'There are many sides to love—admiration, reverence, gratitude, pity, affection; they are all different shapes of that one great spirit of love—the only feeling which will bind a man to do good, not once in a way, but habitually:—KINGSLEY.
DURING the weeks immediately following their meeting, the brothers spent nearly all their time together. Armand had really nothing to do; and Hubert very little, pending the arrival of the chancellor, which was now daily expected—but there was plenty to amuse them. Indeed, there was amusement, more than enough, just then in Constance, for keen young eyes and fresh young spirits. Besides the perpetual pageant of the streets, something special was always going on. There were Mysteries, Moralities, and Miracle Plays: there were famous Mummers from distant England: there were Jongleurs with their songs and jests, their feats of strength and agility, and their merry antics: there were showmen with dwarfs and giants, with learned apes and dancing bears: there were professional fools by the score, in their motley of red, green, and white, or of the other colors pertaining to their princely or noble masters, but always to be distinguished by the long asses' ears, which were their own special badge and cognizance. But the brothers sometimes preferred a quiet talk with each other to these various attractions. Going out by the Schnetz Thor or the Göttlingen Thor, and passing through the gardens and pleasure grounds called the Brühl, the usual scene of sports and pastimes, they would walk along the White Way, as it was styled then, until they reached the lake, where stood the gloomy towers of Gottlieben Castle. Or, taking another direction, they would walk beside the Rhine; or they would cross the bridge and wander in the pleasant fields and woods beyond. Indeed, all the environs of Constance were pleasant and lovely. But even there solitude was difficult; for many of those who had been attracted to the city by the Great Council were unable to find accommodation within its walls, and pitched their tents in the neighborhood.
Although far from agreeing upon all points, Hubert and Armand grew daily more attached to each other. They had many arguments, usually seasoned with jests and laughter, and with an abundance of what we would now style chaff.' Yet sometimes each would grow eager; and for a passing moment they would be on the brink of a quarrel. But the quarrel never came; on the other hand, every meeting cemented their good understanding.
They had two chief subjects of disagreement. One was about Armand's position as squire to the Duke of Burgundy. One of the things in the world which Hubert just then most earnestly desired was the condemnation of Jean Petit by the Council; and through him, of the duke's cowardly assassination of his rival. It is not surprising therefore that, with the usual intolerance of youth, he contended that his brother ought not to remain any longer in the service of a 'murderer,' as he called him.
‘A good way to show my gratitude for all he has done for me,' Armand would answer. ‘And, prithee, what am I to do? If I quit the Service, I have positively no prospect in the world. Wouldest have me take the beggar's staff and wallet, or enlist as an archer in the guard of the Black Friars, yonder on the island? Besides, I really cannot see how my honor is involved. If the duke were to ask me to help him in a murder, I hope I know my duty, as a true squire and gentleman;—but am I to make myself the judge of my lord's conscience and his actions?'
This seemed reasonable; and Armand, so far, had the best of the argument. But he overstated the case when he added: ‘In my place you would think the same. I warrant me you would not forsake your chancellor, suppose, even, for argument's sake, that he were to do what the duke has done.'
But this was asking too much of Hubert; indeed, it sounded in his ears like blasphemy. ‘Hold thy peace, foolish boy!’ he cried indignantly; ‘the chancellor, some day, may haply suffer violence from some of the great men whose sins he reproves so boldly—sparing not even the king upon his throne. But to do it! The notion is outrageous!'
‘Softly, Hubert; I did but jest. Though, methinks, I have heard of churchmen who compassed the death of their enemies.'
‘Oh, if it was a jest,' said Hubert, mollified—' well, if you jest, so can I. Here I promise, with a free heart and a clear conscience, that if ever the chancellor bears part in taking the life of any man, even his worst enemy, I will leave his service forthwith, and tell him why to his face. That promise will not cost me much,' he added, laughing.
‘My hand upon it then,' returned Armand. ‘One never knows what may happen when there are churchmen in the case. But if you love me, cease plaguing me about the duke, for I have no mind to make myself an idle rogue and a masterless man.'
The other cause of difference was more serious. Armand had been brought up amongst courtiers and soldiers, who had little regard for religion. Of course he practiced the outward observances universal in his day; and equally, of course, he had never questioned a single dogma he had been taught—he did not care enough about the matter to do so. But he often used profane oaths; and what to Hubert seemed worse, he never lost an opportunity of sneering at the Church or abusing the priesthood. It must be owned that the corruptions of the one and the crying sins of the other gave abundant cause. Much that he said was perfectly true, far more true than he himself knew, or guessed; yet none the less was it said in scorn of all religion, and learned from the lips of men who, for the most part, hated the good and not the evil in the religion of their day; disliking, as such men always will dislike, any restraint upon their conduct.
But Hubert, in his passage from a rebellious boyhood into a stormy youth, had been taken in hand, greatly to his benefit, by a very noble representative of the Church, and therefore he revered and loved the Church with all his heart. At least, he thought he did, but what he really revered and loved was the great chancellor. So Armand's mocking tone used to arouse his indignation; but all the more did mischievous Armand like to tease him by repeating the scandalous tales that came to his ears day by day-usually beginning with ‘One of your churchmen ' has done so-and-so. To which Hubert would usually answer, 'I am not a churchman.'
Particularly did Armand delight in retailing the many disgraceful and undignified stories which were current about Pope John. Even Hubert joined him in a hearty laugh at the tale of the carriage overturned in the Alpine pass, and the Holy Father (corpulent and unwieldy from a life of self-indulgence) lying helpless on his back in the snow, and greeting those who came to his aid with the characteristic exclamation, ‘Here I lie, in the devil's name.'
‘Pope John, I dare say, will be obliged to abdicate,' said Hubert, when he recovered his countenance.
‘Still, you must acknowledge that at present he is the true pope,' said Armand. ‘Indeed, you say yourself that those in the obedience of Gregory and of Benedict are schismatics,'
‘Oh, as for that,' returned Hubert, ‘the Council will set everything right.'
‘Ay, marry! 'Tis ever with you either the great chancellor, or the great Council, the Holy Council. You are making a Mohammedan idol of the Holy Council. And I, for my part, have no such opinion of it at all.'
There was a reason for this. Armand, although ‘a very subordinate' person in the service of the Duke of Burgundy, yet knew perfectly well that his lord had sent large sums of money by his agents to Constance, in order to influence the decision of the Council on the affair of Jean Petit. And he knew that the holy fathers were proving themselves by no means insensible to these golden arguments.
But besides these subjects of half-jesting contention, a vague but real feeling of uneasiness grew up gradually in the mind of Hubert about Armand. He himself, in all his intercourse with him, was perfectly candid and open, both about the past and the present. It was his character; and besides, he had nothing to conceal. But he could not help suspecting that Armand did not fully reciprocate his confidence. Hubert could see that there were some things about which he did not like to speak, and was uneasy if pressed to do so. The circumstances of his promotion from page to squire appeared to be amongst these, though for what reason Hubert could not guess. This kind of reserve repelled and vexed the stronger and more open-hearted brother, who had already begun to assume somewhat of the position of a protector towards the younger and weaker. Sometimes even a fear would cross his mind that there might be, in the young squire's apparently simple and innocent past, some hidden cause of trouble or embarrassment.
The arrival of the Chancellor of Paris swept the brothers in a measure apart from each other. Hubert had now abundance of work, and could rarely find a free hour even for a walk with Armand. A part of his duty, and one of which he was very proud, was to attend the sittings of the Council, and to take notes for his lord. Or rather, it would be more correct to say that he attended the sittings of the French' nation. 'Four nations,' the Italian, the German, the French, and the English (‘a fifth nation,' the Spanish, was added afterward), took part in the Council. These held their deliberations—which were called Meetings of the Nations—in the first instance apart. They came to their own conclusions, and voted separately, nation by nation. Then congregations, composed of the most distinguished members of all the nations, met together, and compared or revised their decisions, or deliberated upon special questions which had been referred to them. Lastly, these decisions were ratified, or otherwise, in solemn general sessions of the whole Council. All these meetings, were attended by scribes and notaries, for whom special provision was made.
The French nation held its sittings in the chapter house of the Dominican monastery on the island, under the presidency of the Cardinal Archbishop of Cambray, the celebrated Pierre d'Ailly, styled the eagle of France and ‘the hammer of heretics.' But the real master-spirit, ‘the light and soul,' not only of the French theologians, but more and more, as time went on, of the entire Council, was Jean Charlier Gerson, Chancellor of Paris.
The chancellor's zealous, quick-witted young secretary, who served him day by day, both in the Council and out of it, threw his whole heart into the work. All the enthusiasm of which his nature was capable, and that was well-nigh boundless, was enlisted in the cause of the Holy Council, and in its grand work—the restoration of the unity of Christendom. It would seem a strange object to kindle the devotion of a young soul like Hubert's; but then, with him, the Holy Council meant really the great chancellor. The great chancellor's aims and passions had become his also.
He took an early opportunity of presenting his brother to his distinguished patron. Armand would have excused himself, saying that the chancellor would regard him with scant favor, as the retainer of his enemy, the Duke of Burgundy; but Hubert assured him the chancellor was far too magnanimous to be influenced by such a consideration. He led him accordingly to a small apartment, very simply furnished, where at a table covered with papers sat the great chancellor, in his fur-trimmed doctor's robe fastened at the waist with a plain girdle of leather. Already, at fifty-three, his hair was gray, and his powerful rugged face was seamed with deep lines which told of care, of sorrow, of perplexity.
'My lord,' said Hubert, ‘this is my brother, Armand de Clairville, whom I had the honor yesterday to name to you.' The stern, sad face softened a little, as the great man looked kindly on the youth, who bowed low before him.
‘I am glad,' he said, ‘of any good thing which has come to my Hubert. For his sake and for thine own, God bless thee, my son.'
As they passed out, Armand condescended to say to his brother, ‘I think the blessing of thy chancellor will do me no harm, Hubert.'
On a cold and frosty, but very fine day, late in February, Hubert made his appearance at the house where Armand lodged, and found him standing at the door, with two or three other Burgundian gentlemen. They were training a couple of young falcons, allowing them to fly for a little, and luring them back to their wrists with morsels of meat. ‘Come away with me, Armand,' he cried breathless. ‘I have a holiday—the Holy Council are busy enthroning St. Bridget! '
Absurd as it may sound to us, this was the literal truth. The Council, after solemn debate, had decided upon the canonization of the Scandinavian saint, and were now completing their work by exposing, with much ceremony, her silver image for adoration in the cathedral.
Armand untied the embroidered lure from his wrist, and asked a friend to see to the birds; which the latter promised to do, muttering, however, that, in this cursed town, there was no room to see to anything beyond the toes of one's own shoes. ‘I am with you,' said Armand to Hubert. ‘Are we to go to the cathedral, and see the play of St. Bridget to an end? '
Hubert shook his head. ‘Anywhere but that,' he said. ‘I want to see the sky above my head again, which I have scarce done for a fortnight.'
‘Let us to the Brühl, then,' Armand proposed. ‘A merry company of jongleurs are showing their sports there.'
But this proposition did not please Hubert better than the other. ‘I am sick of jongleurs,' he said. ‘I have seen enough of them in Paris. Neither their manners nor their jests are to my taste. Nay; rather come with me to the Rhine bridge. I hear the townsfolk talking of a boat-race they are having on the river. No great affair, I suppose, since it is but a custom of their own. Still, I am rather curious to see it.'
‘As you please,' said the accommodating Armand. They took their way from the Rosgarten Street, where the Burgundian gentlemen lodged, along the market street, to the broad pleasant path by the lake. Leaving the Kaufhaus behind them, they came to the narrow water which divided the great Dominican or Island Monastery from the mainland. As usual, there were loiterers about, but the function in the cathedral had absorbed a great many, so the spot was fairly quiet, and the brothers were in no hurry.
‘How pleasant it is here!’ said Hubert. ‘Look at the swans, Armand.' And indeed the graceful birds, with their proudly arched necks and their snowy pinions, were a goodly sight as they sailed up and down the stream, on the banks of which little wooden houses had been erected for their accommodation.
Armand was still enough of a boy to frequent the booths of the' clever Italian and German confectioners who were making rapid fortunes in the town, so he was provided with morsels of marchpane and other delicacies, which he threw to the birds, and amused himself watching the eagerness with which they snatched them. 'Eat away, my fine fellows!’ he cried, turning out his leathern pouch to throw them the last crumbs. ‘You will be eaten yourselves one of these days. Roast swan is the best of dishes. For my part, I prefer it even to peacock, which is apt to be tough.'
Hubert had little experience of either at the frugal board of the temperate chancellor. But he answered, ‘The monks appear to be of your opinion.' Then, looking across at the stately, spacious monastery—'That is a grand place, Armand. You know I have been there, once and again; for our "nation” holds its sessions in the chapter-house, which is very handsome, and most fairly adorned. But their refectory—you should see that. What a noble hall it is! '
‘Ay, for banquets,' Armand threw in. ‘And noble banquets, I doubt not, are served there, to your good monks and their guests. The Black Friars for good eating, all over the world! When they tire of roast swan and roast capon, they may fall back on the fish in the lake, which is splendid here—and no doubt the choicest come to my lord abbot's table.'
‘He has never honored me with an invitation,' said Hubert. ‘But I have seen their beautiful chapel-ay, and seen it full of bishops and doctors, the greatest in all the world. That was a grand sight. And then the cloisters—some day, Armand, I must bring you in with me, and let you walk in the cloisters-so fine and spacious, so nobly built, and adorned with such beautiful paintings. And sometimes one meets there, walking slowly up and down, staff in hand, and in his long cloak, the great and learned Greek doctor, Manuel Chrysolaurus, who is the abbot's guest.'
‘I have seen doctors enough already to last me a lifetime,' said Armand. ‘The city is black with their gowns.'
‘Well, you have not so often seen a great house like that, in which, with all its dependents, there is not one who lacks meat or drink, or comfort for soul or body,' answered Hubert, still looking proudly at the stately pile of buildings.
‘Art sure of that, Hubert? Is there no dungeon yonder, foul and noisome, without light or air?'
‘Dungeon? Of course, I suppose there is; but no one in it.' Here, however, he caught himself up suddenly. ‘At— least— that is—'
But Armand went on, without heeding him, ‘Are you quite sure your monks oppress nobody? I think I have heard otherwise, from those who know their husbandmen and vassals.'
‘Who are always better treated, and more prosperous, than the vassals of the seigneurs and the barons,' Hubert interposed, standing up for the Church.
‘Then your bishops, and abbots, and so forth, always keep such a train of idle, insolent men-at-arms— archers, lanzknechts, cross-bowmen, and what not. Oh, I have known some of them, very truculent ruffians indeed.'
‘Are they worse than others who ply the same trade, and learn their manners from the knights and squires, their lords and masters?' asked Hubert, in his turn indulging in a gibe. But-talk of the angels-there is one, coming out of that postern gate.'
‘An angel?’ laughed Armand. ‘I should call him an archer of the abbot's guard.'
Armand was not mistaken. As the young man drew nearer, the brothers saw that he bore, on the sleeve of his buff jerkin, a well-known badge and cognizance—an abbot proper, full length, with his pastoral staff in his hand, and in front of him a shield, bearing the special arms of the Island Monastery, quartered with the famous sign of St. Dominic, the dog with the flaming brand in his mouth. The archer came quickly over the little bridge to the road, where Hubert smiled to see him stop, take the hand of a blind beggar, and lead him gently and carefully across the way.
‘Not so bad for one of your "truculent ruffians,"' he said. ‘But come along; you see the crowds are gathering, and everyone going towards the river. The boat-race, you know, is to be from the Rhine bridge.'
But the brothers were not fortunate that day. The function in the cathedral was over, and the crowds who had assisted at it came pouring down the quaint narrow streets that led to the shore. To increase the confusion, the proprietor of a dancing bear had chosen that very spot for an exhibition. A motley group of men and boys gathered about the creature, applauding him aloud as he bowed and took off his cap to his master, but running away with shrieks of half-genuine alarm when he showed a disposition to pay his compliments to the spectators. Hubert and Armand were jostled and pushed about; treatment which Armand at least resented all the more because it came chiefly from Swabians' —‘ beggarly flat-caps,' as he called the citizens.
‘What is the good of trying for the Rhine bridge?' he asked angrily. ‘Like enough, we should see nothing when we got there; and if we did, the game would not be worth the candle. Let us go somewhere else.'
Hubert demurred. ‘When I plan a thing, I do it,' he said. ‘I want to see the boats.'
‘Perhaps I can help you, my masters,' said a voice close at hand, and turning, they saw beside them the archer with the Dominican abbot's badge. The man spoke in German; but Hubert by this time was quite able to understand and reply to him. ‘We want to see the boat-race,' he said. It is, I believe, an affair of your townsfolk, and on that account the more interesting to us strangers.'
The compliment was appreciated, as Hubert intended it to be. The Rhine-Thor-Thurm is the best place to see it from. ‘Just follow me, gentlemen,' said the archer, with a brightening face.