I have heard the whole of your generous conduct from the lips of the Count, and if nobility of mind and the best qualities of the heart may entitle you to the lady`s love, you not only deserve her, but the very highest and richest princess in the state. But she is beautiful, she loves you, and you are at liberty, when you so please, to take her for your wife.” The Count then likewise came forward, and confirming everything the king had said, tenderly embraced the cavalier, considering himself honored in possessing such a son-in-law.

Equally surprised and rejoiced at the unexpected turn of affairs in his favor, the Castilian, with singular modesty, replied, “Although I am aware that the high authority of your majesty and the noble qualities of the Count are sufficient to exalt me to any degree of rank, I am at the same time too sensible of the inequality of my own birth and fortunes to venture upon such a step as you have generously proposed. Permit me to be near your majesty, and to serve you to the utmost of my ability, as I have hitherto done; but let your majesty and the Count both take it again into consideration how far the subject of your favor may be worthy of so high an honor.”

Fair daughter of the Count

But the generous monarch persisted in his intentions, and in order to bring the affair to a speedy and happy termination, he commanded that a sumptuous festival should be held the ensuing day in his palace, which took place in the most gay and magnificent style. Proud trains of lords and cavaliers and gay bevies of ladies, with music, dance, and song, gave life and spirit to the scene. In the midst of these proceedings, the fair daughter of the Count, who had remained ignorant of all the previous explanations, was led forward, arrayed in her bridal ornaments; at the same moment, Messer Aries, the Castilian cavalier, was proclaimed by the heralds without to the applauding people, captain-general of the king`s armies, and immediately afterwards the monarch presented the young bride at the altar, where the noble cavalier received her hand.

The most rapturous surprise and joy beamed in the eyes of the lovers and the guests as this novel and happy ceremony was announced through the assembly. The feast and the dance revived with double spirit. Congratulations, commendations, and inquiries poured in on all sides upon the happy parties, until their union became the favorite topic no less of the court than of the people. Murmurs of applause ran through the rooms as the cavalier led forth his beautiful and happy bride to reap, at her father`s castle, the fruits of his virtue and his valor.

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Having despatched his answer by the same discreet little mesenger, he awaited in much fear and anxiety the result of the strange circumstances in which he was so deeply engaged. The page instantly ran to his master with the above reply, whose previous sorrow and indignation were much diminished on perusing the noble sentiments entertained by the cavalier, and such was his admiration and regard, that he even became gentle and loving as before to his beautiful but weak and unhappy girl.

Monarch expressed

Under these feelings, without saying a word to his daughter, he hastened into the presence of his sovereign, to whom in no slight agitation he recounted the whole of the affair; and after unfolding his own feelings and sentiments on the subject, he entreated that the king would graciously deign to offer his advice. Gifted with great natural sagacity and prudence, the monarch expressed himself by no means surprised at the weak conduct shown by the young lady, being nothing, he declared, very strange or unusual; but he could scarcely prevail upon himself to believe the extraordinary resolution and constancy displayed by the cavalier. However high he had estimated his worth, he had never imagined him capable of such true greatness of soul, in thus sacrificing both ambition and love at the shrine of duty and fidelity.

The king then advised, or rather commanded, him to adopt the most generous resolution in his power; and sending forthwith for the noble Castilian, he closed the door on his attendants, and seizing him affect-ionately by the hand, he exclaimed, “I have long been sensible, Aries, of your high worth, evinced in all your actions, since you first joined my armies under the patronage of the Count.

There has been nothing wanting to complete the excellence of your character, save an occasion to display the hidden force and rectitude of your principles, in the trial of which you have acquitted yourself so nobly, so honorably, and respected the persons whom you loved. I am rejoiced to think that your virtues in peace are equal to the courage and skill you so well displayed in war. We are truly indebted to you, and must endeavor to find such a reward as you may like, such as may evince our gratitude for your good deeds, and commemorate your virtue to later times.

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Unable longer to contend with the variety of emotions which shook her bosom and hourly preyed upon her life, she resolved, with the impulse of despair, to upbraid him for his cruelty, to unfold her love, and to die. And, half blinded with streaming tears, she committed her unhappy secret to paper, filled with the very soul of wretched passion, an appeal which no heart of marble, much less that of a fond lover, could have withstood. The conclusion was, that she had resolved to die rather than to survive the weakness of betraying her unhappy love. The young page to whom she confided the letter, conceiving from her manner that it contained something of high importance, and fearful of the result, bore it immediately to the Count, his master.

Young Castilian

It is impossible to express her father`s surprise and grief on learning the extravagance and folly of which this, his only daughter, had been guilty; but every noble spirit shunning infamy and disgrace beyond death itself, may form some idea of his sensations. In this afflicting circumstance he adopted and rejected a thousand various plans of punishing his unworthy child; but as he felt that it on sdit to be something proportionate to the intolerable pain which she had thus inflicted upon him, he first determined to try the worth and firmness of the young Castilian, and took his measures accordingly. Having carefully wrapped and sealed the letter, he returned it to the boy with orders to deliver it to Messer Aries, and having waited for a reply, to bring it immediately back to him.

These orders being promptly complied with, the young cavalier received it with a throb of ecstasy as he caught the name of his beloved; yet having already prepared his mind by strict discipline and self-control, he persevered in braving the fascinating danger. Armed strong in rectitude, he replied with all the delicacy and honor of a true knight to the lady`s letter, beseeching her in conclusion rather to inflict any kind of punishment upon him, even unto death, than tempt him either in thought or word to presume on what might offend the honor and dignity of the Count, her father.

Dreading, nevertheless, to hurt the feel- irgs of her he loved, and aware of the fatal consequences of scorned or disappointed affections in a woman`s soul, he implied the high honor and gratification he should have experienced in indulging such lofty hopes. “Would you venture,” he continued, “to throw yourself upon your father`s confidence, revealing to him every feeling of your breast (fully sensible as I am of the inequality of our lot), and were it possible that should smile upon our loves, then, only then, might we pronounce ourselves blest; but otherwise forget me—hate me; for when I dwell on the obligations I owe to your father, neither beauty nor ambition, nor any charms or treasures upon earth, shall lead me to sully, in any manner or degree, the brightness of his name.”

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The campaign being concluded with great honor and advantage on the part of the French, with the aid of the young and enterprising Castilian, both armies were compelled by the severity of the season to retire into winter quarters, and, with the chief part of the general officers and cavaliers, our noble adventurer sought the gaieties of Paris.

In order to celebrate his successes in the most popular way, the king sent an invitation to all his chief lords and barons to be present with their ladies at an appointed festival, along with their followers and companions-in-arms. First in the train of favorite nobles, magnificently arrayed in the honors he had won, appeared the Count d`Armagnac, accompanied by his lovely and only daughter, whose charms attracted every eye.

Count`s fair daughter

The joyous and splendid feast began, and was celebrated throughout many happy days with all the pleasures which love, and mirth, and music could afford; and still the star whose brightness eclipsed the beauties of the rest was the eye of the Count`s fair daughter. And as if to show that her taste was in no way inferior to her beauty and accomplishments, having glanced her eye through the ranks of youth and chivalry marshalled around her, it ever returned and rested on the fine features of the Spanish cavalier, the music of whose fame and virtues had already sounded sweet in her ears.

Too incautiously dwelling on these, the idea took her fancy captive, until she at last became so deeply interested in him, that whenever she passed the day without seeing or conversing with him she felt her existence a burden to her. Possessing no one in whom she could confide, in spite of all her struggles, her feelings, when in his presence, half betrayed the secret which preyed upon her heart: her eyes, her voice, and her very motions, when in his presence, or addressing him, all expressed far deeper and softer emotions than language dared to reveal.

Nor was the object of them either so cold or so inexperienced as not to be sensible of the impression he had made. But although he thought her the most beautiful woman he had ever seen, the numerous favors he had received from the Count, her father, were so great as to banish every idea of his own gratification in attaching her affections to himself. With this virtuous resolve, he affected to misunderstand the nature of her impassioned feelings, assuming an apparent calmness in his manners, and a coldness, which struck a pang to the unhappy lady`s heart.

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Masuccio (Guardato) (Flourished latter half of 15th Century)

Masuccio was born at Salerno, of noble parentage. He was a resident at the Court of Naples, in the capacity of secretary, for the greater part of his life. His fifty tales, collected in a volume called the Novellino, are vivid pictures both of the peasants and lower burgher classes, and of the nobility. The Cavalier of Toledo is furnished with a contemporary background and reveals the writer`s skill in relating a romantic episode with skill and sympathy. Masuccio has the distinction of having written one of the earliest stories in the series that gave Shakespeare his Romeo and Juliet.

The present version is translated by Thomas Roscoe and reprinted from his Italian Novelists, London, no date. The story has no title in the original.

The Cavalier of Toledo

The last in my collection of those noble and virtuous actions which I have always been desirous of commemorating, is one related to me by a distinguished foreigner, which, as being strictly true, it is with equal pride and pleasure I proceed to detail. There resided some time ago in the famous city of Toledo a cavalier named Messer Piero Lopez d`Aiala, of high and ancient lineage, whose only son, a fine and spirited youth of the name of Aries, had the misfortune to engage in a. nocturnal brawl. Both parties, in one of which was the king`s particular favorite, drawing their swords, Messer Aries, engaging with the latter, passed his weapon through his body on the: spot.

On discovering the rank of his adversary, aware of the royal favor enjoyed by him, and dreading the indignation of his monarch, the youth resolved to take flight, and being furnished by his father with horses and attendants, he set out to try his fortunes in another land. And hearing of the sanguinary war then waging between the English and the French in the tern- tories of the latter, he resorted without delay to the scene of action, burning with the hope of signalizing himself during the campaign. Arriving in the French army, he had the good fortune to alight at the quarters of the Count d`Armagnac, captain-general of the king`s forces, and related to the royal house of France.

With his permission, the young Castilian employed the remains of his small resources in equipping himself for battle, in which he so greatly signalized himself, both by his courage and his conduct, as well in open field as in the siege, that he became at once admired and celebrated by his own party and dreaded by his adversaries. In the course of time he rose so high in the esteem of his commander, no less than of the French monarch, that he was entrusted and honored above any other favorites of the court, being in a little while promoted to the rank of campo-major, and acquitting himself in such a manner that he was consulted in almost every action.

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