"The poverty of your cell, good father," said the knight, looking around
him, and seeing nothing but a bed of leaves, a crucifix rudely carved
in oak, a missal, with a rough-hewn table and two stools, and one or two
clumsy articles of furniture--"the poverty of your cell should seem a
sufficient defence against any risk of thieves, not to mention the aid
of two trusty dogs, large and strong enough, I think, to pull down a
stag, and of course, to match with most men."
"The good keeper of the forest," said the hermit, "hath allowed me
the use of these animals, to protect my solitude until the times shall
mend."
Having said this, he fixed his torch in a twisted branch of iron which
served for a candlestick; and, placing the oaken trivet before the
embers of the fire, which he refreshed with some dry wood, he placed a
stool upon one side of the table, and beckoned to the knight to do the
same upon the other.
They sat down, and gazed with great gravity at each other, each thinking
in his heart that he had seldom seen a stronger or more athletic figure
than was placed opposite to him.
"Reverend hermit," said the knight, after looking long and fixedly at
his host, "were it not to interrupt your devout meditations, I would
pray to know three things of your holiness; first, where I am to put my
horse?--secondly, what I can have for supper?--thirdly, where I am to
take up my couch for the night?"
"I will reply to you," said the hermit, "with my finger, it being
against my rule to speak by words where signs can answer the purpose."
So saying, he pointed successively to two corners of the hut. "Your
stable," said he, "is there--your bed there; and," reaching down a
platter with two handfuls of parched pease upon it from the neighbouring
shelf, and placing it upon the table, he added, "your supper is here."
The knight shrugged his shoulders, and leaving the hut, brought in his
horse, (which in the interim he had fastened to a tree,) unsaddled him
with much attention, and spread upon the steed's weary back his own
mantle.
The hermit was apparently somewhat moved to compassion by the anxiety as
well as address which the stranger displayed in tending his horse; for,
muttering something about provender left for the keeper's palfrey, he
dragged out of a recess a bundle of forage, which he spread before the
knight's charger, and immediately afterwards shook down a quantity of
dried fern in the corner which he had assigned for the rider's couch.
The knight returned him thanks for his courtesy; and, this duty done,
both resumed their seats by the table, whereon stood the trencher of
pease placed between them. The hermit, after a long grace, which had
once been Latin, but of which original language few traces remained,
excepting here and there the long rolling termination of some word or
phrase, set example to his guest, by modestly putting into a very large
mouth, furnished with teeth which might have ranked with those of a
boar both in sharpness and whiteness, some three or four dried pease, a
miserable grist as it seemed for so large and able a mill.