And yet he thinks,--ha, ha, ha, ha,--he thinks

I am the tool and servant of his will.

Well, let it be; through all the maze of trouble

His plots and base oppression must create,

I'll shape myself a way to higher things,

And who will say 'tis wrong?

--Basil, a Tragedy

No spider ever took more pains to repair the shattered meshes of his

web, than did Waldemar Fitzurse to reunite and combine the scattered

members of Prince John's cabal. Few of these were attached to him from

inclination, and none from personal regard. It was therefore necessary,

that Fitzurse should open to them new prospects of advantage, and remind

them of those which they at present enjoyed. To the young and wild

nobles, he held out the prospect of unpunished license and uncontrolled

revelry; to the ambitious, that of power, and to the covetous, that of

increased wealth and extended domains. The leaders of the mercenaries

received a donation in gold; an argument the most persuasive to their

minds, and without which all others would have proved in vain. Promises

were still more liberally distributed than money by this active agent;

and, in fine, nothing was left undone that could determine the wavering,

or animate the disheartened.

The return of King Richard he spoke of

as an event altogether beyond the reach of probability; yet, when

he observed, from the doubtful looks and uncertain answers which he

received, that this was the apprehension by which the minds of his

accomplices were most haunted, he boldly treated that event, should

it really take place, as one which ought not to alter their political

calculations.

"If Richard returns," said Fitzurse, "he returns to enrich his needy and

impoverished crusaders at the expense of those who did not follow him

to the Holy Land. He returns to call to a fearful reckoning, those who,

during his absence, have done aught that can be construed offence or

encroachment upon either the laws of the land or the privileges of

the crown. He returns to avenge upon the Orders of the Temple and the

Hospital, the preference which they showed to Philip of France during

the wars in the Holy Land. He returns, in fine, to punish as a rebel

every adherent of his brother Prince John. Are ye afraid of his power?"

continued the artful confident of that Prince, "we acknowledge him a

strong and valiant knight; but these are not the days of King Arthur,

when a champion could encounter an army. If Richard indeed comes back,

it must be alone,--unfollowed--unfriended. The bones of his gallant army

have whitened the sands of Palestine. The few of his followers who have

returned have straggled hither like this Wilfred of Ivanhoe, beggared

and broken men.--And what talk ye of Richard's right of birth?" he

proceeded, in answer to those who objected scruples on that head.




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