Page:The Lay of the Last Minstrel - Scott (1805).djvu/260

 Duke began to laugh; and a certayn of yong knightes, that were there present, said, Syr, for godsake, let the mayster assay his cunning; we shal leve making of any signe of the crosse on us for that tyme." The Earl of Savoy, shortly after, entered the tent, and recognized, in the enchanter, the same person who had put the castle into the power of Syr Charles de la Payx, who then held it, by persuading the garrison of the Queen of Naples, through magical deception, that the sea was coming over the walls. The sage avowed himself to be the same person, and added, that he was the man in the world most dreaded by Sir Charles de la Payx. "By my fayth, quod the Erl of Savoy, ye say well; and I will that Sir Charles de la Payx shall know that he hath gret wronge to fear you. But I shall assure hym of you; for ye shall never do enchauntment to disceyve hym, nor yet none other. I wolde nat that in tyme to come we shulde be reproached that in so hygh an enterprise as we be in, wherein there be so many noble knyghtes and squyers assembled, that we shulde do any thyng be enchauntement, nor that we shulde wyn our enemyes by suche crafte. Than he called to hym a servaunt, and sayd, go and get a hangman, and let hym stryke of this mayster's heed without delay; and as sone as the Erle had commaunded it, incontynent it was done, for his heed was stryken of before the Erle's tent."—, vol. i. ch. 391, 392.

The art of glamour, or ocular fascination, was anciently a principal part of the skill of the jongleur, or juggler, whose tricks formed much of the amusement of a Gothic castle. Some instances of this art may be found in the Minstrelsy of the