The signs of it are that when it
has no cause it seizes upon trifles to make them its reasons, and more
often it torments young men than the old; and no woman nor southern
person has ever known it, nor can even understand it. But it follows
the northern blood from generation to generation, like retribution for
an evil without a name done long ago by the northern race.
It was dark night when Gilbert found his way back to his tent, more by
the instinct of one used to living in camps among soldiers than by any
precise recollection of the way, and he sat down to warm himself before
the brazier of red coals which Alric shovelled out of the camp-fire
that burned outside. His men gave him a pottage of beans, with bread
and wine, as it was Christmas Eve and a fast-day, and there was nothing
else, for all the fish brought up from the sea had been bought early in
the day for the great nobles, long before Gilbert had come into the
lines. But he neither knew nor cared, and he ate mechanically what they
gave him, being in a black humour. Then he sat a long time by the light
of the earthenware lamp which Dunstan occasionally tended with an iron
pin, lest the charring wick should slip into the half-melted fat and go
out altogether. When he was not watching the wick, the man's eyes fixed
themselves upon his master's grave face.
"Sir," he said at last, "you are sad. This is the Holy Eve, and all the
army will watch till midnight, when the first masses begin. If it
please you, let us walk through the camp and see what we may.
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