CHAPTER XI
HOW EUSTACE LEIGH MET THE POPE'S LEGATE
"Misguided, rash, intruding fool, farewell!
Thou see'st to be too busy is some danger."
Hamlet.
It is the spring of 1582-3. The gray March skies are curdling hard and
high above black mountain peaks. The keen March wind is sweeping harsh
and dry across a dreary sheet of bog, still red and yellow with the
stains of winter frost. One brown knoll alone breaks the waste, and on
it a few leafless wind-clipt oaks stretch their moss-grown arms, like
giant hairy spiders, above a desolate pool which crisps and shivers in
the biting breeze, while from beside its brink rises a mournful cry, and
sweeps down, faint and fitful, amid the howling of the wind.
Along the brink of the bog, picking their road among crumbling rocks and
green spongy springs, a company of English soldiers are pushing fast,
clad cap-a-pie in helmet and quilted jerkin, with arquebus on shoulder,
and pikes trailing behind them; stern steadfast men, who, two years
since, were working the guns at Smerwick fort, and have since then seen
many a bloody fray, and shall see more before they die. Two captains
ride before them on shaggy ponies, the taller in armor, stained and
rusted with many a storm and fray, the other in brilliant inlaid cuirass
and helmet, gaudy sash and plume, and sword hilt glittering with gold,
a quaint contrast enough to the meager garron which carries him and his
finery.
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