there such virtue in the rude rhymes of
a wandering bard, that domestic love, kindly affection, peace and
happiness, are so wildly bartered, to become the hero of those ballads
which vagabond minstrels sing to drunken churls over their evening ale?"

"By the soul of Hereward!" replied the knight impatiently, "thou
speakest, maiden, of thou knowest not what. Thou wouldst quench the pure
light of chivalry, which alone distinguishes the noble from the base,
the gentle knight from the churl and the savage; which rates our life
far, far beneath the pitch of our honour; raises us victorious over
pain, toil, and suffering, and teaches us to fear no evil but disgrace.
Thou art no Christian, Rebecca; and to thee are unknown those high
feelings which swell the bosom of a noble maiden when her lover hath
done some deed of emprize which sanctions his flame. Chivalry!--why,
maiden, she is the nurse of pure and high affection--the stay of the
oppressed, the redresser of grievances, the curb of the power of the
tyrant--Nobility were but an empty name without her, and liberty finds
the best protection in her lance and her sword."

"I am, indeed," said Rebecca, "sprung from a race whose courage was
distinguished in the defence of their own land, but who warred not, even
while yet a nation, save at the command of the Deity, or in defending
their country from oppression. The sound of the trumpet wakes Judah no
longer, and her despised children are now but the unresisting victims
of hostile and military oppression. Well hast thou spoken, Sir
Knight,--until the God of Jacob shall raise up for his chosen people a
second Gideon, or a new Maccabeus, it ill beseemeth the Jewish damsel to
speak of battle or of war."

The high-minded maiden concluded the argument in a tone of sorrow, which
deeply expressed her sense of the degradation of her people, embittered
perhaps by the idea that Ivanhoe considered her as one not entitled
to interfere in a case of honour, and incapable of entertaining or
expressing sentiments of honour and generosity.

"How little he knows this bosom," she said, "to imagine that cowardice
or meanness of soul must needs be its guests, because I have censured
the fantastic chivalry of the Nazarenes! Would to heaven that the
shedding of mine own blood, drop by drop, could redeem the captivity of
Judah! Nay, would to God it could avail to set free my father, and this
his benefactor, from the chains of the oppressor! The proud