Men of Iron

by Howard Pyle

  CHAPTER 5

  THE EARL of Mackworth, as was customary among the great lords in thosedays, maintained a small army of knights, gentlemen, men-at-arms, andretainers, who were expected to serve him upon all occasions of need,and from whom were supplied his quota of recruits to fill such levies asmight be made upon him by the King in time of war.

  The knights and gentlemen of this little army of horse and foot soldierswere largely recruited from the company of squires and bachelors, as theyoung novitiate soldiers of the castle were called.

  This company of esquires consisted of from eighty to ninety lads,ranging in age from eight to twenty years. Those under fourteen yearswere termed pages, and served chiefly the Countess and her waitinggentlewomen, in whose company they acquired the graces and polish of thetimes, such as they were. After reaching the age of fourteen the ladswere entitled to the name of esquire or squire.

  In most of the great houses of the time the esquires were the especialattendants upon the Lord and Lady of the house, holding such positionsas body-squires, cup-bearers, carvers, and sometimes the office ofchamberlain. But Devlen, like some other of the princely castles of thegreatest nobles, was more like a military post or a fortress than anordinary household. Only comparatively few of the esquires could beused in personal attendance upon the Earl; the others were trainedmore strictly in arms, and served rather in the capacity of a sort ofbody-guard than as ordinary squires. For, as the Earl rose in power andinfluence, and as it so became well worth while for the lower nobilityand gentry to enter their sons in his family, the body of squires becamealmost cumbersomely large. Accordingly, that part which comprised thesquires proper, as separate from the younger pages, was divided intothree classes--first, squires of the body, who were those just pastpagehood, and who waited upon the Earl in personal service; second,squires of the household, who, having regular hours assigned forexercise in the manual of arms, were relieved from personal serviceexcepting upon especial occasions; and thirdly and lastly, at the headof the whole body of lads, a class called bachelors--young men rangingfrom eighteen to twenty years of age. This class was supposed toexercise a sort of government over the other and younger squires--tokeep them in order as much as possible, to marshal them upon occasionsof importance, to see that their arms and equipments were kept in goodorder, to call the roll for chapel in the morning, and to see that thosenot upon duty in the house were present at the daily exercise at arms.Orders to the squires were generally transmitted through the bachelors,and the head of that body was expected to make weekly reports of affairsin their quarters to the chief captain of the body.

  From this overlordship of the bachelors there had gradually risen asystem of fagging, such as is or was practised in the great Englishpublic schools--enforced services exacted from the younger lads--whichat the time Myles came to Devlen had, in the five or six years it hadbeen in practice, grown to be an absolute though unwritten law of thebody--a law supported by all the prestige of long-continued usage. Atthat time the bachelors numbered but thirteen, yet they exercised overthe rest of the sixty-four squires and pages a rule of iron, and weretaskmasters, hard, exacting, and oftentimes cruel.

  The whole company of squires and pages was under the supreme command ofa certain one-eyed knight, by name Sir James Lee; a soldier seasoned bythe fire of a dozen battles, bearing a score of wounds won in fight andtourney, and withered by hardship and labor to a leather-like toughness.He had fought upon the King's side in all the late wars, and had atShrewsbury received a wound that unfitted him for active service, sothat now he was fallen to the post of Captain of Esquires at DevlenCastle--a man disappointed in life, and with a temper imbittered by thatfailure as well as by cankering pain.

  Yet Perhaps no one could have been better fitted for the place he heldthan Sir James Lee. The lads under his charge were a rude, rough, unrulyset, quick, like their elders, to quarrel, and to quarrel fiercely, evento the drawing of sword or dagger. But there was a cold, iron sternnessabout the grim old man that quelled them, as the trainer with a lash ofsteel might quell a den of young wolves. The apartments in which he waslodged, with his clerk, were next in the dormitory of the lads, andeven in the midst of the most excited brawlings the distant sound of hisharsh voice, "Silence, messieurs!" would bring an instant hush to theloudest uproar.

  It was into his grim presence that Myles was introduced by Gascoyne.Sir James was in his office, a room bare of ornament or adornment orsuperfluous comfort of any sort--without even so much as a mat of rushesupon the cold stone pavement to make it less cheerless. The old one-eyedknight sat gnawing his bristling mustaches. To anyone who knew him itwould have been apparent that, as the castle phrase went, "the devil satastride of his neck," which meant that some one of his blind wounds wasaching more sorely than usual.

  His clerk sat beside him, with account-books and parchment spread uponthe table, and the head squire, Walter Blunt, a lad some three or fouryears older than Myles, and half a head taller, black-browed, powerfullybuilt, and with cheek and chin darkened by the soft budding of hisadolescent beard, stood making his report.

  Sir James listened in grim silence while Gascoyne told his errand.

  "So, then, pardee, I am bid to take another one of ye, am I?" hesnarled. "As though ye caused me not trouble enow; and this one a cub,looking a very boor in carriage and breeding. Mayhap the Earl thinketh Iam to train boys to his dilly-dally household service as well as to useof arms."

  "Sir," said Gascoyne, timidly, "my Lord sayeth he would have this oneentered direct as a squire of the body, so that he need not serve in thehousehold."

  "Sayest so?" cried Sir James, harshly. "Then take thou my message backagain to thy Lord. Not for Mackworth--no, nor a better man than he--willI make any changes in my government. An I be set to rule a pack of boys,I will rule them as I list, and not according to any man's bidding.Tell him, sirrah, that I will enter no lad as squire of the body withoutfirst testing an he be fit at arms to hold that place." He sat for awhile glowering at Myles and gnawing his mustaches, and for the timeno one dared to break the grim silence. "What is thy name?" said he,suddenly. And then, almost before Myles could answer, he asked the headsquire whether he could find a place to lodge him.

  "There is Gillis Whitlock's cot empty," said Blunt. "He is in theinfirmary, and belike goeth home again when he cometh thence. The feverhath gotten into his bones, and--"

  "That will do," said the knight, interrupting him impatiently. "Let himtake that place, or any other that thou hast. And thou, Jerome," said heto his clerk, "thou mayst enter him upon the roll, though whether it beas page or squire or bachelor shall be as I please, and not as Mackworthbiddeth me. Now get ye gone."

  "Old Bruin's wound smarteth him sore," Gascoyne observed, as the twolads walked across the armory court. He had good-naturedly offered toshow the new-comer the many sights of interest around the castle, and inthe hour or so of ramble that followed, the two grew from acquaintancesto friends with a quickness that boyhood alone can bring about. Theyvisited the armory, the chapel, the stables, the great hall, the PaintedChamber, the guard-house, the mess-room, and even the scullery and thekitchen, with its great range of boilers and furnaces and ovens. Last ofall Myles's new friend introduced him to the armor-smithy.

  "My Lord hath sent a piece of Milan armor thither to be repaired," saidhe. "Belike thou would like to see it."

  "Aye," said Myles, eagerly, "that would I."

  The smith was a gruff, good-natured fellow, and showed the piece ofarmor to Myles readily and willingly enough. It was a beautiful bascinetof inlaid workmanship, and was edged with a rim of gold. Myles scarcelydared touch it; he gazed at it with an unconcealed delight that warmedthe smith's honest heart.

  "I have another piece of Milan here," said he. "Did I ever show thee mydagger, Master Gascoyne?"

  "Nay," said the squire.

  The smith unlocked a great oaken chest in the corner of the shop, liftedthe lid, and brought thence a beautiful dagger with the handle of ebonyand silver-gi
lt, and a sheath of Spanish leather, embossed and gilt.The keen, well-tempered blade was beautifully engraved and inlaidwith niello-work, representing a group of figures in a then popularsubject--the dance of Death. It was a weapon at once unique andbeautiful, and even Gascoyne showed an admiration scarcely less keenthan Myles's openly-expressed delight.

  "To whom doth it belong?" said he, trying the point upon his thumb nail.

  "There," said the smith, "is the jest of the whole, for it belongethto me. Sir William Beauclerk bade me order the weapon through MasterGildersworthy, of London town, and by the time it came hither, lo! hehad died, and so it fell to my hands. No one here payeth the price forthe trinket, and so I must e'en keep it myself, though I be but a poorman."

  "How much dost thou hold it for?" said Gascoyne.

  "Seventeen shillings buyeth it," said the armorer, carelessly.

  "Aye, aye," said Gascoyne, with a sigh; "so it is to be poor, and not beable to have such things as one loveth and would fain possess. Seventeenshillings is nigh as much by half again as all my yearly wage."

  Then a sudden thought came to Myles, and as it came his cheeks glowedas hot as fire "Master Gascoyne," said he, with gruff awkwardness,"thou hast been a very good, true friend to me since I have come to thisplace, and hast befriended me in all ways thou mightest do, and I, aswell I know, but a poor rustic clod. Now I have forty shillings by mewhich I may spend as I list, and so I do beseech thee that thou wilttake yon dagger of me as a love-gift, and have and hold it for thy veryown."

  Gascoyne stared open-mouthed at Myles. "Dost mean it?" said he, at last.

  "Aye," said Myles, "I do mean it. Master Smith, give him the blade."

  At first the smith grinned, thinking it all a jest; but he soon saw thatMyles was serious enough, and when the seventeen shillings were producedand counted down upon the anvil, he took off his cap and made Myles alow bow as he swept them into his pouch. "Now, by my faith and troth,"quoth he, "that I do call a true lordly gift. Is it not so, MasterGascoyne?"

  "Aye," said Gascoyne, with a gulp, "it is, in soothly earnest." Andthereupon, to Myles's great wonderment, he suddenly flung his arms abouthis neck, and, giving him a great hug, kissed him upon the cheek. "DearMyles," said he, "I tell thee truly and of a verity I did feel warmtowards thee from the very first time I saw thee sitting like a poor oafupon the bench up yonder in the anteroom, and now of a sooth I give theeassurance that I do love thee as my own brother. Yea, I will take thedagger, and will stand by thee as a true friend from this time forth.Mayhap thou mayst need a true friend in this place ere thou livest longwith us, for some of us esquires be soothly rough, and knocks are moreplenty here than broad pennies, so that one new come is like to have ahard time gaining a footing."

  "I thank thee," said Myles, "for thy offer of love and friendship, anddo tell thee, upon my part, that I also of all the world would like bestto have thee for my friend."

  Such was the manner In which Myles formed the first great friendship ofhis life, a friendship that was destined to last him through many yearsto come. As the two walked back across the great quadrangle, upon whichfronted the main buildings of the castle, their arms were wound acrossone another's shoulders, after the manner, as a certain great writersays, of boys and lovers.