Felix walked steadily1 on for nearly three hours, when the rough track, the dust, and heat began to tell upon him, and he sat down beside the way. The sun was now declining, and the long June day tending to its end. A horseman passed, coming from the camp, and as he wore only a sword, and had a leathern bag slung2 from his shoulder, he appeared to be a courtier. The dust raised by the hoofs3, as it rose and floated above the brushwood, rendered his course visible. Some time afterwards, while he still rested, being very weary with walking through the heat of the afternoon, he heard the sound of wheels, and two carts drawn4 by horses came along the track from the city.
The carts were laden5 with bundles of arrows, perhaps the same he had seen unloading that morning from the war-ship, and were accompanied only by carters. As they approached he rose, feeling that it was time to continue his journey. His tired feet were now stiff, and he limped as he stepped out into the road. The men spoke6, and he walked as well as he could beside them, using his boar-spear as a staff. There were two carters with each cart; and presently, noting how he lagged, and could scarce keep pace with them, one of them took a wooden bottle from the load on his cart, and offered him a draught7 of ale.
Thus somewhat refreshed, Felix began to talk, and learnt that the arrows were from the vessel8 in whose track he had sailed; that it had been sent loaded with stores for the king’s use, by his friend the Prince of Quinton; that very great efforts had been made to get together a large army in this campaign; first, because the city besieged9 was so near home, and failure might be disastrous10, and, secondly11, because it was one of three which were all republics, and the other two would be certain to send it assistance. These cities stood in a plain, but a few miles apart, and in a straight line on the banks of the river. The king had just sat down before the first, vowing12 that he would knock them down, one after the other, like a row of ninepins.
The carters asked him, in return, whose retainer he was, and he said that he was on his way to take service, and was under no banner yet.
“Then,” said the man who had given him a drink, “if you are free like that, you had better join the king’s levy13, and be careful to avoid the barons15’ war. For if you join either of the barons’ war, they will know you to be a stranger, and very likely, if they see that you are quick and active, they will not let you free again, and if you attempt to escape after the campaign, you will find yourself mightily16 mistaken. The baron14’s captain would only have to say you had always been his man; and, as for your word, it would be no more than a dog’s bark. Besides which, if you rebelled, it would be only to shave off that moustache of yours, and declare you a slave, and as you have no friends in camp, a slave you would be.”
“That would be very unjust,” said Felix. “Surely the king would not allow it?”
“How is he to know?” said another of the carters. “My brother’s boy was served just like that. He was born free, the same as all our family, but he was fond of roving, and when he reached Quinton, he was seen by Baron Robert, who was in want of men, and being a likely young fellow, they shaved his lip, and forced him to labour under the thong17. When his spirit was cowed, and he seemed reconciled, they let him grow his moustache again, and there he is now, a retainer, and well treated. But still, it was against his will. Jack18 is right; you had better join the king’s levy.”
The king’s levy is composed of his own retainers from his estates, of townsmen, who are not retainers of the barons, of any knights19 and volunteers who like to offer their services; and a king always desires as large a levy as possible, because it enables him to overawe his barons. These, when their “war”, or forces, are collected together in camp, are often troublesome, and inclined to usurp20 authority. A volunteer is, therefore, always welcome in the king’s levy.
Felix thanked them for the information they had given him, and said he should certainly follow their advice. He could now hardly keep up with the carts, having walked for so many hours, and undergone so much previous exertion21. Finding this to be the case, he wished them good-night, and looked round for some cover. It was now dusk, and he knew he could go no farther. When they understood his intention, they consulted among themselves, and finally made him get up into one of the carts, and sit down on the bundles of arrows, which filled it like faggots. Thus he was jolted22 along, the rude wheels fitting but badly on the axle, and often sinking deep into a rut.
They were now in thick forest, and the track was much narrower, so that it had become worn into a hollow, as if it were the dry bed of a torrent23. The horses and the carters were weary, yet they were obliged to plod24 on, as the arms had to be delivered before the morrow. They spoke little, except to urge the animals. Felix soon dropped into a reclining posture25 (uneasy as it was, it was a relief), and looking up, saw the white summer stars above. After a time he lost consciousness, and slept soundly, quite worn out, despite the jolting26 and creaking of the wheels.
The sound of a trumpet27 woke him with a start. His heavy and dreamless sleep for a moment had taken away his memory, and he did not know where he was. As he sat up two sacks fell from him; the carters had thrown them over him as a protection against the night’s dew. The summer morning was already as bright as noonday, and the camp about him was astir. In half a minute he came to himself, and getting out of the cart looked round. All his old interest had returned, the spirit of war entered into him, the trumpet sounded again, and the morning breeze extended the many-coloured banners.
The spot where he stood was in the rear of the main camp, and but a short distance from the unbroken forest. Upon either hand there was an intermingled mass of stores, carts, and waggons28 crowded together, sacks and huge heaps of forage29, on and about which scores of slaves, drivers and others, were sleeping in every possible attitude, many of them evidently still under the influence of the ale they had drunk the night before. What struck him at once was the absence of any guard here in the rear. The enemy might steal out from the forest behind and help himself to what he chose, or murder the sleeping men, or, passing through the stores, fall on the camp itself. To Felix this neglect appeared inexplicable30; it indicated a mental state which he could not comprehend, a state only to be described by negatives. There was no completeness, no system, no organization; it was a kind of haphazardness31, altogether opposite to his own clear and well-ordered ideas.
The ground sloped gently downwards32 from the edge of the forest, and the place where he was had probably been ploughed, but was now trodden flat and hard. Next in front of the stores he observed a long, low hut built of poles, and roofed with fir branches; the walls were formed of ferns, straw, bundles of hay, anything that had come to hand. On a standard beside it, a pale blue banner, with the device of a double hammer worked in gold upon it, fluttered in the wind. Twenty or thirty, perhaps more, spears leant against one end of this rude shed, their bright points projecting yards above the roof. To the right of the booth as many horses were picketed33, and not far from them some soldiers were cooking at an open fire of logs. As Felix came slowly towards the booth, winding34 in and out among the carts and heaps of sacks, he saw that similar erections extended down the slope for a long distance.
There were hundreds of them, some large, some small, not placed in any order, but pitched where chance or fancy led, the first-comers taking the sites that pleased them, and the rest crowding round. Beside each hut stood the banner of the owner, and Felix knew from this that they were occupied by the barons, knights, and captains of the army. The retainers of each baron bivouacked as they might in the open air; some of them had hunter’s hides, and others used bundles of straw to sleep on. Their fire was as close to their lord’s hut as convenient, and thus there were always plenty within call.
The servants, or slaves, also slept in the open air, but in the rear of their owner’s booth, and apart from the free retainers. Felix noticed, that although the huts were pitched anyhow and anywhere, those on the lowest ground seemed built along a line, and, looking closer, he found that a small stream ran there. He learnt afterwards that there was usually an emulation35 among the commanders to set up their standards as near the water as possible, on account of convenience, those in the rear having often to lead their horses a long distance to water. Beyond the stream the ground rose again as gradually as it had declined. It was open and cultivated up to the walls of the besieged city, which was not three-quarters of a mile distant. Felix could not for the moment distinguish the king’s head-quarters. The confused manner in which the booths were built prevented him from seeing far, though from the higher ground it was easy to look over their low roofs.
He now wandered into the centre of the camp, and saw with astonishment36 groups of retainers everywhere eating, drinking, talking, and even playing cards or dice37, but not a single officer of any rank. At last, stopping by the embers of a fire, he asked timidly if he might have breakfast. The soldiers laughed and pointed38 to a cart behind them, telling him to help himself. The cart was turned with the tail towards the fire, and laden with bread and sides of bacon, slices of which the retainers had been toasting at the embers.
He did as he was bid, and the next minute a soldier, not quite steady on his legs even at that hour, offered him the can, “for,” said he, “you had best drink whilst you may, youngster. There is always plenty of drink and good living at the beginning of a war, and very often not a drop or a bite to be got in the middle of it.” Listening to their talk as he ate his breakfast, Felix found the reason there were no officers about was because most of them had drunk too freely the night before. The king himself, they said, was put to bed as tight as a drum, and it took no small quantity to fill so huge a vessel, for he was a remarkably39 big man.
After the fatigue40 of the recent march, they had, in fact, refreshed themselves, and washed down the dust of the track. They thought that this siege was likely to be a very tough business, and congratulated themselves that it was not thirty miles to Aisi, so that so long as they stayed there they might, perhaps, get supplies of provisions with tolerable regularity41. “But if you’re over the water, my lad,” said the old fellow with the can, picking his teeth with a twig42, “and have got to get your victuals43 by ship; by George, you may have to eat grass, or gnaw44 boughs45 like a horse.”
None of these men wore any arms, except the inevitable46 knife; their arms were piled against the adjacent booth, bows and quivers, spears, swords, bills and darts47, thrown together just as they had cast them aside, and more or less rusty48 from the dew. Felix thought that had the enemy come suddenly down in force they might have made a clean sweep of the camp, for there were no defences, neither breastwork, nor fosse, nor any set guard. But he forgot that the enemy were quite as ill-organized as the besiegers; probably they were in still greater confusion, for King Isembard was considered one of the greatest military commanders of his age, if not the very greatest.
The only sign of discipline he saw was the careful grooming49 of some horses, which he rightly guessed to be those ridden by the knights, and the equally careful polishing of pieces of armour50 before the doors of the huts. He wished now to inquire his way to the king’s levy, but as the question rose to his lips he checked himself, remembering the caution the friendly carters had given him. He therefore determined51 to walk about the camp till he found some evidence that he was in the immediate52 neighbourhood of the king.
He rose, stood about a little while to allay53 any possible suspicion (quite needless precautions, for the soldiers were far too agreeably engaged to take the least notice of him), and then sauntered off with as careless an air as he could assume. Looking about him, first at a forge where the blacksmith was shoeing a horse, then at a grindstone, where a knight’s sword was being sharpened, he was nearly knocked down by a horse, urged at some speed through the crowds. By a rope from the collar, three dead bodies were drawn along the ground, dusty and disfigured by bumping against stone and clod. They were those of slaves, hanged the preceding day, perhaps for pilfering54, perhaps for a mere55 whim56, since every baron had power of the gallows57.
They were dragged through the camp, and out a few hundred yards beyond, and there left to the crows. This horrible sight, to which the rest were so accustomed and so indifferent that they did not even turn to look at it, deeply shocked him; the drawn and distorted features, the tongues protruding58 and literally59 licking the dust, haunted him for long after. Though his father, as a baron, possessed60 the same power, it had never been exercised during his tenure61 of the estate, so that Felix had not been hardened to the sight of executions, common enough elsewhere. Upon the Old House estate a species of negative humanity reigned62; if the slaves were not emancipated63, they were not hanged or cruelly beaten for trifles.
Hastening from the spot, Felix came across the artillery64, which consisted of battering65 rams66 and immense crossbows; the bows were made from entire trees, or, more properly, poles. He inspected these clumsy contrivances with interest, and entered into a conversation with some men who were fitting up the framework on which a battering ram67 was to swing. Being extremely conceited68 with themselves and the knowledge they had acquired from experience only (as the repeated blows of the block drive home the pile), they scarcely answered him. But, presently, as he lent a hand to assist, and bore with their churlishness without reply, they softened69, and, as usual, asked him to drink, for here, and throughout the camp, the ale was plentiful70, too plentiful for much progress.
Felix took the opportunity and suggested a new form of trigger for the unwieldy crossbows. He saw that as at present discharged it must require some strength, perhaps the united effort of several men, to pull away the bolt or catch. Such an effort must disconcert the aim; these crossbows were worked upon a carriage, and it was difficult to keep the carriage steady even when stakes were inserted by the low wheels. It occurred to him at once that the catch could be depressed71 by a lever, so that one man could discharge the bow by a mere pressure of the hand, and without interfering72 with the aim. The men soon understood him, and acknowledged that it would be a great improvement. One, who was the leader of the gang, thought it so valuable an idea that he went off at once to communicate with the lieutenant73, who would in his turn carry the matter to Baron Ingulph, Master of the Artillery.
The others congratulated him, and asked to share in the reward that would be given to him for this invention. To whose “war” did he belong? Felix answered, after a little hesitation74, to the king’s levy. At this they whispered among themselves, and Felix, again remembering the carters’ caution, said that he must attend the muster75 (this was a pure guess), but that he would return directly afterwards. Never for a moment suspecting that he would avoid the reward they looked upon as certain, they made no opposition76, and he hurried away. Pushing through the groups, and not in the least knowing where he was going, Felix stumbled at last upon the king’s quarters.
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steadily
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| adv.稳定地；不变地；持续地 | |
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slung
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| 抛( sling的过去式和过去分词 )； 吊挂； 遣送； 押往 | |
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hoofs
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| n.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的名词复数 )v.（兽的）蹄，马蹄( hoof的第三人称单数 ) | |
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drawn
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| v.拖，拉，拔出；adj.憔悴的，紧张的 | |
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laden
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| adj.装满了的；充满了的；负了重担的；苦恼的 | |
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spoke
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| n.（车轮的）辐条；轮辐；破坏某人的计划；阻挠某人的行动 v.讲，谈（speak的过去式）；说；演说；从某种观点来说 | |
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draught
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| n.拉，牵引，拖；一网（饮，吸，阵)；顿服药量，通风；v.起草，设计 | |
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vessel
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| n.船舶；容器，器皿；管，导管，血管 | |
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besieged
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| 包围，围困，围攻( besiege的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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disastrous
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| adj.灾难性的，造成灾害的；极坏的，很糟的 | |
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secondly
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| adv.第二，其次 | |
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vowing
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| 起誓，发誓（vow的现在分词形式） | |
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levy
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| n.征收税或其他款项，征收额 | |
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baron
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| n.男爵；(商业界等)巨头，大王 | |
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barons
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| 男爵( baron的名词复数 )； 巨头； 大王； 大亨 | |
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mightily
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| ad.强烈地；非常地 | |
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thong
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| n.皮带；皮鞭；v.装皮带 | |
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jack
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| n.插座，千斤顶，男人；v.抬起，提醒，扛举；n.（Jake）杰克 | |
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knights
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| 骑士； （中古时代的）武士( knight的名词复数 )； 骑士； 爵士； （国际象棋中）马 | |
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usurp
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| vt.篡夺，霸占；vi.篡位 | |
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exertion
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| n.尽力，努力 | |
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jolted
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| （使）摇动， （使）震惊( jolt的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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torrent
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| n.激流，洪流；爆发，(话语等的)连发 | |
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plod
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| v.沉重缓慢地走，孜孜地工作 | |
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posture
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| n.姿势，姿态，心态，态度；v.作出某种姿势 | |
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jolting
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| adj.令人震惊的 | |
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trumpet
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| n.喇叭，喇叭声；v.吹喇叭，吹嘘 | |
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waggons
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| 四轮的运货马车( waggon的名词复数 )； 铁路货车； 小手推车 | |
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forage
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| n.(牛马的)饲料，粮草；v.搜寻，翻寻 | |
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inexplicable
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| adj.无法解释的，难理解的 | |
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haphazardness
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| 随意性 | |
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downwards
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| adj./adv.向下的（地），下行的（地） | |
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picketed
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| 用尖桩围住（picket的过去式与过去分词形式） | |
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winding
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| n.绕，缠，绕组，线圈 | |
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35
emulation
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| n.竞争；仿效 | |
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astonishment
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| n.惊奇，惊异 | |
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dice
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| n.骰子；vt.把（食物）切成小方块，冒险 | |
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pointed
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| adj.尖的，直截了当的 | |
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remarkably
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| ad.不同寻常地，相当地 | |
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40
fatigue
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| n.疲劳，劳累 | |
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41
regularity
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| n.规律性，规则性；匀称，整齐 | |
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42
twig
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| n.小树枝，嫩枝；v.理解 | |
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43
victuals
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| n.食物；食品 | |
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44
gnaw
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| v.不断地啃、咬；使苦恼，折磨 | |
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45
boughs
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| 大树枝( bough的名词复数 ) | |
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46
inevitable
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| adj.不可避免的，必然发生的 | |
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47
darts
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| n.掷飞镖游戏；飞镖( dart的名词复数 )；急驰，飞奔v.投掷，投射( dart的第三人称单数 )；向前冲，飞奔 | |
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48
rusty
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| adj.生锈的；锈色的；荒废了的 | |
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49
grooming
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| n. 修饰, 美容，（动物）梳理毛发 | |
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50
armour
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| （=armor）n.盔甲；装甲部队 | |
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51
determined
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| adj.坚定的；有决心的 | |
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52
immediate
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| adj.立即的；直接的，最接近的；紧靠的 | |
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53
allay
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| v.消除，减轻(恐惧、怀疑等) | |
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54
pilfering
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| v.偷窃（小东西），小偷( pilfer的现在分词 )；偷窃（一般指小偷小摸） | |
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55
mere
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| adj.纯粹的；仅仅，只不过 | |
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56
whim
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| n.一时的兴致，突然的念头；奇想，幻想 | |
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57
gallows
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| n.绞刑架，绞台 | |
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58
protruding
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| v.（使某物）伸出，（使某物）突出( protrude的现在分词 )；凸 | |
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59
literally
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| adv.照字面意义，逐字地；确实 | |
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60
possessed
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| adj.疯狂的；拥有的，占有的 | |
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61
tenure
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| n.终身职位；任期；(土地)保有权，保有期 | |
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62
reigned
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| vi.当政，统治（reign的过去式形式） | |
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63
emancipated
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| adj.被解放的，不受约束的v.解放某人（尤指摆脱政治、法律或社会的束缚）( emancipate的过去式和过去分词 ) | |
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64
artillery
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| n.(军)火炮，大炮；炮兵(部队) | |
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65
battering
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| n.用坏，损坏v.连续猛击( batter的现在分词 ) | |
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66
rams
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| n.公羊( ram的名词复数 )；(R-)白羊（星）座；夯；攻城槌v.夯实（土等）( ram的第三人称单数 )；猛撞；猛压；反复灌输 | |
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67
ram
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| (random access memory)随机存取存储器 | |
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conceited
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| adj.自负的，骄傲自满的 | |
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softened
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| （使）变软( soften的过去式和过去分词 )； 缓解打击； 缓和； 安慰 | |
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70
plentiful
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| adj.富裕的，丰富的 | |
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71
depressed
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| adj.沮丧的，抑郁的，不景气的，萧条的 | |
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interfering
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| adj. 妨碍的 动词interfere的现在分词 | |
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73
lieutenant
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| n.陆军中尉，海军上尉；代理官员，副职官员 | |
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74
hesitation
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| n.犹豫，踌躇 | |
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75
muster
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| v.集合，收集，鼓起，激起；n.集合，检阅，集合人员，点名册 | |
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opposition
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| n.反对，敌对 | |
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