CHAPTER VII.

THE TRIBUNAL AND THE MIRACLE

It was the dead of night--the army was hushed in sleep--when four
soldiers belonging to the Holy Brotherhood, bearing with them one whose
manacles proclaimed him a prisoner, passed in steady silence to a huge
tent in the neighbourhood of the royal pavilion. A deep dyke, formidable
barricadoes, and sentries stationed at frequent intervals, testified the
estimation in which the safety of this segment of the camp was held. The
tent to which the soldiers approached was, in extent, larger than even
the king's pavilion itself--a mansion of canvas, surrounded by a wide
wall of massive stones; and from its summit gloomed, in the clear and
shining starlight, a small black pennant, on which was wrought a white
broad-pointed cross. The soldiers halted at the gate in the wall,
resigned their charge, with a whispered watchword, to two gaunt sentries;
and then (relieving the sentries who proceeded on with the prisoner)
remained, mute and motionless, at the post: for stern silence and Spartan
discipline were the attributes of the brotherhood of St. Hermandad.

The prisoner, as he now neared the tent, halted a moment, looked round
steadily, as if to fix the spot in his remembrance, and then, with an
impatient though stately gesture, followed his guards. He passed two
divisions of the tent, dimly lighted, and apparently deserted. A man,
clad in long black robes, with a white cross on his breast, now appeared;
there was an interchange of signals in dumb-show-and in another moment
Almamen, the Hebrew, stood within a large chamber (if so that division of
the tent might be called) hung with black serge. At the upper part of
the space was an estrado, or platform, on which, by a long table, sat
three men; while at the head of the board was seen the calm and rigid