Child Christopher and Goldilind the Fair

Chapter 38 : Of Matters Of Meadham
GES the tale back now to the time when the kingship of Child Christopher was scarce more than one month old; and tells that as the King sat with his Queen in the cool of his garden on a morning of August, there came to him a swain of service, who did him to wit that an outland lord was come, and would see him and give him a message. So the King bade bring him in to the garden to him straight-way; so the man went, and came back again leading in a knight somewhat stricken in years, on whose green surcoat was beaten a golden lion. He came to those twain and did obeisance to them, but spake, as it seemed, to Goldilind alone: "Lady, and Queen of Meadham," said he, "it is unto thee, first of all, that mine errand is." Then she spoke and said: "Welcome to thee, Sir Castellan of Greenharbour, we shall hear thy words gladly." Said the new-comer: "Lady, I am no longer the Burgreve of Greenharbour, but Sir Guisebert, lord of the Green March, a... (From : Marxists.org.)

Chapter 37 : Of Child Christopher's Dealings With His Friends & His Folk
It was in the morning when King Christopher arose, and Goldilind stood before him in the kingly chamber, that he clipped her and kissed her, and said: "This is the very chamber whence my father departed when he went to his last battle, and left my mother sickening with the coming birth of me. And never came he back hither, nor did mine eyes behold him ever. Here also lay my mother and gave birth to me, and died of sorrow, and her also I never saw, save with eyes that noted naught that I might remember. And my third kinsman was the traitor, that cast me forth of mine heritage, and looked to it that I should wax up as a churl, and lose all hope of high deeds; and at the last he strove to slay me. "Therefore, sweet, have I no kindred, and none that are bound to cherish me, and it is for thee to take the place of them, and be unto me both father and mother, and brother and sister, and all kindred." She said: "My mother I never saw, and I was but little whe... (From : Marxists.org.)

Chapter 36 : King Christopher Comes To Oakenham
But on the morrow the first man who came to the King was the man-at-arms aforesaid; and he told that he had done the King's errand, and ridden a five miles on the road to Oakenham before he had left the horse with his felon load, and that he had found naught stirring all that way when he had passed through their own out-guards, where folk knew him and let him go freely. "And," quoth he, "it is like enough that this gift to Oakenham, Lord King, has by now come to the gate thereof." Then the King gave that man the gold which he had promised, and he kissed the King's hand and went his ways a happy man. Thereafter sent Christopher for Jack of the Tofts, and told him in few words what had betid, and that Rolf the traitor was dead. Then spake Jack: "King and fosterling, never hath so mighty a warrior as thou waged so easy a war for so goodly a kingdom as thou hast done; for surely thy war was ended last night, wherefore will we straight to Oakenham, if so thou wilt. Bu... (From : Marxists.org.)

Chapter 35 : An Old Acquaintance And An Evil Deed
When morning was, and it was yet early, the town was all astir and the gates were thrown open, and weaponed men thronged into it crying out for Christopher the King. Then the King came forth, and Jack o' the Tofts and his sons, and Oliver Marson, and the captains of Brimside; and the host was blown together to the market-place, and there was a new tale of them taken, and they were now hard on seventy hundreds of men. So then were new captains appointed, and thereafter they tarried not save to eat a morsel, but went out a-gates faring after the banners to Oakenrealm, all folk blessing them as they went. Naught befell them of evil that day, but ever fresh companies joined them on the road; and they gat harbor in another walled town, hight Sevenham, and rested there in peace that night, and were now grown to eighty hundreds. Again on the morrow they were on the road betimes, and again much folk joined them, and they heard no tidings of any foeman faring again... (From : Marxists.org.)

Chapter 34 : Battle Before Woodwall
When morning was, the captains came to King Christopher to council: but while they were amid of their talk came the word that the foe was anigh and come close to the river-bank; whereat was none abashed; but to all it seemed wisdom to abide them on the vantage-ground. So then there was girding of swords and doing on of helms; as for ordering of the folk, it was already done, for all the host was ranked on the bent-side, with the banner of Oakenrealm in the midst; on its left hand the banner of the Tofts, and on the right the banner of Brimside. Now when Christopher was come to his place, he looked down and saw how the foemen were pouring over the river, for it was nowhere deep, and there were four quite shallow fords: many more were they than his folk, but he deemed that they fared somewhat tumultuously; and when the bowmen of the Tofts began shooting, the foemen, a many of them, stayed amid of the river to bend bow in their turn, and seemed to think that were nigh... (From : Marxists.org.)

Tidings Come To Hazeldale
But they had not done their meat, and had scarce begun upon their drink, ere they saw three men come riding on the spur over the crown of the bent before them; these made no stay for aught, but rode straight through the ford of the river, as men who knew well where it was, and came on hastily toward the feasters by the wood-edge. Then would some have run to meet them, but Jack of the Tofts bade them abide till he had heard the tidings; whereas they needed not to run to their weapons, for, all of them, they were fully dight for war, save, it might be, the doing on of their sallets or basnets. But Jack and Christopher alone went forward to meet those men; and the foremost of them cried out at once: "I know thee, Jack of the Tofts! I know thee... (From : Marxists.org.)

Of The Wedding Of Those Twain
Now were folk gathered in the hall, and the Earl Geoffrey was standing on the dais by the high-seat, and beside him a worthy clerk, the Abbot of Meadhamstead, a monk of St. Benedict, and next to him the Burgreve of Greenharbour, and then a score of knights all in brave raiment, and squires withal, and sergeants; but down in the hall were the men- at-arms and serving-men, and a half hundred of folk of the countryside, queans as well as carles, who had been gathered for the show and bidden in. No other women were there in the hall till Goldilind and her serving-women entered. She went straight up the hall, and took her place in the high-seat; and for all that her eyes seemed steady, she had noted Christopher standing by the shot-window just b... (From : Marxists.org.)

Of The Maiden Goldilind
AMID of all his other business Earl Geoffrey bethought him in a while of the dead King's daughter, and he gave her in charge to a gentlewoman, somewhat stricken in years, a widow of high lineage, but not over wealthy. She dwelt in her own house in a fair valley some twenty miles from Meadhamstead: thereabode Goldilind till a year and a half was worn, and had due observance, but little love, and not much kindness from the said gentlewoman, who hight Dame Elinor Leashowe. Howbeit, time and again came knights and ladies and lords to see the little lady, and kissed her hand and did obeisance to her; yet more came to her in the first three months of her sojourn at Leashowe than the second, and more in the second than the third. At last, on a day... (From : Marxists.org.)

What Goldilind Found In The Wood
When she awoke it was broad day and bright sun, and she rose up to her feet and looked about, and saw the horse standing close by, and sharing the shade with her, whisking his tail about lazily. Then she turned, and saw the stream rippling out from the pool over the clean gravel, and here and there a fish darting through the ripple, or making clean rings on the pool as he quietly took a fly; the sky was blue and clear, there was scarce a breath of air, and the morning was already hot; no worse than yesterday sang the birds in the bushes; but as she looked across the river, where, forsooth, the alders grew thick about the pool's edge, a cock blackbird, and then another, flew out from the close boughs, where they had been singing to their mat... (From : Marxists.org.)

Of The King Of Oakenrealm
Even therewith, and while the last word had but come to Christopher's ears, rang out the voice of Jack of the Tofts again, louder and clearer than before: and he said: "Men in this hall, I bear you tidings! The King of Oakenrealm is among us to-night." Then, forsooth, was the noise and the turmoil, and cries and shouts and clatter, and fists raised in air and weapons caught down from the wall, and the glitter of spear-points and gleam of fallow blades. For the name of Rolf, King of Oakenrealm, was to those woodmen as the name of the Great Devil of Hell, so much was he their unfriend and their dastard. But Jack raised up his hand, and cried: "Silence ye! Blow up, horns, The Hunt's Up!" Blared out the horns then, strong and fierce, under the ... (From : Marxists.org.)