The Jacquerie. A Fragment/Chapter V

Chapter V
Then, as the passion of old Gris Grillon A wave swift swelling, grew to highest height And snapped a foaming consummation forth With salty hissing, came the friar through The mass. A stillness of white faces wrought A transient death on all the hands and breasts Of all the crowd, and men and women stood, One instant, fixed, as they had died upright. Then suddenly Lord Raoul rose up in selle And thrust his dagger straight upon the breast Of Gris Grillon, to pin him to the wall; But ere steel-point met flesh, tall Jacques Grillon Had leapt straight upward from the earth, and in The self-same act had whirled his bow by end With mighty whirr about his head, and struck The dagger with so featly stroke and full That blade flew up and hilt flew down, and left Lord Raoul unfriended of his weapon. Then The fool cried shrilly, “Shall a knight of France Go stabbing his own cattle?” And Lord Raoul, Calm with a changing mood, sat still and called: “Here, huntsmen, ’tis my will ye seize the hind That broke my dagger, bind him to this tree And slice both ears to hair-breadth of his head, To be his bloody token of regret That he hath put them to so foul employ As catching villainous breath of strolling priests That mouth at knighthood and defile the Church.” The knife. .   .    .[Rest of line lost.] To place the edge. .   .    .[Rest of line lost.] Mary! the blood! it oozes sluggishly, Scorning to come at call of blade so base. Sathanas! He that cuts the ear has left The blade sticking at midway, for to turn And ask the Duke “if ’tis not done Thus far with nice precision,” and the Duke Leans down to see, and cries, “’tis marvellous nice, Shaved as thou wert ear-barber by profession!” Whereat one witling cries, “’tis monstrous fit, In sooth, a shaven-pated priest should have A shaven-eared audience;” and another, “Give thanks, thou Jacques, to this most gracious Duke That rids thee of the life-long dread of loss Of thy two ears, by cropping them at once; And now henceforth full safely thou may’st dare The powerfullest Lord in France to touch An ear of thine;” and now the knave o’ the knife Seizes the handle to commence again, and saws And. . ha! Lift up thine head, O Henry! Friend! ’Tis Marie, walking midway of the street, As she had just stepped forth from out the gate Of the very, very Heaven where God is, Still glittering with the God-shine on her! Look! And there right suddenly the fool looked up And saw the crowd divided in two ranks. Raoul pale-stricken as a man that waits God’s first remark when he hath died into God’s sudden presence, saw the cropping knave A-pause with knife in hand, the wondering folk All straining forward with round-ringed eyes, And Gris Grillon calm smiling while he prayed The Holy Virgin’s blessing. Down the lane Betwixt the hedging bodies of the crowd, [Part of line lost.]. .   .    .majesty [Part of line lost.]. .   .    .a spirit pacing on the top Of springy clouds, and bore straight on toward The Duke. On him her eyes burned steadily With such gray fires of heaven-hot command As Dawn burns Night away with, and she held Her white forefinger quivering aloft At greatest arm’s-length of her dainty arm, In menace sweeter than a kiss could be And terribler than sudden whispers are That come from lips unseen, in sunlit room. So with the spell of all the Powers of Sense That e’er have swayed the savagery of hot blood Raying from her whole body beautiful, She held the eyes and wills of all the crowd. Then from the numbed hand of him that cut, The knife dropped down, and the quick fool stole in And snatched and deftly severed all the withes Unseen, and Jacques burst forth into the crowd, And then the mass completed the long breath They had forgot to draw, and surged upon The centre where the maiden stood with sound Of multitudes of blessings, and Lord Raoul Rode homeward, silent and most pale and strange, Deep-wrapt in moody fits of hot and cold. (End of Chapter V.) •   •    •    •    •