“The eldest son of Constans Aquila with ten copper pieces,” growled Oliver, rising, but taking them all the same.  “Lend them to me.  I’ll try them on the board to-night.  Fancy me putting down copper! It’s intolerable” (working himself into a rage).  “I’ll turn bandit, and rob on the roads.  I’ll go to King Yeo and fight the Welsh.  Confusion!”

He rushed into the forest, leaving his spear on the sward.

Felix quietly chipped away at the block he was shaping, but his temper, too, was inwardly rising.  The same talk, varied in detail, but the same in point, took place every time the brothers were together, and always with the same result of anger.  In earlier days Sir Constans had been as forward in all warlike exercises as Oliver was now, and being possessed of extraordinary physical strength, took a leading part among men.  Wielding his battle-axe with irresistible force, he distinguished himself in several battles and sieges.

He had a singular talent for mechanical construction (the wheel by which water was drawn from the well at the palace was designed by him), but this very ingenuity was the beginning of his difficulties.  During a long siege, he invented a machine for casting large stones against the walls, or rather put it together from the fragmentary descriptions he had seen in authors, whose works had almost perished before the dispersion of the ancients; for he, too, had been studious in youth.

The old Prince was highly pleased with this engine, which promised him speedy conquest over his enemies, and the destruction of their strongholds.  But the nobles who had the hereditary command of the siege artillery, which consisted mainly of battering-rams, could not endure to see their prestige vanishing.  They caballed, traduced the Baron, and he fell into disgrace.  This disgrace, as he was assured by secret messages from the Prince, was but policy; he would be recalled so soon as the Prince felt himself able to withstand the pressure of the nobles.  But it happened that the old Prince died at that juncture, and the present Prince succeeded.

The enemies of the Baron, having access to him, obtained his confidence; the Baron was arrested and amerced in a heavy fine, the payment of which laid the foundation of those debts which had since been constantly increasing.  He was then released, but was not for some two years permitted to approach the Court.  Meantime, men of not half his descent, but with an unblushing brow and unctuous tongue, had become the favourites at the palace of the Prince, who, as said before, was not bad, but the mere puppet of circumstances.

Into competition with these vulgar flatterers Aquila could not enter.  It was indeed pride, and nothing but pride, that had kept him from the palace.  By slow degrees he had sunk out of sight, occupying himself more and more with mechanical inventions, and with gardening, till at last he had come to be regarded as no more than an agriculturist.  Yet in this obscure condition he had not escaped danger.