n road, the Knight found himself conducted into a
narrow defile between the hills, which, succeeded by a gloomy track of
wild forest-land, brought the party at length into a full and abrupt
view of a wide plain, covered with the tents of what, for Italian
warfare, was considered a mighty army. A stream, over which rude and
hasty bridges had been formed from the neighbouring timber, alone
separated the horsemen from the encampment.

"A noble sight!" said the captive Cavalier, with enthusiasm, as he
reined in his steed, and gazed upon the wild and warlike streets of
canvass, traversing each other in vistas broad and regular.

One of the captains of the Great Company who rode beside him, smiled
complacently.

"There are few masters of the martial art who equal Fra Moreale,"
said he; "and savage, reckless, and gathered from all parts and all
countries--from cavern and from marketplace, from prison and from
palace, as are his troops, he has reduced them already into a discipline
which might shame even the soldiery of the Empire."

The Knight made no reply; but, spurring his horse over one of the rugged
bridges, soon found himself amidst the encampment. But that part at
which he entered little merited the praises bestowed upon the discipline
of the army. A more unruly and disorderly array, the Cavalier,
accustomed to the stern regularity of English, French, and German
discipline, thought he had never beheld: here and there, fierce,
unshaven, half-naked brigands might be seen, driving before them the
cattle which they had just collected by predatory excursions.
Sometimes a knot of dissolute women stood--chattering, scolding,
gesticulating--collected round groups of wild shagged Northmen, who,
despite the bright purity of the summer-noon, were already engaged in
deep potations. Oaths, and laughter, and drunken merriment, and fierce
brawl, rang from side to side; and ever and anon some hasty conflict
with drawn knives was begun and finished by the fiery and savage bravoes
of Calabria or the Apennines, before the very eyes and almost in the
very path of the troop. Tumblers, and mountebanks, and jugglers, and Jew
pedlers, were exhibiting their tricks or their wares at every interval,
apparently well inured to the lawless and turbulent market in which they
exercised their several callings. Despite the protection of the horsemen
who accompanied them, the prisoners were not allowed to pass without
molestation. Groups of urchins,