Runnymede and Lincoln Fair: A Story of the Great Charter

by John G. Edgar

  CHAPTER XXIX

  HUNTING A WILD BOAR

  One day in autumn, about a month after Styr the Anglo-Saxon had takencounsel with his son in the stable at Oakmede, when King John wasoccupied with the siege of Rochester, and Hugh de Moreville was inLondon urging on his confederates the desperate expedient which theysubsequently adopted, a gallant party of knights and squires, armed withspears and hunting-horns, and attended by huntsmen with boar-hounds,left the castle of Chas-Chateil.

  Riding through the chase, the hunters penetrated into the great forestof Berkshire, which at that time stretched from Windsor right away upthe vale of the Kennet to Hungerford, a distance of some forty miles asthe crow flies. Their object was to hunt a wild boar, and they wereheaded by Sir Anthony Waledger, who rode Oliver Icingla’s black steedAyoub, an animal to which the Norman knight had taken a decided fancy,and which he already looked on as his own property.

  It has been hinted that Sir Anthony Waledger was somewhat boastful overhis cups, in which he at times indulged more deeply than prudencewarranted; and after a carouse, while his blood was still heated, he attimes deluded himself with the idea that he was an important feudalmagnate. On such occasions, and in De Moreville’s absence, the knightgave himself much greater airs than ever the lord of the castle took thetrouble to do; and as he paid his vows to St. Hubert, the patron ofsylvan sports, as well as to St. Martin, the patron of mediævalBacchanalians, he was particularly fond of displaying his mightiness andgetting rid of his superfluous energy by indulging in that violent sportwhich has been described as “the image of war.” Nay, more; Sir Anthonyrelished violent sport in its most violent form, and looking withcontempt on hawking and hunting the deer, even by way of whet forfiercer game, devoted himself to the wolf and the wild boar. Many werethe perilous adventures he had passed in the forest; but he boastedfrequently that he loved danger for its own sake, and loved it all thebetter that it was accompanied by the excitement of the chase.

  “Sirs,” he would exclaim, when the red wine of Bordeaux sparkled in hiscup, and the fire began to glow in his brain, “let us leave falconry tothe ladies, and damsels, and spaniels, and stag-hunting to thegreyhounds and men who are women in all but the name. By the head of mynamesake, St. Anthony, I prefer pressing close on the track of the bearor the wild boar, beasts that have the courage to turn to bay and rendtheir pursuers.”

  On this occasion Sir Anthony Waledger, having washed down his breakfastwith copious draughts, was particularly enthusiastic. Moreover, he wasviolent in proportion to his enthusiasm. He talked loudly and largelyabout the qualities of De Moreville’s dogs, and which was likely to huntthe best, always in a way which would have led a stranger to believethey were his own, brooking no contradiction whatever; and no soonerhad the huntsmen roused a huge boar from his lair than he became highlyexcited, and, shouting loudly as he hounded the dogs on the game, dashedhis spurs into Ayoub’s side and went off in keen pursuit. All theforenoon the chase continued, and as their horses grew weary and beganto flag, the hunters gradually tailed off; but Sir Anthony never haltedin the pursuit, nor did the black steed give the slightest sign ofweariness, though his glossy coat was literally covered with foam. Onthe knight went, the dogs gradually gaining on the boar, and the boarmaking a circuit till he led them back to within a mile of Chas-Chateil,and turned fiercely to bay under a gigantic oak hard by the spot wherethe castle of Donnington was afterwards built--perhaps the oak underwhich, according to tradition, Geoffrey Chaucer in his last years wrotemany of his poems.

  And terrible was the aspect which the boar now presented; his earserect, his shaggy hair standing in bristles, and his mouth foaming withrage, as, tearing and tossing aside the dogs with his mighty tusks, hecollected all his remaining strength to spring at the horse and therider. Nor did Sir Anthony shrink from the stern encounter. Blowing hishorn till it resounded through the woods, and shouting with a ferocitywhich rivalled the dumb ferocity of his grisly antagonist, he, with anoath and a gesture of fiery impatience, threw down his hunting-spear,and, drawing his sword of Bordeaux steel, dashed the rowels of his spursinto Ayoub’s flank and swung aloft his weapon to deal a decisive blow.

  But the blow was not destined to be struck. Unaccustomed to suchtreatment, rendered furious by the provocation of hours, and startled bythe fierce aspect of the boar, the noble animal made one plunge, rearedhimself high in the air, and then fell prostrate on the ground, bearinghis rider with him. It was a terrible moment. Sir Anthony was, indeed,little hurt by the fall, but his sword had dropped from his hand, and helay at the boar’s mercy.

  The knight in terror bawled out for St. Anthony and St. Hubert to cometo his aid.

  Only two moments did the boar lose ere making the rush; they wereemployed in freeing himself from the dogs, already blinded by the bloodfrom the wounds he had inflicted; and then he made his final rush--arush that brought his very snout in contact with the prostrate knight’sperson. But ere that rush took place, and ere mischief could be done,from the branches of the oak dropped something which to the knight’sswimming eyes looked like a large ball. Next moment the sword ofBordeaux steel, driven by a sure hand, penetrated the boar’s throat;and, as the monster rolled back on the grass, writhing in the agonies ofdeath, and Sir Anthony freed himself from the steed, and the steedsprang to his feet with a bound, he found standing before him, holdingAyoub’s bridle-rein in his left hand and the Bordeaux blade in theright, a dark-haired and rather swarthy youngster, in parti-colouredgarments of an outlandish cut, with a smile on his countenance. Thesmile was meaningless, and the boy looked marvellously innocent;nevertheless, Sir Anthony was so enraged with his mishap that he almostfelt inclined to kill his preserver on the spot for that meaninglesssmile and that innocent look.

  “Who in the fiend’s name are you?” he asked with a frowning brow and ina voice of thunder.

  The boy, who had not, as it happened, parted with the sword, repliedwith a smile which disarmed Sir Anthony’s anger; but the answer was in alanguage which the knight did not understand; so he muttered a slightimprecation to rid himself of the remnant of his wrath, and, havingagain loudly sounded his horn, began to look more kindly on themysterious stranger who had come to his rescue at the very moment of hisextreme need, and when otherwise he must have been torn to pieces.

  “By my faith,” said he in a low tone and with a thrill of superstitiousawe, “I firmly believe that St. Anthony or St. Hubert has sent thisyouth to my aid, and it behoves me, therefore, to treat him as one whomthe saints account worthy of being their messenger. One thing is lucky,”continued he: “the youth cannot speak our tongue, and therefore cannotreport the unworthy spectacle I have presented.”

  As Sir Anthony thus soliloquised, the huntsmen and two squires,attracted by the repeated blasts of his horn, rode up to the spot, andthe knight, having given a very inadequate description of the scene thathad been enacted, and consigned the boar to the huntsmen to be cut up,ordered them to take care of the boy and bring him to the castle. Hethen attempted to remount, but he might as well have attempted to scalethe heavens. Ayoub positively resisted, and, despising both threats andcaresses, stood proudly upon the dignity which had been so recently andso deeply injured. The knight was finally under the necessity ofmounting the horse of one of the huntsmen, and leaving Ayoub, and themystic boy, and the dead boar under their care, rode slowly away throughthe trees towards Chas-Chateil.

  “Cog’s wounds! friend Martin,” said one of the huntsmen to his fellow,after examining the boy as to his proficiency in the vernacular tongue,“I can make nothing of this jackanapes. Beshrew me if I do not think heis such a creature as was of late taken in the sea on the coast ofSuffolk.”

  “Hubert, lad, I fail to comprehend thee,” said Martin.

  “Natheless, it is true as any story ever sung by minstrel,” continuedHubert. “It was a fish in the form of a man, and they kept it alive sixmonths on land, feeding it the whilst on raw meat; but seeing they couldget no speech out of it, they cast it back into the
sea.”

  “I doubt thee not, Hubert, lad--I doubt thee not,” said Martin cheerily;“but, credit me, this is no such creature, but a boy from someoutlandish country beyond the seas. I have heard the like of him ere nowsinging glees on the great bridge at London. Mark how simple andinnocent he is. Even that fiend of a horse, that wouldn’t so much aslook at Sir Anthony, takes kindly to the child and licks his hand.”