Multimedia Mania/abacus-multimedia-mania.iso/dp/0145/01450.txt

Text File | 1993-07-27 | 8KB | 144 lines

$Unique_ID{bob01450}
$Pretitle{}
$Title{Prince And The Pauper, The
Chapter XXVIII}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Twain, Mark}
$Affiliation{}
$Subject{king
hendon
himself
let
little
mind
stocks

}
$Date{1909}
$Log{}
Title:       Prince And The Pauper, The
Author:      Twain, Mark
Date:        1909

Chapter XXVIII

The Sacrifice

     Meantime Miles was growing sufficiently tired of confinement and
inaction.  But now his trial came on, to his great gratification, and he
thought he could welcome any sentence provided a further imprisonment
should not be a part of it.  But he was mistaken about that.  He was in a
fine fury when he found himself described as a "sturdy vagabond" and
sentenced to sit two hours in the pillory for bearing that character and
for assaulting the master of Hendon Hall.  His pretensions as to
brothership with his prosecutor, and rightful heirship to the Hendon honors
and estates, were left contemptuously unnoticed, as being not even worth
examination.

     He raged and threatened on his way to punishment, but it did no good;
he was snatched roughly along by the officers, and got an occasional cuff,
besides, for his unreverent conduct.

     The king could not pierce through the rabble that swarmed behind; so
he was obliged to follow in the rear, remote from his good friend and
servant.  The king had been nearly condemned to the stocks himself, for
being in such bad company, but had been let off with a lecture and a
warning, in consideration of his youth.  When the crowd at last halted, he
flitted feverishly from point to point around its outer rim, hunting a
place to get through; and at last, after a deal of difficulty and delay,
succeeded.  There sat his poor henchman in the degrading stocks, the sport
and butt of a dirty mob - he, the body servant of the king of England!
Edward had heard the sentence pronounced, but he had not realized the half
that it meant.  His anger began to rise as the sense of this new indignity
which had been put upon him sank home; it jumped to summer heat the next
moment, when he saw an egg sail through the air and crush itself against
Hendon's cheek, and heard the crowd roar its enjoyment of the episode.  He
sprang across the open circle and confronted the officer in charge, crying:

     "For shame!  This is my servant - set him free!  I am the - "

     "Oh, peace!" exclaimed Hendon, in a panic, "thou'lt destroy thyself.
Mind him not, officer, he is mad."

     "Give thyself no trouble as to the matter of minding him, good man, I
have small mind to mind him; but as to teaching him somewhat, to that I am
well inclined." He turned to a subordinate and said, "Give the little fool
a taste or two of the lash, to mend his manners."

     "Half a dozen will better serve his turn," suggested Sir Hugh, who had
ridden up a moment before to take a passing glance at the proceedings.

     The king was seized.  He did not even struggle, so paralyzed was he
with the mere thought of the monstrous outrage that was proposed to be
inflicted upon his sacred person.  History was already defiled with the
record of the scourging of an English king with whips - it was an
intolerable reflection that he must furnish a duplicate of that shameful
page.  He was in the toils, there was no help for him; he must either take
this punishment or beg for its remission.  Hard conditions; he would take
the stripes - a king might do that, but a king could not beg.

     But meantime, Miles Hendon was resolving the difficulty.  "Let the
child go," said he; "ye heartless dogs, do ye not see how young and frail
he is?  Let him go - I will take his lashes."

     "Marry, a good thought, - and thanks for it," said Sir Hugh, his face
lighting with a sardonic satisfaction.  "Let the little beggar go, and give
this fellow a dozen in his place - an honest dozen, well laid on." The king
was in the act of entering a fierce protest, but Sir Hugh silenced him with
the potent remark, "Yes, speak up, do, and free thy mind - only, mark ye,
that for each word you utter he shall get six strokes the more."

     Hendon was removed from the stocks, and his back laid bare; and while
the lash was applied the poor little king turned away his face and allowed
unroyal tears to channel his cheeks unchecked.  "Ah, brave good heart," he
said to himself, "this loyal deed shall never perish out of my memory.  I
will not forget it - and neither shall they!" he added, with passion.
While he mused, his appreciation of Hendon's magnanimous conduct grew to
greater and still greater dimensions in his mind, and so also did his
gratefulness for it.  Presently he said to himself, "Who saves his prince
from wounds and possible death - and this he did for me - performs high
service; but it is little - it is nothing! - oh, less than nothing! - when
'tis weighed against the act of him who saves his prince from shame!"

     Hendon made no outcry under the scourge, but bore the heavy blows with
soldierly fortitude.  This, together with his redeeming the boy by taking
his stripes for him, compelled the respect of even that forlorn and
degraded mob that was gathered there; and its gibes and hootings died away,
and no sound remained but the sound of the falling blows.  The stillness
that pervaded the place when Hendon found himself once more in the stocks,
was in strong contrast with the insulting clamor which had prevailed there
so little a while before.  The king came softly to Hendon's side, and
whispered in his ear:

     "Kings cannot ennoble thee, thou good, great soul, for One who is
higher than kings hath done that for thee; but a king can confirm thy
nobility to men." He picked up the scourge from the ground, touched
Hendon's bleeding shoulders lightly with it, and whispered, "Edward of
England dubs thee earl!"

     Hendon was touched.  The water welled to his eyes, yet at the same
time the grisly humor of the situation and circumstances so undermined his
gravity that it was all he could do to keep some sign of his inward mirth
from showing outside.  To be suddenly hoisted, naked and gory, from the
common stocks to the Alpine altitude and splendor of an earldom, seemed to
him the last possibility in the line of the grotesque.  He said to himself,
"Now am I finely tinseled, indeed!  The specter-knight of the Kingdom of
Dreams and Shadows is become a specter-earl! - a dizzy flight for a callow
wing!  An' this go on, I shall presently be hung like a very May-pole with
fantastic gauds and make-believe honors.  But I shall value them, all
valueless as they are, for the love that doth bestow them.  Better these
poor mock dignities of mine, that come unasked from a clean hand and a
right spirit, than real ones bought by servility from grudging and
interested power."

     The dreaded Sir Hugh wheeled his horse about, and, as he spurred away,
the living wall divided silently to let him pass, and as silently closed
together again.  And so remained; nobody went so far as to venture a remark
in favor of the prisoner, or in compliment to him; but no matter, the
absence of abuse was a sufficient homage in itself.  A late comer who was
not posted as to the present circumstances, and who delivered a sneer at
the "impostor" and was in the act of following it with a dead cat, was
promptly knocked down and kicked out, without any words, and then the deep
quiet resumed sway once more.