At Agincourt

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The French had a few cross-bowmen on board, but Guy, running up on to the
castle at the bow, where Long Tom himself was posted, bade him direct the
fire of his men solely against them, and in a very short time the
discharge of missiles from the French ship ceased. In vain the French
attempted to bring the ships alongside each other by throwing grapnels;
the ropes of these were cut directly they fell, and although many of the
English spears were hacked in two, others were at once thrust out, and the
spars, being inclined so as to meet the hull of the enemy below the water-
line, could not be reached by their axes. The wind was light, and there
was no great difference in point of sailing. The English sailors were
vigilant, and when the Frenchman brailed up his great sail, so as to fall
behind, they at once followed his example. At the end of a quarter of an
hour the effect of the arrows of the thirty archers was so great that
there was much confusion on board the enemy, and Guy thought that,
comparatively small as his force was, an attack might be made. So the
spars were suddenly drawn in and the chains hauled upon. The archers
caught up their axes and joined the men-at-arms, and as the vessels came
together they all leapt with a great shout upon the enemy's deck.

The French knights, whose armour had protected them to some extent from
the slaughter that the arrows had effected among the soldiers, fought
bravely and rallied their men to resistance; but with shouts of
"Agincourt!" the men-at-arms and archers, led by Guy,--who now for the
first time fought in his knightly armour,--were irresistible. They had
boarded at the enemy's stern so as to get all their foes in front of them,
and after clearing the stern castle they poured down into the waist and
gradually won their way along it. After ten minutes' hard fighting the
French admiral and knights were pent up on the fore castle, and defended
the ladder by which it was approached so desperately that Guy ordered Tom,
with a dozen of the archers, to betake themselves to the English fore
castle and to shoot from there, and in a short time the French leaders
lowered their swords and surrendered. The French flag at the stern had
been hauled down and that of England hoisted as soon as they boarded, and
the latter was now run up to the mast-head amid the loud hurrahs of the
English.

The moment the French surrendered, Guy called to his men to cease from
slaying and to disarm the prisoners, who were still much more numerous
than themselves. The common men he told to take to their boats and row
away, while the admiral and knights were conducted to the cabin, and a
guard placed over them. As soon as this was done Guy looked round; the
battle was still raging and many of the French ships had been captured,
but others were defending themselves desperately. Twelve of Guy's men had
been killed, and several of the others more or less severely wounded, and
seeing that his countrymen did not need his assistance, he ordered the
decks to be cleared and the dead bodies thrown overboard. In a quarter of
an hour, the last French ship had been taken. There was now breathing time
for half an hour, during which the Duke of Bedford, whose ship lay not far
from Guy's prize, had himself rowed on board.

"All have done well to-day, Sir Guy Aylmer, but assuredly the feat you
have performed surpasses any of the others, seeing that you have captured
this great ship with one of the smallest in our fleet. Their crew must
have been three or four times as strong as yours, which was, as I know,
but sixty strong. Has the Count de Valles fallen?"

"No, my lord duke, he is, with six of his knights, a prisoner in the
cabin."

"I will see him later," the duke said; "we are now going to attack the
Genoese and Spaniards. Is there aught that I can do for you?"

"Some twenty of my men are dead or disabled," Guy said, "and I must leave
ten in charge of this prize. I have suffered the French soldiers, after
disarming them and the sailors, to leave in their boats, and ten men will
therefore be sufficient to hold her. If your grace can spare me thirty
men-at-arms I will go on in my own ship to attack the Genoese."

"I will do so," the duke replied. "I will send ten to keep this ship, and
twenty to fill the places of those of your men who have fallen. I can
spare ten from my own ship and will borrow twenty from such of the others
as can best spare them."

In a few minutes the thirty men came on board, with a sub-officer to take
charge of the prize. Guy returned with his own men and twenty new-comers
to his vessel, and sailed in with the fleet to attack the great ships of
the Genoese and Spaniards at their moorings. As they approached they were
received with a heavy cannonade from the enemy's ships and shore
batteries, but without replying they sailed on and ranged themselves
alongside the enemy, their numbers permitting them to lay a vessel on each
side of most of the great caravels. Their task was by no means an easy
one, for the sides of these ships were fifteen feet above those of the low
English vessels, and they were all crowded with men. Nevertheless, the
English succeeded in boarding, forcing their way in through port-holes and
windows, clambering up the bows by the carved work, or running out on
their yards and swinging themselves by ropes on to the enemy's deck, while
the cannon plied them with shot close to the water-line.

Most of the ships were taken by boarding, some were sunk with all on
board, a few only escaped by cutting their cables and running up the Seine
into shallow water. The loss of life on the part of the French and their
allies in this brilliant British victory was enormous. With the exception
of those on board the few ships which escaped, and the men sent off in the
boats by Guy, the whole of the crews of the French, Genoese, and
Spaniards, save only the nobles and knights put to ransom, were killed,
drowned, or taken prisoners, and during the three weeks that the English
fleet remained off Harfleur, the sailors were horrified by the immense
number of dead bodies that were carried up and down by the tide. Harfleur
was revictualled and put into a state of defence, and the Duke of Bedford
then sailed with his fleet to England, having achieved the greatest naval
victory that England had ever won save when Edward the Third, with the
Black Prince, completely defeated a great Spanish fleet off the coast of
Sussex, with a squadron composed of ships vastly inferior both in size and
number to those of the Spaniards, which contained fully ten times the
number of fighting men carried by the English vessels.

This great naval victory excited unbounded enthusiasm in England. The king
gave a great banquet to the Duke of Bedford and his principal officers,
and by the duke's orders Guy attended. Before they sat down to the table
the duke presented his officers individually to the king. Guy, as the
youngest knight, was the last to be introduced.

"The duke has already spoken to me of the right valiant deeds that you
accomplished, Sir Guy Aylmer," the king said as he bowed before him, "and
that with but a small craft and only sixty men-at-arms and archers you
captured the ship of the French admiral, which he estimates must have
carried at least three hundred men. We hereby raise you to the rank of
knight-banneret, and appoint you to the fief of Penshurst in Hampshire,
now vacant by the death without heirs of the good knight Sir Richard Fulk.
And we add thereto, as our own gift, the two royal manors of Stoneham and
Piverley lying adjacent to it, and we enjoin you to take for your coat-of-
arms a great ship. The fief of Penshurst is a sign of our royal approval
of your bravery at Harfleur, the two manors are the debt we owe you for
your service at Agincourt. We have ordered our chancellor to make out the
deeds, and tomorrow you will receive them from him and take the oaths."

Guy knelt and kissed the hand that the king held out to him, and
acknowledged the royal gift in fitting words. On the following day, after
taking the oaths for his new possessions, he mounted, and the next day
rode into Summerley. Here to his surprise he found the Count of Montepone,
who had arrived, by way of Calais and Dover, a few days previously. He was
suffering from a severe wound, and when Guy entered rose feebly from a
chair by the fire, for it was now October and the weather was cold. His
daughter was sitting beside him, and Lady Margaret was also in the room.
Lord Eustace and Sir John Aylmer had met Guy as he dismounted below.

"So you have gone through another adventure and come out safely," the
count said after Guy had greeted him. "Truly you have changed greatly
since you left Paris, well-nigh three years ago. It was well that Maitre
Leroux had the armour made big for you, for I see that it is now none too
large. I too, you see, have been at war; but it was one in which there was
small honour, though, as you see, with some risk, for it was a private
duel forced upon me by one of the Armagnac knights. Up to that time my
predictions had wrought me much profit and no harm. I had told Aquitaine
and other lords who consulted me that disaster would happen when the
French army met the English. That much I read in the stars. And though,
when Henry marched north from Harfleur with so small a following, it
seemed to me that victory could scarce attend him against the host of
France, I went over my calculations many times and could not find that I
had made an error. It was owing greatly to my predictions that the duke
readily gave way when the great lords persuaded him not to risk his life
in the battle.

"Others whom I had warned went to their death, in some cases because they
disbelieved me, in others because they preferred death to the dishonour of
drawing back. One of the latter, on the eve of the battle, confided to a
hot-headed knight in his following that I had foretold his death; and
instead of quarrelling with the stars, the fool seemed to think that I had
controlled them, and was responsible for his lord's death. So when in
Paris some months since, he publicly insulted me, and being an Italian
noble as well as an astrologer, I fought him the next day. I killed him,
but not before I received a wound that laid me up for months, and from
which I have not yet fairly recovered. While lying in Paris I decided upon
taking a step that I had for some time been meditating. I could, when
Katarina left Paris with your lady, have well gone with her, with ample
means to live in comfort and to furnish her with a fortune not unfitted to
her rank as my daughter.

"During the past three years the reputation I gained by my success in
saving the lives of several persons of rank, increased so rapidly that
money has flowed into my coffers beyond all belief. There was scarcely a
noble of the king's party who had not consulted me, and since Agincourt
the Duke of Aquitaine and many others took no step whatever without coming
to me. But I am weary of the everlasting troubles of which I can see no
end, and assuredly the aspect of the stars affords no ground for hope that
they will terminate for years; therefore, I have determined to leave
France, and to practise my art henceforth solely for my own pleasure, I
shall open negotiations with friends in Mantua, to see whether, now that
twelve years have elapsed since I had to fly, matters cannot be arranged
with my enemies; much can often be done when there are plenty of funds
wherewith to smooth away difficulties. Still, that is in the future. My
first object in coming to England was to see how my daughter was faring,
and to enjoy a period of rest and quiet while my wound was healing, which
it has begun to do since I came here. I doubted on my journey, which has
been wholly performed in a litter, whether I should arrive here alive."

"And now, father," Katarina said, "let us hear what Sir Guy has been doing
since he left; we have been all full of impatience since the news came
four days ago that the Duke of Bedford had destroyed a great fleet of
French, Spanish, and Genoese ships."

"Guy has had his share of fighting, at any rate," Lord Eustace said, as he
entered the room while the girl was speaking, "for fifteen of our men have
fallen; and, as Long Tom tells me, they had hot work of it, and gained
much credit by capturing single-handed a great French ship."

"Yes, we were fortunate," Guy said, "in falling across the ship of the
French admiral, Count de Valles. Our men all fought stoutly, and the
archers having cleared the way for us and slain many of their crew, we
captured them, and I hold the count and five French knights to ransom."

"That will fill your purse rarely, Guy. But let us hear more of this
fighting. De Valles's ship must have been a great one, and if you took it
with but your own sixty men it must have been a brilliant action."

Guy then gave a full account of the fight, and of the subsequent capture
of one of the Spanish carracks with the aid of another English ship.

"If the Duke of Bedford himself came on board," Lord Eustace said, "and
sent you some reinforcements, he must have thought highly of the action;
indeed he cannot but have done so, or he would not have come personally on
board. Did he speak to the king of it?"

"He did, and much more strongly, it seems to me, than the affair
warranted, for at the banquet the day before yesterday his majesty was
graciously pleased to appoint me a knight-banneret, and to bestow upon me
the estates of Penshurst, adding thereto the royal manors of Stoneham and
Piverley."

"A right royal gift!" Lord Eustace said, while exclamations of pleasure
broke from the others.

"I congratulate you on your new honour, which you have right worthily
earned. Sir John, you may well be proud of this son of yours."

"I am so, indeed," Sir John Aylmer said heartily. "I had hoped well of the
lad, but had not deemed that he would mount so rapidly. Sir Richard Fulk
had a fine estate, and joined now to the two manors it will be as large as
those of Summerley, even with its late additions."

"I am very glad," Dame Margaret said, "that the king has apportioned you
an estate so near us, for it is scarce fifteen miles to Penshurst, and it
will be but a morning ride for you to come hither."

"Methinks, wife," Lord Eustace said with a smile, "we were somewhat hasty
in that matter of Sir William Bailey, for had we but waited Agnes might
have done better."

"She chose for herself," Dame Margaret replied with an answering smile. "I
say not that in my heart I had not hoped at one time that she and Guy
might have come together, for I had learnt to love him almost as if he had
been my own, and would most gladly have given Agnes to him had it been
your wish as well as theirs; but I have seen for some time past that it
was not to be, for they were like brother and sister to each other, and
neither had any thought of a still closer relation. Had it not been so I
should never have favoured Sir William Bailey's suit, though indeed he is
a worthy young man, and Agnes is happy with him. You have not been to your
castle yet, Guy?" she asked, suddenly changing the subject.

"No, indeed, Lady Margaret, I rode straight here from London, deeming
this, as methinks that I shall always deem it, my home."

"We must make up a party to ride over and see it to-morrow," Lord Eustace
said. "We will start early, wife, and you and Katarina can ride with us.
Charlie will of course go, and Sir John. We could make a horse-litter for
the count, if he thinks he could bear the journey.

"Methinks that I had best stay quietly here," the Italian said. "I have
had enough of litters for a time, and the shaking might make my wound
angry again."

"Nonsense, child!" he broke off as Katarina whispered that she would stay
with him; "I need no nursing now; you shall ride with the rest."

Accordingly the next day the party started early. Charlie was in high
spirits; he had grown into a sturdy boy, and was delighted at the good
fortune that had befallen Guy, whom he had regarded with boundless
admiration since the days in Paris. Katarina was in one of her silent
moods, and rode close to Lady Margaret. Long Tom, who was greatly rejoiced
on hearing of the honours and estates that had been bestowed on Guy, rode
with two of his comrades in the rear of the party. Penshurst was a strong
castle, though scarcely equal in size to Summerley; it was, however, a
more comfortable habitation, having been altered by the late owner's
father, who had travelled in Italy, with a view rather to the
accommodation of its inmates than its defence, and had been furnished with
many articles of luxury rare in England.

"A comfortable abode truly, Guy!" his father said. "It was well enough two
hundred years since, when the country was unsettled, for us to pen
ourselves up within walls, but there is little need of it now in England,
although in France, where factions are constantly fighting against each
other, it is well that every man should hold himself secure from attack.
But now that cannon are getting to so great a point of perfection, walls
are only useful to repel sudden attacks, and soon crumble when cannon can
be brought against them. Me thinks the time will come when walls will be
given up altogether, especially in England, where the royal power is so
strong that nobles can no longer war with each other."

"However, Guy," Lord Eustace said, "'tis as well at present to have walls,
and strong ones; and though I say not that this place is as strong as
Villeroy, it is yet strong enough to stand a siege."

Guy spent an hour with the steward, who had been in charge of the castle
since the death of Sir Richard Fulk, and who had the day before heard from
a royal messenger that Sir Guy had been appointed lord of the estates. The
new owner learned from him much about the extent of the feu, the number of
tenants, the strength that he would be called upon to furnish in case of
war, and the terms on which the vassals held their tenure.

"Your force will be well-nigh doubled," the steward said in conclusion,
"since you tell me that the manors of Stoneham and Piverley have also
fallen to you."

"'Tis a fair country," Guy said as the talk ended, "and one could wish for
no better. I shall return to Summerley to-day, but next Monday I will
come over here and take possession, and you can bid the tenants, and those
also of the two manors, to come hither and meet me at two o'clock."

"Well, daughter," the Count of Montepone said to Katarina as she was
sitting by his couch in the evening, "so you think that Penshurst is a
comfortable abode?"

"Yes, father, the rooms are brighter and lighter than these and the walls
are all hung with arras and furnished far more comfortably."

"Wouldst thou like to be its mistress, child?"

A bright flush of colour flooded the girl's face.

"Dost mean it, father?" she asked in a voice hardly above a whisper.

"Why not, child? You have seen much of this brave young knight, whom,
methinks, any maiden might fall in love with. Art thou not more sensible
to his merits than was Mistress Agnes?"

"He saved my life, father."

"That did he, child, and at no small risk to his own: Then do I understand
that such a marriage would be to your liking?"

"Yes, father," she said frankly, "but I know not that it would be to Sir
Guy's."

"That is for me to find out," he said. "I asked Lady Margaret a few days
ago what she thought of the young knight's inclinations, and she told me
that she thought indeed he had a great liking for you, but that in truth
you were so wayward that you gave him but little chance of showing it."

"How could I let him see that I cared for him, father, when I knew not for
certain that he thought aught of me, and moreover, I could not guess what
your intentions for me might be."

"I should not have sent you where you would often be in his company,
Katarina, unless I had thought the matter over deeply. It was easy to
foresee that after the service he had rendered you you would think well of
him, and that, thrown together as you would be, it was like enough that
you should come to love each other. I had cast your horoscope and his and
found that you would both be married about the same time, though I could
not say that it would be to each other. I saw enough of him during that
time in Paris to see that he was not only brave, but prudent and discreet.
I saw, too, from his affection to his mistress, that he would be loyal and
honest in all he undertook, that it was likely that he would rise to
honour, and that above all I could assuredly trust your happiness to him.
He was but a youth and you a girl, but he was bordering upon manhood and
you upon womanhood. I marked his manner with his lady's daughter and saw
that she would be no rival to you. Had it been otherwise I should have
yielded to your prayers, and have kept you with me in France. Matters have
turned out according to my expectation. I can give you a dowry that any
English noble would think an ample one with his bride; and though Guy is
now himself well endowed he will doubtless not object to such an addition
as may enable him, if need be, to place in the field a following as large
as that which many of the great nobles are bound to furnish to their
sovereign. I will speak to him on the subject to-morrow, Katarina."

Accordingly, the next morning at breakfast the count told Guy that there
was a matter on which he wished to consult him, and the young knight
remained behind when the other members of the family left the room to
carry out their avocations.

"Hast thought of a mistress for your new castle, Sir Guy?" the count began
abruptly.

Guy started at the sudden question, and did not reply at once.

"I have thought of one, Count," he said; "but although, so for, all that
you told me long ago in Paris has come true, and fortune has favoured me
wonderfully, in this respect she has not been kind, for the lady cares not
for me, and I would not take a wife who came not to me willingly."

"How know you that she cares not for you?" the count asked.

"Because I have eyes and ears, Count. She thinks me but a boy, and a
somewhat ill-mannered one. She mocks me when I try to talk to her, shuns
being left alone with me, and in all ways shows that she has no
inclination towards me, but very much the contrary."

"Have you asked her straightforwardly?" the count inquired with a smile.

"No, I should only be laughed at for my pains, and it would take more
courage than is required to capture a great French ship for me to put the
matter to her."

"I fancy, Sir Guy, that you are not greatly versed in female ways. A woman
defends herself like a beleaguered fortress. She makes sorties and
attacks, she endeavours to hide her weakness by her bravados, and when she
replies most disdainfully to a summons to capitulate, is perhaps on the
eve of surrender. To come to the point, then, are you speaking of my
daughter?"

"I am, Sir Count," Guy said frankly. "I love her, but she loves me not,
and there is an end of it. 'Tis easy to understand that, beautiful as she
is, she should not give a thought to me who, at the best, can only claim
to be a stout man-at-arms; as for my present promotion, I know that it
goes for nothing in her eyes."

"It may be as you say, Sir Guy; but tell me, as a soldier, before you gave
up the siege of a fortress and retired would you not summon it to
surrender?"

"I should do so," Guy replied with a smile.

"Then it had better be so in this case, Sir Guy. You say that you would
willingly marry my daughter. I would as willingly give her to you. The
difficulty then lies with the maiden herself, and it is but fair to you
both that you should yourself manfully ask her decision in the matter."

He went out of the room, and returned in a minute leading Katarina. "Sir
Guy has a question to ask you, daughter," he said; "I pray you to answer
him frankly." He then led her to a seat, placed her there and left the
room.

Guy felt a greater inclination to escape by another door than he had ever
felt to fly in the hour of danger, but after a pause he said:

"I will put the question, Katarina, since your father would have me do it,
though I know well enough beforehand what the answer will be. I desire
above all things to have you for a wife, and would give you a true and
loyal affection were you willing that it should be so, but I feel only too
well that you do not think of me as I do of you. Still, as it is your
father's wish that I should take your answer from your lips, and as, above
all things, I would leave it in your hands without any constraint from
him, I ask you whether you love me as one should love another before
plighting her faith to him?"

"Why do you say that you know what my answer will be, Guy? Would you have
had me show that I was ready to drop like a ripe peach into your mouth
before you opened it? Why should I not love you? Did you not save my life?
Were you not kind and good to me even in the days when I was more like a
boy than a girl? Have you not since with my humours? I will answer your
question as frankly as my father bade me." She rose now. "Take my hand,
Guy, for it is yours. I love and honour you, and could wish for no better
or happier lot than to be your wife. Had you asked me six months ago I
should have said the same, save that I could not have given you my hand
until I had my father's consent."

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