The elderly knight and faithful counsellor came in, treading
heavily. His swarthy face was overcast, his mouth set in stern
lines under its grizzled beard.

"God keep you, lord," was his greeting, so lugubriously delivered
as to sound like a pious, but rather hopeless, wish.

"And you, Emigio," answered him the Infante. "You are early
astir. What is the cause?"

"III tidings, lord." He crossed the room, unlatched and flung
wide a window. "Listen," he bade the prince.

On the still morning air arose a sound like the drone of some
gigantic hive, or of the sea when the tide is making. Affonso
Henriques recognized it for the murmur of the multitude.

"What does it mean?" he asked, and thrust a sinewy leg from the
bed.

"It means that the Papal Legate has done all that he threatened,
and something more. He has placed your city of Coimbra under a
ban of excommunication. The churches are closed, and until the
ban is lifted no priest Will be found to baptize, marry, shrive
or perform any other Sacrament of Holy Church. The people are
stricken with terror, knowing that they share the curse with you.
They are massing below at the gates of the alcazar, demanding to
see you that they may implore you to lift from them the horror of
this excommunication."