The body of the noble Duke Bego was brought, and laid upon a table in
the great hall. His dogs were still with him, howling pitifully, and
licking his face. Knights and noblemen came in to see him.

"A gentle man this was," said they; "for even his dogs loved him."

"Shame on the rascals who slew him!" said others. "No freeman would
have touched so noble a knight."

Old Duke Fromont came in. He started back at sight of him who lay
there lifeless. Well he knew Duke Bego, by a scar that he himself had
given him at the battle of St. Quentin ten years before. He fell
fainting into the arms of his knights. Then afterward he upbraided his
men for their dastardly deed, and bewailed their wicked folly.

"This is no poaching huntsman whom you have slain," said he, "but a
most worthy knight,--the kindest, the best taught, that ever wore
spurs. And ye have dragged me this day into such a war that I shall
not be out of it so long as I live. I shall see my lands overrun and
wasted, my great castles thrown down and destroyed, and my people
distressed and slain; and as for myself I shall have to die--and all
this for a fault which is none of mine, and for a deed which I have
neither wished nor sanctioned."

And the words of Duke Fromont were true. The death of Bego of Belin
was fearfully avenged by his brother the Lorrainer and by his young
sons Gerin and Hernaud. Never was realm so impoverished as was
Fromont's dukedom. The Lorrainers and the Gascons overran and laid
waste the whole country. A pilgrim might go six days' journey without
finding bread, or meat, or wine. The crucifixes lay prone upon the