserve order and discipline among the revellers.