The Yazoo City Whig and political register. (Yazoo City, Miss.) 183?-1840, 1840-01-31
THE CRUSADE.
BY HENRY w. HERBERT.

IT'S an old story done i'the olden time,
Falsehood and faith-Inan's honor, wOman's crime
IT'S an old story-often told before
Such as hath been, and shall be ever more.
In the Department. of Auvergne, the sun
NEST, fairest, and most fertile districts of all
France, some miles from Monistrol, mar
row, savage, and indented glen, in striking
contrast to the superb Loire, which it inter
sects, affords an outlet to the waters Of the
Lignon; which hurries down, fretting and
chatting, over many rocky dam, to join the
larger river, between stupendous masses of
basatic-rock, black, rugged, and austere, yet
beautiful and grand in all their varied as
poets. Below these mighty walls, reared
ages before the memory Of man began, by
snbteraRean fires, the whole slope of the
valley, formed by the debris of the Slaty
rock, is closed with massive and impervious
foliage, through which a difficult, but most
romantic path ascends, taking the torrentfor
its guide, towards the little village of lssen-
geaux. Above this road, which it commands,
perched like the eyry of some bird of prey
upon the verge of projecting crag, three
hundred feet deep, at least, above the wa
tiers which perpetually foam and murmer
round its base, there may be seen, to this
dav, the remains. rifted and grey. and over
run with immemoral ivy, which has, most
probably, preserved them from entire ruin
of tall Norman keep or watCh-tower. II
evidently never has been large; but in the
early years of the thirteenth century, al
though even then an ancient building, it
was entire, and place Of formidable strength.
| A fanking wall of huge roug stones sur
rounded its small courtyard, Wi tn bartlzans
projecting at the angles, quite over the face
of the precipice, and two small turrets with
many loup and crenelle, guarding the mar
row gate to which the only access was by a
steep and zigzag earth, hewn by the plckaxe
through the solid rock, and purposely ex.
posed at every traverse, to shot, of bow and
arbalast both from the castle and Its out.
work. This perilous approach was liable
moreover, TO be worn from end to end by ava
lanches, as it we're, of rocky fragments
which were piled ready at each point Of van
tage, and that, too, so slightly, that the frai
lest arm would have sufficed to launch them
down the precipitous descent. But at the
time with which we have TO do, the fortress
although garrisoned, as might be judged
from the steel-clad warder pacing his round
upon the ballium, and the swaIlow-tailed
pennoncelle floating above the keep, was evil
IDENTITY on good terms with the neighborhood
for its drawbridge was lowered across the
deep dry moat, hewn like the road out Of
the solid rock. and the steel-clenChed and
grated leaves of the gate stood wide open
/ II IL, ord
to and fro a splendid charger of the high
breed of Andalusia, which, even at that ear
ly age, had been improved by mixture of the
Arab blood, introduced by the Moorish VIC
tors, coal-black, without single speck Of
white, except small star on his brow, with
La keen vicious eve, and q name that almost
swept the ground, when it escaped from the
confinement of the iron-bardings, which,
running all along the neck, connected the
bright chamfront which the steel-plated sad
die, and scaled poitrel. Another mental held
the long lance and small three-cornered
shield, waiting as il should seem, until the
| rider should come forth; while several Others
pages and men-at-arms, and one or two girls
seemingly belonging to the household, were
| lettering round the entrance, admiring the
fine horse,and laughing merely among them
selves al fifty trifes, such as youths and mai
dens have laughed at, and will laugh at still
despite philosophy and common sense tC
boot, from the creation downward.
In the third story of that ruined keep, &C,
cessible even now to an adventurous elm
Der, there is little chamber. occupying one
third of the area of the tower, irregular
shape, for two of its walls are segments, and
the two others radii OF circle, its longes
side being the outer walls Of the castle, and
its two ends, partitions direrging from