“My lord,” said the trembling chamberlain, “the leeches say that cold water may be fatal.”
“To the foul fiend with the leeches!” replied the monarch; “if they cannot cure me, think you I will allow them to torment me?--There, then,” he said, after having made his ablutions, “admit the worshipful envoys; they will now, I think, scarcely see that disease has made Richard negligent of his person.”
The celebrated Master of the Templars was a tall, thin, war-worn man, with a slow yet penetrating eye, and a brow on which a thousand dark intrigues had stamped a portion of their obscurity. At the head of that singular body, to whom their order was everything, and their individuality nothing--seeking the advancement of its power, even at the hazard of that very religion which the fraternity were originally associated to protect--accused of heresy and witchcraft, although by their character Christian priests--suspected of secret league with the Soldan, though by oath devoted to the protection of the Holy Temple, or its recovery--the whole order, and the whole personal character of its commander, or Grand Master, was a riddle, at the exposition of which most men shuddered. The Grand Master was dressed in his white robes of solemnity, and he bore the ABACUS, a mystic staff of office, the peculiar form of which has given rise to such singular conjectures and commentaries, leading to suspicions that this celebrated fraternity of Christian knights were embodied under the foulest symbols of paganism.
Conrade of Montserrat had a much more pleasing exterior than the dark and mysterious priest-soldier by whom he was accompanied. He was a handsome man, of middle age, or something past that term, bold in the field, sagacious in council, gay and gallant in times of festivity; but, on the other hand, he was generally accused of versatility, of a narrow and selfish ambition, of a desire to extend his own principality, without regard to the weal of the Latin kingdom of Palestine, and of seeking his own interest, by private negotiations with Saladin, to the prejudice of the Christian leaguers.
When the usual salutations had been made by these dignitaries, and courteously returned by King Richard, the Marquis of Montserrat commenced an explanation of the motives of their visit, sent, as he said they were, by the anxious kings and princes who composed the Council of the Crusaders, “to inquire into the health of their magnanimous ally, the valiant King of England.”